Chapter 10
She’s paired against Lena first. The lithe girl she once knew with kind eyes and a love of braiding hair, wears guns on her hips and widow bites on her arms.
In fact, as Natasha looks to the two others, she realises they do too.
She carries no weapons, and it’s clear what’s going to happen here, because for every weapon she sees there’s likely two more in hiding.
Sharp eyes now watch her, as the guard offers rules.
“Disarm at any cost. No death,” he clarifies.
Natasha now notices that there’s two way mirrors in this room, and instinctively knows they’re being watched.
If she tries to communicate with the others, they might be tortured. If she tries anything, they might be tortured.
But that’s not why she complies.
She wants to be defiant, even if it’s just to see what happens.
“Fight,” the command comes.
Lena hits her hard in the face, the impact on her cheek as she just manages to turn before it impacts to her nose.
Get the weapons, she knows, as Black Widow works to disarm Lena.
She grabs for the first gun, but Lena is too quick. She avoids it and elbows Natasha hard in the gut, making her lose her breath. She plays on it, making Lena come in closer.
Natasha realises she is not in this fight. It’s Lena versus the Black Widow and Lena is winning.
It’s like she’s a spectator as she grabs for the guns, switches the safety off and ejects all the bullets.
Using the butt of the gun, she hits Lena; though the other gun distracts her.
The fresh feeling of electrocution pounds through her body, even though the voltage seems lower.
Growling, she attacks Lena full force, anger at her concept of her widow bites being used on her, but her weakened body is no match for a widow at full strength.
Two quick kicks and elbow to her jaw, sends Natasha to her knees and Lena on top of her arm wrapped around her neck, the choke hold complete as she crushes Natasha’s windpipe.
The black widow taps out before she passes out, but Natasha knows if it was her in charge, she’d just pass out.
It would be kinder to herself.
Lena let’s go, pulled off by the guard who hands her a long knife.
“Mark your win,” the guard tells her.
Lena approaches her, holds Natasha’s chin steady and guides the knife down her face.
She feels it cut into the soft skin of her cheek the blood running down into her neck as she stares at the woman, who won’t make eye contact.
“Next,” the guard commands.
Max steps up, her dark eyes staring into Natasha’s as the blood tickles her neck.
“Fight.”
Max doesn’t attack, instead reaches for her gun, making Natasha lunge at her; disarming her and walking straight into her play.
Max drops the gun, and picks the knife, stabbing at Natasha catching her by surprise. It’s not a deep cut, but it does push through her uniform cutting into her skin.
Dancing away, Natasha backs up, feeling short against the other girls height.
She can do this, she can fight.
The thing is she’s deconditioned and not used to the brutality of hits that are raining down on her as she backs up arms up.
Catching one, she throws the larger girl, leveraging her momentum and weight against her. It’s unfortunate that Max trips her as she does it and it turns into grappling on the floor.
She doesn’t have a chance.
Max holds down her arms; arm across her neck as she sits on top of Natasha. Leaning in close, she whispers in Natasha’s ear.
Black spots appear in her vision.
“Traitor,” she hears as she gasps for breath.
The guard stops the fight, as Natasha coughs, her windpipe free of pressure.
Max is handed the knife.
“Mark your win,” the guard tells her.
This time, Max pushes Natasha down, she slices the knife across her thigh, cutting through the uniform and into her skin.
Natasha grimaces as she breathes through her teeth.
“Next,” says the guard.
Jace steps up.
“Fight.”
There’s a pause as Natasha remembers them being sixteen, her brown hair thick and tied back laying next each other, clasping hands and making a blood pact that they won’t kill each other.
She still feels the scar across her palm, even though it’s long healed.
Jace throws a half hearted punch and Natasha feigns a kick to her head, changing it to a back fist at the last minute. The connection is loud as the crack across her cheekbone resonates.
Anger plays across Jace’s face and she starts fighting for real, knife out, stabbing towards Natasha as she dodges and weaves.
Jace throws the knife, narrowly missing Natasha and then follows up with a kick and then back fist that connects hard making her see stars.
She falls back and the guard stops Jace from following up.
She gets handed the knife and Jace pulls Natasha’s hand from her body, slicing across her palm; face set in a hard line.
“Stand,” the guard tells them.
The black widow stands, blood sticky in her clenched palm, down her thigh and on her face.
Pain in all the hits, a fatigued body and the disconnected feeling from herself makes Natasha want to shrink back, go back into whatever cell they’re going to push her into.
The others have to come.
She’s not going to survive the wrath of Dreykov, the guards and the other widows.
It’s only a matter of time.
.
Alarms blare throughout the house as Tony rushes into the surveillance room. He finds Clint holding up the tablet.
“It’s no longer transmitting,” Jarvis tells them, and Clint nods.
Tony backtracks to where the last transmission was; typing furiously as Steve and Bruce appear at the door.
“It’s no longer transmitting,” he tells them, a map appearing on the screens.
They watch the footage, or at least what they can see of Natasha’s vitals, as they spike, her heart rate doubling, tripling; then nothing.
Clint makes a noise, a groan that stays in his throat.
“I think.. I think they electrocuted her..”
He leaves the thought hanging.
Tony pulls the satellite footage up.
“How long ago?” Steve asks.
“Since it stopped transmitting?”
Tony looks, “fifteen minutes.”
Clint’s already moving.
“Three hours,” he grumbles. “We are three hours away.”
“I knew I shouldn’t have left.”
Rushing to the quinjet, they all are silent in their thoughts, even as Tony swears, watching the overall satellite footage.
Steve pilots the plane.
Clint cleans his guns, making sure they’re loaded, and pulls his bow from the armory. The arrows he pulls makes Bruce frown.
“You think it’ll be needed?”
Clint’s face is dark. A look Bruce is sure he hasn’t seen before.
“Yes.”
He doesn’t elaborate.
Tony is in his full Ironman suit.
Bruce sits hands clasped tight, body curling in on itself.
“Update,” Clint orders.
Tony stares at the footage.
“Not change in it out of the facility, there doesn’t seem to be any movement.”
Clint nods.
He sits next to Bruce, adopting his posture of hands clasped, breath slowing even though his anger is hot.
With thirty minutes to go, Tony growls at the screen.
“No, don’t you fucking dare.”
There’s cars streaming out, Clint standing next to him, watching; knowing Natasha is in one of them.
“Can you track them?” he asks.
Tony nods.
There’s drones that appear from his suit and he sends them out, six drones for six cars.
“Will they get there in time?” Clint asks as the drones fly away.
Huffing, Tony nods.
“I hope so,” he says quietly. “I was going to leave them in Georgia but I didn’t want to leave any evidence we were there. Ross is a bastard and any stepping out, he’s threatened…”
Tony stops.
“You don’t need to worry about that.”
Clint thinks he knows. Tony holds more knowledge on the world than all of them. They don’t ask, and he doesn’t tell.
Tony tells Steve to cloak the jet as they cross the border into Russia, and he looks for a place to land it.
Koban is small, and Clint is worried that they’re going to meet resistance; and civilians. He doesn’t put it last Dreykov to do anything in self protection.
He’s thankful for the cover of darkness as they get off the plane, he motions for Tony to give them aerial view of everything.
They needn’t have worried though.
The place is deserted.
.
They take Natasha back to medical. March her back, even though she can’t do anything.
It’s clear they’re in Russia, the Cold War feel permeating through the halls.
Jace is on her right, Max on her left and Lena ahead.
It seems as though they are her handlers.
She wishes she could talk, but they said no talking, she wishes she could fight, but the cuts on her hand, face and thigh, prove she’s no match for the widows, even if she could.
Natasha wants more than anything to be left alone.
The doctors tell her exactly what to do, then they cuff her to the bed. They inject her with god knows what, and she feels herself falling, just as it did when Dreykov injected her the first time.
She’s still conscious but everything is delayed. They draw blood, they attach electrodes to her and monitor vital signs.
If she falls asleep, she can escape the trauma of them acting on a body that’s not hers, but then she wouldn’t know what they’re doing.
It’s a catch 22 where she can’t win.
.
They dump her in a cell to herself.
Jace stands watch and she’s thankful that it’s her; out of anyone.
There’s a single bang on the door.
It used to mean someone’s coming.
Apparently it still does.
Dreykov enters her room, Jace still stands tall, eyes forward as he enters.
“Lay down Natasha,” he tells her.
She does.
She hates herself.
He sits on the bed next to her and smiles, a snarl underneath.
“Look how well the Nanites are working, you’ve taken a beating so well,” he laughs, “well three beatings. The way Jace hit you, you’d think she hates you.”
He pushes his hand into the cut that’s deep on her thigh. She winces, unable to stop it playing across her face.
“Does it hurt? Does this hurt?” he asks squeezing.
His hand lingers as he pushes her hair away from her face.
“You look so pretty with all your bruises, but they’ll be gone tomorrow; we’ll just have to do it again.”
Dreykov stands.
“Maybe next time, we will have more fun with you, hmm?”
He takes a small washcloth from his pocket and throws it on her.
“You’ve taken this punishment so well, but this is only the beginning,” he announces.
“You think your friends will find us, but they’ll never find us here.”
There’s another smile.
“Patch yourself up,” he nods.
“You’ll need it for tomorrow.”
.
Natasha vomits in the toilet. The cell has a sink, a toilet and a bed.
She does as he says and wipes herself down. Gets rid of the dried blood and scrubs hard at the place she can still feel his hand on her thigh and face.
She’s trying desperately to hold it together but little by little she can feel herself withdrawing, let the black widow take over.
She knows what that means though, remembers how hard it was to claw her way back the last time.
It all hurts so much, not only in her body but in her soul.
It feels like it’s being broken bit by bit and the people that helped her to put it back together won’t be so lucky this time.
She won’t be so lucky.
Even if they find her.
How can she be whole after this?
She’s drifting,
Jace opens the door, and Natasha vomits once more, then stands, half dressed to face her.
“I hate you,” Jace opens.
“You left us and they… they got meaner, more brutal afterwards.”
She takes a step towards Natasha, the glint of a dagger in her hand, Natasha watches warily.
“But I never forgot you, and I wanted the best for you. Even as they tortured us, even as they asked if we were going to defect too.”
There’s a break in her voice.
“We hold onto what we can here. They’ll inject you daily. It’s chemical. It will take over your brain. It means you have to follow everything they say, whatever they say. They say jump, you jump until they say stop. They say strip, you do. They say kill, you have no choice. They say fight, and you hit your friend.”
She opens her hand and Natasha sees the scar on her palm. For it to still be there, for it to be scarred, she knows Jace must have cut into her hand nightly. It’s something she would have done too to stay present in herself.
“I think I loved you,” she says offering the dagger.
Natasha takes it, feeling emotions that she can’t deal with.
“I know I loved you,” she whispers back.
“I’m sorry.”
And she means it.
Jace shakes her head and adjusts her gun.
“Only use it on the widows, you won’t be able to on Dreykov or any of the guards. If they come for you, you can protect yourself.”
It’s an obvious warning. They’re gunning for you. No one is coming to save you.
Natasha nods in thanks.
Jace pulls her in for a quick hug.
Kisses the top of her head.
“Salaam Natalia.”
“Salaam Jace.”
A whisper and a prayer.
.