Surrogacy has been around since 1985. And for the past 3 decades that's how the Red Room has added to their ranks. By taking genetically chosen embryos and paying women all over the world to be their surrogates in giving birth to the next generation...
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2008 - The Red Room Academy
They say God does things for good reasons. But what good reason would he have to put us through this? I've been here for over a year now. But it feels like I've been here longer. I've seen more death than a normal kid like me should see.
Most of the kids from my orphanage were no longer here. Dead. Didn't survive training or any of the procedures they did to us. I would like to say that I survived for a reason. But the longer I'm here the less reason I find. Everything was terrifying.
The place we were in called themselves the red room. They have made us completely abandon the language any of us grew up in. From the moment we were taken we were only allowed to speak in their native tongue, Russian.
There were plenty of other girls my age here. All different races, ethnicities. They didn't care where we were from, just as long as we did whatever they told us to.
The old man who greeted me when we first arrived, General Dreykov, the big boss here, said we were all family here.
And I know I've never been in a family, but this is not what I had in mind. Families should protect each other and always have each other's back. Not this.
Dreykov had a daughter, Antonia. She was a little older than me, but she was nice unlike her father. Word spread quickly through the Academy. Antonia was dead.
Someone had killed her trying to get to her father. While I would miss Antonia, I would have liked it if her father had also gone down.
Back in the orphanage, cockroaches were impossible to kill. They were everywhere, multiplying faster than we could ever get adopted. Dreykov was no different. He was a disgusting, slimy, cockroach.
Madame B, otherwise known as the most terrifying woman I have ever met, watches as we do our ballet. It was only 13 of us. All girls my age. I didn't know why they made us learn ballet, I used to want to learn, but now, the way they're making us learn I hated it. My bones ached the next morning, and my hair hurt from how tight they had pulled our hair up into buns.
Madame B blows her whistle which makes us stop. When General Dreykov enters the room, we go silent. Keeping our arms to our sides and we proceed to stand in a row.
Dreykov was burned, no doubt from his near-death experience today. He doesn't say anything to us, approaching Madame B. They talk in whispers. But by the way Madame B paused to look at us, look at me. It certainly wasn't good.
THIRD PERSON POV
"Natalia?" Madame B questioned and was confused at what Dreykov had told her. "I thought she was killed by the shield operative."
Dreykov shakes his head. "Unfortunately. He recruited her." Dreykov was angry. Angry at Natasha Romanoff. Angry at SHIELD. They had taken his most successful black widow and turned her into one of them.
After everything Dreykov had done for Natasha, this is how she repays him. By trying to assassinate him through his daughter. He had never had to worry about this kind of thing before, because no widow had ever betrayed him. But now it was time to consider a change.
"It's time the red room lay low." Dreykov told Madame B. "If SHIELD thinks we are out of business I say we let them believe it."
"What about the girls?" Madame B asked. "Keep on training. And when this all blows over, I want you to visit our operatives in the state and shut down the proxy program." Madame B blinked back surprised. "Shutdown the program?" The Proxy Program, otherwise known as the surrogacy ship. They had facilities in every continent.
With women thinking they were giving a happy couple a chance at parenthood. When in reality those children would just be shipped off to orphanages till, they were of age to be taken back to the Red Room.
Some of those girls were standing in that very room. They all had fake names, they had to make sure the children would never find out about their relationship with any of the other widows. Only a certain number of people in the red room knew about the true nature of these children. Madame B being one of them.
Dreykov nods. "We have to lay low for now. But in the meantime, I want you to send Nikolina to the lab."
Madame B frowns. "Whatever for?"
Dreykov nearly scowls, closing his hand into a fist. "Melina has completed the neurological agent. It's time to use it." He didn't think he would use the Agent unless he had a widow that didn't comply with the Red Room.
But now with Natasha Romanoff out there, having betrayed their family he needs to make sure that the others didn't get the same idea.
Madame B nods and looks to spot Nikolina, Nina, looking back at them along with the other girls. "Of course." Madame B didn't know half of the reason why Dreykov had chosen Nina to be the first test subject. But then again, she didn't know what he knew.
