Author's Note: This chapter first began as a review to 'Life on the Sidelines' in Twisting the Hellmouth, until Nycorson's answer to this review gave me a really hilarious idea and caused it to expand into an actual ficlet. Enjoy!
They were all going to Disneyland next week, so naturally the most childish, immature of their company was completely engrossed about what they'd do there in this famous California theme park he'd entirely bought out for several straight days for Stark employees to visit and have fun. Their feminine significant others — Darcy, Jolie, Natasha, Safira, and Pepper — had already decided to have a girls' breakfast morning while in costume as assorted Disney heroines, but they hadn't yet made their final choices as who to go as although somebody else was absolutely sure of whom Pepper Potts should be portraying.
"Well, of course Pepper has to be Mary Poppins," sniffed Tony in the main living room of Avengers Tower where he'd wandered from his lab before lunch to bother the other guys in the room's assorted armchairs working on their laptops. "Who else should she dress up except as someone practically perfect in every way?"
Xander, Clint, Steve, and Bruce kept their attention totally fixed on today's e-mails instead of glancing up in the vain hope Tony would soon get bored and go away. Unfortunately, all this did was to make the billionaire needle them even further, "Speaking of Disney characters, of course there's one particular guy that nobody but me should go by if we're invited to join the ladies. Anyone want to guess who it is?"
Tony waited expectantly for someone to grudgingly admit that he and only he could possibly pull off wearing the costume and behaving like the dashing, over-the-top pirate known as Captain Jack Sparrow.
Except...one after the other, still not glancing up their computer screens, the following people announced:
Bruce Banner - "Goofy."
Xander Harris - "Pumbaa."
Clint Barton - "Sebastian."
Steve Rogers - "Monstro."
More than a bit taken aback, Tony glared at the guys still not even bothering to look at him and snapped to them all, "Oh, fine, so you really think I'm best going as an anthropomorphic dog, a flatulent warthog, a Jamaican crab, and..." Tony trailed off, trying to identify the last name.
When he finally admitted defeat, Tony started over again, "...okay, who the hell is Monstro?"
Seemingly occupied with his mail, Steve said offhandedly, "The giant whale from Pinocchio."
Paying an equal amount of intense attention to his own laptop, Xander distractedly agreed, "Yeah, I got to change my vote to that. Nobody but Tony could work the costume's blowhole the way it fully deserves to blast a huge gale of hot air over everyone in hearing distance."
Giving those two jokers his most scathing glower, Tony reminded them, "Who's paying for this?"
Bruce promptly reached into his shirt pocket, pulled out a quarter, and flipped it over to where Clint snatched up this piece of change in mid-flight without even looking. Slipping the coin into his own pants pocket, Clint declared, "Told you he'd say that the first five minutes."
"Assholes," Tony growled at them all and started to turn around to head back to his lab and thoroughly sulk in there for a while. He ignored the triple chime from the laptops of Steve, Clint, and Bruce indicating they'd all just received mail.
However, he stopped short when Xander rose from his chair where he'd spent the last few moments vigorously typing on his laptop to call out, "Hey, Tony, wait!"
"What?" Iron Man in his civilian identity suspiciously eyed Xander coming towards him, a wide, happy smile on the younger man's face. This meant Tony missed out on seeing the other three males read their new messages, make a prompt decision to work together, and memorize what they'd just been sent.
Fortunately, they'd all watched the 1991 animated movie when Jolie picked it for movie night last Tuesday in honor of their upcoming Disneyland vacation, so the guys already knew fairly well the original lyrics.
Xander stopped short in front of Tony, laying a friendly hand on the billionaire's shoulder. Next, the Sunnydale native did something completely unexpected, causing Tony to gawk at him in absolute surprise.
The one-eyed man started singing right into Tony's astonished face, in a fairly decent baritone voice:
"Gosh it disturbs me to see you, Tony
Looking so down in the dumps
Every guy here'd love to be you, Tony
Even when taking your lumps
There's no man in town as admired as you
You're ev'ryone's favorite guy
Ev'ryone's awed and inspired by you
And it's not very hard to see why"
Steve Rogers arose from his own chair and made an ornate flourish with one hand towards a still-boggled Tony who then switched his attention towards Captain America delivering in a clear tenor voice:
"No one's slick as Tony
No one's quick as Tony
No one's neck's as incredibly thick as Tony
For there's no man in town half as manly
Perfect, a pure paragon
You can ask any Tom, Dick or Stanley
And they'll tell you whose team they prefer to be on"
When a smirking Steve stopped singing for now, Bruce Banner whom during the other man's performance had gotten up from his own chair and sang towards the target of their vocal sarcasm in a quite good bass:
"No one's been like Tony
A king pin like Tony
No one's got a swell cleft in his chin like Tony
As a specimen, yes, he's intimidating
My- what a guy, that Tony"
(Throughout all of the above, deep inside Bruce's mind where the Other Guy normally existed in a state of sullen rage, the Hulk was instead guffawing at the top of his immaterial lungs.)
All four of these men then combined their voices in a fervent chorus of:
"Give five 'hurrahs!'
Give twelve 'hip-hips!'
Tony is the best
And the rest is all drips"
Clint continued in his own solo with a deeper baritone than Xander:
"No one fights like Tony
Douses lights like Tony
In a wrestling match nobody bites like Tony
For there's no one as burly and brawny
As you see he's got biceps to spare
Not a bit of him's scraggly or scrawny
(That's right!)
And ev'ry last inch of him's covered with hair"
Xander took over from Clint:
"No one hits like Tony
Matches wits like Tony
In a spitting match nobody spits like Tony
He's especially good at expectorating
(Ptooey!)
Ten points for Tony!"
That exact named man had just hastily jumped back from where the others had pretended to spit upon his shoes, catching himself to glare at those idiots still singing.
Steve then exultantly delivered:
"No one shoots like Tony
Makes those beauts like Tony
Then goes tromping around wearing boots like Tony
Say it again
Who's a man among men?
And then say it once more
Who's the hero next door?
Who's a super success?
Don't you know? Can't you guess?
Ask his fans and his hangers-on
There's just one guy in town who's got all of it down"
Bruce chimed in, drawing out the final syllable:
"And his name's Teee"
Clint did the same:
"Ohhh"
Steve joined in:
"Ennn"
Xander crisply delivered:
"Why"
Steve and Clint abruptly dropped to a knee in front of someone glaring at them all, arms spread wide in the grand finale, with this same gesture mirrored by Bruce and Xander at this recipient's side while the quartet sang out loud his name:
"TONY!"
Anthony Stark balefully regarded his co-workers each having the dumbest ever grins spreading out upon their faces and informed them in his iciest tone, "You're going to pay for that."
"Worth it!" Xander snickered, while Steve and Clint getting back up onto their feet plus Bruce all nodded firmly in concurrence.
Giving everybody else a last fulminating glower, Tony left them and the room to head down the Stark Tower corridor towards his lab, already plotting his revenge. Midway to there, Tony stopped short in the hallway at a sudden horrific realization which had just appeared in his brain.
Turning to lean forward to the wall and rest his forehead against there, Tony spoke aloud in a morose tone, "Jarvis, please tell me you haven't already downloaded a recording of what happened back there into Pepper's phone?"
"I'm afraid that's not possible, sir," the AI running the entire building replied in his usual urbane manner.
Tony tried, "I don't suppose you could delete—"
"No, sir. Besides, Ms. Potts has even now watched it, repeatedly, and has shared it with her lunchtime companions consisting of Ms. Romanov and Ms. Lewis, with the latter woman undergoing what I have identified as a 'giggle-fit'."
Tony closed his eyes, heaved a weary sigh, and straightened up to continue in a defeated walk to his lab.
When he approached the door that slid open at his presence, Tony gritted in annoyance, "Jarvis, knock it off."
"As you wish, sir," the AI obediently said, ending in mid-note the 'Be Our Guest' tune it'd been serenading Tony on the lab speakers.
