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When she’d accepted Yelena’s invitation to the Watchtower, Kate hadn’t been sure what to expect, but finding the New Avengers arguing around a table sure wasn’t on her list. Maybe there is an emergency? She unleashes Fanny and Lucky and hurries to join the team. They’re not the original Avengers, obviously, but teaming up with them would still be pretty cool.
“Kate Bishop! Maybe you can help us solve this.”
“So she can go with your pick? I don’t think so,” John Walker says.
Yelena glares at him.
“Uhm, hi,” Kate says with a wave of her hand. “I’m Kate, I assume Yelena told you. What’s up?”
Ava stares her up and down. “Damn it.” She takes out a few bills, which Bucky is ready to accept.
“Nice to meet you, Kate.”
“I can’t believe you.” Yelena rolls her eyes.
Kate briefly considers asking what that was about, but she decides she’s better off not knowing.
“Hi, Kate,” a man she doesn’t know tells her. He’s sitting a short way off the main table, so Kate hadn’t immediately noticed him.
“Kate, that’s Bob,” Yelena tells her. “You probably know the others. Anyway, we were—” she suddenly stops talking, bending down to greet Fanny. “I missed you,” she tells her dog, voice filled with fondness.
It’s been a few months since Yelena asked her to dogsit Fanny—but do not give her pizza, Kate Bishop, I’m warning you—so Kate doesn’t want to interrupt their reunion, but she’s really curious now. They were what? They don’t seem worried or in a rush to go save civilians, but the discussion going on when she’d entered had seemed pretty heated. That’s when her eyes slid to the table she’d only glanced at ‘til now—have you ever been in a room with Bucky Barnes and Ava Starr? You can’t blame her for being distracted—and she notices it’s full of boxes.
Games’ boxes, she realizes as she gets near. She blinks, trying to put the pieces together.
It’s Friday night. Yelena invited her to join her new team, without specifying anything except for instructing her to bring the dogs. Could it be…
Some kind of alarm goes off somewhere in the tower, prompting Walker to curse and make for the door, but he stops right before getting out to glare at all of them. “Do not choose without me!”
Kate takes in the threat for a few seconds. The others seem unbothered; Ava is watching the dogs from a distance, Bucky is petting a white shape on his shoulder. The shape meows. How did Kate fail to notice the cat sooner?
“It’s adorable,” Kate says, because it is. She wants to find out if it’s as fluffy as it looks, but first things first, it’s time to check her deduction. “You guys are having a game night?”
Bucky huffs. “That was the idea,” he says, scritching the cat’s chin, “until everyone brought a game and then some. We can’t decide which ones we should play.”
Game night with the New Avengers wasn’t on her bingo card for this year or any other, but it sounds fun. Kate lowkey wishes Clint was here too.
Yelena is still playing with Fanny.
“We’re not playing monopoly,” Ava points out, sounding like she’s had to repeat it many times.
Kate studies the boxes on the table. There are pretty much all the classics, plus some games she doesn’t know. There’s one in particular that catches her eye. “We could try this one?”
“What is it?” Ava appears next to her, Kate jumps. Ava smirks.
Bucky sighs. “You get used to it,” he tells her.
“That’s so cool!” Kate shouts. “I didn’t notice you moving at all. I’d heard about your powers but that was. Wow.”
“Turn off your fangirl mode, Kate Bishop.” Yelena joins them with Fanny by her side. “Clue? Hm, why not. I’ll beat you all.”
Ava is reading the instructions with Bucky peeking from behind her shoulder. “So we need to… find a murderer?”
“Wait, you’ve never played it?” Kate’s smile grows. “We’re definitely fixing that.”
“I told you not to pick without me.”
Kate turns to see Walker come back into the room holding a huge tray in his hands. He looks annoyed. “Uh, you need any help?” she asks, just as Lucky runs towards him.
Oh no.
“Maybe stop your dog, Kate Bishop.”
“Dog?” Walker repeats, trying to look over his tray. Tray that, Kate realizes, is filled with food.
She runs and tackles Lucky much like she did the night that marked her beginning as a vigilante. Walker curses, but they’ve rolled out of his way just in time. Yelena claps.
The tray ends on the—hurriedly freed of boxes—table in one piece, all its treats safe from Lucky’s attempt on them.
“Looks great, John.” Bucky goes for a slice of pizza.
John stares at him for a couple of seconds. “I know it does.” He turns to Kate, who is still lying on the floor with Lucky on top of her, and sighs. “What are we playing then?”
⚡
“I suspect Mr. Green, in the billiard room, with a candlestick.”
“You really like that candlestick,” John—Kate stopped thinking of him as Walker about as soon as she’d tried his homemade pizza—comments, passing her the weapon token.
“Have you seen the body, John? It’s obvious the killer used a candlestick.” Yelena smirks at the flat look that gets her from her teammate. “So! What do you say, Ava?”
“Could be. Mr. Green always looked suspicious to me.”
“Excuse me?” Bucky puts one of his cards face-down on the table and passes it to Yelena. “I’m so clearly innocent.” Alpine meows from his lap, as if to agree with her owner.
“So they all say,” Yelena comments, checking the card. She nods and gives it back. “Your move, Ava.”
Ava hums and rolls the dice. “Yes! I enter the dining room.”
“Why do you always get high results while I’m lucky to move four steps?”
“That’s ‘cause my Solicitor Peacock is a lot cooler than your Colonel, Walker.” Ava smirks, studying her notes. “Now stop distracting me. I suspect Miss Scarlett,” Yelena squeals indignantly at that, “in the dining room, with the candlestick.”
“I thought we were friends,” Yelena says.
“We can still be friends if you’re a killer. I don’t judge.”
Bucky shrugs. “It could be.”
“Here, Ava.” Bob passes her a card.
Kate wonders what it could be, since she has the dining room in her hand. Maybe Miss Scarlett? She’s fairly sure Yelena has the candlestick she likes so much; that, or it really is the murder weapon. Lucky comes distract her, pleading with his big eyes for another slice of pizza. Unfortunately for him, there’s none left. “Sorry, I’ll get you some treat later,” Kate tells him, scritching behind his ears.
Meanwhile, Bucky rolls two ones and can’t get anywhere, Bob chooses to stay in the conservatory and accuses Miss Scarlett—“You too, Bob?”—and the candlestick. Yelena reluctantly passes him a card, then it’s Kate’s turn.
She stays in the ballroom, since she has the card for it. She’ll need to move soon, but she wants to flush out the killer first. “I suspect Chef White in the ballroom with a wrench.”
“That is a nasty weapon,” Yelena says. “Possible, I guess,” she adds after Walker shrugs to pass.
“Nah.” Ava shows Kate her Chef White card.
She nods and makes a note of it; that leaves either Miss Scarlett, which Bob might have, or Mr. Green. Time to change rooms.
Alpine peeks out from Bucky’s lap and makes to jump on the table, only to be stopped by her owner’s human hand. “Be good, girl,” he whispers between pets. She meows again, but she looks satisfied with the attention.
“This game is boring.” John moves his yellow figurine by five steps—one more and he’d get to the hall, but no such luck.
“You really suck at this game,” Kate notes helpfully.
Ava laughs. “I like your friend.”
Yelena smirks and throws. “Yes!” She only got a four, but that’s enough to get her to the library. She clears her throat. “I know Mr. Boddy was killed by Mr. Green in the library with the rope.” She pointedly looks at Bucky. “Such a boring way to kill, by the way.”
They barely have time to realize she’s gone all-in before she’s got the solution cards out, checking her final deduction. Kate blinks; how did she find out so fast?! Yelena might notice her bafflement, ‘cause she winks at her before theatrically revealing her guess to be right.
John throws his cards on the table, Ava and Bucky groan. “I knew you had the candlestick.”
“Best weapon ever.”
Kate sighs, looking at her notes. She’d been close, but obviously not enough.
“Great job, Lena!”
“Don’t be so sportsmanlike, Bob,” Ava chides him. “It’s no fun.”
Kate smiles at the scene, one hand tracing patterns on Lucky’s fur. It seems like Yelena found a good team for herself, after all—she’d held out on telling her about it, so Kate had been lowkey worrying she didn’t like her teammates, but she’s glad to see she couldn’t be more wrong.
“My turn,” John says then. “Let’s play Risk.”
Ava kicks him under the table, somehow managing to avoid hitting Fanny. “Absolutely not.”
“That’s so boring, John,” Yelena says. “Cliché, too.”
Bucky shakes his head. “I’ll pass.” He finishes putting away Clue and gets up to remove the box; Alpine hisses unhappily, jumping off. “I know, I know, sorry.”
“I’ve never played Risk, how is it?”
“War game, Bob.”
“Oh. Maybe pick something else, John.”
John’s answer is to throw his hands in the air. “You all have no taste in games.”
“Come on.” Bucky comes back to the table with something in his hands; Kate squints to figure out what. A deck of red cards. “There’s only one way this game night can end.”
Yelena raises a brow. “You chose blood, I see.”
“How is that any better than my idea?”
“I like Uno,” Bob says, and that seems to settle it.
Bucky smirks and deals the cards, unbothered by Alpine’s return on his lap.
Lucky leaves Kate to go curl up next to Fanny under the table. “Are all your game nights so lively?” Kate asks, checking her hand. It could be worse.
“Bold to assume this chaos is limited to game nights, Kate Bishop.” Yelena appears by her side, having switched places with John—the man is now bickering with Ava, Kate has no clue about what since the game hasn’t even started yet.
“Sounds fun.” Kate studies her friend; Yelena’s smiling like she’s rarely seen her. Surrounded by friends and pets, she seems to have found some piece. “I almost feel guilty my future team will steal all the attention from yours.”
“Keep on dreaming, Kate.”
Ava starts the game with a yellow eight, Yelena takes her cards. For her turn she puts down a blue plus two, making Kate groan at having to draw already.
“After I win this,” Yelena tells her midmatch, “I’ll introduce you to Cucumber.”
“Huh?” Kate puts down a five and blinks. “Who’s Cucumber?”
“I thought you were joking about the name,” John pipes up.
“Me too,” Bob joins in.
“Cucumber is a great name,” Yelena declares. “For my guinea pig,” she adds with a wink to Kate.
“Wait. You have a guinea pig and you didn’t tell me??” Kate pouts. “I’m hurt, Yelena. Hurt.”
“Long story, maybe one day I’ll tell you.” Yelena shrugs. “Here, add two cards to your hurt.”
Kate sighs.
Her friend is fine, alright.