Winter is Coming: Clint and Philip

[om_hawkeye]

Clint and Philip discuss what happened once back at the Stark Building in New York.

Clint ducked into Philip's room about an hour after they got back to the Stark Building, after days of travel from S.H.I.E.L.D. base to S.H.I.E.L.D. base in cramped and noisy cargo planes. Granted, he'd understood the fact that it was too risky to try and get them all out of the country via commercial travel after the clusterfuck at Natasha's school, but it was definitely good to be home. That's why he had a bag over his good shoulder and a couple of pizza boxes in hand as he approached the bed uncertainly; pizza made everything better. "How's the head? You seemed pretty out of it on the plane."

"It hurts less at least," Philip grumbled. "Some of it is no decent sleep. Fucking concussion..." he muttered. He might, perhaps be getting a little loopy. A little.

The archer pushed the pizza closer, flipping open a box, then pulled a couple of ginger ales from the bag, setting them on the table beside him. "Yeah well. Food, then we'll turn on the TV and you can fall asleep to whatever stupid movie you want. I got more painkillers too."

"No more than half a dose," Philip said with a very careful shake of his head. "I hate those things. And don't let me fall asleep until I'm settled, I don't want to sleep on the stitches."

"I won't let you fall asleep," Clint promised, "until you're settled. Now eat your fucking pizza," he smirked, though it was short-lived when he reached for a can of soda and hissed as his shoulder pulled.

"Be careful," Philip murmured as he reached for the food with a grimace. Having to use his left right now was a giant pain in the ass.

Clint snagged a piece himself, much more carefully. "So, you gonna tell me what happened back in Russia?"

"I got my ass kicked, I thought that was pretty obvious," Philip groused as he tried to handle food and not wear most of it.

"Join the club," Clint agreed. "But I'm serious. Who was in there? You know you could have called me to help, right?"

"I think you were busy," Philip said dryly. "His name was Alexei, which he felt a need to keep telling me. As near as I could guess, it was like fighting Steve."

Clint raised a brow at him as he munched on pizza. "You took out Steve?"

"Eventually. He wasn't interested in anything I had to say and after he broke my arm I had to get drastic," Philip admitted.

"Drastic..." Clint eyed him sideways.

"Tased him in the balls," Philip replied bluntly. It wasn't something he was exactly proud of but there was no such thing as a fair fight in that situation. "That dropped him pretty much instantly."

Clint made a face, twitching in sympathy. "Remind me not to get on your bad side."

"I tried to talk to him," Philip said with a sigh. "He'd just bought too much into it and wouldn't stop trying to beat the hell out of me. I've never been so glad for training with Laura and Midnighter before." He leaned back carefully, mindful of the stitches, and sighed again. "The whole thing hit a little too close to home too."

The archer focused on him for a moment, his eyes becoming a little stormy as he realized what Coulson was talking about. "Hey. No matter what happened out there...you were coming back with me. I wouldn't leave you out there. Even if...you know."

"It's not just that, though I appreciate it. With the outfit they had there, I'd have ended up in a jar forever. Or at least until the ability quit." Because... there really had to be a limit to it, Philip hoped. Otherwise the prospect could be pretty bad. How would natural causes work? "I just meant them, training like that, pushed into that life."

Oh. Clint lay back, chewing on a piece of crust. He honestly didn't know how Philip had been brought up or trained, but with a mother like that piece of work, he could imagine. He didn't think Philip would have been smacked around if he missed a target or something, but it probably wasn't fun. "Guess you saw the handcuffs?"

Philip couldn't stop the grimace. That was just... so screwed up. "I did. That's why I thought I had a chance. He was going about it like it was voluntary, some kind of discipline thing because he could get out any time. Who the hell does something like that?"

Clint couldn't shrug, but he wanted to. He'd never had to handcuff himself to anything, but it was all sort of meant to do the same thing. Teach you your place. Remind you that you can't get out. Even if he'd never seen it done like that before, he was used to that kind of thinking. He remembered the late night knife-throwing competitions vividly. Not that he was telling Coulson that. "We're lucky to even have gotten Natasha to go with us," he said instead.

"I'll take it as a win. What did you say to her? You obviously had a scuffle too," Philip asked. There had to have been something he could have done better, Clint obviously had.

"Oh. You know. Just. Hey, what's up? Wanna join? Wham bam, thank you ma'am!" Clint told him, waving his crust around.

Philip just squinted at Clint with his most 'I don't believe you' face. "There had to have been more than that." And if they were talking about Clint and Natasha, they weren't talking about him. So... bonus.

Clint sighed. "Well, first she tried to kill me. A lot. She tried to kill me a lot," he reiterated. "But then I started talking about the school, and about being a mutant, and how she could live her own life without anyone using her for their own agenda. I guess she liked the sound of that. I...also kind of promised that if she didn't like it at Xavier's that I'll help her skip town."

Philip just gave him a raised eyebrow at that. "I hope you mean after she's here long enough. Or did you not hear what they were saying about IDs and all that. It'd be dangerous for her and other people if she decided to take off tomorrow." Not that Philip wouldn't chase her down if she did. Because she was his responsibility among other things.

Clint picked up another piece of pizza and quickly stuffed it in his mouth. "Umph av ort eyeont eevat tyu istenee?"

"Try that again without a face full like a chipmunk," Philip said, still with the Look.

After making a face, then chewing quite a bit, and finally swallowing, Clint sighed. "Look, she shouldn't have to jump from one creepy school to another if she doesn't want to."

"Clint..." Philip sighed and rubbed his face. "I agree with you that she shouldn't be trapped. But she needs to give the school a chance for her own sake. We have no idea what they did to those kids' heads and Xavier is the best bet for helping her through that. At least the best bet that will still treat her like a kid and not an asset," he amended.

"Yeah well maybe she isn't a kid anymore," Clint replied darkly. "I'm not going to march to S.H.I.E.L.D.'s drum just because they've promised her government protection. If you ask me, she can damn well protect herself, and their help shouldn't come with a price tag. I'm the one that got her to agree to come. If she wants out, I'm gonna help her get out."

"Did I say anything about the agency? Beyond that they'd made a deal? No, I did not," Philip said, looking straight at Clint. He looked at him for a few seconds longer and slumped, hand reaching up to rub the bridge of his nose. "You know, we had a conversation that was sort of like this before."

Clint hated to argue with Coulson when he was already worn out. He picked at the cheese on his pizza, just relaxing back into the pillows. "You asked what I said. That's what I said. I made a promise you wouldn't."

"All I'm asking is you think about what I'm saying," Philip replied. He reached out, nudging at Clint. "It wasn't a bad thing that I chased you down in a train station, right?"

"I'm not saying that I wouldn't try to talk her out of it," Clint pointed out. "But I'd still help her if she needed it and she was dead set on leaving."

"Just try to convince her to give it a chance, please. I really, really don't like the thought of her out there with nothing? And she thinks she can handle it, I know and that she doesn't need anything. Hell, Clint, I used to do that and my childhood was a hundred times healthier than hers was." Because it really was, his deranged family notwithstanding. They'd taken care to make sure he came out an actual person.

"Fine," Clint told him, feeding another bite of pizza into his mouth. When he was done chewing, he looked over, pointing out, "You know she wouldn't have come if she hadn't already been thinking about it. You couldn't have convinced that kid."

"I know. The whole thing was just a shot in the dark. At least we got one," Philip replied. His mouth quirked up in smile, just a little one. "I'll bet she's going to be fun to train with though."

"For you, maybe!" Clint made a face. "She's sneaky. I think I've had enough of her thighs around my head." Well. Okay, maybe that part wasn't as bad as he'd thought.

"Excuse me?" Philip could not have heard that right. He blamed the concussion.

So maybe that didn't come out right. "Uh, chokehold. With her legs. I had to blow a smokescreen to get her off of me. That's how I ruined my shoulder," Clint explained.

Philip's eyebrow ticked up just a little higher. "Of course. Anything else you'd like to share with me, Barton?"

"She almost slit my throat with an arrow?" Clint grinned sideways.

Philip would have facepalmed, actually done it, were it not for his headache. "Please try not to kill each other in the future..."

Clint hummed innocently. "Probably won't happen."

"Laps until you both pass out," Philip grumbled. "I'll think of what else when I can think."

"Eat your pizza," the archer rolled his eyes at his friend's drunkenly circular logic. "Then I need to go track her down and see if she wants any."

Philip just grimaced but forced a couple bites before setting it back in the box. "I'll eat more later. I will."

Clint watched him uncertainly. "You haven't hardly eaten in days."

"I haven't eaten much since my head," Philip corrected. "Honestly, I've been too queasy for much. I think if I sleep a little more it'll be fine."

Clint didn't point out that it'd been days since the head incident. It was possible Coulson wasn't keeping track of time as well with the concussion. And all the cargo planes. "Yeah, okay. But if you haven't eaten tomorrow, I'm bringing Rogers in here to give you his disappointed-"

He was abruptly cut off by JARVIS, who sounded tense, even for an AI. "Pardon the interruption, but I was asked to alert you when Mr. Stark was done in the workshop. I believe he and Ms. Romanov are currently engaged in...pleasantries."

"Oh my god," Philip groaned as he levered himself back up. "We need to get down there right now."

Clint flipped the pizza box closed and hauled himself off of the bed, flinching at the pain in his ribs. "I'll get the elevator."