Black Marks
Natasha hated herself. Specifically right now. Generally speaking, it was also true when she stopped to consider all that she had said and done in the service of one spy agency or another (though she could usually fight it off by considering how little choice she'd had at the time, and the good she was doing now to make up for it). But right now, at this point in time, Natasha really hated herself.
Specifically, for forgetting about Barton.
There were excuses, of course. There always were. Fury had died, for crying out loud, and she and Steve had been on the run for a considerable amount of time. Any Hydra analyst worth their salt would have had Barton watched. Going to him for help, or even sending a message, would've been foolhardy. Everything had gone so fast, and there hadn't been any time, even after they found out about Hydra, to go back to the psyche ward and try to extract him.
But after that? The senate hearings, Fury's "funeral," getting the Russian files for Steve... somewhere, in that time, it should have occurred to her "oh yeah, your friend, the foremost marksman in the world, is sitting doped-up in a SHIELD facility, just waiting for Hydra to snap up."
Instead, it had only occurred to her as she was halfway out of Washington on her little "roadtrip of self-discovery." She'd idly wondered what Clint would think if he were here, and the next second the tires were squealing and the engine roaring as she drove as fast as she dared, hoping against hope that Clint had gotten out.
The psyche facility, like all SHIELD installations, was swarming with CIA once she got there. None of them had anything useful to tell any of her identities. She gave Sharon a call, but the girl was so swamped with work—the CIA had her on nearly anything remotely associated with SHIELD—she hadn't even had to time to review the psyche ward data.
Fortunately, Natasha prided herself on being considerably more talented than the average CIA agent, even if forensic science wasn't exactly her specialty. She also had the advantage of having visited Barton's room more than most, so she had a good understanding of what went where and what was out of place. In particular, the misplaced house plant that spoke of a bed being moved out of the room, and the dropped ID card she found behind it.
Which led her here, to a hidden complex deep in the Appalachian mountains. The hunt for and interrogation of the Hydra owner of the ID card had lessened neither Natasha's anger nor her anxiety, and she charged in the front door, guns locked and loaded.
It was almost a disappointment, after all that, to find the base completely empty.
` It was a fairly small base, so far as they went, but Natasha made certain to leave no stone unturned, tapping on the walls and floor to ensure she wasn't missing some kind of hidden room where Barton might be stowed. But there was nothing. Prison cells, and interrogation rooms, and enough torture implements to make a dungeon master drool, but no prisoners. The only real signs that anyone had been in the base recently were the fresh bulletholes sprinkled throughout the complex.
Natasha was just exiting the compound, hoping that Barton had simply managed to get a gun and slaughtered the whole place, and fearing that some rival faction of Hydra had kidnapped him, when she heard a step in the hallway before her, and looked up to meet the dark eyes of Phil Coulson.
"We had the place wired in case someone from Hydra came to check up on him." Coulson told her later, as they looked down through a window at the sleeping Barton. "You tripped the sensor when you broke in, and the security cameras told us who it was."
"I must be getting sloppy, not to notice cameras or sensors." Natasha mused, studying Barton's face. He seemed healthy enough.
"Reckless. Not sloppy." Coulson amended.
Nat shook her head. "Any idea what they were looking for?"
"Best guess? The effects of Loki's scepter," answered Coulson. "They must be experimenting with mind control."
Natasha snorted, seeing again Winter Soldier's cold, merciless eyes. "No, really?"
"It's our working theory." There was a strange note, almost of sarcasm, in Coulson's voice. He turned to face her. "Okay, seriously, nothing? Not a flicker? No, 'missed you, Phil' or 'you look good for dead?'"
"You do look good for dead." Natasha shrugged.
"Thank you."
"Look, no offense, but after Fury coming back, I'm a little used to these sort of things." A little wrinkle appeared in Natasha's forehead. "I'm starting to wonder if anyone if SHIELD is really dead."
Coulson gave a tight smile. "As I understand, it still generally applies to most people."
"That's a comfort. Sort of." Natasha grimaced. "I always used to console myself that all my enemies could only kill me once."
"You do seem to make enemies." Coulson agreed, and again there was the strange tone. Natasha glanced sharply at him. Phil had always been a genial, easygoing sort. She had to be mistaking what sounded like sarcasm for something else.
"I can't understand it." She shrugged, hoping for a little levity. "I'm such a friendly person."
"Yes, I saw your little speech to the Senate." Coulson answered, and now Natasha knew that was sarcasm in his voice. "Very friendly. Very mature. 'I just dismantled your intelligence network, but you can't arrest me because I'm all you have left, as I just dismantled your intelligence network.'"
Natasha Romanov was a stone-cold killer who'd betrayed entire governments without a qualm. She'd lied to orphans, tricked nuns, and killed lovers. She was, in words of Nick goddamned Fury, 'comfortable with everything.'
But for some reason, realizing that Coulson was so bitter, and bitter against her, made her insides twist a little. Coulson had always been the smiling one, the honest, good-natured man's man. Next to Barton and Fury, he'd been one of the main figures she could point to as a sign of how SHIELD was different from the KGB (or really any agency she'd worked, really).
And, Natasha realized, the whole mess with Hydra had completely hung him out to dry.
Coulson glowered at her (which was to say, he looked mildly peeved. Natasha had been glowered at by professionals, Coulson was about a 4 on a 10 point scale.) "'You're helpless without me, so you can't arrest me.' Did you ever stop to consider about how your decision might affect those of us who COULD be arrested?"
"Didn't really have time, no." Natasha answered, forcing down the rising guilt. "At the moment, I was more concerned with dismantling a Nazi conspiracy."
"Which, thanks to you, is now free to move unopposed."
"Which, thanks to me, is no longer to hide under SHIELD's cloak." Natasha shot back. "Hydra committed crimes for years in SHIELD's name. Now they're out in the open."
"And everyone blames SHIELD for the stuff they did anyway." Coulson snorted. "Let's just throw the baby out with the bathwater."
"They were too deeply entrenched, Phil," answered Natasha. "It would have been a long and torturous process, just rooting them out from our own organization, and if we hadn't seized the initiative, the rats would have just gone into deep cover and never been found."
"A convenient decision, from the woman who knew she was too valuable to be held accountable." Coulson snarled.
"It wasn't my call." Natasha snapped, fixing him with a real glare. "Captain Rogers made it."
That stopped him. Natasha could see the emotions flickering across his face—admiration for his hero warring with love for his organization. She could see him wavering, and she pressed her advantage. "The organization was too far gone to save, Phil." She said, adopting a softer tone. "Even if we'd tried to salvage it, no one would have trusted SHIELD anymore. You couldn't keep a mess that big secret."
She let out a long sigh. "Now, maybe I shouldn't have mouthed off like... like that." She admitted. "But at the time, I was just... I wanted to stay in the fight. Like you are." She nodded to Phil. "Someone had to stay in the fight against Hydra. They had to see that they couldn't afford to send me to prison."
"Might have considered that before you released all of SHIELD's secrets worldwide." Coulson had subsided, but he was still very clearly bitter. "You realize you exposed about a hundred deep-cover SHIELD operatives in various agencies and criminal organizations around the world, to say nothing of their families."
It had been a point that had distantly occurred to her as she was searching for Barton. "Anyone who had time to look through all the information I released, sure." She answered. "The best place to hide a leaf is in a forest. The CIA hasn't even had time to go through it all yet. Those deep cover operatives should have plenty of time to disappear."
"In more ways than one." Coulson snorted.
Natasha closed her eyes. "Phil, there just wasn't time. Besides, how were we supposed to decide which agents were ours and which were Hydra's?"
Coulson let out a defiant grunt and sat down. "You know how many extraction missions I've had to run over the last few weeks?"
"No. I was tied up in Senate hearings." Natasha sat down next to him. "That's why I was so eager to get out of them."
Coulson let out a little chuckle. "Senate hearings were the worst part about being Stark's handler." He mused. "Half the reason I became a fugitive from the US was to avoid senate hearings. I'm not even joking."
There was a short silence.
"Most of the deep cover ops could probably apply for the federal witness protection program." Natasha started to say. "I can help with extractions for the others..."
Coulson waved her off. "Most of them did." He looked a little weary. "They're all spies, they know how things work. The biggest problem has actually been convincing them NOT to, and come back to work for us."
Natasha's eyes narrowed. "So you're rebuilding SHIELD, huh?"
"Trying to." Coulson rubbed his eyes. He caught Natasha's look. "It was Fury's idea. I'm under orders from him." He frowned. "Sort of."
"That sounds like him." Natasha admitted wearily. She didn't know why she'd thought Fury would just quietly go along with the decision to dissolve SHIELD, no matter how many people agreed with it. Or that he'd inform her of any plans to start it back up again—probably hadn't even told Hill.
"You don't like the idea." Coulson said. It wasn't a question.
Natasha sighed. "When Kruschev took over from Stalin, he said he was going to build a newer, friendlier Soviet Union. Specifically called it 'De-Stalinization.' When Gorbachev replaced Kruschev, he instituted a policy of glasnost, openness, that was supposed to reduce tensions with the West and usher in a golden era. I remember around the time the Berlin wall fell, the new head of the KGB made sure to inform the agents that it was a new age for us, no more secret arrests or ruling through terror."
Coulson blinked. "Nat, the Berlin Wall fell in 1989."
"I was seven." Natasha shrugged. "It might have been a year or two later. Anyway. The point is, they were always saying they were going to 'rebuild' Russia like it was supposed to be."
"The KGB is a lot friendlier than it was thirty years ago." Coulson pointed out.
"But with a lot of the same problems." Natasha shook his head. "I imagine your new director has plenty of good intentions, but unless he's willing to make really drastic changes, the same problems will creep in." She stood. "Sorry, but you'll have to tell him you can count me out of this new SHIELD."
Coulson looked about to say something, but he closed his mouth and just nodded. "I'll pass word on." He said, also standing. "In the meantime, we'll keep taking care of Barton—at least until we can get him combat-ready. Then he can make his own call."
Natasha smiled. "I'll hold you to that."
They started walking out the door. Coulson cleared his throat suddenly. "I, ah, heard about Sitwell..."
"Hydra. Also dead." Natasha winced. "Sorry, Phil. He gave us the info we needed to take Hydra down, if that helps."
"A little." Coulson shrugged. "I'm afraid I'm a little past getting hurt by betrayal anymore." Natasha wondered if that was a last dig at her, but the sadness in his tone spoke of something else. "I just wanted to confirm it."
Natasha nodded, then remembered something. "He mentioned some targets Hydra was interested in." She noted. "Have you ever heard of Stephen Strange?"
A/N: Well, that took a little longer than I thought. Got side-tracked by my Recruitment Drive series. And I was worried about this coming off a little didactic... in case it's not obvious, I have something of a chip on my shoulder about the ending of CA2. This did help me work out some of my issues about it, though, so I feel better now.
I thought it would be more interesting (and more consistent) to have Black Widow actually opposed to the rebuilding of SHIELD. She'd naturally be more suspicious of organizations, and she seemed to feel particularly betrayed by the revelations about SHIELD. Maybe if she knew it was Coulson... but again, it was more interesting to leave that unsaid.
After writing this, I'm actually intrigued by the idea of writing a Sitwell chapter, but it'll have to wait-next up is Carter.
