"We have to figure this out people." Stephan said in annoyance as looked around the lab.  

"We've been over this like a million times. There's no way they have the safety over the timing working in sync over that much power." Alex/Paul said with a dirty look toward Stephan, they've been stuck on this for over four hours and everyone was tired. But Stephan, their chief, refused to let anyone go until there was some kind of breakthrough.  

"Maybe if we added a program to drop them in a certain order." Nathan spoke up in a tired and hopeful voice. 

"No we tried that, it blew up, next." Stephan said in a condescending tone.  

"You know we're all tapped out here, why don't we all go home, and sleep on it. Who knows, with fresh eyes we might figure this out." Alex/Paul said in a tired voice, his shoulder drop as he massaged his neck.  

Stephan turned toward Paul, his face red with anger."We are not going anywhere! I promised Mr. Stark results by the end of the week." He stared at Paul daring him to defy his orders.  

"But its Friday, are you saying that we have less than 3 hours until this deadline? And just when pray tell did you moron promise this?" As Leo went from confused to angry at this new revelation.  

"Mr. Stark asked me for an update, this morning and I told him you should have an answer on his desk tomorrow." Stephan raised his head up, his chest puffed out in pride. He narrowed his eye at Leo not liking his tone toward him.  

Everyone else groaned in annoyance, Stephan might be the project chief but he was universally hated by his entire team and any other who had the misfortune to work with him. He kept them in the dark about the deadline that he promised, and always managed to slide any accident of responsibility on whomever he had it out more for that day. Docking pay or a mark on their record was added every time they couldn't deliver on his maverick leadership. Add on the fact that he was arrogant, and he believed himself superior to all but his idol of worship Howard Stark.  

Alex/Paul massaged his head trying to remember the movie of Captain America's origin story, trying to picture the experiment scene. He hoped he could glimpse some inspiration from it. Suddenly he remembered all the big ass boxes around the chamber. "What if we use computers outside of the chamber, connected by wires, could it work?" He mumbled quietly.  

Leo turned to him "What was that?" An intrigued look on his face.  

Alex/Paul looked up, he was only half focused on them when he spoke he was still trying to work of the Maths. "I said what if we use outside computers connected by wires from the floor, we could program each with a different timer, so that each injection goes down in order. And since they are not touching the chamber, the power won't need to loop, since we can cut the power toward the computers after the injection." He looked around as the idea became cleared as he was voice it out loud.  

"Yes that would work, it solves all the problem we've had. Outside instead of inside. Ha so simple." Nathan excitement covered his face as he saw the light out, of the tunnel.  

"Well done my boy! We finally got something that could work." A huge grin on Leo face as he went over the idea in his head. Calculating all the variables that they would need to make it work.  

A look of jealousy and frustration was on Stephan's face. "Fine, we go with that let's get started."  

The team came back to reality and move toward making what was discussed. A few hours later they finally had a working prototype. Stephan waved them away telling them they could go home and have the weekend off.  

Alex sigh in relief, he waved goodbye to Leo and Nathan, and gave a brief node to Stephan as he walked away. When they came in on Monday he wouldn't be surprised, nor would the other two, in learning that his idea miraculously became Stephan's Idea. Just another reason why no one wanted to work with the asshole.  

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

"I knew the guy was an asshole, but I needed to get on the team. The Boss's wanted an inside man on the project." He remembered receiving the order from the Pentagon. Keep them informed on the project and record all the steps in the report. " Probably someone wants to reproduce the project in their own image somewhere."  

He signed off at the desk, waving at the guard and walking toward his car to go home. Well at least to Paul Monroe's home, it's a good thing that he was only on the prototype project, and not on the liaison team to professor Reinstein. Or else the good doctor would start having some doubts about him. Not good if he was tasked with keeping tabs on the Professors and keeping his trust at the same time.  

He finally arrived at his apartment, he parked his car, locked up and walked to the entrance. Inside the lobby, the security guard looked up. "Coming home late today Mr. Monroe, burning the midnight oil?"  

"Yeah, the boss was riding our ass about a bullshit deadline cause he got caught with his pants down. Any message for me?" Alex asked with a tired grin.  

"Heh, ain't that the truth. Nope, no messages for you tonight. Get up there and get some rest, night Mr. Monroe." The guard responded with a chuckle.  

Alex waved his hand in the air as he walked to the elevator. Once the door chimed, he entered and pressed for the 10th floor. Resting his back on the elevator wall as he waited for the slow crawl up.  

Once he arrived at his floor, he walked down the corridor to his door, took out his keys, open his door walked in, closing and relocking it behind him, then froze.  

His head was down when he came in, his back to his apartment, he was facing his door and he was staring, the tiny sliver of wood that he had slanted against his door this morning. It was gone, someone had been in here, or could still be in his apartment. Continuing as if nothing were wrong, he knocked his head on the door gave a tired groan. "Fucking Stephan, I'm going to beat his ass one day." He spoke out loud.  

He turned, walking casually to his kitchen, flicking on the kitchen lights, dropping his stuff on the ground as he made a beeline straight to the fridge. Angling himself to see into the lounge, Alex opened the fridge door and grabbed some random container of leftovers and placed it on the counter, next he opened a cupboard, reached in and placed his hand up, grabbed his gun taped to the ceiling of the cupboard. Alex spined around, rapidly ducked down and firing off a shot toward the shadowy silhouette he had spotted in his peripheral vision.  

Bang!  

The shadow ducked down, hidden behind the couch and also fired a few rounds in return. Bang! Bang! Bang!  

Alex returned fire as he leaned out from the side of the kitchen wall separating it from the living room. Bang! Bang!  

The shadow was quietly cursing as it rolled away and fired. Bang! Bang! Bang!  

Alex moved away from the door, to the opening to the open counter wall of the kitchen he quickly shot up fired again. Bang! Bang! And he quickly ducked back down.  

The shadow offered more cursing as he move around dogging, trying to get to the wall of the bedroom for cover. As he wildly fired his last bullets. Bang! Bang! Bang! Click!  

As soon as Alex heard the click he rushed out of cover, speeding toward the Shadow.  

The shadow with one last silent curse threw his empty gun at Alex. He then also rushed at him.  

Alex barely dodged out of the way of the gun coming toward his face, in the process he lost his balance which gave his assailant the chance to tackle him. Alex got launched up in the air and slammed back down on his coffee table, smashing it to pieces. He lets out a groan as he tries to aim his gun at his attacker.  

The shadow grappled his gun away as his other arm punched him in the face. Alex got his arm up in time to block as he swung his legs down to the ground trying to buck his attacker off him.  

A distinctly male gasp of surprise was heard as the shadow stumbled off him, but in the ensuing chaos, he lost his gun. With no time to look for it, Alex grabbed a broken leg of the coffee table and attempted to smack it on the head of his attacker.  

The guy managed to move his head back, out of the way but it still grazed him, over the forehead cutting him enough for blood to flow, blinding him in one eye.  

By this time Alex has gotten back up on his feet, he started swinging the makeshift club at his assailant. Trying to inflict maximum damage or cause him to make a mistake so that he can capitalize on it.  

The shadow did his best to block the club with his arms, he twisted and turned his body, but suddenly he miscalculated a swing thanks to his blood blocking his sight creating a blind spot just for a second.  

Alex quickly twisted his body and delivered a devastating knee to his attacker's gut. Knocking the wind out his lungs, his guard dropped. Using all of his upper body strength he slammed the club down on the shadow's head. A loud crack sounded in the apartment, as the shadow's body slumped down to the ground.  

"Who fuck are you?" Alex gasped heavily to the unconscious shadow on the ground.