Alive

Chapter 37 - Suffering in silence

Andrea POV

The car is filled with tension and silence, no one wants to speak knowing we will have to disturb the bodies of countless young women until we find the right one.

I can't imagine what's going through Natasha's head, she knows she will have to look at every single one of those bodies to identify her sister. This is going to be a very traumatising day.

Romanoff said Wanda will be staying in the car and keeping watch for soldiers, all of us are thankful she said that since I don't want to mentally destroy Maddy's crush.

The sky is starting to turn dark, our destination is apparently very far from the flat we were in and Romanoff says we should arrive at the Red room base around midnight.

It's bad enough that we're digging up a graveyard, now we have to do it in the middle of the night.

This day is going to give me nightmares.

The radio was turned off when a song came on that I'm guessing Romanoff didn't like or something because she almost broke the radio by slamming it so hard to shut it off.

It was an old song that I remember being made in the 1970s, Natasha looked genuinely angry to hear it so Wanda and I stayed quiet about it.

Wanda is sleeping in the back seats, Romanoff had given her her jacket to use as a blanket while she used her own as a pillow.

I'm trying to make myself sleep, but I want too badly to know the location of one of the Red Room bases that I stay awake even though I highly doubt I will remember any of this.

I don't understand how Romanoff knew the location of a base and did nothing about it. I'm sure she has her reasons as to why she kept it quiet, but I can't help being slightly angry that she allowed this to go on.

She has had a tough life, I know that and going to the Red Room again is going to probably put her through a shitstorm of memories, but I have to understand her reasoning behind not telling others there is a base close by.

"Why did you not tell the Avengers about this Red Room base?" I whisper my question so Wanda doesn't wake up.

Romanoff looks like she expected this question and is trying to find the right way to say it.

"Did you know Yelena helped save hundreds of Widows break the chemical subjugation the Red Room had put in them?"

I have no idea where she's going with this.

"She made it her mission to give those girls their freedom back, and she did. All the Widows who were being chemically subjugated were free. But that wasn't enough for her." Her voice is neutral, but her eyes are screaming with grief and pain.

"There were still thousands of victims of the Red Room that were conditioned into believing they were doing the world a favour, they didn't need to be mind controlled because they were raised like this. She started infiltrating bases and spreading doubt in those girls from the inside, and when they were ready she helped them run." Realisation dawned on me.

"This base was one of Yelena's targets."

"Yes. If the Avengers went those girls would be put in prison, they had to leave by their own choice. But this was the fifth base she had gone to, the Red Room caught on to what she was doing and decided she was too dangerous to be left alive." Yelena died trying to save those girls' lives.

"They made sure I knew she was dead. They displayed pictures of her body for me and my parents to see. Their goal was to get angry so we would make a mistake, so we went with our day and only fantasised about getting revenge." I knew the Red Room was horrible, but I never imagined forcing a mother to see her daughter's corpse was even an option for them.

"I'm sorry." I can't think of anything else to say.

"Don't be. You will be bringing her back so there's nothing to be sorry about."

She never got to grieve Yelena. She has been suffering in silence for months.

We don't say another word for the rest of the journey and the silence caused sleep to take over and all this Red Room talk made memories come back as dreams.

They never tortured me as they did Natasha, but it was a mental torture. A constant fear they would get me and take advantage of my abilities.

By the time we arrive and Natasha wakes Wanda and I up the sky is pitch black, not a star in sight.

As promised, Wanda was left in the car with her phone in case something happens, which meant it was just Romanoff and I walking through a forest to get to the graveyard.

You know, a few days ago I would have been scared she'd use a location like this to try to kill me, I'm almost happy she knows it'll be useless.

"How much further?" My arms feel as though they will fall off because of this unnecessarily heavy shovel. I'm practically dragging it while Romanoff is holding her own with ease.

"We're an hour out." My arms won't make it that long.

I need this to be over as fast as possible, Maddy must be worried and since I took Wanda from her she'll be bored.

Over the next hour, Natasha had noticed my struggles and offered to take the shovel, and when I declined she forcefully took it. I fell over and just stayed on the ground for ten minutes. Then I think at one point I started sleepwalking.

"It's just over that hill." Thank god, I'm exhausted. I don't know how Romanoff's hair is still in perfect order and makeup not even slightly out of place. This feels unfair, I'm looking like a dog that just ran a race while she's looking like a model.

Once we make it up the hill, I don't even get the chance to look at what's below before Romanoff yanks me to the ground and onto my stomach.

She puts a finger to her lips before releasing me so I can get a peak at what we're hiding from.

Fuck.

There are Black Widows everywhere, they're in a circle surrounding the field with only a few feet between them.

"There's never this many guards." She whispers with confusion.

The women are like statues, never wavering from their post, their eyes aren't moving from before them. Are they even breathing?

"I don't understand. Why are they here?"

"They knew we were coming."