Lost in Translation

Waking Nightmares

Dark halls, barely lit by dimmed lights, created a maze of turned and halls, each one littered with dorms and training rooms, gyms and classrooms.

Natalia made careful movements, peeking around corners and searching for guards before making her way swiftly down the hall, hurriedly slipping past doors. Finally, she checked the last hall, peeking around the corner with a hand mirror. Coast clear. The young girl made her way to the third door on the left, an old classroom, no longer used for students anymore.

Pausing only long enough to knock a pattern on the door, Natalia pushed open the door. "Alek?"

"I'm here." Strong arms, arms of someone years older than just 16, wrapped around her waist. "Any issues getting here?"

"No, it was fine."

Natalia breathed in the scent of Alek's shampoo and soap - almost like dirt, it was natural. Woody. Mossy. He was older, old enough to be part of the actual mission teams. A KGB operative. A positive outcome.

He kissed down Natalia's cheek and neck, landing near her clavicle. It was forbidden, of course, to love. To care. To fall for someone. A junior trainee, a 14 year old still waiting to graduate, and a 16 year old agent? That was far worse than forbidden. That was condemnation.

Natalia sighed contentedly. "I love you."

The boy stiffened around her, but only for a second. "I love you, too."

They stayed there for the night, wrapped in one another, Natalia blissfully unaware of the little camera in the corner of the room, it's lens always watching.

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"He was older than me. I only saw him a few times. It was a few months before I knew about Peter, and there was no way to hide it. I had him, I got a few hours with him, I was taken down to the medical wing, I had surgery, I woke up, he was gone. They were both gone. I never saw Alek again, and I never knew where Peter went."

Clint was shocked. Unsure of what he could do. Unsure of what he could say. Unsure of how to respond.

"You... You had a son?"

Natasha looked up, eyes strained with pain, intensified over years of being pushed down and ignored. "I had a son. I think they wanted to minimize my connection, and minimize their mistake, so they were quick to graduate me. I jumped into missions after that."

Graduation. The word had taken a new meaning for Clint since meeting Nat. It was synonymous with death. Loss of self. Loss of control. Loss of body. Sure, a uterus didn't make Natasha a woman, and the loss of one didn't make her any less of a human being, full of value and worth, but knowing that they had let her taste the absolute joy of a child, the joy Clint himself had felt time and time again, and then ripped it all away. There was something sinister about it. Something even more cruel than it had seemed before.

Clint sucked in a breath. "I am so sorry. I am so sorry, Nat. I... I don't even know what else to say."

The woman shrugged.

"Have you told him? Or Tony?"

Natasha shook her head. "He has a family. I don't want to go out there and shatter his whole life. Besides, I don't... I don't..."

Clint sat next to his friend, wrapping an arm around her shoulders and pulling her in for a comforting hug. "What do you want to do, then?"

"What I always do," Natasha choked, sniffling. "Act like nothing's wrong."