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Yelena awakens to a bucket of cold water being dumped onto her head. She sputters, her lungs inadvertently causing her to suck air in and choke on the water. She then realizes how bad her lungs and chest were when the action causes her immediate pain. She’s tied to a chair, her hands and legs bound tightly, making her aware of the break in her hand.
“Wakey, wakey,” A familiar voice croons. “My most prized possession.”
Yelena’s eyes fly open, staring up at the face of General Dreykov.
This is a nightmare. A side effect of the sedatives she was given. Yelena’s eyes flicker away, searching for Maria.
Yelena finds her curled in the corner, bound and gagged. She had been stripped of her jacket and Yelena is able to see the bandages peeking out from under her tank top. She's unconscious but alive.
“We have taken very good care of your friend,” General Dreykov continues, reaching out to grab Yelena’s chin and force her attention back onto him. “If you want to keep it that way then you will be a good girl for me.”
Yelena thinks of the time in Moth’s office when Moth had asked her about what she would do if the General was right in front of her.
Yelena had said that she would lay down and give in, begging for forgiveness.
She can’t do that. Not now. Not with Maria’s life at stake. She has to keep the attention on her.
“Fuck you,” Yelena retorts in Russian, wincing when his fingers dig into her cheeks as he yanks her head forward until his face is inches from hers.
“Being with those Americans has ruined you,” The General laughs. “Do not worry. We will fix you up.”
Yelena shakes her head. “I was never broken in the first place.” She retorts, daring to look him in the eyes. “You knew Natasha was coming.”
“Clever girl,” He croons out, the grip on her face softening. “Did you think I wouldn’t be ready for two deserters to come back to finish me off?”
“You did seem stupid enough, yes,” Yelena replies. But she knows that he can be scarily smart. He invented a way to keep the girls under control and made them afraid to even think about facing him.
It’s been over a year since Yelena had heard his voice or seen his face. She’s changed a lot in that time. She’s not small and weak anymore, and she’s certainly not alone.
The General backhands her for her comment and Yelena manages to keep a straight face when his ring cuts her cheek. “What are you?” He demands.
“I am a Widow. I am made of marble,” Yelena says obediently and a grin creeps across the General’s face. “But I am also a teenage girl and I have a voice.”
The grin drops and he leans back. “No worries, my most prized possession. We will fix you.”
A pit forms in Yelena’s stomach when he simply leaves the room. She can’t dwell on whatever torture he has planned for her, it won’t do her any good. Her eyes case the room as she searches for something or anything that could get them out. Her eyes linger on Maria, watching the slow rise and fall of her chest that reassures Yelena that she’s alright.
She has no doubt there are cameras in the room. Still, she calls out to her. “Maria?”
Maria doesn’t move. Yelena worries that they’ve sedated her again.
“Maria?” Yelena repeats before she swallows hard. “Masha, I need you!”
That gets Maria to let out a soft groan through the gag and she barely shifts before her eyes pop open and rapidly flicker to peer around the room until they land on Yelena.
Yelena lets out a breath she didn’t know she was holding. Maria was alive and okay. She was coherent enough to respond to Yelena’s voice.
“Can you sit up?” Yelena needs to take stock of how injured Maria was. With a little bit of shuffling, Maria sits up and leans against the wall. “How’s your shoulder?”
Maria rolls her shoulders, wincing immediately when she barely moved her injured one. It seemed pretty messed up and Yelena severely hoped that it could be fixed with a surgery and rehabilitation.
Maria nods at her as if to ask her about her own injuries. Yelena was vaguely aware of the small drops of blood that had rolled down her cheek and dripped off onto the collar of her shirt from the cut on her cheek. “I’m okay.” Yelena says and Maria raised an eyebrow and gives her a look that always made Yelena squirm. “I’m doing as well as I can.” She amends and Maria accepts that answer. “We’re… we’re back in the Red Room.” Yelena says quietly, deciding to give Maria whatever information she could before she was silenced. “General Dreykov is alive. Damien is part of them or at least paid to grab me.
Yelena wasn’t sure if they even meant to grab Maria. She was the target, she knows that now, but maybe if Maria wasn’t so close to her then they would have just let her go.
“I’m sorry.” The apology falls from her lips before she can help it. She hates that she feels tears welling up in her eyes because this is the last place she needed to cry. Maria shakes her head, denying Yelena’s apology. “I’m sorry that you were captured with me. I’m sorry that you’re going to be hurt. And I’m sorry for whatever I have to do to you.” After a moment she adds on. “And I forgive you for whatever you have to do to me in return.”
There was no doubt that they were going to be pitted against each other. Made to hurt the other in order to survive. Yelena loves Maria, she was her family, but she also knew that they had to do what they had to do.
Yelena needed both of them to walk out alive. She needed to return to SHIELD and see Bobbi and Skye again. She needed to return to her big sister.
The General doesn’t come back on the first day.
Yelena’s unsure of how long time passes for. She keeps talking to Maria in hopes of keeping her upright and coherent.
The door opens and Yelena falls silent, bracing for whatever they had planned for her. Instead, a guard merely holds a newspaper up in front of her face to show her the date.
It’s been nearly twenty-four hours since they were taken.
They don’t see someone again until the next day. Another newspaper is shoved into her face and Yelena can smell the ink on it.
A third day passes and Yelena hates that she had gotten so used to eating whenever she wanted at SHIELD. She was guaranteed three meals every day and at least a snack if she wanted it. She didn’t have to work for or earn food.
Maria needs sustenance in order to heal.
The fourth day the guard comes in to show her a newspaper, Yelena licks her chapped lips before she spoke. “Wait--” She croaks out. Her mouth was dry from being so dehydrated and talking for so long. The guard pauses in the doorway and Yelena knew that they were waiting for her to make the first move. “What… what do I have to do to earn food?”
The guard doesn’t reply, leaving and shutting the door behind him. He returns not so long later with another guard and they cut the binds holding her to the chair but not the ones around her arms and legs. They hoist her up and Yelena can see Maria jerk upright.
Yelena is carried from the room and she doesn’t recognize the hallways she’s taken down. She memorizes the turns that they take until they reach a new room. It’s the infirmary and cold fear grips Yelena although she ensures she doesn’t let it show on her face.
Once a needle is slid into her neck, Yelena doesn’t remember a lot until she’s vaguely aware of someone calling her name. She’s too weak to lift her head up but her eyes open and she peers through the hair falling in her face to see Maria.
She’s back in the room as before and sometime between then and now, Maria’s gag had been removed.
“Masha…” Yelena breathes out and she can see the relief hit Maria. Yelena’s head is fuzzy and her neck hurts from the needle and whatever they injected her with. “How long…”
“Not long,” Maria said in a whisper. Her mouth was so dry from the gag being in for so long. “Are you alright?”
“I’m alive.” Yelena replies and she supposes that while it’s a low bar to set, it’s one that Maria has come to accept.
It didn’t matter as long as they were alive.
Yelena’s stomach twists, utterly empty and cramping as it begged for food. She’s aware of the other sharp pain she had been ignoring for so long flaring up but it does little in comparison to everything else.
The door opens once again and this time a Widow enters. She’s balancing a tray on her arm with two plastic bowls of what Yelena recognizes as porridge.
There is no doubt shit mixed into the food but Yelena knows that they need nutrition more than they need to worry about being compliant. They’re wanted alive so Yelena didn’t have to worry about poison.
The Widow holds a spoon up to Yelena’s lips and Yelena opens her mouth to accept it. They’re a chalky aftertaste that leaves her screwing her face up because she knows what it is. But small doses of sedatives to keep them tired and compliant were manageable. Yelena eats the whole bowl and when the Widow holds a straw up to her lips, Yelena sucks the liquid down greedily. It’s cold orange juice and Yelena has no doubt that it also has medication added to it.
The Widow then moves toward Maria and crouches in front of her. Yelena gets a glimpse of marks creeping out of the back of her uniform, fresh and bruised against her pale skin.
Maria cooperates with the Widow, accepting the food and water in the same manner. She doesn’t attempt to lash out at the Widow, knowing that with how weak she was, it was a fight she wouldn’t win.
And they repeat that. Yelena will give in and ask for favors in exchange for being willing and compliant to their demands. Maria will tell her to stop, that it’s unneeded, but they both know that’s not true.
Yelena has to beg for them to give Maria antibiotics and new bandages when Maria feels the infection set in. Each time Yelena is dragged to the infirmary and each time she returns with a fuzzy head.
It’s getting harder to keep track of time. Yelena is having a harder time stringing together words and Maria tells her that her pupils are blown.
Every day, a guard would enter and show them a newspaper. A week passes by and with it comes the New Year. Yelena is starting to lose hope that maybe they’re not coming for her.
But they have to be. At least for Maria. Maria was the deputy director, she was important.
Then they come get Yelena in the middle of the night and Yelena tries to force herself to dissociate with what happens next. She hadn’t had to do so in a while and it was harder to just tuck herself away in her mind as hands wander in places they shouldn’t.
Yelena’s dumped back in the room with no pants, a smug statement to Maria about what they just did. Yelena doesn’t come out of her own head until she’s aware of something warm resting on her lap and she squirms, immediately afraid that they had come back to do more.
But when she looks down, it’s only Maria, who had crawled her way across the room to rest her head in Yelena’s lap, the only comfort she could provide with her bound state.
“They’re coming, Masha… right?” Yelena whispers out and Maria stares up at her with baby blue eyes that Yelena had come to associate with safety and security.
“They’re coming,” She says with such conviction that Yelena can’t help but believe her.
The guard doesn’t drag Maria off of her when he enters the next day. Instead, he tosses the newspaper at her this time and it falls open on her lap where Maria’s head was moments ago.
Yelena stares at the date on the paper and she swallows hard.
The guard grins at her, reaching out to pat her cheek. “Happy birthday.” He says before he turns and leaves the room, leaving behind the newspaper to mock her.
Yelena turns eighteen alone in a room with Maria, bruised, sedated, and wanting nothing more than to just go home.