Disclaimer: I don't own The Avengers.

Well, this story kind of ran away from me and I'm pretty sure that it's going to be four chapters now instead of two or three. (I ended up writing a lot, and I didn't want to make a 4,000-word chapter.) The next one is going to be shorter than the first two, though. I'm almost finished with Chapter 3 so I should post it by Friday.

Just a note: In case anyone was wondering about the weird writing style, I'm experimenting with stream of consciousness, hence the run-on sentences, and present tense. Also, sometimes I feel that I overuse dialogue, so I'm keeping this story dialogue-free. It's not the way I usually write, and I probably won't write many other things this way, but I've enjoyed it so far.

Also, I want to thank BethN for reviewing and everyone who is following this story. I really appreciate your support!

So, here's the second chapter! I hope you enjoy it.

Doubts: Part the Second

It is a crisp, clear winter morning when the remaining twenty-four girls are ushered outside to a big, snow-covered arena for another training exercise. They are told to choose partners. Natalya looks to Katya, meeting her smile, and takes a step closer to her. None of the other girls will come near her anymore unless they absolutely must.

The instructors then make the girls form a circle, with wide space in between each partnership. Natalya eyes the others in her group; obviously, they are going to do more fighting practice, and since they are all partnered up, this exercise will probably simulate a large battle instead of their more common one-on-one fights. She sizes the other girls up. Tatyana Doletskaya and Irina Patsayeva are a team, and of the group, they will be the hardest pair to beat. Katya shares a glance with her; she is thinking along the same lines. That forbidden sense of pride runs through her when she sees that many of the other teams are looking at her and Katya - the two of them will be a threat.

The girls all fall silent when the head instructor steps into the center of the circle, and begins to speak, confirming Natalya's suspicions. But then she continues, and Natalya can't believe the words she is hearing. Anyone who cannot survive a battle amongst mere girls like them is not needed by the Red Room and has no purpose being in the Black Widow Program, the instructor says. They have been brought here to prove their worth. There is no space for imperfection in the program. They must learn the tricks and ruthlessness of a full-scale battle, or else they are useless. The fight is to the death. The winning two girls will live.

Katya gasps quietly, along with most of the other girls. Natalya has no breath to do so. How can they do this? It doesn't make sense, no sense at all. It's wasting their resources, wasting all the years they spent training them. But of course, it's not, not really. They only want the perfect ones. Horrible as it is, she regains enough breath to sigh in relief. Katya is on her team, so she will be safe.

Then the magnitude of what she's about to do hits her, and she realizes that she has grown up with these girls and that even though she doesn't particularly like most of them, she doesn't want to see them die and she definitely doesn't want to be the one to kill them. She forces down the nausea that has inexplicably risen in her; a battle is no time for sickness.

The instructor steps out of the circle and gives them the signal to begin. For a moment, no one moves, no one even breathes. The air is too thick to do anything but stand there. Though she is as still as everyone else, Natalya's mind is racing, sizing up the strengths of the others, how quick and strong they are and if they will be able to injure her or not. Not that any of it matters, because in that moment she knows that she will kill as many of the others as necessary to make sure that Katya lives. The instructor yells at them that she has given an order and she expects it to be followed.

Someone lashes out, and suddenly the arena explodes with movement. The weaker girls start to scream as they are pounced upon by the others. Natalya throws herself into the fight, her actions smooth and as natural as breathing. She feels more than sees Katya, who blocks attacks that might have otherwise inconvenienced Natalya. For the most part, though, the two of them must seek out their opponents. It is as if a border is around them and others do not want to cross the line. Teachers start shrieking at all of them, urging them not to be cowardly.

The red haze of battle descends upon Natalya's mind, and soon she finds herself in the middle of the fight, screaming for blood. She is a weapon, the most finely crafted of all, and no one can touch her. She dares them to attack her, dares them to even try to get near Katya.

Tatyana is the first girl she kills, snapping her neck cleanly, and that is when the red in her vision gets thicker and a part of her cannot, will not, process the fact that she has killed someone she has known her whole life. It is a small part, though, and she must not be distracted, so she buries it deep.

Next to fall before her is Veronika Gorchakova. For some reason she does not fully understand, the crunching of the other girl's bones as she breaks them makes her stomach roil, but she ignores the feeling. She must duck and parry and return other blows, and there is no time to think.

Out of the corner of her eye, she sees Irina slip past her and strike at Katya's turned back, quick as lightning, but somehow little Katya is faster. She whips around, teeth bared in a snarl, and avoids Irina's deadly punch by a hairsbreadth, then repays her by tripping her and breaking her spine for a quick death. Natalya switches her focus back to her own struggle the moment she knows that Katya is safe, but not before she notices that there are tears streaming down Katya's cheeks.

Natalya pushes her current opponent away with a blow that breaks ribs, just as Zoya Ignatova appears next to her and hits her hard on the jaw. Natalya staggers backwards, barely managing to keep her footing. She hardly has time to duck Zoya's fist a second time, but then she steps closer and lands a hit of her own, kicking the other girl in the stomach. Zoya yells, more in anger than in pain, and before Natalya can register it, the stronger girl's fist smashes into the side of her skull. Pain explodes in her head and she sees bright stars, then her vision dims. Her arms and legs seem strange, like rubber, and it's almost as if she can't control them. She doesn't have time to panic because she can feel herself slipping into cool, soft blackness.

But then Katya screams at her, from somewhere to her side, and her fists clench and she fights out of the darkness because if she loses, Katya will die and that must not happen. Rage rises in her; is she stupid, to have let Zoya hit her twice? She sucks in a ragged breath and she moves, because all her training hasn't been for nothing and she is still Natalya Romanova, the efficient one, the unbeatable one, and she'll be damned if she lets Zoya best her this one time.

She steadies herself, and manages to avoid a few more blows while she waits for her head to clear. She makes Zoya think that she is done for by attempting a few flailing attacks that her opponent dodges easily. She pretends to stumble, and Zoya goes in for a laughably easy kill, but in a heartbeat Natalya straightens up and punches the other girl in the throat, then follows that up with a savage kick to the head. The blood starts flowing and Zoya crumbles to the ground, and her eyes glaze over and then she stops moving.

It seems like it goes on forever, but when the red haze in her vision clears and no one else steps up before her to die and the instructors have stopped goading them on, Natalya quells the shaking of her muscles and stands tall. There is blood everywhere, smeared on her face and hands and clothing, and most of it does not belong to her. She is standing among the grisly, twisted forms of the dead. She is calm, very calm, and her mind is very empty.

Katya struggles over to her side, breathing hard and her long hair tangled and matted with blood. Her lower lip trembles and her eyes are blotchy red, but she is alive and that is all Natalya will allow herself to care about.

A man Natalya has never seen before strides up, not seeming to care that he is stepping on corpses. He is tall and well-built and has icy blue eyes. He neither smiles nor frowns as he stares at the two of them. He tells them that they have progressed to the next level of their training in the Black Widow Program, and that their nation depends on them, and if they fail, they will shame not only the Red Room but the entire country. He turns away as quickly as he came, and then Natalya and Katya are led away from the field of death.

-Scene-

They do not take many classes anymore. Instead, their lives are made up of mission after mission after mission. There are so many people that must be killed, and sometimes the sheer number baffles Natalya.

Because she is almost always away, working a job, she almost never sees Katya. They don't even share a dorm anymore. Sometimes, in rare quiet moments, she wonders about the other girl and if she is all right, and she wonders if Katya has found someone else to tell her stories to. Most of her hopes that she has, because story-telling makes her happy, but another part of Natalya worries that anyone else will turn Katya in and then Katya will be punished. But she never thinks about this for long periods of time, because she knows she must never be distracted from her missions.

When she does return to the Red Room, the same man who spoke to them in the arena on that long-ago day waits for her. Natalya now knows that he is the Winter Soldier, one of the legends of their country, and she always feels that tiny sense of pride that he wants to talk with her. Sometimes, almost never, in fact, he will smile at her, and that makes her stomach flutter and she wishes that he would smile more. He promises her that if she continues on her path, and always works harder, that one day she will be as important as he is, and will bring as much glory to their nation. She wants that to happen very, very badly, because she wants him to admire her the way she admires him.

One day, they meet in a hallway as she is heading to her room, and he kisses her. She feels blissful triumph curl through her body, and then he smiles at her and tells her that there will be another grand mission waiting for her when she wakes up. She doesn't walk so much as float back to her room, and thinks to herself that the day could not get any better.

Someone is waiting by her bedroom door when she reaches it. It is Katya, and Natalya rushes to her and allows herself to hug her. She grins, and it is not until she steps back that she sees it. Although Katya is smiling right back at her, her eyes are wide and much sadder than the last time they met.

Natalya opens the door and they walk into her room. It is spare, to an even greater degree than it was when it had bunk beds and they shared it. There is a small bed with standard white sheets in the corner, a sleek metal nightstand next to it, and a plain chest of drawers shoved under the window.

Katya stands on her tip-toes and stares out that window. She says very quietly that her own room does not have a window and that she misses looking out at the plain and seeing the clouds. Then she turns around and notices Natalya still smiling and asks why she is so happy. Natalya tells her all about the Winter Soldier (the information that she is permitted to tell, anyway) and she cannot help the way her voice rises when she talks about how handsome he is, and how he just kissed her.

Katya gives her that same sad smile and tells her that she is glad for her. Natalya notices a thin scar on the other girl's cheek and asks about it, but the answer is vague and Natalya feels unsettled because Katya has never hidden anything from her before.

They do not talk for a long while, until finally Katya breaks the silence and whispers that she is afraid.

Natalya shakes her head angrily and tells her that she shouldn't ever be afraid, and Katya says that she knows but she can't help it because she feels that something is going to happen. She won't tell Natalya exactly what that something is, and Natalya worries. She thinks back to the last time she and Katya have really talked, and realizes that it was before the day that all the other girls died. She does remember being upset at Katya's inconsolable tears that night, which she didn't understand because they had won and why couldn't she just be grateful that they were alive? The day after that, they had been separated. Natalya realizes that Katya is not the same girl she used to be, and she doesn't like it at all.

She decides that she should change the subject, because it is dangerous. She waits a few minutes before asking the other girl to tell her a story. Katya sighs, shakes her head, and says that she can't remember any of the good ones anymore. Natalya feels something twist in her chest and she asks her again because she knows that she can recall them if she just tries. Katya protests again, but after Natalya asks her the third time (she does not say "please" because she must not beg, ever) she nods once and begins with the words "Once upon a time."

This story is different from the old ones, though. The villain murders the princess before the hero can reach her, and Katya chooses her words so well that Natalya can feel his distress at losing his love. The hero then leads an army against the villain for revenge, but both forces are destroyed and the hero is mortally wounded, and it is only with his dying breaths that he manages to finally slay the villain. When the story is finished, Natalya rubs at her eyes quickly and orders Katya to tell a better one, but Katya says she doesn't know any. Natalya doesn't think that this is very fair, and says so, but the other girl only tells her that it is the way of the world, and it is a good story because the hero never forgot his honor.

Time stops and for a brief moment Natalya wonders how Katya has become the one telling her to be practical. She feels something snap inside her, the way a neck snaps when she breaks it. A little later, Katya stands up to leave, and makes for the door, but as she opens it she turns around and looks back and meets her eyes, and says that she wishes it was different. When she leaves and shuts the door behind her, Natalya feels a searing pain, though she has no recent injuries, and all she can do is bury herself underneath her blankets and wait for sleep to come.

So, thoughts? Predictions? Tell me what you think!