Chapter 18
Natasha was not happy when she sees Yelena’s face. In fact, Yelena watches Natasha flicker through a dozen emotions before she watches her sister let out a long sigh.
“What happened, little one?” She reaches out to touch a bruise on Yelena’s cheekbone. “Who hurt you?”
Yelena tilts her chin up. “I sparred. We agreed on it.”
“Not even I leave bruises like this on you when we fight,” Natasha frowns, concern on her face. “Who did you fight? Steve?”
Yelena lets out a long sigh. “I fought James.”
Her hand darts out to grab Natasha’s wrist before her sister storms off. “We agreed to it!”
Natasha looks like she’s going to go fight him.
“Natasha, I can take care of myself. He didn’t do anything I didn’t agree to,” Yelena said.
“And if he asked for something else?” Natasha demands and Yelena reels back. “More than that?”
“Are you insinuating that I’d spread my legs for him like a slut if he asked?” She demands, trying to keep the hurt out of her tone.
“I’m saying that you two have bad blood,” Natasha corrects her gently, treading lightly. “I don’t want you to be forced to do anything that you do not want. I promised you that, remember?”
Yelena lets out a huff. “I know that.” She softens some. “This was an agreement between me and him.”
“I’m sorry… I worry about you,” Natasha’s shoulders slump and Yelena lets her wrist go so that she can hug her instead. “I don’t mean to be bossy and controlling.”
“I know,” Yelena pressed her forehead against the crook of Natasha’s neck. “I can take care of myself. I did it before you were around. I did it nearly all my life.”
Natasha lets out a long sigh, her hand coming up to cup the back of Yelena’s neck. “I know.”
They both knew. Natasha was fiercely protective over Yelena in a way that she had never been before. Yelena was not used to relying on someone that she could count on to protect her.
“Please trust me enough about this,” Yelena asked softly, closing her eyes and nuzzling closer when Natasha strokes her hair.
“Okay,” Natasha conceded. “Please know that you can come to me if you bite off more than you can chew. I won’t be mad. I’ll help.”
Yelena nods her head. “Thank you for trusting me.”
Natasha pulls Yelena’s head down to press a kiss to her forehead, something she had started to do every time she passed by Yelena since Yelena had told her how much she liked it.
“Now,” Natasha prods against a bruise on Yelena’s cheekbone. “Don’t make me throw you in an ice bath. Go take care of yourself.”
Yelena gives her a wide smile. “Yes ma’am.” She teased, darting off before Natasha can change her mind.
She does take a cold shower. She notices a spot on her vest that she needs to wash out. Her vest is starting to get worn and well-loved. It’s fraying slightly at the seams and the zippers sometimes get stuck.
She empties the pockets onto her bed and finally takes notice that she had more random things than weapons in her pockets.
She starts to go through her pockets in a way that she hadn’t done since stuffing them full of weapons.
There’s the photo strip of her and Natasha as children. She also had her favorite of the bunch of photos she had taken. There is the kid’s meal figurine of Black Widow. A vial of red dust from Tony. A shot of adrenaline. Her notebook and a pen. A lighter. Two cigarettes. One of Lila’s drawings. The housekey from Clint. A pair of handcuffs. A peppermint still in the wrapper from Cooper. One of MJ’s earrings that she found but had forgotten to give back. A receipt for Mr Newmars sandwich shop. A fake ID. Money.
The only weapons she had in her vest were the pieces of the gun that she could assemble in ten seconds along with a variety of knives.
Weapons used to be all that she carried in the vest along with the single photo of her childhood that she clung to.
She doesn’t know when it changed from being her armor to being her storage of things that meant a lot to her. A security blanket filled with things that people she cares about gives her.
She’s pulled out of her musings when the lights flicker and the power goes out. It’s okay. She knows that sometimes the power goes out. But Tony had told her about the giant arc reactor running the tower. How the power should come back on moments after it goes out as the generator kicks in. She straps her vest on, only bothering to fill it with weapons this time.
It’s pitch black and Yelena shakes her head to get her eyes to adjust to the dark. She takes a deep breath and remembers all of the training that they made her do while blindfolded. She barely stumbles as she makes her way to the door, a gun in hand.
It’s eerily quiet. There’s usually some hum or whir that told Yelena that FRIDAY was protecting the tower. There’s nothing right now.
She shuffles her way toward the stairs and only hesitates for a moment about where to go.
There were no orders. No missions. She didn’t know what to do.
She goes up. She sticks to the wall and railing as she quietly makes her way up toward the top of the tower. She knew there was a power source in Tony’s lab that he could easily reach. She decided to go there first to check.
She freezes when she hears someone else shuffling and aims her gun at them moments before Wanda’s red magic dimly lit up the room and the two slump in relief at seeing each other.
“Natasha?” Yelena whispers to her when Wanda nears. Wanda shrugs her shoulders and Yelena frowns.
Yelena presses her back against Wanda’s to cover her and the pair continue to make their way upstairs, Wanda’s magic just barely lighting the way.
There’s a man that was covering the stairs and pulls a gun to shoot them. Wanda doesn’t hesitate, her magic lashing out and snapping his neck. Yelena catches the body, lowering it quietly to the floor as she pats him down for information. Her whole body still hurt from her fight with James.
“What are you doing?” Wanda hissed at her as Yelena shoves a finger into his mouth.
“Give me some light,” Yelena hissed back, grabbing Wanda’s wrist to pull her down next to her. Wanda does, annoyance and confusion on her face.
Yelena’s finger runs along his gum line until she feels his back molar. Yup. There we go. A false tooth filled with cyanide.
“He’s Hydra,” Yelena whispers, pulling her finger from his mouth and wiping it on her pants.
“That was disgusting and I hope you don’t make it a habit to shove your fingers into dead people’s mouths,” Wanda whispers back.
“Hydra got the slip on us. They’re here in the tower,” Yelena said, closing her eyes and taking a few deep breaths. “We need to make it to the lab to turn on the power first.”
“Shouldn’t we find the others first?” Wanda asks as she frowns.
As much as Yelena desperately wanted to find her sister, they would have to hold out on their own for a little bit longer. Yelena needed to get the power on so that FRIDAY could lockdown and send out a security breach alert.
Wanda’s eight years older than her but she listens to Yelena, looking unsure and frightened at the whole thing. She looks toward Yelena to guide her.
So Yelena does. She takes charge and they continue their way up. They encounter four more soldiers, Yelena taking out three of them and Wanda dealing with the fourth.
They finally make their way toward Tony’s lab and Yelena’s heart skips a beat when she sees Tony slumped over his workbench. She darts toward him quickly, reaching her fingers out to search for a pulse.
It’s weak and thready but it’s there. He’s only been knocked out.
That meant that they had slipped by everyone and targeted Tony first. He never even had a chance to put his suit on.
“There should be a false panel in one of these walls,” Yelena whispers to Wanda, starting to run her fingers over the walls. “We need to find it.”
The two of them grope around the walls in the dark in search of the false panel that Yelena knew about.
Wanda finds it and Yelena uses her knife to slide between the crevice that the false panel had against the true wall. She pries the panel off of the wall and takes a look at the mess of wires, taking a deep breath.
She’s never been very good at technology but with her mind under their control, Yelena could be taught anything without needing to understand it. These wires in front of her spark some memory that she’s trying not to get lost in because Wanda really needed her in the present.
She reaches out and uses her knife to cut through two of the wires.
“What are you doing?” Wanda whispers, panic in her tone.
“Turning the power back on,” Yelena replies only for gunshots to echo off the walls a few floors away. Yelena flinches, wanting nothing more than to turn and search and help whoever was being shot at. But she couldn’t. She needed to do this.
“I need electrical tape,” Yelena tells Wanda. “Can you find some? It’ll look like a roll of regular tape but it should be black.”
Wanda nods, leaving Yelena by the panel as Yelena strips the ends of the wires that she cut.
Wanda returns and passes her the roll when she finds it. Yelena binds the two new wires together and hesitates before cutting another pair of wires.
She really hopes that Tony wasn’t going to be mad at her for doing this.
She moves to push the two new wires together after crossing them and gets a quick jolt of electricity sent up her arm that makes her yelp. She quickly tapes those together. “I need to get to the main power source. In the basement.” Yelena tells Wanda.
“We’re a long way from the basement!” Wanda points out ever so helpfully.
“I know that,” Yelena hissed, her heart pounding because Wanda was counting on her.
More gunshots ring out and Yelena glances at Tony still slumped over the bench. She had to leave him behind unprotected.
Or did she?
“I’ll get a move on down there,” Yelena said. “I need you to stay here with Tony in case whoever is firing off weapons makes their way in here.”
“I’m not leaving you!” Wanda protests as Yelena roots around in Tony’s tools for a flashlight. Yelena does not celebrate when she finds a headlamp that she could use and keep her hands free but she gratefully straps it to her head.
“This isn’t about what you want. This isn’t about what I want. This is about what needs to happen,” Yelena tells her, turning to glance at her. “It’ll be okay.”
“You don’t know that,” Wanda looks worried. “What will I tell Natasha? She’ll kill me if she finds out that I let you wander away when I had you by my side.”
“She’ll understand,” Yelena said firmly. Yelena couldn’t let feelings get in the way here. “I’ll tell her myself that it was my idea.”
Wanda stares at her before reaching out to grip Yelena’s shoulders. “Be safe.” She gives Yelena a small shake. “Don’t do anything stupid. Don’t die.”
Yelena couldn’t promise that. She couldn’t swear that because she wasn’t sure. But Wanda looks like she might pass out from the worry and stress so Yelena smiles at her.
“I won’t,” She said, reaching up to briefly set her hands onto Wanda’s forearms that were on her shoulders. “You do the same, yeah?”
She doesn’t expect Wanda to pull her against her chest in a hug. “Be careful.”
Yelena pats Wanda’s back before pulling away, grinning up at her. “I always am.”
Wanda lets out a soft snort of laughter because that was not true and they both knew it.
Yelena turns, reaching up to flick the switch on the headlamp and make her way out. “I’ll see you soon.”
Then she slips out the door and back toward the stairs.