InsaneJournal

Tweak says, "Get off my lawn!"

"ɴɪᴄᴋ ғᴜʀʏ" (shapeshifted) wrote in avengers_logs,
@ 2020-01-14 19:07:00

Entry tags:

-complete, peter parker, talos

Who: Talos & Peter Parker
What: Sharing some info about the other universe
When: Backdated to before the holidays!
Where: A diner for some milkshakes
Status: Complete

Meeting an alien in a diner was hardly the weirdest thing Peter had ever done, but it was definitely up there - especially seeing as how said alien seemed to know a few things about him.

Talos was apparently good friends with Fury and Carol, so that lessened his anxiety a little bit. It made Peter no less twitchy, though, and he was keeping a close watch on his spidey sense just in case. New arrivals to this dimension came from different points in time - and if Talos was familiar with Earth and had come after the whole drone mess, he could’ve seen Beck’s video and whatever messy aftermath had unfolded next. Peter Parker was probably a known and wanted criminal in the other universe by now. That could explain how Talos had known he wasn’t exactly of drinking age, but if Mysterio taught him anything in the last round of memories? It was that nothing was exactly what it seemed.

In the booth where he sat already slurping down a sizable chocolate milkshake, Peter attempted to be subtle when eyeing new customers who came through the door. The guy was apparently green, but he wouldn't show up like that, right? Peter supposed it was anyone’s guess.

No, kid, there wasn’t any way in fresh-hell that Talos would show up in a city diner looking green. He resembled Keller, smart-looking, wire-rimmed glasses, a crisp suit, silver fox. It was his go-to human face when he needed to look like he was from Earth, and he wasn’t ‘borrowing’ anyone else’s mug to do some trolling.

But now that he arrived, he went straight to the booth and scooted in, opening a menu to see what milkshake delights he had to choose from. Oh boy. “Hey Parker,” he greeted, using his normal voice - quirky, accented, conjuring images of a land down under. Keller actually didn’t have an accent, but bothering with it was a chore when no one knew who the guy was anyway. As long as Talos didn’t look green, he could sound like he was from another country. Unless any immigration officers were around.

“Thanks for meeting me.” Or whatever. Whose idea was this again?

“Umm - hey,” Peter said, sitting up a little straighter as he looked the stranger over. Definitely not alien looking and definitely not what he expected. He knew Loki could change his appearance when he wanted, but he figured that was Asgardian based magic; maybe even something having to do with his biology. He bit down the questions that already wanted to bubble over - they would later, probably - and decided to start with the basics.

“Talos, right?” It might’ve been a stupid question seeing as how they’d arranged this meeting on a secure network, but that didn’t mean his overactive imagination wasn’t already picturing an answer of ‘no, it’s Beck’ followed by an all out nightmare of illusionary bullshit. Anyway. That bit of niggling anxiety aside -

“Thanks for meeting me too?” He meant to wait until the guy had ordered before rushing into asking anything, but his curiosity was making him too twitchy to wait on this one. “Have…you met me before? In the universe you came from?”

“Yeah, we’ve met.” Talos would just leave it at that for now, placing his order when the waitress came by (black forest shake, he liked the cherry flavor). Then, when they were alone again, he decided he better go into this.

Maybe Peter deserved the truth. After all, what did it matter here? Tony was alive, there was no EDITH tech to fight over, and Beck hadn’t shown his pretty boy mug in this universe. Yet.

He sighed, taking off his unnecessary glasses to clean the lenses with a napkin. Also unnecessary but it did bide him some time. “I’m a Skrull,” he came right out with it. “A general, really. Awhile ago, I worked with Carol and Fury to help my people find a new home after our planet was destroyed by the Kree. At first it was rocky but then we grew close, as a family.”

That was just the opening. He had a point to this, really.

Peter had heard the names Skrull and Kree tossed around by Peter Quill, once, in an effort to give him a rundown on the alien species that were out there, but the details were new to him. “I’m sorry about your planet,” Peter said sincerely. You didn’t need to be up to date on space happenings to know that truly sucked. “I’m glad you had help. Carol’s pretty awesome.” Understatement of the year, honestly. Peter had a little case of hero worship going on there.

In any case, Talos’ alliance with Carol and Fury didn’t explain his connection with the alien - at least not yet. He had a feeling they were getting there, though. “So you’ve been on Earth for a while? Are your people here too?”

“I’ve been here on and off. My people are on a flagship in space - the coordinates are unknown to the Kree,” Talos continued. His milkshake was delivered, and that meant giving it an extra poke with his straw - there was so much milkshake that extras were contained in a tall silver cup, which matched the long and skinny spoon. Could make a meal out of this, couldn’t you?

Peter was probably spoiling his appetite but oh well. Superheroes ate a lot of food. “For some time, Fury was running the show up in space - and I ran SHIELD, as a favor to him. The thing about Skrulls is that we can be anyone we choose to be - so when we met, I was Fury. You just never knew. And I didn’t know, about what trouble that manbaby Beck would be. So I’m sorry about that, but I guess it turned out alright in the end.”

“Wait, what?” Well, the rug was pulled out from under him with that one. Talos had been Fury. Peter was glad he hadn’t been taking a sip of his milkshake at the moment or else it would’ve been choked on. He blinked, trying to rearrange every memory he had in light of this information, looking very much like a confused deer in headlights.

“You were Fury? You mean the whole time-” To be fair, he’d played the part effectively with the harsh tough love approach. “…I guess that makes sense. Why Beck was able to fool both of us for a while, I mean.” It was no offense to Talos - the guy was a general after all and clearly had plenty of his own skill - but Fury was freakishly good at sniffing out deception. Maybe Beck would’ve pinged on his radar sooner, but there was no telling now. The damage had been done; damage that he wasn't sure Talos knew about.

“All right? Hah, I don’t know about that.” Peter used his spoon to mix in the chocolate syrup further into his shake. He shrugged, even if the casual gesture didn’t match at all the anxiety he felt at the memory itself. “Did you see the video? Y’know, the one where Beck framed me for murdering him and a bunch of other people and got my face and name plastered all over the news? It’s not a thing here-” Yet, anyway. He was always living on the edge of paranoia these days. “But I was hoping you’d know what happened after. That’s the last thing I remember.”

No offense taken. Talos knew that one of Nick-o’s special skills was reading people - in a different way than Talos, who tended to rely on plucking about in someone’s memories if he was going to borrow their face for a bit. “Yeah, that was some shit,” he snorted; a good way to sum up the whole Beck situation in general.

“And sorry, kid, I don’t know what happens next - but I made a call to Fury in space, to get his ass back on Earth, so. Hopefully he’ll come relieve me of the position of being him.”

Not that Talos minded, but anyway. Slurrrrrrrrp went the milkshake - not as good as something from the mecca known as 7-11, but it would suffice. “You doing alright here though? There’s no Beck to worry about and you weren’t caught with your pants down on camera.” He imagined that things would turn out - Parker was a superhero, after all. Beck was a whiny titty baby.

Everyone knew who would come out on top in the end.

Peter didn’t know if the real Fury would be able to help him out with everything thrown into chaos, but the footage was manipulated. The truth would come out eventually - flimsy lies couldn’t hold up forever. Plenty of Beck’s certainly hadn’t.

“I guess worse things have happened. Other me’ll figure it out.” He had to look on the bright side, or else he’d fall into a twitchy pit of despair with imagining how much danger his identity would put his aunt in. MJ, Ned, Happy, all his classmates - it was the people he cared about he worried most for.

“Oh yeah, things are way better here. Mr. Stark’s alive and I think…as far as the Avengers go, it feels like everyone’s really in it together. So I won’t be the only option if anything like that happens again. Hopefully.” And plus, the whole memory thing had a perk - he’d learned to stay steer clear of Brad before the pantless incident could repeat itself here. “Wait - so what about you? Did the whole Fury impersonation thing happen here too? Can you seriously shapeshift into anyone?”

“Yeah, it happened here too - but it was just to give the guy a chance to take a vacation,” Talos chuckled, thinking fondly of his best boyfriend. Or whatever the term was going to be - either way, he’d take a bullet for Fury (and had, thank you very much). “He went on some bougie food tour while I held down the fort. No one really figured it out. Things were smooth as a baby’s ass.”

Well, Carol figured it out - but he sort of knew she would. He wasn’t even really trying to keep up the act anyway, when it came to her.

He grinned cheekily, pouring some extra milkshake goodness into his glass. “I can seriously shapeshift into anyone,” he confirmed. “Gotta know what they look like first, obviously. But otherwise, it can be done. Why, want me to fuck with anyone for you?”

Peter couldn’t help but snort at Talos’ phrasing - the alien had a way with words, after all - and it was a relief to hear that the impersonating here had come without consequences. “I bet Fury needed that vacation.” Everyone did eventually; Peter just hoped the next one he’d be lucky enough to take wouldn’t leave him dealing with theatrical liars and an army of drones.

Anyone. Talos could be anyone. His mind first went the nerd route, because how cool would it be to ask for him to look like someone from Star Wars? But then Peter started thinking on it a little more seriously, and - “I mean, I shouldn’t, but…there’s this guy? At school? His name is Flash. And, you know, he doesn’t know I’m…”

A family walked by their booth, and instead of saying ‘Spider-man’ Peter turned back his wrist and stuck his index finger and pinkie out with a thwip sound. “-so my whole cover story is that I have an internship with Tony, right? And that I know Spider-man and work with him sometimes. But Flash doesn’t believe me, so I’m usually the butt of all his jokes. But if he saw Peter Parker and Spider-man at the same place at the same time…”

The more he thought about it, the more the idea had a lot of appeal. He nudged his spoon around his milkshake, shrugging. “If you’re ever so bored you want to mess with a high schooler, there’s your chance.”

A high-schooler? Not usually Talos’ paygrade, but eh. Why the hell not? Maybe he owed Parker anyway, for that whole Beck shit in another universe. It wasn’t like it was Talos’ fault, but it was still a lot to get caught up in. “Sure, kid, I’ll borrow your face and parade around the guy - “ And his name was seriously Flash? What the fuck? “While you’re wearing the spider suit, to throw him off the trail. You just let me know when.”

He clinked his glass to Peter’s. “Here’s to fucking with people.” Hey, it was one of the things he did best, after all.

It was probably a terrible idea where plenty to go wrong, but Peter wouldn’t mind a little win like this - and a chance to show Flash that he wasn’t totally full of it. “Thanks,” Peter said, almost wishing that Talos hadn’t been impersonating Fury the whole time in the other universe. His whole ‘here’s to fucking with people’ mantra would have probably been the best defense against Beck.

“...And here's to things being a little less of a disaster,” Peter added to the milkshake toast. He’d drink to that.