(no subject)

[blonderussianspy]

Natalya stood in the compound kitchen, watching her tea steep and winding her still wet hair into a coil against the back of her head. She slipped three bobby pins into it to hold it there before moving to retrieve a spoon from a drawer. Her hair hadn't been so long in, probably, ten years. Until she'd been recruited, she'd worn it in a straight blond sheaf, all one length, always tucked behind her ears and falling to the small of her back. Then she'd cut it to her chin and kept it there, a sleek bob that worked as well under a helmet as at an important function.

Hair cuts. Those used to happen. She mused on the nature of how mundane her life on the island was compared to how mundane her life in Russia had been, at least in between assignments. In some ways, Russia actually won.

She turned from the drawer to lift her mug and slipped the spoon into the steaming water, metal scraping gently against the porcelain, and when the tip of the spoon hit the bottom of the mug she went blind.

Or she thought she had, for a moment. All she could see was white. She was lying in the snow on a hillside, among drifts and heavily-laden trees. There was a low concrete building half buried in the stuff in the small box canyon below her. Seven figures, barely discernible against the ground in their white snowsuits, white and grey encasements on their guns and flashbombs, moved toward it. For a moment, as her body acclimated with ready ease to the cold and the gear and her hands fitted themselves more comfortably, naturally, against the weight of the rifle that was butted up against her shoulder, that she was completely mad. And then Llyumzhinov stepped on a landmine. The white lit up even more brightly, although the spray of red and black char and the orange-hued smoke that billowed upward quickly tempered the brilliance.

This wasn't happening, this couldn't possibly happening. Two doors of the compound kicked open, and enemy combatants rushed out, the muzzles of their AKs already flashing. The forward four were dropping to their knees and returning fire. She put her eye to the scope, knowing she'd see two go down quickly, recognizing the faces of her first away team as she did. Zacharov, KIA, Demichev, KIA. Eight Spetsnaz versus a militia. There were worse odds.

It became problematic when one factored in the presence of the Special Air Services. Four mercenaries Natalya knew were going to poke their heads out any minute. Three Chechen insurgents came out of an upstairs doorway to lay down fire on her remaining teammates. She shot the first through the eye. She shot the second through his left cheekbone. She shot the third more cleanly through the forehead.

It was as easy as breathing, although breathing, at the moment, felt very, very hard.

As far as dreams went, this was one of the more horrifically vivid she could ever recall. Scanning the rest of her team to take inventory, it became immediately and immensely more so. Faces that should have belonged to two of her fellow Vympel did not. She was so startled she sat back, up into plain sight, before leaning down and refitting the rifle to her shoulder.

Yorick Brown pushed his goggles up onto his forehead, and her stomach lurched.

This absolutely could not be happening.

Comments

[blondrussianspy.livejournal.com]

"Easy, boys," the Australian chuckled.

"Why don't you two sit back and let the grown ups handle their business." Natalya stumbled into the cell next to Sam's, gaze darting only briefly to him, visibly alarmed for only a fraction of that moment.

An uncomfortable looking metal chair, edges corrugated and stained with questionable fluids, scraped the cement as it was dragged down the hall to be placed roughly at the center of the square formed by the four cells. The Australian pulled a lighter from his pocket and used it to light a new cigarette.

"So," he said, kicking his heel up onto it and leaning his elbow on his knee, looking to the Russian soldier next to Yorick, "does anyone want to explain the thrust of this little excursion?"

He turned his attention to Natalya. His second in command was still looking rough around the edges, and just about livid. Seething, at least.

"Eh, comrade? Care to account for the presence of your American friends?"

Natalya had managed to get her knees under her, if not her feet. She didn't look at him. She was too busy trying to remember which cell they'd gone to first, who'd they'd tortured first. It was hard to focus.

The Australian straightened and wandered back to look between Sam and Yorick.

"Always the biggest different between the Russians and, well, everyone else. Not big talkers, the Russians. Not like you," he said to Yorick.

"So, maybe one of you would like to explain your presence here."

Natalya leaned forward a little, as though she were having difficult keeping conscious, but was mostly trying to find and catch Yorick's eye.

Say nothing say nothing oh, please, say nothing until I've figured this out.

[alas-yorick.livejournal.com]

"I don't have a fucking clue, Captain Kangaroo. Do I look like some kind of military schmuck?" Yorick said, rubbing at his jaw. He could still taste blood in his mouth. "I'll do you a solid and give you some important intel, though. One, cigarettes'll kill you, and two, you are in serious need of a bath."

[blondrussianspy.livejournal.com]

He stared at Yorick for a long moment, unimpressed bordering on confused. He thoughtfully removed the large Israeli industries semi-automatic pistol from its place at his thigh, and aimed it through the bars at Yorick's face. He seemed to be weighing something for a moment, before he swung around to Sam, taking his heel off the chair.

"Charming fellow you've got on your team. Good to know we've got one Chatty Cathy in the group. Anything to add, soldier?" he asked, absently folding his arms, gun still out, as casually as the cigarette.

Natalya was making eye contact with Petrenko- this was Petrenko, and god, had he looked like this, truly? She remembered him being old, but he couldn't have been more than 35. Old to a new recruit, then. They were both stony and tense but there was nothing they could do with the SAS and the Chechnan guard present. Not yet.

[badblood_rising]

If only the guys had done everyone a solid and knocked Yorick out when they had punched him. Now Sam had to watch with his stomach doing flips to see if Yorick was going to talk himself into an early grave. The accent, probably, was the only thing saving him.

When the Australian turned on Sam, he fought not to glance at Natalya for direction, but kept his eyes on the man in charge. He didn't say a word, knowing too little of the situation to risk it one way or another.

[blondrussianspy.livejournal.com]

"Smart," the Australian said, then returned the gun to its holster.

"Stupid bastards. So I assume your forward command's brains are decorating the lawn right now, which means we're going to have to make do with the highest ranking person in this room," he said, strolling between the cells.

"I know it isn't the self-proclaimed civilian, although I've had PFCs who talked more. And it's probably not your young American with the baleful glare. Given levels of expertise," he sighed, turning his head idly this way and that, looking between Natalya and her equally disengaged countrymen. He lifted a hand, barely, to wave his fingers. The door to Natalya's cell was shoved to one side and two men started in to drag her out again.

Ashamed, she felt a wild swell of panic. It hadn't been her. She'd been left for last, originally, curled on the cold floor of the cell nursing her ribs and her paralysis as they'd gone through the others. It hadn't been her. Looked like it was about to be.

"No." The Australian looked to Petrenko, the lines of the Russian's face taught but his eyes narrow, gaze steady.

"I am the highest ranking officer here." There was a pause as Natalya was pushed dismissively back behind the bars, and the other Russian's cell was opened. An insurgent with a plastic zip tie met him as he was shoved into the aluminum chair, kneeling briefly to tie the man's hands together behind the chair back.

The door to the outside opened and two more men bearing the distinctive non-uniform of the mercenaries strode in, brushing snow from themselves.

"Like a fucking sno-cone machine exploded out there, what a mess." The other paused, looking at the Australian's second.

"What happened to your face?"

"Fuck you."

"Easy on the English, boys," the Australian said, and nodded at their two captive Americans. There was a moment of surprised shifting before the new arrivals shrugged and moved to take up places against the walls.

A Chechnan of rank appeared and conversed briefly with the Australian before he removed what appeared to be a soldering iron from a plastic case. The Australian nodded.

"We'll be more direct to start." He walked to where Petrenko sat and stood in front of him, arms crossed, looking like he was mildly put out with an unruly recruit.

"Where's your back up?" There was a silence marred only by the distant hum of a small generator and the occasional drip of water onto stone.

"Did the Russians send your motley little crew, or is this a UN operation?" Natalya closed her eyes. Petrenko wasn't going to say a word. Even after three hours of torture, he wouldn't say a word. That's when they'd kill him.

She had to get them out. Her head hurt.

"Do the people you're working for know about the nuclear element?" He was asking this to get a response. Petrenko's eyelids didn't so much as flicker. The Australian sighed.

"I'll ask you one more time." He did, each question, in clear and careful Russian. Petrenko wasn't even breathing visibly. He sat, eyes ahead, as though the words didn't even reach his ears. He wouldn't talk, but he would, eventually, make other noises. Natalya's throat felt tight. Her own eyes were riveted to a point in space somewhere beyond the bars, but nowhere in the room. She had to think, and couldn't.

"Nyet? Nothing?" the Australian said. There was a moment of silence, and then he nodded to the Chechnan, who lifted his pistol and shot Petrenko through his right cheekbone. Natalya's body gave an involuntary jerk forward, but she managed to clamp down on any noise. They started pulling the body off the chair.

Wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong.

"Then we won't waste any more time, there. Get Chatty Cathy out of his box," he said, and one of the ex-SAS started for Yorick's cell as an insurgent slid the door open.

[alas-yorick.livejournal.com]

"Um."

Yorick let himself get dragged out, because there were a lot of guys with guns, and another guy had just been shot. So maybe it was best to just...go with the flow.

He tried to look to Natalya for help, but was shoved forward before he could get a read. He smiled winningly. "Hi."

[blondrussianspy.livejournal.com]

"Hello, Yorick," The Australian said, absently turning his cigarette around his thumb before replacing it in his mouth.

"Now, that last fella, he was pretty taciturn. I gave him two chances, which is one more than I'm going to give you. Sound fair?"

"He doesn't know anything," Natalya said, voice steady, even and low.

"He won't be able to tell you anything, because he doesn't know." One of the Chechnans barked something at her and slammed the butt of his rifle into the bars, near her head. She didn't flinch.

"Well, we'll see, won't we?" the Australian replied. "Wouldn't be a proper torturing if we just took your word for it." He smiled back at Yorick as someone forced him into the chair and zip-tied his wrists together.

"I have every faith in your sense of self preservation, lad, so let's hear it, shall we? Where's your back up."

Natalya wanted to look over at Sam, but it wouldn't accomplish anything. There was no message she could convey with her eyes other than I'm sorry, and even if she could have telegraphed instructions, they were fucked. Outnumbered and outgunned.

She still wanted to look at him though. Which was stupid, because it wouldn't have made her feel any better, to now they would go after Sam when they were finished with Yorick.

God, Yorick.

She watched him, jaw tense, and tried to think of how to get him out of that chair.

[alas-yorick.livejournal.com]

Yorick just kept reminding himself that this was just a dream. A really, really lifelike dream, but a dream all the same. Their bodies were back on the island, most likely being worried over by friends and family, and the worst that could happen was that he'd get shot and wake up. Right?

"Probably back at the North Pole with the rest of the elves. Or, you know, right over the hill just waiting to take you fuckers out," he said, trying to sound believable.

Yeah. Unless 355 was about to round that corner he was pretty sure he was fucked.

[blondrussianspy.livejournal.com]

Natalya closed her eyes in place of slapping her palm against her forehead. The Australian stared at Yorick for a disconcertingly long time without blinking.

"Here's the thing," he said, reasonably, "you're clearly not trained, the way your friends are. I think we can all agree on that. So you don't have all the facts."

There was a metallic sort of clinking noise, and the militia man who'd been tending the soldering iron lifted it up.

"A few important ones, before I ask you the next question. It takes about a 160 degrees Fahrenheit, since I assume you'd no idea what I was talking about if I used Celsius, right? To give a human a third degree burn. That's where the epidermis is completely burned away. This little gadget that my friend here has, it's going to be anywhere from about 480 to 800 degrees. Fahrenheit. We're going to use it on your arm, there, after we cut your sleeve off, if you don't answer the next question."

Natalya clenched and unclenched her hands, thinking how quickly she could move, what ordinance she could retrieve, before they shot and killed her. She had to get them out of here and God help her, she didn't know how.

"Who sent you?" the Australian was asking Yorick, as the militia man unrolled a leather pouch and removed a pair of scissors from it.

[alas-yorick.livejournal.com]

Yorick bit his tongue. Next thing he knew he'd be stripped and tied up, hung upside down from the ceiling.

Man, that had sucked.

He had a dozen retorts, but he realized there was Natalya to think of, and even Sam. If he fucked up, they'd be the next ones in this chair. He didn't know what the smart thing to do in this situation was. He didn't know what was expected of him, or what they wanted to hear.

But it probably wasn't 'Tinkerbell'.

"I don't know, okay? They didn't tell me."

[blondrussianspy.livejournal.com]

The Australian looked at Natalya, who had no expression on her face, and then at Sam. He watched the other man, unblinking, before slowly turning his attention back to Yorick.

"That would be interesting, if it were true. What were your mission parameters?" He leaned down, absently resting his elbow on his knee, heel kicked up on the center of Yorick's chair.

"Surely they had to have told you that."

Natalya shook her head, just fractionally, from side to side, and prayed Yorick saw it.

[alas-yorick.livejournal.com]

"They didn't," Yorick said, staring the man right in the face. Liars looked away. "They told me to take as many out as I could. Those were my mission parameters. I'm grunt, get it? The money was good."

[blondrussianspy.livejournal.com]

The Australian nodded fractionally.

"So you and the other American are hired guns." It was impossible to tell from his tone if he believed them or not.

Natalya wanted to scream. Her fingertips skirted around the floor by her ankles, looking for anything that could act as a weapon. She kept her eyes on the same non-point in front of her.

"Which means we went out of order." He stood back, and flashed Yorick a perfectly friendly, almost apologetic smile. He said something in the language that was not-quite Russian, and two of the Chechnans, not the other English speakers, went to Natalya's cell and raked the door open.

Natalya took a few measured breaths to brace herself for being hauled up by a combination of her elbow, behind her back, which hurt, and the back of her neck. She managed not to stumble as they started her out of the empty wall-less room and toward the chair, which someone was pulling Yorick up out of.

She did glance at Sam then, the first time she'd managed to see his face, and felt another stab of guilt and something deeper, and hotter, closer to shame.

[badblood_rising]

It was like being caught in a damn foreign language film and the subtitles only worked half the time. Sam didn't have a clue what was going on except that they were in very, very deep trouble and Natalya was about to suffer for it. And there was nothing he could do.

He caught Natalya's look and struggled not to scream, hands tightening on the bars like he just might try to rip them from their place. Reason told him that there was nothing he could say either, not that would do any good and keep them out of further trouble. He kicked at the cell door and grit his teeth, a caged animal ready to kill.

[blondrussianspy.livejournal.com]

The few armed men lounging by Sam's cell started slightly, looking back at him. It took everything Natalya had not to flinch. One of the SAS rubbed the pad of his thumb along the corner of his jaw, the first movement he'd made since joining the group. The Australian acted as though he hadn't noticed Sam's outburst, and dropped to an easy crouch in front of Natalya as someone bent behind her to loop the plastic around her wrists.

She met the Australian's gaze evenly, and after some long moments of silence between the two, he gave a tight, small smile.

"See, this, this is Spetsnaz training," he explained to Yorick and Sam, standing. He reached out and grabbed Natalya's chin and forced her head to the side, to face Sam, as if to present an example.

"See those eyes? Cold as ice. They go through things in training most civilized countries have long since abandoned for being barbarous." He turned her head forward again.

"But you're young, sweetheart, and this isn't going to go well for you." He stepped back and gestured a little. The ex-SAS she had kneed in the face, who still looked sore about it, flicked a knife from his wrist and walked over, pulling her shirt up at one shoulder and starting to saw the sleeve off. He ripped it in half lengthwise and discarded it on the floor, then went to her other side to repeat the process. Once both sleeves were gone, he leaned over her from behind and cut the front of her thermal along the sternum, straight down, about six inches. At the sudden cold, goosebumps spread along her arms.

"Involuntary reactions are a bitch," the Australian said, and she remembered that, he'd said that the first time. A dull and disturbingly nostalgic sort of panic began beating around the inside of her ribcage. She felt sick with dread.

The Second put his knife away and went to stand behind the Chechnan with soldering iron, who took a few steps to kneel by the arm of her chair.

"Who put your operation together?" Every instinct in her body kept her mouth shut.

What does it matter? It doesn't. Tell him. Lie, truth, it doesn't matter. Talking will keep them alive.

"I hate asking the same thing three times," the Australian was murmuring, and then she felt herself turn grey, even as she smelled that distinctive odor that came when human flesh was vaporized. Her arm felt like ice, because the nerve endings in what had previously been the unmarred stretch of skin over her bicep were dead, but the ones around the place where the soldering iron had been drawn in a precise, gently sloping line were still very much intact, and couldn't cope with the amount of pain they were being subjected to.

She made an extremely small, guttural noise, because her throat had constricted, half from her gag reflex kicking in and half from training.

It occurred to her from a distant place of reasoning, that it had been far too long since she was put under this kind of physical duress. Her defenses were in shambles. She wasn't prepared. She needed to regroup to find her voice.

"What is the eta for your backup?" She swallowed down the lump of pain, and looked at him, and then went through it over again because the soldering iron was tracing along the inside of her other arm.

So he wasn't going to let her answer. Well, that was fucking perfect.

"Did whoever assembled your team know about the nuclear element?" the Australian asked, casually indifferent to the rapidity with which her chest was rising and falling, the tension in her throat and stomach. There was not way to manage the pain of a 3rd degree burn. It wasn't something you could train a person to do. She could feel the extremely sensitive skin between her breasts reacting to heat that wasn't touching yet but was getting close enough to blister.

Maybe it was vanity, but something snapped.

[blondrussianspy.livejournal.com]

She surprised the hell out of herself and several of the interrogators by gasping, wrenching out a "Yes! Yes. Yes. He's dead, the nuclear point is dead." Her throat hurt, and it was a blessing. She could try to focus on that instead of the idea of the skin on her arm turning necrotic. The head was gone from her skin. She could focus on trying to breath.

"Well, and that's progress. Looks like we've gone to the right well. Of course that means the others are extraneous."

[alas-yorick.livejournal.com]

Yorick didn't know what the fuck was going on, but he did know that he'd fucked up. What he said was wrong, because he was supposed to be in the chair, not Natalya.

He struggled against the guy trying to shove him back into his cell. "Look, just don't hurt her, she didn't do anything!"

[badblood_rising]

Sam restrained himself from pointing out to Yorick that Natalya had been snipering their men and clearly knew what was going on so, yeah, she did do something, but words would only get them in trouble. Like words showing they cared about Natalya would only end up in her getting tortured more, to make them suffer too. So he saved the comment and just gave Yorick a look he probably missed asking why he was being stupid.

It wasn't like it was easy to watch Natalya getting tortured. The very opposite of easy, it made him want to reach out and grab someone and strangle someone until they changed their minds. Even though he knew that this was Natalya's life and some trick of the island's, Sam felt guilty watching Natalya suffer. Maybe he should have been fighting more, like Yorick only more effectively. Maybe he should have said something, given her some sign to keep her strong. Maybe a hundred different things, but none of them could he do. Sam just had to stand and watch, not turn away though it hurt him to see yet another person he cared about go through outrageous suffering.

Stay strong and plot their demise for later.

[blondrussianspy.livejournal.com]

The Australian shot Yorick a slightly incredulous look.

"She just murdered seven freedom fighters in cold blood out there. Think that constitutes as something." He said something to one of the Chechnans, casually, as if to confirm. A shadow passed over the man's face and he seemed to jump forward, and managed to strike Natalya across the face with a closed fist before one of his comrades and one of the ex-SAS could grab him by the shoulders and pull him back, with some yelling. Natalya kept her eye closed, not from swelling yet, but to keep blood from pooling in it from the open gash on her forehead.

"Hmm." The Australian dropped to a crouch and caught her chin, bringing her face up and peering into her eye.

"Might have addled something loose, there. You should tell me everything I need to know, sweetheart, before I let these boys take out their aggression on you without my supervision."

"The Americans are not hired guns," she said, struggling to form the words and construct the lies through the pain.

"They are escorts. I invite you to kill them. The retribution will be far more severe than that from my country. Though that will come to you as well."

"Eloquent," he murmured, letting go of her chin. "And when will that retribution be finding its way here."

"It depends on how long I was unconscious," she lied again.

"The emergency beacons on our gear go off if a kill code isn't administered within a cyclical time period." Did that sound like a real thing? She was pretty sure it sounded like a real thing. The Australian seemed to be weighing the possibility of it being true. He straightened up and said something sharply, and a few men headed for the stairs at the end of the room of cells.

"Sit tight," he told her, with no trace of irony, and headed off himself. Natalya watched him go, watched the militia trail him down the hallway some and then loiter at the place the stairs emptied into the hall, next to the door, and linger there. They were still being watched, of course, but now they'd be checking the radios and their radar. It was a reprieve. She didn't gasp but let out a harsh breath as her head collapsed forward, neck either unwilling or unable to hold it up. She might have been shaking. Her body was slipping toward shock, between the untended burns, the concussion and the cold.

"Let this be a dream," she whispered, willing it to be true, so that she could wake up.

[badblood_rising]

Sam cursed under his breath, pressed up to the bars like it might do him some good. But too much noise would just bring the guards back, and breaking things was the only idea in his head just then. Starting preferably with the Australian's face. He needed Natalya to take the lead, tell them what to do, some direction so they could get out of here, take care of her and get some answers.

"Natalya," he hissed in a stage whisper, praying his voice wouldn't travel. "Hold on, come on, what'd you tell them? What do we do?"

[blondrussianspy.livejournal.com]

Natalya didn't bother trying to lift her head for a moment. She was shivering badly, but under the cold felt leaden. Sam speaking to her did nothing to make her wake up, but seemed to make the situation that much more surreal. After a moment's internal struggle, she opened both of her eyes, dealt with the fact that she was still tied to a chair in a hallway, and turned her head fractionally toward Sam. Her hair slipped down, but she tilted her chin further to the side and it moved from her eyes.

"I am tell them for check beacons on gear. There no are any thing is recognizable as such. They will be back, five minutes, less patient. I..." She swallowed, against a wave of nausea from the pain.

"I am sorry," she said, though it came out a harsh sort of whisper. "I am not know how this... is possible or why you are bring here with me. I am-" Her voice hitched. She couldn't tell if her throat her lungs, were constricted from panic or impending tears, but she was quickly approaching the point of not caring.

"I am so sorry."

[alas-yorick.livejournal.com]

"What do we do?" Yorick echoed Sam, pleading in as soft a voice as he could make. They'd have time for apologies later, right now he just needed a way to get them out, and now that the guards had gone he was having a harder time keeping the panic down. This couldn't be like those trips home, none of them he'd heard of had been bad. Not like this. "What can I do, Nat? I don't know how to save you."

[badblood_rising]

"Don't," he told Natalya, shaking his head. The last thing he needed was a tearful apology from her that sounded a lot like goodbye. They needed to keep going, and keep Natalya going if need be.

"It's the island. It's gotta be. Not your fault but we've got to figure out how to get out of this and Yorick and I need you to tell us what to do, Natalya."

[blondrussianspy.livejournal.com]

Natalya registered the words, and even knew what they were asking, but coming up with a reply seemed as daunting as the actual prospect of escape. Her eyes closed again and she let her head hang, the muscles in her neck and shoulders somewhere between stinging and numb.

"Ten, twelve, fifteen hours, we are... will be rescue team for us. But I was last," she said, gritting her teeth, half to focus and half to stop her voice from giving away the fact that she was fucking crying, tears welling up past her eyelashes and sliding down the sides of her nose to drop silently onto the white snow pants, diluting the blood that had smeared there, before they dropped pinkish hued to the concrete floor.

"Is all different, now. Before when this is happen, I was left in cell for last." She wanted to shake herself out of it. She couldn't.

"We are have no ordinance, we are outnumber many to us, even with those we are take out in exchange, is no..." She shuddered and went quiet.

"Yorick," she said carefully, after a moment, "you would need unlock cell, get weapon in Sam's hands. I am not sure how I, how I can m-make this possibility." She tried to lift her shoulders and bit back a cry. The pain her her arms was excruciating.

[alas-yorick.livejournal.com]

"Okay, right, okay," Yorick muttered to himself, trying to ignore the sound of Natalya crying. It was about as unnerving as 355 showing some kind of vulnerability, and he didn't have time to think about it, not right now. "I can do that."

He dropped to the ground, searching with his eyes and palms for something he could use. "I don't have my stuff, fuck," he hissed, "goddamnit...just one bobby pin, something..."

The floor was clean. There was nothing. Fuck all nothing. He stood and walked the length of the cell before realizing he had a belt. It probably wouldn't work, but fuck if he wasn't going to try.

Yorick whipped his belt from the loops and started jiggling the pointy part in the keyhole, closing his eyes in some poor attempt at focusing, hands trembling slightly.