st_arkintern | The Best Drink, "Bar"-ed None

The Best Drink, "Bar"-ed None

"Do you like monster movies?"

Peter Parker is sitting on a barstool, hunched slightly over the bar as he looks up and over at Tony on the other side. There's no one in the bar but them tonight, and Tony's the one making them the first of their drinks. The Tender Knob, if Peter remembers correctly.

Who would name a drink that?

That question isn't what's on Peter's mind right now, though. Peter's always really liked monster movies: Godzilla, Mothra, King Kong, the Creature from the Black Lagoon, King Ghidorah, and Gamera. And that first question is probably going to be followed up with another one depending on Tony's response.

"'Cause when I was in Europe, there was this little indie cinema where they were showing this monster movie. Not Pacific Rim: Uprising, but another one. It was a lot different from other monster movies, though."

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“Kaiju or slasher types?” Tony shook the apple slice he garnished in the mixer, facing Peter from the other end of the dimly lit bar. His straight face was fully intact—the bet was in full effect, after all.

"Kaiju, mostly," Peter says, returning the same poker face in turn. "The movie's not kaiju, though. It's a romance between a mute woman and a kinda Creature from the Black Lagoon kind of monster."

Peter shifts in his seat; his Spider-Man mask is stuffed into his back pocket, in case things become desperate enough.

Hopefully they don't. That's plan B. The current plan of attack is to lull Tony into a false sense of security before executing plan A's part two.

Tony eyeballed the bourbon amount as he poured it in. A long history of fixing drinks and you simply developed a sense for these things. The weight, the sound of the liquid hitting the rocks, one simply knew when it was enough.

“The one that came out earlier this year?”

"I think it came out around Christmastime last year," Peter says, watching Tony expertly preparing their drinks. Peter wonders if Tony can show him sometime. Peter wonders if he would show him.

"It's called The Shape of Water. The romance parts are a little weird sometimes, but not as weird as Pacific Rim: Uprising." Another film he watched while he was in Europe. When Liz went off for awhile to visit with other friends from the inn, Peter spent most of his days catching up on movies and reading news articles online. There'd been a lot that he missed.

Seeing Peter’s stiff upper lip was almost enough to make Tony crack up, and he hadn’t yet had a drop. As Tony added the agave and cinnamon, he made a point of maintaining direct eye contact with the boy as he shook the rest. Short, delicate motions. He gave the smooth metal a sensual little tap as he finished his work.

“Romance between the species—I can dig it.”

"I don't have issue with it either..." Peter says, knowing now that there's plenty of aliens out there that are humanoid. "...but Shape of Water had that scene where she completely floods the apartment while she's having sex with him and Newt has sex with a Kaiju brain."

The sleeping with a brain part was beyond weird. Newt had an obsession with Kaiju in the last movie, but Peter never considered that it might be sexual.

Edited 2018-11-17 07:18 (UTC)

Tony squinted for a moment and strained the drink into the old fashioned glasses. There was a fleeting sense of not wanting Peter to get his hands on those bizarre types of media but he was a Gen Z’er. He’d seen every deranged product of the human mind the internet had to shit out.

“Was it at least pleasingly curvy?”

"No, it was a kaiju brain he named Alice and talked about like she was her girlfriend. Anyway, it was really weird. I wouldn't sleep with a kaiju brain."

Or a kaiju.

Tony garnished the glass with an apple wedge, sliding it Peter’s way first. “You wouldn’t? Even to save the world?”

Peter shoots Tony a disturbed look.

"If it were to save the world, yeah, but Newt's brain was infected and he almost ended up killing off the human race. It's probably more likely I'd wind up killing people unless it was a good kaiju like Godzilla or Mothra."

Peter takes the drink into hand. "You have to answer now. Would you or wouldn't you?"

Tony didn’t miss a beat, pouring his own glass. “Time, place, position.”

Peter blinks.

"What?"

“Sometimes saving the world takes getting a little weird.” Tony lifted his glass, his expression the perfect picture of stoic.

"Yeah?" Peter's pretty sure he knows what Tony is trying to do, but he's not going to back down from the challenge.

Maintaining eye contact, Peter asks:

"Yeah, like what?:

Peter keeps his eyes trained on Tony as he raises his glass and takes a sip.

Tony partook of his beverage at a casual pace, the spices tickling his tongue. He blinked innocently at the boy as he lowered the glass.

"Like burping the worm in the ganglia mole hole."

Peter shoots Tony a disturbed look. He opens his mouth, about to say something, then thinks better of it and clamps his mouth into a thin, narrow line.

And Peter says nothing because if he opens his mouth, he has no idea what is likely to come out.

Tony carried right on with another sip, heedless of the imagery he had just brought into the world.

"How's the drink, son?"

This isn't good. Even Tony's straight face is getting to him now. Peter doesn't feel particularly funny, and a near-lifetime of Flash going out of his way to make this particular factoid known to him doesn't do much for Peter's confidence as far as landing a joke goes.

But as his collection of punny t-shirts indicates, he I does know a lot of puns.

"It's good," Peter says defensively. "But I don't drink all that much, especially when I'm working on homework. I don't like to drink and derive."

Tony's jaw made a slow rotation as he tapped the table--the little shudder in his chest needed somewhere to go. Peter's earnest delivery made that crack wrap all the way around into ironic hilarity.

"Let me make you another drink, Pete." Tony pulled a up a clear and square glass up from below and pulled up a nozzle to fill it up. Once it was filled with dark, fizzling soda he neglected to add any liquor and simply slid it over to the boy. "Enjoy."

Tony's reaction does not go unnoticed. Peter maintains a perfectly neutral expression as he opens his mouth to speak.

"Did I tell you about the dream I had last night?" Peter asks, wrapping his hand around the glass of soda. "I dreamed I was swimming in an ocean of orange soda. I guess it was just a Fanta sea."

Tony's immediate response was to wax lyrical for Bohemian Rhapsody. He admirably suppressed it.

"Before you complain about the root beer, it's not." Tony nodded at the glass full of popping liquid within its four faces. "I put it in a square glass for you. Now it's beer. You're welcome."

Edited 2018-11-18 06:14 (UTC)

"I thought we were drinking beer tonight," Peter says, lifting the glass. "If I'm going to be drinking root beer the rest of the night, you should be, too."

"Wheat a second..." Tony leaned in, cupping his ear. "Come a grain, son?"

Peter has to try really, really hard not to smile at that one. He clenches his jaw and tries to clear his mind of thoughts entirely, but he knows without a doubt now:

It's time for the big guns.

Tony knows his weakness. It was his fault for demonstrating to Tony exactly what he found funny to begin with. It was probably also his fault for calling him dad, too. Peter's sure that as soon as you become a father (honorary or no), it allows you to tap into unladen, potent dad joke energy, and Tony likely had a lot stored up since he was 47 now and Peter was technically his first kid.

"Anyway, if we're not actually drinking tonight, can I ask you to do me a favor?"

"Of course." Tony straightened up, tapping the counter in affirmation. "Rye do you ask?"

Rye.

Rye had he done this to himself?!

"Karen's been acting weird again and I don't know if there's something wrong in her programming or something. I'd ask Ned, but..."

Ned wasn't there.

Peter tugs his Spider-Man mask out of his back pocket and holds it out to Tony. "Can you run some sort of diagnostics on her?"

Tony quirked his head in intrigue, looking between the mask and the boy. The idea of putting on the mask again dredged up memories of puberty that were fresher than they had any right to be. "Right now?"

"Karen's my friend," Peter says, still holding out the mask. "If your friend wasn't feeling well, wouldn't you want someone to take care of them right away?"

Tony gave him a look, but didn't push. "You've got a lot of faith."

Not unrightfully so.

"Alright, Hon." Tony murmured, tugging the mask on. "Show me what you've got."

"Karen, play back the video footage I had queued up. Just the first six seconds."

"Certainly, Peter."

Peter takes a breath. He thought he'd never show Tony this in a million years, but things were getting desperate, and Peter was determined to win.

Karen begins to play the video.

The moment Peter opened his mouth, Tony's trap suspicions were confirmed. He had little time to react before he was playing captive audience to playback of one piece of footage he'd never seen.

Suddenly, he was endlessly grateful for the mask that hid whatever expression he made as he shrieked and smacked his forearms on the counter.

Tony's reaction is enough to make Peter's redden, but after a moment, he realizes that he hasn't ever heard Tony laugh before. A grin draws itself across his face as he rubs the side of his nose, still embarrassed, but pleased at the same time.

"So I win?"

Tony tried to pull himself back up right--and then Karen put the video on loop. And then his forehead was smacking the polished wooden finish and his body sagged pitifully.

Peter stands on the lowest bar of the barstool so he can reach over and pat the back of one of Tony's shoulders while he's still hunched over.

Peter settled back down on the barstlol.

"Was it really that funny?"

Tony trembled where he clung to the counter. He yanked off the mask before he could douse it, his glasses receding so as to wipe at his eyes with the back of his hand.

"God. Pete. I needed that."

Peter smiles at that, bright and genuine, embarrassed, but proud.

"You're welcome." Peter retrieves the mask and stuffs it back into his pocket.

Mission accomplished.

Tony produced another square glass, filling it to the top with coke. His shoulders continued to tremble as he did so, and a few droplets got flecked everywhere.

"I'll drink to that one."

Peter smiles and lifts his drink to clink the rim of Tony's glass.

Maybe it was good that he only showed him the first six seconds. Not because he's pretty sure he'd probably bust a rib after the Captain America impression, but also because...

...well, it might be nice to have something stored away for a rainy day.

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