4341/Be better, do better

Be better, do better
Date of Scene:	25 April 2018
Location:	Avengers Mansion, New York City
Synopsis:	Steve converses with Tony about the last mission's flaws.
Cast of Characters:	Captain America, Iron Man

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Captain America has posed:
    The old wooden desk in the den of Avengers mansion does not see much traffic, all told. The only one to take up space in its comfortably stuffed chair is Steve Rogers who at times sits there and answers what fan mail that he can, never able to make a dent in it... but sometimes able to take a handful to that desk and then hand-write a response to the few that he can.
    Only tonight what's drawn him to the desk is a less enjoyable task. The last operation the Avengers went on had been successful. Rough. But successful. Though in success there is still loss and right now the name of Special Agent Allen Jansen remains alone at the top of the letter just underneath the official letterhead.
    It's far from the first of these letters that he's written. Likely it won't be the last. Even still, nothing ever seems to fit. The words always seem to be such a weak vehicle of expression. That's why he's been there for a good bit of time, the silence at least some help to his thoughts.

Iron Man has posed:
    Doing eight hundred things at once takes a toll, even on the king of all multitaskers. Still, not showing weakness of any sort is also one of the things that Tony does, so it isn't too evident. He has not been by the Avengers mansion to do more than drop things off or pick things up, so it has not felt the presence of Stark for a little while. It's been quiet!
    The Tower, though, has needs too. Tony stops in, literally tossing a few new things into one of the downstairs basement labs, and makes a beeline to the Den for some brief time to himself. He enters while stripping off a device off of his ear, with "I'll be offline for-- say, half an hour, JARVIS," into it, dropping it away into a coat pocket and shedding the coat entirely.
    A quick gesture of hand also makes short work of tie, which he strips off skillfully while purposefully striding to the mini-bar. Then, a glance is certainly given to Steve, noticing him at the desk after he's about halfway across the room, briefly surprised: the quirk of brows betrays it. "Oh hey," Tony greets simply, any exhaustion hidden. Clearly just thirsty. But he takes in ...real letters? "Get annoyed with your computer again?"

Captain America has posed:
    "Hey," Steve lifts a hand in greeting, turning in the chair to look across the distance towards Tony, perhaps grateful for the distraction or for the chance to rest his thoughts. Then the jape about his impatience with his computer and he shakes his head, "Hm? Oh no." He gestures behind him, as if encompassing not just the desk but everything on his mind of late.
    The chair squeaks as he turns around to face Tony and tells him, "I need your thoughts on the Op." He uncurls a hand, perhaps glad to take up this puzzle. "Each phase, points of failure, adjustments. The work went well, but it didn't seem clean." He makes no further statement as to the quality of the mission, instead leaving it to Tony to give his angle without his words further colouring his opinion.

Iron Man has posed:
Tony still had his sunglasses on from outside, which meant he was.. looking over them a lot. He finally pulls them off. It's overdramatic, that sunglass removal. But also a brief stall tactic. Only brief: Tony doesn't need much to orient on the new topic at all. He's quick on the uptake.
    "I wasn't physically there for most of it. I had my own personal warehouse laboratory," Tony reminds, but smirks briefly. "...Not that I'm saying that matters. I still have /opinions/." Not to worry, Tony will certainly talk.
    "The largest observation I had with it was it felt like we rolled the dice and got lucky. A bunch of times. I'm still surprised some of us didn't have to chase the Hulk across the city ... again."

Captain America has posed:
    That pen still in his hand lightly taps upon his fingertips as he looks to the side, "I think we're going to have to scale back Hulk's operational status. Away from situations that have possible non-combatants. Just too many variables and not enough avenues to advance on to recover if something goes pear-shaped." He waves a hand to the side as if dismissing the issue with Hulk, however.
    "Still, I think maybe in this case less might have been more." He looks behind him for a moment, his eyes resting on the desk, then he looks back. "More intel about the facility? Or perhaps I didn't allocate our forces effectively." A pause then he adds, "Something along those lines."

Iron Man has posed:
    Tony listens while he continues walking to the mini bar. He lifts one of the empty glasses and waggles it in a 'want this?' motion at Steve, as opposed to interrupting the other man while he's talking to directly ask. Regardless, he'll begin making something for himself. A tall something, that's for sure.
    "He's a big gun," Tony observes of Hulk, without too much additional commentary, just: "He's been worse. Just unpredictable and... sometimes escalating. And not in the good way that I am." Tony grins briefly, screwing a cap back onto one of the bottles, bending to put it away again.
    "Hostage situations are never something that works to plan, though. It's /always/ ugly." Tony pauses. "You want me to tell you what I think could've been better?" Tony asks. "Well. I think we could have gone in quietly, first. Maybe used the SHIELD stealth people up front, and gotten some snipers set up."

Captain America has posed:
    "Almost always the better way," Cap says in response even as he pushes a rough hand through his hair and frowns. To be fair, however, he prefers any plan where he goes in first and takes the heat. "Would have been better if myself, Rogue, maybe another with Drone Buddy." He rubs the back of his neck thoughtfully, "Hit it first from stealth, drew the heat, then the others move in."
    But he shakes his head, "Anyways..."
    A strange thing for him to say, but then he lifts his chin, "What brings you down here tonight? Usually you like to do your drinking in company." That he knows.

Iron Man has posed:
    "Pretty logical: you go in blazing, and the hostages end up being in the middle of it. Like they did. I /expected/ my surviellance bots to get another pass over it before we rang the doorbell, but eh. I think... you felt like the outside got out of control," Tony suggests. "Which... it did. Those mutants needed to be cured of that fear gas right off the bat before they exploded. We missed having Hawkeye there, he's usually right on the ball with that stuff. ...But don't tell him I said so."
    There's an amused soft laugh to the drinking remark. "I do my drinking in /all/ situations," Tony answers, cheeky, raising his glass in a toast to it, or just to add emphasis. "I'm a wide opportunist consumer." But not an alcoholic.
    "Clearly the main problem was I wasn't there to help; glad to be needed," Tony smiles into his glass, walking across the den now, towards Steve, towards one of the chairs in a closer proximity. If he's going to chat, he's not going to do it from across the room. "Dropped some more evidence off." Which answers the 'why at the mansion', but less about the den itself.
    Tony gets close enough to see some of the fan mail, and reaches out to pick up a piece of it that has a drawing on the envelope. It brings a brief smile out that isn't one of Tony's more polished broad ones, but a subtle, small one.

Captain America has posed:
    As Tony draws near, Steve reaches behind him and folds up the letter of condolences, not out of any sense of embarrassment or the like, but perhaps out of a desire to spare that facet of command from Tony. For now at least. He folds the small paper and sets it to the side inside that oaken desk, though he turns back to face the billionaire.
    "I think that may be it in part," Allowing that Tony is right. "We lacked the precision we have perhaps become accustomed to having." He takes a breath and then leans forwards, still holding that pen and tapping it lightly against his off hand, his blue eyes distancing. "Or, perhaps we might want to consider broadening our ranks and doing less liaising with SHIELD.
    He draws up, taking a deep breath. "A lot of the challenges we face, Tony... it's too much to expect conventional troops to be directly in the line of fire." Not that that stopped them years ago in the war, but for some reason this feels different.

Iron Man has posed:
    "I'm not sure that throwing some kid with powers they're unused to against these threats is better," Tony shrugs. "SHIELD at least know what they're in for. Do we have the training?"
    Tony isn't judging, he's merely asking, and settles into the chair he'd picked, after pulling over another a little to put his feet up on it. He also undoes a few buttons of his shirt, tie loosely hanging from one pants pocket, draped in the chair at his thigh.
    "We did get something from this, though; the Bat people are more willing to chat. I'm still working to get the Justice League more on board. I went to the Xavier Institute earlier today to check on one of the mutants that was kidnapped - the earthquake maker. Shy, could barely control his powers." A snap of fingers then, as Tony remembers. "/And/ he's getting the waking nightmares symptom. Did I tell you? That latest gas, even though our antidote worked, still makes these... semi-lucid visions for a few days on these poor people. I... /really/ want to catch this piece of work." There's some venom on the last sentence.

Captain America has posed:
    Lifting a hand to rub at the back of his neck, Steve furrows his brow. "If you get the chance..." He says, thoughtfully, as his eyes distance. "Maybe we can get some information from the other groups of individuals that function similarly to ourselves." He takes a deep breath and then reaches for the glass of water that had been left, on a coaster of course, on the desk. A sip is taken.
    "See if we can build up some sort of understanding of who is out there, how available they are, and what their down time is like. There has to be more assets out there and a better way of using it."
    He sets the glass back down and then adds, "Though I doubt they will want to lose their autonomy." His head lifts, "But if you give me the information, Tony, I'll take it to them and see if I can get at least some promises."

Iron Man has posed:
    "Sure," Tony says, openly, with a wave of hand (with drink in it), as if it were a very easy request. "I've got some sizable lists on my own, plus SHIELD -- not that I'd entirely trust everything they have lately, after those leaks-- and I'll get those others to contribute." Tony fingers the edge of the fan mail, lifting his brows, showing the funny young drawing of Captain America on it.
    "Pretty sure you'll at least make some people pretty jazzed over being visited, even if they aren't immediately convinced. And hey, you also have me, to seal any deals," Tony points out grandly, and loosely tosses the letter back onto the fan mail stacks.

Captain America has posed:
    "Alright," Steve says as he nods, feeling perhaps marginally better that he's decided on a course of action that would... maybe make things better. His eyebrows knit together and then, for one of those rare times, Cap yawns slowly and stifles the yawn with one hand. The weariness on him seems heavy, but likely... it's not a physical kind.
    "I should get things done down here," He turns back towards the desk and touches a hand to the corner of that folded letter then pulls it back towards himself. He opens the first fold just so he can look again at the name. The letterhead. He shakes his head and looks sidelong in Tony's direction, "Are you going to be here tonight or off at the tower?" He asks, not for any obvious reason. Perhaps just to know.

Iron Man has posed:
    Tony isn't paying attention to the other letter that Steve keeps fiddling with. Or he's aware of it but has made a choice to ignore it. Something uncomfortable there, and Tony doesn't need to ask.
    "I'm getting something very important done," Tony clarifies, and taps the drink. "What? Probably the tower. Eventually. Pepper's scheduled some painfully early meetings. And I /did/ request them, so I'd really better attend them," Tony comments, finally unable to fight his own sympathetic yawn. "--You're making /me/ yawn, man of famous endurance. What's worn /you/ down?" Tony asks.

Captain America has posed:
    A small exhalation that almost sounds like a 'heh' comes from him, he closes the letter again and sets it to the side. Lifting blue eyes up he meets Tony's gaze and tells him levelly, "Nothing," He leaves it there for a moment, perhaps pondering another word, then he adds. "Just a lot on our plate."
    He turns back to the desk and then waves Tony off, "You go get me that data, I'll make the rounds. See who nibbles and what we can do with them." A beat, then he adds, "I'll try and catch you tomorrow."
    Setting that pen down upon the desk he adds without looking back this time, "Say hello to Pepper for me."

Iron Man has posed:
    Tony stares into the blue eyed 'nothing', and doesn't buy it for a moment. Still, his own sharp brown eyes pick over it, and a sleek, half-smile is the reply. "My plate is covered in /more/ plates," Tony comments, with the bravado he often affects. "But wouldn't have it another way."
    The drink gets finished off, with pleasure. "Yep, sure thing, as soon as I finish procrastinating about it," Tony assures Steve, when he's told to 'go do' something. Resisting just for the sake of resisting about it.
    "I will, but she'll probably invite you to dinner, if I do. She likes you for some reason," Tony answers, as if he couldn't understand it at all.

Captain America has posed:
    "That poor crazy woman," Cap says with a smile though it's unseenn for the moment. "G'night, Tony."

Iron Man has posed:
    "Yeah," Tony agrees, distracted, and his tone has a funny affection in it. Pepper's something special, indeed.