Time to go

First Words

Back in the Avengers tower, Bruce gathered the other Avengers together in the common room. Deciding that this was going to be a good teachable moment, he had drug a large whiteboard, a pointing stick and a pile of erasable markers up into the common room. The other avengers were not amused in Bruce's mock classroom, not in the least.

But Tony motioned for them to go along with it, because he knew that look in Bruce's eye, the scientist had an idea.

As Steve sat down he gave a passing glance at the empty whiteboard. "What's so important Bruce?" His tone was tired, like all he would rather do right now is sleep.

"I think I have a plan-" Bruce started but was immediately cut off by Tony.

"You found a way to help Clint and Bucky escape?" He sounded both excited and sceptical.

Bruce could feel the eyes of his teammates baring into his skin, they all were so hopeful. They all wanted a magical answer to their problems, yet none of them had the ability to believe in magic anymore. Bruce could almost see in his mind the way their hope would deflate when he told them that he had only bought them some time. All he would do is disappoint them, maybe gathering them together was a bad idea after all.

But Bruce pushed these thoughts to the side and pressed on, full steam ahead like a nerdy steam engine.

"Not exactly, but I found a way to buy us some time."

Bruce quickly uncapped a marker and began to scribble a basic diagram of the SHIELD cells, unable to meet his teammates' eyes. Then he heard Steve's voice.

"Buy us some time?" He sounded a bit confused.

Before Bruce could answer, Natasha jumped into an explanation.

"It takes roughly two weeks before there is no point trying to save Clint or Bucky anymore. SHIELD reinvented solitary confinement when they made those cells, they feed you one kind of food, you don't shower, the lights never go out, you have no view of the outside world, there are constant eyes watching you and you have literally no contact with any other human. Some of the stronger people put through those cells have lasted longer, but it isn't common, usually the people drug out either because they tried to kill themselves or are raving lunatics." Natasha's voice dropped a bit lower. "I should know. I helped test them."

Tony's eyes widened at this statement, but he knew better than to say anything. Instead he turned the conversation back to Bruce.

"So buddy, you had a plan?"

Bruce nodded and pointed to his crude drawing with his pointer stick.

"As you all probably noticed there are no windows and no way to physically enter a cell or get near the door without being spotted on a monitor. But the thing is the camera don't pick up sound very well, so technically we could speak to them without SHIELD knowing the wiser."

"And how do you plan on speaking to them?" Steve inquired, clearly frustrated with this conversation.

"That's where SHIELD made a mistake." Bruce pointed his stick to the vent draw in the cell. "The vents are entire network that runs to every room and has multiple entrances from outside the building. SHIELD designed these vents with Clint in mind specifically, since he was known for sneaking around in the air ducts. Originally they had planned to make the vents no more than a centimetre wide each, but that proved rather inefficient and so the designed them in a way they were a part of the ceiling. No way to open the vents from inside the ducts or from outside, except for one vent on the ninth floor next to the generator."

Bruce spared a moment to look at the other occupants of the room. Natasha had a knowing look in her eye, because she knew where this was headed. Steve had a frown and Bruce wasn't honestly sure why. But then again Tony was biting on his lips, obviously anxious and Bruce didn't have the foggiest why either. He decided to ignore it and continue.