i got infinite ammunition

[barton_me]

Roughly three hours ago, Clint had been skillfully monkeying his way down the side of a building, the grips sewn in the palms of his gloves helping him to twist and turn his way through a fire escape that had, long ago, become nothing more than a tilting mass of rusted metal leaning haphazardly against a wall of brick. Roughly three hours ago, he'd been burning with a purpose, the heady sensation of a job completed but with the bitter caution of knowing he was not yet out of danger. Landing silently on his feet in the alleyway, he had kept to the shadows. Three blocks over he heard sirens, but of course it was too late.

The room he had torched had been filled with hardware containing information on several SHIELD operatives, including their alternate identities. It had already been copied, placed under safe keeping, but the originals had to be wiped clean. When it came to fires, Clint often volunteered; too often when the spark was set by a rookie it spread and harmed civilians. Besides, there was really no place quite like southeast Asia to disappear to for a bit when you wanted to clear your head of things.

At the next building down, at the opposite end of the alley, he had made quick work of the lock. But upon going through he was not in an abandoned service hallway for an insurance firm. Even if there hadn't been windows full of sunlight when he knew it had to be the dead of night, the very air told him that he had experienced something very, very odd.

It took some time to ascertain he had not had a stroke, was not going insane, and really was in what appeared to be a pretty nice hotel, far nicer than the ones he usually stayed in. Dimensional doorways weren't completely out of his grasp, of course, but the ones he knew about required a bit more pomp, circumstance, and energy fields than the single, quiet door he had walked through.

Since a few tries had told him that returning was not an option, he ended up going immediately into what he called 'airport mode' - when waiting for a flight, train, or similar, it was always best to procure three things: book, coffee, and a sandwich. Even if you didn't even want those items. So there he was in the Bistro, a third of the way through a book he had found in the gift shop, wondering how long it was going to take before he could either a) get back home or b) panic. At least his gear was more or less subtle, and he had his compound bow and quiver on the floor and tucked along the side of his leg, mostly out of sight.

Comments

[regimes_fall]

Clint was allowed his full spectrum of emotions, so if he had been angry with her over her verbal misstep, she would not have held it against him. She did know that he wasn't an overly sensitive person, and was pleased when he assured her out loud that she hadn't gone and done something that might start their reunion off on the wrong foot. She hadn't been overly concerned about it, but because she cared for him he'd deserved the apology all the same.

"I know you aren't," she said as she stood with him, and when he held his arms out to her in offering, she went into them with the ease and familiarity with which Clint had inspired in her from the first. She hugged him tight, even moving to rest her cheek on his shoulder as she rubbed her hands along his back in an unconsciously soothing motion. "I'm glad you're here, Clint," she said softly into the material of his shirt, and meant it. She would've preferred he stay well away from the occasional danger the Nexus could present, but was also selfish enough to be happy for his presence and camaraderie.

"Come on," she said when she finally pulled away from the comfort of his hug. "Let's go get drunk like Russian stereotypes, yes?" She thought he might need it for the news she was going to deliver, but perhaps not. Her old friend was surely made of some steadfast stuff, she'd learned that time and again.

With his bill settled, she led him up to her room and inside without much fuss, turning on the light and having a look around before gesturing. "Plop down anywhere," she said. "I don't have any mixers other than ice, so we'll drink it on the rocks, if you want."

[barton_me]

He retrieved his bow before following her, falling into step beside her as they walked. As they moved he looked around him, surreptitiously but alert, aware of what she had told him - that they were not alone, that there were people there from their past and their future. "You're the Russian stereotype," he said. "I'm the American stereotype. You know, minus the racism and sexism, stuff like that."

When they arrived he looked around her room in some interest, "Do they all look like this, or is this just you?" he wondered, aloud. Bow and quiver were set atop a chair backed against the wall. He kept his knives on him, if only because they weren't exactly sheathed in a way where if he passed out drunk they'd be digging into somewhere uncomfortable. Clint left weapons on for enemies, strangers, and close friends, all for different reasons. Natasha, he knew, would not give a damn.

"As long as there's ice, should be good," he said. Of all the places to sit, he chose a small couch - sort of. He sat on the floor with his back against it. It seemed like the better option. "Is it bad enough vodka that it will make the 'big things' you have to tell me less big?" he asked, and, because he knew it couldn't possibly be true, he asked, "You don't have a kid, do you? I am not uncle material."

[regimes_fall]

Natasha glanced up at Clint as she straightened from the mini fridge in the corner, one hand holding a bottle of vodka frosty from the freezer and the other holding a small tray of ice. Her gaze flicked to the room as she sat both items on the counter, then turned for glasses. "I think they're different for every person," she said. "Granted, I haven't been in many people's rooms, but of the rooms I have been in, all were different. I think the hotel tries to be as accommodating as possible, strangely enough."

Natasha's room boasted sparse but comfortable furnishings, a wet bar, and enough security to make her feel comfortable sleeping there, which was really all she wanted or needed anyway. "Maybe yours will have a pizza oven in one corner. If so, dinner's on you from here on out."

She poured the drinks, added the ice, and made her way over to where Clint sat. She didn't feel like sitting on the floor, so she handed him his glass and curled up on the couch behind him, one knee resting against his shoulder. "It's pretty big, Barton," she said with a sigh. "And I'd make an even worse mother than you would an uncle, so let's not joke about that."

She took a drink from her glass, draining it until there was just a bit of vodka mixing with the ice at the bottom of her glass, and then started to speak. She saw no reason to keep delaying, and she laid out the facts of what had happened in Washington from start to finish as though she were relating any other details of a mission to him. She kept to the facts, skimming around her personal feelings on anything because her feelings were abundant and confusing when it came to much of what had happened in Washington, so she simply left them all out for the time being.

"Barnes is at the hotel too," she finished after she'd brought him up to speed. "He and Rogers are currently doing the whole seek and avoid thing, last I knew. I don't see much of either of them."

[barton_me]

Couches always seemed slightly too comfortable to Clint, like he was sinking into them instead of actually sitting. Which, he knew that was an odd way of looking at it, but that was it nonetheless. "Well, fingers crossed for the pizza oven," he said, accepting the glass from her. Vodka tasted the same to Clint no matter what, but he did have an inkling that the good stuff didn't taste like pure poison, and that Natasha never bought the bad stuff.

It was easier to listen to Natasha without looking right in her face, too. He could just concentrate on the words, digest them as he saw fit. She had a lot of big things to say, but Clint was not the kind of person to balk. If anything, she was giving him a report; and those were bread and butter, in his trade, no matter how sensational.

In reality, Barnes was the least of his concerns. So apparently the Winter Soldier - who he always believed to exist, if only because Natasha didn't believe in ghost stories, and treated him as real - was an old companion of Cap's, and had shot Natasha for a second time. Someone had to give him a talking to about that.

"SHIELD is gone?" he asked, instead, looking up over his shoulder at her. Her drink was empty, his only slightly touched, so he held it up for her if she wanted to drink it. He could always get a refill. Gone. All of it. They'd taken it apart.

Man, what about all of his stuff? Ah, well.

"Are you okay with that?" he inquired.

[regimes_fall]

There was something almost cathartic in the full disclosure of events to Clint, as Natasha had not spoken of them in such a linear fashion since they happened. The only person in the hotel with which she might’ve made such a full disclosure to was Rogers, and he’d been there for the events and knew first hand. No matter how clinical she’d made her retelling of the events, it did her some good to speak of them in even the most factual of terms. She had not expected Clint to balk, or otherwise make any grand display of emotion as that was simply not his way, nor was it hers. The quiet calm with which he took the news was almost as comforting to her as the hug he’d given her downstairs.

She took the drink when he offered it to her, moving to sit her glass of watery ice down on the floor and take his mostly fresh one, rubbing her fingers through the condensation on the side of the glass as she pondered his question. She took a drink before speaking because sometimes she felt like vodka was a cold form of humanizing medicine, and she wanted to get her tongue loosened up enough to talk to the one person she could give a (mostly) full disclosure to. “I don’t know,” she said finally. “It’s not what we thought it was.”

Natasha’s sins numbered many, but perhaps her greatest was that of pride. She’d spent a good long while thinking she was so goddamn good at her job, so goddamn smart, and she hadn’t even noticed that the heart of what she was building and working for with her friends was rotting from the inside out. It stung like betrayal to know that. It hurt even worse to know that Fury, a person she would’ve trusted second only to Clint, had not trusted her the same in return. Natasha had always viewed the world in what she had assumed was the cold, harsh light of rationality and experience. Therefore, having her illusions shattered like so much glass hurt twice as bad.

“Besides,” she said, the word echoing in the glass as she moved to take another drink, then licked her lips as she swallowed, “if we get too nostalgic, Rogers got word that Coulson is going to start up SHIELD again. I guess we’ll see.” She paused, then shook her head as though to rattle a thought loose. "Oh. Also, apparently Coulson is alive. I haven't seen it for myself and I'm not sure how the hell he managed that, but Rogers got word of that, too."

[barton_me]

He wiped his hand off on his knee when she took the glass from him, which had been mostly sweating rather than being drunk while he'd held it. "It wasn't," he agreed (which, really, was an opinion he only held because she suggested it, but he trusted those facts). He knew that she wouldn't like it; Natasha had put a lot of stake in SHIELD. Hell, she'd put a lot of stake in him; he'd been the one who had convinced her to come and work with him in the first place. He hoped she didn't blame him for any of that.

But while Clint was upset that, apparently, the organization he had worked for had a darkness to it that had been present for half a century, it was a different kind of upset. So he had worked for bad people. But he trusted in the work he did, and he trusted in what was right or wrong. His heart had steered him - well, up until recently. There was very little doubt cast onto his past choices.

The amount of lies that surrounded them was enough to choke. Coulson, alive? Well, it wouldn't be the first faked death, but that called everything else into question, including Fury. "You did good work," he said, reaching up to pat the knee that was pressed against his shoulder. "You always do. And honestly, you don't need anyone pointing you in a direction anymore. Well," he gave a little shrug. "That's what I think, anyway."

[regimes_fall]

Clint always had a way of reassuring her without making her feel as though she were being silly or patronized. She supposed it was because she’d put her faith in him wholly, long before SHIELD had ever made its way into her life, and he’d yet to betray her of his own volition. The pat on her knee and the words he gave her – generous as always – made her smile a bit. Doing the right thing and being an upstanding citizen, would forever be a shoe that was too large for her foot, but it was bearable for friends like Clint and Steve, who had enough goodness in them for her and any other lost asshole they happened upon.

“You’d better not ever fake your death and not let me know right away, if not beforehand, that you’re alive,” she said, nudging at his shoulder with her knee as she scooted down in the couch a bit so that she could rest her head on the arm. She moved her drink to rest it on the flat of her tummy, leaving a cool, slightly damp ring to soak through her shirt. “I mean it, Barton. If you ever pull some shit on me like Fury did, I will punch you in the face. Probably more than once.”

[barton_me]

"I'd never fake my death without you being in on it," Clint claimed, pushing back at her knee. "Except if, you know, I'm MIA and presumed dead and stranded somewhere. Then it's completely your fault for not finding me alive sooner than you do."

He leaned forward, shifting his weight and getting onto his feet. "Yeah, I know," he said, heading back for the fridge to get the bottle of vodka, which frosted immediately as soon as he took it back out of the freezer compartment. Natasha had punched him before, in training, when she was holding back. For such a little girl, she had a pretty powerful right hook. "You're expressively violent. It's what makes you so charming and sweet."

He stood next to the couch, topping up her drink from where it was balanced on her stomach, then reaching for the other glass to fill it as well.

[regimes_fall]

"That's different," Natasha said, nudging at him again. "Way different than you deciding purposefully to let everyone believe you're dead outside of a few select people and not choosing me to be among them." She didn't really think Clint would do such a thing, but thought it best to underline her point while they were on the subject.

She stayed where she was, watching as he went to retrieve the bottle of vodka and returned to fill her cup, the glass turning a touch colder beneath her fingertips as her supply of vodka was refreshed, then dipping to refill the glass she'd traded him earlier. His words about her being charming and sweet made her smile and she sat up a bit to have a drink before saying, "I think everyone can agree that of the pair of us, you're the charming one." She rubbed at the wet spot her glass had left on her shirt idly as she thought. "Should we get some pizza and beer for you? We could turn it into an all night thing, unless you're tired." World jumping was, after all, strenuous work.

[barton_me]

"Of course I'm the charming one," Clint said, with a grin. "I'm not the one named after a spider that bites men's heads off."

He went to sit down on the floor again, back against the couch. Technically he was having a very, very late night - it had been a little past midnight when he'd stumbled through the door, but he also hadn't been early to rise. "We can see how long I last," he said. "Where do you get pizza? Do they have room service or is that way too normal for digs like this?"

[regimes_fall]

Natasha’s experience in the Nexus had been a lonely one overall, but she supposed that was how she preferred things usually. She had friends at the hotel, people she felt comfortable seeking out when she wanted company, and plenty she would welcome should they come looking for her. She’d never invited anyone to her room for an overnight stay, though she thought she might like a night of catching up with Clint. It wouldn’t have been the first, and while sharing her space would chafe her nerves sooner rather than later, it had been a long time since she’d seen her old friend and she was inclined to keep him around for a while.

“I’m not sure,” she said after a moment of thought. “I’ve never tried to use room service, but I can call the front desk and check, I guess. Either way, I could call down to the bar and get a pizza and then we could go down and pick it up. Get you some beer, too, if you’d rather have that. Or, we can just hang out until you fall asleep. You can crash here tonight, if you want.”

[barton_me]

Clint recognized the invitation for what it was, and he appreciated it, was even somewhat surprised. Natasha was not particularly sociable in the sense where she prized time to herself, in fact needed it in order to operate. That could be said for anyone, but it was strong with her to the point where an invitation to stay the night, when he knew she was definitely someone who liked to be alone when she slept, surprised him. But he was noticing these little differences in her, and he had to wonder if this was a result of her being at the hotel, or if things really had changed since he had seen her last.

"I feel like if we get drunk I'm probably in no sound state of mind to venture through my room door anyway," Clint said, feeling he had to cover his bases. "But if you'd rather spend the night alone, I get it."

He craned his neck to look up at her on the couch. "Let's get food," he said. "You need more than my half of a sandwich to maintain that figure. Though the type of drunk I'd like to be requires something stronger than beer, so let's stick to the hard liquor."

[regimes_fall]

She could tell that she had surprised him with her offer, and it forced her to reconsider it, at least silently, as she weighed out the invitation she’d made him vs. what he might’ve expected from her. Natasha knew that she was cool and distant, perhaps more out of instinct than any real culmination of desires, but cool all the same. She liked distance and solitude, she supposed in the same way he did, and they understood that about one another. There were no awkward angles there, she knew without a shadow of a doubt that nothing would come of a night with Clint in her room other than conversation, drinking, and then snoring. Whereas before she might’ve not felt driven to reach out to him simply because she knew nothing bad or awkward or detrimental to their friendship would come of it, it seemed reason enough then.

Natasha, quite simply, wanted his company.

“No, it’s fine,” she said with a shrug. “I mean you don’t have to if you’d rather just go somewhere and get some sleep, but if you’d like to hang out, I wouldn’t mind some company.” She pushed herself evenly to her feet, smoothing down her shirt and stretching a bit. “I’ll call someone about a pizza and see if they’ll do me a favor and run it up. You might get lucky. There are some cute girls that work in the bar.”

[barton_me]

"I'd feel much safer sleeping with you for company," Clint replied, flashing her a crooked smile that was teasing, yes - but also wholly honest. Very rarely these days did Clint feel comfortable down to his bones - he didn't even feel it just then - because there was always, it seemed, some sort of prickling underneath his skin. It suited him to be alone, but in an environment he was in control of. That, or be away on a job that distracted him.

At the moment he could have neither, and he found there was a third option in Natasha. This was a space she had vouched for. The room he apparently had in the hotel had not been searched or tested, and he would not be able to sleep in there, he knew, even if he had tried, though if Natasha wanted solitude he would have given it and gone there for the night. Clint was trained to spy and kill and do whatever he had to, leaving him with uncanny senses that suggested he had eyes on the back of his head. But sometimes when he was around Natasha, it felt like she was that real, second pair. He looked out for her, and she looked out for him. It was an accidental arrangement, for it had come naturally to him, and he had been pleased to see she returned the sentiments.

"Ah, I would never abandon you for a cute pizza girl," Clint said. "Tonight. Let's just make sure we tip her well, right?" How convenient that the hotel took the cash he happened to have in his pockets and, well, elsewhere - he held at least five currencies, three of which were currently sewn in large sums into the lining of his jacket. It certainly made the universal transition easier, at any rate.

[regimes_fall]

Natasha nodded at his statement, agreeing with his sentiment more than the words themselves. Her fear of the Nexus and the instability it could almost guarantee was very real, but it was a low static in the background compared to her first days in the hotel, and especially the first night. Had the situations been reversed, had Clint already been here when she arrived, she would’ve much preferred curling up in a room with him nearby as backup as opposed to venturing out on her own. Of course, she knew Clint was perfectly capable of protecting himself if for whatever reason he couldn’t have stayed in her room, but this arrangement was more about preferences. He preferred not to be alone in a new place. She preferred the opportunity to be with him a bit longer.

“Tonight,” she agreed, smiling a bit as she lifted the phone to her ear and started to dial. “I planned on tipping exceptionally well, especially since I’m not sure if they usually do this sort of thing.” Someone answered, one of the aforementioned cute girls who also happened to be quite friendly and accommodating, and Natasha racked up an order to go, then promised some extra money for the bill itself and a hugely generous tip if someone would run it up to her room. The arrangements were made, and Natasha hung up.

“I should take you through the Vegas door tomorrow,” she said. “Or whenever you feel up to it. There’s also a pirate ship that I’m in cahoots with now, but you’ll have to help me put on sunscreen.”

[barton_me]

While she set about getting their food organized, he got up from the floor and moved to refresh their drinks. The vodka was starting to set in and it was leaving a nice, fuzzy feeling in his peripherals, so he figured there was no reason to abandon that particular train while it was going well.

"Vegas, huh?" he said, giving her a glass he had freshly topped with ice and a bit more vodka. "I haven't been there in awhile. Is it actually Vegas or some weird Other Vegas where Elvis is alive and well? If it's real Vegas you'll need proper sunscreen for that, too."

[regimes_fall]

“You make one hell of a hostess, Barton,” she said as she moved to accept her freshly refilled glass of vodka and take a long drink, as ordering pizzas was apparently thirsty work. She ran her tongue over her lips, feeling the slight tingle and burn of the alcohol, and smiled at him. How long had she known Clint? For years, that much she knew, but the exact number was vague and just out of her reach, as so much in her memory could be. If he looked any older than he had the moment she’d first seen him, she could not make out the differences just then, and had to wonder if she ever would. Clint would always be Clint, her best friend and unlikely savior, and in bearing both those titles he had taken on some sort of immortality in her mind. Dangerous, but true all the same.

“I’m not sure,” she said as she moved to sit down on the floor next to where he’d been seated earlier, a wrinkle appearing between her brows. “If it is some sort of New and Wild Vegas, it’s similar enough to regular Wild Vegas that I’ve yet to notice the difference. Granted, I usually just go there to line my pockets and don’t bother to discuss Elvis with anyone, but it’s something to look into when we go.”

[barton_me]

"I'm the perfect wife," Clint replied, well aware that, even if he had been female, that was far from true. He was terrible, romantically, and he knew that. It was easier with friendships and companionship, and much easier with Natasha. Maybe it was the fact that she seemed to demand so little of him; then again, she was one of those people for whom he tried his best. Sometimes he felt she had a completely unreal vision of him, and it made him uncomfortable, but he prized her too much to correct her most of the time.

He moved to sit down next to her, leaning his shoulder against hers. He could feel the heat of her body, close to his, and it was comforting. Like being close to a bomb that would explode just for you. "What about other places?" he asked. "What are you doing now?"

If she had leaked her entire, sordid history onto the internet - well. She didn't like to discuss it most times, much less admit to it. She had given him her trust, once, and he had betrayed it to Loki, and he couldn't see her happy about willingly letting all of her secrets go when brainwashing hadn't been involved. For that Clint would never stop feeling guilty, but if she was upset about what she'd felt she had to do, that was more important for the time being than his own mixed feelings. "Have you gone back home, yet?"

[regimes_fall]

“Better you than me,” Natasha said with a bit of a snort, though she supposed of the two of them it seemed far more likely, at least to her, that Clint would be the one to eventually settle down if it ever came to that. Perhaps it was just projecting and perhaps, if asked, he might’ve had the same sentiments concerning her, but Natasha had the notion that there was a fatherliness in Clint that some child could benefit from. It was a quality that she herself definitely did not possess.

When he settled in beside her, his shoulders broad enough to infringe on her personal bubble in a way she found more comforting than anything else, she shrugged in response to his question. Her recent time at the Nexus could be described as ‘loitering’ more than anything else, but with the way she’d left things in Washington she wasn’t sure there would be anything but that left to her for at least a few more months. She had not gone home, though she had thought of doing that more than once, if only to check in with Clint. Now she supposed she could put that trip off for a little longer.

“I’ve just got to lay low for a while,” she said. “I’ve been attempting to manage things from here, since I can’t really do anything about my present life I tried a little recon. Things with Loki and the American, since they’re both here.” She moved without thinking then, shifting so that she could rest her head on his shoulder. Against the top of her head she could feel the cartilage of his ear and beneath her cheek his shoulder was surprisingly comfortable. Maybe she really was getting drunk, or maybe it was just Clint. “We’ll have to plan some things out with that,” she said after a moment. “Someday later, when I have a clearer head.”

[barton_me]

He didn't expect Natasha would eagerly go back into a world that knew all of her secrets. When you considered the fact that most people, whose secrets were far less dark or deep than hers, would prefer that they never saw the light of day, it was easy to understand that she probably felt bare to the world. Natasha was heavily armoured, he knew; she had built her protections from the ground up, inside of her head. She'd had to do that in order to survive, and he didn't fault her in that or anything else she'd done in her life. She was a different person, now, and nothing demonstrated that more clearly than her act of leaking the entirety of SHIELD onto the internet.

When she leaned her head onto his shoulder, he felt her hair against his neck, but was a bit too tipsy to find it ticklish. He patted her knee. "I'm proud of you," he said. A bit vague, but it literally applied to everything she was doing. She was good at doing whatever she focused on, and her focus had shifted in a way that he knew was good for her. Whatever they had to plan, they could plan later, though. If this was a place where he could remove himself slightly from his life and unpack his head, well, he'd been planning on attempting that, already. Besides, it wasn't like they appeared to have a schedule to keep to here. "But Vegas first."