Disclaimer: Marvel and its wonderful men do not belong to me, a fact that absolutely breaks my little heart.

A/N: This was a short and sweet mental picture I got...if it does well enough, maybe it'll grow up to be a multi-chappy someday. Enjoy.

Tony couldn't remember the last time he had gotten to bed before three AM. It was a feat he somehow could not accomplish, though in all honesty he never tried very hard. Tonight, however, Jarvis had all but forced him from his lab, threatening to cut all power unless he packed up the tool kit and chemistry set. Tony deemed it unwise to work with liquid nitrogen in the dark and reluctantly agreed that yes, it was bedtime.

Now he was drying his hair with a stainless steel blow dryer, pointedly ignoring Jarvis as he rattled off horror stories about the effects of sleep-deprivation on the brain.

"You treat your mind like a used tissue," the disembodied butler remarked, seizing his opportunity when Tony switched off the blow dryer.

"Those sell for about three hundred dollars on the internet," Tony countered, squeezing toothpaste onto his brush. "My brain would, in fact, fetch more around twenty billion."

"Which clearly explains why you continue to allow it to self-destruct."

Tony took the toothbrush out of his mouth. "I wish you would self-destruct," he mumbled through minty foam.

Jarvis did not immediately reply. When he did, his monotonous mechanical tone was subtly different. "There is someone at the door, sir."

Tony spit into the sink. "Tell them to go away."

"Sir…I would advise you to handle it yourself."

"What? Why? Who is it?" He stuck his toothbrush back into his mouth and scrubbed a little harder at his bicuspids. When he received no reply, he rolled his eyes and pulled the neck of his robe closed. "You should be doing this. You're the butler."

Chewing the toothbrush, Tony made his way downstairs. The hallway was dark and rain launched a determined assault on the windows. He approached the front door with some small measure of caution, contemplating Jarvis's reluctance to handle things himself. In all likelihood, it was probably a tearful ex or dogged reporter that Jarvis deemed below his status. If it was someone posing a potential threat, the mechanized butler would have told him…right?

Tony opened the front door and took out his toothbrush. "Look, I don't know what you want, but it's two in the morning and I'm—" He faltered, staring in disbelief at the spent figure on his porch. The man was emaciated, bleeding profusely from a head wound, soaked to the skin and barely clothed in what may have, at one time, been a pair of slacks. A cheap, frayed tie hung so loosely around his neck it was laughable. Tony took in the spectacle and slowly said, "…what are you doing—"

His guest staggered forward, choking on sobs, and seized his terrycloth robe in both spidery hands. Wan in the light from Tony's arc reactor, he looked up with wild eyes and gasped, "H-Help…me…."

With that, the sopping form of Bruce Banner collapsed into Tony's arms.

Two best things ever: a beat down Bruce Banner, and a beat down Bruce Banner being held up by Tony Stark. Bam. There it is. Reviews would be beautiful. ~