Merciful

Chapter One: Avian Nine

I sighed as I curled one last strand of my black hair. It had taken hours; my hair refused to hold curls. Today, I had some free time, though, before the birthday of one of my colleagues' kid.

When finally I arrived at the park, the first thing I did was check out different vantage points, mainly the thin woods that surrounded half of the park. Suspiciously, there was a pile of upturned earth, as if someone had been digging. I didn't bother it, though; whoever it was didn't need to know the extent of my knowledge.

"Ag - Jaida!" my colleague said with false enthusiasm. I hadn't actually been invited, and by her worried eyes, she knew there was something up. "Wonderful to see you here?"

I smiled at her. "Hey. I brought a present."

I handed her the sparkly blue bag and uncharacteristically wrapped the woman in a hug. She stiffened; we didn't know each other well, being in completely different branches.

"Don't worry about anything," I whispered. "Just treat me as an old friend and I will take care of everything else."

She nodded shakily and I pulled away, greeting her little children.

I looked nervously around the scarily white room. Several other children my age - about five years old - shuffled around quietly, extremely out of character for their ages. The second the door had opened and the warden had gently pushed me in, the other children had looked up at me, studied me closely for a minute, and returned to their silent thinking and occasional conversations.

"Hi," I said shyly. "I'm Jaida!"

One of the girls blinked in confusion. "No, you aren't. You're name is Avian."

I frowned before deciding she was playing a game. "What's your name?"

"Avian!" the girl said, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. I shrugged and went along with it; these girls seemed nice, like my old friends.

Though I had that childish innocence that allowed me to believe that I would connect easily with these other girls, I didn't know just how close we would become.

Halfway through the party, I heard a loud chirp. My head jerked up immediately at the signal, and I excused myself, walking towards the trees.

When I was enveloped in the woods, I whistled loudly, copying a certain bird call. The next couple seconds were devoted to patterned bird calls until they faded away into their seemingly random chatter. I smirked slightly, though; I now knew all I needed.

"Avian Nine, just whistle."

"Why?" I asked in confusion. I was ten, and beginning to get difficult.

The tester sighed patiently. "Just whistle a small tune, and maybe put some feel into it."

"I don't-"

"Fine. Just listen to this, then, tell me what you hear."

Birdsong filled the room, and I listened silently. Soon, my eyes widened; I could understand it!

"The birds," I breathed. "They're calling to each other, preparing to fly south for the winter. It isn't exactly in ways that we can understand… but I can."

As I strode silently through the woods, comforted by the sound of the birds, I reached into my tall boots, removing two knives. Finally, I came upon a man on the edge of the forest, staring out at the playing children.

"Hello, sir," I said coldly. He jumped and spun around, leveling a rifle at me.

I whistled sharply. "Nice weapon, there; it isn't of any use to you." White missiles rained down on the man, splattering all over. He dropped the gun in disgust; bird poop.

"Let me guess," the man hissed. "S.H.I.E.L.D."

"Yes," I replied shortly before throwing a knife. It cut right through the man's neck.

"Let me guess," the man tied to a chair in front of me said drily. "Female assasin and skilled tourturess? Red Room?"

He was being sarcastic; he and everyone like him believe the Red Room was finished, Natasha Romanoff the only remnant of the failed group. However….

"Yes," I replied simply. The man scoffed.

"Red Room was shut down."

"Only the Black Widow division," I said coldly. "I am Avian Nine."

"Real nice name," the man said sarcastically, but I could see his apprehension.

I sighed. "They've learned their lesson; no more false memories." I didn't let him say anything as my blades ripped through his throat.

The next few minutes I spent getting rid of any visible blood and disguising the body. I also took down exact coordinates; the clean up crew would need them to retrieve the body.

"Natasha Romanoff. What are you doing here."

The Russian looked at me suspiciously. After all, I was in a room surrounded by dead or unconscious S.H.I.E.L.D. agents. "I'm the clean up crew. And you are?"

I smirked. "Avian Nine. No, you don't know me? Perhaps this will help; I was raised by Red Room."

Her eyes widened. "Impossible! They were shut down."

"The Black Widow wing. I'm an Avian."

"Avian Nine? Creative name."

I shrugged. "It doesn't have to be."

Suddenly urgent, Natasha took a step closer. "Listen; nothing good can come of the Red Room. They're using you for their own ends."

"You think I don't know that? I've been with them for nearly thirty years now. I was raised by them; this is the only life I know."

"You don't look thirty. You must be in your teens."

"You don't look seventy."

Natasha sighed. "Just because you've never know another life, that doesn't mean you can't try. Trust me; I've been in your situation before."

I shook my head. "No, you haven't. Your handlers were idiots who directly disobeyed orders and branched off. You were implanted with false memories and handled completely incorrectly. I was not."

"You talk as if we are some sort of animal," Natasha said in disgust.

I snorted and drew my bow. "Close enough, Black Widow. I'm guessing you want to know why I am called Avian Nine?"

I looked up at the sky when I had finished; it was late in the year and already beginning to grow dark. Smiling slightly, I began loping towards a tree at high speed. When I reached the trunk, instead of swerving around, I stepped up and flipped over backwards. Before I even hit the ground, I was a large eagle owl, beating the air with my wings and rising steadily until I was coasting on the thermals towards base.

"A little, yes."

I smirked. "Avian. Bird. I had a slightly different training than you. However, even you would have learned this trick if you hadn't defected."

"What trick?" Natasha said with slight apprehension. I replied by vaulting into the air and morphing into a beautiful owl, soaring over her stunned head. Red Room: One, S.H.I.E.L.D.: Zero.

Finally, I landed at the base in New York.

"Fury said to stop taking unconventional means of departure," Natasha said as I landed as a human. I smirked.

"Unconventional is a matter of opinion," I said. "Anyways, I'm fifty years old as of today; I'm getting up there, and I hope to live it up till the end!"

Natasha sighed. "Normal people don't brag about how old they are; they brag about how young they are."

"Normal people can't live seemingly infinitely," I retorted. "But if you want to be normal, I'm forty years younger than you."

Natasha glared at me as we made our way through the base. "Fine. You asked for it."

Natasha immediately whirled around, but I was ready, meeting her sharp uppercut with a block. Natasha's free hand moved to deliver a blow to my gut, but I collapsed to the ground and rolled between her legs, barely avoiding her kicking them together. As soon as I was balanced, I swept my legs out in an effort to knock Natasha down, but she was expecting the move, jumping over my legs and into a flip that ended with me knocking her from the air. Natasha skidded across the black pavement, immediately hopping up. Natasha fell into a balanced crouch while I rested on my toes, assessing one another to see who would move first. By mutual decision, we both slipped forward at the same time, eyes never leaving each other, analyzing every move the other made.

Several swipes and kicks later, an arrow whizzed past my ear and I froze, immediately dropping into a low crouch uncharacteristic of myself. As soon as I had determined the point the arrow had been shot from, one of my own went flying, alongside a dagger from Natasha.

"Ah! Jeez, try to kill me, why don't you?"

I knew the Red Room lied, I knew they had been harsh at times, that they were using me, but I hadn't known everything. Recently, I had uncovered a file on myself. Basically, the gist of it was that Red Room had specifically chosen my parents, with my father being a Red Room scientist. He had found and seduced my mother, and as soon as I was independent enough, murdered her and staged his own death. As an orphan, Red Room was easily able to get ahold of me. Not only that, apparently I was developing at too slow a rate; I was expendable. Every mission could be my last. I may have been willing to be loyal to Red Room, but I valued my own life much more.

Of course, when I arrived at HQ in a huff, I didn't expect to see it burnt down, the remains of my sisters, blood or not, hanging and burning.

"Oh my gosh," I said, putting a hand up to my mouth. I began running forward, completely disregarding my own safety. A small bomb suddenly went off, blasting me away.

When I came to, a man stood above me.

"Jaida Liao. I am Clint Barton, and I'm here to talk to you about S.H.I.E.L.D."

Natasha and I gave Clint identical glares.

"Perhaps if you didn't interrupt our fights all the time," Natasha began, "we might have more regard for your safety."

"Come on, Nat, we all know you would have won," Clint whined, before squealing slightly as a hand cracked across his face.

"I could have," I said. "After all, Natasha's been slowing down."

"Are you call me old again?" Natasha asked slowly.

"It depends," I replied. "Did I mention anything about age?"

"You said-"

"Girls!" Our faces both snapped over to Clint in glares. "Jaida, Fury wants you. Nat, we have an ops mission coming up."

We both nodded before turning to each other.

"I'll best you next time," I promised.

"You haven't even once yet," Natasha said smugly. "I just keep getting better."

"So do I."

"Director Fury," I greeted.

"Why would you even consider allowing me into your elite little group here?" I sneered at the Director. "After all, I'm the creation of your enemies."

Fury rose an eyebrow. "It wasn't my idea. A little bird told me you could be of use, excuse the pun."

"Did this little birdie happen to be a Russian arachnid with red hair?" I asked disdainfully. "Well. Softer than her files said."

"Would you consider it?"

I hesitated, biting my lip and thinking about all of those files.

"Agent Liao," Fury replied. His hands were folded behind his back as he looked out the window. "Would you mind looking to my desk?"

I did so, and immediately pulled out my bow. "Sir. There is an intergalactic criminal sitting in your chair."

A/N: So yesterday, I was wandering around Seventh Sanctum. I'm sure a few of you know how ridiculous some of the things on there can be, but this time, I got lucky. At first, I was completely skeptical, until I really thought about it. I also got the character description from the site, under ninjas. I can see this story going places! Stick around!

Bonus: If you stick around till the end, I will make sure to show you the ridiculous challenge the site gave me!