Chapter 51
When Ali woke up she had no idea how much time had passed but quickly sat up and looked around. Melina who looked like Natasha was sat next to her. She smiled slightly at Ali before tucking a piece of hair behind her ears.
Ali leaned into the contact and sighed. Her mum had told her she could trust Melina so she allowed Melina to wrap an arm around her shoulder.
There was a pounding and banging noise to the right of them which Ali quickly established as Alexei trying to get out.
"Alexei."
At her voice Alexei stoped his banging and sat down on the sofa in his cell. Melina stood up and started to look around her cell with more curiosity.
Ali watched as she did this while Alexei walked up to the locked glass door of his own cell.
"Natasha. I can't save us."
At that Ali rolled her eyes before jumping off of the sofa and walking over to see what Melina was looking for in order to see if she could help.
"I need you to know that I'm sorry."
Melina sighed at this but both her and Ali payed little attention to Alexei.
Melina had managed to open a hatch in the wall which contained multiple different coloured wires.
"I pledged my life to a cause. You know, I thought I was being very brave. Possibly the bravest but I wasn't being brave. I was coward."
Alexei dramatically fell slightly against the window before dropping to his knees. His face was pressed right up against the glass.
"In Cuba, when they came and took you away from me… No cause is worth that."
Alexei kept talking while Melina tried to reach her hand through the small hatch but failed since her hand was too big. She gestured to Ali in order to ask if she could pick her up and Ali nodded her head. Melina then pointed to the red wire near the back of the hatch. It didn't take Ali long to rip it out of where it was connected.
"You should only sacrifice yourself… for something…"
The glass doors of both cells open and Melina and Ali step out of their cell while Alexei's face was smeared along the glass of his own cell as the door opened. His arm fell through the gap and he moved it back and forth surprised to find no glass in his way. He quickly got up and grabbed his helmet before stepping out of the cell and looking at Melina who he thought was Natasha. Ali was still in her arms and was smiling at Alexei.
"How did you do that?"
"I designed these cells myself."
Melina then pulled off the wig and the electrical face swap device and dropped them onto the floor. Ali giggled at Alexei's face.
"What… What? I bared my soul to you and it was just you the whole time?"
He walked closer towards Melina and Ali leaned away slightly since he still smelled really bad.
"Yes, I'm afraid so. But wait, shhh, I'm on comms with Yelena."
Alexei put his hand to his ear at the same time that Melina did. Ali pushed her own ear closer towards Melina's head so that she could hear a little of what Yelena was saying.
"Yelena, it's me. It's Mamma."
Melina smiled as she said it. Ali was a little surprised by this but knew that both Melina and Alexei were trying to make an effort and so decided to give them both a chance.
"You have a two-inch blade concealed in your belt line."
"What!"
Ali heard her exclamation. The look on her face changed to one of worry. There was silence for a second before Ali and Melina both heard Yelena say to somebody that they could not see,
"What… what are you going to do to me?"
That only once increased Ali's worry. There were a few more seconds of silence before Melina broke them.
"Outside right hip."
Almost as soon as she had said that Melina heard a crash and some cries of pain before they all stopped. They could then only hear Yelena's breathing.
"You couldn't have told me sooner?"
"Don't throw a fit. There wasn't time."
Everyone could feel Yelena roll her eyes at that.
"Where is Ali?"
Melina smirked and loved to hear the care and love in Yelena's voice when she talked about Ali.
"She is with me."
"Can you put her on the com then?"
At her words Melina took out the com from her ear and tried to place it in Ali's but it kept falling out so Ali ended up having to use her hand to keep it there.
"Yelena?"
She heard Yelena sigh in relief and mutter something under her breath.
"Are you all right?"
Ali nodded her head but then realised that Yelena couldn't see her.
"Yes. I am with Melina and Alexei and I helped them open the cells. Mum said that I could trust them."
She once again heard Yelena sigh in relief.
"You can. Just stay with them and if you get into any danger hide."
Ali frowned at that.
"I can protect myself."
"I don't doubt that. Now can you please pass the com back to Melina."
Ali took the com out of her ear and handed it back to Melina who wiped it with her sleeve before putting it back in her own ear.
"Keep her safe."
Melina's smile widened at that as she knew that Yelena was beginning to trust her again.
"I will."
Both adults still had their hands to their ears even though Alexei did not have a com.
"Okay girls, I'm having trouble hearing you but Natasha there's something I need you to know. I need you to know that I'm sorry. no more excuses, okay?"
He walked away slightly from Melina and Ali while he was speaking.
"I gave my life for a cause. I thought I was being brave."
Ali smiled at his words and leaned further into Melina as Melina walked over to Alexei and gently tapped him on the shoulder.
"You don't have earpiece."
He turned to look at her.
"What?"
"No she can't hear you. You don't have earpiece."
Ali smirked before resting her head on top of Melina's shoulder as Alexei stuck one of his fingers in his ear trying to find an earpiece.
"Why not?"
"Because it wasn't part of the plan."
"Oh yeah? Well, what was the plan?"
There was no anger in his voice as he said that. Melina spoke as they started to walk down the corridor. Ali was still being carried by Melina as they walked.
"Natasha is going to deal with Dreykov, We are to go and hack into the Red Room to land it, Yelena will get the antidote to the mind control and then we will help her free the other Widows."
Ali frowned when she heard what her mum's part in this plan was as she knew that it was probably going to be the most dangerous.
They were half way down the corridor before Melina heard Yelena's voice again in the comms.
"Where did he take the vials?"
Alexei and Ali stayed quiet as Melina pressed her finger to her ear and responded.
"Probably down to cold storage. Dreykov still has the Widows under his control, so we have to expose them to this antidote."
"Yeah sure easy."
After that Yelena stopped talking on the comms and Alexei took that moment and stopped Melina. He was slightly annoyed since he didn't see what his part in this plan was.
They had come to the end of the hallway by then and were now in a room with glass either side of them. Melina turned so that she was standing directly in front of him. Alexei had his back to the door that they had just come through.
"Come on, now. If we're just going to press buttons and hack computers…"
The door that they had entered through opened and Taskmaster strode through it slowly.
"Yes."
Melina said it in a way of confirmation but kept one eye on Taskmaster the whole time. Ali had also spotted him and continually flicked her eyes back and forth between him and Alexei.
"I mean, I don't know. There's nothing for me to do. I want to… I want to break something."
Taskmaster started to slowly creep up behind him.
"Oh you do?"
He nods at her and Ali points to Taskmaster behind him while Melina spoke.
"Oh, there is something you can break."
She whispered it and Alexei turned around to see Taskmaster. He then let out a small chuckle while Melina walked out of the room via a lab door with Ali in her arms.
"Melina, Ali, if this is the last time that we…"
He reached his arm out thinking that it would come into contact with Melina or Ali but when he felt nothing there he looked behind him to see that they had already gone.
"Ahhh, damn it."
Once they had pushed open the door into the room Melina set Ali down before dropping to the floor by a grate and lifting it up. Other than a few tables the room was bare.
Looking down Ali could see a metal ladder that was attached to the side of the vent.
Melina climbed onto the ladder first but stopped just before her head was no longer in the room and looked back at Ali who was now sitting by the vent watching her.
"I will go down first and then you can follow me."
Ali nodded and waited until Melina was 10 rungs down before she placed her foot on the first rung of the ladder and started to climb down. She pulled the grate back across the vent while she was still near the top.
The ladder wasn't that tall and it wasn't long before Ali had reached the bottom of it.
The room that she was in now, was only lit up by the lights of the equipment that surrounded them. There were different radars and many computers on different tables.
She saw Melina hacking into one of the computers and almost laughed at how slow she was going but didn't because she knew how serious this situation was. Instead she nudged Melina slightly until she had gained the woman's attention.
Once she had it she climbed up onto the desk that the computer was on and gently pushed Melina away before taking over what she had been doing, though Ali managed to achieve the results five times quicker than Melina would have been able too.
Just as she had initiated the landing sequence the computer went red and alarms started going off.
""Oh, no, no, no."
Ali frowned to herself and tried to type more things into the computer only to find that it had been frozen.
Two doors slid down on either side of them, trapping them in the control room.
Melina watched Ali but quickly saw the girl shake her head.
"The computers frozen I can't do anything with it!"
While Ali was still trying to get the computer to cooperate Melina started looking around the room. She found a grate but quickly saw that it was glued on.
Yelena's voice came over the comms then as Ali angrily pressed the on and off button on the computer continuously.
"Melina, I have found the location of the vials."
"We have had a slight set back."
It didn't take long for Melina to find something to pry the vent open with. She slammed her foot down on a hook that was on the side of one of the tables. Ali cast the computer aside and instead started to watch Melina as she used the hook as a lever to reveal the entrance of the vent.
"You will need to get to the widows."
Melina sat down before motioning to Ali to follow her. They then began to crawl through the vent. Ali was small enough and so was able to crawl on her hands and knees while Melina had to lie on her stomach and uses her arms to crawl along.
It wasn't long before they both reached the end of the vent by one of the turbines. They reached it just as the lights turned red and more alarms started blaring.
Melina looked through the grate. There was one soldier moving towards where they were and she knew that many more would arrive at any second.
She looked back at Ali who was behind her.
"You are to stay here. If the vent starts to collapse then you are allowed to get out of it."
Ali nodded with a frown on her face since she wanted to help.
Melina looked back at her one more time.
"Stay safe little one."
Ali didn't have a chance to respond as Melina had already twisted herself around so that her feet were now at the exit of the vent. She quickly pushed down on the grate and slid out of the vent to come face to face with the soldier that she had seen earlier.
It didn't take her long to knock the guard unconscious and grab his gun but she paused her attack when she saw two more soldiers walking towards her with their guns pointed at her.
Melina raised her arms but kept the gun she had retrieved in her hands and started to walk backwards along a walkway that ran over one of the main turbines that kept the Red Room in the air.
More guards appeared from another entrance and it wasn't long before she was surrounded.
She heard the guards call her name and ask her to drop to the ground and stop moving but she ignored them and continued moving until she came to the middle of the walkway.
Looking down worriedly at the turbine below her, Melina came up with a very risky and dangerous plan. When she had walked onto this walkway she had only done so to get the guards away from where Ali was hiding but now she was glad that she had walked onto this particular walkway.
"Падение на землю (Drop to the ground)."
Melina held her hands up slightly higher and smirked at the soldier that had said that.
"Precisely what I was thinking."
She quickly shot upwards with the gun that was in her hand. The bullets hit an oxygen tank near the ceiling which exploded. The debris hit the turbine. Ali watched from her hiding place in the vents as it slowly fell from the Red Room and fell down to the ground below them.
Melina managed to shoot a grappling hook up at the ceiling at the same time as the walkway she was standing on collapsed.
She swung over to the walkway which surrounds the turbine room. She touched the com in her ear as she walked slowly over to the vent were Ali was hiding.
"Yelena, slight change of plan. I completely demolished one of the engines and we are going into a controlled crash."
Ali saw the soldier before Melina did. The debris had taken care of all but one of the soldiers who had somehow also managed to keep a hold of their gun.
This soldier was standing directly in front of the vent that Ali was in. She could see his legs through the grate and when she looked up she could see his hands on the gun. One of his fingers was about to pull the trigger.
With a massive crash Ali kicked the grate off of the vent. The grate flew into the soldiers knees making him collapse to the floor and let go of his gun. The gun fell over the walkway.
Before the man had a chance to get up Melina had reached Ali and used the bottom of her foot to knock the man unconscious.
She smiled a proud smile at Ali.
"Good job."
Ali smiled back at her before Melina leaned down so that Ali could climb onto her back.
"We have to go."
Once she was on Melina's back, Melina took off running. Ali secured herself onto Melina's back meaning that Melina did not have to use one of her hands in order to keep Ali there.
They ran through many hallways and corridors and down many stairs. The heat from fires was constantly there though the temperature did vary and more than once Melina had to turn back in order to prevent them being burnt by the flames.
Even with all of that it wasn't 7 minutes later before they found Alexei who had also been trying to get down to the runway and had somehow managed to get his shield back.
He ran with them and didn't say a word as they ran but at one point had offered to carry Ali but Melina said that she would rather do it since Alexei's was the muscle. Alexei had smiled proudly at that.
They made it to the runway and saw soldiers in front of them preparing a jet for takeoff.
The soldiers completely ignore them so they ran past them towards the only other jet on the runway.
As soon as they had reached it, Ali jumped down from Melina's back and sat in the copilot seat while Melina took the seat next to her and started flipping switches and pressing buttons. As she did this she quickly turned to Ali and quietly said,
"Put your seatbelt on."
Ali did as she was told before staring out the window to watch as the Red Room literally collapsed around them. Explosion after explosion went off and Ali started to become even more worried since neither Yelena nor her mum were out yet.
"Do you see the girls?"
Alexei looked out of the door of the jet that he hadn't closed yet.
"No!"
He had to yell it over the noise of the explosions.
They all felt it when the jet started to tip forwards. Melina just continued pressing buttons and pulling levers while Ali looked at her worriedly.
The jet continued to tilt forwards but the tilt began to increase and soon they were falling.
Ali watched in horror as fire seemed to ingulf the plane as it dived towards the ground. Alexei tumbled towards the front of the plane since he had not been strapped down but managed to hold onto a strap on the wall in order to keep himself in place.
Everyone sighed in relief when Melina pulled the jet up so that they were no longer flying vertically.
Their worry did not lesson though since they still did not have Yelena or Natasha on the jet with them.
"We need to go back."
Melina nodded at Ali in reassurance and pulled the jet up towards the sky so that they could now see the falling Red Room. The falling Red Room was not the only thing they saw though.
Three soldiers with guns were in front of them. They had no parachutes on their backs and were falling towards the jet.
They started shooting at them but two out of the three fell into debris and so got knocked off course. The only one left managed land on the jet and started shooting at them through the front window.
Ali screamed and ducked down while covering her head with her hands. Melina tried to stay calm and focused her attention on flying the jet without hitting any of the debris that was raining down on them.
Alexei was the one to solve the problem. He quickly threw his shield at the window breaking the glass and knocking the soldier off of the jet.
Glass scattered everywhere but thankfully didn't cause damage to any of them.
For a second everything was slightly calmer. It only lasted a second since the next second they all heard the crash of something breaking and the jet started spinning towards the ground, completely out of control.
Melina desperately started pressing buttons but nothing was working. She looked up at the two others in the plane with dread written all over her face.
"We've lost control."
At her words the two adults immediately sprung in action.
Melina unclipped her seatbelt before grabbing Ali and moving towards the back of the jet where Alexei was.
Ali gripped onto Melina tightly but let go slightly when Alexei handed Melina a parachute.
The two adults then moved carefully towards the jet door. There was no way to secure Ali to the parachute and so Melina had resigned herself to just having to hold the little girl tight to her chest.
Once the parachute was securely on them both Alexei looked pointedly at Melina to show that she could go first which she did.
She pushed off with one of her feet so that she wouldn't land close to the plane when it crashed into the ground.
The only thing was that Melina hadn't realised that one of her feet was wrapped around a strap that had come loose. This meant that when she pushed herself out of the jet she got pulled back.
This surprised her so much that her grip on Ali loosened. Unfortunately it loosened just enough for Ali to slip out of her arms and fall out of the spinning jet.