Disclaimer: I own nothing. Like, literally, none of these characters are mine unless they so happen to be created OCs. If an OC shares your name, this is completely coincidental, if not a bit cool. No part of this work may be reproduced. This is an original work of fiction.

Dedication: To the hidden hero in all of us.

Chapter I: Red Room

-NATASHA ROMANOV-

There was something in the air that made her want to run. It was not new to her to feel fear, but it was unexpected. No, it was more than that. It was the fear itself that terrified her. She was not supposed to feel it. She was not supposed to feel anything. The man with the dead eyes and the gun who had taught her how to dance had told her so.

The redness of the walls reminded her all too much of the flames that had made her alone. A tall man in a uniform that made him look like a crow found her in the ashes. He said that he had saved her, given her a new life.

Phoenix, she had thought. That is what I am. I am a phoenix born again from the ashes of a former life. She had always loved the Arabian stories of the fantastical bird who was consumed by flame and rose up, fresh and youthful, from the ruins of the past. The concept of renewal was a beautiful thing to a girl that was so used to things that were broken.

Of course, renewal was all that much different from rebirth. Within a few weeks, everything in her entire being ached. Her muscles, from her biceps to her heart, were inflicted with pain. She knew in her heart that all that man that had found her in the ashes had done was make her into a shadow of death. She was burned, just like her home, her parents, her heritage. She accepted that she had become ashes. As a Russian, she was proud to show off her battle scars.

She accepted it, this fear, this fear of the Red Room. How odd it was to her hot Russian blood to accept fear, to see it as a normality, to always know its presence but never be in contact with it. She had been warned that feeling fear would burn her again. Of all the things in the world that Natasha Romanov did not want, it was to burn.

"Красная комната," is what the man who taught her how to dance had said when he first showed her the Red Room. Ever since then, the four bleeding crimson walls still managed to elicit the same reaction from her. "'Red Room'. You know why we call it this?"

Natasha had said that she did not. Deep down, she knew that she didn't want to. Deep down, she wanted to run. It was a shame that his bullet would be faster than her pitiful attempt at escape.

"We call it the Red Room not because of the color of the walls, but because of what 'red' itself means. Red is the color of war, anger, passion, and hate. To be simple, it is a color that symbolizes burning. But of course, you would know all about what it is to burn, Miss Romanov."

From that moment on, Natasha hated the Red Room.

She was constantly reminded of fire every time she entered the ballet studio and stood in thin, white tights, ballet flats, and the matte black uniform of the dancers, watched by the man with dead eyes and the gun, surrounded by mirrors. Mirrors, mirrors, mirrors. Mirrors showing hair that was not auburn, nor copper, but red. Red like fire, red like hot pumping blood while dancing, red like spilled blood from a bullet wound, bleeding, bleeding, bleeding out of a destroyed chest cavity, dripping, dripping, dripping down the mirrors.

After her first kill, Natasha not only knew all about what it was to burn, but what it was like to drown, to drown in blood taken by one's own hand. On the days that the walls of the Red Room looked wet, she did not know whether it was that blood or her own tears. Some days it was both. Soon it was only blood. If there was anything that the Red Room had shown her, it was that feeling sorry for herself would get her killed.

So she stood before that man with the dead eyes, who no longer had the familiar gun in his hand. He had given it to her. Trust. She could have scoffed. She also stood before a man that sat in a spindly chair with a cloth sack tied over his head. The man that the bullet was meant for.

He will die if you shoot him or not, the sensible voice in the back of her head told her. She listened to that voice so much now, a voice that was not only part of her, but had become her. Natasha raised the gun and inhaled that fear-tinged air. Her senses were alive. This fear brought her to life. It was the only thing capable of such a feat now.

When she pulled the trigger, both men moved. The man with the dead eyes had nodded his approval. She had passed. The man in the chair had jerked as the bullet had taken his life, like his body was rejecting death. Just like her lungs rejected the air she breathed in that room. When she lowered the barrel of the gun, she noticed the fresh stains of red that had splattered against the walls of the Red Room.

Every time Natasha Romanov killed, she burned a little bit more, and piece by piece crumbled to ash.

I am not a phoenix, she told herself. A phoenix is reborn. A phoenix heals. I am dying. I kill. But in the end, we are both aflame, are we not? All of us are burning alive without care within the walls of the Red Room.

Thank you all for reading! Please feel free to review, or give suggestions for furture chapters. I love feedback, and I also want to make this enjoyable for all of you awesome potatoes out there! Readers have power.

-Fiera the Wisecracking Owl