Chapter 8-desparation

"You have to initiate a search for Agent Hunt", Benji told Director Martin. "Really why do I have to do that Dunn", Martin replied firmly. "Agent Hunt knows IMF's view on the odds of Agent Brandts survival. He is undertaking this mission entirely on his own". Benji's mouth fell open in disbelief , "Ethan has spent years faithfully serving IMF and now it seems you are just going to right him off"."That is not acceptable, he stated. Martin shrugged unaffected by the anger he could hear in Benji's voice, "Hunt's own actions show he does not expect help from us Dunn. He chose to jump off that cliff", he replied

"Dammit", Jane joined in, "you have to do something". "I'm sorry to interrupt ", came a soft female voice. All of them stared at the woman who appeared on the screen in front of them. "I'm Lila Craddock, I work for SHIELD as a psychologist. I have to agree with Director Martin on one point. Both the IMF agent and Clint chose to take this path and both of them need to see it through for different reasons". "Clint has only just rediscovered the fact he has a brother. If he has already lost him then he needs a way to feel closer to him. Jumping off that cliff is Clint's way of experiencing what Will would have gone through. Perhaps the IMF agent also needs to feel closure".

Benji had to take a breath at that moment. He knew what Lila Craddock was saying was true. Ethan felt that he was responsible for what had happened to Will. It must have been difficult to face an identical twin and realize he may never have the opportunity to say goodbye. He would go along on this crazy mission to help alleviate his own guilt as well as remembering Will. Benji knew Ethan would do that same for him as well. He sighed, " I suppose you are right, but they could have chosen a very hard method of searching that will affect their own survival. They had a helicopter why not use that".

"Where would you even start looking", Jane asked him." It's been two days Will could be kilometers out in the sea". She sucked in her breath and made a hard confession," I do not share the belief that Will is alive. Yes, he could have jumped off the cliff. But there would have been the fall then an explosion to survive. " "So you think Ethan is on a pointless mission, that's just another reason to go and rescue him. He could have been injured in the jump", Benji's voice was becoming faster as his anxiety rose," I can't believe we are even having this conversation."

Fury could understand Benji's feelings. He could see this pinched look in Natasha's face and knew she wanted him to order a helicarrier to search for Clint. "I think if you did rescue them now, then you'd just have to lock them up to stop them going back", Lila told them. "You are not talking about average people making this type of move, they are two highly trained agents. No matter how much none of us like it we may just have to go on trust in their abilities. I do not think they would just jump to their deaths. They are out there right now in the sea and when they are ready I believe they will find a way to contact us". Lila knew she was asking for both SHIELD and IMF to trust her opinion. So far her track record had not been that great. She was confident though that her assessment of the facts were correct.

Benji took in yet another breath, Ethan had survived several situations that were in reality worse than this one. It was just the feeling that perhaps he should be there with Ethan. He knew nothing about the man that looked like Clint and hoped he could be relied upon to save Ethan if that became necessary.

"Look", Tony Stark pushed Lila aside and spoke, "JARVIS is going to work out a program that will use all the known factors and track the probable position and destination of Clint and the IMF agent. If we need to we can use that information to narrow down a search area'. In the mean time I guess that we will just have to trust the fact that Clint is good at looking after himself".

All of them reluctantly agreed with that.

Right now Clint Barton was feeling like a drowned rat. He had learnt how to fall from a young age and had made sure he protected the parts of his body that were already injured. It had still been a shock though to plummet into icy water from that height. If he had planned this action he would have had arrows handy to shoot in the sides of the cliff to slow his descent. Beside him Ethan Hunt looked equally bedraggled. He wished he'd had one of those small discs that when thrown turned into an inflatable boat. But then Will did not have one of those upon him, this was Will style. Both of them treaded water ,then spied a large piece of house that wasbeing buffeted in the waves. Swimming towards that they pulled themselves up. "Well at least we know the fall is survival able ", Ethan told Clint as he sat puffing upon the wood. "Yeah well if it wasn't then it would have been a really stupid thing to do", Clint remarked with a half smile. Ethan had to admit he was right. Both of them had not really been thinking all that clearly when they'd jumped. Now in the coldness of the sea reality was setting in.

"Will could have found some floating debris, just like we have", Clint remarked. "Yeah if he survived the explosion. The force was considerable and pieces of house and cliff would have been fired like missiles all around him", Ethan stated. "I am going with yes he did survive and is out there for me to find", Clint told him firmly. " I do not want to waste an exciting jump off a cliff and an equally as riveting float through icy cold water after all". That remark sounded a little something Will would have said to Ethan. He supposed it was because of the fact they were twins. But then Clint had said he had not known about Will. Ethan knew Will did not know about Clint either. It had been a conversation that had given him an insight to Will's private life. Out of all of them Will was the one who talked about himself and his life the least. Benji would drop little comments about his family to the others on many occasions and it was one of these that had been the moment when he discovered the hole in William Brandt's life. "I am going to join my sister and go skiing in the mountains when this is over", Benji had told them over dinner one night in their hotel room. "Just be careful you don't break anyting Benji", Jane replied. "I went skiing with my sister once and ended up falling down the mountain. "Luckily I only bruised this", she pointed to her bottom. "How about you Will, are you going to catch up with family", Jane asked. Ethan remembered Will going a little pale when he found himself to be under their scrutiny. He'd felt a rush of concern when without a word Will had turned and fled into the bathroom. "What did I say", Jane asked worriedly. Ethan let a few minutes tick by before going to check on Brandt. He knocked on the bathroom door but did not wait for an invitation to enter. Will had just been standing there looking into the mirror. "Are you alright", Ethan asked, "Jane was concerned she'd upset you in some way". Will had closed his eyes briefly before telling Ethan, "It is hard for me to listen to others talk about their families when I don't have one. My parents died when I was a child Ethan". "I am an only child as well so don't have anyone to share family time with." Ethan found a lump forming in his throat, "you have us", was what he had said.

As he pulled his mind back from that memory Ethan found himself wondering why Will and Clint did not know each other. Since there was nothing else to do, out here in the water Ethan decided that he might as well talk. "So what happened Clint ,do you grow up apart or something", he asked. Clint took a breath , "No, my mother decided that it was in our best interests to forget one another. So she had this illegal doctor perform brain surgery that damaged the memory centres of the brain. It was meant to be permanent but this God from another planet, who had my mind controlled decided he could not stand the screams coming from my damaged mind and promoted healing". Clint looked over at Ethans startled expression, "beat that for a story", he said drolly. It did sound like he was totally out of his mind.

Ethan finally snapped his mouth shut after a whole 3 minutes of gaping like a fish. Clint sounded totally serious. So maybe it had happened. Okay ,he'd just go with the comment, "shit and I thought the things we do in the IMF were insane. That just sounds like a whole new level of crazy. No offense", he added. "None taken, Clint told him," I agree totally".

He shifted himself on the piece of wood wincing when his bruised side brushed against a piece of metal sticking out of the wood. "You okay', Ethan asked in concern. "Physically a little bruised as for other ways,"well it has been rough, after the mind control God thing came lots of counseling because I killed several of our own agents", Clint confessed. It was still very difficult to think or even speak about that. But somehow he knew Ethan Hunt would not judge him.

Ethan did not really know what to say about that one. He had been tortured before by the enemy so guessed Clint's experience was close to that. It was something that took time to recover from.

"Things are sometimes not all that easy", was what he told Clint. "No, they are not. I'd rather not talk about it anymore. I'd rather know more about Will", Clint asked. It was hard to feel close to someone when you saw them last many years ago and know nothing about their life since. Ethan wished he had a lot to tell. "He is not someone who talks freely about himself. He like you has been through the emotional ringer in his career", he replied. "We met a few years ago during a mission. Will was chief analyst at the time having left IMF because he believed he'd been responsible for my wife's death. He wasn't" , Ethan quickly added."It is almost as good as your story but doesn't involve spooky stuff like people from other planets". He waited for Clints reaction and was surprised when the SHIELD agent started to laugh."Gosh Will and I really do make a great pair, as we share some mind bending situations". I guess it comes with the territory of being an agent" . As for more personal things, I guess I'll have to ask him myself for details", Clint told Ethan.

He looked over at the grey seas and over his shoulder watched the clifftop fade into the distance. "We are going to have to keep our minds busy not thinking about the sea" , Clint told Ethan. "Days of nothingness could make us feel slightly crazy". He evaluated Ethan soberly, "I know it is most likely classified but can you tell me about your mission. "I'd like to know how Will ended up on that clifftop with enemies surrounding him."

Once again Ethan was not worried about sharing information. He had a few questions going through his mind in regards to their mission and knew that sharing them may offer a different perspective.

"Nothing really seemed to go right. We thought we had the perfect stealth approach planned to take the 5 men unawares. If you are going to take out a group of highly trained people who are sitting on top of a cache of weapons then you go for an approach they do not expect. We used heat imaging technology to determine their positions then used diving equipment to approach from the sea. Then we scaled that cliff setting the explosive devices at the same time. It should have worked flawlessly. But it seemed like they knew we were coming", Ethan told Clint. "We found ourselves facing a firefight. That's how Will used up most of his ammunition. Since we were out gunned and outnumbered we had to retreat and regroup to try another approach". "They seemed to know about that one as well." It was the type of thing that set his senses jangling. "That's where the brief case moment comes into the mission". We had noticed that all 5 men had different positions throughout the house and surrounding land and regularly changed them . However there always seemed to be one man in what was the basement of the house. We assumed that there was something important there. We used some IMF technology to see inside the basement during a shift change and saw the briefcase sitting upon the table open with some type of device inside. Will was excited about that, he said that this was a way we could get the other men. I disagreed because of them knowing our plans. It just seemed like that case was…", Ethan broke off feeling emotion rise again.

Clint knew enough about how missions worked to fill in that last words, " a trap', a tempting little sweet waiting for you to come and claim. Ethan nodded and continued the story, "It is really only a stupid person who puts all their information on a device others can take " . So I said to leave the thing alone. Will disagreed though ,he said it was the only way to get their attention. If they expected us to take that move then why not do it. He also thought there was a chance that the device inside the case really did store all their information. They could just be pulling a double bluff. I thought the risks were too high and started to plan yet another line of attack. Will sneaked off before I could stop him and…'well this is where we ended up", Ethan indicated the sea. "I still want to know how they knew we were coming because it may just have cost Will his life", he looked at Clint, "though I do want to belive he is still alive. ".Clint thought through everything Ethan had told him. "Maybe you were bugged or tracked in some manner", he mused. "Benji did a scan of all our equipment and found nothing", Ethan replied. Okay one option down, Clint had not really thought that one was probable anyway. It seemed Ethan was competent enough as an agent not to get caught out like that. There was another explanation that Ethan did not want to hear and he was reluctant to voice it because of what it meant. "Betrayal", Ethan said the words for him." I trust everybody on my team Clint, yet I can't see any other way that the enemy would know what we were going to do". That was the most awful realization any team leader must suffer. It was essentially a team breaker as he could never be really sure which of them betrayed him.

Clint looked over at Ethan. Betrayal was never an easy thing to consider. It must be giving Ethan Hunt nightmares. Clint could share those scary thoughts when he thought of that fact that Will was included on Ethan's list. But then Ethan hurriedly told him, "I doubt it was Will". "He did not have to make the sacrifice play and grab that bloody briefcase. He knew it was not what I wanted. But as I told you Will liked to challenge me sometimes".Ethan closed his eyes.

Clint would have liked yell at Will himself over that. He hoped to get the opportunity. His eyes grazed the surface of the sea again. A wide expanse of nothiness stared back. He swallowed. Don't think about the sea, he told himself. Think about Ethans problem, "so if the bad guys went after Will then he must have been right and the briefcase really did contain information. It does not make sense otherwise. If they were using the case as bait and knew you were coming they would have wanted to take all of you out and not just one agent. I think they underestimated the fact Will would take the case to give you time to take other action. He's a frigging idiot", Clint stormed, "sorry", he apologized seconds later. "I agree but I suppose he did take down some very bad people", Ethan reminded him. "Yeah I suppose that might help me when I think about this again", Clint sighed. Will it seemed had a lot of honor within him,Cap would probably like him.

Finding conversation lulling again Clint's eyes were drawn back to the sea. It was kind of hypnotic with the waves lapping around them and all those dark shapes moving about. What, dark shapes they weren't there before. Clint focused his enhanced eyesight on the nearest one. Memories of a particular movie he'd watched as a child assailed him forcefully. He had not been swimming for months after watching that movie. Now he was in the ocean with the movie's star and all its siblings coming closer. "Ethan he said seriously, there are sharks in the water".

Ethan promptly drew his feet up high onto the wood. "Yet another thing for Will to survive', Clint breathed out..

Xxxxx

Will found himself jolting to awareness when he felt pain shot through his fingers. He had been lying across the wood when he'd fallen unconscious and his arm had been dangling in the water. Pulling out his hand Will looked closely at his fingers. They were bleeding from small cuts. "Dammit", he swore, "hey you fish, I am not dead, therefore you cannot eat me", he yelled into the sea. There of course came no response, maybe he was already going crazy. He fixed the problem of his stinging fingers by placing them in this mouth. That was unfortunately not going to help the rest of him though. The gashes caused by flying debris were still bleeding. The worst of them was on his arm. Blood ran down from his just above his elbow to drip onto the wood then run into the sea. No wonder those fish had thought there was something nice to eat. Moving his cold aching body to an upright position Will had to restrain a scream when he realized the fish were the least of his problems. There were 4 fins circling his piece of wood and they definitely did not belong to dolphins. Will searched around him for something he could use to frighten them off.

He laughed to himself rather crazily when he saw the briefcase that had caused all the problems floating nearby. Okay a sharp smack across the nose with a briefcase might be the best shark deterrent.

He grabbed it up, knowing that it at least had the weight to be effective as a weapon. It was surprising the thing had not sunk. Maybe though there was something inside to give it buoyancy. Holding it in both hands Will watched the shark fins.

It was hard to keep his eyes upon all of them as they swam around the wood. The largest fin was circling closer and Will transferred his gaze to that one. Seconds later the fin disappeared as the shark dived under the water. Will could hear his heart beat speed up as his eyes scanned the waters surface. The shark could surface under the wood and throw him off into the path of the others. There would be very little he could do if that happened. He hoped though that sharks don't like to share their dinner and just the big boss would attack. He almost laughed about that thought, he was happy that the stand in from JAWS the movie was about to try and eat him.

A slight ripple drew his attention and he focused upon that point. What he saw next almost paralyzed him with fear. Nothing or nobody he had ever faced was as frightening as a large great white shark barreling down upon him. He could see the beady eyes and sharp nose as well as the lines of jagged white teeth. In seconds it would be upon him. Holding tight to the briefcase Will counted the seconds and watched the sharks approach. He saw it rise out of the water ,an image of pure death, its mouth agape and rows of needle sharp teeth glinting with saliva. Will jumped down upon the piece of wood and used the buoyancy of the sea to propel himself upwards over the gaping mouth. He struck the case with all the force he could muster at the sharks pointed nose. Pain shot through his arms and he found himself screaming as he felt the jolt of impact shock his injured arm. The case split open in his hands and he saw that it was indeed filled with buoyancy devices. He could also see that it was empty.

That fact barely had time to register before he found himself coming down to land right on the back of the shark. The shock of his attack had enraged the beast and it sped through the water like a jet fighter.

Will balanced his feet across its back and treated it like a surfboard. He had surfed for many years before he'd joined IMF and the knowledge came in handy now as he kept his footing on the wildest ride of his life. He had not gone far when the beast below him decided it had enough of him riding upon its back. It decided to surface. Once again he had to take a gamble and throw himself upward as the beast went under. The piece of wood and been propelled along by the sharks wake and Will found himself hitting it hard. It went under the water a short way then shot back up. Panting hard Will found himself falling flat upon the wood as exhaustion caught up with him. He was surprisingly still alive. But those other fins were still out there and they did not have long to wait until darkness fell. Unless he could somehow manage to stay awake and alert all night they would eventually get him. Once again Will felt despair fill him. How could he hope to survive . He almost felt like screaming again. When he heard a scream a few moments later he thought that perhaps he had lost control totally and not known he had made a sound… Looking out over the water though made him think differently, he could clearly see something glinting in the sun and it was not man made.

"Shit"…Clints sudden shout made Ethan jump. "What", he demanded staring at the sharks. "Ethan I just had the worst thought' Clint told him. He did look rather pale and Ethan thought he knew the cause. "I have already thought about the movie JAWS", he replied grimly. "No it wasn't about the finned foe. "It was about those men who went after Will and that briefcase. They were closing in on Will's position when you detonated and you did not find all of the bodies…If Will could survive the fall then so could they"…..

Clint found himself brushing his eyes and scanning the water for some sign of life. What he saw drifting in the current just made him feel like all hope for Will's survival had gone. "Ethan, there is a severed arm, about 300 metres ahead". Ethan Hunt reached out and touched him as they got closer to the grisly discovery.