Work Text:
The first thing Yelena registers is the snap of gunfire splitting through the wet night. Muzzle flashes stutter against the rain soaked docks, white bursts slicing across rusted shipping containers and chemical drums stacked high.
Yelena ducks low behind a half-collapsed crate as splinters of metal erupt near her face.
“Go!” Kate’s voice crackles through her comm, ragged, breathless. She’s running on the other side of the docks. “I’ll cover you. Get to the canisters!”
Yelena doesn’t hesitate.
Her boots splash through puddles as she breaks cover and runs, darting between concrete pillars and crates, zigzagging like she was trained. Her braid slaps wet against the back of her neck from rain and sweat. The air stinks. Oil, salt, and rusted metallic.
She sees the target. A dented containment unit with an ineligible sigil carved into the steel. Stolen chemicals, sold, re-engineered. Dangerous in the wrong hands and that’s why they were here.
It makes her blood spike hotter then the adrenaline already buzzing through her veins. It reminds her of the Red Room, chemicals and control and evil.
A bullet screams past her hip.
She drops low, slides the last few feet on slick ground. Knees slam hard. Her fingers are already moving, prying the latches of the container, popping the seal — and then a crack, a pop, something hot past her ear.
The gunshot doesn’t hit her. It hits the canister.
The top half explodes with a dull pop, and then, gas. White and acrid, a cloud of it bursting into Yelena’s face.
She inhale without meaning to. And the world turns inside out.
It’s like fire down her throat. Prickles of heat and sharp scrapes that make her swallow and gag.
Something chemical and raw rips the lining of her lungs, clawing its way down like it wants to nest there. She chokes on it, coughs hard, doubles over. Her ribs seize. Her nose burns so bad her eyes are already pouring tears.
She can’t breathe.
She tries to gasp and it only drags more of the poison in. Her vision swims. Pressure blooms behind her eyes like someone’s pushing from the inside, like something is horribly wrong with her blood.
“Yelena!”
Hands grab her. Firm and familiar and painful, like there’s panic behind the touch.
Kate.
She’s talking, saying something, but Yelena can’t make the words out over the ringing in her ears or over her own coughing.
She’s dimly aware of gunfire still snapping through the air, but it feels far away now, like the gas has put a filter over everything. Her pulse is everywhere, throbbing behind her eyes, in her neck, between her thighs.
Kate’s arm is around her waist, her other hand grabs for the remaining canisters.
“Come on, we have to go!”
Yelena’s knees buckle, but Kate doesn’t let her fall.
The heat hits her next. Not from outside, it’s freezing outside, but from inside Yelena. A pulse in her core that spreads like spilled oil catching a flame. Her skin aches. She shudders and tries to suck in air, only the cough again, throat dry.
She leans into Kate because she has to. Because her legs won’t work. Because her balance is shredded. Because Kate is warm and real and the only thing anchoring her to reality.
“Shit, what was that? You good?” Kate says, hauling her towards the alley. “Yelena? Just hang on. We need to get to the car.”
Yelena nods, tries to at least, but her head lolls against Kate’s shoulder. Every breath scrapes like glass, and yet, beneath the pain, something else is stirring.
Something worse. Something needful.
Her fingers twitch where they’ve gripped Kate’s jacket, they don’t let go as they move beyond gunfire and danger.
The car door slams shut behind her like a gunshot. Maybe it is a gunshot, a stray bullet following, Yelena can’t tell in her haze.
She slumps sideways into the passenger seat, still coughing, wet, hacking sounds she can’t control. Her lungs feet raw. Her ribs are aching. Her fingers fumble with the seatbelt, too clumsy, too slow.
Everything is loud. Her pulse in her ears, the movement of fabric, the thump of her heart like it’s crawling up her throat.
Kate throws the car into reverse, tires screeching as they whip out of the alley.
Yelena tries to focus, to speak, to think, but her body is a war zone. Her chest is too tight. Her face is burning and flushed. Her thighs are trembling. There’s sweat at the nape of her neck and under her arms and it makes her feel wrong, like her skin is shrinking, like her body is turning against her.
Kate glances over, frantic. “You with me?”
Yelena nods, or thinks she does, but her vision ghosts at the edges.
Her voice comes out a rasp. “You’re a shit driver.”
Kate snorts, tight with nerves. “Yeah? I’m the one who didn’t inhale mystery gas.”
Yelena swallows down the bitter taste clawing up her throat. The heat is getting worse. Her clothes feel suffocating against her flesh. The seatbelt across her chest is too much, too tight, a pressure she hates. She shifts, squirming subtly. Tries to loosen her jacket, but her fingers fumble the zipper.
Behind them, tires squeak. Headlights flare.
Kate curses. “They’re following.”
Of course they are.
Yelena grits her teeth. She should be driving. She’s better behind the wheel. She should be pulling her gun, doing something. But she can barely hold her head up. The motion of the car is jostling something in her gut, heat pooling low, nauseating and aching and wrong.
She coughs again, wipes her temple, her palm comes away damp with sweat.
Kate looks at her again, panic sharp in her eyes. “You’re sweating. Like, a lot.”
Yelena closes her eyes. “No shit.”
“Yelena. What was in that gas?”
“I don’t know,” she grits. Her thighs press together, an automatic, shameful movement she can’t control. “Some evil bastards experiment. I was not given that information in the briefing.”
It was meant to be an easy snatch and go.
Kate shifts gears hard, narrowly missing the curb, over correcting as they both jerk sideways. “We need to get you out of here.”
Yelena can’t answer. Her jaw locks. Her body is humming, tension thrumming along every nerve in her body. She can feel her own heartbeat between her legs, feel her breath shudder and catch for reasons that have nothing to do with pain.
She’s wets. God. She’s wet.
The realisation makes her chest seize with something like panic. Shame coils hot in her abdomen, and she turns her face toward the window, hoping the cool glass will help. It doesn’t.
“Yelena?” Kate’s voice is softer now.
Yelena doesn’t answer. She can’t. Because if she opens her mouth, she might moan.
The tires scream under them as Kate jerks the wheel hard left, barely missing a parked car this time.
Yelena’s shoulder slams into the door. Her vision blurs again, then clears too bright. She feels the sweat dripping down her back like oil. Her jaw clenches hard enough to ache.
Her hand fumbles toward her ear, finds her comms unit.
Kate’s voice cuts through the chaos first though, clipped and tense. “This is Agent Bishop. We’re under pursuit, request immediate evacuation near dockyard 9. I’ve got a contaminated operative with me.”
Yelena flinches at the word. Contaminated. Like she’s radioactive, like she’s something marred and broken.
Static crackles, then Clint’s voice filters in, rough with urgency. “Copy that. I can reroute a team, but it’ll take a few hours. You’ll need to hunker down until then. There’s a safe house a few miles that’s under our jurisdiction.”
Yelena breathes through her nose, bad idea. The lingering trace of the gas still lives there, heavy and cloying. Chemical rot. Her lungs strain around the bitterness of it.
Kate’s knuckles are white on the wheel. “She inhaled some of the gas. One of the canisters ruptured.”
There’s a pause on the comms.
Then Clint says, grim. “…Shit. That’s bad.”
That’s all. No details. No follow up explanation.
Yelena turns her head slowly, every muscle heavy. “What kind of gas?” Her voice is hoarse, a rasp against her own throat.
But before Clint can answer, impact. Sudden and unexpected.
The world jerks sideways as a second vehicle smashes into them from the left, metal screaming against metal, force ripping Yelena painfully against her seatbelt and into the side door.
Pain bursts in her ribs. Glass shatters. She hears Kate yell, sharp and wordless, as the wheel spins uselessly in her hands.
The car veers, spins, skids sideways and crashes hard into another car parked. Metal crunches and pops.
Yelena’s head slams against the window. For a moment there’s nothing but silence. A tightness in her skull, pain, whiplash. Searing pain all over that feels white and hot.
Then everything comes rushing back. The roar of the engine still ticking, the distant shout of their pursuers now out their own vehicles and approaching, the sharp, gnawing pain sparking down her side.
And underneath it all…the pulse.
That hot, low ache in her stomach, worse now. Worse from the crash. From the adrenaline. From the way Kate’s hand blindly finds her thigh across the console and squeezes.
Yelena shudders like the touch electrocutes her. Everything is too much.
Her voice breaks as she tries to speak. “Kate—“
Kate’s breathing fast. Blood on her temple, but alive. “You okay? Yelena, talk to me.”
Yelena can’t yet. Her throat closes around the words. Her skin is buzzing, fever-hot, soaked in sweat. The smell of Kate, gunpowder, gasoline, skin and heavy breaths is making her dizzy.
“I’m not…” she chokes, gripping her seat with both hands. “Somethings…wrong with me.”
The door is ripped open a moment later, Yelena barely registers the fact Kate had moved out the car.
Rain and smoke pour in, cold against her face, shocking in contrast to the fire burning beneath her skin.
“Come on,” Kate breathes, already ripping off what’s left of Yelena’s belt, hands fast and shaking, fingertips fumbling at Yelena’s hips. “We have to move. Now.”
Yelena tries to answer, but her tongue sticks to the roof of her mouth. Her body is a furnace, trembling with heat and some new terrible rhythm she can’t shake. Her thighs are clenched and slick and she hates it. She hates the need. The wrongness.
But she lets Kate drag her out.
Her boots scrape uselessly on broken glass and asphalt as Kate pulls her around the front of the car. Her ribs scream with every breath. Behind them, men piling in, armed. Fast and trained.
Kate curses under her breath and drops the a duffel bag she must have grabbed from the backseat.
Yelena watches in a haze as she unzips it, pulls out a silver, cylinder shaped canister. The same kind that did this to her.
Kate doesn’t hesitate. She throws it with a grunt, quick and precise. Her training overriding her adrenaline and fear.
It arcs through the rain and hits the ground near the approaching men with a sharp metallic clang. One of them shouts, but it’s too late.
Kate raises her pistol and fires. Always a perfect aim even with a gun. The canister explodes with a hiss.
White gas unfurls in the night like smoke and ash and something sinister.
Yelena watches them stumble. Coughing, choking, clawing at their throats. One man collapses to his knees, vomiting instantly. Another screams something guttural and wordless. Their bodies convulse like puppets with cut strings. Falling to the ground in pain.
The same burn in her own lungs mirrored back at her, the same helplessness of chemicals in lungs and fire in blood.
Yelena doesn’t feel vindicated. She just feels sick.
Kate grabs her again. “We need to go. Now. Come on, I’ve got you.”
Yelena stumbles forward, half limping, half carried. Her body rebels with every step. Overheating, starving for something she can’t name. The contact of Kate’s arm around her back is unbearable, hot and grounding and maddening.
Her head drops to Kate’s shoulder without her permission.
“I hate this.” She croaks, barely audible.
“I know,” Kate mutters, breathless. “But you’re okay. We’re close.”
The light of the streets blur behind them as they slip down a narrow side alley, Kate half-dragging her through rusted out fences and across gravel.
Yelena wants to fight, wants to pull away, wants to scream that she’s not weak, not broken, but the words don’t come. Stuck in her dry throat. Her body is buzzing under her flesh, sensitive to every drop of rain, every shift of fabric, every breath Kate takes.
They round a corner.
A squat concrete building waits at the end of the alley, dark and forgettable, one of the safe houses, likely off-book. Reinforced, hidden. Safe enough.
Yelena’s knees buckle again. Kate catches her.
“Almost there,” Kate whispers against her hair. “Just a little more.”
Yelena grits her teeth, jaw tight with shame. She’s trained to endure anything. She’s fought through bullet wounds, broken ribs, chemical burns and control. But this?
This is humiliating.
Because every breath tastes like want. Every step feels like ache. Every time Kate touches her, it’s like pouring gasoline over her skin and lighting a damn match.
And the worst part?
She doesn’t want it to stop.
The door slams shut behind them hard. Kate throws the deadbolt. Slides a latch. Then a third heavy lock with a satisfying click that echoes off the barren walls.
They’re safe.
But Yelena doesn’t feel safe. She feels like she’s about to combust.
Her legs give out and she hits down on her knees, palms slapping against the cold floorboards. The chill of it sears through her jeans. She’s gasping now, each breath hitching like she’s just run a hundred miles, but it’s not exhaustion. It’s everything else.
“Yelena,” Kate is kneeling next to her, hands fluttering, unsure where to touch, voice honeyed in concern. “Hey, look at me. You’re okay.”
Yelena shakes her head. Not to say no exactly, just to stop the spinning.
Her throat feels like sandpaper, lungs still raw. But it’s not the gas anymore. It’s what the gas woke up.
She hears herself laugh. Quiet, low. A little deranged perhaps. “Define…’okay,’” she rasps.
Kate lets out a breath. “You’re breathing. We’re not shot. That’s a win in my book.”
Yelena leans forward, resting her forehead on the floor. It’s blessedly cold. She wants to press her whole body to it, to bleed out the heat like poison.
But it’s not enough. Nothing is.
There’s a tremor in her limbs she can’t will away. Not fear, need. Her body’s betraying her, whispering things she usually doesn’t give it permission to.
Touch me. Hold me. Please.
Her training screams against it. Her pride, too.
She clenches her teeth. “I need water.”
“I’ll get it.”
Kate’s gone for barely a second, but it feels like hours. Yelena sits up, strips off her jacket with shaking fingers, trying to hide how desperate she is to be rid of it. Her tank top underneath is soaked through, sweat clinging to her spine, under her breasts, between her thighs. The fabric is suffocating.
The door to the tiny kitchen creaks open. Kate returns, crouching down again with a bottle of water and that look, the one Yelena hates. Concern, soft and stubborn.
Kate unscrews the cap, holds it to Yelena’s mouth herself. “Drink.”
Yelena does. Half of it spills down her chin, but she doesn’t care. She drinks until her stomach rolls and she has to push it away.
Kate brushes her fingers along Yelena’s wrist. “You’re burning up.”
Yelena flinches at the contact. Not because it hurts. Because it feels good. And that is dangerous.
“Don’t,” she breathes.
Kate pulls her hand back gently. “Sorry. I just—“
“Not you.” Yelena squeezes her eyes shut. “Me. I’m not. It’s not me right now.”
A lie, it was more her then the gas. The gas was just amplifying it.
Kate says nothing.
Yelena forces herself upright more, back against the nearest wall. Her chest rises and falls too fast. She digs her nails into her thighs, grounding herself through pressure, through pain. Anything but this.
“What did that gas do to me?” She asks, voice rough and low. “Clint knew. He said it was bad.”
Kate sits across from her on the ground, hands clasped. She looks pale now, rain water darkening her shirt, strands of hair stuck to her cheeks and her head tiled sideways to watch Yelena.
“I don’t know exactly,” she admits. “Only that it’s high tech. Clint’s seen it used once before. On a mission years ago. I heard him talking about it before we left. He said it messes with your…instincts.”
Yelena stares. “What instincts?” She could guess.
Kate doesn’t answer right away. She meets Yelena’s eyes and doesn’t look away, swallows, breathes out. A drop of rain falls down her jaw.
“The ones that make you want things.”
Yelena exhales through her nose, the gas still acrid in her nostrils. Her skin prickles. There’s a pounding in her chest that’s no longer adrenaline, it’s a craving.
“Do you feel it now?” Kate asks gently.
Yelena laughs again, bitter. “I feel everything now.”
She can’t look at her.
Can’t look at the way Kate is sitting, knees bent, eyes wide, shirt clinging to her collarbone. The way she smells, gunpowder and rain and warm skin.
The way Yelena’s hands still remember her touch on her thigh from the car. From her arm around her waist in the alleyway. From every moment they’ve touched in the last hour.
She wants. God, she wants. But she won’t ask. Won’t act. She won’t let this gas turn her into some animal.
So she presses her hands flat against the floorboards and focuses on the cold. On her breathing. On not reaching across the room.
On not ruining the only good thing she has.
Kate doesn’t stay where she is, however.
Yelena notices it in pieces first, the soft scrape of fabric on floorboards, the shift of weight, the way the air seems to move when Kate does. Her eyes stay fixed on the floor, but her body tracks every inch of it like a predator that doesn’t want to hunt.
Kate stops closer. Not touching. Just, nearer.
The space between them hums.
“I brought more water,” Kate says quietly, holding the bottle out. Not pushing it, just offering.
Yelena doesn’t take it.
“That won’t work.” She mutters.
Kate hesitates. “Why not?”
Yelena swallows. Her throat tightens around it. Her pulse is a riot under her flesh, heat rolling in waves that make it hard to sit still. Her hands curl into fists at her sides, knuckles pale.
“Because this isn’t dehydration,” she says. “This is chemical manipulation. You don’t flush this out with water and positive thinking.”
Kate exhales slowly and sets the bottle down beside her instead of handing it over, moves another inch closer.
Yelena’s breath stutters.
Kate’s presence is everywhere now. Her warmth bleeding through the air, the faint scent of mint and rain and adrenaline. Yelena’s skin feels too tight, like it’s been stretched thin over her bones and muscles, like something is alive underneath.
Kate reaches out. Just her hand. Slow, careful. Like she’s debating the best approach.
Yelena jerks back immediately, spine hitting the wall harder than necessary.
“Don’t,” she snaps, sharper than she means to. Her accent thickens under the strain. “Kate. Don’t do that.”
Kate freezes, hand suspended mid-air. “Okay. I’m sorry. I just thought—“
“If you keep reaching for me,” Yelena says, voice low and shaking now, “I might do something very stupid.”
The words hang there. Heavy and honest.
Kate doesn’t pull her hand away fast. But she does lower it, resting it on her own knee instead, not increasing the distance between them. Her eyes stay fixed on Yelena’s, open and steady.
“I don’t care,” Kate says softly.
Yelena laughs, one sharp breath that’s almost a sob. “You should.”
“I don’t,” Kate repeats. “If it helps you feel better…if it grounds you…I don’t care.”
That does it. Something inside Yelena cracks. Just a hairline fracture, but enough. Her breath shudders out of her. She drags a hand down her face, fingers digging into her own skin like she’s trying to hold herself together.
“You don’t understand,” she says, and her voice is rough now, scraped raw. “This thing. It’s turning everything up. Every instinct. Every want. It’s not just pain, Kate. It’s—“ she stops herself, jaw clenching hard. “It’s humiliating.”
Kate’s expression softens. “Hey.”
That single word lands like a touch itself.
Yelena squeezes her eyes shut, head tipping back against the wall. Her body feels alive in a way she despises, too sensitive, too reactive, too aware of how close Kate is, of how easy it would be to close that last inch.
Her knees draw up slightly without her permission. Her breathing goes shallow.
“I don’t want you to think this is me,” Yelena whispers. “I don’t want you to think I only want—“ She cuts herself off again, breath hitching. “Because of the gas…”
Kate shifts closer anyway. Close enough now that Yelena can feel the heat of her skin. Close enough that the room seems to narrow, walls pressing in, air charged and sparking.
Kate doesn’t touch her.
“I don’t think that,” Kate says. “I think you’re fighting something that doesn’t fight fair.”
Yelena opens her eyes. Their knees are almost touching. The distance between their faces feels impossible to ignore.
Her heart is hammering so hard she’s sure Kate can hear it. Her skin buzzes where Kate isn’t touching her, anticipation and restraint tangling until it hurts.
“This is dangerous,” Yelena breathes.
Kate nods. “I know.”
Neither of them move. The room feels electric, like the moment right before lightning strikes, where the air goes tight and hot.
Yelena almost leans in, almost. But then the comms in her ear crackles, a pop and whine.
Yelena flinches, blinking like she’s surfaced from underwater. The sound feels too loud, jagged in her head.
“Yelena? Kate? Do you copy?” Clint’s voice, too sudden.
Kate stiffens next to her. Doesn’t move away, but straightens, hand going to her own earpiece.
Yelena doesn’t answer. She can’t, her pulse is still thrumming in her neck, her limbs ache with the restraint she’s currently performing.
Kate taps the comm. “We’re here.”
Static. Then Clint’s voice again, lower this time. “I got more on the gas. It’s one of the early prototypes. Not a crowd control agent like we first thought, nor a torture method. It’s more experimental. Messes with emotional regulation, heightens hormonal response. I’ve seen it once before.”
Yelena’s stomach coils. She knows what’s coming before he says it.
“It doesn’t create desire. It just amplifies what’s already there. It only activates if the person infected feels it on their own. No desire, no symptoms.”
Silence. A heavy beat. Yelena forgets how to breathe during it.
The words hang in the air like smoke.
Not a switch flipped by the gas, not a chemical control. Her. It was her.
She looks at Kate and Kate is already looking back.
Neither of them speak. They don’t have to.
Yelena’s mouth is dry. Her chest so tight she’s sure she wheezes. Her heart stutters behind her ribs, an uneven rhythm of panic and something far worse. Hope, want, need.
She wants to deny it. To blame the gas, the car crash, the adrenaline and the heat of it still rolling through her veins. But now she knows the truth.
She wanted Kate before. And now she can’t not want her. Her body physically trembles with it.
“If symptoms are in effect it will only last 24 hours. The chemical peaks around hour six.” Clint explains, carefully, like he suspects Yelena is having a reaction to the gas.
“Thanks.” Kate says, she reaches up, slowly, never breaking eye contact and removes her comm. Sets it aside on the floor with care and something else, something purposeful.
Then, with equal gentleness, she reaches toward Yelena’s ear. Pauses. Waits with one eyebrow raised.
Yelena nods once, jaw tight.
Kate slips the comm from her ear too. Tosses it with the other. No more voices. No more outside world. Just the sound of their breathing, and the frantic almost painful thrum of blood in Yelena’s ears.
Kate shifts closer.
Her eyes are blown wide, pupils dilated, breath shallow. One of her knees brushes against Yelena’s leg and the contact feels searing.
She’s angling forward now. Deliberate and measured. Letting Yelena choose.
Yelena’s hand comes up between them, not to stop her, but to press flat against Kate’s chest. Not pushing, just feeling.
“I don’t want to mess this up,” she whispers. Her voice is barely a sound. Shaky and honest.
Kate’s lips part, her hand covers Yelena’s, warm and steady and so soft it hurts.
“You won’t,” she whispers back. “Just…let me help.”
Yelena swallows hard.
The air between them is hot, heavy, thick with want. But deeper than that is something else, something softer breaking through. Willing and waiting and patient.
Her fear flickers again. But so does the need.
And some where beneath all of it, beneath the gas, the heat, the aching of desire, she lets herself admit what she’s known longer than she’ll ever say aloud.
She doesn’t want this because of the gas.
She wants Kate because she’s hopelessly attracted to her.
Always has been.
Kate leans in and Yelena meets her halfway.
The kiss is nothing like she thought it would be. It’s everything. Too much, not enough, raw and rough.
Kate’s mouth is warm, soft but hungry, lips parting against hers like she’s been waiting just as long, like she knows.
Yelena lets out a small, unguarded sound. Something caught between a gasp and a growl, and grabs her by the shirt, pulling her closer, needing more, needing all of her.
Their teeth knock slightly, the kiss messy, uncoordinated and desperate.
Kate groans into her mouth and it vibrates through Yelena’s chest like a match catching a flame.
There’s no time to think. No space for doubt. Just the crush of their bodies, Kate’s hands cupping Yelena’s jaw like she’s fragile, like she’s precious, while her hips say otherwise. Bold, sure, sliding forward, pressing Yelena back.
The cold floor hits her spine and she shudders.
But Kate is above her in the next breath, one thigh slotting between Yelena’s legs like she belongs there, like she’s thought about doing this longer then Yelena even. Her weight a welcome crush against Yelena’s over-sensitive skin.
Yelena exhales sharply, chest heaving.
Kate leans over her, hair falling down in soft, rain damp strands around their faces like a curtain.
Yelena’s fingers bury themselves in the fabric of Kate’s shirt, gripping like she’ll fall apart without her. At this point she thinks she will.
It’s not just the gas. She knows it now. It’s not the chemical heat searing her from the inside. It’s this, her, Kate.
The weight of her. The way she moves. The way she kisses like she means it, the way she wants Yelena back.
Kate’s hand slips under her tank top, slow and reverent at first, but her palm is hot, and Yelena arches into it like she’s starving.
Every touch is amplified. Every brush of skin to skin shoots straight through her. Her hips rock up before she even knows she’s doing it, chasing friction, chasing relief.
Kate groans again and presses harder, her thigh firm between Yelena’s legs. The pressure makes Yelena’s breath catch, and she whines low in her throat, a broken, needy sound she would’ve been ashamed of if it were anyone else.
But not Kate. Not like this. Not when Kate makes a similar sound in return at hearing Yelena’s.
Kate kisses her again, deeper this time, tongue sliding against her own with purpose, her hand tightening in Yelena’s hair like she wants her closer, wants her undone.
Yelena breaks the kiss just long enough to pant, “I’m not— this is—fuck—“
Kate presses their foreheads together. Breathing heavy.
“I know,” she whispers. Like she understands Yelena’s broken thoughts.
Or maybe she just wants the kiss to restart faster.
Yelena makes a sound she doesn’t recognise, raw and shivering, and then she’s kissing Kate again, desperate, dragging her closer, wrapping her legs around her waist. Her boots against the backs of Kate’s thighs.
Not more space left between them. Just heat, just breath, just Kate.
Kate grinds down against her, slow and sure and testing, Yelena’s body shudders in response.
The pressure is maddening. Her nerves are already frayed, wrecked by the gas, her own longing stretched so tight it’s almost painful. Every shift of Kate’s hips sends a jolt straight through her, need curling hot and slick between her thighs.
She gasps into Kate’s mouth. “Don’t stop—“
Kate doesn’t. She kisses her like she’s drowning and Yelena’s the only thing keeping her above water, all mouth and teeth and breath.
Her thigh presses harder, rocking in a rhythm that has Yelena arching up into her, chasing every pulse of pleasure like it’s oxygen.
Yelena’s hands drag up Kate’s back, blunt nails catching on the fabric, desperate to feel more skin. She gets her shirt halfway up and Kate pulls away just long enough to strip it over her head and toss it aside, the movement makes Yelena’s legs slip a bit. Boots hit the floorboards, Kate’s hands move to slide under Yelena’s thighs to bring them back around her.
She’s beautiful. Flushed. Wild-eyed. Lips glistening with Yelena’s spit. Her chest rising fast, abdomen tight. Hair out and long and slightly wild.
Yelena doesn’t get to stare for long. Kate is back on her in the next heartbeat, kissing down her neck, along her jaw, across the hollow of her throat. Each drag of her mouth leaves heat in its wake, each flick of her tongue has Yelena writhing.
Yelena lets out a strangled sound when Kate mouths over the top of her tank top, teeth grazing the curve of her breast through the fabric.
She lifts her hips instinctively, grinding against Kate’s thigh. Her body is beyond her control now, all instinct and ache and want.
“Please,” she breathes, the word slipping out unguarded.
She doesn’t beg. Not for anything. Not even mercy. But she begs for this, she begs for Kate Bishop.
Kate kisses her again, slower now, lips moving like she’s trying to savour Yelena.
Then her hand slides under Yelena’s tank, warm fingers skimming up the curve of her waist, the edge of her ribs, and Yelena moans. An open, needy sound she can’t bite down.
Kate palms her breast, thumb brushing over her nipple through the lace of her bra, and Yelena’s back arches off the floor.
“Fuck—“
She’s never felt like this. Not even close. Her whole body is lit, burning, wound tight and strung out and right on the edge of something that’s going to break her apart.
Kate lowers herself fully, chest to chest, hips pressed tight, and starts to move. Rolling into her, controlled, slow, maddening almost.
It’s like being dragged under a current she doesn’t want to fight.
Yelena lets her head fall back, eyes fluttering shut as pleasure rolls through her in thick, molten waves. Her hands claw at Kate’s back, anchoring herself to the only solid thing in the room.
Her voice is wrecked when she speaks. “It feels so— too good.”
Kate’s mouth finds her ear. “Let go.”
Yelena doesn’t know if she can. She’s too tense, moving against Kate in a rhythm they’ve both set. But Kate kisses her again, hot and sweet and deep, and Yelena starts to fall.
It builds too fast. Faster than it usually does for Yelena. Faster than it has, ever.
Her body is already wound so tight it feels like a single wrong breath might snap her in half, and Kate keeps moving. Steady, relentless, pressing her thigh firmer like she knows exactly how close Yelena is to the edge.
Yelena’s grip on her back turns desperate. Her nails bite through skin and fabric alike. She can’t stop it. She can’t slow it down.
Her breathing fractures around every breath she exhales. Panting, sucked in, probably hot against Kate’s lips.
Every nerve in her body feels exposed, raw and sparking. The gas has stripped her defences clean, no numbness, no distance, no control. Just sensation flooding her all at once.
Kate murmurs her name against her mouth, low and wet, like an anchor thrown into rough water.
“Yelena. Look at me.”
She forces her eyes open. Kate is there, right there. Flushed, focused, real. Her eyes blown dark, her cheeks pink with desire. Her thigh dragging up and pressing in time to Yelena’s movements. Watching Yelena’s reaction like it’s the hottest thing she’s ever seen.
The realisation hits Yelena like a wave, sharp and sudden and devastating.
This is happening because she wants it.
Because she wants Kate, and Kate wants her.
The thought drags her closer to the edge, searing energy blooms through her abdomen and it makes her grunt now, soft and sweet and needy.
Kate presses harder, one hand splayed on Yelena’s sides, fingers digging into her ribs for grip. The other moving to grab under Yelena’s thigh again, to move it up, position them both better. Yelena lets her.
Yelena’s body tightens hard, breath catching painfully in her chest as the pressure inside her spikes. Pleasure cresting too high, too fast, swallowing her whole without warning.
Her hips jerk up involuntarily and she cries out, not loud, maybe a gasp. The sound torn straight from her chest before she can stop it.
It’s not graceful.
It’s violent and shuddering and too much.
But Kate presses closer, her lips on Yelena’s, on Yelena’s jaw, on her neck, everywhere. Pushing and pushing Yelena over that edge like she’s barely staying on it herself and Yelena can’t help but fall.
Her muscles lock, then shake, heat ripping through her in pulsing waves that leave her suddenly breathless and helpless beneath Kate’s weight. Her hands clutch, fingers digging in like she’s afraid she’ll disappear if she lets go. Float away.
The intensity of it all leaves her moving out of rhythm, pushing and grinding against Kate with little more than pure lust, but Kate keeps her thigh tensed and her own rhythm steady. Her mouth swallowing Yelena’s small sounds, her breath hot and sticky and sweet, Yelena breaks the kiss by throwing her head back and against the floorboards, eyes shut, jaw tense.
She sobs once, sharp and breathless, as the sensation crashes through her. She’s not use to this feeling, not used to the intensity of it. It catches her off guard how much she wants, needs, desires from Kate.
Her own thighs are clamped around Kate with surprising strength, her abdomen tightens and everything feels suddenly like too much, and yet not enough. It leaves her wrecked and exposed and burning all over. Her skin flushing and on fire, her chest tight, her abdomen twitching from the effort and sensations.
It leaves her gasping and keening against Kate even when the sensations simmer down to small sparks, making Yelena’s breath stutter and slow.
Kate doesn’t move away.
She stays pressed to her, holding her down, holding her together. One hand cradles Yelena’s jaw, thumb brushing slow, steady circles into her cheek as if to remind her she’s still here. That she’s safe.
Yelena’s breathing stutters more as the aftershocks roll through her, smaller now but relentless. Her body feels boneless, spent, overstimulated to the point of pain. But in a good way. The gas amplifying everything.
She squeezes her eyes shut.
For one terrifying second, she expects shame to crash in next. It doesn’t.
What comes instead is something different, softer.
Relief.
She exhales, long and shaky, forehead pressing into Kate’s shoulder as her body finally begins to settle. The heat doesn’t vanish, the gas is still there, simmering, but the edge is gone. The screaming need quieted, dulled to a whispering ache.
Kate’s arms tighten around her, her lips grazing Yelena’s jaw softly.
“You okay?” She whispers.
Yelena nods weakly, breath still uneven. Her voice is wrecked when she manages, “I did not…plan for that.”
Kate lets out a quiet, breathless laugh against her neck.
Yelena closes her eyes. Shes never felt this undone. And she’s never felt this held. Release like this wasn’t common for Yelena, and the softness after less so.
Kate’s still wrapped around her, breath warm against Yelena’s neck, heart pounding where their chests are pressed together.
But something shifts.
Yelena feels it in the way Kate’s breath catches, in the small tremble beneath her fingers, in the way her body’s still pressing close, no longer to support, but because she needs it now.
Yelena lifts her head from the floorboards slowly, eyes focusing on Kate’s in the dark room.
Her voice is low. Rough from panting, but steady. “You’re shaking Kate Bishop.”
Kate swallows, trying to play it off, but her pupils are still blown wide, lips kiss-swollen, chest rising in shallow waves that push against Yelena’s own.
Yelena’s fingers slide up Kate’s side. Gentle now. In control. “You feel everything too, don’t you?”
Kate nods, barely.
Yelena sits up, slow and deliberate, and Kate lets her. Shuffling back so she’s straddling Yelena’s legs. She watches every move like she can’t look away, like Yelena is stunning even with all her clothes still on and wetted by rain.
Kate’s hair is messy, her skin flushed pink along her neck and the tips of her ears, and Yelena can’t stop looking.
Can’t stop watching every detail. Her eyes drop and rise to every point on Kate. Her lips, her bra covered breasts, her taut abdomen.
But it’s different now. Not frantic, not gas-driven and too much. It’s focused, fond.
She brushes a hand across Kate’s hip, slow and purposeful. “Let me take care of you also.”
Kate exhales, the sound almost a whimper. “You just—“
Yelena hushes her with a kiss, softer than any they’ve shared tonight. Her thumb brushes Kate’s jaw as she deepens it, slow and coaxing, igniting her own fire again just with a kiss.
Kate melts into her. Yielding beautifully, so trusting it actually makes Yelena’s chest ache.
Yelena guides her gently to the floor, reversing their positions, lips never leaving hers. She takes her time, pressing a trail of kisses along Kate’s jaw, down her neck, tasting the salt of sweat and the heat just beneath her skin.
Kate gasps when Yelena’s hand finds her waist again, then lower. Tracing a line across her abdomen with reverence, not hunger. Though that still simmers. Feeling the way Kate’s abdomen tightens and flutters under Yelena’s touch.
“You’re warm,” Yelena murmurs against her skin. “Like fire under your skin.”
Kate’s voice is breathless. “You make me feel like that.”
Yelena smiles, something real, something unguarded that pulls at her mouth as she kisses lower.
She runs a hand across Kate’s side, fingers brushing exposed skin, watching every inch of her react. Her hand settles just beneath the swell of her ribs, palm flat and grounding.
Kate shudders. Her hands curl into Yelena’s shoulders like she’s scared this will end.
Yelena leans in and kisses the center of Kate’s chest, she feels the fabric of Kate’s bra against her chin and jaw, the soft swell of her breasts. A pause, a breath. Everything softens.
This isn’t about need anymore. This is about Kate.
Kate’s skin is flushed, her pupils dark and wide with wanting, her breath ragged against Yelena’s throat as she places a kiss there. She’s trembling now, not from fear, not from the cold floor beneath them, but from how close she is to unraveling already. Pent up from watching Yelena writhe beneath her.
Yelena feels it in every part of her, Kate’s every twitch.
She presses one last kiss to the corner of Kate’s mouth and then whispers, “come on.”
She helps Kate up, steady but insistent, and walks them the short few steps to the bed tucked against the wall. Simple frame, old but clean mattress, fresh sheets. Functional for a safe house. The kind of thing that doesn’t matter until suddenly it does and it mattered a lot now.
Kate’s skin catches the low light of the moon peeking in the gap of the blinds, all shadowed flesh and curve and heat.
Yelena watches her sit on the edge of the bed, chest rising fast, legs slightly parted like she’s waiting for Yelena, only her.
She steps between Kate’s knees and leans down, slow, deliberate, bracing one hand on the mattress beside her.
Kate tilts her head up, mouth parted, eyes searching hers.
Yelena kisses her again. But different this time. Deep, slow, possessive. A kiss that says you’re mine for this. A kiss that says let me give you what you need.
She pushes Kate back gently, watching the way her body moves, the way she shivers as her bare shoulders hit the sheets. Her hands roam now, slow and certain, tracing from Kate’s throat to her collarbone, down over her sternum, palm flat, fingers spread. Feeling every stutter of breath, every twitch of muscle, the heat of flesh.
Kate’s eyes flutter closed. Her back arches faintly. “Yelena…”
Yelena hushes her with her mouth again. Kisses her way down, mapping each inch of skin like a path only she gets to walk.
Her lips drag down Kate’s neck, over the hollow of her throat. She lingers there. Presses her mouth to where Kate’s pulse is thrumming. Kate hums, fingers brushing in Yelena’s hair softly.
Yelena goes lower. Across the curve of Kate’s bra clad breast. Her ribcage. Her abdomen. Her skin is so heated and soft it makes Yelena sigh against flesh, nip her teeth to Kate’s side.
Kate trembles with every breath, hands tangled in Yelena’s hair but loose, trying not to control Yelena’s actions.
Yelena looks up once, hand splayed on Kate’s thigh now, and finds her gaze.
She’s never seen Kate like this, open, raw, completely exposed. And yet, there’s no fear there, no apprehension or hesitation. Just pure trust and want.
Yelena kisses the inside of her denim clad thigh, slow and purposeful, and watches Kate’s eyes go glassy.
She whispers against the rough jeans, voice husky, quiet. “Let me feel you come apart.”
Kate exhales like Yelena’s voice almost sends her over the edge already.
Kate’s body is fever-warm under Yelena’s hands even through her jeans.
Her breathing has shifted, not frantic, but deep. Pulled from somewhere low in her chest. She’s watching Yelena intently, eyes wide and glassy, but her body is already arching with Yelena’s touch, already surrendering inch by inch.
Yelena sits back on her knees and reaches for the button of Kate’s jeans.
Her fingers don’t fumble, not now. Not when she feels so clear headed in this one purpose. Like nothing else has ever mattered.
Kate lifts her hips without needing to be asked, her boots kicked off quick, letting Yelena slide the denim down, slow and careful, revealing soft skin, strong legs and damp cotton between them. Her thighs tremble as Yelena pushes the jeans down past her knees and off completely.
Yelena runs her hands up the backs of Kate’s calves, slow and sure, watching how her body reacts. How her muscles tense, then soften beneath her palms. She leans in, mouth brushing over the inside of Kate’s knee, a kiss as soft as breath.
Kate lets out a sound, a choked little moan, and Yelena feels it like a tug in her chest, hot and alive and curling in her abdomen warmly, pulling her own desire back tenfold.
She kisses higher, and higher.
Kate’s legs part instinctively, slow and sweet, and Yelena fits between them like she belongs there.
She murmurs something low in Russian, she doesn’t even know what, just a soft hush against skin as her hands slide up, thumbs stroking soothing lines along the insides of Kate’s thighs.
Kate’s fingers twitch in her hair. Never pulling, but firmer now.
Then, finally, Yelena presses her mouth to Kate through the fabric of her underwear.
Kate gasps, a sharp, open sound that turns into a breathless whisper. Her hips twitch up, but she locks them down, breathes harder instead.
Yelena hums against her, hands keeping her steady as her mouth moves slowly, teasingly, building that rhythm with purpose. Kate is so warm, so wet even through the cotton of her underwear, so sweet. She kisses again, firmer this time, and feels the tension spike in Kate’s thighs as they flex.
She’s close already and Yelena has barely done anything.
Yelena hooks her fingers into the waistband of Kate’s underwear and glances up. “Yes?”
Kate’s only answer is a breathless. “Please.”
Yelena pulls the last barrier away, and then she doesn’t wait. She goes slow, so slow, letting her tongue trace every slick, shivering part of her. Gentle, deliberate. Not overwhelming, not devouring. Just a kind of soft worship.
She feels every tremor. Hears every breathy moan. Watches the way Kate’s hands now fist in the sheets, the way her hips twitch with every roll of Yelena’s tongue.
Kate is so warm, so pliant and the sensation against Yelena’s mouth is addictive.
Yelena feels her own heat growing again. But she stays focused, grinding down on nothing to ease the pressure between her own thighs.
Kate’s legs tighten around her shoulders. Her breathing goes ragged. Her voice breaks in half over another moan when Yelena flattens her tongue and runs it up, firm.
“Yelena, God. Please. Don’t stop—“
Yelena doesn’t, not for anything.
She uses her mouth like she means it, tongue firm and steady, hands keeping Kate grounded by pressing against her stomach and sides, as Kate starts to tremble harder, buck her hips, body tightening like she’s trying to hold back from coming so soon.
But Yelena wants it. Wants to see her fall apart fully.
She finds a rhythm, quick but steady and Kate bucks without meaning too. Her hips lifting sharply and Yelena has to pull back a bit to keep the pressure the same.
“Sorry...” Kate moans.
Yelena hums, a wordless way to say Don’t be, I like it, keep going.
And Kate does, hips rolling with every swipe of Yelena’s tongue, thighs tense around Yelena’s head but always mindful not to press in hard. She’s breathing so quick now it sounds like little prayers, soft and breathy, drawn from her throat in gasps when Yelena doubles her efforts.
Kate’s close. So close. Yelena can tell by the sounds she makes, by the tension curled in her body, by how her abdomen tightens under Yelena’s flat palm.
She sucks gently, presses just right, pushes her face against Kate’s warmth and arousal and that’s it.
Kate cries out, back arching off the bed, hands scrambling to hold Yelena’s hair again. Rougher now, pushing and angling her as she needs. Her whole body locks and then shudders violently, waves of pleasure rolling through her as she climaxes hard, mouth open, eyes squeezed shut, hips rocking against Yelena’s mouth like she can’t stop the movement.
It’s so fucking beautiful Yelena moans, holds Kate through it. Doesn’t let go, doesn’t stop. Just rides it out with her, tongue slowing, touch gentler, until Kate finally collapses back into the mattress, utterly spent.
She’s panting, glowing, wrecked and so stunning Yelena’s heart quickens at the whole vision of it all.
Yelena rises slowly, kissing her way back up Kate’s stomach, her ribs, her chest. Slow and soft. She finally hovers above her again, brushing sweat damp hair from her flushed face.
Kate blinks up at her, dazed and breathless.
Yelena leans down, kisses her forehead. Kisses her jaw. “Was that okay?” She whispers.
Kate gives her a look, soft and full of something that makes Yelena ache.
“More than okay,” Kate whispers back, breath heavy, chest rising. “That was perfect.”
She draws Yelena in, not for a kiss, but for an embrace.
The room is quiet now.
Just the hum of the streets through the walls, the soft rustle of fabric as they shift, and the slowing of two heartbeats pressed close together under tangled sheets.
Yelena shifts to lie on her side, arm slung across Kate’s waist, legs tangled. Their skin still damp, flushed in places. The taste of her still lingers faintly on Yelena’s tongue, a reminder, rich and electric, of everything they just did.
Kate’s chest rises slowly and steady beneath her palm. She’s warm, solid, breathing long and calmer now.
Yelena nestles closer without thinking, cheek pressed into the curve of Kate’s neck, breath ghosting over her collarbone.
Kate’s fingers trail lightly up and down her back, aimless and soothing. Then her voice, soft, quiet.
“How do you feel now?”
Yelena hums against her skin. “Like I want to do that all again.”
Kate huffs a quiet laugh. Yelena feels it against her temple.
Yelena tilts her head just enough to look up at her. “The gas is still there,” she admits. “But it’s not screaming anymore.”
Kate brushes damp strands of hair from Yelena’s own temple, fingertips painfully soft. “What’s it doing, then?”
Yelena pretends to think, letting her lips press lazily against Kate’s neck before answering. “Sulking.”
Kate grins. “Sulking?”
“It wanted chaos. It got closeness and relief. Now it’s confused.” She shrugs one shoulder. “Maybe it’ll give up and leave.”
Kate laughs again, a soft rumble that vibrates under Yelena’s cheek.
“Are you confused?” She asks.
Yelena pauses. She could make a joke, deflect. But there’s something about the quiet, the aftermath of having Kate fall apart under her mouth, that pulls truth from her more easily than she’s used to.
“No,” she says finally. “Not confused.”
Kate’s hand stills on her back, splays flat and warm.
“I was worried you’d think it wasn’t me,” Yelena continues. “That all of it was chemical. That I’d wake up tomorrow and feel nothing.”
Kate shifts just enough to look at her, soft eyes searching, dropping to Yelena’s lips and moving across her cheekbones and jaw before find her eyes again.
Yelena holds her gaze. “But it was me.”
Kate’s smile softens. Her hand moving again, nails lightly scratching to soothe. “I know.”
And that’s it. No fanfare. No declarations. Just warmth, contact, Kate’s nails on Yelena’s back and Yelena’s face pushed to the crook of Kate’s neck a little too needy.
Yelena exhales slowly and lets her eyes fall closed. The burn under her skin has cooled now, like someone opened a window in a stifling room. Her muscles ache in a satisfying way. Her heart has stopped racing, though it still thrums with every touch from Kate.
For the first time since the gas canister and a stray bullet, her body feels like it belongs to her again.
And Kate’s still here, holding her. Letting her rest as she moves to run her fingers through Yelena’s hair now.
Yelena lets herself drift, tucked in the quiet hollow between skin and breath, and decides, maybe, she could get used to these kind of missions if they all ended with Kate Bishop in her arms.