"S.H.I.E.L.D. has always been concerned about the psychological trauma of survivors, especially when certain traumas might evolve into violent tendencies."
She looked at Alice's slender back with implication.
"Last night, there was a murder on Long Island. Justin Hammer, CEO of Hammer Industries, died in his mansion. The scene was handled very cleanly, surveillance was hacked, the bodyguards were collectively temporarily blinded, there were no fingerprints or DNA left behind; all of this points to a ghost who has received top-level training."
Alice turned around, blinking those innocent big eyes: "Sounds like a movie plot, but what does this have to do with me going home to cook dinner for my aunt? Teacher Rushman."
"Of course, it has nothing to do with it, if it were just cooking." Natasha stepped forward, her aura fully unleashed, her originally lazy voice becoming sharp, "I'm just curious, which one is the real you—the little girl crying on the island, or this high school student who doesn't even have an accelerated heartbeat when facing an Agent's interrogation?"
"Maybe both, maybe neither?"
Alice tilted her head, a playful arc appearing at the corner of her mouth, the disguise of a good girl finally tearing open a corner, revealing a hint of cunning.
"Everyone has secrets, Teacher. If you insist on exposing them, it won't be good for anyone—"
Before she finished speaking.
Hum—
The World in Alice's eyes instantly faded, turning into a network composed of countless red lines.
A scalp-numbing sense of crisis exploded behind her head.
On the roof of an abandoned building two hundred meters away, a bright red ballistic prediction line lit up out of thin air.
What made Alice's pupils shrink was that this line was not straight at all.
It was like a red poisonous snake twisted by anger, drawing a weird, large arc in the air that completely violated physical common sense, bypassing a street lamp, bypassing Natasha who was blocking the middle, and heading straight for Alice's brow at an extremely tricky angle.
"Get down!"
Natasha's instinct as a top Agent alarmed almost at the same time.
She didn't know where the bullet came from, but she felt that tangible sense of crisis.
Without any hesitation, she subconsciously lunged at Alice, trying to press this suspect behind a nearby concrete pier.
But Alice was faster, and even more unreasonable.
Facing the curving bullet that was approaching at high speed with a death whistle, Alice did not roll in a panic, nor did she scream in a panic.
In Natasha's shocked, dilated pupils, time seemed to slow down.
Alice's feet were nailed to the spot, motionless.
Immediately after, her upper body performed an extremely extended backbend.
Her flexibility was astonishing; her blonde hair hung down with gravity, and the wine-red skirt hem drew an elegant arc in the air.
At this moment, she didn't seem to be dodging a bullet, but rather performing a beautiful curtain call on stage.
This movement was very similar to the classic scene in "The Matrix," but lighter and more freehand than Neo, with a hint of casual laziness.
Natasha's lunging fingers brushed Alice's clothes and grabbed empty air.
The weightlessness of missing her target horrified Natasha, but years of Agent instinct kept her from stopping for a moment.
She forcibly twisted her waist and abdomen in mid-air, supported herself on the ground with one hand, used the force to perform a standard tactical roll, and instantly flashed behind the roadside railing.
Her body was tense like a bow, drawing her gun, loading, alerting—all in one go.
"Swish—"
A bullet head with strange patterns, carrying rotating airflow, brushed past the tip of Alice's lifted nose.
Because it was a high-speed curved movement, when the bullet passed in front of her, she could even hear the weird lateral tearing sound of the wind, blowing through the bangs on her forehead.
"Clap!"
After missing, the bullet hit a metal billboard behind her fiercely, blasting a bowl-sized hole, the edges even turning slightly red due to the high temperature.
Not until confirming that the second bullet did not strike immediately did Natasha turn back to look at Alice from behind the cover.
This look made the well-informed Black Widow's breathing slightly suffocate.
Alice, she didn't look for cover, didn't panic.
She just supported the ground with one hand, used her core strength to spring up like a spring from that easy backbend pose, followed by a beautiful backflip, and stood up steadily.
She even smoothed out the wrinkles on her skirt.
Natasha's shock was beyond measure.
At that distance, with that weird curved trajectory, if it were her, the only choice would also be to roll in a panic to find cover.
But this girl, she actually stood in place and dodged it with just a backbend?
This was definitely not just simple reaction speed.
Only prediction.
A prediction with absolute confidence in the trajectory.
Only then could this be achieved.
"Only one shot?"
Alice clapped the dust off her hands, cast her gaze toward the direction the bullet came from, with a hint of disappointment in her tone.
On the roof of that building, a woman in leather was looking at this scene through the scope, full of disbelief.
"It seems that besides S.H.I.E.L.D., there are other friends who want to chat with me."
Alice turned her head, glanced at Natasha who was hiding behind the railing in full alert, and a flash of unexpected gentleness crossed her eyes.
Surprised that this S.H.I.E.L.D. Agent, at the first moment danger arrived, instinctively chose not to protect herself, but to try to protect her, the suspect.
"Thank you, Teacher Rushman, but it seems today's tutoring has to be paused."
Saying that, she turned around, faced the distant roof, and left her defenseless back to Natasha.
Under the sunset, the girl slowly raised her right hand, thumb up, index finger pointing in the direction of Fox two hundred meters away, making a childishly innocent gun gesture.
At that moment, a terrifying pressure, invisible yet making Natasha's heart tighten, erupted from the girl.
"Bang."
Alice's red lips parted slightly, silently adding sound effects, and finally playfully blew on the non-existent gunpowder on her fingertips.
On the distant rooftop, Fox clearly saw this gesture through the scope, and also saw the blood-red color that flashed in the girl's eyes.
A fear of being targeted by a top predator instantly gripped her heart, and Fox subconsciously shrank her head, cold sweat instantly soaking her back.
When she mustered the courage to poke her head out again, the scope was empty.
The monster girl who could dodge sniper shots from a kilometer away had disappeared.
Natasha slowly stood up from behind the cover, looking at the empty alley.
She bent down and picked up the severely deformed bullet head on the ground.
Looking at the unique thread on it, Natasha's eyes were extremely heavy for a moment.
"Curving bullets, The Fraternity from the textile mill?"
She muttered to herself, then pressed the communicator at her ear, her voice low.
"Fury, you are right. It is indeed time to tear off the victim label on Alice Mason's file. She is not a frightened little rabbit."
Natasha looked back at the billboard that had been shot through, her mind constantly replaying the girl's stunning dodge just now, as well as the domineering finger gesture at the end.
"Just now, facing the sniper fire of a top killer, she acted more like an Agent than I did."
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