Leave the battle and it follows you home

Summary : Clint had made his peace. He left the good fight and retired. Being under house arrest is not so bad when you can be together with your family again. He was happy with his life but the consequences of Thanos's action followed him home. He lost his entire family at the snap of fingers and in one moment he was completely alone again.

Or

Clint during Avengers : Infinity Wars

Note: the usual disclaimers apply. Don't own anything. All characters and recognizable contents belong to their respective owners. Not making any money from this.

Not betaed so all the spelling and grammatical mistakes are mine. Let me know if you spot them.

Clint retired for the second time - well technically he had no choice but to retire this time as he would have been labelled enemy of the state due to what happened in Sokovia and the resulting accords and the fight which led to the disbandment of the Avengers. He took the deal along with Scott Lang and some other people. Since he was a human with no superhuman powers, he was allowed to stay under house arrest which was far better that being on the Raft. He was able to complete re-flooring the sunroom like he'd promised Laura.

Since Clint had recently completed the duration of being under house arrest, he was now able to move freely wherever he wanted. The first thing that he did after he was able to leave the house was to take Lila and Cooper skiing like he'd promised. His whole family including Laura and Nathaniel were together that day and it's one of the fondest memories Clint had in a long time. His whole family was together, laughing and smiling and having fun. He missed the Avengers – Natasha especially, who he remembers every time he'd take his son's name. Nathaniel was after all named after the Black Widow herself, he would still not give up his family for anything else in the world.

Now here he was, singing softly to himself, making dinner for his family, television playing softly in the background, when his entire world turned upside down. Laura had taken the kids along with Lucky- their dog, to the park while Clint stayed behind to have dinner ready – his speciality Spaghetti and meatballs with extra meatballs just the way Cooper liked it. He'd just finished putting the tray out of the oven and had checked the clock to wonder where the kids and Laura were when the report from the television drew his attention. There were panicked reports coming from all around the world that people and everything living were turning to dust, disintegrating and disappearing right in front of everyone's eyes.

Clint's ears started ringing with white noise as blood rushed to them, his heart started beating a mile a minute and cold sweat and fear gripped his heart. He blindly rushed towards the counter where his phone sat and dialled Laura's speed dial. There was no answer. He kept trying while he ran out of his house, he didn't even bother putting his shoes on, he just ran towards the direction of the park- towards the place where Laura usually sat and the kids played. All he could see there was an empty stroller and a dropped phone- Laura's, he couldn't find her nor could he find the kids or even Lucky who usually ran towards Clint, happy to see his master again. He clutched the stroller to his chest and rocked back and forth, mind completely shut down, tears streaming from his eyes. He shouted for Laura- for Lila- for Cooper- for Nathaniel and for Lucky but no one answered his calls. Somewhere around him he heard a hysterical woman wailing that they all just vanished- turned to dust right in front of her eyes. He tried questioning her but she was too grief-stricken to make any sense. She just kept repeating the same damn thing over and over.

Somehow he found himself back at home, hoping against hope that maybe just maybe he missed them- that maybe they just left in a hurry from the park and forgot to collect their things. He called for them again. Still no reply came. The television was still running and the same reports were coming in from around the world. In that moment Clint broke the agreement to the Accords of not contacting the others and called Natasha. When no reply came, he called Director Fury, Agent Hill, Cap and even Tony. None of them answered. That was the moment that he realised that something very bad had in fact happened and that he won't be seeing his entire family again. Something world changing had taken place while he sat in the kitchen preparing dinner. His family faced something horrible while he wasn't there to protect them.

He, Clint Barton was nothing without his family, he was useless but Hawkeye wasn't. Hawkeye could separate himself from the mind numbing grief he was feeling, could think and find a way out when he, Clint couldn't. Hawkeye was used to thinking and getting out of pressure situations. He could find out what was happening and he could save Laura and his kids if there was any way possible to save them. He had to compartmentalise now. His family needed him right this moment.

With determination, he headed to the closet and dug out his costume which he hadn't donned in a long time, he loaded his quiver with arrows, held his bow in his hand and said with ultimate conviction, "I'll get us back together again, I promise Laura, I promise you kids." With that he headed back to the life he once gave up.

THE END.