A/N: ANOTHER CHAPTER! Yay. Things are moving along now... WARNINGS: Language,
After her talk with Wanda, Natasha got rid of both bottles. She'd decided to keep the baby. Maybe she'd be a great mother, maybe not, but after she'd told Wanda to open up she'd realized that her words had more meaning than she'd thought. She should take this opportunity for a new family. She never thought she'd be in this situation, but Clint had done it…
Although he had Laura. Her baby had no father, no one to take care of it when she went away. Of course, she knew the other Avengers would help her, but she needed someone to actually be the other parent. She couldn't ask Laura, she already had three little kids. Maybe this wasn't such a good idea.
Stop it, Romanoff. You decided. Now go tell Fury you're going on the mission. It'll be fine. You have months to prepare yourself.
After she was prepped for the mission, she went to pack her bags. She packed some generic clothing, plus some fancy business clothes because Fury told her she'd be in disguise as a secretary. That way people would pay attention to her less. She also packed some personal belongings, including the prenatal vitamins disguised as regular vitamins that Clint had almost violently forced her to bring. She packed several burner phones, plus a tablet with some information on the place and people that Fury had given her. After she said goodbye to everyone, a SHIELD agent disguised as a chauffeur began to drive her away. She took a deep breath and placed one hand on her stomach. She knew it was cheesy, but she didn't really care. She was really doing this.
Natasha passively looked out of the window for most of the drive, so when they arrived at the airport she was surprised by how fast the time had gone by. She would have been taken on a SHIELD jet, but they wanted her to appear as normal as possible, so she was taking a regular plane. Not very many people were on her flight, seeing as she was basically going to the middle of nowhere, but there were a couple of sketchy looking dudes that Nat chose to avoid.
During the flight, she didn't do much except study the information on the tablet. She'd only brought one duffle bag, so she tagged it as carry on so she could keep it close to her.
The next morning, after less than three hours of sleep, Natasha got off of the plane. Shockingly, for Russia in October, it was cold. It wasn't snowing, but it was pretty damn cold. Natasha was used to that though. She found the car she was looking for, and entered the back of it. It was a black van. Wow, real subtle.
Inside of the van, it was really dark, because the windows were tinted so much it must have been illegal. There was a black screen in between the back and the front of the car, and in the back there were two seats in the middle, like in an SUV, but no back seats. Just an empty space attached to the trunk, making an even larger empty space. There was a small black cupboard attached to the roof, probably full of guns. They were really sticking with the black aesthetic here. Natasha scanned the area for cameras, and found a very small one just above her seat that most people wouldn't've noticed. She pretended that she didn't see it, however, and sat down.
After she'd placed her duffle bag next to her and buckled in, she looked around. She dramatically swiveled her head, pretending to look slightly scared by her surroundings. She twisted the "engagement ring" that was part of her disguise, and sat back in her seat.
"Hello?" She called, trying to look as lost as possible. Then she gently knocked on the screen. Someone snapped it open.
"Hello, beautiful." Said a rather large, rather gross looking man, who was smoking a cigarette and scratching his head. He had a thick russian accent, and was wearing the most grimy looking brown coat Natasha had ever seen.
"Hello, I'm the new secretary? I was told to get into this van." She said, making her voice slightly nicer than usual and about an octave higher.
The man smiled in an almost mean way. "You are in the right place, beautiful. You are… Natalie Rushman, yeah?"
"I am Natalie Rushman." Natasha said with a little smile. "So… what do you want me to do?" Natasha knew they wanted her to be compliant, so she figured this was a good question. Also, she made sure not to ask where they were going, despite how much she wanted to know. She didn't want them to feel like she was being nosy, because they might think she was a spy. Which she was. But obviously she wasn't about to mention that.
"You relax, beautiful. We will arrive in a couple of hours. While we wait, would you like beer?"
"Oh, no thank you."
The man grunted and took a swig of his own beer, which was very obviously not his first of the day, and sat back in his chair. Natasha frowned, wondering why they weren't driving yet. She decided to take the risk of asking.
"Are we going to get going?" She asked as innocently as possible.
"We are just waiting for another." He growled. She nodded, and wondered who they were waiting for. Maybe it was someone else like her, a new hire.
"Борис! Погнали! (Boris! Let's go!)" Called another voice from outside the van. He opened the door and sat down in the passenger seat. Natasha had to hold in a gasp when she saw who it was. His crooked teeth, his striking green eyes.
"Это новый секретарь. ты говоришь по русски, натали?" Natasha stayed silent. He'd said "This is the new secretary. Do you speak Russian, Natalie?" But she had to pretend that she didn't, so that she could overhear important conversations. The two men smiled at each other, believing that they now had the advantage. But, of course, she did.
As they drove away into the middle of nowhere, Natasha had to keep calm. She never thought she'd see him again. Luckily he didn't recognize her, probably because he hadn't seen her since she was a kid, but she recognized him. He hadn't aged a day.
"So, tell us about yourself Natalia." Said the second man.
Natasha's heart jolted. The way he said her name... it brought back a bad feeling, but she brushed it off. It was just the Russian way of saying Natalie. It had nothing to do with the past.
"It's Natalie." She said confidently. As much as she'd like to say she was over the past, she hated when people called her Natalia. "And I'm a secretary, but I was laid off last month. That's why I applied for this job, it seemed like a good opportunity." She explained, the lies coming easily. Fury had given her a general plan of what was up with the new Natalie Rushman, but Natasha was left to add the details. "I'm engaged," Here she added a little smile, as though she was thinking of her soon-to-be husband. It made her cringe inside. "And we're getting married after I work here for a few months. I just wanted to have some real-world experience before we tie the knot."
"That's wonderful." Boris mumbled absentmindedly.
"Do you know who I am?" Asked the second man.
She did know who he was. How could she not? When she'd arrived at the Red Room the second time, he'd been the one to separate her from her family and friends. She watched him hit several other girls, and then he'd turned to her. His icy green eyes gleamed in the moonlight and the cold of mid-winter Russia. He'd smiled his sick, cruel smile that had filled her nightmares for years after, and grabbed her arm. "Hello Natalia. You can call me Sidorov. I'm so glad you've come again. Follow me." He didn't give her a chance to follow him and grabbed her arm, then led her to a room filled with around a dozen other girls. But before he let her in, he bent down and got so close she could smell his sour breath. "Be a good girl. Obey. Or you will regret it." Then he smiled his crooked smile again, shoved her in the room, and left. She then found out he was one of the supervisors, so she had to see his ugly face every day. No matter how many girls were with her, he almost always seemed to be smiling cruelly at her. He was always in the rooms she was training in. Occasionally when they'd pass in the hall he'd say "Hello Natalia." hissing her name at her. She never understood why he was always focused on her.
But yes, she did remember him. She'd never forget his smile, or his cold, cold green eyes. He made her hate having green eyes for years.
"No, I don't."
"You can call me Sidorov." He growled, for the second time in Natasha's life. She bit her lip.
"It's nice to meet you… Sidorov." She said kindly, keeping her voice steady. He's just a shadow from your past. There's no reason to be this upset. Keep it together, Romanoff.
After a few hours of driving, Natasha mostly focused on coming up with plans of action and trying to look through the windows, they stopped. She opened her door and stepped out.
They were in a clearing, in a forest of some sort, most of the grass yellow and dead. She could see nothing but trees and a small, winding path around her. About 10 meters from them stood a big building, around the size of a big school, but if it was a school it would be fined a million dollars for being unsafe.
It was mostly brick, but in some places it was made of metal. Natasha wondered why. There seemed to be only one entrance from what she could see, and the doors were completely rusted through. A few other vans and cars were parked in random places around the building, and two delivery trucks were parked near the entrance, several people unloading the contents. The contents looked like federal crimes, just judging from the boxes.
Boris put his arm around her, his hand dangerously close to her chest. She casually shrugged him off and followed Sidorov toward the building. She tried not to think about the last time she followed him somewhere.
Sidorov wrenched the door open and let her in first. He smiled at her, and she had to suppress a shiver. Then Boris led her through the halls.
They were mostly just cement, with rusty doors leading off and stingy light bulbs every few feet. There was no decoration, and it was dark and depressing. They stopped at one door, and Boris opened it dramatically.
"This is where you will stay." He announced, as though it was a five star hotel. It really, really wasn't.
It was the size of a large bathroom, and had a hospital cot in one corner. There was a tiny, square foot window one one wall, a rotten looking painting of a sunset on another, and a small desk underneath it. There was also a dresser with a mirror on top, and a small rack with four or five hangers. The bathroom attached was barely big enough for a small person to fit inside, and had a toilet and a sink. In the cupboard under the sink there were two lonely rolls of toilet paper and a tiny first aid kit. There was a facecloth, a tube of toothpaste and soap next to the sink, and that was it. That was everything in the room, although it was pretty nice considering some other places she'd stayed over the years.
"Lovely." She muttered, sitting down on the bed.
"We'll leave you for a couple of minutes, then we will show you where you will be working."
After they'd left, she put her duffel bag on the bed and checked a few things on the tablet. She didn't bother unpacking, she never did, just in case of an emergency. She used the bathroom and then tucked the tablet in her jacket, which had very handy pockets, and sat waiting for them to come back. She noticed that they'd closed her door, and that it was locked from the outside. That was a very big red flag… not that this whole place wasn't a red flag.
"Ms. Rushman!" Called a man, walking into her room. He was tall, muscular but thin, and had a very annoyingly smug look on his face. He was wearing a grey business suit and was carrying a briefcase. He also had an American accent, which piqued Natasha's interest.
"Hello." She said kindly.
"Wow, Boris was right, you really are beautiful. You have lovely hair, and…" His eyes wandered, and she silently glared at him. He quickly stopped. Wow, these men are gross.
"Anyway, follow me, I'll show you where you'll be working."
He led her out of the room and down the hallway to a door which led to a large room. In the corners she saw several doors, which looked like they had some soundproofing qualities. In the middle of the room she saw a large collection of boxes and packages. A couple of people were sitting around in chairs, not bothering to do anything about the mess. Then a man walked in sporting handcuffs and a shiny black eye, being escorted by several other people. His eyes widened when he saw her, and he struggled within his bonds. He looked as though he recognized her, and she thought she recognized him too but she just couldn't place him.
"This is… well, it doesn't really matter. You won't be working here, you'll just pass by. Don't mind those people, they're fine."
Natasha followed the handcuffed man with her eyes, watching as he looked right at her, seemingly terrified. They shoved him into one of the rooms in the corners, and Natasha saw cells past them. Oh, shit. Someone without her trained eye wouldn't have noticed, luckily, so nobody suspected anything.
The man with her guided her away from the scene, and led her through a much nicer looking door.
"This is where you will be working."
She'd expected some kind of office, but instead there was a large room with couches, chairs and a small kitchenette. A couple of grimy looking men were sitting around.
"You can start by making some coffee, I'm sure everyone would appreciate that. Don't worry about distributing it, if anyone wants some they'll come here to get it. This is the break room. If anyone asks for food it's your job to make it, the pantry is fully stocked. And also this place probably needs some vacuuming… Daniel here will take you to the other places that need cleaning up. You'll probably just be cleaning up for the next few days, this place is filthy." He laughed. "Everyone's so busy, we were desperately in need of someone to help."
They don't look busy.
"I thought I was a secretary…" She said, eyeing Daniel, who looked like a sexual assault poster.
"You are! Well, not really. That's what we advertise. You will be organizing some things, but your job has a bit of everything in it. And besides, you're only here for a little while until we find a permanent replacement. Alright! If you need anything, Daniel can help you, and you're done at 2:30. You can eat whatever you like, and that goes for anytime until 7:00 pm. Never come in here past 7, that's important. You'll be fired if you do. As for the rest of the place, you can explore all you like, just don't enter any rooms without permission except that room back there, your room and this room. Obviously except for past 7 pm. Anyway, goodbye! I probably won't see you around. I'm the boss, so I'll be busy."
Then he left.
She looked around at the men in the room, who gestured to the coffee maker. They didn't even bother to show her how it worked.
Fucking misogynistic sexist criminals.