Chapter Text
Nobody could blame Harley for not being immediately put on edge when the doorbell rang. After all, he had no real reason to be, so it definitely came as one hell of a shock when he turned the handle only to find a gun pointed directly at his face.
“Huh.” He said, immediately shutting it again.
The sound of his shoes squeaking as he turned on the spot to run was drowned out by the slam of a body against the flimsy wooden door. Harley felt himself getting thrown across the room as the door slammed into his back. He was already scrambling to his feet as the heavy thud of boots marching in filled the room.
What the fuck is happening? Harley thought absently as gruff shouts filled the room. Who the hell are these guys?
He wouldn’t call it silence exactly, but a kind of stillness did settle across the room. Bodies froze in place and there was nothing to hear except harsh sounds of heavy breaths breaking the quiet.
“Hello?” Harley asked, his voice hitching slightly.
Around him the armoured soldiers held their guns unwavering. Harley’s eyes flickered uncertainly around the circle of people surrounding him as he waited for literally any kind of explanation. Please .
“Harley Keener.” His neck whipped around to find the origin of the voice. A stern woman, maybe twice his size with a wicked scar trailing across her face stared back. He gulped.
“Yes?”
“You are coming with us.” She stated, finger never leaving the trigger.
Now, Harley was a smart kid, most of the time that is, but he was also nothing if not stubborn. So when the woman bust into his house, demanding he leave without any kind of explanation, well that’s when he planted his feet and glared right back at her.
“No.”
To her credit, the woman managed to contain her surprise almost instantly, the only tell he could find was a furious twitch of her left eyebrow.
“What,” she growled, “do you mean ‘ no ’?”
Harley scoffed, shoving his hands into his pockets as if he saw all of this as nothing more than a mild inconvenience. Her lip curled angrily at his display of teenage indolence, but that was fine. He needed her mad. If she was pissed then she wouldn’t notice the way he was digging through his pockets for something roughly the size of a piñata for crickets.
“I mean no ,” he snarked, grateful that this time his voice didn’t waver. All he had to do was figure out why these assholes were in his house and then get them out before his mum or sister got back from the store. Easy peasy. “You just broke into my house and you haven’t even told me why you’re here or why you want me. So no. Stranger danger and all that.” His hand waved about flippantly which only seemed to infuriate her further.
Even if it was definitely the wrong time for it, he couldn’t help the small grin that tugged at his lips.
“Now you listen here-” she said, stepping forward. It took all of Harley’s willpower not to glance at the barrel of the gun which had just been lowered towards the ground in her distraction “The Black fucking Widow just realesed half a fucking mountain’s worth of top secret files onto the internet, kid. The US military has better shit to do than come to Fucksville Tennessee and collect you but it seems you’re important to Iron Man. So you’re coming with us and we’re taking you back to New York because the higher ups want to talk to you about what the hell you know about Tony Stark. Is that alright with you?” She sneered.
Harley barely heard her. His head was ringing. There were files. One included him. Someone knew about him helping Tony. Now everyone did. There were people who hated Tony. That means they might try to come after him to get to Tony. This lady looked pissed. He didn’t like any of this.
His thoughts were interrupted when she slapped one meaty palm across his arm and tried to yank him out the door with her, not willing to wait for his response.
Taking a deep breath and ignoring the pounding of his heart trying to break out of his chest, Harley pulled his hand out of his pocket.
Apparently nobody in the room was prepared for the fourteen year old to have a small flash bomb. Huh.
The moment that light filled the room Harley ripped his arm out of the woman’s grip and sprinted for the garage door, he vaulted across the couch and felt his body slam into the doorframe as he misjudged his momentum but he couldn’t feel it. He couldn’t feel anything.
There was nothing in the world except the pounding of his feet against floorboards and a shuddering crack as he threw the garage door open, yanking it shut behind him. Seconds were all he had to press his hand against the scanner which initiated lock down mode.
He only just tore his hand away and turned to his desk when something began to pound against the door. For a moment Harley felt ready to throw up but to his relief the door held. Of course it held. When Tony Stark says he installed safety features that made Harley’s garage nigh on impossible to infiltrate, well he kept his word to say the least.
Harley flinched as a new sound entered the fray, muffled through the walls but still distinct enough for Harley to know they were now trying to shoot their way in. As much as it really wasn’t the right time all Harley could think of was the fact his mum was going to be pissed when she saw all the bullet holes in the wallpaper.
Shaking his head to stop his mind going on any more tangents Harley began moving around the room.
Grabbing his backpack from where it still lay on th floor he was quick to tip it upside down. Textbooks and sheets of homework scattered around the room but Harley didn’t exactly have time to worry about the mess. He was far too busy grabbing supplies.
Supplies for what? He wasn’t quite sure, but if there was one thing he knew it was that he had to get out of there. For whatever reason people were after him now, and he couldn’t let his family get caught up in this. He needed to escape. He needed to find out what was really happening. He needed to get to Tony.
His hand stilled midair, all the cash from his piggy bank still clutched in his fingers. He could call Tony. He could call him right then and then Iron Man would come and save him. Involuntarily his fingers tightened around the money, his knuckles white with tension. No. He couldn’t call Tony. Whatever was happening was big. Bigger than he could probably imagine and Tony was a very busy, very important man who had better things to do than come rescue some random kid he probably already forgot about. Harley was on his own. He’d just have to make his way to New York himself and then he could get Tony’s attention.
A small part of him whispered that all he was doing was putting himself in danger because he was too embarrassed to ask for help. Harley squashed that thought right down. Just like he did for the one that told him he was trying to play the hero and it was probably going to get him killed.
A thud from outside pulled him from his own mind as he recalled that, oh yeah, he was in imminent danger. Like, right now. Quickly, he shoved a jacket and water into his pack along with the cash, slingshot and potato gun he had stashed in there. As a second thought he grabbed his tool belt and tied it firmly around his waist. Was it enough? Probably not.
But Harley was resourceful. He’d figure it out. He would have to.
“Kid!” Harley spun around but the door was still holding. There was nothing to do except listen to the woman talk to him. He could almost laugh because of how clear it was she was doing everything in her power to keep her anger in check now that she’s realised he has more tricks up his sleeve than she expected. She was wary now. Unsure what his plan was. That makes two of us, lady .
“Kid, I’m… sorry that we frightened you-” Harley scoffed, he could practically hear the way she was grinding her teeth in barely contained fury “-if you could just open the door I’m sure we can all have a nice chat and work it out.”
“Lady,” Harley called back, pulling his backpack up onto his shoulders, “you straight up just tried to shoot me. You think I’m going with you?”
“We didn’t try to-”
“Sorry! I can’t hear you over the sound of all those bullets you just put in my wall!”
“Listen here you little shi- Kid. You little kid,” he rolled his eyes as she talked and moved back further into the garage. In one movement he pulled a tarp away and dropped it onto the floor absently. For a moment he simply stood there, debating just how bad of an idea he was having at that moment. It was probably super bad. Like, really super bad. Like, so incredibly, awfully, terribly super bad that it just might work.
“Kid, we’re here to help, just let us in. Please.”
“I thought you guys had better things to do than come to, what was it? Fucksville Tennessee?” Harley quipped, swinging a leg over the beat up motorcycle that he was apparently about to ride. Yep. Terrible plan. “Don’t worry guys!” He called, hoping to mask the sound of him unlocking the roller door, “you won’t have to deal with me anymore!”
The sound of their confused muttering was quickly drowned out by the roar of bike’s engine. Harley took one shaky breath before clenching his hand around the throttle and jetting out of the house.
The tires squealed in protest as Harley turned sharply to avoid the giant black vans sitting in front of his house. There were maybe four or five guys hanging around the cars. In unison they all turned to watch Harley zooming past them wth blank, confused expressions on their faces. Harley couldn’t help the need to put his finger up at them as he drove past.
He laughed to himself when that seemed to do nothing but baffle them further.
He was almost at the end of the street when he saw the woman and other soldiers tearing out of his house. A glance in the mirrors showed her probably yelling her head off at the five guys still standing there like idiots.
Engines roared to life behind him and Harley felt panic settling back in. He was a fucking fourteen year old, how the hell he was going to avoid the army was a goddamn mystery. Especially considering this may technically be the first time Harley ever rode the motorbike around on actual streets at any kind of speed and not just slowly turning circles in a paddock. Fuck.
Wind rushed past him, tugging him back as he tried to direct the bike towards the center of town. Every second he wasted trying to get the gears right was another second they were catching up to him. Really his only hope at that point was that he could lose them in town. They might have all their fancy training but no one knew the streets of Rose Hill like Harley.
“Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.” He chanted under his breath when he turned a corner too sharply and nearly toppled the bike. In his moment of panic the only thing that crossed his mind was how mad his Mama would be that he was swearing so much.
He righted the bike just in time to catch a glimpse of dark vehicles trailing after him. “Fuck.”
Around him he could see pedestrians halt their morning activities. People he’d known his whole life were stopping at the side of the road to gawk at him as he got chased by the military. A small part of him hoped none of them would know it was him but in a town of roughly five old people and three cows that was pretty goddamn unlikely.
Without thinking about it he realised he’d accidentally been heading towards the diner, where his mum worked but at the last second he corrected his course because like hell was he going to bring these assholes right to her. Instead he found himself heading for the reconstructed watertower. Of course he took the most complicated route he could until he’d managed to bring his pursuers into a dead end that’d take them at least five minutes to get back on the main road while he slipped through a tiny alley way.
In the few minutes he had spare he ditched the bike, ignoring a twang of regret as he looked at the abandoned machine. The only thing left of his father.
“That doesn’t matter now.” Harley reminded himself tersely. After a moment’s hesitation he stepped up to Mister Jenkin’s car and hoped he wouldn’t be pissed that Harley was commandeering it for a while.
Fingers flying deftly, Harley hotwired the car just in time to see a black van hurtling down the street to his left. He was pretty sure they hadn’t actually found him, their driving far too aimless and frantic to have any clear direction in mind. Which meant he had just enough time to start the car and head out of town.
It killed him to drive so slowly but he needed them off his tail and driving like a maniac was a bit of a giveaway. So instead he swallowed his panic and gently pulled out from the curb and began to inch his way towards New York.
He didn’t turn around to look back at Rose Hill, not until it had faded well into the distance.
______
“Boss?” Jarvis said, his voice cutting through the music that Tony was very much not listening to.
“What is it now, J?” He said, a sigh escaping his lips. Tony leaned back in his chair, stretching as he moved for the first time in probably hours. Blinking tiredly, Tony looked away from the screen in front of him to find it was nearly midday which meant he had forgotten to sleep for yet another night. Pepper was gonna be mad when she found out but even she knew he couldn’t tear himself away for a second.
Ever since Natasha released all of those goddamn files Tony had been practically glued to his computer. He needed to do damage control because apparently his so called teammates didn’t think it important to give him a heads up that not only was Shield compromised but that they were about to project every single one of everybody’s dirty little secrets onto the internet.
Tony already had Jarvis sorting through the data, scanning for any mention of Tony and the people he cared about. J was incharge of making sure anything relevant to Tony and Stark Industries was hidden and removed immediately.
Which left Tony with the incredibly fun job of manually sorting through Shield personnel files to try and protect all of the genuine Shield agents. Apprently the Widow didn’t think far enough ahead to realise that there were hundreds of active agents across the world whose aliases and cover stories had just been uploaded online. Already fourteen people had been found out and killed. At least five family members taken out with them.
Tony was doing his best to save as many people as he could but it was difficult work sorting through all of Shield’s piles of shit.
“Sir?”
“Huh?” Tony mumbled, realising he must’ve zoned out and missed whatever Jarvis had just said.
“Sir, I just informed you that Protocol: The Kids Aren’t Alright, was just activated.”
Tony stared at the wall blankly for a second, his mind running through what the hell that meant. He really needed to invest in more explicit protocol names first of all. Then all at once it clicked. The defence system. The garage.
“Harley.”