Chapter 4:

The Avengers Initiative

Life went on as usual for months for the Starks. Tony had never been overly concerned with the discovery of Captain America. There was never a chance that he would have noticed a shift in the world as it slowly regained a superhero. Work and play continued for him as it always had, the only shift being his growing relationship with Pepper Potts, which had absolutely nothing to do with the artic or what had been pulled out of it.

The same could almost be said for Susan. Almost. Though she attempted to act as though finding him had no effect on her, she found herself on occasion hacking into SHIELD's top secret files. She knew unfreezing had been successful, that he was now awake. In the midst of the notes, she had caught that their initial plan had been to make him believe he was still in the 1940's. From all she could gather, it had lasted all of seconds. As if anyone could have been that stupid.

When the information had come to her via hacking that he was now in a facility in Brooklyn, it had taken real restraint (something she was not used to exercising) not to try another break in. What stopped her from illegal activity was the one thing she loved more than causing chaos, surrounding herself with men as stress relief, and the good reserve alcohol Tony kept just for them at his place: science. Iron man was extremely close to giving the world something even better than keeping her brother alive. She had no right to ruin what it could do for the world by making bad press for her family name at the moment.

In reality it had been a real team effort: Pepper had been the one to have the initial light bulb of using the newly upgraded arc reactor to power something other than Iron Man and was handling the press. Tony had done the math, made it possible to make more of the new element that had replaced the one that had begun to poison him. And Susan had designed the place where it would all come together: the new, self-sustaining Stark Tower. She had been of little use since Tony had shut down the weapons manufacturing division of the company. Designing the United States military's most efficient tools had been what she prided herself on most of her adult life. As Obadiah had once put it: Tony did the math, Susan dolled it up, and he sold it. Of course, that had been before they had before they had realized he had been a psycho bent on killing them.

The first prototype was perfected and finished in the months after the discovery in the artic. Even the early designs could run the tower for a year, which would give plenty of time for them to come up a more permanent piece of technology. Though it would have taken a lot of coaxing to force her to admit it, Susan was glad to be useful around the lab again and for her family name being mentioned for something other than destruction and scandal. It was safe to say, in different ways, each of the three minds behind the new building, gleaming in the New York skyline as their child and the product of their brain power.

However, when Tony had invited her to the tower for the big "early Christmas tree lighting," one night she had said no the nicest way she could get it through her brother's head. As much as she wanted to see the tower come to life and her family name in gigantic lights illuminating the night sky, other possible views kept her from going. Any time she was along with him and Pepper, she got the overwhelming sensation she was fast becoming the uncool third wheel. The unplanned episodes of PDA were enough to make her want to run from the room screaming. She wished them the best and that somehow the woman could put a handle on some of his more self-destructive tendencies (like being poisoned by the core of the device that was keeping him alive and not bothering to tell anyone), but Susan did not want to be in on every aspect of their playtime. And because she had the feeling the evening would end in just that, she resisted the urge to crash on their date time.

The night Stark Tower was scheduled to go up in new, self-sustaining lights Susan found herself downstairs in her own private lab, humming along to Adam Lambert's newest CD and repairing a jet engine for one of her many planes. Flying had been an obsession of hers since before her dad had passed away. She had always heard that Howard Stark had been the best civilian pilot during World War II and, from a young age, aspired to be a great pilot someday. While Tony filled his free space and playrooms with cars, she filled hers with every plane she could get her wallet on. She took pride in maintaining and repairing them herself, one of the few engineering things her hands could do. On this particular evening, she had noticed some loose parts on one of the plane's engines and set up shop to remove and fix it. And of course, no night in a Stark workshop was complete without pizza and mind numbingly loud music.

"Baby, I'm on the hunt. Baby, I've got my target on you. Trouble that's what I- Hey!"

The beginning of the track suddenly stopped mid-lyric and silence filled the lab that left a buzz in Susan's ears. It took several second of scanning the room before she noticed Quentin standing in the doorway, looking at her like he had something life-and-death important to say.

"Why would you do that to Adam? He was just getting warmed up. Is the pizza here?"

"There's a man here, but he don't like a pizza delivery boy, babe."

"What does he look like then? This had better be good. I'm working."

"He looks official," the man explained. "Suit. Tie. Serious as hell expression. Balding head."

The woman sighed in expression. "That's probably just Phil. He always looks like the world's ending."

"He sounded like it too."

"Yea, he does that. He's probably looking for Tony. Just get rid of him… and turn my music back on."

"He asked for you."

The expression on her face changed. Suddenly, she too was serious. A thousand different scenarios ran though her head. Could the government really have gotten that efficient? What was the world coming to when she couldn't even hack into a few top secret files without SHIELD knocking on her door? Just as quickly, her expression changed back to I-own-the-universe. She got to her feet, unceremoniously dusted off her jeans, and slid back on her heels.

"Guess I got a date after all," she laughed quietly. "Come on, Q."

Susan and her assistant walked back up the stair and into the living room to be greeted by agent Coulson and the fact his expression was still reading full-scale alien attack-level seriousness. The woman approached the agent fearlessly, not showing the least bit of panic in spite of his. In those moments, she imagined Phil would be a horrible poker player (the kind that would broke or naked in a hurry.) His spotless appearance also reminded her she was in old, holy jeans and a well-warn blue tank top. While it did serve him right to deal with her likely covered in grease for showing up unannounced, it did put her at an imagined disadvantage with she did not appreciate.

"Hello, Phil," she finally began. "You'll have to excuse me, I wasn't expecting company tonight."

"Quite all right, Miss Stark," Coulson had known he had caught her off guard the moment he saw her wearing something that didn't look like it cost a year's worth of his salary. Clearly, she also wasn't aware of the grease smudge in the center of her forehead. He fought the urge to blush, feeling as if he was seeing her in a way that no one else likely would for years, without the shields of perfect makeup and Prada suits. Yet, he consoled himself with the fact she was only metaphorically naked. When Fury had sent him to Susan Stark's door, he had feared walking in on much worse. For a Stark, this was relatively normal.

"Well, if you're looking for my brother, he isn't here."

"Actually, I just came from visiting Mr. Stark," Phil said shortly. "The towers lit nicely. Congratulations."

"Thank you," Susan said, unable to hide her pride regarding the shiny new building that bore her family name. Then, she paused, having no idea why the agent had come knocking at her door. "Tony isn't in the back of your car, is he? Because if he is…"

"It's nothing like that, Miss Stark." The agent interrupted before she could go any farther into an I-didn't-do-it speech she no doubt rehearsed frequently. "We're calling in your brother on a… well, a special assignment and we were hoping we could have your cooperation as a consultant."

"My cooperation?" She blinked. This was the last reason on her long mental list of reasons she expected SHIELD to come calling especially after her brother had failed his test to join the Avengers Initiative and they had both refused to be science toys. "Phil, Tony and I both told you that your band of storm troopers couldn't afford us, and in case that needs any clarification we weren't taking about the money. And besides, I'm not 'Iron Girl.' I don't have any superpowers hiding out in my closet, so…"

If Phil hadn't known better, he would have sworn he could have detected a small bit of bitterness in the last part of her sentence. Of course, he didn't know that he could entirely hold it against her. Being ordinary in the presence of superheroes (even if you are an elite government agent or a billionaire with a genius level IQ) had its ways of damaging an ego. Yet, he wondered if it was also a tool he could use to his advantage. Maybe in this respect, they weren't that different.

"Things have changed since then," he replied, hoping to peak her interest enough to lure her into the way of thinking he needed her in.

"Like what?" Susan asked. "My thoughts on consulting for SHIELD haven't changed. What exactly is in it for me, Phil? And don't start throwing dollar amounts at me. I have that already."

"You'll be helping us safe the world from the greatest threat its faced since World War II."

Susan looked at him momentarily. If he had been intending to peak her interest, he had succeeded. She thought back over his sentence, deciding he had chosen his words very carefully. "Any will… anything else from World War II be involved?"

The agent's face turned into a grin for the first time since the conversation began. His hand moved quickly across his jacket pocket where his vintage cards were safely tucked away. 'Bingo' he thought to himself. He had been right in his thought that they had a few things in common after all, which he had suspected before when he had caught her and Tony sneaking into the artic facility. Captain Rodger's name was all he had to imply to ensure the woman's involvement.

"It's a possibility, yes." He answered carefully.

"I'm in."

"Thank you, Miss Stark."

"Yea, yea. Just give me 5 minutes."

Without even waiting for his response, Susan rushed to her bedroom and adjoining bathroom as fast as her heels could take her. Of course, there was no time for a show with the world being in danger, but she used every second of the five minutes carefully getting ready. When she was done, she took a last look in the mirror and was satisfied. A suitable dress and matching shoes and her hair tamed and back. After so many years, one of the last promises Howard Stark had made her was being made good on. Just like her father before her during the war, she was off to save the world with Captain America.