Men enter the Red Room with a coffin-sized metal box. There are tanks and sensors attached to the box; their screens are frosted over. Natalia watches from the third floor landing. Ivan Petrovitch Bezukhov — male, white, aged forty-seven years — meets the men and their box. They shake hands and hug like old friends. Bezukhov slaps his hand on the box twice. He seems proud of it. Natalia's fingers toy with the wire of her bracelet garrote. Bezukhov waves a hand and they move down a corridor.
The Soldier is back.
She turns away from the landing and goes to the studio. That's where they find her several hours later. Her hair is damp and sticking to her face. Sweat stains her shirt, and inside her pointe shoes, her toes are bleeding. Bezukhov and one of the new men wait for her to finish her movement. The Soldier stands docile behind the two of them. His eyes don't track her. The two men clap when she's finished.
"This is our newest one," Bezukhov says to the man. "Natalia, meet Vasily Petrenko. Mr. Petrenko, the Black Widow."
She shakes his hand, bows a little. "Sir," she says. They haven't acknowledged the Soldier's presence behind them.
Bezukhov holds a dossier out to her. "We have a mission for you."
Natalia accepts it but doesn't open it. She looks at Bezukhov and says, "I don't need a babysitter."
Petrenko laughs and says, "Yes, but sometimes the Asset does."
"I'm not a babysitter."
Bezukhov's face goes stony and he stares hard at her. But Petrenko laughs again and says, "It is good the Asset isn't a baby then! Soldat, come say hello to the Black Widow!"
The Soldier's eyes come back on-line and he steps forward though he still isn't in front of the two men. She stares at him and he stares at her knees.
They've met before: She remembers his metal arm around her neck when she was thirteen. She remembers tapping on that arm when she couldn't escape and him letting her go. She remembers watching all the other girls do the same thing; none of them could escape his hold. She remembers once he smiled when Dasha did a stupid little squirm when it was her turn to escape — they had all laughed, even him. She remembers his handlers disciplining him for it: for smiling and laughing. They put him in a chair and made all the girls watch him forget.
He doesn't remember.
She says to the Soldier, "My name is Natalia."
He glances up to a spot over her right shoulder. That's how he demonstrates his understanding. She knows this. She knows that some call the Soldier a ghost, but she knows that there's not enough humanity left in his body even for that.
Petrenko is genial — male, white, aged sixty-one years. His face is long and narrow. His eyes are deep-set and near-perfect circles. His nose is thin and prominent, an inverse of his eyes. There's dark grey hair, receding on the sides, flat against his head. Natalia guesses that he is almost two meters tall. He is quick to smile.
Bezukhov says, "Mr. Petrenko is going to run you through the Asset's protocols. Then you will take him on the mission."
Natalia looks at her handler but doesn't say anything.
Petrenko claps and says, "Let us begin!" He puts a hand on the Soldier's head, ruffles the dark, damp hair. "He gets antsy when he has nothing to do."
Natalia doubts it. But she says "lead the way" anyway.
She follows him down to the basement. They walk by the room where the Soldier's equipment has been setup; the opened metal box and the chair are prominent among the supplies. Natalia doesn't look at it and neither does the Soldier. Petrenko leads the way, Natalia follows, and the Soldier tails them both. They enter a room two doors down from the metal box.
She's been here before. Everyone has been in this room before. Retraining. Conditioning. Correction.
Petrenko says, "He is good — an excellent listener. Soldat, come here, won't you?"
The Soldier goes to stand beside the man. He looks at Petrenko's knees while the man pats the side of the Soldier's face. Natalia sees that Petrenko is fond of the Soldier the same way sentimental men are fond of dogs.
"He feeds and waters himself as needed but will wait for the order," Petrenko says. He's still stroking the Soldier's cheek. "He can take care of most injuries, both his own and any that his team may incur. If he requires assistance tending to his own injuries, he will let you know. Do not worry about rest; he requires little and prefers to keep watch." Petrenko smiles at Natalia. "It is a habit of his since most of his missions are unaccompanied. We did not find this behavior adverse."
She watches the muscles in the Soldier's back tense as Petrenko's hand settles on the Soldier's neck.
"But sometimes he needs correcting," Petrenko says. "Different behaviors call for different methods of correction."
This, she knows.
Petrenko goes through all kinds of misbehavior the Asset might exhibit. The longer the mission takes, the higher the chances that the Soldier will act undesirably. Natalia learns when she must deny the Soldier food, water, and rest. Petrenko says that cattle prods are effective tools for correcting small acts of disobedience. For example, if the Soldier looks her directly in the eye without being directed thus. He tells her to take the prod and shock the Soldier in the neck, between the legs, and under the ribs. She does, and the Soldier doesn't make a sound; he begins to sweat.
To disable the Soldier's prosthetic arm, Petrenko tells her to use EMPs. He knows that she is already equipped with similar devices. He instructs her to throw one of the devices at the arm, and she does. Sparks jump off the metal and a mechanical, grinding sound scratches at all their ears. It only works for a short while. Sometimes, Petrenko says, the Soldier will remove the EMP device without being instructed to do so. In that case, more extreme forms of correction are required. Petrenko has Natalia whip the Soldier's natural hand with a plastic sjambok — just so she knows the force required to properly discipline him.
It takes two hours for Petrenko to tell Natalia how to correct all the ways the Soldier may act out. He has her strike the Soldier, slash him, suffocate him, and disable every part of him. Natalia does it all without hesitance. The Soldier doesn't hesitate either, but his breathing gets heavy and he continues to sweat.
Petrenko gives her a list of ten words which will recalibrate the Soldier. He gives her a single word which will, he says, work like an emergency shutdown. So far, they've never needed to use the emergency shutdown. Natalia pretends to be impressed. There are more words which will manipulate the Soldier's behavior. Petrenko writes them down because he can't remember them all and what order they must be said in.
When all of this is over, Natalia asks her first question: "Does he spar?"
She knows the answer. She knows.
"It is not wise to injure yourself before a mission."
"Does he spar?" she repeats.
"Of course."
"I like to know how good my partners are."
"The Soldier is very good, I can assure you."
Petrenko does not know how Natalia first met the Soldier. Stupid mistake.
Natalia still hasn't looked at Petrenko. She's had her eyes on the Soldier the whole time. "Leave us," she says to Petrenko. She has no interest in whether or not the Soldier will obey her. She wants to know if Petrenko will.
He is nervous and stutters, but he does leave. The door closes behind him. Natalia relaxes her posture and doesn't smile at the Soldier. He is still kneeling in the center of the room, sweating and slowly regaining control of his breathing.
"You can stand," she says.
He does.
"Sorry about all that," she continues casually. Shrugs. "Have to keep up appearances."
Nothing. But that's what she had expected.
"Let's spar. First to draw blood wins." He blinks at her pointe shoes — she's still wearing them. Blood has stained the satin. She looks at the marks and slashes she'd given him under Petrenko's instruction. "First to draw fresh blood."
Whatever Bezukhov's asking her to do — it is the perfect opportunity to make that change she's been thinking of making. Especially if they give her the Soldier, too. Anything can be accomplished if one has the right tools. The Soldier is the ultimate multi-tool, if she can win his allegiance.
She has to know.
Natalia turns out and raises her arms, rolls onto the bloody boxes hidden in the toes of her shoes. She watches and waits to see how he will respond.
One, two, three, four, five, six.
Slowly — so slowly she would not have noticed if she weren't trying so hard to see it — the Soldier shifts his weight onto the balls of his feet. His heels rise off the ground by mere millimeters. His body remembers what they made his mind forget.
It's a start.
