Reality Crisis

Clint had been doing chinups from the doorframe of his room in Nat's apartment when it happened. All of a sudden his eyes were rolling in the back of his head and his fingers stopped gripping the reinforced wooden frame. He distantly felt the impact of his body hitting the floor.

It was black for a moment, and then his eyes opened abruptly as cold wind hit his face. He jerked forward, then almost lost his balance, only a lifetime of intense physical training making sure he caught himself and went completely still.

He slowly looked around, taking stock of the situation. He was high up in a tree, as high as one could go while still getting some semblance of power. He was crouched on a tiny platform, almost too small to work, which one hand feeling told him was made of woven branches. It was dark, and he was in full gear, dark clothing, his bow resting on the branches in front of him and his quiver resting in easy reach so that he could grab his weapon and use the arrows without disturbing the thick canopy of pine-like boughts just above his head.

It was dark, very dark, but he found his line of sight looking straight at a city. He coudln't tell immediately if it was New Troy of die Festung, or someplace new.

This was a recon perch. That was very clear, and whatsmore it was set up in his own very unique way. There was no way for anybody to get him here, he'd built and perched here himself. The deadness in his legs told him he'd been there for a while. At least twelve hours, possibly longer. The weariness in his body was something he could guarge the passage of time by.

He looked down at a small black notebook in his hand, a bunch of letters and symbols. His own code, invented from scratch so that he could make longterm notes and not miss or forget anything, but similarly nobody looking at them could understand what he'd written.

There were new symbols, names and actions and objects, but even as he looked at them he knew what they were.

He was watching them, watching the natives of this world, studying them. Making sure they weren't making plans. He fliped the pages to the first and glanced at the code for time tables. He had to get back before the light of day, make his report. He moved back to the most recent page.

Part of him wanted to climb down, to check out his surroundings, but he could feel his own focus on the task at hand. He had a mission, a recon, and it was important. He'd see it through, then he'd work out what was going on. Besides, the people inside the city were moving, with purpose and urgency. Clint rocked forward a fraction of an inch, the only indication that he was actively watching.

And then... he blinked, and suddenly his eyes groggily opened. He was back in the apartment, flat on his back, staring up at the ceiling and top of the doorframe.

He groggily sat up, looking around. Same clothes, same place, nothing out of place in his home.

Natasha was still gone, too. He grunted and pulled himself up, then turned to find his boots and jacket. He had to see if everything else was the same, too.

Tony was nowhere to be found. Natasha wasn't sure if he'd just gone into hiding in light of the zombie attack or if he was working on something. She wasn't to the point of concern just yet, though she might get there eventually. Not that the assassin would admit to concern for one of her teammates. That would be too close to attachments. Which would be dangerous.

She would never admit that her time with SHIELD had begun to change her and her time with the Avengers even more so. No, it was easier to keep her distance and keep her walls up.

Speaking of attachments that she would never admit to... she was currently seeking her sometime partner. Before the zombies had become an issue, she'd had a plan to go back to New Troy and make sure she met the leader this time. She'd gotten the tour from the superpowered kid who was a little too freshfaced and naive for someone with the powers of a demigod, but this time she wanted the chance to get the measure of the man who ran that city. And after that, she fully intended to head to Sanctuary and check out the political situation there as well. She needed to know who the players were before she figured out how to play the game here.

There were a few places that she thought she might find Clint. If not their quarters, he might be training in the sparse gym that this town had to offer. Or eating. Or in a bar somewhere, chatting up one of the local women. He did have a knack for blowing off steam that sometimes she envied. Sometimes.

Clint knew that this place had a lot of oddness going on. A lot of unexpected occurrences and effects on the population, like they were all just being messed with constantly. But this? Zombies?

He crouched on a taller building near the outer wall, watching the horde moving around, looking for a way in. He'd never bought into the zombie craze back home, his life was weird enough without spending his time reading and watching movies about the dead rising, but he knew enough to know that it was never a happy outcome when this kind of plague broke over the lands.

He selected an arrow and aimed carefully, taking out one of the shambling horrors through its eye socket. The creature went down, and Clint tilted his head, watching the others for reaction and to see if it stayed down. It did, and no great fuss seemed to be created by the others. So, these were the real deal, and the traditional deal.

Alright.

Clint looked through the streets, but so far right now they didn't seem to be anywhere inside the city, which was good. That just meant they had to secure the food supplies and then work out how to clean out the zombies from around the city later.

Clint hopped down to the wall and leaned against it, starting to count, trying to get a rough estimate for how many there were. He didn't start shooting them yet, that would be a waste of arrows and it was better to have a plan before attacking a larger force. But he kept his bow out, just in case. Who knew, maybe some of the zombies around here could fly or something.

(backdated to the morning after the end of the age regression plot)

Natasha had asked around and done some digging, but she hadn't found anything helpful in regards to what had screwed up Tony's brain. The most she had discovered was that he wasn't the only one. Not by a long shot. Most of the people affected seemed to think that they were thirteen. She supposed it was no surprise that she hadn't noticed the difference in Tony right away.

She'd brought him back to her apartment after knocking him out and had left him to sleep it off on the bed in her unused spare bedroom. She didn't feel bad about hitting him because it had been the right decision at the time. All the same, she'd brought some painkillers and water and her kitchen was stocked with food. Since she didn't know how long he would be stuck in the thirteen year old mentality, she hung onto the painkillers and would give him the correct dosage whenever he woke up.

There wasn't much she could make with the food here, but she managed a breakfast. Back home, she had been able to cook after all. Spending a few months posing as a sous chef would do that for a girl. It might have been a little strange to make breakfast for someone when it wasn't a part of a mission, but this was just her way. She wouldn't apologize for hitting him, but she would take care of him until he was back to normal.