Summary: Pre-Avengers. "There's only so much you can take before you break Clint," Coulson said to the teen's back. "Maybe it's time to do some good before that happens."
Rating: T
Warnings: Swearing, violence, and blood.
Disclaimer: I do not own The Avengers or any of its characters. (I wish…)
Lost and Found
Chapter 1—And it all Came Tumbling Down
Clint lazily stirred the steaming mug of black coffee with a plastic stir-stick—not that he had to, strictly out of habit. He, by rule, always put at least four sugar packets into his midday cup, but somehow, he just couldn't force himself to dump the cheap imitation crap into the bitter liquid. In his left hand, he held a slightly gnawed-on old school yellow pencil, twirling it aimlessly over a blank steno pad. The coffee shop buzzed with life. In each of the corners, couples held hands surreptitiously under tables, reveling in the self constructed images of rebellion. Next to the window, the girl with the teal scarf scribbled furiously onto a notebook. She pushed her massive, horn-rimmed glasses further up on the bridge of her nose. Clint studied the pencil strokes from across the room. A wry grin crept out from behind his apathetic mask as he read her romance novel as she wrote it. Steamy, he thought and laughed to himself as she took out a plastic inhaler and drew in the mist with a pronounced breath. Seemingly of their own accord, Clint's eyes drifted past the aspiring novelist to the window she sat beneath. On the cracked pavement, Chris stood, bouncing impatiently. Noticing Clint's attention, he jerkily motioned for him to come outside. Clint sighed and, slower than usual (strictly to piss the other man off), rose. He drained his coffee in one long drag and placed the empty mug in the busboy's plastic tub, slipping a twenty dollar bill into the young man's pocket, and made for the door. He stopped just before the entrance, ignoring Chris' flustered impatience and strode back to the girl with the teal scarf. He cleared his throat beside her, eliciting a small squeak, exceptionally reminiscent of a mouse.
"Sorry, sorry. Just thought you should know. You spelled clandestine wrong." The owlish look faded into a scowl.
"No I didn't," she proclaimed, scanning the page. "I think I would know how to sp—" she broke off as she turned the page and found her error. Clint grinned at her as her face melted into a look of apprehension and the slight traces of fear. "How—how did—" Clint winked.
"Have a good day."
Ignoring the distressed noises coming from the girl's throat, Clint spun on his heel and strode through the glass door. The cheap silver bells tied to the door handle jingled furiously at his exit. Clint turned left down the street, away from the still-bouncing-Chris, to the traffic post at the corner. With an air of complete nonchalance, he pressed the walk button on the post with his right thumb, and then jammed his hands into his jeans pockets. Chris jogged up beside him.
"Hey! What the hell man, you knew I was there!" The walk indicator flashed and Clint walked forward without even so much as a glance at the short teen to his left.
"You're too jumpy Chris," he drawled. "Too obvious, hey? Need to tone it down a bit." Clint's tone was stern, but the spark in his blue-grey eyes betrayed his levity.
"Yeah, yeah, yeah, you've told me before." Chris ran his hand through dark hair, recognizing his friend's mood. "I just can't help it when it comes to this ya know?" He slapped his jacket for emphasis, raising his eyebrows at Clint through scraggy bangs that reached below his eyes. Clint blew a breath through clenched teeth.
"I dunno Chris," he started slowly, leading the two up a stoop, into a dilapidated apartment complex. "It's been too soon since my last job. Trail isn't even cold yet." A queasy feeling pounded in Clint's chest. Guilt. He pushed it away with practiced ease as the two strode through a green door that he unlocked.
"Doesn't matter Barton, you know that." Chris collapsed onto a dusty couch and absently picked at the loose threads on the arm of the sofa. "This comes straight from the Boss. Turns out he has a rat." Clint clicked his tongue disparagingly and leaned forward onto the countertop in the kitchen. The cheap plastic bit into his forearm. He sighed and hung his head.
"Who's that fucking stupid," he muttered more to himself than Chris, but the other man responded nonetheless.
"Apparently, this fucker." He tossed a manila folder onto the counter and then pulled a cigarette from his shirt pocket. With an apathetic eyebrow raise, Clint picked up the folder and flipped through grainy, amateur surveillance photos and hastily scrawled addresses. He frowned deeply and ran a hand through his long hair.
"Name."
"Don't worry about it."
"I said name, Chris."
"I don't know it Clint, honest." Clint let out a disgusted snort and pushed the papers away. He folded his arms over his chest and turned to the fridge.
"Then you can tell the Boss to go screw himself." Chris shot to his feet, swelling in an emotion that Clint couldn't quite identify—anger, fear?
"Don't be an idiot Barton! He knows where you live." A beat of silence. "He knows where I live. He knows everything. Please Clint. It's not like this guy's a saint."
Clint blew out a breath of air. He looked up at Chris through sandy bangs with a steady, unnerving gaze.
"Get outta here. Got some work to do."
-Break—Break—Break—
Richard Taylor was nothing more than a small time thug. Just a delivery boy wrapped in the vast network of dealers under the Boss' control. He lived on 32nd and Jefferson, tucked in a little apartment building on the wrong side of the tracks. Bums lined the streets outside shops, whores with jingling bangles and overpowering perfume smoked against telephone poles, dirty children with torn shoes played cops and robbers in the streets. The air was alive with delinquency and illegality and it suited Clinton Francis Barton just fine. Sitting atop a crumbling brick rooftop, black neckerchief tied across his nose and mouth, he didn't move an inch. His eyes were locked on the windowpane 3 stories below, across the street.
It was midday on a Saturday when he nocked an arrow across his longbow, traces of purple paint visible through the cracks of the old wood. Traces of a life, long since past.
His target suddenly came into play; little more than the back of a head seated in the plush of the torn armchair beneath the apartment window. Clint slowly allowed the sound of the city to die away, sinking into the murmur of his heartbeat, distorting beyond all semblance of recognition.
The tunnel of his focus honed in on the little room across the alleyway. His breathing filled his ears. With a slight draw of air, Clint pulled the bowstring to rest in the meat of his cheekbone, the wood of the frame digging into his calloused palm. A total sense of calm washed over his body. A prayer, the same mantra as always, floated from his consciousness into the heaven that he believed so ardently in and knew he would never see.
Then he froze.
A small boy suddenly filled the top corner of his vision and his focus came crashing down to his feet. He watched as Richard Taylor's figure rose in malice and clenched his jaw as a violent backhand crashed across the boy's face.
Daddy, Daddy! Stop!
Did I tell you to fucking talk?!
You're killing him Harold!
Shut UP!
Suddenly, Clint was descending from his loft in a near dream-like state, shimmying from the fire escape before he even recognized that he was moving. His bow was suddenly tucked up his left sleeve as he stalked across the street, ignoring the honks and shouts and squealing of tires as the automobiles swerved to avoid Clint's tunnel vision. He stood numbly at the entrance to the apartment building with his hands at his side.
Slowly, Clint reached up and removed the neckerchief from his face and wrapped it tightly around his fist. His face was expressionless, near robotic as he smashed in the window and buzzed himself in.
Barney, we gotta get outta here.
I know, Clint, I'll figure something out, okay buddy?
Please don't leave me here.
The hallway outside Taylor's flat was tight and dimly lit. Clint moved to the green door, bow now slid from his sleeve and gripped in a tight fist. The apartment was silent, save for the crackling of a poorly connected television. The stench of booze and vomit wafted from behind the flimsy plywood. The sound of a smack reverberated through Clint's mind. It never occurred to him that memories could make sounds.
With a practiced ease, he picked the lock and the door swung open. His breathing was deafening as he stalked into the living room. The Wheel of Fortune was on.
"What the fuck?" Richard Taylor bellowed as Clint pulled the bowstring and pulled the suddenly nocked arrow at the man's left eye socket, suddenly less than three inches away. A flash of blue-grey covered Taylor's brown eyes and a familiar pressure gripped Clint's chest. His face hardened into a hateful mask.
"Fuck you, Dad," he managed to croak into a hoarse whisper and he himself didn't realize what he meant.
"What the—" The man slumped forward as the arrow embedded itself into his eye, through his skull, pinning the dead man to the armchair behind. All Clint heard was the static of the television over the drip of blood. With a jerk, he pulled the arrow from the bloody hole, ignoring the squelch of gushing brain matter. He whirled around as a piercing scream rent the air. The little boy stood in the doorframe, a split lip and darkening bruise marring his face. Clint's grip tightened and the bloody arrow snapped, splinters grazing his calloused palm.
The hardened professional ordered him to string the bow again.
No witnesses. No compromise. No. No. You can't afford to start again.
But his hands were already raised in surrender. The little boy had streaked to his father's arm, shaking the limp limb and suddenly Clint wondered where his mother was.
"Daddy!" he screamed. "Daddy!" The word sounded so familiar and so foreign. Clint was perched on the open window. He looked back and for the first time since becoming a mercenary, faltered. The little boy looked back at him. Clint numbly dropped the splintered arrow into the alleyway below. And the little boy with blood still streaming from his split lower lip looked at Clint with rage in his eyes and screamed—a heartbreakingly lost and alone note that Clint remembered.
Clint fled, the sound ringing in his ears and MURDERER tattooed on his heart.
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AN: Hey guys! Sorry for taking so long to update. Thank you so much for reading and all your reviews! You are all awesome. As always, any critique is welcome!
-Robin1231