Chapter Text
Two knocks and the door opens. “He’s here, Sir.”
“Thank you, Marjorie.”
Rogers nods his thanks to Fury’s assistant as he steps past her through the door. “You asked to see me, Sir?”
Fury sits back in his chair. “Have a seat, Captain. I’d like to talk to you about Barnes.”
****
“You’re sending me out?” Clint looks with cautious surprise between Fury and Coulson, who has his arms crossed and is leaning one shoulder against the wall.
“Surveillance. We need your eyes,” Fury says pointedly.
Clint clenches his jaw but he doesn’t say anything.
Fury cuts his eye over to Coulson who steps closer and opens a holographic screen, tapping periodically as he talks. “We have intelligence that a new organization is attempting to define covert routes into the U.S. for the purpose of smuggling large quantities of illegal weapons to markets in urban areas. We're told that they’ll be making trial runs in the next several weeks with the aim of beginning to move the weapons after the New Year. If the intelligence is correct, we’re talking about unprecedented numbers of weapons. There’s indication that the new routes will be water-based so we’re monitoring a number of possibilities. We don’t want to engage them at this point, just monitor and record so when they do move a shipment, we’ll be ready.”
Clint nods his understanding. Adrenaline is starting to hum through him, because even if it is a fairly standard surveillance op and he’s run scores of them, it’s been a long time since they've sent him to do anything.
Coulson opens a new screen with a map; there are dozens of red dots scattered along coastal areas. Clint immediately starts scanning them, mentally assessing the likelihood of each. He's narrowing in on the handful that he thinks have the most potential when the map skips away from where Clint's focused and zooms in tight on one of the dots.
“Lake Superior?” Clint asks with obvious skepticm. The chances of anyone trying to smuggle guns via Lake Superior in winter are close to nil. The lake doesn’t wholly freeze up very often, but it can, and the areas along the shore definitely do.
Coulson hums in agreement, but when his face takes on a decidedly apologetic expression, Clint starts to get a sinking feeling. “While it’s unlikely that they’ll be choosing such a northern route during the winter, we do need to cover all potential access points,” Coulson says, then taps the screen and a picture of a bluff-top cabin appears.
Clint curses under his breath. He’s being relegated to the lowest probability site. Obsolete. He helped save the goddamned world less than a year ago and now he’s deemed to be virtually useless. Not to mention that he hates the fucking cold – even the idea of it – ever since a fucking Ice Giant took over his head.
“Is there a problem, Agent?” Fury asks, in that friendly way that anyone who knows Fury at all knows is him being anything but friendly.
Clint stands and jabs a finger at the screen, closing it down. “No, Sir. When do I leave?”
“Flight plan has you and Barnes wheels-up in two hours.”
Clint’s head snaps up and he looks back and forth between the two men. “Barnes?”
"Mmhm,” Coulson confirms. “We want to assess his capabilities in real world situations.”
Well, that explains Coulson’s presence at this meeting, then. Clint narrows his eyes. “Then why not send him out on something with Captain America?”
“Rogers isn’t objective,” Coulson says.
That’s probably true, but Clint’s face still heats in anger. “Is this even a real op?” he grits out.
“I can assure you, Agent, that this mission has legitimate purpose,” Fury answers smoothly.
Clint doesn’t try to stop the sound of disbelief that comes from his throat.
“You have something to say?” Fury asks, cocking his head dangerously.
Clint looks Fury in the eye. “Yeah, sure. It’s a bullshit babysitting gig. If you want to get rid of me, Sir, then just fucking cut me loose now instead of sending me out to train my replacement.”
“Agent, if I wanted to be rid of you, you’d be long gone by now.”
Clint snorts derisively.
Fury leans forward ominously. “I do not give two shits what you may think of this, Agent. We need you to do your fucking job. So if you want to keep your job, then you will have your ass on that plane and you will work with Asset Barnes.”
Clint pushes an angry breath through his nose. “Yes, Sir,” he grinds out, shooting a betrayed glare at Coulson before stalking out of the office. He leaves the door pointedly open behind him.
Phil crosses the room and shuts the door with a quiet ‘snick’ before sitting down across from Fury in the chair Hawkeye vacated. He doesn’t say anything, but he doesn’t need to.
Fury rolls his eye and sighs. “Barton’s feelings aren’t my biggest concern here, Phil.”
“It was a risky play.”
Fury grins sharkishly. “Not with you in the room.”
“Maybe,” Phil concedes. “But are you sure this is a good idea? Barnes is still largely an unknown.”
Fury pauses. “We need his skills. And he needs to get out of his own head.”
“What are you hoping to accomplish here, Nick?”
Fury casts a dark glance at the closed door, then leans back in his chair and looks at Coulson. “I’ve got an asset who's coming apart at the seams and maybe the only person who can relate is sitting right next to him. Figuratively, anyway.”
“And you think isolating him with someone else who’s been mind-controlled is the way to get him out of his head?”
Fury tips his head. “You don’t think it will work?”
Phil shrugs. “It might.”
“But?”
Phil hesitates before saying, “But there’s a lot that could go wrong, too.”
Fury snorts. “Isn’t that the SHIELD motto?” A second later he waves it off and sighs. “It’s the best play I’ve got left and my gut tells me the clock is ticking on this one. Besides, I’m not running a goddamned daycare here. This Hydra bullshit decimated our numbers; we need every asset we can get. We can’t afford to sit here with our thumbs up our asses and wait to see if he comes around. If he’s not going to be useful to us, we need to find an alternative.”
Phil responds with a noncommittal hum.
“If you’ve got a better idea, I’d love to hear it.”
Phil sighs. “I don’t,” he admits, shaking his head, then, “Rogers is really okay with this?”
“He wasn’t thrilled. He’s too protective of Barnes, but I think he knows that if he can’t get over that, it’ll never work with Barnes as part of the Avengers, and he wants that badly.”
“So… killing two birds with one stone?”
Fury spreads his hands wide. “We do strive to be efficient.”
Phil huffs and makes his way out of the office.