When Barbara asked why her boyfriend was nowhere to be found, Bella helped with the cover story. "Sam called in to file for a leave of absence from school, and then... nobody saw him after that. The call was made from a burner phone, so there's no way to trace it."
Barbara's willpower was ironclad. Dragging her battered body out of bed, she searched among their acquaintances and at the places Sam often hung out, and enlisted friends to help look. Nothing. She had a thousand questions swirling inside her, but in the end, with no leads and no trail, she had no choice but to give up.
A knot of guilt tightened in her chest. "Something must have happened that night. Something I don't know about. Did either of you get a good look at the person who was standing over my bed?"
Barbara retained a rough impression of the key moments that night, and she had at least a vague memory of the Yellow-Eyed Demon.
She believed he was the only lead to finding Sam.
Heather shook her head. She'd been teleported from San Francisco to Los Angeles in a daze. By the time she'd gotten her bearings, Barbara had been at death's door and Sadako had been working frantically to save her. Heather had spent the whole time running back and forth with towels and water. She was still foggy on what had actually happened.
Bella knew the full story, but she intended to bury the truth.
Not only could she not tell Barbara the truth, she had to actively steer her off course.
She was worried that Barbara's abilities were too formidable. With Mockingbird's skill set, a thorough investigation stood a very real chance of digging up the entire Heaven-and-Hell mess.
Bella pretended to think it over, then said with a note of uncertainty, "I didn't get a clear look either. It seemed like a mutant with some kind of gravity manipulation. Looked older. Probably one of Magneto's Brotherhood of Mutants. Could it be that your family's made enemies of the Brotherhood?"
Blaming the unexplainable on mutants was practically a reflex at this point. Terrorist attack? Must be the Brotherhood. Anything weird? Magneto's people. It had become a kind of societal default.
Barbara's imagination, however vivid, simply didn't extend to the realms of Heaven and Hell. Her family had been military for four generations. The friction between the U.S. armed forces and mutants ran deep and long.
"Most likely," she muttered. "That cowardly, despicable bastard. Just let me find him!" She swore to herself that she would have her revenge, that she would make the Brotherhood of Mutants pay.
A week later, Barbara had recovered from her injuries. She answered the Department of Defense's call for volunteers and enlisted.
Heather left to shoot a milk-drink commercial.
Bella had been running around outside for a full week and had finally run out of excuses to stay away. She had no choice but to go home and continue making a baby with Natasha.
The early-stage work, the artificial sperm production and sperm-cell culturing, along with the mid-stage in vitro embryo culture and the late-stage pregnancy itself, could all be handled by Natasha. Beyond providing her bone marrow cells at the start, Bella's remaining duties were comparatively straightforward.
"Comparatively straightforward" meaning: performing the egg retrieval in the early stage, the embryo transfer in the mid-stage, and keeping the expectant mother company during the late stage. Also included: looking after her every need, taking hits without fighting back, enduring scoldings without a word of protest, and other such essential contributions.
When it came down to it, making a baby was a two-person job.
Egg retrieval was a technical procedure. Magic offered precious little help with that, and she certainly couldn't run off to Kamar-Taj to borrow the Time Stone for this. She was afraid the past Sorcerers Supreme would claw their way out of their graves to strangle her.
Natasha hauled her back into the lab to study: watching instructional videos, reading medical texts, practicing on models.
Three days later, the egg retrieval was a success. Five more days, and the embryo entered the in vitro culture stage. Ten days after that, the embryo had implanted and was developing normally in the mother's womb. They both breathed a long sigh of relief.
"Hey, what should we name our daughter?" Natasha asked.
Bella had a name in mind, but she deferred to her partner. "Do you have any ideas?"
"How about Angela?"
Bella thought it over, then shook her head. "My relationship with angels hasn't been great lately. Maybe something else?"
"Barbara?"
Bella shot her a wary look. "One of my friends is already named Barbara..."
Natasha asked with studied casualness, "Is she pretty?"
The answer came without a heartbeat's hesitation. "Completely average. Can't hold a candle to you."
"Daisy?"
"...There are tons of Daisys out there. You shout 'Daisy' on the street and a dozen heads turn."
"Helen?"
"I'd really rather our daughter live a peaceful life. With a face as gorgeous as hers is bound to be, naming her Helen feels like we're asking for a war."
More than ten names later, Bella had vetoed every single one with a different excuse.
Natasha propped her chin on both hands, her bright eyes full of uncertainty. "Fine. You suggest one."
Bella offered two names of her own, but Natasha found them equally unsatisfactory. Too common. Not memorable enough.
"How about this." Bella snapped her fingers. Moisture in the air drew together of its own accord and spelled out their two names on the lab bench.
"Take the El from my name, add the sa from yours, and you get a brand-new name. Simple, beautiful, and she won't have to write a novel every time she signs something." She smiled. "Elsa."
Then she added, "And by Eastern homophone logic, El-sa can be read as 'Bella loves Natasha.'"
Natasha had already liked the name on its own merits. But after hearing that little addendum, the baby's mom and the baby's "dad" wrapped each other in a blissfully tight embrace.
Settled, then. Elsa it was.
If everything went smoothly, little Elsa would be born next year, in April 2005. She'd be a little over a year younger than her aunt Kitty, not yet two years apart.
They didn't tell Charlie. The two of them shared no blood relation, and being together wasn't illegal, nor would it draw condemnation from moral busybodies. It was simply that Natasha's mindset was thoroughly American: she didn't see how this was any of Charlie's or Samantha's business, so she didn't mention it. If she changed her mind down the road, she'd bring it up then.
Showing up one day with a three- or four-year-old child you hadn't mentioned before wasn't exactly unheard of in America. Don't ask; the answer is always "freedom."
To carve out the necessary time for the pregnancy in advance, Natasha began clearing her task backlog. Both of their genetic profiles were exceptional. Whether it was Bella's Isu DNA or Natasha's bio-virus enhancements, both factors demanded that the expectant mother exercise extreme caution throughout the pregnancy. After three months, combat missions were off the table. After five, even vigorous exercise had to be dialed back. By eight months, the safest place for her was in bed.
Where Natasha would spend her pregnancy was a problem.
Earth was too dangerous. Too many people with grudges.
Her rapid promotions within S.H.I.E.L.D. over the past two years had come at a price: enemies everywhere. External enemies, internal enemies, the full set.
S.H.I.E.L.D. leaked like a sieve. The speed at which agents' personal information found its way out was nothing short of terrifying. Any number of people could be biding their time, waiting for the perfect moment to strike. Bella's greater worry was that bald egghead Fury and his Hydra moles stirring up trouble. The safest option for the pregnancy was Arendelle.