Always Okay ─ n. romanoff ✓

fourteen

FOR A secret hideout built into a bridge Sasha had never seen before, this place had a lot of assorted rooms. Her arm now freshly bandaged and her new clothes free of blood, she needed a separate place to think. Everything had been happening so quickly, one big event after another, and in all of that mess, no one had taken the time to step back and examine it. But Sasha was a thinker before she was anything else. She had been beaten, tortured, and extorted into becoming a fighter, a killer, a liar, but she had been born a thinker, and no matter how hard people pushed her into being a monster, she would always have to turn it over in her head a few thousand times before pulling the trigger.

In the middle of an empty room, Sasha took a seat. She could see the walls turning as she sat still, a kaleidoscope of the many colors of starvation that were somewhere inside her. She squeezed her eyes shut and rubbed her temples. The fight took her problems and amplified them by ten times, so she felt even worse than before.

"Just a few more days," Sasha muttered to herself, and as off-kilter as she was, her heart was slamming with excitement. She had gone for twenty-four hours without eating once, and that in itself had been a high up until she ate again. The adrenaline that shot through her veins when she realized that it had been almost thirty hours was thrilling, so thrilling she nearly stood up and ran around the whole facility. But she refused to ignore the nagging question in her head that begged to be answered: who was the girl she fought earlier?

Ever since their visit to the military base earlier in the day, it had been bothering Sasha that all of the articles that flashed on the screen were proof of Hydra murdering someone. All of them but Alexandra Carter's. It was a long shot, but if that girl was enhanced like Steve, it would explain everything. Why else would Hydra care about Alexandra? She wasn't getting in their way, as far as Sasha knew, nor was she a threat to their ideal society. There had to be a reason she disappeared, a reason why Hydra wanted her, and Sasha was willing to bet that was it. Maybe Alexandra's DNA was how they made Bucky into a super soldier.

"Sasha Rushman."

Sasha jerked to attention, turning around to see Nick Fury standing in the doorway.

"Nicholas," she answered. "What brings you here?"

"The fact that someone let their idiot kid run around the facility. I didn't want her getting into any trouble."

"I appreciate it." Sasha glared at him. Part of her wanted to correct him for referring to her as Natasha's kid, but she didn't really mind.

Fury walked over to another chair and pulled it up to Sasha's. He took a seat next to her.

"So why are you in here all alone?" he asked.

"I'm just thinking." Suddenly, her head snapped in his direction. "Do you happen to know anything about Alexandra Carter? The director's daughter?"

Fury sighed.

"Bits and pieces, mostly secondhand information. I've read her file. Everyone has. She's gone now, so it's basically public property inside S.H.I.E.L.D." He chuckled. "Well, Hydra."

"Was she...like Steve?" Sasha asked. "A superhuman, I mean."

Fury nodded. "As far as I know, she was. Why?"

"There was this woman when we were fighting on the highway," Sasha explained. "When I fought her, she seemed like she might have been enhanced somehow, but I didn't really think anything of it until I started thinking about this old S.H.I.E.L.D. headquarters. That scientist, Arnim Zola, he showed us all these articles about Hydra interfering with S.H.I.E.L.D. Killing Howard and Maria Stark, killing you...but when the article with Alexandra Carter's name came up on the screen, it only said she disappeared. There had to be a reason she wasn't just killed. What if they took her to use her to create a new serum? It might explain how Bucky Barnes is suddenly a super soldier."

"I doubt it." Fury shrugged. "But I've learned over the years that if you say something, it's probably right somehow."

He slowly pushed himself off of the chair before gesturing for Sasha to come with him. She obeyed, following him back to the room where everyone else was sitting. Natasha smiled softly when she saw Sasha.

"Hey. You missed the party."

"Oh, did I?" Sasha chucklec. "How nice of you to come and get me after you went over everything. Again."

"I know how you get." Natasha rolled her eyes, but she was still smiling. "I figured it was better to give you a minute. Besides, I highly doubt you're going to listen to the plan anyway."

Sasha made finger guns in Natasha's direction.

"Correct." She took a seat. "So what's the plan?"

"We have to stop Hydra's Helicarriers from reaching three thousand feet and becoming weaponized," Steve said. "We have to replace their targeting blades with these."

He gestured to a black case. Sasha nodded.

"Cool, cool. So does anyone know where I can get some swords?"

"I'm sure we can find something," Maria said as she crossed her arms. Sasha started to speak, but she stopped when she began to feel as if there was a tornado blowing through her skull. She faltered, stepping a few times without looking where she was going. Natasha grabbed her wrist. Sasha wrenched her arm away. Sam and Steve looked at each other cluelessly before leaving the room, and Fury and Maria did so as well. Now only Nat and Sasha were left. Natasha pointed to an empty chair.

"Sit," she ordered. Sasha did.

"Did I do something?" she asked. Natasha looked at her, eyes suddenly stormy.

"The problem is what you haven't been doing."

Desperate to keep up the façade, Sasha snorted.

"You know that's not true. You have seen me eat. I just haven't had anything to drink in a while. I didn't have a chance to get any water earlier. My mouth feels like it's full of cotton."

"I want to believe you, but I don't." Natasha's face was pale as porcelain, ready to shatter on the floor. "Tell me the truth: when was the last time you ate?"

"At Sam's house, this morning!" Sasha yelled. "Are you saying you don't trust me? You don't even trust me. Fantastic."

"Sasha, I didn't say that."

"It was implied." She stormed off, her legs shaking and her stomach turning. She hated herself for that display, for manipulating Natasha, for lying, but she couldn't make herself tell the truth. She suddenly began to gag, but there was nothing left inside her stomach. Sasha ran into the nearest empty room, making sure there was no one else around before letting a wrangled sob escape her mouth. She fell to the ground, pulling her knees up to her chest. Just a few more days.