The Apprentice

Chapter 1

The white walls of the hospital room pinned Clint in, the smell of bleached floors and sick patients giving him a migraine. His side ached, the bullet wound still not fully healed, and he winced before cranking up his morphine intake, sighing as relief flooded through him.

"I wouldn't do that. I need you to have a clear head for this." Came a rough voice from the doorway. Clint craned his head to see who was speaking and groaned when he recognized the man. 

"Director Fury, I wasn't aware you were coming so soon-"

The man's one good eye frowned, "Something's come up. We need our best operative on it and quickly."

Clint looked down at the reddening bandage on his side, "Well I'm a little incapacitated at the moment..."

"We'll take care of that. There's no need for you to stay in these hospitals, you know. We have more advanced medicine at the base."

"Yeah, advanced medicine you won't release to the public. If they can't have it, I won't take it." Clint's voice was bitter, he'd seen cases before that could have been helped by S.H.I.E.L.D.'s advanced techniques. Cases that had died because people like Fury believed that the general populace shouldn't have such powerful technology.  

"We can have this debate another time, Barton. This mission is of utmost importance and we need you to travel within two days. I'm taking you back to the base and that's not negotiable."

Clint sighed; there wasn't much he could do, his life was not his own. Ever since he had signed over to S.H.I.E.L.D. he hadn't had much choice in what he did. As he sulked, a nurse rolled in a wheelchair. He maneuvered himself off the raised bed and into the rickety contraption, collapsing into it so hard he feared it would break. It didn't though, and Fury began to roll him out of the ICU.

"Where is this mission anyway?" Clint asked, now slightly curious as to what this super important mission was.

Director Fury looked down at him, his face serious, "It'll be the most dangerous mission you've ever been on, located in one of the most brutal countries in the world filled with political intrigue and dangerous assassins. A place I've never sent you before."

"Yeah, but where? Iraq, Mexico? I've been to those places before."

Director Fury sighed as they exited the hospital and stopped before a black SUV. "Saudi Arabia."