A/N

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Chapter 4

The next morning found me in the kitchen, humming along to whatever song was currently on the radio, flipping pancakes – a lot of pancakes, have you met my team? – and making sure the eggs didn't burn, all with a seemingly permanent smile on my face.

Footsteps behind me alert me to the presence of another Avenger in the room. I catch a flying pancake just in time and look to see Natasha padding into the room, relaxed and smiling for once.

"Hey, you're up! I never got the chance to talk to you last night." we both say somehow simultaneously and in the same bright tone. Natasha laughs and accepts the coffee and plateful of food I slide towards her before taking everything off the stove and storing it for the rest of the team before sitting down with my own plate and mug.

"So…spill! Leave no detail unsaid!"

I roll my eyes and sip my coffee before I begin letting my mind drift back to last night.

"Well, the pizza place was nice. Pizza was good, but our waiter was – and I quote – a 'sleazy douchebag'. Clint's words, not mine. Creepy dude, a little obsessive. Anyways, Clint paid the bill and we left without castrating anyone. Lines at the movie theater were short, and we shared a popcorn. The movie was…interesting…but a little too realistically gory for me. B-"

"Hold up. What movie?"

"Dawn of the Planet of the Apes."

"I see your point. Continue."

"Anyways, Clint was totally fine with me hiding my face in his jacket when the apes started shooting." I can feel a blush rising on my cheeks that I have a feeling is going to be there for a while.

Natasha coos softly but motions for me to continue.

"He teased me about it the whole way home, but I told him apes should never be able to wield guns and torches, so…" I shudder involuntarily. "The best part was when we got back. He made me take the fire escape up-"

"We have one of those?"

"Yes, building code, something even Tony Stark can't change. Two hundred and seven steps! So he made me take the fire escape up to the roof, but when we got up there, the stars made it all worth it. The sky was clearer than I've ever seen it and you could see thousands of constellations."

Natasha gasps slightly just imagining it, and I nod and take a bite of pancake and swallow before going on.

"So anyways he has this little boom box set up, and there's a song on that I like called Dancing Away with my Heart by Lady Antebellum – you should look it up – and we end up waltzing on the roof. Did you know he's a really good slow dancer?"

Natasha gives a weird half nod. "We danced at galas sometimes to maintain a cover, but that was half-hearted and we were focused on our target. This, on the other hand, sounded like the real deal, so I have no clue."

"So anyways, he spins me and dips me and smirks when he sees my blush. When the song ended, he kissed my cheek! And then almost ran downstairs, but…it was amazing! I felt like a princess, as cliché as that is."

"Who felt like a princess?" Natasha and I both jump to see Bruce making his way into the kitchen.

I quickly blurt out "Nothing!" as Natasha says "Taylor, last night." I send her a glare that clearly asks what on earth she is doing.

Bruce sees this and smiles. "Don't worry, Taylor, I know."

I sigh in defeat and point towards the food on the counter. "Grab a plate and mug Bruce."

Once Bruce has gathered his breakfast and pulled up a third chair, he asks further into our conversation. "So how did last night go?"

"Not as disastrously as I expected. I wanted to castrate the pizza waiter, the movie was gory but Clint was sweet about it, and I got to waltz under the stars." I briefly summarize, hoping Bruce got enough from that so I didn't have to recount the entire night again.

Apparently he did, because he nodded without hesitation. "So he didn't ask you the big question?"

My blush intensifies as I drop my gaze to my mug. "No. I don't think this was even a date."

"If not a date, then what?"

I shrug as I get up to refill my plate and mug. "I don't know, an outing between friends?"

"Friends don't dance to a slow song with each other under the night sky. Couples do."

I groan and pinch the bridge of my nose. "He didn't even ask, guys, so can you please drop it?" I glace at Natasha, who had fallen silent and was watching all this with an amused expression. "Both of you?"

They both nod, and the kitchen falls momentarily silent.

"Hey, can you pass the bacon?"

A~A~A

Five hours later, I was sitting on the couch reading on a tablet as I waited for the paint coat on my bike to dry. Natasha was curled up on the opposite side of the same couch, her eyes glued to whatever was on the screen. Clint – down, butterflies, down! – was sitting across from me, reading some archery magazine I have yet to get my hands on. Bruce was over in the kitchen, helping Steve wash the dishes from that morning.

Everything was fine until my dad walked in with the mail.

"Bill…bill…noise ordinance warning…politics…junk…parking citation for the Quinjet…"

My dad tosses the envelopes in the trash until he comes across something that cuts him off and catches his eye.

It's a magazine of some sort – the press probably just threw something at us out of left field and it smacked us in the head. It wouldn't be the first time.

"Taylor, what do you know about this?"

I wrinkle my brow as I walk over, my dad asking my opinion on something the press saw or said usually means either a) it has to do directly with me, or b) it's something I should really know is happening.

If you said option A, you'd be correct.

Because my dad is staring at somehow well-lit pictures of Clint and I last night – at the pizza parlor, both entering and exiting the theater, and somehow on the roof mid-song – with the caption: Young superheroes in love? Continued on page 15.

I huff as I snatch the magazine from my dad and quickly thumb through the pages to fifteen.

There's an article there, asking who Clint is, how old we are, what we're doing, and if my dad knows (well he wasn't supposed to, idiots…).

I wave Clint over and show him the article. I can hear him suck in a short breath, but he's taking it all better than I expected.

"Someone start talking, now!"

I sigh as I pass the magazine to Bruce, who reads it with raised eyebrows before passing it on.

"I think it would be easier, dad, if you asked questions."

"Okay. Where were you last night?"

"I was on an…excursion…with Clint. Pagolo's Pizza, the movie theater on 5th, and the roof."

My dad raises an eyebrow at the word excursion, but accepts that anyways. "Are you dating?"

I fight to keep my blush contained to my neck as I glance at Clint and back to my dad. "No…"

"Why did you lie to me last night?"

"I-"

"You could have been hurt! Or mugged! Or jumped in a back alleyway! Neither of you had your bows, you didn't have a suit, and you could have been seriously injured all because you were too busy making puppy eyes at each other!"

"Hey! I-"

"Did you even have one sharp thing on you? One knife? A paperclip? No-"

"Lay off, Stark."

"Stay out of this, Barton!"

I sigh internally – why is it always Clint and my dad going toe-to-toe over me? – as their voices rise.

"No, Stark, if you're done with your little temper tantrum, listen! Your daughter, brilliant resourceful kick-butt genius she is, had a purse packed with knives, a gun, and pepper spray. We were both five seconds away from rendering that waiter unable to ever have kids. So quit freaking out and listen to what she was trying to say."

"If I didn't know better, Barton," my dad sneers, "I'd say you sounded like you were defending you girlfriend."

I sigh audibly this time as I watch my dad and my…my…Clint sneer and snarl and throw barbs.

"Maybe I am."

Wait, hold up, say what now?

Clint turns back to me and walks up to me, his eyes shining and his cheeks just a little pinker than normal.

"Taylor, I really enjoyed last night, date or not. If it was a date, I would love so many more in the future. I've been waiting that night for a while, but last night opened my eyes and shoved me to this. So," he takes one of my hands in his, "Taylor Maria Stark, will you be my girlfriend?"

Malfunction…malfunction…does not compute…

I try and reply, but choke on the words. On my third attempt at an answer, I finally manage a few squeaked words.

"I-I-yes!"

Clint laughs and pull me close, putting his other arm around my waist and dipping me, not unlike last night.

Except for the part where he presses his lips to mine.

The kiss is so similar to the dream one, I mentally slap myself to validate that, yes I am awake.

Fireworks erupt behind my eyes, shivers crawl through my bones, and my brain stalls.

An eternity that feels too short later, he pulls back and straightens me up, never letting of my hand.

My dad huffs, rolls his eyes, and stomps across the room.

Bruce is grinning as he checks his watch and I think I see a twenty dollar bill slide between him and Natasha, who is grinning from ear to ear as she flashes me a thumbs up.

Steve is doing a great impersonation of a tomato, scratching his neck and taking great interest in the fruit bowl.

Thor is grinning like a toddler who doesn't know what exactly happened, but everyone else is happy and we just kissed, so he'll smile too.

My dad walks tersely back over, tablet in hand and something is flashing and vibrating. "If you two are done with your little love fest, one of the Loki alarms has gone off."

I briefly release Clint's hand to go over to the couch and retrieve the tablet I was reading earlier and call up the Loki alarm control panel and project it into the space above the table.

"What do you have?" I reply with an even, strictly professional tone I usually save for press conferences, reporters, board members, or enemies.

My dad's tone matches mine as he replies. "Traces of magic matching Loki's signature were found in Edison, New Jersey at 2:25 this morning."

"Edison?" Bruce pipes up. "That is really close to the border. Is he headed for us again?"

"And why the time? Jarvis, make a note for me to look into that."

"Yes ma'am."

"That's all we have."

Everyone looks at the leader. Steve paces around the couches as he formulates a battle plan.

"We can spare two Avengers right now, and this might be a false lead. Thor, you and I will go down to Edison to check what your brother left behind, if he left anything. Thor, will you be able to recognize your brother's magic?"

"Enough. I have trained alongside him for many an eon."

Steve nods. "And I'll go for backup." and to watch Thor.

Steve nods once and walks off in dismissal.

My dad huffs again and walks towards the elevator, mumbling something about dating daughters and fried hawks and Loki.

Bruce follows my dad silently towards the elevator, and I can almost see the algorithms bouncing in his head.

Natasha rolls her eyes at my dad and walks in the other direction, squeezing my shoulder as she passes.

Thor is silent as he follows the path Steve took, probably off to pack.

Clint glances at me and then the vent. "Is there anywhere we can go without people looking for us? Just to talk about Loki, I swear."

I roll my eyes and chuckle. "Calm down, Clint, I trust you. I can put my office on lockdown, come on."

I fire a net at the vent cover, unlatch it, and pull myself in, scurrying away from the entrance to give Clint space. Clint soon pops in, and I lead the way to my rarely-used office.

A~A~A

Fifteen minutes, one elevator, and one fanboy security guard later, I punch in the command for stage 3 lockdown – soundproofed everything, black windows, no cameras or audio, and only Jarvis access.

I slide my chair closer to my desk, where my boyfriend is sort of half sitting, half leaning on the edge.

"Jarvis pull up all the pictures of the Edison scene."

Several pictures from different angles, all of the same scene, pop up. I shove them towards Clint. "Use those brilliant, beautiful eyes of yours to see if you can find anything in these."

"Flattery will get you everywhere."

I give a half smile as I pull up all known information about the numbers two and twenty-five, all significance about the time, and all connections in history and mythology.

Mythology appears clean. No deities – ancient of modern – have any connections to the numbers or the time, nor do any monsters.

So Loki isn't defending anyone's honor or anything.

History is a blank slate as well – nobody was ever doing anything important with those numbers or at that time, anywhere in the world.

Loki isn't trying to remind us of anything, he isn't digging up old grudges.

The time is ordinary: five minutes past 2:20, five till 2:30. Still dark in the morning, blazing hot in the afternoon.

So I settle back to look at the numbers themselves.

Jarvis has pulled up a simple letters to numbers cipher. I shrug as I look for two and five.

2-2-5 would be B-B-E. Not much help there.

2-25 would be B-Y. It's a word, but not much help.

"Try looking at it in military time."

I spin around to see Clint, now cross legged on my desk, peering over his own holograms to look at mine.

"What?"

"Military time. You know, 1400 hours, that's two o'clock, Try looking at 2:25 with a soldier's eyes."

I turn back to my hologram with this new information. If 2:00 is 1400 hours, 2:25 would be 1425.

1-4-2-5 is A-D-B-E. Nope.

14-25 is N-Y.

N-Y.

New York.

"Clint, you genius! I got it!"

Loki was about to pay us a not-so-friendly visit.

A/N

Once again, thanks to Currahee506 for the idea of Clint asking Taylor the 'big question' in front of Tony.

Edison is a real place, I don't own it or have anything against it, I just needed a bordering city.

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