Work Text:
The woman is crying. She holds out her hands beseechingly, makeup smeared by her tears. Hawkeye looks coolly at her. He knows that Stark is planning something, and he knows staying risks his death. But…
“My son!” she sobs. “He was in the market!”
She points, and his eyes follow her finger. She points to a pile of rubble, and Clint knows he cannot just leave a civilian.
He even sees someone shifting in the concrete and he sighs, running off the carrier.
He reaches the boy, and although the child bears little resemblance to his own son, he still finds himself reminded of him.
He flashes the little boy, who cannot be more than seven years old, a smile. He pulls the child into his arms, carrying him close to his own chest.
He glances around, and he sees nothing. He foolishly believes that he sees everything.
He races into the street, making sure not to let the kid slip.
He hears something. He looks up, and sees a ship in the sky. It looks like a quinjet. He keeps going.
It is not a quinjet. Ultron is in the pilot’s chair, and Clint hears the bullets before he has a chance to see them.
He cannot escape in time. He knows this.
The boy cringes in his arms and he knows he has to protect the boy.
He hunches over the child, shielding the boy with his own body.
He is going to die. He feels his heartbeat growing rapidly faster. He is going to die and leave his wife, his kids. They will grow up without him. Because he was saving another man’s child.
Bullets slam into the ground, but they’re not hitting him. He tenses, and suddenly feels something powerful ramming into his side. His brain panics and he thinks he has been shot, and he stays tense as the bullets keep slamming into the concrete beside him and-
Wait a minute.
His eyes open slowly.
Pietro. No more than a teenager, and there he was. Standing over him, smiling. Body riddled with bullet holes.
He stares at Pietro, hoping hoping hoping that his abilities can keep him alive.
“I bet you did not see that coming,” Pietro says with a smirk, before he collapses onto the concrete street.
Clint rushes to his side, setting the boy down and hands feeling for a pulse at Pietro’s wrist.
Nothing.
He says nothing. The boy stares, eyes wide and frightened.
Then the little boy’s lips part, and the words come in a hissing whisper. “It’s your fault!”
He reels back in shock. “What?”
The boy’s eyes narrow. The child grows much taller, until he is towering over Clint. The hair grows longer. The face changes.
Wanda Maximoff is now the one standing over him, eyes glowing red and burning with anger.
Anger at him, he realizes.
“It should have been you!” she says, voice tight and cold and so, so angry.
“I’m sorry,” he offers. He is. He liked the boy. He liked Pietro.
“It’s your fault that my brother is dead!”
Her voice grows deeper, and she repeats this statement over and over, voice echoing. It blurs together, until all he can hear is your fault, your fault, your fault, your fault…
“I’m sorry!” he screams and then everything goes black.
----------
He sat up in the bed, breathing heavily. The sound of Wanda’s voice echoed still in his mind, but he knew now it was a dream.
That didn’t mean it wasn’t true. Well, obviously it hadn’t happened like that, but still. It was his fault. If he had waited a little longer, or if he’d just searched harder for enemies, he never would have been in the way of the bullets. He wouldn’t have been at risk, and then Pietro wouldn’t have had to save his sorry ass.
If he’d been just a little faster… if only…
His eyes fluttered closed, and his chest heaved as sweat dries on his skin.
Pietro was a good kid. A bit messed up, but honestly, weren’t they all? A kid who wanted to help people just like he did. A smartass, snooty little shit. Just like him.
A self-sacrificing little bastard. Just like him.
That kid had his whole life in front of him. He could have been great. Instead, he was dead. Because even though they hurt each other before, even though they teased, they understood each other.
He wished it had been him.
Beside him, Laura shifted, and Clint froze. Was she…
Her eyes opened, and she looked vaguely surprised to see Clint sitting awake. Even more to see the grief-ridden expression on his face.
“Clint?” she muttered sleepily. “What’s wrong?”
He shook his head. Everything. Nothing. “Had a nightmare,” he answered honestly, sighing and settling back down onto the blankets.
She grunted, then ran a hand through his short hair. “Do you wanna talk about it?”
He paused. Then, although he didn’t mean to say anything, he blurted, “What would you do, if I died?”
Much of her drowsiness vanished. “Why would you ask that?” she asked, eyes wide and pained. He was hurting her. But he had to know. He couldn’t let someone else die for him ever again.
“What would you do?” he insisted, gently cupping her cheek in his palm. “I gotta know. Peace of… peace in our time,” he muttered the last part quietly. He couldn’t forget it, or any of the things that happened.
“I- I don’t know, honey. I would… I would tell the kids, I guess. I’d work the farm more myself. I’d raise the kids all by myself. What… why?” Her gaze had softened, but still held the pained light.
He sighed. “I almost died. I was… so close.” His eyes squeezed shut. “But this guy… this guy who was still just a teenager, he saved my life. And now he’s dead.”
She stilled, eyes turning softer. “I’m sorry,” she offered sincerely.
He shook his head. “It was my fault. I was playing hero, I was being stupid. I got a real hero killed. His death was my fault. If I hadn’t done that, he would still… still be alive.”
“Clint?”
“Mmm?”
“What… what was his name?”
He stayed quiet for a long time, simply staring up at the ceiling. “Pietro. His name was Pietro.”
She smiled softly. “What was he like?”
Another pause, but this one was not as drawn out. “He was a stubborn, stupid, sarcastic and a smartass little shit.”
She could hear the faint amusement in his tone.
“He sounds like you.”
“He was like me.”
The silence was back. Laura didn’t want to interrupt Clint while he was thinking, although she knew how self-destructive his thoughts could be.
Finally, Clint rolled over onto his side, so that his face faced her. She smiled at him, brushing his face with her fingers and noting the stubble that had accumulated while he was Avenging. He still had that weird little beard.
She broke the silence. “It was his choice, Clint.”
“His choice to save me?” It was sort of a rhetorical question. She knew there was more coming, and sure enough. “Yes. It was. But he never should have had to choose between my life or his own.”
“Well, he did,” Laura told him. “And here you are.”
“He’s dead. Because of me,” he reminded her, frowning slightly.
“Clint, if you had to make that choice, would you choose him or you?” She knew his answer. Her husband was a noble man, although that was an awfully quaint way to say it.
“Him.” Without a doubt in his voice.
“So… if you say he was like you, how was that any different?”
He stayed silent, and she foolishly believed she had won. She started to relax, when pent up emotions made their escape.
“Because he was useful!” he cried. “Because he was a useful, important member of the team who saved more people than I ever could! Because he deserved redemption, and he just ended up dead! Because without him, Wanda is almost broken. Because if not him, me, and you…” he faltered. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean-”
“Don’t be selfish,” she told him. Although, she knew that him being selfish was the opposite of their problem.
“I am selfish,” he said. “I don’t want to live with the guilt.”
She sighed, then kissed his lips. Gently, offering comfort in the contact. When she pulled back, his eyes were bright and troubled. But still fiery, and still strong.
“He would forgive you,” she said. “If he truly is like you… it wouldn’t even be in the question.”
He fell silent. It was a tension filled silence, but he didn’t argue further. Instead, he sighed again, and fell back onto the bed, wrapping an arm around her shoulders.
She fell asleep, but he remained awake long into the night, staring into the wall. Thinking.
----------
They didn’t have a funeral. Pietro had no family other than Wanda, so there was no real need. Instead, there was a ‘service’ in the new Avengers headquarters.
Wanda stood by her twin’s coffin, eyes dark and full of despair.
Tony expected that. What he hadn’t expected was Barton’s reaction. Barton looked quiet, moody, and deeply guilty. The ridiculous bird probably blamed himself. Figures.
But judging by the lack of aggression from Wanda to Clint, she didn’t share that belief. So, it was something unknown to anyone but their resident Big Bird.
Except… he watched Steve with knowing eyes. Steve was giving Barton sympathetic looks, which Barton rarely caught. Steve looked sorry for Barton, at least almost as much as for Wanda.
That meant it was something real, and not just imagined blame heaped upon his shoulders.
Damn.
Clint coughed and spoke. “Wanda, I have to tell you something.”
She looked up, gaze cold and uncaring.
He stiffened, grew more nervous. The dark, deep sadness of Barton’s character grew. Tony watched, without so much of a trace of eagerness. Which was to say, dead curious.
“Pietro… your brother… he wasn’t just shot by Ultron.” Clint had to stop, to take a breath. Tony could swear he saw shininess on Barton’s eyes, and almost felt bad for the guy. Whatever it was, if it could hurt him this much.
“He died because of me,” he admitted, watching her intently. “He died to save my life. I thought… you had to know. His death is my fault.”
Tony had no idea that Barton bore that guilt, but now it was obvious. Clint’s shoulders shook, and a strangled sounding sob escaped from Barton’s chest. He wasn’t crying, no, but his eyes were shining and full of fear, sadness, grief, and rage.
She stared at him for a long time. Finally, she opened her mouth. “I knew,” she told him, voice even. “I could feel it. I…” she paused, glaring at Clint.
“I didn’t approve. But… I understand. You are a good man, Clint Barton. You… are much like him.”
She saw it too, then. Tony had seen it. Maybe everyone did.
Now, though, much of the carefree attitude they shared was gone, from the living and the dead. It seems the loss of one had deeply affected the other.
“Wanda…” Clint trailed off. “I, uh. If you ever need anything.” He glanced around at his fellow Avengers. “If you ever need anything, come find me. I… I owe you.”
And with that, Clint Barton was out the door, out of their fancy new headquarters and seemingly out of their lives forever.
Until the next catastrophe, at any rate.