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Natasha Romanoff was not a romantic. Never had been. The consummate professional at all times, she was, and always would be, practical. Deceit came as her first nature, not second. Empty on the inside. An unwritten, tin case killer. To be sure, she was a well-trained marionette and could mimic humanity with enough sincerity—as many people do. Maybe it was longstanding mimicry of emotion that with enough repetition, freed her of apathy. Or maybe her emptiness had never been apathy, only loneliness and Red Room brainwashing.
Or maybe she was seeking a better rationalization for breaking into Steve Rodgers’ locker.
Understand, what she did was neither selfish nor selfless. It was necessary. The 21st century was making Steve Rodgers miserable. Little more than six months since he’d been de-thawed and Steve Rodgers was not happy. He mourned his losses. It was normal for normal people to mourn their losses. Bad things happen to good people. Bad people got away with all sorts of things—her, for instance. But it was different with Rodgers because, well.
The terrible truth Natasha soon learned about Rodgers was that he was the genuine article. Not as the old wartime propaganda had portrayed him decades ago. No. He was a better man than that glorified cardboard cut-out soldier. Rodgers put himself forward without deceit, without pretension. Unconscious of holding himself to higher standards, he simply met them and berated no one for falling short of the same heights. Fullness, goodness did not lead to weakness of conviction or character or skill; he honed his emotions as a shield to defend what he cherished.
The day Natasha Romanoff met Steve Rodgers in person was the last day Natasha hadn’t believed humans like Rodgers could exist. It’d been at a briefing before a team op in an office with a big, round table none of the agents were sitting at. Nick Fury had gestured, said her name. Rodgers shook her offered hand. He let go first, crossed his arms and did not trust her.
Rodgers? Idealist, not idiot.
The following mission had been illuminating and surreal and Captain America was real and she understood all too well Fury had sent her to keep Steve’s hands clean.
She found she didn’t mind. She wanted what was too good to be true to stay true as long as she could manage.
That was why she paid attention. That was why, when she saw him decline the team when they asked him to join them for drinks she took note. (They did not ask her). She saw when Steve did not choose to spar with the others in the gym for fun, preferring solitary workouts. He did not socialize with anyone else on his team. Or in the office. Or anyone at all.
That was all well and good if you were an ex-Russian assassin working among those you used to hunt to kill. It was not so good for a man, a good man, who must have been used to being surrounded by good men and women. If Rodgers were allowed to continue down into his misery, the fullness might leave him. It might turn bitter. Hollow him out. It could be worse than Rodgers turning out like other people. It might change him into what Natasha feared most.
A not-person like her.
Better Natasha Romanoff do something than leave Steve to suffer with his chin up.
Natasha did this the only way she knew how.
Were this a normal operation with the objective of befriending Steve Rodgers, she’d put on the pretense of being something like him. Kindhearted, hardworking, beautiful and guileless. She’d be the practical one, let him be the dreamer.
It could not be a normal op. As little of her Steve knew, he saw too much of the real Natalia Romanoff to fall for any overt attempt to befriend him. While she thought it might be. . .nice. . .to have a friend, she couldn’t maintain the facade of a normal person. Again, Rodgers? Нет idiot. She recognized that socialization could be a sufficient stopgap measure, but with little inclination to socialize with him, herself, she’d have to find him friends. That was what full people needed, yes? Friends and family and lovers to sustain them. Rodgers once had these things, but did not have them anymore. She would need to do recon. Needed intel. Needed to provide Steve with safe options for him to do what would eventually come natural to him, like making friends, and she would have do it from a distance.
Her first attempt to force him to make friends went poorly. To say the least.
She’d played her hand with intel she’d not fully understood, cornering him after a mission briefing.
“The paper-pushers at the DC branch have a baseball team. Inter-office league. They’re down their ninth man.” Natasha had ensured they’d been down their ninth man. “Are you free Saturday?”
“You don’t play baseball?” Steve asked.
Natasha blinked. “I’m Russian.”
“Then why do you care about the office baseball league?”
“Any given day, I don’t.” She shrugged. “They play Interpol’s paper-pushers this weekend. I don’t like Interpol’s paper-pushers.” Smarmy, intel-hoarding chuckleheads. She’d snapped her favorite shiv breaking into their offices three weeks ago. “I might also owe our paper-pushers a favor.”
“Owe them? You let our paper-pushers push you around?”
“Our paper-pushers don’t push me around,” Natasha replied. “but that doesn’t mean I don’t owe them gratitude.”
She owned them, actually, but this was not a thing to say to Steve Rodgers.
“You repay them by recruiting for their baseball team?”
“Helpfully, I know a few athletic personnel around the office. You’d fit right in. Apparently, we’re the underdogs in the line-up, and you are—”
“An unfair advantage?”
“You. You’re,” she made a triangle in the air, “you. Besides, Michael Griffith is near-sighted and says he hasn’t played since high school.”
“Ah, well, there you go. Best stick with Michael Griffith,” Steve replied, turning away with a shrug. “Someone with experience. I've never been picked for a baseball team before.”
After this miscalculation, Natasha cut her losses. She was not suited for making friends or finding friends—at least, not finding friends for Rodgers.
This did not mean she gave up.
Natasha applied herself, threw herself into sourcing her intel directly, the way she should have in the first place. She collated a folio on past Steve Rodgers. The accounts of Captain America were flagrantly sensationalized. His so-called ‘life’s story’ had become mythologized and twisted into legend and myth overflowing with pretense Rodgers lacked. Natasha discarded a great deal of it as less than useless. Dry facts were what she stuck to. Fighting Hydra, Steve Rodgers appeared to have made a life for himself. Maintained a dedicated friend in James Buchanan Barnes (the aforementioned ‘Bucky’) and later acquired the Howling Commandos to his list of friends, as well as the reoccurring Colonel Phillips, Agent Margaret (Peggy) Carter (often cited as a love interest), and Howard Stark.
These friends, this family, were what had left the gaping wound Natasha saw every day and was trying find something to fill. She could not hope to do this.
She was going about this the wrong way. The Black Widow was born of the Red Room. Surely she, master of the art of seduction, could find a suitable partner to make Steve Rodgers’ nights less lonely.
She started her reconnaissance into the present life of Steve Rodgers by breaking into his apartment, then breaking into the apartment of the covert SHIELD agent across the hall sent to monitor him. She learned. He sketched a lot. He cooked his meals at home, for one. Was experimenting with Thai spices (poorly). He might like the looks of the agent across the hall.
She found his compass with the picture of Agent Carter in it. Rodgers kept it on him or with his gear at all times. Natasha considered this an as-good-as-confirmed romantic interest, recalling her reading. Unrequited? Unfulfilled? She wasn't sure. After Rodger's plane went down and he was presumed dead, all of the interviews given by Agent Carter or any of the other commandos maintained an emphatic insistence that the two had not had anything other than a professional relationship. In particular, Agent Carter would not comment on 'matters of personal affection' between her and Rodgers. Outside the circle of close friends, amid everyone on the outside looking in, there was insistence that sparks flew. That the two were madly in love, that Agent Carter was Captain America’s and Steve Rodgers was Peggy Carter’s.
Natasha thought the accounts were disgusting and saccharine and smacked of Puritanical, romantic фигня. Then, she unearthed the recording.
Too late, she realized she should not have.
Like the legendary story of Steve Rodgers transformed into Captain America, the tragic love between Agent Peggy Carter and Captain Steve Rodgers was the genuine article, too.
Natasha followed up. She double checked. Cross-referenced. Made sure every ‘t’ was crossed and ‘i’ dotted.
Assistant Director Margaret (Peggy) Carter was KIA working for the fledgling SHIELD, 1948. She’d been taken hostage by a covert operative who’d broken into headquarters. There was no mention of who the operative had been—SHIELD might never have found out. Carter had been made a bloody mess on the linoleum. There were photos. She studied them. Carter wore sensible black pumps. Natasha authenticated the death certificate, running it by her sources. Genuine article, along with the autopsy, as little as there was to go on. Looked up the gravestone. It was in England. Her mother’s family’s plot—Agent Carter had remained unmarried.
Natasha need not wonder if Rodgers knew; the computer told her the archives had only been recently accessed once. She wiped both of their fingerprints out of the database. Let them think he hadn't seen. He deserved his privacy.
Natasha carefully typed up instructions to the gravesite, acquired trace paper and charcoal.
Hence, the breaking into of his locker during one of his many bouts of insomnia.
She’d continue to look out for Rodgers as best she could, but gave up delusions of a Russian Black Widow solving the unfortunate Captain America’s problems.
Anyway. Manhattan was a thing that happened.
Natasha Romanoff’s professional career was, while not ruined, severely stilted. No more long term, deep cover operations. There were few shadow operations she could perform. Not with her face in the papers and on TVs and the internet. She was Black Widow. A life, another past her, was gone.
A new one took shape.
After it was all over, the non-SHIELD Avengers blew to the winds. Barton took time to recover from his knee surgery and then took solo ops. Natasha understood. This left Fury with her and Rodgers, if he wanted any Averages on missions together on a somewhat regular basis. It was a good match. Their methods complement one another. They worked well together. Other agents were not so terrified of her if Rodgers was around. She still got to crack heads and stop bad guys, so that was something.
Most days, though, were at the office. Boring. Mundane. Waiting for things to go pear-shaped before being deployed.
She didn’t forget her previous presumptuous missteps in trying to help Rodgers. Rather, it was a bad habit she fell out of for a time. Rodgers was a mature adult who could take care of himself.
And his curries were improving.
Her resolve held until a few weeks later, when the astonished Natasha watched as Pamela Hornsby ‘accidentally’ brushed her gaping cleavage against Steve’s arm. She watched as a nearly 240 lbs man shrunk down to 90 lbs, stammering and very, very uncomfortable.
Natasha’s first impulse was to punch Pamela Hornsby in the face, then dislocate both of her shoulders. Thought better of it, though. Hornsby couldn’t comprehend that Rodgers was not over the love of his life dying a grizzly death and losing every friend he ever had and was not looking for a quickie in the copy room. Instead, Natasha raised her voice, a hair over her usual relaxed, canting volume and said, “Rodgers.”
People in the hallway scattered like insects. Rodgers startled, then relieved when Pamela Hornsby hurried back behind her desk and put her ass in her seat, where it belonged.
Steve stood straight, turned to her. Himself again, to Natasha's relief. She pointed to the empty air beside her and Steve hopped to.
“Take a walk with me.”
He was getting better at subtlety—only the hairs on the back of his neck stood on end. She’d like to think it was her good influence rubbing off on him.
Overt, she rolled her eyes at him. “Calm down, Rodgers. It’s not an emergency.” He got in the elevator with her. They rode the floors until the other passengers cleared out, leaving them the only two people in the carriage. Natasha killed the mechanism with a micro EMP. The lift would recover in about five minutes, but hold them in place and temporarily disable any bugs.
The second they were clear, she asked, "Are you okay?"
He furrowed his brows, confused and wary of her, "I'm fine, thanks?"
"Rubbing on work colleagues is against SHIELD’s fraternization policies, is sexual harassment and a legal liability.” She chose not to innumerate that she was sure it happened when she was not watching, too. “You can take it to HR. If you want.”
Rodgers angled away from her, a red flush around his neck. Natasha tried not to take offense. He wasn't to know she would've said so for anyone on her team and instead said, “I take sexual predation very seriously.” She was only half-kidding when she added, "You want me to hit her?"
“No, uh. It’s fine. It’s not like I can’t handle over-friendliness.”
“It’s not supposed to be something you should have to handle, Rodgers.” She left it at that. She’d planted the seed and with luck, he’d feel more comfortable coming forward with complaints or telling men and women off when they tried to cop a feel. “Pamela’s not ugly, though. Bad dental hygiene. Or it might be bad genetics—she’s had two cavities and a false tooth put in this past year. No committed relationships, at least not since she’s started working for SHIELD, but does frequently have one night stands. Turns in all her requisition reports time, does calisthenics on Tuesdays and Thursdays, so. If you’re looking for something not long-term, she’s not a bad option.”
Rodgers rubbed his hands down his face. “You keep dossiers on your teammates’. . .personal lives?”
“I know everything about everyone,” Natasha stated, plainly.
The look on Rodgers’ face supposed he actually believed her. “I don’t know why I’m surprised.”
“Because I’m a heartless killer? Please, Rodgers,” Natasha deadpanned. “I’m a goddamn romantic.”
The elevator started up again and they fell back into silence.
He shifted his feet. Putting it together.
Uh-oh.
Cleared his throat.
Don’t you dare.
“Natasha? About—”
“Can it, Rodgers.”
“No, but seriously, it meant a lot—”
“There are two ways you could end that sentence and I don’t want to hear either of them,” she snapped, furious for no reason she could pinpoint. He was a clueless, sentimental human. She shouldn’t have done it. Shouldn’t have done any of it. Nothing could make losing everyone he loved any better. Nothing could bring back his perfect friends and perfect job and perfect boss and perfect girlfriend.
Natalia Romanoff was empty. Natalia Romanoff had no heart.
He respectfully kept his mouth shut, though smiled to himself.
Her resolve wavered as time passed. Natasha wasn’t going to pry, wasn’t going to interfere. She wasn’t going to give up, either. If he gave away intel, she’d pick it up. Nothing invasive. The attempts to find a nice, respectful woman for Steve Rodgers’ long-term relationship needs developed an unanticipated, but informative turn as. . .friendly-ish verbal banter.
She’d catch him unawares while he was tying his shoes and demand, “What about Claire? From clerical. Brunette. She coordinates the Spring Street art fair on days off. Does sculpture. You guys could talk about. . .” he did pencil sketches, right? “. . .graphite density.”
He looked at her like she’d grown a second head, then remembered this was all part of the game. “Is that what artists talk about? Graphite?”
Intel: Steve does not view himself as an artist, though all evidence to the contrary proves him a talented artist.
Natasha shrugged in a way that best said, Steve, look at yourself. Look at the material I have to work with.
“Ah, yeah, Romanoff. I love my number 2 pencil.” His smile did not reach his eyes.
Intel: Likes the banter, not the topic. No art snobs. Is keen on brunettes. Also; Steve wants—needs time to draw.
It was a shaky start, but they got better at talking like humans. She got better at catching him on off moments.
“You doing anything fun Saturday night?”
“Well, all the guys in my barber shop quartet are dead so, no. Not really.”
If she hadn’t failed to coerce him into participating in a sports pastime, she’d be tempted to nudge him into a hobby. And she wasn’t going to pry anymore.
“You know, if you asked Kristin out from Statistics, she’d probably say yes.”
“That’s why I don’t ask.”
Intel: Steve is deploying active avoidance techniques. Also, his response indicates Kristin might be a possible Captain Creeper. Natasha marked her off the list of potentials.
“Too shy or too scared?”
“Too busy.”
. . . Not wholly unjustified.
The mission on the ship, rescue and reconnaissance, was not her best work.
She’d not expected Steve to take it so personally.
She should have expected the way it took them back to square one.
***
Anyway, Hydra was a thing that happened.
Turns out, Steve did have a friend outside of SHIELD, one even she didn’t know about (the sneaky captain did manage to find a real person to make friends with and kept Sam Wilson mostly a secret from her. She was so proud) and his old, best friend was alive and. . .not well. Very, very not well.
Natasha lay in her hospital bed, palms sweaty, heart rate unsteady. She was suffering the after effects of a gunshot wound and being electrocuted. Her head was not clear. She kept thinking of him. Winter Soldier. A ghostly enemy from her past. The ghost of Steve’s friend. Him, shooting her. Phantom pains from the old bullet wound in her abdomen were almost as bad as the fresh shot through her shoulder. No amount of painkiller could subdue them. She didn’t try.
Natasha thought of his dead eyes. The great, yawing void behind them, echoing with whispers of her own past.
If she closed her eyes it would be worse.
Steve was across the hall, and while Sam spent most of his time with him, he’d stop by now and again to relay messages and tell her to take her medicine. Joking about it being the good stuff. She didn’t. She couldn’t. Just a couple of aspirin. Steve might have been saved from drowning by the Winter Soldier, but they weren’t all childhood pals with good ol’Bucky Barnes, were they?
Natasha woke up in the night, in cold sweat, in pain. She thought she saw the shape of him in the dark corner, by the window, the glint of metallic silver. Years of dedicated training and instinct told her he was here. Or he’d been here. If not in her room, then close by.
Creatures like them didn’t let live ones get away.
***
There is no magic button to dismantle an expansive, covert organization like SHIELD let alone its evil underbelly within, Hydra. Nick Fury might’ve gone to ground, evaporating into smoke, but Black Widow, Captain America, Hawkeye, and now the Falcon, didn’t have that luxury.
Rogue Hydra agents and operatives were on the loose and began wreaking havoc at once like a kicked mound of fire ants.
Natasha received a phone call from Barton asking if she wanted to get out from under the heat and scrutiny of the public for a bit. There was a rough sort of charm to living out of a suitcase full of bullets and arrows, being relied upon and. . .being reliable.
It was four months in before she and Barton came across a mission they needed to call in another Avenger on.
Tony didn’t sound totally awake—not from what Natasha could hear over the speakerphone. “How the hell did you get my personal line?”
“Stark, good to hear from you, too,” Barton said. “By the way, how dangerous is a—Natasha, what’s the thing called?”
Natasha pulled her pressure bandage tighter. “I don’t know. I only overheard something about the device being a quantum tunneling vortex? Widening micro black holes to create a temporary means of time travel.”
Barton cleared his throat. “It’s a quantum tunneling micro. . .blackhole . . . vortex thing? In any event, we’re pretty sure it involves Hydra and time travel.”
“Barton, you are the most incompetent spy I know. Is Natalie there? Put Natalie on the phone.”
“Natasha’s had a bad day, Stark. What’s your ETA to upstate New York?”
“I’m in California, Barton. At my house. Where I live.”
“Well, you’ve got about four, maybe five hours if you want to help us stop New York from imploding. We’d do it on our own but we do not specialize in evil, time travel machines.”
Natasha sighed. “Barton, give it here.” He did. “Tony?”
“Natalie! It’s so good to hear from you! Did you get the Christmas card I had my new office assistant send you?”
“Tony.”
“It was a corporate card, I know. Impersonal.”
“Do you want to get your hands on a time travel device or do I have to call Rhodey? Jane Foster, perhaps?”
Rhodey meant the air force, the air force meant JPL, and JPL meant Stark Industries technology might become old hat overnight.
“Give me the coordinates. I’ll be there in an hour.”
***
It should have been a straightforward operation. The Hydra agents intended to test their cunning bit of technology in less than thirty minutes from the time Stark arrived and Natasha's team was in place. Plan A was for Clint and Natasha to get in, plant explosives, boost the tech from under the Hydra agents, get it out, let Iron Man and the bombs flush the nest, Clint and Natasha pick off the stragglers from safe cover outside. Plan B was to be employed if the tech was too big or delicate for them to extract. They’d leave the tech, Natasha would hack it as best she could and download whatever information was available. Plan C was if the tech was as dangerous as they feared, they’d plant the bombs on the tech. Then destroy the Hydra base, take out the operatives, so on and so forth. There were other plans, but these were the most likely; they’d only called Tony for the big guns and handling the machine in the aftermath, or if whatever tech they were dealing with turned out to be extra dangerous and it couldn’t be blown up safely, Tony was the likely the only one who could safely dismantle it.
With all the grumbling noises Tony made about destroying the wonder machine, Natasha sort of wished they’d not brought him in to spare her the headache. She changed her mind, quickly, as she and Barton were caught unaware of the scope of the operation.
They’d not accounted for the mutated, super-soldier Chitauri clones the secret-base-masquerading-as-a-privet-cancer-treatment-facility had created. If they’d known, they’d have called Banner instead. The mad scientists intended to send some of their cloned aliens back in time to assist Nazi Hydra, creating an alternative timeline while destroying theirs.
She was very, VERY glad they’d brought in Iron Man. She was even more pleased when Tony set aside his ego mid-fight under heavy fire and let her call in reinforcements. Two spies and an Iron Man did not an army make.
They still punched their way through the aliens, Clint holding the rear down the hallway all on his own. Iron Man cleared the massive room filled to the ceiling with the time-travel machine. Once the laboratory was secured, Tony threw himself onto the access panel. He sent in JARVIS to help hack it while Natasha squeezed one of the few living Lab coats—one that seemed particularly terrified—until he squealed.
“We only sent one through, it was only the one!” he screamed as Natasha bent his pinky back further (pathetic, it wasn’t even out of joint yet).
“Did it work?” she demanded.
“All the readings were affirmative, but obviously, we can’t know until it returns.”
“What the hell do you mean by it returns?”
Tony broke in, with, “It’s a rubber band!” followed by a lot of jargon Natasha didn’t follow, but she understood well enough as she tied up the evil Lab Coat. The Hydra agents had sent one of the alien clones back in time, programmed to assassinate some meddlesome SHIELD agent or agents of the past through the. . .mini-wormhole. . .thing. But this was just a test to see if it worked. It might not. It might and wreak havoc. JARVIS confirmed the assertion and indicated that he had a lock on where and when the Chitauri clone was sent.
Tony looked at Natasha. Natasha looked at Tony.
“It’ll have to be me,” Natasha said.
“It doesn’t have to be anybody. The Chitauri’s wearing a bio-tracking device. There’s a pre-set time limit of,” Tony checked the machine, “Three hours. It’ll have three hours in the past and if it can make it back to the exact location—and while the machine takes into consideration gravity and spatial rotation, it will still have to be within a two meter radius of the physical point in space it arrived at—the machine will snap it right back here.”
“When will it get back?”
“Our time?”
“Yes!”
JARVIS replied, “Approximately three hours, Agent Romanoff. The machine appears to make the timing concurrent.”
“Okay. Equal time. We only have three hours our time to fix this. Can we synch me with the tracking thing sometime in the next three hours?”
“That is a bad, bad—”
“Worse that allowing a Chitauri do what it will to a SHIELD base in—when, JARVIS?”
“1948.”
Tony remained firm, “Meddling with evil Hyrda technology is a recipe for bad things, Natalie. You know I don’t like that an evil space alien is running around the past for three hours, but sending someone else on top of it can only make it worse, not better.”
“1948, Tony! It could be after anybody, hell, it could be your father for all we know. What would happen to you if it’s him before you’re born?” She could see the possibilities unraveling in his eyes, how only one agent’s assassination could turn into complete and total disaster.
He steeled himself. “Then I’ll do it. I know the machine best, I got the best weapons. I’ll send myself.”
“Tony, be honest. Do you think you’re going to track and kill one Chitauri space alien while protecting whichever SHIELD agent it was sent to kill—doing all that—right under the nose of all the other SHIELD agents? Subtle, you are not.”
Narcissistic egomaniac with trust issues. Tony did not like leaving this to Natasha.
He nodded. “Right.” Admitting it cost him. He was pale, drawn and a little. . .frightened. “Natalie? You are one of only two super-spy assassins I trust. Give me your arm. Not that one, the one already bleeding.”
Once Tony had his blood sample, Natasha left him and JARVIS to work and went to assist Clint. He was still fighting and running low on ammo (they all were). Pickings were slim. They’d killed a lot of the things on the way inside. The Hydra agents had fled rather than stay and be killed (too many had managed to escape). On the up side, she could somewhat hear that their backup had arrived—a heated fire-fight from above. Maybe the Hydra agents wouldn't all get away.
Tony radioed her when the machine was ready.
“Barton, I’ve got to help Tony rig that machine. Can you hold them back without me until backup arrives?” Natasha asked. She did not explain what she planned to do. He could’ve made a convincing argument that he should be sent instead and Natasha. . .she could not let him do that.
“I got this,” he said, “Don’t let Stark blow it while I’m alive in here.”
“You got it.”
Natasha was not one for goodbyes.
Tony met her with two metal wrist bands. “Put your thumb here and here, hold for seven seconds,” he indicated the flat surface of the bands and she did as she was told. “Congratulations, they will now only open for your thumbprint.”
“Just hold for seven seconds?”
“Yep.” He closed a metal bracelet around her wrist with a snap. “This is for you; it’s how the machine tracks you. Give me an ankle.” He snapped an identical bracelet around it.
“Contingency. For you. Or if you cut off the part of its body that had the tracker and you don’t have any other way of getting the corpse out.”
“Good idea.” It was. An alien corpse could not be left behind. And it was reassuring to have contingency. She sometimes forgot Stark was not as incompetent as he pretended to be in order to elicit attention and nurturing from the people around him.
While Stark continued to set up the device, Natasha looted the bodies around the room for weapons and ammo, including a very large energy weapon.
“I think I’ve got a plan that will work with what we got. You’re going to pop up at the same location the alien was programmed to land, but I'll send you five minutes sooner. Sooner, so you can shoot the alien in the face. Five minutes, because my best guess is the trip will make you, uh, not feel so hot.”
That did not sound promising.
He continued. “Here is your watch. It is my watch. It is a very expensive watch Pepper bought me this Christmas which you cannot tell her I am giving to you. It is synced to that clock," He pointed to the one on the time machine, "that is counting down to zero. When you’re on the other side, it’ll count up to three hours. Because that’s the part we’re at in the plan: five minutes in, you’ve shot the alien dead. You make sure its tracker is still attached, then, well. Then find some hidey hole or stay put for two hours and fifty-five minutes, and be at the exact—and I mean exact—same place and the machine pulls you back. The day is saved!”
Natasha frowned. “Why am I waiting around three hours?”
“Because I don’t know why they sent the alien for three hours. Was it to ensure there was enough time to complete the mission? Or is three hours the maximum window this thing is capable of? What if it’s the minimum window and shortening it will do terrible things to you?”
Natasha pointed a gun at the tied up Lab Coat. “Answer his questions.”
“I don’t know!!!” he screamed and blubbered and begged for her not to kill him. “I’m an intern! All I wanted was 1 lab credit!”
Natasha shrugged, took a sharpie from the Lab Coat’s pocket protector, and lowered her voice so only Tony could hear, sliding the marker into her tac belt. “What happens if I’m not back in the same spot?”
“Ditch the bracelets. The machine will pull them back, and won’t be able to create a proper bio-lock on you. Let’s say you’re wearing those bracelets, but you’re not in the spot when the machine tries to yank you out of time.”
He made an exploding noise as an explanation.
“I get it.”
“Of course, if you drop the bracelets, you’re alive but trapped.”
“I get it, Tony.”
“There will be no way to catch a ride to the future with the Capcicle. That was a one-ticket train. I’d have to send Barton back after you. Please, do not make me send Barton for you.”
“Tony? You’re stalling.”
She got up on the platform with all the pointy electronic things directed at it as the countdown fell below ten seconds.
Tony cleared his throat. “It has occurred to me that your super-spy assassin partner is in the hallway and he might try to kill me over the next three hours of you not being here. He will really kill me if you don’t come back.”
“I’m coming back, Tony.”
“Okay,” he took hold of the lever. “Okay, Natasha.”
He pulled it before she could think of a witty rejoiner.
There wasn’t a ‘trip’. At once she was in the lab under bright lights and laser beams. At once, her head was ringing. Up was down, down was up. She hit the floor, hard. The lights were too bright. Vertigo wasn’t like normal pain—Natasha was used to normal pain. This was far worse. It was losing control of her greatest weapon—her body—without sustaining a single injury. She scratched at the plastic floor for a handhold, clinging to the energy gun with the other.
Her head wouldn’t have to hurt so much if everyone would stop shouting.
What would be easier?
Five minutes.
“Five minutes,” she said, but it came out warbled.
Natasha rolled onto her side (hoped she was on her side). She was going to vomit. She was not a vomit-er. She vomited anyway. Bad aftertaste, but she felt better and her head was clearer.
In a blink, she assessed her surroundings.
Cafeteria: Tables and chairs, food on trays, florescent lighting, mass-produced linoleum flooring and people. Lots of people, males, with guns who’d been taken by surprise when she popped into existence, but now had their side arms out and aimed at her. They were ordering her to drop her weapons.
So much for subtlety. Natasha looked at Tony’s watch. She’d wasted three whole minutes.
1:52
“Where’d I land?”
The room fell quiet.
1:49
“Tell me where I landed or we are all going to die.”
A man with black rimmed glasses—not holding a gun—pointed to a spot on the floor and said, “There.”
1:42
Every muzzle tracked the floor-bound Natasha reaching into her tack belt and pulling out a Sharpie. She gripped the top with her teeth, spat the cap out. Scooted a few inches across the floor, the movement making her head reel.
1:15
“Here?” Natasha asked.
“A little to the left.”
“Shut up, Thompson, Christ. Put the gun down, lady.”
Natasha said, “Thompson, was it here?”
Thompson was visibly shaking, but said, “Yeah.”
Natasha drew and ‘x’.
:51
Feet. She had to get on her feet. “Keep those guns out. I want a five meter perimeter from here,” she slapped the floor and got up, backing away. “If you are not armed, get out, sound whatever alarm will call in backup.”
:39
They wasted a second looking between one another.
Natasha shouted, “Running, right now! Running!” as she stumbled beyond the perimeter she’d set.
They ran. The ones with guns followed her instructions to clear the spot. Natasha turned her back to them. She aimed at the empty air where she came through. Some of the men followed her example. Some lowered their guns. Some still had weapons trained on her.
:20
“Here’s what’s about to happen. We are going to have company. It might come though disoriented, like I did; it might arrive wide awake. You see it, you shoot it.”
:10
As always, there were protesters.
A man with a flat nose said, “Whoever it is, we’re not shooting on sight and neither are you. We’re going to detain them. We are detaining you. You’re the one holding the Hydra weapon.”
:04
“It’s not a whowhat.”
:01
Everyone took proper aim.
:00
There is a quintessence of the serene and surreal during the seconds counting down to a grenade going off.
It is nothing to the terror that follows when nothing happens.
“No fucking way.” She was going to murder Stark. Was it possible to murder JARVIS?
Reassessment: find the assassin’s target, before the Chitauri can, secure the asset, locate and kill the Chitauri, get herself and the alien out of 1948.
“Okay, plan B. There is a non-human Hydra assassin loose in the building. Who here does it want to kill?”
Silence. Guns re-targeted her.
Natasha took a calming breath, rephrasing. “Who here does Hydra most want to kill?” Now all the guns were targeted on her. “Where the hell is Thompson when I need him?”
“Uh, here,” said a voice behind an overturned table.
Natasha was too composed to grind her teeth, but oh, she wanted to. “I told the unarmed to run.”
Thompson held up half of a broken, hard plastic lunch tray—sturdy and sharp as a knife—rose over the table lip. “I’m armed.”
Natasha liked Thompson. “Thompson, as the sole intelligent man in this room, tell me who I’m here to save.”
“Umm, well, uhh, uhh.”
“I’m about revoke your intelligence eval, Thompson.”
“No, it’s just, it's not like I know everyone or what everyone is doing. This is a secret organization, have a care.”
“Try.” She eyed everyone. “EVERYBODY, TRY. Is Howard Stark in this building?”
Thompson yelled, “Howard Stark isn’t in the building!”
“Thank you, Thompson.” Natasha hadn’t realized how tense she’d been until this was confirmed.
It was indicative of the fact she might not hate Tony Stark. “You, Flatnose,” she pointed at the man who’d had his gun on her from the start and was used to giving out orders, “Who ranks here?”
“You don’t honestly believe I’m going to tell—”
Somebody random said, “General Lawrence Jones is having a conference with all the directors. I don’t know about wha—”
“When?”
“At noon.”
“When’s that from now?”
He checked his watch. “About ten minutes.”
“Who are your directors?”
“Don’t tell her,” ordered Flatnose.
The random guy holstered his gun. “I just told her ‘all the directors’ and she doesn’t know their names, Hopkins. A Hydra agent would already know; we haven’t exactly kept them a secret.”
“Names, NOW,” Natasha ordered.
“Coronel Rick Stoner, Director Frank Ansell, Director Nick Fury—” Senior, Natasha added to herself. All of these names were very possible.
“Associate Director Paul Langley, Associate Director Malcolm Anderson, Assistant Director Mark Marshall—”
So, naming names she wasn't wholly familiar with was not as helpful as—
“Assistant Director Margaret Carter—”
Нет. Нет нет нет нет нет. “Peggy Carter? Agent Peggy Carter?” Natasha demanded.
“Uh, yeah. But she’s not, well, obviously she’s ranking, but she’s not Fury-important. I mean, she can shoot a gun but the only reason. . .she. . .” he trailed off and reevaluated his life choices based on the look Natasha Romanoff was giving him.
Then she saw. She looked down at the floor. She lifted her shoe.
The linoleum.
It was the linoleum.
Not fair. Not fair, Black Widow did not lose before the gunfight began. She was not giving up, not to some Chitauri Hydra monster, not for anyone.
“Where is she now?”
Everyone looked at everyone else.
“Anyone have her phone number? Call her.”
Everyone looked a bit lost.
“With a GODDMAN TELEPHONE.”
Thompson said, “There’s a phone down the hall, a lounge by the stairs. An operator could patch me through to one of the director’s secretaries, they might be able to find her.”
Oh, the joy of communication in 1948.
“How far down the hall?” Natasha asked, motioning Thompson over to her and prepping one of her guns for him.
He accepted the gun. “Twenty or Thirty yards. It’s by the staircase.”
“It’s twenty-three yards,” someone else volunteered.
Natasha nodded. “Flatnose, how long since your back up should have been here? If they used those stairs?”
It was obvious Flatnose had forgotten about the backup and had to think. “It’s only been a few minutes. They might not have taken the threat too seriously, Ma’am.”
They didn’t even get a shot off. Natasha thought. But at least I'm 'Ma'am'. Tony had dropped her in close to the alien, then, but not close enough. “If I want to reach the phone operator, I dial zero, yes?”
“Yeah.”
“There another exit out of that kitchen?”
“Yeah.”
“Okay, anyone without combat experience, you go with Thompson out the kitchen, but before you do: does anybody know where else this linoleum is in this building?”
If their hands weren’t full of guns, they’d all be scratching their heads.
“Linoleum, this building, WHERE?”
“It’s here and there, ma’am. Here, kitchen, hallways. There’s a lot of wood flooring, too”
That’s what Natasha was afraid of. “Okay. Thompson, the rest of you; go.”
Only two other men went with him. “Who’s the best shot here?”
Flatnose raised his hand, nobody contested it. Terrific. Natasha checked Tony’s watch.
“Congrats, you’re my six. We have under two and about three-quarter hours to contain or kill a monster working for Hydra sent to kill Agent Carter. We are very likely to fail and she will die. All in?”
They followed Natasha out into the quiet, empty hall.
It was all rather anticlimactic, though not wholly disappointing. They’d made it half-way down the hall before they heard gun shots of a fire-fight downstairs and the inhuman howling of a Chitauri war cry.
Natasha bolted down the rickety wooden stairwell to find two bloody, severely injured agents who were attempting to secure cover.
“Is it out there?”
Their wide-eyed terror was answer enough and Natasha kicked open the door to the hall
Pro: the Chitauri was right there, with its back turned.
Con: Its back was covered by that troublesome, plated armor.
Extra Con: SHIELD agents were shooting at it from the cover of office doorways on the other end of the hall, leaving Natasha in the line of fire.
Natasha dropped to the deck and shot out one of the Chitauri’s kneecaps. Only the one, because the piece of shit hydra gun died after the first round.
It screamed in pain and fury, twisting around as it fell reaching for Natasha. She tossed the gun. There was no way she’d survive grappling on the floor with a monster double her weight class and clawed. She rolled, bounded to her feet, jumped in the air out of its grasp and drew her remaining gun. Aimed for the vulnerable joint at its throat and hit her target.
It was a kill shot, but for good measure a second went straight through its skull.
Natasha hadn’t fired the second shot.
She expected to see Flatnose, best shot in the cafeteria. He was there, yes, but the one in the doorway with her gun up was Agent Carter. A very alive Agent Carter whose internal organs were all still internal.
“You’re not dead,” Natasha stated.
“Drop your weapons,” Agent Carter ordered, her English accent full and pronounced. Natasha had known Peggy was British, but in her head, Natasha had somehow imagined Peggy dropped it, falling in to sound full-blooded American to sound like Steve. Also, the black and white photos did not do that shade of lipstick justice.
“Put them on the floor, kick them over to me. Hands up.”
Natasha didn’t like this. Too clean, too easy. She checked the floor, checked Peggy’s shoes.
Black pumps. The linoleum.
Natasha lowered her gun as not to be threatening, but held it, kept it at the ready. “There might be another. Flatnose, take Carter’s six. Carter? For my sake please step off the linoleum.”
Flatnose tugged on Carter’s sleeve to get her to stand down and back up, which Carter, reluctantly, did. To reach them, Natasha had to step over the corpse.
“And who might you be?” Carter asked, prim and untrusting.
Natasha heard the ticking as she stepped over the body. Likely a bio-form grenade. There was no time to shout warning, she just gracelessly sucker-tackled Carter who careened into Flatnose.
They were very lucky they all went tumbling back into the stairwell, down the staircase as the bomb went off with a concussive blast.
The last, satisfying thing Natasha heard before the force knocked her out was Agent Carter’s exclamation of, “Hell’s bells!”
***
Natasha roused, lying in an uncomfortable bed feeling as beat-up as somebody thrown down a staircase. Lots of bruises. No broken bones. She was too well-trained to awake with a start so, in spite of the course of adrenaline that pumped through her, she remained calm and assessed.
Assessment: I’m alive. I’ve been unconscious less than two and a half hours, or they managed to remove the bracelets. Check the watch. Check for both bracelets.
She focused her senses. She had both bracelets. The watch was gone. One hand was hand-cuffed. No point in faking anymore, she needed to know whether or not there was time or if she had to ditch the bracelets.
“Time?” she said.
“What’s that?” English accent.
Natasha blinked, her eyes adjusting to the light as Agent Carter resolved to her right.
Carter was all cleaned up, not a curl on her head out of place. If not for the bloody, grime-smeared tear on the left side of her skirt, you wouldn’t know she’d been in a fight. The room was like a school’s nurse’s office, not a hospital. Same linoleum flooring. They’d only cuffed one of Natasha’s hands to the metal headboard, disarmed her, and cut her out of the cat suit and put her into too-big men’s pajamas. Bandaged her cuts, given her some pain killers—nothing too strong.
Clearly, they had no idea who they were dealing with.
“What’s the time?”
“It’s about a quarter—no, half-past two.”
“Be exact.”
With a turn of her wrist, Carter checked the time. “It’s two-twelve, by my watch.”
“Peggy?” Natasha said, “May I say, I’m—I’m glad to meet you. I like your,” she tapped her own lips with a finger. “It’s a nice shade.”
“Thank you.”
“It’s not regulation.”
She’d cracked the tiniest of smiles from Agent Carter. “No, it’s not, Mrs.—?”
“Widow.”
“My apologies. I’m sorry for your loss.” From Agent Carter it painfully wasn’t a platitude; she meant every word.
Natasha nodded. Her voice cracked a little; her throat was very dry. “You got someone special, Peggy?”
Natasha saw love pass over her face as a wave. Peggy Carter was so like him; she hid nothing. The sadness. The pain. The anger. But she, too, was a grounded idealist. She wasn’t going to fall into a trap.
“Don’t,” Carter warned, assuming what Natasha said was making assumptions. “Everyone thinks they know enough about my relationship with Captain Rodgers to play games with me. Don’t toy. I’ll still kill for him.”
“I didn’t mean,” Natasha swallowed. Cottonmouth, from the meds. “You’re right, I don’t know what I was thinking, suggesting Kristin from statistics. She can’t even shoot a gun.”
Peggy cocked her head, pursed her lips. Eyed the I.V. drip that had been running into Natasha’s arm.
Natasha dislocated her thumb, slipping the cuff. Licked her lips—she needed a glass of water. “Maybe, maybe you have family. Parents? Siblings?”
Peggy relaxed back, sighing. Rubbing her forehead she said, “My brothers died in the war. You? Have any family, that is?”
Natasha opened her mouth to say no. All her life, it was an emphatic, ‘no’. Now? “Maybe. I don’t know. A lot of very bad things haven’t killed me, Agent Carter. Recently, that’s been because I haven't fought alone. That might be family.”
“Bad things like that monster? You told the men it’d come to kill me. You told them Hydra sent that monster to kill me.”
“Yes,” Natasha confirmed. “That was a good shot. Center. Maximized for the exit wound. A great shot. But the bomb would’ve killed you, after. I saved your life.”
“You did,” Carter agreed. “You told them that was the job you were sent to do. Save my life.”
“Yes. It’s the job I’m doing. And—and I mean it when I say the rest of this wasn’t in the original plan, but I’m going to need to ask you to do something for me in return.”
Carter was too smart to agree or disagree out of hand, leaned forward and said, “I’m listening."
“In a few minutes, if I’m not back in the cafeteria, I’m going to die. I need you to save my life.”
Peggy straightened, leaned back, looked Natasha over. “Are you a grenade, too?”
“No, not like that monster was. But I have to go.”
Peggy sighed. “And why should I break you ou—” She noted the cuffs dangling off the head rail.
Natasha’s lip trembled. “He misses you.”
Peggy froze, her face inscrutable save for the flush rising in her cheeks.
“Every day. He misses you. And me?” Natasha pointed the gun she’d swiped off Carter to her head. Peggy did not panic. She raised her hands in dignified, unhurried surrender. Natasha removed the bracelet on her wrist and snapped it onto Carter’s. “I’m a goddamn romantic.”
“Where’s the watch I was wearing?” Natasha asked.
“It’s in my pocket.”
“Take it out. Show it to me.”
Carter did. Her hands didn’t shake.
“We have twenty-two minutes. Put it back in your pocket. That bracelet I put on you? It won't come off, no matter what you try. That’s what will bring me back if I’m in the cafeteria. It will kill me if I'm not.” Natasha twisted her ankle to show it off. “Now, if we aren’t in the cafeteria, we both die. Understood?”
Peggy nodded, jaw clenched but it barely showed.
“This,” she showed off the gun, “is a show for everyone else. I don’t want to hurt you. But I don’t want to die, and I can’t stay here. ”
“Are you taking me where that monster came from?”
“Yes.”
“Am I your hostage?”
Natasha gave her a thumbs up. “Hands on your head, turn around.”
Carter complied and Natasha patted her down. “How do we get to the cafeteria from here?”
She took Carter’s pair of shivs and spare gun for her own as Carter gave out instructions.
“How many are on our door outside?”
“Two.”
“So few?”
With a bite of anger, Carter said, “I’m in here.”
“Right, sorry. You get the left, I’ll get the right.”
Carter’s head snapped around, outraged.
Natasha shrugged. “Or I do it my way and I’ll kill them. I came here for you. Your choice.”
Carter got the left, Natasha took the right, and Carter swiped a gun and pointed it at Natasha.
Natasha was not bothered. “Bracelet, Carter. Drop the gun and come over here, be my simpering hostage.”
“I will get you back for this,” Carter said as Natasha put her into a headlock with the gun to her head. The safety was on.
“Thank me later.”
Carter made a good show of it and only grumbled a little. They made it up two flights of stairs, past professional SHIELD agents who were trigger happy from earlier events and Carter ordered every one of them to stand down, back off. She had this under control.
Natasha knew better than most that the best lies were couched in the truth and took note.
They made it back, all the way to the emptied out cafeteria on the first floor, to the large x drawn in unsteady black marker.
Natasha let Carter go. Carter straightened her skirt, tucked her blouse back in. “What now?”
“We trade.”
Carter raised an eyebrow.
“I mean, it’s not my watch, but Pepper gave it to Tony for Christmas and it’s . . . it means a lot to him.”
Peggy took out the watch, offered it over and Natasha put it back on. Natasha returned all Carter’s weapons.
“Wrist,” Natasha said, and Carter held out her wrist.
So trusting.
Natasha hesitated.
Carter’s hand trembled for the first time. “Take it off. I brought you here. I thank you for saving my life, now leave me mine.”
“Two minutes,” Natasha said. “You’re not an art snob, are you?”
“No!”
“Then come with me. Three hours. Come with me for three hours and if you don’t like it, I’ll get Stark to send you right back.”
“Howard? Howard sent you here and didn't warn me? Oh, this is just like him, you should have said!”
“No, not Howard. Tony. Tony’s his son.”
The light went on in her head.
“Space aliens?” Peggy asked.
“Yes.”
“And Hydra? After how many years?”
“You take that up with Nick Fury. Junior.”
“You bet I bloody wi—”
The lights were too damn bright, up was down, down was up. At least Carter broke her fall.
“Natasha!” Barton shouted (he was probably speaking at normal volume).
“Natalie!” Tony shouted (no consideration whatsoever).
She felt a hand on her arm. “Natasha, please be alive.”
“Bart’n?” Natasha slurred.
“Right here.” His hand on her bicep was like a solid metal vice. Natasha clung right back.
“Room’s spinning,” she said.
“I have you,” he said, pulling her hair out of her face.
“I might puke on you.”
“Please don’t—don’t do that.”
Stark came clunking, clanging, banging over in his awful suit. “Natalie, my watch. Is my watch okay?”
Natasha used the hand affixed to the watch to flip him off.
“Oh, thank God it’s okay. I’d also like to point out that does not look like a Chitauri corpse.”
Peggy spasmed, freed herself by crawling out from under Natasha, and vomited all over the floor.
“That is not a corpse l. Natalie, you kidnapped someone from 1948!”
“Barton?” Natasha asked, “Tony’s useless, go help her.”
He squeezed her arm, but before he could move, someone else spoke.
“I can take it from here, Natasha.” That voice. She knew that voice. “Agent Phil Colson, Agent Carter. May I just say, it is an honor to be the one to welcome and debrief you on the 21st century.”
“Don’t you dare take this moment from me, Colson,” Natasha threatened.
“21st Century?” Peggy asked.
“Aunt Peggy?!” Tony shouted, making Natasha’s head ring again, “My father used to tell me stories about you and Rodgers, World War II, the commandos. Natalie, you kidnapped the SHIELD Assistant Director.”
Barton, quietly asked Natasha, “Wasn’t Peggy Carter Steve’s girlfriend?”
Peggy heard everything.
“Is that how I live on in the history books?” she demanded, “Steve Rodgers’ girlfriend?”
“No. And if you’ll pardon me for saying so,” Coulson soothed, “I doubt your part in history books is over. You see, officially, Assistant Director Margaret Carter died, killed in action after being taken hostage in 1948.”
Peggy closed her eyes. Allowed the implications to set in. “You’re telling me I can’t go back.”
“I’m—I know it’s a loss. I know it’s a shock. We will do everything in our power to make this as painless and comfortable a transition as possible.”
Barton snorted. “I know someone who could—”
Natasha punched him. In the arm, yes, but it was full of every ounce of muscle she could muster.
“Do not ruin this for me, Barton.”
“Well, Agent Coulson,” Peggy started.
“Please, call me Phil.”
“Phil. If I’ve no one, call me Peggy, please. And you can start making me comfortable with a glass of water. Tea if you may.”
“You got it.” He touched a hand to her shoulder before he stood. “Oh, Tony. Could you get Pepper on the horn? Looks like Romanoff and Carter could use some clothes. Miss Carter?”
“Hmm?” Peggy was beyond words, lost. She was probably about to cry.
“Anything else you need? Anything we can do for you?”
She shook her head, no.
“Clothing color preference? Blue, white? Red?”
“No,” she snarled.
Phil let her be, turning to Tony and lowering his voice.
Peggy covered her face with her hands.
Natasha grimaced. She hated this. “I could use some water, too. Barton, let’s—”
He nodded, “I should check on Sam Wilson’s progress, let them know you’re not dead. See if the guys need any help rounding up the escaped Hydra agents.”
Sam Wilson. Sam Wilson and 'the guys' meant Steve Rodgers was also rounding up escaped Hydra agents.
“Is Wilson going to be back soon?”
“I don’t know, so I should. . .?”
“Yes, you should leave and take care of that, thank you.”
He hopped right up to his feet, his strides long. Leaving her with a silently crying Peggy Carter and little excuse to run.
Natasha was not one for apologies or comforting normal people who were grieving. She made to get up and get herself some water.
“Is it Natasha? Or Natalie?” Peggy made it feel like a slap. She was worse than Tony.
“I don’t know. I don’t remember if I ever had a real name. I was Natalia. With SHIELD, I’m Natasha Romanoff. Tony calls me Natalie because I went undercover once as his personal assistant. That was my assumed name. He's sore about it.”
“Is anything you told me true?”
“There’s often more truth and kindness in a lie.”
Peggy cut that down with, “Are you really a widow?”
“Black Widow is my code name. Barton’s is Hawkeye. Tony, Iron Man.”
Peggy sights rested on Tony for a time. “It is quite a suit.”
“You should see it in action.”
Peggy sighed. “Tony, he is so old. And does look so like his father. I don’t suppose?”
“Deceased.”
“Of course.”
“A long time ago,” Natasha clarified. “Drunk. A car crash. Took Tony’s mother with him.”
Peggy sucked in air at a rattle, trying not to wince. “I cannot imagine Howard as a father.”
Natasha refrained from saying he didn’t make a very good one as Phil returned with two opened bottles of water. She would have liked nothing more than to gulp hers down, but knew she’d best sip, let the water sit in her mouth.
“Ladies? Take your time finishing those. Let me know when.”
“Are we going to light up this machine?” Natasha asked.
“Yes we are, Romanoff. We'll want everyone clear of the building before it's leveled, but Carter’s needs take precedence.”
“So good to know my needs take precedence.”
Coulson offered one of his standard, enigmatic grins. “Always, ma’am,” and left them again.
“And you, Natasha,” Carter rinsed her mouth, spat out the water, “Did you spare a single, passing thought to my well-being when you—”
“Peggy,” Natasha touched the back of Carter’s hand. It was calculated. “If I’ve lied, I have not done so to harm you. I would not have brought you if I was not certain about one thing: You will be happier here.”
Carter somehow made a patronizing sniff sound self-deprecating and gulped some water. “If only I could bring myself to believe you. I want to. You know, for a moment you made me believe.” She shook her head. “But no.”
Natasha would take what she could get. “Come on, Peggy. Let’s see who’s brought us a ride out of here. Or we could stay for the fireworks, if you want. Big Hydra bases make a big boom.”
Peggy winced, holding her head. “No, no loud—”
“What was I thinking? Maybe Pepper will give us a ride.”
“Is this Pepper I keep hearing of Tony’s. . .?”
“Virginia Potts. She’s Tony’s CEO. It’s not a long story. I’ll tell you on the way out.”
“Alright.”
As it happened, Pepper did bring the jet. Peggy was bustled in to the air strip, bustled onto the jet, bustled over to Stark Tower two states away.
Natasha left Carter in Pepper’s far more capable hands. She stuck around for the boom. She waited for all the teams to get back and Rock, Paper, Scissor’ed Coulson for who got to intercept Steve.
"Rodgers," she shouted, hugging the flimsy night shirt to herself, hurrying over.
He didn’t look particularly happy to see her. "Are we still friends, Natasha?"
Natasha's heart skipped a beat. She looked anywhere but at him. "I was not aware we were friends, Rodgers."
"We're friends," he smiled, reassuring. Meaning it. "That's why I'm hurt you only invited Stark to the party you and Barton hosted."
Ooooooh. "It wasn't a party Rodgers," she sighed, feigning irritation but very, very satisfied with herself. "It was supposed to be a small Hydra research base. We had no idea about the underground bio-lab. Otherwise we’d have consulted Banner. And, maybe, called you if we felt like it."
He nodded, amused. Frowned, as if noticing her odd attire. "With some slippers, you’d be dressed like my grandpa. What happened to you?"
"I found you a hot date, is what happened."
He was expectedly incredulous. "You found me a hot date dressed in Pappy's pajamas?"
"I happen to look good in anything."
He laughed.
"Really, Rodgers, you should be grateful for what I've gone through for you—what I go through. I lost blood. I barely survived a grenade attack. Guns were pointed at me. I vomited."
"You did all that just to get me a date?"
"A hot date."
"The secret Hydra base full of Chituari clones was also full of hot dates for me?"
"A hot date. Brunette. She's cute. Shoots real well. Not an art snob."
"What department is this one with?"
"She was an Assistant Director of a defense department. Currently unemployed but Coulson is set on her and you know him. He’ll have her onboarded in 24."
A penny dropped for Rodgers. Not the right penny, but the penny whereby he knew Natasha had a specific, living woman in mind. "Please don't be serious, Natasha. It was funny when it was a joke."
"You have a date tomorrow night, eight sharp, Stark Tower. You will shower, you will shave, you will put on some cologne and wear trousers that aren't khaki. Ask Tony if you don't have any."
He knew she meant it. She'd never given him specifics before, only ever offered suggestions but never interfered. "Natasha, I know we have this, uh, gag going. I know it’s because you care. And it's not that I don't want, I mean, I'd like to find a girl but—"
"I vomited in public. Where other people saw me. You will be at Stark Tower with your dance shoes on if I have to drag you by the hair with a gun to your head," Natasha threatened, realizing, too late, that she was letting him see too much. "Eight. Don't be late."
Befuddled, wringing his hands, he called after her as she walked away. "I don't have dancing shoes. Natasha? Natasha!"
"Then go barefoot!" she yelled back.
Just as well. Barefoot would be romantic.
***
Natasha knocked, soft, slow.
The wood muffed Carter’s “Yes?” from the other side.
“Are you decent?” Natasha asked.
There was a long pause. Natasha knew Carter was decent. She was on the other side weighing whether she wanted to subject herself to Natasha's presence.
“Come in,” Carter said, adding, “if you must.”
Natasha let herself into Pepper’s bedroom.
There was no flaw in Coulson’s choice of dress; cocktail dress, vintage red silk cowl neck with three quarters sleeves. Flattering, not revealing. Classy. She made for quite the picture sitting at Pepper’s mod vanity curling her hair. She dropped a curl and turned in her seat.
“Aren’t you the bombshell?” Natasha said.
Carter eyed Natasha. For herself she’d chosen a black dress: low v-neckline, short sleeves, long and straight skirt with a very high slit. It covered the scars well enough, her newest addition peeked past the revealing neck line. The slit was high enough for easy access to the concealed knives.
“Miss Potts mentioned you were invited. She speaks highly of the time you worked for her, but it was like hearing the life of an entirely different person.” If Carter thought this was leeway to get Natasha to open up, it wouldn’t work. “I don’t see why everyone insists on dressing me up like a toy for a night on the town. If Miss Potts weren’t so enigmatically persuasive I would be having nights in for a good long while.”
“The night is young,” Natasha said. “We can only hope.”
“I supposed you weren’t the type to enjoy drunken, idle chatter in crowded rooms. Am I wrong?”
“I am whoever the mission requires me to be.” Natasha waved this aside by holding out a small cylinder. “I brought you a present.”
Wary, Carter accepted. “Oh.” She removed the cap, twisted. Leaned towards the mirror to apply the lipstick.
“It’s a good color on you.”
Carter blotted. “Is this your means of apology, Miss Romanoff?”
“No.”
Carter raised an immaculately penciled eyebrow. “Olive branch?”
“I don’t require your good opinion, Carter.”
“Maintain the timeline without killing me yourself, you mean.”
“No. I don’t.” Natasha let the silence eat at Carter. “I once benefitted from being given a second chance to get it right.” Natasha stood. “I never got it right. Not quite. I’m not nice. You are. Don’t let me fuck that up.”
Natasha left Carter to finish her hair.
***
Natasha checked the time. Knocked on Banner’s door.
"Agent Romanoff, it is always a pleasure," JARVIS said. "Please come in and make yourself comfortable."
"Thank you, JARVIS." Natasha entered to find an angry, sulking, cornered Steve.
He was dressed, dashing and debonair even as he silently seethed. "Nice dress," he said: a man so angry and so well-mannered he was left only with platitudes.
Natasha pulled a face. "I'm not your date."
"I know. You’re neither a brunette or a closet art snob."
"Correct. I’m Russian, I’m openly an art snob."
"You're responsible for this," he said crossing his arms. "You roped poor Dr. Banner in on this."
Dr. Bruce Banner hunched over his glass of non-alcoholic sparkling wine. He was in a suit borrowed from Tony. "Oh, I had nothing to do with any of this. I just like happy endings."
Steve rounded back on her. "Barton has every exit JARVIS can't cover, covered."
"Yup,” said Barton from the aforementioned exit.
Natasha acknowledged Barton with a, "Thank you."
Steve frowned. He leaned in closer, almost whispering, "I don't understand why you're insisting when you know I’m not comfortable being set up on a blind date."
"I'm not going to force you, Steve," she offered him her hands and he took them, reluctantly. She squeezed, reassuring. "All of your friends are dressing up a bit. We're all going to go out. The only couple is Pepper and Tony. We like that couple, yes?"
He nodded.
"Your date doesn't know this is a date. We asked her to spend a night out and put on a nice dress. She has no idea she’d got a date with Captain America. She thinks this will be a nice, intimate party of friends for her to be introduced to. And you’ll be an ordinary, nice young man. Geriatric as you may be."
A thousand pounds lifted from his shoulders. "With super hero friends?”
“She’s smart, Rodgers. It won’t take her long to realize who you are.”
“So this is a date that only has to be a date if I want it to be a date.”
“Yes.”
He gave Barton the side eye. "You just want me to meet her, see if I like her?"
Natasha nodded at him like he was an idiot. "If you don't, you've got seven other people to fall back on. But you will meet her."
“But if that’s the case then why all—”
"And when you do like her," Tony said, cutting in with hand on Rodger's shoulder and pulling him back from Natasha. "I’ve had the whole tower emptied out; you have every floor to yourself. If the world is about to end, consider the rest of us covering it. No interruptions."
Rodgers tried not to pucker his face, but it didn't work. "It's not happening, Tony."
"Oh, it's happening," Tony insisted.
"Stark?” Natasha snapped. “Do not ruin this for me." He gave her a smug smile but shut up. “By the way, Pepper says she’s ready.”
Tony's eyes lit up. He brushed imaginary dust off Rodger's shoulders. "You look good. What about me? How do I look?"
"Good."
"Good? Good's good. This is the first time I'm taking Pepper out on a non-corporate related date in—"
"Walking," Natasha said and they followed behind her as she pressed the call button to the elevator. Up, to Pepper’s penthouse.
“—I’m not sure how long. Long enough I know she’s cheesed. We’ve been too busy with work.”
"We'll meet you down at the car," Barton said, steering Banner.
Banner sent his salutations with, "Have a nice night.”
Steve squinted at him, “We’ll see you in, like ten minutes.”
Tony ploughed right on as though he were the only one talking to Steve, "I want to make it up to her, tonight. I rented out the entire bar, but I don’t know if she’ll be mad or glad this is a group thing and not just the two of us thing."
"You’ve got a great girl, Tony. She deserves you to make time for her."
"Pepper is. . .” When speaking of Pepper, Tony lost his typical, self-indulgent, smug smile; it turned dopey. He never did find the words to describe her.
The elevator doors pinged on the next floor rolling open to reveal Agent Coulson even more self-satisfied than usual.
“Coulson,” Natasha greeted as he entered the car.
“It’s a fine evening, Ms. Romanoff.” He gallantly offered his arm. “Will you pay me the complement of sharing my company this evening?”
She accepted his arm, chin raised. “The triumph is mine.”
Coulson parried with, “Journey’s end in lovers meeting.”
“What’s to come is still unsure,” Natasha tightened her grip.
Suspicion entered Steve’s tone, wanting it all to be over, whatever game everyone was playing. “It’s good to see you, too, Phil.”
“Agent Coulson, please,” Coulson deferred.
The ride was short and sweet, filled with Tony’s mindless chatter about Pepper, what gifts he should buy her. He’d worn the pocket square Pepper bought for him (he was pretty sure it was Pepper who bought this one for him). Natasha should have suspected Tony would be a bit nervous about pulling this off, though where the rest of his nerves were coming from, she couldn’t be certain.
The second the doors were open, Natasha brushed past everyone to loudly announce, “We’re here!”
Mood lighting. Soft jazz in playing in the background. A table covered with a swath of food, more than any couple (even one a serum-enhanced super-soldier) could eat.
Immediately, the clack-clack-clack of rushing heels heralded the burst of Pepper into the room. “We’re all ready to go!”
Pepper wore a sailor-blue cocktail dress that should have been prim, but with the joy she radiated, a decade’s worth of weight was lifted from her shoulders and she looked very young. “Don’t you look handsome?”
Tony preened. “I wore the kerchief.”
Pepper sailed straight past Tony to Steve, reaching up to his perplexed face. Natasha never knew Pepper to be given to excessive demonstrations of emotion, but Pepper’s face was reddening and unshed tears were glittering in the corners of her eyes.
It was Natasha Steve looked to for an explanation for this unwarranted display.
Natasha should have accounted for Pepper.
It was Tony who came to the rescue by rubbing Pepper’s shoulder. Instantly Pepper came to herself. Better composed, she said, “There’s plenty to eat—”
“I can see,” Steve said
“The champagne’s on ice and there’s a few in the fridge if you need more. . .”
Gently, Tony corralled Pepper away, directing her to the elevator, past the enigmatic Agent Coulson. “I think the kids can help themselves to the food.”
Steve cast suspicion on Coulson. “Okay, guys. You’re starting to worry me.”
“No, Captain.” Coulson replied. “We bask in the general splendor of a job well-done.”
With no answers forthcoming, Steve turned back to Natasha. Eyebrows wrinkled, but trusting.
“Natasha?”
She felt strange. From the emptiness within, there came a sensation of seeping. Like an internal bleed deep in her chest, this pain unlike pain as Natasha understood it because, this pain? This pain didn’t hurt.
Natasha reached for him, hands grasping, avoiding eye contact because she was blinking back tears. “Come here, big guy.”
Steve went, holding securely on the tacit understanding this hug was for her and not for him. He whispered, “Seriously, Natasha, this isn’t like you. What’s wrong? What the hell is wrong with all of you?”
Her nails dig into the thick fabric of his suit jacket. “You’re right. This isn’t like me. I am a terrible, bad person, you remember that and Don’t. Ruin. This.”
Natasha was there to brace him as a prettily accented voice from the bedroom called, “Miss Potts? I cannot seem to find the second ear clip you were lending me.”
Natasha hissed, “Too heavy, Steve.”
Pepper scurried by with a flurry of clacks, “Stay right there, I’ll be right in to help you look.”
“It can’t be. If it’s not her—”
“It’s her, Steve.”
Tears welled up in his eyes; he blinked them into spilling over. “The clone place. Is she?”
Natasha shook her head. “Not a copy. The genuine article.”
He bent, gasping like the asthmatic he wasn’t anymore.
“Breathe. Do not make me explain to her why you’re passed out on the floor.”
He placed a hand over his heart. He looked young. Hopeful. “Does she know I’m. . .?”
Natasha shook her head as a lazy smile unfolded across her face. “No.”
Steve straightened, taking in the room around him with bright, new eyes. The food, the champagne. The privacy, before resting on the trio all of them puffed up and preening like peacocks.
“You guys, everyone knew?”
Natasha plucked the handkerchief from Tony’s lapel with only a mild affronted, “Hey!”
She raised Steve’s chin and brushed the tears off his face. “Don’t let your mascara run.”
His head whipped around as the clacking of heels returned, but it was just Pepper reemerging.
“All set.” She noticed Steve. “Oh, did they tell you?”
“Yeah,” he managed.
Her watery grin was enormous and she laid a big kiss on his cheek. “She’s fine. Absolutely fine.”
He let out a big whoosh of air and Natasha felt bad for forgetting his other friend from the past.
Whispering, pale, Steve asked her, “Do I look okay?”
Natasha’s eye twitched. “Have you seen you?”
“Okay you crazy kids,” Tony announced, loudly, for all to hear. “Everyone who’s on board for celebratory drinks: I’m driving.”
“You are not,” Pepper replied, reaching for Tony. Kissing him. “I’m the one driving tonight.”
She didn’t have to look behind her to know Coulson offered his arm once more even though Steve looked as though he might beg them not to leave him. “Natasha?”
The elevator pinged, sliding open.
“Hold, Miss Potts, Mr. Stark,” Carter shouted, stropping down the hall. “You would think after half a century someone would come up with a better way to buckle a pair of heels.”
“Buck up,” Natasha said, jabbing the dazed Steve’s shoulder. He snapped out of it, taking a deep breath and nodding at her, once. “Don’t fuck up.”
There was no going back now. She took the beatific Coulson’s arm wondering how long the lightness that’d taken up residence in her chest would remain.
She whispered to him, “Tell me this is real, Phil.”
“It’s real, Natasha.”
There was a somewhat indignant, “Oh, but don’t—hold the door,” followed by a sharp, gut-twisting gasp.
They certainly did not hold the door.
Tony and Pepper laughed and snickered like school children rewarded for a well-laid prank, kissing. “Thank you,” said Pepper as Tony said, “No, thank you for being such a beautiful human being.”
Natasha lowered her head. Let out a ragged breath. It was awful to be this full to bursting. This effusion of emotion made her head spin. In Russian, she said, “Lie, and tell me they’ll be happy forever.”
“I don’t tell those kinds of lies, Natasha,” Coulson consoled. “They’ll be happy as long as they both shall live.”
She nodded. “We will make sure that is a very long time.”
He tucked her hand more firmly against his arm, patting it. “Yes. We will.”