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“Fancy meeting you here,” is the first thing the Maverick says when Tom wakes up. It is automatically a bad start to his day- anything involving the Maverick would constitute a bad start to his day. It’s not like he detests the other superhero- they’re both fighting for the same side, after all. But he’s always been under the impression that the Maverick is much, much more dangerous to the wellbeing of their city- a more chaotic good to Tom’s lawful good. Leaning neutral, sure, as his guy-in-the-chair Ron would say. But still lawful.
“Likewise,” Tom replies. He doesn’t even know where here is, until the events of the previous day- has it even been a day?- come rushing back to him. Ron said the supervillain MIG was preparing to strike, and Tom just goes where Ron tells him to. Now, however, he’s going to have to have a long talk with his best friend about double checking his intel.
“Get stuck in a trap?” the Maverick asks pleasantly, like they’re old friends meeting for coffee and not rival superheroes very clearly strung up like turkeys in the enemy’s base.
“Unfortunately,” Tom replies, in the same pleasant tone. “You?”
“Oh, yeah,” Maverick snorts. “Didn’t think the Iceman would be joining me, though.”
“Well, happens to the best of us on occasion,” Tom shrugs. “Meaning me. I wouldn’t be surprised if this happened to you more often.”
“I take great offense to that,” Maverick says, clearly not offended. “Wanna get out of here?”
“Thought you’d never ask.”
They both immediately begin struggling. Tom shoots a blast of ice up to the ropes that are keeping his wrists secured, and the ice instantly melts.
“Fuck,” he mutters.
“Problem, Frozone?” Maverick asks teasingly. He attempts to fly up, probably to just untie his restraints, but ropes around his ankles catch him immediately, forcing him back down with a jolt.
“Apparently, Iron Man,” Tom replies. “Seems MIG thought of everything.”
“I’m sure there’s a way out.” Maverick is testing the restraints again, shooting blasts of light up at the ropes. One of the blasts misses and ricochets off the ceiling; Tom has to jerk to avoid it. “Sorry.”
“No problem,” Tom snorts. Maverick opens his mouth to say something else, probably another quip or a sly retort or something that will get Tom’s blood boiling, but their captor chooses that moment to stalk into the room, looking like the cat that got the cream.
“Hello, boys,” MIG says, grinning at them. The mask that covers the top half of her face blinks back at them, just like every other time Tom’s ever encountered her.
“Oh, hey,” Maverick says, grinning charmingly. “What’s the plan here, boss?”
“You refer to me?” MIG asks. Tom rolls his eyes.
“No.” Maverick jerks his head toward Tom. “Iceman.”
“Ah,” MIG says, and without any hesitation, lunges forward. Tom braces for a fist; instead he gets a taser straight to the gut. Everything goes electric white for a moment, and he vaguely registers Maverick’s scream of Jesus Christ! before he stops shaking.
“Fucking hell,” he coughs out. “Give a guy a chance to betray all his information before you start the interrogation tactics.”
“But you’re not going to do that, are you, Iceman?” MIG asks. “I could ask you a million questions and you wouldn’t answer any of them. Neither of you would. No, I’m just here to keep you weak and off the streets while I enact my real plan.”
There’s a moment of silence. “Well?” Maverick asks. “You gonna tell us the plan?”
“No,” MIG says. “I’m not stupid.”
And with that, she leaves.
“Great,” Tom remarks. “Awesome.”
“Super cool,” Maverick agrees.
Tom finds, over the next couple of days, that he actually doesn’t mind Maverick. Granted, he still thinks Maverick is dangerous. But he’s funny, and charming, and yes, very handsome. And yeah, when MIG drags Tom out of the room and drags him back a few hours later soaking wet, Maverick looks at him with so much concern it’s almost funny, and when she grabs a belt and Maverick is screaming Tom feels a whole lot of rage.
So they get through it together, and somehow, their guys-in-the-chair find each other and work together, too, because MIG hasn’t been seen for a few hours and suddenly there are two guys bursting into the room, guns blazing.
“Oh,” the guy Tom doesn’t recognize says. “It’s just y’all.”
“Well, don’t sound so excited,” Maverick drawls, grinning. Ron, meanwhile, has gone straight to Tom, getting him out of the restraints easily. Tom drops down to the ground, rubbing his sore wrists, and watches as the other guy cuts down Maverick. Maverick, the cocky bastard, flies around the room a few times before landing next to Tom, leaning against his side. “Ice, this is Goose.”
“Nick,” Goose says, rolling his eyes and holding out a hand. Tom shakes it. “I’m Mav’s guy-in-the-chair.”
“Ron,” Ron offers. “Or Slider. Tom’s guy-in-the-chair.”
“Your name is Tom?” Maverick asks in surprise, and Tom gives Ron a look. Ron does not look apologetic. “I’m Pete.” Maverick offers his name with no hesitation. Tom smiles at him. Ron rolls his eyes. Nick looks like he wants to gag.
Since both superheroes managed to get caught in a trap, they’re pretty sure their respective bases aren’t compromised. Maverick’s base, Tom finds out, is an apartment in the heart of the city, up on the twentieth floor. It’s much nicer than Tom and Ron’s place, which is a dingy basement apartment on the outskirts of town.
The four of them crash there while Nick and Ron tell the very exciting tale of how they managed to find MIG’s base and then rescue the two superheroes. They look very proud of themselves the whole time- hell, Tom’s proud of them. Proud of Ron, especially, who hates getting his hands dirty. MIG is still out there, but taking her down is a problem for another day.
Right now, Slider is camping out on the couch and Nick has already locked himself in his room, so Maverick offers his bed to Iceman.
“I’ll sleep on the floor,” he says.
“Bull,” Tom scoffs. “I can sleep on the floor, your back-”
Maverick winces at the mention of his back. Nick cleaned him up, Tom watching worriedly the whole time.
“We can share the bed,” he offers after a moment, to which Tom concedes with his heart only skipping a couple of beats.
Maverick, it turns out, does not like sleeping on his back even when it’s not injured, which is something Tom finds out because Mav tells him this. He then promptly throws half his body weight on top of Tom’s chest, and then falls asleep. Leaving Tom in a bit of a conundrum.
The conundrum being that he’s got a little bit of a crush.
When they wake up the next morning, Mav is now completely on top of him as opposed to only half on top of him. Ron and Nick are peeking through the barely-open door, and Tom hears the click of a phone camera. Knowing damn well Ron always keeps his phone silenced, and assuming it’s his best friend holding the camera, Tom holds up a middle finger.
Maverick reaches out and pulls his arm back down.
“Warm,” he says, muffled by Tom’s chest. “You’re not going anywhere. Hate to break it to you.”
Alright, Tom decides. He can live with that.