Steve takes things like personal responsibility and respect seriously. Tony's got people he pays to take care of that kind of thing, and anyway, he's pretty sure that he's going to die of some exotic disease in his workshop, because Dummy's still a little spotty about what is 'clean' enough to put on an open wound. The rest of the Avengers are in this for personal gain, except for Clint, he just enjoys being a dick. And some things shouldn't be a chore.

Clint's a little older than he looks, and his DNA has a few surprises in store, too.

Jake Jensen is sixteen when he meets Tony Stark at MIT. He's nineteen when he joins the US army, and twenty-four when he becomes a Loser. Becoming a Loser is also when he happens to discover that DADT might apply. But that is not where this story begins. It begins on a cold, winter morning in Massachusetts, when a little girl with hair the colour of cornflakes meets her newborn brother for the first time. (In which there are evil toasters, all-around nerdiness, and ohana ).