Ghosts
Sweat drops down Natasha’s spine as she holds onto the bar, grasp as light as possible as she tries to make her movement look effortless.
She’s failing.
Madam B hits her with the switch again against her hand. The flexible rod makes lines across her knuckles and it’s brought down in three quick successions.
“Again.”
The girls make the same four motions, legs shaking as the hour rolls on.
“Again.”
The activity doesn’t deviate, and Natasha feels her concentration waning as it becomes rote.
The switch comes down hard on Evette in front of her and Natasha is brought to attention.
“This is too basic,” Madam says, disdainfully, “but you’re all in need of mastering the basics as it seems to be something you’ve all forgotten.”
“Again,” she commands.
Florence is the first to drop, breathing heavily as she uses the bar to help herself up again.
“Sorry,” she apologises.
She’s sent away, likely to the barracks for running, and Natasha can’t help but think that would almost be better.
Despite the cold, the cramping of her calves as she goes up and down on her toes, she wants to be the last one standing.
It is painful, and it seems like this is the only way it will end, with all of them passed out on the floor.
“You’re all so lazy,” they’re chastised as Ana is next to fall. They frog match her away as her legs shake leaving the room.
Eight girls left and Natasha breathes through the pain.
“Keep going,” the woman commands.
Natasha tries to concentrate on anything else but the fatigue, the pain, the powerlessness of her position.
She smells sweat and as Madam sweeps past, perfume. It’s sickly smell makes it’s mark, as she turns her her away from it, the wrong move as the switch hits her shoulders.
“Wrong Natasha.”
Three times she’s hit on the back of her upper thighs, red welts now adding to the pain.
“Again!” The music, bleeds into her brain, Tchaikovsky’s score blends past and present as the music plays over the speakers indicating the end of intermission.
Natasha hears ghosts in her head as she’s told to stand.
Sees Madam B standing near the bathroom mirror, but it’s wrong, it’s all wrong.
The smell is the same but it’s not her.
“Sorry,” she mumbles at the woman waiting for the bathroom.
She grabs at the earpiece and leaves.
.
“Natasha, can you hear me? Goddammit,” Clint rappels down as soon as Jarvis tells Tony that the woman is behind him.
Tony’s suit whizzes passed his head and he grimaces, hoping that it gets to him in time.
He heard Natasha’s panicked breath and Tony questioning her but had thought they had time.
Time for her to het her shit together, to pull herself out of the panic. He’s worried about both of them but thinks out of the two of them, Tony is in more danger.
“Fuck,” he mutters to himself, making a decision he doesn’t want to.
“Natasha, if you can hear me get to the lower floor, help Tony now,” he says urgently.
He runs through the doors, guns at the ready, and heads down the stairs.
He hears the sounds of a gunshot and heads there. He’s met with a man punching at his head. As he deflects it, he recognises the scar above his eye from Natasha’s debrief file.
It’s likely that he was of the one who broke Tony’s arm and pushed a cattle prod into Natasha.
Calmly, he disarms the man, shoots him once, then twice to make sure it sticks and moves on.
“Agent Barton, Agent Romanoff appears to be back online,” Jarvis tells him, and a slight bit of relief washes over him.
Clint reaches Tony, much to his relief, he’s suited up and relatively safe.
She got a hold of Tony, and even though he hits her with a repulsed, she seems to absorb it, and hold him harder, the burn of his suit almost blinding.
The woman is glowing.
It strikes Clint that in desperation, she’s injected herself.
“Tony, you’ve dealt with Extremis before, what do we do here?”
“Get her away from me!” Tony’s clearly panicking.
Another gunshot rings out as Clint ducks, he waits and calculates the trajectory, the movement of the man and terrain, and then shoots twice as he looks up from cover.
There’s gunshots from above and he feels Natasha near.
.
She runs.
Shaking her head to get rid of the intrusive thoughts pounding in her head. She kicks off her shoes, glad that she picked a dress that allows movement.
As soon as the earpiece is back in, she hears Tony yelling and Clint shooting. The scene is a mess.
The passing thought is that she really needs to teach Tony some self defence, because what she’s seeing is ridiculous.
The woman is holding fast to his suit, she’s… glowing. Extremis.
Natasha calculates the scene and the outcomes resting on on each of the variables.
She shoots one man, before ducking as another shoots back.
First Tony, she decides, seeing Clint peek out and make a perfect shot.
“Tony!” She shouts.
He looks up, and so does the woman, who sees Natasha and lets Tony go.
“Did it work?” The woman yells at her.
“Are you like me?”
She rushes towards Natasha, with seemingly superhuman speed.
She’s read Tony’s debrief of Extremis, knows the only way to kill her now is through an explosion. There’s too many people here, too many civilians.
“Clint, evacuate everyone,” she says, a little desperate.
Clint runs to the side of the room, and pulls the fire alarm. Immediately, the sprinklers set off, soaking the room, and carpeted halls.
He leaves; hacking over the PA and telling everyone to evacuate through the front. He thinks all the goons are either dead or running because the only one left is… her.
Clint runs and it happens in slow motion.
She’s standing over Natasha menacingly, as Tony sends his suit to cover her.
The protective shell encases her before the woman hits her with glowing hands, leaving Tony vulnerable.
The woman turns as Clint runs to cover him, shooting her twice. It doesn’t make any difference.
Tony raises his hands to protect his head, his partially healed arm front and centre, as a second suit comes flying.
Clint almost laughs in relief. He’s got back up plans on back up plans, just like he does.
Natasha isn’t idle, moving in the suit like it’s made for her.
He hears her counting in her head as she sends the suit back towards the woman like some bizarre game of reverse keepings off.
As it attaches to her, the woman yells in frustration, but there’s nothing she can do.
Natasha makes the call, and the suit blows inwardly, holding its shape but the force of the pressure creates a shockwave; pushing Clint on top of Tony and Natasha into the wall.
.