Chapter Text
The weather is blisteringly hot. Bucky’s shirt is stuck to his back with sweat and the steering wheel is scorching his flesh hand. He’s pretty sure he could fry an egg on the other one, but he’s being careful not to touch it. The thing gets hot enough on its own with all the motors and wires running through it – the relentless assault of the sun means it’s probably red hot. He can hear the fans inside whirring.
The car’s got no air con. It’s a beat up piece of shit that SHIELD insisted was incognito. Bucky’s pretty sure they just didn’t want to shell out for something made in the 21st century, though. Apparently, when it comes to smuggling people through Central America, a tin can held together by rust and duct tape is the best plan.
Miguel isn’t helping matters either. Sure, he’s on the run from international criminals, but he could stop fidgeting for a few damn seconds. Bucky’s patience has been burned away by the heat, and the unending shuffling and sighing from the passenger seat is almost enough to make him forget that his mission is to keep the idiot alive.
“Oh man, oh man, oh man,” Miguel is whispering to himself, and his hands are tapping against any surface he can reach with no rhythm whatsoever: an insistent tap-tap taptap tap, just loud enough to grate on Bucky’s nerves. “They’re gonna kill me, man. I’m dead. I am deader than dead.”
“That’s why I’m here,” Bucky points out, but it’s no use: Miguel’s beyond hearing him. “They woulda killed you anyway after what happened in Puebla.” It’s not tactful, but if they wanted tact they should have given this mission to a different team. Neither Bucky nor Steve’s good at it. Steve at least manages polite, but Bucky doesn’t see the point in it, not if it’s not going to get him anywhere.
“Oh shit – Puebla,” Miguel moans in Spanish. And maybe Bucky should have tried polite, because it looks like he’s just wound the guy up more. Huh. Maybe, if he winds him up enough, he’ll pass out from stress and Bucky will get a few hours of peace and quiet. “They’re gonna kill me, man.”
Bucky’s gonna kill Steve for wriggling out of this one. Important briefing at the Triskelion, his ass. Here was Bucky thinking they were partners. Steve better buy out the whole damn bar when Bucky gets back. And he’s taking all his drinks with ice.
“Agent Barnes.” Coulson’s voice says through his earpiece. It is as calm and cool as ever.
“Yeah,” Bucky says, grateful for a distraction from Miguel’s whining.
“The satellite’s reading a heat signature ahead. It’s one person, not close, but be aware. Two klicks ahead, on your left.”
“Sure it ain’t another goat?” Bucky asks. The last three heat signatures had been goats.
“Most likely, but it’s best to be cautious.”
“Easy to say in that nice, air-conditioned control room of yours,” he replies, glaring at the road as there’s no way he can glare at Coulson. “It’s fucking 120° out here.”
“It’s 98°, Agent Barnes,” Coulson replies. He sounds blank, but Bucky knows he’s laughing.
“Maybe outside, but I’m in a greenhouse on wheels.”
“Buy yourself an ice cream.”
“You can buy me a tub when I get back,” Bucky replies. He’s warming up to Coulson. Of all the SHIELD agents they work with, Coulson’s probably the one who comes closest to getting how his mind works. At least he doesn’t look at Bucky like he’s going to snap and kill everyone every five seconds.
“You’re coming up on the heat signature. It should be approximately five hundred metres away on your left. Do you see anything?”
Bucky looks, but there’s no change from the scenery he’s been enjoying for the last three days, not even a goat: brown land, yellow grass, the odd tree and mountains in the distance.
“Nothin’,” he says, letting out a huff as he frowns. Beside him Miguel is still bemoaning his life choices, which Bucky agrees with wholeheartedly. If it weren’t for the deal Miguel made with SHIELD, Bucky would be very much in the camp that thinks the world is better off without Miguel in it. But there is a deal and Bucky’s got a job to do. He turns his attention back to looking for the unknown heat signature instead. Not even any goats this time. Someone in SHIELD ops is fucking with him. “Sure you’re not just lookin’ at a really big bird?”
“Maybe,” Coulson says, but Bucky keeps an eye out anyway.
It happens fast, so fast Bucky can barely remember the details later. Miguel’s despair has made his head flop back against the head rest, while Bucky’s sitting up, alert and looking out to the left.
He’s aware of a blur. He blinks, like his eyes are messing up. Then there’s a rush of air behind his neck. It doesn’t feel like a bullet. Something tickles his skin and when he turns to Miguel there’s a fucking arrow sticking out of his throat. His eyes and mouth hang open.
The rust bucket screeches to a halt and Bucky’s ducking for cover instinctively, his foot slamming down.
“Shooter. Shit,” he says to Coulson. “Miguel’s dead. Fucking arrow.” He spits the word in disbelief and looks again at the man he was supposed to be protecting, but the arrow’s still there, sticking out of his neck like it’s fucking mocking him, a slow drip of blood oozing down from it. Who uses a fucking arrow?
“Arrow?” Coulson asks in his ear, but Bucky doesn’t answer. There are more important things right now.
He’s got a gun in his hand and he’s out the door, starting towards the tree. It’s got to be the tree. Whoever it is has to be in there because there’s nowhere else to hide.
“Do not engage!” Coulson calls. His cool is all but gone. Bucky’s never heard him agitated before. “Do not engage! I repeat. Agent Barnes, do you copy? I repeat: do not engage.”
Like hell. Some fucker with a bow and arrow takes out his man? Bucky’s engaging; he’s gonna shoot the fucker in the head.
“Bastard’s got nowhere to run,” he growls. “I’ve got him.”
“Barnes. That was an order.”
But Bucky only follows the orders he wants to these days, and he’s already running for the tree. He can see a shape in it now, black against the bright sky between the branches. He’s got him and he raises his gun to fire.
An arrow comes flying at him and Bucky deflects it with his left arm, a clang of metal on metal. The next one comes before he can react, though, and it hits him in the neck with all the force of a fast ball. It’s the shock that sends him stumbling, even as he’s reaching up to stop the blood that isn’t coming.
Steve’s never gonna let him live it down if he’s killed by fucking Robin Hood.
Bucky’s vision blurs. His knees buckle. His fingers come away from his neck clean apart from sweat and a slight red smear, but he feels the heaviness of lead in his arm. Sedative. The familiar lassitude drips through him and the world seems to slow.
“Barnes. Report!” Coulson’s yelling. He sounds worried. That’s new. Almost like Bucky’s a person, not just an asset. He opens his mouth to make a comment, but his tongue lolls in his mouth and all his words go spinning from his mind like little spiders. He feels himself hit the ground dimly, like a faded dream, mind already drifting away.
*
Bucky wakes up in a private SHIELD medical room. He can tell from the insignia and from the way the nurse looking him over is simultaneously caring and about two seconds away from drawing a gun on him. They watch each other warily for a few minutes until she walks away. She doesn’t run, but Bucky has the distinct impression that she wants to get out of there as quickly as she can.
No one’s watching over his bedside, which he’s grateful for because, when the fog in his brain clears away and he can piece together the last things he remembers, he knows he failed his mission in a quite spectacular manner.
Miguel’s dead and, with him, all the information he had on his former associates. The world won’t grieve his passing, but it’s going to be that much harder to bring the bastards down now. Bucky hadn’t even managed to get a glance at the guy who did it, beyond a shadowy figure perched in a tree.
He pounds his head back into the pillow with a frustrated groan and assesses his state.
He feels a little groggy, but mostly with it. There’s an IV in his arm and some pain across his left side. He doesn’t remember getting hit and it feels more wide-spread than a bullet wound – an arrow wound, he supposes. Maybe the guy had kicked him while he was down. Bucky really hopes they run into each other again because he’s going to have fun bringing the asshole to his knees.
There’s a whoosh as the door opens to reveal Coulson and the nurse from before. Bucky ignores the pain in his side to drag himself into a sitting position; he’s not comfortable laying down like an invalid in front of his superior. It makes him feel vulnerable, even if he knows a dozen ways to take both of them down without even leaving his bed.
Coulson puts something down on the bedside table and Bucky turns to see a pot of ice cream sitting beside him.
“As promised,” Coulson says, producing a spoon from a pocket.
“Not really hungry,” Bucky tells him. Coulson just shrugs and proceeds to open the tub himself and start eating it.
“From what we can tell, you haven’t suffered any major injuries,” Coulson says. “Whatever he hit you with was a heavy duty sedative, but it doesn’t seem to have any side effects.”
“My side,” Bucky says and Coulson frowns.
“Yes. The way you fell meant your left arm fell across your body,” he explains. Coulson never says ‘metal arm’ or ‘prosthetic,’ always ‘left arm’ without even the slightest hesitation. It’s got to be a calculated move, but Bucky can’t deny that he appreciates it. “The temperature of the metal meant that you have some burns to the skin where it was in contact.”
Bucky grunt and lets the nurse check his eyes, following the soft directions: look up, look down.
“You were very lucky,” Coulson says after swallowing another spoonful of ice cream. “I told you not to engage, Agent Barnes. I gave you a specific order and you disobeyed.” He pauses and cocks his head to one side slightly, weighing Bucky up and down. Bucky doesn’t squirm or look away. “You want to tell me why you didn’t listen?” Bucky shrugs. “Captain Rogers and I both vouched for you. After what happened in Belarus there were a lot of people who worried you were not suited to this line of work.”
Fucking Belarus. Is that never going to stop coming back to bite him in the ass? Bucky knows it’s more than that, though. He knows the whispers have been following him since Steve brought him in, freshly un-brainwashed and still confused about which way was up.
“Guess I’m on probation again, then,” he says, trying to sound casual about it. He screwed up. The first solo mission since Minsk and he’d well and truly fucked it up.
“Perhaps not,” Coulson says. He nods to the nurse and she leaves with ruthless efficiency, so it’s just the two of them, Coulson eating the ice cream, Bucky staring at the grey walls. SHIELD takes non-descript to new levels.
“Tell me what happened,” Coulson says.
“I didn’t see him,” Bucky starts.
“Before that. Don’t tell me what you didn’t see. Tell me what you did see,” Coulson prompts.
So Bucky describes the landscape. The arid brown of it all, how even the splashes of green had seemed brown. He describes the heat haze blurring the road ahead, creating mirages so you could barely tell where the horizon was. He tells Coulson about how tense Miguel was, wound tight as a spring, ready to snap at any second. The tap-tap-tap of his fingers on the car door.
“The windows were open, why?” asks Coulson.
“It was hotter’n hell,” Bucky protests. “And it’s not like they were bullet proof. At least with them down I didn’t have to deal with shattering glass and we could get a bit of a breeze. Didn’t think you’d like it if your snitch baked to death before you could squeeze him for information.”
“I’m not accusing you of anything,” Coulson promises. He pauses as though he’s going to say something else, but he holds his tongue and takes another spoonful of ice cream instead. “What happened next?”
“I didn’t see nothin’ but trees,” Bucky says, going over it in his mind. There should have been something, the glare of a scope or something, but he can’t remember anything. He shakes his head. “And I was looking.” He should have seen something. That’s his job.
“Tell me about the shot,” Coulson says.
“Didn’t see that, either. Or hear it.”
“Bows are virtually silent,” Coulson says. “That’s not a surprise.”
“I saw… something like a blur,” Bucky admits. “Didn’t look like a bullet. I didn’t react quick enough.”
“Even if it had been, the odds of hitting a moving target at that distance were minimal,” Coulson says.
“I shoulda-“
“What happened then?” Coulson asks quickly, before Bucky can finish his sentence.
“I felt something on the back of my neck, like a breeze or… just something really light.”
“Can I see?”
Bucky leans forwards and Coulson cranes to see the back of his neck.
“Not a scratch on you,” he says. “How much space would you say there was between you and the headrest?”
“Couple’a inches, maybe,” Bucky hazards.
“Hmm…” Coulson’s thoughtful hum is not helpful.
“You don’t need to tell me,” Bucky says. “It was an impossible shot.”
“Not impossible, just highly unlikely.”
“With a bow and arrow?” Bucky asks incredulously. He’s a damn good shot himself with a rifle. Highest ratings back in his army days. More kills to his name than any other sniper he’s met, and he’s met a few. But that shot… Bucky hadn’t been driving slow, and it had barely kissed the back of his neck to find its mark in the man next to him. That shot was impossible.
“I have a theory,” Coulson says, “but I’d like to talk to you and Steve about it at the same time, and I’ll need to check something first.”
“You don’t want to hear what happened next?” Bucky asks. They hadn’t even got to the part where Bucky disobeyed a direct order yet.
“I told you to apprehend the suspect. You were injured in the line of duty,” Coulson says as he scrapes the last dregs of ice cream from the tub. “I apologise for putting you in danger.”
Bucky stares at him.
“That’s not what happened.”
“I have a recording that says differently,” Coulson says with his usual calm. “It’s understandable that you’re confused, Agent Barnes. The sedative you were injected with packed quite a punch. I suggest you sleep it off, I’m sure things will all seem clearer tomorrow.”
Coulson walks to the door. He’s got a point about the sedative, because Bucky’s usually quicker than this.
“Phil!” He calls as the door whooshes open. Coulson half turns in the doorway. “Thanks.”
“You’re welcome, James.”
*
The SHIELD databases aren’t much help. He looks up ‘deaths by arrow,’ ‘archery skills,’ and ‘known archers,’ but comes up suspiciously blank on all of them.
Bucky even looks up Miguel, but comes up against the little blue box that tells him he doesn’t have the necessary clearance to access this information.
It was his damn mission, for fuck’s sake!
A guy across the room gives him a sharp look when Bucky brings his fist down on the table, but one look at the metal arm and he changes his mind.
Steve hates the whispers that still follow Bucky through the SHIELD corridors. He gets this stubborn look on his face and a set to his shoulders that Bucky knows is him tensing for a fight; Steve’s bound and determined to fight the whole world somehow. Bucky doesn’t mind them, mostly because it means people leave him the hell alone. The only people whose opinions bother him don’t give a shit as long as he does his job. And Steve, of course.
Steve’s in the gym when Bucky heads down to beat out his frustration on a punching bag or two. he lets Bucky punch out his frustration for a while before coming over to hold the bag steady for him and they stay like that for a few minutes, only the sounds of Bucky’s breathing and the blows of his hands hitting the material filling the air.
“This isn’t still about the mission, is it?” Steve asks when Bucky pauses for a moment to push his hair out of his eyes.
“Sort of,” Bucky says. He takes another swing at the bag with his left arm, at an angle that almost sends it swinging out of Steve’s grasp.
“You can’t win ‘em all,” Steve says. It would be sage advice if it weren’t so damn hypocritical coming out of Steve’s mouth. In retaliation, Bucky hits the bag again, making Steve fumble, just to prove a point.
“That’s not it,” Bucky groans with frustration. He starts unwrapping his hands, the frustration not lessening at all. “I just want to know what happened, but there’s nothing in the database. No known operatives who use a bow and arrow.”
“That’s hardly a surprise,” Steve says.
“Yes, it is!” Bucky snaps. “It was a perfect shot, Steve. You don’t just roll out of bed and make a perfect shot. Not with a fucking long bow. There’s no way that was the guy’s first time. He’s been doing this for years; you don’t get that good without leaving some evidence behind, and you’re telling me SHIELD has nothing on him?”
“If he’s that good…” Steve says, but he doesn’t sound convinced. “OK. So it’s a bit strange.”
“And Coulson knows something,” Bucky continues. “When I mentioned the arrow he knew exactly who it was.”
Steve frowns. “You’re sure?”
“Positive,” Bucky tells him. “He said he’d fill us in later, but it’s been three weeks. No missions and no Coulson.” They cross the room to the benches and Bucky takes a huge gulp of water. “Then today I try to look up the mission, see if there’s anything there, and I don’t have clearance.”
“But it’s your mission.”
“I know. But apparently I don’t have clearance to access my own mission report. An’ I’d bet dollars to donuts it’s got everything to do with that archer.”
Steve contemplates the floor for a moment, finding something in the scratches and scuffs that makes sense to him, but Bucky’s got nothing.
“If they had information about that mission and they didn’t give it to us…” Steve says. “They put the mission at risk – and you.” He stands up with a purpose and Bucky follows; he knows that look on Steve’s face far too well – It’s the righteously pissed off look he always gets when he’s about to start a fight with someone bigger than him. Not that there are many people bigger than him anymore, but still:
It’s a look that usually means Bucky’s gonna have to bust some heads.
*
It’s not just Bucky’s reputation as a homicidal maniac that has everyone getting out of their way as they stride towards Coulson’s office. Steve’s got the human bulldozer impression down to a fine art and Bucky just sort of follows in his wake, glaring at anyone who holds eye contact too long.
Steve walks through Coulson’s door without knocking and, while Bucky is angry, he really hopes that they don’t get into any permanent trouble for this. SHIELD had been Steve’s idea, the only place he found to help him after Bucky went MIA. They’d given him some spiel about making a difference, offered him a role in their experiment, and promised to get him the answers he wanted.
And they’d delivered. Still, Bucky’s never trusted them and he knows Steve’s warier now after getting to know exactly what he’d signed up for; the problem with spies is that they compartmentalise everything. Bucky understands why, but if the right hand doesn’t know what the left hand’s doing, there’s a distinct possibility they’ll end up hitting each other.
Steve’s all about honesty; he’s not cut out for the spy game. Bucky’s better at it. HYDRA taught him how to keep secrets, both for them and from them. Doesn’t mean he likes being kept in the dark, though. He’s had enough of being an unthinking weapon in his life; he likes to know which way he’s being pointed these days.
But even if SHIELD’s full of smoke, mirrors, and vipers, Bucky’s not sure what else he’d do – he’s got no illusions, there’s no way back for him: normal is a dream he gave up a long time back and SHIELD is the closest he can get to being a good guy. He’s just managing to settle in, he’s not ready to fit himself in somewhere else just yet.
In Coulson’s office, the man himself is sitting calmly at his desk, as though he’s been waiting for them to arrive. He probably has. There’s not much that goes on in SHIELD that Coulson doesn’t know.
“Please, Agent Rogers, Agent Barnes, take a seat.”
“What’s going on?” Steve asks, straight to the point as ever. He stays standing, but Bucky sits down. There’s no need to be uncomfortable.
“Agent Hill is on her way, then we’ll be able to answer your questions.” Coulson straightens some papers on his desk. They don’t need straightening, but that in combination with his tone means that Steve’s a little off balance; he’d come in expecting a fight, not a welcome, So Bucky makes sure his glare conveys that he knows exactly what Coulson’s doing. Coulson meets his eyes and offers up a brief nod as Steve sits down.
“I apologise for the delay, but changing your clearance levels took longer than I anticipated,” Coulson says. That makes Bucky start. He knew that the information was classified, the database had made that much clear, but the idea of having his clearance level changed hadn’t even crossed his mind. Bucky’s not exactly flavour of the month as far as SHIELD is concerned. “There will be some extra forms to sign, but as soon as you do you’ll officially be Level 6 agents.”
Bucky blinks. That’s quite a bump. It’s no wonder it took so long. He’s officially a Level 2 agent, though he knows a few things he shouldn’t – Steve is Level 5 by necessity, everything to do with Project Rebirth was.
“Level 6?” Steve asks. “Is this about the archer?”
“I’m afraid I don’t know what you’re referring to,” Coulson says. “Although you could try asking me again in five minutes.”
Maria Hill enters without fanfare, but Bucky’s immediately aware of her. Coulson, he’s used to, but Hill always reminds him of a panther. She makes the hairs prickle on the back of his neck and he knows that if she had to, she’d shoot him in the head right then and there with military precision.
“Rogers, Barnes,” she says by way of greeting.
“Ma’am,” Steve replies, but Bucky just nods. She holds out a tablet computer to him.
“I need you to sign and scan your palm,” she says. “The right one, obviously.”
“Do I get to know what I’m signing?” Bucky asks, looking at the tablet without taking it.
“Standard Level 6 security policy and waiver. You agree to keep our secrets, we agree to keep yours. Any violation is viewed as an act of treason.”
“Treason?” Steve asks.
“SHIELD has a lot of secrets, Agent Rogers. Many of them are matters of national or international security. You should know – you’re one of them.” She makes it all seem matter of fact.
Bucky looks over at Coulson again, who is still serene, before he takes the tablet. A quick scan of the document reveals little beyond what Maria’s told them already. He takes the stylus and puts down his signature, before laying his palm flat on the screen for a scan.
Steve looks alarmed for a moment at Bucky’s willingness to sign, but documents are just documents, after all, so Bucky shrugs and hands over the tablet. If he needs to break the rules, then he’ll do what he has to, some words on a screen aren’t exactly going to stop him.
Steve takes more time to read his way through and Bucky’s got to be impressed by Hill and Coulson’s patience. They don’t even twitch.
“Seems alright,” he says after a minute, before copying Bucky’s actions.
“Welcome to level 6,” says Agent Hill as she takes the tablet back.
“You’ll probably regret that,” Coulson says. Bucky ignores him, taking it as a piece of mindless humour, but Steve looks worried. Maybe he’s right; Coulson rarely says anything without purpose. As though nothing out of the ordinary had happened, Coulson moves on: “We have an assignment for you.”
“I thought you said that this was about the archer,” Steve argues. The stubborn look is coming back into his eyes and his chin rises just that little bit higher.
“That’s not what I said,” Coulson corrects. “But it is about him. He’s your target.”
“You know who he is?” Bucky asks, sitting up straighter. He sees Agent Hill’s lips purse. Whoever this guy is, she’s not a fan.
“Sort of,” Coulson says. He raises a remote control and the screen on the side wall comes on, showing a picture. It takes a moment for Bucky to work out what he’s looking at. There’s the blue of the sky and straight lines of black cutting through the image, lens flare from the sun and a black shape that resolves into the shape of a man, crouched, holding a bow, with a hump on his back that must be a quiver of arrows.
“This is Hawkeye,” Hill says. “He’s an assassin. He uses a bow and arrow for preference, but there are sources that credit him with kills using other weaponry.”
“Okay,” Steve says. “What else do we know?” Agent Hill looks uncomfortable.
“He never misses,” Coulson provides when Agent Hill doesn’t say anything.
“Everyone misses sometimes,” Bucky says. “There are always unknown variables.”
“He doesn’t,” Coulson says. “Or so they claim.”
“Who are ‘they’?” Steve asks. No one answers.
“SHIELD believes he is responsible for a number of prominent assassinations over the last ten to fifteen years,” Hill continues.
“How many is ‘a number?’” Steve asks. This time he gets an answer.
“Anywhere between a dozen and a hundred,” Coulson replies. “Exact figures are hard to pin down.”
Bucky snorts a laugh because ‘anywhere between twelve and a hundred’ isn’t just a rough estimate, it’s a joke. “Got any better pictures of him than that?” he asks, not holding out much hope.
“We have one other picture,” Hill says.
“Two,” Coulson interrupts. Hill’s mouth purses again.
“One confirmed picture,” Hill counters and Coulson doesn’t argue further. He clicks the remote again and an even blurrier picture appears.
“What is that?” Steve asks, obviously as confused by the image as Bucky is.
“This picture was taken at Alexei Dmitriev’s fiftieth birthday party,” Hill says.
“I’ve heard that name,” says Steve.
“He was a prominent member of the Russian government, formerly a general in charge of a number of off-the-books operations.”
“Didn’t he die?”
“Three minutes after this picture was taken,” Coulson confirms. “While entertaining a young man in his private room, two floors above where this picture was taken.”
“And where’s our guy?” Bucky asks. Hill points to the window.
“That’s a foot.” Bucky almost applauds the level of disbelief in Steve’s voice.
“It’s Hawkeye’s foot,” Coulson says.
“So you’ve got someone who’s seen him, then? Someone who can recognise him?” Steve asks.
“Not yet,” Agent Hill says. Her expression is getting sourer by the moment. “But the timing, the location and the method of death—”
“I thought Dmitriev died of heart failure,” Bucky says. “From over exertion.” It had been an article in the newspaper, worth a chuckle at the breakfast table.
“That’s what the Russian government claims, yes,” Agent Hill agrees. “But we have reason to believe they’re not being entirely truthful on the subject.”
“What reason?” Bucky asks.
“A post mortem,” Coulson says, clicking the remote again. A Russian document appears on the screen. Steve looks across at Bucky, who is already reading it, and it definitely wasn’t heart failure, excepting the fact that his heart stopped beating – because it had been penetrated by a sharp object.
“It says ‘consistent with a knife,’” Bucky points out. “Not an arrow.”
“The witness insists that the man who did it was on the window ledge at the time,” Agent Hill says. “The knife was thrown.”
“Any evidence on the knife?”
“The fingerprints of a man who’s been dead for twenty years,” Coulson says. “And apparently it belonged to him, too.”
“What about the arrows?” Bucky asks. “The one he shot me with was modified – it injected me with a sedative. That sort of thing is specialised, you’ve got to be able to track them somehow.”
“No arrows were found in Mexico,” Coulson says, his voice firm and clear. “Only two arrows have ever been recovered, both were from early on in his career and they were standard arrows that could be purchased from sporting goods shops. We believe that since then he has started making his own.”
“I’m getting the impression you don’t have a whole lot of facts on this guy,” Steve says.
“You’d be right,” Hill replies.
“What’s the other picture?” Bucky asks before they get off topic. “You said there was another picture.”
Hill and Coulson exchange a look. Bucky can’t read it properly, but it’s clear that there’s an unspoken argument going on.
“There’s a theory,” Coulson says.
“Based on circumstance and hearsay,” Hill interjects.
“It would explain the name and the arrows,” Coulson protests.
“It’s a longshot and it has no real evidence to support it,” Hill says, folding her arms.
“The way I see it,” Steve tells them, “you don’t have a lot of real evidence on this guy to begin with. I’ll take the long shot.”
Coulson presses his remote again with a small smile;. Hill breathes out through her nose heavily. It’s not a sigh, but it’s probably as close as she gets to one.
The first thing Bucky sees is purple. The picture is of the inside of a circus tent. The crowd brackets it and, in the centre of the ring is a child, dressed from head to toe in purple, some of which sparkles. There’s a mask on his face, pointing up at both sides, and a smile beneath it that seems to dare the world to challenge it. The bow in his hand is what Bucky’s attention seizes upon.
“That’s him.”
“That is the Amazing Hawkeye,” Coulson agrees.
“Allegedly,” Hill says. “It’s a twenty year old photograph supplied by someone who was five years old at the time.”
“The name matches, and the timeline,” Coulson says and Bucky can tell that this is a pet project of his.
“The girl called him ‘the amazing hawk guy, ‘“ Hill says.
“An easy mistake to make.”
Hill doesn’t look convinced.
“Is there anything about this guy that is confirmed?” Bucky asks, breaking up their silent argument.
“Yes,” Coulson says. “Up until about 5 years ago he worked alone, exclusively.”
“But that changed,” Steve prompts.
“Yes. We’re not sure how or why, but somehow he ended up falling in with this woman,” Coulson says and clicks his remote, bringing up a picture ofa woman on the screen. A wide-brimmed hat hides most of her face and all that can be seen is a dark red smile and the curve of her neck. “We have far more images of her.” He clicks through image after image. None of them show her face clearly, and if Bucky hadn’t been told otherwise, he would have thought they were different people: blondes, brunettes and red heads in outfits ranging from running gear to ball gowns.
“Who is she?”
“She’s known as the Black Widow,” Hill says. “And everything that implies is true. We believe she’s one of 28 female operatives trained as part of a Russian black op codenamed ‘Red Room.’”
“Let me guess, Dmitriev was involved,” Steve says with a huff.
“We believe so,” Hill agrees. “Based on their relationship and what little we know of the Red Room, it is our understanding that Hawkeye’s actions may have been revenge.”
“What do we know about her?”
“Little more than we do about him,” Coulson says. “She’s an expert at infiltration, hand-to-hand combat and assassination. As far as we can tell, she has no known associates or contacts besides Hawkeye. When she left the Red Room programme to join him, she burned all her previous aliases.”
“It takes a lot to do something like that,” Bucky says. “This guy must be important to her.”
“So in order to go catch the master assassin, we just have to go after the other master assassin,” Steve says, deadpan. “Please tell me we’ve got something else to go on.”
“The information about all suspected activity for both Hawkeye and the Black Widow has been made available to you,” Hill says. “Agent Coulson will fill you in on your mission details.” She checks her watch. “I need to be going. Congratulations on the promotion and good luck with your assignments.”
And then she is gone, leaving behind the steady, efficient beat of her boots on the floor of the corridor, fading away.
“So this is what we needed level 6 clearance for? Ghost stories and unsubstantiated rumours?” Steve looks unimpressed as he stares across the desk at Coulson. Bucky’s happy to let him do the talking as he pulls up the files he now has access to on his phone and starts looking through them. He can’t deny that, unlike Steve, he’s actually looking forward to this. He’s been on milk runs and simple jobs since he came to SHIELD, never out of sight of someone of rank, babysat every step of the way. But this seems like something different; the promotion and the vague mission parameters imply that they’re going to get the chance to do this their own way.
Eye witness testimony is notoriously terrible, but this seems worse than usual. There’s no way half the things these people are reporting are true, even the police reports – especially the police reports – are full of hyperbole and ridiculous assertions. And, going by the descriptions, Hawkeye could be anything from a teenager to an elderly man, and Black Widow could be anything at all. The only thing every report agrees on about her is that she’s attractive and uses it to her advantage.
“We have a lead,” Coulson says. “Because we know that Hawkeye was involved in the failure of the mission in Mexico, we were able to trace some communications between him and Black Widow.”
“She wasn’t there, though. It was just him,” Bucky says.
“We believe the Widow may have been responsible for Hawkeye being able to find you. Your route was only known to a few agents.”
“A leak?”
“No. We suspect some sort of tracer, maybe a radioactive isotope. We may never know for sure.” Coulson shrugs. “However, we were able to gather information that both Hawkeye and Black Widow were due in Lyon three days ago. We have reason to believe they are going after this man.” Coulson brings up another image on the screen of a man with more jowl than chin. “He’s a major figure in French business and a substantial amount of money was placed on his head.”
“So we’re going to Lyon? Steve says.
“Yes. Monsieur Lefevre’s itinerary will be made available to you.”
*
Lyon is a dead end. Literally.
Monsieur Lefevre is found dead in his car an hour before Steve and Bucky touch down in Lyon-St Exupery.
They’re too late in Cairo, Johannesburg and Los Angeles as well. London turns out to be a red herring. They’re chasing ghosts and shadows, and whenever they get close, their quarry slips through their fingers. There’s nothing concrete, just rumours and stories.
Bucky’s starting to think that this is all some huge practical joke. But at least he can enjoy the trip. An all-expenses paid world tour; life could be worse.