A/N: Written for the MediAvengers Mini-Bang. Unfortunately, family travels and my router finally dying conspired to make me a week late with posting.

"When the finger of Destiny suddenly points at a man in the middle of his breakfast, it makes him thoughtful." - Cusins, Major Barbara by George Bernard Shaw

Darcy wasn't sure what the rules were in her new, alien-infested life, but as far as she was concerned, surviving a hostile attack deserved a drink. Despite the fact that a good portion of Puente Antiguo had been flattened and/or set on fire, a few places were unharmed, including the bar. (The political scientist part of her brain wondered if it was Thor's culture's war-rules that places of celebration be available after the battle for the winners, and she made a mental note to ask the next Asgardian she saw about that.)

The bar was surprisingly full when she walked in, a mix of people celebrating survival like her and mourning their losses. No one had died, but property damage had been huge, and in a town like this, that could be everything. Darcy approached one of the empty stools along the bar and waited for the bartender to notice her. He didn't even bother to ID her before she asked for a rum and coke. Normally, she'd be a little giddy about this, but it probably had less to do with recognizing her and more to do with the fact that anyone wandering in with the streets still torn up really needed the drink.

As she sipped her drink, Darcy looked around the bar, absently cataloging familiar faces. The good ol' boys playing pool were regulars at the diner for breakfast, and the newest waitress was sitting at the end of the bar, staring morosely into her beer. She'd only started the day before everything went to hell, new in town, and Darcy had to wonder if she was going to turn around and head right back out. A few other people, like the elderly postwoman who had no trouble lifting packages with Jane's ridiculously heavy ordered parts, and the possibly-stoned pet shop dude, she recognized from around town. The guy two seats to her right was another story.

The first thing she noticed was that he had great arms. Not as great as Thor, but it was hard to measure up to a god. His sandy blonde haircut made her think military, which made her think "jackbooted thug," but the way his t-shirt was stretched across his chest could not have been uniform appropriate. Besides, they were all either out in the desert packing up their Mew-Mew station, or scouring the streets for additional wreckage. No reason for one to be in the bar having what suspiciously looked like an Appletini.

Thinking that strangers were just friends she hadn't met yet, Darcy picked up her drink and slid down a few seats, dropping herself right next to the man.

"Hello, drifter!" she said cheerily, offering her hand. "Name's Darcy, college student here for an internship. Who are you and how did you end up in this currently less-than-idyllic town?"

The guy stared at her for a moment, eyes wide and flicking from her face to her hand and back up, though she noticed they caught on her chest both ways. Apparently sensing no immediate threat, he took the offered hand. "Clint. Ex-Army, traveling the States doing odd jobs."

"Not settling just yet, I can respect that. I've been through three majors already, but I think this one will stick. Political science just feels right, you know?"

"You hoping to be the first female president?" Clint asked, grinning.

"Nah, I'd rather be the woman that gets her elected," Darcy said.

"So you want the real power?"

"Guilty as charged." She finished off her first drink and signaled the bartender. When he came over, she said, "Another rum and coke and please don't tell me I'm going to have to order an Appletini with a straight face."

"Whatever, they're delicious," he protested, but he was still smiling. "My partner turned me on to them. I like sweet stuff."

"Of course," she said. "The Appletini, that obscenely tight shirt, your partner—"

"No, I'm not— Not that there's anything wrong with— I just—" He stopped and took a deep breath. "I meant my work partner. She's always had my back through some tough scrapes. When she got tired of me trying to macho man my way through bottles of Jack, she told me I might as well go big and order the most obnoxious thing I could. And for the record, I don't care what anyone does in their bed, but I prefer a woman in mine."

"Uh-huh, sure, whatever you say," Darcy joked, nudging the ice cubes around her empty glass with her short straw.

"And suddenly I feel like we're twelve-year-olds at a sleepover or something," he quipped.

The words triggered something in her brain, so when the bartender brought the drinks, she asked him, "Do you have any flavored vodka?"

He glanced at the full back wall and under the bar as well. "I think I might have some cherry in the back?"

"Bring the bottle and two shot glasses," she asked. "I'll pay for the whole thing."

The bartender disappeared and Clint turned to her. "What are you up to?"

"If we're doing the sleepover thing," she said around a wicked grin, "why not have some games? A little Never Have I Ever?"

"You're on," he said. When the bartender came back, half-full bottle and glasses in hand, Clint poured the first pair of shots and gestured. "Ladies first."

She stuck her tongue out and said, "Never have I ever gotten a buzz cut."

"Oh, so it's like that, huh?" He tossed back the shot and refilled it. "Never have I ever bought a bra for myself."

"You know, most guys would have gone with never worn a bra," she reminded him before she took her shot. "I formally submit a request to hear the story behind that at a later time."

The game continued like that, each taking cheap shots at the other. She worked out some of the places he'd been, but tried not to pry, while he got her to drink with the most inane things. "Seriously, who the fuck's never used an ATM before?" she complained when they had almost finished the bottle.

"Me, now drink up."

She did so grudgingly and tried to formulate her next attack in her head. "Never have I ever… gone skinny dipping with a member of the opposite sex."

Clint groaned and took the shot. "Her name was Jenny Jones, we were sixteen, and her dad tried to shoot me with his shotgun when we snuck her back in."

"Was it worth it?"

He grin was bright in the dim light of the bar. "Absolutely." Darcy felt herself smiling back, possibly a lopsided because of the vodka. As she watched, Clint's smile softened a little. "Never have I ever kissed a stranger in a bar just because I wanted to."

She looked pointedly at her shot and then back at him. "Want to change that?"

"Absolutely."

The kiss was sloppy, with both of them on the far side of tipsy, but it felt right. Darcy lost herself in the feel of his lips on hers and their tongues pressing against each other. It wasn't about dominance or impressing each other. It was just about feeling good with someone they'd had a connection with.

Her sense of time may have been skewed, but barely a minute could have gone by when she heard a phone ringing, the Imperial Death March of all things. Clint groaned, not a good kind of groan given what they were doing, and pulled away.

"I'm sorry, I have to take this," he said, pulling his phone out of his back pocket. "This is Clint," he said. "Yeah… Enjoying my night off… None of your damn business, Phil!… Okay… When do I start?… Fuck, really?" He looked at his watch. "If I've only got six hours before I'm hitting the road, I guess I better sleep… Shut up. I'm gonna give you hell for this once I'm sober again." He ended the call and dropped the phone on the bar top. "New job. Have to be on the road at seven tomorrow morning."

Darcy glanced at her watch, a little surprised to see it was already a quarter to one. "Wow, you should definitely go sleep."

Clint nodded, then looked at the almost empty bottle and their empty shot glasses. "Another for the road?"

She smiled and poured the shots. Before he went to take it, she clinked the two small glasses together. "To wherever our adventures take us, and the people we meet along the way."

He snorted and downed the shot in unison with her. "You're a surprisingly elegant drunk, you know that?"

"The word is eloquent, fucker," she said, and then proved the exact difference between the words when she tripped on the leg of her barstool standing up.

"I see that now," he said, holding her to his torso. It wasn't necessary, but it felt nice, so Darcy wasn't going to say otherwise. "Let me call you a friend or something."

Darcy dug her phone out and asked Clint to call Jane, then passed her debit card to the bartender. Clint intercepted that as well and handed over his own. Rather than fight it, Darcy leaned into his chest and let the sounds wash over her, barely paying attention to anything until the short kiss Clint brushed across her forehead after he tucked her into the back of Jane's van. She smiled at him, flinched at the loud noise of the doors closing, and let the rocking of the drive lull her to sleep. She'd probably be cranky and hungover when they saw Erik off in the morning, but she'd move to her own bed after that.

The flight to New York had been unpleasant to say the least. The crying baby, the woman drooling onto Darcy's shoulder in her sleep, her inability to find the audio track in English for the in-flight movie (her Spanish was not good enough to keep up with that). Even her hair had lost some of its bounce by the time they were pulling into her gate.

She was fully prepared to be miserable for the rest day, but she had forgotten just how much of a ball of sunshine her favorite thunder god could be.

"Darcy!" he yelled as soon as he saw her pass the security checkpoint. Apparently not even the Avengers could get on the other side of those things without a ticket or a very good reason.

"Hey man," she said, smiling weakly. He grinned brightly in return and picked her up in a bear hug, swinging her around in a circle that made her laugh like a little kid. "Getting stronger there, huh? Think you could bench press Jane's van now?"

He laughed, a loud boom that reminded her of thunder and made the windows rattle. Absently, she wondered if insurance companies included him and Loki when it came to acts of God. "While your vehicle may have defeated me twice when we first met, I have no doubt that I could lift it with my full strength restored. However, Jane and I have found much better uses for it."

"…Way more than I ever needed to know about your sex life, 'kay buddy?" she said, clapping him on the arm, the closest she could get to his shoulder. "Now let's put those muscles to use and carry my bags out, okay?"

Thor grinned and stripped her bag off her shoulder to carry over his own, then followed her to the baggage carousel. At first, she wasn't sure how she was going to pay for graduate school and didn't want to torture herself, but apparently being a good friend of a good friend of Tony Stark was a way to get no-interest loans that could be paid off in either cash, bizarre favors, or slave labor in the lab. She was only looking at two grad schools in the city, but she figured she might as well get a vacation with free lodging out of the deal and had packed enough for two weeks with room for souvenirs.

"What are your plans for this trip?" Thor asked as they stood patiently, waiting for her bright blue suitcase to circle around. "Jane mentioned furthering your schooling?"

"Yeah, I'm looking at Columbia day after tomorrow and NYU Monday of next week," Darcy said. "And thanks again for getting me that loan from Stark."

"It was but a small favor. I told him a friend of mine was interested in continuing school in a science," he confessed. "He was all too happy to provide the funds."

"We're just ignoring the political part then?"

"I didn't see the point in specifying what kind of scientist you were." He sounded innocent, but she caught the glint in his eye that he often got when he denied knowing who ate the rest of Jane's Kashi. "But you have no further plans, is that correct?"

Darcy shrugged. "Figured I'd see where my time takes me." She spied her bag and pointed. "That one."

He hauled it off the belt and set it on its wheels. "Then may I propose a trip to some of my favorite locations in this city to celebrate your arrival?"

Thor popped his arm out and Darcy took it. "Lead the way, my good sir!"

As it turned out, Thor's favorite places in the city all contained food and copious amounts of alcohol. They only hit about four, but she ordered a few drinks in each place. Stark had sent someone to drive them around, some guy named Happy, and he seemed familiar with the bar-hopping process. Not surprising since he said he'd been working for Stark since the playboy days.

Their adventure ended back at the Tower at three in the morning. Thor half-carried her into the elevator, introduced her to the robot butler voice, and showed her where the guest bedroom on his floor was so she could pass out.

She realized she'd forgotten to close the curtains when the light in the morning became too bright to ignore. Darcy glared at the windows and groaned. "What time is it?" she grumbled to herself, fumbling for her phone.

"The time is now 7:28am," a British voice reported from the ceiling.

Darcy jumped, then remembered. "JARVIS?"

"Yes, Miss Lewis?"

"Okay, just making sure."

"Certainly, Miss Lewis."

Knowing she would sleep anymore, Darcy crawled out of bed. "Jarv, where's the closest place to get coffee?"

"Prince Thor does not keep coffee on his own floor, as the taste does not sit well with him. However, there is a kitchen on the communal floor below this one and there is still a warm pot from when Captain Rogers made it this morning after his run."

"Captain America won't care if I drink his java?"

"Frankly, Miss Lewis, if you don't, someone else will."

"Tower full of coffee thieves," she said. "I can respect that." She considered her suitcase and getting dressed. "JARVIS, is anyone else on the shared floor right now?"

"Not at the moment, Miss Lewis."

She opened the door and let herself out into the hallway, still wearing her pajamas. "Directions to the shared kitchen, please. And call me Darcy. Miss Lewis makes me feel like I'm facing down my third grade teacher."

"Understood, Darcy. Please follow the green arrows," he said as a set of hologram arrows lit up on the wall next to her.

"Awesome."

The arrows led her to the elevator, which then automatically dropped her down a level. The doors opened onto a large room with couches and television. Just down the hall to the left, she could see the arrows ending in a full green halo around the doorway. It flashed blue when she walked through and entered the kitchen and she smiled up at the ceiling. "Thank you, JARVIS."

"You're very welcome, Darcy."

It didn't take long for her to locate the coffeepot by smell. "Jackpot," she hissed and began rummaging around in the cabinets for a mug.

"Two doors to your left."

She followed the instructions and gave JARVIS an absentminded thumbs up before filling her cup with her first coffee of the day. Usually one would get her moving and the second would prepare her for complex human interaction. Actually getting anything done required at least a third one. As she had no plans for the day besides nursing her mini-hangover and finding her question list for Columbia, she should only need two. After quickly doctoring it with enough sugar and the vanilla creamer tucked into the fridge, she decided to take it back to her room and do a little reading while she drank.

Of course, as soon as she approached the kitchen door, her coffee ended up all over the floor and the man she had run into.

"Shit, I am so sorry!" She looked quickly around for some napkins to mop up the spill. "My brain hasn't booted up completely since that was my first cup and obviously my body hasn't either." When she turned around, paper towels in hand, she noticed the guy was holding the coffee spot on his white t-shirt as far away from his body as possible without taking off the shirt. "Seriously, I'll go throw that in the wash if you'll let me and JARVIS shows me where it is."

"There is a laundry room down the hall to your right, Darcy," he piped in helpfully.

"It's okay," the guy said. "It's just a gym shirt." Then he looked up and right at her. He squinted a little and tilted his head. "Darcy?"

"Um, yeah," she said sheepishly, and waved. "Hi. I guess Thor mentioned I was coming?"

"He mentioned his girlfriend's intern, so yeah, you could say that." He glanced down at his shirt, shrugged, and stripped it off, throwing it to the floor. "I'll see what I can get cleaned up with this and you can get the rest while I put it in the laundry," he explained, swiping it around with his foot.

"'Kay," she said, then turned to pour herself a fresh cup while she waited. "Want some of Captain America's coffee?"

"Yeah, pour it in the Hunger Games mug. Splash of hazelnut, five spoons of sugar."

Darcy paused with her hand on the cabinet handle. "And I thought I put a lot of sugar."

He stood up, dripping shirt in hand. "What can I say? I like sweet things." With that, he disappeared down the hall. Darcy filled the mug about halfway, thinking she could just top it off once she put in the sweetener. She had just turned to do that when the guy came back in, pulling a purple t-shirt over his head.

Her hand froze as the pieces clicked together. "Clint?"

He grinned, that same grin she fuzzily remembered from a bar in the middle of a New Mexican war zone. "Hey Darcy."

Leaving her coffee on the counter, she bolted for the elevator.

Jane picked up on the third ring of the second call. It was early enough that she had probably been running errands before sleeping the day away and getting up around six in the evening to start prepping for the night's observations. "What's up, Darce?" she said, out of breath, which pretty much confirmed the out-and-about idea.

"Clint's here."

"You mean Hawkeye?" Jane asked. "I think Thor said his name was Clint."

Darcy had been pacing her room, wishing her phone had a cord like her one in middle school so she could twist it around her fingers, but Jane's comment stopped her in her tracks. "Holy fuck. That was Hawkeye."

"That's what you just—"

"No, you were talking about Hawkeye. I was talking about Clint from the bar in New Mexico, and apparently they're the same person."

"Wait a second." Now she had Jane's full attention. "You made out with Hawkeye in New Mexico?"

"Apparently," Darcy hissed. "And now I've made an ass of myself by spilling coffee on him and not recognizing him and what am I going to do?"

"First, you're going to breathe," Jane reminded her. "Let me hear one good breath in and out, okay?" Darcy indulged her, inhaling deeply and blowing out through her mouth in a huff. "Good. Now, Thor said that there are two SHIELD agents on the team. There were agents all over town back then, so he's probably one of them."

"Oh gods, I kissed a jackbooted thug," Darcy groaned. "I drank cherry vodka and spilled all my dirty secrets to a jackbooted thug who drinks Appletinis."

"You did what now?" Jane asked, a little sharper than she had been. "What secrets?"

"Just embarrassing personal stuff," Darcy said. "We were playing Never Have I Ever. I wouldn't spill science secrets, no matter how much I drank, you know that."

"I know that," Jane said, trying to soothe her friend's ruffled feathers, "but SHIELD didn't, did they?"

Darcy scrubbed a hand over her face. "Normal people don't have genius brains working fast at this time of day. Explain, please?"

"What if he was a plant to make sure you would stay quiet?"

She wanted to defend Clint, but she really couldn't. She knew all kinds of things about him, but all of them could have been lies. One little detail stuck out in her mind and came out of her mouth before she could stop. "His boss called and Clint said it was his night off."

"It might have been a cover," Jane said, and Darcy felt herself deflating again. If she had been Clint's mission, if that connection she thought she had felt was faked, she wasn't sure how well the next two weeks would play out. "Just… let me make a call, okay? I've got a few strings I can pull after the Tromsø thing to find out the truth. I'll call back in ten minutes, got it?"

"Yes ma'am, boss lady," Darcy said automatically. Usually when Jane started giving out instructions, she was in science mode and it was easiest not to argue. The agreement response was so ingrained that Darcy didn't even have to think to follow through with it. Instead, she suddenly found herself staring at a disconnected phone and had to think about what to do with herself.

The problem was, she had really liked Clint. At least, the Clint she got to know in New Mexico. He was relaxed and funny and could handle her snark with ease. It was a rare occasion that she met someone like that. That kiss hadn't been half-bad either. She'd admitted, to Jane at least, that she entertained some very vague, romcom-style fantasies where she met her soldier again and he swept her off her feet. Maybe in the middle of a busy city, maybe back in the bar where it all began. Nowhere in these daydreams did she spill coffee on him while she was still in her pajamas.

If she had been a mission, all bets were off. They could be polite acquaintances, maybe even friends, but she wasn't about to let feelings get tangled up with some guy who was secretly testing her to see if she'd break. That was a surefire way to end up on Jerry Springer or whatever the superspy version of that was.

If it really had been his night off, that made it a little more complicated. He could have been telling the truth about everything. He could have been using an alias with his own name. Maybe he just told her the declassified truth. She could deal with that. The amount of non-disclosures and red tape she'd had to deal with following Thor's first visit gave her an intimate look at exactly what "classified" meant. Classified secrets were fine.

But she'd grown a little attached to the idea of a sarcastic little shit who drank Appletinis and had never used an ATM. It was the quirks that drew her to him, and if those had been made up, she wasn't sure what she'd do.

She was broken out of her thoughts by her phone ringing.

"It was the waitress," Jane said as soon as Darcy picked up.

"What?"

"The waitress, the one that started working at the cafe the day they took all of our stuff?" Jane reminded her. "She was a SHIELD agent. And she had been in the bar to keep an eye on you and make sure you didn't say anything classified. She didn't worry too much since you sat down to talk with the only agent in town with the night off."

Darcy gripped the phone tighter. "He was off-duty?"

"He was off-duty," Jane confirmed. "I still don't know how much of what he told you was real, but if he was playing you, it was because he's an asshole, not because he's an agent."

She laughed. "For some strange reason, that makes me feel a lot better."

"I thought it might." Jane paused, obviously letting Darcy's brain catch up with her emotions and doing the same herself. "You okay?"

Darcy shrugged, then remembered Jane couldn't see that. "I guess. Maybe. It's just a different set of problems now."

"Because you made an ass out of yourself?"

She groaned. "I'd forgotten about that. Thanks for the reminder."

"You're welcome," Jane said, all too chipper. "So what's the problem you were thinking about?"

"How much of what he told me was actually true. Whether he felt what I thought I felt—"

"Whether he wished he could spot you again in a crowded room?"

"Jane, shut up," Darcy whined, but she was laughing a little as well.

"Just get to know him," Jane said. "Put on your big girl panties and deal with it."

"And what if it doesn't pan out?"

"Then I'll be here waiting with a pair of shot glasses and a bottle of tequila."

Darcy grinned. "You're the best."

"Thanks. Now go get your own Avenger. I've got one and they're going fast."

Now she was really laughing. "Bye, you dork," she said, hanging up.

If she was going to see Clint, she was getting dressed. Her pink tank top and monkey-printed boxer shorts were cute, but she needed at least a pair of blue jeans and a shirt. Maybe she'd even try to tame her hair a little bit from its frizzy, slept-in disaster state. She had just tossed a cardigan onto her bed and was scrounging around in her suitcase for a toothbrush when someone knocked on her door.

"Darcy, may I be allowed to enter?"

"Yeah, come on in." Thor opened the door and stood there awkwardly. "What's up?"

"Clint informed me that he might have upset you. He wished that I would look on you and ensure you were not in distress."

She snorted and rolled her eyes. "I was a little upset, but I'm fine now. You can tell him that I'm not about to, I don't know, steal some Stark tech and blow up the Tower or anything."

"I'm sure that will be of great comfort to him," Thor said. "However, I believe his own concern was about your well-being, as was mine."

Darcy collapsed onto her bed and reached to put on her boots. "So he actually cares?"

"Darcy," Thor said, sitting next to her. "Clint is not just a good warrior and my friend. He is also a good man. If he has wronged you in some way, I believe he would only wish to make it right."

Thor was usually a pretty good judge of character, aside from the homicidal brother thing, so that was definitely a point in Clint's favor. "Say you met someone and they lied to you right from the beginning, but you thought you might want to get to know them anyway. What would you do?"

He was silent for a long minute. Darcy almost thought she had asked the wrong person, given that his blind spot of a brother was the god of lies. Just as she was about to tell Thor to forget it, he spoke carefully. "I would inform this person that, while I think fondly of them, dishonesty will not be tolerated."

Darcy thought it sounded like as good a plan as any. "Right." She nodded and got her boots on the ground. "One more thing. When the team goes out to one of your favorite places, what does Clint order to drink?"

Thor wrinkled his nose, trying to remember. "The Man of Iron mocks him mercilessly as he orders a drink the color of Banner's fighting body with the taste of orchards."

"Awesome," Darcy said. "Thanks, buddy." She gave him a hug and left the room. Whatever Clint she knew, it was probably the same one the rest of his team knew, and that was a good enough start for her.

When she hit the elevator, she asked JARVIS to direct her to wherever Clint was. He took her back to the communal floor. She expected to see some green arrows when the doors opened, but instead caught sight of Clint sitting on the couch, ESPN Classic on mute. He looked over when the doors opened and stood as soon as he saw her.

"Darcy—"

She shook her head and walked over to him. "Hi," she said, holding out her hand. "I'm Darcy. Friend of Thor and potential graduate student. Who are you and how did you end up in this way-too-expensive tower?"

He took her hand and smiled. "Clint. Ex-Army, SHIELD sniper and part-time Avenger. This is my new crash pad between the world's most bizarre missions."

"Freeloading off of Tony Stark, I can respect that."

Clint laughed. "Please let me be there to see his face when you tell him you're a political scientist. In the meantime, would you like some of Captain America's coffee? Someone left a perfectly good cup of it on the counter and it just needs a little microwaving."

"Awesome."