Natasha lay on a floor covered in wood chips and broken glass, her throat burning. Every breath felt like swallowing razor blades. Her gaze passed over the cluttered floor and locked onto Lynn's left hand, hanging beside his thigh.
Two taps of the index finger, one of the middle finger, thumb tucked inward.
The sequence was extremely fast, almost imperceptible beneath the cover of darkness and red magical light. But as an elite agent who had emerged from the Red Room, she could not possibly have mistaken it.
This was S.H.I.E.L.D.'s highest-level silent tactical command.
Lynn turned around, his broad back completely blocking the moonlight spilling through the window, as well as the churning mass of scarlet energy behind him. He looked down at Natasha. The eyes that usually carried a trace of a low-level agent's timidity now held nothing but bottomless indifference and scrutiny.
"Still not leaving?"
The barely audible words held no emotional inflection, yet carried an authority that tolerated no defiance.
Natasha forced herself to stand, the scorched smell of her magically burned thigh rushing into her nostrils. Without another word, she braced one hand against the twisted metal window frame and, like a wounded cheetah, vaulted without hesitation into the boundless night.
She knew perfectly well that she had survived not because S.H.I.E.L.D.'s name carried such weight, but because the man before her had pulled back on the leash that could have strangled her at the last moment.
Inside the bedroom behind her, the harsh smell of ozone had yet to dissipate.
"Lynn!" Wanda's shrill voice came from behind him, tinged with resentment and anger. "Why did you let her go? She saw you. Her eyes are filthy now!"
Scarlet energy tendrils reached out of thin air again, hissing like venomous vipers, ready at any moment to pierce the walls and pursue Black Widow into the night.
Lynn did not look back out the window. Instead, he turned straight around and stepped toward the raging magical particles without hesitation.
The energy tendrils stopped abruptly the instant they touched Lynn's suit, forcibly halting just before his nose. Their red light flickered violently, revealing their owner's extremely unstable emotions.
"Wanda." Lynn sighed, the coldness he had shown Natasha leaving his voice, replaced by an almost helpless gentleness. "You nearly tore my house apart."
"She broke in first!" Tears glimmered in Wanda's dark green eyes. The world-destroying demon who had treated human life as worthless a moment earlier instantly became a deeply wronged girl whose territory had been invaded. She took a barefoot step forward, completely ignoring the sharp fragments covering the floor, wanting to throw herself into Lynn's arms.
"Don't move," Lynn suddenly said sharply.
Wanda froze, her red lips trembling slightly. Dangerous red light began surging in her eyes again. She thought Lynn was snapping at her over that redheaded woman.
But the next second, Lynn strode forward, bent down, slipped his arms beneath her knees and behind her back, and scooped her up.
"The floor's covered in broken glass. What if you cut your feet?" Carrying her, Lynn steadily avoided the debris on the floor, walked to the sofa that the magic had yet to reach, and gently set her down.
Wanda stared blankly at Lynn. Her violence, hurt, and jealousy were shattered in that instant by this unexpected tenderness. She clutched the collar of his shirt with both hands, her fingertips flushing an unnatural red from the force of her grip.
"I don't care about them!" Wanda suddenly lifted her head, her voice thick with a nasal catch and an unhealthy obstinacy. "I only care about you! No one else can look at you. No one else can touch you! You're mine!"
Her obsessive possessiveness was laid completely bare.
Lynn knew perfectly well that any attempt to reason with Wanda in this state would only add fuel to the fire. What she needed was not logic, but absolute favoritism and obedience.
"I'm yours." Without the slightest hesitation, Lynn looked straight into her eyes, his voice as certain as though he were reciting some sacred covenant. "Ever since the ruins of Sokovia, my life has been yours. No one can take it away. Not even death."
Those words struck precisely at the most vulnerable place deep within Wanda's heart. The horrific scene from the simulation, of countless bullets piercing his body, flashed through her mind again. It was a nightmare she would never escape.
Tears spilled from Wanda's eyes. The red light in them collapsed completely, replaced by utter dependence and lingering fear. She suddenly straightened and kissed Lynn's lips with near-mad desperation, with a hint of blood and a domineering insistence that brooked no refusal, as though she wanted to meld his entire being into her flesh and bones.
Lynn closed his eyes and returned the kiss that carried a breath of destruction. His arms held Wanda tightly, soothing her trembling back, yet his mind remained perfectly calm.
A high-wire balancing act, perfect control of the situation.
By shielding Natasha with his body, he had both protected S.H.I.E.L.D.'s ace and sent Fury a clear message: I can control this monster, but don't test my limits again.
At the same time, his unreserved promises had completely locked down Wanda's emotional defenses. In this danger-ridden Marvel Universe, only by keeping this Skyfather-level monster firmly tethered to his side would he have the standing to overturn those lofty game boards.
On an abandoned road five kilometers away, on the outskirts of New York.
Natasha stumbled out of the woods and leaned heavily against the hood of a black SUV.
The night wind was cold, but her entire body was drenched in cold sweat. Her throat burned, and every swallow carried a strong taste of blood. The burn on her outer thigh was still seeping tissue fluid, pain battering her nerves in waves.
Trembling, she unzipped her windbreaker and pulled out the high-frequency communicator she wore against her body.
"Calling headquarters... this is Romanoff." Her voice rasped like sandpaper scraping a rough wall.
A brief burst of static came through the communicator, followed by Nick Fury's low voice. "Report, Natasha. You sound like you just crawled out of a meat grinder."
"Worse than that, sir." Natasha closed her eyes. Wanda's scarlet eyes, formed of pure killing intent, surfaced in her mind again, along with Lynn's utterly indifferent gaze. "Mission failed. The target is extremely dangerous. The assessment level needs to be raised to... immeasurable."
Fury fell silent on the other end for two seconds. "The witch lost control?"
"No. It's Lynn." Natasha's eyes snapped open, her voice carrying a tremor even she did not notice. "Sir, that low-level agent fooled all of us. He isn't some poor bastard being held hostage by the witch. He's the one holding the leash."
"Explain." Fury's voice instantly turned cold.
"When the witch was about to kill me, all it took was one sentence and one gesture from him to instantly disperse energy that could have torn apart a Helicarrier." Natasha drew a deep breath, enduring the searing pain in her throat. "What's even more frightening is that while soothing the witch, he had his back to her and gave me a tactical hand signal."
In the underground base beneath the Triskelion.
Fury's remaining eye abruptly narrowed. He leaned forward involuntarily, his leather coat scraping dully against the leather chair. "What signal?"
"Two taps of the index finger, one of the middle finger, thumb tucked inward," Natasha repeated. "It should mean, 'Target under control. Hold position.'"
Dead silence fell over the communications channel for a full ten seconds.
Only the faint hiss of static could be heard.
"Sir?" Natasha frowned.
"Are you certain that was the gesture?" Fury's voice had become extremely dry, carrying a gravity he could barely conceal.
"I underwent the most rigorous code training. There's no possibility I misread it," Natasha answered firmly.
Fury did not answer immediately. He turned toward the main control computer behind his desk, inserted his highest-clearance security key, and pulled up a classified file that had been sealed for ten years.
A complex series of tactical hand-signal diagrams appeared on the screen.
Two taps of the index finger, one of the middle finger, thumb tucked inward.
Fury stared fixedly at the screen. The pupil of his lone eye contracted sharply, and his breathing visibly stopped for a moment.
"Natasha, return to headquarters immediately. Cut off all direct contact with Lynn." Fury delivered the order through gritted teeth, speaking twice as fast as usual.
"Sir, is something wrong with that signal?" Natasha keenly detected the change in Fury.
"That signal does mean 'Target under control. Hold position.'" Fury drew a deep breath, lowering his voice as though he feared some ghost lurking in the shadows. "But it's a one-way command code reserved exclusively for S.H.I.E.L.D.'s former director during the Cold War. It was completely destroyed ten years ago. Even Pierce has no authorization to access it!"
Fury's fingers hovered over the keyboard, the veins on the backs of his hands bulging.
"A level-three agent who joined less than three years ago..." Fury stared at the blinking cursor on the screen, feeling a chill down his back. "Not only does he know this obsolete code, he's using it to give me orders!"
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