Black Widow's Sexy New Symbiotic Catsuit
Chapter 6: A Mind of Its Own
The previous night…
It was late in the evening before Maria was released from the SHEILD hospital. Fury had told her to have another checkup, just to make sure she was okay and fit for duty, after her and Natasha's meeting with him earlier that day. She had been told to go home and get some rest, so she sat down, watching TV and sipping a glass of wine.
A knock at her back window. That was odd. Her backyard was surrounded by fence, there was no way someone could get in…
As insurance, Maria brought her gun with her, just to be safe.
She walked slowly towards the back door, and undid the curtains to see exactly who it was she was facing. The figure walked close, it was in some sort of rubbery bodysuit of some sort. When it was close enough, Maria could tell who was wearing it.
"Natasha…?"
Maria put her gun down and opened the door as her friend walked through it.
"Jesus, what are you doing here? What's with the strange…"
Maria looked up and down Natasha's body, realizing that it was no suit that Natasha was wearing, but rather a symbiote. She looked at Natasha's face, realizing her eyes were closed and that she looked unconscious. Natasha's face then disappeared in the gooey mass of the symbiote's mask.
Maria grabbed and cocked her gun, pointing it at the symbiote. "What the fuck have you done with my friend!?"
Natasha's voice emanated out the symbiote, but Maria knew it was not Natasha who was actually speaking.
"The one you call Natasha is safe."
Maria put the gun down.
"She will have no memory of this," the symbiote said. "She is in hibernation."
"Humans don't hibernate," Maria said, before realizing what the symbiote was trying to convey. "Most of us just prefer to call it sleep."
The symbiote did not respond. Instead it pulled out folders, a binder, a zip-drive, and a tablet computer and laid them on the table.
"Using the memories of the one you call Natasha, I determined what was the best path of investigation."
Maria looked over the materials. "It would've taken us days to get to this point, to get this information after going through SHIELD's red-tape." A pause. "SHIELD is not going to be very happy with you for doing this. They'll blame Natasha."
"Tell her the truth when the time is right," the symbiote replied.
Maria, still baffled, asked "How were you able to understand about a traitor being in our midst? You're just some- glob of goo some Oscorp employee cooked up to look like my friend's catsuit!"
With that, the symbiote moved towards the back door, exited, and swung away from Maria's house, as Maria stared, first at the figure swinging away, and then at the materials she had left on her kitchen table.
Natasha looked out the window of the car that was now speeding towards some unknown location, feeling unease about Maria's recalling of the previous night.
"Hey, you okay?" Maria asked.
"Yeah, it's just… this thing took over my body and I was completely powerless to it."
"Don't look at it like that," Maria said, comfortingly. "I had a chance to look over what it, uh, I mean you, brought me. We could have some real good leads."
Natasha nodded. Soon, they were at a closed access point of what looked like some kind of small airport, as Natasha realized they were heading towards a secret SHIELD airport she had been to before.
Maria turned the car off, and stuck a key into the deadlock bolt that kept the gate to the airport shut. She opened the gate enough for the car to pass through, and the car kept driving down to a runway next to a hanger.
Natasha was confused when they stopped by a small airplane, seemingly with SHIELD logos and symbols, adorned all over it.
Natasha's mask immediately reformed over her face in fear of her uncovered face being spotted.
"It's okay." Maria said as they both got out of the car. "The men piloting this are sworn to absolute secrecy. They won't squeal to Fury. And the guy we're here to meet… well, he's a friend."
Natasha watched as the steps were lowered out of the plane, and a young man wearing glasses walked out.
"You must be Agent Hill," he said. "Jake Thompson. Delighted to finally meet you in person."
"Likewise," Maria said, before indicating Natasha. "This is my friend and fellow agent, Natasha Romanoff."
"Please, after what I've been through, I know enough about SHIELD to know the Black Widow when I see her," Jake said, leaning down as he kissed Natasha's symbiote-covered hand. "Nice to meet you, as well."
Natasha smirked, flattered though uneasy.
Jake examined her. "This is fascinating. An almost-full transformation, but with the human host still fully in control."
"Well, that's not entirely the case," Natasha added.
"Oh, don't worry. Your friend Agent Hill has told me all about what happened. And I believe I was summoned to provide an explanation, which I have!"
"Which is…?" Natasha inquired.
Jake snickered. "That thing… actually, would you mind reverting to its regular form?"
"The catsuit?" Natasha asked. Just then, the symbiote withdrew from her face, hands and feet, and reverted to its catsuit form.
"Ah, there it is!" Jake exclaimed. "Well, this here that you are wearing is Codename: Hercules."
"Like the Disney movie?" Natasha asked
"If that makes it easier, sure. Hercules was our first prototype with symbiote clothing, but after its initial trials, it was considered to… risky to pursue any further. As you notice, it is a singular bodysuit. After my boss's reluctance to accept Hercules, we moved into separate shirts and pants."
"Why was your boss so reluctant?" Maria asked.
"Because of the perception that Hercules was too powerful. A feature you," he said, indicating Natasha, "may have already discovered is that the suit can adapt to different weapons. Learn the mechanisms of weapons and create things that resemble them."
Natasha's suit formed her powered-bracelets to show to Jake.
"Ah, yes. A fine example in that they are confined to the suit. That's the limit of what this symbiote suit can do: create weapons that pop out and are confined to the body. Our next idea for Hercules 2.0 was for the symbiote to actually grow guns for soldiers to use." Jake stroked his goatee. "But perhaps Hercules'-"
"Must we call it Hercules?" Natasha said, interrupting.
Jake laughed. "I suppose not. What do you prefer to call it?"
"I dunno, my catsuit?"
Jake nodded. "Fair enough." He continued: "So, your catsuit's most appealing aspect was what I believe is the cause of its most recent behavior. We gave it a sort of… artificial intelligence. An artificial intelligence specifically programmed to detect and sniff out traitors. You see, we never got to test that one aspect of it out, my boss canceled the project as soon as we had programmed that aspect. But… based upon what Maria told me, it was a success."
Natasha was confused. "Traitors? I don't-"
"Each of these suits would cost somewhere between $1-2 million. They would have been the most powerful, most advanced thing on the battlefield, at least where your average American infantryman or woman would've been concerned. If someone were to say, betray their country, we didn't want to reach enemy hands, or be something someone could use as a weapon against Americans or American interests abroad. We contemplated a self-destruct button, but it would've been too easy for an enemy to destroy all of the suits on the battlefield with just a simple signal. So, instead, we put the impetus on the symbiotes to root out potential traitors. That's why we crafted the intelligence. But a symbiote is different than a computer program, it can evolve. And based on what Maria's told me, I think your catsuit has evolved to meet this situation with the mole. Hell, it found the info you needed, where you needed to look in just a few hours where it would've taken a normal human days to find! Which is why it felt the need to, uh, insert itself over you and break-in. It wants to find this mole just as badly as you do."
"You told him about the mole?" Natasha exclaimed.
"Relax, Natasha! Jake and SHIELD go way back. Hell, after I told him who I was and who I worked for, I've been trying to get him to tell me the secret identity of the Booted Beauty…"
"My lips are sealed!" Jake said with a nervous laugh. "Not just about that, but this as well. Maria, uh, I mean Agent Hill, had to give me all the info at hand so I could understand what Hercules, uh, I mean, what your catsuit was doing. It seems that your psychological issues about this mole is triggering abilities that were never fully tested, thus, it's asserting itself."
"So, what happens next?" Natasha asked.
Jake shrugged. "Beats me. You have the talent, and now, a little extra help from our symbiotic catsuit. I just knew it had to have survived the blast…"
"The blast at the Oscorp building? The one during the incident?"
"Yes. We had to blow all of our symbiotic product to kingdom come in order to neutralize the symbiote threat. But I had a feeling that thing you wear now survived…"
A ring on Maria's watch. "This is Hill, talk to me."
It was Fury's voice on the other end. "Maria, where are you? I thought we had you on building patrol."
"Still there, sir. Just proceeded what I thought was the suspect, but it led nowhere."
"So you're in the garage?"
"Yes… I mean, no, sir. I'm on…" Maria was trying to think fast to name a place Fury and his men would not have gone. "I'm on sublevel H."
"Oh, Maria," Fury said, angry. "If you're going to lie to me, at least don't be idiotic about it."
"Fuck!" Maria exclaimed, muffling the recorder on the watch. "Sublevel H is the emergency bunker. How could I've been so stupid?"
Fury's voice came back on. "We know it was you that took the symbiote suspect away in our organization's Acura. And we know the symbiote is Natasha."
Natasha and Maria looked at each other.
"Natasha. I know you're there. It's always best to have your SHIELD communicator on your person at all times. When we started not getting a response, we knew something was up."
"Chief, if you just listen to me please, we are just trying to help! The mole is-"
"We are now operating under the assumption that you two are, in fact, the moles. And traitors to these organization and to your country. And we will hunt you down and prosecute you with the furthest extent of the-"
Maria took off the watch, threw it on the ground, breaking it.
"Androvich is being held in a top-level federal facility just off the coast. He's our only hope in finding the mole! We got to get to him, or we're as good as dead!"
Just then, the pilots of the plane that had carried Jake began to make their way to the steps, guns in hand.
"Agents Hill and Romanoff, I am arresting you as a duly designated representative of SHIELD and the United States-"
"Oh, for Christsake, does it ever stop?" Natasha asked outloud as the symbiote quickly reformed over her again. "Jake and Maria, get to the hanger quickly before bullets start flying. I'll handle these assholes."