sparrow // mcu

chapter 8 - mistrust

She glanced back through the window. Clint still appeared to be sleeping. Nodding to herself, she buried her hands in her pockets and wandered away towards the motel entrance. The pavement was warm beneath her bare feet, just cool enough not to burn them, the stone holding desperately onto the warmth of the sun that had beat down on it all day. She stopped at the entrance, considering the quiet road beyond, but still she felt no urge to run. What would be the point anyway? Clint would find her, or HYDRA would find her, or she'd just get settled in some kind of life and everything would catch up to her. Running away never worked; once you started, you couldn't stop. Things always caught up to you in the end.

Imogen wasn't the running away type anyway. That was half her trouble – she never backed down or turned away (the other half of her trouble was her brutal honesty, probably. People didn't like seeing the truth).

Turning away from the road, she circled around the long row of motel rooms and parked cars to the back of the building. Everything was more scattered here; there was what looked like a laundromat, still awake even in the middle of the night, a dark barbeque area, and a playground. Down the back and surrounded by a fence was a pool, the whole area illuminated by the soft glow of underwater lights. She drifted towards it, soon finding herself sitting cross-legged at the very edge of the pool, staring down into its depths.

Clint found her there too. She heard his light footsteps, heard him open and close the gate. "Thought you were asleep," she said casually as his feet stopped beside her, clad as every in a pair of heavy black combat boots.

"Woke up when you left," his voice replied from somewhere above her. Grunting, she turned her attention back to the pool. "What are you doing out here anyway?"

She shrugged, pulling her jacket closer around her. "Couldn't sleep," she admitted in an unusually quiet voice.

"So you decided to hang out by the pool?"

"You got any better ideas?" she snapped back.

"Well," he drawled lazily. "There's a nice playground back there..." She didn't even deign to answer. Eventually, he sighed and lowered himself down to the pavers as well, a careful distance from the water.

"Any idea where you're driving to yet?" she asked, just to break the silence.

"Maybe," he replied, trying his best to be mysterious.

"So no, not really then," she said with a roll of her eyes.

Clint almost looked offended. "I know where I'm going!"

"But you're not going to tell me."

"Nope." His voice was smug, just like his face when she glanced at him. Rolling her eyes once more, she returned her gaze to the water. Silence fell over them both, reclaiming the warm night – in the absence of the wind, nothing moved, the world dark and still and quiet under the watchful eye of the moon.

Imogen didn't like it, didn't trust the quiet. All too often, silence came before action, before an attack, before danger. "Clint?" she asked, just to break it. He hummed in reply. "What would you do? If you weren't a SHIELD agent? If you left right now?"

He paused, deep in thought. "I dunno," he replied. "Teach archery maybe. Or be a farmer."

"A farmer?"

"Yeah." He was nodding along now, growing more enthusiastic about the idea by the second. "With like, cows and chickens and stuff."

"Why?" Wrinkling her nose, she tried to imagine being a farmer. It wasn't an appealing idea to her – she'd never been a fan of animals, farm or otherwise.

Clint shrugged. "Nice and peaceful out in the country, miles from anywhere." A wicked grin dawned. "No crazy kids coming to kill me."

"Not a kid," she reminded him, but she smiled anyway.

"Yeah, just keep telling yourself that. Maybe one day I'll believe you."

"You're ridiculous."

He ignored her. "So kid," he said. "What would you do?"

Imogen froze. She'd never been anything but an agent for HYDRA – Will had gotten her into training almost the moment she'd dropped out of school when she was fifteen. She'd thought, at the time, it was because he wanted them to stay together, or to rescue her from Cassandra Brady's warped impression of parenting, but now she was beginning to wonder if it was just so that he could get out of looking after her early.

"I don't know," she admitted finally. "Go and study something, I guess? That's what people do, isn't it?" She laughed. "End up in jail probably."

Wordlessly, Clint stood and offered her a hand up, which she took, and they walked back to the room in silence. Imogen felt only a little better since she'd come out – she still had questions about her brother and their past, and until she found the answers they would continue to torment her.

There was a buzzing noise when they got back, coming from Clint's bag. Imogen had thought it was just weapons and questionably obtained cash, but now, as he rifled through its contents and produced her phone (which she'd been sure she'd lost), it became apparent that there was a whole lot more secreted away in there.

She forgot about the rest as soon as she saw the phone though. "Why do you have that?" she demanded, storming across the room to stand face-to-face with him.

Alarmed, his eyes widened, his first instinct to raise the phone above his head to where she couldn't reach it. "How does this thing even have battery still?" he asked, backing away from her and looking up at the screen.

"It's a Starkphone," she snapped, stalking after him. "They can run for a week between charges."

"Your brother's calling," Clint hit the wall with a grunt, eyes still turned upwards. "Why's he calling?" The buzzing stopped, the call unanswered. Clint's eyebrows shot up. "That's a lot of calls."

She stood in front of him, arms crossed. "Maybe you should answer him," she said impetuously. "See what he wants."

"No way." His eyes finally tore away from the phone above his head. "Phone call from the enemy? Obviously a trap. Are you stupid?"

"I'm not stupid," she argued. "Give me my phone back."

"No." Before she could as much as blink, he whipped the phone down and into his pocket. "Stay. Away." He poked her hard twice in the shoulder, making her flinch away, rubbing her shoulder. Taking his chance, he slipped past her and collapsed on the bed, closing his eyes and feigning sleep.