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2153 hours. Rockefeller Plaza. NYC.
The tradition of hauling some enormous Norway spruce into Rockefeller Center to spangle with lights, to the joy of New Yorkers, began thirty-three years ago. Lake Carmel, New York, has the honour of being a hoste to the 60-foot tall tree. This year's specimen is particularly bushy and exciting under the weight of 5,000 lights.
NBC employees stationed far and wide around the white rectangular skating rink make the last checks for the cameras, while the crowds squeeze in on all sides to partake in that favourite holiday tradition. Four marines and thirty naval officers in perfect dress uniforms stand together, singing a traditional Christmas carol: O Christmas Tree, what else?
The governor's son, Rodman Rockefeller, stands at a podium wrapped under a thick red cloth where the switch to bring the Christmas season officially to a start lurks. Gleeful skaters, a select few, spin and twirl on the ice. Their antics amuse the crowd, and particularly the children, as the 'Follies on Ice' appear to wipe out, only to save themselves with death spirals at the last moment. In seven minutes, the celebration will really start.
There's a face in the crowd, a young man in his twenties with pale blue eyes, sharp cheekbones, dark brown hair tucked up under a watch cap, otherwise bundled up in dark wool: a peacoat, a scarf, lined jeans. A face that might be familiar to some, considering it's a variant of one that was once famous nearly worldwide, generally next to Steven Rogers's.
He knows what Christmas trees are, he's not entirely ignorant. But an entire party devoted to turning one on….that doesn't make a lot of sense. So he's frowning up at the podium like he's waiting for Rockefeller to explain all this nonsense to him, personally. The jostling by the crowd only makes him hunch in on himself a little more.
A great thing about Rockefeller Plaza, is all the building that surround the perfectly centered tree. Allowing for ample spots for a capable sniper, let alone a world class one. Tonight the Black Widow isn't masquerading as a tourist, a Rockette, or a police woman. Tonight she's not with the crowds. Tonight she's largely out of sight, having perched ahead of time in her sniper's nest, a top one of the surrounding buildings. She gets a perfect bird's eye view of the perceedings. Sure, she could put a bullet in the head of any number of dignitaries from her position, but it seems that's not her objective after all, for now she uses her crosshairs simply to observe.
Holiday traditions are interesting with Clint Barton. His background indicates someone who could either literally not give fewer fucks about the holidays, or someone who roots themselves deeply in the ritual of that tradition. He tends to cut the difference and cherrypick like any red-blooded American. The tree lighting, specifically, he shows up to every year, for reasons which may remain up to speculation. None the less, he's here. Bundled up in a long wool coat and a plaid red-green checkered scarf, Clint is here as a civilian by the looks of it. But he always looks like he's there as a civilian. Watching the lighting from a comfortable distance on the ground level above the inset rink where he can take in the full scope of the rink, the tree, the lights and the waiting podium. Smirking while he watches the skaters, amused, but it's a sly amusement.
People sunk in around him, families and the like, getting on with their lives, the guy's unbothered while he glances to his watch, then peers over toward the podium, expecting this shindig to get on the road soon. Clint shuffles his weight to one side, then forward, bartering for a better view. Sharp eyes squint, frowning mildly to himself when he thinks he catches a glimpse of something familiar. Nah. Well. He shuffles around the crowd casually.
The lack of banana magnet just cinches it, really. No banana? No Bucky. It's part of the 'Barton Tag-And-Release' program that SHIELD doesn't know that it's funding.
"Five, four…" Clint whispers to count along, though his focus is no longer on the tree as he smoothly unbuttons the top two buttons of his jacket and opens it up, the handle of his M1911 within reach but hidden by the woolen flap. On his way to track down that sans-banana-man when something else catches his eye ahead. "Aw, no…" Abruptly, the archer's path changes and he presses forward with more urgency through the packed crowd. "S'cuse me. Comin' through. I left my kid up there. Sorry, my brother's got…um, black lung and needs oranges or something…s'cuse me." Clint makes ripples through the crowd now, cramming himself between bodies pretty noticably as he cuts across in a rush toward the third row.
Where were you when…
JFK was killed?
Steve Rogers was shot dead?
Gemini 2 fell from the sky?
The Rockefeller Christmas tree burned?
Three, the red cloth slips away from the podium with a flourish in Santa Claus' white glove. Susan and Peter, his special assistants, rush forward as only children can to grab the lever that will illuminate all five thousand lights strung on the tree and the glowing plastic gift presents overseen by waving foil and tinsel figures.
Four, a man of thirty-something starts to bolt out of the crowd. Widow, in looking through her scope, probably missed his presence in favour of the Great Red Sat…nta. His black coat and scarf fall away when he lifts a silvery-chrome and black device that doesn't raise the proper terror it should. Blue light radiates along the body. Raising the round barrel to the podium, he slams three buttons home. The kick on that sucker is enough to throw him back.
Five, a stream of sizzling bolts fire into the air. Sweep past in a plasma glow and strike the tree, plop, plop, plop, like rotten tomatoes flung on a stage. The main difference being the way the light implodes on itself, scorched spruce and resin growing.
Six, a pulse wave explodes out about fifteen feet up the sixty foot length and dust goes flying across the crowd. Flames in spectral greys and blues roar up the trunk and spread to the branches, though the points of direct impact aren't there.
To the eyes of the lookers-on, he might be a would-be hero. Because just as the man with the boomstick unleashes, the man in the watchcap and peacoat, the one with that almost familiar face, is lunging out of the crowd for him. The arc of wire in his hand might be near impossible to see - a gun will get him shot by the NYPD on the scene, so will the flash of a knife. But he might be able to give this bastard a painful death and avenge his wounded brother if they give him just a moment or two to get it around the shooter's throat and saw in.
There is a policeman by the skating rink. The skaters, Follies on Ice, live up to their name by crashing into one another and falling to the ice amidst a chorus of shrieks, frightened cries, 'oohs' and 'oh my Gods' melting into a hubbub. Brains take a while to process the tree is not lit up, it's on fire. Even if that should be odd coloured fire.
The action that unfolds was the last thing Natasha expected would happen, forcing her to zoom out from Santa, and reassess the field. She has one shooter, she has two people rushing him. But before she can decide whether she's taken the shooter or his pursuiters down, or perhaps seek out the wouldbe Bucky, she is drawn to look at the weird colored fire that the tree is burning with. Just what is going on? This is not what she was anticipating. Either way, let the Capitalist enjoy the embodiment of their merchandising holiday go up in flames, even if odd color, it's a remarkable imagery all the same sure to demoralize the public.
Another impolite word falls from Clint's lips when the target that he went veering off course for stands up and bolts. He has zero problems with pulling a weapon here. In a moment's notice, he's reaching into his coat for his 1911 and pulls the sidearm free, alarming /all kinds/ of people around him. "WEAPON!" The archer barks, his single voice overpowered by the din of the crowd. "DOWN! CLEAR THE STAGE! MARCHMONT! /Stand down!/" Though he doesn't give the guy much of a chance to do so before a far more conventional gunshot rings through the air. Hey, if that's not going to get people moving…
Aimed to wound, not kill, he's sort of out of options here. But then the original curiosity he was looking for is also lunging in that direction? What the hell is going on here? "HEY! BARNES MARK 4!" Clint tries bridging the gap, shoving past people swiftly, barking at the clone. "BUZZ OFF! THAT'S /MY/ CRAZY GUY!"
One of the citizens in the crowd, a blond man wearing an absolutely hideous green and orange Christmas sweater, emerges suddenly from the mass of people like an orca leaping onto a beach to take a sea lion. As he vaults onto the stage, diving reflexively under likely lines of fire, he whips his bulky and relatively concealing coat off and, holding it by one sleeve, whips it towards the garrote arm of the familiar young man. "Fight ME!" Steve Rogers demands in his even more familiar voice, trying to catch the Buckalike's attention.
"Get down!" Santa Claus is a real hero, wrapping his arms around the young blonde girl and hauling her to the ground. Peter, the boy who threw the switch, is still staring up with a confounded, blank look of a deer in the headlights. The governor son, a man of athletic prowess and immense wealth, sacks the nine-year-old around the waist and covers him.
Explosive gunfire sets off more screams, the crowd felled like summer wheat around Clint. Anywhere violence threatens, they part, hands covering their heads, and run. Shrieks and cries blister the air, none louder than "Aliens have come!" from a woman directly in front of a microphone. Those Navy boys and three Marines in dress uniform are swiveling, turning, assessing for a threat despite their pressed trousers and coats. If it's possible to tackle Marchmont, damn straight they will, Captain America cresting a mythical wave like martial Venus or not.
The gun in his hand remains ablaze in blue lights up the sides, and Marchmont swivels, head on a stick, glancing sharp and hard. The 'oh damn' moment roils, but his mouth hardens. "Where were you? They died! You weren't there!" he shouts back, and the next explosion from within the blue fire pulverises the top of the tree and sends a spire dropping down to the rink below. Try running on ice, it sucks. And with that ash comes a billowing sweep of dust, fine powder, floating down and around on the air. So very pretty. People look up in wonder and horror, those with presence of mind to stare.
It's only thirty seconds, a minute, before they start to fall or giddily careen sideways. A lifetime from now, but still…
They're trained to kill, and to fight multiple opponents without losing their cool. The smaller, darker Soldier is turning to face Clint, one of the wire's grip end still firmly in hand. If these SHIELD lackeys want to wolfpack him, bring it on.
Somehow the mere sight of Steve Rogers is enough to give the clone a beat of pause, and his weapon hand is snagged. Then his expression hardens into resolution, and he goes with the yank of the coat, turning a stumble into a willing lunge for Steve himself. «You!» he says, in furious, hoarse Russian. «All those stupid movies. He was watching one when they beat him, you big idiot. Where were you?» It's like Linus finally got a chance to harangue the Great Pumpkin.
Everything stops to matter when one Steve Rogers reveals himself, as he jumps to the fore as one would expect of the famous American Hero. Everything doesn't even matter anymore, not when she has such a prime target as Captain America. If she can take down this icon of American history, she will deal a bigger blow to the USA than she even intended tonight. She doesn't even wait a second, the moment she has Steve in her scope, she fires. Unfortunately, that's when he takes on the wouldbe Bucky, she wasn't anticipating that, so in their struggle and considering the trajectory of her shot, either one of them can wind up taking the hit. She only hopes it is Captain Steve Rogers.
Clint can't roll his eyes at the loudspeaker shout of 'aliens are here', but he can mumble under his breath, "Gee, thanks captain obvious." Just as the other Captain Obvious shows up. A very swift flick of stormy eyes at the stage before they jump back to the in-distress Marchmont. "Yeah! Fight him!" Clint throws Steve under the bus with that bark at the clone. But at least the sea of people has parted to give him room to book it hardcore like in that direction.
Clones, soldiers, whatever. Seriously, whatever. Who has time for all of that? The dark-haired one goes for the light-haired one and Clint is doing his best to bolt the remainder way to his target. Holstering his 1911, Clint needs both his hands free to try to run bodily into Marchmont before he can entirely recover from his last attack, grabbing for the fancy gun, hand to the barrel and the other over the top of the trigger finger to pry it off. "Marchmont," Clint grits between his teeth, intent on trying to ram the butt of it right into the suspended agent's face. "You're being…a real…pill!"
"Sniper! Head down, Clint!" Rogers calls out in warning, winding his coat around the pseudoBucky as he draws him in like a tango partner. "I've got this one!" Steve lowers his center of gravity and throws his hip into his opponent, trying to continue the arc of motion in order to bring him to the ground. "Not close enough to stop it. I'll be the first to admit," he grunts back at semi-Bucky, trying to maneuver him into a blood choke, "that I'm making up for lost time."
The masses streaming out onto the streets might resemble the V-E Day parades, except they weren't screaming about aliens and attacks on their beloved institutions then. No deep kisses by random sailors on passing ladies here. On the platform, the best Santa and Mr. Rockefeller can do is protect the children and try to inch to the ends, while the Navy sailors form a perimeter and one of the Marines leaps up to grab stretching hands, hauling a child down out of the way. Sacrifice and duty are built in, especially with their icon right there.
But then, the hysterical laughter and the moans begin. Everywhere is a different story. People stumbling, bodies leaning together, the mass felling by a psychedelic scythe cutting right through lucidity.
"Oh God, Cheryl, the lights. Look at the pretty lights. It's gooooorgeous."
Agent Marchmont isn't aware entirely of the blood on his leg, the stinging pain gone fiery above the knee to the hip. He has something else to worry about: murderous death, Russian he barely understands, that face. A snarl forms on his mouth, rough, hard and cruel.
He takes a step forward to aim another shot and his leg buckles, and goddamn if Agent Barton isn't there in his face, knocking him over. Odd things happen at that attempt to force the gun up into Marchmont's face. He lets go, naturally, and protects himself, fending off the blow. Soon as his hand's off, the thing emits an electric pulse that doesn't fry skin so much as imply burns, a nasty shock. Ooh, someone hasn't bypassed its security.
Even the gimpy rough draft the Russians had to partially rebuild could give Steve a good run for his money, on a decen day. This one - and it's got to be vertigo-inducing how much he does/doesn't look like that old pal - is better. Oh, the vibranium arm's a missing asset on the clone, but he's fast, strong, and skilled.
Then there's the flat *crack* of a suppressed rifle report, and Steven feels, through the grapple, the shock of the impact that was meant for him. The clone makes no sound of pain, but his body spasms, once. A half heartbeat where he goes limp….and then he explodes into redoubled effort. It was tough before, now it's like trying to wrestle a miniature version of Bruce on his worst days. The Soldier's strength has gone from a near-match to something superhuman, and he's fighting like Widow just tickled him with a feather, paying no heed at all to the spreading darkness on his coat. It's only an instant, as he struggles to break the Captain's grapple…and then the drug takes effect. «What have you done?» he asks, and it's without the earlier fury. The strength remains, but skills and speed depart with haste.
Widow was about to do a quick follow up shot, a perfect opportunity to take down the famous Captain America. There's nothing better. But then she finally discovers, too late, what the odd colored fire was all about when she gets hit by affect of the drugs she's been inhaling. All of a sudden she's no longer in Rockefeller Plaza. Suddenly it's all a haze, and from that haze she recognizes a battlefield. It makes no sense…but it's there, it looks real, and suddenly there's Captain America fighting against her Winter Soldier. The crowds melt away, as she can only focus on those too. «Careful, he's the best they've got…» she mutters to herself, too far to warn Winter Soldier, as if he wouldn't know of Steve Rogers. She wants to take another shot, but she doesn't want to risk killing her mentor, the man she's come to love. So against all odds, she decides to engage, sniper rifle gets slung over her back, and firing a Widow Line at the building she's on, she takes a swing towards the fight, swooping in to crash land atop Captain America. At least that is how it goes in the plan she painted out in her head.
Clint makes a very unpleasant sound when the gun's defensive measures kick in, dropping the whole damn thing. His hands shake while his skin screams in protest. There's a little much happening right now to pay too much heed to Steve's warning, but at least their resident agency screw up is under control. Even if the damage is already done. Oh boy there's going to be paperwork. Panting a little bit, he doesn't seem to immediately notice the effects while he strips his jacket and drops it over the fallen weapon, tying the arms together in a bundle.
Man. The wool on this thing's sorta soft.
The back of Clint's neck is hot and in the chill, he's suddenly very aware of how much he's sweating. He hasn't heard of global warming yet, of El Nino, but there's gotta be some equivalent he can gripe about. Instead, he starts mumbling under his breath, "Whenever I'm with you…Something inside starts to burning." Oh dear God, Clint. Stop. "And I'm filled with desire. Could it be a devil in me…" Singing Martha and the Vandellas song to himself, Barton pulls the sweater off his back and drops it, because DAMN is it hot for December. Picking the bundle of jacket and gun up like a beachblanket, he looks around, lost for a moment. What was he doing?
Steve Rogers finds himself wondering, not for the first time, whether he's really able to keep up with the new breed of super soldier, as the eerily familiar Red decisively takes control of the fight, freeing his neck and putting Steve heavily to the floor of the stage just in time to, ironically, catch a bullet in the back. "Off the stage! Hard cover!" Steve yells, guarding his neck by hauling on the coat entangling demi-Bucky's right arm, and pointing with his free arm in the direction the shot came from. "Less than whoever just… uh," Steve points out vaguely, doing his best to get back on top and roll his opponent off the stage so as to protect him from more rifle fire, in spite of his knees suddenly feeling very pudding-like. Also the lights are doing some very strange things. Also the sounds.
Someone later will say they saw a woman swing through the air on a liana, and she trailed quetzalcoatl feathers in a rainbow gleam behind her legs. The dust swirled by Widow's wake only makes the effect worst on those below.
A police officer tries to take aim and finds nothing to shoot by the spectre of his imagination, the monstrous bogey that dwelled under his bed in the suppurating flesh. He'd scream, except there's no breath coming out under hands clamping around his throat.
Someone later will say they saw faces in the ghostly flames. Cinders rain down as the top of the great spruce crashes onto the ice, and the collapsing sylvan skeleton throws burning embers anywhere. Two Navy sailors in their whites go down giggling under the leprechaun rainbow. Prayers and gasping laughter do not make a good evacuation. Combine a forest fire and a bad, bad acid trip for enlightenment.
Marchmont isn't immune to what they did, though he drops to the ground and covers his head with his hands. "You killed Gonzales, you monster, how dare you look at Captain America, how dare we let you watch him, see him, hear him?" His voice rises in a bloody howl. "You deserve to die in the chair. Poison you, hang you, firing squad, that fucking French blade. Die. Just die, Devil fucking take you! Why weren't you gassed?"
Those shouts don't diminish.
He's ceased fighting, ceased resisting, has the Soldier - dragged along like a ragdoll by Steve, rolling unprotestingly off the edge of the stage without even an attempt to save himself. «Nika will be so happy to see you,» the clone confides to Steven, in the sort of meandering, inconsequential tone you only get when someone is vastly stoned. «I thought you'd be bigger. You're Yasha's friend, right? The Americans messed him up. Why did you let them? Why did they take him from us?» Existential questions, even as he's bleeding out. «My back hurts. Someone shot me.» Then he peers over at Marchmont, blearily. «I hate that guy. He hurt Nika really bad. People keep blaming us for what Yasha does.»
With Captain America rolling out of the way along with the wouldbe Winter Soldier, he just manages to avoid a crashing drop from the Black Widow, as she lands through the stage, though she manages to latch on the Line she was swinging by to pull herself back up, before detaching and rushing after him, drawing a pistol and firing after him, "let him go, Captain America! You can't have the Soldier!" She screams with a feral cry, whatever it is she's seeing in this drug enhanced vision, it's clearly not where they are. She looks predatory as she sets chase after Captain America, not caring if she kills some people she doesn't even know are there as she's chasing him and fires shots, "I will end you!" And as she draws closer to Steve and wouldbe Bucky, she adds in Russian «I am here for you, Winter Soldier, we will finish Captain America together! We will be heroes!»
"It's like a heat wave! Burning in my heart, I can't keep from crying. It's tearing me apart. Whenever he calls my name…Soft, low, sweet, and plain," Clint casually sings to himself as he looks around at the masses of, well, alternating panic and serenity. It's chaos. But that doesn't seem to bother Clint in the least. In fact, he sits down, on the ground, crosslegged beside Marchmont, facing where some hot red-head is fighting with Steve and Bananaless-Bucky. "/Shhhh/!" He shoves at Marchmont while he screams. "Shut up! This is my favorite part. No-no-no, man, watch this! This is the best part!" Shoving at Marchmont's curled body.
Hawkeye, everybody!
"Ease down, soldier!" Captain Christmas Sweater orders Marchmont, picking him out against the weirdly heaving background. "You've done enough." He shakes his head to clear it, practicing mindful breathing as best he can while simultaneously towing the Bucky to safety. "I'm honestly sorry about that, son. I wish I had been there to stop it. We have to do better, and I'm trying to show them. Starting with you." Through the swirling confusion a sharp, clear voice rings out, with a dark figure rushing towards him to punctuate it. Almost before he knows it himself, Steve slings the wounded and entangled Buckloid into the arms of a pair of Marines and charges towards the lethal Red operative. Bullets hiss towards him and he dives under them, sliding feet-first towards her as if he was trying to steal third. "If you want to try, leave the rest of them out of it!"
Those Marines aren't with it, and they just about jump when someone shoves a body into their arms. Call it a case of perennial freakout panic, the drugs permeating their system incapable of allowing a rational response. One jumps away from the Buckling, hissing, "He gave me a dragon. Get it off me!"
At least the lassitude is spreading though area hospitals will have a great many burn wounds to deal with. Sixty feet of flaming spruce is rapidly reduced to a charcoal pile of cinders, melted flesh and bubbling blisters the ideal ornaments.
Marchmont is an unreliable figure, hands clapped tightly over his head, ignorant to everything short of a direct kick from the singing madman. He's lost his mind, not going anywhere. Well, a bullet in one's thigh will do that.
Emergency personnel trying to get through have their own problems: lungs. Not a few of them in the miasma carried on the air around Rockefeller Centre drop, stretchers hitting the ground, the high sending them soaring.
«That lady, she's mad at you,» The Soldier informs Steve, watching Natasha come at them, without a sign of recognition in his eyes. «I bet she thinks I'm Yasha, too. Watch out.» He's leaving a trail of blood. A sound of pain when he's flung at the Marines - he's reduced to trying to put pressure on the wound by the expedient of bunching up his coat and lying on it. It didn't pierce the lung or pass through - at least it's not a sucking chest wound.
.~{:--------------:}~.
"Try? Try!? You think the Black Widow tries!?" Oh drugs ruin everything; decades of keeping perfect cover, being a phantom, a whisper, a myth, and now she goes out and blurts in public that she's the Black Widow. Not because she is wont to brag, but because she's literally seeing an empty battlefield, with only Captain America, Winter Soldier and herself in it. She has no clue she just uttered something she should not have uttered.
While precious few in this crowd would likely even know of the rumours of the Black Widow, largely circulating in high circles of the Intelligence crowd, they would likely not manage to recall thanks to being under the influence themselves. So…maybe drugs don't ruin everything? Either way, Widow sees Steve lunging at her like in that accursed American game, but she's not playing nice and waiting for him to tackle her. She flips in the air, releasing one more shot at him at the apex of her tumbling, before she comes crushing down, knee first, meaning to utterly smash Steve's spine, or whatever part of him she could nail. She is out for blood, she cares about nothing else at the moment.
Clint watches as Steve hoists the clone up and 'off-stage'. He starts cheering and applauding, a little misty-eyed. Really, Clint? Really? IT'S JUST THE ASH IN THE AIR! Sticking two fingers in his mouth, a shrill whistle splits the air expertly for the 'show'. "Oh man. That never gets old. C'mon. I'll buy you something pretty on the way back." Clint sniffs and shoves the gun up under his arm and reaches down to gather Marchmont, who is playing the role of…who? Clint's girlfriend? Brother? Trick? Let's just hope he doesn't try to go for second base before the drugs wear off.
He hears the name 'Black Widow' declared across the stage and he laughs a little bit, lax as he looks back up from trying to heave Marchmont to his feet. "Black Widow? Naaahhh. That one's—" Clint blinks a couple times, bleerily, some vague sliver of lucidity almost slipping into his mind as he wavers on his feet. There's something important about that name.
Steve Rogers squints against the morass of mental noise, throwing up his arms over his chest to deflect the descending Widow and the blow that would've cracked his sternum. Comfortable fighting on the ground (and less comfortable standing up considering the current dizziness), he tries to hook his elbow behind her knee and throw her as a follow-up. "Confident. Have to say, I still don't like to hit a lady. Clint! How're we doing with the package?"
As far as Marchmont is concerned, anyone trying to hold him needs to be shoved off, a horrific figure wrapped in darkness and a murderer's face. Of course, he's bleeding rather freely from the leg and will not be coordinated in pushing at Clint in any fashion. Sure, he's a fighter, but he lacks the ability to use that leg, to make sense of shapes and people in his violent non-lucidity. Call it a case of getting out of there, not wise, not good.
The poor Soldier, or whatever he is….has passed out. His breath isn't the fish out of water gasping of the agonal reflexes, at least. He might make it, if the EMTs can make it to him.
Black Widow's attempt to crush Captain America with a massive knee strike is blocked, but as he throws her, she rolls with the throw and winds up on her feet. Just getting up, reality is starting to blur, shifting from the drug induced vision to the real one, and all of a sudden she realizes the danger she's in, "cyka blyat," she stammers angrily, before pointing an arm upwards and shooting a Widow Line that grapples her out of the scene. Hopefully the confusion will ward off pursuit.
Clint is still trying to remember where he knows that name from when he's shoved away from Marchmont. Yeah. He's going to need medical attention and taken back into custody when stable. Like most of them. Clint is almost laughably human and susceptible to that alien drug and its effects, though he's taking a bit of pause now, frowning as he stares down at the flailing, bleeding man. The trip takes a turn and suddenly he's very, very aware that he's freezing, though he can't figure out quite why. It's not like he's stripped to the waist in December. Oh wait. That's exactly what he did. "Rogers?" Holy shit, he seems to hear and recognize something, mumbling the name. "Package?" He looks at the wrapped up bundle of jacket under his arm as if he's never seen it before. "Secured?"
Further confusion when a black and red streak flies away from the scene. Something in Clint's head clicks through the haze, though he may not consciously recognize it at this moment. All he knows is there's a cold spot in his gut. And it shall remain there until medical attention finds him, standing guard by Marchmont with an arm full of alien tech.