Chapter 3
There’s still blood in the spot that Yelena was last seen. It had dried and faded some in the cold and with some rain but it’s still there.
Varvara crouches to touch her fingers against it but Viktoria grabs her hand to stop her.
Seven Widows stand in an alley and look for their missing eighth.
“Spread out in pairs,” Natasha ordered. “See if you can find more like this.”
Varvara and Daria pair up but Viktoria breaks off to go with them. Alice pairs up with Irina. It leaves Mischa to brush her shoulders against Natasha’s as they move through the streets of Budapest.
“So.” Natasha glances at the Widow. “When did Yelena… adopt the youngest?”
Mischa shrugs. “Dunno.” She’s inspecting the left half while Natasha covers the right. “They just started calling her that and she never stopped them.”
“Do you think of her like your mother?” Natasha asked curiously as they move through the street.
Mischa shrugs her shoulders. “I dunno. I don’t need a mom. Never have. But having Yelena… it’s nice to have someone look out for me.”
Natasha nods her head slightly. “It is. I just… never thought of my sister as one to take on a mentor role.”
Mischa glances at her. “Well…” She shrugs. “You were wrong.”
“I see that now,” Natasha doesn’t know whether she’s denying the admission to Mischa or herself.
She didn’t know her sister as well as she thought she did.
Daria was the one that found the trail and tracked the blood all the way to a warehouse where there is nothing left behind but a smashed empty canister that once held the antidote to chemical subjugation.
Alice picks it up and turns it over in her hands. “It’s empty.”
“It’s broken,” Viktoria corrects as she reaches over to take it from Alice before she cut herself.
“There’s no antidote spilled out,” Varvara points out, gesturing to the ground.
That meant that the antidote had been delivered. Still, the question begs, where is Yelena?
“Irina, are you able to access the cameras?” Natasha questioned the bronze-haired woman when she spots the outdated camera angled at the alley.
Irina fusses about on her phone, her thumbs flying as she types lines of code.
“Why would she do that?” Viktoria sneers at Varvara, drawing Natasha back into their conversation.
“She helps everybody! Nobody has escaped before. Hell, Mischa stabbed her too the first time they met!” Varvara throws a hand at the nineteen-year-old that was grasping Alice’s hand.
“But she wouldn’t leave us. She promised! She said that she wasn’t going to leave!” Viktoria steps toward the two, anger on her face. “She comes back. She always comes back!”
“Okay--” Natasha decides that she needs to insert herself into the situation before the yelling became blows. “Girls, that’s enough.”
Viktoria whirls on her, anger on her face and her fists clenched. “You can kindly fuck off!”
“Vikki!” Alice gasped out. “You can’t say things like that.”
“You can fuck off too!” Viktoria barks at Alice and Mischa shoves her when Alice flinches away.
“That’s enough!” Natasha grabs Mischa’s wrist before she hits Viktoria again, shoving Viktoria away before she lunges. “Would you rather have petty fights than search for Yelena? Because if so then you can just go wait back at the safehouse. Or better yet, I’ll send you back to Melina.”
Viktoria lets out a huff of frustration before turning and kicking the wall.
“You need to calm down. Didn’t you learn to control your emotions as a Widow?” Natasha cannot deal with a bunch of fighting children so they need to woman up and be useful.
“No!” Viktoria snaps at her. “I didn’t! I was too busy being a mindless puppet for years! I can’t remember anything except flashes from when I was sixteen!”
Her answer startles Natasha so Irina steps forward and grabs Viktoria and drags her into a hug.
The anger is instantly gone and Viktoria sags against the younger woman. “She said that she’d come back to use always. That she’d never abandon us.”
“We’ll find her,” Varvara tells her softly. “We’ll bring her home.”
Natasha’s heart hurts. She won’t abandon Yelena. Not again.
There’s a hidden room under a stack of shipping containers on the dock. That’s where the last Widow had been dealing with her mission before stabbing Yelena.
Seven Widows enter and the numerous men and soldiers inside were nothing compared to them.
“Spread out. Find her or the Widow,” Natasha orders the others. They break off in search of her.
Natasha glances down at the bodies that were dispatched with haste and a gracefulness that the girls were too young to know.
“Where is she!?” Alice demands from another room and Natasha steps away from the body to move toward her.
The Widow that had stabbed Yelena was curled up into a tight ball, her arms wrapped around herself as she rocked in a self-soothing motion.
“Step back,” Natasha tells Alice. They couldn’t let emotions get in the way. Mischa appears and cases the room before reaching out to set a hand onto Alice’s shoulder and tugs her back.
Natasha moves in front of the girl, eyeing her for any weapons before she crouches in front of her. “I’m looking for my sister.”
The Widow in front of her trembles and Natasha knows that it’s genuine and that Yelena had succeeded in freeing her.
“I-- I didn’t mean to--” The Widow whispers in broken English. “I didn’t know what I was doing… please, I’m sorry. Please don’t hurt me. Please!”
Natasha holds her hands up so that the Widow can see that they’re empty. “I’m not going to hurt you. But you really hurt my sister and we need to find her and get her help. Do you know where she is?”
“They-- they took her. Her head-- they said something about her head,” The Widow reaches up and taps her forehead and Natasha feels someone jerk forward and turns to grab them before they tackle the Widow.
“That’s hers!” Varvara shouts at the Widow, her arm reaching out to grab the black leather cuff from around the Widow’s wrist. “Why do you have that, it’s not yours!”
“Varvara--” Natasha interrupts, pinning the squirming girl in her arms. “Varvara, you need to stop.”
“That’s her bracelet!” Varvara whines, her eyes filling with tears as she goes limp in Natasha’s hold. “Yelena can’t sleep without her bracelet…”
“I know,” Natasha soothed even though she felt way out of her depth here. “But we need to find Yelena.” Natasha glances at the girl. “Where did they take her?”
The Widow points at the floor. “There’s a lab…” She whispers.
Natasha nods her head and pulls Varvara with her when she steps back.
Mischa steps forward instead and takes Natasha’s place as she crouches in front of her. “What’s your name?”
“Ksenia,” The girl whispers. “I’m sorry. She gave this to me.” The girl undoes the leather bracelet and holds it out to Mischa who reaches out and gently takes it.
Satisfied that there was someone to watch over the Widow and not hurt her, Natasha turns her focus on finding the entrance to the lab.
Daria nudged her and holds up a ring of keys she had filched from one of the guards. Natasha grins at her, exchanging the angry teenager still pinned in her hold for the keys, watching Daria wrap around Varvara in a way that calmed her immediately.
There’s a not very well hidden hatch in the ground under one of the bodies and a rug.
Natasha tries about half of the keys before one of them fits in the lock and clicks. She pulls the hatch open and peers down into the darkness.
Natasha heads down first, Viktoria and Irina following her while Alice stays back with the two youngest.
Natasha spots her first. Yelena is strapped down to a metal table and is covered with dried blood of various stages. Natasha moves toward her immediately, pulling a knife from her belt and cutting the straps off with one flick of her hand.
“Yelena--” Viktoria breathes out, moving to the other side and undoes the few remaining straps.
There’s a weird contraption on Yelena’s head, leads attached to her temples and just under her jaw.
“Oh fuck…” Viktoria breathes out and Irina sets a hand on her shoulder to steady her.
“We need to get her up the ladder,” Natasha reminds them. “I need Viktoria to climb up first and help Alice pull her up. Irina, I need your help carrying her.”
Viktoria is frozen in place, left staring at the bloodied table. “Yelena…” She whimpers out.
“Hey,” Natasha grips her shoulders. She hates to push away whatever emotion Viktoria probably needs to work through. “Focus. Yelena needs you.”
Viktoria inhales sharply and gives a curt nod before turning and moving back up the ladder.
Natasha can’t remember the last time she held Yelena. Probably not since they were children back in Ohio. Her sister is warm and still has the same hint of honey that she carried with her as a child.
Natasha carries Yelena toward the ladder. Yelena is out cold, limp in her grasp.
Viktoria and Alice are waiting for her. Irina climbs halfway up the ladder and the four of them manage to slowly and carefully pull Yelena’s body up the ladder and onto the main floor.
“Ma!” Varvara’s cry sounds as Natasha climbs the ladder.
Viktoria and Varvara are not happy about Ksenia going with them but Mischa is adamant about it.
“She hurt Yelena!” Viktoria protested.
“We all have,” Mischa retorts. “If I remember correctly, you bruised three of her ribs.”
“That doesn’t count, I was under their control--” Viktoria looked pained at the prospect of harming Yelena.
“Well, so was she.”
Natasha holds Yelena close the whole ride back. Irina helps clean some of the blood off so they can see where Yelena is bleeding.
It was mainly surface wounds from a knife. Nothing serious and nothing that would require stitches.
Then they find the brand, still shiny and pink just below Yelena’s right shoulder blade.
Hydra brands those for treason. For those who didn’t need to worry about covers and missions.
“We need Melina,” Natasha tells the girls and they glance at each other. “I know you haven’t told her but she’s probably noticed six missing Widows by now.”
The girls shuffle like guilty children as they avoid looking at Natasha.
“Yelena can’t go back to the farm,” Mischa finally tells Natasha. Natasha raised an eyebrow, prompting her to continue. “It scares her.”
Natasha glances down at her sister in her hold with a small frown. Melina’s farm scared her. “She told you this?”
“Not as much as sobbing it out during a bad night,” Mischa said quietly, her fingers busying themselves smoothing down her uniform. “She doesn’t like the farm and being around Melina upsets her.”
“She never guided us back…” Viktoria nods slowly in agreement as if just realizing it. “Gave us an address and a safe way to get there. Sometimes sent the others to meet us halfway.”
“She didn’t get upset when I came back,” Mischa nods her head. “So… we can’t go the farm. I won’t let you take her there.”
Natasha lets out a long sigh because of course her sister picked the Baby Widows that were stubborn. “Okay.”
Mischa blinks in surprise. “Okay?”
“Do you really think that I’m going to force my sister somewhere that scares her?” Natasha wonders just what these Widows heard about her.
Alice shrugs. “She doesn’t talk about you a lot. It makes her sad. So I don’t know you and that makes you dangerous.”
“But she trusts you enough to send us to you in an emergency,” Varvara shrugs, shuffling in place as they arrive back at the safehouse. “So…”
Natasha hadn’t had time to spend with Yelena. She had the accords and was on the run and had the other rogue Avengers to think about.
She hadn’t meant to neglect Yelena. She made promises about keeping in contact and keeping in touch. She still wore the vest that Yelena had given her.
But Yelena slipped through the cracks and became a thought in the back of Natasha’s mind. Natasha made a promise to not leave her again.
She failed. Yelena made her own little family because she needed people. Her sister needed her and Natasha wasn’t there once again.
They patch Yelena up with what they have. The girls crowd the room so much that Natasha had to implement a rule of no more than two girls in the room at a time.
She walked in on Daria hunched over Yelena, her hands cupped over her mouth. Natasha had been under the impression that Daria was mute.
Yet here the youngest stood, poised over Yelena’s unconscious body as she spoke in a breathy whisper. “Please come back, mama. I need you.”
Yelena wakes up on the third day, a strangled cry in her throat as she jerks upright.
Yelena stares right through Natasha when she enters. She squints at Natasha, her breath hitching.
“Hey sleepyhead,” Natasha greets her, taking a seat on the edge of the bed.
“I knew it,” Yelena grins up at her, reaching out to weakly tug on a strand of Natasha’s blonde hair. “My vest. My hair. You’re such a poser.“
Natasha lets out a huff. “If you wanted to see me, you could have just asked. You didn’t have to get kidnapped.”
“Would you have come?” Yelena glances away and Natasha blinks in surprise at the turn in the tone.
“What? Of course I would have. Did I give you the impression that I wouldn’t?” Natasha frowns, reaching out toward her.
“You were busy…” Yelena shrugs before hissing in pain and changing the subject. “Where’s Ksenia?”
“With your other kids,” Natasha said. “Why didn’t you tell me you adopted a bunch of little Widows?”
Yelena frowns and gives a vague hand motion. “Dunno… would you care?”
“Of course,” Natasha reaches out to cup her sister’s face and doesn’t let her worm away. “Yelena, stop. Look at me, please.”
Yelena droops into the touch and glances up at Natasha.
“I’m sorry that I gave you the impression that I didn’t care,” Natasha said, leaning forward to press her forehead against Yelena’s. “You’re my little sister. You always will be. You’re important to me. You matter. I love you.”
“I love you too, sister,” Yelena replies quietly, leaning into the touch. “Just because I have a bunch of little Widows now doesn’t mean that I don’t need you.”
“I know that,” Natasha slowly pulls away. “They’ve been missing you.”
“Do you think… do you think I’m doing okay?” Yelena asked nervously, looking up at her and seeking the same approval that she did twenty years ago.
Natasha smiles at her, leaning forward to kiss her forehead gently. “You’re doing really great. I’m proud of you.”
Yelena’s face lights up. “Really? I’m trying-- I’m trying to give them what I needed when I defected.”
Yelena needed guidance and reassurance and her mom. Instead, she came out hurt and alone and struggled to learn who she was.
Natasha grins. “You’re doing great and I can’t wait to learn more about you and your little family you’ve made.”
Natasha stands just as the door to the room bursts open and seven Widows pile in.
“Dibs!” Varvara leaps onto the bed, followed moments later by Daria.
Yelena lets out a low laugh. “What did I say about jumping on the furniture?”
“Only do it during shoot-outs,” Varvara rolls her eyes and snuggles into Yelena’s side. “I missed you, Ma. You scared the shit outta me. Out of us.”
Yelena opens her arms to let Daria snuggle into her and watches as the other Widows perch around her to just be close.
“I’ve missed you all,” Yelena said, resting her cheek on the top of Daria’s head. “C’mere you little gremlins and gimme a hug.”