Archive of Our Own ^beta

“Matt,” said Foggy. “Come on, man, be better about this.”

“Why?” asked the Devil of Hell’s Kitchen, petulant. “Why should I be better about a room full of the wealthiest people in Manhattan congratulating each other on their wealth?”

“It’s a charity fundraiser, Matty, you know this—”

“It’s a tax dodge. If they contributed that much to a mutual aid fund instead of an over-inflated non-profit trust—did you see what they’re calling it, Fogs?” That was rhetorical; it had been Foggy who’d brought it to Matt in the first place. “Midtown Hope,” Matt spat. “Three years; three years and the best they can do is hope. The Avengers could have rebuilt the whole damn city by now if they’d actually applied themselves. Or just called Superman.” And that wasn’t fair at all; Metropolis’s alien protector and most of the Justice League had been busy during the Incident, and the bulk of the disaster recovery work was done by the time they got back from space. What Midtown needed now was jobs and investment and, like, master stonemasons, not brute force. Foggy didn’t think Superman was known for his craftsmanship or his business savvy.

“But no—” Matt hadn’t stopped—“no, they let this city rot and left a void and now they want pats on the head for showing up late to the party—”

He’d worked himself into what Foggy’s grandmother had used to call a state, color in his cheeks, fire in his eyes. It had been funnier before Foggy knew his partner worked through his states by punching all the gang members he could find—hell of a stress management technique, there, buddy—but even knowing that, Foggy was still disloyally amused.

“You done, buddy?” he asked when Matt stopped for breath. “Get that all out?”

Matt grunted. “Just don’t expect me to be anything more than civil.”

Foggy clapped him on the shoulder as they left the office. “I will absolutely take civil, mon compadre.”

On the edge of his hearing, Matt said, “How is your Spanish still so bad?” and Foggy laughed all the way down the stairs.

***

The problem was, Foggy reflected (as, like fancy people, they got into a cab)—the problem was that he and Matt were too good at their jobs. If they’d been a little less diligent, or a little more corrupt, or if Matt hadn’t decided to put his childhood ninja training back into rotation (seriously, Matt, what the hell; Foggy wasn’t over it and probably never would be)—if they weren’t just too damn good, Foggy thought, they’d have never taken down Fisk.

And, if they’d never taken down Fisk, they’d have stayed small-time by everybody else’s choice. Not just their own. They wouldn’t be fielding calls from the kind of monied assholes they’d never wanted, wouldn’t be facing a moral dilemma a day: get Herbie Junior off on his DUI, soak his parents for the money, use it for good? or spend the time with people who need it?

And they’d never have gotten the call from Midtown Hope.

And Foggy would never have had to cajole and wheedle and whine Matt into a taxi, or his nicest suit—and, come to that, Foggy wouldn’t have had to sort out attire of his own.

He’d rented the tux. Way things were going, maybe he should buy one, but… law school, man.

The collar of the rented tux dug into his throat.

Matt, of course, owned his tux. What you get when you’re practically Elektra Natchios’ sugar baby for a year, Foggy smirked to himself. And Matt, of course, looked picture-perfect, which was simply not fair—

It wasn’t right, Foggy thought, that Matt could go out and be punched in all sorts of places and punch people right back, and roll around in… hot tar and dumpsters? And get shot, and fall in the Hudson, and whatever else Matt Murdock did in the life part of his work-life balance, and then roll up with maybe a black eye, and still look like James Bond with a guide cane.

Not fair, because Foggy needed three products in the morning just for his hair.

And Matt couldn’t even see it!

Nope, thought Foggy, as the cab drew closer and closer to their destination. Not fair at all.

***

Of course the event was at Stark Tower. Of course Tony Stark and his merry band of misfits were trying to prove themselves; show that they could still fit into polite society (read: monied); show that the destruction of an entire European city was simply an error in judgement, a mere excess of vision. Nothing lasting or permanent, unless you thought of all the dead.

It was looking more and more as though the Justice League would need to deal with the Avengers soon enough. Need to retrain their focus back down from the stars, away from Metropolis and Gotham and all of the nightmarish villains they regularly failed to vanquish, into the normal realm. New York. Crime. Terrorists. With only a soupçon of extraterrestrial intrigue.

No Tamaranean princesses or escaped Kryptonian warlords, just some egotistical asshole and his Tony-knows-best genocidal AI.

And now a gala that couldn’t be avoided, not without explanations that would be out of character. Featuring Tony “I’m-the-Smartest-Man-in-the-Room, Praise-Me” Stark and a group of cashiered soldiers and spies who blundered into political intrigues with no training, like live grenades rolled down a negotiating table.

Face-to-face with the cream of Manhattan’s social world, local community do-gooders, and… anyone passing through town if their wallet was appropriately large.

Ugh.

Bruce Wayne examined his reflection in the mirror, adjusted his cufflinks, and let Brucie settle around him like a cape.

***

Steven Grant Rogers shifted awkwardly in his suit. He was technically entitled to a military uniform, but it always felt disingenuous. Deceitful. And the Captain America costume was a little too much armor for a party, even one of Tony’s parties.

Steve smiled at the thought and pulled at the edge of the jacket, straightening it. He’d had a vague image in his mind of the swell upper classes in tails and top hats, but Tony had disabused him of that notion years ago. The suit Steve ended up in, with its short jacket, was a classic navy blue and contrasted nicely with Tony’s blood-red, but—he’d defer to Tony’s sense of style, fine, but he’d sort of wanted to try white tie and tails. Once.

Well, this one was important. Had to show the world a united front after Sokovia. After Bruce bugged out. Worth an uncomfortable night of glad-handing in what Steve was told was a very well-tailored suit, despite the fact that Steve felt like a fish out of water.

Tonight was a good-will exercise and the Avengers needed good will.

Steve hadn’t bothered reminding everybody that, the last time he’d had the lead role in a good-will exercise, he’d gone AWOL, leapt out of a creaking plane, infiltrated and destroyed a Hydra base, and led almost a whole division safely through Nazi-held territory, largely on foot. And tonight, there weren’t even dancing girls.

Though. If dancing girls had been suggested, Steve thought wryly, there was an about-even chance Tony would run with it as a joke. Iron Man was a hell of a teammate, when he wasn’t designing Ultron or being prickly about threats that nobody else could see—come on, Tones, the world’s got all kinds of aliens now, you think they’ll let whatever lies Loki told you turn real?—but, sometimes, his sense of humor left something to be desired.

That said. Tony was also capable of acts of extraordinary compassion. Which explained why Steve was now standing here, in an uncomfortable, well-fitting suit, talking to the General.

The General was nearly a hundred years old, Steve thought, and resplendent in uniform and push-chair. He had a baby-blue blanket on his lap and a shockingly firm handshake. He’d said call me Archie, I wasn’t even a corporal in your day, and he and Steve had spent a good half-hour now swapping war stories and when I was younger the price was and boy, they do things different now. He didn’t have money, particularly, and Tony, Steve knew, had invited him special. Hand-signed the invitation. Would deflect, if asked, but had done it just to make sure that Steve wasn’t entirely alone.

Half an hour, sadly, was about as much party as the General could bear, and his nurse wheeled him out with a promise to have the Captain over for a visit soon. But it had helped, and Steve was grateful.

“Thanks,” he said, finding his way back to Tony and Natasha. Tony didn’t brush it off as smoothly as Steve had expected, though, his eyes shifty.

“Yeah, well,” Tony said, “consider it payment in advance.”

Steve tensed. “Tony,” he started.

Tony grinned at him, expression taut.

“Tony,” Steve repeated. “What does that mean?”

Natasha—oh, man, Natasha was squirrely too—

“Tony,” Steve hissed.

“Thought you could use a little bit of a friendly face before the…”

“The friendliness,” Natasha said, and Tony winced in her direction, and Steve frowned at both of them. For goodness’ sake, they were still supposed to be a team and springing this kind of—there was a reason mission prep was supposed to happen before the mission, Tony—

“What,” Steve demanded, and Tony, looking past him, said,

“Oh, there’s the man of the hour—don’t turn round—”

“Tony,” Steve said, and he could feel his showgirl smile stretching thin, “what the hell?”

“Bruce,” Tony said, and Steve’s eyes went to Natasha. He wasn’t positive; it wasn’t liked they’d talked about it; but they’d had something, her and Bruce, something under construction, and—

“Not that Bruce,” she said, shortly, her eyes tracking the same way as Tony’s.

Steve repeated, “Tony,” and added, this time, “What the hell is going on?”

That didn’t even rate a language, from either of them, so it was serious.

“Bruce Wayne,” said Natasha, and the name wasn’t unfamiliar but Steve couldn’t place it—

“I asked the General here tonight,” Tony said, “hoping you’d be soldier buddies.” Ridiculous, Steve thought, how he could make it sound so childish. “And I asked Brucie here tonight, hoping you’d be bait.”

***

They hadn’t been at the gala for half an hour before Foggy was regretting it. Matt was tense, pale—wasn’t doing too well with the noise, the crowds, the—

“Perfume,” Matt muttered as Foggy steered him around a knot of elderly women who’d taken up positions defending the buffet. “Heavy on the civet. Heavy.” He scowled.

In an attempt to distract, Foggy asked, “Civet?”

“A kind of a cat. Civet oil’s generally fallen out of use in favor of synthetics, animal welfare and—do you really want me to talk about glands right now, Foggy?”

Foggy didn’t. Foggy would be happy if no one ever talked about glands.

What he said was, “I don’t get it, Matty. You’re usually…” You run around the city every night getting yourself covered in blood and beer and fire and—Claire met you in a dumpster, Matt, she told me—

“Took a hit in the head last night,” his partner said.

Foggy yelped, “Matt!” and then smiled reassuringly at the couple who turned to look. “You have to tell me when things like that happen—”

“It was minor,” Matt said, which meant I should be in the hospital right now. “Just messing up my concentration a little bit.” He smiled, far more convincingly than Foggy had, in the direction of the closest onlookers. Foggy hoped they’d write it off as coincidence.

The man nodded at Foggy, and the couple turned away.

“Pushing, Matt,” Foggy said.

“Anyway,” Murdock-the-Impossible said, “it won’t keep me back. Just here—there’s no target. No focus. When I go out tonight—”

“Matt, you are not—” He was stopped by the arrival of a passing waiter.

“Ceviche on cassava chips, gentlemen?” the waiter asked.

“Matty?” asked Foggy.

Matt shrugged, twitching his head, which Foggy took to mean, it’s fine if you take some, but none for me. The waiter transferred a napkin and one of the chips into Foggy’s palm, somewhat awkwardly, because of Matt’s grip on Foggy’s other arm; said, “Enjoy”; and disappeared.

Foggy was carefully negotiating the chip into his mouth, trying not to lose any of the little bits of—cucumber? he thought, and onion and shrimp, when Matt’s hand tightened, sharp and hard.

Foggy dropped his chip. “Matt—” he started, but the person now holding his arm was Daredevil.

“Foggy,” Daredevil said. “I need you to prepare for evacuation.”

“What? Why?”

“I—” the vigilante—Foggy’s best friend—said—“You can’t see anything? Nothing’s happening yet?”

“Matt, what do you think is going to be happening?”

Matt was frowning hard. “I don’t—there’s nothing except—”

“Matt, for God’s sake—”

“Batman’s here.”

***

Bait. Well, it could be worse, Steve thought. “So this Bruce is a fan?” He could handle the over-friendly fans. He’d had fans since he got out of Erskine’s radiation chamber. He was good at fans. They wanted Captain America the dancing monkey, that’s what they’d get.

But Natasha was making a face. “He’s not a fan,” she said. “He’s a flirt.”

Steve squinted at her.

“Midtown Hope,” Tony said. “All this. I could fund it myself, I’ve—I’ve tried, but obviously recent events have made the board a little leery about this sort of thing. About me, actually. And Pep’s always talking on about the shareholders and… we do have obligations, but this is—I mean, yeah, it was Blitzen’s fault, but there’s still work to be done. And if I try to do it all myself… I’m not exactly looking to become the feudal overlord of New York, Steve.”

Steve was not following.

“Bruce has money, Steve. Old money. Older than you. Bruce Wayne of the Waynes of Gotham.”

Oh, Steve thought. That was why the name was familiar. “Wayne Enterprises?” he asked.

Tony grimaced. Wayne was Stark Industries’ chief competitor; had been since Howard’s day. Tony didn’t talk about Wayne Enterprises much, at least not in Steve’s hearing.

“Brucie’s an idiot,” Tony said, not moving his lips very much, gaze still fixed over Steve’s shoulder. “But where he goes, money follows, and not just his. His family didn’t work their way up—” Tony was a second-generation billionaire, Steve recalled—“They’ve got bankers. Advisors whose great-grandfathers advised Brucie’s, that sort of money. So where Brucie puts his money, his people follow, and smart investment follows them.” He swigged his champagne. “Pepper hates him.”

“So,” Steve said. “You want me to… honeypot Bruce Wayne into donating money. That’s really the best way?”

Tony winced again. “If you’d met him, you wouldn’t have to ask. He wasn't supposed to be here, just rolled into the city yesterday. We'd have a better strategy—but if we get him to contribute, Steve, not just drain my booze… yeah. Good for charities to have more than one high-profile donor, anyway, right?”

Steve asked, “Natasha?” meaning, Nat is much, much better at seduction than I am—if you’re looking for flirtation, Tony… you know my default approach is an awkward half-smile—

Natasha shook her head, precisely. “He likes blonds.”

Steve blinked. “Enough that he’ll overlook sex—”

“You just need to flirt a little, Cap,” Tony said. “Just let him flirt at you. Just stand there; he’ll happily do all the work. Just… do your best to put up with him—he’s annoying but he’s harmless. Just be your normal, repressed, Great Depression self and we'll be fine. He’ll be charmed.”

Jesus-Mary-and-Joseph, Steve thought. Mission parameters before the mission, Tony. This is why.

***

“Who’s here?” Foggy hissed, and they really were going to attract attention soon if Matt—Daredevil—kept twitching—

“Batman,” Daredevil said again, almost inaudible. “Met him last night.”

“You—you what? Is there some kind of… of… book club? Are you just hanging out with Justice League heavies without telling me?”

Daredevil scoffed and said, “You really don’t see him anywhere in this mess?”

Foggy did his best to look around in panic without appearing to look around in panic. “No,” he said, “but isn’t that kind of his thing? Lurking in the shadows until he drops down and flattens someone?”

Matt made another dismissive noise, which—Batman—and said, “There’s no book club. He’s working a case that brought him into my territory. He asked permission.”

“Your—your—” Foggy spluttered quietly. “Your territory, Matt, are you werewolves—”

“Fogs—”

“No, I know what you mean, Matt, I just can’t believe you said it out loud—wait. Did he hit you?” Is Batman why you can’t stand still at a party without flinching from every rustle?

“We had words,” Daredevil said. “We resolved it.”

…Foggy knew that tone. “Matt,” he said, as quietly as possible. “Did you hit Batman first?”

Matt smiled at him.

Matthew Michael Murdock, have you lost what was left of your mind—

“He was in the Kitchen. Werewolves gotta mark territory somehow, Foggy.”

Foggy didn’t say Batman and he didn’t say Murdock—in fact, he said nothing at all for a moment. There was only so much he could say—

Law school only prepared you for so much.

“Okay,” he said, when he could manage that. “Okay. How do you know Batman’s here?”

A flash of appreciation on Matt’s face, for the wording that took his insight on faith. “A particular motor oil. I smelled it last night.”

“It could be Tony Stark?” Foggy suggested. 

Matt shook his head. “Wrong brand.”

“And it’s definitely here—”

“Foggy,” Daredevil said, sharp again. “Take me there and see for yourself.”

“Where, Matt?”

There was a slight pause and then: “That way.”

***

Bruce Wayne didn’t shake hands. He—Steve would say, maybe, that he deigned; he dangled long fingers in the air as though he expected them to be kissed. Steve watched with slight disgust as Tony took the fingers, face bearing an expression of obviously false joviality that a toddler could see through—Bruce, old boy, it’s been too long—and waggled the fingers in mid-air like an inside joke.

Wayne’s eyes passed slowly and insultingly over Natasha, lingering on her hips. She gave no sign of having noticed; she’d faced worse, of course, but Steve was half a minute from decking the guy even if Tony wanted him upright for easier bilking.

For charity, Steve reminded himself. Tony was trying to set up something bigger than he was, something that could survive without the Stark name. And that was noble, even if the methods felt slimy as all hell.

Steve resolutely did not think about why Tony might be trying to prepare for a world he wasn’t in. It wasn’t as if there weren’t risks.

But, not getting a reaction from Natasha or even a flicker, Bruce Wayne turned his eyes to Steve—where they held.

And held.

“Captain America,” Wayne purred, and there weren’t enough generals in the world to make up for this, Tony—

“Mr. Wayne,” said Steve, extending his right hand like a normal person, like good behavior would rub off—ew.

And it didn’t; Bruce Wayne seized Steve’s hand and used it to reel himself in, pressing  forward until there was less than a foot of space between their chests, holding Steve’s arm in such a way that Steve would have to make a scene to get him off.

Ew.

Big guy though; from Tony’s description, Steve had expected some kind of wilting violet. More like a… more like a lady, actually. Not big, not if he’d be interested in Steve.

And that thought was a holdover from the Depression for ya, Tony. Back then, there were big guys, and there were twinks, and they paired off, boy-girl, boy-girl. But things were different now—hell, maybe they’d been different then and Steve just hadn’t noticed.

Regardless, in these modern times, Steve was at sea. Missed the Sexual Liberation entirely; woke up among the liberated with no idea how to be one.

Bruce Wayne, evidently, had no such hangups. He pushed in close, cloying, and breathed a cloud of vodka in Steve’s face.

Steve didn’t wince.

He was surprised Wayne was still standing, though, with that much alcohol in him. Big guy or not.

“O Captain, my Captain,” Wayne exhaled. And then said solemnly, “That is Shakespeare.”

Steve stared at Wayne’s guileless eyes and wondered if it would be worth explaining the difference between Shakespeare and Walt Whitman, or why Shakespeare never wrote a poem about Abraham Lincoln. Behind Wayne, Tony shook his head.

Steve smiled instead. “Thank you, Mr. Wayne.”

“Brucie!” Tony jumped in, valiantly helping out a teammate. “What brings you to New York?”

Brucie pivoted without releasing Steve’s arm, and managed to insinuate himself against Steve’s chest in doing so. Steve widened his eyes meaningfully at Tony, who grimaced.

“I came to see the wall!” Brucie said, and then, at Tony’s bemused looks, elaborated: “On Wall Street! But it’s gone.” That last part was said so sadly that Steve almost wanted to give the man a hug, except that it was so incredibly stupid—

“It’s been gone for three hundred years,” said Natasha.

Brucie pouted. And then bounced back, immediately: “But! Instead I got to see the bull market. And Manhattan is an island, did you know that, Captain? And of course, of course, I got to see you.” He patted Steve’s chest proprietarily, and said, “But I can’t take Captain Steven America to the movies.”

Tony, with an air of regretting the question, said, “Why not?”

“Because,” Brucie crowed, simpering over at Steve, “they won’t let me bring in my own snack!”

Tony closed his eyes and the corners of Natasha’s mouth twitched. Bruce turned and dimpled at Steve, who was feeling—

“Did you see the Incident zone?” Tony asked, still somehow keeping things on track.

“Ohh,” said Bruce, “where you tried to kill yourself to prove you’re a good person?”

Steve flinched and blinked at the back of Bruce’s head—it had been delivered with the same open idiocy as everything else, and you couldn’t fault him for it, but—

Tony’s smile was tight. “Yeah,” he said. “Round there.”

“It was ugly,” said Brucie, like a child. “Everything’s still broken.”

Tony nodded. It wasn’t true, but there were still enough scars to be noticeable— “Exactly,” Tony said. “That’s what we’re here for tonight.”

Bruce looked around, and said, “But here’s nice! All clean and fixed, even though something else happened here already… Voltron? It was your Voltron machine, right?”

“Ah, yeah,” said Tony, slightly wrong-footed and not wasting time on corrections, “it’s easier to fix up a building that I own than to repair people’s livelihoods, Bruce. Lots of people got hurt during the Incident, and a lot of out-of-state business moved away—or a lot of people moved out to the boroughs—”

“You saying Manhattan’s empty, Tony? But there were so many people at the bull!”

“Yeah, well.” Tony smiled. “Midtown could still use something to hope for, you know? That’s what tonight’s all about.”

It actually wasn’t a bad line.

Bruce hummed, non-committal, and wiggled his shoulders. He was still holding Steve’s wrist; had sort of twisted it round his torso so his hand pinned Steve’s down, resting on Wayne’s torso just above his hip. It was a distinctly possessive gesture and not one Steve would have chosen.

“Well,” Brucie lisped—how he could lisp a word with no esses, but he managed—“I’m sure the Captain here could—” He giggled, and bit his lower lip, and fluttered his eyelashes at Steve, and finished, “could fill me in?”

His eyelashes were very long.

Steve was out of his depth. He shot a quick, panicked look to Tony, and Tony thankfully understood—

Too much.

Steve had flirted with men before, when needed or when fun. When they were interested, or he was, in the maybe-maybe harmless banter of the front; when you were just keeping in practice for your girl back home. Or when it was useful, when there was someone who wanted something and a pleasant smile and a hint of openness could get it.

It was useful, actually, much as that thought made his skin crawl. There were a certain number of men who enjoyed the idea of Captain America being shy, and letting such men flirt at him while he didn’t hit them had been helpful on a couple of missions in the past. Even in the long past, before the ice, although then he’d been infiltrating and they’d been Nazis, and punching their lights out had put a damper on their good moods.

But Steve’d never got bit by the show-off bug, and his sexuality, which is what they called it now, hadn’t ever really been in question. The flirting was just a convenient part of his arsenal, when needed. And it had always been subtle; always been something you kept under your hat; a gentlemen’s agreement, sort of thing.

Bruce Wayne, Steve thought, had met the concept of subtlety and murdered it in Times Square.

But something flared in Wayne’s eyes, and Steve wasn’t sure what it was, and Tony said, “Bruce—”

And Steve realized that Wayne had seen the look he’d sent to Tony.

“That’s how it is, then?” Wayne slurred, prodding Steve in the chest, to little effect. “Kill ‘em, mustn’t kiss ‘em?”

There was a note in his voice that Steve didn’t like; was Wayne a man who got nasty when someone turned him down? Had he ever been turned down before?

At least it’s me he’s poking, Steve thought. But then he caught sight of Natasha’s pinched expression and he clued in. The mission objective was good will. If Bruce Wayne told everyone who’d listen that Captain America hated gays—

Jesus-Mary-and-Joseph. Steve was a terrible honeypot.

He’ll be charmed, Tony had said. But it seemed like Bruce Wayne was sharper than Tony knew, all appearances to the contrary.

And there wasn’t really a way to convincingly say I’m not a homophobe; at least not one that Steve had heard yet. So instead he said, “I mostly killed Nazis,” and both of his teammates looked at him blankly.

Tony’s blank face, in particular, was his way of saying what the hell.

“I—” said Brucie, with another poke, “am a much better lay than any Nazi!”

Steve opened his mouth but found nothing at all waiting in reply. He thought, possibly, neighbors were turning; they’d had relative privacy until now, but Brucie was starting to attract attention—

“And if you’d had anyone in the last seventeen years—”

“Seventy,” muttered Natasha—

“You’d know that I’m a much better lay than anyone you would have had since you would have had them then.” Brucie stopped, face a mask of drunk confusion as the end of the sentence got away from him. He looked back over his shoulder at Tony, who started to shake his head—but. Steve could fix this.

He didn’t do this much. People here kept trying to convince him to open up, be vulnerable, share feelings; but it was hard to do that when no one, not anyone else in the world, shared his life experiences. Nevertheless. A well-timed ‘trauma bomb’, Natasha had told him, could defuse just about any situation.

“I apologize, Mr. Wayne,” he said. “It’s not you. I’ve—you might be aware, I’ve been through a lot, and I’m afraid I’m not looking for… companionship of that nature at the moment.” And Tony owes me a lot of chats with retired generals.

Wayne pouted. “But if you gave me a chance—”

“No,” Steve said, firm as he could manage: trauma bomb, deploy. “Mr. Wayne. The love of my life is dying slowly in a nursing home. I’ll never see her walk again, never—” To his own surprise, his voice caught a little—trauma bomb real. “The last time I kissed her, Mr. Wayne, was 1945. February. I’m not…” I’m not ready.

It was, he thought, mostly true.

He might be ready for… something. But it certainly wasn’t Bruce Wayne.

And, for a moment, he thought there was something like sympathy in Wayne’s eyes. Understanding, maybe.

But then Wayne blinked at him, clear and blue, and offered: “She could watch?”

Tony said, “Jesus.”

Steve didn’t throw Wayne across the room, but it was a near thing. He shook the drunken tomcat off his arm in sheer instinctive revulsion, briefly impressed that Wayne only stumbled a bit.

Wayne recovered from the stumble, spinning on his heel. He snarled, “How much?” in Tony’s general direction, and Steve heard something in his voice, a live, wild awareness, a note of hate, of poison—

Oh, sweet Mary.

Steve wasn’t just a terrible honeypot, he was an obvious one.

Wayne had known, from the beginning; had realized what Tony was trying to do, and had played up to what was expected of him. How much of it—the idiocy or the flirtation or—had all of this been Wayne playing a part?

Steve found himself almost more uncomfortable than he had been when Wayne was on his chest. And another, more worrying thought: Just how drunk is he?

But—all of that, only to end up donating anyway? Wayne could have just shaken Tony’s hand and moved on, but instead he’d—He’d taught Steve a lesson, brutally, with just his words and hands and his open blue eyes.

Steve saw his own suspicions in Natasha’s face, and saw undisguised triumph on Tony’s. Ah.

So, this was some kind of game that modern billionaires played, was it? And they’d put Steve in the middle? Mission parameters before the mission, Tony, if you would.

“How much?” Tony shrugged at Wayne. “How much you got?”

Wayne’s lip curled and he pulled out a checkbook. Steve wasn’t modern and he wasn’t rich, but he was nevertheless pretty sure that Wayne was supposed to make polite noises about a commitment and Tony was supposed to shake his hand, and then the charity people were supposed to call Wayne’s people in the morning. Wayne wasn’t supposed to—

He scratched out a number and thrust his check at Tony. “And much good may it do,” he said, which sounded like a threat.

Tony’s eyes narrowed. “You don’t have confidence?”

“In Iron Man?” said Wayne. “In Tony Stark?” His eyes raked dismissively over Steve and Natasha. “In the Spy Kids?”

Natasha’s eyebrow went up.

Tony smiled tightly. “Pleasure as always, Brucie.”

Bruce hummed and looked Steve over again, and—oh god, he still thinks I hate gays, he thinks Tony was—what? Not trying to out him, he’s not shy; he thinks Tony set this up—oh god. He thinks I’m a homophobe and thinks Tony’s on my side. Like some kind of fucking hazing.

Wayne replied to Tony, but with his eyes still on Steve: “Pleasure. Hmm. Pity it couldn’t be more of one.”

He turned, and Steve prepared to round on Tony and tear him apart, but—

Maybe Wayne was drunk after all, or maybe it was just bad timing, but he collided with someone as he turned away and—there was a moment of confusion, someone yelling Matt!—and then the giant billionaire was sitting in a puddle of champagne, half in the lap of the man he’d knocked over.

The man looked stunned, which was fair, Steve supposed. Nice tux, now covered in champagne, little coloured glasses—maybe his eyes were bad? or maybe it was fashionable, it could be, these days—dark hair and a strong jawline and—

Wayne, because he was irrepressible (and had an image to maintain?), said, “That a gun in your pocket, handsome?” and rooted around the man’s lap with his hands, extricating—

Oh. Yeah. Man’s eyes were bad.

“Too bad,” Wayne pouted, putting the cane aside.

“Matt,” said the man who’d been yelling, crouching down with some difficulty. Long blond hair and pudgy; not a soldier, Steve thought. “Matt,” the man continued. “Matt, you okay?”

“Foggy?” the blind man said and—he was foggy? Had he hit his head? Steve hadn’t seen it, but—maybe the man was especially sensitive to head trauma—

Pepper, finally, swept in.

Oh, thank you, mother Mary.

“Good evening, gentlemen,” Pepper said, as smoothly as if they weren’t on the ground. “Bruce.”

“Miss Pats!” Bruce said happily, and Tony growled, and oh, it had to be an act—

“Ma’am,” the pudgy one said. “Good evening. You’re, um, Pepper Potts?”

Doing okay at maintaining his cool; Steve was impressed. Wasn’t every day a billionaire fell on your date and then you met the Avengers.

“I’m so sorry about this, gentlemen. Please let me help you up—and, of course, Stark Industries will reimburse you for the cleaning and—”

“Bruce?” said the blind man, a little behind. “Bruce Banner? Hulk? But Banner…” He trailed off, leaving (probably) But Banner hasn’t been seen since Sokovia, to die in the air.

Natasha had stiffened, not that it would be visible to anyone who didn’t know her.

“Aw,” said Brucie, trampling the awkward silence. “He thinks I’m Hulk! I mean, flattery will get you everywhere, handsome, but I think you’d be squished.”

The pudgy man said, intently and like he was trying to keep it a secret from everyone nearby: “Matt, it’s Bruce Wayne.”

“Matt Murdock?” asked Pepper, as the blind man, Matt, said, “Bruce Wayne?” in a tone of absolute horror. Wayne’s shoulders tightened.

Steve blinked. That seemed like an over-reaction, unless Matt was a homophobe—

“Bruce Wayne the playboy?” Matt repeated. “Bruce Wayne, the—the drunk—”

“And dashing!” said Brucie, but it seemed as though his heart wasn’t in it.

Murdock said, “You’re—” and his pudgy friend’s eyes were wide—

“Matthew Murdock,” said Pepper, again, doggedly establishing some amount of normalcy. “So you must be Franklin Nelson?”

The pudgy man nodded.

Wayne, on his own initiative, began to disentangle himself from Murdock’s legs and cane.

“Tony,” said Pepper, “this is Franklin Nelson and Matthew Murdock, the lawyers from Hell’s Kitchen.”

Tony nodded—whether he knew who she meant or not, Tony and Pepper had their act together down. But: “The Fisk ones?” Tony said, to Steve’s surprise.

“Um,” said Nelson. “I’m not sure I’d call us that.” He gave Pepper a weak smile and looked up at Bruce Wayne, who was standing now and who had sobered a little.

“I apologize for my clumsiness, Mr. Murdock,” Wayne said, and he sounded like he’d bitten a lemon. “If you experience any lasting effects, please contact my attorneys; I’m sure you can work out how. And thank you, Ms.—” He scowled as he turned to Pepper. “Thank you. But Wayne Enterprises will cover the cleaning. I apologize that recognizing me was so traumatic for you, gentlemen—”

“No,” said Murdock, and if he was about to turn down Wayne’s offer or make some kind of comment, well, Steve might deck him. But, “No,” said Murdock, meaningfully, grasping Nelson’s arm and getting his feet under him, “I knew who you were when you walked in the door.”

Nelson wasn’t really breathing, and Steve slid his eyes to Nat and Tony. Tony had—the thinnest, strangest smile on his face, his eyes narrow. Bruce Wayne had stilled, gone quiet, and Murdock added,

“Just… surprised you’re in Stark’s territory.”

Nelson started coughing.

Steve was missing something, and he couldn’t tell just what.

A pause, and then a big, big smile split Wayne’s face, Brucie back in full force. “Oh!” he said, “Well! Tony’s a sweetheart, and Ms. Pats is just so nice! And, you know, I even got to hear about all the things they’re going to do to you!”

Pepper smiled. “Do for the city, Bruce, dear. And the foundation—well, I’ll put you in touch with the board, Mr. Nelson, as you’re—” She smiled wider, neatly conveying as you’re covered in champagne and not planning to stay—“but they are hoping for an on-the-ground view of where the post-Incident response left gaps. And who better to ask than the men who blocked the gaps when Wilson Fisk waded in?”

“That’s us,” said Murdock. “Ears to the ground.”

“Ears in the sky!” Brucie added in excitement.

Pepper smiled, “It’s eyes in the sky, Bruce,” and Bruce looked at the blind man and said,

“Is it?”

And Nelson’s coughing got worse.

***

Tony met Steve’s eyes as the lawyers and Bruce Wayne moved off, separately, the lawyers to the elevator and Bruce Wayne to—well, he’d mingle. Or whatever.

“Tony, what the hell,” Steve began, but Tony cut him off.

“You saw that too?” he asked. “I mean, I’ve wondered, but Brucie’s careful; I never thought that he really could be—”

“Right, yes,” Steve hissed, “he pretends to be stupider than he is, but, Tony, what you did to me just to win some prep school game—” No, that wasn’t fair. Tony couldn’t have known how far Bruce would take things.

…It was a little bit fair.

But Tony was blinking at him. “Uh,” he said. “Yeah. Him hiding intelligence has never been in question. The question is, why he does it. It’s too good—and it causes him too much grief—to just be for the fun.”

Natasha said, “I don’t understand,” and Tony looked at her. His mouth thinned.

“Oh,” he said. “So you didn’t see.”

“See what,” said Steve.

Tony shrugged vaguely. “Testing a theory.” He rubbed his jaw. “And hey.” He grinned at them, for no reason Steve could discern. “Two for the price of one.”

***

“Matt,” Foggy said out of the side of his mouth, as they walked towards the elevators. “Matt.”

“Foggy.”

“Is Bruce Wayne…”

“Foggy.”

Foggy took a deep breath. “Does Bruce Wayne smell like fancy motor oil?”

“Not here, Foggy,” Matt said, with a significant nod ahead of them, at the waiter Pepper Potts had flagged down to help clear a path through the crowd.

“Oh my god,” said Foggy.

The waiter turned to check their progress, and then he moved, and then—

***

“Oh my god, Matt—someone—”

Steve spun; the yell was Nelson, who should have been on his way out the door. They were supposed to be gone; the rest of the night was supposed to be boring and goodwill-generating and not—

Not a man in waiter’s black with a knife at a blind man’s throat—

They were the Avengers, for god’s sake, but they were dressed down and forty feet away with an entire party’s worth of well-heeled civilians between them and the knife, and it was right at his throat—

And all eyes were on them.

Too many people, too many wild cards. If Steve went for a gun or Nat reached for a throwing knife, it was even odds that one of the fools in the room would gasp and the lawyer would get his throat cut. Which would, Steve mused, add quite a lot to his cleaning bill.

Nelson was several paces back, supported by a security guard and a party-goer. Looked like he’d taken a hit to the jaw. Steve spared a moment of sympathy for Pepper and her legal team.

“Don’t you vet your waitstaff?” Bruce Wayne hissed from somewhere behind Steve. He should have been gone, too; he’d hared off in the direction of more alcohol or a more sympathetic partner—

“Not personally,” Tony muttered back. “There are contracts.”

Wayne said, “Hmm.”

Steve stepped up, trying to catch the knifeman’s attention. The man had Murdock pinned tightly—security from the elevator was moving slowly forward, but they needed a distraction while the threat was so intense—

“Hey!” Tony yelled.

Distraction achieved.

“Stark,” the man said, and Steve took over.

“Evenin’,” he said, hands wide, taking a step forward. “How can we help you, Mister…?”

“I need a helicopter,” the hostage-taker said. Right to it, then. “A helicopter, and three million, and Stark anti-tracking on it.”

Steve blinked.

“Man comes prepared,” Natasha said in an undertone.

Tony, stalling, said, “What kind of anti-tracking were you thinking? Cause I’m pretty sure there will be… a few people trying to track you down—”

“Batman,” the man yelled in desperation—but the blade stayed steady. “Please,” he said, as though they’d be on his side—“Batman’s coming for me, I gotta keep moving, please; there’s no one else I could go to—”

“Batman?” scoffed Bruce Wayne, pushing forward, loud and glib and terribly, terribly timed. “Batman’s a myth!”

If he’d set off a flare, it couldn’t have drawn more attention. Everyone in the room turned, and the knifeman gaped, shifting his grip on the knife’s handle a little (not enough). Steve half-turned, running approaches in his head, scowling internally—whatever game Bruce Wayne and Tony had running, now was not the time for Brucie to steal center stage—

“Uh, Brucie,” Tony said, playing along, sounding a little bit strained. “Batman actually… Batman’s not a myth, actually. He’s part of the Justice League.”

Wayne blinked at him and was quiet long enough that Steve wondered if he might actually, somehow, not know this.

If he lived in a cave—

Oh, no, Tony, Steve thought, is that what you thought you saw—

But, with great patience and a touch of concern, Wayne eventually said, “Tony, the Justice League is a comic book.”

A glass shattered; someone choked.

The knifeman said, “Batman’s real! I swear it! I—”

“Hang on,” said Brucie with a charming smile. “Do I know you?”

“I—Mr. Wayne?”

“Gothamites should stick together, Mr. Henry!”

The hostage-taker, evidently a Gothamite, looked nonplussed. He said, “Um. Batman is real, Mr. Wayne. He—didn’t he save you, two months ago?”

Wayne tilted his head. “That was Batman?” he asked.

“Um, yes. He has, um, a cape. And. Bat ears? You were—”

“Well then, why’s he chasing you?”

“Um—”

“Oh, wait! Hennessy! That’s you?”

“Helden, Mr. Wayne—”

“Jack Helden!”

“Yes—”

“With the jewels!”

“Jewels?”

“Yes, you stole all of those jewels from orphans—”

“Um, Mr. Wayne, there weren’t any jewels; I’m not sure—there’s been a misunderstanding—”

They had to wrap this up; they certainly had their distraction now, no Avengers needed. Even the elevator guards could probably separate bewildered Mr. Helden from his knife—but oh hell: Steve could see from here that Murdock was shaking. Trying to catch his breath, Steve thought; on the verge of tears—it must be hell, to be trapped at knifepoint and not be able to determine what was going on around you.

They had to wrap this up, but Brucie had momentum and probably wouldn’t stop for less than a flying tackle.

“No, no, it was jewels!” he was saying. “With a b. Starts with a b.”

Someone in the crowd suggested, her voice wavering, “Beryls?” and Brucie flapped his hand at her.

“B, Tony, b. Jewels, with the sides!”

Tony hummed and, following some process of association known only to billionaires, said, “Do you mean embezzling, Bruce?”

“Bezeling! Exactly!” He turned back on the knifeman. Security had approached from two directions—one good lunge and Murdock would be safe—

“You bezeled! Right?” Brucie demanded. “From the Martha Wayne Fund.”

“Em-bezzled, Bruce,” Tony muttered.

“Don’t be silly, you only say um if you don’t know the word!”

Nelson was staring at him, slack-jawed. Murdock made a choking noise and shook in Helden’s hold, and a line of red sprouted across his neck, and—

“Bruce, stand down,” said Steve. Even if—if what Steve was half-thinking was true—“Please.”

Wayne’s head quirked and he shifted, and in that moment Murdock took a deep breath and smashed his head backwards into Helden’s nose. Steve could hear it shatter.

Helden dropped the knife.

Nelson rushed in, grabbing his partner’s arm, and… and it was over. The security guards grabbed the knife, and grabbed Helden, and shunted him out of the public areas to await the NYPD. And Pepper hurried over to the lawyers, and—

And the Avengers had done very, very little.

Bruce Wayne turned back to them and met Steve’s eyes. “Bezeling,” he said. “A terrible thing, when there’s so much poverty in Gotham.”

“Right,” said Steve.  

“Never a good idea,” Wayne continued, “to run from Batman. It’s the ears, see. He hears things.”

“You—” Natasha began. “You didn’t remember—”

“Lots of people in Gotham wear capes, Ms. Widow. They’re very fashionable! Why on earth would anyone assume that someone’s this ‘Batman’, just because he rescues them from an explosion in a cape and a bat costume and then vanishes into the night?”         

Nat opened her mouth and it stuck that way.

“Well,” Wayne smiled sunnily. “I should apologize to Mr. Murdock on behalf of my countrymen, and then, Tony—well, the night is young!”

“Mr. Wayne,” said Steve, because they might still be on the wrong foot, because Wayne might be—

Wayne’s smile tightened. “Water over the bridge, Captain, for my part. But,” he said, apparently unaware that his metaphorical bridge was flooded, “if you ever want a guide to, you know,”—he looked Tony up and down—“the fun part of the twenty-first century, I do hope you’ll swing out my way. The night is young, and you are—technically young too, and there’s nobody who knows the night like I do.”

Steve froze and heard Tony’s inhale. Was Wayne about to—in public—

Wayne added, “Especially the night in Gotham. You might even say that I am—” He bared his teeth, enjoying himself—and then he didn’t say it. “Well. Sweet dreams, tonight, my lovely avenging angels. Wake to a morning of sunshine and righteousness!”

Tony said, “Bruce—” and Bruce smirked and looked Steve full in the face.

And winked.

***

“Tony,” said Steve, hours later, after the fundraiser had wound down and he, Tony, Nat, and Pepper had recused themselves upstairs, “Bruce Wayne.”

Is either Batman or a lunatic, and the two things might not be mutually exclusive.

“Old friend,” said Tony. “Up to a point.”

“What point?”

“The point where he vanished for more than half a decade and came back drunk and lobotomized. We lost touch. And Gotham being what it is…”

While living standards had soared across the globe since Steve’s day, Gotham had managed to get worse. The fact that it was some kind of hub for supervillains really didn’t help.

“Right,” Steve said.

“Sorry for the… earlier,” Tony said, and apologies from Tony were rare, so Steve took notice. “Crossed wires. In a couple places, I think. Wouldn’t have put either you or him in that position. Few bad calls.”

Steve nodded. “Water over the bridge, after all,” he said, and laughed under his breath. And then, without letting himself think about why he was asking: “Ah. You have his phone number, right?”

***

Meanwhile, on a rooftop in Hell’s Kitchen:

“You got what you came for?” Daredevil asked.

Batman said nothing.

“That is,” said Daredevil, tilting his head, “I had thought that your business in New York was resolved this evening. But if that’s incorrect—”

Batman grunted.

Daredevil paused. “Is that a yes or a no?”

Batman said: “Blind since childhood,” which was neither.

Daredevil graciously said, “Yes,” to show Batman how it could be done.

But Batman only turned and stared at him.

“There’s a… motor oil,” Daredevil said after a few moments, guessing. “It’s very faint. Traces under the fingernails. But the scent is volatile even in small concentrations.” He added, “Very unlikely that anyone else would pick up on it.”

Batman grunted.

“I am sending you my cleaning bill,” Daredevil continued.

Batman jumped off the roof.