Natasha had to know more. Fury was already pressuring her for information, elusive information.
That's what led her to the docks at midnight, tailing a figure moving through the shadows, suspected to be one of Stark's secret operatives. She kept her distance, watching, waiting. The figure moved with precision, experience.
Then they stopped.
Natasha crouched behind a stack of crates, heart pounding as she readied herself. But before she could make a move, the figure spoke without turning around.
"You're sloppy."
Natasha barely had time to react before Yelena Belova spun, striking fast and hard. Natasha dodged, countering with a kick that Yelena deflected. The two clashed in a blur of precise strikes, neither holding back.
"Should've left this alone, Natalia." Yelena taunted, twisting away from a punch.
"Yelena?" Natasha shot back despite being shocked to see her adopted sister, sweeping Yelena's legs.
Yelena recovered instantly, smirking. "You always did love to follow orders."
Natasha lunged again, but Yelena blocked, then suddenly stepped back. Instead of pressing forward, she turned and ran.
A trap.
Natasha hesitated only a second before chasing her into the darkness and later arrived into an old, seemingly abandoned warehouse.
Her instincts screamed at her to stop, but she had come too far. She stepped inside, gun raised.
The lights flickered on.
She was surrounded.
A dozen figures stood around her, weapons in hand, their faces unreadable. At the center of them stood Melina Vostokoff, watching Natasha with a knowing gaze.
"We've been expecting you." Melina said smoothly.
"You set this up." Natasha stiffened as realization dawned to her about what happened to the remaining assassins of the Red Room.
Yelena smirked. "Had to get you here somehow."
Natasha's grip on her weapon tightened, but Melina took a step forward. "If we wanted to kill you, you'd be dead already."
Natasha looked around at the Aegis Protocol agents, their silent presence making the hairs on her arms rise. "Then what do you want?"
The silence in the warehouse stretched, thick with unspoken tension. Natasha Romanoff stood at the center of a storm she had unknowingly stepped into, her muscles taut, eyes scanning every face surrounding her. The Aegis Protocol agents, their weapons holstered but within reach, were not ordinary operatives. She could tell from their stance, from the quiet discipline in their movements, that these were professionals. Seeing some familiar faces, she could guess they came from the same origin, same as her.
Melina Vostokoff stepped forward, her expression impassive. "You followed the trail we left for you, Natalia. You always were relentless."
Natasha's grip on her sidearm tightened, but she didn't raise it. "You set me up."
Yelena scoffed, arms crossed over her chest. "Had to. You wouldn't have listened otherwise."
"Stand down, everyone." Melina ordered the other agents then turned to Natasha, "Follow me."
Melina walked towards an empty room. Natasha who was on still alert, followed while Yelena walked behind her.
Upon entering, the silence between them was heavy, filled with memories unspoken. Natasha Romanoff, Yelena Belova, and Melina Vostokoff stood, the tension lingering like the ghost of a past none of them fully understood.
In the past, they had played their roles for years—a mother, two daughters, a father who was now absent. The Ohio mission had been simple on paper. Establish deep cover, infiltrate American defense program run by Hydra under the pretense of being SHIELD, then relay critical intelligence back to the Red Room. But what had been an assignment for the adults had turned into something much more for the children. For Natasha and Yelena, it had been the only semblance of a real family they had ever known.
"We spent three years in Ohio," Melina finally broke the silence, her voice softer than Natasha remembered.
Natasha added, "Three years pretending."
Yelena scoffed, crossing her arms. "Was it really pretending?"
Natasha took a breath, trying to suppress the emotions clawing their way up. "It was a mission," she said, but the words tasted like a lie. "We were assigned to each other. It wasn't real."
Yelena turned to her, her jaw tight. "Maybe for you, it wasn't."
Melina sighed, rubbing her forehead. "I knew you'd also feel this way." She remembered when she had this very same talk shortly with Yelena after Tony destroyed the Red Room.
Natasha's eyes narrowed. "Feel what way?"
"That you were abandoned. That what we had was nothing." Melina said. "But it wasn't nothing, Natasha. Not to any of us. Or at least, not to me."
A long pause stretched between them. Natasha wanted to fight it, to dismiss the warmth that had existed in their shared history. But she couldn't. The bedtime stories, the dinners, the quiet moments of comfort, they hadn't been fabricated, not entirely. And that was the worst part.
"You left us," Natasha whispered. "We were taken back, ripped apart. And you let it happen."
Melina's gaze was unreadable. "I had no choice."
Yelena let out a bitter laugh. "There's always a choice."
Another silence. Then, Yelena reached into her pocket and pulled out a crumpled photograph. Natasha recognized it immediately. A faded picture of the four of them in Ohio, standing in front of a battered station wagon. A snapshot of a lie that had felt more real than anything else in their lives.
"We were a family," Yelena murmured. "Even if it was just for a little while."
Natasha hesitated, then took the photo. Her fingers brushed against the worn edges, memories flashing through her mind. For years, she had locked those feelings away, buried them beneath duty and necessity, living her life to make amends for what she did. But standing here, in the presence of the only people who had ever come close to being family, it was harder to keep them hidden.
She exhaled, slowly lowering her walls. Just a little.
"What now?" Natasha finally asked.
Melina's lips curled into a knowing smile. "That depends on you, dorogaya."
Yelena smirked. "You already walked into the lion's den. Might as well see where it leads."
Natasha glanced between them. Trust was a fragile thing, and hers had been shattered too many times to count. But for the first time in years, she wasn't entirely sure where she stood.
Maybe, just maybe, she wasn't standing alone.
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