So many story ideas bouncing around in my head right now. I have at least three more sketched out- the movie was absolutely amazing! My goal is to finish this first and then move on but I might get distracted. I have most of this written so I should be able to upload fairly quickly.

This starts out fairly narrative but it'll get more dialogue as it goes on. I'll do the story from Clint's pov and then go to Natasha's for the same situations so you get a full look.

"Well, fuck." Barton sighed from his perch. He had been watching his target, Natasha Romanoff, better known as the Black Widow, for the better part of two weeks now. He began to disassemble his rifle and refit the pieces in the bag he had carried it in.

"Didn't copy that Agent Barton. Repeat." His earpiece hummed and Clint rolled his eyes at Coulson's comment, knowing the man wasn't trying to be funny.

"I said this is Agent Barton requesting additional time to carry out the mission."

Coulson's no-nonsense tone answered, "This mission has already been extended ten days past the allotted time. You'd better have a good reason for this request, Agent."

He allowed the smirk to pull at his mouth as he answered in the most offhand way possible, "No sir, not really a reason you'll like."

"That doesn't fill me with a lot of confidence Barton."

"Don't sweat it Coulson, you're usually fine with my results right? The method is just details," he was already moving across the roof, the bag slung across his back.

"We're going to have to discuss your mission history if you actually believe I don't have a problem with the majority of your so-called methods," Coulson replied sardonically.

"Just keep Director Fury off my ass and I'll contact you when I'm ready for extraction," Clint said. He had taken refuge on the opposite corner of the roof and waited for the transmission to end. He had to get back to the safe house and prepare.

"Clint," Coulson said. "Should I be worried?"

He took a moment to honestly consider that. Although the man's tone hadn't changed, he had been paired with Coulson long enough to hear the difference. This wasn't Coulson, his handler, asking about the mission. This was Phil, his friend, asking about his safety.

"You definitely won't be happy with me when I get back but I think this is for the best. Come and get me if I'm still silent after two days. Barton out."

He pulled the earpiece out and stored it in his jacket after he disabled the device completely. He knew Coulson would chew him out for it later but he really couldn't afford for anyone tracking him right now.

They would probably piece together what he was going to do and send another agent to clean house, but he trusted Coulson to keep him in the clear for at least two days. Just as he knew Coulson trusted him to make contact before that.

The bag was a comfortable weight against his back as he took the fire escape down to the back alley. He set off to his place at a casual pace, knowing that he had enough time to stop quickly and still beat her to her apartment.

Clint walked along, carefully observing everyone and everything around him. It was a Wednesday night and the streets weren't very crowded, especially for a city like Warsaw. His Polish wasn't great but then, she was Russian and he was pretty solid in that language so it didn't really matter.

Quickly ducking into an alley he scaled another fire escape and hopped a couple of roofs to his building. Coulson always made it a point to find him a place with roof access and a top floor location when it was possible.

The rooftop door was locked but it took less than a minute for him to pick it and he closed it firmly behind him. Descending the stairs silently he made sure the hall was clear before approaching his door and entering quietly.

His uniform, including arm bracers and finger guards, were quickly donned and his plain long-sleeved jacket hid the trademark outfit. The earpiece remained securely in his jacket for now.

Clint anticipated being able to return to retrieve the rest of his gear before he was picked up, but experience taught him not to depend on that opportunity. All the essentials were carefully packed together and he slung everything in a single strap bag across his back before checking his bow and quiver.

For the sake of not terrifying the public were he to walk around with the arrows clearly visible he capped the top over the quiver to hide the arrows and folded his bow carefully, sliding it into its own place in a holster on the small of his back. The quiver was also sling across his back and he turned to inspect the room again.

The rifle was left behind, although he wiped the weapon down to remove his prints and hid the ammunition separate from the gun. Anything he wasn't taking with him but could be tied to his identity or to SHIELD was placed in a special trashcan that each SHIELD room was required to have. The bin sealed once it was activated and incinerated the contents completely within twenty minutes.

Satisfied, he left the room, locking it behind him, and took the stairs down to the ground floor before walking back out onto the street and heading toward Romanoff's place.

He knew her apartment like the back of his hand. She didn't go back every night; this was one of several safe houses he had followed her to over the last fifteen days. Romanoff had been carefully restocking, no predictable pattern discernable in the beginning as to when she'd go to which location.

He smirked as he turned the corner, with each safe house she used a slightly different manner of entrance, he assumed that each location had the other entrances booby-trapped to discourage snoopers. This particular apartment was on the fifth floor, east side on the corner of the building. He liked this one the best because there was a roof opposite with a perfect view of one of the windows, even when the curtains were firmly closed shut.

SHIELD had tracked her to this location but he still hadn't been able to discover her mission. Whatever was going on here was a mystery, and SHIELD hadn't picked up any recent chatter regarding Poland or the Black Widow.

Something about that felt off but he didn't allow himself to think about it for too long. He had his hands full with fucking up his own mission.

He had mostly observed her in what could be called 'normal' activities. She shopped for necessities, went to her connections for supplies and things that civilian stores didn't sell, trained obsessively, and tried to throw him off her trail.

It had only taken her two days to pick up on his presence, although he knew she didn't actually know who was following her. He had allowed her to wander farther occasionally without his direct eye, letting her think she threw him off before catching up.

It helped that people, even trained assassins like her, didn't look up nearly as often as they should. His gain.

This apartment would be more troublesome than one of the others because it required a decent amount of grace and acrobatics to enter. He was comfortable with the acrobatics, but she was much lighter on her feet and moved more fluidly than he could ever hope to.

Also, she had only entered this location once so he had to follow everything exactly to be sure nothing was disturbed. He couldn't be sure if something she did while entering was an idiosyncrasy or actually necessary to make it in without disturbing the trap.

Still, he had to make the approach tonight if he hoped to make contact with Phil by his self-imposed deadline.

The fire escape only went to the fourth floor, with a ladder coming down from the fifth floor that had to be lowered from the roof. It was possible for someone on the fifth floor to reach when they were coming down, but for someone climbing up it would be extremely difficult.

Romanoff had free-scaled the building when he watched her so he had to do the same. It was very possible that forcing the ladder would leave some kind of trace behind that she would notice. Plus Clint was a decent climber so it wasn't particularly hard to hoist himself up to the roof.

From there she had jimmied the window open from above and lowered herself down and through the open window. Clint knew he had to open the window further if he was going to make it through and he couldn't see any immediate triggers on the window that could register it being open more than usual.

He pulled his gloves on to hide any smudges he might leave on the window and carefully raised it open. It took a lot of patience and strength to slowly work his way through the window and he had to be mindful of leaving any thing behind which might give away his presence.

To his chagrin he ended up landing solidly on his ass once he was clear of the window. Glad that Coulson wasn't in his ear to hear that embarrassment he inspected the window and carefully closed it.

He moved silently through the small apartment, knife in hand to check any potential hiding spots for enemies. It was clear so he went to the next step and tried to locate hidden weapons.

He almost laughed in amusement at the number of weapons he found. It seemed they both liked to squirrel away guns and knives like other people would hold onto photographs or books.

It would be impossible to find all her weapons in the time he had, so he focused on those areas that would be within her immediate range when she entered the room and cleared that zone, as well as the surrounding areas of as many weapons as he could find. He cleared them all to the furthest corner from the window and unloaded all of the guns as well.

The machete he found had puzzled him but he put it with the rest as he took up a position out of the line of sight of the window but still close and hunkered down to wait. His knife went back into its sheath on his chest and the machete was on the ground away from any light it might reflect.

He expected her to be armed when she entered so he made sure his position could provide cover if she became a little trigger-happy.

As a sniper he was very comfortable with waiting silently in one position for extended amounts of time and he was accustomed to letting his mind wander even as he remained fully alert.

He ended up thinking about what Fury's reaction to this would be. Romanoff had been a major thorn in SHIELD's side for a long time and she had a lot of kills under her belt. Many of those were SHIELD agents, and where her hand wasn't directly involved, the Agency was still responsible.

It would take a lot of effort to make Fury see the potential benefits and he knew he'd pay for this with some miserable missions and a lot of dull meetings. If he was really mad he might make Clint redo parts of the agent training, which had been hell enough the first time.

Coulson would be more controlled but still pissed. He'd see the benefits before Fury did because Phil was annoyingly practical like that. Clint liked to think that he'd get a small frown and a disapproving tone for the immediate reaction.

He knew at this point that Phil would definitely chew him out in private but he liked it most when his handler showed his emotions so it had become his own personal challenge to scare Phil enough to make him show those feelings.

The man was too controlled. It was something that Clint had immediately hated when he first met the man but later he'd come to deeply respect Coulson's restraint and level head.

In his first couple of years at SHIELD, fresh from being out on his own and acting however he wanted, the rules and regulations had chaffed him unbelievably and his only relief came from tormenting his handlers and partners.

Never anything that actually put anyone in unnecessary danger because Clint was always professional when it came to the job. If the job just happened to allow some leeway then he'd gladly pull at that for all it was worth.

Putting him and Coulson together had been Fury's last attempt on both of their parts. Both men were too good at what they did to be reassigned or terminated but for very different reasons no one else could work well with them. Coulson interacted with more people than Clint had to, but there was something about Phil's almost robotic mannerisms that rubbed his previous assets the wrong way.

Clint was always confused as to how Coulson's detachment in a field like theirs was a bad thing, but he wasn't complaining. Their partnership had taken a lot of time to work. It had endured ups and downs, mostly downs, before they both agreed to make some small changes for the betterment of the other. Of course, Coulson had made most of those changes at first.

It took Clint several months to see that Coulson was doing these things on purpose; making sure he had rooftop access whenever possible, had supplies waiting in his room when Clint had turned down medical treatment for manageable wounds, kept them both from working with other assets or handlers who Clint couldn't tolerate even when pressured from Fury himself to behave.

In turn, Clint made a conscious effort to maintain contact with Coulson during missions. He wasn't used to seeking permission before acting, but Coulson again made the change easier by letting him take steps he felt necessary in the field as long as the mission got done in the end. He was conscious about not wasting supplies and he kept his training regime mostly contained to the specified rooms.

He knew Coulson took some shit from Fury for the relatively long leash that Coulson held him on, but the mission results spoke for itself and for the most part he and Phil were allowed to work without too much supervision.

A soft rattle outside drew his gaze immediately to the window and his mind shifted to focus completely on the situation at hand. From the little noise she made it sounded like she had just left the fire escape and was making her way to the roof.

He raised himself to a crouching position on the balls of his feet so he would be ready to spring up after she entered with minimal fuss. He had debated the best way to approach her and decided on close quarters to reduce the chance of her shooting him if he surprised her.

Sure enough two petite hands began to pull the window open from above and he slowed his breathing to deep and quiet breaths. Clint watched carefully as she swung herself through the window and closed it behind her. In the darkness he could make out her silhouette and he waited until her back was to him to make his move.

Silently exploding out of his position, he reached her with one step, his knife resting on her throat. She tensed and he didn't try to restrain her, although she shifted her right arm back towards his center and forced him to catch her wrist to avoid taking a knife to the gut.

His grip was firm and he added a little more pressure to the weapon at her throat. "Easy there," he said softly.

Always,

Sinkme