(Avengers/SPN) why fear death (be scared of living) for ienablu
Title: why fear death (be scared of living)
Author: silverfoxflower
Fandoms: Supernatural, The Avengers
Characters: Dean Winchester, Sam Winchester; Clint Barton, Natasha Romanov, Steve Rogers, Tony Stark, Pepper Potts, Bucky Barnes
Pairings: Clint/Natasha, Bucky/Natasha, hinted Dean/Natasha, Tony/Pepper
Rating: R
Word count: 9000
Spoilers: towards the middle/end of s.5 of Supernatural
Warnings: Major and minor character death Clint Barton, Steve Rogers, Tony Stark, Pepper Potts, Bucky Barnes, dark themes, moderate violence/gore, angst
Disclaimer: The Avengers and Supernatural belong to their respective creators
A/N: Thank you lazy-coconut, for the beta and the mods of this exchange for their endless patience. Title comes from the song "Hope in the Air" by Laura Marling.
Summary: When Clint goes missing during a hunt, Natasha seeks help from Sam and Dean Winchester. She doesn't, however, tell them the whole story.
Natasha was well-acquainted with heartbreak. It was the taste of perfectly aged scotch on the tongue, the ache in her left hip on a rainy day, the patch of her leather jacket which had worn pale over the edge of her holster.
Natasha met Clint Barton on a cold night in a dark alley. She knew he was going to break her heart the minute he raised the gun to her throat and ordered her to drop the knife and step away from the gutted man. She knew it and she went with him anyways, curling her fingers into his rough and dirty hand.
--
The hotel room had the most atrocious shade of olive-green wallpaper. It was normally the kind of thing that bothered Clint more than Natasha, but after sitting for hours staring at the same smatter of newspaper clippings and police bulletins pinned on the wall, the particular shade of green started to grate personally.
Clint had been missing for nearly two days now. His duffle bag, half-unpacked, still sat at the foot of their bed. A bottle of cheap whiskey held a ghost of his lips on the nightstand.
Natasha was out of ideas.
She slumped over her laptop, her head in her hands. A cigarette dangled listlessly at the corner of her lips, and with every inward breath Natasha sucked the bitter taste of nicotine into the back of her throat. The situation was so fucked that she’d finally resorted to calling Fury, knowing that any help he provided would cost an equal pound of flesh at a later date. But even he hadn’t bothered to respond. Natasha’s cell lay still as a corpse on the desk.
If she was going to be realistic, 48 hours was as good as dead. But if there was even the slim chance that the demon riding Clint’s body had left him alive …
In a burst of acute frustration, Natasha yanked the knife from her belt and flung it at the far wall. It planted, blade-first, into a swath of olive green. Natasha left it vibrating to stillness, grabbing her jacket on the way out.
--
“Three dead, two missing,” Clint talked around the pen cap in his mouth. He slouched back against the seat, propping his feet up on the dashboard. Under his knees, the stereo played the muffled chords of an 80’s power ballad. “Mysterious circumstances.”
Natasha made an inquiring sound as her fingers curled loosely around the steering wheel. The dying sunlight through her windshield made everything feel as if suspended in a consistency of egg yolk. In his seat, Clint curled up as happily as a cat on a window ledge.
“Necks broken, no strangulation marks.”
“Demons?” Natasha asked, cocking her head lazily.
“Would make a break from all these monster hunts,” Clint rolled his shoulder, wincing as it popped sickeningly, a parting gift from the windigo they’d ganked two states over.
“I wouldn’t say demons are necessarily a break,” Natasha muttered, the car sliding into shadow as she turned off the highway.
Clint’s newspaper clippings listed the town as Beaufort, North Carolina. It was a faded tourist trap, one of a few dozen scattered upwards the southern coast. They drove slowly past the docks filled with bobbing white sailboats, tarp-covered for the winter. This time of year it was as good as a ghost town, too cold for the annual crop of beach-goers, too early for the snowbirds to roost in their beach houses.
They pulled up to a passable-looking bed and breakfast near the center of town and Natasha killed the engine. “Police station or food?” She asked, tossing the keys from hand to hand.
Clint looked thoughtful until his stomach gave a growl. “Ah, fuck it, they’re already dead. They can wait another hour.”
--
Natasha was watching, waiting. At five after 2PM, the diner was already cleared of its lunch crowd. The vinyl diner seat stuck to her thighs, and although there was a full plate of steak and eggs congealing in front of her, the only thing she’d ingested in the past half-hour was coffee.
In her purse was an unopened pack of cigarettes she’d bought at a gas station on the way over. She’d just managed to stamp out the habit a couple of months ago, after Clint had made one too many cracks about her lung capacity, but he wasn’t there to look at her disapprovingly, now, was he? Natasha glanced at her watch, then took out the pack and placed it on the table.
Two hours ago, Fury finally called back. Told her he’d send some hunters her way. Natasha wondered what they had been told, whether the job was to save Clint Barton, or gank the demon. Ideally it would be both. It couldn’t be both.
From the window she could see a sleek, black classic Impala pulled into the parking lot, and Natasha immediately knew that the men who stepped out where the ones she was waiting for. They oozed danger and competence in equal measures. There was a roughness in their eyes, like fresh-sawed wood.
They argued as they walked towards the diner, something more familiar than genuinely heated. Natasha lifted her coffee cup and took a long sip as the bell above the diner door tinkled.
“- it’s a favor, don’t look too much into it.” The shorter of the two. Blonde. He had a smattering of freckles across his nose and made a beeline for the diner counter, peering at the pie inside the glass case.
“I’m just saying-“ His partner, taller, dark hair. His sentence trailed off as he glanced around the diner, meeting Natasha’s eyes over the rim of her coffee cup. He elbowed the other man and they both began walking towards her table.
The sound of their boots was loud and rough in the silence. The two other patrons, an elderly man by the jukebox, and a trucker sitting at the counter, glanced at the hunters surreptitiously as they passed. A waitress stood at the counter, holding two new menus to her chest uncertainly.
“You must be Natasha,” the tall one said, extending his hand. His face seemed earnest, but his partner was clearly eying Natasha in the self-satisfied, masculine way she utterly despised.
“You must be Sam and Dean Winchester,” she said, sliding her thumbnail under the plastic seal of her cigarette carton and breaking through.
--
Once upon a time, there was a girl named Natasha Romanov. She lived in a small, beige house in a small, beige town with her Russian immigrant parents. After they died in a car accident, she was shuffled off to foster care. There, she got into drugs, learned how to steal bikes and then cars, dropped out of school, and fell in love with a boy named Bucky Barnes.
Not necessarily in that order.
Bucky straightened out her life. He took her virginity. She became pregnant with his baby and lost it. He offered to marry her. Against her better judgment, Natasha said yes. This was the happiest time of her life.
Then Bucky was shipped off to Iraq. It was not a big deal, they had been expecting it. Natasha kissed him at the airport, and rolled her eyes when he asked if she would miss him. Of course she would miss him, he didn’t need to ask her that.
And it wasn’t like Natasha had nothing to occupy herself with. She had her job as a receptionist at a law firm, was going to night school to be a paralegal. There was no big change from one day to the next, no quake in her world to foreshadow how her life would crack in two.
It happened when she was at the office. One minute, she was struggling with the old monster of a printer they kept in the copy room, and the next, vicious, black smoke was curling through the vents. Natasha didn’t have time to run, couldn’t even force a scream through her throat before it rushed towards her, crumpling her consciousness in its wake.
When she next opened her eyes, Natasha found that she was not alone in her body. It would be five long years before she got it back.
--
They were walking towards the parking lot, making plans to split up and revisit the crime scenes when a hiss from the police scanner on the Impala’s dash had Natasha shoving past the Winchester boys in her haste to turn up the volume.
“-384, assault reported, assailant has fled residence, requesting backup to 884 Lancaster Boulevard-“
“We have to go,” Natasha snapped, veering sharply towards her own car. “884 Lancaster, follow me!”
The house was already in yellow tape by the time they got there, the neatly-maintained bushes and manicured lawn trampled by gawkers. Two police cars were parked at the curb, and there was an ambulance in the driveway.
Natasha exited her car at a full-speed run, flashing her fake badge at the officers before ducking under the tape. The EMTs wheeled a body out of the front door, and even before she saw the flash of orange hair, Natasha’s heart began to sink.
“Agents Richards and Moore,” the Winchesters pulled badges from their leather jackets, trying to bluff their way through a line of police officers.
“Pepper!” Natasha rushed to the stretcher, struggling against the EMTs who tried to shove her out of the way. Swathed in bandages and belted to the stretcher, Pepper looked imminently breakable. Her eyes fluttered when she heard Natasha’s voice. “I need to talk to her,” Natasha turned to one of the EMTs.
“She’s in critical condition, you can talk to her in the hospital,” the man said gruffly, as he loaded Pepper into the ambulance.
“Fuck,” Natasha muttered, watching helplessly as the back doors slammed shut and the ambulance drove away with a squeal of its siren.
“Someone you know?” Sam asked, jogging up as he slid his ID into his jacket pocket.
“Someone I interviewed.” Natasha replied grimly. “She was our best lead.”
“They found someone else in the house,” Dean called, gesturing to them from the doorstep. “I think you’re gonna want to see this!”
--
“Badges,” the woman at the door demanded flatly. She looked all of 120 pounds, copper hair swept up in an elegant, yet no-nonsense ponytail. Natasha could tell that if this woman wanted to, she could be trouble.
“I’m Agent Brandt,” Clint said, handing over his ID with a smile, “and this is my partner Agent Rushman.”
Pepper Potts, recent divorcee of missing person Tony Stark, inspected their badges with narrow eyes. Finally, with a short sigh, she handed them back, the defensiveness visibly melting from her posture. “Sorry, just, reporters - you know?” Stepping away from the doorframe, Pepper gestured Clint and Natasha inside her house.
“That’s perfectly understandable,” Natasha said, as they trailed after Pepper towards the kitchen.
This part of Beaufort was seasonal shelter for the upper-middle-class. As expected, Pepper’s home was decorated like a page straight out of Home & Gardens. One of her ottomans probably cost more than what Clint and Natasha could hustle, scam and steal in a year. Clint turned to Natasha with raised eyebrows as they passed a TV larger than their car.
“Can I get you Agents anything? Water, coffee?” Pepper asked, pausing at the kitchen.
“Coffee would be fine.” Clint said, continuing onto the living room. Natasha inspected the walls. Some displayed fine, expensive art, but others were unnaturally blank, as if photographs which used to hang there had been hurriedly removed.
After a minute, Pepper came out of the kitchen with a tray of coffee cups. Natasha quietly moved to help her, earning a harried smile from the other woman as they walked towards the half-circle of couches.
“I don’t know what you want to ask me,” Pepper said, as she eased herself into a seat. “I already told the other officers everything I know. Tony and I are- well, I have no idea what he is doing.” Her fingers curled into the couch cushion as she made that admission, her knuckles turning white.
“Please,” Natasha ducked her head to look Pepper in the eye. “I know you are worried about him.”
“We just want to find Tony, make sure he’s safe.” Clint said soothingly, picking up a cup of coffee. “Anything you can tell us would help.”
Pepper nodded shortly, smoothing the bottom of her skirt. “What do you want to know?”
“Mr. Stark was reported missing three days ago,” Clint said, “Have you had any contact with him since then?”
“No,” Pepper said firmly.
“Had he been acting strange before his disappearance? Out of character?”
Pepper’s brow creased in thought. “Tony is … Tony. He’s always been eccentric. When he stopped … contacting me, I just thought that he was just on another bender. Or had found a new project. It wasn’t until Steve called me that I heard …” She shook her head helplessly.
“Tony lives in Manhattan, right?” Natasha asked.
“We both do.” Pepper said quietly, “We still work for the same company. I’m just down here for the weekend to clean out my things.” Pepper looked from Clint to Natasha, her eyes pleading. “Is it true what they said about Tony? That he killed … those people?”
“A witness identified him at the scene, but nothing is confirmed. We just want to talk to him,” Natasha said reassuringly.
Pepper pressed her knuckles against her lips, glancing out a side window. Outside, the ocean lapped at the docks, frothing under the hastening current. Strom clouds were brewing from far away, bringing tendrils of darkness across a bright blue sky.
“I don’t believe it,” Pepper said faintly, “I know he couldn’t have done this.”
--
The man had been killed like the others, neck snapped and his head still facing a sickening angle. The living room was completely wrecked - glass littering the floor, couches and lamps tipped over. Cardboard boxes, which had been stacked neatly in the foyer, lay crushed. There were tell-tale dents in the wall - as if someone had been slammed into them at a velocity that could shatter bone.
“Sulfur,” Dean muttered, rubbing his fingers against the edge of a picture frame, lying twisted and splintered near the kitchen.
“This Tony guy,” Sam turned to Natasha. “Is this about his ex-wife?”
“I used to think so, but now I’m not so sure.” Natasha said, grabbing a passing cop. “What was the reported incident?”
“Call came in half an hour ago,” the cop said, “Woman barricaded herself in the bathroom and reported that her driver was being attacked.”
“Did she recognize who did this?” Natasha asked.
The cop shook his head. “By the time we arrived, she was already unconscious from blood loss.”
“That’s all,” Natasha smiled wanly, uncurling her fingers from his sleeve “Thank you.”
“What are you thinking?” Sam asked, after the policeman had stepped away.
--
“What are you thinking?” Clint asked around a mouthful of curly fries. They were sitting on a picnic bench outside the fast food restaurant, the only people, apparently, willing to brave the brisk February winds.
Natasha carefully teased a pickle out of her hamburger and chewed it thoughtfully. “He’s possessed. Maybe on the way to meet his ex-wife, maybe in town for another reason. Demon saw a juicy meatsuit, took him for a ride.”
“Or,” Clint put up a finger. “Not so random. Maria told me that Starks are a family of hunters.”
“Vampire hunters,” Natasha said, “And that died off with Tony’s father. The heir apparent is a rich bitch through and through. Not a heroic bone in his body.” She shook her head, “Just look at the number of DUIs this guy’s got. Seriously.”
Clint shrugged, finishing the last bite of his fries. “You think the ex is in danger?” Clint asked, wiping his hands with a napkin before balling it up and tossing it in a calculated direction. Sure enough, the wind picked it up and dunked the napkin ball neatly into the trash.
“Probably not.” Natasha said. “What worries me, though, is that the killings don’t look random. This isn’t just some joyride.”
“No, the style of strangulation isn’t possible of a lesser demon.” Clint said evenly. “I think we’re dealing with a big fish here.”
Natasha watched him carefully. After three years of living in each other’s pockets, she had learned to read the subtle nuances in Clint’s expression. She knew what he was hoping for, and she knew what he was going to ask before he even opened his mouth.
“Did any of reports mention that the demon had … blue eyes?” Clint’s voice was casual, but he couldn’t seem to meet Natasha’s steady gaze.
“There wasn’t anything noted about it,” Natasha said quietly. “But you know it’s not something that they usually notice.”
Clint nodded, crushing the soda can in his hand with a vicious crunch.
--
“Leave Sam to the research,” Dean grinned at Natasha, his hand heavy and uncomfortably warm on her shoulder. “You and I should … talk.”
Natasha barely hid her grimace as she contemplated crushing Dean’s solar plexus. She was used to this sort of treatment from some male hunters, had thought that the Winchesters would be different. Evidently not.
Sam must have had the same idea because his eyes went wide and worried for a second, flicking between his brother and Natasha. “Okay,” he said hesitantly. Natasha smiled thinly at Sam’s retreating back.
Dean’s arm slipped from Natasha’s shoulders as they walked to her car, leaving Sam to take the Impala. This day was brisk like the others, the intrepid early sprouts of grass already frosted over and crunching underfoot.
Dean was pretty, Natasha could give him that. Emotionlessly, she pictured kissing him, raking her nails down his back, riding him like a vicious machine. Pretty, yeah.
“We really do need to talk,” Dean said, once they had slammed their respective car doors. This time, when he turned to her, all pretenses were gone. The hard look in his eyes made Natasha grip her gun through her jacket. “There’s something you’re not telling us.”
“What makes you say that?” Natasha asked evenly, her fingers still twitchy on the hammer.
Dean stared at her for a long minute, and Natasha felt as if the whole space of the car had shrunk down to the inch of space between them, to the bulk of his shoulders and the curl of his fingers into her headrest.
“We’re here to clear Bobby’s debt,” he bit out, and at that moment his voice sounded so familiar, his expression looked so familiar. “Just a job. Sam and I aren’t getting into whatever personal fuckfest you and your partner left behind. So either you tell me everything now-“
“Or what?” Natasha asked, her hand easing off the gun. “You’ll fuck off? Drive away without a look back?”
“Yeah,” Dean said. And Natasha remembered where she had seen that expression before, the grim eyes of a person who had lost everything once.
“I believe you,” Natasha said, and started the car.
--
“Windingos suck,” Clint moaned easing face-down onto the motel mattress as Natasha trailed after him with their first-aid kit.
“No argument here,” Natasha said, unscrewing their medical emergency flask and pressing it into Clint’s good hand. “You want something to bite down on?”
Clint made a pitiful sound as Natasha tugged open her belt buckle and slid it from the loops in her jeans. She had to pry the flask away from his lips before she shoved the folded leather between his teeth.
“Sorry, baby,” she ran a hand through Clint’s hair before grabbing his left shoulder and shoving it back into its socket. The pillows muffled Clint’s scream. Natasha clucked and petted his hair as his body writhed a bit before settling down. They were both too shattered to put up pretenses. Clint’s fingers curled into the crook of Natasha’s hip as she sewed up his wounds with dental floss. She was a bit clumsy - her hands had gotten pretty torn up, and her knees were bleeding through her jeans - but what made her fumble the most was the fatigue that ached down to her bones. They hadn’t been able to save the campers. Or their son.
“Does it even matter?” Clint slurred. The flask dangled from his fingers and dropped, empty, onto the grimy carpet. “Any of it?”
“You know it does,” Natasha said quietly, fiercely, and for a minute she almost believed herself.
That night, Natasha didn’t even bother to take off her jacket or shoes, just shoved the bandages off of the bed and crawled up to Clint’s warmth. They curled around each other like injured dogs.
The next thing Natasha remembered was a piercing trill. She opened her eyes to sunlight, a concentrated beam of it shining directly in her face. Somewhere, her cellphone was ringing.
Beside her, Clint grumbled, rolling away.
It took Natasha five minutes of limping and groping around in the dark before she found the phone, which, by then, had long stopped ringing. She flipped open the screen and squinted at the unfamiliar number.
Telemarketer. Hunter. Fury. None of the above sounded great right now. Natasha dialed her voicemail and pressed the phone to her ear.
“Hello,” a hesitant male voice filled the line, “I’m not sure you remember me, but it’s Steve. Steve Rogers.”
--
“Who was your contact?” Dean asked, hunching over the table, rolling an empty beer bottle between his palms. The booth they had picked all the way in the back corner of the bar was clearly sending the message do not disturb, because no waitress had even ventured into their area.
Natasha thought wistfully that she would much prefer this conversation in a slightly less sober frame of mind.
“And old friend,” of Bucky’s, she didn’t add. “He was the first one who noticed what was going on in his town. Began putting together the pieces.”
“Hunter?” Dean asked.
“No,” Natasha said, “Just familiar with the process.”
Dean’s eyes were too shrewd for her taste. Natasha allowed her gaze to drift around the bar, taking in the skinny female bartender slowly wiping down the counter, to the huddle of men around the pool table. It had been just an hour ago when she had considered Dean just another pretty, dumb fuck.
Someone put a quarter in the jukebox and Billy Joel’s “Piano Man” began playing..
“You mind if I smoke?” Natasha sighed, slapping her pack of cigarettes on the table.
Dean inclined his head, amused, and Natasha lit up with steady hands. That first draw felt so good, the smoke curling, tickling down her throat, the sweet burn she held down as long as possible, her eyes fluttering in pleasure. She was aware of Dean’s gaze on her the entire time. His tongue swept slowly across his bottom lip.
“Steve was calling on behalf of a friend of his, Tony Stark.” Natasha said, exhaling luxuriously. “Ten days ago, he went missing from his apartment in Manhattan and was spotted around Beaufort. Around that time, bodies began popping up.”
“I read the articles Fury forwarded - well,” Dean amended, “Sam read ‘em. Give me the version that’s off the books.”
“Tony Stark is dead.” Natasha said flatly.
“How do you know?” Dean asked.
“Because the demon that was riding him possessed Clint.”
--
Clint was furious, pacing the room from wall to wall in short, vicious steps. “You don’t understand anything-“ he rounded on Natasha, teeth bared, eyes like a rabid animal and she snapped, grabbing his unwounded shoulder and slamming his body against the wall.
“Don’t you fucking talk to me like that,” she said to him through her teeth. “I had that bastard, I had him inside me and you don’t fucking think I want to slit his throat just as badly?”
Clint stared at her mutinously. Natasha could feel him slipping away, slipping inside his anger. “You promised me,” he said quietly. “You promised you would do it.”
“No,” Natasha pushed him away from her, walking backwards. “You don’t know what you’re asking-“
“He wants me, Natasha.” Clint said, rolling his shoulder. “Second choice consolation prize but I’ll do.”
“We’ll think of another way-“
“There is. No. Other. Way.” Clint said his voice drained of anger. “He has enough juice to level the entire town if he wants to and he was waiting for us.”
“So you’re just going to give him what he wants?” Natasha sneered, following Clint as he headed towards the door. “You’re going to walk up to him and roll over on your belly like a good little whore? And then what?”
Clint stopped in the doorway, slowly unbuckling the cuff around his right wrist. The skin exposed was as pale as the underbelly of a fish. When he pressed it into Natasha’s hand, it was still curled into the shape of his arm, old leather softened and reformed countless times over the years. Embroidered into the inside was a distinct design, a demonic ward that prevented possession and manipulation.
“Then,” Clint said, “You’ll do like we talked about. You kill me.”
--
“No one really chooses this life,” Natasha said, grinding out her cigarette in the ashtray and immediately tapping out another. “I’m sure you have your sob story too.”
Dean shrugged, too casually for true nonchalance, “Not really, I was born into it.”
“That is a sob story,” Natasha said, ignoring Dean’s sharp look as she continued. “Clint grew up with a brother and sister, loathed him and adored her. Her name was Greta.”
“Let me guess,” Dean smiled mirthlessly, “Demons.”
“Witches,” Natasha said, “Working under the worst kind of pimp. Clint was 14, Greta was 13 when she was kidnapped.”
“What did they want?” Dean asked.
Natasha took a deep drag and released it. “I’ve heard about you and your brother, you know, what happened with the apocalypse?” Across the seat, she could see Dean stiffen. “I’m sure you’re familiar with the concept of vessels.”
“Thought that only worked for angels.”
Natasha smiled mirthlessly, “You think that Lucifer was the only one that fell?”
--
The Book of Enoch called them the “Grigori”, a Legion of 21 and 7 who followed Lucifer’s fall. They were his garrison, loyal to the man even as they were stripped of their Grace for following the betrayer. Unfortunately, Lucifer did not share their sense of devotion. He needed an army, had no use for brothers-in-arms.
With an offer of false power, Lucifer managed to corrupt the forms of the fallen angels, twisting them into something sinister. No longer did they have to seek permission before taking a vessel. No more were they chained to the rigid virtues of chastity, mercy and obedience. Lilith was once the brightest and most beloved of Lucifer’s garrison. She also became his first demon.
The Grigori were more powerful than the other children of Lucifer, commonplace demons born from the twisted souls of the damned. They could not be held by snares or traps and were nearly impossible to kill once they had found their vessels.
In the summer of 1985, the fallen angel called Baliel sought his destined body, and found Greta.
The night Clint first told Natasha about it, they had been partners for just a little under a year. You’re a natural, was the sweetest compliment Natasha had ever received, accompanied by one of Clint’s crooked smiles.
They’d holed up in a motel room just outside Chicago, hunkering down to wait out the blizzard that was ripping through the area. Cocooned in every blanket, cover and sheet they could get their hands on and slowly sharing a bottle of cheap whiskey, Natasha could almost forget the thing that had broken inside of her so long ago.
“I’ve never stopped thinking about it,” Clint told her, his breath rolling warm on Natasha’s shoulder, “What I could’ve done, if I had just been … She’d acting bratty all week. Slamming doors and shit like that. I called her a little bitch and she threw a piece of toast at my face. I didn’t know, Nat. I didn’t even try to stop her from leaving.”
Natasha took another swig, running her fingers through Clint’s sweaty nape.
“I thought she was running away,” Clint formed the words slowly, like they were heavy on his tongue. “Saw her get into a strange car. I followed on my bike.” He took a sharp breath, “I … thought she was getting in trouble. Boyfriend. Drugs. Teenage things.”
With the amount that she’d drunk that night, Natasha was surprised that she still remembered the story. Remembered, in fact, every hitch of breath and painful pause during which Clint desperately drew from the whiskey bottle. Remembered the way Clint described her sister’s eyes, how she had been begging to live even as she got caught in the crossfire between a pack of witches and some hunters who were more interested in killing the demon than saving the girl.
“Promise me,” Clint whispered fiercely, running his thumb over and over Natasha’s knuckles. “Promise that you’ll kill me when you need to. Kill me and don’t look back.”
Near dawn, Clint finally fell asleep, drooling into Natasha’s hair as she curled around him tight, her eyes dry and burning.
--
“Yeah, Sammy?” Dean barked into the phone. There was a tendril of warmth in his voice, something that just didn’t seem to exist when he talked with other people. Natasha didn’t even think that he noticed. “Get everything you can on fallen angels - the … Grigori? Yeah, like Lu-. Just do it.”
Natasha dropped a twenty on the table as she stood, weighing it down with an empty bottle. It had felt cathartic, almost, telling Dean the things that she’d never been able to share with anyone but Clint before. Natasha had never been the kind of girl to sob her heart out, but she imagined that this is what the aftermath must feel like.
“Sam has something to tell us,” Dean said, snapping his phone shut as they walked out of the bar.
Natasha nodded, pausing in her steps when she dropped her pack of cigarettes. She bent down and retrieved them from the bar floor, tapping out a stick before she even really thought about it.
“What’s the holdup?” Dean asked expectantly, halfway out the door but holding it open for her with a hand. Natasha just shook her head, sliding the cigarette back into the pack and following him at a fast trot.
The moon was a bright fingernail crescent in the night sky. Natasha and Dean shared a strangely companionable silence all the way to the car, walking close but leaving a respectable space so that their shoulders didn’t even brush.
“You really love him, huh?” Dean asked as they slid into the car. He sounded almost yearning, like he didn’t know how that felt, but Natasha had heard stories of the Winchesters, and knew that Dean had his own understanding.
“Love is for children,” Natasha replied softly, staring straight ahead, “I owe him a debt.”
--
They walked into the motel room and Sam started shoving the photos into their faces before they even took off their jackets. “Look!” he kept shouting, but all Natasha saw was a family picture that looked like it was taken in the 70s, teal background and shoulder pads and everything.
“Spit it out, Sam!” Dean barked, pulling the photos from Sam’s hand and scattering them over the bed.
More family photos. Natasha’s eyes scanned through them quickly. Mother, father, son. None of them looked particularly happy. The son’s facial features resembled …
“Tony Stark.” Sam jammed a finger down on a picture of a shirtless teenage boy, grinning unselfconsciously for the camera in his swimming trunks. The photo crinkled slightly under the weight of his finger. “A hunter’s kid.”
“Vampire hunters,” Natasha said faintly.
“Smart vampire hunters,” Sam took the picture off the bed and pointed to the curve of Tony’s shoulder. “Guess what tat they got their son for his 16th birthday?”
A circle of flames around a pentagon. The symbol was so familiar that Natasha’s hand snapped to her wrist, tracing the same grooves carved into the leather cuff.
“So unless the guy had had it removed …” Dean started.
“He couldn’t have gone black-eyed!” Sam finished with a rush. “And look at this,” he dug out the photograph at the bottom of the pile, the one that was not like the others. A crime scene photo, with the victim spayed, spread-eagled on the floor. Pepper’s driver.
Natasha narrowed her eyes, immediately spotting the detail that no one had noticed when they were on the scene. “There are bruises on his jaw.”
“Doesn’t make sense,” Dean said, “The big bad that ganked the other three didn’t need to get so hands-on.”
“Who told you that it was Tony who killed those people?” Sam turned to Natasha.
Natasha shook her head, a bitter taste filling her mouth. “Steve. Steve Rogers.”
--
The police cars were long gone, but the yellow tape remained, an eerie contrast to the otherwise peaceful-looking house. One could almost imagine a family, tucked in and snoring for the night, instead of cold, blood-stained floors and shattered glass. Behind the house, the ocean churned darkly, reflecting what scant light the new moon had to offer.
Under the cover of night, a man in a black hood jogged towards the house. He gave a quick look around before ducking under the tape and swiftly making his way to the door.
Crime Scene: Entrance Prohibited, the seal on the door said. A pocketknife slid under the tape did the trick. The door wasn’t even locked.
Shucking off his hood, he opened the door and walked inside.
There was a sudden blaze of light. Steve whirled around, but the door had already slammed shut behind him, and there was somebody in front of it.
“Don’t think so,” Sam said, crossing his arms.
From the shadows, Natasha and Dean stepped forward, guns loaded and aimed.
“Wait!” Steve threw up his hands, his eyes wide and afraid. “N-Natasha, it’s me!”
“Yeah,” Natasha said, lowering her gun, “I know,” she grabbed the flask at her hip, popping off the cap and flinging her arm in a sharp arc.
The holy water splashed into Steve’s face with a loud hiss. The scream he gave was sickening, his fingers curling in pain as he tried to claw at his own skin. For a second, Steve Roger’s sweet, ken-doll handsome face twisted into something horrifyingly unnatural.
Wildly, Steve spun on his heel, flying at Sam, only to be slammed backwards onto his ass.
“Look up, Einstein,” Dean snapped, pointing at the Devil’s trap on the ceiling.
“Demons these days,” Sam commented drily, locking the door. “Just don’t make ‘em like they used to.”
--
Natasha leaned forward on her elbows, water sluicing off of face, soaking the collar of her tank top. There were towels to her right, fluffy yellow ones with embroidery at the bottom. The entire bathroom was clean and well-lit and tastefully decorated. The only thing out-of-place was the pink smear on wall next to the door, where Pepper had bled out her last minutes, terrified and alone.
Natasha yanked up the bottom of her tank top and wiped her face with that instead.
“You okay?” a quiet voice asked from the doorway. Natasha turned to find Sam standing there, looking at her sympathetically.
“I’m fine,” she said briskly, “Really. I’ve sliced and diced a few demons in my time.”
“But never one who was possessing someone you know.” Sam said, and Natasha pressed her lips together.
From the next room came a tortured scream, followed by what could have been either laughter or sobbing. Not for the first time, Natasha was grateful that Pepper’s house was relatively isolated, with large swaths of land on either side, and the deep, pounding waves of the ocean in the back.
Squaring her shoulders, Natasha followed Sam out of the room in time to see Dean sprinkling a handful of salt on an open wound on Steve’s shoulder. The demon hissed.
“You aren’t too smart, are you?” Dean said conversationally, taking a rag and slowly wiping the demon blood off of his knife. “Coming back to the scene of the crime.”
“Just trying to take back what’s mine,” Steve slouched in the chair sullenly.
“You mean this?” Sam lifted a duffle bag. At the sight of it, Steve straightened, frantically struggling against the ropes anew.
“What is it?” Natasha asked, and Sam slung it in her direction. When she unzipped the bag, a small cloud of dust made her cough. “Bones?”
“They belong to our little demon friend here,” Dean said, inclining his head in Steve’s direction. “Natasha, you have a lighter, right?”
“Oh, Nat,” the demon clucked his tongue, slouching in his bounds, “How could you be so cold-hearted? Could you really kill someone who was the best man at your wedding?”
Natasha didn’t answer, retrieving the lighter from her back pocket and snapping it open.
“Well, Steve was the best man,” the demon said. “Beautiful ceremony, anyway, you were - what - nineteen and pregnant? Sorry, nineteen and miscarried. A bit clichéd, don’t you think?”
“You want me to shut him up?” Dean asked, unwinding a rag from between his hands. Sam raised his eyebrows, his arms crossed over his chest.
“That’s sweet,” Natasha said, grabbing the bottle of wine they had pilfered from the kitchen and dumping it liberally over the bones. “But I’ve mastered the art of ignoring men who spill bullshit.”
“You must have been so surprised when Steve called,” the demon continued. The way he sat, the way he moved made it easy for Natasha to differentiate him from Steve in her mind. Steve had been a sweet man. Kind to a fault with the straightest posture she had ever seen. “You must think he hates your guts, and you know? You’d be right. After all, isn’t he the one who led Clint to the alley? He knows you killed-“
Natasha grabbed a bone from the pile, a fibula, and held it above her lighter. It caught on fire like kindling, and the screams from Steve’s writhing body made even Sam and Dean wince.
“If story time is over now,” Natasha said evenly, “I think you should start telling me something I don’t know.”
--
Natasha pressed her knees together so that Sam could squeeze in beside her on the edge of the dock. On the other side, Dean was bitching up a storm about Sam’s moose-esque body proportions, and just fucking shove Dean into the ocean right now, why don’t cha?
“Don’t tempt me,” Sam muttered, bringing the beer bottle to his lips.
It was a dark, cold night. The sea was as black as obsidian, the curves and troughs of its waves catching the moonlight. Here and there, lights blinked as ships steered through the inlet. Few, and far in-between in this season.
The boys were drinking. Natasha was smoking. It felt downright companionable to lean against the line of Sam’s arm. Even if he did take up too much fucking legroom.
They were treating it like a celebration of sorts, for getting that piece of demon trash to spill his guts about Baliel’s decades-long search for his vessel, his waning dedication to Lucifer and the rest of demonhood’s plan to spring Lucifer from the cage. So far, little success, but now that Bailel had Clint; it would be a different story.
The entire thing had been Bailel from the start: the killings, the demon sightings, making one of his minions possess a man from Natasha’s past. He must have known that Clint had a blind spot for her a mile wide. Only, the demon possessing Steve had had his own agenda, and tore apart the Stark house looking for it.
Steve’s body had been left cooling in the Stark house, yet another red mark on Natasha’s ledger. She took a long drag of her cigarette and remembered the way Steve had smiled at their wedding, the way he patted Bucky’s back and kissed her on the cheek, so happy for them, so proud. If Steve had hated her up to the second he died, she undoubtedly deserved it.
“So do we have a plan?” Sam asked, breaking the silence.
“The usual,” Dean said blithely, “Sneak, smash and shoot. Given that we can kill it.” He leaned up on his elbow. “Can we kill it?”
“That depends,” Natasha asked quietly, “You two still have the gun that killed Azazel?” Sam and Dean looked at each other.
“So the Colt can kill these sons of bitches?” Dean asked slowly.
“Let’s hope so,” Natasha said, “’Cause I don’t have a Plan B.”
Sam sighed and reached for another beer.
__
They parked outside an abandoned boathouse at the edge of town, surrounded by the skeletons of sailboats and dredges. When the wind blew over the water, they all shuffled against each other, yellowed tarps snapping wetly in the air.
“Well this doesn’t smell like a trap at all,” Dean muttered, trying to make as little noise as possible on the creaky docks. “I still can’t see why we couldn’t wait for backup.”
“You hate backup,” Sam whispered back, sidling along in the shadow. “Plus, I’m out of favors with Fury.”
“Pound of flesh,” Natasha said, no the amusement of no one but herself.
Two demons were guarding the doors, another two making rounds around the boathouse. Between the three of them, it was easy work to clear out the low-level trash.
They slammed into the boathouse Winchester style: guns blazing. A last stand, as far as Natasha was concerned.
It was a trap.
Bailel was waiting for them, lounging on a metal folding chair in the middle of the room. In Clint’s body. Natasha drew in a quick breath as the wintery-blue of Clint’s eyes made her insides turn to ice.
“The Winchesters!” Clint crowed, a genuinely delighted expression lighting his face as he slammed them both on opposite walls with a flick of his hand. “What an absolute honor. Can I say,” he added, “I am a huge fan of your work.” He gestured and Sam screamed as his ribs were compressed dangerously.
“Sammy!” Dean bellowed, struggling futilely against his own invisible bonds.
“Keep your eyes on me, you motherfucker!” Natasha yelled, leveling the Colt at the middle of Clint’s chest.
“Aw,” Bailel turned, his eyes flashing blue as he smiled, “Getting lonely, sweetheart? Fortunately for you, I don’t go back for sloppy seconds.” He flicked his hand in her general direction once. Twice.
The demon’s brows creased in confusion as Natasha didn’t go flying into the wall.
“Think again,” Natasha said, flashing the leather cuff on her wrist.
“Ah,” the demon grimaced, making Clint’s eyes blaze blue, “I guess your sweetheart finally gave you his promise ring.”
“Shut the fuck up,” Natasha forced through her teeth, taking one, then another shaking step backwards as Bailel advanced on her.
“Or what?” Bailel deadpanned, cocking his head in condescending curiosity. “You’ll take a chunk out of me with that pea-shooter?”
“It was good enough for Azazel,” Natasha said coldly, and watched the understanding dawn on Bailel’s face.
“So that was your plan all along!” His eyebrows raised to his forehead, an expression Clint had never pulled in his entire life. “Give Clint up as a sacrificial lamb, run crying to the big bad Winchesters, and let them bring the Colt to you?”
There was an aborted shout from the direction of where Dean was pinned to the wall. An indignant sound. Natasha ignored it in favor of keeping Clint in her line of sight.
“Brilliant,” the demon said, “I’ve always said that the most creative evil came from humans. But you know why,” he stepped closer, grabbing the barrel of Natasha’s gun and pressing it to his chest. “I’m still not afraid?”
Natasha’s grip tightened.
“Because I know you,” Bailel said, voice so quiet it was clear that his words were for Natasha’s ears alone. “I was inside of you, remember? I’ve reached into every dark corner of your soul, and moreover,” the demon said, running his hand down Clint’s chest. “I know what this man knows about you. How you made a pact that you would put him down without hesitation of that was what it takes, but sweetheart,” Clint jiggled the barrel of the gun that he had in his grasp, pressing it even harder to Clint’s sternum. “You’ll never be able to pull the-“
The crack of a gunshot ran out in the quiet room. Bailel’s eyes widened, and he stumbled back a few steps, looking down at the growing scarlet across his chest as is body lit from the inside out and began shuddering violently. With a last, tormented scream, Baliel died, and Clint’s body collapsed on the ground.
The second Baliel was gone the Winchesters were dropped on their asses across the floor. Stiffly, they picked themselves up, staring at Natasha like she was the monster-
Natasha turned her back to them, rushing to Clint’s side and pressing her palm to the place where he bled true. It was the warmest part of him, his fingers and toes growing cold as the flesh between her fingers pulsed in time to his still-beating heart.
“Thank you,” Clint told her, the light fading from his soft grey eyes. He was so familiar to her, every line of his face. She traced the curve of his jaw, the small, crescent-shaped scar under his left ear. She gently closed his eyelids.
“I know,” Natasha said, and squeezed his hand, and did not cry.
--
It had been five years since the demon had rode her body right out of the law firm of Dunham & Sons, rolling Natasha’s hips with the easy grace she had never been able to master, an unfamiliar smirk splitting her lips.
It had been five years of silent screaming, beating against the walls of her own mind as the thing inside of her killed and killed and killed. Every time it twisted its fingers around someone’s neck, Natasha could feel the crack of vertebra like a shudder down to her marrow.
And when it grew bored, when it grew frustrated, it would talk to her, reel out her darkest memories as amusements. The day she didn’t slam her break fast enough and ran into the stopped car in front of her, the seatbelt cutting ruthlessly into her soft stomach. When she next opened her eyes, her thighs were slick with blood and the small life Natasha had alternately adored and feared was gone.
It fed pain to her like communion wafers and sips of holy blood. Sometimes, it would retreat to the back of her mind and allow her control of her body for minutes, hours. She would gain consciousness walking on the side of a highway, in unfamiliar clothing, with blood under her nails. There was nothing she could do, no one she could cry to who would listen.
It had been five years, and in the fifth year, she was walking down an alley at dusk when a man shouted her name.
Natasha knew who it was before she even turned around. And for the short second before she saw his choppy brown hair and crooked grin, Natasha felt her breath quickening in joy. Bucky, Bucky, she hadn’t seen him in so long, and now that he was here everything would be fine-
Then it ran its fingers across the knife hilt at its hip, lips twisting into a sick facsimile of a smile. Inside her chest, Natasha felt her heart burst like overripe fruit crushed by a fist.
“Natasha,” Bucky slowed in his jog, his steps stuttering, then halting as he saw her. They were two states and five years from home, and he had found her. “I was, I thought-“ he looked at her like a desperate man, trying to soak up the sight of her. “I was so worried.”
“You look like shit,” it said, in Natasha’s voice, and Bucky’s hopeful expression shuttered.
Run! Natasha screamed, hoping for one, just one second when she could wrest control of her own body. Please, please go-
“What happened to you?” Bucky asked, his words rough and incredulous.
“What’d you think?” It said, closing the last inches between them with slow, swaying steps. A car drove by the open alleyway, its lights flashing as it sped past. “Exactly what everyone’s been telling you all this time. I got tired of waiting for you,” it pressed a nail against the ridge of Bucky’s sternum, “found another guy to make me beg for it, and you know what?” Its voice dropped to a purr, “He was so good I followed his dick all the way to Kansas City.”
“No,” Bucky said faintly, but in his eyes Natasha could see the dark seed of doubt blossoming.
“Sorry,” it said airily, before flicking open the knife and sinking it into Bucky’s stomach.
No, Natasha cried in her own mind, watching Bucky’s incredulous expression change to one of stark realization.
“It’s so nice to kill somebody you love,” it said conversationally, ignoring Natasha’s whimpers and making her watch. “Slowly. Intimately.”
Bucky didn’t even fight back, staring in shock as the knife slid-slick into his stomach once, twice, and twist-
A bullet shot past Natasha’s ear, punching deep into the brick wall of the alley. She missed Bucky’s dying breaths when she turned on her heel to the light at the end of the alleyway. A man stood there, silhouetted in the dim streetlights. His hands were perfectly steady as he aimed the gun at her throat.
“Oh,” the it inside of Natasha roiled, as if nervous. It was the first time she had felt anything like it before. “Well this is a bit of a surprise, Clint. And I didn’t even send the engraved invitations.”
“You know, this place isn’t as private as you think,” Clint said, walking closer. The look in his eyes would have scared Natasha, if she was even capable of feeling something like that anymore. The man was a killer, would kill her and probably never even remember he girl he’d put down like a dog in the back of an alley.
After five years of it, Natasha considered death with a shuddering feeling of relief. The only thing that had been keeping her sane was the thought of returning to Bucky, and now …
“You’ve tried silver bullets before,” it purred in Clint’s direction, “Let’s not make the same mistake twice. All you’ll do is hurt this poor girl who’s trapped in here with me.” And with that it suddenly pulled itself into the back of Natasha’s consciousness, leaving her gasping and stumbling in shock.
It had been so long, so long, since she had felt the rush of air against her skin, feel the winter chill drawn into her lungs with quick breaths and see and hear and touch everything as if she wasn’t smothered behind a thick glass wall.
She must have looked pitiful, so overwhelmed and afraid that Clint began lowering his weapon.
“No!” Natasha managed to scream, just before it clawed back to the forefront of her consciousness, “Please, kill me!”
Clint made a different call.
“Get out of her, or I’ll shoot,” Clint said, lifting the gun and pressing it to his own temple.
It was shocked into silence for a beat, before scoffing loudly. “You can’t possibly think-“
“Get. Out.” Clint gritted, cocking the gun with a crisp sound, “Or be prepared to wait another couple of generations for some second cousin twice removed to get the exact genetic predisposition …”
“Fine,” it spat, viciously punching out of Natasha’s mouth.
Her body jackknifed in pain, furiously vomiting up thick black smoke. It felt like coughing out her heart and lungs, an entire soul ripped from her body and leaving it bloody. The moment it left her, Natasha felt a rush of pain break over her body like a wave. Five years’ worth of bruises, fractures and secret little cuts blooming open on her skin. Her knees weakened and she crumpled.
Blackness teased at the edge of her vision. Natasha laid on the cold concrete and struggled tooth and nail to remain conscious.
“Are you okay?” Clint was suddenly looming over her, his hands warm around her shoulders as he scraped her from the ground. First human contact in five years, the dry brush of skin against skin.
“Just fucking peachy.” she replied weakly, numb to the surprised smile that split Clint’s face. She groped for his hand, her fingers leaving red streaks of blood on his clothes. “Don’t you … dare leave me.”
“I’ll take you to the hospital,” Clint said soothingly. “That sonovabitch isn’t known for riding gentle.”
“No,” Natasha said, digging her nails into Clint’s arm with as much force as she could muster. “I mean … take me with you.”
Clint was silent for a moment, looking down at her. And she didn’t know how she could have thought that he was a cold-hearted killer when the rush of emotions flickered rapidly across his face. His eyes were full of unwritten tragedy. “You don’t know what you’re asking for.”
“Please,” Natasha said, because there was nothing to leave behind. “I … I was listening the whole time. I know his plans, I know his name.” At the edge of her vision was a crumpled body. She refused to turn to look at it, gritting her teeth against unshed tears. “Please.”
Clint breathed out slowly, then looked around himself quickly before he curled his fingers around her waist and gently raised her from the ground. “We’ll see,” he said, his lips moving against her forehead.
And Natasha knew, from that moment, that Clint would one day break her heart.
END-
Prompts:
-characters played by the same actor as the same character
-ex-boyfriends
-action/case-fic
Author: silverfoxflower
Fandoms: Supernatural, The Avengers
Characters: Dean Winchester, Sam Winchester; Clint Barton, Natasha Romanov, Steve Rogers, Tony Stark, Pepper Potts, Bucky Barnes
Pairings: Clint/Natasha, Bucky/Natasha, hinted Dean/Natasha, Tony/Pepper
Rating: R
Word count: 9000
Spoilers: towards the middle/end of s.5 of Supernatural
Warnings: Major and minor character death Clint Barton, Steve Rogers, Tony Stark, Pepper Potts, Bucky Barnes, dark themes, moderate violence/gore, angst
Disclaimer: The Avengers and Supernatural belong to their respective creators
A/N: Thank you lazy-coconut, for the beta and the mods of this exchange for their endless patience. Title comes from the song "Hope in the Air" by Laura Marling.
Summary: When Clint goes missing during a hunt, Natasha seeks help from Sam and Dean Winchester. She doesn't, however, tell them the whole story.
Natasha was well-acquainted with heartbreak. It was the taste of perfectly aged scotch on the tongue, the ache in her left hip on a rainy day, the patch of her leather jacket which had worn pale over the edge of her holster.
Natasha met Clint Barton on a cold night in a dark alley. She knew he was going to break her heart the minute he raised the gun to her throat and ordered her to drop the knife and step away from the gutted man. She knew it and she went with him anyways, curling her fingers into his rough and dirty hand.
--
The hotel room had the most atrocious shade of olive-green wallpaper. It was normally the kind of thing that bothered Clint more than Natasha, but after sitting for hours staring at the same smatter of newspaper clippings and police bulletins pinned on the wall, the particular shade of green started to grate personally.
Clint had been missing for nearly two days now. His duffle bag, half-unpacked, still sat at the foot of their bed. A bottle of cheap whiskey held a ghost of his lips on the nightstand.
Natasha was out of ideas.
She slumped over her laptop, her head in her hands. A cigarette dangled listlessly at the corner of her lips, and with every inward breath Natasha sucked the bitter taste of nicotine into the back of her throat. The situation was so fucked that she’d finally resorted to calling Fury, knowing that any help he provided would cost an equal pound of flesh at a later date. But even he hadn’t bothered to respond. Natasha’s cell lay still as a corpse on the desk.
If she was going to be realistic, 48 hours was as good as dead. But if there was even the slim chance that the demon riding Clint’s body had left him alive …
In a burst of acute frustration, Natasha yanked the knife from her belt and flung it at the far wall. It planted, blade-first, into a swath of olive green. Natasha left it vibrating to stillness, grabbing her jacket on the way out.
--
“Three dead, two missing,” Clint talked around the pen cap in his mouth. He slouched back against the seat, propping his feet up on the dashboard. Under his knees, the stereo played the muffled chords of an 80’s power ballad. “Mysterious circumstances.”
Natasha made an inquiring sound as her fingers curled loosely around the steering wheel. The dying sunlight through her windshield made everything feel as if suspended in a consistency of egg yolk. In his seat, Clint curled up as happily as a cat on a window ledge.
“Necks broken, no strangulation marks.”
“Demons?” Natasha asked, cocking her head lazily.
“Would make a break from all these monster hunts,” Clint rolled his shoulder, wincing as it popped sickeningly, a parting gift from the windigo they’d ganked two states over.
“I wouldn’t say demons are necessarily a break,” Natasha muttered, the car sliding into shadow as she turned off the highway.
Clint’s newspaper clippings listed the town as Beaufort, North Carolina. It was a faded tourist trap, one of a few dozen scattered upwards the southern coast. They drove slowly past the docks filled with bobbing white sailboats, tarp-covered for the winter. This time of year it was as good as a ghost town, too cold for the annual crop of beach-goers, too early for the snowbirds to roost in their beach houses.
They pulled up to a passable-looking bed and breakfast near the center of town and Natasha killed the engine. “Police station or food?” She asked, tossing the keys from hand to hand.
Clint looked thoughtful until his stomach gave a growl. “Ah, fuck it, they’re already dead. They can wait another hour.”
--
Natasha was watching, waiting. At five after 2PM, the diner was already cleared of its lunch crowd. The vinyl diner seat stuck to her thighs, and although there was a full plate of steak and eggs congealing in front of her, the only thing she’d ingested in the past half-hour was coffee.
In her purse was an unopened pack of cigarettes she’d bought at a gas station on the way over. She’d just managed to stamp out the habit a couple of months ago, after Clint had made one too many cracks about her lung capacity, but he wasn’t there to look at her disapprovingly, now, was he? Natasha glanced at her watch, then took out the pack and placed it on the table.
Two hours ago, Fury finally called back. Told her he’d send some hunters her way. Natasha wondered what they had been told, whether the job was to save Clint Barton, or gank the demon. Ideally it would be both. It couldn’t be both.
From the window she could see a sleek, black classic Impala pulled into the parking lot, and Natasha immediately knew that the men who stepped out where the ones she was waiting for. They oozed danger and competence in equal measures. There was a roughness in their eyes, like fresh-sawed wood.
They argued as they walked towards the diner, something more familiar than genuinely heated. Natasha lifted her coffee cup and took a long sip as the bell above the diner door tinkled.
“- it’s a favor, don’t look too much into it.” The shorter of the two. Blonde. He had a smattering of freckles across his nose and made a beeline for the diner counter, peering at the pie inside the glass case.
“I’m just saying-“ His partner, taller, dark hair. His sentence trailed off as he glanced around the diner, meeting Natasha’s eyes over the rim of her coffee cup. He elbowed the other man and they both began walking towards her table.
The sound of their boots was loud and rough in the silence. The two other patrons, an elderly man by the jukebox, and a trucker sitting at the counter, glanced at the hunters surreptitiously as they passed. A waitress stood at the counter, holding two new menus to her chest uncertainly.
“You must be Natasha,” the tall one said, extending his hand. His face seemed earnest, but his partner was clearly eying Natasha in the self-satisfied, masculine way she utterly despised.
“You must be Sam and Dean Winchester,” she said, sliding her thumbnail under the plastic seal of her cigarette carton and breaking through.
--
Once upon a time, there was a girl named Natasha Romanov. She lived in a small, beige house in a small, beige town with her Russian immigrant parents. After they died in a car accident, she was shuffled off to foster care. There, she got into drugs, learned how to steal bikes and then cars, dropped out of school, and fell in love with a boy named Bucky Barnes.
Not necessarily in that order.
Bucky straightened out her life. He took her virginity. She became pregnant with his baby and lost it. He offered to marry her. Against her better judgment, Natasha said yes. This was the happiest time of her life.
Then Bucky was shipped off to Iraq. It was not a big deal, they had been expecting it. Natasha kissed him at the airport, and rolled her eyes when he asked if she would miss him. Of course she would miss him, he didn’t need to ask her that.
And it wasn’t like Natasha had nothing to occupy herself with. She had her job as a receptionist at a law firm, was going to night school to be a paralegal. There was no big change from one day to the next, no quake in her world to foreshadow how her life would crack in two.
It happened when she was at the office. One minute, she was struggling with the old monster of a printer they kept in the copy room, and the next, vicious, black smoke was curling through the vents. Natasha didn’t have time to run, couldn’t even force a scream through her throat before it rushed towards her, crumpling her consciousness in its wake.
When she next opened her eyes, Natasha found that she was not alone in her body. It would be five long years before she got it back.
--
They were walking towards the parking lot, making plans to split up and revisit the crime scenes when a hiss from the police scanner on the Impala’s dash had Natasha shoving past the Winchester boys in her haste to turn up the volume.
“-384, assault reported, assailant has fled residence, requesting backup to 884 Lancaster Boulevard-“
“We have to go,” Natasha snapped, veering sharply towards her own car. “884 Lancaster, follow me!”
The house was already in yellow tape by the time they got there, the neatly-maintained bushes and manicured lawn trampled by gawkers. Two police cars were parked at the curb, and there was an ambulance in the driveway.
Natasha exited her car at a full-speed run, flashing her fake badge at the officers before ducking under the tape. The EMTs wheeled a body out of the front door, and even before she saw the flash of orange hair, Natasha’s heart began to sink.
“Agents Richards and Moore,” the Winchesters pulled badges from their leather jackets, trying to bluff their way through a line of police officers.
“Pepper!” Natasha rushed to the stretcher, struggling against the EMTs who tried to shove her out of the way. Swathed in bandages and belted to the stretcher, Pepper looked imminently breakable. Her eyes fluttered when she heard Natasha’s voice. “I need to talk to her,” Natasha turned to one of the EMTs.
“She’s in critical condition, you can talk to her in the hospital,” the man said gruffly, as he loaded Pepper into the ambulance.
“Fuck,” Natasha muttered, watching helplessly as the back doors slammed shut and the ambulance drove away with a squeal of its siren.
“Someone you know?” Sam asked, jogging up as he slid his ID into his jacket pocket.
“Someone I interviewed.” Natasha replied grimly. “She was our best lead.”
“They found someone else in the house,” Dean called, gesturing to them from the doorstep. “I think you’re gonna want to see this!”
--
“Badges,” the woman at the door demanded flatly. She looked all of 120 pounds, copper hair swept up in an elegant, yet no-nonsense ponytail. Natasha could tell that if this woman wanted to, she could be trouble.
“I’m Agent Brandt,” Clint said, handing over his ID with a smile, “and this is my partner Agent Rushman.”
Pepper Potts, recent divorcee of missing person Tony Stark, inspected their badges with narrow eyes. Finally, with a short sigh, she handed them back, the defensiveness visibly melting from her posture. “Sorry, just, reporters - you know?” Stepping away from the doorframe, Pepper gestured Clint and Natasha inside her house.
“That’s perfectly understandable,” Natasha said, as they trailed after Pepper towards the kitchen.
This part of Beaufort was seasonal shelter for the upper-middle-class. As expected, Pepper’s home was decorated like a page straight out of Home & Gardens. One of her ottomans probably cost more than what Clint and Natasha could hustle, scam and steal in a year. Clint turned to Natasha with raised eyebrows as they passed a TV larger than their car.
“Can I get you Agents anything? Water, coffee?” Pepper asked, pausing at the kitchen.
“Coffee would be fine.” Clint said, continuing onto the living room. Natasha inspected the walls. Some displayed fine, expensive art, but others were unnaturally blank, as if photographs which used to hang there had been hurriedly removed.
After a minute, Pepper came out of the kitchen with a tray of coffee cups. Natasha quietly moved to help her, earning a harried smile from the other woman as they walked towards the half-circle of couches.
“I don’t know what you want to ask me,” Pepper said, as she eased herself into a seat. “I already told the other officers everything I know. Tony and I are- well, I have no idea what he is doing.” Her fingers curled into the couch cushion as she made that admission, her knuckles turning white.
“Please,” Natasha ducked her head to look Pepper in the eye. “I know you are worried about him.”
“We just want to find Tony, make sure he’s safe.” Clint said soothingly, picking up a cup of coffee. “Anything you can tell us would help.”
Pepper nodded shortly, smoothing the bottom of her skirt. “What do you want to know?”
“Mr. Stark was reported missing three days ago,” Clint said, “Have you had any contact with him since then?”
“No,” Pepper said firmly.
“Had he been acting strange before his disappearance? Out of character?”
Pepper’s brow creased in thought. “Tony is … Tony. He’s always been eccentric. When he stopped … contacting me, I just thought that he was just on another bender. Or had found a new project. It wasn’t until Steve called me that I heard …” She shook her head helplessly.
“Tony lives in Manhattan, right?” Natasha asked.
“We both do.” Pepper said quietly, “We still work for the same company. I’m just down here for the weekend to clean out my things.” Pepper looked from Clint to Natasha, her eyes pleading. “Is it true what they said about Tony? That he killed … those people?”
“A witness identified him at the scene, but nothing is confirmed. We just want to talk to him,” Natasha said reassuringly.
Pepper pressed her knuckles against her lips, glancing out a side window. Outside, the ocean lapped at the docks, frothing under the hastening current. Strom clouds were brewing from far away, bringing tendrils of darkness across a bright blue sky.
“I don’t believe it,” Pepper said faintly, “I know he couldn’t have done this.”
--
The man had been killed like the others, neck snapped and his head still facing a sickening angle. The living room was completely wrecked - glass littering the floor, couches and lamps tipped over. Cardboard boxes, which had been stacked neatly in the foyer, lay crushed. There were tell-tale dents in the wall - as if someone had been slammed into them at a velocity that could shatter bone.
“Sulfur,” Dean muttered, rubbing his fingers against the edge of a picture frame, lying twisted and splintered near the kitchen.
“This Tony guy,” Sam turned to Natasha. “Is this about his ex-wife?”
“I used to think so, but now I’m not so sure.” Natasha said, grabbing a passing cop. “What was the reported incident?”
“Call came in half an hour ago,” the cop said, “Woman barricaded herself in the bathroom and reported that her driver was being attacked.”
“Did she recognize who did this?” Natasha asked.
The cop shook his head. “By the time we arrived, she was already unconscious from blood loss.”
“That’s all,” Natasha smiled wanly, uncurling her fingers from his sleeve “Thank you.”
“What are you thinking?” Sam asked, after the policeman had stepped away.
--
“What are you thinking?” Clint asked around a mouthful of curly fries. They were sitting on a picnic bench outside the fast food restaurant, the only people, apparently, willing to brave the brisk February winds.
Natasha carefully teased a pickle out of her hamburger and chewed it thoughtfully. “He’s possessed. Maybe on the way to meet his ex-wife, maybe in town for another reason. Demon saw a juicy meatsuit, took him for a ride.”
“Or,” Clint put up a finger. “Not so random. Maria told me that Starks are a family of hunters.”
“Vampire hunters,” Natasha said, “And that died off with Tony’s father. The heir apparent is a rich bitch through and through. Not a heroic bone in his body.” She shook her head, “Just look at the number of DUIs this guy’s got. Seriously.”
Clint shrugged, finishing the last bite of his fries. “You think the ex is in danger?” Clint asked, wiping his hands with a napkin before balling it up and tossing it in a calculated direction. Sure enough, the wind picked it up and dunked the napkin ball neatly into the trash.
“Probably not.” Natasha said. “What worries me, though, is that the killings don’t look random. This isn’t just some joyride.”
“No, the style of strangulation isn’t possible of a lesser demon.” Clint said evenly. “I think we’re dealing with a big fish here.”
Natasha watched him carefully. After three years of living in each other’s pockets, she had learned to read the subtle nuances in Clint’s expression. She knew what he was hoping for, and she knew what he was going to ask before he even opened his mouth.
“Did any of reports mention that the demon had … blue eyes?” Clint’s voice was casual, but he couldn’t seem to meet Natasha’s steady gaze.
“There wasn’t anything noted about it,” Natasha said quietly. “But you know it’s not something that they usually notice.”
Clint nodded, crushing the soda can in his hand with a vicious crunch.
--
“Leave Sam to the research,” Dean grinned at Natasha, his hand heavy and uncomfortably warm on her shoulder. “You and I should … talk.”
Natasha barely hid her grimace as she contemplated crushing Dean’s solar plexus. She was used to this sort of treatment from some male hunters, had thought that the Winchesters would be different. Evidently not.
Sam must have had the same idea because his eyes went wide and worried for a second, flicking between his brother and Natasha. “Okay,” he said hesitantly. Natasha smiled thinly at Sam’s retreating back.
Dean’s arm slipped from Natasha’s shoulders as they walked to her car, leaving Sam to take the Impala. This day was brisk like the others, the intrepid early sprouts of grass already frosted over and crunching underfoot.
Dean was pretty, Natasha could give him that. Emotionlessly, she pictured kissing him, raking her nails down his back, riding him like a vicious machine. Pretty, yeah.
“We really do need to talk,” Dean said, once they had slammed their respective car doors. This time, when he turned to her, all pretenses were gone. The hard look in his eyes made Natasha grip her gun through her jacket. “There’s something you’re not telling us.”
“What makes you say that?” Natasha asked evenly, her fingers still twitchy on the hammer.
Dean stared at her for a long minute, and Natasha felt as if the whole space of the car had shrunk down to the inch of space between them, to the bulk of his shoulders and the curl of his fingers into her headrest.
“We’re here to clear Bobby’s debt,” he bit out, and at that moment his voice sounded so familiar, his expression looked so familiar. “Just a job. Sam and I aren’t getting into whatever personal fuckfest you and your partner left behind. So either you tell me everything now-“
“Or what?” Natasha asked, her hand easing off the gun. “You’ll fuck off? Drive away without a look back?”
“Yeah,” Dean said. And Natasha remembered where she had seen that expression before, the grim eyes of a person who had lost everything once.
“I believe you,” Natasha said, and started the car.
--
“Windingos suck,” Clint moaned easing face-down onto the motel mattress as Natasha trailed after him with their first-aid kit.
“No argument here,” Natasha said, unscrewing their medical emergency flask and pressing it into Clint’s good hand. “You want something to bite down on?”
Clint made a pitiful sound as Natasha tugged open her belt buckle and slid it from the loops in her jeans. She had to pry the flask away from his lips before she shoved the folded leather between his teeth.
“Sorry, baby,” she ran a hand through Clint’s hair before grabbing his left shoulder and shoving it back into its socket. The pillows muffled Clint’s scream. Natasha clucked and petted his hair as his body writhed a bit before settling down. They were both too shattered to put up pretenses. Clint’s fingers curled into the crook of Natasha’s hip as she sewed up his wounds with dental floss. She was a bit clumsy - her hands had gotten pretty torn up, and her knees were bleeding through her jeans - but what made her fumble the most was the fatigue that ached down to her bones. They hadn’t been able to save the campers. Or their son.
“Does it even matter?” Clint slurred. The flask dangled from his fingers and dropped, empty, onto the grimy carpet. “Any of it?”
“You know it does,” Natasha said quietly, fiercely, and for a minute she almost believed herself.
That night, Natasha didn’t even bother to take off her jacket or shoes, just shoved the bandages off of the bed and crawled up to Clint’s warmth. They curled around each other like injured dogs.
The next thing Natasha remembered was a piercing trill. She opened her eyes to sunlight, a concentrated beam of it shining directly in her face. Somewhere, her cellphone was ringing.
Beside her, Clint grumbled, rolling away.
It took Natasha five minutes of limping and groping around in the dark before she found the phone, which, by then, had long stopped ringing. She flipped open the screen and squinted at the unfamiliar number.
Telemarketer. Hunter. Fury. None of the above sounded great right now. Natasha dialed her voicemail and pressed the phone to her ear.
“Hello,” a hesitant male voice filled the line, “I’m not sure you remember me, but it’s Steve. Steve Rogers.”
--
“Who was your contact?” Dean asked, hunching over the table, rolling an empty beer bottle between his palms. The booth they had picked all the way in the back corner of the bar was clearly sending the message do not disturb, because no waitress had even ventured into their area.
Natasha thought wistfully that she would much prefer this conversation in a slightly less sober frame of mind.
“And old friend,” of Bucky’s, she didn’t add. “He was the first one who noticed what was going on in his town. Began putting together the pieces.”
“Hunter?” Dean asked.
“No,” Natasha said, “Just familiar with the process.”
Dean’s eyes were too shrewd for her taste. Natasha allowed her gaze to drift around the bar, taking in the skinny female bartender slowly wiping down the counter, to the huddle of men around the pool table. It had been just an hour ago when she had considered Dean just another pretty, dumb fuck.
Someone put a quarter in the jukebox and Billy Joel’s “Piano Man” began playing..
“You mind if I smoke?” Natasha sighed, slapping her pack of cigarettes on the table.
Dean inclined his head, amused, and Natasha lit up with steady hands. That first draw felt so good, the smoke curling, tickling down her throat, the sweet burn she held down as long as possible, her eyes fluttering in pleasure. She was aware of Dean’s gaze on her the entire time. His tongue swept slowly across his bottom lip.
“Steve was calling on behalf of a friend of his, Tony Stark.” Natasha said, exhaling luxuriously. “Ten days ago, he went missing from his apartment in Manhattan and was spotted around Beaufort. Around that time, bodies began popping up.”
“I read the articles Fury forwarded - well,” Dean amended, “Sam read ‘em. Give me the version that’s off the books.”
“Tony Stark is dead.” Natasha said flatly.
“How do you know?” Dean asked.
“Because the demon that was riding him possessed Clint.”
--
Clint was furious, pacing the room from wall to wall in short, vicious steps. “You don’t understand anything-“ he rounded on Natasha, teeth bared, eyes like a rabid animal and she snapped, grabbing his unwounded shoulder and slamming his body against the wall.
“Don’t you fucking talk to me like that,” she said to him through her teeth. “I had that bastard, I had him inside me and you don’t fucking think I want to slit his throat just as badly?”
Clint stared at her mutinously. Natasha could feel him slipping away, slipping inside his anger. “You promised me,” he said quietly. “You promised you would do it.”
“No,” Natasha pushed him away from her, walking backwards. “You don’t know what you’re asking-“
“He wants me, Natasha.” Clint said, rolling his shoulder. “Second choice consolation prize but I’ll do.”
“We’ll think of another way-“
“There is. No. Other. Way.” Clint said his voice drained of anger. “He has enough juice to level the entire town if he wants to and he was waiting for us.”
“So you’re just going to give him what he wants?” Natasha sneered, following Clint as he headed towards the door. “You’re going to walk up to him and roll over on your belly like a good little whore? And then what?”
Clint stopped in the doorway, slowly unbuckling the cuff around his right wrist. The skin exposed was as pale as the underbelly of a fish. When he pressed it into Natasha’s hand, it was still curled into the shape of his arm, old leather softened and reformed countless times over the years. Embroidered into the inside was a distinct design, a demonic ward that prevented possession and manipulation.
“Then,” Clint said, “You’ll do like we talked about. You kill me.”
--
“No one really chooses this life,” Natasha said, grinding out her cigarette in the ashtray and immediately tapping out another. “I’m sure you have your sob story too.”
Dean shrugged, too casually for true nonchalance, “Not really, I was born into it.”
“That is a sob story,” Natasha said, ignoring Dean’s sharp look as she continued. “Clint grew up with a brother and sister, loathed him and adored her. Her name was Greta.”
“Let me guess,” Dean smiled mirthlessly, “Demons.”
“Witches,” Natasha said, “Working under the worst kind of pimp. Clint was 14, Greta was 13 when she was kidnapped.”
“What did they want?” Dean asked.
Natasha took a deep drag and released it. “I’ve heard about you and your brother, you know, what happened with the apocalypse?” Across the seat, she could see Dean stiffen. “I’m sure you’re familiar with the concept of vessels.”
“Thought that only worked for angels.”
Natasha smiled mirthlessly, “You think that Lucifer was the only one that fell?”
--
The Book of Enoch called them the “Grigori”, a Legion of 21 and 7 who followed Lucifer’s fall. They were his garrison, loyal to the man even as they were stripped of their Grace for following the betrayer. Unfortunately, Lucifer did not share their sense of devotion. He needed an army, had no use for brothers-in-arms.
With an offer of false power, Lucifer managed to corrupt the forms of the fallen angels, twisting them into something sinister. No longer did they have to seek permission before taking a vessel. No more were they chained to the rigid virtues of chastity, mercy and obedience. Lilith was once the brightest and most beloved of Lucifer’s garrison. She also became his first demon.
The Grigori were more powerful than the other children of Lucifer, commonplace demons born from the twisted souls of the damned. They could not be held by snares or traps and were nearly impossible to kill once they had found their vessels.
In the summer of 1985, the fallen angel called Baliel sought his destined body, and found Greta.
The night Clint first told Natasha about it, they had been partners for just a little under a year. You’re a natural, was the sweetest compliment Natasha had ever received, accompanied by one of Clint’s crooked smiles.
They’d holed up in a motel room just outside Chicago, hunkering down to wait out the blizzard that was ripping through the area. Cocooned in every blanket, cover and sheet they could get their hands on and slowly sharing a bottle of cheap whiskey, Natasha could almost forget the thing that had broken inside of her so long ago.
“I’ve never stopped thinking about it,” Clint told her, his breath rolling warm on Natasha’s shoulder, “What I could’ve done, if I had just been … She’d acting bratty all week. Slamming doors and shit like that. I called her a little bitch and she threw a piece of toast at my face. I didn’t know, Nat. I didn’t even try to stop her from leaving.”
Natasha took another swig, running her fingers through Clint’s sweaty nape.
“I thought she was running away,” Clint formed the words slowly, like they were heavy on his tongue. “Saw her get into a strange car. I followed on my bike.” He took a sharp breath, “I … thought she was getting in trouble. Boyfriend. Drugs. Teenage things.”
With the amount that she’d drunk that night, Natasha was surprised that she still remembered the story. Remembered, in fact, every hitch of breath and painful pause during which Clint desperately drew from the whiskey bottle. Remembered the way Clint described her sister’s eyes, how she had been begging to live even as she got caught in the crossfire between a pack of witches and some hunters who were more interested in killing the demon than saving the girl.
“Promise me,” Clint whispered fiercely, running his thumb over and over Natasha’s knuckles. “Promise that you’ll kill me when you need to. Kill me and don’t look back.”
Near dawn, Clint finally fell asleep, drooling into Natasha’s hair as she curled around him tight, her eyes dry and burning.
--
“Yeah, Sammy?” Dean barked into the phone. There was a tendril of warmth in his voice, something that just didn’t seem to exist when he talked with other people. Natasha didn’t even think that he noticed. “Get everything you can on fallen angels - the … Grigori? Yeah, like Lu-. Just do it.”
Natasha dropped a twenty on the table as she stood, weighing it down with an empty bottle. It had felt cathartic, almost, telling Dean the things that she’d never been able to share with anyone but Clint before. Natasha had never been the kind of girl to sob her heart out, but she imagined that this is what the aftermath must feel like.
“Sam has something to tell us,” Dean said, snapping his phone shut as they walked out of the bar.
Natasha nodded, pausing in her steps when she dropped her pack of cigarettes. She bent down and retrieved them from the bar floor, tapping out a stick before she even really thought about it.
“What’s the holdup?” Dean asked expectantly, halfway out the door but holding it open for her with a hand. Natasha just shook her head, sliding the cigarette back into the pack and following him at a fast trot.
The moon was a bright fingernail crescent in the night sky. Natasha and Dean shared a strangely companionable silence all the way to the car, walking close but leaving a respectable space so that their shoulders didn’t even brush.
“You really love him, huh?” Dean asked as they slid into the car. He sounded almost yearning, like he didn’t know how that felt, but Natasha had heard stories of the Winchesters, and knew that Dean had his own understanding.
“Love is for children,” Natasha replied softly, staring straight ahead, “I owe him a debt.”
--
They walked into the motel room and Sam started shoving the photos into their faces before they even took off their jackets. “Look!” he kept shouting, but all Natasha saw was a family picture that looked like it was taken in the 70s, teal background and shoulder pads and everything.
“Spit it out, Sam!” Dean barked, pulling the photos from Sam’s hand and scattering them over the bed.
More family photos. Natasha’s eyes scanned through them quickly. Mother, father, son. None of them looked particularly happy. The son’s facial features resembled …
“Tony Stark.” Sam jammed a finger down on a picture of a shirtless teenage boy, grinning unselfconsciously for the camera in his swimming trunks. The photo crinkled slightly under the weight of his finger. “A hunter’s kid.”
“Vampire hunters,” Natasha said faintly.
“Smart vampire hunters,” Sam took the picture off the bed and pointed to the curve of Tony’s shoulder. “Guess what tat they got their son for his 16th birthday?”
A circle of flames around a pentagon. The symbol was so familiar that Natasha’s hand snapped to her wrist, tracing the same grooves carved into the leather cuff.
“So unless the guy had had it removed …” Dean started.
“He couldn’t have gone black-eyed!” Sam finished with a rush. “And look at this,” he dug out the photograph at the bottom of the pile, the one that was not like the others. A crime scene photo, with the victim spayed, spread-eagled on the floor. Pepper’s driver.
Natasha narrowed her eyes, immediately spotting the detail that no one had noticed when they were on the scene. “There are bruises on his jaw.”
“Doesn’t make sense,” Dean said, “The big bad that ganked the other three didn’t need to get so hands-on.”
“Who told you that it was Tony who killed those people?” Sam turned to Natasha.
Natasha shook her head, a bitter taste filling her mouth. “Steve. Steve Rogers.”
--
The police cars were long gone, but the yellow tape remained, an eerie contrast to the otherwise peaceful-looking house. One could almost imagine a family, tucked in and snoring for the night, instead of cold, blood-stained floors and shattered glass. Behind the house, the ocean churned darkly, reflecting what scant light the new moon had to offer.
Under the cover of night, a man in a black hood jogged towards the house. He gave a quick look around before ducking under the tape and swiftly making his way to the door.
Crime Scene: Entrance Prohibited, the seal on the door said. A pocketknife slid under the tape did the trick. The door wasn’t even locked.
Shucking off his hood, he opened the door and walked inside.
There was a sudden blaze of light. Steve whirled around, but the door had already slammed shut behind him, and there was somebody in front of it.
“Don’t think so,” Sam said, crossing his arms.
From the shadows, Natasha and Dean stepped forward, guns loaded and aimed.
“Wait!” Steve threw up his hands, his eyes wide and afraid. “N-Natasha, it’s me!”
“Yeah,” Natasha said, lowering her gun, “I know,” she grabbed the flask at her hip, popping off the cap and flinging her arm in a sharp arc.
The holy water splashed into Steve’s face with a loud hiss. The scream he gave was sickening, his fingers curling in pain as he tried to claw at his own skin. For a second, Steve Roger’s sweet, ken-doll handsome face twisted into something horrifyingly unnatural.
Wildly, Steve spun on his heel, flying at Sam, only to be slammed backwards onto his ass.
“Look up, Einstein,” Dean snapped, pointing at the Devil’s trap on the ceiling.
“Demons these days,” Sam commented drily, locking the door. “Just don’t make ‘em like they used to.”
--
Natasha leaned forward on her elbows, water sluicing off of face, soaking the collar of her tank top. There were towels to her right, fluffy yellow ones with embroidery at the bottom. The entire bathroom was clean and well-lit and tastefully decorated. The only thing out-of-place was the pink smear on wall next to the door, where Pepper had bled out her last minutes, terrified and alone.
Natasha yanked up the bottom of her tank top and wiped her face with that instead.
“You okay?” a quiet voice asked from the doorway. Natasha turned to find Sam standing there, looking at her sympathetically.
“I’m fine,” she said briskly, “Really. I’ve sliced and diced a few demons in my time.”
“But never one who was possessing someone you know.” Sam said, and Natasha pressed her lips together.
From the next room came a tortured scream, followed by what could have been either laughter or sobbing. Not for the first time, Natasha was grateful that Pepper’s house was relatively isolated, with large swaths of land on either side, and the deep, pounding waves of the ocean in the back.
Squaring her shoulders, Natasha followed Sam out of the room in time to see Dean sprinkling a handful of salt on an open wound on Steve’s shoulder. The demon hissed.
“You aren’t too smart, are you?” Dean said conversationally, taking a rag and slowly wiping the demon blood off of his knife. “Coming back to the scene of the crime.”
“Just trying to take back what’s mine,” Steve slouched in the chair sullenly.
“You mean this?” Sam lifted a duffle bag. At the sight of it, Steve straightened, frantically struggling against the ropes anew.
“What is it?” Natasha asked, and Sam slung it in her direction. When she unzipped the bag, a small cloud of dust made her cough. “Bones?”
“They belong to our little demon friend here,” Dean said, inclining his head in Steve’s direction. “Natasha, you have a lighter, right?”
“Oh, Nat,” the demon clucked his tongue, slouching in his bounds, “How could you be so cold-hearted? Could you really kill someone who was the best man at your wedding?”
Natasha didn’t answer, retrieving the lighter from her back pocket and snapping it open.
“Well, Steve was the best man,” the demon said. “Beautiful ceremony, anyway, you were - what - nineteen and pregnant? Sorry, nineteen and miscarried. A bit clichéd, don’t you think?”
“You want me to shut him up?” Dean asked, unwinding a rag from between his hands. Sam raised his eyebrows, his arms crossed over his chest.
“That’s sweet,” Natasha said, grabbing the bottle of wine they had pilfered from the kitchen and dumping it liberally over the bones. “But I’ve mastered the art of ignoring men who spill bullshit.”
“You must have been so surprised when Steve called,” the demon continued. The way he sat, the way he moved made it easy for Natasha to differentiate him from Steve in her mind. Steve had been a sweet man. Kind to a fault with the straightest posture she had ever seen. “You must think he hates your guts, and you know? You’d be right. After all, isn’t he the one who led Clint to the alley? He knows you killed-“
Natasha grabbed a bone from the pile, a fibula, and held it above her lighter. It caught on fire like kindling, and the screams from Steve’s writhing body made even Sam and Dean wince.
“If story time is over now,” Natasha said evenly, “I think you should start telling me something I don’t know.”
--
Natasha pressed her knees together so that Sam could squeeze in beside her on the edge of the dock. On the other side, Dean was bitching up a storm about Sam’s moose-esque body proportions, and just fucking shove Dean into the ocean right now, why don’t cha?
“Don’t tempt me,” Sam muttered, bringing the beer bottle to his lips.
It was a dark, cold night. The sea was as black as obsidian, the curves and troughs of its waves catching the moonlight. Here and there, lights blinked as ships steered through the inlet. Few, and far in-between in this season.
The boys were drinking. Natasha was smoking. It felt downright companionable to lean against the line of Sam’s arm. Even if he did take up too much fucking legroom.
They were treating it like a celebration of sorts, for getting that piece of demon trash to spill his guts about Baliel’s decades-long search for his vessel, his waning dedication to Lucifer and the rest of demonhood’s plan to spring Lucifer from the cage. So far, little success, but now that Bailel had Clint; it would be a different story.
The entire thing had been Bailel from the start: the killings, the demon sightings, making one of his minions possess a man from Natasha’s past. He must have known that Clint had a blind spot for her a mile wide. Only, the demon possessing Steve had had his own agenda, and tore apart the Stark house looking for it.
Steve’s body had been left cooling in the Stark house, yet another red mark on Natasha’s ledger. She took a long drag of her cigarette and remembered the way Steve had smiled at their wedding, the way he patted Bucky’s back and kissed her on the cheek, so happy for them, so proud. If Steve had hated her up to the second he died, she undoubtedly deserved it.
“So do we have a plan?” Sam asked, breaking the silence.
“The usual,” Dean said blithely, “Sneak, smash and shoot. Given that we can kill it.” He leaned up on his elbow. “Can we kill it?”
“That depends,” Natasha asked quietly, “You two still have the gun that killed Azazel?” Sam and Dean looked at each other.
“So the Colt can kill these sons of bitches?” Dean asked slowly.
“Let’s hope so,” Natasha said, “’Cause I don’t have a Plan B.”
Sam sighed and reached for another beer.
__
They parked outside an abandoned boathouse at the edge of town, surrounded by the skeletons of sailboats and dredges. When the wind blew over the water, they all shuffled against each other, yellowed tarps snapping wetly in the air.
“Well this doesn’t smell like a trap at all,” Dean muttered, trying to make as little noise as possible on the creaky docks. “I still can’t see why we couldn’t wait for backup.”
“You hate backup,” Sam whispered back, sidling along in the shadow. “Plus, I’m out of favors with Fury.”
“Pound of flesh,” Natasha said, no the amusement of no one but herself.
Two demons were guarding the doors, another two making rounds around the boathouse. Between the three of them, it was easy work to clear out the low-level trash.
They slammed into the boathouse Winchester style: guns blazing. A last stand, as far as Natasha was concerned.
It was a trap.
Bailel was waiting for them, lounging on a metal folding chair in the middle of the room. In Clint’s body. Natasha drew in a quick breath as the wintery-blue of Clint’s eyes made her insides turn to ice.
“The Winchesters!” Clint crowed, a genuinely delighted expression lighting his face as he slammed them both on opposite walls with a flick of his hand. “What an absolute honor. Can I say,” he added, “I am a huge fan of your work.” He gestured and Sam screamed as his ribs were compressed dangerously.
“Sammy!” Dean bellowed, struggling futilely against his own invisible bonds.
“Keep your eyes on me, you motherfucker!” Natasha yelled, leveling the Colt at the middle of Clint’s chest.
“Aw,” Bailel turned, his eyes flashing blue as he smiled, “Getting lonely, sweetheart? Fortunately for you, I don’t go back for sloppy seconds.” He flicked his hand in her general direction once. Twice.
The demon’s brows creased in confusion as Natasha didn’t go flying into the wall.
“Think again,” Natasha said, flashing the leather cuff on her wrist.
“Ah,” the demon grimaced, making Clint’s eyes blaze blue, “I guess your sweetheart finally gave you his promise ring.”
“Shut the fuck up,” Natasha forced through her teeth, taking one, then another shaking step backwards as Bailel advanced on her.
“Or what?” Bailel deadpanned, cocking his head in condescending curiosity. “You’ll take a chunk out of me with that pea-shooter?”
“It was good enough for Azazel,” Natasha said coldly, and watched the understanding dawn on Bailel’s face.
“So that was your plan all along!” His eyebrows raised to his forehead, an expression Clint had never pulled in his entire life. “Give Clint up as a sacrificial lamb, run crying to the big bad Winchesters, and let them bring the Colt to you?”
There was an aborted shout from the direction of where Dean was pinned to the wall. An indignant sound. Natasha ignored it in favor of keeping Clint in her line of sight.
“Brilliant,” the demon said, “I’ve always said that the most creative evil came from humans. But you know why,” he stepped closer, grabbing the barrel of Natasha’s gun and pressing it to his chest. “I’m still not afraid?”
Natasha’s grip tightened.
“Because I know you,” Bailel said, voice so quiet it was clear that his words were for Natasha’s ears alone. “I was inside of you, remember? I’ve reached into every dark corner of your soul, and moreover,” the demon said, running his hand down Clint’s chest. “I know what this man knows about you. How you made a pact that you would put him down without hesitation of that was what it takes, but sweetheart,” Clint jiggled the barrel of the gun that he had in his grasp, pressing it even harder to Clint’s sternum. “You’ll never be able to pull the-“
The crack of a gunshot ran out in the quiet room. Bailel’s eyes widened, and he stumbled back a few steps, looking down at the growing scarlet across his chest as is body lit from the inside out and began shuddering violently. With a last, tormented scream, Baliel died, and Clint’s body collapsed on the ground.
The second Baliel was gone the Winchesters were dropped on their asses across the floor. Stiffly, they picked themselves up, staring at Natasha like she was the monster-
Natasha turned her back to them, rushing to Clint’s side and pressing her palm to the place where he bled true. It was the warmest part of him, his fingers and toes growing cold as the flesh between her fingers pulsed in time to his still-beating heart.
“Thank you,” Clint told her, the light fading from his soft grey eyes. He was so familiar to her, every line of his face. She traced the curve of his jaw, the small, crescent-shaped scar under his left ear. She gently closed his eyelids.
“I know,” Natasha said, and squeezed his hand, and did not cry.
--
It had been five years since the demon had rode her body right out of the law firm of Dunham & Sons, rolling Natasha’s hips with the easy grace she had never been able to master, an unfamiliar smirk splitting her lips.
It had been five years of silent screaming, beating against the walls of her own mind as the thing inside of her killed and killed and killed. Every time it twisted its fingers around someone’s neck, Natasha could feel the crack of vertebra like a shudder down to her marrow.
And when it grew bored, when it grew frustrated, it would talk to her, reel out her darkest memories as amusements. The day she didn’t slam her break fast enough and ran into the stopped car in front of her, the seatbelt cutting ruthlessly into her soft stomach. When she next opened her eyes, her thighs were slick with blood and the small life Natasha had alternately adored and feared was gone.
It fed pain to her like communion wafers and sips of holy blood. Sometimes, it would retreat to the back of her mind and allow her control of her body for minutes, hours. She would gain consciousness walking on the side of a highway, in unfamiliar clothing, with blood under her nails. There was nothing she could do, no one she could cry to who would listen.
It had been five years, and in the fifth year, she was walking down an alley at dusk when a man shouted her name.
Natasha knew who it was before she even turned around. And for the short second before she saw his choppy brown hair and crooked grin, Natasha felt her breath quickening in joy. Bucky, Bucky, she hadn’t seen him in so long, and now that he was here everything would be fine-
Then it ran its fingers across the knife hilt at its hip, lips twisting into a sick facsimile of a smile. Inside her chest, Natasha felt her heart burst like overripe fruit crushed by a fist.
“Natasha,” Bucky slowed in his jog, his steps stuttering, then halting as he saw her. They were two states and five years from home, and he had found her. “I was, I thought-“ he looked at her like a desperate man, trying to soak up the sight of her. “I was so worried.”
“You look like shit,” it said, in Natasha’s voice, and Bucky’s hopeful expression shuttered.
Run! Natasha screamed, hoping for one, just one second when she could wrest control of her own body. Please, please go-
“What happened to you?” Bucky asked, his words rough and incredulous.
“What’d you think?” It said, closing the last inches between them with slow, swaying steps. A car drove by the open alleyway, its lights flashing as it sped past. “Exactly what everyone’s been telling you all this time. I got tired of waiting for you,” it pressed a nail against the ridge of Bucky’s sternum, “found another guy to make me beg for it, and you know what?” Its voice dropped to a purr, “He was so good I followed his dick all the way to Kansas City.”
“No,” Bucky said faintly, but in his eyes Natasha could see the dark seed of doubt blossoming.
“Sorry,” it said airily, before flicking open the knife and sinking it into Bucky’s stomach.
No, Natasha cried in her own mind, watching Bucky’s incredulous expression change to one of stark realization.
“It’s so nice to kill somebody you love,” it said conversationally, ignoring Natasha’s whimpers and making her watch. “Slowly. Intimately.”
Bucky didn’t even fight back, staring in shock as the knife slid-slick into his stomach once, twice, and twist-
A bullet shot past Natasha’s ear, punching deep into the brick wall of the alley. She missed Bucky’s dying breaths when she turned on her heel to the light at the end of the alleyway. A man stood there, silhouetted in the dim streetlights. His hands were perfectly steady as he aimed the gun at her throat.
“Oh,” the it inside of Natasha roiled, as if nervous. It was the first time she had felt anything like it before. “Well this is a bit of a surprise, Clint. And I didn’t even send the engraved invitations.”
“You know, this place isn’t as private as you think,” Clint said, walking closer. The look in his eyes would have scared Natasha, if she was even capable of feeling something like that anymore. The man was a killer, would kill her and probably never even remember he girl he’d put down like a dog in the back of an alley.
After five years of it, Natasha considered death with a shuddering feeling of relief. The only thing that had been keeping her sane was the thought of returning to Bucky, and now …
“You’ve tried silver bullets before,” it purred in Clint’s direction, “Let’s not make the same mistake twice. All you’ll do is hurt this poor girl who’s trapped in here with me.” And with that it suddenly pulled itself into the back of Natasha’s consciousness, leaving her gasping and stumbling in shock.
It had been so long, so long, since she had felt the rush of air against her skin, feel the winter chill drawn into her lungs with quick breaths and see and hear and touch everything as if she wasn’t smothered behind a thick glass wall.
She must have looked pitiful, so overwhelmed and afraid that Clint began lowering his weapon.
“No!” Natasha managed to scream, just before it clawed back to the forefront of her consciousness, “Please, kill me!”
Clint made a different call.
“Get out of her, or I’ll shoot,” Clint said, lifting the gun and pressing it to his own temple.
It was shocked into silence for a beat, before scoffing loudly. “You can’t possibly think-“
“Get. Out.” Clint gritted, cocking the gun with a crisp sound, “Or be prepared to wait another couple of generations for some second cousin twice removed to get the exact genetic predisposition …”
“Fine,” it spat, viciously punching out of Natasha’s mouth.
Her body jackknifed in pain, furiously vomiting up thick black smoke. It felt like coughing out her heart and lungs, an entire soul ripped from her body and leaving it bloody. The moment it left her, Natasha felt a rush of pain break over her body like a wave. Five years’ worth of bruises, fractures and secret little cuts blooming open on her skin. Her knees weakened and she crumpled.
Blackness teased at the edge of her vision. Natasha laid on the cold concrete and struggled tooth and nail to remain conscious.
“Are you okay?” Clint was suddenly looming over her, his hands warm around her shoulders as he scraped her from the ground. First human contact in five years, the dry brush of skin against skin.
“Just fucking peachy.” she replied weakly, numb to the surprised smile that split Clint’s face. She groped for his hand, her fingers leaving red streaks of blood on his clothes. “Don’t you … dare leave me.”
“I’ll take you to the hospital,” Clint said soothingly. “That sonovabitch isn’t known for riding gentle.”
“No,” Natasha said, digging her nails into Clint’s arm with as much force as she could muster. “I mean … take me with you.”
Clint was silent for a moment, looking down at her. And she didn’t know how she could have thought that he was a cold-hearted killer when the rush of emotions flickered rapidly across his face. His eyes were full of unwritten tragedy. “You don’t know what you’re asking for.”
“Please,” Natasha said, because there was nothing to leave behind. “I … I was listening the whole time. I know his plans, I know his name.” At the edge of her vision was a crumpled body. She refused to turn to look at it, gritting her teeth against unshed tears. “Please.”
Clint breathed out slowly, then looked around himself quickly before he curled his fingers around her waist and gently raised her from the ground. “We’ll see,” he said, his lips moving against her forehead.
And Natasha knew, from that moment, that Clint would one day break her heart.
END-
Prompts:
-characters played by the same actor as the same character
-ex-boyfriends
-action/case-fic