My Avengers (1)

Chapter 15

(Romanoff's POV)

I hold Clint's hand tightly as his eyes slowly flutter open.

"Hey there."

He sits up quickly, looking around in distress.

"Clint? Clint. Hey. It's gonna be okay. You're gonna be alright."

"You sure about that?" he stands up and starts pacing the room, crashing into the walls. "You uh, you know that for sure, do you Nat? No no, I have to go in there. I have to flush him out."

"Clint, Loki has already taken off. He's got the Tesseract. There's nothing we can do just now. You need to level out, get your head straight. It's gonna take some time."

"You don't understand Natasha. Do you know what it's like? Have you ever had someone play with your brain? Pull you out and stuff something else in? Be nothing more than a shell. Do you know what it's like to be unmade?"

"That's not even a question Clint, you know I do."

"Why am I back? How did you get him out of my head?"

"Cognitive recalibration," I shrug with a grin. "I hit you on the head. Really hard."

"Well.... Thanks."

He calmly walks over and sits back down on the bed.

"How many?"

"Hmm?"

"How many agents, Nat. Tell me."

"No. Don't do that to yourself. This is Loki we're dealing with. This is monsters and magic, and nothing we ever trained for. You cannot blame yourself for any of this."

"Loki? Did he get away?"

My head dips slightly, "Yeah. I don't suppose you know where to?"

"I didn't need to know so I didn't ask. He's going to make his play soon though. Today."

"We have to stop him," I say as I head towards the door.

"Yeah? Who's we?"

I pause and think briefly of y/n, "Whoever's left."

He follows me over to the door, "Well I suppose if I can put an arrow through Loki's eye socket, I'll sleep better at night."

"You definitely sound like you again."

"You don't."

".....What do you mean?"

"I mean the fact that you're a spy. Not a soldier. And now, what? You want to wade into war? Why? What did Loki do to you?"

"What? Nothing, I just-"

"Natasha."

"I've been compromised. Okay? I got red in my ledger and I'd like to wipe it out. Happy?"

"Do I look happy?" he raises an eyebrow at me.

"Yeah well, I don't think any of us are happy right now."

"Hey. Sit down. Tell me."

"I don't know what you want me to say."

He gently guides me by the arm to sit back down.

"I want you to tell me what happened to make you act like this. Or rather, who."

I fold my arms defiantly.

"Natasha, I've known you long enough that I can read you like a book. You only act like this, defensive, when you've lost someone. And you're blaming yourself. So tell me."

He perches on the edge of the bed as I'm sat in the chair, and he waits patiently whilst I try to find the words.

"It's um.... It's the kid."

"What kid?"

"When you were, uh....."

"Compromised?"

"Yeah. When you were compromised, Fury sent me out recruiting. I got in Doctor Banner, and y/n y/l/n. She was, what. 19? 20? God, I don't even know how old she was, how bad is that?" I laugh scornfully. "I'm a terrible person."

"No."

"Yes, I am. I read the file Fury gave me on her; she was one of Hydra's, and I just took everything that I read at surface level. Assumed she was just a kid who'd gone for a power kick or something like that. But there was more to her than that. When she was questioning Loki, she said she was tortured. That List forced her training upon her, gave her more power than she was born with. But we were all too busy focusing on Loki and his stupid plan, that we never took the time to get to know her properly. And then, when I was fighting Banner, or Hulk or whatever he is, I left her. Me, Clint. I left her there. Which means it's my fault she's dead."

"Natasha, listen to me."

I turn my gaze to him as a tear falls from my left eye.

"If Fury picked her for this mission, it means that he saw something in her that's special. It was your job to bring her in, it was not your job to find out every detail about her and her life, and it was not your job to protect her."

"Clint, how are we supposed to all work as a team if we know nothing about each other? If we don't connect? She tried to tell us that she was a guinea pig rather than a volunteer, and we didn't listen. We let her down, and she died alone. I mean, how could none of us been able to save her?"

"Look, you were busy with me and Banner. I don't know about the rest of them, but I'm sure they had very good reasons for not being able to get to her in time. People die, Nat. Every day. Don't lose it over some kid."

I shake my head slowly, "She wasn't just some kid, Clint. She was special. And I was too busy worrying about you that I couldn't see it until it was too late."