The wind rustled through the vibrant autumn leaves with a hush, combing through branches to free those that could no longer hold on. Several golden pieces skipped over the gravel and caught against the side of Oliver’s boot. He paid little attention to the leaves or the wind. He studiously cleaned and tightened pipes and tubing and made sure that every wire was in prime condition before slamming the hood of the truck down, he hoped for the final time. Why he hadn’t kept it up and running in the first place he’d never know.
He reached through the window and turned the key, holding it for a minute while it spluttered. Not willing to operate on the piece of junk a day longer, he swung the door open and clambered into the driver’s seat. He cranked it again, this time giving it a little gas, and a little more, until the engine roared to life on its own. Oliver smiled and gripped the wheel. This was going to make his job much easier.

---

Clint drummed his fingers on the steering wheel. Some asshole screeched around the side of the car, almost taking the side mirror off as he went, cutting in front of taxi and setting off a string of blaring horns and muffled yelling.
“If I ever decide we’re going to start a mission by driving in post-work traffic, break my legs and toss me in the back seat,” he said.
“We can review the assignment while we wait,” Natasha proposed, albeit half-heartedly.
“And that will take what, two minutes tops?” Clint glanced at her over his shades. “Come on, Nat. You have to have a better idea than that.”
“Why don’t you let me drive,” she offered instead, and Clint shook his head.
“Because we’re supposed to be laying low, we don’t know where we’re going, and I fear for my life riding shotgun with you at the wheel.”
Natasha looked out her window for a moment before digging in her pocket for her phone. She looked to be scrolling through something.
“So do you think Coulson’s right about his niece?” she asked. “Being alive, I mean.”
“If she is, then that opens up a whole other can of worms,” Clint sighed. He propped his elbow on the door and held his head up with two fingers. “This is just…I’ve never been involved in something with so many uncertainties.”
“If Ronne was taking up his father’s cultish habits, and his father kidnapped and possibly killed Eden, that might make a good reason for revenge,” Natasha mused aloud. “And all the supernatural activity happening now would provide a logical point of entry for Eden to come back and kill Ronne.”
“I’m not sure logical is the right word,” Clint frowned. “And the girl in those pictures didn’t look like a vengeful spirit to me. She didn’t look like a ghost at all, to be honest.”
“I don’t know, her eyes are kind of creepy and vacant looking, don’t you think?” Natasha asked, holding up the phone with the girl’s zoomed in, pixelated face.
“When you hold it that way it does,” Clint agreed.
Natasha sat back and swiped through a few more photos on her phone.
“Okay.” Clint decided to recap. He leaned his head back against the headrest and stretched out his arms against the steering wheel. “Okay. So Ronne is David’s son. David claims to have kidnapped and killed Eden because some group or something called Shades told him to. Before he ever gets a trial he freaks out in his jail cell that the Shades will come and kill him and the next day turns up dead. Fast forward to a few months ago and supernatural activity spikes across the globe. Ronne comes out and says he is the avatar for some world-cleansing movement coming from some unseen world. Ronne then turns up dead and Eden, who has been counted dead this whole time, comes out and leaves a very personal note, so to speak, for Coulson.”
“Either this girl is in fact Eden and she somehow survived, maybe in the world referred to by Ronne, or she was brought back to life, or she may be a farce created by these ghosts to distract us,” Natasha said. “It just doesn’t make sense that this girl, Eden or whomever she is, would be so interested in staying out of sight if she pointedly left a clue to expose herself.”
“She’s playing a game,” Clint surmised.
“Like a child,” Natasha furthered.
“So, if you were to engage in a child-like yet highly dangerous game of hide-and-seek, where would you go?”
Natasha considered the question, and stalled by redirecting it to Clint.
“I would be inclined to roam about, staying somewhere new each day, or every week. In big cities there are plenty of places to go, new hiding places to explore. The problem would be how often you moved and where; someone looked for you could find a pattern and move a step ahead of you. The longer you ran the higher the chance of being found out.”
“I’d probably stake out somewhere secluded, with little or no human traffic,” Natasha decided. “Someplace with no security, no cameras, and plenty of places to hide and move about undetected.”
Clint chuckled. “Sounds like an apocalypse shelter, to ward off hordes of zombies or—” he stopped, mouth open, and then turned excitedly to Natasha. “I know where she’s hiding!”
“Where?” Natasha frowned.
“She’s supposedly dead.” Clint stated. “Where do you find dead people?”
“In a graveyard?” Natasha answered uncertainly.
“Exactly. A graveyard or a cemetery is a relatively isolated place, and it isn’t unheard of that homeless people move in to tombs and live off of food offerings left at graves,” Clint said. “See if she has any relatives buried in the surrounding area.”

---

The Evergreens Cemetery was empty and quiet. A cliché environment if there was any. It didn’t take the agents long to find the headstones for Jedediah M. and Azalea A. Weston. The separate marble markers bore the same inscription— “Gone to an Eden of sleepless dreams.” There was a fresh bouquet of lavender between the graves, and a folded paper.
Natasha stooped and picked the paper up with two fingers. On the back were handwritten words. On the front, a flyer for the Museum of Modern Art. Natasha read the message aloud.
“Do not stand at my grave and weep
I am not there. I do not sleep.
I am a thousand winds that blow.
I am the diamond glints on snow.
I am the sunlight on ripened grain.
I am the gentle autumn rain.
When you awaken in the morning's hush I am the swift uplifting rush
Of quiet birds in circled flight.
I am the soft stars that shine at night.
Do not stand at my grave and cry;
I am not there. I did not die.
—Mary Elizabeth Frye”

“Well,” Natasha sighed, “it looks like we were close.”
She turned the flyer over in her hands.
“The Museum of Modern Art. Think it’s a coincidence or a clue?” she asked.
“I brought us here. You decide the next move.”
She folded the flyer neatly and placed it in her pocket.
“MoMA it is.”

---

They found her so easily they had to do a double take. She blended in to the sparse crowd of art appreciatives around her and yet stood out like a dark stain. She did not acknowledge either agent as they approached her, hands hovering over weapons. She continued to stare nonchalantly at Van Gogh’s Starry Night, speaking only three words before Agents Romanoff and Barton handcuffed her.
“Isn’t it sad?”

The dark-eyed girl said it as though there should be a continuation, an explanation, but she left that phrase hanging abruptly in the still air, leaving more questions than answers, as she had continued to do up to that very moment.

Notes