"Shackles. Nice."

"Thanks, Captain Obvious," Natasha replied sarcastically to her partner. "You're probably drugged, aren't you?"

Clint rolled his eyes despite the effort it took him. He felt his hands loosing a bit of the circulation running through them, fading out of touch with reality. They were shackled far over his head and hung by ropes up to the ceiling of what Clint assumed to be a barn. The smell of hay was fresh in the air, along with a slight odor of old timber.

Both assassins had their feet off the ground, stiff toes still pointed at the ground in an attempt to shrug off the heavy cords binding their ankles together. Natasha was bleeding from a newly made bump on her head. It wasn't much, but Clint was still unsure to whether or not she had endured a concussion bad enough to worry about.

"Isn't somebody gonna ask us some questions?" Clint called out to no one in particular. The large double doors adjacent to them were shut, but the pair could see a sliver of pale light reaching in and highlighting nothing but a patch of muddy dirt. "I mean, this isn't out first rodeo!"

Natasha muttered, "It looks like there was a rodeo here."

"Yeah," he agreed. "Between you and me, I know this great guy who can guarantee you a deep cleaning service."

Several things happened at once. Natasha gave Clint a silent look without any emotions betraying her inevitable blank mask. One of the doors slid open a crack, unveiling the darkness with even more contrasting light. It wasn't enough to see everything, but enough for Clint and Natasha to analyze their captors. Three heavyset men trailed in the room from the door before shutting it behind them.

The guy in the front had a big head and a thick neck, reminding Clint of a turkey. He almost thought about making gobbling sounds, but then decided against it (probably for the best). He noted how both this goon and the one in the very back of the three were nearly complete opposites. This other man was still big, but more in a muscle-y way. His shoulders were extremely broad and bulged against his small jacket. It looked like this guy's head actually had a brain — surprisingly. Uno and Dose were their new names, according to Clint's nickname system.

The final guy, walking between his larger friends, was already sporting a black eye. Clint decided to call him Raccoon.

"You—" Raccoon pointed at Clint and Natasha— "are prisoners."

Natasha said dryly, "No shit."

He glared and Clint snickered. Raccoon's pals kept their straight faces, but Uno nudged the other and nodded his head in Natasha's direction. Clint noticed how their captor spoke in broken english. It made sense seeing as Clint remembered being on a mission with his partner in Italy.

Raccoon cleared his throat. "Who do you work for?"

"Cleaning industry." Clint realized that Natasha would be pissed at him for winding up Raccoon's temper.

"Wrong answer," he murmured. Raccoon punched Dose forward and said something in Italian, revealing his natural accent. Dose struck out a fist into Clint's stomach and he fought hard to not release a gasp.

The archer snuck a glance at Natasha. Despite her blank face, Clint knew exactly what she was about to do.

They'd been on different sides before. KGB vs S.H.I.E.L.D. They hurt each other and didn't want to do that anymore. They both wanted to be the ones taking the hits in their partnership, or the one to sacrifice themselves in order for their friend to live long enough to tell their story. Clint had a real family — including Natasha herself, so the assassin's plan would never prevail. They were both raised or taught to be without emotions or thoughts against comrades and partners. Their greatest weaknesses: each other and eventually themselves.

"So," Natasha said before Clint could utter a word. "Maybe I'd be interested in a special deal on those goods you're selling, hm?"

That actually was a part of the mission S.H.I.E.L.D and Coulson had sent them on. Stop a recently leaked drug deal in Italy. Destroy or find any remaining evidence. Go home. It sounded easy when put like that. The part nobody accounted for was both agents being knocked out, captured, and hung by their wrists in a distant barn.

"What's a gal like you doing with Bow-n-Arrow over there?" Raccoon approached her.

"Hey!"

Natasha didn't glare at Clint, but gave him a look that was frightening only because he didn't know what it meant. "Let's hang out sometime... Away from here. I'm open to negotiate."

"Who said anything about negotiations?" Raccoon grinned evilly. "Also, I believe you're already hanging in a place that's fine. Why fix something, if nothing's wrong?"

He ran a weird looking finger (likely broken and never healed properly) over Natasha's jaw before forming a fist and punching her straight in the same spot. She felt the familiar taste of blood fill her mouth instantly. Clint gritted his teeth in frustration. He was supposed to protect her!

Clint whistled to get his attention. "What happened to the eye, Raccoon?" The man was silent, speaking only for Clint to interrupt. "Cat got your tongue? On second thoughts, aren't cats and raccoons related? I mean, they're both kinda strange and like to dig through trash."

Raccoon started violently trembling in rage. Clint could practically imagine smoke coming out of his ears like in a cartoon show Cooper would always watch in the afternoons.

"You ask a lot of questions."

"I pride myself on it, thanks for taking notice."

Natasha almost muttered a curse aloud at how stupid her partner was being. She was supposed to protect him!

She decided, without hesitation, to use the blood in her mouth and spit at Raccoon. He took a hasty step back in surprise. Natasha could only hope Clint would focus on slipping out of his shackles with her distraction still in play.

"You've got a little something on your face."

"You've got yerself a death wish."

Raccoon, living up to his name, skittered out of the barn and closed the doors with a loud bang. Uno and Dose crackled their knuckles and advanced on Natasha. She didn't dare check on Clint's progress as he slowly maneuvered his hand through a small hole. Sweat beaded on both agent's foreheads.

Uno kicked a foot into Natasha's stomach, not getting a reaction. His buddy Dose followed up with a repeat of the same move. She grunted and tried not to let anything show on her face about the pain. Seconds ticked by and felt like hours passing; the clock's hands absentmindedly swinging on automatic. She couldn't feel her surroundings around hit number... Twenty? Natasha realized with a start that she'd lost count in her struggle to remain conscious after Uno had moved on to her head.

Natasha didn't know when or how it had happened, but eventually everything seemed to stop — time, the torture, and even her breaths felt like she was breathing in literal fire from hell. Broken ribs weren't really a new experience, however.

Finally, a pair of strong calloused hands found her wrists and untied the ropes. They caught her falling body once released from constraint and lowered Natasha gently to the ground. She could faintly hear someone talking, but she didn't even bother to decipher the words that likely didn't matter.

The bodies of Uno and Dose lie on the dirt ground, one being near a now cracked spruce beam where Clint had roughly shoved him after their skirmish.

"Well, you can't hang out with Raccoon, so you're unfortunately stuck with me," came the voice of one Clint Barton.

Her eyelids fluttered slightly and Natasha fought to regain control of her human instincts.

"Don't sleep, Tasha," he commanded sternly. "That was stupid of you and now you may have a concussion."

She smirked triumphantly at Clint while he tried to help her to her feet. "Still worth it. C'mon, we have a nocturnal gang leader to deal with."