Avengers 1. Ch 1 - Unexpected Return

**Author´s notes:** Hi, this is my first fanfiction. I got inspired to write after watching Captain America: The Winter Soldier, I loved the chemistry between Steve and Natasha, so I plan on exploring that. There is going to be some action on the story too, so keep calm, I´ll uptade as soon as I can!

English is not my first language so forgive me if there are any mistakes in my writing. Hope you guys like it!

Also, I don´t own any of the avengers or marvel characters.

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CHAPTER 1

Steve Rogers is sitting on the edge of his bed, staring out the widow. His big suite that Stark had designed for him on the Avengers Tower is still dark. He is awake for a couple of hours, thinking about the bad dream he had…again…about Bucky. It had been almost one year since the incident with the Winter Soldier. Steve tried tracking him down, between missions, with no success. He thinks that maybe, if Natasha or even Barton were here, they could help him but they had to disappear after what happened to S.H.I.E.L.D.

Then, Steve's thoughts linger on Natasha. He looks at his nightstand and opens the top drawer. He stares at a key chain with a big white star on it, and remembers her words on the note: "It remind me of you. Nat." It was the first of many trinkets Natasha had sent to him. She sends them now and then and when he receives one, it is the only time he is a little relieved, knowing that she is alive. The others came without a note, but he knew it was from her because all of them had a white star on it somewhere. His favorite was a wooden music box. It has a moon and white stars painted all over the lid. He picks it up and opens it, it plays Clar de Lune and he remembers hearing it once or twice when he was on Europe long time ago. And now every time he hears it, it makes him think of her. He misses her. They had become partners and friends, he trusted her with his life. He knew she had to be careful, to not be found, but sometimes he wishes she would give him just a hint of where she was so that he could go to her, or maybe say when she was going to return to New York so that he could stop looking for her in every corner of the city, like she was going to show up out of nowhere. He looks back at the window and sees the sun rising. Putting the music box back in the drawer, he decides it´s time to clear his head with a morning run, so he changes into his running outfit and leaves his room to grab a bite in the kitchen.

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Steve finishes his breakfast alone, it´s 6:30. Tony, Bruce and Thor are never awake this early, unless they have a mission or something. So he cleans his dishes, goes to the elevator and pushes the lobby button hearing Jarvis greet him: "Good morning Captain."

"Good morning Jarvis" he answers back the A.I. He still finds that talking to a computer is a little strange and creepy, thanks to his encounter with Dr. Zola inside the Bunker in Camp Leigh.

At the lobby, he is walking toward the front door looking at his watch to start the chronometer, as he hears Jarvis say: "Welcome back, Miss Romanoff."

Steve immediately looks up, the front door is open and Natasha is standing there."It´s good to be back Jarvis" she replies.

He stops and stare and her, not believing his eyes as she walks to him with a smile on her face, her red locks brushing on her shoulders. His heart almost stopped, he was so glad that this time his wishes were granted and the beautiful redhead was standing in front of him.

She says: "Hey Cap, going for a little run? I would go with you, but I am a little tired of running."

Steve laughs and can´t resist the urge, throwing his arms around her shoulders, hugging her: "It´s good to see you, Natasha!"

Natasha let go of the bags she is holding and hugs him back, putting her arms around his waist and pressing her face lightly against his chest: "It´s good to see you too, Steve!" She felt so good hearing him laugh, she was used to being alone when she was under cover, it had been part of her training to never need anyone, but she had missed Steve Rogers, more than she was willing to admit to herself. That was part of the reason she send him something every time she changed locations, because deep inside she wishes she was returning to New York, to be near him.

Steve notices her bags knowing she came here to stay with them and not on a mission, he let go to take a good look at her, the smile still on his face: "So, no more running for you! Let me help with your bags then."

Natasha almost forgot he is such a gentleman, and how perfect his smile is, so she smiles back at him, saying: "It´s okay Steve I got it, I don´t want to spoil your morning run."

"I insist!" Steve replies already taking the bags on his hands, "Besides, I can run later." He says turning to the elevator.

Natasha watches him, his muscles moving as he walks back to the elevator, and she thinks "_I guess he can afford to miss one run, he´s still very fit, he looks so good…"_ she takes a deep breath then shakes her head to get rid of that thought and follows him to the elevator.

They arrive at her floor. Steve gets out of the elevator and turns right on the corridor leading Natasha to her room saying: "This floor has been empty for some time, since it´s yours and Barton´s floor. Barton´s room is to the left. My room is one floor above with Thor´s room and Bruce and Tony´s rooms are one floor above us."

Natasha follows him to the door of her room, where he stops: "It has a biometric lock, needs your fingerprint so…"

Before he can finish, Natasha put her thumb to the screen of the lock, it makes a beep and the door slides open. She enters the room and says: "Wow, this is bigger than some of the apartment I have stayed!"

The room is an open concept with high ceilings, it has a lounge area with modern furniture, a mini bar and a big LED TV, then a door to the right that leads to the closet and bathroom, then a king size bed next to a huge widow that goes around the corner with a beautiful view of New York city buildings around then. "Is yours this big too?" Natasha asks as she touches the white couch.

Steve enters the room looking around: "Yes, but mine has darker color furniture and a blue wall behind the bed." Steve said as he noticed her wall was a pale red.

"Of course, Captain America gotta have a white and blue room!" Natasha says looking back at him with a goofy smile on her face. Steve chuckles as Natasha turns and walks toward the window saying: "I´m sure Stark has thrown on yours faces how generous he is."

Steve starts walking toward the bed: "Yes, a dozen of times at least."

She stops at the widow admiring the view: "I´ve missed New York." She says almost to herself.

Steve with his super hearing ability replies as he puts her bags down next to the bed: "Yeah, it´s a great city. Much has changed since I was a kid, but I still love it."

Natasha remembers how Steve was stuck for 70 years on the ice, she felt bad for him, all the time and friends he had lost, she then asks: "Any luck with Bucky?"

Steve walks to stand beside her and stare out the window too: "No, Sam and I tried tracking him, but he is really hard to find, I guess he had training like you." He looks at her.

Natasha bites her lower lip and then turns to meets his eyes: "Now that I´m here, maybe I can help you, but you gotta know that even if we did find him, there is a big change he´ll not recognize you and we´ll have to fight him again."

Steve takes a deep breath and looks back out the window: "I know." He wants to find him because he knows that the Winter Soldier is not Bucky, he was brainwashed and he has to save him somehow, he owes him that much and Natasha may be the only person that can help him with that. His mind is playing back their encounter with Bucky on D.C., when Fury almost died because of him and then he shoot Natasha after chasing her on the street full of innocent people, and thinking about putting Natasha back in that kind of danger, not that she can´t handle, but if something bad happened to her he could never forgive himself. She was his friend too.

Natasha can see his jaw muscles tense as he puts his hands inside his pocket. "Steve…" she puts a hand on his arm.

Steve returns to reality when her hand touches him. He looks at her green eyes and says: "You just got back Natasha. I don´t want to put you thought this right now."

Her brown frown as she knew immediately what he was thinking: "You know **I** can take care of myself! I offer my help because **I** want to help you!" She said with emphasis on the I. "And this time we will be ready to face him if we have to!"

She could read him so well just by looking at him. He pressed his lips together and thought: "_Will we? Will I be ready to face Bucky again?"_, and then he said: "Thank you Natasha, but I have to think about it. Let´s talk about this later, okay."

Natasha gave him an intimidating look and was about to talk back when she heard footsteps, she turns to the door of her room and Tony Stark is walking in.

"Hey, look who decided to show up! I hope I'm not interrupting anything." Tony said seeing the serious expression on their faces.

Right now Steve didn´t want to ruin the happiness he was felling being near Natasha again with Bucky´s dilema, so he mentally thanks Tony for appearing. He takes his hands out of his pockets and turns to Tony: "No Tony, and even if you were, you would interrupt anyway. I thought you were sleeping."

Tony walks all the way to stand in front of them: "Nope, I was working on the lab, Jarvis alerted me that Miss Romanoff was in the building." He turns to Natasha and gives her a quick kiss on the cheek: "How are you doing redhead?"

Natasha is still mad at Steve for not letting her finish her argument, but being the spy that she is, she puts a playful smile on her lips and says looking at Tony: "I´m good, making myself at home at the Stark…no no…Avengers Tower! It´s all very you, I could see the flashy words on the buiding from inside the plane as I got here." Steve chuckles at the comment.

Tony is enthusiastic about it: "I know, right! I thought since we are a team now, I would change the name so you can feel more welcome. How do you like your room, have you checked the bar?" He says as he walks to the minibar and grabs a bottle "I got some top notch vodka for you, being a Russian I'm sure you´ll like it! Wanna taste it?"

Natasha isn´t surprised that Tony wants to start drinking at 7:00 in the morning, so she grabs the bottle from his hands taking a look at it and recognizing the expensive brand, but she puts the bottle down on the counter of the bar: "That really is a good one, thanks, maybe later Stark. Why don´t you show me around the tower first?"

Tony gives a smile: "My pleasure!" He was proud of everything he had done on the tower, so he was more than glad to make the tour with Natasha. "Let´s start with the training room. It occupies two entire floors on the tower and has all the best equipment and gadgets." He puts a hand to the side of his mouth, leans closer to her and says in a low voice: "It cost me a small fortune too!" And then he pulls back and raises his voice again: "But you know me, I love sharing my toys with my friends, that´s how generous I am!" He starts walking out of the room.

Natasha turns to Steve and shakes her head in disbelieve of how Tony hasn´t changed a bit. Steve just shrugs his shoulders and smiles at her. Then they follow Tony out of Natasha´s room.


	2. Ch 2 - Avenger Tower

**Author´s notes:** Hello again, the second chapter is up! Thank you for the reviews, I made a slighty change on the first chapter when Steve is greeting Jarvis if you guys want to check it out, thanks again for the suggestion! More chapters comming soon!

So, like before, english is not my first language sorry for any mistakes in my writing. Enjoy it!

I don´t own any of the avengers or any marvel characters.

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CHAPTER 2

Natasha Romanoff is walking around the tower with Tony Stark on the lead, he is talking nonstop about every detail of what is now their headquarters, and Steve is silently following them. She is very impressed with the Avengers Tower, it is very high-tech and modern, Tony even showed her the security system which is flawless, he really thought of everything. Tony Stark is a genius without a doubt, but she´ll never admit that to him, he is already too full of himself to get more compliments. So she only looks around and keeps her calm expression on her face all the time.

After the tour is finished, Tony, Steve and Natasha go to the common area of the tower, where the team gather occasionally. This place has a spacious living/dining area integrated with a big kitchen to the left and, of course, a bar to the right, all with expensive furniture and decoration. Going straight ahead, through double glass doors there is a huge balcony. As they enter the common room, they notice Bruce and Thor having breakfast sitting on stools at the kitchen island.

Thor noticed them approaching and stands up as he sees that Natasha is with them: "Lady Natasha, you are most welcome!"

Bruce, who had his back at them, turns around as he hears the blonde God greet Natasha.

Natasha smiles at Thor, it is funny to see him in ordinary clothes, but he still looks good, like a model from a magazine. She says: "Thank you Thor, how are things in Asgard?"

Thor smiles back and replies: "Everything is well. We are at peace with the realms again."

Bruce stands up too and walks to Natasha extending his hand to her: "How was your trip back?"

Natasha shakes hands with Bruce who has a timid smile on his face: "It was long, but no one tried to kill me so, it was good." Bruce smiles increases a little by her remark.

Steve then realizes that she probably didn´t eat much, airplane food is not that good and she wouldn´t waist time in a public coffee shop and risk being recognized, so he walks from behind Natasha towards the kitchen saying: "Speaking of which, you must be hungry Natasha, let me cook you something. How do pancakes sounds?"

Natasha was about to reply but got interrupted by Tony: "Wow Capsicle, you never offered to cook me anything, I´m hurt!

Bruce looks at Tony and says: "That´s because you´re not a beautiful lady assassin." Then he makes his way back to his meal.

Thor chuckles at the comment: "Ha! Well said my friend!" and sits back down to finish his meal too.

Tony sits beside Bruce and adds: "Point taken, but you know I´m hungry and tired, I was working on the lab all night to make improvements on the tower, it would be a nice way to thank me for all my hard work and hospitality, after all…."

Steve interrupts Tony, knowing he would start bragging: "Sure Tony, I´ll make you some pancakes too, whatever it takes to shut you up." He takes the egg carton from the refrigerator then glares at Tony.

Tony looks at Steve and decides to tease him a little bit more: "Okay…not as nicely offered as you did to the redhead, but since I know you have a crush on the spy, I forgive you!"

Steve loses track of what he was going to do, stops in the middle of the kitchen and stares at Tony Stark, wanting to knock him out for saying that and leaving him defenseless. He feels his face burning.

Tony just smirks when he sees that the soldier is blushing.

Natasha tries not to smile seeing how embarrassed Steve is: _"Does he really have a crush on me?"_ she thinks. Putting her poker face on, like she is not affected by that thought, she makes her way to the kitchen: "Hey Tony, if you don´t shut up, you´ll have eggs on your head instead of your pancakes!" grabbing the egg carton from Steve´s hands she says to him: "I´ll help you."

Steve tries to avoid eye contact with Natasha because he knows it would only make him blush harder and says: "Thanks." He quickly turns to the cabinet to grab a bowl and tries to occupy his head with making the pancakes and not making a fool of himself by trying to deny what Tony said, because he is a bad liar, as Natasha once said.

Bruce and Thor are a little surprised, it is obvious that Tony has pushed a nerve on Steve with that comment because he didn´t even talk back. For the first time, they realize that Steve has feelings for Natasha. Tony, Bruce and Thor exchange glances, but no one says a word on the subject again.

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After a quiet breakfast, they are all on the living area, Steve and Natasha are sitting next to each other on the end of the big gray couch, Steve has his arm resting on the back of the couch where Natasha is leaning, and Bruce is on the other end with his legs crossed. Tony is sitting on a black armchair with his feet up on the coffee table and, across that, Thor is sitting lazily on the other armchair. They were discussing with Natasha their past missions, mostly minor jobs, but all trying to clean up HYDRA path of destruction and salvage at was left of S.H.I.E.L.D.

Tony then asks Natasha: "What about you redhead, what were you doing all this time? Hiding on a beach somewhere, having cocktails and watching the sunset?"

Natasha gives him a half smile: "I wish, Stark! I have been following leads to gather intel on HIDRA ops and facilities. I spent some time in South America and then the lead got cold, so I went to Europe, but things got too hot when some old friends tried to get to me." Steve gives Natasha a worried glance; he knew she was talking about KGB. She quickly looks at him, then back to the center of the room. She doesn´t want to talk about KGB so she continues: "So Fury thought it would be better if I took some time off and visited my friends in New York."

Tony looks at her with disbelieve, takes his feet off the coffee table and sit up straight: "Wait, wait…Fury has been talking to you? Where the hell is he? We only get Hill to deliver the details of our missions, not that I`m complaining, she is much better to look at then Fury."

Everybody is looking expectantly at Natasha when she says: "We only communicated through messages or over the phone, so I don´t know where Fury is. It was better that I didn´t know so I didn´t ask."

Bruce looks at Tony: "And that is why he didn´t contact us, Tony would probably ask."

Tony looks at Bruce and with sarcasm, he replies: "Ha ha, you are all about jokes today huh Doc!"

Bruce grins back at him and looks at Natasha who has a little smile on her face too, she then continues to break the ice stare Tony is giving to Bruce: "But I do know that Clint is working with him too, doing the same thing that I was doing, somewhere in Asia"

Steve felling a little jealous says: "So, Barton and you were working together?"

Natasha turns to Steve: "No, you misunderstood me, we were doing the same type of mission, but in different parts of the world, I haven´t seen him in a long time, but the last time I talked to Fury, he said Clint was making progress. He was investigating the whereabouts of a HYDRA secret armory. That´s all I know."

They were all silent for a moment, inside their heads. Tony can stay inside his head for too long so he speaks: "Okay, enough about missions!" he looks at Thor: "Hey God of Thunder, have you talked to you dad about lending me the Tesseract?"

Thor just glares at Tony.

Steve put his hands to his face: "Jesus, not that again…"

Thor then replies: "No, I have not talked to my father about that matter, mostly because I am sure he would deny your request, as I have before."

Natasha looks surprised and confused about the question that Tony just made to Thor: "Stark, what the hell do you want the Tesseract for?"

Bruce fixes his glasses up his nose and answers: "He wants to use its energy to generate a force field around the Avengers Tower."

Natasha replies angrily: "Like it had done with the device that happened to open up a portal to space sending an army of Chiutari to kill us all. Are you crazy Stark!"

Tony stands up and starts walking around explaining: "No my dear spy, I´m not crazy, I´m a genius. You see, if we could isolate the energy from the Tesseract and direct its force mainly to the particles of the field it would be a great defense mechanism for the tower, we would be untouchable. They could blow up New York City with a nuke, and the Avengers Tower would be the only thing standing! How cool is that!"

Natasha narrows her eyes: "I don´t see how blowing up NYC with a nuke is cool."

Steve stares at Tony and says: "Me neither."

"Well, you guys get the point! Right, Bruce?" Tony looks at Bruce for support, since Thor, Natasha and Steve seemed to be against it.

Bruce takes a deep breath knowing what Tony is asking him to do, but he can´t support him because after his collateral effects of experimenting on gamma radiation, he has been very careful with messing around with the unknown: "Well, it could work in theory, but the power of the Tesseract is still unpredictable, so I don´t think it is wise to experiment on it, sorry Tony." He looks at Tony who has a hurt expression on his face.

Thor replies looking at Bruce than Tony: "Exactly, thank you Dr. Banner. And if the Tesseract falls in wrong hands again, I would never forgive myself."

Tony throws his hands up in the air, admitting his defeat: "Ah, you guys just keep taking the fun away of everything. Never mind then, forget I asked. Let´s just turn on the TV and see what is in the news, how boring is that…"

So they dropped that subject and relaxed as they watched TV together.

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**PS: **I am assuming that by now all the Avengers know that Fury is alive. But he is still hiding. Next chapter the Avengers will receive a mission and I´ll add some Natasha/Steve moments alone. Bye!


	3. Ch 3 - Nightmare

**Author´s Notes: **Hello again. The first part of this chapter was inspired on Christina Perri song - Human. If you haven´t heard yet, you should, it´s a beautiful song. I hope you enjoy reading this chapter as much as I have enjoyed writing it!

I don´t own any of the avengers or marvel characters.

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CHAPTER 3

It is late night at the Avengers Tower when Natasha wakes up abruptly. She is sweating and breathing heavily. She realizes that her face is wet with tears. She angrily wipes them away from her face and gets up from her bed. She has had this same nightmare too often. She looks at the clock, 3:43 a.m. She won´t be able to sleep again, so she goes to the mini bar of her suite and grabs the bottle of vodka that Tony Stark had shown her before. She pours a shot in a short glass and drinks it all at once; thinking that maybe the burning sensation on her throat will make her forget what is haunting her. She takes another shot, and another…but the images of her dream are still coming to her mind. She hates felling like that, like she is still a cold heart monster that she once was so she just throws the glass against the opposite wall in an act of rage, shattering it. She starts to feel her eyes burning from the tears she is trying to hold back. She collapses on the couch behind her and stares blankly at the wall.

A few minutes later she hears a knock on her door: "Natasha, is everything okay? I heard glass breaking. Jarvis told me you are awake, let me in please!"

She recognizes Steve´s voice and thinks _"Damn his super hearing abilities. I can´t have him seeing me like this, I´m a mess"_. She replies with a trembling voice: "I´m fine Steve! Go back to bed." She curses herself with the way her voice sounds.

Steve senses that she is shaken so he tries again: "Natasha, please open the door, let me see you."

Natasha knows that if she let him in, he will try to comfort her and hold her, and with the way she has being felling about him lately, is only going to make things worse, because she know she won´t be able to keep her walls up for him for too long. He is affecting her in a way she thought she would never be affected. At first she felt attraction towards him, but after what happened on D.C., they got closer. He saved her life, said that he trusted her with his and it became more than that. It is like she is falling in love with him and that can´t be, the Black Widow doesn´t have emotions, she only uses them as weapons. She has red on her ledger, she is tainted, and now she is broken. Steve on the other hand is the image of righteousness, he is too good for her, he deserves better.

Steve interrupts her thoughts: "Natasha, come on, if you don´t let me in I´ll just have to break down your door!" He knocks harder, the door shakes a little.

She realizes that she has no way out of this because when Steve Rogers put his mind to something he doesn´t stop until is done. She looks at her trembling hands, takes a deep breath and closes her eyes, trying to recover herself from the panic she is felling. She stands up and replies, this time her voice is steady: "Okay, just give me a sec!"

She goes to the closet and puts on a gray silk robe over her black tank top and panties, washes up her face and takes another deep breath to pull herself together. She goes to the door, opening it.

Steve is standing there, he is wearing a forest green army t-shirt and a black short. His body is tense, his hands curled up in fists and his blue eyes full of worry. She tries her best not to get lost in them and puts a fake smile on her face saying: "Hey Steve, I´m sorry for waking you up."

But without knowing she fails on her attempt to convince him that she is fine. Steve sees right past her mask because he notices that her eyes are red from crying, her face is pale and she smells like vodka. He hates seeing her like that; she seems lost just like she was when they took shelter on Sam Wilson´s house. He wants to help her, but she´ll have to put her defenses down so he raises one of his hands and rests it on the side of her face looking straight into her green eyes: "Don´t play games with me Natasha, tell me what is wrong?"

Natasha is a little surprised by his move, did she failed that miserable not to show her moment of weakness? His touch sends electricity through her body; she fights the urge to lean into his hand and backs away from it, stepping aside to let him pass.

Steve walks in her room, he sees the opened bottle of vodka on the bar and the broken glass on the other side spread on the floor. Natasha follows his gaze and adds: "I didn´t think that a breaking glass would be so noisy." She closes the door.

Steve turns back to face her and says: "I´m a light sleeper." He extends his hand to her: "Come on, sit down with me." Steve notices that she hesitated to take his hand and when she did he felt that her hand is shaking, so he tightens his grip on it.

And that was all it took for Natasha Romanoff, the Black Widow, to break down, Steve Roger´s tight grip on her hand. Her whole body starts to shake and she can´t control it, her walls crumble and it is like they were never there. She looks down as tears start to fall from her eyes and she feels her knees go weak, she is falling…

Steve moves quickly and put his arms around her back, holding her from falling down, supporting all her weight on his body. Natasha presses her head against his left shoulder and grabs the fabric of his t-shirt with her hands on his chest: "I saw her again" her voice is low and shaken.

Steve places a hand on her head caressing it, his fingers going through her red hair, and whispers: "Who did you see, Tasha?"

Natasha squeezes her eyes shut: "My mother, I remembered her, I see her in my dreams all the time. They ordered me to do it and…I…I…I killed her." She says the last words so low that Steve almost missed it. She starts to sob uncontrollably.

Steve hearts breaks as he wonders: _"Did she really do it or was it just a nightmare? What could have happened with her to remember that now? And who the hell would make someone kill their own mother?"_ Only one thought comes to his mind, KGB._ "Her encounter with them must have trigger some of her old memories."_

Natasha is leaning heavily against him now so he picks her up and carries her to the couch, sitting down with the sobbing spy on his lap, her arms now around his neck. He wishes he could take her pain away, but he doesn´t know how, so he just holds her tight and wait for her to calm down.

Natasha stops sobbing as soon as she feels that Steve tightens his hold on her. She opens her eyes, staring at his strong arm in front of her, and manages to says with a husky voice: "I´m sorry. I never lost control like this, I...I don´t know what is wrong with me…"

Steve remove his right arm from around her and takes her chin making her look up at him. He says softly: "There is nothing wrong with you Natasha. You are only human." He slides his hand from her chin to her cheek and then tucks a strand of her hair behind her ear. He admires her face, she looks so fragile right now, but still beautiful.

Natasha tries to blinks her tears away. He is right, she is human and she is not a killing machine, not anymore. She is amazed at how Steve always knows what to say, he always makes her feel better. She never had that with anyone, he understands her so well.

Steve stares intensely into her eyes, he looks down at her lips and starts to lower his head but stops half-way. He wants to kiss her badly, but he doesn´t want to take advantage of her moment of weakness.

Natasha eyes are locked on his gaze, she feels the heat rises on her body and starts closing the rest of the space between them.

And right before their lips touch, the alarm goes off and they hear Jarvis: "Avengers assemble!"

They both back away, startle by the beeping sound and the command given by Jarvis. The A.I. continues: "Clint Barton is on video call."

And that was all it took to take Natasha out of Steve's arms. She stands up and asks with a mix of surprise and excitement in her voice: "Clint is calling?"

Steve rests his arms on his legs and looks at his feet. He feels jealous again, he doesn´t know exactly if Natasha and Barton are just close friends, or something more.

Jarvis answers: "Yes Miss Romanoff, he is requesting you to gather at the conference room immediately."

She looks back at Steve; he feels she is staring at him so he meets her eyes, he wants to ask her what is the deal with Barton, but duty calls, so he simply says: "Let´s go." He stands up and quickly walks out.

Natasha noticed the hurt expression on his face, but Steve leaves before she can ask about it. So she just tries to clean her wet face with her hands, and follows him in silence.

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**Conference Room**

Tony is last one to come in, as usual, the rest are all sitting at a big gray hexagonal table, in their sleeping clothes, looking tired: "Hey everyone. There is nothing like a quick nap to get me going." Tony says rubbing his eyes. "Turn the video on Jarvis" he says as he sits down next to Bruce, who is looking at the screen in front of them.

"Yes sir." Jarvis responds, and Clint Barton´s face appear in the screen, he smiles a little and says: "Hello Avengers! How did you sleep tonight?"

Thor yawns loudly and then apologizes for it.

Tony answers a little annoyed: "Not very long, thanks to you Legolas! But it is good to see you."

"Good to see all of you too. I´m sorry about that Stark, I´m in a different time zone, it is 4:41 in the afternoon for me." Clint says looking at his watch.

Natasha sat in the farthest end of the table, she avoids eyes contact with the others so they don´t notice that she was crying, so she looks straight ahead at the screen and asks, her voice back to normal: "Where are you exactly, Clint?"

"Hey Nat, I heard you were back at the tower." Clint smiles at her and she smiles back. He then continues: "I´m in Singapore right now, but I´ll meet you in a small island on Indonesia. I´m sending the coordinates, I need you guys to suit up and come right away. I´ll let you know on the details when you get here."

Steve stands up looking at the screen: "Okay Barton. We´ll be there as fast as we can." He looks at the others sitting around: "Everybody, gather your things and be ready in 10 minutes. Stark, call the pilot of the quinjet, tell him we´ll be waiting at the rooftop."

"Sure thing, Cap." Tony stands up and takes his phone out of his pocket walking out as he makes the call, with his friends following right behind him.


	4. Ch 4 - On Our Way

**Author´s notes:** Hello again, sorry it took me longer to write this one, sometimes I get stuck on how to express myself in english, since writing in portuguese is not an option ;) I know my english is not perfect, so have patience with me. I just hope it doesn´t take the fun out of the story! And if you guys want to correct anything, feel free to do it.

Thank you for all the reviews and support. I really appreciate it!

I don´t own any of the avengers or marvel characters.

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CHAPTER 4

It is 5:05 a.m.

The quinjet takes off with all the avengers inside, suited up and ready for battle.

Tony rises from the copilot sit and heads to the back of the jet to join the others: "Okay, so the pilot got the coordinates for our destination, a remote island in Indonesia." He is holding one of his high-tech tablets: "Legolas also sent some briefing on our mission." He waves a hand up from the tablet and an image of a six store building appears on a lager screen inside the jet, the others gather around to take a better look at it.

Tony continues: "This is a HYDRA building, it is a main weapons distribution center and it supplies HYDRA minions and facilities from the eastern part of the world." He waves his hand again and an image of a dock next to the building appears: "There is a major cargo ship schedule to departure in 10 hours. Our mission is to break in the building, gather all the intel we can, get out and then blow up the whole thing. No need to mention that it is heavily guarded."

Steve asks: "Did Barton said how many soldiers are in the area?"

Tony looks at him and answers: "No, he said there will be major resistance, but nothing else on the matter. He did send us a map from the inside of the building." He waves his hands again and a layout of the building appears on the big screen, Tony continues: "And he has the password from the backdoor."

Natasha, knowing that she will be the one to infiltrate the building says: "Hum, that makes my life a little easier." She studies the layout on the screen carefully.

Bruce turns to Tony and asks: "How long until we get there?"

Tony looks away from his tablet to answer Bruce: "The pilot said we should get there in about 7 hours, so let´s get comfortable."

* * *

A couple of hours have passed and Natasha tried to take a nap, but couldn´t to do it. She has a terrible headache, probably a combination from the lack of sleep, drinking vodka and crying. She looks at her right side where Thor is sitting and gets a little envy; he was in deep sleep, his head hanging to the side. On the left, Tony and Bruce we´re having science talk sitting at the end of the jet. Steve is across from her, leaning his head against the back of his chair, with his eyes closed and his fingers taping repeatedly against his leg. He can´t sleep either. She stares at him and wonders if he is thinking about the mission or about her, falling to pieces in front of him. She hates herself for that and hates how he always finds her soft spot. What is it about Steve that makes her want to give all her secrets away?

Steve´s mind is playing the moment he just had with Natasha over and over again, he can´t get it out of his head. Natasha always tried so hard to hide her true emotions from everyone and the way she failed to hide them from him tonight was surprising and scary. He had never seen her so broken and he wants to be there for her because he cares about her too much to let her go through this alone.

The jet goes through some turbulence and shakes a little, so Steve opens his eyes and finds Natasha's eyes studying him. He locks his eyes with hers and then looks down at her lips. He remembers how they almost kissed, but his thoughts are interrupted when the jet shakes a lot, this time causing Thor to wake up.

Thor blinks to adjust his eyes to the dim light.

Natasha on the other hand squint her eyes from the sharp pain in her head.

Steve gives her a concerned look: "Are you okay, Natasha?"

Natasha opens her eyes and rubs her hand in her forehead: "Yeah, I just got a headache, and the turbulence is making it worse."

He gazes at her green eyes again. Natasha feels a little nervous by the intense look Steve is giving her; it is piercing though her soul, but she doesn't look away.

Thor notices Steve and Natasha staring at each other. "_There is definitely something going on between those two_" he thinks. He clears his throat to let them know he is awake: "Ahem, are we far from our destination?" He asks as Steve and Natasha break their connection to look at him.

Natasha breaks the awkward silence: "We should be halfway, let me ask the pilot." She unbuckles her safety belt and heads to the cockpit.

When Natasha is out of sight, Thor looks at Steve who is now staring down at the floor: "You know my friend, if you have feelings for Lady Natasha, you should tell her."

Steve looks at Thor and frowns. He opens his mouth to say something and then closes it again.

Thor smiles a little at seeing his friend speechless, knowing his assumption is right, so he continues: "I see the way you look at her; there is no point in denying it Steven."

Steve moves uncomfortably on his chair: "It's…complicated." He simply answers.

Natasha walks back in; they both look at her as she speaks: "We will be there in about three hours, Thor." Thor nods at Natasha.

Thor decides he should give the two some privacy so he gets up: "I need to stretch my legs, this trip is taking far too long, maybe on a next occasion we should ask Heimdall to transport us." He then rests a hand on Steve's shoulder to reassure him and goes to join Tony and Bruce on the back.

Steve looks back at Natasha. She is still standing in the cockpit doorway, her face is paler than normal: "Natasha, maybe you should sit down." He taps the empty sit beside him.

She is feeling dizzy and her headache is getting worse, so she just accepts his offer and sits down quickly, afraid she might fall down on the way.

Steve just gives her a concerned look again and Natasha answers his unspoken question: "I think I´m having motion sickness. I don´t think drinking vodka and flying afterwards it's a good idea." She squint her eyes again; she is starting to feel nausea too. "_Damn it" _she thinks.

Steve holds her hand, it is ice-cold. He feels bad for her so he says softly: "I´m sorry. Just try taking deep breaths, it might help. Do you want me to see if there is any medication for that?"

With her eyes closed she replies between breaths: "No, thanks. I think if I just sit still and keep breathing, I´ll survive."

Steve laughs: "I´m sure you will."

Natasha takes another deep breath and continues: "I´m sorry Steve, I feel so embarrassed about before and now this. I´m feeling so stupid."

"It´s okay Tasha, don´t worry about it. Besides, I enjoy the fact that you let me take care of you." He then starts to caress her hand with his thumb. He has so many questions in his head, so much he wants to say to Natasha, but now it´s not a good time, so he´ll just wait for another opportunity.

She squeezes Steve´s warm hands and opens her eyes to look at him. She leans into him and whispers: "Well, in that case I´ll have to repay the favor sometime." She gives him a sexy smile just to tease him.

Steve shyly smiles back at her and blushes heavily. She knows how to push his buttons, even when she is not feeling all that hot.

To lighten up the mood, Natasha says looking at the three men on the back: "Poor Thor, he looks very confused; it's hard to keep up with Tony and Bruce when they start to talk about scientific stuff."

Steve turns to look at them too and noticed that Tony is talking to Thor and the expression on Thor's face changed from confusion to irritation. So he adds: "And now Tony is probably asking him to lend some Asgardian artifact to test his crazy ideas."

Natasha chuckles. They watch as Thor replies something to Tony, who looks disappointed at his answer.

Natasha let go of Steve´s hand as she sees Thor making his way back to his seat, Steve glances at Natasha and she just whispers: "I´m okay, getting better." Steve nods at her and then watches as Thor sits across from them with a look of disbelief on his face.

Steve smiles at Thor: "Hard to keep up with those two, huh?"

Thor looks at him: "Yes it really is, there is no end to their theories, it is madness."

Natasha replies: "Well, I don't know about Bruce, but Stark definitely got a loose screw on his head." Thor looks quizzically at her so she explains: "Meaning his is a little crazy."

Thor snorts and replies: "I do not doubt that. My girlfriend is a scientist and she enjoy talking about it too, but those two are no match for her."

Natasha smiles a little and then says: "I guess no one is. How is Jane doing by the way?"

Thor smiles at Natasha and starts to talk about Jane Foster and their live together.

* * *

**Indonesia - 12:20 a.m.**

The quinjet lands on a deserted beach, it is night-time. The back door of the jet opens and the avengers walk out down the ramp. The weather is nice, the moon is up on the sky, and there is a fresh breeze blowing. There is nothing around them except sand, rocks and a dense forest ahead. They can hear the waves crashing. Then, from behind the trees, a man figures appears from the shadow and walks toward them saying: "Hey, is anyone up for a luau on the beach?"

Clint has a smile on his face, he is suited up with his arrows and bow hanging on his back.

Natasha almost run to meet him, they hug each other and she says: "It's good to see you in one piece Clint."

Clint gently pull her away and holds her arms to look at her: "Does that mean you missed me?" He has a playful smile on his lips.

She lightly punches his arm and smiles at him too.

"Ouch, I´ll take that as a yes!" Clint says and then makes his way to meet the guys who are standing on the back and shakes hands with them all exchanging greetings.

Clint speaks: "Okay, now that we are all here, let´s get down to business." He takes out a pen drive from his pocket and heads back inside the jet, the rest following him. He inserts the pen drive at the screen and says: "The building is on the other side of the island; we should get there in 10 minutes by foot, no flying so we don´t call attention until it is required." He looks at Tony and Thor. They both nod.

More photos of the area appears on the screen, showing rounds of the soldiers, the defenses around the building and the points where there are cameras and sensors that trigger the alarm.

Clint explains every detail of the HYDRA facility security and they discuss the best way to get the job done.

Steve, as the leader, makes the final decision on the plan of action and explains it to the team: "So, since the front door is heavily guarded and got cameras everywhere, the backdoor is the best way to enter the building. Natasha and I will infiltrate though here." He points a pathway that leads to the backdoor and then glances at Natasha who nods at him.

Stark interrupts: "Cap, that path got too many soldiers, you´ll call too much attention if you plan to take all of them down, someone will probably trigger the alarm."

He looks at Tony and continues: "And that is where you come in. To avoid the soldiers we are going to need a distraction. The cargo ship is docked and getting loaded, so since we are already planning on blowing the whole thing down, you, Thor and Banner will attack it to get their attention."

Tony rubs his fingers against his chin thinking, he replies: "Huh, okay, that might work."

Steve then turns to Clint: "Barton, you are going to find a nice spot to cover me and Natasha as we enter the building. Once we are in you are going to plant the bomb here." He points at some oil tanks beside the back of the building and continues "When we are all out of there, you can push the button and blow the place down."

Clint looks at Steve and replies: "My pleasure, Cap! And I know just the spot to cover you two." He already scanned the area many times so he knows where to hide safely.

Steve looks around and asks: "Any questions?" No one says anything so he gives the order: "Okay, so get ready and let´s get the HYDRA scums!"

Tony and Bruce are the only ones still in their normal clothes so Tony puts a hand in Bruce´s shoulder and says: "Let´s suit up big guy." Bruce just grins at him.


	5. Ch 5 - Mission Starts

**Author ´s Notes:** Hello! This chapter is for the action lovers, I hope you guys like it! Thanks for the reviews and support!

I don´t own the Avengers or any Marvel character.

* * *

CHAPTER 5

**Indonesia - 12:35 a.m.**

Tony, Thor and Bruce were hiding behind a tree line right before the dock. There are several soldiers walking around and a lot of workers on the dock. A crane is loading the containers to the ship. There are two towers on each side, with moving lights and anti-air guns.

Tony, already is his Iron Man suit, turns to Thor and says: "You and I are going to take down those towers first to avoid the heavy artillery." He then turns to Bruce: "When you unleash the beast, try to clear the way to the crane and smash that thing." He then turns on his communication device and talks to Steve: "Hey Capsicle, we are ready when you are."

Steve and Natasha are on the other side of the area, hiding behind some rocks, near the pathway that leads to the backdoor of the big gray building in front of them. Steve hears Tony and takes his wrist close to his mouth to talk on his com with Clint: "Okay, they are in position. Are you ready Barton?"

Clint was just finishing climbing a rocky hill. Up there he had a panoramic view of the HYDRA facilities and was within his range to cover Steve and Natasha on the back of the building. "I´m in place Cap." He answers inspecting the area, every soldier round was running as he had expected.

Steve looks at Natasha to see if she is ready, she only nods at him and then he talks on his com again: "Okay Stark, we are good to go."

Tony looks at Thor and Bruce: "Let´s start the show!" He flies out with Thor right behind him.

Bruce walks out from behind the tree turning into the Hulk, who smashes his fists on the floor with a roar and starts to runs.

The alarm goes off as soon as they spot Iron Man and Thor flying. The soldiers start to get into combat positions. Iron Man, shoots small missiles at the first tower before they can react to the sudden attack and the tower blows up in flames.

Thor heads for the other and hits the base of the tower with his lighting, breaking the wooden pillars that support it. Soldiers on the ground try to run out of the way as the tower starts to fall down, some not making it and getting crushed.

The Hulk punches a few soldiers out of his way, some of them start to shoot at him with machine guns, but it only makes him angry. He grabs a nearby container and throws at the soldiers shooting at him, crushing them and clearing his path. He gets to the crane and starts smashing it down.

Steve and Natasha hear the alarm and see several soldiers who were nearby running towards the dock. Now only three stay behind, with their back at them, watching the others soldiers passing by.

Steve looks at Natasha and whispers: "Now!" She nods and they leave their hiding place.

The Black Widow grabs the nearest soldier wrapping her legs around his torso and shocking him on the neck with her Widows Bite, he falls unconscious.

Hearing the sound from the soldier falling behind them, the other two turn around only to see Captain America´s shield flying toward them, it hit one on his head, knocking him out.

The other soldier was about to shout when an arrow came flying from above, hitting right on his chest. He is dead.

Another arrow comes flying and hits the camera above the metal door as Natasha and Steve stand in front of it. Natasha types the password Clint gave her on the lock. It beeps and a green light appears. The door unlocks, they walk into a narrow hallway. Steve throws his shield at a camera up ahead; it breaks the camera and bounces off the wall returning in his hand.

Natasha had studied the layout and knows where to go, she whispers to Steve: "The computer room is on the fifth floor, follow me." She silently walks ahead. They reach the end of the hallway, Natasha takes a peek and seeing the way is clear, she moves her hand for Steve to follow her. They turn right into a larger hall and go to an iron door that leads to the staircase. They run up stairs.

Natasha was about to open the iron door from the fifth floor, when Steve grabs her arm and pull her back: "Wait, I hear someone coming!"

They lean back against the wall behind the door. Steve overhear two man talking in german about the operation being compromised and getting away on a helicopter. The voices fade as they walk away. Steve then nods at Natasha and heads to the door opening it for her.

Natasha walks out, carefully looking around for any threats and leads the way to the computer room. Once inside, she goes to the computer and inserts a pen drive. She starts typing really fast as she speaks: "We should have about seven minutes before they detect that I'm hacking the system."

Steve stands by the closed door to hear if someone is coming. He watches Natasha eyes locked on the computer screen as she types. He can hear the noise of explosions coming from outside. He raises his wrist to talks into his com: "We´re hacking the system, how is it going out there?"

Tony answers almost shouting: "You´re missing the fireworks Cap! We just started to blow up the ship!"

Then Clint speaks in a lower voice: "I´m making my way to the oil tanks."

He puts his wrist down, glances at the clock on the wall and says: "Three minutes Tasha!"

She doesn't take her eyes from the screen as she answers: "Almost done...got it!" But when she was about to remove the pen drive, she freezes. There is a file with the name: Winter Soldier. She starts typing again.

Steve furrows his brown noticing that she moves to the keyboard again. He glances at the clock, their time is almost up: "Natasha, what are you doing, we gotta go now!" She keeps typing, so he walks to her side grabbing her arm: "Natasha!" He stares at the screen and realizes what she is doing, she is hacking a file on the Winter Soldier. Steve hears footsteps down the hall. He looks at the door and says: "Tasha, let it go. It´s not worth it!"

Natasha is typing furiously and doesn´t even answer Steve.

The door starts to opens and Steve pulls Natasha down to duck under the desk. She looks at him with a pain expression on her face. He let go of her arm, realizing now that he was squeezing it too hard.

Natasha whispers: "I just need to press enter!"

Steve shakes his head at her, he hears someone walking around the room.

Natasha can't let it go, so she stretches her arm and starts to feel the keyboard for the enter key. She finds it and presses it.

Steve stares at her in disbelieve, she has such hard time taking orders from him.

The computer starts to load the file as the soldiers are walking around the room. They start to head out, when the computer makes a beep sound. The file is loaded and the soldiers come back in.

Steve gives an angry look to Natasha. She mouths the word "_Sorry"_ and seeing no other way out she rises with her gun at her hand, loudly shooting the two soldiers down.

Steve stands up taking a deep breath and looking at the dead soldiers on the floor. The alarm off the building goes off. Steve glares displeased with the spy beside him and shouts: "What the hell Natasha, I told you we had to go!"

She knows she messed up and it pains her to see how Steve is looking at her right now, but she couldn't miss the opportunity. She quickly removes the pen drive from the computer and looks at Steve, trying hard to show no emotions on her face: "I guess that one is on me…again."

He tenses his jaws before speaking in a lower tone this time: "Let´s get out of here, fast!" He turns on his com: "Barton, we´re leaving through the roof and we´re going to need back up!"

Barton is planting the bomb under the oil tanks, he responds: "Okay Cap, I´m on my way." He finishes fixing the bomb and stands up. He looks around, there no one in sight so he look up the building and shoots a grappling hook arrow to the rooftop and starts climbing the rope.

Natasha and Steve are running on the hall toward the staircase, but the iron door opens and soldiers starts to come out.

The first soldier shouts as soon as he sees them and all soldiers start shooting at them.

Steve pulls Natasha behind him and they both duck behind his shield. Some of the bullets ricochet on Captain America´s shield, taking down two soldiers, but others come out.

Natasha grabs an explosive disk from her belt and makes it glide on the floor. It blows up near the soldiers taking three more down and giving time for Captain America to stand up and run toward the guards. He bashes his shield on the first soldier, punches the next and kicks another back into the staircase, closing the iron door. He holds the handle so they can´t open the door and shouts to Natasha: "The elevator!"

The elevator´s doors are open on their floor, but she hits the buttons inside and nothing happens, it is disabled. She looks up and sees a trap door that leads to the elevator´s shaft. She grabs the upper frame of the elevator´s door and swings herself to get impulse to kick the trapdoor, it opens with a loud metal sound. She gets down and turns to Steve who is now pressing his shoulder against the door trying to keep the soldiers from coming in.

Natasha shouts: "Steve, into the elevator shaft!"

Steve let go of door, puts his shield on his back and run to Natasha. A soldier came falling down as the door abruptly opens.

Natasha starts shooting at the soldiers coming out of the staircase as Steve slides the rest of the way into the elevator. He jumps to grab the edge of the open trapdoor and climbs on the elevator. He extends his hand down: "Natasha, come on!" Natasha stops shooting and rolls into the elevator as enemy fire hit the wall beside her. She drops a disc that starts to release tear gas and grabs Steve hands. He easily pulls her up and closes the trapdoor. They have two floors to climb up to reach the rooftop.

Steve looks up and says: "The door on the rooftop is probably locked so I´ll have to use force to open it. Let me go first." Steve says as he holds the iron cable and starts to climb.

Natasha glances at the trapdoor as she hears coughing sounds from the soldiers but it soon stops and there are no more sound. She gives a little smile. She looks up and climbs after Steve.

* * *

**PS:** Tan tan tan! Are they going to make it out of there? I decided to make this chapter a cliffhanger, but don´t worry, I won't keep you guys waiting too long!


	6. Ch 6 - Mission Ends

**Author´s Notes: **Hi there! I really love music, so this chapter was inspired on a Coldplay song called Atlas. It plays on the final credits of Hunger Games-Catching Fire. If you guys want to listen to it, it is an intense song, I love it! Thank you for reading my story and for the reviews and support!

Again, I don´t own the avengers or any marvel character.

* * *

CHAPTER 6

Steve and Natasha were climbing the cable from the empty elevator shaft, going up to the roof, trying to escape from the HYDRA facility. Steve reaches the door to the rooftop and puts all his strength in his arms and hands to force it open. A gust of wind catches his face as he manages to do it. He jumps out and then extends a hand to Natasha, helping her jump out too.

Steve and Natasha look around; the rooftop is dark but it seems to be clear of enemies. Then a voice came from behind and above: "Hey you two." They both quickly turn toward the voice, Natasha already drawing her gun. Clint was standing on the roof above the door they had just come out with a smile on his face: "Took you long enough, I was beginning to worry."

Then Steve hears a helicopter coming, he looks to left and an attack helicopter directs a blinding light on them, it is going to fire, no time to react. Steve was about to jump in front of Natasha when the Hulk leaps on the top of the helicopter tails and starts smashing it. The helicopter starts to spin and fall, with Hulk still on top of it. It hits the ground and explodes.

The three avengers on the rooftop got their eyes wide open as they watch the scene. Steve releases a breath he didn´t realize he was holding: "Jesus! That was a close call. Remind me to thank Banner when we get out of here." Steve exchanges a relieved glance with Natasha.

Natasha looks at where the dock is and notices that the ship the others avengers were attacking was on fire: "Looks like Iron Man and Thor are doing some damage too."

Clint looks the other way and sees the door from the staircase opens, HYDRA soldier were coming out, so he shouted: "Incoming from the right!" They start shooting just as Steve got in front of Natasha and puts up his shield to block the bullets.

Clint shoots an explosive arrow taking out the soldiers that were off the staircase.

Natasha already with her gun in her hand rolls to the side and kneels beside Steve. Two more soldiers come out. Natasha shoots both soldiers down.

Steve lowers his shield as the shooting stops, just in time to see a metal ball rolling its way over and stopping right between him and Natasha.

Clint realizes it must be some kind of grenade and shouts: "Take cover!" He lays with his face down on the roof, his hands on the back of his head.

Steve turns to cover to Natasha and saw her already running towards the empty elevator shaft, so he just ducks behind his shield.

Natasha jumps and grabs the elevator cable as the metal ball went off silently.

Several metal blades flew off it, making tinkling sounds as they hit Captain America´s shield. Steve stands up and sees the blades that hit his shield on the ground. He looks up with worried eyes and there are more blades sticking on the wall beside the door of the elevator shaft. He thinks: _"Damn it!"_ Steve saw Natasha hanging in the elevator´s cable with a pain expression on her face.

Natasha grit her teeth trying not to cry out in pain as she looks down on her right lower back and sees the blade that hit her, thinking _"What the hell is that?"_ She would be covered in there from an explosion, but not from flying blades. The blade went deep, the pain is too much and it is draining her strength. Her right hand loses its grip on the cable. She shuts her eyes and takes shallow breaths trying to control the pain without much success. Her left arm starts to tremble.

Clint slowly stands, not knowing what happened. He sees Steve making a run toward the elevator shaft.

Steve tries to get to Natasha, but it´s too late. She loses the grip from her left hand and falls to her back on the top of the elevator, that luckily wasn´t far down, but Natasha screams at the blade that pierces even deeper on her back, all the way through her abdomen.

Clint sees more soldiers coming out from the staircase but his eyes widen with the horrifying sound of Natasha´s scream. He quickly looks down at Steve.

Steve is looking down into the elevator shaft kneeling besides the opening and was about to jump in to help Natasha when Clint shouted: "Cap, more enemies!" Steve looks to the right were a dozen more of hydra soldiers were coming at them. He closes his hand hard, almost piercing his nails through his palm. He can´t stand leaving Natasha helpless.

Clint quickly asks as he starts to shoot arrows at the enemies: "What happened to Nat?"

Steve looks down at Natasha again, she is not moving but her eyes are open, she seems to be conscious: "She fell into the elevator shaft!" His voice is shaken from the sight of Natasha´s blood pouring out her abdomen. Some bullets hit the floor beside him, taking him out of the panic moment and into a moment of rage. Steve stands up and charges at the soldiers, his shield blocking the bullets. He bashes his shield into the soldiers that were shooting at him with an angry shout, they fall down hard. Then he kicks their faces with all his strength taking them out, he turns around and punches other soldiers that are nearby, knocking them out as fast as he can.

Clint covers Steve, so he doesn´t get hit by the other bullets.

As he caught a break, Steve turns to Clint and shouts: "Where the hell are the others, we need some help here!"

Clint touches his earpiece: "Hey, Tin man, are you guys done over there? We´re on the rooftop trying to escape, Natasha is down and Steve and I are under heavy fire!" He shoots some more arrows without really aiming but hitting the mark.

Tony who was flying over the flaming ship responded: "Got it, I´ll be right with you Legolas! Thor, we gotta go!"

Hulk was smashing down the containers on the ship; some were falling on the water as he hit them.

Thor is flying by and throws his hammer hitting another helicopter that was attacking them. It falls down spinning towards the water. "Lead the way, I am finished here!" Thor answers to Tony as his hammer flies back to his hand.

Natasha vision is blurry. She blinks a few times trying to focus. Her head hurts from hitting it against the elevator, but the more intense pain comes from her right side, she slowly raises her head looking down at her injury and sees the bloody tip of the blade on the right side of her abdomen. She grimaces at the sharp pain it was sending through her body.

Tony and Thor arrive at the rooftop taking a lot of more soldiers down. "We´ve got this, you two get Natasha and get out!" Tony said as he shoot at soldiers with his beams.

Natasha let her head fall again and turns a little to the left side to take a hold on the back of the blade. Natasha takes a deep breath, gathering the strength to try pulling it out. She presses her lips together not to scream as she starts pulling it. She holds her breath for a moment as the pain increases. When the blade came out, she can´t hold it anymore and screams in pain. Tears start to fall from her eyes.

The Avengers all looked terrified at each other as they hear Natasha´s scream. Steve was already running to the elevator shaft with his shield on his back when Clint shouts: "I´m going to get the jet, Cap!"

Clint then turns to Tony: "Hey Stark! You can have the honor!" He throws the detonator from the bomb to Tony, who grabs it and says: "Ah, just like old times!" remembering when his company used to make weapons of mass destruction and he occasionally went on the tests sites.

Clint starts running to the edge and jumps. He turns in the air shooting his grappling hook arrow to descend.

Steve lands right next to where Natasha is laying, her face is pale and tears are falling from her eyes. She looks at him and manages to say: "I took it off…" with the blade in her trembling and bloody hand. He takes the blade out of her hand and tosses it to the side. She let her hand fall beside her. Steve looks down to the puddle of blood on her back and then puts his hands at the cut in her abdomen, to try stopping the bleeding. He presses it, but the bleeding is coming out from her back too, he whispers: "Jesus Tasha!"

She sees the fear in his blue eyes and says: "I…don´t think I´m…going to make it" she feels weak, her breath is erratic.

Steve meets her eyes almost angry at her for saying that: "Yes you are! I´m getting you out of here!" He has to stop the bleeding so he grabs a bandage and a small bottle of antiseptic from one of his pockets. He quickly looks at her and says as he opens the small bottle: "This is going to sting a little." And pour the antiseptic on the top of the wound.

Natasha grits her teeth and takes a hold on Steve arm squeezing it hard. When he is done she let go of him and takes shallow breaths. She then groans when he moves her to pass the bandage around her back and wrap it tightly around her belly. He mutters: "Sorry." Steve takes a hold on her waist, puts her left arm around his neck and says: "Hold on to me". He lifts her up. She sinks her head into his shoulders, biting her lip from the sharp pain and tries not to pass out.

Steve looks up, the opening is high above. He looks to the side walls calculating his trajectory; he gets an impulse with his feet against the side wall and jumps to the opposite wall and with another impulse, jumps out of the shaft landing on his back, his shield absorbing the impact, holding Natasha tightly in his arms.

Thor sees him coming out and points to the right: "The jet is approaching that way, Captain!"

Steve stands up and nods at Thor, shifting Natasha in his arms to get a better grip on her. She groans in pain. Steve looks down at Natasha and whisper: "Stay with me Tasha, I know you can get through this!" She tightens her grip around his neck in response.

Steve runs by Thor as he clears the way for him with his hammer. He looks up and sees the jet coming up with the back door open right in front of him. He runs to the edge, lightly bends his knees and takes a big jump to land on one knee inside the jet. Steve lays Natasha down, takes off his helmet throwing it to a corner and gets more bandages to try containing the blood that is still slowly coming out of her wound.

Clint, already flying away, asks: "How´s she doing Cap?" The pilot that came with them is sitting beside Clint on the copilot´s place.

Steve kneels beside her and answers Clint: "A blade pierced trough her abdomen, she lost a lot of blood, and probably has a concussion on her head, so get us to a hospital, fast!"

Steve then gently rolls Natasha to the side to wrap around more bandages. Natasha press hers lips together trying not to cry with the pain. He rolls her to her back again. Steve sees her eyes shuts tight and the pain expression in her face, he whispers: "Sorry, just hang on. We are getting you to the hospital." He holds her cold hand in his, she tight her grip on it. He looks at her bandage and sees that the bleeding has stopped, but he keeps staring at it, afraid she might start to bleed again.

A few minutes passes and Steve looks up at her face in concern when he feels that her hand starts to lose its grip on his, she is pale, her eyes are open but far away. Steve grabs her face with both hands: "Look at me Natasha!" Her green eyes meet his worried blues, she blinks heavily, "Don´t you dare leaving me, do you hear me?" Steve commands her, holding back the tears forming in his eyes.

Natasha is tired, her body at this point is numb, but Steve Rogers won´t let her give in, he is the only reason she is fighting so hard to not let herself go into the darkness that is surrounding her, his faces the only thing that keeps her going, so she puts a weak smile on her lips and says in a faint voice: "Yes, my Captain…"

Steve caresses her face with his thumbs, occasionally whispering: "Stay with me Tasha." Never taking his eyes out of hers to make sure she stays awake, until the jet lands on the top of Singapore´s main hospital.


	7. Ch 7 - Praying for Her Life

**Author´s Notes: **Hello again, the next chapter is up! I really appreciate all the reviews and support! Thanks! Have fun!

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CHAPTER 7

It is 2:38 a.m. as Clint lands the jet on the rooftop of Singapore´s hospital. He quickly stands up from the pilot sit and takes a look at Natasha, lying still with a bandage around her abdomen, blood all over her suit, sweat on her forehead, her face is pale and her lips are purple. She is blankly looking at Steve who is kneeling beside her, staring back at her. Steve has his hands on her cheeks and is whispering something so low that he can´t quite hear "_Is the Captain praying?"_ Clint thinks and feels a chill go down his spine when the thought of Natasha dying comes to his mind. So he quickly says getting out of the jet: "Let´s go Cap! Get Nat, I´m calling someone to help!" He runs to the door and enters the hospital.

Steve is praying. He has been since he noticed a few minutes ago that Natasha was in shock, she needs help fast because her oxygen rate is low and her heart can stop at any time. He had to hang on to something not to fall apart, so the only thing he could do right now is pray. And when Clint calls him running out of the quinjet, he immediately picks Natasha limp body up in his arms and runs out of the jet too.

Clint goes inside the building, turning left on a large empty hallway and shouts: "We need help! Someone, please!"

An oriental woman in white jacket come out of a room and says with an accent: "Sir, what´s the matter?"

Steve appears turning the corner into the hallway too and answers the nurse: "She got pierced by a blade on her abdomen! I managed to contain the bleeding, but she lost a lot of blood and is in shock!"

The nurse narrows her eyes as she recognizes Captain America and quickly checks Natasha in Steve´s arms, but without saying a word, she runs into a room and comes out pulling a stretcher: "Put her here Captain, let´s go down the elevator and take her to the E.R."

Steve puts her on the stretcher, Natasha´s eyes close and her head fall to the side as they all get inside the elevator. Steve calls Natasha´s name but she doesn´t move. Steve fells like he has a hole in his chest: "No, no, Natasha! Look at me!" he keeps saying grabbing her face, but her eyes stay shut.

The nurse quickly presses a button in the elevator and then grabs Natasha´s wrist to feel the pulse, it is weak. She grabs a phone that is inside the elevator: "I´m on my way to the E.R. with an unconscious female in shock! Get the crash cart ready!"

Steve looks at Clint; both have fear in their eyes. Clint swallows hard, his throat is dry.

The elevator´s door opens again. They go into a room, where more people in white are already waiting for them. Another nurse turns to them: "Please, stand back, we´ve got this."

Steve and Clint stand aside and notice Natasha chest stops moving, the nurse that had her hand on her wrist shouts: "I lost her, get the defibrillator now!" The nurse unzip Natasha´s suit exposing her black bra as another nurse hands the defibrillator to the doctor who shouts: "Clear!"

Clint watches in panic as the nurses and doctor run around trying to reanimate Natasha, he can´t believe what is happening, he nervously put his hand on his mouth. Steve is at his right side, despair in his eyes watching the doctor shocking Natasha´s chest the second time and nothing…he starts whispering: "No God, please, don´t let her die! Natasha, come back, please!" His eyes burning from the tears he is holding back.

After shocking her a third time, the doctor puts a hand on Natasha´s neck and says: "Got a pulse, but it´s weak! Inject 1 mg of atropine, now!" A nurse does as he says, then they plug-in the monitor on Natasha and they all watch as Natasha´s vital signs stabilize.

Clint releases a breath in relieve putting his hands on Steve´s shoulder. Steve just closes his eyes and mutters: "Thank God."

* * *

Tony, Bruce and Thor had arrived in the hospital a short time after the doctor took Natasha away for surgery. They met Steve and Clint quietly sitting in the waiting room. Tony quickly explained that as soon as the quinjet was out of their sight, he blew up the HYDRA building and they left, giving a lift to Bruce once he turned back to his normal self. Then Steve told them what happened to Natasha. They exchange worried looks and remained quiet for a moment. Tony was staring out the window and Bruce sat down the nearest chair.

Thor, who was standing in the middle of the room, broke the silence: "I am famished, is there somewhere we can eat?"

They all look at the Thunder God, but none answered right away, everybody still got their minds stunned with the news.

Thor looks around thinking to ask someone from the hospital for that information, since his friends didn´t respond.

Then Tony walks to Thor and says: "Nothing seems to take the Thunder God´s appetite away, huh!" He taps Thor on the shoulder and continues: "Come on big guy, there is probably a cafeteria around here, I´ll help you find it."

Bruce rises from where he is sitting and says: "I think this surgery is going to take a while, so I could use a cup of coffee." And he starts walking after Tony and Thor.

Then Clint stands up and says: "Yeah, me too" following Bruce.

Then Tony stops and looks back at Steve who is still sitting down, looking lost in his thoughts: "Hey Cap, aren´t you coming?"

Clint stops and looks back at Steve too.

Steve, absentminded looks up: "Huh? Oh no, I think I need some fresh air." He stands up and makes his way to the elevator.

Clint stands beside Tony and whispers: "Is there something going on between Steve and Natasha? I´ve never seen the Captain so devastated. I thought he was going to die with Natasha in the E.R., it was kind of scaring." He watches as Steve gets in the elevator.

Tony looks at Clint and says: "Not that I know of, but he is acting different around Natasha since she got back. I think that the Cap is in love with the spy."

Clint eyes widen and he says in a sarcastic tone: "No way! Captain America and Black Widow?"

Tony has a smirk on his face: "Why, are you jealous, Legolas?"

Clint frown to Tony: "What? No, I mean…yeah…maybe a little. I´m a bit overprotective of Nat, she is like a sister to me." He takes a deep breath and continues: "Do you think she is in love with him too?"

Tony raises an eyebrow and answers: "I don´t know, I can´t read the spy like Rogers, she always got her poker face on. But in the tower they were always around each other."

"Hey, come on!" They both look at Bruce gesturing for them to come in the end of the hallway, so they make their way to reach him.

* * *

Steve is holding the steel rail, on the edge of the hospital´s rooftop, looking at the lights of the city on the horizon. The waiting is killing him. He feels like he has a heavy weight on his chest and it is making it hard for him to breathe. He almost lost Natasha today, he saw how weak she was and she still had to go through surgery, he was so afraid that she wasn´t going to make it. It is in dark times that you find out who your true friends are and Natasha turned out to be even more than that to him. He loved her, more than anything. He realized that now because when he was around her, he felt truly alive. And now losing her means losing what was left of his sanity, he was afraid that he might not be able to go on without her in his life. The steel rail he was holding dents into his tight grip. He lower his head as all the pain and fear he is felling took over him and the tears that he had tried so hard to hold back before now were falling freely from his eyes.

* * *

It has been nearly two hours. Steve comes out of the elevator and goes to the waiting room, finding Tony, Bruce, Thor and Clint sitting there already. They all look up at him as he asks: "Any news from Natasha?"

Bruce is the one to answer him: "Not yet." He sees how beaten up Steve is and asks: "Are you okay Steve?"

Steve sits down on a chair next to Bruce and takes deep breath: "Yes…no…I don´t know…"

Thor, who was pacing around the room with his arms crossed to his chest, just walks to Steve and rest a hand on his shoulder, Steve nods at him and Thor resume his pacing.

Tony is sitting across from them, he tries to comfort the Soldier: "Don´t worry buddy, I´m sure Natasha will be fine, she´s a fighter."

Steve looks at Tony with a half-smile on his face and Tony asks: "What?"

Tony is looking quizzically at Steve as he answers: "You said her real name, instead of some nickname you made up." Bruce chuckles at Steve remark.

Tony continues: "I did, didn´t I? Well at least I got you to smile a little, ´cause you look like crap." He smiles at Steve.

Clint is sitting beside Tony in deep thought and suddenly speaks before Steve can get back at Tony: "You know, Stark is right, Natasha is a fighter, and the serum will surely help her get better in no time."

Thor stopped pacing around and they all look surprised at Clint.

Steve and Tony say together: "What serum?" Steve and Tony look at each other and then back to Clint.

Clint is taken aback by all the eyes on him: "What? You guys didn´t know that yet?" They all kept looking at him, waiting for the answer so Clint continues: "She was injected with a type of Super-Soldier serum when she was in the Red Room. She was the only one who survived its effects."

Bruce, rubbing his hand against his chin, says: "That´s interesting to say the least."

Tony then looks at Bruce: "It is not only interesting, it explains a lot about the redhead too" Bruce nods at Tony.

Steve is still staring at Clint as he speaks: "So that means she can heal like I do?"

Clint looks at Steve: "Not like you no, but she can heal faster than a normal human."

Tony then asks: "What about the other Super-Soldier abilities that the Cap has, does she have them too?"

Clint looks at Tony: "Well, they are similar to the Cap, but not as powerful. Her serum has enhanced her physical and mental abilities to the top of human capability. She is as strong, as fast, as smart as a human can be. She also has a very strong immune system, high endurance, pain suppression…"

Bruce interrupts: "High endurance and pain suppression? Well that explains how she was able to pull out the blade from her abdomen herself. That must have hurt like hell."

Clint nods at Bruce then continues with a smirk on his face, knowing that what he was about to say would cause a fuss: "And her body ages in a much slower rate than ours, so she is a lot older than she appears to be."

Tony looks like he just found out a major gossip and almost jumped out of his chair: "What? How old is she exactly?"

Clint looks at Tony: "I don´t know, every time I asked her about it, she changed the subject. But from the stories she has told me, my guess is that she is almost as old as the Captain here" then he looks at Steve.

Steve is astonished and speechless. Natasha has more in common with him than he thought. He wonders how long Natasha has been around. Has she seen what he had seen? Has she lived in his time too?

And now everyone is staring at Steve as Tony says: "Wow! That must be why you two get along so well! I mean, you´re an old man and she is an old woman. Oh god, so many nicknames are coming to my mind right now…" Tony laughs at himself.

Then the doctor comes in with a nurse behind him. Tony stops laughing immediately. Steve stands up almost as a reflex and they look expectantly at the doctor who starts to speak: "I´m Doctor Ming, the head surgeon and I´m glad to give you the good news. Natasha is well and out of risk."

The tension on the room disappears right there, everyone seemed to be more relaxed, and Tony resumes laughing. They all glare at him and he says: "Oh, I´m sorry, go on Doc."

The doctor smiles a little and continues: "She is a strong woman, we manage to repair the internal damage and she is recovering well. She was moved to a private room, she is asleep but if you want you can see her now. Nurse Wang will show you the way" he points at the oriental woman behind him who says: "Follow me."

Steve goes to the doctor and puts a hand on his shoulder and says with a smile on his face: "Thank you, Doctor!"

The doctor nods at Steve, smiling back.

The other all pass beside the doctor thanking him and the doctor gives a broad grin, after all, it is not every day that you get five superheroes to thank you!


	8. Ch 8 - Fighting Demons

**Author´s notes:** Hi guys! In this chapter there are going to be some explanation on the nightmare Natasha has on chapter 3 and her encounter with old friends she mentioned in chapter 2. It is a little dark, but Natasha´s past has a lot of dark places. I´m not an expert on her background, so I´m just putting my ideas of what might have happened to her.

If you noticed, I decided to put name on the chapters so you don´t get lost, because I keep having so many ideas that I don´t know how many chapter more this story is going to have.

Hope you guys like it!

I don´t own the avengers or any marvel characters.

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CHAPTER 8

**Flashback - Russia, 1952**

It is a cold night. The Black Widow is on surveillance, she was waiting for her mark to come back home. The KGB sent her there to kill an American journalist that was trying to get information on the Black Widow Ops, meaning to bring the operation down by exposing it to the public eye.

She sees the woman arriving and going inside her apartment building. Natasha recognizes her face because that same woman have been following her the last few days. Natasha noticed that on a late night after she left the house of her previous mark, a Russian politician. The Black Widow could have killed her, but she seemed harmless and out of curiosity she pretended that she didn´t see her. Now she understands why the woman was following her, she must have found out who she was and was probably trying to get information for her article. The journalist has a lot of guts, stalking a trained assassin, but she is going to regret that now.

Natasha is waiting outside the woman´s apartment, until the lights are out. When that happened, the Black Widow makes her move. She manages to pick the lock from the front door of the building and from the door of the woman´s apartment without much trouble. Her feet are light and quick at the same time as she silently enters the apartment and makes her way to the bedroom where woman is asleep. Natasha pulls out a small knife from her belt and get on the top of the woman.

The woman awakes with wide eyes, but can't do much because the Black Widow pins her to the bed pressing her tights against her arms and torso and puts her left hand on her mouth so she can't scream.

With the knife on her right hand, the Black Widow makes a quick movement and slices the woman's throat open. It spills blood all over the white sheets.

Natasha gets off of the woman and stands beside the bed, watching with a cold stare as her victim gasps for air and puts her hands on her bleeding throat. She can't help but wonder why this woman looks familiar to her. Have she met her somewhere before? Then, the woman arms falls lifeless to the side of her body, she is dead.

The Black Widow starts to look around for the journalist notes, so she can destroy them. She can't find anything but a letter on the top of a desk in the living room, with a pen on the side. Looks like the woman just wrote that. It is in Russian, so she wonders why an American journalist would write in Russian. Natasha picks up the letter and reads it:

_Dear Natalia,_

_I have been looking for you for 19 years. Since our house was burnt to the ground and I lost everything. When the fire started, your father told me to get out and went to get you in your room. I ran outside and waited, watching the fire consume our home. When I saw a man walking out with you in his arms, I thought it was your father at first, but he looked at me and I didn´t recognized him. He ran the other way, I tried to run after him, but he had disappeared in the shadows. So I waited and waited for your father but he never came out of the flaming house. You were 5 years old. I searched for years for you, without any success. Many times I thought you were dead, but I couldn't stop looking for my only child. And then three nights ago, fate finally brought you to me as I saw you, walking out of a bar, with a man. I almost didn't recognize you, but then you laughed and smiled, the same way you used to when you were just a little girl and I knew you were my Natalia. God had finally shined a light on me. But I didn't have the courage to face you, not yet, afraid you wouldn't remember me and send me away. So I started to follow you, to find out where you live so I can send you this letter and explain everything. I don´t know what happened in your live in these years, but understand that I never abandoned you, never stopped thinking of you, never stopped loving you. I'm sorry from not finding you before. I hope you can forgive me and give me a chance to be with you again. So if you want to meet me, I'll be at the Corner Cafe on Saturday at 9:00 a.m. and whatever happens, just know that I am glad that you´re alive and became a beautiful young woman._

_Your mother, _

_Vera_

Natasha's hands are shaking as she finishes reading the letter. She can't believe it, this got be some sort of sick joke. She drops the paper in her hands and runs back to the room where the woman is dead on her bed. Now Natasha sees why she looked familiar. She has the same fiery red hair as her, the same porcelain skin, the same shape of her nose and mouth. She looks likes her, but older.

Natasha is stunned as she simply stares at the woman wondering if she just killed her own mother. She notices there is a golden chain on her neck, so she reaches for it and pulls it out of her night-gown, it is a locket. She opens it and feels her eyes start tearing as she recognizes herself as a child standing between a tall man and the dead woman. She throws the open locket back in the body of her mother, disgusted by the blood that stained her hands as she reached for it.

Natasha just killed her mother. She panics and back away slowly whispering: "No, no, no…this is a bad dream, it is just a dream!" until she hits a wall and slide to the ground, holding her knees against her chest, tears rolling down her checks, her body shaking badly. She is terrified of what she did. She remembers that Saturday was the day after tomorrow. Her mother was going to be waiting for her in the cafe in two days.

Natasha thought she had died long ago, but she was wrong. She died today, by her hands, killed in cold blood. KGB lied to her, manipulated her, used her, trained her to be a cold hearted assassin and sent her to kill her own mother probably because they were afraid that once they met, Natasha would leave KGB. But now everything was ruined, her hope shattered, her heart broken. She was going to have her vengeance.

Rage takes over Natasha as she returns to KGB´s headquarters and ruthlessly kills a dozen agents before they could get a hold on her. KGB only let her live because they didn´t want to lose their best assassin, she had a set of skills that no one could match, so they punished her and locked her away. Brainwash wasn´t going to work this time, so that was the first time they experiment with a new drug, a memory suppressor, that made her forget her recent past actions, so she would never remember that she had killed her own mother and would remain loyal to KGB. The drug worked and from that day on, it was used on her whenever they thought the Black Widow was losing her allegiance to them.

* * *

**A month back - Ukraine**

Natasha is in Ukraine, following a lead on HYDRA for Fury. That´s when she had a recent encounter with KGB agents. They manage to capture her and take her to an old shack where they chained her to a wall. They were trying to convince her to work with KGB again, as a double agent, but Natasha refuses: "I rather die!" was her answer, as she spoke in Russian. Her eyes are defiant as she looks to the four KGB agents in front of her. Natasha is not afraid of dying.

One of the agents comes closer to her ear and speaks in Russian: "There are worst thing than dying, my dear." He gets a syringe from a small black case and, with an evil grin he injects her arm with the drug.

Then fear finally appears in her eyes as Natasha shouts: "What is that?"

The Russian is staring at her with a smirk on his face: "A drug that will unleash your worst demons, it will make you remember the memories you lost, remember the evil you´ve done, all the innocent blood you´ve spilled, because you see my dear, no matter how much you think you can redeem yourself, there is only one final destination for you…hell." He throws the empty syringe at her feet.

Natasha knew what they were doing, since they couldn´t have her back, they were trying to break her spirit, so she couldn´t fight for anyone. She was afraid that maybe they would succeed.

Then, the agents beat her up, until she was slightly conscious. They release her from the chain and let her fall hard to the floor. They spit at her and leave, laughing as one of them says: "That is the end of the great Black Widow! What a shame."

She tastes the blood in her mouth as her face is pressed against the cold floor. Her body aches all over. She raises her head slowly watching the four men walking away and groans as her head falls again and she passes out. That is when she dreams of ghosts in her past life.

* * *

**Present time - Singapore**

While unconscious, Natasha dreams:

_She wakes up and recognizes the interrogation room from the Red Room facility. The light is dim and she is lying on the floor. Shadows of men with red eyes are standing in front of her. They look at her and laugh as they curse her in Russian. She sees a door ahead, she tries to get up but her legs are paralyzed, she can´t move. She tries to crawl using her hand, but doesn´t get very far because the men start kicking her in the abdomen. She cries in pain. _

_When they stop, she feels weak and about to pass out, but then she hears a voice: __"Don´t you dare leaving me, do you hear me?" __She recognizes the voice of Steve Rogers, she looks around but he is not there. She hears the men still laughing, but they are only echoes, because she is alone in the room now._

_Natasha sees a light coming from the door as it opens slightly. Then Steve´s voice call her again: "Stay with me Tasha!"_

_Natasha starts feels her legs again and slowly gets up. She is having hard time breathing because of the pain in her abdomen, but she has to leave that place so she gathers strength and makes a run for the door. _

_As she goes through it, a blinding light hits her, she stops and puts her hands on her eyes to cover them, she can´t see anything. She is lost, she doesn´t know where to go next. Despair comes over her as she starts to feel weak again and falls to her knees. _

_Then she hears Steve: "Natasha, come back to me!" She looks up ahead as the intensity of the light decreases and she sees Steve standing in front of her in his Captain America uniform. She smiles and says: "Steve!" He extends his hand, she holds it. Steve helps her get up and they both run away into the fading light._

* * *

**PS:** Okay, so I´m already working on the next chapter and I´m sure Romanogers´fans will like it. To be continued...soon...


	9. Ch 9 - Finding my Heart

**Author´s notes:** Hi, thank you for the reviews and support again. This chapter is Romanogers all over! I got inspired by the song Say (All I need) by One Republic. Enjoy it!

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CHAPTER 9

**Singapore´s hospital - 2:15 p.m.**

Clint is sitting on a chair beside the bed that Natasha is sleeping. He is now freshly showered and in his normal clothes, playing on his phone. He has been there for about an hour, since he finally convinced Steve that he should go to the hotel with the others to get cleaned up and rest a little.

It was then that he heard Natasha stirs on the bed.

Clint looks away from his phone and to Natasha, her eyes are still closed, but she is restless, moving her arms and legs on the bed. _"She´s having a bad dream"_, he thinks. So he gets up and put his hand on top of hers, calling her: "Hey, Nat?"

Natasha eyes open just a little, her head hurts like hell and her vision is blurry, but she feels a hand placed lightly on top of hers, so she asks: "Steve?"

Clint gives a bittersweet smile and answers: "No, it´s Clint."

Natasha turns her head toward Clint´s voice and blinks a few times to adjust her vision. She can now see the archer smiling at her. It´s not who she was expecting, but she is glad to see a friendly face. She smiles back saying softly: "Hey, Clint. It is good to see you."

Clint caresses her hand with his fingers and asks: "How are you feeling?"

Natasha takes a deep breath and answers: "Like I fell down two stores on an elevator shaft." She tries to sit up, but the pain in her abdomen stops her. Clint puts his hand on her shoulder saying: "Just lay still" as she falls back to the bed. Natasha grimace and continues: "and got pierced by a blade." She lightly places her hands on her abdomen.

Clint grabs the control of the bed, starting to elevate the back rest for her to sit up as he says: "I´m glad to see that your memory is fine." Then he adjusts some pillows behind her back, so she is more comfortable.

Natasha smiles at him again: "Thanks. How long have I been out?"

Clint, with a serious expression on his face, replies: "For about 12 hours. You scared the hell out of us. Your heart stopped once, luckily we were in the hospital and the doctor was able to reanimate you."

Natasha bit her lower lip. She thought that she wasn´t going to make either, if Steve didn´t keep calling her, she probably would have given up fighting. And all this happened because she was too stubborn to listen to him, she took too long inside the HYDRA building because she wanted to download the file on the Winter Soldier, to help Steve, and she almost got herself killed. Steve would probably be angry at her for that. She wonders where he is, but not to show Clint that she is worried about Steve, she simply asks: "Is everybody else okay?"

Clint sits back down on the chair: "Yes. They are in a hotel nearby, we were all tired. I was there too, but I came back to convince Steve to get some rest. He didn´t want to leave your side."

Natasha´s heart skips a beat, the Captain was still trying to take care of her and that made her feel so happy that she almost smiled, but instead she gives a neutral look to Clint and says: "Well, you know Steve, as a leader he always feel responsible when one of us get hurt."

"True, but I think is more than that, Nat." Clint stares a Natasha, trying to see some sort of reaction to his comment, but Tony was right, she is hard to read.

Before Natasha could reply, the door of the room opens and Steve comes in, with his ordinary clothes, hair combed but still wet from a shower. He gazes at Natasha and gives a bright smile saying: "Hey!" as he walks to the other side of the bed, where Clint is not sitting. He leans down and kisses her forehead. Natasha closes her eyes at the feel of his warm lips on her skin. Steve pull away and stands beside her bed, smile still on his face: "I´m so glad to see you awake."

Natasha can´t help but get lost in his blue eyes and give him a sweet smile.

Clint now saw what he was trying to see before. The Natasha he knew would never allow that kind of intimacy with anyone, unless she wanted. And she was genuinely smiling back at Steve. She is in love with the Captain. Clint is amazed with his realization, he never thought he would see Natasha Romanoff, the Black Widow, fall in love. But she deserves to be happy, and if Captain America makes her happy, that´s is fine by him.

Clint smiles a little to himself, as he sees Natasha and Steve lost on each other eyes, smiling. He feels like a third wheel so he speaks: "I´m going to get a soda. Do you guys want something?"

Steve and Natasha look at Clint, Natasha just shakes her head and Steve says: "No, thanks Barton."

Clint rises from his chair and walk out of the room.

Natasha looks back at Steve, a serious expression on her face now, and says: "I´m sorry for not leaving the computer room when you told me to. I know I messed up."

Steve´s smile disappears from his face. He looks away from her. He is disappointed with Natasha for that, but he didn´t want to lecture her now, so he just stays quiet for a moment, thinking about all that had happened because of that.

Natasha notices his change of mood, she hates herself for making him feel bad. She just wants him to take it all out on her, she deserves it. So she keeps going: "At least I was the one who paid for my mistake, it wasn´t one of you who got hurt."

Steve snorts and looks at her again: "Hurt? Natasha, you almost died!" his voice was getting louder as he spoke: "Do you know what it was like for me to watch you slowly slipping away, to carry your limp body in my arms?" Steve shouts the last part: "Your heart stopped, for god sake!"

Natasha didn´t expect him to be that affected, his eyes were angry and hurt at the same time, she never saw him lose control like that. She opens her mouth to speak, but can´t find the right words, so she closes it again. She feels dazed.

Steve curses himself for shouting at her like that, so he takes a deep breath and continues in a lower voice: "I know that in our line of work there are risks, but in order to survive we need to listen to each other, work together as a team."

Natasha is ashamed for letting him down. She looks at her feet that are covered by a white sheet and whispers: "You´re right. I´m sorry, Steve."

Steve could sense her regret, could sense her walls coming down, she is vulnerable and this was the moment he was waiting for. No more running from his feelings. So he holds her chin in his hand to make her look back at him, staring intensely into her green eyes: "Natasha, all that matters to me now is that my prayers were answered, and you came back to me. I lost too many people in my life and if I had lost you too I don´t think I could go on."

Steve was so straight forward with her, his eyes are so pure that Natasha feels butterflies in her stomach. How could she not fall in love with this man, he is charming, kind, brave, honest...he is perfect. And she can´t believe that he cares that much for her, but some how it feels wrong. She had committed to many sins in her life; she is not worth of being in Steve Rogers´ prayers. She was beyond saving and her dark past haunted her everyday, she didn´t want to drag him down with her.

Natasha is torn for a moment. But like a reflex, her head speaks louder than her heart: "Steve, don´t…don´t go there." She pulls away from his hand, looking down. She thinks that maybe she has lost her heart many years ago.

Her walls are up again, and now she is avoiding him, that was what Steve was afraid of. Steve takes another deep breath, felling hurt, but not defeated. He was determined to figure out Natasha, he wasn´t going let this moment pass like he did on the cemetery back in D.C.

He starts to walk, Natasha thinks that he is going to leave the room, but he goes around the bed and sits on the chair that Clint was. Natasha watches him with curiosity in her eyes.

Steve looks at his hands on his lap: "Can I ask you something?" Steve looks up at Natasha. She nods, so he continues: "Why did you keep sending me little gifts when you were away?"

Natasha didn't expect that. It was hard for anyone to catch her off guard, but he did it twice already. _"Damn"_ she thinks as she looks at the wall in front of her and carefully thinks about what to say. Steve looks at her expectantly.

Natasha turns to meet his eyes and says: "Because you're my friend and I wanted you to know that I was okay."

Steve raises one eyebrow because he knows that she is not telling it all: "And I appreciate that. But that was it, nothing else?"

Natasha looks to the wall again and put her hands together on her lap, playing with her fingers. She is nervous because she can´t say want he wants her to say, but Steve insists: "Have you sent anything to the others?"

She keeps her eyes away and speaks slowly: "No…just for you."

Steve wants to take all the obstacles from his way: "Not even Barton?" Natasha just shakes her head in response.

Steve feels his heart beating faster because now he knows that there is a hope for him to be more than friends with Natasha, he just have to get to her, and so he continues: "Just for me then? Why am I so special to you?" Steve studies her face but can't detect anything. She is good at hiding what she is feeling, she is a spy after all.

Natasha is at a dead end, she can´t think of any excuse to try hiding the truth from Steve, so she simple says in a low voice: "I don´t know." She just keeps staring blankly at the wall, Steve is getting to her again and she is going to crack at any moment.

Steve notices that her body is tense, she is squeezing the fingers from her left hand with her right hand. That is the sign he needed, so he pulls the chair closer to the bed and reach for her left hand taking it away from her tight grip. Natasha looks at his hand on top of hers, his touch send heat waves through her body.

Steve keeps looking at her face as he speaks softly: "I'm just trying to understand you, Tasha. I'm really glad you did that for me because the things you sent me helped me put my mind at ease, but I really missed you back then and I don´t want to miss you now." Steve replies saying so easily want she can't.

Natasha meets his eyes and his honest gaze makes her heart goes so fast that she thinks her chest is going to explode, she can´t think straight anymore.

Steve intertwines his fingers on hers and looks at her with pleading eyes: "Tell me why Tasha, I need to know."

Natasha´s wall fails her again. She can´t hide from him anymore, because deep down she knows that it is because of him that she is still trying so hard to be a better person and he deserves to know that. So her heart speaks louder this time, as she just let it out: "I never had trouble being underground, I was trained for that. But after what happened to S.H.I.E.L.D., all my secrets being exposed, it made me think about what was the point of all this if I don´t even know who I am anymore. And walking around in strange places, with strange people, made me feel lost and alone." Natasha lips are dry; she presses them together and pauses. The voice in her head is screaming, telling her to stop, not to let her emotions take over.

Steve squeezes her hand and Natasha looks back at him, he says softly: "It´s okay, go on."

His bright blue eyes convince her, so she takes a deep breath and continues: "Whenever I started to feel like that I caught myself thinking of you, how you made me feel trustworthy and how you remind me that there is still good left in this world and we have to fight for it, no matter what. You gave me confidence to keep going and as long as you are leading, I´ll follow you. So I sent these things to you because you mean a lot to me, Steve, because you are the light in my darkest hours."

Steve is astonished by her words: "Wow, Tasha, that is beautiful. I never thought that I had that effect on you." Steve is so happy that she feels that way about him, so he takes her hand to his mouth and lightly places a kiss on her knuckles.

Natasha´s heart melts at his gently kiss, and she can´t run from her feelings anymore, so she adds in a lower tone: "And now you helped me find something that I thought I had lost many years ago…my heart." Steve immediately looks up from her hand to meet her eyes, thinking that he didn´t hear it right, but Natasha is slightly blushing and tears are threatening to fall from her eyes. She says with a shaky voice: "You just keep saving me in so many different ways…I don´t know how to be away from you anymore, Steve."

And that was all Steve wanted to hear, he feels like the luckiest man in the world right now, he smiles and replies in a soft tone: "Then don´t…" he stands up from the chair, still holding her left hand on his right one and with his left hand wipes away a single tear that falls from her eye. Then his left hand presses against her bed for support as he leans down to kiss her. When Steve lips gently touches hers, Natasha close her eyes a puts her right hand behind his neck. She kisses him back at full force and as Steve feels Natasha responding to him, he deepens the kiss.

Then, there is a click on the door, someone is entering the room. Steve pulls away quickly and looks back, seeing Tony walking in. Natasha blinks rapidly to get the tears away from her eyes.

Tony says: "Hey, Little Red and Capsicle. Did I interrupt again?" he notices Steve´s flushed face and Natasha stirring uncomfortable on her bed.

Natasha gets herself together and answers with her poker face on: "No Stark, come in." She wasn´t in the mood for Tony to start making jokes about her and Steve.

Tony looks suspicious at them, but continues: "Okay. Clint sent me a text saying you were awake, I decided to see for myself. You look good, I mean, for someone who almost died."

Natasha gives him a half-smile and says sarcastically: "Gee, thanks a lot Stark!"

Steve is blushing and decides he should leave before Stark say something about it, so he looks at Natasha: "Since Stark is here to make you company, I´ll go get a cup of coffee."

Tony replies as the Captain walk away: "Don´t worry old man, I´ll take care of the old lady for you!"

Natasha looks questioning at Tony: "Old lady? What is that about Stark?"

Steve stops in front of the door and mentally takes a hand on his face, he knows Natasha is going to be pissed off when she find out what Clint told them, she is a very reserved person and likes to keep her secrets. But he decides to leave Tony to deal with her alone. Since she is still recovering from her wounds, Steve is pretty sure she won´t be able to kill him. He leaves the room.

Tony sits on the empty chair beside her: "Clint told us about your super-serum thing, and how you age slower than us."

Natasha expression goes from curiosity to anger, she shouts: "What! Oh someone is going to get killed as soon as I get out of this hospital!"

Steve is outside on the hallway and hears what Natasha said, not so sure any more that she won´t kill someone. Steve chuckles thinking: _"Tony is going to regret bringing that up, he shouldn´t play with fire. __Oh well, Tony is smart, he´ll figure something out.__"_ He makes his way to the cafeteria and even after hearing Natasha get mad, he can´t help it but smile on his way there, like a fool in love.

Tony is still curious so he asks: "So, how old are you really? Where you there when the Nazis tried to take over the world?"

Natasha gives a murder glare at Tony and now he fears for his life, so he quickly takes his phone out of his pocket, almost dropping it as he dials: "Hey, look, Pepper was worried about you, why don´t you talk with her a little?" he hands the phone to Natasha.

She aggressively takes the phone from Tony´s hand and says: "Smooth move Stark, but if you ever call me that again, you better sleep with one eye open." then changes her voice to a softer tone as she greets Pepper on the phone.

* * *

**PS: **Sorry for any stupid mistakes in my writing again. There is more to happen yet in the story! Chapter 10 coming soon! Bye!


	10. Ch 10 - Discoveries

CHAPTER 10

**Singapore´s Hospital – Afternoon**

As Steve makes his way back to Natasha´s room, his heart is already racing with the expectation of seeing her again, because he knows things between them now would change, change for good. A smile played on his lips with the thought of having her as his girlfriend.

After missing his chance with Peggy, Steve thought he would never find anyone to replace the hole she left in his heart, but then Natasha appears in his life. When they were introduced by Coulson on the Hellicarrier, he immediately felt attracted to her. She was beautiful and had a fearless attitude that reminded him of Peggy. But she was a spy, the Black Widow is what they called her, so he didn´t trust her because he could never tell if she was lying or not. Then they had to face Loki and his army of Chiutari, and after the battle of New York, he saw that there was more to her than the art of deception. She was also a brave and relentless fighter. He respects and admires her for that. After that they started to work for S.H.I.E.L.D. as partners, going on several missions together, he started to see other sides of her. They became friends, so close friends that she was always trying to set him up to go on dates with other women, but he would never go, at first because he was still trying to move on from Peggy, but then because Natasha was the only woman he wanted to go on a real date, even if it seemed like she wasn´t available. And when they fought together against HYDRA in D.C., he saw a glimpse of the real Natasha, she gained his trust and he completely fell in love with her. She asked him to do her a favor and ask Sharon out, but he couldn´t because his heart was set on the beautiful redhead spy. And the only reason he didn´t go after her on that day, was because he thought she wasn´t interested in him, because she was with Barton and he isn´t the type of guy who betray his friends. But he wrongly assumed that last part.

Steve blissfully opens the door to the room and to his disappointment, only Tony Stark is in there, holding a computer in his hands. Steve asks in a worried tone: "Where´s Natasha?"

Tony turns to Steve and smiles a little: "Hey Capsicle. The doctor came here and said she needed to do some tests to make sure everything is okay." Tony puts the computer on the top of the nightstand and continues: "And I went all the way to the hotel and back to bring her a computer, she wants to see the files she got from HYDRA, now! No time to rest for Ethel!"

Steve looks confused at him and Tony throws his hands on the air: "Ethel is an old woman´s name? Bah…I keep forgetting you are an old man too! You probably knew an Ethel back then."

Steve looks annoyed at Tony and speaks: "Jesus Stark, you got a death wish or something? Her name is Natasha in case you don´t remember!"

Tony gives him a smirk: "Of course I remember, but where is the fun in calling her that! What about you Captain Purity? Have you told her you love her yet?"

"What?" Steve blushes deeply and says in a threatening tone: "That is none of your business Stark!"

Tony grins seeing how red the soldier´s face is and teases him a little more to see if maybe he cracks: "You didn´t deny it, so I´ll take that as a yes! Are you two a couple now?"

Steve looks with disbelieve at him and says abruptly: "I didn´t tell her I love her okay, stop it Stark!"

Tony points a finger at him: "Ha, but you do love her! I knew it!" Tony laughs and claps his hand together, excited with his discovery.

Steve kicks himself for speaking without really thinking and replies bitterly: "Jesus Stark you are unbelievable, don´t you have anything else to do?"

Tony looks at the time in his phone and replies: "Actually, I do, I have a virtual hot date with Pepper! Gotta go! Don´t worry Cap, your secret is safe with me!" he winks at Steve and leaves the room.

Steve takes a deep breath and shakes his head, not believing that Tony Stark is able to keep a secret and that he just handed to him the fact that he loves Natasha, not that it will make a difference if he tells her that now, but because he is pretty sure there will be endless jokes about it.

Steve looks around the room and yawns. He realizes now that he hadn´t sleep much, he is tired. There is a small couch under the widow, he lies on it and tries to make himself as comfortable as he can on the small piece of furniture. It doesn´t take long for him to fall asleep.

* * *

**Singapore´s Hospital – Sundown**

The last rays of sunlight shine through the room as a nurse enters pushing a wheel chair with Natasha in it. They can see the super soldier sleeping on the end of the room. Natasha can´t help but smile at the scene of Steve almost falling out of the small couch, but he looks so peaceful, that she didn´t want to wake him.

Natasha puts a finger on her lips so that the nurse doesn´t make any noise and then whispers: "It´s okay, I can handle myself now, thank you!" She gets up from the wheelchair.

The nurse smiles, nods her head and leaves the room.

Natasha watches Steve for a moment, his chest slowly rises and falls, his face is relaxed. She smiles again and silently makes her way to the bathroom and closes the door behind her. She takes off the hospital´s gown, wearing now only her black panties. She looks at herself in the mirror and touches the scar on her left shoulder, where the Winter Soldier shot her when she was with Steve and Sam in D.C. Then she looks down at the bandage around her abdomen. She takes it off and sees the other scar the Winter Soldier gave her, on the left side of her belly, when she was trying to protect a Russian scientist. And now on the right side a little lower on her belly, a fresh one. The cut got 8 stitches, she notices that there is no inflammation around it and it is healing well, but it will leave a mark. She touches her back and feels the stitches around the entry wound from the blade. Now bikinis are really out of question for her, she takes a deep breath felling a little down. She takes her panties off and go into the shower, as she is still sore, she slowly washes her body trying to cause as minimal pain as possible, and lingers a little longer under the hot water, letting it relax her muscles.

When she is done, Natasha wraps a towel around her body. She opens the bathroom door and takes a peek into the room. The room is dark now, Steve is still asleep. She doesn´t want to wake him, so she leaves only the bathroom lights on and slowly makes her way to the small storage space across the room and opens it. Someone had brought her things to the hospital while she was unconscious, probably Clint. She grabs her bag and picks out a white panties and a dark green silk nightgown, with black laces on the top and on the hem, just because she thought it would be easier to put on than a t-shirt and short. She puts them on the shelf above. She turns to look at Steve. He hasn´t move. So she turns her back to him and let the towel fall to the floor. She picks up the panties, raises her right foot and pull it up on her right leg, then when she shifts her weight from the left to the right leg, she feels a sharp pain on her injury and loses balance. She holds the opened storage door not to fall and it makes a loud crack. She hears Steve shifting on the couch. She quickly pulls her panties the rest of the way up and puts an arm around her breasts thinking: _"Damn it!"_

Steve wakes with a crack and quickly sits up straight. He looks forward and sees Natasha´s bare back, she is wearing only a small panties. He can´t see the details because the light is dim, but he sees enough to make him blush. Her body has perfect curves. He can´t help but stare at her, she is beautiful. He says in a rough voice: "Natasha?"

Natasha closes her eyes tight as she hear him and curses herself for waking Steve on that moment, she looks at him over her shoulder to find him staring at her. She gives him a half-smile and replies calmly: "Hey Steve. Sorry, I didn´t mean to wake you."

Steve looks down the moment she looks back at him, blushing even more for getting caught staring at her, he can feel his face burning and says embarrassed: "Uhm…sorry. Do you…want me to leave the room…until you get dressed?"

Natasha turns back again and answers: "No it´s fine." She grabs her nightgown and quickly put it on; ignoring the light pain the movement sends thought her body. Then she walks to the couch, sitting beside Steve.

Steve looks up at her face, still slightly blushing he asks: "How are you?"

Natasha looks at him: "It still hurts a little when I move, but I´m getting better. They did some exams on me to see if there is any damage left from the fall. The doctor said they will have the results by tomorrow morning."

Steve nods, but he can´t get over the fact that he just saw Natasha almost naked and that now she is sitting very close to him with a very sexy nightgown. He tries not to look at her cleavage, like a gentleman, so he locks his gaze on her face taking a strand of her wet hair with his finger and putting it behind her ear. He says softly: "You´re so beautiful Natasha."

Natasha smiles at him, then her eyes lock on his lips and she leans in, kissing him.

Steve lips immediately responds to hers and he puts a hand on her lower back, pulling her closer. Natasha puts a hand on his neck and let her fingers go through his hair. Then she parts her lips to let his tongue access her mouth. When their tongues touch, as the kiss gets deeper, Steve senses the electricity it sends through his body, he was longing for this moment and it feels so good that now he can´t resist, he wants more. So he grabs her legs putting them on his lap and presses her chest against his. He starts to trail her jaw with kisses down to her neck and then moves his hand up on her thigh, pushing the hem of her nightgown up. Natasha lets a low moan escape her lips and Steve squeezes her bare thigh. Natasha bites her lips with pleasure, his kisses and his touch are inebriating and Natasha is losing control too, so she says in a husky voice: "Steve…maybe we should stop…"

Steve looks up meeting her eyes, he is breathing heavily, he doesn´t want to stop, but he knows she is right, so he replies: "Sorry…I got carried away." He takes his hand off her thigh.

Natasha takes a deep breath. She is always so good at keeping control, she is amazed of how Steve makes her go to the edge, so quickly. She mutters: "It´s okay." She kisses his lips lightly and get off his lap saying with a half-smile: "I thought you didn´t have much experience with woman, you surprised me!"

Steve smiles too, and says: "Like I told you before, I´m old, not dead. I had some experience. But I think we should take one step at a time, maybe I should ask you out on a date first, huh?"

Natasha laughs at the old-fashioned soldier: "No…it´s fine, I don´t go on dates anyway." Which is true, she wasn´t looking for anything romantic or long-term with anyone, not even Steve, until now. And they have been through so much together that she thinks they can skip the dating part.

But Steve is a romantic, he wants to sweep Natasha off her feet and thinks that the dating game is perfect for that, besides it is a way for them to do something normal. So he looks at her with disbelieve: "What? Oh, come on Tasha, you have to go on a date with me, it´ll be fun!" he holds her hand and continues: "Please?"

She can´t say no to those bright blue eyes, so she smiles and say: "Okay…we´ll talk about it when we get back to New York. But now, there is something I need to do."

Natasha stands up and goes to the light switch, turning it on. She goes to the storage space again and grabs a small gun with a black strap. She lifts her nightgown a little to tie it around her thigh.

Steve watches her, amused by her assassin´s habit, she always manage to hide a weapon on her, no matter what she is wearing.

Then she gets her pen drive with the files she hacked from HYDRA and shows it to Steve: "I gotta see what we have here!" She makes her way to the computer Stark left for her, picks it up and climbs into bed with the computer on her lap.

Steve is curious too, so he stands up and stops beside the bed, watching Natasha working on the computer. He looks at the screen as the files start to show.

After a few minutes, Natasha speaks without taking her eyes off the screen: "So, we have all the delivery points of HYDRA´s weapons and names of some high level HYDRA agents. Oh, Stark is going to love this! Prototypes of new weapons HYDRA is developing."

Steve looks at the intel passing on the screen: "Good job, Natasha, that´s a great piece of information. Can you send it to Fury?"

Natasha starts typing: "Yes, I have his contact. I´ll send him an encrypted message. And I´ll also send it to Stark." She does that and when she pushes the enter key she says: "Done. Now, this one better be good too, since it almost cost my life." She clicks at the Winter Soldier file.

Steve glares at Natasha, his jaw muscles tensing up as he remembers how terrified he was of losing her. The memory of her limp body is still fresh in his head and it bothers him. And all because she was trying to help him find Bucky, he feels distressed.

Natasha can feel his eyes on her; she looks at him: "Steve…are you okay?"

Steve just nods to her and says seriously: "Yeah, go on." He moves his eyes back to the screen, but he´s still tense.

Natasha sigh because she knows this isn´t easy for him, but she lets it go. She turns her attention back to the computer. She goes through the file of the Winter Soldier speaking: "Well , he was off duty for sometime, or maybe he took a while to report back in after our meeting in D.C., because there is only one entry after that day."

Steve says in a concerned tone: "Or maybe he was running from HYDRA and they manage to find him and brainwash him again." His hands turn into fists and he presses his nails against his palm. The thought of not being able to help his friend again is frustrating.

Natasha looks at Steve, felling sorry for him and replies softly: "It´s possible." Then she continues her reading and her eyes widen: "Shit! He is in Russia. He infiltrated KGB at HYDRA´s command!"

Steve is surprised and confused: "What?! But why?"

"It doesn´t have details of his mission here, but I think I know" she opens up another window: "Do you see this man." She points at a profile photo on the computer and continues: "Lieutenant General Donskoy of Russia´s military forces, also a HYDRA secret agent according to the files I hacked. The only one above him in the chain of command is General Basov. HYDRA probably wants the General dead, so they can take control of Russia´s military forces. That´s why they sent the Winter Soldier to KGB, he is trying to get close to General Basov…"

Steve completes her sentence: "To kill him…Jesus! And if HYDRA succeeds, they might as well start World War III."

Natasha looks up to Steve: "Yeah, they probably decided to change their course of action after we messed up their plans inside S.H.I.E.L.D. We have to tell the others."

Steve nods at her, then stares at the wall, lost in his thoughts, remembering the information on the file Natasha gave to him when they were at the cemetery on D.C. He knows Bucky was revived by Russian scientists, who attached a bionic arm on him, and then KGB trained him to be a ruthless Soviet assassin under the name of the Winter Soldier. But somehow, HYDRA got his hands on him and turned him to their side.

Realization hits Steve as he recalls Clint saying: _"…she is almost as old as the Captain." _So he turns to Natasha, who is looking at the computer again and asks: "Did you know him?"

She looks up at him, with a confused look on her face: "Who?"

Steve leans closer, never leaving her eyes: "Bucky...I mean, the Winter Soldier, were you with KGB during the Cold War?"

Natasha bit her lower lip, recalling what Tony said before, that Clint told them about the version of Super-Soldier serum in her blood, so there is no point in hiding it now. She takes a deep breath before answering: "Yes…" she hesitates because she hates that part of her past, but Steve glare is intense, he will demand answers and she can´t lie to him, so she continues: "He trained me when I was in the Red Room Academy, during the Black Widow Program."

Steve brown furrows. He backs away from Natasha, perplexed, he doesn´t know what to think or how he feels about that.

* * *

**PS: **Okay, another chapter ending in cliffhanger! How is Steve going to react to that news? To be continued...

And thank you again for the support! See you soon!


	11. Ch 11 - Stand by You

**Author´s notes:** Hello again, so I manage to update my story because today is practically a holiday here in Brazil, FIFA World Cup starts today. I´m excited too, a little mad at how our country´s money was overspent on building new Stadiums instead of just renovate the several we have here already. Not to mention all the money that probably went to the politicians pockets with the over budget of the constructions. It really is revolting because all that money could be used for the health or education system that are in great need, but that´s is not our soccer player´s fault. So I´m still rooting for them! VAI BRASIL! RUMO AO HEXA!

I wish Captain America would just kick the asses of the corrupt politicians in Brazil! unfortunately, not a possibility, so let´s just imagine our great heroes fighting evil somewhere else!

This chapter was inspired on the song I´ll Stand by You by The Pretenders. Here goes nothing...

* * *

CHAPTER 11

**Singapore´s hospital – Evening**

Natasha puts the computer aside, sits in the bed with her legs crossed and stares at Steve. He is lost in thoughts and the expression on his face scares her because she is sure that he is going to start asking questions about her dark past and at this point, she won´t be able to lie to him anymore.

Steve is standing beside the bed, his eyes not looking at anything in particular since his mind is full of doubts and questions, one is bothering him more than the others, he wants to know if there was some part of Bucky left in the Winter Soldier, so he looks back at Natasha and asks: "How was he back then?"

Natasha is a little surprised with his question; she knows what he is trying to find out so she answers: "He was nothing like the Bucky you knew, Steve. He was made to be an assassin, a brutal and cold one and he was not much different as a trainer, he pushed me to my limits every time."

Steve understands that the training in the Red Room was probably as hard as it can get, but was that all that consisted their life back then, so he insists: "But did you know him only as a trainer?"

That is one of the questions that Natasha was afraid he would ask, she curses in her head and looks away from him as she replies in a lower voice:"We…had a brief relationship outside the academy. We slept together a few times."

Steve is surprised again and looks away as he tries to process all the information in his head. He is trying not to feel betrayed by Natasha, but it still stings him a little that she never mentioned that she knew Bucky that well.

Natasha looks at Steve and notices that he is trying to hide his reaction, but she can see it in his eyes that he feels hurt. So she tries to explain a little better: "But I didn´t have feelings for him, it was a physical thing. We were just two emotionless people back then. All we talked about was who we were going to kill next and…sex." Natasha nervously bits her lips because that didn´t sound good too, so she shakes her head thinking: _"Damn it! I´ll just shut up."_

Steve looks back at her and sees the broken expression on her face, he realizes how hard it must be for her to tell him all this because he knows that Natasha is not that person anymore, but what about Bucky, could he overcome the sins of his past and be normal again? Natasha is the strongest woman he knows and even she was still struggling with hers. Steve just tries to push those hurtful thoughts away. He looks at her exposed left shoulder and brushes his fingers at her scar where the Winter Soldier shot her: "He tried to kill you…twice. I guess he didn´t have feelings for you too."

Natasha gives him a bittersweet smile; she is a little relieved that he said instead of being mad or hating her. She holds his hand on her shoulder as she replies: "I´m sorry for not telling you this before, but that part of my life brings me so much painful memories that I…" she can´t find the words to continue and just stare at his blue eyes.

Steve gives a faint smile taking her hand in to his lips and kissing it. Then he says softly: "It´s okay Tasha. I forgive you."

Natasha is stunned, because when Steve says that he forgives her, she fells like he is forgiving her from all her sins, like he could wash them all away, erase everything she had done wrong and she could start all over again, with a clean slate, from the day they first met. She wonders how does he do that.

Steve lets go of her hand and interrupts her thoughts speaking: "Can I ask you just one more thing? I promise this one will be easier to answer."

Natasha would answer anything to him right now, so she simply nods her head.

Steve continues: "Who else knew about your serum besides KGB and Barton?"

Natasha replies: "Only Fury did. But he thought that it would be better if we didn´t tell anyone. He was afraid that the scientist on S.H.I.E.L.D. would want to make experiments on me, and he knew I would run away if they asked to do that. So he changed a thing or two on my file at S.H.I.E.L.D."

Steve says with a questioning expression on his face: "Why would they want to run experiments on you when they could do it on me? My serum is more powerful than yours, you know?" Steve smiles a little.

Natasha smiles at the naïve soldier: "I know, but you see Steve, they have too much respect for you. You are Captain America for God´s sake! They would never take you as a test subject. But me, I´m a Russian spy with a questionable past."

Steve feels bad for her, but he understands what Natasha means: "Yeah, I guess you have a good point…one last question though. When is your real birthday?"

Natasha expression turns serious as she replies: "I don´t really know. I think I was born in the winter of 1928, but I have no idea to what day or month." And that makes her think of one person who could answer that question. It makes her remember her new-found memory of her mother, of how she killed her before she could even say a word. Her eyes start to fill with unexpected tears.

Steve notices the distress on her face and feels bad for asking so many questions: "Natasha? I´m sorry, I didn´t mean to make you sad. Tell me what is wrong?" He sits beside her on the bed.

Natasha shakes her head and looks down as the tears start to fall from her eyes. The suppressed memories that surfaced after she got injected with a drug by KGB agents are the worst she could ever have. They always make her lose control of her emotions. The one of when she killed her mother haunts her the most. Natasha is mad for letting her walls down for Steve, for letting they become more than friends, she is only going to drag him down with her. She whispers: "I´m a horrible person Steve, you should stay away from me. I don´t deserve you…"

Steve holds her hand and squeezes it as he says: "Hey, don´t say that. I´m not perfect Natasha, I make mistakes too. Look at me, please?"

She shuts her eyes tight, tears falling on the white sheet. She whispers: "I can´t Steve…the guilt…is slowly killing me."

Steve wants to help her so bad, he is holding her hand tight as he says in a firm tone: "You don´t have to go through this alone, Natasha…let me help you." He put his other hand on her chin and lightly lifts her face so she can look at him. When he meets her tearful green eyes he says softly: "I promise, whatever it is, it won´t change my feelings for you."

Natasha tries to say something but she loses control and start sobbing. Steve put his arms around her shoulder and pull her closer so she can bury her head on his chest. He places a kiss on her red hair and tighten his grip around her as he whisper: "It´s okay, I got you." Then he remembers that the last time he saw her lose control like this, she mentioned her mother, so after a few minutes, when the sobs stops he asks: "Do you want to talk about your mother?"

Natasha backs away from his chest and looks up at his face, blinking a few times as he reaches his hand to her face and wipes her tears away. She is still paralyzed with his gentle touch so when she doesn´t replies, Steve says: "Do you want a glass of water?"

Natasha licks her lips realizing now how much her mouth is dry, so she just nods at him.

Steve gets up and gets a glass of water from the counter near the door of the room. He sits back on the same spot he was before and hands the glass to Natasha, who drinks it all at once. Steve lets her take her time to say something and just watches her patiently as she stares at the empty glass.

After a few minutes of silence, Natasha puts the empty glass on the nightstand and looks at Steve again, speaking: "I had no memories from my parents until some KGB agents found me recently. They captured me and injected me with a drug that helped me remember some suppressed memories I had, the worst one is of when I killed my mother." Natasha pause and takes a deep breath before she tells Steve the story of the cold Russian night when she had mistaken her mother for an American journalist and sliced her throat open.

Steve listens carefully and when she finally finishes, he sees the dread in her eyes. He feels some of the dread inside him too, he holds her hand tight and says: "Oh God! I´m so sorry, Natasha."

Natasha eyes are starting to tear up again, she hates feeling weak and she doesn´t want Steve´s pity. She was manipulated by KGB, yes, but she still didn´t hesitate to follow blindly her orders and coldly kill an innocent woman, so she blink her tears away and replies harshly: "Don´t be! It´s not your fault, it´s mine! I killed her, not KGB, not you!" She doesn´t want to break down again so she gets up and makes her way to the bathroom.

"Natasha…" Steve says watching her walk away.

Natasha goes to the sink and starts throwing cold water at her face, so that maybe she can snap out of that horrible moment playing over and over in her head. When she looks up at the mirror she sees Steve standing behind her. She dries her face on the towel and he steps closer to embrace Natasha, placing his hands lightly around her belly and kissing her bare shoulder. Natasha put the towel away and leans back against him, resting her head on his chest and closing her eyes. She mutters: "I´m sorry for snapping at you."

Steve rests his chin on her head and simply replies: "It´s okay."

Natasha puts her small hands on the top of his and says: "I don´t think I will be able to sleep tonight."

Steve admires her through the mirror; she looks so beautiful when she is vulnerable, it is like he can see the real woman behind the Black Widow. The woman nobody else knows but him. The woman he loves. He replies softly: "I´ll keep you company. Are you hungry? Maybe I could get us something to eat."

Natasha meets his gaze at the mirror: "Yeah, but I hate the hospital´s food, I´d like to try some local food."

Steve smiles and says: "Okay, I could sneak in some for you"

Natasha turns around to face Steve and says with a half-smile: "See, I´m a bad influence on you, I´m already making Captain America sneak around!"

Steve chuckles and lightly kisses her on the lips.

* * *

**Hotel in Singapore – 9:30 a.m.**

Natasha was released by the doctor early that morning when the results of her exams came out all normal. Steve had stayed with her all night; they even manage to get some sleep.

Now all the Avengers were back at the hotel, sitting in the lounge area of Tony´s suite, discussing Natasha´s finding on HYDRA´s plans. Fury and Hill were on video call with them.

Fury was talking to the team: "There are two major HYDRA drops sites that required immediate attention and now we also have the Winter Soldier issue. So you are going to split up in 3 teams to cover more ground. Stark and Bannon, you are going to the drop site in Japan. Barton and Thor are going to the one in Germany and Rogers and Romanoff are going after the Winter Soldier in Russia."

Steve was worried about their missions being a little overwhelming for only a two member team to handle. He immediately though about his friend Sam Wilson, he would gladly help Steve, especially when the matter involved the Winter Soldier, so he speaks: "Maybe we could call for some reinforcements, I´m sure Sam Wilson would like to join us, sir."

Fury replies looking at the Captain: "Yes Captain, I thought about that too. You can call the Falcon and tell him to meet you and Romanoff in Russia." Fury looks at Maria and continues: "I´m sure Hill would be glad to help too, right?"

Maria was on another screen, she was glad to have some field work to do instead of just being inside an office with tons of paperwork, so she eagerly answers: "Yes, of course. I think I could join Barton and Thor in Germany."

Clint smiles at Maria: "Glad to have you on the team, Hill!"

Thor also replies with a smile: "It will be an honor to fight by our side, Lady Maria."

Maria nods at her teams members.

Tony than speaks up: "In that case, I´ll make a call to my good friend James Rhodes and tell him to suit up and drop by Japan to lend us a hand." He nudges Bruce who is sitting next to him.

Bruce grins back at the billionaire saying: "The more, the merrier."

Fury nods at Tony and says: "Very well, you all know what to do. Please try not to get yourselves killed. If anyone asks for me, I´m in D.C.´s cemetery. Good luck."

* * *

**PS:** I know Maria Hill is not exactly a field agent, but I´m guessing they don´t have too many people then can really trust since HYDRA infiltrate S.H.I.E.L.D. So I decided to put her on the team too. Thanks for reading my story! Next chapter coming soon! Bye!


	12. Ch 12 - Calm Before the Storm

**Author's** **notes:** Hello! Another chapter is up, since things are going to get heavy and dark on the upcoming chapters, I decided to make this one a little lighter. Enjoy it!

* * *

CHAPTER 12

**Hotel in Singapore – Tony´s Suite**

They all finished packing and were ready to leave to their missions, well…all but Tony Stark. So the Avengers were sitting in the lounge area of Tony´s suite, waiting for Tony to finish packing his things.

Clint was sitting in an armchair with his feet up on the coffee table, playing on his phone. Bruce was on the other armchair sitting with his legs crossed, wearing his glasses and reading a magazine. Thor was in the right end of the big couch chewing some pop tarts. Natasha was sitting next to him with her arms crossed, staring out the balcony widow. Steve was beside her, his elbow placed on the left arm of the couch so he could rest his chin on his hand.

Steve was watching as Tony opened every door and drawer to gather his things and he can´t help but say something about it: "Jesus Tony, do you have to use every storage in the hotel room, why didn´t you just leave your clothes in your bag? We have been here for only two days."

Tony grabs the last of his shirts from the hangers in the closet and replies: "What? This are designer shirts, it would be a crime to leave them folded in my bag. But what do you know about clothes, right Capsicle!"

"What´s the problem with my clothes, I like them." Steve looks down at his khaki pants, plaid blue shirt and leather jacket and found nothing wrong with them.

Tony looks at him and says with a smirk on his face: "Yeah, sure. You look good…for an old man."

Clint chuckles at Tony´s remark. Steve looks at the archer who is now smiling at him and just sighs in defeat. He´ll never understand the modern fashion.

Tony starts to fold his clothes carefully and continues to speak: "I mean, look at the Little Red, her fashion sense evolved with her, she looks like a woman from our century."

Clint´s smile disappear from his face as he sees Natasha standing up to glare at Tony.

Tony stops what he is doing half expecting the spy to attack him but she doesn´t, so he continues looking at Natasha with a nervous smile on his face: "A gorgeous woman, if I may add. But you had plenty of time to change your fashion sense, right! The poor Cap here just stayed frozen for 70 years, so I´ll overlook that detail on you Capsicle!"

Natasha takes a deep breath to calm her nerves and says: "I´m going to the lobby." She walks out of the room giving a deadly stare at Clint as she passes by him, and then slams the door behind her.

Everyone jumps on their sits with the loud sound of the door closing and stop what they are doing to stare at Tony, who is frozen at his place with a folded shirt in his hand.

Clint breaks the silence: "I´m dead. You are probably next Stark. Maybe you should sleep with your armor on."

Steve chuckles with that thought then he says: "Stop playing with fire, Stark. You´ll get burn."

Bruce adds with a shy smile: "Literally burn."

Tony snaps out of his little panic moment and finishes putting his clothes on his bag, zipping it close: "Good thing we are going separate ways then. I´m sure the Cap can calm her nerves down until we all get back to the Avengers Tower." He looks at Steve with a mischief smile on his face.

Steve just rolls his eyes and look away.

Then Tony takes advantage of Natasha absence in the room to give the news to Clint: "Speaking of which, Legolas, we were right. Captain Purity loves her like we suspected."

Steve looks at Tony and then at Clint, not quite understanding what is happening.

After watching closely Steve´s reaction when Natasha was hurt and the way they were looking at each other on the hospital, Clint had no doubt about that, but he didn´t think Steve would share his feeling that fast so Clint looks surprised to Tony: "What? He told her? How did you found out?"

Thor has a broad smile on his face, he looks at Steve: "You told her about your feelings? That marvelous news my friend! I am happy for the two of you!

Steve looks confused at Thor: "What? No I…" He stops not knowing what to say and glares at Tony, fighting the urge to punch him in the face.

Tony ignores the look Steve is giving him, and continues speaking to Clint: "No! He haven´t told her yet, but he told me."

Steve stands up and confronts Tony: "What! I haven´t told you anything Stark! You assumed that!"

Tony pokes Steve on the chest as he replies: "Yeah? Well then, tell me I´m wrong! Tell me that you don´t love the redhead spy!"

Bruce is amused by the discussion and just watches the scene, glancing at Steve with curiosity.

Thor puts another pop tart on his mouth but keeps looking at his friends, interested in the conversation too.

Steve poorly tries to hide the fact that he does love Natasha from the others: "What! I do…I mean…I don´t…have to answer that Stark!"

Tony jumps up and down pointing at Steve and looking at Clint: "See! He can´t deny it! He loves her! And I bet 50 bucks that the redhead loves him back, what do you think Clint?"

Clint knows that if Natasha loves Steve, she is not going to let any of them discover that so easily, so he looks at Tony with a playful smile: "Make it a hundred!"

Tony replies with a grin: "Done!"

Steve loses his patient and shouts: "What the hell is wrong with you two?" He looks at Clint who only shrugs his shoulders.

Tony just pretends he hadn´t heard Steve and starts to think out loud: "The only problem is that is going to be a little tricky to get her to confess that. Maybe the Cap can let us know her reply when he tells her that he loves her."

Natasha sneaks in the room without anyone noticing, hearing the last part of Tony sentence and startles the guys when she speaks up with a suspicious look on her face: "Who loves who?"

Everyone turns to look at her, surprised to see Natasha standing behind the couch.

Thor swallows his pop tart, smiles at her and innocently replies to Natasha: "The Captain, he loves you!"

Tony tries to hold back his laughter by putting a hand on his mouth. He can´t believe the God of Thunder just said that.

Clint looks at Thor, shaking his head with disbelieve: "Dude!"

Bruce just gives a half-smile and look to Steve, who is now blushing, and then back to Natasha.

Steve feels his face burning, but he manages to smile at Natasha as their eyes meet.

Natasha tries not to smile as she looks at Steve, she has a reputation to maintain. So she just stays collected and says in a cold tone: "Huh, okay. Thanks Cap." She then looks at the others and continues calmly: "The car is waiting to take us to the airport, let´s go." She turns around, leaving the room.

Thor and Bruce exchange glances, not quite understanding what just happened.

Tony is shocked, he takes his hand from his mouth saying: "I can´t believe it, did she said _thanks Cap_?"

Clint has a broad smile on his face, he looks at Tony: "You own me a hundred bucks, Stark!"

Thor realizes his mistake and stands up to put a hand on Steve´s shoulder: "I apologize my friend Steven, I was certain that Lady Natasha shared your feelings. I shouldn´t have said that."

Steve simply smiles at him and replies: "It´s okay Thor. No harm done."

Thor notices that Steve doesn´t look sad or disappointed, which he finds a little strange, but he said too much already and decides to let it go. He nods at Steve and walks out of the room.

Tony takes his wallet out of his pocket and gives the money to Clint: "Damn it, Legolas!"

Clint says with a smirk: "Always a pleasure to play with you, Tin Man!" he grabs the money, stands up and leaves the room too.

Bruce stands up, leaving the magazine on the coffee table. He gives a sympathetic look to Steve and then he speaks to Tony: "Hey, Tony. Enough playing around, time to go!" he picks up Tony´s bag from the bed and throws it at him.

Tony catches the flying bag and responds rolling his eyes at Bruce: "Okay dad! I´m coming!"

Tony stops beside Steve and says: "I´m sorry Cap. I thought the redhead would react differently to that. But don´t give up, maybe there is still hope!" He taps Steve on the shoulder and follows Bruce out of the room.

Steve smiles to himself because he knows what Natasha is doing, she doesn´t want to give the others any hint that they are together, or at least is what he thinks she is doing. His smile fades when he realizes that maybe she wasn´t ready to hear that. This could have consequences on their relationship; she could start to push him away. He starts to feel nervous about it, so he takes a deep breath and quickly leaves the room too.

* * *

The ride to the airport was a silent one. At first, everybody was felling a little awkward by what just happened in the hotel but then they all started to think that they were going on missions against HYDRA, which was never an easy task. The tension was in the air. When they got to the airport, the car dropped them at the hangars area. Tony had arranged two private jets, one for him and Bruce and another for Steve and Natasha. Since Clint is the only expert pilot on the team, he and Thor were going on the quinjet.

They all said goodbyes, wish one another good luck and went their separate ways.

Natasha got in their jet, followed by Steve. Once they were inside, she turns to him and quickly puts a hand behind his neck, pulling him down to kiss him passionately. Steve eyes widen with the sudden move, but when their lips touch, he slowly closes his eyes and wraps his arms around her waist pulling her closer and kissing her back. When they break the kiss, Steve looks at her and asks smiling: "What was that for?"

Natasha says looking seriously at him: "Do you really love me Steve?"

Steve still has his arms around her; he looks into her eyes as he answers: "Yes, I do."

Natasha holds his gaze for a moment, she sees how honest his blue eyes are; he is telling the true. A huge smile appears on her face as she replies softly: "Good, because I love you too." She lightly kisses him again. She feels him smiling against her lips and then he hugs her so tight that her feet leave the floor for a moment. Natasha groans in pain with Steve´s grip on her waist, she is not fully recovered from her injures yet.

Steve quickly puts her down and says: "I´m so sorry Tasha, are you okay?"

She only nods her head at him.

Steve let go of her and continues: "Sorry about the hotel situation too, Stark kept pushing me and you know that I´m a terrible liar, unlike you. I confess that I was a little worried after your reply back there!"

Natasha laughs and sits at one of the spacious chair inside the jet: "Sorry, Steve! I have a reputation to maintain, the Black Widow doesn´t fall in love." She winks at him as he sits in the chair in front of her, only a small table is between them.

The pilot announces that they have permission to take off, so they both buckle the seat belt and stay silent.

Natasha looks out the widow and Steve is still thinking about what she said and for some reason he wants to solve all the mysteries of this woman sitting in front of him.

Steve keeps looking at her as the plane gains altitude and then he breaks the silence asking: "What about Natasha Romanoff, has she ever fallen in love?"

Natasha meets his eyes, with a hard expression on her face, she slowly answers: "Once…when I was really young...before I became the Black Widow. I met a combat pilot, his name was Alexei Shostakov. We were both KGB agents…we were married for a few years and then…he died." She stares out the widow again.

Steve lost count of how many times Natasha surprised him on the last two days, but he tries to leave his curiosity aside and just remains silent, trying not to cause any more pain to her. He remembers of his lost love, Peggy, and decides that maybe it is his turn to tell her something about his past: "I have loved a woman too, during my time in the war. But I never got to tell her how I felt until it was too late."

Natasha looks back at Steve and asks softly: "What happened? Did she die?"

Steve takes a deep breath; put his hands on the top of table and looks at them as he nervously plays with his fingers. He replies: "No. She is still alive, but she is in a nursing home. I visit her when I can, but it is getting harder because she has Alzheimer and most of the times when i go see her, it is like the first time we met after I got out of the ice, I have to watch her reaction all over again, she tells me how much she missed me, almost breaking down and then I have to explain to her again how I am still alive."

Natasha reaches for his left hand, squeezing it and then says: "I´m so sorry Steve."

Steve shakes his head and looks at her small hand on the top of his: "It´s okay, she moved on, she got married, had kids, she lived a long and happy live. That´s what comforts me."

Natasha caresses his hand with her thumb and continues: "Is she the woman in the picture we saw when we were in Camp Leigh?"

Steve meets her eyes and gives her a half-smile; nothing gets past the spy without being noticed: "Yes, her name is Margaret Carter but we used to call her Peggy. She helped Howard Stark to found S.H.I.E.L.D."

Natasha raises an eyebrow: "Carter? Is she related to Sharon?"

Steve takes a deep breath and replies: "Yes, Sharon is her niece. I found out that later, it was one of the reasons I didn´t ask her out. It´s just too weird for me to date Peggy´s niece."

Natasha asks with a questioning expression in her face: "One of the reasons?"

Steve smiles at her and put his right hand on her face, caressing her cheek: "The other reason was you."

Natasha gives him a sweet smile: "You really love me don´t you?"

Steve is intrigued by her doubt; he put his right hand down on the table again and replies: "Yes! Why is it so hard for you to believe that?"

Natasha let go of his left hand and looks down, remembering that a memory of Alexei had recently came back to haunt her too.

Natasha says in a low voice: "I guess...you are the first man in all these years that really loved me." Tears are starting to form on her eyes as she continues slowly: "Alexei didn´t…love me…I discovered that he had faked his death…because I didn´t want to join the Black Widow program. I just wanted to have a normal life with him."

A single tear escape from Natasha´s eyes and she quickly wipe it away and continues: "So KGB had faked his death and lied to me and so did Alexei." She looks up at Steve blinking her tears away: "I only became the Black Widow because I thought he was dead, I had nothing else to lose. And when I discovered, several years later, that it was all a lie, I tried to leave but they suppressed my memory again, I didn´t remember that...until my encounter with the KGB agents on Ukraine."

Steve furrows his brown and blinks a few times. Again Natasha past brings a lot of information for him to process. How did she manage to carry this entire burden alone, he is not sure. But at least now she is sharing some of it with him.

Steve leans over the small table and kiss Natasha´s lips softly, then with his intense and honest gaze, he says: "You are the strongest and most amazing woman I have ever know and I do love you Natasha, with all my heart."

Natasha cups his face with her hands, her eyes tearing up again, but now with joy. She smiles and replies: "I guess all these years of suffering were worth it because in the end it led me to you, Steve." She kisses him passionately and this time they don´t let go until they are out of breath.


	13. Ch 13 - Ready to Go

**Author´s Notes:** Hi! Here goes another chapter, hope you guys like it. Thank you for the reviews and support, I really appreciate it!

* * *

CHAPTER 13

**Germany - outskirts of Hamburg, twilight**

Maria is tracking the quinjet in her phone´s GPS. The sun is almost set as she walks in the middle of a field. She looks ahead to where the GPS is pointing and sees a bunch of trees. As she walks into the tree line, she hears someone coming from behind, so she quickly turns around, drawing her gun.

Clint puts his hands up and says: "Wow, Hill put that thing down, it´s me."

Maria let out a breath and puts her hand gun down, back into its place on her right thigh as she replies looking at Clint: "Barton, you could at least give me a heads up before scaring the hell out of me."

Clint gives a half-smile to Maria: "Sorry, I was just securing the area. Nice reflexes, though! Come on, Thor is waiting on the jet." He turns around making his way into the trees and Maria follows him.

The quinjet is landed at a small glade with the back door open. They walk up the ramp and enter the jet. Thor is sitting there, wearing his armor and red cape, playing with his hammer. He stands up and turns to the Maria as he sees her: "Greetings Lady Maria, are you ready for battle?"

Maria looks at the tall God in front of her and replies: "Yes, with the two of you by my side it´ll be a piece of cake!"

Thor looks quizzically at her: "Huh? A piece of cake?"

Clint smiles at Thor, tapping him on the shoulder: "She means it´s going to be an easy task!"

Thor gives a broad smile to Maria as realization hits him. Maria smiles back at him.

Clint turns on the video screen on the jet where a photo of a big warehouse appears. He starts to explain their mission: "Okay, so this is our target, a HYDRA warehouse a couple of miles from here, it is a weapon´s dropping site. The biggest problem is going to be the laser cannon guarding the entrance, it´s a deadly weapon. I don´t wanna risking it doing damage to the quinjet because we might need the jet in case the plan goes wrong. So, we are arriving on foot and I guess since Thor can move like lightning, he could strike that thing down without much trouble, right?" Clint looks expectantly at Thor.

Thor gives him a playful smile and says: "Piece of cake, my friend!"

Maria and Clint smile at Thor and then Clint says: "Good, just don´t let it hit you or it will turn you into dust."

Thor expression turns serious again as he nods at Clint.

Clint looks to Maria and continues: "So, once Thor takes care of that, Maria, you and I are going in. I´ll cover you as you enter the warehouse and plant the bomb. And Thor, you just keep the HYDRA soldier on the outside busy until we get out."

Maria nods at Clint: "Okay, that sounds like a good plan, let´s do it!

* * *

**Japan – an industrial area in Yokohama, late night**

Tony and Bruce are inside a black Audi, parked in an isolated road. They are looking out at the night sky, waiting for James Rhodes to arrive.

Tony breaks the silence and says looking at his watch: "If my math is right, and it always is, he should be arriving right…now!"

Three seconds later, Rhodes lands in front of the car, wearing his War Machine suit.

Bruce grins to Tony as the billionaire chuckles at himself.

Tony gets out of the car and says: "It´s about time you showed up! How was the ride?" He extends his hand to his trusted friend.

Rhodes shakes Tony´s hand with his iron grip and says: "You know I love flying in this suit man, is sweet!"

"How about a race when we are finished here?" Tony says with a smirk on his face: "Last one to arrive at the Avengers Tower pays for dinner!"

Rhodes replies: "Okay, I´m in! So, what are we doing here?"

Tony gestures for him to enter the car. When the War Machine sits on the back, the suspension of the car lowers with the heavy weight. Tony sits on the driver sit again. Bruce turns around and greets Rhodes: "Hello Colonel Rhodes, nice to have you on the team!"

Rhodes lightly tap Bruce´s shoulder and says: "Hey, Dr. Banner, thanks. Am I going to meet the Hulk today?"

Bruce gives a shy smile to Rhodes as he replies: "Yeah, probably, but he is not very friendly, so be careful around him."

Rhodes nods at Bruce: "Sure, man! Don´t worry about it!"

Tony brings up his tablet to show images of their mission: "Okay people, this is supposed to be a pharmaceutical industry, but is actually a HYDRA dropping site and is also where they develop biological weapons." He looks at Rhodes and continues: "Our armor will protect us from any biohazard material, but you Doc" he looks at Bruce "should be careful, we don´t know if the green guy can be affected by any of these weapons if they decide to use it against us."

Bruce nods at Tony: "I´ll try my best to avoid that."

"So, are we going to blow up the building?" Rhodes asks.

Bruce looks at him and responds: "We can´t do that, since we don´t know exactly what they are messing with. If we blow up the building, we might unleash biological or chemical threat to the population around us."

Tony nods and continues in a sarcastic tone: "Yeah, and that would be just too easy!" he smiles a little and then continues: "Anyway, the industry is a few blocks from here. We will attack at the same time, Hulk on the front, War Machine on the back and me from above. We we´ll force them to split their forces in three, neutralize the defenses and when the building is clear, we´ll gather all the biological material. Bruce will select the biohazard material from the others so that he can take the necessary measures for discarding everything properly, and then we can go to the fun part and blow up the whole thing!"

"Okay, and what are we expecting to be up against?" Rhodes asks

Tony replies: "Aside the biological weapons, nothing too fancy, just soldiers with machine guns, grenades, bazookas..."

Rhodes interrupts Tony: "Bazookas? Okay, I´ll watch out for that...I´m ready!" He rubs his iron hands together.

Tony smirks and says excited: "Okay! Let´s roll!" He looks at Bruce who shrugs his shoulders and says with apathy: "Sure, let´s get this over with."

* * *

**Russia – Moscow´s downtown, evening**

Natasha and Steve had just picked up Sam Wilson from the airport. Once they were all inside the standard car they rented, Steve and Natasha filled in Sam with the details of their mission.

Steve is driving. He stops in front of a tall building. Natasha gets out from the passenger´s sit and Sam from the back. They are all in casual clothes, trying to keep the low profile. Natasha got a hood to cover her red hair, and Steve and Sam are wearing caps. They go into an alley and climb the fire escape stairs to reach the top of the building. At the roof, they walk near the edge where they stop. Natasha is standing between the two men as she starts to look with a binocular at the opposite building, which happens to be KGB´s headquarters.

Natasha hands the binocular to Steve as she says: "As I expected, the building is heavily guarded, and I know their security system is really good. I don´t think we will be able to infiltrate the building without being noticed."

Steve is searching the building with the binocular as he replies: "There must be a way in, we need more information to figure out when and where the Winter Soldier is planning to assassinate General Basov."

Sam speaks looking at Natasha: "Why don´t you just leave a hint to KGB, so that they know the Winter Soldier is still working with HYDRA?"

Steve takes the binocular down and answers his friend: "Because we are trying to capture him alive."

Natasha completes Steve´s thought turning to Sam: "If KGB finds out about his treason, they will not hesitate to kill him. Steve thinks that if we get to him first, we could try to bring him back to his senses, stop the assassination and spare Bucky´s life."

Sam looks concerned at Steve as he says: "I see. Steve, I have helped you before and I´ll help you now. But, the last time we fought with the Winter Soldier, he didn't seem to remember you, so I just don´t want you to put your hopes up too much, okay?"

Steve glances at Natasha; she said the same thing to him earlier, on their way to Russia. She gives him a sympathetic look and then Steve turns to Sam and replies: "Yes, I´m trying to prepare myself for that. Thanks Sam. I really appreciate your help."

Sam nods at Steve: "No problem, man."

There is a long pause, each of them lost in their thought, staring at the city night lights, trying to get their minds ready for what they are about to face.

Natasha breaks the silence: "So, I´m going inside KGB, undercover, and try to get us some lead." Natasha says that looking at the KGB building.

Steve immediately shoots her a worried look: "No, that´s too dangerous Natasha!"

Natasha stares at Steve with a determinate expression on her face: "Steve, it´s the only way. Trust me. Unless one of you is an expert spy that can speak Russian…"

Steve and Sam exchange glances and both stay silent.

When neither man say anything, Natasha speaks again: "I thought so. And it´s nothing I haven´t done before, I can handle it. So tomorrow I´ll go shopping for my cover to start the mission."

Steve let out an exasperation breath, he doesn´t like the idea, but they are out of options.

Sam looks at the redhead spy and says: "Okay, so we´ll just stay ready in case you need back up." He looks at Steve.

Steve says without much confidence: "Yes, I suppose that will be the plan of action then."

Sam nods and starts walking toward the stairs to climb down.

Steve stares intensely at Natasha, who takes a step closer to him, meeting his gaze. She knows that he is worried about her so she puts a hand on his arm and says: "I´ll be careful, I promise." She gets on the tip of her toes to kiss the tall soldier on the cheek.

Sam is just starting to climb down the stairs when he sees the scene of the spy kissing the soldier. He knew there was a connection between those two. He smiles and starts to go down the stairs.

Steve closes his eyes as he feels Natasha´s gentle kiss and takes a deep breath. When she pulls away, he opens his eyes and finds her smiling to him: "Come on. Let´s go back to the hotel and get some rest." She says walking past him toward the stairs.

Steve turns around and follows her, watching her small figure in front of him. His jaw muscles are tense as he grit his teeth, he knew this mission wasn´t going to be easy, but he can´t help feeling nervous about it, especially when Natasha is so close to her enemies.

The three make their way down stairs and walk away from the building. They are making their way back to the car. When they turn the corner, an old man crashes with Natasha, knocking both of them down. Natasha´s hood fall from her head, exposing her shoulders length red locks.

Steve helps the man up, picking up the grocery bag he was holding and handing it to him.

Sam was about to lend a hand to Natasha, but she quickly stands up by herself before he can help her. She apologizes to the old man in Russian. The old man adjusts his glasses up his nose, smiles at Natasha and goes on his way.

Steve places a hand on Natasha´s arm asking: "Are you okay?"

Natasha puts her hood back on and says looking at Steve: "Yeah, fine." She looks back suspiciously at the old man, but he just keeps walking away.

Steve is still staring at her with a concerned look on his face. She turns to him, just shakes her head and resumes walking to the car. Steve and Sam follow her.

When he is at a safe distance, the old man picks up a phone from his pocket and speaks in Russian with someone on the line: "It´s her, the Black Widow is back. I´ll keep you posted." He enters a dark blue car and drives away.

Back in the hotel, Natasha is in her room alone, on the same floor, two doors after the one Steve and Sam are sharing

Natasha takes a shower and changes clothes. She is drying her hair with a towel when she hears a knock at her door. She puts the towel down and asks: "Who is it?"

"It´s me, Steve." Natasha opens the door and Steve greets her: "Hey Tasha, Sam and I are going out to eat something, do you want to come with us?"

She leans on the doorway and answers: "No, thanks. I don´t think it is wise for me to be walking around Moscow, someone might recognize me."

Steve pauses for a moment and just admires her all the way down and then up again. Natasha is wearing a loose purple t-shirt that is hanging off her right shoulder exposing her sport black bra, black leggings and bare footed. Her face is clean of makeup and her red hair is wet, yet she looks so sexy, he just wants to hold her and kiss her full lips, but he can´t, because Sam is coming their way.

Natasha nudges Steve on the arm to get him out of his trance. Steve blinks a few times and blushes. He clears his throat and continues smiling: "Okay, I´ll bring you something then."

Natasha smiles too: "Okay, thanks Cap. Try not to call too much attention and be careful boys!"

Sam walks past her door and she smiles at him. He nods at her and says: "Yes, ma´am!"

Steve takes one last glance at her and then follows Sam, who is making his way to the elevator.

Natasha closes the door and goes to the window on the opposite side of her room. She can see the front yard of the hotel, where the main entrance and the large parking lot are. In a few minutes she sees Steve and Sam walking out of the hotel and getting into the car. She keeps looking around and as soon as Steve drives away, she sees the old man who bumped on her appearing from behind a dark blue car. He is talking to someone on the phone.

She thinks: _"I knew it! That old man was following us!"_ She is a little apprehensive that maybe someone is going after Steve and Sam, but after a few minutes, a black van parks in front of the hotel and four men get out. They walk toward the hotel´s entrance. _"Shit, they are coming for me! Okay, slightly change of plans!"_ She thinks as she realize what is happening.

Natasha quickly grabs her belt with her throwing knifes and puts it around the inside of the waistline of her legging. She grabs another couple of small knifes and puts one inside her sport bra, another strapped around her left biceps under the sleeve of her shirt, and the last one on her right ankle. She moves fast to pick up her black combat boots from her bag and put them on. She grabs a piece of paper and a pen from the nightstand and writes something on it, she folds it and draws a star on it. Just as she puts the note on the nightstand, someone kicks the door of her room open. Natasha turns around and recognizes the four agents that got her in Ukraine. They come in holding up guns and the one in front says in Russian, with an evil smirk: "Did you miss me?" He is the one that injected her with the drug that brought back her memories.

Natasha just tilts her head to the side, narrows her eyes and says in her nature tongue: "No, not really. I never got you name agent…?"

His right hand is holding his hand gun, pointing it at her chest as he speaks: "Dmitri Zarkov."

Natasha keeps her collected poise as she slowly walks towards him and replies: "Okay, Zarkov. You´re on the top of my - to kill - list."

He laughs and says: "I gotta admit that it´s harder than I thought to break you, Black Widow. Maybe I should just kill you this time."

Natasha stops only a few inches from his hand gun: "Not if I kill you first" and with a swift move she grabs his right hand and twist his arm, turning him around, using him as a human shield, wrapping her other arm tightly around his neck. The other agents are frozen in their places with the sudden move. Natasha makes Zarkov shoot one of the KGB agents in front of them in the chest, he falls bleeding. Before the remaining two can react she takes the gun from Zarkov´s hand and kicks him on the butt so hard that he falls on the other two standing agents, who hold him. Zarkov turns around grabbing a machine gun from his companion, but when he faces Natasha, she shoots him in the head, killing him before he can do anything. He falls dead on the ground. The other agent starts to shoot at Natasha with his machine gun. She slides on the top of the bed and gets down behind it. The agent beside him throws a gas grenade and picks up his gun from the dead Zarkov´s hands before they quickly leave the room, closing the door. Natasha starts coughing as the variant of the tear gas starts to fill her lungs, she could easily make an escape through the window but this was her ticket to get inside KGB, and she was going to use it. So she just sits leaning against the bed and wait for the gas to take its effects on her. She closes her burning eyes, cough a couple of times, starts to feel dizzy and slowly passes out.


	14. Ch 14 - Action!

**Author´s notes:** Hi there! I know this chapter took a while longer for me to write, but I was really busy at work this past few weeks, it was hard for me to find some time to sit down and write, since I have to write in english I really gotta focus or nothing comes out...lol! Oh, well. It´s finally here, hope you guys like it! Thanks again for the support!

* * *

CHAPTER 14

**Germany - outskirts of Hamburg, evening**

Clint and Maria are crouched near the wired fence that stands between them and HYDRA´s warehouse. Clint throws some pebbles at the fence. They can hear the buzzing sound of electricity and see a flicker of light as the pebbles hit it. The fence is electrified.

Maria looks around and spots a panel at the wall on the warehouse: "That must be the power source." She points at the panel and looks at Clint.

Clint takes his bow from his back and barely aims as he shoots an arrow and hits the panel. The arrow releases an electrical discharge and shorts the circuit on the panel. Then he throws some pebbles at the fence again to make sure it worked. Nothing happens, so he nods at Maria who nods back at him.

Clint whispers in his communicator: "Thor, we are in position. It´s your turn!"

Thor is far behind them, he hears his friends on his com and goes flying toward the warehouse with his hammer in his hand. As soon as he got closer, the alarm of the building goes off and a metal door opens on the top of the warehouse. Thor notices the laser cannon that Clint talked about coming out from it. It starts to fire at him.

Clint and Maria can see their friend flying by and they watch intensely as Thor easily dodges the several blue laser beams that the remote-controlled cannon was firing at him.

Thor get within reach and smashes his hammer at the cannon´s tip. This first hit bends the metal, already taking the cannon out of function, but just to be sure, Thor hits it a couple of more times until the cannon is a pile of junk.

Now, several HYDRA soldiers are coming out of the warehouse to see the God of Thunder standing in the rooftop, a broad smile on his face. He looks down at the soldiers and asks with his booming voice: "Who is next?"

They open fire with machine guns at Thor, who flies off the roof before the bullets hit him and takes charge at a group of soldier on the patio. Thor lands on his knee between them, putting his hammer down and making the earth tremble, knocking several soldiers down. He stands up and starts to wave his hammer around, hitting one by one of the remaining soldier.

That is the moment for Clint and Maria to go in. They climb the fence up and jump down on the other side, then quickly get to the door that the soldiers came out. Once inside, Maria draws her handgun and leads the way into the hallway with Clint close behind her holding his bow, glancing at every corner as the walk. They get to a big double door, Maria slowly opens it and sees a great room which has a lot of wooden crates piled up.

Clint speaks in a low tone: "Go! I´ll cover you!" and then he climbs up on the top of a high pile of crates near the entrance, where he can see most of the room. It seems to be clear of enemies. He watches as Maria makes her way around the crates to the center of the room.

When Maria arrives at the middle of the stocked warehouse, she stops and looks around for a moment before putting her handgun back into its holster in her thigh. She kneels on her left leg and takes the small but powerful bomb from her backpack. She puts it carefully behind a crate, making sure it is armed. She pushes a small green button and a red light is now pulsing on the side of the device. She puts the backpack on her back again and was about to stand up when Clint says on her com: "Hill, get out of there, FAST!"

Maria, as an instinct, draws her handgun and looks around. She doesn´t see anything so she starts to quickly make her way back to the entrance of the room, when she hears a growl. She turns around and sees a large metal hound, with red lights on its eye´s sockets, snarling at her. She points her gun at it, but before she could open fire, an arrow comes flying from behind her, hitting the hound and releasing an acid substance which makes the robotic beast growls as it shakes the substance away from his back, but it doesn´t seem to affect it. At least it gives Maria time to turn and run away.

Clint watches as his acid arrow did nothing to the metal hound. _"It was supposed to melt the damn thing!"_ He thinks shocked.

Maria stops beside the pile of crates that Clint is on top, she is panting, but she manages to shouts from below Clint: "Barton, what the hell is that?"

"I don´t know!" Clint answers as he shoots an explosive arrow at the hound. The metal hound howls, but as the smoke disappears, Clint sees the enemy is still standing and it is now looking at him, showing his iron teeth, so he starts to climb down saying to Maria: "I think I only made it angrier!"

Maria glances back and sees the hound coming at her with his iron teeth showing from his metal jaws. Clint lands besides her and pushes her out of the room shouting: "Keep going Hill!"

Maria runs as fast as she can to exit of the warehouse with Clint right behind her.

Maria runs across the patio and reaches the wired fence. She quickly makes her away up and jumps down on the other side.

Clint starts to climb the fence too, but the hound reaches him and closes its metal jaws on his left ankle. Clint screams in pain as the hound pull him down, back to the ground.

Maria turns around and starts shooting at the hound, it stops attacking Clint for a moment but her bullets bounce away on its metal skin: "Damn it! That thing must be made of adamantium! My bullets don´t even dent it!"

Clint sits up and faces the hound as it charges at him again. He put his bow up to block the attack, and the hound bites the bow with such strength that it breaks it in half. "Shit! My bow!" Clint shouts as he watches the hound shakes one piece of his bow around in its mouth.

Maria quickly talks in her com: "Thor, we need help at the back of the building! NOW!"

Clint tries to stand up, but the pain in his ankle is too much, so he crawls backward, until his back hits the wired fence. The metal hound drops the piece of the bow and snarls at Clint again, he is going to pounce at him. Clint put his arm up to protect his face as it jumps at him again, but the impact of its metal jaws never came.

Thor appears flying from nowhere and hits the side of the hound, sending it several meters away from Clint. He extends a hand to Clint: "Are you hurt?"

Clint takes his arm down and looks up relievied at Thor, who is standing in front of him. He takes his hand to stand up: "That thing bit my ankle, it hurts like hell..." He grimace as he tries to put his left feet down without success and then leans his back on the fence for support, since he can´t put weight on his left ankle.

Maria got her eyes on the hound and shouts: "Look out, the dog from hell is up again!"

Thor turns around to see the metal hound running to them. He starts to swirl his hammer on his right hand and throws it with full force at the hound. It makes a loud metal sounds as it hits the hound, the impact sending it flying through the warehouse wall. Thor calls his hammer back to his hand and shouts: "Stay down, metal beast!"

Thor turns to Clint: "Hold on to me my friend, I will help you."

Clint put his arm on Thor´s shoulder for support as Thor grabs him and flies around the fence, landing next to Maria on the other side. He says: "Lady Maria, did you fulfill your part of the quest?

Maria nods at him and Thor continues: "Good, then we are done here. Let´s return to the jet and tend to Hawkeye´s wound."

The three team mates walk away from the warehouse, Thor is supporting Clint since he can´t walk on his own.

When they are at a safe distance, Maria speaks up: "I just need to do one more thing." She grabs the detonator from her backpack and pushes the button.

They turn around and watch as the warehouse blow up in flames.

"Take that, damn dog! I can´t believe you broke my bow in two!" Clint shouts angrily, looking at the flaming warehouse.

Maria smiles sympathetically at Clint: "Better your bow than your face."

Thor laughs looking at Maria: "Indeed!" Then he says to Clint: "Don´t worry my friend, I´m certain that Lord Tony can craft you another bow."

Clint says sadly: "I guess so. It´s just that I feel...naked without my bow." Clint sighs then continues still irritated: "Just help me get the hell out of here, because my ankle is killing me! Damn adamantium dog!"

* * *

**Japan – an industrial area in Yokohama, late night**

Bruce makes his way to the front gate of the pharmaceutical industry and mutters to himself: "Time to get angry."

The two HYDRA soldiers guarding the front gate spot him as he turns into the Hulk. The Hulk growls and smashes the front gate with a punch. The soldiers start to fire at him and the alarm goes off. The bullets from the machine guns only make the Hulk angrier, so he charges at the soldiers and grabs each them in one hand, the soldiers scream with panic at being stuck at the big green monster´s hands. Then Hulk knocks their heads together so hard that, even with helmets, they fall unconscious.

More soldiers come out from the building, making their way to Hulk at the front gate.

On the roof, a soldier is aiming at Hulk with a bazooka. He was about to fire when Iron Man shoots one of his beams at the soldier, sending him falling off the roof before he was able to fire. Iron Man lands at the strategic position and opens fire at the soldiers down on the front patio, who are attacking Hulk.

War Machine appears on the back where some soldiers are inside a bunker with heavy artillery machine guns. They start to fire high caliber bullets at the Hulk, who is now backing away with his arms up on his face trying to defend himself from the painful bullets. War Machine gets them by surprise and shoots small missiles that go inside the small gap on the bunker. Several HYDRA soldiers fly out of the bunker as it blows up.

Iron Man, who saw the scene, speaks up in his com: "Nice shot, Rhodey!"

Hulk manages to catch a break. He notices five more soldiers coming out of the facility. Four of them are taking position in front of him to shoot and one of the soldiers was about to throw a gas grenade at him. He stares at them and growls so loud that all the soldiers fall back down, frightened with the unexpected sound.

Iron Man laughs at the sight: "I love playing with the green guy!"

The gas grenade goes off when it falls to the ground near the soldiers. They all start to cough and gasp for air. Hulk is mad and inpatient, he can´t just wait for the biological weapon to do its work on the soldiers, so he runs and kicks the grenade far up the sky and finishes smashing the soldiers down. The soldiers all stay still, lying on the ground unconscious.

War Machine lands besides Iron Man and says: "Wow, that´s is definitely out of the park!" Rhodes watches the gas grenades flies away and then continues, looking down at Hulk: "There isn´t much to do when that guy is around. He is a total beast!"

"Yeah, but it is fun to watch! Come on, you get inside of the building to see if there is anyone left while I get Bruce some clothes." Tony flies off the roof and lands near Hulk saying: "Hey, big guy, nice work! Could you please call the doctor back for us again?"

Hulk snarls to Tony and then starts to go back to Bruce Banner.

War Machine lands behind Iron Man and goes inside the building.

Iron Man flies off to their car that is parked a few blocks back, grabs a bag from the trunk and then returns to the patio where Bruce is un-hulking.

War Machine goes in a small lobby and looks around. He walks behind a counter on the right. There are screens with images of the several security cameras. He looks at the images and sees no one standing, except for Iron Man who is handing some clothes to Bruce that is now back to his normal self. So he says in his com: "Tony, all clear."

Tony responds: "Okay, Rhodey." He turns to Bruce and continues: "Come on Doc, put on the hazmat suit, you are going to sort the _dangerous_ from _not so dangerous_ biohazard material for us."

Bruce starts to put on the protective garment. He grins to Tony and says in a sarcastic tone: "Yeah…that sounds fun."

* * *

**Russia – A hotel in Moscow, early night**

Steve and Sam arrive back at the hotel. Steve is picking up the food he brought back to Natasha from the back seat of the car as Sam gets out.

Sam spots the police car, with the lights of the siren on, parked in front of the hotel and says with a concerned tone: "Steve! We may have a problem, man."

Steve quickly gets out of the car and follow Sam´s gaze. He feels a chill go down his spine when he sees the police car. He drops the bag of food at the front seat and glances at Sam with a worried expression.

Sam meet Steve´s worried eyes and says: "Call her!"

Steve strides to the entrance of the hotel as he takes his phone out of his pocket and calls Natasha. Sam is beside him, he is almost running to keep up with Steve´s pace.

The phone is ringing but there is no answer. Steve whispers to himself: "Come on Natasha! Pick up!"

They pass unnoticed through the lobby where a police officer is talking to the woman in the front desk.

When they stop in front of the elevator, Sam presses the button.

Steve is in panic as Natasha´s phone goes to the voice mail. He hangs up and puts the phone back in his pocket. His jaws are now tense as he grit his teeth nervously and the time waiting for the elevator seems like an eternity, so he loses his patient and decides to run up the stairs, since they are on the third floor.

When Steve arrives at their floor, he turns to the direction of Natasha´s room and his blood runs cold when he sees that a police officer is standing in front of Natasha´s door. He runs to the door, ignoring the police officer, and burst the door open, quickly entering the room.

The officer goes in after Steve and starts saying things to him with an angry tone, but Steve isn´t listening, and even if he was, he wouldn´t understand since the cop was speaking in Russian.

Steve sees two dead men bodies on the floor, one shoot on the head, the other on the chest. There are bullets hole on the wall near the bed and he can still smell the scent of what it seems to be tear gas in the room. He peaks inside the bathroom but there is nothing there. He thinks: _"They took Natasha. Damn it!"_

Sam arrives at the scene and tries to get the cop´s attention: "I´m sorry, officer. We are Americans, do you speak English?"

The cop turns around to Sam and speaks angrily: "You can´t be in here! This is a crime scene!"

Steve kneels beside the dead bodies and search for clues inside their pockets, but there is nothing on them, not even IDs. Someone must have cleaned them before they left.

Sam knows that they can´t reveal their identities to anyone, it could ruin their mission, so he tries to distract the cop a while longer: "Our friend was in this room, we just want to know what happened to her. Have you seen her? She is a white, medium height woman with red hair."

Steve is still looking around for any clues. He sees Natasha´s phone on the nightstand, he goes to pick it up and notices a folded paper with a star draw on it. He feels a little hopeful as he reaches for it because he knows it is from Natasha. He takes the paper and reads it:

_I´M IN_

_BE AT THE OPPOSITE TOWER AT MIDNIGHT_

_WAIT FOR MY SIGNAL_

The cop answers Sam with a heavy accent: "No! We just arrived here! But if you knew the person staying in this room, you should stay for questioning!"

Steve folds the paper and put it on his pocket with her phone. He then makes his way to the storage space to grab Natasha´s things. Luckily she isn´t like Tony Stark, and her thing are still inside her bag so he picks it up and makes his way to the door. The cop has his back to him since he is speaking to Sam, who occasionally glances at Steve to see what he is doing.

Sam sees Steve coming their way and replies to the cop to get his attention: "Sure! Anything we can do to help! We are staying on this floor too if you need to talk to us, room 306."

Steve sneaks out and makes his way to their room and the end of the hallway. When he goes in Sam continues: "I´m sorry to have bothered you officer. Have a good night." Sam makes his way to their room.

The police officer nods to Sam and then turns around to look inside the room. He wonders where the other man had gone to. He looks around the room suspicioly but finds nothing. So he shrugs his shoulders, goes back to the front door, closing it, and remains on his previous place, guarding the crime scene.

When Sam enters the room he says to Steve: "You are spending too much time with the spy, man. You´re sneaky, soldier!"

Steve looks at Sam, a half-smile on his face: "Yes, but I had help, thanks for distracting that officer."

"So, have you found anything?" Sam eagerly asks.

Steve hands the paper to Sam. Sam reads the note and says: "She is smart! KGB probably came here to get her, she put up a fight to cover the fact that she wanted to be caught and now she is in. Damn, she is good!"

"Yes, that sounds like the Black Widow´s style." Steve has seen Natasha take that course of action before, but never to get inside a dangerous place like KGB. He takes a deep breath and continues: "But I don´t know Sam, KGB is not an ordinary security agency. They are rough, especially with traitors, they will torture her. Maybe we should go and rescue her before anything bad happens."

Sam looks at Steve with a puzzled expression on his face: "What! Are you serious? Steve, she is not a damsel in distress, she is a master assassin! Did you see the size of those guys on her room´s floor? She can handle it. And besides, if we went in kicking the front door of KGB´s headquarters, we have a high chance of getting caught too. Who would help her then?"

Steve knows that was a bad plan, but he can´t just wait until midnight. He can´t stand the thought of anyone hurting Natasha or doing worse. He sits at the edge of his bed, stares at the floor and rubs his fingers against his temple.

Sam notices the distress of his friend, Steve is so bad at hiding his emotions and Sam knows him well enough to know what is bothering him: "Look Steve, you can´t let your feeling for her get in the way of the mission."

Steve looks up at Sam in disbelieve. He was about to say something but he just gives up, because he knows Sam is right. So he looks back at floor and let out an exasperation breath.

Sam taps him on the shoulder and says with a smile on his face: "Don´t worry, I´m sure she knows what she is doing." Steve doesn´t move he just keep staring blankly at the floor, so Sam continues: "Look, if she is not out of there by 01:00 a.m., we go in, but until then you should trust her instincts, she is your partner after all."

Steve now looks up at Sam and replies sadly: "Yes, I know."

"And if we want to help, we should get out of here before the cops come questioning us. We don´t wanna get stuck inside the Russian police department trying to explain everything." Sam says as he turns around and starts to gather his thing to put in his bag.

Steve knows that he is not thinking straight and that Sam got more reason than him at this moment, so he just tries to shake the bad thoughts from his mind, stands up and starts packing his things too.


End file.

Avengers, Adventure, Romance