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Natasha was picked up by SHIELD on a bright June day by an agent with hair like sunlight and a deceptively tiny gun. She was flattered, really, that the organization thought she was dangerous enough for a weapon like that-- the agent, not the gun. Guns were nothing without their wielder. The blonde agent had a familiar look in her eyes that marked her as dangerous; Natasha recognized it from the mirror, from handlers past, from the twenty seven other girls she’d outlived.
So when the agent-- Sharon-- asked her to come in from the cold, Natasha agreed. She wasn’t an idiot; being on SHIELD’s radar, but not their side, was a stupid move. Especially for her, with half of Russia’s most dangerous people wanting her head on a platter, refusing the protection SHIELD was offering was a death sentence. She knew that it wasn’t free, that she’d have to lie and kill for them, just like she had to for the Red Room, but it was better than the alternative. Maybe it was arrogant, but she felt she was made for bigger things than rotting in an unmarked grave back in her homeland. If SHIELD got her away from that fate, she wasn’t going to complain.
Not, of course, that she told Sharon any of this. She had a feeling the blonde had already guessed her reasoning, but Natasha would be damned if she volunteered any information beyond what was absolutely necessary. This woman wasn’t her friend. At best, they were reluctant allies. At worst, she was sure that Sharon had orders to use that gun should Natasha prove uncooperative.
So they walked down the New York streets in silence, not even commiserating about the sweltering heat and how their black tac suits were maybe not the best outfit for the June weather. There was a wall of noise a few streets away; Natasha remembered reading something about a parade, but she hadn’t paid it much attention at the time. She didn’t ask Sharon what it was, not even when the front of it swung into view and her mind started screaming.
Natasha had been on edge since she fled Russia. Anyone could have been an attacker sent by the remains of the Red Room, or any of the myriad other enemies she’d accumulated over the years. She knew that her past would catch up with her sooner or later. She had been expecting a single assassin, maybe another Widow, in a dark corner with the element of surprise on her side. Instead, it was loud and brightly colored, a mass of people smiling and dancing and yelling. Natasha’s mind couldn’t catalogue them fast enough, couldn’t look for weapons hidden under folds of rainbow cloth, for gazes that were too sharp and too dangerous. She stumbled back, every laughing figure registering as a threat, far too many for even a Black Widow to take on on her own. Her hands didn’t shake as she drew her knife, but the pale hand grabbing her wrist stopped their motion all the same.
“Natasha,” Sharon said, soothing and stern all at once. She moved them into an alley, out of sight of the marchers. Her grip was bruising, bending Natasha’s wrist until she was forced to drop the knife. “Natasha, they aren’t a threat. It’s just the Pride parade, they aren’t going to attack you.”
“They might,” Natasha hissed. She was well-aware that she sounded paranoid, but paranoia had kept her alive thus far.
Sharon cocked her head. Her expression was unreadable. “Then they’ll have to get through me first. You’re under SHIELD’s protection now; no one is going to get to you.”
Natasha snarled, pushing Sharon away. Sharon moved with the shove, twisting them so they were even closer, and Natasha still had her back against the alley wall. “I don’t need your protection,” Natasha spat, still struggling against Sharon’s strong (but deceptively gentle) hands.
“I know,” Sharon said simply, their eyes locking.
Three years later, when Sharon kissed her in front of that same alley, the Pride parade raging around them, Natasha broke that promise happily.