In the few months after the Hydra takeover of SHIELD and the resulting chaos, none of the Avengers had time to really relax. As it stands, they did have a few moments to themselves.
After a particularly hard mission involving ex-Hydra agents and some sensitive information, as well as some events they will never speak of again, Iron Man, Captain America, and Hawkeye had a moment of quiet to themselves.
The June sun beat down on the busy city below, surprisingly hot even for the time of year. Though they had relegated themselves to the topmost levels of the Avengers tower, as the lower floors were public, the three kept mostly to themselves. Tony sat on the bar table, pouring himself some water and watching bad television while talking under his breath about the field trip some school had scheduled to tour the lower sections of the Tower. Above him, Barton had found a perch on a metal walkway that let him lie down while still feeling relatively cool.
The room had been made in the wreckage of the section Loki blasted a hole into, though was situated in the middle of the Tower, so there were no outside-facing windows. To compensate for the lack of natural light, Tony had installed a series of strategically placed lights to illuminate the room, though it remained slightly dim. It also had one small window on each side of the room, which opened to the room behind it, which showed the sky. It wasn't as large as most of the other rooms and seemed to be exclusively decorated with the innards of three separate thrift shops, an IKEA, and top-of-the-line electronics, then decorated by someone with a love of three-dimensional spaces. Basically, it was an eclectic eyesore which had modifications to fit all the operatives, including high-up spaces specifically for Clint. Tony downed the water like vodka, almost slipping off the narrow bar table, and called up to the archer,
"Hey, are you gonna watch like a normal person or are you just gonna sit up there?"
"You know me, Stark" Clint replied casually, as if he wasn't over twenty feet in the air and lying on a glorified bridge, "I like my distance."
"Alright, pigeon-man, your choice. Should I turn on the subtitles?" Stark asked, reaching for the remote.
"That would be appreciated," the archer said, turning onto his side to get a better view of the screen. They sat for a while, letting the soap opera drone on. After about an hour, Clint started getting really invested in the drama, at one point slamming his hand into the walkway with a wail as his favorite character got dumped by her boyfriend.
"Hey, Bird-man, careful. That's my stuff you're breaking," Tony warned. Judging by the half-hearted mutter, which was probably an apology, Clint didn't really care. They lapsed back into silence.
The day had been very difficult. Tony himself had been woken up very early, at least by his standards, to check out a lead on where Loki's scepter could have been. What they found was just a normal Hydra base, half-empty and lacking in any special equipment. Blowing that up had been fun, though the resulting headache had not. Thus, Tony was drinking water instead of alcohol, on Pepper's orders.
"Hey, any idea where Thor went?" Clint asked out of the blue. Stark thought for a moment.
"I think he's gone back to Asguard for a few days. I think he's still mourning his brother," he replied. Clint snorted.
"There's a snowball's chance in hell that he's dead" he called down.
Tony chuckled slightly as well, though still threw a pillow at the archer, "Let the guy have this. He braided a lock of Loki's hair into his own."
Clint's face appeared, wearing a delighted expression.
"No, you're joking."
"Right next to his face," Stark replied, gesturing with his finger.
"He stabbed him!" Clint crowed, nearing laughter. Tony shrugged.
"Wasn't the first time apparently. Thor would forgive someone for doing anything short of… actually I think Loki was responsible for a few deaths…"
"A lock of hair!" Clint's face disappeared as he rolled back over.
"Hey, you sticking around tonight or are you heading out?"
"I've got my own place. How's Cap?"
Tony grimaced. "He's still training, last I checked. JARVIS, how's Cap?"
A faint metallic voice answered his query.
"He is still in the gym, sir. Shall I add the last three bags to your tab?" Tony grimaced and fought the urge to pull out some of his real alcohol, settling instead on making three shots of scotch for himself and bringing those over to the couch.
"A hundred years old and he's still wrecking stuff."
Hawkeye, either surprisingly keen of hearing for someone legally deaf or perhaps only speaking his mind, butted in.
"He's doing well for an old-timer. I'll go check on him."
Clint stood up and cracked his back, stalking off down the metal walkway he was perched on. He passed through a door and was gone.
And so, Tony was left alone with a crappy soap opera. He took a shot of scotch and stretched out on an eyebleedingly orange couch, content to keep drinking. Maybe later he could fill out the fake blueprints for the next Iron Man model to see if any students were smart enough to pick up on it. He took another drink.
Thor was missing, probably exploring the nine realms or whatever it was he did, Banner was working with the remaining SHIELD scientists on rebuilding some of SHIELD's equipment and labs, and Natasha was… well, that was probably classified information.
He didn't want to admit it, but he was starting to feel stressed, himself. His job had been to basically provide bolstering funding to ensure that SHIELD got back on its feet properly, but other than that he, like Cap, hadn't been called much. Well, the Captain probably wasn't being called due to his role in bringing Hydra out of SHIELD. Tony had a feeling that there was something more to it, though he didn't want to pressure Steve to say anything he wanted to keep close to his chest. The past few months, Tony had noticed a certain… stress about him.
He should probably recommend a therapist, but that would be somewhat hypocritical of him.
Clint had also been showing up at the Tower less, both from SHIELD missions and for "personal reasons". It wasn't any of Tony's business, though he couldn't help but wonder.
Tony took another shot. That was his last one.
To distract himself from his thoughts, Tony picked up the remote and began flipping through channels. However, Clint chose that exact moment to reappear, dragging Captain Rogers through the door. When he noticed Tony changing the channel, Clint lunged for the remote, almost shoving Steve to the floor as he threw himself off the anachronistic man's perfect abs straight for the increasingly-aware-of-the-danger Iron Avenger.
Clint stopped his forward momentum, snatching the remote from Stark and retreating back up the walkway. He switched the channel back to the soap opera on his way up.
"Jesus, what's got him so possessive of his shitty shows?" Tony commented as he settled back into his previous position on the lurid orange mess of a couch. Steve shrugged but didn't say anything, instead choosing to sit on an adjacent chair in silence. Tony looked at him. Steve wasn't looking so great, with dark shadows under his eyes and a far-off, shut-down expression Tony recognized.
So they were back, watching shitty TV shows until someone was called away for a mission, or just left. Tony sighed but resigned himself to this fate. There was no way it would last, anyway.
Not fifteen minutes later, the sky darkened.
No, not like clouds finally came in to hide the glare of the sun, but actually blackened, localized in only one spot. Clint was the first to notice it. His perch on the walkway was right below the window. For a second, he didn't know what to do.
"Hey… uh, guys? Steve? Tony?" he said uncertainly, "You should come check this out."
Tony sat up slowly, though Steve's head only turned.
"What is it? See an interesting bird, Legolas?"
"Haha, no. Uh, I think SHIELD may have an issue with this…" Clint continued. His interest piqued, Tony eased himself off the couch and called for his AI.
"JARVIS, show the outside cameras for the… uh… wherever Barton's looking."
"Very good, sir," the voice came, changing the image on the television to the outside camera, where a black and green mass hung perfectly suspended right above the city. It looked like a mass of black tiles with a swirling vortex in the middle, leading to nowhere but infinity.
"JARVIS, can you run diagnostics from here?" asked Stark, already on the move to find the latest model of the suit. Clint and Steve similarly left the room almost before he spoke.
"I'm afraid not, sir. It's too far. I assume you'll be heading over to run scans manually?"
"JARVIS, really, what does it look like I'm doing? Get the… what mark are we on?" Tony was already in the elevator on his way to the designated launching point.
"I believe we are on mark forty-one, sir," came the slightly amused response. The elevator dinged and Stark jogged out, anticipation singing in his blood.
"Yeah, get that ready." The whir of machinery greeted him as he reached the launch. Blinking in the bright sun, Stark let the automatic arms apply the armor as he kept walking. He had just received the faceplate when a sudden notification stalled him.
"Sir, the sensors are picking up increased energy."
Sure enough, just as Tony was about to bite back a sharp reply, the portal turned red, swirled once more, and a small black shape appeared in the air, looking around once and speeding off into the depths of the city.
"Sir, Agent Romanoff is on her way," JARVIS suddenly spoke, bringing up a small diagram, "She and other agents will be here in ten minutes."
Tony rolled his eyes, "Sure, but I call dibs on the thing. Contact the others, we need a city-wide sweep."
He stepped off the platform, letting his thrusters take over before gravity. The chase was on.