'Clint. You're gonna be alright.' He shook his head wildly, screwing up his eyes as he tried to force away that feeling. Get out.
'You know that?' A slight laugh comes over him, a disdainful bark of sarcasm that is so much like Loki it scares him he could make the noise. 'Is that what you know?' He stopped again, thinking. This was her. This was Natasha. Stop being a dick. 'I got... I gotta- I gotta flush him out.' Out of my head, he growled internally.
'You've gotta level out; it's gonna take time.'
'You don't understand, I... Have you ever had someone take your brain and play? Pull you out...stuff something else in? You know what it's like to be unmade.' He looked at her, almost pleading with her. He stared, searching for some empathy, some acknowledgement that she knew what he was talking about, that he wasn't insane.
'You know that I do.' And he did. He'd seen it, echoes of it, every time she woke from a nightmare and crawled in next to him in his bunk. But imagining those only made it worse.
'Why am I back? How'd you get him out?' He been trying, in the back of his mind, ever since the first second back in the Tesseract lab, to push him away. How had she managed it?
'Cognitive recalibration.' A flicker of a smile crept onto her face. 'I hit you really hard on the head,' she elaborated, sitting down next to him,
'Thanks.' She hesitated for only a second while removing his restraints, a glimmer of amusement in her eyes. 'Natasha...how many agents did-'
'Don't. Don't do that to yourself, Clint.' He tried. He tried to believe this wasn't on him. But he couldn't. And if Natasha couldn't convince him of something then nobody could. 'This is Loki. This is monsters and magic and nothing we were ever trained for.'
'Loki. He get away?' Clint could feel himself riling up again. If that son of a bitch escaped-
'Yeah. Don't suppose you know where?' Damn him.
'I didn't need to know. I didn't ask.'I should've though, a voice said. This is on me. He's gonna make his play soon though. Today.' Of course he would. Loki was so sure of himself.
'We gotta stop him,' Natasha told him determinedly, turning back to look at him.
'Yeah? Who's we?' Was there anyone left who'd be prepared to help? Nat and he were soloists, with the only exception being partnered with each other. Waging into battle wasn't exactly their specialty.
'I don't know. Whoever's left.'
'Well, if I put an arrow in Loki's eye socket, I'd sleep better I suppose,' he reasoned, figuring joking could go a long way to improving Natasha's mood. She was acting different. Uncomfortable. It's me, he thought. She's not comfortable with me anymore.
'Now you sound like you,' she commented, coming closer again, smiling slightly. That was better, he thought. He couldn't stand being at odds with her. But she was still off - what was that?
'But you don't. You're a spy, not a soldier.' She'd made that clear to him from the moment they'd met. 'Now you want to wade into a war. Why? What did Loki do to you?' He would kill him, that's what Clint's first intention. Kill Loki for messing with her to the point he must've hit a nerve. He knew Natasha. People couldn't figure her out easily; she was practically untouchable. So how had he managed it?
'He didn't, I just...' She was lost. He could tell from her eyes. Whatever Loki had done or said, it was making her question herself.
'Natasha,' he breathed. He needed her to tell him. She needed his help right now as much as he needed her.
'I've been compromised.' He jerked his head in understanding. He'd heard those words before, when he'd brought her in. But he looked away. He wasn't afraid but... it had been a long time since she'd seemed this vulnerable. 'I got red in my ledger.' He could feel her eyes on him, and he looked at her. 'I'd like to wipe it out.'
Loki would pay.
Clint knew her. Clint knew Natasha. What she said was true. They didn't lie to each other, and he could see it in her eyes that she was being honest. But there was something else. She may not be lying but that didn't mean this was the whole story.
He got the feeling that this, whatever it was that she was keeping from him, scared her. It took a lot to scare Natasha Romanoff. She was here, trying to fix him. But he would help her too.
They would save each other, she him, and him, the woman he owed the best times of his life to. Who he owed his life itself to, actually, many times over.
He would save her.