The jump wasn't dramatic.
No blinding light.
No tearing of reality.
One moment they were standing on a New York rooftop, city noise bleeding into the night—and the next, the sound was gone.
Completely.
Natasha inhaled sharply.
The air was different. Cleaner. Thinner. Like the world hadn't been worn down yet.
They stood on a hill overlooking a vast plain, grass moving gently under a pale sky. No buildings. No roads. No satellites humming overhead.
Just wind.
She turned slowly, instincts screaming despite the calm.
"This isn't Earth," she said.
"No," he replied. His voice sounded steadier than he felt. "But it's close enough to breathe."
She looked at him. "You've done this before."
He nodded. "Once. Accidentally."
"That figures."
They walked for a while without speaking.
Natasha catalogued everything automatically—the terrain, sightlines, the absence of human structures. If this place had people, they were far away.
"How long can we stay?" she asked.
"As long as we want," he said. Then, after a beat, "Or as long as it's safe."
She absorbed that. "And SHIELD?"
"Won't find us here," he said. "HYDRA either."
She stopped walking.
"This is bigger than hiding," she said. "You know that, right?"
He met her eyes. "I do."
"And you didn't tell Fury."
"No," he admitted. "Not yet."
Natasha studied him carefully, weighing trust the way she always did—not in absolutes, but in probabilities.
"Okay," she said finally. "Then we keep this between us."
Something eased in his chest at that.
Night fell differently in this world.
The sky deepened into unfamiliar constellations, stars sharp and unmoving. A small fire crackled between them—real flame, no tricks. He'd learned early not to rely on his power for everything.
Natasha sat across from him, cleaning her weapon out of habit more than necessity.
"You didn't have to come with me," she said suddenly.
He looked up. "Yes, I did."
She didn't argue. Instead, she asked, "Why?"
He considered lying.
Didn't.
"Because if something happened to you," he said quietly, "this would stop being worth it."
The words surprised them both.
Natasha froze—not in fear, but in stillness. The kind that meant something had landed.
She set the weapon aside.
"That's not a promise," she said. "Or a confession."
"I know."
"It's a liability."
"Probably."
She looked at him across the fire. "Then don't make it a weakness."
He nodded. "I won't."
That was enough.
Back on Earth, Nick Fury watched the file close.
NATASHA ROMANOFF — STATUS: DECEASED (CLASSIFIED)
He didn't like lies.
But he liked losing people even less.
"They'll believe it," Hill said quietly.
"They'll want to," Fury replied. "HYDRA likes clean endings."
"And him?" Hill asked.
Fury's eye hardened slightly.
"He's off the board," he said. "Which makes him dangerous."
Natasha lay awake later, staring at a sky no one on Earth would ever recognize.
"You ever want to go back?" she asked.
"Yes," he said immediately.
"Good," she replied. "Means you're not running."
A pause.
"And you?" he asked.
She was quiet for a moment.
"Eventually," she said. "But not tonight."
The wind moved through the grass. The fire crackled low.
Between worlds, between wars, two people rested—not because things were safe, but because they'd earned a moment to breathe.
On Earth, HYDRA celebrated a death.
They didn't yet realize what they'd lost control of.