Will You Strike While He's Still Loading

Fanfiction
Title:	Will You Strike While He's Still Loading
Author(s):	shaenie
Date(s):	03 December 2012
Length:	29,199 words
Genre:	slash fanfiction, BDSM
Fandom:	The Avengers (2012), MCU
External Links:	Will You Strike While He's Still Loading (AO3)
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Will You Strike While He's Still Loading is a Steve/Tony BDSM story by shaenie. It's the third part of the Don't Look too Closely (all the angles are oblique) series, a MCU canon AU that starts before the events in the Avengers movie.

Summary:

Fury says, “You’re fucking with me. You expect me to send in some random person to replace you, when you’ve already got a strong rapport with Stark. However you managed to get it.” Fury shakes his head, but smiles a little ruefully. “I’d have to be a moron to try and reassign you. Stark would shut down any attempt at replacing you.” He shakes his head again. “You keep surprising me,” he says. “You’re sure you don’t feel coerced in any way?”

“Not in the slightest, Director. If anyone tricked anyone, I tricked him. I don’t want this information used against Tony,” Steve says, his voice as commanding as he knows how to make it.

Fury holds up both hands, not in surrender, but as if to balance. “No one but me needs to know this, and I hope to never talk about Stark’s sex life ever again.” There is finally some amusement in his voice. Steve’s shoulders relax. “I do have a recommendation, however,” Fury says.

“Sir?” Steve asks.

“Tell him who you are. Stark does not like surprises. He won’t appreciate finding out after the fact.” Fury gives him a long look. “That’s not an order, but think about it. If he finds out and you aren’t the one that tells him, he’s going to react badly.”

Notable kinks include a knotting sex toy developed by Tony Stark and Steve on the St. Andrews Cross discovering a preference for floggers.

Recs and Reviews

This is the best, most fantastically filthy thing (descriptions of pain and oh God all the things they were saying while Tony was fucking him), and yet it still makes me swoon (with kisses and secret identities and staying the night and the feelings Steve can't quite unpack right now but will take out and examine later). Brilliant. Devastatingly brilliant.

You know I think this entire thing is brilliant, but I just, for posterity, want to mention again what I think is an amazing, amazing series of lines in an amazing interchange:

“I am not a good influence,” Tony says a little painfully.

“I don’t need a good influence, I’m not a child,” Steve says. “I need to feel alive, you make me feel like I survived.”

Because, yesss. This tells us everything about both of them, really, right here. \o/

This, and this series, is pretty close to everything I have ever wanted out of BDSM fic. I don't know what it could be missing, actually, to close the gap of "pretty close", but I suspect that should you keep writing for this series (and I sincerely, desperately hope you do), you'll write it in and everything will be perfection. But the impact play, oh Lordy the impact play. Just. I can't. It's the best ever.

Your overall characterization feels so spot on, especially Steve. He blushes a lot and can be shy about some things, sure, but he's an adult and he lived through WWII as part of the Greatest Generation. He might come from a time where a lot of things weren't openly talked about, but the man ain't some grown-up version of Beaver Cleaver or something. He's not an idiot--oh, and let me just interject here that his spiel to Tony in the last fic about the Yellowjackets? And the following discussion about Steve giving their relationship a lot of thought? That was a work of sheer beauty. His competence and surety are so powerful that I really can't describe what it did for me, except that it was good and yes and more please. If everyone wrote Steve with the level of awesomeness that you do, this fandom would probably be the best ever and we'd all cry tears of happiness, because *this* Steve, I feel, is what we see in the movies (can't comment about the comics), and he needs to be able to really shine. I could probably keep ranting/stanning about the glory of Steve and characterization but I think you get the picture. ;)

Steve and Tony's evolving relationship is a wonder to see. I'm curious to read about how things work once the Avengers come into play (if it gets to that, being AU and all and of course whether you continue). Their dynamic is... well. "Blazingly hot" would be an understatement of such enormous magnitude that I'm not even going to try.

I was [...] incredibly impressed with your descriptions of pain. A flogger feels incredibly different than a whip and the way you described how each one felt was incredible. Some people prefer one over the other because they prefer stinging pain vs throbbing pain or vice-versa. A lot of fics don't even differentiate between them, and that you included that AND that not everyone was into each was something I rarely see in these stories. I also couldn't believe it when on the St. Andrew's Cross Tony STOPPED what he was doing when Steve started to hang from his restraints. That kind of detail is something most people overlook. Hanging from restraints is dangerous and you /mentioned/ that. Ughh.. honestly I could go on and on about what "makes it work" for me. The relationship, communication, and boundaries, all fall under the "safe, sane and consensual" motto of BDSM. And that itself, is so rare. This fic is truly a gem.

I don't even know what to say... I'm just consistently bowled over by this very awesome series. I want to say something coherent, and something that isn't just key smash and flailing....but It's hard to because the writing produces such an intensely visceral reaction in me.

[...] Everything from Tony's "You can't be real" to Steve's "Hit me with it...Hurt me" was at this astronomical level of intensity. Steve talked about being touched on the inside of his skin and I kind of feel like you took the reader to a really intimate place with that exchange. I also just want to wallow around in the dirty talk like a pig in slop. Every time EVERY SINGLE TIME Steve tries to articulate how he feels or tries to clarify where he is, I have a miniature heart attack...it's kind of insane. And pretty much everything Tony says during the scenes makes me lose an IQ point...or 40. [...] I feel like I've read a lot of Steve/Tony fics, but I've never read of Tony designing a sex toy as genius as he is. It's kind of obvious but I think most writers and readers feel like Tony Stark himself is sex toy enough. [...] The identity reveal was surprising and so PERFECT. of Course Tony knows, of course he figured it out. And I love that he kind of doesn't give a damn, it's just a new variable and he adjusts the calculations accordingly. Even if he hadn't known, I think his reaction would have been very similar. New information very quickly becomes old information for him.

Finally, Finally, I love how Steve is learning more about himself and what he needs, and there is a parallel process in Tony where he's learning to let Steve closer and closer, and Steve is handling it so well so that Tony doesn't get skittish. To me this is now the most interesting part of the story (well also the sex is supernova level hot) and I am eager to see if Tony can sustain this now that Steve is one of his people. [...]

I don't remember if I commented on this chapter yet or not, but I have definitely read it more than once and it gets better each time. You're handling the D/s dynamic so beautifully I can barely even stand it, and you're making negotiation and consent so fucking hot, and they are both remaining rather spectacularly in-character despite this fic being quite a wide step away from what many people would consider canonical. I love all the little in-between moments, too, where they're figuring each other out and learning and building on this initial base of trust, either actively or via observation and introspection. So, so good. And the whip-cracking scene and Steve's reaction, and then /Tony's reaction to Steve/, just, ughhhh yes, perfect. And Pepper! And Clint!