"Barton, talk to me." Phil bit his lip as he waited for his partner to respond. "Barton, come in." Normally, when Clint didn't answer, it just meant that either his earpiece was playing up or that his hearing aids were failing to work. But this time, Phil could hear some of the background sounds coming from Barton's ear piece. He was starting to get more and more worried that he didn't get a reply. "Clint, come on, this isn't the time for a prank."

Still no reply. Phil ignored the mission – there were enough agents to complete it without his help – and took off to go and check on Clint. He needed to be sure that the archer was alright. He started to run towards the place where he had last seen the man. As panic spread through his stomach, he could only run faster.

And there he was. Clint Barton was laying on the ground, unconscious. Phil rushed to him and fell on his knees next to him. "Clint, please, don't be dead, don't be dead…" He whispered as his fingers fumbled to check the archer's pulse. It was way too weak, he realized. This way, Clint wasn't going to make it.

He quickly used his earpiece to contact Natasha and tell her to get a medical team to where he currently was. When she asked what was wrong, why he needed it, he refused to answer. Natasha kept trying to bother him about it, but he wasn't answering. In fact, he turned his earpiece off so that nobody could bother him anymore while he tried to make Clint as comfortable as possible in his last moments.

How the hell had this happened?

The mission had started great. Clint had been on the roof, where he had been shooting arrow after arrow until he had ran out – and contrary to popular belief, he did carry more than 11 arrows at a time. But then he had ran out – man, there were a lot of bad guys running around – so he left his safe spot up on the roof and he fought hand on hand with the bad guys that were making their life hell. He vaguely heard the other Avengers coming in via his earpiece – that also functioned as his hearing aids, thanks Stark – but he rarely reacted to it. Only when he was given direct orders did he give a brief sign of acknowledgement.

Phil as the one to give him orders most of the time, but sometimes there was something else, just a simply check-in in the style of 'How's it going there, Barton?' or 'Ran out of arrows yet?'. Clint couldn't help but smile as he replied 'just fine, sir' or 'ran out ages ago, sir, do try to keep up'. None of the other Avengers reacted to this, since it was their little form of flirting, of checking up on the other. As long as he replied, everything was fine. It was only when the other side of the line stayed dead that the other had to worry.

They'd been going steady for about four weeks now, and this was their first major battle. Of course there'd been smaller fights – a single bad guy that the two of them could take down – but it was still different, going out with all the Avengers, knowing that everything could easily go wrong. Not that they were planning on letting it go wrong – of course not, they'd be stupid.

So about halfway during the battle – that's what Clint hoped anyway – Phil once again checked in one the archer. "So, Hawkeye. Are there still a lot of enemies down there?"

Clint had smirked – not that the other had been able to see that – and replied: "Yes there are, they keep coming. Why are you asking? Are you jealous that I get to fight while you're coordinating us all?"

Now it was Phil's turn to roll his eyes. "Of course I'm not jealous. I was simply wondering when you might be done shooting and killing bad guys so that we can have some fun of our own."

"Aww, my little Phil wants to play." Hawkeye grinned. During the conversation, he'd been mainly focussed on the guys in front of them, taking them down one by one, but he hadn't been looking over his shoulder – why should he? There were enough camera's in the neighbourhood that Phil could warn him that there was someone sneaking up on him. But Coulson had been distracted too. With how Clint's muscles moved, mainly, as he was fighting off the people that kept coming at him.

"First of all, little Phil's not yours, even though he does what you want most of the time, and second of all, don't pretend like you don't want the same. Just to come home and have fun with me." Phil's voice had dropped down a few levels, which betrayed just how eager he was to get Clint out of the mob of angry people who had it out for him.

Clint didn't reply to the agent since he was a bit distracted. He was also being shot in the back. He groaned softly as pain soared through his back as he was hit three times between his shoulders. He refused to fall to the ground and instead, he turned around to face the man who had shot his. He took out his gun – he was on no state for hand on hand combat – and shot the man in the neck. He dropped down almost immediately – dead.

Clint let out an appreciative noise before he as well collapsed onto the ground. He could hear Coulson almost yell into the coms, demanding him to respond, but he didn't have the strength anymore to do so.

Then time became funny. He was aware that things were happening to him, but it felt like they were happening to someone else. He could see Phil running towards him but he couldn't even be bothered to react as the man was mumbling "Clint, please, don't be dead, don't be dead…" At least Phil was here. If he was going to die, at least it was with the man he loved the most.

Phil couldn't believe that this was really happening. He loved this man to pieces, why the hell did he have to die? He gently took Clint's head in his hands and pulled him closer to him without hurting him too badly. "Come on, Clint, please wake up. I need you."

Clint slowly opened one eye to look at Phil and he sighed in relief. At least there was a chance that he' recover now. He was going to recover, right? Phil quickly checked the body of the archer over to check out what had happened. When he spotted the three bullet holes in his back, his heart sunk. No. This can't be happening.

He once again called for medical attention, but nobody answered his calls. Either they already were on their way, or they weren't coming at all. Coulson just wished that they were close. In the meantime, he just kept talking to Hawkeye, trying to get him to stay with him, but he soon realized that it was of no use. With every breath Clint took, his heartbeat got weaker.

"Clint. Please, don't leave me. I… I need you." Phil's eyes were filling up with tears. "I can't let you die here, I love you. I've never loved anyone as much as I have loved you. Please, don't die on me."

Clint's eyes flickered briefly with recognition and his hands started to move, forming a simple gesture. I love you. After that, his hand fell limp, his eyes closed and his chest stopped moving. Clint Barton, aka Hawkeye, was dead.