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Post by Super Chick on May 5, 2016 22:53:07 GMT -7
But Elektra didn't know who was taking aim at her head.
From the back of the staging room, Natasha had watched the fighting. She heard what the woman said and watched as Elektra, cocky as ever, ignored everyone else in the room and waltzed back inside the dressing room. Natasha watched as the bouncers followed her. One of them stopped to help the woman (who was obviously a stripper and more than a little angry). The other two continued toward the dressing room and Elektra.
Knowing that Elektra would be busy for a moment, Natasha paused to speak to Xin Hua. The woman didn't want to tell her anything either, but Natasha didn't mind. She just covertly gathered some of her DNA and slipped it into her belt. That would have to be was enough for now. The Widow left the woman with the bouncer and moved toward the dressing room. As she approached, she saw one of the bouncers taking aim at Elektra's head with his pistol. Natasha sighed as she came up behind him. She stabbed him gently in the back with a tranquilizer dart as she simultaneously touched his shoulder with her other hand to distract from her the pin prick.
"Trust me. You don't want to do that," she told the man as he turned sharply with his gun still extended. Natasha ducked and struck his wrist harshly in a counter move, causing him to drop the gun. It skittered across the floor. The bouncer dropped to his knees looking at her strangely, then fell on his face and passed out.
Nat looked calmly at the other bouncer who was already coming at her. She simply raised her arm and shot a Widow's bite at him to incapacitate him quickly. "You didn't want to do that either," she told the prone man.
It cost Natasha a precious minute to deal with the bouncers, but she had not let either of them get needlessly killed by Elektra. Tony would have appreciated her decision. Her handlers in the KGB? Not so much.
She looked back into the room for Elektra....
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Post by Deleted on May 5, 2016 23:04:55 GMT -7
Elektra looked up as she heard a weight much heavier than who she expected drop behind her, raising an eyebrow in surprise. She turned around and saw Natasha (ah, there she was,) dealing with the bouncers. No time to deal with her, she thought. Sure she could just throw a sai, but there was a risk of it being caught. And the minute or so it would take Elektra to get away from the Avenger and on the road to the coordinates. In that moment she saw a vision of her options. One led to her helping the Widow, and the two of them on the floor dying, as well as flashes of Matthew for some reason. She pushed him from her thoughts and guided her visions to if she left. Blank. That left it open. A risk, to be sure, but a more secure one than certain death to two people in Daredevil's life. Fine. She dropped a smoke bomb and took her cue to vanish, using her illusion magicks to enhance the getaway. If it helped or hindered the Widow, she did not care. Before the clock struck a minute, she was already in a car she found in the parking lot (hers might have been tracked if Natasha was there) and pulling out. Radioactive Man, you're next.
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Post by Super Chick on May 12, 2016 14:03:57 GMT -7
She expected the retreat, but the smoke bomb was a little dramatic. Of course, Natasha knew to expect as much from Elektra, so that wasn't a surprise either. At least this time she didn't manipulate every bystander's mind so as to believe she was the enemy. That gave the Widow a bigger window in which to give chase.
Leaving the same way as Elektra, Natasha made for a backdoor. She reached outside just in time to see Elektra take off in a stolen car. Natasha made for her motorcycle and gave pursuit. The vehicle was SHIELD issue, meaning it had a lot of fun tech on board. Right now. however, Natasha was most grateful for the wide tires and quick acceleration. She easily caught up to Elektra's vehicle and took the time to fasten her helmet under her chin. She was not in a hurry to run Elektra of the road to anything. Her goal was not to kill the woman or otherwise endanger her or other innocent drivers on the road. Rather, she need only to track her until such a time as the assassin stopped. After all, a live Elektra was going to provide more answers than a hospitalized one.
Reaching behind her back, Natasha retrieved a tracking device. It was highly magnetized and would also excrete a highly sticky substance once activated so as to stick to any surface (just in case the car had little to no metal make up in its frame). The Widow closed in on the car and started to come up beside it to attach the tracker to the bumper. Likely as not Elektra would swerve to keep her from coming along side her, but Natasha had planned for that. She needed only to get close to the car to toss it and the tracker would stick.
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Post by Deleted on May 12, 2016 17:39:24 GMT -7
Elektra got a look in her rear view and saw immediately it was the Widow. Well shit. Was she surprised? No. Disappointed? Most definitely. She put her pedal on the gas and got a vision of the Widow throwing something at her car. Bomb? Not out of the redhead's capacity, she admitted. She had to time it just right and waited for the Widow to speed up. Oh so this was one of those SHIELD bikes. This was already a souped up car, she could tell from the engine, so her catching up only meant more obstacles. Lovely, she thought sarcastically.
She extracted a special explosive shuriken from her belt, one of two she carried ode to not wanting to be a suicide bomber with her already reckless habits, as she drove and timed the throw with Natasha's, the star colliding with whatever the hell she threw at the car. It clicked and gave a spark as the sharp steel collided with whatever that thing was, exploding in mid-air; but she paid no attention, keeping her eyes on the road as she accelerated even faster, the car crossing 100mph within seconds. She swerved around a few cars, but Natasha was there in the rear view.
Persistant this time... She considered how much faster this car could go before its engine would protest, but likely would draw a few cops or hit somebody and turn herself into paste. She groaned. New plan then.
She slammed on the brakes and kept the wheel steady, the axle squealing in protest along with the tires and the light chassis. Your move, Black Widow, she thought as the bike came speeding towards her bumper. Playing chicken with an Avenger driven SHIELD bike wasn't necessarily the smartest idea, but at the risk on the freeway of dozens of casualties, it was a risk she was willing to take.
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Post by Super Chick on May 26, 2016 22:10:54 GMT -7
It was impressive that Elektra was able to see her maneuver to throw the tracker onto her car, but not unexpected. The assassin would have made an excellent widow had she been born in Russia all those decades ago. Instead, her talent had been largely wasted on assassinations for others in the name of profit. Where Elektra's many talents could have been given for the benefit of countries and innocents, her gray morality and hardened heart could ill conceive of it. Only Matt had been capable of bringing any good out of her, in Natasha's opinion, but in the end the woman's treachery always won over wisdom or fragile emotion. She was never one to be trusted nor underestimated - especially since her resurrection by the Hand and the additional skills gifted to her. And now she'd made a deal with the devil himself, and not the one with a moral compass who lived in Hell's Kitchen. No, she'd made a deal with Mephisto and to that end Natasha had to know what foul trickery may come of it.
The small detonation that came from contact being made with the tracker and Elektra's small explosive was not enough to distract Natasha from her course. She did, of course, correct her path so as to avoid it, a quick twist of the wheel and she was directly behind the car again. Elektra was bound to attempt to lose her, but the Widow was determined to speak with the woman again even if all that was said was Elektra telling her to go to hell. At that point, Natasha decided that she would merely ask what the weather was like down there while stinging her with a Widow's bite out of spite. Oh it would never be that easy, but a girl could dream, couldn't she?
The car's sudden engaging of the brakes made the event of a collision with Elektra damned impossible to avoid. They were traveling too fast for Natasha to completely stop before hitting the bumper with the motorbike, and sliding beneath hr would be suicide, so the Widow did what her reflexes commanded of her and lifted her front tire instead. The motorcycle immediately climbed over the car, riding up and over the roof and coming down over the hood while barely touching it form the momentum. ON the road on the other side of the car, Natasha was able to land and come to a stop. The back tire of the motorcycle skidded in a half circle, leaving the Widow facing Elektra through the windshield.
"Why must you make having a simple conversation so difficult?" she asked Elektra rhetorically. She really had very little hope of an answer, but Natasha also had little recourse but to try.
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Post by Deleted on May 30, 2016 14:37:13 GMT -7
Elektra mercifully ducked as the sun roof of the car concaved inwards slightly as it was retracting, which allowed Widow that extra oomp to get over and stand at her face to face. She watched Widow wheel about on a rather busy freeway gracefully, and the only way out was either into the guardrail or the turnoff which would allow her to escape and get lost in the crowd. She had to admire Natasha's tenacity, even if it was rather grating.
Elektra decided to respond to her, projecting her voice a bit over the screams of people and cars.
"If I didn't, you wouldn't be here, would you, Natasha?" she said, calling her bluff. She may have played at being a hero, but deep down, in the darkest corners of her own heart, Elektra knew that Natasha was no better than she. She decided to forego the thoughts she had of what she had done to poor Matthew's heart when he was living in San Francisco with her, and decided to kick the clutch and put her foot on the gas, the tires burning rubber.
Round Two, she thought and let the clutch go. She only had one shot at this and she prayed she would be able to steer herself into the right vision. She pulled the tiniest little .22 out of the kicked open glove compartment, oh so this was a woman's car, she realized, and reached around the windshield and fired right at Elektra, going for the bike's weak points. Natasha was annoying, sure, but she deserved at least a chance at life, provided the potential explosion didn't break that chance in half for her.
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Post by Super Chick on May 31, 2016 23:36:10 GMT -7
Natasha quirked her eyebrow at Elektra's answer as other automobiles slowed or stopped around them in avoidance. Did Elektra want her to chase her? What's her game?
The Widow had little time to reflect on that question as Elektra pushed on the accelerator and spun her wheels. Natasha readied the motorcycle to move, thinking that Elektra would try to run her down. Instead, the woman released the clutch and the car lurched in an arc away from her. The spy hit the throttle and began to spin to follow her in whatever direction she sped. The turn likely saved Natasha's life as Elektra sprayed the side of her bike with small caliber bullets. Reacting quickly, the Black Widow leaned her body far tot he side of the bike and used it as a shield. The bullets all ricocheted off the reinforced metal on the bike and missed her leg as Elektra sped by her. Once passed, Natasha righted herself and hit the throttle hard to catch up again.
The bike didn't act as if it were damaged, but a bullet had indeed lodged itself in an important part of the motorcycle's engine. Natasha did not know this as she raced to catch Elektra again, but within a few moments the bike would likely give way to an engine freeze up as oil was leaking in a stream behind her.
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Post by Deleted on Jun 1, 2016 11:55:08 GMT -7
Elektra swerved ever so slightly around Natasha's skidding bike but doing so caused one of her bags of tricks to spin free and escape onto the concrete. SHIT! She couldn't stop at this speed and glanced over. Phew. The bag with the phone that contained the coordinates was in the passenger seat. She made the turnoff and kicked the gas pedal down and off into the sunset. One problem down, one to go. Fortunately the bag that went flying didn't contain any of her weapons and more of her civilian necessities, which given her next target was the Radioactive Man, was probably for the best.
However, what Elektra would not realize until much later, was the bag that DID fly out of the car contained her encrypted phone with her mainline to Locke. While Elektra herself would not give a damn about his life in any capacity, he was the only person who knew what she was after and why. Inept as he was, he was useful to her. Elektra continued on until she found a dilapidated small town in the middle of nowhere, fitting, she thought, and came to a stop. She pulled out a Geiger counter and followed it to a hole in the ground. Cliche much? Elektra thought as she unscrewed the bunker's lid off and went down the ladder. Down into the madness she went. Appropriate.
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Post by Super Chick on Jun 2, 2016 18:40:04 GMT -7
Elektra spun up the off-ramp and Natasha had every intention to follow. Unfortunately, the bullet lodged in her engine made its presence known in that moment and the motorcycle seized up, nearly throwing Natasha over its handlebar. She hurriedly turned off the power and coasted to the side of the road, watching Elektra speed away. The Widow said nothing despite silently cursing in her head, and looked over her shoulder. Something had flown out of the car window during Elektra's stunt, and while she might have left it in pursuit of a greater cause before, now she was on her way to see if it would be of any help to her in discovering Elektra's motivations.
While walking back through the still stopped (and, in some cases, wrecked) traffic, Natasha activated the remote hover car from SHIELD that she had on standby. There would be no sense looking for Elektra by the time it arrived, but it would give her all the tools she needed to get ahead of her at the next step - provided whatever she left at the scene gave her any clues.
____________________
Jackpot.
Natasha's find at the site of Elektra's spinning car stunt was definitely something helpful. It was a bag of things, really, but the most fortuitous find was that of Elektra's personal cell phone. Sure, it was encrypted, and it took Natasha and a Stark tech AI many hours to decrypt the software, but once it was opened, Natasha was able to see the calls both received by and sent to her intense opponent. "Locke" was a name that appeared more than once, and recently as well, and it seemed the most logical breadcrumb to follow. It was also one of the few that made sense.
The phone traced to a location right here in Nevada. Of course, it was on the other side of the state, but that was a quick trip with her resources. Using her SHIELD hover car, Natasha was in Locke's little town shortly after nine in the morning. She did not wear any obvious uniform to distinguish her from any other, but Locke's location wasn't exactly in a bustling city either. So she dressed casually like one of the locals, meaning denim jeans, boots and a plaid shirt tied at her belly button. A well worn cowboy hat rested atop her head, mostly covering the red hair on top while a ponytail held back the rest. She entered Locke's cover business covered in dust from the desert that surrounded them and approached the bar. The place was a laid back bar straight out of a Hollywood movie for this part of the country, with plenty of heavy hitters sitting around looking lazy. The spy mentally counted the threats as she strolled up to the bar.
She greeted the bartender with a nod. "Whiskey."
{OOC: I am unsure of Locke's location, so I pulled a trope out of a hat. LMK if I need to change it.}
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Post by Deleted on Jun 20, 2016 21:42:11 GMT -7
Locke himself was, in his day job at least, a bar owner for bikers. It was a disguise so obvious that he did more illicit stuff on the side that nobody, not even the Feds, took him seriously. And that was the way he liked it. He kept himself well kept, though he looked more like a card shark with his dress shirt loosely buttoned and his sleeves rolled back. He wore aviator sunglasses to stave off the blistering light that got through even the tinted windows. It was low key, quaint, and now apparently with a gorgeous redhead in tow! Locke knew straight away she was no local, he practically knew everybody in the town, old habit, but he tracked her from the gas station filling up and came in for a drink. To be fair he had the breakfast special on at the moment, so she was probably grabbing a bite to eat. Trying his most casual and friendly tone, which he consistently failed to do with Elektra, poor girl, he spoke.
"Before five in the afternoon? Must've been a rough night of travel," he said and poured her a shot of whiskey and placed the glass on the table.
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Post by Super Chick on Jun 29, 2016 16:42:44 GMT -7
Her green eyes rose from beneath long eyelashes to peer at the bartender. A slow smile arched her lips as she nodded. "A rough night," she conceded.
He grunted in acknowledgement and grabbed her the whiskey. Locke poured the amber fluid into a shot glass and set it in front of Natasha. The woman reached out and touched the rim of the glass with her fingertip. She ran it over the edge, following the circle it made before picking it up and throwing it back.
She never even coughed. Locke was impressed.
Natasha did not release the shot glass but looked around the bar at the other patrons. "Awful lot of security here for a dive bar," she said to no one in particular. Her head turned to Locke. "Get robbed much?"
Locke looked at her suspiciously. There was no reason to think the other men sitting around the bar were anything but patrons to the casual observer. His brow raised. "Dunno what you mean," he said. His eyes narrowed. "Are you expecting trouble?"
The Widow turned to Locke and smiled. "Not much," she replied simply.
The older man blinked. Natasha kept the smile on her face and pushed the shot glass forward toward him. "Vodka this time," she said, not hiding her accent. "It reminds me of the old days."
Locke had begun taking the glass but as her accent registered in his brain, the man stepped back. "Ungh," he grunted. His eyes narrowed on here, her identity recognized. "The Black Widow," he said in a disapproving tone. Locke looked at his men who began standing and moving toward the bar. "I don't know why you're here, but your kind ain't welcome." Locke nodded at his men and they advanced.
Natasha didn't have to look behind her to know where everyone was. There was a dusty old mirror behind the bar and she mapped out her attack as the first man reached for her from behind. A swift kick out and backward took out his knee when a nauseating snap echoed through the bar. He fell with a loud groan, holding his leg. The next men who advanced tried to come from the sides, but their attack was that of two clumsy brutes and Natasha simply ducked out of their grasp. As she did so, she reached out with both hands and took hold of the back of their necks. She forced them into each other as another man made the mistake of grabbing her around the waist from behind.
There was no hesitation as the agile spy used the two men in front of her as a ladder for her feet. She climbed them then forced her feet over her head, turning in the arms of her attacker. He did not expect it and fell backward while trying to keep hold of her. He hit the ground on his back while the Widow landed on her feet. She knelt and punched him in the nose, knocking him out quickly and breaking the cartilage in the process.
The man whose knee she took out reached for her foot in anger and Natasha spun on him, kicking him in the ribs as she rose to meet the other two who were coming for her. He grunted and released her just as the first of the two tried to punch her. She dodged it by flipping backward in a move that then lifted her boots from the floor and brought them up under his chin and knocked him backward into the bar. He fumbled, and fell over the barstool, leaving one man standing and three others on the floor.
The fourth man reached for a weapon as the Widow came up from her flip to face him. She reached out when he did, his gun pointed at her and firing. Her hand caught the slide before it could come forward and bought her the needed split second to deflect the shot away from her. It struck a fifth man who had come just made his way to the front of the bar to help his friends. Natasha then took his gun hand and twisted it with a full body move that took her underneath his arm and dislocated his shoulder. She took the gun in the same move and hit the man in the head with it, rendering him unconscious.
The first man was attempting to crawl away. Natasha threw the gun at him, safety on. It struck him in the head and he ceased moving. The man who had taken a boot to the chin was reaching for his own weapon as Natasha lifted her hand and released her Widow's bite. The electrical shock took him completely out and Natasha looked over the fallen men at Locke. The entire encounter lasted less than two minutes.
She pulled her own weapon from the back of her pants as she walked toward him. She reached the bar, pushing the big man out of her path with a foot. She pulled her barstool back out and laid her gun in front of her on the bar. "You still owe me that vodka," she stated.
Locke, stunned at how quickly she dispatched his men, poured her the drink. Natasha drank it and set the glass back on the bar. "So much better than whiskey," she stated to no one in particular again as she stared at the empty glass. Her green eyes again rose to meet Locke's. "Now, back to business. I need a bit of information. It concerns a pretty little assassin we both know...."
{{With Spider's permission, I have modded Locke through this post.}}
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Post by Deleted on Jun 29, 2016 18:21:53 GMT -7
Locke, deflated as it was, withered even more.
"Fine. FINE! But I want immunity. This is Elektra we're talking about here, and it's safer in an Avengers safe house than SHIELD's. If I give you anything, you know whose head's next!"
He had a knack for body language and the Black Widow's had a lot in common with E; stoic, still, not giving anything and yet everything. Classically trained killer. They really don't make them like they use to, he realized.
"What? I have only two interests in this line of work: Information and Profit. I get Elektra jobs, sure, but those jobs would evaporate rather quickly if I had the Avengers start looking into them now wouldn't I? Bad for business, and certainly not good for people like Elektra who are out simply to cross the less savoury types from your line of work off the board," he said and handed Widow the bottle.
He watched her drink for a moment as he began to tidy up. He felt eyes on him the entire time, but a half dozen 250lbs men unconscious on your restaurant's floor was also bad for business, especially with the lunch rush coming in a few hours! After stowing the last of them in the storage closet until they woke up. Wiping his brow, he motioned to the Widow.
"Come with me," he said and led her down a trap door that led to a modestly hi-tech room that had various maps and targets of the world's most wanted as well as familiar faces (even the Widow herself, right under Tony Stark's and one above Daredevil's.)
He sat at his desk and motioned the Widow into the comfortable guest chair.
"Alright, what do you want to know? I assume you're only here because E's already given you the slip, yes?" he asked, casual but businesslike.
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Post by Super Chick on Jun 30, 2016 23:58:02 GMT -7
Natasha merely gave a dry smile as Locke begged for immunity then proceeded to clean up her mess. She neither granted him immunity, nor denied it. How she handled him would ultimately depend on how good his information turned out to be. She could either leave him out to dry, protect him, or conceal that he ever gave her anything. She knew what her preference would be, but time would seal the man's fate regardless.
She followed him into the place below to where the cowboy mobster conducted his real business. She would have liked to look impressed if only to appease Locke's ego, but sadly she had seen so much better. Her eyes flitted over t equipment and the images that painted his walls. The faces of her teammates appeared as did many others, including daredevil. Her eyes lingered there just a moment longer than the rest as she contemplated how much of Electra's recent activity centered around her former lover. Eventually, her eyes wandered to Locke. It proved to her his quality that, though her visage stared down upon him daily, it took him some time to recognize her. A professional would never let the image of their enemies escape their memory.
She took the seat he offered and crossed her legs. Her gun still hung loosely in her hand and she did not address the obvious. "I want to know what deal she made with Mephisto for starters. After that, we can follow the rabbit hole and see where it leads us."
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Post by Deleted on Jul 8, 2016 21:39:20 GMT -7
Locke glanced at her gun, followed by her expression she showed only through her eyes and not the rest of her body language. Yep, just like Elektra, he thought to himself.
"I don't know whether to be grateful or insulted that you too noticed my own blunder. What can I say? Being so obvious is often the best disguise. No matter," he shuffled and leaned back gently to yank a USB key out of one of the many hard drives of his computer and rolling it across the table.
"Would I accurately assume you used Stark Tech to break into E's phone? Well, same principle here for the core details since even I don't know the exact location or what she intends, though I wouldn't be much of a handler if I didn't create a program that could keep tabs on my clients patterns in case they needed me to throw them off their trail by SHIELD or the like," he said businesslike. If he wasn't a known criminal handler, he would have come off as rather polite and almost respectable.
"As for this Mephisto business, E was rather vague on the details, but I can tell you that this only cropped up a few weeks ago. You see, she was taking out a hired cult leader with ties to Baron Mordo before she went rogue from her follow up contract when several hundreds of children were taken into some mystical hoodoo that somehow got the demon lord involved, or so she claimed, she wasn't very specific and to be frank I've always been more than a little skeptical of the occult, so I didn't press it beyond that," Locke continued.
He poured two more drinks for the pair and briefly glanced at his camera in case of a lunch rush; he had forgotten to lock the doors and shutter the shades when he was cleaning. Well, too late now, he thought. He leaned in closely in case one of his own rivals decided to drop in now, whether electronically or otherwise.
"But after that, E was becoming more reserved and distant, even by her standards. She stopped taking contracts, which was odd since she always found time for them even when she decided to play the hero gig before. So I tracked down one of the cultists who managed to survive Elektra's rampage. Dude was nuttier than squirrel poop, claiming something about "New York will burn in a rain of fire and Mephisto's mark upon the world has found its way through for even devils must die for the one to rise," which doesn't even begin to make much sense, but, maybe you'll have more luck with it than I do," he whispered. It was rather strange all things considered, and unless the Black Widow managed to arrest her, the least she could do was probably slap some sense into E. She may never appreciate it, but he did care for her safety.
He leaned back and drained his shot glass and opened his hands.
"Now that that is taken care of, is this the part where you drive me into the table and cuff me while I bleed on the floor for SHIELD agents to arrive, or will I be able to close up shop and greet them so I go into hiding? Assuming you fail to catch Elektra, we both know I'm the next target and last I checked, leaving somebody to die for helping you isn't your style. At least, not for at least a good forty years at any rate," he said, noting the Black Widow's own extended lifespan. "No wonder she hates you; you must've made quite the impression on Old Red. Seems like the type to be into strong women; well, older ones at the very least," he sounded casual and off the cuff, was even looking at his own fingers as he said it, and he knew it'd get him exactly where he didn't want to be, but it was out of his mouth before he realized he said it aloud.
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Post by Super Chick on Jul 19, 2016 16:37:01 GMT -7
Locke was perceptive, she'd give him that. Perhaps it was due to having partnered with Elektra for so long, or perhaps it was simply reflex for the man, but he noted her disapproval that he had not recognized her upstairs by her briefly lingering on the images on his walls. She had not said a word, yet he knew her thoughts. Disconcerting to a small degree, but then Natasha was used to people reading her mind at times - sometimes literally. It was an annoyance, but one she could correct now that she knew his degree of observance.
The man turned out to be a decent resource for information regarding Elektra, and for that Natasha felt a small reward was in order. She would neither turn him into SHIELD nor endanger his status with Elektra. After all, knowing how to get to him in order to get to her could be profitable in the long run. So when he asked at the end if she was about to hand him over to SHIELD, Natasha merely smiled and replied, "No."
Then, before he could ask anything else, a Widow's sting sent electricity throughout his body. Locke went limp and fell out of his chair. The Widow stepped over him, took whatever else she wanted from his computer system, then left him on the floor incapacitated. For good measure she left additional bruises on Locke and ransacked his place a bit - in a professional manner, of course - then left him to lie there in his little batcave. Elektra would possibly think Natasha came in and took what she wanted. At least she would if Locke were a convincing liar who could control his heartbeat when he lied. Then again, that was why she took so much other information from his computers. Locke didn't have to lie at all. It kept him at a 50/50 chance of surviving the assassin's scrutiny, and her at a 50/50 chance of being able to use him against in the future if the need arose. Beyond that, he was a criminal. The Widow was less concerned with his life than she was following the trail he provided.
"New York will burn in a rain of fire. Mephisto's mark upon the world has found its way through, for even devils must die for the One to rise."
Natasha had chewed on that one since Locke said it and, considering that this involved Elektra, the spy was pretty confident that this indicated two very bad things: One, Mephisto's deal with Elektra involved Matt (the devil of Hell's Kitchen), and, two, it was likely to be some kind of horrible End of Days destruction for Mephisto to rise from Hell. Likely as not, literally Hell's Kitchen. None of this was encouraging, and none of it was in Nevada.
"Oh Matt," she lamented as she left Locke's desert bar. "Looks like you're about to be blindsided again."
She exited from the premises and got into her perfectly functioning car to go back to the hotel forty miles away and catch a flight. Her nest step was most likely back to New York. Someone had to warn Matt about the impending danger brought by the Red Woman - even if he wouldn't believe a word she said. Beyond that, it would require all of her resources to figure out the "when" and "how" of Mephisto's plan if she was to make sure it didn't happen. And most of those resources existed in Manhattan.
Natasha revved the engine and peeled out, sending dirt and dust flying in a 180 degree arc as she turned the car around. There was no time to waste.
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