The Mimic

172

As soon as the little girl disappeared from her sight, y/n looked down at the watch that she'd been given for time travel. She had to keep moving. If she dwelled on that bittersweet reaction, she'd break down. So, y/n closed her eyes, and pressed the button on her watch.

When y/n opened her eyes again, she found herself back in the compound. Back on the platform, and back in a circle with the rest of the team, just like how they'd stood when they left.

Almost everyone seemed shaken up over what they'd just been through, but they all seemed pretty clean. Except for y/n. She stuck out like a random splash of colour in a black-and-white movie. All covered in blood and soot. The stench of smoke followed her. It plagued every part of her mission suit, from her boots to the knives strapped around her waist. But, nobody seemed to make a comment on it.

Everyone had the stone that they were tasked on finding. All either held in their hands or in a briefcase of sorts. Yet nobody made a movement, nor did they say a word. They all scanned around the circle, making eye contact every now and again to check if either person was okay. It was a bittersweet feeling, standing in a circle together again. They had just finished the hardest part of their final mission. Now all they had to do was decide who was going to snap everyone back into existence.

However, as y/n scanned around the circle, a deep, deep frown appeared on her face. There was somebody missing. Her eyebrows furrowed, scanning every person over and over again. She even turned around to check if they had already stepped off of the platform. But they hadn't.

Her heart begun to pound as she made eye contact with Clint from across the circle. He had tears in his eyes. He looked destroyed. Her chest tightened, a lump beginning to form in her throat as she tried to deny the assumption that she'd already made. She swallowed hard, her eyes staying fixed on Clint the whole time. She clenched her jaw tight to try and stop the tears from forming in her eyes, her bottom lip beginning to wobble. She didn't want her assumption to be true, but the only way that she could find out was if she spoke.

"Where's Nat?"

Y/n didn't even need Clint's answer. The look on his face was enough for it to feel as if her heart and mind had been put through a blender. She couldn't decide on whether to tense up or crumble to the ground. Hot and heavy tears blurred her vision as she stared at where Natasha should've been standing, unable to even lift her head and look at anyone else on the team.

It felt like her whole world had shut down.

Y/n couldn't even hear properly over the sound of her heart pounding in her chest. There was something about Vormir, a red man wearing a cloak, and a cliff. It was a soul for a soul. Clint had tried to sacrifice himself, but Nat didn't let him. She sacrificed herself. She jumped off of the cliff. All because of a stupid stone. There must've been another way. There must've.

Natasha was a big sister to y/n. She took care of her and protected her during her darkest times. Y/n could talk to Nat about anything. Anything at all. They'd laughed together, they'd cried together - hell, they'd even beaten the shit out of one another. And now she was gone. The only person left on the team that y/n fully trusted was gone - not dusted, gone - and there was no way that they were going to be able to bring her back.

Natasha was dead.

They weren't even able to have their final training session together.

The rest of the team crowded around Clint. Everyone except y/n. She couldn't move. She couldn't process any of it. She didn't understand why she had to be the one to die. She didn't understand why she wasn't the person to come back from Vormir.

She had never been close to Clint. She understood that the pair had been best friends, but y/n had never bonded wit him. Hell, they'd barely had a conversation. It had been a fifty-fifty chance. A fifty-fifty chance between a person she considered family, and a stranger. The fact that the stranger was the one to come back filled her with a sick hatred. It was a hatred that she knew was wrong, and she would never vocalise it, but something inside of her wished that Clint would've been the one to jump.

Just the realisation of that hatred made her feel sick to her stomach. She shouldn't be thinking like that. Wishing death upon a person was serious and evil, but she couldn't help it. There was an alternate timeline where Natasha was the one to come back. Where they would've had their training session, and she would've told Nat everything about her trip back to the facility. But that wasn't this timeline. In this timeline she was dead, and y/n was alone.

No Sam. No Peter. No Shuri. No T'Challa. No Natasha. No Bucky.

Y/n begun to retrace her final moments with Natasha, still glued to the spot. To everyone else, she seemed completely spaced out, just staring blankly at the ground as tears continued to fall, but there was more going on. She was desperately trying to remember every single movement, every single word, every single smile from their last moments together. There must've been more to it. There was no way that nobody would've known about the soul stone. The pair had been picked for a reason. To get the soul stone, it always had to be two people...

That was when it clicked.

A deep frown appeared on y/n's face. She slowly lifted her head up to reveal a look of pure sorrow and betrayal, her breathing beginning to pick up. It wasn't a surprise that she'd been betrayed by this person again, but the fact that Natasha had to lose her life was where y/n drew the line.

"You knew." She snapped through gritted teeth, making direct eye contact with Tony.