The third transmission was fourteen minutes late, by Tony's watch, at least.
Standing at the ready in the jet bay of the Avengers compound stood Stark Tech Suit Mark XI, flight capable only, loaded on the inside to contain a tissue sampling from Vision's calf, and a single vial of Steve Roger's blood. When the message image first appeared, the room was more alight than it had been the previous times. Visible around the walls were crates marked as containing all manner of weapons and wartime supplies.
"Coms are open, Boss. You're live." FRIDAY informed the team.
"So- Where and when?" Steve spoke up, arms crossed. He and Tony stood side by side, front and center in the view of the webcam attached to the display.
"So eager, Captain Rogers. So eager." The mechanically twisted voice of Bruce's captor called as he walked into the room from behind a large wooden crate labeled 'WARNING, LIVE AMMUNITION' along the side. Natasha nudged between the two men and squinted as her eyes darted around the display.
"Where is he?" She demanded, her voice cracking with rage and terror. "Where is Bruce? What have you done with him?"
"Ah. The widow." The voice sounded with humor. "Afraid we've given life to that codename, are we?"
"Where is our man, asshole?" Tony said, gently pulling Natasha to his side. "You want your goodies, they're over here..." He gestured to Steve's left, where the suit stood at the ready. "But we have to play fair."
"I suppose that is the deal I offered, no? Very well. Come." The man picked the camera up off what the team assumed to be a tripod. He walked over to the crate he'd came from behind and held the camera as he opened the back hatch, and the camera took a moment to focus on Bruce, bound at the hands and feet, mouth gagged, unconscious on the floor. He walked in and used his foot to kick Bruce up onto his side, making Bruce grunt a bit. "You see? He is fine."
"You twisted bastard." Natasha growled. "You call that 'fine?!" Clint Barton pushed over and began trying to soothe his best friend, rubbing small circles on her back and whispering for her to take deep breaths.
"Fine. Alive. Is same." The man laughed. "This is what you wanted, Dr. Banner alive. This is what I offer."
Natasha opened her mouth to begin to yell again, but Tony grabbed her hand and shook his head. Tony and Natasha both looked to Steve.
"I'll ask once more. When and where?" The Captain demanded louder now.
"You will send the suit, alone, to a location I disclose. I will receive my prizes, and upon their inspection, I will then replace them with Dr. Banner. Even trade." He replies, turning the camera back to his masked face.
"Why?" Sam called from the corner. "Why do this?"
"As I said before, Falcon..." The man stopped and cleared his throat. "There is too much power in the hands of too few with you Avengers. I am only interested in helping the rest of humanity achieve their best, nothing more, nothing less."
"And beating up a world famous, genius physicist is how you accomplish that?" Sam argues back. "The man's brain is your best tool, and you have him tied up in a box."
"A smart man, yes. But uncooperative. You must think us fools... Of course we tried to have Dr. Banner give us some of his precious knowledge. But there are other ways of accomplishing our goals. Now please. One of you must have a pen." The man said, propping himself on a crate.
He gave coordinates and instructions to have the suit pilot itself to the location, otherwise Bruce would be given a lethal dose of whatever was keeping him sedated. Vision wrote them on a napkin and handed it to Steve. Tony shut the communications off without a word, then sat himself in the floor and pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes. Colonel Rhodes came over and put his hands on Tony's shoulders.
"Hey man, stay focused." Rhodey reminded his friend. "Tones, look at me."
"Yeah?" Tony said, looking up at Rhodey, who knelt at his side. He handed him a small scrap of paper.
"What's this?" Tony said, looking at what appeared to be a gum wrapper with another, differing set of coordinates on it.
"All this group's focus was on throwing FRIDAY and your satellites off, so while she was unscrambling and eliminating signal locations, I... maybe... used the Air Force satellites to narrow down signal possibilities. Between the two of us, this is the answer for the source." He explained.
"Rhodes you genius son of a bitch!" Sam laughed. "You got 'em!"
"Well, I hope so, anyway." Rhodey smiled.
Tony stood and plugged the coordinates into the navigation and mapping system in the launch bay computer, and the team gathered around as the satellites triangulated in on the location- a barren, abandoned looking town in the Moldovian countryside. The buildings there looked as if they'd been abandoned for decades, businesses and homes all had boarded up windows and doors, most of them weather worn and rotting.
"There is nothing here." Tony says, moving the imaging around. "There has to be something that looks like it has fresh entry."
"I could go and see?" Vision suggested, holding a hand up awkwardly.
"I'd bet we're under surveillance. Anything other than a suit seen leaving here may not bode will for Banner." Sam reminded him.
"True... But..." Vision took a step back and phased himself all but invisible, completely camouflaged. "We could try this way? And I can phase my way through the buildings in and out of this town. See what can be found." Vision finished. He looked to Steve, who exchanged a look with Tony, who nodded.
"Do it. But be careful." The Captain ordered.
"In the mean time, only one other thing can be done," Tony said watching Vision give Wanda's hand a quick squeeze as he flew off, phasing out of sight again as he flew, "And that is to keep up our end of the deal."
He flipped down the back panel of the suit and a holographic keyboard projected itself before him. He began to type code and commands into the suit furiously, then he clicked the panel shut and the suit powered up, its glowing eyes and chest piece illuminating the darker corner where it stood. "Alright FRIDAY, stay in control and sending back audio and video until they try to crack this thing open, then abandon ship. Leave no software traces behind. They may have the mechanics, but they'll have to learn to make it work on their own."
'You got it, boss.' FRIDAY confirmed, the suit walking itself out onto the launch bay and taking flight, it could then be heard in the distance hitting the boosters and shooting off through the air and off out of sight. Tony shoves his hands in his pockets and turns back to the rest of the team, but freezes in his tracks. He looks around the bay.
"Uh, guys..." Tony says, concerned. "Where did Nat go?"
Steve turns on his heels and rushes to the coms board where they'd laid the gum wrapper Rhodey had wrote the coordinates on, which was gone. Sam called from the lockers on the other side of the bay, catching their attention. "Barton is gone too, and his quiver and bow." Sam opened Natasha's locker. "And her electric batons." He called.
"Shit." Tony cursed, throwing his phone down on the hard concrete, sending pieces shattering. "FRIDAY?"
'Out through the sewer hookup, boss.' FRIDAY called. 'Asked me not to tell until they were gone. Maybe consider lowering security trust on flight risks.' The AI suggested, and it made Sam and Rhodey laugh out loud.
"Not. The. Time." Tony scolds, looking back at Steve. "Well, Captain. What now? Lead us." He all but yells. Steve shakes his head.
"No. I think we need to trust our players. Let's hang back and see how they do." Steve says, sitting on a bench by their lockers.
"You're kidding me." Tony argues.
"The world's two best assassins and the most advanced artificial lifeform ever are on it. And if he gets woken up, well... That label on Bruce's crate is accurate. I say the rest of us just hang back, stay at the ready and see what we need to do next."
"I agree." Wanda nods, also sitting down, in a chair over by the control center.
"Solid plan to me." Rhodey agrees, and Sam nods.
"Someone should stay at home base." Sam adds.
"Fine." Tony sighs. "Fine. Let's pray they keep their heads in the game."
Natasha and Clint exit the underground waterway of the sewer system about five miles away from the compound.
Thankfully, the sewer had been a closed system, and they'd just had to walk along piping and not through the sewage, but the fresh air was no less welcome when they reached the outside. Natasha crawled out first and helped Clint haul their gear out.
"Well, we made it out." Clint says, removing his night vision glasses and putting them away in his vest pocket. Natasha does the same and nods.
"Yeah, now we just need to figure out how we catch a flight to Moldova without anyone noticing its two Avengers on board." Natasha sighs. "This may be a bad idea."
"No, no." Clint shakes his head. "We're fine. I have connections."
"Oh no. Your connections put us in cargo holds with livestock." Natasha groans. Clint smiles.
"Yes, but its quick, its discreet, and it'll get us where we need to go, yeah?" He holds out a hand to where Natasha is sitting on a rock, and she takes it and stands.
"Do you think we'll get him back okay?" Natasha asks as they hike along the waterway.
"I know we will." Clint assures her. "If not, I'll kick his ass for breaking your heart. And for the Hulk to get his ass handed to him by me... Well, that would just be embarrassing, wouldn't it."
Natasha snorts, thankful for her best friend's humor and willingness to help her. She knows this mission is a bit reckless, but the two of them had been in so many dangerous and death-defying situations before, she didn't know anyone else she would rather have help rescue her boyfriend with. For a few miles, the two of them walk in silence, until Clint clears his throat.
"Hey, Nat?" He calls, and she pauses from her slight lead ahead of him.
"Yeah?" She looks back.
"You know Bruce asked me, for my blessing, to propose to you?" Clint beams at the memory. "It was a little awkward at first, Bruce asking me to go get a beer, and the way he rambled. He said since I am your older brother, and ya know, with the lack of a dad, he wanted to ask me. Not in the super traditional sense, but still. I found it just... So endearing. He loves you so much, Nat." Clint took a gloved hand and caught a tear sliding down her cheek. "We're going to get him. I swear."
"I know." Natasha nods, looking up and blinking hard to push her tears away. "I know."
The spies reach their ride just after sunset.
The plane they get into is mostly cargo, and as Natasha had guessed, was hauling livestock- chickens, to be exact. The sound and smell inside were more than overpowering, and it prompted Clint to turn his hearing aids off and Natasha to rip up a cloth and roll pieces for her ears. The two made idle chit chat in sign language and played with the cards Clint always kept in his vest to pass the time, and the two even had time to take a nap before coming over their drop zone.
The cargo hatch opened, and Clint and Natasha took turns checking each other's rigging for safety and security before jumping from the plane over a mostly overgrown area of thick evergreen trees. Due to this, rather than the usual parachute for their decent, the two had padded bumpers that deflated on the front and back of their bodies, not unlike airbags in a car. They bounced roughly through the tree limbs until they both came to a rough stop on the ground.
"Not one of our better landings." Natasha groaned, picking pine needles from her hair. Clint laughed, already on his feet, and he helped Natasha to hers.
"We should only be about an hour out." Clint guessed, taking his navigator from his vest pocket. "Due west."
Natasha took her batons from her back and tested the charge in both before snapping them shut. She nodded and placed them back in her back, and waited while he loaded at least a dozen arrow tips before they moved out.
This time, the two moved in silence; coordinated as they'd done many times before. They stuck to the treeline, hidden in shadow until the reached the town. They crept along an alleyway, until a noise stopped them both. Natasha drew her pistol, Clint readied an arrow, but Vision solidified and stood before them. He held his finger to his lips and signed that the suit was still waiting to be picked up near the town square a few miles away and they he'd yet to see anything. Natasha looked disheartened but nodded and gave her signed thanks. Clint ushered the other two into an open doorway where they could wait inside.
An hour passed between the three Avengers in absolute silence.
Clint cleaned Natasha's pistol just to pass the time, and had just reassembled it when the sound of a large truck engine rumbled in the distance. All three on guard, Clint signed to Vision to phase back out of sight and go keep eyes on the drop. Vision did as instructed, and Clint pulled Natasha over to a boarded up window they could peek through. They watched the truck pass, an old logging type with rust spots in more places than paint, and a covered bed, no closed in, but tarpped. The truck breaks could be heard squealing into engagement as it stopped further on up the village road. Clint looked to Natasha, who signed to him.
'What is the plan?' she signed.
'Hitch a ride?' He returned, holding up some of Tony's magnetic grips. Natasha smiled and gave her approval.
Clint peeked outside and found a pile of debris they would hide behind as the truck made its way back. Natasha pointed to her ears, signalling Clint to turn up his hearing aids. Voices could be heard complaining about the weight of the Iron Man suit in Russian. They sounded annoyed to have been sent on the retrieval, and one man sounded scared, and young. Clint raised and eyebrow and Natasha silently laughed.
'Maybe we don't hurt them all?' She signed. Clint crossed his arms and gave her a pointed look. 'Okay. Well, lets at least not KILL them all.' She signed. Clint pulled her down as the engine started up once more. As the truck rumbled by, the two remained crouched but ran and gripped the side with the magnetic grips, before using them to clamber under the truck where they could wedge up in the undercarriage and not be seen. Mentally, she was trying to prepare herself to focus on the mission, on not getting distracted by how bad of a shape Bruce was in and compromising getting him out. How she'd feel when she saw his beautiful, deep brown eyes caked with blood.
Clint noticed and let go of his grip with one hand, placing his over hers. She looked up and he gave her a reassuring smile and he repeated the words from before, thought she could barely hear over the engine.
"I swear, Nat."
So, Natasha decided to hunt them down.
Sorry for the cliffhanger. Thanks for reading! Be sure to leave a review!