Christmas morning, Clint woke earlier than everyone else. When he tried to sneak out his room, he had been surprised to find every access locked. JARVIS had explained it as the others had all agreed while he had been in a coma that they would be locked in their rooms till everyone was awake and ready. Upset at that but not wanting to protest their wishes, Clint had returned to his room. Slowly he began going through the remains of his adult clothes. It actually only took twenty minutes for Clint to analyze every article of clothing to see what could stay and what needed to go. When he was done he had four shirts, three pairs of shorts, two pants, two pairs of socks (three more questionable pairs), and five boxers. He winced. Oh, he totally needed to go shopping with Tony again. And if that didn't fill him full of fear again, he didn't know what would.
"Agent Barton, the others are awake and beginning to arrive in the living room," JARVIS suddenly announced. Clint jumped to his feet.
"I thought we were all going to meet there at the same time," the archer called. JARVIS said nothing. Groaning, Clint rushed to the elevator. It was waiting with the doors open. Frowning, he jumped on. A minute later, the doors re-opened to the living room floor. Everyone was waiting at the end of the hall.
"MERRY CHRISTMAS CLINT!" they shouted at him. He froze for a second, stunned at their appearance. Everyone was decked out in holiday outfits.
"What the hell?" Clint echoed back, slowly walking toward them. He got to the end of the hall before something small, tannish and fluffy suddenly bounded into his legs. With an 'umph' he tripped and fell flat on his face. As he turned around, something wet began licking his face over and over again. "Uh! What the hell!"
"Arrow! Off!" Natasha commanded, rushing to Clint's rescue. Clint sat up as soon as 'Arrow' had backed down. He was stunned to see a little golden retriever 'puppy' was sitting calmly, staring at him. Natasha kneeled down beside the stunned archer. "Merry Christmas. Do you like him?"
"Hmm?" Clint hummed, unsure of what was happening. Natasha chuckled at the shocked archer. She had assumed he wouldn't know what to make of any of this. He just stared at the dog as if it was a fire breathing dragon coming to eat out his heart and Natasha was the witch that controlled it.
"Arrow is my gift to you," she softly told him before nudging his arm closer to touch the puppy. Arrow yipped and then began furiously licking the archer's hand. Clint didn't move. She could have told him that it was the end of the world and Loki was going to fuck him and he still wouldn't react.
"Hey! No fair! You promised that I would go first!" Tony whined behind them. Clint jerked his hand back and turned to look at the genius with wide eyes. Somehow, the genius's voice seemed more normal that Natasha's.
"What the hell is happening?" Clint asked. The others traded looks. Natasha and Pepper had both warned them that he might be a little stunned about what they were planning but they all had wanted to go through with it any ways.
"It's Christmas. We... Uh... Trade gifts," Bruce pointed out. Clint frowned before turning to look back at Arrow. It took him an extra second for Bruce's comment to settle in his mind. Then he flashed back to Natasha mentioning that Arrow was her gift to him. Clint shook his head.
"I... I didn't get you guys anything," Clint muttered. Pepper came over then and pulled him into a hug. She had figured that this would have been his biggest problem with this.
"It's okay. We all promised that this Christmas was about you. No one really got anything for each other," Pepper told him. Clint glanced around and the group nodded. Arrow gave a light bark before crawling into Clint's lap and proceeded to give the archer another wet kiss.
"Ugh," Clint groaned, holding the dog down with a nice and tight bear hug. "Stop, no licking."
Arrow whined lightly at that but didn't attempt to give the archer another kiss. The others chuckled at the uber excited pup. When Natasha had first gotten Arrow, it had been hard to keep him off of any of them, never mind the comatose Clint. And now, even with Clint awake and able to defend himself, it didn't look like it was going to get much better. Tony stepped forward now, figuring Arrow needed a distraction as much as Clint did.
"Want to see the other gifts?" the genius asked. Clint glanced over at the genius before looking back at Arrow. His gaze settled on Tony after a moment and he made a slightly crazed laugh.
"This has to be a joke. I thought you swore off animals," Clint determined, remembering the fiasco with the cat. Tony chuckled, also remembering the cat.
"Nope, just cats. Which, if you ever see one, run," Tony ordered. Clint snorted and smiled at the genius.
"I've known since I was four that I was allergic," the archer commented. Everyone stiffened. He was four when the incident happened.
"Before or after the serum?" Bruce questioned, more for his own curiosity than anything. Clint paused to really think about it.
"Uh... Before?" Clint questioned, sounding unsure himself now.
"Are you certain, friend archer?" Thor wondered. Clint frowned before shaking his head.
"No... Not really... I mean... I remember the cat here... But I also remember my neighbor's cat," Clint whined. Natasha placed a hand on his shoulder. "I can't remember which came first."
"It's okay. We won't talk about that today," the spy stated, her gaze solidly on everyone else. Clint nodded, knowing that she was giving everyone her 'death glare'. He was glad that he wouldn't need to go into detail about what he could and could not remember right now. Already, he had done enough with Tony and Natasha the day before. Having to do more with the rest was just too much right now. He needed a break. Tony clapped his hands, drawing everyone's attention all over again.
"Okay, let's get this party started! Clint, come grab a gift!" Tony demanded, moving around into the main living room area. Clint slowly, got to his feet, surprisingly with the help of Arrow. He frowned at that but shook it off as he started to follow after the genius and froze. The living room looked exactly like the design he had seen when he was four years old. Down to the little rock wall/cat tree section meant for him. Tony laughed. "Oh yeah. You haven't seen this in person."
"No... I haven't..." Clint stuttered. His eyes wondered over the whole place until it landed on the huge Christmas tree and mountain of presents that was placed beside it. "Wow."
"Yup... We went a bit overboard," Tony mentioned.
"We?" Pepper asked. Tony chuckled and placed a hand behind his head in embarrassment.
"Okay... I did... Mind you, it may not be all... Uh... Age appropriate..." the genius said. Clint frowned. "I shopped in October before we found out that Richards had found the cure and couldn't return them cause they came pre-wrapped and I opened the delivery boxes when they came in..."
Clint snorted, trying to hold back his laughter but after a minute he couldn't hold it back any longer. He just stared laughing at the genius. It took Tony a bit longer but once the genius joined in, everyone started laughing with them.
"It's fine Tony. I'm sure I can still have fun with it all," Clint assured the genius. Tony nodded, glad that Clint was trying to please him. Thor clapped the archer on the shoulder.
"That pleases me greatly. For we have decided to make that our... Theme? All of us have gotten you youngling presents," Thor declared. Clint's eyes widened in surprise.
"Seriously?" he wondered. When everyone nodded, he smiled. "Okay then."
Slowly, he made his way into the living room and toward the tree. As he made his way over there, he noted that Arrow was right by his side. He stopped and stared at the dog even as everyone else began to take up the seating arrangements throughout the room. Natasha was the first to notice Clint was watching Arrow follow him. She just chuckled.
"Arrow is a trained helper dog," the spy explained to Clint even though he didn't ask. Clint looked at her, confused. "While you were asleep, he was trained to know that you are his master and what to look for."
"I don't need a helper dog," Clint pointed out.
"Actually, Arrow is trained to sense changes in your body. Specifically changes like seizures or the serum reappearing," Bruce mentioned. Clint paled and focused on the dog.
"Seizures?"
"You would get them before your age changed," Steve described, getting up again as he noticed warning signs of Clint not liking this conversation. Clint frowned.
"Honestly, the serum that did this could have caused a lot of unknown damage to your body that may not show up for years to come. Arrow is trained on you to sense these things before it gets too bad," Bruce said. Clint turned to look at the doc, his face still pale but he seemed a bit more understanding. Everyone calmed.
"Oh..." Clint replied. Arrow licked his hand before shoving his head into it, sensing that his master was becoming distressed and needed comfort. Absently, Clint began petting the pup. No one spoke for a moment as they watched the two slowly bond. After a few minutes, Clint seemed to realize what Arrow had done and stopped petting him. Arrow huffed before trotting toward the presents and sitting down. Clint snorted.
"Come on, you have a bunch of amazing presents to open," Tony stated, making the archer finally move. Clint nodded and grabbed the first present he could get his hands on. It was a gold shiny present with a silver bow. A white tag was attached to the bow. Clint grabbed that to read it.
"To Clint, from... Santa? Really?" Clint asked, glancing over at the others. Everyone, except Tony, began laughing. Tony huffed.
"I bought early!" the genius cried. Clint placed the present down before sitting down behind it.
"Tony, I knew Santa wasn't real by age three," Clint mentioned. Tony snarled.
"Hey, no! Santa is totally real!" Tony argued. Clint rolled his eyes. Of course the genius would believe that.
"Yeah, sure-" Clint started but stopped when Pepper suddenly clapped her hands.
"Boys! No fighting. It's Christmas, let's just enjoy the day. The Santa debate can wait for another day," Pepper ordered.
"Yes, ma'am," Tony and Clint chorused. Pepper's eyes narrowed at the title they used but before she could yell at them for that, Clint began tearing into the wrapping paper around the present. Rather quickly he revealed an average 'Beginner's Science Kit'. Clint paused to stare at it before realizing this gift came from Tony and it wasn't something he made and wasn't worth tons of money. He looked up at Tony. The genius shrugged.
"I swore, if I ever had kids that I was going to buy them a beginner's science kit. You mentioned a few times that you wanted me to adopt you so, I got it for you," Tony smartly replied. Clint gulped, noticing that Tony wasn't even going into the deeper issues. Reverently, the archer placed the kit aside.
"Seriously Tony, a science kit?" Natasha joked. Tony shrugged. Before anyone could tease Tony any more, Clint quickly grabbed the next present. He didn't want to get the genius into deeper topics and issues that involved the archer's age difference. The present Clint grabbed was a Frozen wrapped. Clint started laughing at the paper before finding the tag.
"Frozen Bruce? Really?" Clint laughed. Bruce slowly turned red.
"It's all I could find," Bruce defended. Clint chuckled one last time before slowly going at the wrapping paper. He was stunned to find inside was a small collection of books. Staring at the titles, Clint was surprised to see there were titles for archery, history of spies, history of the circus acts, and much more based a lot on things that happened in his life. Blinking in shock, Clint looked up at Bruce. The doctor shrugged. "I wasn't really sure what to get. But, I figured you might like some of this. Learning more about what you went through was something you were interested in."
"Thanks," Clint whispered. Slowly, Clint placed those with the science kit. With a deep sigh, he grabbed the next present. Like before, this was another gold present but no bow and also marked from Santa. Clint bit his tongue so as to not comment.
"I know... There will be a lot from Santa," Tony mentioned. Clint snorted. "Hey, I told you I shopped in October!"
"And it was stupid," Natasha added. Arrow barked in agreement. Clint chuckled before leaning back and petting the pup. Slowly, he ripped the wrapping. This was definitely not age appropriate. As soon as Clint saw it, he started cracking up laughing. Everyone, except yet again Tony, began calling out, asking what Clint was looking at. Clint took an extra minute to clear the rest of the wrapping paper and show the group what the present was.
"Where did you find those?" Steve cried as soon as he saw the present which was actually a set of presents. What it was ended up being action figures of each Avenger.
"Online. Well, actually I first saw them when out with Clint at the mall. Took a while to find the full collection," Tony admitted. Clint snorted as he pulled his figure's package away from the others' so he could get a better look at it.
"Clint! Toss me mine?" Steve asked. Clint nodded before tossing the entire collection over. Steve pulled his off and passed the collection over to Bruce, who snorted and pulled Hulk off and Thor off and passed it onto Natasha. Natasha quickly snatched her figure away from the Iron Man figure and dropped it to the ground.
"Hey, be careful with me!" Tony shrieked. Pepper smacked the back of his head.
"You have seventeen more of you, it's fine," she snapped. Everyone stopped to stare at the genius.
"Seventeen?" Clint chorused in shock. Tony shrugged.
"Give or take," he agreed. Clint snorted before looking everyone over.
"I better get those back," he warned. Everyone agreed and once they did, Clint laid his figure down and moved onto the next gift. This next one was also from Santa. Another snort from Clint but he opened it. This gift was some clothing. Amazingly it was actually adult clothes. Clint just stared.
"I saw your lack of adult clothes a while ago. Used this as an opportunity," Tony laughed. Clint smiled. The next eight gifts were more adult clothes. He ended up with seventeen more shirts, five more shorts, six more pants, three packs of six socks, four packs of three boxers and eight longs sleeve shirts. Clint paused at those. "I noticed a lack of those but you live in New York now... You're gonna need them sooner or later."
"I usually don't wear them cause they constrict my movements," Clint mentioned. Tony's face brightened.
"I can work on that!" he cried. Clint rolled his eyes before grabbing the next present. He was surprised to see it was from Steve. He glanced over at the soldier. Steve was still distracted with looking at the action figure. Clint chuckled lightly as he looked down at the present and noticed the wrapping paper was Captain America paper. His loud bark of laughter made nearly everyone jump.
"Yeah, I figured you'd like that," Steve chuckled when he saw what present Clint was on. Clint shook his head before opening it. He was surprised to see it was a collection of Captain America comics. "You mentioned that your brother used to read them to you."
"Wow... This must have cost you a fortune," Clint muttered. Steve shrugged.
"Mentioned that I was the main character and they pretty much handed them to me as long as I signed a bunch more," Steve said. Clint laughed as he flipped through them. Suddenly a paper fell out of the comics and drifted to the floor. Arrow sniffed it as Clint reached for it. He quickly read it.
"IOU Tony-pony?" Clint read. Steve snorted as Tony glanced over at him.
"You made Stevie and I want to make Tony-pony," Steve clarified, even though it didn't actually clarify anything. Clint just stared at Steve with a confused expression. Steve chuckled. "I want to go to Build-A-Bear with you and build a bear and name it Tony-pony."
"You couldn't come up with a better name?" Clint joked. Steve shook his head. Rolling his eyes, Clint chuckled. "Sure. Whenever you want."
"Before New Year's." Clint nodded before grabbing the next present. Again, it was from Santa. Clint sighed and looked at Tony.
"Is everything you bought me from Santa?" Clint demanded. Tony paused to think about it.
"Yeah, pretty much," the genius stated. Clint sighed. "Hey! I thought you would be a kid when you opened these so back off!"
"You bought me adult clothes!" Clint cried. Tony glared at the archer. Sensing that he was going to start an argument with genius, Clint rolled his eyes, a sign that he was going to blow the whole thing off. Tony's eyes narrowed. He would not forgive the whole Santa fight. The big man in red was real and the genius was going to prove it. "Forget it."
Slowly, the archer began to peel away at the wrapping paper before freezing. Tony arched up in his seat to get a better look at the gift. Seeing a small piece, he mouthed something and stood up. Pepper grumpily shifted to allow the genius to pass. Once free of the couch and coffee table, Tony headed to the tree, Clint didn't even notice.
"Tony?" Steve called. The genius waved the soldier off, not replying, as Tony knew that his actions would answer for himself. Tony picked up another present, wrapped in similar paper to the one that Clint held, and handed it to Clint.
"This one goes with that one," Tony mentioned. Clint just looked up at him in surprise.
"These aren't for kids," Clint softly said. Tony nodded.
"I knew you'd return to normal. I've been secretly working on them for a while now," Tony explained. Clint sighed deeply before putting down the present he was holding to grab the one that Tony was handing him. Once he had put down the first present, everyone noticed that it was a new quiver case.
"Do all of us get new weapons? Or only ones that you accidently hurt?" Natasha quipped to Tony. The genius winced at her words but said nothing in response as he had originally began working on her Widow Bites because he hadn't been fast enough to help her. And because she came down and asked for it. Clint interrupted the conversation by opening the second present. A brand new bow and new armor.
"Wow... Tony, this is amazing," Clint muttered. Tony shrugged, unconcerned as he reclaimed his seat by Pepper. Carefully, Clint continued to unwrap the bow to get a better look at it. As the archer looked the item over, one could just tell that he was itching to go down to the archery range to go test it out.
"Bet you wished you opened that last," Bruce joked as he nodded to the dwindled pile of presents still left to be opened. Clint sighed deeply.
"Seriously, this is too much you guys," Clint finally stated. The others smiled.
"Want help?" Natasha offered. Clint smiled and nodded. As one, the others got up and slowly began joining in. Soon the room was filled with voices and laughter as they all chatted over the gifts that they had all gotten Clint for Christmas. A couple more of the gifts were useless kids toys life Nerf weapons, educational toys, electronic kids toys, and stuffed animals. But there were more useful things like archery items, mechanic books, and more things that Clint had been rather interested in. Then Thor grabbed onto a thin box but before he could open it, Pepper cried out.
"NO! STOP!" the CEO screeched, snatching the package out of his hands. For a shocking moment, everyone froze and stared at the duo. Thor looked so stunned that he was about to cry and Pepper just looked horrified like Thor had run over her pet hamster or something. If one had just walked in one the scene, they might have just laughed, but as no one was there too, they just sat there and just watched.
"I do not understand. I thought we were helping," Thor whimpered. Pepper felt a wave of guilt before waving the present.
"This has to be specifically opened by Clint, sorry," Pepper replied even as she handed it over to the archer. Clint raised an eyebrow but accepted the present. Slowly he opened it to find that it was a thin box. Opening that, he found an envelope. With a deep sigh, he opened that to find a slip of paper that basically read that his new name was Clinton Francis Barton-Stark.
"Is... Is this what I think it is?" Clint whispered.
"We haven't officially turned in the papers. We were going to. A day away from it when Richards mentioned he had that cure," Tony stuttered out, rambling on and on as he went. A quick glance and Clint realized that the genius was starting the blush. Thinking back on his time with Tony, the archer remembered all the times he mentioned wanting to be adopted by the genius and how Tony wanted such. Clint smiled.
"I like it."
"Wait, what?" Tony asked, having been rambling a bit more and lost in his thoughts. Clint laughed and waved the paper at him.
"I like it. Thanks," Clint said. Tony smiled back.
"Of course it doesn't mean much as you are officially an adult in your own right but we can change it so that you own some Stark Industries stock and will gain an inheritance once Tony passes and such," Pepper mentioned. Clint's eyes widened in horror at the idea. Pepper smiled.
"Does this mean that he has to go to meetings like me too?" Tony jokingly wondered. Pepper shook her head no. Tony moaned as Clint laughed.
"Either way, it really means a lot," Clint pointed out. Tony nodded, grabbing another present. Slowly the group went back to opening the presents. When they were down to the last few presents Steve grabbed a huge box and before he could open it, Tony noticed it.
"STOP!"
"Jeez, again?" Steve wondered. Clint snorted and reached for it. Steve nodded and handed it over. Tony sighed deeply as Clint opened it. "What's so important about Clint opening that one specifically?"
"Uh... It's empty," Clint added, tipping the box over to prove such a fact. Everyone looked to Tony in surprise. The genius nodded.
"Yup. It's all the blackmail material," Tony stated. Clint looked up at him surprised.
"What?"
"I got rid of it all. Well, actually no. I didn't get 'rid' of it per say. I made JARVIS put it on your servers so that you could allow access to whomever you wanted to. I don't want to use any of it as blackmail but I didn't want to get rid of it," Tony explained. He then pointed to the box. "That box represents the blackmail server that I have of this whole experience. It shows the amount that I could have had in pictures and DVDs. But instead, I decided to leave it empty and let you decide what we can all enjoy together at a later date."
For a long time the room was silent. No one had any idea what to say. In all the time they had known Tony, no one had ever really known Tony to do something like this. It meant such a great deal. More than words could even describe. Finally, Clint just got to his feet, walked over all the wrapping paper and simply pulled Tony into a tight hug. Tony just froze for a second before finally gulping and then awkwardly patting Clint on the back.
"Okay man. I get it. You like the gift," Tony said, trying to get Clint to stop hugging him. But Clint continued hugging him. Pepper leaned back to get a good look at Clint's face and was stunned to see that the archer was now crying.
"Oh, Clint," she cooed before pulling both Tony and Clint into a hug of her own. Tony cried out but was largely ignored. Tony looked over Pepper's and Clint's shoulders to everyone else looking at them. He rolled his eyes.
"Come on," he encouraged. With a laugh, they all joined in. When they finally all backed away from the group hug, Clint had stopped crying but his eyes were still slightly red from the tears. He sniffed before looking them all over.
"Best Christmas ever."
4241 words. And totally awesome. I'm glad that everyone has been enjoying this. Can't wait to see how you all respond to this chapter. So many feels, ^_^ .
My family is doing well. My husband just had his allergy testing done and we learned a few things from it but most of the positives were ones we knew about. The biggest surprises was that he is allergic to broccoli and saline (basically salt water). But the test went fine, no extreme reactions. Toddler Clint is well. Still not talking and the new 'head doctor' we were told to meet with has a waiting list of at least three months. So, now we wait. Though we may call another doctor in the mean time. Who knows. Personally, my burn from Thanksgiving got a small infection and needed an ointment to help it heal. Sadly, to help, I needed to loosely cover it with either a Band-Aid or gauze. Come to find out, my chest doesn't like the glue involved in and type of tape or Band-Aid. So now I have a lovely red box of skin around the burn. Thankfully today I was able to get away with no ointment, covering or glue substance and so it seems to be clearing up fine.
Only one more chapter left! OMG! Can't believe it's almost over. Heck, can't wait for the next story either. But, so sad that this one had to end. Either way... Hope you all enjoyed the ride.
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Review Responses:
Niom Lamboise - Yup, Clint and Tony will be good friends but like any good friendship, they may sometimes fight in the future so don't expect it to last. Thanks for the reviews and hope to see you next story.
sammygirl1963 - Nope, couldn't do that. Needed to fix things and the words just kept coming and coming. I almost cried while typing it (which would have been embarrassing seeing as I was typing the chapter at work rather than building key chains like I was supposed to ^_^). I loved having Tony kiss Clint goodnight. It's something that my husband and I do for Clint each night as well and I just knew it would have been force of habit for the genius. Just the most perfect ending.
amy. d .fuller .9 - Yeah, he remembers most of it but as time passes he'll forget more and more. I loved writing the interaction with Tony. To be honest, I surprised myself when I typed that Tony gave Clint a goodnight kiss but as I re-read the chapter, I realized it fit and basically had to end that way. I'll try and work in Clint remembering how much the team cares but it's mostly based on how the mind acts and the mind tries hard to block good memories during moments of self-doubt, self-loathing and depression. (I should know, lol.) Glad to hear you enjoyed Thanksgiving. My burn actually ended up get a small infection and I had to get an ointment cream to put on it. Then, come to find out, my chest doesn't like any type of glue sitting on it. We tried regular Band-Aids, paper tape, and a few others things that I can't remember now. Nothing helped. I got all red and inflamed wherever the glue stuck. But, mostly healed now. Went the whole day without covering and the redness is almost gone and the burn has a nice thin healthy layer of skin on it.
pottyandweezlbe89 - Thank you. Glad you loved every minute of it. Can't wait to post the sequel story as well. Looking forward to what everyone thinks of it.
Ryaaaaann - Yup, sequel. Trust me, you aren't the only one excited for it. Thanks for the compliment.
Guest - I'm glad you like the story.
Wholockian99 (Guest) - Yup, total adventure. The sequel is going to be just as awesome (I hope). I can't believe it's ending either but as they say 'all good things must come to an end.'