"It was stupid of you to come so close," Natasha remarked casually, turning her back to him as she walked over to the chair and sat down. Ankles crossing, she gestured to the edge of the bed, playing the good little hostess, and Clint sat, taking her lead and ignoring the tension that was stretched across the room as tightly as his bowstring. "You were, I assume, sent to kill me."
"That was the original order," Clint admitted.
Natalia nodded, suddenly seeming regal even in a sweat suit. She'd slipped back into being the dauntless Black Widow, he realized.
"Who was it that sent you?"
"The Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement Logistics Division."
"Ahh, SHIELD. I've had a couple of run-ins with your men before."
"That's funny, because once you met them, they were never seen again."
Natasha shrugged, replying, "Occupational hazard. One that brings us back to my original thought. You know what happened to your comrades, and nevertheless you have yet to carry out the order you were given. Why?"
"I think I might have a better idea," Clint confessed.
She raised her eyebrows at that, asking, "Better than your superiors' demands? That's not normal for a soldier like yourself, is it?"
"But they're just my superiors, not my masters. My brain still functions on its own, and I like my idea better."
She smiled at that before inquiring, "And what your idea, Agent… What is your name?"
"Hawkeye."
"Yes," Natasha nodded towards the bow that he was still clutching. "The archer. I've heard about you too."
"I'm honored," Clint drawled.
"Your idea, Hawkeye?"
"I want you to join SHIELD."
Natasha snorted. "You want me to defect to the Americans, forsake my country and those who raised me to join your side?"
"Or I could just kill you," Clint offered easily.
Natasha smiled at him in amusement, and that's when Clint realized that she knew he was unwilling to end her. She confirmed that she knew it when her reply was, "But you won't."
"Really?" Clint asked irritably. "Because the last time I checked, birds ate spiders."
Her cool smile didn't even twitch, but the look in her luminous blue eyes sharpened almost imperceptibly as she replied, "Not if the spider is given a chance to bit the bird first."
Her expression added, And you gave me that chance, silly man.
Clint didn't like that she was right, so he brought them back to the point at hand, saying, "Look, I'm giving you a chance her. Defect, join SHIELD, and live, or don't, and be a loyal little Red Room Russian until the increasingly imminent end. You're choice."
"I've got a third option," she said, body tensing minutely as her eyes just barely narrowed.
Clint responded in kind, recognizing the body language of someone who was ready to strike.
And in the next second, strike she did. She whipped a knife out of the pocket of her trench coat and threw it with remarkable precision at Clint's right eye socket. He'd been ready for her, though, and rolled back onto the bed. He ended up with his back against the headboard, crouched on snowy white pillows with an arrow stung on his bow and pointed straight at her heart.
The knife embedded in the wall with Clint between it and her as he chastised lightly, "Now, that wasn't nice. Got any more options I should know about?"
"Just one," she answered, slipping her hand into her sweatpants' pocket with a cocky expression.
Clint watched, feeling first bewildered and then amused as the look in her eye turned to one of panic. He realized what her fourth option was within the same moment that she spotted the desired weapon. Her gun. On the bedside table – two feet from him and maybe ten from her.
They both froze for a second, staring at one another, before Clint lashed out and grabbed the gun.
He cocked his head to the side, studying her panicked, wide-eyed expression as they both realized she was at his mercy and he repeated, "So – options. Defect or die, and you had better decide while I'm still in a good enough mood to give you a second choice at all. Which won't be for long, because you just tried to kill me, I'm the only one who's armed now, and you can't get to your knife without going by me. Widow's off her A-game today, and I am now only just barely in the mood to give you a second chance. It's your call."
"Defect or die," Natasha mused, the superior tone she'd taken with him disappearing into the tense air. "To a 'loyal little Red Room Russian' they are the same thing."
Noting the defeated, uncertain tone of her voice, Clint asked carefully, "And what is defection to you?"
The silence that met the question stretched on for so long that he began to thing she wasn't going to answer at all.
Then she said softly, sounding every bit like any other frightened teenager, "A chance."
"Yes, I am taking a chance on you here," he agreed. "If you choose to defect. If you want to die, well, then it's just business as usual for me. Otherwise, this whole 'spare the mark thing' is kind of new to me."
"Well, I'm glad you chose me to go on the adventure with you," Natasha said almost teasingly, a wry twist coming onto her lips as she gathered her wits back about her.
"The first of many adventures, maybe?" he offered.
Her lips twitched with an impending sense of the adventure of which they spoke as she replied, "Perhaps."
Clint nodded and stood on the floor, taking that for her answer as he sat down on the window ledge through which he had come in and swung his legs over.
Looking back at her, he held his hand out to her, asking, "Are you coming, Natasha? I made my call when I didn't kill you at the opportunity; now you've got to make a call for yourself."
Natasha swallowed nervously, looking at him and then back at the impersonal hotel room containing her tiny suitcase, bloody clothes, and weapons. She snatched up the knife from the wall and gun from where Clint had left it on the bed – a misstep of his own if he'd believed she was actually going to take any chance he gave her to kill him by that point – and then joined him at the window. Natasha accepted Clint's outstretched hand and they took the leap together.
And there you have it; the end. What do you think? Reviews would make my day if you feel so inclined. Thanks!:)