Story Summary: Hydra provides its soldiers with food and entertainment just like the "bread and circuses" of Ancient Rome. And what's more entertaining than hosting a raffle where the winner gets to punch a defenseless Tony Stark? Or watching a death match between Steve Rogers and Bucky Barnes? Or holding an auction where the highest bidder gets to choose precisely how Clint Barton will die? Or placing bets on how long Thor could last in a pit full of starving lions?

Hydra has big plans for the Avengers, but first they have to create an elaborate trap...

Timeline: This story takes place after "Captain America: The Winter Soldier" but before "Avengers: Age of Ultron."

Title Change: Original title of this story was "Operation Goliath." It was changed to "The Red Skull Arena" on August 5th 2015.

Reviews: More reviews = more chapters posted more frequently!

Chapter Summary: Tony and Steve regret letting Barton be a Trojan Horse when he's nearly tortured to death.

The Red Skull Arena

PenPatronus

Chapter 1

Operation Trojan Horse

At midnight the bruise-colored clouds shifted aside and the full moon shone down like a searchlight on the dark, derelict Russian prison. A pair of 18-wheelers, four trucks, three vans, and two jeeps sent owls, wolves, and foxes scampering back into the snowy forest of bony, dying trees. At the front entrance a balding lieutenant in a wrinkled brown uniform barked at his dozen troops to get in line. His right hand shook when he saluted–whether from his anxiety or because of the subzero temperature, not even he was sure. Hydra general Joseph "the Tycoon" Tsyganov was tall with narrow lips and angry eyebrows. He wore a thick black coat with the collar up and his shoulder-length silver hair flattened down, but neither hid the fact that the Tycoon only had one ear. His voice resembled gravel falling down a steep slope. "The Superior is expecting this shipment tomorrow, Anders," he growled at the trembling lieutenant. "You better have a hell of a good reason for this delay."

"Y-Yes, sir," Anders stammered. "I mean I do, sir. I have a good reason, sir. It's a surprise."

"I hate surprises unless they're from my wife. Unless it is my wife."

"If you'll permit it, sir, please follow me." Anders led the way into the prison. Two pairs of boots echoed down the damp, cold steps to the basement level. "My men snatched him up in Minsk 48 hours ago. You'll want to speak to him. In fact, you might want to take him with you to Warsaw."

A frozen white cloud of breath trailed behind the Tycoon when he snorted. "Unless this hostage of yours is Nick Fury himself, I doubt that Hydra will have any use for him." When they reached the furthest cell in the deepest corridor of the otherwise empty prison, Anders gestured towards the open door with a magician's panache. The Tycoon frowned, tipped his chin up, and then marched into the cell.

The man hanging from the ceiling by iron shackles around his wrists was barefoot and shirtless. It was so cold that the pools of blood beneath his dangling toes had frozen over as solid and smooth as an ice rink. His body was a minefield of blood, bruises, and goose bumps. Cuts fresh, old, and scarred crisscrossed his muscular chest and arms. The Tycoon advanced like a horse whisperer approaching an injured mare. He knew that a half-alive man could still be 100% deadly, especially if it was a SHIELD field agent. The Tycoon reached out with one sharp forefinger and lifted the man's swollen chin. Instantly he recoiled as if stung. Anders opened his mouth to speak but the Tycoon took him by the throat and shoved him against the cell wall. "You brought one of them here?" he bellowed. "Are you insane?"

"We–he–I thought you would be pleased!" Anders sputtered. "Won't The Superior reward us for delivering an Avenger?"

"Did you check him for bugs?"

"We incinerated his gear, strip searched him, took alternate routes in case we were being tailed—"

"You fool. Don't you know anything about tech advances SHIELD made after the Chitauri invasion?" the Tycoon hissed. "The only way to find his locator beacon is to peel off every centimeter of his skin!" Blood vessels popped in Tsyganov's eyes. "If a man like Clint Barton gets captured, it's on purpose.It's by design!" Anders couldn't even hear his own swearwords when, right on cue, the entire prison shuddered as if from an earthquake. Long settled particles of dust shivered awake and began to rain down on them. "They're here," the Tycoon whispered, watching shallow cracks dance through the walls. "You brought a Trojan Horse into my castle!"

Through teeth chattering in the cold, the prisoner suddenly whispered in Russian, "Needed a name for this. Operation Trojan Horse. I like it." Tsyganov dropped Anders. He had to duck a bit to look into the prisoner's eyes. Clint Barton blinked back and gave his enemy an honest-to-God smile. "Look at you. Ugly as hell… winning personality…you must be The Tycoon. I'm Hawkeye. I'll be foiling your plans today."

Tsyganov slammed both of his gloved fists into Clint's chest with the force of a battering ram. Anders unsheathed a sidearm but Tsyganov barked "Don't!" before he could aim. "The Avengers are here to arrest me," The Tycoon explained. "If we kill him, they'll kill me." The building shuddered again. A few floors above them something was on fire.

Anders ducked when a fresh round of dirt fell near his head. "Sir, we should leave. If there's any chance of escaping the Avengers we should take it now."

Tsyganov didn't disagree. His voice dropped to a deadly whisper and he said to Barton, "You think you've won, don't you? You think I put all of my eggs into this one basket."

"I'd let me go if I were you," Clint advised. "The Avengers are coming. And when they see the state your men have left me in, one of them will have a hell of a temper tantrum. She'll smash your bones into confetti, and then she'll introduce you to the Hulk."

Tsyganov clenched his teeth so tight that one of his molars cracked. "You won't find all of Hydra's armories. If one head is cut off—"

"Yeah, yeah, whatever," Clint sighed. "Hate to be the bearer of bad news, buddy, I really do, but you're the last 'head' in town. Actually, as of now, the last one on the continent."

Anders tugged on Tsyganov's sleeve like a toddler. "Sir, that can't be true. I checked in with the Belarus station and spoke with the conductor an hour ago—"

Tsyganov snatched the gun out of the lieutenant's hand and turned it on him so fast that Anders' desperate expression was frozen on his face when he died. The general pivoted back to Barton and pressed the still smoking muzzle between Clint's eyes. Barton hit him with all he had: a dazzling, satisfied grin. "Belarus, eh?"

The Tycoon must've decided that the suspended Clint Barton was a giant piñata because he spent several of his final precious minutes as a free man whaling on him with a baseball bat.

Clint didn't realize that he'd passed out until he was fighting to pry open his swollen eyes. Five minutes–maybe five days–had passed since the Tycoon dropped that bat and made a break for it. The time didn't really matter to Clint. Five days or five minutes were both too long considering how much blood he'd lost. Every inch of his body that wasn't numb from the cold was too painful to move–or downright impossible to. So he hung there, limp, frozen, and pink like a raw slab of meat in a butcher shop freezer. The prison above him was dead quiet. From Clint's experience he knew that was either a very, very good sign or a very, very bad one.

Few things in life were black or white, but silence was one of them.

Another five minutes—maybe five days—passed, and then Clint heard metallic footsteps approach the cell. A familiar, cocky voice declared, "I found him! I win, Rogers. You're doing the dishes tonight after victory pizza–oh, shit." Scurrying, gasping breaths, and then cold metal fingers poked Clint's neck. "Shit, guys, axe Code Green. Barton needs a doctor ASAP. And tell Banner I don't want to hear any of that 'I'm not that type of doctor' bull—Ouch, stop squawking at me, Romanoff! He's alive." Clint heard a series of clicking sounds and then a whispered, "Please be alive." Warm fingers replaced the cold probes groping for the pulse point in Barton's throat. "Oh, thank God."

"Tony," Clint croaked.

"Oh. Better—" Stark's voice broke. He cleared it, coughed through it, and tried again. "Better late than never, eh, Barton?"

Clint heard the zap of a laser and felt its heat near his hands. The iron cuffs split. He yelped, expecting to crash against stone or titanium or both. He was equally shocked and relieved when he landed horizontally in warm arms. Tony Stark looked ten years older since Clint last saw him two days ago. "Dammit, Barton, what did those assholes do to you?" Tony whispered as he lowered the archer to the floor and examined his injuries. "Or, what didn't they do to you?" He cradled Clint close to his chest and started rubbing his arms. "Shit, you're freezing. You feel that?" Tony asked him. "Can you feel anything?"

Clint couldn't tell where his spine ended and the cold floor began. He took the deepest breath he could and whispered, "Did you get him?"

Tony switched to massaging Clint's left leg. "Thor has Tsyganov tied up like a pretzel. All of the weapons in the armory and the convoy are accounted for."

A memory scratched at his brain. Clint searched for a word. "Belarus," he finally whispered.

Tony tapped a knuckle against Barton's knee. "Still numb?"

"A train in Belarus. Tsyganov's lieutenant mentioned a conductor."

"Clint, you can tell us later. I'm going to put you in the suit, ok? Tell me if I hurt you." Stark instructed JARVIS to arrange the Iron Man armor flat on the floor, parallel to Barton. Clint barely noticed he was moving when Tony lifted him up by the armpits.

"No. Listen… is important–I think it's important," Clint slurred. Barton couldn't move his right arm after JARVIS wrapped around it, so he swiped at Stark's arm with his left. "Tony, list–listen to–ouch, something pinched."

"You felt that. Good. Try to relax, Clint. This suit is one-size-fits-all. It's adjusting to the shape of your—"

"Eggs," Clint blurted out.

Stark looked up from his position kneeling at Clint's feet. He loosened his grip on Barton's left ankle and repeated, "Eggs?"

"Tycoon said he didn't…put all of his eggs…in one basket," Clint managed. "Tony, there's another shipment of weapons heading for the Warsaw armory. We gotta find it. If we don't that Hydra base…that Hydra base will be unbreachable."

Tony's wide eyes blinked. "JARVIS—" he began.

"Accessing satellite images for Belarus, sir," the AI announced in Barton's ear.

Clint's skin started to inch. Several moments passed before he realized that the sensation was heat. "Hey, my fingers are still attached," he muttered. "And my toes and my…Oh, good." The heat urged Clint's body to relax and his mind to sharpen. "It's been days," he suddenly hiccupped. "I was only supposed to be here a couple hours."

Tony had walked into the corner of the room where he stared at a dented bat, several red-tipped blades, and a cattle prod that was still warm. He kept his back turned so that Barton couldn't see his contorting face. "The first convoy in Minsk turned out to be a decoy. So was the second one. We were about to call off the mission and extract you when JARVIS confirmed that the real Tycoon was on his way. If we knew—" Tony swallowed the lump in his throat before it could cause his voice to crack again. "Clint, we would've come immediately if we knew they were torturing—"

"I know," Clint whispered. "You neutralized the target. That's what matters."

Tony raised his drowning eyes towards the cracked ceiling and blinked until they were dry. "Barton, I don't care if we could've ended all of Hydra today. Nothing is worth—"

"Tony?" a voice called from down the hall. "Tony!"

"Here, Cap," Barton said, knowing that the super-soldier's super hearing would catch even his wispy, raspy voice.

A breathless, singed, sweating Steve Rogers appeared. He froze at the threshold and nearly dropped his shield when he saw Barton's blood on the floor, the walls, the ceiling, and Tony's boots. He knelt at Clint's side and examined the wounds visible on his neck, face, and head. Color flooded his face and he gripped Clint's hand with both of his. "I never should've let you do this," Steve whispered.

Clint used his lips and eyebrows to shrug. "Operation Trojan Horse was my idea. I wasn't going to let anybody else be the bait."

"Operation Trojan Horse. I like that," said Tony.

Steve gave the inventor a look that would make the Hulk flinch. "What are you waiting for? Why haven't you taken him to the jet?"

"Cap, his skin was turning blue. I wasn't about to take him outside without a sweater," Stark said, gesturing at the armor.

"I want some hot chocolate," Clint muttered. "And victory pizza…"

Both men expected Clint to fuss but the archer just shut his eyes and held still when the captain lifted him and put him over one shoulder. "Guess I'll watch our six," Clint quipped when he nose bounced off of Cap's belt. He heard Tony say either "Let's get out of here," or "Let's grab a beer," and then he passed out.

To Be Continued