Summary: After Ana agreed to help Yelena find Natasha, Yelena had stayed with Ana for a few days. After about a week, Yelena comes into Ana's living room to find a horrifying news report playing. A news report that sends Yelena's world crashing down into nothingness.
Every morning throughout the week that Yelena had awoken in that accursed guest room in Ana's house, she was exceedingly uncomfortable. The bed had been the comfiest one that Yelena had laid down on since her days in Ohio with Natasha, but it was horridly uncomfortable in its unfamiliarity.
Ana had agreed to help Yelena find Natasha, and she had offered to ask around in her assassin networks since there were a few favors that she could call in. So far, since everyone had been coming back from the blip, there was confusion everywhere and there had been no official news on how anything had happened or what was going on to bring everyone back. Yelena had not wanted to stay there at the house, but she had agreed if only to be the first to find out if Ana's contacts came up with anything.
However, Yelena had the strongest feeling that Natasha had something to do with it, and she could not shake the bad feeling that she had about the whole thing. She was trying her best to ignore it but it was still persistently bothering her despite her best efforts.
Yelena had called Melina and asked her if she had heard from Natasha. However, to Yelena's surprise, it turned out that Melina and Alexei had been blipped the entire time as well, and they had no contact with Natasha throughout the past five years.
But they promised to try to contact her the best that they could if they could find a manner to do so. Yelena was truly grateful, but she was starting to grow significantly less patient and was beginning to have the strongest urge to just up and head for America and find Natasha herself.
Yelena missed Natasha more than anything. She had missed her horribly before she had blipped away since the both of them had not had too much contact with one another due to Yelena's mission to rescue what was left of the missing widows and Natasha's attempts to lay low.
Natasha's phone number had changed every two weeks, and while Natasha had tried to always keep Yelena updated on what it was changed to in case Yelena wanted to talk, Natasha had sometimes grown afraid of someone catching on.
Of course, Yelena also understood the implied reason that Natasha felt she was too much of a danger to Yelena considering her current relationship with the American government.
Yelena truly oftentimes wished that Natasha would just throw caution to the wind. She wanted to be able to see the redhead and talk to her any time that she wanted to. She wanted to be with her and be wherever Natasha was more than anything.
At this point, if she could find Natasha, she was never going to leave her side again no matter what sort of overprotective, overcautious excuse Natasha had. Yelena was going to stay with her sister. She would have the other freed widows take up the process of saving the remaining enslaved widows.
She just had to find her first.
Yelena dressed herself, heading into the living room to check the television as she did every single morning in case news was released about the occurrences causing the blipped people to return from ash.
However, to her utmost surprise, Ana and her small family were already gathered in the living room, gaping at the television in pure and utter horror. Yelena approached the couch carefully, standing to the side a bit to avoiding intruding on their space too much as she took in the words emanating from the television set.
"Apparently the great battle went down in upstate New York right around the Avengers compound... The family of billionaire Tony Stark perhaps even better known as Iron Man has released the following statement honoring and listing the fallen," the newsman read aloud, and Yelena just gaped at television, her eyes glued to the screen as she took in the sight of haunting pictures of the battleground appearing.
"This was an extremely difficult fight, and we all understood the cost in taking a direct stand against Thanos and in trying to bring back all of those who were blipped. Some time ago, we began the endeavor to fight back after the great loss five years ago. It was a hard process but some of the most incredible people across the universe united to face this threat together," he read, and Yelena felt that pit in her stomach steadily growing as she remained entranced, everything else fading away as the man announced the next words.
"We want to thank and to honor a few of our very own dear friends and family that so bravely and heroically sacrificed themselves for the smallest chance to bring so many people back to their families and back into the world where they belong," he began, and Yelena felt her stomach plummeting in a downward spiral as she stared in pure dread.
"The late Vision: a synthezoid created by Tony Stark and Bruce Banner. He was not a true human, but he had more humanity than many actual humans in the world," a few images of the odd purple-red creature flashed onto the screen, but Yelena could not care less as she mentally begged the man narrating to continue just a bit faster to get through this list and wash all of Yelena's fears away.
"The truly inspiring leader of the Avengers: Captain America also known as Steve Rogers. A man of action and a heart beating for not just the American people but for the people of the world and beyond," a slideshow of images depicting Steve in his countless patriotic depictions flashed up onto the screen, and Yelena felt an impatience gripping her deeply.
"One of the loudest voices of the Avengers: Iron Man or Tony Stark. Often referred to as the billionaire, the playboy, or the philanthropist but actually being a man of family and of true heart," a ton of pictures of Tony in and out of his suit displaying themselves onscreen, and Yelena felt as if time were moving in slow motion.
However, her mouth went dry as her jaw slackened, and her eyes widened slowly as she took in the sight of the next person displayed before her. It was as if her heart had stopped in her chest and the entire world around the television screen had disappeared into nothingness.
There looking into the camera with one of her rare smiles was the one and only Natasha Romanoff. Yelena's big sister. Yelena's entire world.
"The silent, stoic bombshell of the group: Black Widow or Natasha Romanoff. Perhaps one of the less flashy of the group, but definitely not one to be discounted in terms of her skill and of her love that she held for those dear to her."
The slideshow for Natasha ended on her striking her infamous pose, a slight smirk on her face as she raised a signature eyebrow and Yelena was slapped in the face with so, so many flashbacks rushing her all at once.
Ohio. Back bridges. Macaroni and cheese.
We're both upside down.
And I bet you're going to fall down first!
Planes. Dark, dank transport containers. Photo booth picture reels.
The Red Room.
Budapest. Fighting.
You weren't really my sister.
Bandaging each other up.
Family reunion.
Who cares? That wasn't real.
Abduction. The Red Room. The Red Room falling from the sky.
We're both upside down.
The vest. Separation again. Small contact here and there.
Promises of living together in New York one day.
Such a poser.
Yelena could not breathe. Her chest was tightening, and she was stumbling backwards helplessly, needing to get out somehow or some way. She blearily and just barely registered Ana coming toward her carefully, holding her hands out and saying something.
Yelena offered her one quick glance, everything closing in on her as she lost focus, Natasha's everything flooding her all at once.
When Ana took just one step too close to her, Yelena immediately met eyes with her for just one moment.
She ran.
Yelena was out of the house and tearing through the nearby forest as quickly as she could. She barely registered the dulled pain of tree branches scratching her arms and legs and ripping her clothes in multiple places. She just kept running.
Eventually, she reached a clearing in the woods, and an ill-placed fallen tree caught Yelena's foot and she came falling forward into the snow. Yelena crashed down onto her front, and she just laid there for a moment, registering all of the pain.
She slowly pulled herself up and onto her knees as she took in the blood streaking her hands. She could not feel anything. It was as if her entire body was numb, her chest heaving as she just sat there collapsed in the snow.
Natasha could not be gone. She was not gone. She had always been out there somewhere for Yelena. She might not have even been thinking about Yelena, but she had always been out there where Yelena could hear about her and almost imagine her face again.
They had been together. Yelena had felt her in her arms. For the first time in over twenty years, she had finally gotten her sister back. Yelena had heard the most precious words that she had the pleasure of listening to in years.
It was real to me, too.
Natasha had held her. She had touched her face, lit her skin on fire with the sweet feeling of true kind touch after so many years deprived. Natasha's eyes were real and full of emotion and such a deep, true, raw memory within her. It was fresh. How could that light in those eyes go out so fast?
How could it be true?
Was it true?
It was an official statement released by the family of Tony Stark...
Could it really be true?
Yelena could still feel that erratic heartbeat coursing through the redhead. She could hear her voice clearly in that moment when Natasha had begged her not to jump. She could feel Natasha's hands on her, and she could feel the heat rolling off of her. She could smell her sweat, what was left of the shampoo in her hair when she had stuffed her face near the loose tendrils of red.
She could see the red. The bright, blinding, beautiful red that had always brought reassurance to Yelena. The most gorgeous shade of red she had ever seen. Her favorite color in the world.
Yelena had just gotten her sister back. Had just gotten back the chance of a real life with her where they could be together again.
But now she was just being pried away all over again.
Yelena felt the pressure building up in her chest. Her hands were shaking as the hot blood ran down them from her cuts from the trees. Everything was growing blurry and there was such pain.
So Yelena screamed, her voice splitting the calmness of the snowy forest. And she cried, doubling over heavily as she grabbed at the snow, grabbed at her clothes, grabbed at her hair. Anything she could get her hands on.
Mourning the loss of her love. Mourning the loss of a chance at a life with her. Mourning the loss of just Natasha.
"Natashka, I'm upside down."