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WHO: Herbert West and Tony Stark
TONE: Awkward and goofy and confusing
RATING: PG-13, probably
WHEN: 10th
WHERE: Library
WHAT: Tony's love potion dose gets him fixated on a very unlikely target.
STATUS: Ongoing

Herbert barely noticed the two boys sitting at the next table over in the library. He was too busy composing a treatise on how physical fitness positively affected mental prowess (a new revelation to him, but one only had to look at the perfection that was Odinson to know it made the most sense), sucking on the end of his quill between bursts of furious writing. Anyway, it was only Rogers and Stark, and weirdly enough, a lot of his irritation at Stark lately seemed to have disappeared once he'd gotten a good look at the husky blond boy and ... well. That was probably not an appropriate thought to have in a library.

The small boy smiled to himself as he made another note, this time concerning human pheromones and their genetic advantages.

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For the most part, Tony had no clue that Herbert was near by. It wasn't important, he was busy distracting Steve from his homework seeing as he finished his right after class. Though in between distractions he was actually helpful.

After a little while, Steve being his ever polite self asked 'Do you mind if I go to the restroom now?' raising an eyebrow at him Tony waved his hand dismissively and said it was fine. Tony kept himself occupied by writing in his note book for a while before he started to realise that the egg was wiggling about.

"Wait, hatching. Okay, well this needs a midwife. Steve?!"

Looking around after shouting for Steve, Tony gives a frowning pout that it was now obvious that Steve was not going to come in running, however he did see Herbert.

"Oi, herpert. Do you have a handkerchief on you?"

So engrossed is he in his essay that Herbert doesn't even register the snake pun Tony's aimed his direction, though he does, vaguely, get that he's being talked to. He flaps a distracted hand at the other boy, muttering, "I'm busy, Stark, go pester someone else."

He rolls his eyes.

"I would but he's in the bathroom. Now would you just give me a hanky? Or your tie, I don't really care. I need a hand, so stop writing bad poetry and get over here."

Man this guy needs to learn to give Tony attention right away, it really would lessen how much Tony harasses him.

"I'm not writing poetry, don't be stupid," Herbert said, grudgingly looking up at the other boy. "This is an empirically-based essay on the science of human attraction. And all I've got is tissues, if I give you some, will you leave me alone?"

Tony raises an eyebrow at him.

"Hoping that if you write it all down, you'll finally understand it?"

He sighs and rolls his eyes as he holds out his hand.

"No yeah, sure they'll work. Hand them over, and no. Of course I wont leave you alone, we still have two years stuck in the same room."

"You can come get them," Herbert said, with an impatient look as he dug the tissues out of his pocket. He had thoughts to write down, thoughts that could escape his head at any moment! Though. Tony and Thor were friends. Maybe he could help, even if he didn't mean to ...

Despite his insistence that the younger boy fetch the tissues, Herbert got up himself to drop them soundlessly on Tony's table. "Here. What do you know about Odinson?"

Tony doesn't even have time to mutter a remark to himself as he sees Herbert's bringing him the tissues any.

"Odins-?"

Okay, so Tony's so used to calling him Thor, he's kind of forgotten his last name.

"Thor? Well... Him being my friend probably means I know more than I need to about him."

He turns and starts to pull out some tissues, and curls them around the bottom of the egg. He isn't really too sure how much fluid is going to be coming out of the egg and would rather not sit through Steve lecturing him on how rude it would be to stain the library tables.

"Like he think's we're friends-with-benefits for one."

Herbert blinks, then frowns, all of a sudden just as annoyed at Tony as he used to be. "What, so you two ... fool around, that sort of thing? I thought you fancied Bruce, or girls. Honestly, do you discriminate at all?"

Tony turns around sharply and narrows his eyes at Herbert.

"Who told you I fancied Bruce? And, uh. No the only fooling around is when he man handles me like the gorilla he is. He keeps confusing the phrase, being Norwegian and all."

"No one told me, it's just obvious," Herbert says with a little sniff, though it really doesn't concern him all that much. As long as Tony doesn't fancy Thor. "The way it is with him and you. So you're saying Thor thinks you're 'friends with benefits' more literally?"

The smaller boy's shoulders relax a little, and he smiles, almost fondly. It's kind of a scary expression on the normally haughty face. "I suppose English isn't really his first language. What kinds of things does he like?"

"Why does everyone keep saying that? And yes, he just thinks it's because I fly him to New York during summer holidays."

Tony raises an eyebrow at that look. Making him very supicious, so much so he sits back down in front of the egg and helps open up the egg a little for it.

"Like? Annoying me, being loud. That one should be at the top of the list. Uh, food, Usagi. Why do you even care what he likes?"

"None of your business," Herbert says primly, then leans on the back of one of the chairs. "What kind of food?"

Ugh, girlfriends.

"The edible kind."

Tony raises his eyebrow at the snake and the egg as he starts to smell something weird.

"Okay, I'm not entirely sure it's meant to smell like that."

"Yes, but what are his favorites?" Herbert asks impatiently. "Anyway, how would you know what a hatching snake is supposed to smell like?"

"I don't sit on his table, I sit on you're, keep up. He does sneak bread rolls to his room after dinner though."

Tony puts his hand out for the snake to slowly slither onto as it works it's way up, and we wipes any residual goo off it.

"Not this.. Sweet, that's for..."

Tony turns to give Herbert a dirty look but stops when he looks at him.

"Who cares what it smells like? It's not putrid and dead, so you're fine," Herbert says, flapping his hand dismissively. "But what kind of rolls? Just whatever they have, or does he pick one sort over the others? Though I guess he probably just goes for bread because it's easy to hide ... "

The small boy trails off, smiling faintly and distracted, completely unaware of the change in the way Tony's looking at him.

Tony shifts closer to Herbert, resting his chin in his non-snakeful hand as he rests it against the table.

"You know, he's really not all that great, right? If he's not bugging the hell out of us with being loud and annoyingly optimistic about weird things. He's with his girlfriend spoiling her with candy and things."

Herbert frowns at the taller boy. "I beg your pardon, there's nothing wrong with being enthusiastic about the things you like. It's a sign of passion and intensity, and you probably just think he's weird because you don't understand him."

But Tony does ring up a good point. For some strange reason, Herbert hasn't notice Thor much up until now, except as a friend of Bruce's from an earlier year. He knows the blond has a girlfriend, but not much more than that, and that could be a problem. "Who's his girlfriend, anyway?"

"Hey enthusiasm just tiring. I've always been one for... Reserved side of things. And he's weird, because he's weird. I understand him fine."

He moves closer again.

"Usagi Tsukino. Little asian girl, hufflepuff third year. She's cute, but I'm only a year older than her and she makes me feel tired just listening to her. All energy."

"Funny, I thought that would be your type," Herbert comments dryly, but then his expression changes with a sudden thought. "Though if she's so annoying, you'd probably be doing your friend a favor by, you know, stealing her or whatever it is you do with girls."

Yeah, subtle and sly, Herbert is not, not about this sort of thing. "Then you could break them up. Do you think that would be hard?" he asks hopefully.

"Yeah, well I know what my type is. And I tend to get invested in them."

Tony raises an eyebrow that is 50% suspicious, and 50% jealous.

"Why would you even want to break them up? Thor is straighter than most spirit levels. And far better choices out there, really."

"I've read there are potions that can fix that," Herbert says .. then realizes how terrible that sounds. "But anyway, it doesn't matter. What better choices? He's perfect. And I've hardly got boys lining up on my doorstep, have I? Since when do you care, anyway? You've already got your 'type' that you've invested in, and it isn't Thor."

Tony gives him a slight grin.

"You know you're right, my type isn't Thor. Which is a good thing, and I know that I don't have to worry about changing his sexual preference. And you know, it works in my favour no one's lying up"

Tony puts his hand on Herbert's knee, and gives it a squeeze.

Edited 2013-02-14 10:05 (UTC)

Herbert narrows his eyes, looking at Tony suspiciously and then shoving his hand off. "If you're trying to cozy up to me to get some sort of in with Bruce, I'm not sure why you're bothering. It's not going to impress him, he knows you too well, and knows you don't like me at all."

He raises his eyebrow as his hand is shoved away.

"No that's not true. I do like you. A lot, I mean, what's not to like about you?"

Tony moves closer again, taking the scorned hand and slipping it around Herbert's waist with a grin.