VENUS VADYAEVA. RED Room trained assassin, graduate of the Black Widow program. She'd nearly always been at the top of the class. Cold; smart; ruthless. The qualities that they were looking for. It'd taken a little while, but eventually, she'd gotte...
NATASHA AND VENUS were sparring. That, in itself, was normal. Clint was watching them as he checked and adjusted the arrowheads on their shafts, a smile on his face. It was quite a sight to see. The two of them were almost evenly matched, with Natasha being able to gain the upper hand most of the time, though the matches could draw on for well over half an hour before ending. The first time that Venus had lost, she's brushed it off easily, simply standing and muttering something about close combat not being her best skill. It had made Natasha laugh, and had shown Clint how much deeper their relationship had been than he'd thought.
At this point, it'd been almost half a year since they'd brought Venus in, and she and Clint had grown to like each other more, mostly bonding through whatever sarcasm he used or she let slip. She was still remarkably tense and secretive, and the blank look on her face often made lower-level agents hurry out of her way in corridors. That might not have been the intended effect, but she didn't seem to mind. Then again, she didn't seem to have much of an opinion or anything, and the only time that he'd seen her relaxing was with Natasha, and even then, she didn't show much.
Venus was maybe an inch taller than Natasha, but her cold manner and blank expression always made her seem taller, more intimidating. She seemed to fill more space, to give you the idea that she knew exactly what she was doing, even if she didn't. It was a cold sort of confidence that invaded other people in the worst way, and he was still surprised that she hadn't even made an attempt to leave SHIELD, or even harm someone else. He knew that Natasha trusted her, which increased his own faith in the woman, but Fury didn't yet, and for good reason. Not to mention that she refused to walk around the building without her gloves on, which none of them knew anything about. Natasha had seemed just as intrigued about it as he was when Fury had brought up the matter, which, apparently, had only deepened Fury's mistrust.
The sound of someone hitting the sparring mats dragged him out of his wonder about the golden eyed woman, just in time to see her hook her hand around Natasha's leg from her position on the floor and pull it towards her, harshly. The redhead would've hit the ground if she hadn't managed to get free of Venus' grasp and regain her balance, only to focus on her gaze on the spot that Venus had been in a second ago, mouth open, ready to make a snide remark, only to find it empty.
Instead, Venus was standing behind Natasha, her hands raised and ready to wrap around the redhead's neck in a headlock, causing Clint to lean forwards in interest, only for his face to fall into a frown as the woman froze, staring at her own bare hand, which had come free of its gloves seconds ago when Natasha had slipped out of her hold. Natasha must've sensed someone behind her, because she spun around, ready to slam her forearm into their waist, though she stopped wit ha frown matching Clint's when she saw Venus' state. The redhead took a step back, watching her friend closely, though Venus hadn't even seemed to notice the change in atmosphere, her eyes still fixed on her hand, which had begun to shake slightly. Natasha glanced at Clint, as if hoping for advice. He simply shrugged and stood up, setting down his equipment before walking over and picking up the glove on the ground. It was nothing special, slightly worn through, but the fact that Venus had nothing covering her hand had seemed to shock her more than anything in her 6 months here had.
Venus couldn't focus on anything other than the way the white light of the training room was hitting the skin if her palm. She had almost touched Natasha. The thought was what had made her freeze. She had almost hurt the only person here who she knew, and who would actually give her a chance. There would be no going back from that. They hadn't even got the chance to have that talk that Venus had overheard Clint and Natasha talking about. She heard Natasha say her name, concern laying heavily on her voice, but Venus' mind didn't register the word as belonging to her, too focused on keeping the two people in the room with her safe.
Natasha exchanged a worried look with Clint, who still looked concernedly confused. This had never happened before. There had been similar circumstances, sure, but none like this. The thing that had always seemed to work with Venus was to provide physical contact, gently, just to remind her that there was somewhere there with her. Natasha tried that now, hoping it would work, as she moved her hand carefully towards Venus' exposed one, and while it did work in some way, it wasn't in the way that Natasha had thought. Instead, Venus had pulled her hand towards her body as quickly as she could, taking a step back as she finally met Natasha's concerned eyes.
"Don't touch me." Her golden eyes were wide, her voice cracking with emotion, mostly fear, but while Natasha simply stared at Venus, hand still outstretched, Clint had focused on her eyes. It shocked him how much emotion they contained. He hadn't seen her like this at all, and by the look on Natasha's face, she hadn't either. She looked so scared, so nervous about the situation that it had set him on edge too. He had noticed her shaking hand too, and while Natasha's slightly hurt expressions made it look like the redhead thought it was something to do with her, Clint wasn't so sure. As he thought back over the past months, he realised that no-one had actually touched her bare skin. She had had her gloves on when they brought her in, and once they had begun taking to the interrogation room, she'd warned them not to take them off. Once they had, the first people to touch her had been the-.
Clint froze. His slight frown melted into wariness as he took a step back, grabbing Natasha's shoulder and bringing her with him when he did. When Natasha shouldered off his hand and made a move towards Venus again, he spoke up.
"Don't." It came out slightly colder than he'd expected, but sudden panic had risen in him as he realised what Venus' warnings were for, and he was trying to suppress that. Natasha gave him a confused look, but did as he said, stopping mid-way between Venus and Clint. Venus didn't seem to mind Clint's wariness, instead, it almost seemed like she was relieved when he'd figured it out. The whole room was still as the three Agents of SHIELD stood there, but the silence that had come with it only lasted for a few seconds.
"It was you, wasn't it?" Venus' eyes flicked to Clint as he paused, examining her, but strangely, he still only found relief.
"You killed those guards."
{A/N:} I had this stewing for a lil while. Ngl, wasn't planning for it to go quite like this, but I'm pretty pleased with it. If you don't remember, the guards in her cell 'randomly' dropped dead ;). But yeahh pretty normal update otherwise.
Please vote, comment, let me know what you think, etc.,
1275 Words
Written: 15 / 02 / 2021
Published: 15 / 02 / 2021
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