Black Widow: Red Vengeance (A Marvel YA Novel)

by Margaret Stohl

  Natasha raised an eyebrow. Oh, I’ve been playing that game a lot longer than you, little girl. So why don’t you go shove yourself right back up into that nest? She smiled. Come back again when you’re ready for me.

  Now Natasha held her voice steady. “You belonged to Ivan, then? You were the devushki Ivana of your day?” Ivan’s girls. That was what they were called at the Red Room. His special pets. Natasha had been one of them, and the memory made her physically sick.

  “Belonged to Ivan? Of course not.” The blond girl looked bitter for a moment, then scoffed. “Ivan and Yuri didn’t just raise me. They belonged to me.” Her lip smiled—or snarled—almost triumphantly. She was gloating. Then, as quickly as it had come, the smile faded. “Until you took them away, both of my uncles, and I had to take over for them.”

  “Uncles? Ivan Somodorov had a sister?” Natasha tried to think of it. Was it possible? Did I miss something? Could Ivan have hidden something as big as his own sister from me?

  “Ivan had my mother. I had Ivan. Yuri was—oh, I don’t know, more of a brother, maybe a cousin? I guess that’s how you could see it.”

  Why does she look so familiar?

  “My name is Helen Samuels.”

  And why is that name so familiar? The two women stared at each other across the video link. Natasha tried to feel her way through the situation. “Can I help you with something, Helen? Things are a little busy these days—what with the missile attacks—even when you aren’t trying to kill me.”

  “Sorry about that. I’ve been trying to get your attention, but it turns out you’re an awfully hard girl to get attention from.”

  “Like I said, kind of busy.” Natasha shrugged.

  “I tried the magnesium, but you didn’t remember it was how we first learned basic detonations in the Red Room.”

  “I remembered,” Natasha said, carefully. Keep talking, psycho—

  Helen pouted. “I tried the hack, but you didn’t seem to understand I was your Red Angel.”

  Natasha looked at her. “I guess I was distracted by the whole ‘coming to kill you’ thing.”

  “So then I had to employ a slightly bigger canvas. What a shame.”

  Natasha was having a harder time keeping her composure, now. “Iron Angel? Iron Ghost? You randomly obliterated eight centuries of Sicilian culture; you threatened—what, three cities? Took on the Russian navy—and let’s not forget about the Chinese nuclear reactors—on top of terrifying, say, most of the planet, for a word game?”

  Helen shrugged. “Yet here you are.”

  “Next time try texting,” Natasha said.

  “There’s no next time. Why do you think I had to bring you all the way to Moscow? Yuri had so many plans for his precious bombs, his Faith, the spread of our network across the world—but in the end, what did he really want? Power. Fear. Why waste time? I did the math and jumped straight to the end.” Helen sighed. “You’re still not getting it. And here I thought we were kindred spirits. You know, like minds…”

  Like minds…where was that from? Stark had said something similar, hadn’t he? Suddenly the pieces clicked into place.

  “It’s Tony,” Natasha said suddenly. “Of course. You’re one of his ‘Like Minds.’ You interned for Tony Stark. The think tank.”

  “I did,” Helen said. “Now I’ve moved on to explore other opportunities. Isn’t that how they say it in job interviews?”

  “You’re the Rhodes scholar he went on and on about. The teen Tony Stark of Russia, that’s what he calls you. You won the Stark Award in quantum physics.”

  “And molecular chemistry, though I admit, there’s something about the word quantum that always seems to grab the spotlight.”

  “Why are you doing any of this, Helen? Tony said you had so much promise.”

  “I did. And I do. Wait, I’ll show you what I’m promising to do.” The camera angle swung around suddenly, erratically. “Which is, to ruin your life the way you’ve ruined mine. Kill your baby chicks, ptnets, the way you killed Ivan and Yuri.”

  She’s picked up her computer. What am I looking at?

  “You’re there because I’m here,” Helen’s voice said.

  The screen now showed a warehouse full of workers in bright yellow shirts, moving industriously around the cavernous space.

  Helen spoke again. “And while I’m here, I’m busy, and I need you to leave me alone.”

  That place has to be the size of a football stadium.

  In the center, Natasha could see three giant shapes, brightly colored, though it was difficult to determine what they were.

  Sails? For a boat? Fabric, for a tent?

  A shipping container marked VERAPORT was parked at one end of the warehouse.

  “You’ll be in Moscow, so you won’t get to see the show in person, but I promise you it will be spectacular. Even for New York.”

  Of course she’s in New York. That’s why she made certain I’m not.

  Natasha could feel herself starting to lose control. “I don’t know. New Yorkers are pretty jaded. Now that you’ve used up all your fireworks, I think you’re probably old news.”

  “Oh, believe me. The fireworks are just getting started. Have a little faith, Natasha.”

  That line is really starting to get to me—

  “Even your friends do,” Helen said, offscreen—and she let the camera drop, so that for a split second, Natasha could see the two people lying on her floor.

  Dante and Oksana? How did they get there? And where are they—? Where’s Ava?

  Helen had flipped the camera back to her own face, and she smiled into it.

  “Helen,” Natasha said, carefully. “Why are you doing this? What does this have to do with me? Or your precious Faith?”

  “It was Yuri who wanted to terrorize the world. I just want to terrorize you. Let me put it this way: mathematically speaking, the most effective dispersal method for the Faith particulate is aerosol, and the per-square-foot population density of New York City increases by four hundred percent during a few particular weekends of the year. Two, actually. New Year’s Eve in Times Square, and—”

  “The Stark Holiday Parade,” Natasha said, stunned.

  Helen smiled at the camera, her face angling off-kilter, close to the screen. “You know, I absolutely love balloons—don’t you? I hope your friends do. And your city.”

  Static overwhelmed the video feed.

  “Don’t do it.” Natasha raised her voice. “Helen!”

  The images on the screen grew blurry—and Natasha felt a wave of anger.

  “Where’s Yelena, Helen? I know she’s behind this. Tell her to come out and fight me in the open. Don’t pretend she isn’t involved in this somehow—”

  “Don’t worry about anyone but the Alpha, who can control every exposed inhabitant of New York City. That’s my advice, ptnets.”

  But then the video link cut out—and the screen went to black. “Helen!”

  Only the ghost of a voice lingered. “I was going to kill you, but I decided that would be too merciful. Now I’m going to strip the baby birds from your nest while you watch. It’s a steep drop to the ground, Natasha. You’ll be surprised to see how fast they fall.”

  On the last syllable, the laptop sparked and burst into flame.

  “Der’mo—” Natasha cursed, throwing the computer against the wall as hard as she could. It broke into halves and went skittering into the rubble, sparking and shorting to black.

  Natasha was reeling. It wasn’t a side of herself that she showed very often, but she couldn’t stop it now.

  She felt like the burned-out walls were closing in on her, and she couldn’t think, couldn’t strategize, couldn’t do any of the things that had kept her alive—and made her who she was, really—for most of her life.

  “Are you okay, Tash?” Alexei’s voice came from behind her.

  She tapped her earpiece. “Coulson? Coulson, can you hear me?” She tapped it again. “Tony? Are you there?” Now she tapped it thr
ee times. “Ava? Ava, it’s me.”

  “Tasha!” Alexei stepped through her, turning around to look at her. He looked like he wanted to grab her and shake her, but his hands hovered in their immaterial state.

  She looked at him with wild eyes.

  “Look at me, Tash.” Alexei moved his face directly in front of hers. “Get it together. You’re in Moscow. She’s in New York. You have a few hours to get back to the city, and you have to move quickly now. One step at a time. Just think about that.”

  She tried to look at him but her eyes were blurry with tears.

  You’re not really here, Alexei.

  You’re gone. My brother’s gone.

  I can’t think what to do, because you died.

  They’re all going to die because you died and I can’t think.

  Because I couldn’t save you.

  She closed her eyes.

  Because of Ivan and Yuri Somodorov. Helen Samuels. Yelena, tangled up somehow in all of this.

  And me.

  Because of me.

  Because I’m lost and I’m tired and my brain is full of cotton, only it’s the kind of cotton that hurts—

  “Natashkaya!” Alexei was shouting now. “Stop it! I’m here. I’m right here. Stay with me.”

  “It’s too late. That psychopath, Helen. She’s got Faith. Who knows how much?” Natasha looked at her brother with despair. “Who knows what damage she can do?”

  “It doesn’t matter.” Alexei shook his head. “Forget the Faith. One step at a time. You can’t do anything until you get out of here, right?”

  Natasha stared at her brother for a long moment.

  “I have to find Yelena,” she said, finally. “I know she has something to do with all of this. And I have to tell Ava. She has to help her friends.”

  “We will.” Alexei looked at her. “We’ll work it out. You can do this. You can stop Helen Samuels. You’re not alone. I’m here. Let’s go.”

  She nodded.

  Then she followed her dead brother out the door, once again determined to do the impossible.

  S.H.I.E.L.D. EYES ONLY

  CLEARANCE LEVEL X

  SPECIAL CIRCUMSTANCES & INDIVIDUALS (SCI) INVESTIGATION

  AGENT IN COMMAND (AIC): PHILLIP COULSON

  RE: AGENT NATASHA ROMANOFF A.K.A. BLACK WIDOW

  A.K.A. NATASHA ROMANOVA

  AAA HEARING TRANSCRIPT

  CC: DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE, SCI INQUIRY

  COULSON: Are you saying that you and Ava shared a delusion? Alexei “appeared” to you, too?

  ROMANOFF: I’m not saying anything. Or maybe I don’t know what I’m saying.

  COULSON: And Yelena Belova? Allegedly also a Black Widow, also from the Red Room. Do you want to elaborate? Seeing as she’s supposed to be dead?

  ROMANOFF: You’re one to talk, Phil.

  COULSON: Too bad your files were wiped. I’m sure we could have read all about her there.

  ROMANOFF: That’s why she had Maks wipe them, I’m guessing.

  COULSON: So Ivan was an opportunist. Yuri a terrorist. Helen’s a psychopath—who really hates you.

  ROMANOFF: She can get in line.

  COULSON: How does Yelena fit in to this circus?

  ROMANOFF: My guess? Not the clowns.

  S.H.I.E.L.D.

  NEW YORK TRISKELION, EAST RIVER,

  THE GREAT CITY OF NEW YORK

  Helen Samuels. A.k.a. Elena Somodorova. According to the S.H.I.E.L.D. database, that was her name, Green Dress Girl. Now that Ava finally had the file, she found it difficult to put down.

  It was a wild story.

  Elena Somodorova was born in Moscow and taken to one of the many government-run orphanages, with other wards of the state; she was legally adopted by Ivan Somodorov at the age of six, then privately schooled in a succession of Ivan’s laboratories before transferring to an accelerated high school program at Beijing University.

  Adopted by Ivan Somodorov. Ava had stumbled on that one the first time she’d read it. So she’s Red Room, like we thought. Clearly, she has to be. Ivan wouldn’t have bothered with her otherwise.

  She studied at Ivan’s labs? Did she study at my mother’s lab? She’s older than I am, but not by much. Did we eat at the same table? Were we subjected to the same tortures? No, because who would survive all of that and still call Ivan family?

  Ava kept reading.

  Elena Somodorova eventually graduated from Oxford and returned to Moscow, earning certificates in physics, chemistry, mechanical engineering, and something about data structures that Ava didn’t fully understand.

  Elena was athletic, pretty, blond, outgoing, and smart; one teacher described her as “terrifyingly gifted.” Another found that she “lacked empathy.” A third more specifically defined her as “pathological.”

  Of course she’s pathological. That’s why Ivan wanted her, and what Ivan wanted her to be. She tried to blow up the Harley while we were still on it. What wouldn’t she do?

  But something more was going on here; the longer Ava spent reading over Helen Samuels’s file, the more certain she was of it. There were too many redacted pages, too many holes.

  Ava tried reaching out to Natasha again, though she’d had no luck in the past few hours. She closed her eyes and stretched her consciousness as far as she could, reaching back across the water—

  Natasha. Where are you? I need to talk to you.

  I can’t do this on my own.

  Tony was still with Pepper, getting ready for his parade. Dante and Oksana weren’t answering any phones, not even the burner phones she’d swiped for them out of the S.H.I.E.L.D. Academy supply room.

  I can’t wait any longer—

  She took the file with her and left the Triskelion.

  Tony was standing on the grandstand, being interviewed by three different networks, when Ava pushed through to the edge of the platform.

  She held up the file. “Helen Samuels,” she said.

  “Sorry, guys. I’m going to need five minutes.” He hopped off the platform, walking over to Ava with a panicked look on his face. “There are animals and I have been told to hold them.”

  “Helen Samuels,” Ava said, holding up the file.

  Tony looked startled. “Did something happen to Ellie? Is she all right?” He sounded concerned, which threw Ava off.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Ellie. Helen. What about her? Aside from the obvious?” Tony asked.

  Ava paused, confused. “Wait, which thing do you think is obvious?”

  “Winner of the Stark Prize in Physics and Chemistry, of course,” he said, as if the size of her brain should be as universally obvious as the color of her hair or her height.

  “Okay, so she’s supposed to be some kind of genius, right?” Ava asked. “That’s what I was getting from the file.”

  “Ellie’s not just supposed to be. She is one. She’s a Stark Industries ‘Like Mind.’”

  “You mean your think-tank thing?” Ava asked. “With all the crazy patents?”

  “Exactly. Who do you think designed the neural interface for the ComPlex? Who do you think created the trigger for the PopX?”

  “You had her designing weapons?” Ava’s eyes were huge now.

  “Not weapons. Triggers. Safeties. Redundancies. Little pieces of larger puzzles, that’s what she was good at. Solving individual steps. Ellie wasn’t a big-picture person, in fact I always found it to be fairly strange, how disconnected those two parts of her brain could be. But why are you asking me about Ellie?”

  “Helen Samuels is the Green Dress Girl,” Ava said, helplessly. “Elena Somodorova.”

  “Impossible.” Tony grabbed the file out of her hand and opened it. “Are you telling me that the person who tried to kill both of you is the same person I had designing weapons in my lab?” He looked stricken.

  “Tony! You just told me Helen Samuels didn’t—”

  “Ellie—Helen—this ‘Elena’ person—shouldn’t have even touched pieces of them.
They’re still weapons. I did that. I had her doing that.”

  “You didn’t know,” Ava said. “Hard to check a hacked record.”

  Tony was irate. “It’s bad enough that they don’t examine everyone who buys a weapon. The very least we could do is examine everyone who makes a weapon.”

  “I need to find Natasha, and I can’t find anyone,” Ava said.

  “I have to shut down the manufacturing. I don’t even know what we’re fabricating right now. She could have rigged all of it.” Tony was pulling out his phone.

  “Natasha,” Ava said.

  “You’re the one who shares a conscious seam…reach out.”

  She shook her head. “Is that really what you’re calling it now? A conscious seam?”

  “How am I supposed to know what to call it? Neither one of you ever lets me examine you.” Tony sighed. “Why do you think I went to CERN? At least they’re willing to research Quantums—”

  “What about Dante and Sana?” Ava wasn’t listening to him. “Is there any way to track a burner phone?”

  As she said it, her own phone rang, and she picked it up.

  All she could hear was the seemingly random mashing of buttons. She looked at the number and then put the receiver back to her ear. “Dante? Sana? Is that you guys? I think you’re butt-dialing me—”

  At that moment, Ava thought she heard a whisper, someone trying to speak to her from the other end.

  Then it cut off.

  Tony looked at Ava. She pointed at the phone while still trying to hear.

  “Burner phone? Can you locate it?”

  He held out his hand.

  “This doesn’t make sense. It’s here. The signal.” Tony frowned. He and Ava were sitting in his trailer, just across from Rockefeller Center, the centerpiece of the parade this afternoon—and really, the center of the holidays for New York City.

  The crowds had been swarming onto the sidewalks on either side of the road since early this morning. Tony’s trailer was the only place they could get out of the crowd long enough to hear each other.

  “Where?”

  “Not here. It’s at the head of the parade. Where all the floats are assembled. Some are in the streets at the top of the route, some are in a warehouse a bit farther back.”