Andrea's p.o.v
I groaned as I felt a pounding in my head and bright lights burning my eyes when I opened them. I slowly lifted my head to find my neck aching from it being in an awkward angle for so long. When my sight became less blurry, I moved my neck in circles to try and gain feeling in it once again. When I finally came to my senses, I jumped out of my skin, quickly examining my surroundings. A hotel room, it was cheap and grimy. The chair I was placed in sat in the middle of the room, giving me a great view out of the window. It was snowing, the sky was covered in clouds and below were cars driving around busilly.
I lifted my hand to rub against my forehead, trying to relieve myself of the headache that seemed like it would stay forever. My attention was taken away from where I was to the door that was being opened. I jumped off of the old wooden chair and grabbed the nearest weapon to me, which unfortunately was a tv controller.
The door opened and I quickly attacked, teleporting to the door and slamming the hard device into the gut of my kidnapper. A loud grunt escaped from their mouth, but I didn't have a care as my one aim was to kill the intruder. As I was about to place my next hit, the skilled attacker kicked my legs from under me and held a gun to my head before I could react.
"The real Andrea asked me to shoot her in the head if she was turned into this person. So, if you don't listen to me, I will kill you," she warned, causing me to put my hands in the air, finally recognising who it was. Natalia Romanova, Redroom assassin. "It's okay, I can't kill you. You're on Hydra's save list," I smirked, standing up and walking around the room to properly observe it.
"What? I am Hydra's enemy," she remarked in confusion. "Yeah, I mean you did leak all of their main information, causing it to pretty much shut down. But Hydra remains, and they need to keep you alive for any future endeavours," I shrugged before turning the tv on so I could find out where we were. "How come Andrea knew nothing about this?" The Black Widow asked. "A safety recall. In case I were to be kidnapped and they managed to get me out of this mindset then she wouldn't remember anything. But, over time she does remember things, that's how she gave you locations," I explained.
I flicked through the channels, trying to work out the language until it clicked. I laughed and looked at the assassin. "Taking me to your home country, for what? Redemption. Russia won't bring me back Natasha, I'm not letting her come out this time," I said, before looking out of the window and teleporting through it. Natasha flew in my direction, looking out of the window, down at me. It was ironic really because it felt like Romeo and Juliet. She was my Juliet, my forbidden love, and she stood on the balcony looking down at me as I confess to do anything for her. But that's not how this story ends.
"Thanks for the ride to Russia," I saluted mimicking and then left before she could chase me down. I knew I didn't have long before she would find me, she was a master assassin after all. She was better than me any day and that's what was so amazing about her. The way she has been through so much, more than me in fact, and yet she can come out so ethereal, so... good for the world. Nonetheless, I'm stuck and will always be stuck. Some of us aren't as lucky as she is.
I roamed the streets of Russia, unsure of which part of Russia I was in. My attempts were to find a busy place, somewhere I can hide in plain sight. Having some clothes would be good too, the leggings and sweatshirt I was in was not enough clothing for the country I was in. Eventually my search was a success when I found a busy street that held stalls of people trying to sell things.
My eyes were set on a man who was chopping up meat to sell fresh for the customers. I attempted to show interest, using the little Russian I knew to explain to the man that I was just looking around town. Obviously he was trying to sell to me, and I nodded my head along to what he was saying as I swiped a knife off of his counter before leaving him to it.
I observed the people around, trying to figure out my target. In the corner of my eye, I spotted a young woman staring at her phone. She was a picture of wealth, and appeared to be aggressive to all of the people around her. A perfect target. I followed her until I found an opportunity, I grabbed her, covering her mouth and then pulled her into a side street. "Hail Hydra," I muttered before slicing her throat mercilessly. When the woman fell to the ground, I picked her fluffy coat from her body and placed it on my own. I used the knife to pry off the tracker on my ankle, placing it with the dead body. I took her phone and any money she had in her purse before I left. As I was searching through the phone, which wasn't password protected, I figured out that we were in Moscow.
Knowing that it would be hard for me to leave the country, I made my way to a small cafe in order to figure out my next steps. I got myself a coffee and sat in the corner, observing the phone, trying to find a way to contact Hydra. I began to create an algorithm on the phone to seek through any suspicious numbers I can use to figure out if they're hydra or not. However due to the fact I was doing it on a phone using this WiFi, it would take time. So whilst I was waiting, I began to watch a tv show on Netflix out of boredom.
Time passed and I was distracted from my watching when someone slammed something on the table. I looked up to see Natasha glaring at me. I looked at what she slammed on the table and smirked. "So you got my gift then," I chuckled, sipping my second coffee.
"You can't just leave dead bodies around for me to find," she hissed, sitting in front of me. "What, it's fun, I like a good game," I told her as I looked around the empty cafe and saw the only guy standing at the counter on his phone. Without hesitation, I threw my knife, slicing into his throat with ease. She turned to me, her gaze cold. I wanted her to hate me because if she hated me, I could go back to Hydra with ease. That or she'll shoot me which is another easy way out.
"Fine, you win. I'll give you your freedom, free plane tickets to wherever you need to go as long as you promise me a few things," she said, leaning back on her chair, never leaving eye contact with me. I watched her emerald green eyes observe me, a slight smirk on her lips that held a bright red lipstick. Red has always been her color.
"What's the promises?" I questioned. "6 hours. Give me 6 hours to try and get your humanity back, and if I can't, I'll give you it without hesitation. During that time you're not allowed to kill anyone," she told me. "You've got yourself a deal," I placed my hand out for her to shake, which she did. The warmth of her hand made me feel safe, the softness made me attracted and the strength made me know she was serious.
"Let's go," she demanded, standing up expecting me to follow. And without hesitation, I did. "So what's your plan after this? Find Hydra and then what?" She asked me as we walked the streets of Moscow, the sun now setting. "I'll get back to Ryker of course. He'll be looking for me," I told her. "I hate to say it to you, but Ryker hasn't come for you. It's been a month and not once has he tried to find you. Just some girl," she said.
"That was Rykers girlfriend, bit of a wild card. I assume she's locked up," I said without a card in the world. "We caught her a little while ago, we thought it would be best not to tell you," she confessed. After that we walked in silence, until night fell and the streets seemed empty.
"I only came to Russia once, to kill a general who held too much information on Hydra and was going to spread it. That's when I worked with The Winter Soldier actually. He's crazy I'm telling you," I chuckled, remembering how they let him loose and he destroyed so much.
"What did you think of it? Russia?" She quizzed. "It was beautiful for as much as I saw. I didn't really get to see much. Just a lot of red," I shrugged, before looking around once again to see we were completely in the middle of nowhere. "Where are you taking me?" I asked.
"An old building," she said nonchalantly as we arrived at a gated building that seemed old and run down. "What is this place?" I pestered her with questions as we hopped the fence and began to make our way around the abandoned building. "This was one of the places Redroom trained their members in. It seemed like a normal boarding school, but inside were children training to be powerful assassins," she told me.
"How many have you killed?" I questioned the red head as we walked around the ruins of an assassin base. "Too many to count. They taught us not to care about the killing itself. We had missions we had to complete. We would use any means necessary to complete said missions, so when graduation came they sterilised us. If we got pregnant that would ruin all of the training they did for us," she informed me, insinuating that she even slept with the enemy to get her way.
"So what you're saying is that you're very good at manipulation and you're trying to manipulate me," I huffed, trying not to roll my eyes at her obvious attempts to change me. "No, I've been under mind control, I was brought up to be a killer like you. Which is why I won't manipulate you because you can't manipulate a manipulator," she said, stopping at one room that held a large mirror and some old grimy equipment.
"This is where I grew up. This is how I came to be who I am today. Why don't you tell me how you came to be you," she said, sitting down in the middle of the room, edging me to sit with her. I didn't trust what she was doing but I sat next to her anyway and decided to entertain her conversation.
"I was young, too young to remember what happened. I don't know if my parents gave me up or if I was taken. From then on, I practically lived in a small room, I'm surprised I didn't go crazy. Every now and then they would come in and inject me with something before leaving. I was given food and water and that lasted until I was around 10. That's when they introduced me to Ryker. I had had no human interaction for so long I couldn't even remember how to speak, but he taught me. He taught me everything. He was 18 at the time, I looked up to him. Everyday he would beat me until one day I could beat him back, I found out about my powers and here I am today," I summarised.
"Ryker sounds like a great friend," she murmured, watching me in the mirror. "I'm sure you would have made good friends in my situation," I scoffed, rolling my eyes. I couldn't help but feel defensive of my upbringing, like she was judging me, but I knew she wasn't judging me, she was trying to understand.
"Can I make some observations about you for a change?" I asked. She glanced up at me and nodded softly, ready for what I was about to say. "You're closed off, not just from me but from everyone. The closest you are to anyone is Clint. I thought for a while, why is that? What does Clint have that everyone else doesn't and then I realized. You would never have gotten out of the Redroom yourself, it was inescapable. He saved you and offered you redemption. And yet when I do the same thing, you don't think I'm good enough?" I quizzed.
"I'm scared. Not of you, but for you. I have spent my whole life trying to redeem myself from the bad I've done and I know nothing I can do will fix that. I'm scared you'll be stuck in that loop of owing something to society and will forever be mixed up in the mess that is the Avengers. You deserve a real life," she explained.
"But I'm never gonna get a real life Natasha. Neither are you. Another observation I've had of you. You're a trained assassin, so you were trained to blend in to suit your nature. You learn the American accent when I know you're Russian, and that accent would be so hot on you, yet you change to fit society. You don't form relationships so you don't disappoint. Yet you keep your hair red despite it standing out. What I'm saying is, as much as you try to hide and try to block off, you're not a RedRoom assassin. You're Natalia Romanova, and you know it, you're too busy trying to protect everyone else that you forget that they're trying to protect you too," I informed her wisely, speaking from my heart.
"Here, it's a passport and plane tickets to wherever you want to go," she mumbled, passing me the information before standing up ready to leave. "It's not been 6 hours yet!" I called after her. "I know," she responded without bothering to face me as she left.