Clint landed the jet in the landing zone of the Avengers Tower and looked at Yelena, she had been quiet for the entirety of the ride after Clint explained what really happened on Vormir.
"We're here."
They got up from their seats and made their way to the entrance. They were immediately greeted FRIDAY asking for identification.
"Clint Barton."
"Access granted, welcome back Mr. Barton." The A.I. projected as the door unlocked for the two of them. They walked through the halls until they found themselves in a giant meeting room, with a holographic table in the center and tons of tech in every corner of the room.
The sound of their footsteps caught the attention of everyone in the room; Steve, Sam, Bucky, Bruce, Peter Parker and a few SHIELD agents. They all turned their heads and were immediately confused by Yelena's presence. Steve looked at Yelena for a bit, taking in all her features before turning to Clint.
"Barton, is this...?"
"Avengers, Yelena Belova; Yelena, Avengers. She's Nat's sister." He said quietly looking down at the ground, trying his best not to be awkward.
Steve's, along with everyone else's eyes widened with confusion at the new information. "I'm sorry, 'sister'?"
"What!? Natasha doesn't have a sister." Bucky chimed in, sounding skeptical of Yelena.
"Come on man, they don't even look alike." Sam added, looking at Clint.
"We're adopted, dipshit." Yelena glared at Sam with her arms crossed, which made him quiet down and pout like a puppy.
"Look I'll explain everything later, but for now we have a bigger issue to deal with." Clint told the group.
Banner stepped forward, looking at the cut on Clint's cheek. "Have something to do with that?" He gestured towards the cut and the bruises forming on Clint's face. "What the hell happened while you were gone?"
"Well, see, baby Widow here was trying to kill me and then this weird troll man came out of a portal with a few monsters and tried to kill us. Said his name was Harry Osborn-"
"Wait! Harry? I know him. He was my friend before he moved away, but his dad became a crazy maniac who tried to kill me. Don't remember him being a troll though." Peter piped in after listening quietly in the corner of the room.
"God, we need to find you better friends. Anyways he would've killed us but we made a run for it."
"Is that where that came from?" Bucky asked, gesturing towards the cut.
"Actually that was Yelena." Yelena gave him a small, sarcastic smile.
"Well I guess she really is Nat's sister. Only someone related to Nat would be able to get their hands on Barton." A sarcastic, foreign voice said out of the corner of the room.
Clint chuckled. "Yeah well, let's say their training was top tier and I'm out of practice."
"What the hell?" Yelena turned to see Tony at the end of the room looking down at a tablet. "You're supposed to be dead."
Tony lifted his head from the tablet and looked at her. Since the snap he had been working behind the scenes with the Avengers, building their tech and funding them, only going out to the field if it was absolutely necessary. "Well, technically I was, but you know Wakandan tech, basically brought me back to life." He then held up his metal arm. "Couldn't save the arm though, But it's fine this one makes opening pickle jars a hell of a lot easier." Yelena looked at him with cold eyes and said nothing.
Steve was staring into space when Sam turned to ask him a question. "Cap? What's our next move?"
Steve was snapped out of his thoughts. "Well if this guy was able to almost kill these two then it's safe to say that we have to deal with him immediately. Peter you can give us any information you have on him."
Peter nodded and Steve turned towards Yelena. "You know, we could use someone like you."
Tony stepped forward, towards Yelena. "Yeah we're kind of down a Russian spy at the moment. If only Nat told us sooner, I guess the whole triple imposter thing means you have to keep secrets from your team." He said in his Tony sarcasm, though not meaning to cause any offense.
"No." Yelena deadpanned and looked Tony in the eyes, glaring daggers at him.
The entire group stared at her in silence as she continued.
"At least my sister did something to try to help the world after the Snap. While all of you were too busy feeling bad for yourselves, Natasha was leading the Avengers... and you were doing what?" She looked straight at Tony with burning anger. "All of you abandoned her. You gave up" She looked specifically at Steve and Clint. "I won't help you."
"Yelena..." Clint started walking towards her.
"No! You know what?! My sister gave up everything for this world and for what?" She paused and looked around at all of them. "You know in the short time I've been in New York, I've seen the streets and buildings littered with tributes for the great Iron Man; news stories and art and music. The hero, who gave up his life to save half the universe and you're not even dead. But what about the Black Widow? She sacrificed her life not knowing whether or not you would win and yet no one appreciates her. You all act as if Iron Man was the only hero lost... she worked so hard to make things right, and nobody gave her the credit she deserved." She scoffed lightly. "The world didn't deserve Natasha... let it burn."
She looked at Clint one last time before turning on her heels to walk out the door. "And you-you're the worst of them all. You stand here pretending to be a hero, while the real hero is dead on a foreign planet, because she refused to let you die even when you deserved it. You didn't kill her, I see that now... but you are responsible for her death." She looked forward as Clint looked at the ground with a broken look on his face. "It should have been you." She said looking at the hall in front of her as she walked out of the room.
Steve called out to her, "Yelena."
"No."
He quickly ran after her, leaving his team in silence, to process what just happened. Tony moved towards Clint to put his hand on his shoulder, but he shook it off and walked out the room. Tony watched him leave, though he wouldn't show or admit it, he missed Natasha Romanoff too.
Bucky had said nothing the entire time, but the expression on his face said it all; he was angry. He ran out of the room and towards the training room, with Sam following closely behind him.
Sam got to the training room and saw Bucky using his metal arm to hurl the dumbbells across the room, then took a deep breath and put his right hand over his mouth. His eyes were wet with angry tears. Sam slowly approached him.
"Buck..."
"She's right, you know! Everyone acts as if Tony was the only one that made the ultimate sacrifice." He took in deep breaths as more tears began to fall down his cheek. "NATASHA DIED TO BRING US BACK AND SHE DOESN'T EVEN GET A PROPER BURIAL, MEANWHILE ALL OF US GET TO GO HOME AND CONTINUE LIVING!" He yelled with so much anger and frustration in his voice, as he turned his back towards Sam.
"I get it, Buck-" Sam said in a calm tone, trying to soothe his friend. They had gotten quite close since the final battle against Thanos, Sam was the one that Bucky went to when he needed to talk about his trauma.
"NO! YOU DON'T... you don't get any of it." He let out more tears of frustration and turned to look at Sam. "I loved her." He said in a broken voice. Sam knew full well what Bucky was talking about, ever since he found out Natasha died, he opened up to Sam about their time together in the Red Room when he was her trainer, though he kept it from Steve. Sam helped comfort him when he needed someone to talk to and knew that Bucky was still in love with her despite never saying it. Bucky had found a sort of peace about her death for a little bit, but hearing Yelena's words just reminded him of how broken up he was about her.
"I spent ninety years as the Winter Soldier. Ninety years of pain and suffering, and there was only one thing that made it all go away, one person that silenced the ghosts of the past. And now-now she's gone... and I'm still here. What am I supposed to do with that?"
Sam took a step towards him with a sad look. His heart broke for his friend.
"She moved on while I was in that icebox, I knew that. And I... I was okay with it... Because she was alive and happy... and she was still in my life." His voice cracked at the last part of his sentence. "I can't do this Sam, as the Winter Soldier I felt nothing, no emotions, no sadness, no pain... and now I feel nothing but pain and it is destroying me from the inside. And I-I don't know how to make it stop. How do I make it go away?"
Sam looked at him with a pained expression and put his hand on his shoulder. "It doesn't just go away. You can't just go through life putting your emotions on hold, they'll eat at you until there's nothing. It's okay to feel pain, Buck. You just have to let it out and then move on." Sam's eyes were shiny with tears too at this point.
Bucky clenched his fists up into the air and left out a yell of agony, and punched the brick wall behind him with his real arm, leaving a dent in it. He then leaned his back against it and slid down to the floor in a crying mess. He looked at his friend, now with uncontrolled streams of tears flowing down his face. "I... I miss her." He said in a broken voice.
Sam bent down to him and grabbed his shoulder, reassuringly as Bucky buried his head in his arms that were on top of his knees. "Me too, Buck. Me too."
---Meanwhile---
"Yelena!" Steve called out to her after catching up with her, though she paid him no attention and just kept on walking. "Yelena, wait!" Steve kept calling out to her and she eventually got so annoyed that she turned around to hear what he had to say, hoping it would get him to shut up. She glared at him and waited for him to say what he had to say so she could leave.
Steve stuttered and struggled to get the words out. "None of us forgot about her... we all miss her. I did care for her."
Yelena laughed at him mockingly. "Really? Tell me, where were you while she was leading the Avengers by herself?"
Steve was shocked by the question and couldn't form the words to respond to her. "I-"
Yelena pulled out her phone, pushed a few buttons and held it out so he could hear the sound coming from it. A voice started speaking, he recognized it. Nat. He listened to it intently.
"Yelena... I-god I don't even know what I'm doing anymore. I literally called you just to hear your voice, and it's just the preset voicemail. It's not even you." She started sniffling softly and chuckled. "I probably sound so dumb right now... I don't know what to do anymore, the team, they're gone. it's just me at the compound right now, everyone else has moved on with their lives, and I know I should too... but I just can't." Her voice cracked saying that sentence, it was obvious how broken she felt from the sound of her voice. "I just got you back and then I lost you again... and I won't stop this until I find a way to bring you and everyone else back. I just wanna see you again... I know you probably won't hear this, but on the off chance that you do; I miss you..." The line was silent for a while until it bleeped to indicate the end of the voicemail.
Yelena rubbed her eyes to stop the flow of oncoming tears, then turned her phone off and put it in her pocket and looked up at Steve. He had a dazed look in his eyes and was looking at the ground in front of him. He felt weak and cold. He didn't realize how alone she must have felt at the compound, without the rest of the team.
"Natasha always told me that the Avengers were her other family and that she cared for them deeply. And frankly, I'm trying to figure out why, because I can't see what's worth caring about. Family never give up on each other." Steve remained silent, he was ashamed. "She loved all of you, but the Avengers never cared for her... not the way she did for you." Yelena stormed off and walked to the main street to hail a taxi to take her to a safehouse she had in Staten Island.
Steve was left there with his own thoughts. "AGHHHH!" He screamed in frustration and put his hand on his hips and looked up at the sky.
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Steve stood on the top of Vormir face to face with his old enemy: Red Skull.
"Steven Rogers, son of Sarah."
Steve stood face to face with his old enemy, confused. "Schmidt?"
"In a previous life, yes. But in this one, I am the keeper of the Soul Stone."
"Great, cause I'm here to return it..." He held out the stone with a look of determination in his face. It was the last stone he had to return; he had someone on his mind and he was determined to get her back. "...but I want something in return."
"What you seek is not possible."
"It has to be. A soul for a soul, you said it!" He yelled out then added in a desperate voice, "It has to work. I can't live without her."
"It is not possible." And it wasn't. Red Skull wasn't lying, there was no way to bring her back, it was an everlasting exchange. One that couldn't be reverted by a mere man.
After hours of bargaining, Steve realized that it wasn't possible to bring Natasha back, Steve dropped to his knees and punched the ground, while yelling out in frustration and anger then walked to the edge of the cliff. His heart broke a little when he saw the blood stained stone at the bottom.
He held the stone in his enclosed fist and looked down the cliff. "I'm so sorry, Nat." He opened his fist and dropped the stone. He stood there for a while, just looking down the cliff. Then he walked to a nearby stone wall and began punching it rapidly. His eyes were burning from the hot tears that flowed down his red cheeks. He yelled out in frustration and agony every time his fist made contact with the stone, staining the gray rock with his crimson blood. Eventually he calmed himself down enough to where he felt that it was time to go home. So he activated his suit and was brought back to the platform, surrounded by Bruce, Bucky and Sam. He said nothing and walked to his room, his friends knew that he needed time alone.
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Steve looked down at the ground and let out a huffed breath.
"I did love her."
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