Disclaimer: All characters are property of Marvel Comics. I must include this in here because my dad will get really pissed if we get sued over my obsession with these characters.
Enjoy!
SHIELD Headquarters, Washington DC: May, 2006
"Nat, would you just look at me?" Clint demanded as he finally grew tired of her avoidance. It had been over a month since their last mission; things had gone from bad to worse when he took that bullet for her. Natasha had been distracted by the mob of thugs only thirty meters in front of them when he saw the glimmer of a sniper's scope aimed at his partner. He'd been shot only three inches above the heart and had nearly died in his best friends arms. In the heat of the moment he'd confessed all there was to confess, but most importantly he told her he loved her. He blacked out and woke up in medical three days later.
She'd avoided him like the plague once he woke up, "Could you just wait until I'm through with my mission debrief, Barton?" She stopped fast walking to face him. Her voice was sharp and chiding, but it was at least an acknowledgement of his presence.
Clint halted, almost crashing into her, before deciding he wasn't going to get a better offer, "My place, after six." He waited for her answer as she glared at him.
"Fine." She sharply turned on her heel and proceeded to walk through SHIELD headquarters without another word. After their failed mission, Natasha made sure to request solo missions almost immediately after she herself received a clean bill of health.
If she was honest with herself, Clint's confession, as he lay dying in her arms, had both relieved and scared her. It relieved her because up until then, she thought she was reading into their friendship a little too much. As partners, they were expected to be professionals, but ultimately, people develop feelings; it's only human to desire closeness and comfort. Despite this, she was terrified. She didn't know how to love a person, how to give herself to them. Trust kills you. That's what the Red Room taught her. You can only trust yourself. Never let your guard down. Despite their more than unconventional methods of training, that was one teaching she was grateful for.
Five years of partnership tended to create some serious bonding. She tried to dismiss her feelings as typical. He was the first long terms partner she'd ever had so she figured it came with the territory. It wasn't until she started to develop feeling of jealousy towards the attention Agent Barbara "Bobbi" Morse had been receiving from from Clint that Natasha realized it wasn't at all normal. Bobbi was a junior agent trying to genuinely make friends but Natasha could help but despise every fiber of Bobbi's five-foot-seven blonde haired and tanned skin frame.
Natasha Romanoff was many things, but jealous was not one of them. After Natasha "innocently" accepted Bobbi's offer to spar, Clint finally stepped in.
Two years later, Bobbi still has that thin scar on her wrist from her encounter with Natasha's dagger.
The missions she'd been taking were supposed to clear her mind, but they ended up only putting off the inevitable.
'God I hate confrontation' she thought bitterly as she readied herself to go to Clint's place. This was not going to turn out well. Despite having a key, she knocked as to avoid catching him in an awkward situation. The last time she let herself in, she found him watching Grease in his boxers while eating pizza and drinking beer.
"Come in!" He called from inside. She put on a stern face and sighed, opening the door to his place. It was messy, 'As usual'. He was leaning on the kitchen counter with a drink in his hand. He held up the bottle of whiskey and poured her a drink when she nodded. Taking her seat by the table, she quickly downed it and asked for another, "Easy there, you wanna remember this."
"You know I can hold my liquor just fine, Clint." He lightened up at the use of his first name. It meant she wasn't as angry with him. That didn't mean it would last though. Natasha firmly pressed her lips into a thin line and furrowed her brow as she stared intently at her half full glass, "I don't know what to do." She announced.
Clint took her silence as his cue to say something, "You don't have to do anything, Nat. If you don't feel the same way, I can—"
"That's the problem, Clint" she gave an empty chuckle as she looked up at him, nipping at the inside of her bottom lip, "I feel the same way," she saw a faint glimmer of joy in his eyes, "and I don't know what to do about it." Her voice was defeated and laced with uncertainty. She couldn't look at him.
"And that's fine, Nat." He couldn't help the smile that tugged at his lips as he knelt down in front of her to catch her gaze, "We don't have to move fast. If you want to go slow, we'll go slow." He paused searching her features for a reaction, "But I want you to know that I meant every word of what I said to you back there."
She took a deep breath, finally finding the courage to look at him. The brightness in his blue eyes sent a pang of guilt through her, "I know, Clint, but we can't. We just can't." She looked away, a lump developing in her throat.
"What do you mean? Of course we ca—"
"No!" Her voice came out more stern than she intended. She felt trapped being so close to him. She quickly got up and placed herself on the opposite side of the table, pacing momentarily, "Don't you get it? People who get close to me—that close—always end up dead." His face morphed to irritation, "I could never forgive myself if you were killed because of me. Do you realize how compromised we are? Every move we'll make on missions from now on will be to protect the other. We can't afford to be distracted, Barton." She hoped using his last name would help him realize the impossibility behind what he wanted—what they wanted.
"So what, you're giving up because—because of the job? Is that all you want in your life, when here we have a chance to finally be happy, to feel happiness?" He moved closer to her.
"People like me don't get to be happy." Her voice was even more stern.
"That's bullshit, Natasha, and you know it. You've helped and saved countless lives!" He was growing angry.
"And taken countless others." She countered, "You're the only person I'll ever be partners with, Clint, and I don't want to become a solo operative. It took me years to fully trust every fiber of weird persona." Her voice became calm, "We can't compromise ourselves more than we already have. This," she motioned between them, "this is all I have in my life. I can't lose it and," she hesitated momentarily before continuing, "and I can't lose you." He was at a loss for words. Realizing this, she stared at the tiles beneath her shoes, noting their uncleanliness, "You of all people deserve happiness, Clint. You're easy to love," she glanced up at him, "I'm just the wrong person to give it to you. You'll never be safe with me."
"I don't wanna be safe." He said firmly, finally finding his voice.
She gave out a sad chuckle, holding back her tears, "But you deserve to be." Natasha walked over to him and kissed him lightly on the cheek, "See you tomorrow, partner." Her voice was quiet and raspy.
Clint was frozen in place, arms crossed and eyes unmoving.
Natasha made it to the elevator doors seemingly composed and waked inside before she couldn't take it anymore and she punched the reflective walls that surrounded her. Letting out a frustrated growl, she banged her head on one of the walls, grounding her forehead into it as she shook her head in disappointment, "What've I done?"
It was now Monday morning, six AM to be precise and two days since she last saw Clint. She showed up at the SHIELD gym at their usual time to train and spar with him. When he didn't show, she figured he was still mad and avoiding her. Natasha honestly believed he'd be more mature than this.
After a thorough search of the base and all of his usual spots, she concluded he was, in fact, now avoiding her. Angry, she spent the next hour beating the life out of several other agents before moving on to punching bags. Another hour later, she was walking through the city to her favorite frozen yogurt place when she heard it.
Or rather him. 'Clint'.
She halted before quickly scanning the plaza. She found him sitting on a table in front of a cafe...laughing. It took Natasha a moment to realize that he was with someone.
That someone was Bobbi Morse. 'Dear Lord, have you no mercy?'. If she thought Clint was being immature before, now she was sure of it. If this was a ploy to make her jealous, it was working. Natasha quickly made herself scarce before he could pick up on her presence.
"That jerk!" She growled, kicking her living room sofa as she entered her apartment. Huffing, she threw her keys across the room, 'Note to self: change lock.'
She ran her fingers through her red locks, "Get a grip, Nat." She chided herself. Cringing, she realized that sounded just like something Clint would say to her. Before she could get further into it, her SHIELD issue phone rang in her coat pocket.
Coulson the caller ID read.
'Great', she thought begrudgingly before answering, "Romanoff."
Kiev, Ukraine: Four days later
This was not good. Not one bit. It seemed like SHIELD had a habit of jinxing missions that were "simple in and out in a day" types. Now on their fourth day of a one day mission, Clint and Natasha found themselves in the Ukraine, fighting off a bunch of "Nat's cousins", as Clint had so cleverly nicknamed them. In reality, they were gangsters loyal to one of Europe's most nefarious mobsters.
Natasha was running from her "cousins" through one of the mafia bases. She managed to break into one of their data rooms and send all of the files on their synthetic drug trade to SHIELD, blowing the room to smithereens before she was discovered (quite amateurally) by a guard. Now, if Clint, who was two blocks away watching through his sniper scope, had done his job like he was supposed to, instead of trying to justify his date with Bobbi, he'd have noticed said guard go off route to charge his phone in the data room that sucked all of the electricity out of every corner of the building.
Now he was cursing himself for letting it happen as he ran towards the building to help her fight off the eighty something guards that kept watch over the four story building. Clint knew Natasha would either go to high ground and try to jump onto another building, or flee to the basement and get out through the tunnels. Seeing as how he'd lost communication with her, he quickly made his way into the tunnels.
Before diving into a manhole, he stopped abruptly when his comm began to cackle and buzz with life, "Nat? Natasha, can you hear me?" He called desperately.
"Clint!" He heard her gasping in exertion.
'Running, she's running.'
"Clint! East side of the building. Roof jumping!" He was wrong about the tunnels and he cursed, jetting off toward her position.
"I'm coming, hold on!" He encouraged.
"Comm was damaged in the explosion," she referred to her destruction of the data room, "Clint, they're on me, hurry." He heard her grunt as she fell and tumbled onto another building.
Sounds of fists connecting with flesh and bones cracking filled his ear. He only hoped it was the enemy and not her. Before he knew it, he was only twenty meters from the jumping into the adjacent building from the four story roof. He could see thirty silhouettes running in the full moon light, "Hold on, I'm—"
BOOM!
Bright light engulfed a building in front of him, the shockwave knocking him to the ground.
Clint groaned and coughed as as and debris rained down on him. He rolled over and got to his knees, starting at the burning red flames that illuminated the horizon. He barely felt the small prick on his neck before he again collapsed, hitting the ground face first. The crunching of gravel under hard shoe soles grabbed his fading focus. The mystery shoes nudged his side and pushed him onto his back. The black figure kneeled in front of him, brown trench coat fanning behind him, face partially covered by the shade of his hat. Clint focused on the tiny red glow of the cigarette as the man took a long drag from it. The last thing Clint saw was the moonlight reflecting off of the man's devious grin before his vision faded into darkness.
Secret SHIELD Base: Somewhere in Germany
Destroyed. Obliterated. Demolished. Pulverized. Gone.
All of those words and more came to mind when Clint saw the photos of the building Natasha had been fighting on. SHIELD had picked up his unconscious body before day break and onto the helicarrier, leaving the fire to be dealt with by local authorities.
"No survivors", that's what the report said.
He was in shock, looking at the charred and melted bodies in the ruins of what used to be three buildings.
'No, Natasha isn't dead, she can't be.' he thought, "She has to be out there sir." Clint sat across from Fury at headquarters.
"We can't know that, Agent."
"Then let me find out; I can find answers." Clint offered firmly.
"We looked through the remains and found only one possible match for Romanoff, but the damage prevents any DNA confirmation. Unless you find any evidence suggesting otherwise, I have no choice but to declare her killed in action." He hesitated a little with his last three words. Nick Fury didn't have friends, but that didn't mean he didn't have people he cared for deeply. Natasha was one of those people.
Clint stared at the manilla folder of the mission report, lost in thought. He'd been arguing with her. The last conversation he had with his partner was an argument. Clint mentally slapped himself for how childish he'd been. There was a very slim chance she'd made it off the rooftop alive, but he had to take it, "I'll do my best, sir." Regaining his senses, he readied himself to leave.
"Barton," Fury called, "this will have to be on your own time. It seems Hydra's been rearing its ugly butt in our faces again and I need my best agents ready. Use any SHIELD resource to find her, but with the present threat, SHIELD itself has to be your first priority." Fury gave Clint a stern but apologetic look.
"Understood." Clint closed the office door with a click, determination evident on his features.
Unknown location: Somewhere in Europe
The first thing Natasha noticed as she woke up was that her mind was sluggish and she was strapped to a medical chair. It had been the bright florescent surgical lamp above her head that drew her back. The rest of the room was dimly lit and cold. Recalling her last memories, she remembered running from some thugs and hearing Barton over her comm piece and then...nothing. She couldn't remember how she was knocked out and brought to wherever she was now at. 'This isn't good.'
A guard hidden in the shade of a dark corner immediately stood up and exited the room. Natasha chided herself for not noticing sooner.
A minute later, the door opened and in walked a tall silhouette of a man, "Finally awake, I see."
Natasha inwardly froze at the sound of his voice. She knew this man, "Drakov," she uttered, seemingly unphased. He looked relatively the same but with more wrinkles and darker eyes. He was a fairly built man with grey hair and a short beard speckled with white.
"I bet you thought you'd never see me again," he pulled up and sat on one of the rolling chairs, "not after what you did to me." Drakov had a strangely calm demeanor and wore an annoyingly smug look on his face as he leaned back in the chair and linked his hands behind his head. He stared at her, waiting for her to ask the obvious question but realized she wasn't going to budge, "You must be wondering why you are here, Natasha."
She glared at him murderously but refused to answer.
Drakov grinned and stood up, "The obvious answer is revenge," he walked over to the rolling surgical table to Natasha's left and removed the white cover, "She'd be nineteen this fall," picking up a syringe, he sat back down and eyed it thoughtfully. Natasha's breathing quickened momentarily at the recollection of her.
"The Red Room was certainly cruel."
"But you had a choice," Drakov's calm compose turned to anger, "A child, she was! Nine years old. No, Natasha, you are the monster, you are the legacy of their cruelty and you will pay!" He huffed as he tried to cool down again. He paced before drawing in a calming breath, "Why now, you may ask?" All evidence of his outburst gone from his face, he reached into his coat pocket and found a small vial of blue liquid, "Planning, Natasha. Planning. Planning and waiting. You see, after you defected and destroyed the Red Room, you set me free. The reason my dear Ana was murdered was because I angered them," Natasha grew nervous as he drew the liquid into the syringe, "But Hydra is much more relaxed. So long as I do my job they don't care about what else I do. In fact, when I told them my plans regarding you, they offered to help. They even helped me brain storm."
"And what plans might those be?" He looked up at the sound of her voice and grinned once more.
"I had only planned to torture you, then to use you as a test subject once I was sure you were broken. But Hydra suggested something far better." Drakov walked towards a container of liquid nitrogen and pulled up on the lever, revealing a small electrical device powered by a similar liquid to the one in his syringe, "We've been experimenting on a type of control system, if you will, that allows us to monitor everything the subject sees and does." he carefully closed the capsule, "Hydra plans to cripple SHIELD by gently pressing some key pressure points."
"And who do you expect to carry out your plans?"
"Why you, Natasha." He replied matter of factly.
"You've grown delusional, Drakov."
"Oh no, quite the opposite. You will undergo the procedure, you will recover, and you will follow through with every order I give you." He stepped closer, towering over her.
"And if I don't?" She challenged.
"Then that partner of yours dies."
"You're bluffing." She furrowed her brow in confusion as he went to one of the lab tables and brought back a caged white rat. He opened up a holographic screen, pressed in a code, scanned his finger print, and waited. The white rat suddenly squeaked in pain as it convulsed in its cage. Blood poured from its ears and eyes, staining its pure white fur, "Like I said, planning. When the explosion went off in Kiev, I found your partner dazed on the rooftop about twenty meters from the blast. I pricked him with a sedative laced with nanites. They can be remotely triggered and make for a nasty death, as you can see, and can leave the subject paralyzed in pain for days before death. You may be reckless, but not even you would dare to gamble with his life, I'm sure." The rat squealed once more, "A Hydra mole with in SHIELD kept me apprised of all your missions," he turned the tablet and showed her what looked like a live video feed of Fury's office. Clint was sitting across from him arguing while appearing seemingly unhurt, "We have eyes on him around the clock, so don't try anything stupid."
Natasha clenched her jaw in anger, watching the rat twitch occasionally. Her mind started racing, trying to find a way out, a way to guarantee Clint's survival. She was the key to carrying out their plans, and without her, the plans meant nothing.
"If you think that killing yourself after we've put in the implant, don't. We'll be watching. We have more than one way of controlling you, Natasha." Removing the cage from her line of sight, Drakov pressed a button on his screen and, almost immediately, a medical team entered the room, prepped for surgery,
"There is a cure, but mind you, it's kept safe." He tapped his temple with his index finger and grinned maliciously.
Natasha tried to keep her breath even, anything to show she wasn't frightened. The truth is, she was terrified. Terrified of what they might do, what she might do.
'Damn you Clint.'
"We designed this model just for you, Natasha."
"I'm flattered," she deadpanned.
"Now then, a little something to ease the adaptation," he quickly injected her with the mysterious blue liquid and motioned for the assistant to put her under, "I'll see you soon, Natasha."
Her vision began to blur around the edges as she felt the cold liquid move through her body. The last thing she felt was absolute fear as her vision faded to black.
She woke up with a headache. No, scratch that. She woke up with a throbbing, boiling, ear splitting migraine. Curling her fingers around the fabric beneath her, Natasha winced, unable to open her eyes due to the medical gauze. The room smelled like disinfectant and filtered hospital air. The bed she was on was hard as wood. When she tried to lift her hand to remove the gauze, it was held back by what she assumed was a thick leather strap used on the crazies. Her heart monitor spiked momentarily as she tried to calm herself. If there was one thing that Natasha hated, it was not being fully aware of her surroundings.
She heard the door open and click shut as someone entered the room. She tensed when she heard the persons footsteps near the left side of her bed, "You're adapting well, Natasha." Drakov commented, adjusting her IV drip.
Natasha swallowed in an attempt to bring moisture to her uncomfortable dry mouth. It felt like dry as a desert. The last time it was that dry, she'd been in a coma for three weeks after a mission in Monaco.
"You sleep like a log. A month, we've been waiting." He grabbed a clipboard at the foot of her cot and quietly jotted down some notes.
Annoyed by his silence, Natasha curled her hands into fists, "What did you do to me, Marcus?" She asked through gritted teeth. His first name tasted like venom on her lips.
"Well, you can attribute your headache to the brain implant. Once you recover fully, we will remove the gauze covering your eyes." He put the clipboard back and removed his glasses, "You are blind, Natasha. You will only have access to your vision when under my control in the field. Upon completion of tasks, you will be put to sleep until your next assignment." This time, Natasha couldn't hide the panic and fear as her heart monitor spiked again, "Now, now, no need to react like that. Do you remember being in cryo, Natasha? Being frozen after the Red Room was done with you. It's a feeling you'll remember soon enough."
He moved to exit the room before turning back to her, "Get well soon, Natasha." The sound of the door shutting echoed in the emptiness of the medical room.
Natasha's heart swelled with fear and hatred.
Well there's chapter 1! Next chapter has some confusing time lines so at the end I'll explain it all for you guys. As always, review!
