Fandom: Avengers

Pairing: Phil/Clint, Steve/Tony/Bruce, Natasha/Maria Hill

Summary: Sequel to "Thank You for Coming Back to Me". The rest of the Avengers learn that Phil survived and they're not amused that the director lied to them.

AN: This is a late birthday present for my friend LucianSalesia, who inspired me to Natasha's form of revenge. It is also for hellsbells101, one of my favorite authors, who liked the first part of the story and wanted a sequel as well. It was her review that inspired me to write a sequel at all. Hope you like it!

. o O o .

The Avengers sat in the conference room at the Tower, while Fury was standing in front of them, pacing stiffly up and down the room. It was as if the man was waiting for something, but for the life of them, they couldn't say what. What astonished them was that Maria Hill, Fury's second in command was also there and looking just as puzzled by their boss's behavior and strange gait. It was as if the man was in pain. And why was he not sitting down? Fury always sat down when they had their meetings.

"What's up with him?" Tony asked Maria who was sitting next to him.

"No idea," she answered. "But I heard that he was in medical, once he came back from his trip."

"Maybe he finally noticed that he really has a stick up his ass," Tony snorted, "and they had to cut it out."

"More like he had a few arrows in his ass and they had to be cut out," a new voice said and every eye in the room turned towards the man sitting at the end of the conference table. Clint could see the vein on Fury's forehead start to come out, because he had just told them this embarrassing detail, but he couldn't care less. It wasn't as if the man didn't deserve everything that was coming for him.

"Clint!" Natasha exclaimed and was out of her chair only a moment later to embrace the man. "You're back!"

Clint just hugged her back for a long moment.

"Legolas!" Tony exclaimed and left his chair as well to make his way over to them. "I already have your suite ready and also a range and a lot of new arrowheads for you to try out. You're gonna love it!" He went on and on for a long time, barely drawing a breath while the others also crowded around them. After about ten minutes, Tony deflated however.

"You are going to stay, aren't you?" Tony asked with a small voice. None of them had taken it well when Clint had left after a week after the battle of New York. They had all come to care a lot for him in that short time and Tony had known his before he had gotten taken over by Loki already and the two of them had become friends before the whole disaster went down.

"Yeah, I am. But there are a few conditions however," Clint said as he pulled his friend close to calm him.

He looked up at Tasha who was standing behind Tony and willed her silently to understand and not be mad at him for keeping this from her. It had only been two days since Phil had found him, but he thought he should have called Tasha to tell her that her other best friend was alive and that she didn't have to worry anymore that she would lose him as well.

"I'm not going to come alone," Clint admitted quietly to Tony and the others. "I'm coming with my husband."

Tasha looked at him in horror, not thinking that Phil could have survived, since she trusted the director and his word on the matter of Phil's death. She would never expect him to lie about something like that. It hurt that she would think that Clint could move on that quickly, but he saw it in her eyes, before she even opened her mouth.

"It's only been two months since he died, Clint," she said disapprovingly and the others looked between the two of them back and forth, not knowing what was going on.

"I'm sorry Nat," Clint answered and he was, because he knew that this would destroy all the trust she had in Nick Fury. "JARVIS?"

As he looked up at the AI and prompted her to open the door next to him, all eyes were first on him, not knowing what he was going on about, until the door opened and all of the Avengers stared in shock at the man standing there. Clint quickly went over to help his husband into one of the chairs as the man still shouldn't be out of medical with having been awake for only five days and was still quite weak. Phil however had protested loudly against Clint's wishes to use a wheelchair.

The Avengers were in shock as they looked on as their archer helped his handler/husband into one of the chairs around the table. Tony was the first to break out of the spell and moved over to gently embrace Phil, mindful of his injuries. Phil looked at him suspiciously, but Tony just pulled him closer for a moment before he let go and held Phil at arm's length.

"You can taze me and watch Supernanny all you want as long as you stay with us," Tony whispered and his eyes were suspiciously bright. Phil looked at him for a moment dumfounded, but then he pulled the man close. He had not thought that Tony Stark cared for him, but it seemed like he was wrong.

Bruce and Cap were the next that came out of their shock and came over to them.

"We didn't know each other long, but you're important to Tony, Natasha and Clint, so I hope we'll be able to get to know each other better," Cap said and stretched out his hand, Bruce nodding behind him. Phil and Clint narrowed their eyes at the three men for a moment and then broke out laughing at exactly the same moment.

"Oh my god, this is just priceless," Clint wheezed after a moment and helped Phil sit back up as the older man was in pain again, because the laughing had pulled on his still tender scar. "You three together…"

The three men looked at each other, not understanding how the two had reached that conclusion, not that it was wrong.

Natasha was still staring at them silently and Phil smiled slightly and opened his arms invitingly for a hug. She came over slowly until she was about five feet away, but then she flew into her friend's arms and also pulled Clint down to her. The archer went willingly and whispered sweet nothings in her ear to calm her down. Soon, Maria was also in the threeway-turned-fourway hug and calmed her fiancée down, while she reveled in the fact that she had her two best friends back as well.

Fury had by now left the room silently, but not before he had received a disappointed look from the Captain. He had never thought that he would care much about what people thought about him, but somehow Captain America looking at him like that made him feel very uncomfortable.

Tony soon convinced everyone to come back to the tower and all of them went happily. They spent the rest of the day and well into the night reconnecting and talking about what had happened since they had been separated.

If they were also planning about how to make Nick Fury's life miserable for a while, no one was talking about that.

. o 0 o .

The next two months were spent in constant alertness by the director. That was how long medical took to clear Coulson for work, and after which his best agent was responsible for the Avengers.

It all started with the Captain giving him disapproving looks whenever he crossed ways with the man, which suddenly was quite often. Somehow it made him uncomfortable being looked at like that by Captain America. He didn't know why, but it did.

Then the paperwork he had to read and file was everywhere, but not once where it should have been, with forms missing or badly filled out.

When he had decided to just all do it on the computer and then print it out, his computer started malfunctioning, deleting files, butchering up the printouts, refusing to accept certain letters and more, not to mention that it always started to play embarrassing songs whenever he booted it up, or when someone was in the vicinity of his office and could hear.

But none of this was as bad as the "presents". They had started about a week after Coulson and Barton had come back. First it was just pictures, embarrassing pictures, yes, like the one Barton had no doubt shot after the archer had shot him in the ass with his arrows. He looked like a pincushion. Then it became little pieces, memorabilia, if you wanted to call them that. An arrowhead, the detonator of a bomb, a deformed bullet, that had clearly been used, a short knife that he recognized as one with which Natasha had carved out a man's heart after he had shot Coulson in the shoulder. Then it went on to eyeballs, a few ears, fingers and toes. All the glasses with formaldehyde were labeled with "this could be yours". Just the other day he had found a pair of balls in his desk where he normally kept a stapler. He shuddered silently and hoped that it would be over soon.

Fortunately for him it almost was three days later, when Phil was cleared for active duty. Then there was only one person left that wanted a piece of him for doing what he did and that was Coulson. A week later, he wasn't sure if that was a good or a bad thing. He nearly wished Natasha's form of revenge back.

-FIN-

Hope you liked this sequel! I'd be happy if you left me a note if you did! ^^