#clintashashield
Note
I don’t know if you still take fic requests but I’d love to see your take on Clint and Nat in the vents of the Budapest train station for 2 days.
Two days
Clintasha fic
~
As Barton dropped the hatch of the vent back into place, Natasha caught her breath and checked her weapon. There were shouts somewhere below, and footsteps hammering down the platform. She braced herself against the metal wall behind her and trained her gun on the hatch through which they had just climbed. Her partner was doing the same. Natasha could feel her heartbeat on her tongue. She could still hear the screams from the street above, and the wailing sirens converging on the flaming ruins of Dreykov’s building several blocks away. Not now, she told herself. There was no time to think about it, not yet. Below, the shouts got louder, the footfalls got closer, and she adjusted her grip, preparing herself in case she needed to throw herself through that hatch onto God knows how many men.
The voices and the footsteps passed underneath them. The two of them listened, not moving, not breathing. The men came back, spread out, regrouped and spread out again.
Attention, please, came a tinny announcement. All trains are delayed due to an unexpected emergency. Barton cocked his head at her. His Hungarian was rusty. Natasha mouthed the message at him in English, not sure if there was enough light for him to see. He grimaced, so she figured he got the message.
Down the tunnel, one of the voices called. They’ve gone down the tunnel.
Another voice swore, and then came the crackle of a radio. We’ll get them at the other end. Let’s go.
Then, unbelievably, impossibly, the footsteps receded. Natasha waited, coiled, ready in case this was a trick of some kind. They waited, guns on the hatch, listening to the bustle of people moving up and down the platform.
Natasha wasn’t sure how much time had passed before she exhaled, and relaxed her grip slightly. Barton sank back against the wall of the vent. Neither of them lowered their weapons entirely. Natasha twisted her head slightly to get a glimpse of her partner’s watch. Just gone 5pm.
Attention, please. All trains are delayed due to an unexpected emergency.
People were crowding on the platform. Natasha tensed ever so slightly whenever someone shuffled underneath the hatch, but there were no shouts now, just the voices of disgruntled and confused commuters.
What’s going on? There was an explosion, didn’t you hear? Someone’s on the run, I saw soldiers in the street. They weren’t soldiers, they were cops. No, they were special forces. A whole building came down, did you see it? No, it’s on fire but I don’t think it came down. I don’t know, maybe a gas explosion. I heard gunfire. I think there was a tank. Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for your patience. Normal services resuming from platform B.
It took just under an hour for the trains to empty the platform of people. Natasha finally let herself relax, holstering her weapon. She shifted, stretching her legs, and ever so slowly slid over until she was thigh-to-thigh with her partner.
“Hurt?” Her voice was barely a whisper. There was still a chance that Dreykov’s men or the authorities were somewhere nearby. Hell, even a passerby or a janitor overhearing them could be the end of them.
“Not badly,” he breathed. “You?”
She shook her head. There were various scrapes and bruises she hadn’t even begun to catalogue, but nothing was broken, not as far as she could tell. Footsteps passed underneath them and she froze, feeling Barton do the same beside her. She opened her mouth to say something else, but the fear that someone might hear her stopped her with her lips just parted. A train rattled into the station, opened its doors with a soft hiss, clunked them shut and rumbled away leaving silence behind it. Natasha ducked her head, letting out a breath she hadn’t realised she’d been holding.
“Any word from SHIELD?” her partner whispered, after a while. She shook her head. They would get a signal when an extraction was ready, but there was no knowing how long that would take. It all depended on the political situation, or, more accurately, whether SHIELD could manoeuvre around said situation to retrieve their agents before Dreykov’s cronies could tear their hearts out.
They sat side by side in silence for a long time. There was no change in the light coming through the cracks around the vent hatch. The station would be lit all night. The only way to mark time was with Barton’s watch, and by the fifth hour tense anxiety gave way to lightly worried boredom. Her legs were cramped and she was hungry. The thrill of the chase had long since vanished, and now all she wanted was to be in a jet hurtling back towards the States.
Something poked her thigh. She looked down, and found Barton’s hand, offering her something. She took it, and brought it close to her face to see it in the dim light. It was an arrowhead, one of his less explosive ones. She frowned, confused, and gave it back to him. He smiled, and reached over to touch it to the wall of the vent. As Natasha watched, he began to scratch something. Natasha reached out and grabbed his wrist.
“Someone might hear,” she whispered. He looked at his watch pointedly. It was almost eleven at night. There were still people now and then, and an occasional train, but the station was largely silent. There was nothing else to do but wait for extraction. She sighed, and let go of him. He carved three vertical lines into the metal, then three horizontal lines to form a grid. He finished by scratching a circle into the top right square, and handed her the arrowhead. Natasha smiled, and scratched a cross. They paused as a train whooshed past, not stopping at the empty platform below them. It took her four moves to beat him, and he made a big show of shaking her hand. She smiled, and he drew them another grid.
Barton gave her his watch and took the first shift sleeping once midnight rolled around. Logically, Natasha knew that they were not likely to be found now, but she couldn’t quite relax enough to sleep just yet. Her partner had no such concerns, and was out like a light despite the cold metal of the vent. She kicked him whenever he breathed too loudly, but aside from that she just waited, marking time on his watch until it was 4 in the morning. She shook his shoulder, and he slid over and sat up, making room for her to lie down. She slept fitfully, and once the morning rush took over on the platform below her, she could no longer sleep. She opted to lie with her eye to the crack in the hatchway, watching as unsuspecting people passed under her. The scent of coffee and pastries was almost enough to tempt her out. Almost. As if he had read her mind, Barton reached into a pocket and produced a battered protein bar. She snapped it in half and they shared a miserable communion.
They played another few rounds of noughts and crosses. She slept again once the station quietened down, this time sitting up with her head on her partner’s shoulder. She didn't think too deeply about it - they were still very much in mission mode, boring as it might be for the time being. Barton woke her after a couple of hours, in the early afternoon. They made a game of stretching, trying to get out of each other’s way as they did. The early evening found her practising what basic ASL she had picked up. This proved much more engaging than noughts and crosses, and by the time twenty-four hours had passed, she had mastered the alphabet and could sign several rude words. It helped distract the both of them from the hunger, thirst and other bodily functions they couldn’t deal with in a train station vent.
It was his turn to sleep, and he managed - somehow, she wasn’t sure how - to get a few hours’ rest during the evening rush. Announcements rang out on the crackling speakers, trains groaned in and out of the station, hundreds of people went about their lives, and Barton slept right through it. She watched him, in awe of his ability to ignore the noise until she realised he had probably just turned his hearing aids down.
The dawn of the second day found them irritable, sore, starving and ready to drop out of the vents and just make a run for it. There had been no word from SHIELD, despite both of them checking that their various comms devices were still operational. Natasha practiced her ASL swearing and Barton augmented her vocabulary for a while.
“Two days,” she whispered, sometime around midday. “Maybe something’s gone wrong.”
“They’ll come,” he told her, quietly, simply. She hated him for it for an hour or so, until he carved a game of hangman into the wall and she got sucked into the game. He was good at taking her mind off things, she was starting to realise. It wasn’t something anyone had ever done for her before.
Night approached with all the speed of a glacier, but finally, just as Natasha opened her mouth to guess the word for their current round of hangman, Barton’s watch beeped twice. In one fluid motion, she pulled the hatch open and they dropped down onto the platform. There was no one there to see them, which Natasha assumed was part of the plan. She didn’t like flying blind, but she didn’t have much of a choice. She and her partner streaked up the escalator onto the dark streets of Budapest. A black SUV rolled up and Barton’s watch chirped once. The door opened and they threw themselves inside.
“Butterfly,” she said, once she’d caught her breath, revelling in the sound of her voice at normal volume after two days of quiet whispers.
“You win,” he grinned, and despite herself, Natasha smiled.
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Tell me you’re okay
Clintasha fic
633 words
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The noise of the explosion is obscene. Clint feels the heat of it burning his face even as he throws up his hands to shield himself. He’s blown off his feet, and he collides with a wall but the force of the blast isn’t done with him, and debris is smashing into the concrete all around him. Something hits his leg hard. Something strikes him in the shoulder. Pain springs from each strike point and he just tries to shield his head for as long as he can.
When the noise stops, Clint struggles to his feet. He can’t put weight on his left leg. There’s something he knows he’s forgetting. He can feel it, thrumming through his head, just out of reach of his brain. What is it? He should ask Nat.
Nat. Oh God.
He looks around wildly. She was on the other side of the complex. How close was she to the blast? Was she caught up in it? Where is she?
Clint scrabbles at his ear for his commlink. It’s still there, by some miracle, but he can’t hear anything.
“Nat?” he calls, opening the channel. “Nat, are you there?”
There’s nothing. He swears, looks around, and swears again as he limps towards the centre of the destruction. The building is still burning around him, but he has to find her.
“Nat,” he calls again. “C’mon, Romanoff, talk to me. Tell me you’re okay.”
There is a crackle of static in his ear, but no reply. Could be the batteries giving out. Clint steps over smouldering rubble and catches sight of a black suit. He’s running before he even knows it, the pain in his leg forgotten as he drops down beside her.
“Nat,” he says. “Nat.”
He shakes her shoulder. Her brow furrows, and Clint’s pain comes rushing back as the adrenaline subsides. She’s alive. She opens her eyes, and slowly props herself up on one arm.
“Fuck,” she mutters, looking around. “Didn’t see that coming.”
“You okay?” he asks. She nods, and grips his arm. He helps her up, and they survey the wreckage.
“We need to get out of here,” she says. “Come on.”
He holds onto her as they hobble out of the wrecked compound. Extraction is the only way out now. They just have to get back to the jet.
Natasha leans on him as they walk, and Clint bears the pain and limps as steadily as he can. It takes them almost half an hour to get back, and the whole way Clint tries to be aware of their surroundings.
The jet is waiting in a clearing, and Clint helps Nat up into the copilot’s seat. As quickly as he can manage, Clint jabs his useless leg with a local anaesthetic and hands the kit over to Natasha to treat herself. He gets them off the ground. It takes almost an hour, but eventually they are back in safe airspace, and he turns on the autopilot and finally turns to Natasha. She’s leaning back in her seat, pale and tired, still covered in ash from the explosion.
“Are you okay?” he murmurs. He doesn’t mean it literally, because of course she’s not. All it means is you’re not going to die, right? Like, not this second? She nods, and he reaches over and squeezes her hand.
“Rest,” he murmurs. “We’ll be home soon.”
She doesn’t take much convincing, and Clint follows soon after, leaning back in his own seat and closing his eyes. His body is a landscape of cuts and scrapes and pain and panic, but once he’s all fixed up he knows they’ll be right back out here again doing the same thing over again. The thought is exhausting enough that he falls asleep quickly, his partner by his side.
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Я люблю тебя
Clintasha fic
945 words
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Natasha makes a point of knowing everything that goes on around her. Information is power, and though she’s long past the stage where she thought everyone at SHIELD wanted to kill her, she’s still not entirely comfortable with secrets being kept from her. She’s been reprimanded several times and threatened with deportation once for accessing Fury’s private accounts. The latter was a dressing down from the man himself, the only time Phil wasn’t able to cover for her.
But there’s one thing Natasha doesn’t know, and that is that Clint has a workable knowledge of Russian. He started learning in the down days while she was being deprogrammed, when there was nothing else to do except wait in the waiting room. He’s kept it to himself so far. At first he didn’t want her to mock his clumsy accent and terrible phrasing. Then, it was because he found out she sometimes mutters to herself in her native tongue, and it’s useful to be able to decode a language she doesn’t think he speaks.
It feels a little duplicitous, and he often has to remind himself that he is a spy. He’ll tell her eventually, and it’s not like she’s revealed anything sensitive. Usually the things she says are just expletives, and the words match the tone of her voice anyway, so speaking Russian isn’t even necessary for comprehension.
It’s not until things start to settle that he wonders if now is the time to tell her. The dust has well and truly cleared, and they are being sent out into the world as a team. SHIELD no longer views Natasha as a flight risk, but as half of the most successful strike team in the history of the agency.
He doesn’t tell her when they’re in Paris. He has a few opportunities, but it doesn’t strike him as the right time. Besides, he’s learning new conjugations, and he wants to have those down before he reveals himself. He doesn’t tell her when they’re in Montreal. He’s securing his knowledge of alcohol words, which he figures will be useful. In Caracas, she almost discovers his notebook. He thinks for a moment he will have to tell her, but her fingers brush over it while digging for audio equipment misplaced in his bag. Clint feels guilty now, but he still has so much to learn. He needs to do this properly.
In Khartoum, he is sitting on the edge of a bed, watching her move around the tiny kitchen. He decides that now is the time. It’s been a hard day, and they could both use something nice. He opens his mouth, but she turns to him and he snaps it shut again.
“Lock the window,” she says, pointing behind him. He rolls over the bed and slides the bolt home, then pulls the curtains for good measure.
“I think we did well,” he says. “Evac should be here by the morning.”
“You don’t have to fill the silence with talking, you know.”
He clasps his chest. “You don’t wanna talk to me?” he asks, wounded. She smiles, and flips him off. He mimes a shot to the chest, and flops backwards onto the bed. She laughs, and he sits up. Her eyes are sparkling.
“Я люблю тебя,” she mutters, still smiling at him. Clint falters. He thinks he understands, but he can’t have got that right. She wouldn’t have said it. He brushes it off.
A month later, back at HQ, they have finished training for the day, and they’re sprawled on a couch watching TV. Clint is nodding off, his head on his chest, and he feels Natasha get up to leave. He almost rouses himself, but he feels her fingers on his shoulder.
“Я люблю тебя,” she murmurs. It is unmistakeable this time. Clint feigns sleep until the door closes behind her, and then opens his eyes.
I love you. She’s said it twice now, he’s sure. He knows the only reason she’s saying it is she thinks he can’t understand her, which puts him in a difficult spot. He should tell her he speaks Russian. It’s the right thing to do. But if he does, she’ll stop saying it. And he needs to hear it again, he just has to.
She says it twice more before Clint can’t let it go on any longer. They have grown so close, and he knows that even if she doesn’t say it, it’s true. He loves her too - how could he not? They are in perfect balance. They complete each other.
One night over drinks, when he does some stupid trick with a dart and she laughs and he stumbles, they find themselves dancing. It’s clumsy, and slow, but it’s sweet and he wants nothing more than for this to go on forever.
“Я люблю тебя,” she whispers, into his shoulder. I love you.
“Я тоже тебя люблю,” he replies, without thinking. I love you too.
She pulls back instantly. He doesn’t realise what he’s done for a moment, then it clicks.
“You speak Russian?” she demands.
“Not very well,” he says. She seems torn between anger and something else, but he’s not sure what the something else actually is. Clint waits, wondering if this has ruined everything.
“Why?” she asks. They’re standing a foot apart, and Clint is achingly aware of the distance.
“For you,” he says. She takes the step back over to him and before he can wonder if he’s about to get punched, she kisses him. It’s softer than he expected. Tender. Loving. He slides his arms around her and kisses her back.
“Thank you,” she whispers.
“Я люблю тебя,” he replies.
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Everything
Clintasha fic
1,222 words
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“What’s this about?”
Maria stirs sugar into her coffee. She’s never understood the majority of the agency who insist that black coffee is the only way to drink it. Seems unnecessarily macho, but whatever floats their personal boats.
Natasha grips her tea so hard Hill is worried she’s going to shatter the mug. This must be something big. Maybe she’s thinking about defecting. Maybe she already has, and she’s about to launch across the table and attack her.
“Have you ever had feelings for someone you worked with?”
The question is so out of the blue that she almost chokes on her coffee. “What?”
Natasha is silent for a moment, but rephrases. “In the field, did you ever work with someone and develop feelings for them?”
“Once or twice,” Hill says.
“Did you ever act on those feelings?”
“Once or twice.”
Natasha looks surprised, and Maria grins fleetingly before her composed facade returns. “You’re only in trouble if you get caught,” she advises the agent. Natasha still looks troubled, and she softens. “Is this about Clint?” Natasha gauges her tone, and then nods.
“I’m worried that it’ll get in the way of our work.”
“He’s completely in love with you, you know.”
“I know.”
Natasha sips her tea, and Hill considers the problem. “He just thinks you don’t like him. And he doesn’t know that you know.”
“He thinks he’s subtle.”
“About as subtle as a slap in the face.”
Natasha smiles faintly. “So… it would be okay if these feelings… developed?”
Hill nods. “It’s not unusual, or dangerous for this to happen. You just let it flow, and see how things go.”
Natasha nods, and turns her attention back to her tea.
-
“You can’t keep doing this.”
Natasha sits entirely still. It’s odd for Phil, when his charges don’t fidget under his accusatory stare.
“Natasha.”
She raises her eyes to his. It’s like she’s a stubborn child.
“I just wanted to see where he was.”
“Barton’s on a covert mission. Where he is is none of our business.”
“I wanted to know.”
He sighs. “You can’t hack Fury’s computer. You just… you can’t. Okay?”
She shrugs. Phil does not feel like he’s made any impact on her future behaviour. Again, he feels like a bad parent.
“What’s brought this on?” he asks. “Do you not trust Clint? It’s not a dangerous mission, he’ll be back before you know it.”
She looks away, and he gets an idea of exactly what has brought this on. “Okay. Just… try not to get yourself in trouble, Romanoff. I might not be there to cover for you next time.”
-
Natasha can barely hear anything over the thudding of the helicopter blades. She has one hand on the gash in Clint’s side, and her other hand is holding on to something - the edge of a seat maybe - as they veer out of reach of the gunfire. Once they’ve levelled, someone hands her a headset and she scrambles with one hand to put it on.
“-give the rundown,” a voice says through the earpiece. “What happened to him?”
“He got shot,” she shouts, and it’s difficult to roll her eyes given the circumstances, but she still manages. “Clipped his arm. Hit his head on the way down. Stab wound to the thigh that I’m holding closed right now, so would you fucking grab the kit already?”
The copilot tosses a field kit to her and she gets to work. The leg wound is first and deepest, and gushing a lot of blood. She cauterises it, thankful that he’s unconscious.
“Is he going to be okay?” the pilot asks through the headset.
“He doesn’t get to die until I say so,” she answers.
-
Unconscious in a hospital bed, at another time, with another injury, Clint doesn’t hear her pacing. She has no one to talk to, so she talks to him.
“And another thing. Who doesn’t check their magazine before they dive out to shoot? Idiot.”
He doesn’t answer. She’s not expecting him to, but ranting at him helps.
“You didn’t even give me a chance to have your back. If you had, the worst you would have gotten would be a few cuts and scrapes. Now look at you.”
She sighs, and goes back to the chair by his bedside. “When you wake up, we’re going to have a serious talk about forward planning in the field. I’ll write a list of all the ways you were an idiot, and you can read them back to me so I know you understand.”
“Natasha?”
Phil has coffee. He’s the only one who hasn’t tried to convince her to sleep. Mostly because he knows that’s an argument he’ll lose in record time.
“Thanks,” she says, taking the paper cup. “The doc says he’ll be up and about in a couple of days.”
“Good,” Phil says. “I’m sure he’d be glad you’re here.”
“He’d be annoyed,” she grins. “Natasha, you should sleep. Natasha, you don’t have to be here. Natasha, quit watching me sleep, it’s creepy.”
Phil gives a little smile. “Still. He wouldn’t send you away.”
“No,” she says, looking at her partner. “He wouldn’t.”
-
“Tell him.”
“He already knows.”
“He doesn’t. Tell him.”
Natasha glares at Hill from across the training mats. “He’s not an idiot.”
“Yes he is. Tell him.”
She shakes her head. “I don’t think I can. I don’t know how to have that conversation.”
“Clint, I’m in love with you. Let’s do it.”
“God damn it, Hill-”
“Fine. Let’s spar. Winner tells Barton you’re in love with him.”
“You can’t be serious.”
Maria looks at her, and Natasha can see she’s absolutely serious.
“Do you really want him to hear this from me?” the woman asks.
“Fine,” Natasha groans. “I’ll tell him.”
“If you don’t-”
“I know, I know.”
-
Years after she tells him, after their first kiss, and other firsts, she sits by a window in a facility in upstate New York. The world is a different place now.
“I remember how things used to be,” she tells Wanda. “Right back at the start. I guess it’s more complicated now.”
“Some things aren’t complicated,” Wanda says. Natasha has to smile.
“You’re right,” she says. “Some things aren’t. But sometimes it feels like the world has changed faster than I can change to keep up with it.”
“How do you stay grounded?” Wanda asks. “When everything comes apart, what keeps you together?”
“Clint,” she says, and there’s no hesitation. “He’s my constant. Anything could happen, and I know he’d be right there with me, always. Same as the first day I met him.”
“He means a lot to you,” Wanda murmurs.
“He’s everything,” Natasha says. The phrase isn’t heavy. It doesn’t heap any responsibility on that link. It’s just light, and easy. Clint is her whole world, and she knows she’s his.
Clint is standing just out of sight in the doorway. He knows he shouldn’t listen, but he hears what she’s saying and it warms him. He’ll text her, he thinks. He’ll spare her having to apologise for being mushy, even though he would never think less of her for it. It makes him happier than anything else could, knowing he means as much to her as she does to him. Back in his apartment, he sends the message and waits for Natasha.
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Double Bed
Clintasha fic
968 words
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Another day, another mission, another tiny, shitty safehouse. More of an apartment this time, actually, but Clint doesn’t really care. They’ve been on the move for two days, and he desperately needs to sleep. They have the apartment rigged, so neither of them has to keep watch. They’ll be here on observation for at least three days. Just the thought of the impending boredom is enough to exhaust him, and Clint is already in bed, his eyes closed, when he senses a presence nearby. He opens his eyes.
“Move.”
Clint blinks. Natasha is standing over him, in a t-shirt and leggings.
“This is my bed,” he says.
“It’s the only bed, genius,” she tells him.
Clint sits up. “What?”
“One bed,” she says. “It’s not exactly a big place. Where did you think they were hiding the second bedroom? There’s not even room for a couch.”
She pushes back the covers and gets in. Clint obligingly rolls over to the other side of the double. It’s not that they haven’t slept near each other before, but it’s never been for more than a night. They could be here for a week.
Natasha doesn’t seem to be bothered at all, so Clint tries to put it all out of his mind. It’s just a mission. Having to cosy up is an occupational hazard. They’re professionals, they’ll get over it.
He manages to drift off for a while, but wakes with one arm numb from sleeping on his side. He tries to roll onto his back, but runs into an obstacle. Natasha’s leg is extended all the way across the mattress and into what should technically be called his side of the bed. He moves as best he can, gingerly trying to avoid touching her. He doesn’t want her to wake up and think he’s trying something.
He wakes again a couple of hours later, squashed against the wall. Natasha has her back against his side, and she has moved right into the middle of the bed. Clint tries to ease her back over to one side, but she is surprisingly difficult to move. He has to stand up and climb over her to the free side of the bed so he can lie down again. Then comes the problem of the covers. Natasha has cocooned herself in the comforter, so Clint is left with just a corner of it and one ratty blanket. He makes do, and eventually falls into a fitful sleep until dawn breaks.
He is already up and in the kitchen when Natasha gets up. She has a shower, and then joins him. He is surly, not having slept for very long at all, but they don’t need to talk much. Their day is spent setting up equipment, testing, talking to Phil over the phone, and other things that in the lives of spies are almost mundane.
Clint is already dreading the night when the evening comes. Natasha changes into her soft sleeping shirt, and he massages his neck in anticipation.
“Do you want the wall side?” she asks, stretching.
“I don’t mind,” he says. Doesn’t matter anyway.
Natasha slides into the bed, and moves over to the wall. Clint represses a sigh, and takes the other side.
This time, he wakes up right on the edge of the bed. Natasha’s knee is somehow in the small of his back, and he tries to correct his position but he shifts the wrong way, and the shitty mattress gives way. He rolls onto the floor with a thump, and swears.
“You okay?” Natasha, groggy, appears overhead.
“Yeah,” he mutters. One saving grace is that she moves back over, so he can at least lie in his own spot until they both fall asleep.
By the time he wakes up on the second morning, he’s woken up three times during the night to extricate himself from some ridiculous sleeping position brought on by Natasha hogging the bed. He just doesn’t understand how she can possibly take up so much space. The bed isn’t tiny, by all logic they should be able to share it without issue, but Clint still has a sore back and is increasingly crabby from lack of sleep. Natasha doesn’t comment on it during the day, but he can tell she notices.
On the third night, Clint gives up completely and sleeps on the floor with just a pillow and one of the shitty blankets. It’s hideously uncomfortable, but he gets a couple of hours of uninterrupted sleep. Natasha wakes him up, assuming he’s fallen out of bed again, and instead of telling her it’s because she’s sleeping like a damn starfish, Clint just climbs back into bed to start all over again.
On the fourth night, he’s at breaking point. He falls asleep quickly, thanks to his ongoing sleep deprivation, ready to wake in a couple of hours either on the point of falling out of bed or actually on the floor.
Instead, he wakes to sunlight streaming through the curtains, and a warm weight on his chest. Natasha is draped over him, one leg thrown over his legs, her arm over his torso and her head and shoulder resting on his chest. Her head is nestled in the crook of his neck. Clint doesn’t move, for fear of waking her up. He knows it’s accidental - she’s moved like this in the night, but somehow instead of pushing him out she’s just flopped on top of him. He pretends to be asleep when she wakes up and guiltily crawls off him.
Later in the day, they get the all clear to proceed. All the equipment gets packed away, and they leave the apartment and its awful bed. Clint has learned a couple of new things about his partner, and he won’t soon forget.
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Islands
Clintasha fic
654 words
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Wanda is used to feeling lonely. Her room at the facility is comfortable, and even has a few home comforts that Vision has brought for her. She loves to walk in the grounds, feel the sun on her face. The team is much more comfortable around her now, but anyone else who comes to visit always looks at her with slightly guarded faces. One man asked her once if she could read his mind.
Her link with Pietro is what she misses most. She always felt him in the back of her mind, a buzz in her skull telling her that he was okay. After Sokovia, after the bullets and the blast, it’s gone. She can’t feel anyone like she felt him, although her link with Vision comes close sometimes. It’s nice to have a romantic connection, and she just knows that her brother would disapprove.
She watches the others around each other. She knows that Tony’s emotions run deep, and he forces them down below the surface when he can, so as to avoid uncomfortable situations. Steve wears his heart on his sleeve, and will speak directly when he has something on his mind. Bruce is something of a mystery. She senses the duality in him, and the constant turmoil. It’s nice to see him just reading, or drinking coffee in the mornings. That is when he is most at peace. Sam and Rhodey are soldiers, tactical but able to relax when they want.
She likes watching Clint and Natasha the most. Wanda goes out of her way to spend time with them, just to watch them together. They orbit each other with the practiced grace that comes from years of partnership. They know each other completely. It is a joy to watch.
In the mornings, she watches them make breakfast. Natasha puts on the toast while Clint starts up the coffee machine. Their eyes meet. Coffee? Yes. Toast? Yes. It’s unspoken, but even the least significant communication is easily understood. Natasha plates their breakfast and Clint hands her a coffee. They move to the table together, and sit. Wanda can almost hear a conversation between them.
Their link is strong, she thinks, because it is only to each other. She and Pietro were similar. When the world was unstable, and everything was falling to pieces, the only solid ground was him. She sees that in Natasha and Clint. The difference is that they don’t yearn for links to anything else. They don’t care that the world is chaos around them. They are each other’s islands in the storm, and content to stay that way.
In the training centre, Wanda watches from above while they spar. It is rare that they can surprise each other. Their style is a language, and they are both fluent, and the only ones who speak it. It’s more like a dance than a fight. When they’re done, neither has to tap out. They both sense that the fight is over, and she passes him a water bottle as he hands her a towel.
She knows they love each other. The team doesn’t seem to see it, but Wanda knows that connections like that are rare. She sees it in meetings, when Natasha nudges him to keep him awake, and smiles so faintly that no one else catches it. She sees it in the lounge, when they drink side by side, barely touching yet inseparable. She sees it on missions, when they lock eyes and have arguments without saying a word, then use the tiniest of touches to convey the most vast and weighty of emotions.
Wanda witnesses their connection and admires its strength and beauty. It is rare, in this world, in this time, to find two people who can read each other’s minds. This is not a superpower. It is the prize for decades of trust and companionship. It is love, and it is their strength.
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Early Riser
Clintasha fic
628 words
-
It’s not unusual for a safehouse to have one bed. Apartments can be hard to come by in cities, and they are often less conspicuous if they’re smaller. Clint is used to cramped quarters, and he’s shared rooms with people countless times. Natasha is no different, he tells himself.
When they finally make it back to their less than opulent accommodation, they are exhausted. Clint showers, then clears out of the bathroom to let Natasha wash. He makes sure everything is ready for the morning - they can’t be extracted from the city, so they have to catch an early bus out to somewhere a little more remote.
“It’s a single bed,” he says, gesturing to it. “You can take it if you want. I’ll sleep on the floor.”
“It’s freezing,” she points out. “It’s okay, I’ll stay up. I can sleep on the bus.”
“You’re exhausted,” he protests.
“So are you.”
He can’t come up with a retort, and she sighs. “It’s okay. We can share. We’ve slept in worse places.”
Even over the short span of their partnership so far, that is true. Clint nods, and climbs into the bed, shuffling as close to the wall as he can manage. Natasha climbs in next to him, and they turn so they are on their sides, backs pressed up against each other. Natasha pulls the blankets over them. The fatigue negates the discomfort, and soon they are asleep.
Clint has never been a restless sleeper, but he’s not used to the weight beside him in the bed. He wakes more than once in the night, and the third time he rouses he feels an arm flopped over his waist. Natasha has rolled over and is pressed against his back, her face in his neck. He shifts, uncomfortable, and ends up on his back. Natasha stirs, and then snuggles up in her sleep, her arm winding around his waist again. Clint drifts off, unsure if he’s dreaming.
When he wakes, the first rays of the sun are filtering through the dirty window. His watch alarm is beeping, and he groggily clicks it off, then realises that Natasha is wrapped around him. Her leg is between his thighs. Her head is on his shoulder. Her lips are brushing his neck. Then he realises something else.
Natasha wakes. She opens her eyes and sees him looking at her, then starts guiltily, moving her leg and retracting her arm.
“Sorry,” she mumbles. “Must have got cold.”
“S’okay,” Clint replies, his voice strained. “No problem. It’s fine.”
“You okay?” she asks. She rolls out of bed, and grabs her clothes. Clint sits up, tactfully covering his crotch with the blanket.
“Come on,” she says. “Get ready.”
“I just need… a minute,” he says. She looks at him, uncomprehending, then looks at what he’s covering, and her cheeks go faintly red.
“I’ll go get coffee,” she says, biting her lip. Clint is vaguely relieved that this is as embarrassing for her as it is for him. He wasn’t planning on waking up wrapped around her. His body reacts to her in ways he can’t stop. She closes the door, and he swears. The embarrassment is finally enough to relieve him slightly, and he glares accusingly at his own groin for a few moments before heading to the bathroom to step into a cold shower.
When Natasha gets back, she doesn’t speak. Clint doesn’t either. They get on the bus, and make their quiet, awkward way to the extraction point.
“I’m sorry,” he mutters, an hour later.
“It’s fine,” she says, shaking her head. “Let’s…”
“Never talk about it again?”
She nods, and finally smiles. Clint rests his head against the glass of the window. Tension relieved for the time being, the bus rumbles on.
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Nina
Avengers/Clintasha fic
1,346 words
Part 2
-
The observation deck can be fun, especially when the new recruits are training. The evening is winding on towards dinner, which will be called in just under two hours. Natasha leans on the rail, watching from her unlit spot. It suits her to be invisible.
Below her, they are scattered around the weights, agility courses, and sparring mats. There are almost thirty of them altogether. Though she knows she should focus on a range of things, Natasha finds her eyes invariably drawn back to the sparring mats.
There are four bouts happening at once. Two pairs of boys are fighting, and one pair of girls. The fourth pair is split, one boy on one girl. They are not evenly matched. Natasha watches them closely for a moment. The male rookie has about half a foot on the girl. He is lunging and swinging aggressively, and she is doing her best to dodge his strikes, but every third hit or so is landing hard. Natasha winces as a foot connects with the girls ribs, sending her staggering backwards. She is nimble, but outmatched, and she isn’t using her speed and her size to her advantage.
“I thought I’d find you lurking up here.”
She is so engrossed in the fight that she hasn’t heard Clint appear behind her. Natasha turns her head briefly to acknowledge him, then returns her attention to the losing battle being fought below her.
“Watching someone?” He moves over to the railing beside her.
“Top right mat,” she says, and points. “The girl.”
Clint watches for a few moments, and she feels him tense as another strike lands.
“He should know better,” he mutters. “What’s he fighting a tiny girl like that for?”
Natasha watches in silence as the girl cedes the fight and stumbles off the mats to sit by the wall. The assassin isn’t sure if the girl is wiping sweat or tears from her face, but she wants to run down to the floor and pull her from the fray.
“Nina Orlov,” Clint says. Natasha glances over, and sees that he’s pulled out a tablet. She takes it from him, and reads through the profile on the screen.
“Seventeen,” she murmurs. “They’re starting her at seventeen now?”
“She scored higher than anyone else on every exam, and she’s already fluent in four languages. Guess she was too valuable to keep in training for much longer.”
“She’s so young,” Natasha sighs.
Clint arches an eyebrow. “You’re going to do something stupid, aren’t you?” he mutters. Natasha nods. “Be careful,” he tells her.
“Always am,” she replies.
-
Natasha accesses the system finds a copy of Nina’s timetable. The rookies have dinner for another twenty minutes, and then the girl is scheduled for an evening group session with a weapons specialist. Natasha calls the instructor and swiftly informs him that Nina won’t be there. The man doesn’t argue with her, but he sounds confused. Natasha has neither the time not the patience to explain things to him, so she hangs up.
A group of boys are emerging from the cafeteria as she arrives. They are elbowing each other and laughing about something, but the laughter stops dead as they see the agent come to a halt in front of them. She eyes them coolly, and they scurry off, trying not to glance back over their shoulders. She waits, and soon she spots the person she’s after.
“Orlov,” she calls. The girl jump, and flushes when she sees who has called her name.
“I’m Romanoff,” Natasha says.
“I… I know,” Nina manages. “I… have I done something wrong?”
Natasha shakes her head. “You’re not in trouble. I want to talk to you about your training session today.”
Nina blushes. “You saw that?” Natasha nods, and her blush deepens. “I’m sorry. I’ll… I’ll work harder.”
“Come with me,” Natasha says. She turns and walks away. She has a reputation to maintain, after all, and it won’t do to let any protectiveness show in public. She doesn’t have to wonder if the recruit is following her. They make their way through several restricted doors, and she can feel the poor girl getting more and more nervous the further they go. Eventually, Natasha opens the door to her own quarters, and ushers Nina inside. The girl looks around in awe, clearly aware of where she is. Natasha closes the door, and finally lets her expression soften a little.
“I’m making tea,” she says. “Do you want some?”
Nina looks bewildered, and Natasha gestures for her to sit on one of the couches. Nina does, and Natasha goes into her kitchen and makes two mugs of tea, which she brings back to the lounge. Nina accepts a mug from the assassin, and now she is as confused as she is awestruck.
“How are you feeling?” Natasha asks, as she sits opposite the girl.
“Tired,” Nina answers, carefully. Natasha sighs, and wraps her hands around her hot mug.
“This isn’t a test,” she tells the girl. “I saw your session today, and I wanted to make sure you were okay. It can be hard, being somewhere new. Especially for someone as young as you.”
Nina bristles. “I’m only two years younger than most of them.”
Natasha laughs, but softly, gently. “Don’t take it as an insult. We both know it’s impressive for you to have been brought up from training so young. I just know that it can be hard.”
“I’m sorry,” Nina says. “I’m used to having to defend myself.”
“The others will be jealous,” Natasha says. “They’ll use your age as an excuse to single you out.”
“You singled me out,” Nina observes.
“Because I wanted to talk to you.” Natasha pauses for a moment. “I’m going to request that you be removed from the cadet program.”
Nina gapes at her, horrified. “No!” she exclaims, looking panicked. “You can’t! I know… I know I’m young, and I’m not as strong as some of the others, but I’m trying, I’ll get better-”
“Nina,” Natasha interrupts, laying a hand on the girls arm. “Calm down. I want to remove you from the program so I can take on your training myself.”
Nina glances around her, as if trying to work out whether she’s being set up for some joke.
“Why?” she asks softly, after a long silence. “I’m… I’m just… and you’re…”
“SHIELD needs more agents like you,” Natasha says. “You’re wasting your time with people like that boy in the training centre.”
“He’s not that bad,” Nina protests. “He’s just insecure. He wanted an easy win after being dropped about six times in a row.”
Natasha eyes her approvingly. “You’re good with people, aren’t you?”
Nina blushes again, and shrugs. Natasha smiles.
“Think it over,” she says. “I’ll come and find you in a few days, and you can let me know what you decide then.”
Nina finishes her tea, and Natasha takes the mug for her. She walks the girl to the door, and pauses for a moment, keying a few things into the access panel.
“This will give you access through the way you came if you want to come and see me,” she says. Nina looks astonished, and Natasha resists the strong temptation to give her a hug.
“Thank you,” Nina says. Natasha nods, and opens the door for her. She watches the girl go, and then flops onto the couch.
Clint arrives ten minutes after she messages him.
“How did you go?” he asks. “Adopted her yet?”
“Almost,” she sighs. “I think she has real potential. She’s smart. Intuitive.”
“Plus, her name starts with the same letter as yours.”
She laughs. “Shut up.”
“I’m just preparing you. That’s the first thing that Tony’s going to make fun of.”
She thinks for a moment. “Maybe she should meet the team.”
Clint frowns. “You really think she’s this good?”
Natasha nods, and her partner sighs. “Fine. I know if you like her I’ll like her. Let’s take her upstate the next time we go. Call it work experience.”
Natasha smiles at him. “Steve’s gonna love her.”
-
#in the interest of actually posting day 6 on day 6 this is not finished#request the rest#AC19#day 6#fic#avengersfic#clintashafic#clintashashield#clint barton#natasha romanoff
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The Meeting
Avengers/Clintasha fic
1,240 words
for @liz-a-bell <3
Read Part 1
-
“Woah.”
Natasha has to agree. The view of the facility from the window of the quinjet is pretty spectacular. She prefers this to the tower, without a doubt. It’s nice to be close to the ground. Besides, fewer people gather to watch them land when they’re upstate instead of the centre of Manhattan. Clint pilots the jet down to the landing pad, and then they taxi off into one of the hangars. Nina is glued to the window, staring out at the flashy facility. A few hours ago, she was in weapons class. Natasha summoned her, handed her a duffel bag, and then they were on their way here.
“Nat!”
Sam is waving to them from a balcony above, in a building Tony has dubbed ‘the barracks’. The barracks is not, however, army-standard accommodation, but a collection of brand-new apartments, fully fitted with all the tech and creature comforts Tony could fit in for each of them. Natasha leads the way over to the building, and Sam emerges from a stairwell when they enter the foyer. He jogs over and wraps Natasha in a hug, claps Clint on the shoulder, and then pauses on Nina.
“Sam,” he says, holding out his hand.
“Nina,” she answers. She’s keeping her cool, and Natasha is impressed.
“This the trainee?” Sam asks. Natasha inclines her head. “Okay,” he nods. “Cool. Welcome. Tony’s over in the lounge, and a couple others are coming in for the meeting tonight.”
“Meeting?” Nina asks Natasha, as they leave the barracks and head for the central building of the complex.
“Kind of,” Natasha says. “We get together once every few months, formally to have a meeting, but really just to see each other.”
“Plus, I get lonely,” Sam calls over his shoulder. Natasha laughs, and Nina tries to relax a little.
In the main building, Sam leads them into a sleek, modern lounge, where Tony Stark is sitting with a coffee, reading something off a tablet.
“Stark,” Sam calls. Tony looks up.
“Who’s that?” he asks. He walks over, and dodges Natasha’s attempt to block him. He looks down at Nina. “She doesn’t have clearance. Who are you?” Nina gapes. “Speak,” he snaps.
“Nina,” she says. “I’m Nina.”
“That means nothing to me. What are you, their secret kid?”
“I’m a trainee,” she says, recovering herself. Natasha has warned her about Tony Stark. “Agent Romanoff took me on from the cadet program.”
“I don’t remember inviting you to my house,” Tony says.
“I didn’t see your name on it,” she retorts. Clint snorts, and Nina maintains eye contact.
“Okay,” Tony nods. “Small but strong. You’ll get on well with Lang.” He turns back to the bench. “She’s not security cleared, so I don’t want to see her down in the labs. Romanoff, you want a coffee?”
“Please,” Natasha says. “Black for me, Nina takes milk and sugar.”
“I take it black too,” Clint says, waving a hand. “Hello?”
Tony makes coffee, and they sit around the end of the bench. Clint and Natasha are talking to Tony about weapons upgrades, so Sam turns to Nina.
“So, did they get you through the Army?” he asks. She smiles. He’s good.
“Airforce cadets,” she says. “Straight out of high school. They offered me the college scholarship, but I wanted to get in the thick of it.”
“No family?”
“A grandma in Canada,” she says. “I email her sometimes. She’s not big on the defence forces so she doesn’t ask too many questions.”
“And Romanoff isn’t pushing you too hard?”
She smiles, and shakes her head. “I can take it. She’s taught me how to flatten the douchebags in cadets. That’s worth any amount of pain.”
Sam laughs. “I can see why she likes you.”
Nina looks over at Natasha, who looks away but can’t hide her smile. Watching Nina’s ability to charm and befriend people with no ulterior motive, just as herself, it’s like the girl has her own superpower.
-
The ‘meeting’ lasts for around fifteen minutes, and mostly consists of catching each other up on where they’ve been, what they’ve been doing, and making sure no one’s violated any federal or international laws recently. It then becomes what is very obviously a party, albeit a laid back one. There is beer - not for Nina, that seems to be the one law they don’t want to break - and snacks, and the atmosphere is far less formal than Nina was expecting for an Avengers meeting.
“Are you from New York?”
Steve has appeared by the couch Nina is sitting on. Clint has brought her a soda with a curly straw, but seeing as no one’s mocking her for it, it’s actually kind of nice. The soldier sits, waiting for her answer.
“My mom’s family was from Ontario,” she says. “My grandma still lives in Ottawa. I’m pretty sure I was born in Missouri, not really sure what happened after that. I grew up in a home in Flatbush.”
“Brooklyn,” he says, and his voice is warm. She knows what it’s like to love that place. It wasn’t an easy childhood, but she loved living there.
“We used to walk past your apartment building on the way to school,” she says. “There’s a plaque on the wall with your name and an engraving. Looks nothing like you.”
“I’ve seen it,” he smiles.
“I was about ten when they found you,” she says. “I thought, if he can survive that, then I can survive this. It’s cheesy, but it kind of helped.”
He looks touched, and looks at his beer, embarrassed. She smiles. “Sorry. You take what you can get in the way of heroes, and you’re a pretty good one.”
He clears his throat, and nods. “It’s weird, sometimes. I never did any of this to be a hero. I just wanted to help.”
“I get that. I joined up to help too.”
They chat about Brooklyn and the war and other things, and from across the room Natasha watches. Clint is drinking beside her.
“Told you he’d like her,” she says, like he ever doubted it.
“Shared experience,” he says. “They both wanted to serve, they both got a chance to do something more. And she’s like you.” Natasha raises her eyebrows. “Recruited into a specialised program, trained…”
He stops, because Natasha is looking at him in a pained way, and he suddenly understands that it’s because she’s thinking of the Red Room, and about how she had no choice in her upbringing.
“Hey,” he murmurs. He takes hold of her arm. “That’s not what this is. You know that.” He gestures over to where Nina is animatedly recounting to Steve a tale of a sparring match from the SHIELD gym. “Look at her. This is what she loves. She wants to fight, and she wants to help. Steve doesn’t regret the sacrifices he made, and Nina will be the same. Only she won’t have to lose anything. We won’t let that happen.”
She looks at him, her mouth half open. “Of course I’m going to help you,” he says, brushing off her unasked question. “Don’t be a dumbass.”
She punches him lightly in the shoulder, and then leans against him.
“You really think we won’t screw her up?” she asks. Nina is laughing now, completely at ease surrounded by heroes and gods.
“I’m sure we will,” Clint says. “But she’ll love us anyway.”
Natasha sighs, and squeezes his hand.
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Hot Wine
571 words
~ not exactly to the prompt but hey ~
-
“I bet you fifty bucks that the guy with curly hair cries before the afternoon is up.”
The newbies are milling around the gym, glancing over at the two assassins. Clint is strapping his hands, and Natasha is shedding her jacket and tying up her hair. They look apprehensive.
“Make it a hundred. My money’s on long dark hair at the back.”
“Who’s gonna hook up first?”
Natasha glances over the recruits, a smirk playing over her face. They avert their gazes nervously, unaware that the two agents are betting on them.
“Blondie and the brunette over there.”
They move towards the ring, and the recruits gather. They are fresh from the Academy, and this is the first month out of cadetship for every single one of them. They’re absolutely terrified of the two people who are advancing on them with weirdly eager smiles.
“It’s gonna take five minutes for you to scare them shitless,” Clint grins, switching from Russian to Spanish. Natasha laughs, and looks out over the group of pale faces.
“Who here speaks Russian?” she asks, in Russian. A couple of people raise their hands.
“How about Chinese?” she asks, switching languages again. A couple more hands, more than for Russian, at which she has to roll her eyes.
“Might have to use Latvian,” she murmurs in Latvian to Clint.
“Egg sausage,” he replies, and she remembers how disastrous their last mission there was when her partner could only name the food and alcohol he liked.
“Great,” she smiles. “Latvian it is.”
She switches to English, and waves the troops closer. The gaggle of recruits shuffles in, and she gives her usual curt pep talk, outlining the circuit course and how they will be evaluated and split into groups. They split, and Natasha glances at her partner.
“Twenty bucks and a beer on the tall guy to be the first to Medical,” she murmurs, switching back to the northern European dialect.
“I would like many beer, please,” he shoots back.
“How do you know so little and have such a good accent?”
“Hot wine.”
She rolls her eyes, and he laughs, heading over to the agility segment of the course. They meet up again after half an hour of torturing the newbies with cardio.
“We didn’t bet on the first vomit,” Clint says, in Portugese.
“One hour mark. I think… that girl that’s downed her whole water bottle in the last five minutes.”
They have the trainees doing push ups for an interminably long time when he moves towards her, his face set in a stern expression.
“I’m so fucking bored,” he complains, starting the sentence in Japanese and switching to Russian halfway through. They’ve figured that most of the recruits speak a few languages, so it’s safest just to confuse the hell out of them. Not that anyone is listening. They’re all trying their hardest not to be the second person to vomit.
“Patience,” she replies in Russian, knowing full well that some of them can understand her. “You’ll be rewarded.”
He grins, and she snaps at a trainee who has slipped from his position.
Later, as the ex-cadets are filing morosely out of their first session, sweaty, pale-faced and confused, Clint catches her eye. Natasha signs something incredibly filthy across the trainees’ heads, and he almost chokes.
“Black coffee,” he calls after her in Latvian. She flips him off, laughing as she walks away.
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Little Brother
Clintasha fic
1,283 words
-
They know they’re fucked when the first grenade goes off. When the second explodes, they’re already running. Gunshots are ringing out, so they duck, and zigzag, trusting in the smoke and flashing explosions to keep them covered as they run. Natasha is ahead, and it’s only when she turns her head to check that Clint is behind her that she sees it.
Then they are out in the open, sprinting for the nearest jackable vehicle.
“Cameras,” she hisses, as they scream away from the smoking building. “Fucking cameras, why didn’t I see them?”
Clint groans, and thumps his head against the headrest. “Fuck.”
“Fuck is fucking right. We need to be far away. Now.”
Clint grabs one of the burners in the centre console, and taps in a number. Natasha doesn’t know who he’s calling, but it’s only going to be one of about five people in the world, so she focuses on driving without lights and not crashing into anything.
“It’s me,” Clint mutters. Natasha hears the crackle of someone with bad reception talking back. Clint keeps talking, and she listens for any clues as to where to head next.
“Eight hours. Maybe. Where are we?”
“Denver,” she says, squinting at a sign as they whizz past it.
“Okay. Ten hours. More if we take a roundabout route.”
More crackling from the other end.
“Thanks, man. I owe you.”
Clint tosses the burner back in the console.
“Who was that?” Natasha asks. She has an idea - there are a finite number of places that are ten hours away, and Clint doesn’t have as many secrets from her as he thinks he does. Clint doesn’t reply, and she doesn’t press.
An hour out of Denver, she switches the lights on, and checks the gas. Enough to last them until dawn. Emergency kits and crash bags have all been left behind, and besides, the car they came in is shot to shit and on fire an hour behind them, so there will be no food until they arrive at wherever they’re going.
If it were any other car trip, Natasha would have told Clint to sleep, but she is still buzzing with adrenaline and one of her ears isn’t working properly, so she wants him awake and aware. Besides, he needs to give her directions.
The drive is long. As the sun comes up, they cross into Montana, and Clint seems to relax beside her. They stop for gas, and two hundred miles later, he motions for her to take a right. She swings the car around, and after a good fifteen minutes of bumping along a narrow gravel road, they pull up in front of a weathered little farmhouse.
Clint unlocks the door with a key he finds under a pot plant on the front porch. The house seems empty, but Natasha catches the scent of a recently-used fireplace, and she can feel the residual warmth even though the morning outside is frosty.
“Is this her?”
She has her gun trained on him before she even processes that there’s someone there. Instincts are hard to kick, and the blonde man gives a weary smile and raises his mug. “And good morning to you too.”
Natasha fires a shot into the doorframe beside the man’s ear. He barely winces, and throws Clint a look.
“Who are you?” she asks.
“You know who he is,” Clint yawns. “He’s fine. Promise.”
She holsters her gun with a filthy look at the man leaning against the doorframe.
“Barney,” Clint says, clapping his brother on the shoulder.
“Coffee’s in the pot,” his brother says, as Clint brushes past him into the kitchen. Natasha stands where she is, hackles raised as she takes in the sight of the mythical brother Clint’s said maybe fifty words about in their entire partnership, and whom she’s never seen.
“So you’re Barney.”
“Mmmhmm. Have you guys eaten? There’s no food, I just get pizza delivered or head into town.”
“You get pizza delivered to a safehouse?”
Barney gives a grin that’s eerily familiar. She doesn’t like seeing it on his face.
“The delivery guy’s harmless. Some guy named Brent with about six brain cells and two teeth. He thinks two dollars is a good tip. Nice kid.”
She huffs. Barney has lived in her head all this time as some towering hulk of a man, smarter than Clint, faster, crueller, and (not at all shockingly, she realises) he’s as big of an idiot as his little brother.
“I know,” Barney says, sipping his coffee. “He looks just like me, right?”
“You look just like him, you mean,” she mutters, pushing past him to join Clint in the kitchen. Her partner pours her a coffee, and she finally presses a kiss to his cheek. He still tastes like soot and gunpowder residue, but at least he’s not bleeding from anywhere that counts.
“Wait, woah- what?” Barney demands, staring at them from the door.
“You didn’t tell him?” she growls, most of her relief draining away into exasperation. Clint grimaces apologetically.
“We don’t exactly talk,” he protests. “Besides, it’s none of his business.”
She can’t help but feel a little glow at that. Barney raises his hands.
“Fine,” he says. “Not my place. Whatever. There’s hot water and coffee. I made up two beds, but I guess you don’t need both of them, so… yeah. I’m going to get beer, I’ll get some real food. If you eat that kind of thing.”
He leaves, and Natasha leans against Clint in the silent kitchen. He sips his coffee and she closes her eyes.
“One week. Maximum.”
He laughs. “He’s a piece of shit, but you’ll get used to him. It’s kind of scary how fast it happens.”
“He’s an asshole.”
“So am I.”
“Yeah, but…”
Clint grins, and turns around so he can wrap her up. “I know. I’m infinitely more handsome.”
She doesn’t bother telling him to shut up. He already knows that’s what she wants to say, and he laughs as if she’s said it out loud.
They shower, and when they come back down, Barney’s in the kitchen. Despite appearances, he’s capable of boiling water for pasta, and they sit down to a fairly decent meal. After, the older Barton switches on the TV and they sit with beers in hand, watching in silence. Natasha quickly stops noticing Barney’s presence, and slides down to curl up in Clint’s lap. He slides his fingers into her hair. He jolts when something heavy lands with a thump on his lap, but it’s just Barney throwing a blanket across the room. Clint gives a worn little smile and drapes it over Natasha. Barney leans back in his chair, looking ready to lecture his little brother on life.
“I know,” Clint mutters.
“You know what?”
“Everything you want to warn me about.”
“Sure you do. Let me guess,” Barney sighs. “She’s different.”
“You have no idea.”
“I guess not.”
They sit in silence a little longer.
“She’s a good shot,” Barney mutters.
Clint’s grin is broad, but he doesn’t reply.
“How long can you stay?” his brother asks. He shrugs, shaking his head.
“How long do you want us hanging around?”
Barney just smiles, and shifts in his chair.
Natasha stirs, and sits up, tugging on Clint’s sleeve. He complies without a word, nodding at Barney as they traipse out of the living room and upstairs to the little bedroom Barney has apparently cleaned the crap out of in a hurry. They collapse onto the creaky bed together, and Natasha nudges her head up under his chin.
“He’s a dick,” she murmurs. “I like him.”
Clint kisses her forehead, and they fall asleep, curled up together.
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Purple Blooms
Clintasha fic
893 words
-
Natasha barely has time to catch her breath before her partner is all over her.
“Get off,” she mumbles, irritably pushing him back. Clint persists, and the strong smell of disinfectant fills her senses. Clint dabs the gash on her face again and she hisses, recoiling as the liquid burns through the cut.
“Sit still,” her partner murmurs.
“How the hell did you keep that kit with you the whole time?” she groans, leaning back against the wall. The safe house is more of a safe hovel, but it’ll do until their extraction in the morning. Natasha winces as another swab of disinfectant stings the gash on her cheek.
“Maybe if you didn’t insist on going all kamikaze on me all the time, I wouldn’t have to carry it with me,” Clint mutters. He rocks back on his heels, examining her. “Where else?”
She stays stoically quiet, and Clint rolls his eyes. “C’mon, Romanoff. Don’t make me tear your clothes off.”
“I’d like to see you try,” she mutters, but acquiesces and pulls up her top to reveal a graze across her ribs, bruises already wreathing the broken skin with purple blooms.
“What was this one, then?” Clint sighs, reaching for the disinfectant. “Did this happen before or after the bullet clipped you? And don’t pretend that a bullet didn’t clip you. I saw it happen.”
It’s her turn to roll her eyes. The exasperation is short lived, though, because the feeling of his fingers on her ribs makes her jump, which breaks open another gash on her shoulder. Blood begins to drip down from her shoulder.
“Jesus, Natasha,” Clint murmurs, his voice weak. “How many-”
“Lots.”
Clint purses his lips. “Take off your shirt.”
She obeys with pained passivity. It doesn’t matter if he sees her naked. He’s seen it all before, here and there, changing in tiny safe houses like this one, way back when they were first starting out and she used to walk around with next to nothing on just to see the look on his face. Her shirt is stiff and crusted with dried blood, and it feels good to have it off. For about a second. Then the pain comes back, and she gives a stifled moan, biting down on her lip. Clint just pulls out a pack of gauze and some wet wipes – where the fuck did he even get those?
“Easy,” he murmurs, one hand on her knee as he presses the gauze to her bleeding shoulder. Natasha holds it there, and Clint gets to work on the rest of the dried blood. His fingers are firm and sure, but he is still so gentle with her. She watches in fascination as he gently wipes her skin clean. The white gauze under her fingers slowly soaks up the blood, redness staining the clean fabric. Clint just takes the soaked gauze from her and hands her a new wad. She presses it harder against the cut, gritting her teeth.
“Gently,” he murmurs.
“Have to stop the bleeding,” Natasha mutters, just barely avoiding ending her sentence with ‘moron’.
“You’re hurting yourself.”
She sighs, and doesn’t bother asking him why he would care about that. He’s going to tell her anyway.
“Natasha,” he says.
“Don’t.
“Natasha,” he says again. “You know I hate seeing you in pain.”
She makes a noncommittal sound in the back of her throat, which dies away when he reaches out and grips her shoulder. Even now, he’s being so gentle with her, touching her softly. Treading lightly.
“I want you to be okay.”
She manages to laugh quietly. “I am okay.”
“You’re shirtless and bleeding into a gauze patch.”
“Shut up.”
Clint chuckles, and peels back the gauze, replacing it with another clean square. He tapes it down for her, and unrolls a bandage, winding it carefully around her chest. She doesn’t argue anymore, and she stays where she is even when he goes to his bag and fetches a spare shirt of his for her. Natasha pulls it on, and it’s the closest he’s ever come to giving her a hug.
“Here,” he murmurs, moving around to the back of her chair. “Tilt your head forward. I’ll get the blood out of your hair.”
“How romantic,” she murmurs.
“Don’t ruin the moment,” he laughs. “And take your painkillers.”
For once, she does what she’s told. Anything to keep this easiness going between them. Clint grabs another wipe and begins to work the dried clumps of blood out of her hair. Natasha tries not to lean back into his touch, and doesn’t entirely succeed.
She’s not sure when he stops cleaning her hair and just starts playing with it, but she’s surprised to find that she doesn’t really mind.
“Don’t fall asleep in your chair,” Clint tells her.
“Don’t ruin the moment,” she retorts. He smiles, and offers her his arm. She uses it to claw her way up and out of the chair. Clint walks her to the little bunk on the wall.
“I know, I know,” she mutters. “Get my rest, recover, you’ll take first watch, blah blah blah. Wake me up when the extraction gets here.”
“Will do,” he replies, snapping a mock salute. Natasha’s expression softens into an actual smile.
“Thank you, Clint,” she murmurs.
“Get some sleep,” comes the hesitant reply. Once again, she does as she’s told.
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Digits
Clintasha fic
1,074 words
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They’re both exhausted when they haul themselves to the debriefing. It’s been a long three weeks, and all they want to do is kick back and take some time to themselves, but they still have what looks to be about half an hour of Phil talking at them before they can go.
Clint is the first to start twisting his fingers on the tabletop. He is itching to jump into a hot shower and collapse into bed. He catches Natasha’s eye across the table, and then glances around at the other people. There are a few analysts who were involved with the mission, a couple of senior handlers, and a few junior operatives who look nervous as hell. Clint glances back at Natasha, and gives a tired grin.
I want takeout for dinner, he signs, keeping the movement to a minimum. Luckily, all other eyes are on Phil, who is concentrating on his files. Natasha gives a tired smile and nods.
Chinese or curry? she asks. And maybe a movie.
It’s a date, Clint signs, grinning. Natasha rolls her eyes.
It is not a date, her fingers tell him. The movements are a little sharper, matching her exasperated expression.
Sure it is, he protests. We get takeout, we watch a movie on the couch, we go to bed. How is that not a date?
First of all, Natasha begins, then stops. Phil is looking at her, waiting for an answer to a question she hasn’t heard.
“Sorry?” she asks, sitting up a little straighter. Phil glances at Clint, narrowing his eyes.
“Could you confirm the number of guards that got taken out in the first patrol you encountered?” he asks again.
“Six,” she answers smoothly. Phil’s attention returns to his files, and Natasha’s gaze flicks back to Clint.
First of all, she signs again, I never said anything about going to bed with you.
There is a cough from the end of the table and they glance down, but it’s just one of the rookies shifting in her seat.
It was implied, Clint answers, shrugging. Dinner, a movie… Are you saying you don’t want to go to bed with me?
Of course I do, she answers, rolling her eyes. Don’t be an idiot.
So it is a date, he grins. Natasha glares at him, and he chuckles softly. Phil looks up sharply, and he shuts up fast. They keep their hands to themselves for a couple of minutes before the boredom gets to them again.
I’m kind of tired, he signs across the table. Might not be able to do you up against the wall like last time.
Fine by me, she replies. Couldn’t hold myself up if I tried. I might even let you be on top tonight.
Clint grins. Yeah right. Like you’d ever let me.
I let you when we were in Paris, she protests.
You’d been shot twice, he points out. You weren’t up for being on top of anything, let alone me.
You think you’re hot stuff, don’t you? she asks, a wry smile tweaking the corners of her mouth.
I do, he grins. And I think you are too. Isn’t that why we’re going to fuck each other stupid the second we get out of this briefing?
There’s a choking sound from down the other end of the table, and Clint glances down to see the rookie who coughed earlier spluttering and looking between the two of them. His eyes widen in alarm and he glances back at Natasha.
The rookie’s made us, he signals quickly. Abort.
“Thompson,” Phil says dryly. “Something you want to say?”
“No, Sir,” the rookie says, her voice quiet and her cheeks flaming red. “Sorry, Sir, just a cough.”
Phil’s eyes narrow again, and he looks at the two assassins sitting innocently opposite each other before he returns to his files. Clint glances down at the other end of the table, wondering how he’s missed the fact that someone else in the room understands sign.
Phil wraps up the briefing and they’re free to go. The two assassins move in sync without thinking, and the rookie who spluttered finds herself outside the briefing room being chased down by the formidable pair.
“Hey,” Natasha says, catching her by the arm. The woman flinches, and turns to the two of them with faint terror in her eyes.
“I’m sorry,” she mumbles. “I have to… I’m really busy…”
“You could understand us in there, couldn’t you?” Clint asks sharply. The woman swallows, and nods.
“Thompson, is it?” Natasha asks. She nods again. “The sign we use isn’t standard anywhere, and we made a lot of it up. Explain.”
The agent glances at Clint. “I learned SHIELD standard sign when I was at the Academy,” she tells them. “My mom was mostly deaf, so I already had ASL down pat. The Academy class wasn’t big, and the teacher liked to use a few of his own phrases a lot of the time. He liked improvisation.”
“Lowe,” Clint mutters, shaking his head. “Still teaching the same tricks.”
“Yours is a mixture, right?” she asks. “There were some things I couldn’t pick up, but I got most of it. Were you using a third language in the mix?”
“Russian,” Natasha says. She looks unusually impressed.
“Can I go?” the woman asks, shifting from foot to foot. “I have another debriefing I’m supposed to sit in on.”
Clint nods, and she escapes. The pair turn back just in time to find Phil leaving the room.
“Phil,” Clint says, catching their handler before he can run off. “Who was that rookie down the end of the table?”
“Agent Octavia Thompson,” Phil answers, not looking up from the papers he’s reading. “Fresh out of the Academy.”
“Are you her handler?” Natasha asks. Phil looks up.
“No,” he answers, frowning. “Why?”
“Take her on,” Clint says. “She could translate the sign we were using.”
“I knew you weren’t listening,” Phil mutters. “Wait- she understood it? Half the words you use are made up, how did she manage that?”
“Take her on,” Clint repeats. “I want her working with us when she’s up for field work.”
Phil nods, and scribbles a note on his papers as he walks away. Clint shakes his head, and smiles as he feels Natasha slide an arm around his waist.
“How about that takeout?” she murmurs. Clint glances around, and steals a quick kiss.
“Whatever you say,” he murmurs.
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Fussing
Clintasha fic
892 words
-
“I told you this was a shitty plan,” Clint grunts, as they hit the next roof. The buildings in Aleppo are packed tight, and that makes it easier to dodge the hail of bullets from the men pursuing them.
“Shut up and run,” Natasha pants, as they take the next leap. They thud onto the roof, and there are shouts from behind them.
“We need to make the hotel by ten,” Clint reminds her. “These idiots are going to make it impossible to go in the front door, so we need a clear shot through the window.”
She grunts her assent as they jump yet again. The shouts behind them are getting fainter, but the bullets are still whistling.
“We need to get down to street level,” she says. Clint nods, and gestures to the next gap. It’s a long drop, but he’s spotted a pipe on the building in front of them that they should be able to use to get down. Clint jumps first, hitting the pipe with a thud and sliding inelegantly down to the street. Natasha goes to jump, but a stray bullet clips her arm and she is forced to duck as she jumps. Her hands miss the pipe by a foot, and she falls straight down, hitting the pavement with a heavy sound. Clint hears a crunch and winces, immediately dropping down beside her. Natasha struggles up, shaking it off.
“You okay?” he hisses, as they take off down the alley.
“Yep,” she shoots back, her voice tight with pain. Clint recognises the tone immediately, but they’re still in the open, and he can’t exactly sit her down and patch her up. As they run, he glances at her and sees she’s holding her gun in the wrong hand. Her right is bent at an odd angle, and she’s cradling it against her chest as they sprint.
“Wrist?” he asks, when the hotel comes into view and they duck behind a dumpster to wait.
“Broken,” she shrugs. Clint’s eyes widen, and she waves him off.
“Not important,” she says, shaking her head. Clint knows she has a ridiculously high pain threshold, but this is insane.
“Let me look,” he says. “I think I’ve got the kit still.”
She shakes her head. “No time,” she replies. “And I can’t risk painkillers right now. We need to be alert if we’re going to get to the extraction on time.”
“Nat-”
“It’s just a broken wrist, Clint,” she chides him. “Stop fussing.”
“You’re nuts,” he mutters, and turns his attention back to the mission.
Their target enters the hotel at nine minutes to ten. Clint finds a fire escape up the side of a neighbouring building, and though he tries to convince her to stay on the ground, Natasha climbs first. He has absolutely no idea how she’s pulling herself up on a broken wrist, but he can hear the occasional gasp as they approach the level they need to be on.
Their target enters his hotel room, and switches on the lights. A couple of minutes pass, and he gets in the shower. Clint pulls out his gun, but Natasha stills his hand.
“Let me,” she says firmly.
“Your wrist is broken,” he says, exasperated. Natasha’s refusal to acknowledge any type of pain is going to get her killed. He can see her visibly shoving down the pain of her wrist. Her face is slightly pale, and there is sweat beading on her forehead. Despite all this, he knows he won’t win this argument until she’s unconscious, so he steps back. Natasha aims, resting the gun on her broken wrist, her left forefinger on the trigger. When the target steps out of the bathroom, Clint almost expects her to miss. Almost. She’s got a broken wrist and she’s firing with her weaker hand. But then again, she’s Natasha Romanoff. The target goes down without a sound, and they run.
An hour later, they are on the outskirts of the city. A slight shimmer in the air above them and the hum of an engine is the only indicator that a shielded quinjet is landing. The jet’s door opens, and they climb inside. Only once they’re sitting down, and the jet is taking off again, does Clint feel Natasha collapse against him.
“Fuck,” she spits. “Motherfucking fucking fuck-”
“There we go,” he says wryly. “Where was that an hour ago?”
“Shut up,” she snaps. He sighs, and grabs the medical kit the pilot has left for them.
“You would have done the same,” she tells him. “I need to keep a handle on my pain to make sure I stay efficient and- ow, Clint.”
He interrupts her by sticking her with a syringe of morphine.
“This is for your own good,” he says sternly. Natasha keeps on swearing, but within five minutes she’s clearly in less pain, and Clint begins the basic procedure of splinting and binding her wrist.
“I could have waited until we got back for painkillers,” she grumbles later, as she lies in his lap in the back of the jet. Clint tucks her hair behind her ear and shakes his head in disbelief.
“You’re good,” he says. “But you don’t have to be that good, okay?”
“I hate you,” she mumbles. He laughs softly, and takes her uninjured hand as the jet flies them home.
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Reservoir
Clintasha fic
1,139 words
-
The extraction team is less than a mile away. If he strains, Clint can almost convince himself that he hears the engines of the chopper on its way to pull them out of this frozen hellhole. He sits on the edge of the reservoir with Natasha, exhausted, and ready to go home.
“I’m not gonna miss this pack,” Natasha grumbles, rubbing her shoulders where the pack is cutting into them. They have been trekking the jungle for almost three weeks, laden down with a huge amount of equipment.
“This is why we have to stop saying yes to SciOps,” Clint replies, trying to stretch his neck. “When we get back I’ll let them know that they can send their drones into dangerous territory next time.”
“They needed us to work the equipment,” Natasha reasons.
“Like hell they did,” he groans, trying to lean back. “Twenty days, and no sign of any soldiers. No sign of anyone at all.”
The ledge they are sitting on is not quite wide enough for the packs to sit beside them. All the data they have collected is safely on the servers back at SHIELD, but Clint’s half-joking suggestion that they ditch the equipment was met with stony silence from their handler, who then proceeded to detail exactly how many millions of dollars the equipment in their packs is worth.
Natasha groans, and then hisses sharply, her hand going to her thigh.
“You okay?” he asks, frowning.
“Cramp,” she mutters, massaging her leg. “This damn ledge isn’t helping.”
She pulls her leg up, trying to stretch it out. Clint sees far too late that her legs were her counterbalance. Her pack tips backwards, and he has just enough time for his mouth to open to warn her before she pitches backwards off the ledge. Clint lunges, his own pack making the movement awkward, and grabs her arm. Her legs are sliding off the ledge. She grabs him, just before she falls, and then he is holding her, suspended over the thirty foot drop towards the dark water below.
“Drop the pack!” he shouts. She shrugs it off one shoulder, but the other shoulder is still attached.
“Have to switch hands!” she grunts. He reaches down with his other hand and she takes it, letting go with the other. The pack falls for a sickeningly long time before it crashes into the water. Clint sighs, relieved, and pulls Natasha up.
Her hand slips. He is only fleetingly aware of a change in the strain on his arms before she makes a tiny gasping sound. Then he is holding nothing, scrambling to regain his balance on the ledge. He shouts, wordlessly, as Natasha falls. She hits the water with a smack, and sinks. He waits, horrified. She will resurface. The water will be cold, but she’s had worse.
He can hear his comms buzzing in his ear and he slams the button.
“Clint?” Phil is saying, his voice urgent. “We just lost Natasha’s tracker. What’s going on? Clint?”
“She fell,” Clint gasps, already shrugging off his own pack. One and a half million dollars’ worth of equipment falls off the other side of the ledge, crashing down towards the river below. “She’s in the reservoir.”
Natasha surfaces, and for a moment Clint is relieved. Then he realises that he can’t see her face. Only the back of her head. She’s floating on her front.
“She’s unconscious,” he shouts into his earpiece. “I’ve gotta get her, Phil, she’s going to drown- get the damn extraction here!”
“Clint!” Phil shouts. “Don’t-”
Clint has already jumped. In the brief seconds he is falling, he folds his arms across his chest, unclenches his jaw and takes a deep breath. He can hear Phil yelling in his ear, and then he slams into the water. He shoots down under the surface, the cold hitting him like a physical blow. As soon as he stops shooting down, he begins to kick for the surface, holding his breath in to buoy him upwards.
He breaks the surface about ten feet from Natasha, and swims for her. The bank of the reservoir isn’t far. He grabs her and turns her over. She’s not breathing.
“Tasha!” he splutters, already striking out for the shore. “No- no, come on, come on, Tash, you’ve had worse than this, not now…”
He focuses on pulling her to shore. When he hauls her onto the pebbly beach, all he can see is her lifeless form, not breathing head lolling, her hair wet and dark against the stones.
Clint’s earpiece is dead, and he doesn’t think about it as he pinches her nose and starts to resuscitate her. CPR is not something he ever thought he’d be performing on his partner. Natasha can’t die. She just can’t.
He starts to compress her chest, intermittently blowing air into her lungs. Nothing is working. She’s still not breathing. Overhead, he can hear the sound of a helicopter descending on the reservoir. They won’t be able to land here. He keeps going, desperate, terrified.
“You can’t do this,” he whispers, as he pumps her chest, looking down at her pale face. He can hear a smaller engine now. They have dropped an inflatable from the helicopter. He can hear someone shouting, but he can’t focus on anything except the sheer terror of Natasha’s lifeless form under his hands.
“Clint.”
It’s Phil. He’s here. They’re here. Someone tries to pull him away and he growls, like an animal. He feels Phil’s gentle hand on his shoulder. Consoling. Gentle. No.
He slams his hands down, willing her heart to start again.
She coughs, and he rolls her onto her side, barely daring to believe it. She vomits up a huge lungful of water, and gasps, shaking and coughing.
“Tasha?” he demands, cradling her head so she won’t hit it on the stones.
“I… fucking hate… SciOps,” she manages, her voice faint. She is trembling from the cold, and presumably from the shock. A blanket is pressed onto her, and then one onto Clint. The medic is crouched by them already, checking them over. Neither of them are in a good way. But at least they’re both alive. Clint clings to her, unable to let her go. Phil is trying to usher them into the boat. They need to get out of here.
“You’re okay,” he murmurs, adrenaline still flowing through his veins. Natasha is alive.
“Sorry,” she croaks, and he manages a tiny, frightened laugh. As they are bundled into the boat and then lifted into the helicopter, Phil is saying this and that about irresponsibility, recklessness, about millions of dollars down the drain, but Clint doesn’t care. He sits by Natasha, both of them wrapped in heated blankets, one arm around his partner. They have survived another day. That, he thinks, is good enough.
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