Look here, look back, look ahead, by marinarusalk. Avengers, Steve Rogers/Tony Stark.

This one is going in a Days of Love rec (rather than, you know, a normal set) for a single reason: I can't classify it. I mean, okay, it's a wonderful adventure story featuring Nazis and secret castles and lashings of hurt/comfort, but I don't know if it's an AU or not. Or I guess it would be more accurate to say that I don't know if it's a canon AU or a fan fiction AU or both. If you aren't confused, it must not be comics fandom, that's my motto.

But I don't care. This is fantastic. It's got Steve and Tony having adventures in Transylvania involving a creepy and legendary evil, and there are no pointy teeth anywhere. (Although, man, is Transylvania just unusually stocked with grim legends or what? I don't recall, like, Devon or Iowa having quite this kind of reputation. Maybe I'm just reading the wrong stories. Maybe there are a lot of stories about the unique eeeeeeevil lurking in Dubuque. "Beware of the place of three Us, traveler, or you will not see the corn ripen again." I guess Albuquerque would be in some trouble on that score, too.) Plus, it is a deeply awesome legend. I like vampires as much as the next girl, provided the next girl is not, say, Bella - never have I ever been impregnated by a vampire, and while I'm on the topic, why did I never play Literary Never Have I Ever while I was still playing drinking games? - but I am totally ready for fantasy novels to switch over to this legend for a while. (Oooo, urban fantasy featuring a graduate of this school. I'd pay money for that.)

And I really love how this story handles the Steve/Tony. I'm not going to go into it in too much detail here, because I don't want to spoil it, but I will say that midway through there is one of those scenes that leaves me wanting to applaud the author like she just did a backflip through a circle of fire, because it's an argument in which I am on both sides simultaneously. They're both right! And they completely disagree with each other! That is a sign of characters that are real people, right there. (In real life, when this happens it's just depressing. But in fiction, it's awesome.)

Anyway. This is wonderful. And I love it. And I love you. And you know how you always want to introduce the people you love to each other, providing they are not members of your family of origin? That's how I feel about this story. Go be happy together, fandom and fanwork! You're going to get along. (And in fact most of you have probably made out with this story and taken it home at least time. IGNORING THAT.)