It’s been a long couple of days. Nights, too.
Clint hasn’t slept for at least a week - he’s been able to get a minute here and there, but never more than absolutely necessary for his body. Whenever he catches himself dozing off, he wakes up again, because he can’t allow himself to rest. He just can’t. Not after-
He doesn’t want to think about it. He doesn’t want to think about the smell of ashes in his nose, the feeling of her hands falling apart, of her presence just disappearing as if she had never existed. He’s afraid that if he closes his eyes, he’ll wake up and have forgotten about her.
About them.
He struggles for a moment, pulling out the used and scratched picture of his family he keeps in his vest. He hates himself that it’s been folded so many times, because now there’s a line across Laura’s face and there’s one across Lila’s face, and the top of Cooper’s head too. He’s afraid he’ll forget how they looked if he- if he allows himself to stop, even if just for a second.
It had all happened so fast - they’d been watching the news, making breakfast, as everyone did, when the battle over Wakanda had broken out. With the time difference, what was broad daylight in Wakanda was still early morning and Clint had been busy beating the pancake dough.
There had been news, and even his SHIELD pager had made a sound. He’d heard it from the kitchen, because he knew that high pitched noise from anywhere - it was different from the mosquito repellents, and all the other loud sounds there were in his home. The loud screech of the television when the plug wasn’t entirely pushed in, the mosquito repellent device, the sound of electricity around the neon light in his office. No, his SHIELD pager vibrated at a loud frequency enough that he heard it.
But he ignored it. They got this, he had thought to himself, as he’d continued beating the dough, waiting for his kids to wake up, so they could go to school. He’d spent the morning folding clothes that had been thrown all over the floor, and he’d set a wash over, so he could hang the clothes out to airdry as soon as it was done.
Laura had come down, fresh and pretty from the shower and after applying make-up, followed by Cooper who was wearing a hideous Walmart Spider-Man themed hoodie, and Lila, in a pretty floral dress, with her two front teeth still missing, but a smile that could melt anyone’s heart.
Nathaniel had been sitting by Clint’s feet, on his plaid, laid out with his favorite toys, and playing as he listened to the sounds of the kitchen.
Picking up Nathaniel, Clint had picked his youngest up and sat him down in his high chair, before quickly applying a kiss to Lila’s forehead and one to Laura’s lipstick clad lips. She was going into town to meet with the bank about Nathaniel’s college fund, there had been a deposit and Clint suspected it was Stark meddling, but he didn’t want to go look for himself. He was never good with the big words and the small writing at the back of contracts, so Laura would be the one to go.
The news were muted, so Clint didn’t realize what was happening. He had been pulling Laura in for a hug, grabbing her from behind and putting his hands on her belly, as he kissed the crook of her neck and told her how pretty she looked and how good she smelled, was that his perfume? He’d asked with a smile nestled on his face, and she’d laughed and Clint had thought that it was the most beautiful morning he could wish for.
Right up until he’d looked down when she had tensed.
Right up until the scar on his chest had flared up, burning across his body, as if the mind stone itself was burning its way through his body yet again.
She’d said his name. Then Lila had too. And, before Clint knew it, they had gone. Blown apart, into tiny little particles, gone from where they stood. Cooper took a second to take it all in, looking paler than usual, asking his dad what was going on, before the spoon he’d been holding fell into the bowl of cereal too loud, dropped from where his hand had been moments before.
Clint looks up. He remembers it clearly. He’d looked around, at a loss for words, and before he knew it, he’d gone to check the pager. Something was wrong. Fury had activated the Marvel protocol, and that meant things were wrong. Oh so very wrong.
He’s stopped alongside a road, in the middle of nowhere Minnesota. He’s on his way to New York, to commandeer one of Stark’s jets. He has to get to Wakanda. He has to- he has to figure out what’s going on. Why his- why-
He looks over at Nathaniel who’s sleeping in the portable crib he’s secured him in and Clint sighs. At least his youngest is still here. At least he’s- at least none of it was a dream. He’d packed the car with a his bows, his guns, his swords and his knives, and all the toddler things he could think of. He’d found his stash of cash, American currencies, Euros, kroners, pounds and all of it. He had no idea what was going on, and in the early hours of the following morning, he’d set out.
The world had been chaos: whatever happened to Laura, Lila and Cooper had happened here too. People had disappeared, he found out, in the middle of their tasks: trains had crashed when the drivers had gone, planes had fallen from the skies when the pilots disappeared, ships had sunk, and everywhere around the country, people were in a survival frenzy. Employees around Nuclear Power Plants were trying to shut them down to keep them from going into a reaction, the military had found itself halved down with planes, ships and helicopters grounded because pilots had gone and staff and-
It was chaos. He’d had to fight off a mob when he’d reached the city, at Walmart, to get some food. Everyone was biting, hitting, and someone even brought a gun to the supermarket. Clint had wrestled the shooter out of it, and gotten smacked in the back of the head by one of the school teachers who had been out for as many cigarettes as she could.
Clint had made it back to the car bleeding and bruised, but he’d handed Nathaniel an apple juice box and had sat behind the wheel, contemplating the barrels of extra fuel he always kept under the backseats of the truck. He’d never thought his plan for world collapse would ever come into action.
He’s fallen asleep, and he knows he’s sleeping because the world is bluer, darker, grayer. He knows because ever since Loki, he can tell when he’s dreaming and when he’s awake because there’s a blue edge to everything.
He’s learned to control it over time, but now he isn’t entirely sure what it means. He can’t force himself to wake up. Maybe his body finally gave it, and he fell asleep in the car, next to Nathaniel.
He opens his eyes in the dream world and looks around - it looks familiar, but he it takes him a couple of minutes to recognize the place. It’s the old church, from Sokovia. Where the core of Ultron’s machine was. Where he’d fought off sentient robots, side by side with the Earth’s Mightiest Heroes. He frowns, and pushes himself up - there is no dust on his hand when he pushes away from the floor. He turns around when he hears footsteps and goes for a punch.
His fist only meets the empty air, as his eyes lock on the figure.
“You didn’t see that coming?”
“Pietro?” Clint exclaims, as he takes a deep breath, looking around. There is no sign of anyone else, and Clint closes his eyes. “Am I dead?”
“No, you are not,” Pietro Maximoff replies, in that accent of his Clint first had hated, and then come to love when he had gotten to know Wanda. Wanda? Clint looks around as Pietro bites his lips. He looks older, and his hair is silver in the moonlight that is travelling down from above.
“You are in my world,” the Sokovian boy replies and after a couple of minutes, Clint finds himself hugging Pietro. With his whole body. It is so nice to see him, even if this world- this dreamworld isn’t real. He hasn’t dreamt of Pietro in months. So he takes this as a nice sign of destiny.
“Why am I here?” Clint asks as he lets go of Pietro, and watches the young man. He looks so good. He looks alive and well. Clint feels a bit jealous, but he doesn’t let it show.
Pietro sighs, before pursing his lips. “What happened in the real world?” he asks, and Clint frowns. “I cannot see- I cannot see beyond the horizon, and- and-” He pauses again, and takes a deep breath. Clint looks to where Pietro was looking, and recognized the edge of the rock Ultron had sent flying. A peaceful moon and sky light up the universe, and he understands the quiet Pietro found here.
“I cannot feel Wanda anymore,” Pietro finally admits. “She is not dead, for she is not here,” he comments, and the look he gives Clint makes Clint want to cry. “I could always feel her, and she me,” Pietro explains. “Even in death I could sense my sister,” he goes on, before he frowns, looking worried, looking so much like Clint would when he was worried.
“What happened?”
Clint purses his lips, unsure of what to answer. The truth is, he doesn’t know.
“I don’t know,” he starts, and he has to take a moment to find the words. “There was a- there was a fight, in Wakanda. Wanda was there. I think- I think we lost,” Clint admits, and looks over at Pietro.
Pietro doesn’t look surprised, and Clint wonders if Pietro knew. He wonders if this is a test, and if this is a way for him to accept what happened, but then Pietro motions for him to follow him and Clint does. They walk among the rubble, the remnants of the Battle of Sokovia, as Clint had fought side by side with Wanda and Pietro, protecting them as much as he had could.
He gazes over at Pietro and realizes Pietro still wears the same clothes as the day he died, and that his wounds are still visible. Pietro brings Clint all the way over to the edge of the island, of the rock, of the meteorite and shows Clint. All around them, there are lights. Different worlds and universes, Clint understands.
“The dead come here,” Pietro explains, quietly, as if afraid of waking up the spirits around them. “They come here when their time in your world is done, like mine was.” Pietro points to a soul, not too long from there, shrouded in purple and anger. “This one came from Wakanda,” he explains. Clint looks, and knows in his heart. Killmonger.
“But my sister has not come here. And your wife and children have not come either,” Pietro says.
Clint looks over the edge, and thinks about what it means. He looks at Pietro, his eyes trying to figure out what the meaning of this dream is.
“You will find no answers here,” Pietro finally admits, as he pushes Clint over the edge. Clint doesn’t scream. He doesn’t say a single sound as he falls, surrounded by lights, near and far. He falls for an eternity, as he thinks about what Pietro said.
Clint wakes up with a jolt. There’s a bobcat on the hood of the car, sleeping in the morning sun. The mist is clearing around them, so it must be early morning. Nathaniel is still sleeping.
Laura isn’t dead. Lila isn’t dead. Cooper isn’t dead.
Clint knows this, in his heart. He pulls his shirt up, and looks down at the mark Loki’s scepter left. The mind stone. The one that Vision had held on his forehead. The mark glows a slight blue, as if confirming whatever it was that Clint had just realized.
Wanda wasn’t dead either.
Pietro had shown him the world of the dead, and his family wasn’t there.
And if they weren’t dead, it meant they could be saved.