Picture: Dariya Romanova - I am not afraid

Music: "Agni Partene" by Divna Ljubojevic

All rights go to their rightful owners.

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FOUR

Clint Barton P.O.V.

Twisting an arrow around in my hand, my eyes are on the slim yet strong weapon, eyes going over ever curve and sharp edge. My mind, however, is in a completely different place.

Natasha lays on the bed beside mine, her eyes closed as she listens to her cassette tape player. Divna Ljubojevic, I think? Don't ask. You spend 24/7 with someone, you learn their favorite music. Her's is Russian lullabies and Russian gospel, mine is a secret. I'll never admit it.

I'm exhausted, though I'm not sure why. All we did was scare some kids into shape. I guess it could be the insomnia, or maybe the coffee wearing off, but who the hell really knows. You work for S.H.I.E.L.D., killing people for a living, and something's bound to snap.

"Natasha?" I whisper, tugging on the red head's long curls to get her attention.

She glances up, pulls her headphones off, and replies, "Da?"

"What do you remember about your childhood?" Lately, she and I have been opening up to each other about our lives, what we've been through, and personal details that no one else knows. It's nice to be able to share with someone. I don't think I've ever had that.

She shrugs. "I try to block most of it out, but I remember the training. The constant training." She gulps. "My instructor used to have us cuff ourselves to our bedposts. She would regulate our meals, and hypnotize us with films. We didn't even know we were being programmed."

"I remember when you fist joined S.H.I.E.L.D. that you used to cuff yourself to your bed. You'd hide food and freak out over Snow White, too, now that I think about it. Is that all from then?"

She nods. "I don't cuff myself anymore, and I don't hide food, but I still can't watch Snow White." She looks up at me. "What of your childhood?"

I smirk. "It's going to seem silly compared to yours."

"Tell me anyways?"

"My brother, Barney, and I, we joined the circus after our parents died in a car crash, only after six years in an orphanage. The Carson Carnival of Travelling Wonders," I chuckle. "I really hated it, but it was better than the orphanage."

"Why did you hate it?"

"The guys that owned the place embezzled money and shit. I caught the man who trained me in the act, and he had me beat and left for dead because of it." My fists clench. "Swordsman."

"What happened to your brother?"

I shrug, my eyes going back to my arrow. "I lost touch with him. He's not the best person anymore, and I guess that's partly my fault. But, after all that happened, I joined Tiboldt's Circus and spent some time there before joining the Coney Island Circus. Tiboldt's was the one who gave me the name Hawkeye, and I guess I'm the sentimental bastard who kept it."

"It suits you," she smiles.

The lights flicker before I can reply, and a knock on our door sends us flying from our rest. "What is it?" I ask, opening the door to Maria's frightened face.

"The coms are down. We can't contact main base in Washington. Something's wrong, but they can't figure out what."

I place a hand on her shoulder, looking around. "Is it HYDRA?"

She shakes her head. "I don't know. I don't think so. Clint, I'm really, really scared-"

I look her straight in the eyes and place both hands on her small shoulders. "Breathe, Maria. Remember your training. Just keep calm and breathe, okay?"

She shakes her head, breathing deeply. "I'm not a super spy like you. I'm just a newbie agent who got lucky-"

"-Don't. Don't do that to yourself. You're here for a reason, and that reason is you're a damn good agent. Just remember that and keep breathing." I offer her a smile. "We good?"

"Yeah, and thanks, Clint."

"No problem."

"I hate to break up the touching moment, Agent mudak, but we need to find out what's going on."

I look to Natasha, who is suiting up behind our backs. "I agree. Maria, you stay close to me and Nat, okay? You're gonna be just fine. You're eighteen and a Level 5. That's unheard of."

She nods. "Aye, aye, Agent Barton."

Nat comes out of the room and walks before us. "Follow me, and stay close."

We sneak our way cautiously to the communications room where the group of engineers are going nuts trying to figure out what went haywire. "Not that I care about being woken up at midnight," I ask Agent Phil Coulson, "but what the hell?"

Coulson looks over at us. "We don't know what's going on."

I scoff, looking around the room. "Uh, yeah. That much I figured. Woo hoo! Let's give Agent Coulson an award for 'Mosr Obvious Answer'!"

"Shut up, mudak," Nat says, rolling her eyes. "How do we know this is not HYDRA?"

"We don't," he admits. "All we know is that five minutes ago, communications were fine, pristine even. Now we can't even order take-out from Budapest."

"Shame," I admit. "Can you bring up security cameras? Maybe we can see something."

"They're fried as well. I sent a group of agents out to the boarders to protect it and see what they can find, but even our old school walkies are down. Word of mouth is the only communication we have at the moment."

"Do you think HYDRA will care that I'm in my boxers?" I ask, genuinely concerned.

"Suit up," Coulson says, not even blinking. "You and Nat are our top field agents here. You two are going to the boarder to watch over the idiots out there."

"Babysitting? I did not join S.H.I.E.L.D. to play games with children."

"Besides you, Barton, Hill, and myself, the highest level agent we have is a Level 2."

I cringe and utter a, "Oooh, yikes!"

Phil laughs. "Yeah, now you see our predicament."

"Sir," a young agent asks, running in the room. He looks especially familiar.

"Hey!" I shout, pointing at the broad shouldered guy. "Aren't you the sexist bastard Romanoff beat up today?" I laugh at the guys uncomfortable stance around the petite redhead, who glares at him while smiling, an action she has perfected. "Ha ha! I knew it!"

"What is it, Agent Marcus?" Coulson asks, ignoring me as usual.

Agent Marcus has a cold sweat on his skin and his eyes are terrified, not that he isn't a coward, but this is another level of fear altogether. "S-Sir, there's a squadron of unidentified agents to our north and east boarders."

"How many?"

He shakes his head. "I-I, we don't know. They have land-based artillery, but we don't know what they plan to-"

"-Have any Level 2 agents meet me in the ammunition room in one minute," Coulson says, giving orders. "Romanoff, Barton, Hill, head up to the Nest with weapons of choice for long range shots. Prepare to be given the order to fire at will." He turns to another agent. "Set us on red alert and prepare to wipe all files from our system leading to sensitive material."

"But, Sir-!"

"Just do it!"

I salute as he leaves the room in a hurry. "Aye, aye, Sir!" I turn to Natasha and she looks over my purple boxers and white T-shirt with a purple bullseye logo. "Do you think I should change?"

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Dariya Romanova P.O.V.

At midnight exactly, HYDRA starts to prepare for their attack. Countless men with guns enter their trenches l, almost silent. You only hear the slight patting of footsteps.
Agent Ward pulls me out of the jeep they're keeping me prisoner in. Not the gentle type, I cringe from his rough hand on my neck as he drags me towards the front lines. "Do your thing," he orders, cocking a gun and placing it on my back. "And don't even think of running. You'll be dead before you can reach the trenches."

I sigh, clearing my mind, or at least trying to. I close my eyes and picture the waves of radio, satellite, sound, anything that is on a wavelength. I see colors of all types, and waves of all lengths and volumes. The only thing to focus on is the darkness surrounding the colors, which dance and fly like a flame, and I am the moth.

"What's taking so long?" Agent Ward says, in an ever growing tone of disapproval.

"It's not like I just point and shoot," I defend myself, eyes still closed. "It's not a science. I need quiet and focus to find the strands-"

"-'Find the strands'? What the fuck are you going on about?"

"Do you want this done or not?" I glare at him over my shoulder. "It would help not to have a gun pointed between my shoulders."

He is slow to release his hold on me, but soon enough lets his weapon drop.

That's it, I smirk to myself as I turn around. Give me any slight chance of escaping and I'll take it.

I raise my hands, now able to see the waves of sound and radio like the wind. "I'm in," I mumble. "What are my orders?"

"Didn't Zola tell you?" Ward asks, annoyed. "First you take out their communications, then you make a high pitched soundwave to... disable them."

Disable them? Is that what they call murder now?

I visualize the waves coming from the S.H.I.E.L.D. Base as the color white. It's a neutral sound, no loud, not quiet, just merely existing. They're long and smooth and consistent, like most radio waves I've come across are. Unlike music, which is constantly fluctuating, radio and television waves are always the same. Even when the screen is off, there is always a feed coming through.

I raise my hands towards the white waves and clench my fists, holding them in my hands. I pull them towards me, away from the Base. "I need a jar," I shout. Zola, after he learned of my power and it's abilities and needs, had these special jars made so I can literally take the waves from the source and store them, not just turn them off to me, which is what I normally do.

Ward opens a specially made jar and holds it up to me. I gather all the white light and shove it quickly into the Vibranium case before it can escape. Because Vibranium is a completely vibration absorbent material, it's the idealist for my wave-storing jars.

"Nice," Ward smiles, looking at the jar, which seems empty to him, but it's vibrating state is a sign that I did my job. "Now, the other part of your mission."

I shake my head, tears coming to my eyes. "I can't. I won't."

Wards smile fades and he presses his gun in between my brows. "Do you want a bullet in your head?!"

I whimper, shaking my head no. Maybe I shook it, or maybe I was just trembling from fear.

"Then you will do as HYDRA commands you. Blow their heads up!"

"I am not afraid of you, Ward."

He forces me to turn around, a gun still on my neck. "You should be."

I look to the sky and see the sounds of nature surrounding the Base. I knew that it wouldn't be enough to just injure them all. It's either them or me.

I choose them.

"Fine," I utter.

Ward smiles. "Earplugs!" he shouts in German to the other HYDRA agents.

I raise my hands and pull the sounds from the sky, the mountains, the Base itself: a plane flying overhead, the men talking, rocks falling down a distant cliff. All becomes eerily silent just before I redirect the sound into a high-pitched screech towards the S.H.I.E.L.D. Base.

The windows shatter. The men outside the base fall t the ground screaming, not knowing that the sounds they make only fuel my power. The power goes out around and inside the Base.

"More!" Ward shouts. "You're not killing them! End them all!"

I turn up the volume, dreading my actions.

Someone, please. Take me out.

My wish seems to be heard by Lada herself, for as soon as I think this prayer, a shot is heard and a sharp pain enters my shoulder region.

Oh, I realize. I've been shot.

I place my hand on my shoulder, feeling the warm blood start to pulse from the bullet hole. "Romanova down!" Ward shouts. "End them now!"

Smiling, I turn around and force it on he HYDRA agents, blowing Ward away from me with the force of sound before he has the reaction time to shoot me. I then collapse on the ground, passing out from the loss of blood.

This is the end.

Finally.

END.