The escapee - Marvel

Chapter 59 - The red room

Seven was overly blunt on purpose. Ariadne considered her words.

"Like you?" Seven held her inquisitive stare for a moment, turning her words over in her head.

"Like my mother." 

Aria stepped back, raising both hands and the two continued to train, using the small space in their cell as well as possible. 

Seven had felt the shift in the atmosphere the past few days. She felt it when she woke up, when she trained, when she ate, when she lay awake late at night with only her thoughts to occupy her racing mind. A sense of competition and determination was festering in the red room and seven had felt it in her core at first, stewing until it bubbled up and spread through her body and into her bones.

The other girls were trying harder, pushing themselves. Each training session brought more unfamiliar faces, hardened features, and silent stares. People knew who she was now, or the person she was pretending to be, daring herself to become. 

Seven had taken to thinking of her mother when her own confidence wasn't enough. What Natasha would do in each situation, how would she handle it? It hadn't helped when one of the trainers had called out "Romanova" when she had slipped during ballet and almost faltered. She didn't think that anyone had noticed, but they had. 

After her trainer called her name people began to realise who she was and who she was therefore related to. She had been expecting sneers and torment but instead, she had received respectful solitude, hushed whispers quieting down when she walked past, her four-year-old shadow often trailing not far behind. They would even scramble out the way so they could avoid having to be paired up to fight with her.

Although the respect was nice, she felt undeserving of it. It wasn't her legacy she was relying on, her mother was a god to these children, an idol they were supposed to strive to be. She didn't want to be using her mother as a way to intimidate them, they should be intimidated by her own skill set. It also didn't help that the only friend she made was younger than both the formation of one direction and their president being elected. 

Aria was tough for a four-year-old but she was still the youngest there, and now more and more people were being brought in, the red room would be looking for weaknesses. People they could dispose of. The child had to show that she was an asset to the red room, she could be someone who could do what others couldn't. 

Seven wanted to refine her stamina and therefore sparring practice was the best way to do it. If Aria could maintain her stamina she could spring up and down, and weave between those taller than her whilst maintaining her cover. If she could go unnoticed then she could be considered an asset which might just keep her alive. 

When the two girls finally lay down to sleep Aria was gone immediately, her quiet snores filling the silence. Seven watched the sun begin to rise by watching the soft yellow light trail down the corridor through their cell bars. If she listened really hard she was able to hear the birds chirping outside, ready for the day. The birds never were close enough for her to decipher what species they were, knowing that if they got too close a guard might shoot them for fun. Sometimes the gunshot would pull her back from her daydreams, or very occasionally they would wake her from her sleep. 

Seven didn't want to allow herself to think of her family ever, but when she was alone at night she had nothing else to think of. She missed them all so much and if she thought too long then her heart would begin to hurt. 

Natasha's voice and calming touch.

 Tony, Clint, and Sam's jokes, being at school with Peter, Bruce's science facts, Bucky and Steve's training sessions, Vision's complete lack of understanding of social cues, Pepper's food, Thor's random visits, Happy's complete disdain for picking her and Peter from school every day, and Wanda's company.