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"For me, the vast marvel is to be alive. For man, or for flowers or beast or bird, the supreme triumph is to be most vividly and perfectly alive."
-Al Purdy
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You Take Center Next Time
Hawkeye
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The inexperienced always hold their breath when they shoot. I can, no pun intended, spot a beginner from a mile away. The important thing is to breathe. Aim. Calculate for the distance and wind. To be as proficient as I, one must be able to do a semi-complicated algebra or a physics problem in their head with multiple variables. I am an archer, made out of math and wind and some sort of aviary blood.
"Call it," I said.
Natasha pursed her lips, waiting. "West. To the left of the generator."
A glimmer of white among the metal. A uniform. While most would aim for the body, I aim for a button. A collarbone scar. A mustard stain on a lapel.
Breath, wind, loose, dead.
"Second- on the room. Third stack from the right."
"Also dead," I said, out loud.
"It's a pity they're so understaffed, it wouldn't be as easy to get in," she replied flippantly. "I like to be challenged once in a while."
I slid the bow over my shoulder. "I don't mind having it easy, either. It's almost like a vacation."
We simultaneously jerked at the cables to test the knots, then leapt over the side of the roof, sliding down the side until we reached the ground. I removed my harness and let it dangle. "Perimeter, or center?"
"I took the center last time," she said lightly. "My jaw is still sore. That was my personal record."
"How many hits?"
"He landed six before I broke his neck." She stretched and cracked her knuckles. "It's your turn for the combat."
"I never thought I'd hear you opt out to beat the shit out of someone."
"I'm taking a cue from someone I know," she flipped her hair as she walked towards the edge of the compound. "I'm pretending I'm on vacation."
I smiled at her. Of course in my book, a smile is a grim nod of camaraderie before going into battle.
The gate was easy to scale. It was an older, industrial mill, all chain-link fence and suspension and machines, like a car engine wearing all it's parts on the outside. My feet made slight metallic notes against the walkways. I had an arrow notched and ready, stepping at a slight angle to get better peripheral vision.
I moved from outdoors into the hallways, made of rumbling tubes and moving parts on the right and a railing on the left. I looked over the railing… it was a long fall to working machines below. The yellow caution sign looked idiotic. There was no caution here. It was either walk straight through, or die.
Out of nowhere- a shadow. I whirled, fired, and a white blade slashed into the red and black darkness, cutting the arrow from it's mark. They were too close to shoot again. I whipped my bow to the side, blocking their sword from cutting me in two.
I hate ninjas. Guns I can handle. Two long-distance weapons are a matter of skill. Swords need more defensive maneuvers.
Left, right, left- the blade arced from side to side, too insanely fast to hardly comprehend. Only instinct and training knocked me under, over, and out of the way, bending and dodging and staying out of reach. The shadows converged into the shape of a human, wearing some sort of red uniform and mask, a mask that looked more like a cloak and hood reminiscent of the KKK. Dumb ass.
My bow and their blade came together, clattering and screeching, unlike those ridiculous old movies with well-placed sparks during the duel.
A small knife flew from his hand so fast, I didn't have time to dodge. I managed to slide slightly to the right, and the knife blade skimmed the side of my head, cutting a surface wound through my hair and letting loose a trickle of blood right into my eye. Squinting, half my vision obscured and ignoring the warmth against my scalp. I dropped to my knees, rolled, and knocked my assailant over. In that instant, both of our weapons had been forced from our hands. I threw myself over him, throwing a punch once, and then twice- not in the head, in the throat. It was me, or him, and this wasn't a bar fight. You aim for whatever will make them stop breathing faster.
Somehow I felt his knee drive up into my stomach. Falling off the side, I managed to get my bearings just as he threw an unreasonably high kick in my stomach, which knocked me back against the weak, chain-link railing. The yellow caution sign dangled and swung. One more kick would have put me over the edge to me death below.
Natasha swung from the catwalk above, dropping directly on top of the blood-red ninja, gripping his neck with her thighs and pulling him down to the ground. She flipped upwards, landing lithely on her feet, a handgun slipping out of her sleeve and into her hand.
A sharp BANG! sounded, and the red ninja's head slammed backwards with such force that the insides of his head dripped into the machines below.
A siren began to blare, and the machines cranked to a stop.
"A little overwhelmed this time, Barton?" She gave me a hand up.
I put a hand to my head and winced. "You insisted on taking perimeter."
"Yeah, well, I'll take center from now on. It's not your forte."
"I didn't know we were going to be dealing with Hydra that fought like Mr. Miyagi."
She grasped my chin and forced it to the left to get a better look at the knife wound. "I guess this means an actual vacation for you."
"Stitches don't count," I said. I would never admit that I felt out of it. "Let's get out of here."
"Oh, yeah," she said lazily, as if she had forgotten, "Those charges are due to blow… in… five."
"Let's survive our own bombing, so then I can thank you for saving my ass again," I said, grasping her by the elbow, partly to lead her out of the interior and partly to lean on her should I pass out. She pulled a small, gauzy cloth out of one of the pouches on her belt, handing it to me. I mashed it against the knife wound and grimaced.
The night was waning when we got out of the compound. We cleared the mile-marker at a jog when the first explosive went off. Natasha pulled out her radio and reported success, and then had the audacity to report myself as "wounded and needing immediate attention". She enjoyed the look on my face, a cross between my dead-like "resting face" and a look that said I would get my revenge on her eventually.
"You know Fury will have words for you when he realizes I'm NOT in critical condition," I scolded her.
"Just like Budapest."
"For the second time, I have absolutely NO recollection of that mission being anything like this. How does EVERYTHING remind you of Budapest?"
She shrugged and gave me a sarcastic smile. "Anytime I win. It reminds me of Budapest."
"Last time you said it, we were cornered by aliens."
"Oh, that was just because of all the rubble. We made a mess."
"Is that why the Russian government is trying to press a defacing of public property charge against Shield?"
In the distance, we could hear the distinct rumble of an approaching helicopter. Our ride back home.
"Maybe," she replied. "I don't deal with the paperwork."
"If we're lucky, some of the paperwork survived Hydra," I reminded her.
"I doubt it."
There was a silence.
"Did you read it?" she asked.
"Read what?"
"My files. On the public drive."
"You mean your whole… uh, background and papers and life story…"
"Yeah."
"No," I said simply. "I wouldn't do that unless you wanted me to. I never get on the internet anyway. Computing damages eyesight."
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