Notes: Thanks everyone for sticking with me, even if I'm a little slow to update. This particular chapter has been coming since the very first mission, so... you'll see.
Mission Eleven: You Can't Replicate This Mouth
It had been a few months, and Clint was really starting to like the idea of having a partner like Natasha.
He got plenty of flack for it, of course—especially from people who knew he had been so adamant about wanting to work alone before. But it wasn't so bad, having someone around to watch his back who didn't groan at his jokes and who didn't accuse him of not taking things seriously.
But more than that, he appreciated having someone who understood when his silence was because he was focused on the shot, working on the mission … and when the lack of jokes coming over the airwaves was an indication that something was very, very wrong.
Which was the case at that very moment.
They were supposed to be investigating one of those strange phenomena that SHIELD was in the business of covering up. A military base in the middle of nowhere had drawn attention with some … weird reports.
There had been some chatter on the ground about "strange lights," but that was really as far as it got before SHIELD stepped in. Clint and Natasha were being sent in to see what was going on and sweep it up if they could, but Clint knew there was more to it than that. This wasn't just a coverup. He'd seen the briefing papers and knew that the energy signature was strikingly similar to one he'd encountered before, on one of his first missions out on his own.
Clint wouldn't lie; he had been more than ready to get a crack at those aliens again.
And it had started out okay, even if Natasha had given him the sort of look that screamed to Clint that she absolutely didn't believe him when he said he'd run into aliens the last time he saw an energy signature like that. They'd gotten on the ground and more or less got the civilians out of harm's way. . . .
And then it had all gone very much sideways.
One minute, Clint had been talking to a civilian, and the next, he found himself waking up with a throbbing headache to the sound of Natasha on the other end of his comm. She'd gotten worried when he had been silent for so long, apparently.
Hawkeye, come in. This isn't funny.
He sat up and shook his head out, but as his vision started to come back after his hearing, he realized two things. One: he was in the same kind of cell that he'd busted that alien doppleganger out of way back when. Two: there was a green-skinned alien standing on the other end of the cell holding his comm and listening to Natasha's worried-sounding messages.
The alien smirked at Clint when he saw that Clint was waking up. "Your partner," he said, the tone clearly an order before he even got to the second half of it: "Tell me about her."
Clint shook his head a little harder as he pushed himself up on his hands and knees at least so he wasn't totally laid out. "You're so not her type."
The alien frowned Clint's way for only a moment before he shook his head and took out some kind of weapon that sparked with electricity at its end. Clint only had a second to brace himself before the alien jabbed it into his side, and he gasped as the current passed through him.
When the alien withdrew the weapon again, he didn't give Clint time to catch his breath. "Try again."
"You're gonna… have to be… more specific," Clint said, panting in a few breaths, trying to answer fast when the alien had the electrical weapon out and ready to use again.
"Your partner," the alien said again. "Unless you have multiple partners you would like to tell me about…"
"Not really one to kiss and tell," Clint said—and then wound up flat on his stomach when his arms gave out and he couldn't hold himself up as another current passed through him. His muscles were seizing, and he couldn't get a breath right.
The alien bent down and seized a handful of Clint's hair to force his head up to look at him. "The woman trying to contact you. Tell me about her or the next hit will leave you screaming."
As if to emphasize the point, Clint could hear Natasha on the other end of his comm. Hawkeye, answer me. It sounded like she was running.
"Aww, she does care," Clint said, smirking toward his comm.
The alien narrowed his eyes even further and then broke into a malicious grin and jabbed the device into Clint's side. And, as promised, Clint screamed. He couldn't help it.
Clint was panting hard by the time the alien let up again, though the green-skinned sadist seemed to decide on a different course of questioning as he sat back, watching Clint try to get his bearings. "Why did you come here?" he asked.
"Wasn't my idea," Clint breathed out. "You're the one that dragged me here."
"Stop playing games," the green man demanded. He moved to jab Clint with the electric device again, but Clint had had just about enough of that.
He waited until the last second and then twisted—if he'd still been with the circus and practiced a little more, he probably could have avoided the bolt by a country mile instead of barely an inch—before he brought his elbow down on the alien's arm. He was guessing on anatomy and bone structure, but the thing seemed human-like, and he was hoping that meant joints were pressure points.
The alien didn't cry out in pain or anything, so Clint had the feeling the move wasn't quite as successful as he'd meant it to be. But the alien did drop the device out of pure surprise, and Clint would take an accidental victory, too. Just as good as the real thing when you came down to it.
He snatched up the device and didn't hesitate before he jammed it into the alien's side, letting the guy go to his knees before Clint lashed out to kick him in the side of the head in what he hoped was a good enough blow to knock him out.
Thankfully, Clint's luck seemed to be holding (so far). The green alien went crashing down to the floor and lay still, giving Clint the chance to look around the place.
The cell looked a lot like the one that he'd found that SHIELD agent replica in way back when, but it also looked a lot sleeker, newer, somehow. "New model?" he mused to himself, running his hands over the walls until he got to the door.
He paused as he considered the lock. On the one hand, he might be able to figure out how to get inside. After all, he'd been one of the best thieves in the circus before he joined SHIELD. And there wasn't a lock that could best him yet. And on the other hand, the last time he'd been through a ship like this, he'd been able to avoid detective, at least for a little while, in the air ducts.
He looked down at himself and patted down a few of the pockets where he usually kept things. The aliens had, obviously, taken his bow and his quiver—and he'd want to find those and get those back if he could—but they hadn't quite gotten everything. The knife in his boot was still there, and his comm…
Right. Natasha. He abandoned the door for the moment to scoop up the comm, not far from the unconscious green alien. "Widow, you there?"
There was a pause, and Clint wondered if she'd just decided to go radio silent and come after him. He wondered if she knew where he was. And then: "Hawkeye? What happened?"
"It's a very long story," he said, shaking his head. "This is gonna sound like a weird question, but you haven't happened to run into a space ship while you've been out looking for me, have you?"
Another pause. "No, why would that sound like a weird question?"
Clint couldn't help but chuckle at that. Good old Nat. "Well, that's where I am right now. Find the ship and you'll find me." He looked around. "I'm in some kind of cell, but I'm going to try to find a way out. It's been a while, but I think I can remember the way I went out last time."
"Check in every ten minutes, even if it's just to click your comm," Natasha said. "I need to know if I'm staging a full rescue or just acting as your pickup."
"I'll let you know." Clint set the comm on the ground as he worked open the grate. "Either way, I've got probably the prettiest rescue party in SHIELD."
"Really, Hawkeye?"
"You act like it's not true, Widow, but it is. Don't get huffy with me for pointing out the obvious."
"Are you sure you're alright? I should check you for a concussion when I get there."
"Ha ha."
Clint could practically hear Natasha's smirk in the silence on the comm before she replied again. "Hang tight, Hawkeye."
Clint smiled to himself and hit the silencer on the comm. No need to alert the aliens to his position, right?
Once he had the grate to the air system out of the wall, he crawled inside, surprised to find that it was a slightly tighter fit than he remembered. But then again, the last time he'd been in the walls of an alien ship like this, he'd still been relatively fresh off the circus. He'd been pretty scrawny back then—and, if he was honest, more flexible.
Not that he would ever admit that to anyone. He just had to get through these ventes like he had next time and he wouldn't have to do something as embarrassing as writing in his report that he hadn't been able to pull the same trick twice because the SHIELD mess hall was so much better for him than the fried food he'd grown up on.
It was pretty slow going, all the same, because he was trying to muscle himself through while at the same time staying silent enough that he wouldn't alert anyone to his presence. So he was pretty sure Natasha would get to the ship long before Clint even found his way out of this maze.
He was just starting to move past another grate when he heard the low murmur of voices, and he paused, his head cocked to the side as he listened.
"…no centralized world government to speak of," one of the aliens was saying. "It almost makes conquering the Terrans more difficult; we will have to target all of their little settlements rather than destroying one seat of power."
"We have the numbers," said another alien, dismissively. "And we have the advantage of time. The Kree are not here yet."
"So we should act before they arrive," the first alien countered. "You move too slow, Commander."
"Watch yourself," the commander snapped back in a tone that held an obvious threat to it. "I've conquered dozens of planets and moons. Can you say the same?"
Clint peered through the grate, watching the two green aliens interacting. He wasn't entirely sure what 'the Kree' was, but they sounded bad. He'd need to listen in a little more if he wanted more context clues, but on the other hand, it would be nice to greet Natasha at the front door and not look like a total idiot who needed the full-on rescue and not the pickup.
Yeah, but if she hears you passed up intel just so you could impress her, she'll be the opposite of impressed, he told himself—and decided to wait it out and see what he could learn.
From what he could gather, the aliens were making plans to infiltrate several governments—if they hadn't already. It definitely sounded like this was an "in progress" kind of thing, which made sense when Clint considered how long ago he'd first run into these guys.
But it wasn't just governments on the list. There were a few organizations, too. Like SHIELD.
Which at least explained why they'd captured Clint. If they weren't in SHIELD yet, they'd need intel. That's one mystery solved, he thought to himself, shaking his head. If they'd just asked, he could have told them they were barking up the wrong tree. He was the last guy to ask for intelligence.
But Clint must have stayed a little bit too long. When he heard the crackle of a communication coming in, he almost winced, guessing what it was already, even before the alien on the other end of the call informed his superiors that "the Terran has escaped."
And then he heard the unmistakable sound of someone climbing into the vents system.
Yeah, that's what he got for using the same escape route twice with the same bad guys.
Clint picked up the pace, though he was painfully aware of the fact that he ran the risk of alerting the aliens to his position the faster he moved. It was easier to be slow and quiet in cramped quarters like this, especially since the ventilation system wasn't exactly build for heavy occupancy.
Still, he made it pretty far before someone was finally able to pinpoint his location. Unsurprisingly, it was when he was closer to a vent opening than the recesses of the ship, and Clint's only warning was the sound of blaster fire before another alien joined him in the vents. Which meant that there was someone ahead of him and another alien—he was sure that was his former captor—in the vents behind him.
"Widow," he whispered sharply into his comm, "I'm surrounded."
"Already?" It was meant to be a tease, but Clint was sure he could hear serious worry in her voice.
"Yeah. Listen, I don't know what these guys are calling themselves, but they're trying to infiltrate world governments and international organizations," Clint said, talking quickly so he could relay everything he'd learned before he got caught. Because he had a feeling once he did get caught, he wasn't going to stay, well, conscious. "And there's another group they're trying to fight against, I think. The Kree. I don't know if that rings any bells, but it might for our superiors."
"Hawkeye," Natasha broke in. "I'm coming to get you."
"I know," Clint said. "But, you know, I'm surrounded. So… just in case."
"Don't be so dramatic. I'll be right there. Keep your line open so I can find you."
"Sure thing, Widow," Clint said, though he was a little distracted by that point. The alien who had come in from the grate ahead of him had turned the corner of the vents and had a weapon out, leveled right at Clint.
"Don't move, Terran," the alien hissed.
Clint held his hands up in a gesture of peace. "Hi," he said. "Name's Clint. And you are?"
"Don't speak either."
"Okay. Touchy." Clint shook his head slowly, though when the alien narrowed her eyes, he shrugged openly and kept his hands out until the alien was satisfied he wasn't going to say anything else and nodded to herself.
"Come with me."
Clint nodded, keeping to the "don't speak" rule for the moment, though that was mostly because he didn't want to get shot in the cramped space of the ducts. Even if their weapons were set on something lower than the "kill" settings, Clint knew it would hurt, and he also knew it would be worse if he had to get dragged out.
He followed the alien until they got to the grate, though she kept going a little bit past it so that she still had her weapon trained on Clint. She gestured for him to go through first, and he nodded, still keeping his silence as he slid out into the same room he'd just been spying on—where several other aliens were waiting for him with their weapons drawn as well.
Clint grinned crookedly as he held up his hands. "All this for little old me?"
"Be silent, Terran," one of the aliens in the room snapped.
So at least that was consistent.
The other alien climbed out of the ducts, and it wasn't long before the one that had followed Clint from the original holding cell made it out too. And although the first one was already fixing some kind of energized restraints around Clint's wrist, Clint couldn't keep his mouth shut when he saw that guy—especially when, to the detriment of his pride, he saw that the alien in question wasn't even sporting a shiner.
"Aww, c'mon. I know I did more damage than that."
The alien narrowed his eyes and stalked over to plant a fist in Clint's stomach, doubling him over. The aliens who had been restraining his hands didn't bother to hold him up, either, and they simply let him fall to the ground as all of the breath left him in a whoosh.
"You've been warned about being silent, Terran," the other alien, the one that had coaxed him out of the ductwork, said.
"Well, you're gonna have to choose one," Clint croaked out, still doubled over with his hands behind his back and his ears ringing. "Because your buddy over there wanted me to talk to him and give him intel, and I can't do that if I'm just shutting up and looking pretty, can I?"
Clint winced, absolutely expecting the hit to come. And it did—but he wasn't expecting it to be a crack across the back of the head that sent him reeling into unconsciousness.
…
Clint's head was pounding as he slowly, painfully, came back to consciousness.
He wasn't surprised to find that he was in a much worse position than he'd been in before. Apparently, his captors weren't going to take any more chances with him, and they'd manacled his hands above him to a hook in the wall. And his feet were tied together. No boots, either—they must have frisked him while he was unconscious and decided to just take everything that might be suspicious.
"Okay," he said under his breath, "this looks bad."
The one good thing about his position so far was that at least no one else was in the room with him. He wasn't naïve enough to think it would stay that way, and he was sure they'd try and run another interrogation sooner or later. There was no other reason to keep him alive, especially not when he'd already proven to be a thorn in their sides.
But before they got started trying to milk him for all he knew about SHIELD—which, Clint reflected, was almost hilarious if he didn't know it was going to hurt, considering he was definitely not at the top of the list of people who knew anything about SHIELD—Clint had a little time to orient himself. So… it was a little good luck in a whole sea of crummy luck.
The aliens had taken his comm, so Clint had no idea where Natasha was. He wouldn't be surprised if she was working a rescue at the moment, and he definitely wouldn't have been surprised if she were to burst in and read him the riot act for getting caught and making her go to all the trouble of rescuing him.
That was, Clint was sure, the way to tell whether she cared.
Still, he wasn't going to rely on Natasha to get him out. Not because he didn't think he could but because he didn't want her to have to worry about him. They needed to be equal partners.
Plus, if he was honest with himself, he wanted to live up to his super spy partner's reputation. She was already too amazing for him, and he didn't want to prove that point any further than he already did just by, well, being him.
He readjusted himself as best he could, considering he was literally hanging in the middle of the room by his arms, and then grabbed the chain between his restraints, trying to follow it up if he could. If he could get himself off the hook in the ceiling, that would at least be part of the battle. If nothing else, it would take the weight off his arms—and he would need those if he was going to fight his way out.
He could already feel his arms protesting and wondered just how long he had been unconscious and strung up. He noticed they'd been sure to put weights on the restraints on his feet to make doubly sure he was uncomfortable, too.
At least they didn't break anything, Clint thought to himself—though he was sure if he managed to get himself caught again, that was probably the next step. These guys weren't idiots.
It took a lot of effort, but Clint was able to follow the chain up to where the hook was, and he was relieved to find that it was straightforward enough. No latch or anything else that he'd have to get around. If he could get the chain of his restraints over the top of the hook, he'd drop to the ground.
And then… well, he'd figure the rest of it out from there. He'd been a criminal before he was with SHIELD, and he knew a thing or seven about picking locks. And he was sure that, even for as well as the aliens had patted him down, they hadn't found the picks he always carried with him. Sure, he didn't have his boots on—and he always kept a knife and a pick in his boots—but he had a couple in the lining of his clothes too. Just for situations like this.
He'd been in trouble too many times not to be prepared, after all.
But first thing's fist—he had to get off the hook in the ceiling. So, he took a better grip on the chain between his manacles that would give him the leverage he needed and started to rock until he had enough momentum to jump. Or, well, whatever it was called when a person tried to "jump" the chain of restraints out of a hook with just their body movement. Not quite jumping, but … whatever.
The first few tries didn't do very much for him, but just as his arms were starting to scream at him, Clint let out a little "ha!" of triumph. He hadn't quite gotten off the hook, but he had felt the shift when the chain had gone from being threaded through it to catching on it. He'd moved, and he wasn't as securely fastened.
Now he just had to do that one more time, move that slightest bit more….
Clint was just gearing up to try again when he heard the unmistakable ker-thunk of a bolt being unbolted at the door, and he looked up to see an alien come in, though in the dim light, it was hard to see if it was the same guy he'd escaped from before or if there was some new idiot. Either way, Clint was still strung up, so he couldn't give it back to the new guy the same way he had with the other one.
"You're almost more trouble than you're worth, Terran," the alien said. It was a female voice, and as she approached, Clint could see that she was taller and leaner than the one he'd had to deal with before. "Count yourself lucky we need you alive."
"Yeah, pro tip: don't tell me I'm gonna survive this, because that just means I'm going to make it impossible," Clint said. "You're terrible at this. You must be new."
The alien bared her teeth. "On the contrary," she said, stepping forward so that she was close enough to lash out, striking Clint across the face with a slap that had all the force of a girl who found out he didn't remember her name the next morning—and yes, Clint knew from experience what that felt like.
Clint shook his head and worked his jaw. "Yeah, I don't know how things work in a galaxy far, far away, but—"
"Then remain in your ignorance and be silent," the alien hissed, going so far as to grab his chin between her fingers to emphasize her order and make him look at her.
"Thought this was an interrogation. Gonna have to pick one."
The alien narrowed her eyes further before, finally, she let out a tutting noise and released Clint's face, stepping back from him almost primly as she shook her head. "You're intelligent enough, for a Terran," she said. "Surely you can be reasonable. Once our operative is inside SHIELD, he can gather the higher intelligence we need. You won't be betraying any vows. We only need to know a few things to blend in."
"Well, green is out of season," Clint said conversationally. "So you're going to have to get that addressed. That's first."
"Funny." The alien didn't smile, and she said the word as if it was an observation and not a compliment. "And stubborn, too. Are you like this with your partner and the rest of SHIELD?" She tutted. "How they put up with such insubordination…"
Clint smirked. "Yeah, it annoys them too. You're not special, sunshine."
"And yet they let you in?"
"Hey, I'm very pretty," Clint said, the smirk stretching into an outright smile.
For just a moment, the alien paused, looking him over as if she was trying to decide for herself if he was right about his claims to attractiveness. "I suppose."
"Just wait 'til my partner gets here. She's even prettier than I am," Clint said. "Not that you'll have long to realize it before she puts you on the ground."
The alien let out a hum, and Clint wasn't sure if it was an annoyed sort of hum or one of interest. He wasn't even sure which reaction he wanted, especially when the questions were more about himself than they were about SHIELD—at least so far. "Yes," the alien said at last. "I meant to ask you about this partner of yours. You seem to have a lot of faith in her."
"Yeah. She's pretty amazing. But like I said, keep going down the world-conquering, partner-threatening path. You'll find out."
"You seem to be laboring under the delusion that this partner of yours can even find you, Mr. Barton."
Clint narrowed his eyes at that. He knew for a fact that he hadn't given those creeps his name, so they must have been deeper into SHIELD than they wanted him to believe. If nothing else, they had at least managed to break into the mission records. And at worst, they were in the lower levels and trying to use him to get higher. He was, after all, technically a high-ranked SHIELD agent, even if he still felt like the brand-new, super-green agent he had been the first time he ran into these aliens.
"Oh, I'm sorry; would you prefer your codename?" The alien smiled maliciously, showing all of her teeth, but that had the opposite effect on Clint, and he leaned toward her, baring his teeth right back at her.
"I don't know what your game is, but you're crazy if you think you're going to survive this little stunt."
"Because your partner is going to stop me."
"Because I'm going to put an arrow in your eyeball," Clint said, holding the alien's gaze steadily and with as much real steel as he could muster. He'd faced plenty of people like this in his lifetime—jerks who thought that they could push anyone around and get what they wanted that way. It had been that way with his dad, with the circus, with the scumbags he'd fought since joining SHIELD. This alien wasn't anything different—aside from the green color, of course.
The alien narrowed her eyes before, finally, she did what pretty much anyone who had ever interrogated Clint always resorted to—she hit him.
Clint went swinging like a punching bag, but he couldn't help but smirk to himself all the same. He knew he was getting under the alien's skin, and that was the best way to deal with an interrogation. An interrogator off their balance was less likely to get what they wanted—and more likely to slip and give up information Clint could use.
But the alien must have realized that she was losing her high ground, because when Clint stopped swinging, he could see that she had set her shoulders and was turning to leave. "I have enough for a passable imitation, anyway," she said. "And when your partner finds our plant, he'll be hurt badly enough she won't question it until it's too late and he's already in your precious SHIELD."
At that, Clint could hear his heartbeat in his ears as the alien left and slammed the door behind her. If he'd known that the interrogation was supposed to be about himself, he would have done something else. Put on a show. Impersonated Clay Quartermain. Something. Instead, he'd given them a taste of his insubordination and sense of humor, and really, that was pretty much all SHIELD ever saw of him. As far as SHIELD was concerned, he was one walking pun factory who got in on Phil Coulson's crazy pity stunt.
So, yeah. This looked very, very bad.