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“Here’s the game,” Mama says, one hand gently stroking through his hair, the other wrapped around his skinny frame, pulling him into a warm embrace. “You hide and I’ll find you.”
The rules are simple enough for a child to understand. He gets a head start. He’s not allowed to come out until the seeker finds him. And he’s only allowed to move around if he’s in danger of being discovered.
For the first few rounds it really is just a game. Bruce hides behind the couch and Mama makes a big show of looking under cushions and behind the curtains before she turns, slowly, and heads straight towards him. Before she gets the chance to peer over the back of the couch Bruce jumps out from his hiding place and tackles her legs. In response, Mama scoops him up into her arms and together they spin once, twice, three times, giggling all the way.
Their moment of blissful play is interrupted by the sound of keys rattling in the front door of the house.
Mama goes very quiet, frowning and looking at Bruce in a way that makes Bruce fidget. She lowers him to the floor, crouching down so that she can speak to him at eye level.
“Remember the rules. And this time don’t come out until I tell you to. Can you remember that, Bruce?”
Bruce nods. Of course he can remember that. His memory is excellent for a boy his age, or so he’d overheard his teacher telling Mama. (That day hadn’t been a good day at all. Not when He found out.)
She smiles and it’s tight and worried. Bruce misses her laugh and bright toothy grin already.
“Good boy.” She pats his back. With that, she lets go of Bruce and walks out of the room, heading - much to Bruce’s anxiety - towards the front door.
For a moment, he considers following her, not wanting to leave her alone with Him. But his arm is still healing and Mama made him promise to listen to her when he’s been hurt. So that he can heal, she’d said.
So he turns around on his heel and sprints away from the front of the house, towards a new hiding place where no one will find him.
...
There’s seven sets of footsteps, as far as Bruce can gather from several minutes of intense listening. Maybe more, as they tend to overlap. And at least two groups, both beginning to fan out in two different directions. There’s no way from him to get away without being spotted. All he can do is hide.
Suddenly, a uniformed figure appears below him and Bruce holds his breath, waiting for him to pass by the tree he’s currently perched in.
He doesn’t.
It’s nerve-wracking, watching the man take up position right underneath him and relaying his intentions over a radio. It takes everything in Bruce not to scream in frustration as the man leans back against the tree, gun balanced easily between his hands as he waits for a target that will never approach. Not when it’s already here.
He’s not leaving any time soon.
Hours pass and pain builds in Bruce’s stiff limbs as he refuses to move an inch, too afraid it’d cause a noise and alert the soldier to his position. By the time the sun begins to rise, a treacherous part of his brain even begins to hope that the man will look up, if only to end the agony of waiting. And it’s not just the pain that’s getting to Bruce but the exhaustion. Too many times he catches his eyes blinking blearily, head tilting forward in such a way that threatens to unbalance him from his precarious perch on the thick branch. The ache in his limbs is bone deep by now.
Finally, blessedly, the soldier begins to show signs of the same ailment. He keeps stretching, popping his back and yawning widely. The gun is limp in his hands. Bruce weighs up his options.
He could wait here and hope that the soldier will leave before his strength to remain awake gives out. And also hope that the soldier won’t wake up. And also hope that he won’t be replaced by another soldier too soon...
He doesn’t like those odds.
But then, the alternative is to risk catching the soldier by surprise, somehow overpowering him without Hulking out and then escaping without the other few hundred of Ross’ soldiers that are no doubt close by being alerted to his whereabouts. Not great either.
The thing about being exhausted is that your judgement gets a little skewed. Because after another fifteen minutes of debating with himself Bruce decides he’s going to be found either way and drops out of the tree.
The moment he lands the soldier reels back in surprise and Bruce doesn’t give him a moment to recover as he decks him straight in the jaw. Then he sets off at a sprint in the opposite direction the soldier had come from, gambling that the soldiers are on the other side.
He guessed wrong.
As his arms are forced behind his back and a hot, chemical mixture is injected into his neck he realises - with a morbid sense of humour, no doubt brought on by the fast acting drug - that he had broken one of the rules of hide and seek.
He’d come out before someone had found him and now, just like back when he was a child hiding from the man who called himself Bruce’s father, he is to be punished for it.
…
“Laser tag.”
“No.”
“Monopoly.”
“Absolutely not.”
“Twister?”
“Who the fuck plays twister?”
“Hide and seek.”
Bruce laughs at that.
“You guys wouldn’t stand a chance.”
Five pairs of eyes turn to look at him and the small smile that had been on Bruce’s face throughout his friend’s debating drops, as he realises what he’s just said. He coughs and tries to look like he hasn’t noticed by turning the page over on the magazine he’s been pretending to read. It doesn’t work. There’s a glint in their eyes now that can only mean one thing.
“Sounds like a challenge,” Steve says, a curious look on his face and Bruce can tell that he’s holding back for him, out of respect for Bruce’s boundaries and right to back out.
Tony, however, has no such restraint. A shit eating grin spreads on his face, wide enough to match the one of Clint besides him
“Alright! Hide and seek. Let’s place some bets!” he says, practically bouncing on the balls of his feet as he rubs his hands together.
“We split into teams,” Steve cuts in. “And hide around the city. This is an Avenger’s exercise after all.” He turns to look at Bruce. “You up for that, Bruce?”
Bruce hesitates. It’s been a long time since his childhood and while this particular game doesn’t hold too many good memories for him, he’s at a point in his life where he’s somewhat made peace with his past. He decides:
“Sure. Why not.”
The groups are split like so: Bruce, Steve and Clint will use their skills to go undercover and hide somewhere in the city. The other three (Thor, Natasha and Tony) have 24 hours to find them. If any of them get found before the time runs out, they have to join the seekers. There are a few limitations put on Tony’s technology (and Bruce makes a mental note to address the concerning amount of trackers that Tony has placed in some of their belongings when this is over) but for the most part the seekers will have an advantage.
Bruce watches as both Steve and Clint sprint in opposing directions away from their starting point. Steve at least, clearly has an idea in mind. Maybe Clint does too, maybe he sees this as just another operation.
Bruce has no ideas so he just goes for a walk.
And he walks. And he walks. And he keeps walking until he arrives at a bustling farmers market. He takes a good half an hour to peruse the stalls lined up, figuring he has nowhere else to be for the next day. He buys some blueberries, thinking of Tony. He helps a mother with her bags as she balances them on her child’s already over-packed pram. And then he moves on. Farmers markets, while a good way to kill the time, are one of the places he knows they’d check. Tony must have an entire file of places Bruce likes to go and is familiar with.
Indeed, at one point, just a little after leaving the market, he sees Thor fly overhead and carefully inches over so he’s hidden by the awning of a nearby buildings as he continues his path into an unfamiliar part of the city.
Eventually, he comes to a more run down looking part of the block and spend the entirety of the rest of his time right there. It’s familiar territory to him, reminiscent of his days spent squatting in abandoned buildings around the various countries he’d moved to, but wide enough that he’s pretty confident he won't be found. At least not before he hears Iron-man or Thor arrive in the area and gets a chance to move on. Natasha is his main concern but most of his time on the run had depended on luck, so he figures it’s the same now and will have to hope it’ll be in his favour this time. After all it’d be embarrassing to lose after his confident claim earlier. Tony and Clint would never let him live it down and Bruce is self-aware enough to know that he still has some elements of pride in him that would hate to lose.
When it gets to 23 hours, Bruce begins to think he stands a chance.
With half an hour left, he wonders what he’s supposed to do if they don’t find him. The logical part of him says to go straight back to the tower but there’s another part of him - perhaps the part linked to his previous experiences - that makes him feel more at ease staying where he is until one of them finds him. Surely, it won’t take too long?
Three days.
Bruce stays in the same block for three days before Clint finally catches him. He realises, some time much earlier than that, that he is being quite ridiculous sticking to his old patterns. This is a game. And yet he can’t seem to let old habits die.
When Clint finds him its with a triumphant whoop and a relieved smile into the comm unit.
“I’ve found him.”
Bruce hears a tinny voice come out of the bud in Clint’s ear.
“Tell him what the fuck --” Clint turns it off, stepping forward to embrace Bruce in a one armed hug. This catches Bruce off guard and for a moment he stands, stiff as a board while Clint squeezes the air out of his lungs. But he manages to respond eventually, wrapping his arms around Clint delicately, just before the other man finally pulls away.
“We thought you’d actually run out on us there for a minute, Bruce,” he says and Bruce scratches his head awkwardly, feeling some guilt at having worried them. But then, there’s also the small, golden warmth of knowing that the team - his friends - were actually worried about him… it’s nice, Bruce realises, to be wanted.
“Sorry,” he says, sheepishly. “I have some, uh… old habits tied with this game.”
The look on Clint’s face in response to that makes Bruce very glad that Clint is the one who found him. It’s a soft look of understanding, if a little baffled and… is that awe?
“Forget it. Let’s talk about you.” he laughs. It’s infectious and Bruce can’t help but smile. “Three days? You really weren’t kidding when you said you’d wipe the floor with us.”
“I said you guys wouldn’t stand a chance, actually,” is all he can think to say and he wishes he’d come up with something better.
Clint only shakes his head, disbelieving and amused as he wraps an arm around his shoulder and leads him back into the streets.
“You really are a wonder, Bruce.”