Thank you so much to everyone who has read and reviewed! Here is day 6! :)

Day 6: Torture

***Warning for well...torture….because….you know...the prompt***

"She won't tell you anything." Natasha Romanoff was in the chair across from her, blood dripping down her cheeks from a nasty looking cut that crossed from one side of her forehead to the other, disappearing into her hair sweaty, matted red hair. Her hands were bound behind her, bare feet on the floor, not even flinching at the knife only centimeters away from her nose.

The man holding the knife grinned over at the woman who'd spoken. "You don't think so?"

"This is the Black Widow. Natasha Romanoff."

"Yes, the Avenger."

"The double-crossing Russian spy turned superhero. She's been doing this shit since she was old enough to walk. She's not going to break." The woman spoke with a laugh in her voice, lips turned up, a casual hand brushing some hair back as if there weren't flecks of blood on her slacks. "Does the red room mean anything to you?"

"Red room? What, like that Hill House show?" The man asked, and Penny felt her lips turn up just a little as she stared at the floor.

"Hey, no spoilers. I haven't finished it yet." She spoke, knowing it was a bad idea and doing it anyway. Natasha's expression didn't change...not a muscle did so much as flinch, and Penny wondered for the thousandth time if Natasha Romanoff would actually care if these people did something to her. So far, it had only been the Black Widow who'd suffered. Penny had no hopes that that would last. She was sure that Spidergirl would get her turn.

They'd been captured during a mission. Well...not so much a mission, it turned out, as a trap. It had been her first mission with Natasha. The others had been there too, but she'd been on the ground, both spiders checking the basement which, as it turned out, had a secret entrance around back. And Hydra agents with guns...and vibranium handcuffs. As it turned out, Penny couldn't break out of vibranium handcuffs. And neither of them were bulletproof.

The woman turned to her, smiling with something like delight. "Spidergirl. Never would have suspected that the other spider was a child but…" She waved a hand at Penny, glancing back at Natasha, then taking the blade from the man and approaching Penny slowly.

"I'm not going to tell you anything either." Penny told them, glaring and trying to look fierce, and also trying not to remember the fact that Mr. Stark had once told her that her intimidating face made her look like an 'angry kitten.' The woman with the knife was apparently not impressed.

"She doesn't know anything," Natasha spoke for the first time, apart from the few grunts of pain she'd given up earlier. When the knife had slid her head open. "She's a child. A trainee. Stark said we had to let her tag along, but she doesn't know anything. We don't tell her anything."

Penny had to push back the hurt. Did Natasha mean that? The woman had never seemed overly friendly but...still. "Oh, I'm sure she doesn't." The women approached Penny with a wave of her hand over her shoulder, and the man left the room. "But you do, Miss Romanoff. Let's see how much the Avengers care about their trainees."

Natasha met Penny's eyes then, questioning.

Penny shook her head. "She won't tell you anything," Penny informed the woman, surprised at how flat her own voice came out. Natasha couldn't tell them anything...not because of her. A tiny smile quirked the corner of the Black Widow's mouth. A tiny nod. The woman moved over to a table in the corner, picking up something that she slipped over her fingers, letting it rest on her knuckles. Penny had only seen brass knuckles in movies...she had never thought about them actually existing...about the fact that one day a woman would slip her fingers through them and punch Penny in the face with them.

A fist broke her nose. It was well aimed…almost like the woman had done this before. Penny bit down on her lip, staring straight ahead, knowing that Natasha was watching. That the woman was counting on her to be strong. So she would be.

Another punch. A grunt of pain. More like a whine.

Another. Then another. Penny felt a bone in her cheek break, gasping as her skin broke open and blood drip down her face. Her head snapped to the side each time, even when she tried to flinch away. She gasped for air, the pain forcing the grunts and cries from her lips. And Natasha watched, stone-faced, her stillness giving Penny strength. The greatest super-spy in the world was counting on her.

The woman stopped hitting her then, grabbing her by the chin instead and forcing her face up to the light hanging above them. "Well, Natasha? Still have nothing to say?"

Penny shook her head, just a little.

"No," Natasha told her simply.

The woman smirked. "Alright." Moving back over to the table, she slipped her fingers almost delicately out of the brass knuckles, leaving them there, dripping blood onto the wood surface underneath, and then the man rejoined them. Kneeling in front of ther, the woman grabbed her ankle, stretching her leg out, and Penny watched the man approach, head pounding as she attempted to struggle. The woman held her tight, though, and the room spun around her, making it hard to fight. "Natasha? Are you sure?"

Penny met her eyes. Natasha lifted her eyebrows.

Penny shook her head.

"I'm not telling you anything."

A foot came down...the man's. Lifted up high, then came down hard halfway between her knee and her ankle, and Penny howled. There was no other word for it...she howled, the world going white around the edges as she screamed, everything in her telling her to beg Natasha to help her...to tell them anything if they would just stop. But she didn't. Wouldn't let herself. Not even when the foot came down again on the same spot and she fought against the handcuffs that didn't give an inch.

When it came down a third time, everything went black.

Penny woke to a hand on her cheek...not hitting her. Just touching. Fingers brushing over deep cuts. "Penny? Kid?"

Penny gasped when she woke fully, eyes huge as she looked around, but it was Natasha, crouching in front of her. "Natasha?" She whimpered, lips trembling, and the woman gave her a soft smile.

"Hey...hey, little spider. It's okay, milaya." The woman murmured. "You did so good...Tony was right to recruit you" A hand ran through her hair and Penny bit back a sob, trying to breathe through the pain in her leg. "I know...it's okay malen'kiy pauk. Stay with me." Natasha ran a gentle thumb under her eye, wiping away a tear mixing with the blood that stung the cuts on her face. "We're getting out now."

"I didn't...didn't tell them…"

"I know." Natasha moved behind her, and she felt the woman doing something to her hands...picking the locks. "You didn't tell them anything." Suddenly her arms were released and Natasha moved around to her front once more, looping an arm around the girl. Penny gripped the woman's shoulder, crying out when she started to stand, her leg giving a stab of pain. "Yep...yep, that hurts. I know. It's broken…just hang on to me. I'm going to get you out of here and back to the medbay. How's that sound?"

Penny pressed her lips together, taking an agonizing, hobbling step forward and doing her best not to move her right leg. It didn't really work and the keening noise escaped against her will. "Just lean on me, kiddo. We're getting out."

"How...how did you…"

"I picked the locks on my handcuffs. It's okay. We're going home."

"Where are they?" She slurred a little. Talking hurt so much...moving her mouth jared the broken bone in her cheek, and her head was pounding in time with her pulse, every cut and every bruise throbbing along with it.

"Regrouping. We need to get out before they come back." She adjusted her arm around Penny, but the girl stumbled again. "Okay...if I put you on my back, can you hang on?" She nodded, and Natasha crouched in front of her, letting the girl wrap her arms around her neck. "Hang on tight. We're going to get out of here."

Penny heard gunshots. Gunshots close to her head. But Natasha was with her and nothing hurt more than before, so she kept her eyes closed, feeling like she had when she was little and her mom had carried her in her arms...as long as her mom was holding her, she was safe. As long as Natasha was with her, she was safe. Natasha thought that she'd done good. Thought that she deserved to be there...that Mr. Stark was right to have recruited her. So she rested her head on the woman's shoulder, vaguely aware of her arms lifting and gunshots going off and screaming, but then they beside a car. She wasn't sure exactly where Natasha had gotten the car...or the gun for that matter. But she didn't care. The spy eased her into the passenger seat, carefully unwinding her fingers from around her neck.

"There you go kid. Just hang on." She watched Natasha flinch a little when she couldn't bite back a cry of pain, her leg shifting as she sat her down. "I know...we'll get that fixed soon." Penny nodded, dazed, and drifted for the entirety of the car ride until someone else was there.

Mr. Stark crouched beside the car, a hand touching her shoulder, voice frantic. "Kid? Natasha, what the hell…where have you been? What happened to her?"

Natasha elbowed him aside, reaching out for Penny and scooping her up in her arms. "Get the med team. Broken right femur, that's the worst. We need to get that treated. Bruising. Cuts that we don't want to get infected…" The woman kept talking and Penny's head dropped against her shoulder, choking out a broken sob when she scooped her up, jostling her leg. "I know...I know, little spider. We're almost done." She soothed softly, lips close to her hair.

Another voice joined the mix then. "Nat? How did you…"

"Here. Carry her." Suddenly she was in someone else's arms and she screamed, head thrown back as her leg was moved. "Sorry, milaya." She murmured, a hand pushing some hair back. Opening her eyes a little, Penny realized she was in Steve's arms...the man was carrying her quickly towards the Compound, Mr. Stark hurrying along beside her, barking orders into a phone, throwing frantic looks at her.

"What happened? One second you were in…"

"It was a trap. They wanted information on the Avengers. Tortured her to get it." Mr. Stark made a strange noise beside her, but Penny couldn't make herself turn to look at him again. "She was amazing. Didn't say a thing. You were right, Tony."

Closing her eyes and resting her head against Captain America's very large chest, she let him carry her, trying not to cry out when he accidentally moved her leg, remembering instead that Natasha Romanoff, the Black Widow, had just called her amazing.

Thank you for reading!