a/n: Was going through my old drafts and found this!

Natasha stares at the piece of paper with her calm facade perfectly in place, masking every growing crack they could be waiting for. She knows they are expecting her to obey, expecting her to resist, expecting the assassin who lies under her skin like a lover to rise to the occasion and spill a little more blood across the linoleum floors.

She stares at the piece of paper, fingertips perfectly still as she breathes, and reaches for the phone.

"Steve?" She says into the receiver, head tipped to hold it against her shoulder. "I need your help."

SHIELD burns from the inside, HYDRA lying newly exposed with its underbelly torn open and its secrets dragged into the daylight, and Natasha stands outside the Triskelion with Captain America by her side, watching the wreckage with impassive eyes.

Hail Hydra whispers through her veins, in the blood that she has shed time and time again, and she lifts her chin against the recrimination of her past.

They expected her to choose. She did.

Their mistake was predicting what choice it was that she had to make.