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Natasha had never been more grateful for Tony’s tendency to adopt children than today.
The mission had been a disaster from start to finish. The Avengers had had to react quickly, and therefore went in based on insufficient information. It was something that would probably leave any other first responder unit in a screaming match with their superiors, while it was the most common and most expected from a group of superheroes, really. And on most days, it was okay. On most days, they were quick on their feet and could handle whatever was thrown at their faces.
But there were days when the given intel wasn’t only insufficient but completely misleading. There were days when it meant going into a situation expecting a handful of ordinary goons, when in reality they went in to be pinned down by a squadron of enhanced, intelligent dinosaurs armed to the teeth under the command of the handful of not-exactly-ordinary and not-exactly-human-anymore goons.
Which was challenging, to say the least, even to superheroes, because being super and trained and hard to kill is one thing, and being this far outnumbered by competent enemies was another.
When the reptiles had successfully managed to separate them from each other, they all kind of started to make their peace with the very likely option of not leaving the scene alive. Or at least not all of them, despite their best efforts. Natasha felt the icy feeling settle in her stomach, the ruthless truth of it run through her veins with cold certitude. She didn’t have more time than to spare a few glances to her teammates, but she had been trained to see the important details even by just that.
She saw how heavily Bucky was bleeding; the dinosaur teeth had gone through tac gear like it was cotton candy. She saw the desperation as he switched from rifle to gun to blades, as he had ran out of ammo or lost them to the enemy. (She dodged sharp fangs and shot through the jaw of the beastie.) She saw Steve, his jaw clenched and teeth gritted, partly because of determination and partly simply to not bit his tongue as he flipped, fought, punched and defended himself with the shield, growls of frustration escaping him as he got farther and farther away from the rest of his team. (A goon came close enough for her to slam her body in. Stomp on his feet. Elbow to his noise; hear the satisfactory crack of bone. Push him away, into the waiting jaw of a dinosaur.) She saw Clint, running out of arrows, refusing to move away from his spot as he defended Wanda, who had been knocked unconscious earlier. (Switch the knife from her right to her left hand and thrust into the chest of a reptile, push push push until she couldn’t further, until the warm blood of the animal coated her hand.) She saw Vision, struggling and immobilized by one of the alien devices the enemy had, his synthetic-vibranium body withstanding the dinosaurs but who knew how long would that last. (Get a moment to breath and spray the enemies in front of her with bullets, without aim, just to keep them at bay while she panted.) She saw Rhodey, out of his armor for some reason she had missed, teamed up with Sam who was forced on the ground too, but at least the pair still had their guns. (A bullet hit her chest, stopped by her gear but she still stumbled back two steps, trying to get her bearings again through the pain. A dinosaur nearly chomped her head off. She danced away, further from the others…)
So it was really looking fucking great for everyone.
Natasha wasn’t afraid of dying, hadn’t been since she had turned twelve, always accepted it as an unlikely but possible scenario. And to be completely honest, she wasn’t even displeased with this way of dying. Being eaten alive wasn’t ideal for sure, but she was practical enough to know that there were worse ones. Plus, if there were an afterlife, Clint would be able to brag about it for eternity as something pretty unique and, in his terms, badass way to go.
(She was forced on the ground, assaulted from too many directions to be able to stand up, just rolling away and away - sometimes being able to retaliate, but mostly just avoiding, rolling, dodging…)
She was a bit worried about Steve and Bucky. But hey, they’d died a few times already, they should be good for another round. As long as they went out together, because she was pretty sure they’d commit suicide to drag the other back personally anyway if one of them miraculously survived where the other didn’t.
(Finally she was on her feet and she fired, almost blindly, only paying attention to turn away from her teammates, even though she was going to run out of ammo too soon.)
The rest of the team, well. Natasha could guess, but she was pretty preoccupied with a dinosaur snarling at her face, so she didn’t. They’d figure out afterlife if they even got there.
Which, personally, Natasha doubted, but it was just her belief. Everyone was allowed to have their own delusions. (Even if they were wrong.)
The whole building started to shook around her, and through the roaring of the battle she heard thumbling, thunderous sounds of bricks collapsing, structures shattering, and she looked up, surprised and too damn deep among the enemies to feel hopeful. Even if Thor arrived just in time to save the day, there was never any insurance that all of the team would survive long enough to see him - Natasha herself was bleeding, the cuts from the dinosaur claws slashing deep into her flesh, making her slower, easier to target.
But what she saw when the roof was torn away from above them wasn't the God of Thunder.
What she saw was... a spaceship.
It was bulky, less sleek than the Guardians' ship with which she had experience. It seemed used and old, the way a thirty-years old car would look despite being loved and cared for through the decades. She didn't have time to goggle too much, having plenty enough to focus on without the appearing spaceship. The Avengers were in a bad enough situation, if the newcomer turned out to be hostile, it was all lost anyway, and she couldn't do anything against a spaceship in her condition - she ran out of ammo already, not to mention the exhaustion of the blood loss and the fight.
The spaceship, hovering above them, opened fire.
Dinosaurs and goons fell like they were skittles, the hail of bullets avoiding the Avengers carefully.
The spaceship turned in the air, almost like making a dramatic pirouette, and the head of it tipped down, revealing the pilot.
Natasha had never been more grateful to see an alien.
Nebula was holding a sippy cup in one hand, nibbling at it absent-mindedly as she piloted the ship.
Natasha sliced through the garters of a reptile and grinned up. Nebula parted the cup from her lips long enough to smile back, then continued to nibble on it.
Natasha's smile faltered, partly because a goon got close enough to nearly hit her face with his gunstock, and partly because someone joined Nebula on the cockpit, and of course Tony had to be there.
She was happy to see Tony, always. She wasn't happy to see him out of bed against doctors’ orders. But honestly, what else did she expect.
There was no music, no AC/DC filling the air like the first time Tony had shown up for the very first Avengers mission, joining the fight against Loki. Maybe Tony grew out of some of his antics; maybe he just got older and more tired to waste it without good reason. But he was still dramatic enough to switch on a loudspeaker. "Need a ride, team?" he asked.
The resulting growls, thankfully, were lost to the noise of the spaceship landing. On top of some of the dinosaurs. No one particularly minded that bit.
One by one, the Avengers fought their way to the opening hatch. Natasha helped Clint dragging Wanda, while Sam and Rhodey carried Vision and the supersoldier duo covered their hasty exit with punching or stabbing anything that came close enough to punch or stab it.
They all but collapsed on the floor once the ramp was up and they felt the ship rising to the air.
Natasha heard part of the conversation happening in the cockpit. "These are bad guys by Terran standards, right?" Nebula asked.
"Absolutely," Tony confirmed, voice audibly proud, and also audibly shaky. He probably wasn't as good to go as he tried to convince himself.
"Okay then," Nebula said.
The next moment, there was an explosion huge enough that it shook the ship in the air, throwing everyone off-balance who tried to be on their feet. Natasha was wiser than that to begin with, still sprawled out on the dirty iron lattice. Every inch of her body hurt. Adrenaline had kept the sensations at bay, but even hormones could do miracles only for so long. She was very grateful to just lay on the floor, happy to be still breathing, and getting acclimatized to the fact that she missed her meeting with death yet again.
Thanks to the amazing team. The team that included Tony Stark, Iron Man, the best defender of planet Earth, and foster dad of many deadly being. Including, but not limited to Nebula.
Half-deaf from the explosion, Natasha wondered if they should make Nebula an Avenger in the eyes of the world, too. She always showed up if Iron Man got involved, anyway - they might as well make it official.
Once the ringing of their ears dissipated, Tony sighed, loud and exasperated.
"Neb, Mean and Angsty Blue Princess, dearest of the aliens, when I say bad guys, I mean you should turn them to the authorities, not to blow them up, remember?"
"Ooops," Nebula said, tone as flat as possible. "I'll keep that in mind next time."
Natasha rolled to her back and couldn't help a smile as he listened to the team roustling and groaning and complaining around her.
Nebula didn't blow up the facility because she forgot the rules of Earth. She did it because the people in there had hurt the Avengers. She had chosen Tony as his family, and with Tony came a bunch of other superheroes, and as much as Nebula tried to keep up appearances, she had grown fond of them. All of them. Natasha knew, because she'd been there once where Nebula was now, too attached to not care but too scared to show it openly. Yet.
She'd come around, Natasha was sure of that.
And until then, here she was, saving them all.
Natasha knew there were a lot to come. They'd have to thank Neb and Tony. They'd have to ask them where did they acquire a spaceship. (Or more like, where the hell had been Tony and Nebula secretly building it, since it was clearly a shared project between the pair.) They'd have to deal with the fallout of this mission gone wrong. They'd have to justify the extreme measure of violence to authorities. They'd have to figure out how did this facility got weaponized dinosaurs, which wouldn't be easy with the evidence blown up to kingdom come. They'd have to sit down with Nebula yet again, pretending they didn't all know why had she done what she'd done. And they'd have to chew another one on Tony for not staying in bed when he had been on the brink of death only a few days ago.
But all of that could wait.
At these moments, she just wanted to sleep, preferably for a whole week, surrounded by her family.
So she did.