Who's the sharpest shooter in Town? Annie Oakley!
4 months and 6 days after The Raft; 4 months and 3 days after Tony was missing and then found; 2 days after The Press Conference.
It came as a shock who was first and how quickly it was. All that negotiating Tony did with T’Challa and Queen Ramonda was for naught when the others quickly fled for no reason. Tony had a laugh when T'challa said it was because they didn’t like his house rules. Only Scott stayed and not for long, Tony got him out of there quickly before the real call for blood started. He learned that the group had split. Natasha had left after the airport; he’d been following her since and he wished he could help (he wished he knew he wouldn’t be rejected if he offered). Clint had gone looking for contacts, lagging a day or two after the main group. Tony knew he was looking for one specific contact, Former Agent Laura Barton and not-so-dead Agent Phil Coulson. Of course, Sam, Steve, and Wanda had stayed together.
He didn’t ask about Sgt. James Buchanan Barnes.
He told Phil that he wouldn’t simply harbor Clint and he told Laura that her husband was stupid. She agreed, of course, but asked for one week of unpaid vacation anyways. (Tony gave her three.) And Tony didn’t even check surveillance for her while she was gone. She came back in less than two weeks, angry and sad, and they cried together. He got her in touch with a divorce lawyer and asked her to consider a trial separation first with a watery smirk. She punched him and laughed.
Clint helped Natasha for a bit, both of them keeping away from the sister. It seemed they didn’t want to draw attention, luckily Clint and Natasha were the more unrecognizable/redeemable ones. They went to work establishing their connections, building back the network they had lost when Natasha burned shield to the ground and all of its good agents. They had a lot of bruised limbs and bruised egos but with Coulson vouching for them, it was easier than he liked for them to rebuild bridges. (He still thinks of the ones he couldn't save.)
Still, after the press conference, after Pepper's quiet disappointment and Rhodey’s tight smile, he had resigned himself to having his generosity spit back in his face. He was sure that they were laughing at him somewhere. It came as a surprise when Clint stumbled into an alley near the tower, looking directly at the camera, his own shades missing from his face.
Tony didn’t think “watch your back with this guy” Clint would be the first. If anything, he thought Steve would send Sam or Nat first, have them probe around Tony’s open wounds; see just how angry he was (He wasn’t angry. He was sad, and wasn't that just the worst).
Tony wasn’t stupid, he decided to watch first. He dressed himself in sweats and pulled a cap over his wild sweaty oily hair, pushed on his largest pair of sunglasses that definitely were Peppers, and sat in the coffee shop across the alley. Clint was there, leaning against the wall, head tilted back. His strawberry blonde hair was long and dirty. He wore faded black clothes, hanging off his lean frame. He had lost weight, his normally soft square jaw now gaunt. He looked like he did after the invasion when Tony’s own misery found company in Clint’s sleep deprivation.
Tony knew Clint in those times, both of them more human than the others, both of them compensating for shitty fathers and shitty cards. Tony had been Clint’s troubled rich kid friend with obvious daddy issues and a pathetic need for validation in whatever Breakfast Club- Sixteen Candles-esque shit show their lives were. That Clint liked Tony’s jokes, and made even stupider ones about farts and dying. That Clint appreciated Tony, didn’t ask for more, and wasn’t wasteful. That Clint stayed with Tony after dreams (memories) of wormholes and unending space armies threatened his sanity.
And this very tired and very sad Clint that leaned against disgusting brick walls and didn’t wear shades, was more familiar to Tony than the healthy attack dog he saw in the Raft and the distant but polite husband he met after Sokovia— after Wanda. And wasn’t that terrible?
Clint looked up at the camera and smiled, and it was so…wry that Tomy did the stupid thing and stood up too quickly. Then Clint’s eyes were on him, big blues that looked so goddamn Annie hopeful that Tony felt like he was Daddy Warbucks unable to say no to this precocious little bastard. What a dick, Tony scoffed to himself. Then he sat back down, looked away, looked back at Annie, exhaled, and called for the waiter. In two hops, two steaming cups of gods gift to earth were placed in front of him. He didn’t look back at the damn alley for the damn stray, but he knew he would come.
The bell rang, a violent tinkle interrupting his waning peace. He closed his eyes at that tinkle, thankful he had those stupidly large sunglasses hiding his face. Boots shuffled over and the table creaked. Tony opened his eyes and there was goddamn Annie. It was something like putting warm milk in a bowl for the stray cat, this impromptu coffee date of theirs. Tony hadn’t planned on actually meeting him. He was going to get confirmation and have Viz pick him up. Then he was going to eat his body weight in pizza with a teenager who had a void for a stomach and try not to think about getting wasted.
But then the poor stray cat, poor orphan Annie, and those hopeful big blues and that wry smile, Tony couldn’t help but play his role. If there was a director directing the greek tragedy that was his life, he would say that Tony was born to play a Daddy Warbucks-esque character or the kind but often rebuked prince guy. Because those guys were soft and easily taken advantage of. Not that Annie took advantage of Warbucks but Tony would bet his right arm that she said at one point “you’re not my real dad”. Except in his play, Clint was saying “You’re not my real friend! You’re just some guy I used to work with.”
And that made Tony even more pathetic. Like the 40-year-old manager of somewhere asking all the young kids how their week was and they all rolled their eyes and thought he was weird.
Clint had taken on a weird twisted face the longer Tony stared at him, thinking of all the ways he was the old creepy manager.
“I used to know what you’re thinking,” Clint said quietly. Tony blinked up. “And I think I might, but I don’t want to be wrong again. I don’t want to assume.”
“Assume away.” Tony’s voice was an embarrassing croak and he coughed. “What am I thinking Barton?”
Clint winces at the surname but doesn’t say anything. “that you’re daddy Warbucks.”
“Warbucks was in the wrong.”
“That’s why you’re not him.”
“no?”
Clint lifts up his hands. 'No,' he signs. "I shouldn't have said that shit at the raft."
Tony watched his hands with a twisted-up mouth. He can feel it twisted, shaping letters and words that don’t come out. All of them jumbled. He’s trying to smile, trying not to frown, and it’s just twisting up his mouth. They used to do this, when Clint got tired of the noise, he used to sign and Tony would sign or slow down his mouth so the archer could read him. And only Nat and Rhodey could also sign, but Clint was never Tony’s Clint around them so when he did sign with Tony, when he did express with his hands, it was special.
And Tony, like any girl at the ball, just wanted to feel special to someone.
"Don't talk about Rhodey to me," Tony warns.
Clint nods. "I- You're not the bad guy."
“I don’t think many people agree with you.” It’s a test. Tony knows as he says it that it’s a test. Clint knows it’s a test. The goddamn waiter that was hovering awkwardly a booth away knows it’s a test.
Clint does that thing with his mouth and Tony hates the instinct to copy him. 'No more bullshitting,' he signs, “Tones,” he says.
“Ack, you’re breaking my heart, Annie.”
And Clint’s smile is blinding.
And again Tony does the stupid thing, the I’m-gonna-push-you-away-before-you-get-the-chance-so-i-can-be-right thing. “I for sure thought you blamed me for the divorce.”
And Clint’s smile falls, the corners pulling in a tight flat line that has Tony’s heart skipping a beat. “Divorce?”
“You didn’t get Laura’s letter?”
And then Clint takes a sip of his coffee and Tony thinks, why the fuck are you drinking coffee at a moment like this. Then he thinks about the umpteenth times Pepper called it quits and how all he wanted was a drink and maybe that’s what this is. But then Clint lowers his mug and a smile slowly appears out from under the white ceramic.
''fuck you,' Tony signs, and Clint snickers, his hands moving fast and familiarly.
'I thought about keeping it goings, asking about the kids— '
'you don’t have kids,' tony signs back
'—how they were going to feel that their favorite uncle tony split their parents apart— '
'You Don’t Have Kids.'
'—that sure the youngest, a newborn, would grow up with this life as normal but the oldest two—'
'You Don’t Have Kids. Move on.'
'—would be living this new normal with the memories of when their parents were together and loved each other and their dad was a real hero—'
“You can still be a real hero.” The words are out before he realizes them, they're loud and slap the warm air. Nonetheless, he means them.
Clint drops his smile but not into a tight line, instead, it’s a long curve that arches down. It looks wrong, anything but a smile or a laugh (or comical frown) looks wrong on Clint’s face. He rubs at his jaw and it’s such a Steve thing to do, always scratching at the mostly permanent 1 o’clock shadow (the serum didn’t just make him buff and strong). 'I don’t know Tony.'
“I do know,” Tony says, “I’m writing the goddamn laws and there’s still a chance since you didn’t even sign the Accords.”
'And Nat?'
Tony tucks his tongue in his cheek and makes another stupid move. God Stupid should just be his new middle name. He removes his glasses. And then He says, “If that door closes,” and Clint is watching him intently, “it won’t be my hand that’s last on the knob.”
'knob,' Clint says, then gestures something lewd with a smirk.
Tony rolls his eyes. “Moving on…" a beat. Then, "I am serious. If you want, if being part of the initiative is what you want, then I can make that happen.”
'As leader of the Avengers?'
“Interim.”
Clint drops his hands to wrap around his mug Tony sincerely doubts was still warm because Tony’s own was already too cool. “I don’t know,” Clint says softly. “I had plans before all this. And I don’t know if throwing myself into danger every single time on a huge battlefield is for me— if it ever was.”
And Tony decided it was time for a break and beckons the waiter, who for sure recognizes him without glasses but doesn’t say anything, closer. She gets them new coffee, “Fresh from the pot,” she says brightly, and they take turns prepping the coffee. Tony takes moment to ask for steamed milk “if possible” he makes sure to add, smiling sweetly. She bounces away and back before it can get too awkward in the silence Tony had created. He makes his coffee with more dairy and a lot less sugar than before, and Clint makes his with more sugar and less dairy.
“Lactose intolerant,” Clint mumbles around a stirring straw.
“bad liver,” Tony offers in return. Then it’s quiet again as they taste and adjust and then taste and adjust their coffee some more.
“The way that Rhodey, Maria, and I are reworking The avengers is sure to be something you’re interested in.” Clint sips his coffee and doesn’t tell him to stop so Tony takes it as a sign to continue. “We’ll have ranks and divisions based on what skills you have. We don’t deal in espionage, not like SHIELD. Data recovery and reconnaissance, sure, but no political stuff. Each team will be tailored to what the objective requires, each team will have a squad leader that will report directly to a permanent leader for every mission.”
“Kinda militaristic.” Clint sips his coffee and maybe he expects Tony to scoff but Tony is quiet. “And the Accords? The “Red Tape”? the possible repercussions of being beholden.” Tony narrows his eyes and clint lifts up his hands quickly to sign. 'I’m not saying I think it’s there, I haven’t even read the damn things—(and wow Laura was gonna kill him and Tony was gonna let her)—but was there any merit to what Steve was saying?'
and Tony knew what he was really asking, was there any chance that I didn’t just ruin my life for a whim?
And Tony decided to be honest, the way he should’ve completely with Steve and Wanda. “The first drafts have been in the works since before 2015 and from my research, they were admittedly very sketchy. Of course, Fury and his goons had that squashed but after Ultron,” Tony winced, “After the way we handled it, no discussion about the steps we plan to take to prevent it, what we can do if it’s unpreventable, about Wanda, about Bruce, the evacuation, all of it was just a mess. The world needed answers. They wanted accountability and someone to step up. They wanted someone who would say they have a plan and not be some cowboys. They had SHIELD to be cowboys, to do the quick and dirty work but we were supposed to be the Heroes. Above board, clean, transparent entities for justice.”
“And I just fucked off and left you to deal with it.”
“Yeah well, after Pietro— I get it.”
“I had told laura we were gonna retire, do it for real, that I wouldn’t raise a kid with an absent dad. But the second Cap called for a fight, I didn’t even hesitate.”
“You quit cold turkey because you were guilty and everything was changing. I was stepping back, Bruce was gone, and Thor left. Wanda was just a reminder of a failure that wasn’t even yours.”
Clint grunted, nodding. 'Wasn’t yours either.'
“Debatable.”
“He signed up to be an experiment for Hydra to get revenge. He never had a chance.” Clint looked away. “I don’t even know if she does.”
Tony rubbed his mouth. “Heard you were at that renovation."
'What was she thinking? And Vision, I’m sorry that happened. I’m sorry I was part of that.'
“Yeah well, you didn’t push him through several floors of concrete. You didn't help but it wasn't your hands that did that. Good thing the kid can’t feel physical pain.”
'Now you’re breaking my heart,' Clint signed. Then, 'I heard they talked.'
Tony wasn’t surprised. “Yeah? I’m not exactly surveilling him, what kind of disconcertingly clueless nickelodeon parent would I be if I knew every step my kid took.”
'Just once. Then she left and he stayed.'
'ouch,' Tony mimed.
'Yeah,' Clint nodded. 'Make sure to swaddle the kid and listen to T-Swizzle when he gets back.'
“My baby’s first heartbreak,” Tony sighs, putting his hands to his chest. Then he signs, 'but I’m sure she’s okay.'
Clint winces. “She’s not.” Then he looks down, tucking his hands underneath his arms. “Tony, we were- I was so mad for a while. I don’t even know why. I guess part of me was hurt you didn’t call—
“you were retired!”
“—and another part of me felt like it was all changing and I was out. And the only person who was keeping me in was Cap. And then I hear that you’re working with Ross and making all these laws that will limit us! And then Wanda! she’s calling me, calling me Clint with a voice like I imagine to be her brother's, and all I can hear him saying is, you still can’t see what’s coming can’t you? and I’m obsolete. I got my ass handed to me by a kid— again!”
Tony sinks into his cup, letting the rim catch around his mouth to set into his skin. He inhaled, suctioning the cup, and tries to lift it up but it doesn’t budge and he can’t breathe. His father always hated when he fidgeted. And Tony learned to fidget with words. But he can’t do that here, because he might say the wrong thing and he can’t lose Clint twice.
He lets go of the cup with a gusty exhale. “Jesus— Clint. I-“ and there are words that can make this better but they don’t feel like Tony’s. “You were retired man. And I know what that means cause every time I had that conversation with Pep or Rhodey, it meant something important to quit. And the Accords. Yeah, they needed work, a lot of people like Ross— who actually had no jurisdiction in these proceedings and was just being an unwanted ass— wanted to use them to control us. But Ross is out, he has no legal jurisdiction in this, he’s the secretary General, not the U.N. Ambassador. We have the power to fight his proposals and not obey them. They were asking us for a show of faith, to show them that we understand what they want. And I do. Clint, do you know how many people are 'just collateral damage'-“
“—yeah I heard about that from Nat. Not his best moment.”
“No,” Tony said quietly. “Not his finest. I just think some of us see these kids, these people, all of them victims, as props to our stories. So many people that could’ve been saved if we get questioned for our actions so we can be better. We don’t have evacuation plans, or contingencies for every single major city. We don’t have relationships with any ambassadors or leaders, we don’t have containment plans. Johannesburg should’ve never happened. Veronica, was not prepared in the slightest. Lagos, no training on containment or evacuation for single buildings. Sokovia, no cooperation with government or agencies for aid, transport, or rebuilding. The Maria Stark Foundation isn’t even associated with The Avengers technically and we just left and never went back. Washington, how many burned agents bested your ass when you went continental? Why wasn’t I called, why wasn’t Maria involved more? Seoul. Budapest. Leipzig. Bucharest. We have our grand battle, live to tell the tale, and then move on. Like everything else was just…collateral. Like it had to happen. You always lose people in war.” Tony heaved air in, the memory of metal slamming against metal, pressure, god awful pressure snapping his ribs and artificial sternum. The sound of Clanging and fractures surrounded him. “Except we’re the only ones in the war Steve! No one else but us and everyone suffers. After the villains are gone and the buildings destroyed, were the only ones last seen at the scene, and then we just flee!”
Clint opens his hands next to tony’s taut ones, looking at him gently. “Tony,” He says but Tony isn’t here with him. He’s in the bunker, alone, cold, and dying. He’s thinking about the little boy that was killed in Johannesburg. And he’s thinking about Pepper, Rhodey, and Happy. He’s thinking about Harley and the chatty kid Peter. And he’s alone while the Hero flees the scene.
“Tony-“ Clint says again. And Tony lets his voice pull him back. He slides just the tips of his fingers to meet Clint’s and Clint runs with it, moving his fingers to overlap. “Tony, I’m sorry. I’m sorry I didn’t trust you.”
“Cap called,” Tony says tiredly, “I get it.”
“Yeah.” Then Clint moves his hands off Tony's. Before, Clint would’ve gotten up, and shoved Tony aside so he could cuddle up to him obnoxiously. But there was distance between them now, made of the raft and retirements, of acidic words that had eaten at Tony’s heart.
'But I was still an Idiot,' Clint adds, 'What does he know about politics and all that?'
“I think that’s his point Clint, that what we do should’ve never gotten to that point.”
'The world isn’t just two ways, black and white.'
“No, but I didn’t do a good job of explaining. I was exhausted and angry that I seemed to be the only one who cared, that had read them.”
'He hasn’t even read them?!'
“That was the point of the meeting. No one had read them except for me and Nat, maybe Rhodey, and Ross took advantage of that as a way to intimidate us. And it worked.”
“Jesus Christ!” Clint exhaled roughly.
Tony nodded. Then he looked away. “Read them, tell me what needs work, what has to stay. Even if you don’t sign. I want your input.”
“This is the end then. You gonna pull a Johnny Utah, after all this time?”
Tony leaned back smugly. “You’re gonna turn yourself in point break. And then you’re going to get the plea deal I’ve been setting up for ages. I’m gonna get you a lawyer-“
“I don’t want your fancy lawyers or your mo-“
“Don’t worry, this guy is gonna seek you out, nose of a bloodhound and ears of a bat on that one. He just needs a nudge in the right direction.”
Clint cocks his head, his own wild grin growing. 'And then? What’s next?'
“That’s up to you.”
'And us, do we ever get a next part?'
Tony smiles, and it’s small but real. There are no shades obscuring his eyes or mask on his face. There’s no personality he’s faking or character he’s portraying. And he hopes Clint can see it. “I don’t know how to close the door on people, Annie.”
Clint closes his eyes briefly. “That’s not good Tony.” And Tony’s watching his hands and hearing his words at the same time, he thinks it might be a tactic to reinforce an idea. Probably doesn’t work on Laura or Nat but Tony’s a sucker and it works on him.
He just shrugs in response, throat tight.
“I’m gonna do my best to earned that Tony,”
Tony shrugs again.
“So what, just mosy down over to that payphone, call the U.N. and that’s that?”
Tony pushes himself up, huffing slightly. He throws down a hundred, takes one last gulp of his still-warm coffee, waves cheerfully at the waitress, and walks by the door. Clint is still watching him with a dubious expression. “I think you should try this payphone by Hell’s kitchen, great service.”
Clint jogs over, waving his own awkward goodbye to the waitress. “Hells kitchen?”
“Yeah, and you’re not gonna call the U.N. You’re gonna call Ross.”
“Thaddeus?”
“Everett. And then Laura.”
“She’s here?”
Tony opens the door, the loud tinkle interrupting his answer. It doesn’t sound as violent or foreboding as before. And hes a little bit less lonely than before (The void is momentarily silent and the relief almost makes Tony cry; he’s not hearing clanging metal or the crunch of bones— his nor his mothers).
“nope, gonna have to settle for me, Annie-“
“Enough with the daddy Warbucks bit.”
“-oakley.” Tony finished. “Rude.” He takes a moment to breathe in the damp, sour, heavy air, smiling as he slaps on his glasses. “What are you gonna do after you read?”
Tony knows that Clint already knows what he’s gonna do but it’s nice to be asked.
“Stop fishing, gimpy. You know that I’m going back.”
“Oh goody.”
“Someone’s gotta be there to laugh at your jokes. If not me, then who else.”
“I’m funny.”
“Yeah,” Clint nudges him with his shoulder, grinning when Tony judges back. They are grown men having a nudge fight in a walkway while crowds bustle beside them. And there’s a lot they still have to talk about. There’s a lot they still have to hash out. Fighting a battle because your feelings were hurt is stupid. Running around the world because you don’t like the luxurious house arrest situation you got yourself into, is stupid. Being angry and mean over something you don’t even understand is the epitome of stupidity. But for now, Tony thinks that the assurance that they will have that conversation is enough. “I think I want to do training, combat especially. I know you’re good for it, but what if the suit, serum, magic, isn’t enough or fails? I think I’m gonna move back. Maybe learn how to do skateboard tricks and how to fix a tractor. Be a part of it but not too much.”
“and laura?”
Clint grins at him, the sun catching in his strawberry-blonde hair. He’s a lot less mangy dog and more golden retriever under the sun. It's probably his smile, because anything else doesn’t belong on his face, and it’s probably the caffeine, but Tony wants to believe it’s the sun. “Well it’s like I said, divorce is really hard on kids, I don’t think I could put them through that.”
A startled laugh spills from Tony’s mouth and Clint is smug. He’s full-on Chesire-ing it, hands lifted to show 1-0.
And Tony hates it. So he smooths out his face in a blink, looking bored and smug at the same time. “Overused, you’ve wrung it out, it’s dry, move on from the bit James Corden.”
"Hey! I like James Corden."
Tony cackles. "That explains alot!" And they are back to nudging each other. It feels like springtime in Newyork. The void is smaller. The noise is quieter. It's nice.