(NOTE: I posted this yesterday but it looks like it didn't go through for some reason, so I'm reposting!)

Author's Note: And I am posting this just a few minutes after midnight, I'm going to go ahead and call it a WIN! Challenge COMPLETED! Thank you so much to those who followed along and reviewed! I very much appreciate the support! For those following my other story "Some Assembly Required" I'll be jumping back into that story again ASAP!

Day 31
Alternate Prompt #11
Presumed Dead

It had been a long ass day.

Clint had come off a rough mission a couple weeks ago and was still working on getting back up to physically fit to return to active status as a SHIELD Agent and an Avenger. He had spent the entire day at the SHIELD base upstate working out and running training exercises to make sure he would be well prepared for his assessment in just a few days. He was sick of sitting around Avengers Tower and he felt like he was more than ready to get back into the field.

Clint could have stayed upstate on the SHIELD base, but over the last year and a half since the Avengers had moved into the Tower after the Loki incident, the Tower was finally feeling like home to Clint. And tonight Clint just wanted to be able to sleep in his own bed. So, he got in his car just after six o'clock in the evening and started the four hour drive back home.

He was about halfway home when his phone rang, interrupting his blaring classic rock music.

"Yeah?" Clint said as he answered the phone, not glancing at the caller ID.

"Hey, Clint, just checking in," came Natasha's voice over the line. "How did it go on base today?"

"It went fine," Clint assured her. "I was able to run a couple extra training exercises than I had planned on. I'm a little sore, but I feel good about taking the assessment in a couple days."

"Does that mean you'll take it easy for a few days?" Natasha asked pointedly. When Clint was benched from missions he tended to get obsessive about getting back to active status.

"I think I can go back to just working out and training in the Tower if that's what you mean," Clint said cheekily, knowing that it wasn't.

Natasha sighed heavily and Clint just knew she was rolling her eyes. "Are you staying on base tonight?"

"No, I wanted to come home tonight," Clint said. "I'm actually driving back now."

"How far out are you?"

Clint paused. There was something… off in Natasha's voice. The question had come across just a shade too… demanding.

"I'm probably about an hour and a half or so out," Clint said carefully. "Is everything okay, Nat?"

"Yeah, everything's fine," Natasha assured him, and all traces of the strange tone were gone. Had Clint just imagined it? "Just attempting to keep tabs on you since you're here, there and everywhere these days. I'll see you when you get back."

"Yeah, see you in a bit," Clint agreed before he disconnected the call, the bluetooth immediately switching back over to his blaring music.

Of the course of the next hour and a half, the odd conversation with Natasha slowly but surely slid to the back of Clint's mind as he lost himself in the music. It was after ten o'clock at night when Clint was finally pulling into the parking garage underneath Avengers Tower. He gave a big yawn as he pulled his duffle bag out of the backseat and slung it over his shoulder. Then he trudged over to the elevator, blinking heavily as the exhaustion hit him hard now that he was no longer behind the wheel of a car.

When he got into the elevator, he instinctively hit the button for his apartment floor. But as the doors were closing, he changed his mind and hit the button for the common floor. He had skipped dinner that night and figured there were probably some leftovers he could snag from the communal refrigerator.

Clint stepped out onto the common floor to find that all the Avengers were gathered, and all looked at him when he entered. Clint hesitated, looking around warily at the serious faces that had all turned to him at the same time. The television wasn't on, they had all apparently been just sitting around, which was odd for this time of night.

And then Clint spotted Nick Fury standing on the other side of the room, arms crossed as he leaned back against the wall behind him. That's when Clint really knew something was wrong.

"What happened?" Clint asked as he let the bag slide off his shoulder and onto the floor.

"Why don't you come sit down," Natasha invited, her voice solemn.

Clint didn't move, his eyes darting around the room once around. "Is this an intervention?"

The comment at least got a half hearted chuckle from a few in the room.

"It's nothing like that," Steve assured him, his tone light. "There's just something we need to tell you, and we figured it'd be better if we were all together for it."

"Okay," Clint said slowly as he carefully started walking forward, completely baffled by the situation. What could possibly be going on that made everyone look at him like that?

"It's nothing bad, I promise you," Natasha said as he sat on the couch next to her.

"We're just trying to find a way to do this that won't immediately give you a stroke or a heart attack," Tony input.

"Okay, just tell me what's going on," Clint pleaded.

"Nick," Natasha prompted, looking over at Fury expectantly.

Nick Fury sighed heavily before he pushed himself upright off of the wall. "I want you to know, I never wanted to put you through this, Barton. It was never my intention. It made sense in the big picture, but I knew what it would do to you in particular and I hated it. And it was always my intention to tell you what happened… but there isn't exactly a protocol for how to break this kind of news."

"Okay, we gotta pull the ripcord here at some point," Tony said pointedly.

"SHIELD had a program under Level 9 clearance called Project T.A.H.I.T.I.," Fury went on. "Can't imagine you've heard of it?" Clint only shook his head. "I cannot get into the details of the project, for obvious security reasons, but suffice it to say the goal of the project was to be able to heal wounds that otherwise would be fatal. It was designed to be able to save someone that would have otherwise been beyond saving. We've had mixed results from the project over the years, so when I called it into action a while ago, there was no guarantee that it would work. I didn't want to get anyone's hopes up."

Clint's head was spinning. "Fury, I'm going to be honest with you, I am dead tired and I have no fucking clue where you're going with all this or even what any of it means."

"Clint… Phil Coulson is alive."

There was that ripcord that Tony had been talking about. It was like the world had fallen out from underneath Clint. His heart paused, twisted and then started pumping wildly and out of control. He suddenly felt like he wasn't getting enough air and for some reason he couldn't feel his hands. He was floating away, untethered to the earth any long as his reality was ripped apart.

Clint found himself shaking his head. "No… no… no, Phil is… he's dead. I… I saw it. I saw the security footage. I watched… Phil's dead. We… we buried him." Clint looked around wildly. This was some kind of sick joke. But no one was laughing. Then was everyone else losing their minds? "He died, Loki killed him!"

"Clint," Natasha said softly, placing a gentle hand on his shoulders. "I know how hard this is to get your mind around. I know how painful your mourning process was and how long it took for you to accept it. And I know that this completely destroys that entire process that you went through. But it's true. Phil is alive. Fury managed to save him with Project T.A.H.I.T.I."

"Phil Coulson was clinically dead when the med team arrived on the scene after Loki stabbed him," Fury said, a little too clinically for Clint's mental state at that point. "We were never completely sure that we would be able to bring him back. And even when we did, we were never completely sure we could successfully heal him. It was a day by day operation that lasted for months."

Clint dropped his head into trembling hands. He shook his head. This wasn't real. There was no way this was real. Maybe he was dreaming. Maybe this was another nightmare. He had spent months grieving the loss of his mentor and best friend. He had been completely shattered by Phil Coulson's death. This man had taken him off the streets as a teenager and given him a purpose in life. He was the most stable person in Clint's life, he was Clint's anchor in the world. He was Clint's family. Losing Phil had almost broken Clint.

It couldn't be that easy to get him back. Could it?

"Clint?"

Clint head shot up so quickly that he just about pulled a muscle in his neck. He would know that voice anywhere. The figure had stepped in from an adjacent room and now stood there like a specter. Except he wasn't. He was flesh and blood. He breathed and he smiled that comforting smile that Clint had always loved so much.

Clint was on his feet one moment, and then across the room the next. He threw his arms around Phil with such force that he almost knocked them both over. But it was at that moment it finally hit him. This was real.

Phil was alive.

"It's okay, kid," Phil soothed as hugged Clint back just as fiercely. "It's okay."

"You… you were… I thought you were…" Tears were now flowing freely down Clint's face.

"I know," Phil said gently. "I know. I'm sorry I couldn't get back to you sooner. I just… we didn't know how to tell you."

He didn't care. He didn't care about anything in that moment other than the feeling of Phil's arms wrapped securely around him.

He was home.

DISCLAIMER: I know this probably doesn't fit in exactly with the events of the Agents of SHIELD tv show, I kinda tailored it to what I needed this prompt to do. Also, Fury deliberately leaves out important details about Project T.A.H.I.T.I. ;)