Checks and Balances | PG-13 | Clint/Natasha
Title: Checks and Balances
Fandom: Avengers
Characters/Pairing: Clint/Natasha, Barton/Romanoff
Rating: PG-13
Summary: "It's never happened before but they say there's a first time for everything."
Disclaimer: All credit to those who do own it (obviously not me).
Authors Note: Written for gabe1990 for multifan-gift. Happy Holidays!
They slept in the same bed, nude but for the pieces of their flesh which where bandaged and bound. They did not touch, too aware that the other was exposed to do so, playing at some part of propriety that neither actual spoke of. They waited out the evening, drawing the curtains, dimming the room to mimic darkness until it was good and dark on the outside and the effect was a worthless one. He breathed shallow, as it hurt to breathe, and she watched him with curious eyes.
“Why are you naked,” he asked.
It appeared to him that she shrugged at him but it was too difficult to tell in the low light. “Would you like it better if I was clothed?”
“No,” he answered honestly.
“Then stop complaining.” She turned over onto her stomach which gave him the opportunity to observe the injuries that had been done to her back. It was a mesh of fine little cuts. One, very deep, intersected the valley between the infinitesimal ones. It looked angry and red with clotted blood, the edges puckered and torn. He winced in silent sympathy but sleep took him before he had the forethought to share such a thought aloud.
When he awoke the room was still in caked in darkness, the heavy draperies still drawn. Out of mere curiosity he pulled himself up to standing and padded over to the window with a slow shuffle to throw back the curtains and see what was on the other side. He stared. It looked sleepy in the early morning light, grayscale and picturesque in the softness that hung between the night before and the new day dawning.
He stretched, grimacing when the motion displaced the set of his ribs, the white gauze binding loosening under the movement. “Dammit,” he cursed, softly, shaking his head.
From behind him a rustle of sheets alerted him to Natasha’s wakefulness. He knew she was making noise on purpose, that her skills as an assassin would have made it all too easy for her to slip quietly from the bed to just about anywhere in the room. When he turned to look at her he was, like many men before him, struck by her beauty, long red hair that rippled over the curve of her shoulders, green eyes containing a fierce intelligence, a plush mouth that was now downturned in silent judgment.
“You’re ridiculous,” she told him, moving from her sleeping, prone position to stand beside him. “You should be resting.” He reached out to her; pad of his thumb pressing to her split lip before reaching around to trace the knobs of her spine, ghosting over the edges of a gash along her back that he knew was there.
She didn’t flinch underneath the exploration, simply raised a brow as if it was curious that he tried to elicit a reaction by touch alone. He moved behind her, surveying the damage better than he’d done the night prior, now the she was under the shine of light. He did it all with eagle eyes in lieu of hands as he dropped them to his side. He was always better with seeing than feeling anyway. It allowed him to notice the nuance of injury now, the puckered bits of flesh that were beginning to heal over. “You should have covered this. It’ll scar.” Her shoulders judder, rocking her back and forth in laughter. He finds that her reaction makes him smile in turn.
Clint could see why the dossier he’d been handed on her was over an inch thick. It wasn’t just the history, although that was varied and thoroughly detailed within it, it was the particulars, every inch of her life ascribed by a bland hand from her earliest tenure in a program known only as ‘Department X’ to a marriage to a fighter pilot named Shostakov. It was a colorful history, peppered with minutiae, of where she’d been and who she’d killed and threat assessments. It told of how she was brainwashed but that when she was captured by the American government, once, at the beginning of her career as an assassin, that any counter measures they’d tried to combat the indoctrination was met with a chill silence that the report remarked was ‘very Russian’.
He’d been so sure of mission when he’d take it on. Take out the threat, then, as a secondary objective, collect any and all information relative to the case that had sent her, and in an a roundabout way, him, to Budapest. While he was thinking about this his hands dipped to the hollow of her back, kneading the area below her injury with the knuckles of his hand, holding her again because he wanted to touch, touch her, more than he’d wanted to touch any living, breathing thing in years.
“Rough hands,” she said, but the tone reflected only a clinical truth.
“It’s the arrows,” he explained. “The fletching, scratches the hands. Calluses build up over time. I don’t notice it anymore.”
She nodded as if that was all the explanation that was required. It was strange, not to have to offer more information than he wanted to. Lovers usually sought to know him more and his superiors wanted a play by play, Natasha accepted what he gave and didn’t ask for more.
“Why did you do it,” she asked quietly, sweeping her red hair over one shoulder so she could better look at him. “Why didn’t you kill me when you had the chance?”
“I’m not sure,” he admitted. He dropped a kiss to the bared shoulder, testing his luck. Her hair tickled his face. “You were trying to kill someone who trafficked in people. It was hard to argue with the logic of taking him out.”
“Do you often find you don’t follow through on your orders?” She pressed back into him, the surest way she had of letting him know his attentions were wanted and he kissed the same spot again until her posture relaxed further. He changed tactics, kneading the space where his lips had just been and smiling against her skin when the muscles there became pliant under his ministrations.
“It’s never happened before. “ Natasha was a dancer, balancing on her toes as she turned to face him. Eye to eye was impossible, she was much shorter than him, but he dipped his chin to his chest to look down at her. “But they say there’s a first time for everything.”
“It’s the first time anyone ever saved me.” Her voice is so quiet he almost missed it and it was too fond by half, uncharacteristic, he was sure, though he had no frame of reference. “I don’t like owning people,” she continued.
“Don’t think of it like that. Think of it like…like a debt, if you have to,” he said, picking the idea out of thin air. “Something borrowed. Something you can pay back.”
“I like that. Checks and balances,” she responded as she reached up, pulling him down into a fierce kiss. “Got tons of people owing me,” she murmured against his mouth. “Guess you’re the first red in my ledger, Barton.”
He thought, though didn't say, that no part of him minded that at all.
Fandom: Avengers
Characters/Pairing: Clint/Natasha, Barton/Romanoff
Rating: PG-13
Summary: "It's never happened before but they say there's a first time for everything."
Disclaimer: All credit to those who do own it (obviously not me).
Authors Note: Written for gabe1990 for multifan-gift. Happy Holidays!
They slept in the same bed, nude but for the pieces of their flesh which where bandaged and bound. They did not touch, too aware that the other was exposed to do so, playing at some part of propriety that neither actual spoke of. They waited out the evening, drawing the curtains, dimming the room to mimic darkness until it was good and dark on the outside and the effect was a worthless one. He breathed shallow, as it hurt to breathe, and she watched him with curious eyes.
“Why are you naked,” he asked.
It appeared to him that she shrugged at him but it was too difficult to tell in the low light. “Would you like it better if I was clothed?”
“No,” he answered honestly.
“Then stop complaining.” She turned over onto her stomach which gave him the opportunity to observe the injuries that had been done to her back. It was a mesh of fine little cuts. One, very deep, intersected the valley between the infinitesimal ones. It looked angry and red with clotted blood, the edges puckered and torn. He winced in silent sympathy but sleep took him before he had the forethought to share such a thought aloud.
When he awoke the room was still in caked in darkness, the heavy draperies still drawn. Out of mere curiosity he pulled himself up to standing and padded over to the window with a slow shuffle to throw back the curtains and see what was on the other side. He stared. It looked sleepy in the early morning light, grayscale and picturesque in the softness that hung between the night before and the new day dawning.
He stretched, grimacing when the motion displaced the set of his ribs, the white gauze binding loosening under the movement. “Dammit,” he cursed, softly, shaking his head.
From behind him a rustle of sheets alerted him to Natasha’s wakefulness. He knew she was making noise on purpose, that her skills as an assassin would have made it all too easy for her to slip quietly from the bed to just about anywhere in the room. When he turned to look at her he was, like many men before him, struck by her beauty, long red hair that rippled over the curve of her shoulders, green eyes containing a fierce intelligence, a plush mouth that was now downturned in silent judgment.
“You’re ridiculous,” she told him, moving from her sleeping, prone position to stand beside him. “You should be resting.” He reached out to her; pad of his thumb pressing to her split lip before reaching around to trace the knobs of her spine, ghosting over the edges of a gash along her back that he knew was there.
She didn’t flinch underneath the exploration, simply raised a brow as if it was curious that he tried to elicit a reaction by touch alone. He moved behind her, surveying the damage better than he’d done the night prior, now the she was under the shine of light. He did it all with eagle eyes in lieu of hands as he dropped them to his side. He was always better with seeing than feeling anyway. It allowed him to notice the nuance of injury now, the puckered bits of flesh that were beginning to heal over. “You should have covered this. It’ll scar.” Her shoulders judder, rocking her back and forth in laughter. He finds that her reaction makes him smile in turn.
Clint could see why the dossier he’d been handed on her was over an inch thick. It wasn’t just the history, although that was varied and thoroughly detailed within it, it was the particulars, every inch of her life ascribed by a bland hand from her earliest tenure in a program known only as ‘Department X’ to a marriage to a fighter pilot named Shostakov. It was a colorful history, peppered with minutiae, of where she’d been and who she’d killed and threat assessments. It told of how she was brainwashed but that when she was captured by the American government, once, at the beginning of her career as an assassin, that any counter measures they’d tried to combat the indoctrination was met with a chill silence that the report remarked was ‘very Russian’.
He’d been so sure of mission when he’d take it on. Take out the threat, then, as a secondary objective, collect any and all information relative to the case that had sent her, and in an a roundabout way, him, to Budapest. While he was thinking about this his hands dipped to the hollow of her back, kneading the area below her injury with the knuckles of his hand, holding her again because he wanted to touch, touch her, more than he’d wanted to touch any living, breathing thing in years.
“Rough hands,” she said, but the tone reflected only a clinical truth.
“It’s the arrows,” he explained. “The fletching, scratches the hands. Calluses build up over time. I don’t notice it anymore.”
She nodded as if that was all the explanation that was required. It was strange, not to have to offer more information than he wanted to. Lovers usually sought to know him more and his superiors wanted a play by play, Natasha accepted what he gave and didn’t ask for more.
“Why did you do it,” she asked quietly, sweeping her red hair over one shoulder so she could better look at him. “Why didn’t you kill me when you had the chance?”
“I’m not sure,” he admitted. He dropped a kiss to the bared shoulder, testing his luck. Her hair tickled his face. “You were trying to kill someone who trafficked in people. It was hard to argue with the logic of taking him out.”
“Do you often find you don’t follow through on your orders?” She pressed back into him, the surest way she had of letting him know his attentions were wanted and he kissed the same spot again until her posture relaxed further. He changed tactics, kneading the space where his lips had just been and smiling against her skin when the muscles there became pliant under his ministrations.
“It’s never happened before. “ Natasha was a dancer, balancing on her toes as she turned to face him. Eye to eye was impossible, she was much shorter than him, but he dipped his chin to his chest to look down at her. “But they say there’s a first time for everything.”
“It’s the first time anyone ever saved me.” Her voice is so quiet he almost missed it and it was too fond by half, uncharacteristic, he was sure, though he had no frame of reference. “I don’t like owning people,” she continued.
“Don’t think of it like that. Think of it like…like a debt, if you have to,” he said, picking the idea out of thin air. “Something borrowed. Something you can pay back.”
“I like that. Checks and balances,” she responded as she reached up, pulling him down into a fierce kiss. “Got tons of people owing me,” she murmured against his mouth. “Guess you’re the first red in my ledger, Barton.”
He thought, though didn't say, that no part of him minded that at all.