Not a prompt, I just wrote a thing.
Lola
"Greenscreen," Hunter proclaimed in an obnoxious sing-song voice.
"No way," Trip shot back. "That's raw footage from a camera on Third. Tell him, Skye."
"We're not even supposed to be looking at this. I'm not tearing the file apart to see if it's been edited."
"I've got clearance. Hack away, I'll take the heat if we get caught."
"I like you, Barton."
"That asshole needs to be proved wrong." Natasha glanced over her shoulder to find Clint jabbing his finger at Hunter across the table. "Greenscreen my ass. That's Captain America and Black Widow."
"That's an impossible jump!"
"I was there. It happened. Fuck's sake."
"Really? Because according to the files, you were busy trying to drop Fury's Helicarrier in the middle of the Atlantic."
Natasha reflexively tightened her fingers around the gun in her hand a half-second before the group behind her exploded. Three chairs scraped back, two falling with a bang to the floor. Trip's admonishment of 'Easy, guys!' was lost under a squeal from Jemma and swearing from Skye as she clutched her laptop protectively against her chest.
"Hey!" May shouted, forceful and authoritative. "Don't make me come back there."
Clint and Trip lifted themselves off the table and Hunter pushed off from the wall where he'd hastily retreated, picking up his chair. Skye returned her laptop to the table with a scowl.
Natasha caught Clint's attention and lifted an eyebrow.
Was that necessary, Barton?
He shrugged in response and slammed his chair back on four legs.
Hunter started it.
"I am so tired of their pissing contest," May mumbled, and shoved the clip back into her gun with a little more force than necessary. "Did either of you do anything?"
"I divorced them both," Bobbi offered. "But you'd think that would count as common ground."
"I think it's principle. They feel like they should be enemies, so they are."
It was strange, because Hunter struck her as exactly the type of guy who should be Clint's new best-friend-slash-drinking-buddy. So far, all they'd accomplished was a series of progressively more ridiculous arguments. They'd done the classic football vs. soccer debate, they'd destroyed the firing range with the guns vs. arrows argument, and Clint topped it off by accusing Hunter of having a 'stupid pansy accent'. Which had hurt Jemma's feelings, and Natasha had to drag him to the lab to apologize, and this was exactly why Strike Team Delta worked alone.
She finished cleaning and reassembling her guns, trying to ignore the uncomfortable prickling sensation along the back of her neck. They were still stuck on the footage of her and Steve, talking about her, shooting little glances across the room to the gun-cleaning party.
She longed to ask May to go break it up, but Morse was sat beside her cleaning her own guns, and it seemed like a weakness to let on how twitchy the attention made her feel. Coulson was somewhere on base; maybe he'd wander into the common area and save her.
"The mental calculations," Jemma was saying, awe behind her tone. "The physics involved. It is a rather impressive jump."
"It's staged," Hunter insisted. Clint growled. "Make your girlfriend prove it, then."
She bristled at that. May's eyebrows shot up across from her.
"Enough of this shit," Clint declared. She heard his chair scrape back. "Meet us on the Bus."
She turned her head just enough to get the group in her peripheral vision. They were all rising from the table, Clint stalking away in the lead.
"Natasha," he barked on his way out. She gathered her guns and spare clips and followed him.
She wouldn't ordinarily jump just because Clint demanded it, but Hunter had begun to grate on her nerves a little, too. Nobody had ever suggested the Black Widow should prove her skills before.
They reconvened in the cargo hold of the Bus a half-hour later, Natasha in her catsuit and Clint in his tac gear.
"This is a terrible idea," Fitz called, voice muffled by the reinforced glass of the lab doors. "I'm not involved in this, for the record. I'm doing science."
Jemma sighed fondly and shook her head before turning to Natasha.
"If you gave me the afternoon, I could calculate the approximate speed and velocity of the alien vehicle. We could rig a zip line for you to grab after Agent Barton throws you, so it would be authentic."
"Let's not," she replied. She was doubtful that Clint could get her very far off the ground. "I don't think this is going to turn out anything like the New York footage."
Clint seized her wrist and dragged her to the middle of the hold, then turned to address their assembled teammates.
"Okay, I'll be Cap. This is my shield." He held up a rectangular lid from one of the smaller shipping containers. "There's your burned-out husk of a car."
He gestured to the shiny red convertible a few feet away. Her stomach clenched uncomfortably.
"Trip's going to throw his football from the top of the stairs, and she's going to catch it. That's the closest we could get to an alien motorcycle on short notice." He turned to Natasha. "Show me where to stand, then jump."
"This is a really shitty idea, Barton," she whispered as she positioned him in relation to the car. Doing pretend science with Fitz definitely sounded like the better option. Less likely to get disemboweled that way.
"Just do it. I'm trying to protect your honor."
She snorted with derision.
"You know what Coulson's going to do if he sees this? He'll deport me, straight back to Russia. I'm sure the KGB will be delighted to see me again."
"You're being dramatic."
"It's not going to be your boot print on Lola's hood."
"Trip can buff it out. Go."
He gave her a shove toward the car. She was tired of Hunter running his mouth, even if most of it was provoked by her partner, and Coulson had been tied up in his office all morning. It was unlikely he'd show up in the ten seconds it'd take for her to reenact the shield jump.
She bounced on her toes a few times. Clint took up a defensive stance and braced the plastic lid against his arm.
She ran three long strides and vaulted off the hood of Coulson's Corvette.
"ROMANOFF!"
The strangled, slightly hysterical shout startled her. She had a quick glimpse of Coulson striding into the hold before Clint thrust the shipping container lid up to meet her. The toe of her boot slipped on the plastic and he cracked her in the knee instead; she fell against the makeshift shield and threw Clint off balance. Her momentum paired with his threw her into an ungraceful flip, and while Clint fell hard on his side she rolled and slammed into the wall of the cargo hold. Trip's football made a sad, hollow echo as it bounced down the cargo ramp and into the hangar.
She heard a faint 'Oh, shit...' from Hunter, a cough that may have been a laugh from Trip, and an exasperated groaning noise from May. Then...
"IT IS NEVER OKAY TO STAND ON LOLA!"
Natasha winced and played dead. Maybe Coulson would buy it.
"Disciplinary write-ups! All of you! Even you, May!"
"I was doing science!" Fitz protested.
"Get up," Coulson snarled, and Natasha opened her eyes. He reached down and hauled her up by the back of her catsuit. She limped along beside him, pain lancing through her knee, as he collected Clint as well and marched them down the cargo ramp.
"You know," Skye began pensively from somewhere behind them, "The Cavalry lived up to the hype, but Strike Team Delta leaves something to be desired."