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Maria is silent for several moments. What Nick has just told her is both disturbing and very detailed. She should have known something was up when he asked her to take a walk. They had ended up at the Air and Space Museum amongst the crowds of tourists.
“Hill?” he prompts.
She nods. “OK, sir.” If necessary (and part of her is praying that it won’t come to that, praying that, for once, his intel is wrong), she will do as he’s asked. She looks up at the Wright Brothers’ plane and adds, “I’ll need to tell Natasha.”
“You absolutely cannot tell anyone!” he hisses.
“Sir, there are three people on this planet that I trust with my life. You are one of them. She is another. I cannot keep this from her.”
“Hill,” he sighs, “you swore an oath of loyalty to - ”
“To SHIELD, sir.” Because as much as she respects him, he is not above the organization. “And you’ve just told me that you believe its core is rotten. If this goes down, I am telling her.”
“And if I order you not to.” He raises the eyebrow above his patch.
“Then, with all due respect” - they have both used that phrase enough to understand what’s really being said - “I’ll have to quit.”
“You’d choose her over SHIELD?”
“Again, sir, rotten.” She moves to the next placard, not knowing if he will follow. She wouldn’t be surprised if she turns around and he’s gone.
But a moment later, he is beside her, looking up. “If you trust her…”
She nods. “I do.”
****
The worst has come to pass. And for all of Nick’s paranoia, he’s right. SHIELD is rotten. She stands at the observation window beside Natasha and Rogers. Natasha is heartbroken. (So is Rogers, but he’s not Maria’s immediate concern.)
“Don’t do this to me, Nick,” Natasha whispers. She thinks she owes her life to Nick, that he’s the one who granted her a second chance. (Maria knows the truth, that it was a combination of Barton and Coulson who’d argued for her. But she doesn’t have it in her to break Natasha’s heart about Nick Fury.)
The three of them watch him code, watch the doctor call it. She has to do something to let Natasha know. So she moves closer, arms crossed over her chest. Her left hand sneaks out from under her arm to tap on Natasha’s arm.
Don’t react. Fury not dead. More later.
Natasha’s head twists to one side and Maria shakes hers slightly.
“I need to take him.”
“Natasha, come on.” Steve puts a hand on her lower back and guides her out. Natasha gives Maria one last look and she nods.
****
Natasha nearly gives her a heart attack when she finally makes it home. She’s sitting in the dark on their couch, Liho curled up on her lap. Once Maria recovers, she shakes her head and points upward. Natasha lifts Liho, setting him on the couch, and nods. Together, they make their way to the roof and Maria turns on the radio. She holds out her arms and Natasha steps into them.
“He’s alive?” Natasha whispers into Maria’s ear. Actually it’s more like she breathes it. To anyone watching, it looks like they are dancing on the rooftop patio of their brownstone.
“Yes. And he’s safe. That’s all I can tell you.”
“I can keep a secret, Masha.”
“I know that, sweetheart. I don’t want you to have to.”
Natasha is quiet for a long moment as they sway. Maria wonders how hard she’s going to fight her on this. To her surprise, she says, “Reach into my pocket.”
Her hand moves around to Natasha’s side, slipping into the pocket of her hoodie, and closes around some sort of thumb drive. “What is this?”
Natasha shrugs. “Dunno. Steve put it in the vending machine at the hospital.”
Maria thinks for a moment and exhales loudly. “That fucking man.” Because there’s only one person she can think of who would give something like that to Rogers. The man who insisted that they could trust no one.
“What?”
She shakes her head, removing her hand from Natasha’s pocket and settling it on the curve of her ass. “Rogers will be looking for that.”
Natasha’s mouth is so close to her ear that she can feel her lips pull into a smirk. “I know.”
“Please be careful, Natka.”
She snorts. “You, too. You’re Fury’s right hand woman, you know.”
“They wouldn’t dare. It would look too suspicious after Nick.”
“Still.” She gently kisses the shell of Maria’s ear. “Be careful.”
****
All she wants to do is pull off her helmet and wrap Natasha in her arms. Because she is bleeding out right in the back of this van (the van they hopefully won’t all die in). She somehow manages to wait. Patiently.
The guy with them pipes up about Natasha needing medical attention and Maria decides that’s it. She threatens him with her electric baton and then jabs it into her fellow guard. A quick kick to the head knocks him out and he slumps to the side. She can see the apprehension in their eyes (well, in the guy with them’s eyes, Steve just looks lost, and Natasha seems on the verge of passing out).
“That thing was squeezing my brain,” she says, pulling off the helmet. Then she juts her chin at the guy with them. “Who’s this?” She is glad to see him place himself between her and Natasha (at least someone’s looking out for her).
“It’s OK, Sam. She’s with us,” Natasha answers. More slowly than she should.
“I’m Maria. If you don’t mind…” She gestures and Sam moves aside. “Natka, I told you to be careful.” She rummages in the pockets of her stolen uniform and finds a handkerchief. It’s embroidered with the initials PK and she doesn’t feel badly that she’s about to get Natasha’s blood all over it. She places it on Natasha’s wound. “Can you hold that for me, sweetheart?”
Natasha nods. Slowly. And raises her good hand to hold the hankie in place. Slowly. Maria presses a kiss to her forehead and then turns to the other two. From a different pocket on her uniform, she pulls out a device. “This,” she explains, holding it up, “will cut a hole in the floor of this van. When we slow enough, we’re going to exit.”
****
Once they are in the van, she makes Sam get behind the wheel while she climbs into the back with Natasha. She pulls out an all purpose set of SHIELD handcuff keys and tosses them to Rogers. He can get himself out.
“Nuh uh,” she admonishes when Natasha closes her eyes. “Stay awake.”
One eye cracks open. “I’m awake.”
“Sure you are.”
“Who’s taking care of my cat?”
“Your cat? I thought he was our cat.” She gives the next set of directions to Sam. She’s not exactly sure who he is or what he does, but he definitely gives off the impression of ex-military.
“He’s mine. Loves me more.” She’s slurring her words now.
“Eyes open, Natasha.”
The van starts to move a little faster. Which Maria appreciates. He’s still right around the speed limit so they won’t call attention to themselves, but Natasha needs medical attention.
She’s fading again so Maria says, “I think after all of this is over we should go on vacation.”
“Where to?”
“Somewhere tropical. I wanna see you in a bikini.” Normally, she wouldn’t talk like this, not in front of an audience, not in front of Rogers, but she’s desperate to keep Natasha conscious.
“No bikinis. Winter Soldier fucked that up. Right, Steve?”
She raises an eyebrow at Rogers; he blushes, eyes wide. It doesn’t matter; they’re here. Sam stops the van and they all climb out. Maria wants to scoop Natasha up and rush her in, but she knows she’ll never allow it. At least she leans her weight on Maria as they enter the abandoned wastewater treatment plant.
“Medic!”
“No, I want to see him.”
She knows that it’s pointless to argue. “This way.”
“See who?” Steve asks even as he trails behind them. They move down the corridor and through a doorway. Natasha stops moving when she spots him and Maria drags her forward and out of the way. Nick Fury is sitting up in his hospital bed.
“You’re alive,” states Steve. Then he turns on Natasha. “You knew and you didn’t tell me?”
Maria is not going to let him lay the blame there; Natasha doesn’t deserve it. She steps in front of her. “If you want to be angry at someone for this, be angry at Nick.” Then she turns to face Natasha. “And now you’re going to let someone stitch you up. No arguments.”
****
“If you want to arrest me, arrest me? Seriously, Nat?”
“Relax, Masha, they’re not going to arrest me. Or you. Or Steve.”
Maria rolls her eyes despite the fact she is on the phone. ”They might not arrest you or Rogers.” She glances at herself in the mirror. She’s in a dress. It’s not anything fancy: black and sleeveless, ending near her knees. But still it’s a dress.
“Are you nervous?” Natasha seemingly changes the subject.
“Nervous about a polygraph?”
“Well, it is for Tony. Who knows what he’s going to ask you.”
“Stark is not conducting this polygraph.”
“Are you sure about that?”
”Natka!”
She laughs. “I’m just teasing, babe. You’re going to be fine.”
Maria sighs. “I know.” She isn’t expecting the knock on the door. “Someone’s at the door. Hold on a sec,” she says into the phone. When she looks into the peephole, she’s stunned by what she sees. As she flings open the door, she hangs up the phone. “What? What are you doing here?”
Natasha looks her up and down and smirks. “Surprising my hot girlfriend.”
Maria blushes and steps aside so Natasha can enter the hotel room. “No,” she rolls her eyes, “seriously, what are you doing here?”
“ Seriously , I’m surprising my hot girlfriend. If you promise to keep that dress on, I’ll take you out for dinner.”
“Nat!” She swats at Natasha’s arm. She checks her bag one more time, tucking her phone into it. “I’ve got to go,” she says as she shrugs a blazer over her dress.
Natasha reaches out and takes her hand. “I’d kiss you but I don’t want to mess up your makeup. You’re going to do great. Tony would be an idiot not to hire you.”
“Thank you,” she replies, squeezing her hand. “I’ll be back as soon as I can.”
Natasha kicks off her shoes; luckily they just thud to the floor and not against the wall. She flops on the bed and turns on the television. “I’ll be here when you get back.” Just when Maria opens the door, she calls out, “Oh, and Masha?” She turns back. “You will not be needing the jacket when we go out later.”