Disclaimer: I do not own the original canon nor am I making any profit from writing this piece. All works are accredited to their original authors, performers, and producers while this piece is mine. No copyright infringement is intended. I acknowledge that all views and opinions expressed herein are merely my interpretations of the characters and situations found within the original canon and may not reflect the views and opinions of the original author(s), producer(s), and/or other people.
Warnings: This story may contain material that is not suitable for all audiences and may offend some readers. This particular part deals with an assassination attempt (sort of) from the PoV of the assassin. Please utilize understanding of personal sensitivities before and while reading.
Series Information: The Light of Mankind series is a Marvel Cinematic Universe & Harry Potter crossover. It is also a Sentinel & Guide AU. Certain things have been shifted around to accommodate these two things. Things are also shifted to include information from related media for the crossed canons. As a general rule of thumb, assume my presented information is deliberate and not the result of confused mistakes, even when different from base canon.
The parts of this series are not designed to be read alone. References will be made to other parts, some of which may be published out of order. For the latest order, please see the series section on my profile.
Author's Note(s): Please be aware that this chapter has gratuitous use of profanity. Despite Barton's potty mouth, I'm not bumping up the rating.
Challenge/Competition Block:
Stacked with: Winter Bingo; SHoE; FF; SoC; PP; LL; NC; SI(N); ToS; BAON; Sentinel AU (Y); In a Flash (N); Truth (N); Slicing Life (N)
Representations: BC Use; Assassins; Sentinel & Guides; Life Lessons; Winter Soldier; Strange Fandoms; Tiny Pack
Bonus Challenges: Land of Enchantment; Under the Bridge; Lovely Coconuts; Second Verse (Nontraditional; Found Family; Wabi Sabi; Middle Name; Tomorrow's Shade; Unwanted Advice; Some Beach; Hot Apple; Sitting Hummingbird; Creature Feature; Call Me Dantes); Future Song (Where Angels Fear)
Secondary Challenges: SHoE (Onus; Terse)
Space (Prompt): 5E (Cold)
Word Count: 978
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The Light of Mankind
The Kindness of Strangers
Part 01: Bloody Ghost Story
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"The marks humans leave are too often scars." – John Green
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Clint Barton was damn good at what he did. It was a heavy burden, being so fucking awesome, but hey, it was a sacrifice he was more than willing to make. It was for the greater good, really. (He manfully ignored the voice inside that pointed out how many times he had been betrayed. Those people were just jealous of his awesome awesomeness.) If Clint had been willing to buy into the whole Sensitives exist to protect the Tribe bullshit, he probably could make a decent living off a Center check and a boring security gig somewhere. But he wasn't the type of Sentinel that would be willing to put down roots like that. Carving out a bit of territory to get growly over? Lame. He was a free spirit, had to go where the wind took him and all that shit.
(He refused to think about how his last pack had left him for dead; how his own brother had abandoned him to the cold when the circus had dumped in the icy mud before pulling out to go to their next stop. It was better not to have a pack anyway. They were liabilities, really, not strengths. He was awesome on his own. No one else would be able to handle his sheer awesomeness. Had he mentioned just how awesome he was? Because he, the Amazing Hawkeye, was fucking awesome.)
There were times when he wished that he wasn't quite as good as he had worked so hard to be. If he wasn't the Greatest Marksman, then he wouldn't be staring down the shaft of an arrow watching this absolutely sickening display. The Winter Soldier was supposed to be a hardass lone wolf, the best in the biz who decided to go AWOL on his people. Not that Clint blamed him: the dickbags who hired him were full of something foul. Their deposit cleared, though, so he had been willing to see if he could get close enough to do the job—because, well, the rep for taking out the Winter Soldier? That was worth more than the payout, really. The man was legendary in the sniper set—with rumors giving him numbers similar to such names Vasily Zaytsev, James "Bucky" Barnes, and Simo Häyhä. The intelligence community gave him hard cred for a few dozen up-close-and-squishy jobs and soft cred for over a hundred more, when one of them bothered to admit they even believed he existed.
Here Clint was, his path to the big bucks not fifty yards upwind from him and completely unaware of his impending death by the Amazing Hawkeye, and he could bring himself to make the fucking shot that would cement himself as the true Greatest Marksman. He was the closest to the Winter Soldier that any sniper had managed in the two years since the assassin had been declared rogue. This was his chance dammit. It was a simple job and he was confident he could do it with a single arrow.
The dossier hadn't said anything about a kid, though, especially not one who looked at the Winter Soldier like he hung the moon. The kid was tiny, too—far too small to be able to fend for himself without the assassin. Clint estimated that he was about four (maybe even as old as six, if he ran towards the runty side of things) and while he counted at least three times the little guy picked someone's pocket, the fact that Clint had noticed meant that the kid was still learning. The Winter Soldier was probably the one teaching him. Fuck it all to hell and back—it was morbid, and he would be the first to say a bit wrong, but it really did look like the guy had a pretty valid reason for skipping out and staying gone.
Somewhere along the line, the impossibly long-lived assassin had become a dad.
Hawkeye did eventually let the arrow fly. The way he figured it, the knowledge that he had blooded The Winter Soldier would offset the blow to his pride for it not being a kill-shot. He had spilt the blood of a fucking ghost, so yeah, he could deal with missing just this once.
Of course, the fucking migraine he had to deal with for the next week that left his senses spiking periodically for the next six months was not something he had initially thought to worry about—how the fuck was he to know the kid was an online Guide with enough chops to target a single Sentinel threat without even laying sight on him? Clint resolved to not put too much thought behind why he knew the kid could have dropped him just as easily.
He also wasn't going to think about why he didn't contact a Center about an online child in the custody of a known hostile. He might have stopped going to school around the fifth grade, but he wasn't fucking stupid. It would be suicidal to attempt to separate that little pack, and if his name got connected to any of that shit, death would be the nicest thing they would probably do. He had plans to live forever. What would the world do without his awesomeness?
He didn't tell the dickbags about the kid either.
Something told him that the kid wouldn't be as nice to any of them as he was to Clint. The thought of one of them discovering that little surprise appeased the Sentinel side of him a bit too well. The cocky S.O.B.s deserved everything that came their way if they managed to catch up with the duo again.
Still, in a decade or so, the kid was going to a fucking force.
Hmm…maybe it was time to start thinking about a retirement plan that didn't involve taking a (hopefully figurative) arrow to the knee.
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To be continued
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