Can't Protect Against Yourself

A/N: So. This is the beginning of my first attempt at a chapter story. The prologue is based on the movie, spoilers rampant. It is leading up the a change in Clint and Natasha's relationship. And a plot. I swear. This is a continuation of my story, Before and After, and my drabble, A Still Small Voice, but you don't have to read them in order to understand this one. I didn't get it edited. If I did, I would probably never stop messing with it. Needed to just post it. All errors are mine. Self-flagellation is expected. Hoping you like.

Disclaimer: The things I would do if I did, but I don't.

Prologue: Of Ledgers and Windows

Part 1:

Clint was watching the lab coats scurry around like ants, each alarm increasing their agitation like a stick stuck in the ant hill. It would be amusing if it weren't for the fact that those alarms were attached to something that might end the world. That would suck. He observed the director make a dramatic entrance, his black duster flapping behind like a cape. Fury had a brief conversation with Selvig, who glanced derisively in Clint's direction.

Clint knew that Selvig and the other scientists tolerated him about as much as an inmate tolerates a prison guard, and he had done little to endear himself to them. He didn't blame them. Clint wouldn't like being constantly scrutinized for hints of treachery either. His gaze never wavered as his comm unit hissed and Fury's irritated bark echoed in his ear.

"Agent Barton, report."

A quick descent down his rappelling rope, and he was giving a sit-rep to his one-eyed commander. Fury was chewing his ass out for not getting all up close and personal, but Fury loved to give hell when things were not going as planned. Control issues were standard when it came to spies. When the tesseract began to pulse, Clint was sure things couldn't get any worse. When the spear-wielding "guest" appeared on the platform and began attacking, Clint was sure that they could. When all hell broke loose and he was disarmed with a simple twist of a hand, he was certain that his life was over. And he had a few regrets.

But apparently, this enemy had other plans for him than a quick death from a spear to the heart.

"You have heart." Clint only had a moment of confusion at the words before the world was ripped from beneath him. He felt as if all of his will, his purpose, was shoved deep into a corner, trapped. It was like viewing the world through a chink in the wall of a mental prison. What he could comprehend was that all his faculties had been usurped, refocused and bent to the purpose of HIM. The claustrophobia overwhelmed him, as if he was pinned down, without doors, without a window, smothered by an 'other' flowing through him and leaving him without the breathing room he had always depended on to keep sane. During the struggle against the invading force, Clint caught only snippets of the discussion that was occurring in front of him, but when the gun in his hand raised towards Fury, he used all of his mental strength to redirect from his head. Heart. The bullet entered the body armor, sparing the director's life.

After the flight from the base, Loki, as he could now identified his body's master, questioned him for hours, asking about any and all information he could use to "play" with his adversaries. He asked Clint about missions, actions, pasts, weaponry, but never relationships or emotions. Deep inside, within the walls built by the blue glow of Loki's weapon, Clint was thankful that Loki did not place any strategic value on those things, sparing him from betraying his friends and colleagues any further.

Time seemed to fade as his body was played like a marionette, dancing on the strings manipulated by a madman, without sleep or food. He could only catch momentary glimpses the actions he planned and carried out for Loki, but what he saw was disturbing. All of his skill, the tactical planning and thoroughness, was directed at riding his home, his people into the ground. This was torture enough, but then she appeared behind him, and he knew what real torture could truly be.

Internally, he was beating at the walls of his mental prison as his body struck Natasha, agonizing at the possibility of harming her with those hands he was no longer in control of. Of watching her die. Clint, or what was left of the real him, put every ounce of his strength into distracting his movements, altering his form, leaving him open to her. Anything to give her a chance to finish him. He accepted his end as the inevitable conclusion, actually welcomed death rather than life under Loki's control. Nat would know this, would free him.

Suddenly, Clint felt the wall holding him back loosen, crumble. Shaky and weak, the control of his body was retrieve by his now-whole mind. He looked at Natasha, muttered her name, and was swiftly sent into the bliss of unconsciousness by her fist.

When he regained consciousness, his hands were bound, but his mind was clearing. His body chaffed against the restraints as he struggled to shake the lingering effects of the possession. Of course, she was there, soothing him, helping pull him back. Something was wrong though, in everything she said, her eyes clouded and her voice uncertain.

Clint was certain that Loki must have hurt her somehow. Her response, that she was "compromised," sent a rush of protectiveness through him. He wanted to fix it for her. He wanted to take her away and keep her safe. All of the regrets, the ones he had felt at what seemed to be his life's end, they rushed back to him. Every single one was wrapped up in this woman leaning against his side. Clint didn't know how to process it, was grateful that circumstances allowed him to push aside his thoughts in favor of another mission, but it was only a temporary distraction. Everything in him had shifted, everything had changed for him, and he was pretty sure there was no going back.


Part 2

Natasha was tied to a chair and being threatened with torture, and it was right where she wanted to be. Her target was spilling more in the last ten minutes about his illegal weapons trade than Interpol had learned in months of surveillance and wire taps. All because he saw only what he expected of a woman. Men. They would practically throw information at her. All she had to do was reinforce their opinion that woman were pretty playthings, emotional creatures that were fun to look at but were not able to pose a threat to their masculine dominance.

When the phone call came, she was as confused as her "captors." One did not usually receive a phone call from one's handler mid-mission. Coulson wanted her to come in, but Natasha was not finished. The deception portion of the interrogation was definitely blown, but she still had plenty of information she could convince the General to reveal.

"Natasha, Barton's been compromised." Her handler was straightforward with this information. He knew that was all it would take to get her to move. As she neutralized her targets, a part of her mind was occupied with Clint. Coulson said compromised. Not dead.

When Coulson put off briefing her on Clint's situation, ordering her instead to collect Banner while he picked up Stark, Natasha knew that this was worse than she thought. She had to compartmentalize her anxiety for Clint, which would serve no purpose nor keep him from harm, if she was to head after one of the few people in the world of whom she was afraid.

Natasha hated that Banner rattled her so much, that all of her skills, her ability to manipulate, would be completely meaningless if the good doctor got…emotional. Once she successfully got the "big guy" back to the Helicarrier, with only one breathless moment in between, her worry began creeping back up on her. What worried her most, though, was that her partner was not just captured, but mentally compromised. The thought of losing him to Loki's mind games, the thought of never hearing him call her by those ridiculous nicknames or listening to his playful banter in her ear, that nearly crippled her. Natasha didn't know what to make of this emotional revelation. So she put it away. But she knew that would not keep.

Luckily, the job once again distracted her, keeping her from falling too far into contemplation. Loki's capture, and her interrogation, was child's play. Loki, like most whom she had interrogated, believed that he could manipulate her, which is exactly what she hoped. People revealed their play when they thought they had the upper hand. When she asked about Clint, she recognized that Loki would give her nothing of substance, but the god might reveal how he intended to work on her.

"Is this love, Agent Romanoff?"

Natasha nearly scoffed at the arrogance in Loki's voice. She appeased his malicious curiosity, knowing that his childish understanding of love was meaningless in comparison to bond she had with Clint. Instead, she played with something he would understand. Debt of honor. It was as if a key had turned, unlocking the charming passive exterior and revealing the screaming petulant narcissist beneath. As he listed the less savory aspects of her past, she visibly reacted as he expected to her, cowering, ashamed, frightened, until he let it slip.

She now had a glimpse into his plan, but when she went to neutralize his threat, she was face instead with a room full of egos, a deafening explosion, and a very upset doctor. The ensuing fight for her life, as she found herself knocked to the ground and facing death at the green hands of the Hulk, she felt regret for the first time in her life. Natasha didn't want to die; she needed to see him one last time. Just as she braced herself for the impact, Thor knocked the Hulk all the way into the next room.

The unsteadiness didn't leave with the threat, and Natasha remained motionless, shaking, holding herself together, until she heard Clint's name. He was on the ship. Immediately pulling herself together, she headed to intercept. She refused to contemplate whether she would be able to free him or not.

Once she dropped in behind him, the fight was short and brutal. Natasha took advantage of the handful of openings left in his attacks, incapacitating Clint much faster than it would normally take her. Her only pause came when he called her by one of those nicknames. She felt physical pain landing the final blow that sent him to unconsciousness. Her only focus was to get him secure and get his mind straightened.

When she heard the transmission about Coulson, she couldn't process. Coulson was a fixture in her world, the soft-spoken man who was always there to get them out of trouble, both during missions and at SHIELD. But more importantly, Coulson was like a father to Clint, the man that had pulled him back from the abyss much like Clint had done for her. The bastard Loki had stolen so much from her partner, and Natasha wanted revenge.

Clint regained consciousness quickly, and the guilt followed swiftly behind. As they talked, Natasha felt the desire to punish Loki flow through her, and Clint immediately picked up on it, damn his perception. The regrets, the flutterings of new awareness, in combination with her rage, were once again making themselves known as she leaned on her partner.

"I've been compromised. I've got red in my ledger. I'd like to wipe it out." Natasha spoke of ledgers for the second time that day, but this ledger was a debt owed to Loki. She owed him pain, for trying to break her partner, their bond, for the pain she knew Clint was just beginning to feel. Pain that would lodge in her heart for him.

Things had changed. She didn't know what this meant for her, and she didn't have time to process, but a part of her knew that this was not something she would be able to walk away from. And she wasn't sure if she wanted to.


The battle was done. The victory was complete. The city looked like shit.

Natasha and Clint stood with the other Avengers, awaiting the departure of Loki and Thor. She could only hope that the tortures the trickster would face on Asgard would be as inventive as those she had in her mind. She even whispered to Clint that they could likely do better.

Once the tesseract transported the two back to their home planet, Clint and Natasha got in their car and drove. Between the chaos of the battle and the business of clean-up, they had agreed that a discussion was needed. Clint pulled up to a small riverside walk and parked, and they walked to a bench looking out on them water.

Both sat in silence, both working up to the discussion they wanted to have. Both sensed something off, just before the darts struck the back of their shoulders. Both turned to defend their partner before the neurotoxin took affect and their eyes closed, hands still reaching for each. This wasn't good.


A/N: I could have done better, gone more in depth, but I want to get us to the real story, so I hope you will forgive me. And yes, I cliffie'd. I hope you are at least intrigued. Please review. Reviews motivate me. They make me a better writer. They make me giggle like a school-girl. ;) Shout out to Oddbit, who created an amazing illustration of a scene from my Pre-movie story, Before and After, just because she is awesome like that! See you soon with Chapter 1, if you are interested!