There was so much blood. It was everywhere. On her clothes, on her hands, in her hair. She couldn't stop it, he was going to die and there was nothing she could do. Every time she tried to wrap the wound the blood would just soak through the bandage like it wasn't even there. But she couldn't just give up, so she continued to wrap the wound, even though it was hopeless. She was so focused she barely realized someone was calling her name.

"Tasha! Tasha, wake up!"

Natasha woke up with a jolt, realizing that she was not on the battlefield but in her bed. And Clint was not bleeding out in front of her, he was warm and alive and not covered in blood. Clint sat up on the bed and pulled her with him so that she was practically sitting in his lap. "Are you alright? You were shaking." He said.

"I'm fine." Natasha replied quickly. She placed her hand on his neck and could feel his pulse point, the constant rhythm slowly calming her.

"Bad dream?" he asked. She nodded and he pulled her even closer, wrapping his arms around her. "It's okay, I get them too." She briefly wondered what his nightmares were about. She assumed that they were probably about his time in the war, or maybe they had something to do with his brother. She looked up at him and suddenly kissed him because he was alive and here and she wanted to be with him. He kissed her back, his hands in her hair and moaning softly into her mouth. He dragged his mouth to her neck, placing open-mouth kisses on her soft skin, and his mouth felt like fire. As he continued to kiss her, Natasha saw her clock and realized that she needed to get ready for work.

"Cl-Clint…Clint I have to go." She whispered.

"You have to?" he asked. He looked quite adorable pouting at her.

"We can do something as soon as I am done." She said. "I promise."

It was incredibly tense in the office that day. Bruce would barely look at her and Natasha was scared that they would get another visit from Mr. Pierce. She didn't want him going after any more of her friends, but she didn't know how to stop him. Bruce finally came up to her at the end of the day.

"Look Natasha," he started. "I just wanted to apologize for what happened yesterday. I'm so sorry if I scared you in any way."

"Bruce, it's not your fault," Natasha said. "Betty told me about your condition. It's not something that you can control. I don't blame you for anything that happened yesterday."

"It's just…I don't want people to be scared of me. I'm a doctor and I want to help people, not make them run away from me."

"Well you didn't hurt anyone. And if I'm being honest if someone had threatened me like that I probably would have lashed out at him too."

He seemed to smile at that. "Well that's good to know. I need to get going. Betty's waiting for me. See you tomorrow Natasha."

"Goodnight Bruce." She walked back to her apartment thinking about what she should do when Clint comes over.

"This is amazing!" Clint said. "Now I can insult Tony and he'll have no idea."

"Here, you need to curve your fingers a bit more." Natasha grabbed his hands, trying to make his hand look like the one in the book.

"Can I ask you something?"

"Sure." She said, paying more attention to his hands than to his face.

"What happened yesterday? I keep hearing all these rumors about a fight."

"It wasn't a fight." Natasha replied hasher than she intended. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to yell."

"What happened, Tasha?"

"There's this man named Mr. Pierce." Natasha began. "I never actually talked to him and I barely know him but he seems to hate me. A couple of months ago he basically told Mr. Coulson to kick me out and yesterday he told Bruce to fire me."

"He did what?" Clint nearly shouted.

"Then when Bruce refused he began to threaten him instead. That caused Bruce to go into some kind of rage."

"Did you get hurt?" he asked quickly. His anger had turned quickly into concern.

"No, he didn't hurt anyone. Betty calmed him down and everyone was fine."

"Why would someone want to do that to you?"

"I have no idea," she replied. "He seems to think that I am some sort of communist who wants to destroy America or something stupid like that."

"Well clearly this man is just an idiot and if he ever threatens you again I'll make sure he pays for it." Clint said harshly.

"Clint don't do that I don't want to drag you into this mess." Said Natasha. The last thing she needed was him getting hurt or getting in trouble because of her. She didn't know very much about Mr. Pierce and she would like to keep it that way.

"I don't care, Tasha. You don't deserve to be treated that way."

"Are you always this protective over people?" Natasha asked.

"Only the ones I care about," he said softly, his face turning a little red.

It was really getting late and she knew that he should probably go back home, but she didn't want him to leave. She wanted him to stay with her, where they could learn sign language and kiss and fall asleep together. She felt like she could forget about everything else, it was just the two of them. So when he was thinking about leaving she found her herself stopping him.

"Wait!" she said suddenly. He stopped and turned around back to her. "You…you could stay here if wanted. It's pretty late and it would take you a while to walk home."

"You want me to stay?" asked Clint. He still seemed a little unsure.

"Yes," Natasha replied. They both changed their clothes and climbed into Natasha's small bed.

"You know if this keeps happening you're gonna have to get a bigger bed," said Clint.

"I'll see if I can look into that," said Natasha. "Goodnight, Clint."

"Goodnight, Tasha."