The lost Widow - Natasha Romanoff x Female

Chapter XXIV

"What's Lynx?"
Natasha ignored her sister. Slowly she walked through the hut, small and dusty, nothing special. "Nat? What are you looking for?"
"Something." "Wow, really helpful, thank you." For minutes Nat paid no attention to Yelena's nagging and continued to roam unperturbed. At some point she was back in front of the shelf that took up almost the entire back wall of the hut. Once again, she studied the contents. There were stone-like things, powder in small vials and small ramen with drawings or something similar. The things stood criss-cross in the various squares of the shelf; uncharacteristic. 'Everything has its place, you just have to put it in order. ', Nina had always told her whenever she had looked for something and not found it. 'Everything has an order, Nat. Sometimes the hardest part is finding the principle. ' She had paused before pulling the book she had been looking for from the shelf, in the place where she absolutely would not have looked. Something in her eyes had sparkled as she thrust it into her hand. 'Sometimes it's just because you forget to look just in front of you. '

"We have to put it in order." Suddenly it seemed like the most obvious thing. Yelena had been staring out the dirty window, into the forest which was slowly disappearing into dark shadows. "Please what do we have to put in order?" With hands flying, the redhead pointed to the shelf. "All of what's in here."
For a moment Yelena eyed the shelf and its contents. "And where exactly are you going to 'sort' it by, please? Well, for the life of me I can't think of anything."
"Everything has an order, you just have to find it."
"Wow, do you have any more cryptic sayings like that in store?"

For ages they stood staring at the shelf but, no matter how much they thought, it just didn't seem to make sense. Suddenly, a tiny light glowed in Yelena's head. "Nat, Nat, Nat!" A little startled by the sudden noise, she winced. "What is it?" "What do you notice, what did Nina keep saying?" Excitedly, the blonde pointed at the stone-like things. "I don't know, she talks a lot when the day is long." That was true, Nina found it an interesting and fruitful topic and if you didn't stop her soon enough, you could be in for long, educational lectures. "The purest thing there is, what is it?"
Natasha surveyed her sister, perhaps she hadn't survived the fall so unscathed after all? "Elemental substances, just one element, Natasha! How many times did Nina report and before that."
In Natasha's brain, the switch on the light bulb of realisation finally flipped and she lit up brightly. Grinning broadly and proud of her find, Yelena continued, "These are elemental substances!"
"Okay, okay, but which ones?" Silence.
The 'stones' looked mostly the same, some more silvery than others. Something caught the eye of both of them, it looked like a large and somewhat blunted nail, in a reflective silver. "What's that?"
"A bone nail!" This time it was Natasha who recognised it. Nina had once shown her one and explained - in repulsive detail - where and how one was inserted. She hadn't shown any pictures, but the girl had always had a talent for language and managed to describe and express things in such a way that it appeared crystal clear before her inner eye; images she couldn't forget so quickly. "And it's made of elemental tantalum!" "Symbol Ta. Very good, that could be it!"

-
Far too much time had passed before they had identified everything beyond reasonable doubt. Yelena had written down her findings on a small piece of paper and was now staring puzzled at the sheet of paper.
A small list had emerged. Lithium, yttrium, tantalum, arsenic, nitrogen, sodium and caesium. They had also written the chemical symbols: Li, Y, Ta, As, N, Na and Cs.
"Liytaasnna-cs. What are we going to do with this?" "This," Natasha dramatically put a hand on her shoulder. "My dearest sister is an excellent question."

"Ha!" exclaimed Natasha. Without any explanation, she stepped forward and began rearranging the contents of the shelf, violas changing places and drawings being moved. Just as Yelena was about to ask what she was doing, a voice interrupted her. "Finally, but it really took you long enough." Nina's voice sounded tinny and they both immediately turned backwards. The slender figure was still slumped in the worn armchair, she hadn't moved a bit.
"Okay, that's weird," Yelena voiced her thoughts.
"Well, since you do seem to listen once in a while, one last question." The voice did not come from Nina, although it was unmistakably hers. "I'm a boat."
"What, that's it?" asked Yelena, only to receive no answer once again.
"And I didn't know it." So slowly the blonde seriously began to doubt her sister's state of mind. Again, Nina's voice rang out, "Whatever you do-" "It wasn't me.", Natasha finished the sentence again.
Yelena was about to say something when a strange sound was heard, a kind of whistling, a melody perhaps. The violas on the shelf began to tremble, slowly the wood moved; the shelf slid to the side. A dark gap, not half a metre wide, opened up, not a hand's breadth of the pale light from the hut shone in, as if it would be swallowed up in the passage. "Come on, or do you want to stay out here?" Natasha had Nina in her arms again and was about to enter the corridor. "Nat, wait." the redhead turned to her questioningly, one foot already in the dark. "We don't even know what's behind it, how do we know it's not a trap?"
"And what kind of trap would you have us lure Nina into, please?" "How do you know it's all from her?" asked Yelena defensively. Nat raised an arm - almost dropping the unconscious Nina - and pointed at the shelf and fireplace in the back corner. "That's 100% Nina. No one else would be insane enough to think up something like that."
The shelf creaked. "Now come on, or you really will have to stay outside."