Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Prologue. Three weeks in the future...

Steve Rogers looked utterly confused, “I’m sorry, could you repeat that?”

Tony, on the other hand, is completely gleeful, “Strip bowling! We sell tickets and stream it live. I got a buddy on the local radio station that could give us some air time to advertise...it’ll be great!”

“Uh… no.” Steve says after a moment.

“What? Why not!”

“Tony… that’s… why would you think that’s a good idea?”

“He just wants to see Nat naked,” Clint says, nudging Thor with his elbow, assuming the larger blonde would automatically agree. He does not.

“That would only make sense if she was not the most competent bowler on his team," Thor points out.

“True. Then… maybe he wants to see Steve naked?” Clint tries instead.

“We all would.” Darcy says from the corner.

Scandalized by either her lewdness or the fact she thinks he'd miss enough pins that he would end up unclothed, Steve protests, “Hey! My bowling isn’t that bad.”

“Your ball is in the gutter more than Clint’s mind,” Tony points out with a grin.

“I will neither confirm nor deny that…” Clint begins, but is interrupted by an eager Thor.

“I for one am in! I think it’s a splendid idea!”

“Thor. You’ll be the first one naked,” Steve points out. In response, Thor only beams.

Steve sighs.

Chapter Text

It's been several hours since he opened the letter and the 30th time he read it and yet it refuses to say something, anything, else then what it does. What it says, in clear crisp boring Times New Roman font, is: Sam is screwed. It says it much more kindly however, but the rejection is exactly what it means. Every grant he has applied for had been awarded to some other organization and this was his hail Mary pass. The one grant that he had gotten for the past four years and, silly Sam, assumed (hoped and prayed) he would receive again. It wouldn't have solved all his problems had the letter said what he expected, but it could have kept the lights on for at least six more months and give him time to secure more funding. In between the 30 times he read the letter, Sam crunched numbers. He was in def-con 5, code red, this is not a drill, all hands on deck, go time mode. He couldn't let anyone down. He refused to let anyone down. Money be damned.

Except that he needs money. Badly.

Luckily most of the staff was volunteer so salaries weren't a concern. The urban garden program was a success and the harvest could stretch their pantry budget some, fingers crossed a blight doesn't happen... Maybe he could get Darcy to become an extreme coupon person like he's seen on TV and she could get him carts full of toothpaste and shampoo? He actually considers that for a long while before putting in on his options list. Desperate times and all that. He’s only got three months to come up with the funds to purchase the building and keep the program going.

After spending all day racking his brain, Sam is exhausted. He finally decides he needs to step away from the problem when he looks down at his efforts and sees "write Oprah" and "win lotto" written down in his careful handwriting as if they were serious options.

He calls Steve. Without waiting for Steve to say anything, Sam launches into his tirade about the events of the day and doesn't pause for breath until he hears a muffled exchange between Steve and... another Steve? For a moment Sam wonders if his break with reality has finally been successful. Perfect time, he thinks. Can't worry about his responsibilities if he's clinically insane.

He's disappointed in himself that a part of him would be relieved.

"Sam? Sorry about that. Jake was just... being Jake. He said you sounded upset?"

"Bad day. Horrible day. Drink?" Sam says shortly, lacking the energy to rant any more.

"Of course," Steve says immediately. Then he adds, "I know of a new place. You'll love it. First round is on me."

"Horrible day, Steve," Sam says again.

"All the rounds are on me?" Steve guesses.

"Text me the address. See you in 20."

____

Twenty minutes later Sam is revisiting the idea he's lost his mind. He walks into the pub dubbed Valhalla and spots two Steves, although one has a beard and despite the chilly October weather, is wearing khaki shorts and sandals. The most Steve looking Steve spots Sam and waves him over to their booth. With a bemused smile on his face, he slides in next to the clean shaven Steve and waits.

"Sam, this is Jake Jensen. My cousin."

Jake sticks out his hand and says, "Most people call me Jensen." Sam takes the offered hand in a firm shake and says with a smile, "Those are some strong genes you fellas have in your family tree."

Jensen laughs and Steve looks slightly confused. Sam gives him his "are you serious" frown and then says, "Are you kidding me? You look like you could be twins."

Steve just shakes his head in disbelief, "Whatever you say," and hands him a menu.

Sam looks up at Jensen who shrugs in sympathy and then says in a helpful voice, "Humans and cabbage share 40 to 50% of our DNA in common."

Sam looks at Steve again, this time with his, "is he serious" face. Steve offers a lopsided grin, but is saved from any explanation, as if there could be one for his cousin, by the arrival of an extremely large, slightly harried looking, blonde man holding a tiny pad in one hand, his pen poised in anticipation of their order.

"Hey Thor, short staffed tonight?" Steve asks.

"Twice this week my waitresses have called in, too frightened to come in. Steph refused to explain why, but Pru said she was followed home every day last week by some man that had been waiting outside of here. If this keeps up, I might have to close," he says with exhaustion in his voice.

"Jesus, Thor. That's horrible," Steve offers.

"I apologize. I do not mean to trouble you with my staffing issues. What will you have tonight?"

The three hesitate, but the determined look on Thor's face decides it for Steve. Not ordering just feels rude. "A pitcher of the pale ale, a basket of your famous lefse bread and I think we'll all stick to seafood stew," Steve says, and takes the menus from the other two before they can object. Thor seems to sag a moment in relief, takes the order, then heads off with a slight smile.

"It seemed like the easiest for him to handle without any real wait staff," Steve says to the pointed looks from the other two.

Sam shrugs with sympathy while Jensen points at Steve with both hands as if his hands were guns and concedes, "True".

Steve turns to Sam, "So, what happened?"

Sam sighs and pulls out the grant rejection letter and hands it over without comment.

Steve reads the letter, his eyebrows growing closer together in consternation with each sentence until he reaches the end and sighs just as heavily that Sam had a moment before, "I'm sorry, Sam. What are you going to do?"

"I've been thinking about that all day, Rogers. I've got nothing so far."

"How much time do you..."

"Three months. In three months if I don't have the down payment, I'll lose our purchase option on the building and it's only a matter of time after that we get kicked to the curb by whoever does buy the building."

Steve lets out a long sigh.

"What building?" Jensen asks the two opposite him.

"Sam runs a halfway house for vets," Steve begins, still looking at the letter like it insulted his mother. Jensen is clearly impressed.

Sam continues, "We offer housing, therapy sessions, a rec room that residents can use for family gatherings too large for their apartments, and we just finished furnishing the gym. Most of the stuff is third and fourth hand, but a weight is a weight..." He turns to Steve, "Corporal O'Dea just had his wife and her family over for their daughters 5th birthday party. Dani told me after that she was thinking of letting him come back home, he was doing so well."

"The doc does good work," Steve says, then adds, "You inspire them to want to be better too, Sam."

"Yeah, well, fat lot of good that will do them all when I have to move most of them back into cardboard boxes. And," he looks towards Steve with an apologetic grimace,"I've already decided on some of the cuts I need to make..."

Steve shakes his head, "Don't worry about it, Sam. I understand."

"It's just temporary!" Sam assures him.

"I know," he says with all the sincerity he can. "I'll be fine."

"English?" Jensen asks.

"Art classes," Steve supplies in explanation.

"More like art therapy," Sam fills in, with a guilt laden sigh.

"Other options?" Jensen asks, just as Thor brings over their pitcher and three frosted mugs. Steve nods his thanks and doesn't take offense when Thor rushes off to another table without a word.

"Rob a bank?" Sam says, defeated.

"I can help with that," Jensen offers, completely serious.

"Jensen...." Steve says, patiently.

"No no, let the handsome man speak," Sam says.

Jensen preens just a bit, "I know some guys," he begins.

"Knock it off, you two. You're not going to rob a bank, Sam. No one gets away with that."

"Amateurs don't get away with it," Jensen corrects, pouring the beers.

Sam starts to agree, but is cut off by Steve, "No."

Sam starts enjoying himself, "But..."

Steve, "No."

Jensen mutters, clearly deflated, "Yes sir, Captain Honesty." Sam can't help himself and laughs, despite his lousy day.

The three fall silent, contemplating their beers for a while steadfastly not contemplating bank robbery.

"So..." Jensen says, breaking the silence, because Jensen doesn't do silence, "Who do you think is harassing Thor's waitresses?"

Chapter Text

Dog Days by Florence and the Machine plays over the comms and Nat rolls her eyes. Clint is under the impression that she identifies with any other red haired woman in pop culture. She always gets even by telling his wife just how many bullets he dodged on any given day and leaves him helpless against Laura's ranting. That woman loves him to bits, even if his job scares her to death.

"Barton," she says somewhat impatiently as he starts to sing along, badly, "Eyes on the prize, mister. Do you see anything yet?" She spies him across the park from her bench. He's standing near a gourmet frozen yogurt food truck, scanning the crowd of kids at play and adults on their lunch break. A man dressed as a dancing chicken swings a cardboard chicken leg in an attempt to garner attention to the waffle truck, with limited success. A trio of men older than the oaks that grow around the perimeter of the park are arguing over their rousing game of bocce ball. And a pick up game of basketball between kids that range in age from 14 to 23 have earned themselves an impressed crowd. The playgrounds if filled with shrieking children and the park benches filled with gossiping caregivers.

Clint sighs. "Not yet," he says emphatically.

"Clint..." Nat begins, but he interrupts in frustration, "Nat, the goober twins did the science. The snatcher will strike today."

"You know we can hear you," Fitz interjects without inflection.

"You can hear us because we let you come along," Clint says.

"He has a point, Fitz," Simmons says fondly and Nat rolls her eyes again. Children.

"I didn't think he meant stuck in the van," Fitz replies with a pout in his voice.

This was not exactly what Nat had in mind when she decided to join the force. All the hard work and determination, putting up with the sidelong glances or outright hostility to her, the daughter of a well known mob boss, trying to become part of the NYPD. She's sure that Internal Affairs had her phone bugged the first day of police academy. And when she surprised everyone by making detective before she turned 30, no one wanted to partner with her. Except Clint. Detective Barton. He had been bumped down from Assistant Chief of the Special Investigation Division, but he'd never seemed happier. He made no sense to her.

"The concentration of food vendors to crowd, distance to subway stops, it's within the strike zone..." Fitz rattles off, "the snatcher should strike."

"And if I'm right, he's got a partner," Clint says, then takes a large scoop from his peach mango frozen yogurt. "Got a gut feeling," he says, mouth still full.

"Is your gut telling you who that partner is? There have been no reports of a second perp fleeing any of the previous scenes," Nat points out.

"He's at my 3 o'clock, Romanoff."

She turns her head, scans the crowd looking for his mark. Then stops and nearly chokes. "The chicken?"

"The chicken."

"Oh %$&!#"

"Not in front of the children, Nat."

"Can still hear you..." Fitz sings this time.

"Detectives, there seems to be some commotion at the north end of the park," Simmons cuts in.

"Copy. I've got eyes on a person of interest," Nat says, "Green hoodie, orange sneakers. I'm in pursuit." Nat gets up from the bench and manages to make following swiftly behind the fast walking purse snatcher like a natural stroll. The kid in the hoodie must be confident no one is chasing him as he doesn't even glance around or behind him, making her job of tailing him even easier.

"When on the run, walk, apparently," she comments wryly.

"Yeah, but not the stealthiest crook ever. Orange sneaks? Just don't spook him. We need the second..." Clint begins, but is cut off by Fitz.

"We have a problem. Look at the crowd ahead of him."

"Oh my," Simmons adds, "There must be a dozen kids in the same color jumper and orange trainers. That can't be coincidence," she mutters, then says more clearly, "Detective Romanoff, can you get close enough with the tagging agent we gave you?"

"Hang on," she says, then maneuvers herself right behind her target to keep herself hidden from the crowd he walks towards. She pulls the small container from her jacket pocket and flips the top with her thumb, just as she speeds up and pretends to trip behind him, falling slightly to his side. His instincts kick in and reflexively he makes a grab for her to keep her from falling forward. As he does so, she spills the contents of the small plastic tube in a long swipe down the back of his hoodie. The amount of liquid is small enough that it absorbs quickly without making her would be rescuer aware. She can feel the edge of whatever purse he grabbed underneath the fabric of his sweatshirt and the impulse to toss him to the ground and arrest him is strong. Force strong.

"Oh, clumsy me. Thank you so much," she says with her voice low and husky. The kid, barely 20, blushes hard but keeps moving with a mumbled, "No problem," as he edges away, suddenly looking around. Not seeing anything else amiss, he heads towards the gathered crowd, passing the bocce game and dancing chicken as he goes, looking back at Nat only once with a shy smile.

Poor kid, she thinks. And that's when it happens. The kid turns just as he's passing the chicken and walks so close to the man in the chicken suit that he is able to pass a black leather Burberry bag to him. He hides it behind the sign and with a few tugs of his costume, appears to slide the bag into an opening near his waist.

Their first target reaches the his gathered doppelgangers and almost immediately they all take off in several different directions. Clint ignores them all as get pushes off of the tree he had been leaning against, angels his path to a trash can nearby to dispose of his frozen yogurt cup, and saunters up to the chicken with his badge out.

It didn't occur to him that someone wearing 20 pounds of neon yellow fake feathers would actually consider running, but that he does. Red crest feathers bounced at odd angels and the beak flopped up so hard it bent backwards onto his face, yet he dodged and weaved through the crowd like a Mario Kart champ. Clint curses and the chase goes on for longer than he thought, longer than is good for his ego. Nat had taken off after the hooded partner instead, and from the commotion in his ear comm, she had already tackled him to the ground. "Look who owes me a beer, Barton," she said smugly as he panted after the most elusive fowl in the five boroughs. He grunts in reply but to Nat it sounds like victory.

His quarry rounds a corner created by park benches with memorial name plaques and promptly falls on his face, hard. Clint jogs up with a chuckle and tries to wave reassuringly at the cowering group of middle school kids gathered around the fallen bird. He pulls out his badge and holds it up as he catches his breath. After restraining the man with the cuffs, Clint rolls him back over and finds the hidden purse, only to discover three more. Jackpot! He stands the both up and smiles at the kids, their double dutch ropes still tangled around the ankle of the chicken man person guy. "Thanks, gang!" Clint says brightly.

And that's when she says it, as she lifts the beer to her lips after pausing for dramatic effect, "He probably would have gotten away if it weren't for those kids..." then takes a long pull from the pale ale she earned at the bust. Clint is sitting across from her, with a lazy yet proud smile on his face, as Steve, Jensen, and Sam all laugh at yet another day on the job for Nat and Clint.

Gasping out with laughter, Sam says to Clint, "Oh my god you have the most unusual cases, man!"

Clint raises his glass in salute to the compliment, "Thanks, Sam my man."

Their joviality calms when Steve finally asks, because it's always Steve that wants the details, "What was the 'tagging agent' that Fitz and Simmons came up with?"

Nat rolls her eyes, but Steve can see the amusement in them, "Tonic water." The trio stare and make disbelieving sounds. "I know, right? Turns out, that stuff glows under black light. So all I needed to prove I had the right runner was reveal the swipe I left of the stuff on his back. Case closed!" She finishes triumphantly. Clint raises his glass again and they clink them in celebration.

"Aw, don't tell me I missed another daring adventure of the most beautiful detective duo in Brooklyn!" Darcy cries as she approaches their table with a petite brunette.

"Try showing up on time and that won't happen, Darce," Sam says.

She shrugs with a grin. "Had to make a pit stop and grab my girl Jane here. She's new and thought the only way you losers can earn her friendship is to get in on the ground floor, before cooler people get a hold of her," she says, as she slaps Sam's shoulder and then pushes him to scoot over. He relents with a smile, allowing the two woman to slide into rapidly shrinking booth, and then notes the star struck look on Jensen's face, who hasn't stopped starring at Darcy while Jane offers her greeting to the rest at the table. He nudges Steve and points his chin at Jensen. Steve just shakes his head and mutters for Sam's ears only, "Oh, this is going to be good."

Jensen tries to get up, but the booth prevents him from standing completely as he catches his hip on the tables edge and he falls back on his ass with a thump. Darcy looks over at the noise and all Jensen can do is raise one hand instead and mumble out, "Uh, hi. Hi."

Darcy gives him a puzzled look but says back, "Uh, hi. Hi to you too." Jensen had the good grace to blush but she offers a quirk of her lips that keeps him from feeling too bad about their exchange.

"Wow" Sam mouths at Steve, who only nods sagely.

"You are in time for Steve to explain just why the hell this bar only has one stud-muffin to man the tables," Nat says to Darcy in consolation. Intrigued, she coos and turns to Steve expectantly.

"Seems someone keeps harassing his waitresses but they refuse to say who it is."

Darcy's face falls. "You suck at telling stories, Steve."

He shrugs.

"Suck," she repeats.

"That sounds dangerous," Jane offers, and then she spots the tall blonde as he rushes from bar to table, nearly spilling several glasses of wine in his haste. "Poor guy," she says in sympathy.

"This sounds like a case for the Gorgeous Gang!" Darcy declares.

"Way ahead of you," Nat says casually. "But we need an inside person."

"You mean bait. Hot sexy waitress bait!" Darcy declares.

Clint and Nat both nod in unison. The Nat arches her eyebrow at, of all people, Jane. "So, Jane... you're new in the neighborhood. Any chances you're looking for a job?"

Not realizing the trap she's about to walk into she answers without thinking, possibly distracted by someone's insane biceps, "Actually yes," and Darcy groans.

"Noooo! Aren't I sexy waitress enough for you, Nat? Come on!"

Jane glances between the two of them, "Wait, what?" she says dumbly.

Nat pats Darcy's hand as the menfolk look on amused. "Of course you are, dear. We need two inside women. What say you?"

"Hell yes!"

Jensen finally pulls his gaze from Darcy to look at Steve and Sam across from him, "What just happened?"

"I think we're going to find out who's bothering Thor's waitresses." Steve replies.

"Uh, Darcy?" Jane says nervously.

Before Darcy can say anything, Jensen pipes up helpfully, "In Japan, tipping someone is considered an insult."

Jane wonders when those cooler people will show up to be her friends. Then spies the proprietor again and rethinks. No, this might be good. Maybe even fun.