Prologue

   The Avengers are great heroes, and the world needs them. No one doubts that. But have you ever wondered who makes the Avengers possible?
   In this book, you will get an exclusive look into the people who help from behind the scenes, the ones who don’t get credit for all they do. They often get overlooked, but they should be considered just as important as the Avengers. Without them there might not be the Avengers team that has proved so crucial to the world.
   Here are some exclusive interviews with those who help from behind the curtain. When you next think of superheroes, remember these men and women, and the roles they play.

                                       Chapter One
                       Anna Parkley, S.H.I.E.L.D. Head Cook

   Is it even physically possible for someone to consume that much food? It feels like it shouldn’t be. It’s a nightmare to try and feed the Avengers. They eat more than anyone that I have ever met, and I have two teenage boys! It’s like they’re bottomless pits. And even when there is enough food, there still end up being problems. I don’t understand it. I really don’t.
   Thor, maybe I can get. He isn’t human, and it is probably different where he comes from. However, he does eat more than any of the other Avengers. I order ten or so boxes of pop-tarts, and within one day they’re all gone!
   Captain Rogers is almost as bad. I mean, I know that he’s a genetically enhanced supersoldier, but come on! So. Much. Food. I really hate it when he stays on the helicarrier. I like the guy plenty, but I need at least a week’s worth of notice to stock up on enough food. And the kitchen staff has to take turns explaining to him the things he doesn’t understand about the cooking things.
   Dr. Banner isn’t really bad at all. He’s nice and doesn’t really eat any more than a normal person, which is good. Mr. Stark, however, is a complete and total pain. Seriously, what is with that guy? He takes annoying to a whole new level. He’s sarcastic, rude and just obnoxious about the food. I think it comes from him being rich and having a whole team of personal chefs. That isn’t an excuse, though! We aren’t running a five star buffet here. We just try to make sure that everyone has nutrients enough to do their jobs.
   I guess that it’s Agents Romanoff and Barton who I understand the least. They eat nearly as much as Captain Rogers, but they aren’t even supersoldiers or living myths! They’re also just kind of creepy. It comes with the territory of being an assassin, I’m sure, but they scare the cooks even more than Dr. Banner. And the way that they know where everyone is at every single moment kind of freaks all the cafeteria workers out.
   I do like working at S.H.I.E.L.D., but those six make it hard. The world owes them a huge debt, but they make doing my part in keeping the world safe harder. I don’t do as much as the agents out there risking their live to take down the bad guys, but what I do is still kind of important. The real agents can’t do their jobs without food, and my team and I are the ones who provide them with that food. It doesn’t just appear magically.
   I guess what I’m trying to say is that I would like some more warning before the Avengers come to stay, or even when they are going to be here for just one meal. A little more respect from certain members of their team wouldn’t go amiss, either.

                                     Chapter Two
                 Jay Willets, S.H.I.E.L.D. Head Psychologist

   Why. Are. They. So. Stubborn. I’m supposed to be helping them! Why do they insist on being so uncooperative? Have they ever stopped to consider that maybe I actually want to help? That maybe since they’re required to come see me they might as well make the best of it? I don’t think they have, because every visit it’s the same.
   Captain Steve Rogers is never disrespectful, but he’s always hesitant, and I hardly ever get anything out of him. And he’s the best out of their team! I try to help with what little I know. I talk to him about how he feels about all of the changes, and I always ask him about how he’s doing with adjusting. But all I ever get is: “I’m fine”. Anyone who has been through what he has can’t be just “fine”. I try to explain that I will do my best to understand, that I can help, and that I’m a safe person to talk to, but I don’t think he listens to me.
   Dr. Bruce Banner is really quiet, and quite shy. That always makes for a harder conversation, but especially so here, with his job and his history. It’s awkward on my part, but I always push that out of the way. Why can’t he do the same? All I’m asking is that he says even one single word. But he doesn’t. He just sits. And sits. And sits, until the hour is up.
   Thor talks, but just about average everyday things. I don’t think that he understands what counseling is. So, for an hour I sit there and explain to him what all the “Midgardian contraptions”, as he says, are. I got my Phd. in psychology, not engineering. I don’t have any clue how to give more than a basic answer to any of his questions. And when I try to explain that just leads to more questions. It’s an endless loop!
   Mr. Tony Stark is just an absolute and total nightmare to work with. He’s sarcastic, annoying, and… I don’t even know what. He makes annoying remarks, comments on how low-tech everything is here, and tries to get me to give him the instruction manual on how to fly the helicarrier. Why would I, of all people, even have that!? When he gets bored of that, he resorts to talking about super-complicated technological stuff, all of which is way above my head. I don’t know how much longer I can handle having him on my schedule.
   Agent Clint Barton is very skilled at not talking about what he doesn’t want to. He and Agent Natasha Romanoff. They can turn any conversation all the way around in a matter of seconds. I know that they both have really awful pasts, and they need to talk to someone, but neither of them lets me give them the help that they require. And, I have to admit I’m a little afraid of getting them mad. You know, since they’re both master assassins who could kill me in about two seconds flat!
   S.H.I.E.L.D. pays me to have meaningful conversations with their agents. I make sure that the agents all get the mental help they need, so that they don’t go crazy and start running around on a killing spree. I’m good at my job, and I pride myself on being patient, and not ever having snapped and started screaming like a crazy person at any of my charges. The Avengers are threatening to break that streak. I think that I might have to talk to Director Fury about switching them over to someone else for a little while.

                                    Chapter Three
           Mandy Terren, S.H.I.E.L.D. Transportation Manager

   How? How? How is it possible for someone to manage this? Do you even have any idea how much those jets costs? The special cars? The custom designed motorcycles? Really dang expensive, that’s how much. Yet somehow, every mission they have, they come back with their jet trashed, cars totaled, and motorcycles destroyed. They’re not weapons to be flung at tanks, crashed into buildings, or driven off freeways.
   Do you know how many vehicles they destroyed in their past five missions? Thirteen. Thirteen top-of-the-line, wonderful, perfectly designed vehicles. Eight fighter jets. Three bulletproof cars. Two motorcycles (with many extra features). All destroyed in their stupid fights.
   They go out and destroy them, and then come back and expect them to be replaced in time for their next mission. It takes months just to design, build, and then test the products to make sure that they don’t malfunction and kill the World's Greatest Heroes. But noooo. They don’t appreciate it. The next time a mission comes around, they come back with another jet turned to scrap metal, car used as a shield, or motorcycle used as a bomb or something.
   In addition to that, whenever another mode of transportation is destroyed, I am the one who has to fill out all the paperwork. I’m the one who has to go to the engineers and explain why their brand new Quinjet has only one working wing. I’m the one who has to go to the manufacturers and tell them that they need a new fancy bullet proof car. Never the Avengers. It’s not fair! If they’re going to break every piece of equipment that they're given, they should be the ones having to explain to people what happened, and ask for a replacement.
   I’m not asking for a miracle. I do understand that they have very dangerous jobs, and that broken stuff is an occupational hazard. I really do get that. But would it be too much to ask for them to at least show a little care and at least try to protect the vehicles? To try not to crash them into buildings, or bridges, or people, within the first ten minutes of a mission?
   I really need to talk to Agent Hill about maybe giving them a pamphlet or something, because every time I see one of the modes of transportation that they’ve used, I feel my heart rate increase, and I feel that much closer to just trying to murder them all in their sleep. I have to find a solution to this, before someone does something that ends up with someone hurt or dead.

                                     Chapter Four
           James Harris, S.H.I.E.L.D. Communications Expert

   They do it just to be mean. That’s my conclusion. The Avengers are mean. And they have a plan to make all the communications people go mad. That is the only explanation for this.
   No one should need to talk that much. The comm devices are for easy, undetectable communication during missions and battles, not for having an extensive, annoying conversation. Those things are expensive to keep running. Yet they use them to annoy each other and talk for hours. Don’t they realize that some people have to go back over their conversations to make sure that nothing important was skipped over or dismissed during a mission? It’s excruciating to have to wade through all the pointless chatter to get to the important stuff!
   Iron Man is the worst. He talks almost non-stop, and after about three minutes his voice gets really annoying. Even his teammates who have something to distract them from his incessant talking have to tell him to be quiet or get off the comm channel. What does he have against silence?
   Not that the rest of them are really any better. Thor’s language is just really old, and he uses words that aren’t even in the human language. Sometimes it takes a full minute to figure out what he meant. And then there are the times when he shorts out his very special device with his lightning. It’s maddening.
   Captain America is just kind of loud. He doesn’t talk more than is necessary, but he has a bit of a hard time understanding that he he doesn’t need to yell for the other members of his team to hear him. I’m fairly certain that he just doesn’t get all the new technology, but he could be in on the plot to annoy the communications department to death. I’m not sure.
   Hawkeye is sometimes quiet, but other times he joins in with Iron Man, talking, retorting, and being very sarcastic and obnoxious. He’s definitely in on the conspiracy. One day I will catch them talking about it and they will be busted.
   Black Widow is just scary. She hardly ever talks, which is good, but when she does, her comm picks up scary stuff, like the sound of breaking bones, thuds of bodies hitting the ground, and other such noises. It’s enough to make sure that no one from my department will ever mess with her. The Hulk doesn’t have a comm. The Avengers haven’t asked for one for him yet. That’s good, because if he did have one, we would all go deaf, and good luck with finding anyone else willing to do this job, Fury.
   On the other hand, it would mean that I finally had concrete proof about their plotting against my team. I just really hope that they mature and quit being so unbearable soon, because I am not sure how much longer I can take this.

                                    Chapter Five
         Darryl Sullie, S.H.I.E.L.D. Head of Medical Department

   Aaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrrrrrrgh!!!!!!!! I am a very knowledgeable, incredibly talented doctor! I have gone through years of training! I was valedictorian of my class! I could perform open heart surgery if I needed to! Why won’t they listen to me when I tell them to do something?!!!!!
   They come back from a mission, all banged up with cuts, concussions, and broken bones, and do they ever voluntarily come in to see me and my medical team? No. They never do. I only ever see them when Fury, one of the other high ranking agents, or their teammates force them to.
   And even then, they’re uncooperative! I tell them that they need a cast. They say “No, I’m fine, just give me a bandage”. I tell them that they need to stay in bed for a few days. They leave as soon as my back is turned. And when they do listen to me, they complain, or go all gloomy and antsy, or, in Agent Barton and Agent Romanoff’s case, they just stare at my staff until they release them early because they’re too creeped out to continue treating them.
   I just want to do my job and stop them from bleeding out all over the floor, but apparently that is too much to ask from them. Stark is whiney and infuriating, Rogers is so stoic that he doesn’t ever tell me anything about what’s wrong, Thor is convinced that just because he’s tougher than the other members on his team he can’t get hurt, Banner thinks that since the Hulk is the one who fights, he doesn’t need to be looked at, and Romanoff and Barton are just really stubborn.
   Even when I’m treating an unconscious Avenger they don’t cooperate. They jerk and twitch in their sleep. When this happens, my medical group and I get out of the way as quickly as possible, because soon they will start trying to fight us in their sleep. They kick out, their arms and fists flail, and we have learned to remove all their weapons first or they will attempt to use them while unconscious. It is so, so frustrating.
   The Avengers will also team up on me to get one of them out of the hospital. They cajole, pester, and present me with facts until I give in and let whichever one of them it is that time out. The times I don’t relent, they will sometimes smuggle the wounded member out of the hospital. I sometimes have to literally tie them to the hospital bed.
   Why do they hate us so much? We’re just trying to do our job! It’s my job to make sure that they don’t die from their wounds or have to enter into an early retirement because they are crippled for life.
   I like my job because I get to help people who would otherwise die, but oh... my... goodness, the Avengers will be the death of me. They give me gray hair, and if they don’t have an attitude adjustment, and soon, I will go to Director Fury and demand to be transferred to some other location. I refuse to deal with this for much longer.

                                     Chapter Six
          Marcus Tarl, S.H.I.E.L.D. After Mission Cleanup Crew

   Why do they do it? Why? What have we ever done to them? What causes them to leave such destruction in their wake, and then force us to clean all of it up by ourselves?
   Being on the Avengers After Mission Cleanup Crew is the worst nightmare known to man. It turns your dreams dark, and leaves you exhausted. You have to clean up whole buildings they have knocked down. Steel, brick, plaster, all of it. It has to be cleaned up.
   To clear even one street, I have to get bulldozers, cranes, carrying trucks, all of it just to clear a street. Those things aren’t cheap. They also require an  extensive knowledge of machinery to operate, and not everyone at S.H.I.E.L.D. has that extensive knowledge. So, I have to find people willing to work them, and those people are few and far between. It’s miserable.
   Not only buildings fall, however. There are gas leaks from gas stations, chemical leaks from all over the places, and water pipes broken everywhere. Those things need to be taken care of too. Who do the Avengers think does that? Magical fairies? No, it’s the cleanup crew. Whenever they have a big battle, we get calls for weeks and weeks about leaks, toxic puddles, and flammable fumes.
   Then there are the actual villains that they fought. These nutters that the Avengers take down always have armies, and to defeat the main guy, there are tons of minions to take down. They just lie in the streets until someone picks them up. That’s also my job. It’s really important to get to that part of cleanup quickly, because otherwise it smells absolutely atrocious.
   I know that they have the really hard, life threatening job, but my crew does important work, too. If it weren’t for us, then the streets would remain impassible, there would be chemicals and oil leaks and body parts everywhere, and the whole area would smell so bad that upon walking out a door, normal people without gas masks would immediately feel nauseous, and after about ten seconds they would be lightheaded and unable to go anywhere. This is an undesirable situation, so my team is needed very badly.
   The Avengers are nice people, but I really wish that they would try to make a little less mess while fighting. Why can’t they take their battles to the mountains or deserts or somewhere with fewer buildings? At the very least, a thank-you note or a fruit basket. We would appreciate it a lot.

                                       Epilogue

   As these interviews have proved, the people who help support the Avengers, who deal with them and the things surrounding them on a day to day basis are just as important as those out there physically defeating the bad guys. They should be appreciated and respected.
   Many kids dream of being a member of the Avengers when they grow up. But how about a S.H.I.E.L.D. doctor or communications expert? Those jobs not only help just as much as the team of the World’s Greatest Heroes, but they have a much higher rate of employees actually making it to retirement.
   So, next time you think of heroes, think of these people as well. They are just as much of a hero as Captain America or Black Widow.