Widow Sisters and Friends (Restoring Our Broken Hearts)

Two Sides of the Heart: Part 2

Summary: When Kate, Natasha, Yelena, and Clint go on a mission together, things go horribly wrong, and Natasha ends up being forced to make a choice that she may never entirely forgive herself for having to make despite how necessary it may have been.

  Natasha swallowed hard, her hands shaking as she still tried to fathom what had happened. One minute everything was fine, and they had knocked out the guy, and the next moment, he was up and blowing holes in two of her most favorite people.

Natasha held her head in one of her hands as she reached out her other one to grasp at Yelena's.

When Natasha had been carrying Yelena out, she had run into Clint coming into the building to check on them since the communications had gone out. She had quickly told him about Kate and as soon as she had, he had made a mad dash for her.

Natasha had carried Yelena to the jet, and she had started to try patching up some of the holes in her. When she had managed to get Yelena pulled together just a little, Clint had come in with Kate in his arms, and she was unconscious as well.

She had looked terribly pale, and Natasha felt absolutely horrible knowing that it was all her fault that Kate had ended up in this position. If she had only been faster on the uptake. If only she could have carried both of them instead of having to leave the girl behind.

Which led her to where she was now in the med-bay of the compound, holding Yelena's hand and feeling positively sick to her stomach. Kate was across the large room and Clint was with her, and Natasha had already gone over to see her several times to check on her. She had taken a bullet too close to an artery in her leg and in that place in her chest, and while she would probably be able to get up from this a little easier than Yelena considering the fact that she did not have four holes in her like Yelena did, Kate was still out cold and had been since the disaster on the mission.

Kate had lost a lot of blood just like Yelena had despite the fact that Yelena's wounds had been worse. Kate had been left there bleeding for too long without attention, and Natasha was trembling all over, the only thing that was able to permeate her mind besides worry being an overwhelming guilt.

"You okay?" a voice suddenly came into her ears, and Natasha looked up immediately at the younger woman in the bed before her. Yelena was looking at her with only the utmost concern in the midst of her very weakened state.

Natasha forced a wobbly smile, knowing that she did not need to break down on Yelena when Yelena was already struggling.

"My sweet girl, you're up.... I was so worried," Natasha whispered, trying to avoid actually using her voice since she knew it would crack if she utilized it at this point. She moved up to kiss Yelena's face softly, her lips pressing gently along Yelena's cheekbone and temple.

She finally lowered herself so that she was sitting on Yelena's bedside, and to her surprise, Yelena was still staring at her. Natasha felt a sinking sensation in her gut, knowing that Yelena had figured out that something was not right with her and was not going to let it go.

Natasha tried her best to center her focus in reducing the shaking of her hands that had not successfully gone away since the entire thing went down. She knew that she was on the brink of an episode, and now was definitely not the time to have one. Yelena was not in a place to help her, and she definitely did not want to burden her already injured sister with her stupid emotional problems.

"What's wrong?" Yelena asked, her eyes surprisingly focused considering her pain medication.

"I was just worried about you," Natasha attempted to make a believable excuse, and Yelena narrowed her eyes.