"My Gamora..." Thanos hissed, seemingly ignoring his repeating the question, and Mantis said, "He is in anguish...he mourns...."
And then Thanos said, "To get the soul stone....I had to sacrifice someone I loved."
***
"So we're agreed," Steve was saying to the other Avengers. "If we had more Pym particles, we might try to steal the stones directly from Thanos. But the chances of pulling that off in one attempt are too low. Which means we have to get to each of them before he does."
The general deflation of admitting this was visible to everyone in the room. Including Scott Lang, who was clearly confused by it. "Why were you people so hung up on that idea anyway?" he asked.
"Because," said Natasha grimly, "it was the only way we could get the soul stone without one of us dying." Tony then took over, explaining what he and Nebula had heard Thanos say on Titan.
"I would do it," Nebula said when he was done. "I would gladly be the sacrifice if...if any of you could do it with me."
She looked over at Tony and at Rocket, but they both shook their heads. "Morgan loves you," said Tony. "I'm pretty sure of that. But..." They both had a great affection for Nebula, and after five years, they weren't the only ones. It was possible someone in that room loved her. But for this, they had to be dead certain.
"I don't suppose..." Thor started, "any of you..."
"It shouldn't be you anyway." Steve cut him off. "Now, I know each of us came in here knowing we were willing to die to get this accomplished, if need be. But most of the scenarios involving that kind of thing, you only find out you need to sacrifice yourself a short time before you do it, in which case the only complication would've been what would've happened if more than one person was able to be the sacrifice.
Unfortunately, because so much is at stake, because we've now said whatever it takes, we now have to do something much harder, and much uglier. We now have to decide which one of us should willingly go to our death, even travel to another planet specifically to die there, and we have to be cold and calculating about it."
He saw that reality set in, felt the pain of it. Honestly, Steve would've taken it back and refused to do this, if he hadn't already made the calculations in his head, and come to the conclusion he had.
"First of all," he continued, "while any of us might have to die in the moment during this, there are people we should try to keep alive because once we have these stones, we still have to remake the gauntlet, and then we have to use it. Obviously Tony should be in charge of remaking it, with Bruce and Rocket's help. It's possible, of course, he might not get back here alive, so Bruce, you're his backup." Both men nodded, and while Rocket looked a little annoyed, Steve knew there would ultimately be no arguments there.
"Now, we saw what wielding that thing did to Thanos, and he was of a very big and tough race. I honestly don't know if whoever we choose to wield it won't also be a sacrifice for this. But we should go with who has the best chance of surviving."
"You are right that I should do it, then," said Thor. "I'm the strongest Avenger, so this responsibility falls upon me..."
Several of the others moved with Steve to interrupt, and Thor did not like being interrupted. "Just let me do it," he pleaded with them, near tears. "Let me do something good, something right."
Steve went over to him, and gently put a hand on his shoulder. "You'll be backup for it," he said. "But I'm pretty sure the one of us with the best chance of surviving it is Bruce."
"He's right," said Bruce. "When you look at those waves he sent through the universe, the radiation's mostly gamma. It's like...I was made for this."
Thor made a few more feeble protests, but then Steve saw him cave. "There's another reason I'd just as soon keep you alive," he told him. "Since we're choosing who dies here, we can rule out anyone who has-or hopes to have again-particular responsibilities towards others. I'm pretty sure only a few years after losing most of their people and settling on Midgard, dependent on the mercy of people who once worshiped them, isn't the best time for the Asgardians to lose their king."
"Oh, I'm of no use to them," sighed Thor. "Not anymore. I'm been thinking of handing the crown over anyway. And I've named my successor; reinforced that before coming here."
"Your death would still cause waves," said Rhodey. "He's right; it's better to avoid that."
Mentally thanking Rhodey, Steven turned back to the group. "Similarly," he said, "I wouldn't want this to be any of the five of us with children still under our care."
"Five of us?" Natasha asked. Too quickly; she had already realized whom he meant by the fifth.
"Honestly, Natasha?" said Clint. "The person I am now, you'd probably be of more use to my family than I'd be."
"What?! That's ridiculous!" she protested. "You're their father, Clint. Nothing you've done changes that. I'm just an honorary Aunt whom they've barely seen the past two years of their lives!"
"You know better," said Clint, and Steve could tell he meant more by it; he could long tell when those two referred to their still kept secrets. "If it's either one of us..."
"You can have that conversation then," Steve told them. "For now, it's neither of you."
"So," said Rhodey, meeting Stephen's eyes. "That means it's you and me." He then turned to meet Tony's. "If we went to that place and you killed me, you'd get it, wouldn't you?"
Being the two men that they were, they'd probably never even spoken of loving each other. But now Tony just nodded, and said, "Yeah, buddy, I would."
That had been the easy admission. Now Steve turned on Natasha, getting over to where she sat before she could stand up, fixed his gaze on her hard as he could, and asked, "And if we went there, and you killed me?"
She did not squirm under anyone's gaze, so she didn't squirm under his, but Steve could tell she wanted to. Her eyes did, flickering all around the room, at everyone else staring at her, all of them waiting for the admission she very badly did not want to make. Were the circumstances different, Steve probably would have backed off. They all recognized the weight of the fact that he didn't.
So did Natasha, and maybe that was why, after only a few very long moments, she just nodded.
"So," Steve said, turning around and heading back for the front of the room. "That makes for two possible teams to go to Vormir. We don't need to decide which at this exact moment. In fact, we shouldn't, when we haven't begun to consider when and where we're going to try to obtain all the other stones, so we don't yet know whom we might need where. We will treat this pair of options the same way we treat all our other determined options, agreed?"
"Agreed," the others all chorused, and most of them sounded relieved they didn't have to make such a terrible final decision just yet. But Steve heard the clear unspoken "You bastard" in Rhodey's, and a bit of it in Natasha's as well.
Of course they'd both already realized. Everyone had already thought at least a little about how they were going to do this, and about the fact that one point in time had seen two of those stones located in Stark Tower. There was a good chance they'd go there, and if they did, of course they'd want to bring the guy who'd designed that place.
***
Natasha was preparing to go to her death. She was pretty sure everyone knew it, too, even if noone was saying it out loud. It kind of concerned her that Steve had been talking and acting the entire time as if she wouldn't dream of trying to go against the official plan. But whatever plans he had to stop her there, she was pretty sure she could outmaneuver him.
She spent an hour, that final morning, writing a long letter goodbye, to leave in her quarters in an envelope on which she simply wrote For Yelena and Melina-give to Aleksei. There were other people to write to as well, some currently alive and some they hoped to bring back, mostly through email. Aleksei she called, though. She feared she wouldn't be able to get a hold of him, but she did, and Antonia with him. There might have been no better comfort to Natasha, in these, the final hours of her life, then to hear the latter speak, more coherent than ever, and genuinely sounding happy.
Natasha didn't tell them it was going to be the last time, though. It seemed she was still a coward in very certain ways. Maybe Aleksei suspected, but he didn't say anything.
They'd all gotten their affairs in order. When Natasha looked around her room for the last time, she even knew where each of the small amount of objects she was leaving behind would go. The last thing her eyes lingered on was the drawing Clint had mailed to the place right before he'd gone on his first killing spree. It was obviously Lila's, and advanced enough that she might well had done it in her final weeks. She was sure Clint would take it back to the farm, and maybe when Lila saw it, she would always think of her.
It still struck Natasha hard, sometimes, how loved she now had been. If she had to go make this sacrifice, it was even some consolation that she could make it by being loved.
Halfway to the hanger Clint found her. He had that wild look on him, the one that before all this had been rare, but always a possibility. This was the part that hurt the most, she knew. Well, aside from all the people she wouldn't get to say goodbye to.
They stood there, looking at each other, her waiting patiently for him to get his words together, because maybe then she'd find her own. "When I became a monster," he said, "my main regret was that if I ever saw you again, you'd probably be there to arrest me, or worse. For the most part I didn't even care about the opinions of most other people left alive-maybe a little about those Avengers I wasn't still pissed off at. Now I just wish..." There weren't any more words there, not really. Even what words Natasha was trying for were for his family more than for him.
Before she had them, Clint had her, up against the wall and pressed body to body as he ravaged her mouth like he never had before, not even when one of them had nearly died on a mission. Natasha let him do whatever he wanted, even letting him grope at her breasts one last time with one hand before the other made its way around her torso, more in the way Laura's has in the past, as if he was doing this for the both of them. She couldn't help a moan as that hand found that sensitive place just above her hip, then teased her skin through her suit with only two fingers touching her. His nose pressed into the side of her neck, as if he was trying to get a final scent of her.
They probably keep at it for too long, but Natasha felt better in those moments than she had in so long it almost hurt with how unused she was to it. She was about to die, she reminded herself, and the thing about traveling through time was you could leave late without arriving late.
But, of course, eventually, they had to break apart. Natasha was in too much of a daze by then, her mind unfocused for once, last chance for that, obviously. She lets herself listen to Clint's breathing as he, too, needed a moment to get his bearings, though he seemed to manage it just a little quicker than usual. When he took her hand, she grasped it back, and when he started to walk with their hands still joined, she walked alongside him.
The others were all in the hanger already. Nebula had her hand on Steve's shoulder, and was saying something, each of them having their final farewells to give him. When Rhodey and Tony both looked over at her, Natasha had the feeling they'd give them to her, too, fully preparing for either possible outcome.
She was right. It was the two of them that came over to her first, even though Rhodey was among those going with them to Morag-but then, so was Nebula, and she was doing it here too. Rhodey took her hands and said, "I hope you won't mind, Natasha, if I tell you it has truly been an honor working and fighting alongside you."
"You as well," Natasha said to him. "I know we haven't always been on the best of terms, especially during those two years nobody was, but I hope you believe me when I say I have the greatest respect for you-maybe more than for the rest of these people."
"Well, obviously," said Tony, "seeing as you're not a total idiot." When Rhodey let go of her hands, he took them next. For all his genius and quick thinking, Tony wasn't prepared for this kind of interaction; she saw him grope for words for a moment, before finally coming up with, "We gave 'em hell, right?"
"We did," she said, and gripped so tightly.
Rocket and Nebula reached them together. The former mostly just stared awkwardly about, not lifting his head to look at his taller companions. It was the latter who said, "Thank you, Ms. Ramonov, for all you have done for us both."
"And thank you both," she said to them. "You've done more for us than we would've ever expected."
Next up was Bruce, and it seemed the moment lingered as the two of them just looked at each other. Though they'd never talked about it, Natasha knew his feelings hadn't changed as much as hers had. That fact was written all over his still tender face as he took both her hands in one of his as best he could when it dwarfed them so. "There's so much we never said," he said. "I don't think I can say it now, though."
"It's okay," Natasha said to him. "I think we each know what the other has needed them to know." Or at least as much of it as she could ever hope for him to understand. From the sadness with which he nodded, he, too, knew he could only have ever gotten so much of her, even if they had run together all those years ago.
She and Scott Lang were still strangers bound only by their common cause. He might or might not have even been made aware that she was probably currently planning to die in Steve's stead. He had just spoken a lot more words to Steve. To her he just said good luck. Clint looked a little put out by that, but he knew to let it go.
And Thor, of course, took the longest if you didn't count Clint. Much as she probably loved him, by the time he was done hugging her, Natasha wanted it to be over, because everything was starting to hurt, figuratively and literally both. His words were grandiose, as they typically were, and she didn't even track all of them-here, at the end of her life, she no longer needed to heed every last nook and cranny around her, which was a relief.
When at last he let her go, everyone else was already up on the platform. They hurried to join them.
***
She thought from the start the most painful part would be the flight to Vormir. As she'd expected, Steve didn't talk the entire time. For the most part Natasha had to concentrate on flying the ship, but there were still too many moments where the silence, something that had rarely bothered her throughout her life, threatened to crush her heart; she thought she might be already dead inside by the time she finally did die.
A handful of times, she forced herself to really look out into the cosmos they were flying through. When she'd first left Earth five years ago, even under the circumstances then, she'd found moments to look at the stars as if she had never seen them before, to take in the experience of interstellar travel, even if it hadn't been quite as cinematic as the movies had hoped for. She had managed more of that last time; now, it took too long the focus her mind, and she still had to fly the ship.
Vormir, on the other hand, seemed a beautiful sight when they were first coming down through the atmosphere. It perhaps didn't look entirely unlike the Arctic or Antarctic with its coldstruck lands and mountains and waters, but there was something about the lighting that was just alien; the effects of orbiting a different star from the sun, perhaps.
It perhaps helped her view of it that it had gotten surprisingly warm in the spaceship. She'd done half the trip with her outer vest off.
Still, a mountain with snow swarming around it was never the easiest thing to climb. But Steve and Natasha were both good at climbing snow-swarmed mountains, and they were neither of them even that much out of breath when they heard the voice speak, and whirled around, weapons drawn. Steve's voice was steel as always as he said, "Who are you? Your voice sounds familiar."
It hadn't even to Natasha. Now too many hair-raising possibilities presented themselves to her about their having been followed back in time, and maybe the others had been followed back, too, and even if this man couldn't obtain the soul stone he might have still been able to destroy it.
But she was immediately convinced otherwise when she heard the cloaked figure saying in a sad, simple tone, "Who I was once...that doesn't really matter anymore." A glance at Steve, and Natasha could tell he believed it as well. "All that matters now is you can consider me a guide to all that seek the soul stone."
"We know how to get it already," Steve told him. "Although if there are any catches about the sacrifice having to happen in a certain way or at a certain part of the mountain, we'd appreciate you telling us about that."
"I will not play tricks," the figure told them. "The price for it is great enough. I suppose whichever of you leaves here with it will consider it worth it, for I do know what you want it for."
"Yeah," Steve actually sounded annoyed, "I suppose most think it'll be worth it, and then change their minds afterwards. I'd ask you to even say that to a guy who's going to show up here in about four years, but I've been told that's not how that sort of thing works, and he probably wouldn't listen anyway, so...." The figure was beckoning to them, so he just looked at Natasha and said, "Let's go."
He led them to the top of the mountain, between two great pillars, to a carved stone platform, below which they could stare out into a great, jagged, almost certainly fatal drop. "So," Steve said, "just to confirm, throw someone you love over that precipice, and you get the soul stone?"
"To think you would someday talk like this, Steven, son of Sarah." The figure sounded too amused, given he'd sounded so sad and depressed up until then, but his voice turned grim again as he said, "What you want lies in front of you, as does what you fear. You get the stone by losing that which you love. So long as it is done here, I do not think the exact way how matters."
"Better safe than sorry, though," said Steve. He walked backwards until he was almost at the edge, then unclipped his shield and threw it at her feet, before holding his arms out. "Do it."
"You know better," Natasha said, and a moment later she had reached him and forced the dagger in her vest into his hand. A moment after that she had forced his hand forward to plunge the dagger into her heart.
It didn't pierce her skin. The blade had been blunted.
Hastily Natasha reached for the smaller pistol hidden near her left hip-and then remembered Clint had reached his fingers into that pocket. Sure enough, when her hand closed around the gun, instantly she knew from the weight distribution that he'd jammed the barrel. To unjam it would take seconds she didn't have.
Reaching for it had only lost her a split second of time. But that was all Steve had needed. He grabbed her hand and sent something through it from his glove, some sort of electric shock. Muffled by her own glove, it didn't even do much to her, but it was enough for her fingers to flex out of control-and be unable to fight back when Steve forced them around the hilt of a dagger he'd brought himself.
She did have time enough to take in the blade, one she'd never seen before, and short enough she gained control of her hands in time to stop it from piercing. Or so she thought, until Steve flicked something on the handle she couldn't see, and the blade thrust itself forward as it doubled in length, and she saw the serrations on the edge, the ones that made it harder for her to pull it out-especially when a supersoldier was also clutching the hilt, and there wasn't even time to force his hands off.
The dagger had almost certainly pierced his heart. But being a supersoldier, Natasha reminded herself, he might yet survive this, and so she tilted her head back, knowing how she could snap her own neck in an instant. Except she couldn't so quickly, she discovered, because part of her collar was in the way-the part Clint had nosed, of course, and how had he even pulled that off? One of her hands would've been able to adjust it back, but now Steve had a grip on both her hands, and by the time she wiggled them free, the chances of him surviving would drop too low to risk them both dying here.
And on the slippery stone, she couldn't stop him either as, with what was left of his draining strength, he pulled them back the final inches to the edge.
Their eyes met for the last time. Hers pleaded. His were unmoved. Maybe more at peace then she had ever seen them be.
"You can't." Her voice didn't even sound like her own anymore. It was a little girl's voice, that of one who had lost all hope. Maybe she had last sounded like this when she and Yelena had arrived back at the Red Room from Cuba. "It's not right."
"Natasha," Steve's voice was already hoarse and weak, but he had to be as determined as ever to get this last-or next to last-task done. "If you thought you needed to be the one to die because of what you've done, because of what they left you as, because I know you've always struggled with that...please, for me, let go of that. Let go. It's all right."
Perhaps Natasha still could've done something, or tried to do something. But the fight bled out of her, then, and she made no countermoves when Steve shoved them apart, sending himself into the abyss.
The remains of Steve Rogers, after over a century of being in the world, albeit asleep for the majority of it, lay dashed on the rocks. In her hand, the traitorous hand that had failed her that day, Natasha Romanov saw the soul stone, and wept.
***
When she materialized back in the hanger, the first thing Nastasha did was look over at Clint. When she saw the relief on his face, the rage erupted.
Next thing she knew, she had him shoved up against the wall. "I would've expected it out of Steve!" she yelled at him. "Yeah, we all knew that no matter what happened, he'd never really be willing to trade any life but his own. But you! You who knew he wouldn't beat me without your help, knew I would be relying on that fact! Would he have even known how to blunt that blade without my catching him...or how to made the ship too hot, just so I'd take the vest off? And I know he never had his hands on anything to shock people before this."
"That was courtesy the Yakuza," Clint informed her, which just made her even angrier. "I can show you the new technology once we're back on the farm."
"And you didn't think maybe we could've all maybe had use for that on the most important mission of our lives?! But then I would've had time to figure out how to the thwart it, wouldn't I have?"
"Exactly," said Clint. "Steve and I agreed beforehand we'd both do what we had to. I'm not sorry, and I never will be."
"I trusted you, Clint!" She was nearly screaming in his face now. "I trusted that you would understand that I couldn't survive at his expense! Or at the very least that you'd respect what you knew I'd want. Why the hell did you have to keep me alive so badly you'd throw away one of the best men to ever live, in return for me?!"
Never in her life had she felt this complete lack of control of her own emotions. She was actually crying. That part she was glad for. She needed Clint to see just how much pain he'd caused her.
Natasha had once thought of the ways she could be broken. She'd recognized a few; noone avoided having any at all. This was one she hadn't seen coming.
Clint must have recognized that. "You might not think you can live with this right now," he started.
"You're not giving me that speech either!" Natasha wanted to punch him, just to shut him up. "I've known what I can and cannot live with since I was fifteen. And yeah, I can live with a hell of a lot of things. Yeah, you can insist I've done worse than this. But you don't get to tell me my own mind after what you just did to me."
"Fine, then." Clint's form sagged, but his voice remained hard and still unrepentant. "But you're going to have to. The world's going to need you-I know we haven't really thought about it too much, because we can't afford to, but you know the sudden return of half the planet's population is not going to make for an easy time. Plus my family's going to need you." And I'm going to need you. He wasn't stupid enough to say that last one out loud, but he couldn't keep her from hearing it anyway.
"Look, Natasha," Bruce tried, gingerly moving closer to them. "It's not impossible that we can bring him back with the others."
Natasha shook her head. "If I'd had any hope of that, it didn't survive actually being in that place. I don't know if trying might not even cause the soul stone to vaporize off the gauntlet."
"But you did get the soul stone?" asked a voice, just a little too casually, and instantly Natasha knew something was wrong.
She grabbed her gun and aimed it at the intruder. What she hadn't figured out yet, she easily read off her reaction to that. "That's not our Nebula."
***
In the hours after the rest of it went down, Natasha heard too many people repeat to her how good a thing it was she'd come back, because in all probability noone else would've identified the Nebula from 2014 until it was too late. Did they not realize she had already thought that herself, and been forced to conclude it was true? That still didn't mean it was going to make her feel any better.
Bucky didn't say that one, when he came and pointedly sat down next to her. Instead, he said, "Steve talked to me once about how much it fucked him up, that he went and lost me and it wasn't him who died. I don't think there's much he wouldn't have done to avoid that happening again." Of all the things anyone said to her then, that maybe came the closest to actually helping.
Once it was established that it would take at least a few days for Yelena to get to New York, there was no question Natasha would be going back to the farm with Clint. Wanda ended up coming with them as well, and Natasha spent the entire trip talking to her. When the girl made clear that she wasn't particularly happy to be alive again, when now none of the people who'd truly loved her still were, Natasha nearly laughed, because she knew what she was supposed to say, but even she wasn't capable of that kind of hypocrisy.
She reminded herself, as they drove up to the house, that for the Bartons, all that had happened so far was that their dad had been briefly gone, and the farm had spontaneously gotten filthy and overgrown, with the house in deep disrepair. Obviously it was her the kids were going to be most excited about seeing.
But when she'd barely stepped out of the car before all three of the children were on her-when had Nathan even gotten this mobile?-screaming "Aunt Nat!", the mix of joy and guilt nearly sliced her heart open. Concealing that from the kids was no problem, of course; she even kept up with their babbling and asked Cooper all the needed questions about his work cleaning out the shed almost entirely by himself-or so he claimed, anyway.
Clint, on the other hand, had kept those sharp eyes on her whenever it hadn't been his turn to drive. Within a couple of minutes, he was gently pulling first Nathan, than Cooper off her, saying gently, "Give her some fresh air, boys, we've been cooped up in the car a long while. Now tell daddy how you've been the last couple of days. Your mother told me the stairs need fixing. Can you tell me a little more about that?"
"Yeah, they've gotten really thin, and we can't go up right now. Although she also says she's worried that if anyone goes up to the second floor, it'll fall down on the first...." Which meant Natasha wouldn't be able to flee upstairs.
They all entered the house with Cooper and Lila now both listing off all the things Natasha could take in on her own within moments, from everywhere the wall paper was peeling to where the power cords looked dangerously frayed. She wanted to go fix it all immediately, and ignore everyone around her.
Laura, of course, knew everything already. She typically did. That would be why when she came in to greet them, she gave her husband a quick kiss hello, then took Natasha's arm and said, "Natasha, could you come look at something in the kitchen?"
When they were safely there, she simply looked at Natasha, and asked, "What can we do?"
"Nothing," said Natasha, and she knew it was too harsh, but it was the only response. "You should try to help Wanda; maybe you can still help her. And I seriously think she might truly need it."
"Maybe, but I want to help you." There was a steel in Laura's voice. "And really, Natasha, do you think this is going to just be me and Clint? What are you going to say when you go back to New York to meet with your sister? Even if you could conceal your current state from someone else who's had your training, it's inevitable one of your friends will alert her to it. Because none of us are going to stop until you at least consider the possibility that the rest of your life is still worth having, and not just as in not dying yet."
The most logical part of Natasha's mind agreed with her. Which meant that before all this, she would have absolutely convinced her. But that wasn't true anymore.
Laura took her hand, brought it to her lips and kissed it. Which made a whole new grief and regret rise to the surface of Natasha's heart, and she found herself taking the other woman into her arms and holding her close, pressing a single kiss near her ear. "I'm sorry," she whispered. "You don't deserve any of this."
"But I'm still stuck with it, aren't I?" Laura pulls back just enough to press the softest of kisses to Natasha's lips. "Please...for all of us, even Clint, however angry I know you are at him...give it all a chance."
She walked out of the kitchen, and Natasha ended up standing there for a few minutes, listening to her tell the kids some story about them looking at the stove, and how Aunt Natasha was doing a couple experiments on it and they shouldn't go into the kitchen for half an hour or so. She was very grateful for that.
***
From the time they had first taken her back to the U.S. with them, Natasha had been concerned about Wanda Maximoff, and what she might eventually end up doing. She'd even expressed her concerns to Steve. He hadn't shut them down, exactly, but his response had always been a firm insistence that Wanda could be good, could be a hero, and they needed to give her the chance.
Watching Wanda do most of the heavy lifting in helping repair things for the Bartons the next few days, Natasha observed enough about her mental state to leave her more alarmed than ever, and also became convinced her powers were getting even stronger than they'd already been. And she also found that remembering Steve's belief in her made her very desperately want to make him right.
When she mentioned she had a few affairs to settle in New Jersey, Natasha offered to take her there, since by then Yelena was getting ready to fly into New York. Also, it was something of a relief to leave the farm. The Barton children had had their fill of her, and she'd tried to be as good as she could to Laura, but she could only give her so much. Clint, on the other hand, she might forgive if she stayed around him much longer, and even if she did eventually forgive him, she wasn't going to do so that easily.
So that was how she found herself driving through Pennsylvania with Wanda in the passenger seat, gathering her thoughts together to make one of the most important speeches of her life. When they turned onto the final highway to Northern New Jersey, she changed her mind and just asked, "Are you ready for this, Wanda? Because I'm not sure you are."
"Does it matter whether I'm ready or not for anything ever again?" Wanda asked, tears already in her voice. "It never has before this, so why should it start now?"
This was a truth that had perhaps crossed Natasha's mind in the past, but being brought so face to face with it like this brought her up short the way very little had in her life, not even what had happened over the past five years, or the past couple of weeks.
It also simultaneously hit her for the first time just how much of herself she had seen in the girl-and how that had negatively affected her view of her the entire time she'd known her.
She still had her quick-thinking mind, though, and thanks to it, she only lost a few seconds to this double epiphany before she had her answer: "Then maybe it's time you insisted on it doing so. Don't think we don't all realize how much the world has taken from you, Wanda, and how little it's given in return. Okay, maybe we dismissed it because a lot of us have lost a lot, or even given it up to be the heroes the world has needed. But then again, surely the world needs its heroes to be functioning properly, to step aside and take care of themselves when they really need to." This was language Steve had learned during his final five years. He'd done others more good with it than himself, another legacy Natasha might be continuing on.
"This is because I'm getting too powerful, isn't it?" Wanda demanded.
"Partly," Natasha admitted. "But I really do want you to be okay as well, Wanda. And either way, I can still be right, and I'm asking seriously, what do you actually need to do right now? Just think about that for a while, all right?" It hurt her heart to hear herself sound so much like Steve right then.
They drove in silence for nearly an hour, before Wanda said, "I do need to go see Vision's remains. I don't think I can accept it otherwise. Maybe the rest of it can wait; I'm not sure. I might not know until after I've done it."
Privately, Natasha had suspicions about General Hayward and whether he had told them the whole truth about the current state of his remains. They'd none of them seen much of them since they had first brought them back from Wakanda, and any number of things could've happened with them. "Do you mind if I go with you, then?"
It was only a few hours after Natasha had called those whom she really hoped were the right people to call and passed on her new and much stronger suspicions about what Hayward was hiding (which she was not telling Wanda about, not until they knew something concrete), that she got the call from Bruce. They now had enough Pym particles to get the stones returned, but with so many people, including Thor, having left the planet, he judged her the best person to get the job done.
He was probably right, so they drove to the place he'd specified, Wanda coming along to see her off. Natasha was glad for that; Yelena's plane hadn't landed yet, and she still didn't want to leave her alone.
"We'll send you to Asgard first," Bruce said as she stepped on the platform they'd built around Mjolnir, "and use enough particles that if you've got your hand on the hammer it'll probably go with you; hopefully the past Thor will miss it and summon it pretty quickly."
Actually, as Natasha knelt down and took hold of it, she had a strange feeling that if she tried, she would pick it up.
She tightened her grip, but kept her arm in place. She knew that was foolish, but to be certain of it would've been more painful than she could take at that moment.
***
She almost got the Aether injected back into Jane and then herself out before Jane could stop her. Rocket had claimed to have gotten in and out unseen, but she must have felt something. Bruce had judged it best he and Thor not see Natasha, and she had arrived about a minute or so after their departure, meaning nearly five passed between Rocket leaving Jane's chamber and Natasha reaching it, enough time for her mind to stew and put her on her guard. And while she tried to do both, she had to prioritize getting the injection done before Jane could react over avoiding her eyes.
So what ended up happening was: she had gotten the injection done, scrambled herself backwards into the room's shadows and nearly slipped out the door when Jane shot an arm forward with a, "Pull free and I'll scream this palace down," and that got Natasha to stop and let her wrist be grabbed. She took a moment to debate forcibly muzzling Jane, because she could probably still do it quickly enough, but then Jane said, "Natasha Romanov," and something in her voice made her feel like that was the wrong course of action here. The two of them were actually going to be introduced to each other in a month or so; best not to have a future friend mad at her going in.
A moment later, Jane said, "You look way different from the news footage. Like you're even more worn to shit. You didn't kill anyone breaking in here, did you?"
"I didn't break in." It was probably best to tell her the truth. There was a good chance she'd eventually figure it out anyway. "I came here directly from the year 2023. I am not here to change history; I am in fact here to maintain it."
"You put that stuff back in me, didn't you?" Jane was apparently not at all skeptical, just angry. "I thought it had just been taken out of me; that was your doing too, wasn't it? You came barging in here and just grabbed it like I was some simple container, to use for who knows what purpose in the future which I'm sure is much more important than I could possibly comprehend, and now you won't even let me be rid of it!?"
"It'll be back out of you and for good before long," Natasha replied; Jane was prudent enough a person to handle knowing that much.
"Well, I'm glad to hear that," called a voice from down the hall-further than human ears could've picked her words up-she should've known Thor had been less than truthful about his enhanced hearing being uniquely his. "Don't worry," Queen Frigga added as she approached. I'm fairly certain I won't be telling anyone." The hint of sorrow in her voice confirmed that she knew.
"Your Majesty." Natasha pulled away from Jane so she could do as proper curtsy as could be done in pants. "Your son has always spoken most highly of you."
"Yes, you are one of his friends, are you not?" As the Queen came over, her gaze went over Natasha, and she could feel herself being looked through; this was the kind of woman even she could only conceal so much from. "I imagine you are suffering from the same griefs as he." Jane opened her mouth, but then shut it at a meaningful look from her.
"That's all better now," Natasha told her, because she ought to know that before she died, and she'd rather Jane not worry about it either. "We fixed it."
But the Queen just continued in that same way, saying, "Then I think you have your own, Lady Natasha."
"I do," said Natasha, and under that gaze, she found herself spilling it: "The truth is I shouldn't be here. Someone else should be; someone who I think even had the ability to lift your son's hammer, though he concealed it. But that person is dead, when I ought to be." Even saying that much in front of Jane was dangerous, of course; there was a good chance she'd realize exactly whom Natasha was talking about.
But behind her, Jane just said, "Sorry, Agent Romanov, but that's idiotic of you."
This got both woman to turn towards her. "Really," she said. "And while I only know what Thor's told me about your history, Agent Romanov, I can guess why you'd rather die instead of the guy in question. And yes, I think I know who you're talking about, and okay, you're the one's who's known him, but from every damn thing I've heard or read about him-and maybe I read way too much about the Avengers after seeing Thor in your company on TV..."
"I've heard that argument before," Natasha cut her off, her voice too loud. "I heard it from no less than his best friend."
"And yet you still think you know better," said Queen Frigga. "Thor has told me a bit about you as well, Lady Natasha."
"Please don't call me that."
"He said that you were the must cunning person he ever met, that you even outwitted Loki. Anyone who can do that certainly must succeed at most of what she tries. It must have been painful, indeed, that this was when you failed."
"It was," Natasha said softly, relieved to voice it. "What does that say..."
"I don't think it says anything about you," said Jane. "Hearing you talk now, and guessing who the other guy was, surely that had to be just how that happened. And she's right; you're being arrogant about this as well."
"Even so," said Natasha, "how I can trust myself again?" And wasn't that a question she only identified when she finally voiced it. "And how can I forgive myself?"
"That, I fear, you will have to discover for yourself," said the Queen.
"From what we've heard of you," added Jane, "you should be able to figure out how to manage anything, right?"
***
Natasha more or less managed to return the next six stones without incident. She was particularly relieved to get out of 1970 without having to get anywhere near Peggy Carter. Even being near Howard Stark would've been difficult.
By the time she left 2014, she had a pretty strong suspicion about whom the guardian of the soul stone might have been. But since she still believed what he'd said about it not mattering, she certainly wasn't going to have anything to do with that either.
Finally, 2012 saw her walking through the wreckage of Manhattan to Greenwich Village, the time stone now alone in her pack. It gave her time to contemplate, Jane and Queen Frigga's words still bouncing about her head. They'd already done a bit of that during the flight to Vormir, but she'd had no helpful thoughts of her own in response so far.
The Ancient One had left the doors to the sanctum open just a crack, and Natasha found her sitting at the bottom of the stairs. "It's you," she said. "I thought it might be."
"You didn't know for sure?" Natasha tried to snark.
"I don't know every last outcome of every last timeline, especially since this story's only starting right here. Although I don't need any mystical powers to think you're not in a good place right now."
"For the record, I'm usually better at concealing that." Even if she already hadn't been in this case.
"I'm sure you are." The Ancient One actually smiled as she rose, and took the time stone when Natasha offered it, putting it away in a small bag. "I'm afraid this is not something I'm terribly good at giving advice on."
Natasha had already figured as much. But standing there, knowing she should probably just leave and not risk the timeline further, she knew that she had something very different to ask this woman, even though she might be better off if the Ancient One refused to answer her.
"I intended to die in the place of Captain America, and failed to," she started, just in case the Ancient One couldn't know that on her own. "Towards the end of this 'story,' so to speak. I know at this point in time Thanos has already begun it, and I don't know if you can see possible outcomes yet, but if you can..." Her mind was screaming at her at the illogic of wanting to know it, and yet she asked, "Were there any where I did die, and we still won?"
"I doubt I'll be able to give you any real numbers for such a thing; it's too early for that, but..." As Natasha watched, the Ancient One closed her eyes, and for a minute or so, she watched her stiffen up and quiver a little. The she said, "There are some, but most of the possibilities involving you winning required you to live. Most of those where you died had you do so in Clint Barton's stead." That actually made sense, Natasha thought. Clint she wouldn't have underestimated.
The knowledge that she could've died, and all still might not have been ruined by the 2014 Nebula going unidentified, sat heavy upon her heart, of course. But somehow, knowing things for certain, and knowing even the most general probabilities involved, made her feel much less lost than she had before. There was a clarity that came when you knew where and when all the doors behind you had closed.
"I can also see a few people you can still help, if that makes you feel better," said Ancient One. "That not a hard one to see, by the way. It's always possible to focus on that."
"Right," Natasha said, her voice now steadier than it had been since Vormir. As advice went, it was pretty basic, but it still helped her greatly to hear someone say it out loud.
***
When she returned to about the time she'd left, she spent a small amount of time enduring Bruce's and Wanda's solicitude. She minded it much less from them than she would've from most people. "You look different," Wanda commented when they were again on the road, which she said nothing to then.
Yelena had landed in New York while they'd been going to meet up with Bruce, and when they got to the hotel they'd agreed to meet in, they found her sitting and waiting for them in the lobby. Her first act was to smirk and ask, "Had to just go and save the world again?" But soon enough, she was giving Natasha just the littlest of hugs, telling her it was good to see her. She didn't even say anything about how tight Natasha's grip was on her.
She did have to be glad she'd lived to see Yelena again. Maybe she wouldn't have been this much, if their reunion had happened earlier than this, but even then she would've been a little.
Natasha had explained Wanda and all her woes to Yelena in her emails, but she still hadn't been sure how her sister would react to her. She kept her eyes anxiously focused on Wanda as Yelena took her in with a, "So you're the big dangerous Wanda Maximoff."
That actually got Wanda to laugh, if weakly. "And you are a dangerous Black Widow."
"Well," Yelena, says, "I'm not quite as famous as either of you. I suppose you'll both insist that's lucky for me, and I know you'd be right to, Wanda."
Natasha recognized the shade thrown at her, which she ignored. "Have you checked in yet?"
"Into a suite big enough to sleep all three of us, no problem. I've got a lot of money right now; I can treat us to dinner somewhere expensive..."
"Please, no," said Wanda. "I hate expensive places, especially American ones."
"You're not going to be much fun, are you?" sighed Yelena. "But come, let's go upstairs."
There were a few questions Natasha already had for her, starting with her current source of income, especially what with her having been dead only a couple of weeks ago. She was hoping it didn't involve whom she thought it probably involved. But she definitely wasn't bringing that up around Wanda.
Instead, when they were in the elevator, Yelena asked Wanda a bit more about her powers, and Natasha paid less attention to her exact description of them than to the tones and expressions of both women as they talked. Yelena had an ability to intimidate people, especially when she talked like this, but Wanda didn't seem affected at all, didn't seem anything but tired. It might have taken Yelena a few minutes to notice this, but as they reached their floor, her tone and stance had subtly changed, looking at Wanda with what she recognized as a certain level of respect, for not quailing.
On the other hand, the suite, when they first entered it, did seem to take her aback for a moment. Natasha had to admit the ritziness of the curtains and bedspread, combined with the clearly expensive furniture and electronics, and also the sheer size of the place, was a little much. But Yelena grinned, and said to her, "I know, but mostly these places go to the people like Stark, who screwed over people like your family. When you get to have it tonight, you should do your best to enjoy it."
"That is a point," Wanda conceded, still sounding wary, as Natasha slipped into the bathroom, suddenly very aware of how much she currently needed a shower.
The bathroom was ritzy in the decor as well, but at least the shower was a good one. Nothing like what Stark's properties typically had, but plenty of hot water hard on her skin, which was something that still soothed her a little. She especially felt the dust from Vormir flake off her for the second time. That, at least, she should be rid of for good, now.
She came out to find Wanda asleep, laid out across the bed, still in her socks. Over by the window, Yelena beckoned.
Dusk was falling on Manhattan, but much of the daylight still remained. They were up high enough that with the sky clear for the first time in five years, they could see most of its southern half, maybe even the Hudson if they squinted. It was a view not unlike the ones she'd once had from Avengers Tower, and back then it hadn't impressed her too much. Now, however...
"It's beautiful," Yelena said. "We never got the chance to appreciate that very much. Let's appreciate it, now."
"I'll try," Natasha said, her voice breaking only a little. She meant it, too, more than she'd even thought she would. "I'll try so hard."