A/N: This is my first ever fanfic, so please be nice. Or at least pretend to be. Things you should know: This is set after AOU, and it's as though Clint had stayed with the Avengers instead going home to his family. Italics in most cases will be Natasha's thoughts. I tried to make this as in character as possible, please let me know what you think, and if I should update, because I have a lot more written. WARNINGS: Language, mentions of sex, abortion, violence, blood. Enjoy:)

Also, DISCLAIMER: I wish I owned all of these characters but the majority of them I do not. sad. :(

Chapter One:

It was a very boring day at the Avengers compound. Steve was exploring the joys of television while Bruce tried to explain to him how wifi worked, Thor was having way too much fun chasing Clint around with a banana, (long story,) Tony was fooling around in his lab causing slightly worrying explosions every half-hour or so, Wanda and Vision were nowhere to be seen, (as usual,) and Natasha was at the shooting range. No surprise there. All in all it was basically like every day had been for the past two months since they'd defeated Ultron - boring - and Natasha was aching for some excitement. She wasn't used to lounging around for so long without a mission.

After she'd practically shredded the cardboard dummy on the other side of the shooting range, she wasn't really tired but she decided to go see what the others were doing. It was about six o'clock, so somebody was probably making food.

Natasha walked into the living room to find Steve looking slightly scared, Thor looking confused, Bruce looking amused and Clint laughing like a maniac.

"What's so funny?" she asked.

"Ste- *wheeze* Steve doesn't-" Was Clint's attempt at an answer before he collapsed on the ground, shaking with laughter. Natasha looked over at Steve to find him looking slightly sheepish.

"I showed Steve one of the new tracking systems on my tablet that we've been testing out, and Steve looked at the moving dot and didn't know what it was... so he asked if it was a meme." Bruce answered calmly, but his eyes sparkled with the indication that he was on the verge of ending up like Clint.

"A meme?"

Steve curled into himself despite the smile on his face. "Well I knew it was something to do with modern technology."

Clint finally took control of himself enough to speak. "You've been here for, like, 5 years, how do you not know what a meme is? Or at least that it's NOT that?" Clint said incredulously before collapsing into fits of laughter again.

As Clint, Natasha and Bruce tortured Steve, (and Thor tried to act like he knew what was going on) Tony walked in with his arms spread and his hair sticking straight up.

"I've done it, folks, I've found the answer to the universe." He announced as he walked in. "Save the applause. Or don't."

"What have you done this time?" Nat asked, rolling her eyes at his dramatic entrance and ragged appearance.

"Well, two things actually. One, I created a machine that can make new life all on it's own, no need for that disgusting yet also awesome procreation process. And don't worry, sex can still be a thing. I considered that deeply. But this box… thing… can actually create a new human. How, you ask? Well that brings in my second accomplishment. I convinced the people who managed Helen Cho's project to share some of their technology that made the cradle, and combined it with my own invention. The people that it can make - well, they're not technically people - but they have fully comprehending brain-type thingamajiggies and can walk, and talk and all that shit. Kinda like robots, but-"

"So you made an Ultron maker?" Bruce asked incredulously.

"No! Of course not. This thing isn't combined with Jarvis, and I'm not trying to save the world. It's a different thing entirely."

"Doesn't sound like it." Clint mumbled, getting up to head upstairs.

"No! Wait. I'll show you. Come down to the lab. Pleeeeease... it's super cool."

Everyone looked apprehensive, with all the experience they'd had with this kind of thing lately. But Steve spoke up.

"I'll come see it. If you say it's different, I want to see for myself." He got up from his chair and began to head down to the lab. Nat shrugged and followed him. Eventually, Clint and Bruce gave up, and Tony punched the air, a look of proud glee on his face.

Down in the lab, everything was pretty chaotic. The floors had random liquids dripping from several countertops, and at least one thing was smoking. Other than that, tiny tools and pieces of technology littered every surface, and in the corner was an ugly looking box thing. There wasn't much to say about it besides the fact that it looked like a refrigerator crossed with an MRI machine. It was pretty different from The Cradle, but you could see the similarities.

"What the hell is that?" Natasha asked, carefully stepping over a loose wire that seemed to be sparkling.

"It's my new-"

BOOM.

The room shook as one of the pieces of technology right behind Natasha exploded. She lurched forward into Tony, and he fell to the ground. Behind her, Bruce stumbled, knocking her into the box thingy which smashed. She felt blood seeping through her t-shirt as an alarm right above her head blared. She tried to shift away from it, but rolled onto a button which activated the working half of Tony's machine. It buzzed to life with a deafening crackle, and Natasha felt an inexplicable feeling rush through her. Her body felt weird. She heard Clint and Steve yelling on the other side of the room, and something else exploded. The machine fizzled, and then everything went dark.

There was a beep, and then Natasha returned to consciousness. She heard hushed tones in the corner, and something was sticking into her arm. Her back ached, and something inside her felt different. Actually, multiple things. Then she felt someone touch her face, and her training kicked in. She grabbed the arm in question, twisted it, sat up and pulled one of the many knives out from her belt. She held it to the person's neck and only then did her vision clear.

She was in a SHIELD Med wing, and a very terrified looking Bruce was holding up his free arm, signaling for her to stop. She frowned and released him.

"Sorry." She said, noticing how groggy her voice sounded.

"'S'okay." Bruce squeaked, stepping back a little bit.

"You worried me for a minute there." Clint said as he walked over to her bed. He was followed by Tony and Steve. As she saw the disappointed and guilty look on Tony's face, and the dirt and blood on Steve's, she remembered what happened. But before she could ask Tony or Bruce about what that machine did to her, Fury walked in.

"Romanoff! I'm glad you're okay, I heard about what happened."

Natasha nodded at her boss. "How long was I out?" She asked Bruce.

"About 20 minutes. As far as I can see, you're okay other than a gash on your back, and even that only needed a couple of stitches. You don't have a concussion… I'm honestly not sure why you were out for so long. Or why you were out in the first place." Bruce said, frowning, concern and confusion evident on his face. Natasha reached up behind her ear to trace her scar, something she did sometimes when she was thinking. But it wasn't there. She knew it should be, that scar had been there since the Red Room, since she was about 14. It made no sense that it would just disappear.

"It's gone." She accidentally said out loud.

"What's gone?" Tony asked.

"My scar, it's gone." She said, a little louder this time. This was definitely not normal.

"You mean the one behind your ear?" Clint asked. She'd told him about the scar a few years ago. He knew pretty much everything about her. "May I?" He asked, reaching for the side of her head. She nodded, and he gently felt under her hair. Then he frowned.

Natasha then realized several things at the same time. Number 1: Her ankle didn't hurt, even though she'd sprained it a few days ago jumping off of a roof. It hadn't hurt that much, but it was noticeable. Now it was just gone, like the scar. Number 2: Yesterday, she'd been grating cheese for the pasta that Steve had been making and she'd slipped and hurt her finger. Now, the cut was completely non-existent. And number 3: She felt slightly nauseous.

As she considered all of these things, she began to form an idea. "Stark… your machine was built with technology that Helen Cho used to heal Clint, right?" She confirmed. Tony nodded.

"It's the same stuff, essentially."

"And I activated it, and it would explain…" She trailed off, then looked to Bruce. "I think the machine healed me. Like, everything. The scar, my ankle, the cut… they're all gone. It would explain what the machine was doing when I turned it on, that definitely felt weird."

"You turned it on?!" Tony yelled, his eyes widening.

"By accident. I'm not an idiot Tony. But if the machine healed me, all of me… if it fixed everything, then that means… that it… it fixed… everything."

She looked to Clint, who seemed to understand what she was thinking. Bruce looked at the two of them looking at each other, and understanding dawned on his face. Fury had clearly figured it out long before any of them. But Tony and Steve had no clue.

"What? Why are you all looking at each other like that? It's kinda creepy…" Tony looked from Natasha to Bruce to Fury to Clint, trying to figure out what was going on. Clint, Bruce and Fury all stayed silent, looking to Natasha to explain. It wasn't theirs to tell. Natasha sighed.

"I... was sterilized in the Red Room." She said simply. "But if the machine healed me then it's possible that it healed that too." She explained.

There was a bit of an awkward silence. Actually, a very awkward silence.

Tony was shocked. This explained why she never seemed to be on her period. Steve was concerned, and he wanted to say something, but he felt like apologizing wasn't the right thing to do. He felt extremely out of place, and uncomfortable to say the least.

"Do you want me to do an ultrasound?" Bruce asked, mostly just to change the subject. "Because it could confirm your theory."

Natasha considered. Did she really want to know? And even if she did, did she want to deal with the awkwardness of finding out she was wrong? But she'd already made a scene anyway...

"Sure." She said coolly, trying to act as though this was perfectly normal. As Bruce set everything up, Tony, Clint and Steve respectfully left to clean up the lab. Natasha looked to Fury, who was clearly distracted. He had looked to the other side of the room as Bruce began the ultrasound, but Natasha could tell he had something he needed to talk about.

"What?" She asked, looking at Fury with the stare that most people crumpled underneath. He glanced over at her and sighed.

"There's a base, where HYDRA operatives had been working, that we sent some of our agents to take down. They never returned, and we don't know where it is because you can only get there by meeting with someone who does know where it is. Even with our tracking methods and all the fancy-pancy technology we have, we can't find it. So we need someone to go undercover and figure out what's going on." He paused. "You were the most qualified for the job."

Natasha relaxed a little bit, relieved that no one had died or anything. "Why didn't you just say that?" She asked him, confused by his somber attitude.

"Because it's very dangerous. And… the base is in Russia, near Belarus. We have reason to believe they're working with the Red Room."

Natasha's heart jolted. Her automatic reaction was to either say yes and kill everyone there in cold-blooded revenge, or refuse. But this was a mission. Just a mission. Just like the hundreds of others she'd gone on before. This had a personal connection, but that didn't matter. She needed to stay professional. This was important.

"I'll do it, of course I'll do it." She stated.

"Good, because you need to leave tomorrow. It's-"

"Oh my god." Bruce whispered.

"What?" Natasha's head swerved to the ultrasound machine, where Bruce was staring.

"You were right… more than we thought." He said quietly, pointing to a spot on the screen. Natasha squinted, but couldn't see what he was referring to. "That right there…" Bruce pointed at the screen again. "Is your uterus. Perfectly healthy. And right there…" He rolled the wand again, as though to make sure he was seeing things correctly. "Is… a baby. Well, a fetus."

Natasha blinked. It was as though her brain had turned off. She was… pregnant? That wasn't possible. Her reproductive system had only been restored half an hour ago and now she was pregnant?! It's not like she'd had sex since half an hour ago. She'd thought this was impossible, that she'd never be able to have kids…

"No, that's not possible." She said firmly.

"I think it is." Bruce mumbled, disbelief coating his voice. "I need to talk to Tony." He said, and jumped up from his stool. He just left Natasha there.

Fury stood in the corner awkwardly, not sure whether he should leave or not. Natasha grabbed the wand from where it lay on her stomach and moved it around. Sure enough, there was a small dot right in the middle of the screen. She wasn't an idiot, she knew what that dot was. But even if she was pregnant, it shouldn't be this visible yet. But the machine had the human-like-robot-making technology in it, and maybe it could have sped up the process a little bit. After all, it was Tony Stark who had built it. And just the fact that it had managed to restore her entire reproductive system was enough, why not add to the package?

She reached over to the side table and grabbed a wipe. She cleaned up the gel on her abdomen, placed the wand back in its holster on the ultrasound machine and switched it off. Then she stood up, walked right past Fury and out of the Med wing. Then she walked down the hallway. And out of the building. And down the street.

She felt numb. This was still so unbelievable. But she was pregnant… or was she? Maybe Bruce was wrong… maybe that dot was something else, or maybe this was all a dream…

She snapped back to reality when she felt her stomach contents rise in her throat. She bolted to the nearest trash can and violently threw up. Several passers-by stared at her, and one asked if she was okay.

"She's fine." A gruff voice said behind her. She turned around to see Clint, waving off the concerned citizens. He pulled back her hair as she spit into the trash can, and he handed her a tissue. She found it funny that he, a master assassin and Avenger, kept tissues in his bag like a grandma. Useful though.

"Thanks." She croaked out, cursing her voice for sounding so pitiful. "I'm fine." She said and continued walking.

"Hey." He said softly, gently grabbing her arm. "I heard what happened. That's…" He stopped, meeting her eyes. She couldn't really tell what he was thinking from his expression, but they both knew that this wasn't exactly a good thing.

"Yeah…" She mumbled, tears stinging in her eyes. Damn you Natasha! Why are you crying? I mean, come on!

She quickly looked away and blinked the tears back. Then she smiled thinly at Clint.

"Come on, Bruce is wondering where you went." He said, leading her back to the facility.

"Natasha!" Nat swiveled around to see Bruce running toward her once they got back in the building. "Where did you go?"

"Nowhere."

"Well, I talked to Tony and he said that he'll look at the machine and see how this happened. He did say that it wasn't impossible. Well, clearly. He's pretty embarrassed, he's down in the lab studying it. This is unbelievable... But congratulations!" Bruce exclaimed.

Natasha wished he hadn't said that. She'd just found out this was possible 10 minutes ago, and she needed some time to process. She would probably just sit in her room and watch bad movies with a bottle of vodka… oh wait. Nevermind, she was fucking pregnant. But she wasn't even sure if she would keep the baby or not. I mean, the Black Widow? A mother? She had pretty bad emotional skills, and way too much trauma… no, she probably wouldn't keep it. It didn't even have a father, for god's sake! Just a fucking machine!

As more and more people surrounded her, congratulating her, asking her questions and giving her very unwanted hugs, she began to panic. She needed to be alone, she needed everyone to shut up! And was that Karen from downstairs? Who the hell told this many people in such a short time? She was gonna kill whatever doddering idiot went and spread the news like her personal business was butter.

"Oh my god Nat, that's amazing! Congrats! Do you think it's a boy or girl?"

"Wow, it's a miracle! Aren't you happy? Wait- do you think you'll have it here?"

"How does a machine even do that? Did you know that could happen?"

"Who's gonna be the godmother?"

"Eeee! This is amazing! A baby! You should sit down, you know-"

Just as she was about to scream "Get the fuck off of me", Fury cleared the surprisingly large crowd and took her by the arm.

"I need to discuss a mission with Agent Romanoff." He announced, and steered her out of the room. They entered the elevator, and as the doors shut she calmed down. Thank god.

"Thanks." She breathed.

"You're welcome. But we actually do need to talk about the mission." Here he looked at her seriously. "It would be for at least a month, maybe two. Bruce said that because of the enhancement technology in Stark's machine, you're about two months along. You still wanna go? I'm not sure if you have… personal issues to take care of."

Or course he knew she wasn't planning to keep it. He was a pretty perceptive person. But she didn't know. And she was already two months? That was more than she'd thought. She would have to keep it unless she did it now, because she wouldn't have access to anything like that where she was going to be going. Particularly because she wouldn't want them to know that she was pregnant - never disclose your weaknesses. It was literally now or never. Unless she didn't take the mission… but they needed her. Apparently she was the only one qualified to go. She had several decisions to make, but here, in this elevator, her brain had seemed to stop working.

"Uh." Was all she said. Wow, real helpful Romanoff. Nice going. Do pregnancy hormones make a person dumb?

"I can give you 24 hours to think about it. No more. If you accept, we'll brief you on the mission and give you 3 hours to prepare." He looked at her for a second. Really looked at her. He had always been like a father to her, always seen her. He put a hand on her shoulder. "Good luck Romanoff. Let me know."