2013-09-20 - The Rise of Hawkette Pt. 1

Clint Barton's Apartment, Brooklyn

"You could stay," Clint suggests grinning down at Amanda in the doorway of his apartment.

The girl smiles. "Nuh-uh, cowboy, I work tomorrow, and a girl needs her sleep."

Clint sighs dramatically. "Okay fiiine," he says still smiling.

"Maybe tomorrow?" Amanda offers.

Clint nods. "Give me a call? I may have a thing." he replies.

Amanda smiles and goes up on her tip toes to give him a kiss. "Will do, sleep well."

"Sure," Clint replies and kisses her back before watching her walk to the stairs. Then with a yawn and a last look he goes back into his apartment and closes the door.

"Well that was fun, but what now..." he sighs to himself as he surveys his empty apartment full of half-finished projects. Not the least of them is unpacking the many boxes that are scattered around the place. He'd been planning on Amanda, his latest, girlfriend, fling, friend with benefits, staying the night. Now it was barely past 12am and he had nothing to do.

"Screw it, I'm going to take a shower."

He yawns and pads barefoot his way down the hall towards the bathroom and unbuttoning his jeans as he goes, letting them fall to the floor and steps out of them, the only thing he had been wearing to walk Amanda to the door.

Flicking on the bathroom light on his way into the bathroom Clint turns on the water in the shower all the way up to scalding. Then stifling another yawn and waiting for the water to heat, he looks at himself in the mirror and flexes a little, makes a face and then frowning leans forward to check out a bruise on his forehead. "When did I hit my head?" he wonders to himself.

He never sees the blow coming.

One second he's looking at himself in the mirror, the next second his head feels like it's split open and he's lying on the bathroom tile.

He turns trying to find purchase for his feet on the slick tile but his head spins and the Chinese food he'd shared with Amanda suddenly erupts half-digested from his mouth and joins the blood splatters on the tile.

That when the men come in.

Street clothes and ski masks. They look like robbers but kick like pros.

Clint drives a heel into one guy's groin, and scissors one guy's leg out from under him but there's more than just a couple of guys and in a few seconds they have him and shove a stun gun in his back, and drag him out towards the living room, where another man in a ski mask, one with a gun, silenced, waits.

"Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God! Holy shit! Pleasebealivepleasebealive!", is all that goes through Kate Bishop's mind as she jumps over another alley from the rooftops, hitting the corner of the next building with her tummy and holding on to dear life. That dealer's info better be right, she thinks, while groaning, trying to pull her weigh up and onto the rooftop. Taking a single moment to breathe the girl keeps running, backpack in hands as she takes her scarf, clumsly putting it around her face.

"Nice idea, 'Hawkeye', but next time why don't you buy practical armor instead of a 'Hell yes, Hawkeye is here' one..."

Kate finally arrives on the building overlooking Clint's, and she covers her mouth with her lips to avoid crying out a bit. There's an unmarked car right in front of the apartments, and a... very beautiful, and drunk-looking lady is being forced inside by an armed man. An arrow to his knee later, and the woman can run away, screaming, while the man falls over, and sleeps. Tranquilizing arrows, such a bless.

As she searches for more thugs the socialite grumbles and adjusts her breast inside her armor. "This damn thing is still not my size, god dam- Oh God!", she says, hiding behind the edge of the building, looking at a bloody, naked man being carried by the thugs. "They've got the wrong man... Hawkeye wouldn't get caught all... is that chine- Oh, gross!".

Cringing, the brunette narrows her eyes and aims one of her electric arrows, hitting the power box in Clint's kitchen, letting the room go dark. The next one, also charged with electricity, hits the man holding Hawkeye.

Clint is dazed, and weak and in pain, but he still struggles as the men drag him out of the bathroom towards the guy with the gun. "You know I'm Avenger right?" he growls as one of the men kicks him in the back.

Yeah, they don't care. Clint looks around for something to use to help him out of this, but his search is cut short by it going suddenly dark.

"The hell?" Clint says, a sentiment echoed by the man behind him a moment before he gurgles over the electric crackle of a Taser going off.

Clint doesn't wait, as soon as the guy lets go, Clint is moving, he kicks one guy in the throat and dives behind the guy still twitching on the floor. He sees the arrow sticking out of him and he blinks.

"The hell?" he repeats before he rolls out of the way, the guy with the silenced gun is firing, the bullets thacking into the floor as Clint rolls into his hall closet with a crash, causing the junk he stored there to rain down on him. A flash light hits him in the head. The last thing he needs right now more head wounds. Wait, no that's exactly what he needs! No not a head wound! A flash light!

He can hear silencer and his buddies coming his way. Uttering a silent prayer that he remembered to put batteries in the damn thing, he flicks the switch and rolls it into the hall. The light fills the hall, the living room and most importantly illuminates the bad guys for whoever is shooting arrows.

Kate's hands are shaking as she concentrates and shoots her arrows. This is no joyride, this is not one thug with his back turned to her, this is a man's life at end of her every arrow. And one by one she shoots her arrows, muttering a silent prayer. Kate Bishp was never a very religious woman, but right now she is praying to whoever is listening.

Inside the apartment the man with the silenced gun falls first, an arrow piercing his hand and sticking it to a wall, neutralizing him as the thug tries to pry himself free from it. His boys look startled at it, and ironically, blame Clint, as they have been doing the whole week. He's Hawkeye, after all, Arrowman! As they go to him, one more falls over, an arrow now through his ankle. However is shooting those arrows is doing so with bad intentions.

One more arrow, however, pierces the wall right behind Clint, just as the men walk into the hallway, two remaining. Although they don't, Hawkeye realizes there's a line tied to said arrow, and from behind the thugs, and straight through the window, comes his saviour, kicking both the man on her way to land right before Clint rather ungracefully, a huge chunk of glass digging into her naked arm.

"The hell?" Clint says for the third time tonight as his saviour blasts through his window to save him and bleed on his floor.

There’s no time for more contemplation than that. Clint, gets to his feet and staggers out into the hall. He ducks down and with the world swimming he scoops up the flash light and promptly drives a foot into the face of the man who he’d kicked in the face a moment ago. The man stops moving, he glances at the bleeding girl giving her a slight nod before he walks to the guy who had the gun a moment ago. He punches him in the face. Just to make sure he's down and then takes the gun.

Clint stares at it and the man who held it for a long moment. Then, after shaking his head he moves to stick the gun away in his waist band, and then realizes that he's totally naked.

He turns to his saviour then, and has his first real good look at her. Noticing the blood he asks "Are you okay?" before giving the guy with an arrow in his leg a kick.

Clint rubs his abused head. "It's sort of a mess," he says and then takes her by the uninjured arm if she'll let him and guides her to the kitchen. "Sit down, and don't forget to breathe," he says as he sits her down on the tile. Then he's gone, into the living room where he tosses the gun on the couch and digs into one of his boxes and comes up with a big orange bag with reflective tape on the sides. A first aid kit, like the sort EMTs use.

He brings the kit to the kitchen and crouches beside Kate and puts a hand on her hand. "You're going to be okay, all right but I won't lie, what's going to come next isn't going to be fun." He looks her in the eyes then, and if she's paying attention, she'll notice his gaze is a bit unsteady. All those blows to the head will do that to a guy.

This girl is rapidly losing grip on reality, and Clint might know hte feeling of losing blood and getting that huge adrenaline dump, all at once. From her abs, he might even be able to tell she is not all that worried about eating well, too, as whoever she is, this mysterious benefactor of his could -easily- be a model somewhere. As with all people who lose touch with reality, she lets him guide her despite speaking all the way.

"Mister, you are not safe here, the Bloods think you are the Avenger Hawkeye, let me take... let me take you to Fort Knox so we can have soup and sky...", her speech getting more and more incoherent. As her stomach flexes and turns Clint can tell she is close to hyperventilating, or something similar, so much so that she is still speaking when he comes back. "But mom never won that cricket game and my dog was never champion of lacrosse..."

Clint just looks at her as the non-sense "Yeah, mine neither," he says after a moment. He takes a few seconds to breathe deep and calm his shaking hands before he sets to work trying to patch the girl up, removing the glass and bandaging the whole thing tight. All without a drop of pain killers.

When he's done and assuming the girl hasn't passed out Clint asks "Okay, we're going to need to get you to someone who knows what they're doing now. Can you walk?"

As it really becomes obvious the moment Clint takes the shard of glass from Kate's arm, she is not going to be awake for much longer, and right after ruffling his hair the young socialite passes out, right there, in Hawkeye's kitchen. The last thing she says? "M-Must warn... Hawkeye... mob... after him...".

And just like that Clint has a girl passed out on his hands, a bit younger and bloody than he is used to, but she is there. Where the hell did she come from?

"Fuck," Clint mutters as she passes out in his arms, but for all his frustration he moves carefully to lay her out on the tile so she doesn't fall and hurt herself. He removes his arms from around the girl and gets up and goes to the phone, he picks it up and dials, frowning as he sees he's getting blood on the buttons.

"Hello, Jarvis? I'm sorry to bother you, but I have a bit of a problem. No, no, um, don't call Tony. She's hurt Jarvis. Who? This girl. I think she's the one America told me about. I KNOW I'M NOT MAKING ANY SENSE! Sorry to take a /tone/ but I just need someone to help I can't bring her to a hospital. There are people. Yeah, /people/. Bloods, mob, Intergang, I don't know. Okay, yeah, my place Brooklyn, Ben-Stuy, 189 Sherwood." Clint lets out a sigh. "Thanks Jarvis."

Clint hangs up the phone and goes back to the girl's side. "We've got a ride to Fort Knox," he promises her.

Avenger's Mansion - Medical Bay

In the Avengers' med bay Clint gets the report of the girl's wounds. She has a sprained ankle, distended ACL, the profound puncturing on her right shoulder and a stab wound on her hand. For all of those and some internal bleeding she is taken to the intensive care facility and immediately treated.

Kate awakes with a cough, her shoulder flaring in pain but the rest of her surprisingly chilly. Was she dreaming she just saved Mr. Naked Man? And suddenly the girl comes into realization that not only she was not dreaming, but she is devoid of clothes, aside from her stylish sunglasses. What kind of disturbing psycho-

And then it dawns on her. She is in a hospital, and it is all over, before it even begins. Sitting up straight the beautiful girl tries to sweep the room for information, and it all looks incredibly high-tech, even for someone with her means. Frowning, she looks about, finding her clothes on the other end of the room. This is weird, too weird.

Mr. Naked Man, or as his friends call him Clint Barton is clothed, bandaged and passed out in a chair by Kate's bed, a cup of coffee cooling on a nearby table. He's snoring slightly with a copy of the Cannoneer comic book dangling from his fingers and just about to fall out of his grip to the floor. A moment later it does and the fluttering of pages and the soft thump of the book hitting the floor startles him from his sleep.

Clint rubs his eyes and looks over at Kate. "Welcome to the world of the living," he say tiredly as he moves to stand up and go to her bedside.

Kate knows fully well there is no need for her sunglasses now, unless she wants to be one of -those- people who wear them indoors. Taking a deep breath the good-looking socialite reveals her cool-looking eyes as she arches a brow.

"You don't look -that- much better than me, mi-", oh boy. He's Hawkeye! It was not a mistake by the thugs! So this must be the-

Kate Bishop's eyes go wide in realization, looking around the place, the signs all over. She is in the heart of a very important group of super heroes, and they probably know who she is by now. Most startling of all, however, is another thing, and as she turns back to Clint the young woman just asks.

"-You- are Hawkeye?", her surprise almost demeaning.

"Yeah, kind of disappointing aren't I?" Clint says with a tired smile as he rests his hands on the side of the hospital bed.

He glances at the shades. "Yeah, I had Jarvis leave them. Some people are a bit picky about their identity, but well, safe to say your secret is out though, at least with the Avengers." He puts a hand on her shoulder if he lets her. "And thanks for the save."

There's something about the way Clint says it, be it the tired smile, or the overall kindness he shows even after Kate has been, well, a bitch, that moves the girl somewhat. So what if he doesn't look all godly? She can't claim to be looking any better right now. As his hand touches her shoulder, the girl's eyes go a bit wider, and her heart beats faster. This is Hawkeye, the Avenger, telling her she did good, that she saved him. There's a lot going on through the young crimefighter's mind, and smiling, all she can answer is: "Okay..."

NO! NO! "Y-you're welcome, Hawkeye...", Kate says, expecting to get a bit of a earbeating for going out and playing vigilante. It was a good run, at least. "Thank you for the save too...", she murmurs, looking a bit under the weather.

"No problem. Jarvis did most of the work. I just kept you together until he could look at you," Clint says with an easy smile as he puts his hand back on the edge of the bed. "He'll be down later to snark at you if you want to thank him too."

The Avenger rolls his archer's shoulders and detecting that anticipation of a talking to he smiles again. "Yeah, that's going to happen," he assures her. "So, why'd these guys think it was me who was messing with their world?" by the way he looks at her it's pretty clear he has some ideas about that.

God damn it, why did this have to happen? Kate was so good at sniping those men from afar, she took so many of them down and to the hospital! Why couldn't it be the end of it? With slumping shoulders the girl just exhales, looking at her hands.

"They or may not have gotten their Hawkeyes mixed up.", she starts, and feeling like it won't be enough, Kate continues "I mean... so -what-? They just assumed it was you because I use bow and arrow, but if they knew -anything- they would see we are totally different people. For starters, I am not that easy to find.", she ends, grumpily, folding both arms and screaming in pain as she moves her wounded shoulder. "OHGOD...", Kate whines a bit. She is too green.

Just like that smiley Clint is gone. "Really? You're going to take that tone? With /me/? After what almost happened?" he begins before she starts to turn green on him. He lowers his hand from his face and puts it on her arm. "Seriously, stop moving your arm," he says impatiently. "Or Jarvis is going to be on both of us, you for hurting yourself and me for letting you. I already got a talking to from him last night, which is more than enough. Seeing as this is your mess."

"If you don't like the way I do it, train me.", Kate says simply, her mind still reeling from the pain in her arm. Still, she is not backing down, she is not getting convinced she should stop, that she should simply leave this gig. Kate Bishop is on another time-zone when it comes saying she's sorry or admitting her mistakes.

"I am not backing out, so you might as well train me.", she says once again to punctuate the fact, but she lets her arm go limp, hearing what Clint has to say. Something in the way this girl says things makes it pretty obvious this is important to her.

Clint laughs bitterly. "Train you? Girl, you just about got me killed. Why in the hell would I train you? As for not backing out, fine, you want to go all the way with this, then you can explain to the cops what all those guys they picked up at my place are doing with arrows in them. I did time when I started out as the Hawkeye, maybe it'll be a learning experience for you. There, how's that for training?" he says as he glowers at her. Of course he already told the cops the arrows were his and made sure Kate was on the way to the mansion by the time he called them, but she doesn't know that.

Kate frowns and feels her lips pucker, a sudden surge of emotion catching her off-guard. Why is he being such a jerk, all of a sudden? Trying to keep her cool and, more importantly, her tears to herself, Kate stands up, moaning loudly, trying to get used to her new wound. This one would be hard to explain to her family. Trying to walk casually to her clothes while keeping the back of her medical garb closed, Kate manages to walk very jerkily to her own clothes, grabbing them with one arm, to leave.

And then her scarf falls, and wincing in pain the girl crouches to get it, allowing her sword to fall from it's sheath, a loud clang being heard. Frowning, and deciding not to further humiliate herself, the brunette just stands, and summons a thin smile, as if she doesn't care.

"You know what? Fine! Don't train me! Those arrows are pretty untraceable, and you are Hawkeye -already-! I bet you have dozens of bows in your house anyway!", she says, turning to leave, still limping, until she stops and turns. "And another thing! I was out there rilling these guys up while you were eating Chinese with Miss Bimb- Do you even know the number of people I've hel- The number of WOMEN I help- You know what?! I don't need your endorsement.", she finishes her rant turning her back to the original Hawkeye, knowing she will shed a tear any time now, the whole situation mounting back to the shame she felt after the attack, like she was just pathetic and weak. She knows she has helped people, some of them that could have gone through what she did, had Hawkeye, the Second, not been there.

As she remains with her only good arm full of her own clothes, she can't keep the back of her current clothes closed, adding to her overall failure of a night. Kate, however, doesn't even notice, as she leaves to try and find a bathroom to change, and leave this place at once.

"Whoa, whoa," Clint says as Kate gets out the bed and tries to make her escape. "Where do you think you're going?" he says, he is slow to come after her though, his head isn't in great shape and the world spins when he tries to walk. Though walk he does putting himself between Kate and the door. "Kate," he says dropping the pretences of not knowing /exactly/ who she is. "You may be pissed at me, but tough, you're hurt, you need to get back to bed." He moves to touch her again, to take her shoulder and guide her back to the hospital bed.

"I am NOT moving! I have a family to go back to and all they know is that I am at a party!", Kate says, looking up at Clint furiously, although he will notice her eyes are teary, even though it could be just fury. "I'm hurt, one-armed, under the weather, on that time of the month and I still WILL kick your as-", and Kate falls to one knee. No! Not again! Pl-

And she is goes out, one step a time, but Kate goes out again, the whirlwind of emotions inside her head slowly working against her, as she falls by Clint with all her clothes spilling by his feet.

Clint moves to catch her, the room spins, but he catches her. “Crap,” he sighs, before calling out for someone to help him bring Kate back to her bed.