DISCLAIMER: No, I do not own any part of the MCU.
A/N: Thank you to everyone who reviews, favorites, and follows! They all make me so happy; you have no idea.
SAMANTHA
Samantha had been in S.H.I.E.L.D. custody for six weeks, being as uncooperative as humanly possible. She didn't utter a single word in any of her interrogations, all conducted by a different person. She was pretty sure the next one to give her one would be the director themself. She ate the food, of course, because it was actually pretty okay, but she didn't eat peas and had had a lot of fun using them to spell out cuss words the first and only time she had them that would've made her Roman Catholic parents sob. Well, she did until somebody on the other side of the camera reported what she was doing and somebody else came in and not only took the peas, but also her remaining food, which she was most definitely not pleased about.
Needless to say, she hadn't played with her food again.
As the weeks went on, though, she was starting to get pissed about how she had to eat on S.H.I.E.L.D.'s schedule. She'd gotten what she assumed was food poisoning from the steak they'd served her one night early in and could barely keep anything down, but they'd still take her food away, even if she hadn't touched it, and that became irritating when she'd get ravenously hungry around 3:30.
S.H.I.E.L.D. finally caught on that something was up after her first six weeks and that was when she finally left the containment facility and was taken to a lab.
Of course, she wasn't allowed to know the location of either facility and was drugged during the ride.
"Agent Calderon, has Agent Weaver arrived?" were the first words she could hear, and when she opened her eyes there were two agents in the small room with her.
"Her quinjet just landed; she'll be here any minute."
Agent Weaver, to Bobbi's surprise, turned out to be a woman who simply took a blood sample and then left. Agent Calderon and the other agent talked in hushed tones in the corner of the room while Samantha simply sat on her little bed, pressing the cotton ball into her arm much harder and for much longer than needed. She caught a wiff of Agent Calderon's cologne as he exited the room to check on Agent Weaver and she prepared to throw up, though the other agent quickly realized what was happening and held a bedpan underneath her that she could vomit into. She self-consciously wiped her mouth when she was done and flashed the agent an embarrassed smile.
"Thank you."
"I have a five year old with a weak immune system and, on top of that, she has a relatively small stomach and we're still learning her limits. I do this a lot."
"Do you see her much? Your daughter?"
"My ex-wife and I finalized our divorce last week, and her mother won full custody, but I get to see her up to three times a month. We have a visit this weekend."
"Have a good time," she replied, and she really hope that he understood that she meant it. She'd always loved kids. The views her parents had on abortion were about the only things that the three of them all agreed on.
Agent Weaver came back into the room, Agent Calderon trailing behind her. Both looked worried, and Samantha involuntarily tensed.
"Ms. Fisher. You entered S.H.I.E.L.D. custody six weeks ago, correct?" Agent Weaver asked, and Samantha was surprised that she had a British accent.
"Yes, I think so."
"And do you remember which agent brought you in?
"Shouldn't that be in the files?"
"None of us can get into the mission report, as it also served as confidential testing information for one of our new agents. Do you remember his name?"
"I don't know his real one, but the alias he used was 'Bernard Donaldson.'" Agent Calderon nodded and left the room quickly. Agent Weaver stared at the other agent with a look that clearly said, 'Hallway now,' but the agent didn't seem to get it.
"Agent Browning, can I speak to you for a moment?" Agent Weaver finally asked, and the two agents stepped out into the hallway.
Samantha was left alone in the room for what she counted in her head as twenty-six minutes before the three agents returned. The two boys looked like they were close to cracking up, but Agent Weaver's face was perfectly calm.
"Is this the agent?" she asked, holding up a black and white fax of Bernard Donaldson, which said 'BARTON, CLINTON' in one of the corners.
"Yes, it is."
Agent Weaver pressed a hand to the Bluetooth on her ear and asked for Agent Barton and Dr. Harper to be on stand-by, then she returned her attention to Samantha. Worry was starting to eat its way at her by all the silence between the agents, and why was it so important about who brought her into custody?
Holy crap, Agent Barton hadn't given her an STD, had he?
Wait, could you test STDs in blood samples?
"Miss Fisher. I know this will sound like a strange question, but when was your last menstrual cycle?"
The fact that Agent Calderon suddenly looked incredibly uncomfortable distracted Samantha and Agent Browning had to escort him out of the room. It was all quite comical, and then she was faced with answering Agent Weaver's question. It was mid June, now, so should've had her last one…
Almost four weeks ago.
And she hadn't.
"Oh, God," she groaned, running her hands through her hair, "You've got to be shitting me."
"So I take it you've missed it, then?" Samantha nodded, dazed. "Miss Fisher, did you and Agent Barton engage in sexual intercourse?"
"Yes," she managed to croak out, and then she remembered. It would still be bad, of course, but not as bad as it might be if this Clinton Barton dude had fathered the possible baby inside of her. "But I did have sex with someone else during that same week."
"Well, your blood test showed elevated levels of hCG, which indicates a pregnancy. Agent Barton, as well as the North American S.H.I.E.L.D. OB/GYN are going to come out to make sure we're right."
"What does Agent Barton have to do with anything?"
"We would have to confirm his paternity." Samantha nodded, taking this all in.
She was most likely pregnant.
With the baby of a secret agent.
Who worked for an organization that had her locked up in a cell.
She was not at all ashamed to admit that she threw up into the bedpan.
Again.
It didn't seem as if Clint understood why he had been flown out to this S.H.I.E.L.D. base alongside not only some random S.H.I.E.L.D. doctor, but an OB/GYN at that, and Samantha really didn't want to be the one to tell him. She was starting to wonder whether or not this whole 'impregnating someone you took into custody' was common amongst the male S.H.I.E.L.D. agents, or whether they had an obstetrician on their payroll for a reason.
His pager beeped the whole ten minutes they were alone together, which Samantha assumed was time that was spent briefing the OB/GYN on this whole fucked up situation.
"Who's paging you?" she asked nonchalantly.
"Natasha, probably," he sighed, running a hand through his hair.
"Who's Natasha?"
"My partner."
"As in… girlfriend?"
"No, as in my S.H.I.E.L.D.-assigned partner."
"Do you… have a girlfriend? Or boyfriend or anything?"
"No… Why do you care?"
"Just trying to make conversation," she muttered, though she would admit that the knot in her stomach loosened slightly at those words.
It was then that the woman she assumed was Dr. Harper followed Agent Weaver into the room. Samantha caught sight of Agent Calderon and Agent Browning standing outside just as the door shut.
She also noticed Agent Weaver holding a large needle behind her back. That was unsettling.
"Agent Weaver, why am I here, and why do you have that?"
So he'd seen it, too, not that Agent Weaver was being overly conspicuous. But with the way that Agent Weaver was standing, he shouldn't have been able to see it.
"Agent Barton, Agent Weaver is going to explain all of that. After Miss Fisher and I have left the room," Dr. Harper replied. "Miss Fisher?"
Samantha stood up slowly and followed Dr. Harper down the hall a little ways and into a room identical to the previous one, although this one happened to have what she assumed was a sonogram machine.
"Since Agent Weaver hypothesizes that you're only about a month in, we'll have to use the transvaginal ultrasound to get the best image; I hope that's alright. In such a delicate situation as this one, we really can't have any inaccuracies," Dr. Harper apologized as she rummaged in a large duffle bag on the floor and then pulled out a standard-issue hospital gown, which Samantha took carefully. "I'm really sorry about… all this," Dr. Harper and Samantha knew that she actually meant it.
"Thank you. Where should I change?"
"There's a bathroom right there. I'm going to finish setting everything up while you change." Samantha nodded and stepped into the bathroom. The gown was more papery than she thought normal hospital gowns were, but she wasn't going to push it. The situation was stressful enough as it was, and she wasn't going to waste energy on complaining about backless hospital gowns.
How was S.H.I.E.L.D. going to handle her pregnancy, because it was time to face it: It was highly unlikely that she wasn't pregnant. Would she be kept in custody? Would she be kept in custody but in a house arrest style situation instead of the current one? Would they force her to terminate it? If she didn't end it, would she have to put it up for adoption, or would her child be completely raised in a S.H.I.E.L.D. cell?
And what if Agent Barton actually was the father? That would make things even more complicated than they already were, because he would be involved. Maybe. She wasn't sure how all that would work, if he even wanted to be involved. It made her anxious just thinking about it.
Dr. Harper kept the screen pointed away from her the entire time, which Samantha wasn't sure whether she appreciated or not. Considering how long it took, she prepared herself for the outcome that had been dancing around in her head ever since Agent Weaver had first uttered the words hours ago.
"Well, Agent Weaver was right," Dr. Harper said at the end of the exam, and Samantha nodded slowly, because there wasn't the slight possibility that Agent Weaver had been wrong anymore. This was 100% fact. "Now, you said that this baby may be someone else's?"
"Yes," she answered honestly, though with the way her luck seemed to be running, she doubted that she would be that lucky.
It couldn't get any worse, right?
"That will require us to do a paternity test. Are you aware of that?"
"I figured."
"And are you aware that invasive paternity tests can result in miscarriages?"
"I am now."
"Do you still agree for us to perform this test?"
"I think I'd rather know then not," she admitted after a moment. Dr. Harper nodded.
"I'll alert Agent Weaver, and then we'll perform the test. After that I promise, you can get some rest. We won't know the results for a little while, anyways."
"You can do that kind of testing here?"
"You'd be amazed at everything that goes on in this facility, especially considering its location. We'll have the results at some point tomorrow, and I'll make sure that you're fed when it's appropriate and not on the standard S.H.I.E.L.D. schedule."
"Thank you," she replied. She wondered if anyone was taking her seriously when she, the arms dealer, said anything sincere.
"Of course. My husband's an agent, and they have the most insane schedules. Being on the payroll, I have a busy one, too, but not as bad as him. It's gotten better now that he's a higher rank, but still. Our teenagers have to be the ones to remind us to eat and get enough sleep."
"How old are they?"
"Maya just turned seventeen and Ethan will be fourteen in August. We had them when we were older because of S.H.I.E.L.D. and me getting my doctorate and everything." Samantha nodded.
"Dr. Harper?"
"Yes?"
"Why does S.H.I.E.L.D. have an OB/GYN on its payroll?"
"Well, they have like to have a gynecologist for when female agents get shot or otherwise wounded in their abdomens, especially for those who want to have children. S.H.I.E.L.D. also keeps track of the cycles of all the female agents who suffer from bad cramps, which can be used when assigning missions because pain is a good distraction that some of them really can't afford. They also use us, as there's three of us, at least there's three of us in North America, as aids to keep the female medical records as up-to-date as possible."
"But you're also an obstetrician."
"I am, yes."
"Why does S.H.I.E.L.D. need an obstetrician?"
"Well, there are female agents who get pregnant while with S.H.I.E.L.D. and need to see an obstetrician that understands their lifestyle. There are situations like yours. And then there are some female agents where they execute a take in the way Agent Barton did and find themselves pregnant, and have an abortion."
Samantha nodded.
"Are you ready?"
"For the test?" Dr. Harper nodded. "Do what needs to be done."
The next morning, Samantha and Clint sat side-by-side in what she was pretty sure was an interrogation room. They sat there, silent and alone, for several minutes before Agent Browning opened the door for Dr. Harper and she walked in, closing the door tightly behind her.
"Agent Barton, as you are aware, Miss Fisher is, in fact, pregnant, and the results from the paternity test have arrived, and you are the father."
Samantha was pretty sure her entire world had just crashed down.
"Me? I created a human being?"
"No need to sound so shocked, Agent Barton, as it is a natural biological phenomenon."
She found a whole new appreciation for Dr. Harper at that comment.
"So, what does that mean?"
"Well, I'll have to speak to Director Fury, but usually, if a situation like this occurs, we strongly encourage-"
"No," Samantha interrupted. "Religious conflict."
"You're actually Christian?" Agent Barton asked in what sounded a lot like shock, which she did not appreciate.
"No, but my parents are. My parents were," she corrected after a moment, "And I want to honor them. So, no, Dr. Harper, abortion is not an option."
"I understand," Dr. Harper agreed. "Again, I'll have to speak with Director Fury about what, exactly, the situation with your detainment is, but right now, adoption probably makes the most sense."
"Right now it does, but I will not make a decision until you have spoken to Director Fury."
"Don't I get a say in this?" Agent Barton said harshly, glaring at her.
"Why do you care? Even if I don't give it up for adoption, you will not be involved."
"That's not fully your decision!"
"And it's not fully yours either, so shut up."
"Are we done now?" Dr. Harper asked in a strict tone, a tone she must've perfected on her kids.
"Yes, Dr. Harper," Samantha said immediately, staring at Clint in what she considered her most coercing expression.
"Yes, Dr. Harper," he echoed.
"I think it would be best if we all went to Headquarters together, don't you? That way we can get everything sorted as soon as possible."
"I think that will work. Miss Fisher?" Agent Barton asked in a tone that reminded Samantha of a snake spitting venom.
"That will be just fine."
