I woke up, dazzled by the bright, New York skyline greeting me. I had tossed and turned all night, too hot in the cotton duvet that had been given to me. A thin layer of ice covered my neck and forehead, a sign that I was indeed too hot last night, and that my body had cooled myself down automatically. I was surprised to see frost covering the blanket, and tried to brush it off best I could. The room was freezing, and for me to remark on it being so, meant that it was most likely below -10 degrees celsius. Frozen condensation coated the windows like smog, and I was surprised to see that frost covered the door as well. I didn't remember turning my room into a winter wonderland last night.
I thought back to when Madam B lectured me about my powers: " You must have control. Your powers do not control you, you control them"
Yes, I had to learn to control them more, even if that meant not using them for a while. Control was the key to any form of self defense, a main point that had been drilled into us at the Red Room.
I quickly had a shower and dressed myself in the outfit that S.H.I.E.L.D had given me, making sure that I didn't freeze anything in the process of doing so. The scalding hot water burnt my back, but it was nice to have a bit of warmth once in a while. When I walked out of the bathroom, Clint Barton was at my door, in uniform, waiting.
" I assumed that you would be asleep at this time" he thought to himself.
" You assumed wrong" I shot back.
" Didn't know that you had a habit of turning rooms into the North Pole"
" Specialty of mine"
" Fury was right, you would be up this early. He has moved your training session to in umm- "he looked at his watch. " 5 minutes. Follow me."
Even if it was 6 o'clock in the morning, people were up and running, getting to work as usual to make sure that the Avengers tower was up and running. I noticed that S.H.I.E.L.D had an undeniable presence here, even when the building was still owned my Stark industries. Clint walked us through some hallways and labs, making sure that I wouldn't be too close to potential catastrophes.
" Interesting" I said to myself.
" What is?" he asked.
" You put me across the entire building from the training room, and most of the labs. Looks like you don't take risks after all"
"What make you think we take risks?"
"Oh, just the fact that you followed an anonymous tip-off to a warehouse that you knew next to nothing about. And, you put canola oil in Starks scotch"
" I'm not gonna lie, we do some pretty messed up shit sometimes" he said, shrugging.
We walked into a giant room, weapons of all sorts lining the walls. It was otherwise empty, with no mats or boxing rings to speak of. I guess the Avengers didn't need that sort of thing. On one wall, there was a one-way mirror, and I presumed that Agent Fury would be in there, along with a pack of guards in case things got out of hand.
A voice came from the loudspeaker " Good morning, Experiment A-9753, grab a desired weapon and get into starting position. We will give you two minutes."
Two minutes until what? I glanced at Clint. He just shrugged his shoulders and backed out of the room.
" Good luck. You're gonna need it"
I glared at him and looked at the wall. I didn't know what I was attacking, so it was hard to choose a weapon. Ice was useful for long distance, I could throw daggers made of ice or giant ice balls at the attacker. Bows, guns and crossbows were off the list. Knives were too risky. If I were to be defending myself against anything larger than Cap, knives and tasers would be useless. I would probably benefit from something large and sharp but not too heavy, good for creating space between me and my attacker, but also not slowing me down.
I chose two, shorter handled axes. Great for one to one fights, but I could also through them a fair distance. The axe would give the blade momentum, so that I would use up less energy and didn't have to swing as hard. The space under the blade would be useful if I wanted to hook anything and, assuming that there would be no wood involved in my training, the blade would not get easily stuck in anything.
As soon as I took the modern axes off of their brackets, the walls instantly closed in on itself, folding so that I couldn't change my mind. Furys voice came from a loudspeaker.
"Release the HulkBuster"
Shit.
A large door slowly opened to reveal what I was going to fight.
It was ginormous. At least 12 feet tall, and had to weigh 3 tons at the lightest. HulkBuster had familiar colours and basic design, mimicking the Iron man suit. It had extremely broad shoulders and large legs, allowing for a wider range of movement and obviously able to lift heavy objects. The suit was strong, powerful and enormous. This was going to be interesting.
Suddenly, my axes didn't seem like a great idea anymore. In fact, none of the weapons on that wall would have been a great choice. The HulkBuster was made for the Hulk, not some assassin. Well, I did have ice, but I would have a hard time piercing the suit. I would have to get in the cracks. That gave me an idea. The HulkBuster was made for straight on punches, not anything that involved thin, needle-like shards of ice, piercing it's armour. I could get up close to it once I disabled the machine with ice, having the chance to use my axes.
It stepped towards me, looking as fearsome and terrifying as ever. Something I was used too. I didn't let the HulkBusters size, or name faze me.
It stepped towards me once again, holding up it's arms in an attempt to shoot me with the suits repulsors. I lifted my own arms, using them as an anchor to force my ice into the air, and onto the ground, below the HulkBusters feet. Sadly, Tony didn't think to install and grip to the machine, so it stumbled, stabilizing itself, but still managed to shoot at me pretty accurately, but I dodged. Right away, I have something the Hulkbuster doesn't- balance.
It was pointless for him to run at me now, for he would simply slip over, giving me the upper hand. Now, I just have to find a way to get close to him. I could find my way across the ice, but it would be unnecessary slippery, to the point where I would just look like an amature on an ice-rink. Another idea sprung up in my head. Ice-skates.
Two seconds later, I was skating across the floor, heading straight towards the Hulkbuster. Why didn't I think about this before? As I dodged shot after shot of energy, I powered my way across the floor. I could really use a lift. Creating a ramp of ice, was easy, it was launching off of it that I was unsure of. A few seconds were all I allowed myself in the air, when I grabbed onto the suits helmet and straddled on. I used my axe to stab the Hulkbuster in the neck, a place where I predicted there would be some important wires. The lovely sound of electricity filled my ears as I stabbed, making sure to unlatch it from the neck. One of the machines hands came up to punch me, but I backflipped off the Hulkbuster, landing on the ground and stabbing it in a cracks of it's legs between the armour.
The HulkBuster was getting angry at this point, so I kept my distance, circling and stabbing, making sure that the machine would have to unbalance itself to punch me. I did a few laps before something as hard as a jet plane collided with my body.
I flew backwards, across the length of the room and sliding across the floor. I had been winded, but no damage other than that done. My vision went blurry as I tried to stand up, and I stumbled, losing balance on my skates.
The Hulkbuster came charging at me, wires and spare parts flying from it's legs and neck. I stood up. I was not finished yet.
Natasha
Holy shit.
This girl was good.
I had seen many fights in my life, but none compared to this one, as I saw the girl almost flying across the room, not afraid of the most powerful of Tony's suits.
I could plainly see that she had been trained by Madam B. The way she moved: clean and efficient. She spun around the giant, red monster, not faltering one step, never hesitating. She made precise, accurate shots with shards of ice at HulkBuster, managing to get between the cracks and layers of the suit. Not even the Hulk had been strong enough to tear down the suit, and yet here she was, twirling and slashing at the chunk of metal, not letting it one inch.
I glanced at the team for a moment, and there they were, never keeping their eyes off of the fight. Steve's mouth was practically gaping. Clint was expressionless, as usual, and I could tell that Fury was impressed. "What in Steves star-spangled underwear is this girl doing to my suit?" Tony gasped, coming into the room with a cup of hot coffee.
" Yeah, we borrowed it for training purposes, hope you don't mind" I said, bringing my gaze back to the girl.
As she finished up with the fight, after making sure that the suit was in pieces on the ground, the girl bowed to the one-way mirror we were standing behind.
Fury leaned into the microphone " Bravo Experiment A-9753, you are officially part of S.H.I.E.L.D."