Ch. 8: couldn't put me together again

Notes: I'M SORRY THIS TOOK SO LONG LAW SCHOOL SAPS YOU OF EVERY OUNCE OF CREATIVE ENERGY YOU HAVE

okay here we go

In that split second, the rain seems to stop.

The force of the explosion throws Natasha onto the ground, her eyes shut and her ears ringing. Her hands clench involuntarily at her side, the grass slick and wet between her fingers, and the rain starts again.

Natasha blinks, her mind slowly taking in her surroundings. Her face is planted in mud, and as she gingerly pulls herself into a sitting position her body physically recoils at the sight of a bright, orange fire, the single source of color in the darkness of the night.

She climbs slowly to her feet, examining her body for injuries. When she doesn't find any, she glances at Steve, who seems to be similarly unharmed. Then she looks back at the fire, and everything seems to hit her all at once.

"Sam," she whispers, and horror starts to creep its way onto Steve's face. "SAM!"

"Shhhh!" A hand clamps over Natasha's mouth, then quickly releases.

Sam raises his eyebrows as she spins around. "Do you want them to hear you?"

"How—I thought—why are you out here?"

"Gut feeling," Sam says, shrugging. "It seemed a little too quiet after you guys left, and something just seemed off. So I grabbed our emergency bags and came out here, just in case."

"Well, shit," Steve mutters. "Thank god for your instincts."

"Yeah, well, right now my instincts are telling me we should shut up and get the jet before they find it. Or us."

No one speaks—or breathes—until the three of them are on the jet and the earth is falling away beneath them. Natasha steers the quinjet into the night, her heart and mind racing. She flies with no particular destination in mind, looping backwards and through random routes as often as possible.

Finally, after two hours of evasive maneuvers that lead nowhere in particular, Sam clears his throat.

"So…what do we do now? You don't happen to have another safe house lying around, do you?"

A dark, humorless laugh escapes Natasha. "No," she says drily. "But I do have something in mind."

She brings the jet down in an empty field, double and triple-checking the camouflage settings before disembarking. Sam and Steve follow her silently and obediently through a new grove of trees. They all feel the same sense of urgency, she can tell, as if their hunters could track them by voice alone.

When she sees the cabin she's looking for, Natasha stops. She peers through the windows, and, seeing it sufficiently empty, picks the lock.

"This was one of my hideouts when I was on the run a few years ago," she explains, after they've all filed into the room and barricaded the door behind them. "There are a few of these that I've scouted out, around the country. They're largely abandoned—they technically have owners, but no one checks up on them."

Steve nods and lets his bag fall onto the floor. "Good enough for me."

Sam kicks his shoes off, making a face at the squelching noise they make as he does. "I know we have a lot to talk about, and we should probably tell Maria, but right now all I wanna do is get all this gunk off me and go to bed. So if anyone has any objections—"

"No," Natasha says quickly, before Steve has a chance to respond. "That's good with me. I can take first watch."

"Cool." Sam steps into the hallway, tearing his shirt off as he goes. "Shower's yours in fifteen minutes."

Natasha busies herself with sleeping arrangements, hunting down extra blankets in the corner of a closet and arranging them neatly on the bed. She pretends not to notice Steve in the corner of her eye. He double-checks the windows and draws the curtains as tightly as they'll go, moving around the room with a certain nervous energy.

If she didn't know better, she'd attribute it to the bombing they'd both just endured.

"Can we talk about this?" Steve finally asks, and Natasha looks up. "About—" he gestures, almost helplessly, between the two of them almost helplessly. "Whatever this is? Whatever's been happening?"

There's the slightest shake in his voice, and Natasha knows implicitly that he's been building up the courage to speak for a while. Since before the bomb, maybe.

It's this knowledge, and only this knowledge, that prevents her from immediately shutting it down.

"Not tonight," she answers, her voice soft. "Please."

He swallows, then nods once. She feels inexplicably as if she has disappointed him, as if she needs to explain.

"I'm sorry," she whispers. "I just—I can't—"

"No," Steve says quickly, shaking his head. "No, I understand. It's been a long day, it can wait."

She gives him the smallest of smiles before Sam announces the bathroom is free, and she slips into the shower with only the slightest hint of regret.

Natasha's already taken up her post by the time Steve emerges from the bathroom, clad in a clean tank top and sweats. It makes sense, logically; they've just been attacked, after all, and fifteen minutes without a guard is fifteen minutes they're in greater danger. Still, he can't help the way his heart sinks when he steps into the bedroom to find that the only other inhabitant is Sam, who is already snoring underneath the covers. Steve tucks himself in with a sigh, allowing himself to surrender to the exhaustion creeping at the edges of his mind.

He wakes up in the middle of the night with a raging thirst, and as he swings his legs onto the floor he notices that Natasha has taken Sam's place beside him. Steve pads into the kitchen to pour himself a glass of water, faintly surprised that they managed to switch without waking him up. Either they've become sneakier than before, he thinks, or he was really out cold.

He downs the entire glass of water before heading back to bed, and as he slips back beneath the very welcoming comforter, he feels Natasha tense beside him.

"Nat?"

She doesn't respond. He props himself onto his elbows, brow furrowed in confusion, to find that she still looks fast asleep.

"Uh…Nat? Natasha?"

Natasha stays completely silent. Steve wonders if he'd just been imagining things. He's just started to lower himself back down when he sees her jaw clench.

Full of apprehension, he slowly and gently reaches over to lift the corner of the comforter off her body. Both her fists are clenched tightly at her sides.

The realization hits him all at once—her lack of surprise during his nightmares, her reticence when he'd asked about hers. The difference in their reactions.

He wonders how long it had taken for them to train her to control her body while she was asleep, how many beatings she had taken before she'd learned to stay completely motionless even while she was unconscious. He wonders how many times her missions had depended on it.

He wonders if it would be better to pretend like he'd never witnessed this, to let her think she was still hiding from this.

Then, the tiniest, softest whimper escapes her, and the thought evaporates from his mind.

She sits bolt upright as soon as his hand touches her wrist, her face blank but her eyes full of panic. Steve doesn't flinch.

"Sorry," he whispers. "You—uh—"

She stares at him for one long second, as if her brain is catching up to the moment, and then her entire body slackens at once. "Sorry," she mutters, suddenly refusing to meet his eyes. "That was a bad one."

"Are you…are you okay?"

She takes a long, shuddering breath, twisting the bedsheet with her hand. "I was just—I was so stupid to think we could do this. That this could be safe, or fun, or less dangerous."

She doesn't specify what this is, whether it's going on the run or taking down the Red Room or doing those things together, or something else Steve doesn't want to name. He doesn't ask.

"We've never played anything safe," he says gently. "Never."

She looks up at him then, her eyes full of tears that send a jolt of surprise down his spine. "They tortured you, Steve. Because of me. Because I got you into this."

"No," he says firmly, shaking his head. "No. I chose this. You didn't 'get me into' anything."

She just sighs, and a small suspicion starts to form in the back of his mind. He watches her for a moment, noticing that she makes no move to lie back down or end the conversation, before asking.

"What did you dream?"

Nat opens her mouth to respond, but before she does, a fresh tear forms in the corner of her eye. She closes her mouth and shakes her head. Steve feels something splinter in his chest, and before he is fully aware of what he's doing, he reaches both arms toward her.

She comes, willingly, tucking herself into his lap and burying her face into his shirt. And small has never been a word used to describe Natasha Romanoff, who is all fire and ice and a cold, calculating intelligence that could skin someone alive—but as he wraps his arms around her, it is the only description of her body he can think of. Because she feels small, her body feels small, as she shakes with barely controlled sobs that are leaking through the fabric and onto his chest. It is foreign and terrifying and absolutely heart-wrenching, so he presses a hesitant kiss into her hair. His chest clenches as her grip on his shirt tightens in response.

He holds her as the night stretches indefinitely in front of them, riding it out, and when her tears start to subside he starts to brush his hand lightly up and down her back. She's quiet for a while, and after her breath has steadied he glances down and realizes with a jolt that she has fallen asleep.

He shifts himself carefully, trying not to disturb her as he lowers his back onto the mattress and his head onto his pillow. She doesn't move, and as he drapes a protective arm over her an inexplicable warmth blossoms in his chest, expanding gently over the hollow pain that he feels when he sees her in pain. The warmth doesn't replace it, not really—but it makes her tears a little more bearable, makes the ache a little duller.

When his eyes blink open the next morning, the space next to him is empty.

He barely has time to start panicking before he hears the clink of dishes in the kitchen, followed by the unmistakable smell of bacon and eggs.

"When did you get eggs?" Steve asks, settling into the chair next to Sam's.

"This morning," she answers brusquely, assembling the plates with the skill and efficiency of a professional chef.

"Of course."

Natasha lets the pan clatter back onto the stove, then whisks the plates into her arms. Sam shoots Steve a questioning look, to which Steve responds with his best nonchalant shrug.

"About last night. I owe you an explanation," she says, unceremoniously dumping a plate in front of each of them.

You don't owe me anything, he wants to say. I'd hold you like that for the rest of your life if you'd let me.

Instead, he raises an expectant eyebrow and waits for her to continue.

"I want to preface this by letting you know," she says, her voice cracking slightly, "that if you want to leave after you hear this—I won't hold it against you."

Steve's stomach sinks. "Nothing is going to make me want to leave."

She gives him a small, resigned smile. "You haven't heard it yet."

"It doesn't matter," he says determinedly. "I know you—"

"You don't," she insists, shaking her head. "That's the thing."

Sam takes a bite of his toast and raises an eyebrow. "Enlighten us, then."

She glances at him before lowering her eyes to the table, her fingers picking at the wood. "When Steve was in the Red Room, he saw a picture of—of me, when I was maybe ten or eleven, with another little girl."

He remembers that picture—he doesn't think he'll ever forget it. The innocence in her eyes, the light, will haunt him for the rest of his days.

"That girl was my best friend," Natasha continues, her voice hollow. "Marina. She followed me everywhere—she'd sneak out every day because I asked her to, she'd come with me to all the bakeries and ask for their leftovers, she'd sit by me as we watched the ballerinas train through the window. She got me through a lot of the—a lot of what they put me through. She would've done anything for me."

An inexplicable dread starts to settle in Steve's gut.

"Our first mission was a joint mission in Cuba. They told me I was to extract a family in danger and bring them to safety. We spent weeks bonding with them and gaining their trust. Marina loved it there—she managed to find joy in the work, playing around with her fake boyfriend, buying scarves that she liked."

"Anyway, on the morning of the extraction, they told me that the mission was actually to kill the family. I suppose it was a test to see if I'd get attached. Make it as public as you can, they said. So I sniped them on a bridge as they thought they were running towards freedom."

"That's not your fault," Sam starts to say, but Natasha shakes her head and no part of Steve wants to hear what is coming next.

"They told me," she says, her voice cracking, "they told me that Marina had gotten too eager. That she lacked the ability to remain impartial, to remain unattached. And so part of the mission was—was to kill her, too."

Her eyes shut briefly before she utters her next words, but it doesn't matter—Steve knows what they're going to be.

"I did it," she whispers. "I barely even hesitated. My best friend of over twenty years, my one source of light in that place, and I just—"

She breaks off, lowering her face into her hands, and Steve feels a chill crawl slowly down his spine.

"I have never done anything but hurt the people I love," she says, her voice small. "And I don't—I don't want to, anymore."

Suddenly, the realization hits Steve like a ton of bricks.

"It was me," he guesses. "You killed me."

"It's been everyone," she mumbles into her hands. "It's been Clint, Wanda, Rhodey, Tony, Sam. But last night—yeah. Last night it was you."

The silence after her voice drops off is heavy, and no one makes a move to break it.

After a while, Natasha emerges from behind her hands and takes a deep, shuddering breath before looking up again. "Well," she says with a forced smile, "If you need money for a hotel—"

"I don't want to leave," Steve interrupts quietly.

Surprise flashes briefly through her eyes before she turns to look at Sam.

"Wilson does."

"No, I don't," Sam says slowly. "What I want to do is find every single person who did that to you and gut them like a fish."

The phone chooses that moment to ring, sending all of them a couple inches off their seats.

"It's Maria," announces Steve, grabbing it off the counter. "Who wants to tell her?"

Natasha and Sam immediately raise their index fingers to their noses, and despite everything Steve feels a bit of weight lift off his shoulders.

"That's not a thing," he protests. "Since when has that been a thing?"

Neither Natasha nor Sam says anything, but they do both stare pointedly at the phone in Steve's hand.

"Fine," he says, almost smiling. "But I'm putting her on speaker."

"Hello?"

"Please tell me that was not your safe house."

"What?"

"That explosion," Maria says, her voice an equal mix of exasperation and concern. "Please tell me it wasn't you guys."

"Well, you know I don't like disappointing you, but—."

"Fuck."

"Yes, that was our general reaction as well."

"Is—did anyone—is everyone—"

"Hi, Maria," Natasha interjects, a smirk toying at the corner of her lips. She wipes away a stray tear with her finger. "Nice to hear you again."

"Yeah, I'm here too," says Sam.

"Oh, thank god." There's a shuffling sound at the other end of the line, then the sound of a door closing. "Are you safe? Don't tell me where you are, but are you safe?"

"We found a place," Steve answers, glancing at Natasha. She nods. "It's not as cozy as the last one, but it'll do. I don't think they followed us here."

"Good. Good." There's a brief pause, and then Maria says, "I have some intel for you, too."

Natasha actually lets out a brief laugh. It's a little duller than usual, but Steve nevertheless feels slightly comforted by the positive change in her demeanor.

"It wouldn't be you if you didn't," Natasha says wryly, and Sam snorts.

"No, it wouldn't. Anyway, I have it on good authority that the person running this whole operation is a former student of the Red Room. Given what we know about the dates she's been active, you might even have crossed paths with her while you were there."

"Do you have a name?" asks Natasha.

"Not a real one, no. Just the scary spider name that you all got, for some reason."

"They weren't all spiders."

"I mean, two is still a lot, though, isn't it?"

Steve rolls his eyes. "Okay, what is it?"

"Recluse. Know anything about her?"

A shadow passes over Natasha's face. "Yeah, you could say that."

"Kill any world leaders together?"

Natasha gives a humorless laugh. "No, she refused to be paired with me. She was one of the top in our class, and never really appreciated that we could be more effective together than if we were competing with each other at every turn. Although that might've been better for the world at large, now that I think about it."

"So this is bad, then," guesses Maria.

"She was just as deadly as I was. Maybe even more so. I had to learn to overcome my conscience early on—she never even had that problem. Never even flinched when she had to do some of the worst things I've ever seen done to a person."

"But you were the Black Widow," Sam points out, his voice a fragile quiet. "Not her."

"Only because they thought she was too cocky," Natasha says darkly. "She'd linger for a second before every kill, savoring her success. They didn't like that. But it never mattered, really—she always killed them anyway."

Steve swallows. "Sounds like a real winner."

Natasha gives him a crooked, sour smile. "She was."

There's a beat of silence, and then Maria sighs. "Well, I can't say this is welcome info, but it does help us with preparations. At least we know what we're dealing with, right?"

"Yeah, sure," Sam mutters. "I feel so much better knowing that the person we're up against is probably a sociopathic killer who has been trained to assassinate people with far more security than we have."

"I can meet you in a bit, if it'd be helpful." Natasha shifts slightly in her chair. "We could combine intel, see what bigger-picture stuff we can come up with."

"That'd be good, actually," answers Maria. "I'll send you coordinates shortly."

"Sounds good."

"You three behave, now," Maria says, and then hangs up with a click.

Sam flips the phone closed, then leans back in his chair. "Well, this is fun."

Natasha chokes out a laugh. "I feel like this is karmic punishment for me trying to run from my past for so long, or something."

"Nah." Sam shakes his head. "No, this is just them being a bunch of cold-blooded assassins. Trust me, I'm a therapist."

Natasha gives a second laugh, more genuine this time, before the phone buzzes.

"Coordinates are here," Sam says, sliding the phone towards her. "You should go."

"Yeah." She pushes back from the table and stands up. "I'll see you later."

Steve watches her head towards the door, then calls her name as she opens it. She looks back expectantly, and he realizes he has no idea what he wanted to say.

"Be safe," he says awkwardly, shoving his hands in his pockets.

Natasha gives him a small, knowing smile, as if she has somehow read the thoughts that he hasn't even grasped yet. "Thanks, Rogers. For everything."

She leaves without waiting for a response.