Everyone Is Poly Because Avengers

There's a moment of silence.

Then Tony crosses his arms -- slowly because his bruised ribs hurt like hell -- and raises his eyebrows. Pointedly.

If he could pull of the Glare of Doom™, he'd be aiming for that. But that's really more Natasha's thing than his, so the eyebrows and unamused expression will have to do.

"You wanna try that again?" he asks drily when it becomes clear that Loki hasn't noticed -- or is ignoring -- Tony's wordless demand.

Darcy doesn't look up from where she's scrolling on her phone. Clearly she's got better things to do than help Loki climb out of the hole he dug himself into. Probably plotting revenge.

Or possibly tweeting about Thor's latest attempt to conquer the microwave.

(Let's just say Tony's gonna need a new microwave and leave it at that. Please.)

Loki sighs the most put-upon sigh Tony has heard since his MIT-days where he's put a lot of effort into exasperating a certain professor of his. The asshole even rolls his eyes like he thinks Tony's just being silly but he's gonna take the grown-up road and indulge him.

Joke's on Loki because Tony's never chosen a grown-up option in his life.

"Yes, yes, you belong to yourself and no one else. Now can we kill that insignificant worm for touching you?"

Tony smirks.

Title: Living in CrisesSummary: Tony and his family have moved to the moon. Too bad Christine doesn’t realize that means she’s not welcomeCreator: @tisfanFor: @marvelpolyshipbingoRating: TeenShip: Pepper/Rhodey/Tony/Steve/BuckyWarning: none

Christine Everhart had that look on her face,like Tony Stark had told her a particularly unpalatable truth and she wasn’tsure if she should believe him (because she didn’t want to) or call him a liar.

Except that shewas fairly certain he was telling the truth. Which annoyed her.

Tony’s innertwelve-year-old did a fist pump of triumph, although outwardly his demeanor wasas unflappable as always. He’d been in front of cameras since he was a child.It was going to take more than an ex-lover with a grudge to get him to crack.

Especially today.

“Well, you see,”Tony said, gesturing, “a hundred and seventeen countries signed the Accords. Wefelt we had no choice in the matter.”

“You had nochoice?”

“The United Statesclaimed the moon by virtue of putting some dusty old boot on the surface andplanting a flag,” Tony said. “And if there’s one thing I’ve discovered aboutAmericans, it’s that they’ll buy or sell… well, anything.”

“Including themoon.”

“Including themoon,” Tony said. “Of which I am now sole proprietor, owner, and mayor. And…well, I decided to make some changes to the outdated laws of Earth. Why shouldI be stingy, right? Why should it be one man and one woman? Right? We said noto  that ten years ago. So, now, on the moon, why should marriage be onlytwo people? It’s senseless. Nuclear family is over. We tried it. It wasisolating, it was detrimental to our mental health, our finances, our planet.Auxiliary family is the way, baby.”

“So, you marriedall your friends?”

“Oh, no,” Tonysaid. “This dome would be a lot bigger if I had to house all my friends. Theseare just my spouses.”

“Big dome,”Christine said, tipping her head to one side. “And you have three husbands?”

“And one wife.Don’t forget Pepper. Never forget Pepper. None of us would be alive if itwasn’t for Pepper. She’s the real hero here.”

“Speaking ofheroes, how does the Accords figure in here?”

“They don’t wantthe Avengers on Earth, getting into politics, saving the day, destroying cities.It’s understandable, really. And my second husband, Steve, you remember Steve,right? Captain America? Well, if he sees a situation headed south, he can’tignore it. It’s really hard to see stupid, petty Earth shit from the moon.”

“Does Miss Potts –do you still call her Miss Potts, or–”

“We are, in fact,all Potts now. Dr. Potts, Captain Potts, Colonel Potts, Sergeant Potts and Mrs.Potts. Sounds nice, don’t you think. And it makes those pots and kettles jokesso much funnier. Pep doesn’t always appreciate my humor, but at least Buckystill loves me.”

“It’s hard tobelieve you married the man who–”

Tony leveled hischin at her. “No. We’re not discussing that, it’s been hashed over, it’shistory. The Winter Soldier no longer exists, thank you for playing who thehell do you think you are, anyway?”

“Right,” Stevesaid, standing up and flicking off the television. “I think we’ve seen enough.”

“I’ll get coffeeon,” Bucky said. “His shuttle’s due in like twenty minutes.”

“You really thinkcoffee’s going to help?” Rhodey demanded, but he was already in the closet,pulling out every fluffy blanket they owned. 

“I’ve gotcheeseburgers–” Pepper said, coming in the door, swinging the take-away bag.Surprising how many businesses they had for the little Dome city. Pepper hadn’tallowed them to call it Pottsville, so they named the city Crisium City, forthe lake it was built over. And, because as Tony said, they were constantlyliving in crises anyway, right? 

“You saw the‘wave?” Bucky asked, kissing her cheek and taking the bag from her.

“Happy told me allabout it on the shuttle home,” Pepper said, stepping out of her shoes. Buckyalways liked it when she went barefoot. A soft kind of vulnerability, only forher husbands.

“Rhodey wasamusing himself by watching it again,” Steve accused, and then laughed asRhodey threw a sofa cushion at him.

“He’s coming,”Pepper said.

Tony opened thedoor to their private dome a moment later. Looked around. Blinked.

“What’s this?”

Bucky patted thespace on the sofa reserved for him. “Welcome home. There’s coffee andcheeseburgers.”

“And a wholemarathon of those science fiction movies you like,” Steve offered.

“She was acomplete bitch, I hope she didn’t upset you,” Pepper said. “That woman alwayshas had more ambition than sense.”

“Have you eatenanything more than coffee since you left?” Rhodey demanded.

“You think I’mupset? About Christine getting in my face about our marriage? Don’t be silly,our marriage is the best thing that’s ever happened to me,” Tony said.

“She was acting–”

“Sour grapes,”Tony said. “She’s jealous. And who wouldn’t be.”

“To have allthis,” Rhodey said, gesturing to Tony’s… everything.

tags by @galwednesday​ seized my brain and this fell out: 

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It was unfortunately easy to get jealous or feel neglected in a poly relationship. 

No like, legitimately or anything. Not with what Steve Bucky and Tony had. However, they all had insecurities and they didn’t exactly have the most time to bond between world crises and shield missions. 

They each had one (or a few) things they’d do when insecurity happened, like Tony pulling away to see if they’d come after him, or Steve doing that awful thing where he said bad things about himself just so that the others would contradict him. It wasn’t the best or the healthiest, but considering their lives it was pretty damn good. Anyways, they were working on it. 

There was one thing though, that kept happening. It was subtle, at first only the team (nothing got past them) noticed. The thing, was who got to sit in the middle on movie nights when all three of them were home. 

It was easiest when one of them got to the three seat sofa first. Then whomever the lucky winner was got to just plop themselves down and wait for the other two to surround them. 

Then … it started getting out of hand. Scuffles began happening over the middle seat. Whomever was in the middle had to be prepared to fight to keep it. 

Comments were made by the other Avengers about maybe making a schedule? The idea was shot down immediately by all three of them, for no apparent reason. 

Maybe they liked to snuggle aggressively? Because they argued and fought over who got to sit in the middle so much that it interrupted the movie nights on more than one occasion. 

Then one night, everything changed. 

It was a complete accident, involving Darcy and Jane, who were over. They’d claimed the three person couch for themselves and Thor, despite the rest of the team’s warnings. 

Steve and Bucky got there first, so they took the two person loveseat. In their defence, no one was expecting Tony to actually show up, since he’d just made some huge breakthrough in a piece of tech for SI and was quite impossible to pry away from his work. 

But show up, Tony did, and he looked quite put out when he realized the only open seat was next to Clint (not that he had anything against the archer but  … he did). 

So Tony crossed the room (in front of the television, to everyone’s annoyance) and plopped himself down approximately where the middle was, one butt cheek on Steve’s leg and the other on Bucky’s. 

The dark haired super soldier let out a grunt of displeasure and westled Tony into a lying down position with his head resting on Bucky’s armrest. The inventor’s legs rose up to go across Steve’s lap, his feet on the opposite armrest. 

They were about halfway through the movie, so there was a lot of frustrated shushing when Tony announced to the entire room, “You guys are actually really comfortable, what the fuck.” 

After that night, there were no fights over who sat in the middle. All three of them were fine with Tony laying across the two super soldier’s laps. And the rest of the team enjoyed the empty space that freed up. 

Everything was well.

4am inspiration when I should be studying strikes again. Not beta’d or even reread, so if there are any glaring errors, feel free to point them out.

This is set about three years after the last DrPepperony fic in the Avengers polycule series. I will put this on AO3 with a chronological reading order at some point (Probably after finals.)

———————

Crack

Stephen’s facade doesn’t break often. They’ve been together for five years and Pepper can count the number of times she and Tony have had to comfort a sobbing or screaming Stephen. He doesn’t break like Tony does. He doesn’t break like Pepper does. Stephen cracks, chips, loses little bits of his composure at a time to expose what they know is intense pain beneath the surface of collectedness he has always portrayed so well.

He doesn’t wear his heart on his sleeve like Tony does, or have so little to hide that he doesn’t have to, like Pepper does. It’s only when they’re laying in bed together, Stephen crying silent tears into the fabric of Pepper’s nightgown and holding on to Tony’s hand as tightly as he can with his own shaking one’s, that he ever shows signs of being as old and battle worn as he truly is.

They know he doesn’t tell them a quarter of what he’s really been through. They know that he doesn’t share his burden the way that he should, but Pepper has seen from past experience with Tony that pushing only ever pushed people away, and Tony has his own traumas that keep him awake at night.

There’s nothing they can do for a man who won’t, maybe even can’t, talk about his experiences with them, except be there for him whenever possible.

Morgan is sleeping across the penthouse, the night nurse Pepper hired discreetly when she realized today was a cracked kind of day having put her to bed hours ago. Pepper is running her hands soothingly through Stephen’s hair, and Tony is murmuring something into Stephen’s ear that Pepper can‘t quite hear from where he’s spooning their husband.

He almost never wants to talk about the cracks, the days when fissures run through his composure and leave him seeking out physical contact, feeling desperately alone and entirely unlovable. They always ask, but he usually doesn’t respond.

Not in words at least.

His responses come in the soft turning of nose into neck to hide a steadier steam of tears. Tiny whimpers in his throat caused by the physical pain of trying to clutch tighter to them. The nearly imperceptible way he curls in on himself, even when he’s spread out between them.

Pepper usually cries when Stephen cracks, though she always does her best to hide it. Tony deals better with these things, empathizes better with the sort of worst-case-scenario, end-of-life-as-they-know-it trauma that Stephen has far too much experience with.

She doesn’t know what Tony whispers in Stephen’s ears as the three of them lay together, Stephen’s facade just cracked enough to let them peak at how much he hurts and hides from them, but he always keeps going well after Stephen falls asleep, like maybe he’s warding off his nightmares.

She doesn’t know how she ever managed to help Tony cope before Stephen came into their lives. In a lot of ways maybe she hadn’t. It left her with an emptiness when she thought about the difference in the way Tony dealt with Stephen cracking and the way Pepper used to deal with Tony. A hollow feeling of inadequacy, and wonder that Tony had never left when she so obviously hadn’t given him what he needed. Not like Stephen now gives him. Not like he gives Stephen.

She kisses Stephen’s forehead, even though he’s sleeping now and won’t know it. Tony stops talking just long enough to look up at her and he smiles, sad, but only at the corners of his eyes.

She smiles back through tears and the remnants of mascara or eyeliner not well removed tracking down her checks.

Pepper is mostly along for the ride with her boys and their traumas. She can’t begin to give them what they need on her own. It’s one of the reasons she’s so glad they have each other, so glad they have Bucky. She can’t give them what they need by herself. All the advice from therapists and councilors will never really let her understand the kind of pain they feel in these moments of vulnerability.

Tony kisses Stephen’s shoulder while he holds eye contact with her, and snuggles tighter against him.

They’ve never asked that she be enough on her own, not since the three of them have been together.

She’s glad.

Glad they have each other.

Glad they accept what she can offer.

Glad that between them it’s enough.

Stephen’s facade doesn’t crack often, but when it does it Pepper and Tony are always there to tend the crack and hold him together as best as they can.

If he breaks anyway, they let him, and when he’s ready they help him pick up the pieces.

The experience of Sam Wilson.

Monogam(ish) Sam Wilson

Poly af Steve Rogers

Notes for verbal fight, relationship renegotiation, some swearing, maybe slut-shaming if you squint, but it’s not intentionally slut shaming.

(I’ll add this to my AO3 series shortly)

——

When Sam and Steve started dating, Sam wasn’t really signing on for being in a poly relationship.

“Look, Steve, you want an open relationship? Okay. But I don’t want to hear about it. I don’t wanna know about it. Keep it to yourself and don’t cancel our plans for other people.”

Steve had agreed readily, and they’d proceeded as normal. When Steve came home smelling like ozone, Sam didn’t ask. When Steve came home missing a leather jacket, Sam didn’t ask. Sure, he was jealous, but Steve always came back happy, and he was always happy to be with Sam. It didn’t feel like losing Steve when he went out to have enhanced sex with Thor, or spar suggestively with Natasha. It took a lot of adjustment, and talking, and more adjustment, but eventually Sam got to this place where he was happy. He was glad that Steve had so many people to care for him, and take care of him. He was glad that Steve was so happy.

And then Bucky came into the picture.

Bucky grated on Sam’s nerves. Not in the worst way. Kind of in a sibling rivalry way, and it was just bad enough that when Sam suspected that Steve and Bucky were dating behind his back, Sam… didn’t handle it well.

“Am I not good enough for you, Rogers!? You have to run around with every body that will throw itself into bed for you? Should I go get some super enhancements? Maybe they I’ll make you happy!”

Steve, for his part, had seen the blow up coming and had done nothing to stop or mitigate it. Later, when he talked the whole thing out with Natasha, she’d scold him for that, give him a “love tap” to the jaw that would leave it hard to speak for a few minutes.

“Sam, you know it’s not like that. Come on, come sit down, let’s talk about it.”

“I don’t want to talk about it, Steve! I have told you before, I don’t want to know about who else you’re screwing!” Sam stormed across the room, to his, their, liquor cabinet and mixed himself a drink. He didn’t usually drink when he was mad, but he just wanted his hands to stop shaking, and his heart rate to come down a bit. Alcohol was a depressant.

Before Sam could take the first sip, Steve was there, hand curled over the top of the glass and keeping it firmly on the bar cart. “I think we need to talk about this. We aren’t talking about this if you get drunk.” There’s an ice in Steve’s eyes that Sam knows comes from too much personal experience with angry drunks, but it was hard to find it in himself to empathize with an experience that wasnt his own when he was this mad, and only getting madder with Steve so close to him.

“I’m not gonna get drunk, Steve. It’s one fucking drink.”

Steve’s eyes don’t let up, and Sam steps away from him and the drink, leaving Steve to throw it out, and that had been the good liquor, a present from Tony Stark himself. Dammit.

They’re silent for a long minute. Two. Then Steve comes up behind Sam again, wrapping his arms around Sam’s waist without holding his arms down. “Can you tell me what’s really bothering you?” Steve whispered softly, nearly against his neck. His breath is warm and reassuring, and Sam relaxes against his chest, letting him take some of his weight.

“You’re screwing at least three of your team mates that I know about. Am I really not enough?” There’s no insecurity in Sam’s voice, rather his words are laced with acceptance and defeat, pain that had been festering since Steve told him that he wanted to be Poly, like Tony and Pepper were.

Sam thought he could be okay with it. He considered himself to be accepting. If Captain America from ass backwards 1940s could accept dating multiple people, why the hell couldn’t Sam?

“I’m not actually having sex with Bucky,” Steve corrects, and Sam huffs.

“Thanks, that makes me feel a lot better.”

Steve laughs against Sam’s neck and kisses him there, where his breath had been tickling him. “Does it?” There’s no snark there, just honest curiousity. He wants Sam to think about it. Does knowing he’s not having sex with Bucky make him feel better.

Surprisingly, yes.

“Are you going to?”

“Maybe, one day, if that’s something we both want. Would you want me to tell you about if, if that was a step we decided to take?”

“I already told you, I don’t want the gory details of-“

“I know, not the details.” Steve cut him off before he could work himself up again. “Not the when, the where, or how. But if it looked like we were going in that direction, and that was something we eventually wanted to do, would you want me to tell you?”

Sam thought about it for a few minute, while Steve ran his thumbs soothingly over his hip bones. Steve was such a tactile person, so prone to comfort with touch. It was one of the things Sam loves about him.

He took a deep breath and then nodded.

“Yeah.” He finally said, “yeah, I want to know about it.”

“Okay. Do you want veto power?”

“What?” Sam asked, turning his head to face Steve, who moved his head off Sam’s shoulder to accommodate the motion.

“Do you want veto power. If I tell you we might have sex, do you want the power to stop it? Do you want me to ask you if you veto it?”

Sam blinked as he processed that thought.

“Is that an option.”

“It’s always been an option, but you didn’t want to know about it before. Kinda hard to give you veto power if we aren’t allowed to talk about my other relationships.”

Sam cringed a little at the words “other relationships.” Steve smiled apologetically and kissed him again, turning them around to face each other, but leaving his arms around Sam’s waist. “It’s okay if you’re not entirely comfortable with this. We can be monogamous, if that’s what you want.”

Sam closed his eyes and shook his head. “No, Steve, it’s not- it’s not that.” He looked at Steve again, warm brown eyes meeting baby blues. “I just, I want you to be happy, and the poly thing? That makes you happy. I just have to learn how to deal with it.”

“It’s difficult.” Steve nodded. “It’s only been a year, that’s not a lot of time to adjust to a new relationship, let alone a brand new relationship dynamic.”

Sam chuckled, “You’ve been reading.”

“Tony gave me some material on polyamory when Thor let it slip that we were sleeping together ‘with Sam Wilson’s blessing.’” He imitated Thor’s voice as best he could and Sam scoffed, leaning his forehead on Steve’s shoulder. “Not that I hadn’t been doing plenty of my own reading, but some of the stuff he gave me was about adjusting to being poly… with partners who didn’t want to be.”

Sam sighed and straighted again, pulling Steve into a hug. “I don’t want to take anything away from you that makes you happy. I just…”

“You don’t like not knowing what’s going on.”

Sam nods, and Steve holds him a little tighter.

“Then let’s talk about it. From now on?”

Sam nodded again and Steve rubbed his back soothingly, kissing the top of his head where he could reach it. “I won’t tell you anymore than you need to know, and you can always have the power to tell me not to go out with someone, okay?”

“Yeah,” Sam said, one hand sliding underneath Steve’s shirt just to feel his skin. “Yeah, that sounds good.”

“Alright. Come on. Let’s go to bed.”

“Just to sleep.” Sam reiterated, because no way was he having sex with Steve after the emotional roller coaster he’d just been on.

“Just to sleep, promise.”

Sam nodded and Steve, being the extra little shit that he was, carried Sam to their shared bedroom like some kind of self-assured groom.

Trust me when I say I am definitely keeping my eyes open for healing polyamorous fluff for this blog! If you spot something you think belongs here, by all means SUBMIT IT!