Clint Barton had known for his entire life that he had two soulmates. Those two pale lines of text scrawled across his wrist had told him as much from the day he learned what they meant. However, he was never quite prepared for what actually having two soulmates would mean for him. And he certainly wasn't prepared for either of the people who turned out to be his soulmates.

The first had happened several years ago. He'd gotten his orders from Fury, knew everything he needed to know about his target: Natalia Alianova Romanova, a.k.a. Natasha Romanoff, a.k.a. the Black Widow (Jesus, how many names did this girl need?), assassin with dozens of kills, trained in the Red Room, incredibly deadly. He was to go in, kill her, get out. No dilly-dallying, unless he wanted to die. Just stick an arrow through her heart. How hard could it be?

He got up on the morning of his mission and was halfway through showering when he noticed it. The first of his soulmate tattoos had gone black.
Ah, fuck.
But hey, maybe it wasn't her. Maybe he'd get a coffee on his way to kill her and the barista there would tell him to "fuck off, mister" for some inexplicable reason. Yeah. Definitely. That was it.
He sure as hell wasn't telling Fury, though. So he went and got a coffee and the barista was perfectly friendly and Clint was totally fucked, he knew it.

He went to the hotel where Romanoff was staying, took the elevator to her floor, and found her room. He picked the lock (yay, lock-picking arrow) and stepped inside, bow at the ready. The room appeared to be empty. That was, until the door swung shut behind him, revealing Natasha Romanoff with a gun aimed at his head.
"Fuck off, mister," she spat.
Damn. Damn. Damn. Oh, and of course she had to be gorgeous. With her red curls, and her face of an angel (yeah she was glaring bloody murder, but the angels in the Bible were always all like don't be afraid so it wasn't that far off, right?...), and thighs that could definitely kill him (but would that be so bad a way to die? really though?), and shit he was in trouble. He was doing exactly what he couldn't do: dilly-dallying. He opened his mouth and the first thing that came out was impressively stupid.
"I can help you."
Something flickered in Romanoff's eyes.
Oh. Oh.
Those four little words had gone black on her wrist that morning, just as the much ruder three on Clint's had.

They'd fought of course. Inevitable, really. But in the end, Clint brought her home to S.H.I.E.L.D. like he would have brought home a lost puppy, with the same "can I keep her?" look in his eyes. Fury's exasperation when he learned that she was Clint's soulmate was exactly as withering as he'd expected. But Natasha was allowed to join S.H.I.E.L.D. and she quickly became one of their most prized agents.

Clint and Natasha's relationship was a different matter. She felt indebted to him, and he didn't want her to, he just wanted her to be okay. Which wasn't an easy task for her. She'd been through hell and back, and it took a lot for Clint to get her to trust him. It was a slow road, but it was one he was willing to take. She was his soulmate after all, and he adored her. By the time Loki showed up and made Clint his puppet, they could officially call themselves a couple (though they still kept it on the down low; professionalism and all that).

But then, Clint started thinking about the second tattoo. And of course, he panicked. What did it mean? How could he have two soulmates? What would happen to Natasha when the second tattoo went black? He loved her so much, he would never leave her for this other person. Would she die?

He went to Steve Rogers, who was the only other person he knew with two tattoos. Not only that, but both of his tattoos were black. The first was Bucky Barnes, but that had been during the 40s so they'd done what most same-sex soulmates did back then: treated it as a sign of platonic soulmate-ship. Of course, Steve had been secretly harboring some not-so-platonic feelings, which reared their emotional head when Bucky turned out to be not-so-dead after all (whether anything was to come of this disastrous situation was yet to be known as no one knew where the hell Barnes was). Steve's other soulmate was Peggy Carter, who things could have worked out with nicely had there not been that issue with Steve crashing a plane into the Arctic and being presumed dead for seventy years, leaving Peggy to grow old without him.

So naturally, talking to Steve about his double soulmate situation didn't assuage Clint's fears in the least. If anything, it made it worse. Convinced now that everything was doomed for tragedy, Clint found himself dreading the inevitable darkening of his second tattoo.

Well, he couldn't live in dread forever. It had to happen someday. So of course, it was today of all days. The day the Avengers were scheduled to mount an attack upon a Hydra base in Sokovia.
"Ah, fuck."
"Everything okay, Clint?" Natasha called from the bedroom.
Clint dried his hands and stepped out of the bathroom, holding his wrist aloft. There it was, plain as the nose on his face. The second soulmate tattoo had darkened.
"Oh."
Clint hadn't made a secret of his terror over this second mark, so Natasha knew exactly what was wrong.
"Maybe we'll stop for coffee along the way and the barista will say it for some inexplicable reason..." Clint said, echoing his reasoning from the day he'd met Natasha.
He knew it was no good. They wouldn't have time for a coffee stop. Nope. His second soulmate was probably a Hydra agent. Fantastic.
Oh shit. They were going into battle. Natasha...
"Please promise you'll be careful today," he begged.
"I'm always careful," said Natasha, coming over and draping her arms around his neck.
"No you're not."
"Clint, it's gonna be fine," Nat said. "We'll figure this out. Let's just get this mission going, okay?"
Clint nodded, far from convinced that it was gonna be at all fine. Natasha kissed him and they went back to getting ready.

The fight was going... well, not quite as planned, but not horribly. It could certainly be going better. Which meant of course it had to get worse. Clint fired an arrow at the bunker and ducked back behind the tree, awaiting the explosion. Nothing. Nothing? He never missed. Never. What the hell? He nocked another arrow and stepped out from behind the tree, preparing to fire, only to find himself thrown off his feet by something moving too fast to see. He crashed to the ground, feeling like he'd been hit by a truck. The blue streak of light that had flashed by slowed to a walk and turned out to be a young man with white-blond hair and a self-satisfied smirk.
"You didn't see that coming?" he said, circling Clint like a wolf.
No, he most certainly hadn't.
"Ah, hell. Seriously?" Clint muttered.
This was his soulmate? This twenty-something, jumped-up, speedy little punk? The kid's smirk changed to a confused frown, then he whizzed away. Aaaaand then Clint got shot. Great.

"You got his files?" Clint asked groggily from where he lay getting patched up by Helen Cho's magic machine.
"Right here," said Natasha, handing Clint the tablet in her hand.
Clint took it and began to read. Pietro Maximoff. That was his soulmate's name. Well, soulmate number two. Twenty-five years old. Okay, it could be worse, but it was still rather an age gap. Orphaned along with his sister at age ten because of a bomb. Shit, poor kid. Volunteered for Hydra's experiments. Seriously? Why the hell? Clint continued flipping through the intel, reading about the unrest and oppression in Sokovia, reading about Hydra's experiments. Apparently Pietro and his sister, Wanda, were the only two to survive them and they got superpowers out of the deal. He got super speed (like Clint needed telling) and Wanda got... well, Clint wasn't really sure what half those words meant but she looked like she packed a wallop. He delved deeper into the file, into the stuff they'd leaked from Hydra. Oh god, there were pictures. And videos. Driven by some sick curiosity, Clint hit play on the first video and immediately wished he hadn't. Those weren't just experiments Hydra had done on the Maximoffs, that was torture. Clint stopped the video, unable to watch anymore.

Wow. Great. Typical. First his soulmate was working with Hydra. Now he was working with Ultron. Fan-fucking-tastic. And he and his sister had beat the crap out of them, too. It was nice being at his safe house, off in the middle of nowhere, with his sister-in-law and her kids. It gave him time to think. To breathe. He sat on the porch with his niece and nephew, trying to fix the damn rocking chair on the outside, trying to fix his damn life on the inside. He wanted to get Pietro and his sister out of there, out of Ultron's clutches, to safety, to him. He didn't even know Pietro technically, but he felt a sense of duty to him. They were soulmates, after all. And Clint had always taken that idea rather seriously. It was why he'd saved Natasha instead of killing her. It was why he'd stressed for so long over what it meant for him having two soulmates. And now that he'd found the second one, he'd be damned if he didn't do all that he could to get his ass out of trouble. Well, nearly all he could. He knew his duty to the Avengers needed to come first. The fate of the world depended on it. He could drag Pietro's ass away from all these sketchy characters once Ultron was scrap metal.

No. No. Just no. This could not be happening. This couldn't be real. For a moment, a few brief hours, it looked like things were gonna be okay. Well, okay as it could get with an army of homicidal robots flying around. But then, there was that kid. That little kid, not even as old as his niece, stuck in the rubble while his mother sobbed on the evacuation ship. So of course, Clint had to save him. It was his job. And then there was Ultron, that damn bastard, and maybe Clint could still save the kid, but this was definitely the end for him 'cause those bullets were flying way too fast. And then silence, and Clint vaguely felt a burning in his side from where a bullet grazed him, but he didn't care enough about that to notice right now. Because there was Pietro, standing over him with his arms reaching out and at least half a dozen bullet holes peppering his body.
"You didn't see that coming?" he managed to say.
Then he fell to the ground. His eyes were wide and stared at nothing, and he looked so damn young. Clint set the kid down and went to Pietro's side, laying a hand on him, searching for some kind of sign, because he couldn't be dead, he just couldn't be. But there was no sign, because how the hell could he survive that many bullet wounds, and then Steve was there and carrying Pietro to the ship. As Clint gave the little boy to his mother, he finally became aware of the wound in his side, from the one bullet Pietro's body hadn't blocked. Wincing, he settled down on the bench next to where Pietro lay, watching over this boy, his soulmate, letting his hand drift down to brush Pietro's ever so slightly.
"It's been a long day..." he mumbled, shutting his eyes.

That wasn't right. Why was it doing that? Was it supposed to be flashing? He knew soulmate tattoos faded to grey when your soulmate died, but he really didn't think it was supposed to be flickering like that.
"Steve!" he shouted, running down the hallway of Avengers tower.
"Is something wrong?" Steve asked, poking his head out of his room where he was getting out of his uniform.
"Is it supposed to be doing this?" Clint asked, holding up his wrist to show Steve the tattoo, flickering like a dying lightbulb between black and grey.
"Holy shit," Steve gasped.
"I take that as a no."
"He's not dead."
"What?"
"Pietro's not dead," said Steve, grabbing Clint's wrist and dragging him down the hall toward medical.
"What do you mean, he's not dead? He got shot like eight times! How do you know?" Clint protested.
"Because that's exactly what mine did the day I thought Bucky died, that's how I know."
They reached the medical ward and burst inside.
"Doctor Cho!" Steve called.
Helen appeared around the corner.
"Captain Rogers, is everything okay?" she asked.
"Is the cradle back in action?" said Steve.
"For the most part, why?"
"Get Pietro Maximoff in it. Now."

It had worked. Thank God, it had worked. Pietro was alive. Still a bit banged up, and yet to be conscious, but alive. Clint had decided it would be best if Wanda was the one he woke up to, despite wanting so badly to be there himself, so instead he sat with Natasha in the living room. They'd hardly had a quiet moment since this all started, and he'd missed the feel of her in his arms and the brush of her hair against his cheek.
"I still don't know what I'm gonna do when he wakes up," Clint said.
"I've got a few ideas," said Nat.
"You do?"
"I haven't been idle while you were busy fretting over Wonderboy," Nat teased. "I did some research, looked into other instances of people with double soulmates. A lot of it is message board stuff, people who've worked it all out giving advice to people like you who haven't."
"So what did you find?" Clint asked.
"Well, there's no knowing how you and Pietro's relationship is gonna progress, so it could go a lot of ways," said Natasha. "But if things do take a more romantic and/or sexual turn, that's okay."
"It is?"
"Yeah. A lot of people with double soulmates will be in polyamorous relationships," Nat explained. "They'll have a boyfriend and a girlfriend, or two boyfriends, or two girlfriends, you get the picture. It's not like cheating. Everybody's in on it, everybody's agreed to it. So if things go that way with you two, and if Pietro's okay with it, I want you to know that I'm okay with it too. I won't be jealous or upset or anything. I just want you to be happy. I want to make this work."
"I love you," Clint said adoringly.
"I know you do."
Clint kissed her, first on the cheek, then on the lips. Just then, Helen Cho entered the room.
"Agent Barton, he's awake. And asking for you," she said.
"Thanks, Doctor Cho, I'll be there in a sex, I mean, sec. Dammit," Clint said.
Helen chuckled and left the room.
"You're an idiot, Clint," Natasha said, laughing.
"I know. But I'm your idiot," said Clint.
He gave her another kiss and stood up.
"Good luck with Wonderboy," Natasha called after him.
Clint rolled his eyes at her and went to the medical ward.

Sure enough, Pietro was propped up in bed waiting for him. Wanda passed by Clint on her way out, a silent "thank you" in her eyes. Clint gave her a smile and a nod. Then he went and sat in the chair by Pietro's bed.
"How you feeling, kid?" he asked.
"Could be worse," Pietro said, with an attempt at a shrug which turned into a pained grimace.
"Yeah, a helluva lot worse..." said Clint. "Thanks for saving my life."
"You're welcome," said Pietro. "Thanks for saving mine."
"You're welcome."
They fell silent for a few minutes, both glancing at the other every once in a while as though waiting for them to speak. Finally, Pietro did.
"So, you're my soulmate," he said.
"Looks like it."
"You're a bit older than I expected."
"Hey, I'm not that old," said Clint indignantly.
"Oh yeah? How old are you exactly?"
"Thirty-six."
"Oh," said Pietro, sounding pleasantly surprised. "That's not so bad. Only, what, eleven years difference?"
"Yeah, something like that," said Clint.
"Could be worse."
"Still a bit weird."
"I don't mind."
Clint looked at Pietro. God, just his luck, of course he was gorgeous too. He wasn't sure if he was blessed or cursed to have two soulmates that he found so incredibly attractive. Oh. Right. About that...
"Pietro, there's something I should tell you," he said.
"Oh no. You're straight, aren't you?" said Pietro.
Clint had never heard someone sound so dismal over the concept of heterosexuality and it nearly made him laugh.
"What? No, God no," Clint said. "With guys like you walking the earth? No chance in hell. What I need to tell you is... you're not my only soulmate."
Pietro looked confused and a bit hurt, so Clint held out his wrist for him to see the two tattoos.
"See? I've got two soulmates. And you're one of them. Natasha's the other."
"How does that work?" Pietro asked.
"I wondered the same thing for a long time," said Clint. "Never bothered to find anything out 'til I met you. Well, I still didn't try to find anything out, but that's 'cause I was trying not to get murdered by a crazy robot. Natasha did some research though. She's always ten steps ahead of me like that."
"She's not the only one," Pietro teased.
"You're not ten steps ahead of anyone right now, kiddo," said Clint. "Anyway, Nat figured out some ways this could work. If you're willing, of course."
"I still don't know how someone ends up with two soulmates. But I do want to make this work. I did die for you, after all."
"You weren't dead."
"I felt pretty dead," said Pietro.
"How would you know? Have you ever been dead before?"
"Yeah. Yesterday."
Clint groaned, though he couldn't help but laugh.
"You're a pain in the ass, kid," he said.
"But I'm your pain in the ass," said Pietro.
Clint looked at him; he was beginning to see how the two of them had become soulmates.
"Yeah, I suppose you are," he said. "God help me."