He half expects the dart to be the same fast acting poison she favors when she’s trying to eliminate a target quickly without much drama. It’d make sense, in a way, for her to just kill him and get him out of the way, because he is the only tangible connection to the life she doesn’t remember and eliminating him means that she can go back to what she was before. The fact that he doesn’t start frothing out the mouth is a good sign though, and he thinks, just maybe, she’s curious about what she’s lost. Maybe she’ll let him get it out after all.
There’s a tension that snaps into his body despite himself when she advances, because he knows her and knows that when she’s calm and collected and in control of a situation she’s at her most deadly, but then she’s just taking his hand and he’s trying not to let his breath hitch in his throat because dammit it’s the first time he’s touched her in months and he just
( ... )
Natasha doesn't feel in control of anything right now, least of all herself. Everything she once knew is gone, and she's not sure who she even is anymore. She's coming apart at the seams, spinning desperately out of control and she's looking for anything to hold onto to steady herself. Right now, Hawkeye is that something. Except, whatever precarious hold she has on him, she doesn't dare trust.
For a moment, with Hawkeye's fingers curled around hers, that slight laugh of his still ringing in her ears, and his smile warming her from the inside out, Natasha thinks that everything is going to be alright. But then she pulls away and--
He wants to help her remember. The bottom drops out of Natasha's stomach, and nausea claws at her throat. The time she spent convincing herself that she just heard him wrong, that SHIELD isn't behind her missing ten years, is wiped away in a second when he acknowledges her need to remember. This time, there's no way for her to misinterpret his words. He knows. She hasn't told a living soul, and yet somehow
( ... )
If he knew, exactly, what was clawing at her-what was making her so nervous, he could tell her. He could tell her he knows just because he’s spent so much time with her he knows when she’s not herself. He could say that he knows because he’s spent an absurd amount of time with her in the past ten years and based on how she acts around him, he could probably place her at any time in their relationship. He doesn’t mean to spook her by knowing, but he also can’t pretend he doesn’t, because she may look like his Tasha, but she holds herself just like the Widow and so he knows how much time she’s lost-knows it by the stubborn jut of her chin, the way she carries herself like she’s waiting for someone to challenge her constantly, like she’s both completely sure of who she is and also vaguely uncomfortable in her skin
( ... )
Hawkeye gives his name like it's nothing. Maybe to him it is. The first time you give someone your name, then it's something. But they've exchanged names before. To him it's just a reminder, to her it's momentous. Clint Barton. Natasha tests the name in her head, tries to apply it to the man and comes up short. It's not that it's not a good name. It is. And it's not that it doesn't fit him. But, he's been Hawkeye to her for a year now, and it's strange to think of him as anything else. What is she supposed to call him now? Clint? Barton? Hawkeye, still? What has she been calling him for the past ten years
( ... )
Clint takes the phone back silently as she hands it over, slipping it into a pocket as he snorts. “It’s us, Natasha,” And it still feels strange, rolling off his tongue like that, her full name. He doesn’t really know what to do with it, because, well, she hasn’t been Natasha to him outside of the company of others in years. It’s Tasha, or Nat, or Tash, every now and again when he’s trying to annoy her, or kitten in Russian if he wants to get her attention and redirect it to something else-mostly how much she’s going to have to kill him if he keeps calling her kitten. Once, right before he left for the two month stint in Jakarta, he’d called her babe, and amazingly, she hadn’t killed him, but she swore it was only because there wasn’t enough time to do it properly. He still meant to try it again and see. But, well, now he supposed he’d have to wait
( ... )
Natasha. Her name sounds odd and foreign on his lips. Though not quite as odd 'Tasha' or 'Nat' did. It's something that she'll get used to, she's certain, but right now it makes the space between her shoulder blades crawl with discomfort. She can't remember giving him her name and him using it sends up warning flags and alarm bells that it's hard to ignore, even though she knows that she must've sometime between now and the last time she remembers meeting him.
Captain America conjures up images of old propaganda footage, a black and white film flickering on the screen of the training room and her handler's voice droning on about some kind of supersoldiers. But, that doesn't make sense, and then her attention narrows down to the flicker of silver as Hawkeye pulls out his dogtags,
Natasha takes the offered dogtags with ill-concealed eagerness, her fingers brushing his and sending a jolt of something through her. Instead of going straight for the ring, she takes her time to look over the dogtags first, running her thumb across the
( ... )
He watches her as she looks at the rings and tries not to get lost in the memory of how she looked when she saw them for the first time. How she protested when he tried to make her look when he first got back from the jewelry store, already annoyed that there was a possibility they were going to miss their flight and expecting that he’d picked out the first two fake gold bands he found and a fake diamond engagement ring and that that simple process had taken him five hours.
At the time he couldn’t even justify why he’d spent so long picking them out. Mostly because it was Nat, and he wasn’t going to start their first undercover mission after Loki with something fake wrapped around his finger. Wasn’t going to start repairing their friendship with something cheap and tacky and not at all them, but now? Now he was glad he did, because they’d come to mean a hell of a lot more than just the things worn for a cover
( ... )
A brief, pale smile flashes across Natasha's features at his comment about her taste, and her fingers play absently over the thin chain where it rests against her collarbone. It's the engagement ring she can't get over. The one with the black diamond. Which she knows is real, because she took the rings to a jeweler to have it valued, to see if maybe she was carrying the rings to sell in case of an emergency, but even though she didn't have a dime to her name at that point, she hadn't sold them. Because the engagement ring is perfect for her. Because they seemed too important to lose
( ... )
If she had been there, when Clint was agonizing over which one to pick out, she might have laughed at him. The Nat he gave the ring to definitely would have. That ring, the engagement one, was what took him five hours, because he had been staring down at a sea of gaudy gold and platinum and diamonds and rubies and nothing at all seemed to fit her. And he'd even settled, because he knew he was running late and was going to be killed, on this little white gold number with a ruby in it, until the clerk had looked at him, asked him about Nat and when he'd said, far more honestly than he meant: 'she's as dangerous as she is deadly and gorgeous beyond belief. And the only person you'd trust to have your back in any situation that might come up', the man had smiled, somehow knowingly, and pulled that one from the back
( ... )
"A Norse God? Damn, my life has changed," Natasha jokes weakly. Her forced laughter catches in her throat though. Because it's not a very funny joke. It's ten years of her life gone, and apparently sometime during those ten years, she had dealings with a mythological figure and that's just a little bit hard to swallow. She ducks her head and looks down at the scuffed toes of her high heels, fingers twisting in the delicate material of her dress. It's all just too much. At least Hong Kong is a welcome distraction. The fact that he remembers it too -- that she has a real connection to someone in this world again -- is comforting beyond words
( ... )
Reply
There’s a tension that snaps into his body despite himself when she advances, because he knows her and knows that when she’s calm and collected and in control of a situation she’s at her most deadly, but then she’s just taking his hand and he’s trying not to let his breath hitch in his throat because dammit it’s the first time he’s touched her in months and he just ( ... )
Reply
For a moment, with Hawkeye's fingers curled around hers, that slight laugh of his still ringing in her ears, and his smile warming her from the inside out, Natasha thinks that everything is going to be alright. But then she pulls away and--
He wants to help her remember. The bottom drops out of Natasha's stomach, and nausea claws at her throat. The time she spent convincing herself that she just heard him wrong, that SHIELD isn't behind her missing ten years, is wiped away in a second when he acknowledges her need to remember. This time, there's no way for her to misinterpret his words. He knows. She hasn't told a living soul, and yet somehow ( ... )
Reply
Reply
Reply
Reply
Captain America conjures up images of old propaganda footage, a black and white film flickering on the screen of the training room and her handler's voice droning on about some kind of supersoldiers. But, that doesn't make sense, and then her attention narrows down to the flicker of silver as Hawkeye pulls out his dogtags,
Natasha takes the offered dogtags with ill-concealed eagerness, her fingers brushing his and sending a jolt of something through her. Instead of going straight for the ring, she takes her time to look over the dogtags first, running her thumb across the ( ... )
Reply
At the time he couldn’t even justify why he’d spent so long picking them out. Mostly because it was Nat, and he wasn’t going to start their first undercover mission after Loki with something fake wrapped around his finger. Wasn’t going to start repairing their friendship with something cheap and tacky and not at all them, but now? Now he was glad he did, because they’d come to mean a hell of a lot more than just the things worn for a cover ( ... )
Reply
Reply
Reply
Reply
Leave a comment