Colombia

He had thrown caution to the wind as he crashed through the unkept grasses in a desperate attempt to get to Clint. Phil knew if he had been able to hear the gunshots there was a very good chance someone else did as well and was on their way to check it out. His mind was whirling, hoping Clint was just weak from five days of confinement and nothing more serious, but his gut feeling told him there was something very wrong.

“Crossroads, this is Sentry, I’m requesting immediate pickup. I have eyes on our missing agent” Phil spoke hurriedly into his comm device activating the extraction team that was awaiting orders in Manizales, a small town less than thirty minutes outside Bogota.

“Copy that Sentry, the team is mobilizing now. Should be 25 clicks out from your location.” The calm voice of the operations manager at the base in Manizales helped calm some of the panic that had been plaguing Phil nonstop since Clint had gone AWOL. Assured that there was help on its way he returned all of his focus to finding his agent, making his way up a rather steep hill.

The outline of the shed appeared in his vision as he sprinted up the last of the hills, he was less than one hundred yards away and there was his archer, leaning against the wall of the shed. Phil knew the exact moment Clint sensed his approach, he wasn’t exactly being discreet either, as the kid tensed and turned to face him, his long black knife extended in front of him. As he closed the distance between them he shouted the archer’s name, hoping Clint wasn’t too out of it to attack him.

“Barton?” His name came out as more of a question when he was close enough to take in the shape the kid was in. The too big shirt hung off of his body and was splotched with more red than white. Clint had a confused and relieved look on his face as he suddenly dropped to his knees. Coulson reached his archer just as he crumpled to the ground, and he was able to get an arm around him before the kid face planted into the ground.

Phil gently eased the limp weight of his agent into the dirt attempting to get Clint as comfortable as possible. He ran his hands over the archer’s body, checking for the most obvious of injuries, trying to determine what he could do now before the extraction team got here. The majority of the blood seemed to be coming from a deep cut down his right side, Phil pulled his bag closer and reached inside for the extra tee shirt he knew was inside so he could wipe Clint’s torso down and see how bad the damage was.

He was easing Clint’s shirt up when he felt warm liquid soaking into his pant leg where he was kneeling in the dirt next to Clint’s unconscious form. He looked down and his face paled immediately. The dirt surrounding the agent’s body was now soaked in blood, too much blood to have come from the cut on his chest. Phil’s hand went to Clint’s back, feeling tentatively for a reason he was bleeding so much when he encountered the deep hole in his lower back.

Son of a bitch. Of course he managed to get himself shot. Phil couldn’t stop himself from groaning out loud as he wadded up the shirt to press to the entry wound, trying to stop some of the bleeding.

"Crossroads this is Sentry. Target has a gunshot wound to the lower back, bleeding heavily. What’s your ETA?” He cursed under his breath as he felt blood leaking through the now soaked shirt he had pressed to the wound. Clint was loosing too much blood too fast, Phil was terrified he was going to lose the archer before help could even arrive.

“Sentry we’re 8 clicks out. Doc is prepping now for target. Anything else we should know?” Eight minutes, they were eight minutes out, Phil glanced down at his agent, taking in his pale features, and sent a prayer up that Clint could hold on that long.

“He’s unconscious, but loosing a lot of blood.”

“Roger that.” Phil could hear the comm link disconnect and the silence loomed around him, his thoughts crashing and tumbling around in his head. Clint had to be okay, the kid deserved so much more than the life he had dealt with, Phil had the feeling that the archer was on the brink of trusting him, a huge step from the person he had been when Phil had marched him off the quinjet from Israel.

Phil's thoughts were interrupted as the archer began convulsing on the ground, causing blood to pour out of the gunshot wound on his back. He watched helplessly as Clint’s muscles contracted rapidly and his body jerked violently. Time seemed to drag on forever until his body quieted, going from a flurry of movement to dead still in a matter of moments.
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Pain. There was so much pain. White hot, like flames licking over his body, for what felt like an eternity he was the pain, there was no Clint, only the angry burn of pain, consuming him, dragging him further and further into the shadows.

He opened his mouth to scream, to sob, to beg, anything that could stop the pain, but nothing came out from his dry throat. He could only feel the pain turning his body inside out. The scent of fresh cotton filled his mind, and he clung to the comfort it brought like a lifeline.

Through the burn of the pain a soft voice drifted around him, a voice that took him back to simpler times. A green room, filled with sunshine and the carefree laughter of children, their toys scattered across the worn carpet. The shadows began to clear and he could see her. Long brown hair pulled back in a braid, a few curls escaping to frame her face.

Her eyes were filled with tears, she had always hated to see him in any kind of distress. He had been a carefree child, all pink flushed cheeks, tousled hair, and chubby fingers. But as he had grown older the bright joy in his eyes started to be clouded with shadows as he had withdrawn into himself. Looking at him now her heart broke seeing the raw wounds inside of him.

Oh how she ached to hold him again, to smooth the unruly pieces of hair off of his forehead, to tell him everything was going to be okay, but she couldn’t, not yet anyways. He had unfinished business, she could tell that the deep wounds inside him were slowly beginning to heal, the darkness inside him fading.

“I love you baby. Whatever happens, you can get through it, because you are strong Clint. My beautiful baby boy. I love you.” She whispered the same words she had 13 years ago, and watched as his body relaxed, a strangled sigh passing his lips as she slowly faded back into the shadows.
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There were a few beats of silence as Phil watched Clint intently, trying to catch the rise and fall of his chest, but after a few seconds of straining his eyes he was almost positive Clint wasn’t breathing. He scrambled over to the archer as he pulled a small blade out of its holster, he held it underneath the kid’s nose, praying the steel would fog up from his breath, but there was nothing. He placed his fingers on Clint’s throat checking for a pulse, anything to indicate he was still there, but he couldn’t feel anything; no steady thrum of a heartbeat, just the sweaty clammy skin of Clint’s neck.

Phil mentally told himself to stay calm, even though he felt like screaming at the sky, at God, at whoever would listen, for the unfairness of it all. Instead he pushed the pain clawing at him to the back of his mind as he started CPR, desperately willing his young agent to draw a breath. Two more breaths, then compressions. Two more breaths, then compressions.

A strangled gasp made Phil freeze, his eyes darting to Clint’s face, hoping his mind hadn’t just heard what he wanted to hear. The dull glow of stormy blue-grey eyes met his as the archer took another breath and Phil nearly sobbed in relief.

“Hey kid, just hold on a little longer, help is almost here.” As if to back up Coulson’s words the low hum of the quinjet could be heard from overhead. Clint managed a small nod before his eyes slipped closed again. Two men, dressed entirely in black slid down ropes and approached the pair quickly and Coulson stood to direct them.

They secured Clint’s limp body into a stretcher that was dangling from the quinjet and with a muttered confirmation into a comm device the stretcher was quickly pulled up into the jet. One of the men handed Coulson a harness and soon he was being pulled up and into the quinjet as well.

As his feet touched the solid floor he immediately began unbuckling the harness as his head craned, looking for where they took his archer. A woman in crisp black battle fatigues made her way over to him, a look of sympathy in her eyes as she took in his blood soaked clothes.

“Agent Coulson. They are working to stabilize Agent Barton as we speak. I have alerted the Miami base that we are on our way to them, if he can just hold on until then, they have a team of the best trauma surgeons waiting for him.” Phil just managed a tired nod, the adrenalin of the day starting to fade from his system and his body was protesting the lack of sleep he had gotten in the past five days.

“If you would like you could change into these.” In her hands she held a plain black tee shirt and SHIELD issued sweatpants. “You might be a little more comfortable that way.” She remarked as she gestured to his bloody clothing. Phil nodded his thanks, words seeming too difficult to come up with right now, and grabbed the proffered clothing before walking towards the small bathroom towards the back of the quinjet.

With the door to the small bathroom locked Phil stood, hands braced against the sink, and allowed himself to simply breathe away the panic he had rushing through his system since Clint had disappeared. He lifted his head and stared at his reflection in the mirror, then down at his hands which were stained a rusty red. He turned the water on as hot as he could stand and watched as the blood swirled down the drain. A flurry of movement outside the door broke him from his trance and he quickly finished washing before throwing on the clean clothing the woman had offered him.

He followed the sounds of activity towards the main cargo area of the quinjet, a sinking feeling settling in his stomach as he rounded the corner and found a medic working hurriedly trying to stabilize Clint as his body convulsed on the stretcher he was on. The heart monitor was beeping incessantly, echoing throughout the interior of the quinjet. Phil looked on, his heart in his throat as the young agent’s body seized again and again.

Then eerily similar to before, his body suddenly stopped, and the heart monitor fell silent, the absence of sound more deafening than a gunshot. The medic was scrambling, pulling Clint’s shirt off to expose his battered chest, covered in criss-crossing cuts of various degrees of depth as well as dark purple and green bruises marring much of the exposed skin.

“He’s crashing. I need the jump kit. Now!” The medic’s voice cut through the silence, startling two agents into motion. Phil hadn’t realized he had taken several steps forwards, towards the archer laying still on the stretcher, until a hand landed on his shoulder, gently restraining him. An agent handed the medic a small box which she pulled the paddles out of and powered the device up.

“Everyone clear!” There was a second of silence, then a small whump as Clint’s body flopped with the shock. The process was repeated again, as the few agents gathered waited with bated breath, but still nothing. Phil’s heart was breaking, he couldn’t lose Clint now, he felt he was finally getting through to the archer, breaking through his walls of deadly silence he wrapped around himself. It was a damned waste of a good life.

The medic raised her eyes to meet his, a glint of sorrow in her eyes, and he desperately begged her to try once more, all without saying a word. She nodded slightly and directed everyone to clear again. The device powered up, with its distinctive whine, and she placed the paddles on the archer’s chest and pressed the button delivering the final shock to his system. Clint’s body jolted with the shock and a second passed with no change, the medic shook her head sadly and turned around intending to shut off the heart monitor when it gave a weak pulse, followed quickly by several more weak beats.

Phil’s eyes lit up as he looked to his agent’s body, he could just barely make out the rise and fall of his chest. The heart monitor beat unsteadily, but it was a heartbeat nonetheless. The medic whirled back around quickly stringing a bag of blood up to the IV pole before inserting the needle into his body. Phil noticed the thick white bandage stretching across the archer’s back and sent up a quick prayer that the kid would make it through the next two and a half hours to Miami.

Notes