Spoilers: General spoilers for the movie.
Disclaimer: I still don't own the Avengers, but don't worry, I'll bring them back in good condition. Um, well, mostly.
A/N: As always, I thank my Lord Jesus Christ for his incredible mercy and grace.
I hope you enjoy this, and please let me know what you think!
Hollow Victory
Natasha had always hated hospitals. She hated what came with them - the white, sterile rooms and tiled floors that smelled of sickness and death and disinfectant.
She'd burned a hospital to the ground once, and she'd watched the building crumble to ashes with a sense of satisfaction that hadn't left her until she'd learned just how many patients had failed to reach the exits in the thick, choking smoke.
She'd never again used arson to ferret out a mark.
But she was in a hospital now, and even the specter of that terrible blaze wasn't enough to stop her from wanting to douse the pristine white with something flammable, her fingers itching to strike a match, because this hospital was useless.
It was a state-of-the-art medical facility, the best S.H.I.E.L.D. had to offer, and numerous doctors and specialists had been flown in to consult. But Clint? Clint just lay in the middle of it all, like he had for two weeks, silent and still, his normally piercing gray eyes cloudy and dull.
He wasn't brain dead. The doctors had been able to determine that much, at least. In fact, there wasn't any brain damage at all. Whatever Loki's spell had done to him, it hadn't hurt him physically.
Neither had she, when they'd fought and she'd thrown him head-first into the railing. She'd worried, early on, that she'd put too much force into the blow, because the brilliant blue had faded from his irises, leaving the familiar gray behind, only for him to collapse like a marionette with its strings cut.
Several CT scans and MRIs later, the doctors had ruled out a concussion as the reason for his vegetative state.
That knowledge meant very little in the long-run, though, because the spell was broken, and Clint's body still breathed and his heart still beat, but Clint was gone in every way that mattered.
Thor had vowed that Asgard would send healers to Earth as soon as they were able, and that was something, even if the sad, regret-filled look he'd given her hadn't held the promise of a miracle cure. Still, there was a chance, however small, that the Asgardian healers could do more than the doctors from Earth whose vocabulary had narrowed to "watch and wait." That chance had been the only thing that kept Natasha from sneaking into S.H.I.E.L.D.'s high-security prison and testing the limits of Loki's supposed immortality before Thor could take him away, out of her reach.
The healers hadn't arrived yet, and so Natasha watched, and she waited, and every day, she brought novels to read aloud, because she'd never been one for regular conversation. But Clint had told her once - on a cold, lonely mission to the Alps, when it had just been the two of them surrounded by miles of rugged, frozen landscape - that he liked the sound of her voice, and some desperate part of her couldn't help thinking that if she spoke enough, maybe he would somehow make his way back.
But as the weeks slowly blurred into months, she could only look into Clint's empty, gray eyes and pretend that she saw some faint spark of recognition there…that the thick, heavy feeling growing in her chest was hatred for Loki, and not grief.
Fin
A/N: I hope you enjoyed it, and please let me know what you think!
Take care and God bless!
Ani-maniac494 :)