A/N: I'm thinking of adding an epilogue after this chapter... maybe change up what happened in Endgame a bit. Let me know what you think! Enjoy :)

The first thing that happened was that Wanda tried to use her powers on Sidorov. But as soon as she did, she curled over in pain, clutching at her neck.

"You thought I would let the most powerful Avenger beat me?" Sidorov growled.

"Hey." Tony mumbled.

"Oh, no, Tony Stark, she is hundreds of times stronger than you are. That is why one of my robots placed a chip on her neck." He laughed, smiling insanely and pointing to Wanda, who was clawing at her neck, trying desperately to remove the tiny piece of metal she'd just noticed. "And it is controlled…" He held up a tiny remote, "By me."

An arrow zoomed in Sidorov's direction, whizzing straight at his head from somewhere. Sidorov reached up and caught it midair.

"You think your little archer friend can help you? I'm afraid you have underestimated me."

"That's my son!" Clint yelled, appearing from the stairs leading to the armory and lunging at Sidorov. He pressed a button on his small remote and Wanda screamed, glowing with red energy. Her eyes went wide as her hands shot out and threw a burst of magic at Clint, who was thrown against the wall. Cooper cried out, squirming against Sidorov's hold.

Wanda stared at her hands in shock, and then turned to Sidorov incredulously.

"You-" She began, but Sidorov chuckled and pressed another button and she winced, dropping to her knees defeatedly. Sidorov was controlling her powers.

"Now." The man began, as though he were simply talking about the weather. "Give me the child," He tightened his grip on Cooper. "Or this one dies."

Cooper screamed, his voice echoing through the giant room. He struggled, but to no end.

"Stop, just stop!" Steve cried, stepping out, one hand on his leg. "He's just a kid."

"And I want the baby. It has the potential to be great. It is a perfect clean slate, a chance to remake the defective one. I had Natasha, the greatest weapon I'd ever made. And then she went and joined you. That child would be a chance to do it all over again. And, to obtain it… I can kill all of you. With her."

Wanda began to rise into the air, tendrils of energy swirling around her as she sobbed, trying desperately to break free of Sidorov's hold.

"So." He began to walk backwards toward the door, holding on to Cooper's neck like he did with Sasha. "Would you like to hand me the child, and I leave you all alone, or I take this one with me and kill the rest of you?"

Cooper tried to drop to his knees but Sidorov squeezed his neck harder and he stood up again.

"What will it be?"

There was a silence. Everyone was eyeing Wanda, and none of them knew where Natasha had gone with the baby. A couple of times someone would open their mouth and start to say something, but what could they say?

"Let him go."

Sidorov grinned as Natasha came up the stairs.

"Natalia." He growled.

"Let him go." She repeated, striding over to Sidorov. She didn't let any fear show on her face, even though she was terrified. Slowly, Sidorov released his grip on Cooper's neck and the little boy ran to Natasha. She put her arm around him and leaned down.

"Go." She whispered, and he ran to his dad who was leaning against the wall where he'd been thrown.

"How did you get to him?" She asked, beyond angry with him at this point.

"He's a curious little thing. Was poking his head out of the door in all the chaos. It wasn't hard. I also was able to stop that other man. What was his name… Fury? Yes, he was quite easy. Just like you, Natasha. Always falling into my traps when you were little. Then you got smarter. I must admit, паук, you were perfect. So agile, so strong, so smart… and then you wasted it. You left. I couldn't brainwash you like the others… such a shame."

(паук = spider)

"Why were you always so obsessed with me over the other girls?" She asked. She'd wanted to know for so long. Why she was always the center of his focus. Why she was trained harder, punished harder. Why he'd chosen her.

She was supposed to be fighting, trying to kill him, but she needed to know.

"Because, паук, I saw the potential in you. But mostly… you didn't care anymore. You had nothing left to care about. At least, that's what I thought. But…" His eyes sparkled as a thought occurred to him. "You could come back. Become a trainer for the younger girls, a supervisor. I could take your child and have a copy of you… or I could take you and train generations of copies of you."

Natasha hesitated. From the other side of the room, Maria watched as Natasha stepped closer to Sidorov. She should have been fighting, but she wasn't. It was almost as though she was… considering it. Maria frowned, appalled as Natasha stepped even closer. This man had brainwashed her for so long… she must not have been thinking straight.

"Nat, no!" She yelled, and Sirdorov held up his remote threateningly. Natasha turned and looked at Maria. "I'm sorry." She mouthed, finally taking the last step toward Sidorov, who smirked, shocked by his incredible luck, and grabbed Nat's arm. Natasha looked down and began to follow him out the door.

Maria shook her head, looking over at the others, who were staring wide-eyed at Nat. Fury emerged from upstairs, rubbing his head which had evidently been hit with something, and stopped short at the sight.

Maria stood there in disbelief. Natasha had forgotten entirely about her family. She had given up, all of a sudden, and there was nothing they could do about it. They all watched sadly and defeatedly as she walked. They were watching her go.

But then she turned around.

"Fuck you." Natasha whispered, pulling out her knife and stabbing Sidorov right in the heart. His cruel smile slipped as she held up his remote which she had expertly stolen, and she pressed the release button on the top. Wanda sighed in relief and she yanked the chip from her neck.

"So this is what you've chosen, паук." Sidorov whispered as he fell to the ground. "That was the wrong choice."

"No, it wasn't." She said quietly, as she watched the life drain from his cold green eyes. "No it wasn't."

Maria ran over to Natasha and kneeled down next to her. Natasha took one last look at Sidorov before she turned and took Maria's hand. Together they walked away from his body as Laura and Nate emerged with Vision from the stairs. Vision went straight to Wanda.

"Just to be clear…" Maria turned to Natasha, "You were planning to do that the whole time, right?"

"You don't think I would've actually left with him, right?" Natasha said, raising her eyebrows.

"You were pretty convincing."

"Thank you." Natasha said, smirking slightly.

Maria sighed.

"I'm sorry. I know he was a bastard, but… you grew up with him and then killed him. That must have been at least a little traumatic."

"No. He was… nothing to me. He deserved to die." She said darkly, but turned when she heard a small cry. Laura had passed Nate to Clint, who had recovered pretty well from being thrown against a wall, and she was gently rocking Violet. Natasha immediately crossed the room to her and Laura shifted her into Nat's arms.

"Hey." She whispered, bouncing slightly as Violet cried. She turned to see Fury and agent Carr loading Sidorov's body onto a stretcher. He was gone. They were gonna be okay.

"Is Cooper alright?" Natasha asked as Clint came up to her, bouncing Nate as he cried too. He looked back at Laura who was comforting Cooper and Lila.

"He will be. Are you okay?" He asked, and Natasha nodded.

"Yeah. I'm okay." She looked down at Violet. "We're okay."

Three months passed.

Clint decided to retire back to his farm to spend more time with his family. The kids were put into therapy, which Clint had first thought was ridiculous but then decided that it made sense considering what they'd been through. Particularly Cooper. After a couple of weeks, Clint sent Nat a photo of Cooper and Lila learning how to shoot arrows. "The superior form of weapon" was his caption.

Steve recovered quickly from his gunshot wound, obviously, and took up drawing with Bruce. Bruce sucked at it, but Steve was actually okay. He also read up on memes and made sure to share them with everyone else to the point where they would avoid talking to him so he didn't bring them up.

Tony decided to start on a safer project, one that didn't involve possibly dangerous robot human life creating technology. He built a birdhouse with sensors and automatic refilling technology, becoming friends with a robin which he named Antonia. Pepper wasn't too happy about it.

Thor came back from his trip, claiming that he'd invented a new food. It was a sweet cookie base filled with jam, topped with icing and sprinkles. Bruce kindly explained to him that this was a poptart and had already been invented. Thor didn't believe him.

Wanda and Vision didn't really appear much more in public than they used to, but when they did Wanda looked more comfortable. Still shy, still grieving, but she was alright. And Vision… well, he hadn't really changed much except that he'd learned a whole lot about memes from Steve.

Maria and Natasha had gotten comfortable on their floor with Violet, living a pretty normal life for two gay spies who worked for an organization protecting the earth from aliens who had a baby whose father was a machine. Fury once accidentally walked in on them making out in a supply closet, but none of them ever spoke of it and so it virtually never happened, but other than that everything went relatively smoothly after Sidorov was killed.

Violet grew a lot, gaining adorable chubby cheeks and a lot of red hair. She also got louder, but pretty much everyone at Avengers tower was loud so she fit right in.

Natasha was back on the field after a couple of months, only on safe missions, but she was relieved to be back at work as much as she missed Clint. And Maria had been temporarily appointed head of SHIELD when Fury went on a mysterious business trip, so she was busy too.

They really were okay, all of them.

Because they were the fucking Avengers.