The Art of Learning

There was a horrible, atrocious, downright painful sound coming from the common room of Avengers Mansion. It sounded like a cat was attacking an out-of-tune string instrument.
Which, as it turned out, wasn't that far from the truth.

"What the hell is that awful fucking noise?!" Tommy demanded as he zipped into the room, only to find Billy sitting on a couch with a bright crimson strat electric guitar on his lap.

Tommy blinked at his brother several times, the movement too small and fast to be caught. "What the hell are you doing with a guitar, bro?"

Teddy, who was sitting next the mage, answered: "I found it collecting dust in the closet. It was hidden by a bunch of brooms."

"So, whose is it?" Tommy asked.

"Probably Stark's," Billy shrugged, plucking at the strings again and creating a noise that made the speedster cringe. "Almost everything is. Doesn't look like anybody's used it in a while, though."

"So, what, your boyfriend found a random guitar and you just randomly decided to try to learn how to play?" Tommy asked, raising an argent eyebrow skeptically, before shooting his hands up to cover his ears as his brother strummed the instrument again. "Damn it, Billy! Is that thing even fucking tuned correctly?!"

"I tried to tune it," Bill said defensively, glaring slightly.

"Hey, give him a break," Teddy said told the speedster chidingly as he put an arm around his boyfriend's shoulders. "Neither of us know how to play guitar. We're just trying to figure it out."

Billy pursed his lips thoughtfully as he plucked at the strings again, and the noise was so unpleasant it made Tommy almost want to start crying. Or perhaps run out of the room screaming.

But of course, the speedster did neither.

"Well, you are fucking awful at playing guitar," Tommy sneered at his brother. "I mean, I don't know how to play the guitar either, but I'm betting I could do better than that! And I could definitely figure out how to tune the damn thing!"

"Oh yeah?" Billy snorted, looking at his brother challengingly. "Prove it, then!"

"I will!" Tommy said determinedly, grabbing the guitar out of the mage's hands and throwing himself down on the other side of the couch, taking a moment to stroke his hands over the smooth body of the instrument before the fingers of his left hand flew up to the top of the neck and his right hand began plucking each string individually, closing his eyes as he adjusted the tuning pegs.

Both Teddy and Billy had to cover their ears from the chaotic, high-speed din.

A few minutes later, once he'd gotten all the strings tuned to their correct notes, his hands began skittering across the strings, making such a hellish racket that Billy shoved his face against his boyfriend's chest and Teddy grabbed a pillow to pull over his head.

"AGH! Stop!" Billy cried, clenching his eyes shut and shaking his head. "Are you kidding me, Tommy? This is so much worse than what I was..."

And then he trailed off, because as he'd been speaking the sound changed, and now it actually sounded like a song. And it sounded good, albeit crazy fast and complicated.

Slowly Billy sat up, and Teddy pulled the pillow from his head, and they both looked at the speedster, who was smirking slightly as he played.

"What song is that?" Billy inquired.

"'Through The Fire And Flames' by Dragonforce," Tommy answered, closing his eyes as his fingers danced across the strings at a ridiculous pace. "Apparently one of the hardest guitar riffs to play because of the diverse set of scales and the fast tempo. Of course, my superspeed ensures that that isn't a problem for me." He looked incredibly smug, but also like he was actually enjoying himself somewhat.

Billy frowned slightly at his brother and crinkled his brow. "But how did you—?"

"Shhh!" Tommy said, cutting him off, opening his eyes to watch his fingers skitter over the fretboard, an intense look of concentration on his face and the riff got impossibly faster. "I'm concentrating here! This is by memory and by ear."

Billy and Teddy could only watch, listen and marvel at the speedster's guitar playing.


Tommy finished the song with a flourish, glancing up through his white side-bangs to smirk at them rather conceitedly, stroking the crimson instrument before setting it on the coffee table in front of them, getting up and stretching his arms above his head.

"Tommy, that was amazing," Billy said.

The speedster smirked, arching his back as he stretched. "I know."

"And you've never played a guitar before?" Billy asked him, expression disbelieving.

"Nope. Never really considered it." Tommy shrugged gracefully.

"Then how did you do that?!"

"And what was that awful din before the song?" Teddy asked incredulously.

"That was me learning," Tommy said, walking back over the guitar and picking it up, disappearing, only to return a moment later with a shoulder strap attached to the instrument and slung across his chest. "I'm a speedster, which means I can do stuff faster. I fail faster, but I also succeed faster." He strummed at the guitar strings before turning his glance to his brother and brother's boyfriend with a grin. "Well, now that I've got the hang of this guitar, is there anything you'd like to hear? Provided it's not a stupid sappy love song, of course."


AN: I got the idea for this from the comic X-FACTOR (1986) #79, where Pietro did a similar thing, except with the piano, after getting annoyed with Jamie Madrox playing "Chopsticks" over and over for hours and was giving him a hard time about it, and Jamie was defended by Guido who said that he bet Pietro couldn't do any better. Of course Pietro took the bet. And then he played Beethoven's "Moolight Sonata," by memory and by ear (he'd heard Black Bolt play it a few times when he was living with his wife Crystal and the Inhumans), after a period of 'learning' that was basically a hideous racket of keyboard smashing.

Used a guitar in this, because it was easier to imagine Billy and Tommy playing a guitar than playing a piano. And because Tommy playing the ridiculously fast-paced guitar riff in "Through The Fire And Flames" by Dragonforce was just too good to pass up. If you haven't heard that song, listen to it. It's ridiculous.