Don't ask where this came from. Seriously. Don't ask.

So, I don't think this one is as funny as the previous ones, but...yeah, life hasn't lent itself to humor recently for me. Anyway, hopefully this doesn't suck badly either. Its shorter than the other one too because I really wasn't sure where I was going with this. It didn't have a solid direction. Also, there will be at least one more chapter which will be the memory of how Darcy met the Clint's former self. I've had a few requests for that, so it seems prudent to actually do it.

Anyway, enjoy everyone.

"Rowena, I need your help."

Darcy was completely unsurprised when her Aunt's voice cut through the room, waking her with the same power as a clap of lightning. Not that she really needed to sleep. Really, it was for the cuddles. A glance at the clock told her it was 1 am. "With what?"

Beside her, Clint shot up in bed and grabbed the knife he kept under his pillow. It left his fingers a moment later heading towards Rohan, who promptly snatched from the air and turned the blade over in her hands curiously. Then proceeded to toss it in the air a few times before throwing it off to the side and watching it embed itself in the wall. "The weight is off on your blade. It's front heavy."

Clint blinked hard, confusion sliding over his features. "Uh..."

"Don't throw knives at Aunt Rohan," advised Darcy as she propped herself up on her elbows and turned to look at their visitor over her shoulder. "She's a master with them. What's up Aunt Rohan?"

"I require your assistance," repeated Rohan as she strode forward, straddling a chair near the end of their bed in a way that Darcy was pretty sure immortals as old as her aunt weren't supposed to. Then again, it was Aunt Rohan they were talking about. The woman had become quick friends with Loki and trained with Thor in combat. She wasn't exactly the poster child for normal.

Grabbing her glasses, Darcy sat all the way up despite the fact that she was naked and turned to fully face her aunt. Which was about the time she realized her aunt looked like, well, her aunt rather than the high school student the woman had been masquerading as the last time Darcy saw her. "You dropped the disguise."

Rohan nodded, the heavy waves in her long hair making it bounce against her shoulders. "It stopped being useful." Instead of looking like a 15 year old student, her aunt now looked more like the image of Peggy that Steve carried around with him. With darker hair, yellow eyes, and a deadly air added to the mix. And no make-up.

Beside Darcy, Clint managed to blink enough of the sleep out of his eyes that he could take in their visitor. One of his eyebrows rose in surprise. "Is it safe to assume this is what you actually look like?"

"More or less," confirmed Rohan mildly. "Rowena, I'd rather not repeat myself again."

"Yeah, yeah, yeah," muttered Darcy with a stretch that drew Clint's eyes to her chest, even though he tried to look away just as quickly. Rohan just raised an eyebrow, waiting for Darcy to continue. "What do you need help with?"

Rohan leaned against the back of the chair, her arms folding over the top. "There's a necromancer your mother wants me to take care of, but I'd rather not go in without some form of back-up."

"Its a necromancer," pointed out Darcy mildly. "They raise dead things. Dead things like you."

"Death likes me," corrected Rohan with a dismissive wave. "Dead people aren't always as happy to see me. Plus, these are the dead reanimated and controlled by a necromancer. Being friends with Death won't help except to get me requested to deal with these situations."

Darcy considered her aunts words for a moment, eyes narrowed suspiciously. "You don't need help dealing with a necromancer. I've seen you do it before without any assistance."

"Correct," confirmed Rohan unhappily. "But this is a particularly nasty necromancer who's been around over a hundred years and I'd simply prefer to have some back-up in case things go sideways."

"How do you even know words like that?" asked Darcy with a shake of her head. "You're too old to know that kind of language. Steve doesn't know that language."

"Steve has also been asleep for the past 70 years, not running around killing people at his mother's command," pointed out Rohan, eyes diverting towards the window in their room.

Interesting, thought Darcy with a touch of a devious smile. "Alright, I'll come run back-up IF you talk to Steve."

The groan that came from Rohan definitely shouldn't have come from the throat of a fearsome warrior. "You too? Derek said the same thing." She sighed heavily. "Why do you two want me to talk to Steve?"

Darcy's eyebrows shot up to her hairline, even as she stared at her aunt over the rims of her lenses. "Well, I want you to talk to him because he's been in a weird funk since the diner three weeks ago and I'm sick of it. Plus, you know you want to."

"Do not," denied Rohan with a snort as she stood from the chair. "Look Rowena, will you assist me or not?"

"Will you talk to Steve?" pushed Darcy, folding her arms in front of her chest.

Rohan sighed and pushed her hair back with one hand but nodded. "Fine, I'll speak with him upon our return. Now, can we go please?"

"Yep," assured Darcy as she slid out of bed and snapped her fingers to dress. She leaned back to kiss Clint on the lips with a smile. "I'm going out to hunt necromancers, want me to bring you back a limb?"

Clint looked a bit disturbed still, but managed to come back with, "A hand would be great."

Darcy nodded and snapped her fingers, the leather armor from her arrival appearing on her body again. "You swear you'll talk to Steve, Aunt Rohan?"

"Yes," repeated Rohan with a roll of her eyes. "You can even have him waiting here for our return. Now, can we please go? I'd like to get this dealt with before he manages to raise the graveyard he's currently housing himself in."

"Ready when you are," replied Darcy as she grabbed the knife from the wall. She tossed it once in the air, then paused and tossed it again before turning back to Clint. "She's right, these knives are weighted wrong. Might wanna fix that, otherwise your aim is going to be off. Oh, and have Steve waiting."

"I'll try," muttered Clint as Rohan reached for Darcy's shoulder. "Er, when are you guys gonna be back?"

"I'll have her back by this afternoon," replied Rohan before teleporting them out of the room.

Most of the household was gathered in the kitchen when Darcy popped back in around 10 am, clad in full armor and a hooded cloak.

Steve and Tony, who'd been in a heated debate involving Tony's most recent experiment which had exploded and managed to coat the entire lab level in something resembling gum, nearly jumped out of their skins when Darcy suddenly appeared. Well, Steve jumped. Tony just kinda blinked like he suspected he was hallucinating. Which, depending on how much sleep he'd had recently, might be the case.

Clint, who had been sitting at the counter with Natasha and Coulson observing the argument, was on his feet in a moment out of habit and brought one of his knives up in case of trouble. The action resulted in his coffee landing in Coulson's lap, to the man's chagrin. Natasha's own knife was in her hands and poised for launch, but a quick hand courtesy of Coulson stopped her from following through on the action.

"Miss Lewis," greeted Coulson dryly, eying Darcy as she practically stumbled to the coffee machine, "good trip?"

"Nazi zombies suck," muttered Darcy as she poured herself a cup of coffee.

Clint's brow furrowed as he slid behind her to wrap his arms around her waist, knife safely tucked away again. "I thought you and your aunt were fighting a necromancer, not playing Call of Duty."

"We were," confirmed Darcy as she closed her eyes and took a sip of coffee.

Steve blinked at her cluelessly, scratching his head a little in confusion. "I'm sorry, what?"

"How the hell did you end up fighting Nazi zombies?" asked Tony with a raised eyebrow. He didn't seem surprised so much as curious, a testament to the level of strange in their lives. The fact that Darcy facing Nazi zombies was even considered possible outside a video game emphasized the weird factor.

Another voice broke in, responding so Darcy didn't have to. "Said necromancer took up residency in a Nazi graveyard." Everyone turned to find Rohan standing in the middle of the room, looking no worse for wear than she did that morning. "Which is exactly why I asked for back-up. Alright Rowena, I'm here as promised."

"And Steve is right there next to Tony," pointed out Darcy, who finally opened her eyes to look over at her aunt.

Rohan looked a little twitchy, one of her hands moving about as if she wasn't sure what to do with it. By comparison, Steve looked gob-smacked, eyes wide as he took in Rohan. Yeah, they needed to talk. It was a way over-due conversation.

Darcy had seen the photos Steve had of Peggy; he'd been more than happy to talk about her and show off his photos of her when they'd returned from breakfast that morning. The eyes had been wrong, but that wasn't really a surprise given yellow wasn't a normal eye color. Between Steve's stories, her facial build and dark hair, and the personality described to them, neither Derek nor Darcy had any doubt that this woman was their aunt.

"Steven," greeted Rohan at last, apparently opting to start the conversation rather than wait for Steve to take the first step. There was a touch of a British accent when she said Steve's name. "It's been a while. You look...good. Alive is a good look for you."

Steve nodded like a bobble head, his mouth opening and closing once before he swallowed and managed to spill some words from his mouth. Jumbled as the sentence was. "Peggy, your swell. Er, you look swell. Um, really swell. And young. Alive. Uh..."

Rohan giggled a little, actually giggled, to Darcy's mild amusement and partial horror. "Alive is a bit relative of a term, but still semi-applicable. Your as young as ever it would seem. And still just as shy around women."

"Just pretty dames," assured Steve quickly, eyes going wide as he realized what he said and quickly adjusting. "I mean women. Beautiful women. Ladies. Beautiful ladies."

His stuttering was apparently somehow enduring because Rohan stepped forward and gently tilted his red face so she could look him in the eyes. "Steve, relax. It's not the 1940's any more and I'm not going to be offended if you don't refer to me as a lady. Really, there are a lot of people who would debate that label with you anyway."

Steve opened his mouth to speak again, but Darcy cut in before he could. "Alright, enough. Go be gooey, mushy, sappy lovebird types somewhere else. Seeing Rohan display this much compassion for someone who isn't family is starting to freak me out."

Rohan rolled her eyes but nodded as she took in the looks everyone else was giving her. "Right, that might be best." Taking Steve's hand, she quickly ported them out of the room and off to some unknown place.

Darcy sighed in relief. "Thank the gods."

"What, you didn't want to see their reunion?" asked Tony mockingly. "It looked so promising too."

"I'll pass," snorted Darcy as she gulped down the rest of her coffee and moved back to the coffee maker for a refill. "Oh, by the way, Clint." The archer looked up at her and she tossed a severed hand onto the counter in front of him from behind her back where she'd tied it earlier. "Happy birthday."

Clint jumped away from the counter at first, blinking at the severed appendage. "Darce, why the hell did you bring me a severed hand?"

"'Cause you asked for one," replied Darcy as she refilled her coffee cup. On the counter, the hand twitched and suddenly started running around on the counter top, much to the horror of the rest of the room.

Tony let out a shout, even as Clint, Natasha, and Coulson jumped away from the counter. All four individuals stared at the hand as it ran in circles on the tips of its fingers. Clint was vaguely reminded of the Adam's Family's butler hand, Thing.

"Darce, your hand is moving," informed Clint as calmly as he could. Which was kinda hard to do when a severed hand from a Nazi zombie was running around the counter in the kitchen.

Darcy glanced over her shoulder, noting the hand's movement, and shrugged before slamming her fist down on top of the hand when it tried to run past her. The hand stopped moving at that point, dropping onto the counter top to twitch instead. "Yeah, it does that. Damn thing goosed me a few times on the way back. Just slam your fist on it once and it stops for a while."

"Yeah, no, this is so not okay," insisted Tony at last. "Get that thing out of here. I don't want a biohazard in my kitchen."

The eye roll Darcy offered was massive, but she snapped her fingers and the hand disappeared none the less. Clint breathed a sigh of relief, before noting the slight curl of Darcy's lips behind the rim of her cup. His eyes narrowed at her, even as Tony started going off about cleaning the kitchen with fire.

"That wasn't a real hand, was it Darce," accused Clint, his own smirk just barely under control.

Darcy's lips broke into a full-blown smirk, even as she asked in a calm but teasing voice: "What makes you think I'll ever tell you, Barton?"

Clint broke into laughter at that point, able to appreciate the joke now for what it was: a joke. "Nice one Darce."

Darcy hummed in response, giving him a wide grin. "Glad you enjoyed it."

Tony had managed to stop ranting about cleansing via fire by that point, instead starting up a rant about the children of chaotic gods and formulating a list of house rules. Natasha chose that moment to point out that rules weren't likely to actually stop anyone from pulling pranks, which sent Tony into another rant about building anti-prank devices. Darcy tuned him out at that point, turning towards the door and waving over her shoulder with a comment about getting some more sleep.

Darcy stumbled out of the bedroom she shared with Clint around dusk, rubbing her eyes and muttering about middle-of-the-night missions and a lack of sleep. Not that she really needed it, but Darcy had discovered that she actually enjoyed sleeping when she got to do it. Especially when that sleep time included cuddles from Clint.

Her feet carried her blindly into the living room, the sight within making her pause. And almost break down into hysterical laughter.

Rohan was standing in the middle of the room, clad in a nice mid-shin dress and make-up straight out of the 1940's, looking so uncomfortable it was almost pitiful. Darcy opted for a smirk instead of hyena-like laughter as she wondered over to lean against the wall by the hallway door. "You've got a date with Captain America, don't you."

Rohan sighed and spun to face her niece, still looking incredibly uncomfortable. "His puppy dog eyes are pitiful. And irresistible. And really just down-right painful. I swear the man could defeat an army with those eyes."

"Yeah, that's Steve," confirmed Darcy with a laugh. "At least promise you'll try to have fun." The look Rohan shot her said that wasn't likely. The smirk dropped away from Darcy's face, a furrow developing on her brow instead. "Aunt Rohan, do you really not want to go out with Steve?"

Rohan sighed again and shook her head. "It isn't that. I like Steve just fine and would have probably enjoyed going out with him before. Maybe even hung around after the war if he'd still been alive instead of faking my own death in an explosion. But...things are different now and I'm worried for him. Worried about him. He needs to let go of the past in order to move forward with his life, and this doesn't feel like him letting go."

"Except you aren't just in the past," pointed out Darcy. "That's like saying that Cadeyrn doesn't exist any more. Clint was still Cadeyrn at one point in time and they have the same spirit. Spiritually speaking, him and Cadyrn are the same person, even if they exist in different times. The same applies to you. You've always been Rohan, no matter what name you go by. You and Peggy are the same person, with one of you just existing now and the other having existed before. Besides, given you weren't actually born a mortal, you were always Rohan even when you were 'Peggy'."

Rohan reached up to rub her forehead with a sigh. "Your logic is convoluted but accurate, as always."

"Yep, I'm gifted like that," stated Darcy with a grin. "Now, go have fun with the good Captain and try to bring him back in one piece."

"Please, he wouldn't make a move like the one you're suggesting," insisted Rohan, the British accent coming back full-force with her next words. "He's too much of a gentleman for that."

Darcy shrugged. "Never said he had to be the one to make the move." The glare that Rohan leveled at her had cowed many a human. Thankfully, Darcy was used to the look and just plowed on as if her aunt had never spoken. "Seriously Aunt Rohan, have fun tonight. You've been short with everyone since World War II and clearly part of that came from the way you lost Steve. You've been given another chance, enjoy it."

Rohan still looked unhappy but nodded none the less. "I'll do my best."

"You'll have fun," insisted Darcy. "You've convinced yourself that you wouldn't have because you never got the chance before. But, this is that rain check he promised you. You're getting your chance, so take it."

"I am," assured Rohan, a faint smile tugging at the corner of her lips. "Plus, if I know Steve, whatever he has planned should be...interesting at the very least. He never was one to attempt to woo through flashy displays, a refreshing change from the norm, both before and now."

"And he'd never assume you were weaker than him," added Darcy with as smirk. She knew how much being underestimated irritated Rohan, even though she used it to her advantage frequently.

The smile grew a little more and softened into something more like longing. "That is true. Steve never has been inclined to assume anything about anyone."

"No, he isn't," agreed Darcy, eyes darting to the door into the hallway as Steve stepped into the living room with them. His cheeks were stained a little red, meaning he'd probably heard part of their conversation, but the way his mouth dropped open a little and his eyes took in Rohan with something akin to amazement told Darcy that he wouldn't cancel their date for anything.

"Peggy, you- you look swell," greeted Steve a little breathlessly.

Rohan's cheeks reddened slightly. Darcy felt her eyebrow rise. She'd never seen Rohan look embarrassed once in all her immortal or mortal years. Even when guys were shouting really obscene comments at her, Rohan always looked composed. Yet, one comment from Steve and her cheeks were turning the color of the horizon at dusk.

"Thank you Steven, you look very nice yourself," returned Rohan as Steve took her hand to kiss it, then offered her his arm. "So, can I know where we're going tonight?"

Steve gave her a clever smile and shook his head. "It's a surprise."

Darcy felt her mouth drop open a little as Rohan sighed but nodded in agreement and proceeded to follow Steve out the door. Her aunt, the control freak who hated surprises and never went anywhere with anyone without knowing where she was going or why, was blindly following Steve out the door.

Yeah, thought Darcy with a shake of her head as she disappeared back down the hallway to find Clint and drag him to bed for some sexy fun, Rohan needs this. I just hope Steve's up to the task, because that is going to be one wild ride.