Walking along the street hand in hand with his boyfriend, Tony had to suppress a groan as Steve dragged him along like a rag doll. In his mind he mentally cursed Bruce and his damn choice of movie last night, it being "The Dead Poets Society" everyone seemed to hate it, although really maybe he was wrong, he fell asleep within the first 10 minutes.

Only to be awoken that morning by Steve who had all but thrown him out of his damn bed rambling on and on about how they needed to "seize the day" and when Tony asked why, Steve just stopped and stared at him for a while before throwing a shirt at him and saying 'get dressed'. Apparently one of the themes of the movie was 'carpe diem', and it's a good thing Tony knew what that Latin phrase ment because if he hadn't he would have guessed it ment 'Wake your boyfriend up and shout nonsense at him'.

Tony was currently cursing the existence of that movie and the existence of Bruce for choosing that movie. It seemed as if the world were turning upside down on him, just the other day Steve had complained about something…Steve Rogers the Captain himself had made a complaint. Ever since he had been hanging around with Clint, Tony feared that his boyfriend was picking up bad habits from the marksman, and knowing Clint; Tony was sure he was doing it just to fuck with him.

Shaking his head he decided to suck it up and be a big boy, he could handle this…he could totally handle this…although already his mind was wandering to places he'd rather be, back in the lab with Bruce, or flitting off to his workshop, or cuddled up in bed with a sleeping Steve in his arms; but then he'd just think of Steve and their first kiss.

Their first kiss had been right after a huge fight they'd had, as Clint would have stated if he were present (Although Tony's pretty sure the bastard got it all on film) there had been a lot of sexual tension between them and they were both pushed to the breaking point. Tony almost felt bad for attacking Steve's mouth, that is, if it wasn't for the mind blowing sex that followed.

"Tony?" Steve asked, giving a little nudge to his boyfriend which brought Tony back to where they were currently standing, just in front of a…no. "No, I already told you, we are not going in there." He said, although he was already beginning to wonder whether he could really say no to Steve.

"Tony, I am prepared to withhold sex." And thank god he hadn't been drinking anything because it would have been one horrible reaction. He was going to have to tell Clint to stop letting Steve know what Nat does to him when she gets pissed. Sighing he looked at Steve and then at the Pet Shop and then back to Steve, gaze wondering a little bit lower….and fuck. Yeah he was going to regret this wither way. "Fine-" any other words died as Steve practically jumped on Tony, kissing him fiercely.

"Thank you." He said as they walked into the shop. Tony really prayed that Steve wasn't going to get too attached to an animal.

~2 minutes later~

"Tony! Look how cute he is!" Steve practically shouted in his ear as he ran about like a kid in a candy store. Which wouldn't have even been accurate, half the kids in the store were looking at Steve like he was the child.

For the next 20 minutes it went along the lines of Steve approaching Tony with a new possible pet, and each time Tony would say no. How else was he going to manage to keep the house clean? After the seventh pet, it was getting harder and harder to say no to Steve. After several moments of wandering aimlessly through the store he thought Steve had finally given up. That is, until he turned around and almost smacked straight into him.

"Look Tony! I think I finally found the perfect pets."

"Pets? Pets…as in, more than one?"

"C'mon just wait till you see 'em." Steve beamed.

Following Steve over to a container he stopped, turned to look at Steve and nodded, "Ok, that could be arranged."

-Back at the Avengers HQ-

"What the fuck are those?" Clint asked from where he was perched on the barstool. He was looking at where Steve was setting up a little tank.

Steve turned around and smiled, "They're hermit crabs! Look, their little shells are painted." He said, stepping aside so the inhabitants of the tank were visible through the glass now, Clint walked over and gaped at the design. On one of the crabs shells was the design for Steve's Captain America shield and on the other crabs was a reddish-gold design spiraling along it's shell.

At that moment, Natasha decided to come rushing in. "I heard you Tony let you get-" but she stopped mid-sentence as she saw what was in the glass habitat. "Well, it's not a kitten like I had hoped, but…they do look kinda…cute?" she said, "So, what are their names?"

Steve smiled proudly, "Well, Tony named the reddish-gold one "Iron Shell" and I named mine "Captain Crab", we figured it'd suit them well." He said, Nat nodded moving to pick up "Captain Crab" (wishing she had had a say in what to name them), but Tony's hermit crab (Iron Shell) rushed over and tried to pinch at Nat's hand, she looked up at Steve who shrugged.

"Oh, yeah, that little guy is kinda possessive." Steve said, apology in his voice.

"You don't say." Nat said with a smile, remembering a time when a waitress had mistakenly tried to hit on Steve in front of Tony, god that'd been a spectacle. Tony practically rushed over to grasp Steve's hand, all but tossing the bimbo a predatory glare.

Clearly, the pets were well suited to their owners.


A/N: I hope you all enjoyed this new chapter! I know it's been quiet some time since I've posted but either way, reviews are much appreciated :) and I'm still taking suggestions.