A/N: Another long one! A direct sequel to the last chapter! Featuring more Bruce and a nice dose of Clint/Natasha!

Again, I have no idea how American hospitals work, but I did my best to hand-wave it away.

Prompt: "Your OTP goes sledding (bonus points if one of them breaks a bone)"

Chapter Text

Bruce turned from the destruction of the Christmas tree to watch Clint and Natasha walk into the living room together. "What happened?" he asked, seeing the blue cast encasing Clint's wrist.

"Sledding," Natasha said, making her way to the couch and flopping onto it. "Do we have any alcohol?"

Bruce held out his mug. "Thor made eggnog," he said in explanation.

Taking it with a grateful expression, Natasha took a long drink. "So, we went shopping," she started.

"It was amazing," Clint said, still staring at the wreckage of what had been, until that morning, a gorgeous twelve-foot Douglas fir. "Santa was there."

"Santa?" Bruce asked.

Natasha was already tapping at her phone. "Here," she said, showing Bruce the photos. Clint was standing beside a Santa with a child in his lap, while a group of elves crowded into the frame. "I'm going to make it our new Christmas card."

"Great idea!" Clint enthused, making his way over the couch and taking over the end Natasha hadn't already claimed. "What happened to the tree?"

Bruce sighed. "It's a long story," he said, re-claiming his now mostly empty mug. "It involves a shapeshifting Loki and a very hyper Peter."

"You know," Clint said thoughtfully, "for a 'traditional Christmas' we seem to be breaking a lot of traditions."

Bruce shrugged. "I think that's a tradition in and of itself, isn't it?"

"Like any of us would know," Natasha said, cracking a smile.

"Anyway," the scientist said, "what happened to your wrist?"

Clint sat up and spread his arms wide. "Okay, so picture this. A hill, and not just any hill but a great sledding hill. The kind of hill you only see in movies. 45-degree angle, untouched snow as far as the eye can see and not a single tree in sight."

"Sounds great," Bruce agreed.

Clint kept talking as Natasha sat up and regarded both of them with a look that was equal parts fond annoyance and frustration. "So, what better way to enjoy this hill than on a dare?"

"Where did you get the sled?" Bruce cut in, putting his drained mug on the miraculously untouched coffee table.

Clint and Natasha exchanged an unreadable look before answering in unison. "It doesn't matter – You don't want to know."

"Okay," Bruce agreed. "So, you dared each other to go down the hill?"

"Not exactly," Natasha said. "Clint made a bet with me that he could reach the bottom of the hill in less than twenty seconds."

"How tall was the hill?" Bruce asked, now entirely invested in the story.

Clint shrugged. "Seventy-five feet, give or take a couple feet. Anyway, I took the bet because, seriously, why not? I was going pretty fast, but not fast enough – "

" – and there was a bump in the hill," Natasha interrupted, gently kicking Clint in the ribs.

Clint grabbed her foot and tucked it under one of his knees. "There was a bump in the hill," he repeated, "and the next thing I know, I'm going ass over teakettle down this hill."

"One trip to the hospital later and we've got this," Natasha finished the story. "Turns out being on Stark's insurance makes doctors move a hell of a lot faster."

Bruce nodded. "Interesting," he said.

Natasha's response was drowned out by the sound of another crash. Peter swung into the room and landed in a heap against the far wall. Jumping up, he started talking a mile a minute. "Hey, did you guys see Loki? He's a cat now, or maybe a bird – he seems to like ravens. I don't know where he went, but he disappeared again. Sorry about the tree, Mr. Bruce, I can find you a new one or maybe help you get one – I'll definitely decorate it for you – "

"Holy crap, slow down kid," Clint interrupted him. "What's going on?"

Peter whipped his head around to look at the three of them. "Oh, hi, Mr. Clint. I just had all of Starbucks holiday drinks."

"All of them?" Natasha, Clint, and Bruce said in unison.

Nodding quickly, Peter shot a string of webbing to the ceiling outside the room. "Yeah. They don't have that much coffee in them and my metabolism's super-fast anyway and Loki dared me that I couldn't so I had to prove him wrong and now I need to find him so I can prove I did it." Finishing the sentence all in one breath, Peter swung away with a shouted, "See you guys later!"

The group on the couch stared after him. "So," Clint finally said. "Loki, eh?"

"He is the God of Mischief," Bruce said dryly, standing and picking up his mug and heading to the kitchen to wash it out.