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Chapter Thirteen
The first week of training with Natasha Romanoff went rather smoothly.
Natasha worked very differently than Sharon or Sam. Natasha would teach Georgiana something once, move away from it, and then come back to it when it was least expected. There was a physiological element to her training that Sharon had never had. Natasha was never going to do exactly as she said she was going to do. She was never just going to let Georgiana win.
"Right. Left. Left. Knee. Low. Right."
Instead of going over one move at a time, Natasha preferred to fight Georgiana continuously, usually calling out what she was going to do before she did it. So that if Natasha said "left" Georgiana new to block Natasha's left fist. The idea was that this was a more practical training score, and that this way Georgiana would start to be able to predict what people were about to do by the way they moved and shifted their weight.
"Left. Right. Right."
Instead of punching with her right fist twice, as she had said she would, Natasha swung her leg around and knocked Georgiana on the ground.
Georgiana learned very fast not to trust everything Natasha called out when they trained like this, which ended up helping because Georgiana concentrated more on Natasha instead of what Natasha said.
The second week of training came quickly, as did the departure of most of the other people currently living in the very crowded cabin.
Vision, Rhodey, Sharon, and Sam left to meet with the National Board of the Sokovia Accords to show their proposed Amendments. Clint, after a very long goodbye and another promise to Georgiana that she could come and stay with his family whenever she wanted, went home. He had promised to take his kids fishing, and he was going to research who the two Spring Children had been before their capture, in case their family needed to be notified that they had died. Their personal information might also give leads as to how The Departed worked.
Tony returned to Stark Tower to run tests on the sample of the purple drug that Clint had almost died retrieving.
"Was that the famous Pepper Potts?" Georgiana had asked him, the night before he left, after she had walked onto the porch to find Tony ending a call.
"The one and only," Tony had said. To her surprise, and what Georgiana would later guess was a rare moment of openness from Tony, he showed her a picture of a pretty woman with ginger hair on his phone.
"She's beautiful," Georgiana had said, and Tony had mumbled something with a sarcastic undertone and put his phone away. "How are you guys?"
For a moment Tony had tried to brush her away, and then paused to study her, as if trying to figure out if she really cared. Georgiana waited patiently.
"Better, actually," Tony had said. "Maybe you were right, about this being where we start. To, you know, heal, or whatever. I thought, well, hoped, the Accords were going to do that. Big mess that made."
There was something about Tony that made Georgiana like him. After Tony left, she would often wonder if it was because she wanted to heal him, and therefore was drawn to be around him. But his injuries weren't physical.
"All we can do it try," she had said. "Right?"
He had patted her hard on the shoulder then, and Georgiana took it to be the equivalent of a hug.
Perhaps supporting, or just listening, to people was all the healing anyone could ever do.
The third week of training with Natasha was when things started to become interesting.
Natasha had always suggested that they trained not in a way that would teach Georgiana how to copy her skills, but in a way where Georgiana would build her own skill set. Which meant that they had to brainstorm what Georgiana would be good at and what she needed to know in order to survive on missions.
Natasha had looked Georgiana over once and said, "You might be able to throw a good punch, but someone else is going to be able to put a lot more weight into their attack. Your speed, brain, and ridiculous power to sense injuries, is how you are going to take people down."
Georgiana had nodded, and as always she tried to memorize everything Natasha said. "What are you suggesting?"
Natasha had smiled. "What to go shopping?"
Once in town and in a very popular and crowded clothing store, Natasha leaned into Georgiana and whispered, "Alright, the women to my left, what is her weakness?"
Georgiana concentrated, staring at the women. "She isn't injured."
"Everyone is injured," Natasha said, looking at a jacket and sounding bored. "Try harder."
Georgiana focused her attention on the women and waited. There. It was small, but there was a little bit of tightness on the skin around Georgiana's knee.
"Her right knee," Georgiana said, turning her attention back to the clothing shelf. "It gives her problems. She might have had a surgery on it years ago."
"Good, so if she was fighting you?"
"I would go for her knee?"
Natasha punched Georgiana's forearms gently. "Right. Try again, this time don't stare the person down when you are concentrating. It gives you away. Try to feel it without looking at them. Also, while we are out here, let's start working on how to make you a little less noticeable in crowds."
"I already tried dying my hair."
That had made Natasha laugh. "It isn't about what you look like. It's how you act."
"How should I act?"
"Depends on the situation."
The fourth week of training with Natasha was when Georgiana started to notice the odd interactions between her current mentor and the captain.
"What are you looking at?"
Georgiana jumped. Which hurt. Natasha had been extra aggressive in training earlier and Georgiana was sore everywhere. When she had been heading for bed, she had noticed the soft laughter that she now recognized as Natasha's coming from the living room.
Bucky was watching her, half of his mouth pulled up in a smile where he stood in the doorway of the bathroom. Georgiana took a handful of his shirt and pulled him into her bedroom.
"Did you see that?" Georgiana asked, peering again around the corner of her door into the living room. When Bucky said nothing, she noticed that he had a slightly red tone on his cheeks and was refusing to meet her eyes. She let go of his shirt.
Georgiana could just make out the back of the couch, where both Natasha and Steve were sitting. They were close together, and Steve had his arm around the back of the couch.
"They're just reading an email from Tony, I heard them talking about it," said Bucky.
Georgiana shook her head. "Just watch."
Right on cue, Steve's fingers brushed the back of Natasha's shoulders.
"Steve uses you as an armrest when you stand by him," said Bucky, shrugging. "It's nothing."
"Maybe to him," Georgiana said. "But Natasha is letting him do that. And no one ever touches her first. She goes to them, that's how she stays in control."
Bucky chuckled quietly. "And you know this because you are now a master at reading people?"
Georgiana turned completely away from the door to face him, noticing that he had stayed close to her even though she had let go of his shirt. With all of the extra people around, Georgiana had seen less of Bucky lately. And because Natasha's training always left Georgiana heal sleeping, her nightmares about Bucky's past had been placed on hold, which meant that Bucky hadn't needed to come into her room and calm her down.
"I'll let you know that I have always been a master at reading people," she said, realizing once again that he was a full head taller than her as she strained to look up. "Also, she told me."
"She told you?"
"Yes," said Georgiana. "She suggested training me how to flirt with people to get information out of them."
In Bucky's silence, she felt herself heat up in the face. "We only tried it for twenty minutes before she gave up on me and we moved on. Apparently I am too quick to blush."
Bucky grinned and peered around her door to look into the living room, one of his hands came up to her face and brushed her hair behind her ear. Georgiana turned red.
"You are."
The fifth week of training was when Scott Lang became bored enough to be a distraction.
Scott, like everyone else, couldn't been seen in public places until the Amendments to the Accords were fully agreed on. Otherwise, he might end up in a cell. So he had been staying at the cabin instead of the safe house Tony had set up, claiming that he liked the environment better, although Natasha said it was because he was a fanboy of Steve and enjoyed Peter's company more than adults.
Scott would often try, and then fail, to run with Georgiana in the morning. Then, he would watch her train with Natasha and call out extra advice. At first, Natasha didn't mind. She said it was good practice to ignore the useless information and focus on what was important during a fight. But after a good hour of him nonstop talking about the first time he had run into Sam - "by accident, I of course had no idea the place belonged to the Avengers until I was already there" – Natasha stopped him.
"Why don't you join us today," Natasha asked him sweetly. "I could use a break, but Georgiana should still keep going."
Georgiana couldn't help but think that he should have known, really. Natasha never needed a break.
Scott, grinning ear to ear, jogged off the porch to stand in front of Georgiana. Natasha leaned into her and whispered, "Take him down, please," before jogging towards the cabin to grab water bottles.
When Natasha returned, Georgiana had her foot on Scott's back and his arm locked behind him. Scott's face was in the grass.
"Look!" said Georgiana. "I actually did it! Maybe next time you should send me a real challenger. Who would be the most challenging, anyway?"
Natasha laughed. "Besides me? Barnes, I guess. When he is in full Winter Soldier mood, he can take us all on at once. Although I doubt he could do that when he is actually aware of what he is doing. And I don't think he'll ever agree to spar with you."
"Don't get cocky," Scott mumbled into the lawn. "I don't even have my suit on."
Which was true, but Georgiana still counted it as a win.
In the sixth week of training, Steve, Bucky, and Scott left the cabin to travel to the last known location of Bruce Banner. Hoping that at the very least they would be able to tell once and for all if he had been recaptured or not. Natasha had paled when they had mentioned Bruce's name.
The day before they left Georgiana realized that she had never spent a day away from Bucky since she had met him. Shyly, she admitted that realization when he found her after dinner holding her knees towards her chest, her book forgotten as she sat on the floor and leaned into her bed. Bucky sat down beside her.
"I know," he said. "It'll be weird."
Georgiana kissed his cheek. "Be careful."
The seventh week of training was surprising fun.
The only people left at the cabin was Georgiana, Natasha, and Peter Parker. It seemed like an odd group the first few days, but Georgiana found that she actually really enjoyed it.
Peter had to wait one more week before he could return home. The people who ran the Accords didn't know his identity, so at the very least he had the option to return home, but he had told his Aunt that he was at a summer camp for aspiring scientists, and therefore couldn't return home too early without his Aunt realizing that he had never gone to camp.
The teenager had been spending his time at the cabin building things with Tony, until Tony left, and then tinkering with Scott's suit, until Scott left, and then binge watching things on his laptop. Finally bored, he had asked to join Natasha and Georgiana's training. To Georgiana's surprise, Natasha agreed.
Sparring with Peter was a fun challenge that Georgiana failed at every single time. He was fast and unpredictable, and just when she thought she had him, her hands would be tied together by webbing.
"Gotcha!" Peter said, every single time Georgiana was hit by the webbing and fell to the ground in a tangled mess.
The odd trio spent much of the week in the nearby town, working once again on Georgiana's ability to sense physical weaknesses in people and how to blend into crowds.
"I'm really sorry, by the way," Peter had said as he and Georgiana wandered around the store Natasha had disappeared into a few minutes ago.
"For what?" Georgiana asked.
"For telling Wade about you before I told Tony," said Peter. "I just kind of blurted it out. If I had just waited to tell Tony first . . ."
Peter left for home the next day. Georgiana had been sad to see him go. He was funny.
The eighth week was when Steve and Bucky returned to the cabin.
"They don't have Banner," Steve said in place of a greeting. "But we do have another problem."
Georgiana and Natasha had met them in the front yard, and the warm summer breeze danced around them.
"What?" asked Natasha.
"The Departed, their leader, Andrew McCaffrey, is still alive," said Bucky.
Georgiana's stomach twisted. McCaffrey was the name of Box Face. McCaffrey was the one she had pulled onto the bars of her cage and fried.
"Ho-how?" Georgiana asked.
Steve rubbed his forehead. "He didn't die because your bare skin was touching his when you tried to kill him. Apparently that was enough skin to skin contact to keep him alive long enough for one of his men to get him into a hospital."
"With McCaffrey still alive, this whole thing could be more dangerous than we thought," said Bucky.
"Nat, we need you get back in touch with Clint and find out everything we can about McCaffrey and the people he is turning into Spring Children," said Steve. "I'll see what Tony has gotten out of the sample of the purple drug. And make sure Sam and Sharon know that we need the Amendments to the Accords to be passed as quickly as possible."
"Sorry, Georgy," said Natasha. "Looks like training is over."