Sorry for the delay, I don't have time for life even. Enjoy, I did this instead of my paper XD
-Stax

Chapter 8

Ending the time jump by landing on her bum was something Dani wished wasn’t a reoccurrence. She winced and pulled herself to her feet, surveying the settings. This place looked… very unpromising. Everything was drab and plain, even painfully so. She shuddered. Creepiness seemed to emanate off of the walls. The only sound seemed to be the soft shuffling of feet in the distance. Hesitating, Dani stepped out of the small sitting room into the equally drab hallway.
A line of girls walked past, feet shuffling in synch, gazes focused ahead and spines perfectly straight. Dani subconsciously straightened at the sight of their perfect posture. The strange sight brought to mind a scene she had watched in Avengers: Age of Ultron. I bet I’m here for the Black Widow now… this is probably where she grew up. Dani shuddered. That poor girl…
She stepped quietly down the stairs. They couldn’t hear or see her, she knew, but the deafening silence seemed to challenge her to break it. She wasn’t that brave, not even after the horrors of war. This was far more sinister than anything she had experienced.
A lone voice rang in the distance. Dani quickly traced it to the source.
Another familiar sight greeted her. Girls were soundlessly going through a series of complex looking ballet moves, just as in synch as the hallway girls had been. A harsh voice was repeating a command over and over, every few seconds. Dani knew she was commanding ‘again,’ as every time it was uttered the girls would start at the beginning again. Their movements seemed flawless, but apparently not so to the horrible woman ordering them to start over so many times.

A flash of red from the center of the group caught Dani’s eyes. That must be her…
A girl on the edge tripped up. Fearfully she looked up to the woman in charge, who flicked her wrist. Some men that Dani hadn’t noticed before walked over and rolled out two tarps. One was hung from hooks in the wall and the other was laid out on the floor below. Together they made a ‘photoshoot’ sort of area against the wall and floor. The girl who tripped went to stand on the tarp, face as white as a sheet. She stood rigidly in place.
Some younger girls were sitting and watching from the wall. They all looked horrified, as did most of the girls who had been dancing. The younger version of the Black Widow, however, seemed completely emotionless and unfazed. The horrible woman started to speak.
Dani didn’t understand her words, but she could piece together the meaning. With three fingers held up, the woman pointed to the first and asked a question. All the girls in the room replied in voices plainly trying to be flat and emotionless but failing. The same thing happened when the woman pointed to the second upheld finger. When she pointed to the third and asked her question, some of the girls in the back started crying. They were silenced with an angrily barked command.
Dani deduced, from this display, that it meant that this place had a ‘three strikes and you’re out’ policy. But what-
A bang sounded from behind her. A gunshot. Dani had been in enough battles to recognize that sound, that horrible sound that haunted her nightmares every moment she dreamed. The youngest girls who were watching began to sob, barely settling down when they were yelled at. Only the Black Widow still stood emotionless, even as the dancers around her mirrored the horror of the younger girls in their eyes.
Dani slowly turned around.
Slumped dramatically on the floor with a gory hole through her head was the poor girl. Dani dry heaved and ran out of the room.
War hadn’t prepared her for this.
All she could think of was the lack of humanity in the Black Widows eyes. She knew, without any tinge of uncertainty, was that her next task would be to preserve the girl’s humanity. Dani got the sinking feeling that it was a lost cause.
XXX
Dani followed the girls back to their bedrooms. The Black Widow was alone in hers, for the moment, so Dani approached the redhead. She had looked right through her in the room, maybe she could see her now that they were alone. Sure enough, the younger girl looked up in shock at the motion and stood suddenly.
She asked something in Russian, standing at attention. She must think I’m one of the people running this hell hole…
“Um… hey, Natalia, listen, I’m not one of those people, I’m… uh…” she quickly said, not wanting the future Avenger to act so formally around her. The Black Widow just wrinkled her forehead slightly in confusion, still standing at attention. She must not understand English. Dani stepped forward and tried again. “Look, I’m not one of those jerks, I’m Dani and I’m here to help you with… stuff…” she trailed off, getting slightly worried as the Black Widow’s body language changed.
The redhead stiffened further, if possible, and crouched ever-so-slightly. Dani could see that she was ready to pounce into action and kick her ass. She prayed silently that she was still intangible.
“Natalia, it’s okay, I’m DANI,” she relayed, dramatically pointing at herself as she emphasized her name. “Friend. You and me. Really.”
This didn’t do much to calm the assassin in the making. Without any warning, she jumped into Dani in a slightly more sophisticated version of a football tackle… and passed right through the dimensional traveler. Dani’s sigh of relief was covered by the other girl’s shriek of shock or terror… whichever it was.
“Ok, let’s try that again,” Dani nodded, ignoring the horrified look she received. “I’m Dani and I’m your new chum, got it?” At that, the Black Widow backed up and looked around. She probably thinks that I’m a ghost or something…
That thought stopped Dani’s attempts at communications abruptly. Damn… maybe I AM a ghost! How the heck do I KNOW if I survived the fall from the plane, really? Maybe I died…
Her thought process was interrupted as the other girl dashed out of the room. Dani decided to deal with the possibility that she was dead some other time. Running after her, she whipped out her phone. Conveniently, she had a translation app on her phone from one day when she was bored. Nothing productive had come from fiddling with it, but familiarity allowed her to find the “English to Russian” setting while running.
She found her new acquaintance huddled in a closet, sweating bullets. Dani shook her head frustratedly. It would do no good in the long run to scare her. Panting, she typed her message into her phone and hit play. The mechanical voice echoed in a tinny tone down the halls.
<<em>Hello, my name is Dani. Please don’t be scared, I’m a ghost but I’m here to help you.>
Standing up violently, the Black Widow widened her eyes and let loose a string of high-pitched Russian chatter. Dani sighed and typed into the phone again.

The redhead narrowed her eyes. She hissed a word that sounded strikingly like ‘American’, distain dripping off of her. Dani stifled yet another sigh- with the frequency she had been doing that, she was sure that the girl would think she had breathing problems.

Without even attempting to answer, the Black Widow walked through Dani and calmly stalked back to her room. Running after her, Dani tried to grab her attention to no avail. She waved her hand in front of the unresponsive girl’s eyes, eliciting an involuntary eye twitch, which meant she could still see Dani.
This little shit is ignoring me…! A door was slammed in her face, which she walked through.
“HEY!” she yelled, getting no reaction. The Widow was just going about her business, completely ignoring every attempt by Dani.
Things were off to a great start.

Notes