Honesty ♧ Bucky Barnes

Token Flashback (TM)

I'm afraid Bucko doesn't make an appearance in this chapter. It's time to learn more about Erin and Bruce's relationships (becasue I'm nothing if not an EVIL WITCH who makes people wait for romance)

Also, shout out to Ruth, my friend, who makes sure that I don't get trigger-happy and put seven commas in each sentence (I am a sucker for commas)

SIX MONTHS EARLIER

There was a new girl in the lab.

Bruce noticed her almost immediately. As in, he noticed her as soon as he walked through the creaky double doors. She was sat on her own, her table-top covered in so much paper that he couldn't even see the mahogany wood underneath it, and she was writing furiously. Her hair was piled into an unruly bun on top of her head with strands falling out all over. It was unusual for S.H.I.E.L.D. to get new science workers but he know that they only hired the very best - not to blow his own horn or anything.

It was realtively late at night so Bruce was surprised to see anybody there. Usually as soon as office hours were over, everybody clocked out and went home. Only those in the middle of an experiment would stay past that time. By the looks of the girl, buried in her strewn paperwork, that was exactly what was going on.

Bruce took a seat on a table near her, opening his briefcase and getting out his work. She didn't look up, so engrossed was she in her work, and Bruce was left to wonder if she even heard him enter at all. With a resigned sigh he opened up his laptop and begun to type furiously. The tesseract was mostly untraceable but it let off tiny amounts of gamma radiation and hopefully, using that, Bruce would be able to find it.

And if he found the tesseract, he would find Loki.

There was a slight chill in the room. Someone, maybe even this new scientist, had put the AC on and Bruce couldn't help but shiver, he'd left his jacket somewhere and his thin white shirt wasn't doing much to protect him from the frigid air. He lifted his glance to the girl opposite him and smiled slightly when he noticed that she had definitely dressed for the cold. She was bundled up in a thick jumper, with a gaudy orange scarf wrapped tightly around her neck. So maybe she did turn on the AC then. She felt Bruce looking at her and raised her eyes to his.

"Hey," Banner smiled at her, raising a hand in way of a wave.

Her eyebrows raised in shock slightly and Bruce winced. His fame had apparently travelled further than he had thought, if the new girl already knew who he was. He lifted up both palms in a surrender-pose.

"Don't worry. I'm not about to hulk out on you."

The girl rolled her eyes and smiled, a flash of straight white teeth.

"Good to know," she quipped back, placing her pen down on the mound of papers on her desk, "Well I'll try not to piss you off with any of my shit."

Banner chuckled, surprised by her comment. It was unusual for people to feel easy around him, what with the constant fear of him morphing into a giant green thing all the time. It was even rarer for people to make jokes about it. It was refreshing.

"I feel like we should start that introduction again," He began, getting up from his chair and walking over to her desk, hand outstretched, "I'm Bruce Banner."

She stood up and shook his hand, her grip firm. Bruce liked that, the fact that she didn't seem to be tiptoeing around him as so many other people did.

"Nice to meet you, Bruce Banner. I'm Erin Jefferson."

She had a strange accent, broad and clipped. It sounded British. He gestured to the mound of papers on her desk.

"Whatcha working on there, Erin?" He asked, taking a closer look. The sheets were all filled with scrawls of chemical compounds, as well as a few surprisingly well-drawn diagrams of the human brain.

She gave a snort.

"You wouldn't believe me if I told you."

Her chair creaked as she sat back down, picking up one of the sheets of paper and studying it intently. A corner of Bruce's mouth lifted and he pulled up a chair to sit next to her, intrigued.

"Try me."

Another crack of a smile. Erin placed the sheet of paper on the desk in front of her and shuffled slightly closer to Bruce as best she could on her ticket stool, her pen in her hand. On the paper was a photocopy of a diagram of the human brain, cut in half to show the inner workings. Erin pointed to a small nodule at the base of the skull.

"This is the prefrontal cortex," she explained, "Neurobiologists call it the 'Pinocchio gland."

Bruce raised an eyebrow in confusion but Erin continued regardless.

"Theoretically, it controls a human's ability to tell the truth. Technically, it controls the ability to invent lies. This little bastard here..." she tapped the pen on the paper, "Is the reason for every lie you've ever been told."

Bruce leant back in his chair, intrigued. He was a doctor but he had only rudimentary training in neuropsychology. This was new to him.

"What I'm working on," Erin explained, putting the diagram down and shuffling through the mound of papers on her desk, eventually pulling out one that contained a complicated looking chemical formula on it, "Is a synthetic neuroreceptor that could block the synapse."

Bruce let out a huff of air.

"It's been a while since I looked at a brain, remind me what that means?"

Erin smiled and put the paper down, looking at Bruce. Her eyes were intense, such a dark brown that Bruce almost couldn't see the pupils. They made her face striking. She looked young, he realised, barely into her twenties and he was surprised that she was so acomplished in her field.

"In layman's terms, I'm trying to block the gland."

His eyes widened in surprise.

"You're trying to make a..." he struggled for the right phrase, "A truth-telling serum?"

Erin let out a short bark of laughter at his explanation.

"Yeah. I guess. It's only theoretical, mind you. I've not tried it out in practice...yet." She admitted and Bruce gave her a smile.

"From what you've got here," he gestured to the papers, "It looks pretty legit." He laughed, "You know, most new ChemEngineers try to come up with something like a lightweight bulletproof vest. Or a fireproof spray. You've gone full James Bond here, Jefferson."

Her curly blonde hair bounced as she nodded her head in agreement, looking at Bruce with a smirk.

"Dream big, right?"

He raised his eyebrows in amusement. He was beginning to like this girl. It was rare for Bruce to feel comfortbale around somebody. Ever since the gamma incident there had always been a part of his mind that had remained wary around other people. It wasn't in his nature to hurt people but when the Other Guy made an appearance...well... things happen. There was something about Erin's easygoing laugh and friendly eyes that made him feel slightly more at ease with himself and he liked it.

It had been a while since he had had a friend.

REVIEW PLEASE and bucky will be back in thext chapter dont u worry