Not That Lucky

#26: There Are No Strings On Me

"Son of a..." Clint rolled out from the other direction, irritated, and notched another arrow. He pulled back on the string, but before he could let it fly something slammed into his side sending him sprawling onto the ground. He groaned in annoyance and shoved himself back up.

Clint dusted off the snow on his shoulder and his eyes landed on a smug kid walking past him. He couldn't be older than 18 with grayish hair and dark roots. The kid had on a navy and silver jumpsuit and a broad smirk. When he spoke, Clint recognized the Sokovian accent, "You didn't see that coming?"

Before Clint could question why the kid was in a fucking battlefield, he blinked out of existence sending snow and dirt flying up from the ground. Inhuman. A runner? Clint swapped his arrows from incendiary to the net ones, and he notched an arrow to aim it in the direction he thought the kid ran in.

"Guys, we have a problem." Clint said slowly as he let his bow fall to his side.

"His vow lasted literal hours." Tony joked over his comm unit.

Clint couldn't see or hear the kid at all. He opened his mouth to explain the situation when he heard the charging of a plasma turret, but before his brain could connect the dots it fired. There was a flash of blue and Clint felt something hot tear into his side as it clipped him.

"Fuck!" Clint yelled as he hit the ground. He heard the others call out to him over the comm system, but all he could focus on was the burning pain at his side. The one time he manages to not break his ribs this happens instead. He gripped at his side and flinched as his had clasped down onto a wet wound. Oh shit. This was bad. This was really bad.

Steve was too far away to get to Clint, but he could hear Natasha getting to him quick enough. He lifted a hand to his earpiece to question their status again when something slammed into his side hard. It flipped him forward and Steve twisted in the air to land on his feet. He glanced around but saw nothing in the area.

"I think I found Clint's problem." Steve said. The air of humor they held earlier had vanished as the mission took a turn. Steve sprinted off to find Thor. "We have an inhuman in the field. Stay on alert."

Natasha slid in the snow, dodging gunfire, to reach Clint who was writhing on the ground trying to grasp his side. Snow and dirt flew up as the turret continued to try and fire at them. The only thing blocking the blows was one tree a few feet in front of them. Natasha glanced down at the gaping wound on his side. A chunk of him was missing as blood oozed out. The only thing working for Clint was the fact that the plasma that hit him had also managed to cauterize some of the bleeding.

"It's bad." Natasha reported and yanked the few first aid items she had on her belt. Clint let out a cry of pain when she shoved the gauze into the bleeding hole as quickly as she should. Despite the cauterization, he was still losing more blood than Natasha liked. The snow underneath him was staining red. The turret fired again, and she flinched, "Somebody wanna deal with that bunker!?" She pulled the morphine shot out of her belt and injected it into Clint's neck. Hulk roared behind her and she glanced over her shoulder to see him scream while barreling through the bunker. She nodded. That was one solution. "Thank you."

Clint's eyes fluttered, "If you guys...If you guys make me pay for saying fuck earlier... I swear to God I'm quitting the team."

Natasha smirked in amusement and set her hand on the side of his face. Hawkeye gave her a smile, more of a grimace really, and then blacked out. She lifted a hand to her earpiece, "Clint is stable for now."

Steve came upon on another group of soldiers and picked up his speed. He threw out his shield to the first soldier and jumped up into the air to catch it when it came back. His forward momentum kept him going and, on the way down from his jump, he slammed the edge of the shield into the next soldier's helmet.