The Jasmine Dragon

Bruce instantly felt himself relax after he entered the tea shop, he was attracted to it because of its unusual name, The Jasmine Dragon, "can't we just go and grab a coffee?" wined tony " you know I don't like these sorts of places" Bruce was fed up of Tony's complaining and went to get tea. He went up to the counter and was greeted by a teenager who had a red burn like scar around his left eye. "Hello, my name is Zuko, welcome to the jasmine dragon, what can I get you?" asked the teenager. Bruce took a moment to quickly study the menu "I will have a... Camomile tea, and Tony what are you having?" asked Bruce. Tony reluctantly entering the shop when he gave an answer "the closest thing they have to coffee" and at Tony's remark Zuko smiled and said "we don't normal serve coffee, but seeing as you are the only two customers, I think I can make an exception" he turned and started to make the tea, and coffee.

Bruce was surprised how quickly the water started to boil. "Here you go, one Camomile tea, and one coffee" he waited for them to try the tea, he noticed the look on Bruce's face, "I can tell you want to ask a question, so go ahead" Bruce put down his tea "I was wondering, your accent, I have not heard it before, where are you from?" The man chuckled to himself "I thought you would want to know about my eye" before he could finish he was interrupted by tony, "well now you mention it, I would, my names Tony by the way, and this is Bruce" stated Tony while motioning to Bruce "well to answer your question Bruce, I travelled around a lot and picked up a bit of this, and a bit of that. I got this scar because I stood up to somebody, and they reacted badly" while they were processing the information they were interrupted by a voice Bruce knew all too well.

"Hello Dr Banner, how useful of you to stop in this nice little town, now are you coming out or are we going to have to rip apart this nice little tea shop" said General Ross. Zuko looked up in shock "I am very sorry, but we are closed today, and there will most certainly be no ripping apart of my tea shop" tony was surprised at his out burst, "nice speech mate, but I think you should let me and my friend handle it" tony looked at Bruce the other guy was going to take over any second now "Zuko, get back!" Zuko looked at him as if Tony was mad, not that he wasn't, "trust me you will want my help" shouted Zuko. Before either tony or Bruce could ask him what he meant they were interrupted with bullet fire, and that is when Zuko met the hulk.

The Hulk burst out of the shop. Metal started to fly towards Tony, at first Zuko thought that he was being attacked, but then he realised it was a suit of armour. "come on he needs help" shouted Zuko while running out of the shop. Tony quickly followed and was surprised by what he saw, the kid who was a tea maker less than five minuets ago was fighting the soldiers with fire.

After the fighting was finished the tea shop was no more, but the Hulk, Tony and their new found ally Zuko had won. They went to what remained of the tea shop and waited for SHIELD to turn up. Zuko went behind the counter to look for some cloths for Bruce. When tony was sure he was out of ear shot he turned to Bruce "he fought with fire, he controlled it, like a sort of marshal art" tony looked like a over exaggerated child as he waved his hands around I excitement. "Do you think that fury would be interested in him" asked Bruce. Zuko came back from behind the counter with a pair of Jeans and a red T-Shirt. Zuko handed them to Bruce. Zuko left to give Bruce some privacy and tony followed "Who are you?" questioned Tony. Zuko looked down and sighed "I've told you I'm Zuko, anyway I don't see why you look so surprised when you found out what I could do, considering you have a robot suit." By now Bruce had gotten changed into the cloths, most probably belonging to Zuko, and joined the them. "but just tell me what you did, please" begged Tony, Bruce was smiling, because if there was one thing Tony was good at it was getting his own way. After having Tony constantly asking him he finally gave in, "Fine if you must know, I am a Fire Bender"

While deep in conversation something caught Tony's eye, as he turned to face it he realised what it was, or more accurately who it was, a man was standing with a gun trained on Bruce "Get down! Stark shouted. Bruce moved out of the way, unfortunately Zuko was not as lucky. Tony quickly dealt with the remaining soldier and looked over to Zuko who staggered and fell over.

The sterile smell of the room was what Zuko first noticed as he woke. His eyes took a moment to focus. "I'm sorry, it was all my fault" Zuko turned to the owner of the voice, "Bruce, what happened?" Bruce moves closer, "you were hit with a tranquiliser, it was meant for me, but you pushed me out of the way. You were out cold for over 4 hours, luckily you only got part of the dose." Zuko stood up before Bruce could protest, "where are we?" asked Zuko while stretching, "we are at SHIELD, and there is someone who wants to meet you, and he will be able to answer your questions"

Zuko followed Bruce out of the room and down several corridors. There was a creak of metal and Suddenly Zuko stopped. He looked up and saw the air vents, "Someone's up there" said Zuko while shifting his weight and taking up a fighting stance. By now Bruce was use to having someone moving around in the air vents, "Clint, why don't you come down and meet our guest instead of spying on us. "okay, one sec" a few moments later and Clint was standing next to them, after finding out that Bruce knew the man Zuko relaxed his position. "Hi I'm Clint, normally I am silent, I think Fury has been making the air vents squeak, but I can soon fix that… Anyway, Stark showed me the footage of the fight, I have never seen anything like it." Zuko was pleasantly surprised and was unsure what to say in response. "Clint I was wondering if you could take Zuko to Fury's office, I said I would help Tony in the lab." Bruce asked while feeling guilty of just handing over the kid to Clint. "Sure thing Bruce, come one kid lets go." Anger flared up in Zuko's eyes "I am not a kid" said an obviously annoyed Zuko. "Sure you are, now let's get going, Kid" Zuko's reaction must have been funny as Bruce could hear Clint laughing as Bruce turned a corner leaving the pair.

Zuko and Clint arrived at a door, "try not to irritate him too much" and then Clint opened the door and motioned for Zuko to enter the room. "Have a seat" Zuko obliged, the man was very imposing and his appearance made him even more so.

"I have told you this already, I am not some science experiment, I have been able to do this for as long as I can remember" Zuko was clearly getting angry at the repetitive questions "What do you want?"
"I have put together a team, you have already met three of them, I want you to join them"
Zuko's eyes lit up, he missed the adrenalin rush and the slip second decisions between life and death. "well you had better give me the tour then"

"what did he say?" asked Clint
"don't pretend that you weren't listening, any way, you going to show me around?"
"sure thing kiddo"
Zuko clenched his fists "well at least your not as bad as my sister"
"do you stay in touch with her?"
"not since she tried to kill me" Zuko said it like it was a perfectly normal occurrence for him. "Could you get someone to pick up some stuff from my shop, behind the counter is a black rucksack, I would appreciate it"
"that should not be a problem"

"So what do you think about the Helicarrier?"
"It is certainly impressive, Is this where I will be staying?"
"no you will be staying at Avenger tower, you will probably get your own floor, Team are there, except Thor he is currently on Asgard, Shall we go?"
"sure why not?"

"Meet the team, we've got Natasha and Steve, you've already met Bruce, Clint and myself, also this backpack arrived for you. Tony held out a large string black backpack and handed it to Zuko "What do you keep in that thing?, its really heavy"
"Just the usual; spare cloths, money, dual dao swords" said Zuko pulling out a pair of impressive swords and swinging them around impressively showing his obvious skill "I use to use these under a different name"
"you don't have to tell us about it if you don't want to, we all have thing we would rather keep private"
"Thanks Bruce"
Tony looked into Zuko's bag, "are all the cloths you have red and black?"
"not all, I think I have some that is navy and a bit of gold"
"What's with it anyway?"
"It reminds me of home"

After the introductions had been made, Zuko was unpacking his stuff in one of the guest bedrooms, he had that backpack on standby just in case he had needed to run, from various people and different situations, hidden at the bottom of the bag was his mask for when he was the blue spirit he sat looking at it, it had been a long time since he had been the blue spirit. The blue spirit was know in the criminal underworld, because there were rumors of a masked man, who never spoke, who would steal stolen painting and jewellery. Zuko use to do this as extra income, but it lost its charm and he was often carless and on occasion it had nearly cost him. "Sir wished for me to inform you that the takeout has arrived and I that if you don't come soon Clint and Steve will consume it all"
"Ok, thanks Jarvis, I'll be down in a minute" that is going to take some getting use to he thought as he replaced his mask in his bag and left the room.

The meal was Chinese takeout, Zuko helped himself to the spiciest food he could find, and felt comfort in the heat, "you're actually eating that without your mouth bursting into flames?" said Tony
"It's quite mild actually, could use some more chill and pepper"
The avengers all looked up from their meal, Clint had stopped inhaling noodles long enough to speak " Is that just your taste, or does it come with the whole fire thing?"
"A bit of both really... anyway I have a question, have any of you heard of the blue spirit?" Judging by Clint's reaction he had.
Steve looked around suspiciously, "What's the blue spirit?"
"More like who, the blue spirit was notorious for stealing stolen artwork, Fury had me follow him once on a mission, he fought with... I've been so stupid"
"Well that's new birdbrain" Tony received a death glare for his comment so promptly shut up.
"He fought with double dao swords, I'm the blue spirit"
"you were a thief?" asked a cautious Steve
"what I stole was already stolen, I was returning it to the rightful owner, for a reward. I stopped that a long time ago, settled down and attempted to live a normal life, but look how well that worked out"
"so not only can you fire bend, but fight with swords and steal from art thief's without ever getting caught" Zuko nodded "well I'm glad that's cleared up because we have a movie to watch, and its my turn to choose"
"I swear Legolas, if you choose Brave again I"
Zuko turned to Bruce who was sitting near to him, "are they always like this?" and Bruce simply laughed

About halfway through the latest action movie Zuko found himself tired so he closed his eyes, just for a second.
"Is the kid asleep? Is he ok?" asked Clint with genuine concern
Bruce nodded "the sedatives will still probably be in his system, and combine that with all the fighting he did, he will be fine, he needs the rest" the avengers looked at the teenagers sleeping form and silently turned off the movie and left the room, Clint took the opportunity to steal the remaining popcorn, Steve returned to the room with a blanket and placed it over Zuko the newest and youngest Avenger.

So that is my first chapter finished, sorry it took so long but I was distracted by so many amazing fan fictions, please review about what you liked or disliked, any feed back would be great ! and thanks to the people who have already reviewed!
~WinterBreeze