Prompt: A million and one years ago I saw a post from @itsallavengers about the Avengers doing a body positivity ad, and I just ran with it. Find the full original post here! So dear, thank you for the inspiration!
When: This takes place after Endgame i guess, because tony’s got a kid but tbh I’m ignoring every single other thing that happened lmao
Warnings: A little bit of negative talk about body image, some cursing
“I’ll start,” Tony Stark announces, getting up from his seat, leaving his teammates and friends looking wearily at one another as they remain seated. The idea for the campaign seemed to duly unsettle and inspire them, and they settle in to listen to Stark’s interview.
First question: How many scars, approximately, do you think you have?
Stark has a great laugh, and it comes out easy at the prospect of the question.
“How many scars,” He repeats, eyes tilted up in thought. “Not as much as some of these other guys, honestly. But, I mean, probably at least a hundred,” He shrugs.
What do you dislike about your body?
Stark lets out a whistle. “Layin’ in hard,” He says, and a chuckle comes from his team. “Let’s see. I’m pretty short. That makes me a little self-conscious. It’s hard to be a commanding presence when you’re short. I’m slowly getting old, even though I look so beautifully young, and I’m just starting to get…wrinkly. Like, skin, it just, sags. It does everything you don’t want it to do. And it goes without saying that the hole in my chest is pretty ugly. Blue thing is pretty though,” He says, tapping where the former mini-Arc Reactor sat, once circular, now replaced with a triangle of glowing blue nanite technology.
Time to get naked, Mr. Stark.
Another laugh as he stands and unbuttons his shirt, babbling all the while about how fun he finds interviews, especially when he, quote, “Tells the truth”. His wife Pepper takes the shirt and Tony squares up to begin speaking.
“So, the obvious,” He begins, gesturing to his chest with a hand. I ask him to talk about it as our photographer gets up close and personal with the camera. “Well, the thing about having a huge hole in your chest, really, is that it always hurts a little to breathe. Not matter what. And, it’s an eighth of an inch off center, which really pisses me off.” It’s not noticeable to anyone else. But to Stark it is. “The scar tissue around the triangle, that actually used to look worse. And look, if I turn to the side, you can see how sunken in my chest really is. Something like this, damages the bone.”
Tony continues by explaining that when the first arc reactor was put into his chest, his skin was raw from the surgery, and the scarring is, “Mostly a result of me fucking with the thing for so long. Removing it and scratching myself in the process. Messy stuff.”
Turning, Tony brings a hand up to tap the back of his head. “See the bald spot?” He begins, “I’ve smashed the back of my head so many times in my stupid helmet, this spot is just permanently done growing hair. Not really noticeable unless you’re looking,” It’s true, the spot is small, but there are lines of scarring that run parallel to his spine beneath a tuft of hair.
“Other than that, got a few scars on my face from various things. Calluses all over, especially on my hands. The very first Iron Man suit was clunky, you know, and I didn’t wear the right clothing underneath all the time, and I rubbed my elbows and knees raw every time I put it on. You can kinda see,” He presents his elbows, covered in what looks like rug burn scars. “Told you, not that many.”
When do you feel the most beautiful?
The room was expecting Tony Stark to laugh. Instead, he cocks an eyebrow as he buttons up his shirt, eyes cast downward in thought.
“When my daughter tells me she loves me. Or, one of these idiots,” He motions to the Avengers, sitting in quiet, “When one of them, you know, smiles or laughs at me and they really mean it. There’s a lot of love there, so, I guess that makes me feel good.”
The Captain volunteers to go next. He and Tony knock shoulders as they trade places, both sharing a smile and a laugh as Steve Rogers takes Tony’s place. I ask if he’s ready, and he gives a shy nod.
What do you dislike about your body?
Steve takes a deep breath before beginning. “You know, when I was a kid growing up in Brooklyn, I should have never even left the house, I was so bad. Asthma, chronic pain, fatigue, anxiety, high blood pressure - I could barely breathe. At all. Ever,” He laughs a little. “I hated it then. I remember that all I ever wanted to do was be able to run. Just, take off flyin’ and see how it felt.”
“Now,” Steve starts, “Now I’ve got stretch marks everywhere that haven’t gone away. They probably won’t,” He shrugs. “No matter what I do, I can’t fill out my waist. You know, that Dorito meme?” (He pronounces meme ‘Me-me’ - Sam Wilson quickly corrects him.) “In all honesty, I’m pretty fuckin’ lucky. There’s not a whole lot I’d care to change if I could. I’ve got some ugly scars because, I don’t know, my cells regenerate too fast and I never have time to get stitches before they’re already closed up. So, they end up looking gross.”
When asked how many scars he thinks he has, Captain Rogers chuckled and said, “I’d have way more if I weren’t a lab experiment.”
Shirt stripped off, Steve shows us an old scar from his childhood, when he’d broken his arm and the bone had stuck through. The stretch marks on his biceps (which don’t make them any less impressive), and his stomach, even his inner thighs. “They’re on my ass too, but I won’t frighten anyone with that,” He jokes.
A few gunshot scars to the sternum, that Steve says likely still have bullets behind them. “I never know if they’ve come out.” The scars without stitches are jagged and wide, like badly-knitted fabric. “Basically took a chunk outta my leg with this one,” Steve says, presenting his calf, where a patch of skin seems as though it’s been completely carved out. “Alien weapon, really fuckin’ hot.” He says.
What makes you feel beautiful?
He seems to have anticipated the question, because his answer comes quickly. “Laughing. I always feel good when I laugh. And running. It’s weird but, I got this body mostly through science, and it’s kind of amazing what it can do. I can jump over twelve foot walls, that’s insane,” he shakes his head with a blinding grin. “So, yeah, when I think about what my body can do, it feels pretty beautiful.”
Clint Barton, better known as Hawkeye, takes Steve’s place. He sits with a mocking groan and complains that he’s aging, but his smile says differently.
“Oh, shit, tons,” He says, “Not a whole lot of big ones. Lots of bullet holes, unfortunately, but I get them stitched, unlike some people. There’s a nasty one on my leg that I had to sew shut myself - that looks like a toddler got its hands on a needle and thread. Nah, I’m mostly deaf though,” Clint says, and reaches behind his ear to pop out a hearing aid, holding it up.
“Sorta how I got my nickname. When you lose some of your senses, other ones get better. So, my eyesight is damn good.” He states. “It sucks, sometimes. I got shit a lot as a kid, cause I couldn’t hear a damn thing. Sometimes my wife still has to scream at me. But, Stark and Banner put their heads together and these hearing aids are fucking awesome. Way better now than it’s ever been.”
Clint smiles. “These fuckers learned ASL for me,” He nods to his friends. “So did my kids and my wife. And you know, that makes me feel good. To be loved enough that they put forth that amount of effort.”
He signs his name and an “I love you”, to the camera.
Barnes is up next, with a slap on the shoulder from his best and oldest friend, Steve. Shyly, James Barnes, better known as “Bucky”, and to the intelligence community as “The Winter Soldier”, sits down before the camera and shoots everyone a smile. Frightening as he may be in uniform, in real life Barnes has a pretty smile and kind eyes, rivaling even Captain America in his politeness.
“Four hundred and thirteen,” He says, “That’s how many stitches I’ve gotten over the years, but I have fifty-three noticeable scars.”
I ask if he’s keeping a count.
“Yeah, I keep count,” He admits, “Some stuff I just don’t remember, but the ones I do, there’s a lot.
Are your scars the thing you dislike the most about your body?
A solid answer of no. “No,” He says, “No, the thing I dislike the most is my brain,” Even though it’s said with a laugh, the energy in the room turns immediately somber with Barnes’ confession. “But, physically, it’s not having lost my arm that I dislike, it’s the scars around it. The first few years I sort of, kept waking up and trying to claw it off,” He continues.
I ask if he’ll show us the scars, and Barnes immediately stands and slides his shirt off, revealing an expanse of skin dotted with large and small scars - bullet wounds, a pristine row of knife slots down his stomach, and his shoulder, devoid of the usual prosthetic limb the word has come to know. Turning to the side, Barnes presents what’s left of his left arm to the camera, shy as it snaps away. He explains in a quiet voice the scars that litter his body, some of them attached to more amusing stories than others.
How often do you forego the prosthetic?
Barnes shrugs. “Not as much anymore. Shuri and the doctors in Wakanda made something really amazing, and I love wearing it. For a few years there I just had to get used to being all me again, before I felt comfortable with it.”
What makes you feel beautiful?
“It sounds really stupid but, being able to make a choice, you know, about anything. I make mistakes a lot, but now I can apologize for them. It’s nice to have all that back,” Barnes says, grinning as the camera flashes.
All things said and done, he’s got the one-armed thing down.
Natasha Romanoff is next up, a sideways smirk squinting her eyes as she plops down, one leg crossed over the other and as intent upon me as I am on her. Hailed by the media for years now as beautiful, Natasha up close is just that, and more.
How many scars do you think you’ve got?
“You know, I couldn’t even begin to count every individual one, but so many. My body isn’t quite as bulletproof as some of the rest of my friends,” She shoots a glance at Captain Rogers and Barnes before continuing, “But it’s withstood a lot, that’s for sure.”
And what do you dislike about it?
Natasha takes a deep breath and folds her hands over her knees. “Not the scars, not even really anything noticeable. But, I can’t have children,” The words come out tight, a confession that she doesn’t want to make. “And to some people that’s a silly thing to be upset about but, the choice was taken away from me before I could even make it. And I really hate that. I hate that for most of my life, I didn’t have choices about what happened to my body, and I do have scars to show for that.”
Asking her to show those scars made her chuckle nervously before presenting her back, that bears a long, jagged scar that runs up her spine. Then, a bullet wound to the hip, courtesy of a “friend”, she says. It seems to be an inside joke. She turns a hip out to show a long scar on her inner thigh, and another on her leg.
So, what makes you feel beautiful?
Natasha smiles a little, sticking a bare foot out and flexing her toes. “My feet are messed up, because I used to be a ballerina, just another one of those things that I didn’t have a choice in. But, I did love it. And dancing still makes me feel beautiful.”
A shout comes from Tony Stark as he says, “Go bendy for us, Nat!!”
With a grin, Natasha stands from the seat and takes a breath, body claiming a position so naturally you would think she was floating. Another breath, and Natasha’s leg lifts, her knee elevated to her ribs before her foot extends and she rises onto her toes, smiling all the while. The fluidity of it is something you have to see to believe.
Doctor Banner appears next, shuffling quietly past Natasha and plopping down onto the school.
“I’m green,” He says with a grin. “But only sometimes.”
“No, not really. I’m sorry, these things make me so uncomfortable, can I just rapid-fire my answers at you?” He says, and I gesture for him to go right ahead. “I used to hate the other part of me, you know, the one everybody seems to care about more. But I don’t hate him so much now, because it’s just there. I obviously can’t get rid of him, so I had to learn to live with him. I really like my brain - it knows a lot. And I feel beautiful when I find the right solution to a problem, because that’s what I’m good at. Using my brain to its full potential, that’s the best thing I have to offer, I think.”
“I feel cheated,” Calls Tony Stark, “I thought I made you feel beautiful, Bruce!”
Doctor Banner grins and blushes as he makes his way back to his seat, and the final Avenger of the day takes his place. Thor immediately begins to speak.
“On Asgard, we celebrate scars. Here, people seem to wish to cover them. But where I’m from, we bare them proudly, no matter their circumstance. You see, my brother has stabbed me multiple times,” Thor says, standing and removing his shirt to gesture to a few small wounds in his torso.
“Oh, of course! I’ve been shot at, stabbed, broken bones, I’ve even been blown up - but I’m not dead yet! My personal favorite is the eye, though,” Thor leans down to show the photographer his eye after popping out the prosthetic, to which a chorus of groans can be heard from his friends, a loud that’s fucking disgusting, coming from Barton. Thor winks with his good eye.
And what makes you feel beautiful?
Thor grins wildly. “I’m alive. Is there any other way to feel but beautiful?”
All things considered, the Avengers are a mess of personalities and abilities just as much as they are a mess of scars, missing limbs, and prosthetics. Perhaps you’d expect the humans and superhumans who protect our galaxy to be in peak physical condition - and in a lot of ways, they are. In most ways, though, they are just like us.
No one is perfect - not even a superhero.
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