Tried to get this out when I first got home at 4 today but Baby Clint wanted to play games online. A week and a day away from being 1 years old and he knows that when I sit on the computer, he can bother me to play games online. Well, actually it's more like he gets to slam his hand on the keyboard as images on the screen change and make noise, but either way. He has fun. Anyways, enjoy this next chapter! I loved writing this one and the next one coming next week. ^_^
Age: 21
Mission: Execute Black Widow aka. Natalia Alianova Romanova
Coulson walked into the debrief room like he owned the place. A rather large file was tucked under his arm. Having been prepared, Coulson had memorized the whole file beforehand so this copy was his agent's. Clint had already been reclining in one of the seats which rather surprised the older agent. He had only informed the younger agent about this mission less than an hour prior. But considering this was going to be one of the archer's first mission post injury, Coulson really shouldn't have been shocked. Not that you could even tell. Coulson covered his emotions well and dropped the file down before Clint. It took the archer a moment before he stopped reclining to lean forward and grab the file. Slowly, he began scanning the information over. If the archer felt anything about what was said in the file, Coulson wouldn't know. For Clint had learned from his handler well. After a minute of complete silence he looked up at Coulson.
"Seriously? This is my mission?" Clint asked as if the whole thing was a joke. Coulson nodded, looking more serious than normal. And if Clint didn't know any better, Coulson looked slightly nervous. Considering the file said that this person had killed many agent and handler pairs before, Clint couldn't tell what Coulson was more nervous about, the archer or himself. Clint dropped the file down onto the table. He already knew a lot about the mysterious woman the S.H.I.E.L.D could only call Black Widow. In fact, he had secretly been in on every meeting about her. "I am to go kill her?"
"Do you have a problem with this mission? We have many other agents we can send," Coulson questioned, unperturbed by Clint making sure this mission was actually his. Heck, even he had been shocked when Fury demanded that Clint was the next agent to take on this dangerous assassin. Clint snarled, thinking of some of the other agents that worked for S.H.I.E.L.D. He didn't really want any of them going after Black Widow. She and he had a history. One that S.H.I.E.L.D didn't know about, if it was the Widow he thought it was. He had been told that there were multiple Black Widows.
"Really? You knew Natasha before you were sent to kill her?" Bruce called. Clint nodded. It wasn't that big of a deal now to mention it. He actually had already assumed Natasha had mentioned it. But then again, considering how she reacted back then, he wouldn't be surprised if someone had erased her memory of their first meeting.
"Yeah... Actually, when I left Ivan's group, I met her. She helped me become a better assassin till Coulson found me," Clint admitted. Bruce sighed. "It wasn't until years later that I was actually assigned her case... So... It's no surprise that she doesn't remember that she met me before. Then again, even I don't really remember much about it. Just that we met, she helped me and we moved on."
"So... Did Coulson try to take the mission away when he found out?" Bruce wondered. Clint snorted and shook his head.
"I didn't tell him..."
"No one else can handle this," Clint snapped as he slammed his hands down onto the table. If Coulson wasn't the extreme super agent that he was, he would have jumped at the sudden noise. Instead his eyes twitched to look up at Clint. His eyes showed the slight shock at Clint's reaction but otherwise he showed nothing of how he felt. If Clint didn't know Coulson at all, he'd say that Coulson didn't care if he lived or died. But Clint did know Coulson and so he knew that the old agent was worried that Clint was overreacting.
"We have indeed already lost over twenty agents who tried to go up against her. But Fury and I believe that you are our best shot now," Coulson told him. Clint nodded. He agreed completely that he was S.H.I.E.L.D's best choice. Even without his prior history with the Widow, Clint was one of the best (if not the best) agent S.H.I.E.L.D had. Sighing deeply, Clint leaned forward against the desk. There were some bits of the mission that weren't outlined in the file before him.
"How deep undercover am I to go?" Clint questioned. Coulson sighed deeply. This was the part that really bothered him the most about the whole thing.
"We have intel that Widow will be appearing at the Gala in New York. Her target is supposed to be the head of Stark Industries, or so we believe," Coulson began. Clint frowned, holding up a hand to stop Coulson from speaking any more.
"Tony Stark? Is he finally the leader?" Clint muttered, reaching for the folder again. He was never one for watching the news or even reading it online. All his info came from over the water cooler, cafeteria, and shooting range. Gossip mainly focused on S.H.I.E.L.D stuff and not the outside world, so it was no surprise that Clint had no idea. Coulson shook his head while he began making plans on getting Clint more aware of the rest of the world.
"No. Obadiah Stane," Coulson answered. Clint growled at the name. Something about that guy just rubbed him the wrong way. Sadly, everyone loved him. "But our intel states that Stark may make a surprise appearance at the gala."
"Should I worry about her changing over to him?" Clint watched Coulson for any sign of confermation. Sometimes it wasn't in the actual mission to watch for things like that but if Coulson gave Clint any sort of sign otherwise, the archer damned well did his best. Coulson shook his head.
"Not that we are aware of. But just in case, watch over him," Coulson answered. Clint frowned, finally understanding what Coulson was getting at. His eyes widened in shock. Coulson couldn't be meaning what Clint thought he was meaning. Quickly he grabbed the folder again and flipped through. After a few seconds of looking over the papers, the archer groaned loudly. Coulson smirked. "Yes, you have to attend the gala and not watch from a perch outside."
"Do I seriously have to attend? I could easily spot her from outside!" Clint complained. Coulson smirked, having been ready for this argument the moment he saw the orders. At first he had thought Fury was joking when he was handed this order. He had even confirmed it with the Director. Though
Clint was a distance agent, he was also a remarkable spy. Slowly, Coulson shook his head. "I see better from a distance."
"You have a secondary mission to keep all the guests at the gala safe. You can't do that from a distance. Never mind that she would spot you and run," Coulson mentioned. Clint frowned. That was just an insult as to his talents. And Clint didn't take kindly to those.
"Do you take me for a rookie? I know how to hide from a mark!" Clint snapped. Coulson leveled a hard gaze onto the other agent.
"Agent Green wasn't a rookie either," Coulson calmly pointed out. Clint's frown deepened before once again, he looked at the file. Coulson didn't give him that much time to read over what he wanted to before speaking again. "We lost him, her mark, his handler and her after that. She reappeared a year later."
Clint didn't look at his handler. Instead he looked over the other various failed missions. Many were indeed distance missions where Black Widow would find them and kill them before they even spotted her. The rest, she would either never have been seen or talking on the other side of the room and suddenly, they'd die. Nearly all of these missions were from poisoning that induced a heart attack, her M.O. But no one ever saw her actually poison the agents, nor the others on the mission. Each and every time it was agent and handler who died. Clint suddenly realized that Coulson must really trust him if he was going to be acting handler.
"Who got the picture?" Clint wondered, looking at an extremely blurry picture of a lithe red headed woman. It was hard to make out her features, but Clint knew what they looked like anyways. Her face was burned into his memory forever. Though the time he spent with her was brief, Clint swore that he'd never forget her.
"A guest from a party on one of her missions. It's actually from before we even started chasing her. To be honest, intel isn't even sure that it's her. But all missions before mentioned a red haired woman before we lost contact," Coulson said. Clint nodded, used to lack of information. But the more he was told about this particular mission, the more he began to feel like this would be his last mission. Glancing over the file to look at Coulson, Clint swore that it wouldn't be the end of his. The archer would stop the Black Widow, even if it killed him.
"We then went into the logistics of the whole mission. Where we were going to be, how many other agents I'd need to help protect the guests, what agents would be best, if we should let security know and so on. Then we split up to pack and got to the gala," Clint explained, resting his head against the rocks behind him. He had a fond smile as he remembered the suit he was forced into wearing that night. Never mind the huge fight Coulson and he had at the hotel about the monkey outfit. Clint had started that fight for fun but by the end of it, he was so pissed that he almost punched Coulson's face in.
"When did you figure out you knew her?" Bruce asked. For a moment, Clint didn't register what the doc was asking. Then he smirked.
"When she slammed me into a wall..."
"What are you doing here?" a woman hissed in Clint's ear after he bashed into the hard surface that was now behind him. Dazed from hitting his head, it took the archer a bit to realize what was going on. Thankfully Coulson was silent in his ear, as well as the other S.H.I.E.L.D agents. The woman was close enough to Clint's face that he feared she'd hear them talking to him if they tried. She had an arm against his throat to hold him in place and a gun jabbing into his side to make sure he didn't try anything. Watching her as he cleared his head, Clint noticed her emerald green eyes and fiery red hair that was done up into a tight bun. It took Clint a minute more to realize that this was the Black Widow and... He knew her. Worst of all, she remembered him. "This is my mark!"
"I have a different mark," Clint grumbled in Russian, a language that he knew Coulson didn't know and he wasn't even sure he told S.H.I.E.L.D that he knew. He couldn't let S.H.I.E.L.D know that he knew this woman. It was bad enough that they knew most of his history. But Clint couldn't be removed from this mission. Especially now that he knew her. Natalia, the woman holding him, had taught him Russian so long ago that as he used it, Clint realized he was rather rusty. Thankfully, she got the gist. Slowly her eyes narrowed.
"I thought you got out," she called, still in English. Clint squeezed his eyes closed as she tightened her arm against his neck. It was a clear enough threat that meant if he lied, she'd know. When she backed off, he looked at her again and shook his head. He needed to get her to switch languages.
"Got out of the 'for hire' part," he explained, again in Russian. With a dark hiss, she backed off, letting him drop to the floor but she kept her gun trained on him. Clint watched as she looked him over for some sort of sign. When she got it, surprise flitted over her features before she looked as if she just shut down. Unsure of what to make of that, Clint just watched her. Slowly, she lowered her gun, but still kept it pointed toward him as a just in case. Clint took a little pride in the fact that she refused to fully put it away. Even though he shouldn't, it meant that she assumed he'd be a challenge.
"You're here for me?" she asked, this time in Russian. She finally understood that someone was listening in. Clint wanted to nod but stopped. He could only pray that this wasn't true. As much as Clint wanted to fix his past and redo most of his life, he'd never regret meeting Natalia. Nor would he ever regret what he learned while working with her.
"Are you the Black Widow?" he countered in Russian, even though he knew that Coulson might understand her code-name. There was a gasp on the other end of his comm, but Clint didn't make any response to it. Natalia frowned but slowly nodded. While he watched her, she put her gun away again. A pair of party guest walked by. Clint could only sigh deeply before closing his eyes. When he opened them, Natalia was still there, which partly surprised the archer. She was watching him, sadly.
"I have to complete this mission," she told him in her native language. Clint frowned. That was totally not what he was expecting her to say.
"Why?" he asked in English. Natalia jerked at his abrupt change but didn't run. Grunting, Clint reached up and ripped his comm out of his ear. There was a brief sound of protest at the sudden crackle from the removal but Clint didn't respond. Natalia just watched him. "Why is this mark so important?"
"I want to make it my last one," Natalia answered. Clint shook his head. She gave him a sad smile before reaching out to stroke his cheek. In the years after she had abandoned Clint, she found she missed him. It had been good to have someone watching her back. Her memory tended to betray her at many points in time but her time with Clint was something she'd hold dear and private.
"I can't let you do that," Clint responded. Natalia gave him a sad smile and Clint knew, before she could do anything, that he might not be able to stop her. She shifted in just the slightest before she attacked. Clint, having just barely remembered her tells, was able to dodge by the skin of his teeth. Her right leg swung over his ducked head so fast that Clint was amazed he had actually dodged. But her next attack, he couldn't. She dropped her foot to the ground and back kicked out with her left leg, catching Clint in the side. He grunted when his momentum slammed him back into the wall. "You don't have to do this!"
"Yes. I do," Natalia told him as she threw a punch toward him. Clint shifted so that her hand would just skim his cheek before reaching out and grabbing her wrist. Growling, she pulled him closer toward her. He fell into her, intentionally knocking her off balance. The duo fell into the opposite wall with it looking as though Clint was giving her a kiss. Another party couple came by and giggled at the position the two assassins were in. Natalia began to blush slightly until they were gone and then she lifted her left leg up to slam into his stomach. With a grunt, he backed away, releasing her. By the time he recovered, she was gone. Clint cursed.
"We lost track of her after that. Coulson was pretty much furious with me after that. Even though no one died, he didn't care. Refused to speak to me. Didn't even ask what we talked about. Nothing, he just didn't care," Clint remembered. Bruce smiled, thinking about the agent that he hadn't really spent that much time with. Even though he didn't have that long with the agent, he could see Coulson acting like that. Especially after how everyone else talked about him. "He wanted to take me off the mission. But when I told Fury that I'd look for her on my own, Fury had to give in and keep me going. I think he also gave in because I was the only one who had seen her and lived to tell the tale."
"Did Coulson ever find out what you two talked about?" Bruce mumbled. Clint laughed.
"He wishes!" Clint said, still laughing. Bruce's smile widened, enjoying that Clint was being so open. Clint calmed and relaxed against the stone once again. He sighed deeply. "No... Coulson never did find out. I didn't tell him. Natasha thought I already did... And Coulson never asked me."
"But that doesn't rule out Natasha telling him when you weren't around," Bruce pointed out. Clint nodded, having already thought of that before.
"Trust me, if Coulson knew or was even told, he'd take some sort of revenge on me. Seeing as he never did, I believe he never found out," Clint carefully explained. Bruce laughed. Clint gave him an odd look but before he could ask, Bruce just shook his head. There was a long silence. One in which Bruce forgot that Clint was slowly dying and needed to stay awake. It wasn't until Clint suddenly jerked and then loudly cursed, that Bruce remembered.
"Shit, I'm sorry Clint!" Bruce cried as he rushed to check over the archer's body. Clint grunted as he shook in fear. He had felt himself drifting off to sleep and he couldn't stop himself. After so many times seeing so many other agents falling into the same trap, Clint had sworn he would never do that. But he never understood how much the darkness called him. It was so... enticing. "Jeez! How close were you?"
"Nearly out..." Clint admitted softly. Slowly he looked to Bruce. "I don't want to die."
"I won't let you! Tell me about how you got Natasha to join S.H.I.E.L.D," Bruce suggested. Clint nodded, tears rolling down his face as he tried to cover his own fear of nearly dying. He was really beginning to believe now that the others wouldn't find them in time.
"Natasha showed up on the assassin's hit list a few days after the gala. On the run, S.H.I.E.L.D found it a bit easier to track her. Considering I was on probation for about a month, other agents were on her case. They never found her and she never killed any of them. All she did was turn tail and run. Until I was back after her. We met again in Miyajima. Natasha was checking out the Torii with a huge crowd of tourists when I spotted her. I was stationed in the temple, a good distance back and Coulson was wandering the crowd," Clint began. Bruce smiled, remembering the Torii from his own travels. He had happen to catch it at high tide where it looked to be floating on the water and so he never got to enjoy getting up close to it.
"Overwatch, I see her," Clint called into the comms without much preamble. Coulson jerked just slightly in surprise at his voice. He had told him about an hour before to keep off comms unless absolutely necessary. Clint believed this to be necessary, but judging by Coulson's angry glare back at him, he was wrong. Natalia jerked in response, glancing quickly at Coulson. Somehow she had heard the nearly silent comm. When she noticed that Coulson wasn't even looking at her, she followed his line of sight and spotted Clint. Clint could just about see her mouth his name before she suddenly vanished. "Shit! Overwatch, get out of there!"
"What happened?" Coulson snapped, rushing to get away from the huge Torii. Clint quickly prepared his bow and loaded an arrow. Coulson's eyes widened when the archer aimed them straight at him. Just before coming on the mission, Coulson was informed that Clint may be turning against them to join Black Widow. Coulson had just hoped that that was just a bad explanation as to her sudden change of habit. But now, Coulson wasn't so sure. "Hawkeye?"
"Watching your six," Clint declared, watching the rest of the crowd behind the older agent for any signs of the red head. Coulson swore into the comm, glancing back at the crowd. Natalia had vanished so fast that Clint couldn't even tell if she was still in the crowd. "For someone with such bright red hair, she sure can disappear."
"Not helping," Coulson mentioned, now almost halfway to the temple. That was when Clint spotted her. She was at the other end of the temple, rushing across the roof and heading straight for him. Clint's eyes widened when he noticed she had two twin guns in her hands. Coulson snapped to attention when Clint swore once again into the comm. He looked to see Clint spin away from his direction and toward a different end of the temple. Following the archer's gaze, Coulson spotted the lithe red head rushing toward his agent. Briefly he wondered how fast the assassin was to have gotten all the way over there. But it didn't partly explain how she got away with the other agents' murders. "Get out of there!"
"No can do!" Clint called back before grabbing the comm from his ear, dropping it to the ground and rushing toward the Black Widow. Natalia smirked when she saw Clint coming toward her and shifted direction away. Clint didn't even think for a moment that she might be baiting him. The chase was on.
"I lost track of her three times... Each time, I think she made herself seen so that I could follow her. At the time, I didn't think about the fact that she was leading me away from Coulson and any S.H.I.E.L.D backup. I just wanted to get her," Clint admitted. Bruce snorted, imagining the whole thing in his head. "She let me catch up to her on the top of Mount Misen."
"Hello again," Natalia said as Clint reached the peak. No one else was there except a small monkey that was watching the duo with an interested gaze. Clint snorted as he tried to catch his breath. Chasing her up the mountain was something he hadn't expected, nor was he ready for. Though medical had approved him for missions a while ago, Clint still wasn't up to his full endurance. She smirked at him. The only sign she gave of enjoying his discomfort. "What are you doing? Doesn't S.H.I.E.L.D have a price on my head?"
"How do you know who I work for?" Clint gasped out. Natalia pointed to the logo on the chest of his uniform. Clint growled at it as if it completely offended him. A soft chuckle made Clint frown. That couldn't have been from her. But it wasn't from him and certainly not the damned monkey. Slowly, he looked up at Natalia. It took him a bit to realize she was just standing there, watching him catch his breath. "Why aren't you running from me?"
"If I have to die by anyone's hands, why not my predecessor?" Natalia questioned. Clint took a moment to realize what she meant. Then he stared at her as if she told him that he was 'god'. She gave him a smile and opened her arms as though welcoming him to attack. Clint just stared at her. After a minute, she looked at him. "Well?"
"No fighting? No more running? You're just going to go... Like this?" Clint asked, wondering if there was some type of punch line or something. This whole thing just felt... Wrong. Natalia shook her head. Clint frowned. "No..." Natalia looked at him in shock. Was he refusing her request? Was he actually refusing an order from his newest authority? Was he risking his life for her? "No... I won't do this."
"Are you refusing?" Natalia growled, feeling too insulted to be fully relieved at not dying. Clint nodded his head, now beginning to wonder if he was making a mistake. Natalia was better than he was. She was a better fighter, a better assassin. Hell, she was the one who trained him so long ago. So what makes him think that right now he could survive not killing her when she was giving him the chance to?
"I won't kill you like this," Clint told her, a grimace already beginning to form before her face can narrow into a glare. "You don't deserve this."
Natalia lunged toward Clint, wrapping her hands around his throat. He fell back in shock but his mind registered the attack and moved his arms in an arch over his head and down into the inside of her elbows. The force made her release her rather loose grip on his throat. Backing up a step, she swung her leg out to kick him. He had only a second to realize what that meant before he raised his arm to defend himself. The strength behind the kick sent the archer stumbling back a few steps. Enough for Natalia to recover and come at him with her other leg. He couldn't defend this time and took the shin of her leg into the right cheek of his face. It sent him spinning down onto the ground, where Natalia began to straddle him before he could recover.
"I deserve so much worse than this," Natalia snarled into Clint's ear as he tried to recover. Feeling her legs tightening around his neck, the archer knew he was at her mercy. Slowly, he raised his eyes to look into hers.
"What if I could help fix it?" Clint softly asked her. Natalia raised an eyebrow but patiently waited for him to continue. "What if, you went after the force you used to work for?"
"Kill the Red Room? Impossible," Natalia scoffed. Clint shook his head for only a second but was forced to stop when Natalia flexed her muscles. He gulped before centering himself and continuing.
"Not just the Red Room. But everyone you ever worked for. All those who stand for... Well, evil," Clint finished pathetically. Natalia stared at Clint for a minute. Her eyes searched his face for something. Almost like she was looking for the truth. No... It was something else. Finally she let out a barking laugh and got off of him. He rolled away from her before stopping and watching as she clutched at her sides.
"Are you serious? Please, tell me you're joking!" Natalia begged. Clint frowned, unsure if he should be insulted or not. Natalia shook her head before getting onto her knees and looking out over the mountain view. Clint focused on her for a moment before turning to look over at the monkey that had surprisingly never left. "Do you really believe in all that?"
"All what?" Natalia tilted her head just slightly to look over at him.
"All that crap? That 'we're trying to save the world' shit that these companies spill," Natalia questioned. Clint sighed and sat up. This wasn't how he had expected things to go. But at least she had stopped attacking him.
"No... No I don't," Clint admitted. Natalia turned to face him fully. Now it was his turn to look out over the view. Below, he could see the small town that the two had run from. The town that Coulson was searching him for. Clint sighed deeply. "I believe in one man. One man that was willing to look past all I had done. He believes in all that 'save the world' crap."
"What did he do to you?" Clint slowly looked to her. She had a wondering, yet hopeful, gaze. He smiled at her.
"He gave me a chance."
Wow... Did you enjoy? Review, Favorite or Follow! Thanks!