The first meeting
He hated bodyguard jobs.
No, of course, it sounded cool, painting the picture of a giant of at least 6,8ft with the build of an oak wardrobe, kicking ass in suit and tie.
Which was a bit different from the man standing watch in front of the room at the end of the hallway tonight, being a muscular, but not bulky man in his late twenties. He was wearing a suit, though, at least that part lived up to the image, he was supposed to be inconspicuous and that involved not dressing in uniform.
Had he mentioned that he was bored?
Clint Barton leaned against the wall of the hallway, lingering in front of the room of the extremely secret meeting that his client was attending. If Fury had chosen this job as a punishment, Clint at least didn’t know what for, his rogue days were pretty much over, he had been an established S.H.I.E.L.D agent for a few years and his wish for maximum adrenaline had been replaced by the wish of coming home safely. Which didn’t mean that he didn’t like exciting missions, he absolutely did and he would have traded pretty much anything for this one. Laura had been relieved to send him on a minimum risk mission, but she had not shown it, knowing he didn’t like it. Their definitions of boring weren’t quite the same, but that was okay. They were able to compromise.
Clint sighed deeply. He’d have to carefully drop a hint to Fury, or better, to Coulson, that he wasn’t the man for this kind of job. Like, sniper missions were boring, but at least you got to shoot at some point. On this mission, he didn’t even get a drink.
He only woke from the boredom-induced stupor half an hour later when he heard quiet steps around the corner. Frowning, he went into position, immediately fully alert. Nobody was supposed to come near here.
Casually, a young woman came around the corner, hardly seeming to notice him. She was petite, her hair of a rusty copper shade of red. A pretty girl, Clint could well imagine she’d get a lot of date requests from the guys at her college.
She approached him easily, eyes running over the expensive paintings on the wall.
“Uhm, miss?” Clint asked politely. “Sorry, but I have to ask you to turn around. This area is private.”
She looked up but didn't stop walking.
“But I have been asked to come here?” she half-asked, half-stated, and waved a small sheet of paper.
Clint raised an eyebrow.
“Oh, and why that?”
She shrugged.
“The brown-haired man, he asked me to. I think it’s obvious why.” She smiled flirtatiously, looking at him through her lashes.
Clint shook his head.
“He doesn’t have any time for you now. Please leave.”
She was making this up, there was something alert and feline in her posture clearly showing that. She tilted her head a little.
“Please?” she asked softly, doing a very good job at sounding cute and innocent.
Clint shook her head. “No, and I won’t ask you again.” His voice was firm.
The young woman’s friendly mask fell in a split second and her face turned hard.
“Okay, then we’ll have to do it the hard way.”
Clint’s sharp eyes picked up her movement and his body reacted faster than even he thought possible.
The silence was deadly as two guns were unlocked at the same second. Clint cursed himself. He should have been more ready for this.
“Put the gun down!” he demanded. She scoffed.
“Certainly not.” Her voice was now uncannily monotone and emotionless, her piercing green eyes interlocked with his blue ones.
“C’mon, kid,” he persisted. “Put it down.”
She scoffed again. “I’m sorry about this, I know you’re doing your job, but so am I.”
He saw the movement again but wasn’t fast enough to prevent the gun from being ripped from his hand with surprising strength. Another reason not to like guns, she could never have taken his bow from him, but they said it was too unorthodox for him to pass as a bodyguard.
He ducked instinctively to dodge the bullets and launched himself at her. Only then he realized that no shots had been fired at all. He landed on top of her but didn’t have time for an attack before receiving a blow to his head with the gun handle that almost knocked him out. She used the moment of dazedness and freed herself, pinning him to the ground in turn. Clint threw a punch, hitting her side, but she didn’t even flinch. He reached down to the knife strapped to his leg.
“You’re no bodyguard,” she remarked matter-of-factly, barely dodging the knife.
“Tonight I am,” he replied, throwing himself at her again. They exchanged a few harmless punches, for a reason he couldn’t fathom she had holstered both guns instead of easily taking him out. Stupid, but good for him.
“And what are you here for?” he asked pantingly, throwing her to the ground. She rolled over and was back on her feet before he could fully execute the next attack. She handed it back to him with a skillfully placed punch in the gut.
“Same guy, opposite directive,” she answered, then groaned as he pushed her against the wall. “You are not making this any easier -nah-ah!” She pushed him away to prevent him from getting the gun. “Let’s be civil. You are not my mission, I’d prefer not to use a bullet on you.”
“Well, technically you are my mission,” he retorted. “Anyone who tries to kill that dude is my mission.”
Something between a small grin and a pained grimace flashed over his opponent’s face.
He had no idea how the dainty girl managed to do it, but he was past underestimating her when he was thrown to the ground, her knees pinning down his arms.
“As I said,” she repeated. “I’m sorry.”
He felt the cold gun pressed against his head. He should not have said the thing about the mission…
I’m sorry, Laura.
A hard, brutal punch threw his head to the side.
“Gotta make it convincing,” he heard a soft murmur float through his fading consciousness. “At least make it look like I tried…”
Another punch. Then black.
Clint came to rather dazedly, shaking his head groggily. His nose was bleeding and his head hurt way too much, but he was alive and that was confusing as hell. He reached for his comm, activating it.
“Coulson? We got a small problem.” Around 5ft3 or something like that.
“Barton!” Coulson sounded relieved. “We’ve been signaling for minutes, I just sent in back-up for you.”
Clint lifted himself up, throwing a weary look at the open door next to him. Three bloody corpses, cleanly shot, no survivors. Except him.
“I don’t think they can help much anymore. We had a third party involved. Our client was killed, so were the others.” He groaned. “I got knocked out.”
“How many?” Coulson asked, sounding surprised. Clint had a high success rate at S.H.I.E.L.D, naturally, he expected an ambush. Clint didn’t even try to make himself look heroic.
“One. A girl, small thing, but absolutely handed my ass to me. I have no idea why she didn’t kill me when she had the chance.”
Coulson was silent for a bit.
“We’ll send in a medical team, Barton.”
Clint didn’t protest. Laura would want to know if he had let the medical team look at him, she was always strict about that part. She was right, of course, he’d want the same thing if he were in her position. At least he’d come home.
The next day and on quite some painkillers, Clint sat in the office of Director Nick Fury, world’s coolest pirate, head of S.H.I.E.L.D, and his boss, and laid out what had led to the failure of his mission. He had insisted on having the briefing done now, that he was feeling up to it because afterward, they'd let him go home to recover for a few days, and the earlier he left, the better.
Fury’s face was serious when Clint finished his recollection of the fight with the red-haired assassin.
“Describe her, Agent Barton,” he demanded simply.
Clint tried to get the picture back into his head, ignoring her last words that tried to sneak into his head again, the whisper he had heard before not being killed. A few words that infuriatingly disrupted the straightforward picture of the events.
He cleared his throat.
“Red hair, green eyes, rather young. It’s hard to tell with make-up, but a couple years younger than me for sure. Never seen her before. Spoke perfect English, no specific dialect.”
Fury nodded grimly.
“I think you might have made contact with the Black Widow, Agent Barton, and the fact that you survived that encounter is... surprising”
“The Black Widow?” Clint raised an eyebrow. “That urban myth that the underworld is going on and on about?”
Fury scoffed. “If it was an urban myth, I wouldn’t have mentioned it, would I?”
Clint had to admit that. Fury seemed to have more than the myth on the mysterious assassin, otherwise, he wouldn't be so sure.
“What do we have on her?” he asked. “Has she meddled with our things before?”
“No,” Fury replied. “Not until last night. But she is a master of hand-to-hand combat and our intelligence says she works as a killer on-demand. A small red-haired woman that everyone underestimates -and quickly regrets it.”
Clint nodded, cheeks burning. The moment of underestimating her had been what could have cost him his life.
“Her background?” he asked.
Fury shook his head.
“Russian, we presume, mainly because her kill history started there and spread out over Europe. No affiliations known, we don’t even know how we could hire her if we wanted to. She’s like a shadow, nobody knows who she is, how old she is, which kills are really hers. For all we know, it might be several people using one alias.”
“So there’s nothing you really have on her apart from last night?”
Fury nodded. “We’ll get more, now that we have a reason to pursue her. Someone who can take one of our best down just like that has to be eliminated. Give me your judgment, Agent Barton, how can we take her down?"
“Not in hand-to-hand,” Clint replied immediately. “I might not be the best at that, but I have never seen anything close to it. She doesn’t even seem to feel the pain. But a bullet should finish her off just fine. A shooter could keep his distance and even someone like her will leave opportunities.”
Fury nodded.
“Quite so. You’ll be off as soon as we get a lead on her.”
“Me?” Clint asked, surprised. “I mean, sure, but why me? I’ve just failed at killing her.”
Fury smirked evilly.
“Well, that means you have double the reason to get it done next time, don’t you?”