clandestinement | Unexpected Aid

Unexpected Aid - for wereperrito

The burning wing of the laboratory facility is just a smudge of smoke on the horizon when the snowmobile dies beneath her. Natasha blinks in confusion for a moment, then tries to restart it. Tries again. Notices, finally, that the fuel gauge rests on empty, which is distantly worrying, but less so than the fact that she no longer feels the cracked ribs, or the roughly bound wound that punches through the meat of her thigh, or the laceration along the side of her head that has turned her hair to a frozen, bloody horror in the alpine wind.

Of course it's empty. She'd had barely enough time to steal a vehicle in the chaos of the explosion she'd set off to cover her escape, let alone find one in ideal condition to make it to her rendezvous point. Just more proof that an op designed for two people is a disaster for just one, even one at the top of her field.

Natasha smacks dash of the snowmobile with one hand in helpless frustration, then slides off the saddle - and keeps sliding, wounded leg going out from under her in the snow. She digs in her pack for a moment until she finds her communicator and - no signal. Of course there isn't. This entire network of valleys is a dead zone, which is what had attracted her attention in the first place.

No choice but to get to her extraction point - which would be difficult enough on foot if she were whole. She estimates it's at least 20 miles off, and that's if her tunnel vision hadn't been bad enough that she veered off course. At least she can't hear the sound of engines approaching. The pursuit had dropped off half an hour ago.

Maybe because they knew her fuel would run out, and expected her to bleed out and be easy enough to find and mop up later.

She bows her head, then snaps upright again when exhaustion tugs at her, forcing herself to her feet. Her leg holds this time, but she should probably find something to use as a walking stick if she wants to stay standing.

She makes it all of a mile from the vehicle, in an increasingly-weaving line, before her leg goes out from under her again, and she falls, clutching the gnarled branch she'd picked up along the way to give her some semblance of control in her descent. Black spots dance at the corners of her vision, and when she shakes her head to try to clear them, they flood inward, and her stomach rolls in protest.

Her last coherent thought is that it's a bitter sort of irony to have survived the death of half the universe only to wind up here, alone in the forest, because the one person she'd been absolutely certain she could count on had decided abruptly that it was more important to chase ghosts than to try to put the rest of a broken world back together.

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"Probably not very useful, then, unless your friends are already close by," Jack agrees, and brings the radio over to set on the side table, before starting to rummage around in cupboards, looking for anything more useful. "I won't ask what you were doing," he adds. "It's none of my business. But if you expect people to be chasing you who are not your friends, that might be a good thing to know."

They might not manage very well in the storm, but they might have planes. Or magic. Or teleporters, for all he knows.

Edited 2022-12-07 08:18 (UTC)

"Smart man," she says, one corner of her mouth twitching up into something that can probably pass for a smile. "I'm pretty sure I lost any pursuers before my ride stalled out. It's possible they might come out looking for a body, but probably not until after the storm."

"And by then, we can be on our way. I do have a car, parked in a shed behind the cabin, so I can drive you wherever," he offers, head stuck in a cupboard as he stands on tip-toe to try and see into the back. "Might have to dig it out first, but it's there. The car radio wouldn't help you, would it? It's, uh, not a new car, though." So there's no bluetooth or onstar or anything.

"No," Natasha says, a little ruefully. "Not with my engineering skills. But the ride will be appreciated. It's a long hike."

There's a flicker of humour in the last sentence - long would be more accurately translated as impossible in her current condition.

"A very long, very cold hike," Jack agrees, and closes the cupboards up again. "I think we may be out of luck for radios. You will just have to put up with me for a couple of days." He comes back to the fireplace and gives the soup a stir. "I can be entertaining, or be very quiet. Just let me know."

He... will not actually be very good at being very quiet, Jack is by nature a chatterer, but he will try if she finds him annoying!

"I don't mind conversation," she says. It's true enough, but more importantly, he gives her the impression of being the gregarious sort. Asking him to keep quiet for days while they wait for the storm to blow itself out would probably just make the situation more uncomfortable.

"Or entertainment. Do you have a deck of cards?"

"I do have cards! A few kinds of cards. There's something called Uno, which is not actually as Spanish as it sounds. But the last time I was here, I played a lot of Solitaire. I mean, a lot." Ironically, he's used to spending storms in this dumb little cabin. Both times he's been here before, he got snowed in. The first time he'd had pleasant company in the form of the actual cabin's owner, but the second time it was just him, and it was very boring.

"And we should still be able to get the AM stations on the radio," he adds, "the storm won't interfere with those. There's a Russian radio station that I could get last time, if you like Russian music. And a Spanish one, for some reason, I have no idea why that one is playing out here in the middle of nowhere."

Yes, Natasha, you guessed right. He is very much the gregarious sort.

"That is strange," Natasha agrees. "But at least it gives us some options. I'm fine with Russian music, but I have to admit, I'm curious about the mystery station. --I don't think I've ever played Uno, but learning seems like a good distraction."

She pauses a moment, then smiles a little wryly. "And it's the perfect excuse to lose horribly."

"We both might lose horribly, I definitely did last time I tried it," Jack grins, and gives the soup another stir before going to hunt down the cards. "Can two people both lose when they're the only people playing the game?" he wonders from the other room.

He comes back with the Uno cards, a pack of regular cards, and two bowls and spoons for the soup. "I don't know if you actually feel hungry, but you should eat even if you don't."

"I don't think so," Natasha says. "Unless the cards are rigged to explode, but I think I would've heard about it if that was part of the game."

She carefully eases herself up a little bit straighter, and takes another sip of tea, only freeing one child hand to sketch a playful salute when he returns. "Yes, sir."

She doesn't feel hungry. She feels, in fact, a little nauseous, though she has enough familiarity with blood loss to realize that it's almost certainly the culprit there. Which means as awful as it will probably feel, eating will help in the long run.

"No, they don't explode. Thank goodness." He tends to not do so great with things that explode. Usually they explode at the exact wrong time.

That's about what he expected, but food will help. He ladles soup out of the pot and into one of the bowls, offering it to her. "I can take the tea," he says, making to trade her. "And you don't have to eat all of it, but it would be better if you could. You were unconscious for most of the night and all morning, you know."

She relinquishes the mug with only a little reluctance, taking the soup and blowing on a spoonful to cool it before taking a cautious sip. Her stomach rolls in warning, but doesn't rebel any further, and his comment proves a good distraction.

"I didn't know that. The storm's hell on my sense of time." Between the cloud cover and the snow, it's dark enough that she'd assumed it was still night, or daybreak at the earliest. If it's been that long, it does at least bode well for their chances of making it through the weather unmolested - if anyone was inclined to brave the storm to search for her body, they wouldn't have waited this long.

Jack intimately knows the feel of sundown and sunup, even if he can't see it. But he's a bit... unusual that way. "And there isn't a clock in this room," he agrees sympathetically. He pulls out an old-fashioned pocket-watch to show her the time: 1:15. Ish. It's a nice little watch, quite likely an antique, but not an expensive one for whatever time it was made in. The cover is fairly plain, a little scratched up.

"There is one in the bedroom," Jack adds, "but it's actually an hour and a half off. I hadn't gotten around to fixing it."

He tucks the watch away again, in a jacket pocket-- he's not dressed to his usual standard, but then, he hadn't actually expected to have company. It's just nice jeans, a simple button-down, and a sweater. Then he sets about getting some soup for himself, too. "So we are playing Uno once you've eaten, yes? Apparently the goal is to get down to one card and call uno when you do. If you don't call it, someone else can call it for you and make you draw more cards."

She notes the pocket watch absently - the wear on it suggests something passed down through a family, rather than purchased as an affectation.

(The idea that he might have owned it since it was new doesn't cross her mind. She might have had an Asgardian as a friend and teammate, once upon a time, but most people's lifespans run nowhere near that scale.)

"Sounds like it can get a little cut-throat, she says, quashing the urge to laugh in favour of a small, playful smile that doesn't hurt nearly as much.

"Ah, I kept forgetting to call it," Jack chuckles. "I'm afraid my friend playing it with me was much more ruthless."

He blows on his soup a moment before having a bite. "And there are cards for reversing something done to you. And making the other person draw cards. Which you can then reverse on them if you're very lucky. It's a complicated game!" Which is really a joke, as it's easier than a lot of card games Jack knows. He's just not very lucky with draws, and tends to forget to pay attention to things.

"It'll be fun," Natasha says, and chances another bite of soup. This time, her stomach doesn't protest quite as much, as though it's considering the possibility of actually being hungry in a productive sort of way.

"I can't remember the last time I actually had time for a card game."

That wasn't during a stakeout or an undercover op, at least.

"You are usually very busy, then?" Jack guesses. He grins over his soup, teasing, "Then these next couple of days will either be very good for you, or very bad for me."

There's an edge of nervousness to the statement, though. Because if he can't get her to take his pain pill to knock herself out, she's going to have to explain what he's really doing here sooner than later. It could, in fact, be very bad for both of them.

"I keep myself occupied." Which is perhaps the understatement of a lifetime. What had started as a need to not slow down and stare the enormity of her losses in the face has transformed into filling a genuine need. There are far too many people who've looked at the deaths of half the world and decided to make things worse.

The throb in her ribs as she shifts her position reminds her that she might have to begin counting some of her nearest and dearest in that number.

"Luckily for both of us, I'm in no shape to start literally climbing the walls."

"Believe me, I am very glad of that," Jack promises. "I will try to keep you distracted as much as I can." When he can. He has no idea how distracting he'll be thumping and rattling around in the basement. Probably too distracting.

At least first there will be cards. And more soup. He even has bread they can toast up, later. "I am not sure what questions are safe to ask you. Do I ask where you are from? Or is that classified?" Not that he thinks she's necessarily government (and he still hasn't put together that she's that Natasha), but it's a handy short-hand for something she doesn't want to tell him.

"Russia, originally. New York, more recently," she says, without any real hesitation. Both those pieces of information are matters of public record, if he recognizes her, and unlikely to endanger anything if he doesn't.

"Asking's safe; I don't bite. I just can't answer everything. Wouldn't want to drag you into any more trouble than I already have."

He pauses, his spoon halfway to his mouth. He squints at her. Russia and New York. Natasha. Red hair. Dangerous mission and protective friends.

"Natasha," he asks slowly. "Does your last name, um, happen to start with an R?" He's not sure if that's better or worse. (Worse. It's definitely worse. An actual Avenger is not going to take his pitiful excuses to disappear below readily, and probably not going to stay put when he starts snarling and prowling around and rattling chains in the basements.)

"Yeah," she says. "I'm that Natasha." She smiles a little bit wryly, and sets her spoon down. "Starting to wish you'd left me out in the snow yet?"

Without any knowledge of his tendency to run mad and furry on the full moon, her assumption is that his hesitance comes from realizing belatedly just how much trouble she could potentially drag him into.

"Of course not. Of course I'm not," Jack says immediately, shaking his head quickly, almost dog-like. "You're a hero. You shouldn't have to die freezing in the snow. Though the timing could be, um, it could be better," he finishes a little lamely.

He has to tell her. She might decide to try and put him down if he does, but he did leave her guns at the site of her vehicle, and he could just lock himself in the basement early. It's not like she's not too injured to really do him much harm. But he has to tell her.

There's a moment's pause as she studies him, brow creasing slightly. "You're not just talking about the storm," she decides, opting not to touch the hero comment. Heroes don't let their little sisters die. Heroes don't let half the damn world die.

Sometimes heroes lose. It happens. Jack has lived long enough to have learned that lesson more than once.

He looks hang-dog at the statement, but nods. "There is a reason I'm out by myself in the middle of nowhere. And if you had collapsed a mile away from it tomorrow or the day after, you wouldn't have to find out why." Of course, if it was tomorrow he might have been too grumpy and sore to find her. He sighs, scrubs a hand over his hair, and pulls himself back up. "But you're here now. So."

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