A/N: Sorry for the delay...this chapter was like getting blood out of a stone to write.
Chapter Nine: Thief in the Night
Darcy woke to muffled footsteps and a flash of red in her peripheral vision.
She lay frozen in place, thinking it was another waking dream. She'd had so many of those lately; the impression of someone in the room, gone before she could muster her eyes open. But tonight, between one blink and the next, a shadow appeared at her bedside. It loomed over her, fierce eyes staring down.
"Natasha?" she whispered. She scrambled to sit up, until the blade at her throat stilled her.
"What's your room number in the facility?" Natasha asked, her words barely an exhale.
"Th-thirty-one."
"What's the pattern on the item you were making?"
"The blanket? There isn't one…"
Natasha nodded and removed the blade. "I had to check." She reached for the pile of folded laundry on the counter and tossed some clothes over to the bed.
Darcy remembered her revelation and shot upright. "No, no, no—you can't be here! This is a trap. This is what he wants!"
"You think I don't know that? That's why it's taken three weeks to come up with a plan to get you out. I'm no fool. Can you walk?"
"Yeah, I'm fine. He was never after me at all."
"Darcy, get dressed. We've prepared for this. We waited until Loki was out of town. This isn't a big rescue mission involving all the Avengers. Everything will go smoothly so long as we're out of here immediately."
She dressed in record time, logic chasing the last of sleep out of her head. It didn't matter if this was a trap—Natasha was here now, so either Darcy was going to escape, or she was going to gain a cellmate.
Outside the door, the two guards slumbered on the carpet. Natasha made no effort to creep around them. "They'll be out until the relief shift arrives in the morning."
"What about the cameras? Everywhere up here is watched…"
"Right now a loop of the last hour is playing in the security control room. They won't even realize you're gone until the morning."
They ignored the elevator, heading for the stairs, and Darcy had an overwhelming sense of deja vu. By the time they'd gone down ten flights, Darcy was regretting that the elevator was unavailable to them. At least if the stairs melted again they could slide all the way down. Natasha kept darting back and forth, gun posed steady in her hand, her thighs apparently not suffering quite as much as Darcy's were.
To Darcy's horror, they kept going below even when they'd reached ground level, down into the basements. "Please not more tunnels."
"Don't worry," Natasha muttered. "Stay here." They'd reached an exit door. Natasha peered through the glass, then disappeared through the door so swiftly Darcy barely saw her move. A moment later she returned. "Clear."
Darcy followed her, not in the parking lot she feared, but a corridor. Natasha led her in through the third door, which turned out to be a janitorial closet. She retrieved a supply box from a shelf and began to pass items to Darcy. "Put these on." She pulled a tiny device from her boot—it looked like a credit card with a screen—and swept it over Darcy from head-to-toe. She seemed satisfied with whatever it told her. "They haven't chipped you," she explained. "There'd be no point taking you anywhere if they could track you."
They covered their clothes in cleaner's aprons and covered their hair with caps. Darcy stashed her glasses in a pocket, and Natasha handed her a pass. "These will get us out of the building."
"You played dress-up a ton as a kid, huh?"
Natasha gave her a blank look. "I don't know." She opened the closet door and crept back out. Darcy followed, for the first time feeling sorry for her. She'd meant it as a joke, not really expecting an answer at all, and while Natasha's demeanor hadn't invited pity, the implications of her words did. She'd never revealed anything about herself—all Darcy knew about her was her name and her poorly-concealed soft spot for Clint. But exactly how did someone become a superspy? Every one of the Avengers had a backstory—and Darcy had never heard Natasha's. She doubted she ever would. "The next shift change is in fifteen minutes, we're leaving with them."
They headed back up, using a service elevator this time, Natasha acting like she'd been in the building some time, she knew the layout so well. It wasn't entirely outside the realms of possibility. When they were on the ground floor the hush of the building vanished, clear sounds of occupation replacing it. Footsteps echoed from other corridors, and the rumble of traffic passed close by.
They emerged into a small lobby, manned only by a security guard. A clock on the wall told Darcy it was approaching 4am and it took a lot of willpower to keep from swaying on her feet. Knowing the time made her suddenly very tired.
Other cleaners were just disappearing through a door onto the street. The guard shouted over to them. "You! Paperwork says only four cleaners on tonight." If Darcy had been forced to place his accent, she'd have said Eastern Europe.
Natasha sauntered over, and when she spoke, her words were accented as thickly as his. "Supervisor fucked up our shifts. We worked all night and don't even know if we're going to get paid."
"Again? Second time this week—she needs firing. Ty russkiy?"
"Da." She gestured vaguely in Darcy's direction. "She's Polish. Her English is non-existent—and her Russian is even worse." She was wrong, though it wasn't the time to point out that Darcy had taken two Russian classes in college and could just about follow the conversation.
"I need you to sign the form," he said, "so I can get this mess sorted."
"Sure." Natasha scribbled something down then walked away, jerking her head to indicate Darcy should follow. They exited through the revolving door, stepping out onto a street where dawn was still some hours away yet.
She recognized where they were immediately, even if she didn't know exactly which building they'd just exited. It took up the entire block, a grander entrance visible on the corner, where the street met First Avenue. Over the Avenue she could see the United Nations complex—a place she'd often visited when she moved to New York, even if she'd never gone inside. The usual rows of flags had disappeared, flagpoles standing empty, where a higher one had been raised to loom above them all. A horned serpent of gold twined around itself on a viridian background, gusting out over the roof of the complex.
Natasha led her away from the plaza, back towards the heart of Manhattan. Few people were around at this hour, though a steady stream of cars drove past.
"That almost seemed too easy," Darcy said.
"We still have to get off Manhattan first."
"How are we doing that this time?"
"The subway."
"You never struck me as the type to use public transport, Agent Romanoff." Loki appeared on the sidewalk in front of them, lounging against a street light. He was less casually dressed than Darcy had seen him in some time, back in the full leathers he'd worn when he announced he was taking over the world. He cocked his head. "Sorry, ex-agent Romanoff."
Natasha's gun had been in her hands before he'd finished his third word, though Darcy didn't think it would do them any good. She backed behind her anyway, just to be on the safe side. "Cover on East 45th," she said quietly. Her voice betrayed none of the terror Darcy felt.
"Then again, you never struck me as the type to work for no pay," Loki continued, as if Natasha hadn't said anything at all. "Still trying to wash away the red?" He pushed himself away from the post. "Such discourtesy." This time he addressed Darcy. "To leave without saying goodbye, after all I had done to make you at home. Did you really think I wouldn't notice your absence?"
"How did you—"
"You're so peaceful in sleep. I like to remind myself of that, sometimes, since all you offer me in wakefulness is sullen silence." He caught the arrow that span towards him easily, and Darcy reflexively looked towards the sky. Clint was somewhere nearby. Loki tossed the arrow away, but wasn't quick enough to avoid the one that came on its heels. It pierced the leather of his sleeve and he hissed a curse.
Natasha pushed her away, running back in the direction they came, and Darcy felt the sidewalk rock beneath her feet as the arrow exploded behind them. She stumbled and Natasha kept her upright with a hand on her arm, pulling her along. Somehow Loki was in front of them again, his armor a wreck but his skin unmarred. Natasha veered away, pulling them into the road. Headlamps blinded Darcy, and a blaring horn warned they were in the path of a car.
The world moved too quickly—she was yanked off her feet, then landed on her front with the sidewalk below her. Natasha never hit the ground fully—she rolled and stayed upright. A horrible crunching sound came from behind Darcy, like metal and stone colliding. She rolled over, still dazed and half-blinded, to find the front end of a cab wrapped around Loki. To his credit, he was mostly upright and looking less smushed than Darcy would've expected. Clint took the opportunity to loose another arrow his way.
"Come on." Natasha urged Darcy to her feet and they ran again, despite the jelly-like consistency of her legs. She wasn't exactly sure what had just happened. She'd been pulled out of the path of the cab—and while logic dictated Natasha had done it, the force behind the way she'd been pulled made it unlikely she was strong enough. That theory also didn't explain why Loki had been in the middle of the road. Had he pulled them away?
They took the first right, and then into a building, Natasha backhanding the doorman before he could react. They sped down the stairs into the basement, and once more Darcy found herself entering a tunnel below the city.
Again, Natasha seemed to know the way, which was helpful because Darcy couldn't see a thing. They walked for what could have been five, fifteen or fifty minutes, time meaningless without a reference point, before Natasha halted. They'd reached a door—an ordinary, unassuming fire door—and Natasha disappeared through it, leaving Darcy to wait in the blackness. She returned with a rucksack, pulling her hair free of the cleaner's cap and discarding of the apron too. Out came a dress and a brunette wig for her, with a change of clothes for Darcy too.
"Turn around," she said, and Darcy complied, letting her deftly plait her hair. No wig for her, for which she was thankful.
They left the cleaner's stuff behind in the tunnel, sneaking into the basement beyond the door, which turned out to be another underground parking lot. Natasha surveyed the cars, selecting a black SUV, and had it unlocked and running by some voodoo in under a minute. Darcy headed for the passenger seat, but Natasha stopped her.
"You need to drive, I need to cover us."
"What about Clint?"
"He's got another mission in the city."
"Right. Where are we going?"
"It doesn't matter. We just need to get off the island before any blockades are in place."
Darcy's grip on the steering wheel was shaky. Dawn was just about creeping up over the skyscrapers, giving them flashes of cerulean every time they passed between them. Natasha gave directions and Darcy followed, too tired and bewildered to argue. "Where are we going when we're out of Manhattan?"
"Back to the facility."
"You guys didn't leave?"
"Tony's got back into SHIELD's systems. We were ready to leave if they were coming for us, but they never did. You didn't give us up." An expression close to pride hovered on Natasha's face.
"He never asked me where you were."
The pride gave way to something shrewder. "Then what did he ask you for?"
"Nothing. That was the weirdest thing—I barely saw him and he never asked me any questions."
"Yet he liked to watch you sleep and just threw himself in front of a moving vehicle to save your life."
"What are you saying?"
Natasha gave her a sideways glance.
"Oh, come on. Eric told me how Loki sees us. Ants."
"And yet."
"No. No. That's gross. Besides, he never tried anything…that wasn't what he wanted. I was bait. That's all."
"That's all," Natasha echoed.
They didn't speak again until they reached Queens. Darcy tried to absorb herself in freedom—how lovely it was to be on the expressway, to get glimpses of the wooden houses around the borough, to not be surrounded by steel sheeting. Anything better than to think about Natasha's suggestion. Which was completely absurd. He'd looked at her with such hatred the first time he'd laid eyes on her, and he barely knew her. The only thing that would interest him in her was connection to Thor, Jane and the Avengers.
In Queens, they abandoned the car and borrowed a new one, another SUV, which Natasha switched the plates on. Natasha drove this time, letting Darcy catch up on her interrupted sleep. She napped until they stopped at a gas station, where Natasha procured caffeine and bagels. Then it was back on the freeway, heading north again, and back to blessedly dreamless sleep.
Only when Natasha shook her awake, back in the confines of the rickety garage, did it finally feel like she'd escaped. The shadows and cobwebs didn't scare her anymore, instead seeming like old friends. She practically skipped down the steps into the facility, turning the corner to find a few of its inhabitants waiting with wide eyes.
"Welcome back," said Steve. "You look well."
"Bruce is fetching Jane," Pepper breathed, pulling Darcy into a hug.
"He's here?" she asked.
"We needed him," Tony explained. "We're nearly there."
"With the Bifrost?"
"Of course. I'm a little disappointed in myself it's taken this long."
The door at the end of the corridor opened, and Jane peeked through. Darcy gave her a wave. "Honey, I'm home!"
Jane came sprinting up, nearly barreling Darcy over when she reached her and taking her in a hug so tight she nearly choked. "I thought I'd lost you too," she whispered tearfully, and then Darcy was crying too.
"It's okay. I'm okay."
"No, it's not okay. I'm sick of Loki doing what he wants, hurting who he wants. When we finish the Bifrost, we're going to find out what happened to Thor. Then we're going to take Loki down. For good."