Chapter 17
It’s obvious who the assassin is. Fury thinks himself a fool for not realizing it sooner. She looks similar to what he remembers of ‘Alyssa Daniel’.
He had never gotten her name. He had never forgotten her either. Struck with the startling realization that not even children were safe from being trained. Bring your child to work day was banned. All children on base must be under the age of three. Under no circumstances is the child to get close to the director or commander.
Fury never forgot the day that an eight-year-old committed corporate espionage and killed one of his newest agents.
When they finally track down and haul the assassin in, he reads the reports. It’s a child or a young adult with a babyface. She killed thirteen of their agents that were sent to apprehend her. She suddenly lost all fight and refused to speak or make eye contact.
He stares at her from behind a window. He watches as his second in command questions her but she never replies. She doesn’t respond to painful stimuli and her eyes are glassy and unfocused.
But it’s her. There are a few more scars and her face has matured but Fury never forgot her face. He can easily picture the tiny eight-year-old on the bed in her place, the healing bruise on her jaw and hair pulled back into perfect braids.
She, as a child, nearly brought SHIELD down to her velcro-shoed feet. She was older now. Had more training.
She was dangerous.
Dangerous things had to be put down for their own good.
“I’m sorry.”
“You shouldn’t be here with me,” Yelena comments from where she was dancing in the gym. “Natasha wouldn’t like it.”
“I know. She hates me,” Winter Soldier steps into the gym.
Yelena glances at him, barely pausing in her routine. “If you want to be here with me and talk then you have to do this too.”
She didn’t expect him to hesitate before sloppily following her movements.
“I didn’t mean to hurt you. It’s an awful excuse,” He continues, grunting when Yelena spins. “I’m thinking that maybe I’m not ready for another arm.”
Yelena is quiet for a few moments, doing a running leap. “That’s not for me to decide.”
“Steve never meant for you to get hurt either. He keeps underestimating how dangerous I am,” Winter Soldier continues, following her running leap. “He thinks that with my mind free of triggers now that I don’t have the capacity to kill people.”
“Natasha said that you being here isn’t good for me,” Yelena does a flip that falls into a split. “I hear her on the phone with Clint when she thinks I’m asleep. She wants to take me back to him when this is over.”
“I don’t mean to keep reminding you,” He does a flip, grunting as he manages a partial split.
“You scare me,” Yelena confessed, her arms stretched above her head. “Every single time I see you I become afraid that nothing around me is real. That I’m back in the Red Room. Whenever I see your face then I have to find my sister and touch her to make sure that it’s real.”
He swallows hard, closing his eyes briefly. “I’m not him anymore.”
Yelena falls into the end of her routine, taking a moment to catch her breath before falling into the next routine. “You still have his face.”
“The Wakandan’s can help you,” He tells her earnestly as he doesn’t hesitate to follow her into the new routine. “They helped me.”
“They have no reason to help me. Me and you, we are not the same,” Yelena shakes her head, falling into a handstand. Their eyes meet as he follows. “I am nothing like you.”
It’s a lie. She’s more like him than she cares to admit.
“Aren’t you though?” He calls her out on it. Yelena falls into a flip and straightens up. “A brainwashed soldier that has hurt plenty of people.”
“I’m different now,” Yelena argues.
“So am I,” He responds.
“I didn’t forget someone I knew for nine years,” Yelena scoffs.
“But you forget plenty of other things,” He points out.
“What do you want from me?” Yelena stops her routine to look at him. Winter Soldier drops his stance and they just stare at each other.
“I want you to stop being afraid of life,” His answer startles Yelena. “Not everything or everyone is out to hurt you.”
“Being cautious hasn’t hurt me yet. At least I’m still alive,” She gestures to herself. “I didn’t go on this big adventure that caused the Avengers to split up. I don’t even know what happened.”
“You don’t?” He blinks in surprise, tilting his head to the side.
“Just that Natasha did something that the others didn’t that ended with Tony forgiving my sister for it,” Yelena frowns at him. “Why do you keep cornering me?”
“Because I want to talk,” He lets out a sigh.
“Don’t you think that if I wanted to talk then I would seek you out?” Yelena folds her arms.
His shoulders droop, making him look much smaller than he actually was. “I know…”
“We are never going to be best friends,” Yelena tells him. “And I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to give you the forgiveness that you are searching for. I’m sorry that I can’t give you what you want.”
He lets out a long sigh. “I want to make up for the people I hurt. The wrong that I did. Finding out about you? You’re at the top of my list.”
“Yet you still don’t remember me,” Yelena shakes her head. “I don’t want to be on your silly little list. You don’t even know what you’re trying to make up for.”
Winter Soldier reaches up to run a hand through his tangled hair. “Will you tell me?”
“Are you ready to hear it?” Yelena counters.
“I think that I need to,” He frowns, looking up at her. “Will you tell me?”
“Do you want all of it? Or just the gist?” Yelena sighs, moving to sit on the mat, watching as he sinks to his knees in front of her.
“All of it. Don’t hold back. Please. I need-- I need to know,” His fingers curl into his sweatpants.
Yelena swallows hard and looks down at her own shorts she’s wearing. “It’s not nice.”
“I’ve gathered as much,” He bows his head. “Please…”
“We met when I was seven and I had made my first kill only days earlier…” Yelena starts quietly, closing her eyes. “You only ever spoke a handful of words to me. Widow. Soldier. More. Harder. Faster.”
He opens his mouth and she hears the inhale as he prepares to speak but she holds her hand up. “Please don’t interrupt me.”
She hears his mouth snap shut and she lets out a deep breath. “I was the only one that you trained personally. The youngest too. You pushed me past every physical and mental limitation that I had. I always left training with you in tears, barely able to walk as I bleed on the floor.”
She hears his breath hitch. “The very first time I saw any hint of approval was when I killed a guard that had tried to kiss me. I still didn’t know how to kill without making a mess yet. I showed up to training with blood on my clothes and you stared down at me and reached out to wipe away some blood on my cheek. I explain what happened and you give a slight incline of your head. You approved. That little bit of approval meant the world to me.”
“Is that why you asked me if you ever made me proud?” Winter Soldier can’t help but interrupt.
“You were the closest thing I had to a mentor. Someone who actually cared whether I lived or died. When you stabbed me during one of our training sessions, you refused to go on until a doctor looked at me. No matter what they threatened or what they did to you,” Yelena continues softly.
“I stabbed you?” His voice cracks.
Yelena hesitates before pulling up her shirt to point out each and every scar he gave her. “Sometimes you would show up and you didn’t even appear to recognize me. You’d look at the guards like they had made some sort of mistake because you only trained the older widows.”
Yelena flops back to lay on the mat, taking a few moments to focus on her breathing.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t think about how this would impact you,” He said softly. “You don’t have to go on.”
“You want to know so badly,” Yelena swallows hard.
“Then we should take a break,” He stands and Yelena flinches slightly. “This was a bad idea.”
“I’d want to know too,” Yelena said quietly. “It bothers me not knowing things.”
“But it’s hurting you. God, Natasha will kill me,” He mumbles and Yelena tilts her head to look at him.
“If you keep wallowing in self-pity and keep going ‘boo-hoo, I’m such a bad person’ then you’re not going to get anywhere,” Yelena comments, watching as he tenses up. “If you have somehow forgotten within the few seconds of our conversation, I have killed people. I have hurt many. I have hurt and been hurt.”
“You don’t understand,” He shakes his head.
“Then tell me!” Yelena slams her hand onto the mat and pushes herself to her feet. “You keep tiptoeing around me and being all cautious but then you corner me when I’m alone.”
“Because I keep hurting you!” He finally raised his voice and it causes Yelena to flinch. “Because I keep hurting you and hurting people seems to be all I’m good for!”
Yelena scoffs. “You just said that me and you were alike. Is hurting people all I’m good for too?”
“See? I did it again,” He thrusts a hand at her.
“If you want to prove to the world that you’re more than what Hydra made you then go actually do something. Knit blankets for babies, donate to food drives. I don’t care,” Yelena curls her fingers into fists. “But you getting all sad and then getting angry at people is not going to work.”
He tugs on his hair in frustration and Yelena shifts uneasily. “I’m so angry all of the time.”
“When was the last time that you actually fought without holding back?” Yelena questioned. “Natasha and I fight without holding back whenever I get too angry.”
“I’m much stronger,” He shakes his head. “Nobody can match me.”
“Then take your metal arm off and fight me,” Yelena said. “Come at me and don’t hold back.”
“Jesus, that’s a horrible idea,” He scoffs.
“I don’t see you coming up with any other ones. Just me and you. No weapons. Going until one of us taps out,” Yelena folds her arms. “No holding back. You were the one that trained me. I know your style.”
He swallows hard, looking up at the camera in the corner of the gym.
“Don’t be afraid,” Yelena goads. “We’ve fought all the time before. I’ll have an advantage.”
He slowly reaches up and detaches his metal arm, setting it down onto the mat along with a few weapons he stashed on him.
Yelena pulls her hair up and out of the way before she follows and removes all the weapons from her.
“I still think this is a bad idea,” He comments as he steps out onto the mat. Yelena follows, sliding into position.
“They don’t understand it. Not like I do,” Yelena stares at him. “Ready?”
He inclines his head. “Ready.”
Yelena makes the first move. It’s been almost two years since they last fought. But she falls back into it with practiced ease.
He’s holding himself back. Yelena doesn’t. She hits and goads and eggs him on. She fights until he finally starts fighting back.
They’re being knocked down to the mat and pulling themselves back up as they fight with no restraint. She doesn’t know how much time passes. By the time that they’re at a stalemate and neither can go further, they are a mess of sweat and bruises. They let each other go at the same time and flop to lay back on the mats, breathing hard.
“Well?” Yelena questioned after a few moments. “Do you feel better?”
Winter Soldier’s chest heaves as he slowly nods. “Yeah…” He sounds surprised. “I do.”
“I’m not always full of bad ideas,” Yelena comments. “And you’ll even get to fight Natasha when she sees what I look like.”
He lets out a startled laugh as Yelena grins at him.
“Thank you…” He said, his breathing evening out some. “I didn’t realize that I needed that.”
“Bottling up all your anger to exchange it for being sad doesn’t work. Natasha taught me that,” Yelena said. “Anger is a normal emotion to feel.”
“You know…” He turns his head to look at her. “I’m sorry that I don’t remember you. But, I’m proud of who you have become.”
Yelena rears back in surprise, her breath hitching. “Don’t say things you don’t mean.”
“You and I might be the same but you are so much better than what I could ever hope to achieve,” He slowly reaches his human hand out. “I’d like to get to know you again. This time as James Barnes.”
Yelena looks down at the hand offers out and reaches out to slowly grasp it with hers. “You’re not a bad person, James.”
“Neither are you,” Winter Soldier-- James-- replies, giving her hand a small squeeze before letting go.
Yelena turns her head to stare back up at the ceiling, her body aching in a way that it hadn’t in a long time but she’s not angry about it.
“I should probably go ice my face before Natasha thinks I got hit by a truck,” Yelena sits up, letting out a soft groan as she climbs to her feet. She gathers up the weapons on the mat and glances at James. “Let me know when you want to do this again.”
She watches him inclines his head before she turns to leave.
She takes a cold shower and ices her face. Her body hurts but she’s so happy because he’s proud of her.
And yeah, maybe it wasn’t what she wanted him to be proud of her for. She had killed and hurt so many to make him proud. But him telling her that she was better than him, that he was proud of her for getting out and changing and just being her?
It means the world to her. More than he will ever know.