Seven Devils // Natasha Romanoff

Part 17 - Even in Death, Dreykov Ruins Shit

While Natasha is cursing herself out and watching our deaths imminently approaching, I do my best to stumble towards the closet of emergency equipment. I fling it open, my eyes settling upon what I'm looking for: two parachutes.

I throw my parachute backpack onto my back before I pivot towards Natasha, flinging a parachute pack at her. "Natasha, catch!"

She turns to me and outstretches an arm, but my throw is not strong enough as the backpack goes flying back into the cabin of the plane. "Shit."  If we went back to get it, we would get trapped back there because of the speed at which the plane is nosediving, unable to get up to an exit. What I'm trying to say is that getting that parachute back is a non-option.

I turn back to the closet, and to my dismay, there are no more parachutes. "We've got to work with one parachute!" I tell Natasha as I stumble towards her.

She seems unbothered as outstretches a hand and says, "Come on."  I take it, and together we stumble towards the plane's exit, doing our best to defy physics and not allow ourselves to get swept into the back of the plane.

I exhale in relief as I latch onto the doorframe of the exit, pulling myself and Natasha towards it. I scope out our surroundings outside the plane and give Natasha my report. "There's not too much debris around us - I think we're good to jump!"

"Then jump!"

"Three, two, one!"

I push off of the doorway as I jump into the open air, bringing Natasha with me. I quickly secure myself to Natasha by wrapping my legs around her hips.

She chuckles lightly, nuzzling her head into my neck as she runs a hand through my hair. I ignore her for a few seconds as I adjust against her, taking off the backpack. "What are you doing?" she asks, trying to stay in the nook of my neck despite my moving.

"Only adjusting," I lie as I finish removing the backpack. I quickly slip it onto Natasha, adjusting her arms so I can put it on her shoulders.

By the time she's realized what I'm doing, I've done up the buckles in the middle. "Vallonia..." she mutters in complaint, removing her face from my neck so she can look down at the buckles.

As she tries to unbuckle the top one, I cover her hand with mine. "Natasha, leave it on for me. Just for peace of mind."

"Vallonia, just take it back-"

"I will let you go right now if you try to make me take it back."

She sends me a skeptical look. "You wouldn't."

"Want to test me?" I challenge with a raise of my eyebrow.

She sighs defeatedly as she wraps her arms around me tightly, and I can tell that I won. "You're going to be the death of me," she mutters. "Or yourself if you keep pulling this shit," she adds on.

I chuckle as I look down, checking to see how far we are from the ground (I don't want to forget to pull the parachute open in time; I'm trying to wait as long as possible to open it so it's less likely to be hit by debris). Instead of feeling the fear that I expected from seeing the height, I feel a weightless bliss. The sight of the ground so far below us intensifies my emotions but doesn't do anything to frighten me.

I smile as I look back up at Natasha, who is already looking at me, her face seemingly admiring mine. "The view is almost as pretty as you," she says lowly, quirking an eyebrow in the way that she does when she's flirting.

I chuckle lightly as I lean forward, giving her a simple kiss.

Only a few seconds into the kiss, I furrow a brow, suddenly getting a gut feeling that something is off. I pull away, earning a confused glance from Natasha. After she sees my facial expression, she takes my face in her hands, sending me a concerned look. "What's wrong?"

I shake my head, turning to scan our surroundings. Nothing appears to be wrong. I have a nagging in the back of my head, and it keeps telling me that something is really wrong. My gaze lands on Dreykov's plane falling beside us, and the answer suddenly dawns on me.

"Oh my god, Dreykov's plane!" I exclaim.  I quickly look back at Natasha. "He has a lifeline self-destruct technology embedded in it. If he dies, the plane stops working."

"So that explains why we couldn't start it," Natasha finishes. "But what's the problem?"

"Life self-destruct. If he isn't revived in the five minutes after he dies, the plane self-destructs."

Natasha snaps her head to the plane (which is still very close to us), eyes widening in horror. "Explosion-style?"

I nod. "Our only shot is to get away from the plane, which seems near impossible, especially given the fact that we have a minute max left."

She quickly turns, making swimming motions through the air. They seem to somewhat work, but I can tell that we're getting nowhere in decent time, my added weight certainly not helping.

I grab her hand, making her turn to me. "Natasha, you need to push off of something."

"We need to push off of something," she corrects.

I shake my head. "You need to push off of me."

She scoffs. "No. Not happening. I'll open the parachute and gravity will create enough room between us and the plane."

"Don't you see the debris around us? Something will hit the parachute before you're within a safe distance of the ground."

She squeezes my hand tightly. "I'll take my chances."

"Not when they're non-existent."

She shakes her head, a few tears now coming to her eyes. "Vallonia, I can't go on without you. Stop talking stupid and take your chances with me."

I quickly place a hand behind her head and cup her cheek in my other. "Natasha, I love you."

"Please don't-"

I cut her off as I kick off of her midsection. She gasps, "No!" as she reaches for me, but she misses as her fingers slip past my arm. She flies back 15 feet, well away from the radius of what will be the explosion. My back slams into the cold metal of Dreykov's plane, and I look down to see that we're still a good distance from the ground.

I look up to see Natasha's teary eyes and sigh, knowing I have to at least try to get away from the plane no matter how nonexistent my chances are. I quickly use all of my strength to push off of the plane, aiming for Natasha.

I lock eyes with Natasha as I'm flying through the air, time seemingly slowing down. A look of defeat slowly settles onto her features, realizing that I'm not going to reach her. She shakes her head, pulling her hand that was outstretched for me into her chest, clutching it closely.

I nod acceptingly, tears in my own eyes. I attempt to say Natasha's name one last time, but the plane explodes from behind me. And so Natasha is the last unspoken word on my lips before unconsciousness overtakes me.

a/n: Okay everybody, this is the point at which I decided that I had two courses of action: a happy ending and a sad ending. I couldn't decide which to go with, so I wrote two. After reading both of them, I still couldn't decide, hence my next choice - publishing them both. I'm letting you decide which ending you like more, and that's the one that you can accept.

Just to be clear: Ending A is the sad ending; Ending B is the happy. I'm posting them all at once within the next week.  Enjoy!