Sounds faded in with multiple tones, some screaming shrilly close by and others moaning deep and far away. They became coherent soon, distinguishing themselves into beeps and voices, and Clint peeled his eyes open to be greeted with a dark room, shoots of white light laying against the ceiling like a painting of the sun's rays. He breathed deep and blinked slowly, pulling his mind together to place himself. Those beeps became slightly faster at his awakening, and he groaned as he realized the white ceiling and low voices from it put him in a hospital. Those beeps, he hated them. He reached to pull off the sticky papers that hooked him to the machine and found his arm restrained to the bed. When he lifted his head with a creaking in his neck he saw the tube of red poking under a white strip of tape in the crook of his elbow. His other arm wrapped in gauze and tape and felt numb.
Over the top of his bandaged arm he saw Loki, sitting in a chair against the wall, watching him hopefully. The god rose and went to his side, face darkened in the shadows of the pulled curtain that separated them from the rest of the hospital. He put his hand over Clint's gently, and the archer turned his palm up to hold his fingers. He licked his lips to wet them.
"I take it we got out," he croaked.
Loki took a breath and nodded once. "I had a few choice words for Agent Romanov, but she proved her loyalty to you and took us away from the fight."
"You call her names again? She told me about the first one."
"Mm. Well, perhaps she will tell you this one also."
He sighed and gripped Clint's hand gently. Clint squeezed the fingers pressing into his palm and looked up at the shadowed figure above him, remembering the fear he'd felt but hadn't the time to acknowledge when he came upon the god tossed into the gutter and bleeding on the street. Pieces of metal and plastic flung around him from the impact of the crash. He remembered the god's bleeding face and ripped skin when he'd pulled their heads together, wondering what the hell was happening.
Loki seemed to know what he was thinking, reaching up to stroke back Clint's hair and leaning his forehead against his again with a soft sigh through his nose. Clint closed his eyes and felt the god's breath against his cheek, his skin tingling at the near touch of Loki's face against his. He turned and brushed his lips against the corner of Loki's mouth as the curtain swished open and the room flooded with light. Loki jumped away at the sound and released Clint's hand as a nurse sashayed into the room.
She looked at Loki with surprise and stopped in her tracks, clutching her clipboard in her arms.
"Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't know you were in here- we would've left the light on for you."
Loki waved her apology away. "It's fine, it was too bright anyway."
She nodded at his dismissal and moved to the gurney, setting her clipboard on the counter and turning to switch off the IV. She gathered a small square of gauze and pressed it over the entry point of the tube in Clint's arm, sliding the needle out quickly and setting it aside as she grabbed a piece of tape and tacked the gauze down over the puncture. Clint read the badge hanging from her shirt pocket. Her name was Caroline James.
"The Doc. says you're ready to go," she said and pulled down her clipboard, pulling a pen out from the messy bun behind her head and starting to scribble.
"This is a prescription for some painkillers- Percocet- from the Doc. Instructions are on the bottle, but the pharmacist is going to go over it with you too." She got a serious look on her face and pointed at Clint with her pen. "Don't abuse it! You don't want to live through a life of addiction and then the withdrawals when suddenly you can't get your fix. Take it from a former junkie, okay?" With that, she tapped her pen on the inside of her elbow, drawing their attention to her needle scars. She suddenly smiled and got up, laying the prescription paper on Clint's blanket covered lap.
"Your friend is here to take you home; I'll send her in."
And she left the two in the room again, swinging the curtain closed and flicking on the light.
"Hm. Colorful kid," Clint assessed. Loki nodded in agreement.
Natasha slipped through the curtain then, rolling a wheelchair out in front of her and up to the gurney, bouncing Loki out of the way with her hip. He growled at her quietly but allowed her a moment to look over the archer herself.
She looked at him, unimpressed. "You're embarrassing."
Clint sputtered and sat up slowly. "Excuse me?"
"You could've handled them- it was only a few grunts. But instead you got thrown from your bike, chased into a stranger's house and huddled by the bed before he had to carry your unconscious body to safety."
"I was unarmed! And toting around an injured civilian- this civilian!" He pointed at Loki indignantly.
"Mm-hm." She didn't care.
Clint sighed in exasperation and slid out of the bed, bracing his good leg on the floor and letting his injured one hang. The blanket fell away and Clint cursed as the cold air of the hospital swatted him on the butt.
"Damn it, where are my clothes?" He snapped.
"They cut them off of you," Loki told him and he groaned in response.
Natasha tossed the sweats and shirt she had on the seat of the wheelchair onto the bed. Clint swiveled to see them and he looked at her apologetically. She smiled.
"Love me again?"
"I never stopped, you just bug me sometimes."
He dressed slowly and with some difficulty, trying to get his injured arm and leg into the clothes, but he managed and then he sat in the wheelchair with a lot of protest, and Natasha wheeled him out, Loki following behind.
Clint got his painkillers, and was wheeled out of the hospital to a sedan parked right outside the doors. Natasha opened the passenger door and let Clint load himself in. Loki followed suit, grumbling when he bumped his head on the padded roof. Clint shut his door and Natasha left to return the wheelchair into the hospital.
Clint wiggled in his seat to look over his shoulder at the god in the back seat. He had gauze taped to the side of his face, from the corner of his eye to his ear, but it didn't hide all of the scrape- it scrabbled out across the front of his cheek from under the bandage and was fiery red like shooting stars.
"You okay?"
"I'm bruised and scraped; nothing like your injuries."
"Doesn't mean you don't hurt," Clint reminded him, turning back to the front when he saw Natasha returning. "You need any pills, you let me know."
The redhead slipped into the driver's seat and started the car and she began winding them through the parking lot and out onto the streets.
"Here's the deal," she began, keeping her eyes on the road. "You can't go back to your apartment yet."
"Because of the ambush?"
"Mm, partly." She took a deep breath and prepared herself for a long winded explanation. "There were contract killers waiting for you in your apartment. Fury and I knew about it and that's why I came over and got you out the next day."
Clint huffed and leaned his head against the window, staring out at the passing city like none of this information pertained to his life.
"Fury sent a team to halt the attack while we were in the gym. My job was to keep you two out of the apartment until the men were apprehended." She clicked her tongue. "We didn't think there'd be a team to ambush you on the streets. Maybe some of them from the apartment split off when you didn't show up and they cruised the area watching for you."
Loki sat forward to put himself between the front seats and he furrowed his brows. Natasha leaned away from him as inconspicuously as she could.
"You say Fury and yourself were aware there would be an attack- why not simply inform us? I believe you could have prevented Agent Barton's grievous injuries had we known."
"Fury's thought was that you'd try to catch the killers off guard and handle the situation yourself. It would've been a bad plan."
Clint groaned and half rolled his eyes. "Whatever," he muttered to drop the subject. "So where are we going instead?"
"Stark Tower."
Loki leaned back against the seats limply, dipping his head back to rest on the rear shelf of the car and sighing hard. Clint snickered at the sound and felt his displeasure.
"Right?" he said to the god behind him. "Just when you thought your life couldn't get any worse." He shook his head and chuckled and they waited out the rest of the ride in silence.
Clint wrapped his arm around Natasha's shoulder and settled most of his weight against her as she helped him hobble into the tower. Loki followed behind warily, glancing up at the tower and its singular 'A' at the top apprehensively. They loaded into the elevator and Natasha punched in a code on the pad inside, allowing them access to the living floors at the very top of the building. As the elevator rose to their destination, the speakers suddenly came to life with voice.
"Welcome back, Agent Romanov, Agent Barton," the dulcet male voice greeted.
Natasha didn't look up to the ceiling to respond, but she always had to fight the urge to do so. "JARVIS, you noticed Loki's reclassification as a neutral party in SHIELD's files, right?"
There's silence for a second and Loki looked surprised at Natasha's words.
"Yes," the voice returned. "That is correct."
"Have Stark and Rogers meet us in the common area, we have to talk."
"They will be there."
Clint scoffed but said nothing, leaning against the redhead as they rose to the top of the tower.
When the doors opened and the group limped into the common room, tiled with glass and steel, Clint broke away from the other agent to drop into the closest of the light grey sofas with a groan of approval. Loki sat in the couch across from him, a metal coffee table between them with a vase of intricate glass flowers. He stretched his legs and leaned his elbow on the arm rest, gazing out of the floor-to-ceiling windows at the skyline of New York. Natasha settled on the coffee table with one leg crossed over the other and took glances over her shoulder at Clint and Loki. The elevator dinged across the room behind Clint's couch and the doors slid open, letting Tony Stark enter the room followed closely by Steve Rogers. The sharply bearded man gabbed with increasing excitement at the man behind him, looking up to find Loki in his direct line of sight. Tony's speech snapped off and he swiveled around instantly to walk right back into the elevator, smacking his nose into Steve's broad chest. Steve grabbed the smaller man by the arms to steady him, confused for a moment by Tony's sudden turn and his expression of bewilderment. He finally noticed the god seated on the sofa and stared.
"What the hell is he doing here?" Tony mumbled into Steve's chest. "Pretty sure we sent him away with all the fancy glowing blue stuff, right- I have footage somewhere probably. You're seeing what I'm seeing right?"
Steve swallowed hard and nodded slowly, not taking his eyes away from Loki's. "I see him, Tony."
From his spot on the couch, Clint sighed loudly and spoke up. "Can you guys get over here, please? I can't get up right now."
Natasha stood then and Steve steered Tony over to her, going the long way behind the couch to keep it between them and Loki. The god had lost interest and turned back to the windows, watching the sun fall behind the buildings.
"Steve-" Natasha began and he cut her off.
"What's going on here?"
Tony caught sight of Clint and squinted at him hard, searching his eyes for the blue glow of the Tesseract. "JARVIS, what's he doing here?"
"Loki has been reclassified into neutrality in SHIELD's files, sir. He accompanied Agents Romanov and Barton into the tower."
"That didn't answer the question."
"He's here as punishment," Natasha asserted.
The two men looked confused, shocked, doubtful, but Natasha laid out the details of Odin's decree, trying to set them at ease as quickly as possible. Clint and Loki tried to listen, but they were tiring and grew bored.
"How many times do you think we'll have to explain this shit?" Clint complained quietly with a tilt to his lips. Loki just smirked and continued to look out the windows. Natasha's voice was a monotonous tone in the background, going through the circumstances of their injuries and then why they were in Tony's tower.
"Are you kidding? It's a quarter fucking mile," Tony exclaimed. "He can sleep outside!"
"No!" Clint shouted with panic, drawing all their eyes to him. He made his face serious, trying to hide his alarm. "He stays with me."
Tony turned to Natasha with concern. "Has he been tested? I feel like there's some glow-stick shit happening here; it's making me nervous."
Natasha puts his worries to rest, shaking her head and explaining. Steve listened without asking questions, glancing at Loki every now and then only to find that the god was paying them no mind.
He was though. Loki had listened to it all, growing increasingly agitated. His cuts burned and his body ached, and then to be nervous about staying in a former enemy's home, one that he'd tried to take over... It had been a long day. After Clint's outburst, he'd decided they had enough, and he stood up gracefully, keeping himself erect in front of the heroes though he felt as though he couldn't stand straight enough through his pain.
"I'm tired from this entire day- where may I sleep? Do you prefer me on the couch?"
Tony was at a loss for words, not wanting the god to be in his tower at all, let alone sleeping in it. Steve helped out, finding himself wary, but adjusting to the situation slowly.
"There's a room up the stairs." Steve pointed to the small flight of steel steps leading to a second layer of the floor. "This is two floors connected. There's a spare up there. Bathroom too, I think."
Tony gave Steve a disbelieving look of betrayal and the tall blond spoke to him quietly.
"Come on, Tony- He doesn't have any magic; he won't do anything. Clint's here too, been watching over him all this time. At least if he stays on this floor, he's away from you. You won't have to see him."
Tony tried to fight it for a moment, but he relented and let his arms hang limply at his sides before pivoting to take off into the elevator.
"Whatever," he muttered. "Keep your fucking pet away from my labs, Barton." The doors of the elevator closed and Steve released a breath of exasperation, going to apologize to Clint for Tony, but the elevator opened again. Tony stuck his head out and pointed across the room to the bar.
"And stay out of my liquor! I offered you a drink last time but that was just threats- I still don't like you. And also, so much for my offering: Coulson's still dead. Some god you are."
He leaned back into the elevator and crossed his arms, letting the doors shut on their own and take him away. Loki glared in the man's wake, and Steve shook his head. Clint rolled his eyes angrily and Natasha looked unimpressed. She led Steve to sit on the couch while she sat herself on the low table again, and Clint got up, nearly falling but being caught by Loki's hand.
Clint huffed and told the god it was time to go, reaching around to hold onto him and limp away, staggering up the stairs with his flesh-and-blood crutch. They opened all the doors until they came across the bedroom, and then they shut out the quiet voices of Natasha and Steve who continued to talk. The two were bathed in darkness, only the nearly night sky and a half moon offering any visibility to the room. Clint released Loki and sagged onto the edge of the bed outlined in the light, groaning as the weight was taken off his bum leg again. He pulled the bottle of pills out of his sweatpants and jiggled it before prying it open, listening to the pills clack around inside the plastic tube. He tossed a pill in his mouth and swallowed it dry.
Loki ambled over to the giant window across the room, standing at the edge and catching lights flick on in the surrounding buildings as night fell. Clint shimmied carelessly out of his clothes, leaving his shorts on as usual, just wanting to crawl into bed and fade away. He moaned when he slipped between the sheets, relishing the cool against his skin and the squishy mattress. He turned his head on the pillow to watch Loki at the window still, now looking up into the sky.
"Do you see the same sky at home?" Clint asked.
Loki looked away, down at his feet, remembering. "No."
He turned away from the glass and began to undress, flinging his torn and bloodied shirt over a corner of the bed, and dropping his pants to the floor. In his underwear he stood stock still as he looked at the empty space in the bed beside Clint. The archer took in the sight of the pale moonlight illuminating Loki's white skin along his edges and his heart started beating a little faster. He averted his gaze to the other side of the room as the god climbed into the bed, waiting for him to get settled.
When it was silent and still, Clint turned his head again to see the ghost outline of Loki's cheek, knowing the god was looking at him too even though he couldn't see his eyes. The moonlight colored the god's hair silver and grey along its curves. Clint propped himself up and pushed Loki's shoulder to lie him on his back, hovering over him and watching the light flow over the valley of Loki's jaw and hill of his cheek like an ocean wave, catching one green eye brightly. He reached up to graze his fingertips over the marble skin and leaned down slowly, brushing his lips against the corner of Loki's in a parody of their interrupted moment in the hospital. His breath stuttered with the force of his heartbeat from the light touch, but he forced himself further and pressed his lips against Loki's fully, sharply inhaling as his skin crackled electric down his arms at the contact. He rubbed his thumb over Loki's cheek as the god responded to his kiss, moving into it and wrapping his hands around the back of the archer's head. Clint groaned and touched the tip of his tongue to Loki's lips and slipped it into the mouth as it opened to him, sliding it against the other waiting for him. He lowered his chest onto Loki's and let him run those long fingers down his sides, coming up to squeeze the muscles on either side of his spine. He hadn't realized he'd moved closer to the god until he moaned around Loki's tongue and jerked his hips against the taller man's thigh, rubbing his hard length against him. Loki panted into Clint's mouth and broke away, white skin flushed pink in the moonlight. He cupped Clint's jaw and touched their foreheads.
"We mustn't do this now," he breathed. "You're injured."
Clint tensed his jaw, trying his best to keep himself from grinding on the god again. "I'm not gonna feel it soon with all these meds on board."
"It doesn't matter. We won't be able to enjoy it fully with our injuries and with the careful watch I'm sure Stark is keeping on me." Loki placed another kiss on Clint's lips. "I want this as well, but this is all frantic passions of fear from our near loss today- I don't want you to regret this."
The archer closed his eyes and sighed, nodding in agreement, and sliding off the god, but keeping his wrapped up arm over the pale chest.
"I don't usually regret stuff. But if you want to wait, I guess I can do that."
Loki huffed and turned to face him, tracing a finger in a line down Clint's lips. "I don't want to push you away, but I have my reasons for doing so. Even simple kisses put us at risk under this roof- we will be watched constantly."
"There're no cameras in here, Loki."
"I know," he whispered.
"If you're not ready, all you have to do is say so."
The god sighed hard. "I'm ready, I want it- I want you, but..." He bit his lip as he thought. "I would prefer to wait until you're healed."
Clint nodded in understanding and conceded to his request, closing his eyes and inching closer to the god until their noses touched. "I heal fast."
Loki snorted softly, "I will be the judge of that, you lascivious beast." He kissed him again as the archer chuckled, and then gave him a light smack on the cheek when his hand wandered away down the god's stomach to the top of his briefs.
"I said wait- or you'll get nothing. Now sleep."
Clint calmed his chortling and kept his hands to himself. "Okay, Boss."