Chapter 8.
Clint had to leave the lab when Jemma and Fitz started finishing each other's sentences. He found it unbearably sexy listening to Jemma talk science, but he was also jealous of her closeness with Fitz, even though she'd described the young engineer as like a brother to her, it was clear she was deeply fond of him. He left them figuring out how to turn arrows into ICER rounds and went looking for May. She was still in the cockpit, preparing to turn the plane over to autopilot.
"Want me to stay here and fly while you brief your team?" Clint had been briefed on where they were headed today, but he knew the rest of them hadn't.
"You leave my Bus alone," May grinned at him, gesturing him out of the cockpit, and he shoulder-checked her lightly as they headed for the command centre. Skye was already there, playing with the Bus's supercomputer. Clint scanned briefly over what she was doing and nodded. Skye looked at him with narrowed eyes and cocked head, and he grinned at her. She'd find out he was a hacker almost her equal soon enough. They might even trade some secrets.
"Briefing time," May paged FitzSimmons, and they arrived within a couple of minutes, still arguing in low voices, though they went silent as they entered the room.
"So where are we headed…" for an instant Clint thought Skye was going to call May Cav, but she wised up and went with "AM?"
"New Mexico." May pulled up an image on the screen. "We're to collect Dr. Foster, her assistant and her scientific equipment, transfer them to New York and escort Dr. Foster to Avengers Tower personally."
"Dr. Foster – Jane Foster? The astrophysicist who defined the Einstein-Rosen Bridge Equations?" That was Jemma.
"She's amazing," from Fitz with a dreamy sigh. "Brilliant and beautiful."
"And Thor's girlfriend." Skye, of course, grinning to herself. "Is Thor around?"
May gestured at Clint to speak, and he nodded. She wasn't exactly a big talker at the best of times, and he was happy to take over the briefing. "No. Which is where we come in. Thor's busy at the moment and he wants a safe escort for Dr. Foster. Her experiments in both London and New Mexico have wrapped up and she's going to be working at the Avengers Tower labs in the future. For obvious reasons," Clint grinned, "Thor trusts this team to get the job done."
Skye snorted to herself. Fitz was clutching his hands to his chest, looking dreamy-eyed. Jemma stood quietly, refusing to meet Clint's eye. May was eyeing Jemma too, and when Clint turned his head, May gave him a cocked eyebrow. He looked away, not really wanting to admit that he'd already seduced the young scientist. Somehow he didn't really think May had that in mind when she'd offered him a chance to get to know Jemma without anyone else in the way.
"It's not a long trip, and we are able to land the Bus literally alongside Dr. Foster's lab as it's on the outskirts of town," Clint said finally, pulling up some photo images. "We'll spend the night on the ground in Puente Antiguo and depart tomorrow. Dr. Foster and her assistant Miss Lewis are supposed to have all their equipment packed. I can tell you for certain this will not have happened as Foster is one of the world's least organised people, so Fitz and Simmons, you'll almost certainly be required to help pack up and transport some sensitive scientific equipment. Skye, you'll be needed for computer support. I'll want you to keep an accurate inventory, including photographic records of what was packed where. I know from experience that Dr. Foster is very difficult to deal with if any of her equipment is misplaced."
All three of them nodded and murmured "Yes, Agent Barton."
"We're leaving at noon tomorrow," May said, "so it could be a long night. Get some rest on the flight down. That means you, FitzSimmons. Agent Barton's ICER arrows can wait a day or two. Don't make me lock you out of the lab again. And Skye? Leave your laptop here."
"Yes, Agent May," the three junior agents chorused.
"Now," May said when nobody moved, and the three all twitched and hurried out. Clint relieved Skye of her phone as she passed him, getting a nasty look in return. He smiled at her and put it down on her laptop.
"Agent Barton," May said coolly as he turned to follow them out, "a word in my office?"
Damn it, Melinda knew him too well. He followed her up the spiral stairs and sat down comfortably in the chair opposite the desk, leaning back and putting his feet on the desk. She gave him stink eye and he shrugged and dropped his boots back to the floor. "Wassup, Cav?"
"Have you and Simmons had sex already?"
Well, she always did come straight to the point. "Yup."
"Clint…"
"Mutually willingly, I assure you," he smiled at the memory. "I gave her plenty of opportunities to turn me down."
"And now she's too embarrassed to even look you in the eye. She's shy, Clint. You've pushed her too fast." May sounded distinctly disapproving.
"She has hidden depths." Clint sat forward and looked hard at May. "You and Ward, and Coulson, coddled all three of your junior agents. I know Phil thinks of them as his kids, which is all well and good because loving your team translates to looking out for their best interests, but let's get real. Skye hasn't been encouraged to push her hacking training any further than she already has on her own, and you and I both know there are many, many S.H.I.E.L.D. tricks that would help take her skills to the next level. Her physical training is coming along well, I'll grant you and Ward did a fair job there, but I can't believe Phil and you didn't force Fitz and Jemma into better physical training as well. Jemma couldn't punch her way out of a paper bag, and Fitz – well, the less said about his combat instincts the better. Has he taken a PT class of any kind since graduating the Academy?"
May sat down behind the desk with her mouth open, for once caught by surprise. "Fuck, Clint," she said after a moment. "You're not pulling punches, are you?"
"You and I both know what Coulson has planned for Simmons. And even setting personal feelings aside, there is no way I am letting her go in as a HYDRA plant without significantly better self-defence skills. And Fitz's sense of self-worth is completely shot. He's not going to get better hiding in the lab like he's always done. He needs to build himself up physically. The mental courage will come once the physical skills to back it up are in place."
May nodded slowly, unable to disagree with his assessment of either of the two scientists. "Skye's only Level One, though," she pointed out.
"And she hasn't even been given access to S.H.I.E.L.D.'s Level One hacking programs! How the hell does Coulson expect her to become our top hacker – and I know that's what he expects – if he won't even give her the basic tools to do her job?"
"Ah, shit," May shut her eyes in disgust. She'd pulled Clint up here to ream him out, and instead he'd pointed out serious shortcomings in a team he'd walked into only a few hours ago. Shortcomings she should have addressed months ago, even before it became her command. "You should be in this seat, not me."
"We both know why I'm not. Coulson intends this to be your billet. I'm his troubleshooter. We're rebuilding S.H.I.E.L.D. from the core out, and right now, this is the core. I'm just here to make sure it's not a weak foundation."
"You're higher-ranked than me." May didn't want to acknowledge his words. Didn't want to believe that Coulson put that much faith in her. She was one of very few people who knew that Clint had been up for Level Nine – had been offered the Deputy Director job and turned it down, saying Maria Hill was a better fit because Clint didn't kiss ass well enough. He'd been Level Eight for several years, dropped back to Six after New York, and was back up to Eight again. He was certainly senior in the agency to May, who'd only just been promoted to Level Eight.
"I've got no problems taking mission orders from you, Cav. Never have had. And we both know that if you hadn't chosen to back out of field work after Bahrain and spend five years rotting in Admin, you'd be Deputy Director right now instead of Natasha, not Coulson's roving firefighter."
"Fuck you!"
"Lie to yourself all you like, but you can't lie to me."
"Get out of my office, Barton."
"Yes, ma'am," he stood and saluted deliberately. "I respectfully request you take into consideration the points I brought up regarding the team? Or I can put it in my report."
"We'll start PT with Simmons and Fitz once we've dropped Foster in New York," May said with a sigh. He was right and she knew it. "And you can give Skye access to whatever programs you think appropriate. Up to Level Five, on my authority."
"Yes, ma'am."
"Oh, stop it Clint. You're the only person I know who can sound so fucking rude when you're saying such respectful words."
He grinned cheekily on his way out the door. "You know it, Cav."
May sighed and made her way back to the cockpit. She needed to think. She'd been sitting staring out into the sky for almost half an hour before she realised he'd so successfully distracted her that she'd forgotten to tell Clint to give Simmons some space for a while.
"That sneaky bastard!"
So now we know where they're going and why Clint is on the Bus. Next chapter we get to see Jane and Darcy again…
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