Inventions, Allies, and Postcards
“Please! I’m sorry man! I don’t know nothin’ about that girl! Don’t kill me! Please!”
The pleading was getting annoying. Animals like the one on the ground beneath him were always sorry once they were the ones under the boot. In this case literally. It’d been two days since he took the kid in, and he was no closer to finding out who tried to nab her. He’d been working his way through a Brooklyn based gang primarily known for drugs, but with a reputation of dabbling in human trafficking. The past two days led to the asshole whimpering below him. One of the top lieutenants for the gang, the man had tried to flee Brooklyn when he realized that the Punisher was after him. He didn’t get very far.
Frank caught up with him in Chinatown, just over the bridge, and things wrapped up quickly from there. A quick chase up a fire escape and a bullet to the knee led to where they are now, the end of an interrogation, and yet another denial of information.
“Don’t bullshit me!” Frank ordered, pressing the barrel of his rifle to the man’s cheek, causing him to whimper again in fear. “You’re one of the top dogs right!? Even if your boys weren’t responsible, you would have an idea who was operating in your territory!” He pressed his boot harder into the man’s chest.
“We don’t kidnap people man!” The crook protested, until Frank’s gun pressed even harder against his face.
“What did I just fucking say!” Frank barked, raising his boot up just enough to stop down on the guy’s ribs, one of them cracking from the force of the impact.
The man screamed. “I’m not lying man! Oh god! We don’t grab the people! We only move them! Someone wants a person moved, they come to us and we get it done! We didn’t have anything to do with that girl! Nobody even approached us to move her for them!” The gang banger cried again, hands wrapping around Frank’s boot in an attempt to alleviate the pressure from his ribs, to no avail.
“He’s telling the truth, Frank.” A stern voice sounded from behind, the newcomer’s boots making little noise on the rooftop.
Frank groaned. “What the fuck are you doing here Red? This ain’t your territory.” He spat, turning to face the Devil of Hell’s Kitchen.
Daredevil stood just out of arm’s reach, his arms crossed against his chest as the sanctimonious bastard gave Frank one of his signature looks of disdain. It almost made Frank want to shoot him in the head again, but he resisted the urge. Instead he shot back a look of his own, before grounding his boot into the already damaged ribs beneath him. The cries of pain made Daredevil flinch slightly, though it could have been the fact that Red could hear the bones grinding better than anyone present. Frank didn’t really care which.
“I heard the screams and followed them. You’re close enough to the Kitchen for me to take notice.” Red explained, still staring Frank down, or at least as much as a blind man can stare someone down. Frank still wasn’t completely over that particular discovery.
“So what Red? You gonna try and stop me again? Is that it?” He retorted with a scoff.
“He’s telling you the truth.” Daredevil repeated. “Let me turn him in. He doesn’t have to die.”
He rolled his eyes. It was always the same with Red. “He just admitted to human trafficking Red! You really think he deserves to live? He’ll just make some other kid disappear again as soon as he gets out!”
“He deserves the chance to change!”
They were going down a dangerous road. They always tried to avoid each other unless they directly asked for help under the terms of their arrangement, as it would always lead to this same argument, over and over again. It wasn’t worth it tonight. Not when he had a kid who needed his help.
“You better give me something good, otherwise I’m not turning you over to Red here.” Frank threatened, turning back to the criminal who had been looking between the two vigilantes as they argued. Red huffed, but Frank ignored him.
“Alright! Alright! We operate out of an old cannery near the Brooklyn docks! We move all our product through there! Please God don’t kill me!” The man announced desperately.
Frank gave a glance towards Daredevil, who only nodded in confirmation. He took his boot off the man, and lifted him to his feet, the movement causing the man to cry in pain as his ribs ground together and he put weight on his destroyed knee. “Looks like you get to live another day.” Frank ground out, pushing the man over to Red. “If I see your face again you are dead! You hear me!?”
“Y-yes. I got it!”
“Good. Seeya around Red.” Frank turned to leave.
“Frank! Wait!” Daredevil called after him, causing him to stop and turn, an inquisitive look crossing his face.
“What now Red?”
“If you need any help finding the kid, I can help.” Daredevil offered kindly.
“I don’t.” He replied simply, refusing to go further in case he might accidentally let something slip, or have Red know he’s lying. He doesn’t want Red anywhere near the girl. Based on his luck, the man would figure out the girl was enhanced and grow attached. Even amongst the other vigilantes of the city, Red was the only one who had the incredibly enhanced senses as far as Frank knew, and he didn’t want the Devil to grow attached. Girl already has too much on her plate to add a helicopter vigilante.
Making his way back down to street level, Frank spent a few minutes walking through the city, having to make his way back to where he parked his van. It was amazing how, just by zipping up his coat to cover the bulletproof vest and skull, people didn’t seem to notice one of the most wanted men in New York walking right beside them. It helped that he hid his short-barreled rifle within the confines of the trench coat as well. As he walked he made sure to stay close to the buildings, ready to duck into an alley if the need ever arose.
Eventually Frank made it back to his van unhindered, hopping into the driver’s seat and starting the engine. He merged with the nighttime traffic, listening to the police scanner that he installed in place of a normal radio. Overall it seemed to be a slow night for the city, with the worst calls coming through being reports of muggings. Frank knew it wouldn’t last. As soon as he reached the docks, the scanner would be lighting up with reports of shots fired and the police would come scrambling to the slaughterhouse that the old cannery would become. Though before that happened, he figured he would make good on his promise to call David, hopefully it wasn’t too late for the man to still be awake.
Pulling out his phone, Frank quickly scrolled down the few contacts he had, before hitting ‘call’ on David’s number. With each ring, Frank realized that a part of him hoped David didn’t pick up. Last thing he wanted to do was drag the man into another one of his wars. But this was the only way he could think of to help Payton get home, and David was far more tolerable than Red was. Just as Frank thought he was able to get sent to voicemail, the rings stopped, and his ear was assaulted with the sounds of a party raging on the other end of the line.
“Pete?” David’s voice sounded disbelieving, and his choice of name let Frank know there were wandering ears nearby.
“Is this a bad time?”
“No, no. Just - uh - give me a second here.” Muffled conversation came through the phone, and slowly the commotion faded away, finalized by the sound of a door shutting. “Sorry about that Frank. Took Zach to a friend’s birthday party.”
“I can call back later…”
“It's fine, I needed a breather anyway. What’s going on Frank, I haven’t heard from you since you rejected the invite to Sarah’s birthday.” David asked him, curiosity mixed with concern lacing his words.
Frank sighed, biting the bullet. “I need your help.”
There was a pregnant pause; “With what?” came the cautious response. “I told you after the Rawlins and Russo fiasco that I wouldn’t help you with your war on crime.” David continued.
“It’s not for me.” Frank was quick to clarify. “Did you see the news yesterday? About the kidnapping in Queens?”
“Yessss?” David sounded unsure of himself for a moment, before he coughed “It was that young girl right? Paige? Penny? Something along those lines. I just heard something about it on the radio while driving to work. Why? Are you looking into it, cause I have to say Frank, you should just leave finding her to the police or FBI or whoever is looking into it.” His old partner rambled, reminding Frank of some of his least favorite things about working with David.
“I’m not looking for her.”
“Oh good cause-”
“I’ve got her with me.”
The two of them had cut each other off a few times, but his revelation had David silent, though he could swear that he heard the man mutter a curse under his breath. The silence hung in the call for a few moments as David seemed to be working up to the inevitable rant that Frank just knew was coming his way.
“Why the fuck do you have her with you? Jesus Frank! Just take her to the police and let them do their jobs !” David’s frustrated voice berated him, loud enough that Frank pulled the phone away from his ear until it died down.
“I tried that when I rescued her Monday night.” He admitted, something he hadn’t even told the girl yet. “Turns out whoever is after her has got enough resources to buy some cops. Overheard one of the crooked ones talking about how they would be keeping an eye out for her, and would have somebody watching her Aunt in the hospital. If I give her to the authorities right now I would be handing her to them on a silver platter.”
He had kept that information from Payton, making up some story about an acquaintance in the hospital. He didn’t even know which hospital the kid’s Aunt had been brought to. He figured it would be easier to just have her think he had friendly sources, rather than be told that the people she’d probably been told to go to if she needed help were already infiltrated by the people trying to kidnap her.
“Just tell the FBI that Frank! They’ll put her and her Aunt into protective custody. You are one man Frank! If they find out that you have her, if they don’t know already, all they have to do is follow you, and they get her.”
Frank sighed. “They sent some masked freak after her. A merc of some kind who would wipe the fucking floor with any FBI agent. In their hands I bet those fuckers would find her within a few hours. With me they haven’t gotten her in two days so far. Maybe I’m working on borrowed time, but that’s why I need your help. I’ve exhausted the leads that I could follow, now I need your skills to look into the rest.” He explained calmly.
More silence followed, and Frank could see David pacing and running his hand through his hair in his mind’s eye. “Tell me everything you know about this merc and what’s been going on the past few days. I’ll see what I can scrounge up tomorrow at work and stop by base in the afternoon. If something comes up that points to some bigger conspiracy, I’ll help. If not… just take her to the police.” His friend gave in over the phone, sounding resigned.
He spent the next ten minutes of the drive catching David up to speed on recent events, starting with his hearing the reports about a chase on the scanner, to leaving the girl just a few hours ago. Though she probably hadn’t even noticed he left, eyes stuck in her notebook as they were, her little station covered in beakers, wires, and random scrap that she picked up from around the place. Finally he ended with the description of the unknown mercenary, using what little he had personally seen, as well as the testimony he had gotten out of Payton earlier that day.
“So, blue and orange armor, and a white skull helmet?” David clarified, a strange something to his words that Frank couldn’t put a name to.
“That’s right. You know ‘em?” He confirmed.
“I recognize the description. I’ll know more tomorrow.” On the other end of the phone, a door opened and the sounds of the party leaked over the call again, only slightly covered by a muffled conversation. “I’ve got to go Pete. I’ll see you at work tomorrow.”
David hung up.
Alone once again, Frank took the rest of the drive in silence, finding a small alleyway to park in once he neared the docks. He knew the general location of the old cannery, and had heard whispers of it being used for… less legal pursuits, though other things had always popped up before he could investigate. That was no longer the case. Rearming himself with an assortment of weapons, Frank was once again ready to fight. He stalked through the narrow alleyways that twisted through the city, growing ever closer to his goal. Soon enough, the cannery was ahead of him, a single guard posted out by one of the doors, pretending to be some random smoker.
The Punisher knew better. He could see the barrel of sub machine gun poking out from beneath the man’s coat as he shivered in the brisk October air. It would be too easy. The man was more focused on his cigarette than his surroundings. Only thing he had to avoid was creating a loud enough noise to alert anyone inside. Reaching behind his head, he pulled his hood up to hide his features, hunching over to give himself an enfeebled appearance, and began limping towards the sentry. One hand wrapped around the hilt of his knife as he approached, the man not even noticing him until he spoke.
“E-excuse me. Could you s-spare a-a dollar for an old veteran?” He groveled, limping towards the crook, who swore under his breath.
“Fuck off old timer!” The guard threatened, but he hadn’t drawn his weapon, thinking the threat in his tone would be enough.
He kept walking, getting closer and closer.
“I’m fuckin’ warning ya! Get the fuck outta here!” The man threw his cigarette to the ground, one hand reaching into his coat. It was too late.
Snapping out of his ruse, the Punisher took the final few steps and drove his knife straight into the guard’s chest, sliding easily between the ribs as one hand covered the man’s mouth preventing any screams from escaping. As the man began to collapse, the light fading from his eyes, his eyes cast down to the skull adorned on Frank’s chest. The symbol of the Punisher, the last thing he ever saw.
Stepping past him, Frank slowly opened the doors to the cannery, slipping inside and closing the door ever so slowly to prevent it from making noise. Deeper into the building, he heard the sounds of laughter, cards shuffling, and bottles being opened. It seemed the people here were hosting a game night. Frank slipped quietly through the hallways before coming across the old lunchroom for the cannery. Within were around a dozen guys, none armed as their weapons were scattered across the tables as some of them played poker. The other ones were unloading an assortment of drugs from a crate that must have been delivered somewhat recently.
Frank watched for a moment before raising his rifle, lining the sights up against the first man’s head.
“One Batch” He breathed in.
“Two Batch” He released half of a breath.
“Penny and Dime.” He squeezed the trigger, and the bloodbath began.
When Mister Castle finally returned, once again smelling of blood, Payton was in an awkward situation. She’d been working on her so-called ‘artificial spinnerets’ throughout the whole day, only taking breaks to eat when the hunger grew too painful to ignore. She hadn’t honestly anticipated hunger being a major downside to her new powers, but over the past couple days she has begun to realize that she needs far more calories than before to function, which was going to make things a bit difficult. Anyway, food wasn’t really her problem right now , as she was currently struggling to clean up a bit of a web-explosion that was the result of her first attempt at actually creating the spinnerets not turning out exactly as she had hoped. Now there were a bunch of strands of the ‘webs’ covering the armory, sticking weapons to the walls, and just overall making a nuisance of themselves. Which was the last thing she wanted when she could hear the Punisher’s van nearing the building. She hadn’t even cleaned up half the mess yet!
On the other hand; despite the mess she made, she at least got to see that her idea had merit. It was incredibly annoying trying to clean up the webs, the adhesive qualities of them stronger than she had anticipated. So long as the people hunting her didn’t have super strength, Payton didn’t see them getting out of the webs. But that still required her to make a dispenser system that actually worked, and her current model of spinneret clearly wasn’t up to snuff.
Payton had managed to use her strength to free a few more of Castle’s weapons from the webs before the man himself drove back into the room, giving her an incredulous look. She figured that she probably looked like a kid who got caught taking from the cookie jar right now.
“Uh, so I know it looks bad. But it could be so much worse?” She tried to explain, though that only led to a scoff.
“What the hell happened?”
“Well uh, you know how I was tinkering a bit before you left earlier? Yeah, well, I tried building something that could act as a dispersal unit for an adhesive I made. I’m calling it web fluid, cause ya know? Spider bite and all. Having a theme is cool.” She started to ramble, before a glare from Castle drew her back to the question. “ Anyway , my first model had a bit of a structural failure. The little canister I used to hold the fluid was a bit over-pressurized, and when I did the first test the nozzle popped off and everything just kind of… exploded.”
“Well, keep cleaning this shit up. And get some sleep kid, you’ve got bags under your eyes.” He told her, before stomping off towards the showers that he somehow got to work in this place.
Sighing, Payton turned back to the mess and began tearing webs off the walls and ceiling again, balling them up and throwing them into a big pile in a corner. If her chemistry was correct the webs should dissolve within a few hours, but well, the spinneret should have worked as well and look at where that got her.
It took her another half hour to clean up the remaining webs, the pile in the corner having reached an impressive size for the amount of fluid she had put into the capsule. It was at least a testament to how compressed the fluid could get, and how much use she could get out of a single one, once the spinneret worked that is.
Castle rejoined her shortly after, passing a few plastic bags to her as he began to remove the weapons from the van, finally able to do so now that the armory was free again. Inside the bag were an assortment of clothes, as well as some basic necessities. Toothbrush, toothpaste, shampoo, and more.
“Went shopping?” She asked, somewhat touched that he cared enough to do so.
“You smell like shit kid. Go shower then go to bed.” Castle told her, focusing more on cleaning his rifle than her.
“Thanks. Really know how to raise a girl’s spirit.” She snorted, turning to walk to the showers with the shampoo and the towel she found at the bottom of one of the bags. The showers were nice, even if the hottest they could get was lukewarm. She was still clean now, and turns out being clean does wonders for a person’s mood. Drying off and putting on a pair of clothes that she hadn’t been wearing for two days straight, Payton rejoined Castle in the main living area of his fortress. The man himself was sitting at the table, an MRE in hand and another one sitting in the chair across from him. He gestured for her to sit without looking so much in her direction.
They ate quietly, which was nothing special really. Castle’s chosen profession had him living weird hours, and so he slept during most of the day, and those times he was awake he usually kept to himself, only speaking to her if he saw her changing up whatever she was doing, or telling her to ‘get over here and eat’. It was a stark contrast to what life had been like for her up until a few days ago, where May and Ben were always talking. About their days, things they saw, asking her how school was, or what she was reading. There was always noise back home, and here there isn’t that much, just the scuffing of shoes on concrete, and her scratching pencil when she was over in her claimed corner.
Castle was the one to break the silence. “Micro will be stopping by tomorrow evening. He said he recognized the description you gave of the guy who chased you and that he would look into it.”
“So you found nothing?” Payton mumbled, idly poking at the remaining food in the MRE.
“Yeah. The last trail I had was a dead-end.”
Payton raised her eyes toward Castle's. “And what if this Micro guy can’t find anything? They’ve had two days now to cover their tracks.”
“If something is out there, he will find it.” Castle stated firmly. She appreciated the trust he had in this guy, but she couldn’t help but notice his phrasing; ‘If something is out there’. It didn’t really alleviate her fears that two days was more than long enough for the bad guys to cover their tracks.
Instead of voicing those concerns however, she just nodded and left the table to carry on with her night. Not that there was much of it left. Her neck and eyes were sore from being hunched over and working with small wires and other tech all day so she didn’t feel like getting back to work. She was also super tired, and was only fighting sleep in hopes of avoiding another nightmare, but with the way things were going, she would be losing the fight here relatively soon. So, instead of finding something to waste her time and keep her awake, she decided to face the music. Taking a few minutes to brush her teeth, Payton finished getting ready for bed. She was asleep before her head finished hitting the pillow.
Surprisingly, she had a dreamless night; waking up refreshed after having slept in far longer than she normally did. In a further surprise, Castle was already up as well, sitting over next to his armory and doing well, something, with the guns. Payton didn’t know enough about guns to really understand what more he had to do after he was done cleaning them the previous night.
Both of them mostly ignored each other during the day, each absorbed in their own tasks. Castle with his weapons and explosives, and Payton with her prototype spinnerets. After the massive failure of version one, she had a general idea of where exactly she had gone wrong, and was working to fix the issue, though she was being far more careful this time around. Before Payton knew it, Castle was receiving a call and informing her that Micro would be there in a few minutes. Maybe Micro would be more talkative than her current roommate was?
The rumbling of a car, as per usual with her sensitive ears, was the first sign that something was entering their little hideaway. But rather than another militarized black van, a small brown sedan rolled through the tunnel, pulling in to park behind the aforementioned van. The person who stepped out of the car did not look anything like she would have imagined a friend of Frank Castle’s to look. Wearing a button-up shirt, jeans, and carrying a leather briefcase, the guy, Micro, wouldn’t have looked out of place sitting behind a teacher’s desk at Midtown. He seemed way too domestic to have once worked alongside the Punisher of all people.
As she watched, Micro quickly greeted Castle before turning to her. “You must be Payton. My name’s David Lieberman.” He greeted her with a polite smile, reaching his hand out towards her.
Taking his hand, she smiled back. “Nice to meet you, Mister Lieberman. Mister Castle said you are here to help?”
“You as well, Payton, wish it was under better circumstances though.” He replied, his smile turning somewhat sour, which she more than understood.
“What’ve you got David?” Castle interjected, proving once again that he isn’t much of one for small talk.
Mister Lieberman nodded, and turned away from her, walking towards the computers as he spoke. “Well you were right about something big going on Frank. That gang you were hunting? They didn’t have the standing, much less the money, necessary to hire the guy who is after Payton.”
“Big player?” Castle asked as he walked next to her, both of them following Micro as he got into his chair and began turning the computers on.
“That’s an understatement.” Lieberman scoffed before turning to face her directly. “Frank told me you are enhanced, which is lucky, as that’s probably the only reason you got away from the guy, and even then it's a damn miracle.
“It was close.” She openly admitted with a shrug. “One of my enhancements is a danger sense, which when paired with the fact that I’m just really fast now, meant I was dodging his attempts to knock me down fairly easily. If he got close enough to reach me…” She trailed off with a shudder.
“Danger sense? That’s new to me.” Lieberman noted, turning back to his computers to begin pulling up surveillance cameras, and a dozen other programs that Payton struggled to keep track of. This computer stuff was far more Ned’s forte than hers.
“You familiar with enhancements now David?” Castle questioned.
“I got transferred to a different department shortly after the destruction of Sokovia. Instead of terrorist analytics, I’m now working on a team dedicated to taking note and categorizing the potential threat of enhanced individuals. Mutant, mutate, tech-based. Doesn’t matter, information about them comes through us.” David answered, taking a flash drive out of a pouch in his briefcase and inserting it into the USB port of one of the computers.
“The government's tracking enhanced now?” She piped up, more than a little concerned about the idea.
“If it is, I’m not aware of it, but I wouldn’t be surprised. My team just analyzes footage of enhanced activities to get a sense of the power levels that are more common. Enhanced strength is by far the most common that we’ve seen. You are the first I’ve heard of with an actual physical sense for danger though.” He explained.
“Alright, so is this leading you to telling us that the asshole hunting the kid is enhanced?”
Payton watched as on one of the monitors an image popped up, clearly of the man who shot her Aunt and Uncle, and chased her through half of Queens. It was somewhat grainy, coming from an old CCTV camera, but she recognized him. “That’s him!” She couldn’t help but blurt out.
“We think he’s enhanced. We don’t have confirmation one way or the other, but the way he fights is far beyond what any normal person could do.” David answered for Castle. “He is only known by the alias ‘Taskmaster’. Exceptionally skilled mercenary and assassin. The price to hire him is incredibly steep, with the lowest he ever goes still being in the six-figure range. And he only accepts jobs from people with the power to go along with the cash, we believe it's an ego thing.”
Payton openly gaped at the information, while Castle let out a low whistle.
“So it could be Oscorp…” She mused quietly, though it was loud enough that David turned towards her.
“ Oscorp?! What the hell would you have done to piss them off?”
Realizing that Castle hadn’t told David everything, Payton quickly caught the newcomer to their group up on how exactly she got her powers, and the theories that Castle had the first morning after everything went down. Throughout the explanation, Micro went between openly listening, and turning back to his computers to type things down.
“Right so Norman Osborn certainly has the capital and the standing to hire Taskmaster, so that’s the best place to start looking. Moving that much money always leaves a trail, and two days isn’t enough time to cover up such a transfer. Especially if it went international.”
Something almost akin to hope started to bloom in her chest. Between Frank and David’s abilities, and her own invention that should be great for self-defense, they might actually be able to pull this off. If only she was able to help out more, rather than just sit around and tinker all day. But that would come later, after the spinnerets were complete.
Castle and David kept talking and making plans, but everything they were saying was soon going over her head and she left them to keep working on her prototypes. The next few hours had the place more lively than it had been over the last days, with David’s presence making far more noise, both with him talking to both Castle and her, as well as the fact that he liked to play music while he worked. It was far better than the oppressive silence she had been dealing with recently.
At one point, Castle had left and returned shortly thereafter with actual food again, rather than MREs, but beyond that quick meal, Payton stayed focused on her work, putting together version 2.0. As she put the finishing touches on the device, David walked over and sat down next to her on the bench.
“So, these are those little… web shooter things that Frank mentioned earlier.” He commented, staring down at the device with interest. She hadn’t actually heard Castle talk about them, but she had been a bit distracted. But what he called them caught her attention.
“Dude. Web shooters is a much better name for them! I’d been calling them artificial spinnerets. Ha. Web shooters. Nice ” She replied joyfully, looking back down at her invention. “But yeah, they are. These ones shouldn’t explode like the ones last night did. Hopefully.” She remarked, unsure.
“Well, you might as well test them out.” David prompted her with a nudge.”
Agreeing with him, Payton brought one of the devices over to an open area of the room, away from all of Castle’s weapons. She learned her lesson last night. Though it was nice to see that the pile of webs had dissolved into nothingness at some point while she slept. Aiming the nozzle towards an empty wall, she pressed the button she had installed on the side, and a thin string of webbing shot out, connecting the web shooter to the wall. It worked. It worked! Laughing, Payton celebrated the success, accepting a high-five from David over the string of webbing. Pressing the button twice caused the line to detach, floating slowly to the floor while still adhered to the wall, but it left the shooter open to create another line.
“Good job Payton!” David praised.
“Thanks! Now I just have to add a wrist brace to it so it’s wearable.” She remarked beaming with pride.
An alert from the computers had David going back to his own station, offering her another congratulations before leaving her to her work.
It was around 11pm when David left them, telling them he would be back the next day to help out some more, but that he wanted to spend the night at his actual house. Payton stayed up, designing a version three for the web shooters to create a truly functional model. Her current design worked, but it was awkward. With wrist bracers she could wear the shooters, and she wanted to install a button she could press with the same hand that the web shooter was on the wrist of. Such a feature would allow her to use two shooters simultaneously.
But now, with a working design, Payton felt a little less helpless than she had before. Once the web shooters were complete, she could practice with them and learn how to best use them in self defense. Things were starting to look up.
Friday’s at the Tower were quiet affairs. Most of the Avengers tended to make their way from their private apartments towards their shared floor. Tony’s presence usually revolved around whether or not Pepper had him actually doing work for Stark Industries, or if Tony had some new experiment he was running in his lab. The only other one who tended to be flaky was Pietro. The young Sokovian had issues staying still. Wanda claimed her brother had always been that way, but most Avengers agreed that the young man’s powers definitely played a role in just how hyperactive the guy was.
Today was one of the few days he was actually sitting still. Natasha watched from her place at the kitchen counter as the twins sat together at the dining table, textbooks arranged in front of them as they studied for midterm exams. One of the requirements that the government had for letting those two into the country as Avengers was that they had to get a formal, American, education. As such, with both of them being eighteen, they were in their senior year of high school, though they were homeschooled in the tower with hired educators to help them out.
It was nice having two younger members on the team. It had taken a few months for herself and Tony to grow comfortable with them being around, especially after Wanda’s part in messing with their minds. Bruce, if he wasn’t missing, probably would’ve had a bigger problem with it. But after some intense heart-to-hearts, and with the Avengers as a whole helping the twins to realize that they couldn’t blame Stark as being responsible for their parents deaths (seeing as how Obadiah Stane had been the one selling Stark weapons to unauthorized parties such as the Sokovian rebels who bombed the Maximoff household), the team was truly coming together in a way they hadn’t been even before Ultron. Once they had just been a group of strangers dragged together by SHIELD, but now, in Natasha’s eyes anyway, the people around her felt like family.
Alongside Pietro being present, Tony also was, making today a truly rare day where everyone was just hanging out. Clint was talking with Tony about some ideas for new arrows, Steve, Sam, and Rhodey were playing cards as ESPN played on the TV near them. Natasha herself stood in the kitchen nursing a coffee as the Vision read a cookbook, still working on his personal journey of trying to understand the art of cooking.
With a ding the elevator doors opened revealing Pepper Potts, and a handful of mail. Not many Avengers tended to receive personal mail. Clint, Tony, Rhodey, and Sam got the most, Clint from his family usually, and the latter three from an assortment of organizations they were affiliated with. Steve would occasionally get bursts of spam-mail after making another mistake on the internet, and causing Tony to force the good Captain into another internet safety lesson with FRIDAY. Steve was far more acclimated now than he used to be, but he still had a ways to go to truly understand the intricacies of the modern information era.
Herself, the twins, and Vision never received mail, as none of them had any connections left outside of the Avengers who could, or would, reach out to them here. Which was why it was a huge surprise for her when Pepper tossed a letter onto the counter in front of her, giving Nat an intrigued look before the CEO finished making the rounds for everyone.
“Got a secret admirer there Natashalie?” Tony quipped, turning to face her as she stared dumbly down at the letter marked for ‘Natasha Romanoff’. Clint laughed at the joke, which wasn’t surprising in the least.
“Friday? Has this been scanned?” She asked the AI suspiciously, still refusing to touch it.
“Yes, Miss Romanoff. All mail entering the building is vetted for safety, and that letter has not set off any alarms.” The Irish voice of the AI replied, sounding like it spoke from everywhere and nowhere.
“Come on Nat, you gonna open it? See who sent you a really late Valentine?” Clint joked, joining in with Tony.
Sighing, Natasha removed a knife from her pocket, using it to cut the envelope open and dump its contents onto the table. Two things fell out, one seemed to be a postcard from Budapest, which caused her to give a concerned glance towards Clint due to their history with that city. The other was an image of a teenage girl, clearly taken from a surveillance camera, the girl had long, straight brown hair, blue eyes, and glasses. Natasha thought she seemed familiar, but she couldn’t place it.
Turning her attention back to the postcard, she flipped it over to read the message on the back.
Sister,
Rescue the girl, then come find me. I need your help.
-YB
A small drawing of a firefly was made next to the initials.
YB
She knew those initials. They belonged to a little blonde girl who she lived with on a mission in Ohio. They were sisters.
YB. Yelena Belova.
Her sister needed her help.