In the Quinjet
The engines filled the cockpit with a low, steady hum. Natasha flew with practiced calm, hands light on the controls, her posture composed and focused.
Luke sat in the co-pilot seat beside her, legs stretched out, completely relaxed. He looked less like someone being taken to a high-priority S.H.I.E.L.D. situation and more like someone enjoying a casual ride in a taxi.
Natasha still couldn't believe how he agreed to come.
Well… agreed was generous.
He made it difficult on purpose.
"Sure, I'll help… if you agree to a date. If not, I'm busy."
And he didn't drop it.
Not for an entire ten minutes.
Not until Natasha finally exhaled the kind of slow breath that meant she accepted defeat.
So now, technically, Luke had a date with the Black Widow — something he looked far too pleased about.
Natasha kept her eyes on the sky ahead. "You're smiling," she said without looking.
Luke didn't deny it. "Well, I did get a date with a beautiful woman. Hard not to."
"You blackmailed me into it," she muttered.
"Blackmailed?" Luke lifted a brow. "I prefer the term negotiated."
Natasha didn't look at him, but the confusion — and mild frustration — was clear in her voice. "I still don't understand you. You're already involved with three beautiful women, and somehow you still chase me. Do you have no shame? No morals? Anything?"
Luke shrugged, completely unfazed. "Nah. I left it somewhere. It kept getting in the way of my dreams."
Natasha glanced at him sharply. "Dreams of a scum?"
From the way he phrased it, she was fully expecting something dirty, ridiculous, and absolutely on-brand for him.
"Nah. Just a normal dream every man has."
Natasha quickly decided to cut off the previous conversation.
She didn't like where it was heading. If she let Luke continue, she'd probably end up hearing things she definitely didn't want to think about — and she had enough stress already. So she shifted the topic.
"So what were you doing during the year you disappeared?" she asked, keeping her tone casual as she adjusted the Quinjet's altitude.
Luke didn't even blink. "Well, I was in another world fighting zombies and eliminating a terrorist organization who thought wiping out humanity was the way to save the planet."
He said it with the same tone someone might use to describe cleaning their room.
Natasha sighed. "You really need to stop with that other-world nonsense." She still didn't believe any of it — multiverse or not, zombies and alternate universes sounded ridiculous. "You vanished for a year, Luke. You expect me to believe zombies now?"
"Sooner or later you will," Luke replied calmly. "And it's not nonsense. Didn't I tell you a year ago that S.H.I.E.L.D. would mess up? And you did."
She didn't argue. His predictions were frustratingly accurate.
"Yes, I agree you can 'predict' things," Natasha said, though her tone made it clear she didn't enjoy admitting it. After a second, curiosity slipped in — the kind she tried to hide behind sarcasm. "So what about me? What's my future?"
The question came out lightly, like a joke, but it wasn't entirely a joke. If he truly saw things coming, part of her wanted to know.
"Ummmm… it's gloomy," Luke said.
He knew the truth from the original timeline: her future wasn't great. Honestly, almost every major female hero in the MCU had a miserable future — dying alone, losing loved ones, or sacrificing themselves. Natasha's fate was one of the bleakest.
Natasha's expression didn't change. She expected that kind of answer. She'd never pictured herself settling down, having children, or retiring peacefully. But hearing the word gloomy out loud wasn't exactly reassuring.
"Just say it. I can handle it," she said. She assumed it would be something straightforward — a mission gone wrong, an ambush, a sniper's bullet. Something familiar.
Luke didn't sugarcoat it. "You die on an alien planet as a single woman," he said casually. "Middle-aged, I think."
Natasha's face shifted immediately — first confusion, then annoyance, then outright offense.
Dying? Fine. Expected.
Alien planet? Not great.
Single middle-aged woman?
That one hit her pride dead center.
Her jaw tightened. "Middle-aged?" she repeated, voice flat. She didn't care about aliens or danger, but that part? That stung.
No woman liked hearing it, and Natasha Romanoff — trained assassin or not — was no exception. And Luke had said it in the most pointed, deliberate way possible.
Her eyes narrowed. "You really emphasized the 'single middle-aged' part."
She wasn't a romantic, so being single never bothered her. But the idea of dying alone on some alien planet, far from Earth, like a nameless soldier no one would ever recover… that bothered her more than she expected.
That wasn't heroic — that was pathetic.
And what the hell would she even be doing on an alien planet?
Luke raised both hands defensively. "Hey, don't look at me like I caused it."
Natasha stared ahead in silence, her jaw tightening. "So my future is really dark," she said. Her voice was controlled, but she wasn't doubting him. Because why would anyone lie about something this grim?
"Yep," Luke said bluntly. "But now that future may not happen."
Natasha turned slightly toward him. "Why?"
Luke shifted in his seat, turned to face her with exaggerated drama, and extended his hands like he was offering her the universe. "Because I'm here. I don't mind helping you escape from such a cursed fate. I'm willing to sacrifice myself."
Natasha didn't react with sarcasm, didn't shoot back a cold remark, and didn't roll her eyes. She actually paused. It surprised even her.
As over-the-top as Luke was being, she couldn't ignore the fact that he had predicted the Tesseract incident a year in advance — and he had been right in a way that no one could dismiss as a lucky guess.
Her mind, trained to evaluate patterns and probabilities, reluctantly accepted that there might be truth in what he said.
If that was her real future, if she truly would die alone somewhere far away, then she couldn't just brush it off. It wasn't fear that made her think; it was practicality.
She didn't want such a miserable ending, and if there was even a small chance she could change that path, she had to consider it.
"I'll think about it," Natasha said finally, her tone calm and steady.
Luke's expression froze like his brain had temporarily shut down. He hadn't expected her to take him seriously, let alone respond in a way that suggested she was genuinely considering the idea. For once, he didn't have a quick comeback.
If her future was truly that bleak, then the first logical thing she needed to change was her relationship status. Remaining single wouldn't help her avoid that path.
And without realizing it, that moment became the first real shift in her feelings — not love, not attraction, but acceptance that keeping certain walls up might lead her exactly toward the future she didn't want.
*****
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