The Morning After Meme

[somepartsbroken]

the morning after meme
1. Post your characters!
2. Respond to others!
3. Your characters wake up together.
4. What happened? Memories can be intact or they can piece together the mystery.

Stolen from lastvoyages

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[shapedthecentury]

[ Ever the skilled liar. He can't take her surface reactions for truth, but he has been lied to for many years. He thinks he knows the signs by now. ]

Because I know who you are. The leaks weren't hard to follow. Official channels did their best to sweep everything from public access, but I know how to make the right people talk.

[ He studies her quietly for a moment. The bright green hue of her eyes, her deceptively delicate fingers and feet. That was the conceit of the Black Widow, a small, delicate thing with a deadly bite should you be fool enough to draw close. There had been dozens of girls who vied for the opportunity. The woman lying on the sheets was the remnants of that program. All that was left of all those bright eyes filled with fear.

And when she defected, they seemed smug in sending him after her, as though it sent a message or made some poetic irony. He hadn't known why, hadn't cared when he put a bullet through her outside of Odessa, and the mission had been scraped like all the rest once he returned. But there are no coincidences, not anymore. ]

[iwasrussian]

Then you know it doesn't matter. Everyone knows who I am now.

[ She replied slowly and no sooner than he finished. He was getting too close now, his eyes holding an unmistakable familiarity that had her schooling her features into something indifferent and unreadable. There was that instinctive need to protect herself; hide herself away even though she wasn't really sure who she was. James knew. But, he wasn't him.

Not yet, anyway.

Natasha spared a few long moments, regarding him carefully with her gaze holding his until she shifted a little in discomfort. ]

So you know who I am. What now?

[shapedthecentury]

I trained you.

[ That's what the text says, what the frightened technician had managed to burble through the blood in his lungs. He stares hard at her, unflinchingly. ]

I trained you and they separated us. Why?

[ Who she is matters because she has answers. He doesn't need to keep her, if they're looking for her. Whoever is looking for her is free to find her, once he's gotten the answers he needs. ]

[iwasrussian]

[ In the seconds before he answers, there's a pull inside her chest that causes her brow to dip so slightly it would have been hard for anyone else, but him, to notice. With it came a flooding of images, memories and shared moments that should have been lost to her. But, like they seemed to be resurfacing slowly for him now, hers came back the moment she saw him in Odessa; moments before he fired.

Silence hung in the air between them like dead weight. There would be no lie good enough to convince him to drop the subject. But, the truth wouldn't be enough either. Sadly, she had no other choice; no escape this time. ]

My training had been completed. You were no longer needed.

[ That was what they had told her, but she had known the real reason why. ]

[shapedthecentury]

That's not all.

[ There's no threat to his voice. It'd be unnecessary at this juncture. He's nearly killed her twice, and hasn't. He could easily do her harm, and she knows it. It's more important to be able to see through these facades of hers to the heart of the matter, and she will come clean eventually.

He has the patience to wait her out. He has all the time in the world, now. ]

Tell me.

[iwasrussian]

Why are you doing this?

[The words were soft and breathy and her eyes left his to focus on something not so intense. Looking into them, even though they held no familiarity of her were the same eyes that she looked into when they sparred, or as they passed each other in the hallway. Across the dining hall.

In the shower.]

It was a long time ago.

[shapedthecentury]

You have answers I need.

[ There are too many holes, too many blanks left unfilled, and piecing things together one step at a time is all that the previous months have been. That, and extracting vengeance on the ones who unleashed him on the world, who manipulated him into doing their bidding.

Natasha was no different. She of all people might understand what it was like to be taken apart and put back together again as something else, something not entirely you. ]

[iwasrussian]

[And she did. Better than anyone else and it was a time in her life she would never ever be allowed to forget. The blood on her hands - the blood she was commanded to take for them - was forever stained on them. It couldn't be washed away.

Nor, could she become the person she thought she might have been if they hadn't taken her away from her life all those years ago. That's something they had in common; each of them knew what the other had been through.

He was the closest thing she knew to normal.

When she spoke again, it was with that understanding that he sought.]

We got too close and they found out. They didn't want you compromising me.

[What they didn't know was that he already had.]