Chapter Text
“Aww, alien robot invasions.”
Clint Barton, master marksman, and avenging archer collapses onto the grimy metal seats of the empty subway cart, a nearly depleted quiver of arrows and his collapsible bow thudding onto the seat beside him. He runs a bandaged hand through his sandy blonde hair, still covered in dry clumps of blue alien robot goop that he couldn’t fully wash off.
In fairness, Stark had issued a warning to the team before he blew up the robots from the inside, but in Clint’s defence, he was also the only member of the team there that couldn’t literally fly away from the splash zone, no thanks to Thor and Carol who had immediately zipped off without offering him a ride as soon as the words “implode” and “alien gunk” left Tony’s mouth. There’s now a sample of blue alien goop in a test tube sitting somewhere on Stark’s desk waiting to be analysed, sourced straight from Clint’s now ruined Avengers uniform. He tries again in vain to get the goop out with his hands before giving up.
“State of the art shower and bathrooms in Avengers Tower, but not a single extra bottle of shampoo lying around, thanks a bunch Stark.” he grumbles to himself. “Should’ve known that Thor had a twelve step hair care routine.”
Now Clint was taking the train back to his apartment in Bed-Stuy. He supposes that he could have crashed at Avengers Tower, maybe have stayed aboard the SHIELD Helicarrier after the team handed over some extra alien goop samples, but he misses his dog and wants nothing more than to binge the third season of Dog Cops from his complete DVD set. To sink into the familiar, Clint shaped indent of his couch with a slice of pizza and Lucky on his feet.
As the train rattled to his stop, Clint picks up his gear, groaning as his knees cracked standing up, and makes his way up the stairs and out of the station.
Immediately, Clint knows something is wrong.
You don’t get to hang around the Avengers, fighting crime and supervillains on the daily without developing a serious Shit-is-about-to-go-down-o-meter, and this… Well, maybe shit isn’t going down, not exactly, but something is definitely wrong. The buildings are all off, there aren’t enough flashy, LED shop signs or social media trap cafes. The regular bodegas are around, but the signs all look mysteriously newer. The people around him are decked out in suits and minidresses that he hasn’t seen in vogue since––
Since…
Aww futz!
Clint rushes over to the closest news stand, almost barreling over a man in maroon plaid pants who lets out a few rather creative swears at him. If Clint weren’t so much in a panic, he’d have memorised a few to throw around Cap, see what would get a bigger “Language!” out of him, but as it was, he snatches up the first newspaper that he sees.
“THE NEW YORK TIMES: MEN WALK ON MOON!” proclaims the headline, “MONDAY, JULY 21st, 1969”.
Clint’s heart plummets to his converse clad feet.
No… no no no no no this isn’t happening this isn’t––
Clint whirls around to where he had just left the station and it’s.
Gone.
The station entrance had disappeared entirely, as if it never even existed at all. In its place is a sewer grate, and pedestrians are walking past it in their go-go boots and chelseas like nothing was amiss. As if a large, fuck off staircase and subway sign didn’t evaporate in front of them.
“Hey Cupid! You gotta pay to read it!” A voice calls from behind him.
Clint turns back to face the beleaguered looking stalls person, and puts down the paper,
“Right, sorry man, sorry.”
He flashes him an apologetic smile before hurrying away, ducking around the corner into the nearest alley. Clint slumps down behind one of the bins, arrows clattering as they collapse with him. His heart is racing and his vision is clouding and he’s––
Breathe, Barton, breathe.
This time the voice sounds an awful lot like Kate Bishop, fellow Hawkeye and best friend extraordinaire. Clint sucks in a breath and squeezes his eyes shut, releasing the breath with a sigh.
Okay Barton, what do you know?
“It’s 1969. According to The Times, Armstrong has just finished hopping around the moon. I recognise the family delis and shops, so chances are we’re still somewhere in, Bed-Stuy, Brooklyn.” Clint says, replying to the imaginary Kate and feeling a little silly for it.
Good. And no you're not silly. This is helping you, isn't it? Anyways, how did you get here?
“I took the subway, the entrance is gone now though, so I’m stuck.”
Alright, how do you get back?
Clint laughs a short, hysterical laugh.
“Wish I knew, Katie-Kate, wish I knew."
Then it’s about time we changed that, don’t you think? Let’s get a lay of the land. Also, don’t call me that.
“Whatever you say, Hawkeye”
Strapping on his quiver and slinging his bow over his shoulder, Clint turns to face the wall behind him. A fire escape ladder lines up the side of the building wall. He could climb them, but the attention he’d draw, rattling the rusty metal as he makes his ascent would probably alert the building tenants. It’d be pretty damn hard to explain why he is sneaking up a building armed in tactical gear without people assuming the worst. Instead, Clint reaches into his quiver and draws out his grappling hook arrow, and in one smooth motion, pulls the bowstring back, sending the arrow up where it wedges itself between the top railings of the fire escape. With a tug, Clint pulls himself up, hauling himself over the ledge and onto the building rooftop.
Clint casts a glance over the view.
In terms of sight lines, it’s hardly the most optimal building in New York, but for an old brownstone, he could see a fair amount of the neighbourhood and borough from here. The layout of Bed-Stuy is nearly the same. The sun is starting to set over Brooklyn, casting the borough in a familiar deep, golden glow. For a moment, the Brooklyn of 1969 looks a lot like the Brooklyn he’d left behind in the 21st century, and Clint finds it oddly comforting that in over 50 years, that much hasn’t changed about the place. If he squints his eyes, he could just about make out the familiar skyline of Lower Manhattan across the East River, and what looks a lot like the– wait.
Clint doubles back and frowns.
It’s faint, but he notices a familiar symbol, a circular window outfitted with two sets of intersecting, parallel lines with the ends curling outwards. Clint feels his heart jolt in his chest, and the mini Kate in his head lets out a little victory yelp of excitement.
Clint, oh my god! That’s the–
“–Sanctum Sanctorum. Kate, Doctor Strange’s weird eye necklace thing-y, the time stone, that’s my ticket out!”
Well what are you waiting for, Hawkeye?
Clint hops over the ledge and slides down the tightly corded cable attached to his arrow. The moment his feet touch the ground, Clint yanks it down, and runs out of the alley. He skids around the building corner as he retracts the cable and shoves the arrow back into his quiver.
The distance from Bed-Stuy to Bleecker Street would take him about two hours to walk, one and half if he hurries. He doubts his 21st century cash would be accepted on the subway so he'll have to make a run for it; Clint doesn’t want to have to stay in 1969 any longer than he has to.
By the time Clint gets to 177A Bleecker Street, the sun had long since set, and the moon was steadily creeping along the sky. He’d narrowly avoided several altercations with some shady figures in low tipped hats, others in thick leather jackets with roaring motorcycles who’d taken a look at his bow and arrows and decided he meant trouble. Clint's not overly keen to draw any more unnecessary attention to himself. He’s watched enough sci-fi time travel movies to know that one misstep, and he could change the course of history forever. Probably. Clint isn’t quite sure actually, but he’s not about to doubt the logic of Back to the Future now, especially because it’s all the time travel knowledge he’s got. He’s now sneaking from rooftop to rooftop, hopefully this way he can avoid any altercations and not accidentally incite a gang war.
As he lands on the roof of the Sanctum Sanctorum opposite its ornate, circular window, he notices from afar a lone, hooded figure on the adjacent rooftop, dressed all in black. The figure is wearing some sort of matching set of wrist gadgets on their arms and a pair of red goggles beneath the hood, obscuring any other identifiable features not hidden by their mask. They fire some sort of grappling line at the roof of the Sanctorum from their wrist gadget, and slides down the cable to reach the other end of the rooftop. He watches as they retract the grappling line and how it seems to magically fold itself back into whatever was on their wrist.
Now, Clint’s no super genius playboy inventor like Tony is, but it doesn’t take a whole lot of brain cells to know that sort of tech had yet to be developed in the late-60s. Which means that whoever’s on the roof with him is probably from the same time as he is too, only, what side were they on? He doesn’t recognise any of the particular identifiers on their suit, so it’s no superhero or agent he knows back home. Were they at the Sanctum for the same reason he was, to borrow the time stone to send them home? Or were they on some sort of time heist of their own?
Only one way to find out.
Treading lightly, Clint makes his way over the roof and onto the narrow ledge running along the exterior walls of the Sanctum Sanctorum. From his peripheral, he can see that the figure is trying to break in the window, but some sort of invisible force was preventing them from even making contact with the glass. They’re getting increasingly agitated, he can tell, which is probably why they don’t even notice him until he says:
“Hey there.”
The figure turns sharply, now on high alert and levels their wrist at his face, only, the movement causes them to lose their balance on the ledge and they start to tumble backwards. Clint shoots out an arm to bring them flat against his chest. Balancing precariously against the building, Clint can feel the figure’s heart beating rapidly through the thick fabric of their tac-suit against his.
“Careful, stranger,” He says, flashing them one of his trademark smiles that he hopes conveys a general sense of good guy, super-hero-y-ness, “You’d break a rib from a fall at this height. I’d know, it’s my usual Friday night.”
The mysterious person’s gaze bore straight through Clint’s as they balanced there, and for a moment Clint can make out piercing almond shaped eyes, before the stranger pulls away and nails him in the stomach. Clint lets out a cry before his assailant makes to hit him again, only this time he’s prepared and deflects the blow. It’s an awkward scuffle, both of them angling to keep their footing on the narrow ledge whilst still trying to land and deflect each other’s attacks. The figure lunges for him again, and this time, it’s Clint that loses his footing, allowing them to pin him against the wall with groan.
“Ow!” he wheezes out, “I just saved your life! this the thanks I get?”
They respond by firing an electro-fibre net at him, shocking Clint and keeping him in place as he cries out.
“Stay out of my way, Hawkeye.” The stranger says in a low, smokey voice that had no right to sound as attractive as it did in the moment.
Oh for god’s sake, this is so not the time for that, Barton!
In comes Kate’s voice, rattling through Clint’s head again and getting him back on track.
The net is well made, but clearly meant to only be used to slow down an attacker, not hold them down forever. Clint thinks with a little bit more effort, he could get out of them. He just needs to buy himself some time.
“You know my name, can I get yours, sweetheart?” Clint says, struggling against the restraints.
He turns his head to take in the figure who has returned to the widow, and is attempting to break it once again. This time, they’ve pulled out some sort of concealed, collapsible baton, and are ramming it against the crystal glass to no avail.
“You know, that’s not going to work! These ‘practicers of the mystic arts’ guys, they don’t fuck around, they’re not about to leave this building unsecured. They’ve got all sorts of protective spells surrounding it, you can’t just smash it in!” Clint calls out, still pulling against the net. It’s starting to give a little.
The figure ignores him in favour of hitting the glass again, even harder, as if trying to prove a point.
“Look,” Clint begins, “I’m guessing you and I are in the same boat here, so if you could just let me help–”
They turn around facing him, baton clenched in their fist.
“God, do you ever shut up?” They exclaim, exhaustion and exasperation dripping from their voice.
Clint can’t help but grin.
“Nah, it’s part of the Barton charm.”
The figure retracts their baton and secures it against their back, sighing. It’s then that Clint notices for the first time that their hood had come off, probably from when they were busy trading blows. He can now see that whoever this was, they had long, fiery red hair, backlit like a halo around her head in the moonlight.
The piercing eyes, the red hair, the black suit, her cold efficiency and confidence in her abilities.
Oh god.
Clint knew her. Contrary to popular belief, he does go over the briefing documents SHIELD and the other Avengers give him. They’ve all been tailing this woman for years, and she has always eluded their grasp.
“You’re the Black Widow.” Clint gasps out.
His mind is racing, putting the pieces together.
That’s how she knew who he was. Two months ago, the Avengers had gotten a tip off that the Widow had been seen sneaking around the NYC subways. They’d just managed to catch up with her, when she disappeared in one of the empty train carts. Clint had been sent to the next station over to catch her, but her train never arrived. It was like she had disappeared with it entirely.
So this was what she was doing, it has to be, this is where she disappeared to. But what is she doing in 1969? Why did she come here?
There’s a pause, the Black Widow had frozen in place.
Suddenly, she points her wrist gadgets (Widow Bites, Clint remembers now, they’re called Widow Bites) at his face, her brows knit together and lips twisted in a snarl. This time, Clint manages to pull free of the electro-fibre and draws his bow, levelling an arrow at her.
“Widow, I don’t know what or why you came here, but by the order of SHIELD and the Avengers, I’m gonna have to take you down.”
The Black Widow lets out a high, slightly hysterical laugh.
“Take me down? And where the hell do you think you could take me?" She says, voice in a perfected, neutral sounding accent. "The Avengers don’t even exist yet, and you’ve no SHIELD clearance in this time. They’re hardly gonna let you come waltzing into their head quarters.”
Clint frowns, she has a point.
“Do you know that you’re the reason why I’m even stuck here?” She continues, her voice shaking slightly, like she's about to panic, but that can’t be right. Widows don’t feel things as base and human as panic. Now that he’s thinking about it, they’re not meant to be able to feel exhaustion or exasperation either. They’re not meant feel anything at all, they’re trained killing machines, they’ve had all emotions written out of their DNA, or so he’d read in her file.
Yet here she was, hair plastered across her forehead, chest heaving with exertion, desperation in her eyes, and panic laced throughout her voice. This isn’t a woman devoid of emotion. She is living, breathing, feeling. Clint feels a twinge in his chest.
She is afraid .
He still doesn’t know why she’s come to this point in time, but whatever it was, it’s clearly not for some sort of history revising hit. It’s something personal, that much he can tell. It is the look on her face, something burning in her eyes that causes Clint to makes a split second decision, and he lowers his arrow. The Black Widow’s eyes follow the movement, confusion written across her face.
“What are you doing? Aren’t you supposed to kill me on sight?” She says, shifting on her feet, widow bites still pointed at him, but she’s not firing. There’s hesitation in her eyes.
“I’m not going to kill you,” Clint meets her gaze, “Maybe I’m being stupid, too trusting, and this is gonna bite me in the ass but… but something tells me that you don’t really want to kill me either.” He nods towards the window and reaches out his hand.
“So I’m gonna help you. I want to help you, if you’ll let me.”
The Black Widow blinks at him. Her features contorting in a way that suggests she is confused, as if she’s not used to feeling such a thing. Her widow bites stay levelled at his chest as she gives him a once over. Clint knows that she’s studying his battered purple converse, his bandaged hand, the crook of his oft broken nose. Worst of all, she's looking at the blue gunk that he knows is still stuck in his hair. He knows he looks every bit the mess that he is, but he hopes she sees past it and accepts the offer anyways. Something in the Widow’s expression shifts, and for a moment, Clint fears the worst. That this was it, that he was gonna die on a wizard's rooftop in 1969, his body unrecovered, and potentially erased from history altogether, when her expression softens.
She reaches out, tremulous and uncertain, and takes his hand in hers.
Clint grins down at her, relieved, and filled with an inexplicable feeling of certainty that he is making the right choice.
“Hold on.” He says, squeezing her hand as if by instinct.
Clint takes out his grappling hook arrow for the umpteenth time that day, knocking it against his bowstring with his teeth. He feels the Widow tense up beside him for a moment before relaxing as she realises what he’s doing. He fires at the Sanctum wall as she wraps her arms around his waist, and they kick off of the ledge together as the cable lowers them safely to the ground.
When their feet land on the pavement, the Black Widow pushes her goggles up and onto her forehead. Green eyes meet blue for the first time.
“I’m Clint, by the way. Clint Barton, aka Hawkeye, but I’m guessing you knew that already.” he says, sheepishly.
“I’m…” She starts, before pausing, as if thinking something over, making her mind up on what she’s going to say next. Then, as if giving in to some sort of instinct, she tells him.
“I’m Natasha.”
A name. She has given him her name, something that had eluded government agencies for years, of her own free will. Admittedly, it could be a fake one, but something in Clint believes that it isn’t, and she’s telling the truth.
Unbelievably, he thinks it’s because she might even trust him, at least for the moment.
“Natasha,” Clint says, rolling the vowels around in his mouth. “Nice to put a name to the face.”
The Black Widow– no. Natasha’s – lips twitch in what Clint suspects was the start of a begrudging smile.
“Nice to put a face to the name, Clint Barton.”