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“Uh, what’s with the mistletoe? I think we skipped a few holidays.”
Natasha glances over at Tony, sipping at a smoothie as she sits on the edge of the coffee table and watches the doorway where the mysterious mistletoe hung. “Thor brought it back as a gift. Last time he was here Jane and Darcy taught him about modern Christmas traditions.”
“Did you tell him it’s March? He’s a couple months late.”
“He wanted everyone to experience it before you put it away.”
Tony raises an eyebrow at her. “Experience what? It’s just mistletoe.”
She points wordlessly at the doorway. Tony just stands and stares, waiting for something miraculous to happen. When nothing does, he says,
“Not that this isn’t thrilling, but—”
She shushes him and points again. A moment later, Bruce and Dr. Cho walk through the door, both looking down at a tablet Bruce is holding. Strangely, they both stop in the middle of the doorway and look at each other in confusion. Bruce tries to keep walking but doesn’t actually get anywhere.
It clicks in Tony’s head a second later. “Oh man, everyone is going to kill Thor.”
“Yep,” Natasha says agreeably, not sounding concerned.
Across the room, Helen points at the mistletoe hanging above their heads. Bruce reaches for it but is unable to pull it down. They confer for a few moments quietly, then Helen leans in and gives Bruce a peck on the lips. Whatever supernatural hold the mistletoe has on them vanishes, and they step out from underneath it, going back to discussing whatever’s on the tablet seemingly unperturbed.
Tony frowns. “That was really anticlimactic.”
“You should have seen Barton and Wilson earlier. Clint was ready to die right there in that spot if that’s what it took to not kiss Sam.”
“Poor birdbrains,” Tony says dryly.
“I told him not to, but Thor finally took pity on him and said a kiss on the cheek works too.”
Laughing, Tony pats Natasha on the shoulder and heads across the room. “I’ll just take this down before someone gets hurt.”
Natasha pouts around her smoothie straw but doesn’t stop him.
“Tony?” Pepper calls down the stairwell, heels clicking on each step. “What’s with this mysterious text? Oh, Jim—is everything all right?”
Standing at the bottom of the stairs, Rhodey shrugs. “Tony tell you to come down to the lab too?”
“Something about some experiment he desperately needs you for?”
“That’s the one.”
He waits until she gets the rest of the way down the stairs before walking with her into Tony’s workshop.
“Tony?” he starts, cutting himself off as something tugs him back. He frowns and glances at Pepper, but she’s looking around in confusion too. “What’d you do, Tony?”
“Why does it have to be something I did?” Tony protests, popping out from behind a sliding tool cabinet. He looks ridiculously pleased with himself, so Rhodey assumes he did something for sure.
“You lured us here with vague text messages, for one thing,” Pepper points out, trying to step away from Rhodey and failing. “What’s this, some force field containment system?”
“Mistletoe,” Tony answers so cheerfully that Rhodey almost laughs, but he looks up and sure enough, there’s mistletoe hanging above them. “The power of Christmas joy. Or Asgardian science. Your choice.”
Pepper doesn’t look as amused. “This is what Thor decides to share with us? Cursed mistletoe?”
“It’s not cursed. Probably.” Tony practically bounces over, beaming at them. Rhodey already knows what he’s going to say.
“Let me guess, you have to kiss to escape?” he asks.
“Isn’t it ridiculous? I’m trying to figure out how it works.”
“So you need guinea pigs.”
Pepper sighs, leaning over to give Rhodey a kiss. This time when she tries to step away, the mistletoe lets her go. “You couldn’t have told us ahead of time?”
“And ruin the mystery? No way.” Tony checks some readings on a nearby screen, then nudges Pepper back through the door, going with her this time. “I wonder if it works with three people.”
Rhodey obligingly tries to leave again, but he’s stuck just like before. “There’s got to be an upper limit,” he muses, curious despite himself.
Sandwiched between the two of them, Tony grins at him. “See, I knew you’d want to investigate.”
“You want an excuse to kiss us a lot,” Rhodey retorts, and Tony shrugs, saying,
“Perks of being a scientist?”
He gives Rhodey a quick kiss, tries to leave the doorway, and when he doesn’t get anywhere, turns around to kiss Pepper as well. The mistletoe’s magical hold on him vanishes and he hops to the side, but neither Rhodey nor Pepper can follow.
“How the hell does it know?” Tony says, mystified, and pulls up another screen, trying to find some sort of reading or data point the mistletoe could be honing in on. “Endorphins? Pheromones?”
“Magic?” Pepper suggests, lips quirked up in a smirk as Tony spins around to scowl at her.
“It’s not magic!”
“You gotta admit, it’s pretty magical,” Rhodey says just to further ruffle Tony’s feathers. “Maybe you should just ask Thor.”
“No way,” Tony grumbles, flicking to another screen, then another. “We can figure this out.”
Pepper gives Rhodey a Look, capital L, and he nods and gives her a peck on the lips so they can move out from under the mistletoe. While he finds something to step on so he can take the foreign plant down, Pepper goes over to Tony, slipping an arm around his waist.
“How about,” she say slowly, like she’s just now getting a brilliant idea, “you leave the mistletoe to the experts, and the three of us go upstairs and share as many kisses as you want? Without recording all of them?”
Tony nearly protests, Rhodey can see it on his face, but after a moment he relents, shutting down the array of screens and looping an arm around Pepper’s waist in return. Rhodey finishes taking down the mistletoe, jumping down from the precariously wobbling stool he’d been standing on, and holds up the plant.
“What do we do with this?”
Tony shrugs. “Eh, take it up with us. We’ll find a use for it.”
Pepper rolls her eyes but Rhodey laughs, setting down the mistletoe on one of the lab tables, and says, “Maybe next time. If you’re good.”
“Merry Marchmas to all,” Tony announces cheerfully as Pepper leads him out of the lab, both of them grabbing Rhodey by the hand as they pass. “And to all a good night.”