At first, Clint felt like things were happening in slow-motion. Even with the ringing in his ears, he could tell that the the cacophony of screams had changed in pitch and character, going from anger to fear. People were clawing and frantic or frozen in shock… except one. There was a man moving toward the exit, not in a panic, but with confident strides. No one was paying attention to him, like he was a ghost. Eye patch? Where did he know that face from?


"Sitrep, people!" Coulson demanded, even though he knew they were functionally blind and deaf following the electronic blast they'd put through Barton and Romanoff's earpieces. "Tap into local law, any security cameras in the vicinity, whatever you can get."

"Should we call Mr. Stark?" Agent Jackson asked, turning in his seat.

Coulson made a disgruntled face. Stark. "Try Miss Potts. I doubt Stark would deign to answer his phone if he knew it was us."

"Yes, sir," Jackson answered, turning back to his console and bringing up the number.


A red-gold blur streaked over the heads of the panicking crowd. A man. The bulk of the gilded frame of the chandelier came crashing down on the armored figure. Jets fired on full, glowing bright in the shadows of the hall, but for a moment the unexpected savior dipped and almost seemed as if he would topple under its awkward balance and weight. Long crystal ornaments banged and jangled as he struggled with the unwieldy mass. Shrieks of surprised joy turned to fear and then once more to joy once more as the twisted arms of certain death failed to break bones and split skulls, though plaster chunks and fine dust continued to rain down like ashes, coating everyone in gray.

"Stark's got this. Let's go," Widow said loudly, one hand simultaneously gesturing in front of Hawkeye's face to get his attention. Their mission was totally blown and their contact to HQ severed; time to cut their losses and extract themselves before something worse happened.

"Follow me," Hawkeye replied, beginning to push through the crowd. Many people had stopped their harried flight to stare at Iron Man. Of course. The archer turned his back on the auditorium and cut a path like a dog through a herd of sheep, hot on the trail of the mystery man with the eyepatch. That bastard hadn't been in any hurry, so they might just catch up. He knew without looking that Widow was right on his heels, trusting his lead.

Indeed, Black Widow had seen the intent look in the man's eyes. She knew that expression well and realized that he'd seen something she'd missed. In the old days that would have bothered her. Now she just treated it as if she had four eyes instead of two, both his and hers. Together they saw the whole picture.


"Sir, we've got lobby cameras at the opera house."

Coulson pivoted toward the monitor and saw the flash of Romanoff's green dress as she and Barton emerged at the top of the long, curving staircase. The archer wore a searching, determined expression that Coulson knew well, and his head pivoted as he made a quick scan of the space.

"What's he looking for? Do we have another view?"

"They're all static cameras, sir. I've got them all up on the monitors, but it just looks like a crowd of patrons."

Scanning for himself, Coulson had to agree. There was no view that gave him the perspective from his agents' position. "What do you see, Barton?" he wondered to himself. "What do you see?"


The stairs and the lobby floor were full of people. Clint spied his quarry, who seemed to be moving with ease, people parting before him to provide a clear path. How was he doing that? At this rate, the man would be out the front doors and into the street before he and Widow even reached the main floor. There were too many thick columns for a swingline, not that he was anxious to repeat that kind of performance after his descent from the balcony. He also didn't want to drop down on someone's head. The balustrade! It was slick-looking, sloping and curved along the full length of the staircase, but it was almost a foot wide. That was child's play for a kid who'd walked the tightrope once upon a time. Bingo!

With one leap Hawkeye was up and on the fat stair railing, both arms automatically going out to balance himself for the half-second until the rubber soles of his tactical boots found a sure grip the surface. Then he began to run down. Widow was up behind him in the next instant, amazingly nimble and all but soundless in her bare feet. His headlong descent hovered on the knife edge of uncontrolled, his feet working by instinct, eyes locked on his quarry each step of the way. The smallest misstep could send him flying headlong into the crowd or tumbling to crack his head on the marble floor below, but that didn't stop him. It never did.

Of course, that didn't rule out a headlong leap on purpose. A dozen steps or so from the end of the railing, Hawkeye launched himself over the heads of a pair of shocked society matrons and executed a flying tackle of his quarry, wrapping both arms around the man and bowling him over. They sprawled out and rolled down the last several stairs in a wild tangle of limbs, landing in separate piles as Hawkeye's bow caught and slowed his wild ride sooner than Cross's. There was a sickening snap as one riser gave way and the bowstring went slack, though at least it wasn't bone. Even so, he was gonna hurt like hell in the morning.