The Witch's Shadow (Wanda Maximoff x Girl)

Twenty-Five

⚠️ suicidal thoughts and plans⚠️

"Project Eight calling for Dreykov," I say in Russian to the Widow on the other end of the phone. "I am ready for extraction, sending my coordinates now," I tell her as I send my location.

"Extraction team is on their way," the Widow answers.

Hanging up my phone, I set it on the cafe table and pick up my coffee. After I'd left the others, the first place I could think of was the cafe in Paris. Clarissa had been happy to see me, especially when I gave her enough money to keep her cafe open for another year and told her to take a day off. I didn't want her here when Dreykov came for me.

I didn't want anyone here.

But.. that wasn't entirely true. It wasn't supposed to happen like this. Sure the original plan had just been me going down in a blaze of glory, but then Yelena had shown up and it felt good to be on a team again. And then with Natasha and Wanda, I'd gotten my hopes up that we'd do this together.

But I shouldn't have. I shouldn't have relied on them to do this. It wasn't their fight anyway and I never should have tried to make it theirs.

And while the team may have changed, my plan hasn't- save my daughter, kill Dreykov and free the Widows. In that order. And honestly, as long as I got my kid out, I was ok with blowing the entire Red Room sky high with everyone in it if I have to.

Ray?

Wanda's voice floats in my head and it takes everything I have not to answer her.

I know you can hear us, Yelena scoffs. Answer, you asshole.

Ray, where are you? Wanda asks, her voice laced with worry. Baby please answer me.

And I almost do. I hated to hear her like that, like I'd broken her heart again. I wanted to apologize, to tell her that I love her, that I'm coming home soon. But that would be a lie, and I promised never to lie to her again. And while I do love her, I knew deep down that I wasn't coming home.

"Daughter," comes a voice from behind me. A voice that haunts my dreams and makes me want to run away.

"You're late," I tell him as I take a sip of my coffee. I don't turn around to face him. Not because I can't, but because I want to piss him off.

"Traffic," he answers as he comes to sit across from me. "It's good to see you," he says and it almost sounds like he's sincere. "Your sisters aren't hiding around here somewhere are they?"

I shake my head, "nope. Just me, sorry."

"It's no matter," he shrugs. "You always were my favorite, Raelle."

I laugh, "we both know that's a lie. Natasha was your favorite. And don't call me that, it's not my name. Hasn't been for a long time. Not since you sold me to Hydra."

"Well, I can only assume that the great Shadow is here to get her revenge on me," he says easily. "But I didn't expect you to give up so easily."

"Maybe I'm tired of fighting," I tell him softly. "Tired of all the running. Maybe I just want to come home, papa."

He looks surprised that I'd call him that after all these years, after everything that's happened between us, but it does the trick. "And I want you to come home, daughter." He nods to someone behind me and then a black hood is tossed over my head right before a gun slams into me, knocking me out.

To nobody's surprise, I woke up strapped to a table, unable to move with blood bags sitting next to me. I know it's my blood just from the shadows that seem to swim in it. I grunt slightly as I try and move, but whatever they gave me was the good stuff.

"Good you're awake," Dreykov said out of my sight. The sound of footsteps got louder as he walked to my table. "We gave you a sedative so you may find it hard to move," he laughed at this like it was the funniest joke ever. "You must be wondering what is going on. You see, you are very special. So special in fact that we haven't been able to replicate your powers. But now that we have you back we can make more serum and with it, more like you." He breaths rapidly like he's having a hard time catching his breath, "or not like you. Better. More reliable." He pats my head and my skin crawls, "I'll leave you with our dear doctors for now. Be good for them, won't you."

He walks away and when he gets to the door, I manage to get out two words, "my daughter?"

His laugh drifts over to me, "she was killed the same day she was born."

The pain that crushed my heart and soul made what the Red Room doctors did to me next seem like a warm hug.

Not that I felt any of it. Not that I even registered what they were doing. All I could feel was my soul ripping into a million pieces as I sank deeper and deeper into blackness.

Days passed, possibly weeks or months, I wasn't sure. I didn't fight, didn't try and escape. I didn't even blink when they brought in another woman and gave her a blood transfusion straight from my body. I may have laughed when she died though. It was funny to me for some reason, how hard they were trying to make another me when I had made another me. I had given them a child and they'd thrown her away like she was nothing.

I suppose this was Dreykov's and my karma. I couldn't save her and he killed her. And now he was going to kill me and countless others.

Unless..

Unless I killed myself before that happened. Without me, there was no program.

It would serve him right. He didn't deserve to have powered soldiers and I.. I didn't deserve to live. I didn't want to live in a world where my daughter was dead.

Ironically, the thought of dying is what brought me out of the darkness.

It was a comfort, making a plan on how I would do it. Not that I really had many options since I was cuffed most of the time, but even the cuffs could be used to slit my wrists. I'd just have to pull hard enough and at the right angle and hope I bleed out before the doctors see.

Or maybe I could get free, grab a scalpel or even a bottle of pills. Although the pills didn't work very last time I tried that. Or rather, they had until Natasha had found me and forced me to throw up what was left in my stomach. Somehow I don't think the doctors would be gentle with me like she was.

Briefly I wonder what she would say about this. She'd probably call me an idiot and say that I deserved this for running off on my own, but then she'd give me a hug and tell me that everything would be fine, that she was going to get me out of here.

But she's made that promise before and look how it all turned out.

No, this time I wouldn't fuck it up. This time I would finish the job. I did have a 99% kill rate and the only reason it wasn't 100% was because I didn't die the first time.

But I would fix that. I'd end my career with a 100% kill rate, even if it killed me. I laugh at that, because it will kill me, and I'm alright with that.