#clint-circusboy-barton

[wolvesandromanoffs]

Texts || Clintasha

Natasha: Clint?

[wolvesandromanoffs]

[A plain box is left inside Clint's door, with the following items within: Beltone Micro-Invision Hearing Aids, A recurve riser bow, and a Nikon Laser Rangefinder.]

Clint,

I . . . yeah.  I thought you'd like the bow, and the scope.  And I uh, I owed you a pair of hearing aids.  I um, Merry Christmas.

- Natasha

[wolvesandromanoffs]

The Red Room || Natasha and Hawkeye^2

30% chance of survival.  That's what Natasha had determined about this mission.  She'd had worse.  Of course, then, it had only been her she was endangering.  Now she was involving others: Clint, and Kate.  She had tried to keep them out of it, to go on her own, but they had constantly insisted on helping her, and Natasha had to admit that her chances of survival went way up with others there having her back.  Still, she was nervous as she traveled.  Not that she let it show.  She was sitting at a bar, nursing a beer, and waiting for them.  She'd been here many times before, at this bar in Ukraine, where there was almost always at least one Red Room operative.  It would take some time, she knew, for the operative would hardly be stupid enough to try and take her on their own- and she couldn't just let them.  They would suspect her if she did not put up a good fight.  Natasha glanced at her watch.  Two-thirty pm.  She'd been here two and a half hours already, and expected that they would come for her soon.

She wasn't wrong.  A few sips later and the doors (front and back) burst open, allowing a large number of people to enter.  Natasha burst into action.  She didn't give her full effort, but she made sure to avoid bullets- getting out would be much harder if she was seriously injured.  She knew there would be minor injuries, especially by the time she got out, but those she could handle just fine.  Allowing herself to knock out a couple operatives, and kill one, she also let them get in a few hits to make her eventual capture seem more plausible.  She didn't lead them on for long, not wanting to waste time.  They'd only been fighting a few minutes before she allowed one to strike her hard on the head, and then she was conscious only long enough to hope that they behaved exactly as she expected them too, and that they did not decide to just kill her and be done with it.  Her last thought was a hope that they would not discover Clint and Kate, who were hiding only miles away with the device that would track her movement.

[wolvesandromanoffs]

Devil May Cry || Oneshot

She had resolved not to go.  She wasn't going to go.  It wasn't fair to Clint for her to be around him- to continue on their friendship when he wanted something more, and she couldn't give it to him.  The best thing was for her to leave.  She had talked to SHIELD, and they'd agreed to allow her on some probationary missions, with the promise of more to come if she did well, so she could leave the school, leave Clint, and then he would be free to find friends or a woman who could love him back.  He'd be much happier for it, she knew, and she'd likely be miserable either way, so it hardly mattered.  She had just resolved not to go, to make it a clean break, when she received yet another message.  Do you think he will be a good trainee?

She flinched at the message.  She'd been receiving similar threats- many of them also in Russian- for several days now.  At first she hadn't believed them, sure that some student that hated her was trying to play a trick, and that Yasha wouldn't turn her in, as he had promised, but as the messages continued, they'd begun to sound more and more like them, like the Red Room, and she had gotten more and more nervous about it.  Few things scared Natasha, but the Red Room was one of them, and while she could survive their ministrations, and perhaps deserved them- though she would do her best to avoid them- she knew Clint, along with most people, could never survive there.  And yet . . . this threat implied that they had him.

With this knowledge, she moved fast.  Her first instinct was to panic; worry about Clint, or freak out about the Red Room's return- if they knew where she was, they could come for her at any time, and she could easily end up back in their grasp, doing their bidding, for they knew exactly what made her tick, what her weaknesses were.  But panicking would do neither her or Clint any good.  It was easy enough to throw on her boots and jacket, tucking her only  weapon- a knife- into her right boot, and her wallet into her jacket pocket, before running out the door, taking a second to lock it on her way out just in case this was some kind of trap.  She was at Clint's door within minutes.  Taking a moment to prepare herself for what-or whomever could be in there, she pulled out her knife, and tensed her body.  Then she shoved open the door, diving to the ground and rolling just in case anyone was within with a gun.  But there was no on there.  Not even Clint.  A quick glance around gave evidence of a struggle, and she knew immediately.  They had him.  They had him because they knew he was her friend, and she care about him.  They had him in order to get at her.  This meant that they had him, and it was entirely her fault.  She dreaded to think what they might do to him, even if it was just to harm her.

Obviously, she had to go after him.  Natasha took a moment to inspect the scene, but she knew it was pointless.  Nothing left behind would help her any, but she didn't really need the help.  She knew where they would go.  They wanted her to chase after him- wanted her to fall back into Red Room hands, and would take him right to the Volvograd base to ensure that she could find them.  Of course, there were a couple ways to do that, but Natasha could guess what their plan would be.  With a prisoner, they obviously could not take public transportation, so they would stick to some sort of private aircraft to get off of Sky High.  Of course, aircraft was never allowed directly into the Volvograd base, so they would likely switch out for some sort of armored vehicle- well defended and difficult to stop.  She knew just the airfield that was perfect for the switch- a little illegal venue in Russia that she'd often used.

She'd prefer to catch their plane and avoid an international incident, as well as the difficulty of breaking into an armored vehicle, but they had a head start on her, and she still needed to 'borrow' one of SHIELD's jets, so it was unlikely she would catch up to them in time.  Instead she would have to try and catch them at the airfield if she could.  If not, then catch up to them.  She did not want to have to go into the facility to get him back, for that was a new task entirely, and nigh impossible.  So she would have to get him out of the armored vehicle.  She frowned.  She could find most of the things she needed well enough, but she was going to have to steal a few extra things from SHIELD.

[wolvesandromanoffs]

You saw my pain, washed out in the rain || Clintasha

The texts had been.  Well she didn't really understand.  The first had been just a single text.  I need to talk to you.  Whatever the hell that meant, she had no idea.  She did know, however, that such phrases were never deemed good in normal everyday society, but of course, Natasha was hardly involved in normal everyday society.  She wouldn't even know what it was really, if part of her training had not been designed so she could slot herself into any part of it.  But she had, and Clint, she thought, at least had some real experience within normal everyday society, so perhaps his idea of the phrase was similar.  She didn't know.  She didn't like not knowing.  Knowing things was her specialty, or rather, one of her specialties- she had quite a few . . .  Clint had been acting weird lately.  And of course, being who she was, she had noticed.  Though in all her experience, she wasn't quite sure what to make of it.  

He wanted sex with her.  That much she could tell, but beyond that . . . It was hard, and Natasha wondered how much of that was due to her severely skewed viewpoint  Most men she'd met in her lifetime had wanted sex with her, and many of them had got what they wanted, though often they got a little more than they wanted by the end of it.  Then of course, most of these men- all, really, she thought, had only wanted sex.  Except perhaps Yasha, but she still couldn't really understand that relationship.  It had been easier then, when she hadn't had to really understand it, but now . . . the Winter Soldier had been her instructor, her superior, same as many of the Red Room men she'd had sex with, and yet . . . she'd felt she had a choice in the matter, and again, she thought maybe . . . maybe he at least, had felt something more.  She didn't know.  Maybe she had felt something more.  At the time, it had been much more painless not to consider such things.

Now of course, she still could not tell.  Didn't know what feelings beyond a desire for sex looked or felt like.  It was all well enough- Natasha knew very well that any such feelings were dangerous, and best kept away from her.  Except then there was Clint.  He was her friend.  Even she had admitted it.  Sometimes she regretted that, fearing it would eventually get him hurt, or killed.  And he wanted more.  She knew that at least.  He wanted more, and she could not give it to him.  She couldn't.  He was already in far too much danger just in his friendship to her, and she did not want to think about the danger inherent in anything further, let alone the fact that she was surely incapable of holding any such further relationship.  Yet she found herself inviting him over anyways- maybe he just wanted to talk about something else.

[wolvesandromanoffs]

Texts || Clintasha

Natasha: [unsent] Clint, I-I'm sorry . . . fuck.

Natasha: Clint?

[wolvesandromanoffs]

clint-circusboy-barton replied to your post: You deserve everything that ever happened to you.

That’s not true.

Yeah it is.

But don't worry.  I don't expect you to ever agree with me, so just- just leave it.

[wolvesandromanoffs]

clint-circusboy-barton replied to your post: Was it worth letting little Rose wither? Was all of this worth it?

[P Tash, just ignore them. They don’t know shit.

I-I know.  It just . . . fuck.  It's stupid to get upset about it.  It's done with.