Get Ready
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New York, New York 2014 Post Captain America and the Winter Soldier.
Maria and Natasha were sitting in a trendy Manhattan bar that was far too expensive for what it offered, but got away with it for its vibes. It was a Tuesday, 10:43 PM and the place was mostly empty. Maria and Natasha were sitting across from each other at a corner bar table that was high off the ground. They both had just a bit left of their drink to finish but neither one of them wanted to be the first one to finish, because they weren’t sure where they were going from here—literally. Maria didn’t want it to be over since they were having a good time, Natasha was pretty sure it wouldn’t be over, but she new Maria had a big day tomorrow so if anything was going to happen it might not be tonight.
“How’s your…” Maria gestured to Natasha’s chest where she had been hit by the Winter Soldier.
“I think a nice scar will take over.” Natasha pulled her shirt down a bit. “I’ll tell everyone it was from a shark attack.” Natasha grinned.
“Where’s Aquaman where you need him?” Maria joked.
“Wrong crew, Hill.” Natasha laughed as she took the smallest sip of her drink.
Maria and Natasha were quiet again, it was quite shocking the fall of SHIELD as they experienced it. Maria very narrowly escaped it a building coming down on top of her and she just kind of had to keep rolling with the punches here. All the sudden, a swarm of political actors had taken a great interest in her and Fury with the fall of SHIELD and the testimony that Natasha had given. It was all very complicated and overwhelming. The way everything Maria knew had come crashing down so suddenly and unexpectedly, she knew it had to, when Steve revealed the plot Maria was the first on board to taken SHIELD down from the inside. She remembered looking right at Nick and having to tell him they had to do this, there was no saving the agency with this level of corruption and infiltration. And now, Fury was in the wind, Natasha was going to take off soon too, and Maria was a prime target for the blame.
“So, tomorrow is your first day at Stark, are you nervous? I used to fake intern there you know, if you need any tips.” Natasha said, the top of her boot touching the side of Maria’s calf under the table. Maria squinted at Natasha and gave her snarky look.
“Yeah, I recall and I don’t need any tips.” Maria answered quickly. “Of course, I’m not nervous.” Maria shook her head.
“New irritating boss, new place, new people… new schedule…” Natasha started.
“Seems like it is probably going to be mostly the same.” Maria laughed a little to herself. She actually had no idea what to expect.
“Good idea Fury had sending you over there.” Natasha mumbled.
“It wasn’t his idea.”
“Oh, should have figured it was yours.” Natasha grabbed onto her drink and swished the little left of it around in hr hand.
“No, it was actually the idea of Pepper Potts. She contacted me and she asked me to come in after SHIELD fell to see if there was anything I could preserve for the Avengers because she thought they could keep running them through Stark. After we talked she sent me down to HR to do a polygraph so I could work there too. Apparently, Tony makes everyone he hires do a polygraph now.”
“Like SHIELD agents aren’t trained to evade them.” Natasha laughed.
“He says you can’t trick his.”
“Well you passed I guess.”
“I guess.” Maria shrugged.
“So, SHIELD is really, really done.”
“Yeah…”
“It just feels weird.” Natasha sighed, SHIELD was her sort of home for five years and now it’s gone.
“We really missed the forrest for the trees on that one.” Maria mumbled, it was jaw dropping, terrifying really that some people they worked with every day were really secretly Hydra and they had idea. Maria never felt so betrayed and stupid in her life. She had been at SHIELD since she was 22 years old, almost ten years.
Natasha couldn’t help but laugh at Maria’s massive understatement.
“And you don’t work at SHIELD anymore, and I don’t work there anymore…” Natasha started say in a flirtatious voice as if that had truly been a barrier in the past—sometimes it was and sometimes maybe it wasn’t.
“Yep, that’s the case when your former employing agency comes crashing down and doesn’t exist.”
“So, you are not my boss anymore.” Natasha added trying to be obvious.
“I am not.” Maria said putting her hand over the top of her wide rimmed glass as if sh wasn’t getting it all.
“And here I’d thought it’d just be a lifetime of angst between us.” Natasha joked and Maria rolled her eyes. “Well.. except that one time, and that other time…”
“What exactly are you saying to me?” Maria said in an unamused voice as she now knew exactly what Natasha was saying already.
“Your place or mine?” Natasha huffed as if it wasn’t obvious.
Maria tried not to laugh at Natasha’s smug comment she half looked away from her bashfully.
“Did you clean your temporary apartment?” Maria asked and Natasha made a face signaling she did not.
“Did you grocery shop?” Natasha asked back and Maria laughed.
“Yeah, right between faking Nick’s death and breaking into the Triskelion, got right into Whole Foods.” Maria snarked and Natasha laughed.
“So... no?” Natasha made a face. Maria was notorious for not having food in her apartment.
“If only there were places that delivered food to your door, open basically all day and night…” Maria mumbled.
“I mean, you can’t live your life on restaurant food.”
“Oh, what like you know how to cook?” Maria shot back at Natasha like she was out there making gourmet meals or something.
“I know how to cook better than you.” Natasha grinned and Maria scoffed like that was not true — even though it definitely was.
“I can at least make a sandwich.” Natasha added.
“I can also make a sandwich.” Maria shook her head and huffed under her breath
“Not if you don’t have any food in your house.” Natasha laughed at her and Maria laughed too.
FAST CUT TO MARIA’S NEW APARTMENT 11:25 PM
Natasha pulled her head back for a minute as Maria and were rather eagerly kissing one other, Natasha’s back was up against the wall.
“When you said you could make a sandwich did you mean between me and the wall?” Natasha laughed and Maria rolled her eyes stepping backward a bit.
“Are you going to talk the whole time?” Maria snarked.
“I don’t know are you going to take my pants off?” Natasha shot back quickly with a sly smirk.
“You can take your own pants off.” Maria grumbled.
“Wow, still acting like my boss, huh?” Natasha snarked and Maria made a dramatic face shaking her head no that and Natasha laughed.
In the morning Maria was in the shower and Natasha was at the bathroom sink vanity getting ready. Natasha had already taken a shower without Maria.
“Why do you have such little stuff? Where is your hidden highly organized compartment of beauty products?” Natasha asked going through all of Maria’s drawers in her vanity.
“I have some stuff in the thing.” Maria said from the shower.
“I have some stuff in the thing.” Natasha mocked. "So clear and obvious what you mean by that.” Natasha mumbled. “I can’t believe you wouldn’t take a shower with me.” She added with a huff.
“I like to think in the shower.” Maria called back over the curtain washing her hair.
“Am I keeping you from that?” Natasha asked with a smirk.
“Sure are.” Maria answered confidently.
“Good.” Natasha mumbled to herself as she started going through all of Maria’ vanity to find whatever make up products she has. “Seriously, Maria, no woman with legs that smooth doesn’t have like exfoliators or whatever.”
“Exfoliate? Like your face? I just use mild clear and free face wash and warm water.” Maria barely heard Natasha’s mumbles and Natasha rolled her eyes.
“Where is all your make up and stuff?” Natasha asked as going through Maria’s stuff was proving quite boring.
Maria grabbed a towel from the hook near the shower curtain and wrapped it around her before she stepped out of the shower.
“What do you need make up for? You don’t have any plans or a job.” Maria laughed as she grabbed a hand towel and started to towel dry her hair standing next to Natasha and Natasha made a face at her.
“Because I’m bored and I want to. Where’s your foundation?”
“I don’t have any, I don’t really use it.”
Natasha then observed Maria’s face. She really did have such nice even skin that Natasha as a red head did not have have that luxury. Natasha looked both pale and pink at the same time.
Natasha ruffled through Maria’s stuff and finally she found the saddest little make up bag with some mascara, eyeliner, and two colors of neutral eye shadows and then a lipstick that was the same color of Maria’s lips. Natasha groaned.
“Do you want me to give you smokey eyes?” Natasha said holding up Maria’s eyeliner.
“Mm, not today.” Maria shook her head.
“They’re very corporate.” Natasha added.
“I really don’t want to set the expectation that I am going to wear make up everyday. You know because then if you have a day that you don’t people will say things and I hate that.”
“No one is going to notice you are wearing any make up with this make up.” Natasha snickered.
“That is kind of the idea.” Natasha laughed at her.
“Hey, I interned there, the women they all wear make up, when I say it’s corporate I mean it’s corporate.” Natasha tried to warn.
“I’m sure it will be fine.” Maria shrugged.
“What are you going to wear?” Natasha asked tilting her head.
“What I always we—-…” Maria started but then stopped herself. She couldn’t wear what she always wore, a shield jumpsuit. “A uhm, a suit.” Maria hadn’t even given it one thought yet and she had to leave for work in not that long from now.
“Is it pants?” Natasha asked trying to suppress a smirk and Maria made a face at her.
“You don’t have like a nice Ann Taylor dress in your closet?” Natasha tried not to laugh.
“Who is Ann Taylor?” Maria asked as she wasn’t aware of that particular ‘designer’ and Natasha really laughed.
“You know what, you do the smokey eye and I’ll go through your closet.” Natasha offered.
“No, Natasha.” Maria sighed as Natasha handed Maria her own eyeliner and left the bathroom to go through Maria’s clothes.
“Oh, yeah, I meant to make fun of you about this earlier…” Natasha started as she went through Maria’s clothes. “Were you wearing like full on granny briefs last night?” Natasha asked with a wide grin.
“NO, they were normal bikini cuts.” Maria said defensively.
“I guess I was just surprised they weren’t like the boy shorts from the SHIELD training room days.” Natasha laughed under her breath.
“I do still have those.” Maria admitted and they both laughed.
Natasha could hear Maria turned the hair dryer on. Maria’s clothes closet was also perfectly organized by both item and color. Natasha started messing it up and rearranging things just to be a brat and then she pulled some clothes out. After about 20 minutes Maria came out with her hair fully blown dry, wearing an undershirt and underwear to grab some clothes and she made a face at what Natasha laid out.
“Uhm.” Maria made a face.
“What? This is what the women wear there.” Natasha made a face at Maria’s reaction.
“Oh god. Am I going to have to pick out outfits everyday?” Maria said exasperated realizing how irritating this was going to be.
“Uhm, yeah, weirdo…” Natasha laughed at her and Maria groaned loudly. She grabbed a pair of tailored pants and a blouse off her bed and threw it on without a care.
“Hey, what’s for breakfast?” Natasha asked and Maria glared at her as she got dressed and then she groaned again.
“Why did I decide that the night before a new job was a good night for you to come over?” Maria squinted at Natasha.
“I don’t know, it’s very uncharacteristically like you, you were obviously, very thirsty.”
Maria scoffed as she buttoned up her shirt.
“Uhm no, you started flirting.” Maria corrected Natasha.
“So there’s no breakfast?” Natasha teased.
“Anything you can find you can eat.” Maria muttered as she pulled her shoes on and Natasha glared at her wide eyed as a smirk appeared from ear to ear as she heard what Maria said without realizing. After Maria pulled her heels on she looked at Natasha’s stupid grinning face and tilted her head curiously and she thought for a moment and Natasha started laughing at her.
“Natasha, grow up!” Maria yelled at her.
“I didn’t say a word.” Natasha laughed.
“You didn’t have to.” Maria rolled her eyes.
“It was funny, you’re funny, give yourself a break.” Natasha encouraged.
“Get it out of your system, woman.” Maria sighed.
“I mean, maybe you need to get it out of your system.” Natasha mumbled laughing. Maria looked away from Natasha and then to the wall and then at herself in the mirror.
“Does this look ok?” Maria asked in her very simple straight forward outfit.
“It would look better with a smokey eye.” Natasha teased and Maria laughed.
“Ready?” Natasha asked.
“Ready.” Maria nodded and the two smirked at each other.
AT STARK INDUSTRIES, Maria walked into the tower and she signed in at the front and waited for a woman who worked in human resources who had her do paperwork and lots of boring things, after a few hours Pepper met Maria at the office they had Maria working out of.
“You’re here!” Pepper said cheerfully. Pepper didn’t know what it was, but when she met Maria she just knew that she liked her, she was really smart and she helped save and preserve a lot of information to help keep the Avengers going. Pepper thought it made the most sense for Maria to come to Stark. Maria did ask Fury about it and he agreed it was a good move. Tony was also on board with this, surprising Maria but she was thankful.
One thing Maria had observed about the people in this Stark building, was that they indeed dressed really corporate, very nice, beautiful tailored suits and dresses, heels that were much higher and more expensive than Maria had on, jewelry, full face of make up, hair done up, perfectly. Every woman who worked there looked like a model. Maria was a tall woman and here, she did not feel like she was very tall, in fact she might have been on the shorter side of women who worked here. When it came to the Avengers Maria was the tallest woman but since the only other woman was Natasha it wasn’t that great of a feat.
Natasha had tried to warn Maria, and she was right. There was definitely a look to this workforce and Maria already felt uncomfortably out of place. Even Pepper was wearing the most expensive outfit Maria had ever seen.
Pepper walked Maria around and Maria was surprised she had the time to do this, she was talking to Maria about how unimaginable everything had been with the fall of SHIELD. Pepper led Maria to a a work room on one of the top floors of the tower and as Pepper unlocked the access to the room and the two walked in, Maria was surprised to see Tony Stark there.
“I need an eight letter word for ‘shimmers and shines.’” Tony said abruptly not even looking up at who was coming, he just assumed it was Pepper.
“Glitters?” Pepper asked and Tony pursed his lips to the side of his face as if that was not it.
“Sparkles?” Maria asked and then Tony nodded and then he looked up from what he was doing as he heard a voice he wasn’t expecting and definitely wasn’t expecting to say the word ‘sparkles.’
“Ms. Hill.” Tony said formally standing up from the counter he was leaning over and he walked over to Pepper and Maria.
“So, you have left the evil awful grip of government service and joined the thriving private sector?” Tony asked skeptically.
“Yep, here to help you privatize global security.” Maria’s voice was clearly snarky but she tried to hide it. Tony pressed his lips together.
“Are you joking?” Tony asked in a serious voice.
“I was being serious.”
“Hmmm. And where’s my buddy Fury?” Tony asked still very unsure about Maria’s true intentions, he of course doubted she was associated with Hydra, given her work to dismantle it, but he knew her over the last few years and she was clearly Nick Fury’s number one, in whatever strange relationship they had. “He doesn’t want a job too?”
“Working for you?” Maria asked pressing her lips together.
“Well, apparently I am just handing out jobs to whatever former SHIELD Agents need them to escape government scrutiny.”
“Tony.” Pepper scolded.
“I am just saying!” Tony rolled his eyes.
“Working for me, it’s not like working for Fury.” Tony said in a stern voice.
“Okay.” Maria nodded, she believed that was very true.
“You know, it’s going to be very demanding, you have to be here early and leave late, and be on call 24/7 basically.”
Pepper glared at Tony unimpressed.
“Isn’t Maria doing the same job she was doing before except here at Stark?” Pepper asked.
“Mm, well, that was a pretty good description of my job before.” Maria mumbled to Pepper and she smirked and Tony rolled his eyes.
“What are we even going to call your job?” Pepper muttered. “Security liaison?” Pepper asked.
“Global Security Coordinator?” Tony turned his head pondering.
“I like that one.” Maria half smiled.
“Assistant to the Global Security Coordinator, I mean.” Tony smirked.
“Funny.” Maria looked unamused.
“We’ll come back to the title.” Tony shook his head.
“Do you normally walk people around on their first day…?” Maria looked at Pepper.
“She’s the CEO, so no.” Tony answered for Pepper.
“Apparently, I’m a CEO who doesn’t even speak for myself.” Pepper glared at Tony.
“Sorry…” Tony rubbed the back of his head.
“We have to go to a meeting.” Pepper said casually and she and Tony started to lead Maria out of the room.
Maria started to head the opposite way back to where the mountain of first day paperwork was waiting for her.
“Where are you going?” Tony asked and Maria looked surprised. “You’re coming.” He handed Maria a tablet with a great deal of information on it and Maria made a face.
“You’re presenting I guess I should say.” Tony corrected himself and Maria looked up at Tony as she was simultaneously trying to read everything he put in front of her and walk in a building she had no idea where she was going.
“Presenting?” Maria asked.
“Like talking, you know that thing you do where you explain everything.”
“But, I don’t know what this is yet.” Maria said looking over the intel as quick as she could.
“Better get on it quick.” Tony huffed.
“Are you hazing me?” Maria asked as she was trying to read.
“Hazing is very serious it is not joke.” Tony almost scolded and Maria pressed her lips together and looked very serious as she started reading over the materials. “We have a very ‘throw in the deep end and swim’ type of vibe here, get used to it.” Tony dismissed. Maria’s jaw was agape.
Pepper, Maria, and Tony walked into the meeting room, a group of men in suits were there, Maria recognized some of them as high ranking government officials also in the field of national security, James Rhodes was one.
“Gentlemen, sorry for the delay, I’m sure you all remember, Ms. Hill, my new Director of Special Threat Assessment Division.” Tony made up on the spot.
“You want to have a corporation direct a bunch of super heroes to breach a hostile territory, are you kidding? Do you have any idea of the global ramifications this could have? It could start a war Stark.” Thaddeus Ross said.
“And I’m not even convinced all of the Avengers have been cleared from suspected Hydra affiliation.”
“Operating without SHIELD is new for everybody.” Tony responded, “but we got some extraordinary information and we’re going to act on it.” Tony said like he wasn’t asking he was just being considerate to alert them.
“You cannot just breach global and national security protocols because you want to!” Ross huffed. “I mean, what is so advanced and skilled the extraordinary talents in the American military cannot do this.” He growled again.
“Well that would actually start a war.” Maria snarked under her breath.
“Do you have something you want to say ‘Director of Specialized Threat Assessments’” Ross snarked back at her, what a joke he thought some 30 year old kid having this job, she was clearly just there to never push back against Tony like she never pushed back against Fury—-Ross assumed.
Tony glared at Maria looking at her to finish.
“Okay, sure.” Maria muttered to herself. Maria hit something on the tablet and it made it appear on the screen in front of everyone in the conference room. It was very similar to technology at SHIELD.
“This intel identified remote Hydra cell operating in a hostile foreign territory with the intention of developing micro targeted nuclear capable weapons.” Maria made a sour face because that would be a disaster. “Swift, covert, action is unquestionably required and we have the ability to do just that...” Maria explained.
“The Avengers are a liability right now.” Ross grumbled.
“The Avengers are the only thing preventing this highly dangerous situation from becoming a liability or more accurately a mass casualty event.” Maria glared at Ross.
“Seems like quite the gamble Ms. Hill, you of all people should want more information and not less before you send potentially corrupted agents toward Hydra.”
“I’ve never gambled a day in my life.” Maria responded coldly and confidently to Ross and he groaned as it sounded like they were going to do this no matter what, with or without government approval.
“And when exactly is this little illegal covert operation going to take place?” Ross asked mumbling o himself.
“Oh, we just finished.” Maria answered and Ross gasped.
Tony smiled because Maria caught on quick, alarmingly quick and Steve Rogers suddenly appeared on screen and waved at everyone at the table.
“We got ‘em.” Rogers said confidently and most of the men in the room were caught off guard by Rogers’ charm and confidence that they barely even cared. Ross still looked mad.
“So this courtesy call was what? Just a fucking ruse!” Ross yelled.
“Language.” Steve said on the screen.
“No, we’re just informing you of our success.” Maria smiled “and while you are here, Stark Industries has branded M&Ms in the gift shop for 3.99. Fun fact, Stark Industries is the only place in the world aside from the White House that the Mars company allows brand it’s most popular product: M&Ms.” Maria added in and Rhodey, Steve, and Tony laughed but the rest of the room tilted there head a bit.
As the men exited the room, Rhodey hung back.
“Pretty good for her first day, huh?” Tony bragged to the room as if he had done something, instead of Maria or as if Pepper wasn’t the one who pushed to hire her.
“God, it’s exhausting being the smartest person in the room.” Tony groaned.
“Well, good thing I’m here to relieve you.” Maria smirked and Pepper, Steve, and Rhodey all laughed. Tony squinted at Maria’s brashness for a moment and then smirked.
“Get ready, this was an easy one.” Tony looked at Maria and Maria furrowed her brows at Tony.
“I got it.” She said confidently.
“Clearly.” Pepper added rolling her eyes at Tony’s remark.