Kitchen Fic - A Brief Look at Steve Rogers: Captain America, Avenger, & Sometime Voyeur
Fandom: Avengers Movie-verse (2012)
Rating: R
Word Count: too many (no, seriously, 3500 words of what exactly)
Disclaimer: no one makes a profit off this; promise
Warnings: slash, unbeta'ed, and silly, silly fluff
Pairings: Clint/Coulson, Steve/Tony, Tony/Pepper, Natasha/Bruce
Summary: Steve keeps finding the Avengers having sex everywhere.
Author's Note: so this was meant to be 1500 words of Steve fluff and indirect character study. Instead, we have - this
Chapter One
Six months into his stay in the twenty-first century, Steve seriously considered taking out an ad announcing to the world that, yeah, people had sex in the forties. Maybe they talked about it less. Maybe they had a few hang-ups that weren’t in fashion anymore (thank God). But, overall, sex had been pretty popular. He’d certainly found it exciting.
But Steve knew it wouldn’t do a damn thing. His teammates, especially Tony, would still make comments about his sorry dating history. He’d still have to keep talking about his virginity (and wasn’t that a kick in the pants - a foot taller, a hundred pounds heavier, and everyone still thought he couldn’t get lucky) and he’d still be catching Avengers having sex everywhere. Every. Where. So far, the tally ran something like this.
Tony and Pepper in the elevator.
Okay. That one had pretty much always been in the books. He’d just been lulled into a false sense of security when it hadn’t happened within a week of moving in with Stark, that’s all.
Steve had been waiting for an elevator to take him up to dinner. When the doors opened, though, he’d been treated to the sight of Pepper with her skirt pushed up around her hips, one long leg thrown over Tony’s shoulder, and Tony’s face buried between her slender thighs. She stared at him for a full minute with wide, shocked eyes before Tony, of course, broke the impasse.
“Security breach,” Tony cackled breathlessly against her pale skin.
Pepper hit the billionaire genius across the back of the head before grabbing for her skirt.
“Sorry. Sorry,” she muttered, pressing buttons frantically. “There will be another elevator in a minute. We’ll get this one - fumigated or something. Stop laughing, Tony. I told you we should have left the express elevator for the penthouse only.”
Tony’s warm gaze and unrepentant shrug had reminded Steve of Bucky.
Natasha and Bruce just about anywhere.
To be fair, Steve never actually caught Natasha and Bruce in the middle of anything. It was just the way the two were around each other. Whether he walked in on her pinning Bruce to the mat in the gym or Bruce helping her out with a yoga pose in the living room or both of them making tea in the kitchen, it always felt like he was interrupting something better done without any clothes on.
“Of course, not,” Bruce said the one time Steve decided to ask. “Would you like some tea? It’s a chamomile blend.”
Then Bruce touched Natasha on the wrist - lightly, almost reverently - and handed her a steaming mug of something that smelled like flowers and licorice and lemons. She leaned in to take it from him and, just like that, they were in their own world again.
“No, thanks. I think I’ll just - uh - go for a run.” Steve hated running. Legacy of an asthmatic. “Or something.”
Bruce turned and frowned at him. “Are you sure? Exercise in the middle of the night isn’t actually a recommended treatment modality for insomnia.”
“The tea is delicious,” Natasha murmured as her eyes slid down to Bruce’s ass, barely discernible in his usual baggy pants.
The way Natasha eyed Bruce promised exotic, possibly painful things that made Steve want to cross his legs and beg for mercy. But when the doctor turned back around and caught her line of sight, he only swallowed. Their eyes met and the room flashed suddenly hot with a dark, predatory fire. Steve took one step back then two. Bruce was a brave man. Steve had found new respect for him. But they were worse than Tony and Pepper, really. A smoldering burn instead of a flash fire but still impossible to put out.
“I’ll just-” Take a cold shower. A really cold shower. He couldn’t remember ever taking so many cold showers in his life. At least, his SHIELD assigned therapist thought it was a sign he was overcoming his PTSD. “Read.”
That week, Steve had come close to just asking Jarvis where everyone was before he even headed out of his rooms.
Clint and Agent Coulson on the phone.
Steve knew his team and most of the world expected him to have problems with sex in general and gay sex in particular. His first news conference with the Avengers had made that much clear. There were whole groups of people out there using his shield as a symbol, a rallying cry for ‘wholesome values’. It had taken everything he had not to laugh like a loon or shoot somebody when he’d finally figured out what they meant.
Bucky would have been relieved. He’d always been scared to death that a couple of half-assed hand jobs would turn Steve into (more of) a target or, after Doc Erskine’s serum, get them dishonorably discharged or just flat out shot. Even the hand jobs had stopped after he’d met Peggy. No one had encouraged him to run after Peggy Carter more than Bucky. The fact that their secret was still a secret after seventy years tasted bitter - on those nights when Steve forgot himself enough to actually think about it anyway.
On one of those nights, Steve had wandered up to the kitchen in search of something - anything - to distract him from memories of dead people and ice. He’d found Clint - who Tony had housed on his own floor for some reason - in the living room, talking to Phil Coulson over some sort of video feed on the television. He’d known Clint went to see the man every day. He’d chalked it up to their long partnership in the field. Then he’d walked in to find Clint on the sofa, head thrown back as his hands worked desperately between his legs as Phil leaned forward on the television, his hands clenched like claws as he watched intently from a hospital room miles away.
“Come on, baby boy,” Phil muttered, voice hoarse, eyes burning.
Clint tossed his head, eyes still clenched shut. “I can’t.”
“Yes, you can. You come for me. Only me. And you will. Come. Right. Now.”
Clint wailed his release like a wounded animal finally set free.
Now, Steve flinched every time Tony mentioned video conferencing anyone.
So, that left Thor and that was just a matter of time. Thor spent at least half his time in Asgard - apparently arguing for leniency for Loki which made Steve feel more than a little grateful that he was an only child - and Dr. Foster was still investigating Einstein something bridges in Norway. Steve figured another month, maybe two, and he could add some brain melting images of Thor in flagrante to his collection. He really, really couldn’t wait.
Chapter Two
The elevator incident changed Steve’s relationship with Tony Stark. He just couldn’t decide if it was for the better or not. He also wished Nick Fury hadn’t been around when he first found out that he and Tony were - apparently - now friends.
Steve’s rooms in the Tower were on the same floor as Thor’s which meant that, most of the time, he lived alone. The elevator opened out onto an entryway with doors for each of their apartments, complete with doorbells, video screening, and a potted plant that Steve couldn’t decide if he was responsible for watering or not. He rarely got visitors and never at the crack of dawn so when his doorbell finally rang for the first time, he bolted upright in bed and reached for the shield.
Which was when the holographic screen across from his bed flared to life and started playing some sort of porno. A porno starring Tony Stark. A porno starring Tony Stark without the arc reactor but with no less than three blondes, one of whom may or may not have been a guy. Everyone seemed to be doing a lot of moaning.
The doorbell rang again - sharp, brisk bursts of noise that said the person pressing it wasn’t interested in waiting around. Steve gave up on finding the remote control and ran for the front door. He threw it open to find Nick Fury standing there with a box under one arm. SHIELD’s director eyed him up and down, took in the threadbare sweats and rumpled hair, and stepped inside without waiting for an invitation.
“Let me guess. Not a morning person?”
“Not really.” Steve shut the door behind the man instead of booting him out because Mrs. Rogers had raised a gentleman after all. “Can I - get you something?”
Did he even have anything? He ate most of his meals up on Tony’s floor because it was just simpler. Jarvis probably made sure there was stuff in his kitchenette, though. Coffee maybe. Steve tried to picture Nick’s face when offered a glass of tap water and smiled.
“What the hell is that?” Nick demanded then.
He turned to point at the television in Steve’s living room. On it, a man with a tattoo of Steve’s shield on his ass was fucking a woman in a USO dance outfit with only occasional pauses for her to smack him across the mark. Steve was pretty sure he’d never filmed that piece of questionable cinematography for the U.S. government.
“I - uh - can explain.”
“I sincerely doubt that, Captain.”
“It’s just Tony’s idea of an X-rated alarm clock.” Steve found the remote and pressed the off button. Nothing happened. “And a bad joke.”
Nick shook his head.
“Captain, for the sake of my own sanity, I’m gonna go on believing that you knew what you were doing when you moved into this sorry excuse for a frat house in the first place. Files.” The box hit Steve’s coffee table with a thud. “I need you to go through them and pick out the top three candidates.”
“Candidates?”
“Phil Coulson’s going to be out for a while. Extended rehab.” Nick’s eye twitched. “The Avengers will need a temporary liaison until he’s cleared to return to duty.”
There would be no temporary liaison. Clint, for one, would probably skewer the bastard on the first day. Steve nodded anyway. Sometimes, people needed to believe.
In the bedroom, someone moaned and Tony’s distinctive laugh reached out to them.
“Oh, baby. You know I give great head.”
“Sweet baby Jesus,” Nick swore. “Every morning? Really?”
“I hope not,” Steve muttered. “Jarvis, could you please-?”
“Of course, Captain,” Tony’s AI - whose programming Steve took as proof that someone other than a hyperactive five year old lived in that body - assured him politely and blessed silence filled his apartment again.
Nick left still shaking his head. Steve watched him go then spoke softly to thin air because watching the others always look up at Tony’s towering ceilings when talking to his AI had helped him realize how unnecessary it all was.
“Jarvis, please tell me he hasn’t-”
“Your doorbell and any alarms set into your system will trigger a playlist of similar videos.” Jarvis paused and seemed to be apologizing silently for his creator. “I’m afraid Sir has a rather extensive portfolio.”
“And he doesn’t mind just-” Steve waved his hands uselessly at the television where Captain America and the USO dame were frozen in a parody of pleasure. “Sharing them with me?”
“Most of the selected videos are already available for public viewing on several internet sites.”
“Of course, they are.”
“Captain?”
“Yes, Jarvis.”
“I understand that his actions may sometimes seem somewhat brash but I hope you will take Sir’s gesture of friendship for what it is.”
Which was how Steve found out he and Tony Stark were now BFFs (thanks, Jarvis).
Despite cancelling all his alarms and leaving his door open whenever he was in, Steve still got to see Tony in all his glory as least one more time not to mention a quartet of Captain America ‘training films’ he desperately wished he could scrape out of his brain. In the end, even after Jarvis promised he’d disconnected all the triggers this time around, Steve decided to brave the lion in his den and put the whole damn mess to bed already.
He was only a little surprised that the door to Tony’s lab slid open for him without needing some sort of arcane password or secret handshake.
“Locking out Captain America just makes me look like a dick,” Tony said before Steve could ask, not glancing up from his work bench. “What can I do for you, Cap?”
“Can we just call a truce?” Steve sighed, too tired for formalities. Between the porn-filled alarms and all the bullshit Nick had him wading through for SHIELD, Steve felt like he hadn’t slept in a week.
Tony pushed up his welding goggles and looked at him.
“Truce? Were we at war?”
“Porn wars maybe.”
“Was that a quip at the expense of modern media? I’m impressed.”
“No, you’re angry. And I don’t blame you. But I didn’t intend to interrupt you and Pepper and I would never say anything-”
Tony tossed off his goggles entirely and started flapping his hands at Steve before he could finish the sentence.
“No, of course, you wouldn’t. That goes without saying - your word is your bond. Yadda yadda. Pep may have needed to indulge in a Xanax prescription or two but that really doesn’t have anything to do with you. You’re missing my point.”
As usual went unsaid. Steve frowned.
“Are you going to tell me what your point is or am I just going to have to learn to live with the non-stop porn fest?”
“I thought Jarvis disengaged the triggers for you.”
Of course, Tony would know all about that. Steve fought the urge to swear.
“Tony-”
Tony rolled his eyes at him.
“Fine. But this curtain doesn’t go up for just anyone so I hope you appreciate the moment of brutal honesty we’re about to share.” Tony stared down at the scraps of metal in front of him and took a deep breath. “I’ve lived in a fish bowl my whole life, Rogers. I don’t know what it feels like to live any other way actually. Hence the wealth of unendorsed amateur porn not so lovingly dedicated to my ass. But you actually are just a guy from Brooklyn. Well, welcome to the aquarium. Not everything you want private stays that way and not everything they say about you is true.”
It was painful apology and ruthless soul-baring all at the same time. Clever. Fearless. Complicated. Just like the man offering it. Steve understood for the first time why they’d clashed so badly at the beginning. Their individual strengths were the other’s blind spots. If Tony swam freely in a sea of emotion, then Steve was the guy who stayed on shore.
“Only you could make porn complicated,” he said in the end because it seemed simpler than talking about it some more.
Tony grinned.
“Did you at least catch ‘The Boot Camp Trilogy’? The shower scenes alone are epic. Seriously, I just wanted to update the red, white, and blue spank bank, Capsicle. Don’t be mad.”
And, oddly enough, Steve wasn’t mad. Tired maybe. In deep, deep trouble definitely. For the first time since SHIELD thawed him out, Steve was having dreams that didn’t feature someone who’d been dead for seventy years. It would all be a lot more awkward if it weren’t for Pepper. She made Tony safe and off limits which was familiar territory, at least.
Steve was an old hand at unrequited. He could do it again.
Chapter Three
On one thing, Nick Fury had been dead right. Steve had never been a morning person. He was still amazed that modern pop culture had somehow managed to weave a fantasy world where Captain America not only got up at the crack of dawn but routinely ran ten miles before breakfast for fun. The only reason he was up at this hour at all was the United States Army. Apparently, it took just about eighteen months to teach a man to wake up at 6 AM for the rest of his life. On the other hand, Clint looked like he was up mostly because he had never gone back to bed after their hot chocolate powwow the night before.
They didn’t talk about it, of course. They didn’t talk about much of anything really and Steve was fast coming to the conclusion that the absence of talking was actually the glue that kept his relationship with Clint Barton from exploding. The man had issues with Steve - shockingly - and until Steve cracked that code, he was pretty much doomed to keep up the status quo for the sake of team cohesion and world peace.
If Clint knew Steve had walked in on his call with Phil, he never said anything.
So, this morning - like all the other mornings before it - they sat in the kitchen together in silence punctuated only by the occasional crackle of plastic and creak of cardboard as they passed cereal and milk back and forth. Of course, their fragile peace shattered once Thor showed up and started talking. Apparently, the guy had gotten back late last night and had loads to share, enough for all three of them really. Two sentences in, Clint snorted cornflakes out his nose. Blessed with better timing, Steve paused, a spoonful of cereal halfway to his mouth, as Thor stared back at him.
“Have I said something amiss? Is she not on her way back from their domicile in the West?”
“Umm,” Clint hummed from his perch on the countertop - neatly tucked away between refrigerator and coffee maker - and glanced warily at Thor. “No, you’re not wrong. I think Pepper said she’d probably be back sometime today.”
“Stark’s consort also informed me that he was needed at several gatherings that would result in his absence from our abode until well past the dinner hour - a particular convenience considering that tonight’s repast was to have been his responsibility.”
“Okay, yeah. Cap, batter up.” Clint slid from the countertop with his bowl clutched close to his chest. “I’m not sure where to even start with that one. I’ll just head-”
“Move and I’ll make sure you’re hand-delivering the team’s mission reports to Fury for a month.” Steve set down his spoon.
Clint stopped and scowled at him.
“I do not understand.” Thor frowned. “Do you feel I have insulted Stark in some way by suggesting-”
“Oh, no.” Clint shook his head. “He’s totally dodging K.P. duty, which - for anyone who might be interested, Cap - is the fourth time since we started the whole BYOB sideshow.”
“Thor, it’s just that-” Steve groped for the words. Words had never been his friends. His USO days had been a nightmare even when they wrote all the words out for him and taped them to his gear. “I think Pepper actually prefers to be called Pepper.”
“On occasion, Ms. Potts,” Jarvis supplied then, unhelpfully reminding Steve that Tony was probably going to be treated to a multiple angle, stereo surround sound video replay of this nightmare the minute he made it down to his workshop.
“Escort Pepper then?” Thor looked genuinely puzzled.
“Oh, Jesus.”
“Not helping,” Steve snapped. “No, Thor. Definitely not ‘escort’. Look, I just don’t think that women in this time appreciate those terms the way you mean them.”
This time or any time in Earth’s recent history really. Peggy would have already shot him in the eye and Natasha - hell, she was going to shoot him somewhere a lot more painful, alien god or not.
“I mean to show the greatest respect.”
“I know,” Steve said soothingly.
Clint dumped his bowl into the sink with a clatter, clearly not feeling soothed in the slightest.
“Thor, man, seriously. Didn’t any of this shit come up with Jane?” Clint squinted at the bowed, shaggy blond head suspiciously. “I can’t see things going your way the first time you called Dr. Foster - holder of PhDs in things I can’t even pronounce - a consort.”
Thor’s head came up, his expression gone stiff. “The issue never arose.”
Thor had never looked as much the part of a prince as he did then, distant and icy and absolutely grim. At least, that explained why Steve had yet to be treated to long, rambling stories about weekend trips to Tromso or - better yet - loud, raucous sex involving Thor and the enigmatic Jane Foster in any of the Tower’s public living areas. Still, Steve was the last person to give anyone relationship advice or break-up advice or any advice really. That had always been more Bucky’s thing. He glanced over at Clint who watched him with dark eyes, thickly muscled arms folded forbiddingly across his chest. Amazingly, the fact that he was wearing Hello Kitty boxers that were at least one size too small didn’t make the man seem any more approachable. Steve went back to eating his breakfast.
“So,” Thor finally said, breaking the long silence. “Lady Pepper.”
Steve’s mind went blank and he gave up the battle, if not the war.
“Close enough.”
“Dude.” Clint shook his head and pushed away from the counter. “You are so lost.”
Steve watched him walk away, Hello Kitty’s smiling, bow-clad head bobbing down the hall, and wished he knew which of them Clint had been talking to.
This entry was originally posted at http://www.pheyne.dreamwidth.org.
Rating: R
Word Count: too many (no, seriously, 3500 words of what exactly)
Disclaimer: no one makes a profit off this; promise
Warnings: slash, unbeta'ed, and silly, silly fluff
Pairings: Clint/Coulson, Steve/Tony, Tony/Pepper, Natasha/Bruce
Summary: Steve keeps finding the Avengers having sex everywhere.
Author's Note: so this was meant to be 1500 words of Steve fluff and indirect character study. Instead, we have - this
Chapter One
Six months into his stay in the twenty-first century, Steve seriously considered taking out an ad announcing to the world that, yeah, people had sex in the forties. Maybe they talked about it less. Maybe they had a few hang-ups that weren’t in fashion anymore (thank God). But, overall, sex had been pretty popular. He’d certainly found it exciting.
But Steve knew it wouldn’t do a damn thing. His teammates, especially Tony, would still make comments about his sorry dating history. He’d still have to keep talking about his virginity (and wasn’t that a kick in the pants - a foot taller, a hundred pounds heavier, and everyone still thought he couldn’t get lucky) and he’d still be catching Avengers having sex everywhere. Every. Where. So far, the tally ran something like this.
Tony and Pepper in the elevator.
Okay. That one had pretty much always been in the books. He’d just been lulled into a false sense of security when it hadn’t happened within a week of moving in with Stark, that’s all.
Steve had been waiting for an elevator to take him up to dinner. When the doors opened, though, he’d been treated to the sight of Pepper with her skirt pushed up around her hips, one long leg thrown over Tony’s shoulder, and Tony’s face buried between her slender thighs. She stared at him for a full minute with wide, shocked eyes before Tony, of course, broke the impasse.
“Security breach,” Tony cackled breathlessly against her pale skin.
Pepper hit the billionaire genius across the back of the head before grabbing for her skirt.
“Sorry. Sorry,” she muttered, pressing buttons frantically. “There will be another elevator in a minute. We’ll get this one - fumigated or something. Stop laughing, Tony. I told you we should have left the express elevator for the penthouse only.”
Tony’s warm gaze and unrepentant shrug had reminded Steve of Bucky.
Natasha and Bruce just about anywhere.
To be fair, Steve never actually caught Natasha and Bruce in the middle of anything. It was just the way the two were around each other. Whether he walked in on her pinning Bruce to the mat in the gym or Bruce helping her out with a yoga pose in the living room or both of them making tea in the kitchen, it always felt like he was interrupting something better done without any clothes on.
“Of course, not,” Bruce said the one time Steve decided to ask. “Would you like some tea? It’s a chamomile blend.”
Then Bruce touched Natasha on the wrist - lightly, almost reverently - and handed her a steaming mug of something that smelled like flowers and licorice and lemons. She leaned in to take it from him and, just like that, they were in their own world again.
“No, thanks. I think I’ll just - uh - go for a run.” Steve hated running. Legacy of an asthmatic. “Or something.”
Bruce turned and frowned at him. “Are you sure? Exercise in the middle of the night isn’t actually a recommended treatment modality for insomnia.”
“The tea is delicious,” Natasha murmured as her eyes slid down to Bruce’s ass, barely discernible in his usual baggy pants.
The way Natasha eyed Bruce promised exotic, possibly painful things that made Steve want to cross his legs and beg for mercy. But when the doctor turned back around and caught her line of sight, he only swallowed. Their eyes met and the room flashed suddenly hot with a dark, predatory fire. Steve took one step back then two. Bruce was a brave man. Steve had found new respect for him. But they were worse than Tony and Pepper, really. A smoldering burn instead of a flash fire but still impossible to put out.
“I’ll just-” Take a cold shower. A really cold shower. He couldn’t remember ever taking so many cold showers in his life. At least, his SHIELD assigned therapist thought it was a sign he was overcoming his PTSD. “Read.”
That week, Steve had come close to just asking Jarvis where everyone was before he even headed out of his rooms.
Clint and Agent Coulson on the phone.
Steve knew his team and most of the world expected him to have problems with sex in general and gay sex in particular. His first news conference with the Avengers had made that much clear. There were whole groups of people out there using his shield as a symbol, a rallying cry for ‘wholesome values’. It had taken everything he had not to laugh like a loon or shoot somebody when he’d finally figured out what they meant.
Bucky would have been relieved. He’d always been scared to death that a couple of half-assed hand jobs would turn Steve into (more of) a target or, after Doc Erskine’s serum, get them dishonorably discharged or just flat out shot. Even the hand jobs had stopped after he’d met Peggy. No one had encouraged him to run after Peggy Carter more than Bucky. The fact that their secret was still a secret after seventy years tasted bitter - on those nights when Steve forgot himself enough to actually think about it anyway.
On one of those nights, Steve had wandered up to the kitchen in search of something - anything - to distract him from memories of dead people and ice. He’d found Clint - who Tony had housed on his own floor for some reason - in the living room, talking to Phil Coulson over some sort of video feed on the television. He’d known Clint went to see the man every day. He’d chalked it up to their long partnership in the field. Then he’d walked in to find Clint on the sofa, head thrown back as his hands worked desperately between his legs as Phil leaned forward on the television, his hands clenched like claws as he watched intently from a hospital room miles away.
“Come on, baby boy,” Phil muttered, voice hoarse, eyes burning.
Clint tossed his head, eyes still clenched shut. “I can’t.”
“Yes, you can. You come for me. Only me. And you will. Come. Right. Now.”
Clint wailed his release like a wounded animal finally set free.
Now, Steve flinched every time Tony mentioned video conferencing anyone.
So, that left Thor and that was just a matter of time. Thor spent at least half his time in Asgard - apparently arguing for leniency for Loki which made Steve feel more than a little grateful that he was an only child - and Dr. Foster was still investigating Einstein something bridges in Norway. Steve figured another month, maybe two, and he could add some brain melting images of Thor in flagrante to his collection. He really, really couldn’t wait.
Chapter Two
The elevator incident changed Steve’s relationship with Tony Stark. He just couldn’t decide if it was for the better or not. He also wished Nick Fury hadn’t been around when he first found out that he and Tony were - apparently - now friends.
Steve’s rooms in the Tower were on the same floor as Thor’s which meant that, most of the time, he lived alone. The elevator opened out onto an entryway with doors for each of their apartments, complete with doorbells, video screening, and a potted plant that Steve couldn’t decide if he was responsible for watering or not. He rarely got visitors and never at the crack of dawn so when his doorbell finally rang for the first time, he bolted upright in bed and reached for the shield.
Which was when the holographic screen across from his bed flared to life and started playing some sort of porno. A porno starring Tony Stark. A porno starring Tony Stark without the arc reactor but with no less than three blondes, one of whom may or may not have been a guy. Everyone seemed to be doing a lot of moaning.
The doorbell rang again - sharp, brisk bursts of noise that said the person pressing it wasn’t interested in waiting around. Steve gave up on finding the remote control and ran for the front door. He threw it open to find Nick Fury standing there with a box under one arm. SHIELD’s director eyed him up and down, took in the threadbare sweats and rumpled hair, and stepped inside without waiting for an invitation.
“Let me guess. Not a morning person?”
“Not really.” Steve shut the door behind the man instead of booting him out because Mrs. Rogers had raised a gentleman after all. “Can I - get you something?”
Did he even have anything? He ate most of his meals up on Tony’s floor because it was just simpler. Jarvis probably made sure there was stuff in his kitchenette, though. Coffee maybe. Steve tried to picture Nick’s face when offered a glass of tap water and smiled.
“What the hell is that?” Nick demanded then.
He turned to point at the television in Steve’s living room. On it, a man with a tattoo of Steve’s shield on his ass was fucking a woman in a USO dance outfit with only occasional pauses for her to smack him across the mark. Steve was pretty sure he’d never filmed that piece of questionable cinematography for the U.S. government.
“I - uh - can explain.”
“I sincerely doubt that, Captain.”
“It’s just Tony’s idea of an X-rated alarm clock.” Steve found the remote and pressed the off button. Nothing happened. “And a bad joke.”
Nick shook his head.
“Captain, for the sake of my own sanity, I’m gonna go on believing that you knew what you were doing when you moved into this sorry excuse for a frat house in the first place. Files.” The box hit Steve’s coffee table with a thud. “I need you to go through them and pick out the top three candidates.”
“Candidates?”
“Phil Coulson’s going to be out for a while. Extended rehab.” Nick’s eye twitched. “The Avengers will need a temporary liaison until he’s cleared to return to duty.”
There would be no temporary liaison. Clint, for one, would probably skewer the bastard on the first day. Steve nodded anyway. Sometimes, people needed to believe.
In the bedroom, someone moaned and Tony’s distinctive laugh reached out to them.
“Oh, baby. You know I give great head.”
“Sweet baby Jesus,” Nick swore. “Every morning? Really?”
“I hope not,” Steve muttered. “Jarvis, could you please-?”
“Of course, Captain,” Tony’s AI - whose programming Steve took as proof that someone other than a hyperactive five year old lived in that body - assured him politely and blessed silence filled his apartment again.
Nick left still shaking his head. Steve watched him go then spoke softly to thin air because watching the others always look up at Tony’s towering ceilings when talking to his AI had helped him realize how unnecessary it all was.
“Jarvis, please tell me he hasn’t-”
“Your doorbell and any alarms set into your system will trigger a playlist of similar videos.” Jarvis paused and seemed to be apologizing silently for his creator. “I’m afraid Sir has a rather extensive portfolio.”
“And he doesn’t mind just-” Steve waved his hands uselessly at the television where Captain America and the USO dame were frozen in a parody of pleasure. “Sharing them with me?”
“Most of the selected videos are already available for public viewing on several internet sites.”
“Of course, they are.”
“Captain?”
“Yes, Jarvis.”
“I understand that his actions may sometimes seem somewhat brash but I hope you will take Sir’s gesture of friendship for what it is.”
Which was how Steve found out he and Tony Stark were now BFFs (thanks, Jarvis).
Despite cancelling all his alarms and leaving his door open whenever he was in, Steve still got to see Tony in all his glory as least one more time not to mention a quartet of Captain America ‘training films’ he desperately wished he could scrape out of his brain. In the end, even after Jarvis promised he’d disconnected all the triggers this time around, Steve decided to brave the lion in his den and put the whole damn mess to bed already.
He was only a little surprised that the door to Tony’s lab slid open for him without needing some sort of arcane password or secret handshake.
“Locking out Captain America just makes me look like a dick,” Tony said before Steve could ask, not glancing up from his work bench. “What can I do for you, Cap?”
“Can we just call a truce?” Steve sighed, too tired for formalities. Between the porn-filled alarms and all the bullshit Nick had him wading through for SHIELD, Steve felt like he hadn’t slept in a week.
Tony pushed up his welding goggles and looked at him.
“Truce? Were we at war?”
“Porn wars maybe.”
“Was that a quip at the expense of modern media? I’m impressed.”
“No, you’re angry. And I don’t blame you. But I didn’t intend to interrupt you and Pepper and I would never say anything-”
Tony tossed off his goggles entirely and started flapping his hands at Steve before he could finish the sentence.
“No, of course, you wouldn’t. That goes without saying - your word is your bond. Yadda yadda. Pep may have needed to indulge in a Xanax prescription or two but that really doesn’t have anything to do with you. You’re missing my point.”
As usual went unsaid. Steve frowned.
“Are you going to tell me what your point is or am I just going to have to learn to live with the non-stop porn fest?”
“I thought Jarvis disengaged the triggers for you.”
Of course, Tony would know all about that. Steve fought the urge to swear.
“Tony-”
Tony rolled his eyes at him.
“Fine. But this curtain doesn’t go up for just anyone so I hope you appreciate the moment of brutal honesty we’re about to share.” Tony stared down at the scraps of metal in front of him and took a deep breath. “I’ve lived in a fish bowl my whole life, Rogers. I don’t know what it feels like to live any other way actually. Hence the wealth of unendorsed amateur porn not so lovingly dedicated to my ass. But you actually are just a guy from Brooklyn. Well, welcome to the aquarium. Not everything you want private stays that way and not everything they say about you is true.”
It was painful apology and ruthless soul-baring all at the same time. Clever. Fearless. Complicated. Just like the man offering it. Steve understood for the first time why they’d clashed so badly at the beginning. Their individual strengths were the other’s blind spots. If Tony swam freely in a sea of emotion, then Steve was the guy who stayed on shore.
“Only you could make porn complicated,” he said in the end because it seemed simpler than talking about it some more.
Tony grinned.
“Did you at least catch ‘The Boot Camp Trilogy’? The shower scenes alone are epic. Seriously, I just wanted to update the red, white, and blue spank bank, Capsicle. Don’t be mad.”
And, oddly enough, Steve wasn’t mad. Tired maybe. In deep, deep trouble definitely. For the first time since SHIELD thawed him out, Steve was having dreams that didn’t feature someone who’d been dead for seventy years. It would all be a lot more awkward if it weren’t for Pepper. She made Tony safe and off limits which was familiar territory, at least.
Steve was an old hand at unrequited. He could do it again.
Chapter Three
On one thing, Nick Fury had been dead right. Steve had never been a morning person. He was still amazed that modern pop culture had somehow managed to weave a fantasy world where Captain America not only got up at the crack of dawn but routinely ran ten miles before breakfast for fun. The only reason he was up at this hour at all was the United States Army. Apparently, it took just about eighteen months to teach a man to wake up at 6 AM for the rest of his life. On the other hand, Clint looked like he was up mostly because he had never gone back to bed after their hot chocolate powwow the night before.
They didn’t talk about it, of course. They didn’t talk about much of anything really and Steve was fast coming to the conclusion that the absence of talking was actually the glue that kept his relationship with Clint Barton from exploding. The man had issues with Steve - shockingly - and until Steve cracked that code, he was pretty much doomed to keep up the status quo for the sake of team cohesion and world peace.
If Clint knew Steve had walked in on his call with Phil, he never said anything.
So, this morning - like all the other mornings before it - they sat in the kitchen together in silence punctuated only by the occasional crackle of plastic and creak of cardboard as they passed cereal and milk back and forth. Of course, their fragile peace shattered once Thor showed up and started talking. Apparently, the guy had gotten back late last night and had loads to share, enough for all three of them really. Two sentences in, Clint snorted cornflakes out his nose. Blessed with better timing, Steve paused, a spoonful of cereal halfway to his mouth, as Thor stared back at him.
“Have I said something amiss? Is she not on her way back from their domicile in the West?”
“Umm,” Clint hummed from his perch on the countertop - neatly tucked away between refrigerator and coffee maker - and glanced warily at Thor. “No, you’re not wrong. I think Pepper said she’d probably be back sometime today.”
“Stark’s consort also informed me that he was needed at several gatherings that would result in his absence from our abode until well past the dinner hour - a particular convenience considering that tonight’s repast was to have been his responsibility.”
“Okay, yeah. Cap, batter up.” Clint slid from the countertop with his bowl clutched close to his chest. “I’m not sure where to even start with that one. I’ll just head-”
“Move and I’ll make sure you’re hand-delivering the team’s mission reports to Fury for a month.” Steve set down his spoon.
Clint stopped and scowled at him.
“I do not understand.” Thor frowned. “Do you feel I have insulted Stark in some way by suggesting-”
“Oh, no.” Clint shook his head. “He’s totally dodging K.P. duty, which - for anyone who might be interested, Cap - is the fourth time since we started the whole BYOB sideshow.”
“Thor, it’s just that-” Steve groped for the words. Words had never been his friends. His USO days had been a nightmare even when they wrote all the words out for him and taped them to his gear. “I think Pepper actually prefers to be called Pepper.”
“On occasion, Ms. Potts,” Jarvis supplied then, unhelpfully reminding Steve that Tony was probably going to be treated to a multiple angle, stereo surround sound video replay of this nightmare the minute he made it down to his workshop.
“Escort Pepper then?” Thor looked genuinely puzzled.
“Oh, Jesus.”
“Not helping,” Steve snapped. “No, Thor. Definitely not ‘escort’. Look, I just don’t think that women in this time appreciate those terms the way you mean them.”
This time or any time in Earth’s recent history really. Peggy would have already shot him in the eye and Natasha - hell, she was going to shoot him somewhere a lot more painful, alien god or not.
“I mean to show the greatest respect.”
“I know,” Steve said soothingly.
Clint dumped his bowl into the sink with a clatter, clearly not feeling soothed in the slightest.
“Thor, man, seriously. Didn’t any of this shit come up with Jane?” Clint squinted at the bowed, shaggy blond head suspiciously. “I can’t see things going your way the first time you called Dr. Foster - holder of PhDs in things I can’t even pronounce - a consort.”
Thor’s head came up, his expression gone stiff. “The issue never arose.”
Thor had never looked as much the part of a prince as he did then, distant and icy and absolutely grim. At least, that explained why Steve had yet to be treated to long, rambling stories about weekend trips to Tromso or - better yet - loud, raucous sex involving Thor and the enigmatic Jane Foster in any of the Tower’s public living areas. Still, Steve was the last person to give anyone relationship advice or break-up advice or any advice really. That had always been more Bucky’s thing. He glanced over at Clint who watched him with dark eyes, thickly muscled arms folded forbiddingly across his chest. Amazingly, the fact that he was wearing Hello Kitty boxers that were at least one size too small didn’t make the man seem any more approachable. Steve went back to eating his breakfast.
“So,” Thor finally said, breaking the long silence. “Lady Pepper.”
Steve’s mind went blank and he gave up the battle, if not the war.
“Close enough.”
“Dude.” Clint shook his head and pushed away from the counter. “You are so lost.”
Steve watched him walk away, Hello Kitty’s smiling, bow-clad head bobbing down the hall, and wished he knew which of them Clint had been talking to.
This entry was originally posted at http://www.pheyne.dreamwidth.org.