(no subject)

[starkingenuity]

[Tony volunteers for the worst sort of body take over ever: here.]

Comments

[hulkbusted]

Bruce gives him a wry smile, "Of course I wouldn't understand how that feels, but I'm going to go out on a limb and say that wanting to reduce the noise in your head isn't crazy."

Bruce has had to find other methods to filter the noise. No one on this planet or any other wants to know what an alcoholic Bruce Banner would be like. He can be a mean drunk.

"But you seemed to have less noise to filter two years ago."

[starkingenuity]

"Steve was around. And you answered your phone. And Rhodey wasn't barely able to walk. Vision was still JARVIS. Pepper still loved me-- A lot's happened in two years." He's still not drunk enough to be giving up all of this stuff, and yet here he is. Giving it all up. Bruce is probably some sort of genius billionaire whisperer. He should really be charging for his services. "I was a lot younger two years ago than I am now."

Tony's eyebrows smooth out and he asks FRIDAY how long until they reach New York. Her answer is somewhere over the five hour mark, even in the quinjet, and Tony pulls himself to his feet with a groan.

"If you didn't get cold feet and married me, we could have had an awesome wedding night. But you blew it. So I'm going to go pass out on the cargo bench. If I roll out or we hit turbulence, don't take photos of me looking like an idiot."

[hulkbusted]

Tony's already given Bruce so much that he couldn't pay him back if he tried for the rest of his life, however long that might be. Besides, when Tony wants to talk, he'll talk whether Bruce is conscious or not.

"I just don't want to be your rebound." He pushes himself up when Tony stands and goes to check the compartments where he'd expect to find a couple of blankets kept for emergencies or Code Greens, which are their own kind of emergency.

He offers Tony a blanket and shakes the other one out for himself. "This is a no pictures zone. I'm going to get some sleep, too." He'll just stretch out on the floor. He's slept rougher, and at least he can feel as safe as he ever feels.

[starkingenuity]

"Not sure you'd be a rebound. I've been having a mental affair with you for years now. Even if you were gone for half of it." It's hard to tell if Tony's being serious so it's better just to assume he's being a sarcastic dick. It's his usual state of being.

He doesn't tell Bruce about the reclining jump seat, he figures that if Bruce wants to nap there, he can, even if it's mostly upright. If he wants to sleep on the ground...let him. It puts them about in line with each other and that's almost like sleeping next to someone. Tony misses that more than anything else.

He's jolted awake by FRIDAY letting them know she's landing on the north lawn and he finds himself strapped in, but he doesn't know if that was Banner or if he did it himself. His feet are on the ground anyway and he scratches his belly like a frat boy before he heads to the rear of the quinjet to wander down the ramp as it owns.

Banner should follow. Tony will show him where he's been keeping most of his stuff for the last two years.

[hulkbusted]

It's very hard to tell if Tony's being serious, so Bruce defaults to reading most ambiguity from Tony as facetiousness unless it involves science or engineering.

The floor's fine. He knows quinjets well enough that sleeping on the floor is a choice. He likes a good mattress as much as the next guy, but he isn't picky, and the floor is just more companionable just then.

He wakes when Friday announces they're landing, and if anything, he's more tired now than he was five hours ago. Probably because he gave himself enough down time to really feel the hours and light years catching up.

Bright side to the short hair: he doesn't look overly disheveled when he pushes himself up and gives a jaw-cracking yawn before putting away their blankets and following Tony down onto the grounds of Tony's childhood home.

"Is it just you here or am I going to run into staff if I walk around in my boxers?" Oh god, if Tony has his clothes here, he's going to bless him and finally let his balls breathe again in clothes that fit.

What? These pants are tight.

[starkingenuity]

“Staff?” Tony can’t help but snort at that. “When have you known me to have staff? Oh. Happy? Sometimes. Usually not any more. He’s been sticking with Ms. Potts almost exclusively.”

He was running the compound. He was head of security. Sometimes he relayed information between himself and Parker and ran errands but mostly Tony is on his own and that’s actually how he likes it.

“I should probably get another assistant now that I think about it. But FRIDAY would get jealous—. And if you grab your crotch one more time— Don’t tempt me.”

Tony hesitates noticeably at the door before he pushes it open. He’s lived here awhile now and it still creeps him out a little.

[hulkbusted]

"I don't see you doing much housecleaning." So someone's got to do it, and it isn't DUM-E or U. That would be quite the unexpected use of the Legion, too. "Or cooking."

He looks guiltily down and drops his hand to his side. Note to self: Tony's got great peripheral vision.

The hesitation is also noted and set in a corner for further consideration later. He's mostly curious just then, and his curiosity is a hook that has pulled him into many a situation where he shouldn't have been.

And so he steps inside the Stark family home and immediately thinks he needs to encourage Tony to live somewhere a little less like a museum.

[starkingenuity]

“FRIDAY, do we have staff?” Because the place is dust free and immaculate. The only thing it’s missing is the velvet rope keeping non-existent visitors back from the giant twelve-foot portrait of Howard and Maria Stark heading up the stairs or from touching the antique piano.

“There is a cleaning staff on standby at all times and based upon your location out of the mansion, I send for them to tidy up after your messes, Boss,” FRIDAY says as Tony beelines it out of the main room and down a dark hallway towards a kitchen stuck in the late 80s. It’s spacious, most of the appliances have been updated, but it’s not Tony’s style. In fact, there’s no white or chrome or glass to be seen at all. Tony opens a big avocado green refrigerator and takes out some things he needs to make his weird green smoothies. Greek yogurt (not expired), spinach, protein powder—

Evidently he gets regular grocery deliveries too, automated by FRIDAY like the cleaners.

So while Tony does have staff, he never sees them. And they likely never see him either. And that’s almost as sad is this massive house that’s been left as it was the last time his mother had lived here.

While Bruce looks around, Tony dumps his things into the blender and chases it with some scotch. Shh. He’s not even going to offer this to his friend. Banner’s not the green smoothie sort.

[hulkbusted]

Bruce isn't going to ask for it, either. He finishes his circuit of the kitchen and comes back to Tony, leaning against the counter to watch him make yet another of his odious smoothies. He's seen the Stark Special before and doesn't need to be offered one.

"So, how long are you going to spend in Purgatory before getting a new place?" he asks in his usual quiet, direct way. This isn't Tony, and coming back here after taking some hard hits is going to ground, which is more Bruce's style than Tony's.

Tony isn't perfect by any stretch, but he's Bruce's best friend and someone he honestly admires when he isn't afraid for or of him. He wants better for him than haunting his parents' museum.

[starkingenuity]

“I mess up all of the new places.” He only answers after drowning out half of the question with another spin of the old blender, eyes focused on the liquid that slops into his glass. He’ll leave the mess on the counter, as he always does, never noticing that he has people that come in to clean up after him. He’s never really grown out of that phase as a five year old when his nanny used to pick up anything he knocked over. He’s never needed to, after all.

But none of that is important. None of what he’s saying is important either but there he goes, divulging what he would have kept to himself a year or two ago. Maybe it’s not just Banner that’s giving him over-share syndrome. Maybe he just really needs to talk. Finally.

“I don’t mind getting this place ruined.”

[hulkbusted]

"Bullshit." It's delivered in the same calm tone with which he might declare that one trial out of a hundred so far isn't the right one - not angry, not sad, just delivering a report of fact.

"I can see the the appliances are newer than '91, but they're still just as dated looking." He waves an arm at the room, but really it's the whole house he's only seen a bit of so far. "You've modernized but still maintained it like a museum. You care, and you can't even walk through the front door without looking like there's a gallows hiding in one of these halls."

Whatever's going on with Tony, this place isn't helping him.

[starkingenuity]

“Excuse me?”

People don’t talk to Tony like this. Except Cap. And now Cap’s gone, so maybe it’s fitting that mild mannered Bruce Banner comes back after his two-year sabatical to rake him across the coals. He juts out his hip, leaning on the counter with the hand not wrapped around his adult sippy cup containing his liquor-smoothie.

He’s half annoyed and half amused. He needs people like this. Cap kept him honest, until Cap decided not to be honest with him (as if Tony hasn’t and still isn’t keeping secrets himself).

“You just waltz back in here psychoanalyzing me like you own the place and haven’t been gone for a lifetime?” Oh right. Bruce doesn’t remember the last two years. Tony sighs. “Where do you want me to go, Banner? I’m a menace to society. I might pump money into the economy every time some new big bad decides he wants to take me out with relief efforts and repairs, but I’m a target. Sitting on top of a tower in Midtown is a bad idea. Being at the Compound is a really bad idea. And I’m banned from Brooklyn and Queens so here I am. Good old Long Island boy.”

[hulkbusted]

The man who wrapped a hand around Wanda's throat and dared her to piss him off isn't as mild-mannered as he wants people to think. He's the man who wouldn't hurt a fly, but only because he chooses not to. If there's any doubt of that, they could go talk to that disoriented green woman on Sakaar.

That man doesn't flinch from Tony's rebuke. "I don't know. I've never had billions at my fingertips to build whatever I want, including a secure facility for myself with a better place for DUM-E than above the garage." Low blow going for the kids.

"I've also never had the ability to be anywhere in the world within hours, making living in the middle of nowhere something other than exile." He's never doing the whole stuck in the middle of nowhere thing again. It isn't good for him. That way lies the dark pit of the soul where a bullet looks like a good idea.

[starkingenuity]

“I need to be close. Cap’s gone. Do you know how tiring it is to run a group I didn’t even want to be apart of that now contains my ex, my crippled before-I-met-you best friend and a bunch of other people that hate my guts because I got their friends jailed and who are now all living in exile in Wakanda, probably, because Cap doesn’t understand that laws are there for a reason?”

Raising his voice? Hell yes he’s raising his voice. DUM-E’s just fine in the attic, Banner, jeez! That’s probably where he’s doing the least damage in the name of being helpful. And yes, Tony gets the irony of that. This right here is like living in the attic where he’s doing his best not to cause problems for the whole world.

“Most of those billions are tied up in trying to keep the people that work for my company employed and to pay the families of our victims. Sure, we save lives, we save whole cities, but our antics kill a lot of people too. Or worse, cause them to have a lifetime of hospital bills. Wanna guess who funds all of that? Me. Right here. This guy. I don’t have the luxury of going anywhere. I could barely fit in all of the time I spent looking for you or trying really hard not to mess up the life of a stubborn teenager who can’t help but get himself in danger all the time. Which, yeah I know, that’s my fault for bringing him to Germany…. So there you have it!” He makes some grand, circular gesture with a frown. “I just ruin whatever I touch. Make sure you keep your distance. I can probably manage to mess you up too.”

[hulkbusted]

Bruce's eyebrows go up at the part about laws being there for a reason and Steve not getting that. There's no small irony to hearing that part of the rant coming from Tony Stark.

The rest comes at him like a dam's finally broke. He's gotten some of the overflow since he sent Tony that angry text... when? this morning? yesterday? Recently. He's gotten overflow, but now that Tony's pouring out his feelings, Bruce can finally start putting together a fuller picture of what the hell is going on with his friend.

The kid? He'll have to wait until later for details.

Tony gets his unwavering attention, but other than his raised eyebrows, he gives nothing away until Tony's self-deprecatory conclusion, which is met with a quiet huff of dark amusement. "You're not doing well with just AIs for company. I think I'll stick around for a while."

Ultron isn't water under the bridge, and Bruce has some fresh wounds about that, some of which have Tony's signature on them, but if the universe won't let him give up and die, Tony doesn't get to either.

[starkingenuity]

Ready to do battle, to be angry and to let his pride ruin a friendship, Tony Stark is surprised by Bruce’s responses to his mounting upset.

Big brown eyes widen before he takes a small step back. Maybe he’s had too much to drink (ha!) because he’s pretty sure that Bruce just said… Tony exhales slowly. “Yeah? You want to stay in a dinosaur with memories of how messed up my childhood was? Don’t you have enough skeletons in your own closet? And I swear to-- Just go upstairs and get changed because if I see you tug at your crotch again…”

There’s a half sheepish smile on Tony’s face, mixing with relief.

“Hurry up or I’m going to hug you. Again.”

[hulkbusted]

Yeah, of course Tony wanted a fight, even if he didn't want a fight. It's what he's used to; it's what most people who aren't afraid of him do. Call Bruce's choice less avoiding fight and more interpersonal aikido.

At the mention of his crotch, he hugs himself to keep his hands in control, ducking his head apologetically and smiling a little at the apparent success of his tactics.

"Yeah, but I know all my skeletons by name, and I'm going to need you to tell me where I'm going upstairs unless you want me walking into every room and digging through drawers and boxes."

[starkingenuity]

Tony explains about where Bruce can find his things and decides to stay in the kitchen to drink and so it’s up to FRIDAY to give Bruce clues on where to go. Tony’s retrofitted the mansion with speakers at least, allowing the AI to find him easily wherever he is and to perform whatever he might need her to along the way.

Tony’s spent a lot of time accumulating old possessions that Bruce has up and left over his years in exile. He’d hit up all of the known places in Earth Bruce might have gone to and the people whose lives he’s touched had been willing to part with the things Bruce left behind when he bugged out.

There’s quite the collection for Bruce to pick from. Including a fine array of stretchy pants that Tony has left the occasional note of hilarity pinned to.

When Bruce had settled, he’ll find Tony half dragging DUM-E across the left wing. “You’re. Not. Too. Big to.. work with DUM-E, you’ll fit. I measured!”

[hulkbusted]

Bruce pokes around a little until he gets to a suite filled with boxes and stray items that mostly leave him with an ugly pit in his stomach as each one calls him back to Canada or Brazil or Iraq or India or Virginia. This isn't his suite; it's the Bruce Banner Archive. He's not sure whether to laugh or cry, hug Tony or punch him.

He closes every box he opens, sometimes only after he puts something lying loose away inside. He'll eventually look at everything, but in his own time, and only a little at time.

By the time he comes back downstairs, letting FRIDAY guide him to find Tony, he's dressed in a pair of his own non-ball-binding pants and a soft old button-down and cardigan he vaguely remembers from his student teaching days. Better still, he has a pair of glasses tucked in his pocket.

He stops to watch Tony struggling with DUM-E with unconcealed amusement before coming to help pick up some of the weight on the other side. "Thanks for hanging on to my stuff, but if I find that you've got a picture of me in your room with a heart drawn around it, we're going to have to have a talk."

[starkingenuity]

“FRIDAY, uh,” Tony says as he guides a track over a high lip between a doorway and the hall, heel catching briefly on the carpet, “do me a favor and get rid of my I HEART BB folder on my digital photo frame?”

“All right Boss. Set it as backup on the server,” FRIDAY deadpans.

“Good girl. Okay, idiot, stop rocking backward—. Ha!” Success! DUM-E might not make it downstairs without Tony converting the stairs into a ramp again but it would do for now. He can get to his lab and get around most of the upper wing that Tony’s more or less taken over.

[hulkbusted]

"I knew it." He squeezes past DUM-E once he's through the door and looks around. It's weird, but he misses the tower. It had started to feel like home to a guy who hadn't really had one in a long time. The Avengers compound sounds terrible, even if Tony says there's a lab for him there. Maybe it's just the word compound; it evokes some very specific, not very pleasant associations.

More likely it's knowing that he'll be the odd man out again, and he still doesn't know who's left there.

In the spirit of curiosity and always knowing where to find the nearest exit, he turns a slow circle to take in the space they've just manhandled DUM-E into. In his distraction, he's most of the way through a 360 when he has to duck DUM-E's swinging arm or get knocked on his ass.

"Got a project in mind for him or just doing a little redecorating?"

[starkingenuity]

“Both and neither,” Tony says, not trying to be cryptic so much as to express his lack of direction. He looks at Banner as if he might suddenly laugh and reveal himself to be Loki, or as if he is just on the verge of disappearing into the dusk, a figment of his lonely imagination. If the latter happens, he’ll be setting fire to another three blocks just to get another two days of his company. Even if it’s just in his mind.

The staring probably isn’t something Bruce would be disturbed by. Tony isn’t an eye contact sort of guy but he’s always been intense and more than just a little protective of Bruce. There’s something more to it now though. Bruce stands for a break to his solitude. Tony has become a pet project for the other scientist and he finds that he really likes it.

“I’ve been working on upgrades to Underoo’s suit. Something to channel his web splooge through without all the options I—. You have no idea who I’m talking about. FRIDAY, bring up Parker’s greatest hits?”

Tony has never been good keeping secret identities.

[hulkbusted]

Honestly, there's not much that Tony could do in terms of body language that could disturb Bruce. He's used to the intensity with which Tony studies anything and anyone that catches his eye until something else pulls him away like a hummingbird whose feeder had been filled with Jolt instead of sugar water.

"Underoos?" He's nonplussed because there's zero context there but it doesn't sound good. "Splooge?"

And now there's nothing for it but to watch this skinny figure brachiating (it's the closest verb he can think of) around New York on-- "What is that fiber he's using?"

Now he sees where "Underoos" comes from, and splooge is starting to make sense, too. "Who is this guy?"

[starkingenuity]

“He’s the kid we would have if we did it right,” Tony says immediately. “He’s fifteen, a genius like me and a huge nerd like you. He developed that fluid himself. In his sophomore science lab at school.”

There’s pride in the way that Tony talks about the teenager, hands in his pockets and relaxed for the first time in awhile aside from his restless sleep.

“It’s probably one of the strongest materials I’ve come across. Stronger than nano-carbon tubes. He was running around in this homemade costume so I made him a suit. Working in cloth? Not as easy as metal. You’re going to love him. And he’s going to love you. Just wear protection. Hockey mask. Gloves. He’s high energy.”

[hulkbusted]

“Fifteen?” Bruce turns away from the projection of Peter practically crucified between two halves of a ferry to stare incredulously at Tony. “This kid’s going to die before eighteen.”

The only reason he doesn’t launch accusatory questions at Tony about how could you support a child doing this is the part about running around in a homemade costume. He understands being resigned to the reality that teens will have sex, so teach them safer sex, but is making him a... a what? a spider suit? Is making him a spider suit anything but a terrible idea? There’s no such thing as safer superheroing.

“Where are his parents?” He has a guess before Tony can even answer. It circles back to his earlier thoughts about the Avengers and their relationships with their parents.