Clint rounds the corner, annoyed that Natasha had indeed gone off by herself again.
The last time she had done it, he had so much paperwork that Fury wouldn’t let him leave the basement for two weeks. She’d been placed in a holding cell until they’d cleared her actions and they’d both been placed on probation.
He wondered what was wrong with her.
Why this time?
Last time she wouldn’t tell him; and he’d let it go.
She’d been up front with Fury and a knowing look had passed through both of them with Clint on the outside.
Since the Avengers initiative, he thought they were past it.
Past the secret rendezvous of old informants, but, he thinks, his annoyance growing, it seemed that they weren’t.
Natasha had left.
Gone off by herself, and not said anything, and left Clint feeling like an idiot, and that he didn’t know her at all.
Four years of this, and Natasha still had her secrets.
He didn’t have any, and he felt like if she was holding back, then maybe he should have been too.
Fury clearly knew, otherwise they would have locked her up and thrown away the key.
Traitor, traitor, traitor - wasn’t that Rumlow’s taunt?
He never felt like there was any weight behind it, and she’d apologized, told him that it was something she had to deal with, promised it wouldn’t happen again.
But now.
Now they were dealing with it again.
She’d left a note, with coordinates, and expected him to follow.
Like the little lap dog he was, he of course did, no question about it, he loved her; assumed that she loved him despite all of this.
He just wished she trusted him with whatever this was.
Clint looks up at the tower in Seoul, and sighs. Likely his ire is misplaced. She’d tell him if she could.
Maybe this was the catalyst that could help answer questions for him.
Like where did she go that time, or if the coming of aliens brought new information to light.
He doesn’t like not knowing, and so, enters the large hotel; following the neatly penned note that was left on his bed.
.
Natasha feels tainted, every time his fingers touch her and she suppresses the urge to shudder.
What if he didn’t come?
The coordinates were clear.
They’ve been through worse but perhaps leaving without notice… she’s only done it once before but that wasn’t her fault. She likely should have told him why… but, she was a different person back then.
Leonardo makes himself another drink.
“What are we waiting for?”
She pretends not to notice the drug he slips into the drink, and nods to the toilet.
“I’ll just go freshen up, okay?”
She makes sweet eyes at him and he nods, removing his top to reveal his naked chest.
Covering her disgust with another smile, she moves to the bathroom and arms herself with the truth serum she hid under the sink.
Wearing nothing but a wig, underwear and a bra makes her seem unthreatening but the golden bracelet holds more than just pearls.
The knock at the door makes her smile, knowing and hoping that it’s Clint.
She opens the door.
Clint holds his gun at her chest, and looks at her outfit with shock.
Leonardo holds a gun at Clint’s chest and takes two steps back.
“What are you doing here?” Clint says suspiciously.
“Who are you?” Leonardo asks, looking first to Clint, then to Natasha.
“Yelena, who is this man?”
Natasha shrugs.
It doesn’t feel convincing especially as Clint takes a step forward.
Natasha takes the gun off Leonardo.
“I don’t know, do you?”
She points the gun at Clint.
“Two of us and one of you, maybe raise your hands.”
Clint throws his gun to the left; and, if it seemed too easy for Leonardo, he doesn’t show it in his face.
She watches as he cocks his head, brief moment of distrust and anger passing through; but raises his hands all the same.
Natasha taps her fingers together, just like he taught her and he looks down momentarily.
‘Trust me’, her left hand signed, even as the right levelled the gun at his chest.
Clint’s arms stay raised.
He watches Leonardo carefully, as he touches Natasha’s hair.
He wants to punch him.
Natasha’s clearly done her job well, but he doesn’t want this to continue.
He watches Natasha’s hand count down.
Five.
She alters her stance, one foot forward, locking herself for a fight.
Four, her finger tightens around the hilt of the gun, away from the trigger.
Three; she smiles.
Two.
Clint steps one leg back.
One.
All hell breaks loose.
Natasha elbows up into Leondardo’s face whilst Clint runs to tackle him, Natasha turns, pistol whipping down, the butt of the gun hitting him on the temple.
Leondardo isn’t as slow as she thinks as the gun goes off, narrowly missing her neck, then another shot from Clint puts him down.
It’s all done in a matter of seconds.
“Shit,” she says looking at his body, blood coming from the near headshot of Clints.
Clint tends to the body, making sure he’s dead then stands and stares at her.
“Yelena?”
Natasha looks nervously around and then pulls a briefcase with what looks like diamonds inside.
“He was a trafficker,” she states, staring.
Natasha seems to notice she’s in her underwear and grabs at her pile of clothing nearby.
She takes the wig off and Clint picks it up.
“Why are you blonde?”
“What is all this?”
He swallows, he has so many questions.
“Who was he? Why are you using a pseudonym?”
Natasha shakes her head, still moving, she grabs her jacket and takes out a letter and a folder.
Without hesitation she hands it to him.
“Thank you for coming, I need you here okay? Just read this, it’ll make more sense.”
She pauses and then kisses him.
“I’ve got to go, meet me here at 7pm, and I swear I’ll explain everything.”
The next set of coordinates are on top of the letter.
“I know you have no reason to trust me, but just think, if it wasn’t important to me, I wouldn’t have jeopardized everything, I would have jeopardized… us.”
Clint swallows hard, and takes the folder from her.
Natasha stands at the door, her jacket on with a thin scarf around her neck.
“I trust you, it’s the only reason you’re here, okay?”
Clint, baffled by the last ten minutes stares at her.
“Come on,” she ushers, “we need to go.”
A last look at the dead body, Clint follows her out the door of the hotel, they stay in silence in the elevator even as Natasha grabs and squeezes his hand.
By the time they reach the street, Natasha has already got in the closest taxi and leaves him standing on the sidewalk.
.
Gwangjang Market is exactly how Natasha remembered it. The aisles of food, the offshoots of textiles and the smells, all combine in her memory.
If the timelines and plans are correct then maybe Yelena will meet her in one of the back alleys, where they could both disappear; if only for a minute.
Slowly she’d come to grips with the fact that not all of the Red Room was gone, it had morphed and become something else. Slowly, too slowly, she’d realised that Yelena wasn’t dead.
A blonde assassin.
The white widow.
The words had passed around the underworld where she still had contacts.
Defected Widows had helped her, confirmed her suspicions, told her how to make contact.
Time, was always of the essence.
She’d become a replica of Yelena, hoping it was enough to draw her out; but she was never sure.
Leondardo’s money and diamonds were the insurance to pay the widows for their information. She wanted to make sure it would get to them.
He was a trafficker and she was glad Clint had killed him, but he was a means to an end. He knew more about the coming and going of widows than anyone did. Now dead, she only had some luck and precious intel to go by.
Clint…
She bites her lip.
She just hopes there’s enough trust for him to follow her.
Yelena’s mission, if Leondardo was correct, was a drop of ingredients to one of the stalls. Whilst seemingly insignificant, the ripple effects of it was huge.
It always was with the Red Room, kill one person and weapons get into Chile, give another poison ingredients and…
Natasha turns; pushing past the tourists and the food stall holders, shaking her head at the menu they offer.
Almost..
She feels her arm being taking and dragged to left.
Looking up, she finds a woman, younger than her with deep red hair. A wig.
She knows it’s Yelena.
Natasha wrenches her grasp away, but Yelena is faster, parrying her and pushing her into a nearby chair.
“Natasha.”
The words aren’t said with hatred, much to Natasha’s surprise.
“You shouldn’t be here,” Yelena continues.
“It’s not safe.”
Natasha almost smiles.
“Is that all you have to say to me?”
“They’ll find you- you’re wanted! They’ll-“
Natasha pulls her into a hug.
It takes a moment but Yelena hugs her back.
“They know you’re here, I don’t have much time.”
Natasha pushes a small bag into Yelena’s hand.
“Here,” she whispers.
Yelena looks inside.
Photos, diamonds and a small bracelet.
“Did you ever trust me, at all?" she asked, eyes steeled but somehow still filled with so much pain.
“Lena…” Natasha’s eyes well up, “you were six, what was I supposed to say? Of course I trusted you, but I wasn’t allowed to say anything; and they… made sure I didn’t.”
Yelena takes in Natasha’s words.
“How?” her voice barely above a whisper.
“You loved them. They played their role well. I was the outlier who knew too much and had too much to lose. It didn’t take much to threaten me.”
Natasha looks up, as if willing the tears to go back in her eyes.
“We could have run away.”
Natasha nods.
“We could have; but they would have killed us. Melina, Alexei, they grew up in a time and place that the brutality was always around them and they always had to think about themselves. We were nothing to them. Maybe a blip on their records but killing us would have been the same. I think I wanted our lives to be different, maybe to mean something.”
Yelena is quiet at this. She knows that there’s so many what ifs about their childhood that they can never be answered.
“I trusted you,” Natasha finishes. “I trust you.”
Yelena puts the bag into her pocket.
“I’ll be in Rotterdam in a month. Meet me at the Euromast. I’ll… find a way to get to you.”
Yelena looks around, a slight panic on her face.
She gives Natasha a note.
“We can leave now,” Natasha tells her, “you can…”
Yelena frowns.
“I can’t, they’ve got… insurance.”
Natasha’s heart pulls.
The particular tactic was an old one.
With Natasha class they used dogs. Had the girls train them, and become attached.
If the mission failed, then the dog had been given to Dreykov as tribute.
Those dogs were feral.
All the dogs became feral in the end.
When Natasha had failed in Ohio, her dog had become one of them.
She shakes her head at the memory.
“I’m sorry,” she whispers.
She doubts they just use animals now.
There’s a commotion outside and Natasha stands; pulling Yelena into a hug.
“It’s good to see you,” she says quietly, “if only for a minute.”
Yelena nods.
“One month,” she says firmly.
Natasha nods, “one month.”
.
Yeosu is quiet.
The fishing town has houses spread amongst the sea and Clint sees the appeal.
He looks at the piece of paper again and finds the house.
Anger at being left in the dark still pulls at him.
Anger at being left alone.
Clint wonders if anyone else would do the same; but then he thinks that it’s Natasha.
His anger simmers.
Gently, he knocks on the door.
Clint scrunches the piece of paper, clenching his fist.
He thinks he’s almost memorized it.
He can hear her voice telling him, about Yelena, about the Red Room, more than she’s ever wanted to commit to paper.
The door opens.
Natasha looks tired.
She has no make up on and her hair is pulled back.
Clint’s anger simmers.
“I don’t understand.”
He stands staring at her.
Guilt pours through her but she stands her ground.
“I know you don’t. Just come inside, okay? We can figure it out together.“
The rain starts lightly, as they stand locked in motion.
Clint wants so badly to turn around, leave the house, pretend that he never found her.
She waits for him, just as he’s waited so long for her, and he knows that she’ll continue to wait no matter what inside the house holds.
He doesn’t understand why she left.
He wants her to know that it hurt.
Wants so badly to hurt her and turn away, even though maybe, just maybe there’s an answer; a reason for it.
“I made cookies,” she says quietly, then holds up her phone.
“They’re the ones you like.”
Clint huffs.
The rain starts a little harder.
Taking a brave step forward he walks into the house.
Natasha presents him with the cookies, and offers him a seat.
The night is full of small arguments, explanations and apologies. She tries to explain Yelena, and the Red Room, but she thinks she just succeeds in making Clint feel sorry for her.
It’s not something she wants or needs but it does help to drive home her point of rescuing Yelena.
Or doing something.
It perhaps absolves some her reasoning for running away.
Clint knew Natasha’s trauma runs deep.
The realisations of the night make him think that he didn’t know how much.
He wants to help, and so when he asks how she just shrugs.
Rotterdam is surely a trap, if she knows anything about the red room, but then again, maybe not.
Making contact was the first step, with that done, she’s not sure of the next.
A month feels like such a long time, and no time at all, to figure it out, and get help.
They talk long into the night, grief, anger and pain turns into quiet words and the move to bed.
Natasha strips in front of him, grabs a tshirt that he recognises as his own, and she climbs into bed.
He smiles easily, as she pats the bed, a move he’s so often done to her back at their own apartment.
“Can we just forget it, maybe just for tonight?”
Clint nods and rummages in his backpack for a pair of shorts.
He changes and gets in with her, pulling her close.
“The world can’t touch us here,” he whispers, “we’ll deal with with it tomorrow.”
She nods against him.
“We have a month to figure it out,” she says.
Clint nods.
He wants more words to say that he understands, but everything seems inadequate.
She doesn’t want him to go.
He is a comfort in her life, a brightness. Without him, and his guidance, she’s not sure what she would do.
“Will you still be here when I wake up?”
Clint pulls her closer.
“You actually going to sleep?”
Natasha yawns, as if in protest.
“I will if you do.”
Clint kisses the top of her head.
“I’ll wake you before I go.”
Natasha looks up to him.
“Promise?”
He hugs her a bit closer.
“Promise.”
.
Yelena sits, voluntarily, the sharp sting of the needle in her arm doesn’t even register.
She watches Ariana carefully, her eyes sharp even as the sedation takes hold.
It’s an old dance, but one that’s familiar as the chemicals move through her body.
Susceptible now to all the questions, nervousness becomes mixed with drowsiness and she squeezes her nails into her palm.
The door swings open.
To her surprise Dreykov stands in front of her.
The man, fat in his old age, smells like cabbage and cigars and she can’t quite school her face to wipe away the disgust.
He slaps her hard and then squeezes her face.
“You found her?”
He asks the question like it wasn’t ordered.
She wishes she could spit.
“Yes,” come the words.
“I found her.”
She hates the concoction of the sedation and truth serum.
The words bleed out of her at every question.
Sometimes, being met with a slap when she tries to stop the words.
They know about Rotterdam.
They know about Gwangjang.
She vomits on herself as the nausea takes hold, and she’s pleased at the disgust on Dreykov’s face.
Yelena can’t hide her smile.
She’ll kill him one day.
Or maybe Natasha can actually finish the job this time.
.
The month of March comes upon them quickly. Short fall missions make Natasha angry, even though the aftermath of New York is still fresh and the governments of the world all need placating and support.
She doesn’t know when it became their job.
The only upside is that it gives her more insight into the Russian government and helps her create some moles and double agents.
Old widows are easily persuaded, even old guards.
“You owe me,” she tells them, guilt on their faces as she shows them old scars and reminds them of the old horrors.
She hates that Clint is in her ear as she recounts beatings, or trainings, but she needs someone on her six, sniper trained as protection.
It increases both their nightmares, sometimes requiring Natasha to employ less desired ways of detaching, but they learn to deal with them as they do with all things.
When Natasha finds Dreykov hiding in the Siberian plains, Clint drives her to the desert in the middle of nowhere and tells her to scream.
She does til her voice is hoarse.
She screams and throws rocks and every time she thinks of him, she screams more.
The drive home, the long drive home; is quiet.
Except for a five words.
“I’m going to kill him,”she says with finality.
Clint puts music on, and Natasha covers her tear stained face with her sunglasses.
.
Rotterdam is exactly how Natasha remembers.
Steve insists on coming with them, Tony too, however she doesn’t want them to be a part of Dreykov’s assassination.
Clint knows the reality of their work, but the other two, they aren’t as jaded; so she tasks Tony with scouring the city, and Steve with blending into the background just in case Yelena actually shows.
Clint stays on the rooftops, awaiting Tony’s signal, and Natasha sits as bait.
The Euromast is tall.
The café nearby has some local delicacies and Natasha orders; waiting.
She doesn’t expect Dreykov to sit, but he does with a grotesque smile.
She smiles back at him.
The countdown begins, even though he doesn’t realise it, he’s already dead and she doesn’t have to do anything.
She hears Tony in her head, and Clint.
She sees Steve behind Dreykov and she knows that he can’t do anything. Not physically anyway.
“Natashka,” he says, and she suppresses a shudder.
Tuning into Clint, she hears his words, the plan that started to unfold once Dreykov sat down.
She had hoped he would come, but wasn’t convinced he would do the dirty work himself.
“Where’s Yelena?”
A red light switches on Natasha chest and Clint confirms that he can see it too.
“Poetic, no? To have her kill you?”
He sips at his coffee.
“I did not expect it to take you this long, but after New York, you became out in the open. I used her to get to you.”
He smirks, an odd grunt that seems to mix with his disgust at her.
“And your arrogance and pig headedness; you fell for it, giving her pictures? Touching base with widows still under MY control? How dare you think you’re above us, you’re still one of them, and when we take you back, you will become one of us again, just like the winter solider, just like the brain washed widows - you think- you think it was bad before? We’ve perfected it. We know how to make you ours. “
He holds up a vial.
She hears a commotion through the comms.
“You don’t think I know what you’re trying to do? That I didn’t bring back up?”
He smashes the vial and red smoke permeates the air.
She tries not to breathe in even as he blows it towards her.
Natasha feels it settling on her face and skin.
“Perfected it,” he smiles.
Steve stands and she subtly shakes her head, still holding her breath until the rest settles on the table.
Clint confirms they have Yelena restrained.
She can hear muffled shouts and Tony making a snide remark.
The red dot turns to Dreykov and he looks mildly confused before he shakes his head.
“You will die alone, and no one will care. You are so easily replaced.”
Natasha feels the words come out but they feel bitter in her mouth.
Her face grows hot, and it feels like an allergic reaction as her vision turns glassy.
“As you sat down,” she murmurs, “did you feel it?
The piercing of poison? So easily you were lured to sit near me. So easily, into the black widow’s trap. The poison should be making it’s way through your body, making it harder and harder to breathe. You can feel it can’t you? Try and take a deep breath, when you do, you can’t let it go.”
Dreykov shuffles and she hears the shot of tranquilliser from the makeshift gun and nods at where she think Clint is perched.
He can’t move.
His eyes watch her.
Even as she stands, then squats next to him.
“You deserve 100 more painful deaths than the one I’m giving you, but at least this time, I can watch as you die.”
His eyes twitch as his breathing slows.
No vicious words, just drool and panic.
To an onlooker, she wonders what they’d see, and as he takes his last breath, Dreykov’s eyes roll back.
Natasha’s breath short circuits, and she falls back from her squat. Steve is there to pick her up and guide her away, but she wants to touch the body and make sure he’s dead.
Really dead this time.
Her limbs don’t respond, and even as she turns back she feels like she’s not connected to her body.
Her hand shakes, and the little control she had, leaves.
Steve looks at her, worried, almost dragging her forward.
“I need to go back,” she tells him, “to make sure.”
Clint and Tony hear her words.
“I’ll collect the body,” Tony promises.
“Leave it at the airport for you to look at if you need to.”
He seems off, and she wonders idly if it’s the first time that he’s ever been a part of an assassination.
“Thank you,” she says, quietly.
One foot in front of the other, her vision blurs, the safe house feeling too far away.
“Steve?”
She manages the sentence, the aura around herself getting stronger as her limbs twitch.
“I don’t feels so good.”
.
Yelena stares at Clint.
The frown on her face at being restrained and held, does nothing but make Clint feel uneasy.
“He's dead,” he assures her.
She says nothing.
Just stares and pouts and he paces, wondering how Natasha and the others are getting on.
He hears Tony promise to take the body to the airport and then he hears Natasha’s confession of not feeling well.
“Steve?” he asks, in alarm.
“She’s seizing,” Steve says into the comms, his voice on the edge of panic.
“People are looking, what do I do?”
“She’s seizing?”
Yelena looks up, interested now, at the urgency in Clint’s voice.
“Call and ambulance?” Tony suggests.
“No!” Clint knows that won’t go well.
“It’s too late,” Steve groans quietly, “someone already has.”
Clint looks from Yelena to the street down below.
He wants to go to Natasha, but her last request was for him to find her and keep her safe and situated until they could reunite.
It wasn’t supposed to go like this.
“Clint.. Tony.. What do I do?”
Tony grunts, “I can’t help, I’m moving a body, and thank you by the way, for creating that distraction.”
Clint looks at Yelena, and makes the decision quickly.
Whichever decision would be the wrong one.
“I’m coming,” he says, then looks to Yelena.
“Stay here.”
She rolls her eyes.
Clint sprints down the stairs, knowing she won’t be there when he returns but hopes that just maybe she’ll leave some sort of way of contact.
He pushes down the panic, and asks for an update.
“The ambulance is here,” Steve murmurs, “she hasn’t stopped seizing.”
Clint runs faster, fast enough to see the ambulance drive off.
“Steve?”
“What hospital are we going to?” Clint hears him ask.
The paramedics give him a strange look.
“Erasmus,” one answers.
Clint looks around and finds a taxi, he types it into his phone to go to the hospital and the driver nods.
“It’s not far,” he says in accented English.
.
“She’s stopping, but her temperature is too high, did she take any drugs?”
Steve shakes his head.
“No, no drugs,” he says, “please help her.”
The woman looks at him suspiciously, just as Natasha starts to seize again.
The doctors gather around her, pushing Steve back into the waiting room.
He finds Clint, arguing with the administration, and pulls him back.
“They’re with her now, okay?”
It doesn’t make Clint feel any better.
He turns to the administrator, “they’ll find us when they have news?”
The poor woman nods looking from Clint to Steve.
“You can wait there.”
She points to a row of seats.
Clint looks at Steve nervously as they both sit.
“She hates hospitals,” he says quietly.
Steve looks to the door.
“I know.”
.
“I want to go home!”
The exclamation is followed by a stethoscope being thrown at his head.
Her drugged eyes stare at him.
She tries to stand again, but sheets get tangled in flailing limbs.
“I want. To go. Home,” she growls as she struggles.
Clint has no words, he could try and placate her, tell her this is where she needs to be, that they just need the test results before they leave; and that he wants nothing more than to pick her up and take her home.
But he doesn’t.
He stands and stares and presses the button to alert the doctor that she’s awake.
It takes a minute but they enter on his left and see her struggling.
Wordlessly, they approach and it seems to scare her more.
“Clint?”
She locks eyes with him, then eyes the others off. She seems not to notice the doctor or anyone else, and Clint just hopes that the drugs make her forget this too.
“Clint?”
He nods and steps forward.
She stares at him as the doctor advances first.
“I want to go home,” she whispers as her injects her with another sedative.
Clint steps forward, approaching the doctors, as Natasha’s eyes close again.
“We’ve been here hours, she just gets more distressed, have you found anything?”
The doctor looks her over.
“The test results came back negative to most things, but with high results in a drug called mescaline that’s been mixed with something else; we aren’t sure of what that is yet. It’s a psychotropic drug, we think it’s been absorbed through her skin. We’ve given some other drugs that will reduce the symptoms but likely, she’s going to have some differences in her mental state. Maybe hallucinations? Likely increased anxiety, insomnia, maybe fear or paranoia.”
Clint’s heart clenches.
She doesn’t need this.
“How long? Can we leave?”
Steve moves from leg to leg, understanding the urgency of leaving.
“We have our own medical…”
The doctor looks at them strangely, then looks to Natasha.
“I’d like to keep her under observation for the next twelve hours. For her body to work through the most of it…”
The doctor stops.
“You’re Captain America,” he says to Steve.
Steve blushes and nods.
“She’s… the white widow?”
“Black widow,” Clint supplies.
“… and you still don’t know what happened?”
Clint shakes his head.
“No.”
The doctor looks over to Natasha, and sighs gently.
“If she stays stable for the next twelve hours, then I’ll transfer her to your care. I’ll be back in a couple of hours.”
He leaves the room, leaving Natasha with Clint and Steve.
.
The first scream breaks through her lips, and it shocks Clint upright.
She stares at nothing and raises her hands above her head to protect herself.
“No,” she groans.
She flinches against imaginary hits.
“Stop, please stop,” she whispers.
Clint pulls her arms down, trying to ground her with touch. He knows this dream.
The one where Dreykov beats her in the woods.
He shakes her gently, trying to get her to wake properly.
“He’s dead,” Clint whispered. “He’s dead and he isn’t coming back.”
The nightmare is still too fresh for Natasha to respond.
She’s holding onto his arm so tight that he knows it’s going to bruise.
Her breath is still jagged, and the screams fresh in both their minds.
Clint grips her hand back.
The anniversary always brings nightmares. Her body knows and keeps score, even if consciously they don’t.
“He’s. He’s alive,” she whispers.
Clint tries to get her to look at him, even though her eyes are pinched shut.
He touches the sweat that’s beading on her face and wipes it.
“Tash, he’s dead. Okay? Open your eyes, look where we are? He’s not here, he can’t be.”
She moans and shakes her head.
“He’s coming,” she says, louder this time. Her hands shake as they reach for his.
“Hey, no one’s coming,” he clasps his hands over hers.
“No one’s coming, no one can find us here, you’re safe, okay?”
He glances at the time.
Only midnight.
The night feels long and it’s just started.
He lays with her back down, not daring a look at Steve, almost embarrassed for them both, for him to witness such moments.
“Four more hours,” Steve says, trying to be helpful.
Clint nods, pulling Natasha closer.
.
There’s a gentle pull away from sleep, as Natasha stares at the doctor taking her blood pressure.
She tries to pull her arm away, the unwanted touch like pain.
“Let him,” Clint warns, “we can leave when it’s done.”
His voice penetrates the voices in her head.
She tries to hold onto the thoughts but as soon as she does they disappear like mist.
“What time is it?”
He voice cracks and she wonders if she’s been screaming.
“Where…”
The events of the last day are gone, she can remember small snippets, memories of Dreykov holding her down, only that’s not right; Clint is here. Steve is here.
They wouldn’t let him?
She’s in a hospital.
Her head hurts.
Her muscles ache horribly.
The nausea rises.
“I’m going to be sick,” she warns them.
Clint pushes a sick bag into her hands and she promptly vomits.
The doctor looks worried but asks her how she feels anyway.
“Fine,” she responds automatically, not wanting to be there, even if she needs all the hospital can offer.
“Can I leave?”
The doctor uses a light and shines it in her eyes without warning, she doesn’t tell him about the tinnitus in her ears or the slight blur in her vision.
She turns away and looks at Clint.
“Can we leave?”
He turns to the doctor.
“It was the deal,” he says.
Steve looks unsure at both of them; but stays quiet all the same.
“You can go, but you’re going against medical advice,” he tells them.
“You need to get checked when you are back home, and I’d advise not flying for a couple of days, just until your symptoms resolve.”
Natasha stands, pulls on the hoodie that Clint presents to her and the pants, then turns to the doctor and thanks him.
Without breaking stride or step, she focuses on the door walks straight for it.
.
“She needs to be in the hospital,” Steve hisses, hearing her vomit again.
“And what are they going to do for her?” Clint growls back.
“I don’t know, hydrate her?”
“You don’t know, none of you know, here is better okay?”
Steve gestures around, “we’re in an airplane hanger, waiting for the quinjet to get refueled and then to be cleared by the FAA for flight, this is not the best place for her!”
Natasha emerges, wiping her mouth.
“I’m not going back, I just want to go home, I’ll be fine.”
Tony stares at her, for once keeping quiet.
“Nat, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean…”
Steve tries to back peddle, but Natasha clearly doesn’t want to hear it as she leaves and goes to sit outside.
The fresh air is better; she thinks.
The realisations of the last day playing as much havoc as the drugs that permeate her system.
She wants to go see the body again anyway.
He’s dead, she tells herself.
He’s dead and he’s not coming back.
But seeing is better than just telling herself, she thinks as she makes her way down to the hanger, the body in the bag laying straight.
She unzips it and sees his face.
Dead.
.
Clint watches her from the roof.
He wants to go to her but they’ve had all the conversations, the ones that matter.
She blames him, he thinks, for leaving Yelena to get to her.
He knows she doesn’t feel well, the way her face falls when she’s not in the presence of others; and the sharp tells of pain by the creases of her brow.
Even by the way she fiddles more with her clothing, picking at her fingers and skin; perhaps to take her mind of the anxiety of real and not real.
Clint finds Tony at the holding room, reading on his phone.
At first he thinks it’s just words, but then, he realises he’s reading about the drug that Dreykov used on her.
“Anything I should know?” he asks to break the silence.
Tony switches off his phone, looking surprised at Clint.
“God we need to put a bell on you.”
“You’re worried,” Clint surmises.
“No.”
“Yes.”
“You know you could go check on her?”
Tony shakes his head.
“She doesn’t want to see me,” he argues.
“What could I say, that would possibly help?”
Clint points to the table, full of food.
“Maybe you could get her to eat something,” he suggests. “Maybe even drink something.”
“She doesn’t need me,” Tony replies lightly.
Clint shakes his head.
“I think you’re exactly what she needs.”
.
Tony thinks this is not his job.
He didn’t ask for friends, and he certainly didn’t ask for the complications of them.
But as he approaches Natasha, he feels oddly protective of her and finds himself wanting to help.
Even if he does it in his own antagonistic way.
He stands in front of her to make his presence known, waiting for her to look up.
“Come with me,” he offers.
She frowns and ignores him.
“It’s almost time to leave…” he starts.
Natasha usually has such an unreadable face when she’s angry or hurt, but the last day seems to have broken all her defences.
“I didn't ask you to come back for me,” she says the words almost angrily.
“Get up,” Tony eyes her, holds out a hand and waits.
He stands waiting for her to move.
Turns out, Natasha is just as stubborn as he is.
The concrete ground is cold as he sits down next to her, shoulders just touching.
“You’re going to have to move some time, you know.”
He says the words as they watch the private planes leave the airport.
“He sent you didn’t he?”
Tony shrugs.
“What do you think?”
She sighs heavily.
“Sorry, you shouldn’t have got tied up in this.”
He nudges her, not so gently.
“Come on super spy. Let’s go get something to eat.”
He grabs at her hand and heaves her up, pulling her away from the body, and out of the cold.
.
They arrive home on a Tuesday.
Clint has no idea how they’ve only been away for four days, and yet, the world feels changed.
Natasha leaves the tower almost straight away, licking her wounds in private.
Steve asks if Clint will follow, but he knows better than to follow straight away.
He knows where she’s gone anyway.
At least he hopes he does.
He organises the aftermath of the mission, the disposal of the body and loose ends that always seem to need tying up.
The hospital, Yelena, the mission report for Fury.
Tony looks on in ambivalence and leaves for his workshop, commenting that he thought that as an avenger, Clint shouldn’t have to do mission debriefs.
Clint finds he doesn’t mind.
It actually helps, putting it all in a time line, and from his point of view all the information he knows.
He used to have a therapist that would tell him to make the debrief reports as detailed as possible, and whilst a tedious process; he knew why.
When it was written it was concrete, the visions of the mission and heaviness of it could bleed onto the paper, it allowed him to process, it allowed him to forget.
Printing two copies, he finds his motorcycle and heads to where he knows Natasha will be.
.
There’s a reprieve of two weeks where nothing happens.
There’s no missions, no need for the avengers, no need for diplomacy or diplomatic missions, only peace.
Natasha feels like the world has gone quiet.
She’s not sure how
She puts out feelers for Yelena, but knows that Yelena knows where to find her.
The Avengers tower now beams in the sky.
She’d be an idiot to miss it.
Natasha knows she just has to wait.
Something she isn’t good at.
Dreykov’s drugs wear off eventually, and she tries to explain to both Clint and Tony what it was like.
Clint asks if she wants to see their therapist, and Tony asks if she wouldn’t mind if he obtained the labs from the hospital stay.
She says yes to both.
First organising a visit to the therapist, to work through the pain of the changes of her life; and for Tony, she hopes that he can synthesise some sort of antidote.
Just in case.
It’s quiet.
She dreams of Yelena, and Ohio.
Nightmares of the dogs of the red room and how they morph into Clint and Steve and Tony.
Natasha wonders if they’ll ever stop; the dreams and nightmares.
Clint asks if she wants to try medication and she agrees; wanting maybe one night of reprieve where her brain doesn’t rebel against her.
Time moves on, as it always does and the events of March become another memory.
One that seems to feature in nightmares and daydreams, where Yelena is safe and sometimes she isn’t.
She’s sent with Clint to a small seaside village in Canada, the parameters of mission to take photos and watch a diplomat they’re sure is on Hydra’s payroll.
Easy, she thinks, and tells Tony as such, on the phone. Since Rotterdam, they’d all become closer.
She even thinks that Tony considers them friends.
He’d made an effort, to make sure she was okay, and she pretended not to be weirded out when the therapist told her that all bills were covered, indefinitely.
Tony’s doing, and one he wouldn’t take any thanks for.
Clint grows fond of the village, the easy life, as they live amongst the locals for the week that turns into two.
He tells her he feels that their lives don’t really touch them here, and there’s a sort of peace.
The sea life looks good on him.
It’s the longest reprieve they’ve had in since before New York and she thinks maybe he’s healing.
.
Clint watches Natasha on the phone to Tony, the laugh genuine as she makes fun of his insomnia. He can’t help but scoff and shake his head.
Packed up and ready to leave, he doesn’t think when there’s a knock at the door.
He answers it and is met with a gun to his face.
“Shit,” he thinks, putting his hands up and facing the man who they’d been taking photos of.
Natasha looks up and reacts immediately, throwing the phone at the man’s head, making him hostage enough for Clint to wrench the gun and break his finger in the process.
He hears Tony on the phone, panicking, yelling and asking what’s happening as he breaks glass on the man’s head, Natasha pistol whipping him to knock him out.
Gun shot hit the door and Clint grabs their go bag and Natasha hand and they run out the back.
Natasha motorbike sits idly, she helps him on and they leave a trail of black cars behind them.
.
The dodge and weave through the city is impressive.
“We need to get somewhere safe!” she yells.
Clint nods, even though she can’t see him.
“There’s the safe house near the frat house we can probably use,” he yells back.
Natasha takes the next left, following the memory of the safe house from the last time they were here.
She seems to lose the tail, running the block one more time before Clint tells her as such.
He feels his back sweating.
She has beads on her face too, as she breathes heavily.
“Tony will be worried,” she grins.
Clint can’t quiet take her mirth, punching in the key code for the house and motioning to clear the space before he talks.
“He sounded so panicked,” he replies finally.
Natasha bursts into laughter, the adrenaline making her feel on a high.
She throws an orange to him.
“Any injuries?”
He shakes his head.
“You?”
She does the same.
“How’d you feel about a prank?”
Clint eyes her, he doesn’t like pranks much, but…
“On Tony?”
She nods.
“Okay, sure.”
.
There’s deliberation.
Clint isn’t sure about Natasha’s idea but he shrugs in agreement.
“Your pranks are weird, you know that, right?”
Natasha laughs, “that’s why they’re great.”
He’s sure she’s high on adrenaline.
Clint isn’t so sure but he picks up the phone anyway.
“Hey Tony,” he says, “it’s Clint.”
Tony makes a noise of derision, and asks if they’re okay.
On speakerphone, Natasha smirks.
"We've made it to a safe house and it’s going to be okay, but I have to ask you a favour.... if I send coordinates, could you bring a cat?"
Tony doesn’t answer straight away, lost for words.
“What? A cap?”
“A cat,” Clint replies, enunciating the “t”.
“A cat.” Tony replies.
“A cat-you know what, if you can do it, great, if not just don’t worry, I can call Maria—“
Tony frowns at the implication that he’s unable to get a cat to help Natasha, even if he doesn’t understand.
“Send the coordinates, Barton, I’ll see you soon. Tell Nat—“
He pauses.
She hadn’t sounded good when he talked to her in the morning.
“Tell her I’ll see her soon.”
He hangs up and stares at the phone.
Opening the browser, he types in “cat.”
Realising his stupidity at the picture of a cat looking at him, he closes his eyes and sighs.
Then he calls Pepper.
.
Natasha laughs.
Clint looks at the phone.
“Nat, he’s going to get us a cat,” he frowns.
“No he’s not, where’s he going to get a cat from?”
Clint feels like it’s the wrong call, but she looks so delightfully evil that he rolls his eyes and sets up the house.
Four hours later Tony arrives with the cat of Pepper Potts.
.
The cat travels back with them, she’s never met such a chill cat.
Of course Pepper Potts has a cat that is used to traveling and is the most relaxed cat either of them have ever met.
“Are we cat people now?”
Natasha laughs and shrugs.
“It wasn’t a great prank in hindsight,” she admits.
Clint laughs and nods.
“But Tony’s reaction and indignation of having to find a cat, and convince Pepper to take her cat without reason, was.”
“We have to return her,” she smiles, patting her fur and smiling wider at the purrs that emanate.
“Good job we’re staying in the tower, huh?”
Natasha nods.
“I don’t want to go to the stupid party,” she admits.
Clint nods, “me either, I’d prefer to be in pajamas, watching a cooking show.”
Natasha yawns.
“Me too.”
The quinjet arrives at the tower, and they work together landing it.
The separate as they leave the threshold, kissing lightly and knocking heads.
Natasha looks and can’t find Pepper in her usual spots, she leaves a note on her desk, and then heads for a shower.
.
Tired eyes tracked her as she crossed the patio over to the hammock swings, "Mind if I join you?"
Natasha nods, the slight swing of the hammock dampening the movement.
Pepper sits on the hammock adjacent, her legs stabilising her before she swings her legs into the hammock.
It earns a smile from the spy, and Pepper smiles too.
“Do you want to talk about it?” Natasha asks.
It’s a generous question, given Natasha’s own state.
Pepper let’s the hammock sway and doesn’t answer.
“How’s your day been?” she asks after a minute.
Natasha sighs; the soft breeze carrying the sound.
“I’m glad it’s over,” she decides on.
Pepper nods, unsure what to say to that.
“When did you get back?”
Natasha looks at her watch, “about three hours ago.”
“Tony missed you both,” Pepper clarifies, “he’s stuck on the exploding arrows.”
Natasha nods, eyes closing.
“Tomorrow,” she says, “we can tackle that tomorrow.”
Natasha pauses.
“Still misses us, even though we pulled a prank on him?”
Pepper shakes her head.
“Maybe the exploding arrows are for you,” she jokes.
“I’m sorry about the Cat,” Natasha tells her, rocking slowly, “she’s with Clint; he loves her.”
To her surprise, Pepper laughs.
“Tony was panicked, and it made him get out of the workshop, and actually, it was good worry - and Shiro likes to travel.”
“Shiro?”
Pepper nods.
“So what did Tony say?”
Pepper explains the last day to her, and how Tony had walked in panicked that he needed a cat.
So much so, that he had forgotten that she had one.
“Did you know he once forgot I was allergic to strawberries?”
Natasha’s jaw drops.
“What?”
Pepper nods, “even got me some as an apology.”
Natasha rocks in the hammock, noises of derision in her exhalation.
“What time do we need to be there?”
Pepper glances at her watch.
“An hour, we should get up, really.”
Natasha nods.
“Ten minutes?”
Pepper smiles.
“Yeah, ten minutes.”
Pepper hands Natasha a bag of sour gummies.
“Tell me about the mission?”
.
Clint puts on his penguin suit, and hates that it makes him look older and more professional than he wants. He slicks his hair, and ties his tie then groans as it looks uneven.
“Nat, help,” he groans, calling to her from the bathroom.
She emerges and he stands open mouth.
“You look beautiful,” he gasps in awe, stepping closer.
She laughs easily, brushing off the compliment.
“I look tired,” she rebukes.
He shakes his head and hugs and kisses her and then looks forlornly at his tie.
“I always get it wrong,” he sighs.
“Come here,” she replies, gathering the tie in her hands and making it even.
“What would you do without me?”
Natasha in the hospital flashes through his mind.
“I don’t know,” he replies honestly.
The thought persists, as they finish getting dressed and head to the ballroom.
“What would you do without me?”
He feels lost in thought, Natasha looking at him strangely, as they take their places and mingle amongst the people.
What would he do without her?
She would be okay.
He thinks so anyway, but him?
He wouldn’t be.
He’d almost lost her - New York, then Rotterdam; even Korea hadn’t been easy.
He wants so badly to tell her these things as she smiles up at him, his tie neatly tied, and gently pushes on his chest.
“What are you thinking so hard about?” she asks.
Clint stands for a while and answers nonchalantly, wondering how to convey anything.
“How lucky I am,” he decides on.
Natasha shakes her head.
“No, I’m the lucky one,” she rebuffs, “come on, we should go, we are already late.”
Clint glances at the time and groans.
“Fine, but we’re not staying the whole time right?”
Natasha shrugs, “that’s what I said to you, earlier!”
He nods in assurance.
“Just checking.”
.
It’s not far to the ballroom, entering holding hands, they drop them as they enter, each separating away.
The night is one of celebration, and of coming together to thank those for the generous donations of rebuilding the city.
It’s redundant and silly, Clint thinks, picking up a drink, but Tony and Pepper had said necessary; so they’d all begrudgingly agreed.
Even Bruce was there in his suit, clutching his drink.
Clint doesn’t recognise a lot of the people, but makes a point to find a few people and mingle until he settles next to Steve on the outside balcony.
“There’s so many people here,” Steve says, in greeting.
Clint nods.
“Everyone wants to meet you though.”
Steve rolls his eyes.
“I think I’ve met and taken photos with everyone twice, each of them wanting to tell me where they were when the aliens came.”
Clint nods at his indignation.
They talk, and watch the people mill around them, laugh at Tony’s speech and watch Natasha and Pepper as they effortlessly keep conversation.
Steve notices.
“Are you and Nat together?” he asks.
The question takes Clint by surprise.
“Uh yeah?” he replies, unsure.
“Is that question?”
Clint shrugs, “no?”
“You are together?”
“Yes,” Clint says with more assurance.
“Why?”
Steve looks in Natasha’s direction.
“I assumed, but I wanted to ask.”
Clint sighs.
“People always wonder, and sometimes I do too.”
Steve turns his body to face Clint.
“What do you mean?”
Clint fiddles with his tie, wondering how to phrase it.
“Am I really enough?“
Steve holds the question.
“Ya know, I always thought that with Peggy. I didn’t think I was. Even though this body is mine, it didn’t always look like this, and she was one of the only people that knew me, before and after the changes.”
He takes a large swig of his drink, prompting Clint to the same.
The breeze doesn’t seem to affect either of them as they watch the party go on inside.
Natasha looks beautiful in her long blue dress. Her hair braided in a way that frames her face.
“You’re enough because she thinks your enough,” Steve finishes, “she’s never asked you to be anyone else but you, right?”
Clint nods.
The feeling of inadequacy when she talks to billionaires, to those who could offer more. To people; not even men, who could perhaps love her better.
“I just hope that she’s not stuck with me, because she feels…”
Steve holds his hands up.
“Nah, no. That’s - you’re not allowed to put feelings in her mouth. Okay? You’re not allowed to say what, and how she feels - or draw conclusions from it. Okay?”
Clint is taken aback at the surprisingly wise words.
Steve’s right.
Pepper wanders over to them, a tray of drinks in hand.
Taking it off her, she smiles at Clint.
“Nat was asking about you, go find her?”
Clint nods, looking into the dining hall and finding her straight away.
Steve’s right.
Sometimes he may not feel like enough, but that’s not for him to decide.
He finds Natasha standing at the door, envelope in her hands.
Signaling his approach, she sees him and smiles, the kind that melts her face.
He smiles back, the fears slowly disappearing as her presence reassures him as much as Steve’s words.
“Look,” Natasha says, handing him a picture from the envelope.
The Polaroid of Yelena in front of the Avengers tower feels jarring to him; he’s not sure how it feels to her.
“What does it mean?” he asks, taking it off her, examining it further.
“I don’t know?”
“Do you think she wants to meet up with you?”
Natasha looks around at the party.
“Maybe,” she says, distracted.
“We’ll find her,” he nods, handing the picture back.
Clint doesn’t know what memories play in her mind but she’s quiet as she caresses the envelope and picture.
“Do you know the story of salt roses?”
Clint shakes his head.
Natasha takes a deep breath.
“It was a story they used to tell us, that if we challenged them that they’d kill us and throw our bodies into the sea, that only the salt roses would know where we lay.”
Clint shudders thinking of little girls being dumped in the ocean.
“So we changed it.”
She swallows.
“There was a fairytale that was passed down from widow to widow, I don’t even know how,” she sighs.
“That tale goes that the two sisters stolen from their homes. They were all they had of each other and their home was all they knew. The people that took them got lost on the journey; so they split up to find their way, taking one girl each. One went to the mountains and one to the sea. The girls knew they’d never find their way back so they left trails to find their way back to each other. One a trail of salt and rose petals from the other.”
She puts her hand inside the envelope.
“The salt and roses mixed together, and the salt rose got planted as a way point for all those that were lost, leaving it’s vines along the trails of both petals and salt.”
Clint looks at what she’s holding.
The granules of salt slip through her fingers, but the rose petals stay.
“I think maybe, she might find us.”
.