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Clint just wanted to crawl in a hole and die quietly for a couple minutes. He was just sick of being everyone freaking punching bag. Sure, it had just been one fight…but seriously. Not content with beating the bloody snot out of him, the damn thugs had thrown him off a two story building. Oh well, if they hadn't he would probably be dead…or worse. Barton was military and SHIELD trained, but he had heard some pretty nasty torture stories around the special-ops campfire. He had never been pushed to his limit, but he had come pretty close…like right now for instance. He took a quick physical assessment…

Okay, a fractured leg, dislocated shoulder, black eye, knife wound on left side, possible broken ribs… He took a deep breath and nearly threw up. Defiantly broken ribs…Also cold…great. Blood loss.

Barton tried to figure out which way was up as he opened his eyes. He figured that it was probably the opposite of down and pushed himself up on his elbows, feeling the slight scratch of a woven mat beneath him. He waited for the world to stop spinning and his vision to clear.

For a tiny shack in the slum, this wasn't a bad place. Sure, the ceiling had some pretty obvious rusted-through holes and the floor was nothing but hard packed dirt, but it was well taken care of. A small amount of furniture filled the one-room shed, including a small table and chair and the mat that he lay on. The room was lit by two small windows, one just over the bed and another on the other side of the room where a small fire pit with a metal pipe for a chimney cast the room in an orange glow. A shadow passed over Clint's eyes and, squinting, he saw the girl kneeling by the fire. He tried to remember her name and added "hit on the head" to his list on injuries. At least that explained the headache and slight memory loss he had been struggling with.

Kyla…That was her name, Kyla.

Clint mumbled something incoherent and Kyla looked over her shoulder at him.

"Oh, good. You're up."

Barton wanted to point out that this was a touch optimistic an assessment of things as he was barely holding on to consciousness as it was, but he didn't have the willpower or strength to argue. His head flopped painfully back on the mat as she approached, a plastic water bottle in one hand and a few strips of cloth in the other.

"Here." She said roughly, holding out the water. His hand missed a few times, but eventually got a hold of the bottle. As he fumbled trying to get it to his mouth he felt pressure on his shoulder as Kyla wrapped a strip of cloth around his upper arm where he vaguely remembered being grazed with a bullet at some point.

He wasn't aware of how thirsty he was until he started drinking and the bottle was empty in seconds. He thought he caught a disapproving glance from Kyla as she took it away and threw it onto the table. She didn't say anything as she tied off the bandage on his arm. She stood up and walked back to the fire. She didn't say anything, so neither did Clint.

He must have fallen asleep again because the next time he opened his eyes the windows were dark and the only light came from the fire. His headache had improved some, but he still didn't bother trying to get up. He let his head roll to the side, allowing him to see all around the room. He was alone. He blinked, wondering if his eyes were just giving him trouble, but Kyla was really not there. He swallowed, feeling the dryness in his mouth, and tried to call her name. No answer. He looked back at the ceiling. Through a small crack he could make out the night sky. It was pitch black and he judged the time at around midnight. Maybe she just went for a walk. Okay, that was a stupid idea… No girl in her right mind would go walking around here at night. Then again…Kyla wasn't just some girl…

The sounds of the city drifted in through the unscreened window and voices of large groups of loud (or drunk) men faded in and out as they wandered the streets. Twice they came close to the shed, but never seemed interested enough to look in the windows. Clint wondered how anyone could live here and remain a good person. He caught himself. No, Kyla wasn't a normal person. She had the definite feel of a trained criminal. Then again, was he any different? He killed people for money.

A loud chorus of voices and wolf-whistles outside interrupted his thoughts and he heard footsteps approaching outside. They stopped at the door and he recognized Kyla's voice as she yelled something in Portuguese at whoever was whistling at her. There was a pause and hushed voices which then faded off into the night. Kyla opened the door and entered.

Over her shoulder was a backpack, and in her hands were Barton's bow and arrows.

"Here. I had to reclaim your…whatever this is…" She put them down on the table and Clint had to grin.

"Thank you." He said. She began to unpack her bag and gave him a quick half-smile.

"No problem, I just had to fight off the entire street gang. They were trying to use it I think. It was quite amusing."

At this Clint showed obvious discomfort, imagining all of those grubby and untrained people handling his bow.

"Don't worry…" Kyla muttered, pulling two bottles of water and a small box out of the bag. "I made sure they didn't break anything." She gave what looked like a sly grin and Barton relaxed a little, knowing that his preferred weapon was within reach. As he watched in silence, Kyla pulled a small metal pot out of a box in the corner and poured in most of one of the bottles of water, a bag of rice, and the contents of the small box she had brought in…beans. Without a word she poked the fire in the pit back into life with a stick and wedged the pot between two logs. She stirred it with a rusted metal spoon and sat back, eyes on the flames. She must have known that Clint was watching her, but give no indication that she noticed or cared.

Barton could only speak for himself, but if he had just saved someone's life and had nearly died trying to do so, he'd want to know a little more about them.

"I'm not the bad guy." He said, apparently out of the blue. Kyla didn't turn to face him, but he could tell she was listening. "Those guys that were after me, I know all you have to go on is my word, but really. Those were the bad guys."

"So that makes you?..." Kyla said, turning around and watching him with a pair of startlingly green eyes.

"Not quite the good guy, but as close as I can get."

Kyla nodded to herself, then stood up and sat beside Clint's mat on the floor.

"Too bad I'm a 'bad guy' then."

Clint searched her face. Sadness. She was an immensely sad person who had found a way to hide it, and use it. She was smart, and he liked that.

"Good and bad can just be labels…" He said slowly, trying to find the right words. Pep-talks weren't his forte.

"…Or someone's nature." She added, her face drawn in a frown.

"Yeah." Clint said. "And you have a good nature."

She looked at him with an incredulous stare.

"You don't know me very well."

"You saved my life."

"You would have croaked on my lawn!" She said, her voice raising a couple octaves.

The two stared at each other for what felt like a long time. Clint was determined to win this argument. He couldn't stand seeing someone making his mistakes. Kyla also seemed determined to prove that she wasn't a good person, deep down. A misled goal, for sure, but one Barton could understand.

"Trust me…" Clint muttered after several beats. "A dead guy on your lawn would have been the least of your worries…"

This gave Kyla pause. "What do you mean?"

Oh good, she had taken the bait. "I work for an organization. They hire people with extraordinary abilities and together we…"

"Yes?" Kyla said when he paused, mostly for dramatic effect.

"…we save the world." He let this sink in for a couple seconds.

"Why are you telling me this, Hawkeye?" She asked, reminding Clint that she didn't know his real name.

"Because I think you have a secret, Kyla. And I think we could use you."

"We?"

"We're called the Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement and Logistics Division…SHIELD."

Barton had expected pretty much anything. She could have been surprised, scared, intrigued, disbelieving, but the one thing he hadn't counted on was anger.

"Get the hell out of my house!" She yelled at him, standing up and pointing to the door. "SHILED is the reason I live in this piece of garbage of a home. You ruined my life! I had a job, I had money, and I had a future!"

Clint propped himself up on his shoulders and shook his head in confusion.

"What are you talking about? SHIELD never…oh…" He drifted off, suddenly remembering something he had been told, well over a year ago… "You're…You're Kyla Amano."

"I told you to get out." She hissed venomously. Was it just him, or did her eyes seem to glow when she was angry?

"You met Phil Coulson, didn't you?"

She narrowed her eyes at him, but didn't answer.

"Oh Jesus, Kid, we thought you got away. What happened?"

"That's a change. Suddenly your organization, as you put it, wants to help me." She said coldly.

"No…" Clint said, fighting the exhaustion that this conversation was causing him. "I want to help you. Just tell me what happened. This is all a misunderstanding, believe me."

Kyla looked at him with something akin to a fisherman deciding whether or not to release the talking bass. Slowly, hesitantly, she resumed her seat on the floor. She fixed Clint with an unfaltering glare and waited.

"Right…" He began, wondering where the best place to start was. "So, SHIELD sometimes sends agents out on missions to make contact with possible recruits. Usually they're age 18 or older, but with you living alone we figured that it didn't really matter how old you were, at least at the time. Coulson was sent out to meet you. We had intel that you'd be in the backstreets, and that you have an…ability…that might apply well to surveillance and covert operations. We were…" He shook his head, wondering why they had just wiped this under the rug. "…we were trying to recruit you Kyla, for something called the Avengers Initiative. It's a group of people with special abilities that protect the world, just like I said. We thought you had knocked out Coulson and chucked him out a window…but personally I don't think that's the case. What really happened?"

The look Kyla shot him could have burned through a bank vault, and for a second Clint was sure she was going to suffocate him with a pillow.

"I saved him. I knocked him out, felt bad, and tried to take him out the window." She said, matter-of-factly. "A man named Rahul Texanto and his gang of over-intense drug dealers nearly caught us, but I dropped Coulson into a dumpster and they seemed to be happy with just me as prisoner."

Barton nodded in silent understanding. There was one thing that was still bugging him…

"Coulson told us about the incident. He didn't remember much after you hit him, but he said something about you climbing a wall."

"Lots of people can climb walls."

"…with your bare hands…"

"I don't like gloves."

"…like a spider."

"Yeah, I do that."

They lapsed into an awkward silence. Clint wanted to twiddle his thumbs but found that doing so hurt more than the mute tension between them.

"Do you have a…gift?" Kyla asked him suddenly. Barton shook him head.

"No…just a high skillset."

"Does that skillset have something to do with the bow?"

"Ish…"

Kyla smiled, making Clint more nervous than her glare had.

"I'm in."

"What?"

"I said I'm in. I want to be a part of this."

Clint opened his mouth to speak, but honestly had nothing to say to that. Was this kid bipolar or something?

"Well, you were going to recruit me anyway right? So what's the problem?" She looked at him with anxious eyes and Clint could tell that she wouldn't take no for an answer. It wasn't really his call, but what the hell; she seemed to know what she was doing.

"No problem at all." He winced as he offered his hand. "Welcome aboard agent Amano." She shook his hand, smiling apologetically as he gasped in pain moving his dislocated arm.

"Thank you Hawkeye. Oh, and seeing as we're co-workers now, can you tell me your real name?"

Clint hesitated before answering, "Clint. Clint Barton."

"Nice to meet you Clint Barton."