Chapter 6
Jason blinked at the ceiling a couple of times and frowned. He was back in the safehouse. He hadn’t done anything! He didn’t kill anyone! He didn’t think he’d been killed! Though there was a distant corner of his mind that worried that his bike might’ve totaled that minivan if he wasn’t there to steer it. Did it even count if time reset? Was this still technically the same day or was there now a variant of the multiverse where Jason… disappeared? Died? On that exit? He allowed himself one horrible moment of thinking about what that’d do to Alfred and then got out of bed. There was nothing he could do about it now.
Jason paused in front of the bathroom door and rocked his head back and forth as he tried to decide. Fuck it. Self-care was important and so was Never Thinking About That Again. He’d go find out what those two had done after he’d gotten his day off to the right start. He wouldn’t want to approach them while being a hypocrite, after all.
The hotel they were staying at wasn’t that hard to find, now that he knew what he was looking for. The research yesterday had been thorough enough that Jason had been pretty sure where they’d been staying and just a little bit of investigating had led him to their room number. When he knocked, Barnes opened the door looking awake, but not exactly delighted, reminding Jason that he was probably here a little earlier than they would’ve liked. Barnes could blame the fucking magic. Jason smiled broadly at him and took the unspoken invitation of Barnes opening the door wider to step into the room.
As soon as the door closed, Barnes had a gun pointed at him, but Jason decided to ignore it to stare at the lump on the bed that he was pretty sure was supposed to be Barton. He couldn’t quite figure out where Barton’s head was, but he must’ve been able to see Jason with his set-up because there was a definite “No. No coffee yet. Come back to kill us later. After coffee.”
Jason snorted and leaned back against the wall, trying to portray, well. Not innocence. But at least to be not-threatening. “I’m not here to kill you! I just. Didn’t. Know who I was killing the first couple of times. And Short, Grumpy, and Armed over here got me back for it! And last time I didn’t do anything at all! Did you two get sick of each other or something?!”
Barton snorted and pushed his head free of the blanket to look over Barnes appreciatively. “Armed,” he repeated with a type of glee that made Jason open and close his mouth a few times before looking over at Barnes uncomfortably.
“I didn’t. I mean. Gun?”
“I know. Clint just can’t help himself,” Barnes said sympathetically before crossing to sit in front of the blanket lump and setting the gun on the bedstand. “And speaking of can’t help himself… We were just talking about yesterday. Maybe you want to clarify things for Jason, Clint?” He looked up at Jason, his eyes bright with amusement even as he kept his mouth relatively flat.
Jason allowed himself a moment’s satisfaction that they’d looked into him, too, at least enough to know his name. They knew his name and had flirted with him. If he’d wanted a sign that maybe this could end up going nicely for him after all…
Clint squirmed a little, looking for all the world like he was considering pulling the blanket back over his head. He muttered something, his shoulders hunching as he turned to look at the black TV screen.
“Sorry, Clint, I didn’t catch that and I don’t think Jason did either. Maybe you could say it a little louder,” Barnes said with the quiet glee of someone who knew exactly what had been said, but intended to rely on plausible deniability to drag a situation out.
“I SAID… There was a dog. She ran in the street and I thought she was going to get hit by a car!”
“And then?”
“…Coffee?”
“After you tell us what happened next. And then?”
“And then I got hit by a car. Coffee?”
Jason startled himself laughing and watched as Clint blinked at him blearily. After a moment, Barnes started laughing as well. It’d be rude to say an Avenger was pouting, but, well. If the shoe fits, then that’s definitely what Clint was doing. “You got us reset by getting hit by a car trying to keep a dog from getting hit by a car?”
“Not trying! I did! I did keep her from getting hit by a car!” Clint argued as he struggled to be upright without unwrapping himself from the blanket. Barnes- was it weird to still be thinking of him as Barnes if he was thinking of the other one as Clint?- waited until Clint was relatively stable and then held out a paper cup. Clint made an eager sound and half-lunged for it. “So it is happening to you, too. We thought so,” he told Jason before starting to drink the coffee. Jason caught himself frowning in concern as he watched the cup drain faster that was probably necessary. He glanced at Barnes, who shook his head with a half-smile before holding out another cup. Clint traded him for the empty and held the full one against his chest.
“Yeah. It’s been days. I thought it was because,” Jason paused here and glanced at Barnes again before frowning down at the ground, “I thought it was because I shot you? But then I was the one who got shot and it happened again. Eventually it made sense that I needed to catch that magician earlier in the day, and then the bomb. Yesterday I was trying to get out of town so we wouldn’t trip over each other, but that… didn’t really work out the way I hoped.”
Barnes was nodding a little and then tipped his head towards Clint, who was trying to become one with the coffee again. “We’ve been chasing him since New York, but the time resets is a new one for us, too. We’re pretty sure we narrowed it down to a few options yesterday, leaving us with two real options out? Find him and make him undo it, or figure out what he set as the release sequence. If it’s the three of us living out the loop, then whatever gets us out should also involve all three of us.”
“Well,” Jason drawled after a moment, “if we know the day is going to reset on us anyway… Maybe we’ve got time for you to see the sights, maybe grab a bite to eat? Avoid heavy traffic and gunfights?”
Clint grinned at him and leaned against Barnes a little before letting his expression settle into something closer to innocent. “Well, we’d love to, but we’re so new to the area… Do you think you might know anyone who could show us around?”
Barnes- no, it was probably time to call him Bucky, if this was happening- looped an arm around Clint and smiled up at Jason from the bed. “Maybe someone gorgeous who wouldn’t be too surprised if things got a little weird or heavy?” And damn, that voice was an invitation all its own.
Jason smiled back at them. “Oh, you know. I think I know just the guy.”
Jason groaned a little and stretched as he woke up before curling back towards the warmth nestled against his chest. A large calloused hand tugged one of his back around the torso in front of him and held his arm in place around them. “Too early. More sleep,” came a drowsy rumble. A different voice hummed agreeably with that plan. A new morning, a new day. Jason allowed himself a moment to consider all that needed doing and then also hummed before kissing the scarred shoulder in front of him and closing his eyes again. There would be time for that later.