AN: 01/13/19 Updated
AN: Kinda just wrote this and double checked it the same day, let me know if there's any glaring mistakes.
Natasha had been watching Ichigo Kurosaki for a week now and so far, he had displayed nothing that indicated he had any unnatural abilities. Unless being boring counted as a superpower, this guy lived a completely vanilla life. Wake, exercise, work, then sleep; a robotic routine as sure as the rise and fall of the sun.
Her daily reports back to Fury had been relatively sparse, reflecting the lack of anything noteworthy to see. This was not that unusual, like most surveillance missions, nothing tended to happen until something exploded. Then the surveillance part of her mission would be over, and it was time to put on her ass kicking boots. Currently her mission target had provided her little reason to think Fury wasn't wasting her time.
Ichigo was a man of habit. One week probably wasn't enough to establish this as fact, but Romanoff was willing to bet her favorite pair of hand-crafted Mongolian throwing knives that the man had been following the same pattern for years. Someone might deviate from their routine occasionally, but it took borderline obsession to follow the kind of spartan schedule Dr. Kurosaki did. The man practically had his routine down to the minute. Natasha made a mental note to add a possible case of OCD into the psychological profile she was building for Kurosaki.
Every morning he would wake up at exactly 0500 before his alarm sounded, head over to the sink and begin washing up. Downing a simple protein shake of milk, whey powder, crushed oats and raw egg whites, he would be out the door at 0515. The rest of the hour would be spent jogging at a brisk pace around the neighborhood until the sun rose.
Returning home at exactly 0600, he would spend the next hour in the backyard practicing kenjutsu with the bokken he kept in his living room. Exactly 500 strikes of each form of his flowing kata were performed meticulously in a brutal machine like fashion. Breakfast would be made and consumed before 0740, and then he would be out the door again, dressed in a semi casual attire after a quick shower. It would have been an odd style for a man in the medical field, but it somehow suited the odd clinic owner.
Arriving at work precisely at 0800, he would park his Mercedes in the exact same spot beneath the massive willow that provided shade throughout the hot afternoon. The rest of the day was spent working in his health clinic. Lunch was always takeout, brought to him by one of his staff members, the choice of food left up to the individual getting the meal. Dinner was a quiet affair at home after a lazy drive back. Following supper, he would take the trio of newspapers he subscribed to and head on down to a little hole in the wall bar nestled in a cozy small town shopping center a few blocks from his home. There, he would sit nursing a pint of ale, watching the television, browsing the papers or simply quietly staring off into space in a detached fashion.
No one ever joined him.
Ichigo would return home at 2300, go to bed and the whole routine would start over again in six hours. His clinic was open seven days a week, 8 a.m. to 6 p.m., so there was no deviation to his schedule even on weekends. It was like clockwork, both fascinating and mind numbingly boring to observe.
Natasha carefully applied the last bit of dark eyeshadow, manipulating the brush to get the smokey eyed effect she was going for. The spy leaned back to observe herself in the mirror, the unrecognizable woman in the reflection staring back with a content expression of self-satisfaction.
The apartment SHIELD had provided for this recon mission served both as a part of her cover and as a place for her to stay. It was a cozy little one bedroom thing of barely 900 square feet on the second floor of a three-story unit. Comfortable, but not exactly the lap of luxury. The spy had stayed in much worst dives in her time as a Russian asset, so she couldn't complain about her current accommodations.
A part of her wondered if this was what it felt like to take a vacation. She'd have to ask Clint the next time she saw him. Unlike her, he had more than his job to live for on the account that he had people waiting for him at home. Natasha had whatever safe house or cover story she had been assigned to next.
She frowned at the oddly distracted thought.
This was probably a sign that she was slowly losing her mind barely a week into the mission. Romanoff was a woman of action. Fury had given her no handler and no real parameters for this mission. Her orders were distressingly vague, something along the lines of do what was necessary to determine whether Kurosaki should be recruited. Was she supposed to seduce him? Beat him until he displayed some power to defend himself? Kidnap his family and blackmail some answers out of him?
Having too many choices could sometimes be paralyzing, but this was not the first time Natasha had to run her own mission. She decided after a week of watching that it was time to make contact if she wanted to get anywhere with this guy. If she didn't, she may slit her own wrists to spare herself the slow death from tedium.
The spy had dyed her hair blonde as a part of her cover, her naturally curly red hair straightened out so that they fell like a cascading waterfall down to her shoulder. The dark leather jacket she wore was kept open so that the rather tight red tank top she had underneath would show though. The thin red cloth allowed enough of her bosom to entice a peek, but not to scream for attention. That was what the delicate cerulean jeweled pendent dangling from her neck down into her cleavage was intended for.
The jacket was balanced out with a pair of worn Levis and thigh high boots that showed off her calves. A pair of electric blue contact lenses had been chosen to hide her natural green eyes, complementing the jewelry she had chosen.
All in all, it was a tongue wagging look that would hopefully help ease her transition into Dr. Kurosaki's life.
"Looking hot sweetheart."
The musical compliment would have been startling in the empty apartment had Natasha not recognized the lovely voice. A familiar hollow pang of sorrow filled her when she turned to face the speaker.
There was a young woman sitting on the couch in the living room, smiling brightly at Natasha. Dark brown hair curled around a heart shaped face, her bangs long enough to almost hide the alluring pair of chocolate kissed eyes staring out in wonder at the world. Her name was Angelina Ivanov and she didn't look a day older than sixteen.
And she never would, because Angelina was dead. Natasha had killed her as a part of her initiation after officially graduating from the Red Room. She was the only graduate in her class of twenty.
"Hello Angelina," the spy said softly as she joined her former comrade in the living room. "It's been a while since I've seen you. I had hoped you'd finally moved on."
Now up close, the SHIELD agent could see that the brunette was in fact slightly transparent. If Natasha stared hard enough, she could make out the faded plaid pattern of the couch through the ghostly woman's chest.
Angelina smiled sadly at her friend. "Oh Natalie, it's not so simple. We are tied to you in death, love. We all are."
Natasha looked away. When she first joined SHIELD, she had told Nick Fury that she wanted to erase some of the red on her ledger; she never told him why she had the sudden change of heart. Most killers didn't suddenly develop a conscious after years in the business, and Natasha was no exception.
The only difference between her and other murderers was that she could see the ghosts of those she killed following her around. She was trained not to feel anything for her targets, but it wasn't easy to forget them when their departed souls were drawn back to her like moths to flame, a constant reminder of her sins.
They weren't always visible, not unless she really concentrated and tried to see them. At night when the spy lay awake in bed tormented by memories of her past, she could hear them whispering, cursing her, hundreds of raging voices clamoring to different deities for vengeance. It had finally gotten to her, shaking her away from that cold disconnected place she had been conditioned into. Natasha couldn't bring those people she killed, and she had no other skill that could benefit the world. But she could ensure that the people she killed had more meaning than a simple paycheck.
Angelina was one of the few ghosts following her that was not angry, perhaps because she too had been an initiate of the Red Room. Under other circumstances their positions would be switched, Natasha being the one cursed to haunt her friend.
All the girls who were placed in the Red Room program were paired up at the beginning, told by their handlers that the girl they were partnered with was their battle sister. In a world full of deceit and lies, your partner was supposed to be the only one you could always trust your life with.
Then, on the day before they graduated, they were ordered to fight to the death. One final test to prove that they had truly killed their hearts, to see if they could take the final step to remove the only connection they had left in the world. Most failed, consigning both partners to termination due to failure.
Natasha hadn't.
"Crowd's gotten a bit bigger since we last talked," her pseudo sister commented lightly. "Getting hard to find elbow room around you."
Natasha turned to look at her friend, frowning at the reference to those she had killed. It had been almost a year since she had last seen Angelina, a year where her body count had risen by twenty-seven. A drop in the ocean compared to the numbers of lives she had ended in the almost two decades since she had first left the Red Room.
"Where did you go?" the spy asked out of curiosity.
The ghosts did not have to stay by her side from what she had observed. They could wander off for periods of time, travel the world unhindered by mortal limitations. But ultimately, they would be drawn back to the cause of their death, unable to stay away.
"I went to France for a little while," Angelina said with a soft airy smile. "Beautiful place, I think I stood on the Eiffel Tower for a few weeks. So many sunsets. They were so pretty; I couldn't stop looking at them. Maybe it was months. It's hard to tell time when you're dead, especially when I'm far away from you. I can't seem to focus very well."
Romanoff frowned at the distracted look in her friend's eyes. Angelina always seemed a little off after being away from her, and it took a while for her to return to normal, but she appeared more disconnected than normal.
"Angel," Natasha said using the old nickname she had given her. "Are you ok?"
Dull eyes finally seemed to focus as they looked at her as if seeing Natasha clearly for the first time. Gone was the lost reflection in her dark eyes; they now burned hot with unrestrained hate and rage.
"YOU!" the ghost suddenly shrieked, leaping to her feet. "IT WAS YOUR FAULT! YOU KILLED ME! WHY DID YOU GET TO LIVE?! WHY DID I DIE?! YOU! YOU DID THIS TO ME!"
Natasha took an uncertain step back, shaken by the sudden enraged outburst from her dead friend. She opened her mouth, wanting to say something, anything. But nothing came out. What could she say to the truth?
The ghost girl's shoulders heaved with exertion, her form seemed to swell and expand. Fingers curled up in twisted claws, reaching out as if she might strangle the living woman before her. Her pale face began to peel, the skin flaking away to bleed a milky white substance out of the horrible wounds. Split lips peeled back, revealing rotting teeth and her dark brown eyes melted into pools of endless midnight.
"Angel," Natasha pleaded, reaching out a hand hesitantly to her friend. "Please Angel, it's me Natalie. Please snap out of it."
A single tear rolled down her cheek as the spy watched the twisted form of her dead partner. The sight of the lone tear seemed to draw Angelina back from whatever depths she had been trapped in, and the naked animal rage left her eyes.
Her peeling skin smoothed out, her form shrinking, the wounds vanishing and returning her appearance to that of the sixteen year old girl that Natasha had strangled to death. Angelina's neck still bore the visible prints of her hand where she had squeezed, a constant visual reminder of what she had done to her friend.
"I'm sorry Natalie," Angelina said with a confused shake of her head. "I did that thing again didn't I?"
The spy wanted to hold her friend, but she knew from experience it would do nothing but chill her flesh to come in contact with a ghost. They could talk, but never touch. The barriers of life and death separated them. She withdrew her hand.
"No, I'm the one who should be sorry Angel," Natasha whispered turning away. The guilt that tore at her made her heart hurt. If she could go back in time and take her friends place, she would.
The ghost of the girl gave a watery smile, brushing her hair from her eyes. "Well I guess we can both be sorry then. It's getting harder to focus lately, harder to think. Ever since…"
Natasha frowned as she took a look at the chain her dead friend was fingering. Every ghost seemed to have one of those chains attached to their chest. She'd never bothered looking too closely at any of the spirits that followed her, but she was certain that Angelina's chain had been much longer than the single fist worth that was now left.
"What happened?" the redhead asked anxiously.
She'd never seen a ghost with such a short chain before.
"I don't know," admitted Angelina hesitantly, her expression baffled. "I tried asking some of the others I ran into while out in the world, but most either don't know or refuse to talk to me when they see my chain. They all say that I don't have much time left, that I will become one of them soon. I don't know what that means."
It was odd seeing the fear in her dead companion's eyes. One would think that death was the end to all fears, after all what more was there left to be frightened about? But it seemed even the dead were bothered by the same uncertainty of not knowing what came after dying still. It was just a different kind of unknown.
"Angel I…"
But what could Natasha say? There were no words that she had that could comfort the spirit of her friend, she had no more answers than the dead girl before her did. She couldn't even provide physical reassurance.
"It's ok Natalie," the ghost said with a sad smile. "What will happen, will happen. We must all face it in the end. I just thought that death was the end of all uncertainty."
Natasha grimaced as she looked away. Her emotions that she normally kept locked away tight was bubbling to the surface. With it came the sharpened clarity that forced her to see more of the dead. Already the living room seemed to be crowding with faint outlines of raging ghosts she normally happily ignored.
Angelina must have noticed her discomfort, for she quickly changed the topic.
"So, who's the target this time?" she asked eagerly. "Can I come with you?"
"It's not like I can stop you," Natasha said with a small smile.
Pulling out the image she had of Ichigo Kurosaki, she showed it to her dead comrade.
"Oh, he's cute," Angelina said with a cluck of her tongue as she eagerly leaned forward to examine the photo more closely. "I always had a thing for Asian men. I hope you don't have to kill him, although maybe that would give me a chance to get to know him better."
"I'm not here to assassinate him," Natasha replied as she briskly began the final preparations for her upcoming self-imposed mission. "We're just going to have ourselves a friendly little chat and see if there's anything unexpected he's hiding."
A swift glance at the clock showed that it was almost 1900. She would have to move quickly if she wanted to arrive at the bar before Kurosaki. He'd be less suspicious of her if she was already present when he came in.
Romanoff frowned as she considered the glossy photo of the scowling man in her hand one more time before putting it away. Perhaps he might have some answers if Fury's suspicions proved accurate.
AN: Probably a bit of deviation from her character, but hey it's fanfiction for a reason right? If I wanted to I can add spongebob into my story =D Though it would be pretty sick if Ichigo showed up in Avengers Infinity Wars…