Title: Extraction Point

Author: AutumnEnnui

Chapter Three: Reason Within Relevation

One thing was for damn sure: he hated waiting to see if Natasha was going to make it through surgery after being tortured by those assholes. As he sat in a hard, plastic chair on one side of the room in the bases' medical facility he could fully admit that his fears that she wouldn't make it were largely bullshit: Natasha's childhood training, programming, and modifications allowed for an accelerated healing time that impressed just about everyone. But still… there had been a shitload of blood: on the ugly tile floor, on the heavily-fortified chair, on her ripped clothing, on her skin. He remembered with a shiver the way the blood ran down her legs until it spread out when it hit the tops of her small feet. Being of eastern European descent meant fair skin, but the shade of pale she was when he had first seen her seemed ghostly. He didn't like the think about it much, but he had nothing else to do until she woke up and inevitably told him he looked like hell. He sure as hell felt like it.

She had regained most of her color, even if she was still sedated so her body could do its healing with no interruptions from someone as stubborn as Natasha. She was clever enough to charm some doctor right out of the hospital. They all knew that. So sedation was the vote and the action. He knew she would be pissed about that when she woke up, along with just about everything else that had gone wrong. The person she was going to be most pissed at, besides herself, was him.

Clint ran his hand though his dirty hair and sighed as he rolled his head back onto the chair. It hadn't been hard to overwhelm the second-rate gangster squad and surprise the underwhelming boss. Toxicity screening done on Natasha showed trace amounts of various concoctions, though they were still processing all the components. It was almost like the boss knew what he was doing and had the funds but hadn't been able to pull off the mission as he intended. It all smelled of trap, and Clint wondered who it had been truly set for. He also wondered how Natasha had become such easy prey. Natasha Romanoff may be numerous things, but gullible and off-guard wasn't anything like her.

It had been three days since the extraction. Clint was still trying to work out and process everything that happened and how it had made him feel. He felt almost ashamed for panicking and storming through the enemy's complex in order to find Natasha. He felt even more ashamed when he realized that he was more afraid of losing her than of taking down that crew. She was going to find out. It was inevitable. The statements had been taken, the reports had been filed. Clint didn't know what was going to come of it when Director Fury finally made a decision, but what he feared more was what Natasha was going to think of him. It may be the end of their partnership. It may be the end of their friendship. He could have risked the lives of all agents under his command. He had been reckless: he didn't even bother to check to see if the room was clear before make a bee-line to the woman he loved. Both of their lives could have ended right then and there but he hadn't given it a second thought.

Fucking hell.

Clint stood abruptly and walked over to the window.

Fucking hell.

It was another two days before they weaned Natasha off the sedation, though no one had gotten around to warning Clint before he walked right into a sticky web of confrontation. A strong hand caught his upper arm and swung him into the wall just before a bare foot kicked the door closed. He was confronted by those large green eyes, sharpened into slits, and lips pressed tight with anger.

"This," Natasha growled, "is all your fucking fault, Barton."

Clint cleared his throat and reminded himself that he was backed into a corner by some primal, visceral version of the Black Widow. She wasn't amused. She wasn't concentrating. Her stance said she was ready to fight. She was grim and angry, and it was all directed straight at him. He knew he deserved every amount of it.

After a deep breath, Hawkeye responded as calmly as he could manage with one of her hands suddenly around his throat and the other holding his arm behind his back and against the wall. He was hurting, sure, but cooling this situation was much more important than his comfort.

"Nat, I don't know how I caused your mission to go haywire…" The hand on his throat tightened.

Her stare bore into him, pressing for answers he didn't have.

"I was distracted. I don't know how or when or why you …," Natasha started to pant and shake. Clint knew then that the sedation hadn't completely worn off, but as long as she felt more secure holding him there he didn't dare move. Plus, she might be even deadlier right now than usual because she didn't have complete control of herself.

"You … and I didn't even bother to do all the research I should have because … I wanted … to stop…," her voice started to grow weaker, and her grip on his throat started to slacken, "I just wanted… I wanted to stop."

Natasha started to sag, and her eyes fluttered. Clint scooped her up, and she didn't protest. He put her down on the bed as carefully as he could and pulled the sheets up over her. Her eyes were dazed as she looked at him.

Clint knew this wouldn't be the first or only time she would attempt to blame him and grill him for what had happened. Why she blamed him for the mission, he still didn't know. Her fragmented sentences had only barely made sense. He didn't even know if she would remember what she had just done and what she had just said.

"You need to go," Natasha said suddenly, her voice quiet but clear.

"Why?"

"I need to think. Clint … I need you to go. There are reasons. I can't tell you now. But please …"

Clint nodded briefly before turning on his heel and leaving the room. There were a thousand questions running through his brain, none of them with answers to match. He was tired, he was angry, and he knew he was fucked in so many ways. He made his way back to his barracks, back to someplace he could lock the door and maybe think of what he could do to salvage this. He didn't want to lose her, in any way, but he didn't truly know how he was going to keep her, either.

Clint awoke with a start somewhere about 0300 hours, shaking, panting, and covered in sweat. He flung the covers off his body, swung his legs over the side of the bed, and buried his face in his hands. Natasha had been in his dream, both dripping and clotted red from head to toe as she stood on the frozen lake he knew to be outside his cabin in the mountains. Her voice was heavy with exhaustion, and tinged with blame. Him. He was to blame.

It's your fault, she said.

I have my reasons, she said.

You lost, Barton, she said.

It was never an option, she said.

She shook her head. Deep red leaves began to fall, like a rainstorm. She was gone. All Clint was left with was the red leaf in his hand and a lake covered in blood.

Clint shook his head, tried to clear out the cobwebs.

"Just a dream, huh," he said to the empty room. "Some dream."

He pulled on workout pants and a tank top, knowing that sleep wasn't going to happen right now. He grabbed a bow and quiver. If he couldn't sleep, he might as well try to focus on something other than the girl that was going to get away.

Dawn came, and Clint stepped into the common area to grab a bottle of water out of the fridge. Of all the people in all the world, he didn't expect Agent Hill to be sitting in a chair, looking as if she had been waiting for him.

"Good morning, Agent Hill," Clint said politely to the stern woman. She was beautiful, but she was every inch a dedicated agent. She was also direct: she didn't pull punches, didn't spare feelings, and never followed orders blindly. She and Clint tolerated each other but respected one another's talents. They weren't close, but they were civil to one another.

"I have work to do, so I'll make this short," she said as she uncrossed her legs. "Agent Romanoff disappeared from the med center three hours ago. She took nothing, and no one even saw her leave, though that's not beyond her capabilities even in an infirmed state."

Clint was hardly shocked, and he kept his face neutral. "There were no clues?"

Agent Hill shook her head and then leveled her gaze with Agent Barton.

"You didn't come back when she did. She was only gone the month," she remarked, somewhat accusingly.

"I needed time to think."

"I know that I come across as arrogant and often tactless," Hill said as she stood up and folded her arms in front of her, "but I'm not stupid."

"No one accused you of being stupid, Agent Hill," Clint countered, "But I have to ask why you're taking the time to tell me this? Shouldn't you be looking for Agent Romanoff?"

"I saw how she was when she came back after Coulson told her that you'd been compromised," Hill explained, her tone level. "You were all she thought about, and she didn't do a good job of hiding it. She kept insisting we might be running out of time, but she was also positive you were still alive. There was hope there, Agent Barton, and almost wishing. I saw the same thing when she came back and you didn't – wishing. Looking out of windows. Scanning computers. Looking at file after file. Asking question after question. She tried to hide it, and she almost did. Director Fury didn't notice, but I did. Maybe it's woman's intuition, or maybe I'm just really perceptive. I don't know; but at the two month mark it changed and the wishing was replaced by distress."

Clint took a drink and sat down, absorbing what his fellow agent was telling him. This was information he didn't have: who Agent Romanoff was when he was gone. Natasha without him. Natasha that took an improperly-researched mission for reasons he was only starting to piece together with the help of Agent Hill.

"If you ask me," Hill said as she moved toward the door, "she looked like a woman in love."

Clint stood and clenched his fists in fear. "What will you tell Fury?"

Agent Hill surprised him with her response, delivered with a shake of her head.

"Nothing. Your affairs are yours to handle. Both of you do your jobs, I'll do mine, and unless that changes it's no one else's business."

Clint watched the tall woman walk out the door, his mind reeling. What if Hill was right? Did Natasha, for all her claims of love being selfish, of love being something that was not an option for her, of love being something only children engage in… was she in love with him? Had she been so distracted by his whereabouts and whether or not he was coming back that she didn't think her mission all the way through?

Did he now owe her a debt?

Where had she gone?