Disclaimer: I'm too young to be Rowling so there is sadly no way Harry Potter is mine…
Placing:around Hermione's Hogwart's years…
Thanks to Nanchih of ff. net.
They and their PM's are at fault that this fic actually exists. xDD
Ebenbild
Five times Fury chased a ghost and one time he encountered him.
Companion story to most of the Granger Relation stories (Hermione's Hogwart's years)…
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sSsSsSsSs
CHASING GHOSTS
The first time, Fury saw the ghost, was way before he managed to take in the actual subject.
One of his men was sure that Hawkeye – the subject Fury had been after to recruit for the last few years – was in France. There had been a killing near Avignon, done with an arrow, and so they were sure that Hawkeye had to be there.
Fury had send his men the moment he heard about the killing in Avignon. They had barely been half an hour away and had heard about the killing just about an hour or two after it had happened.
After all the years Fury and his organization were chasing Hawkeye, they also finally had a photo of the man they believed Hawkeye to be.
They had gained that photo just two months ago when Phil Coulson as the first agent ever managed to take one of the fleeing Hawkeye.
And yet, while his men still searched Avignon for the missing assassin, Fury was staring at one of the security camera recordings in Brazil – looking straight into Hawkeye's face…
"That's… impossible!" Fury murmured to himself and then looked at the report about the killing of the man in Avignon and the recording that just for a second showed Hawkeye's face while he was crossing the street!
Again, Fury looked from the image to the killing.
"A copycat?" Fury asked himself frowning.
Or did they have the wrong photo?
Alright, the recording was a bit grainy and the photo they had was as well – but they looked like the same person!
In that moment, someone knocked onto his door.
Fury frowned.
"Enter," he growled, looking up from his comparison of photo and recording.
It was Phil Coulson who entered.
"Sir," he said, before continuing right away. "The agents from Avignon have send us an update. Hawkeye's gone."
Fury stared at his agent.
Then he closed his eyes and frowned.
"Tell me, Coulson," Fury said slowly. "Is there any way – any way at all – that Hawkeye is able to kill this man in Avignon and then turn up in Brazil right now?"
Phil Coulson blinked at that question in surprise.
Then he thought it over for a minute or two.
"If he isn't some kind of teleporter or has access to a technology we don't – no," he finally said. "There's no way."
Fury nodded slowly at that.
"Is there a reason why you asked, sir?" Coulson asked him and Fury sighed and waved him off.
"No, Cheese," he said. "Tell our men to comb through the streets of Avignon. Maybe we will at least find out where he lived while waiting for that man if not him himself."
"Of course, sir," Coulson agreed and left.
Fury on the other hand turned his head to stare at the recording – just to frown.
The man he had thought looked like Hawkeye, suddenly didn't look like Hawkeye at all…
His frown deepened while he looked down at the photo in his hands, comparing it with the man in the recording.
The man in the recording definitely didn't look like Hawkeye at all.
For a moment, Fury glared at the recording, then he decided that he was definitely too obsessed with Hawkeye if he saw the man in the faces of other people already…
"Coulson!" He called out.
The moment, Coulson opened the door, Fury threw the Hawkeye's file at him.
Coulson barely caught it in time before he was hit in the face by it.
His normally expressionless face nearly looked stunned while he rearranged Hawkeye's file in his arms.
"This is your case now, Coulson," Fury said coolly.
"Sir?" Coulson's face changed to something akin to a frown.
"You're taking over," Fury said coolly. "I've enough of this case!"
With that he waved him off to do his job, while deciding on his next case.
Three months later, Coulson finally managed to take in Hawkeye – and Fury hoped that this was the last time he would imagine Hawkeye somewhere the man wasn't…
Sadly, this was only the beginning.
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The next time, Fury saw the ghost on recording was about one and a half years later.
It was just the night before Fury had debriefed Hawkeye before he had send him out to a new job in Germany – Stuttgart, to be precise.
Oddly enough, Fury was now staring at a security camera recording from a shop in Aschaffenburg…
"Aschaffenburg… Aschaffenburg," Fury murmured to himself. "That's also in Germany, isn't it?"
He thought a bit about it, before finally giving up and actually researching it.
"Yes," he said slowly. "Germany… about three hours away by car from where he should be."
That just didn't explain why Hawkeye was in Aschaffenburg instead of Stuttgart and – what's more important: What the hell was Hawkeye doing shopping?!
Fury frowned at the recording.
Then he growled and finally reached out towards his phone.
There was just one thing he could do to bring Hawkeye back to where he should be.
He phoned Hawkeye's handler.
"Coulson," he growled the moment the other side was picked up. "Why the hell is Hawkeye in Aschaffenburg shopping?"
For a second, there was silence on the other side of the line, then Coulson spoke up, even his voice sounding slightly stunned.
"Shopping?" He repeated.
"Yes, shopping!" Fury growled.
"Hawkeye isn't shopping, sir," Coulson said and Fury guessed that since the recording was an hour or two old that might be true.
"Then why has he been shopping in Aschaffenburg?" Fury corrected himself coolly.
Another second or two silence, then Coulson spoke up again.
"Hawkeye wasn't in Aschaffenburg – and definitely not shopping!" Coulson objected icily.
"Don't shit me, Coulson!" Fury growled. "I've seen Hawkeye in Aschaffenburg shopping!"
"Sir," Coulson interrupted him coolly. "I was with Hawkeye the whole time – and we definitely weren't even anywhere near Aschaffenburg!"
"Then tell me how I can have a recording of Hawkeye –"
Fury stopped midsentence while gesturing towards his computer where the recording had shown Hawkeye, just to stop midsentence when he saw that the man on the screen didn't look like Hawkeye at all.
He frowned.
That couldn't be! He had seen Hawkeye! How the hell –?
"Everything alright, sir?" Phil Coulson asked from the phone.
Fury frowned at his computer.
"Hawkeye's face has changed into another one on the recording," he said slowly, frowning.
For a second, there was silence, then Coulson sighed.
"Marcus," he said, using for the first time since a long time the first name Nick Fury had grown up with. "Tell me, how long has it been since you slept?"
Fury opened his mouth to object that he wasn't hallucinating and that he definitely wasn't overtired, just to snap his mouth shut and instead answering the question asked of him by Coulson.
"I slept just…," he stopped midsentence when he registered that it was longer ago than he had thought was.
"When, Marcus?" Coulson replied, sounding suddenly stern and Fury sighed.
"Two days ago," he forced out between his lips.
The answer was a sigh from Coulson.
"Go home and sleep, Marcus," he said, sounding tired himself. "And don't object!"
Fury's eyes returned to the screen where a foreign man was shopping in Aschaffenburg.
"I will," he finally promised with a growl. "Might be a good idea…"
Of course, this wasn't the last time, he would see Hawkeye in places he shouldn't be…
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The third time he saw Hawkeye in a place he shouldn't be, was about three years later.
This time, Fury mentally went through his sleep-schedule to ensure that he couldn't be hallucinating thanks to tiredness, before calling Coulson.
"Coulson!" He called out and Coulson came stumbling into the room.
"Sir?" He asked, some kind of pleading in his eyes.
Fury stared at the security recording he had been monitoring.
"Didn't you lose Hawkeye in Budapest?" He asked frowning.
Coulson looked at him unhappily.
"I did," he said darkly. "Why do you ask, sir?"
Fury frowned at the recording.
"Can you tell me why he's now in Seattle?" He asked.
Coulson stared at him.
"Seattle?" He repeated in disbelief.
"Seattle," Fury agreed.
"If Hawkeye would be in Seattle he would have called!" Coulson objected.
"Obviously he is and he hasn't," Fury said sighing.
For a moment, there was silence, then Coulson's eyes narrowed.
"And the Widow?" He asked.
Fury frowned and looked at the recording of Hawkeye leaving a bus.
"Not anywhere near him," he said.
Coulson's eyes narrowed.
"Hawkeye would never leave the Widow anywhere – especially not after they went through hell… and how they left Budapest, that was hell, sir," Coulson stated.
Fury stared at him, before turning around his computer screen so that Coulson could see it.
"Then who is this, Coulson?" He growled challengingly.
Coulson looked at the screen which showed the recording Fury had gone over just before calling Coulson.
"I… actually don't know, sir," he said before looking up and into Fury's face, concern in his eyes even if it didn't show on his face. "Are you alright, sir? Maybe overtired again?"
"I'm not overtired!" Fury objected darkly. "I've slept just yesterday!"
"That's quite a long time, sir…"
"That's normal for me, Coulson!" Fury objected heatedly. "And you can't object that this man is Hawkeye!"
Coulson looked at the screen doubtfully.
"I actually don't recognize Hawkeye in that face," he finally said slowly. "At all!"
Fury turned the screen back to himself to look down onto the recording.
The moment he saw the screen, he stopped staring at it…
The man in the recording wasn't Hawkeye.
"Who the hell is that?" Fury cursed.
Coulson looked at Fury oddly.
"I actually don't know, sir," he said slowly. "I just know that he isn't Hawkeye."
That, Fury guessed was the only thing they agreed on.
Fury sighed and rubbed his eyes.
Slowly but surely he started to belief in ghosts – ghosts that wore Hawkeye's face just to confuse Fury…
Fury scowled.
He would find out who was playing with him by changing the recording temporarily to look like Hawkeye!
Sadly, he wouldn't find out anything about Hawkeye's ghost for years to come…
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The fourth time Fury found himself looking at Hawkeye's face, the first thing he did was groan. Then he did the next practical thing and made a screen shot – just to have proof, this time around, if it should turn out that this was the damn ghost again... not that he thought so, this time around.
"Coulson! Widow!" He called out harshly.
It didn't take long until Coulson and the Black Widow were standing in his office.
"Sir?" Coulson asked the moment they entered.
Fury looked up from his computer screen.
"Where the hell have you two left Barton?" He asked them with narrowed eyes.
The other two looked at each other in confusion.
"Left… Barton?" Coulson repeated and Natasha Romanoff shrugged as an answer to his question.
"Yes, left Barton," Fury gritted out.
"I actually can't remember leaving him anywhere, sir," Coulson stated and raised an eyebrow at him.
As an answer, Fury's face darkened.
"Did you or didn't you two just return from India, Mumbai to be precise?"
Coulson and Romanoff exchanged another glance before both of them agreed.
"We did, sir," Coulson said. "If it's about the report – we still need some time to finish –"
"This isn't about the bloody report, Coulson!" Fury disagreed immediately. "This is about where the hell you left Barton and why you want to wait to tell me that he's still in Mumbai until you're done with writing up your report?!"
At that, Coulson blinked.
The Widow stared at Fury as if he had gone insane.
"Marcus," Coulson finally said slowly. "We definitely didn't leave Hawkeye in Mumbai…"
Fury's eyes narrowed at Coulson.
"Then where is he?" He asked sharply.
Coulson looked at Romanoff.
Romanoff looked at the ceiling.
"I think he had time to escape the hospital wing," she said slowly. "So I'd say the range."
Fury frowned at Romanoff, but in the end opened the surveillance of headquarters in his computer – and there he was, shooting arrows.
Fury frowned and then reopened the recording with Hawkeye's face.
Erstwhile Hawkeye's face…
Now it was the face of a stranger.
Again.
So Fury opened the screen-shot he had made of the recording.
There!
The moment he saw the picture, he groaned.
It was the same face as it was on the recording.
"Damn ghost!" Fury exclaimed furiously. "Coulson, call Stark! I want him to re-check our computers!"
"May I asked why?" Coulson asked coolly.
"There's a damn ghost playing with me!" Fury growled. "And I want it stopped!"
Sadly enough, it wouldn't stop at all…
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The fifth time Fury saw Hawkeye's face on the recording of a security camera, he was more than sure that something was going on. There was no way that Hawkeye could be in a suburb somewhere in London – the British London, to be precise…
It wasn't the first time, Fury used those cameras. He had been using security cameras within Britain since long before Hawkeye had come to work for him – even more often in the last few years…
Still – Fury stood up and walked to the office next to his own where Coulson was situated.
Inside, Coulson was sitting on his desk, working.
In the corner of his office on his couch, Hawkeye was snoozing.
Fury frowned at the inside of the office, but didn't dare to open the door because he knew that the moment he would open the door, Hawkeye would wake up – and that was something Coulson wouldn't want because Hawkeye had been injured and was now finally sleeping.
Still, Nick Fury kept standing there for another minute or two before he finally turned around and returned to his office.
Just a second later, Phil Coulson entered his office.
"Is something, Marcus?" He asked a bit confused.
Fury sighed.
"I'm seeing ghosts again," he said resigned.
"Ghosts?" Coulson asked with a frown.
Fury sighed and then looked at the computer screen where the face of Hawkeye in a shopping district in Malta had changed to that of another man.
"Ghost," he repeated and rubbed his face.
"How –?"
"It's nothing, Cheese," he finally said with a sigh. "Everything's alright."
In that moment, Hawkeye entered behind Coulson into his office.
"Hey," he said, sounding quite a bit sleepy. "Wha's up?"
Then his eyes fell onto Fury's computer and then wandered to Fury's eyes.
"Oh," Hawkeye said and rubbed his face. "Ghos's again, boss?"
Fury's eyes narrowed at Hawkeye.
"What the hell would you know about ghosts, Barton?" Fury asked harshly.
Hawkeye blinked, a bit confused.
"They're a pain in the ass," he answered immediately, before blinking, thinking about what he had said and then adding a "sir".
Fury growled and then waved both out of his office.
"Keep your damn ghosts away from my security cameras!" He forced out before Hawkeye and Coulson had fully left his office.
"Sir, yes, sir," Hawkeye replied and saluted sloppily. "I'll tell them immediately!"
And with that, he was shoved out of the office by Coulson.
Fury suppressed an eye-roll at that reply.
As if Hawkeye could truly stop that ghost from appearing on Fury's recordings!
Of course, actually seeing the ghost hadn't been discussed that day…
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"Who the hell are you?!" Fury growled, staring at the man in front of him.
Said man just leaned further against his office desk.
"I'm Hawkeye," the man said, smirking.
Fury's eyes narrowed.
The man looked like Hawkeye. He had his eyes, his hair, his figure – and yet, there was something different about that man… and Fury wasn't talking about the suit Barton wouldn't even allowed to be found dead in it.
It was something in his demeanour, something in his eyes that told him that the man in front of him couldn't be Hawkeye – or could he?
The man's face turned feral at that.
"Oh," he said. "But I am."
Fury opened his mouth to reply something – not sure himself what he wanted to say, if he wanted to decry the man's word or agree – but was stopped by the man tipping with his finger against Fury's computer screen.
"Doesn't matter. I'm gone in a minute again anyway, Fury," he said and Fury couldn't help but notice that the man's voice sounded like Hawkeye's.
Fury's eyes darkened and he reached for his gun.
The man didn't seem concerned when Fury nearly shoved it in his face.
The next second, Fury knew why.
Before he could react, before he even understood what was happening, someone was behind him, taking the gun from his hands and incapacitating him.
"Thanks, 007," Hawkeye or not-Hawkeye said.
"You're welcome, Hawkeye," the man replied, leaving Fury wondering again if this foreign man wasn't the new Hawkeye, Tony Stark's Hawkeye…
"Barton," he finally decided to growl out. "Why're you here?"
Hawkeye-not-Hawkeye blinked.
Then he tipped against Fury's computer again.
"I heard you've been watching the whole world with that thing," he said nonchalant.
"That's –"
"Fact," Hawkeye-not-Hawkeye replied. "And I'm just here to tell you to stop searching."
Fury's eyes narrowed.
"Stop searching what?" He asked icily.
The man smiled and crooked his head. The motion of the head was Hawkeye's, but the feral smile was all the stranger's.
"Your Good Eye," was the amused reply.
"My Good –"
Fury's eyes widened at that.
Coulson.
He had kept Coulson's survival a secret from the Avengers and had forced the still bed-ridden man to break all his connections to them by keeping quiet.
And yet, there was Hawkeye sitting on his desk, knowing.
"Barton –"
"Spare your threats, Fury," the strange Hawkeye said icily and Fury wondered if it was the revelation of Coulson's survival that had changed Hawkeye that much…
Before he could think about it further, the man behind him chuckled.
"Oh," he said amused. "Now I know why Sherrinford send us."
Fury's eyes widened further.
"Sherrinford?" He repeated. He had heard that name just once before. "Holmes brother?"
The answer was a twinkle in the eyes of Hawkeye.
"Oh, yes," he agreed amused. "And I have a message from him and his brother for you, Fury."
Fury frowned.
"A message?" He repeated icily. "What message?"
"'Stop messing with our security cameras'," Hawkeye replied with bared teeth.
"I didn't –"
"Sherrinford knows without a doubt that you messed with one of his most important security cameras near London," Hawkeye replied and waved it off. "He wouldn't have cared that much if it had been somewhere else but in London – but London… well, it's the Holmes' headquarters. I guess after seeing ghosts more than once you might have started to understand…"
"I –"
"I think he messed with your equipment just a few weeks ago to warn you off one last time," Hawkeye said, a bit thoughtful. "Since you didn't listen – well, Sherrinford decided to take your Good Eye."
"I have every right to check into London if my agents –"
"If you just had monitored your agents, Sherrinford might not be pissed off," Hawkeye said shrugging while exchanging a glance with the man who still ensured that Fury couldn't move.
"This man –"
"Also didn't like that you tried to look into his identity," Hawkeye replied quite un-Hawkeye-like. "Not that you found anything. Sherrinford, after all, is better than that."
Fury opened his mouth again, his face thunderous, when Hawkeye pressed his finger against his lips, leaning in so that he was quite close.
"This is your last warning, Director Nicholas Fury," he whispered. "London is ours. If you want to see Hawkeye and your Good Eye ever again – behave. If you don't, the contract you made up with Mycroft will be null and void."
And this time, Fury believed them…
Still, he didn't promise anything, but his face seemed to be enough for Hawkeye. He signaled the other man to let him go.
Just a second later, both of the men were gone.
When Fury finally was able to check his security system, nothing was to see.
There was no Hawkeye.
There was no stranger to hold him.
And Fury guessed, that maybe once he should listen to the 'nice' warning Hawkeye's ghost had given him the last time he saw him…
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Just a little idea I had. Mostly prequel to "Confession Time."
Hope you liked it
Ebenbild