Poppies

Evasion is done better in the summer, Natasha Romanov thought as she blended in with the lunchtime crowd in Budapest. January in northern climates were a pain. Cold and snowy, and hidden ice was always a risk when moving at speed. Hours of daylight were limited, which was both a plus and a minus. The plumes made by your breath could easily betray you if you were trying to hide. On the plus side, with everybody bundled up in thick coats, hats and scarves, it was easy to blend in and her trademark red hair was covered and unremarkable.

Niko Constantine had been sent by the Red Room to track her down and bring her back. The Wolf Spider made her nervous, and she didn't understand why they were still sending him out on missions. He was unreliable, refusing to work with his handler or follow protocols. And he was more violent than he needed to be. There were rules and protocols, even in work like this, but he ignored them when it was convenient to do so.

And now there was this other guy. Hair an unremarkable brown, face that was pleasant enough but not handsome or even cute, and not ugly enough to be interesting. But he moved with discipline and training. She wondered what government had sent him. It would make a difference in her tactics if she knew what type of training he'd had, what expectations his handlers would have for the mission.

She immediately halted the idle speculation and concentrated on her objective, which was to shake her two tails. She detoured through a few shops, exiting through the back as they'd expect her to, but also making a few quick purchases, easily concealed in the pockets of her puffy black coat, unremarkable and just like the coats of about a third of the pedestrians out today. Finally, she went into the largest store in the area, pulling off her hat, scarf and gloves in the midst of the crowd, and putting on a dark green beret and plain blue scarf and gloves. Her newly dyed dark chestnut hair hung straight, unlike her usual curls. She switched her walk to add a lot more hipsway and slowed down slightly. She walked right past Constantine, who gave her no notice. The other guy was still watching in her direction, however. As she walked past a restaurant, she deliberately bumped into a single man, and after apologizing, accepted his invitation to lunch. Spies have to eat and use the bathroom too, so she had a pleasant lunch and touched up her makeup to subtly change the shape of her lips, contouring her face a little differently, arching her brows a bit more. She agreed to a date with the man. Too bad she'd be long gone, he seemed nice. But nice wasn't for women like her.

She changed hats again after lunch, this time a stocking hat in a dark blue to match her scarf and gloves. She didn't see evidence of either tail, but it was too early to relax. She had to make one pass this evening, then she could blow out of town and into her new life. Freelancing. It had a strong appeal.

She spent the afternoon browsing through stores. She'd have liked to go to a movie, stop moving, relax a bit, but sitting down gives your opposition time to find you, to disrupt your work, kill you if the mission is important enough. She settled into a waiting pattern; outwardly calm and interested in her shopping, inwardly she reviewed barre exercises to reinforce the external calm. First position, second, third, fourth, fifth. Tendu front, side, back. Degage front, side, back. The concentration helped keep her mind clear and the memories that led her toward this moment at bay. Grand battement front, side, back. It wasn't so much the killing; some of the people she'd liquidated were truly better off for it. It wasn't the occasional theft; that was kind of a thrill. It wasn't the injuries she'd received or the people she'd had to fuck, either, although the brutality of the last man was still felt deep in her tissues even though the bruises around her wrists and ankles and the cuts he'd inflicted had healed. Demi plie in first, full plie in first. It was the culmination of it all, really. The feeling that she'd done a lot of bad things to a lot of people, whether or not they'd deserved what they'd gotten. And sometimes they didn't deserve what had happened. Some of those who did had had families who were depending on them, who didn't know how black their souls really were. Demi plie in second, full plie in second.

So this was her chance. With this database, she'd have enough leverage to strike out, choose her own jobs. Where she could choose how to execute the mission, when or if to seduce, when to fight, when to kill. She would be able, for the first time in her memory, to relax. Slightly.

She liked Budapest a lot, usually. The two roads that encircled the city and the roads that radiated out through it always reminded her of the facets of a gemstone. The city was beautiful, as well. She took the Chain Bridge across the Danube into Buda. From there, she got a Dobos torte at Ruszwurm, the oldest confectionary in the city, and strolled through Castle Hill, finally fetching up at Fishermen's Bastion. It was probably her favorite place in Buda. It was a lot more fun to wander around in during the warmer months, but the dusting of fresh snow it currently boasted was enchanting. She walked from her favorite vantage overlooking the Hungarian Parliament building, moving with purpose toward a massive arch, the bulb in the lighting fixture blowing out. She had the tiny envelope with the payment in her hand; it contained an account number and password instead of physical payment, and as she trotted down the stairs, past the imposing, watchful statues, she brushed the hand of a woman coming up. The envelope left her fingers and an external drive placed in her hand. Without breaking stride, she tucked it into her pocket--a careful slit in the pocket allowed the drive to fall into her parka, more secure. She exited the bastion, passing by the ornate statue of St. Stephen. She felt a searing pain on the side of her neck and knew it for the graze of a bullet. She ducked around the base of the statue into more gunfire, this time not silenced. People in the square screamed and ran; Natasha brought out her own guns and prepared. She ran across the square to Matthias Church and was hit by a ricochet in the hip before she'd gone three paces. She exerted her will and ran, stuffing the pain down until she could unpack it later. From the firing patterns, Nico had brought a friend. They seemed to be herding her toward the church, which made her wary, but she made it up the steps and through St. Mary's door without further incident.

Moving swiftly and silently, she came up behind a man watching the main entry, a pistol held discreetly down against his leg. She snapped his neck and shoved him out of sight in the stairwell of the Matthias tower, (she felt kind of bad about that, but at least she hadn't spilled blood in the church) picked up his gun (no point in letting it go to waste) and blended in with a group of parishioners leaving the church, discreetly dropping away as they stood in shock, looking at the police cars with their flashing lights, responding to reports of gunshots. The whine of gunshots made everybody in the square duck for cover; screams and shouts rang through the cold night air and at least one person had been hit.

That person was not Natasha. She stood up, emptied the magazines of her gun and the found gun at Niko and his little friend, dropping the gun she'd picked up, and ran for her life, putting the police between herself and them. She could see the conveyance pulling up to Chain Bridge and ran with all her might, catching it just before it pulled away. It was almost deserted. She smiled cheerily and the other passengers and went to sit behind them, concealing her injuries. The puffy black coat helped a lot.

Next step; evacuation. A stop by her hotel to pick up her essentials, and she was in the wind. She'd travel a bit before setting up business for herself. She just had to get out of here first.

She'd taken a room at the Corinthia, which went against most of her training as it was expensive and not low key. However, it was large and had a good turnover rate. She returned there only to sleep and shower, had never seen staff except for check in, and felt fairly anonymous. She got out of the cab near Vajdahunyad Castle, which, except for the agricultural museum, was free and open twenty four hours a day. She touched up her makeup in the cab, making it seem like she was meeting someone there, then slipped into the shadows. Her intuition told her that she was being followed. She went down by the moat, avoiding the light, moving lightly. Stepping behind a big tree, she waited until the person following her passed, then cocked the pistol as a warning. The sound brought the man to an abrupt halt, and he turned to face her. In the dim light, she could see it was the mystery man from earlier in the day.

"We haven't met," he said blithely. "I'm Clint."

"I don't care," she said. "Why are you following me?" His attention was caught behind her and before she could turn to examine why, he'd flicked what she'd taken to be a big roll of paper open and had an arrow nocked on a bowstring. A threatening thrum, the arrow was away and there was a splash. Natasha looked into the moat to see a man floating in the water, bobbing gently up and down.

"Come on. You have other suitors," he said urgently, and in a split second she made up her mind and followed. He led her back to the Corinthia, but not to her room. His, apparently. He hadn't unpacked either, and what she could see of his wardrobe was mostly black. Although there were some purple boxers there. Huh. "You ok?" he asked, emerging from the bathroom with a dop kit and a handful of hotel toiletries.

"Nothing severe," she said.

"Take off your coat," he instructed, and she wordlessly showed him the graze on her neck and the bullet wound on her hip. He trotted to the bathroom and she could hear him wash his hands, returning with a warm damp washcloth. She used this to clean the graze on her neck, and hissed as he flicked the bullet out of her hip. "Good thing that was almost spent when it hit you," he observed, and unzipped something from his suitcase. She yelped at the splash of alcohol on the wound, then slapped a gauze pad on and taped it. "Go get your stuff. Bring it back here. I don't think there's much time," he said, and she put her coat on and returned to her room, thinking about running. But as the door clicked behind her as she entered the hall with her suitcase, she heard the elevator stop and hustled back down to that guy's room. The door closed behind her just as the elevator doors opened. The man--Clint--extinguished the lights and flipped the deadbolt, drawing her back into the room. The curtains were shut, leaving the room black. It wasn't long before they could hear voices speaking Russian. Nico. He was agitated, swearing at having lost her, describing what he'd do to her if he got the chance. Made her wish for vagina dentata. Then they started knocking on doors. She could see a shadow pass over the door's peephole. It took awhile, but they gave up and left. Clint listened intently.

"They're gone," he said normally, and brushed past her to turn on the lights. "Ok," he said. "Here's the thing. I've been sent here to kill you. My boss thinks you're a little too dangerous to be operating."

Her heart beat a little faster, but she didn't betray her concern by so much as the flick of an eye. "And what's your opinion?"

"I think you're going rogue," he said, surprising her. She barely managed to control a blink, turning it into a narrowing of her eyes instead. "And I think that represents an opportunity. I've been watching you," he said softly. "I think you're here in Budapest not just for the shopping and the wonderful array of headgear they have for the winter but to make one final score that will enable your independence, and that guy was here to stop you. And then you'd either retire or set up shop for yourself."

"And what if you're correct?" she said levelly.

"Well, if it's the former, maybe I could turn the other way. If it's the latter... that's harder to negotiate." He looked at her. "But it doesn't have to end in your end," he said with a bit of a grin. "I think you've got some skills that could be useful to an organization I work for."

"I'm tired of being told what to do," she said, a touch sullenly.

He measured her, then nodded. "What if you got the assignment but could plan how to execute it?" That caught her interest. He nodded again. "I've been watching you for some time now, Natasha Romanov." Her heart kicked at the sound of her name. This was more than something casual. "I've seen you in action. You've got some very specific training. Espionage. Theft. Seduction. Execution. Hacking. It's impressive. So here's what I'm offering. Not to kill you, but to bring you in. My boss will most likely make you my partner. I'd be responsible for you since I'm recruiting you. I'm a marksman myself, but I could use some help with other aspects of missions. I'm not going to say we're on the side of the angels, but I actually do believe that we're operating with a fair amount of decency and fairness, for a covert ops agency. You'd be joining a team. We don't get together for a kumbayah circle and smores, but we have each other's back."

They stared at each other. Clint seemed fine with waiting for her to decide, not pushing her.

"Who do you work for?"

"Every heard of SHIELD?"