The next morning the kids got up early, and as such; Tony's hope of a lie in went out the window.
He heard a crash from the kitchen, panicked Hydra had somehow broken in, and ran down the hallway in nothing more than his boxer shorts. As it turned out, it was nothing more sinister than Clint dropping the plates he'd been trying to get out of the cupboard and Natasha had burning the toast.
After cleaning up their mess, he went to take a shower and get dressed while Pepper kept an eye on them.
Steve joined them shortly later and Clint asked for a rematch of Clue.
Part-way through the game (just as Natasha was about to win, again) Jarvis interrupted;
"Sir, Agent Coulson is on the phone. He says it's urgent"
"Hold the line Jarvs, I'll take this in private" he said, smiling reassuringly at Natasha as she glanced nervously in his direction, before leaving the four of them to continue with the game.
"What is it Phil?"
"There anyway you can bring the kids back down to medical?"
"What? Why?"
"There were some... anomalies with the blood results; they need another sample to run some more tests"
"They're just starting to settle in, can't I take some blood here and bring it down to you? I don't want to upset them more than necessary"
"Sure, but make it fast?"
Half an hour later; Tony and Pepper were on their way back to Shield with several vials of Clint and Natasha's blood, while Steve opted to stay at the tower and try to burn off some of their energy.
They played on the wii for a while before heading down to the gym.
Steve set them both up on treadmills, before they attempted the climbing wall. Clint asked if they could have a go on the sparring matt, but Steve caught Natasha's sly grin and opted to say no to that one; instead he hung two punching bags next to each other. When Clint saw Natasha's technique of hitting and kicking the bag he was glad Steve had said no to a spar.
Next, Steve went about teaching Clint how to do pull ups while Natasha watched. She had no interest in joining them so she went over the sparring matt and started to dance. Steve watched in amazement as she twirled and leapt; dancing the perfect ballet even in the absence of music. Steve always knew Natasha liked to dance, but he'd never actually seen her. He didn't realise just how good she was. Clint climbed up to perch on the bar in order to watch too, but Natasha froze and blushed when she realised all eyes were on her.
"Go on" Steve encouraged, smiling and turning to continue teaching Clint. Steve quietly asked Jarvis to play some music, and he was happy to see Natasha had gone back to her performance now no one was watching; a smile of pure content worn on her face as she picked up her pace.
Natasha, Clint and even Steve were tired, sweaty and hungry by now; so they headed back to Tony's floor for some dinner.
They were halfway through their spaghetti when Pepper and Tony got home. Ah hour later, when Clint and Natasha were playing darts; Steve got his chance to ask them what had happened at Shield;
"They got any news yet?"
"No, they just said there were some 'strange' readings from the blood samples and wanted to rerun the tests, as well as some additional ones. They weren't big on the talking"
Over the next two days they heard nothing from Shield, at least not officially. Phil let them know they were still looking into the blood work, but they got no more details than that.
The time passes quickly as Clint and Natasha settled in even more at the tower; Pepper taught them to bake, they had regular game sessions; whether it be board games, competing on the wii, or playing on the playstation. Tony got into trouble when he let them race on their roller blades around the tower which resulted in a broken television. They played laser tag, which Steve was sure Tony enjoyed just as much as the kids, and Natasha finished all seven of her Harry Potter books. She continued to dance, while Clint continued to use the gym and they steadily made their way through all the kid-friendly DVDs Tony had.
Tony and Pepper's floor had become a safety hazard. There were roller blades and scooters, plastic guns, goggles and controllers, a radio controlled car, discarded clothes, books and jigsaw pieces scattered about the floor. The five of them spent the whole morning tidying.
That afternoon Pepper went back into work for a few hours to catch up on some paperwork, leaving Steve and Tony strict instructions that under no circumstances, was she to return to a mess.
Tony had finally received the blueprints for the machine Shield though Hydra might have used to revert their resident assassins into children, and was examining them in his lab.
Steve excused himself from watching Frozen with Clint and Natasha in order to take a phone call from Agent Hill.
"Hey Tasha, wanna go play?"
"No, I like this film!"
"Yeah I know, we've watched it nine times!" he groaned
"Shush!"
Natasha was singing along to 'Let it Go' while Clint snuck off to find his bow and arrow set. Just as the song finished, a plastic arrow with a suction cup attached stuck to the center of the TV, and a second latter one hit Natasha in the side of the head.
"Clint!"
"Come on Tasha, come play"
"No!"
Another arrow to the head was all it took for Natasha to grab her nerf gun and shoot Clint rapidly; all five shots hitting him in his forehead.
"You're on" he grinned at her, shooting another arrow which would have hit her right in the face had she not already dove behind the sofa. They shot and ducked, rolling across the floor in order to retrieve their spent ammo and keeping count of the amount of hits they's got in. Natasha was in the lead, but only just.
The two were at battle with one another for about ten minutes before Tony came back into the room. Natasha hit him twice with the nerf gun and Clint managed to stick one of his suction arrows to his forehead before he'd even fully emerged from the elevator.
"Right then" he said, strolling to the kitchen area. Clint and Natasha eyed each other suspiciously from their hiding place under the table, and were both taken by surprise when Tony soaked them with a water gun.
They screamed and shrieked as cold water soaked their hair and clothes, scrambling out from beneath the table while shooting their own weapons.
Steve ran back into the room, only to get soaked and pelted too, before leaving again;
"Sorry Hill. No it's nothing; just an impromptu water fight"
Pepper arrived back a few minutes later, glaring at the three of them until they all muttered their apologies. As Clint and Natasha set about collecting their projectiles, Tony couldn't resist shooting Pepper with the water gun... Just once.