So, it occurred to me that both this chapter and the newly-posted chapter of Screams both start in the TV room … I dunno. It's just the way it worked out. I clearly need to look at the floor plans for Stark/Avengers Tower. XD
Unlikely Housemates
By: Syntyche
Day Thirteen: An Extremely Unlucky Day
So, the grand Avengers experiment wasn't working out quite like Tony had anticipated. While he had to admit that they were like a weirdly dysfunctional family (complete with food fights and squabbling over whose turn it was to vacuum,) there were definitely a few downsides to this new living arrangement. Such as:
Thor eating him out of house and pop tarts, and filling the main fridge with disgusting samples of Asgardian "cuisine" that often looked like it festered from the witches' pot from Clash of the Titans.
Banner occasionally Hulking out and tearing up the place.
Barton randomly winging things like paperclips and cheese at people (mostly Tony) from his network of air vents.
And worst of all …
Steve wandered in, took one look at the TV they're all focusing on with varying degrees of interest, and sighed gustily at the barely-clad, barely-legal boys and girls running around, screaming and shouting and generally making unwise decisions that will without fail draw their pursuers' attention to them.
"Not another teen movie," Steve chastised reproachfully, as if he couldn't be bothered to even waste the brain space to learn the name of the picture.
"Oh boy," Tony said dryly, "It's Captain Cheer-merica. Join us, won't you, Cap? We can always use your insightful commentary about how every single movie made after 1940 is an assault on the senses."
Steve crossed his arms with another sigh. "Not every movie," he protested. "I just really dislike this sort of drivel." And he did. Not only did these movies continually decry his profound sense of morality, they were just, well, stupid. He'd come to Stark's "mandatory" movie night hoping they would be watching another installment in the "Superman" movie series (now there was a guy with morals Steve could associate with, and also his ingenious method of disguise that Steve could also relate to - glasses, that was just clever), and his disappointment at whatever idiocy this is was palpable.
But Tony's eating this up, along with handfuls of dried fruit and popcorn, and rolled his expressive eyes when Bruce roused from his semi-asleep state to point out how unhealthy popcorn actually was.
Tony pointed to his chest. "Yeah, jolly green giant, popcorn kernel versus shrapnel … I think I'll take my chances with the popcorn." To prove his point, Tony shoveled in a particularly large fistful of popcorn, which he immediately started choking on.
Thor reacted swiftly, leaping majestically from the futon to thump Tony on the back, perhaps not remembering that's an unwise idea for many reasons, but one glaring reason was immediately obvious when, along with a soggy glop of popcorn shooting from the inventor's mouth to land wetly on Coulson's shoe, the force of Thor's blow also sent Tony's arc reactor spilling from his chest cavity. There were a few tense moments until they figured out how to put the device back in the flailing inventor's chest and Tony sucked in a few gasping breaths, after which he quietly switched to just dried fruit and everyone settled back into their mostly somnolent states as Coulson discreetly wiped the hardening mass of popcorn slowly fusing to his no-longer shiny shoe onto the carpet and moved his chair overtop of it for no one to find ever.
Eventually, Steve gave in and carefully sat himself next to the assassins with a polite smile, but his attention had barely wandered back to the screen when the hapless teenagers decided to split up to explore the creepy, dangerous residence containing at least one axe murderer.
"See?" Steve pointed out irritably. "Look how ridiculous this is! Isn't there one person in that entire group with an ounce of sense?" He answered his own question with a snarky, "Although, with the way they've been spreading their various bodily fluids liberally around a crime scene, I seriously doubt it."
He looked to Clint and Natasha for support, since Bruce was out of it and Stark and Coulson were clearly not in his corner here, but all he got was a sleepy nod from Clint and a supportive grunt from Natasha. Barton's grounding had finally been lifted, and the assassins were just returned from an assignment where they took a hell of a beating ("but the bad guys look worse," Clint claimed proudly, with a grin on his bruised face.) Natasha's casted ankle was propped on a pillow in front of her, and the archer's read rested in her lap while she absently drifted her fingers through his short hair, mindful of the stitches tracking across his cheekbone all the way to his ear. Steve knew there were other stitches, bruises, and cuts that littered their bodies, but he'd been too courteous to watch the pair's routine cleaning and stitching up of each other, especially when Natasha had started to strip out of her tattered catsuit.
Steve finally gave up even trying to watch the movie. "I'm going for ice cream," he decided. "Anyone feel like a banana split?"
OoOoOoOoOo
They're not even sure how it happened.
What they do know is that all of the sudden, Tony Hulked out, Clint was super-strong, and Steve was doing acrobatic moves no man should physically be able to do. They heard a shriek from the adjoining laboratory - they weren't actually sure whether it was Bruce or Natasha - and the duo reappeared, Natasha clumping awkwardly in the Iron Man suit while Bruce trailed slowly behind her, openly admiring his new, extremely impressive biceps.
They stared at each other for a minute as their minds processed what had apparently happened, and it was still Tony who grasped the entirety of the situation first; probably because the face he loved to look at in the mirror every morning was now green and perched atop an extremely large, equally green body clad only in an extremely unflattering pair of ugly purple pants.
"Well, this is interesting," he said. "And very unwelcome."
Bruce smiled as he flexed tentatively. "I don't know," he said cheerfully, "Look at these biceps!"
"I want those back," Clint warned Bruce as Tony fussed and fumbled with his newly enormous hands.
"Oh, go screw yourself," Tony whined, "I'm green! I'm green and huge!"
"See?" Steve moaned despairingly, "Once again the dangers of splitting up are clearly illustrated here!" He spun suddenly and kicked his leg up quite high to take out a remaining drone whirring up behind him and the other men winced sympathetically, while Tony's hand actually drifted protectively toward his bright purple pants.
"Yeah, I dunno," Clint shrugged, pulling uncomfortably at his new, shiny spandex, though the blue was inarguably a nice color for him. "The goatee kinda makes Iron Hulk look … distinguished. Like all you need, dude, is a pipe and a smoking jacket."
"Iron Hulk?" Bruce chuckled, still flexing and admiring. "I like it."
"Speak for yourself, Hulkeye," Tony shot back, looking extremely and greenly disgruntled.
"Oh, right!" Bruce lit up brightly as a thought occurred to him and he went for Clint's bow, strapped securely to his now well-muscled back. Clint immediately snatched it from his grasp.
"I don't think so," the archer-supersoldier said darkly.
They searched the lab and found nothing useful to switch themselves back and so, resigned, they returned to Stark Tower, with Natasha jetting off almost gleefully in the Iron Man suit and leaving the men to hail a taxi since they were all still a little uncoordinated with their new physiques. There was a slight issue with getting Tony to de-Hulk so he'd fit in the small car, and it took several minutes of Bruce showing the inventor some soothing yoga moves before Tony was clutching the purple pants around his wait irritably (several long moments because Bruce kept getting distracted by his muscles rippling as he moved through the familiar poses.)
Once they arrived at the Tower they found Coulson waiting for them at the door. He looked at them curiously for a moment as he paid their cab fare, then without a word he produced a stack of paperwork for each of them before walking away.
Natasha was sitting patiently for them once they'd schlepped back into the TV room; with no real plan, they decided to order a pizza, finish their movie, and then maybe go from there. She was still wearing the Iron Man suit, and Tony nodded at her in speculative approval.
"I feel strangely attracted to you right now," he said curiously.
"I'm not surprised," Natasha muttered wryly, "since I'm sort of you right now."
"Don't even think about it," Clint and Bruce said together, with a glare at Tony, and Natasha - and Steve - gave them both a look of gratitude, which really highlighted the awkwardness of their situation.
They all stared at each other, unsure, until Tony said weakly, "How about we finish watching our movie now?"
There was a general rumble of consensus and they made themselves comfortable. Tony discovered that if he Hulked out he could have the whole sofa to himself, and Clint frowned heavily when his still-stitched together head impacted against the hard thigh of the Iron Man suit Natasha hadn't been able to get off yet. Bruce found himself a spot in the ceiling and Steve perched daintily on a chair and crossed one knee gracefully over the other.
"This is weird," Clint said, and at that moment Loki strolled in, a camera crew trailing at his heels. The god of mischief took in the scene with remarkable calm (he'd quietly been filming their exploits since the laboratory, and the mysterious 'accident' was actually courtesy of him, which explained why they were mixed up so curiously.) Loki smiled his ingratiating grin and clapped his hands together gleefully.
"No, Agent Barton," he corrected lightly, "this is perfect."
OoOoOoOoOo
Review, please, please, please! :D and remember to offer suggestions if anything you'd like to see pops into your mind!
Next: The Avengers - still switched around - respond as expected to both Loki's appearance and his proposition. Unfortunately, it seems like their PR manager Pepper is on Loki's side.