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[starkingenuity]

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

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[starkingenuity]

Tony has absolutely no reason to keep up his body. He’s rich and he’s brilliant. He’s put together armor that gives him all of the athleticism he could ever need, but the truth is that wearing that armor and using it effectively requires that he be in shape.

Happy used to train him to box. Tony’s kept up with it more or less on his own. His muscle definition for a man his age is relatively good and given that he rarely remembers to eat three meals a day, his body fat is lean.

No amount of fine form however can stop him from stumbling and then splashing his way into the tub, completely nude, but Banner certainly can help keep him from slipping and drowning.

The water is restorative. Exquisitely so. Tony immediately relaxes, some of the buzz wearing mercifully off as he reclines against the smooth stone basin.

[hulkbusted]

He's certainly not going to try to protect Tony from Sakaar's population only to lose him to drowning in a hot tub.

Once Tony's situated, he can shuck off his own pants and underwear, toss them in the general direction of the rest of his clothes, and slide into the water. He doesn't need to use armor effectively, his physical training was aikido, not boxing, and he hasn't been running in a while, even though he used to run often as a way of learning how to redline his heart rate without going into green. He's a little squishy, a lot hairy, and very okay with that because he appreciates his body whenever it's his.

Still, he can appreciate a well-sculpted ass when he sees one.

He can even allow himself a contented groan as the heat starts to sink into his muscles.

"Your first alien hot tub. How's it measuring up?"

[starkingenuity]

“Yours too?” There’s a cat that got the cream expression on his face. It’s not quite sweet, just a mellow sort of look that leaves him with his eyes hooded and water dripping from his elbows to his fingertips as he gets himself comfortable. “There’s something as weird about this water as there is about the Hulk juice. Which we are bringing back with us by the way. For science.”

The proof of that alcohol is insane and the potential applications are great. Tony’s mind is still fuzzy but he’s already imagining new molecules and new formulas that can come out of just a drop of that liquid.

“I wonder how cleanly it burns. Do you think we can synthesize it? You’re more of a chemist than I am.”

[hulkbusted]

"Mine too," he admits. He should be a little prickly about that admission, linked as it is to thoughts of Hulk hot tubbing. He isn't and that's a little strange to him, but not troubling.

"FRIDAY gave the water the all clear." He lets his legs stretch out and float in front of him, warm and weightless and lets his mind wander to other methods to induce this level of relaxation without adulterating the water. "Vibrations maybe? Find the right frequency to work synergistically with the rest of the experience?"

He huffs through his nose, amused. "We didn't ask her to analyze the air over here. Maybe we're sitting in a Sakaaran Xanax hotbox."

His distracted from his daydreaming about how to replicate this back on Earth by Tony's question. "Huh? Yeah, probably. Let's see how you feel when you sober up. You might not ever want to go near it again."

[starkingenuity]

“Or I think I should have some more. Maybe with a little ice to water it down.” The thought has him laughing as whatever it is about the properties of this particular spot keeps him chill and pliant. Whatever knots he has are gone. Whatever worry he’d had? Gone too. Maybe that’s partially due to the alcohol but he’s in no shape to puzzle the procedure out.

For a few long moments, there’s nothing but silence between them. It’s not the uncomfortable sort that Tony is always afraid of, that he always fills with inane chatter or loud music, even when he’s just working by himself. There’s a general comfort to the situation and that doesn’t have to do entirely with the hot tub.

“Can we just erase the stuff I said back at the mansion? Is that possible? I don’t want you thinking I’m a time bomb.” Those are no fun. People don’t stick too close to those.

[hulkbusted]

"Too bad. I left it back in Hulk's room." If they're lucky, Tony won't think to ask one of the suits to go retrieve it.

This right now is worth coming to Sakaar for. It's worth letting Tony stick him in an Iron Man suit. It's worth seeing Hulk's bachelor pad/prison.

With his arms stretched out along the sides of the tub for leverage and his head tipped back against the edge, he just rolls his head toward Tony and shrugs, adding a few ripples to the water. "Why not? I could use some company in that category."

Tony has to know the words are out in the world between them and can't be unsaid. He dismisses the thought with a flick of his fingers, sending drops of water off their tips in Tony's direction. "It's just between us. Promise."

[starkingenuity]

Why does he have to smile like that? Bruce is a ball of confusing to Tony Stark and generally he can cover up for himself so easily. Bruce is gone more than he’s close. Bruce is untouchable by his own unfortunate design. There’s usually far more interesting things between them to tinker with than each other.

Even poor addled, still half drunk and thoroughly relaxed Tony recognizes how problematic the first half an hour of their vacation has become. There’s no good distraction right now and Tony isn’t fully capable of making one up.

And that’s why he doesn’t stop himself from shifting through waist deep water to sit next to Bruce on the wide, warm seat.

“I want to trust you. No. I do trust you. But I want you to trust me.”

[hulkbusted]

No amount of relaxation is going to make that request any less difficult to respond to. The truth is that Bruce doesn't trust Tony, not completely. Some of their trust was broken when they created Ultron, some of his lack of trust is just an understanding of Tony's character.

Finding an answer that's honest but not hurtful feels like an impossibility, and he doesn't want to hurt Tony while he's this vulnerable.

His answer might be the right one, or it might send Tony spiraling, but he thinks that at least he's found an honest one worth looking Tony in the eye to say. "I trust that you'd do anything, up to and including sacrificing yourself, if one of your friends or someone you love is in trouble. I trust that without any hesitation."

He might have to rethink it if he gets a complete picture of what's going on between Tony and Steve, but even with that shitstorm going on, he believes what he's saying.

[starkingenuity]

Bruce is trying and Tony just keeps lobbing on more and more weight. What should be fun and without consequence keeps turning into something else entirely. He almost wishes he was still the alien suit. She was willing to enjoy herself and hedonistically cast out everything else.

“That diplomatic. Wrong, but diplomatic. I did try to beat the shit out of Steve for something he didn’t really deserve. Just pointing that out. But thank you. I don’t trust me either. I’m probably the person in the world I trust the least. Unless that’s to make bad decisions.”

That makes him laugh and he shifts to lay his arms out along the tub. His thumb grazes Bruce’s far shoulder.

“I’m probably going to make another really bad decision in about ten seconds, Doctor Banner. And I think you’re going to change your mind about me. Or you really should.”

All Bruce needs to do is turn his head to look at him. Or worse, open his mouth. Because that’s all it’s going to take for Tony to lean over and wonder if Bruce can dodge a kiss.

[hulkbusted]

Bruce is trying really damn hard, and this hot tub is going a long way toward keeping him from throwing up a white flag and packing it in.

"Okay, so only you can beat the shit out of your friends. Tell me you wouldn't put on that armor and go butt in if someone else was doing it without you." Sorry, but he doesn't believe it.

If this is going to be a light vacation that actually feels like a vacation and not an extended therapy session that Bruce is entirely unqualified to conduct, he's going to have to get Tony sobered up and take him out among the extremely varied population of the city.

Just the thought of going back out into the city is enough to make Bruce want to sink entirely under the water, and his thoughts are on how they can navigate the masses without getting their asses handed to them when Tony's words draw his attention over to him.

So yes, he ends up too surprised to dodge a kiss and caught in a momentary overload of are there hallucinogens in this hot tub? or maybe how drunk is Tony? with a cherry on top of so he wasn't kidding?

It doesn't make for an enthusiastic response to the sudden press of lips against his. That's got to be for the best, but damn does this remind Bruce of how lonely he is.

[starkingenuity]

Tony is constantly reminded of his own loneliness. And that’s part of the reason that he does really dumb things despite how smart he is. He pushes the envelope to be noticed, to keep people to close, to make people hate him (because it’s better than apathy!) or any of the other things he does. He wants to be with people because he’s nothing like them but the world tells him constantly (and it’s right) that money can’t buy happiness. Only connection with other people can.

He’s just run out of those connections. The best and easiest way to gain something of them is through intimacy. Even with someone that can barely stand it without physically erupting into something else.

The hand that had brushed Bruce’s shoulder now cups the back of his neck. The other crosses his chest to gently rub a thumb across his cheek.

Once the analyzing is over, Bruce can get right down to brass tacks here. Tony is a fantastic kisser. He’s present and he’s real and he’s there. He knows about the Hulk, too, and about the heart rate trigger.

And that’s why his hands are where they are. He’s not just kissing his absenteeism friend, he’s also monitoring him to make sure it doesn’t go too far.

If it hasn’t already.

[hulkbusted]

The last person who kissed him pushed him into a pit because she didn't need him, she needed Hulk, and he lost two years because of it. That one's still pretty raw, too, thanks to Hulk-based time travel.

He has a lot of wants bubbling up but oddly, not the usual smorgasbord of fears. He's definitely going to have to get FRIDAY to do some more analysis on this hot tub and its surroundings, but hey there's a few seconds there where he doesn't care about that and his lips are just as plush as Tony has been imagining, softening and returning that kiss.

Then the seconds have ticked by and he's pulling back enough to see Tony's expression and give a slow, confused shake of his head. He should be pissed off at himself and at Tony, but he's not; he should be furious at the situation, but he's not; he should be afraid of calling Hulk back somewhere he'd consider his stomping grounds, and he is. Not even the magically relaxing alien hot tub can completely quash that integral part of his nature. "You know that's probably the worst idea you've ever had, right?"

His heart rate has barely ticked up at all.

[starkingenuity]

Water drips back to the pool from where Tony’s arms are still extended. Bruce hasn’t gone far, he hasn’t retreated enough to make Tony think that he ought to stop touching him now. Or now. Or even now. His words make the other man smirk, his eyes a different shade of brown, his voice just a note or two higher in pitch than the confused but still on point gravel that Bruce uses when he’s trying to verbally puzzle something out.

Tony loves that. The drawn out syllables. He can’t stop himself from that even if he wants to. Truthfully, though, he doesn’t want to do anything but this.

“I warned you,” he says, as helpful as it truly isn’t. “But that probably doesn’t matter.” There’s a smacking sound as he bites the fat on the inside of his lower lip and lets it go.

There hasn’t been one abnormal jump on Bruce’s pulse. Not one.

“Guess I just don’t do it for you, huh?”

[hulkbusted]

"Tony..." Tony's chest is suddenly very interesting because it isn't those brown eyes or his lips or that damned smirk. Ten minutes ago Tony wasn't anywhere on his sexual radar because Bruce has boundaries. Now Tony's very much on the radar because Tony doesn't have boundaries.

"Where do you think this is going?" He can't seem to stop his head from shaking minutely, tiny sweeps of his chin from left to right and back again, over and over. No, no, no.

Coming back up to read Tony's expression is no improvement. He wants his demeanor to be calm, firm, but what he gets with that little head shake and the pucker between his eyebrows is closer to yearning and fear. "This isn't Vegas and I'm not a fling."

[starkingenuity]

“I’ve been to Vegas. The rooms are nicer,” Tony says as if it’s a complaint, making a sort of ‘sheesh’ face as his fingers stealthily smooth the damp naps of Banner’s neck. He has a favorite part of people, a part that doesn’t translate well in his armor or in robotics in general but that everyone has. The triangular shaped area from neck to shoulders, where all of the important muscles attach, happens to be it. His wrists rests on Bruce’s shoulder but his fingers linger there and will continue to do so until Banner recalls that he’s as capable of moving away from him as Tony is to cease a potentially unwanted touch.

He wets his lips with his tongue, an unconscious but thoroughly and bafflingly sensual gesture, and lets ridiculously long lashes touch his cheeks for a moment.

Or two.

Before he speaks, he breaths in the air between them. It’s warm and damp from the hot tub and from the moment they had shared where Bruce had so nearly missed him back.

“There’s no where this can go. I’m not an idiot. I get it. And you’re not a fling... you’re... important. I don’t have a lot of people like that to overstep with.”

[hulkbusted]

He can't think of a single better way to ruin his friendship with Tony than to let this go any farther than it already has. Everything outside this tub is cracked and hanging on by a thread, and it's still going to be there when they get out.

"This would have made for a hell of a honeymoon." It's the best he can offer.

The second best he can offer. On a split second's impulse he decides to offer the best, too. He twists and catches Tony's face between his palms to hold him while Bruce leans in to set the balance teetering crazily between them. He kisses Tony knowing that they can't go anywhere with this, and knowing that if he doesn't do this, they'll both have different, uglier regrets later. At least with Bruce's mouth on his, teeth lightly grazing Tony's lip where Tony had been biting it earlier, he'll know that Bruce is about to get out of the hot tub for Tony's safety, and not because Tony had overstepped where he's unwelcome.

[starkingenuity]

Tony has never been concerned for his own safety, as really ought to be evident by forty odd years of near suicidal genius. He’s still taken by surprise when the cooling space between them translates into absolutely no space between them. There’s just wet skin against wet skin, droplets clinging to Bruce’s chest hair squeezing to the nearly invisible scar where the arc reactor had once been and now artificial bone replaced the smashed area where Cap’s shield had cracked his chest plate.

Tony can’t even get in a breath but he doesn’t need one. Those light touches to the back of Bruce’s neck strength to a desperate, clinging desire to hold onto something real. Bruce is about as real as they get.

He’s never been kissed quite like this before. Women are more demure and on his brief dalliances with men, he’s tended to go for those that might behave a bit more like women than err towards dominant.

Save for Rhodey. But that was a very one sided kiss that each decided to chalk up to Tony’s drinking because Rhodey very definitely didn’t ‘chill’ that way and each still wanted a friendship with the other.

Tony doesn’t feel for a pulse. He doesn’t melt and he doesn’t yield and there’s a click of teeth from two men getting all they can out of a situation that is irresponsible and unsustainable. Tony will have bruised lips and a knowing, pleased smile when Bruce finally retreats.

“I think I like alien hot tubs.”

[hulkbusted]

Bruce has had far fewer "dalliances" with men: one, in the name of "science" (and horniness but science sounds better.) He kisses Tony like he would kiss anyone he cares deeply about for the first time after more years of abstinence than he wants to think about.

He even lets himself imagine, for a split-second, that they don't stop with a kiss. It's a nice thought until the screaming starts in his imagination.

It is a retreat. He allows himself a moment of satisfaction for the sight of Tony's smile, knowing they'll both be feeling this for the rest of the day, then he boosts himself out of the tub and stands up, looking for something to use as a towel. He's naked, wet, and well aware of Tony's attention, which is why a towel is an urgent priority. He's old enough not to have the physical responses of a teenager to a couple of kisses, but it's been a long time and it's better safe than having to listen to Tony talk about how he really is a grower.

The hot tub's relaxation doesn't disappear all at once, but he can feel it draining away. "We have got to figure out how it does that," he mutters while he pounces on a basket near the hot tub and pulls out a rectangle of cloth that shows that they might be on an alien world, but towels are universal.

"Are you sobering up?" He tosses another towel in Tony's direction and gets to drying off. "Because you were three sheets to the wind when we got in."

[starkingenuity]

Bruce’s retreat probably is not helped along by the fact that Tony turns to watch him go, arms folded over the lip of whatever alien stone this is keeping the water in with him instead of spreading out after the man it so recently lost its grip of. He is open about his appreciation. Bruce is lovely in ways that coeds on college campuses across America would call him so. He’s mousy, older, he has brooding eyes and a pouting mouth. His voice is fit for long, drawn out lectures or, for the more romantic, poetry readings with glasses of fine wine on a balcony.

There are many sides of Tony Stark. One of those sides is the too young kid in college who never got the have the experience of a crush on a professor because his professors all hated and resented him. Bruce fills a strange fantasy just as he fills any holes in Tony’s intellectual needs regular human beings simply can not.

“You gave me a sip of Hulk’s secret stash. You got me drunk and lured me into a hot tub, Dr. Banner. Don’t go blaming my inebriation on my own poor judgements.” Hes teasing and it’s irreverent, not because they are forgetting what just happened, but because there’s a pin there for later. If Bruce thinks Tony will let it go without a cease and desist letter, he’s got another thing coming. “But yeah. I think I’m at acceptable levels of drunkenness now. Are those towels clean? I think I’ll just drip dry.”

And force his teenage wet dream to watch him prance around.

Poor Bruce.

[hulkbusted]

If only Bruce could hear Tony's inner monologue about him; he'd be terribly uncomfortable, but it would be revelatory as well. He certainly doesn't see himself the way Tony does. Being watched doesn't surprise him, though; he'd brought that on himself by playing Tony's game.

The problem is, if he tries to return the favor by staring at Tony, he'll still be playing Tony's game. "They were folded. No one folds dirty towels, but if you want to walk around like me after a Code Green have at it."

He offers a smile that's all Bruce, a mix of sarcastic and self-deprecatory, but when he turns his back to Tony, he rubs a hand over his mouth. The faint ache of a bruise is a reminder of kissing him that he can't quite manage to regret.

"If you can walk without being held up by a suit, we could try going down to do a little mingling."

[starkingenuity]

“I might be able to walk around but I’m pretty sure whatever is left of my liver is shot,” Tony says, accepting a towel only because drip drying will take too long and he really does want to explore. Unlike Banner, he’s never been to an alien planet before and he’s filled with kiss-fueled excitement mixed with all of the desires of a ten year old kid wanting to play Indiana Jones or Buck Rogers (as awkward as that name may now be).

He’s irreverent to the towel when he’s finished, tossing it aside like DUM-E is here to clean up after him and dresses in the same jeans and t-shirt he’d taken off. Normally he’d put on a suit but he looks all right in this, once he musses up his hair and glances over his shoulder to make sure that Banner was either watching all of that or trying to make it a point not to watch him.

Yes. It had just been a kiss. But it was some kiss. And Tony has designs on ways to get more of that. Even if it means being patient. He hates being patient. Once he’s ready, for example, he’s very ready, waiting for Banner like an overly excited puppy. The suits can stay here. For now.

[hulkbusted]

"That isn't as reassuring as you think it is." Bruce isn't trying not to look at Tony or watching him parade around naked, he's just intensely focused on getting dressed. It's like a men's locker room or the YMCA. Just keep your eyes on your own business and all is fine.

There's nothing like life on the run to get a guy acquainted with the finer points of communal living and how to mind your own business. Not that he's always succeeded at the latter, but it's working for this specific moment in time.

He doesn't make Tony wait for him. He's dressed and hopping to pull on his shoe when Tony finishes up. "Let's go see how the revolution's going."

[starkingenuity]

“What happened anyway? I’m all for opposed people coming into their own but this seems different than the usual coups that happen back on Earth,” Tony says as he and Bruce stand in a strange elevator, rumbling from side to side at times. His back is to the doors and he watches the world move closer and closer as they descend. It’s strangely beautiful, familiar and exotic at the same time.

And he’s dying to get out into those streets, right after they take in the Tower itself.

The doors open with a familiar ping (elevators are elevators no matter where you are) and Tony feels hands on his shoulders before he can even turn around. He’s yanked out of the cab and crumples against the wall in front of the doors with a groan. The woman that stand between him and Banner is familiar, even from the backside.

“Doctor Banner.” Her smile is wide but awkward. She hasn’t gotten used to this body yet.

[hulkbusted]

"You're stuck on a strange planet that enslaves people as gladiators, you need to get off that planet, and you really need a fighting force to distract from stealing the planetary leader's spaceship." Bruce isn't watching the streets below them. He's seen them and he's very much hoping that they're over that whole dancing around with Hulk heads thing.

He has his back to the windows watching alien characters shift on the interface and committing them to memory. There's a certain pleasure to being as big of a pain in the ass at doling out a clear narrative as Tony is. "Who do--"

The elevator doors open and he has enough time to register green woman = Kiara before Tony's taking a short flight.

"Kiara." There is nothing about his expression, posture, or tone that doesn't scream, Oh shit. "Nice to see you?"

[starkingenuity]

“It’s so good to see you too,” Kiara exclaims, her volume control about as good as her ability to smile convincingly. “Thank you so much for this body... I had been hoping you would come to see it in person.”

She ignores the groan from poor Tony Stark, trying to pick himself up, and straightens the row of buttons on Banner’s cardigan. Her purple tinted nails lightly scrape against the rounded edges.

Perhaps this hadn’t been the best idea. Her new host is very strong and Bruce doesn’t have her tied down.

“Is this more pleasing than my last body?”