Synopsis / Summary / Plot
Last issue Hawkeye (Kate Bishop) teamed up with Hawkeye (Clint Barton) to find out who was trying to kill him. It was teleporting, time-travelling archer Eden Vale (last and only seen when Kate was sent to Clint's past in the Generations: Hawkeyes 1-shot). They fought on the roof of Grauman's Chinese Theatre off which the Hawkeye's fell. But Vale teleported Bishop to her lair where she explained that she blamed Barton for the death of her young daughter during Secret Empire. And now she offered to bring Kate's mother through time from before her death if she would agree to help kill Clint. And to prove she wasn't kidding she did bring Eleanor Bishop to the present.
Now we see Clint-eye, aching from his *unstopped* fall, enter PI Kate's Hawkeye Investigations office/apartment, where he finds her friends/helpers (who he met last issue) Johnny Watts, Ramone Watts and Quinn (and Lucky the dog) who demand to know where she is. They saw her fall and disappearance on the News. Clint burbles on as he finds a pack of frozen peas in the fridge to ease his largest bruise, but they keep insisting he tell them what's going on. So he briefly explains about Eden Vale and the teleporting bit but they want to know what happened afterwards. He says he came here and got the peas.
But now he proposes to stock up with some fresh arrows for his bow and go look for Vale. He says he doesn't want their help but then has to admit he has no idea where to look other than the apartment they found her at already. Internet-savvy Quinn finds a warehouse leased by someone with a name that's an anagram of Eden's on the same day as she rented the apartment. And just to clinch it finds video of the distinctively blue-haired woman near there. Meanwhile the Watts siblings have been looking through some of Kate's files and clumsy Clint makes them drop 1, which opens up to display a photo of Madame Masque wearing the cloned Kate-body from #10-11 that Kate told him about last issue. And this gives him an idea.
We see a flashback to young teen Kate and her mom. Kate remonstrates with her about going out with other men while dad's away on business. Mom says she'll understand when she gets older. Now in Eden Vale's hideout Eleanor Bishop doesn't understand why her daughter's older, and why she's chained to the floor. Kate is more concerned with telling her mom she's sorry she didn't run away with her when she asked (in a flashback in #7 which was the last time she saw her before she mysteriously died). She says she knew dad was a bad guy but not just how bad he was. Mom says she has nothing to apologise about. Kate doesn't want to mention her death (imminent since Eleanor seems to recognise the incident Kate mentioned) so can only profess her love.
Then Eden sends Mrs Bishop back in time. She says this was only a demonstration to show she could do what she said. If she wants her mother here permanently then she must help her kill Barton.
Meanwhile we see Clint crawling through ventilation ducts of Madame Masque's base guided (by radio?) by Quinn (who has got hold of the building schematics?) but he can also hear the 3 commenting how cool it is because Kate never lets them help *this* much. They also discuss the merits of Clint's plan which is to switch fake Kate for real Kate and hope Eden doesn't notice.
Meanwhile Hawkeye's dropped into a very large room decorated like a Renaissance church with Masque as an object of worship, where he deals with a mob of minions with various archer-y/Errol Flynn-y moves. Then he enters another ornate room where he's attacked by MM still in her Kate-body but wearing her Masque outfit without the gold mask. They fight until he gets her pinned to the ground face-to-face. So she kisses him (explaining the cover, sort of) which almost makes him let go in disgust. But he keeps her pinned and threatens to stab an arrow in her eye if she doesn't do what he wants. 5 minutes later she's changing behind a screen into her copy of Kate's Hawkeye costume, and then she asks what's next. So he knocks her out.
Back with Kate-eye in Eden Vale's abandoned warehouse Kate turns down the villain's proposal and says she's surprised she even asked. Eden will obviously do anything to get her daughter back because they're family, but she should have realised that Clint Barton is 'family' to Kate too. Meanwhile she's been picking the lock of her shackles with a hairpin. Then an arrow hits a wall behind Eden and explodes, knocking her out. Kate is free and leaps through the hole blown in the wall, congratulating Clint on his rescue. But then sees that he's still in the room and placing MM's unconscious body beside EV's. He joins Kate outside the room but she's not impressed. She doesn't think it's a good idea to put the 2 villainesses together because when they wake up they'll team up to kill them *both*. And she's right because they both wake up now and *do* agree to work together.