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The thing is this: the Avengers Initiative shouldn’t work. Steve is the only remotely stable one and he’s a man seventy years out of his time; Tony is the king of fuck-upped-ness, Bruce is a ticking time bomb of zen hormonal rage, Thor is Thor, and both Clint and Natasha have PTSD stamped all over their (heavily redacted) files.
Obviously, they’re the best fighting force the United States has ever seen.
Maria thinks that the Initiative is a waste of time. A whole new department has to be set up, with five pages of safety protocols added because of the Hulk alone. And there’s Tony Stark.
“Can you hand me that--no, the other one, the one with the flat head--right, yes, good, come on--” A grunt, a clang, a startled “ow!”
“I meant to do that,” Stark announces, popping up from between two prised-open metal plates, stripped to his undershirt with a grease streak over one cheekbone. “Hill, what a surprise! And how are you this lovely day?”
“Shut it,” she tells him, and, wonder of wonders, he actually does. The two lab techs next to him bend industriously over their own projects. “Where is Rogers?”
“How would I know?” Stark scowls. It would be kind of cute, like siblings hating each other, but since it’s Stark it’s just irritating. “Go ask Fury, he’s the one practically in love with the guy.”
“This is why everybody hates you,” Maria informs him, and turns on her heel.
“Everybody loves me!” Stark shouts after her. There’s another loud noise, metal on metal. “You’re just jealous!”
The furious clack of her heels on the floor is less therapeutic than it ought to be.
People learn to stay away from the few rooms that Bruce claims for his labs. The first couple of days biologists and nuclear physicists were always hanging around, lurking casually in doorways with a folder of papers or coffee, ready to spout out a “Dr. Banner! Would you--?”
Then there was the Giant Green Bunny Incident, and the Unfortunate Gamma Radiation Scare, and approximately half the scientists apply for a change of lab position to the other side of the helicarrier. Those that don’t already have labs on the other side of the helicarrier, that is.
“You should be glad you’ve got all this lab space,” Tony tells Bruce. “They won’t even give me a workroom.”
“You need windows,” Clint says the third time he brings him food from the mess, “so you can tell time. If I didn’t come in here, you’d be dead of starvation.”
“Have you even been outside in the past three weeks?” Steve asks.
“Right,” Bruce says, and adjusts a microscope.
“Go away, Clint,” Bruce says, muffled around a mouthful of mac and cheese.
“There’s a distinct possibility that the answer is no,” Bruce admits gloomily, and doesn’t protest when Steve suggests they go out for lunch.
It’s a team lunch. This means that Tony shows up twenty minutes late and is nearly stabbed by Natasha with her butter knife, Clint pretends he doesn’t have a dietary fitness plan, and Bruce steals everybody’s napkins to scribble on. Tony’s food arrives as soon as he does, because he’s Tony Stark and sometimes the world waits on his every need. Or possibly Pepper intervenes, it’s hard to tell the difference.
“So what’s this about?” Tony says, flopping down in his chair. Clint eyes his side of fries covetously; Tony doesn’t notice. “Is it about the massive property damage and complaints we’ve been getting? Because I’ve been paying for those, and Pepper is saying that we aren’t made of money again, and Fury is, hah, furious, so.”
“No, Tony,” Steve says patiently. “This is just a team lunch where we can get to know each other better, outside of our files or fighting for our lives.”
Tony furrows his brow. “Do we even want to get to know each other better?”
“I definitely don’t,” Clint volunteers.
Coulson longs for the days when he only had to babysit one idiot at a time, even if that idiot was Tony Fucking Stark.
“Clint, if you don’t get down from the ceiling I will shoot you. Stark, put that--put that down. You too, Banner, no test tubes in the briefing rooms. Jesus, it’s like herding cats.”
“Cats have got to be more cooperative,” Captain America says. Coulson looks at him.
“I never said I always followed orders,” Captain America says.
Coulson grinds his teeth. Maybe he should make them do all his paperwork, except it’d probably all be set on fire.
Coulson would like to set them all on fire.
Darcy, because she is a good friend and a great assistant, totally loves Thor best. This has nothing to do with his muscles, especially not his arms, because she would never steal from Jane. She likes Cap second-best though, and that’s totally for his muscles. Also his ass.
She compliments Tony on the design of Cap’s uniform, once. Tony’s jaw twitches, eyes narrowed, but then he sighs and throws an arm around her shoulders.
“I know,” he says, sounding wistful. “You should see him when he’s leaping in front of you and throwing his shield.”
Darcy thinks about that. It’s a nice thought.
Tony is her third favorite, because he’s awesome and gives her gifts and flirts with her, although he’s totally old enough to be her dad, so ew, no. Actually, he may be her second favorite. It depends.
“You know, you are totally like my uncle Marvin,” she tells Clint when he tries to ambush Tony in her presence. “He pretends he’s a ninja.”
”Excuse me,” Clint draws back, offended. “I am way better than a ninja, I am a silent killer in the night, if I decided I wanted to kill you I’d be completely undetectable and professional and you’d thank me for being quick and merciful--”
Tony laughs so hard he chokes.
They array themselves in battle like they do in everyday life. Steve and Tony circle each other, orbiting a center that cannot hold; they touch, back to back, then separate, and then spiral close again. Thor wades straight in, never daunted, fighting alone but assisting whomever needs help. Natasha and Clint ghost along together until they don’t, Clint scaling high and Natasha popping in and out, both on the fringes, engaged but not in. They all work around Bruce, who is solitary but never alone.
And they always, always squabble, until the arguing is worn smooth and familiar, another background noise and a comfort. Speaking requires breath; breathing means you’re alive.
They are all of them alive.