I've Got Red In My Ledger

Chapter Thirteen

I thought I couldn't be more grateful for Wanda's presence, but she proves me wrong every single time. Of course she does. I don't know why I am still surprised at this point. I am completely in love with her. I'm torn from my thoughts by Alexei, who continues to talk and talk. I wish we'd just shut him up. He's so painful.  He doesn't know when to stop, when is enough.
"I did my best to make sure you would both succeed to achieve your fullest potentials, and looking back, everything worked out."
"Looking back? Everything worked out?" I shake my head, beyond frustrated at him.
"Yes! For you, yes! Yes it did." I glare at him with disgust.
Does he know the pain he's caused? Does he know that I haven't had a solid night of sleep since our last night in Ohio? Did he forget what the Red Room does to little girls? Handcuff them to bed at night so that they couldn't escape, even if they tried. Tearing apart their reproductive organs and completely manipulating their minds. Did he forget that? Was he so wrapped up in his boring, lifeless mission that he forgot about all of that? Can he not see that Yelena and I are not the little girls that were promised an adventure? The little girls that were promised and adventure, but we're sent off to be trained, trafficked and tortured for years? Can he not see that the Red Room turned us into brutal machines and nothing more?

The fact he thinks that everything worked out so well makes me so angry that I want to cry. Scream. Attack him. How dare he say that things worked out? How could he even think that? Yelena and I were taken against our will, turned into assassins. Even now, even all these long years later, our hands are still stained red. It won't go away, no matter the actions I take to try and forget it all. It's impossible to forget. And he thinks it all worked out?
The Graduation. He has the audacity to think that it all worked out. I can never have kids. I can't carry a child. I don't have a uterus. Ovaries. Nothing. They took that away from me, and he thinks it worked out perfectly?
Wanda laces her fingers through mine, which I am so grateful for. She keeps me grounded. She keeps me breathing steadily. She keeps me from lunging towards Alexei. Yelena stands on the other side of me, clearly as unimpressed as I am.
"We accomplished our mission in Ohio. Yelena, you went on the become the greatest child assassin the world has ever seen. No one, still to this day, can match your efficiency, your ruthlessness!" Yelena doesn't think that's something to be proud of, we've talked about it enough. I am moment away from asking Wanda if there's any way we can just permanently shut Alexei up. "And Natasha..." Alexei steps towards me, but I step backwards a few paces. Still, he tries to continue forward. Wanda stops him dead in his tracks, leaving him rooted to the ground. I don't know why he looks so confused. What did he expect? That Yelena and I would leap forward in great favour to the people that let us be taken away in the first place?
"Natasha," he continues. "You're not just a spy... you're not just toppling regimes and destroying great empires from within, you're an Avenger." Yelena glares at him, shaking her head. "You both have killed so many people." Alexei reaches out and takes Yelena's hand, and reaching for mine. "Your ledgers must be dripping, just absolutely gushing red. And I couldn't be more proud of you."