Running Through The Halls

When the door closed behind them, Darcy thrust the paper in his hands. “This asshole wrote a story about raping a girl!”

            “What?” Clint skimmed the first page.

            “No!” Darcy snatched it away. “Don’t read it. He says her name in there. That poor girl doesn’t need anybody else reading about that.”

            Clint tried to calm her down. “Darcy, you need to relax. We’ll take care of it. Is it a student at our school?” Darcy nodded and Clint pulled out his cell phone. “I’m calling Fury. What’s her name?”

            Darcy’s eyes narrowed. “No chance in hell. Hand over the phone and I’ll tell Fury about it.”

            “Darcy,” Clint spoke sharply. “I’m his teacher, I’m responsible for fixing this. What is her name?”

            On the other end of the line, Fury picked up. “Barton? What happened?”

            “We’ve got a problem,” Clint told him. “We were going through the first senior essays of the year and Darcy stumbled upon something you need to see.”

            He could hear Fury moving around. “I’m on my way. You’re at O’Reilly’s?”

            “Yeah. We’re probably going to need the cops, too,” Clint informed him.

            Fury sighed. “I need details, Barton. Is this a situation involving a teacher or a student?”

            “Student. There was a paper detailing a nonconsensual encounter between Daniel Hall and…” Clint looked at Darcy expectantly.

            Darcy looked defeated. “Becca Barnes.”

            “Holy shit. Seriously?” Clint gaped.

            “What?” Fury demanded.

            “Uh,” Clint stammered. “I…apparently the girl was Becca.”

            There was silence on the other end.

            “Nick?” Clint called quietly into the phone.

            “I want every employee of the school that is at that bar to meet me in my office in ten minutes,” he ordered.

            Clint hung up and looked at Darcy. “We’ll fix this, Darcy. Come on. We need to get to the high school.”

            Darcy led the way into the bar, grabbing drinks away from people on her way to her purse. Tony fumbled to regain hold of his drink and shouted when she took it.

            “Shut it. Grab your shit and let’s go. Now,” she commanded.

            Tony and Steve glanced at each other.

            “Darcy, what’s-” Natasha began.

            “No time,” Clint interrupted. “We need to get to the school to meet Fury. You’ll get an explanation there. No smartass comments, no stupid guessing. Just shut up and move.”

            They were at the high school in seven minutes flat.

            Fury met them at the front door, his face impassive. He locked the door behind them and led the way to his office. He paused at his door and glanced at the small crowd of teachers.

            “We need some place bigger,” Fury mused out loud.

            “We can use my room. I’ll be able to pull up the files we’ll need there,” Clint suggested.

            Fury gave a single nod and Clint took the lead, pulling out his keys. A few minutes later, they were set up. Clint had turned on the computer and everyone else had dragged a desk into a circle. Clint pulled the paper out of his back pocket and dropped it on Darcy’s desk.

            “Before we start, I need the papers everyone else read. I need to know if there was anything illegal in the papers. Even a mention of it,” Clint stressed.

            They all shook their heads and handed in the papers.

            Clint motioned to Darcy. “The paper Darcy and I read is an account of the kid raping a female student.”

            “Oh my god,” Tony murmured.

            Peter looked shocked. Bruce looked disgusted.

            Fury cleared his throat. “I’ve called the police. There’s an officer on his way here. Before he gets here to take the paper as evidence and to get statements, I thought you should be told first hand. Some of you have one or both of the students in your classes, and you will at the least, have to face the victim come Monday. There will be a full investigation, charges will be pressed, and I expect Clint and Darcy to testify if need be.”

            Both of them nodded in agreement and Fury continued. “The boy who wrote the paper was a senior named Daniel Hall. I know Banner, Odinson, Barton, and Rogers have him. The victim he wrote about has classes with Stark and Parker, Rogers, Romanoff, Barton, and Laufeyson. Because of that reason, it could be that some of the rest of you are called in to testify about the character of both parties. You should prepare yourself should you be called on to do so.”

            A low murmur of assent rippled through the room.

            “Fury, who was the girl?” Loki spoke quietly, his voice like ice.

            Fury glanced away. “I don’t know if I should say. You’ll all find out at some point, but I don’t think I want to be the one to tell you.”

            “Barnes,” Darcy said, her voice small and distant.

            It was like the world frozen for a long moment. Shock, anger, disappointment, sympathy, and fear flashed through their faces in the blink of an eye. The silence was interrupted by the arrival of the officer. The silence continued as he read the paper, bagged it as evidence, and explained what they were going to do. He took statements from Darcy, Clint, and Fury and took down everyone’s contact information.

            “I understand that this may be difficult, but should you see either of the parties involved, you should not confront them about the encounter,” the man instructed them. “I have to file a report with my sergeant before I can make an arrest, but we should have him in custody by tomorrow afternoon-”

            “Tomorrow afternoon?” Darcy burst out. “You’re going to let that guy run free for twenty four hours because of a chain of command that’s established solely to remind everyone who has the bigger dick? You have to be fucking kidding me!”
            “Darcy!” Natasha called out as the girl stormed out of the room.

            The officer glanced around. “Was she close to the victim?”

            “We all were,” Tony answered quietly.

            The officer nodded. “I promise we’ll get to the bottom of this. Give me a call if you have any questions, or you think of something pertinent to the case.”

            The man excused himself and left them to their thoughts. A few silent moments passed before Peter pushed himself to his feet.

            “I’m going to look for Darcy,” he said.

            Natasha stood with him. “Check the library, cafeteria, and science wings. I’ll take the social studies and language wings.”

            “I’ll check the gym and the front offices,” Steve said.

            Thor made for the door with Loki not far behind him. “We shall scour the parking lot.”

            “I’ve got the football and soccer fields,” Clint claimed. “Everybody else just wander the halls. Call when you find her.”

            They split their separate ways and Clint headed for the back exit of the school that let out not far from the sports fields. It was pretty dark back there, but the lights in the parking lot cast enough light to illuminate the path well enough to walk. He passed the empty tennis courts and cut through the soccer field. He rounded the corner of the bleachers for the football field and heard a sniffle. He stood still for a moment, trying to spot Darcy. He found her finally, huddled on the bleachers, her chin on her knees.

            He pulled out his phone and dialed Natasha. “I’ve got her. You guys head home.”

            “How about we all meet for breakfast tomorrow morning?” Natasha suggested.

            “Sounds like a plan. I’ll fill her in,” Clint assured her before hanging up.

            Clint joined Darcy on the bleachers silently. He sat next to her, his shoulder touching hers. He could feel her body shaking with sobs. He longed to pull her into his arms and murmur reassurances in her ear, but he knew not to. She’d pull away and wouldn’t help either of them. He settled for resting a hand on her shoulder and she surprised him by dropping her head against his upper arm.

            “It’s okay, Darcy,” he whispered. “It’ll be okay. Becca will be fine.”

            Darcy swiped at her tears. “Y-you didn’t read the whole thing, Clint. He…oh my god. How can we not go check on her? After knowing what happened to her? How can we not run over there and smother her with love until she wants to punch us? I can’t…I can’t just leave her like that.”

            “Fury will check in on her. He knows her. He’ll make sure she’s okay without giving it away,” Clint soothed her.

            Darcy bit her lip. “And what about that boy? He just gets to go on his way like nothing happened?”

            “The police will pick him up. He’ll get what he deserves,” Clint told her.

            Darcy pulled away, creating a gap. “That isn’t good enough.”
            “It doesn’t do you any good to be angry about it, Darcy. You need to keep a clear head-” Clint reached out a hand.

            “No! Don’t touch me! Right now, I need to be angry. Because if I’m not angry…” Darcy’s voice trailed off. “Forget it. I’m going home. I’ll see you Monday.”

            Darcy was up and running across the field before he could stop her. He made a mental note to ask Peter to call her about breakfast. Clint stood up and made his way to his car, thinking about Darcy. This hadn’t been easy for any of them, but Darcy…It was like it was happening to her. There was something else going on, and Clint wanted to know what it was. For now, he resigned himself to going home, drinking another beer, and getting some sleep.