AN: This story takes place after the Winter Soldier. What happens when Natasha/Black Widow continues working for Fury and how Clint/Hawkeye reacts to her decision. There will be references to scenes in The Avengers, CA:TWS and Agents of SHIELD. Rated T for language and some Suggestive content (in later Chapters.) Chapter 1 has been revised to give Natasha a little more depth.
I own no part of Marvel or its characters.
Natasha walked into her apartment, kicked off the heels she had been wearing and let out a frustrated huff "Idiots, complete and utter idiots! I should have just burned the building down around them." It had been a very long couple of days.
Natasha, along with Maria Hill had spent the last several days testifying at hearing after hearing about SHIELD. What did she know? What really happened to Director Fury? When did she learn about Hydra? Who was working for Hydra? The last question had infuriated her. By the end except for a handful of agents it seemed like damn near everybody was part of Hydra. Natasha was done playing along with the group of politicians she considered to be almost as corrupt as Hydra.
"From here on out Maria can deal with the assholes on Capitol Hill." The two women although friends had different agenda's when it came to testifying anyways and very different ideas on what should happen now. Besides Maria was completely cooperating in tearing SHIELD apart. Natasha had been focused on her friends, making sure the politicians understood they still needed people like Tony, Steve and Clint to go after some of the nastier people in the world. And no matter what a certain self-righteous Senator thought there was no way in hell she was telling anyone where Dr. Banner currently was. "Although they would deserve everything they got if I did. What kind of a dumbass wants to go take on the Hulk? Been there, got the t-shirt. You're on your own with that one."
Natasha thought back to the words of a particularly obnoxious senator from earlier that day. "Agent Romanoff, you have two choices here. You can help us finish dismantling SHEILD or you can spend the rest of your life in the deepest, darkest hole we can find." And smirked to herself, "Sorry Senator but I think I'll choose door number three."
SHIELD may be in a shambles, hell her whole life was in a shambles at the moment, everything there was to know about Natasha Romanoff was public knowledge. The very fact that so much of her life was now out there for all the world to see was slowly killing part of her. But none of that mattered; there was still a job to be done. Fury had given Natasha a mission. A mission that there was no way Natasha was going to turn down, it was too damn important to her personally. And truthfully she didn't trust anyone else to do it. There was simply too much riding on this, failure was not an option.
Natasha walked into her small kitchen and pulled a bottle of water out of her refrigerator, mentally going over the instructions Fury had given her. "This is top priority Romanoff; we need to find that artifact. You have to disappear completely. Trust no one, tell no one. You're on your own here; there'll be no SHIELD, no back up. If you get discovered you'll have to get yourself out, preferably alive. But whatever you do Don't let them take you. If they use the artifact on you…" But Natasha hadn't need Fury to spell out what happened to someone the artifact was used on; she'd already seen what could happen.
Natasha also knew exactly who it was Fury was worried she'd share the details of her mission with, Clint. But she wouldn't do that to him. He'd been off on his own mission when everything with the Winter Soldier and HYDRA had gone down. Because of what she'd helped Steve do, Clint had been forced to abandon his mission and go underground. She knew he'd gotten out, that he was safe, there several dead Hydra agents in Sri Lanka telling her that much. but she had no idea where he was now, nor did she have anyway of contacting him. Not that she would contact him if she could.
Natasha agreed with Fury this was not something she wanted Clint dragged into. There were too many variables at play, to many unanswered questions. Deep down Natasha had a very bad feeling about this assignment. Something was telling her that for her this was going to be a one way trip. She'd get the artifact, destroy it if she could. But she didn't think she was going to survive.
No, it was better this way. No way would Clint let her go off and do this on her own and no God damn way was Natasha going to risk dragging Clint into a new version of his own personal hell. She owed Clint that much, really she owed him a lot more than that. There was always that red in her ledger she could never seem to wipe out, getting Clint killed alongside her was not another red mark Natasha was willing to take.
Clint would understand one day. "Please understand" She whispered into the empty apartment. This wasn't about leaving him, this was about protecting him. Natasha had seen up close and personal what this artifact could do to a person. She wasn't going to risk Clint or anyone else being hurt by it again.
"No, Fury is right this is a solo mission." One that Natasha knew instinctively was going to take her a long time to accomplish. She really had very little information to go on. But that was one of the many things she did so very well, getting the information she needed.
Natasha threw her empty water bottle into the trash and walked silently over to a bookcase in her living room. She leaned forward so that the barely noticeable camera could scan her eye than quietly spoke the password that always privately amused her into a microphone "цирк" (Circus). A small panel in the wall slide open revealing the little secret she'd kept from everyone. Natasha like all well trained spies had cover ids that no one but she knew about, not even Clint. She reached in and pulled out a couple of different passports. "Hmmm, who should I become now?"
Having quickly decided and taken everything she would need to establish her new life Natasha headed into her bathroom to begin her transformation. The key to becoming someone else was subtlety; none of the over the top, obviously fake disguises Hollywood used. Instead of completely changing her hair color she added brown lowlights to tone down the red. She straightened it and pulled it slightly forward to frame her face and soften her features. Next she put in a pair of colored contacts to change her eye color from their naturally vivid green to a deep chocolate brown.
She stopped and examined herself in the mirror. While she assessed her new look she mentally took everything about her, everything that made her Natasha Romanoff and put it in a box to be tucked away in the farthest corner of her conscience. Slowly and deliberately she made every part of who she really was retreat into that mental box. Clint had called it creepy, the way she could simply and completely cease to be herself, Natasha called it compartmentalizing. She firmly believed you should never give your opponent the slightest hint as to the real you. Mistakes could be made, you could be compromised and you could wind up dead fast.
She reached up, her hands trembling slightly and removed the delicate necklace with the tiny arrow charm from around her neck. "I'm so sorry Clint" She whispered. Natasha felt a deep stab of pain slice across her chest as regret and sorrow threatened to overwhelm her. She knew that she would be hurting Clint by what she was about to do just as much as she was hurting herself. She also knew she didn't really have a choice.
It had taken her so damn long just to get to the point that she could let herself believe in everything Clint had been offering her and now she had to walk away from it. Natasha remembered the first time she'd kissed him that had nothing to do with a cover and everything to do with how she felt about him. She allowed herself a few moments just to feel. Just to remember everything she and Clint had shared and what they meant to each other. Then she took those feelings and stuffed them inside the box marked Natasha and firmly slammed the lid. Just as she'd been trained to do since childhood.
Satisfied Natasha Romanoff no longer existed she gathered up all the trash and put it in a small bag to take with her when she left.
She quickly packed the clothes she thought the new her would wear and everything the Black Widow would need. Then she grabbed some professional camera equipment from her closet. She was almost ready to go.
Once back out in her living room she stopped and took a look around. She was surprised by what she saw. A half-finished book lying on the coffee table next to a vase of tulips, a turquoise blue blanket she'd picked up at a street fair thrown across the back of the tan couch and on the mantle two pictures both of her and Clint. One of the two of them at a local café, the other she'd taken off SHIELD footage of one of their many assignments together in Abidjan. It was a picture of the two of them behind a barricade, Hawkeye using his bow to shoot at the enemy and her with both guns firing doing the same, the two of them at their best.
She silently wondered to herself "When in the hell did I allow this place to become something other than just a place to eat and sleep in? When in the hell did I turn it into a home?" But she knew the answer, the moment she'd let Clint Barton become more to her than just her friend.
Giving herself a mental shake she changed her expression to a small playful, mischievous smile and put a New York Yankees ball cap on her head. She placed the necklace on the kitchen counter and walked out the door talking to herself as she went. "Hi, my name is Alexandra Taylor, Alex to my friends, Freelance photojournalist." Not a trace of her Russian accent could be detected, everything that made her the black widow ready to begin spinning her new web.
AN: Reviews are always welcome and appreciated.
