Author note: So, this is more sensual than any of my other fics, but lets be honest...I don't write smut.
Sedated Author not: Well, this one is for all those Clintasha fans whom have always been a little disappointed by my lack of enthusiasm for them as a couple. I honestly can say this was not all my idea, a good friend wanted me to write some sexy Clint/Natasha scenes and this is what happened as a result.
Disclaimer: I do not own Avengers, Marvel, or any other profit making enterprises. I do own a heap of students loans that will be distributed on request.
Rating: M to be safe.
Breaking Fifty Shades
Authored by: (an uncharacteristic) Peechtao/Ezra Cross
She asked for it. That's my opinion. In the end this was everything she wanted. I wasn't blinded by her need to just get away or this surprise trip to the middle of nowhere Alaska. Being stuck in the woods with nothing but a salmon-filled creek, a pair of sleeping bags, and a pop tent wasn't exactly my idea of a vacation. But vacation was never really a part of the plan. There was only a single thing on that woman's mind: to take me out where no one in the world would be watching and ravage me until there was nothing left.
Sure it started out romantic enough. A private biplane that I flew us out in. A cozy little glen. Twenty hours of straight sunlight with which to show world what exact carnal thoughts had been harboring between the two of us over the past year . . . or more.
From our sleeping bags, to the bent meadow grass, to the spring-thawed creek, there was not an inch of that untouched landscape left unbent by our pursuit of one another. Thoughts of the world beyond us never came. I suppose that was how she wanted it. Just us. The Hawk and the Widow in the great outdoors.
We'd had stakeouts like this before, but it was never quite the fantasy she'd always dreamed of. It was hard to get into the mood sometimes with Tony Stark hanging over my shoulder. It didn't bother me as much. He was practically my twin, someone I shared my everything manly with. Talking about our girls was natural. But I guess Natasha was getting a little disgruntled with his constant interruptions of our supposedly private moments.
Then again we weren't doing much these days to hide our obvious affinity towards one another. I gave her those half-closed cat eyes that for a man said "Come hither, woman, and get in my bed."
She gave me the finger curl that read, "I can murder you in as many ways as I can make love to you." She always got me with that curled little finger.
Our relationship was volatile. Mainly on her part. I don't think there was ever an occasion in our lives together, as partners or lovers, that I hurt her more than mentally. Physically, emotionally, spiritually, and any other way she had managed to scar me for life. For one, the bite marks in the small of my back I would now be living with like a vampire's brand. She'd shot me more than once out of spite, mistake, or other random excuses. I thought she died once and I went on a twelve-day bender. I found out on day six she was alive and finished out the other six days in celebration. When we first met she tortured me in a basement in Budapest, leaving scars not only on me body but in the fissures of my brain I could never again heal.
But what can I say? I'm an idiot in love with an assassin. And she's crazy for loving me back. At least I think its love. Neither of us dared to utter the word, dancing around it like teenagers at a bonfire. Things I've done, the things I can never be forgiven for, she somehow can look past them and complete a half of me that I never realized was missing. Until we crossed that line in the sand that kept us partners and made us unrestrained lovers, I never knew what I missed in my life.
I suppose I was just as happy for this little respite as she was. It wasn't often we got a pass from SHIELD to get a week off. Or even a day. Assassins really didn't get those. But our new identities as Avengers came with certain perks that we would never be disappointed with. Sure the paparazzi swarming the Stark Tower and seeing myself on the 5-o-clock news got old. But with a little cover up and clever whit I could still do my undercover work. Nothing much had changed besides the strange fame and fortune that came with a new lease on life. And beside the fame and fortune came the paid vacations on Tony Stark's tab.
When the proposition of us taking off came up, Stark's first response was his need to come along with Pepper. I said yes instantly. I love the idea of a double date with my best friend and Pepper was a better cook than any of us. Natasha was the one to put her heel down on that idea. This was a trip for just the two of us.
I was cool with that too.
Stark offered any one of his half dozen vacation resorts, all of which Tasha turned down. We were going someplace so remote, so out of the way, so on the other side of the globe, there was no way for Stark to suddenly be "in the neighborhood". Well, we were alone all right. The only thing out here besides the foxes, bears, and salmon was the SHIELD satellite we put a show on for every half hour or so. I'm sure the boys filtering through our surveillance footage were sitting in a locked room someplace with popcorn and a notepad taking tips on the Karma Sutra we were busting out with.
During the few moments of respite that we weren't wantonly engaged in illicit activity, we tried to strike out in the brush and live like we'd been trained to. It had been too long since we had a true survivalist mission, one in which we had nothing but the clothes on our backs and something to sleep in (for which I was glad we even had that). A little practice between the two of us relying solely on one another, built not only our relationship, but our foundation. Besides, what man doesn't want to wade into a creek and catch his woman a fish with his bare hands?
Natasha lay stretched out like a leopard on the bank of the creek. One hand propped her head up, her elbow pointed into the grass. She was covered in nothing but my shirt. It was just long enough to keep me wondering what was hiding beneath. She wore a Cheshire grin, her face turned up to take in the beams of the sun. She looked like a perfect Aphrodite.
I was across from her, balancing on the river rocks with the balls of my feet. The water rushed passed my legs, carrying scores of fish up stream. My pant legs were rolled up almost to my knees to keep them from soaking too badly. I didn't need much more than one of those fish for now to keep us fed for the night.
Believe it or not, but I used to be quite proficient at bare-hand fishing. It served me little good in Afghanistan and even less use when I got stationed in that little hole in Belarus. But when I had to track the Black Widow across all of Northern Europe and East Asia I was a hit with the watch a fish crowed. Skills like that people like to use the term like riding a bike with. I'm here to tell you those people are either full of crap, or never rode a bike.
Natasha watched my lack of success with the same smile on her face. I knew she was confident that her own skills had not waned with disuse as mine obviously had.
"How's it going there?" She asked.
I straightened up, snapping half a dozen vertebrae in the process. My back had been protesting since our last round of pin-the-woman-to-the-ground. It was a game I was more than excited to get back to playing if I could just get this fish thing sorted out. Most of the fish had noticed my presence and were making an obvious attempt to simply swim around me.
"Going?" I asked, "Going's great. Going's fine. I am gonna land one of these suckers and then you can see how awesome my salmon cooking skills are."
She nodded. At least that point would never be fought. It was well known that besides off and on luck with bags of microwave popcorn, Natasha was just about the worst cook in existence. I may not have been great, but I was a solid alternative to what she'd be dishing out for us.
"I guess it's not fair." She said, watching me flounder again in an attempt at another fish. "Me making you catch it and cook it. I could do the catching if you prefer."
I should have taken her advice then and not waved her off with my brazen attempt at being the one wearing the pants. If I had, I probably would have avoided running into that bear.
:(:):(:):
Climbing into the elevator was like entering an walk-in freezer after stepping out of an oven. The relief swamped us both to the point where Natasha hooked her arms around my shoulders and I virtually allowed me to carry her the rest of the way. My own weight was transferred to the elevator wall, which I collapsed against in the same wave on content. We were home. After all that, we were finally home.
I think I may have fallen asleep standing there with her in my arms. By the time we even reached our floor of the Stark Tower, neither of us realized we could get off. The doors opened, then closed, and we just stood in the unmoving elevator wondering when we should leave. It was a joint decision to get moving again, otherwise it wouldn't have happened at all and Natasha and I would still be in that metal box sleeping on our feet.
We stumbled up the hallway, passing the various items that transformed the Tower from Tony's bachelor pad to the Avengers' living space. A few short tables that did nothing but hold up fake flowers in fancy vases and some inspirational pictures, of what I couldn't honestly tell you. All of this spilled out into the main room which composed of a sunken sitting area with a couch and some arm chairs with the kitchen set a little way behind that. There was a center island with a black marble top, complete with four bar stools that we tended to use more than the dining table not far from it. Bypassing the couch, Nat and me went for the stools.
Someone was bent over behind the fridge door, no doubt wondering what the maid, Elsa, had decided to stock for us. I think it was Tuesday and she usually did the shopping then. It was like candy land looking in all those cabinets and wondering what one may find. Getting closer, I realized it was Steve. A strange sight at this time of the day. He normally stayed in the gym till at least eight at night before looking for the left over dinner. Elsa's shopping must have brought him up early as usual.
I would be more than happy to start tearing through the normal objects in our cabinets in search of the box of fruit rollups I knew she kept in stock for me, but honestly I had more important things on my mind. Like the eye I couldn't see out of and the swollen jaw of my girlfriend. I didn't even wait for Steve to move before I opened the freezer over his head in search of a few ice bags. We tended to keep them handy. Either me or Tony were in general need of them between our constant bouts with concussive injuries. Finding two I closed the freezer and sat back next to Nat, passing one to her.
Steve popped up from his inspection of the fridge contents to wish me a welcome back. I'm assuming that's what the plan was because after getting a look at the two of us that plan deviated really quick.
"Oh my God!" Steve exclaimed. Not a guy to get shocked by much, he just couldn't restrain himself in this case. I'd only seen a little bit of my reflection about twenty hours ago when we were still in Alaska. I assumed it was bad.
Steve's head bobbed between looking at me, and looking at Natasha, and then back to me as if wondering who was worse off. On a comparative standpoint my eye looked the worst, but she was a woman and that tended to pull at his heart strings harder.
"What happened?" He asked, "Do you need a doctor? Have you seen a doctor yet? I thought you were on vacation?!"
Natasha waved her hand a few times, the universal meaning for Steve to take his voice down a notch and allow her brain a chance to recover. I could only concur with her feelings. We had both expected this reaction, how could we not?
Hearing the commotion, it was natural for those within earshot to come running. In this case it was Thor and Bruce. Someone shouted Tony's name. It wouldn't be long until they were all gathered around poking us like goats at a petting zoo.
"My friends!" Thor exclaimed, louder than Steve. "Great realms, have you suffered at the hand of some mighty foe? Should his end not have been met, you have my hammer to dispense retribution at this atrocity!"
"Clint, can you even see out of that?!" Banner said, switching from concerned citizen to doctor mode. "Natasha, open your mouth."
I fought my swollen eyelid with no use at recovering my sight and Natasha braved her swollen jaw to display the three missing teeth on the right side of her mouth. Well, three and a half now that I'm getting a good look at it.
"What the Hell happened to you two?" Tony now entered the conversation. He was dressed in a suit with high top sneakers. Typical for his dress-up days but I hardly knew the last time he'd had one of those. A suitcase was in his hand, adding to the weird state in which he appeared.
"What are you wearing?" I asked, truly curious.
"I had a meeting with Rhodey, one I'm canceling. What is all this crap?!" Stark dropped his suitcase on the table. Behind him Pepper rounded the corner. She was dressed in a smart little pinstripe skirt and blouse. I'm sure upon first sight she held much the same opinion of our condition as everyone else. She didn't say anything directly to us; instead she pulled out her phone then moved off to a corner. I overheard the call to cancel with James Rhodes.
"Is this leg broken?" Banner nearly shouted, tracing the football shaped swelling from Nat's knee to her ankle.
Natasha said no, but it didn't fool anyone.
"I may have slipped a disc." I reported, folding over the kitchen island with my face on the icepack.
The Avengers assembled around us. Steve grabbed a few dish towels off the stove handle and wrapped our ice packs in it to prevent freezer burn from adding to our ailments. Pepper got a pot of boiling water going after pulling out a can of Swiss Miss and the box of fruit rollups. I forgot how awesome she was sometimes.
"Well?" Tony demanded.
Beside him Thor was tense; waiting to know what beast had befallen us.
Natasha and I already had our story ready. We'd had more than enough time to relive it since leaving that scorched Alaska earth. I didn't want to be the one to start. I was always the one coming home with the crazy got-the-crap-kicked-out-of-me stories.
So, Natasha with her missing teeth and swollen lip started for us.
"We kicked a bear." She said.
I looked sharply over at her. Her face showed nothing but unabashed emotion. The others looked at me.
I shrugged. "Yeah. We kicked a bear. Right in the head."
"And after that it didn't go well." She added.
"Actually, things went downhill real fast." I said.
"It was a big bear."
"Huge."
"Brown."
"Real tall."
"Sharp claws."
"It bit me." I said, displaying the minor teeth marks healing in the flesh of my back.
"We didn't exactly mean to kick it. I just sort of happened that way." She said.
Steve, Tony, Thor, Pepper, and God-bless-him Banner all stopped what they were doing to look at the two of us. Sure it had to have looked like we tousled with an Alaska grizzly. But kicked him in the head?
"How exactly did you end up doing that?" Steve asked.
Natasha could only grin with half her mouth, giving her the look of a recent dental patient recovering from Novocain. "Well, it started like this:"
:(:):(:):
I had just about been ready to throw in the towel on my ability to snag us dinner before the sun went down. Granted, that particular time period wasn't for another six hours, but the fact remained I was getting absolutely nowhere. Even the change of position wasn't conducive to my fish-catching skills.
Up the creek a little way from our camp was a three foot rise. It was like something one would see in a Discovery documentary about Grizzly bears in Alaska. I could just imagine the outline of some big fuzzy lug hanging his head over the drop, waiting for a flying fish to leap right into its mouth. It was this principle alone that inspired the move up stream. Natasha followed with her eyes full of amusement.
I had only been there a few minutes, standing with my knees bent, hands out, waiting to get smacked in the face with a ten pound fish. They were jumping all right, in every direction but mine. Out of desperation I abandoned the don't-get-pants-wet strategy in order to get myself one stupid fish. I dove left, the right, slipped and fell on my backside. Natasha was laughing as she watched me wiggling around about as much as the salmon I was after. The laughing halted abruptly.
I thought I had impressed her at last. After a two-hour ordeal I at last emerged the victor of the creek with a whopping six-inch catch flopping around in my hands. To me, this was the best catch of the century. To the bear that snuck up behind me, it was an easy meal.
It didn't make much of a noise at first besides some huffing and puffing. Like a wolf from the Three Little Pigs. My hair suddenly went back and forth with a strange hot wind that hadn't existed before. Desperate not to let go of my catch, I tucked my shoulder and turned my head to see what massive bug was fanning me with its wings. Seeing the protruding snout of a bear was not exactly what I was expecting. I'm not sure why when faced with a grizzly bear my first feral response was to protect that stupid fish. I clutched the slimy thing to my bare chest with one hand, the other I waved right in the beast's face.
"HA!" I shouted, you know like they tell you to on those survival shows. I tried to look like a big mean human, not something to be tasted or trifled with. And certainly not someone to try and steal a free meal from. I backed up slowly, continuing to shout whatever obscene articles that a bear may find offensive. I started out in English then for some reason began rattling off in German, French, and then Swahili. Why an Alaskan bear would be bothered by an African language, you got me. But I suppose no one is thinking straight when an animal like that just shows up.
"Clint!" Natasha hissed from somewhere behind me. "Clint, be careful!"
I wanted to ask her if she was blind. Obviously, standing across from that thing, the name of my game was being careful.
"BACK BEAR!" I roared, my voice deep and powerful (or so I like to tell myself). To my disappointment he seemed unfazed by these brazen moves from a bipedal naked grunted lowly at me, dropping its massive head to sniff at the water. One huge paw came forward again, followed by the next.
"Clint!" Natasha hissed again.
I raised my voice, screaming at the bear as if he could understand whatever language I was spewing at him. I stepped back again, this time there was nothing for me to walk on but air. In the shock of meeting a grizzly I had forgotten about the three foot ledge. Since I led with my full weight on that now unsupported foot, I went sailing backwards, my hands wind milling, the fish went flying, and I landed in the creek face up. Natasha raced over to me, my shirt flapping over the water as she pulled me to my feet and we ran for our lives. Some assassins we made. Here we were having a beautifully erogenous weekend, one in which not a single instrument of self-preservation was allowed, and we are beset by wildlife.
With nothing at camp but a backpack full of clothes and the two sleeping bags, it was easy to grab out things and run for our lives. The bear seemed more interested in the creek of fish then the two strange people racing away at break neck speed.
As we ran, Natasha worked on her pair of jeans. I was just ahead of her, folding up the sleeping bags in mid-stride. All I could hear was the strangled scream that made my heart go cold.
I remembered something I heard from a comedian once. You don't have to be faster than the bear; you just have to be quicker than the slowest person running from it.
:(:):(:):
"I fashioned a spear out of a tree limb I found. It's how they taught us to catch easy fish in SHIELD basic. We wanted to keep it simple. Strike out on our own again. I caught plenty that first day." I looked over to Natasha for confirmation. She was going for bear-kicking. It was my right therefore to improve the situation.
"Yeah," she picked up, "We set some out to dry for later. Clint was going to fry up his famous salmon for dinner."
"I make one mean salmon filet." I professed. It was true.
"But we never really got to that part." She reported.
"Yeah, the bear shifted our plans some."
"I think it probably just smelled us out."
"Came looking for food."
We both nodded. It was logical. The others agreed. None of them had ever encountered a grizzly before. Tony took a moment between Banner peeling off Nat's crapped-out shoes and my shifting the ice bag over my face to Google the word bear on his phone. Thor gave a surprised look.
"A peculiar beast, it is sure." The Asgardian said. Everyone knew what he was really thinking. He wanted to find one at his earliest convenience and test his inhuman strength against it. Preferably he would go out into the Alaskan wild, find our exact bear, and match himself quite satisfyingly.
"Go on." Steve prodded after the interruption.
"Well," I replied, "While I was out spearing a nice two-footer (I swear, it was the biggest salmon I ever saw) all of a sudden this big brown mass just charges out of the woods next to me. The water started jumping like an earthquake, the fish ran scared, and all of a sudden I turn around and this thing is right on top of me."
Natasha shivered as Banner cut back what was left of her jean pant leg. The discovery produced the lovely blue-purple swelling that was most likely a clean fracture.
"What he do, get a hold of you?" Bruce asked her.
"Yeah." She said without pause. "I saw him come up on Clint. He was huge."
"Gigantic. Took one big paw and just slammed me down the creek." I added. For emphasis I rubbed a hand along my spine. So, it was close to the truth. But after Natasha's unscripted bombshell I couldn't restrain myself.
"I went to grab Clint and the bear ran after us. I got tossed to the side."
"I thought he was really gonna eat her." I put in.
"What about your fishing spear?" Pepper interrupted. She plopped a mug of hot chocolate in front of me, the top covered in whip cream. Beside it she slid over a fruit rollup. The gesture made my core all warm and loveable. Some part of me was transformed into a five-year-old. What grown man eats fruit rollups? What assassin on this planet goes out of his way to eat that? Me. And Natasha apparently because she did not do much to hide the sneaky hand she reached over with to steal my space-ship fruit cutouts.
"I lost it." I answered Pepper after I could think of an answer. "Dropped it when the bear knocked me over."
"Lost dinner too." Natasha said, a little disheartened at the inflated memory.
"So, Tasha's sprawled out on the ground, and this bear is just running up behind her with this gnarly drooling mouth, roaring like crazy. I think at once she's dead. There's nothing I can do at this point and she's just dead."
"But then the thing drops its big head down and I'm able to get one good kick in." Nat said.
I looked at her. Obviously I was hoping to be the bear-head-kicker of this story. But she had other plans. So be it.
"Yeah but it didn't do any good." I said. "Cause the things head's the size of a semi-truck. It did give us enough of a distraction to get up and just start grabbing whatever we can for a standoff. After all, we had to claim our turf or lose it. And we don't lose easily."
"Dang straight." Natasha grumbled. She grabbed the cup of coffee Pepper gave to her and sipped it sorely. I bet that felt like hot coals going down her throat.
Banner had enough of looking at what he knew was going to end up being radiograph of her leg and moved to me. It helped him that I was already shirtless. The obvious hitch in the flow of my spine was easy to see, along with Natasha's savage mark in my flesh. Cuts, bruises, scraps created a discord of color against my tanned skin. Bruce had that look on his face. The one he adopted when one (usually me) of us came home in a bad way. He was thinking about the limited medical equipment in the lab, his lack of a proper x-ray unit, casting material, and the supply of liquid-stitch he had left in the bathroom closest.
I let him go through the motions I knew too well. My story continued, recanting the epic tale of Natasha Romanov and Clint Barton against the grizzly.
:(:):(:):
When I looked to the side and saw that Natasha was not right there with me a feral part of my mind took over. I stopped and turned all at once. My right hand was balled into a fist as I pivoted in place. If that bear was creeping up on us or had taken her already I was all set to punch my fist through its skull until every bone in my hand broke. Maybe that shouldn't be my first reaction when faced with the slobbering jaws of a grizzly, but there you have it folks, Clint "Bear Grylls" Barton, bear fighter extraordinaire.
The bear wasn't behind me only Natasha was. She had a bloody nose, a look of murder in her eyes, and lay sprawled across the grass in a non-sexy position.
"You all right?" I asked, worried.
She pushed herself up; untangling her foot from what must have been the smallest root to ever fell a human. In the little cove of trees we found ourselves in, the knob of a tree root just pushed up from the smooth ground enough to catch her toe.
"Ow." Natasha complained, holding a hand now to her bleeding nose.
I surveyed the open trail we blazed from the creek to our current copse of trees. We'd gone nearly a third of a mile in no time at all. I could see the blurry mass of brown muscles waddling around in the water, getting his fat fill of salmon. Looking out at the land stretched before us was like opening a National Geographic magazine. High mountains capped in snow crested the sky itself. A thin band of clouds clung to their middle like the rings of Saturn. Across the endless purple, yellow and green wild flower fields a line of pines competed against the blueness of the sky. Picturesque. Beautiful.
Satisfied we were in no immediate danger I turned my attention back to Natasha. I offered a hand and got her back on her feet. I dropped the sleeping bags next to the backpack we shared. Our world of possession in a single spot.
"We tell no one about that." She said with a nasally whistle.
I nodded, not daring to argue. "That would be some story to come home with. I fell on my back and ran like a lunatic, Tasha followed and did a face plant. Yeah, doesn't have that romantic ring."
She swatted my arm. I thought it was playful at first until I saw the wolf spider that hit the ground by my foot. I screamed like a woman, then proceeded to smash the offending insect with my . . . bare . . . foot.
"That is so disgusting." I growled, wiping my foot against the grass as if trying to dislodge dog crap from my boot heel. I grabbed the one spare shirt I had been permitted to bring with me and handed it over to Natasha. She took it and pressed the fabric to her oozing nose.
"So much for dinner." I pointed out with a sigh.
"We can follow the water for a bit, head down stream." She suggested.
Our eyes met. She looked like a kid with her red nose and my big shirt covering her torso. Her jeans were hardly on. With two buttons cinched up the wrong way and her zipper missing a few teeth. It was amusing to try and figure out whether that happened during her fall or the night before when we quite literally tore each other's clothes off. The errant thought must have shown on my face.
"Never even made it off that plane before you grabbed me." She said.
I grinned, striding forward like a stud to take her in my arms. "I'm pretty sure you grabbed me. Then we fell out my door and onto the pontoon."
"The water was cold."
"You were warm enough."
The shirt dropped from her nose and we were at each other again. Our love was like a wild run through the wilderness into a land of mountains and wildflowers. Our souls were one with each other, our bodies moving on pure instinct and savage passion. Even if the bed of moss sprouting from the ground in our copse of trees hadn't been there to cushion our bodies, it wouldn't have mattered. Our growling stomachs filled with a separate hunger. Fishing could wait.
I liked her hair when it was longer. I loved pressing my hands through it, filling my senses with the perfume of her body. Shorter made it easier to remain untangled as my hands ravaged paths through it.
She leaned forward, closed the space between us, and pulled my face to hers. Our lips met one another. I brushed against her for a second, tasting her skin, and pulled an inch apart. My eyes were closed. I couldn't see the hungry look upon her face or the passion that flared into her cold eyes. I moved my hand behind her head and pulled her against me again. The intensity skyrocketed between us to levels I hardly knew myself capable of. My arms wrapped around her neck as she angled her chest against mine. Our lips danced across each other. Crushing forward and pulling back in exciting waves of ecstasy. Suddenly her knee was up, crossing behind mine to close every inch of air that separated us. Her hands first went for the back of my neck, massaging the taught muscles built up over years of working with my bow. Then they trailled lower, her nails drawing lines across the edges of my back. Half elecricity, half pain, it was driving my mind wild.
Our moment of passion was interrupted before it got as far as either of us wanted. First, Natasha's hair snagged on a piece of bark from a log we had crashed beside. In my pursuit to get her free, my eyes caught the sight of a little red creature making off with one of our sleeping bags.
"HEY!" I shouted, jumping to my feet to run after the thing. It was a red fox, actually it was three of them. Only one was rushing off with my sleeping bag, the other two were skittering around it yipping and whining like it was all a big game to them.
"Clint, quick grab him!" Natasha complained. She worked at her hair, finally pulling it free but leaving a decent amount behind. She fixed her jeans and ran after me and the trio of foxes.
I shouted at the animals, picking up little stones along the way. I didn't want to hurt them, it was obvious they were just playing. If Natasha and I got close, they would run, barking and nipping at each other in excitement. If we stayed where we were they would stop not that far from us. The one with my sleeping bag dropped it and cocked its head at me.
"Yeah, real cute." I said as if it would understand me. "You are interrupting me nailing this lovely lady to my left, do you realize that?"
His head tilted the opposite way.
Natasha snickered beside me. It was humorous. First a bear runs off with our dinner then a bunch of foxes waltzes up and run off with our sleeping bag. She pushed my shoulder, indicating we flank around them. Chances were one of us was going to end up with it.
The chances were correct, but the timing was both exhausting and mood killing. It must have taken three hours to get those things to give us our sleeping bag back but when Natasha finally did get the drop on them we were a good mile from where the game all started. By the time we actually made it to our supplies (I am using that word rather generously now) the two of us were exhausted. The foxes weren't finished with us, though. They hung in a ring around our camp, making it necessary for us to place our backpack between Nat's sleeping bag and my own just in case it went missing as well. We were both hungry again, but figured that a new day would sort that out. I wasn't shy about letting Nat take the lead in the morning on the fish catching. If worse came to worse, we could just have fox stew.
I estimated that sleep grabbed me for a grand total of ten, maybe stretching to fifteen minutes before I felt the pull on my sleeping bag again. I rolled over, tugging the backpack to my chest and kicking my legs at the critters trying to make off with me again.
"Get off." I muttered.
When the tugging persisted, I gave the fox a bigger shove to get him to let me alone. Something close by growled lowly. My eye crested open to look for the source.
"Well, stop tugging at me you little red and white beast or I'll—" My voice cut off. Standing over the end of my sleeping bag was not the trickster little fox I had assumed would be there. Instead, it was massive grey wolf.
A clot of spit formed at the back of my throat. For the life of me I couldn't swallow it. My hand reached out slowly, the fingers settled on Natasha's shoulder where they gently squeezed down. She'd know better than wake up with a start and get us both eaten alive. Or, normally she would know better. I don't know what in the world possessed the once-in-a-lifetime change that had Nat thrusting out of slumber and sitting up with an exclamation on her lips. This startled the massive wolf at our feet. He jumped back, barking in discontent. To my left something growled and snapped its jaws. It didn't take a biologist to know that another one was tucked away in the bushes, watching.
Its official, I am never coming to Alaska without my bow or bowie knife again.
Natasha realized her mistake the minute her eyes opened. She tried to amend the situation by going still and quiet, but by the then jig was up. We had only a single recourse left. We had to run, now, and if we were lucky climb a tree. My sleeping bag tangled around my feet, spilling me headlong as Natasha scrambled out of hers. I headed left, bursting through the tree line in the direction of the closest growls. I figured it was best to rush the line of wolves now and send them scattering rather than give them an easy target to chase. Most likely, I hoped, they were just curious. If I proved more trouble than it was worth, they may just take off and leave us be.
As I ran, I grabbed a large hunk of tree limb and waved it over my head. I tried to appear as crazy as I could. One wolf, taken by surprise, turned and snapped its jaws in warning. I swung the tree limb like a bat, shooing it away. Behind me another set of light footfalls was coming up quick. I turned, swinging at the same time.
Right at that moment I did one of the things in my life I would come to regret the most. I swung like a major-league batter. I hit the invisible ball out of the park, but it wasn't a wolf's snout I was swinging against. It was Natasha's face. It was too late to pull back the full force of my blow. All at once I had been chasing wolves in the midst of the night, now I was knocking out my girlfriend.
Natasha's head snapped back as she stumbled and hit the ground. I rushed forward, remembered we were still surrounded by wolves, and instead grabbed her around the waist and tried to make off into the night.
:(:):(:):
"So I grab the closest thing I can find. I was routing around in the water and come up with this tree-lib sized Louisville Slugger. So I grab it, I'm still shirtless, running through the water of this stupid creek towards this nasty bear who's got Natasha flat out on her back. This bear just reeled up, and I'm swinging this thing at him." I recanted our harrowing journey.
"Oh, that sucks." Steve said, shaking his head. He'd heard his fair share of fish stories in the past. It was hard to tell just exactly what Nat and me were deciding to embellish and what we weren't. The end result was practically the same, however. We sure got the crap kicked out of us. Whether it was a bear or not.
Bruce ran his fingers along my spine, manipulating the disjointed vertebrae he found along the way. I paused my story telling to scrunch my face at the doctor's ministrations.
"All I saw was Clint with this half a tree after this roaring bear." Natasha picked the story up. "And he just starts wailing on him. At some point the bear stumbles back, I'm trying to get out of the way, and the thing goes right over and hits me. So now I'm in the water, this bear's huge foot comes right down on my leg and I slam my head into a rock."
She pulled the icepack away from her face to display the beautiful array of missing teeth. Tony, Steve, and Pepper all grimace. Thor closed in, his curiosity overwhelmed by the sight. "I'm assuming you know a good dentist, Stark?"
Pepper pulled out her cell phone and began to dial a separate number. Stark probably had no idea who his own personal physician was (besides Banner) so asking him to remember the name of his dentist was equally useless. Pepper, as always, filled that void in Tony's life.
"So," I said, trying to brush Banner's hands off. "I rush over and grab Natasha."
"And that's when the bear comes too." Natasha added.
"I've got Natasha, this bear snapping at our rears, and we're both running to get back to dry land."
"Which is how Clint really hurt his back. He was rushing to get me out of the water and none of us were really looking at the bear. That big lug just reached up and slammed us sideways until we couldn't figure out which way was up."
"So there we are, splayed out on the ground. Nat's got a busted lip, her leg's broken. I can't really move. And this thing just keeps thundering on over like he's gonna eat us alive."
Thor rested his hammer on the kitchen island. His mind was overcome with the imagery of it all. Surely we painted him a picture that this bear must be a horrid beast, fiercer than the Slikneg Pak or even a Rovreffs Sen or whatever other weird creature he could come up with in that Asgardian mind of his. A beast as large as the Stark Tower, as mean as the Hulk's temper, as strong as all of Thor's thunder! "By the power of Odin, my friend, how ever did such a thing be defeated?! Is he still in existence, this maniacal beast that was set upon you? Where be his location that I may return his hide for decoration on our mantel?!"
Tony placed a gentle hand on Thor's chest. "Easy, slugger. For one, we don't have a mantel. And frankly a bearskin anything is just a little too native for me." He grabbed another fruit rollup from the cabinet and tossed it on the counter beside Thor's hammer. "Here, now get with the story."
I took the offering, launching back into the epic finale.
:(:):(:):
"I HATE you. I honestly, right now, hate you. You thought Budapest was bad? You thought you had it rough when I strapped you to a chair and slid every single hypodermic under your fingernails one at a time? You think it's bad when I shot you and locked you up, and left you for dead? Well, let me tell you that is nothing compared to what I am going to do to you!"
I supposed this reaction was normal. It wasn't every day Natasha and I had a vacation all to us. And then that vacation was systematically ruined by every force of nature available in the Alaskan wilderness. First fishing, the bear, the little adventure with foxes, and then waking up to a pack of wolves attempting to turn us into a snack. It wasn't the best turn of events by far. And me knocking out a few of Natasha's teeth was probably the worst part. She'd gotten me back pretty quickly. Not half a second after her recovery from the impromptu smack, the tree limb was in her hands and that was the last time I saw straight out of one eye. Over time the eyelids had swollen up in perhaps a fitting retribution. For her though, it was nothing compared to the audacity of losing some teeth.
I had Natasha hoisted up under my arm, until she got sick and tired of being so close to me. She wasn't bleeding too badly and to my relief she didn't have broken jaw. I certainly swung that tree limb hard enough to do the job. Instead I was left with an angry assassin, nursing an injury she should never have gotten, and the only one she had to blame for it was me. It was the only time I was happy we hadn't come into this abandoned wilderness with any weapons.
"I know." I told her. It was my sad attempt at placating her increasing fury towards the sight of me.
"You don't know a thing!" She growled. Poor thing looked a mess with her fat busted lip. And the way her missing teeth made her voice come out different wasn't exactly unrecognizable either. "You might think you do, but you don't! Let's get out of this Hell-hole! I want full access to my knives, my bullets, I want to feel the perfect weight of my nine-millimeter in my hand—No, I want my .45. Yup, my .45. I am going to blast a whole so big in that cheesy smile of yours that you won't know what to do with yourself!"
I sighed. It was a long walk of shame back to where we'd parked the biplane. The sun had finely set, giving us a picturesque view of the unspoiled star scape. It was just as unearthly beautiful as everything else in this place. But in the same moment I could no longer stand it. The world could have its unspoiled land, the unwalked trails through forest paths and the secret grooves for lovers to hide in. Give Nat and me the back of an abandoned city bus in the middle of a Moscow war zone. Stark can watch all he wants.
"Dead." She continued to whisper. "Just, dead."
"I know." I told her. "But, it was fun while it lasted."
She gave me another killer look.
I shrugged. "It's true. Hadn't had this much fun in a while, I have to say. Yeah, I know. So half the time crap didn't end up like it was supposed to, but still. It's all about making memories. And I don't think I'm soon going to forget how awesome it was to see you bare as birth naked next to that glacier fall."
She stopped walking long enough to look at me. I suppose she was trying to figure out if I was being serious or not. "Bare-as-birth naked? Really?"
I nodded.
She punched my arm. It could have hurt worse if she'd wanted it to. I guess I struck a nerve with her. As bad as it was, we had enjoyed at least a little bit of our time together.
The hike wasn't long, maybe an hour's worth of following the creek bed until it opened up into the lake where I'd set the biplane down. Night was almost as short as our walk. Already the edges of the black sky were beginning to fold back. One by one the stars were flickering out and the sky that never existed in the city was disappearing. It was a shame, really. I bet it was the last time Natasha and I would ever be out in that wild place again. To see it all just go away under a hail of bad luck was a sad prospect.
"Sucks." She said, interrupting the typical plots for my death I had listened to since leaving camp.
"What?"
"You know. Heading off so quick. We can't stay. Not with this." She indicated her swollen lip.
I indicated my swollen eye, the one I had lost the ability to see out of as the lids approached each other and sealed off. "Not with this either."
She gave a weak grin. It was one sided, more of a smirk but it was all she could manage. "I'm sorry for trying to claw your eye out."
"Sorry for smacking you in the face." I replied.
"And I'm sorry I made fun of you not being able to catch a fish." She went on.
"But I did catch a fish." I pointed out. We had stopped walking now. We stood on the edge of the small rock face that overlooked the lake and watched as the sky began to fade into the colors of morning as the stars behind us continued to fall away. Natasha's arm was around me again.
"Ok, you did." She assented. "Right before the bear took it away from you."
I snickered, and she tried to. It wasn't long before my lips were tenderly against hers and her hands were snaking all over me again. Like newlyweds on a honeymoon. We just couldn't help ourselves. Regardless of all the idiocy that had been going on around us, or that we swore off surviving in the Alaskan wilderness for the next ten years, we couldn't resist this last fling in paradise. Until, that is, the ground caved in beneath out feet. This time, I went over head first, crashing down the slope nearly thirty feet straight down. Natasha came tumbling right after, like the Jill to my Jack. Or, humpty dumpty would probably be more appropriate in this case. I hit the lake back-first, bounced off a few rocks and fell into the water. I heard the sickening crunch of Natasha landing beside me. Half of her hit the water, the other half hit the rocks, splitting her leg.
Officially worse vacation ever.
She didn't seem outraged, or even in as much pain as I would have thought. She just sat up and glared at the hill as if she would one day come back and drop a nuke on it. "Clint," she said, voice dripping in acrimony, "Get me the Hell out of here."
:(:):(:):
"And that's when we see it." I said, bringing our dramatic tale to the climax. "The plane's just sitting there. I know we've got something in there we can use against the big sucker if we can just get to it. Nat's limping along like her life depends on it, I'm army crawling my way to the plane and the bear's still thumping behind us."
"I get to the plane first and I'm looking all over for the survival kit." Natasha jumped in. "I know the flare gun is in the case and if I could get to it, it might be enough to scare the thing off."
"I'm crawling up the side of the pontoon, kicking the bear whose trying to take my leg off and I'm screaming at Nat to hurry up with whatever she's doing. My thought was getting to the fuel tank. So that's where I went first."
"I find the flare gun under the seat and load it just as the bear realizes I'm on the other side of the plane. He's after me now and trying to dig Clint out from underneath the pontoons where he's draining the fuel tank."
"Natasha slides to the other side of the plane, and shimmies down under the belly with me. All the while I'm fighting to get some fabric ripped off of me and soaking it up in the fuel. The bear's ticked, he tries to push his big head up between the pontoon struts to get to me, and by this time Tasha's already got the flare gun loaded and ready."
"The minute he opened his jaws wide enough to try and bite Clint's arm off and drag him out, Clint had his pant leg ripped off and soaked in jet fuel. He balled the whole thing up and threw it down the bear's throat."
"And then Tasha shot the flare gun."
I sat back in my chair, trying to straighten out the impromptu chiropractic job Banner did on me. At least I felt better, even if he was poking around my eyeball now. It didn't need to be said what happened to the bear. Full of jet fuel and an ignition source it was pretty well apparent he became little mammalian filets with which to feed the wolves. For emphasis on our shared heroic tale, Natasha put her hands together then rapidly drew them apart in her rendition of a Jaws-style mushroom cloud. I could see the story affect the team. Tony never liked hearing that I had been in danger, without him, for any length of time. It was hard for him to realize I survived a good twenty plus years without him as my personal body guard (or babysitter). As for Natasha, seeing her wounded by anything, let alone a force of nature and not an army of alien invaders, was shock enough. For a long time none of the Avengers could say anything.
"Well," Banner broke the ice. "Tony, these guys aren't getting themselves to the ER. Wanna bring a car around? I'll knock Clint out and we can drag him through feet first."
I smiled, though some part of me was slightly disturbed. Sure everyone knew exactly how I felt about hospitals, doctors, and the needles they armed themselves with but Banner's tone made me believe he wasn't joking.
Tony agreed. "Yeah, sure. You coming Cap?"
Steve declined, but headed off in Tony's direction anyway. No doubt he was going for the gym to mull things over. He wished us well on his way by.
Thor stood there for a little longer before following Steve out as usual. He seemed still in a state of shock that the earth could provide such beasts that must be blown up in order to defeat. In the end he gave us both a sort of Asgardian salute, one I knew from my brief history with him stemmed from a warrior's respect for another, and then he went after Steve.
"Already called the hospital." Pepper announced. "They've got the files ready and waiting for you, Bruce. I'm going to head off to that meeting with Rhodes and see if we can get some things sorted out while you guys are gone." She leaned over gave Natasha a brief sisterly hug I was surprised my counterpart allowed. Then she planted a kiss on my cheek.
"Be good you two." She told us. "I'll have Tony get something good for dinner tonight."
"No salmon." I replied, watching her go.
Banner stopped fussing with my face and looking at Natasha's leg finally. He grabbed our empty glasses off the table and dropped them into the sink. I heard the water running but I was too tired to sit there and watch him play housemaid.
"That was a nice line you fed us." He said.
Natasha and I both straightened up. There was no one left in the place but the three of us and it seemed to me that Banner had planned that exactly out.
He put the cleaned cups in the dish rack to dry. His body turned our way with a look of gravity. "Look, I know what bite marks are, Clint, I'm not an idiot."
Natasha looked at me, the little minx was trying to play innocent!
Banner's sudden fierce mood then focused on her. "And you didn't go hopping off anywhere, not on a leg like that."
She opened her mouth, maybe to say something cute, or sultry, or whatever in her little Russian arsenal she thought would work of Bruce Banner.
But Bruce just cut her off before the words could get out. "Just, don't try the stories with me. I can tell you guys went off and had your little Fifty Shades of Grey weekend. You're cooped up, under pressure, and you get about as much privacy here as a sideshow in Ringling Brothers. Clint, you've got splinters in your face and grass burns down just about every part of you. Natasha, you have blunt force trauma to that leg, maybe a fall, and I know something made of wood gave you that sucker punched jaw. Neither of you smell like gasoline, by-the-way. Now, I honestly don't care what the truth is. Maybe you two had a wonderful little romp in the woods till things got crazy and you forgot the safe word, I don't care. But I am the stand in doctor for this crazy group of people we have shoved up in this mess and I don't need my patients falsifying information."
I felt like a heel. Beside me I'm sure Natasha was feeling just as bad. We were like two school kids being punished by a nun. Or an angry father catching his kid realize what love was for the first time right before he burned the house down with the mood-setting candles. Either way, his verbal lashing was worse than what Alaska sent us home with.
"Now," Bruce said. "From now on, you two are to divulge all injury cases to me, no matter how stupid and mundane they are. That is the rule and if you don't like it I'm sure the Other Guy will be more than happy to explain it in more excruciating detail."
My eyebrows raised. "Whoa, Bruce. That's a big threat from you."
He shrugged. "What else can I do, Clint? Throw you over my knee?"
I let it drop. The guy had a point.
"That a deal?"
It didn't take much deliberation for Natasha and me to both agree to the set terms. After all, this was Banner we were talking about. He only ever wanted the best for us. And if it would help keep him quiet about our true weekend exploits, it was worth the agreement.
"Good. At least that is out of the way." Bruce reached up into the side cupboard. He returned with a stack of gauze and an unfamiliar brown bottle. Why they would be in our spice cabinet, I don't know, but there they were in his hands and I was suddenly very frightened that it was for me.
"Clint, you don't like hospitals. In fact, the last time I had to bring you to one you walked out after giving three doctors a black eye and nearly stabbing an off-duty cop with a plastic tray table you turned into a shiv."
I opened to say something to my own defense, but realized no matter what I came up with it would all be worthless.
"I borrowed this from a friend who owed me a favor down at the research lab on 10th street. I don't know why they had it, but it worked out for me to be able to get my hands on it. You have two options. Either you march yourself right back down that elevator and willingly get in the back of Tony's car. Or, I am soaking this stack of gauze in Chloroform and you will wake up chained to a hospital bed tasting copper pennies in the back of your mouth. Pick an option."
I guess Bruce really was getting to know our little group better than I gave him credit for. I hardly spoke to him much except when missions landed me on his exam table. I tended to get along better with his other half strangely enough, then the mild mannered Bruce Banner we all knew and cared about. But I guess he and I shared a little more in our brief exchanges then I thought. Because I woke up from my chloroform stupor a few hours later, chained to my hospital bed tasting copper pennies.
now, let that be satisfactory to you Clintasha fans out there! :)
please review! as it is i have no other plans for future Avengers books, i wouldn't mind a little inspiration should anyone want me to continue this canon.