It's just a game, Steve told himself. Just a game. Like you used to play back then, even before the War, before everything else. Get your act together, Rogers—they're counting on you.

But who was he kidding? They thought he was dead. They didn't know that he was sitting in a simple metal chair, facing a simple metal desk, in a simple metal room—less than a hundred feet away—whose walls had fist sized dents from his own bleeding knuckles. They didn't know that he was wagering their lives; their pain—they didn't know he was in a near cold sweat trying to win this impossible game with an impossible price and failing so horribly. They didn't know that his concentration was slipping further and further away until he could barely hear himself think.

Steve glanced up at the man across the table, lifting his head from its buried crook on his hand and wrist. The man had a ghost of a smile twisted on his almost translucent lips. The man was waiting, smirking—he knew. He knew and he fed off the fact that he knew Steve's mind and game were slowly slipping. Cracking.

Steve knew it too.

There was another muffled shout that flooded the room from its unseen speakers, and Steve jumped as if he had been shocked. His eyes flickered unconsciously around the room, as if searching for the source—desperately wishing he could help them—but his eyes found their way back to his opponent's own and Steve instantly knew it was a warning. The time to make his next move way running out.

Focus. Block it out.

Block out the thoughts of his everlasting, never to be relayed, failure.

It's just game, Steve told himself again, blinking the cloud furiously out of his mind as he reached for the small metal pawn in front of him. Pretending would be the only way he could get through this without snapping, he had to—had to focus. He had to pretend. For their sakes, he had to pretend. He had to pretend it was just a game.

Only—

—it wasn't

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

Just a Game.

Fleet of the Wind

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

It was actually a fairly dull day. Well, dull for them—the group that called themselves the Avengers. Mother Earth didn't need saving from some incredibly aggressive alien fleet, New York was not in danger of being destroyed—no Military Base had spontaneously combusted and no bank was being held up by some amateur super powered super villain. North Korea was not pondering missile-launches, L.A.X. was not at risk of some massive terrorist attack (that they knew of), and the world—or so it appeared—was at peace.

This meant, of course, the quiet relaxed manner at Stark Towers had to be broken.

"TONY!"

There was a crash and an enraged shout from Natasha, quickly followed by a roll of half-fearful half-evil cackle from said playboy-genius-philanthropist. There was another crash, and a sharp OW! and more laughing and fury emanating from a nearby room.

Steve sighed, staring deep into his coffee mug-gazing hopelessly at the dark brown liquid as if it could somehow save him from whatever chaos was about to break loose. So much for a quiet morning not saving the world.

Clint poked his head in the kitchen doorway; obviously just having woken up—hair messily combed and wearing the same shirt Steve has seen him in last night. He had a half glazed look of sleep in his eyes, quickly sparked to life by the mischievous glint that pushed through. All in one glance that Clint shot him, Steve could tell that the assassin was asking him where the sounds were coming from—as they were obviously not here—and that if Steve didn't tell him, Clint would eventually find them anyways, though he would be irritated to have missed what exactly made ever composed Natasha shriek and miss Tony running for his life. All in one look.

Steve sighed and jerked a hand over his shoulder, gesturing to the sitting room just off of the kitchen. The archer's grin grew significantly, and he raced by Steve so fast the Captain almost missed the camera clutched in his hands. Trying not to think about what was probably happening (such as Stark getting murdered or mauled) in the next room over, Steve tried to return to his paper and coffee.

Banner walked in a few seconds later, blinking sleepily over his wire-rimmed glasses and plopping down across the wooden table from Steve. The soldier slowly pushed the mostly full coffee pot across the table to the scientist, not glancing up from his paper, who took it and poured himself a cup.

"HOLY MOTHER OF GOD—SHE HAS A TAZER!"

"DAMN RIGHT I DO—NOW HOLD STILL!"

Steve sighed heavily, glancing up from his paper and catching Bruce's amused stare, before returning back to his article and saying loudly, with great exasperation, "Natasha—please don't taze Tony. Tony—whatever you did, apologize for it."

"I didn't do anything!" Stark protested weakly.

There was a ZAP!—a strangled yell, and a burst of laughter from Clint (who was no doubtlessly watching this whole thing with an overly amused expression on his face behind the camera lens).

"Oh, how mature," Tony hissed. "Laughing my pain—you are such a great role model, Barton. What would I do without your shinning beacon of example?"

"Oh, I know—" Came the amused response, "—and who would video tape the entire thing for your YouTube fan base? So I'm like posting your humiliation of yourself being pinned and tazed by the famous Black Widow for the world to see and a someone who laughs at your pain. I really don't know what you would do without—"

The rest of his reply was cut off by another zapping noise and a complimentary (and totally manly, Tony would claim later) scream.

"OKAY—OKAY. I. AM. SORRY. HAPPY NOW?"

ZAP—"OW!"

"Now I am," came the rather smug reply.

Steve listened for a moment more, but like most of the scrimmages in the tower—it seemed to have resolved itself within a few minutes and he returned his full attention to the paper laying out on the table in front of him. This was how life was in Stark Towers—unpredictable, tense, but never boring. It had first just started out with Banner living here with Stark, the genius had somehow managed to convince Bruce to crash here for a few days after their battle with Loki instead of hiking it outa there back to India or Guatemala or wherever he was planning on hiding himself in. The few days had eventually turned into a few weeks; how Tony had managed it, Steve wasn't quite sure—and during those few weeks, Clint and Natasha had somehow been dragged into residence as well, for Stark Towers had become a sort of an unofficial base for the Avengers that was well equipped, an easy launch point, and a hell of a lot more comfortable than most S.H.I.E.L.D. agent residences.

Eventually, Steve found himself blinking in confusion at the phone in his hands amongst the dull dial tone and wondering what the hell had just happened and did he just agree to come stay at Stark Towers? Tony had called him up, and in less than a minute warped his words and suggestions that Steve was saying 'yes' before he even knew what he was agreeing to. Apparently, Steve learned this a while later, Tony had felt rather sorry for the super-solider living in a dreary S.H.I.E.L.D base with humorless agents and seriously destroyed punching bags for company. Of course, the man had used a much more brief and crude way of saying this, but that wasn't really important at the moment.

Thor returned from Asgard—in his own words, to 'honor his vow to protect this Midgardian World from harm alongside 'Earth's Mightiest Heroes'.' Apparently, some of the people higher up in S.H.I.E.L.D's defense hadn't taken kindly to his return and after a messy debate—Thor was eventually allowed to stay. The Asgardian was not to be left out, and soon took up residence at Stark Towers as well, completely determining the Towers as the unofficial Avenger's Base and/or Residence.

It was... an interesting experience, to say the least. Certainly nothing like Steve had ever done before. The Helicarrier had been mind-blowing enough. Between the first time he heard JARVIS, to YouTube... life was never boring. Oh, and there was that time that Tony had insisted on trying to get him drunk—which hadn't ended well for any of them. Fighting a group of sonic-screaming robot things with massive hangovers hadn't been their best battle the following day. Steve had ended up doing most of the work, with Tony the only one mildly coherent enough to help him out after shutting his ability to hear through the suit.

Missions were frequent—but not today. Not for the past week either. It made the solider rather nervous, feeling on edge as if this were the calm before the storm. Everyone else had let their guard down—telling him to relax, enjoy it while it lasted—but he just couldn't shake the feeling that something horrible was coming. Something horrible and big.

But then again, he was probably just being paranoid.

Paranoid, or highly insightful.

Either way, Steve wasn't surprised when JARVIS called him saying 'his presence was requested' upstairs. Which meant that Fury had a new mission for them. Well, it could've also meant that Tony's prodding up Bruce with sharp objects had finally succeeded in revealing the monster from within. However, when asking JARVIS as such—the AI had confirmed Steve's earlier thoughts of a mission's brief.

Fury's video briefing was short, brief, and to the point. The team had gathered around a large flat-screen in a sort of office-looking room on the fifteenth level of the building. The mission was supposed to be rather simple—there was a suspected low-threat terrorist base they had discovered and they wanted the Avengers to take down and neutralize. It was supposed to be rather simple, the inside group was suspected to be armed—but not too heavily—and large—but not too large. In fact, the only reason they were sending in the Avengers at all in opposed to a regular team was the suspicion of mutant involvement. This raised the threat level up a few notches, but the mutant involvement was suggested to be low-powered, and possibly even nonexistent. It was a supposed to be a simple in/out mission that could potentially have them back in time for Shwarma if they were careful.

Natasha and Bruce suited up without a word (more of the suiting up on Natasha's case, and less to Bruce) as usual. Clint made a few wisecracks, Thor happily rumbled about the glorious battle approaching, and Tony made a comment about how it took Fury long enough and he was getting bored out of his mind. Steve grabbed his shield and suit, falling easily into the good leader position, forming quick tactical plans during the helicopter ride, reminding Barton of the extra quiver he always forgot, sharing a terse smile with Bruce (the only one who truly looked like he was not going to enjoy what was coming every time)—typical fearless leader stuff that Clint and Tony always teased him about.

This time though, as the helicopter landed—empty of both Thor and Tony who had decided to fly ahead—and the smaller group of four moved out onto the forestry grounds, Steve felt a bit more… solemn than usual. Grave, even. He pushed the feeling off as apprehension and suspicion to the supposedly easy task—but there was always a pang in the back of his mind, a pang that would not leave him.

Steve ignored that pang.

And he would regret it for weeks to come.

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

"You know what I love about this whole thing?" Tony's voice came through in Clint's ear-piece. "How Fury says that this one is actually going to be relatively simple and easy and then he totally forgets to mention the fact that they have freaking giant robot as a last-resort security system."

Clint smirked at the comment, pulling back the bow and letting an arrow loose, watching it briefly as it buried itself into a weak chink in the robot's arm joint and promptly exploded, sending the enormous thing wheeling from the explosion. They had entered the castle-like facility with little to no issues. Really, any combination of two of the team could've taken the whole base down. It was after they had taken down the base and moved into some sort of court-yard with the leader in cuffs had things gotten… messy.

Out of nowhere, a gigantic robot thing had burst through one of the high stone walls. It looked eerily out of place among the falling snow and the medieval like style of the base walls. It was probably thirty-feet high, a little under the height of the stone walls, and rather like the robots out of that Avatar movie that had come out a few years ago except without a driver inside (as far as they could tell). Hulk had gone one-on-one with it for a while, before the third time the robot had back-handed him into a wall and Thor and Tony had stepped in. After a few hard hits to the Mark VII and Thor's lightning bouncing off the robot's exterior (and nearly taking down Cap as he made his way out of the hole in the wall and into the courtyard), the rest of the team had joined the fight.

At the combined force of all six of the Avengers, (even Natasha, who was more of a melee fighter and not the best match for a huge thirty-foot tall robot, had found some grenade launchers in the base and seemed to be having the time of her life) the Robot was slowly wearing down.

Clint readied another arrow, rigged to explode a few seconds after impact, and drew it back from his spot atop a snow-covered tower about twenty-feet above the robot's head. His eyes carefully flickered along the robot's body, before he noticed how incredibly beat-up the thing was and lowered his bow. The rest of the team seemed to have the same idea, all drawing back as Hulk surged forward with malice in his eyes—watching silently as the beast literally tore the robot apart limb by limb with a new ease.

Tony was still babbling in his ear, Clint finally letting his zone down and tuning back in. "—and there he goes. Oh, good—Hulkie's almost done with his new toy. Can we go home now?"

Steve sighed heavily. "Clint—all clear from up there?"

The archer put a boot on the edge of the snow-topped half-wall that lined the tower's edge and peered downward. He could make out the bright red and blue of the soldier easily against the snowy ground amongst leather black, gold and red, scarlet and silver—and of course, bright green (but the green was busy stomping on the remains of the metal robot). Clint let his eyes sweep once around the courtyard—before nodding, even though he knew that Steve couldn't see it.

"As far as I can tell—yes," he answered.

"Good," Steve replied, sounding weary like he always did after a fight. "Then we can make our way up to the rendezvous spot and wait for Fury to send someone to pick us up." Because Fury already probably knew that they were finished, being Fury.

Steve then proceeded to ask if anyone was hurt and etc., and Clint tuned out, backing away from the edge of the tower and glancing absent mindedly around the castle. Quite honestly, he would be surprised if anyone had gotten hurt more than a bruise or so—the worse Clint himself had gotten was a papercut, and he was fairly certain that was from this morning when he was putting a book back on the shelf. The archer gazed about the rooftop, musing, blinking the lightly falling snow out of his eyelashes. Easy mission—nice entertainment, if anything, for the week. Maybe when they got back, after dinner, he could show Thor how to play Zelda. Surely the big guy would be into the whole 'saving the princess' kinda thing?—

—flash.

Clint flinched as something bright caught his eye in the dim sun. At first, he thought it was the remains of the robot catching in the sunlight as Hulk stomped it to dust—but no, the Hyde version of Banner was standing still in the snow and breathing heavily like an irritated bull.

Slowly, Clint let his eyes scour the rooftops again—letting them narrow and take in the tiny details of the rooftop.

"—you ready to go, Hulkie?" Tony was saying, and Clint could almost hear the smirk in his voice as Hulk turned and looked at the one he so neutrally regarded as 'Tin-Man'. "I'm hungry—so, if you could let Bruce come out now and come again some other day, I'd really appreciate it—"

"Cap—" Clint interrupted slowly, edge to his voice that made even Tony shut up for a second.

"Clint?"

That's when the world exploded.

Or at least the world that Clint was currently standing on. The archer, luckily, had seen the grenade coming, and had dove to the side with gritted teeth. Within seconds, shouting had filled his ear-piece, and Clint had rolled to his knees—throwing one out and letting an arrow fly all within a fraction of a second. He swore, numerous times, all in a row. Letting another arrow fly, this time one that let an explosion loose and blow a huge chunk out of the roof, Clint tried to get everything straight in his head—deciding first to concentrate on the voices coming through the comm.

"Barton! What's happening up there? Are you alright?" Steve's voice was at a painfully loud volume, making the archer grimace under the flow of demanding questions.

"I'm okay—" A bullet of some kind whizzed by his ear, and he ducked his head, "—shit. No. I'm fine. It looks like there was a straggler, a sniper of some kind. I couldn't see him, god, I can't see him—he's wearing some kind of reflective armor or somethi—"

There was a roar from Hulk, something strangled that made Clint's blood run cold.

"Banner!" Someone shouted.

Clint grit his teeth, let another arrow fly in the direction he had seen the sniper, before darting across the exposed platform of the tower. A bullet pinged off of the stone above his head, and Barton ducked his head before he reached the half-wall of the tower and half threw himself over it to see what was going on. Straightening before he actually fell, the archer's eyes widened.

Hulk was staggering. Staggering. It was something Clint had never seen before, and it scared the hell out of him. It took only a second for his sharpened eye to pick out the large dart sticking out of a throbbing vein in Hulk's neck—and only a second more to note how rapidly the guy was morphing. Green was swirling nauseously on the thick skin until it began to give way to a much paler and more human color and the huge form of the Hulk. The half-man, half-hulk began to shrink rapidly, legs twisting and form swaying dangerously, until a half-naked (only half, they had made it a primary objective long ago to find the man some pants that stayed on after battle) Bruce slumped forward limply into the snow like a puppet who's strings had been cut.

Natasha, who was closest to him, had made a move to catch him before he completely fell—but with a sharp warning from Clint, "—Nat!—" she leapt back just in time to avoid a bullet that sunk into the ground just a few inches from where she had been standing.

"Where is he?"

"Watch out, Steve!" Clint shouted another warning, the barrel of the gun on the rooftops just visible behind something that resembled a chimney aiming for the Captain's chest.

Steve ducked behind his shield just as the bullet fired, causing it to reflect off of the shield with a sharp ping! Clint wasted no time, standing and pulling back his bow almost vertical in the air. He let the arrow fly, and let out a huff of satisfactory relief as he saw the gun dip dangerously onto the roof tiles. He lowered his bow—

—there was a surprised cry.

Thor was staring in a bemused fashion at the large dart he had just pulled out of his neck. For a second, the archer thought with held breath that nothing would happen. It looked like the god had pulled it out fast enough, and he was a god. Then a glazed confused look passed over the man's face and he staggered once before keeling over.

It had been a distraction—all the grenades and bullets, how they were just easy enough to block without getting suspicious—Clint raged at himself internally for not seeing it earlier. He ducked behind the wall again, swiveling on raised feet to peer around the rooftop. There could be any number of snipers positioned around the perimeter—and Clint was the one with the best view and the only one who had eyes sharp enough to see through whatever sort of reflective armor they were wearing.

But I can't see anything from here! The assassin thought through gritted teeth. Not while cowering behind a crumbling wall. Some part of the man told him that getting hit wouldn't solve anything either, and standing just might do him in—but if there was going to be any hope of the rest of the team not being taken down like rats in a trap, there had to be drastic measures taken.

"…ark—get up high, see if you can spot them with your sensors. Natasha—find some cover, now. Hawkeye, you still with us?—Hawkeye? Clint?"

Clint stood. Instantly, his world opened up—taking in the small imprints of footprints on the snowy rooftops, tiny puffs of hot air from invisible mouths, the slight shimmer from very-hard to see reflective plates as their wearers moved ever so slightly—and he began firing off words and arrows so fast he wasn't even sure they made sense at all. "Captain—one to your three o'clock and two directly ten and thirteen feet to their left, wait, actually—only one," said one fell well an arrow through his chest with a shriek of pain "—all on the rooftops in the center of the slope. Nat—two coming up fast behind you, and another directly above your head and three feet to the left on the roof. Sta—"

The archer cut himself off as a grenade came his way. He blinked, momentarily confused—he had gotten the impression that they wanted to capture them alive. But then again, Hulk was very hard to kill when he was smashing you into the ground, and Thor was generally just very hard to kill. Were those darts even full of tranqs like he had thought?—were the two even breathing? Clint spared a half a second to shoot a glance at Thor (who now laid nearly facedown in the snow) and could just make out some shallow breathing. Quickly he turned back to the grenade and launched it away from him with a sharp kick just a half a second too late, sending him launching backwards from the heated blast.

Clint swore mildly, feet scraping unbalanced against the half-wall edge, trying to keep a grip on his bow so he could maybe pull a rappel stunt and not go crashing three stories into the quickly approaching ground. No use, the ground was coming much too quick—Clint closed his eyes and his stomach lurched—maybe this time he wouldn't break any bones if rolled on impact—

—instead of hitting something hard and wet and cold, Clint blinked in surprise as he hit something equally as cold and hard, but not nearly as painful and, dear God, did not know when to shut up.

"What is this, the second time I've saved your ass today, my feathered friend?" Tony asked, amusement lining his electronicly blaring voice as he shifted his grip around Clint's torso. "God, I'm turning into some kinda softie—you need to learn how to take a hit."

"My hero," Clint muttered. "We can practice jumping off of three-story buildings when we're done here."

Stark laughed, and Clint could've almost sworn he heard Natasha give a 'tsk' of amusement. The man seemed about to say something as they approach the ground rapidly, but not as rapidly as falling, but then there was a flash in the side of the archer's vision and assumedly Tony's too—because the Iron Man deadpanned a swear, before promptly dropping Clint the remaining five feet into the snow.

There was a loud boom, and CRASH, and Clint jerked his head upward as soon as he landed in the snow—watching in a sort of horror as a missile crashed into the armor earned it a large new pressure which forced the iron-man suit backwards. Had it not been so serious, Clint might've laughed at the cartoon comical aura to the picture as the suit spun out of control before crashing with a minor explosion into the far wall. Tony slid down the wall and collapsed in a heap of metal, suit smoking.

This… this isn't right. Clint took a huge staggering breath, eyes dazed and rather disbelieving, staggering upwards from where he had landed in the snow. How could it be that they were being taken down so easily? The set-up, while brilliant, shouldn't be able to take down the supposed 'Earth's Mightiest Heroes'. They used surprise tactics and invisible armor, but that shouldn't be all it took. This wasn't… it just wasn't possible.

Was it?

Clint snapped back to his senses and scooped downwards, grabbing his bow firmly in one hand and righting himself. He was falling back, running backwards to the wall and to minimal cover behind some crumbled parts of stone and nailing another sniper in what he thought might be the head. No mercy now—this was getting far too dangerous.

Steve had given up trying to see if Tony was up for the fight, the silence that followed his shout and the strange cracks and still burning missile driving in the armor said it all, and Clint could just see the tip of his blue head across the courtyard from behind some fallen pillar. The archer couldn't see Natasha at first, he knew she was there—he just didn't know where exactly—and didn't spot her until she spoke.

Like, directly behind him.

"Steve—they'll be aiming for you next," the assassin said, both in Barton's ear and a less than a foot behind his said ear.

Clint jumped—something scarcely possible in his crouched position—and whirled around. Natasha was staring at him with a raised eyebrow before crawling sleekly up to his side, using the same crumbled stone as cover.

"Geez, Nat," he muttered, turning back to the task at hand. "Scared the hell out of me."

"I think that's why there are only three of us still coherent enough to stand," Natasha replied darkly, shifting on the balls of her feet in the crouch and peering over the stone.

Steve's voice crackled through the comm—heavy and worried, "Why are they going for me next, Natasha?"

"Because they're taking us down from the most powerful to the least," Natasha said simply.

"That makes very little sense," Clint said, rather offended.

Natasha shot him a look. "Do you really think you could beat Thor at arm-wrestling?" She pressed. "They're taking us down in the order of brute firepower, not in order of who would win a fight, or who is the most agile. Think about it—if you had to fight all five of us, and you could choose one of the five to remove from the fight—would you really choose me?"

"Of course," Clint said seriously.

Another icy look was sent his way from the corner of his vision as Clint drew back an arrow. "…or maybe Hulk," he admitted. "But why Tony before me? I mean, without the suit, he's just as squishy as the rest of us."

"Stop thinking objectively," Natasha hissed, wincing appreciatively as a shriek was heard and a man—flicking in and out of focus as a shield knocked him plain off the roof— "And start thinking now. Tony is wearing his suit now. The fight is happening now. They are taking us down now. We need to duck—NOW."

Clint blinked once before very quickly rolling onto his knees and ducking his head down as close to his legs as he could. The impact of the missile flying over their heads and into the wall behind them shook Clint to his core, making him shiver in obligation. He slowly sat up, ears ringing from the loud echo, and sent a vague explosive arrow in the direction from where the missile had come from, Natasha following up with two shots from her pistol .

"So… I'm next?" Steve asked breaking into the conversation.

"Yes," Natasha said confidently. "So you need to lay low for a while—and Clint and I can take out as many as possible before they try to switch tactics."

"…or…" Steve began, slowly—and Clint knew that if could've looked at the man there would've been that slowly dawning idea look drawing across his face.

"…Steve…" Natasha stopped her flow of startlingly accurate bullets to crouch down low, pressing the ear-piece more firmly into her ear. "No."

Clint felt confused. And out of the loop. "Care to explain your brilliant plan?" He asked.

"…we could exploit it," The soldier suggested. "If they want me, why would they miss an oppertunty for a shot? I can run out, like I'm making my way over to you—or to Bruce or Thor or Tony or someone—and they all fire. You can see where the shots are coming from and take them all out in a swift swoop."

Clint paused. It was a good plan—

"—that is a horrible plan," Natasha growled. "We don't even know if they want you alive. They've been throwing grenades at us, Steve—what makes you so sure they won't light you up the second you make a run for it?"

"And what else should we do?" Steve challenged. "Sit here until they actually hit me?—and then move onto you? We can't let that happen, Natasha—there's no telling what they'll do when everyone's down for the count."

"New plan idea? One without a sacrifice play?" Clint suggested hopefully, furrowing his brow in frustration as another of his arrows pinged off of the roof-tiles and into empty space.

They both ignored him.

"God, Steve," Natasha hissed, "I'm not going to let you run out there and have to explain to Fury how we lost America's freaking poster-boy to some half-witted idea."

"It just might work, though," The soldier said firmly—in his 'no-arguing-with-me-I'm-the-leader-here' voice. "We don't know what they injected Bruce and Thor with—it could be poison for all we know. We need to at least try something new—this hiding behind the shadows and hoping to fire lucky isn't working."

"Then try something else!" Natasha argued, making Clint want to stare. Natasha was usually pretty good on following orders—she was a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent after all—and, besides Bruce (who didn't even really count) she was probably the one who spoke the least one missions and argued the least at Steve's orders. "You're being reckless—god dammit, you're acting like Tony!"

"I take… offense… to that statement…" Stark suddenly rejoined the world, voice dangerously slurred. The Iron Man suit was shifting blearily in the snow, arc-reactor flickering worryingly, before Tony reached up and yanked the missile out of his armor.

"Oh, good, you're alive," Clint said dryly, successfully hiding the relief in his voice as another arrow was let loose. "You're just in time for the party. Can you please tell Steve that making a suicide run is a bad idea?"

Tony made a strangled 'meeeh' sound, and promptly keeled over again.

"Or not."

"Clint, get ready," Steve said, making the archer hesitate.

"Steve…" Natasha said warningly, almost pleadingly.

"I'm making a run for it on the count of three—" Steve continued, and Clint could just make out the shifting blur of the soldier on the other side of the courtyard. "Watch the roof, Clint. One."

"Clint!" Natasha snarled, turning on him.

"Two."

The archer hesitated for another moment, before shrugging helplessly.

"If you can't beat em," Clint muttered, shooting Natasha an apologetic glance, as he notched an arrow. "Join em."

"Three!"

Clint was so focused on the rooftop tiles, searching anxiously for the remaining targets—that he didn't even feel the tiny dart sink into his neck.

Um, hello! ^^ Welcome to my second-ever fanfiction story. For those of you who have read my other story, and the following Author Notes, you might have been expecting a different story to be uploaded. Don't worry-the next chapter of MMB+B I will explain. ^^;

For those of you who have no idea what I'm talking about- Hiiiiiiiiiiii~! :3 Thanks for reading! I'm Fleet, nice to meet you! This is my first Avengers fic, and I'm SUPER excited because the movie was SO FREAKING AWESOME. I saw it like three times. (crazed fan) I hope you guys will stick along for the rides, because it's (hopefully) going to be awesome.

IN GENERAL: This story spawned from the darker parts of my heart. :D If you've read my other story, then you'll be like, 'dark? how so? your other story is mildly humorous!' Yes. This is going to be DARK. BAHAHAHA. It's going to deal with violence (though not too graphic), probably a bit of torture (because Tony just can't keep his mouth shut xD) though... I'm going to go out on a limb here and say it's not going to be too descriptive. There's going to be a bit of swearing as well, because Tony's Tony and stuff. In fact, most of the reasons for why this story is T is because Tony's Tony. xD Romance wise? I think I'm going to leave that part of the story undeveloped. Stories loose/gain lots of reviews due to developed romance, and I'm just going to keep it carefully neutral here. Maybe a little Blackhawk... because, I mean, the Avengers movie just kept poking at it that it spawned ideas in there-but probably very little of that if any. However, you can interpret interactions any way you'd like. xD

LAST THING: Did you notice the lack of Thor in this? Because I did. I like Thor. ^^ He's awesome. His hair is also awesome and I want to touch it. However, I had difficulties writing him. I'm going to rent Thor tonight at our Red-Box or something and read lots of Thor fanfiction so I can write him better and show lots more of him in here. :D This story is probably going to be leaning towards Steve-centric, but should have a decent amount of POVs from each member of the team. So, everyone happy! (I might even somehow weave Loki in because people seem to love him).

And there concludes this incredibly long AU. Consider it an introduction-trust me, they'll (probably) be much shorter in the future. ^^; (You're probably thinking, how can she write this much writing about absolutely nothing) Hope to see you around? Thanks for reading!

-Fleet.