Chapter Text
The cold metal bit into Wade’s back. Above him, smog and light pollution choked out the stars, turning the night sky into a soupy gray. The air was frigid. It smelled like old fish and back alley urine. Not exactly the gentle perfume you’d like to use to introduce a story, right? But no amount of Daffodil Daydream air fresheners could make a dock smell any less like a dock.
Hm. New stories. Docks. He was on the wrong side of the Hudson, but something about this setup tickled the old brain cells.
Wade’s leg hitched a little where it was crossed over one knee. Then he framed the half-hidden moon between both hands.
Time to ASMR this shit.
“New Jersey. Midnight. Cut to a suspiciously empty setting. It’s dark, spooky. The lights have been shot out by unknown villains. There are cargo containers as far as the eye can see. But wait!” Wade deepened his voice. “Lo, a hero approaches, evil drawing out not a dashing, devilish deviant—thank you—but rather another alliteration ally! But for whom does the bell of justice toll? Why, none other than some nefarious nincompoops neglecting necessary- uh. Hm. What’s another n-word?" Nothing came to mind. Wade cracked his head back, groaning at himself. "Jesus Christ, this is why we always lose at fucking Scrabble-”
“Who the fuck is talking?”
Having been proven a liar, Wade paused in his monologue, considering the not so suspiciously empty docks around him. Then, tentatively, he whispered, “God?”
Well, fuck. If Wade was right, God was a sweaty, middle-aged man with a neckbeard—and God was fucking pissed.
A meaty hand jerked him off the top of the cargo container. (Try and clean your brain of that mental image.) Giggling, Wade hit the ground at an awkward angle, his sheaths jabbing mercilessly in his spine. Then he looked between his knees at his foe, suddenly registering the very boring New Jersey accent.
“Wait, what? You’re not Russian. Way to totally ruin my pop culture reference, ya fuck.” Grunting slightly, Wade got to his feet, gripping the small of his back like an old man. Wade whined when he hit a sore spot and tried to rub it out.
Heh. More dick jokes.
By the time he swung back to Neckbeard, the dastardly deviant dumbass had gathered a whole posse of sweaty noob criminals. Did Buckteeth over there really have a chain wrapped around his first?
Wade nodded at his makeshift weapon. “Baby’s first gang beat down?” Wade asked warmly. “Yeah, that’s not how you want to pop your cherry, trust me.” Buckteeth just gripped the chains harder, his namesake clenched.
“You’re Deadpool,” Neckbeard called out, trying to regain control of the situation. He was armed with a gun, but that spicy number in black was pointed down at the ground for now. Mistake. “What does Deadpool want with the Russians?”
“Not the Russians, the Russian,” Buckteeth countered, snarling. “The giant metal mutant fuck.”
Wade paused, cocking his head to the right. Colossus was in New Jersey? “That’s… not the reference I was going for. Nope.” His mind spun off, fabricating one hundred and one reasons why his reluctant bestie from another nestie would been released into the wild. Last time they spoke, Colossus was supposed to be taking a break from fieldwork, unless... Wade had fucked up again, somehow? Oh, boo. Wade didn’t need him breaking his semi-vacation to babysit Deadpool!
Everything he did nowadays was legit. Above board. Government sanctioned! Still hella murder-y though.
Well. File that nugget away in the Tomorrow Problems folder… Anyhoo.
“Not looking for him, buddy. Not yet, anyway.” Back pain miraculously gone, Wade skipped forward a step, clasping his hands behind him. He nudged an empty beer can with his toe. “Actually, I was hoping for a ruffled Charlie Cox to wander in like an avenging angel with daddy issues. You’ve seen him?”
“Who the fuck are you talking about?” Buckteeth snarled, rattling his finger breakers.
Wade gasped. “Do you not even know? They’ve all been canceled!” He jabbed a finger in their direction. “That means you’re next, buddy!” After a beat, his shoulders loosened into a shrug, his hands swinging down. “Well, I’m overstating. Netflix doesn’t know you, pal. You’re an unnamed OC I’m gonna pummel in a few seconds to hammer home how violent and saucy I am-”
Without further ado, Wade buried one of his steel-toed shoes straight into Neckbeard’s groin. What’s that about poor sportsmanship? Oh, go lick an ashtray. Nope, this baddie was fixing to aim a modded snub nose shotgun up and at the main protagonist of this story—and super healing didn’t mean that shit didn’t hurt.
Wheezing hilariously, Neckbeard hit the floor, the gun clattering next to him. He stared up at Deadpool with absolute horror, like he’d accidentally taken a sneak panty shot of Cthulhu. Wade walked past him. “Serves you right. Consent, motherfucker.”
Eager beaver Buckteeth rushed forward to claim the first open spot on Wade’s dance card. Wade spun away, letting him break his own fingers on the pillar just to the left of Wade; after all, he'd been warned. When the idiot screamed, hand predictably mangled, Wade grasped the back of his neck and slammed his face against the same block of concrete. Then he did it again. And again. And again one more time for good luck. Then he paused, admiring his handiwork.
Dazed, the lesser baddie spat out blood and teeth, barely conscious. Wade let him go, sidestepping the man as he collapsed to the floor. Absently, Wade reached for a katana, looking up at the last two frozen idiots.
Jerking out of their paralysis, they quickly disarmed themselves, tossing metal pipes, knives, and a single handgun to the ground. They backed off quickly, hands up in a universal gesture of peace. Then, when Wade didn’t immediately kill them, they turned around and ran for their cars, leaving an inch of rubber behind them as they peeled out of the docks.
Smart! Also, efficient and timely. Economical. You go, villains!
Just not too far.
Humming some Katy Perry, Wade stopped reaching for Bea and instead started to skip along the row cargo containers. In the background, Neckbeard and Buckteeth crawled towards each other—aw, cute. Villain bromance! Wade left them to it.
“Now what oh what are we trafficking here, fellas?” he called out cheerfully. He pirouetted around an empty barrel, peeking into it briefly. “Drugs? TVs? Director’s cut of Once Upon A Deadpool, available on Blu-ray and DVD?” SHIELD hadn't shared that tidbit in their briefing.
Wade bent over and picked up the lone handgun on the floor. Aiming carefully, he shot off every lock to every container near Neckbeard’s set up. The gun jammed after the final lock was destroyed. Looking down the barrel briefly, Wade shrugged and tossed it over his shoulder, reaching for the double doors of the closest receptacle of transported goods.
“I got the eye of a tiger- ugh.” The first one was empty.
“The eye of a tiger, a fighter, walking… no. Dancing?” The second one was full of ATVs and motorbikes—boring! “Dancing.”
“Dancing through the fire—whoa ho, party over here!” The third one had a rickety desk and a pile of coke big enough to make Scarface super jelly.
After that, the fourth container was totally boring, full of slightly dented cars from three years ago. Coke aside, it was enough made Wade think that maybe he’d been pointed at green traffickers after all. Baby baddies! What the fuck? That didn’t seem fair, giving them the full Deadpool treatment so early in their career. They should have gotten the chance to cut their teeth in something before Wade straight up broke them.
Muttering crap under his breath about SHIELD, Wade headed over to the last container. “Cuz I’m a champion, and you’re gonna hear me-” Wade flung open the fifth container. He froze in place. “…fuck. Hey.”
The smell of human waste was strong. And yet, there was a clear attempt at cleanliness and order in the horrid little space. Trash was carefully collected in the furthest corner near a single dismal bucket. Closer to where Wade crouched was a neat row of granola bars boxes and sealed water bottles. Closer still was a pile of dirty rags and fabrics, making up a sad little bed.
And on the bedding, there were two girls and one boy.
It was almost pitch black, and the children blinked harshly, like even the dim night light Wade had brought in was too much for their eyes. Once their peepers had adjusted, the children had stared at him suspiciously, fearfully.
“Hey,” he said again, softer, crouching.
They looked alike, despite their age ranges. Noses, chins, faces, skin tone—it screamed shared genetics. Their skin was pale under the dirt, and that dirty hair was still clearly various shades of blond. Their eyes were as dark as Vanessa’s. The oldest one had the other two clamped to her tightly, like Wade was going to rip them away from her at any moment. Despite the determination clear in her grip, her eyes were deadened, resigned. The only thing bright about her ragged appearance was a glint of gold at her throat—a Mockingjay necklace.
There was a long pause. A stalemate. A fucking old West standoff between three traumatized children and an equally traumatized adult.
Then-
“Pidermn?” the toddler whispered through the fingers in his mouth. He gazed up at Deadpool, visibly confused.
“That’s not Spider-Man,” snapped the youngest girl, eyes narrowing angrily. She couldn’t have been more than 10, but she looked half-feral, ready to fight. The teenager behind her hauled the little firecracker closer, but she herself said nothing. Instead, she buried her face in the toddler’s oily mess of hair.
Right. This required a slightly different approach. There wasn’t an adultier adult to hide behind for this—fuck!
“You’re right, kiddo! I’m not Spider-Man, but I’m, like, his mentor or something. He idolizes me. Copied my costume and everything.”
Predictably, this extravagant set of lies went over like a lead balloon. The little girl squinted at him darkly, and the little toddler clearly wasn’t comforted. The teen buried her face deeper, her thin shoulders lifting to her ears.
“You look s-s-scary.” There was a dangerous wobble to the boy’s lower lip. His big eyes got even bigger—shit. The youngest girl scowled deeper, her eyes shiny in the low light, and the teenager behind them trembled, readjusting her grip on them.
Wade scrambled for something to say. “I know the mask is scary, but what’s underneath it is worse, trust me. Not- not that there’s a monster here or anything! I… just don’t look… great.” He dropped his head, clenching his fist by his knee.
God. Kids. He couldn’t work with kids. His luck with Russell was more of a reflection of Russell than any skill or empathy on Wade’s part. Like most teenagers, Russell was just plain oblivious. Totally self-absorbed and overly confident, that little bastard. He hadn’t ever looked at Wade as a threat. No, Wade was just an X-Man trainee assclown. Then a friend. Then a rival. Then back to being a friend again. Wade was never, ever someone he feared.
Well, what did other adults do to get children to trust them?
Ah. Shit. Wade looked up at the murky sky, sighing. So regretting this train of thought. Resigned, Wade nevertheless started fumbling at his pouches.
“Hey, kids," he said dully, "want some candy?” One minute, it was like Wade had the plague. The next, it was like Wade was leaking gold—that was how quick the kids shoved their reservations aside. So. Fucking. Easy. “Jesus Christ, it’s like you kids never heard of stranger danger. I don’t care if the man in the van has candy and puppies in the backseat—you walk away, children.”
All he had mints and a couple of pieces of gum in his pockets, but he unloaded all of his haul on the youths. Everything he pulled out of his belt disappeared in a blink. And yet—
“This is old man candy,” the little girl accused, glaring up at him. Next to her, the toddler chewed on his mint like a zen baby Buddha, chubby cheeks and all.
“Ah ah ah. Werther’s Originals are old men candies. Get on my level.” Swiping the mints from the little man, Wade shook the tin at the girl. “No, these are candies of someone who would like to get kissed sometime in the near future. Understand?”
She understood a little too well; there was a scary level of interest on the preteen’s face. She clapped a hand over the container, ripping it from Wade’s fingers before he could react. Then she tipped back her head, dumping the whole thing in her mouth.
“Hey!” Wade complained. The demon child started coughing immediately as the sudden influx of mint overwhelmed her little taste buds. “Let that be a lesson to you, missie! No dating until after you’re married.” She flipped him off, still hacking up the mints.
“Shitty old man,” she snarled, coughing.
“Shitty preteen twerp,” Wade fired back, delighted. She grumbled, crossing her arms. Next to her, the toddler, not understanding but amused all the same, let out one sharp but joyous laugh, like he couldn't help it.
Pleased by the visible change in trust levels, he turned his attention to the guilty looking teenager, the only one of the three who should have really known better than to trust a stranger with candy.
“Little known fact, but, uh, it’s against my religion to ask an older child to be an adult so the younger kids don’t have to. But something tells me you’re already doing it.”
The teen looked back at him with tired eyes. She’d scooted after her siblings dutifully, even swiping some candy for herself, but where the other two were practically crawling into Wade’s lap, she stayed out of arm’s reach of Wade, indecision scrunching up her face. She white-knuckled the ends of her skirt, her mouth saying nothing, but her eyes saying everything.
She may have taken a treat like the other two, but there would be no trust while Wade stayed so close to her brother and sister.
Nodding, Wade stood and jerked his head away from the container. After a beat, the teen rose unsteadily, following his retreat with small, hesitant footsteps. The other two didn’t even make a break for it.
Wade really, really didn’t like what that told him.
He stopped a little ways away from the container, still in line of sight, and waited for the teen. She approached slowly, arms crossed over her chest. She looked both ways. Then she looked behind her at her siblings.
“Do you want to tell me why you three are in a cargo container, Katniss? Spirited game of hide and go seek gone wrong?” Wade tapped his ear. “You can tell me.”
Katniss gazed up at him. She was tiny. Well, no. She was tall, actually, very tall for a girl of her age. But she was also thin like some kids got sometimes, like her weight was duking it out with her height, and her height was winning. She looked all of 90 pounds, soaking wet. She was probably about 14, but she seemed so much younger than his foul-mouthed little buddy Firefist when he was arrested and thrown into mutant jail.
But she walked up to him still, brave girl, one step at a time. She got up on her bare tiptoes and whispered to him in a soft voice.
Wade stilled. He watched her as she dropped back down to her heels, her mouth pressing flat anxiously, big eyes staring into his mask.
Wade let out a low, steady breath. The thing about kids like Russell and Katniss, well… you could always tell.
A long moment later, glass crashed to the floor. The sound of familiar male voices registered with them both. Katniss flinched, shrinking. Wade shook his head once, slowly. He looked behind him, tracking the muffled swearing and insults of his recovering prey.
He made a decision. “Oookay,” he breathed. He gestured to the container. Katniss seemed to understand the necessity of it, even if Wade didn’t like it, didn’t like ushering her to her cage.
Katniss ran on light feet and quickly hustled her siblings back to their bedding. After a beat, Wade followed her in.
“So, kids,” Wade said in a bright voice, “I’m gonna teach you a little bit about music.” He took out his Walkman, testing the batteries.
“Is this an old iPod?” asked the demon child, curious now. “It’s so big.”
Ugh. Children. So much pain and suffering right now. Annoyed, Wade muttered to himself, “This was the generation who got a smartphone by the time they were 3, right? A lot of help that was in this situation-” Katniss cleared her throat. Wade changed his tune. “Anyhoo, big sis and I checked, and you can’t leave your container yet. It’s, um, unsafe. You name a gross and/or messy thing? It’s out there. Feces, vomit, broken glass, my shattered hopes and dreams… It looks like Steven Tyler’s tour bus after a coke binge—do you guys even know who Aerosmith is? Ugh, forget it. I’ll do you one better with some Queen.” Wade turned up his Walkman to eleven and passed to the demon child. “Give me a few minutes to clean up, okay?”
The demon child didn’t seem to know how to respond to the sound of Earth’s one and only angel troubadour. She just stared at the Walkman, fixated by the music. Wade kept unloading his pockets, handing off a pair of emergency glow sticks to the little dude. Like his sister, he froze at the offering, but when Wade leaned over, obligingly cracking both sticks for the kiddo, he lit up like sunshine, whipping the sticks around like he was at a baby rave.
But in the teen’s hands, he pushed a flashlight and a very big knife. Just in case. Katniss looked up at him, petrified. “Trust me.” He closed her fingers around both items and tried to channel someone far more responsible than Wade Winston Wilson.
She seemed to buy it. A moment later, he gently closed the door to the cargo container behind him.
Thirty feet away, the baddies were rallying. Buckteeth—minus the teeth—was swearing his charming head off. He was hurling things in the back of a cargo van like a mad man, spitting and tripping over himself the whole time. Silent for once, Wade perched on the top of the same van like a certain dead, arachnid-themed superhero, looming over him. When Neckbeard came running up, huffing and puffing and hauling a huge duffle bag full of weapons, he immediately saw Wade, but he couldn’t catch enough air to yell out a warning to his bro.
And so, unimpeded, Wade dropped on Buckteeth like a bag of bricks from above—his kind of hero landing.
It was barely a tussle. Wade had Buck on his stomach almost immediately, and he yanked Buck’s head back, sliding a knife close to his neck.
“So,” Wade said conversationally. “Your boss fired you. And instead of review bombing his business on Yelp like a normal person, you took his kids?”
“Wait! Wait, wait-” Neckbeard wheezed, tripping forward on his hands and knees. He reached out, freezing in place under Wade’s glare—good boy. “We got a good offer for them. We can cut you in!" Wade stared at him wordlessly, forcing Neckbeard to explain. "The baby has a mutation. Chances are, the others do too. W-we-we can unload ‘em, and everyone will be half a million richer!”
Wade kept his blade on Buckteeth’s throat. The baddie under him swallowed shallowly, his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down. After a long moment, Wade tilted his head consideringly. “…Half a million.”
“At least,” Neckbeard stressed. A thick line of sweat made its way down his cheek.
“Half a million,” Wade breathed out again, this time with awe. He settled back on his haunches, relaxing his grip on Buck’s head. “Well, why didn’t you say something? Ha! This conversation would have gone so differently.” Wade laughed again, loud and free, the docks echoing with it. “Half a million!”
Neckbeard laughed too, though not as freely. “At least, yeah.” Then he pressed his advantage, eyes feverish and bright. “You know, guy, you’re tough a-a-and infamous. With your help, maybe we could get a lot more. That was just the first offer we got. But I heard there’s a whole big market for them out there-”
“Is there really?” Wade gushed girlishly. “Tell me more.”
Eager, Neckbeard crawled a little closer, just within arm’s reach. “You see, there’s a-”
“You fucking moron,” Buckteeth hissed, ruining Wade’s fun. “He’s a goddamn mutant.”
“Oh, I sure am,” Wade purred, yanking his knife to back to him until it hit bone.
Then he stood, releasing the dying man. He casually towered above the lingering bad guy, and he couldn’t find it in him to feel an ounce of guilt over the emotions that flickered over Neckbeard’s face—shock, fear, grief, despair. After all, Neckbeard certainly hadn’t felt bad about terrorizing those kids.
Wade tipped Neckbeard’s face up with the tip of the knife that killed his friend. Then he smiled horribly. “You know my name, but you don’t know my backstory, bud? That’s hurtful.” Wade shrugged. “Well. In your defense, canon is a hot fucking mess. Mutant, mutate, some rando with a gun—who knows? And some canons, see, they don’t give a shit about the difference. And neither do you.” He clapped a hard, bruising hand over Neckbeard’s shoulder. “Let’s chat some more about that mutie market, big boy.”
Neckbeard had quite the set of lungs on him, but in the background, Queen blared on uninterrupted.
We are the champions, indeed.
-
The white glow from the fridge cut through the darkness of the room, shifting restlessly around the dark silhouette of the intruder. A massive, unexpected, and undeniably broad-shouldered form had wedged itself between the double doors. Glass clicked together noisily as the robbery continued.
There were weirder things than stumbling on a Norse god in your kitchen. Probably.
“You are a literal king,” Tony said finally, exasperated. He flipped on the light switch, transforming the scene. “Why are you raiding my fridge?”
Blinking in the sudden light, Thor didn’t apologize. He just finished grabbed his haul, unloading it on the island counter between them. “I’m to take a long journey. I do not wish to become famished along the way.” Despite this nonchalant thievery, Thor was watching him, like he was waiting for Tony to rescind his longstanding invitation to barge in whenever he liked. When Tony just stared at him, Thor slurped up the rest of Pepper’s chow mein noisily.
Ah. The ever-continuing ripple effects of the great Avengers divide.
Thor had wisely kept his mouth shut about his thoughts on who was the bigger idiot when it came to the Sokovia Accords. But those were just words. Thor had always been a man—well, a god—of action. Anyone with eyes and half a brain could tell he’d settled on Team Cap.
It was—and continued to be—an absolute mess. Tony had been fighting a battle for accountability and transparency, a war of ideals. Steve had looked beyond that, seeing dictators and corrupted officials salivating at the thought of leashing some of the most powerful people in the world. Any snowball’s chance Tony had to sway Steve over to his side was lost the second Bucky Barnes became a pawn piece.
There was no way Thor wouldn’t be sympathetic to all that. Beyond Thor’s discoveries about Asgard’s not so glorious past, they’d all found out much too late that Loki had been a pawn too in those early days, a wild shade of himself corrupted by the power of an infinity stone.
And yet, in the end, Tony couldn’t bring himself to be upset that Steve claimed another child in the divorce. Not when Thor used it as an excuse to hastily set up a non-extradition treaty, claiming Steve as a citizen of New Asgard in the same breath.
“Must be some trip.” Shaking the cobwebs from his brain, Tony went to the coffee machine.
Thor didn’t disagree. He didn’t leave Earth much these days. It was too hard. Carol’s Skrull contacts may have been the ones to pinpoint Thanos, but Stormbreaker was how they delivered a bunch of angry Avengers—both new and old—to Thanos’ doorstep. But by the time the battle concluded, Stormbreaker was badly broken. The exhausted and wounded team spent two weeks on the planet Thanos died on before Carol and Thor’s Valkyrie friend came back with a Kree ship to take them all home.
In the years since, Stormbreaker had been pieced together enough that Thor could finally reopen the Bifrost and take small jumps, but the big guy was leery about exercising this power. Something about how it was like skydiving into a tornado while holding dust in your bare hands.
“I have been summoned,” Thor revealed, digging deeper in his pilfered Styrofoam container.
“Who summons Thor?” Tony said with faux outrage, spinning around to meet Thor at the counter with his coffee.
Thor snorted. Then he looked up with a half-smile. “A friend.”
“Oh. Well. Good,” Tony said awkwardly. Tony didn’t know Thor had friends anymore outside of Earth.
A long moment passed. Then another. Hunched over the counter, Thor slurped up more noodles, eyeing him steadily, reminding Tony that, of the two of them, Thor was the one with all the time in the world.
Tony broke first. “Speaking of which, how’s our mutual friend?” He paused, then said quickly, “Subtlety isn’t always your thing, but try to remember the game here is plausible deniability-”
“If you wanted plausible deniability,” Thor countered critically, “you wouldn’t ask about our mutual friend.”
Oof. Someone was testy.
“Come on, Thor,” Tony said, pleading. When Thor just raised his eyebrows, Tony sighed. “Ever since we ganked Thanos, and he-” Tony’s chest tightened. Oh. This was going to be hard, wasn’t it? “Ever since Rogers-” No. Tony took in a shuddering breath. “Look. Ever since we got back… I haven’t seen Cap in person. You know this.”
“My personal invitation to you to visit New Asgard had not been rescinded,” Thor said with weird, rigid formality. “You are still more than welcome.”
“And I still can’t,” Tony said, regretful. “I have eyes on me. You know that too.”
Thor looked pained. Something in that exchange had flown the distance between the two of them and struck home with cruel accuracy. Tony didn’t celebrate it. He couldn’t. So he watched as Thor set aside his takeout suddenly, folding his thick arms over the edge of the counter.
When they finally came, Thor’s words were gentle. “Is that why you do not sleep?”
Tony snorted, throwing Thor a flat glare. “My insomnia predates Steven Grant Rogers putting on the Infinity Gauntlet to save the universe, thank you very much.”
Thor grinned at that, teeth sharp. He stood up straight then, towering over Tony. “My friend…” Thor’s voice was fond and a little irritated but so thoroughly genuine. Tony felt like Thor had punched him in the gut. Then some of the amusement filtered out of Thor’s gaze. “Would you rather I gave you the truth or the politician’s reply?”
Dread made his coffee taste like ash. He fiddled with his cup, stalling. He’d had a feeling Thor came here to share an update. After all, Thor could have accessed the Bifrost anywhere. Instead, he chose to do it in here, in what was almost enemy territory for him… just for the chance to talk to Tony. “I’ve had enough of politicians, big guy. Lay it on me.”
Thor’s responding smile was dimmer, but it still reached his intact blue eye. The other eye, still missing, still covered by a shiny metal patch, crinkled around the edges. Thor looked rough. His cheeks were hollow, like he hadn’t been eating much lately. It was a slight physical change he could have gotten away with, had he not kept his beard and hair as short as it was the day he came back to Earth to revisit the Asgardian response to Thanos’ aggression.
“The decay no longer spreads. Our people managed to contain it. He says he can move it still, but he feels nothing.” There was a bleak steadiness to Thor’s words. “His arm is… gray. And grayer every day. It bears no warmth. When it is cut, it does not bleed. It is… quite unlike anything we have ever seen.” Thor looked away then, expression clouded. “Had we still had Asgard, we could have done more. Perhaps even cured him. But as it is, as we are—refugees, remnants, unwanted guests on Midgard—this is as much as we can do.”
Tony liked to think that, where there was life, there was hope. But there was nothing to say to that gloomy sentence. Nodding wordlessly, Tony gulped down his coffee in silence. On the other side of the counter, Thor seemed like he’d lost his appetite.
Eventually, Tony followed Thor out of the kitchen. They walked to the central courtyard of the Avengers Compound, Thor seemingly lost in his own thoughts.
Tony looked up, squinting up at the faint belt of stars above them. “…Thank you.”
“For raiding your fridge?” Thor inquired warmly.
“No. For harboring a fugitive,” Tony said abruptly, so abruptly that it probably came across as sarcastic. Wincing, Tony shot an apolgetic look at his friend. “I know you’re feeling guilty, Thor, but what you guys were able to do… it’s the best-case scenario. If Cap came home, he wouldn’t have gotten health care. He would have gotten a jail cell. They would have tucked him somewhere dark and deep, and no one would have seen neither hide nor hair of Captain America ever again.”
Thor stared at him for a long moment. His mouth opened, like he was about to say something, but then Tony’s hand shot up to the side of his head. His earpiece clicked a four-note warning—something was rapidly approaching the compound. If he strained, he could just barely hear the squeal of tires in the distance. And if he could barely hear it, then Thor definitely could.
Sure enough, Thor was tracking it, staring intently at something on the other side of the compound. Armed as he was, Thor looked lost for a second, like a child left behind in a mall.
Tony stuck his hands in his pockets. “Goodbye, Thor,” he said pointedly.
Thor finally dragged his gaze away from the interlopers, dropping his focus back down on Tony himself. Tony expected the regret and sadness; Thor was a genuinely good guy. Leaving people to deal with consequences alone wasn't in his nature. But what he didn’t expect that look of sudden wildness, like Thor was sorely tempted to grab Tony and take him on an intergalactic adventure.
Tony kept his hands in his pockets and stared him down. He had made his preference clear years ago.
Gravely, Thor nodded once, whipping Stormbreaker behind him. All around him, the Bifrost opened up in an obvious show. Whatever power it was—science, magic, mystery—it lit his friend up with beautiful, iridescent light.
And then Thor was gone, only a stamp on the ground left as evidence.
And Tony was being surrounded by government agents. Barely registering the jingle of bullets and suited up humans, Tony stared up at the sky. After a moment, he looked down, eyes jumping from blank face to blank face, trying to find a friendly one. A useless effort. After all, these men were under Ross, and Ross existed for little else these days than to rain on Tony’s parade.
“Stark-” one of them barked. Special Agent Something or Other—whatever. Tony had stopped pairing the names to the faces.
“Yeah, I got the drill.” His indifference translated itself in a casual shrug—the slightest of shoulder twitches, really. But that twitch fluttered through the group, and Tony suddenly found himself under the focus of way too many guns. Tony paused, amazed at how a bunch of highly trained agents could look at his bare feet, oil stained clothes, and bloodshot eyes, and still see a threat.
Maybe amazed wasn’t the right word for it.
Heart pounding, Tony very carefully took his hands out of his pockets. “Lead the way, gentlemen.”
“You will debrief General Ross at once,” said Special Agent What's His Face.
“Yeah, yeah.” Tony didn’t need the reminder that he was just a rat in a cage.
-
“What the hell, Parker! He was going to grade on a curve.”
The hallway was crowded. But the shout still echoed. College students of all ages and sizes glanced from face to face, looking for the elusive Peter Benjamin Parker—but only for a moment. Eyes slipped past him easily. Most of Peter’s classes were big enough to ensure anonymity, and his last presentation in either of his majors was in freshman year. He hadn’t had to pair up with another person in lab for almost 22 months, which was a combination of extreme luck, surprisingly biddable teachers, and a long series of independent study courses to flesh out his credits.
The result? No one jumped to out him to his angry classmate. Not a single person.
And yet, Peter still froze, phone clutched to his chest. He closed his eyes briefly, ears burning. Then, taking a deep breath, he pushed forward, making his way where the crowd was clustered the tightest in that cramped hallway.
His professor, Dr. Wakefield, was an ancient guy, pushing 90 with a mind like a steel trap. Peter had only had the pleasure of doing so twice but stepping into his office was like time traveling to the past fifty years. He tended to reference things that happened back in the eighties like it was yesterday, and he still used plastic sheets, Expo markers, and a dingy, beat up overhead projector for his lectures. Even scantrons were too modern for him. Instead, he had them write everything out on blank pieces of paper, and he graded them step by excruciating step.
And he absolutely hated Empire State University’s online classroom environment. Instead of posting grades on the platform, he printed out grade rankings and taped them to the wall outside his classroom, a clear violation of several ESU academic confidentiality rules. Wakefield shrugged off the criticism like water off a duck’s back, and the rule breaking continued. Peter wished he had half of Wakefield’s stubborn confidence.
As it was, he didn’t. He was just Peter. Just another college student hovering in a random hallway, trying to figure out his score on the last exam of his course.
Fortunately for him, the crowd was mobile, constantly shifting as students came, found their grade, and left. Only his angry classmate stood still, looming at the wall with an expression that was more despair than genuine rage.
Peter took a minute to observe him. His classmate was blond, tall, and broadly built. Handsome too. He stood with a wide stance, a concrete pillar in a sea of moving bodies. Peter knew from watching him in class the last two terms that he was both gregarious and flirty, but nothing of that warmth was visible now. Instead, he looked grumpy and unapproachable.
So, naturally, Peter approached him. “Was it all you ever hoped for?”
“It’s an advanced physics class, not a date with a wishing well.” His classmate stood even taller, chest pushing out. “I’d have better luck with the well.”
Ah. There was the cocky guy Peter remembered. Barely. What was his name again?
“I bet you would.” Peter stood shoulder to shoulder with the guy, who still hadn’t bothered to look over. He found his name up at the very top: 97% on their cumulative final. Then, because he couldn’t help himself, he dropped his eyes to the next highest grade—63%. He winced. Ouch. No wonder his classmate was pissed.
“Man, it took me an hour longer than everyone else to do the damn test… and now this?” The other man shifted his weight finally, covering his mouth with his hand. “Can you believe this guy?”
“Yeah, Parker’s a total asshole,” Peter commented dryly.
His classmate snorted. “Amen, brother.” Without looking, he lifted a fist to Peter. After a beat, Peter awkwardly bumped it with his own.
As if the touch activated him, his classmate turned towards him, blue eyes dropping down to Peter’s face, mouth opening to say something else-
But Peter was already turning into the crowd, disappearing into it.
He wasn’t here to make friends.
-
Like most bars and night scenes, Adore was a strange place in the afternoon. There was a hint of unreality to it, like the strip club had no right to even exist at 1pm. And yet, there it was—slightly dim with fewer fluorescent bulbs than Vanessa expected.
Adore was smaller than some of the other strip clubs she’d worked at over the years. Where the place wasn’t black, it was done up in warm reds, subtle purples, and elegant golds. There were two elevated stages with twin poles on the left and right of the club. Chairs were clustered around small, circular tables between the stages themselves. The bar was set up in the back, bold and eye-catching with warm gold lighting set under the glass fixtures. She couldn’t see it, but there was also a full kitchen there too. According to their website, Adore served some of the best sliders in town.
But she was the very opposite of hungry. Swallowing, Vanessa looked around some more, hands twisting on the strap of her bag. The place was almost empty. A twenty-something-year-old woman had homework spread out over three tables. She was wearing jeans and a loose fitting Linkin Park shirt, and she ignored Vanessa completely, chewing on the end of her pencil fitfully. No way in hell that was the owner. Vanessa kept looking.
Soft music moved through the air, but there were no customers. Unlike some strip clubs, Adore didn’t entertain daytime visitors.
“Over here.”
The call came from the bar. There was a woman moving around just behind it. Even as Vanessa approached her, she didn’t stop what she was doing, drying a cup idly before flipping it upside down at the counter. She watched Vanessa the entire time, sizing her up. Then, after a beat, the woman crooked a finger at her and walked off, leading Vanessa to a slightly sticky table.
Vanessa knew who she was before the formal introduction: Maria Solas. Owner. Manager. Resident hard ass. She had a reputation. And, in person, she was living up to it perfectly.
Maria gave the impression of being immediately unimpressed with the world in general—and Vanessa in particular. She had dark hair, darker eyes, and a perpetually flat expression on her tan face. She was in her mid-forties, and she was very fit. A scar too jagged to be from a knife bisected her right eyebrow, and Vanessa couldn’t help but wonder what bar fight she’d gotten it from. She didn’t seem like the type to hang back and wait for the cops. She seemed like the type to wade in and crack the heads of the two idiots together.
Maria was normally the kind of woman Vanessa admired. But only from a distance.
They exchanged stilted greetings, eyeing each other closely as they traded the usual work questions. Vanessa didn’t bother with kiss ass responses. She stuck to the facts. Either her experience was enough or it wasn’t. The job opening specified that whoever filled it needed to be flexible and willing to jump in wherever needed. Vanessa could do that. She’d been everything from bartender to waitress to the talent in this kind of scene—and then some. She was the very definition of flexible.
But Maria wasn’t taking any notes, so Vanessa didn’t know how serious she was taking this. Vanessa had a bad feeling that Maria had already made her mind up. But in which way?
“I called your references,” Maria said eventually.
Ah. “And?” Vanessa’s references were a little dated, but she did have a few good ones from Boston. Even Weasel said he’d pitch in. St. Margaret’s wasn’t a strip club, but Weasel would give her a recommendation anyway. She used to bartend for him when money was tight, like it always was that year Wade disappeared.
“I also called around town about you. Tried to figure out the gaps in your work history.” Vanessa’s fingers twitched. There was a reason she didn’t include some things in her resume. Maria gazed at her steadily. “Is it true you beat up your last boss so bad, you broke his nose?”
And his cheekbone, his pride, and possibly his ability to bear children. She hoped. “The owner had a habit of assuming that he was entitled to the merchandise.”
Finally, a faint smirk appeared on Maria’s face. “That fits with what I’ve heard about him.” Too quickly, the smirk faded. Maria leaned back, hooking her arm over the back of the seat. She stared at Vanessa for a little while longer, clearly thinking. Then she nodded. “I like you. So here’s how it goes. I don’t tolerate shit. You have side jobs? They don’t happen in the club. Same with shitty habits. If you drink, if you do drugs on the clock, you’re out. You bring any of that shit in, you’re out. I know a lot of the girls here have issues, multiple jobs, personal drama, what have you… but while you’re on my payroll and on my time, you keep that shit out of Adore.”
For a moment, Vanessa was speechless—and not over the list of rules. It wasn’t unusual for an owner to have stipulations. Most of her former workplaces charged the dancers the right to work the pole. Some of them required full nudity all the time. Others enforced minimum distances between a dancer and a customer. Still others were as lax as shit about that sort of thing or, worse, as criminal as hell. Even at St. Margaret’s, you could do anything up to and including murder. Weasel rarely paid attention to what was going on. As long as the bodies and the evidence was gone by 4:00am, he didn’t give a shit and he didn’t take a cut.
Weirdly, though, his was one of the better places—the mercs, for better or worse, policed each other. But some of her other workplaces set up restricted areas for illegal activities, demanded a cut, and denied any oversight or liability.
Adore seemed practically heavenly in comparison. Vanessa slowly relaxed, muscle groups unclenching one by one.
Maria pulled out her phone, typing something in. “You got any affiliations with the families, gangs, or other organizations in the city?”
“Why?” Vanessa asked. “Do I need one?”
“New York’s a city of endless networking,” Maria replied dryly. “It’s hard to find people not affiliated with someone or something here.” She looked up from her phone suddenly, expression dark. “Anyone HYDRA is a hard fucking no.”
“No HYDRA, thank you.” Vanessa was under the impression that HYDRA was supposed to be gone, but what did she know? “But I do know someone who works with the X-Men occasionally. Is that going to a problem?”
Maria just waved her hand dismissively. “Whatever. Like I'm gonna get my panties in a twist with those goodie two shoes... Anyway, barring any hidden character defects, you’re hired. We’re shorthanded, and you’re not new to this.” She pushed herself out of the seat, rolling her shoulder. “Figure out your own routine on your own time. Use of the club before or after hours is encouraged. No house fee, you’re hourly. I’ll have some forms for you to fill out.”
Vanessa stood too. “Anything else?”
Maria eyed her for a second. “You break shit, you replace it. You’ll get a $500 monthly allowance for clothes and makeup. Budget properly and don’t bitch at me if you go over.” She crossed her arms over her chest. “The tips you get are yours, but you will be expected to pony up 15% to the other staff. If you get cheap, we won’t know, but we’ll figure you out eventually.”
Vanessa snorted. “I will be an ethical stripper,” she promised, clapping her hand over her heart. "Scout's honor."
“Lastly, you pull any shit with me like you have with your last bosses, I’ll lay you out.” She smiled thinly. “I’m not asking anything more from you than what you’re already prepared to give me. You follow the rules and do your job, and we’ll be fast friends.”
Vanessa dropped her hand. She frowned at her. “I don’t do friends.”
“Not surprised. Off the record anecdotes aside, your reference from St. Margaret’s warned me that you don’t play well with others.”
Weasel! That motherfucker...