Thank you so much for all the support! You guys are seriously the best; I am blown away by how many reviews, favorites and follows I have gotten! I'm ridiculously sorry that it has taken me so long to update. And yes, I'm going to do that unprofessional thing called making excuses: I have had an insanely heavy workload for college this semester and I also got my first real signa language interpreting assignment! Unfortunately, not for someplace as cool as S.H.I.E.L.D. but I'm super excited anyway! Well, without further ado, here's that chapter that should have been up months ago… :/
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This is seriously the scariest thing I've ever had happen to me. And I've seen a lot of scary. But nothing compares to being handcuffed and leg chained to a cold steel chair in a sterile white room, waiting.
Waiting for the unknown. Since they left me here…I don't know, three hours ago? They took my watch…I've seen nothing. I'm thirsty, and hungry, and I've developed a nervous tremble in my left leg.
I can handle field ops that go bad. You have a limited number of things that can happen. You might get shot, you might slip off a roof and break your neck, you might drown. You might get taken and tortured. All bad, yes. But not as bad as the truly unknown.
That's why, when the door opens, I bite back a genuine scream. Yes, I'm not proud of it, but that's the truth of what happened. Agent Jackson enters the room, flanked by two gun-toting guards. Honestly, I'm a bit flattered that he brought hat much backup to deal with little old me. Does he really think that I've become as badass as Clint or Nat in less than a year?
Jackson waves to the men to stand outside the door, and my self-assessed impressiveness decreases somewhat.
Jackson sits down across from me, setting down a small ruggedized tablet on the table. He taps the screen and my dossier flicks up. But I see the mark on the cover-Consider Potential Threat Until Further Notice-and I swallow hard.
"Agent McBride, I need you to understand that as of right now you have no rights. You are considered to be in league with a rogue operative who has committed an act with implications of terrorism and the potential to start a war with a very powerful country."
"I told you, I have no idea what is going on. I've never heard of this Karkaroff guy in my life."
"Karakoff. This isn't a time for jokes, McBride."
"Sorry." Damn, I knew reading Harry Potter was gonna come back to bite me in the butt.
"I swear I haven't heard anything from Agent Romanoff in at least a week. Clint said she was on a dark op, that's all I know."
"You expect me to believe that you know nothing about the actions of your partner's closest associate? You three are the most tightly-knit strike team in S.H.I.E.L.D."
"That doesn't mean I'm told everything. I'm only the interpreter."
"Not according to your field assessments. You show skills of a Level Five operative after only months of field work."
"Clint is a good teacher. And I'm a fast learner."
"Our concern is that these skills were already ingrained in you when you became an agent."
Suddenly, it clicks. What's going on in his head. "Wait, you're saying you think I'm a mole? Seriously? My background was checked so extensively I swear they have my fifth-grade photos, the ones where I had my sweater on backward and looked like an idiot. And have you seen the footage of me in training? Do you think I could fake that level of incompetence?" I accidentally sign incompetent as I say it, behind my back still in the cuffs.
Jackson rises. "I believe you."
"Why?"
"You just used your sign language when you were under extreme duress and anger. If you weren't a real interpreter who spent years with the language, that would not have happened. You can't fake that level of naturalness."
"This was a test?"
"One that you passed. Admirably. We've run your phone records and Barton's, and we know you're telling the truth about that as well. I'm sorry for that."
"I get it." And I do. In this business, you have to do things like that. I've done it to others. So there's no anger about having a skill turned back on me. It's just part of the life. And I'm a bit afraid of how passively I accept what this job does to you.
"Wait here." Jackson stands up. "I'll be back."
Right. Yeah. Wonderful. I really, really need the bathroom. And my nervous tremor is back. And Jackson forgot to uncuff me. If they don't start giving me some leash soon, they may find that they have a rogue agent after all.
Thankfully it's only about half an hour more before a new agent, a woman, comes in and unlocks me. "Come with me." I'm a bit concerned about what I'm being led to, but they said I was cleared so it's probably nothing terrible. I hope. Unless they lied.
The Latina woman with me is tight-lipped when I try to ask her about what is about to happen. I've seen her around a few times, but not well enough to know if this is her normal personality or if I bring out the worst in her. I can read off her ID that she's Agent Rebecca Stevens, but that's all I can read from her. The stiff way she carries herself makes her seem almost robotic.
"Agent McBride, we'd like your help."
"I don't see how I'd be much use to you seeing as I have had minimal contact with Romanoff."
"We'd like you to help us find her. If you're right, if she's not at fault, you're the only one she'll trust. And if not, you're the only ones who have a chance of catching her. Barton, you know how she thinks. You trained her. Help us find her, and maybe she won't need to be part of our kill on sight list."
I don't like this, but I have to admit they are right. No matter which way this goes, we are the best agents for the job. Clint saved Natasha once. Maybe we can do it again.
I follow Stevens down a painfully lit fluorescent hallway to a small conference room with frosted glass doors, cheap swivel chairs, a whiteboard table that someone used permanent marker to plan a field op in Lisbon on, and a TV monitor so old it looks like it should have rabbit ears.
Clint is sitting with Coulson at the far end of the table, lazily twirling one of the whiteboard pens through his fingers. He looks perfectly calm and relaxed, but having worked around him long enough I can tell he is seriously stressed.
He looks up before we even enter. My footsteps have a distinctive pattern, he told me once, he always knows when I'm coming. I can see the concern visibly melt away now that I'm walking next to Agent Stevens and not being shoved down the hall in handcuffs.
The calm doesn't last long, not when Clint finally processes who my companion is.
"Agent Stevens." Clint's voice is cold and clipped.
"Barton." Her voice has the same cool professionalism. "We've decided that you're our best bet of brining Romanoff In. You know her better than anyone else, and you're one of the few agents we can send in without serious concern for their survival."
"In other words, I'm the expendable crew member."
I thought she was calling Clint competent to stand in the same league as Nat, but now that I think about it, there were some incredibly sarcastic undertones to that comment. I am still not used to snark on the level of secret agent.
Agent Jackson enters just as I am sitting down with a file folder and a-oh my god, seriously-a VHS tape that he inserts into a player at the bottom of the TV monitor. I feel like there's been some kind of technology retrogression here.
While Jackson is setting up, I lean across the table to Clint and start to sign rapidly.
What's with her? Did you two sleep together or something?
Hen! Why was that your first assumption? Clint seems so genuinely insulted.
Then what the hell is wrong with her?
We were recruited the same year and were always trying to one-up each other in training. She's still sore that I beat her and got the posting she wanted. She's S.H.I.E.L.D.'s second-best sniper.
Let me guess, you're the first.
"What are you two doing?" Stevens asks suddenly, rounding on us. "If you're going to have a conversation, at least be civil enough to let the rest of us in on it."
Clint glares at her. "You'd be perfectly capable of understanding if you'd bother to learn sign language. Next to Kurdish, Japanese, Arabic and Chinese, that should be a snap for you."
Agent Jackson glares at them both. "Will this be a problem, Agents?"
"No sir," Stevens says with an effort.
"Good, then let's proceed." Jackson hits the play button and the screen is filled with a statickly image that looks like it's been pulled from a 70s model security camera. It's footage of what appears to be an office, with a man sitting at a desk doing paperwork. Jackson begins to fast forward and I watch the figures like it's one of those psychotically speeded up videos that people make for fun. The desk man gets up and walks in and out several times, and other people enter and leave. The room gets progressively lighter, then darkaer again. Then Jackson hits play.
I watch the grainy, dark image of two men in the room. One is definitely the older man who was at the desk all day, the other is a younger, taller figure that I've seen go in and out several times on the psychedelic fast-forward. They appear to be engaged in a conversation, even though the time-stamp on the video says it's ten p.m.
The man behind the desk stands up and then immediately lurches forward, falling on his face on the desk. Dark spreads through his silvery hair, the only thing about him that's clearly visible in the weak moonlight. The second person falls to the ground as well, and I think he might be dead too, but a moment later I see him scramble awkwardly to his feet and rush to the door.
Jackson stops the tape and turns to us.
"Your briefings are in the dossiers on the table. I've got to go make arrangements for our asset. Agents Stevens and I will be accompanying you on this mission as a failsafe, I hope we can agree to be civil to each other?" When all of us nod, Clint incredibly grudgingly, Jackson walks out.
I open my file folder to see the still image of Karakoff bleeding out on his desk. What the hell have we gotten outselves into?
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Well, sorry it has taken me so long, hope the update was worth the wait! I ought to be updating a bit more frequently now that I am getting used to my schedule, but it will be sporadic still. Rest assured though, I am not quitting this story!