It was an unexpected feeling that started it. A horrid sick, dizzy feeling that made her head spin and her limbs feel heavy. Then everything went black.

"Darcy?" Jane called out, hearing a crashing noise and blinking up from her papers in confusion. The Astrophysicist spotted the younger woman sprawled across the floor amongst a variety of items. "Darcy!"

Running over she shook her assistant lightly, before spotting what looked like a fork sticking into the woman's arm.

"Or crap." She muttered, scrambling to her feet. "Bruce?! Bruce, I need your help!"

The nuclear physicist stuck his head out of his lab door to find the source of his name.

"Bruce! Help! Darcy's...I don't even know what happened but she's on the floor." Jane blurted out, waving her arms frantically to get him to follow her.

Bruce knelt next to the dark haired woman led across the tiled floor. His fingers moved her hair from her face and neck before checking her pulse and breathing.

"You said you didn't know what happened?" He asked, carefully turning the impaled arm to get a better look. He glanced at the various other utensils and smashed crockery on the floor, taking note of the spilt tea. He touched his fingers to it, it was still warm. "Do you know if she was coming into the room or out? This all looks fresh...it's possible the coffee might have burnt her if she landed in it."

"She went to get lunch. I heard and crash and when I called her name and she didn't answer I looked up and found her like this." The woman explained.

"It looks like she just fainted, she looks pretty pale...has she been sick at all?" He asked, carefully moving away some of the broken debris to allow him to move Darcy.

"Not that I've noticed, she hasn't said anything." Jane shrugged. "What about you?"

"I...don't even notice she's been in and out until I reach for my tea and find it hot. Unless she's kicking me out of the lab..." He admitted. "There's a couch in my lab, let's move her there and get a better look at that arm."

He carefully shifted his arms underneath her and instructed Jane to place the arm carefully on her chest, in a way least likely to move it around.

"Jarvis can you tell me anything about the incident?" He asked, entering his own lab and placing Darcy safely onto the couch.

"It appears you were correct, Miss Lewis appears to have fainted on her way into the lab. I would advise preparing a guest room for her in the tower for a few days to recover."

"From fainting?" Jane asked.

"Jarvis...exactly what time did Darcy leave the tower last night?" He frowned.

"Miss Lewis has not left the tower since Tuesday night Sir." He replied.

"I was afraid you were going to say that." Bruce sighed. "Alright, Jarvis is there a guest room free on one of the private floors?"

"There are two on your own floor Dr Banner."

"Great, that's perfect." He said, "Let's give her a quick check over then get her upstairs."

"Her arm Bruce." Jane spoke, biting her bottom lip with worry.

"She'll be fine, there's not much bleeding so she isn't in immediate danger." He reassured the astrophysicist calmly. He ran his hands briefly over Darcy's skull, relieved to find no bumps or redness and then quickly skimmed his hands along her neck, shoulders, ribs and arms to check for breaks. "I'm not feeling any other injuries." Scissors from his desk made quick work of cutting the sleeve of her top to allow him access, he prodded gently and the flesh surrounding where the fork penetrated Darcy's skin. "It doesn't appear to have hit any veins so it should be pretty straight forward to take out."

"Will she need to go to the hospital?" Jane asked.

"I don't think so. It looks like it'll just be a flesh wound, it probably looks pretty bad like this but I promise you it'll heal very quickly." He replied, opening a first aid kit and pulling out gloves and sterile wipes. He wiped down the skin before giving the fork a tug, the skin seemed to cling to it. Reaching for a small packet he opened it.

"What are you doing?!" Jane blurted out in horror, watching as the small silver blade cut the edges of the wound. Darcy's arm flinched and both scientists looked to the brunettes face to see her wince a bit.

"Just making sure I can get it out cleanly." Bruce explained. "Darcy? Can you hear me?" There was a mumbled response from the younger woman but no actual words. "This will sting but you'll feel a lot better in a minute, alright?" He got no response and calmly asked Jane to hold Darcy's hand down against the cushion, before pulling sharply at the fork. Blood followed it out of the wound but not enough to worry him.

"I think I'm going to be sick." Jane cringed.

"Well that was the worst part cover with." Bruce told her, his eyes flicking up to Darcy's face. The assistant had rather worrying not woken up yet, despite showing signs of being in pain. "Jarvis did she hit her head at all?"

"Not hard enough to result in injury Doctor, I can assure you that Miss Lewis is merely unconscious." The A.I. Replied. "Her brain activity and vital signs all appear to be normal."

Once the bleeding slowed and he was able to fully clean the area, he applied lidocaine to the area.

"I'm going to just put a couple of stitches in to help hold it closed while it heals, if I thought she would take it easy and let it heal I'd probably just use the glue and strips...but since that probably won't be the case..." He explained, trailing off as he began to suture Darcy's arm.

"We should get her cleaned up." Jane said quietly.

"We'll do that upstairs." He nodded, removing the gloves and throwing them away. "Would you mind bringing the first aid kit and the scissors?"

Jane quickly closed up the first aid kit, tossing the scissors into it as well and followed her co-worker, now carrying Darcy, out of the lab.

After he and Jane had taken Darcy to a guest room, they had cut her top off to save moving her arm around, since he had already cut the sleeve anyway. Jane had gotten a cloth and washed any traces of food, coffee or blood from Darcy's skin. Bruce found himself grateful for the other scientists help in removing Darcy's jeans, so that he could carefully clean the red patch of skin on the younger woman's thigh. It was burnt but not badly. He cleaned it and carefully applied some cream before they left Darcy to sleep.

Knowing that Jarvis would alert either of them if Darcy woke or needed help, Jane went to sort out cleaning the mess in the lab and Bruce found himself seeking out Tony.

"Wait...she doesn't live here?" Tony asked in surprise. "But...she's always here?"

"Exactly." He sighed, rubbing his eyes tiredly, knocking his glasses askew. "She keeps me and Jane supplied with food and drinks and forces us to rest when we skip a night of sleep. She makes breakfast for nearly the entire of the team and some extras. She takes care of all of us; we virtually never sleep, so when does she get the chance to go home and sleep?"

"I see your point." Tony agree. "In my defence, I seriously thought she lived here. She's always in the kitchen!"

"She's lost weight, I didn't notice until I was treating her but...she's exhausted." He frowned.

"She eats, I see her eat all the time." Tony protested.

"She does eat but does she eat enough to stay awake for days on end, chasing around after a dozen other people?" he asked.

"Why doesn't she live here?" Tony frowned.

"Probably because no one offered." He shrugged.

"Well I'll sort her a room, tell her she has a room." Tony said. "How long you been at it? You look like you could use a nap yourself Big Guy."

"I'll probably do that actually." He agreed.

Darcy cringed as her head pounded. She hadn't even opened her eyes yet and her head already hurt.

"What the hell?" She groaned. She cracked her eyes open slowly and glanced around at the unfamiliar room. "Where am I?"

"Still in the tower Miss Lewis."

"Oh thank god." She sighed. "I panicked for a sec there J."

"I have alerted Dr Banner that you are awake." The A.I. informed her.

"Bruce..." She frowned, sitting up and wincing at a tightness in her leg. Then she noticed a clean white bandage on her right arm. "What happened?"

"You fainted." A quiet voice came from the doorway. Darcy's jaw dropped. Bruce stood in the doorway, arms supporting him on the frame as if he had literally stumbled out of bed and to the door of the room she was in. Shirtless.

She had seen him shirtless before, she had seen him practically naked before but there wasn't really much sexy about a battered guy passing out naked and in pain, after changing back from the Hulk. This was completely different and brought a whole set of different, decidedly sexier images to mind.

"Seriously?" She asked, lifting her bandaged arm up pointedly.

"You fainted, carrying a tray of lunch and coffee for Jane." He elaborated. "You landed on the fork."

"I got stabbed with a fork?" She asked in disbelief. "Aw crap...how come everyone else gets awesome battle scars and I get to be the one stabbed with a fork?!"

"You also have some mild burns on your thigh from the coffee." He told her.

"Goodbye swim suits." She muttered.

"It shouldn't scar." He said, coming closer. "It'll be like sun burn, it'll peel but it shouldn't scar."

"Small mercies." She smiled up at him. "Is Jane OK?"

"Worried but fine." He smiled back. "Darcy, you were awake and in the tower working for seventy-four hours."

"Was I?" Her eyes widened in surprise. "No wonder I feel like crap."

"You've been asleep for sixteen hours."

"Please tell me somebody fed everyone." She winced.

"Darcy!" He stared at her in disbelief. "We are adults, we appreciate everything you do for us but we aren't going to die if you go home and get some sleep for yourself every now and then."

"You don't know that." She said quietly. "Last time I took a whole weekend off, I had to find out that Tony was in the hospital on the news!" She pointed out.

"Tony is...wait, were you mad because he got in an explosion or because no one told you?"

"Both! But more the finding out on TV thing." She huffed. "I...I know I'm not the genius scientist and I'm not a master assassin or a massively important business person or a superhero but...you guys mean a lot to me and you just...forgot about me. You forgot to tell me anything. I couldn't get through to anyone's phone and no one called me."

"We don't forget you..." He offered weakly, knowing full well that he often spent so much time in his bubble that he didn't know when days passed him by, let alone lab assistants.

"I don't mind not being important, I honestly mean that. I'm not throwing a pity party here but if I'm not here then something happens; I get left out. I mean...if you were the one sat at home, watching someone you care about being wheeled into hospital and not knowing what was happening, how would you feel?"

"Terrified." He admitted honestly, stepping into the room and moving closer to scrutinize her. "Anywhere other than your arm hurt?" She shook her head. "Headache?"

"A bit. Anyway," She said, switching the subject back. "I don't care that I'm not special but if he had actually died, if any of you actually died and I only found out on the fucking news..."

"You are important Darcy, really you are." He told her. "We don't always show it but we couldn't get through the days without you. I mean it. Tony is kicking himself, he feels awful because he thought you actually lived here."

"I've never lived here." She frowned.

"You do now, if you want to of course." He told her. "He just assumed you already lived here because everyone else did and you were always here."

"Want or not, you live here now." Tony's voice interrupted them. "There's a small suite on floor twenty-six with your name on it, literally, so now you have to move in. I wanted to find you a bigger one but the only big one empty wasn't on a floor with any of us soooo..."

"You put my name on a door?" She asked, as he threw a keycard at her.

"Obviously. Steve and Bruce are on this floor too." He said. "I thought about Thor and Jane's floor but Steve already moved from there to get away from the loudness of late night activities, so I thought I'd spare you that. Unless you're into that."

"Floor twenty-six is good." She said quickly, grabbing the keycard from the bed.

"Good, Steve and Thor already started packing your stuff an hour ago." Tony grinned, offering a small wave and leaving.

"Tony! They can't pack my stuff!" She shouted after him. "Don't think I didn't notice that you just had a whole conversation with my boobs! Tony you can't let Steve pack my stuff! It'll break him!"

"You can't go anywhere until I say so." Bruce said, stopping her from getting up but carefully avoiding touching anywhere but her shoulder.

"Say so quickly, before Captain America sees my underwear and sex toy collection!" She insisted.

"Collection?" He found himself repeating, pinching the bridge of his nose.

"Sorry, overshare right?" She offered sheepishly. "But a girl has needs and I don't have time to find a boyfriend, besides normal guys total suck after meeting real deal super soldiers and geniuses. I'm not even that smart but I say stuff and normal people look at me like I'm talking Martian! I've been tainted with physics!"

"We lured you to the dark side huh?" He chuckled.

"You can lure me anywhere you want Doc." She winked.

"Um...well right now the only thing anyone should be luring you into doing, is eating something and then resting some more." He replied, his face flushing slightly but he didn't appear too ruffled by her flirty banter. Then again he was friends with Tony Stark, so really she couldn't imagine that much ruffled him anymore.

"If you promise me that everyone has eaten something since I've been asleep and that none of you have been in the labs or workshops since before I fainted without sleeping, then I will Co-operate." She nodded. "And please someone stop Steve from finding my sex toys."

"Jarvis?" Bruce called.

"I can confirm that everyone has eaten at least one meal since your accident Miss Lewis. Dr Banner has not returned to his lab since, Dr Foster did not return to hers until three hours ago. Mr Stark is currently still in his workshop but currently sleeping. Was there anyone else?"

"Is there anyone else that hasn't eaten or slept since I fainted, that is currently still working?" She asked.

"No Miss Lewis."

"Then as long as I can call Jane and get her to go rescue Steve, I'm all yours Doc." Darcy nodded, satisfied that no one was likely to blow up immediately. "Also, I might need more clothes."

"They're in the laundry, well not the shirt, that got thrown out because we cut the sleeve off." He told her. "Since all of your stuff is being brought to the tower you'll have access to all your own clothes in the next hour or so I expect."

"Then can I steal a shirt from someone because otherwise someone is either going to get a slap or a heart attack?" She grinned.

"I'm going to assume by slap you mean Tony and heart attack you mean Steve." He chuckled, moving back to the door. "I'll grab you one."

When he returned a moment later, Bruce found it admittedly hard to avoid looking at her breasts. Sat up in bed like she was, only wearing her black bra with black and pink laced edges, they were far more distracting than they had been when he had been examining her earlier. When he and Jane had undressed her and he had treated her leg and arm, he had been busy focusing on what he was doing rather than what Darcy looked like with her clothes off. He handed her the plain grey t-shirt silently.

"Thanks." She tugged it over her head and climbed out of the bed.

"Jane put your jeans in her machine, I've sent a message to ask her to bring them for you and I mentioned that you might appreciate her helping pack any of your personal stuff that you might not want other people finding." He said, trying not to look like he was staring at her bared legs. "In the meantime, I ordered some Chinese food."

"Excellent!" She beamed. "Um...so this is the twenty-sixth floor?"

"Yeah, it's one of the main floors in the residential area. Each residential floor has a few suites on it, plus one or two spare rooms for guests. This is a spare room. My apartment is right next door, Steve's is the opposite side of the hall, you'll be in the suite at the end, I didn't know that when we brought you up here, although I don't actually know if the suite even has a bed yet." He explained, opening the door of the room and checking the hallway. "No one's about."

In the hallway Darcy noticed that to the right of them was a small open area and elevator. Directly opposite was a blank door, presumably another guest room, to the left of that was a door with Steve's name on it. Directly opposite that was one with Bruce's name on. As Bruce opened the door for them, Darcy noticed a door further down the corridor, all the way at the end with her name on it.

"He literally put my name on a door." She said.

"Knowing Tony it'll be beyond all expectations within twenty-four hours." The man to her left commented, gesturing for her to head inside.

On entering Bruce's apartment, her first thoughts were that it was very him. There wasn't much in the way of personal items on the shelves or walls. Instead there were books. Books that filled the shelves and also lay haphazardly around from the chair arms to the kitchen counter.

"Take a seat, the food will be here any minute, choose something to watch if you like." He offered.

Jarvis alerted them to the arrival of the food and Bruce went down to the lobby to collect it. When he returned he found Darcy curled up on his couch, half under a blanket, half in his shirt, remote in her hand.
For a moment the image made him wonder what it would be like to come home to a woman waiting for him under better circumstances, someone full of warmth and humour like Darcy.

"Tough decision here, Lord of the Rings or Pirates of the Caribbean?" She asked him, as he placed the bag of food on the coffee table.

"Lord of the Rings." He replied without thinking.

"Good choice." She nodded, hitting play from the list of films on the screen. "Not that there was really a bad choice, really they're both good trilogies but Lord of the Rings is just infinitely more epic. Like Star Wars but minus the sci-fi and double the fantasy."

"Aren't there six Star Wars films now?" He asked.

"Yeah but the original three are the great epic trilogy I mean. The newer ones are still pretty great but they're never going to be the same." She explained. "Which remains me, if anyone damages any of my posters in the move, I will pull my Taser on them."

"You have Star Wars posters?" he asked, his lips quirking in amusement.

"No I have a Star Wars poster, I just have several other posters that are also awesome and don't deserve to be torn or wrinkled up." She corrected him defensively.

"You have posters." Bruce grinned, shaking his head and suddenly having flashbacks of college.

"So? I hardly think my posters make me the dorkiest person in this building." She snorted. "Not even my graphic novel collection and collectible figures make me the biggest dork in this building!"

"Not to be confused with the sex toy collection?" He asked. Darcy practically choked on her food at that.

"That was both a joke and dirty! Bruce I'm shocked! Shocked and proud!" She exclaimed.

"I bet the dorks at your school had no clue how to react to you did they?" He chuckled. He certainly wouldn't have when he was a teenager. A girl that looked like Darcy and appeared to be both smart and slightly dorky was every nerdy teenaged boy's wet dream come true. She would've have eaten them alive. Hell he still wasn't exactly sure how to react to her now!

"It was easier when I was flat chested." She grinned. "Also I went through a goth phase that did a good job of scaring off quite a few people. If you ever tell anyone about that I will taze you so hard you'll be green for a month."