HIDDEN ─ marvel

XLV. Bring Them Back

Chapter Fourty-Five
Soroya

Clint sinks down to his knees with a hard thud, a look of pure heartbreak in his eyes.

"Clint, where's Nat?" Bruce asks, looking very confused.

I stare at Clint and see him not be able to form words to tell us what he wants to, but he doesn't have to. I glance over to Steve, seeing tears brimmed in his eyes, sharing a knowing look.

Feeling the tears spill down my face, I try to stifle my crying by pressing my palm over my mouth, but the sob comes through anyways. The sound is drowned by Bruce falling to his knees and pounding his fist into the floor.

Rhodey tries to stifle his own sorrow as well, gesturing for Scott, Nebula, and Rocket to give the rest of us some space, no doubt wanting to mourn our friend alone.

We all take our time travel suits off, placing them back in the supply room and we make our way out to the small dock near the lake. Tony, Bruce, Steve, Clint, and I stand there in silence for a moment or two, before Tony asks:

"Do we know if she had family?"

Steve nods, a tear slipping down his cheek. "Yeah...us."

I wipe my nose on my sleeve, wrapping my arms around my chest and leaning my head against Steve's shoulder. He and I are sitting on one of the benches resting on the dock. He leans his head against mine, sniffling silently to himself.

"What?" Thor asks incredulously. "You're acting like she's dead. Why are we acting like she's dead? We have the stones, right? As long as we have the stones...Cap, we can bring her back. Isn't that right? So, stop this shit. We are the Avengers. Get it together."

Clint shakes his head. "We can't get her back...it can't be undone. It can't."

Thor laughs this off, looking at us all like we're idiots. "Look, I'm sorry, no offense but you're a very earthly being, okay? We're talking about space magic. And 'can't' seems very definitive don't you think?"

"Yeah, look, I know that I'm way outside my pay grade here. But she still isn't here is she? It can't be undone. Or that's at least what the red floating guy had to say. Maybe you want to go talk to him, okay? Go grab your hammer and you go fly and talk to him!" Clint shouts, the tears cascading down his cheeks.

The rest of us are silent for a moment, but Clint shakes his head, his voice is thick as he says; "It was supposed to be me."

I turn to him, shaking my head. "Don't say that. Your family needs you. She wanted you to be happy."

Clint looks over to me, nodding his head solemnly. "I know...but she deserved to be happy too. She deserves better than this. She sacrificed her life for that goddamn stone. She bet her life on it."

Bruce throws one of the benches in a fit of rage. I watch as the bench flies to the other side of the lake. "She's not coming back," He mutters. "We have to make this worth it. We have to."

Steve stands, anger and determination written on his face. "We will."

We make our way back to the compound, and as we do so, Steve slows his pace next to me so we are a few feet behind everyone else.