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Clint will drink anything. Literally anything. It's kind of gross, actually. Tony doesn't usually consider himself picky (anyone who's known him longer than fifteen minutes would find this hysterical), but the fact that he's seen Barton drink day old coffee straight out of the pot is just too disgusting for words.
The next time he catches him drinking stale dregs he's on his way from Bruce's lab to his own, and he swings back around, waving a hand. "Whoa, whoa, whoa, Hawkeye-- you gotta stop this, I can't handle it."
Clint looks up at him over the rim of the chipped mug he's poured the stuff into. (Tony has no idea where that mug came from. It most certainly did not come out of his budget, so it must have come with Clint.) "Why?"
"Because it's awful," Tony says, with a note of flat disbelief.
"Better than it going to waste," Clint raises an eyebrow, "Thought we were watching out for waste."
Tony shakes his head, "That's Pepper's initiative. When I'm around we don't drink coffee that's been out for a week."
"Natasha made this this morning."
"In coffee terms, that's like two weeks."
Clint shrugs again, "Well, where I'm from we don't just throw stuff out. Nobody's asking you to drink it."
Tony raises an eyebrow, takes a step back, half-turns toward the lab. "I could get one of the bots to make sure the coffee's never older than forty minutes." He says this in his I'm being helpful tone of voice.
Clint grins, "And I could get just about any one of us save Steve to, uh, disassemble the thing so that I can keep making sure coffee doesn't go to waste."
"You wouldn't."
There's something in Clint's expression that reminds Tony that Clint -- for all he seems like the laid-back, mostly quiet, Poker-buddy type -- is actually a super spy with some serious skills. "Try me."
Tony decides he better reevaluate this Fresh Coffee To Save Barton initiative.
~*~
"It's wasteful, Pepper," Tony says, for what is probably the hundredth time. He might love to hear himself talk, sure, but he doesn't particularly enjoy repeating himself.
Pepper gives him a flat look from behind her desk, and he takes his feet off the edge of it and sits up. "We reuse the pods, Tony."
"You keep saying that, but I don't see any evidence of it."
"Because you're here, in my office, so very often."
Tony holds up his hands, "Hey, look, I'm not in your day-to-day, that's how we both like it--"
"Yes," Pepper says, dangerously serene, "It is."
"I just think you can do better, especially with this green initiative. I mean, this is an easy piece, Pep."
"Tony, I don't need you to explain my own initiatives to me."
His eyebrows go up, "Oh. Your initiatives, oh I see Miss Potts."
"MS. Potts, and you know I'm not saying you don't have any input here."
"What percentage input would you say I have?"
"Whatever percentage that gets you to leave my coffee alone and let me get back to work."
"So, what, eighty? Eighty-five?"
She rolls her eyes, and turns back to the screen full of spreadsheets. "Thank you, Mr. Stark. Have a lovely afternoon."
"Now I'm being dismissed."
"You should get used to that," without looking back up at him.
"It's just so-- Pepper, it's not even good coffee, it doesn't even make a good cup. I could easily--"
"That won't be necessary."
He gets up and paces a moment before turning back to her, "I mean-- what's even the appeal?"
"It's hot, it's fresh, it's fast, and I can do it with minimal disruption." She tosses him a look, "I think you understand about seventy-five percent of that list."
"You and percentages." Tony goes to mess with the machine -- what Pepper says is probably true, but this stuff tastes awful and, even worse, the machine itself is hideous. No design element at all, just clunky black plastic and a drip tray. Ugh. "You could at least let me dress it up a little."
"Because God knows what I need is a cherry red coffee maker, would you please get out?"
Tony shrugs, leaning in to open the little hatch where the pods go, "Doesn't have to be red."
He hears Pepper get up, "Don't-- what are you doing? Don't take it apart!"
"Where would you get an idea like that?" His voice has that slightly distant quality, he notices it but he doesn't really care -- about to take something apart, put something together, build something new, figure something out. But Pepper takes his elbow and turns him gently away.
"I know you," she says, and smiles at him, that smile that is wry and loving and just patient enough to put up with his shit.
"Well," he says, giving in. (Because how can he not? Look at her -- her and her damned sensibility. She's so great it's stupid.) "But if you decide you want something better, you know--"
"Yes, I know. You're my guy."
"Oh, now here we go with the mushiness," he says, sarcastically.
"Get out." She kisses him, quickly, and shoves him toward the door.
~*~
Bruce wanders into Tony's lab, grumbling, "No idea why everybody's always asking me to make the coffee."
"It's because of Science," says Tony, without looking up from the circuit board.
"That-- doesn't even make sense."
"Sure it does. Not that one-- hold still." He swears he programmed DUM-E better than this. "Yes, good. Right there. Don't move or you're scrap. Again."
Bruce ambles over, leaning to peer over Tony's shoulder at the magnifying glass that Tony's holding, "What does science have to do with coffee?"
"Only everything."
"What, just because a guy uses beakers and Bunsen burners he ought to know how to use a--"
"Vacuum coffee maker, yes-- I swear to God, DUM-E. I'm not fooling around."
"Funny that you should make an AI that's so distractible."
Tony sits up at last, elbowing Bruce in the gut for good measure, "Is it?"
"Hilarious," dryly as he takes a step back.
"Well did you come here to whine about being asked to help with household chores?"
Bruce grins, folds and unfolds his hands, "Making coffee isn't a household chore."
"Aren't we disagreeable today?" Tony sets aside the soldering iron. "So what's your beef then?"
"Well, I do know how to make coffee -- I've worked in enough research labs, it's a required skill--"
"See?" Tony says, pointing at Bruce, "SCIENCE."
"Right, but I don't drink it."
Tony makes the sort of noise one makes when a realization is dawning, "Ohhhhh, I get it. Keep the Other Guy uncaffeinated."
"No," Bruce laughs, "No, I just don't like it."
"You're not a--"
"Tea drinker. Not ashamed to admit it." Bruce grins as Tony shakes his head ruefully.
Tony starts off with, "You know who else drinks tea.."
And Bruce says, "I do. Captain Picard."
"Oh, shit, you got me there. I withdraw my complaint."
"Any reasonable man would," Bruce is eyeballing some other work-in-progress, which Tony shoos him away from. "Only I don't care much for Earl Grey."
"And yet you use the Picard Defense. Interesting. Stop touching things."
"You come into my lab and mess with stuff all the time," Bruce points out.
"Yeah, and I own the place."
"You're really obnoxious, you know that?"
"So what is it, then, Darjeeling?"
"Usually, yeah," Bruce grins at him, "Look who knows so much."
"Indeed. Just so. Put that down."
"I'm helping."
“Help by making that coffee. I could go for some right now.”
“Sure, sure,” Bruce says, starting toward the door, “But only if I get to play lab assistant.”
Tony turns just in time to snatch his mug off the table before DUM-E gets to it, shouting over his shoulder, “Lab assistant’s not a game!”
“Could’ve fooled me,” Bruce tosses back.
~*~
Coulson and Hill always drink espresso. They each have one double shot when they first get in and one at the mid-morning break. Tony finds their military-like precision in coffee drinking to be both disturbing and fascinating. Once he asked Hill about it and she looked at him like he had four heads (as if she'd never seen a humanoid with four heads, sheesh) and simply said, "It's efficient."
Tony couldn't really argue with that.
There are plenty of days when neither Coulson nor Hill is at the Tower, but they do occasionally come in for meetings -- somehow Hill's gotten roped into some of the PR management on the SHIELD side, probably because Fury would rather skip it -- and so eventually Tony has a really nice espresso machine installed in the boardroom on the 76th floor. Which is when he learns that Coulson knows more about espresso machines than Tony really counted on.
"It's a nice one," Coulson says, eyeing the machine critically. “Surprised you went with a La Pavoni lever model."
Tony shrugs, “Rather have a little more control.”
Coulson only makes a tiny hm sort of noise. It’s very Natasha, actually. As Tony picks up a demitasse, he says, “Little heavy on the flash but I guess if it it's easy to maintain--"
Tony raises an eyebrow, turns to the machine, and starts making Coulson's shots. "You're worried about the maintenance of a machine in my house?"
"Well," Coulson eases his hands into his pockets, "It's not a car, you know. Or a droid."
"Droid's a trademarked term," Tony says, peeved.
"Robot," Coulson allows.
"It's a machine," says Tony, pulling the cup from under the portafilter. He turns, smoothly, and offers the demitasse to Coulson on a little saucer, "I'm good at machines. Maybe you didn't notice? I guess it's not possible for one guy to notice everything."
Coulson just smiles at him; he doesn't even pull his hands out of his pocket, he just smiles. You have to give the guy credit -- he's a pretty slick bastard when he wants to be. Tony holds the cup out to him as he walks past and sure enough, Coulson takes it smoothly off his hands just before Tony would've dropped it.
"I assume you're going to pull one for Hill, when she gets here."
"Oh, you know-- probably."
Coulson sips the espresso, making a thoughtful, neutral face. Tony knows that face. When he looks absolutely neutral it most likely means that Coulson is judging you. The only person who never gets that face is Steve.
"Pretty good," he says eventually, then tips back the rest of the drink. He sets the cup and saucer neatly next to the machine. “I think,” he says, “Any room for improvement probably lies with the barista.”
"Tony's a barista now?" Pepper says, sweeping in. She and Coulson exchange one of those looks that Tony's taken to pretending he ignores.
"He pulls a decent shot," Coulson says, almost sunnily.
Tony has to admit that he respects the guy -- it's hard not to -- for all he gives him shit.
“He’s a fast learner,” Pepper says, with one of her wry, almost-sweet smiles, “It’s one of his good qualities.”
“One of many, you mean,” Tony say, reaching for the file folder she’s carrying.
Pepper lifts the folder right back out of his grasp. “Why don’t you pull me one as well, if you’re taking orders.”
“Stark takes orders now?” Coulson says, and Pepper laughs.
~*~
Tony comes into the kitchen and Steve and Natasha are at the stove, their backs to him, focused intently on something. For just a second, Tony gets excited -- and then he remembers that these two aren't exactly likely to be conducting any kind of lab experiment. Natasha's talking quietly to Steve and Steve has his head tilted slightly toward her; if he weren't so damned tall he wouldn't need to do that.
"What're you two super soldiers up to?"
"I'm not a super soldier," Natasha reminds him, "And we're making coffee."
"Oh, do tell!" Tony saunters over to see, and finds that they are making coffee, yes. Very very tiny, very fancy cups of coffee. Turkish coffee, to be exact.
"Miss Romanoff is showing me how to make Turkish coffee," Steve says. Unnecessarily.
"I can see that, Cap. Looks pretty boring."
Natasha doesn't take her eyes off the little copper pot. "You have weird ideas about fun."
"Watching water boil could be fun," Tony allows. "Under the right circumstances. But right now, it isn't."
"It's interesting," says Steve, looking at Tony with that bright look he sometimes gets, that he usually tries not to show to Tony. Tony knows that look -- curiosity.
"You'd think so." Tony points at him. He realizes he's probably too close to Natasha, so he rocks back on his heels.
"No, really," Steve says, turning to lean against the counter. "I was thinking about how I used to make coffee for my mom when I was a kid. It wasn't really like this, but not so different."
"What," Tony says, with mock interest, "Tossing grounds into the cast-iron pot over the hearth fire?"
"Stove top percolator." Steve's getting very good at responding to Tony as if Tony won't have any idea what he's talking about; Tony doesn't like it -- that's his trick -- but he can respect it. Cap can hold his own. "See, you filled it up with water, and--"
"You two should run along," says Natasha, stirring the coffee slowly.
"No, no," Steve says, suddenly apologetic, "I want to try it. It looks good."
"It is good," says Tony. "She's just taking forever about it."
"Some things," Natasha says, her eyes still on the coffee -- she lifts it off the burner for a moment, then sets it down again, "Are worth waiting for."
"Can't blame Stark for wanting everything right this minute," Steve shoves his hands in his pockets, and Natasha gives one of her little shrugs - you've got a point. He doesn't sound smug; Tony figures he's still learning how to poke fun at him. "But really. I used to put the grounds in the pot, just like this, and then you couldn't really just walk away from it - you had to watch the time to see when it was really done. Mom liked hers strong."
Natasha smiles, "Your mother was a smart woman."
"Look, Rogers, if you really want something interesting, come by the lab later and I'll show you how to make it in a vacuum."
Steve looks over at him -- faintly wary, he could swear -- and then says, "Sure, and then I'll show you how to make it out of those little packets we used to get in the C-rations."
Tony makes a face, "Ugh. You can still get that stuff. It's terrible. Enjoy watching your water boil."
As he goes out, he's half-tempted to elbow Natasha (a friendly, joshing elbow) but he'd rather not find himself pinned to the ground with boiling coffee all down his front, so he decides not to.
~*~
Thor really likes those big, chocolatey Starbucks abominations that are barely even coffee. Usually every weekday afternoon, when Darcy's coming in for her social media meeting with Pepper, she's got one of those cardboard carriers stocked with two cups big enough that if they were soda, Bloomberg would've tried to outlaw them. Today she swings in, throws her bag on the sofa, and heads out to the balcony where she expects Thor to come in, any minute. Tony stops her.
"You sure you should give the big guy that much sugar and caffeine?"
Darcy's drinking hers at what is, really, an incredible rate. How she doesn't get brain freeze is beyond even Tony's grasp of science. "I thought Banner was 'the big guy'."
"No," Tony says, patiently. (It's a tone of voice he'd never use with anybody else, for fear of getting one of Those Looks, but Darcy usually takes it as verbal sparring.) "Banner's guy is 'the other guy.' Banner's not usually big."
"Thor's not that big."
"Thor's a human mountain."
Darcy grins, chewing on her straw, "You would think that, because you're like four feet tall."
"I'm taller than you," pointing just above her head with his laser pointer.
"You're wearing those shoes."
"This isn't about me."
Darcy gives him the look that says, yeah right. "Look, he can barely get drunk off even our worst grain alcohol." (This is true. They've tried.) "I'm not really too concerned about some sugar."
"And caffeine," Tony points out.
"Or caffeine." She looks up, squinting against the sunshine. "Quit being a buzzkill, I thought you were Mister Fun."
"Well, it's not fun if Thor goes on a sugar high and smashes up all my stuff."
"I thought Banner did the smashing?"
"That's the Other Guy."
"Stop being a dad is what I'm saying," with a roll of her eyes, and just as Thor drops down to the balcony, only rattling the windows a little bit.
"Friend Darcy!" And here comes the ridiculous hug. "You have brought me a gift!"
He always sounds surprised, even though she does this every day. That's one thing about Thor that Tony really appreciates -- just about everything delights him.
"Take it easy, there, Tiger," Darcy says, laughing, and hands him the drink.
"Ah, I see they have given us more whipped cream than usual," Thor grins, staring down at the drink in something like fascination. "And what are these?"
"Sprinkles," Tony says, just as Darcy says, "Jimmies."
Thor laughs in such a way that Tony supposes he can’t really begrudge him the sugar high. “Astounding!” He sounds like he really means it, too, “You should bring one for Stark.”
“Nooo, thank you,” Tony says, turning to go. “Real deal only, thank you very much.”
“I thought you enjoyed all good things in life?”
Tony swivels back around, “I do. Key word there is ‘good.’ You might also know that I’m a—“
“Fun killer,” says Darcy, around the sadly chewed end of her straw.
“Purist,” finishes Tony. “Don’t wreck up the place.”
As he goes back inside, he hears Darcy telling Thor excitedly about some new music she’s bought, offering to loan him her iPod during her meeting with Pepper. Tony will find him later with the tiny little earbuds in his ear, grinning broadly, empty Starbucks cup beside him.