So many triggers! Be Warned! Check the end notes if you're worried. There are new ones.

Patrick wasn't lying.

He was injected with a muscle relaxant so they could move him into a reclining chair. About half way through them securing him with an obscene amount of straps, it clicked. It was a dentist's chair.

Donnelly waited until his was completely immobile before bringing out the mouth spreader. Clint tried to thrash, tried to get loose, but they weren't taking any chances, and he was wishing his reputation hadn't preceded him so well. When the spreader was in place, his head was secured between two foam blocks.

Donnelly leered down at him and slipped his thumb into Clint's gaping mouth. A slight increase in breathing was his only reaction, though he wanted to bite the man's thumb off. Donnelly leaned in, putting his weight on his knee between Clint's thighs, and whispered, "I'm getting all kinds of ideas, Hawkeye."

Somehow. Somehow Clint was going to kill Donnelly. They couldn't be this diligent all the time. He just had to be ready for them to mess up, and then he would kill him.

Donnelly stepped aside, allowing the dentist, and he looked like a dentist, if you ignored the slight blood splatter on his apron, to move in on Clint.

They pulled his teeth out. Not all of them. Two of the back molars. They didn't even pull them right away. They started drilling into them first, no prep. Clint would have taken a needle in the mouth over the burning agony that began to cut through his skull. He may have been yelling but couldn't be sure over the sound of the drill. He already hated the smell and taste of powdered teeth, and these people weren't taking the same precautions as a normal dentist; with no water and suction to wash it out, everything in his mouth was soon coated. It wasn't long before Clint was choking on his own blood and spit, forced to swallow it down, making him further nauseous. He tried to zone out and lost track of time again.

He could barely hear through the pain in his jaw. He felt hands moving him but only groaned. They hooked him back into his manacles and Donnelly left with a 'Happy two months".

Two months.

Huh. So there was a reason.

Happy Anniversary, Clint. At least he hadn't been raped this time.

He realized two things later, while he was throwing up into the drain; one, that he probably shouldn't be relieved that he was only tortured. And two, he should have realized that sooner than he did. But Clint was going to blame it on the pain.

His cheeks and jaw were swollen. He could barely chew the food he was given, he didn't really want to chew, it didn't seem worth it, especially since he only seemed to throw it back up. He couldn't sleep. The throbbing in his jaw was different than the cane or the whip. He couldn't seem to block it out. By the third day he was hitting his head against the pillar in the hope of knocking himself out. Everything began to feel surreal, like he was dreaming but he knew he wasn't sleeping. There was no reprieve from the empty cell. He was exhausted physically and emotionally.

At the end of the the fourth day Patrick came in with some salt water and pills. Clint was pretty sure they weren't pain pills, just something to prevent infection, but he still passed out before Patrick left.

88888888

They weren't friends. Clint knew about Stockholm Syndrome. It just helped to have someone be nice to him now and again. Because he didn't see Patrick everyday, or even every other day. Two days after Patrick came with the pills Clint was waterboarded again. They left him naked for it and for the next couple. He could air dry just fine, so Patrick and his towels weren't needed. Neither was Patrick and his bucket because waterboarding started counting for baths. It was two, three? weeks before he saw Patrick again. He started wondering if the guards had noticed him being too friendly on camera and took him off Hawkeye duty.

More laminated news clippings were added to the wall by then. They were on the wall wrong. There was a space next to the picture of Steve and the sniper where the new one showing Tony and Natasha walking together, headline claiming they were secret lovers, should have been put. It would have fit better, now the whole thing was lopsided. Clint wasn't going to say anything; wasn't his problem if Donnelly messed up the wall. Clint barely looked at it anyway.

Besides the, now, usual torture, Donnelly had started having "fun" with him on a weekly basis. Clint didn't know what was worse, having it trigger a PTSD episode or trying to block it out and just letting it happen.

Not thinking about it was easier.

Donnelly brought the little orange handled knife back but ended up cutting Clint a little too deep on his leg. After he left, Patrick was there to sew it up. He didn't get anything to numb the area, so Clint decided talking was the best way to get his mind off the fact someone was sticking a needle into his inner thigh.

"I'm starting to think you're the mom of this place. Sponge baths, towels, sewing lessons; should I call you Patty instead?"

Patty shook his head. "Someone's got to do it."

The constant state of pain Clint was in said otherwise. "I seriously doubt that."

"They still need you alive. They're not going to let you bleed out."

The 'they' didn't escape Clint's notice. "Where would Donnelly get his jollies off then?" he asked, with dark humor.

Patty's hand stilled. "I think I've given you the wrong impression of me Clint. I'm not a lacky, I didn't answer an ad for torture aftercare. I'm a mercenary."

Clint had let himself get the wrong impression. Obviously he knew who Patrick would have to be to work for people that would take an Avenger and torture him, but he had conveniently blocked that out. He was blocking a lot out.

"You've got to be new at this, at least. You're not suppose to talk to the prisoner, Patty."

"Not new to the business." Patty said, continuing to stitch. "Do I look young enough to have just started out? Never been this up close before, though."

"Pilot? Wait, no…" Clint groaned, "sniper?"

Patrick winced. "Yeah, I'm actually the one that…" He pointed his finger at him, like a gun, and made a 'pow' sound.

Well, shit. This was the guy that had shot him. Clint thought maybe he should be angry about that.

"It wasn't personal," Patrick said, finishing off the last stitch. "A job's a job."

Unfortunately, Clint did understand. When you took a job that's all it was, a paycheck. And a job involving shooting an Avenger was bound to be high paying, it probably helped that… "Oh, god," he groaned.

"What?" Patrick asked, checking the cut.

"You're a sniper."

Patrick looked confused. "Yeah?"

"You admire my skills?"

"So what?"

"This IS 'Misery'," Clint said, letting a dark chuckle out.

It took Patrick a second, then he gave a half smile and laughed.

88888888

Donnelly was alone and didn't have anything with him. But Clint was hanging in the center of the room.

This was new. New usually didn't end well for him.

Donnelly turned to one of the cameras, twirling his index finger in a circle a few times, then turned back to Clint and waited.

Clint didn't know where the speakers were but the room filled with the sound of a phone ringing.

There was a click. "Make it quick," a voice said sharply.

Clint started. He knew that voice.

"Tony Stark?" another voice asked. It wasn't Donnelly.

"You know who I am, it's nearly impossible to to get me on the phone, so you're either an idiot or you're wasting my time. Probably both. Get to the point."

Clint was close to breaking down, it was taking everything he had not to call out to Tony. It was Tony! He was actually hearing him, most likely not live, a recording, but it was him.

"We have Hawkeye."

The was a pause. "What?" Tony asked

Clint looked at Donnelly, but his expression didn't even twitch. Were they messing with Tony? Trying to taunt him?

"We have Hawkeye, your missing Avenger, and we are willing to return him for a price."

There was another pause, no longer than the first. "No."

Clint's heart broke a little when he heard that, but he understood; no negotiations, not that it mattered, Tony would be tracking the phone call. When did this happen? How long ago?

"I don't think you understand-"

"I understand fine," Tony cut in, "I just don't care."

Clint stopped breathing.

Tony continued, "You have something else? If not, I'm hanging up."

"I haven't even told you what we want," the person sounded irritated.

"Doesn't matter, not interested."

Was Tony just trying to keep them on the line?

He was trying to hang up.

"What about the rest of your team, or SHIELD," the man asked, pointedly, "will they feel the same way?"

"They'll probably care less than me, and that's saying something."

The cell felt too small. Suffocating.

"Is this because you think we need a sniper?" Tony sounded angry, then abruptly turned flippant, "I can make a call and have another one here in half an hour, less for the right price." Angry again, "That clear enough for you? Don't call back." The line went dead and Clint heard the speakers turn off.

Donnelly didn't say anything, just stared at Clint, studying him.

It's a test, a lie, you need to react. Clint scoffed, "You really expect me to believe that was Tony Stark?"

Donnelly smiled, like he had won. "Tell yourself whatever you want, I saw the relief on your face at the beginning, you know it was him." Without saying anything more, he turned and left the room, leaving Clint literally hanging.

What else was there to say?

No one was coming for him.

That was Tony.

It couldn't be him, he wouldn't say those things.

It was him! It was his voice, but that doesn't mean it was real. They edited some audio tracks, made it sound like that.

Did you hear any cuts in the sound?

How would they even be able to get them to edit?

I doesn't matter, stop thinking about it!

He had almost been here three months. If the others were looking for him… they were looking for him, they were, but they obviously couldn't find him. Tony couldn't find him. And if they hadn't found him by now, the chances that they would were decreasing. The trail was going cold, or was already gone.

Clint still didn't know what they wanted from him. Someone with training to test their torture on? Were they simply waiting for him to break to ask questions? Almost three months, any codes he knew would be changed by now, any intel would be outdated. What did they want from him?

What if the phone call was the last straw? He didn't give in to them so they went to Tony for money as a last resort, but Tony didn't want-

It wasn't real! Stop thinking about it!

'They probably care less than me, and that's saying something.'

'They're not coming for you.'

You gonna cry? Clint flinched. Like a goddamn baby. Look at you!

He couldn't wait anymore. He needed to get out of this place or at least get a signal out. The team was trying, he knew they were, but as much as he hated to admit it, it looked like he was on his own for this one.

He needed a plan.

Trigger Warnings: Graphic depictions of violence! More very creepy Donnelly. Being unwillingly restrained to a chair, teeth drilling and teeth pulling, choking on and throwing up blood, torture, mentions of rape, Clint's deteriorating mental state.