Hi guys, how's it going? This is a Clintasha one-shot, I really hope you like it! Please do let me know what you think of the story, that'd mean so very much to me, thanks! :)

Rated 'T' for some strong language and some violence.

I OWN NOTHING; I DO NOT OWN THE AVENGERS.

"Safe"

. . .

A dark, crimson red liquid oozes out of the wound on Natasha's head as she is tied to a steel chair. Her arms and legs are handcuffed and tied to the chair, which is preventing her from moving. Her head is bent over and blood is spilling out of the various cuts on her face, arms, and legs and spilling onto the white tile floor.

Beside where Natasha is restrained, a wooden table lies a few feet away from her. On the table there are all different kinds of weapons and tools, such as flamethrower, knives, blowtorches, guns, forks, steel pipes, needles, blades, tasers, hammers, a pot of boiling water, scalpels; etc.

On the other side of the room of the empty warehouse, Clint Barton has his arms stretched up in the air, handcuffed to the ceiling. He is left there, with his head also bent, as his half-open eyes remain glued to the floor.

He can barely see as the blood that drips from the wound on his forehead slides down his face and into his eyes. He has blood pouring out of his mouth and nose as his body lifelessly hangs from the ceiling.

He is shirtless, only left in his uniform pants as his shirt lies a few inches away from him, torn and drenched in his blood. His pants have holes in them and are darkened with red bloodstains.

Natasha forces herself to lift her head up to lock eyes with Clint's face. His face is covered in a dark, crimson color, making it hard to realize it's even Clint. She sucks in a deep breath, but only coughs out blood.

She can't breathe and she feels like her entire body is on flames. Holes are imprinted onto her skin, due to only moments ago, the man that put her and Clint in this position, burned her with his cigarette.

The two agents have been tied up like this for the last three days. The mission went brutally wrong and Clint and Natasha ended up paying the price for it. Someone betrayed SHIELD and ended up ratting Clint and Natasha out, which ended up the two agents being caught and now being tortured for information.

"Jus' give up whatever information ya' got on us an' then we'll be on our way. You two could go home an' everythin' would be settled, no? Jus' tell us what we wanna know, fellas." The right hand man of the boss of the entire operation says while smirking at the two of them.

Suddenly, the boss of the entire operation who Clint and Natasha were trying to take down walks into the room, his eyebrow raised and an annoyed look on his face. The boss made sure not to give a name, he always faked a different name. All they knew was he was holding a very dangerous and illegal operation in Paris, France that could affect many innocent lives.

"Have they said anything yet, Benjamin?" The boss asks as he presses his lips together in a tight, thin line.

The man, Benjamin, shakes his head as he folds his arms across his chest, "No, Sir."

The boss shakes his head and wanders over to Clint, "Nothing to say, Agent Barton?" Clint stays silent as she slowly lifts his head up to glare into the boss's stormy grey eyes. The boss sighs, "You're a hard one to crack, aren't you?" He has a heavy French accent and a dangerous look on his face.

"Fuck… you." Clint manages to say through clenched teeth as he almost chokes on his blood.

The boss only shakes his head, "My, my… it's actually pretty admiring to me how loyal you are to your job. However, it's sad how your girlfriend over there has to pay the price, considering she isn't going to speak either, I assume."

"Leave her alone!" Clint growls as he tries to fight against the handcuffs that are restraining him from killing the man who stands only inches from him.

The boss starts walking backwards as he walks over to the table, lifting up each tool on the table. "Huh… which weapon do you prefer I use, Agent Barton? I mean, I am going to use each and every single one of them anyways, but I just want to know which one you'd like me to use first, on this lovely redhead girlfriend of yours."

"I swear if you touch her-" He goes to say, but Benjamin punches Clint right in the stomach, making him grunt in pain. "Shut it." Benjamin snaps at him as he presses his knife against Clint's throat, "Understand?"

This boss lifts up a sharp knife and walks over to Natasha, running the knife gently against her right arm. "Such a beauty…" He then shakes his head, "But such a waste. If only you would have been working for me. It's a pity how we have to kill you… and then you're little boy toy over there."

"Shut your filthy mouth, you asshole." Natasha says through her clenched teeth and she curls her restrained hands into fists. "If you make another comment like that, I'll make sure personally that you have a knife in your stomach and you have a long, painful death."

"Now that is the Black Widow I've heard so much about." The boss says with a smirk, "Such a feisty human being… I like it."

"Get the hell away from her!" Clint yells as he groans in pain; his entire body is aching in pain; his head is throbbing and the world around him is spinning. "Please…" He is begging now as a last resort as he watches the boss press the knife down into Natasha's pale skin.

Natasha bites down on her tongue, refusing to allow herself to show weakness; she will not allow herself to let herself scream in pain. That's what the boss wants and that's the one thing he's not getting from her.

Natasha can faintly hear in the background Clint screaming her name, begging, pleading, everything he can to try to save her. She knows it must kill him to watch her be beaten and hurt. The boss lands a hard punch to her jaw and she spits out blood. She looks right back to Clint, noticing the pain looming in his dark eyes. She can only imagine how much pain he must be in, physically and emotionally.

Despite her being the whole who is having her body sliced with the sharp knife, tasered, stabbed, and whatever else the boss feels like doing to torture her and Clint. Once or twice Natasha would allow herself to whimper and wince, but otherwise, she remains strong.

Clint was shot right above the knee, in the thigh, and the arm; he was repeatedly stabbed, but they made sure he was only suffering and didn't die. They wanted the torture to last, not kill him.

Clint is forced to watch in horror as Natasha is brutally beaten. By the time the boss is done with her, he no longer sees Natasha. He sees a bloody woman who's the ghost of the woman he loves who has demons roaming deep in her eyes.

The boss takes his gun and slams it right over Clint's head, making him slipping in and out of consciousness. His vision is blurry, but he sees red… and lots of it. He sees Natasha's blood dripping down onto the floor and staining the once white tile floor with a dark crimson color.

Clint watches Benjamin untie Natasha and drag her by the hair over to where he is. He throws Natasha on her side right in front of Clint and spits on her, smirking his wide, stupid smirk.

The color is drained out of her face and her eyes no longer have the usual spark he is so used to seeing. They're empty and lifeless as her body lies motionless on the bloody floor.

His vision is blackening as he starts to fall right back into oblivion and the last thing he sees before falling into exhaustion is the boss pointing his gun against Natasha's head and pulling the trigger-

Clint immediately sits up in the bed, sweat pouring down his face as he breathes heavily. His entire body is shaking and he can't seem to catch his breath. His eyes are wide with a haunted look inside of them and fear lies across his face.

He licks his dried lips as he slowly turns his head to look over at the sleeping Russian. Natasha is fast asleep next to him, her head resting peacefully on the pillow as she is curled up the blankets.

He lays his index finger and middle finger on Natasha's cheek gently and closes his eyes, trying to calm his nervous. He can't help as his hands shake; his entire body is trembling and he can't help or stop it.

All he sees is red; blood. All he sees is blood everywhere and it's making him sick to his stomach. His stomach is doing twists and turns and he can't take it anymore. His throat is burning and his eyes are becoming watery as he thinks about the nightmare- no, flashback, he just relived.

He slides out of bed with shaky legs and limps towards the bathroom. They just came back from that mission a week ago and he's still sore. He's supposed to wear crutches, but he hates the stupid things. SHIELD's best agent somehow cannot manage to use crutches to save his life.

He falls on his knees gently and bends over the toilet, throwing up whatever he ate for dinner last night, which was barely anything. Ever since that mission, he's had no appetite and every early morning he'd wake up throwing up.

He clenches his hands into tight fists as he squeezes his eyes shut, tears leaking out of his closed eyes. He runs his hand through his hair and coughs a violent cough. His body is trembling and he is heaving loudly as he struggles to catch his breath.

"Clint?" Natasha's soft voice interrupts his thoughts as his mind starts to wander back to the nightmare he just dealt with. She walks over to the bathroom dressed in a pair of her black shorts and once of his blue T-shirts. Her bare feet slap against the wooden floor as she walks into the bathroom, kneeling down beside him.

"Clint," She tries again as she places her hand gently on his shaking shoulder, "talk to me."

He can't speak; he can't manage to put words together and form a sentence. He just shakes his head and continues to throw up in the toilet.

She closes her eyes and sighs; she knows what's bothering him. "Clint, I'm fine. You're fine. You need some rest and you need to relax." He just shakes his head and Natasha plants a soft kiss to his shoulder, "Clint, everything's okay. I'm here, with you."

Clint wipes his mouth and tries to stand up, but he stumbles right back to the floor, leaning his back against the wall. He squeezes his eyes shut and keeps his hands curled into tight fists.

Natasha kneels right in front of him, settling right between his legs as she cups his face in her soft hands, "I'm not going anywhere. There were some… complications in that mission, but look at us now. We're still okay and we're safe. You're safe… I'm safe."

She strokes his cheek smoothly with her fingers, "That gunshot you heard was one of our agents shooting the boss in the back before he could shoot me. It's all over, Clint. It's all over."

"I couldn't save you." He whispers as he stares down at his hands, "I couldn't protect you when you needed me the most. You almost died and all I could do is sit there and watch while that bastard beat you and tortured you because I wouldn't tell him what he wanted."

"And you shouldn't have told him what he wanted to know! I fell in love with you for many reasons, but one of those reasons was that because you're loyal. I hate it how the two of us had to go through that and you had to watch me be hurt like that, but Clint, it's all over now." Natasha tries to reason with him as she gives him a slight, sad smile.

"I still dream of that fucking mission, Nat. I could still see how you were hurt so badly clearly in my mind. I'm reliving the same mission over and over and I can't get it out of my head." His eyes lock with the scars on her arms, "I see those scars every day and I'm reminded how I failed you."

"That's not true, Clint!" She growls at him, "And you know it! You know, I had to watch you have a gun pointed to your leg and watch them pull the trigger. I had to watch them hit you repeatedly as they put a knife or blade or a screwdriver to you! I watched them hit you with a fucking hammer for Christ sake! I know exactly how you're feeling, but Clint, you need to move on. If you keep living in the past like you're doing now, it's only going to eat you up alive and you're torturing yourself."

"Nat-" He starts, but she stops him, shaking her head, "I love you. I love you and there's nothing I wouldn't do for you. If you keep reliving the horrified past, we can't move forward with our lives and I want to have a life with you. I want to be with you. There's always going to be complications in a mission, but we're going to get through it because we're a good team."

"Promise me," He says in a weak, tired voice, "promise me you'll never leave me." He knows he sounds desperate, but after their last mission and almost losing her in one of the worst ways possible, he didn't care. "Please."

Natasha smiles at him and that's all he needs for a reassurance. She would be the only one who's ever seen Clint's emotional side like this. She presses her forehead against his, leaving her lips only inches from his. "I love you, Clint Barton and there's no way in hell the Black Widow is going to leave you because of a mission that's gone wrong."

He smiles and leans forward to plant a soft, passionate kiss against Natasha's lips. He closes his eyes and pulls her closer to his body. "You've got no idea how much that means to me to hear."

"I only speak the truth, you know that." She says with a smile, "Now, come back to bed."

He looks away from her and sighs, "Every time I close my eyes I see blood, Tasha. I can't get it out of my head."

"Then let me help you get it off your mind." She says with a crooked, innocent smile as she slowly stands up. "What do you say?"

Clint looks up at her and can't help the way the corners of his lips curve up into a grin, "I like the sound of that."

She offers him a hand and helps him up. He stands up shakily; his legs are still weak and from lack of sleep, his body is exhausted. He looks down at her and suddenly pulls her into a tight hug. He wraps his arms around her waist, holding her tightly against him. He could never get sick of the feeling of her body against his own.

She wraps her arms around his neck and buries her face in the crook of his neck, breathing in his scent that she has grown used to.

"You know," He begins as they pull away from the embrace, "I've actually been looking for that shirt."

Natasha looks down at his shirt she is wearing and she smirks back up at him, "Would you prefer me to take it off?" She winks at him and his eyebrows go up as his eyes sparkle with excitement. She only shakes her head and laughs as she starts backing up back into the bedroom. "You coming?"

He is standing there for a few moments before finally snapping out of it and following her into the bedroom. She slides back into bed and watches as he limps over to lie back down beside her. "Listen," She starts as she cuddles up beside him; she places her leg over his, and places her head on his bare chest, "I know you're still recovering from that mission, but trust me, it'll only get better… if you allow it. Just focus on the most important thing, which is that we're both okay and safe and we're always going to be okay, as long as we have each other by our sides."

He kisses the top of her head and holds her tightly against him, "You're right, you know?" He closes his eyes and rests his cheek on top of her head, "I love you, Nat."

"Promise me you'll stop blaming yourself." She suddenly says as she looks up at him, her eyes locking with his. "Promise me."

Clint takes her hand in his and nods his head slowly, "I promise you I'll try my hardest to forget about what happened in Paris and focus on what's happening now and on our future together, okay? I will probably always blame myself for not being able to control the situation we were in and protect you, but I'm going to try to stop having these stupid nightmares and stop reliving them constantly in my head."

"That's good to hear." She smiles up at him and then she kisses him softly on the lips. "You're a good partner, you know that, right?" Before he could respond, she adds, "Professionally and personally."

He grins and kisses her again, smiling against her lips, "You're not too bad either, Agent Romanoff."

She elbows his side, which causes him to wince, but also let out a playful laugh. She only rolls her eyes at him and shortly afterwards, she falls back into a peaceful night's sleep.

Clint looks over at the time and notices how they only have a few more hours until the night is over and morning comes, but for now, he's going to try to get some sleep. He's nervous to go back to sleep, worried that the nightmares will still invade his dreams as he sleeps, but he also can feel the exhaustion starting to creep up and consume him.

He keeps Natasha's body close against his as he wraps an arm around her. He finds peace, as he knows she is sound asleep beside him. The feisty, confident, and over powering agent looks so serene and calm as she sleeps, a side of her he rarely gets to see.

Clint smiles to himself as he closes his eyes and finally allows himself to fall into unconsciousness while for once in a long time, the haunted nightmares that have been invading his dreams are gone and instead he dreams of his future together with his girlfriend, Natasha Romanoff and they are both finally safe.