The Avenger In Red

by Maeve Rogers

Maeve Rimmer is the Red Room's most powerful graduate. She soon finds herself alone in the world with only one friend, Natasha Romanoff. Soon she is wrapped up in monsters and magic, as well as some very special powers that Maeve would have preferred to keep secret.

1. Chapter 1

The Avenger in Red

Chapter 1

Maeve stepped out of the cold chamber, the hypnotism already wearing off, the infinite rage releasing its grip on her body until she was left with the pit of emptiness that always followed The Session. This had been her penultimate opponent and she had been consumed repeatedly with guilt as the memories from each one came flooding back to her. Tonight would be no exception. For now though, she could sleep off the headache that was drilling a hole in her skull. She thought back, for the millionth time, to the events of the past few years. Her time in the Red Room had gone quickly, and Maeve was glad. It had strengthened her, but also taken away some aspects of herself she wished she could have kept.

As the trainee assassin stumbled into her room, she wondered how Katia had done in her Session. She should have been back by now,lying in bed like the other successful recruit. Then it hit her. Memories from the past half an hour came flooding into her mind's eye, the look of cold, harsh stillness on Katia's face as she fell to the flood, her jugular vein having been slit by the knife in Maeve's icy fingers. Under the influence of the hypnotism, she had killed Katia. Katia. She, Maeve, the most prodigious assassin in Red Room history, better than even Natasha Romanoff, with all her knowledge and better understanding of the training, had been pitted against the weakest member of the recruits. No wonder it had been such a short time. 'I've nearly forgot my broken heart, its taking me miles away…' Chris Cornell sang through her earphones as Maeve's world became a kaleidoscope of self-hatred, and hatred for every single person in the Red Room. As she drifted into an uneasy sleep of mental preparation, Maeve took solace in two thoughts. The first: there's only two of us left; the second: at least they still don't know what I'm capable of.

Three doors down, Georgia, the second best trainee of that year's selection, was preparing to kill Maeve in The Final Session the next day. It wouldn't work out too well for her.