CHAPTER NINE; BLACK WIDOW

❝ her couldn't break her anymore, she was made of stone ❞















･ ｡ﾟ☆

❝ the red room [ dreykov's office ] ❞

STALL HIM, SHE HAD TO STALL HIM, Alina thought making herself ask, "And what about my mother? Anastasia? Where is she? And my father, what happened to him?" Dreykov seemed to be studying her, deciding whether or not the information would benefit him to tell her. He came to conclusion it would, only because it might break her heart.

Reaching back into the file he had, he pulled out a photo throwing it on the ground in front of her. Alina bent down picking it up, it was the same woman Melina had shown her, this time with a man cradling a baby.

As she was fixed on the image Dreykov explained, "Ana was strong, powerful, bloodthirsty, and best of all, immortal after giving birth to you. Apparently carrying you in her womb resurrected her after she died in childbirth. Honestly it broke my heart to send her away but getting you in exchange was worth it. I don't know where she is, no one has been able to find her since Hydra fell. But, if I remember anything about her, she's out there looking for you, and your father."

Thinking back on what he'd discovered about them in his search for them he sadistically told her, "Your father was truly, uncontrollable. A violent, and willful man though I suppose for a man who has seen most civilizations rise and fall, that is par for the course. Since he kept getting free, Hydra took him and dumped him somewhere no book has discovered yet. He will dry out until eventually even time consumes him."

With broken tears in her eyes she asked, or rather pleaded, "What is his name? I at least deserve to know who he was."

Leaning back in his chair, Dreykov said, "Fine, but you may wish you didn't know him. Unlike you who was forced to be a monster, he was one all on his own. Where do you think your abilities come from? That magic that flows through your veins is the stronger version of what he, and his ancestors had. His name was Nikolai Dranganov, the dragon among the monsters."

"What is so broken in you that you can destroy this many people's lives and feel nothing? I was just one years old when you tore me from my parents' arms... you torture even your own daughter. You force her to be just like me, a monster under your control. Why," Alina asked him horrified.

Her words seem to enrage him because before she knew it, he had stood form his seat and back handed her across the face. Natasha stepped forward, "Take one more step and I kill her right here," snapped Dreykov reaching for his gun keeping it pointed at the teenager.

Alina rolled over on her back, "It's okay Natasha, I can take it," she told her.

"So much pride, so much spirit left to break," Dreykov mused suddenly kicking the young teen in her stomach. With each hit Natasha had to look away, it was too hard to watch. Until it was too much, she threw her body down in front of the Dranganov teenager take the hits for her as best she could.

When he was through, he backed away leaving them on the floor as he sat back in his chair. Helping the younger girl sit up Natasha asked, "Are you okay?"

Alina nodded insisting, "I'm okay, he doesn't even hit that hard." With Natasha's help, she was brought back to her feet, "And what's even funnier is, I don't have third of my abilities and he's still too much a coward to fight me. Come on Dreykov, you want to fight me, you want to see the killer you made, then stop being a coward and fight me. Winner takes all, all as in, your life."

Dreykov laughed truly amused with her confidence, "So, this was the big plan, huh?" Turning the monitor of the security camera around for them he finished, "Melina was going to land the Red Room and hand me over to the authorities." 

 "So, what now, you're gonna fold me into your pathetic little puppeteer act," interrogated Natasha.

Dreykov shifted agitatedly in his seat, "Pathetic, huh?"

This time taking her chance to laugh Alina said, "What else would you call it? All I see is a sad, pathetic, and cruel man."

Trying to answer her question Dreykov began, "I would call it--"

Natasha didn't let him finish before she cut him off asking, "When was the last time that you had a conversation with somebody that wasn't forced to talk to you?"

Answering it for her swiftly Alina taunted, "Not in the last sixty years that's for sure."

"You ran away to fight in the wrong war. The real war was fought here, in the shadows," he said truly believing the hype he'd sold himself all this time.

Natasha placed her hand on his desk saying, "You didn't fight in the shadows. You hid in the dark."

In addition, Alina, who had begun to feel something shifting inside her corrected, "And you didn't fight, I fought. Me, Yelena, Natahsa, all the widows, we fought this, we died for this, not you."

"Real power comes from undetectable influence."

Natasha nearly fell over laughing at the thought quickly mocking him, "If no one's noticed, then why even do it? You're nothing. You have nothing."

"There are 50 people on this planet--"

Scoffing Alina threw her bound hands up insisting, "Oh please fuck off with that already!"

Leaping from his chair Dreykov shouted like a mad man in their faces, "Don't tell me to stop!"

"I'm not doing anything you say for the rest of your life which won't be lasting too much longer," Alina warned him truthfully.

With a calm furry inside her, Natasha countered mere inches from the old man, "If I don't tell you when to stop, then how will you know when to shut up?"

Intantly he punched her in her face, stumbling back Natasha was caught by Alina, "Come on. Think I can't take a punch?"

Quickly he punched her again, following up with another one for Alina. The Dranganov teen hardly even flinched, "God damn it, you're weak. To think I was afraid at one point of getting hit by you, a weak little man," she mocked.

"Weak," he challenged before punching Alina directly in her nose, but he still hadn't broken it.

Natasha laughed at him insinuating, "I bet it's easier to be tough in front of defenseless little girls, huh?"

Once again, he punched Natasha, who ate his hit like it was nothing. She was on her knees when he kicked her in her face, "You wouldn't be so glib if you had any notion of the scope of what I've built. I own this world. Me."

Natasha smirked saying, "You seem desperate to impress us."

Dreykov shook his head making his way to his desk, "I don't need to impress you. I don't need to impress anyone." Yanking out his chair he opened his drawer he slid his ring from the bottom left corner to the top right. From their spots on either side of the room the women shared a quick and unnoticed knowing glance. "These world leaders, these great men, they answer to me and my widows." Before them a map of the entire world on a red hologram filled the room.

Suddenly pictures of thousands of girls were coming from lit up locations on the map. "Look at them. These girls were trash. They are thrown out into the street. I recycle the trash. And I give them purpose. I give them a life." Seeing the faces of the little girls passing her by Alina felt her tears fall. They were all so small, and he would let most of them die.

Shaking her head Alina turned around angrily telling him, "You took them, and you made them into monsters you didn't give them life you robbed them of one!"

Dreykov shrugged changing the slide to video footage of the carnage his widows had caused throughout the decades, "It's my network of widows that help me control the scales of power. One command, the oil and stock markets crumble. One command, and a quarter of the planet will starve. My widows can start and end wars. They can make and break kings."

Stunned Natasha confirmed, "You control all of that from here?"

"And with you, an Avenger under my control, I can finally come out of the shadows using the only natural resource that the world has too much of. Girls," he informed filling Alina with a rage so powerful her eyes glowed, but he couldn't see with her back turned.

'All from that little console," teased Natasha smugly.

"Yeah. Oh, you find this amusing," looking between both smirking pairs he asked, "Why are you smiling?"

Natasha placed her hands on his desk saying, "Don't take it personal, but, uh..." Looking to the younger girl the two of them said together, "We thank you for your cooperation."