Ancient History

(Or, Five times Cap didn't know a pop culture reference, and one time he knew more than the Avengers did.)

I.

"I don't know why you read those, Romanoff. Everybody know they're the same plotline over and over with different characters."

Natasha looked up from the brightly covered paperback she was reading, her face blank. "I'm also reading The Russian Debutante's Handbook and Practical Ways to Kill People, Volume 4. If you like, I could go get one of those."

Tony seemed mildly concerned at the prospect of the assassin learning more ways to kill people but didn't bite. "Sure, but those make sense! You're Russian! You're a spy-slash-ninja. You shouldn't be reading crappy romance novels!"

Steve wandered into the kitchen, sketchbook in tow, looking to make a sandwich or something, half listening to the mostly-playful banter between Natasha and Tony. It happened a lot; he had decided a long time ago not to intervene unless someone pulled out a weapon.

"Maybe I like crappy romance novels, Stark. And if I were you, I would keep my mouth shut."

Tony, of course, couldn't. "Come on, Romanoff, you know its true! They've got more repetition than an Andy Warhol painting!"

Steve couldn't resist. He was an artist, after all. "A what painting?"

"Andy Warhol, Steve." Natasha turned towards him, clearly done with Tony. "He was an artist and started a movement called pop art, mostly during the sixties, I think. There was a lot of bright colors and repetition and it was nothing like my books at all." She sent another glare at Tony, then continued.

"I know a lot of his stuff is in museums; maybe we can go see it sometime." She smiled at Steve.

"No fair!" Tony whined. "How come you like Steve more than me?"

"Maybe because Steve isn't a jerk about what I like to read!"

"Fine! Read whatever you like."

The billionaire gave Steve a jaunty grin, and waltzed off to... somewhere else.

"So. Tomorrow; you, me, anyone else. Museum trip."

Natasha gave him a little salute and left the room.

II.

Steve wandered into the room where Tony and Clint sat arguing (mostly good naturedly) about which fictional archer persona best fit Clint.

"I'm going for Merida," Tony said. "She's got a dislike of the rules. But then again, so does Katniss. And Katniss is cooler."

"Legolas all the way," Clint argued back. "He's got the great hair and the keen elf eye gaze thing going on."

Tony sighed dramatically. "I suppose you are right, but..."

"But nothing!" Clint scoffed.

Cap sighed. Again. And asked. "Okay, I know Legolas, but who's Katniss?"

"Kick butt archer chick in dystopian teenager novels."

Clint nodded as if that was all the information Steve needed and left the room without any more explanation.

"Tony?"

The billionaire sighed, ever longsuffering. "JARVIS, hook Steve up with the Hunger Games, okay?"

And left the room as well.

III.

It was Halloween. Steve was dressed like Buck Rogers, "Man out of Time", which Tony found plenty fitting. Natasha and Clint were a Harry Potter duo, with Natasha as a scarier version of the red-haired Ginny Weasley and Clint as a taller, unknown Hogwarts student. Thor was dressed as a viking, which really wasn't all that different for him except for the horned helmet.

Tony (of course) and Bruce were the last to come down.

Tony had a crazy white wig of long, mad scientist hair, a flamboyant Hawaiian shirt, and a lab coat with the "radioactive" symbol on the back. He had two watches on each wrist and a stopwatch around his neck.

Bruce, on the other hand, looked distinctly teenagerish. He had on jeans and Nike shoes with a whole lot of ankle support, if he had laced them up all the way. A shirt and a red down vest that looked like a life preserver to Steve, sunglasses, and a skateboard finished the look.

As soon as they entered the room, Tony looked around and dramatically yelled, "Great Scott, Marty! We're the last people here!"

Bruce, trailing behind him came up and looked into the room around his shoulder. "The last ones? Woah, Doc, this is heavy."

Clint and Natasha grinned; Steve and Thor looked perplexed. "What are you two from?" Steve asked.

"A movie trilogy called Back to the Future." Bruce grinned. "One of my favorites."

"I'm the crazy awesome scientist, Doc Brown, who invents time travel, and this is my young friend Marty, who accidentally travels back to the year 1955!" Tony looked at his two watches. "Great Scott!" he exclaimed again. "We've got to go. Tonight, though. Movie night, Back to the Future."

IV.

"This is not normal."

The glowing door hung in space, a few centimeters above the floor, its metal frame emitting beams of purple light.

Natasha started whistling a four-note, eerie sounding theme over and over.

Clint doubled over, laughing.

Tony put on his announcer voice. "Welcome to the Twilight Zone!"

Steve sighed, rolled his eyes, and made a mental note to look it up later.

V.

He came in halfway through The Sound of Music. "What's this?" Clint looked up from his place on the couch next to Natasha.

"Sound of Music, Julie Andrews, Christopher Plummer."

Steve sat on the arm of the couch, running a hand through his hair. "Julie Andrews?"

Pepper looked up at him like the world had stopped spinning. "You don't know who Julie Andrews is? The Julie Andrews?"

Steve hesitated. "...No?"

"Julie Andrews? The Sound of Music? Despicable Me? Mary Poppins?" Pepper's surprise seemed to be reaching unheard of proportions. "Sit down, Mister. You aren't leaving until you get an education."

VI.

Steve wandered through the rec room on the way to the kitchen when he caught a name: Indiana Jones.

Confused, he turned to the couch, where the rest of the Avenger Initiative was watching a movie. "Did I just hear the name Indiana Jones?"

Tony turned to look at him. "Um, yes?"

"Indiana Jones, as in Henry Jones, Junior? The archaeologist?"

Tony nodded again. "We're watching the movies..."

Steve smiled. "They made movies?"

By this point, Steve was the least confused person in the room.

"They made movies about who?" Clint asked.

Steve blinked. "Jones. Usually called Indiana. The archeologist from the thirties and forties. They made movies about him."

"He's a real person?" Natasha questioned. "I thought he was based off that explorer who found Machu Picchu."

"No, he's real. I helped him out a little, once. We found one of Schmit's recordings and he made a comment about the Fuhrer digging for trinkets in the desert. Even though we were worried about stamping out Hydra, we didn't want to have another problem on our hands by fighting another crazy force. So I went to Egypt."

Steve looked around and grinned; everyone was staring at him, wide-eyed. He leaned against the back of the couch. "Turned out, what Hitler was looking for was the lost Ark of the Covenant, which had the power to destroy those who looked at it. Obviously, we didn't want the Axis to get their hands on it, so even though the government had hired Indiana already, they brought me in."

"We met in the middle of the desert, through a mutual friend we both had. He ended up getting trapped with a woman, her name was Marian, in this huge underground chamber where they had found the Ark. I kept an eye on the Ark for a while, tracked it through the camp, and ended up sending it back to the airbase there until I could get it out without blowing my cover. Indiana ended up getting out alive and came to get the Ark. We didn't end up meeting again until the whole thing was over and the Ark was in Allied hands."

A frown wrinkled the super-soldier's forehead. "In hindsight, the whole thing was crazy. We were running through the desert, chasing a mythical item that the Nazis wanted, and were were both wearing Egyptian laborer's clothing even though we didn't look remotely Egyptian." He grinned boyishly. "It was also pretty fun."

An awestruck Tony motioned at the movie paused in the background. "You knew... Indiana Jones? Personally?" He shook his head. "That's fantastic."

He played the move, just in time for Steve to see Indiana plummet through a group of snakes on a huge statue. "That's him, all right." He shook head admiringly. "He kept pulling foolish stunts, but he always got out of them alive, somehow or the other."

At a hand gesture from Clint, who seemed just as amazed as Tony, Steve came around the edge of the couch and plopped down next to the assassins. For the next forty-five minutes, the Avengers listened in silent awe as Steve occasionally interjected personal experience into Indiana Jones and The Raiders of the Lost Ark.

The man himself smiled a little. He may not have known much about modern times, but nobody could beat his insider's knowledge when it came to the past.