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If Clint is being honest, their newest charges are weird.
There is, of course, the fact that they’re both Hydra assassins. That’s certainly a solid start to the weird, he supposes, but it’s more than that. It’s the way they were found sitting back to back amidst destruction the likes of which Clint had never seen, with their eyes closed - as if they knew that the danger had already passed. It was the way that neither man fought back when he, Nat, and Fury shuffled them onto the jet, too injured and too exhausted to care beyond the fact that…that Clint wasn’t Hydra.
The look on the older man’s face when he asked - when he begged - to know who Clint worked for, would forever be ingrained in Clint’s mind.
Clint doesn’t even think they knew who SHIELD was.
But ultimately, right now, it’s the way that both men are staring down him and Nat, neither of them saying a damn word despite the fact that they’re in completely separate rooms.
Clint is with the younger of the two, and while Clint is all smiles and loose shoulders, his friend is wound up like a livewire. He’s scowling, and Clint has a feeling that the man has already come up with half a dozen ways to murder him. In fact, if he could do it just by glaring, Clint is sure he’d already be dead.
“Not even a name, huh, kid?” Clint tries again with a sigh. It must be the fourth or fifth time he’s asked, scattered between other simple interrogations.
Like, what’s your favorite color? and how old are you? and seen any good movies lately?
And okay, maybe that last one was a little much, but Clint is getting desperate here. He needs to get something, even if that something is just proof that the kid can talk at all.
Is he even a kid? He’s young, Clint is sure of that, but maybe ‘kid’ isn’t right. College age? He can’t be sure. The kid’s eyes have seen hell though, and speaking from experience, Clint knows that at some point, age is just a number.
Clint’s own eyes drop down to the kid’s man’s hands, where one of his fingers has started tapping irregularly on the tabletop in obvious annoyance. He’s not sure if the guy even knows he’s doing it.
Clint can’t help the little smirk that catches on his lips when he mentally decides to just call the guy Taps.
—
As it turns out, Natasha's new friend is only slightly more cooperative, and only because, Natasha assumes, they already knew his name.
The Winter Soldier, one of Hydra’s greatest Assets.
When Natasha had asked if that was really his name, the man had answered “that’s what they call me”, and then promptly shut his mouth and continued committing homicide with only his burning glare.
“Gee,” Clint says with fake cheerfulness as they reconvene between interrogation rooms. “What a couple’a rays of sunshine, am I right?”
Natasha levels him with an unimpressed look. “Would you be? I doubt the Winter Soldier’s life with Hydra was a walk in the park, Barton.”
She doesn’t even mention the other one, but she doesn’t have to. The jab is enough to sober Clint right up, and his attempted jokes fall flat as a grimace takes over.
“Then why not talk to us?” he asks. “Don’t they realize they’re–”
“They’re what?” Natasha interrupts. “Free? I highly doubt they’ve even considered that they might not be prisoners here, especially considering that they’re right at the center of an interrogation. Just because they aren’t being actively tortured into talking doesn’t change what it is, and this shit isn’t something they learned overnight. In their eyes, all they’ve done is changed Handlers.”
The comparison pulls a darkness over Clint’s expression. She’s right, she almost always is, and he knows she’s speaking from experience. Besides, he and Nat might not be Hydra, but he doubts they’d count SHIELD’s care as freedom, anyway. After all, all of this really is nothing more than a glorified interrogation.
—
Natasha thinks, if she could do things her way, she’d have more information out of him than SHIELD would know what to do with. As it is, she’s already promised Fury and Barton that she’d play nice, so all she’s managed to get is a snide confirmation of who exactly is sitting across from her.
He hasn’t said a word since, and now, as she’s reentered the room after checking in with Barton, he’s apparently taken a liking to dissecting her with his glare.
Natasha stares right back, ignoring the bubble of frustration that’s starting to catch in her throat. She promised Fury she wouldn’t resort to doing things the old fashioned way, but she has a feeling the Winter Soldier won’t respond to nice.
She needs a middle ground.
“You know,” Natasha finally says, keeping her tone laid back. “My partner says your friend is even more tight-lipped than you are.” It’s not a lie, although she does have a talent for such things. “I’m surprised, honestly. I’d heard your people had a habit of giving up when things got a little rough.”
Something in the Soldier’s expression twitches. He’s listening now, which is a step up from willfully ignoring her like before.
She’ll take it.
“The thing is, as much as my partner doesn’t like getting his hands dirty, he’s always been good at doing what he has to.” She meets his eyes, unwavering, and watches for some sort of tell as she carefully attempts to prod him into a corner. “What do you think, Winter? How long do you think your friend will last before we have him singing like a canary, hm?”
The Soldier’s lip catches at one corner, slight enough that Natasha knows she only saw it because she’s looking for it.
“Did I touch a nerve?” she asks with an innocent tilt of her head.
The Soldier immediately hardens his expression again, and she silently swears to herself. Wrong move. They stare each other down in the following silence, and Natasha is left wondering what exactly is so damn funny that it made the Winter Soldier smile.
—
It’s another hour before Natasha and Clint reconvene again, and Natasha has a feeling that he’s made the same amount of progress that she has. That is to say, absolutely none.
“What are the odds of us getting them to open up before the weekend?” Clint sighs as he drops into one of the armchairs in Fury’s office. “Think we can bribe them with Friday night happy hour?”
Natasha raises a brow and he groans, letting his head fall back.
“I threatened him,” Natasha says after a stretch. She won’t look at Clint, even though she can feel him staring at her at the admission, though she’s not sure why she’s feeling guilty about it. She’s doing what she needs to. “Told him things might have to get rough with his friend if it meant making him talk.”
Clint frowns, rolling his bottom lip between his teeth for a few moments before asking, “Did he say anything to that?”
“No.” Natasha’s gaze hardens. “In fact, I’m half convinced the bastard smiled.”
Clint blinks and does his best to ignore the shudder that runs up his spine. “I’m sorry, he smiled at the insinuation that we were willing to torture his partner for information? Which, by the way, come on, Nat. We talked about this, you can’t just go around torturing people, especially when we want them on our side!”
“I already said I wouldn’t,” Natasha says, raising a brow. “He doesn’t know that though.”
He makes a face, scrunching his nose slightly. He knows that this is kind of SHIELD’s whole deal, they’re technically spies, for God’s sake, but something about lying to these guys just isn’t sitting right.
“Maybe we should trade.” He’s only half joking, and she can probably tell. “I know Fury wanted you with the Winter Soldier and all that, but neither of us are getting anywhere. Maybe you’ll have better luck with Taps.”
Natasha gives him a look. “Tell me you didn’t give him a nickname.”
Clint throws his hands up in defeat. “Well what else was I supposed to call him?! Tall, dark, and broody?!”
“Taps?” she repeats the name incredulously, making him sink deeper into the chair with a groan. “Why that?”
“Because he–” Clint flails his hand, trying and failing to imitate the motion to explain. “He taps! The more questions I ask, the more annoyed and impatient he’s getting, and he just–I mean, he taps, Nat! He taps his fingers on the table.”
Natasha stares at him as the information sinks in. “He taps his fingers,” she clarifies, even though Clint has said it more than enough times. “When you ask questions?”
Clint huffs and nods, and her expression shifts to something that can only be described as completely unimpressed.
“Yeah.” Somehow she resists pinching the bridge of her nose in frustration, but it’s a close thing. “Time to switch rooms.”
—
When they’d first gotten onto the jet after finding the Hydra Assets, Natasha hadn’t really thought about how young the other man was. Sure, the Winter Soldier had a bit of a baby face of his own underneath all the grime, but he was still older than her. But the other one?
Now that she’s really getting a good look at him, sitting across from her in the interrogation room and watching her with stormy blue eyes that even she can’t decipher, she almost questions if he’s even out of his teens yet.
He has to be, she thinks about half an hour later, after really looking at him. Neither of them have said anything, and he hasn’t even done the tapping thing Clint was talking about, but she doesn’t mind. It’s more time to try and figure him out.
He’s not as young as she’d thought when she first entered the room, which settles something in her - though who’s to say how long they’ve had him. If he’s anything like her… Natasha doesn’t let that thought settle. She’d rather have plausible deniability for as long as she can.
She’s lost track of time by the time she finally decides to say anything. “Someone really did a number on that base of yours, didn’t they?”
He stares at her, and for a moment she’s actually not sure if he even understands her. Maybe he doesn’t speak English, maybe her theory really is wrong–
But no.
It’s an extra beat before it happens, but he gives an apparently nonsensical tap of his fingers on the table top. It’s a damn good thing she’s as quick as she is or she might have missed it.
Morse code.
Good.
She can’t stop her brows from shooting up ever so slightly. “You think it’s a good thing?” she asks, if only to hide her surprise at getting an answer at all.
He freezes, and for a moment, Natasha thinks she sees his mask finally slip. It’s back up in the next blink, but she’ll take the win, however small. Then his face goes blank, and his fingers don’t budge, and Natasha is forced to pause again.
“For what it’s worth,” she says when it becomes clear he’s not going to respond any further. “We do.”
She watches him closely, but he’s being careful not to react now. Of course, then that makes something else click, too. “Were you only answering Barton because you knew he hadn’t caught on?”
The kid’s got sass, apparently, and his mask falters for a second time. The twitch at the corner of his lips gives him away completely. She can’t help her amusement.
Natasha lets her shoulders relax as she leans forward to rest her elbows on the table. “He’s a smart guy, you know, but sometimes I think he can be a little oblivious. I’m sure you noticed. Bit of a one track mind.” She watches him, just making sure he’s listening as she rambles on almost lazily. It’s not quite small talk, but it’s close to it. Hopefully it’s enough to get his walls down a little more. “How long were you answering his questions without him realizing it, anyway?”
His eyes dart away. It’s the first time he’s actively avoided looking at her. And then, just when she’s sure that he’s not going to answer, something in his demeanor shifts. He taps, hesitant but deliberate, and she watches his fingers as close as possible so she doesn’t miss anything.
Pretty much the whole time.
Natasha smirks, unable to stop herself. “I can’t wait to see his face when he finally figures it out.”
Will he? He taps again, surprising her with the question.
Why is he so willing to talk to her when he won’t with Clint? Except, he’s saying he did and Clint just didn’t notice. So maybe, unlike his friend in the other room, this one…actually wants to talk. And if he’s willing to talk, there’s a good chance that he realizes that they’re on the same side.
Natasha’s brow furrows with the realization, practically watching the puzzle pieces fall into place. “You and the Winter Soldier are the ones who took the base down, aren’t you?”
It’s the answer that makes the most sense, and one she and Barton were already thinking about, considering the men’s state when SHIELD showed up. But that doesn’t answer the question of why, and that means all she can do is ask.
“Why take down Hydra?”
She nearly startles when she realizes that he’s looking at her again. His eyes are completely different now, any hint of that earlier joking long gone and replaced with something somehow cold and burning at the same time. Something tells her that he’s trying to figure her out as much as she is, him.
And for a moment, she’s uncharacteristically hopeful. She’s gotten farther than Barton, at least, and she thinks he might actually answer if he sees something like a kindred spirit in her. Instead, his entire expression shutters, and when Natasha looks at his fingers, waiting for the next line of Morse, she instead finds his hands balled into fists. A declaration of silence if she’s ever seen one.
She sighs internally but keeps her face void of anything that might give her away. “I meant what I said before. We want Hydra gone. I’d like to know if that includes you and your partner, or if maybe we might be on the same side here.”
His own blank expression doesn’t falter, and as the silence drags on, Natasha eventually admits that she's not going to make another inch of progress. Still, she’s made enough for now, and she has a feeling that enough of the puzzle has fit together for her to start coming to a few conclusions. The first of which is that this man and his partner - the damn Winter Soldier - are not their enemies.
Now she just needs to get them to realize it too.
—
Clint makes sure that he is the picture of relaxed as he leans back in the chair across from the Winter Soldier, face devoid of anything other than thoughts about his dinner plans with Nat. At least that way he won’t give away how much this guy creeps him out. And he does. The staring thing is really setting him on edge.
Clint chews the inside of his cheek as he risks a look at the Soldier’s face, holding back a flinch when he meets his eyes and finds the man still staring at him.
“Thirsty?” Clint breaks the silence as nonchalantly as possible.
The Soldier’s expression doesn’t change.
“We’ve got water. Soda?” Clint leans forward with his elbows on the table. “Coffee! Our coffee here is pretty good, actually. Way better than–”
“What do you want?” The Soldier interrupts him, his tone dark and cold, and it startles Clint so much that he doesn’t even remember what he was going to say.
A chill runs up his spine as those four simple words do an excellent job at reminding Clint who, exactly, is sitting in front of him. The man is an assassin, a living weapon, with no feelings or emotions or regrets in regards to who he kills–
At least, that’s what the files say. But it just doesn’t line up with the man Clint found in the rubble, the one who panicked when he thought it was Hydra dragging him out of the destruction, the one who made sure he stayed awake until he was sure that both he and his partner were away from that facility.
That isn’t a weapon. That’s a man, hanging onto his humanity by a thread.
Clint softens his expression. “What’s it going to take to convince you that we’re the good guys?”
The Soldier’s brow pulls low and threatening. “Just because you aren’t Hydra doesn’t mean we’re on the same side. You want to talk? Act like you’re my friend? Bring me to my partner.”
“Nat is taking a crack at your partner now, actually.” Clint answers thoughtfully, refusing to take the bait. They’d discussed having both men in the same room, but there was the matter of safety, when it came to keeping two obviously enhanced individuals ‘locked up’ together. “She’s a lot better at it than I am, if we’re being honest–”
Clint doesn’t even see the man move. One second he’s talking away, and the next he’s slamming against the wall with a metal arm across his neck, the cuffs once holding the Soldier now in pieces on the floor. He can’t hide the way that his heart starts racing in panic, nor keep his eyes from blowing wide, but he doesn’t move. He doesn’t reach his hands up to try and pry the Soldier’s arm away, doesn’t try to fight back, doesn’t do anything that would tell the Soldier he’s willing to hurt him, impossible as it might seem at the moment.
The Soldier bares his teeth and leans in close, his face mere inches from Clint’s own. “You hurt him, even one little scratch, and I’ll make sure this place looks exactly like that base did.”
Clint takes a shaky breath, careful not to avoid the Soldier’s gaze so that he knows he’s telling the truth. “We’re not going to hurt him,” he says and calmly raises his hands in surrender, proud of the way he keeps his voice from cracking. “We don’t want to hurt either of you. Okay? We want to help, I promise. Hydra is the enemy, but that doesn’t mean you two are. In fact, considering how we found you, I think we both know how you feel about them.”
The Soldier’s nose scrunches as his face contorts with fury, but the more Clint talks, the less angry he looks. He’s silent for a long while after Clint finishes, not budging his arm from where he’s pinning him in place, but not attacking anymore either.
“Prove it,” the Soldier finally says, and Clint can’t help but think, again, that he sounds so much more human than before. “Take me to my partner. Then we’ll think about talking.”
It’s something. Not a promise - Clint doesn’t think he’ll ever get something like that from the Winter Soldier - but it’s a start.
“Deal.”
—
When Clint takes the Soldier down the hall to the other interrogation room, he’s not sure what he’s expecting to find. He knows Natasha won’t actually resort to torture, but he’s still a little wary about just walking in there in the middle of whatever she is resorting to.
Except, when he peers through the window, he sees that Natasha and the other Asset aren’t actually doing anything. They’re at a stalemate, both staring each other down and neither saying a word. But when Clint reaches for the handle, barely starting to open it, Taps’ attention immediately zeroes in on the door. Clint knows the window is one way, and that Taps can’t actually see him, but that doesn’t keep the shudder from dripping down his back.
“Is the creepy staring just a thing with you two?” Clint asks the Soldier beside him, somehow still maintaining eye contact with the younger man.
Of course he doesn’t get an answer, other than the burn of the Soldier’s glare. Clint can practically feel the impatience bleeding off of him, and it’s not something he wants to test the limits of, so he clears his throat and opens the door.
Nat doesn’t look at him as they enter, though there’s a touch of amusement in her voice. “Welcome back, Barton. Did you bring us some company?”
Clint risks a quick look at the Soldier, only to find that he suddenly looks anxious in a way Clint had thought impossible before. “We came to an understanding,” he says as easily as he can, though he imagines he sounds at least a little confused.
The confusion only furthers when Taps stands up so suddenly that it yanks on the cuffs on his wrists and almost pulls him right back down. His harsh expression from before immediately twists into something akin to relief, and suddenly Clint thinks that maybe he really is just as young as he’d originally feared.
The Soldier moves before Clint can think to stop him, and Nat doesn’t even bother trying. Neither of them can do anything more than watch as the Soldier takes the other Asset’s face in his hands, turning him with care as he looks him over for cuts or bruises that weren’t there before. He even goes so far as to brush the younger man’s hair back from his eyes, running his thumb along his brow in what Clint can only call an affectionate manner.
“Are you alright?” the Soldier asks as he continues his check up. His voice is quiet, and Clint feels like he’s invading on something private as he watches the younger man’s fingers tap out an answer against the table - Morse code, Clint finally understands, far too late.
Suddenly, the protectiveness makes a lot more sense. Suddenly, so does the ruined compound.
They let it go on for another minute before Natasha speaks up, causing both Assets to tense in surprise. “As you can see, we haven’t hurt him, and we don’t want to. We just want to know what happened at that base.”
The Soldier clenches his jaw, searching his partner’s face for a long moment before Taps nods almost imperceptibly. That’s all it takes for the Soldier to drop his hands and look back at their captors, and all Clint can think as he looks at the man - his entire demeanor so different from even seconds before - is that he must be exhausted.
“We took them down,” the Soldier says plainly, leaving no room for argument.
Beside him, Taps’ eyes fall to his own hands in their cuffs. He doesn’t fight them - Clint knows it would be easy to - but he doesn’t sit down either. Slowly, he taps with one finger,
We got tired of doing their dirty work
And Clint doesn’t know how, but even the tapping of the man’s fingers screams guilt. It’s not guilt over Hydra, though. No, Clint knows what it looks like when one can do nothing but regret the blood on their hands. He’s seen it in the mirror often enough, and it bleeds off of the man in front of him, so thick that Clint fears he might drown in it.
Natasha grimaces, and Clint knows she sees it too.
“And if I told you there were more bases out there? More Hydra?” Natasha asks.
The Soldier narrows his eyes. “What are you after?”
“Nothing,” she answers with a shake of her head. “We’re going after them as it is. Taking down Hydra, making sure that Hydra is fully extinct, that’s the end goal. I’m just asking if you two want in.”
The two men share a glance and a million words pass in their silence before the Soldier answers,
“We’re in.”