Archive of Our Own ^beta

“Honestly Nat,” Carol calls as she sends one of the multi-limbed, heavily armoured scavengers reeling with a gentle tap to the jaw, “This wasn’t what I expected to happen when I asked if you wanted to join me for a mission off Earth.”

“Oh?” Natasha sounds like she’s barely even breathing hard as she twists around to kick an alien in its shark-like teeth, “This is exactly what I thought you had in mind.”

She’s over in the front of their small ship, where the scavengers attached their own vessel like a bloated leech and drilled through the hull. If the seal breaks, they’re all dead except for Carol. Natasha’s nonetheless grinning, bright hair whipping in a halo around her as she flips over another alien, this one holding a jagged scimitar, shoving it into stumbling forwards with the force of her momentum and onto a third alien’s blade.

The viewport shows a spider web of brilliant lightning storms chasing across a massive gas giant painted in shades of swirling red, providing a backdrop to outline Natasha against as she drops down to the deck in an effortless crouch.    

Carol pats an alien lightly on top of its stoutly helmeted head, sending it crashing to the floor without even particularly registering it, too caught up in the sight of the other woman to look away.

***

“Come with me to search for survivors,” Carol had said.

Natasha had been lying on the table in the base’s meeting room with her head propped on a cushion, eating instant noodles from the bowl balanced on her stomach, the circle of its base feeling like the one point of warmth in her body. Steve had drifted by sometime earlier and then had wandered back out again, chugging orange juice straight from the carton – which was entirely unlike him – and looking lost – which, nowadays, was.

Rhodey had touched bases a few hours earlier and Natasha had made contact with the next civilians on her ever lengthening list of those who were struggling the worst – which felt like everyone most days – and had done what she could to see they were provided for.

Then she’d sat in the gathering darkness for a while, not really looking out at the lights of the city beyond the window – so many spaces between them now, like scattered stars. Not really doing anything; not thinking much.

Then she’d gone to cook her noodles, lying back while eating to examine the cracks appearing in the ceiling – Tony would be appalled – and Carol had appeared. As suddenly and silently as she had the first time, although Natasha’s instincts had pinged and she’d had a second where she’d nearly launched herself off the table –

Slow, she was slow these days, weighed down by the miasma of everything that had happened –

Then realisation had kicked in as she’d focused on the quirk of a grin she hadn’t seen that often before, the upswept curl of Carol’s hair, and the eyebrow Carol had raised at her.

“Instant noodles?” she’d asked.

“There are more in the kitchen,” Natasha had gestured with her chin in its direction, “Do you want some?”

And so they’d ended up sitting outside on the balcony, Carol with noodles while Natasha drank a black coffee, and she’d known she would say yes even before the other woman mentioned rumours of a lost group of surviving Kree children somewhere in space.

***

The rumour about the children turns out to be false.

Natasha ascertains this easily enough once they’ve made a couple of pit stops after the scavenger attack, flying the larger, more powerful ship they’ve commandeered. They don’t let the disappointment stop them, instead chasing other mentions of people in need, other remnants of broken family groups, scatted factions and separated friends.

Many of the people they aid are just trying to get by, much like those Natasha strove to help on Earth.

Watching the other woman work is a pleasure in itself – Carol is aware she herself can be anything but subtle, does not enjoy subtle as a rule, but Natasha makes something about it compelling. Where Carol would use her fists or photon blasts, Natasha smiles sweetly and tips her head, the underlying air of threat she can exude when she wants to all the more effective in contrast to her petite and disarming form.

The further they fly from Earth, the more something within Natasha seems to come back alive.

It isn’t that she’s forgotten. Carol can’t imagine either of them will ever forget. But, as she forcibly destroys an illegal slave ring that’s gone into overdrive since the snap, she’s aware she asked Natasha for the company because even she can’t stand being on her own anymore.

And because Natasha, when Carol had swooped down through Earth’s atmosphere to hover outside the Avengers’ base, had seemed so very alone.

Blasting through the horrible sheds where the slavers kept their victims captive is one of the more satisfying things Carol has done of late. Catching sight of Natasha rattling the teeth of the head slaver with her widow’s bites, Carol circles by to give her a jaunty salute.

Dumping the twitching slaver on the ground, Natasha salutes neatly back, her red lips quirking before she blows a lock of hair away from the side of her face.

“Nat, behind you –” In truth, this is not the first time Carol wonders what it would be like to kiss her.

“Already on it,” Natasha is indeed wheeling, fist rising up, body pirouetting gracefully into an attack.

Carol doesn’t find out the answer – or, at least, not yet.

***

It happens when the engine of their commandeered ship explodes in a fairly impressive fireball when they’ve paused to clean up from their last battle on a tiny planet that’s practically all island, so perfectly composed of ruby sun, jewel green sea and golden beaches that each woman teasingly wonders whether the other had the mishap planned.

Natasha checks the ruin of the ship over, declares it beyond fixing – something Carol had already known at a glance – and peels both her flight suit and underwear off simply as she strides down the flawless golden sand into the sea.

“Call me if an apocalypse seems likely to happen,” With that, Natasha flops onto her back into water so pure and clear it seems like she’s simply suspended in warmth, and closes her eyes.

Carol’s never seen her look so relaxed. She’s also never seen Natasha naked before, which is –

Well, ever since first meeting the other woman, it’s always been difficult for Carol to look elsewhere.

She’s got her arms full when she flies back from exploring the planet. When the time comes, she can cart the wreck of their ship off to a nearby asteroid that does repairs, purloin a replacement and return to collect Natasha, if the other woman agrees to this plan.

However, given how hard Natasha always seems to push herself, Carol’s not about to interrupt her one and only break.

“Coconut?” she offers, when Natasha opens her eyes in response to Carol’s shadow hovering above her, and shrugs, “Not an apocalypse, but I think we’ve had enough of those.”

“Mm, unless we create one ourselves perhaps,” Floating effortlessly in the green sea, her limbs as pale and perfectly shaped as the rest of her, Natasha reaches up a hand to accept the scaled blue fruit Carol passes down and inspects it musingly, “This doesn’t appear to be a coconut.”

“Nope,” Carol grins, “Sure tastes like it, though. I thought you might be thirsty.”

“Oh, I’m thirsty,” Natasha grins back like they’re talking about something else entirely and –

Well. Perhaps they are.

“You know,” Natasha continues while Carol’s still scanning her face, trying not to let her eyes wander down to the arch of her throat or the droplets of seawater caught between the gentle swell of her breasts or –

She’s not looking, not directly, although she can’t help but be aware.

Anyway,

“You know,” Natasha’s saying, “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you out of that suit,” and if that isn’t an invitation –

“Want to see?” Raising an eyebrow of her own right back at the other woman, Carol keys in the appropriate command on her wrist –

Well, if that isn’t an invitation, what is?

***

“Now, that’s better,” Natasha’s response is one of open approval as the technology forming Carol’s uniform recedes.

“Hell yes,” Dipping into the wonderfully warm water, Carol grins broadly when Natasha parts her legs to receive her, “This is all right?” She places a hand on top of one of Natasha’s slim feet, thumb brushing her ankle.

“Mm-hm,” Nodding as she cradles her drink, Natasha agrees.

“Mm,” Carol lets her thumb continue to move. She isn’t used to feeling people’s skin without her gloves on, not anymore. She’s never felt Natasha’s skin before, not at all. The question pops not quite intentionally out of her mouth, “Now what did I do to deserve this?”

“You’re you,” Natasha’s smile is noticeably soft and, for all there’s constant shadow about the edges of her face, it seems for once somehow further off, “Besides, I think we both deserve it.”

“You absolutely do,” Carol therefore takes her time about it, learning the shape of Natasha’s ankles, the way her toes point when Carol runs her palms up the length of Natasha’s calves, a pattern of scars like claw marks on one shin, the soft skin of the inside of her thighs.

Everything is warm and wet in the water and, after Natasha nods her permission, she is warm and wet between her legs also, as Carol parts the other woman’s sex with her thumbs.

“May I?” She does thirst, and not for the coconut.

“Of course,” Lifting her head a little, cushioned by the ever steady water, Natasha sips at her drink, her gaze sparkling and eager, her smile too genuine to be a smirk.

She’s so controlled at first Carol takes it as a point of pride to get a gasp out of her. Concentrating on that area, she then succeeds in prompting a wriggle and a flex of Natasha’s stomach, the other woman’s fingers trembling slightly after a while as they create waves of their own in the green sea – Carol works with her lips and tongue, and relishes it when she sucks and Natasha doesn’t quite muffle a cry.

“Mm!”

“Like that?”

“Mm yes, Carol, that’s good –”

“Only good?” Chuckling, Carol snorts, “I’ll show you ‘good’.”

Sliding two fingers inside the other woman, she spreads them meaningfully and Natasha moans just a little and laughs, rolling her hips back against the arm Carol slings under her to support her just in case. Finding her g-spot doesn’t prove too much trouble and Carol concentrates on it, circling it soothingly while sealing her mouth back around Natasha’s clit, coaxing an orgasm out of the other woman like that.

Only then does she start to thrust. Carefully, carefully, always restrained with her power –

And yet, if Carol summons just the tiniest possible touches of it, it’s enough to make her fingertips vibrate.

“Oh!” Natasha spasms in the water, losing her drink as she splashes, “O-oh, Carol –”

“Surprise,” Carol beams, delighted to have caught her off-guard, and relishes in the way Natasha seems to finally loosen up properly, shedding some element of restraint that had still been lingering even after her orgasm –

She gets Natasha grinding against her face after a second orgasm and – when Carol channels just a hint of sparking power to her mouth and burrows her face in deep against Natasha’s sex as she works the other woman’s clit enthusiastically with her thumb – Natasha howls her way into a third.

“Surprise!” Natasha surges up out of the water after, when others might go breathless and limp, and Carol’s left laughing fit to burst as Natasha wrestles her onto her back.

She could resist effortlessly of course, but why would she want to do that?

“Hah! Nat!” Carol’s soon spluttering and swallowing seawater, given Natasha’s fingers prove just as talented in creating pleasure as they seem to be in everything else, and –

“Mm?” Drawing one of Carol’s nipples in between her red lips, Natasha hums enquiringly, and crooks a third slender finger deep within Carol’s sex.

“H-hah –” Carol nearly takes flight with the force of her orgasm; nearly triggers a minor tidal wave. She releases the energy as a photon blast up into the sky that falls around them like fireworks instead.

Shaking with inelegant laughter, flushed and beautiful, Natasha reels Carol in for a kiss. Carol returns it as wholeheartedly as she’s able to, given she’s also laughing uncontrollably.

“That hasn’t happened before,” she has to admit.

“Let’s see if we can get it to happen again,” Natasha smirks –

“Sure, let’s,” Carol kisses her again, relishing the way their bodies fit together in the water as their mouths move –

And they succeed.

***

They won’t stay there forever. Maybe not even longer than the next day.

Even as they laze on the still warm beach in the starlight after the sun goes down, they both know this. Carol’s going to go on deeper into space, to help planets other humans can’t survive on, while Natasha’s going to go back to Earth.

“We’re needed,” Natasha murmurs, as Carol fiddles with a strand of her bright hair.

“Sure are,” she agrees, “But after?”

Before this time with Natasha, when Carol had tried to consider after, all her mind had come up with was everything they had all lost and her determination to punch a certain purple bastard hard as she could in his crinkly chin.

Right now he doesn’t seem worthy of either of their thoughts.

After, though, now seems filled with possibility. Because however long it takes, they’re going to succeed – and they’re going to meet again under better circumstances.

It’s going to be amazing.

“Yes,” Natasha agrees, and there isn’t a single sign of that shadow in any of the contours of her lovely face, “Then.”