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𝐓𝐫𝐮𝐭𝐡'𝐬 𝐀𝐩𝐚𝐫𝐭𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐭
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Truth was as far away from the world as possible.
She sat at her kitchen island with one leg bent on the stool, her mind solely focused on the task in front of her and the music that flooded her space:
i hopped off the plane at LAX
with a dream and my cardigan
welcome to the land of fame excess
woah, am i gonna fit in?
jumped in the cab, here i am for the first time
look to my right and i see the Hollywood sign
this is all so crazy
everybody seems so famous
Studying the blade in her hand, satisfied with its sharpness, she brought the small bottle of oil closer and picked up a cloth as she sang along with the lyrics.
my tummy's turnin' and i'm feelin' kinda homesick
too much pressure and i'm nervous
that's when the taxi man turned on the radio
and a jay-z song was on
and a jay-z song was on
and a jay-z song was on
so i put my—
The song abruptly changed just before the chorus. Truth frowned, but let it slide when she recognized the new song.
it's a beautiful night
we're looking for something dumb to do
hey baby
i think i wanna—
Once again, the song was skipped. Annoyed, Truth glanced up at Heidi, who stood on the island, nose hovering over her phone.
"Now you don't like Bruno Mars?"
Heidi flicked an ear. Then she skipped another three songs.
"You know," Truth said, eyes returning to the blade to inspect it. "You're the one who chose this playlist."
Truth Castello had a lot of knives. And, sure, she was an assassin, so it was expected, but even the most driven assassins didn't usually keep several cases of all the knives they've collected over the years.
Maybe Truth was a little nostalgic. Or maybe it was a result of having perfect recall, because she found it was easier to categorize her memories when she tied them to an object.
Every knife she owned had its story.
The one in her hand now had been a gift from Coulson. It was a Scottish dirk knife, its steel hilt a throwback to medieval times. He had given it to her just before her first solo mission at S.H.I.E.L.D—the last day of her probation. As her probationary agent, he had acted like a father dropping his kid off to college, and she and Michael had teased him about it for days.
But, staring at the blade, she remembered what he had said when he had handed it to her:
"You did this. All of it. You made it here. And you should be as proud of yourself as I am of you."
As much as she'd teased, the words had made her emotional once she'd boarded the jet headed toward the insertion point. She'd searched for validation her whole life, and the little girl inside of her had finally found it.
She didn't usually take the knife out on missions, but last night had been a quick infiltration with a STRIKE team on an illegal smuggling site. No causalities on either side, all stolen weapons had been accounted for, and all criminals involved in the operation were apprehended and set to stand on trial for the next few months.
Yeah. She was pretty proud of herself.
you're on the phone with your girlfriend, she's upset
she's going off about something that you said
'cause she doesn't get your humor like i do
With a quirk of her lips, she gently wrapped the newly sharpened knife in its leather sheath. Before she moved on to her next blade, she took a spoonful of the bowl of soup sitting away from the oils and polish. Satisfied with the temperature, she took a few more bites as she hummed along.
i'm in the room, it's your typical Tuesday night
i'm listening to the kind of music she doesn't like
and she'll never know your story like i do
but she wears—
Truth dropped her spoon in the bowl with a clang to give her cat an offended glare.
"Heidi! No puedes saltarte una canción de Taylor Swift."
You can't just skip a Taylor Swift song.
Heidi responded by skipping another song.
"Heidi!"
Truth moved, intending to revoke Heidi's phone privileges when the cat laid down, curving her body around the device and out of Truth's sight.
Truth huffed.
"You hang out with Michael too much."
It took a few more minutes of arguing with her cat as she worked before she noticed someone had been standing outside her door for a while now. She had dismissed them at first, because she was used to people coming and going down the hall, most of them heading home after a long day or leaving to fulfill a mindless task. She never fretted over them because, in there, she was in her safe little bubble where she could keep the world out.
Only, the person outside her door hadn't moved. Well, they paced up and down the corridor, but they always returned, always stopped in front of her door. Mental barriers kept their exact thoughts hidden, but Truth could feel the anxiety and nerves bubbling within them even from here.
And, thoughts or not, Truth would recognize her mind anywhere. Only, Truth couldn't begin to guess why Natasha Romanoff would be standing outside of her apartment...
Glancing at the clock on the wall behind her, Truth realized it was almost noon.
Almost four hours since Clint left.
...Shit.
It wasn't so much that she'd forgotten, because she remembered her conversation with the archer quite clearly. He had been worried before he left, enough so that he had knocked on her door on his way to his jet.
"Just let yourself in, I guess," Truth had told Clint as he'd shouldered past her. Closing the door, she had turned to follow him into the kitchen. "Aren't you supposed to be leaving, like, right now?"
"Had to make a detour," had been his only response. He had stolen a glass from her cupboard and filled it with water.
"You know, I don't like how you and Michael act like my apartment is your home."
Clint had scoffed.
"Don't act like you haven't stolen stuff from us. The only difference is that you do it when we aren't looking."
Truth's lips had turned up.
"It's called being polite." She'd gotten up to grab her used weapons from her go bag still sitting on the floor and began to lay out the materials she'd need to start her cleaning ritual. "Clock's ticking, Barton. Say what you have to say before the jet leaves without you."
Clint had sighed, staring down into his cup.
"It's Natasha. I feel like I'm...leaving her."
"Well, you are. She probably feels that way too."
Clint had raised an eyebrow.
"Aren't you supposed to make me feel better, not worse?"
Truth had shrugged.
"The truth isn't always sunshine and rainbows. I should know," she had added with a wink, and he had rolled his eyes.
Stopping by her bookshelf to grab her clove oil and metal polish, she set the items on the island.
"I don't think Romanoff would be ecstatic to know that you're coming to me for advice regarding her. A bit personal, don't you think?"
Clint had scoffed. Again.
"I'm not an idiot. The little show you guys put on for everyone else? Doesn't work on me. Granted, I don't know how you two became friends because I've never seen you hang out, but I know you and I know Nat."
Truth only shrugged, a sly smirk spreading across her face.
"What can I say? We have reputations."
Then, at the look on his face, she had sighed and leaned on the island to give him her full attention.
"I remember the first time Phil 'left' me," she'd started. "He had told me as soon as he'd been given his assignment. He'd been so excited for me because it meant that my probation was on its way to being lifted. That had been the goal since I had defected to S.H.I.E.L.D., and he had told me of all the places to go to in D.C.—the best cafes, restaurants, libraries...
"And then he left and I spent the rest of the week holed up in this very apartment. Michael had been cleared before me, so he was also on assignment—a whole other story—, and you know how my uncle is. It wasn't until Maria showed up at my door and told me that we were leaving that I finally got out of my funk. She took me down to the Potomac. I'd forgotten how much I missed the ocean."
Truth had sighed again and straightened, returning her gaze to Clint.
"Of course, Natasha's probation isn't the exact same as mine. From my understanding, she's left the building for missions with you before and her probation has only lasted four months. Mine lasted six, and Fury hadn't been so lenient with me as her."
Clint's eyebrows rose, because "lenient" wasn't a word he'd use to define what Natasha had to go through to get to this point. Truth had smirked.
"You forget that I was an enhanced known for making people go mad and destroying buildings when I lost control. They had a right to be cautious.
"Anyways. The point I'm trying to make is that the feeling of being saved by someone after a lifetime of never knowing the word—of connecting the person who pulled you out of hell with safety—is overwhelming. It's as powerful as love or hate. It's the feeling a child has, or should have, with their parents. And, if you ignore the fact that I am discreetly calling you a mother hen, you'll see that I mean to say that the feeling of being left behind will be inevitable. I won't guess how Natasha may feel or act, but I can tell you that that week Phil was on that mission? It was both the hardest and most uplifting part of my probation. Because it taught me how to get up and live for myself instead of relying on someone else to do it for me."
Clint had stared at her, eyes wide.
"I...you've never told me that."
Truth had shrugged.
"If you don't ask, I don't tell. I thought you knew that by now, Barton. Can't give away all my secrets."
With that, Truth had glanced at the clock behind her. Walking around the island, she had taken the glass from Clint, put it in the sink, then looped her arm through his.
"Come on, Francis, I'll escort you. And, to make you feel doubly better, Natasha won't be alone. After all, now I get to take her on my version of the Castello D.C. Tour."
Clint had groaned as she dragged him into the corridor.
"One, I hated that tour—Michael made me go to a gay bar."
"I heard you'd enjoyed it."
"Shut up," he had told her, because plausible deniability did not exist with Truth. "Two, stop calling me that."
"It's your name," she had argued.
"It's my middle name. Middle names are supposed to be forgotten, not used."
"Well, I'm not exactly used to this concept of middle names, and I find it improbable to have one and not use it."
"That may be true," Clint had allowed, "but most Americans strongly dislike their middle names."
"Aw. But Francis is cute."
"That's what every man wants to hear."
Truth had patted his arm before putting some distance between them as they stopped in front of the elevators.
"Cute is a good thing, Barton. Don't tell me you forgot everything Michael taught you."
Clint gave her a look of alarm.
"Please don't take Natasha to a gay bar."
"Mm. You may be right. Can't have her outshining me there, too. I'd never hear the end of it."
The elevator doors had opened.
"You're ridiculous, you know that, right?"
Truth had smiled.
"I try to be."
Then she'd watched as Clint stepped inside the transport.
"You were possibly the first choice she had ever made for herself," she'd said softly, and Clint had turned to listen. "She chose to trust you, and she may always wonder whether she made the right choice."
Clint had stared for a moment. He was beginning to understand that Truth's "expertise" wasn't just a spew of half-assed guesses.
"Who was yours? Your first choice?"
"I told you, our lives aren't completely the same." Those who cycled through the Red Room were often introduced from infancy. Truth at least had the opportunity to experience a semi-normal childhood, however short and fleeting it had been. "The first person I trusted, the person who was supposed to love me and protect me, became the person who hurt me the most. Just...make sure you come back. Don't let her doubt herself in choosing you."
That had been four hours ago.
Two hours before that, Truth had just returned from her op in Vegas.
Dropping the knife in her hand onto the cloth protecting the counter top, she took in the state of her apartment. As was usual post-mission, her go bag still laid discarded on the floor—containing her suit waiting to go in the wash, a few gadgets and ammunition she had yet to return to the armory, as well as her mission report that needed to be filed and handed in to Fury and the reports of the STRIKE Team that she also had to review—and she still had two more blades to clean and sharpen.
She couldn't remember the last time she'd gone to sleep. Well, she did remember, but, before last night's mission, she'd still been working on the paperwork for her last infiltration. And then she'd been teaching one of her intermediate classes, going over progress reports and assessments for field readiness, and then there were her nights with Natasha...
Truth sighed. Just thinking of it all reminded her of the exhaustion lingering in her mind. But, she'd done more on less sleep. She could do this for Natasha.
She would, for a friend.
And over the last few weeks, she'd really grown to see Natasha as a friend.
So, Truth pushed aside the fatigue, as well as the bundle of nerves that had settled in her stomach at the thought of letting someone new into her space.
Because, if she were being honest with herself—which she usually was—, she'd already let Natasha into her safe place the night she'd told her to stay. So, nudging Heidi in the direction of the front door and using her telekinesis to unlock it for the assassin still mustering up the courage to simply knock wasn't the hardest decision in the world.
Truth had already returned her attention to her food when Heidi herded the other assassin inside, who's thoughts had quickly quieted upon the sudden invitation.
remember those walls I built?
well, baby they're tumbling down
and they didn't even put up a fight
they didn't even make a sound
"Good morning," Truth greeted. "Or afternoon. I don't really know anymore. Welcome to my humble abode. We have soup and knives, but the knives aren't for sale for safety reasons."
Natasha appeared lost standing in the entryway, though she did take a moment to study Truth's mess of a living room before her gaze fell on the other assassin sitting on a stool in front of a strew of discarded oils and polishes that filled the apartment with a familiar aroma. More confusing was perhaps the bowl of soup Truth was consuming at 11:23 in the morning.
i found a way to let you in
but i never really had a doubt
"I can..." Natasha eyed the remaining two knives unsheathed on the island. "I can come back later," she finished uncertainly.
standing in the light of your halo
"But you're here and welcome to be here now."
i've got my angel now
Truth patted the seat beside her in invitation, only for Heidi to hop up and lay down on it as though it was for her.
"Hey!" Truth snapped. "Bájate. Eso era para Natasha."
Get off. That was for Natasha.
Natasha's lips threatened to curve at the exclamation, pushing aside the tumbling feeling at the sound of her name coming from the other assassin, let alone in a Mexican accent. To help settle things, she sat in the remaining stool next to Heidi and held out a hand to the feline.
it's like i've been awakened
every rule i had you breaking
"It's okay, malenʹkij tigr (little tiger), the seat's all yours."
Heidi huffed at the name, but nudged Natasha's offered hand with her nose. Natasha's sharp gaze fell on Truth, before glancing again at the mess on the island.
it's the risk that i'm taking
"You look busy."
Truth took another spoonful of soup with a shrug.
i ain't never gonna shut you out
"I can multitask."
Natasha frowned at her soup.
"Are you sick?"
"No."
"I thought people only eat soup when they're sick."
Not that Natasha would know. She'd never gotten sick. And, if she had, she doubted she would've been rewarded with soup.
"I don't really get sick," Truth admitted. "At least, not by the usual viruses. I just wanted soup."
Natasha noted the new information, piling it into the ever sparse mental profile she had regarding Truth Castello. There were bits and pieces, and none of them so much as resembled a coherent big picture, but it was one more thing she knew about the other assassin, and she'd learned to embrace what little Truth revealed about herself without complaint.
That she even trusted Natasha enough to do so was more than she could ever ask for.
That Truth was willing to let her step inside her space, to bare her side, a weakness in battle, as she reached for the whetstone across the table, to take her eyes off of Natasha long enough to give her the advantage of distraction...
It was almost too much for Natasha to comprehend.
She knew it wasn't trust—it couldn't be. Not with the life they led. Not with Natasha's lack of familiarity with the word.
With Clint, it was different. He was a spy, an assassin, just the same as her, but, for him, it was something he could turn off. On a mission, he was Hawkeye; off duty, he was Clint—at least, as much of Clint as he could be at S.H.I.E.L.D.
Natasha expected it with Clint. He saw something in her, something that sometimes had her questioning his eyesight, but she had grown to grudgingly accept the foreign, yet seemingly universal idea he had that everyone has some amount of good in them.
It wasn't that she thought it was true. Natasha had come across a many people, not all of whom she was fortunate to kill, who were a true embodiment of all that is evil in the world. And, maybe Natasha wasn't that, but she certainly wasn't good.
But, Clint believed. When Natasha had began to accept her fondness for the archer, she'd worried about his belief. After all, she'd manipulated a number of men who had thought the same thing. It was a weakness, one she didn't like Clint having.
Maybe that was why she chose to be his partner. He needed someone who had his back, someone who could cover his weaknesses instead of exploit them. It was certainly a change in her usual mode of operandi, but...she didn't want Clint to stop believing. So she'd fight to make sure he never would.
But, where Clint grew up with this notion of inherent goodness, people like the Siren and the Black Widow did not. Natasha did not know much about Truth's backstory, but she was familiar enough with HYDRA to know that they would've had similar teachings.
Love was for children, and neither of them had ever been a child. They knew better than to trust, because trust always led to betrayal.
That is to say that Natasha was...comfortable with Truth. The core of their relationship was forged with a respect they'd earned from each other after a month of navigating the same space, of working around each other and dancing around the sordid complexity of their pasts. Even their "competitions" were familiar events, with neither assassin ever grazing a boundary, skirting around each other while still somehow meeting in the middle.
It was why she had entertained the idea of seeking Truth's help. Natasha...wanted to. She wanted to ask because she knew that Truth would help, no questions asked and no judgment made.
you're the only one that i want
think i'm addicted to your light
And that was what scared her the most. Natasha wasn't allowed to want things. And that included wanting to believe that, somehow, Truth Castello trusted Natasha Romanoff.
Because, she didn't. Point blank. It was one thing Natasha was absolutely sure of regarding the other assassin. She trusted no one. Others may question the statement only because, while Truth was known for being this uptight agent who gave zero shits about anyone around her, she was also kind. She did things for people, whether they knew she was helping them or not. She did it for Natasha more than once, giving her space when she needed it or distracting her from the hauntings of the past. Natasha had seen her do it for her students, their colleagues, the staff.
But it didn't mean she trusted them. Not with the real Truth Castello.
Natasha figured that Truth could pay the price to be kind. She had these abilities that separated her from the rest of them, abilities that made her a lot more capable. Even with her back turned, Truth was not defenseless. It was nothing about trust. She simply knew Natasha wouldn't be stupid enough to attack an enhanced, distracted or not.
gravity can't forget
to pull me back to the ground again
It was nothing about trust.
Natasha looked away.
"Natasha."
you're everything i need and more
Then she was drawn back.
it's written all over your face
"This could go a lot faster if you were helping me."
Natasha paused, watching Truth's skilled hands scrape the blade across the whetstone, not quite grasping the request.
At Natasha's continued silence, Truth continued.
"If it helps, you can think of it as a debt. And, to be clear, you're welcome to ask me for favors so long as you'd welcome the same from me."
At that Natasha nodded because she understood the signs of an deal. Somehow, yet again, Truth knew exactly what to say to put her at ease.
The kind, gentle assassin.
you know you're my saving grace
"Yeah," she replied. "I can do that."
"Excellent. Now, the faster we get this done, the closer we are to leaving."
Natasha raised a brow as she grabbed the last dirty knife. She didn't recall ever voicing her dilemma, yet.
"And, where would we be going?"
Truth gave her a mischievous smile.
pray it won't fade away
"Just for a little walk."
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