A/N: A few notes; Mockingbird isn't strictly an OC in Marvel, but is (currently at least) to the film universe. However, she's got a backstory that's a) not all that great and b) has changed multiple times so I've taken the liberty of re-imagining it for my own purposes.

It had been a week.

A week of repeated interrogation, a week of smiles and falsities, a week of absolutely nothing to show for the operation. The girl seemed quite happy to go round after round with whoever Fury wanted to throw at her, talking a great deal but ultimately saying nothing.

What she had done, however, was relieve his staff of pens, phones, watches, wallets and, on one occasion, freedom. Even Barton had to smile when they played the tapes back – exasperated no doubt at the word play and evasive tactics, Agent 12 had leaned forward suddenly across the table towards the girl, which turned out to be a bad move on his part.

Standard show of strength, standard interrogation technique designed to intimidate. She'd pulled back simultaneously and, somehow, Agent 12 had ended up handcuffed to the table with the girl flattened against the one way mirror. Laughing.

Fury was teetering on the edge of declaring it all a mistake, and handing her international ass to the Brits. He doubted very much there was anything they'd be able to do with her; he was confident that they still had her incarcerated was due in part to the hefty reinforcements S.H.I.E.L.D. had as necessity and in no smaller part to her own curiosity.

He reset the tapes again and again; almost spitting in anger as he watched – for the fifth time – the successful pick pocketing of one of his best agents.

She would be an asset, no doubt. He'd a list of her escapades; either declared or attributed, as long as his arm. She was smart, apparently extremely flexible and now half his staff could attest to her dexterity. All skills he very much found himself in need of right now. But how to get her onside?

He drummed his fingers absentmindedly on the table. Realistically, he had one card left in the pack on this one. But Romanoff, skilled as she was, currently resided half the world away on a different assignment.

"Sir?"

He looked up. Agent Barton stood in the doorway, bow strapped, as ever, to his back. He tipped his head to the younger man, silently motioning him into the room proper. He pressed fast forward, then back, then pause. The cameras just about picked up the moment her deft little fingers nipped into Hill's pocket to relieve her of the phone she kept there.

He slammed his hand down on the table, exasperated by it all. Here was the perfect set of skills, here was exactly what he needed right now – and surely would in the future – and yet, he had no idea how to get at it. He was slightly concerned he might be going after another Stark. He really didn't need another one of those.

"Can I try, sir?"

He'd forgotten Barton was even there.

"I might be able to get through." The archer continued. "After all, Natasha …" He trailed off. He'd gone off book for that one, but overall it had worked out in the end. Slightly sticky at the start, but you can't have everything, he reasoned. And this one, as clever as she might be, was no Natasha.

Fury raised both hands, palms out. "At this point, I'd be happy to get Banner in and see his friend wipe the grin off her face."

"I don't think that'll be necessary, sir."

"Perhaps not, but it would sure ease my mental state right now." Fury replied. "Go on, Barton. Do your worst."

She looked up at the door opened. Said nothing. Her eyes followed him across the room as he reached up to the CCTV and deftly pulled the cable from the back of it. The red light abruptly stopped blinking.

He turned back towards her, taking in her small form as she gazed back at him. Not exactly defiantly, but there was a certain tilt to her head that didn't suggest full co-operation would be forthcoming. He sighed, pulled the free chair back from the other side of the table and flung himself into it.

"You remember me?" He asked quietly.

"A girl rarely forgets the man who handcuffs her." She replied glibly. "Or one certainly shouldn't, at least." He could feel her eyes on him, knew without doubt she was drinking in as much as she could – assessing, weighing, working out what she could get away with. He wasn't sure how far he could let her go and still stay in control. He changed the subject.

"You know why we're here? Why we want you?" He grabbed the water jug and poured a glass. He paused, then pushed it over to the girl. She regarded it with a certain amount of suspicion. He shrugged and poured himself one, downing it in seconds.

"Strangely, no one from the secret government organization has been overly communicative on that front." She replied with a certain amount of sarcasm and reached out tentatively to pull the glass closer to herself, still not taking a drink.

"Cut the hostility."

"Your organization has kept me here, against my will, for a week – without given reason."

He put his elbows on the table and stared across at her. "You were about to rob a museum before I took you in."

"I really don't think you have any grounds to prove that, do you?" She grinned back at him, knowing full well they'd been unable to find anything of value on her person or, indeed, nothing specifically not belonging to her.

"You don't tend to find many innocent parties in the Smithsonian after hours, sweetheart."

"Back on friendly terms, are we?" She leaned across the table towards him, and he found the hairs on his arms start to raise as she did so. The handcuffs, still firmly – he hoped – around her wrists, clanked against the dark oak table as she rested her hands in front of her. She almost looked innocent. He slapped himself mentally.

"That depends." He answered, smoothly.

She raised an eyebrow. "On what?"

"On you."

"Really." She breathed, eyes on him. "How about you just enlighten me as to what it is your Strategically Placed Homeland Bureau of Illegal Interrogation wants and then we can go from there?" She raised both hands up as if to say, how about it?

"Okay." She looked mildly surprised at his reaction. He reached behind him and grabbed a brown dossier folder from the shelf, flipped it open and began reading aloud.

"Roberta 'Bobbi' Morse; born in England, London to be precise, the East End to be even more precise."

She rolled her eyes. "And? It's clearly not news to you and, I can assure you, it's not news to me either."

"Born 1985 to parents unknown," he continued as though she hadn't spoken. "Educated at the Benedictine Convent School for Girls, disappeared from both home and school at age 17. Reappeared in Budapest as assistant to magician 'The Great Ka-Zar', aged 20. Disappeared again aged 21 and has not been heard of since."

He snapped the dossier shut and continued. "The Mockingbird robberies have both scandalized and enthralled the world, leading newspapers to speculate that the Mockingbird moniker must be applied to a whole team of thieves working in partnership. But that's not true, is it Bobbi?"

She regarded him for a moment. "You didn't know all that in the museum – you weren't expecting me." It wasn't so much a question as a statement, but he answered it anyway.

"We've had a week to work on filling in the blanks." He paused, opening the dossier once more. The intelligence operatives had located a school photo of the girl, and she stared back at him from the page shyly. The uniform made her look absurdly young. He shut it again and looked up at the older Bobbi Morse. "You weren't what we were expecting, but you are what we need."

She laughed. "And what would that be?"

"A thief, an escape artist, a clever mind and a willingness to serve the country."

"You forgot yourself; this isn't my country." She reminded him sharply, but there was a glimmer of interest in her light blue eyes as she regarded him across the table. "Why would I want to have anything to do with it?"

"You want the challenge." He answered. "I've read the newspaper reports, I've seen the coverage – I've seen the places you've broken into and the things you've stolen – they're barely what you'd call valuable sometimes. You just want to beat something smart, you want to prove you're better than the system, you want to win."

In his passion, he'd leaned across the table and was almost face to face with the girl, she'd leaned forward also. Eye to eye they gazed at each other, her eyes slightly narrowed. "So what's your challenge, then?" She whispered.

He opened his mouth to answer but was interrupted by the door crashing open and bouncing against the wall, hinges groaning under the stress of being forced open so brutally. A dark-haired man in an expensive suit stood, visibly fuming, in the doorway. He looked down at Bobbi over his sunglasses, completely ignoring Barton.

"So this is the kid that broke in Stark Tower, huh?"