cap_ironman_fe (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
cap_ironman_fe) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
cap_ironman2012-01-02 05:21 am
cap_ironman_fe) wrote in cap_ironman2012-01-02 05:21 am
Entry tags:
Happy Holidays, ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
espadas part one!
Title: Team Building Activities
Author:valtyr
Beta:dorcas_gustine
Rating: R
Parings: Steve/Tony, Pepper/Tony, Clint and Natasha are open to interpretation.
Universe: Movieverse
Wordcount: 40k
A/N: This got out of hand. You can carve that on my tombstone.
Summary: Fury's a beautiful princess. Clint's plotting a Communist revolution. Rhodey's not sexy. Wall-E's not a documentary. Clint's not gay but he does give a great blowjob. This fic is not an AU.
Part One - Part Two - Part Three - Part Four - Part Five
Captain America was just where Director Fury had said he would be; viciously attacking a punch bag in the gym, which was surprisingly low-tech and lacking in efficient purpose for a SHIELD establishment. Pepper paused on the threshold for a moment, to admire the flexing muscles of back and shoulder. He'd been at it long enough to work up a sweat, and his t-shirt clung as if he'd been vacuum-packed into it.
The moment stretched, only the impact of fists on bag, and his sneakers squeaking on the floor breaking the silence. Pepper might have carried on watching for a long time, but a hiccup escaped her throat; he spun round, balanced on the balls of his toes, and Pepper exchanged appreciative look for bright introductory smile. He took a step back, and Pepper dimmed the brightness a few levels. Possibly she should have refused that last drink, but Director Fury had been so politely insistent.
"Good afternoon, Captain," she said in a happily-steady tone. "I'm Mr Stark's - " she almost said personal assistant out of years of habit, almost corrected to girlfriend, decided technical boss would lead to confusion, and settled on " - friend."
Captain America favoured her with a confused glower that really wasn't very intimidating, with the pouty mouth and big, confused eyes. She had a vague urge to pinch his cheek, although that might have been the espresso Martini talking.
"Did he send you?"
"Well, no," she admitted, and he turned to glare at the punch bag again. "Director Fury suggested I might want to try getting you two to re-open diplomatic relations." Director Fury had taken her out to a very nice lunch, been far more charming than Tony's descriptions of him had led her to believe possible, and then benevolently invited her to do exactly what she'd been wanting to do for a fortnight.
She'd have a word with JARVIS about moving his calls up the priority list. He clearly had their best interests at heart, after all. She stepped into the room and walked round the Captain in a wide circle so she could see his expression, which was dubious. Seeing his chest outlined by damp white cotton was just a bonus.
"Well, maybe I don't want to," Captain America poked at the gym floor with his toe, scowling. "He said I was - "
"I think we can all agree that things were said that shouldn't have been," Pepper gave him a stern look, and he drooped. Technically, he'd taken the step to out-and-out aggression, but Tony had been deliberately needling him for an hour. Still, if he couldn't handle Tony, he was never going to survive being on a superhero team. He'd be all over the gutter press the first time he lost his temper with a reporter. "I was thinking that you, being the better man and all, might want to take the first step - "
"No," he interrupted. Pepper glared. He scowled. That was unhelpful. Tony had been sulking steadily since the blowup; he'd apparently not expected Captain America to have quite such an instinct for weak points. The crack about Howard had been wounding.
The odds of getting him to make the first move were slim to none.
"Would it really hurt?" she tried, and he shrugged and looked down at his feet.
"I tried already," he admitted when Pepper didn't speak. "Called three times, got an automated message. I persuaded someone to take me over, got the same message from the intercom, and a robot blew a raspberry at me through the window."
Tony hadn't shared those little details. She gritted her teeth.
"Well. So if I can get you access, you'll apologise?" Shuffle, shuffle, she hadn't expected him to fidget, somehow. She'd had a vague image of him striking heroic poses, and holding them. Like a statue.
"I guess," he fixed her with a very sincere gaze. "I am sorry."
"All right." She waited. He looked at her in puzzlement. "Take those things off your hands, then." He looked down at the tapes in puzzlement, then his eyebrows shot up.
"Now?" He tugged at the hem of his damp shirt doubtfully. "I should clean up."
"Yes, now." She looked pointedly up at the clock. By now, Tony could have Not Cared his way to Hawaii for some performance sulking. It was the time for action, and anyway, she was quite happy to look at him the way he was for the duration of the car ride. "Come on, you can take off the tape in the car."
"I'm not supposed to leave - "
"Agent Hill is waiting in the car."
"Well," he tugged nervously at the tape. "Well, okay."
Tony glared up at Captain America, who blinked guileless eyes and tugged his shirt over his head at the nurse's command. She pressed the stethoscope to his chest with what Tony judged as more than necessary fondling.
Dummy made a noise like phhhbbbt and Tony looked away from the big screen to see a blond figure lurking on the other side of the soundproofed glass door. Tony sighed, and drummed his fingers on the steering wheel. He was going to have to talk to the guy eventually, after all; Fury would probably welcome the opportunity to bounce him back off the team.
"JARVIS, lose Cap TV and then let him in." The screen turned to Wall-E, which served the dual purpose of diverting Dummy's attention, and Captain America slipped through the door and advanced towards him, looking around like a kid in a very confusing toy store. The look he cast at the glowing transparent 3-D models was distinctly covetous; when his eyes settled on the vintage Cadillac Tony was seated in, he looked suitably impressed. Tony would probably have been pleased to impress Captain America a few weeks ago. Before he'd discovered that the great hero was actually a complete jerk.
"What do you want, Uncle Sam?" He slumped lower in the seat, tapping his foot on the accelerator as if he could flee the conversation. Although the guy could probably chase him down like the Terminator. "Come to criticise my work ethic? Because I'm working now, this is work, you're actually disrupting my work here, shame on you."
The Captain's head turned to the screen, where EVE was zooming through the wreckage of Earth.
"I'm sorry to interrupt your work," and okay, that was hilarious. Tony could have fun with a guy who had no pop-culture references later than 1945. His smile apparently encouraged the Captain, because he smiled tentatively back and continued. "I came to apologise," he said. "I was hoping we could start again."
"Why? I'm just a drunken thrillseeker in tin can, right?" He folded his arms, smile dying, and the Captain shook his head.
"Tin can was Clint," he corrected, and Tony gritted his teeth. Pedantry, really.
"Oh, I'm sorry, what did you call it?"
"Nothing?" He rubbed a hand over the back of his neck, and tried another smile. "I think your armour's pretty amazing."
"Oh." Tony tapped his feet against the pedals some more. Amazing was all right."Well, maybe I shouldn't have said that about freezing causing brain cells to burst," he offered magnanimously.
"Right." The Captain's eyes widened earnestly. "And I'm sorry for saying you're spoiled and - "
"All right, let's not go through the litany." Tony sighed. "Who made you come and apologise?"
"No one. I felt bad."
"Huh." Tony cast him a thoughtful glance. He was a nice enough kid. And Tony was an adult, and all, technically. And something about teamwork, and so on. And he had to admit the idea of being even casually friendly with Captain America was something of a guilty thrill, if said Captain was willing to be suitably respectful of his amazing accomplishments.
The Captain apparently took his silence for doubt.
"Pepper got me past the robot," he volunteered. "She's nice." Well, he had good taste at least. If it would make Pepper happy, Tony could make up.
"The robot?" Tony glanced at Dummy, who had clearly not required Pepper's intervention.
"Why is it British?"
"That's not a robot, it's an artificial intelligence. It's British because all the best butlers are British." The Captain's brow furrowed briefly, as if in consideration, and Tony felt his mouth twitch up. "I just thought it sounded better."
"It sounds great," he agreed. "I would never have thought it wasn't a real person. Do they have Laws of Robotics?"
"Laws... wouldn't have pegged you for an Asimov fan."
"I read some of his stories." He tipped his head, eyes brightening. "I was an illustrator, did some stuff for the magazines before I enlisted. I had a picture in that issue, the one - Runaway, Runaround, about the robot - "
"Runaround. Huh," Tony shook his head, and then leaned sideways and tugged the latch of the car door. It swung open, and the Captain looked down at it, and then back at Tony. "Well, sit down."
"Are we going somewhere?" He sat down obediently, folding his long legs into the footwell.
"No. Unless you want to?"
"Not really." He looked up at the screen. "What are we watching?"
"Uh - " Tony glanced between him and the screen. "A documentary. About the rubbish heaps of the West Coast, and the efforts to reclaim them."
"Really?" he said, with an innocent trust that almost made Tony feel guilt, and settled in to watch.
Surprisingly, Steve didn't get mad when he figured out Tony was lying. (Fifty-four minutes in.) He laughed, and punched Tony gently in the shoulder. By the time he left, making Tony promise to attend the next Avengers meeting, Tony thought they were - not friends, but friendly. There was definitely friendship potential.
Tony resolved that in due course, when scheduling allowed, Tony would make some kind of friendly overture, take him to the IMAX or bring him freeze-dried ice-cream. Bring him a DVD of Soylent Green with a faked-up cover claiming it was based on a true story. Something, anyway.
After escorting Steve back up to the lobby, he realised he'd barely left the basement workshop in three days, and took the elevator to the penthouse.
"Traitor," he said to Pepper, who was lying on the couch watching Jeopardy and eating an oversized muffin.
"I hope you weren't horrible to him," she muttered around a mouthful of what looked like lemon and poppyseed, because Pepper was weird like that.
"Not especially." Tony investigated her leftovers, and claimed half a ham and cheese sandwich. "We watched a movie."
"Huh," Pepper squinted up at him. "Better than I hoped. Go and have a shower, you look like a crazy person. I'm surprised the Captain didn't run screaming."
"How would he know? I bet we all seem crazy to him." He wandered in the direction of the shower, pondering what kind of present he could take Captain America.
Steve re-settled himself in his chair - how, in the future, did they still not have comfortable chairs in meeting rooms - and surveyed the huge map that hung on the wall. It continued to be uninformative; Clint yawned, and then sat upright as the door clicked open to reveal Tony Stark. Steve smiled at him, and was pleased to get a smile back.
"Hey, it's the man himself," Clint said brightly. "And only half an hour late! Truly a red-letter day."
"Clint," Steve turned and gave him a stern look. They'd only just smoothed things over between him and Tony; they didn't need Clint getting into it with Tony.
"Aye aye, Captain. Stark! Buddy! How come your armour can break Mach 3 but you can't get - "
"Clint," Steve grabbed his arm and turned him back to face the huge map on the wall, and Tony moved up beside him. He reached out and tapped the head of one pin, the one in New York; pins scattered through the US, South America through India, a couple in Europe, Tunisia, West Egypt.
"Banner sightings?"
"Small pins are Banner. Larger pins are... other Banner." Monster seemed such a dramatic way of putting it.
"I can't believe you're using a physical map." Tony poked it. "How do you - are these little date stickers attached to the pins, that is adorable. Barton, I know SHIELD has better than this. I could do better with my phone."
"Really?" Steve folded his arms, mouth quirking a little. SHIELD were pretty persistent about dumbing the tech down for him; he was half-convinced these meeting were all an elaborate charade to ease him gently into the twenty-first century ways of doing things. Which would certainly explain Tony's reluctance to show up to them. "Go on, then."
Tony smirked at him, and pulled what was presumably his phone out of his pocket, although Steve couldn't have picked it out of a line-up. If pressed, he'd have guessed it as a picture frame.
"Permission to show off, Captain?"
"Knock yourself out, soldier."
Tony tapped at the transparent part of the phone, and it fired with light. Under Tony's tapping fingers it all moved too fast and confusing for Steve to catch, like listening to a foreign language. Tony backed up and waved them aside, and the phone made a noise like a camera-shutter.
Then he turned, and projected the world on the wall - not a map, but -
"The clouds are moving," Steve said, enchanted, and peered closer. Amazingly detailed - he could make out the Grand Canyon, and there were little snowcapped mountain ranges.
"Yeah, that's live satellite imaging." Tony spoke casually, but he was grinning. "Say if you want anything blown up."
"Blown up?"
"Enlarged," Tony said hastily, and Steve felt like an idiot. "No satellite weapons systems - there was a proposal to get some up there, but - never mind."
Steve turned back to the image to hide his blush and - there was a giant pin sticking out of Nebraska, and orbiting it was a date. He waved his finger through it, and the numbers scattered and reformed. "Your phone can read?"
"It has text recognition," Tony sounded incredibly smug, and Steve couldn't blame him.
"It's amazing." He glanced at Clint, who looked bored. "It is amazing, right? Or does your phone do this?"
"Are you kidding? I'm a field agent. SHIELD buys all my phones, and they don't do anything that hasn't been signed off in triplicate by Financial."
"What Barton means is, this is truly, truly amazing. He's in awe."
"It's a very shiny and expensive version of the map we already had, Stark. Well done."
"True," Tony's grin didn't waver. "You have incident reports? Hardcopy, you're shitting me." His eyes flicked to Steve, and then he dropped the subject, which confirmed Steve's suspicion they didn't usually hand out big stacks of paper. The map vanished as he turned away. Click-whir, and he flicked rapidly through the pages.
"Is that secure?" Steve asked, and Clint looked faintly guilty.
"We may technically be putting highly classified documents on an unauthorised system, yes."
"Don't be a baby, Barton, me and my phone were invited to this meeting." He turned back, and this time when he recreated the map, swirls of data surrounded each pin like tiny galaxies.
"Hurrah, this solves everything," Clint deadpanned, and Steve elbowed him in the ribs. "Jeez, Cap, just because you're enjoying Cirque de Stark doesn't mean - "
"Show a date progression with size in order of SHIELD assessment of severity, size in order of collateral damage estimate by local authorities, colour from violet to red estimated property damage." Tony arched an eyebrow at Clint, who shut up.
And there it was, the very first incident - a severe one, but short. A few less severe ones, heading south, one that lasted for almost a minute and trailed slowly across Arkansas. Down to Mexico - two incidents, brief and violent - then Brazil, and the incidents settled, becoming less severe, further apart.
"A lot of this is second-hand info, reconstructed later from eyewitnesses and police records," Clint said, and Steve nodded.
"Seems to be a pattern, though - ah." A big, bright glow, yellow-orange. "That?"
"A team sent to capture him." Clint shrugged. "We've got hardly any data on that."
"And so he ran," Tony muttered, gesturing to the next light in Virginia. "Another team?"
"Yeah. And then - " New York lit up in blazing scarlet, and Clint grimaced. "That wasn't all Banner. The army managed to hire a guy who turned himself into something even worse than Banner, went on the rampage, Banner offered to take him down. Big fight."
"Banner offered to help," Steve repeated. That was the interesting thing; Banner had willingly unleashed his beast. To help. "And then back on the run again, huh?" Small incidents, in Brazil, then Peru, then a sudden jump to Tunisia. "Army close in?"
"They suck," Clint shook his head with an air of professional disapproval. "Didn't get near him that time."
"All the incidents are violet, now," Steve said. "He's not causing much in the way of damage."
"Even though they're lasting a while," Tony nodded. "Ah - freeze - what's this one, Clint?"
"They caught up with him that time. Took a beating."
"See, SHIELD rate it severe, but collateral damage is negligible."
"The direct damage, however, was impressive." Natasha strolled in, all smart, professional suit and towering heels, and eyed the map. Steve should probably make noises about lateness, but he hadn't said anything to Tony, and she was carrying four cups of coffee, which he approved of. "We think he's learning control over his transformation."
"That's the conclusion we were coming to, I'm so glad we could duplicate work already done." Tony glared at Natasha, and flicked the map of light shut. Steve tried not to look disappointed; maybe he could corner Tony later and get him to show off some more.
"What we want to know is where he's going." Natasha sat down, crossing one stockinged leg over the other, and began removing the coffees from their cardboard holder. Clint grabbed two, and passed one to Steve; Tony advanced cautiously towards a third, and then darted in and grabbed it. Steve assumed he was pretending to be afraid of Natasha. "The army chase him, and sometimes catch up with him; then he destroys everything and flees. How can we predict where he's going, gentlemen?"
"We can't," Tony said irritably. "He's not going anywhere; he's going away. Call the army off, let him settle, then you can... do what you want, and probably get a lot of things destroyed."
"It's not in our power to call the army off," Natasha pursed her lips. "This is an army operation, and we're just support."
"And Ross is a dick," Tony added helpfully. Natasha said something very explicit in Russian, and Steve choked on his coffee. "Wow, Natasha, what was that?"
"I didn't know you spoke Russian," Natasha sounded slightly apologetic, and having a lady apologising for swearing in front of him was really, really embarrassing.
"Mostly swear words," he admitted. "Bucky and Gabe used to bilk them at poker." It barely hurt at all to say that; he took another swig from him coffee, which tasted nothing at all like the stuff he'd drunk in the war.
"Let's get back to hating Ross," Tony clapped his hands together. "Raise your hand if you think he's a dick. You too, Clint? Awesome. Come on, Steve, you're odd man out."
"That doesn't help," Steve tried the stern look on all of them; Natasha actually laughed out loud, though she did lower her hand. He was sure this had been easier in the War. Tony sighed, and began to fiddle with his phone again. "Solutions to predicting Banner's movements? How does he travel?"
"Half the time, he just jumps," Clint said. "He can cover over a mile in one jump. Sure, it's slow, but it gets him out of situations fast, he doesn't need roads, and we can't track him on radar. When he's good and lost, he Banners it up and he's a nondescript nerd of average height and weight again. Thousands like him wandering around the world looking for inner peace or writing travel guides."
"If we can't predict where he's going, we need to choose a place and send him there," Steve said. Clint snorted.
"Good luck driving Banner anywhere; that green monster cannot be contained."
"Not driving him. What does he want? He wants control? A cure? Could we convince him one exists?"
"Sneaky." Natasha gave him an approving look. "How?"
"Well, uh," Steve glanced down at the stack of papers. "Maybe - can we get a researcher to say they're releasing a paper?"
"Yeah, this is where people who actually know things about science join the conversation," Tony interrupted. "We've found scientific journals in his wake. When we've been able to get an idea of what he looks at when he gets net access, he checks a lot of scientific sites. Not just the pro stuff; pop science, and even amateurs. Not that there's a lot of amateur geneticists, but hey."
"I long for the day this becomes relevant," Clint told Natasha, who shrugged.
"So, Agent Barton, we can seed a story about this shit and know Banner will see it. Something about the army declassifying research - I'm sure you can buy an academic to make broad claims that won't pan out."
"About a cure?"
"Not a cure," Steve tapped his fingers on his coffee cup, considering the very limited information he had on Banner. "Banner might not risk it for a cure; after all, he's under control, he can afford to wait, right? See if it works out, wait for the research. He doesn't lose anything. The guy in New York - the one who changed himself - "
"Blonsky," Clint filled in. "They've got him in custody."
"Do you know they wanted to put him on the Avengers?" Tony said. "See, I'm too unstable, but the guy who turned himself into a freakshow and levelled Harlem - "
"You're kidding," Steve turned to look at Natasha, who affected her blank mask.
"SHIELD did not want Blonsky. He was almost inflicted on us." She quirked an eyebrow. "Mr Stark's inestimable diplomatic skills came through for us, though."
"Nice work," Steve smiled at Tony, who looked a little shifty. "So if there's a rumour that something's happened to him - "
"Announce he's melted or something?" Clint said. "Make it fatal?"
"I don't think that's what Banner's scared of," Steve said slowly, and Tony whistled.
"You've got a nasty streak, haven't you? We'll say Blonsky lost any semblance of intelligence; just a ravening beast. Inevitable progression of the mutation, and it's only a matter of time before Banner goes the same way."
"He'll want that research." Natasha stood up. "Back to Russia, then."
"Why Russia?" Steve said.
"I won't blend as an academic in Asia, Africa or the Middle East," Natasha said dryly. "And Banner's unfamiliar with Russia."
"Send us a postcard," Clint said, and kissed her cheek. She turned on her heel and stalked out, and Tony shrugged.
"Well, glad I could help."
"Come get lunch with us," Steve suggested, but Tony shook his head.
"Promised to a test-launch of a new propulsion system - might be able to do something for the Iron Man flight stabilisers, so I can't bail." He clapped Steve on the shoulder. "Meeting next week, right? We'll do something then."
"Sure," Steve said, and turned to Clint as Tony left.
"Always second choice," Clint shook his head mournfully. "Let's go."
Tony finally settled on the IMAX, because it was completely harmless and he wanted to lull Steve before trying another prank. Also, they were showing Jurassic Park, which Tony judged to be just the right kind of movie for someone who liked Asimov. Laura Dern in shorts was just a bonus.
Sadly, the next time he and Steve were both in the same place at the same time - team bonding time at the end of a briefing - Steve was clearly not in the correct mood for dinosaurs. He was brooding, in a blond, earnest kind of way, and responded monosyllabically to any attempt at conversation. As the Banner situation was in Natasha's capable hands (and presumably in Russia) they didn't really have anything to discuss. Clint and Tony managed a more or less civil conversation about exploding arrows for about three minutes, and that was Tony's limit for resisting temptation.
Time to needle Steve. Are you anatomically correct, GI Joe, did you ride into battles on mammoths, grandpa - . Steve snapped at him; Tony snapped back, watched his eyes flash with rage, and then - and then Steve crushed his jaw shut and threw himself out of his chair and made for the door. Tony darted after him, caught him when he hesitated and looked about him.
"Hey, hey. Where you going, going to walk out? Not thought up any new things to call me?" Tony folded a hand around his broad forearm, like he could possibly stop Steve if he wanted to leave.
Steve twitched as if to throw Tony off, and then gently took his wrist.
"I'm sorry, that was rude," he said very tightly, and tried to separate Tony's fingers from his sleeve.
"That? That wasn't rude. I am a show-off, I'm such a show-off. Ask anyone. It's in my file, even, Fury uses it like a club to beat me with. What's wrong with you, anyway?"
"What's..." Steve looked at him as if he were stupid, which was a look Tony was more familiar with than a genius should be. "I was frozen in ice for seventy years," as if maybe Tony hadn't heard.
"Yeah? So?" That was - well, not old news, but it wasn't like he'd suddenly get mad at that now. Was it? Maybe he had PTSD. Drowning would probably screw you up a bit. Steve shifted from foot to foot, looked up at the ceiling, down at Tony's hand on his forearm. Up into Tony's eyes, a look more intense and searching than Tony had seen from him before.
"So - " his mouth turned down, and Tony stared at it, as if the shape of his lips might convey something important. "So - so my girlfriend doesn't want me any more."
"What?" Tony processed that. "What, your wartime squeeze?"
"Peggy," and his voice trembled a little, and he looked down again, lips twisting. "We, I saw her at the weekend."
Right. Tony hooked an arm firmly through his, and tugged. Steve went with him, the admission seeming to have blown his anger away and left only compliance.
"You need a drink." Tony informed him, and turned them towards the elevator. Underground parking garage, smuggle Steve out in the car. Easy.
"I can't get drunk."
"Life has truly conspired to shit on you, my friend." He tried a comforting squeeze - Steve had really big arms - and kept right on towards their exit route. "Let's go see if we can get a placebo effect going."
"She's ninety-four," Steve mumbled into his third glass of the murky brown cocktail Tony had ordered at random. He'd never been to this bar; there were pictures of baseball players on the walls, and the seats were upholstered in battered leatherette. Tony didn't approve. "She - and she said she still had her dignity, and wasn't going to - that she didn't want to be - she has, you know, a lot of bad days, that's why I had to wait to see her, she got a cold this spring and it went to her chest."
"That's understandable," Tony said slowly, feeling his way. He wasn't used to this kind of thing - when Pepper's mom had died, she'd burst into tears at the office, just spontaneously while handing him his schedule. He'd hugged her and let her sob on his shoulder for five endless minutes, wanting to do something, anything, but not knowing what, because all his ways of dealing with grief would just horrify her.
When the tears stopped, she'd stood up straight and given him a watery smile, and said will that be all Mr Stark, and he'd said take the week. The month, if you need it.
She'd taken four days and they'd been a hideous time of disaster, but Tony didn't care, because that was something he could do. Oh, and he'd sent a very nice wreath; Pepper had told him about it afterwards.
But this - how did you deal with this? Steve was white-faced and dry-eyed and couldn't even get drunk. Tony squinted around. He could pick out at least three SHIELD agents, all pointedly not looking in their direction; seemed like Fury was inclined to let Tony play this hand on his own, which confirmed he was a sadistic bastard. Sure, Tony could off-load Steve onto one of them, but. He'd wanted to be friends, and Tony wasn't as ignorant of the obligations of friendship as some people might think.
"I suppose," Steve said, and took another drink. Tony picked up the pitcher, and topped off his glass. "I asked her to marry me."
Tony clenched his jaw shut on what the fuck.
"And she said no?" He kept the incredulity out of his voice. He supposed, if Pepper suddenly sprouted wrinkles and arthritis, it wouldn't make much difference to the way he felt about her.
"Said she'd. She said a lot of things, but I guess what it came down to was that it wouldn't make her happy."
"Well, I guess at ninety-four you know your own mind."
"Just, it was - three months ago. She was - and I was just a memory to her, she didn't look at me like - I wasn't a part of her life anymore, I was like the War. Long gone. I felt like a ghost. I am a ghost." He covered his face with his hands, and Tony reached out to press a hand to his shoulder. "I'm sorry," he looked up, face scrunched up. "I'm sorry I was so - so unkind."
"Oh Jesus, don't apologise to me, I was a dick and I get worse from Coulson twice a week." Tony gave up, and just wrapped an arm around his broad shoulders and pulled him closer. SHIELD would probably abduct anyone who ventured to point a camera in their direction, after all. Steve put his head down on Tony's shoulder, and snuffled.
"Everyone's dead except Peggy, and she doesn't want me anymore. I'm too late. I wish - " he pushed the heels of his hand into his eyes, elbowing Tony in the ribs. "This is a bad joke, I should be - "
Tony's mind helpfully filled in the missing words.
"No you shouldn't," he tipped his own glass up. "There's not anything should about it, you can't go around saying this person should be and this person shouldn't be, it doesn't work like that. Even when we wish it could, you know."
"I know," Steve drooped. "But - "
"You're just a kid to her," Tony told him, and Steve looked up, frowning a little. "You're not even thirty yet. You're the same guy, but she's lived seventy years. Are you the same guy you were a few years ago? Not counting frozen time."
A tiny indentation appeared at the corner of his mouth, like a smile was lurking in there.
"Well, no," he said.
"Apart from the whole super soldier - okay, fighting in the War too, you've had a busy couple of year." He put his chin in his hand. "This made more sense when I started it. I mean, she's gone through a lot. All kinds of things that you haven't, can't understand."
"Yeah," he breathed a warm sigh against Tony's neck. "I wanted to be there with her. I wanted - she was going to teach me to dance." He sounded more resigned, now, the raw edge gone from his words.
"But you know how experiences can set you apart from people," Tony urged. He could still remember Rhodey back from his first deployment into a war zone; he'd been different, and they hadn't slipped easily back into their friendship for all it had only been six months. It had taken a while for them to click together again, get the machinery moving smoothly. Steve had to know that too; he was nodding. "So she's a stranger to you, now. And she's smart enough to know that."
Steve was quiet for a little while, and then he sat up and reached for his glass again. His eyes were a little sticky, but he gave Tony a smile, weak but sincere.
"You're right, of course."
"Of course I am," and then, right when things were looking like they could hang out and work on getting to know each other, Fury stepped into the bar and Steve froze, guilt painting his face. Fury walked up to the table, and raised an eyebrow at the pitcher.
"Are you almost done here, Captain?" he said in an entirely pleasant voice, and Steve nodded, and stood up. "No, no rush. Mr Stark will be happy to drive you back, won't you?"
"Sure," Tony drained his glass and stood up. Less attention than hustling him into a huge black car, he supposed. Fury took his place, and placidly poured himself a drink; Clint popped up from, apparently, a hidden trapdoor, and snagged Steve's glass. He gave Tony a bland smile, and Tony just rolled his eyes.
"I hope I didn't get you in trouble," Steve said as they drove back into the underground garage. Tony gave him a surprised look.
"No, I'm pretty sure I got myself into trouble by kidnapping you."
"You didn't kidnap me." Steve smiled. "It was good to get out... I feel so cooped up in here." He sighed. "At least I can write to Peggy now, I guess. She said that was okay."
"Write? What, doesn't she have email?" Surely even pensioners had smartphones these days.
"I don't have email," Steve said in patient tones. "I don't have a telephone, either."
"Well, that's unreasonable." Tony pulled in one of the spots near the elevator, and turned to look at Steve. "When are you free?"
"Huh?"
"You want to get lunch tomorrow? I probably can't smuggle you out again, but I can bring you takeout." Steve blinked at him for a moment, and then his mouth crooked up.
"Yeah, sure."
"Awesome." Tony flapped a hand. "Now shoo. I'm sure someone's waiting to check you over for dings and scratches."
Pepper rushed back from her lunch meeting to hear Tony's account of the Avengers meeting he'd deigned to attend; of course, he didn't come back to the penthouse, and she had to trek down to his workshop, where he was sitting on his battered couch, staring up at the big screen.
"What are you doing?" Pepper sat down beside him, and leaned her head against his shoulder. He hummed, and dropped a kiss on the top of her head, and then offered her his glass. She took a sniff, and then waved it away. "No, really. You're watching... newsreels again? Didn't you make up with Captain America?" He was laughed and talking soundlessly with some men in uniform, one wearing a ridiculous bowler hat.
"Yeah, yeah, but he's weird."
"Weird?"
"Weird things. Weird thoughts." Tony shrugged. "Maybe he's freaking out? I'm just," he gestured with his glass at the projected image.
"Why?" She frowned up at the images, flickering slightly. These weren't newsreels, she realised; Captain America was unmasked, leaning on a table spread with maps and smiling as he listened to the chatter around him. "How's this going to help?"
"I just want an idea of what makes him tick," Tony shook his head. "I don't know." He rested his chin on her head, and sighed. "Getting handles on everyone else - even Natasha - but this one's deceptive, you know? I thought I was getting him, and then boom, rug gone. Surprising."
"You like surprises."
"I like steadiness. Order. Routine. That's why we get on so well." He slumped down further, cheek rubbing against her hair, and pushed a kiss onto her cheek. "Speaking of getting on well."
"I'm trying to cut down on sex with the ex," she said, but she smiled.
"See, 'cut down on' is not 'eliminate', so I think - " the rest of that was lost against the sensitive skin of her hairline, and she shivered as he combed her hair back with his fingers. She tipped her head sideways, to allow him better access, and snaked a hand down between them to undo his belt buckle, because it had been a very long and stressful week, and as Tony had caused most of the stress, it was really only fair he helped her get rid of it.
And he did do a fine job of it; she'd always thought, before, he'd be a selfish lover, and he was, but - it was a wonderful selfishness, the way he wrapped himself in her and luxuriated, like she was a fur blanket or a fine wine, always so fascinated by her body, her noises.
"I love you," he murmured, and she hummed a soft response. "Pepper? You're so beautiful."
"Mmm," she managed, and pulled him in for another kiss, to quiet him.
Dummy brought them a blanket, and JARVIS must have turned off the air-conditioning at some point, because the room wasn't as cold as it usually was. Tony rested his head on her breasts, and she blinked up at Captain Rogers, in full colour, sitting on the edge of a bed with patient acceptance all over his face. It took her a few moments to realise what was weird about it, because she was pleasantly distracted by his shirtlessness.
"This is modern footage." Tony muttered something indecipherable into her cleavage. "Tony, where did you get this?"
"SHIELD," she managed to pick out from the next mumble, which probably meant hacking, or possibly meant bribing Agent Barton, or there was a small chance he'd just stolen a flash drive from Director Fury's desk. Fury was handling the Captain's case personally, from all evidence.
The Captain smiled nicely up at the nurse who came and took about twenty vials of blood from him, and then dutifully blew into bags, had his heartbeat listened to, and had his eyes peered into.
"See," Tony lifted his head. "Look at that. Hours and hours of being poked and prodded, and he just smiles at them. What is that?"
"Politeness?" she suggested, and he snorted. It had taken her a while to figure out that Tony viewed social niceties as an elaborate fiction. Natasha, he claimed, had proved his point. You could hide anything under a bland smile. She'd never been able to bring herself to point out that Obie had hidden much worse under fatherly gruffness and apparent straight-talking. They'd never really talked about that; maybe they should have.
She smoothed his hair back, and he sighed, and kissed her wrist.
"Can I take you out to lunch tomorrow?"
"No," she said firmly, ignoring his pout. Tony was like a kudzu, almost impossible to root out; but in the interests of not being smothered, she had to try. Possibly with a machete. She should really stop having sex with him. "I should get back to the office."
He grumbled, and apparently managed to double his bodyweight in cat-like fashion, but she squirmed out from under him and stepped quickly into her shoes; the workshop floor was always freezing. Tony watch her with lazy appreciation until she zipped up her dress, and then he turned his head back towards the screen, showing Captain Rogers on a treadmill.
"He doesn't seem to be hiding anything." He bundled himself more tightly in his blanket, until he resembled a cocoon. "I can figure him out."
"Of course you can." She leaned over the back of the couch, and kissed his cheek; he gave her a fuzzy smile. "Be nice to him. I like him."
"Of course," he said. "I'm being nice. I have been very nice."
"Of course you have."
"I bought him a present." He smiled, a private gleeful thing.
"Is it horrifying?"
"No." He yawned. "I'm not going to tell you what it is, because I know you have secret assignations with Fury."
"Pfft," she kissed him again, and clicked her way to the door, escorted by Dummy.
Tony allowed a two day space between their lunch - and his gift - and stopping by to say hi. Pleasantly nonchalant, no element of creepy fanboy. Grabbing someone's hand and saying I see you're sad, let's be friends just wasn't dignified, after all.
He hit the button for the elevator, and glanced down at his phone. He looked up when the doors open, and found himself nose to nose with Agent Coulson. Tony didn't shriek and throw his coffee in the air, because he'd gotten used to Natasha's funny little ways. Instead, he merely twitched a little before stepping around him into the elevator.
"Did you give Captain Rogers a tablet?" Coulson rotated on his heel like a creepy marionette, mournful eyes fixed on Tony.
"Yes, yes I did." Tony put his chin up, and hit the button for Steve's floor. He had nothing to be ashamed of. "I taught him how to use it, and I got him logged on to the wireless, and introduced him to the Gutenberg library and Wikipedia, and I also installed NetNanny, because by the time he figures out how to - "
"That took him about an hour, Stark. Please. Remember he has superpowers."
"Computer superpowers?" Tony sipped his coffee and tried to look interested. Steve had been happily fascinated by his new toy; he'd been carefully picking out colours for his custom desktop theme when Tony had left. He hadn't exhibited any superpowers that Tony had noticed, unless being extraordinarily picky about blue was one.
"Enhanced cognitive functions, mostly related to acquiring new skills and multitasking. We're still testing." Coulson gave him a cool smile. "What I want to know is, why did you give him a computer?"
"Well, I don't really like to analyse myself, but I think my train of thought was something like, Steve doesn't have a computer? Everyone needs a computer! So I got him a tablet. He can jump straight into touchscreens, right? Keyboards are over, they're gone."
"Uh huh. And then you brought it to him personally, and spent two hours teaching him how to use it?"
"We also ate Chinese food. He did pick it up pretty quick. How did you find out, by the way?" Coulson closed his eyes with an expression of long-suffering.
"He friended Director Fury on Facebook." His eyes slitted open again at Tony's crow of laughter.
"Well, that." Tony tried to choke the hilarity out of his voice - Coulson looked like a man on the edge. "That's nice, really, that Steve wants to be friends."
Coulson gave Tony a very intense and poisonous look.
"Literally the only reason Natasha and Clint are not competing to be the first to drop your head at Fury's feet is Farmville."
That was - Tony stared at him, trying to get a clue, but Coulson continued to look like a small-town math teacher grading a D student.
"Fury likes Farmville?" was all he could think of, and then, "Wait, Natasha's back from Russia already?"
"He doesn't play Farmville, no, but it does seem to be thoroughly distracting Captain Rogers." Coulson's eyebrows twitched up just a fraction. "There are now twenty-five SHIELD agents playing Farmville on the clock." He looked like that was hurting him in his very soul, and the hurt grew more evident as he went on, through gritted teeth. "Fury says good initiative. Don't do anything like that again."
"Fury's pleased with me?" This was a new and heady concept. Tony hadn't even been sure it was possible, unless you were a steel-spined bundle of redheaded competence.
"I wouldn't go that far." Coulson gave him a humourless smile. "Please try and remember that Captain Rogers does not have enhanced emotional processing to match his mental capabilities."
"Huh?"
"He's vulnerable to culture shock. We're trying to feed him data slow enough he can adjust."
"Well no, that's stupid, he'll just get frustrated." Coulson responded to this perfectly reasoned assessment by flexing a muscle in his jaw.
"Frustrated has been deemed the safer option."
"Than what, than his tiny brain bursting out of his skull?"
Coulson smacked the emergency stop button without changing expression, and Tony raised his eyebrows.
"Do you know the suicide rates for returning soldiers?"
"Uh - "
"Sometimes, they can't adjust to the civilian world again. And that's without a seventy year time jump and losing everything you know and love."
"He's not - "
"Fury's of the opinion you mean well. I'm of the opinion we cannot afford to let you fuck this up." Coulson leaned in close. "This is not a broken leg, this is not property damage, this is not smashing up your fancy house or blowing off your investors."
"Fuck off," Tony snapped, and Coulson's eyes narrowed. "You think I don't get that? In case you hadn't noticed, my best friend's had multiple combat deployments."
"Captain Rogers is not Colonel Rhodes. As he's not one of the two people you don't regard as dispensable - "
"Oh hey, right, because you're all here with the tender concern for his well-being, you're not all scared out your minds by the fact if he scratches his pinky or gets a complex, SHIELD will be defunded so hard Natasha will be killing people with paperclips? You keep babying him, he's going to go quietly out of his mind. When a guy comes back from a war zone, you don't shut him up in the basement with nothing to do but brood and break stuff." He shut his mouth tight, because Coulson was looking at him with analytical interest. The corners of his mouth turned up, very slightly, and he turned back to the elevator panel and did something that got the elevator moving again.
"That's why you're still allowed to socialise with the Captain," Coulson said. "Until you get bored of him, you should be a distraction." The doors dinged open with perfect dramatic timing.
"Fine. Wow." Tony stalked out into the corridor, and down towards Steve's room.
Part One - Part Two - Part Three - Part Four - Part Five
Author:
valtyr Beta:
dorcas_gustineRating: R
Parings: Steve/Tony, Pepper/Tony, Clint and Natasha are open to interpretation.
Universe: Movieverse
Wordcount: 40k
A/N: This got out of hand. You can carve that on my tombstone.
Summary: Fury's a beautiful princess. Clint's plotting a Communist revolution. Rhodey's not sexy. Wall-E's not a documentary. Clint's not gay but he does give a great blowjob. This fic is not an AU.
Part One - Part Two - Part Three - Part Four - Part Five
Captain America was just where Director Fury had said he would be; viciously attacking a punch bag in the gym, which was surprisingly low-tech and lacking in efficient purpose for a SHIELD establishment. Pepper paused on the threshold for a moment, to admire the flexing muscles of back and shoulder. He'd been at it long enough to work up a sweat, and his t-shirt clung as if he'd been vacuum-packed into it.
The moment stretched, only the impact of fists on bag, and his sneakers squeaking on the floor breaking the silence. Pepper might have carried on watching for a long time, but a hiccup escaped her throat; he spun round, balanced on the balls of his toes, and Pepper exchanged appreciative look for bright introductory smile. He took a step back, and Pepper dimmed the brightness a few levels. Possibly she should have refused that last drink, but Director Fury had been so politely insistent.
"Good afternoon, Captain," she said in a happily-steady tone. "I'm Mr Stark's - " she almost said personal assistant out of years of habit, almost corrected to girlfriend, decided technical boss would lead to confusion, and settled on " - friend."
Captain America favoured her with a confused glower that really wasn't very intimidating, with the pouty mouth and big, confused eyes. She had a vague urge to pinch his cheek, although that might have been the espresso Martini talking.
"Did he send you?"
"Well, no," she admitted, and he turned to glare at the punch bag again. "Director Fury suggested I might want to try getting you two to re-open diplomatic relations." Director Fury had taken her out to a very nice lunch, been far more charming than Tony's descriptions of him had led her to believe possible, and then benevolently invited her to do exactly what she'd been wanting to do for a fortnight.
She'd have a word with JARVIS about moving his calls up the priority list. He clearly had their best interests at heart, after all. She stepped into the room and walked round the Captain in a wide circle so she could see his expression, which was dubious. Seeing his chest outlined by damp white cotton was just a bonus.
"Well, maybe I don't want to," Captain America poked at the gym floor with his toe, scowling. "He said I was - "
"I think we can all agree that things were said that shouldn't have been," Pepper gave him a stern look, and he drooped. Technically, he'd taken the step to out-and-out aggression, but Tony had been deliberately needling him for an hour. Still, if he couldn't handle Tony, he was never going to survive being on a superhero team. He'd be all over the gutter press the first time he lost his temper with a reporter. "I was thinking that you, being the better man and all, might want to take the first step - "
"No," he interrupted. Pepper glared. He scowled. That was unhelpful. Tony had been sulking steadily since the blowup; he'd apparently not expected Captain America to have quite such an instinct for weak points. The crack about Howard had been wounding.
The odds of getting him to make the first move were slim to none.
"Would it really hurt?" she tried, and he shrugged and looked down at his feet.
"I tried already," he admitted when Pepper didn't speak. "Called three times, got an automated message. I persuaded someone to take me over, got the same message from the intercom, and a robot blew a raspberry at me through the window."
Tony hadn't shared those little details. She gritted her teeth.
"Well. So if I can get you access, you'll apologise?" Shuffle, shuffle, she hadn't expected him to fidget, somehow. She'd had a vague image of him striking heroic poses, and holding them. Like a statue.
"I guess," he fixed her with a very sincere gaze. "I am sorry."
"All right." She waited. He looked at her in puzzlement. "Take those things off your hands, then." He looked down at the tapes in puzzlement, then his eyebrows shot up.
"Now?" He tugged at the hem of his damp shirt doubtfully. "I should clean up."
"Yes, now." She looked pointedly up at the clock. By now, Tony could have Not Cared his way to Hawaii for some performance sulking. It was the time for action, and anyway, she was quite happy to look at him the way he was for the duration of the car ride. "Come on, you can take off the tape in the car."
"I'm not supposed to leave - "
"Agent Hill is waiting in the car."
"Well," he tugged nervously at the tape. "Well, okay."
Tony glared up at Captain America, who blinked guileless eyes and tugged his shirt over his head at the nurse's command. She pressed the stethoscope to his chest with what Tony judged as more than necessary fondling.
Dummy made a noise like phhhbbbt and Tony looked away from the big screen to see a blond figure lurking on the other side of the soundproofed glass door. Tony sighed, and drummed his fingers on the steering wheel. He was going to have to talk to the guy eventually, after all; Fury would probably welcome the opportunity to bounce him back off the team.
"JARVIS, lose Cap TV and then let him in." The screen turned to Wall-E, which served the dual purpose of diverting Dummy's attention, and Captain America slipped through the door and advanced towards him, looking around like a kid in a very confusing toy store. The look he cast at the glowing transparent 3-D models was distinctly covetous; when his eyes settled on the vintage Cadillac Tony was seated in, he looked suitably impressed. Tony would probably have been pleased to impress Captain America a few weeks ago. Before he'd discovered that the great hero was actually a complete jerk.
"What do you want, Uncle Sam?" He slumped lower in the seat, tapping his foot on the accelerator as if he could flee the conversation. Although the guy could probably chase him down like the Terminator. "Come to criticise my work ethic? Because I'm working now, this is work, you're actually disrupting my work here, shame on you."
The Captain's head turned to the screen, where EVE was zooming through the wreckage of Earth.
"I'm sorry to interrupt your work," and okay, that was hilarious. Tony could have fun with a guy who had no pop-culture references later than 1945. His smile apparently encouraged the Captain, because he smiled tentatively back and continued. "I came to apologise," he said. "I was hoping we could start again."
"Why? I'm just a drunken thrillseeker in tin can, right?" He folded his arms, smile dying, and the Captain shook his head.
"Tin can was Clint," he corrected, and Tony gritted his teeth. Pedantry, really.
"Oh, I'm sorry, what did you call it?"
"Nothing?" He rubbed a hand over the back of his neck, and tried another smile. "I think your armour's pretty amazing."
"Oh." Tony tapped his feet against the pedals some more. Amazing was all right."Well, maybe I shouldn't have said that about freezing causing brain cells to burst," he offered magnanimously.
"Right." The Captain's eyes widened earnestly. "And I'm sorry for saying you're spoiled and - "
"All right, let's not go through the litany." Tony sighed. "Who made you come and apologise?"
"No one. I felt bad."
"Huh." Tony cast him a thoughtful glance. He was a nice enough kid. And Tony was an adult, and all, technically. And something about teamwork, and so on. And he had to admit the idea of being even casually friendly with Captain America was something of a guilty thrill, if said Captain was willing to be suitably respectful of his amazing accomplishments.
The Captain apparently took his silence for doubt.
"Pepper got me past the robot," he volunteered. "She's nice." Well, he had good taste at least. If it would make Pepper happy, Tony could make up.
"The robot?" Tony glanced at Dummy, who had clearly not required Pepper's intervention.
"Why is it British?"
"That's not a robot, it's an artificial intelligence. It's British because all the best butlers are British." The Captain's brow furrowed briefly, as if in consideration, and Tony felt his mouth twitch up. "I just thought it sounded better."
"It sounds great," he agreed. "I would never have thought it wasn't a real person. Do they have Laws of Robotics?"
"Laws... wouldn't have pegged you for an Asimov fan."
"I read some of his stories." He tipped his head, eyes brightening. "I was an illustrator, did some stuff for the magazines before I enlisted. I had a picture in that issue, the one - Runaway, Runaround, about the robot - "
"Runaround. Huh," Tony shook his head, and then leaned sideways and tugged the latch of the car door. It swung open, and the Captain looked down at it, and then back at Tony. "Well, sit down."
"Are we going somewhere?" He sat down obediently, folding his long legs into the footwell.
"No. Unless you want to?"
"Not really." He looked up at the screen. "What are we watching?"
"Uh - " Tony glanced between him and the screen. "A documentary. About the rubbish heaps of the West Coast, and the efforts to reclaim them."
"Really?" he said, with an innocent trust that almost made Tony feel guilt, and settled in to watch.
Surprisingly, Steve didn't get mad when he figured out Tony was lying. (Fifty-four minutes in.) He laughed, and punched Tony gently in the shoulder. By the time he left, making Tony promise to attend the next Avengers meeting, Tony thought they were - not friends, but friendly. There was definitely friendship potential.
Tony resolved that in due course, when scheduling allowed, Tony would make some kind of friendly overture, take him to the IMAX or bring him freeze-dried ice-cream. Bring him a DVD of Soylent Green with a faked-up cover claiming it was based on a true story. Something, anyway.
After escorting Steve back up to the lobby, he realised he'd barely left the basement workshop in three days, and took the elevator to the penthouse.
"Traitor," he said to Pepper, who was lying on the couch watching Jeopardy and eating an oversized muffin.
"I hope you weren't horrible to him," she muttered around a mouthful of what looked like lemon and poppyseed, because Pepper was weird like that.
"Not especially." Tony investigated her leftovers, and claimed half a ham and cheese sandwich. "We watched a movie."
"Huh," Pepper squinted up at him. "Better than I hoped. Go and have a shower, you look like a crazy person. I'm surprised the Captain didn't run screaming."
"How would he know? I bet we all seem crazy to him." He wandered in the direction of the shower, pondering what kind of present he could take Captain America.
Steve re-settled himself in his chair - how, in the future, did they still not have comfortable chairs in meeting rooms - and surveyed the huge map that hung on the wall. It continued to be uninformative; Clint yawned, and then sat upright as the door clicked open to reveal Tony Stark. Steve smiled at him, and was pleased to get a smile back.
"Hey, it's the man himself," Clint said brightly. "And only half an hour late! Truly a red-letter day."
"Clint," Steve turned and gave him a stern look. They'd only just smoothed things over between him and Tony; they didn't need Clint getting into it with Tony.
"Aye aye, Captain. Stark! Buddy! How come your armour can break Mach 3 but you can't get - "
"Clint," Steve grabbed his arm and turned him back to face the huge map on the wall, and Tony moved up beside him. He reached out and tapped the head of one pin, the one in New York; pins scattered through the US, South America through India, a couple in Europe, Tunisia, West Egypt.
"Banner sightings?"
"Small pins are Banner. Larger pins are... other Banner." Monster seemed such a dramatic way of putting it.
"I can't believe you're using a physical map." Tony poked it. "How do you - are these little date stickers attached to the pins, that is adorable. Barton, I know SHIELD has better than this. I could do better with my phone."
"Really?" Steve folded his arms, mouth quirking a little. SHIELD were pretty persistent about dumbing the tech down for him; he was half-convinced these meeting were all an elaborate charade to ease him gently into the twenty-first century ways of doing things. Which would certainly explain Tony's reluctance to show up to them. "Go on, then."
Tony smirked at him, and pulled what was presumably his phone out of his pocket, although Steve couldn't have picked it out of a line-up. If pressed, he'd have guessed it as a picture frame.
"Permission to show off, Captain?"
"Knock yourself out, soldier."
Tony tapped at the transparent part of the phone, and it fired with light. Under Tony's tapping fingers it all moved too fast and confusing for Steve to catch, like listening to a foreign language. Tony backed up and waved them aside, and the phone made a noise like a camera-shutter.
Then he turned, and projected the world on the wall - not a map, but -
"The clouds are moving," Steve said, enchanted, and peered closer. Amazingly detailed - he could make out the Grand Canyon, and there were little snowcapped mountain ranges.
"Yeah, that's live satellite imaging." Tony spoke casually, but he was grinning. "Say if you want anything blown up."
"Blown up?"
"Enlarged," Tony said hastily, and Steve felt like an idiot. "No satellite weapons systems - there was a proposal to get some up there, but - never mind."
Steve turned back to the image to hide his blush and - there was a giant pin sticking out of Nebraska, and orbiting it was a date. He waved his finger through it, and the numbers scattered and reformed. "Your phone can read?"
"It has text recognition," Tony sounded incredibly smug, and Steve couldn't blame him.
"It's amazing." He glanced at Clint, who looked bored. "It is amazing, right? Or does your phone do this?"
"Are you kidding? I'm a field agent. SHIELD buys all my phones, and they don't do anything that hasn't been signed off in triplicate by Financial."
"What Barton means is, this is truly, truly amazing. He's in awe."
"It's a very shiny and expensive version of the map we already had, Stark. Well done."
"True," Tony's grin didn't waver. "You have incident reports? Hardcopy, you're shitting me." His eyes flicked to Steve, and then he dropped the subject, which confirmed Steve's suspicion they didn't usually hand out big stacks of paper. The map vanished as he turned away. Click-whir, and he flicked rapidly through the pages.
"Is that secure?" Steve asked, and Clint looked faintly guilty.
"We may technically be putting highly classified documents on an unauthorised system, yes."
"Don't be a baby, Barton, me and my phone were invited to this meeting." He turned back, and this time when he recreated the map, swirls of data surrounded each pin like tiny galaxies.
"Hurrah, this solves everything," Clint deadpanned, and Steve elbowed him in the ribs. "Jeez, Cap, just because you're enjoying Cirque de Stark doesn't mean - "
"Show a date progression with size in order of SHIELD assessment of severity, size in order of collateral damage estimate by local authorities, colour from violet to red estimated property damage." Tony arched an eyebrow at Clint, who shut up.
And there it was, the very first incident - a severe one, but short. A few less severe ones, heading south, one that lasted for almost a minute and trailed slowly across Arkansas. Down to Mexico - two incidents, brief and violent - then Brazil, and the incidents settled, becoming less severe, further apart.
"A lot of this is second-hand info, reconstructed later from eyewitnesses and police records," Clint said, and Steve nodded.
"Seems to be a pattern, though - ah." A big, bright glow, yellow-orange. "That?"
"A team sent to capture him." Clint shrugged. "We've got hardly any data on that."
"And so he ran," Tony muttered, gesturing to the next light in Virginia. "Another team?"
"Yeah. And then - " New York lit up in blazing scarlet, and Clint grimaced. "That wasn't all Banner. The army managed to hire a guy who turned himself into something even worse than Banner, went on the rampage, Banner offered to take him down. Big fight."
"Banner offered to help," Steve repeated. That was the interesting thing; Banner had willingly unleashed his beast. To help. "And then back on the run again, huh?" Small incidents, in Brazil, then Peru, then a sudden jump to Tunisia. "Army close in?"
"They suck," Clint shook his head with an air of professional disapproval. "Didn't get near him that time."
"All the incidents are violet, now," Steve said. "He's not causing much in the way of damage."
"Even though they're lasting a while," Tony nodded. "Ah - freeze - what's this one, Clint?"
"They caught up with him that time. Took a beating."
"See, SHIELD rate it severe, but collateral damage is negligible."
"The direct damage, however, was impressive." Natasha strolled in, all smart, professional suit and towering heels, and eyed the map. Steve should probably make noises about lateness, but he hadn't said anything to Tony, and she was carrying four cups of coffee, which he approved of. "We think he's learning control over his transformation."
"That's the conclusion we were coming to, I'm so glad we could duplicate work already done." Tony glared at Natasha, and flicked the map of light shut. Steve tried not to look disappointed; maybe he could corner Tony later and get him to show off some more.
"What we want to know is where he's going." Natasha sat down, crossing one stockinged leg over the other, and began removing the coffees from their cardboard holder. Clint grabbed two, and passed one to Steve; Tony advanced cautiously towards a third, and then darted in and grabbed it. Steve assumed he was pretending to be afraid of Natasha. "The army chase him, and sometimes catch up with him; then he destroys everything and flees. How can we predict where he's going, gentlemen?"
"We can't," Tony said irritably. "He's not going anywhere; he's going away. Call the army off, let him settle, then you can... do what you want, and probably get a lot of things destroyed."
"It's not in our power to call the army off," Natasha pursed her lips. "This is an army operation, and we're just support."
"And Ross is a dick," Tony added helpfully. Natasha said something very explicit in Russian, and Steve choked on his coffee. "Wow, Natasha, what was that?"
"I didn't know you spoke Russian," Natasha sounded slightly apologetic, and having a lady apologising for swearing in front of him was really, really embarrassing.
"Mostly swear words," he admitted. "Bucky and Gabe used to bilk them at poker." It barely hurt at all to say that; he took another swig from him coffee, which tasted nothing at all like the stuff he'd drunk in the war.
"Let's get back to hating Ross," Tony clapped his hands together. "Raise your hand if you think he's a dick. You too, Clint? Awesome. Come on, Steve, you're odd man out."
"That doesn't help," Steve tried the stern look on all of them; Natasha actually laughed out loud, though she did lower her hand. He was sure this had been easier in the War. Tony sighed, and began to fiddle with his phone again. "Solutions to predicting Banner's movements? How does he travel?"
"Half the time, he just jumps," Clint said. "He can cover over a mile in one jump. Sure, it's slow, but it gets him out of situations fast, he doesn't need roads, and we can't track him on radar. When he's good and lost, he Banners it up and he's a nondescript nerd of average height and weight again. Thousands like him wandering around the world looking for inner peace or writing travel guides."
"If we can't predict where he's going, we need to choose a place and send him there," Steve said. Clint snorted.
"Good luck driving Banner anywhere; that green monster cannot be contained."
"Not driving him. What does he want? He wants control? A cure? Could we convince him one exists?"
"Sneaky." Natasha gave him an approving look. "How?"
"Well, uh," Steve glanced down at the stack of papers. "Maybe - can we get a researcher to say they're releasing a paper?"
"Yeah, this is where people who actually know things about science join the conversation," Tony interrupted. "We've found scientific journals in his wake. When we've been able to get an idea of what he looks at when he gets net access, he checks a lot of scientific sites. Not just the pro stuff; pop science, and even amateurs. Not that there's a lot of amateur geneticists, but hey."
"I long for the day this becomes relevant," Clint told Natasha, who shrugged.
"So, Agent Barton, we can seed a story about this shit and know Banner will see it. Something about the army declassifying research - I'm sure you can buy an academic to make broad claims that won't pan out."
"About a cure?"
"Not a cure," Steve tapped his fingers on his coffee cup, considering the very limited information he had on Banner. "Banner might not risk it for a cure; after all, he's under control, he can afford to wait, right? See if it works out, wait for the research. He doesn't lose anything. The guy in New York - the one who changed himself - "
"Blonsky," Clint filled in. "They've got him in custody."
"Do you know they wanted to put him on the Avengers?" Tony said. "See, I'm too unstable, but the guy who turned himself into a freakshow and levelled Harlem - "
"You're kidding," Steve turned to look at Natasha, who affected her blank mask.
"SHIELD did not want Blonsky. He was almost inflicted on us." She quirked an eyebrow. "Mr Stark's inestimable diplomatic skills came through for us, though."
"Nice work," Steve smiled at Tony, who looked a little shifty. "So if there's a rumour that something's happened to him - "
"Announce he's melted or something?" Clint said. "Make it fatal?"
"I don't think that's what Banner's scared of," Steve said slowly, and Tony whistled.
"You've got a nasty streak, haven't you? We'll say Blonsky lost any semblance of intelligence; just a ravening beast. Inevitable progression of the mutation, and it's only a matter of time before Banner goes the same way."
"He'll want that research." Natasha stood up. "Back to Russia, then."
"Why Russia?" Steve said.
"I won't blend as an academic in Asia, Africa or the Middle East," Natasha said dryly. "And Banner's unfamiliar with Russia."
"Send us a postcard," Clint said, and kissed her cheek. She turned on her heel and stalked out, and Tony shrugged.
"Well, glad I could help."
"Come get lunch with us," Steve suggested, but Tony shook his head.
"Promised to a test-launch of a new propulsion system - might be able to do something for the Iron Man flight stabilisers, so I can't bail." He clapped Steve on the shoulder. "Meeting next week, right? We'll do something then."
"Sure," Steve said, and turned to Clint as Tony left.
"Always second choice," Clint shook his head mournfully. "Let's go."
Tony finally settled on the IMAX, because it was completely harmless and he wanted to lull Steve before trying another prank. Also, they were showing Jurassic Park, which Tony judged to be just the right kind of movie for someone who liked Asimov. Laura Dern in shorts was just a bonus.
Sadly, the next time he and Steve were both in the same place at the same time - team bonding time at the end of a briefing - Steve was clearly not in the correct mood for dinosaurs. He was brooding, in a blond, earnest kind of way, and responded monosyllabically to any attempt at conversation. As the Banner situation was in Natasha's capable hands (and presumably in Russia) they didn't really have anything to discuss. Clint and Tony managed a more or less civil conversation about exploding arrows for about three minutes, and that was Tony's limit for resisting temptation.
Time to needle Steve. Are you anatomically correct, GI Joe, did you ride into battles on mammoths, grandpa - . Steve snapped at him; Tony snapped back, watched his eyes flash with rage, and then - and then Steve crushed his jaw shut and threw himself out of his chair and made for the door. Tony darted after him, caught him when he hesitated and looked about him.
"Hey, hey. Where you going, going to walk out? Not thought up any new things to call me?" Tony folded a hand around his broad forearm, like he could possibly stop Steve if he wanted to leave.
Steve twitched as if to throw Tony off, and then gently took his wrist.
"I'm sorry, that was rude," he said very tightly, and tried to separate Tony's fingers from his sleeve.
"That? That wasn't rude. I am a show-off, I'm such a show-off. Ask anyone. It's in my file, even, Fury uses it like a club to beat me with. What's wrong with you, anyway?"
"What's..." Steve looked at him as if he were stupid, which was a look Tony was more familiar with than a genius should be. "I was frozen in ice for seventy years," as if maybe Tony hadn't heard.
"Yeah? So?" That was - well, not old news, but it wasn't like he'd suddenly get mad at that now. Was it? Maybe he had PTSD. Drowning would probably screw you up a bit. Steve shifted from foot to foot, looked up at the ceiling, down at Tony's hand on his forearm. Up into Tony's eyes, a look more intense and searching than Tony had seen from him before.
"So - " his mouth turned down, and Tony stared at it, as if the shape of his lips might convey something important. "So - so my girlfriend doesn't want me any more."
"What?" Tony processed that. "What, your wartime squeeze?"
"Peggy," and his voice trembled a little, and he looked down again, lips twisting. "We, I saw her at the weekend."
Right. Tony hooked an arm firmly through his, and tugged. Steve went with him, the admission seeming to have blown his anger away and left only compliance.
"You need a drink." Tony informed him, and turned them towards the elevator. Underground parking garage, smuggle Steve out in the car. Easy.
"I can't get drunk."
"Life has truly conspired to shit on you, my friend." He tried a comforting squeeze - Steve had really big arms - and kept right on towards their exit route. "Let's go see if we can get a placebo effect going."
"She's ninety-four," Steve mumbled into his third glass of the murky brown cocktail Tony had ordered at random. He'd never been to this bar; there were pictures of baseball players on the walls, and the seats were upholstered in battered leatherette. Tony didn't approve. "She - and she said she still had her dignity, and wasn't going to - that she didn't want to be - she has, you know, a lot of bad days, that's why I had to wait to see her, she got a cold this spring and it went to her chest."
"That's understandable," Tony said slowly, feeling his way. He wasn't used to this kind of thing - when Pepper's mom had died, she'd burst into tears at the office, just spontaneously while handing him his schedule. He'd hugged her and let her sob on his shoulder for five endless minutes, wanting to do something, anything, but not knowing what, because all his ways of dealing with grief would just horrify her.
When the tears stopped, she'd stood up straight and given him a watery smile, and said will that be all Mr Stark, and he'd said take the week. The month, if you need it.
She'd taken four days and they'd been a hideous time of disaster, but Tony didn't care, because that was something he could do. Oh, and he'd sent a very nice wreath; Pepper had told him about it afterwards.
But this - how did you deal with this? Steve was white-faced and dry-eyed and couldn't even get drunk. Tony squinted around. He could pick out at least three SHIELD agents, all pointedly not looking in their direction; seemed like Fury was inclined to let Tony play this hand on his own, which confirmed he was a sadistic bastard. Sure, Tony could off-load Steve onto one of them, but. He'd wanted to be friends, and Tony wasn't as ignorant of the obligations of friendship as some people might think.
"I suppose," Steve said, and took another drink. Tony picked up the pitcher, and topped off his glass. "I asked her to marry me."
Tony clenched his jaw shut on what the fuck.
"And she said no?" He kept the incredulity out of his voice. He supposed, if Pepper suddenly sprouted wrinkles and arthritis, it wouldn't make much difference to the way he felt about her.
"Said she'd. She said a lot of things, but I guess what it came down to was that it wouldn't make her happy."
"Well, I guess at ninety-four you know your own mind."
"Just, it was - three months ago. She was - and I was just a memory to her, she didn't look at me like - I wasn't a part of her life anymore, I was like the War. Long gone. I felt like a ghost. I am a ghost." He covered his face with his hands, and Tony reached out to press a hand to his shoulder. "I'm sorry," he looked up, face scrunched up. "I'm sorry I was so - so unkind."
"Oh Jesus, don't apologise to me, I was a dick and I get worse from Coulson twice a week." Tony gave up, and just wrapped an arm around his broad shoulders and pulled him closer. SHIELD would probably abduct anyone who ventured to point a camera in their direction, after all. Steve put his head down on Tony's shoulder, and snuffled.
"Everyone's dead except Peggy, and she doesn't want me anymore. I'm too late. I wish - " he pushed the heels of his hand into his eyes, elbowing Tony in the ribs. "This is a bad joke, I should be - "
Tony's mind helpfully filled in the missing words.
"No you shouldn't," he tipped his own glass up. "There's not anything should about it, you can't go around saying this person should be and this person shouldn't be, it doesn't work like that. Even when we wish it could, you know."
"I know," Steve drooped. "But - "
"You're just a kid to her," Tony told him, and Steve looked up, frowning a little. "You're not even thirty yet. You're the same guy, but she's lived seventy years. Are you the same guy you were a few years ago? Not counting frozen time."
A tiny indentation appeared at the corner of his mouth, like a smile was lurking in there.
"Well, no," he said.
"Apart from the whole super soldier - okay, fighting in the War too, you've had a busy couple of year." He put his chin in his hand. "This made more sense when I started it. I mean, she's gone through a lot. All kinds of things that you haven't, can't understand."
"Yeah," he breathed a warm sigh against Tony's neck. "I wanted to be there with her. I wanted - she was going to teach me to dance." He sounded more resigned, now, the raw edge gone from his words.
"But you know how experiences can set you apart from people," Tony urged. He could still remember Rhodey back from his first deployment into a war zone; he'd been different, and they hadn't slipped easily back into their friendship for all it had only been six months. It had taken a while for them to click together again, get the machinery moving smoothly. Steve had to know that too; he was nodding. "So she's a stranger to you, now. And she's smart enough to know that."
Steve was quiet for a little while, and then he sat up and reached for his glass again. His eyes were a little sticky, but he gave Tony a smile, weak but sincere.
"You're right, of course."
"Of course I am," and then, right when things were looking like they could hang out and work on getting to know each other, Fury stepped into the bar and Steve froze, guilt painting his face. Fury walked up to the table, and raised an eyebrow at the pitcher.
"Are you almost done here, Captain?" he said in an entirely pleasant voice, and Steve nodded, and stood up. "No, no rush. Mr Stark will be happy to drive you back, won't you?"
"Sure," Tony drained his glass and stood up. Less attention than hustling him into a huge black car, he supposed. Fury took his place, and placidly poured himself a drink; Clint popped up from, apparently, a hidden trapdoor, and snagged Steve's glass. He gave Tony a bland smile, and Tony just rolled his eyes.
"I hope I didn't get you in trouble," Steve said as they drove back into the underground garage. Tony gave him a surprised look.
"No, I'm pretty sure I got myself into trouble by kidnapping you."
"You didn't kidnap me." Steve smiled. "It was good to get out... I feel so cooped up in here." He sighed. "At least I can write to Peggy now, I guess. She said that was okay."
"Write? What, doesn't she have email?" Surely even pensioners had smartphones these days.
"I don't have email," Steve said in patient tones. "I don't have a telephone, either."
"Well, that's unreasonable." Tony pulled in one of the spots near the elevator, and turned to look at Steve. "When are you free?"
"Huh?"
"You want to get lunch tomorrow? I probably can't smuggle you out again, but I can bring you takeout." Steve blinked at him for a moment, and then his mouth crooked up.
"Yeah, sure."
"Awesome." Tony flapped a hand. "Now shoo. I'm sure someone's waiting to check you over for dings and scratches."
Pepper rushed back from her lunch meeting to hear Tony's account of the Avengers meeting he'd deigned to attend; of course, he didn't come back to the penthouse, and she had to trek down to his workshop, where he was sitting on his battered couch, staring up at the big screen.
"What are you doing?" Pepper sat down beside him, and leaned her head against his shoulder. He hummed, and dropped a kiss on the top of her head, and then offered her his glass. She took a sniff, and then waved it away. "No, really. You're watching... newsreels again? Didn't you make up with Captain America?" He was laughed and talking soundlessly with some men in uniform, one wearing a ridiculous bowler hat.
"Yeah, yeah, but he's weird."
"Weird?"
"Weird things. Weird thoughts." Tony shrugged. "Maybe he's freaking out? I'm just," he gestured with his glass at the projected image.
"Why?" She frowned up at the images, flickering slightly. These weren't newsreels, she realised; Captain America was unmasked, leaning on a table spread with maps and smiling as he listened to the chatter around him. "How's this going to help?"
"I just want an idea of what makes him tick," Tony shook his head. "I don't know." He rested his chin on her head, and sighed. "Getting handles on everyone else - even Natasha - but this one's deceptive, you know? I thought I was getting him, and then boom, rug gone. Surprising."
"You like surprises."
"I like steadiness. Order. Routine. That's why we get on so well." He slumped down further, cheek rubbing against her hair, and pushed a kiss onto her cheek. "Speaking of getting on well."
"I'm trying to cut down on sex with the ex," she said, but she smiled.
"See, 'cut down on' is not 'eliminate', so I think - " the rest of that was lost against the sensitive skin of her hairline, and she shivered as he combed her hair back with his fingers. She tipped her head sideways, to allow him better access, and snaked a hand down between them to undo his belt buckle, because it had been a very long and stressful week, and as Tony had caused most of the stress, it was really only fair he helped her get rid of it.
And he did do a fine job of it; she'd always thought, before, he'd be a selfish lover, and he was, but - it was a wonderful selfishness, the way he wrapped himself in her and luxuriated, like she was a fur blanket or a fine wine, always so fascinated by her body, her noises.
"I love you," he murmured, and she hummed a soft response. "Pepper? You're so beautiful."
"Mmm," she managed, and pulled him in for another kiss, to quiet him.
Dummy brought them a blanket, and JARVIS must have turned off the air-conditioning at some point, because the room wasn't as cold as it usually was. Tony rested his head on her breasts, and she blinked up at Captain Rogers, in full colour, sitting on the edge of a bed with patient acceptance all over his face. It took her a few moments to realise what was weird about it, because she was pleasantly distracted by his shirtlessness.
"This is modern footage." Tony muttered something indecipherable into her cleavage. "Tony, where did you get this?"
"SHIELD," she managed to pick out from the next mumble, which probably meant hacking, or possibly meant bribing Agent Barton, or there was a small chance he'd just stolen a flash drive from Director Fury's desk. Fury was handling the Captain's case personally, from all evidence.
The Captain smiled nicely up at the nurse who came and took about twenty vials of blood from him, and then dutifully blew into bags, had his heartbeat listened to, and had his eyes peered into.
"See," Tony lifted his head. "Look at that. Hours and hours of being poked and prodded, and he just smiles at them. What is that?"
"Politeness?" she suggested, and he snorted. It had taken her a while to figure out that Tony viewed social niceties as an elaborate fiction. Natasha, he claimed, had proved his point. You could hide anything under a bland smile. She'd never been able to bring herself to point out that Obie had hidden much worse under fatherly gruffness and apparent straight-talking. They'd never really talked about that; maybe they should have.
She smoothed his hair back, and he sighed, and kissed her wrist.
"Can I take you out to lunch tomorrow?"
"No," she said firmly, ignoring his pout. Tony was like a kudzu, almost impossible to root out; but in the interests of not being smothered, she had to try. Possibly with a machete. She should really stop having sex with him. "I should get back to the office."
He grumbled, and apparently managed to double his bodyweight in cat-like fashion, but she squirmed out from under him and stepped quickly into her shoes; the workshop floor was always freezing. Tony watch her with lazy appreciation until she zipped up her dress, and then he turned his head back towards the screen, showing Captain Rogers on a treadmill.
"He doesn't seem to be hiding anything." He bundled himself more tightly in his blanket, until he resembled a cocoon. "I can figure him out."
"Of course you can." She leaned over the back of the couch, and kissed his cheek; he gave her a fuzzy smile. "Be nice to him. I like him."
"Of course," he said. "I'm being nice. I have been very nice."
"Of course you have."
"I bought him a present." He smiled, a private gleeful thing.
"Is it horrifying?"
"No." He yawned. "I'm not going to tell you what it is, because I know you have secret assignations with Fury."
"Pfft," she kissed him again, and clicked her way to the door, escorted by Dummy.
Tony allowed a two day space between their lunch - and his gift - and stopping by to say hi. Pleasantly nonchalant, no element of creepy fanboy. Grabbing someone's hand and saying I see you're sad, let's be friends just wasn't dignified, after all.
He hit the button for the elevator, and glanced down at his phone. He looked up when the doors open, and found himself nose to nose with Agent Coulson. Tony didn't shriek and throw his coffee in the air, because he'd gotten used to Natasha's funny little ways. Instead, he merely twitched a little before stepping around him into the elevator.
"Did you give Captain Rogers a tablet?" Coulson rotated on his heel like a creepy marionette, mournful eyes fixed on Tony.
"Yes, yes I did." Tony put his chin up, and hit the button for Steve's floor. He had nothing to be ashamed of. "I taught him how to use it, and I got him logged on to the wireless, and introduced him to the Gutenberg library and Wikipedia, and I also installed NetNanny, because by the time he figures out how to - "
"That took him about an hour, Stark. Please. Remember he has superpowers."
"Computer superpowers?" Tony sipped his coffee and tried to look interested. Steve had been happily fascinated by his new toy; he'd been carefully picking out colours for his custom desktop theme when Tony had left. He hadn't exhibited any superpowers that Tony had noticed, unless being extraordinarily picky about blue was one.
"Enhanced cognitive functions, mostly related to acquiring new skills and multitasking. We're still testing." Coulson gave him a cool smile. "What I want to know is, why did you give him a computer?"
"Well, I don't really like to analyse myself, but I think my train of thought was something like, Steve doesn't have a computer? Everyone needs a computer! So I got him a tablet. He can jump straight into touchscreens, right? Keyboards are over, they're gone."
"Uh huh. And then you brought it to him personally, and spent two hours teaching him how to use it?"
"We also ate Chinese food. He did pick it up pretty quick. How did you find out, by the way?" Coulson closed his eyes with an expression of long-suffering.
"He friended Director Fury on Facebook." His eyes slitted open again at Tony's crow of laughter.
"Well, that." Tony tried to choke the hilarity out of his voice - Coulson looked like a man on the edge. "That's nice, really, that Steve wants to be friends."
Coulson gave Tony a very intense and poisonous look.
"Literally the only reason Natasha and Clint are not competing to be the first to drop your head at Fury's feet is Farmville."
That was - Tony stared at him, trying to get a clue, but Coulson continued to look like a small-town math teacher grading a D student.
"Fury likes Farmville?" was all he could think of, and then, "Wait, Natasha's back from Russia already?"
"He doesn't play Farmville, no, but it does seem to be thoroughly distracting Captain Rogers." Coulson's eyebrows twitched up just a fraction. "There are now twenty-five SHIELD agents playing Farmville on the clock." He looked like that was hurting him in his very soul, and the hurt grew more evident as he went on, through gritted teeth. "Fury says good initiative. Don't do anything like that again."
"Fury's pleased with me?" This was a new and heady concept. Tony hadn't even been sure it was possible, unless you were a steel-spined bundle of redheaded competence.
"I wouldn't go that far." Coulson gave him a humourless smile. "Please try and remember that Captain Rogers does not have enhanced emotional processing to match his mental capabilities."
"Huh?"
"He's vulnerable to culture shock. We're trying to feed him data slow enough he can adjust."
"Well no, that's stupid, he'll just get frustrated." Coulson responded to this perfectly reasoned assessment by flexing a muscle in his jaw.
"Frustrated has been deemed the safer option."
"Than what, than his tiny brain bursting out of his skull?"
Coulson smacked the emergency stop button without changing expression, and Tony raised his eyebrows.
"Do you know the suicide rates for returning soldiers?"
"Uh - "
"Sometimes, they can't adjust to the civilian world again. And that's without a seventy year time jump and losing everything you know and love."
"He's not - "
"Fury's of the opinion you mean well. I'm of the opinion we cannot afford to let you fuck this up." Coulson leaned in close. "This is not a broken leg, this is not property damage, this is not smashing up your fancy house or blowing off your investors."
"Fuck off," Tony snapped, and Coulson's eyes narrowed. "You think I don't get that? In case you hadn't noticed, my best friend's had multiple combat deployments."
"Captain Rogers is not Colonel Rhodes. As he's not one of the two people you don't regard as dispensable - "
"Oh hey, right, because you're all here with the tender concern for his well-being, you're not all scared out your minds by the fact if he scratches his pinky or gets a complex, SHIELD will be defunded so hard Natasha will be killing people with paperclips? You keep babying him, he's going to go quietly out of his mind. When a guy comes back from a war zone, you don't shut him up in the basement with nothing to do but brood and break stuff." He shut his mouth tight, because Coulson was looking at him with analytical interest. The corners of his mouth turned up, very slightly, and he turned back to the elevator panel and did something that got the elevator moving again.
"That's why you're still allowed to socialise with the Captain," Coulson said. "Until you get bored of him, you should be a distraction." The doors dinged open with perfect dramatic timing.
"Fine. Wow." Tony stalked out into the corridor, and down towards Steve's room.
Part One - Part Two - Part Three - Part Four - Part Five