Chapter Text
Tony never thought he would be happy to see aliens rain from the sky.
As it was, they came as a godsend—maybe literally. Tony no longer underestimated what was out there.
They were nasty creatures, resembling giant pillbugs with razor-sharp pincers. They were the length of small cars, sporting outer shells as tough as plate armor; savage, brainless beings out for destruction of the most primal kind.
Tony could work with primal. It was easier than dealing with enhanced terrorists or devastated teenagers any day.
The aliens hadn’t been easy monsters to kill, but after Natasha had discovered that they had soft, vulnerable underbellies, the Avengers had taken them out in droves. Meanwhile, the media got all sorts of footage of the heroes defending the city, on a United Nations-sanctioned mission, with minimal casualties.
It was the miracle the Avengers’ PR team had been looking for. It was almost too good, and Tony couldn’t wait to read the conspiracy theories blaming him of orchestrating the whole event. Hell, their long-suffering PR team was so stoked, he wished he had thought of it.
After a long and grueling fight, the creatures were dealt with and were either being destroyed or hauled back to New SHIELD’s lab to be studied. Tony and Steve had both given their pre-written statements about the importance of unity and teamwork to the press, had gotten the team back to the Compound, and now Tony was going to bed.
Long gone were the days when he would have stayed awake at least another twenty-four hours, running on pure adrenaline. Depending on how those early team missions had gone, Tony would celebrate into the early hours of the morning with the team, or withdraw into his workshop and start building, because he could always do better. The team could always be safer.
These days, whenever a mission ended, he was just tired.
“Boss? Your assistance is required in the med bay.”
Tony hesitated in the entryway to his private rooms, a few steps away from a hot meal, a shower, and sleep. “Is there a reason you’re asking anyone who isn’t yours truly?”
“It’s Agent Barton, Boss. It appears he is giving the medical staff some resistance.”
“Yeah, that tracks.” Tony had never picked apart enough of Clint’s past to trace back the exact origins of his resistance to doctors. He suspected it wasn’t one trigger but many, with zero warning of which ones would come out to play on the rare occasions Clint was forced to stay in medical care longer than ten minutes.
Tony had tried his best to accommodate first in the medical floor of the Tower, then in the Compound's med bay, making the space feel more like stylish apartments than hospital rooms. Clint still refused nine times out of ten, although over time he had relaxed around the team enough to let Bruce treat him when he could, despite the physicist’s griping that he really wasn’t that kind of doctor, and could they please stop asking him to act like one?
Bruce treated them all anyway.
It took a lot for the team to band together to convince Clint to actually get medical treatment—the headache of apologizing to any staff that had to deal with a sick or injured Barton was usually enough for Tony to give in and drag Clint to Bruce instead, or just deal with it himself, with JARVIS’s assistance.
“Where, Fri?” Tony asked as he headed for the medical bay, still dressed in the dry-fit clothes from the battle, bemoaning the lost shower. The alien-things had easy to kill once they had figured out how, but there was no getting around the explosion of blood, guts, and what seemed to be sulfuric-smelling pus whenever their underbellies were stabbed or shot. Tony was luckier than most as nearly all of the visceral debris had ended up on the suit, but he could still smell it on himself.
“Agent Barton is in Room 101, Boss.”
“And is there a reason you’re not dragging Nat down here instead?”
“Agent Romanoff is receiving medical treatment for an abdominal injury. She is indisposed but in no immediate danger.”
The second he jogged around the corner, Tony wished he had sprinted instead.
Clint was strapped to a hospital bed, being attended to by a frustrated doctor and frantic nurse, two huge security guards looking on. His eyes were rolling around the room, desperately looking for an out as he tugged on the leather cuffs binding him to the bedrails, more straps over his chest and legs pinning him in a half-upright position.
His shirt and most of his trousers had been cut away, revealing several long, deep gashes up his leg, side, and chest, the deepest one slicing from shoulder to cheekbone. They didn’t seem to be bleeding, courtesy of an experimental field drug from Bruce, but they looked deep and painful, and Clint’s thrashing escape attempts weren’t helping.
Tony swore as he dashed into the room, drawing a panicked look from the nurse and a cold one from the doctor. He didn’t recognize either of them, but that wasn’t unusual. With the exception of Helen Cho, he’d had to get all new medical staff, vetted and approved by the Accords committee.
“You can’t be in here,” the doctor shot at him as the nurse prepared a wicked-looking needle. Clint cursed and struggled, not lying still enough for her to insert it despite the restraints. “Help me,” the doctor ordered the two security guards, who moved in to hold Clint’s arm immobile.
“Stop. That’s not going to help,” Tony said, taking another step into the room. Clint seemed to latch onto his voice because his head lolled sideways for a second, taking in Tony with wide eyes before realizing that he had let his guard down enough for the nurse to almost get the needle in him. He snarled at her, straining at the straps holding him to the bed, only to fall back with a pained cry a second later, biting into his lip so hard that it bled.
Ignoring the four other people in the room, Tony dragged a chair across the floor and dropped into it next to Clint’s less injured side. He’d seen Clint like this before, more times than he cared to count. Doctors were bad enough, but Clint adamantly refused any painkillers stronger than paracetamol if he got into his head that someone was going to mess with him while he was incapacitated. Tony had gotten a glimpse of that origin story once when an infected wound had had Clint babbling about Carson Carnival and swordsmen and someone named Duquesne, but he had never gotten all the details. He had never asked, and Clint had never offered.
It was usually Natasha who took on the battle of getting Clint through an episode, and for a long time she was the only one he trusted to be around him when he was like this. But as the months had rolled on and the six heroes had gone from teammates to friends to something even closer, Tony had found he was second-in-line for that role.
Tony would have put himself dead last on the list of anyone someone would want as a caretaker, but over time he saw the logic of it. While the other Avengers definitely had a better bedside manner than he ever would, in this state Clint couldn’t stand to have men that were stronger than him in the same room, which ruled out Steve or Thor. Bruce was also excluded as Clint had a tendency to lash out, physically and verbally, when he felt cornered, and the risks of inciting a Hulk out were too high.
Which left Tony. The first time had been hell, a frustrated and worried Natasha coaching him via phone from an undisclosed location. No raised voices, no sudden movements, no heavy drugs unless necessary. And absolutely no restraints, ever.
Tony was already reaching for the cuff around Clint’s right wrist, but the doctor batted his hands away. “You can’t take those off.”
The words elected a distressed moan from the archer, who gave them another fruitless tug. “It’s okay,” Tony said, fighting to keep his voice calm. “I know what I’m doing, Doctor…”
“Doctor Dhawan. And I’d like to remind you, Mr. Stark, who the medical professionals in this room are.”
“And I’d like to remind you who pays your salary.”
Dhawan stared him down, not relenting. The nurse fumbled the needle as Clint bared his teeth at her, all caged wild animal. “They’re for his safety. And ours.”
“And the Men in Black over there? Did you even read Barton’s file?”
Dhawan didn’t drop her gaze. “I am entitled to feel safe in my workplace.”
There was a yelp as the nurse stumbled backward several steps, dropping the needle, and it took a moment for Tony to realize that Clint had made good on his threat and tried to bite her.
“My case in point,” Dhawan said.
Tony forced himself to take a breath. Clint needed calm, and he clearly wasn’t going to get it from anyone else in the room. “May I point out that your patients also have a right to feel safe in your care?” He snapped his fingers at the two security guards. “Both of you. Out.”
“Stay,” Dhawan ordered them in return. “You’re needed here.”
“They are the very opposite of ‘needed here’,” Tony retorted. “Whoever is wearing a security badge in this room in the next sixty seconds is going to find themselves at Happy Hogan's mercy."
The guards didn’t need telling twice, scurrying from the room with their tails between their legs. Okay, one problem down, a dozen or so more to go, and Tony had no idea what they were going to be. Clint had a tendency to be unpredictable even when he was all there, and from the way his eyes were still darting around the room, Tony could tell that this was going to be a hard fight.
Dhawan rounded on Tony. “Stark. I took an oath to heal and do no harm to any patient under my care, whoever they might be. I don’t have a problem with you or anyone on your side. You can trust me.”
Tony opened his mouth to try and detangle any part of that, but the nurse was trying to approach with a new needle, and he had much more pressing matters on his hands right now.
“You can’t have any security guards in here,” Tony stated. “That’s a non-starter. But I’ll stay—he trusts me.” Or at least he used to.
You gotta watch your back with this guy. There’s a chance he’s going to break it.
“And I’m telling you that you can’t be in here,” Dhawan shot back. “You’re not trained, you’re in my way, and you’re filthy. My patient has open wounds and you haven’t even washed your hands. So leave.”
“Okay,” Tony relented, putting both hands up as he looked down at himself. “Fair point. Give me a second.” He stood, registering Dhawan’s triumphant look before it turned to confusion as, instead of heading for the door, Tony made for the sink in the corner, stripping his t-shirt and trousers on the way there, not bothering with decency. He washed his hands, arms, and face as best as could before tugging on a spare set of scrubs.
He was only just dressed when he heard a new string of curses from the hospital bed and turned just in time to see Dhawan insert a thick mouthguard between a resisting Clint’s teeth.
The resulting howl that split the hospital room had Tony dashing back to Clint’s bedside, finding his way blocked by a fuming doctor. “Leave, Stark. We know what we’re doing.”
For a second, Tony considered if that actually was the best option. It wasn’t as though he and Clint were on the same terms as they once were. They had barely spoken outside of missions since the Accords, their usual banter and dark humor lost, maybe forever. For all he knew, he was contributing to Clint’s panicked state by being here, by putting another person Clint didn’t trust near him when he was vulnerable.
Then Clint’s head twisted to one side, giving another cry as he pulled at the straps and tried to spit out the mouthguard, only to find that he was well and truly trapped. His eyes locked onto Tony’s, and the helpless desperation there was enough for any thoughts of leaving to evaporate.
“Move,” Tony ordered Dhawan, not waiting for her to comply as he stepped around her and went back to Clint’s side as a shadow filled the doorway of the hospital room.
“What the hell are you doing?”
Tony’s head snapped up, his whole body going rigid with the urge to run run run. The figure in the doorway must have registered Tony’s presence at the same time, because he paused on his way into the room, suddenly uncertain.
Tony hadn’t seen Barnes since Siberia. The former soldier had kept his word of staying to his own quarters, allowing Tony free reign of the rest of the Compound without fearing that he’d run into him. It had made it easier to compartmentalize the idea of sharing a building with the man. He could almost pretend he wasn’t even there. Almost.
But now Barnes was here, blocking the only exit from the room, and suddenly Tony was back kneeling on the freezing stone ground, chained and muzzled with Barnes holding his and Peter’s lives in his hand with that terrifying, blank expression.
Then Clint gave another distressed moan, and Tony was in the present again. They only had room for one freak-out at a time right now, and Clint had dibs.
“You can’t be here,” Tony told Barnes, ignoring Dhawan’s disbelieving snort from behind him as he mirrored the words he had just ignored.
Barnes took another step into the room instead. His were eyes wide and calculating as he stared down at Clint, bound and gagged and surrounded by medical equipment, and Tony realized that he almost certainly wasn’t the only one in the room having a very unwanted flashback right now.
“I’m going to help him,” Tony assured Barnes, straining to make his voice level. “But you can’t be here for me to do that. He doesn’t react well to having men that are stronger than him around when he’s like this.”
Barnes seemed torn, but eventually nodded, taking two steps back. “Tell me when he’s okay?”
The words hit closer to home than Tony had expected. When had Barnes and Clint become so close? “FRIDAY will alert you.”
Barnes glanced from Tony, to Clint, to the doctor and nurse. “I’m in the room down the hall,” he said finally. “And I can hear everything that goes on in here. Everything.” And with those chilling words, he vanished.
“Stark.” Dhawan was back in his face, arms folded, looking livid. “Let us do the jobs you hired us to do.”
“Technically the Accords Committee hired you.” Tony’s hands were hovering an inch above one of Clint’s pinned arms, wanting to touch but not knowing if it was going to make things better worse. “Your job is to provide care to your patients.” He gestured to Clint. “Does this look like care to you?”
“Are there cameras in here?”
Tony raised an eyebrow at her. “Why is that relevant?”
“Are there?”
“FRIDAY is recording, yes.” He was only half-listening, attention mostly on Clint.
“Good. Then let it be known that Mr. Stark is here against my professional recommendation, and interfering in my patient’s care against my will. I will not accept fault for anything that happens to Agent Barton from here on out, do you understand?”
“Fully. Now get out of my way, and keep whatever you have in that needle away from him.” She finally backed off, allowing Tony to turn his full attention to his injured teammate, trying hard not to get distracted by the weeping wounds slashed into Clint’s side. “Hey. Legolas. Look at me.”
When Clint didn’t, Tony risked taking Clint’s hand, ready to pull it away at the first sign of resistance. Instead, Clint’s fingers curled limply around his, which Tony took as progress. “Look at me,” Tony repeated, trying to emulate Natasha’s calm but authoritative tone. It worked, as Clint shifted his head to one side, and Tony swallowed when he saw the tears forming there.
“Dammit, Barton," Tony whispered. Then he cleared his throat, sensing Clint slipping away again.
Clint had two modes when he got like this; violent and defiant, or terrified and pleading. Which one he was likely to fall into was a roll of the dice, but the attitudes of those around him definitely contributed to which side of the spectrum he landed on. Tony took a breath, reminding himself to stay in control, calm and confident and all the things he certainly wasn’t feeling right now. “Why don’t I get that thing out your mouth? Yeah?”
Clint nodded so desperately that it took all of Tony’s self-control not to rip it from his teeth, but he knew they had put it in for a reason, and he had to make sure said reason had passed. “You’re not going to bite me if I touch your jaw?”
Clint shook his head, letting out a pitiful moan that had Tony hesitating even further. Yes, Clint did get like this, but he was also good at faking being like this; something he had tried multiple times whenever it was Tony sent for him rather than Natasha. “Because if you bite me I can’t build you any more toys, you know that right? Which would be a shame, because I've been working up something in nanotech that you're going to drool all over.”
Clint’s answer was to stare up at him with such earnestness that Tony was almost convinced that he wasn’t faking after all. Almost. He decided to risk it anyway.
”Alright,” Tony breathed. “Here goes.” He leaned forward in the chair, careful to keep as much of himself in Clint’s eyeline as possible, and placed his hands around the mouthguard. “Relax your jaw,” he instructed. It took Clint a moment, body rigid with tension. “Come on,” Tony urged him. “Deep breath. Relax. Then it’s out.”
It was more of several hitches in Clint’s throat than a proper breath, but it had the desired effect of unlocking his jaw enough to pull out the mouthguard. The nurse stepped forward, tentative, to take it, but Tony glared at her and threw it away instead, not bothering to see where it landed. The action earned him a shaky laugh from Clint, a grin that turned into a grimace as he gave another futile pull at the cuffs. “Hands.”
“Yeah, I’m here, I’m here, I’m going to free your hands.”
Tony started with the straps locked down over Clint’s body, fixing the nurse with a look as he worked. “What were you going to give him?”
“Precedex,” the nurse offered. “It’s what it said in his file—”
“If you read his file you’d know that he’s not to be given any drugs without his or a medical proxy’s consent,” Tony shot back.
“An instruction I chose to ignore given the patient’s urgent condition,” Dhawan stepped in. “I refuse to operate on injuries of this extent without medication.”
Clint tugged the cuffs again as Tony untied his feet. “Hands.”
“I’m getting to them,” Tony soothed him, eyes still on Dhawan. “And the bit about no restraints? You just threw that out the window too?”
“It was my medical opinion—”
“You lashed a patient with a history of captivity and abuse to the bed and then tried to sedate him without his consent,” Tony snapped at her. He still had nightmares sometimes about the things he had read in Natasha and Clint’s files; the enemy camps they had both inevitably stumbled into. The things done to them there. “And to answer your earlier question—yes, FRIDAY records everything.”
With the rest of Clint free, Tony went to unbuckle both his wrists, pausing just before he did so. “You know I can see inside you right now, Barton. So no running away after they’re off.”
Clint nodded frantically in agreement. Tony worked the first buckle free, revealing Clint’s wrist. “Doctor? Get out.”
“Excuse me?”
“You heard me—out!” The last word was a shout that made Clint flinch, curling into himself with a whimper. “Right, quiet, got it,” Tony murmured, hastening to free his other wrist. The cuffs were designed to restrain patients without harming them, but they had been wrapped around Clint’s wrists so tightly that the skin was red and pinched, bruises already starting to form. Clint sighed in relief when they were both free. Tony reached out, meaning to start up the blood flood to Clint’s hands again, but the archer batted him away.
“Okay, no touching, I hear you.” Tony looked up at where Dhawan was still standing. “What part of ‘get out’ wasn’t clear to you?”
She crossed her arms. “There is a patient under my care in need of urgent medical assistance that you are getting in the way of, Stark. I cannot leave until I’m sure he no longer requires my attention.”
“I think he’s had all the attention he needs from you.” That said, Clint’s wounds were still open and they had to be closed sooner rather than later. “FRIDAY? Get someone competent in here, would you?”
“Dr. Hara is on their way. ETA ten minutes, Boss.”
“Tell them to make it five. Clint? We’re getting you someone else.”
“No,” Clint groaned, the sound muffled by the arm over his face. “Leave me alone.”
“You look like you had a run-in with Freddy Kruger. We need to do something about that.”
Dhawan wasn’t done. “I want video footage of all of this.”
“Have it. You really think you’re going to look like the good guy in this little snuff film you were making?”
“I think the Accords Committee who appointed me will take my side of things, yes. I was prepared to give care to a dangerous patient—”
“He wouldn’t have been dangerous if you had followed the instructions in his file!”
“—and I took the necessary precautions to guarantee both myself and my co-workers’ safety.”
“Good argument,” Tony retorted. “Bet my lawyers can think of a better one.”
“The same lawyers that helped you pass Amendments to the Accords that you signed? Those same Accords which dictated that I was a suitable employee for the Avengers Compound medical staff?”
“Can everything stop being about the Accords for five goddamn minutes?” The words brought him back to his teammate currently injured and curled up on a hospital bed. Shakes were racking his body, and it looked like Bruce’s field drug was starting to wear off, because Clint’s wounds were starting to ooze blood.
Tony swung his attention off Dhawan, hesitating, knowing these next words were pushing it, but Clint had to be in agony from the cuts and adrenaline could only carry him so far. “When the new doctor gets here, they can give you something to help with the pain.”
Tony had never seen anyone move as fast as Clint did then, snapping from cowering in one instant to bolting for the door in the next. Tony was on the floor before he registered what had happened, pain exploding over one eye. He had a split second to be glad that his teammate had at least missed his nose before he was staggering to his feet, calling after the fleeing archer. “Barton, dammit, get back here!”
He needn’t have bothered. The surge of flight-or-fight instinct that had carried Clint off the bed seemed to have only have gotten him as far as the door, because he was now on one knee, panting, gazing desperately at the escape route just a few feet from him.
“Clint!” Tony staggered to his friend’s side, crouching down. All his instincts were telling him to get between Clint and the door, to activate his nanotech gauntlet, currently in watch form around his wrist, and drag Clint back to the bed and hold him there. But there was a reason Clint trusted—or had trusted—Tony with this over Steve.
They had gotten to the point in the past where Steve had had no choice but to hold Clint down while drugs were administered, and every time it took Clint days to forgive him, even though in the long run he always did. Whether they were at that point or not was moot, because while Steve matched Clint for speed and far outmatched him for strength, Tony didn’t. He could only get what he needed from Clint through cooperation, which Clint never made easy.
So he gritted his teeth, kept his hands off his watch, and hovered in Clint’s side view, neither blocking his path to the door nor sneaking up behind him.
“Hey,” Tony tried, earning him a snarl. “Yeah, love you too. Stop being an idiot and come back to bed so we can fix you before you really start bleeding.”
Clint didn’t move, still panting, eyeing the door.
“Come on,” Tony attempted to reason with him. “Just come back to the bed. No drugs, okay?”
A fraction of tension went out of Clint’s shoulders. “No drugs?”
“Not unless you say it’s alright.” Tony took a tentative step forward and, when Clint didn’t bolt further, risked putting a hand on his shoulder. Clint flinched, but didn’t move away. “Come on. Back to bed.”
It was time for the moment of truth. As slowly as he dared, Tony wrapped an arm under Clint’s shoulders and helped him to his feet, trying not to panic when he felt how much Clint slumped against him. Getting back to the bed wasn’t exactly a cakewalk, but by the time Tony had got Clint settled again, a Japanese doctor was entering the room, a little out of breath, as though they had run here. They took in the scene with one sweeping look over half-rim glasses that reminded Tony of Bruce before they said, “Right. Let’s get to work, shall we?”
Tony fixed Dhawan with a glower which she took in stride as she marched out of the room, barely acknowledging Hara except with a “Good luck. You’ll need it.”
Tony eyed the terrified nurse, wondering who had ever employed her in the first place. “You can get out too and don’t come back. See whoever you need to at HR about that.” She didn’t need telling twice, hurrying from the room, head bowed.
“I’ll need a nurse,” Hara said as they came around to Clint’s side. “I can’t treat him without assistance.”
“You have me,” Tony offered.
Hara’s expression didn’t change. “Mr. Stark, you are many things, but a medically trained professional isn’t one of them.”
Tony relented. “Fine. Who do you trust?”
“FRIDAY?” Hara called. “I know Fahd is on break but can you tell him I need him and that it’s an emergency, please? He’ll understand.”
After a beat, FRIDAY confirmed, “Mr. Nazari is on his way, Dr. Hara.”
“Thank you, FRIDAY.” They turned to Clint. “Agent Barton? My name is Dr. Hara, but you can call me Ali. Mr. Stark—”
“It’s Tony,” Tony corrected them.
“Tony. Can you please assist me while I review Agent Barton’s file by removing the restraints from the bed? We won’t be needing those.”
Tony made a mental note to give the doctor a raise as he busied himself with removing the leather straps and cuffs entirely from the bed. Clint had curled himself back into a ball on his side, hands defensively over his head. He flinched when he first heard the snap of the restraints, but relaxed when he peaked out to see what exactly Tony was doing. Tony shoved the straps and cuffs under the bed, out of Clint’s eyesight, then perched back in the chair as a nurse entered the room. Like Hara, he approached Clint first, smiling and introducing himself. “Agent Barton? I’m Fahd. I’m going to be your nurse today—is that okay?”
Clint gave a jerky nod. As Hara and Fahd went into discussions about how to proceed, Tony slid closer to Clint’s side. “Hey. You in there?”
“Tony.”
“Yeah, Tony.” Tony’s eyes drifted to the bruises around Clint’s wrists. They would only be worse tomorrow. He didn’t want to think how long Dhawan would have limited Clint’s circulation if Tony hadn’t stepped in; what damage that might have done to the archer’s hands.
“Tony,” Clint said again, the word holding no inflection.
“Yeah,” Tony frowned. “Still Tony.”
Hara approached with a warm smile, drawing over a stool so they were sitting next to Clint as opposed to leaning over him, as Dhawan had done. “Agent Barton? I can see here you have several extensive and rather serious lacerations. Dr. Banner’s drug has prevented serious bleeding, but it’s only a temporary solution. I’m going to need to clean and stitch your injuries closed. Are you following me so far?”
Clint didn’t open his eyes, but he nodded again. Tony offered his hand again, and for a second it looked like Clint was going to take it, until his hand locked around Tony’s wrist instead, and Tony couldn’t stop the short gasp that slipped past his lips.
Tony knew the intention. It was the need for touch but also for control; to have something to hold onto without someone holding onto him in turn. It didn’t lessen that fact that Clint could snap his wrist in two, severely injured or not.
Still, Clint seemed calmer now Dhawan and the frantic nurse were gone, and if this was what he needed as an anchor, Tony would provide.
“I imagine you’re in a lot of pain right now” Hara continued, and Tony clenched his teeth as Clint’s hold on him tightened. “I can do something about that, but only if you or a medical proxy give me permission.”
“No drugs.”
“This is not a procedure I can perform without anesthetic, Agent Barton. Do you understand that?”
Clint’s hand became a vice so tight that Tony couldn’t help the hiss of air that escaped his teeth. The grip loosened instantly as Clint said, in the same tone of voice as before, “Tony.”
Tony’s brow furrowed. Clint had never done this before, and it didn’t seem like a question or a request. It was just his name.
“What about the anesthetic are you resisting?” Hara prompted. “We can keep you conscious if that would make you more comfortable, although I would prefer not to. I’m happy to run you through any and all side effects of the different options we have on hand. We’re not going to do anything to your body that you don’t fully understand, okay?”
“No drugs,” came Clint’s reply. Then, “Tony.”
“I don't know that is,” Tony told Hara. “I haven’t seen him get caught in a loop like this before. I’m not sure what it means.”
“That’s okay,” Hara assured him. “Agent Barton? I’m going to take Tony to one side for a moment, alright? Are you okay if Fahd looks after you for a moment?”
“I don’t think that’s the best idea,” Tony said quickly, even as Clint shook his head. “Whatever you need to say, let him hear it.”
Hara took it in stride. “To be blunt; he needs the stitches. I cannot give him the stitches without at least some form of anesthetic. But I can’t give him said anesthetic without permission from him or a medical proxy. Do you understand the position that puts us in?”
Yeah, a pretty shitty one. “I’d rather not make the call for him,” Tony said.
“You misunderstand me. His medical proxies are listed as Natasha Romanoff and Steve Rogers. This decision is not yours to make.”
Tony tried to hide the flash of hurt that roiled in his gut, even as he reasoned it through. Clint’s partner and his team leader. That made sense. There was no reason for Tony to be on that list, even if he had been through this shit show more times than he cared to count. “So you need me to convince him?”
“If you can. Or perhaps Captain Rogers—”
“No.” Clint curled himself up even tighter, taking Tony’s wrist with him, almost pulling him off the chair. Tony agreed. Steve was the last resort. Tony didn’t bother to ask about Natasha. If she could have been there, she would have been.
“Agent Barton, if your listed medical proxy decides that you require medication—which you do—I am obliged to administer it. But I would much rather do that with your permission.”
“Tony.”
“Tony is not listed as a medical proxy. He cannot make that decision.”
”Tony.” There was a note of panic to the last word, but still Tony didn’t feel like his name was aimed at him.
“Stop,” Tony said. He glanced behind them at where the nurse had already prepared the anesthetic, ready to go. “Just give us a bit of space. Please?”
Hara considered it. “Five minutes,” they decided. “Then I must really insist you call Captain Rogers.” Their tone was kind but firm, and Tony nodded. Call Steve so he could give Hara permission to do the procedure anyway, and while he was sure they would be gentler and more sympathetic than Dhawan, it was going to trigger whatever number of traumas this whole mess had re-activated in Clint in the first place.
“Alright.” Tony slid closer to the bed, tugging the chair with him. “Clint? This operation needs to happen.”
“No drugs.”
“Let me clarify. This operation needs to happen, and the lovely doctor is not going to fill you full of stitches sober. I’m in pain just looking at you. Don’t you want that to stop?” Tony was sure he did, but also knew that Clint would rather feel every inch of the pain than lose an ounce of control.
Clint’s eyes were still closed, tears beginning to slip from underneath them onto the pillow. Not for the first time, Tony cursed that both Clint and Natasha were so damn good at what they did. Because as useful as two super-spies were in the field, Clint could and would turn on the crocodile tears if he thought it would get him his way, and Tony was never completely certain when the archer was being genuine or if the tears were just to tug at Tony’s heartstrings to make him comply.
“It’s happening,” Tony decided, even as Clint moaned in protest. “But that doesn’t mean there aren’t options.” He shot a meaningful look to the nurse, who inclined his head to indicate he was listening. “We can give you the mildest stuff we can, or we can give you the stuff that knocks you on your ass so hard you won’t even remember any of this happened. Which one are you leaning towards?”
His hand was going numb from how hard Clint was gripping his wrist. “Tony.”
“That’s not an answer.”
The tears were continuing to fall, Clint’s body a steel rod from tension. “Please.”
Well, Tony no longer needed that “Proof that Tony Stark has a Heart” plaque because he could feel that single word pierce straight into it. “Neither is that.”
Clint’s eyes shot open, glaring at him as the tears halted as quickly as they had started. “Bastard. Motherfucking bastard.”
Hara tapped their watch and, god, Tony really didn’t want to drag Steve down here, didn’t want to see the betrayal in Clint’s eyes as their team leader held him down. Because Steve would do it, Tony was sure of it, muscling his way to what he thought was right as he always did, even if Clint hated it for him later.
“Nurse,” Tony asked. “What’s the mildest you can go?”
He didn’t listen to the answer, already shaking back the sleeve of his scrub, turning back to Clint. “Sure. I’m a bastard. And so are you, Barton, dammit. You know who isn’t though? Bruce.”
Clint’s eyes narrowed, unsure, trying to decipher Tony’s train of thought.
“And you know who orders and checks all the drugs who come through here? Bruce does.” That wasn’t true, not by a long shot, but Bruce had been keeping himself busy by helping out in the med bay—enough that a disorientated Clint might just believe it. “And I know you and me have had our differences lately but you still trust Bruce, right? I know I do. Watch.”
He held his arm to the disbelieving nurse. “Mr. Stark, I really can’t condone—”
Tony cut him off, still talking to Clint. “I’ll go first, okay? You’ll see it’s fine. Nothing’s going to happen except all that pain going away.”
Hara stepped forward and, when they spoke, their tone was kind. “Tony, we can’t do that.”
“I pay for whatever happy juice you’re about to give me, not to mention for the entire hospital wing we’re having this delightful conversation in. I think I can do whatever the hell I want.”
Hara didn’t rise to the bait. “You have a long history with substance abuse and an addictive personality. Can you understand why I cannot morally give you painkillers without due cause?”
“What about this isn’t due cause? We’re having a big discussion about consent, right? Well, this is me giving you my consent. Hit me.”
“No.” The whole room’s attention went to Clint. “Tony.”
“That’s my name, and you’re really wearing it out.”
Something seemed to click behind Clint’s eyes because, with great effort, he looked over to Hara, acknowledging them fully for the first time. “What do they do? The drugs?”
Hara didn’t break stride, returning to the bed, resuming the non-threatening position of sitting on the stool. “They will significantly reduce feeling on the side of your body that I need to clean, stitch and bandage. This will last for approximately twelve hours and then, with your consent or the consent of a medical proxy, I will give you another dose to help with the pain. After that, I will prescribe some painkillers in an oral form for pain management while you heal.”
“Side effects?”
“Possible side effects include dry mouth, loss of appetite, constipation, and, in very rare cases, mild nausea.”
“Not drowsiness?
“No drowsiness. What I’m about to give you actually a drug of my own invention. It was designed for field medics to operate on or treat soldiers who still needed to keep their wits about them in active war zones. It’s passed all human trials and has been in use for the past eight months, to great success. Does that sound okay to you, Agent Barton?”
Pepper Potts would always be the greatest human Tony had ever known, but Dr. Ali Hara was giving his CEO. a damn good run for her money. “What do you say?” Hara pressed. “Your care has been delayed long enough and I would like to get started as soon as possible. Do I have your consent to use anesthetics in order to treat your injuries?”
Clint considered as the room held its breath. “Don’t use.”
Tony was about to tear his hair out in frustration, when Clint slipped his grip on Tony’s wrist to his hand. Clint could still break several of his fingers in half a breath, but the gesture felt far less threatening.
“Don’t use.” It took a second for Tony to realize that the words were aimed at him, and another to cotton on to what Clint meant.
“Okay,” he agreed. “I won’t use them. But you need to.”
Then, finally, Clint nodded, and it was a harder won victory than the alien monsters that had put them here in the first place.
The room breathed a collected sigh of relief, even as Hara and Fahd hid it far better behind a veil of professionalism. Tony was far too exhausted to hide anything, and slumped back in the chair as far as he could with Clint using his hand as an anchor.
Tony knew Clint wanted to ask the question, but wouldn’t, so he did. “Can I stay with him?”
Hara looked like they were about to launch into a logical argument about why that wasn’t a good idea, so Tony cut them off before they could. “I know you want me out the way, but your job is going to be a whole lot easier if I’m here. Even if it violates about a dozen medical practices you have in place for very good reasons.”
Hara considered, then gave in. “Okay, you can stay. Just this once.”
Fahd approached, a needle in hand. “Agent Barton? I’m going to inject you now. I’m going to walk you through everything I’m doing, every step of the way. Nothing is going to happen before I tell you first. And for Tony’s safety, I think it would be best if you let go of his hand.”
When Clint hesitated, Tony offered a different solution. “Hold on. Fahd, you’re about to see something very cool.” Indeed, Fahd’s eyes did light up, just a little, as Tony’s watch spiraled out into an Iron Man gauntlet which he offered to Clint instead. “Here. No way you’re breaking anything inside of that.”
It was a relief to Tony as well, to finally have his arm away from the spy’s deadly grip, potential nasty incident avoided. His eye was still throbbing something terrible, but it could wait.
“Maybe something to bite down on as well?” Fahd offered, noting Clint’s split lip, ripped apart by his own teeth. “Your choice,” he added quickly as Clint went rigid. “It shouldn’t hurt that much with the anesthetic, but it can still be an unpleasant experience. But only if you’re comfortable with it.”
“Not a mouthguard,” Tony said quickly as Clint’s breathing accelerated. “Maybe something he can spit out, if he needs to?” He squeezed Clint’s hand, gentle behind the glove. “Does that sound okay, Clint? It’s optional, but I think we’d both prefer it if you didn’t chew your lip off.”
“Here.” Hara, having listened to the exchange, returned with a rolled-up towel, which Clint accepted between his teeth. “Does that feel alright, Agent Barton? You can get it out if you need to?”
Clint tested rolling it back and forth with his tongue, then gave them a flurried gesture that made Tony laugh in disbelief. “He’s telling you to hurry up,” he translated. “Yeah, we’ve been waiting on you, birdbrain. You ready to do this?”
Clint nodded, suddenly eager to have the whole thing behind him. Tony could relate. Clint’s hand clung to the glove as Fahd carefully approached him with the needle. Clint screwed his eyes up as it was injected, breathing picking up, but at last he slumped back in the bed, his grip on Tony going soft, and letting the doctor get to work.