➵ for usavatar ● there's no justice in the world and there never was

[arches]

<sub>( In battle, he can forget. Eyes on a target, a mission to fulfill, and no room for error, there is no time to think about who he is or what’s been done to him. In battle, there is purpose, and the adrenaline of living each moment between life and death, and the thrilling feeling of victory.

And then, it is over, and he is left with the things he has done.

Eating shawarma does not give him purpose. It does not help him forget. It’s delicious, to be sure, but Natasha’s presence beside him is really the only thing keeping him grounded, the only thing stopping him from bolting. He doesn’t belong at this table—the men around him are heroes, and Natasha as much as any of them. And he? He spent his week sniping innocent security guards and his own associates.

He puts his leg up on her chair, and she touches his knee, briefly. If one woman was capable of absolving him of everything, it would be her. But even she can’t do that for him, so he munches into his sandwich and smacks his lips and tells Banner that green is really his color. And Stark is going on about how he deserves a statue, and Thor is clapping him on the back, and the captain? The captain Clint can’t get a read on. He’s an American hero, a living legend. And Clint Barton is nothing but a man with blood on his hands.

They wrap up their food and get up, and Natasha is touching his shoulder and whispering something about keeping a promise (he finds out later that she’s conferring with Banner, finding him a way to vanish and a place to vanish to), and Thor and Stark are still wrapped up in their conversation, so despite Clint’s best efforts, he finds himself face-to-face with Steve Rogers, genuine American hero. )</sub>

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[arches]

Well, that's the thing. We're the tools.

_{( That had never been more apparent than it was today. Clint would have followed Nick's orders on just about anything--not without question, but he'd follow them--but then again, Clint was never supposed to be an Avenger. He wasn't a hero, or a remarkable person. He was just a guy with a good shot. )}

You don't have to tell me that. We're probably going to put "SHIELD: We Don't Do Nice," on our mugs, next year.

[usavatar]

Yes. We are. [There's a hardness to the statement that wouldn't have been there six months ago. A coldness that Steve isn't sure he likes, but knows he can't shed.] Captain America was a propaganda machine before the name ever meant anything real. Every soldier is a tool, a cog. The most we can do is decide who's pulling our levers, and whether or not we trust them to use us well.

[He softens, a little, remembering the faces of the people on the street.] Or we do what we did today. We decide for ourselves.

[arches]

People like you were made for days like today. _{( He doesn't mean manufactured; it was clear to anyone with eyes that Steve's element was helping people, and leading. But it was equally clear to Clint that that wasn't where he belonged. )}

Some of us like being a little further removed.

[usavatar]

Sometimes where you like to be isn't where you belong.

[He flinches as soon as the words are out of his mouth, hating that he said them, hating how close to home the statement hits. Steve abandons the kitchen for his room, peeling off the upper layers of the uniform as he goes. They stick in places, not with sweat, and he winces as he rips tattered cloth free from where blood glued it into wounds. He's bleeding in at least three places when he pulls off the undershirt, and the medical kit from the bathroom isn't going to do much. In the end, Steve drags on a fresh t-shirt and puts the wounds out of sight and out of mind. As soon as he's changed, he wanders back out again, dumping a set of sweats and a t-shirt on the couch for Barton to use or not as he sees fit.

Steve doesn't even know what he's arguing for, what he's trying to convince Clint of, except that without Hawkeye they - the Avengers, Steve thinks, the name like a knell even in his head - would have been blind today. If this team is going to exist, if it's going to be something sustained, he wants Clint and Natasha both.]

[arches]

<sub>( When Steve walks away, Clint waits until he's fully out of the kitchen before pulling up a chair, leaning his arms on the table, and putting his head in his hands. Where he belongs? What a damn joke.

When he hears Steve coming back, he gets up and joins him in the main room. Now, he's been goaded into anger, so he smirks, darkly, when he rounds on Steve. )</sub>

If today's taught me anything, it's that I belong apart.

[usavatar]

[Steve regards Clint silently, arms crossed, weighing the man's reaction against anything Steve himself might say. Quietly:] Which part of today taught you that? Was it when you and Romanoff emptied that bus? Or when you talked Stark through how to shake his tail, or told me about the civilians in that bank? They were about to get blown to pieces for the record.

[He doesn't sit down on the couch as much as collapse onto it, closing his eyes.] That man, Randall, probably appreciated you being right where you were. If you're trying to punish yourself, Barton, keep it to yourself. Don't make innocents pay when you can do some good.

[arches]

You want to know who was innocent?

_{( He's angry, now, more than he'd let himself be all day. But his words don't come out heated; instead, they're accompanied by a hollow laugh. The same laugh he gave Natasha when they sat together in the sickbay and he processed what had been done to him. )}

The scientist guarding the iridium was innocent. The guards on security detail at the lab were innocent. Phil Coulson was innocent, or as close to it as a SHIELD agent ever got.

I have blood on my hands, and I did last week, too, but now it's different. And no amount of good Samaritan deeds is ever going to make up for that.

[usavatar]

Did I say they would?

[Steve looks up long enough to meet Barton's gaze, keeping his expression entirely neutral. No judgement, no impatience.]

You're the only one here who thinks good deeds wash away bad ones. That's the painful thing about redemption. You don't earn it. There's no way you can. If anything, it's given to you.

[That, Steve learned the hard way. He learned it when Bucky died and the Commandos went after HYDRA to make them pay for it. He learned it when HYDRA fell and he fell with them, waking up in the purgatory of a world so far removed from his own that he felt like as much of an alien as Thor. He's still being punished for his failure, in a way, and there's nothing he can do but live with it.]

What I said - what I meant - is that you have a skill set and the drive to use it that can help people when things go as wrong as they did today. And you can say you don't deserve the chance to use those skills for good purpose, that you're tainted. You can say whatever you want. But it wasn't just anyone who held things together for us out there. It was you. This isn't about your personal issues, Barton. You have to sort those out yourself.

[Steve rubs one eye, fighting a yawn. He rests his face in his hand.] I don't think anyone on that team today doesn't have blood on their hands. This is bigger than any of us. Or did you miss the hole in the universe those things came through?

[arches]

<sub>( At first, Clint isn't sure how to respond. He has enough pride, enough arrogance, that he doesn't want to deny what he did out there today. He knows he did good--he's a tactician, an eye in the sky. It's what he does and what he's good at, and he certainly doesn't need validation from this outdated military hero to tell him that.

But when Steve mentions the hole in the universe, something inside Clint breaks--some last vestige of control, the way he's been holding this all together for the past few hours. )</sub>

But that was my fault, too.

<sub>( He starts laughing. For a man who usually disguises just about everything with a warm, well-meaning humor, it's a dark and bitter contrast. It's a laughter that is a hair away from being sobs, a laughter that lets him sink into a dark place.

And sink he does, because the next thing he knows he's slumped against the couch and he's holding his head in his hand and shaking with the gravity of everything.

You have heart, Loki had said. Right now he wants nothing more than to tear it out. )</sub>

[usavatar]

No.

[Steve slides off the couch and onto the floor to sit next to Clint, not trying to offer any comfort beyond his presence.] And yes.

It's Fury's fault for researching that thing, for drawing Loki's attention. SHIELD's fault for trying to hide it. Howard's for pulling it out of the water. Mine, for not burying it with me.

[He inhales around the knot in his chest.] Heck, it's Thor's, his peoples', for leaving it here.

Yeah. Those are technicalities. It doesn't change what happened. But technically I... [He stops, and the next words are a quiet struggle.] Technically, I didn't push my best friend off of a HYDRA train on a run through the mountains. What happened is still in some portion my fault. But the question I've got for you, Agent Barton, is what if it had been someone else? Agent Romanoff, or Hill, or Agent Coulson? Would you rather bear the responsibility for what was done through you, or be left helpless to watch someone you care about blame themselves?

...This is what I know. [He drapes his arms over his knees and rests his head against them.] This is the only thing I'm really sure of, in all this. If you let it destroy you, then Loki. Well. We never beat him at all. If you let him put something broken where you're supposed to be, you never really escaped in the first place.

[arches]

<sub>( Clint doesn't look at the captain as he speaks. His hysteric laughter, at least, has subsided, but now he is just silent, head in his hands. He's listening, of course, and he can't disagree with what Steve's saying. But there is a stark difference between knowing, nominally, where the true fault lies and feeling absolved of what he's done.

When he finally speaks, he still sounds a bit incensed, but his voice echoes, hollowly. )</sub>

But it's not about what might have happened, is it? It wasn't Nat or Hill or Coulson. We've all got to deal with the crap that happens to us and the things we do. You think I don't know that?

<sub>( Of course he knows it. He is one of SHIELD's best agents, one of the most competent men in the world. He may not be a scientific genius or an enhanced super-soldier, but he is a man hardened by years spent in the shadows, working to protect a world that doesn't know he exists. Clint Barton knows a lot about sacrifice, and pushing down his own feelings, and doing what needs to be done.

So maybe what's really bothering him is how much this effected him. How much his conviction's been shaken. How he feels like he's falling off a cliff, scrambling to find purchase in the rocks. But he'll be damned if he'll let himself hit that ground. )</sub>

It's not a matter of being destroyed, or broken--those things have already happened to me.

Today, we saved the world. Tomorrow, I have to get up and deal with those things.

[usavatar]

Yep. [Steve doesn't lift his head, feeling spent. He's not sure what else he can say. There's nothing, really. Clint knows what's necessary. Where his life stands. He's not giving up, which is the only thing Steve could really have tried to stop.] And the day after that, and the one after that.

[He pulls Coulson's card out of his pocket and sits up enough to turn it over and over again between his fingers.] You won't be alone.

[arches]

_{( This time, when Clint laughs, it's warm and has a sense of something clean--camaraderie, being able to poke fun at himself. )}

God, you really are a Boy Scout, aren't you?

[usavatar]

[He relaxes, relieved that Barton's laughter sounds healthy instead of ragged. Steve raises an eyebrow and shrugs, wry.]

I wouldn't know. Never joined them.

[arches]

Yeah, 'cause you obviously didn't need to.

_{( Clint likes girl scouts better, personally. They sell cookies. )}

[usavatar]

If you say so. [A tiny grin might be teasing at the corners of his mouth.] That where you learned the whole bow thing?

[He's not making fun, Clint. Srsly.]

[arches]

Yes, exactly. They've really stepped it from Swiss army knives in the last century.

<sub>( He rolls his eyes, and gives Steve a look. You know the one.

Then he just shrugs. )</sub>

I grew up in a circus. You learn some interesting tricks.

[usavatar]

...Really? [He doesn't seem to be lying - it's not the deadpan delivery of Clint's earlier sarcasm, so Steve doesn't think the latter part is a joke.] A circus. You're not pulling my leg.

[arches]

Really, really. _{( He says it dryly. He has mixed memories of his youth, but overall knows he wouldn't be who he is without those experiences. So he's not ashamed. )}

The Coney Island Circus is where "Hawkeye" made his first appearance.

[usavatar]

Lucky for us, I guess.

[He's well aware that he's parroting Clint's earlier statement. The more he thinks about it - about all of them, each one a broken piece of something that just fits when you put it all together - the more it seems fated, in some cruel and wonderful way.]

How on earth did you end up with SHIELD?

[arches]

<sub>( Clint sits up a little, trying to decide how much he wants to say. Nick Fury has had practice with rescuing and reusing broken things, he wants to quip. Or, maybe another reference Rogers won't get--he made me an offer I couldn't refuse.

Finally, Clint just runs his hands through his hair and offers Steve the simplest explanation. )</sub>

It was SHIELD, or death-row. I weighed my options.

[usavatar]

[Steve nods, not asking why Clint ended up where he did. It doesn't matter. What matters is what he's proven himself capable of and willing to do. He's a good man - as much as Banner, Thor, any of them.]

How did you and Agent Romanoff meet?

[arches]

That's more her story than mine.

<sub>( Which is, Clint thinks, a fair answer. Never mind that Natasha would tell Steve the opposite, if he ever asked her.

Natasha Romanoff, the Beautiful Spider--the only target Clint had ever missed. Now, years later, he can't quite remember what his state of mind had been when that arrow had missed the mark, when he'd extended a hand instead of a knife. And he doesn't know what she was thinking, either, when she took his hand, and they began an unbreakable partnership.

He smiles, now, at the memory. )</sub>

We come from similar backgrounds, though hers is about a hundred times more glamorous. She's the best there is, so that was going to make her either a target, or an asset. I asked her to be the latter before being the first got her killed.

[usavatar]

Best there is.

[Steve says it under his breath, smiling a little. Similar backgrounds. Reverse Clint and Natasha's positions and it's almost the way Steve met Peggy - except she was the best, and the one offering him a chance, along with Erskine.]

She saved the whole city today. She saved the world.

[arches]

<sub>( She saved me.

That's not a monumental thought in and of itself. After all, how many times has he wagered his life on this woman? More times that he could count. They had a policy, the two of them against the world. They made sure the other got home safe.

The thing of it was, today they'd gotten both. Saved the world, and both of them had come home safe. Clint liked this new state of affairs, more than he was willing to admit. )</sub>

That's Natasha for you. You can keep your shield, and Stark his armor, and Thor his... godliness. Natasha's got a brain, and conviction like no one else. No offense, but between you all, it's still her I want watching my back, the next time we do this.