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Pietro Maximoff had no plans to gamble that day in Sokovia. Sure, Wanda had been the one to give the remark to the Avengers when they asked if the two of them understood the risks, but Pietro was not going back on that. No way. Let every asshole on the floating rock go; he wasn’t risking losing Wanda, through his own death or hers. Everything in between was negotiable, but not that. Not that.
So, when he saw good ol’ Clint trying to shield some Sokovian kid from imminent death at everyone’s favorite eight foot robotic Tony Stark hellspawn, he considered his moves carefully. Ultron was firing a gun that shot bullets much faster than the average handgun, but Pietro could still gain the distance he needed.
He watched as the bullets left Ultron’s gun. Clint still hadn’t reacted yet.
Clint had said something about a family, didn’t he? Yeah, that was worth the quick run.
Pietro darted out in the several dozen yards between the oncoming bullets and Clint. When his hands were on Clint’s stupid hooded sleeveless shirt, he could still see the bullets coming. Maybe…a dozen feet now. He wondered if Ultron could see him if Pietro gave him the finger. Probably not. Should he just push Clint out of the way or show off, change the bullets’ trajectory or something? What would look cooler?
Trajectory change. Sometimes he was envious of Wanda’s seemingly never-ending rain of new abilities she discovered every day, but he loved his powers. When else could he poke bullets out of their death paths like he was playing marbles?
He found himself smiling to himself as he moved the bullets, tossing them far off their courses to save time before he grabbed Clint by his shirt again and moved him just enough feet out of the way that he’d have no idea what happened.
When life returned to “normal speed,” Clint’s eyes got so huge Pietro cursed himself for not having brought a camera.
“When did you—?” Clint stammered.
Pietro threw an arm around Clint. “I’m always looking out for you, Old Man.”
Clint threw Pietro’s arm off and crossed his arms, hunched in a little. “Are we safe now?”
“Yeah, but let’s get safer.”
Pietro slipped a hand against the back of the boy’s head, and took Clint by the arm.
Whiplash was one of those things that Pietro would’ve absolutely never realized nor cared about if not for Wanda. It still stung a little to think of the first time he picked her up and went running with her, and how he’d hurt Wanda running. She’d stopped mentioning pain after a few hours, but he always knew she’d strained to ignore it for weeks after.
And Clint did need a vacation.
Pietro dropped the Sokovian kid off on his way to an empty space on the heli-carrier. And, the moment he stopped, Clint cried out in pain, hands clutching his neck.
“What did you do?”
“Like most thrill rides, keeping your neck stiff is advisable,” Pietro replied.
“You little shit.”
Pietro grinned for just a moment as he helped get Clint onto the floor in front of the bench.
“I needed to do something to keep you from running off again,” Pietro said.
“My job is to run out there and save people!”
“Shh, Clint, it’s okay. Relax. The mission’s over.”
“Yeah, unless this rock makes it to the ground.”
“Stark and Thor gave birth to an entirely new species to save us. It’s all under control.”
Or, it would be, once Pietro knew Wanda was okay. Every inch of him was racing to go out there and find her, bring her back, but he’d promised to stay. Wanda always had a good gut instinct with these things. If she was more worried about him, maybe he should listen. It’d make her happy if he stayed. Plus, she was surrounded by the Avengers, by Steve. Steve understood how much Pietro needed Wanda to be okay. All Pietro had was a bunch of injured Sokovians and Clint.
He’d try to stay.
It lasted about twenty seconds, when he realized his costume/uniform had not in fact provided enough fuel room, and he’d run out of protein bars. He considered asking Clint if he had anything on him, maybe something stored in his little arrow holder, but decided not to.
“Stay,” Pietro said before he ran off to find food.
He managed to pick up several pre-packaged sandwiches from an abandoned deli, an armful of chips and cookies from an office vending machine, and an unopened bottle of water somewhere on the ground.
“What?” Clint said as Pietro returned. Pietro spread his findings out around him and looked down at Clint. “Where did you—?”
Pietro half-ignored him, inspecting the sandwiches. “So, this one looks like turkey, these two are ham, this one’s roast beef…anything sound good to you? Or do you just want some chips?”
“Did you just steal all that?”
“Disaster rules. Everything’s free game.”
Pietro opened a bag of chips and tossed it down to Clint, spilling at least half the bag’s contents onto Clint’s chest. Clint’s eyes fell on his chest, and he moved as if to grab it, but Pietro stopped him with the bottom of his shoe on Clint’s face.
“No, Hawkeye, sudden movements will only further aggravate the injury.”
“The only thing getting further aggravated—“
“Shh. No straining.”
For a bit, the two of them sat there in silence. Clint never touched his chips, didn’t even move them off his body with his hands, and Pietro got through the turkey and roast beef sandwiches. He could still go for the ham ones, but that tiny, nagging little voice he’d come to accept as his mother’s told him no.
“You religious, Clint?” Pietro asked.
“Will it get you to pull me off the ground?”
“Wanda and I are Jewish. Or, well, our parents were, and we were raised Jewish, but it got…blurred after a while. Back home, when we had a home, we were everything short of orthodox. I mean, Shabbat on Fridays, synagogue on Saturdays, kosher, you name it. But once Wanda and I were forced onto the streets, all that just faded away. Kosher was the first thing to go. I always figure the big guy up there gets it, that we were starving, and it wasn’t like we could turn down a ham sandwich someone just tossed into the trash. We told ourselves we’d stop once we could, repent for even the tiniest of sins.”
“Wait.”
“Yeah?”
“You’re Jewish?” Didn’t he just say that? “You worked for Hydra, and you’re Jewish?”
“We didn’t know!”
“How did you not know that you volunteered for a program with a bunch of Nazi scientists?”
“It’s not like they were advertising their roots! We were doing it for Sokovia, for our parents. They never told us. We found out when we got out, when we…”
“Okay, sorry, stop, I thought you two went in willingly on that one.” Clint paused. “You’re Jewish?”
“Yes.”
“I don’t believe it.”
“Why not?”
“You just don’t seem Jewish to me.”
“You want me to prove it?”
“I do.”
Pietro only had to begin to unzip his pants to get Clint to start crying, “No, no, no, Jesus Christ, stop!”
Pietro smirked, zipped back up, and returned to his place on the bench. Back to using Clint as an ottoman. What was he doing before that?
Right, the Jewish thing. “So anyway, the kosher thing went on the wayside when Wanda and I were on the streets. Hydra didn’t help. Then, when we were finally out, I just—you can’t even imagine, Clint. It’s not like a gluttony thing, I just genuinely need so much food, and again, there’s no room for turning down pork and waiting an hour for dairy after eating meat. I mean, I guess I’ve accepted that the kosher thing is never going to work out, but it leaves a lot of mitzvahs Wanda and I have to catch up on.”
“Mitzvahs?”
“Good deeds.” Pietro paused. “Then again, helping save the world has to count for something.”
Clint snorted. “You can’t quantify good deeds.”
“Go screw yourself. Today is worth at least—“
“—Twelve.”
“A thousand good deeds.” Pietro paused. “Twelve?! I saved your life!”
“You broke my neck!”
“I gave you a bag of chips!”
“That fell on the floor!”
“I gave you both my ham sandwiches!”
Clint paused. “No you didn’t!”
Both Pietro and Clint looked at Clint. Pietro actually hadn’t.
Pietro dropped the sandwiches and opened a bag of cookies for himself. Clint never moved to take the wrapping off.
When the world was saved and everyone reunited to eat at some Russian restaurant, Clint got asked what happened to him exactly once.
“Wanda, your brother is the worst Avenger I’ve ever worked with,” was Clint’s response.
“Hey, I could’ve dropkicked you halfway across Sokovia to get out of the path of those bullets,” Pietro retorted.
Pietro and Wanda exchanged a look, and Wanda offered Clint a simple, “I’m sure it was an accident.”