Budapest, Hungary (17/04/2005)
Natalia- no, Galina, smiled, a sweet, disarming smile, so different from the baring of teeth the assassin Black Widow called a smile. Barton- no, Petrov, slung an arm around her shoulders, laughing a loud, low laugh, so different from the subtle, occasional snorts the sniper Hawkeye would let out.
The mark- no, Ivan, as he insisted they call him, never stood a chance. Galina’s dainty frame and low cut dress, paired with Petrov’s golden hair and golden nature? The pair charmed him completely, and he didn’t see anything wrong with leading the two undercover agents into his safe room, letting Galina leave for the toilet, and allowing Petrov to sit by Ivan’s computer.
Galina was shed as soon as she was out of Ivan’s sight, and Natalia opened up the ceiling to retrieve their stash of guns, and the duffel with their tac suits. Stripping out of the provocative dress, she paused before putting on the tac suit she’d been fitted for.
This was STRIKE team Delta’s second ever op together. Budapest, Hungary. Mark: Ivan Smirnov, the son of an OGPU agent, had fled to a family home in Budapest when the Kremlin began targeting him. Natalia had been sent in along with Barton - whom she still had her reservations about - to find the information stored on his hard drive, and if necessary, to take him out.
It wasn’t the mission that gave Natalia pause - it hadn’t been, since she was eleven and deemed old enough for missions - it was the organisation she was working for.
S.H.I.E.L.D. A ridiculous name - Peggy Carter had filled in words that may as well have been nonsense, so the initials could be a tribute to her dead ex-boyfriend - a faceless, nameless organisation working globally, with full autonomy. How could anyone oppose them when they were everywhere?
Natalia had very few morals - she had been raised a cutthroat assassin - but she had been forced to join a team with a man she barely knew, working under the supervision of another man she barely knew. Her closest friends at SHIELD were Barton and Coulson - and Maria, Masha, the girl who brought her lunch. She heard rumours about her Masha - that she was moving up, she was better than Hand, than Coulson, that Fury had his eyes on her - but to Natalia, Masha was a friendly face. And it was Masha’s quiet insistence that had Natalia agreeing to this op, going against Mother Russia like this.
It was a little bit about the mission. Natalia had been a child of Mother Russia since 1984. Now here she was - Easter, 2005 - turning against her country. Barton - a 20 year old American - had no idea how hesitant she had been to go on this op. Or maybe he did, the man was an enigma - he acted the class clown, but she had seen him kill a man nearly two miles away, headshot, clean between the eyes. He used a bow and arrow - if it were anyone else, it would seem archaic, outdated, patently ridiculous, but the blond man used the medieval weapon like he was born to it. From what little she’d gleaned from Coulson about his childhood, maybe he was.
Natalia donned the tac suit, holstering her guns - her Makarov, the Beretta M9 Masha had pressed into her hands, her collection of knives - and fitted a silencer on her Glock, cocking it, holding it in one hand while she dragged Barton’s duffel with the other. As she neared the safe room, she spotted Ivan’s surprised expression and buried a 9mm in his forehead.
At Barton’s sigh, she tossed him his duffel, kicked Smirnov under the computer table, and holstered her Glock to clap her hands at Barton, impatient.
“It does not take this long to download a hard drive,” she chided in Hungarian, “you are slow.” As soon as Barton unplugged his SHIELD drive from the computer, she dragged him out of the safe room, hitting the button to close the room back up.
“Leaving the Kremlin a present?” Barton quipped - in English - his American twang grating on Natalia’s ears. “Or hoping they won’t find him?”
Natalia growled and kicked his duffel, spurring him to start loading up. He headed into the bathroom to change, and she chanced a look out of one of Smirnov’s tinted windows, her heart sinking.
“Idióta, people are here,” she called to Barton, switching to English, hoping his ears were in. “Kremlin or mafia, I cannot tell yet, but hostile definitely.” She pulled her Makarov from its holster, feeling more comfortable with its familiar weight in her hands. “Get changed quickly.”
When Barton exited the bathroom, his mechanical bow in his hands, Natalia would never admit to the fact that she was pleased to see him. There was something comforting about the fact that he was there for her. “Come, -” she was cut off by the shattering of glass, and a bullet impacting Smirnov’s wall. Barton hopped out of the window first, firing on the hostiles, while Natalia secured the hard drive in a pocket of her tac suit and stashed the duffels back in the ceiling. No SHIELD issue equipment should be found by enemies.
When she exited the house, Barton was unconscious and there were Kremlin operatives searching his pockets. Natalia cocked her Makarov, ignoring her trembling hands, and began to open fire.
Barton only stirred once throughout the entire firefight, and that was when Natalia managed to blow up one of the hostile trucks and the light near-blinded her. They kept coming, more arriving in trucks and cars, but she pushed down her fear and protected Barton. Once she was relatively sure she had put down all of the soldiers there, she grabbed Barton and hopped in one of the cars, driving as fast as she could to their safe house.
Natalia had killed dozens of Kremlin operatives. Barton killed three men.
“Just like Budapest all over again!”
“You and I remember Budapest very differently.”