𝐂𝐇𝐀𝐏𝐓𝐄𝐑 𝐓𝐖𝐄𝐍𝐓𝐘-𝐓𝐖𝐎 || 𝘈 𝘊𝘰𝘯𝘨𝘳𝘶𝘦𝘯𝘵 𝘍𝘦𝘢𝘵𝘶𝘳𝘦

"I LIKE THE LOOK."

Shifting around to face the giant, Nova smiled at the man. "Could say the same for you."

The man looked down at himself and the slight modifications made to the suit; the S.H.I.E.L.D. logo was ripped from it along with the name tag. The sleeves were cut perfectly halfway up his bicep which displayed his tattoos fairly well. Along with a Kevlar vest and pistol holster around his right thigh, everything else seemed close to the original.

"I was worried I looked like an idiot. But with some of that tech Rick and your father gave, I feel like a brand new man," he quipped as he walked to her side of the cliffside. "But your suit is different from what I saw in magazines and on the news."

Nova laughed as she stared at the white suit. "Nanobots. It's been worked on for years with Tony and my Father. It seems like Martin finally cracked it and gave me the first "testing sample."

Andrei snorted as he crouched at the edge of the cliffside, staring down at the prison within the valley of snow. Lost in the middle of nowhere but miles of nothing. A perfect place to lock up some of the worst. "Well, at least your father gave you something. Mine got me his action figure while the scientist cut into me."

Resentment seemed to be a congruent feature among the family that were all treated and shaped into whatever their superiors wanted by the people they trusted. And as much as Nova wished to say Fury had done the same, in the end, she had more power than that man. If she had wanted out a long time ago she could've left.

But she did resent Martin for a time after abandoning her as a child. It took a lot for her to forgive him, and she was sure Yelena felt the same with Natasha or Andrei. Or Andrei with Alexei, who he was now forced to help break from prison. In some way, that had to mess with his feelings a little bit.

Sighing, Nova crouched down beside the man. "If you're lucky, maybe you get to punch him."

That seemed to pull a laugh from the man's lips as he nodded in agreement. And even though it was just a suggestion, Nova had a feeling the man was going to do. It just seemed like something Andrei would do.

"Nova, Andrei, are you in position?" Yelena asked over the comms.

"Affirmative. Waiting for the signal," Nova announced as she pushed herself from her feet moved toward the crate and tossed the lid to the side. Grabbing the G28 gifted by Rick and slid the magazine into place and pulled the charging handle just enough to see a 7.62 already in the chamber. Allowing it to snap into place, she wrapped the strap around her body and tightened it to sit flush against her chest.

"What's the signal again?" As the words spilled from Andrei's lips, alarms could be heard in the distance. Blips of guards ran around in the courtyard and towers as they moved to and fro.

"That's the signal." Seeing the woman sprinting toward the cliffside, he backed up a few steps before running and jumping. Spreading his arms out as the cold flakes of snow melted against his flushed cheeks and the wind nipped at his naked arms.

But as the ground grew closer, a pair of hands grabbed his own and suddenly yanked him up and stopped his fall. Glancing up to look at Nova's masked face that looked at their target. Thrusters on her back doubled their power and propelled them forward.

Once in range, she let go of Andrei where he was prepped for the landing and rolling across the metal catwalk and thrown into immediate fighting with guards. Using his Benelli with expert precision and as a weapon when they got close enough for hand-to-hand combat.

"I'll keep overwatch," she announced, placing herself on the far wall with a grunt. Loosening the strap and grabbing her DMR before aiming. Eye peering through the scope, she watched prisoners and guards flood out of the steel door dividing them from the inside. Looking around, she eventually found the hulking figure of Alexei searching for a viable exit. "I got eyes on Alexei."

She guarded the man as best she could. Killing guards and prisoners in the man's path. All the while Natasha had eventually joined the fray with her brother. But as Yelena took gunfire from guards along the wall surrounding the courtyard, she tried to use two unmovable cranes as cover, only making her control over the helicopter at such a tight squeeze unbearable. The tail of the helicopter swung and nearly hit Natasha who ducked back. "Seriously?"

"Sorry!" Yelena called out over the comms.

Once gaining control, she was greeted by the sight of her older sister waving her hands in hysterics. "What are you doing? Are you kidding me? Back up!"

"We're both doing a really good job," she responded before pulling up.

"Can anyone tell me why I have Yelena's job and she has mine? This seems absurdly backwards," Nova questioned firing another round into another prisoner with the ache of the recoil slowly ebbing to a controllable reaction.

Continuing to fire her rifle, a loud explosion had been enough to shake her attention from the scope and stare at the guard tower crumbling with flames. But an echoing of the earth shifting was enough to make her stand from her position, lips parting as snow could be seen falling from the same cliffside she and Andrei had been on less than 5 minutes ago.

"Tell me that's a good sign for us!" Alexei's voice yelled over the comms.

"Move your ass!" Natasha urged, watching the man use a riot shield as something to step on and launch onto the cages scattered through the courtyard.

As the avalanche steadily approached, Andrei shot a guard in the head and pressed a finger to his ear. "Nova, how about that pickup?"

"Incoming, big guy!" He placed his foot on the railing and launched himself in the air, hands held above his hands which Nova caught and flew well above the prison. Flying around in tandem with the helicopter and getting them both inside. Able to see Natasha grab Alexei's hand just in time with the avalanches cascade over the prison.

The two helped Natasha in and allowed Alexei to climb in himself. "I need a hand up here!" Yelena announced and her sister was quick to join her in the cockpit.

Whatever Alexei yelled out the cabin side door as the four members of the team slipped headsets on. Both Nova and Andrei moved down the cabin with the string connecting to their headsets unfurling from their natural curl as they disengaged their weapons.

But sadly, there had been a spare headset that Alexei had slipped on and chuckled, leaning on the threshold of the cabin and cockpit. "Wow."

Yelena didn't waste a second of hitting the man in the face, causing him to exclaim in Russian, holding the bridge of his nose. It made Nova chuckle in amusement as she took off the 4x scope from the rifle and tossed it onto the crate, along with her rifle.

"Okay." The man sniffled, wiping his nose with the back of his hand. "Why the aggression, huh? Is it your time of the month?"

"I don't get my period, dipshit. I don't have a uterus," Yelena told the man.

"Or ovaries," Natasha added, unaware of Nova's attention shifting to the sisters.

The clueless look on Alexei's face had only sparked Yelena to continue. "Yeah. That's what happens when the Red Room gives you an involuntary hysterectomy." She looked back at him, using her hands as some sort of demonstration as she said, "They kind of just go in and rip out all your reproductive organs. They just get right in there and they chop them all away. Everything out-"

"Okay, okay-"

"-so you can't have babies."

"Okay! Okay! You don't have to get so clinical and nasty," Alexei announced as he sat down, disengaging from his youngest challenge.

"Oh, well, I was about to talk about fallopian tubes, but okay."

Sighing, Alexei smiled. "It means so much to me that you came back for me."

Andrei's laugh echoed off the group's ears as he slid a shell into the chamber of his shotgun marched around Nova and stared at his father. "That would be if you were worth coming back to. But you got something we want, Dad," he explained sitting across from his adoptive Father and levelled his gun to the man's head.

"Woah. C'mon, little Andy. Let's cool our jets for a second-"

"Oh, you're making it far easier to put a hole in your chest," Andrei chuckled darkly.

"You're gonna tell us how to get to the Red Room," Natasha announced.

Alexei let out a laugh. "Wow, look at you, huh? All business."

"Trust me, this isn't pleasure."

"Little Natasha, all indoctrinated into the Western agenda," Alexei mocked, only earning the unbeknownst glare from Nova off to his left.

"I chose to go west to become an Avenger. 'Cause they treated me like family," Natasha countered with a shake of her head.

"Really? Family? Well, where are they now?" Alexei questioned, pulling the mic closer to his lips. "Where is that family now-"

Before he could finish, Nova punched the man in the jaw. A perfect follow-through that had the man groaning as Nova shook her hand in false hopes it would ease the ache splashing through her hand. Still satisfied to see the joke of a supersoldier holding his jaw in pain.

"Oh, yeah, that's my wife. Nova, meet Alexei. Alexei, meet my wife, Nova," Natasha introduced. "My family is right there."

Alexei looked up at the woman and managed a painful smile that made her scoff. "Dumbass."

"Now that your question is answered, time you repay that. Tell me where the Red Room is."

The man pursed his lips, glancing at his children for a few moments before clenching his jaw. "I have no idea. Okay?"

That had been enough Natasha rip her headset off as she stood to her feet and walked into the cabin. Yanking Alexei's off, she sat beside her brother. "Come on. You and Dreykov were like..."

"Dreykov?"

"Yeah!"

"General Dreyjov, my friend, huh?" He repeated. "Gives me glory—Soviet Union's first and only super soldier. I could have been more famous than Captain America. Then he buries me in Ohio on that stupid mission."

All three siblings looked at the man incredulously as he continued, "Three years! So tedious, boring me to tears." But as he stared at Yelena, noticing the glare on her face, he took notice of his words. "No offence."

"Then he puts me in prison for the rest of my life. Why, huh? Why? Why would he put in... You know why? 'Cause maybe I want to talk about the withering of the state. Or maybe I don't like his hair or something and I say something casually about that. Maybe, you know, I want the Party to actually feel like a party instead of this sourpuss organization. But instead, no. He puts me in prison for the rest of my life. He just runs off and hides, huh?"

The man wailed and whined like a child, which Nova wasn't sure if she should be surprised about or not. From the brief understanding of the man provided by Andrei, the man was a self-absorbed, egotistical, bitter, and pitiful excuse of a soldier. But that was directly from Andrei's lips and it seemed to be entirely true just based on his childish tantrum.

He laughed, sighing as he motioned a finger to Natasha. "I'm not even the one who, uh, you know..." When Natasha looked at him in confusion, he continued. "I'm not the one who killed his daughter."

Nova had enough as she marched toward the man and kicked him in the face. A groan spliced through his lips as he could barely get a word out before Nova grabbed him by the scruff of his jacket and glared at the man. "Okay, I'm going to give you this warning. Only one because you may hold some sort of significance to Natasha, and I'd rather not ruin that for her. But you mention another thing to insult her or cut her down, I'll cut your cock and balls off, fry them, and then feed them to you, you dumb piece of shit!"

Natasha couldn't rid herself of the smirk that formed on her lips as she stared at Nova. Completely enthralled by the woman's aggressive behaviour. She shoved Alexei into the wall and turned back to her gear. Purposefully pulling out a knife and placing it in front of her, furthering the validity of the threat.

"I see why you like her," Alexei muttered to his daughter, a smirk on his face. "She's got that same fire that I've missed since my time."

"Can we throw him out the window now?" Yelena called out from the front.

"I think we should wait until we get to a higher altitude," Natasha commented.

Andrei scoffed. "Or I could put a hole in his rest. Sure sounds a lot better than waiting."

Alexei called out something in Russian which made the three siblings frown. "Wait, Mom Melina?"

"We thought she was dead," Natasha added.

The man scoffed. "You cannot kill a fox that swift."

The underlying tone of the man's comment made the siblings cringe as they stared at the man. "Ew."

"What?" He asked. "She was the strategist, scientist. I was the muscle. She worked directly for Dreykov far more than I ever did."

"Wait. Are you telling me that Melina is working for the Red Room present day?" Natasha asked.

"She works remotely outside St. Petersburg."

Yelena let out a laugh, tilting her head as she stared at the fuel gauge. "Uh, I don't think we'll have enough fuel for St. Petersburg."

"No, we're good. We'll make it," Alexei reassured with a waved hand.

"Okay."