Trigger Warning: Torture; PTSD; Blood

Day Six
Proof of Life
Ransom Video | "I've got a pulse" | Screams From Across The Hall

Clint and Tony were sitting shoulder to shoulder in the cold, dark cell when the door at the end of the hallway scraped open. Tony couldn't help but shudder slightly, and though Clint outwardly appeared unconcerned, Tony could feel him tense beside him.

The door to their cell opened and Valdis, the man who had captured them off a mission gone by, entered with a posse of five armed guards.

"You," Valdis spat, zeroing in on Clint. "On your feet."

For a moment, no one moved. But when Clint didn't comply, one of the guards took a step further into the cell and cocked his gun before leveling it at Tony.

"Okay, okay," Clint relented as he got to his feet.

One of the guards approached and grabbed the back of Clint's neck, shoving him forward and sending him stumbling. Two of the other guards grabbed him and began manhandling him to the front of the cell, yelling at him in a language that Tony didn't recognize.

"Hey!" Tony shouted as they dragged Clint out of the cell and into a room across the hall. "You know if there's a party, I hate to be excluded."

Three of the guards disappeared into the room with Clint, slamming the door behind them, while the other two posted up in the hallway.

"We are going to have our own little party, Mr. Stark," Valdis said calmly.

Tony sighed heavily. "I thought we were done with this conversation. I don't have what you want. In fact, it doesn't even exist. Nothin' I can do for you."

"I don't think that's true," Valdis said casually.

Tony stared at the man in confusion. "Well, agree to disagree, I guess."

"We'll see."

Tony's confusion grew as the man just stood there. What kind of plan was this? He didn't bother questioning Tony further, only stood there and appeared to be waiting for something. But what could he possibly be waiting for.

"Okay…" Tony finally said slowly after several minutes of silence. "Is that it?"

"No."

Another long silence. Despite himself, Tony started to feel unnerved.

"Are you waiting for something?" Tony finally guessed, mostly because he couldn't handle the silence.

"Yes."

Tony glanced at the guards in the hallway, who also were not moving. Was this guy crazy?

"So, what the hell are you waiting for?" Tony finally demanded.

Valdis smiled. "As I understand it, your friend, Mr. Barton, used to be a high ranking SHIELD operative. It's understandable that this will take a few minutes."

Tony's stomach shifted uneasily. "What will–"

Tony was cut off by what sounded like a loud groan through gritted teeth coming from the room across the hall. Tony's eyes immediately locked onto the closed door as his whole body went cold.

"Ah," Valdis said serenely. "There it is. Everyone has their breaking points."

Tony suddenly pushed himself to his feet. Neither Valdis nor any of his guards so much as flinched. They knew that Tony was no threat.

"What are you doing to him?" Tony demanded.

Another groan, this one louder and opening up into half a yell at the end of it.

"You know what I want, Mr. Stark," Valdis said calmly.

"I don't…" Tony's thoughts were racing as he struggled to keep up with the situation. "I mean, I can't–"

He was cut off as a scream of agony suddenly tore through the air. Tony's stomach twisted itself into a knot at the sound. He knew how tough Barton was. He knew that anything that could elicit that kind of noise from him, had to be horrific.

Were they killing him?

"Okay, come on, maybe we can work something out," Tony said quickly.

"You know what I want," Valdis said simply.

"You know I can't do that," Tony snapped. Another cry of pain floated across the hallway and Tony felt a shiver wreak through his spine. "So how about we talk about something more realistic."

"No."

Tony stared and then wrenched his gaze away as more screaming came from that damned room. He didn't understand what was going on. Why would they take Barton away to torture him. Why wouldn't they do it right here in front of him? That's when it finally dawned on him. This was the whole point. His imagination was always going to be leaps and bounds worse than the real thing. And from the sound of it, the real thing was already pretty horrific.

"What you want doesn't exist," Tony insisted, his voice thin with desperation as yet another scream filtered from across the hall. It wasn't as loud as before… but that wasn't necessarily a good thing. "If you want it, I'm gonna need time and equipment."

"What equipment will you need?"

Another scream, this one louder than the one before. It felt like someone was rubbing sandpaper all over Tony's skin.

"Stop!" Tony snapped, a note of pleading in his voice. "Stop hurting him and bring him back in here and I'll give you anything you want!" Even Tony himself wasn't quite sure he was bluffing.

"You tell me what equipment I need," he said calmly over top of more screams, "and I will consider it."

But Tony could barely comprehend his words as the screams across the hall worsened. If he had anything at all in his stomach, he was fairly certain he would have vomited by now. Instead, he fisted his right hand and started pounding it against the wall behind him.

"I can't think, I can't think, I can't think!" Tony practically shouted. His shoulders shook and he was pretty sure he was about to fall apart at the seams. "If you want anything from me you have to stop that, I can't think with that going on! You have to stop!"

"The sooner you tell me what you need, the sooner this will stop."

Tony could only stare helplessly. It was like trying to talk to a brick wall. Tony tried to think, he really did, but every time another scream tore through the air his brain spiraled.

Afghanistan.

Yinsen.

"This was always the plan, Stark."

Tony's hands went to either side of his head, his fingers weaving tightly into his hair as he squeezed his eyes shut. The screams continued. Tony yanked painfully, his hair straining on his scalp, in an attempt to ground himself and concentrate. The screams continued. Tony felt himself sinking down the wall until he landed heavily on the ground.

The screams continued.

I can't do this, I can't do this, not again, I can't lose anyone like this again…

And then the entire room shook. Tony looked up in surprise, bracing himself for whatever fresh hell was in store for him next. But Valdis wasn't looking at him anymore. He had turned, looking confused and concerned as he looked up the hallway. He called out something in a different language and then turned to the front of the cell.

Tony watched with detached interest. This clearly wasn't part of the plan.

The next thing he knew, Valdis was out in the hall and was calling his men out of the torture room across from Tony's cell. The men trooped out and all of them hurried down the hall as another tremor rumbled through the building.

And then Tony mechanically turned his head back to the room across the hall. The men had left the door open just a crack.

"Barton?" Tony called out unsteadily. The silence weighed heavily around him. It was almost worse than the screaming. Almost. Tony used the wall behind him in order to leverage himself up onto shaky feet. "Barton?" he tried again, a little louder this time. Still nothing. Tony felt his heart pounding painfully in his chest as he stumbled to the front of the cell, grabbing the bars in order to keep his knees from buckling away beneath him. "Clint!?" Tony yelled desperately. More silence. Tony felt like he was trying to gulp air into his lungs from a straw.

Tony strained as far as he could to one side of the cell, but couldn't see anything through the small crack left in the doorway.

No, Tony thought as his panic finally started to overtake him. No, no, no, no… he couldn't be…

Tony opened his mouth to call out to Clint again, but was cut off when the door at the end of the hallway slammed back open, causing Tony to bodily flinch. They're back to finish the job.

But as he strained to see down the hall, he spotted a familiar shock of red.

"Natasha!" Tony gasped. Goddamn, he was fairly certain he had never been so relieved to see anyone in his entire life.

Natasha's intense gaze immediately zeroed in on him, relief washing over her face as she picked up her pace to hurry down the hall. "I found them!" she said into what Tony belatedly realized was a comm. But her eyes searched the cell behind him and then started darting around to the other cells in the hallway.

"Get to Clint!" Tony said, flinging his arm between the bars and pointing at the door across from him. "He needs help!"

Natasha didn't so much as hesitate. She darted across the hall, leading with a sidearm as she pushed the door open. What she saw stopped her in his tracks. Her gun lowered as she started in shock. And then she disappeared into the room.

Tony strained to look, but the door was still at an angle so he couldn't see the whole room. All he could really see was a pair of knees peeking out from a seated position. And those knees weren't moving.

"Is he…?" Tony started before the question was choked off by his terror at what the answer would be.

"I've got a pulse!"

If Tony hadn't still been gripping the bars of his cell like a lifeline, he would have collapsed into a puddle on the floor.

"Tony!"

Tony didn't even notice that Steve had suddenly appeared at his cell. Steve reached forward and yanked the door to the cell clear away, and Tony felt a pang of jealousy at the ability. And then Tony was moving, putting hand over hand in order to hang onto the bars as he worked himself to the door of the cell. Steve was in front of him, but Tony pushed by him as he stumbled across the hall.

"Tony! Tony are you alright? Are you hurt?"

But Tony ignored Steve's words. He needed to see this for himself. He grabbed the doorway to the room and sagged up against it as he finally laid eyes on Clint.

He was sitting in a metal chair and Natasha was working on removing the cuffs that had held him there. His eyes were closed and his head hung listlessly on his shoulders. The shirt he was wearing was in tatters and beneath that Clint's skin looked like it had been practically shredded. There were slices taken out of his chest and curving up over his shoulders from his back. His right hand was hanging free at his side, and every single finger was bent in an unnatural position. Tony's gaze racked over all the equipment in the room – whips, pliers, rods, cattle prod, chains…

Tony leaned over and heaved, but there was nothing in his stomach to vomit up.

"He's coming around," Natasha said.

Tony's eyes darted back up to Clint's face. Natasha was in front of him, firmly patting his cheeks while Clint blinked groggily.

"Is he… he'll be alright… right?" Tony asked thinly, wincing at how small and pathetic his voice sounded.

"Yeah, Tony, he's gonna be alright," Steve assured him. "Can you walk? We need to get you both out of here."

Tony swallowed but then nodded resolutely. Steve walked forward and carefully lifted a semi-conscious Clint up into his arms. Natasha and Tony fell in step behind him as he led the way back out of the dungeon. Tony didn't miss the way that Natasha hovered closer to him than she normally would, looking at him like he might collapse at any moment.

He wasn't so sure he wouldn't.

"Whatever happened… you are both making it out of here alive," Natasha said softly.

"That's a low bar, Romanoff," Tony said flatly, unable to look at her.

He saw her shrug out of the corner of his eye. "Sometimes that's how we have to survive." She reached over and placed a surprisingly gentle hand on his shoulder. "Clint knows that."

Tony nodded, though he suddenly felt detached from the situation. This was a part of his life. It was a part of his life that he didn't think he'd ever get used to or be okay with. But maybe Natasha was right. Maybe any time they all walked away from these situations alive, they had to count that as a win. Maybe that was the only way they could get by.