Another slightly mellow chapter, but I promise things will begin to heat up soon so just bear with me :)
Pepper found the majority of the Avengers in the kitchen, the smell of waffles and bacon excited her senses and her common sense told her that where there is food, there are men. She tapped her foot against the marble floor to make herself known but everyone was too preoccupied to notice. Penny had her head resting on her arms and was quickly falling back to sleep while next to her sat an equally tired looking Bruce.
Thor had so far devoured a staggering 14 slices of bacon, 5 cups of coffee and 18 waffles drenched in maple syrup; just watching him eat that much had put Natasha off her breakfast. She could see him eye her untouched plate every now and then, and quickly shoved it towards him unceremoniously after the 8th glance.
"Why are you two so tired?" Pepper smiled as she took a seat opposite Bruce, she heard a grumble of sounds from Penny and turned her head to Bruce, "Translation?" Bruce chuckled, "We stayed up late in the lab again." He looked at the top of Penny's head, "We should probably take a break from that you know, you've probably only had around four hours sleep."
Penny sat upright quickly and looked to Bruce, "Is that it? Four hours?" Disbelieving him she mentally worked it out in her head. Damn! Why does he have to be right all the time? Letting her head flop back down on her arms she groaned. She stood up and walked over to the kettle, she was filling it up with water when Tony walked in.
Tony pecked Pepper on the cheek and took a seat next to her, "Good morning people, how are we all on this fine morning?" He asked sarcastically, and made a point to stare at Pepper with his big brown eyes.
"Ignore him, he's just moody." Pepper smiled and concentrated on her waffles. Penny walked back over and placed two cups of coffee down, one in front of Tony and the other in front of Pepper. Opening their mouths to thank her, she wandered back over and placed another cup in front of Thor and another cup in front of Clint. Settling back down in her seat, she pushed a cup of green tea to Bruce before taking a sip of her own.
Bruce placed his book down and smiled gratefully at her, "How did you know I liked green tea?" He asked quietly, Pepper and Tony were trying to subtly argue about something or other and were quickly growing quite loud.
Penny smiled at Bruce and took another sip, "I didn't," she shrugged, "I just figured that you couldn't drink coffee because of the other guy, and I fancied green tea anyway so I thought you could try it." She smiled at him while he took a sip and folded the page of his book down. "It's meant to be calming." That was something else to add to the ever growing list of things he liked about her; she never really called the other guy the 'Hulk', Bruce admitted to her that he hadn't gotten used to it yet and liked people saying 'the other guy' around him. So since then, she'd made a point of never saying Hulk.
He chuckled, "I think Pepper and Tony need it right now more than I do." They both looked over to the pair who were, rather loudly, arguing still. Tony abruptly stood up from the table, "If I have to go so do they." He pouted like a child as Pepper glanced at Penny for help.
Sighing in defeat, she nodded. "Fine," Tony grinned and fist pumped. "But!" He stopped and stared at her. "You have to tell them. I'll meet you downstairs in 20 minutes." She smiled sweetly and left, taking her coffee with her.
"Tell us what?" Steve asked warily, fearing that changes were planned for the tower. He had yet to get use to the technology of Stark Tower and had just managed to figure out how the most basic things work with the help of Penny and Pepper. They had begun a little tutoring class for him and Thor much to the delight of Tony and Clint who thought it was hilarious.
Tony paused and debated with himself, did he break the terrible news? Or did he shield them from it?
"Guy's," He spoke with a grave tone, "I uh, I've kinda got some bad news…" He stared at his hands as everyone fell silent. Something had happened, Penny just knew it. They were coming for her, they had sent another tape she just knew it. Feeling her hand start to shake from the fear she clasped them together.
Feeling a hand take hers, she looked down and found Bruce's hand holding hers. She smiled slightly and he locked his fingers with hers.
Tony sighed and looked at everyone, he noticed Bruce was holding Penny's hand and had to stop himself from breaking out in a grin. "I'm afraid that we have to go shopping." The room deadpanned in silence as Tony smiled sadly.
"What?" Asked Steve who was more than slightly confused, "How is that bad news exactly?"
Tony shrugged, "You've obviously never been shopping with a woman Steve. They like to suck the life out of you and then-"
Penny stood up and glared dangerously at Tony, he stopped mid-sentence and stared. "Uh, you okay there Pen?" Her mother always told her that she had her grandmother's glares, dangerous. She also said that her eyes flashed green when she was angry; Tony now had proof that they did.
"You better run Stark." She pushed her stool back as Tony began to run down the corridor and to the lift, he jabbed at the button. He looked and saw her round the corner and peg it for him, her auburn hair was flying out behind her and what he recognised to be one of his jackets got discarded on the floor; the elevator was taking too long. Quickly he ran into the living room, only to find himself trapped by a very angry looking Penny.
Bruce, Steve, Thor, Natasha and Clint weren't quite sure what had happened. They exchanged confused glances before Clint spoke up, "What the hell just happened? And why do we have to go shopping?"
A cry from Tony broke everyone from their train of thought, standing up they ran to where the sound had come from. Jogging into the living room they were shocked to say the least, Tony was running around the room in a desperate attempt to shake Penny from him. She had climbed on his back and gripped on for dear life; her legs were wrapped around his waist and her arms were firmly locked around his neck to hold herself there.
Tony glanced up at his friends and spun around in a circle in one last attempt, "Don't just stand there! Get this, this thing off of me!" Everyone broke out into fits of laughter, but Penny frowned at being called a thing and gently nipped his neck.
"OW!" He shouted, spinning once again. "SHE BIT ME!" At this point, Tony was flushed and frazzled while Penny looked victorious. Recovering slightly from the laughing fit, Bruce staggered over and pulled her from Tony's back gently.
Penny watched Tony rub his neck before he turned towards her, "You're worse than the jolly green giant over here!" He whined and motioned to Bruce who just rolled his eyes. Penny just smiled triumphantly, "Well it'll teach you to scare me like that then won't it?"
Penny saw Tony grin menacingly and start to run towards her, instinctively she yelped and ran a lap around the room with Tony hot on her tail. She grabbed Bruce's arm and wrapped it around herself before she buried her head into his side. Tony halted to a stop and without thinking, Bruce wrapped his arms around her protectively.
"Sorry Tony," He shrugged and looked down at Penny's hair.
Feeling it was relatively safe, the remaining Avengers piled into the room and sat on the furniture. "What do we have to go shopping for anyway?" Clint asked again as he rested his feet on the coffee table, needless to say that shopping was one of his least favourite past times; unless it was shopping for new weapons. Now that, he liked.
Sticking his tongue out at Penny, who quickly popped her head out and did it back before hiding again, he turned around and huffed. "Stark Industries is throwing a charity gala, very big and fancy, and Pepper has decided that you are all to attend."
Natasha grimaced at the thought, "You mean that you decided right?" Tony blanched and began to nod. "Technically, yeah. But Pepper want's you there too." He added sweetly onto the end, he really didn't want to attend one of these things alone. Pepper would mostly be talking business since she was now CEO, and that left him with a bunch of boring old farts. He was also under strict orders that he wasn't allowed to get drunk, so he couldn't even entertain himself that way.
"Does that mean we get pretty dresses?" Tony spun round to see that Penny had emerged from Bruce's side, but was still standing rather close for protection. "I doubt the majority of us would look good in gowns, so I'll leave that to you and Natasha. But yes, you get as you so eloquently put it, 'pretty dresses'." She faked a smile and carried on.
"I bet you'll all look dashing in your suits! Oh! Can I make a request?" She smiled at each of the men in the room and waited for an answer, "Oh God." Tony whispered and pinched his nose, "Fine. What is it?"
"One of you has to wear a bow tie! They're sooo cute!" She dragged out the vowel and clapped her hands together, Natasha began to usher them towards the lift as she remembered something about meeting Pepper in 20 minutes.
"Do you even know how we're going to be tortured? We'll be dragged around shops all day." Tony whined as they waited for the elevator, "I don't see what the problem is, in my day-" Steve started but was cut off by Tony.
"In your day, people also only had sex with people they were married too." Steve blushed and quickly shut up. Bruce and Tony decided to wait for the next lift instead of being cramped.
Penny giggled as she turned to Tony, "I'd like to offer you moral support, but I'm afraid I have very questionable morals." She winked as she saw the looks on their faces as the doors slid closed.
"How about this one?" Penny cowered as what could only be described as a ball of purple was tossed over the top of the changing room door. Standing up, she straightened it out and looked it over. It wasn't the worst, in fact, she kind of liked it. It was purple with a strapless top, it was relatively plain until it got the knees and fishtailed out. Penny couldn't help but think that it looked very fitted, something she wasn't completely comfortably with.
"Hey Pep?" She called warily as she eyed the gown up and down again. "Yeah?" She replied from the next stall over. "I don't think-"
"Just try it Pen!" She shouted back, finding a dress that Penny actually liked turned out to be a nightmare, and Nat was even worse. "Pepper do I have to try this one on? I look like a Barbie doll's thrown up on me." Penny heard Nat whine.
Pulling the dress off the hanger she quickly stepped into it and pulled it up, sucking her breath in she grabbed the zipper and gently pulled it upwards. Slowly letting her breath out, she looked in the mirror.
In Peppers defence, it was a pretty dress. On Penny however, it looked like she had been wrapped up in purple cling film. "Pepper! I look ridiculous!" She pushed the door open and waddled out, it was very difficult to walk in if you didn't take the steps of an ant. Stepping too quickly, she lost her balance and landed face down on the carpet. "Damn…"
"Did I ever mention that you have a lovely behind Miss Green?"
She just wanted the ground to swallow her whole. Opening her eyes she saw a mixture of different kinds of men's shoes, looking up slowly she saw five very amused men.
"Shove it Stark," She rolled to her side and tried to pull herself to her knees; the dress however, had other ideas. Constricting her mobility, she flopped down on her back and spread her arms out snow angle style. "Can someone help me up please?" She mumbled, and Steve helped pull her to her feet quickly. "Thanks." She flashed him a shy smile and looked around for Pepper.
"She's gone to fetch some more dresses for you to try." Natasha walked out of a changing room in her normal clothes and no dress in sight. "What? Where's your dress?" Penny asked quickly, she could feel Nat mentally laughing at how ridiculous she looked in the cling film dress.
"I found one, Pepper's gone to pay for hers and mine." She turned to the guys, "I assume you all brought tux's?" Quirking an eyebrow she peaked in Clint's bag. "Yeah, you'll have to wait and see who's wearing the bow tie though." He smirked mischievously.
"Okay, here are some more dresses," Pepper hung eight new dresses up in the changing room and pushed her back in, closing the curtain behind her. "And we wanna see them!"
Sighing, she stepped out of the purple dress and chucked it over the top for someone to catch; she grabbed the first one off the pile and stepped out. "I hate it."
Bruce thought she was adorable when she pouted. She had a pale yellow, floor length dress on that had a pattern of fabric flowers trailing around the bottom, he thought she looked lovely, but Penny had other views. The next, was a halter neck, shiny blue number that came down to her knees. "Just, what were you thinking?" She huffed at Pepper and stormed back into the changing room.
She'd tried on five of the eight dresses before she found it. The dress of her dreams, it was perfect. "I've found it!" She screamed excitedly as she pulled it from the hanger and hurriedly tried it on. "Which one?" Pepper asked happily though the curtain, before it was ripped open.
Penny had put her normal clothes on again and was holding the pile of dresses in her arms, "What? I want to see! Which one is it?" Pepper reached out for the dresses but Penny snatched them away from her reach. "Oh no! You'll have to wait and see, consider this payback for making me try on the most ridiculous dresses I've ever seen"
Pepper pouted, "But you looked so pretty…"
Tony saw an opportunity and intervened, "Pepper, honey, just think of it as a surprise." She nodded and he led her to the shop door and handed Penny his credit card with a wink. "How about I take you to dinner, huh?" She heard him ask nicely. Bruce stayed behind and helped Penny hang the dresses back up.
"So which one did you decide on?" He asked curiously, she spun around holding two dresses; one silver and the other red. "It's one of these, but you'll have to wait and see!" She smiled and gently pushed him to the shop door while she went to pay, grabbing a matching pair of shoes and a purse on her way.
Tony and Bruce waved goodbye to the group as they set off on their own, Tony planned to buy Pepper some nice new jewellery to wear to the Gala. Bruce accompanied him for 'advice', why, he had no idea; he was probably the most useless person to ask advice from when it came to women.
Tony stopped to look in the window, "What about that?" He pointed to a simple white gold bangle with inset diamonds on the curves, "Uh, sure. It's pretty." Bruce mumbled awkwardly. "You probably shouldn't ask me for advice," Tony walked into the shop and paced around, "I'm not very good with gifts."
Tony pointed to a bracelet and a shop assistant got it out for him to look at, "What about this one?" It was similar to the first, but had sapphires along with diamonds. "You know, 'cause her eyes are blue and everything…" He explained awkwardly.
Bruce smiled and nodded, "She'll love it." Tony grinned and asked for it to be gift wrapped. He turned to face Bruce while he was waiting, "You know," He said, thinking up a master plan. "If you're going to ask Penny to the gala, you should really get her a gift to give her on the night." Bruce frowned, "Tony you know I can't afford-"
"Who said anything about you paying?" He grinned slyly, fanning himself with his credit card as he did so. Shaking his head Bruce scratched his chin, "And you know I can't let you pay for it either. You've already paid for my tux and-"
"Look, if you don't then I will. And I'm sure you'll be able to jump in bed with her even quicker if you give her something she'll love." He smirked and thanked the man who handed him the small bag. They headed began walking down the street to another jewellers.
"I don't want to jump into bed with her Tony." Bruce sighed, "Fine, tap it, whatever."
Bruce stopped and looked at his friend in confusion, "Tap what?" He began walking again, Tony pulled him into a shop and chuckled. "Never mind, just," He faced Bruce and lowered his voice, "Let me do this. Okay? You can pay me back by keeping Pepper off my back for a few days. She's been acting weird lately." Bruce nodded in defeat and looked around before Tony spoke confidently.
"Good, now. Let's find some pretty jewellery for a pretty Penny shall we?"
God I love mush, aha. Just to let people know, Penny's eyes didn't actually flash green. Her eyes are green anyway, but it's just a saying. My Nan says it all the time to me when I'm annoyed, so yeah :) In case anyone was a bit confused! Sorry if this chap is a bit naff, it's 2:20am here and I'm shattered.
-Readers Assemble!-