HUMAN CONDITION | ❝There's bones in my closet, but you hang stuff anyway.❞
PRE-CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE WINTER SOLDIER | NATASHA ROMANOFF
A HERO OF HEROES BOOK
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NATASHA LOUNGED IN HER CHAIR AS SHE WAITED FOR FURY TO GET BACK TO HIS OFFICE. It wasn't uncommon for him to call her in, giving her an assignment solo or debriefing her separate from the others if there was something far too important to be entrusted to the whole team. For the latter, she was normally debriefed afterwards, Fury waiting for everyone to be on the same page before giving her the additional assignment. It had been some time since she'd gone solo, and she couldn't help but wonder what she would be given that she couldn't do with Clint.
The door opened, interrupting her thoughts, Fury stepping into the room with a cup of coffee in his hand and a tablet tucked under his arm. She raised her eyebrow, tracking his movements as he sat down across from her behind his desk, setting his things down before leaning back in his seat.
She quirked her lips, eyes darting to the coffee then back to the man. "None for me?"
He rolled his good eye, reaching out to pull the cup further out of her reach, pushing the tablet forward instead, motioning to it as he pulled his arm back. "You can get your own once we're done."
She stood up, her chair too far from the desk for her to lean, picking up the tablet and sitting back down, opening it up to the file that was waiting for her, images of a person strikingly similar to Clint filling the screen, personal information listed beside them.
Natasha very well knew that she hadn't outwardly reacted, but Fury snorted anyways, leaning forward to fold his hands atop his desk. She raised her eyes to look at him, head still bent to the tablet, and he shrugged.
"Matvey Stepanov," she read, intrigued by the name, starting to scan through the list of information.
"He goes by Terran Sweets," Fury explained, calling her attention, "He's worked for us a bit in the past. We paired him with Clint at one point, helps that they could pass as twins, though we can't figure why."
"Does it matter?" she asked, glancing back down at the list, pausing when she read the note beside his birthday, "Is he a mutant, why is there a note about his decelerated aging process?"
Fury shook his head. "You can keep reading or I can just explain it. I vote for you to read it first, 'cause I don't need you yelling at me while I'm explaining things."
She frowned. "I don't yell at you. I never yell."
He raised his hands, moving to lean back in his chair. "You're gonna yell about this one. Barton thinks so anyways."
"You told Barton before me?" she asked, looking back down at the tablet, "If he's worked with him before, why am I here, you could just send him."
"Just read the damn file," Fury cried, "We haven't even gotten to the real target, I thought you wanted to get your coffee."
Natasha didn't respond, instead continuing to read over the file, forcing herself not to pause despite the red flags and alarms going off in her mind as she read the notes about his skillset and disposition, then moving on to his background where, after reading multiple, drastically differing variations of his childhood, she reached the part of the file that, according to Fury, would get her to yell.
