Unexpected Aid - for wereperrito

[ofmarble]

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.

Comments

[wereperrito]

Jack is startled into a little snicker by the suggestion. "I am not a rooftop kind of person, I'm afraid. Not unless I am very desperate, or else I'm, you know." He waves his hand vaguely at himself and the cabin, as if indicating what's going to happen in a couple of hours. The wolfman leaps rooftops readily, if caught in a city. Jack tries very hard not to be caught in a city.

"Venice is a nice choice," he continues thoughtfully. "It is very pretty. Though it smells a little funny to me sometimes."

[ofmarble]

"The canals?" Natasha asks, wincing a little in sympathy. "Those smell weird enough to me, some days. Can't imagine how much worse it might be with sharper senses."

[wereperrito]

"Not as bad as some places I've been," Jack allows. Especially given his lifespan. "But it's still a lot of water and a lot of people all in one place, and it is very old. The smells aren't even all bad, they just... turn me around a lot." He shakes his head. "I do better in smaller cities. Though suburbs still confuse me sometimes."

[ofmarble]

"Pretty sure suburbs are designed to be confusing," she says, flashing a quick, wry smile. "Homogeneity as psychological warfare. So, scent's a big part of how you navigate?"

[wereperrito]

"Oh, I read street signs and maps just like everyone else," Jack chuckles. "And I have a little compass in my bag, too. But scent is..." He pauses to consider how to explain. "Smells catch my interest. Sometimes they take me to good places. Sometimes bad places. But they are never boring, you know? But in a place where water is everywhere, they get all confused, and I can't always make out what is coming from where."

[ofmarble]

"So you have a nose for adventure." She manages to make the cheesy remark sound solemn, though there's amusement glinting in her eyes. "--Is that what led you to me? Or was it just chance?"

[wereperrito]

"Well, you were very lucky that you collapsed so close to this cabin," Jack allows, after an amiable eye-roll at the joke. "But I smelled the blood. Blood smell carries a long way." And the wolf pays close attention to the smell of blood, so this close to the full moon, it was stronger than usual.

[ofmarble]

She's quiet for a moment, expression thoughtful, shading towards concern. "Is that going to be a problem for you tonight?" she asks. There isn't, she thinks, much they can do about it if it is - even if it weren't for the storm, there's nowhere else she can really go in her condition.

[wereperrito]

He shakes his head a little, though not necessarily in a no. It's a valid concern, and reminds him that Natasha Romanoff is certainly known for being a spy. She has to be smart with potential threats.

"I don't know," he admits soberly. "Sometimes I'll leave hurt people alone. Sometimes I'll want to get to them even more. But the basement is very well secured, and we can move you to the bedroom, which is a little further away from where I will be." Not that a dozen more feet will help much with the scent, but it'll be another door between them, at least.

[ofmarble]

"All right," she says. "That sounds like a good idea." Will it offset any desire to get to her, if his instincts flip that way, knowing there are added barriers between them? Hard to guess, but it still seems like a reasonable precaution.

"How much do you remember, when you transform back?"

[wereperrito]

"Not a lot," he admits. "If something was particularly strange or difficult, I might remember it." He remembers that awful amulet blasting him against the wall. He remembers the touch of Elsa's hand on his cheek, but not what he did after that. Certainly not why she had. He gestures along as he continues, "But I won't necessarily understand it. I think it is much like being an animal. There are impressions, feelings, it is all very immediate. But the details do not stick."

[ofmarble]

"That sounds familiar," Natasha says quietly. "If you're ever Stateside, look me up, and I'll put you in touch with Dr. Banner. I don't know if you could help each other, but you'll probably understand one another better than pretty much anyone."

[wereperrito]

"Oh. Okay." Then he pauses as he connects "Doctor Banner" with "the Hulk". "Oh. Well. Now I have to go stateside next," Jack says, looking vaguely flustered. It's one thing to meet Natasha Romanoff when she's got busted ribs on his (borrowed) couch, but it's quite another to go to New York (or wherever) and be introduced to an actual superhero. "I hop continents pretty regularly," he adds, a little sheepishly.