D A R K

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Guys I'm working on being more descriptive as my one shots don't allow me to do that. 

THEN, 1992

"What is a weakness?" Madame's voice did not waver, she was made of marble after all.

"Friends" Elizaveta spoke too gently, she wasn't going to make it in the Red Room if she kept this up.

"A family?" Anastasia spoke calmly and confidently, she was supposed to make it. They had expected her to. The harsh winter of Russia got to her first before any knife could.

"Love.", it was Natalia's turn to answer. Madame B smiled, if you could call that dark grin a smile, she was going to shape Natalia into the perfect little student. She wasn't as good as Anastasia, but she followed close behind.

Natalia had not felt love before, it was a foreign subject to her. It wasn't conceivable at first, how could someone care about someone that much? To put your own life on the line for someone else

Three Years Later, 1995

The harsh sunlight was beating down on the desolate landscape, and the silence of the open space only amplified the growing guilt in her stomach. She was going to lose them, lose them all.  She watched as the officials, dressed in stern, impersonal uniforms, led Yelena away. They were grabbing her arm tightly, Natasha knew it was going to bruise.

She couldn't lose her. She was hers and hers only.

The way Yelena's infectious laughter could make even the darkest days feel lighter, how they would play in the garden and catch dragon flies. She wanted to go back to Ohio, to sit on the front porch with a jar of glowing creatures buzzing around. To be anywhere but here.

"slezai s nee! slezai s nee!" (get off her! get off her!), she shouted, kicking one of the men and grabbing his gun in one swift motion. Yelena tucked away behind her. Not quite safe, but safer than before.

"ya boudou strelyat! nay trogay eye! ya boudou strelyat!" (I will shoot! Don't touch her! I will shoot!".  A fire burned within her that day on the airstrip, a fire that would fuel her rage for eternity. She couldn't stop them. And just like that, they both fell into a dreamless sleep. The drugs swimming in their systems keeping them calm, allowing to think it was a dream. That they would wake up in Ohio, in their colourful bedrooms and not an unknown location in a cold and damp shipping container.

Love really was for children.

Ten Years Later, 2005

 The night was shrouded in darkness as Natalia Romonova, the Black Widow, stood perched on the rooftop of a nondescript building in the heart of a sprawling, rain-soaked city.  Her heart was steady, however the pressure of the mission did not feel heavy. A simple collect and retrieve. There won't be any red on her ledger tonight.

The entry point to the building was well-guarded, and Natalia couldn't afford to be detected. Madame B would make an example out of her again. She moved like a whisper, incapacitating guards one by one, leaving them unconscious in her wake.  

But nothing was ever simple, Natalia Romononva had never been fortunate.

There she was, a child with freely flowing blonde hair playing in what seemed to be her mother's office. It wasn't Yelena, she reminded herself, She'd be sixteen by now. Oh, so close to her Graduation ceremony.

The guilt washed over Natalia like a relentless tide. She had been older, more experienced, and she should have been able to shield Yelena from the horrors of the Red Room. But she had failed. How could she allow that to happen? Yelena was her sister, her responsibility. The memory of Yelena's cries, her teddy clutched ever so tightly in her hands. Her pleas for help that had gone unanswered, and it tormented Natasha to her core.