Natasha
Chapter 12: Blair’s POV
Blair followed Steve up the stairs to the laboratory area. After the events of yesterday, just as her vision had predicted, they were going to start to try to quantify her powers. Blair knew incredibly little about the origin of her power. Although she had been born empathic, her power had grown immensely and become something entirely new after Hyrda had experimented on her unwilling body.
“So you don’t remember anything else?” Steve asked one last time as they approached the lab door.
“No, only what I said yesterday just flashes, pain. It all feels like a fever dream really. I mean I would guess it was surgical based on the scarring….” Blair trailed off tracing one of the scars which ran horizontal across her lower left rib cage. Often the scar ached and throbbed, the same way her head did when the power was restless.
Steve paused, his hand on the door handle of the lab entrance, “Hey, we will figure it out okay? You’re definitely not the first rogue scientific experiment we’ve seen.” he smiled jokingly at her and she felt slightly better for a moment. Until he pulled open the lab door and she stepped inside.
Even though she had been in Tony’s lab before, experiencing a vision in real time was disorienting. She felt nauseous as she looked at the chairs she and Natasha were supposed to sit in, they were positioned the same way they had been in her head yesterday. As she took her seat she noticed Steve still stood at the door, arms crossed watching her.
“Are you okay?” he asked.
She nodded.
“Okay, I’ll go get Natasha.” he said as he turned back toward the doorway.
A few minutes later the door to the room opened and Natasha walked in giving Blair a hesitant smile and taking a seat in the empty chair that was across from her.
“Are you sure you’re ready for this?” she asked Natasha.
Natasha smiled again before replying “As ready as I’ll ever be.”
“You don’t have to do this you know.” Blair said frowning as she realized she was repeating the dialogue from her vision.
“I know, but Tony thinks it will help.” Natasha reassured her.
Tony appeared suddenly, waltzing into the lab a holographic tablet and other equipment in hand. “Okay I think we are almost set up.” he said looking quite pleased with himself.
“Bruce, Steve, and I will be right next door in the observation room, through that two way mirror.” he pointed off to the east side of the room. “There can’t be more people in here or we won’t get an accurate energy reading. You can hit this button,” he said handing Blair a tiny remote, “when you move through different phases of the mind scan or whatever it is called and we will see if it causes any differential energy spikes.”
“Remember this is the first test we are running so we might not get anything groundbreaking but it is a good start” he said looking between Blair and Natasha, “So we’re good to go.”
He gave them a thumbs up and walked out the door shutting it behind him.
Blair turned toward Natasha. “Are you sure you want me to go digging around inside your head.”
“Yeah I trust you.” Natasha replied, “Just don’t tell anyone all the horrible things you learn about me.”
Blair wasn’t sure how much of that request was a joke and how much was the truth but she extended her hand out to Natasha palm up so that Natasha could easily severe their connection if she needed to.
“I’ll go slowly” she said
Blair closed her eyes and she let her powers burst free the connection of their hands joining her and Natasha’s mind. Blair’s powers sang happily in response but she still focused on keeping them in check. She wanted to follow the protocol she had planned before agreeing to do this experiment.
“Natasha?” Blair spoke quietly into her mind
“Yes?” Natasha’s voice answered softly back, she sounded nervous
“This is the forefront of your mind.” Blair spoke again, “Here I can see only what you allow me to see, stream of conscious, immediate thoughts and reactions, and surface emotions. We can also converse here.”
“Before I go deeper in your mind I’m going to teach you how to keep me out if you ever wished to. Okay? Focus on what I am doing.”
Blair first imagined building a brick wall between her and Natasha’s joined mind. Brick by brick she put the wall into place until she imagined it was complete severing the connection between their minds. Allowing the brick wall to disappear she performed the same action again, only this time she imagined a metal steel wall sliding between them until they were disconnected again. Lowering it she spoke to Natasha again.
“Okay now you try, use whatever method you wish. When you finish I am going to prod it, try to get around your mental defenses. Try to keep me out. If I can’t get in I’ll squeeze your hand and then let it down and we will continue. Do you understand?”
“I understand.” Natasha’s nervousness was suddenly accompanied by determination.
Ever the soldier, she was more comfortable with training than with emotional vulnerability. Shakily Natasha drew an iron curtain between them, severing the connection, just barely. Blair poked at Natasha’s defenses with her mind and they came crumbling down.
Blair gave Natasha a wave of encouragement, “That’s okay, it was really good for your first try we can practice.” she said “Okay, Nat? Are you okay if I enter your mind now?”
Natasha nodded, but Blair felt a wave of discomfort wash over her. To counter it Blair sent her a wave of calm and a memory… the first time they had trained together, the banter, laughter…
Gripping Natasha’s subconscious she pushed it toward the memory, lulling her into a dreamlike state. She wouldn’t accompany Blair on the deep dive into her own head. Most people weren’t ready for that, Blair was pretty sure even she wouldn’t be ready for that.
Taking a deep breathe she unleashed her full telepathic power on Natasha’s mind. Blair spiraled through her memories, her life, experiencing it all as if it was a movie in fast motion. She didn’t have any concept of time when she did a mindcast this powerful, it could have been minutes or hours, it made no difference to her. She flew through her friend’s past feeling every blow of her Red Room training, meeting Clint, joining Nick Fury at S.H.I.E.L.D, the weight of her past crimes, the guilt that she carried every day. Soon she reached the near present, saw their own meeting through Natasha’s eyes. Experienced the terror she had felt waking up immobilized and wounded in Blair’s apartment.
Yanking herself from Natasha’s memories Blair steadied herself, reined in her power. Pulling it back and centering herself. Gently she reached for Natasha’s conscious mind, rousing her from the meditative state.
“Was that it?” Natasha asked drawing a deep breathe.
“Yeah, I told you it would be painless.” Blair smiled. “But since I just invaded your mind I thought I would repay the favor and show you what it was like.”
Blair reached into her own memories pulling her perspective of the events of the day at Horizon labs and pushed it into Natasha’s mind, letting her experience the memory the same way she had gone through hers.
“Whoa…” Natasha inhaled
And drew her had from Blair’s severing the connection between them. She looked up at Blair.
“See anything terrible?” she asked, studying her friend.
“Lots” Blair teased smiling at her.
The door to the lab swung open and Tony stood in the doorway.
“25 minutes” he said checking his watch. “What to come see the results?” he asked tilting his head towards the control room.