Chapter Text
The call from Jane couldn’t have come at a better time. She was running out of ways to make their homelessness fun for Sophie. The three year old was getting cabin fever from having to stay inside for such long periods of time in the half-way houses. So when Jane had called and asked for her help with something she had jumped at the chance. Never mind the fact that she hadn’t seen Jane in almost four years. This was for her baby girl. The train rides had used up what little money she had left and so she ended up having to walk the four blocks from the subway station to Avengers’ Tower. Which might have been okay if she had been by herself, but she had a three year old that really preferred walking to being held. When they finally made it to the tower she was unsurprised to find a doorman guarding the front. However Jane had texted her a picture that allowed her inside and onto the elevator.
Walking into Avengers’ Tower was just as surreal as she expected it to be. Jane had told her to call as soon as she got inside. The call was made and Jane told her to get into the elevator and basically tell the ceiling to take her to the laboratories. Slightly confused by these instructions she nevertheless did as she was told and was greeted by a disembodied voice telling her that Doctor Foster was expecting her and that she had already been given a room in Doctor Foster’s apartments. It had then asked if she wanted it to tell Jane about “the little girl” she had replied to the negative and with that they had arrived on the floor that apparently housed the labs.
Walking down the hall she saw several doors, thankfully they had nametags on them. The first one belonged to Tony Stark, the second to Bruce Banner and the third to Jane Foster. Apparently there were only three scientists in Avengers’ Tower. She knew who Tony Stark was, and obviously Jane. But she couldn’t place the other name. It sounded familiar. As if she should know who it was. But she couldn’t for the life of her think of who it could be. Shrugging this off she headed to Jane’s door and walked in. Sophie had been uncharacteristically quiet during this process. But as soon as Darcy walked through the doors she gasped and pointed to the large machine that was apparently doing… something. Darcy couldn’t quite figure out its purpose.
“Darcy! Hi! Um, who is this?” Jane came over and had looked as though she were about to give Darcy a hug but the little girl had apparently thrown her off.
“This is Sophie, Soph can you say hi to Doctor Foster for mommy?” Sophie gave a wave but it was all but ignored as Jane had frozen at the mention of mommy.
“Mommy?”
“Oh yeah, didn’t I tell you? I met this ‘awesome’ guy Isaiah, and when I found out I was pregnant he decided that he didn’t love me any more and that a kid was way too much responsibility for him. And then my wonderful mother kicked us out because we were being too much of a “drain” and she didn’t need a constant reminder of how much of a screw up her daughter was. So we’ve been trying to make it in the lovely half-way houses of Phoenix. So I hope your past four years have been dandy, I’m sure you’ve had a lovely time with your Avenger boyfriend. No need to contact old assistants. But I really need this job. So if you could tell me what you need and if there is somewhere that Soph could play then that would be awesome. If not then I guess I’ll have to try the half-way houses of New York.” Jane had sat through Darcy’s rant with her jaw dropped. But at Darcy’s mention of leaving she had hurried to speak.
“No! Oh my god Darcy, no I would never turn you out onto the street! Why didn’t you call me? Darcy! And of course there’s somewhere Sophie can play. Absolutely! Oh my god I’m so sorry! I wasn’t able to fix the bridge for about a year or so and so Thor wasn’t able to come back, and then I did fix it and Tony hired me as a Stark Industries scientist and I guess I just figured you’d moved on with your life. I am soo sorry Darce. So sorry.” she had then jumped up and hugged Darcy who had stood still for a second before relaxing slightly. She had then patted Jane slightly on the back and then cleared her throat.
“Uh, Jane, I think you’re crushing her.” Jane immediately backed off and apologized again. Darcy smiled slightly and then looked down at the three year old who was starting to get a little antsy. “Sophie, we’re going to stay in this tower for right now, okay?” Sophie nodded and then squirmed a little bit.
“Mommy, I need to go potty.” Darcy looked in askance at Jane who pointed to the door to her lab.
“There’s a bathroom in the hallway. Tony decided it would be a good idea for us all to share one. Don’t ask me why, he’s kind of random with his decisions…”
“Okay, um, be right back” Darcy opened the door and kept walking down the hallway, where there was indeed a ‘family’ style restroom. Sophie squirmed out of her arms and ran over to the door right as it opened to reveal a man who could only be Bruce Banner. It was in that moment that she realized why his name had sounded so familiar. If she wasn’t mistaken, this was the Hulk. Only, not hulked out, obviously. And he was apparently not going to stop walking. He was apparently so caught up in his thoughts that he walked straight into Sophie, who fell back onto her butt. He looked down in surprise and saw he had knocked a little girl down.
“Oh! I’m so sorry, are you okay?” Sophie looked up at him and promptly burst into tears.
“Soph, you’re okay baby girl,” Darcy said as she ran over to the little girl and scooped her up. “I’m sorry! She likes to run off, I’m Darcy, Jane’s assistant. Well, former assistant, turned current assistant. Anyway, this is my daughter Sophie, she’s really okay, I think you just scared her…” She realized she was rambling and trailed off.
“Oh, hi I’m Bruce Banner. Again, I’m really sorry!” He turned to Sophie and held out his hand, “Hi, Sophie, I’m Bruce. I’m really sorry I ran into you.” She smiled and took his hand.
“Hi Mr. Bruce. It’s ‘kay. I have to go potty now. Can I get down mommy? I can go potty by myself.”
Darcy nodded and let her down and then turned to Bruce and held up her hand, forestalling his words. She counted to three and grinned when she was rewarded with a loud voice saying “Mommy! I need help the potty is too big!” She smiled apologetically at him and held up a finger,
“I’ll be right back.” She opened the door and helped Sophie climb onto the adult sized toilet and when she was done helped her off of it. Then she picked her up and helped her wash her hands, somehow managing to get water all over both of them. They walked back out and found Bruce exactly where they had left him. Darcy grinned and said, “Thanks for waiting, and now I have to ask, where in the world did you learn how to talk to a three-year-old?” He smiled back at her and answered,
“Tony and Pepper have a little boy that’s 3 and Clint and Natasha have twins, a boy and a girl, that are 1. The entire tower is pretty well versed on how to talk to toddlers. Actually, now that I think about it, I’m pretty sure Pepper and Ryder are in Tony’s lab. They usually have lunch there. I’m sure Pepper wouldn’t mind if you left Sophie with her for the day while you helped Jane.” Darcy’s eyebrows had gone up at the mention of children in the tower. But she had actually started in surprise at the thought of Pepper Potts taking care of Sophie or really any child for that matter.
“Are you sure she wouldn’t mind? Doesn’t she have better things to do? She is the CEO of Stark Industries…”
He shrugged and said, “It wouldn’t hurt to ask. She passed those duties on to her assistant, she watches Eli and Amy while Clint and Natasha are at S.H.I.E.L.D. training new agents.”
“Alright, let me tell Jane, where I’ll be.” Jane was fine with it, in fact when she learned that Darcy had met Bruce she had gotten a sparkle in her eyes that usually meant trouble for Darcy. Rolling her eyes she left the lab and headed down the hallway to where Bruce was standing. He knocked once and then opened the door for her and Sophie to walk through.