Two
The last time he’s seen Barney, his brother tried to shoot him – honest to god bullet-thought-the-chest shoot him and they parted on no terms at all. Clint wanted to be away from him so he never tried to find him again; he closed that chapter of his life and didn’t think he’d ever have to reopen it again.
But that’s the thing with chapters – they can, and likely will, be reread in order to be revised and edited.
Currently, Clint is having a hard time editing the Barney-Chapter.
The fuck am I supposed to do with this—he signs sloppily at Natasha, who, graciously, translates his question a little more carefully to the notary who has not even five minutes ago read the present attendees the will of Barney Barton.
Present attendees are comprised of Clint, Natasha and a shady looking fellow who Clint sincerely feels like kicking in the balls until he cannot breathe – there is barely any hair on the head of the man, safe for the few survivor-strands that cling limply to the sides of the skull like dead ivy to a wall, and the old Adidas-track-suit is not doing his bulging barrel of a stomach any favours. As it stands, neither is the Hugo Boss Fragrance covering up the stench of what appears to be three days going without a shower.
Now he knows Barney was a crook. After his days in Iraq in the Explosive Ordinance Disposal – basically: Suicide Squad USA – he came back home to find that nothing had quite the thrill that he’d grown accustomed to. Normal life became ‘boring’ rather quickly so going for the diverse had seemed like a good option; even when it pulled him into the morass of the big cities around the world.
His Army pay had never been retracted, given the fact that proving he was, indeed, in cahoots with mafias around the globe was difficult – as much as a crook he was, Barney was also hellishly intelligent.
And now Clint is the – not so – proud owner of about $ 2.5 billion. In short: he’s filthy rich and he doesn’t know how; or if he even wants the money because the majority of it sure as hell didn’t come from clean business.
The mouth of the notary is moving, Nat is nodding in constant intervals and Clint is really thinking of standing up and having at the guy to his left and behind – simply to scratch at the itch under his god damn skin – but he doesn’t because now that he’s deaf he’s not an Avenger anymore and that means having to behave like a damn normal citizen.
That had been a hard talk.
Or rather… just… it had been hard even getting his point across, or properly getting theirs – Tash wasn’t 100% fluid in ASL and Clint only had one pair of eyes and could concentrate on one mouth at the time only. It had been exactly as he’d feared, and very precisely what he’d wanted to avoid.
Thor had unfortunately been off planet and a vicious voice in his head had called them all sorts of names, starting with cowards for announcing that particular decision while his best friend after Tash was away. It left him with no back up and no way to articulate himself (All Speak was wondrously proficient even in translating mad hand waving and angry finger wriggling).
Tash waves her hand in front of his eyes to get his attention; she translates what the notary said, haltingly, but honestly.
Do whatever the fuck you want
Clint is prepared for this; pulls a dossier on a rundown apartment-block somewhere in the city; he hasn’t even seen it yet, but Barney lived there, apparently. The notary nods and before another hour is even over, Clint is in deeply engrossed in the legal process of buying the house that Barney’s apartment is in. Some big-shot real-estate-company has had it in holding for some time now and is desperate to get rid of it; the notary is rather optimistic that it’ll end up in Clint’s possession.
The man in the back stands up in such a rush that Clint can feel it in the floor; he doesn’t need to hear to know that he’s just made an enemy.
--
The house he buys is a run-down factory that, sometime in the early 1900s had been transformed into make-shift lodgings only to have it stick for good. The façade would have to be renovated and there are probably about a hundred piping issues hiding in the cracks decorating the house’s staircase and the moment he enters ‘Barney’s’ apartment he knows his brother has never truly lived here, but it’s his now.
This cracked up agglomeration of apartments under a flat roof in Bedford-Stuyvesant is now the property of Clinton Francis Barton and… he swallows.
At least he won’t have to go stir-crazy right away.
Cats will yet be spared his company.
--
It’s December 4th when first he gets to see Mr Adidas-Track-Suit again – he’s lost the last stubborn tufts of hair and, by the looks of it, some of his teeth too. Clint is only somewhat certain that it’s not related to his purchase of the house he’s currently living in. The tenants have been ridiculously happy to have a deaf owner.
“You should sell.”—Mr Tracksuit talks to him like he doesn’t know that Clint is deaf and so he doesn’t react at all. Adidas’ face scrunches up; his chin morphs from smooth skin to ugly red dimples as the man pushes it forward and rolls his lips inward until only a small rotund of the upper- and lower-lip remain and the rest forms a down-turned bracket. He looks as if someone painted Disney’s Chanyu in the way of the Chinese at the time. It’s not a flattering picture.
“Your loss.”—Tracksuit spits in front of his feet as he walks away, the bottom of his barrel-stomach peeking out from under the vest; it’s hairy and pasty and Clint does not need it adding to the already horrid pictures he has spooking around in his mind. He’s sure that particular treasure trail is going to come to haunt him.
Bye Sucker—he signs at the retreating Adidas Logo.
Despite his cockiness, he stocks up on his weaponry.
There’ll be no telling the Avengers about this; there’ll be no telling anyone about this – he’ll be lucky if his tenants make it out alive.
Probably.
--
As it turns out though, even mobsters have some common sense and, instead of attacking his house, they ambush him during a pizza-run; which, quite frankly, is an insulting thing to do – he’s not even in Bed-Stuy.
There’s this crappy little Snack-Cart, handled by a man whose name he can’t spell properly until he’s heard it from the mouth of the owner himself because there’s something in it Clint doesn’t quite get by reading the lips, that serves the hottest pizza-slices around the boroughs. The cheese is runny and perfect and eight times out of ten he burns his fucking tongue with it; but it’s cheap and the dairy clogs his stomach until it thinks it’s been fed appropriately and stops demanding attention.
He wastes a perfectly good slice of Pizza on the face of Mr Tracksuit and watches with morbid satisfaction when the blistering hot cheese settles over the eyelids of the ass-hat. His clique is not prepared for a deaf-man fighting, so he has about the blink of an eye to make as much damage as possible – he makes it count, unhinges the jaw of another track-suited thug with a well-placed rounder-kick that Tash has taught him those many years ago, his victim whips around heavily and inadvertently head-butts one of his compadres – it’s not nearly as bad as Clint wants, but it’s good for now – before he takes out the knee of another one.
Four is as far as he gets before the stupor wears off and somebody pulls a gun.
Which is when he knows things will go bad.
The first shot hits him too soon for him to move, but not proficiently and only into the upper arm, before he manages to wrench the gun out of the hand of the tracksuit, he clocks him with the uninjured arm and disassembles it with quick moves as the man in front of him wavers on his feet and Clint abuses the moment of instability to ruthlessly bring down his heel onto the pubic bone of the man. It doesn’t break but Clint knows from experience that it hurts like hell.
He doesn’t hear the attack from behind him and is surprised by the sharp pain at the back of his head – he falls, dark spots clouding his vision as he instinctively drops into a Judo Roll. His hand scraps over something that identifies at somewhat sharp and as he comes up to his knees, he throws the projectile at the torso of his attacker – it turns out to be a nail-file though and doesn’t exactly do damage. It distracts his opponent nevertheless and in the short moment of diversion, he hails a hefty punch to the Solar Plexus.
Within five minutes his six attackers are on the ground and unwilling or –able to move; Clint has suffered what appears to be a minor concussion and a shot-graze. He’s had worse.
They don’t come back.
--
A week later though, Clint wonders if, maybe, they chose to go another route – because something is not quite kosher in his house; the basement-door gives off a weird vibe which, said by an Avenger (even if only former) who’s been under the literal boot of the God of Mischief, means something. And so, one evening, Clint decides to just give it a shot.
He has several projectiles on his body, as well as a slingshot that he knows to employ. But the basement is quiet when he steps into it.
It is obvious that, recently, somebody has been here going by the scuff marks on the cold floor. It’s fucking freezing though and he wonders about the desperation of people that would, willingly, come down here.
Moving deeper into the old arcs of the brown-stone, he is surprised to find that the farther he moves in, the less cold it gets, when he looks up and around he realizes just why. Some clever busy-body had taken it upon themselves to insulate the surroundings with mattresses hidden between wooden pallets; he twirls the slingshot thoughtfully between his fingers as he ventures on.
The high windows to the back of the basement allow for natural lighting to stream into the arcs and he wonders if maybe he should think about refurbishing it properly and offering it up as a studio apartment; God knows there’d be enough young folk snatching it up.
Clint stumbles; looks down. His feet are tangled in an electrical cord that he is rather certain has no business whatsoever being down here – he follows it as if it were the red string to a story and finally happens upon The Nest.
Well, at least he now knows that it’s not a Drug Addict.
###
She emerges from the scuffle with two broken fingers and a few heavy-duty black spots but the Diner remains intact and once she’s managed to cut off a sufficient amount of oxygen from the ass-cracker that just wanted to rob her and he loses consciousness, she can positively attest to the fact that she never wants to do that again.
“Call the police.”—she asks a nearby customer as she bends over the young boy and checks for his pulse; thank Thor it’s there.
Darcy fully dismantles the gun before she looks for something to tie the guy up with; if he somehow miraculously wakes up and still feels homicidal at least he won’t have a projectile weapon any longer. She finds a plastic-bag full of zip-ties in a drawer behind the counter; she’s not even certain if she wants to know why – but instead rolls with it and puts one of them around the wrists of the still unconscious boy.
When that is done, she gives a cursory look around the diner.
“Everyone alright and accounted for?”—she asks loudly; nods all around. “Fantastic. Now I’ll open the door but please remain inside, the police will be here shortly-“
“Five minutes.”—the man who called 911 interrupts her briefly and she gives him a nod of acknowledgement.
“-in five minutes”—she continues on, correcting herself, “and I’d appreciate it if y’all waited to give your statement. There’s free cake in the meantime.”
Because police never takes ‘just five minutes’ no matter what they say and not only does she need to keep her guests occupied, but the adrenaline is going to be leaving their systems like a Bat Out Of Hell and jittery nerves are usually best soothed with sweets. Also, she’s made the Chocolate Cake herself and she’s curious as to the comments of the customers.
When the police do arrive Darcy has managed to put the young man into a booth all by himself and he is reluctantly nibbling on the straw in his smoothie – because she might have trounced him, but never let it be said that she is a bad host.
One of the police-men – he looks nice, a little surprised but nice – gives her a high brow when he notices and leaves his colleagues to fan out in the diner as well as take in the bound perpetrator as he swaggers up to her. The disassembled gun is still lying in front of her and when he sees it his second brow joins the first.
“Ma’am.”—he greets her carefully, tips his hat and everything; Darcy nods from behind her Hot Cocoa.
“Officer.”—she replies as she steps away from where she’s leaning against the counter and towards the bar; towards him. She puts her Cocoa down and pushes all the pieces towards him. “I have a statement prepared?”
He has dimples, she notices when surprise finally wins over and he smiles a little baffled. “Would you mind if I took a seat?”—he motions towards a stool.
“Go ahead. You guys want a coffee?”—it appears she’s said the magic word because blue-caps around the diner appear above the booth-ends, revealing hopeful faces; Darcy makes a quick headcount before moving towards the To-Go cups.
The officer at her bar looks at her with curious blue eyes that make her wonder just a little. “You’re awfully calm.”—he finally says when she’s filled the last of the To-Go-Cups and is ready to dole them out; Darcy snorts.
“Hon, I’m jittery like a freshly-birthed fawn but I’ll be damned if it’ll stop me from being a good host.”—Texas comes through and the man smirks a little wryly when she pushes the container of hot liquid into his hands. “Give me a moment to cater to your boys and I’ll be all yours.”
He’s a cutie – beautiful copper hair, pale skin, impish freckles and the brightest, bluest eyes she’s seen in a while. But he’s a Cop and even as she flirts with him like there’s no tomorrow, she’s well aware that it’ll lead nowhere. Officer Peyton is a dish she’ll save for the cold nights in her van – of which, currently, there are aplenty. It’s lovely, too, that he doesn’t hold back either and when he leaves they are both a little red-faced but smiling.
It only comes to her later that she, too, managed to divert most of his attention to her plot-holes by flirting with him and feels a little dirty for it. Despite liking him, she hopes he won’t return to the diner.
--
December comes and she still has not managed to find a valid apartment that she’d voluntarily stay at and can afford. At this point she’d even deny pickiness because she has considered the apartment above the strip-club; seriously the bass probably wouldn’t even have bothered her and if the proprietor of said club wouldn’t have come on to her… yeah, she’d have taken the flat.
But security is a human need – ask Maslow – and therefor she feels unrepentant in her decision to not have taken the apartment.
Fact remains that she does not have an actual address though and she’s running out of her three months fast. By the end of December, in order to satisfy another human need, security of employment, she needs an address and because the good way hasn’t worked, Darcy improvises.
She’s always been good at that; it’s why she managed to stay with Jane longer than anyone could possibly have estimated.
--
“So if it don’t work the grown-up-way-“—she says between bites of deliciously hot pizza, “-it’ll have to be my way.”
Her pizza buddie seems as pleased as she is regarding the temperature of the slice that she’s left him; the Cart she’s got them from is delightfully overrun by what appears to be regulars – she has already jotted down the route of the Cart in order to never again have to suffer from luke-warm-pizza.
The cheese is perfectly hot on her tongue – near to blistering – and she relishes in its abundance, mostly because it means that she won’t feel her stomach twisting in hunger, for once. Eating from the diner is not something she’s discussed with her boss and she doesn’t want to find out if it’s allowed or not by simply doing it and being caught. Also the cook is a little shady and she’s not certain if she trusts him with anything he’d prepare for her.
When they’re both done, Darcy accompanies her friend a few yards through the brown sludge that is all that remains from the white powder hailing from the sky. Her friend stops at a corner, looks to the right and she gives him a small wave.
“Bye buddy.”
He doesn’t answer or even look back as he trudges towards some unknown destination, Darcy fills her lungs with the crisp winter air.
“Time to unpack the Big Girl Panties, Lewis.”—she tells herself as she crosses the road; in this weather her van won’t do her any good for much longer either way.
--
Shelter becomes imperative when her van breaks down. Forty years the girl has served her family now, but it seems like this is the end of the road for her – of course Darcy can’t say anything for certain without a mechanic but she’s short on pretty much anything but her awesomeness at the moment so her girl will, unfortunately, have to wait.
On the upside, her van has stopped right in front of a run-down factory that looks semi-habitable. Before Thor Darcy hadn’t put much faith in divinatory stories or esoteric rituals, but meeting a God-Alien whose science-magic made him the protector of women and the mythological figure responsible for fertility she had become at least a little more tolerant to ‘lucky occurrences’.
So when she steps out of her van that late evening and realizes that the cellar-door to the factory-turned-apartment-block, she doesn’t hesitate to, at least, check it out – because she’s not going to stay here if a) somebody already ‘lives’ here or b) she doesn’t have a way to enter undetected. Because the building looks nice enough and who knows, maybe the landlord is somewhat cool – she might want an actual apartment here, in the future, once she has re-opened an account and is in possession of a functioning cell-phone again.
The cellar is cold, which was to be expected, but the arches are high and she can see the windows on the other side of the building as she carefully steps through the rooms. It’s clean, uninhabited and unused, a few mattresses for isolation and she might even be able to sleep here without much interruption – her sleeping-bag was designed for Arctic Expeditions after all (God bless whoever at SHIELD equipped her for Norway) and kept her warm; so long as she kept somewhat dry.
Her first night is not nearly as bad as she anticipated.
--
There’s a guy on her pallet. He looks somewhat familiar, though she cannot, for the life of her, remember when or where she might have seen him before – as it is, though, she is way too close now to still go unnoticed by him.
Her hand is on her taser, ready to fire even though they are technically forbidden in New York, but this is her ‘home’ and like hell is she going to give it up because of some creep. His eyes sweep her with familiar wonder, as if he too remembers her and they hang on her Taser-hand for a second before he looks up at her again.
“Those are illegal ‘round here.”
His voice is quieter than she would have anticipated, but he doesn’t make any move towards her so she allows herself to move her hand away from her hip – she doesn’t disarm herself though. She’s not that stupid.
“Who are you?”—she asks as she steps back; she’s ready to run if that’s what it takes. Her van won’t take her anywhere and all her possessions are here, not to forget that she has just given her boss her new address – seriously, it must have been an hour and a half ago, tops. But she has a plan for the worst-case scenario, so if she has to run, at least it won’t be alike to a headless chicken.
“I can’t read lips very well, hon. Especially not in the dark.”—he answers her, squints his eyes and ducks his head in that instinctual fashion people have when they try to get a closer look at something that is just outside of their visual field. Darcy bites her lips, hesitant.
Who are you—she signs somewhat stiltedly, but she doesn’t step out of the shades. If he can’t read her lips then maybe he can’t see her quite that well and in case she has to run that might just be an advantage for her; can’t put out an APB if you have no points to bulletin.
“Clint Barton.”—he answers. “’s a pleasure to finally meet you, Ms Lewis.”
Fuck.