Giving me to you

April

Budapest was not like any city Aria had ever seen, Natalia saw it in her eyes.

Aria merged in with the atmosphere, her kind smile as she bought fruits from the stands, the greeting she utters to neighbours, the quiet peacefulness that seems to settle around her, making others willing to approach her and smile, to which she smiles back.

Aria was like a wilting flower who had finally seen the sun, and was beginning to live, beginning to thrive. Unlike Natalia and the Black Widows, who have to pretend, to disguise themselves to fit in, Aria did it as if she has spent her whole life in Budapest.

It made Natalia wonder. It was as if staying in the Red Room itself was killing the girl, who now looks slightly healthier, still thin and pale, yet there was a blush on her cheeks, and her eyes were bright with excitement, brighter than they have ever been. It made Natalia jealous, yet of what, she wasn't sure.

Perhaps, it was the distance that the city created, between her and Aria, or perhaps it was the fact that Aria was clean, with no blood on her hands, free to enjoy the world as it is in the eyes of the innocent.

Natalia was uncomfortable in the sun. She was an assassin, doing her job with little regret, yet there was always a nag of conscience when she walked down the sunlit streets.

Look at these people, they maybe the next ones you kill....

She could almost see them turning to her on the streets, their faces moulding into the faces which she killed. Some were young, some old, some were important figures, and others were merely in the way of her mission. She could perhaps have saved a few, yet at the time, it did not matter to her.

"Look at me," a young boy stepped forwards, he was a son of her target, caught in an explosion. He was innocent, and dead by her hands. "Look at what you've done. There will be no escape."

"Who is going to join us next?" A young woman stepped forwards, she was an agent, newly graduated, on her first mission. Shot in the temple. "Who else are you going to kill now?"

"The girl who you are on a mission with, your sister, your family." A man this time, with kind eyes, who offered to help her find her way around a city that she went on her mission to. He was under a collapsed building crushed by rocks the next time Natalia saw him. "Would you kill them too, if that was your orders, would you hesitate?"

"I have family to go back to." A wail, yet from who Natalia did not see. "My son is waiting for me, back home."

""My wife, she's pregnant, we were going to receive our first child."

"My father, you killed my father. Murderer!"

"I want to go home. It's all your fault, all your fault..."

They crowded her, approached her, their hands grabbed her by the arm, the legs, by the hem of her shirt, pulling her down into a crowd of hands and bodies and bones, their wounds ripped open in front of her eyes. Blood, the sickly sweet metallic scent of blood, its warm feel, its stickiness. It was smeared on to her, along with cries and wails and pleas and angry shouts. She was drowning... Slowly...

Natalia started as she felt a small, cold hand touch her brow. Her eyelids fluttered open, her chest heaving, her emerald eyes meeting with Aria's, wide open with panic. The younger girl pursed her lips, lowering her gaze, and after a few moments of hesitation, choked out, "I.. It seemed that you were having an nightmare..."

"Thank you." Natalia rasped back, her voice sounded as if she has not had a drink of water for months.

Aria turned, her cheeks slightly pink, quickly pacing to one of the shopping bags she brought back. "I... uh... There are some scented candles here, which should help with sleep."

Natalia studied Aria as the girl had her back turned to her. She was small, long legged and long armed, but short for her age. She was like a rabbit more than a snake, Natalia thought, nose quivering, as curious as she was afraid, one false move and she scurries back to her burrow.

Natalia found herself trying to suppress a smile as she took the scented candle from Aria's hand, peering at the label, "Chamomile Lavender?"

The blush traveled up the girl's cheeks to her ears. "I..."

"I'll try it tonight, thank you." Natalia, pleased to see the girl blushing and fumbling with her fingers for some reason that she herself did not know, put the candle in her pocket.

Aria seemed to let out a breath of relief.

"You are scared of me?" Natalia stood, leaning closer so that she could see Aria's eye lashes, bending down slightly so they were looking at each other at eye level. She was fully enjoying teasing the girl, and was even more amused as the girl, seeming to shrink under her, stutter for an excuse.

"I..."

"As mission partners," Natalia stepped forwards as Aria stepped back. "We are obliged to work with each other. We will be easily exposed if you shy away from me."

"Sorry... I"

"So you better get to know me, Aria"

Natalia decided that she liked the name. It was song like, at the tip of her tongue. "Because tomorrow, we start our hunt for Barton."