you're (we're) still not dead
Natasha puts down her book, hearing Tony’s footfalls walking towards her.
The oversized couch comfortable in making small talk and allowing distance between them.
He nods, sitting near her, the splint on his wrist better than the thick cast that was on it initially.
“How’s your wrist?” She asks, pointedly.
Tony rotates it around, showing her his newfound movement without a wince.
“How’s your hand?” He retaliates.
Natasha flexes her fingers and stretches them back.
“We’re still not dead, huh?” He smiles, watching her concentration.
“Takes a lot more than that to kill us,” Natasha says seriously.
“Apparently,” he says, a hint of a smile. She returns it, as they both watch the television, quietly talking in the background.
“She’s still out there, Tony,” Natasha states, not looking at him.
“I know,” he mumbles.
“I have leads,” she leaves the thought hanging.
“Me too.”
“Clint…” she starts, and then stops, wondering just how much to tell him.
“Clint knows where she is,” she reveals. There’s a pause as she watches emotions play on his face.
“Good. When do we leave?”
Natasha can’t keep the shock off hers.
“We?” She stutters.
“You think I’m going to let the two of you go alone?”
Natasha looks uncomfortable, but runs through all the scenarios in her head.
“You’re not a spy,” she states.
“No.”
“You’re not an assassin.”
“No.”
“But you want revenge,” she finishes.
“Yes.”
“Let me talk to Clint,” she reasons, wanting to run some scenarios through with him.
.
Clint finds her on the roof.
He shrugs off his sweater, and dumps it on her lap.
“What are you doing out here?” He worries that Extremis has messed with her, more than she cares to admit.
Her body is still recovering, no matter how much she acts like it’s not.
“I just want to be cold,” she admits, and it solidifies everything Clint’s been thinking.
“How’s your skin?” He asks tentatively, not wanting to overstep.
“Still touchy,” she says freely, wrapping her own arms around herself. She looks over to him, and he offers his jacket as well.
She declines, but pulls his overly large sweater over her head.
“Nat, come to bed,” he tells her.
“I just want to stay here a little longer,” she pulls her knees to her chest, and he sits, copying the action.
“Want company?” He asks, scooting closer.
“Sure,” she means her head on his shoulder.
“No talking, ok?”
He looks at the view, content in watching the sun set with the sounds of the world loud around them.
.
“Tony wants to come with us,” she says later when they’re laying in bed.
“What?” Clint turns away from his book to look at her.
“He wants revenge like us,” she justifies.
Clint doesn’t like this.
“But.”
“I know.”
She shrugs.
“Does he know what we are going to do to her?”
Natasha frowns.
“I don’t know, it’s not like I said, when we find her, I’m going to kill her.”
Clint smirks. He wonders if Tony could stomach the realities of their work.
“Do you want him to come?” He asks softly, trying to gauge what side to fall on and just how much he will likely need to protect Tony if he does come along.
“I don’t know,” she rolls to face him. “What do you think?”
“I think it’s dangerous, but he’s as heavily invested as we are,” he says, diplomatically.
“Yeah.”
They both sigh.
“Yeah.”
“We can talk more with him tomorrow maybe?”
Natasha nods.
“Yeah, ok.”
Clint reaches to hold her hand, her grasp so much stronger now than the last time
.
The opera house is loud, as Natasha and Tony make their way to their seats. His tuxedo fitted and her dress as black as her thoughts.
Of course they’re playing Swan Lake.
Natasha sighs and adjusts her glasses as she scouts the area, hoping to spot the woman.
The warehouse district in New Haven was cleared out. Clint knew it would be, finding only shell casings and remnants of shipping containers which had been burnt from the inside.
Using Tony’s considerable resources, he’d found a dead ballet dancer in the morgue with the same symptoms as Natasha, which has led them here.
Clint had suspected that considering she found a different way of testing Extremis on others of her own body weight and height, those with extreme tolerances to pain and a want to better themselves. It had made sense.
Surveillance had then confirmed it, finding her face in amongst the crowd.
Tony had bought tickets immediately, and they’d sat down to mark the parameters of the plan.
Arm In arm, Clint watches as they traverse the stairs, Natasha’s hyper vigilance on full display.
“Nothing yet,” he tells her through the ear piece, and she sneaks a glance up.
“How will you watch us when we are inside?” Tony asks, holding the door open for Natasha.
“He doesn’t, I do,” Natasha responds.
“I’ve got the perimeter. We went through this, remember?” Clint watches as Tony nods, looks towards him, and steps inside after Natasha.
.
Natasha holds it together through act one. Ballet, she holds dear to herself, she knows though how off it makes her, despite her love for it.
The beauty of the dancers hold her captive and make her forget why she is really there.
Clint speaks and she’s pulled back into the present, watching and waiting for the woman of her nightmares.
There’s only been one other woman who held a place there, and now, with ballet, the two are running in parallel, battling for the darkest parts of her mind.
She remembers dancing Swan Lake, at least, she thinks she does.
Memories of ballet, either true or false are embedded, so when Odette appears, she fees her breath catch and heart sink.
This is what panic feels like.
Tony is oblivious, using his binoculars to look at all the faces of the room; and it gives her at least a slight reprieve he’s at least staying on mission.
Natasha grounds herself. Three of three.
She feels the velvet seat beneath her, runs her hand over the scaring on her wrist, and the lightweight fabric of her dress.
She sees the bright lights as she looks up, tries to look away from the stage, and watches her hand run back and forth, back and forth tiny movements.
She smells the old hall, the wood… the perfume.
Perfume.
She stands abruptly.
If she can wet her face, maybe leave the area, she can do better, be better.
“I can’t,” she breathes.
Tony looks at her sharply, now aware that something is not right.
“Did you see her?” He asks, voice low.
“I can’t, I-” she needs to leave, she can’t get rapid breaths under control.
Tony follows her out to the foyer, hand low on her back as he says something to Clint.
She can’t even decipher it as she looks wildly for the bathroom, her stomach cramping hard.
She finds the door and shuts herself inside the stall. Memories of a mirrored wall, just like the bathroom, make her close her eyes, trying desperately to stay present.
The voice in her ear reminds her to breathe, both males holding their concern back as she fishes it out and puts it onto the sanitary bin.
She can only deal with herself.
.
Tony waits outside the bathroom.
Clint thinks it’s unlikely the woman will show, and they’re both ready to call it a failure.
He’s worried for his friend, who he hadn’t even noticed she was struggling.
He opens his phone, texting Pepper to tell her they’re ok.
Jarvis continually scans the room.
At intermission there’s still no sign of Natasha as people flood in. Tony can’t help himself, he heads down towards the dancers.
He feels a chill up the back of his spine and seems to know it before Jarvis even says it.
“She’s behind you, Sir.”