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It was a safe bet to say everyone was worried about their resident genius. The man hadn’t come out of his lab in days, and it was really starting to worry his teammates.
When they had first moved into the tower, everyone had simply minded their own business, not wanting to step on each other's toes but slowly, thanks to Tony, they began to spend more time around each other outside of missions.
Tony was very convincing, he had somehow managed to rope all of them into random activities whenever they were all at the tower.
But sometimes, even he got extremely busy and couldn't just laze around with them. The rest of the Avengers often forgot that he actually ran a company.
Even though Pepper did most of the social work, Tony was still the brains behind it all. Which meant he had to keep Stark Industries up to date with all the latest tech.
Which also meant sometimes he could be in his lab for days at a time, not willing to come out unless he had a whole new line of tech designed for his company.
The first time this occurred, he had disappeared for almost 4 days, the team had thought he'd been kidnapped but they were informed per JARVIS that the genius was on one of his “creative binges”.
Steve and Natasha had taken the liberty upon themselves to go down and get the genius for some fresh air and food, but they were surprised to find that Tony had put his lab on complete lockdown, no one could get in or out.
And the usual glass panels he had surrounding the lab were now obscure, so they couldn't even see the genius.
Steve had tried to convince JARVIS to let them in, but even the AI couldn't override the specific instructions Stark had given him.
So he and Natasha spent the whole night into the next day sitting outside of the lab doors, when Tony finally emerged, looking dead on his feet
It was safe to say Steve and Natasha had given him a thorough lecture on taking care of himself and so on, which ultimately the genius brushed off and repeated the same cycle not even two months later.
Eventually everyone got used to Tony's “creative binges”, it was just another part of the eccentric genius that they couldn't change.
But this time it was somehow different.
Stark was just pushing past a whole week, and even though they tried not to show it, his team were seriously getting worried. Yes, JARVIS kept them updated on the genius and what he was doing, they just couldn't see him.
But he'd never spent a week alone in his lab, at least not with his team so present in the tower.
Natasha, Steve, and Clint this time, had started taking shifts standing outside the lab, hoping to even get a glimpse of the genius.
Right now it was Clint's turn and he was watching the gloomy glass doors with his utmost attention, he had hope Tony might emerge any second.
He had already been here for almost 3 hours, but there still wasn't any signs of the genius, besides the updates JARVIS gave him occasionally.
But he was tired of waiting, and he was sure Tony was running himself ragged behind those doors. Sometimes the genius didn't know how to call it quits, which might just be his downfall if he couldn't get a grip.
Clint let his eyes follow the lab doors until he reached the ceiling and let them linger there for a few seconds until an idea popped into his head.
When Stark had first invited all of them to stay at the tower, he had took it upon himself to explore the tower….in a not so traditional way.
The vents.
He'd scouting the tower by using the vents, and boy oh boy did he find some pretty interesting things.
As sneaky as he thought he was about it, Natasha had caught on when he'd just disappear out of thin air. She had made it clear he couldn't use the vents to spy on their teammates, much to his dismay.
But she never said anything about not using the vents to check up on Stark, it was basically fair game.
With his mind made up, Clint hopped into the nearest vent which happened to be a few doors down from Tony's lab.
Now all he had to do was get to Tony's lab without getting lost in the maze that was Stark Tower's ventilation system.
Which was easier said than done, considering all the dead ends and roundabouts inside it. He thought about asking JARVIS for directions but decided not to, just in case the AI decided to snitch to Stark, if he hadn't already.
Clint focused back on making sure he wasn't going in circles, and soon enough he heard Tony's tired voice.
He couldn't make out what the genius was saying, but he followed the sound of his voice which led him straight to a vent in the far side of the lab, that gave him a front row seat of the genius.
And he didn't look good at all.
The man looked like he had lost weight in the span of a few days. He had deep dark purple bags under his eyes and looked like he was a few seconds from completely passing out cold.
Clint watched for a few more seconds while the genius mumbled to himself and flipped through the holographic frames that were surrounding him, before he decided he'd seen enough.
With two swift kicks, the vent cover clattered to the ground with a loud noise, he wasn't trying to be discreet, he was on a rescue mission, at least that's how he saw it in his eyes.
Even though Tony was looking worse for wear he was still alert, and in a flash had the iron man gauntlet posed and ready to shoot at the spy.
Clint held his hands up as a sign of surrender, while he walked towards the genius, he didn't feel threatened, he just wanted to make sure the other knew he was here as a friend.
“I don't think that's really necessary”
Tony looked at him and then at the vents and then back at him again
“Barton, what the actual fuck?” He sighed as he dropped the gauntlet
Clint just shrugged his shoulders, walking towards the other, “desperate times, calls for desperate measures, or something like that” he mumbled the last part to himself
Tony immediately perked up, “is there a mission? Why didn't JARVIS alert me?”, the last part was aimed at the AI, but before JARVIS could respond Clint butted in.
“There's no mission-”, he paused, “well technically it is, but it's not for the Avengers”
Tony stared at him with a blank face
Clint was hoping the genius was putting two and two together, but the other just stared at him.
He sighed before waving the holographs away from the both of them
“You've been down here for nearly nine days, Stark, even you know that's not exactly healthy”
Tony rolled his eyes at him, “I'm aware of how many days it's been Clint, you can't put a timestamp on genuisness”, he pulled back up the holographs and now Clint could see exactly what the genius has been working on.
Each holograph had a different mock up of a suit, it took him a few seconds to realize that the suits were being designed for each member of the team.
Clint hummed, “So this is what you've been working on?” He slowly walked around looking at all the different designs that Stark had laid out.
His eyes caught into his hero name and the suit. It was a deep dark purple, looked almost black unless you were up close to it.
Tony interrupted his snooping, “as lovely as this was, I need you to leave so I can focus. And fix the vent on your way out”, he added
Clint sucked in a breath, “sorry, no can do, tin man”.
Tony narrowed his eyes at him, “And why's that?”
“Because” Clint started as he walked around the other and grabbed him by his shoulders and started leading him to the lab doors, “you look like you're about to kill over, and we can't have that now, can we?”
Tony shrugged him off, Clint cursed internally, they were only a few feet from the doors.
“I'm fine, Barton, I just need to finish these up and I'll be out in a couple hours”
Like he believed that, he wasn't born last night, Stark.
“Just a few hours? Great that means you can do it another day”, he blocked Tony from going back to his desk.
Stark rubbed his eyes out of frustration and maybe a little tiredness, “Barton, I'm serious, stop distracting me, and go bother someone else”
“Ehhh, no thanks, I like bothering you”, he smirked at the other. There was no way he was letting the man go back to working when he was obviously overworked already.
“Besides”, he continued, “I know you're dead on your feet right now and the only thing that's keeping you moving is whatever Dum-E keeps feeding you”, he shot the robot in the corner a look. Dum-E had a cup of…. something in his claw, Clint didn't even want to know what it was, he just knew it wasn't good enough to keep Tony running any longer.
Tony frowned at him, “Clint. Leave, or I'll have JARVIS make you.” Just as he finished his sentence, one of the Ironman suits came to life and JARVIS’ voice came through
“Sir, would like you to leave now, may I escort you out, Mr. Barton?”, the suit came to stand between the two of them.
Clint let out a half laugh, before realizing, both JARVIS and Tony were serious.
“You're fucking with me right? This is a joke.” He turned to the suit, “J, even you know this isn't healthy for Tony”
Tony rubbed a hand across his face, “Barton, listen-”, he started but Clint cut him off
“No, Stark, you listen. You've been down here cooped up for nine days. All of us are worried about you. Now can you stop being an asshole and realize for once that people actually want what's best for you. This team wants what's best for you, and I can tell you right now, this ain't it”, Clint finished off with a huff and crossed his arms over his chest. He was staying here until he got Tony out of this godforsaken lab, JARVIS didn't scare him, he was a trained spy, he could take a pilotless suit.
Tony just stared at him, his face black. He and Clint stared at each other for a few seconds.
“J, I think birdbrain’s right, let's call it quits for tonight”, Stark finally conceded.
Clint breathed a sigh of relief, he really did not want to fight Tony's suit.
A few minutes later, Tony had closed out all his projects and was leaving the lab with Clint right behind him. They were greeted by Steve and Natasha, who had come down to relieve Clint of his shift, but we're surprised to see Tony.
Later that night, Natasha finally asked Clint how he'd convinced Tony to come out, and he'd simply replied with,
“A little tough love always does the trick”.