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Magic Box | Thursday

Scott didn't really like to cut things this close as far as the portalling back and forth between here and San Francisco thing, but last night had been parent-teacher conferences for Cassie. And while she was, of course, doing great (and still trying to take her ant to school with her, despite parental protests all around), it had turned into dinner with Cassie and Maggie and Jim, and then a drink to discuss this whole ant thing after Cassie went to bed, and....

And anyway. The long and short of it was that Scott was a little tired today when he opened, between the red-eye portal and the many elementary school-aged friends Cassie had introduced him to and the two whole drinks he'd had (stupid body, stupid inability to metabolize alcohol anymore.)

And what that all really meant was that while Jeff got a nice slice of pumpkin cake roll, Scott had a giant coffee he was nursing behind the counter today.

[lil' bit of method RP today. open with a little SP here and there!]

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"Oh, shit." Well. At least Scott immediately knew he'd stepped in it and was more willing to blame himself for it? "I'm sorry. That's even weirder than knowing the other version of yourself, I'd bet."

Give it time, Scott. You were dead in a few universes, too.

"It's pretty weird," Steve admitted, nodding. "The Tony of my universe still bumps pretty hard on me marrying any version of him anywhere."

"I mean. I've never looked at the Iron Man and Cap that I know and gone, 'Man, they'd make a cute couple,'" Scott offered slowly, striving not to accidentally insult Steve's marriage, here. Different universes! And the Tony here absolutely seemed like way less of a jerk than the one Scott vaguely knew. "But I also met everyone at a really weird time."

Probably the weirdest time, in terms of then having to wrap his mind around the idea of Tony and Steve being married and adorable in a different universe.

"Was it in Germany?" Steve asked with a wry smile. "Because I just got back from that."

'Weird time' just about covered it, yeah.

"Oh, cool, you're caught up!" Scott probably didn't need to be quite that excited about it, but he was bad at keeping secrets, so it was also kind of a relief? "I mean. Not cool, because that was all a lot more of a big deal for you than it was for me, huh? I just got jet lag and arrested."

Though it had also been kind of a big deal for Scott, you know, bah dum tss and all.

"Yeah, I'm sorry about the arrest part," Steve said. "And, um, very glad you didn't tear yourself apart when you got big?"

"Yeah, me too," Scott admitted, eyes widening a little at the thought that he totally could have been. #YOLO, or whatever? "It's so much easier to go small. Less tiring, too. But no worries on the arrest. Wasn't my first time, and I'd do it again."

Especially since it hadn't ended up being that bad (see also: being here, and not in jail.)

"That's nice to hear," Steve said with a genuine smile. "That whole thing was just--"

A huge fucking mess.

"A clusterfuck?" Scott offered, his smile tempered a little by his (equally genuine) sympathy. "How're you doing?"

Scott, weirdly enough, had not seemed to be on his Steve's list of people to call to catch up with after all of the shit in Germany and being in jail and all. But he'd wondered.

"One foot in front of the other," Steve said. "At least with Tony as a cat right now, he can't yell?"

Scott had kind of wondered, yeah. "So I take it your Tony -- "

Hang on, he needed a second to organize his Starks here.

"Your Tony as in your husband," he amended, "didn't wholly, um, disagree with the Tony back home?"

Jesus. That sounded -- messy. He'd be grateful his spouse was a cat in that case, too.

It was very confusing. "He didn't," Steve agreed quietly. "And he didn't love getting left behind as I ran around Europe helping Bucky. Stark--back home--isn't talking to me at all. And he has my shield."

Ugh.

"Is he allowed to do that?" Scott wondered, frowning. "It's not like it's a baseball you hit into his backyard."

And if it had been, for the record, he would still think Tony should give it back!

"It, technically, belongs to the US government," Steve said. "I'm half convinced the Secretary of State is throwing it around his office."

That asshole.

"Then I hope he's wrecking all kinds of awards or whatever with it," Scott decided. It didn't seem like something you should throw casually. He considered the rest of what Steve had said, frowning, and clarified, "Bucky's the guy with the arm, right?"

Look, he had barely caught that Falcon -- you know, the guy he'd beaten in a fight that time, remember? -- was named Sam in his day-to-day life. Introductions had been a little rushed in Germany.

"Yes," Steve said, smiling. "He's my best friend since before World War II."

Very normal thing to say!

"He got a different version of the super serum and had been brainwashed by Hydra for decades, and so he was the one they framed for the explosion in Vienna."

This whole plot was ridiculously convoluted.

So convoluted.

But the 'best friend' factor explained a little bit about the dynamics in play here, and Scott nodded in understanding. "Hence the whole being outside the law part of things," he replied slowly. "He seems like a good dude?"

He seemed like a quiet, standoffish, probably-kinda-messed-up guy? But if Steve was vouching for him, Scott was more than willing to just toss that all aside.

"He's the best," Steve said with a fond, slightly sad, smile. "We were trying to get to Russia to stop a bunch of other guys like him from being woken up and destabilizing governments. Without asking the UN first."

Because the Accords didn't exactly account for split-second changes in, well, anything.

"Well, the UN probably wasn't going to say yes if they asked, anyway," Scott pointed out. "Right?"

Not to, like, have Russia's back here.

"Right," Steve said. "We didn't have time to take it to a committee that hadn't even been formed yet."

The whole thing was so dumb, Scott. So. Dumb.

"So this whole thing was about...bureaucracy?" Scott asked skeptically.

Like, he'd kind of gotten the gist that it was something like that, but it sounded even dumber than he'd thought?

"Orchestrated by some Sokovian intelligence agent," Steve said, nodding. "He was trying to destroy the Avengers."

Through bureaucracy and blackmail. As you do.

Scott frowned, glancing down as he drummed his fingers on the counter lightly, before venturing, "How successful do you feel like he was?"

It was one thing to know how the news reported things after the fact, back home. It was another thing to assume that those people had all probably been pretty friendly with each other before the airport.

Steve found the floor of Wanda's shop suddenly fascinating. "Well."

"That good, huh?" Scott asked, though his tone was gentle. "Have you talked to anyone else from -- Tony's side?"

God, it sucked to put it like that, but he didn't know how else to phrase it.

Edited 2022-10-21 15:55 (UTC)

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