Disclaimer: I do not own "The Avengers" or any of the characters affiliated with them. If I did, there would totally be a Hawkeye/Black Widow movie in the works. I do not claim any of the directly quoted lines from "The Avengers" as my own, they belong to Marvel and the writers. The cover art came from a google search with the original source being pinterest where it was credited to Anthony Genuardi.
Author's Note: While I embrace constructive criticism, remember this old saying if you choose to leave a review "If you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all"
Special thanks to all who reviewed Chapter Five: Well done you, GremlinX, truefairytales, Awesomesauceamy, CyanB, LostHawk, ladybug114, Batghost, faithfreedom, R1dDL3M37h15, BatmanOtaku, Cello06, jaguarspot, NCISJunkie14, ELOSHAZZY, Alice of Scots, weemcg33, JRBarton, thababes, yevguine, BooksAreMedicine, Lollypops101, RAGAnne, Wolfsdrache, Kirstiej104, animexluva13, Sara, Tchoupagris, Natalia Grayson, discordchick, Sandy-wmd, bookworm1517, Kait-WIN3, Rogueroza, Arlothia, ILuvClintasha, GreenLoki, Hawksicle, Zoeff, darkdestiney2000
Shout out to those that have guessed the song inspiration for the chapter titles:Kirstiej104
You can guess the song up until I tell you what it is in the final chapter!
Continued thanks to my wonderful betas Kylen and JRBarton for their amazingness.
to Well done you: how did I find my betas? Fate. Destiny. Luck. Lol. Wow its been years now since Kylen and I started working together, she found me, honestly. She offered assistance in the beta'ing and I gratefully accepted. The rest is history. After that, JRBarton and her great attention to timeline detail got her HER spot on the team. And my newest beta Arlothia got the offer because of her insightfulness and natural understanding of the characters. So, I really got all my beta's from reviews. I didn't really go looking for them, fate just brought us together.
to Cello06: at this point I'd take whatever they'll give me in Clintasha. I actually think a Netflix series would better serve their characters than a movie, as you said you can get WAY deeper into a character over several episodes than you can in a 2 hour movie.
to yevguine: you haven't missed anything. It just takes a while to get used to the name change for Dan after years of calling him Barton :)
to BooksAreMedicine: yes, I full intend to flesh out Natasha bonding with the team, the team's perception of Clint and their actual coming together more as a team, and Clint himself in all of that in the rewrite. :) And believe it or not, I've loosely discussed doing a prequel story of Dan, Todd, and Phil's early friendship days with my betas lol we'll see.
to ILuvClintasha: to the best of my knowledge, the Phil and Clint bromance is strictly headcanon on my part. I don't think its a thing anywhere, but I may be wrong I've only read Fraction's "Hawkeye" comic so i don't really know what else is out there.
to Zoeff: everything you said is exactly why I want to do a rewrite :) Being my first story, it, and a couple others, need to be brought more firmly into the VPU. :)
Onward!
Last time in The Untold Stories:
He'd said what needed to be said. Words he hoped would help Clint move past the devastation. Words he hoped would make Clint's world start spinning again like Clint's words in Cairo had done for him.
He is a weapon, a killer. Do not forget it. You can use a spear as a walking stick, but that will not change its nature.
Madeline Miller
April 13, 2012 (April 12, 2012 NYC)
12:15 a.m. Local Time (6:15 pm NYC)
Helicarrier deck
Natasha breathed out a sigh to encompass the relief that filled her as the jet finally taxied to a stop in the appropriate docking station on the Helicarrier deck. Even as the ramp lowered, she was moving swiftly and efficiently through her co-pilot post-flight responsibilities. The flight log – arguably one of her least favorite things about piloting because honestly, the damn things had GPS and SHIELD knew exactly where their jet had been the entire time they were gone – was shoved at the pilot and then she was standing from her seat and heading towards the ramp.
The men had already shuffled Loki off the jet – Thor on one side, Cap on the other and Stark leading the way. Phil, Fury and a tac-team's worth of armed agents had arrived to meet them. But by the time she made it to the group, Fury was leading Cap, Thor and Loki away, the tac-team forming a tight circle around them. Stark was wandering off on his own, no doubt to find a place to shed his armor. Phil turned to her and smiled wearily in greeting.
For a long moment they just stared at each other, each reading what they could from the other. In the end, they were both worried and doing their best to keep moving forward. It was the best that could be expected from either of them, she supposed.
Finally, Phil nodded in the direction of the door that would take them inside. She fell into step with him and wasn't all that surprised that when he spoke, his words were bleeding sincerity.
"How are you?"
"I'm fine." It was an automatic, instinctive reply. It was one that she had grown to treat as a blaring siren of warning when Clint was the one saying it. 'I'm fine' coming from him usually meant the opposite was most assuredly true. He would say he was 'fine' while secretly harboring a nasty, heavily bleeding knife wound he would then try to treat himself – she'd learned that specific lesson in Brazil on their first mission together. He would say he was 'fine' when he was internally torturing himself over something he deemed as a personal failure. He would say he was 'fine' when he was trying to convince himself of that fact even when all evidence pointed to the opposite.
She'd learned never to believe him when he claimed to be 'fine.' Because whether he was lying intentionally, or honestly thought he was, or was saying it because he couldn't afford not to be, 'fine' never meant anything good with him.
Unsurprisingly, Phil had learned that lesson too.
"You know, whenever Clint says that to me, it's how I know everything is about to go to hell." He cast her a sidelong look. "I've come to learn the same applies to you in most circumstances."
She paused, her lack of motion causing Phil to stop too and turn to face her. She met his gaze seriously.
"I'm fine," she stated again, more convincingly this time, but then belied it by adding more quietly, "I have to be."
Phil's gaze softened in understanding. Now wasn't the time for heartfelt confessions or putting voice to all of their growing concerns for their missing archer. Maybe there would be time later, maybe there wouldn't. But there wasn't time now.
"Then I'm fine, too."
They were a couple of liars, the both of them.
"I saw Stark wander off." She needed to refocus. To stay zeroed in on her target, which at the moment was figuring out Loki's angle and keeping the combustible personalities that were now on board from combusting. "I give him less than 10 minutes before he's hacking the system."
Phil watched her closely for a long moment. He was so used to diversionary tactics from Clint, that she knew she'd had little hope of getting it past him. He allowed it though.
"I'll find Stark. The Director is going to have a talk with our newest carrier guest. You can watch from the main conference area."
The assassin and spy part of her – which was, in all honesty, the biggest part of who she was – wanted to hear that talk, wanted to analyze the shit out of it and figure out how to take Loki apart. But the part of her that couldn't seem to avoid thinking about her missing partner – like that term could ever really describe what Clint was to her – for more than a few minutes at a time wanted to go hit something.
The assassin and spy part won out. Loki knew where Clint was. She didn't want to miss a word the bastard uttered.
"Get a read on him." Phil surprised her by going on. "We may need use of your interrogation skills."
She arched an eyebrow, wondering what Hill had had to say about that suggestion. She tended to frown on Natasha and Clint's less-than-professional partnership. She could almost hear the Deputy Director now,
"Given the nature of Agent Romanoff and Agent Barton's 'partnership', are we sure she's in the best state of mind to conduct an interrogation of the prisoner?"
Natasha respected Hill, she did – her sometimes too-lingering looks at Clint when he was strutting around with bare biceps and sometimes barer abs notwithstanding. The woman was as professional as the day was long and she had a cool, level head on her shoulders. She called a spade a spade – not unlike Clint in that respect – and she made an excellent member of the chain of command.
But she'd also never had a problem playing devil's advocate. And while Natasha could also respect that most of the time, when it came to questioning her skills or that of her time-proven partner, she was less than impressed. And Hill tended to question them both…often.
It was her job, though, so despite it all, Natasha usually let it go. It helped that the woman also took no issue with questioning Fury himself.
Phil was waiting for a response, so she nodded. He gave her one last long, searching look and then reached to squeeze her shoulder. She didn't know if it was the action itself, or if Phil could just squeeze shoulders better than anyone else in the world, but she felt inexplicably better, more centered, more focused. He'd leveled her axis – thrown into disarray with three words 'Barton's been compromised' – in a way that she hadn't been able to manage on her own.
She granted him a slight quirk of her lips and a sincere look of thanks and then they parted ways – him to search out the wayward billionaire who tended to be a permanent thorn in SHIELD's collective side, and her into the bowels of the carrier, aiming for the main conference area.
April 13, 2012 (April 12, 2012 NYC)
12:40 a.m. (6:40 pm NYC)
Helicarrier main conference area
Natasha sat quietly and listened to the others discuss Loki and theorize about his plans. Loki's bravado was going to be her ticket in. He liked to talk and he liked to talk big. She'd dealt with marks like him before. They liked to feel powerful, and to lord that power over anyone and everyone.
She'd just have to give Loki an opportunity to feel like he had some sort of power over her.
It shouldn't be hard.
If his little magic stick was as powerful as it seemed to be – and with it being able to take control of someone as stubborn and strong as Clint it had to be pretty powerful – she didn't doubt that he'd used it to gain information on all of them.
He'd already proven he knew about Banner and he'd known about Steve back in Stuttgart. It was wise, now, to assume he knew about all of them.
Which meant he probably knew what Clint was to her and what she was to him.
He'd use that knowledge as a weapon, she'd have to do the same.
"Selvig?"
Thor's confused concern drew her attention. Banner mistook the confusion for lack of knowledge.
"He's an astrophysicist."
"He's a friend," Thor corrected firmly, fresh worry in his eyes.
She supposed nobody had been given a chance to fill him in.
"Loki has them under some kind of spell," she offered by way of explanation. "Along with one of ours," she added more quietly.
"I wanna know why Loki let us take him," Rogers asserted curiously. "He's not leading an army from here."
The Captain had a point. It was something Natasha had been puzzling over ever since Stuttgart. Either Loki was incredibly smart and this was all part of some elaborate plan – which would be her guess – or he was incredibly stupid.
"I don't think we should be focusing on Loki. That guy's brain is a bag full of cats. You can smell crazy on him."
Natasha resisted the urge to sigh. Banner wasn't looking beyond the surface – beyond the 'crazy'. Plenty of crazy men had caused more than their fair share of destruction and chaos.
"Have care how you speak. Loki is beyond reason, but he is of Asgard, and he is my brother."
Natasha fixed the god with an arched eyebrow look.
"He's killed eighty people in two days."
Thor's expression turned rueful and he shrugged slightly.
"He's adopted?"
Natasha was beyond appreciating the humor.
Banner was the one that got them back on track.
"I think it's about the mechanics." He shifted, hands fiddling together restlessly. "Iridium, what do they need iridium for?"
"It's a stabilizing agent." Stark's arrival, alongside Phil, drew all their attention. He leaned closer to Phil and continued in a conspiratorial whisper, "I'm saying, take a weekend. I'll fly you to Portland." Phil studiously ignored him and moved away even as Stark added a little louder, "Keep love alive."
Natasha shook her head slightly as Phil peeled away from Stark and came to stand near her. She met his eyes and he gave her a slight nod. Apparently talk of his 'cellist' in 'Portland' hadn't ruffled his feathers too badly.
She wasn't all that surprised that Stark knew about Celine. Pepper knew, and Stark knowing was a logical progression from that. She also wasn't surprised he only knew the civilian cover for Phil's former girlfriend, who happened to be the base director of the Paris SHIELD compound. They'd met years ago on the exact mission in Paris where Natasha had ultimately met Clint. She wasn't exactly clear on when Phil and Celine had started something up, but they had. And apparently, Pepper Potts had stumbled on the two of them having lunch one day while Celine was visiting the city. All curious and sweet, Potts wasn't someone you could easily dissuade once she gained interest. Phil had finally put the questions to rest by claiming Celine was a 'cellist' from 'Portland' who traveled often so 'no' Pepper wouldn't likely be seeing more of her.
Clint had found great amusement in the whole thing when Phil had filled them in later.
Clint had been less amused when Phil and Celine had eventually called it quits. Distance was where the blame had fallen, but Natasha hadn't bought it. Neither had Clint. The look in Phil's eyes when he told them, and the hooded glance he slipped towards Clint while he explained had told them everything they needed to know.
Celine didn't like coming in second. And Phil had always made it abundantly clear that Clint would always be his number one priority.
Clint had taken it pretty hard, had even talked about going to Paris to 'set the bitch straight' – he'd been pretty angry on Phil's behalf at the time – but Natasha had talked him out of it. in his current state, he'd likely have made it worse.
He had tried to talk to Phil though. He hadn't given her a chance to talk him out of that one. She didn't know what had been said behind those closed doors, but Clint had been fairly annoyed with Phil for a few days following, so she guessed it hadn't gone the way the archer had hoped.
"…And I'm a huge fan of the way you lose control and turn into an enormous green rage monster."
Natasha rolled her eyes. Clint would get a kick out of Stark. They both shared a tendency towards inappropriate humor. With Clint, she tolerated it, found it endearing even. Stark, well…wasn't Clint.
Banner apparently didn't know how to respond.
"…Thanks."
Fury blew in then, with all the subtly of a freight train.
"Doctor Banner is only here to track the cube. I was hoping you might join him."
Natasha narrowed her gaze. Fury was awfully adamant about Banner only being here for scientific purposes, considering he had a Hulk-sized cell on board. And she'd never known Fury to lay all his cards on the table from the get go.
No one else seemed as suspicious though, at least not Rogers, who appeared to hand out trust like it was candy. But compared to someone like her, she supposed most people appeared that way.
"I'd start with that stick of his. It may be magical but it works an awful lot like a Hydra weapon," Rogers suggested.
"I don't know about that, but it is powered by the cube. And I'd like to know how Loki used it to turn two of the sharpest men I know into his personal flying monkeys," Fury replied.
Natasha barely held back a flinch. She hadn't been ready for that, for Fury to bring up Clint's current state so bluntly.
"Monkeys?" Thor frowned. "I do not understand…"
"I do!" Rogers snapped and pointed at Fury. Everyone stared at him for the enthusiastic interruption. Rogers sat back, looking suddenly sheepish. "I…I understood that reference."
Natasha bit back a grin. She supposed if she had spent 70 years in what equated to hibernation, she'd feel triumphant for understanding culture references as well. Though, she supposed she'd felt about the same when she'd finally started to be able to distinguish an American idiom from a literal statement.
"Shall we play, Doctor?" Stark blew past the awkward silence and refocused on his new playmate.
"This way, sir." Banner played along and together the two left the bridge.
Natasha glanced around, watching Rogers stand and move to investigate one of the many computers on the bridge. He was obviously still intrigued by all the technological advances since his time. Who could blame him?
Thor had shifted, quietly asking a tech to show him Loki once again, and now stood in silent contemplation as he studied his betraying brother.
Natasha frowned, recognizing the expression in Thor's eyes. She'd seen it before after all, every time Clint talked about his own betraying brother.
She glanced at Phil, wondering if he'd drawn the same correlation, but her handler was deep in conversation with Fury and Hill.
Natasha blew out a breath, a wave of frustration rolling through her. There was nothing to do but wait. They'd send her to talk to Loki eventually, but not yet. Not so close on the heels of his talk with Fury. They'd want to let him stew. Then they'd probably want to try the easy way by sending in Thor first.
Normally she was a very patient person; one had to be when you spent so much time with someone like Clint Barton. Clint embodied controlled energy. He was almost constantly moving. It was a balance, she supposed, for when his job as a sniper required him to be absolutely still for hours at a time. His body made up for it by constantly expending energy throughout the day. It was never something simple like tapping a pen during a brief. No, that would have been far too normal.
It was always something ridiculous, like the blue rubber ball. He'd had the damn thing for as long as she could remember. It made appearances on the rare times he got to a briefing or debriefing early. He'd got her in the forehead once and though he'd claimed it was an accident, she knew with certainty that Clint Barton never hit anywhere but where he aimed.
That and his poorly hidden little smirk had been equivalent to an admission to guilt in her book.
The memory of that day and of that smirk made her chest tighten. It brought to mind more memories, of other days and other smirks. And memories of those rare, real, honest-to-God smiles that made it impossible to do anything but smile back. And that special smile, crafted just for her that could turn her to putty in his hands. That expression he would get when he saw her for the first time after a long mission – a look of want, no need, and absolute longing – that invariably had them both heading to whoever's quarters were closer…or whatever empty room they could find first.
And then there was the way he said her name, different ways for different moments, but always with the same weight of something real and tangible. When they were alone, lost in a tangle of sheets and sweat and he gasped it like her name was water and he was dying of thirst.
In the quiet moments after when he said it like a whispered prayer.
"Natasha."
She stood abruptly and headed for the exit.
She ignored Phil's worried call after her and just kept moving. No one tried to stop her, which was just as well. She wasn't sure what she would do if someone had dared to slow her down.
She hadn't really decided where she was going, just away, but wasn't entirely surprised when she looked up and Clint's door was looking back at her. She stared at the markings on it.
R-207
Residence Hall 2, Room 7.
It had been Clint's since the day he'd been officially transferred to the Helicarrier after the attack on the New York base put it out of commission as anything but a training ground for several months.
It was a familiar number, one she'd seen countless times before as she came to or went from Clint's room. She clenched her jaw and placed her hand on the small scanner next to the door. A moment later the screen flashed green and her name lit up the panel.
Clint had paid a tech to hack the lock system two days after he'd been assigned this room to have Natasha's handprint coded to unlock the door as well. Apparently getting up to let her in was just too much of a strain. It had taken her less than 48 hours of having unrestricted access to his room for her to buy him the same access to hers. She was fairly certain Clint had granted Phil the same honor, but he'd never used it when she was around…probably actually because she'd been around.
It had only taken Phil walking in on them once, way back when he'd first found out about them, for him to start knocking anytime they even might have been together.
She sighed and quietly pushed her way inside. Then she turned, closing the door without looking into the room. She leaned forward, resting her forehead on the cool metal.
She debated with herself now, as to what she wanted to do. She could go right back out the door, pretend this hadn't happened and continue to soldier on as the Black Widow was expected to. There was no place for emotion in the spy game, no place for worry or fear. There was just the mission. There was no room for Natasha Romanoff, there was only the Black Widow.
It was appealing. It meant she could go on ignoring everything she was trying not to feel right now.
But Clint had told her once, years ago now, that emotion was part of the job, not independent of it. He hadn't meant that a spy – or assassin as was more often the case with him – should wear their emotions on their sleeve. He kept his own feelings just as closely guarded as she did. He'd meant that they were supposed to feel, to have regrets, to have hope. They weren't robots, even if in the moment, in the midst of a hard kill, it seemed like they were.
So that left her with the other option.
She could turn around. She could see everything about this room that made it Clint's and she could take a minute to embrace her emotions instead of fighting them.
In the end, she figured even the Black Widow could let go of the reins once and a while…and besides, she'd never been the Black Widow when she was in this room. She'd always just been Natasha.
So she turned, but instead of looking around, moved directly over to the small, built-in dresser. She leaned over and pulled open the bottom drawer, hands curling around the soft, worn fabric of his old gray ARMY hoodie.
She brought the sweatshirt to her face, inhaling deeply. It smelled so strongly of Clint it made her eyes sting and her throat tighten – leather, gunpowder and sweat with an undercurrent of something so uniquely Clint that she didn't know how to describe it…it was just him.
She threaded her arms into the sleeves and slid the sweatshirt over her head, pulling it down around her torso. With his scent surrounding her now, she turned to face the room.
He hadn't put his mark in this space as much as he had his quarters on the New York base, but he also hadn't been living here as long…and had fundamentally been opposed to the whole 'Helicarrier' idea to begin with. He claimed it was near impossible to 'settle in' somewhere that was always moving.
She wondered sometimes if it just reminded him too strongly of his days as a nomad with Carson's.
But there were still traces of him scattered throughout the small space. The haphazardly abandoned Nike running shoes half shoved under the bed. The half-empty case of blue Gatorades by the door. The mess of tangled sheets on the narrow bed and the pillow folded in half as if it'd been used to prop his head higher for some reason. The stack of books on the bedside table was messy and barely balanced, held up mostly by its tenuous lean against the lamp. Whatever he'd currently been reading would have been with him in New Mexico, but she'd known him to read two or three books at once, depending on his mood.
There was a small pile of clothes in the corner with a sock sitting a foot away like it hadn't quite made it to the pile and he hadn't bothered to help it on its way. There was a small stack of clean and folded clothes on the corner of the small desk. She knew for a fact that had he been the one to launder them, they would not have been folded. Last she'd heard, he'd bribed a starry-eyed recruit to do it for him.
She moved over to the desk, tracing her fingers across the meticulously arranged arrow heads and fletching tools. Clint may keep most of his room in a state that suggested he was nothing more than a sloppy teenager, but his arrows he always treated with near-obsessive care.
The techs made most of his arrows these days, but he always had a handful of his own in his quiver at any given time. It was a skill and a hobby he wasn't willing to give up.
August 1, 2011
Natasha shivered as the air vent kicked on and blew chilled air across her bare back, pulling her from her sleep. She shifted, expecting to find warmth in Clint's body behind her – the bed was too small to afford either of them any real room to move – but met nothing but open air instead. Fully awake now, she rolled over, pulling the sheet up around her to keep the chill from the vent at bay, and searched for her wayward archer.
He wasn't hard to find. He sat, in nothing but boxers with one foot folded underneath him, at his desk. He was very meticulously filing down the edge of an arrow head, brow furrowed in concentration, but movements sure and efficient.
It was something she'd seen him do before, always with the same precision and ease. He found a certain catharsis in the hobby, she suspected, even if he didn't realize it.
Unwilling to break whatever peace he'd found – and honestly she enjoyed the view – she just watched him for several long, quiet moments. He continued as if he didn't feel her gaze, but she knew he did. They were tuned to each other, had been for a long time now. He'd probably known the exact moment she woke up.
Finally, he paused, carefully inspected the arrow head with first his eyes and then his fingers, before he set it down, perfectly in line with the several others on his desk.
"You gonna stare at me all night?" he asked with a sudden grin as he peeked at her over his shoulder.
"You gonna stay over there all night and leave me to freeze?"
His eyebrow arched and she saw his grin widen.
"Freeze?" he asked doubtfully.
She jerked her chin towards the air vent. He followed the gesture with his eyes and then turned his suddenly impish gaze back to her.
"If you wanted to have your way with me again, all you had to do was say the word."
But even as he teased her, he rose from the desk, turned off the lamp on the corner and moved across the room. He slid back onto the small bed, allowing her to burrow into his chest even as he worked to get the sheet back over both of them.
"Better?" he asked in a low rumble, his chin shifting to rest lightly on top of her hair and one of his arms closing around her, pulling her closer.
She hummed in contentment and let her eyes drift closed again, listening to the slow, steady sounds of his breaths. When she felt sufficiently warmed, she shifted, lifting her head and kissing the underside of his chin. A day's worth of scratchy stubble tickled her nose and she smiled.
"Did you sleep at all?" she asked softly.
He hummed something indiscernible and she felt the vibration of it where she was pressed up against his chest.
"Something on your mind?" she continued quietly.
He hummed something again and shifted, hand drifting slowly up the curve of her spine. She shivered and he chuckled.
"Not feeling very articulate?" she wondered with a grin.
He hummed something that sounded like a negative response and pulled away slightly, nudging her forehead with his nose until she tilted her head back far enough that he could kiss her.
Five years they'd celebrated that night. Five years since he threw caution to the wind and decided she was worth something to the world. Less than that since they'd become partners. And less still since they'd become something more.
As she kissed him now, she knew that this was it. She'd found the one thing that she had once been certain would never be hers.
This is what it meant to feel complete.
Natasha withdrew her fingers from the arrow head, releasing a deep breath to dispel the lingering memory. She turned away from the desk and moved over to the narrow bed, dropping down to sit on it and then laying back to look at the ceiling. How many times had they shared this small space, or the identical bunk back in her room? Clint often postulated that the lack of excess space just made things more interesting.
And she supposed that was a good way to put it. The first time they'd taken one of these things for a 'test drive' – Clint's words, not hers – he'd ended up with a bruised elbow, and a knot on his temple, both from the corner of pesky bedside table. She'd bruised her knee and – to Clint's endless amusement – her ass when they'd gotten a little too acrobatic and she'd ended up on the floor.
Phil hadn't dared ask when he'd seen Clint's bruised temple and her ginger attempts at sitting the next morning.
They'd had to get more creative – and careful – after that to make effective use of the small bunk.
She sighed, glancing over at the leaning tower of books. She slid the top one off the pile and turned it so she could see the cover.
Take a Thief by Mercedes Lackey.
She chewed her lip, recognizing the title. He'd had it for as long as she'd known him and had read it at least half a dozen times that she knew of. He was apparently in the middle of it right now because she could see the very top edge of a bookmark peeking out.
Curious for no other reason than it being in her nature, she opened the book to the marked page and the bookmark went fluttering down to her chest. It looked like a small photo. Very curious now, she draped the book over her abdomen and picked the photo up, turning it over so she could see what it was.
Her throat tightened and her eyes welled when she realized what she was looking at.
It was her. A candid photo, that she only vaguely remembered him sneaking years ago, of her sitting cross legged on his bed back at the New York base. Her hair was still long then and it fell in loose, slightly disheveled waves. She was wearing the same sweatshirt she wore now – though if memory served that was all she was wearing at the time – and was smiling up at him even as she held the pieces to her disassembled Makarov in her hands.
The memory of that moment became clearer now, as she stared at the picture.
He'd just gotten back from South Africa, his mission there having gone completely sideways. She'd taken it upon herself to help him forget everything that had happened – a delicate process considering he'd had a bullet hole in his side. That mission was easily accomplished, though, and they'd spent the remainder of that evening just hanging out in his room. What was an assassin to do with extra time on her hands when her partner wasn't up for repeated physical activity – at least not as 'repeated' as he usually managed?
Clean her weapons, of course. Why he'd snapped a picture of it, was beyond her. She looked a mess in it.
But she remembered it as if it were yesterday now.
He'd been sitting at his desk, stiffly bent over his tools as he methodically fletched an arrow. She'd been looking down at the disassembled gun spread out before her. She'd looked up at a short, low whistle, and found him turned in his chair with his phone angled at her. She'd smiled even as he snapped the picture. The expression that had taken over his face then…
Nothing but complete adoration and contentment.
December 2009
"You're beautiful, you know that?" Clint told her quietly, a soft smile – one meant only for her – curving up the corners of his mouth. He twirled his phone absently in his hand as he stared at her.
"Are you crazy? I'm a mess," she challenged, gesturing at her sex-tousled hair and fading makeup. She was absolutely certain she didn't look anywhere near good enough to warrant a look like that. She was wearing an old ratty sweatshirt for one.
"You don't even see it, do you?" he replied seriously.
She arched an eyebrow curiously and his smile, if possible, softened even further.
"What I see when I look at you."
Natasha drew in a shaky breath and let it out slowly.
She'd never understood it. How he had always been able to see past the Black Widow. Even in the beginning, he'd seen her. And years later, he was still seeing her.
Seeing what no one else ever saw.
Her eyes stung and she quickly picked the book back up, searching for distraction. Her eyes fell to words on the middle of the page.
"Unfortunately, though he had cultivated acute hearing, it wasn't good enough to enable him to hear what it was that the dour sell-sword was saying.
However, it did seem as if the man was buying, not selling information. When the surreptitious motion that marked the passing of coins from hand to hand finally took place, it was the sell-sword who passed the coins to Skif's target, and not the other way around."
A small grin tweaked the corner of her mouth. She could already see, with only a few sentences, why Clint loved this book. It sounded like an excerpt out of his everyday life.
Smile fading, she carefully slid the bookmark back into its place in the book. She returned it to the stack and curled onto her side, pulling down his pillow until she could hug it to her chest and bury her face in it.
Her hand hit something hard and she frowned, wrapping her fingers around the offending device.
She pulled it out and could only stare for a long moment at his iPod, most likely forgotten since it had been lost in the bed. Clint was always losing it and his phone amongst his pillows and blankets.
Seeing the beloved device, this tangible piece of him, holding it in her hand…it was her undoing. She clenched her hand around the iPod and buried her face in the pillow.
Then she just let it all go, just this once, with no one to bear witness to the moment of weakness.
She wasn't sure how long she laid there, hiding the evidence of her fear and worry from an empty room. But when a light knock came at the door, she forced a deep, albeit shaky, breath and pulled her face from Clint's pillow, turning red-rimmed eyes to the door.
"It's me, Natasha," came a familiar voice from the other side.
Phil. Of course it was Phil.
She forced herself to sit up and wiped at her eyes with her hand. Satisfied most of the evidence was hidden in Clint's pillow, she looked to the door again.
"You can come in."
A moment later she heard the palm scanner beep its approval and the door unlocked. Phil slid in a moment later, closing the door quietly behind him. He leaned back against it – very purposefully not looking around, she noticed – and stared at her.
"You okay?" he asked softly.
The slightly hysterical huff of laughter she couldn't hold back just seemed to add to his concern.
"I'm fine," she stated with a shake of her head. "Just fine." She pushed a hand up through her hair and sighed.
Phil's mouth quirked sympathetically and he pushed away from the door. He moved to sit next to her on the bed, eyes drifting to the stack of books before snapping away and focusing on some blank spot on the wall.
"You don't have to be, you know," he offered.
She shook her head again, but couldn't find the words to reply.
"I'm not," he admitted quietly.
She turned her gaze to watch his profile. A moment later he shifted so he could meet her eyes.
"I do have to be," she insisted in a near whisper. "I'm supposed to be."
"Why?" he asked simply, but then answered his own question. "Because you're the Black Widow?"
She raised her eyebrows and shrugged her shoulders a little in a 'well, yeah' type way.
"And when have you ever been that to him? When have you ever been the Black Widow in this room?"
Hadn't she just been thinking that when she first came in? It was true. Phil knew it. She knew it. She'd never been the Black Widow to Clint. She'd been Romanoff first. Then, in Vietnam, she'd become Natasha. She was sometimes Tasha, sometimes Nat or Tash…but never Black Widow. Not to Clint.
"I sure as hell know I've never been anything but Phil for a very, very long time."
She watched him look around then, scanning the room slowly and then swallowing thickly.
"When we go back out that door, it'll be different. We'll be strong then. We'll be unshakeable. We'll be Agent Coulson and Agent Romanoff, Overwatch and the Black Widow. But in here, in his room, we're Phil and Natasha and we don't have to be okay."
Natasha felt her throat start to burn and willed away the emotions threatening to overwhelm her again. Phil's hand landed on her shoulder, gliding across her shoulder blade to rest under the hood at the base of her neck. He squeezed gently and then withdrew the touch.
"I'm scared." Her confession was made in a whisper, barely loud enough for her to hear herself, but somehow Phil heard it too. "This time is different and I'm so scared…"
"I know. So am I," he admitted it so easily, with no shame. "I'm absolutely terrified because I don't see how this ends. I don't know how we'll get him back. I don't know when. All I know is that he's out there, alone. He's my…" Phil trailed off and gestured helplessly around the room, taking in all the pieces of it that made it Clint's. When he spoke again, his voice was rougher, "You know what he is to me. And the only thing that's keeping me sane is the knowledge of one, unshakeable, undeniable fact."
She watched him closely, intrigued.
"What?"
He met her gaze again.
"Clint Barton is a goddamned survivor."
Like his words were a shot of adrenaline, she felt like she'd gotten a second wind.
"He'll do his part and stay alive. And we'll do ours and find him."
He sounded so sure, so absolutely certain. It was heartening, but a betraying thought still pricked at her.
"But what if we find him…and he's not him anymore? We don't know what Loki's spear did to him."
Phil smiled now and Natasha frowned in confusion.
"Do you really think a personality like Clint's is so easily erased? Loki bit off more than he could chew with him, I guarantee it."
Natasha found herself smiling too. Phil nodded, looking satisfied, and stood.
"Take all the time you need. Get some sleep. Fury wants to let Loki stew for a few hours, and then he's gonna send in Thor. If that doesn't work, then you're up." He met her gaze even as he shifted towards the door. "Everything you're feeling right now, use it. Channel it and let it work in your favor. Find out why he's here." He put his hand on the door handle but paused. "I don't think it's a coincidence that this plan of his seems so familiar. It's a play Clint would make. So if you can get anything on Clint from him…"
She nodded. He didn't need to finish.
"What are you going to do?" she asked even as pushed herself to standing and wiped her eyes again, taking a deep, cleansing breath.
"I've got to brief Thor on Jane Foster. Then do my best to get some shut eye myself."
She nodded and watched him leave. She moved over to the narrow door that led to Clint's small bathroom. It was cramped even for one person – of course that hadn't stopped them from taking the narrow shower for a 'test drive' of its own – but it served its purpose. She washed her face and took a few more cleansing breaths, then she moved back into Clint's room. She went back to Clint's bed, curling on top of the blanket and snuggling into the pillow once again. She slid his earbuds into her ears and pressed play on his iPod. The mellow notes from an Eagles' song filled her mind. She burrowed farther into his sweatshirt, inhaling his scent and letting it surround her as she closed her eyes and took slow, purposeful breaths.
Soon, she'd have to be the Black Widow again. She'd have to leave this room and be unshakeable. She'd have to face Loki and deal with whatever the alien revealed. But for now….
She could just be Natasha.
April 13, 2012 (April 12, 2012, NYC)
2:43 a.m. Local Time (8:43 pm NYC)
Bordeaux, France
Aiden Carlyle tilted his head, cracking the vertebrae of his neck. He'd only been on duty for 43 minutes and he was already bored. If only there were a mission active in the area, then perhaps he'd have some action to look forward to. The Bordeaux field storage unit was not the largest of SHIELD's weapons deposits throughout the world, or even throughout Europe. But it did have its own jet, on standby for any field team in need. It had a TAC-team's worth of gear too.
If Aiden ever passed his field test, he hoped to be on one of those TAC teams one day.
The door intercom beeped.
Aiden frowned. As far as he'd been told, he wasn't supposed to be expecting anyone.
His eyes shifted to the printed bulletin tacked up on the cork board.
WANTED
PRIORITY 1
CLINT "HAWKEYE" BARTON
Beneath the words was Hawkeye's SHIELD ID picture and a notation that he should be considered armed and extremely dangerous.
The door buzzed again, several times in quick succession.
Aiden blew out a breath and reached for the intercom button.
"Code in."
"I need help." The voice was edging on panic.
Aiden frowned, shifting to wake up his computer and pull up the exterior security cameras.
"Code in," he repeated firmly.
"4-9-4-7-6-2-Delta-Zulu," the voice said in a rush. Then… "Hurry, they're coming."
Aiden felt his adrenaline spike as he typed in the ID even as he selected the front door camera, bringing up the feed.
The ID log popped up with a name at the same time he recognized the figure on the screen.
"Holy shit."
He was here. If the ID hadn't given it away, the bow the man was carrying would have.
"HOLY SHIT."
That was Hawkeye. Standing outside his door.
He pressed the intercom button again.
"Put down your weapons. I'm placing you under arrest."
Hawkeye shifted, looking directly at the supposedly hidden security camera. Aiden couldn't really see his face because of the shadows, but he held his hands out wide from his body. Trying to look less threatening, Aiden supposed.
"Please, I barely got away. You know what happened. I was taken against my will. I escaped, but they're right behind me."
Aiden hesitated.
"I need your help."
Hawkeye needed his help, his. This was arguably the most notorious agent in SHIELD history. The only covert, distance assassin on file. He was a legend and a ghost all at the same time. His name was said in whispers and his records gaped at in awe.
He'd been with SHIELD for years. Had bled for the cause more than once. Aiden would know, he'd revered the man all through training. He'd watched recruit after recruit try to beat the organization-wide record Barton had set in the range. No one had ever come close.
Maybe he had escaped. If anyone could have managed it, it would have been Hawkeye.
Best just to be safe, though…for now.
"Stow your bow and thread your fingers behind your head."
He watched to make sure the wayward agent was obeying. He was, but he kept looking over his shoulder like he was waiting for someone to jump out at him.
Aiden stood from the computer, moving towards the door. With a deep breath, he drew his side arm and pressed his thumb to the finger print reader on the door lock and heard the locks disengage.
"Keep your hands threaded," he instructed sternly as he slowly pulled the door open, scanning the dark night behind the archer.
Hawkeye didn't move, had his chin dipped and his eyes down. His hands were obediently threaded together behind his head.
"How many are chasing you?"
"About that…"
Then, Hawkeye raised his gaze and Aiden got his first real look at his eyes. Blue like ice. Unnatural.
"What the fu..."
Hawkeye exploded into motion, his left hand swinging out from behind his head. He twisted the gun out of Aiden's hand even as he kicked out with his boot at the inside of Aiden's knee. The joint collapsed under him, sending him towards the ground. He barely caught himself on his other knee, but before he could even mount a defense, Hawkeye stepped forward and brought his own knee sharply up into Aiden's chin, sending him sprawling backwards onto the floor.
He rolled to his side with a groan, eyes going immediately to the emergency lock down button, hidden on the underside of the desk with a plastic cover to prevent accidental touches.
"I wouldn't." Aiden's eyes snapped back to Hawkeye's. A dozen men poured into the room behind the assassin. "You'll never get to it. Now, I need your thumb…and I can take it the hard way or the easy way. That's up to you."
Aiden swallowed, met that unnatural blue gaze for a breath and then scrambled towards the button.
"Hard way it is," Hawkeye muttered.
Aiden's finger brushed the plastic cover on the button, but then he was yanked back. Before he could even mount a defense, he was flung backwards by the shoulder. His back met something solid but soft and then strong arms locked around him, pulling him up and holding him in place. Hawkeye stepped in front of him, slowing pulling a knife from a sheath hidden at his back.
Aiden struggled against the arms trapping him. But the large man holding him, larger than either he or the Hawk, was unmoved.
"Everybody gear up and get that jet through the pre-flight prep," Hawkeye ordered.
The mass of men that had filed in from outside started moving back towards the door that would take them to the weapons and gear.
"Wait." Hawkeye's command brought them all to a stop. "You're gonna need this."
He grabbed Aiden's hand and forcefully uncurled his thumb from the fist he'd tried to hide it in. He placed the sharp blade of his knife just under the bottom joint and then met Aiden's wide terrified gaze with his own unnaturally blue eyes.
"Should have picked the easy way."
Then he pressed harder with the blade.
Aiden couldn't hold back a scream and almost immediately one of the arms holding him loosened and a hand clamped around his mouth, silencing him. Mercifully, the knife was sharp and did its work quickly. Aiden panted, sagging against the arms holding him, as Hawkeye tossed his liberated thumb to the man nearest the weapon room door.
He met the turncoat agent's eyes again, the icy blueness sending a chill down his spine.
For a long moment, Hawkeye stared at him, then abruptly turned away.
"Get rid of him. We can't have him alerting SHIELD."
Aiden had precisely five painfully brief seconds to process what that meant before the arms around him shifted, locking around his head and neck instead.
The last thing he saw was the back of a dirty blonde head.
End of Chapter 6
Yikes...anybody else intimated by dark-Clint? Poor Aiden *shakes head*
What about Natasha's breakdown? She's strong, she's fierce, but she's also firmly and completely in love with Clint...and she's legitimately afraid she'll never get him back.
You want more? I got more. Meet me here tomorrow and you'll get it. Until then, drop me a line and enjoy your preview
"I do not need your protection!" he spat, voice dropping an octave in anger. "My purpose here will not be thwarted and when I have prevailed, it is you who will beg for my protection!"
Thor opened his mouth to reply, but Loki stepped closer, eyes blazing, and went on,
"You want to know why, my brother?" he spat the familial term with as much venom as he could muster. "Why I chose this realm to conquer for my own? I will tell you why," he hissed.