Notes: Arly, I feel like I could probably just point you at Sinister and let you loose and you'd take him down on your own at this point. He really is the worst of all the X-Men villains (probably the worst Marvel villain of all, if I'm honest). He should fear YOUR wrath!

And CC, I'm sorry in advance.


Chapter 7: Leverage


Katie was really worried about her new family.

Her new mom and dad were still gone, and no matter what Miss Jean and Mister Scott and Mister Kurt and anyone else said, she could tell that they were worried. They didn't smile like normal, and they were always checking their comms and spending their time looking over papers and computers and stuff.

But Katie was very sure that Logan and K wouldn't leave their new baby boy for this long, so she knew something was very, very wrong. She just didn't know what it was.

She did know that James was upset, so she was trying to help Kurt take care of him. She liked James a lot, even if he cried a ton lately. But she knew what his favorite toys were, so she tried to make sure that Kurt had those whenever he needed them. Sometimes, that helped.

But Katie had to admit that she was a little scared, too. She was trying not to show it because James was so little and he needed someone to look after him, but… Katie was worried.

She really didn't want to lose her parents all over again now that she had new ones that were super nice and let her stay up and watch movies like her big brothers.

Katie was doing really well at keeping her brave face on, too… all the way up until Susie tattled on her and told Dr. Blue she wasn't doing real well, and then as soon as Dr. Blue scooped Katie up into a hug… that was it. She couldn't hold it in anymore, and she completely buried herself in the hug.

"You know everyone here is doing everything they can to find them," Dr. Blue said gently, rubbing a hand over her head and hair as she sniffled into his shoulder.

Katie nodded and sniffled, but she still buried her face a little deeper into his fur. "I want my dad," she whispered out.

Hank let out a noise that clearly revealed how heartbroken he was. "I know," he said gently, still snuggling her tight to his chest.

"I want my Clint," she whispered, holding on a little tighter.

"I know," Hank said again, pulling her close to kiss her temple before she let out a hitched sort of sound and started to cry into his shoulder all over again.


Things weren't much better on the other side of things, inside the department.

Clint still hadn't seen his parents, and it had been a couple of days. He hadn't been able to do much of anything, really, except to "rest" and "recover" and "not pop his stitches" and insult the guards who brought him food. The cell was pretty small, and there wasn't anything to do, and Clint felt like he was going out of his mind.

At this point, he almost wanted to do something that would pop his stitches, just to screw up whatever their stupid plans were. Just for spite. He was that frustrated.

He didn't know what he'd do. Maybe somersaults. Something he'd learned from Barney at the circus. The contortionist had taught him some pretty cool stuff last time he'd spent a weekend there. That would probably work, right?

He was just thinking about maybe trying to touch his toes to his ears when he heard the door open at the other end of the hallway and got to his feet fast, his hands in fists and his eyes narrowed. He stuck his chin out and looked as defiant as he could. That was, he figured, the best way to tell these guys to screw themselves when he was stuck and couldn't do much else.

But instead of just dropping off something for him to eat like they'd done every time before, the guards actually opened up the door to Clint's cell — and that had him dropping the defiant look in favor of one more like panic. As much as he hated being trapped in that cell, he didn't want to go anywhere these creeps wanted to take him.

After all, the last time they'd dragged him out, he'd gotten stitches.

The problem, of course, was that the guards were still a whole lot bigger than Clint was, and they didn't care that he was ten and scared. They just grabbed an arm apiece and pulled.

"Get offa me," Clint said, his tone ringing with panic — not that it had any effect on the guards.

"Shut up, kid."

That was all anybody said to him lately — "shut up, kid" — and it was grating on his last nerve. What else was he supposed to do in this place?

Maybe they'd rather he just bit them. He could totally do that too.

Clint was mentally cursing everyone he could think of related to this whole stupid mess, though he was paying enough attention to realize that they didn't take the right turn down the second hallway that had taken them to where Sinister was set up, and that more than anything was what finally got him worried.

If he wasn't going to Sinister, then where, exactly, were they taking him?

After that left turn, they just seemed to keep going, deeper and deeper into the facility that looked a lot bigger to Clint than it probably actually was, since he was small and panicking. But when they got to what looked like a much more intensive holding area than the little cell that Clint had, Clint couldn't help but hold his breath.

Maybe this was where they'd been keeping his parents.

His heart was too loud in his ears, and he didn't have his aide, so he couldn't have heard either of them, but he did feel a growl as the guards brought him into a room before he even saw Logan—

And then he couldn't stop his smirk, because Logan was surrounded by guards — but all of the guards were black and blue and clearly wary of Logan.

That's what you get, he thought to himself, though he had to frown when he took in the rest of the scene.

Logan looked pretty bloody, and it was clear he was healing from several shots that he'd taken, based on the pattern of red alone. The fight had also upended a table, where there had been what looked like some kind of black suit as well as a communicator and … a collar, it looked like.

Clint had a feeling he'd just been paraded into some bigger fight, but he only had the pieces of it. But given what his mom had told him about how these people tried to make her kill for them, he couldn't help but glare at the comm and uniform on the floor.

"The hell's he doin' here?" Logan growled out when he saw Clint, though it was clear from his expression he had a pretty good idea.

"Since you can't seem to follow orders without incentive," the guard on Clint's left said with a sneer and then let the sentence drop, pulling Clint slightly closer with his free hand on his gun, which just had Clint holding his breath because this was exactly what he hadn't wanted to have happen.

Logan glared the guard's way, staring him straight in the eyes as he took a measured breath. "You know you're gonna die real slow, now, right?"

"You're not getting out of it, X," the guy said evenly.

But the tone and the name only had Logan doing his best to keep from rushing him at that moment and tearing him up — in case Clint got in the way. "Neither are you."

For a moment, the guard narrowed his eyes at Logan, and then he let out a breath and pulled his weapon, resting it on Clint's shoulder almost lazily. "You've got two minutes to cooperate. Take the uniform, the comm, the collar — and get your instructions. Clock's ticking."

The growl intensified as Logan glared at him for a moment longer, though it was clear he knew he wasn't going to get anywhere right then. Not with Clint and a gun pointed at him. And even though Clint was wide-eyed and unconsciously shaking his head, Logan didn't say a word, though he did change fast, pausing only when he got to the collar. "What the hell is this for?"

"Call it insurance," the guard holding Clint said. "In case you deviate from your instructions."

"Where the hell's my wife?" Logan growled out.

"Not here."

"No wonder you're in the job you are," Logan said from between his teeth. "Too damn stupid to do anything but be a pain in the ass."

"He's compensating," Clint said in a breath, shooting Logan a smile he hoped looked heroic and brave but probably wasn't.

The guard glared at both of them but didn't address either of them except to say, "Twenty seconds."

Logan didn't even look Clint's way, since instead, he was focused on the big-shot guard as he finally tipped his head slightly. "I'm gonna enjoy gettin' a hold of you." But he did, in fact, snap the collar on.

The guard smirked and started to pull on Clint's arm to leave with him. "You'll be too busy doing as you're told," he said over his shoulder.

"Yeah, you go ahead thinkin' that," Logan called back. "Then ask how long the guards live around here that're on my detail."

"Lucky me. I'm on the kid's," the guard drawled.

"Yeah, lucky you … 'cept I got your scent. Ask your friends … no way to hide from that, pal."

"Yeah, you're pretty screwed," Clint agreed, though that really just had the guard glaring at him and hitting him upside the head.

"Shut up, kid."

The words barely left the guard's mouth before he shouted out — at the same moment a loud, ringing clunk echoed the hall and a helmet hit the ground after rebounding from the guard's head.

The guard crumpled, and Clint turned just in time to see Logan take a hit from the shock collar that put him on the ground too, though without the guard holding onto his arm, Clint rushed over anyway, just upset at that point and feeling pretty terrible about the whole affair.

Logan was down and out, though, and Clint found himself being dragged back and hurried away from the whole thing — not that he wasn't doing his level best to fight back and get to Logan, dropping himself as low as he could to make it hard to carry him, biting exposed skin — whatever he could do to make the guards work for it.

So he was understandably keyed up and had a couple new bruises by the time they managed to bring him to the next stop in Sinister's lab.

"How hard is it for you cretins to keep the boy calm?" Sinister said, honestly sounding irritated — more than usual.

"You're not the one calling the shots around here," Clint's new guard said.

"And neither are you," Sinister said, looking furious. "If you need to learn the intricacies of a hierarchy, I can certainly arrange for it to be explained to you in small enough terms that you might have hope to absorb it.."

The guard narrowed his eyes at that and then simply shoved Clint forward. "I'll be outside the door," he said — slamming it shut behind him and leaving Clint still fuming with his hands clenched in fists.

"If he harmed you, I'll have his head," Sinister said, though it was clear he was looking for a fight.

"I… took a chunk outta his hand," Clint admitted.

Sinister waved a hand. "But were you injured?" He was finishing up something on paper, and he hadn't risen from his seat at the desk — yet.

For a second, Clint thought about waving it off like he always did…. But then, he figured if the bad guys were gonna fight, he might as well stoke it, so he shrugged and then nodded. "Yeah, a little," he said. "I got mad when they hurt my dad."

Sinister set his pen down and looked over at Clint with narrowed eyes, though he didn't ask further, instead simply diving into Clint's mind to see for himself what had happened. And once he saw, it was clear that he was right on the edge of livid.

Clint rubbed his forehead a little as he sat down — getting invaded like that gave him a headache, especially since Jean had been helping him with psychic defense and it hurt when those walls went down. "So… yeah. That happened."

Sinister kept his eyes on Clint as he picked up the phone on the desk and made a very quick call. "The imbecile that is mishandling my test subjects must be replaced immediately." He didn't wait for an answer before he hung up and then turned his attention to Clint. "I'm afraid there are drawbacks to working with those that are slower than my Marauders."

Clint blinked, still not sure how to react to … anything Sinister was doing, since it was… sort of helpful? In a weird way? He shook his head and then decided the only thing for it was to fall back on a joke. "Which is impressive because your Marauders are stupid."

"They at least know their place," Sinister said. "Which is a step above these brutes."

Once more, Clint paused, because, well, it was weird enough that Sinister was the (relatively) nicest person there, but then to have a sense of humor on top of that was just… It was messing with his head, and he didn't know how to react to it. "You know, if you don't wanna work with cavemen, you could just… not," Clint pointed out at last.

It's a temporary arrangement, Sinister projected to him. Don't concern yourself with it.

It's concerning to me if my dad's gonna get enslaved and my mom is still missing!

Sinister narrowed his eyes at that as he slowly made his preparations to examine Clint. Tell me everything. Not just what happened before you came to my lab today.

Clint took a deep breath, hesitating only a moment before he figured, well, Sinister had already been in his head anyway and would probably take it anyway. And the next thing he knew, he had just… rushed through laying out everything from how they were caught to the fact that he knew his mom had said she was forced to kill people to the fact that he hated being leverage…. He'd been cooped up for a few days, and it all came out at once — everything he'd been worrying about in his little cell.

And as a side note, while Clint was telling him everything, Sinister had simply moved on to perform his exam while the boy was distracted, to the point that by the time Clint was finished and realized what was going on, it was a little too late to fight with him on it. As I told you before, this is temporary. Try not to draw too much attention to yourself. They aren't allowed to hurt you.

Clint frowned at that. But they told Dad

They lied to him. He likely knew it but didn't want to risk you anyhow. He knows better than most how easily these animals slip their chains.

I hate 'em, Clint replied fervently, pausing to hold his breath when Sinister took a blood sample — just a small one but still… it freaked him out every time it happened.

"It seems as though you're healing well," Sinister said, ignoring the comments that Clint had made more privately. "Though not as quickly as I had hoped."

Clint blinked for a second at the conversation switch and then shook his head. "I already said I'm not like my mom."

"No, not yet. There's still time, though."

"Um, I'm pretty sure I'd know if I was, because…" Clint tipped his head toward where he had a bruise on his arm from the guards yanking him around.

Sinister smirked at that. Pay attention to the names. I'll want them.

Okay, but you're giving me whiplash, Clint said, shaking his head with his eyes wide. Why are you even… what's with the… nice… routine?

Believe it or not, I want to be sure those that I study are in good condition.

O...kay. Clint was pretty sure he had a headache. "So. Um. Now what?"

Sinister paused before the diamond in his forehead began to glow a bit brighter. "Now, you can simply relax, Mr. Barton."

Clint frowned at that, but he couldn't quite stop it as he started to simply drift off to sleep.