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"Barton, I'm hungry." Natasha complained. It had been almost a week since Thor returned to Asgard with his brother and many of their usual food suppliers hadn't reopened yet.
"Ask Stark to order another pizza."
"They said they weren't delivering to the tower anymore, something about getting shot at."
"We could go get shwarma."
"I wasn't impressed."
"Taco Bell?"
"We going for food?" Tony walked into the room writing on a glowing tablet.
"Clint and I were thinking about it, yes."
"Jarvis, tell Cap and Greenie we're going out for food."
"I don't think we invited--"
"I'm buying."
"He's going." Clint decided as Steve and Bruce meandered into the room.
"Where to today?" Steve asked, looking at the tablet over the top of Tony's head.
"Taco Bell." Clint answered, "Prepare for the best Americanized Mexican food this side of sober."
-----
Even in their street clothes the group was anything but subtle. The greeting they received upon entering the establishment, however, was a bit much, even for the infamous Avengers.
"Master Barton!" A man rushed out from behind the counter and dropped to one knee in front of Clint and bowed his head. It looked like he hadn't slept in two weeks but his peppy demeanor never faltered. "Will Master Loki be joining you today or is it just you?"
"What?" The man flinched and hunched his shoulders, his head getting pushed further towards the floor.
"I'm sorry, sir, it was a stupid question! It won't happen again!" The employees behind the counter looked on in horror, like Clint was going to kick the man whimpering on the floor. They looked to be in much the same condition as the man as well.
"What the hell is going on, Clint?" Natasha asked, eyeing the man on the floor.
"I-uh..."
"Hey," Tony poked the man's shoulder, "look at me." The man hesitantly looked up at Tony. "You know him?" He pointed to Clint and the man nodded quickly. "From where?" He looked at Clint from his spot on the tile, his face asking for permission and his eyes filled with fear. Clint couldn't pinpoint it but there was something hiding behind the fear, he nodded for the man to speak.
"He comes in with Master Loki. Master Barton gets four burritos, no sour cream, chips, extra cheese and a water. Master Loki gets two dozen do-ry-too tay-coes, cinnamon twists and a large Mountain Dew."
"What the hell is a 'do-ry-too'?" Tony asked.
"You coming in with Loki, that must have been when you were still influenced by the Tesseract." Natasha commented.
"I think they are, too." Clint said quietly, nodding to the employees.
"But how?" Steve asked, "Shouldn't it have stopped when the machine was shut down?"
"Not necessarily." Bruce shuffled from one foot to the other. "Our only subjects were Clint and Dr. Selvig, both of which were uh, cognitively recalibrated," he smirked at Natasha. "before the machine was stopped. We had no way of knowing if the Tesseract still had an influence after Thor took it with him. I guess it did." Everyone turned to look at the terrified staff. There was no telling how many people were still under the effects of the small cube. Tony was the next to speak.
"Well, I know I'll have two tacos, one with chicken instead of beef, two orders of nachos and a Pepsi."
-----
Another week had gone by and they had found more influenced people. Tony had a holographic map of the city up on the table they all stood around. There were nearly sixty markers tacked onto various places around the map, each meaning that there were workers still under Loki's influence. The tags were supposed to be color coded by what kind of place Loki had taken over and the fact that all of them were red didn't seem to be by chance. From what they had pieced together Loki had followed Clint around the city, tasting the foods that it had to offer and enslaving the employees for the next time he went in, no other forms of service seemed to have been effected. Steve walked into the room with six large plastic bags and the smell of teriyaki filled the room.
"Add another tag. I'm fairly certain the place next door was hit, too. They just changed their front window display to green and gold."