Black Widow: Forever Red Read online

  They were in.

  Within an hour, Ava and Alex—now outfitted in black like every other regulation S.H.I.E.L.D. recruit—and Tony and Natasha were ensconced several floors beneath the East River, in what Tony called the Brain Trust. The dark room appeared to be the size of a football field, though in reality it wasn’t much more than fifty feet in any one direction. It was the information flowing through it that threw off the perspective.

  The place was virtually larger than life.

  As Ava and Alex stood side by side in the back of the chamber, they couldn’t help but marvel at the free flow of data surrounding them.

  “All right. This is cool.” Alex nodded. He no longer seemed thrown off by the presence of Iron Man, or even the threat of Ivan’s army.

  Ava wished it were that easy for her. She was still wary. S.H.I.E.L.D. had taught her to be that way; even this room was protected by three separately patrolled corridors, an alarm sequence that reset on the hour, and a two-foot steel door. For a girl who couldn’t help but calculate escape routes from every room that she entered, this was a nightmare. She couldn’t trust anything in the building—not even if it was called the Brain Trust.

  “Yeah, super cool,” Ava said.

  Still, there was no denying that what was happening in this room was nothing like anything she had ever seen in 7B—or anywhere else in the world. Back in the safe house, she’d snuck over-the-shoulder glimpses at elaborately encrypted files and equally elaborately encrypted routines that could steal them, just like she’d seen tech that could start any car or open any door. She’d thought nothing of it.

  But that wasn’t this.

  Now thousands of S.H.I.E.L.D. files streamed over the walls, encircling them with illuminated images and numbers and charts and graphs, as Natasha and Tony searched different sectors of the mainframe. They were drowning in data, and it all had to do with Ivan Somodorov in one way or another.

  Natasha was silent and focused, but Tony talked as he worked. “Walk me through it again. Your not-so-dead long-lost Red Roomie shows up in Panama City. You’re afraid he’ll try to tangle with Natasha Junior, here.”

  Ava coughed. “Excuse me?”

  “So you circle the wagons, pick up Mini-Me, take out Ivan’s welcome party, hop on Coulson’s good ship Lollipop, and hitch a ride to S.H.I.E.L.D.’s doorstep.”

  “Mini-Me? No.” Ava still looked wounded.

  “Yeah. More or less,” Natasha said, not looking up.

  Tony frowned. “And what about the boy?”

  “Caught in the cross fire,” Natasha said dismissively.

  “Tell me about it.” Alex sighed.

  “Ivan wants something, and I think it has to do with Ava and me. That’s why we’re here,” Natasha said.

  Tony nodded from his keyboard. “Because you need help babysitting?”

  “Because I’m trained for ballistics and military strategy and counterintelligence and not for this.”

  “Top of her class,” Alex muttered, nudging Ava’s foot.

  “So?” Tony laughed once. “I’m trained for highballs and the high life and—well, high everything—but people adapt. Things change.”

  “Not everyone,” Natasha said, trying to focus on the screen in front of her. She sounded uncomfortable.

  Ava watched her from behind. You had to appreciate the irony. My curse was for her to abandon me, and her curse will be that she can never escape me.

  Ava looked away.

  “Yeah, well, it looks like Ivan doesn’t change much either. Here. I’ve got something.” Tony tapped on a tablet, and what looked like a set of blueprints projected itself on the wall of screens. “This is a scan of what S.H.I.E.L.D. recovered the night of the Odessa raid.”

  Natasha glanced up at the projected image in front of her.

  “That’s what you were looking for, right? I think—there’s more.” Tony kept moving new files on and off the screen. Immediately numbers and images began to fly as he mined the Triskeleon’s powerful—and powerfully secure—mainframe.

  Natasha grabbed his arm. “Stop. The O.P.U.S. project. That one. That’s it.”

  Tony pulled the image off the screen, and now the model projected itself into the center of the room. It was far from complete—if anything, the model appeared to be damaged and only partially materialized—but even in that state, it hung in the air above them in three translucent dimensions.

  He tapped again, and the model spun over and over, revealing every side of itself, every angle, every flaw. What looked like some sort of patched, riveted metal box, as tall as a person, with coils of cabling that dangled beneath it like a kind of dead octopus.

  A familiar dead octopus.

  Ava felt herself holding her breath as Alex tightened his arm around her shoulders. She was transfixed. “I remember now. That—that thing. It was there. In the warehouse with Ivan.”

  “That thing is how we blew the place up,” Natasha said, studying the glowing white lines and numbers that dissected the open space in front of her. “So this is what was left of it? After?”

  “Apparently.” Tony’s hands were flying. Every inch of the room was full of images and numbers.

  Finally he sat back. “Even what’s left of it is pretty spooky.”

  “Spooky?” Ava said from behind him. “I know why I think it’s spooky. Why do you?”

  “Not me. Einstein.” Tony tapped the tablet again, and Albert Einstein’s face appeared on the screens behind the rotating model. “Spooky physics. That’s what Einstein called quantum entanglement.”

  “Wait, what?” Alex asked.

  “Quantum entanglement. The total manipulation of physics across space and time. The idea that two distinct pieces of matter can affect each other over a span of vast distances.”

  Ava frowned. “Two pieces of matter?”

  “He means people,” Natasha said. She kept her eyes on the walls. “Two people.”

  Tony nodded. “Ask twins who feel each other’s pain—or a mother who suddenly wakes up when her kid has a nightmare—or a dog who waits by his master’s grave.” He looked up. “You could argue that those are natural entanglements. But what if you could control them? What if you could entangle matter for yourself?”

  Natasha sat back in her chair, staring at the data in front of her.

  “The O.P.U.S. project, if these records are right, was Moscow’s push to weaponize quantum entanglement—and then build it. If they got it done, they’ve found what amounts to the legendary lost unicorn of every physics department in the world.”

  Natasha shook her head, frustrated. “You know who also said that? Howard Stark, only he was talking about Vita-Rays. Bruce could have said the same thing about gamma radiation. I’m getting pretty tired of unicorns. Could we try to get a regular horse around here for once?”

  Tony tapped the interface again. “I think this particular unicorn is already out of the gate, Agent Romanoff. There are hundreds of pages of files here that corroborate mentions of your O.P.U.S. project, involving dozens of Russian labs.”

  She gave up. “Fine. So we know this thing, whatever it was, was a priority, and not just for Ivan. For Moscow.” Natasha reached forward to the interface, rotating the model again.

  Alex spoke up. “What do you mean, weaponize?”

  “I mean, when people become just as dangerous as weapons.” Tony sat back. “Unless I’m mistaken, that device right there was an attempt to entangle the psyches of two unsuspecting parties. Like an adaptor, but for brains.”

  “And by people you mean me,” Ava said slowly. Her eyes were fixed on the wall of data streaming past her. “I’m the weapon.”

  “Conceivably. A weapon,” Tony corrected.

  “That has to be impossible,” Natasha said. “Please tell me that’s impossible.”

  “I’m not so sure,” Tony said. “Imagine a modern-day version of the Vulcan mind meld, only Spock is completely in the driver’s seat now, and poor Captain Kirk doesn’t even know his mind
is being melded.”

  Natasha looked annoyed. “Is that before or after they blow up the Death Star?”

  “I’m going to pretend you didn’t say that.” Alex laughed. Tony didn’t.

  “Think about it. It’s the perfect way to spy on heads of state, tycoons of industry, military generals, Supreme Court justices. If the psyche of one person can connect to the psyche of another person, anyone could be a double agent, anywhere.”

  “Not anyone,” Natasha said, staring at the model in front of her. “How old were you, Ava? Back in Odessa?”

  “Eight,” Ava said, barely able to speak. “I was eight. By the time I left I was almost ten.”

  “Exactly.” Natasha pulled a Ukrainian newspaper article up on the screens. “And now children are disappearing and not just from Ukraine. The kidnappings range from Moscow to Moldova. Just like last time Ivan was running his operation.”

  “Makes sense. Better brains,” Tony added. “More adaptive. More growth of neuron pathways. Until you’re twenty-six, and then it all gets shot to hell. Unless you’re a—what’s the word for it? A Tony Stark?”

  Alex laughed.

  Ava glared at him. Suck up.

  Tony tapped a button, and the illuminated model disappeared. What looked like typewritten, sometimes handwritten, Russian lab reports appeared in front of them.

  POLNAYA SINKHRONIZATSIYA.

  “Synchronization complete,” Natasha said, staring at the words. “That was the message we intercepted too. What if they were talking about Ava and me?”

  “That might be a little not good.” Tony shrugged. “Ish.”

  “Would the connection be stronger when both parties were in physical proximity?”

  “You tell me. As far as we know, you and Ava appear to be Ivan’s only Entangled working prototype.”

  Natasha spun her chair toward Ava. “I grabbed Ava by the hand, twice. The first time made her so sick she almost couldn’t stand up. The second time, she lost consciousness.”

  Ava nodded. “It felt like my body was on fire. Like I was being electrocuted or something.”

  “And then she was gone. Completely sacked out,” Alex added.

  Tony looked delighted, and his brain appeared to be racing “Like two live wires. That’s amazing. That’s unbelievable. And some kind of dopaminergic pathway? Mesolimbic and mesocortical? That’s—”

  Natasha cut him off. “A level seven classified breach? An intelligence disaster? An unparalleled vulnerability, not just for S.H.I.E.L.D. but for the entire Avengers Initiative?”

  “I see your point,” Tony said.

  “I hate to bring it up, but what if they’re not the only Entangled prototype?” Alex asked.

  “Then we’re in a lot more trouble than anyone knows.” Tony hesitated. “This party’s just getting started. Even if it is only Ava and Natasha who are Entangled, it’s likely that the stronger the connection gets, the greater access Ava will have to Natasha’s cerebral cortex.”

  “Which means?” Alex looked at Tony.

  “Which means I won’t just be leaping from bridges and using her combat moves, will I?” Ava asked.

  Tony shook his head. “No. Natasha—Agent Romanoff—will eventually just start…leaking…leaching…into your brain.”

  “Super,” Natasha said.

  “I know I’m thrilled,” Ava answered.

  Tony looked at Natasha. “Prepare for exposure. And I’m only saying this because I’ve never seen you as an oversharer,” he said. “Or, and I’m just being honest here, even an under-sharer. Or, you know. Sharer.”

  The silence that answered him was awkward.

  “Yay sharing,” Alex said.

  Tony spun his chair toward Natasha. “You’ll have no secrets, Romanoff. Not about what we do, and not about your past. You’ll be an open book, and not just for Ava but to anyone who can get to her.”

  Ava found she couldn’t look at Natasha. It was all too strangely intimate now. “Why now? What changed?”

  “I don’t think it is just now. I think the initial connection probably booted itself up when the two of you first encountered this thing,” Tony said. “In Odessa. You and Ivan.”

  Natasha nodded. She remembered the moment, and she suspected Ava did too. The blue light. The explosion of electricity. The shooting pain.

  “But something has to be triggering it. Now. After all this time,” Ava said.

  “Maybe that’s why this Ivan guy showed up,” Alex said. “So that Agent Romanoff would come for Ava. Maybe just getting them together again was the synchronization he was talking about.”

  “Exactly.” Tony looked from one redheaded Russian to the other. “As you said. Physical proximity. It’s possible.”

  Natasha’s eyes were now as cold as the New York City winter night. “So use that big brain of yours to find a way to shut it down, Tony.”

  “If I can,” Tony said. Then he smiled. “Who are we kidding? Of course I can.” He checked his watch. “But I have to get to Bora Bora by dinner. It’s Date Night.”

  Natasha put her hand awkwardly on his arm. “Thanks, Tony. I mean it.”

  Tony sighed. “Just so long as it doesn’t involve chaos. I promised Pepper—we’re on a break from chaos.”

  “So I heard.” Natasha did not look amused.

  “It was a book,” he said defensively. “She made me read it. I’ll send it to you. Break from Chaos. That’s apparently a thing.”

  “You’re Tony Stark. Since when do you have to get permission for a life of chaos?”

  “Things change, Agent Romanoff.”

  S.H.I.E.L.D. EYES ONLY

  CLEARANCE LEVEL X

  LINE-OF-DUTY DEATH [LODD] INVESTIGATION

  REF: S.H.I.E.L.D. CASE 121A415

  AGENT IN COMMAND [AIC]: PHILLIP COULSON

  RE: AGENT NATASHA ROMANOFF A.K.A. BLACK WIDOW, A.K.A. NATASHA ROMANOVA

  TRANSCRIPT: DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE, LODD INQUIRY HEARINGS.

  DOD: You expect me to believe you knew nothing more about the identities of the civilian minors placed in your care?

  ROMANOFF: Sir?

  DOD: I just find it odd that a solo operative suddenly involved herself with not one but two minor assets.

  ROMANOFF: Is that a question, sir?

  DOD: Did you believe that they were each in some way connected to the case?

  ROMANOFF: Ava was always a target, as far as Ivan was concerned. Alex was just--wrong place, wrong time.

  DOD: Would you say a protective instinct emerged? One that an agent of your record would have found disorienting, given your own childhood history with Ivan Somodorov?

  ROMANOFF: I find everything about children disorienting, sir.

  DOD: So no instincts?

  ROMANOFF: My only instincts are to shoot and to run, sir.

  DOD: And the children?

  ROMANOFF: I wouldn’t say I’d shoot them, but they should probably still run. Just to be on the safe side.

  DOD: So no instincts.

  ROMANOFF: None whatsoever.

  S.H.I.E.L.D. TRISKELEON BASE

  THE GREAT CITY OF NEW YORK—

  EAST RIVER

  “You know what they say. The fifteenth time’s the charm,” Tony said cheerfully.

  “They don’t say that.” Natasha glared. “Ever.”

  “Actually, I think the fifteenth time is when they say to give up,” Alex offered.

  “They don’t say it to me,” Tony said, waving him off.

  Tony’s fourteenth attempt to sever the mental connection between Ava and Natasha had nearly incinerated half her head, and she was still resentful. She looked doubtfully at Ava, who sat on a metal stool in the center of the room, just as she did.

  Like two sitting ducks.

  “Is he always like this?” Ava asked her.

  “Always,” Natasha said.

  “Come on. Haven’t you seen the documentary?” Alex piped up from where he stood behind them. “Tony Stark—Iron Will? He’s the original American opt
imist.”

  “Yeah. What he said.” Tony smiled, holding up a blowtorch.

  “Actually, he’s not the original,” Natasha said. “That would be Rogers. By about fifty years.”

  “I’m just getting started,” Tony said, lowering a welding mask over his face. “Reverse dog years. What are those, cat years?”

  “Super-Soldier Steve Rogers?” Alex swallowed.

  “I like this kid,” Tony said as sparks flew. “The kid stays.”

  Just as he said it, the sparks exploded around all four of them.

  Natasha’s vision blacked out, and she flashed on a split second of imagery—a blurry figure of a dancing girl, maybe? It was too quick to see who it was. She only knew it wasn’t her.

  But she’d also heard something.

  A song.

  Is that—Tchaikovsky?

  It was too quick to understand, though, and Natasha’s vision returned to normal just as Tony dropped the mass of burning wires on the tiled floor. Two dutiful lab technicians sprayed the smoking heap with white foam.

  “I saw something that time,” Natasha said. “I might have.”

  “Let me guess, you saw stars?” Alex eyed the ruined remains of trail fifteen.

  Natasha thought about it.

  What did I see?

  Were those Ava’s memories? Was I seeing into her mind?

  She could feel her own pulse beginning to race.

  It had been one thing to logically understand quantum entanglement. But to see it for herself? For the first time, Natasha realized Ava could really see into her mind. Could actually access her memories.

  The thought was more than terrifying.

  The idea of anyone seeing her past made her almost physically sick.

  “I don’t care. I’m not putting these things anywhere near my head,” Ava said, ripping off her own smoking electrodes. “I don’t have a death wish.”

  Natasha looked at the other fourteen charred piles on the floor. Though the Triskeleon’s lab facilities were state of the art—at least they had been, before today—Tony didn’t seem to be making much progress. In fact, he seemed to be making everything but progress.