—chapter three:
learn something
new every day

"TELL ME SOMETHING
  I DON'T ALREADY KNOW."

Jackson's brain was an interesting place, to say the least.

     It held a lot of articles, facts, and memories, and instances she wanted to forget but couldn't. That was the downside of having an eidetic memory. She remembered anything and everything and she couldn't drag and drop things into the garbage can to make space for new information. She could only sort things into folders, label them, and then hope and pray for the best.

    She didn't want amnesia. If she had to choose between remembering everything and remembering nothing at all, she'd choose to remember everything and live with it.

     Even if there was a lot of useless information stored in her head. Chances were, she'd need it for later.

     "You know what I learned about you?" Bruce had asked over dinner one night. While also working with patients, Jackson and Bruce had set aside time to get to know each other better. They learned everything they could during their one year together—the good, the bad, the ugly, and everything in between the three. "I learned that you're really in touch with your emotions."

    "I'd like to think of it as my superpower," Jackson had responded, laughing a little afterward. "It was the one thing I promised myself after my hell of an emotionless bender. I promised myself that I'd feel everything that came my way—I wouldn't push it down or shove it away, but I'd process what I was feeling so I could get a better understanding of why I was feeling that way. I've got a very high EQ and I read that it wasn't particularly great to be so sensitive, as it would make me hyperaware of everything that was going on around me. But I think it's nice."

    "And you didn't think of going into Psychology? You could've become a very successful therapist," Bruce had teased, smiling. 

   Jackson had rolled her eyes before answering, rolling around a piece of chicken around her plate. "Mind you, I was already out of college when my life started to go to shit, and before I had my big revelation. But I could still become a therapist when this is all over."

    "There you go! Think of the positives."

Looking over all of the screens in the laboratory, everything seemed to be steady from what Jackson could see. She took everything in—absorbed it, processed it.

    "Okay, what am I looking at?" she asked after one whole minute of intense staring at the technology. What they were doing wasn't really her field, but with the bits of basic knowledge she had about a few of the major sciences, she could understand a little bit of it all.

    "What you're looking at is potential patterns of energy that the Tesseract could be emitting, along with the tracking algorithm I made," Bruce explained, "clearly, they're all strong because the power it has is. . .off the charts. This guy named Loki— "

    "Wait a minute," Jackson cut him off, turning to him, "Loki? As in Norse mythology, shapeshifter, god Loki?"

    Bruce nodded. "He's got his hands on the Tesseract. Once we get him, we'll be able to refine the tracking algorithm and narrow everything down even more."

    "I'm assuming that they're tracking Loki the same way they're tracking the Tesseract. They're probably using some sort of facial recognition system to get a match and a location on where he is, too."

    "Point for Jackson." Bruce tapped her on the nose with his pen, emitting a laugh from her.

    "Oh, this I've gotta see." Jackson made her way to the bridge of the helicarrier to get a good look at the system. Images of potential matches left the screen as soon as they showed up, crossing out names and faces that didn't fit any of the criteria.

    "Wow. That is fast," Jackson commented as she watched, the images sticking to her brain as they whirred by, "it almost hurts my brain. Almost."

    "I would hope so. Or else you could say your goodbyes to planet Earth while you're still here," Coulson replied.

    "Sir, we've got a hit. Sixty-seven percent," said one of the workers to Coulson, "no, it's a cross-match. Seventy-nine percent. Location: Stuttgart, Germany."

    On the computer screen, Jackson saw a godly man with slick black hair and two different colored eyes—one blue, one green. Heterochromia. "Huh. A little less hiding and a little more plain sight, if you ask me," she commented, "who's gonna get him?"

    "Captain," said Coulson, turning to Steve. "You're up."

    Steve nodded and went to go suit up. Coulson then turned to Jackson and asked, "Don't you have somewhere to be, miss Edwards?"

    "Oh. Right." Jackson made a tsk sound. "I'm. . .gonna go, then."

    When Jackson got back to the lab, Bruce looked up to see who it was. Knowing it was her, he reverted his attention back to his work. "So you've finally come back to help me," he said, maneuvering his way around his work area.

    "I've been banished from the bridge," Jackson announced, her voice taking on a weird posh accent, adding emphasis to the word banished.

    "What'd you do? Touch one of the computers?" Bruce snorted, "Because from what I've learned from working with you, is that you can be pretty handsy."

     Jackson rolled her eyes. "No, actually. I don't think Coulson liked me there, taking up breathing air."

    "Ah," Bruce nodded, "I'm sure he's actually nice once you get to know him."

    "So I guess I'm stuck here with you for the time being," Jackson teased, putting her hands up to tuck some loose strands of hair behind ears before crossing them, "but I'm only staying because you actually like me."

    There was a moment's pause when the two of them just looked at each other, really looked at each other. It's happened a couple of times before, where there was a meaningful silence where the world seemed to stop for that one, small moment. This instance only lasted a few seconds but there had been a range of emotion that went through the both of them before Bruce finally said:

    "Of course I like you, birdie."

Later that day, Jackson was in the briefing room this time, sitting at the round table like one of Arthur's knights. She was watching a live feed of Loki inside the cage as he went off on some sort of villainous monologue. Natasha, Steve, and Bruce were also watching, while the Norse god named Thor intimately stared at the wall and listened.

     "How desperate are you?" Loki asked, "That you call on such lost creatures to defend you?"

     Jackson didn't miss the snide comment he had made about Bruce earlier, about being a mindless beast who played human. She looked over to him, concern etched into her features, and received a tight-lipped nod in response before returning her attention to the feed.

     "To have power," Loki continued, "unlimited power. And for what? A warm light for all mankind to share, and then to be reminded what real power is."

     The feed cut off then and Jackson sat back in her seat. "Well, he seems nice."

     "Yeah," Bruce agreed sarcastically, "he really starts to grow on you."

     "Loki's gonna drag this out," Steve added, "Thor, what's his play?"

     Thor turned around, his face still pensive and his mind deep in thought. "He has an army, called the Chitauri. They're not of Asgard or any world known. They'll wage war on your people and win him the Earth in exchange for, I'm assuming, the Tesseract."

     "An army. From outer space." Jackson could hear the disbelief in Steve's voice from where she was sitting. She couldn't believe it either. The possibility of anything coming from outer space was mind-blowing. Thinking of all the other galaxies and planets that could be existing at that very moment made her head spin—and watching Star Wars only strengthened that possibility in her.

     "So he's probably building a portal," Jackson suggested, swiveling in her spin chair, "that's what he'd need Eric Selvig for."

     "Selvig?" Thor questioned, his interest piqued.

     "He's an astrophysicist," Bruce explained.

     "He's a friend."

    "He's got them all under some sort of spell," Natasha included, sitting up, "along with one of our own."'

     "Loki seems a little too happy to be here," Jackson added, "he couldn't possibly lead an army from where he is."

     "I don't think we should be worrying about Loki," Bruce interjected, "the guy's mind is a bag full of cats. You can smell the crazy on him. Think about the mechanics, the Iridium. What could he possibly need Iridium for?"

      "It's a stabilizing agent," Jackson and a different voice said together. She turned around in her seat to see Tony Stark walking in alongside Coulson before Coulson went off to attend to his other duties.

Jackson knew who he was. He announced his identity as Iron Man to the world, his face was plastered all over newspapers and magazines for a week straight, and his father had been the one to found S.H.I.E.L.D.

     "Means that the portal won't collapse on itself the way it did at S.H.I.E.L.D," Tony continued, walking into the briefing room like he owned the place. He patted Thor on the arm before he began to twiddle with the center console. "Also, the portal can open as wide and stay open as long as Loki wants."

    Abruptly, he pointed out, "That man is playing Galaga! Thought we wouldn't notice. . .but we did." Then he went back to fiddling with the console. "As for the raw materials, Barton can get his hands on them pretty easily. All he needs now is a power source, something to kickstart the Cube."

     "When did you become an expert on thermonuclear astrophysics?" asked Agent Hill, who didn't sound the least bit impressed.

     "Last night," Tony replied, smug, "Selvig's notes, the Theory Extraction papers. Did anyone else do the reading?"

     "Does Loki need any kind of particular power source?" Steve asked, cutting to the chase.

     "He'd have to heat the Cube to one-hundred twenty million Kelvin to even think about breaking the Coulomb barrier," Jackson answered, scratching her head.

     Tony turned to look at her as if to challenge her. "That is unless Selvig's managed to stabilize the Quantum Tunnel Effect."

     Jackson put her hands up. "Don't look at me. I'm just the Chemistry know-it-all."

    "But Coulomb is Physics."

    "I pride myself in knowing at least a little bit of everything. Jack of all trades, master of one. The one being Chemistry."

     "Well, if he could do that, then he could achieve heavy-ion fusion at any reactor on the planet," Bruce answered instead.

"Finally," Tony applauded, "someone who speaks English. Good try though, Marie Curie." He patted Jackson on the shoulder.

     Steve looked around at the others, confused. "Is that what that was?"

     Tony reached out to shake Bruce's hand. "Pleasure to meet you, Dr. Banner. Your work on anti-electron collisions is unparalleled. I'm also a fan of the way you get all angry and turn into an enormous green rage monster."

    "Thanks," said Bruce sheepishly. 

    "Who's this?" Tony then pointed to Jackson.

     "Jackson Edwards," Jackson introduced herself, standing up and holding her gloved hand out for a handshake, "I'm Banner's assistant, I worked with him while we were in India."

     Tony met her handshake, his smile sly. "Jackson. Wasn't really the name I was picturing for someone so. . .womanly. Tell me, how long have you known Banner?"

     "My mother insisted that I be named after my grandfather, God knows why," she replied, retracting out of the handshake before answering the question. "To answer your question, I think I've known Bruce a little over a year, I think?"

     "Did you guys ever. . ." Tony motioned between the two of them. 

    Jackson stared at him, blushing furiously, mouth agape, before stuttering, "N-no! Nothing like that!"

     "Really?" Tony sounded disappointed. "No 'Thousand and One Arabian Nights'? No 'Devil's Tango'?"

     "Oh, my God" was all Jackson could reply because she was stunned by the sheer audacity. She'd known that he was brash but she didn't think he'd lay in on that thick. But before she could come up with something, Fury interrupted them. "Banner and Edwards are only here to track down the Cube. I was hoping you'd join them."

     "I'd start with that stick of his," Steve recommended, "that thing is magic but it sure works like a HYDRA weapon."

    "That's what I was thinking," Jackson agreed. 

     "I don't know about that," said Fury, "but it is powerful. What I would like to know is how Loki turned two of the sharpest men I know into his personal flying monkeys."

     "Monkeys?" Thor turned, puzzled, "I do not understand."

     "I do," Steve quickly interjected, looking around. "I understood that reference."

     Tony, who looked a little vexed by Steve's comment, turned to Bruce. "Shall we play, Doctor?"

     "This way, sir." Bruce led the way to the lab and Tony followed. Jackson sat in her chair for a few more moments, everyone looking at her. "What?" She shrugged, "I've been cooped up in there all day. I deserve to stretch my legs."

    They continued to look at her until she groaned and got up to follow suit to the laboratory.