Natasha Romanoff | Ghostbusters
no warnings
Steve slammed Natasha against the wall. Vincent was leaning against the wall next to them, holding a pack of peanuts he got from the vending machine.
"Where is it?" Steve hissed, frustrated with the redhead.
"Safe." She replied.
"Do better!"
Natasha looked into his eyes, looking for an answer. "Where did you get it?"
Steve put more pressure on her arms. "Why would I tell you?"
"Fury gave it to you. Why?"
Damn! This is just like watching an episode of Real Housewives.
Steve got the idea that she had opened the file. "What's on it?"
"I don't know." She answered truthfully.
"Stop lying!" He gritted through his teeth.
Vincent could see the slight smile on her face. "I only act like I know everything, Rogers."
"I bet you knew Fury hired the pirates, didn't you?" Steve looked out the room's window to make sure nobody was about to come in, or nobody was watching them.
"Well, it makes sense. The ship was dirty. Fury needed a way in, so do you."
Steve lifted her a little by her jacket. "I'm not gonna ask you again."
"Steve, watch it now, will you!" Vincent spoke, lightning sparking at his fingertips again.
Natasha looked at Vincent, giving him a look that it was fine. "I know who killed Fury. Most of the intelligence community doesn't believe he exists. The ones who do call him the Winter Soldier. He's credited with over two dozen assassinations in the last fifty years."
"So he's a ghost story." Steve deadpanned.
Guess we got upgraded to ghostbusters...
"Five years ago, I was escorting a nuclear engineer out of Iran. Somebody shot out my tires near Odessa. We lost control and went straight over a cliff, I pulled us out, but the Winter Soldier was there. I was covering my engineer, so he shot him straight through me." She pulled up her shirt to show him the scar on the side of her stomach.
"Soviet slug, no rifling. Bye-bye, bikinis."
"Goddamn," Vincent mumbled to himself turned out it wasn't quite enough because Natasha looked at him with a smirk and winked.
"Yeah, I bet you look terrible in them now," Steve told her. Natasha slightly smiled.
"Going after him is a dead end. I know, I've tried."
Natasha held up the flash drive. "Like you said, he's a ghost story."
Steve took the flash drive from her. "Well, let's find out what the ghost wants."
Natasha nodded and looked at Vincent. "First, we need to stop at a store to get mr. pretty boy over here a shirt."
___
"First rule of going on the run is, don't run, walk," Natasha informed the two.
Steve looked down at his shoes. "If I run in these shoes, they're gonna fall off."
"Thank you, Nat for telling me. I thought it was to run and catch everybody's attention." Vincent sarcastically chuckled while trying not to trip on his untied shoelaces.
"Shut up." She hissed stepping on his left shoe.
Vincent hit her arm. "Natasha, we've been through this Do. Not. Step on my Nike Air Trainer III's."
"Don't step on my shoes." She mocked.
"Shut up." He huffed.
She smirked. "Make me." That made Vincent speechless till they made it to the Mac store.
"The drive has a Level Six homing program, so as soon as we boot up SHIELD will know exactly where we are." Natasha acquainted.
"How much time do we have?" Steve questioned.
"Uh...about nine minutes from..." She popped the flash drive into a MacBook Pro.
"Now."
"Fury was right about that ship, somebody's trying to hide something. This drive is protected by some sort of AI, it keeps rewriting itself to counter my commands."
Steve looked around the store looking for any Strike agents. "Can you override it?"
"The person who developed this is slightly smarter than me. Slightly."
"Fucking shit," Vincent whispered next to them.
Natasha and Steve both looked at him confused.
He shrugged. "I was so close to the high score on subway surfers." He pointed to the phone.
Natasha continued to try and find out what's on the flash drive. "I'm gonna try running a tracer. This is a program that SHIELD developed to track hostile malware, so if we can't read the file, maybe we can find out where it came from."
"Can I help you guys with anything?" An apple employee asked.
Natasha grabbed Steve's arm. "Oh, no. My fiancé was just helping me with some honeymoon destinations."
"Cool, where-"
"Umm Aaron, do you think you could help me with this?" Vincent asked pointing to a Mac book two down from Natasha and Steve.
"Sure." Aaron followed Vincent to the Mac.
"So I was thinking about buying this, now how would I set it up?"
"The first time your MacBook Air starts up, the Setup Assistant walks you through the simple steps needed to start using your new Mac. Choose a country or region to set the language and time zone for your Mac. You can respond to all the prompts, or skip some and choose "Set up later" when you see that option. For example, it might make sense to set up Apple Pay, which requires a verified credit card, and Screen Time, which you can set for different users, after initial setup. Read on for more information about setup tasks." Aaron explained to a 'trying not to fall asleep' Vincent.
"Thank you. Can I give you my card to pay for it?" He told the employee.
"Yes, you can." Aaron walked to the front of the store and swiped Vincent's card and went to the back and grabbed a bag with a Mac in it. He walked back over to Vincent handed him the bag.
Vincent shook his hand. "Thank you, sir."
"Anytime." Aaron nodded and walked away.
Vincent walked over to Natasha and Steve. "You said nine minutes, come on."
"Shh, relax. Got it."
Vincent scoffed. "Relax? You're telling me to relax are you serious."
The screen zooms in and the signal is coming from Wheaton, NJ. "You know it?" Natasha asked Steve.
"I used to. Let's go." Steve pulled the flash drive from the computer and they walked out of the store.
"Natasha, you own me fucking nine hundred seventy-nine dollars and eighty-six cents for keeping the employee busy."
"I didn't tell you to buy anything."
Vincent scoffed. "How else did expect me to distract him?"
"Standard tac-team. Two behind, to across, two coming straight at us. If they make us, I'll engage, you hit the south escalator to the metro." Steve told them as two agents are coming straight towards them.
"Shut up and put your arm around me, laugh at something I said," Natasha addressed confusing Steve
"What?"
"Do it!" Steve quickly put his arm around Natasha and laughed as Vincent looked down at his shoes making sure there were no smudges.
As they are going down the escalator Natasha spotted Rumlow on the escalator next to them going up, she turned to Vincent knowing if he saw Rumlow it would be it for them.
"Kiss me."
Vincent's eyes widened. "I'm sorry, what?"
"Public displays of affection make people very uncomfortable. Take this Steve." She handed Steve her phone.
"Yeah, I guess they do." She quickly pulled Vincent's jacket collars down to her level so she could reach him, his hands landed on her hips, he felt her arch into his hold.
Rumlow rolled his eyes and looked away as he goes past them on the escalator.
Natasha pulled out of the kiss and started walking off the escalator with the two men following her. "You still uncomfortable?"
"Wishing the escalator was longer." He replied putting his hood on.
Steve handed Natasha her phone back. "I'm glad it's over, those things make me sick."
Vincent chuckled putting an arm around Steve. "Let's go grampa.
____
"So we have to steal a car?" Vincent asked his two superheroes/super-spy best friends...only friends except for Milo.
Natasha pushed a strand of her straight red hair out of her eyes. "Yes."
"And none of you know how to do that?" Vincent snorted.
Steve and Natasha rolled their eyes. "Yes, Vince."
"This is going to be fun I haven't done this sinc-." Vincent cut himself off as he remembered why he stopped.
"Since what?" Natasha questioned.
Vincent shook his head. "Nothing."
____
He watched as a woman parked her Chevrolet Silverado 1500 LTZ. After the woman walked inside the Mall and nobody was around the truck he hotwired the truck, as soon as the truck started Natasha opened the door to the front and climbed in and Steve climbed in the backseat.
"Where did Vincent Lanez learn how to steal a car?" Natasha questioned him.
"My older brother Timothee." Vincent smiled making a right turn. "And we're borrowing. Take your feet off the dash."
Natasha glared at him and took her feet off the dash.
"Timothee?" Steve asked, the whole time he knew Vincent he's never seen or heard about an older brother.
"Uhh, he died a year ago."
Steve frowned. "I-I didn't know, I-I'm sorry."
"It's fine Steve."
"Why didn't you tell me?" Natasha asked frowning.
Vincent sighed. "Because I can barely speak about."
Natasha nodded. "Alright, I have a question for you, oh, which you do not have to answer. I feel like if you don't answer it though, you're kind of answering it, you know?"
"Natasha."
"Was that a bad kiss?" She asked him, taking a drink of a water bottle Vincent had got her from a gas station earlier in the trip.
"No, it was a really good kiss. Why did you think it was a bad kiss?"
"I didn't say it was a bad kiss I asked if it was a bad kiss." She giggled defended herself.
They stopped at a red light and Vincent unbuckled his seat belt, he reached over the armrest console and kissed her.
"Was that a bad kiss?" He asked as he buckled his seatbelt back.
"N-No...No it wasn't." She stammered blushing.
___
Two hours into the trip Steve fell asleep and Natasha was dosing off and on.
"Why don't you go to sleep we have about thirty-two minutes left. I'll wake you when we get there." Vincent told her.
She nodded and grabbed Vincent's right hand that rested the armrest console and held his hand in hers.
Natasha soon fell asleep softly snoring. Vincent would occasionally glance down at the sleeping redhead he adored.
Vincent hopped out of the truck and woke up Steve.
"Son of a gun," Steve mumbled as he was shaken awake, he grabbed his shield and got out of the truck.
Vincent opened the passenger door and pushed a strang of Natasha's hair out of her face. "Natasha, wake up." He spoke softly.
Her eyes slowly opened and she sat up and looked around at their surroundings and shivered. "Vinnie, can I have your jacket?"
"Yeah." He took off his jacket and handed it to her, he helped her out of the truck.
"Thank you." She shivered, putting the jacket over her hoodie.
"This is it," Vincent spoke as he went to shake the gate but Natasha grabbed his arm.
Natasha put her phone in her back pocket. "The file came from these coordinates."
Steve looked at the sign on the gate that read Camp Lehigh. "So did I."
Vincent looked at him bewildered. "You were born here?"
Steve sighed while Natasha smiled.
Later that night as they walked around the base trying to pinpoint where the signal came from. "This camp is where I was trained."
"Now you tell us, after we've been here for forty minutes," Vincent murmured picking up a rock chucking it at a wall.
He and Natasha were walking on a platform while Steve was down on the ground.
Natasha held up her phone looking for a signal. "Changed much?"
"A little." Steve glanced at a camera on a pole.
"I think Steve is in la-la land." Vincent chuckled.
Natasha turned around and glanced at Steve. "Wonder what he's thinking."
"Come on Vinnie boo let's continue looking." She dragged him along with her.
____
Natasha and Vincent walked back to Steve. "This is a dead-end. Zero heat signature, zero waves, not even radio. Whoever wrote the file must have used a router to throw people off." She addressed putting her phone in her back pocket.
Vincent noticed a building ahead of them, he jumped over the railing of the platform walking towards the building.
"What is it?" Natasha questioned as she and Steve walked over to the building.
"Army regulations forbid storing ammunition within five hundred yards of the barracks. This building is in the wrong place." Vincent sighed.
"How do you know that?" Steve asked.
"Army kid."
Vincent stood back and Steve opened the lock with his shield and they entered inside, when they turned on the lights they noticed it's a SHIELD office.
"This is SHIELD." Natasha breathed out.
"Maybe where it started," Steve commented.
Vincent opened a door that entered into a room where they found old framed portraits of Howard Stark, Peggy, Col. Chester Phillips, and Vincent great great great grand father General. Thomas Lanez.
Natasha pointed to an unbalanced picture. "There's Stark's father."
Steve acknowledged. "Howard."
Natasha glanced at Steve. "Who's the girl?" Steve doesn't respond, he turned away and followed Vincent who didn't take interest in the pictures.
Vincent walked further down the room and stopped by a massive bookshelf and noticed a cobweb swaying.
"Fuck this is heavy." He mumbled as he pushed the bookshelf and it slid open to reveal an elevator behind it.
"Elevator?" Steve asked.
Natasha pulled out her phone and scanned the keypad.
She typed the password in and pushed the button it opened to Vincent's surprise the old thing worked.
Steve and Natasha walked into the elevator while Vincent gulped. "Y-You know what I-I'll stay here."
Natasha sighed and grabbed his arm. "Come on scaredy-cat."
They go down the elevator which took them to a room with old looking computers.
The elevator doors opened to a dark room, they walked out of the elevator the doors closed behind them.
Vincent gulped, he turned around and looked at the closed doors. "Oh hell no."
Natasha grabbed his hand to calm him down.
She took a glance around the room. "This can't be the data-point, this technology is ancient."
They walked to what looked like the main console. The lights flickered on. Natasha noticed a small flash drive port, she placed the flash drive in it which then activated the ancient computer.
"Initiate system?" The computer spoke.
Natasha typed using the keyboard. "Y-E-S spells yes. "
Natasha smiled and turned to Steve as the old computer started to cranks up. "Shall we play a game?" It's from a movie that...
"Yeah, I saw it." Suddenly they hear an accented voice speaking.
"Rogers, Steven. Born, 1918. Romanoff, Natalia Alianovna. Born, 1984. Lanez, Vincent. Born, 1990."
They see an old camera moving above them as it analyzed them.
Natasha looked at the camera puzzled. "It's some kind of a recording."
"I am not a recording, Fräulein. I may not be the man I was when the Captain took me, prisoner, in 1945, but I am." The computer screen shows an old photo of Dr. Arnim Zola.
Natasha turned towards Steve. "Do you know this thing?"
"Steve buddy, we need to talk about your friends." Vincent sighed.
Steve walked off the platform looking behind the computer. "Arnim Zola was a German scientist who worked for the Red Skull. He's been dead for years."
"First correction, I am Swiss. Second, look around you. I have never been more alive. In 1972 I received a terminal diagnosis. Science could not save my body, my mind, however, that was worth saving on two hundred thousand feet of data banks. You are standing in my brain."
Vincent scoffed. "You weren't very popular as a child where you?"
Steve walked back up where Natasha and Vincent were. "How did you get here?"
"Invited."
"It was Operation Paperclip after World War II. SHIELD recruited German scientists with strategic value." Natasha informed.
"They thought I could help their cause. I also helped my own."
Steve scoffed. "HYDRA died with the Red Skull."
"Cut off one head, two more shall take its place." Vincent could hear the smirk in his voice.
"Prove it." Steve challenged.
"Accessing archive." The computer screen shows them old footage of Johann Schmidt/Red Skull, of how the original SHIELD founders.
"HYDRA was founded on the belief that humanity could not be trusted with its own freedom. What we did not realize, was that if you try to take that freedom, they resist. The war taught us much."
"Holy shit," Vincent mumbled.
"Humanity needed to surrender its freedom willingly. After the war, SHIELD was founded and I was recruited. The new HYDRA grew. A beautiful parasite inside SHIELD. For seventy years HYDRA has been secretly feeding crisis, reaping war. And when history did not cooperate, history was changed."
Natasha walked closer to the screen. "That's impossible, SHIELD would have stopped you."
"Accidents will happen." The computer screen showed them HYDRA had killed Howard and Maria Stark making it look like a car accident along with the recent death of Fury.
"HYDRA created a world so chaotic that humanity is finally ready to sacrifice its freedom to gain its security. Once the purification process is complete, HYDRA's new world order will arise. We won, Captain. Your death amounts to the same as your Life; a zero-sum."
In anger, Steve smashed the computer screen.
"As I was saying..." Zola spoke.
"What's on this drive?" Natasha questioned getting frustrated at the computer...or person.
"Project Insight requires insight. So I wrote an algorithm."
Natasha walked closer to the computer screen. "What kind of algorithm? What does it do?"
"The answer to your question is fascinating. Unfortunately, you shall be too dead to hear it."
Natasha looked at Vincent in slight fear of what it meant by 'Too dead to hear it.' As much as she hated to admit but she was scared.
Suddenly the doors started to close, Steve tried to stop it by throwing his shield in between them but he's too late. He ran over to the door and tried to pry it open with his hands but it didn't work it was sealed shut.
"Vince, Steve, we got a bogey. Short-range ballistic. 30 seconds tops." Natasha addressed with worry laced in her voice.
"Who fired it?" Vincent inquired as he looked around the room for an entrance.
"S.H.I.E.L.D."
"I am afraid I have been stalling, Captain. Admit it, it's better this way. We're both of us...out of time." Zola told the three of them.
Vincent noticed a small opening on the ground, he threw the metal door aside and grabbed Natasha, Steve jumped in just as the place exploded and protected them with his shield.
Steve and Vincent managed to get out from under the building rubble just as STRIKE agents arrived to roam the area for them.
"Fuck." Vincent groaned picking a piece of glass out of his leg. He leaned down and picked up Natasha who was out cold.
"Come on we need to hurry," Steve spoke moving rock out of the way.
____
"She's going to be alright. Right?" Vincent asked Steve who was driving, Vince had sat in the back with Natasha who had her head resting on his lap asleep.
Steve looked in the rearview mirror. "She will be fine, Vince."
Natasha groaned as she regained consciousness. "What happened?" She asked her voice rasper then usual.
"A building fell on us," Steve uttered to her. He looked away from the road just for a split second to look back at the redhead.
"Sure feels like it." She groaned.
She looked down at her waist to see Vincent's left arm resting on her, Natasha noticed something off about it.
She and noticed when he would move his arm a little his body would tense. "What happened to your arm?"
"Nothing." He responded quickly which was a red flag for Natasha.
She reached down and touched his arm, again his body tensed. "I think your arm is broken."
"It's not, It's just sore you landed right on it." Vincent chuckled.
She looked up at him. "Sorry."
"It's fine, I still want you to pay me back."
"I'm not paying you back so get over it," Natasha rolled her eye.
Vincent gave her a playful glare before turning to Steve. "Aye, grampa where are we going?"
"To see a friend."