Author's note
Thank you SO much for all the reviews, adding it to alerts/favourites and general love I'm getting from just one chapter! It was a lovely surprise to wake up to this morning! :D :D
This next chapter was a lot harder to write than chapter one! I wrote most of it at 3am and then spent today editing it so if it doesn't make sense, it's because I've had little to no sleep. A lot like Clint I guess.. haha! Even after spending the day on it, I'm still not feeling 100% about it.
I'll try to make chapter 3 more interesting. This one is mostly introductions. Also, I hate writing dialogue soooo that didn't bode well :)
Enjoy!
Oh, and I don't own Marvel.
The silence was deafening; it was as if time was standing still.
After what felt like a lifetime, the woman stepped forward towards them, heels clicking on the floor. Clint leaned his body towards Tony, raising his eyebrows in amusement and cupping his hand over his mouth.
"How could you get it so wrong Stark?" He whispered, shoulders shaking, struggling to stifle his laughter.
"Shut it, Birdy." He glared at his friend. Quickly recovering, he stood up, took her hand and turned on the charm. "Hey there! Tony Stark, Iron Man. It's an absolute pleasure to meet you Miss..."
"Winters. Elizabeth Winters. Charmed, I'm sure." She replied with her crisp English accent as she grimaced and firmly retracted her hand from his grasp. Clint watched her carefully as she regarded Tony, her eyes touched with disgust not quite reaching the rest of her face. It was moments like this that he was glad to be a master at reading people.
Coulson cleared his throat and spoke up for the first time. "Miss Winters will be spending some time with the team. She harnesses some, well... skills that I think you will find very useful in time." A small smile played on Coulson's mouth.
Steve stood, moving around the table to stand in front of Elizabeth. He offered his hand in greeting. "Pleasure to meet you Ma'am, welcome aboard. I'm Steve Rogers." She smiled pleasantly at him with no trace of the disgust she had shown Tony.
She turned to Clint, who rose from his seat and extended a hand to her, a small smile at his lips. "Clint Barton. Nice to meet you, Miss Winters."
"Please," she replied, "Elizabeth is fine." She took his hand in hers, giving it a quick squeeze and gave him a polite nod.
Her hand was soft, delicate and very warm. Her face was sharp, with large dark brown eyes which seemed to burn into everything she looked at. There was something scary about her. Clint just couldn't pin-point what.
His train of thought was interrupted by Thor bounding across the table to engulf Elizabeth in a bear hug. "Thor, son of Odin. WELCOME, Elizabeth, daughter of Winter!"
"Thor!" Banner stepped out from behind Elizabeth "Put her down!" he laughed. Thor obliged, grinning widely at their latest visitor.
Slapping Thor on the shoulder, Clint glanced at Elizabeth, whose eyes were filled with fiery alarm at such a greeting. She patted her pencil skirt down and adjusted her shirt. He noticed for the first time that she was immaculately dressed. Her black skirt fell to just below her knees with not a crease in sight. Her crisp white shirt clung to every curve, and her long, wavy, dark brown hair fell around her waist. She did not look like she belonged in the middle of the action. Not at all. She looked like she belonged in an office.
Suddenly, her eyes flickered up to Clint's stare, catching him out. He quickly averted his gaze, silently cussing to himself. The corner of Elizabeth's mouth twitched upwards but the rest of her face remained serious.
Fury cleared his throat. "As of 10:00am this morning, training will recommence. This will include target practice, sparring, and individual skills training."
"Individual skills?" questioned Bruce. "Don't you think that's a bit...erm, dangerous... considering?"
Tony piped up "Yeah, think it's a bit early to introduce Lizzie to the other guy, don't you think?" He said, grinning at Bruce.
Elizabeth's head snapped towards Tony, her eyes narrowed. "Elizabeth, Stark. Dear me, looks like memory really does diminish with age."
With that, she turned on her heel and walked out of the room, leaving Tony with his eyebrows so high up his forehead that they almost merged with his curly hair.
Funny? Yes. Scary? Yes. Menace to society? Clint wasn't so sure. He was yet to see what made her so special.
10am came all too quickly.
Of course, Clint hadn't got a wink of sleep. He'd sat in the training room all night, taking the weapons apart and carefully cleaning them.
By the time the rest of the team traipsed in, he had stationed himself at his usual target, bow in hand. He turned to face the line of targets, listening to Steve hitting a punch bag. He's angry today. Clint thought to himself. The punch bag didn't stand a chance.
He raised the bow in his hands, taking careful aim and holding his breath.
whhhhh-THUNK
An arrow soared past his left ear, the air whipping at his hair. He quickly lowered his bow and brought his hands together to release the tension that had been building.
"Not bad for an office girl, hey?" A crisp, female voice came from behind him.
He turned, eyes filled with amazement. Had he heard right? "Wh-"
"Yes?" She interrupted, her eyebrow raised.
He quickly shook his head. "Nothing."
"No, go on. You were about to say something."
But how did she know about the office thing?
"Alright Team Stark, let's get this show on the road!"
Clint felt his eyes close as he sighed as his friend entered the room, slamming the door against the wall. He really did have the most perfect timing.
The first few hours passed without much drama. Clint kept close to his target, Steve concentrated on his punch bags, Bruce was sat on the bench, reading his book and Tony and Thor divided their time between sparring and drinking copious amounts of coffee. He hadn't seen Elizabeth since the morning
"Tell you what, Fury can't keep calling these early morning meetings. Some of us need our beauty sleep." Clint heard Tony's voice drift across the training room.
A quiet voice came from over his left shoulder. "Yeah, some of you do."
Clint's head snapped towards where the voice had come from and found his nose just inches from a pale, heart-shaped face.
"Looks like Stark could do with Rogers' 70 years of beauty sleep," she murmured under her breath, moving around Clint to cross over to the other side of the room to the area set aside for individual skills training. His eyes followed her as she left him, surprise spreading across his face.
Who is this woman! She's bloody mental!
Her head jerked in his direction, almost as if she had heard what he had been thinking.
No way...
"You got it, Robin Hood." Her voice carried across the room, causing the blood to slowly drain from Clint's already pale face.
Looks like no one's thoughts are safe then. Great. Yeah, because this place had so much in the way of privacy up 'til now...
All of a sudden, an eye-watering blast of heat came from the area where Elizabeth had been standing. In her place, a ball of violent flames.
"WHAT THE FUCK!" Tony yelled, shielding his eyes from the blinding heat. Thor grabbed the water dispenser from the wall and emptied the contents over Elizabeth, extinguishing the flames from her body. The room was filled with smoky, steamy air and Clint's chest tightened, struggling for air.
As the smoke cleared, Clint looked on in astonishment to see that not a single hair on Elizabeth's head had been damaged. Her skin still had its usual pale glow and her clothes looked as though she'd just ironed them.
She parted her sodden hair and looked up through the curls at Thor with fury in her eyes. "What in God's name do you think you're doing, you great huge moron?"
"I'm sorry?" came the reply, confusion written across Thor's face. He'd just saved her life, hadn't he? Clint moved closer, his eyes narrowed in suspicion.
"You just threw an entire container of water over me! What the hell were you thinking!"
"Elizabeth?" A quiet voice came from the punch bags.
She turned her head, water dripping around her. "What?" she replied, bluntly.
Steve stepped forward, glaring at the woman in front of him, his brow furrowed in anger. "There's something you've been keeping from us. And in an environment like this, you can't keep things like THIS," he gestured at her with his hands, "secret."
"No..." A groan from the other side of the room broke the tension that had quickly built up between the two Avengers. Clint watched Steve carefully as his eyes shot to where Bruce had been reading, alarm growing on his face.
Everyone turned in unison as Tony ran to Bruce's shuddering arm, closely followed by Steve and Clint.
"Shit! Shit, shit, shit. Bruce? Heeey buddy, look at me." Tony placed his hands on Bruce's face, forcing him to turn to look at him.
"I... can't..." Tears of frustration trailed down Bruce's face as he tried to fight the inevitable.
"What is going on here? Look, I'm sorry for scaring you all but I'm the one who has to deal with bursting into flames. So what if he's a little freaked out? How do you think I feel?" Elizabeth shrugged, and bent over to flip her hair over in front of her face, scrunching the curls.
Tony stepped back from Bruce and turned to look her in the face, his cheeks flushing red with anger. "Don't think you quite get what's going on here, darling. You might want to start running..."
"Running? Why would I run from a scared little man? And don't call me-"
"ARRRRGGGGHHHHHH!" A terrifying roar filled the room as Thor grabbed Clint and Steve by their waists and pulled them aside, before bringing an arm forward to block a large green arm from knocking Tony against the wall.
"You're not the only menace to society in this team Lizzie." Tony yelled angrily over the roars coming from Bruce.
Clint gave Tony a warning glance. "Stark, I wouldn't provoke-"
"ELIZABETH!" she screamed, and a flash of sweltering, white-hot heat exploded across the room.
Great. Clint thought. A giant green Hulk and a walking, mind-reading fireball.
He had not had enough sleep for this.
Ta-dah! I know it's a bit of a weird chapter, but I did the best I could :)
Thanks again for all of the reviews so far, but keep them coming! It fills my heart with joy every time I check my emails to see a new alert there :D
yvaiine :)
