Title: Conquer
Author: SLynn
Summary: While Phil and Clint settle back into their normal lives, Natasha begins to see that things are not the same.
ix.
"Come on," Tony said, still at Natasha's side even after Steve had left, and determined to get answers, "tell me what's wrong between you and Barton now, so I can fix it, and we can all move on with our lives."
"You're unbelievable," she muttered into her drink.
"I know," he shrugged. "It's a gift."
Tony continued to stare at her as he waited. He didn't really expect her to continue, but he hoped she would.
"He seems so cold," she finally said quietly, her face still turned away. "Like they broke him. Or I did. He's got no fight left."
"We've all been there."
"And who picked you up?" she asked, inclining her head his way; knowing the answer.
"Pepper."
"After New York," Natasha continued, lowering her voice to ensure no one else would hear them, "I tried. We have an understanding. We always have and I tried to be there for him but... but he needed so much more of me. More than I was used to giving."
Tony finished his drink and flipped the glass over on the bar, stopping to let the words sink in.
"It's a scary thing," he admitted.
"New York was the worst it's ever been, but it was hardly the first time," she continued, still refusing eye contact. Having slowly began to trace the rim of her glass as she spoke. "He's always been fine through a fight. He does his job. Doesn't flinch from it. He knows what needs to be done but afterwards... it takes a toil."
Natasha's eyes darted back to where Clint sat, still laughing and talking directly behind where the two of them sat.
"Where's that toil now?" she asked Tony.
"I'm not going to sit here and pretend to know him better than you do," he answered after a minute to think through what he was going to say, "but he's been out of that place for over a month. Maybe it hasn't sunk in yet or maybe he's already gotten through the hard part on his own."
"He did have Phil."
"He did," Tony agreed, not liking Natasha's tone or train of thought one bit. "Given how things ended -"
"Did he blame me?"
"No," he admitted, immediately and truthfully. "He was worried for you."
"But he blames me now," she said with a brisk nod. "He doesn't even call me Tasha anymore. You all do but he won't... I was concerned about what his reaction would be if this was all true, that he was really coming back to us, but I wasn't prepared."
"I'm not sure how you could have been."
"Clint has loved me for so long... long before I deserved it. Maybe this just proves I don't deserve it because I relied too much... I took for granted he always would love me but he's changed."
"I've been there," Tony said, the corners of his mouth turned down as he thought of Pepper.
"He's changed," she said firmly.
"Well, we don't know what they did to him or to Phil. Not really."
"No," she agreed, meeting his eyes directly for the first time. "We don't."
"What are you..." he started to ask, but Natasha shook off whatever emotion had begun to overtake her as easily as if she was batting her eyelashes.
"It's probably nothing," Natasha decided before tipping back the rest of her drink and getting to her feet, leaving with only a nod for a 'goodbye'.
But even after she'd left, Tony couldn't stop thinking about it.
It kept him up through the night, working in his lab; the place he took all his troubles that were too distant or intangible to bring to Pepper.
"Do you have a minute?"
Tony looked up from the ID card he'd just finished, the last one, and smiled as best he could at Dr. Ross.
"Got a few," he said. "What'd you need?"
"I just wanted to run this by you."
"Not Bruce?"
"You can run it by him later, if you like," she said with a careful smile. "Take a look."
Betty pulled up the data she had and stood back, waiting for Tony to make the connection.
"Is this... how is this possible?"
"I don't know," she shrugged, "but Agent Morse wasn't exaggerating when she said Captain Danvers had been altered. This incident changed her right down to her DNA. It's unrecognizable. It's almost inhuman."
Tony held up a finger, silently asking for a minute, before turning to his terminal and pulling up several different files, including Danvers, onto the 3D projector.
"Do they know about these?" Betty asked with a single eyebrow raised.
"Bruce does," Tony admitting as the two of them stood there, visually comparing Danvers's DNA against Steve and Bruce's own.
"The biometric readers in the cards?" she asked.
"Yep," Tony confirmed. "Got everyone's. But this," he said, closing everything but Danvers's file. "This is way out of my realm of expertise."
"Mine, too," Betty admitted. "You know, we could call -"
"I'm not calling Reed. Reed is an ass."
"Well, I really don't have anything else to offer, so..."
"You're not leaving, are you?" Tony asked, shutting down the protector.
"There's no real reason to stay and I have research of my own. A lab to run. Papers to write."
"I thought... I don't know, you might want to hang out. See how things work."
"I know how things work," Betty said kindly. "And I appreciate what you're trying to do. What you've done. You've changed his life," she said, struggling not to get choked up as she spoke. "Thank you for that. And thank you for letting me in, even if it was just for a little while. Even if it was only to observe."
"So you're really going without... Have you even talked? I don't think I've even seen the two of you in the same room."
"We don't need to talk," she answered, in a slightly exasperated, yet familiar, way. "If we did, we would. When he needs me again, when he can have me back in his life, he'll know. We'll talk then. I'm sure of it."
"When are you going?" he asked, but saw the answer in her eyes. "You're leaving now? Right now? Like..."
"My flight leaves in three hours."
"Wow. Okay, well... have you at least said goodbye?"
"Goodbye," she said, walking over and wrapping him into a warm hug.
"I didn't mean to me," he said perplexed, but Betty offered up no explanation.
With a smile and a wave she was gone.
Tony was still trying to puzzle out her odd behavior an hour later when Bruce showed up in his workshop.
"Betty emailed me the files," he said, shaking his head as he entered the room. "What are you thinking?"
"Why didn't you talk to her?"
"Oh, geez, Tony," Bruce sighed, rubbing his hand over the top of this head. "Not again. You said you brought her here as a consultant and I told you not to do this."
"I can't help myself."
"I know you can't," Bruce muttered, but he didn't sound very forgiving.
"I did bring her in to help out..."
"Which she did."
"Yes," Tony answered, "but I thought the two of you might at least talk. You didn't even talk and now she's gone again."
"Tony," Bruce said, beginning to feel that same familiar churning deep inside, "if I couldn't even say hello to her, how hard do you think goodbye would have been?"
Tony shook his head and frowned.
"I didn't think of it like that."
"I know," Bruce shrugged, trying to fight off his own uneasiness, "but you have to stop. It's good of you to give me a push every now and then, but there are some things I do know better than you."
"I'm sorry," Tony said as the doors to the shop slid open again and Clint walked in. "I am. And I promise to stay out of it from now on."
Bruce wanted to joke that he'd heard that one before, but found he couldn't. He felt ready to split in two and he had to get out of there.
Still calm, still barely in control, Bruce gave him a short nod and without even looking at Clint, he left.
"What'd I just walk in on?" Clint asked, eyeing the door suspiciously.
"It's nothing," Tony said dismissing the topic. "What do you need?"
"JARVIS said you got my ID ready," Clint said. "I'd have stopped by sooner but I was on the range."
"Glutton for punishment," Tony said as he shifted through the contents of his nearest workstations. "I just had this thing."
"Take your time," Clint said as he pushed himself up onto one of the empty tables to take a seat. "I've got nothing better going on."
"Aren't you supposed to be earning a paycheck?" Tony asked with a grin as he continued his search.
"What? I don't get convalescent leave?"
"Take it up with HR," Tony answered, still unable to find what he needed.
"Technically I'm still dead," Clint said, rubbing a hand over the back of his neck. "Pepper's got your lawyers working on the paperwork."
"You're welcome."
"SHIELD is sorting out Phil," Clint continued, ignoring Tony's sarcastic dig. "Although, as much as Phil loves paperwork, he might be handling it on his own. I wouldn't be surprised if he had all the proper forms pre-filled out and stashed away somewhere on the Helicarrier, just in case."
"Here it is," Tony said happily. "No, wait. This was supposed to be Dr. Ross's. Son of a bitch," he said, running a hand through his hair. "I've got to get organized in here."
"How's she working out?"
"Who?" Tony asked without looking up from the desk drawer he'd begun to rifle through.
"Dr. Ross," Clint returned. "She getting anywhere?"
"Yeah, clear across the country."
"What do you mean?"
"She's gone," Tony answered, slamming the drawer shut and momentarily shutting his eyes, as if to visualize the last place he'd left that damn ID. "She actually just left."
"So, she couldn't do it? She couldn't find anything?"
"Oh, no, she found plenty," Tony answered, his eyes popping open as he raced back across the room. "Danvers's DNA was off the charts. Completely changed. She's practically her own species. How did she look?"
"Carol?"
"Yeah," Tony asked, having finally found what he needed.
"Normal," Clint answered. "She looked... human."
"Huh," Tony shrugged. "Guess we won't know more until we find her."
"If we find her."
"We will," Tony said with complete certainty as he handed Clint his ID. "Give it a second."
"Same as before?"
"I've made a few improvements," Tony said, but when Clint looked back at him suspiciously, he laughed. "Nothing drastic and I'm still sworn to only use them for good."
Clint held his card out before him and waited. It took a minute, but finally the card registered his fingerprints and began to fill with all the pertinent information.
"That it?" Clint asked as he gave the card one last look before slipping it into his pocket.
"That's it," Tony confirmed, clapping his hands together and watching as Clint slid down off of his perch and made to leave. "Unless you want me to activate that one-way camera. For fun. And science."
"No," Clint laughed, shaking his head as he did so. "I think it works just fine the way it is."
Tony watched him go, watched him until he got back on the elevator even, before turning back to his workstation.
"Yes, it does," he muttered to himself.
Notes: Fixed a mistake - thank you, Alpha Flyer!
