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It could be excused. It had after all, been a busy week. Aliens invaded New York, there was a very good sale on candles and the world’s first superhero team got their heads out of their asses for just long enough to eat victory schwarma. It had been busy, and Tony looked for lies and found them.
Tony however, had a habit of building creations smarter than he was, something which would become a rather large problem one day.
For now though, a week after the sky opened, Jarvis combed through some files and 03:27 in the morning and figured something out. Tony (alias: Iron man, formerly Merchant of Death) was asleep, Pepper’d been keeping a strict watch on him lately. Bruce (alias: Doctor, the Hulk) was reading The Old Man and The Sea and listening to Beethoven twenty two floors below him. Steve Rogers (alias: Captain America) was a few boroughs down destroying punching bags to banish new ghosts. Clint Barton (alias Hawkeye, Dad) was at an unassuming farmhouse with his hidden family shooting targets in the barn. Thor (alias: God of Thunder, Prince of Asgard) was asleep on a couch curled up next to one Doctor Jane Foster. Natasha Romanoff (alias: too many to count) who’d denied an invitation to the farmhouse was at a small safehouse in Germany working on uncompromising herself. James Buchanon Barnes (alias: Bucky, the Winter Soldier) slept somewhere cold, awaiting orders.
Jarvis turned on the lights in Tony Stark’s bedroom. “Sir, I think you’ll want to see this.” Hydra was supposed to be dead. Why was it showing up in current files? Why did it look like Shield was it, not hunting it?
24 hours later the Avengers reconvened in the still half destroyed tower. It was time to get back to work. No rest for the wicked after all.
~~~
It wasn’t much. Hydra had hidden in the shadows of The intelligence organization for decades not just on luck. But it was enough. A few cocky errors, and try as they might, no one could truly prepare for Tony Stark. It was enough that while Tony was still loudly proclaiming his genius, Bruce and Steve were reveling in confirmed biases, and Thor was off on a rant about humans having no honor, Natasha Romanoff used the brain that saved the world and realized they were right.
Shield was Hydra.
She was Hydra.
The red in her ledger would never be wiped out. She was out of the room before anyone could stop her. Everyone stared at the door for a moment, silent now in the room instead of the overlapping voices it had been before.
Clint rubbed his hand over his face. He looked like hell. He felt worse. This sucked. It had all sucked. It’d been one of those weeks.
It was never going to suck as much for him as it would for her though. Clint’s muttered swears brought the attention back to him.
They still weren’t sure what to do with him, none of them really knew each other, they had a bond forged in battle, not friendship bracelets. And Clint had been an enemy longer than he’d been a friend. It was odd, and more than a little confusing.
He was there on the grace of Natasha though, despite her ‘mind blowing duplicity’ somehow Natasha seemed like the most trustworthy person there, and she trusted Barton. They all stared like alarmed meerkats. Clint swore more.
He was brainwashed for one week and she adopted five murder puppies. Now he knew how Laura’d felt when he brought home Nat for the first time.
“Tact. For the love of god if you can’t find some buy some. I have to go deal with that now, don’t do anything until I get back. Anything. Breathe very quietly and that’s it.” He did not trust them not to do something immensely stupid while he went to fetch ‘Tasha.
“Jarvis, you are in charge. If you let them do anything I’m hitting control alt delete on your code, don’t test me.” So not in the mood for this.
With a firm point at an indeterminate spot on the ceiling, he slung his bow and quiver over his shoulder and left the room, leaving it in stunned silence. Predictably, Tony was the one to break it, (His psych profile had listed a fear of silence.) throwing up his hands. “Well what the hell was that all about?”
Bruce started rubbing his brow. Steve, Tony, and Thor still looked mystified. “I think he was referencing the part where you blew up their entire lives with the glee of a psychotic kid wrecking a sandcastle with a t-rex?”
They’d all been given files on the others. Even Thor, although somewhat belatedly. Was Bruce the only one who’d read them? Natasha’s may have been heavily redacted, but it was honestly not that hard to figure out that Shield mattered to her.
“Ohhhh. Huh. Hypothetically, would you say my presentation of this was better or worse than pretending to be someone’s hot assistant and then stabbing them in the neck with what was admittedly a form of medicine but still kind of a betrayal? How much difference does who have to make up here?” Humans were weird. Thor was honestly considering calling up Darcy. It seemed like she’d be able to parse some of this.
He got the broad strokes. Betrayal, evil organization is slightly more evil than originally thought. Employees of evil organization upset. But the rest of it was really escaping him.
“I can’t believe they did this in Peggy’s organization.” It was also Tony’s dad’s, and general Phillips’. But who was counting?
Steve pushed himself off where he’d been leaning on the table and started to gather up his shield. “Hold on there Private Brooklyn. Where you going?” Steve held out his hands impatiently, ignoring the demotion and looking at all of them like they were the ones being weird.
“We have to go and stop the nazis obviously.”Leave it to Cap to sidestep the point so completely.
Yes, obviously the nazis needed to be stopped.
What his plan was with an oversized frisbee in the middle of the night to take down a double secret organization of terrorists inside of a secret organization of spies who don’t take kindly to being frisbee’d no one knew. Especially not him. “Hold up with the n word there Godwin. Didn’t you hear Robin Hood? We’re supposed to stay put.” When Stark was the voice of reason, things had really gotten bad.
“But he could be a spy too! Both of them. What if they’re alerting their masters now?” Spycraft was not his specialty. Or just subtlety in general. The man used to make eye contact with, and salute, his sniper mid combat. His battle plans were good, everything else...not so much.
“Correct me if I’m wrong, but hasn’t Natasha saved all of our lives? More than once? Even after having met Stark and whatever the hell that story is, and me going all ragey, and having a chat with your beloved brother who used her mind controlled bestie/boyfriend against her, and I think I remember Steve calling her ma’am at one point? What exactly would she have to do to prove herself to us?” Bruce of all people knew what it was to try and not be judged by his past. Besides, he’d gotten damn near close to killing her, and she hadn’t treated him any differently.
He owed her.
“The lord and lady have behaved honorably and we shall do as we were told, for the moment.”
His brother was the god of mischief and trickery, it wasn’t like he was unfamiliar with the concept. On that same note though, he didn’t believe they were secret nozzles (was that what it was called?).
It was more like how he knew...well his face looked like upon Loki’s latest betrayal. Not unexpected, not the first time, still painful. Stab wound or no. Steve winced. Thor was right, and if Peggy were here she’d have already decked him. They’d told him they’d won the the war though. Sure didn’t seem like it.
“Curtains makes a point. Who wants a movie?” Fallaces sunt rerum species. The appearances of things are deceptive. Not get your ass in the car, as he’d been told. Right before they’d parted ways after Shwarma Tony had asked Natasha something that had been bugging him for a while.
Why Natalie Rushman? Why a name so close to her own? She’d told him the best lies were close to the truth, and asked why he thought that was her real name anyway. Then she’d disappeared with Barton.
He’d watched the tape of her interrogation with Loki. She’d deceived the god of tricksters alright. But he knew lies. The real lie had been when she’d pretended it had all been an act. The best lies are close to the truth.
He had in fact, read her file, even if files with that much black ink through it gave him hives. How did someone get that ‘mind blowingly duplicitous’? None of the answers he could dig up were good.
“Before anyone thinks they have a vote though. They don’t. My tower, my rules. We’re watching Grease.”
~~~
Natasha was perched on a ledge looking out over the skyline, her legs dangling carelessly fifty floors up. If it was anyone else they’d have tried to get her down, it would probably be the sensible thing to do. Clint climbed up with her.
“I’ll kill them.” Slowly. “Who?” He knew the answer. “Everyone.” She’d done it before.
“And we will. But come on back inside and let us help.” Because she had that look in her eyes again. The one that said she was trained to work alone.
The problem being she was also trained to complete the mission no matter the cost by some heartless bastards. When ‘Tasha got that look she ended up bleeding. Not as much as the other guys, but more than enough.
“No. You need to go home. You need to recover and someone has to protect Laura and the kids.” If something happened to them...no. Nothing would happen to them.
“Laura’s off the books and remembers the protocols. What’s your excuse for the rest?” He had no doubt she had them. She could justify her needing to suffer like nobody else.
Whatever she said was never the reason though. The reason was that she’d been taught her life was worthless, or at least only useful in the context of the mission. If dying accomplished the mission than it was a shame to lose all that work, but ultimately replaceable, and injuries could heal. It was the kind of thing that made Clint feel stabby. It was the kind of thing that had prompted a few stabby vacations.
“Stark will take the entire organizations sins upon himself, I’m betting with the excuse of the connection to his father. The less he knows about it the better.” Wonder who that sounded like.
“Rogers’ attachment to Carter and tendency to think in absolutes will blind him and render his judgement faulty.” The devil of it was that ‘Tasha was right. She was good at this kind of thing.
“Banner is not suited for this kind of mission even if he were willing to pull out the other guy.” She had everyone down to a peg.
The other devil of it was that even if she was right it didn’t mean she was right.
“And this planet’s problems don’t concern Thor.” Clint had never been a brainwashed russian assassin, but he had been a petty crook carnie, and if Shield hadn’t scooped him up who knows what would have happened to him.
There was a part of him that was dissecting every order ever given to him, the same part that was drowning in guilt over the Loki stuff. Someday soon, Laura would walk into the house to find at least three more walls there than she’d left with while he worked on processing all this. It maybe wasn’t the greatest coping method, but it was what he had.
And he looked like the most emotionally adjusted person in the world next to ‘Tasha’s coping methods.
“Wanna try explaining that to any of them?”
Her habit of suicide missions definitely gave him more grey hair than the kids and the spying combined.
“No, that’s why I left. Go home Barton.” He and her had been playing this game as long as they knew each other. She told him to leave, he never did. She was his best friend and she needed him, it was as simple as that.
“Not a chance Romanoff. We’re all already involved. Unless you want everyone to go in guns a blazing and uncoordinated you’re going to have to work with us.” If there was one thing she hated it was incompetence and that bunch with this job? It would be a nightmare.
“Just because we punched a few aliens together with them doesn’t make us a team.” Or competent. There was nothing about any of them that fit with precision missions.
“Nope. It’s basically a loose cannon factory here. Which is why they need you, and if you go slinking into the night they will do something extremely stupid.” And Clint would help. ‘Tasha was right when she talked about all the reasons why the ‘team’ wasn’t a good idea, but there were plenty of reasons why they were, and right now ‘Tasha needed people, even if she’d throat punch him for even thinking such a thing.
“Fine. I’ll go in and start a plan, you will back me up unquestionably and not drag me into you explaining this mess to Laura.” Yeah, that conversation was going to suck. (And yeah he would have tried to make ‘Tasha help because he knew very well who was the favorite there.) Regardless, Clint nodded firmly and Natasha nodded back. She didn’t move. Clint waited.
“Do you think people can change?” There it was.
Natasha was not processing this right now. Natasha was in mission mode. Still, even for someone as good at compartmentalizing as ‘Tasha this was a hard knock. He’d been there for deprogramming, and her finding out that yes it did matter how hurt she got during a mission, and some truly nauseating late night talks about her past.
He knew how hard it had been for her. After this was done, she would drink an unreasonable amount of vodka and probably spend some time with him on the farm as Auntie Nat. After this was done, she’d work through it. There was no time for that now, but there was time for one question.
“…I think I was a carnie freak, and you were a prima ballerina, and now we are on Stark Tower with a billionaire with a superhero hobby, an unfrozen american icon, doctor Jekyl and Mr Hyde 2000, and an actual god, waiting on us. This right here? Is fucked up, but just because Shield isn’t quite what we thought doesn’t make the fact that you were trying to do the right thing any less true. Or any less important.” She had never been a prima ballerina, but she got what he meant. If Clint ever took a minute to think about his life he tended to laugh hysterically, and that was before aliens poured out of the sky and a god took a joyride in his brain.
“When did you get so sappy? And they’re not waiting on us, I’m pretty sure they’re watching Grease.” Yes they were, Thor and Steve were very confused, Bruce was brewing a pot of chamomile, Tony had made popcorn and was having the time of his life.
Natasha sighed and hopped off the ledge and back into the tower, Clint close behind her, Jarvis paused the movie without her having to ask. “Okay we have basically one shot at this so we’re going to do it right, now let’s see exactly what files Jarvis found.”
~~~
The takedown of Hydra itself a few weeks later was a little underwhelming. With the help of Tony’s tech, placed in strategic locations around Shield, and Clint and Natasha’s personal insights they were able to categorize a lot of agents as good bad or indifferent and loop in a few of the verified agents.
The day of, nothing fell out of the sky, no one rose from the dead, and no one had to be fished out of the Potomac. A lot of the process was deputized but the team itself went in for the bigwigs. They didn’t get everybody, but they got enough, and Tony got more files to play with. This resulted in another moonlight crisis meeting. Cap’s bestie was alive.
Ish.
Cap started weeping. Natasha left the room again. Clint had deja vu.
“Okay, red white and snot’s reaction I get. The mata hari’s I don’t.” This was good news. It’d been a job well done, the kebabs they got after were decent, and now they just needed to run some errands and spend a few minutes with the microwave to get Cap’s bff back with them. What reason did she have to be so spooked?
“You are the world’s dumbest genius.” He sounded like Pepper.
“Why are you guys so surprised? They knew each other right? Of course she’s affected by the news.” Everyone looked at Thor. He’d missed something again hadn’t he?
“Why would you say that big guy?” Clint highly doubted Natasha had been opening up to anyone.
He basically only knew because she’d been high on pain meds after the whole business a couple years ago and he heard enough to be curious. And when he was curious he was a pain in the ass. (‘Tasha would say he always was, but what could he say? He was a curious guy.) Even then he didn’t know anything really. He knew not to talk about men with metal arms, that was it.
Everything else was speculation.
“How many evil super secret spy training organizations do you guys have? Weren’t they in the same one?” Son of an alien. The man had occam’s razored his innocent little way into the truth. More or less.
“Natasha knew Buck was alive this whole time and didn’t tell me?” Cap could go from blubbering to an angry wrong conclusion way too quickly for anyone’s blood pressure. Clint was too old for this.
“Calm down with the judgements liberty bell. There are so many reasons why this is probably not nearly as evil as you make it sound. Give everyone a little breathing room.” Not as evil on her part. It was evil on everyone else’s. That much Clint knew. Tony was gathering it as well.
“Jarvis, we’re watching Grease 2! Ready the theater.” He should have had lightning strike when he said that. Would have been good. He’d add it to the remodel plans.
“They made a second one? I thought they wrapped it up pretty thoroughly.” He didn’t particularly like the conclusion but it was a conclusion.
“Yes. Now it’s a cousin. But with basically the same plot.” It was so cliche, he loved it.
“Why would they do that?” Technically speaking Cap was older than him, but man did he not act like it.
“You’re asking far too many questions.” In general, but especially for this movie. Clint slung an arm over Cap’s shoulders and guided him towards the theater room, (he was still kind of in shock, Bucky was alive, Bucky was alive) Thor followed, and Bruce looked inquisitively at Tony who hadn’t moved.
Tony gestured vaguely and muttered something about popcorn. Bruce raised an eyebrow but he went into the theater anyway.
He didn’t hear Tony asking Jarvis where Natasha was, but he wouldn’t have been surprised if he had.
~~~
She was in the exact same spot she’d been the last time, although Tony didn’t know that, and like Clint he merely slid beside her. Jarvis could get the suit to him in time if she shoved him off.
Probably.
Natasha didn’t turn from her inspection of the city, or indicate she’d noticed him at all. He knew she had though, and he exercised what little patience he possessed to wait. Luckily he didn’t have to wait long.
“Anthony Howard Stark, raised by an emotionally unavailable but demanding father to whom nothing ever measured up and with a mother who, among her many virtues, always ended up siding with her husband in a rather interesting exception to maternal love conquering all.” She still hadn’t turned, and her recitation was monotone, emotionless. She was…empty, in a way he’d never seen before.
“In fact, you weren’t raised by the Starks, you were raised by a series of au pairs and the original Jarvis and his family. Your parents died tragically before you had a chance to receive the approval you so desperately craved so you spent the next years chasing similarly manipulative and borderline abusive father figures for approval, including Obadiah Stane and a litany of military generals, leading you to put your energy into manufacturing weapons in an attempt to garner affection. When the consequences of that behavior was rather dramatically demonstrated to you in Afghanistan you acted irrationally in a sort of second rebellious teenager phase and cut loose all of the father figures, shutting down all weapons related manufacturing without any consideration towards moderation or investigations into who you were hurting with this rash action, taking it upon yourself to personally save the world with, and without any irony if you can believe it, a bigger and better gun. You, Tony Stark, are a narcissist, not because you believe you deserve all the credit but because you believe you deserve all the blame. The showmanship is smoke and mirrors designed to paint a target on your back for your perceived sins of action and inaction which no one will ever blame you for more than you. You don’t have to explain anything to me about guilt and loss Stark, I know you very well, and it too.”
Iron man yes, Tony Stark no. His guilt was a liability.
“How?” Tony didn’t know why he’d gone to check on her, last time he’d let Susan Pevensie do it just fine, he wasn’t great with feelings and he knew it. Besides, he barely knew this woman and she’d spent most of their acquaintanceship lying to him. Except: fallaces sunt rerum species.
She stabbed him in the neck the first time they truly met, and he still had his kidneys.
He owed her. (His guilt was a liability.) “I was assigned to profile you to see whether you were a good candidate for the Avengers initiative Stark and I am exceptional at what I do. There was never any other option.” Her lips tightened at the last sentence, like she hadn’t meant to say it.
There was a part of Tony that wanted to do his usual thing and be immature and cause everyone to roll their eyes and leave. He had plenty of an excuse, he’d read the report she wrote on him, what she said wasn’t verbatim that but it was pretty close. Regardless, knowing someone thought things like that about you and hearing them lay your deepest darkest secrets on the floor like so much garbage was another thing entirely.
He wanted to be angry, but he thought about spending three hours making an omelet, and that feeling, and he just wasn’t. Maybe that was what growth felt like. Platypus would be so proud.
“‘Tasha, we practiced not profiling people out loud. It freaks them out.” This had been proven on many occasions.
“Jesus christ. How’d you sneak up on us?” Him. He’d snuck up on Tony.
Natasha had been well aware of his presence. Clint walked to the ledge and hopped on next to Natasha, rolling his eyes with a droll look and pointing at his head. “Spy. I am a spy.”
He didn’t have the whole vibe that ‘Tasha had, even with them both in their civvies, but he was still a highly trained spy. Clint scanned the skyline and bobbed his head, resisting the urge to whistle just barely.
“So. This is fun.” Why did Tony have the impression that Pigeon was a serious guy? This was almost as bad as him.
Instead of the throat punch Tony was expecting her to respond with, Natasha snorted and bumped her shoulder into his probably a little more firmly than being this high up warranted.
“You knew him didn’t you?” This, this was what Tony had been expecting from him when he came out here. The serious matter of fact tone.
“Of course I do, the man shot me.” When exactly had this been? Why did nobody tell Tony things?
“No. You knew him.” He was not letting her get away with those deflections again. Time to suck it up and pay the piper.
“A dancer named Natalia might have, a very long time ago.” Tony was very very confused, but for once instead of being obnoxious, he stayed quiet. And mentally started defining search parameters for later with Jarvis.
“Rogers know?” He was pretty sure he didn’t based on both his reaction and ‘Tasha’s…’Tashaness, but there was an order to these kinds of things.
“I barely know.” Bits and pieces, memories and illusions, handcuffs attached to beds, and a metal arm that was still warmer than anything else in that godforsaken place. But she also remembered dancing, and being on the stage with flowers thrown at her feet and the roar of the crowd in her ears. Memories were unreliable.
“You need to tell him. You need to tell them all. This had the potential to go so sideways so fast.
“They’ll think I’m lying, or that I was keeping things from them. They don’t trust me now, but they never will if I tell them.” The truth only ever made people hate you in Natasha’s experience. In fairness to some people, her truth was usually that she was an assassin sent to kill you or otherwise do something unpleasant. But still, you can only have so many people find out more about you only to turn around and try to kill you immediately before you started to take it personally.
“It’s not your fault.” It was and it wasn’t.
Natasha hadn’t made a lot of choices in the early years of her life, but she’d made one, and it was the most important one. She chose to survive. Everything after that, no matter who directly gave the orders and how many options she may or may not have had, was on her.
“And Loki wasn’t yours.” He hadn’t even had the choice of survival. It made her wish she’d stabbed Loki in the heart right in Stark’s living room.
“Aren’t we the pair?” Two deadly assassins who could barely function at the best of times. It wasn’t the best of times.
“You should go home.” To Laura, to his family. Clint would argue, but he’d always be more human than she was. He didn’t need to see this.
“Not a chance.” She told him to leave, and he didn’t. Routine, even super spies liked it.
“Hey I’m here too.” Not that this wasn’t a fascinating look into their relationship, but he was still there. Natasha didn’t miss a beat.
“Weapons manufacturing.” Yeah but that really was his fau-oh. So that’s what they were talking about.
“Point. But we’re a dysfunctional trio thank you very much.” Who said he wasn’t a team player?Natasha, Natasha said that. And he had magnanimously mostly forgiven her.
“Fine, dysfunctional trio.” There was silence again. It was very cold this high up, and Tony decided to speed things up.
“So…you boned Rogers’ best friend? And didn’t tell anyone.” Was this probably a vulgar oversimplification of complex and traumatizing events? Yes. But Tony was Tony, and while he didn’t know either Clint or Natasha very well, he knew they knew each other very well. He was taking his cues from Clint.
“Don’t be crass. A I had no idea who he was, I only just found out his name through that file of yours. And B, we never slept together. It wasn’t about that. Sex was a tool and unnecessary with him. We were...friends.” As close as they knew how to be anyway. Clint’s face didn’t change, but his next blink was slightly slower than normal. Honestly he’d assumed they were exes of a sort too.
Being friends was somehow so much worse.
Natasha slept with people, and she cared about some of them whether they deserved it or not (he still wanted to beat up Murdock for that whole business), but she didn’t make friends easily.
It wasn’t something she’d been taught. What she had been taught and why made him feel ill, but she was damn good at what she did.
“You think you and Cap are going to have to split time? William Tell going to arm wrestle him for best friend privileges? Does using the metal one count as cheating?” Natasha started laughing, fully laughing. It was the first time Tony had heard her do that, and if it had a slight edge of hysteria he wasn’t about to tell. Both Clint and her would throat punch him.
“Hey the metal arm definitely counts as cheating, you don’t arm wrestle a fork lift.” Clint had a pretty good arm from the archery and…everything, but he knew when there was a fight he wouldn’t win. Tony was mentally calculating betting odds for a face off between Clint and Dum-E.
On the one hand, Dum-E was a robot with the ability to exert a lot of force, on the other hand, it was Dum-E. Clint probably had the edge.
“I’m sorry Clint, you’d lose with either arm.” There were a lot of things she didn’t remember, but she remembered enough to know that.
“No faith Red, no faith.” There was a small part of him that quaked at her casual assessment of Barnes’ skill. He may not know her well, but she’d looked the god of mischief in the eyes and lied, she’d watched Banner transform after having already had him try to kill her without flinching, and Steve had told the story of her leaping off his shield into the sky with a look of complete wonder. Not much shook her, and clearly she had a high opinion of this guy.
“Okay, can we talk now about the odds that both Cap and his bff were both freeze dried to preserve freshness?” He should have Jarvis calculate it later. It had to be astronomical.
“Instead of ice ice baby we got ice baby baby.”Clint’s dry as the sahara remark set both Tony and Natasha off. After a long time they finally collected themselves, and the smile slipped off of Natasha’s face as she leaned her head on Clint’s shoulder in a well practiced motion.
Tony still had no idea what was going on with that relationship. He was not gonna ask. Throat punching and all that.
“Fuck I’m going to have to tell them shit.” Much more than she’d ever told her Shield mandated therapist.
“Yes, but we still have about an hour twenty ‘til grease two is done. You guys wanna go get some cheeseburgers?” A long time ago, Natasha had gotten back from a mission telling him about a billionaire who was more than he pretended to be.
He’d believed her, because ‘Tasha was basically always right, but it had been weird actually meeting the guy. Natasha smiled slightly and hopped off the ledge nodding. “As long as we get fries too.” Clint mentally kicked up his estimation of Stark a few notches.
Tony slid off less smoothly and then grinned broadly, throwing an arm around Natasha that she chose not to break. “Of course George Smiley, we’re not savages.” Yeah, maybe he wouldn’t have to kill Stark after all.
He wasn’t great at any of this, but he was trying.
In a weird way he reminded him of Natasha. They both sucked at feelings and self worth. Everyone needed so much therapy. Clint jumped off and followed them inside.
“Do you think if we remind them we saved the entire city like a month ago they’ll let me fill up one of those big drink cups with honey mustard?” He’d ask for a tub but he wasn’t sure the average fast food restaurant had one.
“In my experience if I wave my black card they’ll do just about whatever I want.” That came out dirtier than he’d intended. That was certainly a first for him. Usually he did intend it. Natasha raised an eyebrow.
“Like eat your donuts inside the donut sign? Yep.
Kelly, the old manager, just finished med school with no student loans. She sent him postcards sometimes. It was nice.
“Oh the donut incident. Lemme ask, did he actually tell you to ‘exit the donut’ or was ‘Tasha fucking with me.” Either was possible.
She had a much more wicked sense of humor and the absurd than most people gave her credit for. Granted that was because most of the time she locked that down because she was raised in literal hell and taught that feelings were an avoidable weakness. Better to imagine Fury saying that then think about anything to do with ‘Tasha’s childhood.
“He did. Honestly? Almost dying and being in chronic pain for months was nearly worth it just for that moment.” Not really, but Tony liked to laugh instead of processing complex feelings. Also drink. Drinking was fun. (He really was a lot like Natasha.)
“I liked the part where I got to stab you in the neck.” They were a fantastic dysfunctional trio.
“You stabbed Stark and didn’t invite me? And you’re supposed to be my best friend.” It shouldn’t work, but it did, and Natasha smiled.
Three horrible coping methods almost made a good one.
~~~
They arrived back, two hours later, smelling strongly of fried food, and intermittently giggling. Thor was making some asgardian dish everyone was too afraid to ask about, Bruce was muttering to himself and scribbling calculations on the notebook he seemed to always carry, and Steve was sitting rigidly on the couch with his arms crossed and a frown on his face.
He looked for all the world like a disappointed father waiting for his kid hours after curfew. “I’m about to tell you all a story, under some duress.”
Natasha sobered up a lot when she saw everyone, and soon she was back to being the picture of poise and calm again, although her fingers were still slightly greasy. Clint chuckled in a way that Tony could only tell was forced after a couple hours of genuine laughter, and strolled over to a stool and climbed up with a jaunty wave and a grin.
“Hi, I’m some duress. If any one of you interrupts her story you will be stabbed in a painful but not life threatening way. I’m looking at you Stark, and you Rogers. Do not test me I will hog tie you all.” He would.
Tony held up his hands defensively and collapsed on the couch opposite Rogers, taking up the whole thing with no remorse. Natasha sighed and flicked a finger at Clint, a hint of a smile briefly appearing on her face before it got serious again, and dragged an office chair from one of Tony’s labs that had mysteriously ended up there, to a spot where she could see everyone, (Bruce sitting on the floor leaning in front of the couch Steve was on, and Thor, moved from the kitchen and seated on an arm chair) and didn’t have any exits behind her.
“Stark, you once asked me if anything about me was real. I didn’t answer you. The truth is, I have no idea. I am what I was made. And remade. Over and over and over again. I have no past and I have no future, never have, never will.” The file Fury had given them all on her past had left quite a bit out. Fury barely knew the half of it, and what little he did know was not for public consumption.
“I know I’m not supposed to say anything but...what does this have to do with Bucky?” It took him so little time to break the one rule. If he didn’t look so goddamn earnest, and his arms hadn’t finally unfolded, Clint would hog tie him.
As it was, it looked like Steve had shifted out of attack mode and into wounded puppy mode, it was more of a lateral move than Clint liked but they could work with it and assaulting him would probably slow things down.
“His name wasn’t Bucky. He didn’t have a name. Didn’t have anything, wasn’t allowed.” A name.
Such a simple thing, taken for granted, but it had haunted him. Natasha never had a childhood, but at least she had a name.
“So you knew him?” Another question. Honestly how did the guy survive in the army?
“I knew someone who looked like him. And he knew someone who looked like me. Then they made me forget. A few things jarred loose when he shot me though.” Tony snorted at her casual mention of being shot. Only her. Bruce glared at him but Clint smiled. You had to be able to laugh with Natasha. Otherwise you’d go mad.
“He shot you?” If he reacted that badly to only that much it was going to be a long night.
“Don’t look so surprised. Bucky never shot me. I never met Bucky. The man I knew wasn’t the one to shoot me then either. The people we knew didn’t take kindly to us, and it was getting time for a reboot anyway, for both of us.” Tony didn’t laugh at that. Everyone looked mildly ill.
“So they just...” That was Bruce, calculations on the floor, desperately trying to figure out a way to phrase it delicately. (He failed. The green monster in him raged.)
“They did much worse. Look the point of this is not my sob story. The point is whatever heartfelt idiotic plan you all are cooking up is a bad one. Banner shouldn’t be anywhere near him. Neither should Thor, we need people who can control themselves and neither of you can, sorry. Stark whatever plan you have to capture him won’t work, he won’t allow himself to be captured and no one wants to clean up the mess it’ll leave if you try. Rogers, the things they can do to a person will not be overcome with a speech about the old days in Brooklyn.” This was not her first mind control rodeo. They had no idea what it felt like.
That was on the whole good, Natasha wouldn’t wish it on anyone, but it was frustrating to not have anyone realize the magnitude of it. Based on Steve’s guilty expression this had been more or less his plan. He would have gotten himself killed. And then his friend would have had to deal with being very guilty about that on top of everything else once Natasha finally got him.
“You’re acting like he’s already awake.” From what little Tony knew of this guy that was more than a little concerning.
“Because he is. We got most of Hydra, not all of it. The chances we got everybody who knew where he was and how to control him are slim to nil. I’m not sure if he’s been sent to kill us yet, might take a few more days before they feel comfortable enough to let loose their best guard dog. But rest assured, he will be.” Oh. That was…lovely.
“Well, we’re going to need a plan.” With Tony’s matter of fact statement it was done.
Maybe Clint wouldn’t end up hog tying everyone. Still, he could keep it in mind. Just in case.
~~~
Natasha wanted it very firmly on the record that she had been against this plan. It relied far too heavily on chance and a level of competence on their part and incompetence on his that frankly evidence of neither had been presented.
So it was partially excusable that when it all went to shit like she knew it would (having a team sucked) she felt a small burst of vindictive satisfaction.
Then she got her ass out of the way too conspicuous van to help Bruce before he hulked out and everything went even more sideways.
She’d told them that Bruce treated lies like active bombs, with the hand shakes to prove it, and he’d spot it a mile away, but no no one listened to the spy with decades of experience and the only one to have actually worked with the guy. Everyone else was too recognizable and they needed someone on the scene to distract him for Clint to get in position with the times ten tranq dose.
He only needed to bump into him for one moment and it would have been enough time for Clint, but Bruce walked way too stiffly and the Soldier noticed and he was made and then things got aggressive. It was what Natasha would have done.
Maybe with a little more panache than shooting into the sky and darting into an alley in the chaos, but the intent was there.
Tony was joking around and trying to calm down Bruce. Steve and Clint were trying to prevent a rampage, and Thor was keeping a watchful eye on Bruce in case he needed to fight him again.
Natasha started running.
He went down one alley, walked calmly down the next street, changed clothes in a store and walked out a new man, blended into the crowd, and then climbed onto a handy roof.
He’d always had a fondness for roofs. It was a small thing, but it had always tickled her. It was one of the few things that hinted at him having a past beyond the room. A little soldier reading about heroes chasing on roofs.
It took her a good few minutes to track him down, and even then it was only a glimpse in the distance.
He was gone. It had been a bad plan. Time to regroup.
~~~
“I’m just asking whether anyone has tried.” He said it so seriously. But he was Tony Stark.
“We are not going to try to capture the Winter Soldier with a comically large net.” It would give them the element of surprise. Nobody ever appreciated his genius.
“I feel like you’re not even considering it.” That was because they weren’t. Not even a little. Thor didn’t even have any idea what they were talking about when they said ‘looney tunes style net’.
“This is serious.” Yes yes very. Tony may not be the most emotionally evolved ever, but he was aware that decades of nazi experimentation and brainwashing was considered not good.
But they’d been proposing and discarding plans for a while now and Natasha was starting to look twitchy, and his bad jokes made her lips twitch slightly (but in a good way) so he counted it as a win. Bowler Hat had lost his sense of humor in the ice however and he was doing that pursed lips thing that he thought was more effective than it was. It was clear he was displeased, but Tony didn’t care.
“Yes it is. Which is why it’s stupid that none of you are letting ‘Tasha make the plan. She is the only one here who has experience with this kind of thing in general, and him personally.” The whole concept might make him want to vomit it but it didn’t make it any less true. ‘Tasha’s past might be an unending dumpster fire of pain and horror, but sometimes it could be helpful.
“Turkey-Leg makes a solid point. What’s the plan Rasputin?” Thor did not understand most of what was said, especially what Tony said. (Apparently even allspeak couldn’t cover anything.) He reminded him of Darcy. They’d probably get along. Then again that sounded terrifying.
Steve clenched a fist and bit back a reprimand to be serious. He was pretty sure Clint would in fact hurt him if he stepped out of line. And nobody would stop him. Bruce contemplated making everyone a soothing pot of chamomile.
Natasha’s lips twitched. Clint nodded shortly at Tony. Vaguely, Bruce connected those three getting chummy with the fact that Tony hadn’t actually stuck around to watch grease 2, and neither had Clint.
Steve didn’t connect anything and was simply annoyed that he was being ganged up on. Thor remained blissfully oblivious to just about all of the tension.
“First off, Bruce, you’re on comms.” For everyone’s sake. Bruce visibly relaxed. He was willing to do what was needed for the team, but his brief foray into undercover work was not his best memory.
“Secondly, and vitally, we plan to kill him.” Predictably, the second part of the plan didn’t go over as well as the first. Steve started yelling. Clint slipped a tranquilizer out of his sleeve. Across the table, Tony did the same. Thor finally picked up on the tension. Bruce went to get that tea started. Natasha didn’t move a muscle.
It was a long night.
~~~
The problem, as Natasha had painstakingly explained, was in managing expectations. They weren’t going to kill him, obviously, but he would be expecting them to.
Trying to capture him would confuse him, his responses would vary. A good old assassination attempt though? That was textbook. They had to behave the way he expected them to in order for him to behave the way they expected them to.
Steve had a hard time in accepting that his best friend expected him to try to kill him, but eventually even that was smoothed over. So in order to rescue him they had to plot to brutally murder him.
Here was the big flaw in the unstoppable machine known as the winter soldier: the amount of mind fuckery it required to stop him having a conscience and the amount of mind power needed to be an adequate assassin capable of innovation and complex problem solving was an extremely thin area of overlap. He wasn’t a drooling mess, but at times, especially when he was straight off the ice, he played things a little too by the book. This wasn’t a problem usually since the book may be full of horrors but it was very thorough, except Natasha also knew the book very well.
Hopefully, whatever momentary pause he needed to pivot from a by the book plan to something completely else would be enough to nail him with approximately ten elephant tranquilizers. (Maybe twelve.)
At this point he knew they knew he was after them which changed the game somewhat. But Natasha could work with it. It all made a lot of sense really.
Even if that was hard to remember when he was getting his ass handed to him by an angry war hero turned brainwashed assassin. The things he did for ‘Tasha. The worst part was the comments.
They weren’t happening now because Natasha wasn’t Stark, but he could just hear her later telling him he was slowing down and critiquing his performance. The Soldier gets a kidney shot with his left arm. (‘It’s shiny and the size of a tree trunk Clint how could you not see that coming?’ ‘Yeah well you seem to be paying awfully close attention to his biceps for an old friend ‘Tasha’.)
“Do you think that after you get five brainwashed assassins the sixth one is free?”And of course there was Tony. Tony saw no need to wait his mocking for later.
“He didn’t get me I got him.” That was partially true. Despite whatever bs he’d told the higher ups at the time, his fight with Natasha had not been going that well.
He might have been able to pull it out in the end, but it was pretty close. Until, mid redirecting a knife that was perilously close to his femoral artery, he’d said something about how it was stupid for her to waste her skills doing low rent assassinations for dictators. She’d already been annoyed at how long this was taking and had snapped and asked him what else she was supposed to be doing exactly It was the beginning of a beautiful friendship.
“No chatter on the comms.” He’d been given one job. Was it slightly humiliated to be relegated to managing phones when he had seven phds? Yes, yes it was. But he was self aware enough to realize it was the right thing to do. And he’d been drinking a lot of tea.
Tony had surprisingly nice tea selections for someone who looked genuinely offended at the thought of a beverage that neither caffeinated nor intoxicated you. (He hadn’t before recently. He’d ordered a lot of things to make the team feel more at home. In addition to his teas there were a lot of high level scientific journals in Bruce’s areas of interest littered around. There was a record player and drawing paper and pencils in Cap’s room also a fondu pot, just for fun. Technically speaking there was one in every room, but he’d made Cap’s extra large. Thor had ancient Norwegian decorations in his room, along with a state of the art link to Foster’s lab so they could talk and some god awful microbrew he said almost tasted like the mead at home. Clint had a dartboard he liked to have people dare him to do trick shots on and a special kind of coffee making monstrosity that belonged in a defunct diner and not his billion dollar tower but Clint swore by. And he hadn’t known what to do with Natasha so there was just a lot of borscht, vodka, and weaponry in her areas.)
“It’s not chatter when it’s worth as much as me. Do you have any idea how much I charge Shield for consulting? You guys are basically being gifted free vibranium and are throwing it away like heathens.” He had a slight point.
“Yes Stark you’re rich, we’re all very impressed by it. Now please be quiet.” Bruce was surprisingly snarky at times. That part of him intrigued Tony almost as much as the rage monster part.
“And….action.” It was time for Tony to do what he did best: make a very annoying and distracting nuisance of himself. He was going to vote Natasha new team leader. That girl knew their strengths.
“Awww, Annie Oakley, you started without me? How rude.” Tony had asked Natasha, (and pointedly not Steve) how much he should be holding back, and she had laughed and asked how much he valued his extremities.
She said to go whole hog and if he saw an opening for the tranqs he should take it, but he wouldn’t see an opening. The casual assurance had been mildly terrifying. He could now see it was warranted. The man was terrifying. No hesitation, sharp clean moves, terrifying accuracy and brutality. Seeing him and Clint fight was almost too fast to see. Time to stir the pot. With the addition of Tony, Barnes’ fighting shifted, if only minutely.
At the moment he was fighting two of earths mightiest heroes with one hand per each. Tony had the honor of the metal arm (and oh did he want to take a screwdriver to that beautiful thing) and Clint had the flesh one. It was at this point during the planning that Cap had suggested that this was where he and Thor came in. Natasha had looked at him blankly.
‘Unlike some people, when faced with bad odds well trained people leave to fight another day.’ No one had dared to mention her fighting an alien invasion with handguns. Natasha had seemed sure that Clint and Tony were the right amount of Barnes believing he had a chance against them without making him go back into the woodwork.
It was around that point of the night people (Cap) finally stopped questioning her. The plan had been for Tony and Clint to lead Barnes to a garage that Tony had specially modded which had reinforced everything and tranq gas and darts a plenty. Thor, Cap, and Natasha were close by in case backup was needed. It was simple, it was elegant, it was doomed for failure. Natasha had known this.
Which was why when Cap made an anguished cry of ‘Bucky’ and darted off the bench he’d been specifically told to stay on and not do anything, she was disappointed but unsurprised. Steve Rogers was a good commander, but he couldn’t compartmentalize his feelings for shit and he was currently watching live feed of people he didn’t like or trust much doing their level best to beat the stuffing out of his long lost bff.
So it was time for plan b. Swearing colorfully in multiple languages Natasha jumped up and glared firmly at Thor who had the look of perpetual confusion she’d begun to associate with him.
“You, stay put, I’ll handle this.” Barnes did not need another hostile (a god at that) to deal with.
It was understandable, Steve’s action, even if extremely frustrating. The problem with Steve was his empathy, he couldn’t turn it off.
The man was born to be a martyr, and he was never meant to wake up. And it was his best friend, from cradle to both their presumed graves. It wasn’t even his problem really.
It’s hers. He was her friend too.
She can remember moments of mercy, clear amidst all the bloodshed and cruelty. She can remember a man without a name and a girl without a soul being something like friends in a place such things as that were forbidden. She can remember identifying a fledgling feeling, long after he was taken from her, as some form of love.
She knows, in the same part of her that knows she’s a monster that she should feel something more about this than she does. But she also knows that any amount of pain is worth being free in your own mind.
She knew it when she rammed Clint’s head into a railing, and she knew it when she took his hand after the strangest assassination attempt of her life. Which is what made Steve going off book annoying.
Manageable, but annoying. The simple truth was that Natasha lived in a place of lesser evils, and Steve would always believe that if he suffers enough he can save everyone else from it.
They hadn’t quite gotten him out to the garage, but they had gotten pretty far in leading him out. Good thing they’d made sure to engage him in an area with no civilians. (So what Tony had bought a few derelict buildings, he’d refurbish them and make a bundle and improve the neighborhood to boot.)
Steve was there on the edge of tears going in and on about brooklyn and trains tracks or something, Tony was calling him an idiot, and Clint was just swearing. Barnes was taking all of them. Although in fairness Steve wasn’t really fighting back for some doubtless nauseatingly sentimental reason.
“Timber.” It was said quietly, an old code word between Clint and her, but he’d get it through the comms. When she’d peeked on Tony’s suit specs way back when, she’d found out his suit had measures against flash bangs, she remembers being impressed and a little surprised by that kind of forethought from the drunk idiot in a midlife crisis she had met.
And Steve wouldn’t know the code, but if his eardrums burst he’d heal and she was not very pleased with him at the moment. The flashbang went off right about as she got there, and was swiftly reminded that her knees only had a finite amount of building jumps left in them.
It wouldn’t hold Barnes for long, but it would be enough to get her close enough to act.
Cognitive recalibration.
Hit him really hard in the head. If that didn’t work…well, what was life without a little adventure? (‘Tasha’s death wish was really beginning to give Clint a headache, or maybe that was the flashbang.)
Here was the thing, Natasha may or may not have accidentally kept some of the chitauri weapons from the invasion instead of handing them over to Shield like she was supposed to. So on top of the flashbang she may or may not have immediately shot him in the face with an alien lazer.
If Steve could see or hear he’d be having a heart attack. But Barnes blocked it with his arm well enough even with the flashbang. He really was quite good. They were the avengers though.
So Clint got him in the calf with an arrow, Tony finally landed one of his emps on the arm, and Natasha hit him really hard in the head.
Barnes was down. Natasha didn’t catch him gently and lay him on the ground, he weighed like three times her and she was neither an idiot or particularly a martyr, (Clint could argue that point) but she did catch his head before it hit the cement and didn’t use her characteristic businesslike economy in her movements when securing him.
It was still pretty brisk, but Clint had seen her do this a thousand times and there was the slightest hesitation. Only Tony’s enhanced hearing in his suit could hear her mumble something in russian.
In a rare moment of delicacy he decided not to ask Jarvis to translate it. If he had he would have heard her tell Soldier to sleep, and that she’d keep watch for now.
Steve never left his side, neither did Natasha.
~~~
Steve had been yelled at a lot recently. He knew that somehow everyone had taken sides and somehow nobody was on his. He knew that things were complex. He knew that Clint could and would arrow him if he stepped out of line.
He knew everyone was annoyed for him not following the plan before. He knew this. He wasn’t stupid.
But he’d always been reckless. (See alley fights, army applications, military experiments and casual jaunts into enemy territory.) Tony was in the lab looking at the arm, Bruce was getting into contact with neurologists he knew, Thor was trying to contact Asgard to see if Eir could be any help, and Clint had left a message for Fury to round up some of the old gang of deprogrammers, and had finally told them he was going to sleep on their behalf if they weren’t going to.
It had been him and Natasha, sitting silently on two chairs next to Bucky’s bedside in the combination hospital room/prison cell, for well over an hour.
“How did you not know?” He didn’t bother clarifying whether he was talking about H.Y.D.R.A or Barnes.
It was both, it was neither. It was an honest man’s protest against someone who’d never been honest a day in their life. She’d never been given a chance to be, but that was a matter for another day. Too much of her dirty laundry had been aired lately, no need for more.
“Love is blind Captain.” She was never a dancer. She knew that, and yet she thought she could be good. Go straight. Couldn’t even tell the truth to herself. A liar and killer in the service of liars and killers.
Even then, she should have made the connection between her Soldier and Rogers best friend. She’d only given a cursory look over Rogers’ file and the devil may care smile of Captain America’s mythical best friend was not the slight eye crinkle her Soldier used to do.
Besides, her memory wasn’t that great. Age was catching up to her.
“Did you love him?” Of course everyone’s concern was whether or not she’d had sex with him. Because that was what was most important here.
“Not in the way you’re thinking. He was a good man, and that was not something that was really allowed where we were.” He had also been a brutally efficient assassin, one of the only people she was ever assigned with that could match her. But she wouldn’t tell him that. Steve smiled, and looked down, face full of nostalgia.
“Sounds like Buck. He talked a big game about how tough he was, but he always took care of me and his sisters.” The fondness quickly melted into sadness. Natasha suppressed a sigh. She was not good with the emotional stuff. If only Clint was here, he’d know what to do.
“Tell me about him. I’d like to know the man he was.” He would never be that man again, but with some help, he could be freer than he was now, and maybe he could be more like that. Besides, she actually did want to know what he used to be like, the man she’d only ever caught glimpses of.
“Well maybe just this one. You see, Buck had a brilliant idea, he liked those, and somehow he got me caught up in it…” Steve hadn’t talked about Bucky in almost seventy years, but that day, sitting next to his best friend, and a morally ambiguous ex spy with an extremely shady past he talked for hours.
Natasha didn’t tell any stories in return, he didn’t want to hear about blood soaked moments of something like mercy, of a good man who did very bad things, and a girl who never had a chance.
But she did something like a smile and listened to a man talk about his best friend, and felt like maybe she understood him a little better.
Throughout it, James Buchanan Barnes slept.
~~~
The Soldier woke up almost a full day later.
Tony had finished tinkering with the arm and had reattached it, with a flew slight restrictions against violence, basic Asimov’s laws kind of stuff, and was trying to teach Thor hearts while Clint mocked them and pocketed cards. Steve had finally fallen asleep a little bit ago, in a way that was sure to give him a crick in the neck, and Natasha was studiously ignoring the ‘more in sorrow than in anger’ look Bruce was giving her about how little sleep she’d had.
The hospital room/prison cell wasn’t very large; and it should have felt more claustrophobic than it did with so many people in it. Instead it felt comforting.
Until the soldier ripped off the restraints and stood defensively in the corner like a cornered animal. Natasha stood up slowly, and waved them off subtly with a quick movement of her wrist by her waist, to signal to everyone, especially the newly awake Steve, to stand down.
Tony fingered the button that would tranq him again and disable the arm. Natasha smiled slightly and moved forward slowly.
Hopefully the cognitive recalibration had shook something loose. She spoke in Russian next, but between Thor’s allspeak, Jarvis translating in Tony’s ear, the Russian Clint had picked up over the years, and the fact that Bruce wasn’t an idiot, the gist was clear.
“Do you remember me Soldier?” The question was asked almost as a joke, but her eyes were very serious.
Barnes squinted, tilted his head, and then his face cleared and he looked at Natasha with more emotion than they’d seen on him during the entire fight. (It was more emotion he’d had in years.) He looked lost, but like someone had just dropped a life raft. And like he was afraid it would be taken away.
“Dancer?” Nat’s face on the other hand, was solid stone. It didn’t seem to discourage Barnes from holding up a hand tentatively towards her.
When she spoke it was perfectly even, but there was an energy to it that only Clint had heard before. That had been when he’d plopped a baby Lila into her arms for the first time.
“Soldier.” The room was immaculately silent, Bucky’s hand, his metal hand, landed on her shoulder and he smiled, as fragile and new as fresh snow. One corner of Nat’s mouth twitched.
“Tightwad.” Bruce smacked Tony upside the head. In his defense, he really didn’t know how to deal with feelings, and he’d been pretty sure they’d forgotten they were there.
He wouldn’t mind a peek at Raskelnekov but he could live without America’s sidekick turned Germany’s favorite toy’s bits anywhere in his mind.
“I thought we were identifying each other and you can all glare but you all looked right at Capricorn once I said that.” That was actually true. Barnes finally realized everyone else was there again and looked confusedly at Natasha.
Well it was kind of a blank face, but it was his version of confused. Steve tried to tamp down the hurt at Bucky not even looking at him. He thought it had been the worst when he’d looked at him blankly, but the absolute lack of interest was crushing.
“They are allies. Things are different now.”Barnes’ brows drew together and he looked around again at the rest of the room.
“But…the mission.” Natasha could see the programming slamming up into his head.
She turned, looked at Tony, and nodded. This time when Bucky fell his best friend caught him.
Natasha knew Steve meant no harm to her Soldier, but she kept an eye on him anyway.
~~~
Natasha didn’t sleep for three days.
Her memories were muddled, but she could remember feelings better than details. She remembered knowing they were going to take him away, and she remembered them doing it.
She remembered being terrified of medical rooms and waking up to find someone had done something terrible while she was asleep. She had told the Soldier she would keep watch and she would.
Tony tried to distract her from her guard, and slipped her copies of his security protocols hoping that would make her feel safer. Bruce explained in depth the problems sleep deprivation could cause and made her a lot of herbal tea she didn’t drink. Thor talked about how worried he’d been when his father had been asleep, and told stories about him passing out in strange places, although those were mostly from drinking and not sleep deprivation. Clint looked at her, set up a cot, pointed at it, and told her that he would keep watch while she slept for a minimum of six hours or he would call in the big guns. (The big guns were Laura, but Jarvis had ears everywhere and Clint liked the bunch but he’d known them for like a month.)
Natasha looked extremely annoyed (kind of like a wet cat to be honest) but consented to sleep for three whole hours. Clint kept watch over them both as they slept.
By the time Barnes’ official ‘Get American Soon’ (as Tony and no one else was calling it) team was ready Natasha had slept two more hours.
The handoff didn’t go great. Natasha had some perfectly reasonable trauma to do with medical professionals, especially ones who could mess with your head. It didn’t help that these people were a hodge podge group of Shield and Shield affiliate people.
Bruce had been the unlucky one to reassure her that they had all been checked as she looked at them suspiciously. Natasha looked directly at him and said ‘Hydra’.
After that they let her run checks and question people as she pleased. After two more days of that Natasha finally took Fury and Tony into a small room and threatened them graphically about what would happen if all their fancy geniusness failed Barnes.
Then she told them that they may proceed but they were not leaving the tower and she would be periodically reviewing the tapes, and if anyone let anyone else see the tapes (cough cough Steve cough cough) she would be Very Displeased. Fury had been mildly surprised she cared so much, and Tony had looked haunted for days. Clint just kept laughing.
When asked about any of Natasha’s behavior he would laugh harder and tell them he’d seen it worse. Sometimes, if they were lucky, he’d tell stories.
He was just glad there was someone there to see it other than Phil. Phil, that one still hurt. But things were getting better, and Phil would certainly have been proud of them all.
There were lots of things to be proud of.
~~~
Time passed. Fury worked on salvaging what there was left of the Shield of their imagination.
Barnes was deprogrammed and therapized bit by painful bit, under Natasha’s careful supervision.
Everyone had their moments, and they all had people to notice when they did, and people to help in their own ways. Clint’s rough affection. Tony’s distracting teases. Thor’s surprisingly good cooking. Bruce’s teas for every occasion. Steve’s big eyes as he quietly asked if you were okay. Natasha’s silent comfort and lack of judgement. Eventually, they’d have to figure out how to factor Barnes into all that, but for once it was looking up.
There would be more moonlight crisis meetings in the future, but it would be okay.
They’d all make sure of it.