All right I'll keep this as brief as possible. There are just a couple of things I need to say. First Choices and Consequences has 7 followers and six reviews with three being guest reviews and the other three being from Not-A-Robot28, syzygy101, and veronica2shoes, so first I am happy you're enjoy my story so far, and hope you continue to. Also thank you for the reviews. I always enjoy them whether they are praise or constructive.
Now one question I believe was about characters going OOC. Honestly that might happen with Banner as I said I don't know the character that well. Never read the Hulk comics, and the only information I get from the character was from this encounters with the characters in the comic universe, and there is little to work with in Marvel's Cinematic Universe as Marvel can't do a solo film without letting Universal Studios control the character. I know it's strange, but that's what Marvel got for selling off all the rights to different studios back in the late 1990's. Anyway all I can use really for Banner is what I know about the character and from places like Wikepidia, Marvel Wiki, and Marvel's Cinematic Wiki page, so I apologize if Bruce is anyway out of character.
I don't believe I will have that problem with the Black Widow. I have always loved the character in the comics, I have liked what Marvel has done with the character in film, and love Scarlett Johansson's portrayal of the character ad both Natasha are such a complex character, but I believe I know both well and understand them. I think some people have hard time with this, but Natasha on screen is a slightly different character than the one in the comics, which means the Natasha on film will have different experiences than the Natasha in the comics. Also I have to say this, but stagnant characters are boring and uninteresting without character growth yet some people were pissed off that Natasha grew and changed as a character in film from her days in the Red Room to joining S.H.I.E.L.D. to Iron Man 2, Avengers, Winter Soldier and Age of Ultron. Scarlett's Natasha first appeared on screen in 2010, and it's been five years since then with the character finding a family with Clint and Laura, meeting Tony, Steve, Thor, and Bruce along with encountering aliens and gods, so of course the character will change with the new experience, and so matter how man walls someone builds up around themselves to protect them from the world and to do their job they can come crumbling down. This isn't out of character it's something called character development, , which can be a problem in the comics with the characters have been around for so long and Marvel recycling so many stories and plot developments as well with writers bringing their own views and takes on the character that aren't always good.
Sorry I need to get that off as I love both incarnations of Natasha. As for the story I am anchoring her in the cinematic universe, but taking elements of her history and attaching it to the character. Chapter 2 had been originally close to eleven thousand words not counting my authors note, and it entirely focuses on Natasha her character and thoughts with her past, Age of Ultron to the present. That's how much I love the character, but I decided to cut this long chapter into two chapters to give the reader a break, so the good news is you'll get another chapter probably tomorrow, and the bad news you Bruce and Natasha won't find each other again until chapter 4.
Here I am saying I was going to post anymore authors notes or keep them short, but here I did it again. I am sorry for that, but I need to say some things. I hope you can forgive me for that, and enjoy the second chapter.
CHAPTER TWO
Natasha woke in pain as she turned to her side irritating her ribs. She had suffered one broken left rib, and the rest were bruised after the disaster two days ago in Chicago. Even with her heightened healing ability thanks to the Red Room, she wouldn't anywhere near a hundred percent for at least a week. Looking at the clock on her night stand in her small room in the new Avengers Intuitive Base it Natasha saw it was four in the morning, which didn't bother her since she rarely got more than a few hours of sleep a night. Natasha took a shower, put on her exercise equipment, and first went for a run. As she ran around the base with only a flicker of lights on as only a few people lived on base the ones with no lives like Steve, Maria Hill, and Wanda Maximoff. Sam Wilson lived outside the base renting an apartment near the base. James Rhodes still was part of the US military, but worked allowed to work with the Avengers, so he wasn't on the base much, and Natasha didn't trust that. Since she had been no longer affiliated with the United States government Natasha had realized she preferred that, and didn't want to go back, and certainly didn't trust the government's intentions especially after what General Ross implied about the Avengers and Bruce.
Thinking about Bruce her lovable messed up dork made her stop in her tracks nearly falling to the ground. Natasha had blocked him from her mind as she had once been able to do. Natasha blocked everything out as to not feel anything going back to her Black Widow persona. With the Avengers Intuitive Fury and Stark decided to hire a small number of private soldiers to help the Avengers. Nowhere near the size of S.H.I.E.L.D. as the US wouldn't allow that, and Natasha worked the regular recruits training them harder than normal pushing them beyond their limits forcing some to collapse in exhaustion, others she nearly crippled in combat training just because Natasha had taken things too far when they underestimated her size and ability or those stupid enough to hit on her, and others nearly died forcing some to quit. This forced Fury and Steve to step in talking to her knowing it was because of Bruce, but Natasha had cut them off forcing Fury and Steve her from training the recruits. He time with helping Steve work with the new Avengers didn't fare much better. The team just had no chemistry or jelled together like when it was just Steve, Clint, Bruce, Thor, Tony, and her. Sure they were far from perfect, but they managed to get along and work well together. Their new team of Steve, James, Sam, Wanda, and the Vision, just weren't working or functioning well together. Sure they could easily handle some terrorists, or the new upstart organization trying to replace Hydra in A.I.M. led by a man named MODOK, but when it came to the team being backed by Elihas Starr going by the name of Egghead and the leader and backing behind the outlaw and terrorist group known as the Masters of Evil that was filled with dangerous and powerful super powered mutants who had been stealing, kidnapping, murdering across the North America. Without being a well jelled team or the backing of their own strong men like Thor or the Hulk the Avengers didn't stand a change, and it nearly cost them their lives.
Natasha walked back to the Avengers compound still thinking of Bruce. Did he hate her for what she did by kissing him pushing him into the pit taking his choice away? Did Bruce think she was just manipulating him from the beginning to gain the trust and some control of the Hulk. In her old life or over five years ago she wouldn't have hesitated, as even with her being part of S.H.I.E.L.D. she put the mission above everything even using good people to get the job done, but things slowly change when Clint trusted her enough to let her know about him being married and introducing her to Laura. Natasha soon grew to like having friends in Laura and Clint who she didn't have to lie to or completely lie to or be fake with, and showing her there was more to life outside of the mission. Natasha was happy for Clint, but Natasha never thought she deserved what Clint had. She was a monster created by the Red Room who's only job was to complete the mission, and she had so much blood on her hands working for the Red Room and S.H.I.E.L.D.. What right did Natasha have to want to live or be happy? Still she found some peace with Clint and Laura and their family. Through her thawing thanks to Clint, Natasha was able to become friends with Steven Rogers the legendary Captain America. After the battle of New York the two had started working together, and even though Steve was a too much of an honorable man and naïve for the modern world not liking her methods Steve and her worked well together. Sure some would say, and Natasha had even heard whispers of rumors that they were involved or sleeping together, and all Natasha could was laugh. Clint was her best friend, but Steve was like a little brother who she had to look out for in the new world Steve was living in trying to help him integrate with modern times, and even trying to get him to date, but Natasha had no feelings for Steve, and believed she didn't deserve that kind of love, and wasn't even capable of it. That was until she got to know Bruce Banner.
Natasha had first heard about Bruce from Nick Fury asking her to keep an eye on Bruce Banner in 2008, which ended in disaster. Natasha witnessed Bruce tuning into the Hulk for the first time, and the hatred obsession General Ross had for capturing and possibly killing Bruce and the Hulk or the lengths he would go to achieve that goal which some would say is borderline illegal. One thing Natasha knew was she was out of her depth nearly getting killed by Abomination after Fury had ordered her to Grayburn College to get rid of any evidence of Bruce's experiments to cure himself. Natasha had dealt with Dr. Samuel Sterns calling in a cleanup crew and witnessing some of the fight between the Hulk and Abomination she went to have a talk with Fury as she was out of her depth, and couldn't handle the assignment any longer. The Black Widow being perhaps the world's best spy could handle almost anything from handling the most skilled men with easy, infiltrating the most secure bases or easily blending in and taking on a new identity to get information, but dealing with nearly seven foot tall if not taller giant green monster that seem like it came out of a science fiction film with super human strength and the capability of destroying a city was beyond her unfortunately the next time she met Bruce she didn't have choice. Of course she had been afraid who wouldn't be after seeing what Bruce as the Hulk was capable of doing, but she had to job to do. In Calcutta, India she once again observed Bruce and realized Bruce was a genuine good man, which was a rare thing in the world Natasha lived in and who didn't want to the Hulk as a part of him, and just wanted to help people and live in peace. Through their brief time together in Calcutta and working with him on the Hellcarrier Natasha understood Bruce better as she certainly could understand the feeling of having something dark inside of you, feeling so suicide and lack of self-worth, but she just did a much better job of hiding it from the world.
Even with the incident on the Hellcarrier with the Hulk she found that she wasn't as terrified of the Hulk as she once had been as Natasha thought the Hulk was a part of Bruce, and could see it in the Hulk's eyes, and when Fury ordered her to be Bruce's bodyguard while he lived in Tony's Avengers Tower she hadn't minded. Natasha found that she enjoyed Bruce's company, and thought of it as a vacation with only having to deal with Stark's endless schemes and trouble making. Living and working with Bruce in the Avengers Tower for those two years was quite the experience for her. Bruce was unlike any man she had known till then. Working in the line of work that Natasha did she ran into more than her share of unsavory men or men like Clint and Steve who chose the life, and were similar to her in that they were also soldiers and killers and the toll it took on them. Bruce was different like her he didn't choose to be a part of this life they were living. Like her it was forced upon him by an accident that created the other darker part of him in the Hulk, but I like her he hadn't let it corrupt his soul. Bruce was still good person at heart always trying to help people and avoiding conflict not only because he'd turn into the Hulk, but because he didn't like fighting, war, and death, and would rather live a peaceful life. Natasha learned a lot about Bruce as they grew a working repartee while working together that quickly grew into a friendship as Bruce didn't need anything from her. Everyone wanted something from her whether it as a sexual object or her skills as a spy, and assassin everyone wanted to take something from Natasha, but all Bruce wanted was to chance to get to know her and be her friend, and surprisingly Natasha found it easy to be friends with Bruce.
Unlike Clint and Steve she found her friendship with Bruce was almost instantaneous. Natasha did still feel some uneasiness towards the Hulk, but with Bruce it came easy. Natasha found she didn't put up all the acting and barriers around Bruce. She still had many walls to keep people out from seeing her dark and twisted insides, but with Bruce she could found Natasha could be more herself around the handsome doctor more than anyone else outside of Clint. Natasha learned a lot about Bruce. Natasha learned Bruce loved opera and classical music with some of his favorites being Verdi, Holtz, and Mozart as Bruce loved the music and it helped him to relax. Bruce preferred Star Trek over Star Wars as Star Trek was more grounded based on reality and science while Star Wars was just pure fantasy drivel. Natasha had heard of the two, but never had the time or the need to see any of the films, which Bruce was surprised, and Tony unfortunately overheard, which ended up having over a month long period watching all six Star Wars films, and all eleven Star Trek films. She had painfully agreed to watch the films only if Tony wasn't in the room as after his endless commentary during the Phantom Menace she threated Tony with painful bodily harm, and then went into detail all the ways she could torture Tony without killing him. After that Tony didn't attend Bruce and her viewings of Star Wars and Star Trek. With her and Bruce she found watching the films with Bruce. Bruce didn't talk during the films with endless commentary, and took time to answer her questions, and from then on out they made a movie night each week when she wasn't away on a mission. Natasha revealed to Bruce that her favorite films were comedies. Natasha found after a long weary mission for S.H.I.E.L.D. and adding more red to her ledger she needed to laugh as a release from the darkness, and no not the bad rom-coms that she absolutely hated with one of the few exceptions being the Princess Bride. Natasha loved the comedies of the 1970's, 1980's and early 1990's she thought that was the height of comedy in film. Natasha had a great appreciation Mel Brooks, Harold Ramis, and Leslie Nielsen with some of her favorite films being Airplane!, Robin Hood: Men in Tights, Blazing Saddles, History of the World Part I, The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad!, and The Monty Python films. Natasha also enjoyed watching him work in his lab, and yes even when Tony was working with him. Bruce seemed so at home as his awkwardness around her and other went away. Not that Natasha didn't find Bruce's sometimes shy and self-conscious way endearing and cute, but in the lab all that went away as the confident scientist came out, and Natasha liked the confident self-assured Bruce as much as the other, and wish he'd show this side of himself more.
Still with the natural easy of their friendship Natasha found that both she and Bruce avoided deeper conversations. Natasha had read Bruce's file, but it only it wasn't that thick only going into broad details about Bruce's life with his mother and abusive father, and very little detail about his life growing up in foster homes. Natasha could understand Bruce's reluctance to talk about early years or the Hulk as she was much the same. S.H.I.E.L.D., Fury, and Clint knew the most about her past, but even they didn't know everything about her life. Like Bruce they only knew the broad details about her life as a spy and assassin in the Red Room, but left a lot about her training, early missions, and childhood that had been erased from history. Natasha build up so many walls over the years with her first walls being built living on the streets of Volgograd, the next walls built to protect herself were built after Ivan Petrovich had and taken the eight year old orphan Natasha who at the time was living on the streets of Volgograd, and forced her into the Red Room program. Natasha built another wall around herself in the early years trying to survive the harsh instructors in the Red Room, and the other girls in part of the program fighting to be the chose ones. The final walls Natasha built was through her training as a spy, assassin, and seductress as using her body as a weapon was part of the program. With so much damage to her psychologically, and with all the lives Natasha had taken or damaged, and all the blood on her hands she didn't believe she had thought she didn't deserve any happiness, love was for children, and that she was incapable of love. Slowly her view of those things began to change when she came to S.H.I.E.L.D. when Clint had introduced her to Laura Barton. Laura was kind to her from the moment they had met welcoming her into her home and to be a part of their family without even knowing her. Laura understood what Clint was doing and fighting for yet didn't look at him differently for all the things he had to do. Laura saw the good man inside Hawkeye. The two became close as Natasha had never had a woman as a friend before Natasha opened up to Laura like she couldn't with Clint, and through that Natasha's wall about trust came down as she trusted both Clint and Laura, and they in turn trusted her with her secret, and being a part of their children's lives. Since that time years ago her view of the world created by all the Red Room and barriers Natasha had put up were slowly came down as she was more open with a select few, and more willing to show her human side, but everything change after her world came crumbling down.
With the S.H.I.E.L.D. collapse and the release of her file online to the whole world Natasha's world had collapsed around her. Natasha had put on a brave face for the congressman at the hearing as Steve and Fury, but inside she was lost. One of the big reasons Natasha had joined S.H.I.E.L.D. was because she thought while she was damned she could still use her skills to make a better world. It was one of the reasons that kept her going, but now she had found out it was all for nothing, and she was alone. Fury was gone. Steve and Sam were off searching for Bucky, Clint was badly hurt and recuperating at the farm with his family, and she had thought of going back to the tower, but she didn't want to look at the disgust and disappointment in Bruce's eyes. She was alone, and Natasha just wondered from place to place just drinking, surviving and taking the law into her own hands instead of being given orders. In Buffalo, New York she had tracked and hunted down a gang of child traffickers killing them all. In Paris, France Natasha had dealt killed a child molester, and taken down the Albanian mob that was working out of the city. In hear wondering Natasha had even gone back to Russia. In St. Petersburg she had found one of her old Red Room handlers and killed the woman, and tracked down a serial killer that was hunting young street women. Natasha was going to head back to Volgograd when she was left a message on her phone to call Misha, and found that the Red Room was apparently after her and was working with remnants of Hydra. Misha was one of the very few kind people she had met during her life in Russia and part of the Red Room, and after having seen his family killed, and then Misha killed Natasha just snapped not absolutely not caring about her life anymore killing every single one of the bastards who had murdered Misha and his family even going so far as torturing and burning them alive, which led her back to Tony's Avengers Tower, and more importantly to Bruce where all her walls she had built up and thought would never come down would come crumbling down for one day.
Natasha had done her best to avoid Bruce after he stitched her together and she reluctantly agreed to stay in the Tower. When Natasha thought she heard Bruce or saw him enter a room she was in she'd leave only seeing him when Bruce needed to check on her wounds. Tony confronted her first while Bruce was gone for the day with jokes as that was one of his annoying copying mechanisms to avoid conflict and uncomfortable situations when she didn't respond to him only giving him a warning glance Tony got serious accusing her of being the cold hearted manipulative bitch that Natasha's file said she was using Bruce, and saying the only reason she was here was because she was again a bitch who had no one who cared or loved her. Tony didn't get the response he was hoping for when Natasha pulled out her gun in a flash, and shot Tony grazing his leg telling him that was the only warning he was going to get. After that Tony had quickly left for a business trip leaving Natasha alone with Bruce to think about what Tony had said about her. Natasha wasn't going to take that from anyone even if she thought what he said was the truth. She was all of those things, she was alone, and hurting Bruce her kind hearted dork. Two nights later after nightmares involving her days in the Red Room, Misha and his family, about being empty soulless monster she thought she was, and Bruce calling her everything that Tony did and losing his friendship Natasha started to drink at sunrise pulling out everything in Tony's bar trying to erase the pain, which is where Bruce would find her.
Natasha knew she could no longer avoid Bruce or how she knew he would view her after her file was released, and lose his friendship that she had come to value as one of the most important in her life. After Natasha told him what had happened the night she showed up at the Tower, Bruce once again showed her how she was unlike any man she had knew. Bruce hadn't looked at her with disgust, pity or disappointment, but what she saw in Bruce's deep engrossing brown eyes was concern, kindness, and understanding, and when Bruce told her that he hadn't read or file, and only wanted her to tell him about her past all her barriers she kept up crumbled as she allowed the first tears to fall from her eyes since her childhood, and Natasha had thought she was capable of now. Natasha cried tears of sadness for her life, and feelings of gratitude and happiness she never thought she would have for having a friend like Bruce Banner. Bruce had opened up about his abusive childhood and growing up in orphanages and foster homes, and she had opened up about some of her life in the Red Room and her past. The two had talked all through the day and into night learning about each other, and Natasha even told Bruce things about herself she's told no one else including her. Natasha also found the Bruce's shorting of her name endearing, and didn't mind it coming from him. Clint, Laura and even Tony had started calling her Nat after he heard Clint call her that, but Natasha wanted to keep Tasha between them.
That day change everything for Natasha going forward. Living in the Tower with Tony and Bruce she found a purpose again as She and Tony actually agreed on something that the world needed the Avengers, and Natasha had convinced Steve to come to New York after he had lost the trail off his friend Bucky. Clint agreed as believing in what the Avengers were had done and capable of doing despite what happened with S.H.I.E.L.D. and Hydra. Natasha followed the lead of Steve, who with Tony and Clint formed the Avengers. The Avengers had no trouble with Hydra, which was on the run now that they were exposed, but were encountering more and more super powered people or who the media were calling mutants who were quite different from Loki, like Juggernaut who clad in red armor and apparently powered by some red jewel claimed to be unstoppable and basically was for the Avengers as they had stopped him from escaping with the over twenty millions dollars he's robbed from a bank in Boston, but they had failed to capture the Juggernaut, and with the Hulk still in Asgard they realized they need Bruce. Natasha was reluctant to ask her friend for help trying to explain to him that he had better control, and understanding of his other self, but Natasha wasn't going to force Bruce, which left Tony. Tony of course hounded his friend day and night until they came up with a compromise. Bruce would agree to help if Tony helped him build something that could stop and contain the Hulk. Tony agreed and Bruce went into the field as back up working as a doctor and scientist only going code green when absolutely necessary, and that led Natasha confidently realizing that Bruce and Hulk were not separate, but the same after the incident in Argentina where the Hulk let loose expectantly decimating the Hydra soldiers who had taken out their jet with Bruce inside, rampaging through a small town before manhandling Tony, Steve and Clint leaving on her to stop the Hulk. Natasha knew that her and Bruce's friendship had progressed to an all new territory, but didn't realize the true affect she had on the man until the Hulk hesitated in attacking her. Natasha new the Hulk could easily run through her, but she wasn't afraid as she need to stop the Hulk from causing any more damage to the town, and Natasha believed that Bruce was inside the Hulk and she could talk both of them down. Natasha told the big guy to stop and calm down, and he did even though he acted like a petulant child being scolded by a parent as he picked up a car and slammed it on the ground in protest. Natasha began to hum an old Russian lullaby that she remembered as a child. Natasha didn't remember the name of the lullaby just that it was about a warning to children to go to sleep when they were supposed to or the boogey man would come get them. The lyrics of the lullaby weren't soothing, but the music that went with it was, and the Hulk seemed to like as she slowly approached the green giant and told him that it was getting late the sun getting low, and it was time to go home. Natasha had reached her hand out, and the Hulk reached his hand out allowing her to trail her fingers down his large arm and into his hand briefly before pulling back, and then the Hulk eyes stopped being rage filled as the green giant smiled a small smile towards Natasha touching her cheek with his large green hands saying "Pretty spider", and then pulled back and sat down in front of Natasha turning back into Bruce. Natasha just sweetly smiled at the man with her cheeks getting slightly red as it confirmed something in her mind as the Hulk transformed back into Bruce and the man collapsed to the ground. Natasha never told Bruce what the Hulk said as she didn't want to embarrass the man who bring up feelings the two were beginning to have for each other that neither were ready for, but after that day whenever the Hulk went into the field it was Natasha's job to work with and keep the Hulk in check.
While Natasha found her place with the Avengers she found her friendship with Bruce growing to whole new levels as they went out more together with Bruce trying to take them to do all the things they never got to enjoy or appreciate as a child like spending an afternoon going to an arcade bar called Ground Control where apparently it catered to the man child just with booze and food. Still Natasha hand time of her life with Bruce playing what were apparently classic games and arcade games in Mario Bros., Donkey Kong, TMNT: Turtles In Time, Mario Kart Arcade 2, and Gauntlet: Dark Legacy were just some of the games Natasha remembered playing with Bruce. While Bruce was helping both of them act like a child Natasha tried get Bruce to be more confident in himself and his outlook on the Hulk trying to help the man gain better control of the Hulk by mediating explaining that he and the Hulk were the same that he wasn't some violent incarnation of his father that Bruce's father had cursed him with. Both Bruce and the Hulk were good men who avoided conflict if possible and helped people making them heroes. Through their months working together as Black Widow and the Hulk, and their growing intimate friendship it wasn't until one late winter day in this past February that Natasha knew something had change. She and Bruce were going on one their days together for fun, and while getting ready Natasha had looked in the mirror to what she was wearing in buckle knew high boots, a pair of dark washed skinny jeans, a white seamless cami, and over top of that a tan fringed sweater, and Natasha had begun to grow out her hair after a mission in India she reluctantly agreed to go on in a joint mission with the Avengers and the CIA where she had to get cut her hair into a pixie cut, and realized she wanted her hair back to her back length shoulder hair because Natasha knew Bruce liked it after she had taken him dancing one night, and Natasha froze as she realized what had happened to her.
Natasha had a body of what men called a goddess and she knew that, and used it to complete missions, and dressed in sexy cloths like it was the theater and she was putting on an act with no emotional involvement, and Natasha never had dressed up for a man trying to please him when it wasn't part of the mission, and she realized she had feeling for Bruce that had nothing to do with friendship, and began to look back at when did that began. Natasha first noticed the way Bruce would looked at her for a brief moment while she was teaching Bruce to play pool almost four months ago. Through a mirror she saw for a brief moment Bruce starring at her but through the mirror, and then caught him looking at her differently before he turned away quickly picking up his drink. The way Bruce looked at her wasn't the way friend was supposed to look at another friend, and the way Bruce had looked at her was like she was the only woman in the world, a flash of desire, and something else. Natasha noticed also remembered that they would occasionally hold hands while they were alone or that she would loop her arm with his, and then there was the incident with the Hulk where the other guy had let perhaps let open Bruce's growing feeling for her. What was this feeling Natasha had inside her that mixed both fear and happiness into a new emotion that she'd never felt for man before. Was this love Natasha thought? No that was ridiculous love was for children or at least that was what Natasha kept telling herself.
Natasha was the Black Widow she was a monster who didn't need anyone and certainly not love not did she deserve it, and it would just get in the way of her job, but then Natasha had thought back to her mission in India dealing with a terrorist organization that had managed to get their hands on some Chitauri weaponry stolen from New York. Natasha had easily been able to separate Tasha from the Black Widow and efficiently completer her mission infiltrating the terrorist organization as a sex slave, manipulate the targets, and find the weapons calling in the joint team of the Avengers, CIA agents and local India authorities. Natasha knew if she wanted to she could separate Black Widow from Tasha when necessary to compete mission, and Natasha had begun to think maybe she wanted something more from her life than just being a killer, but what truly terrified more than anything else was taking that chance with her heart. Natasha had mistakenly become emotionally involved with a target as the man was only petty criminal and an otherwise a decent man, but was a family member to a criminal organization functioning out of Asia called The Hand that originated out of Japan. Still even with her sympathy for the man she completed her mission at the cost of his life, but Natasha had never been in love before and new it was a risk she'd never taken before, but as Natasha thought about it she may not deserve to be happy and have peace, but Bruce did and maybe giving Bruce that she could find her own, and decided to take a chance with Bruce as Natasha knew he wouldn't take the first step, so she'd let him know in a not so subtle way. Unfortunately for Natasha that hesitation cost her a chance as Thor showed up asking for their help to find Loki's scepter and led to one mission after another with really now time to rest or for Natasha to talk to Bruce until after the events in Sokovia she thought the Avenger might finally get a break and she'd have a chance to talk to Bruce, and at Tony's part she had took it opening up to Bruce about taking the next step in their relationship that Natasha thought they both wanted, but once again something got in her way with Ultron. It seemed god for fate was telling her that Natasha didn't deserve any love or happiness. After the incident in South Africa, Natasha had once again talked to Bruce trying to comfort him about his fear of the Hulk, that he could hurt her and the life Bruce could give her, and Natasha again opened up to Bruce like no other reveling that the Red Room had turned her into a cold emotional less monster whose only job was manipulating and killing, and one of those by products of the Red Room was that she was incapable of having children telling him that she understood and it didn't matter to her as long as they were together. After they agreed to go with it and run away together after they dealt with Ultron they had lied in bed holding each other taking away each other's pain and sorrow, and a promise for a future together, and Natasha being the Black Widow she found a way to destroy that like virtually everything else in her life. She had turned away Bruce forcing him without his consent to become the Hulk, and used him to help the other Avengers to defeat Ultron. Natasha understood why Bruce and the Hulk ran away as both of them probably hated her now, but she didn't regret the decision she had made as without her and the Hulk the Avengers would have most likely lost and at best tens of millions would have died and at worst the human race would have been wiped out. Still even with her not regretting her decision it still didn't hurt any less. Natasha hoped Bruce was living a quiet peaceful life, and maybe one day she'd see him again, but she wasn't going to look for him as she didn't deserve him, and Natasha would leave it up to Bruce about their future as friends or more, which brought her thoughts back to the present.
Natasha made her way through the Avengers facility towards the gym past the medical bay. As she walked by the medical bay she heard Steve, Nick and General Ross talking.
I hoped everyone enjoyed the chapter, and sorry for the lack of dialog and character interaction, but like the last chapter I wanted to go into events leading up Age of Ultron. Focusing in on the character and how she evolved to that point of loving another person opening up to them in Age of Ultorn. The next chapter again is Natasha chapter, but pushes the story and overarching conflict forward with a lot more character interaction and dialog.