Chapter title from Hey Man, Nice Shot by Filter.

All SHIELD personnel have the option of therapy, but that's really not Clint's idea of a good time, so when Coulson suggests it, he snorts and raises a single eyebrow. "Worth a try," Coulson says with a small smile, and gestures for Clint to take a seat opposite him. Coulson's office isn't a place Clint knows well – Coulson tends to just waylay him between training sessions or in the rec room – and it's a pretty bare room, though freakishly well-organised.

"You call me here for a reason, sir?" Clint asks.

"I did indeed." Coulson shuffles the papers on his desk and separates them into piles before pulling a file with Clint's name on it from a drawer Clint can't see. "I need to talk to you about that last mission."

"Am I in trouble?" Clint frowns, suddenly worried. He thought he'd done pretty well, all things considered.

"Not for your actions," Coulson reassures him, "but there is a security matter that's come to light. It appears that our frequency was hacked by someone at the target's house, probably a member of the security team there."

"I thought they didn't have anyone that sophisticated," Clint frowns. "The briefing file said the target was only guarded by thugs and lackeys, no one special."

"And that information was correct, up to a point," Coulson opens the file and glances through it, keeping it tilted so that Clint can't read anything. It's annoying, but Clint understands. Files are highly confidential, especially files belonging to agents who perform sensitive work like him. "The point is, someone hacked the frequency and heard every word we exchanged after the signal cleared."

"They heard my name," Clint realises.

Coulson nods. "They did."

"Shit."

"There are steps we can now take." Coulson closes the file and lays it flat on the desk, looking Clint right in the eye. "And there are options that present themselves. You are not the first agent to have their identity compromised."

"It's a big deal though, right?" Clint remembers all the times in training that it had been drilled into him – names were important. You do not give up your name. Names can always be traced.

"In this case, you were lucky," Coulson doesn't smile, but his eyes crinkle slightly at the edges. Clint relaxes slightly, because that expression never precedes bad news. "No one saw your face. They heard your voice, distorted by static, but that's not enough for anyone to go on. Your appearance is still safe. It's just your name that's been compromised."

"You're saying I need to change my name?" Clint raises his eyebrows.

"In a manner of speaking." Coulson clasps his hands and shrugs. "Agents who have been truly compromised are not cut loose from SHIELD. We treat our people better than that. Compromised agents merely cease to do much field work. You can stay on at SHIELD under your own name, but for further missions in the field, you need a code name. Several agents have them, usually those with a particular calling card. Your preferred weapon is quite a distinctive calling card."

Clint grins, relaxing properly. "So all I need to do is get a code name? That's not so bad."

"I never said that it was going to be," Coulson's lips twitch. "I need a code name from you by the end of the week, sooner rather than later."

"I've got an idea," Clint says, barely holding back a laugh.

"Oh?" Coulson raises an eyebrow.

"What do you think about Hawkeye?"

x

Once again, he lives a double life. Clint Barton turns down the offer of an apartment outside the SHIELD base in order to settle in more comfortably with the agents who live there with him. He starts up the casual cocktail/general drinking Friday with another agent called Mike Pawlkowski, and pushes beer on everyone else until they give in and accept that the rec room becomes a bar on Friday nights. It's as popular with the agents as it is unpopular with the trainees, who get bullied into taking shots until they pass out as an introduction to life at SHIELD. Clint Barton spars in the mornings, works in the gym in the afternoons, and avoids his paperwork just to get Coulson or one of the other handlers to chase him because he likes to practise his evasion tactics. Clint Barton gets a SHIELD-issued laptop and an mp3 player and starts buying the CDs of all the old tapes he used to have. He keeps his headphones in almost constantly, and his library of music grows weekly.

Hawkeye flies to more countries than he can count, passes through cities and towns that blur into lines of shop fronts and houses in various shades of brick and glass and stone, falling down and being built. Hawkeye infiltrates buildings in total silence and leaves arrows behind him all over the world. He is grim, quiet, and professional, evading security and government with an ease born of constant practise. Hawkeye makes a name for himself among the enemies of SHIELD (of which there are no shortage) – his kills are quick and clean, his presence a spark that leaves whole organisations in flames behind him. Hawkeye rises through the ranks of SHIELD quickly, and his work becomes something to aspire to.

Clint has been an agent for just over a year when he's finally invited to the Helicarrier.

"You're sure this is safe?" he asks Coulson, who's explained what the Helicarrier is on the flight over.

"It's been tested," Coulson tells him, amused, and ushers him out onto the deck. "It's perfectly safe."

"And I'm here because Fury wants to see me?"

"You're here because Maria Hill wants to interview you."

"Why?" Clint squints against the wind and looks out over the water. He can't believe this thing will be able to get up in the air with no kind of run-up.

"To potentially give you a higher security clearance."

"How many are there?" Clint looks at him, interested. His own clearance level was three.

"Six."

"So I do well, I get bumped up to a four?"

"It's possible. If you do very well, you might get bumped up to a five."

Clint whistled. "Sweet. Any advice?"

"Do not try to charm Agent Hill, or make out to be someone you're not in any sort of way," Coulson warns. "Just be honest. And think before you open your mouth."

"Okay," Clint nods and looks around as a siren starts to wail. "Is that normal?"

"We need to head inside now," Coulson explains. "The Helicarrier is about to fly."

"You're kidding me," Clint grins and makes his way towards the edge. "I can stay outside while it lifts off, right?"

Coulson sighs, but Clint doesn't miss his smile, so he takes that as permission and goes to the railing to peer over the edge. Something's happening in the water; some sort of turbine is rising to the surface, and Clint's eyes widen as rotors begin to spin faster than he can see. "Holy shit!" he laughs and ducks as water churned up by the rotors sprays up over the side and splashes him. There's another turbine further down, and he'd be willing to bet there are two more on the other side of the deck. He only just holds back a gasp as the deck shifts and slowly begins to rise. The noise is phenomenal, and he whoops into the wind. The Helicarrier picks up speed, and in moments they're high over the ocean, and Coulson taps his shoulder and jerks his head towards the door that leads inside.

"That was the coolest thing I have ever seen in my life," Clint tells him seriously as soon as the door closes behind them and blocks out the howling of the wind.

"I did get that impression," Coulson nods, and Clint laughs. "Come on. You're due to be interviewed in ten minutes."

"How big is this place?" Clint asks as they come to the end of the corridor and it splits to stretch for a long way down both ends.

"Big," Coulson says shortly, and leads him to an elevator. "You'll be spending the next week or so here if this goes well, and the night if it doesn't, so you'll have a chance to explore if you want to."

"Does this place have a good ventilation system?"

"Don't even think about it."

x

Clint's lounging comfortably in his chair when the door behind him opens. He turns to look and gets up when he sees a woman in a blue uniform walk in. There's no doubt that this is Maria Hill. She's tall, slim, and wears her hair pulled back in a bun. She's got an expression on her face that tells Clint right away that she is not a woman to be messed with. But what would he expect from Director Fury's second in command?

"Agent Barton?" she says.

"Ma'am," he nods, holding out a hand. She shakes it – firm grip – and nods for him to sit as she goes behind the desk and sits down gracefully.

"You've come a long way very quickly, agent," she says without preamble. He doesn't reply, and she goes on. "You finished the training in less than two years, an almost record-breaking time. Your record is almost spotless, with the exception of the Papua New Guinea incident, and you've become one of the most-requested assassins in SHIELD in just a year of working for us. It's an impressive career so far." She gives him a narrow-eyed, assessing look. He tries not to shift in place and resists the urge to sit up straighter. "Anything to say on the subject, Agent Barton?"

"Um," for once he can't come up with anything smart to say, "what is the record-breaking time for completing training?"

"Thirteen months."

"Who managed that?"

"I did." Agent Hill's eyes dare him to say anything, and he wisely changes the subject.

"I'm just doing my job."

"Is that all this is to you?" Agent Hill waves a hand at the wall and leans back in her chair. He wonders if she ever smiles. "Just a job?"

Clint hesitates for a moment before answering. "I guess it started out as a job, like the army but with more emphasis on the individual. But…I like it."

"You like to kill people?"

"That's just the end result sometimes. I like the process, I guess. I'm good at it. I like doing what I'm good at."

"Do you feel you wouldn't be good at anything in civilian life?"

"Not really. I don't know how to be a normal civilian."

"What do you mean by that?"

"You've read my file, right?" Clint smiles slightly. "I was a civilian for ten years, and I was too young to remember most of it."

"It says in your file that you spent roughly a year as a civilian between leaving Carson's Carnival of Travelling Wonders and joining up," she raises an eyebrow.

Clint nods slowly. "Wasn't really a civilian though, not really. Didn't settle anywhere."

"So why join the army?"

Something about Agent Hill's tone makes Clint pause, suspicious. SHIELD is famed for knowing far more than they should be able to know. Coulson had told him to be honest, but two bodies in an alleyway aren't things he wants to own up to. "I knew I couldn't keep driving forever," he says, which is true. "Joining up seemed like a good way to settle and still keep moving."

"That's all?" Agent Hill asks, and yeah, she definitely knows something, but Clint really, really doesn't want to own up to anything. But Coulson had told him not to lie.

He takes a deep breath and leans forward, putting his hands on the table. "Can we be straight with each other, ma'am?"

She doesn't smile, but she looks like she's thinking about it. Clint takes that as a good sign. "I'd appreciate that, Agent Barton."

"I was travelling with someone at the time – you probably already know that –"

"Miss Lorelai Simpson, yes."

"Lorelai?" Clint stares at her. "Lorelai? Huh. I never knew that was her full name. Uh, anyway, I was with Lori, and something happened in Ohio. I did something, something not entirely legal, and we split. I joined the army because I wanted to start fresh."

"I'd say killing two men is a little more serious than 'not entirely legal', wouldn't you?" Agent Hill doesn't look surprised at all, and since he's not in handcuffs, Clint figures he might as well spill. Coulson always says SHIELD takes care of its own. He'd prefer not to test that so seriously, but shit happens.

"They were going to hurt Lori," he tells Agent Hill. "I didn't really think it through."

"Clearly." She leans forward and meets his eyes squarely. "Do you regret your actions, Agent Barton?"

"No, ma'am."

"Why not?"

"Because they were going to hurt Lori." Clint can see Agent Hill's acceptance in the tiny shift of her expression. "Am I going to be arrested, ma'am?"

"There's no evidence to put you at the crime scene, Agent Barton," she leans back and the smallest of smiles graces her face. "SHIELD looks out for its own. We wanted to know whether you would try to hide this from us if pressed."

"Was this a test?"

"It was."

"Did I pass?"

"You did," she nods, "but this interview isn't over yet. I've still got some questions for you."

Clint's in the windowless room with Agent Hill for another forty minutes, grilled on every topic relevant to his job. Agent Hill wants to know about his preference for the bow over guns, his acrobatic training from the circus, and his reactions to certain situations. She asks him about how he trains, probes him about the motivation behind his tendency to spy on his fellow agents and whoever else is in the building. She gets him to tell her about the army's influence on his sniping technique, and at the end she takes him to the shooting range and asks him to demonstrate his archery skills for her.

Someone's already brought his bow down for him, and he strings it up happily, shooting the bull's eye consistently on every target that presents itself.

"How small can the target be?" Agent Hill asks him as the moving targets are pulled out of sight.

"You mean what's the smallest thing I can hit?" Clint asks, feeling a lot more comfortable with his bow in his hand. She nods and he grins. "Well, the ringmaster used to throw apples for me."

Agent Hill nods to someone over his shoulder, and Clint turns to see a man in a SHIELD uniform holding a bag of balls ranging in size from grapefruit to cherry. "Think you could hit these?" she asks him, and he nods.

"Sure thing."

"Wilson," she nods to the man holding the bag. "O'Brian, Peters! Down here."

Another man and a woman with a blonde ponytail come down from the observation platform, where a small crowd has gathered to watch Clint's show. Agent Hill turns back to him. "You think you can hit targets of different sizes thrown from three different places?"

Clint looks over at the three SHIELD agents each taking balls from the bag and moving to stand at the sides of the range, safe behind the steel shields. "I don't miss."

"Let's see." Agent Hill checks that each agent is in place and then shouts, "Go!"

Clint just has time to get an arrow to the string when the first ball, a big grapefruit-sized one, sails out into the open. His arrow goes straight through it, and he adjusts his shot for the next ball, a satsuma-sized one. After that, the world fades out of existence. His eyes are on the range, on the balls, on the bow in his hand and the string under his fingers. It sings under his skin, the speed he's shooting faster and harder than he's ever done before, and as long as there are still arrows in the container at his feet he can keep going, can keep nailing the white balls dead centre, keep proving his worth. The balls suddenly stop appearing, and Clint pauses, arrow at the ready. He doesn't relax, because no one's said anything, and his actions are vindicated when a ball the size of a grape flies out into his window. His eyes narrow and track the path of movement, and the release of the string under his fingers is smooth and true. The arrow flies and pins the tiny ball to the back wall, and Agent Hill says, "Okay."

Clint breathes out as he lowers his arms, and glances over his shoulder at the observation platform when the sound of applause reaches his ears. There are about twenty people in blue uniforms clapping and grinning excitedly, and for a moment it's like he's back in the circus again, the range a ring, the stands behind thick glass. He grins and takes a bow, unable to resist. When he turns back to Agent Hill, she's not smiling, but she looks pleased.

"Very impressive," she says.

"Thank you, ma'am."

"Leave your bow," she nods to his hand, still curled tight around the weapon. "Follow me."

"Yes, ma'am." Clint puts the bow on the floor next to the almost empty container of arrows and walks half a step behind Agent Hill as they leave the range.

"You ever find the bow difficult to handle in the field?" she asks as they walk. "Too big, or too unwieldy?"

"No more so than a rifle, ma'am," he tells her honestly. "It's not that much bigger than an M16, really, and it's much lighter."

"True," she nods and leads him to a set of stairs with a door at the top. It's unmarked, but Clint can tell as soon as they walk in that it's an admin office. There's too much paper for it to be anything else.

"Barton, C," Agent Hill tells a woman at the front desk. "Code name: Hawkeye."

"Yes, ma'am," the woman nods and taps away at her computer. After two seconds she nods. "Got it."

"Security clearance update," Agent Hill says crisply. "Three to five."

"Yes, ma'am," the woman types something in and Clint resists the urge to punch the air. The woman behind the desk pulls out a small chunky device with a screen and a stylus attached on a string. She beckons Clint forward and hands it to him "Sign," she says, pointing. He does so, and she signs it as well before tapping a few keys and then nodding at Agent Hill. "Done."

"Thank you," Agent Hill nods and motions for Clint to follow her out. "This clearance update will have a significant impact on the nature of the missions you'll be sent on," she tells him as they go back down the stairs. "There will be more emphasis on gathering information and infiltration, and you will be required to attend briefing and de-briefing meetings with your senior handler rather than just reading a file. Your mission reports will have to be more detailed. You will very rarely have one handler for the duration of a single mission, because your missions will be longer than they are now, possibly extending for months at a time. If any of this is disagreeable to you, you need to discuss it with your senior handler."

"Who's that, ma'am?" Clint asks, trying to keep up with all this new information.

"Agent Coulson," she stops in front of another flight of stairs. "He'll be upstairs in his office. I'm needed on the bridge. Agent Barton?" she turns to face him properly, and he meets her gaze. "Agent Coulson has taken a special interest in your progress at SHIELD. He would never normally find time to handle a field agent of such a low security clearance on such a regular basis. He's taken a chance on you, and so far, you've done well. One might even say exceptionally so."

"Ma'am?" Clint asks when she pauses.

"Keep doing what you're doing, Agent Barton," Agent Hill says after a moment. "And tell Coulson that Fernandez owes him twenty bucks."

"Yes, ma'am," Clint nods and starts making his way upstairs when she turns away and walks briskly down the corridor. He's not sure what to make of everything she's just said. He didn't know that Coulson was particularly high up on the ladder – he thought he was a handler like Tenner and the others he got paired with for his missions. He finds Coulson's office without any problems and knocks before entering.

"Come in."

"Fernandez owes you twenty bucks," Clint says by way of greeting as he walks in and slumps into the first available seat he sees.

Coulson smiles, pleased and somewhat sly. "You got upgraded to a five."

"I feel like I've been x-rayed and drained of energy," Clint complains, looking over at him.

"Agent Hill can have that effect on her interviewees," Coulson agrees.

"So who's Fernandez?" Clint asks after a moment. "And why does he owe you twenty bucks?"

"Agent Fernandez is a colleague of mine," Coulson goes back to whatever he's writing, glancing occasionally at the computer screen, "and he believed that investing so much time in your career would be a doomed undertaking. I have just proved him wrong."

"Was I an experiment?" Clint raises his eyebrows and puts on an offended tone.

"In a way," Coulson admits freely, putting his pen down to type something in. "I don't usually involve myself so directly with agents on a clearance level below four."

"Wow, this security clearance stuff is a real hierarchy, isn't it?" Clint leans his chair back on two legs. "What level are you?"

"Six."

Clint stares at him. "You're actually one of the top dogs, aren't you? How did I not know this?"

"You never thought to ask," Coulson looks back at him calmly. "You were quite understandably involved in your own life. Your tendency to focus only on what's relevant to you or the mission is a good quality in a sniper."

Clint frowns. "I'm gonna have to be more big-picture now, aren't I?"

"Adaption is another one of your good qualities," Coulson goes back to his paperwork. "I have every faith in your abilities."

"Thanks," Clint lets the chair drop back onto all four legs and grins at Coulson. "Hey, does this place have a bar?"

"It does not."

"There's nowhere on this flying aircraft carrier I can get myself a celebration drink?"

"You could always try the lounge, or the common room," Coulson says, "they both have open fridges. But I forbid you from trying to instate casual Fridays here."

"Casual cocktails and general drinking Fridays," Clint corrects him. "Besides, it's a Tuesday."

"Would that really stop you?"

Clint laughs. "Probably not. Come get a drink with me, Coulson."

"I'm busy, Barton, in case the piles of paperwork on my desk escaped your attention."

"When will you be done?"

"If I'm lucky, by midnight."

"Wow, that sucks. Leave it for an hour and get a drink with me."

"No."

"Please?"

"No."

"Pretty please?"

"No."

"Pretty please with –"

"Finish that sentence and I will have you escorted to the edge of the top deck and thrown off."

Clint pouts. "You're no fun."

Coulson looks up and shakes his head, but the corner of his lips is turned up. "One drink."

Clint jumps to his feet. "Victory!" he crows.

"Don't speak too soon," Coulson tells him, getting out from behind his desk. "This will be a good opportunity to show you the layout so you know where your briefings and meetings will be happening for the next week."

"Always a hidden agenda," Clint sighs as he follows Coulson out of his office.

"I am a secret agent," the shadow of a smirk touches Coulson's expression, and Clint grins.

"Where's this common room then?"

x

There are definitely more briefings. Clint spends more time sitting at large tables with men and women in sharp SHIELD uniforms and dark suits than he cares to count, but he suffers through the tedium because occasionally they'll give him information he can work with when he finally gets sent out into the field. Agent Hill wasn't kidding about his missions being longer either. Before his upgrade, he never spent more than a week on a job. Now a week is the minimum. It's harder, requires much more stamina and patience, but patience is something Clint has plenty of. He's well-versed in sitting still in an uncomfortable position for hours at a time in complete silence. He doesn't think about other things outside of the job, the target, the goal. He focuses in on his window with a strength of concentration that impresses his handlers and moves him further up in the ranks. It's hard work, yes, but he's good at it.

The missions now require more cover – no more being dropped into a hostile environment with just his clothes and weapons and an earpiece to talk him through. Now he gets new documents each time. Passports, driver's licences, visas, sometimes apartments, once a two-bedroom bungalow in a slice of suburbia so perfect it might have been cut from the pages of a magazine. Clint and Hawkeye can't stay separate anymore, and that's probably the hardest thing to adapt to. He can't just draw a line in the sand and hop over it every time he leaves and comes back again. He has to spend too much time under cover as a civilian, and to pass at that he has to be Clint, not Hawkeye. But Hawkeye has to be there all the time, close enough to spring to life if something goes wrong, or if the call comes through that he needs to make his move now, the target is out of the house, go go go!

Civilian living, even fake, is the really hard thing. It takes Clint several missions before he really gets into the swing of it, and the thing that helps him with that is TV. When the target goes to sleep in the apartment across the street, Clint shifts the TV in front of the window so he can keep an eye on the target in case they get up, and switches on the box. TV teaches him about the lives that civilians live. Friends, Hope and Faith, American Idol – these are all shows he peers at with a sort of detached interest before he discovers cartoons. He watched The Simpsons with Lori in the motels with functioning TV sets, but now he discovers Clone High, The Grim Adventures of Bill and Mandy, and Teen Titans. He's in Boston when Xiaolin Showdown debuts in November, and he's immediately hooked.

He suddenly understands how civilians can bear to live the way they do, in dull repetitions of daily action. Wake up, go to work, come home, eat, sleep. Repeat daily until dead. He's never known a life like that, so he can't really miss it, but he does envy the people he sees sometimes, when he hasn't slept for three days and he's bleeding from a knife wound and the target is on the move and he has to run too hard to keep up. Civilians don't have to worry about things like bullets and international smuggling rings. They have the luxury of ignorance and comfort in their own homes.

They actually have homes.

Most of them anyway. Clint's not naïve enough to think that all civilians live happy, suburban lives. But he has to resist cursing every single one of them when he's crawling through the unimaginable stench of a sewer, searching for a labyrinth of underground tunnels that apparently connect on. "Not sure I can imagine a bunch of businessmen doing this to meet for drinks, Sitwell," he hisses, trying desperately not to breathe more than absolutely necessary. He's going to stink for weeks, he's sure.

"They'll have access to the tunnels through cleaner paths, Hawkeye," Sitwell tells him, and Clint hates him for being far away in a warm chair with a clean suit. Bastard, he almost says, but swallows it down when he catches the edge of an unfamiliar sound. He taps the earpiece twice, the signal to tell Sitwell that he'd seen or something and wasn't able to speak yet. He moves through the thick oozing waste quietly, keeping low and to the shadows. Around a corner, light appears, and Clint would grin if he wasn't worried about getting shit in his teeth.

He kills five of the assembled men before they get control of themselves and start shooting back, and he immobilises the rest with arrows to their legs and arms. "No," he says sharply, kicking a phone from someone's fingers into the gutter. "Now," he says, squatting down next to the man he's been trailing for three weeks, "let's you and I have a little talk. Somewhere private, I think." He knocks everyone else out, ties them up securely and spaces them at regular intervals along the wall and puts hidden pressure pads between them so he'll know if they start trying to get closer to each other to talk.

The man threatens, then cries, then begs, and finally comes around. Men like him aren't good under pressure, which is really what torture mostly is. Clint's surprisingly good at it, because most of it is about instilling fear and panic by telling them what he could do. A few demonstrations are necessary to show them what pain is, and it usually isn't long before they sing like birds. Clint calls Sitwell for a clean-up crew, and he takes the longest shower of his life before he gets a jet back to the Helicarrier.

The briefings and de-briefings can go on for days at a time if the mission he was on was particularly important. He never thought there were so many shadowy organisations in the world. Not even the governments of the countries he's sent to know exactly what their people are getting up to, and whispers of a power directing Director Fury reach his ears after a while. The World Security Council. He doesn't like the sound of it, but he likes Fury. Fury's a soldier, and a spy, and he attends most of the de-briefings and makes good points. He understands the limits and abilities of the agents under him, and Clint begins to trust him almost as much as he trusts Coulson, who he still trusts more than anyone else at SHIELD apart from Lucy in catering, who never serves decaf, and doesn't take bribes to do so from anyone on April Fools'.

Clint reads files that have to be shredded and burned after reading about secrets that would rip the world apart if they got out. The Zodiac Cartel, HYDRA, the Hand, the Ten Rings, and AIM are names that become familiar to him, and he becomes heavily involved in bringing down cells of extremists run by the Zodiac Cartel. Clint's been working as a level five agent for a year and a half when they hit a serious block.

The list of people SHIELD would want out of the way if they could get anywhere near them is quite short, because anyone on that list is seriously good, and very capable of evading capture and/or assassination. Due to her recent work, Black Widow has just shot right up to the top of that list.

Fury is practically spitting in the briefing for Clint's next mission. "We need her gone!" he snarls. "I don't care how it happens, I don't care how many people we need to put onto this. That woman has just successfully put us back about three years! If she gets to Yelmilov or Maslak we're in the dark! I want every available agent on the ground looking for her. Coulson, you're in charge. Everything else can wait."

Coulson nods and closes a file quietly. "Yes, sir."

"The moment we've got solid intel on where she is, it's your show, Barton," Fury turns his eye on Clint, who nods, grim-faced.

"Yes, sir."

"This may be the most important mission of your life, agent," Fury tells him, eye burning. "I don't care if you have to bring down half of the damn country on her head – take the Widow out." He sweeps from the room in a blur of black leather and tightly-wound anger, and everyone else lets out small sighs of relief. Fury on a bad day is not something anyone wants to get in the way of. Clint feels sorry for any technician who tries to waylay the director today.

He takes a course on basic Russian before he leaves. He's been there before, but not for a length of time when speaking the language became necessary.

"Do you really need to be able to say, 'nobody move, or so help me god I will scalp every single one of you'?" his teacher asks, giving him a pained look.

"Yes," Clint says firmly. "How do I ask for more coffee again?"

He's good at soaking up information quickly and dumping it just as fast. Most SHIELD agents are fluent in at least two other languages. Clint knows sparse bits and pieces from dozens, but he'd be hard pressed to differentiate between Spanish and Portuguese in a tight spot. It occasionally gets him into trouble, but most of the time he can remember enough to get by. He remembers a few words of Russian from the times he's breezed through in the past, but he needs to know a lot more now. He spends the time he's given while other agents are scouting for the Black Widow learning to speak her language and reading up on everything they know about her.

Black Widow, real name unknown, but possibly Natalia Romanova, Nadine Roman, or Natalia Shostokova. Most likely a renegade from the highly confidential Red Room facility, which had been initiated in the early Soviet era in order to train female operatives for espionage and other stealth activities, including assassination. All of the Black Widow operatives SHIELD and their associates had encountered in the past had been incredibly deadly and had avoided capture above all else. They were all intelligent, fast, and chose suicide rather than being taken alive. Their loyalty to their shadowy masters was paramount, and they always acted on orders, never by their own initiative.

The Black Widow who had killed five of the people that had been instrumental in getting SHIELD further along the process to destroying the Zodiac Cartel for good was an exception, and since her appearance no other Black Widows had been heard of. She worked alone, and as far as SHIELD could tell, she worked for a variety of employers. They had almost been able to talk to one, but she had killed him before they could get there. The only photographs they had of her were blurry, CCTV images. She never left a trail, and she disappeared after committing her crimes like a ghost.

Clint runs through the list of her supposed victims (she never left a calling card, and nothing could be proven) and whistles, long and slow. Poison, strangulation, shooting, drowning, stabbing – the list went on. The Black Widow used anything and everything to kill, and she always got the job done. Sometimes her victims suffered, sometimes they didn't. Clint wonders whether she enjoys killing slowly when she's in the mood, and smiles. He's interested now.

Coulson is surprised when Clint asks for details of the Widow's targets, but he hands the information over without qualms. The slow deaths, Clint learns, are meted out to those who hurt others. Thieves, unlucky fools, and other such people get killed quickly, and Clint somehow gets the impression, looking at the photograph of a man with his neck snapped cleanly in his bed, that such work is so quick because it's second nature to her. Those she makes suffer are torturers, beaters, and rapists nine times out of ten.

Clint listens to Fighter by Christina Aguilera, Girl by Tori Amos, and thinks about the woman who managed to escape the most psychologically brutal institution in the world and set up a life of her own, answering to no one and choosing her own contracts. He's become more involved in this mission than any before. He doesn't miss the frowns Coulson gives him in the briefings as they coordinate the operation and close in on the Black Widow.

When he finally gets sent to Russia, it's to a city called Volgograd, south of Moscow. It's November and bitterly cold, the temperature falling almost daily. Snow lies in thin greyish piles on the roads and sidewalks, and Clint doesn't have time to switch on his TV in the tiny apartment SHIELD has found for him. There are SHIELD agents peppered through the city, but he's the only one allowed within two miles of the Widow at any given time. She's notoriously flighty and she hasn't gotten to where she is today by not paying attention to her intuition when it tells her she's being watched.

Clint has to be more careful than he's ever been before.

He first sees her in a café. He's eating a pastry, coffee steaming on the table in front of him, and he looks up when the bell over the door trills. It's snowing outside, so her hood is up. He doesn't realise it's her for a moment, but then she slides the hood down and shakes out a mane of dark red hair, and he knows. She glances around the inside, doesn't catch his eye, goes to the counter and orders something in a low voice. She doesn't stay – she gets it in a take-away cup and pulls her hood up before she leaves. Clint doesn't follow her. He finishes his pastry, drinks his coffee, and goes back to his apartment.

"Seen," he says casually to Coulson over the phone that evening. "Damn pretty."

"You didn't trip over your own feet, did you?" Coulson asks dryly. They haven't worked on a code more complicated than a few basic phrases for certain situations, but they know each other's voices so well by now that Clint knows exactly what he means and grins, watching his microwave hum in the quiet apartment.

"Nah," Clint has the phone wedged between his ear and his shoulder. The microwave pings and he pulls out the steaming tray, neatly partitioned into sections of little carrots, little broccoli, rice, and some sort of meaty mulch that smells like gravy. "I'm off – there's a TV show on later I want to watch."

"Check in," Coulson says.

"I will," Clint puts the tray on the table and spears one of the tiny carrots with his fork. "Later." He hangs up and pops the carrot in his mouth. It tastes of hot water, and he sighs long-sufferingly. He thinks of New York hotdogs and the meatloaf they serve in the Helicarrier canteen and eats the rest of his tray in moody silence.

According to the intel, the Widow is staying in a hotel near the centre. Clint examined the building earlier that week, so he knows how to get a view into her room. He's never been in a colder environment as he crouches on the fire escape on the building opposite and keeps his eyes open, body alert. He's in a dangerous place. The gap between the buildings isn't very wide. He wouldn't be able to see her from the roof, so he's had to move further down than he'd like. It's dark and snowy – she'd only be able to see him if she turned out the lights and stared out exactly where he was, but he still feels too vulnerable. It's a risk he's okay with taking for the chance to gain some more information.

The lights in her room turn on at half past eleven. Clint has hand warmers packed under his coat to stop himself freezing, and only his eyes are exposed. He tries to remember the sticky humidity of the tropics, the rainforest in Papua New Guinea. He can't. He huffs and concentrates instead on the hotel window. The woman he had seen in the café is on the phone, talking steadily with a small frown on her face. She looks determined, and a little angry. Clint stays absolutely still as she comes over to the window, still barking into the phone, and yanks the curtains shut. Her shadow recedes out of sight, and he relaxes slightly. He can wait.

He watches her all night. She opens her curtains at six-thirty the next morning and showers in under five minutes. When she comes to the window next, her hair is wet and straight, stark against the pale bathrobe. He wonders if she ever smiles when there's no need for it. She leaves the hotel ten minutes later, dressed warmly against the biting cold. Clint waits for her to be long gone before going back to his apartment and taking a hot shower. "I hate the cold," he mutters to the mouldy tiles, and bundles himself up in three towels, sitting in front of a space heater to call Coulson.

"Fun night?" Coulson asks without greeting.

"The funnest," Clint replies sarcastically. "No, dead boring. Nothing happening. We secure?"

"As we'll ever be."

"She was on the phone, not looking happy. That's it. Nothing exciting, didn't leave at any point, got up very early, went out."

"We've got eyes on her now."

"Not too many, right?"

"We're good so far," Coulson sighs, and Clint can just see him pinching the bridge of his nose. "Yellow's in the big town."

Yelmilov's in Moscow. Clint stilled. "Think she'll bite?"

"Be ready to move fast, just in case."

"She'll bite," Clint doesn't even know why he's so certain, but he remembers the way she was speaking on the phone last night, the slant of her dark eyebrows over her eyes, and he's surer than he's ever been regarding the movements of a target. "She'll bite for sure. Paint me yellow, C."

Coulson doesn't reply for a moment, and Clint knows he's weighing up the risks of working on the intelligence they have verses Clint's gut instinct, strengthened by seeing the target in movement. It was a very difficult decision. The whole mission could ride on it, because there's no question of any of the other agents in the area taking on the Black Widow. Only Hawkeye is qualified for the job. "Alright," Coulson says finally, as calm as if they'd been discussing the weather. "I'll have someone pick you up."

"ETA?"

"Twenty minutes good?"

"Plenty. See you soon."

"Hope so." Coulson hangs up, and Clint lowers the phone slowly, collecting himself. He can feel the tension in the soles of his feet, and it's only going to grow the closer he gets to Moscow. She'll make her move on Yelmilov there, he knows it. Maslak's in Switzerland at the moment. If they're both on her hit list, she'll definitely go for Yelmilov first. Clint's outside on the grey-snowed sidewalk when a battered silver car pulls up. He knocks once on the window and gets three knocks back, but he still checks the agent's face before getting in properly.

"The heating on full in this thing?" he asks, bundling his gear into the back before sliding into the passenger seat next to Agent Fisher.

"She's an old car," Fisher says apologetically, patting the dashboard. Clint huffs and goes to sleep for the drive to the airport, and sleeps on the flight to Moscow as well. He dreams of trying to shoot spiders, but his arrows turn into flies the closer they get to the web.