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*
Yelena has dreamed of going back to Ohio, running and screaming down the neighborhood streets with Natasha like they used to…
Maybe not while screaming in fear…
"Come on!"
Bullets pepper the ground at Yelena's heels, sending up fragments of pavement and dust clouds.
In the distance, men shouting.
She veers right, darting full speed behind a gigantic moving van, heading for the fence.
Up ahead, a panting Natasha scales it without hesitating. Yelena doesn't need more than a few seconds to register Natasha's face glistening heavily with sweat, but there's a paling nastiness to it. She's not as moving as she should be. Bright blood wets Natasha's fingertips.
They're trained killers, sure… but what happens when trained killers wanna kill the trained killers?
What do they DO…?
Yelena makes a flying leap over a trampoline, the edge of her calf clipping the metal-rod. Pain echoes up Yelena's leg in small spikes, as they make it out of the stretch of grassy green backyard and into another road off of Berkshire. No more gunfire.
Out of nowhere, an all-black van with tinted windows speeds into Yelena's direction.
Natasha whips out her pistol, shooting out the front tires. It goes flying forward at eighty miles an hour, flipping over. Another accurate shot from Natasha and she blows out the engine. "Goddammit!" Natasha swears in Russian. "Move your ass! Now!"
Yelena resists the urge to roll her eyes.
"Stop yelling at me, poser!" she yells back in Russian, but obeys the command.
*
There were times Yelena remembers her 'Dad' bringing home a tall, greasy bag of McDonald's. Sometimes at midnight, and sometimes at five in the morning when everybody had been mostly asleep at the dinner table. It was a bizarre three years in retrospect.
She loved the chicken nuggets. Tasty and crispy.
The french fries were always cold. Overly salty. Kinda really gross, but still tasty.
After running for another mile and a half, passing a lawnmower store and veterinary clinic, Yelena spots a McDonald's. She slows her run before pushing through the back glass doors, discovering only a handful of people inside. Including kids.
Yelena doesn't waste time climbing into the entrance of a huge, magenta playground tube, managing to fit.
"You gotta be kidding me…"
Natasha's voice grumbles in English, her Russian accent heavy.
"Oh, I'm sorry about that," Yelena barks over her shoulder, hearing Natasha crawl in after her. "Would you prefer to get shot? Again?"
Once they've lodged themselves up into the indoor playing tube, Yelena awkwardly shuffles herself, examining Natasha.
She's clamped a hand over her shoulder, attempting to staunch the increasing flow of blood. Red gleams against Natasha's denim jacket.
Yelena eyes her, scoffing lightly at Natasha's faintly irritated look, and peers quickly out of a roundel tube-window, spotting no little kids wandering for McDonald's play area. Nobody really noticed them entering. That's promising.
It's not so promising when one of the men chasing them enters the same back-doors.
Yelena swallows her groan.
It's just their luck that Ohio is an open carry state…
"We're fucked," Yelena concludes, ripping the hem of her tight, lemon-orange shirt for Natasha's makeshift bandage. She leans into the other woman gritting her teeth, Yelena's hands busying themselves. "I didn't even get to try a Big Mac."
Natasha's brow furrows. "Shh!"
"You shhh!" Yelena retorts quietly. "I'm not the one making a blood trail leading them right to us!"
*
From outside the colorfully plastic tubes, the HYDRA agent notices their muffled voices. But no signs of life.
There's flecks of either blood or runny ketchup on the mats.
He's about to jam his head into the magenta tube, when a five-year-old girl taps on his leg and glares venomously. From behind her, the girl's mother already has her phone out, also glaring, recording him suspiciously blocking her daughter.
The agent retreats, muttering out in German.
*
"Coast is clear," Natasha tells her, peering out the next roundel-window. Her nose still scrunched in discomfort.
"Finally."
That's when Yelena slides, ass-first, down one of the yellow and sloping tubes.
*
She's never been in a ball pit in her entire goddamn life, and Yelena doesn't know what she was expecting. It smells like hamburgers. Really old and sweaty hamburgers. It smells like if Alexei decided to roll around in it instead of bathing.
"This is disgusting," Natasha complains, sinking into the deep pile of small, rainbow-colored balls.
Yelena spies someone passing by.
"Down, down. Get down," she hisses, ending up on her stomach and reaching through the play area's netting.
Yelena places a dark blue ball under that person's foot, tripping them.
Their newly ordered meal goes airborne.
One of the workers notices the ruckus, but not Yelena or Natasha. Nobody notices them.
He apologizes profusely, holding out a mop.
They're lead away.
"I take it back—you're disgusting," Natasha mutters, watching in bemusement as Yelena gleefully dives to the other side of the ball pit, grabbing up McDonald's chicken nuggets scattered all over. Yelena shrugs, dumping two into her vest-pocket.
"Not my fault if you're hungry later."
"Do you even know how much active bacteria lives in a place like this?"
"Mm?" Yelena hums, absently chewing on a nugget.
*
Never let them take your heart…
She can hear Natasha's stomach gurgling from beside her.
"You're a terrible big sister," Yelena announces, unzipping her pocket and offering her tropical Skittles. What she scooped up from the McDonald's ball pit already eaten. Natasha's fingers gratefully dig in, plucking up a share of the Skittles, one by one.
They've stopped off for gas outside of Carrollton, and Yelena impatiently unties her hair, shaking it out.
"I appreciate that, Yelena," Natasha rasps, tenderly cradling her own injured but bandaged shoulder. Her smile wide.
Yelena grunts, feeling the brief, hot press of Natasha's mouth on hers.
Never…
"Don't mention it," she murmurs, stubbornly ignoring her flush.
*