Fic: Welcome to the Family [Avengers]
Title: Welcome to the Family
Fandom: The Avengers (film)
Pairing: Phil/Clint, Ororo/Kurt
Rating: PG
Summary: Ororo's coming home for a visit, and she's bringing a boy.
A/N: Just a fluffy little thing inspired by
coffeesuperhero's Phil Coulson: Family Man series. No angst, just love. <3
This is it. This is the day that Phil has lived in terror of for the last twelve years. More than the hug goodbye outside the gates of Xavier’s school, more than the inevitable announcement that she’d decided to follow in her fathers’ footsteps and become a hero with the absurdly named X-Men. No, today is worse. Today, Phil’s stomach is in the kind of knots he used to get on rough missions, the ones that called for a blackout on comms and he had to spend minutes, hours, days waiting for Clint to check in.
Today, Ororo is coming home for a visit, and she’s bringing a boy.
“Which do you think is more threatening?” Clint holds up two arrow heads for his inspection. “The explosive round is nice and scary, but it doesn’t look like much. The grappling one won’t do a lot of damage, but it’s got these wicked little barbs.”
“Put out both. Shows adaptability.” Phil doesn’t think there are many things that can intimidate one of Xavier’s X-Men, but he’s betting that two former Avengers being protective of their only child will make the boy think twice, at the very least.
“Fury met the kid,” Clint remarks. “Says he’s nice.”
Phil hums, unconvinced. Nice is fine for other men’s daughters, but nice won’t watch her back in a pitched battle or stand fast when she calls up a hurricane out of blue skies. Phil hopes the kid is nice, obviously, that he’s kind and good and treats Ororo like the queen she is, but Phil hopes there’s a lot more to him than just plain nice.
Clint has his gear scattered across the kitchen table, arrows, guns, knives, and the pieces of a hybrid bow that he’s in the process of rebuilding. They have a rule about weapons in the kitchen, and Phil does think it’s a bit heavy-handed. Still, he knows that it’s not entirely to do with scarring Ororo’s boyfriend. Clint is just as anxious about this as Phil is, and tinkering with lethal tools is how Clint soothes his nerves.
They were going to throw a surprise party, let this boy meet the whole family all at once, but Ororo saw that one coming and made them swear on Steve’s shield that they will keep Tony and Thor away until he at least has a chance to unpack. Natasha isn’t allowed anywhere near him for the foreseeable future.
“We could have gone to get her,” Clint says for the fifty-third time that week. “Don’t see why they had to drive.”
“She has her own car,” Phil reminds him for the forty-seventh time, “and she’s a good driver.”
“She drives like you. That is the opposite of good.”
Suddenly, Phil hears the sound he’s been waiting for all day: the crunch of tires in the driveway. He and Clint share a look, and Phil suddenly starts thinking of all the ways this could go horribly wrong.
What if they scare the boy off and Ororo won’t forgive them? What if they argue and Ororo has to choose a side? What if he doesn’t like that her parents are both men? What if he doesn’t like that her parents are both S.H.I.E.L.D. agents? What if Clint likes him and Phil doesn’t? What if he doesn’t like either of them?
“Are you freaking out a little?” Clint asks. “Because I’m freaking out a little.”
“Maybe a little,” Phil admits. “But I’m sure it’ll be fine.”
Clint gives him a dubious look and heads for the door. Phil follows behind him, and it’s an amazing thing, he thinks, to watch all the tension and nerves evaporate off of Clint’s shoulders as Ororo gives a shriek of delight and flings herself into his arms.
“Excuse me, miss,” Clint says, laughing. “Have you seen my daughter? She’s about this tall and way too young to drive.”
Ororo grins and punches him in the shoulder. “You’re hilarious.”
“Yes. Yes I am.”
She sees Phil, and her smile widens. “Hey, dad,” she says, pushing past Clint to give Phil a kiss on the cheek.
“Hey, yourself.” He gives her a tight hug and remembers a frightened little girl with stormy eyes huddled in the rain-soaked ruins of a city block.
The boy is hanging back, smiling politely, but Phil sees the wary envy of someone who has never had a family suddenly thrust into the middle of someone else’s. He knows that look, knows that feeling.
Clint must see it, too, because he offers the boy a friendly hand and his brightest grin. “You must be Kurt.”
“Ya. Hello. You are mister Hawkeye?” He’s nervous, and his tail - which is much more distracting than Phil anticipated - is twitching back and forth behind him. Phil can’t blame him, though. Getting sized up by a founding member of the Avengers would make anyone a little flustered.
And Clint’s definitely sizing him up, however friendly he might sound. “It’s Clint. No codenames in the house.”
“Or experimental technology,” Phil adds, and Ororo gives him a dirty look
“I will leave my time travel device in the car, then,” Kurt deadpans, still smiling pleasantly.
Clint makes a face. “Don’t even joke. There’s a reason we never let Tony babysit.”
“That was one time, and he said he was sorry,” Ororo points out.
“You were nine, and he shouldn’t have had irradiated materials in our dining room.”
They go into the house, still bickering, leaving Phil and Kurt to trail after them in bemusement.
“Are there any more rules I should be aware of?” Kurt asks, and Phil thinks he might not be joking.
“No weapons in the kitchen. All doors and windows remain locked at all times. The security system is armed at night and at any time when the house is empty or someone is here alone. No one is allowed access to the house until they’ve cleared a background check. There is a box of toaster waffles in the freezer. They are Clint’s. Do not touch them.” He fixes Kurt with a serious look. “We are both highly trained government agents, and don’t, for one second, think that age, parenthood, or other occupations have made that any less the case.”
Kurt swallows, yellow eyes wide. Phil gives him a bland smile and gestures into the house.
“Shall we?”
Dinner passes without incident, and the conversation consists mostly of polite questions and the kids talking about their “X-training”. Phil resolves himself not to roll his eyes every time an “X” is amended to something. After a while, Clint - on the tail end of a few beers, which he shares with Ororo when he thinks Phil isn’t looking - is delighted to learn that he and Kurt share a common history in circus performance, and the discussion turns to acrobatic techniques and their application in close combat.
Phil wants to be pleased that they’re getting along, wants to tease them for talking shop at the table, but he can never forget that Clint’s time in the circus began in tragedy and ended with him betrayed, abandoned, and left for dead. He manages to share a long-suffering look with Ororo before he starts collecting the dishes.
“I like him,” Clint whispers, a little louder than necessary, as he sorts out the leftovers. Ororo is giving Kurt the five-cent tour, and they can hear her telling the story of The Day The Avengers Built A Duck Pond In The Back Yard.
“I can tell.” Phil doesn’t make the observation that there is a point of intoxication at which Clint is overly fond of everyone.
Clint frowns at him, blue eyes sharp despite the alcohol. “You don’t like him.”
“I don’t know him.” Clint is still frowning at him, and Phil sighs. “He seems like a good kid, and I’m glad you’re getting along. I just haven’t made up my mind, yet.”
Clint nods. This much, he knows, Clint will understand. Raising an eyebrow, Clint gives him a sly look. “Seem to remember you taking a while to warm up to me, too.”
“Oh, I warmed up fine,” Phil replies, pushing down a smile. “Usually with anger.”
Clint laughs, bright and clear, and sidles closer, leaning against the counter next to Phil. “Sure. ‘Til I found other ways to get you hot.”
His hand drags across Phil’s stomach, pulling at the folds where the shirt is tucked into his trousers. Phil stays perfectly still, breathing evenly, and keeps right on rinsing dishes even as heat and promises uncoil in his skin. “Agent Barton, you are drunk.”
“Not so drunk that I can’t perform my duty, sir,” Clint says, leaning in, his breath scorching on Phil’s ear. “Of course, maybe you should put me to bed, just to be sure.”
Phil will never get used to the way Clint kisses, swift and sure, zeroing in on all the places in Phil’s mouth that raise his pulse and shorten his breath. Even now, even after years of knowing that he will be kissed this way for the rest of his life, it still takes Phil by surprise, and he’ll be forgiven, he thinks, if he can’t help but compare it to an arrow through the heart.
He knows they’re there before Ororo clears her throat. Clint does, too, but neither of them rushes to pull away. They’ve earned the right to kiss slowly, and Ororo is long past the age of being horrified by their affection.
“Yes, dear?” Phil asks mildly, turning to find Ororo smirking at them and Kurt twitching uncomfortably beside her.
“Do you guys need another minute? ‘Cause we can wait,” she says, grinning.
Clint winks and tucks his chin into Phil’s shoulder. “Oh, we’re gonna need more than a minute.”
Phil rolls his eyes, and Ororo huffs. “Okay, awkward.”
Kurt just stares at his feet, and the embarrassment rolling off of him is almost palpable.
Clint grins like he’s accomplished his mission and gives Phil a wet kiss on the cheek. “Settled in alright?” he asks Ororo.
“Just about,” she says, smiling at Kurt. “The armory’s locked, though, and I can’t find the key.”
Clint smacks himself lightly on the forehead. “That’s because I forgot to put it back. Meant to get all that done before you got here. Crap. C’mon, I’ll get it for you.”
Ororo follows him out of the kitchen, once again leaving Phil and Kurt to stand in their wake.
After a moment, Kurt clears his throat. “Please, may I ask... this armory? I don’t understand.”
“It’s the linen closet,” Phil explains. “Clint always called it the armory because the cleaning supplies were his, quote-unquote, weapons in the war against domestic chaos.”
Kurt laughs. “I see. Very clever.”
“There’s also a small weapons cache in there,” Phil adds. “Which is why it stays locked.”
“I... see,” Kurt repeats. “May I, um, help with the dishes?”
Phil hands him a towel.
They spend several minutes cleaning in companionable silence, and Phil is just starting to think that maybe this isn’t so awkward after all, when Kurt says suddenly, “It must have been... difficult.”
Phil knows that the tightening of his nerves doesn’t show. He has forty plus years of training and experience to make sure that it doesn’t. “What’s that?”
“This life. Having this family and always in such danger.” Kurt is very intently drying the plate in his hand. “To keep your guns beside your daughter’s bed sheets. I think this would be hard.”
Phil thinks about the addendum clause in his will, detailing Ororo’s future should anything happen to he and Clint. He thinks about the household rules and about the one time in twelve years that Clint had come home to find the security system disarmed and the house empty. He thinks about a frightened little girl with stormy eyes and the moment that I need you don’t leave me became We need you don’t leave us.
“It was,” he says. “It is.”
He thinks about Thor summoning the power of thunder to make Ororo a duck pond and Tony applying all his genius to creating the world’s most perfect bicycle. He thinks about Steve teaching her to throw a frisbee and Natasha teaching her to dance and Bruce helping with her homework.
He doesn’t want to talk about this, not with Kurt, not with a stranger who doesn’t technically have the security clearance to know that Phil and Clint even have a daughter. Even so, he finds himself saying, “We look out for each other, though. We all do.” He gives Kurt a pointed look and adds, “Ororo can look out for herself, too.”
Kurt laughs. “Yes, I have seen her. I think maybe she has learned from the best?”
Phil raises an eyebrow, but Kurt just smiles innocently back. “Flattery might get in you in with Clint,” Phil warns, “but it won’t get you anywhere with me.”
“Ah. Perhaps I will go talk to him, then.”
“Be my guest.” Phil gestures toward the door. “If you can get a word in edgewise.”
The dishwater is matting down the fur on Kurt’s arms, and Phil really should have thought to give him gloves. Kurt doesn’t seem to notice, though, just rinses and dries every dish, his tail curling lazily behind him. Phil’s almost starting to get used to it.
“I don’t mind. He’s very interesting,” Kurt says. “This is where Ororo gets her sense of humor?”
“Unfortunately, yes. And her charm, stubbornness, and unsettling propensity for practical jokes.” Phil looks over his shoulder to make sure they aren’t close by and tells Kurt quietly, “Check your bed for rubber spiders and caustic chemicals before you go to sleep.”
“I... yes. Thank you. I will.” Kurt follows Phil’s example, checking that they aren’t being overheard. “What should I do if I find them? Is there a... what would you say? Retaliation protocol?”
Insight into interpersonal dynamics, adaptability, flawless manners, and now strategic thinking and preparation. This boy is nice, to be sure, but maybe there’s more to him, after all.
“Sleep somewhere else,” Phil says. “Apprise me of the situation in the morning, and we can discuss a counter strategy. I’ve had a lot of practice fending off their attacks.”
Kurt grins. “I am sure, yes. Thank you.”
Phil gives him a smile and passes him a handful of silverware. “Welcome to the family.”
Fandom: The Avengers (film)
Pairing: Phil/Clint, Ororo/Kurt
Rating: PG
Summary: Ororo's coming home for a visit, and she's bringing a boy.
A/N: Just a fluffy little thing inspired by
coffeesuperhero's Phil Coulson: Family Man series. No angst, just love. <3
This is it. This is the day that Phil has lived in terror of for the last twelve years. More than the hug goodbye outside the gates of Xavier’s school, more than the inevitable announcement that she’d decided to follow in her fathers’ footsteps and become a hero with the absurdly named X-Men. No, today is worse. Today, Phil’s stomach is in the kind of knots he used to get on rough missions, the ones that called for a blackout on comms and he had to spend minutes, hours, days waiting for Clint to check in.
Today, Ororo is coming home for a visit, and she’s bringing a boy.
“Which do you think is more threatening?” Clint holds up two arrow heads for his inspection. “The explosive round is nice and scary, but it doesn’t look like much. The grappling one won’t do a lot of damage, but it’s got these wicked little barbs.”
“Put out both. Shows adaptability.” Phil doesn’t think there are many things that can intimidate one of Xavier’s X-Men, but he’s betting that two former Avengers being protective of their only child will make the boy think twice, at the very least.
“Fury met the kid,” Clint remarks. “Says he’s nice.”
Phil hums, unconvinced. Nice is fine for other men’s daughters, but nice won’t watch her back in a pitched battle or stand fast when she calls up a hurricane out of blue skies. Phil hopes the kid is nice, obviously, that he’s kind and good and treats Ororo like the queen she is, but Phil hopes there’s a lot more to him than just plain nice.
Clint has his gear scattered across the kitchen table, arrows, guns, knives, and the pieces of a hybrid bow that he’s in the process of rebuilding. They have a rule about weapons in the kitchen, and Phil does think it’s a bit heavy-handed. Still, he knows that it’s not entirely to do with scarring Ororo’s boyfriend. Clint is just as anxious about this as Phil is, and tinkering with lethal tools is how Clint soothes his nerves.
They were going to throw a surprise party, let this boy meet the whole family all at once, but Ororo saw that one coming and made them swear on Steve’s shield that they will keep Tony and Thor away until he at least has a chance to unpack. Natasha isn’t allowed anywhere near him for the foreseeable future.
“We could have gone to get her,” Clint says for the fifty-third time that week. “Don’t see why they had to drive.”
“She has her own car,” Phil reminds him for the forty-seventh time, “and she’s a good driver.”
“She drives like you. That is the opposite of good.”
Suddenly, Phil hears the sound he’s been waiting for all day: the crunch of tires in the driveway. He and Clint share a look, and Phil suddenly starts thinking of all the ways this could go horribly wrong.
What if they scare the boy off and Ororo won’t forgive them? What if they argue and Ororo has to choose a side? What if he doesn’t like that her parents are both men? What if he doesn’t like that her parents are both S.H.I.E.L.D. agents? What if Clint likes him and Phil doesn’t? What if he doesn’t like either of them?
“Are you freaking out a little?” Clint asks. “Because I’m freaking out a little.”
“Maybe a little,” Phil admits. “But I’m sure it’ll be fine.”
Clint gives him a dubious look and heads for the door. Phil follows behind him, and it’s an amazing thing, he thinks, to watch all the tension and nerves evaporate off of Clint’s shoulders as Ororo gives a shriek of delight and flings herself into his arms.
“Excuse me, miss,” Clint says, laughing. “Have you seen my daughter? She’s about this tall and way too young to drive.”
Ororo grins and punches him in the shoulder. “You’re hilarious.”
“Yes. Yes I am.”
She sees Phil, and her smile widens. “Hey, dad,” she says, pushing past Clint to give Phil a kiss on the cheek.
“Hey, yourself.” He gives her a tight hug and remembers a frightened little girl with stormy eyes huddled in the rain-soaked ruins of a city block.
The boy is hanging back, smiling politely, but Phil sees the wary envy of someone who has never had a family suddenly thrust into the middle of someone else’s. He knows that look, knows that feeling.
Clint must see it, too, because he offers the boy a friendly hand and his brightest grin. “You must be Kurt.”
“Ya. Hello. You are mister Hawkeye?” He’s nervous, and his tail - which is much more distracting than Phil anticipated - is twitching back and forth behind him. Phil can’t blame him, though. Getting sized up by a founding member of the Avengers would make anyone a little flustered.
And Clint’s definitely sizing him up, however friendly he might sound. “It’s Clint. No codenames in the house.”
“Or experimental technology,” Phil adds, and Ororo gives him a dirty look
“I will leave my time travel device in the car, then,” Kurt deadpans, still smiling pleasantly.
Clint makes a face. “Don’t even joke. There’s a reason we never let Tony babysit.”
“That was one time, and he said he was sorry,” Ororo points out.
“You were nine, and he shouldn’t have had irradiated materials in our dining room.”
They go into the house, still bickering, leaving Phil and Kurt to trail after them in bemusement.
“Are there any more rules I should be aware of?” Kurt asks, and Phil thinks he might not be joking.
“No weapons in the kitchen. All doors and windows remain locked at all times. The security system is armed at night and at any time when the house is empty or someone is here alone. No one is allowed access to the house until they’ve cleared a background check. There is a box of toaster waffles in the freezer. They are Clint’s. Do not touch them.” He fixes Kurt with a serious look. “We are both highly trained government agents, and don’t, for one second, think that age, parenthood, or other occupations have made that any less the case.”
Kurt swallows, yellow eyes wide. Phil gives him a bland smile and gestures into the house.
“Shall we?”
Dinner passes without incident, and the conversation consists mostly of polite questions and the kids talking about their “X-training”. Phil resolves himself not to roll his eyes every time an “X” is amended to something. After a while, Clint - on the tail end of a few beers, which he shares with Ororo when he thinks Phil isn’t looking - is delighted to learn that he and Kurt share a common history in circus performance, and the discussion turns to acrobatic techniques and their application in close combat.
Phil wants to be pleased that they’re getting along, wants to tease them for talking shop at the table, but he can never forget that Clint’s time in the circus began in tragedy and ended with him betrayed, abandoned, and left for dead. He manages to share a long-suffering look with Ororo before he starts collecting the dishes.
“I like him,” Clint whispers, a little louder than necessary, as he sorts out the leftovers. Ororo is giving Kurt the five-cent tour, and they can hear her telling the story of The Day The Avengers Built A Duck Pond In The Back Yard.
“I can tell.” Phil doesn’t make the observation that there is a point of intoxication at which Clint is overly fond of everyone.
Clint frowns at him, blue eyes sharp despite the alcohol. “You don’t like him.”
“I don’t know him.” Clint is still frowning at him, and Phil sighs. “He seems like a good kid, and I’m glad you’re getting along. I just haven’t made up my mind, yet.”
Clint nods. This much, he knows, Clint will understand. Raising an eyebrow, Clint gives him a sly look. “Seem to remember you taking a while to warm up to me, too.”
“Oh, I warmed up fine,” Phil replies, pushing down a smile. “Usually with anger.”
Clint laughs, bright and clear, and sidles closer, leaning against the counter next to Phil. “Sure. ‘Til I found other ways to get you hot.”
His hand drags across Phil’s stomach, pulling at the folds where the shirt is tucked into his trousers. Phil stays perfectly still, breathing evenly, and keeps right on rinsing dishes even as heat and promises uncoil in his skin. “Agent Barton, you are drunk.”
“Not so drunk that I can’t perform my duty, sir,” Clint says, leaning in, his breath scorching on Phil’s ear. “Of course, maybe you should put me to bed, just to be sure.”
Phil will never get used to the way Clint kisses, swift and sure, zeroing in on all the places in Phil’s mouth that raise his pulse and shorten his breath. Even now, even after years of knowing that he will be kissed this way for the rest of his life, it still takes Phil by surprise, and he’ll be forgiven, he thinks, if he can’t help but compare it to an arrow through the heart.
He knows they’re there before Ororo clears her throat. Clint does, too, but neither of them rushes to pull away. They’ve earned the right to kiss slowly, and Ororo is long past the age of being horrified by their affection.
“Yes, dear?” Phil asks mildly, turning to find Ororo smirking at them and Kurt twitching uncomfortably beside her.
“Do you guys need another minute? ‘Cause we can wait,” she says, grinning.
Clint winks and tucks his chin into Phil’s shoulder. “Oh, we’re gonna need more than a minute.”
Phil rolls his eyes, and Ororo huffs. “Okay, awkward.”
Kurt just stares at his feet, and the embarrassment rolling off of him is almost palpable.
Clint grins like he’s accomplished his mission and gives Phil a wet kiss on the cheek. “Settled in alright?” he asks Ororo.
“Just about,” she says, smiling at Kurt. “The armory’s locked, though, and I can’t find the key.”
Clint smacks himself lightly on the forehead. “That’s because I forgot to put it back. Meant to get all that done before you got here. Crap. C’mon, I’ll get it for you.”
Ororo follows him out of the kitchen, once again leaving Phil and Kurt to stand in their wake.
After a moment, Kurt clears his throat. “Please, may I ask... this armory? I don’t understand.”
“It’s the linen closet,” Phil explains. “Clint always called it the armory because the cleaning supplies were his, quote-unquote, weapons in the war against domestic chaos.”
Kurt laughs. “I see. Very clever.”
“There’s also a small weapons cache in there,” Phil adds. “Which is why it stays locked.”
“I... see,” Kurt repeats. “May I, um, help with the dishes?”
Phil hands him a towel.
They spend several minutes cleaning in companionable silence, and Phil is just starting to think that maybe this isn’t so awkward after all, when Kurt says suddenly, “It must have been... difficult.”
Phil knows that the tightening of his nerves doesn’t show. He has forty plus years of training and experience to make sure that it doesn’t. “What’s that?”
“This life. Having this family and always in such danger.” Kurt is very intently drying the plate in his hand. “To keep your guns beside your daughter’s bed sheets. I think this would be hard.”
Phil thinks about the addendum clause in his will, detailing Ororo’s future should anything happen to he and Clint. He thinks about the household rules and about the one time in twelve years that Clint had come home to find the security system disarmed and the house empty. He thinks about a frightened little girl with stormy eyes and the moment that I need you don’t leave me became We need you don’t leave us.
“It was,” he says. “It is.”
He thinks about Thor summoning the power of thunder to make Ororo a duck pond and Tony applying all his genius to creating the world’s most perfect bicycle. He thinks about Steve teaching her to throw a frisbee and Natasha teaching her to dance and Bruce helping with her homework.
He doesn’t want to talk about this, not with Kurt, not with a stranger who doesn’t technically have the security clearance to know that Phil and Clint even have a daughter. Even so, he finds himself saying, “We look out for each other, though. We all do.” He gives Kurt a pointed look and adds, “Ororo can look out for herself, too.”
Kurt laughs. “Yes, I have seen her. I think maybe she has learned from the best?”
Phil raises an eyebrow, but Kurt just smiles innocently back. “Flattery might get in you in with Clint,” Phil warns, “but it won’t get you anywhere with me.”
“Ah. Perhaps I will go talk to him, then.”
“Be my guest.” Phil gestures toward the door. “If you can get a word in edgewise.”
The dishwater is matting down the fur on Kurt’s arms, and Phil really should have thought to give him gloves. Kurt doesn’t seem to notice, though, just rinses and dries every dish, his tail curling lazily behind him. Phil’s almost starting to get used to it.
“I don’t mind. He’s very interesting,” Kurt says. “This is where Ororo gets her sense of humor?”
“Unfortunately, yes. And her charm, stubbornness, and unsettling propensity for practical jokes.” Phil looks over his shoulder to make sure they aren’t close by and tells Kurt quietly, “Check your bed for rubber spiders and caustic chemicals before you go to sleep.”
“I... yes. Thank you. I will.” Kurt follows Phil’s example, checking that they aren’t being overheard. “What should I do if I find them? Is there a... what would you say? Retaliation protocol?”
Insight into interpersonal dynamics, adaptability, flawless manners, and now strategic thinking and preparation. This boy is nice, to be sure, but maybe there’s more to him, after all.
“Sleep somewhere else,” Phil says. “Apprise me of the situation in the morning, and we can discuss a counter strategy. I’ve had a lot of practice fending off their attacks.”
Kurt grins. “I am sure, yes. Thank you.”
Phil gives him a smile and passes him a handful of silverware. “Welcome to the family.”