Natalia (the_black_widow) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2016-09-25 16:20:00 |
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Entry tags: | !complete, natasha romanoff (black widow), stahma tarr |
Who: Stahma and Natasha
What: Stahma drops in, Natasha finally talks to someone about her Civil War dreams
When: Recent
Where: Nat's condo
Status: complete
Rating: PG-13
Stahma had decided to take the initiative and surprise Natasha. She decided that she wanted to bring a little something for her as well. So on her way over to Natasha’s place, she stopped and bought some flowers. It was a bouquet of roses, both red and black. She felt they were fitting considering Natasha’s hair color and dominant wardrobe color.
She then arrived and rang the bell. She was wearing the device that Natasha had given her to conceal her alien appearance. It had become jarring to her to see the dark hair and dark eyes now after she’d adjusted to her lilac eyes and grey-ish white hair. She held the flowers behind her back, wanting them to be a surprise when Natasha answered the door.
Natasha wasn’t expecting company. Luckily her condo was the opposite of a mess. Well and meticulously cared for, with all the ‘normal’ decorations you’d expect of a ‘normal’ person, though with a Russian flair. Nothing that really gave away her personality. She had been exercising, and answered the door with a headband around her head and wearing short shorts and a very small and loose tank top. She blinked. “Stahma?”
She felt suddenly underdressed and a little trashy.
Natasha may have felt underdressed and a little trashy, but Stahma didn’t think so. She hadn’t had expectations of what Natasha should be dressed like when she was surprising her. That was the point of a surprise. She smiled at Natasha.
“Hello, I hope that this is not a bad time? I wanted to surprise you.”
She hoped it was at least sexy-sweaty. Natasha smiled. “No, it’s not a bad time. This is a really pleasant surprise. Come in! Let me put some.. Pants on.” Pants would probably be good. “I was training.”
It was sexy-sweaty. Natasha working out was a bit of a turn on for her. She did certainly appreciate that Natasha liked to stay in shape. “At least I caught you while you were home,” she said with a smile. While she’d not have minded surprising Natasha at work, she wouldn’t do that without invitation, considering the work Natasha did. She started to step inside before she remembered the flowers in her hand. “I brought you something.” She then pulled the red and black roses out from behind her back and held them out to Natasha. “I thought that the colors, at least, would be acceptable.”
“I’m home so little, you’re either lucky or you’re stalking me.” She winked at Stahma, clearly not minding either answer. Then she looked down at the flowers, a surprised look on her face. “You...didn’t need to.” She took them. How often had people given her flowers? How often had they just wanted something, or expected something? Natasha and flowers, especially roses, was something of a mixed bag.
“Thank you.” Luckily, in this case, it wasn’t a bad thing. “Coming from you, this means more than you might realize.”
Stahma laughed at that. While she wasn’t technically stalking Natasha, it couldn’t be ruled out. Though if Natasha minded, she would call or text first. Stahma wasn’t in the business of stalking the people she liked. “I wanted to.” She did wish that she had some of the flowers from her dreams. There were many beautiful and exotic plants from the terraformed Earth that she’d love to have around her home.
“You are welcome. I am happy you like them.” Flowers could be a bad idea, so it had been a risk. But Stahma had long since learned that no risk taking meant little to no reward.
Careful to not smush the flowers, Natasha cupped the side of Stahma’s neck and pulled her in for a kiss. The truth was she’d been working out much heavier than usual. Trying to deal with her dreams. Why people who should know better kept fighting each other, she didn’t know. It broke her, to have to stand between Tony and Steve. To have to go back into hiding, to lose the freedom that she’d earned. Everything they’d worked for had been destroyed. Again.
She happily returned the kiss. It was obvious that Natasha had been doing a hard workout, but the intent behind it was a mystery to her. She gently brushed her fingertips along Natasha’s cheek. When the kiss broke, she smiled softly. “Perhaps I should surprise you more often.”
“You can always help with my workouts,” Natasha replied. She took the flowers to find something to put them in, though there was a little sashay to her hips. Considering what she was wearing and how long her legs were, she knew it was probably distracting. Good. “I need the distraction, honestly.”
“I would enjoy that.” And she would. Stahma could also due with some exercise, even if she wasn’t in need of losing weight. And oh yes, that sashay to her hips was distracting. Stahma eyed that as she followed after Natasha. “What is wrong?” It was a blunt question, but with what Natasha had just said, clearly something was bothering her.
Filling a tall glass with water, Nat put the flowers in, then turned to look at Stahma, leaning against a counter. “Dreams have been..playing havoc with my emotions. We let ourselves be split, get played.”
After Natasha turned around, Stahma deactivated her disguise device. Now that she was inside and with someone who knew her, she liked being herself. She tilted her head a bit. She understood how people could be divided and turned against each other. “I am sorry. What happened that divided you?”
She looked Stahma over, toying with the idea of just skipping conversation and going directly to dessert. But she knew she needed to talk about this. “In my first dreams, we all get divided over the idea of registering superheros. Something similar happens in these second dreams, only for different reasons. It becomes a question of oversight. Who watches the watchers. Steve doesn’t trust them. I can’t blame him. Tony thinks we need to be have someone to answer to. I can’t blame him either.” She shrugged her shoulders. “I just want us to stay together. At first, I thought that joining Tony’s side would be better, simply because we can change things from the inside, rather than being locked out and hunted from the outside.”
Stahma could understand how that topic could be divisive. Such topics were never easy to discuss or implement without dividing people. “It is understandable why you would want your friends to stay together. No one wants to have to their friends be pulled apart or be forced to choose between which side to support. Though you said at first Tony’s side may have been better. Did something change your opinion?”
“I spent so long believing in something, only to have it fall apart. I believed in SHIELD and what it meant, and when the snake in the grass ruined it, I believed in the Avengers.” She just wanted her family to stay together. “I realized the government wasn’t going to give us the freedom we needed, and I realized Tony couldn’t see the forest for the trees. Steve wasn’t completely in the right either, but I believed him when it came to what he was trying to do, which was protect his friend and find out the truth.”
“Some people are rather short-sighted when they believe they are right. But that does not always mean things cannot be repaired.” It mostly rested on people being able to look at things with a clear head and be more objective about it. “Do you think there is any chance of repairing the rift between your friends?”
“No.” She shook her head. “Yes. I don’t know. I don’t have all the information and after everything I’m a fugitive.” There were more important things to worry about. The stones, Loki. How easily it had all fallen apart. “It’s...really depressing.”
“I am sorry.” She reached out and gently rubbed Natasha’s arm. “What happened, precisely? If I may ask.” She took on a softer tone, not wanting to push Natasha if she wasn’t ready to talk about the details. Stahma, however, knew what it was to be a fugitive. That she could relate to on a personal level.
“It started with a mission. Something went wrong. We saved a bunch of people, but not everyone. So naturally people looked for scape goats. After Sokavia, that was easy. Hell we got blamed for the carnage in New York and that wasn’t even our fault.” Natasha shook her head. She’d debated that endlessly in her head. But New York probably would have happened without them. Sokavia was more complicated. But the thing with Crossbones? That wasn’t Wanda’s fault.
“They wanted us to sign accords. Turn over control to the military, basically. Should have thought that not being given a chance to read them was suspicious. We all acted like idiots. And then someone bombed the signing. Someone else got blamed, and that someone else was Steve’s best friend.”
“When something goes wrong, people will always blame the most convenient person, whether they are guilty or not.” She was sympathetic to Natasha, and she was listening closely. Of course, the not being able to read something before signing it was suspicious. And that was all anyone needed to know that whatever was in the document to be signed was the equivalent of signing one’s soul away to the devil. “I take it that fact only drove the wedge further between everyone? That Steve’s friend was blamed for it?”
“Yes. Bucky was… He was captured. Brainwashed and tortured. Turned into an assassin. He broke his conditioning, and Steve was always the kind of person to give people second chances, and he was especially blinded by this particular friend. But when he was brainwashed, Bucky did a lot of bad things. This happened in both sets of dreams. We were...very close, in the first set.” Natasha rubbed her arm, then decided she needed to pour them some drinks. “Steve wanted to prove that Bucky was innocent. Tony wanted him brought to justice. A third party only made things worse and it escalated from there.”
Stahma read into Natasha’s wording, understanding what she meant by her and Bucky being very close. Considering what she knew of Natasha, she was able to determine that most likely meant her and Bucky had been together. She could see why, considering Natasha’s own background. “Of course, nothing can ever go simply or smoothly. Having two sides at odds is bad enough, but to add a third party in only makes it all worse. Where did you stand on what should be done with Bucky?”
It was one of those forbidden relationships, the discovery of which could have gotten them both killed. The only thing more forbidden would have been her and Stahma. Natasha liked the forbidden fruit.
"It was more important to find out the truth and stop some very bad people from doing some very bad things, than to search for vengeance. I trusted Steve. Even if I didn't fully agree with his side."
Perhaps theirs could be considered a forbidden relationship, but that never bothered Stahma. There was little that actually bothered her. She didn’t really care what people thought of her that didn’t really know her.
“Did you help him at all?” It certainly seemed to be a difficult situation.
Natasha remained silent for a moment, looking down at the floor. Finally, she looked up at Stahma. “Yeah. I gave them time to escape. That was when I had to get out, myself. The last memory I have was Tony telling me they’ll come after me next. All that work to wipe the red from my ledger, gone.”
Stahma reached out, setting her hand on Natasha’s arm. “I am sorry. What happened in your other dreams, when it came to that point? Were you able to come to peaceful terms in regards to the question of the accords you were presented with?” She also didn’t think it was out of the question to work out of the spot she was in currently. One simply needed to have the want to put the work in for it.
"In that one, they wanted to register superheroes. Names, aliases, everything about them. In hindsight, it was a terrible plan." She'd sided with Tony. She knew why she had. Her reasons were similar to the ones in the more recent dreams. But when she could look at the context from the outside in, it didn't entirely make sense.
Why the hell would she trust a government to do right by secrecy and transparency?
“Did that experience suggest that there could be hope of peacefully rectifying the issues in your current dreams?” Not all of them could be settled peacefully. Stahma knew that all too well. However, it was always best to try the peaceful means first before resorting to violence.
“What we need is time. But some of the wounds never really closed, and it left us open to worse things down the way. It weakened us. We still hadn’t truly recovered by the time the world ended.” Maybe if all those bridges hadn’t been burned and those hard feelings hadn’t hardened, they could have stopped the end.
“Though I’m told the world gets better, I haven’t dreamed that yet.”
“Time can certainly heal wounds so long as they are given the correct treatment.” Stahma looked at Natasha. “If that world is able to get better, perhaps the current one you are dreaming has hope as well. You are strong, and so are your friends. Everyone has things that can tear them apart, but things can also be mended.”
Natasha approached Stahma. She let her arms drop to her side. “It’s easy to give up. Let things happen, let them consume me. Sometimes I even fantasize about letting that happen. I’ve barely talked to anyone about these dreams. Steve hasn’t even dreamed of me yet. I feel oddly...distant from Bucky.”
That hurt. Saying it out loud made it real. She missed her people. Bucky and Steve, Sam, and so many others.
She frowned softly, tilting her head and studying Natasha. “It is always easy to give up, taking the easier path and letting things consume you. But I do not think you are one who would ever take the easy way out.” She reached out and took Natasha’s hands in her own, giving them a little squeeze. Despite the fact she was the same height as Natasha, she angled her head so she was looking up at her. “I am sorry about your distance, though it is one I share.” Alak and Kenya had been distant, possibly partially of Stahma’s fault, though it wasn’t completely on her. She had known that Kenya cared less for her for a while. And now that she had Natasha, it didn’t bother her nearly as much as it had a few months earlier.
“If there is anything I may do to help you in that respect, I will do it.”
“Be you. Listen. Tell me when I’m being morose and a little melodramatic.” Natasha winked, then leaned in and kissed her. After baring her soul she needed some kind of assurance. Some kind of physical confirmation that she hadn’t overshared.
Stahma smiled and would have verbally responded, but Natasha had kissed her. So instead, she kissed her back, letting Natasha know she hadn’t overshared, and that she wasn’t going to just pull away. She rest a hand against Natasha’s cheek.
“Thank you.” Natasha leaned her head against the other woman’s. She closed her eyes, letting Stahma’s warmth wash over her. It was a comforting thing, a comforting moment and she didn’t want to let it go. She wanted to hold it as long as possible.
“You are welcome,” she responded with a smile, also closing her eyes and slid her arms around Natasha. Stahma did what she could to give comfort to her girlfriend, knowing that what she’d just told her was something that she wasn’t inclined to share with just anyone. Or really anyone in general.
Too soon for emotions, and Natasha wasn’t dressed enough for them either. She cleared her throat stepping away. “Want to go out for dinner? It doesn’t have to be anything fancy.”
“I would like that. I do not mind where we go.” Stahma wasn’t too fancily dressed and wouldn’t be out of place regardless of where they went.
“Let me get cleaned up and dressed.” Natasha headed towards the bathroom, and the shower. She glanced back at Stahma, and raised her eyebrows questioningly.
Her head lifted, moving like an animal’s might as it stood up to attention, watching Natasha heading for the bathroom. Upon seeing the questioning raise of her eyebrows, a playful smirk crossed her face and she followed after her. She wasn’t going to pass on that particular invitation.
Natasha had hoped that Stahma would get the invitation. If she was going to be so rudely interrupted in her work out, then she wouldn’t mind a different sort. “We’re probably going to have a late lunch. I hope you don’t mind.’
This was certainly not a workout that Stahma would turn down. She stepped up to Natasha, close enough to feel her body heat. “I do not mind that at all. Besides, sometimes I enjoy having dessert first.”
“What’s your favorite kind?” As if Natasha were actually talking about food. Or didn’t already know. But sometimes it was good to hear it from the other person. It also helped distract Stahma from where Nat’s hands were starting to wander already. As alien as she was, she was still close enough that all of Natasha’s favorite parts were there. It was just some slight differences in anatomy, the subtle kind that only someone like Natasha would take the time to notice, and appreciate.
“Strawberries and cream,” Stahma responded with a smirk and a matching glint in her eyes. As if she wasn’t talking about Natasha. She slipped her arms loosely around her neck. Her external anatomy was the same as a human woman’s. Internal was different. Stahma could swear she was more sensitive to sexual stimulation as a Castithan than she had been as a human. But perhaps part of that was due to the fact she could smell so much better than a human. Her sense of smell was so strong she could detect hormonal changes in someone.
“Good to know,” Natasha murmured. She kissed Stahma, saving words for later, speaking with her hands and with the way her body moved against her lover’s. Nat liked to indulge. She never got to in any of her lives and Stahma made her feel like she had something to belong to that wasn’t death and destruction.
She kissed Natasha back, body pressing into her lover’s touch. She brushed a hand through Natasha’s hair as the other one began to wander and she pulled her closer against her. It hadn’t been until things had begun picking up with Natasha that Stahma had realized just how lonely and isolated she had been. She wasn’t the clingy type, but she did so enjoy making the most of touching her girlfriend, indulging in the feeling of wanting someone and being wanted in return. It was a notion that made her feel warm and fuzzy inside.
Natasha didn’t even need one hand to count the number of people she’d made feel this way - or made her feel that way. She just hoped nothing ruined what they had, though thoughts like that had a way of ruining things.
She turned Stahma around, rubbing her hands up and down her body before giving her the kind of greeting she’d wanted to give when the woman had showed up at her doorstep.
She groaned, arching into Natasha’s touch. Stahma’s body slid against Natasha’s, loving the greeting she was getting. It never did take much to put Stahma in the mood, and her lover certainly had a way of getting her motor going.