Chapter 8
It takes too long to find and get to Fury, when Tony also doesn't want to state his business to anyone he might not be able to trust, and by the time he's located, caught up to, and ambushed the man, it's been dark for hours, and running on no food and no sleep makes it feel even later. Tony's not sure if he should be thinking about Clint, or trying not to.
"You look like hell," Fury tells him, like he's not surprised to find Tony waiting in his car.
"Your GPS isn't very secure," Tony counters, and adjusts the rearview mirror to see exactly how fucked up he looks, really. "Car locks, too. You should look into that."
"Really."
"And I'd get started on it pretty soon if I were you. Also, are you aware that you're missing an agent?"
Fury stops with his key half into the ignition and looks at him. Takes him in head to toe and back, then turns the key, adjusts the rearview back to its previous position, and pulls out. Then, when they're on the road and the seatbelt alert is pinging its soft but insistent warning at them, guesses, "Hawkeye."
Tony tries to smirk, but his lips are chapped and it stings. "Got it in one," he says. "The others went after him, but they're not going to make it in time."
Fury, to his credit, doesn't swerve or hit the brakes, or even turn to look at him. Just waits for the rest of it, which is a pain, because Tony had planned it all out as a series of increasingly grim, possibly non-sequiturial responses. After dealing with the Avengers, he's not prepared for the lack of interjection and demands for explanation.
"We're going to lose Clint," he tells Fury, "in about a day. The estimated time of death is sometime Friday morning. Early."
Fury glances at him, then turns back to the road. Doesn't ask how he knows that, or if they've been threatened, or why he hadn't been informed sooner. Instead, he flips the radio on and jogs the dial around until something soothing and jazz comes on.
"Is that supposed to calm me down?" Tony asks.
"You seem pretty calm already."
"Yeah. Well. I've been here before. Well, not here. This part is a first. Nice car, by the way. Very fuel guzzling."
"And where's my team?" Fury asks.
"Europe. Somewhere near or around the French-German border. You didn't hear about Banner visiting his foreign friends in academia?"
Fury's eyebrow raises. Tony says, "Huh. And here I was under the impression that you kept tabs on Big Green."
"We do."
"But not today? Or not personally? Or are you starting to get a niggling feeling that's uncomfortably like suspicion?"
The car comes to a very law abiding stop, then, when the light changes, hangs a left, and then a right, and then another right.
"Why are we pulling into a diner?" Tony asks.
"For coffee."
"The car's clean. I checked for bugs."
Fury parks anyway, and gets out and Tony follows, then stops, halfway across the narrow parking lot. "I don't have a baseball cap or my mustache glasses, you realize? If you're trying for incognito."
Fury doesn't stop. "You'll be fine."
-----
He is fine. It's probably the combination of Clint's ruined sweater and exhaustion, making him look worn and unlike himself. It's a sickening kind of relief to slump into a booth and feel distant from the catch-up game he'd been trying to catch up on.
"Why are we here?" he asks, as soon as Fury's ordered, and they're left to themselves.
"Because you're going to tell me exactly what is going on, and how you know with such specificity when my agent is going to die, and why I don't."
Tony takes a breath. Lets it out. So much for distance. "One promise first--you don't take anything from my lab, or try to bar my access to the lab or try anything that might seem even slightly against the spirit of this deal, regardless of what I may or may not have in there."
"Tony."
"Promise me. And anyway, if you do anything, this all goes to shit, Clint dies permanently, maybe we die, and then probably you. And then we lose SHIELD."
Fury leans back to consider that. Then he says, "Fine. Talk."
It takes even more time to fill Fury in, and, unlike the team, Tony's not sure how much faith and willingness to suspend disbelief he comes pre-wired with. Probably not a ton, but the fact of both Steve and Natasha being onboard with the lunacy coming out of his mouth maybe counts for something, because he listens to the whole thing and takes the folded papers Tony pulls out of his jacket and tosses to the table.
"Might want to finish your burger," he suggests, because it's probably polite to offer some warning before letting someone open forensics photos over their dinner.
Fury gives him a look, but unfolds the documents anyway. Leafs through the pages, before flipping back to the photos, then glances from them, to Tony and back again. Says, "I thought he wasn't dead yet."
"He's not. You can call your morgue and see if they've conducted this autopsy yet, but I'd rather you didn't. I have a finely tuned--thing--in progress."
"A thing?"
"We'll call it an algorithm. You tinker in the wrong direction, people find out what we're finding out, get the jump on us, and I wake up in a week and missing a team, maybe my tower, and with no time machine to fix it with anymore."
Fury goes through the papers one more time, then, instead of tucking them away like Tony had expected, hands them back. Says, "You want me to pull an inside job."
"We've been trying that already," Tony says, "I just want you in on it."
-----
It's slow going, Fury style. Tony's not sure what he'd expected, but hanging around what he suspects is a safehouse while the director rifles through lists of names and addresses hadn't been high on the list. It's making him antsy and nervous and even though he has a computer with him, there's not much he can do but watch the second hand tick its way around the clock in Fury's kitchen and--despite himself--compare the time against the report he has rolled in his hands.
The paper's getting grimy and damp from his sweaty hands. He keeps fidgeting with it, almost opening it before catching himself and rolling it into an even tighter tube. Clint's probably thirsty. Tony remembers his lips being cracked from more than impact.
"It's going to take time," Fury says, when Tony's gotten up to pace and sat back down, and demanded to know what the hold-up is, at least three separate time, "If SHIELD is infiltrated, we're going to have to pick our contacts carefully."
Clint has a day left, but Tony has no idea how long before that the effective too late marker might be. At what point Clint will be too far gone to save, even if they manage to get to him.
"As I understand it," Fury tells him, "You have time. Another time."
"That part's getting to be a problem," Tony says.
-----
He leaves Fury's while he still has cover of darkness, hoofing it back to the tower under the pretext of possibly needing to get into an Iron Man suit--lot of good that will do--but really because he can't stand to watch Fury be meticulous and careful while their time runs down.
"Tell the team I'm on stand-by," he tells JARVIS, as soon as he gets back, "and ready my fastest suit."
JARVIS does both, but instead of ending up at the launch pad, Tony ends up in Clint's apartment, and in Clint's bed. Listening to Avenger radio chatter and watching the daylight crawl across Clint's ceiling.
"I don't know how to say this," Steve says, once he's on proper comms and they've filled each other in, "But maybe you should stay there. In case Fury needs back-up."
"Or a save," Natasha adds, sounding like she's enjoying the idea. Tony doesn't tell her that they're down to hours, and it feels like he should argue the point, but really, he's grateful for the reprieve. Finding Clint, this time--just this time--might break him. He's rather not have to see the results of what he's more or less intentionally caused by redirecting the team.
"Roger that, Rogers," he jokes weakly, and leaves the comms open while he waits for more news and for Natasha to tell him I'm so sorry, Tony.
-----
The present kicks back in with a vengeance, and it takes a good few minutes to remember why Fury might be in his kitchen, conferring in low tones with Steve and Maria Hill, while Tony shuffles past them for coffee.
"Don't tell me. You fucked up, lost everything, and now this is SHIELD HQ?"
The conversation pauses while they give him a concerned look he's gotten way too familiar with. At least this time it's on new faces. "So I forget things," Tony says. "So sue me."
"A side effect?" Hill asks, and really.
"Sharper than Bruce, this one" Tony tells the room in general, then re-explains, "I lose a week somewhere. I have it on Captain authority that that week still exists, but--" he shrugs. "I like to think of it as optional."
"I wish it had been optional.” Hill doesn't sound pleased, and she's giving Fury a look as she says it. It's good to see some blame being passed around that's being passed to someone who isn't him.
"So what do we have? Other than Barton in the morgue. Is that still how this goes?"
Steve gets up and comes back with his hands full. Lays files on the table one at a time. Says, "Post mortem and forensics," and "SHIELD recon," and "Vehicle tracking. And this is a list of names of everyone Clint or his team passed information to who didn't pass it up the chain."
It's a good stack. A lot more there than I know what I last saw him wearing, like he was filing some missing persons report. They're so close Tony can feel it like the nervous jitters of pre-test-flight. Nothing left to do but succeed or fail.
"Okay," he says, to Fury, "Okay. What are we looking at?"
"We're looking at a sizable faction within SHIELD looking to take control of our resources and assets, and gut us from the inside out, to continue operating under the name."
"A mutiny."
"A coup." Fury's lip twitches. Tony can't tell what he finds amusing in the whole mess. It's not even the worn thin, cracked smile Natasha had been wearing the last few versions of the week. "A covert coup."
It's shadows in shadows. The kind of mess Tony hates. The kind Clint and Natasha understand, but he and Steve aren't quite sure how to fight, at least until the targets come into focus and become more distinct.
"Crap," Tony says, "I was hoping we could solve this by just getting someone to shoot someone."
"Don't worry," Hill says, "There'll be a lot of shooting of a lot of someones in the near future," then adds, "Covertly. Probably. Hopefully."
If they get there. If Tony gets there. His future's been sort of limited, lately.
"Okay," he says. Again. "Nice catching up with you kids. Now tell me what you've got on Clint, because the battery in my Delorean is running down."
-----
Tony climbs into what turns out to be mid-day Thursday, his jump cut short by another day. "But with answers, this time," he tells JARVIS, "More or less. How's our intrepid leader?"
"Would you like me to contact Captain Rogers, sir?"
"I meant Fury, actually, but okay." It might not actually be a great idea to fill now-Fury in on what he'd find later. Who knew what kind of snarls he should be avoiding and what messes he could make. Better to keep the damage to a minimum, or at least obfuscate enough that he can smooth over the wrinkles.
"We don't have Clint yet," is the first thing Steve says when the call connects. Anticipating the question.
"I know."
"Do you--Are you," Steve stops. Ends with, "Back?" in a doubtful tone that would be funny if they weren't hours away from losing Clint. Bright penny Steve's been putting together what's probably looked like erratic behavior on Tony's part and realizing he's been getting a different Tony--or at least a later Tony--every few hours.
"Yeah," Tony says, "Yeah, I'm back. Sorry if things have been weird."
"Things have been weird since Nineteen Forty-Two." Tony can hear the shrug in it. "What've you got?"
"Nick Fury. Also Hill, and I think Natasha's coroner was clean." Out of sheer luck. "So right now, SHIELD is us and the three of them." Tony stops. Asks, "How much of this did I already catch you up on?"
"You were going to see Director Fury."
"Right." Tony remembers the call, now. "Well, it went okay. And our jolly Saint Nick of Christmas Future gifted me with possible locations. Opened up the whole off-line train-related SHIELD properties file for us. We should have time to check them out if we split up. I'll send you the list of coordinates and meet you there. Just give me two minutes to slip into something shiny."
-----
The weather in Europe is the same it's been every other one of Clint's last days. It's sickeningly familiar. "I had JARVIS drive," he tells Natasha, as he requisitions her whole thermos of strong coffee, "but it's still not exactly easy to sleep in the suit. It kind of locks up. It's a bit freaky, actually."
"Are you okay?"
"I'm great. How many Fury hidey-holes have you scratched off the list? And where's Bruce?"
"Four, and with Thor."
"Huh. You've been busy, busy." Not busy enough, considering the time they have left. Tony bounces his leg. It's hard to cover up the twitching when he's in the armor, but maybe Natasha will put it down to the sudden but intense caffeination.
"I need to remind Bruce to think about energy. I'm down to--I don't know, exactly, but this might be it, so let's move, alright?"
Natasha and Steve have a car. An unlikely little cute thing, in an unlikely cute shade Tony wants to call persimmon. It makes Steve look even more like a clueless tourist, behind the wheel with his elbow resting in the window and wearing really stupid shades. It's probably Natasha's doing. Don't look cool while undercover seems like a page from her book of sneaking, and everything about the both of them is coming off lost and ridiculous.
They're parked in an empty lot behind an ugly corrugated iron shed. Train-related SHIELD depot number five, Tony guesses. Empty and fenced-off and last used maybe sometime during the cold war.
"We'll call him for you," Natasha says, "If you don't want to, but let's get out of here before someone notices and something changes." And makes Tony's from-last-possible-future information obsolete.
"Right," Tony says, "Because that shade of orange is really inconspicuous."
"We're lost," Natasha says, and jerks her head at the car, "Boyfriend wouldn't ask for directions."
-----
When they meet up again, at site number seven--six having been eliminated by Thor and Bruce--Steve and Natasha are still doing their confused tourist routine, but they've switched out their car for one in lime green and Natasha is driving.
"He's not here," Tony says, as they pull up. "There's not even any power. JARVIS isn't finding a heat signal, or vehicles, or any sign of anything." He can tell he's gaining volume. Steve and Natasha have no idea how absolute their deadline is. Tony's not sure if he's even given them that information. Not the specifics. "He's probably in bad shape by now, and we still don't know where--"
"We have to look, Tony," Steve says. His tourist shades aren't doing much to support the reassuring steadiness he's obviously trying for. "All of those things can be hidden. False signals. Insulated basements. What if we miss something?"
"Yeah. Yeah, you're right. Let's flush another hour and a half down the can in the name of thoroughness and professionalism."
Steve has the grace to not answer, but just silently gets his shield out of the hatchback of the car and slides his arm through the straps. The way he's absorbed in adjusting it and the way it's making his sleeve bunch means the situation--and maybe Tony and the streak of asshole he can't seem to shut down--is getting to him more than he'd like to let on. There's an ashen look to his face and an unsteadiness to the set of his jaw that's hard to miss now that Tony's looking.
"Sorry," he says, turned away from Steve. "Sorry. I just--It's getting late."
"I want to find him too, Tony."
"I know. I'm sorry. And we should look. Better than having to double back and not know which site to re-search because we half assed all the recon, right?"
Steve flicks his glasses into the car, then closes the door. It's odd to see him with the shield, but out of uniform.
"Should I have put a Barcelona sticker on my suit?" Tony asks, to make things normal again between them, "So I can fit in with the Euro tour theme you two have going?"
-----
The place comes up empty. Even though he'd expected that, Tony's still disappointed. There's an actual bitter taste in his mouth as Natasha checks in with Bruce to find they've also come up with nothing.
"It's always the last place you look," she says, but without much optimism. Their list of locations is getting short.
"It's got to be one of these," Steve says, but really it doesn't. It could be Fury's wrong. That Tony's wrong, and has been the whole time. That he's fit the puzzle pieces together incorrectly, and come up with a distorted image. Maybe Clint's dying someplace entirely different than he'd thought based on assumptions and guesswork, and now there's no more time to work any of it out.
He's out of do overs, and they still don't have Clint. Still don't know where he is, even despite everything else that's come into unwelcome focus.
"I fucked up," he says when they assemble, meeting Thor and Bruce to compare notes. He's glad of the faceplate, and of the darkness of the parking lot they're in. Half the purpose of the rendezvous, Tony's sure, is to give each other pep talks, but it's nothing he wants to hear. This time, the Avengers being new at losing Clint is making them painful rather than pitiful. They're determined and brave-faced and full of faith in Clint's ability to hang on long enough to be found. Listening to them exchange futile theories feels like being scoured from the inside out, until he's more blank and empty than hurt. "I misread something somewhere," he explains. His voice sounds flat. "Got the answers to the wrong question, or something."
"He's not dead yet," Steve says, at the same time that Thor makes a reassuring have faith statement. It's almost morning and they're out of leads, and it would only be fair to flip his faceplate up and look them in the eye, and tell them that he's blown what might have been his last chance, but he can't.
"Yes, he is," Tony says, "And in a few hours, we can go get him. I know where to look."
-----
This time, it's impossible to leave Clint to Steve and Natasha and SHIELD to deal with. As much as Tony would like to be done with the day, to run home and pick up with Steve where he'd left off, at the bar in his penthouse what feels like an eternity ago, and poison himself properly on cocktails this time--if it's the last time, he owes Clint a bit of backbone.
He's not sure if he's grateful or not that the others give him space while he lets the armor thump in pieces to the ground, letting them depower and fall wherever, then goes to crouch next to Clint, resting a knee on the ground when sitting on his heels gets painful. "I know this means jack shit, Barton," Tony tells him, "but we tried." He's not sure he's seen Clint this close before. At least, not his body. Even despite the horrifically detailed mental pictures his brain's been throwing at him, it feels new and strange and freshly awful.
Clint's eyes are mostly closed, leaving dull slivers of blue. His lips dry and cracked and parted enough to show the edge of a tooth. If Tony lets his vision blur enough, Clint could almost be sleeping, but when he focuses, the details make the illusion impossible to maintain. He's pale and too still and there's blood in his hair, and something about the set to his mouth is wrong. Relaxed too far into a non-expression.
Tony tips backwards, collapsing to sit on his butt in the gravel. Touches Clint's hair carefully. Not wanting to disturb any trace, even if it might not matter anymore. The way Clint's hair is smushed to his head is making him look even more lifeless, and if Tony can fix that one thing, then he will.
"If--There were so many times, where if I had done something different," Tony says, watching his fingers straighten Clint's hair. It's better than focusing on his face. "But it was always too late. By the time I knew what I should do, it was always too late. I was--I had a fucking time machine and everything was still always too fucking late."
Clint's lip is cut. Tony's memorized it by now, and seeing it is sickeningly familiar, but bizarrely steadying. He knows how everything will play out from here. He's played it out. It isn't, really, the punch to the gut that it had been, the first time. Or at least, it shouldn't be. At some point, Tony should have gotten good at this.
"Ready to take him home?"
"Huh?"
It's Bruce. Standing at a slight distance. Shoulders hunched like he's bracing for impact, or walking through a high wind. "SHIELD's here."
Tony hadn't noticed. Had somehow tuned out the arrival of a whole transport and the Avengers-Agents discussion that's still going on in the background, distant and low enough that he can only make out parts of words, but close enough that he should have been aware of them.
"I guess," Tony says, turning back to Clint and not getting up, "Nat's going to get that funeral she's been wanting. I can't promise you I'll be sober enough to give a good eulogy. I might let Steve do it, if you don't mind. Or--I don't know if you had a will or arrangements or anything. I didn't really look into it."
"We can sort it out later, Tony," Bruce says, and, when Tony looks up, "I'm sorry."
Tony laughs. It sounds wet. "It's your turn for that, huh?"
"What?"
"Nothing." He starts to unfold. "It's nothing. I had a thing going with Natasha, but you can be in it, if you want."
It's hard to get up. His body feels heavy, but more than that, he doesn't want anyone touching Clint, or wrapping him up in dark plastic. He's going to throw up. Or implode. The pressure he's been carrying in his chest feels more like a black hole, now. A vacuum threatening to collapse him into himself rather than something about to explode outward.
Bruce doesn't respond. He does catch Tony's arm like he's afraid Tony will fall back onto his ass, and gives it a heave. Hauling him the rest of the way to his feet. Not really giving him a choice about it, unless he's willing to make a scene over Clint's body, and he's probably done that enough times already.
"Come on, Tony." It's muted and far. He can hear Natasha and Steve talking, sounding just as muffled. Thor. Some distant fucking train.
"Oh hell," he says, and laughs. It hurts.
Bruce gives him a tug, trying to hustle him towards the others. Tony digs his heels in. "I know where Clint is. Was."
Bruce tugs again, then stops.
"Not specifically, I mean," Tony says, "But I have a really good guess where I fucked up."
"Tony--"
Bruce still has his arm, so Tony steps into him. Using the contact to bounce Bruce back into motion. Reversing their roles, and steering Bruce towards Steve and Natasha and the transport. Using him as a screen while he wipes his face. "Think about energy, Bruce. You have a week to think really hard about energy. Do you remember me saying something about that? And while you get busy, I need to give a certain director a certain headstart."