Pull No Punches
Later, she'll find out Hill asked him to do it, pulled him out of retirement because they needed an inside man and he was the only one who hadn't picked a side. Later, she'll find out he agreed to it because he wanted to protect them, couldn't sit by as his teammates, his family, tore each other apart. Later, she'll find out Steve began to suspect he wasn't in Stark's pocket when an arrow clipped his ear and then harmlessly buried itself in the concrete pillar behind him.
In the field, she can always anticipate his movements. They had been partners since the day he dropped the arrow meant to kill her to the ground and extended his hand to her. He had protected her, and she had protected him. They had fought together, cried together, laughed together. She had given him her trust, the most precious gift she could ever give him, and he had betrayed her, like so many others had.
He was no better than any of them, after all. He was even worse.
After she identifies his latest perch, the rooftop of an abandoned warehouse just outside of the fray, she decides to flush him out. If she gets him on the ground, where the fighting is up close and personal, where he can't hide behind his precious bow and hawk-like eyesight, she'll hold the advantage. She doesn't tell anyone, not even Steve, what she intends to do.
If she had, she would have learned he didn't tell her because he needed Stark to trust him. He was in deep—he had become Stark's eyes, his strategist, his confidant. Stark still made him wear an earpiece and a tracker at all times, but he was just starting to give him more freedom. And that started when she hadn't pulled her punches the first time they met in the heat of battle; she was so consumed with rage and hatred she would have killed him if Rhodes hadn't intervened.
But nobody will be able to intervene this time; she makes sure of it. Since she's the least their foes' concerns, not when they have Steve, Wanda and the near-mythical Winter Solider to contend with, she's able to slip away undetected. There's a fire escape on the south side of the warehouse, and she climbs up it without making a sound. And then she's standing right behind him.
She raises the pistol, her finger curling around the trigger. He's preoccupied with the battle raging below, and he'll never see it coming. For some reason, that realization makes her hesitate, causing her to be overwhelmed by a flood of memories—of spending lazy days at his farm in the middle of nowhere Iowa, of patching each other's wounds in sleazy motel rooms throughout Europe, of playing pranks on new recruits on the S.H.I.E.L.D. helicarrier.
He catches her off guard. One second, he's leaning over the edge of the roof. The next, he's staring her down over his bow, his body as taunt as its bowstring. "What are you doing here?" he demands and, if she was thinking clearly, she would have detected the note of panic in his otherwise cold voice.
"I could say the same to you, partner." She says partner with such venom, he flinches, but he recovers quickly, setting his jaw and narrowing his eyes. "Picking off your friends from a distance isn't…"
Sometimes, she swears she knows him better than he knows himself. Her goal was to get him to break their stalemate, and he does just that, recklessly charging her even though she still has her pistol trained on him. She starts to squeeze the trigger, but she hesitates again, and a tiny part of her is relieved when he knocks her pistol away and pins her to the ground, twisting one arm behind her back.
"Are we still friends?" she asks in a small voice even though she already knows the answer to that question.
"Depends on how hard you hit me," he replies flatly before wrenching her arm further back.
That's all the answer she needs. In one fluid motion, she works the hunting knife holstered on her calf free and plunges it deep into his side. With a yelp of pain, he releases his hold on her, and she knees him in the jaw before scrambling to her feet.
She expects him to come after her, but he stays down, clutching his side with a hand already slick with dark blood. Slowly, she goes to retrieve her pistol. As she picks it up, she steels herself for what she has to do, what she's wanted to do since he, the one person she thought never would, turned his back on her. Then, she walks back over to where he's slumped further to the ground.
She notices there's blood in his wry smile. She doesn't notice his tired eyes are glistening with tears. "Pull no punches, right?"
She knows she doesn't have to do this. He's already defeated, broken, and he'll be of no use to Stark now. They're already one step closer to ending this. She can just leave him here, where he'll either bleed out or, more likely, be rescued and shipped to some renowned hospital by his new best friend. Then, he'll be sent back home, to his wife and kids, where he always belonged because, really, he was always hopelessly out of his league. She doesn't have to pull the trigger.
She makes a different call. Later, she'll find out it was the wrong one.
For the record, I doubt this is how Natasha and Clint's fight scene will play out in Civil War. This was just an idea that popped into my head after reading one or two other stories inspired by the recently released trailer. I know I swapped their sides (all the rumors have Natasha on Tony's side and Clint on Steve's side) but I like the idea of Clint, not Natasha, being the double agent (as I suspect Natasha is the double agent if she's really on Tony's team).
Anyway, this story was a little different for me so I'd love to hear your thoughts. I LOVE getting reviews, favorites and follows; they inspire me to keep writing. Anyway, hope you enjoyed it (even though it ends sadly). Until next time. ~Moore12