Chapter 28

"Steve!" Natasha rolled on her side and looked at him. "That's enough!"

"I'm not doing anything!" They were in bed trying to get some sleep after the Ultron attack. Tomorrow they would need to come up with a plan to stop Ultron. But first they needed to find out what he had planned. Steve stared at the ceiling of their bedroom.

Natasha sat up and leaned against the headboard. "You're thinking too loud."

He sat up as well. "I can't believe they built some murder robot."

"I don't think that was their intention. And it's an AI and not a robot."

He rubbed his palms over his eyes. "Natasha." He was tired and angry and didn't want to start a fight with her. "You know this will end badly, right?"

Ultron posed a big threat to them and the world. Who knew what he wanted to do besides wiping out the Avengers.

She leaned her head on his shoulder. "We'll handle it. We've stopped an alien invasion. We'll fix this too."

He kissed the top of her head. He hoped she was right. "I feel like you're the only one I can really trust."

She laughed. "Now we're really screwed if Captain America only trusts the Black Widow."

They didn't get much sleep last night and he had nightmares about Ultron taking Nat.

Hill updated him on Ultron. He was pretty busy in the last ten hours and it looked like the teamed up with the Maximoffs. The three together posed an incredibly threat. She showed him a picture of a dead von Strucker in his cell. The killing continued.

He and Maria joined the others who were going through files. He showed them the photo of Strucker's body. "What's this?"

"A message. Ultron killed him."

"And he did a Banksy at the crime scene." He hated it how Tony had to make jokes at the most inappropiate times. All of this was his and Banner's fault.

"This is a smokescreen. Why send a message when you've just given a speech?" Natasha looked up from her laptop.

"Strucker knew something that Ultron doesn't want us to know."

Natasha's eyes were back on the screen. "Yeah, I bet he... Yep. Everything we had on Strucker has been erased."

They went through the paper files they had on Strucker and HYDRA. "The man had a lot of friends."

Tony looked over his shoulder. "Hey, I know that guy." He gave him the photo. "From back in the day. He operates off the African coast, black market arms." Everyone was staring at him. "There are conventions, alright? You meet people, I didn't sell him anything. He was talking about finding something new, a game changer, it was all very "Ahab."

Nat held her hand out and Tony gave her the photo. "I know him too. Ulysesses Klaue. SHIELD tried to capture him but failed. He's obsessed with vibranium and tried to get into Wakanda on countless times."

Steve looked at his shield and then at his fellow Avengers. "Ultron wants to make himself out of vibranium."

"That's just great." Thor muttered and Bruce looked at least guilty.

"We need to find Klaue before Ultron does." Natasha reminded them. "If he gets that vibranium, he's pretty much unkillable."

Clint and Nat managed to track down Klaue's ship near South Africa. They immediately left to be there before Ultron but he was already there and attacked them. They had to fight the Iron Legion and Klaue's men off.

"The girl tried to warp my mind. Take special care. I doubt a human can keep her at bay. But I am mighty..." The connection broke off and Thor didn't react when he called his name.

He was about to join Stark to deal with the rest of the Iron Legion but then he suddenly got dizzy and wasn't on the ship anymore.

He was in a ballroom and wearing a WWII dress uniform. He was back in the 40s. The cameras, the music and the clothes were all from that era. Did the Maximoff girl send him back in time? Could she do that? He had to get back to Nat!

"Steve?" He turned around and Peggy was smiling at him. A young Peggy was smiling at him. "Now we can have our dance, Steve."

She held her hand out to him and he took it. She grinned up to him. "I thought you didn't now how to dance."

He did now because Nat showed him how. He twirled her and Peggy's hair turned from brown to red when she was back in his arms. She looked up and green eyes were looking at him and not brown.

"Natasha." Was she here for real? Was any of this real?

"Why are you failing me?" She asked with big eyes.

"What? What are you talking about?" Suddenly they weren't in the ballroom anymore but on a battlefield. Natasha wasn't in his arms anymore but standing a few meters before him in her catsuit. A metal arm crushed through her spine and she fell to the ground. Ultron looked at him and then took off. He ran to Nat and craddled her lifeless body against him.

"Cap!" Someone was shaking him. "Hey Steve! Don't make me punch you!" He opened his eyes and looked at Clint. Natasha was standing next to him with her arm over his shoulder. She was pale, sweaty and it seemed like she wasn't really here.

"What happened to her?!"

"The same thing that happened to you. Maximoff. Come on. We have to go. Hulk is going berserk in Johannesburg right now."

Clint brought them to his farmhouse and everyone except him and Nat were pretty surprised that Clint had a wife and kids. He wanted to meet them for some time now but under different circumstances. Bruce immediately bolted up the stairs to hide from the others. He caused havoc in Johannesburg and Tony could barely stop him. Something told him that Bruce wouldn't be on the team anymore after they've dealt with Ultron.

Cooper and Lila were delighted to meet the Avengers and thankfully didn't notice how off their aunt was. Nat wouldn't really look at him and he couldn't stop picturing her dead body in his arms. Whatever Maximoff did to him felt so real.

Lila looked up to him. She barely reached his waist. "Are you Auntie Nat's boyfriend?"

"Um,yes."

The girl nodded. "Cool. Be nice to her, okay?" She gave him a stern look which looked more cute than threatening.

He wanted to assure her that he would always be nice to her when Tony interrupted them. "Ha, you just got a shovel talk from a little girl."

He rolled his eyes at him and saw how Nat plopped down on the couch and Lila climed onto her lap. Nat began to stroke the girl's hair absently. He needed to talk to her about what she saw.

Thor suddenly stormed out of the house. He gave Nat one last look before he followed him outside. "Thor!"

"I saw something in that dream. I need answers, I won't find them here" With that Thor flew away.

He turned to go back inside but he heard Nat's voice in his head. Why are you failing me? He shook his head to get it out and walked back inside.

Laura Barton was standing in the hallway and smiling at him. "Natasha is taking a shower right now. I'm glad we finally met but..."

"Yeah, could've been under better circumstances." She nodded. "Is she okay?"

"No but she will be. She has you now. I hope you know how much she loves you. I know she's not good at saying it." Laura brushed her hand through her son's hair when he walked past by him.

"I know that. She's...she's the love of my life." He never said that out loud before but Laura had something about her that made him talk.

She smiled brightly at her. "I'm glad she found you." She rested her hand on his arm. "Give her some time. She'll come to you when she's ready to talk about what she saw."

He changed into a t-shirt and jeans in the room he would be sharing with Nat and went outside to chop some wood. She was still under the shower and he needed to distract himself for some time.

Tony joined him. "Thor didn't say where he would go to get his answers?"

"Sometimes my teammates don't tell me things. I was kind of hoping Thor would be the exception besides Natasha."

"Yeah, give him time. We don't know what the Maximoff kid showed him." Looked like Tony decided to ignore the jab at him.

Steve chopped the wood in record time. If he kept going the Bartons had enough wood for a year. " "Earth's Mightiest Heroes." Pulled us apart like cotton candy."

"Seems like you're okay."

"Is that a problem?" He wasn't really okay but it wasn't real what Maximoff showed him. He had the suspicion that what Nat saw was something from her past.

"I don't trust a guy without a dark side. Call me old fashioned." Tony said. Of course he had a dark side. If something happened to Natasha, he would rip the world apart without any guilt.

"Let's just say you haven't seen it yet."

Tony wanted to say something but Laura showed up and asked for his help with a tractor.

Natasha didn't come to him. He didn't know if he was allowed to be hurt by that.

They were all in the kitchen of the Bartons with Fury who showed up out of nowhere and trying to come up with a plan. He hadn't seen Nick since DC. Banner came to the conclusion that Ultron wanted to evolve and that was a terrible thought. But Nat made a language joke and that lifted his spirit a little bit. Maybe she was already doing better now.

Everyone left to go to bed because early next morning they would leave for Seoul where they suspected Ultron was headed to get a new body.

Natasha was still sitting at the kitchen table and staring into her mug. "What did she show you?"

He walked over to her side and sat down next to her. He took a deep breath. "Your death."

She looked up from the mug and stared at him. "Oh."

He cupped her face and kissed her deeply. She seemed surprised at first but then kissed him back. "Sorry, I just had to kiss you."

She gave him brief smile that didn't quiet reach her eyes. "Never apologize for kissing me."

"What did you see?"

Her gaze fell to the ground. "Everything. She showed me every horrible thing I did. How I killed Liho. The other girls in the Red Room. How I killed them." She looked at him with shame in her eyes. "I once set a hospital on fire. 54 people died."

"I know."

"I'm a monster." She looked to the ground again.

He tilted her chin with his fingers to make her look at him. "No, you're not. You're a victim of brainwashing, abuse and torture. And you overcame that. You are not a monster. You are a hero!"

She didn't really look like she believed him but she nodded nevertheless. "Let's go to bed."

She let him pick her up and carry her to their room for the night. He figured she needed to be close to him as he needed to be close to her.

They crawled under the blankets and Nat wrapped herself around him. "How did I die?" She murmured against his chest. "In your vision?"

"Ultron killed you. My biggest fear is losing you." He admitted and tightened his hold on her.

"You know that wasn't a vision like in showing you the future, right? She just showed you what would make you freeze." She pressed herself even closer to him. "My biggest fear is losing you too."

"I'll do my best to guarantee that our fear doesn't come true." He promised but he knew that if he had to chose between his and her life, he would always choose to save her.

He kissed the top of her head and they both tried to get some sleep.