Chapter title from Signs by Bloc Party.
He's still feeling slightly nauseas the next day, but he's painfully conscious of the missed practise hours. The others can relax for a day, he's sure – it's not like Bruce is ever going to lose the Hulk, and a day off won't stop Thor being able to punch people through walls – but he logs up the hours he should have spent yesterday training and shooting and pushes himself downstairs as soon as he wakes up.
Logically, he knows one day off won't kill him, and it isn't like he's never had days off before. It's just that those days off have only happened because he was either on a mission or in medical. And he's never stayed in medical for his full recommended time anyway (he doesn't think anyone he knows has, come to that. No wonder the medics hate them all so much). But he's on a team of superheroes now. He needs to be better. He needs to be useful. The moment he slips up, he becomes obsolete. Natasha's pretty damn accurate, after all, and he's sure they could outfit her with some fancy bullets to make up for his fancy arrows. It's worse because they're all in the public eye so much these days. He's Googled himself, sure. It's not narcissism. It's actually more like masochism, because a lot of the stuff the internet has on him isn't exactly flattering.
He's not one of the big four, is the thing. Sure, neither is Natasha, but she's the sole woman of the group, and therefore gets just as much attention as Iron Man, Captain America, Thor, and the Hulk. The only one of them with less written about him is Bruce, and that's because no one cares about the Hulk's human incarnation. Clint knows that Bruce is probably incredibly grateful for this, and most of the time he mentally agrees with him. Clint's whole job is based around secrecy, after all. If he becomes an easily recognised face, his job gets a whole lot harder. He tells himself this, but it doesn't hide the real problem, and the real reason behind the way he's practically bullying himself into going to the range at seven in the morning on a Sunday.
Because he can't allow himself to slip up. He's seen enough blog entries asking what the point of him even being on the team is to know what will happen if he slips up. And yeah, those might be the same blogs that insist that Natasha is only there to tick some sort of feminism box, and ask what will happen if Thor has to choose between his brother and humankind again (an alien's an alien whether it's in a cape or a spaceship, they warn), but it still stings a little. He knows his shooting marked him out in the army, and he knows he proved himself pretty damn well in SHIELD, but this is a completely different ball game. He's playing on a team with a god, a billionaire in a virtually indestructible suit he built himself, andCaptain America, for god's sakes. He's just a guy with a bow, a quiver of interesting arrows, and good aim. And the Iron Man suit can aim automatically.
Clint sighs and sits down on the floor of the range to take his bow apart and line his arrows out next to him, grouping them by what they can do. Normal, explosive, smoke, tear gas, putty, net, grapple, flare, cable, and the newest additions – acid, and electric. He's played with the prototypes, but these are the finalised products. He spends the first hour just practising with the different types. Adjusting his technique to their different weights and flight paths is second nature by now, but he takes his time, falling into a nice, easy rhythm. Take arrow, nock, draw, sight, hold, release. Breathe. Take arrow, nock, draw, sight, hold, release. Breathe. Repeat.
In the second hour, he goes for speed. He adjusts his position constantly – standing, crouching, kneeling – and after a while he takes some arrows and scatters them around the room, testing his ability to retrieve and shoot them as fast as possible. Exercises like these are ones he's come up with himself, based on his experiences in the field. His arrows don't hit the targets perfectly every time, so he does it again and again until they do.
In the third hour he boots up Tony's basic moving target program and gets to work. He starts the speed off at the lowest setting and increases it after each round until they're zipping around the range beyond the barrier. He's good with moving targets; always has been. He gets it perfect every time, and he sets them on the lowest speed again and starts to move himself, keeping a slow jog his minimum speed. He keeps going until he's sprinting around the range with the targets at maximum speed, constantly changing his distance from the targets. It's hard work, and it drives everything else from his mind.
He's sweating by the end, but he doesn't let himself rest. He might not get a chance to rest in a combat situation, after all, and it's always best to prepare for the worst. He sets up Tony's newest program and stands back as it comes into effect. The barrier that separates him from the targets lowers into the floor and the mobile targets begin to move around as other things rise from the floor and descend from the ceiling. It had taken Tony a few days to install, but Clint has to admit that it's really worth it. The moving obstacle course is the only thing that can come close to a real life situation, and he relishes the challenge. He sets it to run for half an hour and jumps into action.
The targets freeze for twenty seconds when he hits their centres (he only uses normal arrows for this course, though Tony's apparently working towards accommodating the special ones), so he has a chance to retrieve them. The blocks move slowly around the floor, but are liable to change direction without warning. There are pipe-like structures hanging from the ceiling that are excellent for climbing on and using as vantage points, but they occasionally give way underneath him if he stays on them for too long. The first time that had happened had caught Clint by surprise and he had nearly twisted his ankle in the fall. He didn't complain though – he's meant to be able to handle surprises like that in the field, and he can't blame Tony for making the course realistic.
He's panting by the time the course shudders to a stop, but he sets it for another half hour without pausing. He has to stay focused. He can't afford to slip up.
When it ends, he rolls back to the basics. The course shuts down, blocks sinking into the floor and pipes rising into the ceiling, and Clint collects his arrows and sorts through them carefully, taking the time to get his breath back. He's tired and verging on weak (he hasn't had breakfast yet), but he doesn't want to stop yet. He's in the zone. The string is singing and the bow is steady in his hand, the arrows practically leaping to his fingers when he touches them. He sets the moving targets going and shoots until he's out of arrows. Then he pauses the course to collect them and starts again, upping the speed.
This course is his favourite, and when his mind goes blank and empty like this it's like he's reached some sort of zen state. He's hyper aware of his surroundings and every single one of his arrows hits the bullseye. He doesn't hesitate or waver for a second, and his whole world narrows to the inside of the range, eyes constantly tracking movement and flight paths, adjusting automatically and making no mistakes. It's perfect, and he forgets that he's hungry, that he's in the tower, that he's still a little hungover. He forgets his name, he forgets the rest of the team, and he forgets Coulson. Everything that isn't immediately relevant to the shooting slips away, and the rhythm swallows him whole.
He sees Natasha approach the door out of the corner of his eye, and he's glad that she waits for him to run out of arrows before she comes in. "Having fun?" she asks dryly, and he doesn't answer, pausing the targets and going to collect his arrows. "You know you've been down here for hours right?"
"What time is it?"
"Almost two."
He raises his eyebrows. "Huh."
"Have you even had breakfast yet?"
"I was getting to it."
"Sure you were," he can hear her rolling her eyes, and she comes over to lean on the barrier. "You done here or what?"
His mind is full again now, so he sighs and says, "Yeah, I guess so."
"Good, we're making cakes."
That floors him. "We are?"
She smirks. "Remember Chicago?"
He does. They'd been sent there a week before the mark arrived in town to set up a base, and since they'd done than in the first day, they'd spent the rest of the week trying to find civilian-friendly ways to avoid boredom. One of the things they came up with was cooking.
"Didn't we say we wouldn't ever try working together in a kitchen ever again?"
"Who said we would be alone in this?"
Clint narrows his eyes. "Who else? It's not Tony, is it?"
"He's banned from the kitchen," she says smoothly as he turns around, hands full of arrows. "Pepper's orders."
"When did that happen?"
"He tried to make her an omelette once. I think it nearly gave her food poisoning. Also, you can't have missed his tendency to turn everything mechanical he touches into some sort of sentient being and/or weapon."
"She banned him after that?"
"No, I think he tried doing something to the microwave one time. She warned us not to let him in the kitchen again."
"When did that happen?"
"Pepper actually comes around at least once a month, you know," Natasha gives him a pointed look. "Maybe you'd see her if you actually spent some time upstairs once in a while."
"Bite me," he says, but he's smiling slightly as he puts the arrows back in the quiver and slings it over his shoulder. "Give me a minute to shower, then I'll be up."
"Good. You reek."
"Ever the charmer."
She smiles and shakes her head as she leaves, and he sighs before he follows, casting a look at the range over his shoulder as he does. He's already missing his blank, focused mind-set.
x
"Here," Clint says, handing Steve the memory stick.
"What is it?" Steve asks, frowning. "I mean, what's on it?"
"A few songs I thought you'd like."
"Trust him," Natasha says as she walks past them into the kitchen. "He's good with matching music to people."
He remembers the first CD he ever gave her and smiles. "Still a big Tori Amos fan, huh?"
"My second musical love," she places a hand over her heart and smirks.
"Who's your first?"
"You know the answer to that."
Tchaikovsky. He knows.
"Okay," Steve looks between them and smiles faintly. "Thanks. How many are there?"
"Not many," Clint shrugs. "The first one's the important one. The others are ones I think you'll like. Stuff I know you haven't heard, anyway."
Steve looks at the stick curiously. "What's the first one?"
"I And Love And You by The Avett Brothers."
"Why's it important?"
"Something you said the other night made me think of it. By the way – don't worry if you don't like any of it, I won't take it personally," he smirks, and Steve shrugs self-consciously. He has a tendency to worry about accidentally hurting their feelings, and they all know it.
Steve finds him in the range the next day and waits for his course to finish before coming in, the way Natasha had. It was Tony's special moving course, so Clint's out of breath when he waves Steve in. "You're really good," is the first thing Steve says, and Clint shrugs.
"I have to be. You need something?"
"The music you gave me," Steve falters and then pulls himself together. "I wanted to say thank you. Natasha was right. About you matching songs to people, I mean."
"Oh," Clint raises his eyebrows and then smiles. "Hey, no problem. I'm glad you liked them."
"You really are good, you know," Steve says, looking around at where the moving blocks and targets had been. "I'm glad you're on the team."
"Yeah?" Clint tilts his head.
"Every team needs a sniper," Steve says, a slight twist to the corner of his mouth. "You're the best shot I've seen since…well, since Bucky. He used a gun though."
"Of course," Clint nods and only hesitates for a moment before he smirks and asks, "who do you think is better?"
Steve laughs. "Since you use such different weapons, I couldn't possibly say."
"Your loyalty is truly inspirational, Cap," Clint grins. "You staying? Because this place is going to get pretty mobile in a minute."
"No, I just wanted to say thank you," Steve shakes his head, "and I knew this was where you'd be. You spend a lot of time down here."
"You guys are all lazy, that's all," Clint snorts. "I mean, how often does Thor even bother sparring? He's not gonna run out of biceps any time soon."
"Bruce comes down to the gym more than he did," Steve points out.
"To help himself sleep a little better at night, sure," Clint shrugs, "not because he actually wants to punch people."
"Do you actually want to punch people?"
"As long as I hit the target," Clint smirks and gestures for Steve to leave. He wants to get back in the zone. It's calming to forget everything for a couple of hours a day. He'll spend three more hours in here, he decides, then take a break, grab some lunch. After that, he'll spar with Natasha and they'll have another session with Bruce if they can drag him out of the lab. The trick is to get Jarvis to bug him for about two hours before they want him. It's the only way to get his attention.
x
Clint's never pretended to be a brainbox like Tony or Bruce, but he understands the impact of what happens when the smart people lose their shit all too well. And when Tony loses his shit, everyone knows about it. It's pretty hard to miss.
"What the hell is going on?" he asks Natasha as they run towards the main room.
"No idea," she shakes her head and they put on speed. Thor walks through from outside as they arrive, and the sight of Tony pacing the room with Pepper tapping frantically at three holographic screens and barking into a phone pinched between her ear and her shoulder is enough to set off alarms. Or would have done, if Jarvis hadn't sounded the alarm two minutes earlier.
"The team is present, sir," Jarvis says, and Tony snarls.
"I can see that, Jarvis! Jesus Christ, tell me this isn't happening."
"What's happening?" Steve asks, as startled as the rest of them.
"It's the latest Stark Industries technology," Bruce tells them. He looks pale, and Clint stares at Pepper, who looks about ready to tear her hair out. Pepper, who is always perfectly presented and has an air of professionalism around her that no one alive can touch, is panicking. Clint starts to freak out, very quietly.
"What about it?" Natasha asks before Steve can.
"It's going to malfunction," Bruce says, glancing at Tony, who has moved to Pepper's side and is going through whatever's on the screens with her. "Soon. Like, within the next day soon."
"Malfunction how?" Steve frowns.
"And when you say latest technology," Clint adds, "what are we talking about here? Cell phones or computer chips? What?"
"Everything," Bruce tells them. "Everything that's been shipped out or upgraded in the last six months is going to fail."
"Is that it?" Steve raises his eyebrows, and Clint feels the atmosphere crackle as Tony turns, eyes narrow and furious.
"Is that it?" he repeats. Pepper puts a hand on his arm, but he shakes it off and stalks forward. Clint actually takes a step back instinctively, but Tony only has eyes for Steve, who looks like he's regretting his words already. "Is that it? Do you have any idea what will happen if this happens? Any idea what the implications will be for the company? Do you know how many people use my technology? Cell phones to goddamn computer chips? Millions of people are using Stark tech right now, and if it fails, or if something happens, the company will suffer."
"Tony, I need you to look at this!" Pepper calls.
"What do you mean if something happens?" Clint frowns. Natasha goes down to Pepper and they begin to work together. Pepper actually passes her phone to Natasha, and Clint remembers that they worked together while Natasha was undercover as Tony's new PA.
"I mean that none of my tech is harmless." Tony is obviously making a great effort to remain calm. "Practically everything holds data, and people will be using more Stark tech as backup. If the data is lost, systems collapse. So much…look, it's difficult to grasp, but if this happens, Stark Industries is looking at fallout on an unprecedented scale. This cannot be allowed to happen."
"It is the company only though, is it not?" Thor joins them, a frown in place. "The owners of your device will not be harmed?"
"Yes they will!" Tony bellows, and everyone takes a step back, because he's really snapped now. His eyes spit fire as he advances on Thor. "Losing data like this is going to get people killed! Everyone uses Stark tech, do you understand? They use it because it is reliable and strong, and nothing ever stops it, and if it stops and explodes on them, people will get hurt! This isn't going to be just a glitch in the system – the systems themselves will be destroyed! They will be gone forever! And the implications for the company –"
"But the company –" Steve starts, and Tony rounds on him, incensed beyond rationality.
"Do you own a company?" he shouts. "Do you? No! Stark Industries is my life, Rogers! The company is me – if the company fails, I fail. If I fail, Iron Man fails. Integrity is everything, don't you get that? If we don't stop this, the company won't recover!"
"Tony!" Natasha calls, and she sounds seriously worried. "Little help here!"
"The scale of this is what's the problem," Bruce explains softly as Tony stalks over to the screens and gets a pained look on his face as he reads through whatever Natasha called him over for. "Lots of people use Stark Industries technology. Even something like a cell phone can become dangerous. And this isn't just the circuits misfiring – this is deliberate sabotage. Someone has been working very hard on this for a long time. This sort of thing is years in the making."
"What sort of malfunctions will happen?" Clint asks as Tony yells for Jarvis to so something or another. "We looking at data loss or explosions here?"
Bruce shrugs helplessly. "That's the thing – it varies. Some things are set to erase themselves, some are set to transmit, some to burn up. And it's all Tony's work."
"What?" Steve frowns.
"That's what this will look like," Thor says, realising. "Whoever has done this plans to discredit him."
"And discrediting Tony discredits Iron Man, and by extension the Avengers," Bruce finishes, nodding. "And so far there doesn't seem to be any way to stop this from happening."
"Jarvis, I want this routed to sub-section alpha-B-28 right now," Tony snaps. "Contact Rhody, he needs to be aware of this – if the War Machine goes south it could kill him. You sent that email yet?"
"I have, sir."
"Email?" Steve raises an eyebrow.
"To everyone who bought something from Stark Industries in the last six months or upgraded their software," Bruce says quietly, "reminding them to back up their work in case of emergency."
"No way will that reach everyone," Clint says, and Bruce nods.
"He knows."
"Why not warn them?" Steve asks. Clint shakes his head.
"Can't scare them. If this gets fixed but a warning like that was released anyway, it still damages the faith people have in the company."
"Which has been damaged enough in the past as it is," Bruce adds.
"Bruce, I need you here!" Tony yells.
"Is there anything we can do to aid you?" Thor asks.
"Oh god," Tony drags his hands through his hair and turns to them. "I don't know, not yet. None of you could do anything here – this is all way out of your league." He turns back to the screens and moans faintly. "There isn't enough time!"
"There's time," Natasha says firmly, hanging up on whoever she was talking to.
Tony takes a deep breath and goes to the window, his fingertips skimming across it and pulling up pages and pages of numbers and equations, charts and graphs. "Okay," he says to himself, "okay, okay – Jarvis, you ready for this?"
"For you sir, always."
"Okay then," Tony swallows and starts to reel off strings of numbers and letters that make absolutely no sense to anyone but him and Jarvis.
"There's really nothing we can do," Steve sounds slightly lost, and Clint pats his shoulder, trying to hide his own worry.
"Cap, you would be surprised how many times the world has nearly ended because of computer problems. Trust me, it's better we stay out of this."
Some world-threatening events occur loudly and publically, like the Chitauri attack on New York. But most of the time Clint knows they happen the way it's happening now – playing out in no more than a few rooms with just a few very panicked people and a lot of computer power. Tony vanishes into his workshop on his own because that's where he thinks best, but Bruce, Pepper, and Natasha stay in the main room, moving between screens and talking to each other in jargon Clint doesn't understand. He, Steve, and Thor make themselves useful by distributing coffee and easy-to-eat food. None of the others make eye contact with them; too glued to the horror unfolding across the screens to look away. Tony chips in occasionally over the speakers, giving them directions and orders and telling them where to direct their focus.
Just as the sun begins to set they pause and sway in place. "Was that –?" Bruce asks, and Pepper breathes out slowly.
"I think it was," she says. "Tony?"
"Here," Tony says over the intercom. "And yes, I think we did just avert that. Take the time it takes for me to get up there to celebrate."
"So, crisis over?" Steve asks hopefully.
"I think so," Pepper nods, scanning data on the window and smiling slowly. "Oh my god, I think it's going to be okay."
"Let's not jump to any conclusions," Natasha says distractedly.
When Tony comes up, it looks like he's aged twenty years in eight hours. "Did we celebrate?" he asks, looking around and going on without waiting for an answer. "Great, because that's the good news. The bad news is, this wasn't it."
"What does that mean?" Pepper asks, immediately on guard again.
"I mean that this has raised several very worrying questions," Tony pinches the bridge of his nose. "Namely, how did this happen, who infiltrated the company at such a terrifyingly comprehensive level, who put this into effect, who orchestrated the whole merry dance, and most importantly, what were they trying to distract us from?"
"Distract?" Clint frowns.
"This was too easy," Tony shakes his head.
"You call that easy?" Natasha raises an eyebrow.
"That should have taken me at least five more hours," Tony snaps, clearly too strung out to bother with manners. "Three and a half at the absolute minimum. This was a distraction. And if something like this was the distraction, I really can't wait to find out what the main event was."
"SHIELD's reported no strange events," Natasha says.
"SHIELD can suck it," Tony growls, "I'm telling you this was a distraction. Jarvis, what –"
"I believe I know what the distraction was for, sir," Jarvis says, and Clint gets to his feet because Jarvis has never sounded like that before. Tony's eyes go wide, and Pepper frowns.
"Jarvis, are you alright?"
"Something is attempting to corrupt me, sir," Jarvis sounds distracted, Clint realises. "It is not dissimilar to the malware that tried to infect my software while you were with AIM."
"Connection?" Tony says immediately, running to the window and clearing it with one swipe of his hand.
"At this point, sir, I would say so. I am currently directing over seventy percent of my attention to this assault."
"Jesus Christ," Tony mutters, fingers fluttering over data on the window. "Oh…shit. Okay, not good, not good…"
"Tony?" Pepper says quietly, sounding worried.
"It isn't corruption," Tony says faintly, his mind elsewhere. "It's a takeover. Whoever this is, they're trying to take Jarvis."
"I am holding steady, sir," Jarvis informs them. "Currently backing up all data into the SHIELD mainframe."
"Initiate failsafe omega-bourbon 88."
"Sir, with the processing –"
"Dump everything unnecessary into SHIELD and the emergency backup unit. Personal preferences, user interfaces, birthdays – everything you don't need right now."
"Yes, sir."
"What the hell is going on?" Clint asks, thoroughly lost.
"More to the point, what does this person want him for?" Natasha says in a low voice.
"Jarvis is unique," Bruce says when Tony doesn't answer. "There is nothing like him in the whole world. No one has ever created a truly successful AI before this. Jarvis is a real personality – he isn't just a machine imitating the trappings of one. If someone got hold of him and corrupted his core parameters, it could be devastating."
"Skynet?" Clint looks at the window, where Tony is moving windows of data around at breath-taking speed.
"Pretty much," Bruce nods, smiling tightly.
"How hard are you trying not to freak out right now?" Clint asks.
"Pretty hard," Bruce looks down and lets out a deep breath. "This is scary on a very global level. Most people don't even know that Jarvis exists. He's too important to be public knowledge. And someone not only knows about him, but is trying to turn him against us."
"And there is still naught we can do to help," Thor growls, clearly at the end of his patience.
"Isn't there any way of tracking this?" Steve asks, sounding a little desperate.
"Trying," Tony says from the window, writing an equation onto the glass. "Locator, locator, locate me a spy, bring him within reach of my laser-beam eyes…"
"He's rhyming," Steve says flatly.
"Stressed here!" Tony yells.
"Transfer complete," Jarvis says. "Currently directing seventy-four point eight nine percent of processing power to combatting the attack. Running diagnostics."
"Buckle up, boys and girls," Tony mutters, "this could get very interesting indeed."
x
"So let me get this straight," Clint says as he goes downstairs to get his bow, Natasha with him. "The Mandarin is slowly and surely capturing pieces of Jarvis, and we can't go up against him to stop him because he has more firepower. The only way we could stop him is with the Hulk, but if we put the Hulk in the field, the Mandarin will use his rings to turn him against us. Tony is losing his shit, Bruce is having a very controlled meltdown, and the only way he thinks he'll be able to get the Hulk back on our side is by…what was it?"
"Remembering his repressed memories," Natasha sighs, "which is what the Mandarin is using to control him, the way he did when he captured Bruce before."
"This all sounds kind of insane."
"It does."
"And we're totally screwed."
"It looks that way."
"Well," Clint opens the door for Natasha as they enter the range, "I don't know about you, but this is the calmest apocalypse situation I've ever been in."
"You've jinxed it now," she shakes her head as she picks up her guns and loads up with extra ammunition.
"You don't believe in that crap," he reminds her as he slings his quiver over his shoulder and hefts his bow in his hand. The weight is reassuring and firm.
"But you do," she gives him a pointed look. "You even believe in star signs."
"I don't believe in star signs," he argues, "I'm just saying that a lot of it matches up."
"You spent too long in the fortune-teller's tent as a kid, Barton."
"You can't talk – we chose your birthday based on your star sign."
"Says the Sagittarius."
"Low blow, Romanoff."
She looks at him as they stride out of the range and head for the elevator, and smiles. "Do I ever aim high?"
He smiles back and she lets him put an arm over her shoulders. "It's going to be fine," he says.
"You think?"
"Sure. Apocalypses are always loud and flashy, with a lot more gunfire."
"Well the night's still young."
"I've always found your optimism an extremely attractive trait."
She elbows him gently and he laughs and removes his arm as they get into the elevator. Maybe it's just taking a while to hit him, but it certainly doesn't feel like the end of the world. And if it is, well. Maybe he'll die. Maybe he'll get to hurt the bad guy before he does. Maybe he'll see Coulson again.
When they get back into the main room, everyone's ready for battle except for Tony, who's standing next to Bruce in front of the window, where Agent Hill is arguing with them.
"This is completely unacceptable!" Tony snaps, and she narrows her eyes.
"You think I'm not aware of that, Stark?"
"What did we miss?" Clint asks Thor.
"The files containing the information Bruce needs to remember have been erased," Thor explains under his breath. "He and Tony believe that if he knows what truly occurred, he will remember and regain control of the Hulk."
"But the files are gone," Natasha face is blank – her battle mask.
"It's okay," Bruce says, looking far from okay himself, "there must have been people who read the files, right? Before they were destroyed, someone must have compiled the information?"
Agent Hill's expression becomes strained. "We don't have access to the only person who could be of help in that respect."
Clint sighs and goes to lean against the wall next to Steve. Coulson compiled their files himself. He spent hours collecting every scrap of relevant information. The Banner incident had always been one of his, right from the first meeting with General Ross' team.
"Excuse me," Agent Hill says suddenly, pressing her finger to her earpiece and turning away slightly.
"This isn't exactly something you can excuse!" Tony yells, but she ignores him.
"Say that again," she says into her earpiece, voice sharp enough to cut glass. "What? He's…I see. Thank you, yes, your incompetence will be reported to the Director himself. I hope you're very pleased with yourself. Put Stevens on the line."
"I wouldn't want to be that guy," Clint says conversationally, but Steve just looks worried. He jerks when Agent Hill says his name.
"Captain! Front and centre, please. I need to speak with you for a moment, alone."
"Whoa whoa whoa," Tony puts up a hand between Steve and the window, "are you telling me what to do in my house?"
"This really isn't the moment for egotism, Stark," Agent Hill says acidly. Clint feels like he's watching a tennis match, being played with a live bomb as the ball.
"No, it's a moment for you to remember exactly who we are," Tony glares at her. "This is my tower, and we are all part of this team. That includes Bruce, and this concerns him. Anything you have to say about him to Steve, you can say to all of us, right, Cap?" he looks over at Steve, and Clint holds his breath. This is a real make-or-break moment as far as the partnership between Tony and Steve goes.
Steve doesn't hesitate. He draws himself up and looks Agent Hill dead in the eye. "Right," he says, and no one misses the smile that plays at the corner of Tony's mouth for a second before he steels himself.
"So say what you have to say, Agent Hill. Or better yet, put Fury on the line."
"Director Fury is busy," she snaps, and closes her eyes for a moment. "Fine. An agent who possesses the information you seek is on his way to the tower right now. He will arrive in less than five minutes. I don't want any record of his presence there, do you understand me? His existence alone…I don't want camera feeds, microphones, or any of your high-tech devices detecting more than six bodies in that tower, do I make myself clear? And only Dr Banner is allowed to see him. If you don't agree to these terms, we stop him from entering the building. Are you in?"
Tony narrows his eyes and looks at Bruce, who nods. "Fine," he snaps, "you've got a deal. How close is this mystery guy?"
Clint zones out and tightens his grip on his bow. We don't have access to the only person who could be of help in that respect. That's what Agent Hill had said. The only person. The only person, who happens to be Phil Coulson, deceased. And now there's an agent on his way to the tower who apparently has the information that only Coulson had possessed. An agent whose identity is such a secret that Agent Hill had demanded that the surveillance be completely shut down and insisted on only Bruce being able to see him.
He isn't stupid.
He isn't stupid, so he knows it can't be true. Coulson's dead. It was confirmed. He's dead, and people who die stay dead. He never saw the body because no one ever sees the bodies SHIELD pulls in from the field apart from the coroners. He never attended a funeral because SHIELD agents don't have them. He never watched the footage because he couldn't bring himself to, and he doesn't need to – Thor saw it happen with his own eyes, and Natasha had reviewed the footage herself. It's not true, he knows, but he still feels slightly winded. He still has to tap out the patterns for his different arrows over the bow's buttons without actually pressing them, just reassuring himself that he remembers.
Index, middle, ring for normal. Little, ring, index for explosive. Middle and ring for electro. Double index and middle for flare. He runs through each of them over and over, keeping his thumb pressed on the lock to stop his quiver activating. He sees Natasha approach him, but doesn't lift his head.
"Are you alright?" she asks quietly, and he doesn't answer immediately.
"You saw the footage," he says finally. She knows what he means. "Right? He's dead. This is just me being stupid."
"You're not stupid."
"Yeah," he forces his fingers to relax and switches the bow to his other hand. "You saw it. He's dead, isn't he?"
She leans against the wall next to him and ducks her head with a sigh. "I saw it. He died."
He can't decide whether the confirmation hurts more or less than the hope being crushed. Fool's hope, he thinks. He's always been a fool. Maybe he can't help it.
When the agent arrives though, he has to hold onto the kitchen counter to stop himself from running to the elevator to check. He just wants to be sure. A hundred percent sure. He needs to know. His knuckles turn white, and he closes his eyes and puts his back to the door. The agent is going to Tony's office, which is probably the one room in the tower people hardly ever go into. Tony barely uses it, and Clint's pretty sure the only reason it exists at all is because it also has an extremely well-stocked bar in it. Bruce goes alone to meet him, and he's gone for a long time. Normally, Clint would be the one to break the silence and suggest something stupid to keep their minds occupied, but this time he can't bring himself to speak.
"You can't," Natasha whispers, coming into the kitchen and putting the kettle on for tea. Bruce has dozens of strange teas, and Natasha and Steve drink them sometimes.
"Can't what?" he mutters.
She smacks his elbow lightly. "You know what."
He knows her protest is only a token thing. She's tense as well. Footage can be faked, after all.
He crushes that thought as soon as it crosses his mind. He can't have hope. He knows he can't. Coulson's dead, and that's that. He's gone, and Clint knows it. Everyone knows it.
He and Natasha both know that he's still going to check. He doesn't care what Agent Hill thinks or does – he needs to be sure. He needs toknow.
He hears Bruce's footsteps as they approach the door, and he turns to watch him enter. It's strange for the door to be closed in the first place – they always leave it open – and it seems to happen too slowly. Bruce looks exhausted, but after nodding at Tony, the first person he looks for is Clint.
Clint doesn't think about what that means, but he's moving forward before he really knows what his feet are doing. Bruce nods to him too, and Clint doesn't look at anyone else before he leaves the room. No one tries to stop him. No one says anything. Tony's office door is just along the hall, and the door is closed. Clint walks to it quickly and opens it without knocking.
There's a man inside, and he looks just like Coulson.
There's a man in Tony's office. He looks like Phil.
Clint stops, hand still on the door handle. He can't think. There's nothing in his head other than Coulson's name, over and over like a prayer. "Are you real?" he manages to say. His voice is insubstantial, just a breath.
The agent nods. "I am."
Clint swallows, because it sounds like Coulson as well. "You're not…" he shakes his head and tries to think. "You're not a…an LMD, or an alien? Or…a robot?" he can feel himself trembling; he can hear it in his voice, and he swallows, trying to control himself.
"I'm real."
Oh, Clint thinks, and takes a moment just to stare. Coulson is in a suit that fits him well, dark and smart. He looks good, from his perfectly knotted tie to his shined shoes, and he looks like himself. His face is exactly the way Clint remembers it, but with details his mind's eye had overlooked. The lines that go from his nose to the edges of his mouth, and the small creases beyond them. The shape of his eyebrows, sloping back and giving him his easy-going look. The tiny wrinkles around his eyes, especially at the corners. Everything looks so clear, and Clint feels the world spinning around him, the floor of the room tilting under his feet, because this is impossible.
He's overloading, and he's being pulled in too many directions at once. He wants to scream at Coulson, he wants to kiss him, he wants to shoot him, he wants to curl into a ball, and he wants to curl around Coulson and just cling to him, touch him all over to prove that he's real and solid and alive.
The word, even only spoken mentally, sets his head shaking and his feet scuffing backwards. "I can't deal with this," he hears himself say, unable to so much as blink in case Coulson disappears. "I, I can't…not now, not after…I can't."
Tearing his eyes away gives him almost physical pain, but his world is upside down by now and he barely manages to stumble out of the door in one piece without falling over. He's scared that if he falls now he might never get up. He leans his hand heavily against the wall as he makes his way back to the main room, and Natasha comes out and stands in front of him. He meets her eyes and answers her unspoken question with a nod. She almost runs to Tony's office to see for herself. He doesn't know how he makes it back to the living room, but he can't look at anyone in the eye. He thinks they speak, but he can't make sense of what they say, so he just shakes his head until they leave him alone.
He follows the others blindly to the quinjet and sits in silence next to Natasha as they fly to wherever the Mandarin's holed himself up, because Jarvis is cracking under the pressure, but Bruce has his memories and he's worked something out with the Hulk. Very distantly, Clint hopes it works, but mostly he feels like he's full of white noise.
"Clint," Natasha says, pressing her shoulder against his, and she sounds the way she did just after she'd beaten the blue edges out of his vision on the Helicarrier.
"Is this real?" he whispers so that only she will hear him. He can see her hair in the edge of his vision, but he can't move his eyes from the floor. "Is he real?"
"He's real."
"How do you know?"
"Codes we agreed on. Signals we worked out."
"Just the two of you?"
"Of course. He cut his finger to prove he was human."
"Real blood?"
"Real blood. It certainly tasted like it, at least."
He breathes in deep and closes his eyes. "I don't know if I can do this."
"Shut it out," she tells him firmly. "Focus on the mission. For the next few hours, forget everything outside of this team."
He's always been good at following direct orders. It takes him a few minutes, but he straightens and manages to look her in the eye, focusing clearly. She gives him the barest twitch of her lips and nods. He dips his head as well, and looks over at Steve. He clears his throat, and Steve looks up immediately. "So, Cap," Clint says, and swallows down everything that could interfere, "what's the plan?"