Chapter Text
“This is the Avengers Initiative.”
Nick Fury laid down a stack of files, some familiar and some new.
Clint Barton slid his own file to the side and flipped Natasha Romanoff’s open just long enough to snap a photo of her shitty SHIELD employee picture. As soon as he sent it to her as a never-ending reminder of the one time a pimple dared defy her, Clint moved hers aside as well.
The next file didn’t surprise Clint a bit, even if it didn’t exactly have him jumping for joy. Steve Rogers, America’s most beloved fossil.
No, wait… Mummy?
“What’s it called when something is preserved on ice and then brought back to life?” Clint murmured while flipping the pages in Rogers’ file. There wasn’t much in there Clint didn’t already know. Rogers lived in SHIELD housing same as him.
They didn’t talk.
Clint didn’t have anything to say to him.
Phil Coulson didn’t even look up from the cards he flipped through in his hands. “Cryonics,” he said.
Right, yeah.
The next file made Clint roll his eyes, only because he knew who had a hand in drafting Bruce Banner to the team. Nat’s obsession with the man was concerning and Clint would tell her to seek therapy and antipsychotic medications if his leg didn’t still have phantom pains from the last time he suggested something similar.
“This guy?” Clint held up the file for Fury and waved it lightly. “Are you drafting the guy who cries during PETA ads—”
Phil’s head lifted and his eyes crinkled at the corners.
It was one time.
“— or the uncontrollable green freak?” he asked. “Because I’ll be honest, I don’t get the sense either are especially useful in the field.”
Fury looked unconcerned, which for Fury meant that his shoulders were only eighty-five percent strained beneath his gear instead of the usual ninety-five.
“He’s one of the leading minds in gamma radiation research,” Fury said. “Doctor Banner is just as useful to us as his counterpart.”
“Doctor Jekyll and Mister Hyde,” Clint said, not quite under his breath. “Which one was the bad guy again? Both, right?”
“Clint…” Phil didn’t raise his voice, didn’t need to. Clint dropped the commentary anyway.
Banner was a write-off in Clint’s opinion, just like Tony Stark’s file after his.
Clint had been forewarned about Stark by Fury, who wanted Clint to know that one of Phil’s great heroes would be given an offer to join them. Clint had also been forewarned about Stark by Phil, who wanted Clint to know that Stark had lawyers and liked to use them.
If SHIELD needed funding, Clint wished they would apply for grants or have a bake sale instead.
Clint’s eyes slid toward Phil who shook his head without looking at him.
Cool. Internal snark only.
Clint tossed Stark’s file back onto the table before reaching for the final folder in the stack. Then he paused, because it was thick.
Significantly thicker than the others had been.
Clint’s eyes ticked across the table at Fury once before he opened the cover with all the care of detonating a ticking bomb. The file was messy, several different agencies contributed reports in several different languages.
There was a lot of redacted information that pissed Clint off right off the bat. Back-hacking the servers to dig for the missing information was a pain in the ass, it would be easier if Fury saved them both the extra work.
The name at the top wasn’t familiar, and Clint knew most of the major players in the game.
“Harry Potter,” Clint read. “Where’d we find him?”
“Most recently?” Fury asked. “Rome.”
That was descriptive.
Clint scanned the front page until he found the status on the guy.
CURRENT STATUS: UNAFFILIATED
THREAT LEVEL: HIGH
RECRUITMENT STATUS: PENDING
CLASSIFICATION: WITCH
“A witch,” Clint read, looking at Phil then. “This guy is a witch?”
A threatening, unaffiliated, not-yet-recruited, witch.
“Wizard,” Phil corrected him, a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth. “Here.”
Phil pulled one of his cards from the small stack and slid it to Clint. It was different from the others, less vintage baseball card and more rare Pokemon card.
The picture moved. The fucking photograph moved.
Clint nearly ripped it on instinct, but then he’d have to listen to Phil complain about it for roughly the rest of his life. He picked it up slowly, it felt warmer in his hand.
Definitely not a Pokemon card.
The ‘wizard’ on the front shifted inside the golden frame before absolutely rubbing a hand over his face. Young. Dark hair. A lightning-shaped scar near his temple.
‘Harry Potter’ the card said in bold purple letters.
“What am I looking at?” Clint asked as he turned it over in his hand.
“A Chocolate Frog Card,” Phil told him.
Which explained almost as little as the back side of the card did.
Known for the defeat of Lord Voldemort (Tom Riddle) during the Second Wizarding War at only seventeen and for surviving the Killing Curse twice. Noted for having survived all three Unforgivable Curses, the youngest ever recipient of the Order of Merlin First Class, and often cited as one of the most unusually resilient wizards in history.
(Additionally, Harry Potter was the youngest seeker for a Hogwarts Quidditch Team in a century.)
Clint read it - twice.
Then a third time before he flipped the card back over again and squinted down at the tiny Harry Potter.
“You’re trying to recruit a kid?” Clint asked Fury. “He can’t even vote yet?”
“Technically, he can’t vote here at all because he’s not a citizen,” Phil said, sounding all warm and fond. He took the card back from Clint and slid it carefully back in the stack he had.
“That card was made three years ago,” Fury said. “And I’d damn well rather have Potter with us than against us.”
“And I’d rather—”
Phil cleared his throat, Clint shut up.
The file in front of him was more interesting anyway. Mostly because Clint hadn’t initially realized that it was less of a case file and more of a collection of incident reports that cited Harry Potter.
Rome. Prague. Cairo. Bucharest.
One report from Argentina was so redacted that the only thing Clint could read were snippets of three different witness statements that directly contradicted each other.
SUBJECT WAS UNARMED
SUBJECT WIELDED A FLAMING SWORD
SUBJECT DID NOTHING WRONG AND WAS IN FACT NOT AT THE SCENE
“Come on.” Clint started to laugh, but it dried up almost immediately at the looks on Phil and Fury’s faces. “This can’t be real,” he said, gesturing to the report. “This makes him sound like an urban legend or something.”
“That,” Fury said flatly, “is exactly what he’s been considered until recently.”
There were dozens of reports all clipped together with no real pattern and no clear evidence of involvement. From what Clint read, Harry Potter happened to show up in the vicinity of dangerous situations just before they were quietly resolved.
Illegal artifact trafficking
Cult activity
Human disappearances
Serial murders
Then several things that SHIELD apparently classified under categories Clint definitely had not been cleared for yet, judging by the amount of black ink aggressively censoring entire pages.
There was a collection of grainy images of Harry Potter, none that gave Clint a real good look at him. One photograph had him walking away from a burning building, a cat tucked under his arm. Another caught him climbing out of a sewer drain covered in blood and mud.
“Until recently?” Clint asked, picking up the phrase Fury used. “He retired?”
“No, he’s here,” Fury said. “Harry Potter showed up three days ago and requested to see me. He asked to be a part of the team.”
Huh.
Clint looked through the file again and didn’t see any sort of indication that Potter wanted to be a team player and definitely not one with rules and restrictions. Why would he — wait.
“Three days ago?” Clint asked Fury. “You invited the wizard before I was given an invite?”
Way to kick a guy, wow. Someone dedicated their entire adult life to a shady government organization as a way to get out of a circus and that was how they were repaid? Fucking rude.
“Actually, no.” Fury leaned on the table with both arms, his one eye fixed on Clint. “As of three days ago, there were only four people who knew about the initiative being launched. Even then, there was only one person who knew what it was called. Me.”
“And Harry asked to join the Avengers,” Phil added, quieter than Fury, but ten times as audibly curious. “He’s been in lockup since arriving and refuses to disclose how he became aware of it or why he wants to join.”
That was… probably not good.
Almost as not-good as Clint realizing abruptly that Potter’s file had been dropped in front of him with the others.
“You arrested him, interrogated him, and you’re still going to give him exactly what he asked for?” Clint asked. He whistled when nobody denied it. “Ballsy.”
“As I said, I’d damn well rather have him with us than against us,” Fury said flatly. “I put him on the team and one of two things happens: we find out what his game is and shut it down or we turn one of the most dangerous beings into an asset for SHIELD.”
Or… and Clint was just spitballing there… Potter played his game right to the winners circle.
Clint tapped the file and considered what Potter’s game might be. “So he’s just been sitting in a cell, waiting to be made into a hero?”
Phil rubbed a hand over his mouth, hiding a smile. So Phil liked him, that wasn’t proof of a great character. In fact, with Phil’s personal history, Clint would say it was proof that Potter was a pain in the ass.
“Potter will remain incarcerated until we have a use for him,” Fury said. “We’ve had agents rotating duty on surveillance split between him and the Tesseract. When the team is assembled, we’ll adapt.”
Clint felt like a teenager in a slasher film: sure, all signs said to not follow that path if he wanted to live, but damn if Clint didn’t want to meet his new teammate.
“Great.” Clint tossed the file back on the table with the others and got to his feet. “I’ll just go give him a warm welcome then.”
“Do not antagonize him, Clint,” Phil said before Clint could slip away. “The last agent who tried to bring him in dropped dead before they could.”
Clint paused by the door, tilted his head. “What happened?” he asked curiously.
“We believe he crystallized their lungs.”
“Damn,” Clint shook his head. “That’s cold.”
It took a second for Phil to get it, then he sighed Clint’s name like a curse as Clint slipped out in the hall with a small grin.
The containment center where Potter would be was sublevel eight, which was where Clint headed while seamlessly mixing in with the usual SHIELD rhythm. Phones ringing, conversations being held in loud whispers that echoed off the underground walls. People seemed to think that whispering wasn’t just as annoying as shouting was, but Clint’s fingers still twitched to turn off his earpiece.
Better to not be walking around deaf, the last time he tried that he had accidentally taken down three agents. It had helped the rest of SHIELD staff to learn not to underestimate him though.
SHIELD liked polished soldiers with clean histories, soldiers like Rogers who fell in line with snappy salutes. Clint had shown up with a lazy drawl, sarcasm etched in his teeth, and a tendency to lean against things instead of standing properly.
If it wasn’t for Phil, Clint was pretty sure SHIELD would have tossed his ass back in a circus before they ever saw him as useful. Though if it wasn’t for Phil, Clint probably would have skipped the whole way back to the big top.
When Clint liked his job, he was grateful. When his job sucked, he asked Phil why he hated him so much.
That day was still up in the air, Clint would wait until after meeting Potter to make up his mind.
Clint didn’t bother nodding at the agents outside of the containment area when he reached it. His clearance outranked theirs and the first set of doors slid open with his access car. The second doors opened with a fingerprint, the third set had a retina scan. The fourth set asked for a thirty-seven digit PIN code.
And then Clint entered the containment room and got his first look at Harry Potter.
Potter sat inside the massive glass cell with a wooden chair leaned back on two legs. He had his legs crossed at the ankle, just one boot hooked loosely over the other. There were several little gold balls flying through the air around him in slow circles while he seemed to be guiding them with one finger lazily making circles in the air.
The photos hadn’t really done him justice, not that Clint had ever seen a CCTV headshot look too glamorous.
Clint didn’t hide that he was assessing Potter as he approached the cage, just as Potter didn’t hide that he was pretending to not notice Clint.
Potter looked lean beneath his many layers of dark clothes. He wore it all casually, but Clint spent years learning how to spot money from people who wanted to keep it hidden. The messy black hair in his Chocolate Card photo had grown down to his shoulders and fell in curled waves. There was a slight hollowing beneath his cheekbones, the kind of look that suggested he could use a vacation and that he belonged on a billboard.
All together? Potter was pretty, annoyingly so. Not soft pretty, not deceptively pretty.
More like Ted Bundy pretty where victims would follow him just before they ended up on a slab in a morgue. And, like Ted Bundy, there was something deeply wrong with Clint for wondering if he could fix him.
One of the little gold balls bounced off Potter’s shoulder lightly and he curled his fingers around it, flashing three gaudy rings on his middle three fingers when he did it. Clint blinked, then took a step to the side when the ball was thrown directly to him, passing through thick and solid glass like smoke.
Clint caught it immediately, letting the solid gold ball smack into his palm hard. He glanced at it curiously, saw it had fluttering wings attached to it.
Potter finally looked directly at him then with green eyes a shade too bright to be natural and a smirk curling his mouth to one side.
“Yes, no, purple, fifteen, and probably but only if you beg real nice,” Potter said.
British. Overtly amused for a guy in a cage built for the worst possible threats to humanity.
Clint raised an eyebrow and moved closer while locking down anything for Potter to read off his face.
“Hate when I have answers and no questions,” Clint said. He tossed the gold ball up, caught it. Potter’s eyes tracked the movement.
“Ahem.” Potter sat down, let his chair legs clatter against the ground. “Am I starving? Will I settle for vending machine crisps? What color are my socks? How many agents have interrogated me before you? And is it possible for you to seduce me into sharing my secrets?”
That one caught Clint off guard enough that he nearly laughed. He didn’t though, so Potter’s widened grin was unneeded.
“Little forward there, Houdini,” Clint said. He tossed the ball again, Potter watched it go up then back down in Clint’s palm.
“It is a housewarming party. Now that you’re here anyway. Okay, okay, I won’t lie to you - I was having a party by myself, but that sounds pathetic and I’m desperate to impress you.”
Potter delivered the whole bit so seriously that Clint didn’t doubt most people missed the full saturation of sarcasm it was coated in.
“Housewarming, huh?” Clint moved up to the glass, rapped his knuckles on it. It looked casual, relevant to the conversation.
The golden ball was solid. The glass was still solid.
If Potter could magic the ball out of the cage, Clint had to wonder what Potter’s game was that had him tolerating his own place within it.
“In some places, seventy-two hours establishes residency,” Potter told him. “I’m afraid your master will have to evict me now. I am officially a legal squatter.”
“Huh.” Clint threw the ball high, caught it behind his back with his other hand. “You call Fury ‘master’ to his face?” he asked, figuring Potter just said it to piss him off.
It did piss him off a little, which made Potter that much more dangerous.
Attractive, charismatic, and clocking Clint just as much as he was Potter.
“I called him Nicky once,” Potter said. “Can’t say he was a fan, I was in this charming room only a few minutes later.”
Clint leaned one shoulder against the glass and openly studied him up close. The scar on his forehead from the photo wasn’t the only one he had anymore. There was another one, long and vicious, that started just above his left eyebrow and ended at the cheekbone.
Clint tossed the ball and then looked at Potter’s left hand when his eyes ticked upward. He had a scaly black fingerless glove on that hand, then the three rings on the other.
Weird fashion statement, hated that it was working for him.
“Heard you asked Nicky for us to be teammates,” Clint said. There was no twitch, no shift in expression. Either Potter already knew Clint was in the team he asked to be on or he didn’t give a damn.
Or he had mastered the same mask Clint wore.
“Can I tell you something?” Potter stood up, stretched his arms high over his head while he arched his back. When his fingers twitched, the other gold balls and the chair disappeared, leaving Potter free to lope over to where Clint stood.
“I think I messed up the application process,” Potter said with a heavy sigh. “I knew I should have brought a cover letter, it really would have made all the difference.”
That close, the green of his eyes looked almost unreal against the dark black curls and fair skin. He was pretty enough to lower somebody’s guard, dangerous enough that lowering it would be fatal.
“That was your mistake,” Clint agreed dryly. “SHIELD loves paperwork. Cover letters or manifestos get asset housing, empty hands get this place.”
It was quick, but a muscle in Potter’s mouth very nearly twinged. If Clint had to guess? It would have made a sneer.
Yeah, Potter really waltzed in hoping to be put on a team. Clearly.
“In that case, I’d hate to lose this place.” Potter spread his arms to the side, gesturing to the empty cage. “Do you have any idea what some people pay for such a cushy studio loft like this? And I get to be here for free? It’s a dream come true, mate.”
“That’s what they’re here for.” Clint looked away from Potter, tossed the gold ball high. “I saw your chocolate frog card, by the way. What’s a Hogwarts quidditch team?”
“Did it mention that?” Potter leaned on the glass too, a few steps in front of Clint and facing him. “Brilliant. You have no idea what kind of threats I had to make good on for them to add that.”
Clint tossed the ball up.
“What kind of threats?”
“Hm? Oh, I told them — hey!” Potter grinned and wagged a finger at Clint. “You’re a really great interrogator. Can you believe that I held up under waterboarding, tickle fights, and sleep deprivation, but almost broke for a pretty face?”
The ball smacked Clint’s palm and he wrapped his fingers around it that time.
“Level with me,” Clint said, ready to be done with the conversation that was going nowhere. “You don’t want to be on a team, I’m gonna guess you couldn’t give a damn about joining SHIELD. While I’m guessing? You could walk out of this place whenever you want. So if you haven’t, you must want something. Tell me what it is, I could help you get it.”
Potter went still, sniper-still.
Clint didn’t tense, but he did prepare himself for Potter to pull his trigger.
“You know…” Potter lifted his chin and the gold ball Clint held disappeared from his hand and reappeared in Potter’s. “I think I’ll take a nap. You have no idea how exhausting my day has been.”
Potter turned away from Clint, strolled casually to the other side of the cage. With a wave of his hand, a narrow cot appeared that Potter promptly laid on with his back to Clint.
Anyone else did that? Clint would take it as an unconscious sign that they were beginning to trust him already. Potter? Clint was sure that was a nap-position of arrogance.
Clint stayed where he was for another few seconds anyway, watching Potter’s shoulders rise and fall out of time with the vein ticking in the side of his neck.
Potter would make an excellent agent if SHIELD could control him. And he’d make a damned difficult opponent when SHIELD realized they couldn’t. Fury wasn’t wrong for wanting to try and pull him on their side, he was wrong if he thought for a second it would actually work.
Clint kicked off the glass he had been leaning on and made for the door at a casual angle, not liking the idea of Potter getting a shot at his back. And Potter didn’t take a shot, not until Clint was a step away from the door.
“Hey, Clint?” Potter called after him casually, though Clint thought there was a hint of tiredness in his voice.
Clint stopped, turned his head to look over his shoulder. Potter had only flipped to his other side with one arm tucked beneath his head and his eyes tracking Clint like he had the gold ball.
“You’re going to need my help soon,” Potter said. “When you do, I will help you. And afterward, I’ll show you my purple socks if you still want to see them.”
Yup.
Arrogant.
Clint turned away again and threw a hand up in an airy wave. “I’ll keep that in mind, honey.”
Potter’s laugh followed Clint through all four doors. Not because it was memorable, because it was confident. Potter seemed to genuinely believe that SHIELD would need his help soon.
Clint would have been more skeptical about his confidence if Potter hadn’t called Clint by name. Which Clint never gave him.
So when the alarms were triggered that night and Clint was alerted that someone was making a play for the Tesseract, Clint wasn’t even surprised that Fury gave orders for Potter to be pulled in for assistance.
Annoyingly pretty, annoyingly observant, annoyingly correct.
Harry Potter was goddamned annoying.