Chapter 7
Clint sits with Steve for a long afternoon. They reminisce, and then Clint diplomatically sets a thick file on the table. Steve can see Nat’s doodles and slanted scrawl, and his throat chokes up.
“This is what they were working on. Bucky brought Nat in, and Sam was the last to get in on it. Steve… if they were on to something, and they were… it’s massive.”
“Why didn’t they bring me in?” Steve asks softly, hesitating to reach for the file.
Clint sighs. “I wasn’t in on it either. Most of it is indecipherable to me, but from what I’ve put together, it’s an organization that’s been around since the end of World War Two. Some kind of fighting ring. The ultra-dirty, ultra-elite frequent it. And SHEILD won’t touch it with a ten foot pole.”
“Too messy?” Steve asks skeptically.
“I don’t know,” Clint admits. He leans back in his chair and stares out at the sky. The file sitting between them is like something sacred, something that it would be unbearable to touch. The moment they open it will be an admission. They wouldn't be closing up their friends' old files if they thought that the friends were going to return. Clint clears his throat, not quite looking at Steve. “How’s Tony doing?” It's a deflection, a delay tactic for the inevitable.
Steve wants to delay just as much as Clint. “He’s coping as well as he can with the fact that he lost almost two months. I’m just glad to have him back.”
“I’m thinking," Clint says, his voice strained with something made real by its vocalization. "This’ll be my last case.” He rests a few fingers on the file, right over where Nat had doodled a forest with a fox. “I can’t… put anyone through what I’m going through.”
Steve glances back through the window, to where Tony is typing furiously on his laptop, the circles under his eyes rivaled only by the ones under Steve’s. He imagines if Tony were to disappear, if he were left truly alone, and he can't imagine putting someone through the pain.
“Fury, he gave me this,” Clint says, holding a tattered note out to Steve. The paper is well read, obviously having been carried in many pockets for a while. It’s in Nat’s slanted, almost too handwriting, and Steve looks down, eyes flying across the words almost too fast for him to absorb them
It’s idiotic to do this, but here we go. If you’re reading this I’m dead. Of course, you probably don’t have that much closure. In this line of work, you’re lucky to know for sure. In any case, I won’t be seeing you again. Hopefully we didn’t fight. Hopefully you didn’t go out with me. There are a lot of things to be hopeful for. But I guess I just want to say this. Hold on to what you’ve got. I’m with you, you don’t have to worry about losing me. So hold on to the people you’ve still got. I chose this way of life. I knew there was one way out, and I knew it wouldn’t be pretty.
Love ya,
Nat
Steve’s crying by the end of it, Clint reaching across to place a hand on his shoulder. “Dammit Nat,” he whispers. “Thank you, Clint.”
He returns the letter and stares out at the steadily setting sun. “One last time?” Clint asks, raising his fist.
Steve taps it with his own and they stay there for a moment. “Suddenly the Avengers Taskforce doesn’t seem like such a gimmicky name.”
“Avenge,” Clint grins. “I like it.”
They open the folder, poring over handwritten notes and coffee stains on important documents. There’s the worried, blackened corners of papers where Bucky had fidgeted with them, working the mechanical grease from his arm into the paper. Nat’s doodles, and Sam’s many drone reconnaissance photos. Each piece of their friends is a fresh wound, but it takes the place of a deeper one. When the sun is thoroughly set, Steve sits back, surveying the papers, arranged a bit haphazardly. “This is big,” he breathes.