September 2012

Natasha's P.O.V.

She knocked on the door to Percy's apartment. Unfortunately, her house had been demolished two weeks ago in the Battle of New York. So now, she needed a place to stay. Percy opened the door, slightly surprised to see her.

"Hey, Tash! Come on in!" he said, ushering her through the door. She walked through, and dropped the backpack she was carrying on the couch, collapsing next to it.

"So, what brings you here? I haven't seen you since the Chitauri Invasion." Percy commented.

"My house was destroyed during the invasion, but I was hanging out with Clint at his place, so I didn't notice until now. I was wondering whether I could crash here for a while." she replied. Percy grinned.

"I've got a better place. Let's go!" He held a hand out to her, and she took it, grabbing her backpack just before they dissolved into mist. They reformed in a place with tons of weapons.

"Welcome to Bunker 5, Ares's base. Nobody knows about this place except for me. I've got a room in Bunker 3, Poseidon's base. I located all 12 Olympian bases in the months after Stark's party, barring Bunker 9, which the demigods already know about. This place be all yours until I let the demigods know about it. I found my tac suit in Bunker 3, and my katar in this bunker. Maybe you can find something for yourself as well." Percy explained. He handed her a map of the surrounding forest.

"The different bunkers are shown on this map. I've only fully explored Bunker 3, and I've taken a look at Bunker 5 and 6, but I haven't really searched the other bunkers. If you go to Bunker 6, you can access that database I gave you." he continued. Natasha blinked. Percy continued to surprise her. She had been expecting to crash in a guest room or couch, and ended up with her own bunker, with weapons literally lining the walls. She started walking around the bunker. Natasha felt a cold draft, and looked for the source. Her search led her to what seemed to be a blank wall. She brought out her spider robot, which she had decided to name Zvezda, a word for spider in Russian. Natasha set Zvezda on the floor, and directed her to search the wall for any way to open it. Zvezda whirred happily, and skittered up the cement, scanning it thoroughly. After a couple of minutes, Zvezda mentally sent her a picture of a small, square shaped crack in the wall. Natasha went over to the crack. She pushed it, causing a keypad to pop up. Percy watched her as she pulled out her SHIELD phone, and opened up an app that would allow her to check which buttons were pressed most often.

"I'll need to get Leo to build those monster proof phones." he muttered to himself. Her phone pinged, displaying the number 0512. She pushed the keys, and stepped back as a section of the wall lifted up. Walking through, she noticed a box labeled Project: Rebirth. Her breath caught. She opened the box carefully, finding notes on how the super serum was made, how it worked, and all of the demigods' research on attempts to recreate it. Three names caught her eye: Natasha Alianovna Romanoff, Robert Bruce Banner, and James Buchanan Barnes. She narrowed her eyes. Natasha had no idea that she had been enhanced. Sure, she healed faster than most people even before becoming a demigod, but she hadn't ever noticed anything strange otherwise that she couldn't put down to her training. Unless, of course, the training was only effective due to the serum. She decided to think on that later.

The next name, Banner's, hadn't surprised her. She was already aware of that, as it was in Bruce's files, but she hadn't known everything about the incident. According to the demigods' notes, he had been saving a teenager named Rick Jones who had wandered into the area when he was experimenting. Apparently, he had never meant to test it on himself, but had gotten caught in the explosion that had occured when he had abandoned his experiments to help Rick. She found some interesting information, though. The serum had been perfect. Bruce had gotten it right. The problem was that, in the words of Dr. Erskine, the serum amplifies everything that is inside, so good becomes great; bad becomes worse. That meant...

Natasha's eyes widened slightly at the implications. Somehow, before the serum, a part of Bruce Banner had been angry and scared. That part had wanted to protect himself from someone, wished that he could stand up to those who threatened him. That part of him wanted to be strong enough to fight for what he wanted. The serum magnified that part of him. It combined his wishes and formed a whole new persona. An angry, unstoppable, extremely strong persona, who only wanted to defend himself from the rest of the world. One who was pessimistic, and couldn't see the light at the end of the tunnel. Who didn't trust the world, and never found the silver lining in the clouds. The uncontained gamma radiation was what turned Bruce green. Natasha suddenly understood the Hulk a lot better. Something still bugged her, though. If the serum worked, then Bruce himself should have gotten enhanced as well. Natasha decided that she wanted to get to know Bruce. Perhaps it was the spy in her, but she was curious about the man behind the monster. And there was something else interesting about him, something that had caught her attention after their first meeting, and she intended to find out what it was.

The last name was rather unexpected. Natasha knew that Bucky Barnes had been captured during the war, and Steve had rescued him. She had not known that he had been experimented on. Bucky had died, though. Falling from a train going over the mountains would have definitely killed him. "Steve's able to drop from ridiculous heights. What if Bucky survived?" she thought. But if he had, wouldn't he have rejoined Steve at some point? A red star on a glinting metal arm flashed through her mind. And then, a scene played through her head, one that she had not remembered until now.

"You are the one they call the Winter Soldier." A fifteen year old Natalia said in Russian to a masked figure with a metal arm.

"Yes." he replied. Natalia noted that he had a strange accent. She later found that it was American.

"And you are going to train me?" she questioned. Cold eyes softened, and locked on her own.

"You are the best in the program. You will receive special training." he said simply. Natalia nodded.

"What will I call you?" she asked. The Winter Soldier looked at her.

"Just Winter will do." he responded. Natalia looked at him, slightly confused.

"Do you not have a name?" she queried. The Soldier looked rather perplexed.

"A name? I am the Winter Soldier. That is my past, present, and future." he said, nodding firmly to himself, but his tone was uncertain, as if he questioned his own words.

Natasha blinked, pulling herself from the memory. She hadn't known that the Winter Soldier had trained her. The Red Room had probably brainwashed her and wiped those memories. She supposed that something had triggered the memory, causing it to somehow come to the surface.

"Maybe, the Winter Soldier was brainwashed, too. And maybe he was Bucky Barnes. Or maybe he wasn't. I don't have enough information." she thought, slightly frustrated. She decided to worry about it later. She put the files down, and started moving further into the secret room.

In the middle of the room, there were several interesting things. There was a pair of small, plastic devices which could apparently be swallowed, allowing the users to mentally communicate from anywhere. There were also clear contacts that could scan people for weapons, outlining all of their weapons in white and identifying them. They were activated by a mental command. A pair of guns which could be linked to a piece of jewelry sat in a corner. On a shelf were a pair of boots which wouldn't make a sound no matter what, and that could be mentally transformed into other types of shoes. They apparently allowed the wearer to jump higher than normal as well. Natasha found all of this tech useful, and strangely convenient. Almost too convenient. Perhaps the gods were helping them out. She handed Percy one of the mental comms, swallowed the other, grabbed the guns and stowed them away to link to something later, popped in a pair of the contacts, and pulled on the boots, imagining them as black rubber shoes with red streaks.  Percy applied a pair of clear contacts to himself as well.

"Is this thing even working?"  she thought, directing her thought towards Percy.

"Apparently." His voice rang out in her mind, loud and clear. He hadn't moved his lips.

"Can you activate your suit? I want to test out these contacts." she said mentally. Percy complied, and several parts of his body immediately lit up.

"Looks like they works pretty well." she remarked.

"Yep. Hey, so that's where you hide that gun." Percy exclaimed. She mock glared at him.

"Don't ever tell anybody, okay?" she said out loud. Percy gave her a thumbs up and his signature crooked smile. She grinned.

November 2012

Two months later, she decided to visit the newly renamed Avengers Tower. She needed to upgrade her cuffs and shock disks, and Stark had said he would be willing to upgrade any technology the Avengers might need improved. Her last set of cuffs short circuited right as she went to use them, and she had narrowly avoided getting her head slammed into a cement wall shortly afterwards. 

She didn't feel like going through the front door, so she decided to test the tower security. She went to the Empire State Building and went up to an empty floor near the top. Because of her demigod status, the security guard let her go to any floor she wanted. First, she hacked into Stark's tower system, and made it so she could overide Jarvis at anytime she wanted, having even more control of the AI than Tony. Then, she opened a window facing Stark Tower, two blocks away. Then, she aimed the launcher at a slight angle downwards and shot the grappling hook. The hook was designed to go straight forward until it hit something. It would never bend, and it would extend infinitely. And she could cut off the end, and tie it to things. A new hook would magically appear in the launcher. Natasha really loved demigod tech.

She tied the end of the line to an extremely heavy metal desk, and walked over to her new zip line. She pulled on a pair of gloves, and grabbed on to the cable. She slid down until she was on the side of Avengers Tower, next to a window. She ran the knife Percy had given her through the bottom, easily cutting through the metal and breaking the latch. She opened the window and stepped inside.

"Jarvis, do not tell anyone that I am here. Do not alert security, either. If Tony asks you why you didn't tell him I was here, do not reply." she called out immediately.

"Certainly, Ms. Romanoff." came the cool reply.

She turned back to her zip line, and pulled out a lighter. She set fire to the cable, which burned quickly, and was completely gone in seconds. Natasha realized that she had left the window of the Empire State Building open. She shrugged mentally, not really caring. She walked through the halls of Avengers Tower, riding the elevator down to the labs. She found both Bruce and Tony there, both staring at a screen, trying to figure something out. Bruce was facing her, and Tony was facing away. She smiled internally. It was a perfect setup. She didn't want to startle Bruce, so she approached slowly, the movement catching his eye, and causing him to glance up. He looked surprised to see her. She put a finger up to her lips, and he moved his head in an almost imperceptible nod. She crept up closer to Tony, and spoke.

"I need these upgraded." she said loudly. As she expected, Tony startled very badly. But she had not expected him to whip around, pick her up, and throw her. She flew towards Bruce, who looked as bemused as she felt. She had been preparing to dodge a punch, not to avoid being tossed like a ball towards a scientist with an angry alter ego. Bruce, to her surprise, caught her instead of stepping out of the way. Everybody went still. Natasha sat in Bruce's arms bridal style while Tony stared, stupefied. Bruce was focused on her, eyes wide. Natasha looked between the two geniuses.

"Well, this is awkward." she quipped. Nobody responded. The two men stayed frozen. A couple minutes passed. She mentally face palmed.

"Can I get down now?" Natasha asked Bruce, and her words seemed to break him out of his stupor. He set her on the floor, and she turned to Tony.

"Hey, Stark? Anybody home?" she pressed. Tony blinked.

"Huh? Okay, uh, what did you want? And how did you even get in here?" he said, rather confused at the events of the last couple minutes. She held out her cuffs and shock disks.

"Please upgrade these so they don't break and get me killed while on missions. And it wasn't hard. Why do your windows open on the top floors anyways?" she replied, tacking on a question at the end. Tony blinked again, taking the weapons.

"How does that even- you know what? I'm not even going to bother." He turned and set the electroshock devices down.

"I'll need a couple of weeks or so to tinker. Why don't you stick around in the tower? I'll constantly want your opinion on things, so you should probably stay here, Ms. Rushman." Natasha pressed her lips together.

"Fine." she responded.

"Excellent. Your floor is the 13th one. Yes, this tower has a 13th floor. I don't believe much in superstition." He clapped his hands together.

"I have a floor? And I need to get my stuff." she said, but Tony ignored her.

"Jarvis? Send Natasha up- " He frowned.

"Hold on. Why didn't Jarvis detect you and tell me that you were in my tower? Jarvis, why didn't you alert me to Natasha's presence?" he asked the AI. There was no response. He sighed.

"Okay, then. Jarvis, send her up to her floor." The elevator doors opened, and she got in. Bruce, who had been completely silent for the past five minutes, caught her eye. He looked rather awkward. She smiled reassuringly, and gave him a tiny wave, a flutter of her fingers. This seemed to shock him, and the last thing Natasha saw of the scientist before the doors closed were a pair of wide brown eyes.