▌𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐓𝐰𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐲-𝐒𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐧 ━︎━︎ 𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐏𝐚𝐬𝐭 𝐑𝐞𝐭𝐮𝐫𝐧𝐬 ▌

━︎━︎━︎━︎𝐋𝐈𝐋𝐈𝐘𝐀 𝐒𝐓𝐎𝐎𝐃 𝐓𝐇𝐄𝐑𝐄, arms crossed over her chest as she kept a close eye on the soldiers she was training. A small unsatisfied frown was pulled on her lips as she watched them. They were being lazy and quite frankly she wasn't having it. A smirk pulled to her lips as an idea popped in her head and suddenly she was invisible. She walked behind one of the soldiers, appearing behind him and sending a kick to his back. He spun and she motioned for him to fight, and so he did. Every hit or kick he threw, Liliya easily dodged it. She dropped to the ground, swinging out her leg and sending him flat on his back. She went invisible again, going to another soldier and starting another round. She did this until every soldier was on the ground and she walked to stand in front of all of them.

"I'm disappointed in all of you." Liliya called. "Always expect the unexpected, always be prepared. You have been trained for this and I expected better of you. That's the end of today's training, I hope tomorrow will be much better." She watched as the soldiers all left and a sigh fell from her lips.

"Well, you don't look happy." Steve approached her and Liliya turned her head to look at him, shaking her head.

"I'm not." Liliya replied, pushing the hair from her face. "They have always done so well, but today all of them were unprepared and were constantly caught off guard." She chewed on the inside of her cheek. "I don't know what I'm doing wrong."

"Maybe they were just having an off day," Steve suggested.

"All of them?" Liliya scoffed.

Steve softly sighed. "They are allowed to have bad days you know."

"Not if they want to survive." Liliya denied. "Where I come from, if you have an off day, if you react a fraction of a second too late, you were killed."

Steve frowned. "You're not there anymore, Lils." He placed a gentle hand on her shoulder. "You're allowed to have an off day too, you know?"

Liliya shook her head. "I'm not wired that way."

"And they're not wired to be assassins." Steve reasoned. "Don't forget that."

Liliya looked at him before nodding her head and beginning to walk. Steve joined her side. "No matter how hard I try to get away from the Murder House, it still follows me everywhere I go. I hate that they've made me who I am."

Instantly, Steve shook his head. "No they didn't." Liliya gave him a blank look. "Yes, they made you an assassin and they are the reason for your powers, but those things are not who you are." Steve stopped walking, turning to face her and reached out to grab her hands. "You are Liliya Petrova, you are kind, and you are smart, and you're are such a caring person even if you don't want to admit that to yourself. Those are the things that the Murder House tried to take away from you, but they failed. You should give yourself much more credit."

"It's hard to give myself credit when giving it to them is all I've ever known." Liliya softly said. "I know that I have become a better person, I know that, but I am still what they made me to be. A ruthless assassin that shows no mercy and will do whatever it takes to get the job done."

"Liliya. . ."

"Liliya, you need to come with me right now." Natasha's stern voice made the couple quickly turn to look at her. Natasha rushed towards them, grabbing Liliya by the wrist and dragging her inside. Steve was quick to follow.

"Natasha, what the hell?" Liliya hissed, ripping her arm from Natasha's grasp. "What's wrong with you?"

Natasha spun on her heel to look at her. "You said the Murder House was destroyed, right?"

Liliya straightened in alert. "Yes."

"Well, they just discovered there's more than one."

Liliya's mouth opened and closed. "Wh-what? That's impossible!"

"Oh, it's very possible." Natasha began walking again and Liliya and Steve followed her. "And we have a positive ID on who's running it." She walked over to a computer and pulled up a picture.

Liliya stumbled back in surprise. Her eyes were wide. "No." She shook her head, her throat going dry. "No, there's no way. It's impossible."

Steve frowned, crossing his arms over his chest as he looked at her. "Do you know her?"

"I couldn't forget her even if I tried." Liliya whispered. "It's. . . it's Karine."

"I thought you said. . ."

"I killed her." Liliya said. "I watched the light leave her eyes. She is dead. There has to be some mistake. Where's my file?" Natasha left, coming back a few minutes later with a file in her hands. Liliya took it from her, opening it and grabbing the photo of Karine, comparing it to the photo they'd received and comparing them. Sure enough, it was her.

"I don't understand." Liliya rasped, tears filling her eyes. "How can this be?"

"Maybe it was a mistake." Steve tried. "People don't just come back from the dead."

Liliya scoffed. "Says the man who was declared dead for 70 years and then was found frozen and came back to life."

He scratched the back of his neck. "Right."

Liliya shook her head, looking at Natasha. "What do I do, Nat? There's no way she's working for the Murder House, she hated it as much as I did."

"Do you think she's being manipulated?" Natasha asked.

"That could be a possibility." Liliya hummed. "I'm still caught on the fact that she's alive." She shook her head to clear her thoughts. "If she is being manipulated, we have to find her and make things right. What the Murder House does. . . it's inhumane. Pitting kids against each other. We have to destroy this one the same way we destroyed the last one."

Steve frowned. "And what's that?"

Liliya looked at him and a sigh left her lips. "We have to destroy it from the inside."