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Tony stretched as he walked in from another meeting pertaining to the Info Dump.
‘Sir,’ JARVIS spoke. ‘I have quarantined the Avengers Compound and sent an email to the Avengers explaining why.’
Tony paused. ‘Why?’
‘They took the quinjet to Brazil without taking the appropriate vaccinations.’
Tony nodded. ‘And came back with some kind of disease.’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘All right,’ Tony sighed and sat down. ‘Start screening doctors to find out what they’ve gone and picked up and let’s contact Pepper to see what to do about the PR situation.’ He groaned. ‘And the political one. Brazil will want to know why they just waltzed into their country unannounced and I have no idea why.’
‘Well, you have the chance to find out,’ JARVIS said. ‘It seems the Captain is calling to demand answers from you.’ Sarcasm entered his tone. ‘He seems unfamiliar with the concept of quarantine.’
Tony sighed and sat down. ‘Okay, patch him through.’ He flicked up the data he’d now need to work through to deal with this fiasco.
‘Tony.’ Rogers’ voice held that disapproving tone. ‘Is there a reason why the Compound is on lockdown and we can’t leave?’
‘Because you went to Brazil without getting the inoculations and picked up a deadly disease so you’re in quarantine,’ Tony said, sending off an email to Pepper. ‘This was all in the email you were sent when the building was put in lockdown. Didn’t you read it?’ Sure, Tony was a little snappy but frankly this, and the dumbassery of the Info Dump was a little too much. Tony was seriously considering vetting shrinks so he could get an accurate psych profile on Rogers.
‘I don’t get sick,’ Rogers said like it was an irrefutable fact.
‘Yes, but you can still be a carrier of diseases.’ Tony looked at the screen Jarvis had flashed up of all those involved in the trip. ‘Besides, Wilson, Romanoff, and Barton are still susceptible.’
‘There’re not sick either!’ Rogers insisted.
‘How would you know?’ Tony asked. ‘Are you a doctor? No, no, you four are staying right where you are until you’re cleared by a medical professional.’
‘That’s internment, Tony!’
‘No, no, that’s quarantine. Pick up a dictionary and look it up. I’m not endangering the general public just because you don’t think you’re sick.’
There was a silence on the other side. Rogers clearly didn’t have an answer to that one.
‘What were you doing in Brazil?’ Tony asked.
‘That’s none of your business,’ Rogers told him reproachfully.
Tony rolled his eyes. ‘Bullshit. You used my quinjet to get there – and I know that because the only other way you could’ve gotten there is commercial, and they never would have let you through without the paperwork proving you’d gotten the inoculations. And within the next 48 hours, the Brazilian government is going to be, quite reasonably, asking what you were doing within their borders without a passport.’
‘Well, it’s none of their business!’
‘Actually, it is. You know they call people who cross the border into America without permission and live here? Illegal immigrants. You know what they call it an organised body enters any country without permission? Invasion. They have every right to demand and explanation and if you won’t tell them why and you won’t tell me, I’ll just have to say that you’re refusing to answer even me, so I don’t know what you were doing.’
‘You’ll tell them it was Avengers business!’ Rogers ordered.
‘But it wasn’t,’ Tony said. ‘You didn’t involve all of the Avengers. Me, Bruce, and Thor weren’t involved at all. And Wilson isn’t officially an Avenger yet.’
‘That’s an order, Tony!’
‘Then I exercise my right to disobey orders that I find morally wrong.’ With a snap of his fingers, he hung up on Rogers. ‘If he calls again, JARVIS, play annoying infomercials at him.’
‘Yes, sir.’
***
Natasha rubbed the bridge of her nose.
Their work for S.H.I.E.L.D. meant that she and Clint had those inoculations, but no one had bothered with Steve. “He’s Captain America,” they said. “What’s he need an inoculation for?” And the only inoculations Sam had were for his tour of duty in the Middle East. After the team of doctors Tony had gotten examined him, he was immediately shipped to a specialist hospital. She, Clint, and Steve, however, were still confined to the Compound because they were all still carrying various diseases.
Steve didn’t seem to grasp the concept that not being able to contract the disease didn’t mean you were safe. He thought this was a power-play by Tony. He was determined it would all blow over soon and he could get back to looking for Bucky. But Natasha knew better. Because he had refused to give any explanation for their presence in Brazil, and her own attempt at one had fallen flat (seen as trying to save face, because she hadn’t known it was needed until much too later), a team had been assembled to investigate.
The truth would come out very soon.
And Tony would drop them like a hot potato.
Meanwhile, they had another thing to worry about. The doctors had taken blood from all of them and Steve’s results had come back. It seemed, before being injected, he’d been a carrier of tuberculosis. Steve insisted that the serum had cured it, but the blood tests had told a very different story.
‘The serum,’ the head doctor said, glaring at Steve through the visor of his anti-contamination suit, ‘did not recognise the dormant TB as harmful to you, because it was not doing harm to you at the time. So it enhanced the disease within you as well as everything else. But that TB still runs the risk of turning active. While we have antibiotics for TB now, there are some strains that remain resistant. The one festering within your body would undoubtedly be one of them.’
Clint raised his hand.
The doctor looked over. ‘Yes, Mr. Barton?’
‘So, since Steve’s essentially a ticking time bomb, what happens now?’ He ignored Steve’s betrayed look.
‘You and Miss Romanoff will be moved to a separate location,’ the doctor said. ‘Mr. Rogers will remain until further notice.’
In other words, they would isolate Steve – to a degree, on account of human rights – until either his TB activated or until they worked out how to cure his particular strain of TB.
Clint and Natasha were removed from the Compound with Steve left behind.
In the new facility, Natasha saw her predictions come true. The investigation into what they’d been doing in Brazil uncovered Barnes, and his time as the Winter Soldier. Following that, his list of victims was released to the public – including Howard and Maria Stark. When Tony appeared for his next press conference, he was dressed in a black suit and wore sunglasses as he addressed the reporters.
His words rang in Natasha’s ears.
‘I didn’t have the best relationship with my father as a kid, but I was still a kid when he died. I would have appreciated it if someone had told me the truth, but I guess that was a bit too much to ask from a clandestine agency that places its own secrets and survival above all else.’
Natasha liked to think she didn’t feel guilty.
She liked to think.