Somewhere out there Ho Yinsen is turning to Tony Stark and saying, “you didn’t waste a single second”.
Ok but now I have this image in my head of Tony in some kind of afterlife, like his own personal heaven. It looks like his lab, not any specific one, rather it’s made up of all the best and favorite tools, parts and pieces from workshops throughout his life. He’s sitting at a table working with a small device, nothing really important just something keeping his hands busy, when he calls out “JARVIS pull up the Life-streams”.
“Any preference for this particular viewing sir.”
“Just the family this time J,” Tony replies as a number of glowing blue screens appear in front of him, “wife and kids.” Pepper and Morgan Stark, Peter Parker and Harley Keener come into focus a moment later. He spends his time relaxing like that, watching over them as he tinkers.
Footsteps approaching from behind pulls some of his focus several hours later, he doesn’t turn around, keeps his eyes on Morgan, Harley and Peter working together on an as of yet unidentifiable lego set. Visitors aren’t exactly rare but they’re not all that common either and Tony never knows quite what to say to the people who have come to see him.
“So this is the legacy of the great Tony Stark.” Familiar words said in a tone vastly diffierent to how they were once spoken startles him enough to look at the figure that draws up next to him. Ho Yinsen settles beside him peering curiously at the screens acting as windows to the lives of his loved ones. Struggling to come up with something to say to the man who gave him his second chance at life he turns back to the screens and focuses on Pepper, she’s having lunch with Happy he notices either talking about SI or reminiscing about him with the amount his name keeps coming up. “How’s the family?”, comes out before he really thinks about it. An amused huff is his immediate answer as Yinsen leans back to take in the rest of his surroundings.
“They are well Stark, enjoying the time we now have together”.
Silence falls between them for several beats before Tony swallows down the anxiety he can feel threatening to rise, “so, how’d I do?”
Ho Yinsen finally turns to face Tony Stark and says, “you didn’t waste a single second “.
the least thing that he can do is go get her body, give her a funeral.
sam volunteers to come with him, but clint goes alone. they only have so many pym particles, after all, and clint isn’t sure what he’ll do when he sees nat, isn’t sure if he wants anyone to see him break down.
when he comes back to earth, the other avengers are kind enough to ignore the tear stains.
–
clint almost doesn’t give the eulogy.
he asks maria to do it, after tony’s funeral, knows that she can come up with one off the top of her head, one that would probably be better than the one he had worked on for hours.
she shakes her head, though, gives him a sad, small smile.
“she was your best friend, barton. you knew her best. and you were there when…you were there for it. it’s only fitting that you’re the one to do it.”
the podium looks like a gallows to him.
he can’t do natasha justice in one speech, can’t even begin to scratch the surface of her.
but he has to try.
–
shuffling the note cards that his speech is written on, the words dry up in clint’s mouth as he looks out at the assembled crowd. they feel fake, forced.
so he puts down the cards, and just talks.
“i, uh…i met natasha when she was still working for the russians. sent to kill her, actually. she was – she was fucking terrifying, honestly, in that uniquely tasha way of hers, y’know? people make threats, but tasha never really had to. she’d just fix you with that look, and you knew what was coming. but she was more than that. she was so much more than a scary badass assassin, though that was pretty cool of her, too.”
he has to stop for a moment, try to gather his thoughts and fight back the sobs that are already rising up in his eyes.
“i had the honor of being her first friend at shield, and getting to know her and help her become the hero she died as. she was funny and kind and wicked smart, and seeing her open up was…it meant a lot. she’d spent so much of her life being hurt and hurting people, never allowed to make her own decisions, and living like that – it fucks you up. but she didn’t let that slow her down. she never let anybody define her. honestly, this speech feels kinda ridiculous, ‘cause i know i can’t explain her with it.”
maria gives him a comforting smile from the front row, and clint takes a deep breath, forcing himself to continue on.
“another thing about her was…she liked sugary foods. a lot. like, seriously, you couldn’t have any cookies or candy around her, she’d always find it and steal it. thor lost a lot of poptarts that way.”
thor nods solemnly, and clint almost laughs.
“but yeah, she always treated having sugar like it was some kind of present. she wasn’t used to it, y’know? didn’t have much of that stuff growing up in the red room. didn’t have much of anything, really. and she…she could’ve used that as a reason to be selfish, i guess. but i don’t think that ever crossed her mind. she was selfless, only ever wanted to help people, make sure that they were all okay before she even thought about herself. and she…she died to save the universe.”
the room is quiet, the stillness only broken by a few tears.
“she died to save me. she did so fucking much for me, and i-now i’m never gonna be able to pay that back. the black widow was so many things to so many people, but above everything she was just tasha. she was my best friend. and if i could see her again, i’d-i didn’t tell her i loved her as much as i should have. ‘cause i did. i do. always.”
he has to take a moment, then, to bury his face in his hands and try not to cry, even though they all know that he’s sobbing.
“but we…we have what we have when we have it. that’s what she always said. so let’s make the best of it, everybody, you hear? it’s what she’d want us to do. just make the best of it.”
