17 Natasha's Search pt. 2

Natasha Romanoff POV… (about a week after MC saved people from burning building)

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Arriving in Richmond, the first thing I did was call Coulson. I know he was still working in town on this, and I wanted to get the information he had. After calling him, I made my way towards the forest where they were told they heard loud booms and trees being uprooted.

Pulling up to the site that has been taped off, the first thing I notice is large boulders just lying around. Looking around a bit, I could see a couple of trees uprooted, all seem to be different sizes, but by the looks of things, he had gone from small to large.

"Almost like he was training, right?" She heard Coulson say as he walked over towards her.

"Yeah. That is exactly what it looks like. Big craters from where boulders landed after being tossed. Fist imprints on some trees and some boulders. It is like he was testing himself. Who would test themselves by punching trees and rocks?" I said as I scan my surroundings. I notice off to the side-set foot imprints that seemed to slide backward. "What is going on over there? Some footprints seem to be pushed backward and some craters like those of the boulders." I asked Coulson

"Oh, you are going to love this. We think someone else, or he himself, was throwing boulders and letting them hit him. Testing his durability, I suppose. I am not sure whether there were one or two people. I can sit here and tell you this training field was set up and used by a single person. All the footprints seem the same size. If there was another person, then that person's only job was to chuck boulders at the kid. Although, if you look closely by the side of the imprints where the boulders were thrown, you will see slide marks. Almost as if he were running into position. My theory is that he would chuck the boulder, run into position, then get hit by the same boulder. If that were the case, depending on how hard the boulder was thrown, which if the divots in front of us are correct, then the boulders should have been thrown pretty hard and fast. This means our man here was fast, and I mean fast, at least the speed of a car if not faster. These trees over here weigh anywhere from 40 tons to 75 tons. To pull out the tree roots and all, you would have to add anywhere from 6 to 15 tons on top of that. So not only is this guy fast, but now he is extremely strong, stronger than we thought at least. If you look over here, you will find something we have zero answers to." Coulson said he walked over to a cordoned-off zone and onto a platform over the middle of the area. "We are trying to preserve this area as best as we can. We limited the amount of weather that can come into this area, and no one can cross the boundary. If you look down below, you can see circles radiating from the center. What is peculiar is in the center, there are footprints. The smaller trees in the area were bent away from this point in an exact circle. It is like some energy pushed everything away, including the dirt. You can see circles of dirt from the center point, and it is making a pattern like a wave. We have no idea what he was doing or did here, but we can see that it was powerful." Coulson finished saying while looking down at the area. (Yes, his first flight takeoff point)

"Do you have any other points of interest in the city? Also, what have the police said, and what documents have they given you?" Natasha asked Coulson.

"We have not found his base of ops yet. We assume that it is closer to the city or closer to the forest, but somewhere between both. We have a team searching for it as we speak. As for the police, they have been moving slow. You know how the police act when some other agency comes and takes root in their backyard. If I were you, I would head over to the police and ask for the documents. Knowing you, they will get it to you in 30 minutes or less." Coulson said with a knowing smile.

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45 Minutes later…

Natasha had just arrived at Shield HQ in Richmond while they were there from the police station with all the documents related to our MC. She had ordered a few people to work with her, and they dug through the files until one person, or the other would find something interesting.

"Here is one. They found a guy dead under a pile of cars. Said the guy was alive for at least 30 minutes before finally succumbing to multiple impalements. They say he could not scream for help because one of the bars that impaled him hit him directly in one of the lungs. This guy was an ex-felon. He had multiple rape charges and got off for them. I a couple of homicide charges and was busted for one. He then got out and ran a clean-up shop out of his scrap yard. He also got off a few Pedophile charges. This dude was trash, and I am kind of happy he suffered." The agent said, then continued. "This was the third murder since our guy arrived here in the city. Another one was a guy raping a woman in a back alley. The female being raped did not see much but could confirm the head of the rapist was torn off. She did not see much after that as she passed out. No surveillance was in the area either. Another was gang-related. A guy was shot three times." The agent finished

"Over here, I got six more possible matches; all seem to be either a rapist, murderer, or child trafficker. All missing parts of their bodies, and all seemed to die miserably. I don't know if we are dealing with a kid or a monster." the other agent said

Right then, there was a call to Natasha, who answered and was told that the main base of the culprit was possibly found. She got up, told the agents to continue with their search, and headed towards her car to a bridge located near town. Upon arriving, she saw a few squatters under the said bridge and a few agents trying to question a couple of them. It did not seem to be going well.

"Hey, my name is Natalie. I am currently trying to look for a young man who seems to have lived with you guys. Could you possibly tell me anything about him?" Natasha asked an older gentleman. He looked her up and down and had a grin on his face.

"Well, hello there, lassie the names Jim. I also cannot tell ya a darn thing about no kid. I have been here one of the longest, and I haven't seen anything." Jim said. The whole time Natasha followed the man's eyes and noticed a couple of agents looking up at what looked like a treehouse. Only it was attached to the bottom of a bridge. She thanked the man and walked over to the agents.

"Is this where you are thinking he has been living?" She asked

"Yeah. There is some rebar that was bent to hold most of this up. Nothing was found on the inside-outside the norm. A few posters, a bed, and a dresser with clothes varied in size. Rugs were strewn across the floor." The agent told her.

She then went towards the wall and noticed grooves that seemed to be hand and footholds. She climbed towards the home and found the door to the home. All it seemed to be an oval going from the ground to around six feet high. She pushed it open and what she saw was what she had been told. It seems the agents already went through everything and cataloged it all.

She then spent the rest of the day talking with eyewitnesses that saw the whole fire episode. Nothing they said was outside what she saw in the video. She was at a loss and ended up just calling Fury.

"Yeah. I could not find a single thing we missed other than the photo. Yes, sir, I have tried that; no one is saying anything outside what was shown in the video. Coulson is still at the training site looking around. We found his home but could not get a single thread of where he was going. Well yeah, sir, he can fly. I don't have the ability to talk to birds. Ok. Yes sir. Thanks. Bye." Natasha let out a sigh and headed back to her vehicle. She was unaccustomed to not finishing her mission. Since the person she is tracking can fly anywhere he wanted, there was no way for her to track him unless he left a paper trail, and since he lived off-grid, that was highly unlikely. Once she gets the aged face from Shield, they can run it through facial programming and get a hit. The odds of that were slim, though, since they did not know if they were right or wrong. It was a 50 50 of getting it right or wrong.

Natasha fired up her car and started the long drive back to New York for some much-needed relaxation.