PREVIOUSLY ON: Dawn of New Change
The Avengers return to the Tower where Tony convinces everyone to stay back for a couple days, at least, until the farewell party. Steve goes over the HYDRA mission with Hill where we find out about the Twins. Taeyong, Taeil and Bruce are completely in love with Dr Helen Cho's new machine and Clint is gonna live!
Meanwhile, Ultron is up online and within the first ten minutes of scouring the internet, he decides to fuck peace and go feral... honestly? mood.
Taeyong spent the time at the Avengers 'farewell' party slipping in and out of conversation. He had on his best dress shirt; a deep red button up with warm brown buttons that Pepper bought him for his birthday last year. He liked it well enough and it beat wearing another graphic t-shirt from the long pile he had accumulated in his room.
Unfortunately, Mark and Johnny didn't get to make it into the party. Mark had a prior engagement in the form of heading to a new friend's house and forcing the kid to watch Star Trek with him. The kid, whose name Taeyong had been told but forgot, was a Star Wars fan and Mark was a Trekkie, so Johnny got to hear all the new drama they were stirring up. Taeyong didn't understand the weird love-hate friendship that Mark was working on, but then again, Taeyong's only friend his age, was Johnny.
Johnny had a shift at the same diner his mother worked at. It was his first job and he didn't want to take too many off-days whilst he was just starting. Taeyong, as much as he tried to give Johnny the same lavish style that he had, couldn't really stop him from getting work when he wanted to. "Besides," Taeyong waved fruitfully.
"Johnny needs to talk to his mum more, so maybe them having the same job will help them stop whatever argument they had to begin with."
Bruce, who was manning the drinks, nodded as he wiped down a glass for Taeyong. He didn't want to completely immerse himself with the crowd of people that had started to gather. Even though the guests were made up of S.H.I.E.L.D. agents, Avengers, veterans and more work-people. Socialising after their three days of absolute brain-whack working to create Ultron meant Bruce's battery had died out like two days ago.
"What are they arguing about?" the part-time barkeep asked.
Taeyong blinked, leaning forward on his barstool and resting his elbows on the bench. "Johnny's dad."
Bruce winced, giving a reluctant nod, "fathers can be like that."
"I don't know," Taeyong said, gratefully taking the glass of cold apple juice Bruce slid his way. "I mean, from what Mark tells me, Mister Seo is actually really nice and trying his best to be a better dad for them. Johnny doesn't want anything to do with him though... can't forgive him."
Bruce swiped another glass and started to clean it up. "You think he should?"
"I did," Taeyong said, turning around in his barstool to look over at his dad, who was standing beside Thor and talking to Rhodey. "You weren't there for the first couple years living with my dad, but I used to call him Tony." Taeyong snorted, sipping on his drink and trying to not let it show that the ice was too cold for his teeth. "Even Pepper was weird around me, she didn't know how to handle a kid. The only people I got on well with were Happy and Obadiah. Uncle Rhodey... when he flew over but the majority of the time I was in schooling."
"Jarvis," Bruce replied because Taeyong had talked about his schooling with Bruce a lot. It's what their conversations were driven by, Taeyong's want to go into university or maybe just public school so that he could grow up somewhat normally. "Well, you turned out alright," Bruce said, giving a reassuring smile.
Taeyong shrugged, rubbing the tips of his fingers together to get rid of the condensation around the glass. "I think you turned out alright yourself."
"Yeah, as alright as a big, green rage monster can be."
Taeyong furrowed his brow, "hey the Hulk is my friend. Stop putting him down."
Bruce simply gave a short smile. "You don't know what you're talking about."
"Maybe. But I've at least talked to the Hulk, at least we get along." He took his glass, raising it slightly before turning to jump off the barstool and find someone else to talk to.
Taeyong wandered around the room for a little while, grinning at Thor who was telling some story to a bunch of veterans with enthusiastic waves and excited swings of his large glass of beer. Taeyong steered his way through the taller adults, giving a small wave to Taeil who sent him a thumbs up before returning to talk to Helen Cho and Uncle Rhodey. Then Taeyong found Steve in the middle of a game of pool with one of his vet friends.
If Taeyong remembered correctly the man was Sam Wilson, he was there to help during the take down of S.H.I.E.L.D. Taeyong saddled up to Steve, giving the man a grin when he looked down at him. "I hope that's juice young man."
"Apple," Taeyong said, holding out the glass. "How's it?"
"Chill, little man," Sam said, standing up from his position. His eyes were trained on the pocket where his object ball fell into . Taeyong gave a little cheer, moving out of the way for Steve to play. "So I heard you were in the mission too, take down any HYDRA agents?"
Taeyong shook his head, "nah. Just went to talk the Hulk down into Bruce again though... so that was fun, I guess?"
"Wait-" Sam tilted his head, looking between Steve and then Taeyong- "you went up against the Hulk?"
Taeyong felt pride stir in his gut and he jutted out his hip against the pool table, taking a sip from his glass. "What? Like it's hard?"
Steve snorted but did give a nod, "Taeyong and the Hulk are an interesting pair of friends."
"You guys are friends?!"
"Once again, like it's hard?" Taeyong snickered, looking back down at the game. "The Hulk is his own entity and his main drive isn't just to smash a bunch of stuff, but to ultimately protect Bruce." He gave a very confident nod, "he's also pretty cool, and he understands basic phrases so when I want Bruce back he allows it. Just need for Bruce to understand."
"It'll always be hard," Steve commented, leaning against his pool stick. "When you have something bigger than yourself or what you were meant to be, there's a lot of pressure on you to do right. With the Hulk it must be even worse, because he only creates destruction."
Sam gave a small nod. "But he's doing good now."
"'Controlled chaos' is how we phrase it," Taeyong explained. "I just need more people to see that the Hulk and Bruce and two very different people... harder than you think."
"Not when you say it like that," Sam shrugged. "So Bruce and the Hulk, two different personalities?"
Taeyong nodded, "oh for sure. The Hulk is protective and intelligent in his own right." Taeyong took another sip and then winced, biting at his cheek. "Gods the ice is killing my teeth... anyway yeah! The Hulk is almost like the baby of the Avengers. Need to steer him in the right direction but he'll get there and Bruce? Bruce is a grumpy old man with seven PhD's, dad says staying in school for that long is what makes him angry in real life."
Sam laughed, "I bet. Imagine that, seven PhD's. What- what do you need seven for?"
Taeyong shrugged, "you don't. There's no position in the world that requires that many. But... it is still cool."
"I'm still in shock that you called the Hulk the 'baby' of our group," Steve said honestly.
Taeyong gave a nod, "my wisdom knows no bounds, Captain. Now if you gentlemen'll excuse me."
Taeyong left his glass of apple juice on the side of the pool table and wiped his damp hand against the black jeans he opted to wear instead of actual dress pants. He wandered over to Rhodey, who had managed to escape whatever conversation Tony, Thor and Hill were in because he was retelling a story to a bunch of other people.
"I fly right up to the general's palace, I drop it at his feet, I'm, like, 'Boom. You looking for this?'"
Almost immediately, everyone around that small lounge area burst out laughing and Rhodey grinned. Taeyong tilted his head, not really understanding the punchline but maybe he just needed the full context. He walked past their group and eventually made it towards the upper levels in a secluded corner where Taeil was in the middle of a conversation with two other S.H.I.E.L.D. agents.
One was Jungwoo, who had the opportunity to go and work in their S.W.O.R.D. database but much preferred staying at Stark Industries. The other boy, who was South Asian, short and scrutinising his glass of what appeared to be regular looking alcohol, was leaning most of his weight against Jungwoo.
"Hey guys," Taeyong said, leaning back against the railing and giving each of them a smile.
"Oh hey Taeyong," Jungwoo raised his glass and quickly steered his S.H.I.E.L.D. friend to one of the stools. "This is my friend, Tommy, he doesn't drink much."
"Or at all," Tommy said, holding his glass with two hands. Tommy peered over his glass, glaring at the contents. "Thor gave me some... said it wasn't for mortal men. But one of the vets basically bet him on it and now here I am... by the Gods themselves... I feel so- so-"
"So?" Taeil asked, amused.
"Fuzzy."
Taeyong snorted, "you should probably stop drinking that then."
Tommy gave a nonchalant nod but remained firm gripped as he finally looked up. He blinked at Taeyong, staring at him for a good couple of seconds before he stretched himself up to his full height, which was not so much taller than Taeyong and sighed. "I think... I think I should go home. Try to sleep whatever this is off."
"I can take you?" Jungwoo asked, hand on his shorter friend's shoulder.
"Nah, nah. I know you wanted to talk to the Captain America," Tommy held out a little fist and got the three boys to 'fist bump' him but it didn't go so well.
Taeil titled his head, watching Tommy try and connect their hands together. "Make sure you take care of Jungwoo, he's on his second glass."
Jungwoo scoffed, "right. I'm the one who needs help."
Taeyong lifted a worried brow, "um... how much did you drink?"
Tommy hugged the glass of Asgardian mead to his chest, "this is my first glass."
"But-" Taeyong watched him slowly walk away -"he didn't even finish that?"
NEXT TIME ON: Dawn of New Change
Taeyong got up, running over to the Hammer and rubbing his palms together.
"So... I get Asgard?" he asked, looking back at Thor.
"Sure," Thor chuckled.
"Neat," Taeyong grinned.