𝙏𝙝𝙚 𝙂𝙞𝙛𝙩𝙚𝙙 - 𝙈𝘼𝙍𝙑𝙀𝙇

three

- Age of Ultron -

┏━━━━━━━━━ ━━━━━━━━━┓

Steve gently carried Alexei into the Quinjet, when he was suddenly surrounded by Tony and Thor.

"Where did you find him?" Tony asked as he stepped out of his Iron Man suit.

"I was looking for Thor, until I came across him. He was alone," Steve explained.

Steve then turned to Thor. "Where were you, anyway?"

Thor cleared his throat awkwardly and looked up, squinting his eyes. "The usual things, saving and fighting...you know," he trailed off vaguely.

Tony snorted in amusement. "You definitely got your ass handed to you," he smirked knowingly at the disheveled Asgardian.

Thor shifted on his feet, not meeting their eyes. "Well, I may have had a brief...encounter with the young one's powers," Thor admitted. "But it was merely a misunderstanding."

Steve and Tony exchanged a look. It was clear Thor wasn't telling the whole story.

"Let's just focus on getting him safely back to base for now," Steve said, looking down at Alexei's unconscious form with concern. Their questions could wait - helping Alexei was the priority.

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[BARTON'S HOUSE]

The Quinjet landed outside a large farmhouse and they all disembarked, Steve still carrying Alexei carefully in his arms.

Thor looked around in confusion. "What is this place?"

"A safe house?" Tony guessed uncertainly.

"Let's hope so," Clint replied with a smile before opening the front door. "Honey, I'm home!" he called out.

Clint's very pregnant wife, Laura, emerged from the kitchen to greet them.

"Hi. Company. Sorry I didn't call ahead," Clint said apologetically.

As they watched Laura kiss Clint in welcome, Tony murmured to Thor out the side of his mouth, "This is an agent of some kind."

Clint then turned to introduce his wife to the team. "Gentlemen, this is Laura."

Laura smiled warmly at them. "I know all your names," she said before her gaze landed on Alexei still unconscious in Steve's arms. "Except that one," she added with a little laugh.

The team exchanged awkward looks. "Neither do we," Clint admitted ruefully, glancing down at Alexei's sleeping face.

Clint's face lit up even more as he heard little footsteps running their way. "Ooh, incoming!"

Clint's two children, Cooper and Lila, came barreling into the room. 

"Dad!" his daughter shouted excitedly as Clint swept her up into his arms. He planted a kiss on top of his son's head. "Hi buddy! How you guys doing?"

Tony cleared his throat awkwardly and glanced at the others, who looked just as surprised. "These are...smaller agents," he commented wryly.

"Sorry for barging in on you like this," Steve apologized with an awkward smile.

"Yeah, we would have called ahead, but we were busy having no idea that you existed," Tony added bluntly.

Clint shrugged. "Yeah, well Fury helped me set this up when I joined SHIELD. Kept it off the books - I'd like to keep it that way. I figured it's a good place to lay low."