Title: Five Times James Bond encountered Natasha Romanoff (and one time he didn't)

Warnings/General Notes: A Five plus one format fan fiction. Exactly what it says on the tin. Language. Cannon level violence. Un-beta'd and not Brit-picked. Author's notes will appear after the chapter.

Parings: None except an implied Clintasha eventually if you want to squint.

Standard Disclaimer: The characters belong to their respective owners. I'm just borrowing them for fun. I claim no rights. I make no profit.

One: Bratislava, Slovakia

Traditionally courier duty is the first job for any MI6 field agent. It starts with deliveries to Embassies, progresses to safe houses and eventually involves deliveries directly to other agents in the field. The locations likewise begin with the ludicrously easy in friendly countries where it doesn't matter if the agent is spotted to the insanely difficult where the British have no official presence and shouldn't even be there in the first place. James Bond was in the deliver to safe houses in moderately difficult places phase of his training. As such he was quite careful as he exited the alley that lead to the current safe house location in Bratislava.

He was dressed as a student tourist today to better fit in with the summertime crowds. Looking around to case the street he tried to project a I took a short cut through this alley and I don't quite know where I came out vibe. He thought he was doing it quite well up until the point where he locked gazes with an absolutely gorgeous girl who was restocking the fruit display at a small shop up the street. She looked to be a few inches over 5 foot, with nice curves, and long black hair. She was staring intently at him with a speculative look on her face as if she was memorizing or cataloging him. The instant she noticed him looking back she smiled a sultry smile and licked her lips. Too bad he was due back at the Embassy in less than an hour with the information he'd been given. He calculated the odds of getting away with I had to take the long way round to avoid being spotted and decided that it wouldn't be worth it. Tanner the duty officer on station was way too savvy to fall for that one. Duty was a bitch of a mistress sometimes. James settled for giving the girl an answering grin and a wink. If he got a moment free in next day or two he might see if he could look her up.

That, unfortunately, was not to be. The very next day Bond found out that the safe house had been compromised. Bond's delivery run had been the last before the Russian agent who'd been being debriefed in said safe house had been assassinated along with the agents guarding him. James, since he'd been one of the last people in or out, had endured a day and a half of questioning as London attempted to figure out what exactly had gone wrong.

Bond was sure that he'd been clean both going in and coming out. In fact the only thing that had not been by the book had been the long range flirtation he'd had with the fruit vender. He'd mentioned as much to Tanner when they'd been released from the incident debrief. Tanner had thought it was a good idea to have him look at the known operatives file just in case which was why he had found himself looking at pictures and descriptions of female foreign operatives.

It was early evening when he found her picture. She was thinner, her hair was short and red but it was unmistakably her. Natalia Spitzlov. Former KGB operative now working for FSB/FSK. Unconfirmed association with secret Soviet spy training program code named Red Room. Infiltration and close in assassination specialist. Bond took a moment to memorize and link them to his memory of the fruit vendor then went to tell Tanner and start writing the report that this discovery would entail.

Author's Note: I'm planning on updating this one once a week, probably on Thursday or Friday barring unforseen intrusions of real life. If this is the first story of mine you've read you might also enjoy Brothers Three my James Bond/Sherlock crossover. If you have wandered over from the prior publication, welcome back. This one is quite a bit shorter and fluffier than the last.

I based this primarily on the movie version of the Avengers. I intentionally did not use any of the Marvel-verse pesudonyms for Black Widow. I assumed, that since Natasha changes names like most people change underwear that she had a multitude of alises that don't appear in cannon. This is not to mention the fact that Marvel has a history of rebooting its franchises periodically. Thus, its awfully hard for the average reader/viewer to determine what the heck is cannon anyway. That said, I hope you enjoy this random plot bunny that attacked me one night demanding to be written. Please read and review.