Author's Note: I'm glad that you all seemed to enjoy the last chapter! Thank you so much to everyone who has taken the time to review... it really makes me excited about this story. I'm very humbled by all of your kind words :-)
And, now, what most of you have probably been waiting for - here's the chapter with Clint's confrontation with Loki. I hope you like my take on it. Just a slight warning - this chapter contains some mature themes.
Clint Barton, Steve Rogers, Bruce Banner, and Thor were all gathered in the command center of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s airship, watching as Loki was interrogated by Nick Fury.
The mission to apprehend him had gone smoothly - too smoothly, if you asked Clint. The only hiccup had been when Thor tried to villain-nap Loki, which had turned into something of a pissing contest between Thor, Stark, and Rogers. Clint had stayed out of it, opting instead to take the quinjet to Loki's location while the three other men were having it out. There was no way he was going to let Loki escape - certainly not for the sake of his own ego. Natasha would have kicked his ass if he were to let that happen.
As for Natasha herself... to say that Clint had been disappointed when she hadn't been with Loki in Germany would have been an understatement. While Rogers and Stark fought Loki he knew that she had to be somewhere nearby, being forced to do Loki's dirty work. But, even his piercing hawk eyes couldn't manage to locate the covert spy. S.H.I.E.L.D. had Loki now, though, and soon enough, hopefully Natasha and the Tesseract would follow.
Yet, all of Clint's senses were tingling, and he couldn't help but feel like something about this was all wrong. Loki seemed much too eager to be taken prisoner, as if everything were going according to his plan. What kind of game is he playing, Clint wondered with frustration.
"He really grows on you, doesn't he?" Banner observed with no small hint of sarcasm.
"Like a tumor, maybe," Clint mused, causing Banner chuckle.
"Loki's gonna drag this out. So, Thor, what's his play?" Rogers asked, getting down to business. Under less straining circumstance, Clint considered that he might get along well with Rogers. Although Rogers seemed to have - to put it kindly - a stick up his ass, he was smart, focused, and didn't put his own pride before a mission.
"He has an army called the Chitauri, that none of Asgard nor any world know," Thor responded. "He means to lead them against your people. They will win him the earth. In return, I suspect, for the Tesseract."
Rogers paused. "An army, from outer space," he recounted with disbelief.
"Well, that's just dandy," Clint commented. "And by dandy I mean, really, really, horrible."
The others couldn't help but agree.
"So, he's building another portal," Banner said. "That's what he needs Erik Selvig for."
"Selvig?" Thor asked.
Banner nodded. "He's an astrophysicist."
"He's a friend," Thor said with confusion.
"Loki has him under some kind of spell, along with one of ours," Clint told him, his throat tightening as he thought of Natasha. He knew that until he had her back, this pill would continue to be a bitter one to swallow.
"I want to know why Loki let us take him," Rogers said, echoing Clint's earlier concerns. "He's not leading an army from here."
"I don't think we should be focusing on Loki," Banner asserted. "That guy's brain is a bag full of cats. You could smell crazy on him."
Well, no argument there, Clint surmised. Still he had to disagree with Banner. Loki was up to something, he just knew it...
"I don't care for how you speak," Thor said threateningly. "Loki is beyond reason, but he is of Asgard, and he's my brother."
"He killed eighty people in two days," Clint grumbled.
"He's adopted," Thor said quickly, backtracking, and Clint couldn't help but smile. Once Natasha was back, he might even end up enjoying this whole Avengers thing, after all.
Clint silently entered the room holding Loki's prison, taking a moment to observe the villain while he was facing away from the door.
Directed by Fury, Clint's mission was to see if he could extract any information from Loki about his next move. As Fury had said earlier, Loki seemed like the only person on the ship who wanted to be here. There was just something unnerving about how calm Loki was with the whole situation - he clearly had some kind of trick up his sleeve.
Clint fully intended to find out what it was, but beyond that, he also wanted to learn more about what Loki did to Natasha. There was never any harm in killing two birds with one stone anyway, was there?
Taking out three arrows, Clint shot them at the room's surveillance cameras. These arrows were specially made to jam electronics, and he figured it would take around 10 minutes or so for S.H.I.E.L.D. to unscramble the signal and get the cameras up and running again. Ever since S.H.I.E.L.D. had sent him after his own brother, Clint was careful to hide as much personal information as he could from the organization. This time, though, he did it not only for himself, but to protect Natasha as well. He had no idea what Loki might reveal about her, if anything, but whatever it was, he wouldn't let S.H.I.E.L.D. use it against her.
Fury would surely be - well, furious - but this wouldn't be the first time Clint had disobeyed protocols. Generally, S.H.I.E.L.D. was okay with his occasional disregard for the rules because he always produced results. S.H.I.E.L.D. was quite Machiavellian in that way, after all. More than anything, the organization believed that the end justified the means.
"Impressive, Agent Barton," Loki commented casually after turning to face him. "Both in marksmanship and in stealth. There are not many people that can sneak up on me."
Getting only his second up-close-and-personal look at Loki, Clint studied him for a moment. Loki didn't appear to be too intimidating, especially when he was without his menacing spear - the guy clearly needed a haircut, a shower, and a fashion sense. However, his dangerous, psychotic eyes more than made up for the rest of him, and Clint could almost feel them chilling his entire essence on the spot. They were evil and full of mischief, as if Loki got untold amusement from destroying the lives of others.
"Didn't you figure I'd come?" Clint asked, his eyebrow raised. Loki wasn't stupid - he had to know another interrogation was coming. Granted, this sort of thing wasn't Clint's specialty. If Natasha had been here, S.H.I.E.L.D. would certainly have sent her instead of him, as she thrived in disarming her marks, making them think they had the upper-hand, and using their arrogance against them. It was an art, really.
But, Natasha isn't here, he thought, as a painful ache he'd been becoming used to over the past few days settled into his chest. Yes, Natasha wasn't here, so they had sent Clint, instead.
There was a lot at stake for him. He wouldn't fail.
"Yes, I did figure that you'd come," Loki responded, "But not until after. After whatever tortures Fury can concoct, you would appear as a friend, as a balm. And I would cooperate."
Clint smirked. "I don't have time to wait for Fury's games. And, make no mistake - I'm no friend of yours," he told Loki with a growl in his voice. "I want to know what you've done to Agent Romanoff."
Loki chuckled. "I'd say I've expanded her mind," he replied boastfully.
"And once you've won. Once you're king of the mountain. What happens to her mind?" Clint asked, carefully keeping his face stoic.
Amusement danced in Loki's eyes. "Is this love, Agent Barton?" he questioned, his tone mocking and menacing.
Unaffected by Loki's attempt to goad him, Clint went on the attack. "And what would you know about love?" he asked seriously. "Despite all your powers, no one has ever loved you, have they? Not even the man who raised you as his son."
Loki's eyes went cold, but soon, a vicious smile found its way to his face. "And what of you, Agent Barton? You were an orphan, were you not? And then you went and killed your own brother, the only family you ever had." Clint looked at him in surprise, and Loki continued. "Yes, that's right. Your precious Natasha told me everything. That is, when she wasn't screaming out my name in ecstasy..."
All the air suddenly seemed to disappear from the room, and Clint had to consciously stop his knees from buckling. "What did you say?" he asked murderously, his eyes glowering.
"Oh, come now," Loki said, clearly enjoying himself. "Did you really think I'd be in possession of such a beautiful woman and not make her mine? My brother isn't the only god who can fraternize with a Midgardian, you know."
Clint felt himself trembling with rage. His muscles strained against his skin, as if his body was wondering why it wasn't slowly choking the life out of the man in front of him. Never, not even in his worst nightmares, had Clint imagined this. Anguish ripped through every nerve, every cell, every synapse in his body at the thought of Loki taking advantage of Natasha while she was under his mind control, touching her, climaxing into her...
For a second, Clint thought he might just break.
But, he had to keep it together. He wouldn't do Natasha any good by losing his cool here - that was exactly what Loki wanted, and he wouldn't play into his hands.
In that moment, Clint couldn't help but have a much greater respect for Banner and the struggle it took him to contain the Hulk. Lord knows it was taking every fiber of his being right now to keep the beast inside of himself from attempting to rip Loki to shreds.
Fleetingly, Clint also thought that if Natasha were in his place, she'd have Loki right where she wanted him. Yet, Clint couldn't do this with the same detached pragmatism as she could, not when Loki had just claimed to...
Clint tensed, feeling the sudden urge to vomit. "You're lying," he finally said through gritted teeth.
"Am I?" Loki challenged. "But you'll always wonder now, won't you? And tell me, Agent Barton - will you ever be able to look at her in the same way again, wondering if I had her first?"
As his fists clenched tightly, Clint's nails were digging into the palms of his hands so forcibly that they started to draw blood.
"Not that it even matters," Loki continued, clearly sensing that his opponent was teetering on the edge of insanity. "The Natasha you know is dead - you can't release her from my spell."
Clint shook his head, wishing that would help him purge out Loki's cruel words. His Natasha, she couldn't be dead - he refused to believe it. Clint would get her back, no matter what it took, because any alternative was just unthinkable.
He felt himself weakening under Loki's verbal assault, wishing he could run away, wanting nothing more than for it to stop...
But Loki wasn't finished.
"You asked me earlier what I would do with her, once I was 'king of the mountain,' was it? Well, I'll make her my queen, of course," he said with a satisfying smile.
"Over my dead body," Clint whispered dangerously.
Loki's smile widened. "And even if you could somehow release her from my spell, Agent Barton, what then? I would hope that if you really cared about her, you would care about her enough to kill her, because that's the only way she'll ever truly be free of me. After all, how do you think she'll feel, living with the guilt of all the evil that she's done, with the knowledge that I claimed her as my own and knew every inch of her body..."
STOP IT, Clint wanted to scream, wanted to moan, the torment he was feeling seeming to eat him alive. The killer inside of him begged to be released, to snap Loki's neck in half.
Yet somehow, even though the anguish he was feeling was ripping his insides apart, aside from visibly shaking, Clint managed to keep his outward cool. "You don't know Natasha," Clint finally said, his voice quivering slightly. "She's stronger than you think."
"You're right, she is strong," Loki replied, his eyes narrowing. "And that's why I'll make her kill you. Slowly, intimately, in every way she knows you fear. And then she'll wake just long enough to see her good work, and when she screams I'll split her skull!" he spit out. "This is my bargain, you mewling geck!"
The picture Loki had painted was so graphic that Clint shuddered in disgust. As much as he hated to admit it, Loki's words had shaken him to his very core. Instead of feeling like a master assassin, like the dangerous killer he was, Clint just felt unraveled, completely undone. Loki was winning this battle, Clint was slowly losing himself... but he couldn't let that happen!
Natasha, Clint thought, clenching his eyes shut. I will free you from Loki and I will save us from this fate.
Refusing to back down, especially as the thought of Natasha needing him filled him with renewed strength, Clint locked eyes with Loki. "You're a monster," he snarled.
"Oh, no. You brought the monster," Loki said knowingly.
Suddenly, as if snapping to attention, Clint's back shot up straight. This was it, the was the information he'd been looking for...
Gotcha, asshole, Clint thought, although it felt almost like a hollow victory in the wake of Loki's torment.
"So, Banner? That's your play?" Clint inquired eagerly.
"What?" Loki asked, the amusement quickly fading from his eyes.
Clint turned on his communication link and started talking into his earpiece. "Loki means to unleash the Hulk. Keep Banner in the lab, I'm on my way. Make sure the door is locked." Rushing out of the room, Clint turned around before exiting and peered icily at Loki. "I'm going to kill you, you know," he said matter-of-factly. "And if you're really immortal and can't die, well - I'm going to make you wish that you could. This is my bargain," he vowed.
Finally leaving, Clint headed double-time to the lab. First, though, he made a beeline for the men's restroom and retched out all of the contents in his stomach.
To be continued...
Thank you so much for reading! Sorry that my chapters keep getting longer and longer.
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