Even before their mission started, Natasha knew it was going to be a bad day. It wasn't a particularly difficult mission, no. It wasn't even an Avengers-level threat so really, it should be a walk in the park for the spy, but Nat knew better. When Natasha woke up that morning she was greeted by a piercing headache. She wasn't new to this feeling, the sensation alone wasn't what alarmed her: It was the fact that it had finally come and she wasn't prepared.
The headache was caused by her drops, or lack thereof, and she knew that. Natasha Romanoff, like many other agents of SHIELD, was a classified little. The one thing that sets her apart? No one knew her little age because no one has ever seen her drop, not even Nat herself. Typically, a little would experience their first drop around one year after they physiologically reach their little age, or in other words: A person who has the little age of six would experience their first drop when they're seven.
In Natasha's case though, that first drop never came. No, it wasn't a problem biologically, it was a choice, or so they all thought it was. The truth behind first drops is that it's more a matter of safety than the little's choice. Dropping meant exposing their most vulnerable sides and even at young ages, littles have already developed that self-preservation instinct. This was good, because at least it meant no little would experience their first drop in the middle of a life-threatening situation. It assured that the first drop would be a pleasurable experience because you want Littles to want their drops. Because Littles need to drop: It's hardwired into their systems.
The only reason no one's ever tried to persistently convince Natasha to drop was that she never showed any symptoms of pain, deterioration, or worse. That is, until now.
Nevertheless, Natasha pushed on with the day as if nothing was out of place. She pushed the pain to the back of her mind and left on her mission with Steve and several other agents.
"Two guards by the entrance, two doing rounds." Natasha said into her comms from where she was perched on top of a ten wheeler truck. The truck was parked several meters away from the entrance of a base hidden in the shadows of the surrounding trees. "A lot fewer than we'd anticipated." Nat mumbled.
"We stick to the plan, agent Romanoff." Steve responded.
"It's an easy opening." Natasha argued. The mission was simple: Get into the base, retrieve the weapon, and release the captured inhumans. Nat usually could have done all this on her own in her sleep, but Fury and Hill insisted on doing this mission with a new team: Something about no better way to get proper training than to baptize them by fire or something. Steve at first thought Fury meant literally baptizing the agents by fire, and Nat honestly thought that Steve's version sounded better right now.
"We stick to the plan as discussed." Steve said sounding a bit more firm this time. Of course Steve would go by the book especially with the other agents around. "Skye, you in position?"
"Ready when you are, cap." said a female voice. It was Skye Johnson, one of the newer agents that were with them on this mission. Steve went on just checking the status of everyone and asking for updates, probably to get a better feel of the situation. But Nat was losing patience, and she was losing patience fast. On a regular day, Nat would be able to sit through all this but currently she was nursing a terrible headache. She just wanted to get this over with already.
Natasha studied the scene before her again and calculated her chances. She was pretty sure she can take on these guards and speed up their mission a little bit. With the sound of Steve still rambling instructions into their comms, Natasha left her spot and slowly crept towards the entrance.
She was 30 feet away... 20... And just when she was close enough to the guards doing rounds, she was met with a sharp pain in the back of her head. It was the worst pain she's felt in her head in a while: So bad that she involuntarily gasped as she clutched her head in her hands, effectively catching the attention of one of the guards. As soon as the guard saw Natasha, evidently everyone else was alerted.
"Natasha? Natasha what's wrong?" Steve spoke into the comms once more, but Natasha had no time to answer.
She was still seeing white from the pain, but her senses were telling her that enemies were approaching her both from behind and in front. "Agent Romanoff your status, now." Steve said in a more urgent tone.
"Oh for fuck's sake." Natasha muttered before turning off her earpiece. Yes, she was aware that was going to get her in trouble later but quite frankly she had enough on her plate now even without Steve badgering her. If anything, the constant chattering in her ear was making her headache worse so she believed that turning off the earpiece was the best course of action now.
She closed her eyes and took a deep breath before focusing all her other senses into the situation. Natasha stepped to the side and narrowly avoided a strike from one of the guards and from there, it was like she was on autopilot. Her instincts kicked in and she kicked her leg out as she bent down, swiping two of them off their feet. She then took the chance to open her eyes and really look at her opponents. Just with a quick glance she knew she had this in the bag. For whatever reason, guarding the entrance didn't seem like a priority for the base because if these were the best they got, then almost anyone could probably just walk in through the other entry points.
One of the guards made the mistake of charging her from the side, and Nat simply extended an arm out, releasing one of her Widow Bites and electrocuting the man. From her peripheral vision, she can see the fourth guard approaching her so she made a turn as if to run away from him. She ran towards the base as if making her way to the entrance, but instead of trying to kick open the door Natasha jumped up and kicked herself from the door. In mid-air she did a backflip and landed on the guard's shoulders from which she easily strangled the man until he passed out.
Before the guard fell down, Natasha jumped from his shoulders and landed crouched down with one hand on the floor. As she stood up, Natasha bent forward just as one of the earlier-fallen guards tried to tackle her, causing him to lose balance near her back. Natasha reached back for him and easily flipped the man over onto his back on the floor. She quickly pointed down to the man and released another round of her Widow Bites. She looked around her and once she deemed everything clear, she sank down on the floor and took a deep breath as she held her head in her hands. Now that the adrenaline was gone, she could feel the intensity of the pain in her head. The pain was so bad, she didn't even notice another guard drop unconscious a few feet away from her.
"Natasha. Natasha." It was Steve who'd presumably come to check on Natasha once she'd turned off her comms. When Natasha finally heard Steve, she sucked in a deep breath and tried to get a grip.
"Yeah?" Natasha said casually as she stood up, but as she did she felt her world spinning and her vision getting blurry. She would've fallen if it weren't for Steve reaching out to steady her. "I'm fine." She insisted as she tried to pull away from Steve, but she stumbled yet again.
"What happened?" Steve asked in a firm voice, yet you could hear the concern seeping through. Everyone knew Natasha was a little, and everyone knew she despised it. That's why people tended to try to give her space because they didn't want to piss the Black Widow off. Well, everyone except Steve and emphasis on "try".
Steve had always felt naturally more protective of Natasha. Don't get him wrong: Steve's protective of a lot of people especially his team, but it was different with Natasha. He couldn't ever bring himself to turn the other cheek when Nat was in trouble, and Natasha couldn't really get mad at him for it. Well, she'd get annoyed but honestly that was an improvement. If it was anyone else who'd act towards her as Steve does, she'd probably have their head. Nat liked to tell herself that she was tolerating certain levels of protectiveness from Steve for Steve's sake. Everyone else had different ideas, but they chose to keep quiet about it.
"Nothing, I just got a little banged up." Natasha muttered, and the look Steve gave her suggested he didn't believe that. "I'm serious, I'm f-fine." Nat stumbled on that last bit as her head was met with flashes of searing pain yet again. She cursed under her breath and pulled away from Steve so she could sink down onto the ground, clutching her head in her hands again.
"Nat, you're not okay. I'm not letting you go on like this." Steve said in a gentle yet firm voice as he crouched in front of Natasha. "I'm taking you back to the jet."
Of course that was met with resistance. "I'll be fine. Just give me a minute." Natasha muttered.
"No, I'm taking you back, Natasha. You're off this mission and that's an order." Steve said. There was something in Steve's voice that made Natasha hunch in on herself, but want to gravitate towards Steve at the same time. She took a moment to collect herself and once the pain dulled a bit again, she lifted her head from her hands and opened her eyes after a moment.
"You'll be wasting time bringing me back to the jet." Natasha said, and Steve looked like he was going to tell her again that she was off the mission, but she beat him to it. "I'll go back by myself. I know where it is, and the way back is clear. Cap, just... Get to this. I got myself." Natasha said as she pushed herself to stand up again. She wobbled just for a moment but otherwise, she seemed steady on her feet.
"You keep getting flashes, I'm not letting y-"
"We're wasting time arguing about taking me back to the jet."
"Then just let me take you back to the jet so we wouldn't be wasting time." Steve said in a firmer voice.
"Just let me go back myself, I don't need a babysitter." Nat said, sounding a little annoyed. She usually wasn't so snappy with Steve but the headache was getting the best of her.
Steve looked like he was going to argue one more time, but then he looked up at someone to Nat's right. "Agent Rodriguez." Steve nodded to Yoyo, one of the agents they had with them on the mission. "Can you please take agent Romanoff back to the jet?"
"Steve, I-." Natasha began to argue again, but Steve cut her off with a "now, please." to Yoyo. Of course Yoyo couldn't really go against the captain's orders, so she nodded her head and looked curiously at Natasha. Not wanting to argue more because it all seemed futile, Nat sighed and just went off with Yoyo. She didn't even look at Steve anymore as she walked away with the agent.
Much to her dismay, on the way back to the jet Natasha had to pause a couple of times because of her head. Yoyo would look on in concern but didn't say anything until they got back to the jet where she was sure they'd be safe. Upon reaching the jet, they were greeted by Fitz and Simmons who looked quite perplexed to see them back so soon. Jemma Simmons and Leopold Fitz are their team's doctors for the mission. Yoyo ignored their questioning looks first though and led Natasha over somewhere to sit.
"Agent Romanoff? Natasha?" Yoyo spoke quietly as she crouched down in front of Nat, who was currently basically hunched over in her seat, holding her head in her hands. "Can you tell me what's wrong?"
When they take in agents early from their missions due to presumed injuries or complications, it was standard of course to check them over and tend to them, especially if they were little. Right now however as she was crouching down in front of Natasha, trying to look at the spy's face, Yoyo couldn't help but feel a little more concerned.
Bigs have always been, for some reason, so protective of Natasha even though Black Widow scared them. None of them really knew why though. They tried to rationalize it as just maybe the natural tendency to be protective over littles, but part of them knew that wasn't it. They had a lot of little colleagues, but they never felt this way towards other littles when they're aged like they do with Nat. Regardless, agents tried not to dwell on it too much because Natasha wasn't quite fond of the attention anyway. They'd probably get the urge to hug or coddle Natasha for some reason, but just one mean look from Nat and all that instantly goes away.
Right now though, Natasha wasn't serving Yoyo any death glares which in theory, should be a good sign. With Nat though, this concerned Yoyo more. "Natasha, we can't help if we don't know what's wrong. Is it a headache?" Yoyo asked once more.
"I'm fine. I probably just need to sit down for a bit." Natasha mumbled, her eyes still tightly shut. She was alternating now between waves of nausea and intense pain.
"You don't look fine." Yoyo said with a shake of her head as she reached up to feel Natasha's forehead. "Fitz, Jemma, can either of you do a quick scan?" Yoyo asked as she turned her head to look at their two teammates.
"I don't need a scan." Natasha insisted and sighed but even then, Jemma was already walking towards the pair.
"It'll be a quick scan, agent Romanoff." Jemma said as she stood to Yoyo's left and tapped away on her tablet. "You won't even feel a thing, we can count to three and it'll aaaall be over." Jemma explained in a soothing voice like how she usually would to their little colleagues when dropped, but she didn't mean to. She'd been told Natasha doesn't appreciate that kind of treatment-and Nat wasn't even dropped. Jemma seemed to have realized her mistake because she tensed up and looked at Yoyo for help.
Before Yoyo could say anything though, Natasha just shook her head and stood up on shaky legs. Jemma instinctively reached out to steady her, but Natasha just brushed her off. "I'm fine. I'll just go sleep this off." She muttered before staggering away.
"It's okay, just let her be." Yoyo said softly in response to Jemma's concerned look. She sighed softly as she stood and turned her head to look at Natasha making her way to the bunks. "Let her cool down, we'll check on her in a bit."
"What even happened?" Fitz asked, finally stepping in once Natasha was out.
"I honestly don't know," Yoyo frowned. "I think she turned off her comms at one point and cap went to check on her. I was just nearby so I decided to see if I could help and when I got there, he just asked me to bring her back here."
"Did she get hurt or something?" Fitz asked.
"I didn't see any physical injuries though." Jemma said with a frown as she tapped away on her tablet.
"Well agent Romanoff's known for hiding her injuries well." Fitz pointed out, which was true. Nat would often skip trips to the med bay even for the worst of injuries because she just absolutely hated hospitals.
"No, I don't think she's hiding any physical injuries this time." Jemma shook her head, and Yoyo looked at her curiously as Jemma was still tapping and scrolling away. "I managed to do a quick scan while she sat there, but it's not a complete one."
Yoyo moved closer to Jemma so she can look at the tablet's screen. "What does it say?"
"No physical injuries, at least none that the system deems to be an urgent threat to her." Jemma said, but that didn't really ease Yoyo's worries about the agent. "I didn't get to finish other internal scans, but the system had a start on a quick brain scan." Jemma said, pausing for a bit as she looked at the results. "According to these results, there seems to be some chemical imbalance in her brain."
"That must be from her avoiding drops, right?" Fitz suggested.
"Likely, but if that's the case then this should be more cause for worry." Jemma frowned at them.
"What do you mean?" Yoyo asked, not liking the sound of this.
"Given the period that agent Romanoff's been avoiding her drops, the chemical imbalance should be tremendous." Jemma pointed out. She and a few other scientists back at SHIELD were given the task of trying to understand the science behind Natasha's (lack of) drops. Of course it wasn't easy because they relied on information they got from the med bay on the off-chance Nat would drop by after a mission. "I say should, because it's also quite odd. The few previous scans we have of her showed no imbalance at all."
"So it must be something else then?" Fitz asked.
"Maybe, I can't really know for sure." Jemma said with a sigh as she put the tablet away for the meantime. "It can be caused by a plethora of things given the lack of information I have right now."
"We can check on her later and you can try to get a more thorough scan." Yoyo said reassuringly. "Right now, let's check on the team and see if there's anything we can do from here." Yoyo of course decided she would be staying back in the jet. She was sure the rest of their team would've already advanced on the mission and her re-entering would just cause chaos. Plus, she felt the captain would appreciate it more if she stayed behind to make sure agent Romanoff would be okay. With that, the trio went to the jet's command center to get updates on the status of their mission.
About half an hour later and once they were certain that the mission was going smoothly, Yoyo brought up the subject of Natasha again. "I think we should go check on her."
"Agreed." Jemma said with a nod of her head. She'd been wanting to check on Natasha for quite some time now, but just didn't know if they should already or not.
"I'll stay behind so we don't overwhelm her." Fitz said as he stayed in his seat and Jemma retrieved her tablet. The two women agreed and once Jemma was ready with her things, she and Yoyo went for the bunks.
Upon reaching the bunks, Yoyo knocked before letting herself and Jemma inside. "Agent Romanoff?" Yoyo called out as she looked around. "Agent Romanoff, Simmons just wants to do one quick scan to make sure everything's fine." She frowned slightly when she couldn't see Natasha right away, so she went in deeper and looked through all the beds.
"I swear, it'll only take a moment and then we'll be out of your hair." Jemma said, making a conscious effort this time to not sound so... Soothing? Unlike Yoyo, she was just standing by the doorway currently tapping away on her tablet. She wanted to double check all the tests she'd set up so they could really make quick work of this.
"Jemma." Yoyo called the girl's attention, but Jemma didn't look up.
"Yes?" Jemma asked, still looking down at her screen.
"Natasha's not here." And at that, Yoyo effectively caught her attention and Jemma looked up to see all empty bunk beds around them.