DISCLAIMER: All Characters belong to Marvel.
The party was well on its way when they arrived, something that did not surprise Natasha seeing as they had turned up an hour later than expected. As accorded, the group had split right after the initial greetings, with Clint and Pietro moving near the buffet while Vision and Wanda sat near the pool, the young girl scanning the guest. Natasha and Steve were near the back door of the house, making small talk with some of the neighbors. Holly and her husband had disappeared soon after their arrival, and they were pretty sure that was not a good sign.
"He's here" Wanda's voice coming through the comms startled them, but Natasha turned slightly so she could make eye contact with the girl.
"Who is here?" Natasha asked, pulling Steve aside as she pretended to pick a call on her phone.
"The man from the park. I can't see him, but I can feel him. He's here"
She felt Steve tense beside her and placed her hand softly on his arm, now would not be the time to go looking after Bucky. "Okay, how many hostiles are here?"
"Half the people in the party is clueless to what's going on, everyone else is hostile"
"Sam, Rhodes; something happening with the house?"
"So far, we good. No car or people walking around. Hill is on the living room, the LMD is visible by her side. If they do come, they will see him" Sam's voice had an amused tone to it, and she'd have to thank Tony for FRIDAY and her video surveillance.
"Okay, Wanda, get the innocents out. Everyone else get ready, as soon as they realize what's going on they will attack"
She placed her phone on Steve's shirt pocket and moved closer to peck his lips. "Let's get ready, Wanda will get started soon"
As casually as they could, Wanda and Vision made their rounds around the backyard, dispersing as many people as they could without being seen. It was only a matter of time before Holly or whoever orchestred this realized what was going on.
"Two black SUV's just parked down the block" Sam's voice came through the comms as she and Steve moved to sit by the pool "Redwing scanned it. It's Rumlow. Should we engage?"
"No, not yet. There are innocents here. Wanda, get moving" she huffed quietly.
"Almost done"
"Shit" Rhodes stated "They know something is up. Wanda hurry up kid!"
"I'm done. Let's do this" Wanda stated as she moved to the door with Vision.
Just as expected, Holly and her husband made their way back to the yard, looking more like ex-soldiers than the friendly neighbors they posed as. The remaining hostiles were pulling out their weapons as they circled around the group.
"I see you've finally figure it out" Holly smirked, moving closer to Nat.
"You are sloppy. Wasn't hard" she sighed, acting bored.
"Let's see what you say when that child becomes one of us"
"If you live that long…" Steve spat, glaring at the group.
Clint gave an eye roll as the group jumped on them, because seriously? They were fighting Avengers! It took more than twelve armed minions to take them down.
"Sam and Rhodey go! Wanda, keep Maria safe" Natasha ordered as she pushed her fist against a man's throat, crushing his windpipe as she tased another one with her shoes. "Guys!"
"On it!" Steve stretched his arm at the same time as Clint pulled his hand out, their shield and arc landing perfectly on their hands "Cap, go for Rumlow, we got this"
He knew how capable his team was, so it was fairly easy to leave them behind, not before throwing a worried glance at Natasha that was met with a glare that clearly said Go.
"Holly! C'mon don't be shy!" Natasha taunted as she choked the life out of a man with her thighs, her hands throwing a widow bite to the neck of a woman charging at Clint "Or should I say… Yelena"
The woman glared "You would know"
"You've always been sloppy; I'm surprised Rumlow even hired you" she mocked, dodging a knife that was thrown her way, easily charging at the man and shooting him. "Then again, Rumlow was always an idiot"
Tom tried to go after her, but had barely made it down the backyard steps when a flash of grey moved past him, snapping his neck and throwing him against the fence. The last hostile dropping to his knees as Vision's hand went through his chest and stopped his heart.
"Get Maria out of here. I got her" she signaled the team as she stood face to face to her past.
Glancing at each other, Clint, Pietro and Vision left the yard, leaving Natasha and Yelena to face each other.
"Ya poluchu mest'" i will get my revenge"
"My yeshche posmotrim -WE WILL SEE ABOUT THAT-"
Red Room. It was the Red Room all over again. Same training, same failures. Yelena growing frustrated as Natalia deflected every single one of her hits. Natalia landing a few, but causing far more damage than anyone they knew. Black Widow. That's what they aimed, and only Natalia earned it. After so many years, it felt the same.
"YOU ARE STILL FAILING, YELENA. YOU CAN'T BEAT ME. I'VE ALWAYS BEEN BETTER"
"WE'LL SEE ONCE WE ROT IN HELL"
In retrospective, she should've expected that. It's what they taught them, to sacrifice yourself if the mission goes south. Never go back if you've failed.
So really, she shouldn't have been surprised when Yelena pulled a string from the grass and everything exploded.
"We meet again, Cap" Rumlow's voice was bitter as he jumped on Steve and punched him through a wall with his new, armored arm "Ready for some pain?"
"Try harder" Steve spat as he saw Sam and Rhodes burst through one of the windows, helping Maria as she shot down two hostiles "I can do this all day long"
"We'll see about that"
Whoever built that suit for Rumlow was obviously not Tony Stark, it was rudimentary at best, but Steve would be lying if the punches didn't hurt "Don't you love my face now? Thanks for dumping a fucking building on me"
"Technically it was a helicarrier, and to be honest, I never liked your face"
He dodged another punch and tried use his shield, but somhow Rumlow's arm was strong enough to deflect it.
"Child was a decoy. It's not here!" one of the man yelled right before redwing shot him in the neck, and Rumlow groaned before grabbing Steve and throwing him against a wall, which sent him flying to the backyard "Where's the damn child?"
"Why should I tell you?" Rhodes threw the shield at him, which in turn he threw at Rumlow, knocking him off his feet before grabbing him by the neck.
"He'll come for it. Your friend? Your Bucky? He remembered you, and I enjoyed every second of the wipeout afterwards"
He let his guard down at that. He should've known better but it was Bucky. And he remembered him. And he felt like that damn Brooklyn kid when Rumlow produced a knife from his suit, jamming it right on his stomach, and then again upwards to his chest.
"Now you'll get to see how I wipe her out, too"
He tried to breathe as he saw a flash of silver, a metal arm. It was choking Rumlow, crushing his jaw before a red orb wrapped around him. He was fucking suicidal, and barely had time to register Wanda moving Rumlow out of the yard and onto the house next to theirs before he exploded. The horror on her face as a few of the other houses blew up too was evident.
"Steve? Hold on" Bucky was talking to him, applying pressure to his wounds as Maria, Rhodes and Sam ran to them, horror on their face.
"Buck…"
"I got this" Bucky turned to the men beside him, and then eyed the young girl with horrified eyes "You should take care of her. Take her wherever it is you all huddle up. And call 911 while you are at it"
Just as he was about to close his eyes, he saw Pietro run right up to his sister.
"Wanda?... God, that Holly woman just blew up the house"
"Was she in it?"
"Yes, but so was Natasha. We must get them to the quinjet, now!"
Natasha. He tried to speak, but the rumble on his chest told him his lungs were filling with blood, and they were filling up fast. He could hear Bucky, he was saying something to him but he couldn't make out any word before everything went black.
He woke up with a start, crying out in pain as his chest hurt. He was at the facility's medical bay as far as he could see, but his head was hurting and everything was spinning, so he wasn't sure.
"You might wanna lay back down, fella"
Bucky. His eyes snapped to the man sitting by the window. He was wearing a snapback and had cut off his hair, but it was him, and he was there.
"That juice they pumped you with is quite cool. You should've died" he smiled, and he wasn't sure how to feel. But then a flash of red invaded his thoughts and he moved to get off the bed before Bucky pushed him down to it.
"They are fine. Natalia is quite the wise woman. She was bruised and suffered a few burns but she's okay. So is the boy"
He wanted to cry out of happiness. He didn't remember much of the fight, but hearing that Natasha was in the other house when it blew up made him feel sick. He didn't want to lose her. He wasn't ready to lose her.
"She was here. But Maria dragged her out and sent her up to your room. Something about your kid needing a parent and that she wasn't fit to babysit."
He wanted to get out of the bed and go find his family, but the shackles around his hands prevented him to.
"Ah yes. Mr. Stark designed those for you, made out of vibranium. So is the bed. The doctor wants to make sure you are healed but he knew you wouldn't stay put so…"
"Can you get Natasha?"
"I'm here" he looked over Bucky's shoulder to see Nat cradling James to her chest. He could see a few bruises and a bandage on the arm that wasn't holding James but she seemed fine.
"I'm sorry, I should've been there with you-"
"Steve, don't" she glanced at Bucky and he took his clue to leave, not before reassuring Steve that he wouldn't leave the tower and that Vision was assigned to be his shadow if he tried.
"Nat-"
"I'm fine. I've been through worst. A few cuts and burns won't kill me" she moved to sit beside him, placing a sleeping James on his chest "He started babbling the other day"
He looked at her questionably "How long have I been out?"
"A week give or take. This is the first time I bring him over though, he's been particularly clingy to Wanda. I guess he can sense she's in distress"
"Is she okay?"
"Well… a few people died. Five to be exact. No children at least. The investigation simply said that a gas leak caused all the houses to blow up. But she'll still pretty shaken. Last night she locked herself up on her room and we had a hard time getting her out of it this morning, but she'll be fine" she smiled, grabbing his hand.
"I wanna hug him"
"You do have bad precedents of leaving the medical bay when you shouldn't so, I think I'll support Tony and Bruce on this one" she smirked and he groaned "Relax, the serum should make sure you are off the bed in a day or two, or when you stop wincing whenever James moves over you".
"I don't need this" he groaned, and tried to hide his wincing a bit better when James' head lolled to a particularly painful spot.
"Oh but you do" she leant it to kiss him, stunning him "Don't look at me like that, we agreed to try, didn't we?"
"Yeah but-"
"No buts. Now you should rest soldier, it's about time you take over babysitting your super son"
"So now he's my son?" he asked, smiling.
"He has always been your son"
He shuffled on the bed, as much as he could with the restrains holding him in place and James sleeping on his chest.
"Now what?"
"Now we start over, somewhere else"
"Somewhere safer?"
"You are Captain America and i'm Black Widow, safer is a word that doesn't go well with us" she shrugged, lifting James off his chest "But as long as we are together, i think he will be fine"
"So... a farm?"
"Don't even, Soldier"
AN: I am so so so so sorry! Really, i am. This story has been ready for quite a while now(and i have a few connected OS showing the fluffy side of Romanogers that i didnt show here coming soon) but i have not been able to actually hook my pc to internet basically since i last updated. Our phone/internet providers are utter crap, and i live in a quite dangerous place so i really cant prance around with a laptop. Anyway, here it is! I'll try to start posting the OS next week, once i proofread them again! Thanks for sticking around! -OHP.