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Yelena lays low in the tiny apartment that she and Natalia were sharing. It had been nearly two months since Natalia defected from the Red Room and managed to pull Yelena out with her.
Yelena hadn’t seen her sister in eleven years at that point but felt oddly emotional when Natalia broke her out as well.
Natalia was now taking hit contracts to earn money. Yelena would sometimes pickpocket. They never really acknowledged the whole Red Room thing. They just picked up where they left off. Yelena was the little sister and Natalia was the big sister and that was that.
Yelena glances at the clock, frowning because Natalia never took this long on contracts. Her sister was the best at what she did. Then there is a knock at the door that tells Yelena that Natalia was back but not alone.
Yelena rolls off the couch, snatching the gun taped under the coffee table up, and lets out a whistle in return.
The door opens and Yelena points the gun. The man behind Natalia paused as Natalia entered the apartment.
“Gun down, he says he has an offer,” Natalia tells Yelena. Yelena lowers her gun but doesn’t holster it. Natalia waves the man in.
“Wow. When you said little sister, I didn’t think you meant a child,” The man comments, glancing around the apartment.
“I am not a child,” Yelena sneers at him and points the gun again. Natalia sighs and tells her to lower the gun again and Yelena rolls her eyes.
“They sent me to kill you,” The man glances at Natalia, and Yelena lunges. Natalia shoves her back before flicking her nose.
“Stop. Listen.” Natalia chides and Yelena huffs.
“Then dear Black Widow here told me about the Red Room and about how someone would come to avenge her. Then she mentions a sister. Now, here we are,” He makes himself at home on the couch. “I want to recruit you for an agency called SHIELD.”
Yelena promptly leaves the room to go dig into her stash of tea biscuits. Natalia could handle him well enough. She trusted Natalia’s judgment. She’s halfway through the metal tin when Natalie tells her to pack a bag.
Yelena sticks close to Natalia as they follow the man to his extraction.
Yelena wrinkles her nose as they’re handcuffed and their bags are taken.
“Are you sure this is the best choice?” Yelena questioned as she’s strapped in next to Natalia.
“Have faith in me, little sister,” Natalia gives her a sweet smile and Yelena rolls her eyes and they’re quiet for the rest of the ride.
“I send you to kill one and you come back with two,” A woman comments as Yelena and Natalia are manhandled off of the plane.
Yelena is jerked away from Natalia and Yelena twists to try and find her sister again in the crowd. “What are you doing? Let me go! Natalia!”
“You said we could stay together!” Natalia’s voice is heard through the crowds. “You have to let us stay together!”
“We have to interview you separately,” The female spoke.
Yelena reaches up and grabs the razor she tucked under her tongue just before they left. She turns and swipes at the first soldier holding her.
She wasn’t going to let them take her from her sister again.
“Jesus Christ, stop her--” A man calls out.
Yelena whistles, spinning around to defend herself from hands reaching out to grab at her.
“Let me go, please, let me go. I can calm her--” Natalia speaks up from somewhere in the mix.
And only a few moments later do familiar hands cup her face and Yelena sags into the touch but doesn’t let down her guard.
“Don’t let them take me,” Yelena whispers into the touch. “You said that we wouldn’t be separated again. You promised.”
“I know. I’ve got you,” Natalia pulls her as close as she can with the handcuffs. Yelena drops the bloodied razor blade and Natalia raises her arms up to Yelena can get close to her before lowering her arms around her to hold her close. “Breathe, little sister .”
Yelena presses her face into the crook of Natalia’s neck, trusting her sister to guard her back while she does.
“Let’s get somewhere more private,” The female speaks up. Yelena doesn’t pull away from Natalia all the way as they’re herded into an interrogation room. There’s only one chair so Natalia and Yelena do what they always do.
They make things work.
Natalia sits and Yelena folds herself up into Natalia’s lap to paint the picture of the scared little girl that she only partially felt. They might not buy it. Not after she pulled a razor blade from her mouth and slashed anybody who got too close.
“We can bring another chair,” The man comments but Natalia shakes her head, pulling Yelena closer.
Another chair is brought anyway and the woman from before takes a seat across from them.
Yelena focused on the cuffs around their wrists, a prototype that she had never seen before. She lets the conversation flow over her, knowing that Natalia would pinch her if she needed to be listening.
A file is slammed onto the table and Yelena jumps and twists and reaches for the blade that was no longer hidden under her tongue.
“Shh,” Natalia pulls her back against her chest. “It is alright.”
The file on the table is opened and a pen is pushed toward them. “Fill this out.” The woman replies.
Yelena looks down at the form, wrinkling her nose at the English. She hated writing and reading in English.
Natalia grips the pen and glances down and starts to write. Yelena watches her and takes the pen when it is offered to her. Yelena writes her answers in Russian, Natalia whispering the questions in Russian into Yelena’s ear.
“Does she understand English?” The woman questioned when she catches onto what they’re doing.
Natalia shrugs. “Well enough.” She replies ominously.
Yelena glances at the nametag on the woman’s suit, taking a moment to translate it into her head. The woman was named Maria Hill.
“What exactly are you offering us?” Yelena questioned the woman with narrowed eyes.
“A job,” Natalia replies, poking Yelena’s side. “Pay attention.”
“A job for both of us or just you?” Yelena asked and Natalia glances at Maria, translating the question when the woman doesn’t reply.
“Both of you,” Maria said and Natalia pulls Yelena closer. “We understand that she’s a minor. She won’t be working full-time. But she has a particular skill set that we could use.”
“Is it seduction? I know some people like little girls,” Yelena inquired and Natalia sneers.
“If you send my sister out to seduce then I will kill you,” Natalia informs Maria.
Maria blinks in surprise, glancing between them. “She-- Jesus, she’s seventeen. I’m not doing that.”
Yelena laughs. “I have been doing for many years.” She tries to relay to Maria in English. “Nothing new.”
Maria shakes her head. “No. You’re not seducing anybody. The Director will probably just stick you with the other new recruits to go through training.”
Yelena wrinkles her nose. Training? She’d been training almost her whole life. “I’ve been training since six.”
“Well, you would otherwise be the youngest recruit,” Maria replies.
“I stay with Natalia,” Yelena continues, nodding her head at her sister. “I go where she go.”
Maria pursed her lips, glancing between them. “I can’t guarantee that you’ll stay together.”
“No. You don’t understand. She stays with me,” Natalia tells Maria firmly.
Maria sighs. “I’ll see what I can do.”
They try to separate them for missions. Yelena allows it at first as long as she was able to see them off and be the first to greet them when they came back. She tried her best to be good but she was the youngest of all the new recruits by four years and didn’t speak, read, or write English very well.
Then she sneaks out to accompany her sister on a mission. Even though Natalia’s handler was furious with her, Yelena ended up saving the mission by being small enough to shimmy through a vent and gather the intel and take out the target.
Apparently, they had vastly underestimated her abilities because she didn’t bother with actually training with the other new recruits.
Natalia has a possessive grip on Yelena the whole flight back from the mission. Each time that her handler tries to start a conversation then Natalia would glare at him and he would concede and wait.
An angry Maria Hill greets them when they come back. She yells at Yelena. She tells her that it was stupid and dangerous for her to go, how she could have gotten hurt or died. Yelena took the whole thing in stride. Natalia’s team watched the whole thing with wide eyes.
Maria moves her hand and Yelena flinches in anticipation of a hit. It doesn’t come. Natalia steps between them, looking at Maria, and just tells her “enough”.
“We don’t physically punish agents here, Agent Romanoff,” Maria tells her cooly.
Yelena waits because that was probably a lie. How else would they learn?
Maria sighs, turning to look at Natalia’s team. “Have any of you ever been physically punished while working at SHIELD?”
They shake their heads and mutter out a “no ma’am”.
And if they didn’t physically punish then Yelena went through all of the ways in her head of how they could possibly punish her instead.
“Do I have to dance?” Yelena asked Maria.
Maria frowns, her brow furrowing. “Dance?” She echoes.
Yelena nods. “Dance.” She glances at Natalia.
“Do ballet until you can no longer dance and then push yourself to dance more,” Natalia explains.
“That doesn’t seem like much of a punishment…” Maria raised an eyebrow.
“You dance until you cannot,” Natalia elaborates. “Until your feet are bloody and your toes are crooked and your whole body screams for rest but then you keep dancing more because this was better than the other punishments.”
Maria lets out a sigh. “Let’s take this conversation to the Director's office, Agent Belova.”
Yelena follows after Maria, her head held high even though she plasters herself to Natalia’s side.
Maria says nothing about Natalia accompanying her.
The Director listens to Maria, glances at the two of them, and then just makes an indiscernible hum as he stares before he nods. “Bump up Agent Belova’s clearance level to the same as Agent Romanoff’s and stick her on the same team.”
Yelena bumps her shoulder against Natalia’s and grins.
Working with SHIELD is different than the Red Room. Yelena doesn’t mind the work because she gets to be with her sister and nobody hurts them. It’s practically everything that she wanted.
And when she finally turns eighteen, her team throws her a birthday party, the first one she’s had since she was six.
Natalia changes her name to Natasha.
Her team members have her back and she has theirs. They trust her to step up and not freeze. They also trust her to protect them with they're down.
They don't care about her merely because she is their team member. They care because she is part of their weird little family, even if she doesn't quite understand it.
She has a place to stay, her sister, and her team.
And Yelena is home.