Just Watch Me
Silence.
From the look on Romanova’s face, it appears the idea of multiple defections hadn’t occurred to her. Being a college student must be rubbing off on her, because Darcy has to stifle the urge to snicker. She never imagined the Black Widow looking gobsmacked. Beautiful and deadly, the subject of hushed whispers, placed on some shadowy pedestal by tutors and trainees alike – it simply didn’t fit.
“Got out? Got out from where?” Jane asks, and Darcy no longer feels like laughing. Jane’s going to hate her when she finds out the truth. She can't count on Thor as a moderating presence (or more likely, as a distraction), because he's not here. From memory, he would be on Vanaheim by now, representing Asgard at some peace conference.
“The Red Room,” Barton says, snapping his fingers. “I’m right, aren’t I? She’s got the same look about her you did. Only, you know, less murderous.”
Knuckles white on her armrests, Darcy takes a deep breath and nods.
The room explodes into a frenzy of questions. Even Barton looks surprised, as if he didn’t expect to be right. Jane’s confused, bless her soul, as is Rogers. Everyone else is reacting with varying combinations of disbelief and fear.
“Quiet!” Rogers finally bellows. “What is the Red Room?”
Surprisingly, it is Bucky who offers an answer. “Russian training ground for female espionage operatives, of which the Black Widow is their most famous graduate.” He finishes with a nod towards Romanova.
“For- for spies? And you’re one of them?” Jane stammers, and the look in her eyes is everything Darcy feared.
Nodding once more, she closes her eyes and rests her head against the back of her chair. Anya’s face flashes up against the back of her eyelids and her eyes shoot open.
“When exactly did that email come in?”
“Three months ago,” Pepper says, glancing down at her tablet. “A few days before that break in. Was that you who killed those men?”
Darcy nods, seeing no point in hiding it. “They must’ve sent it to convince me to come back, and when that didn’t work, they sent the goons.”
“That makes sense. They didn’t seem to be the normal corporate espionage types.”
“Hold up, hold up. I think we’re focussing on the wrong thing here,” Clint breaks in. “Aren’t we going to talk about the Russian assassin in our midst?”
“Uh, which one?” Tony snarks, earning a glare from half the room.
“Tony, enough," Pepper says. "Who is this girl in the photo, Darcy? You said she was your sister.”
Darcy pastes a smile on and makes her voice extra-chirpy. “That’s Anna! We went to school together.”
Clint’s eyes narrow. “School, as in the Red Room? How is she still alive? I thought you had to kill each other as part of the training.”
“Turns out, training twenty-eight girls but only getting a single operative is not the most efficient way of doing things." There is a snort from beside her, but Darcy just continues, "better a few great operatives than a single perfect one." She pauses, considering how much to reveal. "After the defections, they even let us bond, to a certain extent. They thought if they gave us each other, we’d have a reason to stay.”
“Hold up. Defections?” Barton asks, emphasising the ‘s’.
“Yeah, her and Belova. They disappeared about the same time?”
Romanova gives a short bark of a laugh. “Yelena didn’t defect. She didn’t have the imagination. She tried to kill me, or drag me back - I’m still not sure which one. SHIELD cleaned that up for me – they must have done a better job than I thought to disappear her so effectively."
For the first time in a long while, Darcy is struck speechless. When she finds her voice again, it’s oh-so-slightly squeaky. “Are you saying she didn’t defect?”
Her only answer is a flat stare.
“We based our escape on hers! She's the one who stayed hidden, even after you joined SHIELD. We wanted that.”
“That's that ‘we’ again,” Barton says, a frown wrinkling his brow. “Who exactly are we talking about?”
Darcy chooses her words carefully. “There were five of us who survived training; they’re all the family I have left!”
The metal hand on her shoulder tightens but she doesn’t correct herself out loud. If one good thing has come out of this, it is that the spotlight has been taken off her soulmate and onto her.
"I can't believe we missed the defection of five Red Room recruits," Barton mutters.
Darcy shrugs. "Like I said, we didn't want to be found."
“So what happens now?” Pepper asks, always the practical one. Darcy liked her: a day ago, they'd be somewhere close to friends, what with the looking-after-reckless-idiots thing they had in common. She's not sure where they stand now.
"I need to find Anna, get her out. She'd never have gone back willingly."
"You do realise that it's a trap, right?"
Darcy levels a glare at Stark. "She's my sister. Not that you'd understand."
"I'm just saying, you don't seem much like a Black Wid-" He stares at the knife protruding from the chair over his left shoulder. "What the hell? Friday, where did that come from?"
"Ceramic blade, invisible to metal detectors." Darcy spins a second knife in her fingers, expression daring him to continue. A similar knife has appeared in Romanova's hand, clenched tightly in her fist, her focus laser-sharp.
Satisfied that Stark will shut up for now, Darcy slides her remaining knife away. After a moment, Romanova does the same.
Rogers clears his throat. “First order of business is to rescue this Anna, if she’s still alive. After that, we’ll see.”
“We’re not going to arrest her?” Tony's voice is sceptical.
“For what? There’s no record of me ever committing a crime on American soil.”
“How about for fraud and false identification?” Jane snaps and Darcy winces.
“Nonsense.” Rogers says. “If she’s anywhere as skilled as Nat –“
“I am,” Darcy interjects.
“-then I’m sure Darcy would be a great addition to the Avengers.”
“Yeah, that’s not going to happen.”
“Excuse me?”
“You heard me, Spangles. I’m not joining the Avengers. I’m finishing my Masters and getting a dog.”
Rogers looks like she hit him on the back of the head with a board and she is momentarily sorry for the chaos she has unleashed upon his world in the last few hours. “But- but why not?”
“Because I don’t want to. Because the whole reason I left the Red Room was to get away from this.”
“But you have skills, a duty!”
“A duty to what?” she scoffs. “To America? Not my country. To use my powers for good and never evil? Why should I? I never volunteered for that life!”
“Darcy, none of us volunteered for this!” A tiny part of Darcy’s mind notes that Romanova’s accent grows stronger when she is upset.
Darcy points an accusing finger at Steve Rogers, who flushes.
“Okay, ignoring Rogers, the rest of us didn’t volunteer!”
“But you’re here now,” she points out. “You choose to go out and do good. I’m choosing something different.”
“Why should we help you, then?” Rogers asks, watching her reaction. “If you’re not one of us, why should we get involved? Why shouldn't we hand this mess over to SHIELD?”
Darcy freezes, mind working furiously. Once again, it’s her soulmate to the rescue. “Do you really want a foreign organisation of unknown allegiance to have their own Black Widow? This might be your only chance to neutralise this asset. Besides, where she goes, I follow. Betray us to SHIELD and you'll never see me again.”
Rogers flinches, and damn she’s going to have to get to the bottom of all this because the good Captain’s resolve crumples like a house of cards.
Stark’s watching with interest too, but Pepper’s looking at something on her tablet and Jane is steadfastly ignoring Darcy. Romanova and Barton seem to be communicating silently, but for all her training, Darcy can’t work out what they’re saying.
“I have research to do,” Jane announces, pushing herself away from the table and standing. “And apparently, I need to start looking for a new assistant.”
“I have a meeting to get to,” Pepper says, standing. She pauses at the door. “For what it’s worth, Darcy, you’ve been a good worker here and we’re happy to keep you on, even in some other capacity.”
With their exit, only the Avengers are left in the room. Her soulmate slips into the chair Jane vacated as Romanova perches on the table beside Barton. Rogers has his stern face back on and even Stark looks serious for once.
“Alright Lewis,” Stark says. “Spill.”