Quit Wishing! by voracity

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Xander was let into the meeting room where the two heros were trapped, listening to see if they were asleep.

"Stark, it's a closet, like it's been a closet all night."

"There's no clothes."

"It's a storage closet," Rogers complained with a sigh at the end. "Calm down."

Xander opened the door. "The demon who put you in here suggested I come save you and we have a talk," he said, staring at them. "He's sorry he set off the claustrophobia, Stark." They both came out and found the main door was missing. Xander shut the closet door and looked at them before sitting down. "Sit, guys. Let's talk about why a higher level demon decided to lock you two in a closet to work things out before it became another fist fight."

Rogers glared at him. "You don't know me, Harris."

"No, I know plenty about you, Rogers. You're willing to screw over the world for the sake of one man." Rogers stiffened at that, glaring at him. "And I kinda understand that."

"None of you...."

Xander held up a hand. "My best friend since we were in diapers was turned, Rogers. We didn't get to save him and I ended up staking him. It was the right thing to do even though it sucked ass. There were probably ways of saving your friend without creating a rift in your team that led to the world being attacked." Rogers huffed and went to stare out the single window. He looked at Stark. "The same as I understand why you'd want to create something to do some of the easier lifting for you because you're getting older and no one's able to take over your spot.

"Once your team's too injured there's no other heros ready to step up and in for you. I totally understand that. You and Willow, somewhat alike in that. That's how she justified not looking at how to uncall all the slayers. Because it'd end the calling and no one else would do it." He looked at Rogers. "They're not going to let you two out until you work some shit out, Rogers. So sit down." He got glared at. "Now please. I'm here to mediate and explain you to the other since you've both forgotten how to talk to your teammates."

"What if we don't want to?" Stark sneered, leaning back.

"Then you can stay in here and I'll be going to help one of my minis learn long division tonight." He shrugged. "There's been a push by a few different demon councils to put you two into big, shiny crystals because you two fighting is causing the world problems that mean we get attacked and they have to protect themselves. Frankly, they're really tired of having to protect humans. A number of them won't protect humans from anything anymore unless it'd impact their people too. Mostly because they get attacked back when they do because of someone," he said, staring at Rogers, "decided all demons are evil even if they're not."

"Are you the same messenger chick that showed up before?" Stark asked.

"No. That's Cordelia. She's the messenger for the Powers That Be. She's also a former Sunnydale slaying team member and the head cheerleader of our school. I'm surprised she had mellowed so much in the years since graduation. She's driven a few different harmful beings to committing suicide in the past." He looked at them both again. "So let's work this out so you two aren't trapped in here for a few more weeks. What's the main sticking point? Beyond operating methods?"

"The Accords," Steve said firmly, glaring at Stark.

"Which he didn't start," Xander said. "He was diffusing it by a lot. The slayers had to hide from all that too. We had to evacuate most of the houses to another realm because of that stupidity. Though it is understandable. Battles do a hell of a lot of damage, especially to those who weren't involved."

"He made that monster!" Steve said.

Xander stared at him. "I'm pretty sure he programmed it to not go that way so something got to it, and secondly, what's going to happen when you're too old to handle the shield?"

"What?" Steve demanded, staring at him.

"You're getting older," Xander said. "Stark's nearly fifty. Banner's nearly forty-eight if I heard right. Romanoff's younger but she and Hawkeye have damaged their bodies for years with battles and spy work. So have you. You probably have the least damage of any of your team outside the twins. You know that knee creaking thing in the morning? Each joint you damage gets that. Older people aren't as effective or as fast on the battlefield, Rogers. Who's going to handle your shield when you're too damaged or too old to handle it yourself? Or his suit? Or the agents who'll take over for your two spies?
"Speaking as watching slayers get damaged, heal, and age, we last effectively for about ten years." Stark nodded at that. "Then they fall back to a more supervisory or training position and just fall in when they have to or they want to go on patrol with a rookie slayer. Buffy's been doing this since we were fifteen and I'm almost thirty now. I know damn well all the damage I've taken will take me out someday. I'll end up dying in a battle and there's no one to follow me. There's no one to follow you. Or Stark. Or most of your team. So then what?"

"I was working on breaking the Accords so they were more reasonable," Stark said calmly. Steve stared at him. "Then you undercut it with Bucky."

"I'm pretty sure they don't need a list," Xander said dryly. "SHIELD already had one. It came out with the data dump. And it got a lot of them injured and a few dead because people went 'they're weird, let's kill them'." He looked at Rogers again. "Yes, that was conscription and a lot of the Accords was a bad idea. That's why it got stopped in most countries and a few had people who had to flee. Including in the US since our president is cranked mentally.

"In fact he tried to nominate me to lead SHIELD." Stark burst out laughing. "Yeah. More than once actually. I suggested Wade Wilson instead." He looked at Rogers again. "Did you come out and put out a thoughtful, reasonable argument against the Accords? At all? Or did you go off half-cocked, attack and split your team, and then let some of your people attack civies?"

"What?" Rogers demanded.

"The witch, dude. She sicced Banner on a city, like a real city, to divert everyone's attention." Rogers winced. "Also, a lot of us hate collateral damage, even if it's unavoidable. And if we lose that feeling of guilt over it, then we're broken. If you can't feel guilt about senseless violence taking out non-combatants you shouldn't be in the field. You should be on a couch in a therapist's office. That's about the same as those who only care about certain races existing." Rogers got up and went to kick a wall.

Xander looked at Stark. "You're not getting off scot free either. The road to hell and all that? You paved it very well." He stared at him. "Having known Rosenburg since she was five, and her parents being awful shrinks who needed their licenses yanked more than once, I've seen the same things happen. Hers became an addiction to magic and her always seeing herself as right due to it.

"You have a lot of that. Mostly because you've been doing it alone for a long time." Stark grimaced but nodded. "You've seen problems and tried to solve them without letting anyone else give you advice. You're not the Goddess, you can't solve everything, and even if you could it'd just drag you down farther. Like volunteering does."

"I..."

Xander held up a hand. "I know. I've seen her doing 'I'm powerful so I'm right' a few times. The only thing that separated you and vonDoom is that you care about the welfare of people. But it's not a solo job. And yeah, a lot of that is that *someone* refused to listen." He shot a glare at Rogers, then looked at Stark again. "You're really taking a whole lot of the job yourself because you've seen no one else doing it. Though there are people who do handle those things. There's others in spandex who handle more minor things. There's more mutants being born every year due to environmental decay. So yeah, you need an heir to the suit, and maybe even a lineage so it's not lost if they get hurt or killed and you have to pull a pure comic book move and take it back up when you're eighty."

"I'd suck at that. I don't...."

"You can't let others be in charge because that takes away your abilities and makes you feel like they're treating you like a kid," Xander said with a nod. "Seen it. I'm the most unlistened to seer ever, Stark. Until something happens and then someone remembered I saw it a few years ago." He shrugged. "You two need to work out how to be a team again. How to merge the two groups again. And how to handle problems within the groups. I hate to say this but Captain PTSD over here never got help for it after he got thawed. He probably didn't get a lot of help for the shock of waking up so many years later. He just got shoved into his spangly uniform, handed his shield, and told to go handle things with Romanoff. Fury's an ass about his people's health and well being."

"You know a lot about Nick Fury?" Steve snorted.

"I know enough and I've met plenty with his management style," Xander said dryly. "And had to help take some of them out. And I'm about to take him out because he keeps trying for one of my minis and I'm about to shove a rocket up his ass and launch him into space. She's five. She should be a kid, not the next Black Widow. Especially since slayers aren't supposed to be harming humans. It breaks the slayer coding in the spirit that they all get hit with." He stared at him. "You two need to work out the control issues you both have. You're used to having control now that you're bigger. You took right to it after you got changed over. Probably because you didn't have a lot before, but all the history books said that you sure tried a lot and got your ass kicked when you did. "

"I didn't think doing the right thing... I did get into a lot of fights," Rogers admitted, sitting at the other end of the table again. "Mostly against bullies."

"And then you got bigger so you could effectively fight bullies, and you took command, and you never let anyone tell you otherwise," Xander reminded him.

"We had a colonel who gave us orders."

"He gave you intel and let you make orders," Stark corrected. "Dad's files had video of it, Steve." He looked at Harris. "What about yours?"

Xander smirked at him. "If you two fail, I've got to step in and I'll desecrate your grave afterwards. I get into plenty of world-ending battles already. Thanks," he said dryly. "You guys don't jump into demon battles. And half the time when you do, you don't help any. Like not listening to how to handle something and making the problem in the cemetery worse." He stared at Steve. "If someone has more experience than you in that area, do you listen to them?"

"I usually try to."

"And yet you didn't."

"I was sure it'd work."

"Yeah, that only works when it's against humans, who die by a variety of methods. Killing aliens or demons usually requires a bit more work. You can't just shoot most of them. Well, one can be killed but you'd need plutonium bullets." Stark shuddered. "Yeah. We managed to raid a group of morons with bad ideas and took their explosives to use against them. Thankfully I'm so full of hellmouth radiation I didn't soak up too much more of the other kind."

He looked at the older hero again. "So, if you want to learn how to handle demon battles, we'll gladly hand over information. Frankly, the girls could use the help. They won't look up to you. You've both broken that because neither of you were good role models. Hell, the only ones I'd suggest is Banner and Barton really. They've both handled things, big and bad and normal and simple and everything in between, and managed to heal afterwards."

"Fury pulled him from the field," Stark said.

"Yeah, and then told him he was tainted and unworthy. Really great thing to do. What would you have done after being captured if he had said that to you?"

"I would've lashed out and probably taken down SHIELD," Stark admitted.

Xander nodded. "I probably would've worked against him." He looked at Steve.

"Nick's a friend."

"He's only a friend to himself and for plans," Stark said. "He's manipulated me with stuff my father left."

"Frankly, if the idiot higher up in the US gets his wish, I'm sending you both to therapy," Xander quipped, staring at them. "You could both use it. You've both got PTSD that's been not fully handled. Some of you can bullshit your way around things," he said, staring at Stark. "You know, someone compared you to Rain Man in the press because of the bimbo manwhore you pretend to be. Or used to be." Stark groaned.

Xander looked at Steve, who was grimacing. "Yeah, things have changed and even back then you had manwhores, Rogers. Even during prohibition there were party boys and manwhores and bimbos who wanted a wallet and sugar daddy. You're having shock adjusting from being poor but sturdy, and then the military stuff, and now things are culturally different and you're not a poor boy who has to eat turnips for six days in a row because that's all you could afford."

"I didn't have to worry about money but the first thing I did was buy myself my own house," Stark agreed with a nod. "To make it mine. My house, my rules, my own kingdom."

Xander nodded. "It's a good thing and gives you a good base to grow from. Rogers, have you even started to build a base to steady yourself on?"

"I have Bucky."

"Rogers, let's be honest," Xander said, staring at him. "Do you really have Bucky back or do you have the guy that he became? War changes people." Steve glared again. "Are you the same guy you were, mentally and all that, as you were at eighteen?" Steve slowly shook his head. "Or after your first month being on the USO tour?" Steve shook his head again. "Or even after your first month of war? Or after Sokovia?"

"I...no I'm not," he admitted, making himself relax. "Bucky can't protect himself without bringing up the bad memories."

Xander nodded. "Isn't that why he's raising goats now?"

Steve blinked at that. "Yeah. That's not a bad idea."

"Well, if you live long enough to retire, you can start up a farm too," Xander quipped. "You can even do it if you end up in a wheelchair. You might have to hire a few helpers though." Steve slumped, grimacing. "Is you hovering over your friend helping him? A lot of that has to be done by yourself, and while you supporting him is good, you can't do it all. And you're hurting others by doing that. Including ripping your team apart."

"They were going to capture him and take him to be wiped and used for the US's goals," Steve ground out.

Xander nodded. "Then feel free to wreck that shit. The US shouldn't be doing it either!" He shrugged. "No one would be upset about that, dude. Stark, would you have helped with that?"

"I wanted Bucky somewhere he was safe in case he slipped back under control. Which they did."

"Psych wards are horrible places that end up harming more people than not," Xander reminded him.

"I could've gotten him into a private facility that worked with brainwashed people. There's a great one in Switzerland. They would've guarded him and helped him with all that coming back out."

"They wouldn't have protected him," Steve said firmly. "He could've been taken from there by those same people or HYDRA again!"

"So create the homegrown version," Xander said. "Get a therapist who knows about brainwashing, even from that clinic. Put Bucky into protective custody that you monitor and you can pop around to visit or live next door to if necessary, and hire a few former agents to help." Steve slumped, staring at him. "Put it on an island so he can't be snatched without warning. That way he couldn't retrigger himself and escape either. You could be there when you're not on team or other duties to help him. Set up a small compound with multiple houses and all that. With a farm since he seems to like goats."

"I could've found a way to do that," Stark agreed. "But he needed hardcore memory breaking first. It would've hurt more but been a cleaner retrieval. I looked over how they deprogrammed Natasha and how she ended up with gaps to this day."

Steve stared at him. "If you had offered that, I might've been able to talk him into it. Instead you attacked us."

"Your friend was trying to take me out, Rogers. Did you want me to lay down and die?"

"No!"

"It's an emotional thought instead of a rational or a practical thought," Xander reminded them. "Rogers realigned his hierarchy of importance to put the touchstone he used to lean on up at the top, over everything else. And doing that meant he made some weird choices that probably weren't healthy. The same as Stark made some weird choices that weren't healthy but was trying to backtrack on them." Stark nodded he agreed with that. "At the moment, both of you have 'my shit doesn't stink' moments that need to be weeded out. You've both done wrong, you've both caused hell, and you've both caused the rift in the team. Now, it's time to be big, adult heros and fix it before something takes out humanity again." They stared at him. "Do you think Thanos can't come back? You drove him off, you didn't kill him. He can come back. There's also bigger bads out there. Had the visions to prove it and the next one's blue." He stared at them.

"Blue?" Stark demanded.

"Yeah. Named Apocalypse. Real cute of him to have an honest name."

Steve shuddered. "Does that one have a glove?"

"No. He can control people. Including guys just like you only with real powers." He grinned. "He's where we get the four horsemen thing from."

Steve groaned. "How long?"

"Few years."

"Damn." He looked at Stark, seeing him how he was. "How's Pepper?"

"Mad. Very mad. Not just about this though."

"I..." He grimaced. "We do need to talk things out."

"Yeah, we do," he agreed. "And I'm not sure if it'll fully heal things."

"You can't go back in time to do that without magic," Xander said dryly. "I can refer you to the Coven or Strange if you want to."

"No thanks," Stark said, shaking his head quickly. "Magic is very weird and wrong."

"Fundamental forces, dude. It works with physics." He grinned. "Could be worse. We could be in a realm that has dragons and unicorns and all sorts of creatures. There's a spell to do that to the world."

"Less pollution," Steve quipped.

"Yup. More earth healing and not really taking out tech. Though dragons probably wouldn't really like cars."

Stark shuddered. "That's so weird."

"Yeah but weird works," Xander said with a grin for him. "Without weird we wouldn't have portals that have let thousands of beings flee from violence. And some get here to go to college or to find a career that would support their families. And some who're here for worse reasons."

"Like any immigration," Stark said. Xander nodded. He looked at his teammate again. "We do need to hold a summit to work things out. The whole team."

"You'll have to hold it in the US. If they catch your witch outside the US again they're going to try to kill her." Xander shrugged. "We can't change the decision of those councils. Those are like regional governments for their demon communities. She nearly destroyed one by siccing Banner on it. They consider that genocide of both humans and demons by means of magical coercion and force. Most of them consider her worse than Hitler's people because she did it as a diversion, just an off-hand thing to get away. He at least had an ideological idiocy going."

"Are they against Stark for what his program did?"

Xander stared at him. "They said it was something that got out of hand. That it was not meant to do that and they realized that it gained sentience and overrode all protections he had put on it. They do hate him for it but it is seen as accidental instead of intentional."

"It was," Stark agreed. "And I've made reparations."

"Which is a thing that they looked at. You stood up and took action, you took back control of it, you helped fix the problems it created. They knew that was not the intention of it. The ones who realized why it was created agreed that you probably had a point about making something to solve that problem. They'll watch you for the rest of your life for more bad ideas to show up and possibly take you out if you have another problem like that one."

Stark nodded. "I'm hoping it won't be a good idea. I almost turned on Ultron's program to help us against Thanos but I thought it might be counterproductive and align with him."

Steve blinked at him. "Seriously?"

"Yeah. If I was sure I could make him fight against Thanos it would've helped the battle a lot more."

Steve blinked. "That's probably a bad idea."

"Which is why I didn't."

Xander pulled out his phone and put the video he selected up so they could see it. Steve shuddered, backing away. Stark was wincing at it. "The last battle of Sunnydale, guys. Thousands of super vamps we had to get through to bleed seven slayers on an altar, and then make out way back out. Because Rosenburg decided we had to have Buffy back. We think she was prompted but we can't be certain. She lied about what she did to bring Buffy back. She didn't think about any implications that might mean. Does Stark do that, Rogers?"

"No." He looked at him. Xander turned off the video and put his phone back into his pants pocket. He looked at Xander. "How did you survive that?"

"Sheer dumb luck to quote a mythical teacher," Xander said dryly. "We lost some there. I lost my former fiancee. I lost a few friends too. We lost some of the girls. A lot of those girls had been raised by the Council to sacrifice their lives for the greater good. Them losing the girl next to them shook them badly and we had to work with them about it before the LA invasion."

"Why weren't you at the invasion?" Stark demanded, staring at him.

Xander grinned. "Buffy decided I was having more fun and worked out better down here so she didn't tell me there was a battle. She only called on the European slayers and the US ones for it. If they had lost I would've had to come back to fight against the rest of the old liners and take the girls over from them."

"Shit."

"Yeah, she keeps telling me I'm normal." He shrugged. "So I walk off and disprove her. Repeatedly."

"I got told I was worthless and useless, only good to be a drunk," Tony sighed, shifting to put his feet up.

Xander nodded. "Rogers got told he was too delicate and small to handle problems." Steve sighed and nodded, looking at his hands. "What would your higher authority think of your current lives? Your mom, whoever?"

"My mother would've soaped my mouth for swearing so often," Steve admitted.

"My mother too," Stark agreed. "I would've gotten that disappointed look that I hated from Jarvis and his wife." Steve looked at him oddly. "Yeah, there was originally a Jarvis who was the housekeeper. He practically raised me." Steve's mouth flopped open. "He and Aunt Peggy both agreed that my father had went to hell already and was dragging others with him."

"I...you weren't at her funeral."

"No. I didn't want to cause a problem, Steve. She would've come out of that casket and beaten my with her hat. I said my goodbyes in private."

Steve cleared his throat. "I didn't realize she kept working with your dad after the war."

"Yup. They started SHIELD," Stark said dryly. "I didn't get to see a lot of that thankfully. I saw more of Jarvis and his wife than I did anyone."

"That sucks," Steve said quietly. "Did Peggy train you or anything?"

"Nope. I heard Dad telling her to leave me alone because I wasn't worth the effort." He stared at him. "She got Jarvis to teach me how to be a real man."

Steve nodded. "She taught a few soldiers those lessons too." He looked at Xander. "Your friend?"

"Jesse?"

Steve nodded. "What if you had to take him out?"

"Admittedly me staking him was an accident but I knew that I had to then. I couldn't let him go out to eat me, or Willow, or his family. And it fell on my shoulders because Willow was too delicate and would just sob about it. Back then I shouldn't have dragged her with me to get to know Buffy. I knew it was going to come down to him going to dust. Even if it wasn't that night, it would've been later when he tried to come after me to eat or turn me. You can't let a monster loose if you can stop it. I also know that when I finally do die, however that happens, he'll be waiting on me and will beat my ass until I'm a puddle and I'll probably let him without complaint because he has that right."

Stark swallowed. "That sucks, kid."

"Yeah but if I hadn't gotten him, or someone hadn't gotten him, he would've come after me, Willow, his family, all his friends. He would've probably come after Cordy because he loved to pick on her." He shrugged. "I couldn't let that happen."

Steve nodded once. "I can't do that if Bucky goes down again."

"We'd never let you," Stark reminded him. "We'd send Hawkeye to do it. Or we'd let him be captured by an unfriendly agency. I'd never let you do that, Steve. That'd be cruel to even have you distract him."

Steve looked at him and nodded. "Thanks."

"Not a problem." He looked at the kid. "What happens if Rosenburg goes dark?"

"Again?" Xander asked with a grin. "She nearly destroyed humanity once in her grief, Stark. I stopped her from doing it then. The coven made her grieve and let go of all the black magic she sucked up. Next time, I'll probably have to end her. Not like most of the people at the Council could or would. Though some would just to piss off Giles."

"You guys are so screwed," Tony said.

Xander nodded. "Yeah but we do what we have to do so you guys get to live in ignorant bliss about that stuff. You guys didn't know a thing about any demonic apocalypse battle until the one that hit LA. You let the lies to cover them up soothe you because it made sense to you." He shrugged. "Sunnydale was a smaller version of that so we were used to it. The attention after LA made Buffy and a few others freak out."

"Who takes over if you fall?" Steve asked.

Xander shrugged. "Probably nobody. Not like I've got a kid waiting to avenge me. Or a protege I let read the same comic books I used to read and stan on Hawkeye's comics to get that feeling that normal people can do great things." He smirked at him. "Reading those comics for years made it easy for me to push to jump in and help Buffy. It was the right thing to do. And that comic book was basically my ethical guideline because my parents were drunken pieces of shit."

"I didn't know he had any," Stark said, frowning. "Really?"

"Yeah. Still going on. That and he used to play in the demon poker circuit so I heard a lot about him. There's a lot of us who stanned him because he was the normal guy who handled shit."

Stark nodded. Steve grimaced. "Yeah, he is." He sighed. "Any idea where he is?"

"Home, with his family. Cordy made sure of it," Xander said. "As he should've been. He desperately needed to be with them to help him heal the mental trauma of watching them turn to dust and fade."

Steve shuddered. So did Stark. "We all lost people," Stark said quietly, looking at Steve.

"I was next to Bucky," he agreed.

"I had Peter next to me, hugging me," Stark said. Steve winced but nodded. "I just wanted him to be safe. He demanded to help." He was unconsciously rubbing his wrist but when he realized it he made himself stop.

Xander nodded. "Sometimes you gotta do the right thing, even if it hurts. In his case, that was probably what he was doing. He thought it was too important."

"He's a kid," Stark said firmly.

"And Buffy was fifteen when she was called," Xander said. "I was almost sixteen when I jumped in with Willow." Stark slumped. "We may have been young but we knew that it needed to be handled and done. Even if it hurt us to do it. Because no one else would. Just like you remade the first suit into something sleeker and went to handle things no one else was. Because no one was going to fill that gap."

"True," Stark said, grimacing. "And somewhere in there I lost hope of anyone else ever joining in."

Xander nodded. "Well, have a son show up. Or a daughter. Girls can do good science too." He grinned. "If you can't train one you gotta make one, Stark. Otherwise someone's going to create one for you after you die."

"Pepper can protect the suit."

"Not if she's gone too," Xander said dryly. "And she can't fight the government breaking in to steal it. Or just jacking your plans by hacking you." Stark grimaced. "They might already have some. Are you going to trust them with them?"

"No. I already don't." He looked at Steve.

"My shield's a symbol, but it can't destroy things on its own." He took a deep breath. "We do need to talk and work this out. Hold a NATO summit." Stark nodded. "I...can we do that after breakfast?"

"Yeah, we can do that. I could use some coffee." Xander got up and left. They saw the door and headed for it, finding their teammate on the other side. "Clint."

"Stark. Rogers. We working on things? The demons that summoned me said that you two had to work things out before bigger things come. Then I saw Harris."

"He let us out of the closet they had us trapped in and sat us down to remind us that we both had problems that needed to be fixed and we both had to work on things. C'mon, you can help and mediate," Stark said, walking off. "We need food."

"Do you think they did something so we had to listen to him?" Steve asked as they walked off together.

"Probably," Stark agreed. "Though he did have his points." Steve nodded he agreed with that. He looked at Clint. "They summoned you?"

"They told the wife first, but yeah. Said it was a problem within the team."

Stark nodded. "Harris suggested we all need therapy."

Clint nodded. "We're nowhere near normal, Stark. Not a single one of us. Probably including Harris."

Steve looked at him. "You have comic books?"

"Have for a few years now. Someone at SHIELD started that off as a way to make them look nicer." He shrugged and put his hands in his pockets. "Then someone decided they liked it so they kept it going for a few years. No idea about anything."

"Huh." The two heros shared a look and nodded at each other. "Does Natasha know?" Stark asked.

"Yes, and she made fun of me for years," Clint said dryly. "Still probably would too but I showed her hers and she freaked out." He smirked at them. Steve snickered, shaking his head. They were let out of the building and found themselves up by the new avengers campus, in the small town closest to it. And Pepper just pulling into a parking spot a bit away. "That was handy," Clint said, looking back and not finding a doorway. "Thanks," he called then followed the other two. Pepper looked happy to see them. "I got asked to mediate."

She patted him on the cheek. "That's always a good thing. Let's go talk some more, but out of sight, people."

"Breakfast first," Stark told her, heading for the diner. "Do you have my wallet?" She nodded, going to pay for their food and take them back to the new campus so they could sit down and talk.

Wanda spotted them and stomped off so Clint followed her. "Okay, so let's talk since it's apparently the day for therapy for avengers members," he said, staring at her.

"I will not work with Stark!" she shouted with a point.

Clint sighed. "Do you blame the gun manufacturers for people being shot?" She flinched back, staring at him. "He didn't send that bomb, Wanda. In fact, it's likely that the guy who had control of the company sold it illegally and Stark stopped that because he found out when they kidnaped him. He had nothing to do with that beyond having his name on the company." He stared at her. "Do you blame the people who shoot others or the guns that got made for shootings?" She glared and stomped off. "Fine. We'll be talking in the other room." He felt the wind from Pietro and shrugged at him. "It's true."

"It is," he agreed. "My sister is stuck on that point."

"Then get her to a therapist. Sam's one." Pietro blinked. Clint grinned. "He is, he works with returning soldiers."

"Let myself and Vision talk to her."

"I have no idea where he is," Clint admitted. "I'll ask." He left them to talk. "Hey, Pietro wondered where Vision is."

"Probably in our safehouse over there, where we were until earlier," Stark said after thinking for a second. He sent him a text message, getting one back. "He's in Wakanda working on the little robot and that germ puppy thing. He'll be back here tonight." He put his phone up after sending that message. He looked at Clint before eating a bite of breakfast. "Your kids okay?"

"Yeah. They're good. They don't remember." He sat down with a sigh. "I'm glad they don't remember anything about that." Stark nodded, shoving his box over. "Thanks, Stark." He dug in, looking at Steve. "So where do we start the talking?"

"Let's start at the beginning. We need to work out how to work together again," Steve said. "In the battle in Wakanda, we were doing mostly our own thing but moving forward."

"Which is the easiest and fastest way to get ahead but also go missing someone," Clint agreed. He nodded at Scott as he showed up with Hope. "Hey, guys."

Scott smiled and punched him on the arm. "Our kids are penpals. I hope you don't mind?"

"Nah, they could use more kids who understood. The local kids give them funny looks for having me as a dad." He shrugged but smirked slightly. "My daughter had to break the gym coach's heart. He wanted her on the school's team."

"Can she do the karate lessons and the like? Some schools have judo teams," Hope offered.

"Oh, they get self defense lessons," Clint assured her with a grin. "Auntie Nat made sure." She grinned back. "Sit, guys. We're working out some of the stress before more demons lock us all in a closet." He ate some toast with eggs on top.

"At least it was a bigger closet," Stark said dryly. "Could've been too tiny to move in."

"It was a very roomy storage closet," Steve agreed.

"They did?" Scott asked, sitting down.

"Yeah," Steve said with a nod. He ate a bit of his scrambled eggs.

"Then they had Harris, from the Council, show up to nag us," Stark agreed. "He had some points."

"Including that we need to work together because there's always bigger problems on the way. He said the next massive one was named Apocalypse."

Clint choked, shaking his head. "Great, the wanna be overlord of mutant kind." He got some coffee to clear his throat. "I can get the files on when he was here before." He sat down. "At least this one's blue."

Hope shook her head slowly. "Are all the bad guys strange colors?"

"Not sure," Clint admitted. "Some just wear freaky things I guess." He shrugged. "I'm not MIB, ask Thor?"

"Yeah, I can do that if we see him soon." She looked at Scott, who shrugged back. "As a question, should we be taking special training times?"

Clint smirked at her. "Yes, you should." He nodded.

"I meant to work with the team," she said. "I've already taken a lot of other training, Barton."

"Possibly," Steve agreed. "We do need to work on working together. We did okay when we just all jumped in for the battle of Manhattan. We managed to pull it together and we each had our own areas but we came together well."

Stark nodded. "We did okay. Could've used more help."

"It would've been nice," Steve agreed with a nod. Clint nodded since his mouth was full. "Since then...we've had problems. We need to work on them." He stared at Stark. "I should have listened some."

Stark nodded. "And I didn't even bother to explain things because you weren't listening." Pepper cleared her throat from her seat. He looked at Hope. "Part of the problems I've tried to fix included having no one to follow us in the future."

"My daughter might follow me," Scott said. "Her mother will freak out and scream a lot. Then put her in a hospital and have her drugged up until she's normal again."

Hope nodded. "I'm a second generation one already. Some day I'll have kids but no clue, Mr. Stark."

"You are?" Steve asked.

She nodded. "My mother was the Wasp, the original one, and got lost in between space." Steve blinked a few times. She grinned. "Scott found her. She and my dad are cooing at each other while trying hard not to fight about wearing the uniform."

Scott nodded. "I'm technically a second generation one since her dad had my suit first. Way back in the day."

Stark shook his head quickly. "Wow, didn't realize that."

"Your dad and her dad had a fight," Scott reminded him.

"Yeah, I heard. Wow." He rubbed his forehead, sitting back. "Okay, so we do have some second generation and some who may someday become third gen. Hawkass?"

"Not likely and Laura will scream more than Scott's wife and sob on us. She's already vowed she'd stop any heroics in action so she doesn't have to worry about two of us."

Pietro came walking out shaking his head. "Some day my sister will have children and we can remind them that being a hero is a dumb idea that will ruin your life." He got some coffee and came back to join in. He stared at the two he didn't know.

"Hope VanDyne," she said with a grin and a point. "Scott Lang. He's the Ant Man. I'm the Wasp."

"Ah!" He nodded. "I saw those files. That's very weird that you both shrink."

"I can fire Scott on an arrow," Clint said with a smirk for his buddy. Then at Pietro. "So he can go wreck stuff then expand."

Pietro nodded. "That is handy, yes. Something we could have used." Stark nodded at that. "Why is my sister mad?"

"Because we reminded her she turned into someone like the IRA," Clint said. "Sorry but..." He waved a hand around.

"I can see that," Pietro agreed. "It's something we need to work out." He looked at Stark. "Her... boyfriend?"

"Coming later tonight from Wakanda."

"That's fine. She can pout for a few hours." He shifted to cross his feet. "Are there upcoming problems?"

"There's always problems," Barton said.

"Bite your tongue. We could use a few days off," Stark complained. "I need to do some maintenance work after we took out that group of morons who had captured women."

Steve winced. "Are they okay?"

"They're not the first that it's happened to and been rescued," Stark said. "They might not be the most gentle but they've handled a lot of them before. It's unfortunate but a sucky reality that needs to be changed."

"Are they on our lists?" Scott asked.

"If we run into them, yup," Stark said with a nod.

Steve nodded after a second. "We helped flush them out and close down their camp, plus rescue a lot of the women they had. Harris, the Council guy, was down there and had some local demons helping track them. And any that got away they got to have some fun with I guess. We rescued about twenty women."

Scott grimaced. "That totally blows, guys. Are we working against more like that?"

"If we run into them," Stark agreed. "I'm all for picking a fight against them but I know we won't be as effective because we're not down there and they won't trust us because we're Americans."

"We did get a lot of stiffness thanks to being white americans," Steve agreed. "And I can see why with how colonialism screwed up things." He ate a bite of his toast. "I don't know how to fix that."

"You support the native peoples," Clint said. "If there's a local company that employs locals then you support the over someone from outside. You support their work to help educate them and support their women and children's charities. The same as you do for Native Americans."

Steve blinked. "I didn't think about that. Do we have a charity program, Pepper?"

"We do have someone who does pick our charities for us," she said. "I can put you on with her if you wanted to set up something for donating purposes. Or you can do it yourself and go through someone like Charity Navigator. It's a site that rates charities on a few spectrums so you can find ones that you agree with."

Steve nodded. "Thanks, Pepper. I'll figure out which way I want to do that this week." She smiled and nodded. He looked at Stark.

"I have a charitable foundation," he said. "They only do grants and scholarships."

"I have to oversee them to make sure they do good for the ones they should," Pepper said patiently. "We take in applications for scholarships and grants. Plus his mom's foundation for breast cancer and domestic violence funding." Tony grinned at her and nodded. "Should we set up one for younger wannabe heros?"

"No. If they want to train to be a team member, they can talk to us," Clint said. "There's a few already, guys. Including some older people who do the minor jobs, like Peter does." Stark nodded he realized that.

"He's still doing that?" Steve demanded.

"Yeah. He was doing it for over a year before Stark found him," Clint said dryly. "SHIELD tracked him."

"Geez. Can we stop him so he can have a few normal years?"

"Nope," Stark said. "According to his uncle, with great power comes great responsibility." He looked at his teammate. "He does confine himself to minor things but he's got a few different minor villains that want to get him already. Worries me and his aunt incredibly but I can't say much with why I got into my suit."

"Peter's not a kid that could've been recruited into SHIELD either," Clint said. "That would've given him a lot of training in tactics and fighting skills. Kid could use it, Stark."

"I know. I have Happy helping with that." He grimaced. "I'd like the kid to take his senior year off. And maybe his freshman year of college. But noooooo." Pepper giggled. "I know, it's like he's my kid sometimes." He sighed, looking at Barton. "Your oldest is...."

"About ready to go to regular martial arts classes," he said. "She will not be in spandex, Stark. She hates my guns and my bow for more than target time. She thinks Hope's cool but mostly because she's fashionable." Hope grinned at him. "She'll be one of those women who can defend the homestead but doesn't want to go out to solve a problem. I hope."

"There's a young avengers team," Scott reminded him.

Clint winced. "I've seen and met and discouraged to no end. Yup, they still wanna keep going. And my mini me is pretty cool. She's watching my dog."

Steve gave him a funny look. "You have a protege?"

"No, she blatantly stole my bow, Cap. She's sure she wants to make sure no kid gets pushed toward our lives the way she felt she was by what's happened to her." Steve slumped, shaking his head. "She's good. Doesn't want to be deadly, wants to solve problems. Vowed if her teammates turned into the cluster fuck our team does now and then she'd kick all their asses. Miss America is just as punch happy as you are by the way." He grinned.

Steve stared. "Miss America?"

"America Chavez," Pepper said. "Nice girl. Very strong. Punches people through walls sometimes. Very nice young woman though. Kate's a nice young woman from a semi-bad family but she's more like her mom from what I've heard. Peter's met them and said they were all pretty nice kids too but they can't work together."

Clint nodded. "Yup. They've got some weird skills in the group but they're coming together well."

"They're kids," Stark said. "And I hate that."

"Yeah but they won't be stopped from helping if they can and it's near them," Clint said. "Pietro would've done the same thing with his sister." That kid nodded. "He's only nineteen. Peter was sixteen."

"Which gave me multiple gray hairs. Can we discourage them?" he asked.

"Nope," Pepper said, shaking her head with a smile. "They took your backstory and agreed that if you had the skills and the desire you should do it. I tried to talk to Miss Chavez about it. She's firm about it."

"I guess that makes sense," Stark sighed. "Though I don't like kids doing that."

Pepper cleared her throat and leaned closer. "The president is trying to get them conscripted into the military to handle things for the government. So far they've managed it and we've filed multiple injunctions to help them." She smiled. "You need to help them stay free."

"Yes I do," Tony agreed, looking at Steve. Who nodded. "We can help the kids."

Pepper smiled at Clint. "I heard that the president wants Harris, that Council guy, to take over SHIELD."

"Yeah, I've heard that rumor and he's fighting against it," Stark agreed. "He told us that and he suggested some guy named Wade Wilson to take his place instead since he dealt more with spandex hero sorts as he put it." Clint burst out laughing and fell onto the floor rolling around. "I must've missed the joke. Hey, Barton?"

"Deadpool," he gasped out.

"Oh!" Stark nodded and sighed. "I ran into him once. Yeah....but probably not as dangerous as Fury was." He blinked a few times.

Natasha came strolling in. "What's happened now?"

"The president suggested Harris to take over SHIELD," Stark said. She grimaced and shook her head. "He suggested Wade Wilson."

She frowned, looking at Clint. "The one with the swords?" she demanded. He grinned and nodded, giggling some more. "Oh, dear. Well...." She walked off with a sigh, calling someone. "Harris is still fighting against being named over SHIELD," she said in greeting. "He suggested Deadpool instead." She hung up on the groaning and yelling going on. "I'm sure they'll stop that."

"Oh, damn," Clint said, getting up and dusting himself off before sitting back down. "Yeah, that'd definitely change SHIELD."

Pepper sent a message to some people. "Maybe we can head him off." She read one she got back. "The Council guy hated that the president got fixated on him doing good things," she noted. She looked up. "He said he doesn't want it."

"No one can take his place either," Stark said. "We talked about that too." Steve nodded, stuffing his mouth with the last of his breakfast.

***

Xander looked around the official birthday celebration of a school a few of his slayers went to. He had tried to let the girls not attend but he had been overruled so they were there being bored by all the adults who wanted to brag about being for female education. The slayers, of course, were stupidly bored in a corner away from all the sorts who could cause them problems. They had already caught six people in the room with offering marks from demonic deals so yeah, they were being bored in a corner. Xander looked down at his girls. "Okay, let's do girlish things. What's your patronus?"

The three girls stared at each other then at him. One smiled. "A gnu. They're big, strong, have weaknesses but horns to defend themselves, and they're smart enough to know when to run away instead of fighting."

Xander grinned and nodded. "They make funny noises that sound like you snoring too." She giggled and swatted them then looked at the slayer next to her.

"A lioness. They're strong hunters but they have lazy males," she said, glaring at her father where he was talking to higher ups.

"Women do rule the pride," Xander agreed with a nod. "And do most of the work cooperatively with the other females." He looked at the other one. "What about you?"

"Some sort of reptile. They're usually smart and cunning for their size, and deadly when they're bothered but mostly just want to be left alone to sun themselves and eat."

Xander nodded. "They can be great hunters when they need to eat, and when they're disturbed, or peed on like I've done twice now." The girls giggled. "I'd be an emu. They're a flightless really big bird, but they scare Australians. They actually lost a war to emus a few decades back over grazing rights."

"The country lost against birds?" one of them asked. Xander nodded. They all pulled out their phones to look up what an emu was and what had happened. They giggled and nodded. That did sound a lot like their watcher.

"Girls," the headmistress said, sounding stressed and like she was trying to be cheerful.

"They're looking up what an emu is," Xander quipped with a grin. "It'd be my patronus."

The headmistress gave him a tight smile. "They could go make contacts."

Xander leaned closer to her. "With all the demonic deal markings we saw," he said quietly. "I don't think it's a good idea for them to get too used to seeing a slayer." She winced but nodded. "We're good. I'm going to sneak them off for fast food in a few minutes then bring them back for curfew."

"I think that's a great idea, Watcher Harris. Thank you." She shook his hand and he did teach the girls how to sneak out of a fairly full room. She went to talk to her husband, who had a mark on his arm, but she knew why. She loved him even though he had sold his soul to find a good wife. Though it did make her wonder if that was why all of her little girls hated his art class. She'd have to ask tomorrow.

***

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