Shortly after Root's departure, Natasha said flatly, "I don't like her."
At times like these, the only move was unconditional solidarity. Bella nodded with conviction. "That woman's wired differently from normal people. Probably some kind of childhood trauma. But she's a friend of a friend, and in a situation like this, she can be trusted."
Some people were simply born to clash. Natasha and Root were both the type to wear a casual smile while being utterly ruthless behind it. A single meeting had been enough for mutual wariness to take root.
Two people with near-identical temperaments and methods were far more likely to become adversaries than allies.
Bella didn't need to read minds to see they didn't get along. Wars between women could be even more brutal than the ones men waged. Perfectly normal.
She said nothing more and drove with Natasha toward a different back road.
Half an hour later, the two of them strolled through the front entrance of the S.H.I.E.L.D. military installation known as the Cabin in the Woods with all the confidence in the world.
Both had altered their appearances. Combined with the fake identities Root had provided, they moved through the facility without a hitch.
"I know I've said this a hundred times already, but I'll say it again: the management of your organization is genuinely terrible. The security holes are everywhere." Bella was dressed as a lab researcher, clear-lens glasses on her face, hair dyed blonde, currently using her cover credentials to search for the unicorn's file and holding location.
Natasha, meanwhile, was on the other side of the base, mapping a safe and undetectable route.
As an agent breaking into her own agency's military installation, she felt not one ounce of guilt.
Hearing Bella's complaint through her earpiece, she gave an indifferent shrug. "An organization this size is always going to be riddled with holes. Hardly a revelation."
She found a ventilation shaft, then pulled up the facility's blueprints and began analyzing their route of action.
"Got it. What kind of designation is this? 355TY, L21A7? Coordinates?" A unicorn wasn't exactly a ferocious monster. The access clearance was minimal, and the holding cell sat on the facility's second sublevel, close to the surface.
She tapped into the cell's internal camera feed. The unicorn was lying pitifully on the floor of what looked like a cramped glass compartment, staring at nothing.
Bella checked the registration data available under her clearance level and grinned. "Natasha, we're in luck. This one's male. Bring him back and little Elsa will have a baby unicorn to play with by next year!"
Natasha's face broke into genuine delight, happier than if she'd gotten a new toy herself. "Then hurry up and get over here!"
The Cabin in the Woods facility extended more than a hundred meters underground. Only a single wooden cabin on the surface served as camouflage. Below, the earth had been hollowed out entirely.
"Who built this place originally?" Bella and Natasha slipped through the ventilation ducts, dropping from the staff living quarters into the detention level below.
Bella was deeply puzzled. To ordinary eyes, the layout would seem unremarkable. But to a five-ring Spirit Journeyer, every corridor's trajectory was a line in an exquisitely designed arcane formation. The countless cells holding prisoners served as densely packed nodes of magical power.
This underground facility had been constructed around some kind of magical barrier. Whoever designed it was leagues above her.
"The earliest records date back to just after World War II. Some famous architect, I think," Natasha said offhandedly.
An architect? Bella didn't buy that for a second. If an architect could produce work like this, the sorcerers at Kamar-Taj might as well go enroll in architecture school.
"This is more complicated than it looks. Let's get the unicorn and get out."
The place looked like something straight out of Cube. Rows upon rows of transparent compartments held prisoners of every description.
Some of the creatures were well-known: werewolves, phantasms. Others were bizarre in the extreme, like a specter that no ordinary person could perceive, or a shapeshifter that could remold its body at will.
Forget Natasha, who still operated within a conventional worldview. Even Bella, a seasoned practitioner of the arcane, found herself marveling.
"Over here!" They reached the unicorn's cell in short order.
The cell's locking mechanism was precision-engineered. Between each cell ran a unique electronic signal lock. The slightest contact would trigger a base-wide alert.
Both of them stared at the unicorn inside.
"Did we maybe rush into this? How about we just settle for buying Elsa a My Little Pony instead?" With the moment of truth at hand, Natasha was having second thoughts. She chalked it up to overwhelming stress and severe pregnancy hormones.
Impulsive? That was very impulsive. Bella's smile was radiant. She gestured at their surroundings. "Don't make excuses. You wanted a thrill. You wanted to cause trouble. It's fine. Nothing catastrophic is going to happen. We grab the unicorn and we go."
That seemed to put Natasha somewhat at ease.
"He's not dangerous, is he?" Before committing, she asked one more time.
Bella had no desire to turn their impromptu road trip into a disaster.
She reached out with her mind and carefully read the unicorn's thoughts, then delivered her final verdict.
"He's a gentle soul. He misses the forests and streams, the squirrels and songbirds. A creature this beautiful doesn't deserve to be locked up in here by humans."
"All right. Stand back." Natasha didn't hesitate any longer.
She produced an instrument with a somewhat exaggerated design and pressed it against the cell door. It was a gadget Ironhide had built for her, capable of jamming every known type of electronic signal on Earth within a small radius. Then she drew a high-frequency particle blade and cut through the cell door the old-fashioned way.
The door swung open. The unicorn eyed them warily, suspecting these humans had come to drag him off for some horrific experiment.
"Easy, buddy. Calm down. That's it... come on, lick my hand. I'm not going to hurt you. I'm taking you home." Bella murmured soothingly. The unicorn had endured years of human cruelty. His hatred ran deep. Even with Bella projecting nothing but goodwill, his gaze remained guarded.
"Let's move, Natasha!" A unicorn this size wasn't something you could smuggle out unnoticed. They hadn't expected to fool anyone.
After wiping every fingerprint they'd left behind, Bella prepared to teleport out with her partner and the unicorn.
"Huh? What's going on?!" The teleportation spell shattered mid-cast, torn apart by wildly chaotic magical interference. This wasn't the kind of Dimensional Anchor a Balrog would deploy, a targeted countermeasure against spatial transport. It felt more like dozens of different energies churning together, destabilizing space itself into a blanket anti-teleportation field.
Natasha's reactions were instantaneous. Pistol drawn, her eyes swept the area. "Please tell me your magic didn't just malfunction. Sweetheart, are you planning to fight our way out? Oh God, if we fight our way out, I'm definitely getting exposed. There goes my pension."