In the Red Room's training facilities, prospective Black Widows continued their drills despite the alarm blaring through the facility. Their conditioning wouldn't allow them to break routine without direct orders, discipline maintained through years of neural programming and chemical reinforcement.
Among them, leading the formation with crisp efficiency, was Yelena Belova, Natasha's sister, the White Widow, the Red Room's finest operative after Natasha's defection.
Meanwhile, armed response teams converged on Landing Platform Five from multiple directions. Heavy boots pounded against metal floors, assault rifles held at ready positions, tactical gear creaking as they moved.
Smith and Natasha rounded a corner and came face-to-face with the first squad, a dozen guards in full combat loadout, weapons already rising.
The guards opened fire immediately. Smith moved.
To Natasha's eyes, he simply vanished, one moment standing beside her, the next in the middle of the guard formation. Bodies flew in every direction like ragdolls caught in an explosion. Some slammed into the ceiling with bone-breaking force, leaving dents in the reinforced metal. Others crashed through walls. Several smashed into doorframes hard enough to buckle the steel.
Their tactical armor, rated to stop rifle rounds and absorb blunt trauma, shattered like glass. None of them survived. The impacts Smith delivered, even holding back substantially from his maximum output, exceeded what unenhanced human bodies could withstand.
Natasha stared at the carnage, her mouth falling open. "Smith... I'd believe you if you said you were Superman right now. You're not secretly from Krypton, are you?"
Smith smiled slightly. He wasn't Kryptonian, though if pressed, he supposed he could claim Saiyan heritage. Close enough to alien, anyway.
Natasha jogged up beside him, her earlier shock transforming into something approaching awe. "That was incredibly impressive. Terrifyingly impressive."
They pressed deeper into the facility, Smith following the Scouter's guidance toward concentrations of higher power levels. Yelena, as a premier Black Widow, should register above the baseline guards, probably around seven or eight points given her training and enhancement.
Though truthfully, no one in the entire Red Room facility had broken eight points yet. Most signatures clustered around five, six, or seven, enhanced beyond normal humans but nowhere near super-soldier tier.
They carved through the facility systematically. Smith handled the actual combat while Natasha provided tactical guidance and, increasingly, enthusiastic commentary.
"Did you see how far that one flew?" She gestured at a guard Smith had punched through a wall. "That's at least fifteen meters!"
"The way you just dodged those bullets was, " She made an impressed whistling sound.
Smith began wondering if he'd accidentally brought Puar instead of Natasha. The running commentary was flattering but distracting.
In his office, Dreykov watched the security feeds with growing horror.
Initially, he'd dismissed Smith Doyle as simply another enhanced operative, dangerous, certainly, but within parameters his security forces could handle. Then he'd watched Smith encounter the first guard squad.
The massacre, because that's what it was, a complete slaughter, had made Dreykov's blood run cold.
"How... how can anyone be that strong?" His hand trembled slightly against the holographic controls. "Super-soldiers aren't fit to carry his shoes."
Dreykov had overseen Russia's super-soldier program personally. Had selected Alexei Shostakov for enhancement, monitored his progress, documented his capabilities. He knew exactly what enhanced humans could achieve, the upper limits of strength, speed, endurance, reaction time.
Smith Doyle shattered those limits effortlessly. This wasn't enhanced human performance. This was something categorically different.
"All guards, all agents, converge on the intruders immediately. Eliminate them by any means necessary."
He grabbed a tablet-sized control interface, the device that networked with every conditioned Black Widow globally. Not just the operatives in this facility, but hundreds of agents deployed worldwide, embedded in corporations and governments and criminal organizations. With this device, he could manipulate oil prices, crash stock markets, trigger famines. It was the Red Room's true power, and he couldn't leave it behind.
Dreykov called his personal guard squad and began evacuation procedures.
Following his command, the Black Widows abandoned their training drills and deployed with weapons drawn. Every guard in the facility converged on Smith's position from multiple directions, a coordinated assault designed to overwhelm through sheer numbers.
It wasn't enough. It couldn't be enough.
Smith raised his hand, his casual demeanor shifting to something more serious. "Playtime's over."
Ki blasts erupted from his palms like artillery fire. Explosions ripped through corridors, vaporizing guards and Widows alike. Walls collapsed. Ceilings buckled. Entire sections of the facility suffered catastrophic structural damage.
Yet somehow, despite the destruction, the Red Room's engines continued functioning. The fortress maintained altitude and stability, its critical systems protected by redundant shielding and compartmentalized design.
Natasha shouted over the chaos, "I know where the training facilities are! And Dreykov's office! Melina described the layout, follow me!"
Smith nodded, letting her take point. The Scouter showed the training area aligned with the highest concentration of enhanced signatures anyway, Natasha's knowledge just saved time.
They eliminated another defensive position and emerged into a wider corridor. Ahead, a group of women armed with various weapons blocked their path, some carrying firearms, others with bladed weapons, all moving with the fluid precision of elite operatives.
Natasha spotted her immediately. "Yelena!"
The blonde woman in the formation showed no reaction, no recognition, no acknowledgment. Just the empty focus of someone operating under chemical control.
"Smith, the one with blonde hair, that's my sister. Please don't hurt her."
The Black Widows attacked before Smith could respond. They moved as one coordinated unit, weapons tracking, feet positioned for optimal striking angles, years of training evident in every motion.
Smith noticed the diversity among them, every ethnicity represented, every skin tone, every major racial category. Dreykov had cast a wide net during recruitment, ensuring his controlled agents could infiltrate any culture or region without raising suspicion.
The Widows launched their assault. Thrown blades flashed through the air. Gunfire cracked. They closed in from multiple angles simultaneously, a textbook coordinated attack.
Smith waved his hand casually. Every projectile, bullets, blades, even the few energy weapons some carried, deflected harmlessly. Metal pinged against the floor in a scattered chorus.
The Widows didn't hesitate, didn't retreat. They charged directly at him, hands reaching for grapples and strikes, utterly fearless despite witnessing their weapons' uselessness.
Smith didn't show mercy. He couldn't afford to, not when they attacked without self-preservation. His strikes were precise, lethal, efficient. Bones broke. Organs ruptured. Bodies fell.
Yelena he avoided, tracking her position, redirecting attacks away from her specifically. But the others? They were enemies. Gender didn't factor into his tactical calculus, only threat assessment.
Within thirty seconds, only Yelena remained standing among the carnage of her squad.
She charged anyway, eyes empty of everything except programmed directive. Smith appeared behind her with enhanced speed and delivered a precise strike to the back of her neck, controlled force, calibrated to induce unconsciousness without permanent damage.
Yelena collapsed. Natasha caught her before she hit the floor, cradling her sister with visible relief.
"Thank you," Natasha said quietly. "Thank you for being careful with her."
Smith's attention had already shifted to the Scouter's display. Something was wrong with the movement patterns. A cluster of signatures, including one that registered slightly higher than the others, probably Dreykov, was moving rapidly toward the facility's landing platforms.
Not toward them. Away.
Smith's jaw tightened. "Dreykov's running. He's heading for evacuation."
Natasha looked up sharply, torn between staying with Yelena and pursuing their primary target.
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