Pixie Plot: Clint, Natasha, and Philip
Oct. 27th, 2015 07:29 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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om_mainWhen Pixie develops a cold in the middle of the cafeteria, Clint is hit by a wave of pixie dust and ends up wandering the school, only to be found by Natasha and taken to Philip for safekeeping. After he's out, Philip and Natasha discuss the archer in private.
The last thing Clint knew, he'd been having a hamburger in the cafeteria (okay, maybe two) and trying to read A Midsummer Night's Dream. Trying, being the operative word there. He barely understood a word of it. He was somewhere around Oberon talking about dolphins and mermaids and Cupid of all things when small purple flowers started to grow up through the table around him, wafting prettily in the breeze.
What breeze? Oh hey, nice breeze. He reached out to touch one of the flowers, heavy with sparkling dew, head tilted oddly to one side. He felt...light. He felt really light. Like he could lift right up out of his seat and float out of the room. Which he did, taking a couple of flowers with him.
Nymphs and fairies floated here and there, darting across his path, but he glided easily through the halls overgrown with vines and ferns and moss. It was...warm, and the heavy clothes weighed on him, so he stripped off his shirt, leaving it in his wake as he went, floating, flying? along, a low song on his lips.
He was like that when he found Natasha. Or, at least, he was stripped to the waist, his pupils large, fist cupped as though he were holding something and padding along the halls a little drunkenly as he mumbled, "Puff, the magic dragon lived by the sea, and frolicked in the autumn mist in a land called Honah Lee..."
Natasha was hard to surprise. Or, at least, hard to make visibly surprised. And yet there she was, an intoxicated and half-naked Clint Barton stumbling towards her, with wide eyes. "Clint? What're you doing?"
"Nata..." Clint almost exclaimed as he saw her, stumbling to a stop. He paused partially through her name, looking thoughtful. She had many names. So many names. Which one was the right name? "Nat," he decided, grinning dazedly, "Naaaaat." and he plucked nothing from his hand to offer it to her with a wobbly grin. "Flower? They're special. Titania likes them anyway, so they gotta be."
She cocked her head, her gaze on him piercing. Finally, though, she reached up and pretended to take something from him. It might be easier to keep him calm if she pretended to follow along with his drunken rambling. She offered him a smile, and said, "Thank you. And who is Titania?" He couldn't mean the literary character, could he? What on Earth was going on? "Did you....what did you do today?"
"Your wings are gorgeous," Clint breathed, eyes wide and awed. He reached for her hand, tugging her toward a nearby plate-glass window. "Come fly with me!"
Clint was strong, and Natasha had to tense and dig her heels in to keep him from actually hauling her out a window. "You can't be serious," she murmured under her breath. She tugged him back into the safety of the hallway.
He blinked at her in confusion, but was quickly distracted, following...something? up the wall and around over their heads with a curious crane of his neck. "Man, that stuff grows fast."
She was sure she wouldn't like the answer, but asked, "What does?"
Clint poked at thin air, then peered closer at it, tilting his head. "The forest. And these...wriggly, vine, honeysuckle things. You think they're honeysuckle? It's been so fucking long since I've had real honeysuckle."
Natasha would really prefer Clint not start licking the walls, so she shook her head a little. "No, I don't think honeysuckle, probably just ivy." She started pulling him gently down the hall towards the faculty rooms. Clint wouldn't have kept a joke up this long, and probably wouldn't have gone with delusions as his joke anyway. Something weird was going on, and she had no idea what it was, but she was willing to bet he'd be easier to handle with Philip's help.
The disoriented archer made a grab for one of the flowers as she tugged him away, pouting when it was out of reach. "Where are we going?" he asked when he finally managed to notice that they were headed...somewhere. Up some kind of hill, toward a towering grove. "Did you know your skin glows? I don't remember it glowing. Then again, you're kind of unbelievably hot so I guess it comes with the territory. Even with wings." He made to bat playfully at something on her back.
"Mmmm...I think that may be the first time I've been told my skin glows," she said, sounding mildly amused. She didn't let go of the hand she held as she led him towards Philip's room. "And we're going to see if your theory holds true and Coulson's skin glows, too."
"Everything glows," Clint told her reverently, looking around them as she led him down the hall. "It's like, stardust."
"Pretty." She finally got to the door she'd been searching for and rapped on it quickly.
"Come in," Philip called out. He'd just been reading, getting ready for an online class and frowned as soon as the words were out of his mouth. He found telepathic communication disconcerting at the best of times, even more when it was bad news. Class could wait and hopefully the visitor wanted something short. He needed to check on things.
Clint didn't really understand the telepathic announcement in his head. Something about powers going wrong and quarantine, and he was kind of disappointed that he wasn't a hawk again, because he hadn't gotten to fly outside last time. Oh but hey! He pulled open the door and did a little hop into the room, spreading his arms. "I can fly!"
"We decided to fly indoors," Natasha said dryly, closing the door behind her.
"Good idea. Remember that it took practice last time, Clint," Philip said easily. "It's pretty chilly out too, you don't want to get cold."
"Totally different," Clint told him, padding across the room in just his jeans and his shoes. Come to think of it, the shoes were kind of getting in the way of the moss. He stopped halfway to Coulson and pulled them off, then the socks too, squishing his toes down into the sponginess with a content grin. "Oh yeah, that's better."
Natasha perched against Philip's desk. "He was like this the whole way here. I'm not sure what he's seeing, but it must be amazing."
"And I think I'm grateful I'm missing it," Philip said with a sigh. "The headmaster says it's harmless but I'm glad you brought him here. The bit about flying is a little worrisome."
Clint had gotten distracted again, circling Philip curiously, poking at something just above his head, then petting it with a grin. "Your ears are so freaking soft."
She smirked at them both as Clint circled Philip like an oversized small child. On LSD. With hickies. "He was easily dissuaded from it, at least."
"My... ears?" Philip glanced at Natasha with a look that said, please tell me I didn't sprout anything... "That's very interesting to know, Clint."
Clint snorted over in Natasha's direction. "She wouldn't let me have honeysuckle."
"The wall," she translated. Natasha gave Philip's ears an exaggerating look and then just shrugged.
"The... wall?" Philip didn't even want to know really. This was going to be difficult. "Why don't you tell me about it?"
But Clint had already thumped to the floor, spreading out on his back, basking in the sunlight coming through the one window. "Tell you about what?" he asked, clearly easily distracted. "Naaat, come feel the sun. The moss is really soft over here."
Natasha sashayed over, looking increasingly amused. She gently plopped herself down next to Clint. Unlike the archer, however, she did not lay down. Instead, she braced herself on her arms and remained sitting up. "Honeysuckle," she reminded him.
"God, you are stoned," Philip muttered almost silently. "Yes, tell me about the honeysuckle," he said as he took a seat on the bed. WIth any luck it would keep him in one spot.
"It was growing up the wall," Clint hummed, his eyes closed as he stretched his arms up over his head. "But everything's growing, here." He paused. "That's weird, right?" He had a feeling that things weren't supposed to grow inside.
"Little bit," Natasha said.
"I'm sure it's fine," Philip said soothingly. "Probably just a little powers mishap, it'll sort itself out and meanwhile you've got a nice view, right?"
"Heeey," Clint opened his eyes and reached a hand out toward Philip, though he didn't bother to get up off of the floor. If he thought he was still on the floor at all. "You sure you don't wanna fly?"
She was sure he did not mean the sexual innuendo, but Natasha couldn't quite help her slight smirk at it anyway. "Not while I'm in here."
"I don't have wings, Clint, I never did," Philip reminded him. "And I'm too heavy for you to carry."
"Bull~shit," Clint sing-songed, rolling around on the carpet a little. Then he reached up and placed his hands flat on the floor behind him, tucked his legs in, and rolled up into an easy, limber back-bend to look at them both upside down. "I'm fucking magic!"
Natasha quirked an eyebrow at Coulson.
Philip's own raised pretty darn quickly. He knew Clint was flexible, he just hadn't been sure how much. "I..,. would probably agree." That he was doing that shirtless did not help.
"I could carry you both," Clint insisted, letting his back muscles stretch, shifting one leg to slide up underneath him in a contortionist's trick, his jeans tugging to slip down an inch, revealing the waistband of his boxer-briefs. He was clearly unbothered by this fact. "But Tasha has wings so she can fly herself."
She knew (well, anyone who had seen Clint high now knew) that Clint was Philip's (and Philip was Clint's). That didn't mean she couldn't look, though.
"So she gets wings and I get strange ears?" Philip said with a smile. He was doing all the looking himself, but didn't seem to be bothered by Natasha looking too.
Clint didn't seem to take notice of the attention, or the fact that Natasha seemed to have gone completely silent in the face of his crazy. Instead, he flipped his legs up in an easy handstand, twisted around playfully, torquing his body, then rolled in a slow back-flip until he was on his feet, reaching up to tug at something in the air over his head. "They're not strange. They're fuzzy," he insisted distractedly.
"What do they look like?" Natasha asked.
"I'm going to guess black," Philip said dryly. "There was an incident before you came here that involved some very odd intersections of abilities. Clint spent the day as an actual bird."
Clint cupped a hand to his lips to hide them from Coulson and stage whispered over to her, "He was a cat!"
She snickered, and looked at Philip as though envisioning him as a kitten. "I'm really sad that I missed that," she said, sounding both amused and abnormally honest.
If he'd still been a cat, Philip's ears would be laid back. "It was disconcerting being that small," he replied. "Though Clint enjoyed flying once he got the hang of it. There was careening involved."
Meanwhile, Clint had found Coulson's desk, and had climbed up on top of it, carefully setting books and papers aside until there was enough room for him to sit crosslegged in the middle of it. It wasn't high enough, but it would do.
"Careening seems to be a hobby of his," Natasha commented, remembering how he'd wander through the halls. "Comfy, Barton?"
"It's certainly better than hiding in the top of my closet," Philip put in. "There were very large shelves," he said by way of explanation. "He was trying to get the drop on me."
Clint rolled something invisible around between his hands, sticking his fingers in it (whatever it was) every now and then. "Getting better at it!" He was remembering how to sit still. How to hide. How to slow his breathing and listen to his heart and wait. Sometimes he could be patient.
That didn't surprise Natasha at all; Clint had a natural talent. She was not at all surprised he was making strides. Of course, she doubted he'd caught up to Coulson just yet. "Prove it," she suggested.
The archer paused, looking up at her with an odd expression. "But...the forest."
The look Natasha gave Philip said I have no idea what to do with that, more effectively than her words could have.
Well he certainly didn't know either... Philip just barely stopped the eyeroll before patting the bed next to him. "You know what might be nice, Clint, with a day this nice. How does a nap in the sun sound?"
Clint eyed him like he thought that might be a trick, but honestly, that sounded like the fucking best thing in the world. He had dropped what he was holding (nothing) and hopped off the desk a few beats later, moving to sprawl on the bed beside Coulson. "Can Tasha come?"
Philip glanced at Natasha and gave her a little shrug. "That would be up to her. I'll keep an eye out regardless. Forest and all."
For possibly the first time since the boys had met Natasha, she looked somewhat uncertain.
Stretched out on the bed, Clint rolled his head toward Natasha, huge, dark eyes meeting her gaze. He made a little grabby hand motion against the coverlet and smiled easily at her, lazy and welcoming. It wasn't clear whether he truly understood her dilemma or not in the state he was in, but the pixie dust didn't seem to impair his ability to think at all. It just changed his perception of the world. "It's warm," he murmured finally.
"It's entirely up to you, Natasha," Philip replied. "I'm certainly not going to do anything beyond keep him in one spot. I have a decided aversion for the idea of non-consent."
It would be weak, to give in and lay with Clint. She couldn't be weak around Philip Coulson; she didn't trust him any more than he trusted her. Still, she wanted to, and idly wished she could trust that way. So she compromised, and sat on the edge of the bed, near where Clint was lying.
Clint, seeming to understand the bargain, wriggled closer to where she was perched, stretching out on his side. He didn't touch her, keeping about a six-inch buffer between their bodies, but the way he lay on his side, he almost curled around her as his eyes slipped closed. It might not be cuddling, and it didn't imply any weakness on Natasha's part, but it was just close enough that Clint could feel her body heat, and that was good enough for him.
Philip just smiled at him indulgently once Clint's eyes were closed. He made no attempt to touch Natasha either, settling in on Clint's other side, his only concession was to toe his shoes off. "You can relax," he said as he leaned back. "You're safe here."
She smiled slightly, but it was muted. She wasn't really safe anywhere. Still, Natasha guessed she could appreciate the attempt to make her comfortable. "Do you relax?"
"Occasionally," Philip admitted. "Here, at the apartment. I've gotten much better about it than I used to be."
Natasha nodded, as though it was the sort of answer she expected.
"He helps," Philip said after a few moments. "Even when he's being ridiculous. He helps remind me."
She looked back down at where Clint was curled up near her. If Philip were not there, she'd have touched him, stroked his hair or even curled up alongside him. She suspected the same could be said of Coulson, though she did not ask. "He's special," she agreed.
"And he'll never believe you if you tell him," Philip said with no small amount of exasperation. "It drives me out of my mind sometimes, how he does that."
"You like that he drives you crazy," Natasha pointed out. It had taken her all of thirty seconds after meeting them both to realize that. "Part of his charm."
"It's definitely different," Philip said as he looked over at her. There was that faint smile again, Clint was good for that. "But it's good that he can pull me out of my ruts that way. For all that he's so unconventional, he's very good at being a regular person."
She let out a breath of air that could almost be a laugh. "I hardly know what a regular person is like anymore."
"It's a good place to figure it out. Or at least close to it," Philip replied. "There are a lot of pretty strange people here, one more kind of strange isn't so bad."
"If they're all strange, normal seems like it would be tough to come by." Natasha said, an idle retort.
"Well, there's strange and there's strange," Philip commented. "Most of their strange is mutant related, but it makes it easier to blend in."
Her look at him was appraising. "Do you think you blend in?"
"More than you would think," Philip said with a faint smile. "Enough that no one's ever pushed for an answer when I dodge the question about why I'm here."
"Knowing you won't answer isn't the same as being uninterested," Natasha said with a small smirk.
"I do, technically, answer," Philip replied. "That one, it's not interesting and two, has absolutely no effect on day to day life. And no, I'm not saying more than that to you either," he said with a tiny smirk.
"Technically, that wasn't an answer," she retorted. Natasha's smirk widened. "And I have my suspicions. And can be patient."
Philip's eyebrow tipped up at that. "If you can figure it out, I'll be impressed. And that's all I'm going to say on that."
Natasha gave him an enigmatic look, before glancing back down at Clint. He really was different; certainly different from she and Philip, but even from people who hadn't been so....forged. She wondered if being dragged along Coulson's road - which she imagined differed only slightly from her own - would do something to ruin it.
"He'll be fine," Philip said and whether he meant from the hallucinations or whether he had divined a little bit of her thoughts, well that was the question.
"He better be." She murmured.
"He will," Philip said firmly and again, he could mean a couple things with that.
She wasn't sure how to take Philip's promise, or how much of it to believe. He hadn't seen what she had; children broken by the weight of what was being asked of them. He'd been trained alone, and by someone who cared for him. That was not the usual way. Natasha did not have the will or the words to say that, though, so instead she simply shrugged, as though taking him at face-value.
"And he's an idiot," Philip said with a sigh. "You'll be banging your head against that before long. He thinks he's useless. Frequently."
Natasha huffed slightly. "He's wrong."
"You know it, I know it, I've been trying to drum it through his thick skull," Philip said dryly.
She looked up and smirked at him. "He seems like the stubborn type. Good luck."
"I have secret weapons," Philip replied with a little smile. "He's been susceptible to them so far."
Natasha's expression was amused, and knowing. "I'm sure," she said dryly.
"Mind out of the gutter, Ms. Romanoff," Philip replied. "That's not what I meant."
"Oh, of course not." Her voice was intentionally over innocent and she feigned surprise at even the insinuation.
"Mmhm. He'll be out for a while, I think. You're welcome to stick around?" Philip said.
Natasha could take the hint, and stood. "I'm sure I'll see him later."
"I'll let you know if anything happens, but as I said, you're welcome to stay," Philip replied, "Not pushing though, just an offer."
If he had meant for her to stay, she didn't think he'd have pointed out she had the option to leave. Natasha was not offended, though. It wasn't as though either of them needed her there, at the moment, and Philip might want some time alone with Clint. "It's no problem."
Philip just nodded then, he meant it when he said he wasn't pushing.
Natasha gave he and Clint one more look, and then slipped almost silently out the door.
The last thing Clint knew, he'd been having a hamburger in the cafeteria (okay, maybe two) and trying to read A Midsummer Night's Dream. Trying, being the operative word there. He barely understood a word of it. He was somewhere around Oberon talking about dolphins and mermaids and Cupid of all things when small purple flowers started to grow up through the table around him, wafting prettily in the breeze.
What breeze? Oh hey, nice breeze. He reached out to touch one of the flowers, heavy with sparkling dew, head tilted oddly to one side. He felt...light. He felt really light. Like he could lift right up out of his seat and float out of the room. Which he did, taking a couple of flowers with him.
Nymphs and fairies floated here and there, darting across his path, but he glided easily through the halls overgrown with vines and ferns and moss. It was...warm, and the heavy clothes weighed on him, so he stripped off his shirt, leaving it in his wake as he went, floating, flying? along, a low song on his lips.
He was like that when he found Natasha. Or, at least, he was stripped to the waist, his pupils large, fist cupped as though he were holding something and padding along the halls a little drunkenly as he mumbled, "Puff, the magic dragon lived by the sea, and frolicked in the autumn mist in a land called Honah Lee..."
Natasha was hard to surprise. Or, at least, hard to make visibly surprised. And yet there she was, an intoxicated and half-naked Clint Barton stumbling towards her, with wide eyes. "Clint? What're you doing?"
"Nata..." Clint almost exclaimed as he saw her, stumbling to a stop. He paused partially through her name, looking thoughtful. She had many names. So many names. Which one was the right name? "Nat," he decided, grinning dazedly, "Naaaaat." and he plucked nothing from his hand to offer it to her with a wobbly grin. "Flower? They're special. Titania likes them anyway, so they gotta be."
She cocked her head, her gaze on him piercing. Finally, though, she reached up and pretended to take something from him. It might be easier to keep him calm if she pretended to follow along with his drunken rambling. She offered him a smile, and said, "Thank you. And who is Titania?" He couldn't mean the literary character, could he? What on Earth was going on? "Did you....what did you do today?"
"Your wings are gorgeous," Clint breathed, eyes wide and awed. He reached for her hand, tugging her toward a nearby plate-glass window. "Come fly with me!"
Clint was strong, and Natasha had to tense and dig her heels in to keep him from actually hauling her out a window. "You can't be serious," she murmured under her breath. She tugged him back into the safety of the hallway.
He blinked at her in confusion, but was quickly distracted, following...something? up the wall and around over their heads with a curious crane of his neck. "Man, that stuff grows fast."
She was sure she wouldn't like the answer, but asked, "What does?"
Clint poked at thin air, then peered closer at it, tilting his head. "The forest. And these...wriggly, vine, honeysuckle things. You think they're honeysuckle? It's been so fucking long since I've had real honeysuckle."
Natasha would really prefer Clint not start licking the walls, so she shook her head a little. "No, I don't think honeysuckle, probably just ivy." She started pulling him gently down the hall towards the faculty rooms. Clint wouldn't have kept a joke up this long, and probably wouldn't have gone with delusions as his joke anyway. Something weird was going on, and she had no idea what it was, but she was willing to bet he'd be easier to handle with Philip's help.
The disoriented archer made a grab for one of the flowers as she tugged him away, pouting when it was out of reach. "Where are we going?" he asked when he finally managed to notice that they were headed...somewhere. Up some kind of hill, toward a towering grove. "Did you know your skin glows? I don't remember it glowing. Then again, you're kind of unbelievably hot so I guess it comes with the territory. Even with wings." He made to bat playfully at something on her back.
"Mmmm...I think that may be the first time I've been told my skin glows," she said, sounding mildly amused. She didn't let go of the hand she held as she led him towards Philip's room. "And we're going to see if your theory holds true and Coulson's skin glows, too."
"Everything glows," Clint told her reverently, looking around them as she led him down the hall. "It's like, stardust."
"Pretty." She finally got to the door she'd been searching for and rapped on it quickly.
"Come in," Philip called out. He'd just been reading, getting ready for an online class and frowned as soon as the words were out of his mouth. He found telepathic communication disconcerting at the best of times, even more when it was bad news. Class could wait and hopefully the visitor wanted something short. He needed to check on things.
Clint didn't really understand the telepathic announcement in his head. Something about powers going wrong and quarantine, and he was kind of disappointed that he wasn't a hawk again, because he hadn't gotten to fly outside last time. Oh but hey! He pulled open the door and did a little hop into the room, spreading his arms. "I can fly!"
"We decided to fly indoors," Natasha said dryly, closing the door behind her.
"Good idea. Remember that it took practice last time, Clint," Philip said easily. "It's pretty chilly out too, you don't want to get cold."
"Totally different," Clint told him, padding across the room in just his jeans and his shoes. Come to think of it, the shoes were kind of getting in the way of the moss. He stopped halfway to Coulson and pulled them off, then the socks too, squishing his toes down into the sponginess with a content grin. "Oh yeah, that's better."
Natasha perched against Philip's desk. "He was like this the whole way here. I'm not sure what he's seeing, but it must be amazing."
"And I think I'm grateful I'm missing it," Philip said with a sigh. "The headmaster says it's harmless but I'm glad you brought him here. The bit about flying is a little worrisome."
Clint had gotten distracted again, circling Philip curiously, poking at something just above his head, then petting it with a grin. "Your ears are so freaking soft."
She smirked at them both as Clint circled Philip like an oversized small child. On LSD. With hickies. "He was easily dissuaded from it, at least."
"My... ears?" Philip glanced at Natasha with a look that said, please tell me I didn't sprout anything... "That's very interesting to know, Clint."
Clint snorted over in Natasha's direction. "She wouldn't let me have honeysuckle."
"The wall," she translated. Natasha gave Philip's ears an exaggerating look and then just shrugged.
"The... wall?" Philip didn't even want to know really. This was going to be difficult. "Why don't you tell me about it?"
But Clint had already thumped to the floor, spreading out on his back, basking in the sunlight coming through the one window. "Tell you about what?" he asked, clearly easily distracted. "Naaat, come feel the sun. The moss is really soft over here."
Natasha sashayed over, looking increasingly amused. She gently plopped herself down next to Clint. Unlike the archer, however, she did not lay down. Instead, she braced herself on her arms and remained sitting up. "Honeysuckle," she reminded him.
"God, you are stoned," Philip muttered almost silently. "Yes, tell me about the honeysuckle," he said as he took a seat on the bed. WIth any luck it would keep him in one spot.
"It was growing up the wall," Clint hummed, his eyes closed as he stretched his arms up over his head. "But everything's growing, here." He paused. "That's weird, right?" He had a feeling that things weren't supposed to grow inside.
"Little bit," Natasha said.
"I'm sure it's fine," Philip said soothingly. "Probably just a little powers mishap, it'll sort itself out and meanwhile you've got a nice view, right?"
"Heeey," Clint opened his eyes and reached a hand out toward Philip, though he didn't bother to get up off of the floor. If he thought he was still on the floor at all. "You sure you don't wanna fly?"
She was sure he did not mean the sexual innuendo, but Natasha couldn't quite help her slight smirk at it anyway. "Not while I'm in here."
"I don't have wings, Clint, I never did," Philip reminded him. "And I'm too heavy for you to carry."
"Bull~shit," Clint sing-songed, rolling around on the carpet a little. Then he reached up and placed his hands flat on the floor behind him, tucked his legs in, and rolled up into an easy, limber back-bend to look at them both upside down. "I'm fucking magic!"
Natasha quirked an eyebrow at Coulson.
Philip's own raised pretty darn quickly. He knew Clint was flexible, he just hadn't been sure how much. "I..,. would probably agree." That he was doing that shirtless did not help.
"I could carry you both," Clint insisted, letting his back muscles stretch, shifting one leg to slide up underneath him in a contortionist's trick, his jeans tugging to slip down an inch, revealing the waistband of his boxer-briefs. He was clearly unbothered by this fact. "But Tasha has wings so she can fly herself."
She knew (well, anyone who had seen Clint high now knew) that Clint was Philip's (and Philip was Clint's). That didn't mean she couldn't look, though.
"So she gets wings and I get strange ears?" Philip said with a smile. He was doing all the looking himself, but didn't seem to be bothered by Natasha looking too.
Clint didn't seem to take notice of the attention, or the fact that Natasha seemed to have gone completely silent in the face of his crazy. Instead, he flipped his legs up in an easy handstand, twisted around playfully, torquing his body, then rolled in a slow back-flip until he was on his feet, reaching up to tug at something in the air over his head. "They're not strange. They're fuzzy," he insisted distractedly.
"What do they look like?" Natasha asked.
"I'm going to guess black," Philip said dryly. "There was an incident before you came here that involved some very odd intersections of abilities. Clint spent the day as an actual bird."
Clint cupped a hand to his lips to hide them from Coulson and stage whispered over to her, "He was a cat!"
She snickered, and looked at Philip as though envisioning him as a kitten. "I'm really sad that I missed that," she said, sounding both amused and abnormally honest.
If he'd still been a cat, Philip's ears would be laid back. "It was disconcerting being that small," he replied. "Though Clint enjoyed flying once he got the hang of it. There was careening involved."
Meanwhile, Clint had found Coulson's desk, and had climbed up on top of it, carefully setting books and papers aside until there was enough room for him to sit crosslegged in the middle of it. It wasn't high enough, but it would do.
"Careening seems to be a hobby of his," Natasha commented, remembering how he'd wander through the halls. "Comfy, Barton?"
"It's certainly better than hiding in the top of my closet," Philip put in. "There were very large shelves," he said by way of explanation. "He was trying to get the drop on me."
Clint rolled something invisible around between his hands, sticking his fingers in it (whatever it was) every now and then. "Getting better at it!" He was remembering how to sit still. How to hide. How to slow his breathing and listen to his heart and wait. Sometimes he could be patient.
That didn't surprise Natasha at all; Clint had a natural talent. She was not at all surprised he was making strides. Of course, she doubted he'd caught up to Coulson just yet. "Prove it," she suggested.
The archer paused, looking up at her with an odd expression. "But...the forest."
The look Natasha gave Philip said I have no idea what to do with that, more effectively than her words could have.
Well he certainly didn't know either... Philip just barely stopped the eyeroll before patting the bed next to him. "You know what might be nice, Clint, with a day this nice. How does a nap in the sun sound?"
Clint eyed him like he thought that might be a trick, but honestly, that sounded like the fucking best thing in the world. He had dropped what he was holding (nothing) and hopped off the desk a few beats later, moving to sprawl on the bed beside Coulson. "Can Tasha come?"
Philip glanced at Natasha and gave her a little shrug. "That would be up to her. I'll keep an eye out regardless. Forest and all."
For possibly the first time since the boys had met Natasha, she looked somewhat uncertain.
Stretched out on the bed, Clint rolled his head toward Natasha, huge, dark eyes meeting her gaze. He made a little grabby hand motion against the coverlet and smiled easily at her, lazy and welcoming. It wasn't clear whether he truly understood her dilemma or not in the state he was in, but the pixie dust didn't seem to impair his ability to think at all. It just changed his perception of the world. "It's warm," he murmured finally.
"It's entirely up to you, Natasha," Philip replied. "I'm certainly not going to do anything beyond keep him in one spot. I have a decided aversion for the idea of non-consent."
It would be weak, to give in and lay with Clint. She couldn't be weak around Philip Coulson; she didn't trust him any more than he trusted her. Still, she wanted to, and idly wished she could trust that way. So she compromised, and sat on the edge of the bed, near where Clint was lying.
Clint, seeming to understand the bargain, wriggled closer to where she was perched, stretching out on his side. He didn't touch her, keeping about a six-inch buffer between their bodies, but the way he lay on his side, he almost curled around her as his eyes slipped closed. It might not be cuddling, and it didn't imply any weakness on Natasha's part, but it was just close enough that Clint could feel her body heat, and that was good enough for him.
Philip just smiled at him indulgently once Clint's eyes were closed. He made no attempt to touch Natasha either, settling in on Clint's other side, his only concession was to toe his shoes off. "You can relax," he said as he leaned back. "You're safe here."
She smiled slightly, but it was muted. She wasn't really safe anywhere. Still, Natasha guessed she could appreciate the attempt to make her comfortable. "Do you relax?"
"Occasionally," Philip admitted. "Here, at the apartment. I've gotten much better about it than I used to be."
Natasha nodded, as though it was the sort of answer she expected.
"He helps," Philip said after a few moments. "Even when he's being ridiculous. He helps remind me."
She looked back down at where Clint was curled up near her. If Philip were not there, she'd have touched him, stroked his hair or even curled up alongside him. She suspected the same could be said of Coulson, though she did not ask. "He's special," she agreed.
"And he'll never believe you if you tell him," Philip said with no small amount of exasperation. "It drives me out of my mind sometimes, how he does that."
"You like that he drives you crazy," Natasha pointed out. It had taken her all of thirty seconds after meeting them both to realize that. "Part of his charm."
"It's definitely different," Philip said as he looked over at her. There was that faint smile again, Clint was good for that. "But it's good that he can pull me out of my ruts that way. For all that he's so unconventional, he's very good at being a regular person."
She let out a breath of air that could almost be a laugh. "I hardly know what a regular person is like anymore."
"It's a good place to figure it out. Or at least close to it," Philip replied. "There are a lot of pretty strange people here, one more kind of strange isn't so bad."
"If they're all strange, normal seems like it would be tough to come by." Natasha said, an idle retort.
"Well, there's strange and there's strange," Philip commented. "Most of their strange is mutant related, but it makes it easier to blend in."
Her look at him was appraising. "Do you think you blend in?"
"More than you would think," Philip said with a faint smile. "Enough that no one's ever pushed for an answer when I dodge the question about why I'm here."
"Knowing you won't answer isn't the same as being uninterested," Natasha said with a small smirk.
"I do, technically, answer," Philip replied. "That one, it's not interesting and two, has absolutely no effect on day to day life. And no, I'm not saying more than that to you either," he said with a tiny smirk.
"Technically, that wasn't an answer," she retorted. Natasha's smirk widened. "And I have my suspicions. And can be patient."
Philip's eyebrow tipped up at that. "If you can figure it out, I'll be impressed. And that's all I'm going to say on that."
Natasha gave him an enigmatic look, before glancing back down at Clint. He really was different; certainly different from she and Philip, but even from people who hadn't been so....forged. She wondered if being dragged along Coulson's road - which she imagined differed only slightly from her own - would do something to ruin it.
"He'll be fine," Philip said and whether he meant from the hallucinations or whether he had divined a little bit of her thoughts, well that was the question.
"He better be." She murmured.
"He will," Philip said firmly and again, he could mean a couple things with that.
She wasn't sure how to take Philip's promise, or how much of it to believe. He hadn't seen what she had; children broken by the weight of what was being asked of them. He'd been trained alone, and by someone who cared for him. That was not the usual way. Natasha did not have the will or the words to say that, though, so instead she simply shrugged, as though taking him at face-value.
"And he's an idiot," Philip said with a sigh. "You'll be banging your head against that before long. He thinks he's useless. Frequently."
Natasha huffed slightly. "He's wrong."
"You know it, I know it, I've been trying to drum it through his thick skull," Philip said dryly.
She looked up and smirked at him. "He seems like the stubborn type. Good luck."
"I have secret weapons," Philip replied with a little smile. "He's been susceptible to them so far."
Natasha's expression was amused, and knowing. "I'm sure," she said dryly.
"Mind out of the gutter, Ms. Romanoff," Philip replied. "That's not what I meant."
"Oh, of course not." Her voice was intentionally over innocent and she feigned surprise at even the insinuation.
"Mmhm. He'll be out for a while, I think. You're welcome to stick around?" Philip said.
Natasha could take the hint, and stood. "I'm sure I'll see him later."
"I'll let you know if anything happens, but as I said, you're welcome to stay," Philip replied, "Not pushing though, just an offer."
If he had meant for her to stay, she didn't think he'd have pointed out she had the option to leave. Natasha was not offended, though. It wasn't as though either of them needed her there, at the moment, and Philip might want some time alone with Clint. "It's no problem."
Philip just nodded then, he meant it when he said he wasn't pushing.
Natasha gave he and Clint one more look, and then slipped almost silently out the door.
