Chapter Thirty-Eight
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Natasha stared down at me.

It was the first time I'd ever seen her genuinely surprised. Completely unmasked, full emotion.

And then —

"What the fuck are you doing here, Mia?"

I knew this was going to happen. It wasn't like I was invited. Or that Natasha knew I knew where she was, or that I could find her. That I wanted to find her. That I was here, right now.

And what could I say? That I'd rather be here than going home?

"I wanted to see you," I said, which wasn't exactly a lie. Lying would get me nowhere. Especially with someone like Nat. "Can I come in?"

Nat glared at me, and for a second I was afraid she was going to slam the door in my face. Maybe tell me to leave, go home, etc. Instead, she took a deep breath, and stepped back. I climbed into the camper, flinching slightly as Nat slammed the metal door behind me.

"What the hell is going on, Mia?" She demanded immediately, while the camper still rang with the sound of the door slam. "Why are you here?"

"I just said —!"

"No! No bullshit!" Natasha waved a hand, one finger up. "You're alone? Where's your father?"

"Uh. Still in Wakanda."

"And, what, you walked all the way over here? By yourself?"

"Nooo," I hunched up my shoulders, shying away from her judgemental stare. "US diplomats wanted to fly me back. I just… took a detour in Switzerland."

"WHAT." Natasha threw up her hands, shaking them at me as if she wanted to throttle me. "How did you get here? How did you even find me? Does anyone you're here right now?"

"Not specifically."

Her eyes narrowed. "Your father?"

The way she phrased it had me worried. She already knew, of course. "Not yet."

Her lips pursed slightly. "Call him. Right now."

"I can't." I said, and when Natasha took a threatening step forward, I retreated quickly with hands raised. "I can't, I swear! He's still in Wakanda. There's a civil war. I think. He told me not to contact him until he reached out to me first. Maintain radio silence."

Natasha scowled, testing my veracity with a long look. "He would say that…" Then, shaking her head, she added, "You cannot stay here, Mia. I'm hiding for a reason, and you do not want to be around if Secretary Ross manages to catch up to me. You're putting the negotiations the King made for you at risk."

I was aware of them, vaguely, but it hadn't really been relevant until now. I never knew the specifics. "So I'm supposed to go home and be happy knowing I'm basically a prisoner, never allowed to step outside the borders of my country?"

"Well, not really your country," Natasha said. "I was aware of a tracking anklet and two mile radius."

"Two miles?!"

"Don't knock it till you try it. That's still a lot of square footage in New York City."

I tried not to sneer, but there was no hiding my disdain. "You think a tracking anklet would honestly contain me?"

"No. But I think it's better than what you were going to get." Natasha folded her arms. "Ross wanted to send you to the Raft. Or so he claims."

"Oh, so I should be thankful for my leash! Like a dog!"

"I'm not trying to argue with you, Mia!" Natasha snapped back. "Of course it sucks! None of us want to be where we are right now. Half the Avengers are in prison and Rogers and I are on the run. You have the chance of a semi-normal life, Mia. You can go home!"

"That's not —"

"GO. HOME."

I inhaled sharply through my nose, fists clenching at my sides as I tried not to blurt something I'd regret. I didn't even know what I was going to say, only that it would be bad. Though I knew I wasn't invited, I knew I was a bad surprise for Natasha, I was still hurt by this response. When I could finally speak, my voice was small. "Please don't yell at me."

Natasha huffed, perhaps not realizing she had raised her voice. Just the faintest flush in her cheeks, a sign of overworked emotions. She looked away, hands on hips, before reaching for the keys to her jeep on the counter. "I'll take you to the train station. There should still —"

"The last train was an hour ago," I told her, just as her fist clenched around the keys. "The station opens again at five-thirty in the morning."

Natasha stood there, a slightly trembling mass of barely contained stress and tension. She closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and released the keys with a flash of fingers. The metal clattered back onto the counter. "Fine. Fine! First thing tomorrow, I'm taking you to the train station. I'm getting you a ticket to the nearest airport. And you will get on the plane. And you will be back to New York twenty-four hours from now. And anklet monitor or no, you will stay there. Understand?"

I was a little disappointed, but not necessarily surprised. Highly aware of how close Natasha came to actually blowing a gasket. So I smiled a tight, close-lipped smile and hoped that meant I might get to eat soon.

Natasha looked at me, first a glare, then softening a little. A frown. "Now go take a shower and get changed. You got a spare set of clothes."

"Yeah."

"Good. Because nothing I have will fit you."

To say the next few hours were tense would be an understatement. The shower was refreshing, at least, and gave me a few minutes to think about how I was going to answer whatever questions Nat had waiting for me. Because rest assured, she was already lining them up, one by one, little deadly dominoes to destroy me, mentally and emotionally.

The camper was a decent size, enough for at least two people but probably not three. It occurred to me, as I stepped out in clean clothes and damp hair, that Natasha, though surprised to see me, thought I wouldn't be alone. Thought that Dad would've been with me.

Had she been disappointed?

Pondering on that, I awkwardly studied my reflection in the door mirror before reluctantly shuffling back into the kitchen/dining room area. Natasha sat on the couch, arms folded, waiting. One foot tapping out the seconds, as if she'd been timing me this entire time.

"So you're going to tell me how you found me," Natasha said, as I sat in the furthest seat away from her. When I didn't answer right away, she leaned forward, elbows on knees. "Were you followed?"

I snorted despite myself. "No. They lost me at the base."

Natasha remained silent, waiting for further elaboration. I hated this part, but I couldn't lie, either. As much as I knew she was going to hate the truth. "I found you. Through your texts. With Dad."

She stared at me. Her mouth dropped open. "You read our messages —?"

"Ew, no!" I shuddered at the thought. I wasn't that curious. Just curious enough to go poking at GPS locations and nothing else. Pretending I was half blind the whole time. "I just used them to find your location. Princess… uh, Princess Shuri may have helped me a bit. So. Maybe she knows. But! I don't think she'd tell anyone."

Not anytime soon, at least. And certainly not to anyone I was worried about.

Natasha's shoulders sagged ever so slightly, the minute sign of relief. She shook her head to herself. "You're damn lucky no one caught you. And I will not defend you to your father when he finds out."

"I didn't expect you to," I knew going into this harebrained plan that I was completely on my own, and going completely AWOL would probably go worse if I went to anyone else besides Natasha. Or Steve. But I knew I couldn't bear the blatant disappointment Steve would express in me. At least Natasha buffered it with extreme annoyance, which was much more tolerable for me right now.

"Good," Natasha huffed through her nose, standing up abruptly. "What do you want to eat? I can heat up a turkey TV dinner or spaghettios. Your choice."

"Both?" I asked, a little hopeful.

She cut me a wry look. "Only because it looks like you actually did walk all this way."

"Just the last dozen miles or so." I admitted. Though I definitely had to hike it out of Switzerland before I found a truck heading in the right direction. "You're really out in the middle of nowhere."

"Yeah, funny that." She said as she walked past. "Almost like I didn't want to be found. Hm?"

I didn't dare to answer that question.

TV dinner and spaghettios was hardly a feast of champions, but after everything, it was nice to have something familiar. Factory produced, microwave cooked, full of salts and fatty acids and whatever else my body will process like everything else — with maximum efficiency. Never quite as good as the promotional images on the packaging, but still an American indulgence in their own right.

Home sweet home.

Natasha, food in hand, plopped herself beside me, uncomfortable close, on the kitchen bench, making me shift over so we were both in line of sight of her laptop sitting on the tabletop. For a moment, I was about to be impressed she actually had wifi all the way out here, before Natasha revealed she was not sos stupid as to have a virtual radio tower announcing her location, and the laptop had as much internet connectivity as a potato. Just movies and music.

I did not get a choice in tonight's selection.

"I can't believe you've never watched Goldeneye," Natasha said while leaning back in her seat, one foot up on the table as she ate cold pasta right out of the can. Like a monster. "It's a classic!"

"I'm sorry I didn't watch one of the over two dozen Bond movies in existence," I said with a roll of my eyes. "Besides, I was more into Eighties movies growing up."

"And somehow you haven't seen any of those Bond movies, either," Nat shook her head, disappointed. She was silent for a moment, before saying, "You know I'm just giving you a hard time, right?"

Maybe I came off a little too annoyed. I tried to shrug it off. "Yeah. I know. It's just a movie."

"I don't mean the movie," She said, setting the empty can on the table. "I mean you're here. Full transparency, I'm a little mad. Not as mad as your aunt is going to be, though."

"Yeah," I said shortly, my voice tight.

Natasha cut me an inscrutable look, before moving on. with the toe of her shoe, she carefully nudged my shield, which was leaning against the wall nearby, tilting it slightly so the metal shone better in the dim light. "New paint job?"

"What? Oh, yeah," I glanced over and frowned slightly. One of Shuri's parting gifts to me was a repaint of the shield — which she had done without asking first, or even consulting me on the design. At least it wasn't one of the ones I rejected before. "The princess did that. She figured I needed a new look."

"Its not bad," Natasha said, squinting in the darkness. "Subtle. Well, more subtle than before. Do you like it?"

I snorted despite myself. The shield had gone through multiple repaints in its lifetime with me, from plain silver with red star, to black stripes, clean again, more black and gray and now — cleaned once more, Shuri had made it a bit of a surprise for me. The red star was gone now, only a thin scarlet outline of where it once was, unpainted silver encircled in dark navy, with three additional bands around it. Blue, silver, blue. In the dark, you could barely make out the design at all except where the light reflected off of unpainted Vibranium. I hadn't decided yet on my opinion of it, but I didn't think I hated it. Shuri's extra touch — bee wings painted on either side of the star, in a soft holographic ink so it only revealed parts of the design with movement — was definitely starting to win me over a little. Maybe T'Challa had told her about our conversation with the bees, because I couldn't recall ever mentioning my super casual normal interest in apiology to her.

"It's alright," I said at last, in lieu of having to actually think about my feelings for the moment. "Dunno what people will think when they see it, though. Who they're going to associate with it. Not that I'm going to use it again, obviously. Because I'm going straight home and not starting any funny business while I'm there."

"Damn straight," Nat said, and I knew I had successfully navigated that minefield of a question. "Besides, nothing wrong with reinventing yourself. I do it all the time. People will get used to the new Rebel Columbia, whether they like it or not."

At my look, she averted her gaze. "Not that you'll be doing any of that stuff, of course."

"Of course."

Then, in a segue smoother than top-shelf vodka, she continued, "So, how's your father doing?"

"Oh, you know," I said, frowning at my TV dinner and sad slabs of turkey breast. "Stuck in a foreign country, fighting in a civil war he's technically not even supposed to be involved in, while everyone he knows and cares about is scattered to the four winds and has no way of coming home again. Not for a while, at least."

"Ah. Right," Nat inhaled through her nose, perhaps regretting asking such a loaded question. But her expression remained unchanged, unwavering even with the spikes in hostility between us. "He told me there's a possibility of deprogramming you two. Is that true?"

"Y-yeah, I think so," I stammered, brushing some hair behind my ear. I hadn't realized he'd mentioned it to her. How much he might've said. "At least, that's what he told me. He won't leave until he's sure it's gone. And then, when he knows it works — I'll go next."

Nat leaned forward a little, so our eyes met. Just the smallest quirk of her lips. "That's good, right?"

"Yeah. I hope so." My hands twisted together, trying not to sound more hopeful than I wanted to be. I was too afraid at this point. Fearful there would be no end, no cure, no change from this endless spiral of misery. That I wasn't just setting myself up for more heartbreak. "Just trying to… manage expectations."

"It'll be okay," Natasha said, and for the first time she sounded genuinely reassuring. Or trying to be. No hidden jabs. "This stuff is never easy. But you'll feel worse for not trying."

She was probably right about that, but I didn't really have the words to express myself, not in the way I wanted. I wasn't sure how I even felt enough to be able to talk about it coherently. I looked out the windows, but it was dark now; the sun was just starting to set when I had arrived at the camper. Nothing outside, except the glow of the moon and the faintest twinkling of a passing car in the far distance, high up on some mountain road.

Really nowhere at all.

"It's really quiet here," I said at length, deciding to avoid the topic entirely.

"It sure is," Nat studied me a moment longer. "Appreciate it while it lasts. I'm not sure how much you're going to get after tonight."

I sighed, maybe more like a groan, as I slumped back and tried not to think about the utter disaster waiting for me, after my stupid stunt. I knew Nat didn't really believe my half-assed answer before, but anything I could think of now would make even less sense to her, I thought. It wasn't logical. It had no strategy, no planning, no sexy cunning. I was just a stupid kid, throwing myself onto her doorstep because it just felt easier.

Even if I didn't exactly feel great about it, either. Maybe going straight home would've been better after all.

But I didn't want to think about that. Too late now.

Natasha didn't try to broach the topic again, for which I was thankful for. Instead, we spent the rest of the evening finishing the movie, before going straight to bed. Maybe she didn't want me to get up to any funny business, spending time awake to think of even worse shenanigans to get up to. Not that I had it in me. I had spent most of my energy just getting here, and the thought of getting to lay down and passing out into oblivion sounded very appealing.

Natasha pulled the fold-out bed from the couch, after which she retreated into the privacy of the master bedroom ("We are not sharing.") — giving me some semblance of peace and privacy as I laid out on the thin, squeaky mattress. Looking up at the metal ceiling, eyeing the blinking light of the smoke alarm.

Sleep did not come as easy as I thought.

Still, though I tossed and turned, I must have finally slept at some point, because I found myself suddenly and rudely awoken by the toss of a pillow on my head, and Natasha's brisk tones telling me to get up, before we missed the train.

Eyes bleary and muscles sore, my thoughts were still scrambled trying to remember where I was and how I got here, as I squinted looking for the clock face. Five in the morning. Damn, she wasn't kidding about getting up first thing.

Luckily I had nothing to pack, since everything I had was still in my backpack. Natasha took nothing with her besides a small pile of mail, a concept that in the moment didn't strike me as odd, not until we were both in the Jeep and taking off. "You get mail here?"

"No, this is from one of my safehouses," Natasha said, as the vehicle ground up a dirt path. The sky was just the dimmest of blues, paling in the predawn hours. "A friend brought it over. He checks on that sort of thing."

"People send you mail?" I asked, still baffled. Maybe it was the sleep talking. We didn't even pause to have breakfast, it was just straight to the car.

"I have old contacts. People I've helped before. People who need help. They have addresses if they ever need anything," Natasha explained cooly, before pulling an envelope from the stack. It had nothing written on it, looking new. "This has enough money to get your ass on a plane back to New York. I'm sure by time you get there, the FBI, CIA, NSA, and CPS will all be there waiting for you. Do not run away from them."

"I'm not running away," I grumbled under my breath, faintly wishing for a cup of coffee that would do me no good anyways. At least the flavor would be stimulating.

It was ten minutes before we actually hit the paved road and started winding our way back to the nearest town. The same way I came, more or less, but the hours it took me on foot, it was minutes or less on wheels. A little humiliating, after everything I did to get here, how quickly Nat could get rid of me again.

My shield bounced off my knees as I clutched my backpack to my check, letter full of unmarked bills in my fist. Would that get a weird look from whatever ticketmaster I encountered? Was it really just that easy to get on a plane? "I don't exactly have a passport."

"Check the envelope," Nat said.

Inside, I found not only a giant wad of cash, but the hard leather cardboard booklet of a passport. Opening it, I was stunned to find my face next to a name that wasn't mine. "What — did you make a fake passport for me?"

"What, like it's hard?" Natasha made a face. "I never go anywhere without a bunch. And that one was a favor."

"I can't believe Dad asked you to make fake passports for me." I muttered under my breath, absolutely stunned. "How many are there?"

I started looking around, reaching towards the glovebox before Natasha swiped my hand away. "Mind your business. You get to keep that one. You lose it, you're fucked. Understand?"

The nice way to tell me not to keep fucking around and running off to god-knows-where. I certainly wasn't stupid enough to think she wouldn't use this passport to track my exact movements across the globe. If it went somewhere it wasn't supposed to, or fell off the map entirely, then Nat would know what I'd done. More or less.

"Understood," I muttered, as she turned the Jeep onto a bridge spanning the river that went all the way back to the camper we had left. "Definitely not a little creepy you just had this with you the whole time…"

"The one time I do something nice," Natasha sighed, fingers tapping the steering wheel. "And you think it's —"

BOOM.

The projectile slammed into my side of the Jeep — all I saw was a flash of light, the jerk of impact, the loss of breath before I felt gravity leave this mortal plane. Everything flying up, hair, hands, letters, and bags.

I could only close my eyes as the Jeep flipped, slamming down hard once — twice — three times, before finally skidding to a stop, upside down. My skull snapped back against the headrest, and for a moment I thought another car had hit us. But the angle was all wrong. The smell. Like smoke and gas and black powder.

Hanging upside down, with my seatbelt holding me up in place. Beside me, Natasha shifted, groaned, fell out of her seat and onto her shoulder before rolling over. Broken glass was everywhere. The Jeeps' hood had cracked open, emitting black smoke.

I squinted past the acrid clouds, into the middle distance, where I spotted another vehicle. The one that struck us? No, no, it was still intact… still upright. Someone stepping out.

Walking towards us.

A man in a mask, a hood.

Carrying a bow, knocking an arrow.

With a grenade for an arrowhead.