Captain America: Professional Best Friend

This Means War

Emma's heart picks up its pace and her hands shake the entire time the teams are gone, which is less than a minute of her time. When they land back on the platform, Emma does a quick headcount and sees that someone is missing.

Before anyone else notices though, Bruce is asking, "Did we get them all?"

Rhodey laughs and adds, "You're telling me this actually worked?"

In the meantime, Emma heads up the ramp and notices that Natasha is the one missing from the ranks and Clint is visibly distraught. She can't manage to get any words out to ask what happened though, her mind already going to the worst with a sense of dread flooding her body. She doesn't have to though because Bruce takes the words out of her mouth, asking him, "Clint, where's Nat?"

When Clint doesn't respond, Steve and Bruce's faces fall and Emma's hands start shaking once again. Not having it with this silence, Emma asks once again, "Where is she, Clint?"

"She's gone," he finally whispers.

Bruce loses feeling in his knees and falls at the words and Emma holds herself up on the railing, shouting, "Bullshit Clinton! Where is she?"

"She's really gone, Emma..." he mumbles weakly. "She made the decision. I tried to save her but she wouldn't let me..."

Emma opens her mouth to say something but can't find the words to say at the loss of one of her best friends in the world. Steve tries to offer her his embrace, but she pushes past him and runs outside, not wanting anyone to see her break down.

Being blinded by tears, Emma doesn't see where she's running, but she ends up at the little pier by the Compound's lake. As she sits on the ledge, her mind is taken back to all the deep talks she and Natasha had at the lodge with their feet dangling in the water. Sobs overwhelm Emma as she tries to picture a world without Natasha Romanoff in it and hates every moment of it.

After a few minutes alone, there's a presence beside Emma. She knows it's Steve when he sits beside her and wraps an arm around her to hold her close. "It's not fair, this wasn't supposed to happen..." Emma whispers through her tears. She chokes on her tears as she cries, "No one was supposed to die! Especially not her!"

"Shh," Steve tries to calm her down by playing with her hands as they both cry. "It isn't fair I know, but..." he can't even finish his sentence as he himself is overcome with emotion at the loss of his dear friend. Try as he might to be optimistic through this, at the moment he can't, he's just as upset at the loss of Natasha as Emma is.

Soon enough, the rest of the group joins Emma and Steve on the dock, no one knowing what to say. After a few minutes of silence, Tony speaks up, asking, "Do we know if she had any family?"

While Steve replies with, "Yeah, us," Emma tells Tony quietly, "The only other family besides us that she had got snapped away by Thanos. We tried tracking them down a few times but couldn't find them. Granted, they could also just be really good at hiding seeing as they're all professional spies, but..."

"God, Yelena's gonna be so upset..." Clint whispers, just loud enough for Emma to hear while running his hands down his face.

"What are you doing?" Thor asks Tony which earns a look from everyone.

"I'm just asking a question," Tony tells him.

"Yeah, no, you're acting like she's dead. Why are we acting like she's dead?" Thor retorts, getting closer to Tony. There is a hint of desperation in his voice as he continues, "We have the stones, we can bring her back. Isn't that right, Cap? So stop this shit. We're the Avengers!"

This statement sparks a bit of hope in Emma until Clint tells him, "We can't get her back. It can't be undone...it can't."

This crushes Emma's hope once more and she buries her face in Steve's chest as a fresh batch of tears starts falling from her eyes. While Emma is crying, Thor is laughing and says to Clint, "Look, I'm sorry, and no offense, but you're a very earthly being and we're talking about space magic here. I think I know a bit more than you do and the word can't seems a bit too definitive yeah?"