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Chapter Text

PROLOGUE

Vormir, 2014

Talos sprinted behind Clint and Natasha. His green hands wrapped around a slip of paper. Clint and Natasha began to climb the mountain. “Natasha, wait!” he called after them. Natasha turned around, but didn’t see Talos, so she and Clint continued up the mountain. Talos began to run faster.

He caught up with them as they approached Red Skull. “Natasha, you can’t go any further,” he pleaded.

Natasha extended her arm as her widow’s bites gave off a growing blue glow. “Who are you?” she demanded.

Red Skull floated over and interjected, “Clint, son of Edith--” but was kicked back by Talos.

“He is not needed now,” Talos said, gesturing to Red Skull. “My name is Talos. I am a Skrull sent here from the future. Director Fury has a note for you.”

“Fury?” Natasha’s voice broke in astonishment. She took the note from Talos’s hand. She sat down and slowly opened out the crinkled piece of paper. Her thumb smoothed over the edges, trying to make out Fury’s inked handwriting.

Natasha--

Yes, we did it. The Avengers saved the world. I am back. Clint’s family is back. Sam Wilson and Bucky Barnes are back. Everyone else is back. But you didn’t make it. In order to save the world, you made the ultimate sacrifice, and we are so grateful for that. Even though we’ve all returned, SHIELD is falling apart. We were infiltrated and terrorized by a man mad at Stark, of all people. We need you back, which is why I’ve sent Talos.

Barton is no longer the man you knew and loved. Everything he’s been doing while his family is gone has gotten worse. Getting his family back didn’t make him feel any better. SHIELD now classifies him as a traitor and threat. Which is why you can’t stop what’s about to happen. Talos will sim Clint and act like nothing has changed, so we can save everyone the way it’s supposed to play out. He will fake Barton’s death at SHIELD and then come to retrieve you. Sit tight.

Nicholas Joseph Fury

A tear streamed down Natasha’s face as she looked up. Her eyes met Clint’s innocent gaze. Snow dusted his hair and blurred her vision. Natasha closed her eyes.

“I am so sorry I have to do this, Natasha,” Talos said, his green flesh becoming pale, his bald head sprouting Clint’s brown hair. Talos kicked Clint off the side of the cliff. A single tear made its way down Natasha’s cheek as Talos’s hand began to glow yellow. Talos checked his hand. In his palm sat the soul stone. He looked at Natasha one last time. “See you in a minute,” he said before his figure disappeared, traveling to 2023.

Chapter Text

STEVE

Earth, 2024

The silver shine of bucky’s metal arm contrasted the black matte of the arm of Natasha’s suit that it grabbed. His hand blocked her strike from above. She wasn’t going to give up that easily. Natasha circled her arm out to the side; Bucky’s tight grip launched him into the air, flipping over her arm as he released. Bucky’s feet landed steadily on the ground.

“Weak,” Bucky muttered in Russain as he attempted to launch a punch square across Natasha’s chest.

His fist was met by a steady hand. “Oh really,” Natasha replied, keeping the conversation in Russian. She released her arm, pushing Bucky back in the process.

“You know, Buck,” Steve interjected in English, “you could try--” “Which one of us is not a trained assassin?” Bucky remarked. He blocked another overhead approach by Natasha.

“Fine,” Steve replied defensively.

The back-and-forth of strikes and blocks by Bucky and Natasha with the trash talk in Russian and the occasional unsolicited comments from Steve continued for 5 minutes. Suddenly, Natasha gained a huge advantage: she had managed to control Bucky’s metal arm. In one graceful motion, Natasha launched herself into the air, flipped over Bucky’s arm, and stomped it off.

“That’s not fair!” Bucky shouted.

“Nat, give Bucky his arm back,” Steve scolded.

“Fine. I still win.” Natasha let out a huge sigh as she handed Bucky his arm back. “That’s enough fun for today. I think I need to sit down.” She began to slowly lower herself down to the floor, but her control didn’t last long. There was a sudden thud on the floor mat. Natasha laid lifeless, sprawled out against the blue floor.

Steve ran from his spot on the sidelines to the middle of the room, where Natasha lay. “Natasha!” he shouted, hoping to wake her up. There was no response. He knelt down next to her and placed his hand against her wrist. He felt nothing. He tried her neck. Yet again, nothing. He placed his ear against her chest. Still no signs of a pulse. “Buck, I don’t have a pulse. Call 9-1-1.”

“An ambulance? We can’t afford that.”

“It’s not like we’re poor.”

“Things have changed significantly since the war, Steve. No one can afford an ambulance.”

“SHIELD can. Now, PLEASE, just call 9-1-1.”

“On it.”

The EMTs sprinted down the sleek modern hallway of the Avengers facility. They ran a stretcher alongside themselves. Upon their arrival, the EMTs pulled it up right next to Natasha.

“Are you…” the male started.

“Captain America?” the female finished.

“Yes and no. Call me Steve Rogers,” Steve replied.

“Alexei,” the male stuck his hand out.

“Sasha,” the female said, “it’s so good to--”

Bucky interrupted, kneeling beside Natasha’s still-unconscious body. “Chest compressions for about thirty seconds. Then I realized that she was vibrating, so I backed away. She is now respirating on her own.” Bucky laid his hand on Natasha’s arm and felt her racing heartbeat.

Just as Sasha and Alexei were about to lift Natasha onto the stretcher, Sasha noticed a faint blue glow from around Natasha’s wrists. “What is that?” she asked, motioning to Natasha’s blue-glowing bracelets.

“Her Widow’s Bite,” Bucky responded. “But they are deactivated because they are off-limits for practice.”

Alexei stared down at the soft black sheen of Natasha’s suit against the blue mat. His brow furrowed. “Do they come off?” he asked.

“No,” Steve sighed. “They are attached to this suit.”

Sasha glanced over at Alexei. At this point in their partnership, they could almost communicate telepathically. Alexei nodded. “If any part of the casualty is dangerous, regardless of state of consciousness, they must be restrained,” Sasha recited. “I have some rope. We can attach her wrists to guides on the side.”

“I have never been inside a modern ambulance,” Steve remarked.

Alexei kept his eyes on the road. “Huh?”

He was cut off by Sasha. “So what was being frozen in ice for 70 years like?” Sasha asked. She looked up from the monitor next to Natasha’s body, now letting out a steady beeping.

“I don’t know. I was frozen,” Steve responded sarcastically, “What about you, Buck? What was it like being a HYDRA agent for 70 years?”

“I don’t know. They kept wiping my memory,” Bucky responded in the same sarcastic tone.

“Very funny, you two,” Sasha replied.

Bucky’s left thumb twitched, making a slight squeaking noise from the abnormal movement. “We really need to stop making that joke,” he said. “Just acknowledge that you have fans and your best friend doesn’t and your best friend is totally fine that.”

“Fine,” Steve sighed. He had wanted to draw attention to Bucky. Steve knew that Bucky was just as important and extraordinary and unique as he was, but Bucky never saw any light. Steve could sense Bucky’s unease in the moment from the way he sat, the way he was twiddling his thumbs. Steve blankly glanced over at Natasha, whose eyes were beginning to flutter open. “Look who’s awake,” he said. “Nice to see ya, Agent Romanoff.”

Natasha tried to lift her arms or sit up, but she found herself restrained. “What happened?” she mumbled.

“Well, you collapsed. So, I win,” Bucky told her.

“And now we are--” Steve continued, “Sasha, how far away are we?”

“Umm… Alexei, ETA?”

“3 minutes.”

“3 minutes away from the hospital,” Steve finished.

“Okay,” Natasha said, releasing the tension in her back, letting herself fall back, helpless against the stretcher. She closed her eyes.

Chapter Text

NATASHA

Alexei. Sasha. Those names rang out in her head like the sound of fireworks with a headache. She began to flutter her eyes back open. She made another unsuccessful attempt to move her arms. Natasha scanned the ambulance. Something felt familiar, like a nightmare she’d had before. One more attempt to move. To get out. To figure out what was going on. Her wrists were firmly held down.

Sweat began to matte her red hair and glisten on her cheeks. A shakiness rippled throughout her body, starting in her legs and inching its way up to her head. Natasha could feel her heart begin to race out of control. Suddenly everything was fuzzy; she could barely see and limbs began to go numb.

The heart rate monitor began beeping out of control. Sasha glanced down to find that Natasha’s blood Oxygen content was dangerously low. “Alexei,” she called out, “her blood Oxygen is dropping. I am putting her on Oxygen, could you speed up a bit?”

Natasha blacked out.

Madame B’s voice rang out in Natasha’s head, haunting her like an old ghost. “The ceremony is necessary for you to take your place in the world.”

The last time Natasha laid on a stretcher was the graduation ceremony. Petrified. Her arms motionless against the cold metal. The long hallway to where she would complete her transformation into nothing more than a trained killing machine.

She felt Madame B’s cold hand against her face, pushing her back down onto the stretcher. Madame B’s palm covered Natasha's mouth and fingers obscured her vision.

“But—“ Natasha had pleaded.

“Silence,” Madame B reprimanded.

She heard the clink of the not-so-sterile surgical equipment against the table. She was in the room where she had lost it all. It was a symbol that she had no rights. It took away all of her hope for a future.

Natasha fully regained awareness upon her arrival in the ED of the local hospital. A young nurse spoke to her in a calm voice. “Natasha, you are here. You are alive. You are safe. We are not sure what happened when you first lost consciousness, but your heart began to beat too fast in the ambulance on your way here. Your vitals are stable now, but we will need to keep you here for observation. We also have a cardiologist, Dr. Zaytsev, on-call today, so he’ll be down to evaluate you shortly, okay? I’m also gonna need you to do a few things. I need you to change into the gown that’ll be on the bed when we arrive and place your suit in the bag next to it. Fury is on his way down to pick up anything ‘dangerous.’”

“Fury? Dangerous?” Natasha asked in a weak voice. The bright lights and white walls of the ED screamed at her. She felt a nervous tingle throughout her body that made her limbs weak and extremities numb.

“The Widow’s Bite,” Steve offered, “He’s bringing stealth clothes for all of us, too. We’ll need to remain low-profile for everyone’s safety. We don’t need to injure innocent civilians just because someone found out that an Avenger is in the hospital.”

“A few more things,” the nurse interrupted. “What is your full name?’

“Natalia Alianovna Romanova.”

“Date of birth?”

“November 22, 1984.”

“Place of residence?”

“Classified.”

“Fair enough.” The nurse kept pace as Alexei and Sasha steered the stretcher into a curtained-off bay at the end of the hallway. The nurse paused as Alexei and Sasha began to free Natasha’s hands. The white spotted hospital gown on the bed taunted Natasha, further evoking her past trauma. The nurse began to walk away. “If you need anything, my name is Alyssa,” she said.

Upon the nurse’s departure, Bucky piped up. “Alyssa,” he said, “Is Nat going to be okay?”

“Yes,” Alyssa replied somewhat confidently.

Chapter Text

FURY

Fury wandered into the ED not expecting anything, just hoping to find a nurse to assist him. Instead, he stopped in his tracks, surprised by seeing Steve and Bucky standing out in the open, in the corner of the large room. “What the hell are you two doing out here?’ Fury demanded.

“Keeping...Natalia...company?” Bucky offered.

“And why is she here?” Fury asked, getting agitated.

“I thought you knew,” Steve said, “she collapsed.”

“I did know that, Captain,” Fury responded mockingly. He turned around to face the nurse’s station in the middle of the room. “Nurse, why is she not in the presidential suite? You know, the high-security room for important people.”

“We don’t have one,” Alyssa replied blankly. “

This is a security disaster,” Fury muttered. “If she’s not released by tomorrow morning, I’m airlifting her to Bellevue.” He walked over to Bucky and Steve and handed them a pile of street clothes. “SHIELD is trying to protect your location, make sure no one gets hurt or caught in the middle of anything. Don’t draw attention to yourselves. As for you, Mr. Barnes, I need you to give me the arm or keep it covered.” He walked past Bucky and Steve into the curtained-off area. He took a seat in the cushioned chair beside Natasha’s bed.

Natasha lifted her head upon hearing the chair next to her creak. She shifted her green-eyed gaze to Fury. “Fury,” she managed in an airy, shaky voice.

“Agent Romanoff,” he said. “It’s good to see you.”

“Fury, I--”

“Don’t apologize. You’re alive.”

Alyssa pulled the curtain back and walked towards Natasha and Fury. She paused and twiddled her thumbs, not wanting to interrupt Fury. She cleared her throat. “Natasha, Dr. Zaytsev will be down in five minutes for an evaluation.”

Dr. Zaystev was a middle-aged man with white hair atop his head. He pulled back the curtain and calmly approached Natasha, clipboard in hand. He stuck his right hand out for Natasha and Fury. “I’m Dr. Adam Zaystev. You can call me Adam,” he said. Fury provided a firm handshake, but Natasha didn’t move. Dr. Zaytsev took out his clipboard and began scanning the white pages of the ambulatory report. He scanned Natasha’s recorded medical history, or lack thereof. “Natasha,” he said, “have you ever been light headed during strenuous exercise?”

“I have been noticing that more recently, so yes,” she responded.

Dr. Zaystev took one last pass at the report on his clipboard before lightly sighing and shifting a gentle gaze to Natasha. “Judging by the evidence shown in your episodes today, you are exhibiting symptoms of CPVT. While this evidence is strong, it is limited. I would like to have you complete an EKG and a stress test to gain further information on my hypothesis. A chest MRI may also be necessary for confirmation of the diagnosis.” He paused.

“What do you think I have?” Natasha asked.

“CPVT,” Dr. Zaystev repeated.

“Which is,” Natasha followed up.

“Catecholaminergic Polymorphic Ventricular Tachycardia,” Dr. Zaystev said.

“And how the hell would I know what that means?” Fury asked.

“It means that when Natasha’s heart beats too fast, it starts having problems. After a certain point, her heart cannot control how fast it beats, so it begins to beat too fast. This means that the blood doesn’t have enough time to oxygenate, causing a lack of oxygen to her entire body, but most dangerously, to the brain,” Dr. Zaystev responded. He paused. “The one thing I have yet to figure out is that CPVT is genetic, so it doesn’t entirely make sense that it’s only just now appearing.”

Bucky stepped forward. “Radiation can cause DNA mutations. We also don’t know her parents, or their genetics,” he offered.

“When would she have been exposed to radiation?” Dr. Zaystev asked.

“Really?” Bucky remarked. “Basically every time she did pretty much anything relating to the Avengers or SHIELD. We also don’t know the full effects of time travel.”

“Time travel?” Dr. Zaystev asked.

“Yeah, that’s how we saved the universe,” Steve added.

“Okay,” Dr. Zaystev said, “Natasha, we will need to go to cardiology on the third floor for your EKG. We can take the elevator. Do you think you can walk?”

“Yeah,” Natasha said. She pulled her legs out from underneath the white bed sheet and placed them dangling over the side. She placed her hands down on the bed at her side and used them to slide herself forward until her feet touched the ground. She slowly extended her arms, using them as support but beginning to shift her weight to her legs. Fury lifted his arm to offer Natasha support as she rose, and she grasped his arm as soon as her hands were no longer touching the white sheets. Her legs trembled. She tried to take a step forward, but she was too shaken to support herself. Her legs gave out, and she fell to the ground.

As if on queue, Steve wheeled a wheelchair over to Natasha’s bedside.

“I can still walk,” Natasha insisted.

Fury sighed and looked down at Natasha, whose hands had lost their grip on his arm. “Agent Romanoff, I appreciate the commitment, but we should really be focusing on not dying,” he said.

“If anyone is dying, it’s him,” Natasha whined, weakly motioning in Steve’s direction.

“As your fossilized friend, I am going to have to agree with Fury,” Steve added. “Let’s go.”

Chapter Text

The blue plastic of the examination table stuck to Natasha’s skin. Bucky heard the sound of Natasha peeling her hands off the table as he helped her up. The shine of his left hand contrasted the pale skin of her ankles, which he guided to meet the table. Natasha nodded to signify that she was fully on the table, so she no longer needed help. Bucky backed away, and Steve wheeled the wheelchair away from the table.

There was a knock on the door. An attending entered and approached Natasha. He stuck out his hand. “I’m Zayne,” he said, “And you must be Natasha.”

Natasha nodded weakly. Silence persisted throughout the room as Bucky adjusted the sleeves of his leather jacket. His eyes met Natasha’s, and he understood what he was supposed to do. Bucky cleared his throat and introduced himself. Steve followed.

“Right on then,” Zayne said. “Natasha, I am going to need you to lie back onto the table. I am going to attach some electrodes to your chest. We will be able to see your heart rhythm on the monitor to my right. We will get data on your current heart rate and Dr. Zaystev has ordered a stress test. He shall be in to monitor the procedure shortly. In the meantime, let’s get you prepped.” Zayne removed Natasha’s hospital gown. He cleaned her chest with an alcohol swab before beginning to untangle the wires to the electrodes. Zayne placed the electrodes across Natasha’s chest. He ensured everything was stuck in place before walking over to the computer. The sound of Zayne’s fingers on the keyboard filled the uncomfortable quiet of the room. A rising and falling line began to travel across the screen. “I will go get Dr. Zaystev,” Zayne said, stepping out of the room.

Bucky glanced over at Natasha. She lay still on the table, surrounded by wires. While he was prepping, Zayne had slipped a catheter into Natasha’s left hand, which now loosely dangled off the edge of the table. Bucky traced the wires, his eyes running from the electrodes on her chest to the monitor a few feet away. As the chase continued, a pit formed in Bucky’s stomach. His arms felt heavy and limp. He paused, closing his eyes and taking a deep breath, in through his nose and out through his mouth. His gaze refocused on Natasha. The pit grew as he observed the electrodes rise and fall with her chest as she breathed, her body staying otherwise still.

Bucky startled with a knock on the door. Zayne entered followed by Dr. Zaystev. Zayne placed a white tray on the table next to the computer, and Dr. Zaystev flipped over some pages of his clipboard as he approached Natasha. Zayne wrapped a blue blood pressure cuff around Natasha’s arm. Dr. Zaystev pulled a stool out from under the computer and took a seat next to the exam table. He cleared his throat.

“Let’s get started,” Dr. Zaystev said. “Natasha, we have already been recording your at rest heart pattern for some time, so we don’t need much more of this. In a moment, I am going to have you do a few simple tasks, such as counting to ten or saying the ABCs. We will then perform a stress test. As you are having some trouble walking, I have opted to give you a pharmacological stress test.”

“What does that mean?” Natasha interrupted.

“It means that instead of having you run on a treadmill, I will use a pharmacological agent to simulate exercise.” Dr. Zaystev motioned over the tray that Zayne had set down earlier. “That’s why I had Zayne insert a catheter earlier. Let’s begin.” Natasha nodded her head. “Please count to ten,” Dr. Zaystev told her.

“One--”

Bucky’s heart skipped a beat. He turned to Steve. “I can’t let them do this to her,” he pleaded. “I need to save Natalia. They can’t hurt her like they did me.” Bucky took a step forward but was held back by the grab of Steve’s hand.

“Buck,” Steve said, “she is in good hands. She’ll be fine.”

“Eight. Nine. Ten,” Natasha said slowly as Dr. Zaystev raised his eyebrows at Steve and Bucky.

Bucky’s arms tensed up. He felt a weird sensation creeping up his back and into his head. Bucky shook his head. Snap out of it , he thought to himself. “Ready to-- no.” Bucky shook his head again. “Read-- no. Ready to-- no. Ready to c-- no.”

Natasha abruptly sat up. “Is everything okay?” she asked. Steve pointed to Bucky, whose mumbled words filled the room as he paced an anxious two-foot span. The lines on the monitor began to rise and fall at an increasing rate. Dr. Zaystev checked the monitor apprehensively and motioned for Natasha to lie back down. “Get Fury,” Natasha commanded, surrendering herself to her doctor and lying down. 

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Steve tugged at the back of Bucky’s shirt. He guided Bucky into the hallway and searched for Fury. Steve found Fury sitting in a chair about 100 feet down the hall. “Fury,” he called, “we’ve got a code Whiskey Sierra!”

Fury glanced over at Bucky, whose continued mumbling and darkening gaze filled the room, before whispering into his walkie talkie. “SHIELD, I need backup on floor three. We have an unstable James Barnes. I am alerting hospital personnel.” Fury walked towards Steve as a SHIELD team began to file into the hallway and create a protective circle around Bucky. Alyssa approached the group as well.

“Don’t ask questions,” Steve warned.

Alyssa nodded, though she shifted her gaze to the SHIELD agents grouped in the middle of the hallway. Fury laid out a plan. “Please notify everyone that we have a code silver,” he said motioning to Bucky. “Do you have a padded room?”

“Yes. Fourth floor in psych,” Alyssa promptly responded. 

Bucky was holding onto himself by a thread. His mumbling kept inching ever so slightly towards a full “ready to comply.” He could hear the mechanical shifts of his arm gearing up for battle, but all he saw was the black bulletproof vests of SHIELD agents. He figured that he couldn’t do much damage, but still kept resisting.

“SHIELD, move on out,” Fury commanded.

The agents safely transported Bucky to a padded room upstairs. As the door slammed shut, the words “ready to comply” slipped out of Bucky’s mouth. His metal hand sunk into the green wall.