"And the bullet came out?"

Tony was dimly aware of Pepper's voice, and a white ceiling above him.

"Yes, the bullet came out. He's lucky, it missed nearly all the major vessels in his shoulder, no bone damage, and other than the bullet hanging around, a pretty clean wound."

He blinked hard; the room was slowly coming into focus.

"Will there be any lasting damage?"

Fucking hell, his throat hurt.

"He'll have a stiff shoulder for a while, but Doctor Fury doesn't think it'll cause him any trouble in the long term. It's hard to say Ms. Potts."

From the corner of his eye, Tony saw Pepper nod and move round to the side of his bed.

"Tony? Are you awake?"

"Ugh," he moaned. "I think so."

"Do you know what happened?" Pepper's voice was steady and soothing, something Tony desperately needed right now.

"I-sort of? There was a gun…my shoulder?" His hand moved up to assess it, almost on autopilot. He could feel a dressing covering up something that stung when he poked it.

"Stop that." Pepper gently slapped his arm, taking care to avoid the tubes hooked up to a cannula in his hand. "You're the patient right now, not the doctor. You need to take time to recover."

"But I don't wanna," Tony whined. Pepper glared at him, a look that could put the fear of god into anyone.

"You're going to be moved up to the ICU in a minute, just as soon as . Are you in any pain?" Pepper had picked up his chart and was looking at it closely. "O negative, huh?"

"No, these are excellent painkillers you have up here. And yes, anyone can have my blood, but only if you ask nicely."

"Well, if I ever need it, I know who to call." Pepper smiled but he could see the anxiety in her eyes. "One of these days, you're going to give me a heart attack, you know?"

"Sorry Pepper," Tony mumbled, and grabbed her hand, holding it close to his chest.

"Thank you for apologising in advance," Pepper sighed, closing her eyes.

They stayed like that for a while, just breathing in time with the beep of the monitors. Pepper waved him off as he got wheeled down the corridor and into the lift, Tony trying in vain to sit up so he could see her better.

"Sit down Stark, or you'll pull your stitches out and that won't be fun for anyone," one of the nurses wheeling him up hissed. It seemed his reputation as 'insufferable prick' had preceded him to the surgical ward.

The elevator was dim, so when they opened the doors, Tony felt like he was waking up from the anaesthetic all over again. It wasn't until he'd been shuffled onto a different, less comfortable bed that he realised who was in the bed next to him.

"Tony?"

"Bruce?"

"What the heck are you doing here?" Bruce seemed slightly awed that Tony had ended up in the hospital as the patient for a change; he liked to boast that he never got sick.

"I got shot," Tony said, and grinned hugely at the look on Bruce's face. He was going to have a lot of fun with this.

Steve was staring at the board, trying to figure out how he could get out of suturing the arm of the angry man in Exam 1 when Clint grabbed his arm and handed him a gown and some gloves.

"What's going on?"

"We've got an elderly lady coming in, respiratory distress, and we're a little low on staff. The angry guy can wait a little longer," Clint replied, as he dragged Steve out from behind the desk and round to the side of a gurney.

"This is Peggy Carter, ninety four years old, possible pneumonia, in acute respiratory distress. Her heart rate one-ten, sats at ninety, and her BP is one-oh-four over fifty seven. Temperature is 38.7, and she's confused and disoriented, we haven't really been able to hold a conversation with her for very long at all before she forgets it all. Got it all?"

"Think so, let's go!" Steve started pushing the trolley down the corridor before he realised he had absolutely no idea where he was going. "Clint, which-"

"Trauma two, Thor is in there already." Clint grinned. It wasn't unusual for the medical students to pretend they knew exactly what they were doing, but he much preferred it when they asked for help.

Once they were in the trauma room, Thor took over, flipping through the chart the paramedics had started. Steve was relegated to cannula duty, but he couldn't help noticing that Peggy was becoming increasingly distressed at the flurry of activity going on around her.

"Hey, are you ok?"

She nodded, calming down a little once she had something to focus on.

"I know it hurts a lot, but you need to take deeper breaths. You're just going to feel worse if you breathe like that, ok?"

"I know," she mumbled through the oxygen mask. "I'm…a doctor."

"Really?"

"Yes, and you're…not very good at putting…cannulas in," she smirked slightly, though she was still struggling to breathe. Her eyes were going heavy, and Steve could see she was drifting into unconsciousness, so he squeezed her hand.

"Hey, Peggy, we need you to stay awake, ok? Thor, can we increase the oxygen or something? She's really having trouble here," Steve called.

"We're going to have to intubate, we're not going to get her any more oxygen through that, she's not breathing steadily enough," Thor said, moving round to the head of the gurney with an intubation tray. "Can you sedate her?"

Peggy was fast losing track of the conversation, so Steve moved away to grab the sedative, and quickly explained what was going on.

"You're not getting enough oxygen, so we're going to give you this, you'll feel more comfortable, and we'll put a tube down your throat, ok?" Steve attached the syringe to the cannula he'd just put in and pushed the sedative into her vein.

"You can…explain it properly…I'm a doctor."

Steve smiled sadly.

"Really?"

A/N: So...sorry about the long wait. We were busy moving to university so we didn't have much time for this, and once everything had settled down a little, I had to go into hospital for a while very unexpectedly. Sadly, none of the doctors in the A&E were the Avengers, so it ruined the entire hospital experience for me.