State of mind

By the time Red Guardian grunted and groaned his way into an old superhero suit and emerged with his belly sticking out,

the battle outside was all but over.

All eight helicopters had been shot down. Eight enormous fires blazed around the house, bathing it and the surrounding woods in a red glow.

Yelena and the freed Widows took the Recovery Potions and antidote Apocalypse had given them to rescue the people who had crashed.

Black Widow, meanwhile, was locked in a fierce fight with someone wearing a silver metal skull mask and a dark brown combat suit.

Judging by the slender, graceful figure, her opponent was probably a woman too.

"Taskmaster?" Apocalypse frowned.

In the comic-book universe, Taskmaster was a man.

Neither wholly good nor wholly evil, he could perfectly copy anyone's techniques simply by watching them fight.

Captain America's shield techniques, Black Panther's pounces, Hawkeye's archery—he could learn almost any of them at a glance.

But in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Taskmaster was a woman.

Her ability to mimic others remained the same, but her identity had changed—she was General Dreykov's daughter.

The pivotal mission in Black Widow's defection from the Red Room had been to blow up General Dreykov, proving her commitment so she could join S.H.I.E.L.D.

Hawkeye and Black Widow had carried out that mission together.

But when the explosion went off, Dreykov's daughter, Antonia, had happened to be there too.

As it turned out, General Dreykov had survived, while Antonia, still a little girl at the time, had been severely injured and left almost completely paralyzed.

They had believed they had accidentally killed the little girl. The incident haunted them both, leaving Black Widow and Hawkeye with deep guilt.

What they did not know was that Dreykov had installed a smart chip in the back