So This is Love || Book 1

Rueful Reprimanding

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

"All our work is gone," Bruce stated as we gathered in the lab. "Ultron cleared out. He used the internet as an escape hatch.

I sat on one of the chairs, squeezing the armrests in pain while Maria did her best to pluck out the specks of glass from my wounds. "Hang on, kiddo. Won't be much longer," she whispered soothingly, running a hand up my tense arm.

I would have blamed adrenaline for not feeling the pain sooner, but if I'm being honest, it was exhaustion that dominated the pain.

Not just regular exhaustion too. 

This was new.

I felt my body buzzing with ache but at the same time, I felt nothing. As in, I couldn't feel my limbs.

"He's been in everything. Files, surveillance..." Nat crossed her arms over her chest. "Probably knows more about us than we know about each other."

Rhodey stepped forward. "He's in your files, he's in the internet. What if he decides to access something a little more exciting?"

"Nuclear codes..." Maria looked up from my leg for a moment, hand still dabbing my cuts with a betadine-soaked cotton pad.

"Look, we need to make some calls. Assuming we still can."

I turned my attention to the conversation as a distraction from the pain in my limbs. And from the chaotic mind my head currently housed.

"Nukes? He said he wanted us dead," said Nat with furrowed eyebrows.

"He didn't say 'dead.' He said 'extinct,'" Steve corrected.

"He also said he killed somebody," Clint chimed in.

Maria responded without taking her eyes off the bandages she was wrapping around my shin. "There wasn't anyone else in the building."

"Yes, there was." I turned to my father who took out his device again, tapping its screen. A 3D image of Jarvis' consciousness appeared, destroyed and unstable.

"What?" Bruce came to stand next to it. "This is insane..."

My head began to feel woozy at the newfound information. No wonder I couldn't get hold of Jarvis before the party.

This was starting to get freaky.

"Jarvis was the first line of defense... He would've shut Ultron down. It makes sense," Steve said sorrowfully.

Bruce was quick to disagree with him. "No. Ultron could have assimilated Jarvis. This isn't strategy. This is... Rage."

Everyone turned to the door when Thor came storming through in his suit, making a beeline for my father.

Thor's hand wrapped itself around his neck, alarming the group. I quickly jumped to my feet, ready to intervene.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa!"

My father had been lifted off the ground by a chokehold, seemingly as unaffected by it as unexpected.

"Come on, use your words buddy," My father choked out.

I huffed, "Let him go!" Maria took hold of my hand, preventing me from going to stop them. I looked her in the eyes and shook my head rapidly to which she responded with a shift of her eyebrows.

"I have more than enough words to describe you, Stark."

"Thor. The Legionnaire." Steve cut in thankfully.