No Time to Regret, It's Time to Forget

If I'll Ever Get to Heaven, When a Million Dollars Gets You There

She was singing quietly, a half-remembered song from her childhood. Her arms were wrapped around her belly and she was smiling, looking over at her husband. He smiled in return, and touched her stomach.

"It's kicking," he said, awed.

"Yes, he is," she replied, considerable pride in her tone.

"I can't wait to meet him," he told her earnestly, pulling a blue ribbon out of his pocket and wrapping it around her fingers.

She smiled, touched, then turned her attention back to the life growing inside her. How amazing it was, to go from taking life to making it. Her hands were stained red but this should go some way to washing them clean. It hadn't been easy, escaping the place where she'd spent most of her life. But he was worth it. They were worth it. She wouldn't go back to that life. Surely she could serve her beloved country some other way than killing enemies of the state. That's what he'd assured her, anyway.

"Alexei," she murmured, a sudden urgency in her tone.

"I'm here, Natalia. You're safe now," he assured her, taking her hand. "They won't take you back, now that I have you. I won't let them. And they value me too highly to risk my displeasure," he added with a self-deprecating wink.

She smiled up at him; he was so handsome, so confident. Reaching up to cup his cheek, she closed her eyes as she rubbed her belly. This was going to be perfect.

Natasha tried to cling to the moment, but her traitorous subconscious carried her forward, to when this pretty image shattered. To when she woke up in a pool of blood, horrified that she could no longer feel the child moving inside of her.

"Alexei! Alexei!" she screamed, panicked.

"Natalia, I'm here, you're safe," he told her, but his voice was shaken.

"He's gone, Alexei!" she cried, burying her face in his chest.

He tried to console her, but both were consumed by grief.

It was the last time she spoke to him, the last time she was in his arms, the last time she felt – felt

Natasha woke herself up violently, jumping out of bed and grabbing her gun. What had she been thinking? That she'd never felt safe again, after she'd lost Alexei? That wasn't true. It was a troubling thought. Some of the impressions she had in her memories made her think they might have been implanted, but she had been sure of herself after leaving the Red Room. They hadn't taken her again after she'd escaped.

Dawn found her sitting by the window, absorbed in thought. After Alexei had died, been killed in action, she'd fled Russia. She'd known it was only a matter of time before her former masters exerted their influence and took her back. Not that she left to do anything better, for a while. Now she did better – now she did good. She worked with the Avengers, and with Captain America. Perhaps the latter wouldn't give her any points in another country, but she was wiping the red from her ledger, slowly but surely.

And, yesterday, she'd almost killed a man. He'd deserved it, perhaps, but that wasn't really her place to decide. Afterward, she had done research on him and alleviated some of her guilt. Still, the organization for which he was condemned was still alive and well, and under new management. Or would be, soon enough. She would have to act fast. There were other pressing matters.

Leaving her hotel with all of her belongings, she headed a little ways out of town, a place to which she had not expected to return.

"Oh, and I must apologize again for disturbing you, Svetlana," Natasha laughed, setting down her teacup in its saucer.