Avengers Fic: Priority One
The bullet came out of nowhere and ripped through Clint’s side, leaving fire in its wake.
He had been doing his last sweep from the roof of the compound, just checking for stragglers. He obviously found one. His knees buckled and he stumbled on the concrete roof, gravel digging into his pants where he knelt, trying to catch his breath. He gritted his teeth and stood, scanning the trees for the shooter, and he found him scurrying down toward the ground, obviously hoping to move on to the Steve and Bruce if he could. He didn’t make it. Clint nocked an arrow, ignoring the fire in his side, and loosed it, watching it bury itself in the neck of the shooter, sending him tumbling to the ground.
Bruce looked up and Clint saluted, shouting, “I’ll be down in a minute. I think that’s it.” Bruce nodded, and stumbled his own way over to the edge of the compound where Steve held out a pair of pants for him. He gratefully took them and the shirt Steve had and Clint watched him pull them on wearily.
As Steve and Bruce regrouped, Clint shuffled around the roof, holding his side and doing one last sweep. If there were more, they were hiding in the hillside, waiting for a better shot. They’d have to be careful, but they were probably okay. Steve had taken out the computer system they were after with a few well-placed explosives, while the Hulk and Clint took out the personnel who were crazy enough to stay and fight.
They’d succeeded on their mission.
Coulson was on the line from his vantage point a mile or so away as soon as Clint finished his sweep. “Meet at extraction point C as soon as you can. Repeat, extraction point C. I’ll catch you guys there.”
Clint took a couple of deep breaths and clenched his eyes shut as shards of glass raked down his side. He looked down and saw a bullet wound, entry and exit point, on his side. He thought of calling out to Phil or the others, but Bruce was exhausted from Hulking out, Steve was going to have to run point just in case they hadn’t gotten all of the soldiers, and Clint should run guard behind as they went so that no surprises came.
Besides, no one could do anything for him until they got to the extraction point.
So he clenched his teeth and stood still, swaying a bit, but then gathering his ammunition and quiver to his back, heading down the fire escape to the dusty ground and trying to keep his knees from buckling again when he made the short leap to the ground. It sort of worked.
Bruce was watching.
“Hawkeye, you all right?” he asked, coming over to Clint.
Clint nodded, trying to look confident. “A little scrape or two, but I’m okay. We should go.”
Bruce and Steve started walking, and Clint took up behind them, feeling a dagger pierce his side with every step. He was being stupid, he knew that, but he just couldn’t slow them down, and Steve or Bruce helping him would slow them down. So he walked with clenched teeth and kept repeating to himself, ‘get to the extraction point, get to the extraction point.’
Extraction point C was two miles from the compound. Steve took one sniper out with his shield about a mile in, but Clint hardly noticed. His breathing was getting harder, his hand was clutching his side as if he could hold the blood in. He couldn’t, though, and he felt his t-shirt getting soggy, felt the blood soaking his waist and seeping down his leg into his boot.
A mile and a half in and Clint swore his boot was squelching, and all he could feel was pain. Breath in, needles; breath out, fire. Breath in, needles; breath out, fire. A quarter mile from the extraction point and his breath was ragged and his vision spotty. He blinked a lot to keep his eyes on the path in front of him. Sweat was pouring down his forehead and he tried to raise his hand to wipe it away and fire ripped through his body and he stumbled.
Bruce and Steve were a couple hundred yards ahead and didn’t see him.
He squeezed his eyes shut and stood slowly, legs shaking with the effort. He stood for a moment before he realized he should still be walking, and gingerly stepped forward, trying to be more careful of the uneven ground.
When he finally saw Phil standing with Steve and Bruce, they were in a heated discussion.
“They can’t get us yet,” Phil said as Clint leaned against a nearby tree, trying to get his breathing under control.
“When can they come?” Steve asked.
“Hill wasn’t sure. She thinks they can make it out here tonight, but it might be morning. We’ll have to find a place to hole up until then.”
“The terrorists might come looking for us if they regroup at all,” Bruce said.
“We have to keep watch,” Phil replied.
All Clint heard was that they weren’t coming. He had been counting on a helicopter waiting for them at the extraction point, but they weren’t coming. He closed his eyes as he heard Steve say, “There’s a series of caves in these hills. We can find one that’s well protected for the night if we have to.”
He opened them again and his vision swam, his body finally giving out in protest to his own stupidity. “I need extraction,” he said, his voice sounding like it was going through a tunnel, and he saw Phil finally really look at him as he swayed on his feet, tumbling to the ground and unable to do anything to stop it.
Bruce saw Clint crumble to the ground and he rushed over, getting there before Phil or Steve. Clint’s eyes were glassy with pain and his breathing was coming in gasps. He realized that Clint was pale and sweating as well, and he had fallen awkwardly on the ground but hadn’t moved at all.
He rolled Clint onto his back and the sniper moaned, his hands going to his side and clenching it. Phil was there in a second.
“Clint, what happened?” Phil asked, and Bruce marveled at his calm.
“Shot,” Clint said, his voice ragged and weak. “Didn’t want to slow us down. Thought help would be waiting anyway.”
Bruce peeled the black vest away from Clint’s chest and his shoulders sagged when he saw the blood-soaked t-shirt underneath. Clint cringed violently as Bruce tried to peel the t-shirt up from his waist, so he looked up at Phil and said, “Do you have a knife?” Phil nodded and reached into one of his vest pockets and handed Bruce his knife, and he cut the t-shirt away carefully to get a better look at the wound.
He heard Steve’s sharp intake of breath when they saw the gunshot hole in Clint’s side. Phil reached down and grasped Clint’s hand tightly. The hole was seeping blood and the bullet had gone through to his back, leaving a rough exit wound.
“We need to get him cleaned up and stop the bleeding,” Bruce said, looking up at Steve. “Can you carry him to one of those caves? I don’t want to have to move him twice.”
Steve nodded and knelt down, sliding his arms under Clint’s back. When he lifted the archer up, Clint groaned and went another shade of pale. Bruce followed Steve and he heard Phil getting back on his comm unit to Agent Hill.
“Agent Barton’s been shot. You’ve got to move the extraction ahead. He needs medical attention right away.” Bruce heard Phil pause and then his voice hardened and Bruce heard power in Phil’s voice. “No. Sooner. You’ve got to make it sooner, Agent Hill. Move our team to Priority One. Now.”
They followed Steve into a hollowed out cave. It wasn’t very deep, and the light from outside seeped in, casting the ground in a pale glow. Steve laid Clint down gently on the ground and leaned over him, wiping sweat from his cheeks. Clint’s eyes were squeezed shut and he was breathing quickly. Phil knelt down and looked at Bruce.
“What do we need?” he asked, and Bruce looked around. “Take your t-shirt off,” he said and he stood and took off his own shirt that Steve had just given him. He took one shirt and handed it to Steve. Find some water. Soak it and bring it back. We should also get a fire going; he’s going to get cold.”
Phil caught Steve’s arm. “According to the map of the area, there’s a good sized creek about a half mile west of this area. Here,” he said, pulling off a water bottle from his vest and reaching down for Clint’s as well, “Fill these, too.”
Steve nodded, took another look at Clint, and headed out. Bruce looked back down at Clint, seeing the archer in a different light than normal.
Clint was older than Bruce. Not by much, though, and he usually came across as younger. He was funny, a prankster, and constantly in motion when he wasn’t on the job. He bounced on his toes when he stood still too long, he played video games with Tony as if they were real, and he worked out more than anyone Bruce had ever met. It was as if he had to work out all of the energy he held in tight when he was in the field.
Now, lying on the ground of a cave, sweating and motionless, he looked his age. Lines creased around his eyes and down his cheeks and he seemed to have no energy left at all. Bruce leaned over to talk to him and put his own hand against Clint’s pale cheek. “Clint. Hawkeye, look at me for a minute, okay? Come on.” He needed Clint to stay awake. Sleep would bring shock more quickly, and the uncertainty of when the extraction would come meant they needed to delay shock as much as possible.
With obvious effort, Clint opened his eyes, trying to focus on Bruce.
“Hurts like hell,” Clint said, through clenched teeth.
“I know. But we need you to stay awake. Try, okay?”
Clint nodded and looked over at Phil. “Sorry,” he said, and Bruce watched as Phil leant over his lover, running his hand through Clint’s hair.
“It’s okay. You were thinking of the team.”
“Where’s Steve?” Clint asked, trying to look around but wincing and gasping at his movement.
Phil reached down and held his hand again. “He’s getting some water to help get your wound clean. He’ll be back soon.”
“Snipers,” Clint said, frantically. “There might be more out there.”
“Steve can handle them,” Bruce said gently.
Clint shook his head. “Shouldn’t have to.” He paused to take a shuddering breath. “Where the fuck is SHIELD?”
“They’ll be here,” Phil said, quietly.
“Soon,” Bruce added.
Clint nodded and Bruce leaned over the wound again. He didn’t have anything clean, but he had to put pressure on the wound anyway or Clint would bleed out. He took the Phil’s shirt that he’d taken off and pushed it under Clint’s back to the exit wound. Then he wrapped some of it around to the front and leaned in, putting pressure on both points.
Clint tried to strangle his outcry at the pain, but he couldn’t help throwing his head back and writhing. Phil leaned over and tried to hold him still.
“Gotta stop this bleeding. He’s been bleeding for half an hour at least, depending when in the fight he got shot,” Bruce said, gritting his own teeth. Phil leaned on Clint’s arms to keep him from flailing, and whispered into his ear as Bruce pushed.
A few minutes later, Clint stopped struggling and went limp in Phil’s arms, his breathing shallow. Bruce realized his skin was getting cold.
“Phil, you’ve got to gather some wood and try and get a fire started. We don’t have any blankets and he’s getting cold.”
“Shock?” Phil asked.
“Yeah.”
Phil cursed and stood quickly, not sparing a glance back at Clint’s still form as he headed out to gather some wood and kindling for a fire. He worked quickly, trying not to think about what was happening. Clint had lost too much blood already. He was going into shock and help might not be here for hours.
He thought back to the first time he’d seen Clint injured in the field. It should have been a clear signal that his relationship with Barton was not going to progress as usual. He had only known Clint for about six months, and it was Clint’s second full mission as SHIELD junior agent. He wasn’t alone on the job by any means, but the two senior agents Clint was working with took him for granted and Phil didn’t realize they’d left him hanging too far on his own until it was too late.
It was a throwing knife wound that time, and Clint had finished his assailant with efficiency even though he’d been stabbed in the gut. By the time Coulson found him he was laying on the roof he’d been sniping from, breathing heavily and trying to get himself upright. Phil had felt the blood drain from his own face as he saw the wound, and his fear as he helped the young man to the extraction point then had been exponentially higher than any he’d felt before. He even found himself ripping into the senior agents with uncontrollable fury when they submitted to the debriefing session as Barton lay in surgery.
Now, there would be no surgery. Not likely, anyway, and now Clint was far more than just another agent to Coulson. So he gathered firewood as quickly as he could and made it back to the cave in ten minutes.
When he got back Clint was ashen.
Phil caught himself just standing in the entranceway staring at him when Steve, who had returned from gathering water in record time, gently pulled the wood and kindling out of his hands and began to pile it near Clint. Phil still stood, staring. Clint’s chest was hardly moving, his face was slack, and his breaths were staggered and quick.
Phil felt something shift within his own chest. He had to turn off his fear. He wouldn’t worry about whether it would help, whether Clint was lying on the cave floor dying. He couldn’t afford to worry now. He clenched his jaw, took a deep breath through his nose, and moved to help Steve build a fire. Bruce called him over.
“Phil, you should sit with him while I get the water purified. Steve can handle the fire.” Bruce’s eyes were filled with concern for Phil, clearly seeing the shift that had occurred. “I think I’ve stopped the bleeding, which is good. We need to get him to wake up again, though, and drink some water.”
Phil willed his feet to carry him to Clint’s side and he sat down next to him, reached over, and twined his fingers through Clint’s the way he did when they were sitting on the couch watching a movie together. He reached down and brushed some sweat from Clint’s forehead, marveling at how still, how disastrously still, Clint was. With his combat gear stripped from his torso he looked smaller, too, like a part of who he was had been stripped away, which, Phil supposed, it had.
A few moments later, Bruce sat down opposite Phil and held out a water bottle. “Okay. We need to wake him up, and we need to try and keep him awake.”
Both men were startled when the fire Steve had been working on sprung to life.
Then Phil leaned over Clint, running his hand through his hair and talking close to his ear. “Clint. Clint, wake up. Come on, Agent, I need you awake. Clint, we’re not finished here. We’re not, and Steve and Bruce are waiting on you to wake up. They need you, Clint, come on.”
Steve watched as Phil spoke to Clint and tried to wake him. He saw the panic that Phil was trying desperately to hide, saw the fear in his eyes that reflected Steve’s own.
Clint was Steve’s best friend. He didn’t quite understand how that happened, but it did. Phil and Clint both had even invited Steve into their relationship, and he accepted their invitation gratefully. Steve knew that he was an addition, though, not the core. That was okay, and right now he knew that Clint and Phil were the ones at the center and his job was to support them both.
He looked to Bruce and said, “What else should I do?”
Bruce looked around the cave. He pointed to a few large rocks toward the entrance. “Put those near the fire to warm up. We’ll put them near his feet when they do. We’ve got to keep his body temperature regulated.”
Steve nodded and pulled four of the rocks to the fire. He looked over at Clint as he heard him groan. He was waking.
Steve moved closer and saw Clint fighting to focus on Phil, who was leaning close to his face, holding his hand and talking to him.
“The taxi’s late,” Clint said, weakly.
Steve grinned and knelt down next to the other men and saw Phil duck his head and draw a shaky breath. Steve put a hand on Phil’s back to steady him.
“Yeah,” Steve said, “But at least the fare is cheap.”
Clint gave a small smile and looked at Phil. “Are they coming, Phil?”
Phil nodded. “They’re coming. Soon. They’ll be here soon.”
Bruce leaned forward. “Clint, you need to try and drink some water, okay?” He passed the water bottle to Phil.
“Too tired. Not thirsty,” Clint said, looking up at the ceiling of the cave.
“Clint,” Steve said, laying his hand on Clint’s arm, “You need to try. Your body is going into shock and we need to stave it off. Hydration helps. You’ve lost a lot of blood today and you need this.” We need this, he thought. We need you to do this because we can’t lose you.
This was not a moving train, but Steve swore he could smell snow mingling with the flames from the fire, and he inched a little closer to Clint’s side.
Phil slid his hand under Clint’s head and tilted it up, gently, and put the bottle to his lips. Clint swallowed a couple times and then clenched his eyes shut and leaned back, breathing through gritted teeth.
“Try again,” Phil said, quietly.
Clint took another breath and tilted his head, keeping his eyes shut tight. He managed to drink more than before, and Bruce nodded as he lay back down. “Good job, Clint. Good.”
Steve watched as Phil leaned in and pressed his lips to Clint’s forehead. “Hang on, Barton. Please,” he said.
A few minutes later, as Clint took shallow breaths and Phil talked to him quietly, getting him to smile from time to time, Steve saw Bruce reach down for the wet t-shirt Steve had brought back from the creek. He used it to pull the rocks from the fire and he put two of them very close to Clint’s feet and the other two on either side of his body, close again.
And then they waited.
Steve stood near the entrance to the cave after about an hour, hoping to hear the helicopter. It kept not coming.
And then it did.
Just after Clint had finally passed out again, oblivious to Phil’s pleas and Bruce’s attempts to keep his body warm, the helicopter came. As Bruce sat with his fingers against Clint’s neck, keeping tabs on his slowing pulse and after Phil had finally just lain down next to Clint, wrapping one arm over his chest and talking, talking, talking into his ear even though he wasn’t awake to hear it, the helicopter came.
The SHIELD med team pulled Clint onto a stretcher and hurriedly carried him to the copter and Steve and Bruce and Phil climbed on, too, after they stamped out the fire. The medics were running an IV and speaking in hushed tones to each other as the three men watched, silently.
The copter landed on the Helicarrier twenty minutes later and, as Clint was rushed toward the surgery that would save his life, the behemoth ship turned, heading toward priority two.
He had been doing his last sweep from the roof of the compound, just checking for stragglers. He obviously found one. His knees buckled and he stumbled on the concrete roof, gravel digging into his pants where he knelt, trying to catch his breath. He gritted his teeth and stood, scanning the trees for the shooter, and he found him scurrying down toward the ground, obviously hoping to move on to the Steve and Bruce if he could. He didn’t make it. Clint nocked an arrow, ignoring the fire in his side, and loosed it, watching it bury itself in the neck of the shooter, sending him tumbling to the ground.
Bruce looked up and Clint saluted, shouting, “I’ll be down in a minute. I think that’s it.” Bruce nodded, and stumbled his own way over to the edge of the compound where Steve held out a pair of pants for him. He gratefully took them and the shirt Steve had and Clint watched him pull them on wearily.
As Steve and Bruce regrouped, Clint shuffled around the roof, holding his side and doing one last sweep. If there were more, they were hiding in the hillside, waiting for a better shot. They’d have to be careful, but they were probably okay. Steve had taken out the computer system they were after with a few well-placed explosives, while the Hulk and Clint took out the personnel who were crazy enough to stay and fight.
They’d succeeded on their mission.
Coulson was on the line from his vantage point a mile or so away as soon as Clint finished his sweep. “Meet at extraction point C as soon as you can. Repeat, extraction point C. I’ll catch you guys there.”
Clint took a couple of deep breaths and clenched his eyes shut as shards of glass raked down his side. He looked down and saw a bullet wound, entry and exit point, on his side. He thought of calling out to Phil or the others, but Bruce was exhausted from Hulking out, Steve was going to have to run point just in case they hadn’t gotten all of the soldiers, and Clint should run guard behind as they went so that no surprises came.
Besides, no one could do anything for him until they got to the extraction point.
So he clenched his teeth and stood still, swaying a bit, but then gathering his ammunition and quiver to his back, heading down the fire escape to the dusty ground and trying to keep his knees from buckling again when he made the short leap to the ground. It sort of worked.
Bruce was watching.
“Hawkeye, you all right?” he asked, coming over to Clint.
Clint nodded, trying to look confident. “A little scrape or two, but I’m okay. We should go.”
Bruce and Steve started walking, and Clint took up behind them, feeling a dagger pierce his side with every step. He was being stupid, he knew that, but he just couldn’t slow them down, and Steve or Bruce helping him would slow them down. So he walked with clenched teeth and kept repeating to himself, ‘get to the extraction point, get to the extraction point.’
Extraction point C was two miles from the compound. Steve took one sniper out with his shield about a mile in, but Clint hardly noticed. His breathing was getting harder, his hand was clutching his side as if he could hold the blood in. He couldn’t, though, and he felt his t-shirt getting soggy, felt the blood soaking his waist and seeping down his leg into his boot.
A mile and a half in and Clint swore his boot was squelching, and all he could feel was pain. Breath in, needles; breath out, fire. Breath in, needles; breath out, fire. A quarter mile from the extraction point and his breath was ragged and his vision spotty. He blinked a lot to keep his eyes on the path in front of him. Sweat was pouring down his forehead and he tried to raise his hand to wipe it away and fire ripped through his body and he stumbled.
Bruce and Steve were a couple hundred yards ahead and didn’t see him.
He squeezed his eyes shut and stood slowly, legs shaking with the effort. He stood for a moment before he realized he should still be walking, and gingerly stepped forward, trying to be more careful of the uneven ground.
When he finally saw Phil standing with Steve and Bruce, they were in a heated discussion.
“They can’t get us yet,” Phil said as Clint leaned against a nearby tree, trying to get his breathing under control.
“When can they come?” Steve asked.
“Hill wasn’t sure. She thinks they can make it out here tonight, but it might be morning. We’ll have to find a place to hole up until then.”
“The terrorists might come looking for us if they regroup at all,” Bruce said.
“We have to keep watch,” Phil replied.
All Clint heard was that they weren’t coming. He had been counting on a helicopter waiting for them at the extraction point, but they weren’t coming. He closed his eyes as he heard Steve say, “There’s a series of caves in these hills. We can find one that’s well protected for the night if we have to.”
He opened them again and his vision swam, his body finally giving out in protest to his own stupidity. “I need extraction,” he said, his voice sounding like it was going through a tunnel, and he saw Phil finally really look at him as he swayed on his feet, tumbling to the ground and unable to do anything to stop it.
Bruce saw Clint crumble to the ground and he rushed over, getting there before Phil or Steve. Clint’s eyes were glassy with pain and his breathing was coming in gasps. He realized that Clint was pale and sweating as well, and he had fallen awkwardly on the ground but hadn’t moved at all.
He rolled Clint onto his back and the sniper moaned, his hands going to his side and clenching it. Phil was there in a second.
“Clint, what happened?” Phil asked, and Bruce marveled at his calm.
“Shot,” Clint said, his voice ragged and weak. “Didn’t want to slow us down. Thought help would be waiting anyway.”
Bruce peeled the black vest away from Clint’s chest and his shoulders sagged when he saw the blood-soaked t-shirt underneath. Clint cringed violently as Bruce tried to peel the t-shirt up from his waist, so he looked up at Phil and said, “Do you have a knife?” Phil nodded and reached into one of his vest pockets and handed Bruce his knife, and he cut the t-shirt away carefully to get a better look at the wound.
He heard Steve’s sharp intake of breath when they saw the gunshot hole in Clint’s side. Phil reached down and grasped Clint’s hand tightly. The hole was seeping blood and the bullet had gone through to his back, leaving a rough exit wound.
“We need to get him cleaned up and stop the bleeding,” Bruce said, looking up at Steve. “Can you carry him to one of those caves? I don’t want to have to move him twice.”
Steve nodded and knelt down, sliding his arms under Clint’s back. When he lifted the archer up, Clint groaned and went another shade of pale. Bruce followed Steve and he heard Phil getting back on his comm unit to Agent Hill.
“Agent Barton’s been shot. You’ve got to move the extraction ahead. He needs medical attention right away.” Bruce heard Phil pause and then his voice hardened and Bruce heard power in Phil’s voice. “No. Sooner. You’ve got to make it sooner, Agent Hill. Move our team to Priority One. Now.”
They followed Steve into a hollowed out cave. It wasn’t very deep, and the light from outside seeped in, casting the ground in a pale glow. Steve laid Clint down gently on the ground and leaned over him, wiping sweat from his cheeks. Clint’s eyes were squeezed shut and he was breathing quickly. Phil knelt down and looked at Bruce.
“What do we need?” he asked, and Bruce looked around. “Take your t-shirt off,” he said and he stood and took off his own shirt that Steve had just given him. He took one shirt and handed it to Steve. Find some water. Soak it and bring it back. We should also get a fire going; he’s going to get cold.”
Phil caught Steve’s arm. “According to the map of the area, there’s a good sized creek about a half mile west of this area. Here,” he said, pulling off a water bottle from his vest and reaching down for Clint’s as well, “Fill these, too.”
Steve nodded, took another look at Clint, and headed out. Bruce looked back down at Clint, seeing the archer in a different light than normal.
Clint was older than Bruce. Not by much, though, and he usually came across as younger. He was funny, a prankster, and constantly in motion when he wasn’t on the job. He bounced on his toes when he stood still too long, he played video games with Tony as if they were real, and he worked out more than anyone Bruce had ever met. It was as if he had to work out all of the energy he held in tight when he was in the field.
Now, lying on the ground of a cave, sweating and motionless, he looked his age. Lines creased around his eyes and down his cheeks and he seemed to have no energy left at all. Bruce leaned over to talk to him and put his own hand against Clint’s pale cheek. “Clint. Hawkeye, look at me for a minute, okay? Come on.” He needed Clint to stay awake. Sleep would bring shock more quickly, and the uncertainty of when the extraction would come meant they needed to delay shock as much as possible.
With obvious effort, Clint opened his eyes, trying to focus on Bruce.
“Hurts like hell,” Clint said, through clenched teeth.
“I know. But we need you to stay awake. Try, okay?”
Clint nodded and looked over at Phil. “Sorry,” he said, and Bruce watched as Phil leant over his lover, running his hand through Clint’s hair.
“It’s okay. You were thinking of the team.”
“Where’s Steve?” Clint asked, trying to look around but wincing and gasping at his movement.
Phil reached down and held his hand again. “He’s getting some water to help get your wound clean. He’ll be back soon.”
“Snipers,” Clint said, frantically. “There might be more out there.”
“Steve can handle them,” Bruce said gently.
Clint shook his head. “Shouldn’t have to.” He paused to take a shuddering breath. “Where the fuck is SHIELD?”
“They’ll be here,” Phil said, quietly.
“Soon,” Bruce added.
Clint nodded and Bruce leaned over the wound again. He didn’t have anything clean, but he had to put pressure on the wound anyway or Clint would bleed out. He took the Phil’s shirt that he’d taken off and pushed it under Clint’s back to the exit wound. Then he wrapped some of it around to the front and leaned in, putting pressure on both points.
Clint tried to strangle his outcry at the pain, but he couldn’t help throwing his head back and writhing. Phil leaned over and tried to hold him still.
“Gotta stop this bleeding. He’s been bleeding for half an hour at least, depending when in the fight he got shot,” Bruce said, gritting his own teeth. Phil leaned on Clint’s arms to keep him from flailing, and whispered into his ear as Bruce pushed.
A few minutes later, Clint stopped struggling and went limp in Phil’s arms, his breathing shallow. Bruce realized his skin was getting cold.
“Phil, you’ve got to gather some wood and try and get a fire started. We don’t have any blankets and he’s getting cold.”
“Shock?” Phil asked.
“Yeah.”
Phil cursed and stood quickly, not sparing a glance back at Clint’s still form as he headed out to gather some wood and kindling for a fire. He worked quickly, trying not to think about what was happening. Clint had lost too much blood already. He was going into shock and help might not be here for hours.
He thought back to the first time he’d seen Clint injured in the field. It should have been a clear signal that his relationship with Barton was not going to progress as usual. He had only known Clint for about six months, and it was Clint’s second full mission as SHIELD junior agent. He wasn’t alone on the job by any means, but the two senior agents Clint was working with took him for granted and Phil didn’t realize they’d left him hanging too far on his own until it was too late.
It was a throwing knife wound that time, and Clint had finished his assailant with efficiency even though he’d been stabbed in the gut. By the time Coulson found him he was laying on the roof he’d been sniping from, breathing heavily and trying to get himself upright. Phil had felt the blood drain from his own face as he saw the wound, and his fear as he helped the young man to the extraction point then had been exponentially higher than any he’d felt before. He even found himself ripping into the senior agents with uncontrollable fury when they submitted to the debriefing session as Barton lay in surgery.
Now, there would be no surgery. Not likely, anyway, and now Clint was far more than just another agent to Coulson. So he gathered firewood as quickly as he could and made it back to the cave in ten minutes.
When he got back Clint was ashen.
Phil caught himself just standing in the entranceway staring at him when Steve, who had returned from gathering water in record time, gently pulled the wood and kindling out of his hands and began to pile it near Clint. Phil still stood, staring. Clint’s chest was hardly moving, his face was slack, and his breaths were staggered and quick.
Phil felt something shift within his own chest. He had to turn off his fear. He wouldn’t worry about whether it would help, whether Clint was lying on the cave floor dying. He couldn’t afford to worry now. He clenched his jaw, took a deep breath through his nose, and moved to help Steve build a fire. Bruce called him over.
“Phil, you should sit with him while I get the water purified. Steve can handle the fire.” Bruce’s eyes were filled with concern for Phil, clearly seeing the shift that had occurred. “I think I’ve stopped the bleeding, which is good. We need to get him to wake up again, though, and drink some water.”
Phil willed his feet to carry him to Clint’s side and he sat down next to him, reached over, and twined his fingers through Clint’s the way he did when they were sitting on the couch watching a movie together. He reached down and brushed some sweat from Clint’s forehead, marveling at how still, how disastrously still, Clint was. With his combat gear stripped from his torso he looked smaller, too, like a part of who he was had been stripped away, which, Phil supposed, it had.
A few moments later, Bruce sat down opposite Phil and held out a water bottle. “Okay. We need to wake him up, and we need to try and keep him awake.”
Both men were startled when the fire Steve had been working on sprung to life.
Then Phil leaned over Clint, running his hand through his hair and talking close to his ear. “Clint. Clint, wake up. Come on, Agent, I need you awake. Clint, we’re not finished here. We’re not, and Steve and Bruce are waiting on you to wake up. They need you, Clint, come on.”
Steve watched as Phil spoke to Clint and tried to wake him. He saw the panic that Phil was trying desperately to hide, saw the fear in his eyes that reflected Steve’s own.
Clint was Steve’s best friend. He didn’t quite understand how that happened, but it did. Phil and Clint both had even invited Steve into their relationship, and he accepted their invitation gratefully. Steve knew that he was an addition, though, not the core. That was okay, and right now he knew that Clint and Phil were the ones at the center and his job was to support them both.
He looked to Bruce and said, “What else should I do?”
Bruce looked around the cave. He pointed to a few large rocks toward the entrance. “Put those near the fire to warm up. We’ll put them near his feet when they do. We’ve got to keep his body temperature regulated.”
Steve nodded and pulled four of the rocks to the fire. He looked over at Clint as he heard him groan. He was waking.
Steve moved closer and saw Clint fighting to focus on Phil, who was leaning close to his face, holding his hand and talking to him.
“The taxi’s late,” Clint said, weakly.
Steve grinned and knelt down next to the other men and saw Phil duck his head and draw a shaky breath. Steve put a hand on Phil’s back to steady him.
“Yeah,” Steve said, “But at least the fare is cheap.”
Clint gave a small smile and looked at Phil. “Are they coming, Phil?”
Phil nodded. “They’re coming. Soon. They’ll be here soon.”
Bruce leaned forward. “Clint, you need to try and drink some water, okay?” He passed the water bottle to Phil.
“Too tired. Not thirsty,” Clint said, looking up at the ceiling of the cave.
“Clint,” Steve said, laying his hand on Clint’s arm, “You need to try. Your body is going into shock and we need to stave it off. Hydration helps. You’ve lost a lot of blood today and you need this.” We need this, he thought. We need you to do this because we can’t lose you.
This was not a moving train, but Steve swore he could smell snow mingling with the flames from the fire, and he inched a little closer to Clint’s side.
Phil slid his hand under Clint’s head and tilted it up, gently, and put the bottle to his lips. Clint swallowed a couple times and then clenched his eyes shut and leaned back, breathing through gritted teeth.
“Try again,” Phil said, quietly.
Clint took another breath and tilted his head, keeping his eyes shut tight. He managed to drink more than before, and Bruce nodded as he lay back down. “Good job, Clint. Good.”
Steve watched as Phil leaned in and pressed his lips to Clint’s forehead. “Hang on, Barton. Please,” he said.
A few minutes later, as Clint took shallow breaths and Phil talked to him quietly, getting him to smile from time to time, Steve saw Bruce reach down for the wet t-shirt Steve had brought back from the creek. He used it to pull the rocks from the fire and he put two of them very close to Clint’s feet and the other two on either side of his body, close again.
And then they waited.
Steve stood near the entrance to the cave after about an hour, hoping to hear the helicopter. It kept not coming.
And then it did.
Just after Clint had finally passed out again, oblivious to Phil’s pleas and Bruce’s attempts to keep his body warm, the helicopter came. As Bruce sat with his fingers against Clint’s neck, keeping tabs on his slowing pulse and after Phil had finally just lain down next to Clint, wrapping one arm over his chest and talking, talking, talking into his ear even though he wasn’t awake to hear it, the helicopter came.
The SHIELD med team pulled Clint onto a stretcher and hurriedly carried him to the copter and Steve and Bruce and Phil climbed on, too, after they stamped out the fire. The medics were running an IV and speaking in hushed tones to each other as the three men watched, silently.
The copter landed on the Helicarrier twenty minutes later and, as Clint was rushed toward the surgery that would save his life, the behemoth ship turned, heading toward priority two.