madimpossibledreamer (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
madimpossibledreamer) wrote2017-03-25 11:47 pm
madimpossibledreamer) wrote2017-03-25 11:47 pm
Entry tags:
In a Crowded Room
If anyone has any time control tips, now would be the time to share.
~Dreamer~
Main Points:
Buffy the Vampire Slayer/Iron Man Crossover (Self-Made Hero)
Summary: Buffy thought Xander never shut up when he was actually talking out loud. Turns out she was wrong. It's nothing on his brain. (goes along with the episode Earshot)
Word Count: 2037
Rating: Gen
~Dreamer~
Main Points:
Buffy the Vampire Slayer/Iron Man Crossover (Self-Made Hero)
Summary: Buffy thought Xander never shut up when he was actually talking out loud. Turns out she was wrong. It's nothing on his brain. (goes along with the episode Earshot)
Word Count: 2037
Rating: Gen
It’s actually kind of obvious when Buffy gets her telepathy. Oh, the avoidance early on had been a little hurtful but now when she’s explaining it all he completely gets it.
“How do you not go insane?” she asks, and he grins.
It’s a balancing act but it’s no more difficult than doing diff eq in your head. Like I do now. Apparently. There’s at least one Tony wasted in his head, all the time. Tony, the Iron Maiden, (who he tried to differentiate from the others by using an i but she’d hid in the mental equivalent of an attic until he stopped) wolf whistles Buffy, who rolls her eyes in response and gets lots of thoughts about lesbian sex in response. I apologize for the peanut gallery, he continues, and gets loud booing in response. They’re suddenly on a stage in a grand opera house. See, the trick to multitasking with many different people in your head is letting yourself think all these weird thoughts and just letting someone else in your head deal with it. It makes listening to conversations a little easier.
“God, Xander, is that all you think about?” she asks. He can’t tell if it’s disgust or surprise or something else, and she can hear that too, damn.
That earns a laugh and a toast from the drunk Tony. Who’s shushed by three other Tonys working on some sort of holographic equation. He’s not one hundred percent certain what it’s for but figures they’ll let him in on it sooner or later. He’s surprised they even noticed that anyone else was here, let alone were bothered by it. Tony Stark on a roll could probably work through an apocalypse.
One Stark (on rotation, they can’t bother doing it all the time) is currently trying to work out what he’s decided to call The Power Problem of Doom, because it’s driving them all nuts trying to work it out, since it wasn’t a problem in their world and it’s like trying to find an alternative to something as basic as a AA battery. That’s how fundamental it feels like it should be, only it’s obviously not. It’s the teenage one, and he’s getting really, really frustrated, so someone else should take over soon, because he seriously is having trouble even getting started. They all are, really.
One of them is probably having a nightmare about something. They start out asleep but that’s never where they end up. The cave, the wormhole, almost losing Buffy, preying mantis ladies. There’s plenty of baggage to pick and choose from. On the whole when they’re active, they’re all active, but they can at least get some rest by letting the others take over. Even, to a very small extent, Xander, the personality they’ve decided to call Prime, since having some organization and idea who’s calling the shots helps out a lot.
“Uhhh.” Very eloquent Xander, well done is quickly met with shut up, me. He raises an eyebrow. “Did you even hear yourself just now?”
She blinks. “Point,” she acknowledges. Yes, one of us is pretty much always thinking about sex, because I am a teenage boy and therefore think about sex a lot, and there’s also the fact that I’m pretty sure most Starks are sex addicts, and goddess there’s a pun there and I’m not going to be able to stop it help—
And there’s another one trying to figure out business stuff. He actually does enjoy it—parts of it anyway. Not the working with people, because human systems aren’t their forte, but crunching the numbers is like solving problems, and that’s what he does, he’s the mechanic, he fixes things, and if he can figure out how to fix this, how to make them all better, the Scoobies and the life of the brave kid who’s given him a place to stay and actually made it feel like home and figure out the right way to make him a little cash so he can live like he should and the rest of the Scoobies because they deserve it too but they can’t get the attention of the government because they took Marcie and he doesn’t trust them (he doesn’t trust practically anybody, paranoia’s actually a gene here) or make too many waves (of the wrong kind, anyway) or making the world worse because
Because that’s what he’d done for so long, breaking all the things, putting cool stuff in the hands of people who never ever should have had access to it and he can’t make that mistake again—
Two of them are arguing—one of them wants registration complete with responsibility and accountability, and the other has had a million arguments with Maria about the same thing and would rather things stay accountable within his own team. It's an old argument, so everyone else is ignoring them.
She sees the file folders, the organized chaos of his mind, the way that everyone is categorized in a big manila folder that summarizes them in terms of a weird schematic doodle of a willow tree and the Au that is Buffy’s because she burns like the sun—
And then she sees the Tony having the breakdown in the corner, staring so fixedly at something that she looks and she catches a glimpse of two green dots that might be eyes, worrying about how he’s becoming his dad and everything he touches rusts, it’s an irreversible action of entropy when all he’d tried to do was ward away entropy
And then a Tony brushes past. “Sorry, darling, I’d love to talk but I’ve got this engagement,” he says with his sunglasses and one of his patented smiles-but it’s real and it’s brilliant and it loves her, they all love her because she’s Buffy and they’re all trying to figure out what anything means in the wake of so much love and fire and PEPPERPEPPERPEPPER so much that his little crush on her’s been filed away, stamped neatly as ‘archived’, and then he’s on the stage and there are people cheering and he soaks it up because of that stupid psychologist thing that says if he couldn’t have love from home he could seek it elsewhere, seek it and seek it and continue to seek it as he shows off because he’s a little boy with all his toys and he just wants a little recognition sometimes, when he bothers to notice, when he’s not too busy being an awesome genius
And suddenly he blinks, because he’s got clarity and he’s in the real world again and Buffy is just staring at him.
“Please tell me this isn’t going to become this awkward thing,” he jokes, a little of Stark in the smirk, and she feels the urge to reach across the table and smack him but knows that’s exactly the kind of reaction he’s trying to evoke.
They both have command of their situation, can read and control people if they don’t care about them, but if it’s people they care about they can’t just do a little experiment and whoops if the results are unexpected. Masters of misdirection, very good at manipulating people. Xander was just more…subtle.
Tony could be subtle. When he was hiding it behind the obvious. The man had layers. And she must still be slightly connected, because the smirk just gets a little more naughty and she rolls her eyes instead.
Tony was grandiose. Xander was understated, humble. Both manipulated situations so they’d be underestimated, like some sort of armor, and yet it drove them insane.
“Like ‘hey, I can read your mind’ isn’t going to be awkward?” Buffy asks.
The light goes on. Xander’s been paying attention. He can tell she’s insecure—experience. “Hey, it could be worse.” He takes a deep breath.
Time for truth. “After all, understanding’s a two way street, right?” Operation Scooby Repair coulda used this a long time—
“No, Xander,” Buffy says instantly, and the sudden flash of a smile is familiar, now.
“Reading loud and clear, Buff.” Cap.
He had trouble sleeping. No wonder, if they were always this active and noisy. He’d mentioned, briefly, tried to explain how it felt, post-Halloween, but words were clearly useless to communicate the reality.
“Is anyone else creeped out by this right now?” Cordy asks, watching them almost have a silent conversation.
“Oh, come on, outta everything we’ve seen, you’re freaked out the most by two good friends being able to communicate by eyebrow?” And for the first time, Buffy felt a little relaxed again, like the Xander she’d thought had changed forever was still here, just a little differently shaped.
“Yes.” Well, at least that was something. At least the Queen Bitch was honest. No matter how annoying that was.
“Wow.” And now that voice is in some weird sort of stereo. “I think I should probably consider that some sort of personal accomplishment. Maybe I should make a plaque? I think I could make a plaque. There’s probably enough scrap metal for one. That I’m not planning on using for something else.”
“Of course you’d go diving in the trash,” Cordy responds cattily, but Buffy catches a stray thought and grins back at Xander.
“Think you and your entourage could break out the secret imported hot chocolate stash?” she asks, and he gets up and bows.
“Only the best for Milady Slayer,” he grins theatrically. “Though I’ll probably have to get more since I’d be a terrible host if I didn’t offer some to everyone here. No matter how high they go on the annoyance scale on a regular basis.” Actually, most of the Tonys are amused by her, but it’s fun to banter. She’s got nice sharp claws.
Buffy snorts at this, but feels more grounded. “It’s nice having one person I can focus on. It makes me feel less like I’m going crazy.”
Well, aren’t you lucky that there’s enough of me to go around, he thinks, and ducks before he even finishes the thought. It’s lucky, or that book would’ve nailed him, too.
She blinks at the realization. Tony treats innuendo like it’s some messed up version of Scrabble. Some of the ‘peanut gallery’ probably mean it, but the rest are monogamous or consider her jailbait or are having too much fun actually having friends who’ve got their back or are a little distracted by the unique opportunities presented by the little Halloween mishap.
Don’t know if you got the memo, I like memos, they should be given to everyone, including that average homeless Joe on the street, but you’re not crazy. Expert, here. On a ton of things. I’ve got several PhDs and no paperwork and that’s beside the point. Also meddler. Pretty sure Angelus said that one. So, yeah, I probably shouldn’t know about the mental hospital, or whatever, and you can tear me a new one if you want, and it’s maybe stalkerish. Anyone tries anything like that again and they go through me. I’m holding back. Don’t need the suit. Trying not to draw attention. But I can, with the knowledge that I know, absolutely positively ruin their lives for the rest of their lives to a startling degree. I’ve got your back, Buff.
She doesn’t realize that he’s finished actions speak loudest of all but he’s suddenly handing out cups of hot cocoa to all of them, complete with little marshmallows, bowing with a flourish once he finishes. “Enjoy,” he purrs, and then he sits down and puts his feet on the table which drives G-man crazy and sips from his cup, looking smug like he’s just taken on the world.
Honestly, maybe he has.
“I need my own stash,” she moans into the cup. You’re welcome, he responds, and she knows it’s for more than just the drink. “No, second thoughts, Mom needs a stash so that she can make her hot chocolate. I didn’t think it could be better, but she could do it.”
Consider it done. Xander’s practically salvating at the thought, and another Tony gets distracted by the thought of food. She doesn’t recognize the accent, but after that she actually thinks she can sit down and rest for a while.
“How do you not go insane?” she asks, and he grins.
It’s a balancing act but it’s no more difficult than doing diff eq in your head. Like I do now. Apparently. There’s at least one Tony wasted in his head, all the time. Tony, the Iron Maiden, (who he tried to differentiate from the others by using an i but she’d hid in the mental equivalent of an attic until he stopped) wolf whistles Buffy, who rolls her eyes in response and gets lots of thoughts about lesbian sex in response. I apologize for the peanut gallery, he continues, and gets loud booing in response. They’re suddenly on a stage in a grand opera house. See, the trick to multitasking with many different people in your head is letting yourself think all these weird thoughts and just letting someone else in your head deal with it. It makes listening to conversations a little easier.
“God, Xander, is that all you think about?” she asks. He can’t tell if it’s disgust or surprise or something else, and she can hear that too, damn.
That earns a laugh and a toast from the drunk Tony. Who’s shushed by three other Tonys working on some sort of holographic equation. He’s not one hundred percent certain what it’s for but figures they’ll let him in on it sooner or later. He’s surprised they even noticed that anyone else was here, let alone were bothered by it. Tony Stark on a roll could probably work through an apocalypse.
One Stark (on rotation, they can’t bother doing it all the time) is currently trying to work out what he’s decided to call The Power Problem of Doom, because it’s driving them all nuts trying to work it out, since it wasn’t a problem in their world and it’s like trying to find an alternative to something as basic as a AA battery. That’s how fundamental it feels like it should be, only it’s obviously not. It’s the teenage one, and he’s getting really, really frustrated, so someone else should take over soon, because he seriously is having trouble even getting started. They all are, really.
One of them is probably having a nightmare about something. They start out asleep but that’s never where they end up. The cave, the wormhole, almost losing Buffy, preying mantis ladies. There’s plenty of baggage to pick and choose from. On the whole when they’re active, they’re all active, but they can at least get some rest by letting the others take over. Even, to a very small extent, Xander, the personality they’ve decided to call Prime, since having some organization and idea who’s calling the shots helps out a lot.
“Uhhh.” Very eloquent Xander, well done is quickly met with shut up, me. He raises an eyebrow. “Did you even hear yourself just now?”
She blinks. “Point,” she acknowledges. Yes, one of us is pretty much always thinking about sex, because I am a teenage boy and therefore think about sex a lot, and there’s also the fact that I’m pretty sure most Starks are sex addicts, and goddess there’s a pun there and I’m not going to be able to stop it help—
And there’s another one trying to figure out business stuff. He actually does enjoy it—parts of it anyway. Not the working with people, because human systems aren’t their forte, but crunching the numbers is like solving problems, and that’s what he does, he’s the mechanic, he fixes things, and if he can figure out how to fix this, how to make them all better, the Scoobies and the life of the brave kid who’s given him a place to stay and actually made it feel like home and figure out the right way to make him a little cash so he can live like he should and the rest of the Scoobies because they deserve it too but they can’t get the attention of the government because they took Marcie and he doesn’t trust them (he doesn’t trust practically anybody, paranoia’s actually a gene here) or make too many waves (of the wrong kind, anyway) or making the world worse because
Because that’s what he’d done for so long, breaking all the things, putting cool stuff in the hands of people who never ever should have had access to it and he can’t make that mistake again—
Two of them are arguing—one of them wants registration complete with responsibility and accountability, and the other has had a million arguments with Maria about the same thing and would rather things stay accountable within his own team. It's an old argument, so everyone else is ignoring them.
She sees the file folders, the organized chaos of his mind, the way that everyone is categorized in a big manila folder that summarizes them in terms of a weird schematic doodle of a willow tree and the Au that is Buffy’s because she burns like the sun—
And then she sees the Tony having the breakdown in the corner, staring so fixedly at something that she looks and she catches a glimpse of two green dots that might be eyes, worrying about how he’s becoming his dad and everything he touches rusts, it’s an irreversible action of entropy when all he’d tried to do was ward away entropy
And then a Tony brushes past. “Sorry, darling, I’d love to talk but I’ve got this engagement,” he says with his sunglasses and one of his patented smiles-but it’s real and it’s brilliant and it loves her, they all love her because she’s Buffy and they’re all trying to figure out what anything means in the wake of so much love and fire and PEPPERPEPPERPEPPER so much that his little crush on her’s been filed away, stamped neatly as ‘archived’, and then he’s on the stage and there are people cheering and he soaks it up because of that stupid psychologist thing that says if he couldn’t have love from home he could seek it elsewhere, seek it and seek it and continue to seek it as he shows off because he’s a little boy with all his toys and he just wants a little recognition sometimes, when he bothers to notice, when he’s not too busy being an awesome genius
And suddenly he blinks, because he’s got clarity and he’s in the real world again and Buffy is just staring at him.
“Please tell me this isn’t going to become this awkward thing,” he jokes, a little of Stark in the smirk, and she feels the urge to reach across the table and smack him but knows that’s exactly the kind of reaction he’s trying to evoke.
They both have command of their situation, can read and control people if they don’t care about them, but if it’s people they care about they can’t just do a little experiment and whoops if the results are unexpected. Masters of misdirection, very good at manipulating people. Xander was just more…subtle.
Tony could be subtle. When he was hiding it behind the obvious. The man had layers. And she must still be slightly connected, because the smirk just gets a little more naughty and she rolls her eyes instead.
Tony was grandiose. Xander was understated, humble. Both manipulated situations so they’d be underestimated, like some sort of armor, and yet it drove them insane.
“Like ‘hey, I can read your mind’ isn’t going to be awkward?” Buffy asks.
The light goes on. Xander’s been paying attention. He can tell she’s insecure—experience. “Hey, it could be worse.” He takes a deep breath.
Time for truth. “After all, understanding’s a two way street, right?” Operation Scooby Repair coulda used this a long time—
“No, Xander,” Buffy says instantly, and the sudden flash of a smile is familiar, now.
“Reading loud and clear, Buff.” Cap.
He had trouble sleeping. No wonder, if they were always this active and noisy. He’d mentioned, briefly, tried to explain how it felt, post-Halloween, but words were clearly useless to communicate the reality.
“Is anyone else creeped out by this right now?” Cordy asks, watching them almost have a silent conversation.
“Oh, come on, outta everything we’ve seen, you’re freaked out the most by two good friends being able to communicate by eyebrow?” And for the first time, Buffy felt a little relaxed again, like the Xander she’d thought had changed forever was still here, just a little differently shaped.
“Yes.” Well, at least that was something. At least the Queen Bitch was honest. No matter how annoying that was.
“Wow.” And now that voice is in some weird sort of stereo. “I think I should probably consider that some sort of personal accomplishment. Maybe I should make a plaque? I think I could make a plaque. There’s probably enough scrap metal for one. That I’m not planning on using for something else.”
“Of course you’d go diving in the trash,” Cordy responds cattily, but Buffy catches a stray thought and grins back at Xander.
“Think you and your entourage could break out the secret imported hot chocolate stash?” she asks, and he gets up and bows.
“Only the best for Milady Slayer,” he grins theatrically. “Though I’ll probably have to get more since I’d be a terrible host if I didn’t offer some to everyone here. No matter how high they go on the annoyance scale on a regular basis.” Actually, most of the Tonys are amused by her, but it’s fun to banter. She’s got nice sharp claws.
Buffy snorts at this, but feels more grounded. “It’s nice having one person I can focus on. It makes me feel less like I’m going crazy.”
Well, aren’t you lucky that there’s enough of me to go around, he thinks, and ducks before he even finishes the thought. It’s lucky, or that book would’ve nailed him, too.
She blinks at the realization. Tony treats innuendo like it’s some messed up version of Scrabble. Some of the ‘peanut gallery’ probably mean it, but the rest are monogamous or consider her jailbait or are having too much fun actually having friends who’ve got their back or are a little distracted by the unique opportunities presented by the little Halloween mishap.
Don’t know if you got the memo, I like memos, they should be given to everyone, including that average homeless Joe on the street, but you’re not crazy. Expert, here. On a ton of things. I’ve got several PhDs and no paperwork and that’s beside the point. Also meddler. Pretty sure Angelus said that one. So, yeah, I probably shouldn’t know about the mental hospital, or whatever, and you can tear me a new one if you want, and it’s maybe stalkerish. Anyone tries anything like that again and they go through me. I’m holding back. Don’t need the suit. Trying not to draw attention. But I can, with the knowledge that I know, absolutely positively ruin their lives for the rest of their lives to a startling degree. I’ve got your back, Buff.
She doesn’t realize that he’s finished actions speak loudest of all but he’s suddenly handing out cups of hot cocoa to all of them, complete with little marshmallows, bowing with a flourish once he finishes. “Enjoy,” he purrs, and then he sits down and puts his feet on the table which drives G-man crazy and sips from his cup, looking smug like he’s just taken on the world.
Honestly, maybe he has.
“I need my own stash,” she moans into the cup. You’re welcome, he responds, and she knows it’s for more than just the drink. “No, second thoughts, Mom needs a stash so that she can make her hot chocolate. I didn’t think it could be better, but she could do it.”
Consider it done. Xander’s practically salvating at the thought, and another Tony gets distracted by the thought of food. She doesn’t recognize the accent, but after that she actually thinks she can sit down and rest for a while.