When Casen first saw Normani in the Mirror Realm, he knew salvation was near. Just the sheer fact that he knew someone was going to come to save her one day was enough motivation for his escape. He was simply just tired of ruling over a kingdom full of equally devious people and no action whatsoever.
Everyone was either always fighting one another or there was nothing going on at all. And even the fights got old when they were all for the same reasons;
Everyone wanted to get out of there and no one could.
Until today. Casen had made it his mission to make sure Normani never saw him from the day she entered the realm to the day she left it. He wanted to make sure that there was no assurance that he would escape the same day she did. And that he would finally get his revenge on the Avengers and take back New York... and then, the world.
But there was something else that he wanted to take back now, too. And that was his daughter. His own flesh and blood, who he had never met before. He only knew her name, the one that he had envisioned that Normani would pick for her daughter, their daughter.
Sapphire.
He wanted to meet her, see who she looked more like. And then teach her.
Wherever she was, he would teach her to be just like him, and they could rule the world together, and if Normani wanted to join, then of course she could. But if she didn't, well then he'd cut his loses. After all, she had killed him.
"Fury!" Sam smiled as he landed atop the helipad.
"Wilson." Fury grumbled. In Sam's tow was Natasha, who had ridden on his back. She was in her catsuit still and her hair had blown all over the place due to the flight. But she regained her composure and smiled at her old friend and boss.
"Romanoff." He nodded, a smile lacing his face. Nat smiled back. "Hey Fury."
There was a silence when Sam cut in. "Fury listen, we have this experiment going on that we need an object for. We were hoping you could help us out with that." He smiled. Nick placed his hands behind his back and furrowed his brow. He turned around and began to walk away, signaling for Nat and Sam to follow suit.
"And what might this object be?" He asked. Nat gulped and signaled for Sam to continue. "Uh, well, it's the um... Teser-"
"It's a test tube. We need a test tube with melted alimantium. I remember a few years back that we had a few locked up somewhere. I don't see Wolverine running around looking for any so can we borrow some?" She asked, her face professionally masked and her eyes locked on what she needed to do, what she wanted. Even though it was covered in a lie.
If Fury was suspicious, he showed no signs of it and continued walking to the laboratory where all of that would be held. Upon opening the door, he looked back at Nat and whispered something in her ear that made her smile before he nodded towards Sam and walked off.
Sam rightfully curious, furrowed his eyebrows. "What was that for?" He asked. Looking back at a walking Fury. Nat shook her head.
"Nothing, come on Tesseract's this way." She said, leading Sam in the direction of the "HIGHLY DANGEROUS AND CONTAMINENT" unit in the back of the SHIELD building.
"Okay, there shouldn't be anyone guarding it for another minute. There's a break in between when the shifts change down here and up there. In other words, while the camera guy switches with the person that comes in after, the camera's are unwatched for one full minute, now 57 seconds. Same as down here, the guard here just left, we have 53 seconds to get to the Tesseract and out of this area before anyone is on either the cams or guarding here. Got it?" She asked. But Sam looked as if he were about to ask some questions, so Nat just rolled her eyes.
"Fuck it. Set a timer for 45 seconds, I'll do it myself." And with that, she deep sighed and ran into the room. Pressing the button on her coms she was able to speak to Sam. "Okay Wilson, where should I start looking?" She whispered as she scanned through shelves.
Sam had the timer and the feed of where the Tesseract was located on two separate screens.
"Okay, um it should be located on Shelf 245 B, that's where most of the Extra-terrestrial stuff is located. Should be next to um, the Kree Monolith? What the hell is that?"
Nat froze for a second as she shook off the bad memories. "It's nothing good. Some Kree were using it when the were experimenting on humans awhile back. They left it behind. Long story. But I think I found shelf 245 B." She gulped as she looked up. The shelf was the last one in that aisles stand. And it stood so tall that she had to squint to see its blue glint.
"I'm gonna have to climb this bitch." She sighed, hooking her foot onto one of the holes in the shelf. "Be careful." Sam warned. "When am I not?" She asked, sarcastically of course. "Time check, Wilson." She asked. Sam looked over at the screen. "Shit, um, 41 seconds." He responded. Nat grumbled as she continued to climb up. The Tesseract was getting closer into her sight and the black box that it was labeled in was visible now. It literally shone through the box. It's blue tent almost touchable even in the air.
"Nat. 34 seconds."
She snapped back into reality and continued to climb. Passing all sorts of remnants from ancient celestial wars. A section of unmarked items that she could only guess were as useful to some other species as they were to anyone else looking for them.
Boxes lined with papers entered her view as well and some pictures that were all black from one angle and then from another covered with people.
There was enough here to start an alien war if every race that ever lost something came for it all at once. Terrifying.
"23 seconds, better hurry."
The warning was enough for her to jump up two shelves and swing onto the hook of an outstretched was that a claw? Before she landed on both feet two shelves from the Tesseract.
Oh how close she was to what could be her own salvation. And then, that's when the visions hit.
Vivid scenes of her fraternizing with her president of the United States. Running SHIELD and becoming the worlds greatest marital arts specialist. Having a kid.
Every dream she'd ever had was laid out in front of her, all she had to do, was take it.
Take the damn opportunity, and the world would be hers.
"Nat, 15 seconds!" Sam yelled, when there was no reply he yelled again at a dazed Natasha.
"Romanoff! 14 seconds! I can literally hear footsteps! When those cameras cut on it's over, we're done for!"
Still no reply, complete radio silence, and she still had to get all the way back down and out the room.
"God damnit! Natasha!" Sam yelled, which seemingly knocked her out of her trance as she found her hand laid on top of the Tesseract's box. She shook her head and suddenly began to fall backwards. "Oh shit!" She yelled, as she lost her footing and tumbled back. Luckily, she was able to grab the box as she fell, a strangled scream left her mouth as she moved upright and grabbed ahold of the same claw she jumped onto before. A grunt left her mouth as her should strained to keep her entire body from falling.
"Nat! What the hell?" Sam yelled, his attention wasn't even on the timer anymore as the last 10 seconds trickled down.
"I'm fine, Sam." She replied, regaining her footing and getting the rest of the way down. "Woah, that was-" She was cut off by the sound of Sam's timer going off. "Oh shit." She yelled. She looked dead at the camera in the corner of the room as annoyance filled her expression before she started booking it down the aisles towards the door. "Sam! Go to the outside of the hellipad! I'll meet you there!" She yelled, darting past objects, the Tesseract in her arms.
"What! Are you insane? The guards already on his way, you're going to get caught-"
"Shut the hell up, and move! And when I say catch me, you better catch me or so help me God-"
"Okay, I'll catch you." He responded.
Nat sighed and picked up her running speed, changing directions from the door to the window above a bunch of stacked boxes. Hoping to God that there wasn't some alien egg that she would crack with her frantic movements inside anyone of the boxes, she flipped and jumped and climbed her way up the cardboard ladder and slid the Tesseract box onto the window seal.
"Sam!" She yelled as she grunted, sliding the window open. God had it must have been years since it was last even cracked.
"Yea! I'm here, Romanoff."
The spy sighed, "Yea, well you better be." She said, now on the window seal looking down at the endless sky in front of her. The camera in the corner was about to do a 360 and then she would be caught in 4k ultra wide view. And Natasha never got caught.
Throwing her fear into a small pocket of her racing mind, she grabbed ahold of the Tesseract box tightly and turned around. "Sam!" She yelled. "Yea! I'm coming, hold on!" But the camera was already about to lock her position in. She shook her head. "Catch me."
She whispered as she closed her eyes and let herself fall back. The wind immediately caught her breath as the air grew thinner and her brain shut off. Her body fell through the sky unconscious, the box clipped onto her belt as she had done before falling. The clouds turned into pure blue sky before it faded like a tunnel into a view of the ground.
Sam was yelling the entire time the Russian spy was falling, but of course she heard none of it. All she saw in her head was a replay of the past few years. All the good and the bad, and then... the end.
She didn't feel Sam's hands grabbing onto her suits collar or him carrying her bridal style in her arms as he frantically called her name and flew towards the Avengers tower.
"Holy shit, what the hell happened?" Sapphire yelled as she raced towards the landing where Sam had stopped with an unconscious Natasha. But the fear in her child's voice jolted her awake.
"The Tesseract. Please tell me I still-" She hopped out of Sam's arms and looked down to find the box still attached to her waist, it's unmistakable blue glow sparkled brightly.
"Oh thank god that wasn't for nothing." She sighed relieved.
"Good, now that we have everything, let's get this process started." Ned said, as the group all walked to the portal that was already built. Hope reentered Natasha's body as she locked eyes with Sam.
"We did it." She smiled.
"We're gonna bring her back."
But no one was smiling wider than Casen.