My Little Archer § Kate Bishop §

Prolouge

*2012*

Ten year old Larisa Orlova was walking home from her best friend Kate Bishop's house when a large hole magically appeared in the sky and a massive alien spaceship flew through it, with several smaller ships following. Panic rose through the streets of New York and Lara frantically started looking around for shelter. There were no open shops around her that served as a protective building so she started running, trying to make it home, it was the only place she could think of where she'd feel safe.

She ran, as fast as she could, dodging all the panicked and freaked out people blocking her path. And just as she reached her apartment complex she stopped, panting as one of the bigger alien ships crashed into the large building, destroying most of it, and she yelled out, crying. Her parents were dead. She knew it. The place where she had lived half of her life, was completely gone. Her legs lost all strength as she collapsed onto the pavement. She was crying uncontrollably and no one even noticed because of the attack. She didn't care about anything in that moment, so she just sat there, on the ground, with her knees up to her chest, face planted down, not really caring if something happened to her too.

But nothing did. She just sat there, exhausted. And after what seemed like forever, she eventually fell asleep.

She didn't know how long she slept. The only thing she did know, was that when she woke up, she wasn't on the crowded, panicked streets of New York. She was on a plane, hands tied up and a blindfold over her eyes. Lara could hear the men around her speaking Russian, but she couldn't really make out the words because A. they were talking so fast and B. she was so tired that their speaking was a bit muffled. And her Russian had dulled after spending five years almost only speaking English.

She was so tired, and still in shock after the recent events, that she didn't truly realise that she had been kidnapped. The plane landed, maybe an hour or two after she woke up, and one of the men there picked her up and once they got off the plane she could feel the cold wind blow on her face. The man put her down on the soft dirt ground, so she was sitting on her knees, before taking her blindfold off and then untying her hands.

She blinked quickly, squinting to adjust her eyes to the blinding light flushing over her. She noticed a man she thought looked familiar, standing a little away from her along with a young woman. She had blonde hair, a bit darker than her own, which was tied up in a high ponytail. Lara's memories from her years in Russia started to come back to her, and the man was definitely a part of that life.

"Lara Orlova. It has been a long time since i last saw you." The man spoke slowly in Russian, so she could understand him. "Do you understand me?" He asked, and she nodded in response. "Good. Do you remember me?" He asked her and she tilted her head slightly. "Barely." She replied in Russian before talking in English. "Why am I back here?" As the man looked at her, she swore she could see a glimpse of empathy flash over the woman's face next to him, before her neutral poker face was back. "Well, your parents dead, it's a great loss for red room, but we now get you. You continue your training here, with Yelena." The man spoke broken and heavily accented English as he gestured to the woman next to him. "Since you have not say my name, i assume you don't remember it. I am general Dreykov, leader of red room." Lara wasn't sure how she felt about this whole situation, but she didn't really remember anything good from her time in Russia, the only time she could remember when she actually felt happy, was when her parents said they were leaving. Lara had a feeling that she wouldn't be leaving anytime soon.