A/N: A slightly different take at the first meeting of Clint and Natasha. I kind of have a writer's block on my other BlackHawk stories so I tried something different. I hope you like it.
Dislaimer: violence (only a small part)
No one knows the actual story behind the first meeting of Hawkeye and Black Widow, and if Clint has anything to say in the matter it will remain that way.
Coulson knew of course – not all the details but more than anyone else ever will – and Fury has a general idea of what happened, but save for the them the truth is something only existing in their memories.
The story about how Hawkeye was sent to end the infamous Black Widow and made a different call is well-known, that he brought her into SHIELD instead of killing her like he was supposed to. There are many rumors regarding the why and how of said event, but the general consent includes some sort of a fight to the death between them with him prevailing in the end.
Even now, more than a decade later, the thought makes Clint snort.
Natalia Alianovna Romanova was the most successful and as far as he is concerned the best ever contract assassin on this planet, and the thought of him beating her in an all-out fight should be deemed ridiculous by anyone who has ever seen her wipe the floor with him in a sparring match. No one – no matter their gender, size, strength or age – can defeat the Black Widow in close combat.
He is her partner, he knows the facts better than anyone else. If Natasha had actually tried to kill him back then she would have – the irony of it has followed Clint Barton for more than a decade now.
The bar is almost empty, but then it's still early in the evening. In a few hours the bars and clubs of Petersburg will be throbbing with life, young people going out to have some fun and celebrate those last days of the year that are filled with anticipation for the beginning of the new millennium.
Something is coming and even the civilians have noticed it.
Fury is convinced that whatever it is that will happen will be bad, and Clint is inclined to believe him. Dark clouds are gathering so to speak and while no one knows that exactly the outcome will be SHIELD is doing its utmost to stop it from happening altogether.
This is why he is in Russia in the first place, to get rid of someone that could make the director's life increasingly difficult if they decided to show their face in the near future. The Black Widow. One of the most deadly contract assassins the world has to offer, with a ledger dripping with red and a reputation that makes it dangerous to even utter her name in certain circles.
Trained by the Red Room – a Soviet cold war program that was abandoned more than ten years ago – the woman is said to be the perfect killer. She is skilled, lethal, efficient… and vanished some four years ago.
Usually the disappearance of a master assassin is something SHIELD does rejoice at – unless it is a case like hers where there is neither a body nor a picture nor someone that claims her death as their doing. Over four years and there isn't even a trace of the Black Widow anywhere in the world. Nothing.
Clint can't hold it against Fury that he wants to make sure that she is dead. Better save than sorry, and so he is here in Saint Petersburg to follow a trail that is anything but new in hopes of finding a killer that turned into a phantom overnight.
Sitting down in a booth in the back of the club he puts his boots on the table and waits for the waitress, his eyes scanning the nearly deserted interior without real interest.
"Your feet belong under the table, not on top of it."
Her flawless English surprises him but Clint doesn't let it show, not even bothering to spare the young woman he saw coming up to his table from the corner of his eye a glance.
"The customer is always right." he shoots back without missing a beat.
"Then be a customer somewhere else." she hisses and he can imagine the lips he can't see behind a mop of dark hair turn into a frown, "Bloody Americans."
It is the unexpected choice of swear words that finally makes him lift his head from the wall and turn to face her.
Shows no sign of aging. He read her file – or better the three sheets of paper that are all SHIELD has on the Black Widow. He read them, read that by now she has to be around fifty, even looked at the blurry picture that showed her in Berlin in 1971 not looking a day older than sixteen… but none of that could prepare him for seeing it, the face of the Black Widow, on a waitress in a bar in Saint Petersburg that looks to be twenty at most.
She has traded her red curls for dark brown waves with a hint of purple that probably is caused by the dim light of the club. Her blue eyes are framed in black and vivid in color and the dark red lipstick on her plump lips a stark contrast to her pale skin.
He can't help but stare and she can't help but notice – of course she does, she's a world class assassin, noticing is half of what she does.
His initial thought is to flee, the one immediately following to fight and the last that he probably won't have much luck at either. This is her territory, in here he is nothing but prey. Damn.
There is a reason Clint's codename is Hawkeye. He works best from afar, not only because of his choice in weapon but also because he sees clearer when there is space between him and his target, and of course because when working from a distance the case of being killed by your kill is way less likely.
Making a motion to get up he is immediately pushed back down by a firm hand, the rings on her fingers reflecting the light.
Blue eyes bore into grey ones and he can see an emotion in her eyes he can't quite place. He expected to see anger but there is none, no determination either, just a shimmer of what could be described as… tenderness?
"Stay." she orders him, not unfriendly but with steel in her voice, "I'll be back in a minute."
A sound somewhere between snorting and laughing escapes from his throat and the Widow stops in mid-turn, her head turning back around to look at him once more. There is a question in her eyes and an answer in his – she can't just expect him to sit here idly while she wanders off to only God knows where.
It is small, but a smile forms on her lips, "Don't worry, I won't run."
Really, those few words shouldn't be a reassurance at all, but still Clint remains sitting and watches her when she walks over to the bar. He tries to ignore how his eyes are drawn to the sway of her hips, but the attempt is futile at best and her ass looks great in those jeans.
She talks with the barman but his Russian isn't good enough to lip read, even if the light was better. The big man doesn't seem happy with what she tells him but nods in the end and not even two minutes later the Black Widow is coming back to his booth, a tray with a bottle of vodka and two ice-filled glasses in her right hand.
Placing the tablet on the wooden table she slaps his lower legs with the back of her hand, "The rules still stand."
Sighing Clint takes his feet off the table at least to not provoke the barman any further who is already sending death glares in his direction. A brawl with the staff is the last thing he wants at the moment – not to mention that he will never hear the end of it from Phil if he loses the Black Widow over something like this.
He takes the liberty of pouring both of them a glass, the ice clinking softly when pushes one in her direction, not once taking is eyes off her hands that are resting in front of her on the table.
The woman is a killer and probably twice his age, he tells himself to stop his gaze from wandering to her cleavage.
"What are you?" she finally asks and he can't help but notice her composure. The Black Widow was in hide from every intelligence organization between Washington and Peking for four years, and now that she has been found out she doesn't seem faced by it in the least.
Taking a sip from his – very good, and just as strong – vodka he realizes that one of them will be dead by the end of the night anyway and that from her lack of fighting so far it most likely won't be him. Telling her won't make a difference.
"Shield." he informs her, putting his glass down and once again noting that she doesn't show any reaction at all to his words.
Satisfaction shines through in the way she tilts her head in acknowledgement, "Marlow."
For once he seems to know something she doesn't, "He retired five years ago."
"Oh." for the first time tonight surprise colors her young face, her brow furrowing slightly when she takes in the information.
Clint meanwhile isn't reassured at all. A woman as dangerous as the Black Widow shouldn't even know of SHIELDs existence, much less the name of its now former director – she shouldn't be sitting opposite him as calmly as she does, discussing trivialities with a man she has to know was send to kill her.
She downs her vodka in one go, tilting her head back and exposing her throat to him before reaching for the bottle to refill her glass, gleaming blue eyes locking with his, "I always thought that the Triad would get me first."
"You pissed off a lot of people." he mutters, shrugging because it is the truth.
Her grin doesn't reach her eyes, "That comes with the job."
They both down the content of their glasses, though neither of them goes for another refill. Silence stretches between them and Clint somehow can't bring himself to hurry despite knowing that time is against him in every aspect.
For once he doesn't have a plan. He had one before: follow the trail, find the Black Widow, chase her until the right opportunity appears and kill her. It was easy… now she is sitting there in front of him, in a bar he never expected to find her in, and looks at him with her pretty, empty eyes and he has the sinking feeling that she doesn't intend to fight him at all.
"You know that I have to kill you?" he just has to ask, has to know why instead of the infamous assassin he is looking at the empty shell of a broken woman.
"Of course." again she smiles almost understandingly, and he starts to despise her.
His voice is full of venom, "You are pathetic."
"I am an old woman in a body that is not mine anymore." she puts her hand to her neck and lets her fingers slip down until they grace the top of her breasts, a faint laugh leaving her throat when his eyes follow the digits on their own accord, "I was raised in war, I was raised for war… almost forty years of bloodshed is more than enough for one life time."
It takes a few seconds for her words to sink in and then, finally, Clint understands what she is up to. He is understands and is livid, because all she has done in the last four years was waiting, waiting for someone to show up and kill her, waiting for death.
"Fine." his anger has to show in his body language, but again she doesn't react, just sits there like a doll and stares at him.
In one smooth motion he is on his feet and with another grabs her wrist tight and pulls her out of the booth after him. The former Black Widow doesn't resist but simply follows, pointing him towards the back entrance with a nod of her head.
Even this early in the night the air is ice-cold in his face and he drags the woman out into the alley before closing the door forcefully behind them – Clint knows that he has to find place to kill her, the barman having seem him is already bad enough. He is still a SHIELD agent after all, and the fact that the target doesn't resist doesn't mean that he can be lax in doing his job.
"You can do it here." she offers, "Dmitry won't tell the police about you, no matter what happens."
The look he gives her is all are you kidding me, but like everything else it bounces off her without any visible sign of an effect.
"I have no reason to lie to you." the woman reminds him and while that doesn't mean that she is saying the truth by this point Clint is just tired of all of her, pretty face, empty eyes and even the great ass.
"You just can't wait to die, uh?" he asks, though it is a rhetoric question.
This time she doesn't respond. All she does is stand in front of him, her face barely visible in the faint light coming from the door – there is no tension in her body, no sign of fight, just a silent resignation, surrender.
"Fifty years of fighting, all for nothing." he means it.
Turning her to face away from him the pulls the knife out of his right boot and comes up behind her.
It is a pity, really, that someone like her has to end like that. Clint has heard stories about her, about the infamous Black Widow, the woman with a skill that no mortal man can ever hope to reach, the woman that fights with teeth and nails if she has to, the woman they say has to be a goddess of something…
In the end it wasn't him that brought her down, it was she herself.
He brings the blade to her throat.
"What is your name?" strands of her hair brush against his cheek when she turns her head just the fraction of an inch.
"Clint, Clint Barton." he is about to kill her, she has the right to know who executes the verdict she decided years before he came along.
She doesn't move when the steel of the knife is pressed against her skin, the blade not yet slicing, though the pressure must still be uncomfortable. Clint can feel her shivering slightly, but that could as well be from the cold.
"Any last words, Natalia?" another stupid question while, honestly, he should cut her throat, leave her to bleed to death and be done with this whole thing.
A shudder goes through her body at the words, "My name is Black Widow."
The laugh escapes his lips before he can stop it. It is not a pretty sound, not at all – it is hoarse, half a bark actually, and full of scorn. But it is what she deserves, because whoever the Black Widow was once upon a time, the woman in his arms is anything but.
"No, you aren't the Black Widow." he tells her, "Because the Black Widow was a killer, she was a fighter, she would've gone down with her head held high. You are nothing but a girl shivering alone in the cold, a frightened child, you have given up, you are what the Widow would have despised… you are Natalia."
"You know nothing of me." her tone is ice, her back stiff against his front.
Leaning down a little he whispers into her ear, "I know that you are broken. I know that you have given up. I know that you are nothing but a sorry excuse for the woman you once were."
"I have lived war, all my life I have lived war... all I ever did was kill, all I know is killing. I have seen more dead than you will have by the time you die. There is no excuse for what I did, for what I am. I am the Black Widow and today I will die." her tone is low, each word sharp as broken glass and he thinks that if the Widow sounded anything like that he would've loved to go toe-to-toe with her.
"So you think death will bring you redemption? You think that your death will make things undone?" he growls, his hand tightening around the knife, the first layer of her skin giving way to the blade.
Anger and despair are thick in her voice, "Death is everything I have left to offer."
In that moment he hates her, hates her almost as much as he hated himself in the past – because when she says those words she is finally standing upright against him, her head held high, her gaze straight ahead and he wants to tear her apart, he wants to look her in the eyes, he wants…
The knife clatters when it hits the asphalt and he spins her around, seeing her eyes shimmering with uncried tears and a multitude of emotions. Then he has her form pressed to the wall and is no longer thinking straight because his lips cover hers and an instant later she is responding, kissing him back with just as much vigor, biting his lower lip and burying her fingers in his neck.
It is rough and it hurts and it burns – it makes him feel alive.
Their gazes lock and god, those eyes… even void of any emotion they were pretty but now, with a fire burning bright in them, Clint is sure that he has never seen eyes more beautiful than hers.
He has never seen anything more beautiful than her period, because right then, with her back to wall, her lipstick smeared and blood running from the cut on her neck she is blazing, finally looking like the goddess they say she is, burning him alive and he accepts it gladly. He lets her drag him even closer, lets her weave the fingers of her free hand in his hair, lets her pull his tongue into her much, lets her consume him until all he can feel is her.
This is the Black Widow, the best assassin of them all, the woman he would've killed without a second thought if she's stood across from him in the bar.
She breaks away from him slowly, his lips tingling when their mouths separate, her hands still on his back – oh how he wants to fuck her, right there in the back alley with half their clothes still on and his name leaving her lips when she comes.
"You should have killed me." she mutters, slightly out of breath.
For the first time tonight it's him who smiles, "There was nothing to kill, you were already dead inside… this is how you are needed, biting and clawing and fighting, not that lifeless shell of a person."
Her expression turns serious, "I told you already, killing is everything I know. There is no such thing as redemption for me, you cannot atone for the things I have done."
"No." Clint nods and puts his hands on her cheeks, forcing her to keep eye contact, "But you can try. You can try and maybe one day you can look back and say that you have done more good than bad in your life. Yes, maybe you won't, but at least you tried."
Silence envelops them for a while everything they do is look at each other, her blue eyes locked with his grey ones. It feels strange and intimidate on a level he can't explain but in the end they reach some level of understanding, her eyes shining with an emotion unfamiliar to him.
"I… maybe you are right." she licks her lips, "But I don't even know how. Right now I'm just an assassin out of practice standing an inch from the man sent to kill me."
An idea crosses his mind while she speaks and he knows that it is ridiculous, but he likes it even more with every second he thinks about it. He will never hear the end of it from Phil and Fury will probably declare him crazy, but it's not like he ever cared about either of that before.
Brushing the blood from her throat Clint is pleased to note that the cut is shallow and has already stopped bleeding.
"Tomorrow." he can't help but grin, "Tonight… we celebrate. Life, or living, or survival, or whatever you want. It's our last day off before a really long shift, and they don't pay for extra hours."
One of her brows raises and he isn't sure whether or not she is taking him seriously.
"You just want an excuse to look down my cleavage, grope by ass, get piss drunk and not pay the bill." she accuses, a gleam in her eyes that makes him giddy like a teenage boy on his first date.
His hands travel down her sides until they lie on her hips, "Maybe."
She snorts, "You are half my age."
Tilting his head to the side he blinks at her innocently, "We can turn off the lights if you're uncomfortable."
Her laugh is a clear sound in the otherwise silent night, beautiful and feminine and full of amusement reflected in her eyes – she doesn't bother answering, you slips out of his grasp before he can stop her and walks over to the door. The bass from the club is clearly audible the moment she pushes down the handle.
"Hey Nat, wait dammit." he calls after her and is rewarded with a frown.
"What did you just call me?" she is sexy as hell with that look on her face, but even Clint Barton is not reckless enough to tell the Black Widow so.
"Nat." he shrugs, "I have to call you something, you know?"
Sliding through the door she mutters something that suspiciously sound like "How did I deserve this?" but is gone before he can be sure and the only thing he can do is slip in after her, the thick metal door sliding shut behind him.
Yes, Hawkeye didn't kill the Black Widow – but the Black Widow didn't even try to kill Hawkeye.
I don't usually write from Clint's POV so I hope I managed to do him justice ...oh, and I almost forgot: Natasha's appearance in this fic is based on the cover Scarlett Johansson did for the November issue of W Magazine.
Reviews are very much appreciated.