Chapter Text
Phil Coulson and Clint Barton had been together for several years, they lived together, whenever they could manage, worked together, and trained together and yet it still surprised some people to find they were together. They’d been together since nearly the day they met. Phil had been sent to recruit Hawkeye into SHIELD.
Nothing about this day was the same other than it fell on the same date.
It was a stormy day, the kind that left the city in a twilight gloom despite it being nearly midday. Phil Coulson walked into the establishment his target had been frequenting the last week and took a seat at the bar. He knew his target was expecting him, for someone like him, he’s continued patronage was as good as an invitation.
Phil ordered a scotch, though he had no intention of drinking it, and replayed the bar's occupants in his mind. He’d only taken a brief glance upon entering but that was all he needed. His target was at the corner booth on the far side of the room, the perfect spot from which to watch the door, looking about how you’d expect a sniper on the run.
The man went by the codename Hawkeye and was by all reports the world’s greatest marksman by a far margin. Phil’s drink had only just arrived before Hawkeye appeared on the stool next to him.
“So,” he said casually, taking a swig of his cheap beer, “are you here to picking me up or take me out?”
“That depends on how this conversation goes,” Phil answered.
Hawkeye shrugged like it was a better answer than he was expecting and extended his hand, swiveling on his stool to face Phil for the first time, “Clint Barton.”
“Agent Phil Coulson of the Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement, and Logistics Division,” Phil said, taking his hand in a firm, brief shake. Once the agent released his hand Phil watched him adjust his sleeve slightly, obviously a habit he wasn’t really even aware of anymore.
“So what’s the government want with me, Agent Coulson? You going to try to convince me to do my patriotic duty for the good of my country?” Barton looked mildly amused by that idea, but more than that he looked tired, like someone who’d been on the wrong side of the right thing too many times. He was either going to be the hardest or the easiest sell Phil had made yet.
“Oh, we don’t do national security, we do global.” Barton raised an eyebrow at this but didn’t shut him down so Phil continued, “We specialize in the extraordinary, combating forces that would tear our world apart. So your options are: join us and make a real and lasting influence on the world or rot in a prison cell so deep even the sun will have forgotten you.”
“Well that would be rather awkward wouldn’t it,” Barton says with a smartass half smirk that crinkles his face but doesn’t bear any real humor, “but I’m in.”
“Good to hear, Barton,” easiest it is then.
“Clint,” Barton continued before Phil could proceed, “You should call me, Clint.” The other man rolled up his right sleeve a single turn and presented Phil with his wrist.
0000d 00h 00m 00s
For the first time since his military days Phil didn’t know how to respond. He just stared at Barton’s exposed wrist and then checked his own.
0000d 00h 00m 00s
He doesn’t say anything but apparently Barton sees it anyway. “It didn’t affect my decision, just so you know, I’m just tired is all. Tired of following the wrong orders and tired of running.” His face is open and downtrodden and Phil finds that he helplessly believes him.
“I have to make a call,” Phil said, using his flat “Agent Coulson” voice because he fears the alternative. Barton, Clint?, just nods and turns back to his beer.
“Sir, the director’s helicopter is 5 minutes out.”
“Thank you, agent,” Phil replied without really looking up from his tablet. Sure reminiscing while supervising an evacuation caused by a glowing cube of alien energy being unpredictable was some sort of extreme multitasking but it was better than dwelling on the fact that his husband was in the same room as said unpredictable glowing cube.
This was his life.
Phil donned his sunglasses before approaching the helipad, it was really just to keep the swirling sand, kicked up by the chopper, out of his eyes but if the junior agents had other theories he could count it as a bonus.