Chapter 5

"Ow!"

Danny and Steve walked in to see Tony staring intently into Bruce's eyes, a small poker in his hand.

"Hey!" Steve shouted.

"Nothing?" Tony asked Bruce, as if he hadn't heard Steve at all. "Jury's out. You really do have a lid on it. What's your secret? Mellow jazz, bongo drums, a huge bag of weed?" Tony was talking a mile a minute, but he was funny. Danny couldn't suppress his smile.

"Is everything a joke to you?" Steve asked, irritation obvious in his voice. It seems as though he didn't have that Twenty-First Century Humor yet.

"Funny things are," Tony quipped.

"Threatening the safety of everyone on this ship isn't funny. No offense, Doc."

"I-it's alright. I wouldn't have come aboard if I couldn't handle pointy things."

"He's got a point. Plus, Bruce hasn't even turned into the Hulk since the Harlem incident. I'd put a little more faith in him, Steve," Danny said.

Steve shot him a look, and Danny could see why Tony wasn't star struck with the good Captain as Danny had been when they first met. Steve was a good guy, but he really needed to take the stick out of his ass.

"You're tip-toeing big man," Tony gestured to Bruce as he walked towards another machine. "You need to strut."

"And you need to focus on the problems here, Stark," Steve interjected.

"You think I'm not?" Tony shot back, making his way towards Steve now. "Why did Fury call us? And why now, why not before? What isn't he telling us? I can't do the equation unless I have all the variables."

"You think Fury is hiding something?"

"Cap, he's a spy. He's the spy. His secrets have secrets."

"I gotta agree with him on this one," Danny chimed in. "Not only are they spies, but they're the government, which you can't fully trust ever. Not even back in your day, Steve. The government is fucked up, and they do terrible things for the right and wrong reasons."

"What did they do to you?" Tony asked.

"Nothing that makes me want to talk about it," Danny replied. Flashes of white soared through his thoughts. Searing pain. Quiet murmurs, and cold restraints. He took a deep breath and focused on the matter at hand again.

Tony wasn't expecting a real answer. In a way he didn't get one, but there was something some government did that fucked Danny up. Tony didn't miss the way he got more pale, or the way he was now clenching and unclenching his fists nervously. Maybe he had PTSD? He wouldn't be surprised if a ghost-person had it. But now Tony was curious about Danny, and Tony being curious was never a safe thing.

Danny was the biggest anomaly Tony has met. He was covered in blue-purple Lichtenberg scars, criss-crossing all over his body, the most heavily scarred aread being his left hand and forearm. Every time he walked into a room the temperature would drop significantly, and for being so young, it was obvious he had a lot of baggage and experience behind those piercing, blue eyes. Tony wanted to talk to him.

But the scepter and Loki were their priorities at the moment. Not Danny.

"It's bugging him too, isn't it?" Tony continued, turning to Bruce.

"Uh," Bruce said. He wasn't used to being put on the spot like that, but standing next to Stark it was impossible to avoid. "I just want to finish my work here," he gestured vaguely in front of him."

"Doctor?" Steve asked expectantly. Danny looked between the two, the tension in both their jaws not going unnoticed.

"'A warm light for all mankind.' Loki's jab at Fury about the cube."

"I heard it," Steve replied.

"Well, I think that was meant for you," Bruce pointed at Tony, who then offered him a blueberry. Then he offered some to Danny, who also accepted. "Even if Barton didn't tell Loki about the tower, it was still all over the news."

"Stark tower?" Danny asked. "I heard about that, it's powered by an arc reactor, right?"

"A self-sustaining energy source," Bruce chimed in. "That building will run itself on what, a year?"

"It's just a prototype," Tony answered. "I'm kind of the only name in clean energy right now," he said to Steve. "That's what he's getting at."

"So, why didn't S.H.I.E.L.D. bring him in on the Tesseract project? What are they doing in the clean energy business in the first place"

"I just assumed it was because he "doesn't play well with others," Danny said, using air quotes as he did. "That's what was in your file, anyway."

"I should probably look into that once my decryption program finishes breaking into all of S.H.I.E.L.D's secure files," Tony said. He walked around the work table to stand next to Steve and Danny.

"I'm sorry, did you say-"

"-Jarvis has been running it since I hit the bridge," interrupted Tony. "In a few hours I'll know every dirty secret S.H.I.E.L.D. has ever tried to hide. Blueberry?" he pointed the open package towards Steve, who righteously ignored it.

"Yet you're confused about why they didn't want you around," he said.

"I think Tony is onto something," Danny chimed in, but it fell on deaf ears.

"An intelligence organization that fears intelligence? Historically, not awesome," Tony said.

"I think Loki's trying to wind us up," Steve countered. "This is a man who means to start a war, and if we don't stay focused he'll succeed. We have orders. We should follow them."

"Are you feeling the sexual tension in the room, too, or is it just me?" whispered Danny to Bruce. Bruce chuckled a little and shrugged.

"Following's not really my style," Tony popped some blueberries in his mouth.

"And you're all about style, aren't you?"

"Of the people in this room, which one is A, wearing a spangly outfit, and B, not of use?"

"Yikes," Danny said.

"Steve," Bruce interjected. "Tell me none of this smells a little funky to you."

Steve looked at Bruce for a moment, then at the ground before saying, "Just find the Cube."

Nobody tried to stop him from leaving.

"That's the guy my dad never shut up about?" Tony said, exasperated. Danny didn't really blame him, but he didn't really blame Steve either. But to be fair, he knew for a fact Steve hardly just followed orders. Azzano is a good example of this. But he didn't bring it up as Tony walked around the room. "I'm wondering if they should have kept him on ice."

Danny, no longer wanting to be a part of this conversation, sunk through the floor.

He traveled through the ship, invisible and intangible, until he got to some random room with a bunch of wooden crates. They gave off a sort of energy that Danny thought was familiar, but couldn't quite place. He frowned and looked around. It was a chilling sort of sensation, and it sent shivers down his spine. Danny frowned, and opened one of the crates. Inside was a large gun sort of thing, glowing that same bright blue as the Tesseract. Danny's frown deepened as he looked down at it, examining it for a moment longer before replacing the lid. He needed to show Steve, they could show him that they were all on the same side. But before he could even think about moving, the star spangled man with a plan pried the door open and snuck through.

"What are you doing here?" Danny asked.

"Checking out S.H.I.E.L.D.S's dirty secrets. And I could ask you the same thing." Steve's eyes flicked between Danny and the open crate.

"Same thing. You know, if you wanted help breaking in you could have just asked."

"You were still talking with Stark, I didn't think you'd be interested."

"Exposing secret government branches is a hobby of mine, Cap. I do it all the time."

"Is that why you hate them?"

It was like Steve had punched him in the face. He was so shocked by his forwardness that his mouth and brain lost their connection for a few moments. The tone in Steve's voice was so earnest that Danny almost told him. Thankfully, he managed to hold his tongue, and looked away from Steve.

"It's personal," he finally said. There was a finality in his tone, a message for Steve to drop the subject. Thankfully, he did.

"Right. So, what did you find?" He asked.

"Um, some guns," Danny answered. He picked the long one up out of the crate carefully and showed it to Steve. The soldier's eyes widened as he took it, a grimace on his face. "You recognize it?" Danny asked.

"This was used by Hydra in the war," Steve said, his voice angry and quiet.

"How long has it been? Since you've been unfrozen, and whatnot."

Steve studied him for a moment, and Danny really hoped he wasn't giving off his own bad vibes. Steve's hands tightened around the weapon.

"Two weeks," he said. And Jesus, no wonder he was so fucking angry at everyone right now. Steve had given his life to stop Skull from using the Tesseract, only to wake up and be faced with the same problem because some people couldn't keep their noses clean.

"So everything is still pretty recent," Danny said. "That's gotta suck, dude. I can't imagine dying for something to be fixed, only for that thing to end up broken again."

"Yeah, well," Steve said, leveling him with piercing, blue eyes. "At least I know who to go to to talk to about this."

Danny grinned at him, and clapped a hand on his shoulder. "I'm right there with you, pal."