Owner	Pose
Clint Barton	They started as he walked. Thick sticky tendrils coming from the haze around him clinging to his arms and legs. Clint swipes at them with a hand, and feels nothing there, but his own skin. Yet at the same time he still feels them clinging to him like cobwebs. It only gets worse. The tendrils begin to brush at his face. His walking slow, the ground giving way to much beneith his feet. He starts to sink. He struggles against it, but the more he does the faster he sinks and faster the tendrils hold to him. "No, no, no," he says. He struggles harder. The tendrils wrap tight about his chest, bringing the feeling of cold terror with them as the squeeze the air from his lungs. "Nooo!" he croaks. It was a mistake, when his mouth opens the darkness around him rushes in, like a nausiating wave of cold. -- Clint sits up in the dark with his heart thumping in his ears. His bare chest is covered with a cold clammy sweat as his breaths come to him gasps. As his eyes adjust to the darkness he finds himself in bed, Skye beside him. Though none of that calms him. It all felt so real.
Skye Johnson	Skye's sleep has been a restless thing. A thing of tossing and turning, and unsettled thoughts and dreams fueled by vodka, and the mission that had gone so terribly off course. And, of course, the sighting of her father, that great, hunkling, angry feral beast of a man who'd stood there staring at her and then turned tail and run. Well, he hadn't run, but the rejection felt the same. When Clint tosses and mutters in his sleep, she's mildly disturbed, but not enough to wake properly, or to roll over and wake him. He certainly wasn't loud enough to wake their guest in the nearby guest room. When he wakes, fully, and sits up in bed, Skye rolls over, and at first only cracks an eye, his croak of 'Nooo!' having her reaching out, a hand on his thigh. "You okay?"
Clint Barton	Clint jumps at the touch of his thigh. "Wha?" he asks. "Oh, hey, yeah, I'm fine," he murmurs as he slips his legs over the side of the bed to stand. "Just need to got to the washroom for a sec." He gets up and navigates by rote through the darkened room until he can turn on the light in their ensuite. The door is left ajar as he goes directly to the mirror, opening his mouth wide and peering inside for any signs of that dark...whatever that got into him. Nothing's there, but he can't shake the feeling of dread it left behind. "Fuck. C'mon man, it's just a dream, what are you twelve?" he tells his reflection. He's still him but he looks paler. He turns on the faucet and lets the water run for a minute until there's steam rising, then scooping up a handful he splashes it on his face. "C'mon, Barton, it's just a dream," he murmurs as the warm water runs down his face.
Skye Johnson	"Dream that's had you tossing and turning all night," Skye says quietly from just behind him, careful not to startle him, then wrapping her arms about him from behind as he stands at the sink, water dripping down his face. Her cheek presses against his back. "I remember when you used to have scars here. What's up, Hotshot? What's just a dream?"
Clint Barton	Skye's care pays off and her sudden arrival doesn't startle him. "Hey," Clint greets gently. "And all night? Sorry, Keyboard." He smiles faintly as Skye presses her cheek against his back. "Been working on keeping it that way," he says of the scars. Remembering how strange it had felt when they had all been wiped away along with the damage done to his body elsewhere by years of heroing. He'd been given a fresh start, and it felt wrong to waste it. The questions bring him back to the moment and lingering tension and dread left by the dream. "This dream I had," Clint answers. "Which yeah, obviously that, but I dunno, Keyboard, it seemed so real. I don't know where I was but these sticky ropes kept clinging to me but I couldn't get a hold of them to pull them off. Then I was sinking into mud and the ropes were crushing me...." he shakes his head. "Anyhow, I was going to die, and I tried to scream and that's when this darkness rushed into me. It was cold, Skye, really cold, and I don't know felt like every bad memory I've ever had rolled into one cold, gross mass being shoved down my throat. It freaked me out."
Skye Johnson	Skye nods, her cheek a warm and moving pressure along his back. "That sounds horrible. And yeah, all night. Not a problem. I wasn't really sleeping much myself. Head feels like a bag of stuffing or something. All these horrible thoughts keep rolling around in there." She lifts her head and presses a kiss agaisnt a shoulderblade. "Sounds like we both have some heavy shit going on. Any idea what's got you dreaming things like that? And maybe finish this in bed?"
Clint Barton	Clint turns off the tap. "Still feel bad," he says of his tossing and turning. Normally Clint slept shallowly, but calmly. Able to drift in and out almost on demand. A trick picked up by a life not knowing when the next chance to sleep would come. He gives a nod for where Skye was at. "I don't blame you, there's a lot to process what with your Dad showing up." He still couldn't believe it, the guy in that picture they brought back from China was out there and some sort of mutated monster. The kiss is met with a smile and he reaches to his waist to brush his hand against her own. "Yeah, sounds like we do," he says. "And no clue what's going on with me. Everything's good right now. I've got a balance between SHIELD and the Avengers, helped save the world a couple weeks ago, I'm riding high, probably my stupid brain taking exception for that. Not used to seeing me happy." The comment about bed earns a ghost of a grin, "Phrasing," he says with half-heared humour. "And sure, bed sounds good." It and their room was their refuge after all.
Skye Johnson	Skye laughs, even as she lifts her fingers to brush along and with his where he reaches for her hands. "Phrasing? Don't see anythign wrong with what I said. We're grownups last I checked. Seem to recall you enjoying finishing things in bed, hrm?" But she knows what he means, even if it amuses her that even now, with all their stresses, he's joking with her. "Fine. Bed where we can be comfortable." Her arms slip away from him, and she holds out a hand to walk slowly back to their refuge with him. "You know what's funny" she asks when they crawl back into it and snuggle down together. "This big huge bed, and we still end up snuggled into the middle of it together every night."
Clint Barton	Clint chuckles. "You were thinking the same thing and you know it," he says laughing. "And yes, yes I do." "I know, such a sacrifice, right?" he says of moving to the bed. He takes her hand though and follows her to the bed, crawling in with her and smiling at her observation. "The rest is just padding against the world. At least if you ask me," he says regarding the swaths of bed on either side of them. He shifts onto his side and wraps his arms around Skye, holding her close. "So, what happened's still going through your head?" he asks. "The mission, I mean?" he asks. He knows the answer but it was a gentle prod and a deflection from his own worries all in one.
Skye Johnson	Skye snuggles in close, arms curled up in front of her, allowing her hands to splay along Clint's chest. "Mmmm kind of?" Really, there's no 'kind of' about it, but some things need easing into. And it's true. Beside them on the bed, to either side, great swaths of mattress. It's as though both have failed to notice there's all this extra space, or maybe they're harkening back to days when they only had smaller spaces, and to be with someone meant you needed to snuggles close. Or perhaps it's just the two of them have found that together, they're happier, more at peace, and it isn't a hardship to nestle together in slumber. "You know, this sounds an awful lot like you trying to get out of talking about your dream." Which was blatantly untrue, and an awful lot more like Skye trying to avoid talking about her own problems. "I can't imagine dreaming about drowning. Falling, sure. Everyone's heard about dreaming about falling. But drowning? In darkness?"
Clint Barton	Clint 'mmms' happily as Skye snuggles close, hands spread on his chest. A chest a little chillier than it aught to be but warming quickly with the closeness and warmth of the bed. Sleeping close in the middle of the bed just seemed natural now, like having Skye next to him. It was just something that fit effortlessly into his life after their first night together. One of those things that goes unnoticed until it's missing or it's pointed out. That's when the buffer idea came, and it felt true, this was their little spot away from the world where the walls were down and the world couldn't get them. "Kind of, huh?" he says. with a sort of lazy skepticisim in his tone. He smiles, "You don't need to talk to me about if you don't want to but it might help." The accusation is met with quiet, 'heh'. "Maybe," he allows, Clint give the rest a nod. "Yeah, falling happens a lot, flashbacks to stuff I've seen or did sometimes, but sinking and being crushed, never. I mean I haven't even lived through anything like that, and I am feeling good, I have no idea where it came from," he pauses for a breath. "But it felt real, there was none of that hazy dream feeling about it, it was like clear as daylight." He let's out a sigh. "Ever get anything like that?" he asks.
Skye Johnson	There's a slow nod from Skye, who listens quietly. "That's weird. Usually dreams.. I don't know. They kind of fade. And the details aren't all that clear. Even nightmares, mostly. And nothing bothering you?" There's nothing in their shared immediate past that should be triggering any such sort dream, especially one of drowning, or being crushed that way. She could see fighting gangs, or something like that, but the other? Even the battle with the fungal creature shouldn't be producing drowning, but it did make her think of something funny. "Was just thinking, you know those shroom things? Was just thinking if they were a nightmare they'd be more likely you picturing a slice from Gino's sprouting legs and coming to haunt you." She smiles softly, then sighs. "And I'm not sleeping because that whole mission just, I don't know. Mostly just keep seeing him standing there, staring at me wide eyed, horrified. And leaving."
Clint Barton	Clint shakes his head, his hair scratching against the pillow, "Nope nothing. I mean things are going really well..." he says, he pauses, a frown spreading across his lips. "You don't think I'm so fucked up, I am having nightmares because things are too good?" He makes a face at it, and when his brain catches up with his mouth he says: "I mean not that the op is good, but I mean before that, there's been nothing bad weighing on my mind." "Oh great, if I drift off at all tonight I am going to be dreaming about being crushed by pizza monsters," he chuckles lightly and kisses her forehead. "I can imagine," Clint says. "That must have been a shock, we thought he was dead, then he was there, and then he just left," he frowns at that last part. "I really don't even know where to begin with that one. Did he say anything or did he just see you and leave?"
Skye Johnson	Not that he can see it in the dark, but Skye's face scrunches up, "I don't think things going okay makes people have nightmares. You sure nothing happened with those shroom things?" though as she reflects, it was the mutant who was controlling the shroom, not the other way around. "You can always talk to psych and get cleared if you're worried." She's a bit worried, but not worried enough to force him to go. Nightmares.. happen, she supposes. Sometimes, anyway. There's a laugh at his complaint. "Hey, you have that dream, about pizza monsters I want to hear it." There's a gurgle from her belly. "And now I want pizza. That's hardly fair." She doesn't move, though. What she does is contemplate what had happened on the mission. "Well, to be fair, nobody said they'd died. Just that there were no survivors found. Nobody actually said they'd found their bodies. Even the old man didn't say that. I suppose we just assumed that everyone included them. Only, why? What makes people leave their baby. If they got out, well, him, then why didn't he take me?" It's clear that question, more than the fact of seeing him, is weighing heavily upon the young woman, and may be responsible for her lack of sleep. "He didn't say anything - wait. No. He said 'No, not like this' and then there was some weird noises like.. I don't know. It was garbled. Like someone being hurt."
Clint Barton	"I've heard of it happening before with people like us, system kids," Clint says. "Things get too good and they sit there waiting and waiting for the other shoe to drop, they wait and wait and can't help thinking about it and then boom, bad dreams. Anyhow, I don't think I'm that messed up, besides, still feels like you just got back from Tidepool so I don't think 'too good' is the right word for things... more pleasantly chaotic." He smiles at that before frowning as he considers psych and the fungus thing. "Right there was that psychic thing," he says. "Guess it couldn't hurt to have psych check me out. I'd invite you and May to come have your heads examined, but guessing from what you guys were saying that one was off the books." "You'll be the first one I tell,"he promises. "And we could call for 'za if you're serious. I am not sleeping right now and I could probably eat." Clint nods, "Yeah, we did sort of assume there, but the old man said the whole village was wiped out so it made sense..." He gives Skye a hug. "I don't know," he says. "Maybe they were away when it happened like the old man, or maybe they got cut off from you and SHIELD got to you first and evacuated you." Or they just didn't care. "Not like this, huh? Not like what?" he asks. "And any more details on those noises?"
Skye Johnson	"Pleasantly chaotic," Skye echoes wryly. "Yeah, that's about it, huh? I mean I got back. Then there was the file Fury dropped on me. And China. Toss in the shrooms, and yeah." She nods, worrying at her lower lip. "Just, if it gets worse, you'll talk to someone, right? I mean,, not sure I'm qaulified to do a whole lot of unmessing up of heads given where mine's at right now." His pause is noted, though, and draws a frown. "What psychic thing? Huh?" And when he mentions having her own head checked out, Skye gives a soft huff of breath. "I know. I mean, I know you're right. Just.." The thought isn't finished. Skye hasn't an answer to it. The mission might have been off the books, but given all that's been going on in her life recently, she half expected a visit to psych was going to shortly be mandatory for her. "I can't explain everything about the mission, Hotshot. Just trust me with it?" SHIELD had been involved. She hoped that would be enough for him not to worry excessively. "Don't know. Not sure I'll have answers until I talk to Lumley, and even then he can't answer why I was left. Or why my father wasn't there." She sighs and leans her forehead on his chest, trying to recall the noises. "Hurt noises. Not like someone hurting themselves," Skye recalls. "Like they were hurting. Inside. It doesn't make sense."
Clint Barton	"About the best we can hope for with out jobs, but if we wanted boring we'd have gone off and become accountants," Clint says breezily before nodding, a sort of useless gesture in the dark. "Yeah, we've been running pretty hard since Tidepool with all the crazy going on. We could always sneak off for another vacation... but we'd probably end up stumbling over a Hydra plot, or some lost city or something, clearly we've been cursed with interesting lives," he chuckles lightly. He presses the sign for ~Ok~ against her side. "I promise I will. Hopefully it was just a weird dream and that's it. If something else happens I'll go right to psych, Scout's honour." It's probably a safe bet the former teenage criminal was never a Scout. "The psychic thing? It was at the final battle with the fungus, one of the X-Men borrowed some of our brain space for some mental whammy. Then we got a flash of something weird. This thing that was just full of hate. I don't know, it was weird, but it felt totally different from this...." He lets out a sigh. "So, yeah, heading to psych tomorrow, just in case." "And hey, I get it and I trust you, just wanted to make sure you're okay too. If there's problems, head to psych and lie like a rug about how you came into contact with a teep," he says. "Sucky option, but still better than the alternative." "No, it doesn't, can't even guess what those noises were about. And hmm, yeah, it sounds like Lumley's your best play, you're right, he's only going to have so many answers but got to figure any would be better than none." "Also, your dad, what do we know about him? And do we want to try and track him down?"
Skye Johnson	"With our luck, we'd *create* a Hydra plot. Honestly." And she wasn't too far off on that, as she thought about it. She wasn't sure how Clint hadn't tweaked that Karl wasn't just peripherally involved in this, that he'd made full on designs on Lumley to get at her. "Wouldn't worry too much about getting lost, though. Could always ask Lara if she wanted to go dig up some lost Aztec temple or something." His fingers against her side make her smile and she lifts her head, letting her fingers play an ~I love you~ against his chest. "You'd make a lousy accountant." She doesn't push on the issue of psych, lest he remind her of her own obligations. Even if she knew she was putting off the inevitable there. But May had her worried. He distracts her for the moment with talk about that final battle with teh fungus. "You didn't mention that borrowing your brain thing. Are you sure they gave you the right brain back?" Teasing, then more seriously, "Or at least all of your old one? Seriously, Clint. Did you get that checked out? Maybe not the did you get it all back, but are you okay? I mean, is loaning your head out to someone safe?" She'd seen Star Trek. She wasn't entirely convinced this joining of minds thing was all that wonderful an idea. "As for my dad, I don't know. Maybe Lumley knows something. Probably not much about him, but maybe something else. I mean, he went into hiding for a reason. I don't suppose a 3am visit would be kosher there. But I'm worried about May, Clint. She crushed a man's skull." Even if J had delivered what was likely the killing blow there.
Clint Barton	Clint would be far more worried if he'd cottoned to Karl's involvement in all of this. As it was it was a near miss, an op gone bad but Skye was home now. He didn't think too deeply about the implications. "Create a Hydra plot?" he asks. "How so?" The lost bit earns a smile. "Yeah, then we'd owe her for the house and saving our butts." There's a smile at that, one that broadens as he feels the ~I love you~ form on his chest. "Love you too," he says back. "And hey, I keep count of my arrows alright, that's the same thing right?" It totally wasn't and he knew it. "To be fair, it was all a bit of a blur, so really didn't think about it until now," he gives her playful swat. "And yes I got all of my brain back." Or so he thought anyhow. He was glad for the darkness hiding his sudden frown. "Anyhow, it probably wasn't safe but you should have seen the size of the thing we were fighting Skye, the lady asked and said lending her some brain would help and I didn't ask questions, my bow was doing next to nothing out there." There was a bit of waver in his voice as he admits the last. That long burried fear rising to the surface, what if he really was the useless Avenger... He pushed that thought down hard until it was back in the little box he kept it in. "Might want to pull up what you can on the law enforcement databases and things too. I mean guy went to China in the early 2000's he's got to have at least had a passport." The mention of May earns a concerned noise. "Yeah, she looked grim. I mean, grimmer than usual. I heard she's got issues with mind stuff. I mean, I thought it was just a rumour, because there's a million of them about her, but maybe it's true." He lets out a breath. "How'd she do it? I mean not like what weapon, but was she pissed or was it usual cold May?"
Skye Johnson	"I don't know. Someone borrowing your brain is kinda creepy, Hotshot. But I guess if I'd been there I might not have thought twice about it either. I mean, between that or having fungal overlords, I know where I stand." Skye makes a face, a face that is replaced by a smile at his telling her he loved her too. "And I don't know. I mean, trouble seems to follow us. It was a joke." But maybe not so much a joke. "Karl was after Lumley, Clint. It was his men we were fighting there. Not sure how far into Hydra he is, but those were specifically his." She only knew that because Oracle followed the digital traces, and looking at what she'd found, Skye had to concur. It was Karl. And given he'd contacted her, telling her he not only wanted her back, but he'd find a way to get her? The passport lead she nods to. "Yeah. There are a few things like that we can chase down. Talk to Lumley. Maybe dig up his SHIELD files again. I don't know." "I'm scared about May, Clint. I've never seen her like that." And Skye doesn't just mean downstairs in their livingroom. She's thinking of the missio. The peripheral memories she has of the thing. May systematically beating upon that mutant's head. Maybe the ICER didn't work. Maybe. Still, it really wasn't like May to take a man past the point of down. Down usually meant you moved on, not continued beating on them. "She just... kept on. Like she was afraid of him. You know how you do a thing and keep on doing it past the point where it matters because you're in shock? Like that."
Clint Barton	"Oh it's definitely creepy, but it sounded like a good idea at the time," Clint says without reservation. "Which is sort of my motto, but yeah, it seemed like the best way to make sure we weren't all eaten by those fungus things." He shakes his head. "Weird how saving the world becomes just another day," he murmurs, thinking of how little he'd thought of the day since it past. Just another day at the office. The news about Karl has him snapping out of his musing and back to the present. "Wait Karl?" Clint says as the pieces come together for him. "There's only one reason why he'd want Lumley... Jesus he still wants something over you, doesn't he?" Clint had been willing to let Karl slip off his radar with the fungal business looming large but the guy had just made the top of Clint's shit list. "We need to do something about that guy, Skye, he's going to keep coming." Though he wasn't the only person out there they had to worry about, thankfully all Clint's enemies were locked up or behaving themselves, which left them with Karl and Skye's Dad to worry about. "Good plan," he says of digging up the SHIELD file. The worry about May draws a concerned frown from Clint. He'd known May for most of the eight years he'd been with SHIELD and while she changed after Bahrain, she'd never been the sort of person to react out of shock. "I know what you mean, where they totally check out and they just keep hitting something until they come down and get back in control of themselves. Jesus, that's crazy, I've never even heard of May being like that," he says. "Normally I'd hit up Coulson to check on her but he's out of the country on an op, so it's likely up to us. We should track her down and talk to her."
Skye Johnson	Skye laughs softly, "Track her down? She's in the bedroom down the hall. But yeah, know what you mean. It want' so creepy then. I was sorta out of it, but when I think about it, and try to focus on what else was going on, yeah. It wasn't her. I don't know. Worried, though." He's right about Karl, though. "It's not the first time Karl's contacted me since Tidepool. Well, he didn't contact me here, but I know he's behind the attack on Lumley. He wants me. It's like an obsession, Clint. Like he can't help himself. I got away. He's not happy about it."
Clint Barton	"Well, meant more like after she leaves, I am not sure if she's a morning person and I don't want to confront her and find out," Clint says, joking and also totally covering for the fact he'd forgotten May was spending the night. "Sounds like you have a reason to be worried," Clint says honestly. "We'll talk to her." "Obesession, that's what I'm worried about," Clint says. "Didn't switch brains with your ex did he?" he asks half-joking, before he goes deadly serious. "But yeah, if it's true, and he's just going to keep coming he either needs to be put in deep, dark hole, or he needs to be crossed off. You going to be okay with that?" he asks.
Skye Johnson	"Okay with crossing Karl off?" Skye has to sit and think about that. This mission she came face to face with the reality of that. It was always a possibility with SHIELD, but never the goal. With the Birds, she knew the parameters were looser - Babs had made that clear, and Skye had made her peace with that, or so she thought. That she hadn't walked after the death of that mutant told Skye a lot about herself. Things she wasn't sure were good - but neither was she sure they were bad. Maybe she did need to talk to psych. "Yeah. I can be okay with that. If he can't be kept in a hole, he's always going to be out there trying to get to me. But I'd rather dig a hole." May however... "I.. think we talk to May before she leaves in the morning. Tell her she walks herself to psych by the end of the day, or we make sure Fury knows she needs to. She leaves our place without that talk, not sure we get another chance, Clint. She'll have all the walls and all the reasons not to listen."
Clint Barton	"Yeah," Clint confirms. He knew with all the times he'd refused to cross people off in the field he was a being a hypocrite suggesting it now that Skye was in danger, but the guy wasn't going to quit... "Oh I am definitely all for putting him in a hole first, even if SHIELD has to build one special for him. But if he doesn't stay put and it's him or you, there's no question." Clint nods to Skye's plan for May. "Tough, but yeah, we'll make sure we have that talk before she leaves." He lets out a breath, then leans forward to steal a quick kiss and press an ~I love you~ against her side. "But if we're doing that, we better get some sleep," he says as he leans his head back down on the pillow. "Or at least pretend until morning," he smiles. Either way until then they had this space and each other to see them through.