The fear in the air was potent.
Shoes crashed against the pavement, slow and methodical and every bit predatory. The night air crackled with an energy that reeked of danger. He glanced over his shoulder, hoping that his diversion into the alley gave him safety and a chance to gather his bearings.
He should have known better.
The thick sole of a boot came crashing down against the side of his face, knocking him into the brick wall behind him. He let out a sharp hiss of pain as the rough stone dug into his cheek but the pain was short lived when he was yanked up by the front of his shirt and forced to face his attacker.
"Please," he begged.
"Please. I'm sorry. Don't hurt me. I'm a good guy," she mocked. "I like watching you beg. It's fun. Is that why you hurt those girls? Because you loved seeing the fear in their eyes?"
"They...they were asking for it. If you had been there and saw what they were weari-" A hand closed around his throat and cut off whatever he was going to say next. She tilted her head to the side and studied him with those eerie eyes. Eyes that had been rumored to haunt the crime underbelly of New York City.
"Do you want to repeat that bullshit?" she questioned. Her nails dug into his cheek and a slow, sadistic smirk spread across her lips. "Or would you like to make this easier for yourself?"
He nodded as best as he could against her tight grip and she released him, letting him fall back against the wall. The woman turned her back for a split second and he took that as his chance to lunge forward, his fist sloppily connecting with her nose as she swiveled her head to look at him. Blood dripped down her lip and onto her chin and illuminated the brilliant grin that grew and grew and grew on her lips.
"Now that….that was fucking idiotic," she spat.
And the next thing he remembered was waking up in the hospital with two cops staring down at him, handcuffed to the bed, with a dislocated shoulder, six broken bones.
She gingerly stepped upstairs, careful to avoid the creaking steps so that Mrs Henderson in A3 wouldn't be woken up by her arrival. The sun was already rising on the city that never sleeps, but that didn't mean that she couldn't extend some kind of courtesy to her neighbors.
The dark haired woman approached B2 and unlocked her door, pushing it open with her shoulder. The dim apartment greeted her with only a few rays of sunlight coming into the dilapidated windows. A dirty mattress was shoved up against one wall with a simple blanket and pillow thrown on top. Other than that, the apartment was entirely bare aside from a few books scattered about the place and the remnants of food shoved here and there in the kitchen. The woman wiped the blood out from under her nose and went to the eternally dripping faucet to wash her hands before she started a pot of coffee on her five dollar machine.
The air shifted just slightly as she opened the utensil drawer. The woman let out a soft chuckle and held up the gun that rested against her spatula, pointing it in the direction of her bathroom.
"How long have you been here?" she asked.
A taller woman emerged from the closet sized bathroom, her hands raised in innocence but no hint of surprise on her face.
"Long enough. Got enough for two?"
They regarded each other coolly before the shorter woman nodded, placing her gun on the counter and getting out two coffee mugs. She poured them both some of the liquid gold and passed it to the mahogany skinned woman.
"Gonna tell me why you're here now? Surely this isn't a courtesy call, Becks."
"We need you."
"Well that's a fucking shame because I remember being put on leave and indefinitely suspended. And here comes the mighty Rebecca Blake doing Fury's dirty work. You can tell him to fuck off."
Rebecca sighed and leaned against the crumbling counter. She watched as the other woman reached up and cleanly snapped her nose back into place with barely a grimace. She then reached up, opened a cabinet, took out a bottle of Svedka, and took a long drink.
"Barton and Murakami have been compromised."
That got her attention.
"When?"
"Yesterday. An Asgardian god stole the Tesseract and used some sort of mind control on them."
"Do we know where they are?"
"No. Loki is powerful. That's why we need your help. Romanoff's been called in as well."
"Who else? If you're coming to me, it's bigger than Nat and I."
"Captain Rogers. Dr. Bruce Banner. Stark."
"That's a good lineup. Why me?"
"You know why, Dragon."
The infamous Dragon let out a sardonic chuckle and shook her head before sighing. "How long do I have?"
"You have twenty minutes. Maybe take a shower. Clean up your knuckles. You look like shit."
"Thanks Becks," she drawled. "Missed you too."
With a record breaking two minute shower in icy water, the Dragon purposefully slammed her cabinets to ensure that Rebecca knew just how unenthused she was by this news. Wrapping a towel around her, she headed back out to the living room where Rebecca talked quietly on the phone. The Dragon flashed her a sardonic smile and dropped the towel to the eye roll of her former handler. She tugged on a plain black t-shirt, jeans, and tennis shoes before letting her dark curls free from the bun she held them in.
Padding over to the sagging mattress in the corner, the dark haired woman pried a section of the floor boards off to reveal a large silver case with a SHIELD insignia impressed upon the front.
The Dragon pulled it out and set it on the floor, cracking open the lid to reveal a black catsuit surrounded by various weapons. Her fingers ran down the rough kevlar fabric of the suit and the red piping that lined the edges and down, down, down to the buckle at her utility belt where a roaring dragon was emblazoned across the metal.
She shut her eyes for a moment and inhaled sharply, the smell of gunpowder, ash, and burning flesh drifting through her mind. Yanking herself out of her mind, the Dragon slammed the top of the case down and locked it. She stood, the silver handle clutched tightly in her hand, and faced Rebecca.
"This better be quick," she announced.
Rebecca looked down at the case in her hands and then let her eyes trail up to meet the cold, hard gaze of the Dragon. Something told her that this would be one of the last times they stepped into the tiny apartment. The Dragon, also known as Jane Doe, didn't seem too torn up by that possibility. There was nothing she felt attached to in this place. There was nothing she remembered and no little trinkets she kept near and dear as a reminder of her past.
She had no past. She had no name. She was simply an asset that SHIELD rescued from a warehouse three years ago.
And so when Captain Rogers looked at her with remembrance and maybe even a hint of fear in his eyes, the name of an unknown woman on his tongue that rang absolutely zero bells in her mind, the strings of fate began to unravel.
A/N: to the guest who reviewed and said they were having a bit of deja vu, yes! This is the same story. I have been working on this story for almost a decade at this point and I was never satisfied with it but after Endgame, I said fuck it. Write the damn story. A lot has changed from the various drafts I've put out before so I hope you stick around!