Clint, Loki; Clint
Aug. 25th, 2012 11:18 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
aa_natashaIt's a risk every time we go out. I know it, he knows it. We both made our peace with it long ago.
But this is different. It feels different. To look at him and have to wonder if a hostile stranger has taken up residence behind familiar eyes. To look at him and wonder if this time, I will have to kill him.
Is this what it felt like for him?
http://aa.mudmagic.com/w/index.php/2012-8-24_Tourists
The tourist industry in Latveria is lacking, and there isn't a number of foreigners in this local watering hole, just the two of them for all that they at least do not pose as Americans. Clint is British security to Natasha's cover, sitting discreetly as she talks to the locals and he listens for other conversation around them. He doesn't drink a beer, his cover allowing him that as he sits with only a warm water.
Natasha alternates between friendly conversation about the state of the city and the country and business opportunities here and silent nursing of her drink as she listens to others chat about various goings-on in the same. She's left Clint at a separate table as she works the room with a light beer in hand.
"Watch your left. He's checking out the goods," Clint says under his breath, the fancy bud in his ear picking up the vibration of the movement and transmitting it to Natasha's. His water is left lifted to his lips to cover the fact that he's talking to himself. There is no tension in the line of his shoulders or in the way he sips from his cup, and he is either a very good actor or doesn't have a reason to suspect that their cover has been compromised. He does, however, have a variety of weapons plastered against his person, if not his bow.
Latveria is not known for its international guests, it's true, but in these later months, there seems to be an overcompensation. America, Germany, Russia.
Outer space.
His appearances around the locals tends to be discreet, and Johann has done more groundwork in this way than Loki, who keeps disappearing into the night only to return at random like a quasi-loyal housecat. But he has laid down enough to investigate some of the stranger occurances lately. Security questions. New faces. It's all to be expected, after Thor's appearance, if not in enough ways that fully satisfies Loki's curiousity. In the darkness, he hangs back and observes the bar face like a crouching gargoyle, before giving in to whim -- as ever -- and landing on the street.
To their credit, the agents have probably heard a few murmurings that match what they know of him.
It's a familiar face, then, that Natasha sees first, and Clint after. Loki is empty handed, in clothing that is remarkably ordinary, if expensive, and thus sets himself apart from the less than fancy patronage of the watering hole. He simply appears, materialising at a lean by the bar, apparently observing her rather quizzically.
Natasha takes her time in looking to the left, and when she does it's not to shift away, but to fix an inviting, enticing smile on the man in question. Her gaze is a touch coy as she lifts her bottle to her lips for a sip, and she's patient enough to wait for him to come to her. It helps that it doesn't take long. He pauses, though, uncertain when Natasha's eyes slip away from him and fix on a figure at the bar. For a split moment she freezes, and then she says very softly, "Clint," and takes another drink.
When Natasha directs his attention to the correct place, Clint freezes with his fingers against the water glass, tightening as if to prevent him from reaching immediately for the closest weapon. He puts his glass down slowly, pushing to his feet and grabbing his coat. "We need to leave," he assess. Brilliantly.
"Please don't."
That voice, all delicate enunciation, barely veiled malicious intent. It comes from behind Clint, although perhaps it's a reassurance that Loki has not been standing there for very long, judging by halt of his approach. He is exactly the same as the figment by the bar, save for one difference -- a walking stick is held in hand, wrought silver containing glass that gives off a faint and familiar blue glow.
The one at the bar smiles wide, then twists to address the bartender, saying something inaudible from that distance.
"You've come all this way," says the one nearest Barton, blue eyes hard and flicking to Nastaha, back to her partner.
Natasha straightens slowly, her eyes fixed on the figure at the bar until he speaks just behind her. Her eyes flash toward the mirror, taking in Loki and his staff and Clint and the civilians surrounding them both all in one fast glance. A second, maybe two, flashes by before Natasha palms something in her pocket and then turns and drops in the same motion. A table flips, providing cover, and Natasha lifts her gun in fast, smooth aim to squeeze off a handful of pointless shots. The bar, predictably, explodes in sudden movement and terrified screams.
"Just passing through the neighborhood," Clint replies, buying just that second for Natasha to spring into action. His own gaze drops to that glowy stick, and then he sprints and jumps for his own table, rolling across it and bringing it crashing down behind him to put it between himself and Loki. Or at least the Loki with the spear. He looks over to Natasha, reaching for his gun. He nods towards the back exit and then the front. Split up, y/n?
Well then. This is one of those sharp lessons that not everyone likes to play Loki's games.
Fleeting (if slightly understated) surprise flickers across his generally very controlled features, before he is moving. A spin on his heel propels him away from that line of fire, although he probably catches some bullets anyway -- what good they do doesn't immediately present itself as instinctive transformation floods golden light off the edges of fine jacket and polished wooden walking stick, replacing the former with leathers and the latter with dense, sharp metal.
This is a very small, contained battlefield, and filled with people. People are more concerned with ducking for cover and staying out of Loki's way at presence of flashy magic, and he ignores them in turn as the staff arcs in his hand and connects with the nearest table, sending it careening through the air towards where he last saw Natasha.
The Loki by the bar has disappeared in the chaos. The one engaged in battle isn't ducking for cover.
The benefit of gunshots is that they at least tend to clear a room quickly. A few bystanders still lurk behind tables and chairs and the bar, but many more have fled out the door. Natasha takes this in without conscious thought as her eyes flick toward Clint. The faintest edge of a frown etches its way across her features and she gives a minute shake of her head. /N/. It is in this moment - this careless moment, Agent Romanoff - that Loki's table catches her and sends her flying backwards with a painful thud while the fleeing civilians scramble for cover with much screaming and whimpering in response to the Loki blocking the exit. Well. This was an awesome plan.
The line of Clint's jaw twitches as Loki sends that table flying, but it prompts him into action. His shot is lined up quickly over the top of his own table, the gun aimed at Loki's chest and fired off rapidly for all the good that does against armor. "We can't win this one, Tasha," he murmurs, the strategies already ran through. "Need to retreat."
A surge of movement for the downed Romanoff is interrupted with direct gunfire, Loki showing his teeth as he turns for Barton. Nf. Sparks fly where shots hit and the knock back of bullet has Loki staggering back, but it's a comparatively minute sort of response under what is, for most, a fatal shot. Perhaps it would be expected, here, for a pulse of kinetic blue light to come charged and sparking from the end of the spear--
But Loki does not.
But it's also very a very sharp sceptre, and Coulson can attest to its deadliness otherwise. "Fools," he hisses, in a voice that almost seems to echo and slither through the space, beyond volume. "Frail, base. Long after you are bones in the ground and vermin has eaten away all recollection of your pathetic existence, I will remain. Long after your dust mingles in the star stuff of the galaxy as the ash of an Earth that has fallen, I will remain. You battle a storm and know this not."
Natasha is moving a little more stiffly when she struggles back to her feet and dives sideways behind another table. Her fingers curl around the cool comfort of her glock, and she jerks her gaze toward a door in the back, where presumably an exit waits beyond a storeroom or kitchen. She edges forward until she can catch Clint's gaze, and she mouths clearly, '/Go/' before she takes a deep breath and stands in one smooth, fast movement. She turns to face Loki, her expression trembling on the edge of brave defiance. "We know," she says, quiet but clear. "We have always known how to weather storms. You know /this/ not."
Clint may hesitate a brief second, but let's be honest, Natasha is better in this arena and always has been. He dives forward, rolling to his feet as far away from Loki as he can before he attempts to duck behind the doorway. "Romanov, don't egg on the nice man with the spear," he murmurs.
"Is this so?" is said as Clint beats his retreat, Loki awarding him a predatory glance of cat considering the flick of rodent movement, but his attention ultimately steers back to Natasha, posture unmoving. "Then it will be tested, agent, and we shall see. For now, allow me now the chance to send you on your way."
Abruptly, a burst of light appears -- not neatly from the end of the spear, but in electrical crackles that seem to leap from its metallic length, sears the floor where it connects, dances up Loki's arm. A gesture sends a bolt towards Natasha, as fast as light, hitting her full in the chest and-- then she is vanished, gone, no longer in Latveria, and he turns for where he last saw Clint.
Meanwhile.
Natasha is unceremoniously cast upon brick in jarring, dizzying teleportation, the night time air the first thing she can sense before the rest of the place materialises. It could almost be Latveria, but there is too much city, too much noise, and a quickly working analytical mind will be able to recognise Budapest at night.
Shallow pain is hot where her arm connects to her torso, reaching for the base of her throat, a burn-like injury that blisters beneath her clothing. All around her are wary strangers.
Natasha collapses forward with a jolt, wincing against the pain as she connects hard with the floor. It takes her a moment to regain her bearings and set her jaw against the pain. She whips her head up, red curls flying as she fixes her gaze on the wary faces around her. "Nyugalom," she barks in badly-accented Hungarian before biting off in English, "/Shit/." Her hand goes automatically to the tiny piece in her ear, then falls away in frustration. She raises her non-injured arm to rake her fingers hard through her hair. She reaches again for the card in her pocket, then hesitates - she doesn't dare make a call that might distract Clint at the moment. She follows it up with a "/Fuck/" and then a fast stream of angry curses in Russian.
Clint mirrors Natasha unconsciously, breathing out his own sharp, "Shit." He presses back into the bite of worn wood, his fingers steady against the weight of his gun as he considers with a quick sweep of his gaze over the storeroom and the part of the bar still in view. "Neat little trick you have there, but did you ever think about just using please?" he calls towards Loki, sliding against the wall to put more distance between them. "Where did you send her, Loki?"
They can't see one another, which is for the best. Loki needs a moment, after that, smoke unfurling off the sleeves of his armored coat where that strange lightning-like energy had struck, and drawing in longer breaths, his hand clutched defiantly tight around sceptre.
"Away," is not very helpful. "If you ask very nicely, perhaps I'll permit you to join her."
Except maybe not, because Loki moves swiftly at a sudden surge down the path that Barton took. The aim is to put the pointy end of weapon into assassin flesh.
"I think I'll wait on permission from someone else," Clint answers, and he attempts to beat a retreat as Loki moves forward. He pulls down a rack of pots and pans between them, sending the metal flying and scattering but not leaving much in the way of protection between them besides that distraction before he sprints for the back door.
Natasha pushes her way past confused, cautious faces in a half-stumble into the street. It doesn't take more than a few moments to confirm her location. She staggers several steps and collapses into the rough stone facade of the nearest building. Her breath hisses out as she tests the movement of her injured arm, and then she settles it still at her side and screams wordless rage into the night.
It doesn't get heard in Latveria. Whether Loki hears it anyway is for no one to discern.
He pursues, the clatter of metal ringing loud between them, unearthly sharp metal taking a gauge out of wood where Clint's head was in the path of just prior. The door slams on its hinges as Clint charges through, into the night, sans his partner. "I never thanked you properly for your service during times of war, Agent Barton," comes Loki's voice -- again, a little detached, nearly psychic in terms of comprehension, over sound.
If he looks back, he's alone, but how can one tell?
"I never thanked you, either," Clint curses under his breath, but he does not linger to talk to the ghosts of gods or argue against the Asgardian's assertions. Instead, he is using his momentum and the garbage bin in the alley to launch himself up the fire escape of an older building, scrambling up to the roof, to a comfortable position. Only then does he turn to look back at the exit, sweeping the area at not finding Loki there.
There is nothing. The voice doesn't pursue Clint any further, and there is no sign of Loki -- even through the windows of the broken bar, no movement is detected. Clint is very much alone, for the time being, although as he moves from here, he will probably feel watched -- whether via picking up on humans tailing him, or a simple feeling of presence in the quieter moments for as long as he is in Latveria.
Two assassins and an alien walk into a bar...
8/25/2012
It takes Natasha the better part of fifteen minutes to find an empty room she considers secure enough. She takes up watch at the window, stiff with tension and the radiating pain of her burnt shoulder, and puts in a quick call to SHIELD before finally shooting a message to Clint. She texts first: alone safe. you?
thank god.
The text message comes back immediately, relief written all over that little screen. In fifteen minutes, Clint is already back at the hotel, packing in efficient movements made easier by the fact that both of them have long since learned not to let their belongings stray far from their luggage. He's already put in a word to Janet that their cover has been compromised, that they need to leave immediately.
He pauses long enough to make the call, the phone jammed into the crook of his neck between shoulder and ear.
"Clint?" Natasha's voice is tight with worry and the tiniest edge of doubt. Is he, still? She scans the street below through the small slit she's let open in the curtains, wary.
"Yeah, it's me," Clint answers, though without being there, without seeing that his eyes are still the dark brown they usually are with no edge of iced blue, it is not garauntee. "Where are you at, Tash?"
"Budapest." The single word comes with a twist of frustration and anger. Natasha tugs the curtains fully closed and stalks across the room, allowing herself the restless movement. "What happened?"
Clint exhales a low breath of relief at the word, finally releasing it before he explains slowly, "He hit you with that spear, you disappeared. I made it out before he caught up with me, and he didn't seem to persue, but I am getting us packed up and getting the little one to get her stuff and then we're making it out of here." A pause. "You hold still and we'll come get you."
Natasha hesitates for a moment, long enough for another pace across the room. And then she nods, vocalizing her agreement only quietly. "Yeah. Okay. I'm good here."
"We should have tried splitting up," Clint says quietly in turn, a hint of ill-placed humor brushing his words as he throws a shirt into his own suitcase. Then he adds, as if remembering, "I got all your things packed, unless you can think of something I missed, or if you wanted a souvenir from beautiful Latveria."
"/Chush' sobach'ya/, Barton, I wasn't leaving you alone with him.!" Natasha's voice grows sharp, though she keeps it very, very quiet. She rolls her shoulder carefully, wincing as the injured skin pulls, and then says more evenly, "Get out of the country. I'll be here."
Clint asks, his own tone smoother, "How'd that work out for you, Romanoff?"
There's a beat of silence before Natasha says, "Toropit," 'hurry,' and thumbs the phone off.
"Yeah, yeah," Clint murmurs to the dead line, his lips twitching into a victorious smile even as he slides his phone away and moves to finish the packing and make his own calls in to SHIELD.
In Budapest, Natasha does not smile. She settles on the edge of the bed, jaw set against the burn of pain, and settles into the wait with a frown.
Follow-up.
8/25/2012
The minute Clint and Janet land in Budapest, Natasha's given them an address and firm instructions. The address is a shady hotel in a shady part of town, both of which are familiar to Clint. The instructions are to leave Janet someplace nicer and nearer the airport with a flight booked for tonight that they may or may not join her on. The subtext isn't all that sub, to someone who knows her as well as Clint: if there's any Loki lingering behind his eyes, Natasha doesn't want Janet staying close while she deals with it.
Natasha waits on the edge of her bed, every nerve strung tight. She's smeared ointment across her shoulder and patched up the burn, and she's given the area another go-over or two. It's as secure as its getting. Any more fussing and she'll cause more problems than she solves. So she's left here, in the quiet. Waiting.
There might be some leering on the part of the receptionist where Clint steps into the seedy hotel, a knowing grin shared to him before he mounts the stairs. He doesn't mask the sounds of his steps down the hall, booted and heavy, just his alone sounding against creaking floor boards. He has Natasha's bag with him, slung over his shoulder and bumping his hip as he makes his way down the hall, complete with her traveling papers. His own is left back at the nicer hotel, though not all of his weapons. They remain, even as he knocks on the door lightly.
Natasha greets Clint with a gun in her hand, though she isn't, at least, pointing it at him. She pulls the door open and stares at him, silent and still for a moment while her fingers curve around black metal.
A half-smile pulls at Clint's lips for the situation, his gaze drawing down over the weapon and then slowly back up towards Natasha. His movements remain careful where he shrugs the bag off his shoulder and holds it out to his partner. "Thought you might appreciate a clean pair of underwear," he says.
Natasha doesn't answer just yet. Green eyes study brown, searching for several long moments before Natasha finally steps back with a visible wash of relief. It sweeps downward from eyes to lips to the set of her shoulders and the line of her spine. Eventually she tucks her gun away at the small of her back as she steps out of the doorway and jerks her chin to invite him in. Her answer, when it comes, is a ragged, "/Fuck/, Clint," that escapes behind the rub of her hand across her lips.
"Not really what I was thinking, about the underwear," Clint drawls as he steps inside, closing the door firmly behind him and leaning against it. The bag hits the floor at his feet, his own breath released as he examines Natasha in a way that catches on the outline of bandages before sliding over the rest of her to assure himself that his partner is whole. He finally adds, "Could have been worse."
Natasha exhales a short, sharp laugh as she lets her arm swing loose to her side. She doesn't wince with the motion - pain is not unfamiliar, and this, at least, has been treated - but she does favor it somewhat. "You have no idea what I thought when he tossed me halfway across the continent," she says, watching him with a dark worry. "I still don't know why he did it. I thought he was just trying to get me out of the way."
"He may have been. Shit, I don't know." That is admitted with the barest line of tension to Clint's shoulders, his expression tightening in a line of his jaw as he shakes his head slowly. He draws away from the door, however, to take a seat on the springs that call themselves a bed in this hotel room. He repeats, "It coud have been a lot worse. I don't know what he was doing there."
Natasha settles almost immediately next to him, so close that hip and thigh and shoulder (her whole, unburnt one) press against his. She is silent for a few seconds before she turns her face toward him and asks quietly, "Did he let you go?"
Clint laughs, a raw sound that catches in his throat as he leans into Natasha's warmth, an arm wrapping around her without even thinking about the potential consequences but seeking no more than a vague hug. He replies, "Didn't ask for his permission, but it seems like he did."
Natasha's hand squeezes against Clint's knee before slipping away again, and she doesn't pull from his embrace. There's comfort in touch just now, and it flows in both directions. Her voice remains low and dark. It is almost inaudibly quiet when she admits, "That scares me more than if you'd shown up with blue eyes and your bow in your hand."
"Yeah, me too," Clint says on a sigh, his forehead pressed for a moment against Natasha's shoulder before he draws away from his own embrace. "It means he still has plans for us, and some sort of use."
Natasha's hand slips up to catch at the back of Clint's neck, holding him there for a moment before she lets him pull away. Silence again, caught between them and then broken with a soft, "When we get back. You need to have them dig into your head."
"If there's something lingering there, you think they're going to find it this time, Tasha?" Clint asks, a sudden sharpness to his words where he stands and paces to the window to twitch back the blinds for a moment. "He didn't touch me. He didn't do anything new to me."
Natasha drops her hands into her lap, and in the privacy of this hotel room she lets them twist together there as her gaze tracks Clint. "I think they might," she says, voice kept carefully even. "They know what to look for, Clint. Triggers. Suggestions. You know that."
Clint doesn't look back as he watches the stretch of Budapest before them, answering slowly, "This isn't what you've been through. This isn't /human/. I'll let them look in my head if they want, but they didn't find anything last time, Nat."
"It's not /not/ the same, either," Natasha says with sudden dark passion. "They didn't find anything last time because I'd knocked him the hell out of your head."
"And he didn't touch me this time," Clint answers flatly, looking back towards Natasha with a slow breath. "I'll have my head examined, get myself signed off. I just don't think they're going to find anything."
Natasha watches Clint for a moment, but she doesn't argue. Agreement is enough. She gives him a nod, slow and even.
The silent agreement seems to do little to put Clint at ease, a sharp curse uttered at the nod as his fist hits the window pane in a single gesture. "Fuck," he says.
"Clint," Natasha says, rising with the sound of fist against glass. A few steps carry her to him, behind him. Her hand reaches for his. "Don't."
"I'm not broken," Clint answers to that one word, his hand allowed to be taken even as his gaze levels on her flatly.
Natasha twists her fingers through his, squeezes them hard. Her lips curve in a dark smile. "No," she agrees. "You're /not/."
His grip on hers is too hard in turn, the pressure exherted with a will before Clint takes a breath and only says, "Alright."
Natasha tips her head just slightly, just enough to meet his gaze with steady green eyes. "I will never let you shatter, Clint. Never."
"I'm not glass, Tasha," Clint answers, the barest quirk at the corners of his lips even as he meets her gaze darkly.
Natasha releases a quiet breath and then his hand, and she steps backwards as she turns away. "No," she says, and, "Let's go home."
Clint's gaze lingers on Natasha as she pulls away, a slight wince showing subtly on his expression before it disappears quickly. He agrees, "Yeah."
It doesn't take long. There's not much to gather, and Natasha has already paid for the room. A short hop to collect Janet, another to the airport, and then the three are winging their way back to the safety of New York.
Budapest.
But this is different. It feels different. To look at him and have to wonder if a hostile stranger has taken up residence behind familiar eyes. To look at him and wonder if this time, I will have to kill him.
Is this what it felt like for him?
http://aa.mudmagic.com/w/index.php/2012-8-24_Tourists
The tourist industry in Latveria is lacking, and there isn't a number of foreigners in this local watering hole, just the two of them for all that they at least do not pose as Americans. Clint is British security to Natasha's cover, sitting discreetly as she talks to the locals and he listens for other conversation around them. He doesn't drink a beer, his cover allowing him that as he sits with only a warm water.
Natasha alternates between friendly conversation about the state of the city and the country and business opportunities here and silent nursing of her drink as she listens to others chat about various goings-on in the same. She's left Clint at a separate table as she works the room with a light beer in hand.
"Watch your left. He's checking out the goods," Clint says under his breath, the fancy bud in his ear picking up the vibration of the movement and transmitting it to Natasha's. His water is left lifted to his lips to cover the fact that he's talking to himself. There is no tension in the line of his shoulders or in the way he sips from his cup, and he is either a very good actor or doesn't have a reason to suspect that their cover has been compromised. He does, however, have a variety of weapons plastered against his person, if not his bow.
Latveria is not known for its international guests, it's true, but in these later months, there seems to be an overcompensation. America, Germany, Russia.
Outer space.
His appearances around the locals tends to be discreet, and Johann has done more groundwork in this way than Loki, who keeps disappearing into the night only to return at random like a quasi-loyal housecat. But he has laid down enough to investigate some of the stranger occurances lately. Security questions. New faces. It's all to be expected, after Thor's appearance, if not in enough ways that fully satisfies Loki's curiousity. In the darkness, he hangs back and observes the bar face like a crouching gargoyle, before giving in to whim -- as ever -- and landing on the street.
To their credit, the agents have probably heard a few murmurings that match what they know of him.
It's a familiar face, then, that Natasha sees first, and Clint after. Loki is empty handed, in clothing that is remarkably ordinary, if expensive, and thus sets himself apart from the less than fancy patronage of the watering hole. He simply appears, materialising at a lean by the bar, apparently observing her rather quizzically.
Natasha takes her time in looking to the left, and when she does it's not to shift away, but to fix an inviting, enticing smile on the man in question. Her gaze is a touch coy as she lifts her bottle to her lips for a sip, and she's patient enough to wait for him to come to her. It helps that it doesn't take long. He pauses, though, uncertain when Natasha's eyes slip away from him and fix on a figure at the bar. For a split moment she freezes, and then she says very softly, "Clint," and takes another drink.
When Natasha directs his attention to the correct place, Clint freezes with his fingers against the water glass, tightening as if to prevent him from reaching immediately for the closest weapon. He puts his glass down slowly, pushing to his feet and grabbing his coat. "We need to leave," he assess. Brilliantly.
"Please don't."
That voice, all delicate enunciation, barely veiled malicious intent. It comes from behind Clint, although perhaps it's a reassurance that Loki has not been standing there for very long, judging by halt of his approach. He is exactly the same as the figment by the bar, save for one difference -- a walking stick is held in hand, wrought silver containing glass that gives off a faint and familiar blue glow.
The one at the bar smiles wide, then twists to address the bartender, saying something inaudible from that distance.
"You've come all this way," says the one nearest Barton, blue eyes hard and flicking to Nastaha, back to her partner.
Natasha straightens slowly, her eyes fixed on the figure at the bar until he speaks just behind her. Her eyes flash toward the mirror, taking in Loki and his staff and Clint and the civilians surrounding them both all in one fast glance. A second, maybe two, flashes by before Natasha palms something in her pocket and then turns and drops in the same motion. A table flips, providing cover, and Natasha lifts her gun in fast, smooth aim to squeeze off a handful of pointless shots. The bar, predictably, explodes in sudden movement and terrified screams.
"Just passing through the neighborhood," Clint replies, buying just that second for Natasha to spring into action. His own gaze drops to that glowy stick, and then he sprints and jumps for his own table, rolling across it and bringing it crashing down behind him to put it between himself and Loki. Or at least the Loki with the spear. He looks over to Natasha, reaching for his gun. He nods towards the back exit and then the front. Split up, y/n?
Well then. This is one of those sharp lessons that not everyone likes to play Loki's games.
Fleeting (if slightly understated) surprise flickers across his generally very controlled features, before he is moving. A spin on his heel propels him away from that line of fire, although he probably catches some bullets anyway -- what good they do doesn't immediately present itself as instinctive transformation floods golden light off the edges of fine jacket and polished wooden walking stick, replacing the former with leathers and the latter with dense, sharp metal.
This is a very small, contained battlefield, and filled with people. People are more concerned with ducking for cover and staying out of Loki's way at presence of flashy magic, and he ignores them in turn as the staff arcs in his hand and connects with the nearest table, sending it careening through the air towards where he last saw Natasha.
The Loki by the bar has disappeared in the chaos. The one engaged in battle isn't ducking for cover.
The benefit of gunshots is that they at least tend to clear a room quickly. A few bystanders still lurk behind tables and chairs and the bar, but many more have fled out the door. Natasha takes this in without conscious thought as her eyes flick toward Clint. The faintest edge of a frown etches its way across her features and she gives a minute shake of her head. /N/. It is in this moment - this careless moment, Agent Romanoff - that Loki's table catches her and sends her flying backwards with a painful thud while the fleeing civilians scramble for cover with much screaming and whimpering in response to the Loki blocking the exit. Well. This was an awesome plan.
The line of Clint's jaw twitches as Loki sends that table flying, but it prompts him into action. His shot is lined up quickly over the top of his own table, the gun aimed at Loki's chest and fired off rapidly for all the good that does against armor. "We can't win this one, Tasha," he murmurs, the strategies already ran through. "Need to retreat."
A surge of movement for the downed Romanoff is interrupted with direct gunfire, Loki showing his teeth as he turns for Barton. Nf. Sparks fly where shots hit and the knock back of bullet has Loki staggering back, but it's a comparatively minute sort of response under what is, for most, a fatal shot. Perhaps it would be expected, here, for a pulse of kinetic blue light to come charged and sparking from the end of the spear--
But Loki does not.
But it's also very a very sharp sceptre, and Coulson can attest to its deadliness otherwise. "Fools," he hisses, in a voice that almost seems to echo and slither through the space, beyond volume. "Frail, base. Long after you are bones in the ground and vermin has eaten away all recollection of your pathetic existence, I will remain. Long after your dust mingles in the star stuff of the galaxy as the ash of an Earth that has fallen, I will remain. You battle a storm and know this not."
Natasha is moving a little more stiffly when she struggles back to her feet and dives sideways behind another table. Her fingers curl around the cool comfort of her glock, and she jerks her gaze toward a door in the back, where presumably an exit waits beyond a storeroom or kitchen. She edges forward until she can catch Clint's gaze, and she mouths clearly, '/Go/' before she takes a deep breath and stands in one smooth, fast movement. She turns to face Loki, her expression trembling on the edge of brave defiance. "We know," she says, quiet but clear. "We have always known how to weather storms. You know /this/ not."
Clint may hesitate a brief second, but let's be honest, Natasha is better in this arena and always has been. He dives forward, rolling to his feet as far away from Loki as he can before he attempts to duck behind the doorway. "Romanov, don't egg on the nice man with the spear," he murmurs.
"Is this so?" is said as Clint beats his retreat, Loki awarding him a predatory glance of cat considering the flick of rodent movement, but his attention ultimately steers back to Natasha, posture unmoving. "Then it will be tested, agent, and we shall see. For now, allow me now the chance to send you on your way."
Abruptly, a burst of light appears -- not neatly from the end of the spear, but in electrical crackles that seem to leap from its metallic length, sears the floor where it connects, dances up Loki's arm. A gesture sends a bolt towards Natasha, as fast as light, hitting her full in the chest and-- then she is vanished, gone, no longer in Latveria, and he turns for where he last saw Clint.
Meanwhile.
Natasha is unceremoniously cast upon brick in jarring, dizzying teleportation, the night time air the first thing she can sense before the rest of the place materialises. It could almost be Latveria, but there is too much city, too much noise, and a quickly working analytical mind will be able to recognise Budapest at night.
Shallow pain is hot where her arm connects to her torso, reaching for the base of her throat, a burn-like injury that blisters beneath her clothing. All around her are wary strangers.
Natasha collapses forward with a jolt, wincing against the pain as she connects hard with the floor. It takes her a moment to regain her bearings and set her jaw against the pain. She whips her head up, red curls flying as she fixes her gaze on the wary faces around her. "Nyugalom," she barks in badly-accented Hungarian before biting off in English, "/Shit/." Her hand goes automatically to the tiny piece in her ear, then falls away in frustration. She raises her non-injured arm to rake her fingers hard through her hair. She reaches again for the card in her pocket, then hesitates - she doesn't dare make a call that might distract Clint at the moment. She follows it up with a "/Fuck/" and then a fast stream of angry curses in Russian.
Clint mirrors Natasha unconsciously, breathing out his own sharp, "Shit." He presses back into the bite of worn wood, his fingers steady against the weight of his gun as he considers with a quick sweep of his gaze over the storeroom and the part of the bar still in view. "Neat little trick you have there, but did you ever think about just using please?" he calls towards Loki, sliding against the wall to put more distance between them. "Where did you send her, Loki?"
They can't see one another, which is for the best. Loki needs a moment, after that, smoke unfurling off the sleeves of his armored coat where that strange lightning-like energy had struck, and drawing in longer breaths, his hand clutched defiantly tight around sceptre.
"Away," is not very helpful. "If you ask very nicely, perhaps I'll permit you to join her."
Except maybe not, because Loki moves swiftly at a sudden surge down the path that Barton took. The aim is to put the pointy end of weapon into assassin flesh.
"I think I'll wait on permission from someone else," Clint answers, and he attempts to beat a retreat as Loki moves forward. He pulls down a rack of pots and pans between them, sending the metal flying and scattering but not leaving much in the way of protection between them besides that distraction before he sprints for the back door.
Natasha pushes her way past confused, cautious faces in a half-stumble into the street. It doesn't take more than a few moments to confirm her location. She staggers several steps and collapses into the rough stone facade of the nearest building. Her breath hisses out as she tests the movement of her injured arm, and then she settles it still at her side and screams wordless rage into the night.
It doesn't get heard in Latveria. Whether Loki hears it anyway is for no one to discern.
He pursues, the clatter of metal ringing loud between them, unearthly sharp metal taking a gauge out of wood where Clint's head was in the path of just prior. The door slams on its hinges as Clint charges through, into the night, sans his partner. "I never thanked you properly for your service during times of war, Agent Barton," comes Loki's voice -- again, a little detached, nearly psychic in terms of comprehension, over sound.
If he looks back, he's alone, but how can one tell?
"I never thanked you, either," Clint curses under his breath, but he does not linger to talk to the ghosts of gods or argue against the Asgardian's assertions. Instead, he is using his momentum and the garbage bin in the alley to launch himself up the fire escape of an older building, scrambling up to the roof, to a comfortable position. Only then does he turn to look back at the exit, sweeping the area at not finding Loki there.
There is nothing. The voice doesn't pursue Clint any further, and there is no sign of Loki -- even through the windows of the broken bar, no movement is detected. Clint is very much alone, for the time being, although as he moves from here, he will probably feel watched -- whether via picking up on humans tailing him, or a simple feeling of presence in the quieter moments for as long as he is in Latveria.
Two assassins and an alien walk into a bar...
8/25/2012
It takes Natasha the better part of fifteen minutes to find an empty room she considers secure enough. She takes up watch at the window, stiff with tension and the radiating pain of her burnt shoulder, and puts in a quick call to SHIELD before finally shooting a message to Clint. She texts first: alone safe. you?
thank god.
The text message comes back immediately, relief written all over that little screen. In fifteen minutes, Clint is already back at the hotel, packing in efficient movements made easier by the fact that both of them have long since learned not to let their belongings stray far from their luggage. He's already put in a word to Janet that their cover has been compromised, that they need to leave immediately.
He pauses long enough to make the call, the phone jammed into the crook of his neck between shoulder and ear.
"Clint?" Natasha's voice is tight with worry and the tiniest edge of doubt. Is he, still? She scans the street below through the small slit she's let open in the curtains, wary.
"Yeah, it's me," Clint answers, though without being there, without seeing that his eyes are still the dark brown they usually are with no edge of iced blue, it is not garauntee. "Where are you at, Tash?"
"Budapest." The single word comes with a twist of frustration and anger. Natasha tugs the curtains fully closed and stalks across the room, allowing herself the restless movement. "What happened?"
Clint exhales a low breath of relief at the word, finally releasing it before he explains slowly, "He hit you with that spear, you disappeared. I made it out before he caught up with me, and he didn't seem to persue, but I am getting us packed up and getting the little one to get her stuff and then we're making it out of here." A pause. "You hold still and we'll come get you."
Natasha hesitates for a moment, long enough for another pace across the room. And then she nods, vocalizing her agreement only quietly. "Yeah. Okay. I'm good here."
"We should have tried splitting up," Clint says quietly in turn, a hint of ill-placed humor brushing his words as he throws a shirt into his own suitcase. Then he adds, as if remembering, "I got all your things packed, unless you can think of something I missed, or if you wanted a souvenir from beautiful Latveria."
"/Chush' sobach'ya/, Barton, I wasn't leaving you alone with him.!" Natasha's voice grows sharp, though she keeps it very, very quiet. She rolls her shoulder carefully, wincing as the injured skin pulls, and then says more evenly, "Get out of the country. I'll be here."
Clint asks, his own tone smoother, "How'd that work out for you, Romanoff?"
There's a beat of silence before Natasha says, "Toropit," 'hurry,' and thumbs the phone off.
"Yeah, yeah," Clint murmurs to the dead line, his lips twitching into a victorious smile even as he slides his phone away and moves to finish the packing and make his own calls in to SHIELD.
In Budapest, Natasha does not smile. She settles on the edge of the bed, jaw set against the burn of pain, and settles into the wait with a frown.
Follow-up.
8/25/2012
The minute Clint and Janet land in Budapest, Natasha's given them an address and firm instructions. The address is a shady hotel in a shady part of town, both of which are familiar to Clint. The instructions are to leave Janet someplace nicer and nearer the airport with a flight booked for tonight that they may or may not join her on. The subtext isn't all that sub, to someone who knows her as well as Clint: if there's any Loki lingering behind his eyes, Natasha doesn't want Janet staying close while she deals with it.
Natasha waits on the edge of her bed, every nerve strung tight. She's smeared ointment across her shoulder and patched up the burn, and she's given the area another go-over or two. It's as secure as its getting. Any more fussing and she'll cause more problems than she solves. So she's left here, in the quiet. Waiting.
There might be some leering on the part of the receptionist where Clint steps into the seedy hotel, a knowing grin shared to him before he mounts the stairs. He doesn't mask the sounds of his steps down the hall, booted and heavy, just his alone sounding against creaking floor boards. He has Natasha's bag with him, slung over his shoulder and bumping his hip as he makes his way down the hall, complete with her traveling papers. His own is left back at the nicer hotel, though not all of his weapons. They remain, even as he knocks on the door lightly.
Natasha greets Clint with a gun in her hand, though she isn't, at least, pointing it at him. She pulls the door open and stares at him, silent and still for a moment while her fingers curve around black metal.
A half-smile pulls at Clint's lips for the situation, his gaze drawing down over the weapon and then slowly back up towards Natasha. His movements remain careful where he shrugs the bag off his shoulder and holds it out to his partner. "Thought you might appreciate a clean pair of underwear," he says.
Natasha doesn't answer just yet. Green eyes study brown, searching for several long moments before Natasha finally steps back with a visible wash of relief. It sweeps downward from eyes to lips to the set of her shoulders and the line of her spine. Eventually she tucks her gun away at the small of her back as she steps out of the doorway and jerks her chin to invite him in. Her answer, when it comes, is a ragged, "/Fuck/, Clint," that escapes behind the rub of her hand across her lips.
"Not really what I was thinking, about the underwear," Clint drawls as he steps inside, closing the door firmly behind him and leaning against it. The bag hits the floor at his feet, his own breath released as he examines Natasha in a way that catches on the outline of bandages before sliding over the rest of her to assure himself that his partner is whole. He finally adds, "Could have been worse."
Natasha exhales a short, sharp laugh as she lets her arm swing loose to her side. She doesn't wince with the motion - pain is not unfamiliar, and this, at least, has been treated - but she does favor it somewhat. "You have no idea what I thought when he tossed me halfway across the continent," she says, watching him with a dark worry. "I still don't know why he did it. I thought he was just trying to get me out of the way."
"He may have been. Shit, I don't know." That is admitted with the barest line of tension to Clint's shoulders, his expression tightening in a line of his jaw as he shakes his head slowly. He draws away from the door, however, to take a seat on the springs that call themselves a bed in this hotel room. He repeats, "It coud have been a lot worse. I don't know what he was doing there."
Natasha settles almost immediately next to him, so close that hip and thigh and shoulder (her whole, unburnt one) press against his. She is silent for a few seconds before she turns her face toward him and asks quietly, "Did he let you go?"
Clint laughs, a raw sound that catches in his throat as he leans into Natasha's warmth, an arm wrapping around her without even thinking about the potential consequences but seeking no more than a vague hug. He replies, "Didn't ask for his permission, but it seems like he did."
Natasha's hand squeezes against Clint's knee before slipping away again, and she doesn't pull from his embrace. There's comfort in touch just now, and it flows in both directions. Her voice remains low and dark. It is almost inaudibly quiet when she admits, "That scares me more than if you'd shown up with blue eyes and your bow in your hand."
"Yeah, me too," Clint says on a sigh, his forehead pressed for a moment against Natasha's shoulder before he draws away from his own embrace. "It means he still has plans for us, and some sort of use."
Natasha's hand slips up to catch at the back of Clint's neck, holding him there for a moment before she lets him pull away. Silence again, caught between them and then broken with a soft, "When we get back. You need to have them dig into your head."
"If there's something lingering there, you think they're going to find it this time, Tasha?" Clint asks, a sudden sharpness to his words where he stands and paces to the window to twitch back the blinds for a moment. "He didn't touch me. He didn't do anything new to me."
Natasha drops her hands into her lap, and in the privacy of this hotel room she lets them twist together there as her gaze tracks Clint. "I think they might," she says, voice kept carefully even. "They know what to look for, Clint. Triggers. Suggestions. You know that."
Clint doesn't look back as he watches the stretch of Budapest before them, answering slowly, "This isn't what you've been through. This isn't /human/. I'll let them look in my head if they want, but they didn't find anything last time, Nat."
"It's not /not/ the same, either," Natasha says with sudden dark passion. "They didn't find anything last time because I'd knocked him the hell out of your head."
"And he didn't touch me this time," Clint answers flatly, looking back towards Natasha with a slow breath. "I'll have my head examined, get myself signed off. I just don't think they're going to find anything."
Natasha watches Clint for a moment, but she doesn't argue. Agreement is enough. She gives him a nod, slow and even.
The silent agreement seems to do little to put Clint at ease, a sharp curse uttered at the nod as his fist hits the window pane in a single gesture. "Fuck," he says.
"Clint," Natasha says, rising with the sound of fist against glass. A few steps carry her to him, behind him. Her hand reaches for his. "Don't."
"I'm not broken," Clint answers to that one word, his hand allowed to be taken even as his gaze levels on her flatly.
Natasha twists her fingers through his, squeezes them hard. Her lips curve in a dark smile. "No," she agrees. "You're /not/."
His grip on hers is too hard in turn, the pressure exherted with a will before Clint takes a breath and only says, "Alright."
Natasha tips her head just slightly, just enough to meet his gaze with steady green eyes. "I will never let you shatter, Clint. Never."
"I'm not glass, Tasha," Clint answers, the barest quirk at the corners of his lips even as he meets her gaze darkly.
Natasha releases a quiet breath and then his hand, and she steps backwards as she turns away. "No," she says, and, "Let's go home."
Clint's gaze lingers on Natasha as she pulls away, a slight wince showing subtly on his expression before it disappears quickly. He agrees, "Yeah."
It doesn't take long. There's not much to gather, and Natasha has already paid for the room. A short hop to collect Janet, another to the airport, and then the three are winging their way back to the safety of New York.
Budapest.