Bad Bitch ⋙ N.Romanoff

f o u r

BAD BITCH
❝these were the women who knitted pain into glory❞

04. Old men Taste Like Little Girls

January 2003

Natalia Romanova wasn't sure she'd ever seen her look so beautiful. The younger girl definitely held a certain classic type of beauty about her which was undeniable even at the expense of the blind, but it was usually shrouded by the darkness that tended to follow disasters like Svetlana and it had taken Natalia by surprise. The way she was dressed was far different from her usual style, along with the soft curls that were placed on her head of hair like a halo, and it was the first time she'd ever seen the girl's skin without it being coated thick with red fluids.
The dress she'd been given had been something akin to the ballet dresses they'd both once worn. It was white, purer than either of their young souls, but seemed to fade to a dull grey as Natalia stare lingered to it. The concrete room they were waiting in was visibly stripping the beauty from the girl in front of Natalia but there was little she could try to do. Svetlana seemed quiet as they waited for the men to collect her. Her usual silent demeanour was nothing short of comfort yet, as the lights above their heads flickered and buzzed audibly, Natalia couldn't help but feel as though the lack of words were less to do with reputation and more to do with hesitance.

Natalia didn't know what they were awaiting but she had a sick feeling in her stomach that she couldn't ignore. She'd been taught to reflect her actions on her own personal instinct and at that moment, as she stared at the grungy mirror consuming the whole wall in front of them, she felt the sudden need to spring into action. She felt the overwhelming need to take Svetlana to safety.
It was a gut instinct that Natalia had never experienced before. During the three long years they'd spent in combat together, Svetlana had always been the toughest out of the pair. Natalia had always been the one who was in need of aid and it had never seemed to occurr to the elder of the pair that Svetlana would have a weakness. Yet, seeing the girl in the dirty white dress stare at her feet in conflicted confusion, Natalia finally saw that Svetlana was as far from safety as could be humanly possible.
She'd simply been ordered to stay with Svetlana and to stay silent until she was needed but, despite the conditioning she'd experienced since she were a small girl, she had an urge to disobey.
Disobedience was not tolerated in the KGB. Just simple thoughts of disobedience could leave her as another corpse that Madame B cleaned up from the pile. The thoughts scared Natalia, short and simple, but the thought of Svetlana in danger scared her more.

❝Where are they going to take you?❞
Natalia whispered in her native tongue, staring directly at the mirror in hopes of meeting the younger girl's eyes, and waited as her breath hitched in anticipation. Svetlana still didn't look up, choosing instead to square her shoulders in a desperate attempt at appearing brave, and ignored Natalia completely.
It had been Svetlana's birthday, Natasha would remember, that day and she'd planned to give the girl her present that evening. It had only been a small gift, just a small show of her alliance to her, but was enough to have gotten them both in enormous amounts of trouble. Food had been rationed, after all, and spending months saving credits, skipping meals in order to do so, to buy a present for another individual was a dangerously close mannerism to friendship. Friendships were not tolerated in the KGB.