Disclaimer: I don't own any part of the MCU. A bunch of companies do.

Note 1: This is an idea I had that refused to be put aside, and the opening scene more or less wrote itself.

Note 2: I've never had an opinion one way or the other on Clintasha as a pairing (I read it and enjoyed it and believed it when it came up in a fic, but it was never something I shipped or sought out), but the fact that Age of Ultron blew the pairing out of the water canon-wise (what with his canon wife and kids, etc) means that in this fic, its not going to have been a thing. They were and are very close, but they are not lovers, nor were they lovers at any point. Barton will be showing up in this fic, but it will take a several chapters to get to him. If Clintasha is what you're looking for, you're not going to find it here. I'm sorry.

Note 3: We see a heck of a lot less of Agent Romanoff (Four movies with her in them so far, a total maybe 9 or a little more hours of airtime) than any major character in AoS (22 45-minute episodes totals out to 16.5 hours, and AoS has had two seasons). Its the nature of things with TV shows – but what it means is that it is harder to get a good handle on a character's personality when you have less to work with. This is all a roundabout way of saying that I don't feel 100% confident in my writing of Romanoff. I feel she's in-character, but she's not an easy character to write. If you think I'm writing her OOC, please, please feel free to tell me so (politely, even if critically), in a review, comment or private message – I may not always agree with you, but I will hear you out, and if convinced, I will try to take your issues with my characterization of her into account.

Note 4: For the interested, I have a tumblr, alkenifanfiction . Tumblr . Com (remove extraneous spaces) where I do sneak peaks, writing updates, new fic announcements, fandom metas, and so on. If you're interested, take a look, if not, on with the fic!

Thanks to Riley Holden/Colormeblue for beta-reading this chapter.

Ledger Dripping Red

By Alkeni

Chapter 1: Think About It

Director Coulson's Office, The Playground

September 28th, 2014

"Where is he!?"

When Phil Coulson, formerly Agent and now Director of the Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement and Logistics Division (more commonly referred to as S.H.I.E.L.D.) heard his door burst open – without so much as a knock or a warning – he'd been expecting Skye. Granted, the former Rising Tide hacker usually knocked, but she was the only one who would burst in without knocking.

He wouldn't say that Natasha Romanoff was the one he'd least expected to see when he looked up. But she still ranked up there, given that the woman wasn't supposed to know that he was alive, and she wasn't supposed to know about the Playground. For all intents and purposes, the former 'Black Widow' wasn't even a member of the new S.H.I.E.L.D. She'd spent the months since the fall of the agency working solo, or with Cap or Hawkeye, to take down Hydra Bases, but as a free agent.

"I don't suppose I should really bother asking how you got to my office without raising any alarms or attracting the attention of security?" He didn't wait for an answer. "I do have to ask how you knew we were here."

"I've known about the Playground for a while." Romanoff countered. "After I heard the Air Force took Providence – and what the hell was Hill thinking with that, I don't know - I figured that this was the place you'd be." She held up a hand and pointed at Coulson, her tone growing sharp. "And don't think I've forgiven you for not telling us you were alive after the Battle of New York."

I wasn't exactly 'alive' after the Battle itself. Coulson didn't tell her that. It was bad enough that Romanoff knew he was alive at all, It was a hard secret to keep from her, he supposed, but they'd managed it for some time before the fall of S.H.I.E.L.D. Of course, if Romanoff knew, then Barton knew, and the odds were good that the rest of the Avengers either knew already or would know soon.

"I was under orders from Director Fury." Coulson said instead, falling back on a reasonable – and technically accurate – excuse.

"Fury hasn't been Director for months. You don't have to keep sticking to his more moronic orders." Romanoff pointed out. "I mourned you. I attended your funeral!" She shook her head. "But that's another conversation. Where is he?"

There were a few 'he's that Romanoff could be referring to, technically, but given the circumstances, and the way that she'd barged into his office-

Before he could say anything, Romanoff was away from his desk and grabbing someone, then flipping them to the ground, one hand on their collar, the other raised in a fist. The whole motion had been a blur, almost too fast to follow.

"Agent May." Romanoff got off the other woman, helping her up. "Nice to see you again too."

"Likewise." May offered the Russian woman a rare smile. "If I had known it was you, I wouldn't have been concerned."

"You don't know why she's here." Coulson pointed out, looking May. He looked at Romanoff. "Ward's in a cell, where he belongs."

May looked from him to Romanoff, then back to him. The confusion wasn't actually on her face, but he knew it was there.

"Where he belongs?" Romanoff let out a small half-scoff of laughter. "Because a cell is really the best place for him. You're just giving up on him? He was a member of your team – he's one of us."

"He was never one of us." May cut in, and Coulson nodded.

"May's right. Ward was never a member of our team, and he stopped being one of us when he joined Hydra." The blank, surprised look on Romanoff's face seemed out of place. Then recognition dawned on her face:

"You really don't know?" She let out another soft scoff. "Being Director really has changed you, Coulson. Where did the guy who always tried to dig deeper go?" Romanoff stood up straight and glared at Coulson. "I want to see him."

It was probably a futile gesture – Romanoff didn't give up when she got like this – but he had to try. She didn't understand. She didn't understand what Ward had done. "You can't. You're not objective on this. I know he saved your life-"

"He saved it three times," Romanoff interjected. All things considered, it wasn't that high – Barton had saved her life nine or ten times (as far as Coulson knew, they still bickered about how many it was), and he'd saved her life four times himself. But if there was one thing Romanoff had always been, since she'd joined S.H.I.E.L.D. it was loyal to the people who put their own lives on the line to save hers.

"Three times then," Coulson accepted. "But that's exactly why you're not objective. You don't understand what he's done. H – he's a murderer, a liar and a traitor. The man's been a -"

Romanoff cut him off. "I'm not objective? You're saying he needs to stay in a cell, that he deserves to be given up on, because he's a murderer? I killed a lot more people than he ever did before I joined with S.H.I.E.L.D. We're all liars – we're spies. It's kind of in the job description. And Barton betrayed us all when he brought down the Helicarrier while working for Loki. You forgave him."

"Barton was brainwashed," Coulson replied. "Loki took control of his mind with the scepter. It's not the same thing."

"No, it's not," Romanoff agreed. "Garrett had to brainwash him Grant the old-fashioned way. He had five years to work on Grant before he joined S.H.I.E.L.D. And no one noticed. The entire agency abandoned him to...what was it you called Garrett? A deranged narcissist?" Coulson nodded, wondering how she'd heard that comment. And, of course, wondering how long it was going to take for Stark to hack his way into the base, or for Cap to show up, demanding to know why he'd never told them he was alive.

Well, you don'tknow that she told them. The only one he could be sure knew was Barton. Romanoff virtually never kept secrets from him.

"Your problem isn't that he's a traitor; your problem is that he betrayed you. He spent the entire time on your team lying to you and you never saw it. – you're angry at him for being able to trick you, and you're mad at yourself for never seeing it," Romanoff said. "You're no more objective than I am." She stepped forward, put her hands on his desk and leaned towards him. "You're going to let me see him."

Coulson didn't say anything for a long moment. – all he did do was shoot May a look telling her to not say anything either. He should have known that sooner or later, Romanoff would find out that Ward was Hydra. Natasha had never gotten as close to him as she had to Clint, but, after their year and a half of working together on the same team, Coulson knew that Ward had been one of the ones she called a friend.

And what was this about Garrett having had five years to work on Ward? Ward didn't meet the so-called Clairvoyant until he was at the academy. He didn't get Garrett as an S.O. until his second year. Ward had been recruited straight out of military school. – his off the charts hand-eye coordination had drawn the eye of a recruiter, and then the rest was...well, the rest was history.

He would have combed through Ward's records, trying to find answers ...but having Skye erase almost every trace of the man had come back to haunt him. He shouldn't have been surprised that Romanoff had found out more than him. – no one was better at finding information that no one else could find than she was. Well, maybe Skye, if the information was somewhere on the internet. But that was another question for another time.

"He's not the man you remember. He called you eye-candy," Coulson said after a moment. Would it be so bad to let Romanoff see him? Let her see how much Ward wasn't the guy they'd all come to know, come to care about?

Something told him it was a bad idea. There was something about Romanoff's tone, – that initial burst of anger when she'd come into his office demanding to know where Ward was. She wasn't pissed at Ward; she was pissed at him.

That was never a good place to be.

Romanoff scowled a moment, then laughed darkly. "Yes, Hill told me about that. I'm going to make him pay for that comment one way or the other. But not until after."

"After what?" May demanded, all her good humor at seeing Romanoff thoroughly gone at this point.

"Until after I've decided if he really isn't the man I knew," Romanoff replied. "Unlike you, I actually did the digging. You're the Director of S.H.I.E.L.D., and pretty smart when you dig your head out of your ass." She stepped back. She took a breath and lowered her voice. – it was a little softer, though only by a touch. "You say I'm not objective., and maybe I'm not, but you're sure as hell not being objective either. You and Clint gave me a second chance, a chance to blot out the red in my ledger. I don't know if he deserves one. I want to see him so I can find out if he does."

"And if you decide he does? You're not the arbiter of who decides on second chances, Agent Romanoff." Coulson tried to adopt a 'Director' tone of voice on her, but it didn't work. "That would be my job."

"Considering we're the ones he betrayed, and what he did to Fitz, it's definitely not up to you,." May cut in.

"I don't work for you anymore, Coulson. I haven't actually signed on with your new S.H.I.E.L.D. yet." She paused and raised an eyebrow, looking at him. "Let me see him and talk to him – with the cameras off – and I'll consider it."

Coulson was tempted. Romanoff was the best. Having her on board – and by extension, Barton – would be a huge boon for them. But what if she makes the mistake of believing in Ward's crap about wanting to earn redemption?

No, Romanoff was too smart for that. She wouldn't fall for it. It would cost him nothing. But no cameras?

"You know I can't turn off the cameras on a high security prisoner,." Coulson replied.

Romanoff actually rolled her eyes at that, "Grant's good, yes, but even when he was at his best, he couldn't beat me. You know that, I know that. Don't even start with that."

"Why do you want the cameras off?" May demanded.

"So I can have a conversation with him – and I can't do that with you two and who knows who else watching over my shoulder." An almost cruel smirk formed on her face, and Coulson mentally braced himself. "If you don't let me talk to him – without any cameras, microphones or recorders – I will tell Stark, Bruce, Cap and Thor that you're still alive. Right now, I'm only planning on telling Clint. Do you really want Stark dropping by? Or would you like Pepper to call you up about it?" Telling Stark would be telling Pepper Potts, and Coulson knew that she'd been about as upset, by all accounts, at his death as the rest of the Avengers.

Coulson took a breath. This was a bad idea. He wasn't exactly sure why it was a bad idea; he just knew that it was. But he really, really, didn't want Stark dropping by. Stark was a good man, but the new S.H.E.I.L.D. didn't need the self-obsessed, eccentric billionaire hanging around. Or even dropping in intrusively, which would be even worse.

And it would be useful to have Romanoff and Barton officially part of the new S.H.I.E.L.D. Either way, he knew that they'd carry on the fight against Hydra. But they could do much more good as part of the organization. – S.H.I.E.L.D. didn't have the resources it once did, not by a long shot, but it did have resources, connections, and information that could help 'Black Widow' and 'Hawkeye' put their talents in the best places to achieve maximum impact.

"And if I agree to let you see him – with all the cameras, microphones and recorders turned off – you won't tell the rest of the Avengers, apart from Agent Barton?" Coulson clarified.

"I won't. You should tell them, but I won't tell them myself. And I'll make sure Clint doesn't tell them either," Romanoff agreed.

"Fine," Coulson said after a long moment's thought. "You can talk to him. No cameras or anything." He looked to May. "Take her down to Vault D."

Vault D, The Playground

September 28th, 2014

May deliberately led her the long way to where they were keeping Grant. Initially, Romanoff thought it was due to mere spite, until she realized that they hadn't run into anyone else on the base along the way. Coulson was willing to give her the meeting, but apparently he didn't want anyone else to know that it was happening.

Romanoff only knew some of the story of Grant's betrayal. – but she knew that he had dropped Coulson's scientists into the ocean, that one of them ended up in a coma for months. She also was aware that he'd killed Hand, Jacobson, Chaimson, and Eric Koenig. And others, doubtless, though she didn't know how many.

From everything she'd seen and heard from Coulson and May in his office...,their little team had taken the discovery that Grant was a traitor hard. Hard enough that Coulson - who never liked unanswered or incomplete questions - didn't dig. It hadn't even been that hard for her to figure it out, even with a lot of Grant's information missing from the dumped S.H.I.E.L.D. files. But still, only a week and a half in, she'd run into the missing five years in Grant Ward's life. Five years when there was no accounting for his location. Five years after John Garrett paid a visit to a juvenile detention center where a young Grant Ward had been.

May insisted she hand over her weapon before letting her into the cell, but that hadn't been an issue. The woman hadn't taken her bug sweeper, and Romanoff didn't need a weapon to beat Ward, if it came to that. She doubted it would. The laser grid was high grade.

Even I'd have trouble figuring out my way past it.

When she walked into the room, the first thing she noticed about Grant, was the beard.

Grant Ward hated having facial hair. He'd never liked undercover ops where it was needed, or ops where he couldn't have access to a razor for whatever reason for long enough for even stubble to grow. He'd always done whatever needed to be done, but he'd never been happy about it. Everything had to be neat and tidy and just so for him.

The second thing she noticed were the scars on his wrists.

That would explain the beard.

She stepped into view of the single flickering light, and Ward blinked.

"Agent Romanoff," he said after a moment, sounding almost… hesitant? But there was still some defiance in his words. "I told Coulson that would give intel to Skye. I gave intel to Skye – and since I know it's true, it obviously panned out. So why would he send you down here? I'm surprised he told you he was alive. Was it just so you could interrogate me?"

There was something both familiar and unfamiliar in the way that Grant spoke. She knew that iron, almost – but never entirely – emotionless certitude well, but there was something in his expression. She wasn't sure what to call it. Pained, she supposed. If she hadn't known him as well as she did...she wouldn't have noticed it. It was there for a split second, and then it was gone.

Well, maybe you never knew him, a voice that sounded suspiciously like Coulson murmured in the back of her mind. Romanoff ignored it. Maybe she never had known him, but that was why she was here to talk to him.

"I'm not here to interrogate you," she replied, sitting down in the lone chair. "If you volunteer some information about Hydra, I'll make sure it gets to Coulson, but I didn't come here for that."

"Then what did you come here for?" Now his tone was a complete blank. "Are you here about what I said to Hill?"

"You are going to pay for that comment," she told him. "But all things considered, it's a minor sin. I'm here to talk to you." She took out her bug sweeper and stood up, carefully checking the room over, ignoring the confusion on Grant's face as she moved. It only took her a few minutes to be satisfied that Coulson really had turned everything off. It was a top of the line S.H.I.E.L.D. device, upgraded by some of Stark's new tech. It was possible Coulson had something that could beat it, but unlikely.

If they can beat it, I guess they've earned what they hear. She didn't like that possibility, but she'd done what she could.

"I had Coulson turn off the cameras, microphones and recorders for this conversation," she told him, sitting back down.

"Why? And why would he turn them off for you, Agent Romanoff?" Grant's tone was still missing all inflection or emotion. It was the kind of almost total shut down she was only capable of with some effort, these days. But she used to be a hell of a lot more capable of it. Back when she was still with the Red Room and, when she'd just left it.

"Can you stop calling me Agent Romanoff? I'm not an agent of anything at the moment, and you called me Natasha before you went back to solo work." And he had the few times they'd crossed paths at the Hub or the Triskellion. "It's what friends do, Grant."

"I didn't think we still qualified as friends. I don't have any left," Grant replied, flatly.

"It's what I'm here to figure out, Grant. Deep cover only works if you lie as little as you actually need to." She leaned in a little. "The question, then, is who are you? Are you the man I knew? Or are you as evil as Coulson, May and Hill think you are?"

"So you're here to play therapist?" Ward's tone finally found a trace of emotion – mocking scorn. "I know what I am. I've come to terms with it. I'm a murderer and a traitor. A serial killer. A monster." And once more, back to the empty tone.

"I know about Garrett coming to see you in Juvenile Hall." She let that little bomb land without further comment, and saw recognition flick across his face. Fear, pain, loss – all in his eyes for the briefest of moments.

"Those records don't exist. John made sure of that," he said after a moment, shaken, his iron emotionlessness cracked by her unexpected knowledge.

"But people do exist. People who remember you going AWOL from the military school that S.H.I.E.L.D. thinks that you graduated from. People who remember John Garrett showing up at a juvenile secure center in Plymouth, Massachusetts shortly before a group of unknown masked men attacked the center and freed a number of kids. One of whom vanished from the prison records afterwards." Romanoff sat back in the chair, looking him dead in the eye.

"Grant Ward, charged with arson and attempted murder, vanishes. Five years later, you're accepted into the S.H.I.E.L.D. Operations Academy. With no criminal record, and all the paperwork saying you graduated military school." She quirked an eyebrow deliberately. "Interesting isn't it?"

"I was always loyal to John. You knowing for how long doesn't change a thing." Grant replied. "What do you want?"

"How did he do it? Let me guess. He got you out of prison and promised you a place. Told you no one else would ever give a shit about you. That you owed him, for all that he'd done for you, that he'd made something of you." The Red Room had almost certainly been more sophisticated than John Garrett and she'd gotten started there at an even younger age, but the basics were always the same. Dependence. Reliance. Gratitude.

"He made sure he was your only contact with another living being." Isolation. Romanoff looked at him, then stood up, walking towards the laser barrier. "He reminded you every time – about what you were before he got to you, right? He made you rely on him even as he said relying on people made you weak. He promised to build you up, make you matter, and he did. But he built you on his blueprint." She was right in front of the barrier, only about half a foot and a highly lethal barrier between them. "How am I doing so far?"

Grant stepped back a pace, forcing distance between him and her, falling back to be seated on his cot. He didn't say anything for a long moment – a very long moment – then finally:

"Not my only contact. He left me a dog." His voice was... small. Quiet. Pained.

"And he turned you into his dog." She looked at his wrists again. "How many times?"

Grant saw where her gaze was, but didn't say anything. Romanoff didn't ask the question again. She just looked at him, crossing her arms in front of her, waiting for him to talk. She stared, and he stared back. She stared more, and he looked away, unwilling or unable to meet her gaze.

"Three times," he said after a moment. "The last time...I ran at the walls." There was something even more pained in his voice then, and his armor was cracking further. Romanoff made a mental note to get a look at all the recordings of his time in this cell – and whatever other cells Coulson and his people had put Grant in.

"Why?" Without her eyes flickering to the cuts, Grant may have assumed it was the other big 'why', the one no one had ever really asked him. If they'd asked, really asked, and truly listened, Romanoff was fairly sure Grant wouldn't be here. Maybe he wouldn't be allowed to roam free, but he wouldn't be here, in a cell, with nothing but a small space and a cot to keep him company. He'd have been given treatment, help, and they'd have been far less resistant to her seeing him.

"I..." Ward didn't say anything for a minute, then two minutes, letting the single letter sit out there, unfollowed. Then finally he said, "John was dead. My entire life for fifteen years was him. My team – my friends – they all hated me, and they were right to. And Sk-" He cut himself off before he could finish the name, but Romanoff already could guess.

She didn't know much about this 'Skye'. Hill had mentioned she was Coulson's protege, the member of his team that Ward had held hostage, or kidnapped, for a short time after revealing himself as Hydra. An ex-Rising Tide hacker. One that S.H.I.E.L.D. had had precious little on even before she'd gone and wiped the files on her and on her entire team. Grant had been her S.O. and she'd even made it to officially being an Agent before...well, before everything had gone to hell.

Romanoff didn't know much about what had happened with the team during their time together, but, in this case, the pieces were pretty obvious. One and one made two.

Grant Ward. Skye.

He'd said he'd give the intel to her. Only her. Because he wanted to see her.

"And Skye?" she asked, prompting him to finish.

Ward said nothing, and Romanoff saw him start to close off. To shut down. He wasn't going to answer that one right now. She had to change the subject – a little, anyway.

"Why did you do it?" She asked, the inevitable question. She already knew why: John Garrett. Garrett had brainwashed Grant. It was the logical fit for his behavior, for the missing five years, for him. Maybe it was instinct. Grant was a master liar, who'd managed to have even her fooled her when it came to where his loyalties lay. Maybe she really was wrong.

But Alexander Pierce had everyone including Fury fooled, and he was not as good a liar as Grant is. Hydra loyalists across S.H.I.E.L.D. had stayed impossibly well hidden for decades. People who were good liars, and people who Romanoff would have – and still did – swear couldn't tell a lie to save their lives ended up being good liars. At least when it came to Hydra.

It was one of the basic tenants of intelligence work. The best way to keep a secret is for no one to know that there's a secret being kept. You slap a big red 'top secret' on a door and throw a few thousand locks onto it and everyone is going to want to know what's on the other side. But keep information so well hidden that no one knows there's information to be had?

You can't steal what you don't know they have.

It wasn't a foolproof strategy, but it was the one Hydra had apparently ridden to success in its infiltration of S.H.I.E.L.D.

She could be wrong, but she didn't believe she was. She felt this even more so after seeing and talking to Grant.

"You say that your team were your friends. So why did you betray them?" Romanoff needed to hear his answer. Needed to hear him say it. See him say it.

But he didn't say anything.

"I'm willing to hear your answer, Grant. Has anyone else been willing? Has anyone else cared enough to ask? If you want to be the man Garrett turned you into, then don't answer. That'd be all the answer I need."

"I owed John everything," Ward said. "He pulled me out of hell. He saved my life, saved me from myself. He was the only one who ever cared about me." His voice was firm again, but it wasn't emotionless. It was hollow. "I owed him everything. And in the end, that's what I gave him. My friends. My life. My soul."

"Right answer," Romanoff told him. "You did give him everything." She allowed herself the slightest of smiles. "But there's a funny thing about souls. When you give that up, it doesn't really end up in anyone else's hands. It just kind of sits there, waiting for you to pick it back up, clean it off as best you can."

She stepped away from the barrier, turning around and walking away a few paces. "You've heard the stories. I've even told you a handful. What I did, how I'm trying to make up for it. But the truth is, there's a lot of red in my ledger, and no matter how much good I do, nothing will ever blot it out." She'd known that well before her little 'conversation' with Loki on the Helicarrier. She'd expected he'd take a play like that once she used the phrase. He hadn't disappointed. "Coming to terms with that means I do one of two things. I let that red define me, or I can keep trying. Keep working. Keep trying to undo that red. To wipe the accounts clean, even if nothing will."

She turned to look directly at him. "There's a lot of red in your ledger too. It drips." Hers did more than that. "The question is: do you want to wipe it clean?"

"I don't deserve forgiveness Natasha. Not after what I did. Not after who I did it to," Grant replied softly. Romanoff saw the moment of yearning on the word forgiveness. He wanted it, but he didn't believe he deserved it. He probably didn't. Murderers like him and her didn't 'deserve' forgiveness. It was one of the lies people told about the way the world worked. She hadn't gotten it forgiveness from any of her victims, or the friends and family of her victims. And it was possible Grant would never get it from the people that he'd hurt the most. But forgiveness wasn't really the point.

"This isn't about forgiveness. That's not something you deserve, or something you earn for good behavior," she told him. "All the intel in the world won't make Skye or Coulson or anyone else forgive you. Not if they're determined to hate you because they still see the traitor, the serial killer, the monster when they look at you. This is about you. About being able to look at yourself in the mirror and accept what you see. About being more than what you were, but knowing that you'll always be that too."

"You're a killer, Grant. You made mistakes, and all that was compounded by what Garrett did to you." Romanoff walked back up to the laser barrier. "Your ledger drips red. If you want to try to blot it out, to try to settle your accounts, then I can give you that chance." Even if she had to break him out of the cell. "Think about it."

Leaving him to do just that, Romanoff turned around and left Vault D. She'd be back. Back for his answer, and back to get him out of that cell and out of this base, if he decided he wanted to be able to look at himself in the mirror again.

If he decided to try – to try and try and never quite succeed – to blot out the red in his ledger.