I'm lying to you // Natasha Romanoff x OC Odindottir

Chapter 24 - You Broke Steve

Hyra's pov

"She's out cold, semi-comatose by the looks of it," a calm voice washes over me, swimming through my ears like a sea of warmth.

"So, wake her up!" a sharper, more agitated voice cuts through the other, "you've got to have those 20 PHDs for a reason, Banner."

"It's not that easy," he responds, still in a soft manner, "she appears to just be... asleep. It's like nothing I've seen before."

"Maybe it's something Asgardian?" another voice offers.

"No, this only ever happens in Odinsleep," a deep, booming man replies in a low tone. I can hear the rhythmic pacing of a pair of feet echoing around the room.

"She'll be ok, Nat-"

"How can you say that? You said you didn't even know what this was! For all we know she could stay like that for a thousand years and-"

Suddenly I gain control over my body again, immediately snapping open my eyes and letting out a sharp gasp. A cool breeze sweeps over my nerves in a frozen shiver. I sit up quickly, slowly shaking away the blinding light in my eyes and the deep, rapid breaths in my chest.

When I finally become fully aware and awake, the room is still in an icy silence. Clearly my lungs thickly, I mumble out, "Don't all talk at once."

"-What the..." Bruce looks up from his screen, only then seeming to notice my now-conscious state. He immediately begins to bustle around, assaulting me with needles and sensors, taking scrawled notes from dynamic and immensely complicated graphs.

Once he's finally done, he tells me to rest and leaves with the others. I hadn't noticed the motionless figure stood behind me. My voice only musters a whisper, "I'm sorry, Nat, I didn't mean to-"

As I look up at her, I notice the rapidly growing well of tears in her eyes. She wipes them away hastily, but I had seen them. Stuffing her hands in her sleeves anxiously, she mumbles, "Just don't ever do that again, Kane."

"Nat-" I catch her hand as she moves to go, spinning her back to face me. I stand warily from the hospital bed, ignoring the sore cramp in my legs. I meet her eyes, watching how they flick around and never settling on one place.

"Nat, honey, look at me, please," I ghost my palm on her cheek, guiding it back towards me. All of a sudden - just as her eyes lock into mine - a flash of realisation and guilt proceeds the pooling of tears in her eyes once again. Crushing me in a vice-tight hug, I feel her head buried deep in the crook of my neck, burning hot tears seeping through my thin t-shirt.

"Mr Stark would like to invite all Avengers to a party tonight, starting at 7pm," JARVIS' voice startles us both. Jumping apart, we immediately begin to laugh. After we begin to settle, she grabs my hand lightly and squeezes it absentmindedly. Staring deeply at me, a warm smile tugs at her lips.

"Sounds like fun," Natasha comments somewhat sarcastically.

"It's what I envisage the deepest, darkest depths of Hel to be like," I counter with a light smirk. She looks unimpressed, yet her eyes twinkle in the whisper of a smile.

"Stark parties aren't that bad," she twiddles my rings lightly.

"Maybe not, but they're the last thing I want to do right now," I admit, the world around us slowly blurring and falling away.

She watches me carefully, her gaze fixed on my unfocused eyes. The space between us seems almost conservative, the inches repelling us like polar magnets. I strain to move against the force, moving mere millimetres towards her.

"So, what do you want to do right now?" her voice is lower than a whisper, nearly just mouthing the words. She tilts her head forward, pressing her forehead on mine. I muster the strength to look into her eyes.

"To be with you. Anywhere with you."

As if the invisible force is still pushing us away, I can't bring us any closer. But this is enough: it conveys such raw compassion without the need to make a scene or a grand gesture. Just this.

My hands inch around her midriff, pulling her in so that my arms nearly cross. Our breaths mingle heavily in the small space between us. Ghosting over each other, our lips never touch, but it is as if they have for days on end. Silence amidst the storm around us.

"Cyrus, Tony wants to see you-" Steve stops dead in his tracks, stood motionless in the doorway. As the world around us begins to reshape and form comprehensive shapes again, I turn my head to look at the stunned man.

"Just because you're standing really still, doesn't mean we can't see you, Steve," I remind him lightheartedly, letting out the lightest of laughs. All at once, his joints begin to soften as his comical expression becomes more dynamic.

"Right, yes, of course, I'll just be going-" and with that, he practically runs away, his footsteps soon receding from ear shot.

Natasha laughs quietly, "I think you broke Steve, C."

"I'm sure he'll live," I smile, pressing a tight kiss onto her forehead. I feel her smile, the rosy warmth of a blush rising to her cheeks.

"You should probably go and find out what Tony wanted to talk to you about," she finally whispers, seemingly disheartened at her own words.

"Getting rid of me so soon?" I joke, rubbing my thumb across a small section of her hip. She swats my shoulder as she gives me a mildly disapproving glare. I raise my hands in false surrender, feeling a smile emerge on my face, "Alright, alright I'm going."

Just as I turn to go - with my hand lightly rested on the door handle - she pulls back my other hand and spin me back sharply to face her. With no more than a satisfied half-smirk, she places a firm hand on the back of my neck and pulls me in. I'm well aware that it's utterly cliché, but there was slightly crackle of sparks as she did, blazing our unsaid words onto the skyline.

It was only a short time before she pulls away to breathe, hanging her head to hide her somewhat shit-eating grin. After giving herself a moment to compose herself, she looks back up with more sane and level eyes, "Meet me at my room at 6:30; don't be a minute later."

Pushing me out of the door, all I can give her is a quick nod before she disappears from view. With a slight hop in my step, I hurry on towards Tony's lab where I'm sure to find him.

I'm so sorry I haven't updated in a while. I've had a lot of tests and have ultimately had zero inspiration (and I've been binging stranger things before Vol2 comes out). Thank you all for your patience.

Thanks again,

Much love, Shrimpward xx