Mirage // Marvel Universe

RomanoffNatasha_BlackWidow

March 2004

Natasha Romanoff. I've heard rumours about the so-called Black Widow; everyone in SHIELD has. I just never expected to be going after her in only my first year as an agent. I'm not alone of course. Clint Barton is right by my side on this mission as he has been for the past year. As my Senior Officer, he had to be. Strictly speaking, I'm not even technically on this mission, but Clint rarely followed anything to the letter. "Besides," he had said, "This'll be good training— some real mission experience."

"Careful!" Clint yells at me as the quinjet jolts under my steering.

"My bad," I apologise. It has been a turbulent flight, and considering what a clear day it is, that's probably my fault. No, it's definitely my fault. There's another jolt and I grimace. "That's also my bad."

"Jeez, I've seen my chickens fly better than you," he mumbles.

Repositioning my hands on the steering, I look at him, "You have chickens?"

"Keep your eyes on where you're flying."

"Right," I correct, making a point of staring dead-ahead, "So Barton, you do realise this is a kill mission, right?"

He stares at his tablet where Natasha Romanoff's file had been copied. "Yep."

"It's just, you haven't taken any kill missions all year."

"Uh-huh."

"Do you actually plan on, um killing her?" He doesn't answer right away and so I turn to him with concern. He did plan on following the mission, right? I know he's not always one for the rules, but the stakes are high here. The Black Widow is an assassin; an extremely dangerous assassin. Only the worse of the worse got on SHIELD's kill list.

A bump from my flying draws Clint's head up from the tablet. "Hagino, why don't you spend a little less time worrying about my mission and a little more on not killing us before we get there," Clint snaps. I bite my lip, checking the controls and changing gears silently. Something is off about Clint today.

The building the quinjet perches on is one of the tallest in the city, but I don't mind the height. Clint has taught me well to respect a good distance as the best vantage point. The view of Berlin, Germany from above is enough to make a person lost in thought. The buildings snake around each other, streets bustling with cars slivering in between and a train sounding in the distance. The orange topped roofs and white stucco bricks are full of life and energy. I love being able to see places I never thought I would. It is probably my favourite thing about being an agent. 

"Do you have a twenty on the people inside?" My earpiece buzzes, "Hagino, do you copy?"

Caught off attention, I lean over my knees in the pilot's chair of the quinjet, flicking through the taps on my sleek, SHIELD-issued laptop. "There're heat signatures congregated on the fourth floor near the main stairwell. You're going to want to take the back East stairwell." Clicking through more of the security feed I have pulled up of the building, I spot someone coming down the exact hallway I just told Clint to go down. "Wait!" I yell through the comms, "There's someone there. Stay where you are and give me a second to reroute the west wing cameras."

I catch Clint on my end on the security feed looking through his quiver from behind a corner. "If I die on this mission, I'm making it very clear in my mission report whose fault it was."

"You'll be dead."

"Well, then I'll have some unfinished business."

"I've always wanted to be haunted," I smile, directing the looped footage through the building's feed. Now as long as Clint stays out of sight, no one will even know he's there. "Done! Take the side West stairwell about—" I swipe through the building's blueprints. "—four doors down the hall."