∆ {1⁴} {SOMETHING LIKE MAGIC} ∆

ROXI WAS ONE when her parents had been killed in a train crash on the way home from a date on Christmas Eve, and as a result, she had grown up in an orphanage until she was 7, but then, she got her first foster family. None of the homes kept her long, and she would often three or four different homes a year. When she was 17, she had been brought into a foster home that'd been almost nice at first, but a few months in, everything began to change.

The man who was acting as her guardian had begun to grow more careless with hiding his darker actions, and that in turn had led him to drugs and alcohol. Both their things in their turn, not only affected the man but all the kids who lived there. He had become abusive and in the end, became drunk enough to start taking advantage of the children in his house. Eventually, Roxi couldn't bear it any longer and she'd left in the dead of night when the man had been safely knocked out by his alcohol consumption.

She had lived on the streets for a few months before S.H.I.E.L.D found her. They took her in and cared for her, but Roxi's past experiences had damaged her so much and made her so paranoid that she wouldn't tell them her first name in dear that they would send her back to the man and the foster system. But they did no such thing and raised her as one of their own. Even now, 15 years later, when Roxi was one of the best agents S.H.I.E.L.D had, she never stopped looking over her shoulder, never started trusting.

That was why she approached the God of Mischief on the mountainside with a plain mask of expressionless neutralism, though her eyes were taking in his every movement, every subtle shift in his robes that could signify the man drawing a knife on her. But, she didn't find any and continued to approach him from behind as he observed Tony and Thor fighting before he turned to leave.

"It'd be a little more helpful if you stayed put," Roxi told him, essentially threatening him as she held a loaded gun in her hand, ready to be used if needed.

"Ah yes, I'm sure it would," Loki commented as he turned to face her, acting as if nothing had happened.

"I'm glad you agree," she told him, gesturing with the gun for him to sit down on the edge of the cliff, which he did with no comment, which surprised her slightly. She sat down next to him, the gun still ready to use. For a few minutes, they were bathed in silence as they watched Thor and Tony fight.

"Aren't you going to stop them?" Loki asked, turning to her slightly.

"No, Cap will do that," Roxi responded with absolute surety. The god nodded slightly as if accepting her reason, before deciding to speak again.

"I sense something different inside of you, something like magic," he informed her, and Roxi rolled her eyes just as Cap intervened below.

"Oh here we go," she said, exasperation shining through her voice.

"Yet, you are Midgardian?" Loki inquired confusedly as if he were trying to work out a difficult puzzle.

"Yes, I'm Midgardian," she told him, just as the others finished up below them. 

"Alright, get up, we need to get down there before Natasha forgets about us too," she ordered and he followed her command. Even so, Roxi made him walk in front of her until they arrived on the jet. Cap was telling Tony off in his very polite way, while Thor stormed over to Loki and began reprimanding him in the back of the Quinjet. Roxi walked past them all and rolled her eyes, making her way to the cockpit, where she tapped her back-up on the shoulder.

"Thanks, Jones," she greeted, and the Agent made his way to the cargo hold of the Quinjet. Roxi strapped herself into the seat, glancing back over her shoulder to see Thor and Cap still lecturing, and Tony and Loki not listening. As she turned around again, she shook her head.

"And Clint wonders why I don't date men."

{~}

THEY FINALLY TOUCHED down back on the helicarrier, and as she got up, Roxi noticed the pain in her shoulders had grown on the flight, but she'd been so busy pondering Loki's words that she hadn't noticed it.

'I sense something different inside of you, something like magic.' 

What did that mean? She wondered if it had something to do with her blood family. She had no idea who they were. All she remembered of them was fireflies dancing on a spring night and the smell of lemon and peppermint. She wasn't even sure how she remembered those things, because after all, they had only been alive for the first year of her life. 

The wounds on her right shoulder had split open slightly, trickles of blood running down her arm, bringing her back to reality as they made their way through the halls of the carrier. As they walked past the lab, Loki looked inside to see Bruce and the scientist looked up, seeming nervous at the sight of the god. As they reached the holding room, Roxi saw Fury waiting outside for them. He walked up to her, his eyes shifting automatically to where he knew the bullet wounds were and he gave her a look. Roxi shrugged it off, but Fury wasn't going to let her go a moment later without medical attention.

"Go to the medical bay, have them take a look at it. And rest for once in your life," he ordered, his tone making it clear that there was to be no arguing. She nodded.

"Yes sir," she told him, with a slightly mocking undertone that no-one but Fury could pick up, but he ignored it.

"Good," he finalized, before turning and making his way to the rest of the group to give them their instructions. Roxi gave the room a once-over, just to be sure that everything seemed to be in place, old habits taking over. She noticed that Natasha took note of that and quietly told herself to be more discreet before she too turned and walked away. She was going to the medical bay, but she had some things to pick up from her room first. Luckily, it was on-the-way enough to not be suspicious.

She glanced around her once more before entering her room and grabbing the black notebook and a pen from under the mattress and grabbing the laptop out of her rucksack so she could add the newest names to her Black Book. When she entered the medical ward, one of the nurses came over to inspect her bullet wounds and told her off for not coming earlier. It all rushed past Roxi's ears like a soft stream, a sense of familiarity overtaking her senses as she realized just how many times she'd been in a situation like this. Far too many times for her own good. She could at least have some permanent damage by this point, other than scars, and Loki's words once again rang in her ears.

'Something like magic.'

She was ushered towards an operating table, which surprised Roxi slightly. Was she that badly damaged? But to her relief, the nurse told her that the bullets had been removed on her first flight to the helicarrier and the medics had done a decent job of patching her up temporarily and that the wounds would just have to be stitched together, limiting her movement in both arms for a day or so. Roxi nodded along, pretending to agree to the nurse's terms, though she knew if something were to happen during that time, she would not hesitate to jump into action, and she was pretty sure the nurse knew it too and was just giving her the instructions in hope that she would follow them for once. The nurse eventually left her alone to see to other patients or something similar, and Roxi got the chance to do what she'd been wanting to do for the past few days. 

She picked up her laptop from where it'd been put by the side of her bed and opened the lid, waiting until it finally started before beginning to type. The first thing she did was tap into the security feed of Loki's cell so that she could listen in to Fury's conversation even if he didn't want her to. She made the window smaller and put it in the corner of the screen, more listening to the audio than watching the visual.

'It's an impressive cage. Not built, I think, for me.' Loki's voice crackled through the earbuds she'd put in to help conceal her viewing of the security feed. Roxi rolled her eyes as she realized that Loki was going to start spewing word vomit any second now.

'Built for something a lot stronger than you.' Fury's voice joined in, and even from those two lines, it was enough for Roxi to guess what would transpire next.  As Loki made his next response, she managed to remotely gain access to the private server that James Davis had used.

'Oh, I've heard. A mindless beast who makes play he's still a man. How desperate are you to call on such lost creatures to defend you?' She brought up the login screen, which had an empty box for the password. 

'How desperate am I? You threaten my world with war. You steal a force you can't hope to control. We talk about peace and you kill caus' it's fun. You have made me very desperate. You might not be glad that you did.' Roxi admired Fury's ability to come up with a short speech and a threat in a few seconds, as she continued to listen in. The password. What could the password be?

'Ooh. It burns you to have come so close; to have the Tesseract, to have power. Unlimited power, and for what? A warm light for all of mankind. And then to be reminded what real power is.' She had to admit, Loki was exceptional with words. Roxi was almost interested to see what the god could learn about her and use against her by the way she stood, talked, acted. He was highly skilled at reading people. But she was highly skilled at putting up an act all the time. What made it so difficult for other people to figure her out, was that she didn't know who she was herself. She heard Fury scoff lightly.

'Well let me know if real power wants a magazine or something.' Fury left the holding room and Roxi paused the audio and minimized the visual window as she thought through the Director's sentence.

"What kind of magazine though?" She murmured to herself, "One loaded with bullets or one loaded with crap?" A thought occurred to her as a potential password, and she smiled slightly. It sounded exactly like something James Davis would do. She carefully typed in the -unsurprisingly custom- number plate of the Tesla she'd stolen.

1984 JRD.

The number plate was comprised of the year that Davis had been born, along with the initials of his name. The server accepted the password and now, Roxi was free to have a poke around the mainframe. She didn't doubt that the others were having a chat on the bridge about how to proceed, and it annoyed her slightly that Fury had forced her to be absent for such a situation just because she had been shot in the shoulder. 

Eventually, she managed to find the employee list, and she scrolled through it, looking for the faces of the eight men she had killed by her own hand. The first image she found that she recognized was the first security guard she'd taken out. Damián Santayana. James Davis. She continued her search looking for the name of the third man she'd killed. Braulio Salazar. Five to go. The next two were the men who had survived the crossfire in the hallway when she'd been stranded between the two groups of men. Genaro Collantes and Ezequiel Guerrero. The last names she needed were the ones of the three men in the hallway, and she managed to find them in quick succession (Gonzalo Moya, Leandro Abril, and Miguel Menaldo) although she hadn't been expecting an intrusion.

{~}

NATASHA DIDN'T QUITE know what to think of Agent Ryder. Up until the day she'd been ordered to call the Spanish Agent, she'd never heard her name mentioned, but judging by the fact that Fury had ordered Natasha to call her, she must be more than just an average agent. The first time she'd met the Agent, she'd taken in her appearance. Medium length, dark brown hair she'd tied up to keep out of the way, sharp, blue eyes that seemed to analyze anyone she saw and a professional posture. Even from that one look, Natasha was sure that the lady was more than just a pretty face. 

She'd proved that theory when she'd accompanied Captain Rogers and Natasha on the mission to apprehend Loki, even when she'd been shot three times the day before. And then, Ryder had jumped out of a plane with the intent of keeping an eye on a God. She hadn't panicked, showing Natasha that she was levelheaded and calm and that she thought through the situation and evaluated if she was needed, also taking into account Tony and Steve's personalities when making her decision. The Agent still made sarcastic remarks, and Natasha couldn't help but feel as if it was some kind of deflection, to keep people from looking too hard.

Natasha had fully agreed with Fury's decision to send the Agent to the medical center on the plane, knowing that they'd need their agents as healthy as they could be, which for Ryder, meant bed rest and no strenuous activity until the bullet wounds at least had a layer of solid flesh over them. Instead, when she walked past the medical ward on her way to see Loki, she glanced in to see the Agent sitting upright and typing away at her computer, with a black book open in her lap. Natasha glanced at the clock inside the room, noticing she had a little time to spare. She walked into the doorway and stood there, waiting for the woman to notice her, ignoring the whining noise that the automatic door made as it decided to open or close. When she realized that Agent Ryder wasn't going to acknowledge her, she decided to speak, wondering in the back of her mind if the Agent had even noticed her presence.

"Aren't you supposed to be resting?" She asked in a cool, calm voice. Ryder didn't look up or flinch in the slightest, leading Natasha to believe that the Agent had noticed her presence and had simply ignored her.

"Probably," Ryder answered, obviously very invested into what she was doing on the laptop,. Natasha saw her begin to scribble down something in the notepad, occasionally accompanied by glances up at the laptop screen. 

"Okay, I'll rephrase that. Fury ordered you to get some rest." The Agent briefly glanced at Natasha, before her eyes snapped to the computer screen, flitting her eyes down to the notebook for a second, before replying.

"And I'm going to. I just had something to do first." Then, she shut the laptop lid, closed the book, and set both things on the side. Natasha watched her for a moment more, before nodding and leaving. Out of the corner of her eye, on the way past, she saw the Agent pick up the black book and hide it underneath her pillow, where Natasha also saw a flash of metal. That meant that the book Ryder had been writing in was very important, to be kept so close to a weapon, and also that the Agent as just as paranoid as Natasha was, which meant she had something to hide. 

Natasha Romanoff walked into the holding room of S.H.I.E.L.D to talk to the God of Mischief (who also happened to be a mass-murderer), but her mind was on Agent Ryder and what secrets she had to keep.

{A/N:} Hello again, all you Marvel fans. I only published this chapter because @jessicamaplesand asked for it and I owe (a lot) her for putting up with me every day on video call so this is my congratulations to you. 

I hope you're enjoying reading this story as much as I am writing it because this is my favorite story on this profile at the moment, and I have hope that I will actually finish this one (even though I'm only on Chapter 4). Well, thank you for reading this even if you didn't enjoy it. Please drop a comment (and maybe a vote) and let me know what you think so I can improve. See you next update (so soon).

JabberJay11

2870 Words

Written: 01 /06 /2020

Published: 02 /06/2020