"Better than I expected," Avery admitted. "I half expected to be pelted with things from the vents."

"Yeah, pretty much," Kerry agreed with a sigh. "I expected that to go much worse."

"They need to get used to us," Avery said. She sighed as well. "This is going to take a while."

"Yes, it is." Kerry sighed. "We should give them a few days to get used to the idea and then start hanging around. We'll have to be careful, though."

"We should make it a routine, first," Avery said, thinking. "Stop in two or three times a week on a set schedule. We can see what happens from there."

"Right." Kerry nodded. "We don't even have to stop in for long. Especially not the first few times."

Avery nodded.

"Right," she said. She sighed and pushed her hair back behind her ears again, revealing the points. "Ugh I hate having my hair over my ears, it's so uncomfortable..."

"Yeah," Kerry agreed. "Why Fury wanted us to take over..." She trailed off into grumbling.

"He said something about Coulson's list of approved alternates," Avery pointed out. "Did you know about such a list? Because I didn't. That implies that there are more agents than just us that Coulson wouldn't mind looking after Barton and Romanov, at least."

"I did not know about the list," Kerry said. "I should have, but I didn't. And if there are other people, I bet Fury is keeping an eye on them, in case things don't work out with us."

"Which brings up the question, were we first choice, or were there others before us who didn't work out?" Avery pointed out. "And were we chosen because we're freaks, or because we're skilled?"

"That is hard to say," Kerry grumbled. "I'm thinking we're the first ones because they looked pretty unhappy to see us. That or there was someone else who tried to imitate Coulson and pissed them off and left us a mess to deal with."

"Both are equally likely," Avery mused. "We still need to run a bit of damage control, either way. We need to get them at least used to us, even if they don't like us yet."

Kerry nodded. "That may take some time but I think we can manage it."

Avery nodded and stretched a bit.

"Come on," she said, "I think we deserve to go out for dinner tonight."

"Agreed. Let's go." Kerry managed a brief grin and motioned for her to lead the way.

Avery grinned and headed outside.

"That Italian place sound good?" she asked.

"Absolutely." Kerry grinned. "Weapons practice tomorrow morning? I'm planning on going and it's always more fun with a partner."

"Sure," Avery replied, grinning. "I could use the spar."

"Good." Kerry grinned briefly and headed into the Italian place with her.

After two weeks of periodic visits, the girls had settled into something of a routine. One (or both) would show up at the tower, a stack of paperwork in tow, and set themselves up at the kitchen table to work. Avery had already made sure to make friends with the toaster, and she was working on befriending the coffee machine for Kerry.

Kerry had endeared herself to the stove already, and she was also working on befriending the coffee machine. The toaster was next on her list, although she already habitually greeted all of them when she walked in with her stack of paperwork.

Tony largely ignored them. They were doing stuff in the kitchen, he didn't much care about that, and they didn't bother him. So they went from automatically pushing his buttons to minor annoyances.

Although to hear it from Bruce they weren't so bad. Tony was still reserving judgment.

Because they were ignored for the majority of the time, Avery felt comfortable enough discussing things with Kerry that she wouldn't have mentioned otherwise.

"Did you get the memo about the yearly physicals?" she asked her partner as she went through some papers. "My files got transferred again. I swear, no SHIELD doctor keeps me for more than six months. I think I freak them out."

"No kidding," Kerry grumbled. "I'm on my third, and this one is brand new. So I'll have to explain stuff all over again. How fun." She rolled her eyes and signed another form, putting it to the side.

Avery snorted softly.

"No kidding," she said. "They see 'semi homo sapien' on my file and suddenly look at me differently."