Chapter: 8
Exactly one hour and ten minutes later she found herself back in the same interrogation room as before. She sat quietly, with her arms crossed over her chest, and stared at the two-way mirror. She wondered if there was anyone watching her at that moment, she highly doubted that it would be just her and Agent Coulson. She wondered if Agent Coulson or Furry was studying her at that very moment as she sat there, perhaps to see if they could pick up on anything. She also found herself wondering if Agent Barton was there, not for any particular reason, she was just curious and he was someone she knew. After a bit of a wait, she heard the door open behind her but she didn't look at the man who had entered. She kept her emotionless mask firmly in place. In that medical room they had seen her in a weakened state. She didn't dare let him see it again. She had spent most of the last twenty minutes preparing herself for the interrogation. She would not let her mask crack this time.
"Hello Ms. Romanoff," he said as he shut the door and walked to the opposite side of the table. "Are you feeling better today?" He tried to keep his tone kind and polite, but she could hear the edge hidden in his voice. She kept him on edge, that was good.
"I'm fine," she replied in a neutral tone of her own. He shrugged slightly as he took the seat in front of her and put down th clipboard.
"You had us concerned for a while there," he said and she didn't bother to reply to that. She had no doubt that a lot of people on the base would've been relieved if she had just died. "There was a device found," he said taking a paper out of the file that was resting beside his clipboard. He slid it over to her but she didn't pick it up, just stared at it. It was of some sort of device. It was paper-thin and about as small as a dime. She looked up at him with a raised eyebrow. "It was found under your skin, Ms. Romanoff, at the back of your neck," he said "do you know what it is?" She stared at him for a moment, possibly judging if he was telling the truth or not.
"No," she replied and slid the picture back to him. He sighed softly as he placed the picture back into the file.
"We believe it was the reason you collapsed," he informed her "somehow they believe it activated when I asked about your past organization, like some sort of trigger. Did your organization create anything like that?"
"There's a lot they didn't tell us," was her only reply. They stared at each other for a moment before he nodded and picked up his pen.
"Ok," he said "let's get back to where we left off then, what was your last organization?" The reaction was almost instant. her eyes began to look unfocused.
"Who takes care of you?" A harsh voice snapped at her.
"Red Room," She replied automatically. She didn't dare take to long to reply.
"Who is your only family?"
"Ms. Romanoff?" The other voice called out to her again.
"Red Room," She replied again.
"Will you ever betray your family?"
"No."
"Ms. Romanoff," The voice snapped just enough to get her attention. She snapped out of her past and into the present. She could picture her old handler, Ivan, could see the dark look he seemed to always have in his eyes. She could smell him, hear his harsh voice in her ears, see his sick smile he always gave her.
"Ms. Romanoff, can I try something new?" Agent Coulson's voice cut through her thoughts again and she fought back the glare she wanted to give him for no apparent reason. He held out his pen to her and waited for her to take it. On instinct her mind went through all the different ways she could kill him with just that pen. She held it in her hand and pushed those thoughts to the back of her mind. "I want you to twirl the pen." He said and she gave him a look. He sent one right back to her that said he wasn't kidding. His theory was that it gave her something that helped her focus, gave her a connection to the present. "Start twirling Romanoff, we're going to build up to this." She fought another glare but slowly did as she was told. "Ok, new question, where were you born?"
"Russia," she replied instantly. The pen twirled faster in her fingers.
"Good, how long where you with your past organization?" The pen slowed down and almost stopped. "Keep twirling." He said and she obeyed.
"As long as I can remember," she replied.
"Can you tell me how old you were when you joined them?"
"No," he had expected as much. "I was young though," the pen came back up to speed.
"Eighteen?" He threw out there and she shook her head.
"No, a child," she replied and he tried not to get frustrated.
"Thirteen?" He tried again.
"A young child," she tried not to snap at him. He paused for a moment and tried to give her a gentle look.
"Ballpark estimate?" The pen slowed down. "Ms. Romanoff?" Her eyes where losing focus again. "Ms. Romanoff?"
The weapon was heavy in her hands, and it was empty, she knew that for a fact. She looked up in the dirty old mirror of the preparation room and studied her small body closely. She was much smaller than a lot of the other girls. She grabbed the clip laying on the table beside her and put it into the weapon like she had been taught. A small clanking sound pulled her out of her thoughts along with a man's voice.
"Seven," she said calmly as she picked up the fallen pen. "If I had to guess." Coulson wrote it down.
"Can you estimate how old you were when you started doing actual work for them?" He asked and looked back up at her.
"seven" She repeated simply as she twirled the pen again. He gave her a look "we trained and worked at the same time." She said simply, as if it were completely normal. She simply kept twirling the pen and waited for the next question. She stopped when she noticed he was just staring at her. She thought back to what they had just said and realised he was surprised. SHEILD didn't train their agents that young? "Next," she said and he seemed to snap out of it. He wrote something down then looked up at her.
"Ok, Ms. Romanoff," he said with a serious look "I want you to twirl the pen and don't stop. Focus on twirling the pen ok." She wanted to roll her eyes at him but she had to admit to herself that twirling the pen had helped at least a little. She nodded and the pen began to move in her hand. "Do you remember what happened to your parents?" He asked cautiously, he knew this would be a tough one. Smoke, she could smell it all around her. The air was warming up with fire. Natasha fought the flashback and focused her attention on the pen as it twirled in her fingers.
"They-" The smoke grew thicker and she could hear screaming.
"I just need a dead or alive," Coulson said. Voices screamed out her name. Something crashed behind her.
"Dead," she said quickly. The screaming grew louder and the fire was growing closer. She focused on the pen twirling. She fought the memories that she couldn't even be sure were real, though somewhere deep inside of her said that they were. Coulson watched her closely the entire time, he waited until it seemed that she had a firm grip on herself again.
"Next question?" He asked and she looked up at him. "What organization did you work for?" Her hand stilled again and the pen fell from her fingers. It was slightly impressive to him that she could be so well conditioned that even the mention of revelling her past organization made her freeze. However, he wasn't too sure that he wanted to know how it was accomplished. "Romanoff focus," he said in a stern voice "get the pen." She looked down to where it lay in front of her. Suddenly she hated the stupid thing.
"Who is your only family," She pushed back against the flashback. She glared at the pen on the table. She didn't need some stupid little object to help her, she was stronger than that. They had no more control over her. She's one of the best, if not the best, assassins in Russia. She could handle a simple question, she was being ridiculous.
"Will you betray your family?" She pushed against her own mind until it was silent.
"Red Room," something inside her snapped. It was like a chain that had held her back had finally broken. "The organization that I worked for was called the Red Room." Coulson stared at her for a moment then wrote it down. He was just about to speak again when the door came open and Furry himself stepped in. His face was just as blank as Natasha's, revelling nothing. She guessed that it was him who was doing the observing behind the glass.
"We need to speak." He said looking from Natasha to Coulson. He gave him a stern look to show that he wasn't anywhere near playing around "Right now."
There's chapter 8. Hope you all enjoyed :)