Avengers fic: They'll give you a statue when you're done (Steve&Tony)

[seriousfic]

Title: They'll give you a statue when you're done
Fandom: Avengers movieverse
Rating: PG
Word Count: 2,052
Characters/Pairings: Steve Rogers, Tony Stark
Summary: If it weren't for Yinsen, Tony Stark wouldn't have been Iron Man. If it weren't for Erskine, Steve Rogers wouldn't have been Captain America.



Tony Stark was not hailing a cab, he was an Avenger.

All he was supposed to be doing was touring the new SHIELD outpost in Fresno, but Natasha had chauffeur-jacked him, using her old "Natalie Rushman" cover. Hadn't he sent a memo telling everyone not to trust her? He'd included a lingerie photo, so how could anyone have forgotten her?

However, just because he was out a car didn't mean Tony was down. Oh no. A few strokes of his smartphone and he'd called up the local limo service, explaining how he needed a limousine sent.

"Wait…" said someone who was either really high or really stupid. "So you want it sent over there now?"

"Yes. Now would be good. Five minutes ago, when I first called you, would be even better."

"We really just reserve limos. You can't just, like, order one up like a pizza."

"I'm not trying to order a limo like a pizza. I'm trying to order a limo like a limo." Great, now he was doing it. Tony punched the air. "Just send one down."

"We really don't have any, all our reservations are booked…"

"So you're telling me the entire Echelon Limousine Service fleet of limos—that's what it says on your listing, fleet—is out on the streets? Because I don't recall seeing any. Is 'limo' code for Volkswagen, because I've seen a lot of those. I'm thinking of buying stock, in fact, they seem to be on an upswing."

"No, man, sir, they're all… reserved. For later in the week."

"Later in the week. Okay, well I just need one for fifteen minutes to pick me up and drop me off, and then it can go right back to waiting for whatever high school prom it's destined for, okay?"

"Dude… what if you scratched it?"

Tony had been this mad before. It was when he had to destroy a swarm of kill-bots before they blew up a hospital. "What's your name? I want to know so that when I buy your company, I can fire you."

"Uhh… Mary."

"You're clearly a man!"

He hung up.

Tony was going to buy his company, fire him, and then be a horrible reference.

"Sup, Tony?"

Outdated slang. Upbeat attitude. Voice like a surfer dude who'd just gotten a haircut and no, Tony did not know what that meant.

Had to be Cap.

Here's the thing about Steve Rogers. He hates Tony. Tony can tell. Every time Steve looks at him, he sees Howard Stark, who personally tested the guns he built to kill Nazis—on Nazis. Whereas Tony's social conscience was more comfortable at the level of strapping into a robot suit and punching other robot suits. And Steve reminded him of that every time he did that little double-take of seeing Tony and reminding himself it wasn't his father and he wasn't in the 20th century. It was enough to make Tony want to shave his goatee. And he had an awesome goatee.

"Nothing, Steve, I'm great." Tony texted his broker to buy Echelon Limousine Services. "How are you? Still loving America?"

"Well, you know, Captain Canada doesn't really roll off the tongue." Steve sat down at the bench Tony had been ignoring for the past ten minutes. Angrily pacing was much better for the posture. "Trouble?"

"Nothing that needs a vibranium shield thrown at it."

"Touché."

Douché, Tony thought.

Steve sighed. "Hey, we're on the same team, Tony."

"I know that. Our names are next to each other on the roster." Although Tony would much rather be next to Black Widow. Alphabetical order.

"So if you have a problem, the team has a problem."

That's funny, I don't recall any erectile dysfunction on my part. So much for 'the team' having a problem. That was a good one. Tony would have to remember to use it when he wasn't sparring with someone who was pretty much a really big, really patriotic puppy. "Well, Steve, I need to get to 56th Street, so unless you want to carry me—no, you probably would do that, I'm taking it off the table."

Steve reached into his jeans and came up with some keys. Which he jingled. "Or I could just drive you."

***

Tony had no idea why a man from the 1940s was so enthused with a car from the sixties, but then, it was a 1967 Shelby Mustang GT 500. Which Nick Fury gave him, because "the America spirit doesn't drive around in some Japanese POS." All Tony's ever gotten from Fury has been a potentially bipolar Russian assassin.

"Are you sure you know how to drive?" Tony asked.

"We had cars back in 1943, you know."

"Did you have stoplights?"

Steve cruised to a gentle stop at the red light. "Yeah."

Of course, he was a model driver. Of course.

"Steve, you think I'm an asshole?"

Steve laughed, a little uneasily. "I wouldn't say that."

"What would you say?"

Steve looked over at him, eyebrow raised. "Jerk."

"Right. Language."

"Spend a few months as a children's entertainer, you'd watch your mouth too."

"Yeah, I actually don't like kids—it's a thing, they're like small noisy adults, freaks me out. If you saw a really small, really noisy horse, you would not think it was cute."

Steve nodded along. "Probably not."

Tony ran a hand over the dashboard. He wouldn't dream of putting a GPS or an XM radio in there, but maybe if he took a StarkTech AllPurpose and modified it to go with the décor… there'd probably be a market for a combination GPS/radio that looked like American steel and not an overgrown Game Boy. He'd have to get the techies on it. Maybe put one in the Quinjet.

"It's not that you're a bad guy," Steve said. "It's just your irresponsible, reckless, self-centered—"

"But not a bad guy," Tony reminded him.

"No." They were stopped at a light. Steve tapped his fingers on the wheel. "It wouldn't kill you to read some of the Founding Fathers' words. Really inspiring stuff."

"I'll wait for the movie."

"They sacrificed a lot for your freedom."

"Uh-huh." Tony was really glad he put a button on his cell-phone that, when discreetly pressed, made the phone ring so it sounded like you were getting a call. "I gotta take this."

***

Thankfully, they reached Stark Enterprises' Fresno facility before Tony could find out too much about Steve's taste in radio stations. Like a wayward puppy (there was that metaphor again), Steve followed Tony to the courtyard. For a moment, Tony just took in the bustle of the employees. Of course, they wouldn't be expecting him and didn't much notice him. That was alright. This was a bit private, anyway.

He went to the statue in the middle, opened up his suitcase, and took out something the size and shape of a microphone. When he dripped some Evian from his mini-bottle onto it, it expanded into a bouquet of flowers. He dropped it beside the statue's plaque.

Steve was looking at him. "Simple bioengineering. Flowers are always so bulky and you've got petals flying everywhere, complete hassle—"

"Tony," Steve interrupted gently, jerking his head at the statue. "Who's he?"

"There's a plaque."

Tony stepped aside for Steve to read. "Dr. Yinsen."

"I couldn't find out his first name." Tony slouched, his hands in his pockets. "We managed to bury him in his village, with his family, but I wanted something here, to remind me. Three years I've been coming here, leaving flowers. Three years isn't long enough to earn you breaking a tradition."

"I read about him in your file," Steve said. "I didn't know you still thought about him."

"He died for me. Least I can do is remember. I can get a ride from here. Management drives company cars, so technically they're just borrowing from me."

"If an Avenger has a problem, the Avengers have a problem." Steve stepped up next to Tony. "I know what it's like. You take a man who's so wise and with all that wisdom, he ends up making you his life's work. It's a lot to live up to. I'm glad you're not letting it go."

"You say that like there's an option."

"Want a drink?"

"You're talking about milk, right?"

"Martinis."

"Didn't know you could get drunk."

"I like the taste."

***

It was a quiet enough pub, the kind of place firefighters and old cops frequented, and Tony went unrecognized with his jacket and power tie off. Steve, of course, could just disappear without a big A on his forehead.

Tony tried to convince Steve to warm up his mouth for some tequila, since it wasn't like he could get intoxicated, but Steve stuck with a pink martini and bar peanuts. Some days, Tony was ashamed to be an American.

They toasted Yinsen and Tony paid a longshoreman fifty bucks to keep the jukebox playing Bruce Springsteen for the rest of the evening. Tony couldn't help but wonder what Steve's reaction to Born In The USA would be.

"Hey," Steve said. "I might've been a little hasty with you."

"Telling me to read about George Washington? No, that was a good idea. You should start a book club." That felt good. Tony sipped his tequila. Fruity. Steve didn't know what he was missing.

"Calling you a jerk, I mean. That was a little… uncouth of me."

"Uncouth," Tony repeated, his eyebrows doing tricks.

"You're a good guy, you're just not…"

"You?"

Steve laughed. "I'm not me. Have you ever done a USO show?"

"Have you ever accidentally sold arms to terrorists?"

"You ever missed a date?"

For some reason, Steve was so quiet after that, Tony couldn't even make a quip. He just ordered another round. Steve knocked back his drink, shut his eyes, made his face, and popped his eyelids open sober as a judge. "Sometimes I miss getting drunk."

"Trust me, you're better off. Have you ever tried to sneak out of Vanessa Hudgens's house at 4 AM?"

"Ever tried to fight Nazi ubermensch sober?"

"This is getting to be a drinking game, and you have an unfair advantage." Tony pushed his drink aside. "Weren't you complimenting me?"

"Yeah, I was." Steve leaned against the bar. "Maybe it's presumptuous of me, but I knew your father pretty well and I…" he shrugged, "think he'd be proud of you."

Tony was quiet, tapping his finger against the bar, picking at the scratched wood with his fingernail like there was a signal there he could decipher. He opened the button at his collar and Steve saw a patch of stubble at the nape of his throat, like a weed in an immaculately-planted garden. Even in debauchery, Tony had an air of careless perfectionism to him, like he'd chosen every aspect of his life and allowed it to wash over his appearance. Seeing him like this… it made Steve regret insulting him more.

"I read about Dr. Erskine's work. He was brilliant, you know…" Tony pinched the bridge of his nose in his fingers. "I mean, one of those Renaissance-types who picks everything up. Sociology, biology, technology. He saw eugenics for the bullshit it was long before everyone else did. He didn't want to weaponize the super-soldier technology—he started the work for medical applications. He thought he could make the handicapped walk, help the blind see… he didn't want to just sell six-pack abs and arms the size of tree trunks to us trust fund assholes. His idea—and it was just a thing in his notebooks, not the master plan or anything—was to hold a lottery among the poor. Someone, chosen at random, would be given the serum and have the chance to uplift their entire life. He was so sure that most people, when given the serum, would turn out so good that they'd inspire the rest of us. Do the work of a hundred super-soldier serums."

Tony got up. People were starting to stare. He'd probably given the bartender classified information. Time to head home.

He slapped Steve on his rock-hard shoulder. "I say you proved him right."

Steve looked back at him. "Don't tell me I inspired you."

"You convinced me not to fire a guy who rents limousines. That's something."