Just a quick update to keep us rolling - struggling to find the time to write at the moment but I'll update as often as I can! Hope you like it.
It was two days before his ability to move on the injured leg began to improve. Natasha watched over him carefully, aware that the desire to see her get closure would push him to work the leg too hard before it was ready. They worked together on stretching out the muscles, maintaining the strength and flexibility that he was used to without causing any further damage. Though she would never admit it, she found herself benefiting from the respite too. Her sleep didn't improve much but just having some downtime and eating well gave her body a chance to throw off the exhaustion that had built since they had taken on Anders.
The execution had made the local news, reporters flocking to the scene of the 'grisly murder' and speculating on crime statistics in the big city. It galled her somewhat to see the man who had tortured her being portrayed as a victim but she was more concerned about what the news coverage would provide the surviving men with. The reports had also got her some grief from Hill who was not impressed that they'd made such a bold statement when they killed Anders or that they hadn't taken steps to conceal their work. As far as Natasha was concerned the woman should be happy that she hadn't displayed the body publicly or left a very obvious calling card on the corpse, they had been remarkably subtle in leaving the body in a condition where it could be mistaken for a victim of random crime.
Four days after she had forced him to rest the leg, they agreed that it was time for them to move on out into the desert. They spent the day planning, curled up side by side with maps laid out before them on the mattress, and preparing for the ride out into the desert. She woke from a brief nap in the early evening to find her partner, suited up and ready to go, bow strapped to his back as he paced around the room, limp barely affecting his stride. He looked powerful, determined, and it was like hundreds of other missions that they had completed together, so familiar that the simple sight of him felt like home and family and everything that made her feel safe and secure.
Natasha took her time dressing, checking every weapon to make sure that it was functioning correctly. She cleaned her guns, checked the mechanism on each of her folding knives, tested the power to her Widows Bite bracelets and forced all thoughts that weren't directly related to killing Brady and Sawyer out of her head. Tonight was a night for killing, not for mulling over the ever shifting tides of her emotions.
Following the plan they acquired a car on the outskirts of town and drove out into the desert, driving the last few miles before they abandoned the vehicle with the lights out. They hiked the last mile or so to their destination in silence, Natasha keeping watch on Clint's injured leg for signs of strain and finding none. There wasn't any need for words, they were more than able to communicate with one another without opening their mouths, and there was nothing that either of them could say that would make them feel better about what they were potentially about to walk into. With every step she took, Natasha felt the chill that had started to settle in the centre of her chest spread a little further through her body and limbs. She had no wish to step back into that compound with its subterranean tunnels and its remembered horrors. She had to go back there to prove to herself that she could and she had an urge just to burn it to the ground.
The complex smelled the same as she remembered, stale air and hot metal, as they moved through the upper rooms of the old warehouse toward the hidden stairway at the back of the complex. The only thing missing was the heavy metallic smell of spilled blood. Natasha didn't need to smell it on the air, her subconscious was doing a fantastic job of filling in the gaps for her, forcing her to divert some of her attention towards locking down the memories and the impotent urge to vomit. She hadn't eaten a thing all day and now she was glad that her appetite had deserted her once again.
At the foot of the stairs, Clint paused, signalling for her to stop, eyes scanning the dimly lit hallway as if searching for any sign that their presence had been detected. She didn't see a need for such caution; their presence was expected. When he was confident that nothing was coming directly at them, he moved aside to let her move up to his side. They had both been there before, Natasha's memories of the place permanently stained with the blood that she had spilled somewhere in this warren of former mining tunnels, Clint's memories probably clearer than her own but no less horrific. His eyes asked the question that he wouldn't voice aloud and she nodded, yes she was okay. Without words they moved forward, weapons raised, bodies turned outward as they moved, sweeping the shadowed doorways for signs of threat.
Clearing the first seven rooms told her exactly where Sawyer and Brady would be hiding. There was no way, given the number of security cameras that they had passed under, that they didn't know who had infiltrated their base. They were waiting for her in the last place that she wanted to go and Natasha was going to have to face her nightmares head on.
The room appeared empty when she peered through the doorway, illuminated by the screens of a dozen black and white computer monitors which seemed to display the hallway security footage. Metal glinted almost everywhere she looked. She suppressed a shudder, working up the nerve to step over the threshold and put herself back in the space where she had been victimised, the only thing that would make it tolerable this time was the knowledge that she was putting herself in that space and that when she left the men who had harmed her would be dead. Gunfire lit up the hallway behind them, and they dropped low to avoid any rounds that had ricocheted off the walls.
"Move!" Clint yelled, forcing her through the doorway and into the room. Natasha followed his instructions without question, turning to cover him just as the metallic door slammed shut, closing them off from one another. Launching herself at the door, she screamed his name, impotent rage and something close to panic momentarily suspending her ability to think rationally. Clint was on the other side of that door, caught amid the gunfire and she couldn't protect him.
The gunfire died. Booted footsteps echoed on the other side of the door. Silence.
"Barton?" she screamed, trying in vain to release the locking mechanism that had triggered when the door closed. "Hawkeye!"
For the first time since she had escaped from the room she now stood in, he didn't respond when she called for him.