Avengers fic, 5+1, Clint/Coulson
Title: Five Times Someone Had a Nickname for Clint Barton, and One Time They Didn't
Rating: PG-13 for language
Pairing: Clint Barton/Phil Coulson
Word Count: 4664
Summary: Pretty much as advertised. Clint likes the familiarity and affection that come with nicknames. But that doesn't mean that, sometimes, he doesn't like hearing his own name.
Warnings: Perceived Character Death
Author's Notes: Not compliant with Marvel's timeline for Iron Man 3 or Thor 2. Ignores the fact that AoS claims the Avengers don't know of Coulson's return.
AO3 link here: desert_neon at AO3
1. Natasha Romanoff
Natasha’s the first, of course. He doesn’t even know what she’s saying, the first time. Or the second or third or fourth. It’s all harsh consonants and short vowels, a thread of affection woven through the Russian words. Coulson looks amused when he hears it (which is about a year after she’d said it for the first time. It had taken her a little while to let her guard down around the handler) so Clint figures it can’t be anything too bad.
Anyway, it’s nice when she says it. Especially later, when it’s accompanied by a fond smile or an affectionate roll of the eyes. Sometimes it comes with a soft toe to the ribs or a cuff to the back of the head. Once, it had been accompanied by a knife to the thigh, but she’d avoided the femoral artery and hadn’t twisted the knife nearly as much as she’d made it look, and they’d needed to gain the mark’s trust somehow. The guy had been an idiot anyway, a fucking sex-slaver from New Mexico (and it fucking pisses him off when the really bad ones are home-grown, some kind of fucked up sense of patriotism, maybe) and he hadn’t understood either the words or the undercurrent of reassurance and trust she’d placed in them.
So he’s getting used to being called something other than his last name or his code name for the first time in a long time, even if he doesn’t know what it means. He just knows, with the way she says it, it’s something good. Anyway, he trusts her not to call him the other names he’s used to hearing.
Piece of shit.
Worthless fuck.
Goddamn idiot.
Fucking no-good bleeding-heart tattletale.
Yeah. He’s pretty sure it’s not any of those. So whatever it is? Is all right with him.
They’re on a jet over the Atlantic when he finds out what it means. Coulson’s stretched out on a cot in front of them, a bullet wound to the stomach the result of a hitch in an otherwise successful op in the Sudan. He’ll be fine, the medic says. The bullet missed anything vital, and it’s been extracted and Coulson is all sewn up. He’s just sleeping off the meds, and Clint is doing his best not to stare, to hardly even look, really, but Natasha sighs, calls him that name, knocks him affectionately in the arm (which hurts, because she never pulls her punches and she damn well knows there’s a burn there) and gets up to confer with her counterpart on the beta team.
The beta team’s handler, a woman Clint thinks is named Anikin or Anishin or something, is sitting on the other side of Coulson, and looking across at Clint curiously.
“What?” he growls, because Coulson is his handler, okay, and that might not mean as much to some teams as it does to theirs, and he’s not obsessing over the man or anything, he’s just a little worried. Nothing wrong with that.
“She just . . .” the woman starts, and Clint has to readjust his thinking because apparently this isn’t about Coulson at all. “That doesn’t bother you?”
“What doesn’t bother me?”
“That she calls you her little assassin.”
Clint has to laugh. All that time, all these years, and that’s what she’s been calling him? Also, fuck no, it doesn’t bother him. Coming from her, it’s a high compliment. Also, well, behold, he thinks, looking down at his blood covered shirt and tac vest. There’s blood on his shoes too, and probably some brain matter. (He’d had to come down from his perch to resolve the hitch.)
He shrugs. “It fits,” is all he says.
Anikin or whatever her name is looks skeptical, like she can’t quite believe anyone would be okay with just being called that, even if it is the truth. Like she doesn’t understand that being called an affectionate nickname is still a novelty to him. That having someone in his life to want to call him something new, something fond, something just for them is something he’s never had before, and he doesn’t care so much what the actual words are as long as they’re not said in a drunken, hateful voice.
He doesn’t try to explain it to her. He’s honestly not sure he could.
2. Tony Stark
Stark’s the second. He says it in the midst of battle, their first battle, and Clint’s just glad he knows Stark’s talking to him when he says it. There’s not a lot of time between being called Legolas and being swept up into the air, and if he hadn’t understood the nickname, he might not have been prepared. He doesn’t have time then to care, to even really notice the name or the feeling of familiarity it might have once implied. Also, he’s still reeling from Loki, and then, after the battle, from the news about Coulson.
Time passes, and he does his psych evals and Medical can’t find any lingering trace of Loki in his brain and SHIELD has no reason to keep him locked up. He stays in his quarters, mostly, because while SHIELD doesn’t detain him, they also don’t use him. He’s not entirely trusted by the staff, and he can’t blame them, not at all, but he can’t help but think that the one person who might have helped get people on his side isn’t there anymore. Natasha can’t help, because even though she’s proved her loyalty in the past, there are some asshats who just don’t see it. About of quarter of the staff still think she’s a plant, and another quarter think that she’s on their side for now, but that she’ll switch when a better offer comes along.
See? Asshats.
So when Stark comes along with an offer of an apartment in his tower, Clint confers with Natasha and decides to take it, even if Fury says no. (Fury doesn’t hold much sway over him. Scuttlebutt has it that he’s mad at Fury for letting Coulson die, which is bullshit because if anyone’s to blame it’s Clint himself. The truth is that Fury has never pulled his strings. He’d taken orders from Coulson, the only higher-up he’s ever trusted, and the one man he’d known who would sort through the lies and the politics to get to truth of the operation. The only person Clint’s ever trusted to point him at the right target, to tell him to take the shot only when the target truly needed to be taken out. For Coulson, Clint would take have taken the shot on faith alone, on Coulson’s say-so, with no intel to back it up. Coulson had never asked him to.)
Fury doesn’t say no, though, so Clint and Natasha officially move into Stark’s tower when it’s ready. Banner’s already there, greeting them with a head nod and a polite, collective, “Agents.” Thor is back on Asgard, and Rogers is off exploring the twenty-first century, though he moves in about a month later. It’s all “Agent Barton” or just plain “Barton,” with the occasional “Clint” or the Russian version of “my little assassin” from Nat. And then there’s Stark. Stark almost never calls him anything other than some archery-related nickname.
It doesn’t mean anything though. Stark calls everyone some funny nickname or another. Except Natasha, because clearly Stark is a smart man who values his life. Clint would take offense, but it’s just Stark being Stark. And after he meets the man’s best friend Rhodey, who gets called all sorts of embarrassing things, he even realizes it’s some kind of measure of affection from the guy.
So Clint just ignores it when he hears Legolas instead of Barton. There’s also Katniss, Merida, Cupid, Robin Hood (sometimes shortened just to Robin or Rob), William Tell, and even, occasionally, Link. But then one day Stark’s in the kitchen waiting for fresh coffee to finish brewing, and says, “So, Daryl, I’ve got this prototype armor-piercing arrow. We should head down to the range later, see how she flies.”
It’s only the topic that clues Clint in at all that he’s being spoken to, because, seriously, who the fuck is Daryl? “What?”
“Prototype arrow,” Stark repeats. “Goes stabby-stabby. Needs testing. You in?”
“Uh. Sure. Who the fuck- Oh! Oh, no, fuck you, Stark, you did not just compare me to some guy who points a crossbow at things that move at the pace of a snail and pulls a trigger.”
“Wow. I honestly can‘t tell if you’re more upset about the lack of difficulty of the targets or the crossbow thing.”
Clint gnashes his teeth. “It’s not the same thing, okay? Yeah, I can use a crossbow, and yeah my aim’s still better than anyone else’s, but fuck, where’s the fun in that? Load, point, shoot? And the reload time is just atrocious, you’re more likely to get yourself killed fucking around with that than anything. The distance on them isn’t as great as people think, anyway. An experienced archer can shoot just as far with a recurve or a compound. And don’t even get me started on the accuracy.”
Stark holds up his hands. “Easy there, zealot. No more Daryl jokes.” He squints at Clint then, assessing. “Can I call you Apollo instead?”
“The god of archery?” Clint asks with a laugh. “Yeah. You can do that.”
He doesn’t tell Stark that Legolas is still his favorite though.
3. The Hulk/Bruce Banner
They’re in the middle of a battle again, their third, this time against some kind of flying thing that looks like it came straight out of a bad sci-fi movie. Or maybe a D&D card set. It’s not quite a dragon, but that’s the closest thing they can compare it to, so the word sticks. It doesn’t help that Stark’s been calling it Falcor and Smaug and Norbert.
“Norbert was a baby, Stark,” Clint argues over the open channel, because fuck you, Woo, he does too know how to read. “I think this one might be the Horntail.”
“Not the Chinese Fireball?” Tony (it’s been three months now, and sometimes he is Tony, not Stark) snarks back. “Or the Swedish Short-Snout?”
“Hawkeye, Iron Man, focus,” Cap bites out, and Clint knows there’s an extra bit of edge to it because he doesn’t understand what the hell they’re talking about.
“Aw, Captain Antiquated. Don’t get upset just because you don’t get the reference.” Stark zooms by then, his repulsors aimed at the creature’s wings.
It turns suddenly to bite at the nuisance, missing Tony by a foot or two but completing its midair spin by knocking its tail into the building Clint is on. Woo shouts at him to get down, the structural integrity of the building is compromised.
This is why Clint misses Coulson. Because seriously, Woo? The building is crumbling under his feet and he, what? Wasn’t going to notice? “Structural integrity is compromised.” What the fuck. “Building’s coming down” would have been a much more efficient assessment, even if he did need to be told. (That’s not the only reason he misses Coulson, but he’s trying not to think about that.)
Clint makes the leap, already nocking his grappling hook arrow, aiming at the building across the alley. Before he can shoot it though, he gets the air knocked out of him when a giant green hand shoots out to catch him. Hulk obviously doesn’t do things like compensate for gravity, so it’s a pretty jarring landing. Not as jarring as falling another fifteen stories and landing on concrete though, so Clint’s not going to complain.
“Thanks, big guy,” he says when he can talk again. “You’re my buddy.”
“Buddy,” Hulk grunts in agreement, trying out the new word. He smiles that freaky smile of his, then leaps away to rip off one of Puff’s wings at Cap’s command.
After that it doesn’t take long. They’re back at the tower and bickering over dinner ninety minutes later. Clint’s ribs are pretty bruised up thanks to his daring rescue, but they aren’t cracked and they certainly aren’t broken, so he’s calling it a win.
“Thai,” he says, because fuck all if he’s letting Tony bully them into sushi yet again.
“Sushi,” Stark counters.
“Pizza,” Nat commands, because of all of them, she’s the one that eats like a college kid.
“Sushi.”
“Repeating what you want doesn’t win you the argument, Tony,” Cap says with a roll of his eyes. “Anyway, it’s been a while since we’ve done those really good deli sandwiches. How about those?”
All eyes turn to Bruce, who’s sitting in the corner of the couch with his eyes closed, head lolled back. He seems to notice the weight of their stares, because he cracks one eye open to look at them. His gaze shifts to the mug of tea Clint had brought in for him a few minutes ago, and he nods decisively. “Thai.”
Clint crows and jumps up to look for a takeout menu, before he remembers that he lives with Tony Stark now, and things that are printed on paper are scarce. He sits back down and tilts his head back. “Jarvis, can you pull up our last order and repeat that? And make sure to get extra spring rolls. Someone always eats more than her fair share.”
This earns him a poke in his bruised ribs, and Tony tells Jarvis to hold on, the argument for sushi isn’t dead. Steve argues the point, insisting that majority rules, and Clint listens to the ensuing bickering with half an ear. Nat will put a stop to it if it gets out of hand.
He looks over to see if the noise is bothering Bruce at all, but the man just smiles at him when he catches him looking. So Clint grins back and says, “Thanks.”
“No problem, buddy.”
The resultant look of surprise on his face is so comical, Clint can’t help but laugh.
The next time the Hulk emerges though, he looks straight at Clint, says, “Buddy,” and smiles. Then he uproots a tree and throws it at the guy who was about to lob an explosive in Clint’s general direction.
Clint smiles, and nocks an arrow as Iron Man grabs him to take him to higher ground.
4. Thor
Thor comes back, and the tower is suddenly a lot fuller and lot louder than it was. Clint doesn’t mind though. They each have their own floor, with soundproof rooms, so Thor’s general volume only matters when they’re in the common areas together. Plus, he’s a fun guy to have around, and his presence at least means there are always Pop Tarts stocked in the big kitchen. Clint can dig that.
“I do not understand. Why does Tony not call you by your proper names? Does he have a memory problem?”
Clint snorts into his cereal, and Bruce gives a small smile. “Uh, no. He knows our names, Thor. But it isn’t uncommon here on Earth-Midgard-to affectionately label friends and loved ones with nicknames. Something just for two people, or a group of people, to call each other. Tony is just a little more enthusiastic about it than most people.”
Clint snorts again, because that’s an understatement if ever he’s heard one.
“And what are these nicknames based on?” Thor asks.
“Well, Tony seems to base a lot of his on pop culture references. Books and movies and the like. There are also standard nicknames that a lot of people use, though usually those are for romantic partners. Things like honey, or sweetheart.”
“Or pookie,” Clint interrupts, just to be obnoxious. “Or maybe schnookums.”
Bruce laughs a little, shaking his head. “Don’t give him ideas. Anyway, you can also shorten or lengthen people’s names. Like how Clint calls Natasha ‘Nat.’”
“But I don’t suggest you try it,” Clint warns. “Natasha isn’t too fond of nicknames. I only get a pass because of our history.”
Thor nods seriously. “I shall have to consider this carefully. It would be unjust to bestow ill-fitting names upon my fellow warriors.”
“Don’t worry about it,” Clint tells him. “Usually nicknames happen naturally. If you ever want to call me something other than Barton or Clint or Hawkeye, that’s fine, as long as it isn’t mean-spirited. But you don’t have to, either. It’s not like I’m gonna think you don’t like me if you just use my name.”
“But this is something friends do, is it not? And there is no greater friendship than that of those who have fought together. Worry not, dear friends,” he says, clapping Clint on the back with a great blow. “I shall have appropriate names of affection for you all quite soon!”
Clint not so subtly gags on his cereal, trying to dislodge it from his throat.
It’s after their next fight that Thor drops the moniker he’s chosen for Clint. It’s a giant squid this time, down at the harbor, and Thor totally electrocutes it with lightening. (“Sushi tonight!” Tony sings as it goes down, only to be met with a resounding chorus of “No!”)
“Heart of Coal!” Thor booms when Clint joins them at the SHIELD vans. He’s not even wet, which Clint thinks is totally unfair, given that he and Nat look like a pair of drowned rats.
“Heart of Coal?” Clint repeats, puzzled. “Like, hard, black and burning?”
“What?” Thor asks, but then his face clears. “No, not coal, the energy source. Coul. Son of Coul.”
Clint immediately wipes his face blank and turns away. He doesn’t exactly stomp over to the squid’s body to retrieve his arrows, but it’s a near thing. His body is tight, footsteps heavy, and he pulls each arrow free with a vicious and satisfying squelching sound.
He’s still wearing his earpiece, so he hears Thor when he asks in a disappointed voice, “Was that not a noble and apt nickname?”
He stops what he’s doing to dig at the comm in his ear, but he’s not fast enough to avoid Natasha’s quiet response. “A little too apt, maybe.”
He doesn’t hear what else she might say, or if any of the others were still on the open line to hear it. He just shoves the damned thing into one of his pockets and goes on collecting arrows.
Squelch.
5. Steve Rogers
“Agent Barton.”
“Yeah?” Clint looks up at the place he suspects Jarvis’s hidden camera is. He doesn’t want to be disturbed, and he’s hoping the AI can read facial cues.
“Captain Rogers is requesting access to your floor.”
Clint frowns, but nods. He may as well get this over with. “Let him in.”
The elevator door slides open, and there’s Steve, looking nervous and concerned and all too much like the hero he is. He’s in khakis and plaid again, no uniform, but he still has that stupid out-of-style hair, and probably out-of-date sensibilities too. Clint stands to meet him, because fuck if he’s going to be caught flat-footed.
But Steve doesn’t start with an accusation, or even a question. All he says is, “I had no idea.”
Clint’s shoulders relax, slump a little even. He shakes his head, then sits back down on the couch, waving at Cap to take the chair. “It wasn’t . . . We weren’t together. I don’t even know if he wanted that. If he was even . . .”
“Gay?”
Clint’s eyes snap to Steve’s face, but the only thing he sees there is concern, and maybe some mild grief. He nods. “Coulson played his cards really close to the chest, you know? I knew more about him than a lot of people did, but in some ways I don’t think I knew him at all. I always figured there’d be time. Stupid, right? In our line of work, that’s just stupid.”
Steve doesn’t say anything for a long moment, and when Clint looks, there’s definite grief in his expression. “When I was, uh, in the war, there was this dame. Sorry,” he corrects himself with a wince. “Girl. Peggy. And we talked about what we’d do after the war. The date we’d go on. Then, well. You know the story. Hydra, plane, ice. Never did get that dance.”
Clint doesn’t know what to say. If someone had ever told him he’d be having a heart-to-heart with Captain fucking America, he’d probably have shot them in the mouth. Coulson would have gotten such a kick out of this. He’d probably also have known what to say. “Well. Okay. So you get it. I mean, we didn’t talk about it or anything, but yeah. Sometimes it felt like maybe? Maybe we were kind of getting somewhere? Like, dancing around the edges of something.”
“And maybe that’s worse, because now you’re stuck wondering if there was really something there, or if it was all just wishful thinking and imagination.”
“Exactly.” Clint picks at the label of his beer. Just the one, of course, because the Avengers are basically on call twenty-four/seven, and he doesn’t like what being drunk does to his eyesight or his hands anyway. “You want one?” he asks belatedly.
“Sure.”
Clint gets up to fetch another bottle from the fridge. He knows Steve can’t get drunk, and he has a feeling he’d accepted more out of a sense of comradery than actual thirst or desire. But Clint will take what he can fucking get right now. At least it’s not fucking Tony banging down his door.
He returns and hands the bottle off, reclaiming his seat on the couch. “And you’re, uh. Okay with this?”
“With beer?” Steve asks, and shit, he’s being deliberately obtuse.
Clint sends him a look. “With me.”
Steve smiles at him and takes a sip. “I’ve been in this century for a while now. Long enough to know that most places have made great strides in this area. Anyway, I’m not sure I had a problem with it back then, really. I mean, I didn’t think much about it, either way. Now that it’s more of a public issue, I’ve had to figure out my feelings about it. And no, it doesn’t bother me. You don’t choose love, right? It chooses you.”
“That’s . . . surprisingly enlightened of you, Cap. For an Army boy.” Clint gives him a wicked grin, shows he’s teasing.
“You flyboys are all the same,” Steve returns just as easily.
“Hey, I’m no Air Force drone.”
“Neither was Howard. He was still a good pilot. So, yeah, when I say flyboy, I don’t mean Air Force. I mean cocksure, mouthy aces.”
Clint’s never been good at accepting compliments, but he makes sure not to duck his head. He just flashes a “cocksure” grin and says, “Well, as long as you recognize.”
Steve laughs. “Recognize your skills? Or your smart mouth? Hard to miss either of them, really.”
Clint just scrunches up his face in acknowledgment and takes the last sip of his beer. He doesn’t mind so much now, that he can’t have another. Steve has helped, more than Clint would have thought possible. “Thanks, Cap,” he says after another moment has gone by.
“Any time, flyboy.”
+1. Phil Coulson
They’re all there, crowded into a room in some top secret facility even Natasha hadn’t known existed. Coulson is there, in a bed, wires and tubes everywhere, and he looks terrible. Pale and small, no command left in his slack body. Jesus fuck, he looks awful.
Clint thinks he’s the most goddamn beautiful thing he’s ever seen.
Months. It’s been months. Five months of thinking this man was dead, was gone, was never coming back. Fury was a fucking scheming prick, with a Machiavellian bent to him. Clint would be having it out with him later, if Nat didn’t get there first. Fuck, even Tony had gone for it, advancing on the Director before Steve had tugged him back.
But then the call had come through, that the patient had been responsive, had awakened, had checked on the status of the battle he clearly thought was recent. Fury had repeated all that for them to hear, but then he’d gone quiet, his eyes on Clint, then Natasha. Clint had tensed, but when he’d hung up the phone, Fury looked back to him and said, “He asked for you.”
Clint had known that Fury meant the both of them, or maybe even all of them. Coulson hadn’t asked for Clint specifically. He’d wanted his team. His assets. Even his friends. Whatever. Given that Coulson was alive, was there, Clint would be more than happy with any or all of those statuses.
And now they’re all there, in his room, waiting tensely because as alive as Coulson might be, he’s still recovering, and he’d fallen back to sleep before they’d arrived. It’s been over two hours, but no one’s leaving, and no one’s talking. Clint has one of the chairs, pushed right up to the bed. Nat’s in the other one, right next to him. Tony’s leaning against a wall, pretending to be aloof, and Thor stands in the doorway, an immovable guard. Bruce is on a stool, Coulson’s chart in his hands, though he must have finished reading it a long time ago. Steve is alternating between pacing by Coulson’s bed and standing at the foot of it, and Clint wants to tell him to stop, to sit, to just be still, but he can’t. He can’t find any words right now, for anything he wants to say.
There’s a change in one of the monitors by Coulson’s bed, and Clint doesn’t know what it means, but it doesn’t sound too alarming. He sits up though, body on alert, just in case. There’s a slight rustling, and Coulson’s hand twitches. Clint absolutely does not reach for it. Instead, he fists his hand in the thin blanket at the edge of the bed.
There’s more movement then, and everyone notices. Remarkably, it’s Tony who gets to the bed first, leaning over Coulson, looking for new signs of life.
“I’ve died, right?” Coulson says before any of them even notice that his eyes are open. “I’ve died and this is hell, because I’m being greeted by Stark.”
There’s a collective sigh of relief, of released tension. “Not hell, Agent Coulson,” Tony says. “A face this pretty can only belong in heaven.”
“Alternatively, you’re alive and on Earth, and Tony was actually worried about you,” Bruce suggests as he approaches the bed, chart in hand.
Coulson’s eyes focus on him, track his movements. “Dr. Banner? Thor.” He seems confused, tired and drugged up, unable to gather his thoughts. “And Captain Rogers. I didn’t want . . . I asked for . . .”
“We’re here, Coulson,” Natasha says, her voice soft. She puts a hand on his, just for a moment, just enough to get his attention. “We’re both here.”
He struggles to turn his head, eyes landing on Natasha first, and then he sees Clint. Clint offers him a smile. It’s all he can do. His tongue still isn’t working and it doesn’t even feel like he can breathe right now. Coulson doesn’t look away so Clint holds his gaze, trying to reassure him that he’s there, that he’s fine, he’s fixed, no more Loki in his brain. In his peripheral vision, he sees Coulson’s hand twitch again, and this time he can’t stop himself from taking it.
Cold fingers spasm against his, and Coulson licks his lips, his throat working. Finally he opens his mouth, and Clint thinks he’s going to hear his name, thinks Coulson will say, “Barton, report,” in that way that Clint had thought he’d never hear again. He waits for it, wants to hear it, will get on his knees and weep for joy if he does.
What he gets is so much better.
“Clint.”
He slides to his knees. He doesn’t weep, but it’s a near thing.
Rating: PG-13 for language
Pairing: Clint Barton/Phil Coulson
Word Count: 4664
Summary: Pretty much as advertised. Clint likes the familiarity and affection that come with nicknames. But that doesn't mean that, sometimes, he doesn't like hearing his own name.
Warnings: Perceived Character Death
Author's Notes: Not compliant with Marvel's timeline for Iron Man 3 or Thor 2. Ignores the fact that AoS claims the Avengers don't know of Coulson's return.
AO3 link here: desert_neon at AO3
1. Natasha Romanoff
Natasha’s the first, of course. He doesn’t even know what she’s saying, the first time. Or the second or third or fourth. It’s all harsh consonants and short vowels, a thread of affection woven through the Russian words. Coulson looks amused when he hears it (which is about a year after she’d said it for the first time. It had taken her a little while to let her guard down around the handler) so Clint figures it can’t be anything too bad.
Anyway, it’s nice when she says it. Especially later, when it’s accompanied by a fond smile or an affectionate roll of the eyes. Sometimes it comes with a soft toe to the ribs or a cuff to the back of the head. Once, it had been accompanied by a knife to the thigh, but she’d avoided the femoral artery and hadn’t twisted the knife nearly as much as she’d made it look, and they’d needed to gain the mark’s trust somehow. The guy had been an idiot anyway, a fucking sex-slaver from New Mexico (and it fucking pisses him off when the really bad ones are home-grown, some kind of fucked up sense of patriotism, maybe) and he hadn’t understood either the words or the undercurrent of reassurance and trust she’d placed in them.
So he’s getting used to being called something other than his last name or his code name for the first time in a long time, even if he doesn’t know what it means. He just knows, with the way she says it, it’s something good. Anyway, he trusts her not to call him the other names he’s used to hearing.
Piece of shit.
Worthless fuck.
Goddamn idiot.
Fucking no-good bleeding-heart tattletale.
Yeah. He’s pretty sure it’s not any of those. So whatever it is? Is all right with him.
They’re on a jet over the Atlantic when he finds out what it means. Coulson’s stretched out on a cot in front of them, a bullet wound to the stomach the result of a hitch in an otherwise successful op in the Sudan. He’ll be fine, the medic says. The bullet missed anything vital, and it’s been extracted and Coulson is all sewn up. He’s just sleeping off the meds, and Clint is doing his best not to stare, to hardly even look, really, but Natasha sighs, calls him that name, knocks him affectionately in the arm (which hurts, because she never pulls her punches and she damn well knows there’s a burn there) and gets up to confer with her counterpart on the beta team.
The beta team’s handler, a woman Clint thinks is named Anikin or Anishin or something, is sitting on the other side of Coulson, and looking across at Clint curiously.
“What?” he growls, because Coulson is his handler, okay, and that might not mean as much to some teams as it does to theirs, and he’s not obsessing over the man or anything, he’s just a little worried. Nothing wrong with that.
“She just . . .” the woman starts, and Clint has to readjust his thinking because apparently this isn’t about Coulson at all. “That doesn’t bother you?”
“What doesn’t bother me?”
“That she calls you her little assassin.”
Clint has to laugh. All that time, all these years, and that’s what she’s been calling him? Also, fuck no, it doesn’t bother him. Coming from her, it’s a high compliment. Also, well, behold, he thinks, looking down at his blood covered shirt and tac vest. There’s blood on his shoes too, and probably some brain matter. (He’d had to come down from his perch to resolve the hitch.)
He shrugs. “It fits,” is all he says.
Anikin or whatever her name is looks skeptical, like she can’t quite believe anyone would be okay with just being called that, even if it is the truth. Like she doesn’t understand that being called an affectionate nickname is still a novelty to him. That having someone in his life to want to call him something new, something fond, something just for them is something he’s never had before, and he doesn’t care so much what the actual words are as long as they’re not said in a drunken, hateful voice.
He doesn’t try to explain it to her. He’s honestly not sure he could.
2. Tony Stark
Stark’s the second. He says it in the midst of battle, their first battle, and Clint’s just glad he knows Stark’s talking to him when he says it. There’s not a lot of time between being called Legolas and being swept up into the air, and if he hadn’t understood the nickname, he might not have been prepared. He doesn’t have time then to care, to even really notice the name or the feeling of familiarity it might have once implied. Also, he’s still reeling from Loki, and then, after the battle, from the news about Coulson.
Time passes, and he does his psych evals and Medical can’t find any lingering trace of Loki in his brain and SHIELD has no reason to keep him locked up. He stays in his quarters, mostly, because while SHIELD doesn’t detain him, they also don’t use him. He’s not entirely trusted by the staff, and he can’t blame them, not at all, but he can’t help but think that the one person who might have helped get people on his side isn’t there anymore. Natasha can’t help, because even though she’s proved her loyalty in the past, there are some asshats who just don’t see it. About of quarter of the staff still think she’s a plant, and another quarter think that she’s on their side for now, but that she’ll switch when a better offer comes along.
See? Asshats.
So when Stark comes along with an offer of an apartment in his tower, Clint confers with Natasha and decides to take it, even if Fury says no. (Fury doesn’t hold much sway over him. Scuttlebutt has it that he’s mad at Fury for letting Coulson die, which is bullshit because if anyone’s to blame it’s Clint himself. The truth is that Fury has never pulled his strings. He’d taken orders from Coulson, the only higher-up he’s ever trusted, and the one man he’d known who would sort through the lies and the politics to get to truth of the operation. The only person Clint’s ever trusted to point him at the right target, to tell him to take the shot only when the target truly needed to be taken out. For Coulson, Clint would take have taken the shot on faith alone, on Coulson’s say-so, with no intel to back it up. Coulson had never asked him to.)
Fury doesn’t say no, though, so Clint and Natasha officially move into Stark’s tower when it’s ready. Banner’s already there, greeting them with a head nod and a polite, collective, “Agents.” Thor is back on Asgard, and Rogers is off exploring the twenty-first century, though he moves in about a month later. It’s all “Agent Barton” or just plain “Barton,” with the occasional “Clint” or the Russian version of “my little assassin” from Nat. And then there’s Stark. Stark almost never calls him anything other than some archery-related nickname.
It doesn’t mean anything though. Stark calls everyone some funny nickname or another. Except Natasha, because clearly Stark is a smart man who values his life. Clint would take offense, but it’s just Stark being Stark. And after he meets the man’s best friend Rhodey, who gets called all sorts of embarrassing things, he even realizes it’s some kind of measure of affection from the guy.
So Clint just ignores it when he hears Legolas instead of Barton. There’s also Katniss, Merida, Cupid, Robin Hood (sometimes shortened just to Robin or Rob), William Tell, and even, occasionally, Link. But then one day Stark’s in the kitchen waiting for fresh coffee to finish brewing, and says, “So, Daryl, I’ve got this prototype armor-piercing arrow. We should head down to the range later, see how she flies.”
It’s only the topic that clues Clint in at all that he’s being spoken to, because, seriously, who the fuck is Daryl? “What?”
“Prototype arrow,” Stark repeats. “Goes stabby-stabby. Needs testing. You in?”
“Uh. Sure. Who the fuck- Oh! Oh, no, fuck you, Stark, you did not just compare me to some guy who points a crossbow at things that move at the pace of a snail and pulls a trigger.”
“Wow. I honestly can‘t tell if you’re more upset about the lack of difficulty of the targets or the crossbow thing.”
Clint gnashes his teeth. “It’s not the same thing, okay? Yeah, I can use a crossbow, and yeah my aim’s still better than anyone else’s, but fuck, where’s the fun in that? Load, point, shoot? And the reload time is just atrocious, you’re more likely to get yourself killed fucking around with that than anything. The distance on them isn’t as great as people think, anyway. An experienced archer can shoot just as far with a recurve or a compound. And don’t even get me started on the accuracy.”
Stark holds up his hands. “Easy there, zealot. No more Daryl jokes.” He squints at Clint then, assessing. “Can I call you Apollo instead?”
“The god of archery?” Clint asks with a laugh. “Yeah. You can do that.”
He doesn’t tell Stark that Legolas is still his favorite though.
3. The Hulk/Bruce Banner
They’re in the middle of a battle again, their third, this time against some kind of flying thing that looks like it came straight out of a bad sci-fi movie. Or maybe a D&D card set. It’s not quite a dragon, but that’s the closest thing they can compare it to, so the word sticks. It doesn’t help that Stark’s been calling it Falcor and Smaug and Norbert.
“Norbert was a baby, Stark,” Clint argues over the open channel, because fuck you, Woo, he does too know how to read. “I think this one might be the Horntail.”
“Not the Chinese Fireball?” Tony (it’s been three months now, and sometimes he is Tony, not Stark) snarks back. “Or the Swedish Short-Snout?”
“Hawkeye, Iron Man, focus,” Cap bites out, and Clint knows there’s an extra bit of edge to it because he doesn’t understand what the hell they’re talking about.
“Aw, Captain Antiquated. Don’t get upset just because you don’t get the reference.” Stark zooms by then, his repulsors aimed at the creature’s wings.
It turns suddenly to bite at the nuisance, missing Tony by a foot or two but completing its midair spin by knocking its tail into the building Clint is on. Woo shouts at him to get down, the structural integrity of the building is compromised.
This is why Clint misses Coulson. Because seriously, Woo? The building is crumbling under his feet and he, what? Wasn’t going to notice? “Structural integrity is compromised.” What the fuck. “Building’s coming down” would have been a much more efficient assessment, even if he did need to be told. (That’s not the only reason he misses Coulson, but he’s trying not to think about that.)
Clint makes the leap, already nocking his grappling hook arrow, aiming at the building across the alley. Before he can shoot it though, he gets the air knocked out of him when a giant green hand shoots out to catch him. Hulk obviously doesn’t do things like compensate for gravity, so it’s a pretty jarring landing. Not as jarring as falling another fifteen stories and landing on concrete though, so Clint’s not going to complain.
“Thanks, big guy,” he says when he can talk again. “You’re my buddy.”
“Buddy,” Hulk grunts in agreement, trying out the new word. He smiles that freaky smile of his, then leaps away to rip off one of Puff’s wings at Cap’s command.
After that it doesn’t take long. They’re back at the tower and bickering over dinner ninety minutes later. Clint’s ribs are pretty bruised up thanks to his daring rescue, but they aren’t cracked and they certainly aren’t broken, so he’s calling it a win.
“Thai,” he says, because fuck all if he’s letting Tony bully them into sushi yet again.
“Sushi,” Stark counters.
“Pizza,” Nat commands, because of all of them, she’s the one that eats like a college kid.
“Sushi.”
“Repeating what you want doesn’t win you the argument, Tony,” Cap says with a roll of his eyes. “Anyway, it’s been a while since we’ve done those really good deli sandwiches. How about those?”
All eyes turn to Bruce, who’s sitting in the corner of the couch with his eyes closed, head lolled back. He seems to notice the weight of their stares, because he cracks one eye open to look at them. His gaze shifts to the mug of tea Clint had brought in for him a few minutes ago, and he nods decisively. “Thai.”
Clint crows and jumps up to look for a takeout menu, before he remembers that he lives with Tony Stark now, and things that are printed on paper are scarce. He sits back down and tilts his head back. “Jarvis, can you pull up our last order and repeat that? And make sure to get extra spring rolls. Someone always eats more than her fair share.”
This earns him a poke in his bruised ribs, and Tony tells Jarvis to hold on, the argument for sushi isn’t dead. Steve argues the point, insisting that majority rules, and Clint listens to the ensuing bickering with half an ear. Nat will put a stop to it if it gets out of hand.
He looks over to see if the noise is bothering Bruce at all, but the man just smiles at him when he catches him looking. So Clint grins back and says, “Thanks.”
“No problem, buddy.”
The resultant look of surprise on his face is so comical, Clint can’t help but laugh.
The next time the Hulk emerges though, he looks straight at Clint, says, “Buddy,” and smiles. Then he uproots a tree and throws it at the guy who was about to lob an explosive in Clint’s general direction.
Clint smiles, and nocks an arrow as Iron Man grabs him to take him to higher ground.
4. Thor
Thor comes back, and the tower is suddenly a lot fuller and lot louder than it was. Clint doesn’t mind though. They each have their own floor, with soundproof rooms, so Thor’s general volume only matters when they’re in the common areas together. Plus, he’s a fun guy to have around, and his presence at least means there are always Pop Tarts stocked in the big kitchen. Clint can dig that.
“I do not understand. Why does Tony not call you by your proper names? Does he have a memory problem?”
Clint snorts into his cereal, and Bruce gives a small smile. “Uh, no. He knows our names, Thor. But it isn’t uncommon here on Earth-Midgard-to affectionately label friends and loved ones with nicknames. Something just for two people, or a group of people, to call each other. Tony is just a little more enthusiastic about it than most people.”
Clint snorts again, because that’s an understatement if ever he’s heard one.
“And what are these nicknames based on?” Thor asks.
“Well, Tony seems to base a lot of his on pop culture references. Books and movies and the like. There are also standard nicknames that a lot of people use, though usually those are for romantic partners. Things like honey, or sweetheart.”
“Or pookie,” Clint interrupts, just to be obnoxious. “Or maybe schnookums.”
Bruce laughs a little, shaking his head. “Don’t give him ideas. Anyway, you can also shorten or lengthen people’s names. Like how Clint calls Natasha ‘Nat.’”
“But I don’t suggest you try it,” Clint warns. “Natasha isn’t too fond of nicknames. I only get a pass because of our history.”
Thor nods seriously. “I shall have to consider this carefully. It would be unjust to bestow ill-fitting names upon my fellow warriors.”
“Don’t worry about it,” Clint tells him. “Usually nicknames happen naturally. If you ever want to call me something other than Barton or Clint or Hawkeye, that’s fine, as long as it isn’t mean-spirited. But you don’t have to, either. It’s not like I’m gonna think you don’t like me if you just use my name.”
“But this is something friends do, is it not? And there is no greater friendship than that of those who have fought together. Worry not, dear friends,” he says, clapping Clint on the back with a great blow. “I shall have appropriate names of affection for you all quite soon!”
Clint not so subtly gags on his cereal, trying to dislodge it from his throat.
It’s after their next fight that Thor drops the moniker he’s chosen for Clint. It’s a giant squid this time, down at the harbor, and Thor totally electrocutes it with lightening. (“Sushi tonight!” Tony sings as it goes down, only to be met with a resounding chorus of “No!”)
“Heart of Coal!” Thor booms when Clint joins them at the SHIELD vans. He’s not even wet, which Clint thinks is totally unfair, given that he and Nat look like a pair of drowned rats.
“Heart of Coal?” Clint repeats, puzzled. “Like, hard, black and burning?”
“What?” Thor asks, but then his face clears. “No, not coal, the energy source. Coul. Son of Coul.”
Clint immediately wipes his face blank and turns away. He doesn’t exactly stomp over to the squid’s body to retrieve his arrows, but it’s a near thing. His body is tight, footsteps heavy, and he pulls each arrow free with a vicious and satisfying squelching sound.
He’s still wearing his earpiece, so he hears Thor when he asks in a disappointed voice, “Was that not a noble and apt nickname?”
He stops what he’s doing to dig at the comm in his ear, but he’s not fast enough to avoid Natasha’s quiet response. “A little too apt, maybe.”
He doesn’t hear what else she might say, or if any of the others were still on the open line to hear it. He just shoves the damned thing into one of his pockets and goes on collecting arrows.
Squelch.
5. Steve Rogers
“Agent Barton.”
“Yeah?” Clint looks up at the place he suspects Jarvis’s hidden camera is. He doesn’t want to be disturbed, and he’s hoping the AI can read facial cues.
“Captain Rogers is requesting access to your floor.”
Clint frowns, but nods. He may as well get this over with. “Let him in.”
The elevator door slides open, and there’s Steve, looking nervous and concerned and all too much like the hero he is. He’s in khakis and plaid again, no uniform, but he still has that stupid out-of-style hair, and probably out-of-date sensibilities too. Clint stands to meet him, because fuck if he’s going to be caught flat-footed.
But Steve doesn’t start with an accusation, or even a question. All he says is, “I had no idea.”
Clint’s shoulders relax, slump a little even. He shakes his head, then sits back down on the couch, waving at Cap to take the chair. “It wasn’t . . . We weren’t together. I don’t even know if he wanted that. If he was even . . .”
“Gay?”
Clint’s eyes snap to Steve’s face, but the only thing he sees there is concern, and maybe some mild grief. He nods. “Coulson played his cards really close to the chest, you know? I knew more about him than a lot of people did, but in some ways I don’t think I knew him at all. I always figured there’d be time. Stupid, right? In our line of work, that’s just stupid.”
Steve doesn’t say anything for a long moment, and when Clint looks, there’s definite grief in his expression. “When I was, uh, in the war, there was this dame. Sorry,” he corrects himself with a wince. “Girl. Peggy. And we talked about what we’d do after the war. The date we’d go on. Then, well. You know the story. Hydra, plane, ice. Never did get that dance.”
Clint doesn’t know what to say. If someone had ever told him he’d be having a heart-to-heart with Captain fucking America, he’d probably have shot them in the mouth. Coulson would have gotten such a kick out of this. He’d probably also have known what to say. “Well. Okay. So you get it. I mean, we didn’t talk about it or anything, but yeah. Sometimes it felt like maybe? Maybe we were kind of getting somewhere? Like, dancing around the edges of something.”
“And maybe that’s worse, because now you’re stuck wondering if there was really something there, or if it was all just wishful thinking and imagination.”
“Exactly.” Clint picks at the label of his beer. Just the one, of course, because the Avengers are basically on call twenty-four/seven, and he doesn’t like what being drunk does to his eyesight or his hands anyway. “You want one?” he asks belatedly.
“Sure.”
Clint gets up to fetch another bottle from the fridge. He knows Steve can’t get drunk, and he has a feeling he’d accepted more out of a sense of comradery than actual thirst or desire. But Clint will take what he can fucking get right now. At least it’s not fucking Tony banging down his door.
He returns and hands the bottle off, reclaiming his seat on the couch. “And you’re, uh. Okay with this?”
“With beer?” Steve asks, and shit, he’s being deliberately obtuse.
Clint sends him a look. “With me.”
Steve smiles at him and takes a sip. “I’ve been in this century for a while now. Long enough to know that most places have made great strides in this area. Anyway, I’m not sure I had a problem with it back then, really. I mean, I didn’t think much about it, either way. Now that it’s more of a public issue, I’ve had to figure out my feelings about it. And no, it doesn’t bother me. You don’t choose love, right? It chooses you.”
“That’s . . . surprisingly enlightened of you, Cap. For an Army boy.” Clint gives him a wicked grin, shows he’s teasing.
“You flyboys are all the same,” Steve returns just as easily.
“Hey, I’m no Air Force drone.”
“Neither was Howard. He was still a good pilot. So, yeah, when I say flyboy, I don’t mean Air Force. I mean cocksure, mouthy aces.”
Clint’s never been good at accepting compliments, but he makes sure not to duck his head. He just flashes a “cocksure” grin and says, “Well, as long as you recognize.”
Steve laughs. “Recognize your skills? Or your smart mouth? Hard to miss either of them, really.”
Clint just scrunches up his face in acknowledgment and takes the last sip of his beer. He doesn’t mind so much now, that he can’t have another. Steve has helped, more than Clint would have thought possible. “Thanks, Cap,” he says after another moment has gone by.
“Any time, flyboy.”
+1. Phil Coulson
They’re all there, crowded into a room in some top secret facility even Natasha hadn’t known existed. Coulson is there, in a bed, wires and tubes everywhere, and he looks terrible. Pale and small, no command left in his slack body. Jesus fuck, he looks awful.
Clint thinks he’s the most goddamn beautiful thing he’s ever seen.
Months. It’s been months. Five months of thinking this man was dead, was gone, was never coming back. Fury was a fucking scheming prick, with a Machiavellian bent to him. Clint would be having it out with him later, if Nat didn’t get there first. Fuck, even Tony had gone for it, advancing on the Director before Steve had tugged him back.
But then the call had come through, that the patient had been responsive, had awakened, had checked on the status of the battle he clearly thought was recent. Fury had repeated all that for them to hear, but then he’d gone quiet, his eyes on Clint, then Natasha. Clint had tensed, but when he’d hung up the phone, Fury looked back to him and said, “He asked for you.”
Clint had known that Fury meant the both of them, or maybe even all of them. Coulson hadn’t asked for Clint specifically. He’d wanted his team. His assets. Even his friends. Whatever. Given that Coulson was alive, was there, Clint would be more than happy with any or all of those statuses.
And now they’re all there, in his room, waiting tensely because as alive as Coulson might be, he’s still recovering, and he’d fallen back to sleep before they’d arrived. It’s been over two hours, but no one’s leaving, and no one’s talking. Clint has one of the chairs, pushed right up to the bed. Nat’s in the other one, right next to him. Tony’s leaning against a wall, pretending to be aloof, and Thor stands in the doorway, an immovable guard. Bruce is on a stool, Coulson’s chart in his hands, though he must have finished reading it a long time ago. Steve is alternating between pacing by Coulson’s bed and standing at the foot of it, and Clint wants to tell him to stop, to sit, to just be still, but he can’t. He can’t find any words right now, for anything he wants to say.
There’s a change in one of the monitors by Coulson’s bed, and Clint doesn’t know what it means, but it doesn’t sound too alarming. He sits up though, body on alert, just in case. There’s a slight rustling, and Coulson’s hand twitches. Clint absolutely does not reach for it. Instead, he fists his hand in the thin blanket at the edge of the bed.
There’s more movement then, and everyone notices. Remarkably, it’s Tony who gets to the bed first, leaning over Coulson, looking for new signs of life.
“I’ve died, right?” Coulson says before any of them even notice that his eyes are open. “I’ve died and this is hell, because I’m being greeted by Stark.”
There’s a collective sigh of relief, of released tension. “Not hell, Agent Coulson,” Tony says. “A face this pretty can only belong in heaven.”
“Alternatively, you’re alive and on Earth, and Tony was actually worried about you,” Bruce suggests as he approaches the bed, chart in hand.
Coulson’s eyes focus on him, track his movements. “Dr. Banner? Thor.” He seems confused, tired and drugged up, unable to gather his thoughts. “And Captain Rogers. I didn’t want . . . I asked for . . .”
“We’re here, Coulson,” Natasha says, her voice soft. She puts a hand on his, just for a moment, just enough to get his attention. “We’re both here.”
He struggles to turn his head, eyes landing on Natasha first, and then he sees Clint. Clint offers him a smile. It’s all he can do. His tongue still isn’t working and it doesn’t even feel like he can breathe right now. Coulson doesn’t look away so Clint holds his gaze, trying to reassure him that he’s there, that he’s fine, he’s fixed, no more Loki in his brain. In his peripheral vision, he sees Coulson’s hand twitch again, and this time he can’t stop himself from taking it.
Cold fingers spasm against his, and Coulson licks his lips, his throat working. Finally he opens his mouth, and Clint thinks he’s going to hear his name, thinks Coulson will say, “Barton, report,” in that way that Clint had thought he’d never hear again. He waits for it, wants to hear it, will get on his knees and weep for joy if he does.
What he gets is so much better.
“Clint.”
He slides to his knees. He doesn’t weep, but it’s a near thing.