Chapter 7
Natasha pulls the binoculars away from her eyes and leans back from her perch on Oscorp’s roof. She presses the talk button on her earpiece.
“Anything?”
“Nada.” comes Clint’s voice, tiny and thin over the coms. If she squints, she can just make out the form of him on the opposite roof.
“Blueprints say there is only one sublevel. Keep looking.” she says.
“Since when do these things follow the blueprint?” Clint replies, but Nat can make out him lifting his own binoculars to his eyes again.
“Tony is sure the kid is here.” she says, rolling her shoulder back. She’s starting to get sore from staying in one position for so long. They’ve been on the roof since 8 that morning, and the sun now is starting to blaze in the sky.
“Who is this kid again?” Clint asks, voice slightly muffled as he concentrates.
“Some Starklabs employee that Osborn has taken an interest in.”
“When did we become Tony Stark’s personal spy service?”
Nat pushes air out her nose; the closest thing she can get to a laugh while on missions.
“Believe it or not, Osborn has been on SHIELD's radar for a while. If they’ve kidnapped a rival employee and we can prove it, that evidence can do some real damage.”
Clint sniffs but doesn’t say anything. Nat is right. Oscorp has been involved in some shady practices over the past decade. There’s been rumors that Norman Osborn was directing funding toward researching his own version of a super-serum.
“Oscorp is the leading chemical manufacturing firm in the entire world. Why are they interested in a mail clerk?” Clint asks.
“Tony said they’re more interested in his research than him as a person.” she corrects.
“What was he working on, a new type of postage stamp?”
“Clint.” she barks out. He gets quiet, noticing what she pointed out. There’s movement in the lower left quadrant that she can just make out from her perch. Too much movement to be any normal office movements. Natasha looks down at the blueprint and then back down the building.
“Looks like the west side of the fifth floor. You see that?”
Clint hums in agreement. “Two guards. Looks like they’re in a rush.”
“Maybe someone found out about the postage stamps.” Nat says dryly.
“Norman Osborn is with them.” Clint confirms. Natasha bites the inside of her cheek, thinking. Such a habit was discouraged in her youth, but now she’s got more freedom than in her training. She can bite the inside of her cheek all she wishes. That novelty makes her do it more often.
“Okay. Let’s get moving.”
Nat rolls up the blueprints and shoves them into her utility belt along with the binoculars.
“I’ll go down, you go up.” she says and Clint grunts his approval. Nat sets her watch timer for thirty minutes. No use in being the best in the game without a little competition with yourself.
She stalks her way over to the air vent cover and wrinkles her nose in distaste. This is much more of Clint’s area, but what can you do? She pops the vent cover off with a good kick and climbs her way inside, careful to replace the vent cover.
She’s already memorized the blueprints to the building earlier that day and finds no problem in navigating the dark, dusty vents. Clint’s voice crackles to life in her ear.
“It’s definitely the fifth floor.”
“10-4.” she mutters quietly and crawls.
As much as she dislikes being forced into this life, there’s a certain thrill she gets from working these jobs. The heart-racing fights, the pulse of her blood ringing in her ears, the bated breath, the nervousness in her stomach; all of it made for a very exciting career path. She loves it.
A few turns and numerous amounts of dust bunnies later and she’s in the right hallway. There are two guards posted outside what looks like a utility closet door. Odd place for them.
“Where are you?”
“Fourth floor.”
“Get to the fifth stair level and keep it clear.”
Nat reaches into her belt and pulls out her EMP. It's a nice, handy, small little thing. She opens the vent just outside and places it on the ceiling. One flick of a switch and the cameras are disabled. Finally, something Stark made that actually does her some good.
She counts the second until Barton confirms his position. Then she counts ten more seconds before dropping down the ceiling vent.
She’s quick; quick enough to make quick work of the guards. She takes the first one by surprise, one roundhouse kick to the head and he’s out. She knees the other one in the groin, jumps up and grabs him by his neck with her thighs and squeezes, throwing him to the floor. One punch, then two and three; he’s down.
She pulls herself off the floor and gives herself a moment to breathe. She disarms both security guards, taking their guns. She puts one inside her waist band and the other she unloads, takes the clip out, and tosses it to one side. She throws the body of the gun in the other direction.
“Barton?”
“Still Clear.”
Nat takes both guard’s keycards from them and looks at the utility closet door. One swipe of the card and she was in.
The room was small, just like someone would expect but it wasn’t a closet; it looked more like a shitty hotel room. The walls and floor are concrete and the air is frigid cold. There’s a drain int the middle of the floor, the sounds of water pouring into it from further back.
In the corner of the room, arms behind this back attached to the sink pipe, is the kid. He looks worse for wear, head resting on his knees, shivering.
Nat stalks over and turns off the sink. The kid hadn’t reacted when she walked in, perhaps not caring, but at the water turning off, he looked up.
His eyes are big and brown like a doe’s. One of them was slit, a swollen, bruised crater, the other looking at her wildly. Dried blood crusted his nostrils.
“Hey, Peter. I’m getting you out of here.” she says. The kid is staring at her as she reaches for her blade to free his arms.
“You’re the Black Widow.” he says, his voice hoarse and raw.
“Yeah.” she says, cutting the kid free. As soon as his wrists are free, he slumps over. Nat catches him with her knee to keep him from hitting his head on the floor. She places the back of her hand to his cheek. He’s burning hot.
“Can you stand?”
Peter blinks like he didn’t understand the question.
“You’re so pretty,” he says, voice hushed with awe.
Nat gives him a small smile. “Thank you. Peter, can you stand?”
“Uh,” he says dumbly. He tries to get up, using the sink as support and Nat’s shoulder. As soon as he straightens his legs = his knees buckle under him.
Nat frowns. She’s seen this before, dealt with it herself actually, being forced into stress positions and not being able to move afterwards.
“I’m sorry.” Peter says, looking genuinely apologetic.
“That’s okay. Are you okay if I carry you?”
Peter nods. His eyes are cloudy and glazed over, like he’s not all there.
Nat gathers him up into her arms and slings him over her shoulder. He’s lighter than she expected, something concerning considering he’d only been here since early morning. The skininess was another issue. She pushes the thought back into her mind.
She opens the door and they move into the hallway. Peter mutters something about spiders and red-headed women.
“Barton, change of plans. Kid can’t walk.” she says into her ear piece.
“Got you covered.”
Clint appears suddenly at the end of the hallway, pushing a janitor’s cart. He’s wearing a blue uniform and has a shit-eating grin across his face.
“Ta-da!” he taps his forehead. “Bird brain for the win this time.”
Nat smirks. “This time.”
Clint pushes the cart over. There’s a top and bottom to it, the lower side is big enough for one person. Nat sets Peter down and lays him on the bottom of the janitor cart and throws some trash bags over him.
“What’s happening?” Peter slurs. Nat pats his cheek calmingly. “Stay there and don’t move, okay?”
“Okay .” he says quietly.
Nat finishes covering up the kid on the cart.
“You don’t happen to have a uniform for me?”
Clint shrugs. “I only found one.”
“Meet me outside. Get him out and to the car. I’ll go back the way I came and down the fire escape. We can meet in the alley out back.”
“Gotcha.” Clint straightens his shoulders and starts to whistle an annoying little tune, pushing the cart down the hallway.
He turns the corner and Nat turns her attention back to the guards. She grabs one by their shoulders and drags him into the room Peter had been in before, then the other one. By the end she’s sweating from the effort of it all. Carrying three adult men in one day was not on the agenda.
On second thought, she retrieves the gun pieces she threw down the hallway and shoves them back into her waistband. No use in leaving perfectly good weaponry around, right? She stands under the vent and with one massive jump, kicking off the wall, she grabs the edges of the vent and pulls herself back into the vent, kicking to give herself more leverage.
She sticks one arm back out and grabs the EMP she had placed on the ceiling and turns it off before gently placing the vent back into place, feeling pleased with herself. No record of them being in the building was the best option.
She crawls back the way she came, not needing to recall the blueprints as much since she can see the smudges of the dust she had distrubed the first time around. She sniffles, thanking her lucky stars she’s not allergic to dust like some other people are.
She finds the right vent and pulls herself through back onto the roof. Once she steps out and dusts her clothing off all of the dirt and grime she’s been crawling in, she places the vent cover back on the roof.
Nat makes her way to the fire escape, the same way she had gotten up the building in the first place and starts the long, careful descent down the ladder. If she wasn’t so worried about drawing attention to herself, she’d just slide down it. But sliding red-heads in all black would definitely catch some eyes.
She skips every two rungs, though.
When she lands on the solid concrete under her, Clinton is pulling up in the car, a sleek, nondescript sedan borrowed from Tony.