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If there was one thing that Mohinder Suresh was good at, it was getting into trouble. He did it to himself, falling into patterns that placed him in dangerous situations and in league with dangerous people. Yes, he always meant well, chasing after research that would save mankind from and for itself, but the personal toll to himself and those around him tended to be extremely high. This time was no different. A distraction and a slip of a normally very careful hand left a jab through a double layered glove that had him throwing down his tools and heading to the sink to see if he had gotten through the skin. He had only torn off the latex when the first wave of dizziness hit.

Mohinder woke up over an hour later, sweat soaked and shivering on the floor of the lab. Nothing felt broken and for a little while, he forgot what had happened. He sat up slowly, pushed the hair back from his eyes, and glanced down at one blue hand and one skin-coloured palm. Memory rushed back to him and he leaped to his feet to call the company whose drug it was that he was testing and perfecting. There was just a dial tone and a friendly voice telling him that the number had been disconnected. He glanced up and the little red light that usually signaled he was being taped (standard procedure in this lab) was off. The door was unlocked and he shivered again, feeling something move through him.

He should be dead. The catalyst in the drug was enough to kill a man twice his size, the purest form of the component that would make the medicine work against the virus affecting evolved humans. No, he shouldn’t just be dead. He should have exploded all over these walls…and he did not.

The cell phone in his pocket didn’t have reception until he stepped, shaking, into the loading dock. He called the only person he knew might be able to help him. He hadn’t seen Bruce Banner in years. He’d become a consultant for the Avengers in the time since doing humanitarian work in Calcutta, or so the internet said, a frequent guest of Tony Stark of all people. Mohinder didn’t actually have Bruce’s number so he just called the Stark Relief Foundation, where Banner was supposed to be working. It took an hour for him to track down his old acquaintance from his time volunteering with Banner in the slums of Indian. “Doctor Banner? I don’t know if you remember me… My name is Mohinder Suresh. I interned briefly with you overseas?”

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Mohinder didn’t feel poorly. He touched his nose, fingers coming away with that almost black blood smeared on them and the fear returned to his eyes. “I don’t know. I just… I thought that if I asked—“ But there were people swimming on Stark’s living room ceiling. How did that happen? Shaking hands reached for a tissue in his pocket to press to his face and they allowed the Iron Legion to clean up the rest of the mess and they could retreat back into the lab. Mohinder was dripping inky blood as they went, but he felt the need to sit down, not because he was in pain, but because his fear response had kicked in strong.

His tongue was thick in his mouth as he allowed Bruce to tend to him or stick electrodes on him or whatever it was that Mohinder needed to go through to finish up testing or just to monitor his vitals as they were now.

“I think it must go back to… What I said. About human cerebral capacity. I’m using more of mine. Able to use more of mine. Instead of using technology to adapt, my brain is adapting to help me do what I wish… I think I can control matter. Or maybe just other people… Oh God, Doctor Banner, what have I done to myself? How could this have triggered a mutation? It’s a catalyst, it was never near the serum. I was never introduced physically to any of the trail runs!”

"You thought if you asked-" Bruce parroted, voice tightening in momentary shock before he closed his eyes and took a breath. "We need to figure out what's going on, because until we have some better idea of that, we won't be able to do anything about it."

Back to the lab they went, and this time, Bruce worked quickly to try and get as much information as he could together. He was grateful for the Legion in the sense that he didn't have to deal with those agents, but all of it made him incredibly anxious. The Other Guy sat right behind his eyes because of it, watching as they hooked Mohinder back up, trying to understand his changed body with science.

"I've been thinking on that," Bruce said quietly as he watched the latest scan, "and I wonder... if you were lied to. Maybe it wasn't just the catalyst. Otherwise, why did they run so quickly? Why not lock you up and let you explode, then continue on?"

Mohinder had been wondering the same thing and he watched Bruce diligently book him up for the next few tests. Mohinder wasn't even sure what they were measuring for. His baselines kept jumping to a point where it wasn't even possible to find out what his levels were. Still, due diligence and the scientific method was clear on how to proceed. It wasn't as if he was suffering.

"They were waiting for me to make a mistake?" No. They orchestrated it. "I passed out. I was feeling groggy-- Oh God, they drugged me to make me implant myself... Why me?" He was their head researcher. He was the one who had discovered the catalyst to begin with. His mind supplied the answer. "Clinical trials. I can't be the only one. My team... They might be out there as well."

Or dead. It would depend on the serum sample.

"I feel as if I must strongly consider retiring after this."

He tried. For everything he had been raised and brought up to believe in science and theory, he tried. However, it was all too quick before he realized that any machine he had on hand, calculated for humans or even himself, was capable of dealing with what Mohinder had become. Everything was carefully documented, but at the end, he wasn't sure if anything truly had been accomplished.

Mohinder's last words made Bruce give a sad sort of laugh, shaking his head ever so slightly. "Strongly consider retiring. ...I strongly considered retiring several times and even attempted to and somehow I kept getting drawn right back in. I get the feeling that given all of this? You will have the same problem and even more so? You and I both know... you want to understand this and what to do next with it."

"I don't think I have very much of a choice about the whole of it," Mohinder responded quietly, pulling off the electrodes from his skin because he knew that this was doing absolutely no good at all. "My brain is active but my heart is in cardiac arrest perpetually. I no longer need to breathe unless I care to talk. My blood is coagulating... Am I dead or alive? And if I am merely the experimental victim of a force I did not believe I formally aligned myself with, who? And why are they coming after me?"

That last question caused Mohinder to stand up and he lightly brushed a hand through the new growth of hair on his head. The curls did not catch his fingers at all and they seemed to almost flow over them.

"I am and have been placing you in the utmost danger, Doctor Banner. I'll return to the lab, perhaps there are clues there, but I can not include you further in this mess. I could not forgive myself if I lost another friend. I have lost so many already."

"No." That Bruce could and did sound firm on, looking over to Mohinder with a serious expression and almost pleading eyes. "You are standing in one of the most secure locations in the city, and even with what happened, I believe we won't be disturbed here. Someone must have tracked you here - and we need to figure out how they did so. Doing this alone isn't going to help anyone."

His voice softened, a hand gesturing slightly towards Mohinder. "You can't lose me. I don't want to go into details, so let's leave it at that. We need to understand something of what's happening here, and if you're alone, it gives them all that much more chance to capture you."

The problem was that Bruce didn't need to go into details. Mohinder had a horribly knowing look as he leaned forward to put a hand to the older man's shoulder. "I fear more that you will blame yourself if I trigger the one lurking behind your eyes and under your skin." He was not judging. He couldn't judge in this particular case. It would be hypocritical. "And I believe I can take care of myself."

People. Swimming on the ceiling.

"But you should come with me. I might need an anchor. My friends have long since left and I have no one to remind me of what i once was." He was already collecting his things. He bent to hand Bruce his brief case back.

Unfortunately, Bruce couldn't disagree with that - for the most part. Mohinder would feel the very faint flinch under his hand of someone no longer used to touch before Bruce's lips thinned and he said quietly, "Maybe you're right," Mohinder was right, "but I don't want to see you abandoned." If the irony didn't creep up on him, it still existed. How similar were his thoughts to Betty's as she stood by him despite the hell breaking loose around her, the danger the Other Guy put her in. Maybe it didn't show as strongly for him because unlike her, he couldn't so easily be killed.

"Let me pack a bag and I'll be going with you." And leave a note for Tony because he had a feeling the other man would have severe issues if he was suddenly gone after an attack by HYDRA.

Well yeah he'd have severe issues! Banner came to visit, had a party, left a mess and didn't even wait for him to get back?! Rude. That note would maybe keep the angry voice mails from Bruce's Stark Relief Fund phone down to a minimum. Maybe.

Bruce was given something of a shocked look from Mohinder. He was pretty sure that he could convince Bruce to stay but he found that he didn't want to. He needed some sort of reminder here that he was still human despite his lack of some vital signs and the addition and over abundance of others.

"All right. I won't leave without you," he promised, bending for a moment to gather up what had been dropped. He made sure that his laptop had been put away and that he took extra notebooks from one of the desks.

Maybe. Sigh.

You better keep that promise, Bruce thought briefly to himself, but nodded as he quickly left to do exactly what he said. He was used to living out of a single bag or nothing at all, so it almost felt like a luxury to take just a few minutes to gather some things together, almost like he was packing for a vacation (almost). Leaving a note for Tony was simple as well, though he tried not to think on the wording too long:

Tony,

An old friend needed help. Will return when able. Sorry about the blood stains. Thank you for getting the Legion to clean up. Don't worry about me.

He read it again and ended up just shaking his head, leaving it where he was fairly sure Tony would spot it before he returned to his lab, half expecting to not find Mohinder there.

Bruce would be pleasantly surprised to see Mohinder sitting on a stool with his back to the doors. His whole body gave off that subtle glow, under his clothing, that he looked almost as if he was surrounded by a halo. He was studying his hands with his bag on his lap, counting the hair follicles on his wrists. He could see each one. He could see how they grew from his skin and he knew how long they were burrowed beneath it.

When Bruce came in, he let out a breath he had been holding and stood.

"Thank you for not telling him where we're going," Mohinder said as if he knew the contents of the hastily scratched letter. "Or for mentioning my name. He should not be in danger. They'll come after me. I've taken the liberty of erasing the data you collected on me too." No reason letting it potentially fall into the wrong hands. "We shouldn't take a cab. The subway is much faster and more anonymous. Do you have everything?"

He almost sounded cheerful.

Frown. Bruce stared at Mohinder for several long seconds before letting out a breath slowly. "Mohinder." Quiet but firm, clearly not pleased. "I don't know how you're doing it, but stop. Stay out of my head. You are going to have to learn some new form of self-control and to do it quickly." He didn't like the idea of anyone else in his head than the being already trapped in there.

He wasn't fond of the subway, so crowded, but this was more about Mohinder so he ended up just nodding. "Subway is fine," he lied easily.

Mohinder looked surprised. "I'm not in your head. I heard the pen on the paper. I am truly sorry that this is making you uncomfortable. I haven't developed telepathy, not that I'm aware of. But I do know what it's like to live with a telepath. I was very good friends with one once... But he lost... He lost a great deal more than his way. It is not a pleasant ability," Mohinder said with a sigh. "I do apologise so... Hearing... The writing. I hardly know how sound from another room translates into the words written across my eyelids, but it does."

He couldn't telepathically bond with the beast in Bruce's head either. He just felt him stirring, like a fly caught on his web.

Mohinder gave Bruce a tight smile. "You're under no obligation to stay with me. If it gets too troublesome, I would understand if you returned to your own work." His eyes flashed like a cat's in low light before he turned to bring up the elevator and head down to street level.

Bruce wasn't entirely certain he believed Mohinder's diagnosis of what had occurred. Perhaps he did somehow hear the paper that far away, perhaps, but given the distance out of the lab, Bruce doubted it highly. An unconscious mental connection, given what he knew of another with certain possibilities, seemed more likely in the face of this vast amount of impossibilities today. Given that Mohinder had merely commanded a group of men to stop and they had listened.

Still, he chose to say nothing on it. "I told you, I'm coming with you, or I wouldn't still be here." He stepped up beside the other, adjusting the shoulder strap to his bag. Maybe it was insane to be doing this at all, given that it could go very poorly very quickly, but the idea of sending Mohinder out alone to deal with this would never have settled well on his conscience.

Though he might argue that he was able to soothe people to stop in their tracks not because he read their minds so much as was able to alter them, explaining that to Bruce might only upset him more. He could not hear what went on inside of his head but he could control it. Which was worse? Probably the latter.

Without thinking, or lifting his arm as was customary to call a cab, Mohinder called the nearest one over with a glance and after it pulled up, tha passenger riding inside of it eased out of the back seat and Mohinder took his place. Bruce could gawk or follow. It didn't matter. Mohinder was already giving directions to the lab.

And there he was, as far as Bruce was concerned, doing it again. He followed, but it was obvious from his expression and body language he was less than pleased with Mohinder. In the back of his mind, he wondered just how far this power went, and wondered if Mohinder even realized just how dangerous he was to be able to suggest such a thing. If the young man didn't get control over it properly...

His fingers tightened over the handle of the briefcase he didn't allow out of his grip, staring down at the dull surface. A part of him wondered if they would find anything at all in the lab, or even if the lab remained. Whatever Mohinder had gotten himself messed into, possibly HYDRA the more Bruce thought on it, the more obvious it became that they would not allow much to slip through their fingers. Perhaps they had no idea just what their little experiment would become in his full power, strong enough to resist them.

But Bruce knew how ruthless HYDRA could be when they wanted something. It was what he chewed on during the cab ride, remaining silent in a mix of thought and displeasure.

The silence in the back of the cab bothered him but Mohinder tried to put it out of his thoughts. He had so many more things to worry about, didn't he? The cab let them off at a street corner somewhere in the not so nice parts of the Lower East Side. Mohinder paid and tipped generously. He knew what it was like to drive a cab and while their driver was middle eastern and not Indian, he still wanted to pay it forward to a brother just trying to earn some money. At the corner, and not waiting for Bruce, Mohinder crossed the street and passed spray paint stenciled art work that depicted several pseudo HYDRA like images. He didn't notice, or seem to mind at least, and just kept walking to an alley.

The back door, thick metal, of what looked like an Indy record shop with a complicated keypad stood in the way of their progress. There were dumpsters to flanked it, and Mohinder used one to climb up and grab a folding fire escape ladder that hung just above it. He pulled it down for Bruce and slipped up to the third floor. A window there had a similar keypad and into this one, Mohinder punched a code. The window flung itself open, the brick around it slipping up as well to provide a door for them.

"It's one of the side entry ways," he said. He hadn't known about it until he felt it in his fingers upon passing one of the images actually. He didn't fill Bruce in on that either.

Bruce, however, did notice them and silently eyeballed the hell out of them before sighing. Damn it. How had Mohinder gotten mixed up so deeply with HYDRA? They had been able to use him so easily...

He followed Mohinder up the complicated way up, a brow raising at the surprising entrance, but he said nothing about it. Nothing about this felt right. Surely there were eyes on this building, waiting for Mohinder to return. Nervously he glanced around, studying the alley and all behind them, but it was silent. His gaze drifted to the rooftops but saw no figures there, either. That didn't mean they weren't being watched. "We can't stay for long," he said quietly before he ducked inside, eyes peering into the gloom.

"Says the man who requested to come with," Mohinder teased as if all of this was just a jaunt to the grocery store or the pharmacy and they weren't letting themselves into a dangerous underground lab that allowed or coerced Mohinder into killing himself while making him immortal.

Once inside, the facility played exactly as one might suspect. Mohinder found the lights (well no, he touched a wall and the lights came on, but whatever) and cold, white hallways laid out in a grid of mazes in front of them. None of the doors were labeled and all had security pads next to them but Mohinder knew the way. Or at least he walked straight ahead and expected Bruce to follow.

"Says the man who wanted to watch over his friend," Bruce grumbled, but a hint of a smile played over the edges of his lips before fading away again in the face of what they were doing. This whole place reminded him far too much of places that he had been in before, places he had worked and never wanted to be a part of again. His heartrate pushed a little more than he liked, eyes flickering as he tried to take in everything, feeling that faint tingle at the back of his neck.

He did follow Mohinder, listening carefully, knowing they might not be alone. Slow, deep breathes took in any faint lingering scent, trying to make sure not to be too obvious about the motion from long practice. Their steps echoed too loudly in the otherwise silent lab, which made him watch the floor. "...they would have come back to look for you," he whispered on a breath.

"More accurately, they ought to have had someone here waiting and they did not. I wandered the halls long enough for anyone to come for me. The electricity had been disconnected. There were only emergency lighting by the exits."

A very tiny smile lit upon his face as he slowed down for Bruce and took his wrist somewhat startlingly. He was trying to regulate his heartbeat from outside his body. Hopefully that thunk-thunk-thunk would calm itself down to a reasonable seventy-ish beats per minute.

"But no one is here. Everyone left me. Something must be wrong." He released Bruce's wrist after that and pushed open the door to the stairwell. It was pitch black so Mohinder used his phone for light.

"Perhaps it was less attempt to see if you change and more that of an assassination attempt-" Bruce cut off as Mohinder's fingers wrapped around his wrist, leaving the older scientist to look first for someone that might be out there, going into silence as he assumed it was a silent warning, but when no other sign of it came, it took a moment or two to realize that his heart rate wasn't sky high, leaping into his throat given the possible danger, but in fact slowing down. Another second or two to realize that Mohinder might somehow be behind that, and he pulled his wrist away. That felt far too much like exactly what he had told Mohinder not to do, even though his mind told him that Mohinder would not want Him out and it was a protective gesture.

That didn't mean he liked it, though.

Why would they just up and leave all of this? Something wasn't fully adding up, and it settled badly with him more nad more with each passing second. "...What if they found what they wanted, while you were down?" Bruce murmured softly, his eyes slowly adjusting to the single light source as he strained to see or hear anything down the stairwell. "What was down here?"

Could he have been so blind? Nothing Bruce said struck him as false. He had been slated to die and had not. They left him here because they did not believe he would wake up. No wonder they had come for him. “Labs. Test subjects. Video recording devices,” Mohinder said to answer Bruce’s question. He could feel the central hub of nerve endings for every electronic device. It was as if they throbbed against the walls, as if they had a pulse.

That Bruce removed himself from Mohinder’s touch did not bother the Indian. He remembered the mousey doctor and his displeasure of actually being physically close to anyone. Strange for a healer. Understandable now that he knew what Banner was about.

They paused on the stairs, but only because Mohinder stopped, turning when he was two steps below Bruce and putting himself physically lower than the older man.

“I’m not reading your thoughts,” he said abruptly. “I’m reading your scent and your breath and your skin. I know about your father. It would be best if we do not touch again.” It was as if Bruce’s skin was made of scales like a moth’s wings and touching them made those scales rub off on his fingertips.

"...Test subjects?" Bruce whispered as Mohinder finished that statement, the idea that they could be walking into something even more dangerous. Who knew what these people had done to their other test subjects, even if Mohinder had unintentionally become one. "If there is anything to collect..." He meant more under the category of the video recording devices, but a part of his mind said that anything alive down here would need to be dealt with as well.

When Mohinder suddenly stopped and turned, and said those words of any other, Bruce felt a surge of shame and anger that left his teeth gritting and even in the darkness of the stairwell, there was a flicker of green in his eyes. "What did I say?" He said low, taking a breath in through his nose that was loud in the small space. "Nothing about my scent or breath or skin would give away that." His words were that tight, over-enunciated type of real anger, and it would have shown on his face if there was more light.

Bruce's tone turned darker and more firm that Mohinder had ever heard it before out of the doctor. "You need to learn to control this and more importantly, control your mouth. We're in a dangerous situation where someone could be listening in - you don't say those sorts of things but even more so, you don't know what those words could be doing to the other person." As much of a hint as he was giving Mohinder on that particular edge.

"Volunteers. Agents. People in the organization," he clarified three times. This wasn't like Pinehearst. He wasn't given hobos off the street to experiment on and he wouldn't do that now anyway. He was relatively sure of that at least. It had been a feral side effect of the last time he experimented on himself-- He realized, amused and a little sad, that he had a terrible pattern.

Once Bruce was back to trying to be stern, to trying to set the world back together somehow that didn't reflect the way that Mohinder now saw it, the Indian allowed him to finish his scolding. Mohinder's eyes shone in the dark. It wasn't at all like a cat's reflective gaze, it was as if there was a light source behind the lens, inside of his skull. He didn't blink of breathe while Bruce told him off. He just tilted his head to the side.

"I need you to know what I know," he started simply. "If you're to stay with me through this, I need you to understand. You're wrong about everything, Doctor. What happens to you imprints on your skin in a physical way. It changes how you smell. You leave pieces and clues on everything you touch and if anyone touches you-- You must start to believe the things I tell you. Our minds don't connect. That's the one beautiful thing about this. Everything else connects. I didn't get into the heads of those people back at the Tower, you see? I whispered a suggestion into the air and that suggestion, my breath, touched them. I think I can see and feel and touch everything if I really try..."

He turned to start back down the steps.

"But I can't control the information pinging off of my skin when you're nearby. I am truly sorry. I should never have involved you." Through it all, no matter what he knew, at least Mohinder didn't judge... Even if Bruce was judging him pretty heavily. "Perhaps you should wait here. I'll get the information alone."