"You're still here."

Calina glanced over her shoulder at Yelena, but returned her gaze to the woman in the garden before answering. "Yes, for another day. I'm getting the bus home tomorrow."

It had been three days since the mission. Three days since Calina and Katya had made it back from the Ambassador's house, bleeding and bruised, but alive. Calina had stayed to have her wounds treated, and to let the worst of the bruising fade before heading back to New York.

By bus.

She wasn't looking forward to the long journey - or series of journeys really. She would have to change Greyhounds in Virginia and detour through Pennsylvania to throw off any possible tails. It would be a long, uncomfortable trip home, but she would suffer it gladly to avoid giving away this location.

Yelena joined her at the window. "You've been watching over her for days like some mother hen."

Calina shrugged. "Don't you wish you'd had someone looking out for you when you were first freed? Instead of floundering through it alone?"

"I was fine."

Calina spared her a sceptical glance.

Yelena rolled her eyes. "Okay. I was too busy running for my life to worry about my mental health. But the distraction helped." She nodded to the woman outside. "She has no distractions, though. So how do you think she's doing?"

Calina wrapped her arms around herself, wincing as the action pulled on the stitches across her shoulder. "I think she's about to reach the anger stage," she murmured.

The two of them studied Katya as she wandered amongst the petunias. The Widow's base was located near the South Carolina coast, in a beautiful old Antebellum mansion. It had been relatively cheap, and private - isolated from the major roads and towns, but not too far from Charleston airport - and the South had seemed as good a place as any to hide out.

But Yelena liked to joke that she hadn't considered any of those practical reasons, and had chosen the house because it had once been a plantation. She thought there was poetic symmetry in a bunch of ex mind-enslaved Widows reclaiming a slaver's space.

Calina didn't care about that. She just liked it for the gardens.

The warm, sub-tropical climate was perfect for growing vibrant, lush flowers, and they filled the landscape at the back of the house. The garden was a riot of colour and scent, and the air hummed with bees and the flapping of butterfly wings.

It was peaceful, but so full of life.

She thought it was good for the Widows to have this space. A place where they could just walk amidst the beauty of the world and reflect. So many of them were still so...angry. Hyper-focussed on their rage and their revenge.

It was one of the reasons she'd wanted to leave and make a life for herself elsewhere.

Yes, she was angry too. It was a background simmer that she could mostly ignore, only occasionally boiling over when she thought too hard about what had been done to her. And what she had been forced to do. But she didn't want to feed that rage. She didn't want to drown in it, become bitter with it.

She wanted to live.

That was how she would spite Dreykov and all the other evil bastards of the Red Room. That was how she would win: by letting go of her training and enjoying her new life.

She hoped the woman in the garden would get to that place soon.

Katya had been confused in the moments after receiving the antidote. As the mist evaporated and the red tinge cleared from her eyes, she had stumbled off Calina, shaking her head as if to clear it.

Calina remembered the feeling well. It was as if her head had been filled with a dark, dense fog, a cloud of nothing but whispered orders and commands. As the fog had thinned, horror had seeped in at the realisation of what it meant.

She had been controlled.

Turned into nothing more than Dreykov's puppet. A mindless automaton that he could command - and even terminate - at the click of a button.

The confusion and horror had been followed by anger. Then depression, acceptance - basically all the stages of grief.

Because it was a grief, or sorts.

Mourning the loss of free will.

"That's good. Anger is better than all that shame and fear," Yelena replied. She nodded to the woman outside. "Let's go give her an outlet."

"What did you have in mind?" Calina asked.

———

The muffled pap, pap, pap of the gun was familiar, like a soundtrack from her youth. The weight of the weapon in her hands was a comfort, a safety blanket. The recoil tried to buck the barrel, but her muscle memory compensated, keeping the sight steady.

She had to give Yelena credit - the shooting range was the perfect outlet.

She'd thought at first the activity would just bring up bad memories of their training. But the fact that they were so used to target practice, meant that the act itself was almost...mindless. She didn't have to concentrate on her aim. She didn't have to overanalyse her form, or get used to an unfamiliar weapon.

It was all second nature.

Which meant she could relax her mind, and just...feel.

And bask in the sense of control.

She was the one holding the weapon.

She got to choose where to aim. When to pull the trigger. How often to fire.

She was in charge.

Pap, pap, pap.

After emptying her fifth clip - and having shredded several paper targets with bullets - Calina flicked the safety on and holstered the weapon. Then she leaned against the wall behind her and watched her sisters as they continued firing. Yelena was supernaturally accurate, as always, the hole in the bullseye of her target getting bigger and bigger as she shot round after round into it. Katya was...less precise. Her emotional state was evident in the wildly off-centre bullet holes, as well as her tight shoulders and the white-knuckled grip she had on her pistol.

Eventually, when the gun clicked empty, she hung her head, panting with rage. Calina knew better than to approach her in this condition - especially from behind - so she stayed where she was.

"Yelena," Calina called. "Yelena!" she repeated, trying to be heard over the gunshots.

Yelena whipped off her ear protectors. "What?" she yelled back, annoyed.

Calina nodded to Katya, who was now practically vibrating with anger, her hands clenched by her side as she stared sightlessly ahead. "I think it's time for step 2."

"Drinks?"

"Drinks. Lots of drinks."

———

Calina slumped in her chair, and picked at the label on her beer bottle. Being good Russian women, they'd started with vodka, knocking back shot after shot until they'd all developed a pleasant buzz. Calina had switched to beer when the room started spinning, never having had much tolerance for alcohol. But Yelena and had Katya carried on with the harder stuff.

Other Widows had drifted through the lounge, staying for a few minutes at a time to have a drink with the newest newly-recovered member of the group. But Yelena and Calina had taken on a kind of mentoring role to Katya - as the one who'd found her, and the one who'd freed her - so the three of them were mostly left to it.

"-and then she made fun of my vest! My vest! You've seen my vest, haven't you, Calina? It's the one with-"

"Aaaalllll the pockets. Yes, Yelena," Catalina replied with a small smile. Yelena was regaling Katya with the story of how she'd reconnected with her sister Natasha, and how they'd brought down the Red Room together. It was a story Calina had heard several times already.

"Calina, you're slouching," Yelena remarked suddenly, eyeing her upside down from her sprawl on the floor. "You never slouch. Do you remember, Katya, in ballet class? Calina would hardly ever get a whack across the legs for bad posture. Even when we were little. Now look at her - slouched in that chair, back all crumpled. Madame Galkin would be very displeased."

"Madame Galkin can kiss my ass," Calina murmured.

Yelena burst out laughing, and even Katya managed a small smile. The shooting range had helped to bring her anger to the surface, and the alcohol was doing the trick of relaxing it out of her.

They were flying blind when it came to the best way to deal with their un-brainwashing. There were no handy therapists in the group, and none that they could go to for help. So they'd come up with their own ways of coping.

This seemed to be working for Katya.

"Ha! Did you learn that kind of language in New York City?" Yelena teased, her accent even heavier than usual.

Calina just rolled her eyes.

"You've been in New York?" Katya asked.

Calina nodded. "Been living there for about a month now."

"What is that like?" Katya asked. "Isn't it scary, being out in the world, all on your own?"

It may have sounded like a strange question to an outsider, especially coming from a lethal, highly skilled secret operative like Katya. But Calina remembered that fear very well. The sense that the world beyond the control of the red room was too vast. Too full of possibilities and choices. Too complicated and daunting to navigate.

"You know what they say back home," Calina responded. "'The eyes are afraid, but the hands are still doing it'. It is kind of scary, but it gets easier every day."

"She only came back for a one-off, to help you," Yelena explained.

"Thank you, Calina" Katya said.

"You don't need to thank me."

"Well, I should at least apologise for stabbing you. And strangling you."

Calina smiled. "Then I'd have to apologise for stabbing you, and making you talk like Marge Simpson." Katya's hoarse voice had just about recovered, but for the first two days in the compound she'd sounded suspiciously like the yellow cartoon character.

"Fair enough," Katya smiled. She turned serious, her gaze locked on the empty shot glass in her hands. "He told me that someone might come. And that I had to kill them on sight. I just never thought it would be you..."

"Wait, what?" Calina sat up straighter and exchanged a look with Yelena. "Who told you that?"

Katya looked confused. "My handler for the assignment. Why? What's going on?"

The sick feeling in Calina's stomach suddenly had nothing to do with the quantity of Stoli she'd ingested. "We thought you were following long term protocols. Are you saying you were still in contact with your handler?"

Yelena suddenly looked completely sober. "When Katya? When was the last check-in?"

"Last Thursday."

"Shit. Shit!" Yelena replied. She swung her worried gaze to Calina. "We missed someone. Not all of Dreykov's men are dead."

———

"I can't believe you're still leaving," Yelena said, arms crossed over her chest.

Calina finished shoving her clothing into her carry-on. "Nothing's changed-"

"Everything's changed!"

"Nothing's changed for me, Yelena. I still want out." She zipped up the luggage and shrugged into her jacket.

"You're being a coward," Yelena spat. "We found out last night that one of Dreykov's men is still controlling Widows and you just want to disappear and forget about it. Leave us to clean it up."

"We still don't know what 'it' is. Is it one guy? A whole independent cell of operatives? Do they have any Widows left now that we've freed Katya? We. Don't. Know. It could be nothing - just a lone Dreykov-wannabe who has no toys left to play with."

"And we need to find out!"

"You need to! I did my part. I was with you in the beginning, Yelena. I helped you take out the other handlers, and the trainers, and the scientists. And I will always come back to help free Widows. But I want out, Yelena. No more death. No more revenge." She stepped closer to the other woman, and softened her voice, suddenly feeling so...tired. "Do you remember what Natasha said in the Red Room after you freed us? We get to make our own choices now. This is my choice, Yelena. Please respect it."

Yelena gritted her teeth and looked away.

Calina sighed and grabbed her bag. As she shouldered past her stubborn, relentless sister, Yelena stopped her with a hand on her arm. "He could find you, you know. You're using your real name. Like a complete amateur."

Calina sighed. "I didn't want them to take anything else from me. They already took my innocence, my home, my childhood...I wanted to keep this last piece of me. The name my parents gave me." She leaned over and kissed Yelena on the forehead - a sudden impulse to soothe her sister's fears.

Because that's what this whole conversation was about. Yelena was scared for her.

She'd taken on the role of protector for the rest of the Widows. Maybe because she was one of the first to be freed; maybe because that freedom had come at the cost of another Widow's life...or maybe this was just who Yelena was away from the influence of the Red Room.

A leader. A guardian.

She had moulded a group of lone operatives into a team. She had found them a home, and made it into a fortress. Everything she did was to keep the Widows safe.

And it drove her nuts that Calina wanted nothing to do with it. That she wanted to live out in the world instead. Where she was exposed. On her own.

Unsafe.

"I promise," Calina vowed. "That I'll be careful out there. You know I can take care of myself."

Yelena gave a quick sharp nod, still not looking at her...and Calina walked away.

———

Matt perched on top of the water tower and opened his senses to the world below. He filtered through the sounds that rang out in the night - the beeping of the car alarm on 51st street; the sobs of the teething baby on the seventh floor of the apartment building; the hiss of the subway below ground; the baseball game being streamed in the sports bar on the corner...

And he listened for any cries for help. For the crack of a gun, or the flick of a blade.

But there were none.

He'd normally be thankful, taking it as a sign that maybe - maybe - he was starting to make a difference in Hell's Kitchen. That the criminal underbelly was scared enough of the Devil to think twice about causing mischief...

But tonight he would have welcomed a fight. A chase. Something to burn off his excess energy. To satisfy the frustration and growing anxiety in his gut.

His head turned towards the rooftop in the distance - his rooftop.

Their rooftop.

But just like the dozen other times he'd checked tonight - and the previous six nights - there was no sign of Calina.

No lonely figure at the parapet, gazing at the stars.

No scent on the wind.

No heartbeat.

There was nothing. She had disappeared.

He had walked her home from the subway, asked her out for a drink...and he hadn't seen her since.

He'd looked out for her the next day, hoping to turn her 'maybe' into a 'yes'. He'd paused at her door on the way to work, and on returning to his apartment in the evening, but heard nothing from inside.

He did the same the next day.

And the next.

But there was always...nothing.

"Maybe your mojo has finally worn off and you scared this particular beautiful woman away," Foggy teased when Matt had raised his concerns a couple of days ago.

"It's not funny, Foggy. What if something happened to her? Remember I told you about that other Russian woman who visited - the intense one? There'd been a...vibe...between them in the corridor. Calina didn't look very happy to see her."

"Matt, you're jumping to conclusions again. You only met this woman a month ago - for all you know, this could be a habit of hers. Maybe she likes to head into the wilderness and go camping. Or maybe she checked herself into rehab. I get why your mind always catastrophises things and goes for the worst option, but there could be a hundred innocent explanations for this."

"What are you guys talking about?" Karen asked, suddenly appearing in the doorway of the firm, three coffees in hand.

Matt considered lying - it had been a reflex around Karen for so long - but he was trying to be better. More open. More honest. And more mindful of the pain he caused through his misguided attempts to protect her. So he opted for the truth. And as he said the words out loud, he realised that he may well be over-reacting. "My new neighbour. I haven't seen her in a few days."

"The incredibly hot new neighbour that Matt asked out on a date," Foggy elaborated. "She's ghosted him."

Matt glared at Foggy. He and Karen may have decided they were better off as friends, but it still felt...disrespectful...discussing other women with her. "I didn't ask her out. I invited her to join us for drinks at Josie's. She doesn't seem to know anyone else in the city, and she seemed lonely."

"You keep telling yourself that, pal," Foggy replied.

Karen placed the coffees on the conference table. "Did you try calling her?"

"I don't have her number."

"What about her work. Could you contact her there?"

"I think she's unemployed."

"Oh."

Even Karen - and her keen investigative mind - seemed out of options.

Which gave Matt an idea.

The next day during a break in his schedule he paid a visit to an old acquaintance. He rapped on the glass door of Alias Investigations, and smiled when he was answered with a characteristically annoyed "What?"

"Is that how you greet all potential clients?" Matt teased upon entering the office.

"It's how I greet assholes who fake their own deaths," Jessica Jones replied. Her leather jacket creaked softly as she folded her arms and leaned back in her chair. But even without that hint to her body language, Matt could tell she was angry with him - the scorn seemed to radiate from her.

Even more than usual.

The smile slipped from his face. "It wasn't a conscious decision. I know that's not really an excuse, but I never set out to hurt anyone. I just wasn't in the right...frame of mind...to be Matt Murdock anymore."

"I had to find out you were alive from the news. I never believed that murdering psycho posing as Daredevil was you, but then the real you took down Fisk, and that's how I found out. It was a dick move, Murdock."

"I know. And I'm sorry."

She scoffed. "Its not like I was mourning or anything. It just would have been common courtesy to let me know. Pick up the phone or something, and say 'Hey, Jess, turns out I didn't die when you guys abandoned me in that building.'"

He took a step closer. "You didn't abandon me. It was my choice to stay down there. What happened was not on you. Or Luke, or anyone else."

"Whatever. Like I said, its not like I cared."

Matt could hear the lie in her voice. He knew she cared - she wouldn't be angry otherwise - but he didn't challenge her on it. It was enough that she was talking to him and hadn't just kicked him out.

Or tried to hit him.

He considered that a win.

"Well, I'm still sorry," he said.

She shrugged. Then changed the subject. "So what brings you to my neck of the Kitchen? Another zombie ex-girlfriend on the loose?"

"No. I have a job for you." He explained the situation with Calina. And asked for her help to find out more about his neighbour's past and where she might have gone.

Jessica tapped her pen against the notepad in front of her as she contemplated his request. "I'm happy to take your money, but isn't this something you usually handle by yourself?"

"Usually," he replied. "But I'm prepping for a big case at work. And the last time we took on something this big, I got distracted by my...other work. It cost me my practice and pretty much blew up my life."

The new case wasn't quite on the scale of the Frank Castle trial, but it had attracted a lot of media attention. Especially given the unusual perpetrator - a middle-aged mother of two named Margaret Posen. She'd never had so much as a parking ticket in her life but now she was facing life in prison for the murder of a female grad student, a woman she'd never met before and had no motive to kill - but one she'd gunned down in broad daylight, with eye witnesses and CCTV footage attesting to her guilt.

It was a nightmare of a case. And it would take all the time and expertise Nelson, Murdock and Page had to defend her. "I'm trying something new this time," he finished explaining.

"I can respect that," Jessica replied. "Okay, Counsellor, I'll take your case."

———

The first step, Jessica explained, was getting into Calina's apartment. "I'll start running a background check tomorrow, but if there's been foul play involved in her disappearance, we need to know ASAP," she said. "And her apartment might give us some clues. Have you accessed it yet?"

Matt shook his head. He'd considered it - more than once. He'd even scoped out the best entry route (her bedroom window, via the fire escape), but something had always stopped him from taking that step. Maybe it was the feeling that he was over-reacting. Or maybe it was the sense that he'd be violating the tenuous trust that had developed between him and Calina.

Or maybe it was just that there was a limited amount of information he could gather himself - he needed someone with two functioning eyes.

He could have asked Foggy or Karen to help, but Jessica was the better option - she wouldn't have any reservations about some unethical and legally-dubious snooping. Which she proved when she met him later that night, brandishing a key to Calina's apartment. "I spoke to the Super and convinced him to let me look around."

"He just handed it over?" Matt asked, sceptical.

Jessica shrugged. "I may have spun a story about my 'sister' being in hospital upstate and needing some personal items, but gosh-darn it, her house key went missing after the car accident so I can't get into her apartment."

Matt could taste salt in the air, and he gave Jessica a look. "Did you manipulate the poor man with tears?"

"Is that judgement I'm hearing, Murdock?

Matt held up his hands in defence. "No judgement here."

"Good." She slipped the key in the lock and opened Calina's door. The familiar, heady scent hit Matt in a wave. He closed his eyes and breathed it in, having missed the intoxicating smell.

But it was old.

Proof that Calina hadn't been here in days.

He filtered through the other pieces of olfactory data lingering in the air, as Jessica filled him in on the visual details. "No scratch marks on the door. No broken furniture. Windows are still locked."

Matt nodded. It fit with his impression too. There was no scent of blood, no lingering traces of adrenaline from a fight or flight. And no other person had been in this apartment for months. The knot of anxiety in his gut that he'd been trying to ignore unfurled in relief - she hadn't been attacked or taken against her will.

At least, not from her home.

The two of them continued searching through her relatively meagre possessions, finding nothing incriminating, and nothing that told them where she might have gone. He came across a stack of envelopes and some scraps of paper in the bottom drawer of the kitchen cabinet and handed them to Jessica. "Anything?" he asked as she flipped through them.

"No. Just some unopened bills. A copy of her birth certificate, the usual stuff."

"Have you seen her passport at all?"

"No," Jessica replied. "But I spent the afternoon going through airline manifests for the past few days. No Calina Balashova listed. She also didn't buy a bus ticket or hire a car."

"She might not have needed to - she owns a motorcycle."

He heard Jessica roll her eyes. "A detail that would have been helpful to know earlier."

Matt ignored the censure in her voice as he opened Calina's closet. It was the most filled space in the apartment, the small rail bursting with clothes. He ran his hands over them, enjoying the feel of the soft wools and silks.

"A woman after my own heart," Jessica commented as she joined him.

"Hmmm?" Matt asked, not sure what she was picking up on.

"Mostly black. Your girl isn't one for colour. Except this."

She pulled out one of the coats and Matt took note of the particular texture and shape. "What colour is it?"

"Red. Bright red. But it still has the tags on. Guess she's not bold enough to wear it out yet."

"What do you mean?"

"With her looks, in this colour, she'd stand out a mile. Stop traffic and shit."

Matt filed that bit of information away. Did she not want to stand out? And if so, why not?

Was she running from something...

Or someone...?

"Hmm," Jessica murmured.

"What?"

"This is all pretty expensive stuff. Some of its designer. Yet she lives in this shithole - no offence."

"None taken," he said dryly. "What do you think it means?"

"I don't know. Just making an observation."

"Do you see a suitcase or a large bag anywhere?" Matt asked. He hadn't picked up any traces of jet fuel that usually clung to well-used luggage, but thought he would double check.

"No. And I'm not seeing a purse or phone. She's definitely gone somewhere. And it looks like it was of her own free will."

"Any books?"

"Books? No. Why?"

"No reason." He remembered the way Calina had clutched the library books to her chest, as if they were precious treasures. He got the sense she wouldn't have left them behind.

Which meant she really had left of her own volition.

A part of him was relieved at the evidence that she was likely unharmed. But he couldn't shake the vague sense that she was in trouble.

And he had nowhere left to look.

Matt sighed and descended the water tower, leaping from halfway down the metal frame onto the nearest rooftop. He made his way across the skyline to his building, then down the steps to his apartment just as the first drops of rain started splattering against the concrete. It quickly turned into a downpour, the water battering almost horizontally against the walls of his apartment.

The rat-a-tat sound rose to a crescendo, until it enclosed his loft in a static of white noise. He wandered over to the window and pressed his hand against the cool glass, enjoying the way the sound blocked out all others, giving him a small respite from the over-stimulation of the world.

After a few moments of peace, Matt started peeling off his suit. He changed into his sweats and grabbed the boxing gear from the bottom of his wardrobe. He wasn't looking forward to heading back out in the rain, but he was still feeling...antsy. If he couldn't burn off this feeling as Daredevil, a few rounds with a punching bag at Fogwell's should do the trick.

He shoved on his sneakers and headed out the front door. He locked his apartment door behind him, and glanced at 6A. His senses reached out almost automatically, but there was no one there.

Again.

He clenched his jaw in frustration and trudged down the hallway.

But just as he stepped into the stairwell, the elevator doors opened...and the fragrance of strawberries and sea salt nearly knocked him flat.

She was back.