The Devil's Keeper - Blackhill

Chapter 9 - She'll Be A Scar Now

[April 16th, 2007 – Helicarrier, location classified]

She lost track of time quickly after they started reverting her conditioning. Simmons told her she was in and out of consciousness for two weeks. It was another week and a half before she'd recovered from the process enough to be able to start counting days again. Slowly but steadily, she improved. She started feeling better by the day, until after a month she was ready to start her training, just as Fitz-Simmons had predicted.

Clint still visited her. The visits were very short and consisted purely of small talk since Natalia's room was under video surveillance, at least until she finished her reprogramming.

"Fitz and Simmons have been assigned to the Triskelion."

"I know."Natalia said. "They left yesterday."

Clint sighed. "May and Phil are still in Egypt, they've been there for a week already. Morse has been assigned something undercover and left three days ago."

"I know Clint, they all came to say goodbye. Who knows why."

"Because they care." he shrugged.

"They shouldn't." she told him tiredly. And the one person who should have, didn't anymore. "Is Hill..."

"Yes. She left a month ago for that mission in Belgium and has been gone ever since. I have this hunch that Fury isn't planning letting her return until she's back to her cold and calculating self. You've only met her when she was going through all of this, but..." he shrugged and didn't finish the sentence.

"Carter came here twice. She never said a word. Just looked at me, saw I was still alive, and left again."

Clint shrugged. "Sharon's like that. We're meeting our handler later, Sitwell. I know him already, he's a douche but it could have been worse. We're going to be Strike Team Delta. Cool name, isn't it?"

"Your childish behaviour is endearing." she said in a monotonous tone.

"Come on, you're going to go through a truth machine. How aren't you at least a little excited or nervous or something?"

Natalia sighed, "I don't know, Clint."

"You do, Natalia."

She looked at him and hesitated. "I was actually thinking about changing that. I don't feel like her anymore. I don't think that's who I am anymore. Plus, I already told Fury to have Natasha Romanoff printed on my gear so..." she shrugged.

"And it has nothing to do with the woman you supposedly owe a debt to?" Clint raised an eyebrow.

"My father used to call me that when I was a kid when I wanted to become a ballerina here in the States. Believe it or not, there's nothing going on between Hill and me. There never was."

"Sure. You tell yourself whatever you need to, Natasha."

She rolled her eyes, punched him in the shoulder, then dropped the topic at once.

- - -

Natasha walked into the room and was connected to the polygraph by a technician.

"An agent will be with you shortly to question you."

She nodded, knowing already it would be Sitwell, her soon-to-be handler.

Once she was alone, she thought about what Clint said. About the name she'd chosen. Perhaps there was some truth to what he said about Hill, but it didn't matter, because Maria hadn't been on the Helicarrier for a month and she'd yet to make contact. She'd moved on and Natasha was supposed to have already forgotten all about her.