Oh, God...

[shieldborne]

Infinity War Open Post






THERE WILL BE SPOILERS.

Drop me a prompt, or ask me to drop you a prompt. Open to doomy pre-IW foreshadowing, fix-it AUs, post-IW angst, character interactions that should have happened but didn't on-screen, crossovers, and whatever else anyone can come up with.

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[starkingenuity]

So far on the Things Rogers Blows At list, there’s a big fat blank space. Tony hadn’t been paying enough attention to the moment of depressed fugue state to listen to the notes so much as the tone, but he can’t help but find the little shower concert to be just the thing to take the edge off of his own depression.

It doesn’t stop him from drinking exactly, but he’s got a nice, lazy glaze to his eyes instead of the mania most people come to know from the once near constant drunkard that the inventor had been. Dark eyes, floating on an amber cloud of self medication, follow the blond as he enters the room, akin glistening from the shower and hair now the appropriate color and shape. He kind of misses the lumberjack beard but he decides again at saying so.

Instead, Tony raises a glass, though it’s empty of anything but bronze droplets. “Didn’t know you were a lounge singer. After that one song, I was hoping to hear Umbrella. Or something from Britney Spears.”

[shieldborne]

He still can't dance, don't worry. And his flirting skills are in some ways even worse than they were in the 1940s, especially where flirting with women is concerned. If Tony just drags him to a club, he can feel infinitely superior while Steve lurks by the wall and looks like a deer in headlights.

That's probably not going to happen any time soon, though.

As soon as Steve emerges, he can tell Tony's been drinking again, to a greater degree than before, and he knows his history. He isn't sure anyone's ever used the term 'alcoholic' to describe him, but it's probably applicable. He's also dead certain Tony's not about to do anything to jeopardize the mission they've set themselves, so there's a flicker of concern in his face, a little frown, and a sigh. "Don't make me jealous with that stuff," he says, nodding at the glass.

Softening again, he has the grace to blush at the reference to his singing. "I like Umbrella. I could try Toxic, but don't expect me to wear the outfit."

He wanders closer and sits across from Tony. "Sometimes when I'm on edge anyway, the sound of water trickling close to my head is...uncomfortable. It's a coping mechanism. Anyway, I like music."

[starkingenuity]

“Ella-ella-ella,” Tony chants, because he doesn’t want to picture Steve wearing clothing from 90s music videos. It’s bad enough that he’s already warping the watercolorist drag queen off-Broadway play version of Rogers together with the Lumberjack he littered the floor with and this new-but-old Rogers standing in front of him.

Tony can’t see a difference in the brassiness of his hair, but he’s not a super soldier with superior sight that doesn’t appear to age like a normal person. This Tony Stark is much older than the one from most of a decade ago. He’s not sure if he’s improved with age, but he still doesn’t think anyone will look too closely. Most people don’t really look at him for long periods of time.

Evidently being a wise cracking, genius, billionaire tends to make people uncomfortable.

Except for Steve Rogers, who doesn’t care who you are and will punch you down to size if he thinks you’re being a bully.

In response to Steve’s ‘jealousy,’ Tony tries to drain the last two drops from the glass, but it’s a no go. He barely gets a taste and his smarmy, absolutely drunken smile proves that the whole thing was for the best.

“I really like this Taxi Cab Confessional episode. I’m learning so much about you.” The man might be drunk, but he doesn’t slur. That’s the mark of a truly functioning alcoholic. “What’s it like…? Crashing? Do you remember it more than just subconsciously?” Because if Steve gets nervous about water on his head-- Well, who the hell knows. Tony’s not an expert in psychoanalysis. Maybe he’ll spend tonight reading up on it so he can be.

[shieldborne]

Okay, but Steve's drag queen persona would be either a USO girl or a sexy nurse, never a flight attendant. He'd probably go to the USO first, since he remembers the chorus girls he worked with awfully well, even now. Red, white, and blue is still his comfort zone.

The smug look on Tony's face rubs Steve the wrong way. That's one aspect of the man's personality he's never cared for, and seeing it crop up right now makes him less comfortable with this conversation than he might have been ten minutes ago. It's also impressively insensitive for him to ask that kind of question, and Steve doesn't have to dignify it with a response.

But they're both hurting, and information--maybe a nibble of schadenfreude--might ease the pain for Stark a little. They both need one another functional. Letting himself be vulnerable for a few minutes can be strategic.

Besides, he's tired of pretending nothing gets to him.

"I was awake. Well...there was the impact, and I hit the windshield like a ton of bricks, and that knocked me out for a couple minutes. I think I probably broke some bones, too. SHIELD files said there were some repairs during the thawing process, and I remember my chest hurt. I did come to, though, as the plane was settling into the ice. I figured I had nothing to lose, so I tried to rewire the radio, but I was already losing manual dexterity in the cold, and then the water started coming in, and it started to get real dark. I guess it was going under at that point."

He's never discussed this before, and in the intervening years it has lost some of its sting, but not nearly enough. He's staring at Tony's empty glass as he talks, as if it has something to tell him. "So it was too dark to see, but all I could hear was water rushing in, and the ice grinding and crunching against the metal, and I didn't know if I was going to freeze, or drown, or get crushed first. Even if I could get the radio working, no one was ever going to find me in time, so."

He takes a deep breath, calming himself, then shrugs weakly. "I laid down on my back with the shield on my chest and just let go."

[starkingenuity]

Just let go.

Tony finds his eyes closing. It’s not a comforting tale, even if Steve has a strangely fantastic way of telling them. He’s descriptive and he’s careful, picking his words carefully as he speaks to give him that deeper, darker sort of voice that is very different from the Captain America tone. Steve’s various vocalizations, various tones, have always managed to inspire reaction in people and Tony’s no different. The call to assemble increases his pulse. Commands on the field of battle are often heeded, despite Stark’s generally combative do-it-my-way personality.

Now this tone…this tone makes him feel like he’s in that plane, running out of oxygen in his lungs, freezing, being crushed—

He’s experienced something very similar in his life, something that the oddly soothing gravel in Steve’s voice dredges up for him. The smug smile just stays on his face, but he doesn’t open his eyes. “First time I was in space-- Well, upper atmosphere, my armor froze over. Fixed that problem with a gold-titanium alloy and some extra temperature control. Thought I fixed that problem,” he clarifies. “Space is cold. So cold. It drains power, which shouldn’t be a problem, arc reactors are perpetual-- But too much cold freezes the moving parts and—” He almost snaps.

“So I was up there. I saw the missile hit the Chitauri ship. I watched the fireworks. Front row seat. But the HUD gave out. And JARVIS gave out. Everything went dark and cold-- So fast,” he half-whispers, finally opening his eyes to look over at Steve. “I didn’t have time to worry about the oxygen levels in the suit. It should have thirty minutes without power, even with the draw from the vacuum. Closed system, like a plane only better. More atmospheric control—” Evidently, drinking makes him rattle on. He’s much less poetic than Steve, that’s for sure. “So it froze up, and I’m just wearing jeans and a t-shirt inside of a metal coffin at that point. I don’t remember anything at all, just that I didn’t want to go out like a martyr…and then yeah, I really did want to go out like a martyr to make you feel bad. Shit. I couldn’t get my girlfriend on the line and I’m just thinking about you and not her as I went to my death. But hey! I just figured out what we have in common-- Floating pieces of metal in freezing temperatures can’t beat us. And we like Rhianna.”

[shieldborne]

Steve has always had a big mouth. It's not that he likes to talk, it's just that a lot of the time he can't stop himself. Steve wasn't always an innocent bystander when bullies selected him, personally, to target. A lot of the time, he lashed out with his tongue before anyone's fists came into play. Not that that made it right or okay, but being able to say he brought it on himself sure makes him feel better. Never a victim, always a participant.

He has a big mouth, and big ideas, and sometimes the two characteristics coincide and he finds people listening to him like the Word of God issues forth from his mouth. Or, in Tony's case, like he's dragged shadows out of his brain and spun them into a solid form. He wants to reach out and soothe him, but that doesn't work so well, from what he's seen. Steve is tactile by nature. Tony, even under all his quirks and traumas, is not.

He'd like to comfort or reassure him, but he has no idea how, or whether he would even accept it.

"That, and the whole 'just about died to save New York' thing, you mean." Steve rests his elbow on the counter, chin on his hand, watching with a softer look in his eyes.

"It's the worst moments of our lives that leave the most indelible marks on us," he adds. "And we keep quiet about it as much as we can, because no good ever comes of anyone seeing us struggle."

That may be him drawing more parallels between himself and Tony, or it may just be a general observation on the nature of humanity. "But I'm honored that the last thought on your mind was 'Take that, Rogers'. I would have definitely felt like shit. Kinda did anyway."

Kinda still do.

As long as they're still in a confessional mood: "Did you really hate me that much when you were growing up?"

[starkingenuity]

Tony’s issues are more complicated than even Steve understands when it comes to touch. He’s not at all adverse to a hug and he has embraced people whole heartedly when he feels like he’s no longer falling apart. It’s different when he’s in crisis. He suffers those moments alone. Jubilation, however, calls for a more tactile approach. They just haven’t had a win in awhile. And he’s not relieved enough to want to hug Steve.

He’s not sure if he’s even capable of hugging someone like Steve. The man is so alien-- More so than even Thor. At least Thor provides comic relief. Rogers is all paragon of virtue.

Or had been. Now he’s just the hot guy next door who probably will impress both your friend group and your parents for very different reasons. That makes him a little uneasy, but the booze does a great job of buffing that out.

“I didn’t always hate you,” Tony scoffs up into blue eyes that seem almost like they’re swimming. He’s pleasantly dizzy. “I had a t-shirt and every action figure and all of your collectible cards-- I think I burned most of it when my thumb was strong enough to flick a lighter. Shame. It would have been worth something.”

Says the guy with more money in the world than he knows what to do with.

“Dad liked you best. Most people like you best. Even people that sided with me like you best. I wanted to balance that out.” And he’s jealous.

[shieldborne]

Steve isn't psychic, but he's good at reading body language. The past hour has made it obvious he has to approach Tony with caution. Before that, he realized friendly hugs and touches were not the norm. He doesn't necessarily get the why, but the fact that he and Tony are maybe, possibly, starting to mend bridges makes him more interested in finding out.

Gently. Carefully. Slowly.

"Christ," he mutters, inadvertently picturing child Tony Stark with action figures of Captain America. Little plush toys of the dancing monkey in a star-spangled uniform. "That's as bad as Coulson."

Oh, damn. If their plan works out here, Phil won't die. That's bound to change the future for the better. Light a fire under him, he'll ferret out any Hydra agents within SHIELD...God. If they can get Bucky and have Coulson and the Steve that belongs to this time take care of him, he'll be just fine.

"People see what they want to see, when they look at me. I don't know when that got started. After the serum, after the USO tour. Maybe during the war or maybe not until I was presumed dead in the Arctic. But they see what they want to believe in, and then sometimes they think because I wear the uniform I'm the one that originated the concept. Freedom, the American Dream, whatever. I never planned on that. I only wanted to be good enough to fight alongside the other guys."

"I think it's like how when you're a kid they tell you about how George Washington couldn't tell a lie about chopping down the cherry tree. When I wear the uniform, I'm a parable. It's not me. " The other Avengers know better, to be fair, although he's cagey about letting even them in too deep.

"Not saying your anger isn't valid or anything. I'd be pissed off, too. If it helps any, I like Iron Man better than Captain America. I was really going to keep that bobblehead. But I was angry with Howard, too, when we first met. I took it out on you. That wasn't fair."

[starkingenuity]

At Howard?

“What did my dad do to you? Give you a tiny girl-waist?” Well, Steve Rogers is pretty disproportionate. He’s all shoulders and long legs and a waist that Tony is pretty sure he can get his arms cleanly around so that his hands can cup his elbows. It’s silly to picture it. He’d probably look like a kid hugging an adult, so much shorter he is.

And maybe he’d like to eventually give Steve a shot at that hug. On his own terms. He’s not sure how else he’d manage to get over the anxiety he feels to have Steve approach him.

It’s embarrassing. He shouldn’t be flinching away from a thirty-something. He’s Iron Man.

And Steve Rogers likes Iron Man.

Surprised to hear that the blond liked the bobble head, drunk-mind Tony isn’t quite able to zero in on one topic and still process others. Drunk, he’s a lot like everyone else. Just still a lot richer and more handsome and smarter than the rest. But closer, a lot closer to other people.

He has to hold up his hand to collect his thoughts. “I’ll get you a new bobble head but please, tell me all the shit dad did. In detail.”

[shieldborne]

"What's that supposed to mean?" Steve looks down at his waist, a little perplexed by the jibe. "It holds the rest of me up; my waist is fine."

Okay, so he's basically an inverted triangle with giraffe legs, but it works.

Steve shakes his head and gives Tony a wry smile. "I'm not sure it's my place to...to speak ill of the dead."

Not that he's unaware there was conflict between Tony and Howard. It's been subtextual in their conversations, but it's been really loud subtext. The nature of it and how deep it might have run, that's the part he's not sure about. Nor is he inclined to ask.

"Look, I considered him a friend. He was a young man then, he may have changed a lot in his later years. When I knew him, the worst thing he did was flirt with Peggy right in front of me, and it was annoying, but she took it in stride so I just glared at him and walked it off. Seemed like it was just a knee-jerk reaction with him around pretty women. And Peggy was too good for him and she knew it. No offense; she was too good for me, too. But that wasn't that big a deal."

"What I really mean is, he should have left the cube alone. If anyone on the goddamn planet should have guessed what it could do, how dangerous it is, how we should have left it alone, it was him. He probably had orders. He didn't have to follow 'em."

"He was always too curious for his own good." He folds his arms over his chest, like there's something else he's thinking that he's trying to hold in.

[starkingenuity]

Tony is a better reader of body language than most people, Steve Rogers excluded, but only when he wants to be. It’s how he grew his father’s company, how he’s continued to stride into court rooms and before councils and get himself heard. People might not care too much for him, but his business acumen comes not only from a rich sense of self, but also from a rich understanding of human nature.

Crossed arms, held tightly like that while seated, that’s a sign of closing one’s self off. And Tony knows how to deal with that.

When he’s sober, which has been a lot lately thanks to Pepper (at least when she’s not traveling and leaving her fiancé to several days straight of tinkering or missing the guy whose sketchbooks he’s almost completely dog eared), he’s subtle about the lean forward, or the look upwards through his lashes. It’s a form of flirting, sure, of being docile and sweet and inviting the other person to share.

But drunk as he is, this is almost like open season. There’s a wolffish glance in his eye, predatory, curious and inquisitive. He’s absolutely his father’s son, though he’d throw a fit to hear it right about now when he’s having a good time getting dirt on the old man.

Plus, it helps that Steve is attractive.

“And?” There absolutely is one. Tony wants it.

[shieldborne]

The 'and' is ridiculously complicated. Steve isn't even sure how to vocalize it, and he hates thinking about it, because taken to an extreme it tarnishes everything he and the people he admires most have done.

But Tony is literally the only thing he has left right now. Maybe they'll rebuild later, pick an era and find friends, or even fight alongside their alternate selves somehow, if they're needed. If they're asked. Still, Steve knows a lifeline when he sees one, and if Tony's a tenuous lifeline, at least he's one that needs Steve just as much as Steve needs him.

So. Complete honesty.

"Science scares me, Tony. It didn't when I was younger and didn't really get much of it, but I've seen a lot more now. There's more to see than there used to be. It's not that I'm a Luddite or a technophobe, honestly, but--look. The Tesseract should have been left alone. The Midnight Oil was a nightmare; I don't know how anyone thought it would be a good idea to create, even if Howard had the best of intentions. After I vanished, after the war, I hear there was some kind of scramble over a vial of my blood. My blood."

The expression on his face is a blend of horror and disgust and guilt. "And really, if you strip Project Rebirth of the propaganda, it's about shooting a disabled man full of chemicals and radiation and coming up with a soldier. What kind of soldier? If they had made as many of me as they thought they could have, how would society have dealt with that? Would they have celebrated it or would we have been second-class beings only fit for cannon fodder? No one cared about shell-shocked soldiers after the first World War. What in god's name do you do with a bunch of traumatized war vets that can level a fuckin' building if they have a panic attack?"

"I'd love to believe Erskine had a plan, but I...can't. I want to believe he was a good man who just missed some of the ramifications of his actions. I want to believe that of Howard, too, but he did a lot of work without considering the consequences fully. He left a lot of messes in his wake."

He's not saying so, but that's probably why the Ultron incident upset him as much as it did. But this isn't about Tony. He's not completely his father's son. Steve has faith in his intentions in a way he never did with Howard.

"And I never got to ask Peggy. I never will. I know her intentions were good, but maybe she missed some things she should have caught, too." He actually whispers this, like saying anything negative about Peggy is borderline blasphemy. To Steve, it kind of is. It's easy to idealize the one that got away.

"It was a lot to take in, those first few months. I felt like there was shrapnel everywhere, and I was stuck cleaning up other peoples' messes. And then you came in eight different kinds of flashy and cool and beautiful and brilliant, when all the good soldiers I'd ever known were dead. I couldn't handle it. I shouldn't have said half of what I did, but--well. I guess we're mostly past that now, aren't we?"


((Referencing some of the plot from the Agent Carter TV show, although I've only seen a few episodes. Feel free to improvise whatever details you want to there.))

[starkingenuity]

Steve’s blood has been a problem ever since he stepped out of the machine and into an assassination. It’s been on the black market. It’s been used to experiment on people. It’s created both the Hulk and the Abomination (in part, at least, due to serum synthetization). Steve’s blood is a problem. Tony knew that early on, when he’d been given the key to lockboxes and a cryptic message in his parents’ Will.

Howard probably had a good reason to patent Steve Rogers’ blood. Considering that he died over the serum, and had believed to his dying day that they’d find Steve Rogers eventually, it only made sense that he not only patented the technology used to created Captain America, but also the very thing that made Steve into a super soldier. How better to keep tabs on other governments and organizations also looking for the war hero? It had pinged on his radar when Bruce Banner had been just a scientist with an anger issue. And it pinged again when they brought Steve out of deep freeze. Tony hadn’t been surprised because he had known.

So yeah, Steve has every right to be scared of technology. And he has every right to believe that people like him would be considered Second-class Citizens. Technically, Steve Rogers is one because he’s not his own man.

Tony Stark, thanks to his father, owns the blond’s blood.

But he’s not drunk enough to say any of that. He’s too fixated on the other man’s eyes and the he passionately speaks. “So,” he says, zeroing in on the wrong parts of what Steve is saying here, “you didn’t like me because you thought I was cool and beautiful? I’ll take it.”

But there’s something else that Steve had brought up that Tont can’t just let linger.

He could end perfectly well on a flirty high note, but the guy has managed to be a masochist for entirely too long not to let the rest of Steve’s speech effect him. Tony leans back in the chair, contemplating getting another class of scotch. And he will. Shortly. “The road to hell is paved in good intentions, Rogers. And the one I’m on is a six lane highway.”

(Sounds good! I tend to borrow from SHIELD and the comics too. 😊 )

[shieldborne]

Steve had actually braced himself to have opened a giant can of worms there, so when Tony deflects--the way Tony often does--his shoulders drop with relief, and he laughs quietly. "Yeah, that's pretty much it. And you didn't like me because your dad thought I was cool and beautiful."

Or one of his most successful projects. Something like that. That's the other thing; Steve isn't as certain in retrospect that Howard thought of him as a friend so much as a success story. But that's also one of Steve's worst issues of late, that uncertainty as to whether people see him or the Star-Spangled Man With a Plan. Even worse, how many see him as human.

He just doesn't know. And he doesn't, in many cases, want to know.

"Yeah? Well, if we're not on the same road, they probably run parallel." Steve is full of good intentions. "You talking about this particular project, or something else entirely?"

He may or may not be bracing for a bombshell.

[starkingenuity]

“You don’t need to be cute. I tried to destroy the world by saving it. And then I tried to put a band-aid on the situation that happened. Let’s not pretend that the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree here, right?” The mood’s turned, Tony’s put away his bedroom eyes. Rogers hasn’t soured anything towards himself, but Tony often has mood swings when he’s this drunk, and not simply drunk enough to let the world bounce off of him. He groans as he pulls himself up. His healing factor is baseline normal, and so he’s still bruised up pretty decently from the fight with Thanos on Titan’s wasteland.

Getting up is difficult. His bones ache.

He doesn’t give Steve a wider berth than usual, though, and that’s because Steve is seated and staying that way, so his body doesn’t react in flight away from him. He’s neat with his pour and takes a sip before returning the fill line in the tumbler to the standard three fingers he enjoys.

“Should have started realizing that there’s a problem when I created the Relief Foundation. The collateral damage we leave behind is insane, Rogers. That I leave behind. Cleaning up New York was quick. The damage we did could be seen more like the damage that the Chitauri did. Hell, it gave people jobs before we saw what was happening there, until the black market for all things alien formed. Should have seen that coming. Really should have.”

Laws move too slow, but laws are how their society works. Legislation is the way they work. Tony still firmly believes that, even if he sees now that sometimes you just have to take matters into your own hands.

“If we take care of this… No invasion. No super hero boy band. No needless death. We get a do over. I promise you that I’m gonna be better than dad was this time around.”

[shieldborne]

"I'm not trying to be cute. I'm trying to be fair in spite of my own prejudices," Steve tells him gently. "Ultron scared the hell out of me on a bunch of different levels, but I'd say it's pretty obvious now that you were 100% right about the potential danger from forces outside our world too strong to combat in any traditional way."

He takes a deep breath and lets it out again, saddened to see Tony's mood changing, to see him backing off, but not offended. This was always going to be a hard conversation. It's probably past due.

"New York wasn't our fault. SHIELD was ready to bomb the place; if anything, we prevented a lot of death and property damage there. Lagos was the same deal. Wanda didn't set the bomb, she just failed to contain the explosion. Sokovia..."

There's no getting around Sokovia. "That one's on all of us, not just you. I should have been keeping a closer eye on you after the mission. It's hard, coming down from the kind of fights we were putting in. You needed support and I failed to notice that. And you did what you thought you had to do."

"I know that's at least part of why you were ready to support the Accords. For an atheist, you sure do a lot of penance. Don't go thinking I don't feel any guilt about the messes we leave behind. I do. I guess I found a way to compartmentalize some, in the army. I'm responsible for more deaths than you are, trust me."

"I don't...think we should encourage our alternates here to hide their heads in the sand, either, though. Thanos is still going to be out there. His M.O. has been going from planet to planet and wiping out half the population for years. Just because we keep the stones out of his grasp doesn't mean he'll be defeated. Just defeatable. Maybe that's not our job, but they ought to know what's out there."

"But Tony, at the end of the day, I do have faith in you as a person. You've made mistakes, but I see the why behind most of them more clearly than you may think."

[starkingenuity]

Oh, ho, ho. Steve Rogers has no idea what he’s just said. Tony finishes the alcohol in his glass in two gulps and slams it down. “Whip it out,” he says, turning towards Steve again. The liquor burns his throat and relaxes the tension in his body. Steve is still a swarm of slightly blurred colors, and Tony wonders if he’s seeing him in watercolor right now. He likes the idea.

Of course, he just waits for the blond to start stammering before he opens his mouth again to clarify.

“I have the numbers of how many people were killed by weapons I personally had a hand in designing and contracting out to various military and ally groups across the globe. Contracts I made a lot of money from.” It’s one of the ghosts he just can’t see around, they loom too large and color everything in blackness. “I’m glad you have faith in me. I actually am glad someone has faith in me. But I don’t have faith in myself to do much more than arrogantly destroy and then try to rebuild everything. Classic Tony.”

He’s not a good guy. And nothing you say will make him think he is, Rogers.

[shieldborne]

"Whip i--what??" If Tony gets any enjoyment out of seeing Steve completely blindsided and awkward, at least he'll get a couple seconds of pleasure in this conversation. Blushing, too. Lots of it.

He is, in fact, too startled to register the amount of liquor Tony has consumed thus far, and that could prove an issue before too much longer.

Unfortunately--or maybe fortunately--when Tony hastens to clarify, Steve doesn't look any less shocked. If anything, he goes from awkward to stricken, eyes too bright and too sad. "Jesus, Tony."

Truthfully, he doesn't think about that aspect of Tony's past, which is ridiculously naive of him. But of course it's there. That kind of thing, that kind of guilt never goes away, especially when it's been driven home to a man in such personal, painful ways, time after time after time. Maybe this is one of the wider gulfs between them, Steve thinks for the first time. His conscience isn't exactly clear, but the fights he's been in, the kill-count in his head, nearly all occurred in battle. Life or death. Them or him.

Not so much for Tony, if he's taking the weapons he designed into account.

"...somethin' like twelve or thirteen thousand, last I checked," he says softly after a heavy, silent moment. "Hard to estimate how many people are in bunkers when they blow up or on helicarriers when they crash into the Potomac."

"I should have realized you feel that way. I didn't even think about it." Worse, he doesn't really have a solid argument as to why Tony shouldn't feel that way, shouldn't still be doing his penance for the people his designs have hurt. All he's got is what's in his own head.

"I just...when I look at you, I see a guy who owns up to his mistakes and tries to correct them, and then is willing to give his life to help when other peoples' mistakes or outright malevolence come into play. Since I've known you, you've worked to leave the world better than you found it. We disagree on the methodology more often than not, but I have never, even in our worst moments, doubted your courage or your goodness."

[starkingenuity]

“Scrap the watercoloring drag act and be a motivational speaker,” Tony says, or at least that’s what he’s trying to say but it comes out as something like a few mumbles and several punctuated high points that might be words but are more like baby talk. He has to lean against the window sill to keep from tipping over and that makes him close his eyes and take a few breaths. “I’m sorry,” he continues, and it at least sounds like English. “I think you’ve got me…dunk.”

Why’s it so hard for people to pronounce the ‘r’ in drunk when they’re plastered? There’s probably some neurologist that can explain slurring somewhere in the world, but there aren’t any handy close by.

“You-- You and your—” Tony twists his wrist around as if any of this helps explains himself. “You. You-you. You-ness. I like your singing.”

And that’s about when room service shows up, forty minutes post phone call and approximately right on time to stop Tony’s compliments from getting messy.

[shieldborne]

Steve isn't sure what the first part of that was. He caught 'drag act' but none of the rest. Still, it sounds like it was meant to be a reasonably-friendly joke, so he gives Tony an uncertain little smile and continues to fret. Especially when, seconds later, Tony acknowledges how drunk he is and--

"Damnit. I should have cut you off." He wasn't paying attention, and occasionally he forgets how much alcohol is a normal amount for normal people. Ironic, though, how he was just saying a few minutes ago he wasn't paying enough attention to Tony's mood after a traumatic incident. He's going to have to do better.

"My what?" He starts to stand, hesitates because he's not sure it's okay, and then shocks himself utterly by feeling a near-desperate urge to kiss the other man. It's not the compliment--he's not sure how to take that, exactly--it's something about the moment of vulnerability. Tony's smart mouth failing him, his guilt and his grief and the strange, sad, tipsy glimmer in his eyes.

"Th-thanks..." He manages to stammer, and then there's a knock at the door and the crisis is averted. Sort of.

He gets up, moving away to answer for room service, but looking back anxiously. "Don't fall over, okay? Can you sit?"

[starkingenuity]

“Can you sit?” Tony asks in a way that makes utterly no sense, wrapping an arm around thick red curtains. There’s probably dust mites all over the darn thing, but alcohol has managed to dull the receptors in his brain enough not to register. The material is cool against his cheek and it’s helping him stay upright. That’s what the most important thing is.

The molecules break down in his system quickly. His tolerance is astronomical and he’s developed a little something to help with his liver regeneration. Technically, it’s also helped patch up some Avengers and give JARVIS’ technological corpse a body too, and those are both much more useful things…but one can never underestimate the power of a rich man using his money and influence to allow him to pursue his vices to their extreme.

He’s not much more clear eyed when Steve returns, wheeling in the cart laden with a variety of food smells that must clash to the overly sensitive nose, but he does spot the guy from the front desk downstairs lingering in the still-open doorway. “He’ll be right with you,” Tony manages to articulate, using the curtains to pick himself back up to his feet from the half-sit, half-lean on the sill that he had been doing. “Go tip the nice, flirty clerk before I throw up all over your shoes.”

He won’t. He’s not a puker. Lucky for Steve.

“I’ll just fall face first into the pizza.”

[shieldborne]

Dust mites? At this hotel? Dust mites can't afford the Four Seasons.

Steve eyes him uncertainly from across the room, still concerned, but since he seems to be on his feet he'll let it go for the moment. He has no idea what Tony ordered, but there's a lot of it, and it looks pretty good even with the clashing scents. He hasn't had a chance to be picky on the run as he's been, and pizza and tacos--even fancy tacos with cilantro pesto and mango salsa garnish or whatever that is--look really appealing. At the door, he tries not to look the desk clerk in the eye. There's no way it will have escaped the guy's notice that Steve is shaved and his hair has changed color, which doesn't quite fit the 'bodyguard' thing they established before, but it doesn't matter what he thinks as long as he doesn't identify Captain America.

Luckily, the clerk has a tablet for electronically adding tips to the credit card bill, because Steve is carrying about enough cash for a cup of coffee. Not Starbucks, either. McDonald's coffee. "Of course, sir," he says to Tony in the tone he thinks a professional bodyguard might say it. It comes out sounding half-military and half like JARVIS if he had a Brooklyn accent.

And when he goes back to the door, the clerk's gaze has intensified. Oops. That's a look of either recognition or 'I really should know who you are, give me a second to place you'. "Uh...are you...?" He begins softly.

Steve puts a finger to his lips and takes the tablet to add the tip, desperately hoping the hospitality industry's training in polite discretion towards guests' various quirks will hold out. "Thanks, though. If I were gonna be in town longer..."

He looks even more Captain America when he smiles sheepishly. The poor clerk is going to be confused for days.

[starkingenuity]

Watching the event unfold is almost sad. Tony props up his head a little, knowing he’s met his match this time with the alcohol consumption, and frowns stubbornly as the door is shut and Steve approaches him. He’s not upset about that, he’s going to need Steve’s help to get back to his feet and Stark reaches out to try and grip some large muscle or other for support.

“Boo. You don’t have to say no on my account. I’ve got this. I can feed myself.” Says the guy with Bambi legs. “If he’s not your type, then let me sober up a little and we can find someone who is.”

It’s a bad idea to leave the room tonight. It’s a bad idea to do anything to jeopardize tomorrow’s infiltration.

Tony can really use the sleep, too.

But it’s not in his nature to do the best thing. And it’s certainly not to stay still.

[shieldborne]

Steve's got plenty of large muscles he can get a hold of, and he puts his upper arm within easy reach. His expression still says he's worried, but he can't help but smile a little at Tony's determination to get him a date. Bucky used to do that, too.

"I didn't say no on your account, I said no on the universe's account. And we should stick together in any case, on the off chance one of our alternates shows up demanding to know what the hell's going on and why we have his face."

If that does happen, it's far more likely to be Tony's alternate. Steve was still adjusting to existence again at this point in time. "Anyway, it's not a type thing. I have a bunch of types. I just...don't want to get attached to anyone. I'd go out for a beer with the guy and then we'd either die or have to go somewhere else on the timeline and if I liked him at all, I'd be wondering what if forever. I don't need that. And I don't do one-night stands anymore."

[starkingenuity]

Wrist to elbow to shoulder, Tony climbs his way up Steve Rogers until he’s got a good enough grasp to get his knees locked under him. It’s been a long time since he drank this much, this fast. Things with Pepper had been good. He’d been more of a mentor to Peter. Rhodey needed him, and his genius, to be able to properly walk again. Things had been falling so neatly into stability, minus his sometimes regresses back to missing the Steve sized hole in his life, that Tony hadn't needed to resort to slowing down his brain to function.

It’s amazing what lack of stress will do to a person and what the sudden loss of everyone in his life might make him do instead. Tony is more than hurting. He’s heavily compensating with someone he had been unwilling to meet halfway for two years.

Steve’s right, though. They can’t form relationships here. They can’t risk it. And no one will ever understand what their lives are like save for each other.

And isn’t that weird? You can’t even count on yourself?

Tony’s about to dismiss it all, body turning more towards Steve’s chest in an attempt to actually turn even more towards his arm so he can have support when he bends over for a quick snatch of food, but Steve has to let his natural honesty sneak up at the worst time.

The shift in tone tells Tony to fixate on the word ‘anymore.’

“What have you been doing the last few years? Sex tourism? T’Challa was a bad influence on you!”