usavatar | I WAS MADE TO HIT IN AMERICAAAA

I WAS MADE TO HIT IN AMERICAAAA

He should know not to go out at night by himself. Not because he's in any danger - Captain America in New York City on a less-than-average day doesn't have much to worry about. But because, almost without exception, he gets lost. Steve tucks his hands into the pockets of his jeans and squints up at the buildings around him, ignoring the college student who staggers by, stops to stare at him, and bursts out laughing before moving on.

He's used to that, too, by now. Apparently dressing conservatively these days isn't a reflection of care for the resources of the country, or a side-effect of living life as a soldier for two years - it's just "dorky." At least he doesn't feel like someone's taped a sign to his back, not since he asked Darcy - Agent Lewis - why he kept getting that reaction.

Of course the fact that she had to explain what 'Because you're a dork' meant didn't really help his... street cred. He chuckles to himself, only a little ironic, at managing to use both terms in one train of thought.

A few streets later he's getting very confused. Usually he's able to find at least one familiar street or landmark to point him in the general right direction, at least until he finds a cab to get him the rest of the way back to the mansion. He's done this enough in the months he's been here that his assigned SHIELD shadows don't pop a vein unless he's not back by morning - in this case, though, that's probably working against him.

Finally Steve sighs and digs into his pocket to pull out his cellular phone. He looks at it for a moment, smiling to himself and wondering what Howard would make of all this. Tiny phones with tinier batteries and communicators and jets that don't need runways to take off.

Well, for all Steve knows, Howard invented most of it. He still hasn't been able to bring himself to look at history texts to see how his friends lived out their lives. There's something too much like admitting he's never going to see them again in doing that.

He flips the phone open gingerly, poking the tiny buttons with his pinky because he's not sure how else to manage the thing, and dials in what he's fairly sure is Darcy's number. Agent Lewis's number. He could try calling someone else, but she's friendly, in her own way. She doesn't treat him like a loaded gun waiting to be pointed at the next Big Bad Guy.

Steve lifts the phone to his ear with a frown. "Uh. Hello?"

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"It wasn't faith, or the right choice, just. There wasn't anything that could have stopped it, and. Enough people had gotten hurt already. Way more than enough."

Bruce squirms a bit in his seat, more than a little uncomfortable. It's one part his usual not knowing what to do in conversation, more parts talking about his episodes, and even more parts being uncertain what to do with being called a hero. So he latches onto something else.

"Erskine? That's." His forehead wrinkles a bit, trying to remember where he's heard that name before. "I think I've read some of his work," he says slowly, chewing on his lip until it hits him. "It was mostly B- Uh. Another scientist's focus than mine, I was all in--" There's a general hand-wave as to where he was before getting back to point. "Anyway, what little the General let us see, you know, in between the edits, that is, it was. It was brilliant stuff. Th-"

Wait, something does not make sense. Bruce had assumed that Dr. Erskine was just another scientist Ross had contracted on another project, and he hadn't presumed that he knew the community well enough to know everyone. But if Steve...

"How did you know him?"

"Didn't I-?" He scratches his head and grins sheepishly. "He's - he was the head scientist of Project Rebirth, the program I was recruited for. ...He was the doctor that Schmidt had killed."

The smile drops off his face and he looks at his hands. "His serum was misused by the Schmidt, Johann Schmidt, the head of Hydra. It changed him, kind of like it changed me - except t made him the Red Skull. It's what the Nazi soldiers who'd seen him, the ones who got out alive, who weren't part of Hydra? It's what they called him."

Bruce may be awkward, and sometimes he can't see the forest for the trees, but it can never be said that he's dumb. All the information clicks together in his head and his mouth makes a small 'o' of realization. Now things make sense, or as much sense as things ever do in his life these days. It's still hard to picture a sickly and scrawny Steve, but a serum akin to what Betty had produced from Erskine's notes wou-

Once his brain starts though, it keeps going, and the realization goes from quiet to pained.

Ross had Erskine's notes. Ross would have known - he'd had to have known where those notes came from. And Ross had wanted a weaponized result. A super soldier. A whole slew of Captain Americas.

If he'd needed another yardstick to measure his failings against, well, Bruce sure has it now. Sitting across from the real reason for his research, what it all should have resulted in, and what he himself was now...

"Damn it," he mutters as he starts slowly and methodically pounding the back of his head against the wall.

Steve knocks his chair of lunging to his feet. He grabs Bruce's shoulders, a little knot of fear twisting in his gut at the thought that Bruce might be losing control- but that vanishes when he sees the man still looks very much himself, albeit somehow more miserable.

"Woah woah hey, stop that, fella." He's doing his best not to look worried or alarmed. "What's wrong? What happened?"

Bruce startles a bit at the sudden there-ness of Cap, and that on top of the slow throbbing ache at the base of his skull is enough to get him to stop. Blinking up at the other man, it takes a minute to process what he's being asked (self-induced head trauma does have that kind of effect). Once it sinks in, there's an ironic chuckle and a bitter smile.

"You happened," he replies, as if it should be obvious. "And then I happened, and." He shakes his head, still laughing hoarsely as his head lolls back against the wall and rests there. He brings up a hand, drags it down his face. "I mean, I knew I'd screwed up pretty bad, but not to that certain kind of epic degree of failure until. I- Not that it's news to much of anyone, but I'm just. A complete idiot. That's all. Sorry."

Edited 2011-09-10 06:58 (UTC)

Steve isn't getting it. He feels like he should be, like Bruce is holding a picture so close to Steve's face that he can't quite make out what it is. "I'm not following," he says. "What's wrong? What did you do? Whatever it is, we can all fix it."

Whatever it is, we can all fix it.

Steve doesn't know how hard that choice of words hits, and it starts Bruce off laughing all over again. He's been trying to fix it for the better part of a decade now with no luck and as much as the offer's appreciated, he's pretty sure there's nobody out there who can help him along with it.

"The Gamma Pulse Project," he says after he's caught his breath. "What I was working on when- They wanted you. We had Erskine's notes, but we didn't know, and." Shaking his head, Bruce slips back into laughter, but drier this time, without that moseying-toward-unhinged sound it had before. "They wanted you, and what they got was me. I mean - just look at me." There's a helpless shrug, and something tugs at the corner of his mouth before giving up. "It's kind of funny, you know, once you get past how ridiculously far off the actual mark I was. Hilarious, even."

He loosens his grip slightly as Bruce starts to laugh, hoping he's not hurting the man, but then the explanation comes and he lets go completely and looks away. "I'm sorry," Steve says, his throat squeezed tight around the words. "His work - I knew they wanted to recreate it, but I never th..."

He sits down next to Bruce, looking incredibly tired. "Erskine told me the night before he died, that..." How can he remember that night so clearly? "He told me why he chose me. He told me that a weak man knows the value of strength, and knows compassion. He told me to stay who I was, no matter what happened."

Steve fists his hands together and leans his forehead against them. "After the procedure, after he died and the last vial of the serum broke, they were going to take me to Alamogordo. Use me as a test subject. Try and rebuild. I didn't go. If I had-" He breaks off. "...I'm sorry."

Blinking in confusion, Bruce looks at the back of Steve's head. Cap isn't the only one who's tired. "Huh? ...What are you sorry for? That's." He thought he'd made that clear enough, but apparently he was wrong about that too. A long minute passes before he scoots himself until his feet hit the floor again.

"Look, I." He stares at the floor and tries to go and figure out what he's going to say without screwing up what he means. "If you had gone and... You know. Made a lab rat of yourself. You wouldn't have gone and. Done what you did. Which made a difference. N-not only in the whole, er, war thing, though you did make a huge difference there too, I'm not saying you didn't but." Bruce keeps his eyes down and his ears go more than slightly red. "You probably go and get this a lot, but. You've meant a whole lot to people since then, even to the people who just thought it was a, um. Comic book story. Just. That's important enough for--"

Bruce shakes his head as his hand fists at his pants, the clothe bunching up between his fingers. "What happened to me, that... I know that wasn't anyone's fault but my own. I was stupid and impulsive and reckless and I didn't think beyond the." He cuts himself off there - it's an old rant, one he's rehearsed in his head too many times to count, and Steve doesn't need to hear it. "So that's. It's not on you."

Bruce is right. About the war especially. If he hadn't done things the way he had, the Commandos would have died. Bucky would have-

He cuts that thought off and gets up to pace a few steps away, then back, clasping his hands behind him in parade rest and then dropping them loose to his sides. He's not uncomfortable, exactly, just... Once the campaigning for bonds was done, the movies made, and he was out in the field with the only cameras being the ones catching shots of him and the Commandos for the news reels... He kind of forgot about the celebrity part of things. He didn't forget his country, or the people in it, the people counting on him and his men - but he forgot that they knew him, forgot that they watched fabricated heroics playing out in matinees, or bought comics with his name on the pages.

"I'm just a kid from Brooklyn," he says, irony in his tone. He remembers saying those same words to the Schmidt, not too long ago.

He smiles faintly. Telling Bruce he's seen kids pretending to be the Hulk, beating the Abomination on downtown playgrounds, probably won't help him feel better. "I made a choice to try and serve my country, and so did you. Maybe it was stupid and impulsive and reckless, but what you're doing now, with where it's put you... You're a hero, as much as I am, as much as anyone in this building. And sometimes being stupid and reckless when you're trying to do the hero stuff is... well, it's what saves lives."

He almost puts a hand on Steve's shoulder in some kind of reassuring gesture, but he's too unsure, too slow, and then Steve's up and moving and Bruce pulls his hand back before it can be noticed. For a moment, he thinks he's screwed up again and Steve's going to up and leave - not that Bruce would be able to blame the guy, of course.

...It probably wouldn't help, no. It would probably have him blanching and wondering what was wrong with kids today. Then again, compared to him, Steve still is a kid, and it's a bit of a trip to remember that, technically, Bruce is the older one here.

He replies in a small voice, and feels even more like a failure compared to Steve as he does so. "I don't want to be anybody's hero. I just... All I wanted-" He shakes his head because to put it in past tense is wrong, like he's given up on it. He hasn't, darn it. He won't. "All I want is to be normal. To be left alone. That's it." Compared to Steve, who's still fighting the good fight after all these years, it's cowardly and petty and selfish and Bruce knows it. It's the truth, though; at least he can say that he's honest about it. Not much of a plus, but still.

His expression softens from uncertain to gentle. "You know better than most what we're trying to protect. And when you figure things out, it'll mean more."

He rubs the back of his neck. "I know what it meant to me, being able to fight and protect."

Bruce shrugs, eyes still on the hands in his lap. He doesn't know for sure which things Steve means, but for him, there's only one figuring that matters, so. "When I figure things out, only thing it'll mean is me not being here anymore. But until then, I guess. I'm stuck with what I'm stuck with."

Scratching at his neck, a rueful smile settles on his face. "I'm more, um. The running away type. Lots and lots of running." Not so much anymore, but it worked well enough when he did.

"Start running, they'll never let you stop," he says, so quietly it's almost inaudible. Then, louder, "You'll be missed. When you go."

"They might've," he replies just as quietly, even if he doesn't believe it for a minute. Not with Ross behind it. "I don't know. It was a nice thought."

A small snort escapes him before he can help it, and the ruefulness takes a turn for the resigned. "Yeah. Sure. I'm j-" He shakes his head as someone who knows better. "Thanks. You don't have to go and- I know that. But still. Nice of you to say as much."

One of these days he'll be sarcastic, and everyone will just believe he's telling the truth. Until then, Captain Sincerity is once again just confused. "Did I say something funny?"

"No, the..." Bruce blinks back in mild puzzlement. Shaking his head, he shrugs. "Well, it's not so much funny of the ha-ha kind, but that wasn't."

He knows how pathetic it sounds, but he also knows it's the truth so. Bruce has never been enough of a presence that people would notice when the presence is removed, has never really been the guy with a lot of friends. It's just who he is, and he's more than used to it.

"You don't have to say people will miss me. Like I said, it's nice of you to try and say, but. I know better. So."

Steve isn't sure what to say to that. He just gives Bruce a long, steady look and says, "I wish you could believe me. I'm sorry that you don't."

Bruce can't meet that stare, and drops his eyes to some low point on the wall. It almost hurts when Steve goes and says things like that, he's just that sincere. He can't really let himself start thinking of himself like he belongs here since he most definitely doesn't. And he's not staying that much longer, not if he keeps up the work.

"Uh, I know it's. I mean, I should have asked a while ago, but. Do you want anything? I have the mini-kitchen down here, not too full, but there's enough." Bruce pulls himself up and steps toward the fridge to avoid all of this... Niceness. Most of the stuff he's stocked up on here is caffeine-free, healthy, kinda-bland fare, but he can at least offer.

It takes Steve a second to realize Bruce is asking about drinks and not personal feelings. It's a bit of a switch. "Oh, oh- no, thank you. Actually, just a glass of water."

He wanders after Bruce, curious about the kitchen. "Do you cook much?"

He grabs a glass and fills it at the kitchen sink without preamble. After dealing with third-world water and power, American tap water is heavenly. Turning around, he hands it off with a mild expression on his face.

"When I have to. I mean. I don't really eat all that much in general, and when I do it's not like I can order out." He cocks his head at that, then smiles sheepishly. Money to pay for it and availability of take-out menus aren't issues anymore (the money thing sort of is, even though he's been told he's being paid top-tier agent salary; he's gotten used to frugality as a necessity). "Well, I suppose I can now, but. Fallen out of the habit. Plus, it's probably not the most healthy so. Yeah, when I have to eat I pretty much cook for myself."

He rests the small of his back against the counter and takes the cup with a nod and a thank-you. A look of dismay grows on his face along with the feeling itself as Bruce talks. "But. Why wouldn't you? Eat, I mean."

Forget the fact that his heightened metabolism lets him - forces him - to put away enough food to fill the back of a small pickup at regular intervals. Steve just likes food. From poorhouse, to orphanage, to depression and rationing - living in the here and now with multiple fridges stocked to the edges of their shelves is still miraculous to him. As long as he doesn't look at the prices, just walking through a grocery store is like a walk through Valhalla. "You have a whole kitchen to yourself. ...You must at least make some pretty interesting dishes."

Edited 2011-09-16 06:51 (UTC)

"Work's more important," is the answer as he settles himself against the fridge. "Just... You know, you get into a rhythm and it's not really worth it to break for a bite. I mean I'll eat when it comes up, but."

A small smile lights up his face as he remembers. "There was this one time, I think I almost went for a whole week on just, uh. Coffee and pretzel sticks. Didn't even realize how long it'd been until I slid out of my chair with the room spinning like a top." He chuckles at himself, continuing without realizing what he's saying. "Didn't matter how often she'd yell at me about it, it'd always end up with somebody shoving loaded with carbs in my face and a lecture from Betty about--"

It's her name that snaps him back as his chest aches. Working in the lab at Culver seems like a lifetime ago, and in a lot of ways it is. Better that way, really.

"Anyway." Bruce clears his throat to get rid of whatever's trying to block it. "I mostly just throw whatever's in the fridge together and heat it up some. Quick and easy."

Steve knows that knee-jerk sadness too well to let it pass. Not that he's going to make Bruce talk about things, because... Well. Talking sometimes hurts more. He straightens up determinedly and grabs the fridge's handle. "Um. May I?"

Bruce blinks before registering what Cap's asking. Scrambling out of the way, he ducks his head in a nod and waves a welcoming hand.

"Uh, sure?" Not that he's at all sure what Steve wants with the fridge, especially since he's pretty sure it's still bare-ish.

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