Issue 12 YEAR THREE AUGUST Author: Lonni Holland

HAWKEYE Armed with a high-tech arsenal and the surpassing skill to use it, Clint Barton dons the familiar purple costume and fires justice from his bow.

The Good Old Days (Part One)

Arizona, 1878... man, is this beautiful country, the sky is so blue it almost hurts to look at it. I had been there about fifteen minutes and was still overwhelmed. It was good to get away from LA, from the traffic, the pollution, the paperwork, the hassles. Ya know, I really do love being a team leader but sometimes all the bureaucracy crap is just too much. Maybe this is where I really belong, simpler times, when a guy could be a hero without having to fill it out everything in triplicate.

After getting Rawhide's message I had made a quick call to New York, told Maggie & Phil to wait for me, and grabbed Jack. "Look, Agent, I have to go away again for a few hours, I should be back by midnight at the latest, but in the meantime you're in charge."

"Hawk, we need to talk about..."

"Hey, do you want the job or not? I'm not leaving Simon in charge, he's just too spaced out lately, so it's you or Tigra cause I'm not dropping it in the lap of some newbie. Now are you in, or out?"

"In, but..." *

"No buts, I gotta book. I can fly east with Magdelene and Swordsman, get my business done then fly the Quinjet back later. Just run a practice or something and try to stay out of trouble, okay? Bye!"

* check out WCA 108 to see what Jack is trying to tell Clint about

I had a lot to think about on the flight but I did manage to talk to Phillip a bit. His decision to leave the team still puzzled me but it was his choice to make after all. We shook hands and they left once we reached the mansion. I checked in with the Capster and then headed to Yellowjacket's lab. Sure enough, Hank had come through for me again. He borrowed the FF's time machine, fiddled around with the idea, and came up with a portable model for me. He'd even made it look like a pocket watch so no one would suspect what it was. He had some authentic looking clothes and money for me too, even a quiver that would fit in with the period. I drew the line at leaving my own arrows and bow behind though, so he had put pouches in the quiver strap where I could stash extra arrowheads. He also had a fully equipped gun belt for me. I didn't like the idea much, but if I was going to fit into the era I guess I needed it. He had tossed a few goodies into saddlebags for me as well.

Hank briefed my on the equipment. "Well, Clint, I made a few modifications. This unit will bring you back in a week, or sooner if you want, but only six hours will have passed here. I gave you some leeway because you don't want to run into yourself leaving after all." He chuckled. Scientists! How do you explain to them that they have no senses of humor? "You can also pick your return destination. I've preset it to bring you back to the mansion's Quinjet hanger but there are other options. like the west coast compound, or... the mansion infirmary."

"The infirmary? Gee, thanks for the vote of confidence, YJ, I needed that."

"No knock against you intended, Clint, but, if you are badly hurt, pressing two settings, infirmary and instant recall, could easily save your life. You have been seriously injured in battle before, as have many of us, and the medical facilities in 1878 are dubious at best. It's only a safeguard."

"Yeah, yeah, I know it is." Man, I didn't mean to piss him off. I know he only did that because he's trying to make things easy for me. I shouldn't be so sensitive I guess. "Thanks, Hank, I really do appreciate this and I didn't mean to sound like I was getting on your case or anything."

"No offense taken, Clint. I just hope you have everything you need."

Well I hoped so too, but I wasn't too worried about it, I could always improvise. I headed back to our Quinjet, shucked my costume and changed into the appropriate clothes, flipped on Hank's dohickey and poof - there I was, sitting on a rock in Arizona, enjoying the scenery and feeling more at peace than I had in ages.

That feeling passed fast and I felt my stomach drop abruptly as I heard the unmistakable click of a gun hammer being drawn back on a six-gun and it sounded close. I froze in place when I heard "I wouldn't move, partner. Not if you plan to keep breathing."

"Uhhhh... Matt? That you?"

"Clint!"

I decided to restart my heart and turn around. "God damn it, Two Gun, don't do that! Man, you just shaved ten years off my life, and in this business my life expectancy is short enough already."

"Sorry, Hawk, but you weren't in costume, and I didn't want to take any chances."

He brought me up to date pretty quickly on what was happening. Iron Mask and a few of the others we had run into last time * had banded back together again. They had been pretty cocky in the way they were trotting around and were hauling some metal equipment with them. From the way Matt described it, it sure sounded like some of the stuff Kang had been batting around way back. **

* in AWC 18

** Avengers 143-144

Two Gun had tailed them but the Fat Man had taken him down with one of his boomerangs. They had just left him bound, and taken off, like they were so confident in their plans that they couldn't be bothered with him. Now all this sounded bad enough until Rawhide mentioned that he had checked out their trail and they were heading north, then Two Gun commented that President Hayes was due in Winslow in a few days on a territorial junket and that was directly in their path.

Hayes? Damn, I remembered Lincoln, and Grant, but who was Hayes? I should have paid more attention in those history classes I guess. Even when Matt referred to him by his nickname of His Fraudulency it rang no bells. Oh well, save him now, find out who he was later, but I vowed to myself to check it out as soon as I got back to the compound.

I still was a bit puzzled about the message I had gotten but Rawhide pulled out a package he had found in one of his hangouts. Sure enough, there were special zippered bags to put messages in to keep the them safe over the years. There were also detailed instructions on how to put them into a bank in Tucson, for delivery to me by Federal Express in my time. The instructions were in my handwriting.

I felt like I had fallen into Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure. So... I had to remember to go back and deposit these instructions so I'd get the message later which was really before, but in the future. Ouch! Party on, dudes.

Well, we weren't going to accomplish much sitting around here. The Kids had a mount for me and we needed to hit the trail if we were ever going to catch up to Iron Mask and his pals. I was looking forward to it. Action at last, with none of the hassles I had in my time. Yahoo... let's ride!

Two Gun said we'd change horses at a relay station he knew of, of course he didn't mention that we'd have to ride for six hours before we got there. This was assuming that Iron Mask and his buddies pretty much kept to the main route, which so far they were doing. Rawhide was a whiz at following a trail, no matter how obscure, and he was keeping us on track. They had a few hours lead on us so all we could hope was that they stopped somewhere so we could overtake them.

I had a kerchief up over my face but the sand still got in my eyes and made them water; and, even though I had my hat pulled low, the glare off the sand wasn't helping much. Even worse, after the first hour I realized that it had been a long time since I'd been on a horse. Now I'm a good rider but I could feel it even then and hoped that by the time we got to the relay station that I'd be able to walk straight. I didn't want the guys to think I was a tenderfoot or something.

It had been early when we set out and we got to the station about two in the afternoon. Matt said we'd stop long enough to eat and get fresh mounts. I made sure no one was watching as I dismounted stiffly. The guys headed inside for some grub. I pleaded a call of nature and, gritting my teeth, walked back to the facilities to see if I could assess the damage. I gingerly unbuttoned my jeans and checked. My god - the insides of my thighs were almost as purple as my Hawkeye costume and I hated to even think what my butt looked like. Hank had tucked some medical stuff in my gear so I smeared on a bit of analgesic cream, while trying not to bellow when I touched the bruises, and wished I had brought along some kind of topical anesthetic. Oh well, I could fake it and it'd get better as I got used to it. At least I sure hoped it would.

Rawhide said the trail markings were getting sharper now so we were gaining on them some. Man, I've got above average vision but I still couldn't see what he was tracking. It just looked like sand and rock and more sand.

We rode on and we rode hard. They had about an hour's lead on us and we wanted to get closer before nightfall. Night fell, and still we went on, at least for another couple of hours. Then Rawhide told us he was losing the trail so we stopped. Supper was cold beef jerky and some water from our canteens. We didn't want to chance a fire since we weren't sure how close they were and didn't want to be spotted. The temperature had dropped fast as soon as the sun had set, so we huddled in our bedrolls and tried to get some sleep on the hard sands.

Welcome to the old west, Clint, where men were men, saddles were hard, and there wasn't a Motel 6 to be found.

It had taken me ages to get to sleep. My legs and back ached and every time I moved, trying to get into a comfortable position, it was all I could do to not yell, it hurt so bad. I finally managed to drift off but morning seemed to come pretty fast. I woke up and my whole body felt like it was on fire. I could hear the Kids moving about and I lay real still, hoping they'd wander off to wash up or something before I tried to unknot myself enough to attempt getting up. Then I caught a little of their conversation and knew I wasn't going to be able to bluff them.

"So, Two Gun, should I call Hawk?"

"Nah, better let him rest. He sounded pretty rough last night, tossing around and moaning in his sleep, so I reckon he's going to be pretty sore when he does wake up."

No way, man! I wasn't going to let the coddle me like some city slicker. I'd worked a ranch and ridden all the time, this was just a little morning stiffness. I started to move and gasped. It felt like every muscle I had was torn to shreds.

"Well, mornin', Hawk. Having a bit of trouble?"

A bit of trouble... sure, go ahead, make fun of me. "Nope, I'm fine, Rawhide. Just a kink, but it's gone now." I started to get up. "So, what's for breakf... aarrgghh!" My knees locked, my back felt like every disc was shattered and my legs and ass felt like someone had beaten me with a two by four. I dropped back to the ground and just lay there groaning, trying to recuperate.

"Told ya he was gonna be hurting, Rawhide. Come on, you know what to do."

"Yup, I reckon the cold'll help."

I didn't know what they had in mind but when they started to unbutton my jeans I had an inkling. I tried to fight them, but, even though I was bigger than both of them, they were tough little guys and besides, I could barely move. They stripped me down to my skivvies and started to carry me to the creek.

"Damn it, Matt! You wouldn't dare!"

Two Gun chuckled. "Trust me, Hawk, this is for your own good. You'll feel a lot better, honest."

"Matt! Nooooo...." I screamed when they tossed me in that icy cold water. It was freezing and it bloody well hurt! Of course I went right under as I screamed and came up spitting out mouthfuls. I was choking and sputtering as I tried to climb out as best as my almost paralyzed body would let me but Two Gun just shoved me back in and told me to stay there for a while. I cursed at him, in English, in Spanish, in some Yiddish I had heard in New York, hell, I even cursed at him in Kree, but to no avail, he made me stay there for about ten minutes.

Rawhide had left, and Two Gun finally extended his hand to me to help me out. I crawled up onto the bank and he got me to my feet. I could at least stand now but it was just after dawn, the air was still cold and I was turning blue. We headed back to camp, me limping, shivering, and still cussing, him holding me up. He rubbed me down with a rough towel then shoved me down, face first, on my bedroll. I was still too stiff to stop him.

Rawhide was crouched over the campfire but he turned back with a pot in his hands and said, "Okay, Hawk, now don't you fight this. These is some herbs and things an Injun friend showed me. They'll fix you up right quick. Just lie still, it might sting a bit at first."

Sting! The two of them started to rub this warm sticky stuff on me and I damn near went into orbit. They ignored me as I made a few impossible, but rather intriguing suggestions about their personal sexual habits with their horses. Finally I just buried my face in my blanket. Man, this was humiliating. I mean it was bad enough having a couple of guys smearing stuff on my legs and butt like I was a baby, but when it was these two guys..... I had grown up idolizing them, pouring over dime novels that told their exploits, they had been my heroes since I was a little tyke, and now here I was whimpering into my blankets while they nursed me for saddle sores of all things. I was never going to live this one down.

They finished and I just lay there, hurting... and sulking too, I guess. After a few minutes Two Gun nudged me. I looked up and saw he was offering me a coffee and a plate of food, some of the dehydrated eggs I had brought, scrambled up. I realized I was starving so I decided I'd just eat now and pout later. The eggs were still powdery, the coffee was bitter and gritty, and I can't remember the last time anything tasted so good. Guess what they say about eating outdoors is true, everything tastes better. Of course the fact we hadn't eaten much the day before wasn't hurting much either.

I was sitting up, with my blanket around my shoulders, when I suddenly realized that I was sitting, and not hurting, or certainly not as much as I had been. Maybe the prudent course would be just to drop the whole thing and feign some assemblance of dignity. If I didn't mention it they might just ignore it too, and that would suit me just fine.

After we ate Rawhide left to see if he could scout out anything and Two Gun and I stayed behind to break camp. Not that there was much to break, but we had a fire, this morning anyway, and we just wanted to clear everything up and saddle the horses. I got dressed and we packed up the bedrolls and cooking stuff in silence. I was still a bit stiff, but I was moving, which is more than I could say for an hour ago.

Finally Matt muttered, "So, feeling better?"

I mumbled back, "Uh huh." I thought about it then decided I'd better say a bit more. "Uhh, Matt, thanks. Look, I'm sorry I gave you and Rawhide such a hard time earlier."

"Aw, that's okay, Clint. I shouldn't have laughed at you either. I remember what a time I had when I first came out here from Boston. I sort of forget that things are different where you are. I mean, you guys have so many things that we've never even dreamed of and you do such fantastic things that I sometimes forget that you aren't invincible. You're a bit of a legend around here, you know."

That surprised me a bit because I had always hero worshipped the old west heroes but it never dawned on me that they did the same to me. We both mumbled a few more semi-polite things, then Rawhide came back. Iron Mask was moving but he was in sight now. Okay, if we could see him, we could stop him. We mounted up, me rather slowly of course, and headed out.

As we rounded a rocky hill we spotted them. I was hoping that we could have snuck up on them kinda subtle like but the Kids started whooping and shooting and galloping so I had little choice but to follow along. The bad guys were just loading up some equipment on a wagon. Blast, it sure did look like one of the over complex pieces of feldercarb that Kang was always playing around with. In the hands of old blue nose it was bad enough, in the hands of a bunch of amateurs... I didn't want to even think about it. Damned if I knew how they had gotten it when I was pretty sure that everything of Kang's had been destroyed but then we had thought he was destroyed too and he wasn't. I could worry about that later. Right now we had been spotted and about a dozen guys were firing bullets at us so my attention was going to have to be on the fight I was in now instead of the one from the past.

My horse was getting skittish but I managed to control him with my knees as I nocked a gas arrow and fired it at the some of the gunslingers. Well, it had worked the last time I faced this bunch of yahoos but I guess even 19th century bad guys learn, cause Iron Mask was keeping his troops spread out and it's a lot easier for me to deal with them in groups. My arrow took out about five of them but the rest kept on firing.

They were fanning out and herding us together and that was bad. Neither of the Kids seemed to be noticing it; they were both intent on trying to disarm some of our assailants. I hollered at them not to bunch up but they didn't hear me or just weren't paying attention . I tried a blast arrow that took out a few more but then a bullet caught the side of my shirt and made me steer away from the fight and in the same direction that Rawhide and Two Gun were now heading. Red Raven and Iron Mask seemed to be the leaders although I knew the Fat Man was with them too, since Two Gun had mentioned him earlier. I tried to fire off an electro arrow but a sharp pain in my wrist, that almost made me drop my bow, let me know that the Fat Man and his bloody boomerangs were around somewhere.

My arm felt numb and I had to do exactly what Rawhide and Two Gun were doing, turn tail and bolt. We were outnumbered, outgunned and about to be badly beaten if we didn't regroup, but I hated the idea of running, especially running in a direction our enemies were picking for us. A sharp pain on the top of my leg allayed my fears though. I glanced down to see a small trickle of blood, realized I had been creased and just rode as hard as I could before the next shot really got me.

Red Raven flew above, directing the men who were firing at us. As I saw the walls of rock rising up beside us I knew we had made a bad mistake. We were in a box canyon, no way out except back through Iron Mask's gang. He pulled up to the mouth of the canyon in the wagon and started fiddling with the stuff in the back. I had a bad feeling about this.

"Well, you wanted to find us, so here we are!" Iron Mask was gloating as he flipped levers and pushed buttons. "I heard that you had a run in with a rather unusual coyote once Two Gun. Here, have three of them."

I knew I had a bad feeling about this, and it looked like I was right. There are times I just hate being right. Something shimmered and wavered in front of the wagon and then three large purplish creatures arose and charged towards us. * Oh brother, were we in trouble now! These things were big and nasty, sorta scaly things with large swinging tails that packed a heck of a whallop. I remembered how tough it was to take down one of these pug uglies the first time and this time there were three of them and no Moondragon around to mind blast it.

* check Avengers 144 for those details

I glanced at the others. Rawhide looked surprised, but he started calmly firing at the creatures. Too bad his shots were having no effect except possibly riling them. Two Gun was shooting too, but he had a wild look in his eyes that scared me. If he panicked he wasn't going to be much good to us. Not that any of us were going to be real effective anyway but we had to try.

I remembered that my blast arrows hadn't done much good last time so I tried an electro arrow but couldn't get the shot off. Our horses were bucking and panicking. Now you can fire a gun with one hand but a bow takes two, so I was having a hard time. I could feel myself slipping so I grabbed my saddlebags that had all of the food and medical gear in them, tossed them to Rawhide and jumped off.

I scrambled back to my feet and got the shock arrow off fast. To my surprise it slowed the creature down a bit. He was batting at his side furiously, one of the others was eyeing my fleeing horse but the third one was bearing down on me. I'm a distance fighter, I was ineffective this close up but neither Two Gun nor Rawhide seemed to realize that because they both focused on the one who was freaking over the electro arrow and not on the one that was heading my way. I saw little choice but to run like hell.

I took off to try to put some distance between me and the pursing critter but I'm 6'3" and it had to be about 60 feet tall so it had a way longer stride then I did. From one side I could hear the frenzied whinnying of my mount as the brute closed in on it. I knew better than to let myself be distracted but I glanced that way a bit and...

Unnngghhhh........

Damn.... hurts.... gotta get up... clear my head.....

There was sand in my mouth, my vision was cloudy. I tried to push myself up. I could smell the hot, rancid breath of my attacker at my back, feel its rough scaly hands squeezing my ribs as it lifted me into the air. I tried to catch my breath and it grasped me even tighter. I was trying to fight it but I knew I was blacking out again. Suddenly the monster turned and let go of me. I felt myself falling, felt the ground hit me between the shoulder blades, then I felt.... nothing.

This arc falls between AWC 108 and the beginning of 109 and relies heavily on the Assault on Castle Kang issues (143 & 144) written by Steve Englehart. Be back next month to see how Hawk gets out of this one for 'The Good Old Days Part Two'.

Lonni Holland Feb. 21, 1999 lonni@paratime.ca