I'm back and I have a lot of (Clintasha) feelings about Endgame.
Enjoy!
Vormir is vast and barren, the magenta sun poking through the heavy layers of mist descending on the horizon. It casts a somber purple light along the endless waves of sand. Colossal and domineering over the arid landscape, two pillars sit atop an equally domineering rock structure. At the lip of the cliff stand three figures. Clint Barton and Natasha Romanoff peer over the edge to the fog-covered ground below. From behind them, continues a voice. "In order to take the stone, you must lose that which you love. An everlasting exchange. A soul, for a soul." The cursed Stonekeeper falls back to the entrance to the sanctuary, leaving the two to look at each other with distress slowly building between them.
"Maybe he's making this shit up." Clint suggests with a slight scoff, but the beginnings of desperation are creeping into his voice.
Natasha looks back at the Stonekeeper. "No. I don't think so."
This seems to be the end of conversation. Determination creates a stony look across Natasha's face. "Thanos left here with the stone and without his daughter. It's not a coincidence."
Clint's stomach drops to his toes. He knows what this means. He swallows. The saliva grates against his dry throat. "Yeah."
Natasha's green eyes study him, she can sense his hesitancy. Clint looks back into them. Those green eyes. They were the eyes he fell in love with, all those years ago in Budapest. Their impossible mix of intensity and softness, the mix that he noticed exclusively when she looked at him. He's broken from his reverie by Natasha's voice. "Whatever it takes." She reminds, her voice steady against a slight waver.
Clint swallows again, remembering their promise to each other. "Whatever it takes." He knows what he has to do. He has to do whatever he can to keep Natasha alive. She has to stay alive. Not only because he knows she'll be able to look after Laura and his kids, but because he doesn't think he can live a life without her. She has saved him so many more times than she could have known. She's saved him from himself, from his own mind, by doing as little as taking his hand in hers. With Natasha, he knows comfort. With Natasha, he is home. Clint loves Laura and can't imagine a life without her either, but Natasha was his first love. And deep down, it is still Natasha. It has always been Natasha.
He meets her emerald eyes as she speaks again. "If we don't get that stone, billions of people stay dead."
There are no ambient noises in Vormir. The silence is deafening. "Then I guess we both know who it's gotta be." He says, resolve clear on his worn and tired face. He musters the smallest smile. He's ready to pay the price for the sins he's committed. For the lives he's taken in the past five years. And the only thing that brings him peace is that Natasha will be safe.
Natasha smiles as well, though it takes a little more effort. All this time, she has not taken her eyes off of him. It's clear that she, too, has made up her mind. "I guess we do."
Clint's heart drops to his stomach. It can't be her. "I'm starting to think we've been thinking of different people here, Natasha." His voice is low, stern.
Natasha's brows furrow and her voice raises in frustration with him. Still, her eyes are locked into his. He can see the fire in them, the devastation, the passion. "For the last five years I've been trying to do one thing: Get to right here. That's all it's been about. Bringing everybody back-"
Clint begins to get frustrated as well, and cuts in over her. He can't let her do this. Not when he loves her this much and not when he has so many sins to repay. "Oh, don't you get all decent on me now-"
"What, you think I wanna do it?" Natasha interjects again. She looks almost offended, tears gathering in her eyes. She blinks them away quickly. "I'm trying to save your life, you idiot."
Clint takes a step back, half defeated and half desperate. "Yeah well, I don't want you to, because I…" I'm trying to save yours. Clint closes his eyes, finally breaking their eye contact. His voice softens. He has become unrecognizable to himself. "Natasha, you know what I've done. You know what I've become."
Natasha reaches for his hand, defeated at his side. She coaxes his eyes open with her voice. It is stoic but somehow comforting at the same time. "I don't judge people on their worst mistakes." There it is again. The uncanny ability that Natasha has to make him feel as though he's more than what he truly is.
"Maybe you should." He responds. Their hands entwined feels like a deadweight. They can't keep avoiding the inevitable. Clint just wishes that Natasha would stop being so stubborn and let him do this for her. She's saved him so many times, now it's his turn to save her. It's better off this way.
"You didn't." Natasha says simply. These words nearly break Clint. He remembers when he first met Natasha. Him fresh out of SHIELD training and her straight out of the Red Room. She was his target. She had already killed so many people. And still Clint saw something in her; something redeemable about her, even if she couldn't. She was his target, but she became so much more than that. It was in Budapest where he was able to break through her walls, where he was able to meet a remarkable, stubborn, passionate woman who was so much more than her trauma. It was in Budapest where he made a best friend; fell in love. And he couldn't lose her here, and not like this. He doesn't know if he can bear a life without Natasha Romanoff. But he knows she can bear one without him.
"You're a pain in my ass, you know that?" Clint scoffs softly. Slowly, naturally, their foreheads pressed together. Natasha and Clint both squeeze their eyes shut and breathe for a moment, their breaths mingling between them. Their foreheads pressed together is so vulnerable, so trusting. Slowly, they open their eyes, but as the wind blows hard through the sanctuary, they can't seem to move. And this once, he looks into her eyes and she can't look back at him. Her throat bobs up and down, her brow furrows. She releases a deep, wavering breath, and Clint knows it. She's made up her mind. "Okay." She says, taking her forehead from his. "You win."
They look at each other for a moment. Neither moves. Natasha's breathing is heavy with anticipation, eyes still full of fire, devastation, passion. Clint smiles at her, half apologetically, and pulls her to the ground, pinning her down far enough away from the ledge that she won't be able to stop him from going over. "Tell my family I love them." He says, his voice strained with fear for what will happen when he hits the ground, distress that he's leaving Natasha, knowledge that he'll never see Laura or his children again. He picks up at a jog for the the ledge when Natasha's voice says, "You tell them yourself." behind him.
The two of them grapple on the flat cliff for a time, until both of them are dangling precariously over the lip of the cliff, struggling to find footing. "Damn you!" Clint whispers through gritted teeth. He holds onto Natasha with everything he has. It isn't supposed to be like this. It can't be like this. He looks down at her, and there are those emerald eyes again, locking him in. Her voice is impossibly still. "Let me go."
Clint shakes his head, "No." his voice breaks so slightly. "Please, no." I still love you. His arm is numbing. He won't be able to hold on much longer. If he can't hold on Natasha has no chance. His face contorted in pain. After all that they've been through with each other, for each other… the only thing Clint can continue to think is that it can't happen this way.
Tears begin to appear in Natasha's eyes. She smiles comfortingly and she still keeps Clint locked in. She nods sharply and takes a shaky breath. "It's okay."
For the smallest fraction of a second, Clint hesitates. "Please." His voice breaks. He holds tighter onto Natasha's hand. He watches helplessly as she kicks off the cliff face, wrenching her hand from his. He screams so loud and with such anguish that he can't hear himself over the rush of blood in his ears. He watches her hurtle through the air, he hears her land with a crunch on the ground below. At the bottom of the structure her hair is thrown around her like a cruel halo, outlined by fresh and red blood. Clint can only look at her for a moment before he turns away. There is a flash of white light, and…
Clint wakes up. He is fully submerged in water. He shoots up, gasping for air. The rock structure far off in the distance. He looks around desperately for Natasha, but she is nowhere to be seen. If possible, the silence is even emptier than it was when they were up on the cliff face. His hand is clenched in a fist at his side. He uncurls his stiff fingers, a orange glow escaping in the gaps between his fingers. Before he can help himself, a sob escapes from his chest, primal and guttral. He closes his fist around the stone again, unable to look at it. Because there she is. The love of his life is in the palm of his hand, within the stone and he's powerless to save her. He's unable to look at it because it should have been him. Tears stream down his worn, weathered face as more sobs wrench from his chest.
And once he gets back to the Avengers facility without Natasha, the only thing he can do is fall to his knees while the Stonekeeper's words play on a loop through his head. In order to take the stone, you must lose that which you love. An everlasting exchange. A soul, for a soul. That which you love. A soul for a soul. That which you love. That which you love. That which you love.