"I don't think anyone says that," Bruce replied evenly, absently, his eyes scanning along the page to settle on the page number in the corner: 3. Christ. He set the book down in his lap, and turned his head to peer down at Tony where he'd burrowed into what Bruce had to remind himself was, after all, his own bed. "But - maybe they do," he conceded. "People say all kinds of moronic things about heroes."
Anyway, Rogers' character wasn't a subject in which he was sufficiently interested to give it much space in a discussion; it didn't really matter. Actions taken were the only real measure of a person, and he didn't really feel anyone was owed the courtesy of having those actions interpreted in the context of their own story. That wasn't how they affected anyone, after all - no one looked at a shattered road or a burning building or a city fallen from the sky and thought to themselves, wow, this provides so much valuable understanding of Bruce Banner's failed redemption narrative. Hero, coward - who fucking cared. The story as the model for human existence was really an unfortunate development; probably too late to change it, though. By a few hundred thousand years.
"So - you punched Steve in the face. Presumably that didn't end with either of you using your words. And that was it, and the Avengers were no more. Not an auspicious introduction for your new protege. But he stuck around, I guess." It would have been easy to comment upon how young people failed to appreciate their own mortality, but it wasn't like many of them had aged out of it yet - and so it would hardly have been fair. "That seems less than ideal."