BIOGRAPHY - Page 2
As World War II broke out in full force in Europe, Natalia and Ivan enlisted and fought to defend 
Mother Russia. Towards the end of the war, when she was about 16, Natalia’s unit was fighting on the western front against the Germans. Ivan was not with their forces at the time, and Natalia had become lovers with a soldier named Nikolai. Many soldiers in their unit were killed in a battle on the Western front, retreating from the Nazi advance. Natalia and Nikolai discovered she was pregnant, and fought to survive. Nikolai swore to protect her, and the two of them even informally exchanged vows while on the run in Eastern Europe. Natalia wore a silk ribbon as a ring, a keepsake Nikolai’s mother gave him before he shipped out. Nikolai did not survive their escapades, however, and a very pregnant Natalia eventually found herself at the remote home of a Slovakian mid-wife. The family cared for her but, for whatever reason, Natalia’s baby did not survive. Natalia named her lost child Rose and buried her in the woods near the mid-wife’s cabin, with the silk ribbon and a paper rose to commemorate her passing. She would only tell Ivan about this in the years to come, but Natalia occasionally took a pilgrimage back to Slovakia to sit at her child’s grave and ruminate. [Black Widow (4th series) #4]
Not much is known about how Natalia spent the rest of the Great Patriotic War, as the Nazis fell and East Berlin rose under the control of the Soviet Union. In 1956, when Natalia was 28 years old, she and Ivan got into a conflict with some of the gangs in Berlin where Ivan was seriously 
wounded. The infamous Winter Soldier appeared to Natalia and the dying Ivan, offering them a choice. They could serve the Red Room and, in exchange, would receive a serum to prolong their life and healing, allowing Ivan to survive. As her adopted father and lifelong companion faded before her eyes, Natalia accepted the deal on behalf of both of them. [Black Widow: Deadly Origin #1]
From there, Natalia entered the Red Room. She became one of 28 young women engineered and trained as Black Widows for the KGB’s Department X and their special ops program. She received further and more intensive training on top of her existing skills, making her a lethal weapon. The serum did as promised, increasing her vitality, healing and resilience to toxins, as well as extending her lifespan. Ivan was also saved and he returned to active military service under the deal Natalia made, removing him from her side. The Black Widow program included memory implants to create cover identities which could be activated by Natalia’s handlers, including one where she trained since childhood as a Bolshoi ballerina. [Black Widow (1st series) #1, Black Widow (3rd series) #5-6, Winter Soldier (1st series) #7] At several times in her life, Natalia believed she first met Alexi Shostakov while in an agent training academy. It might even be true. [Daredevil (1st series) #88, Marvel Fanfare (1st series) #10]
As a Black Widow, one of Natalia’s instructors was the Winter Soldier. A naturally talented fighter, the Soldier also had remarkable infiltration skills during the Cold War, able to look and act like a real American. It would be decades before Natalia learned the rumors were true and the Winter Soldier was actually Captain America’s partner Bucky from the war, reprogrammed to serve the Communists. Natalia and the Soldier trained together often and began an affair behind the backs of their handlers. This disobedience continued even as Natalia was arranged to wed Alexi 
Shostakov, the famous Soviet test pilot. Because of their affair, cracks began to show in the Soldier’s conditioning, so his handlers removed him from active service, placing him back in cryo-stasis to be re-conditioned between specific missions. Natalia infiltrated the storage facility once to find him, but ultimately could not release him. [Captain America (5th series) #27, Captain America & Bucky #624, Black Widow: Deadly Origin #2]
By 1957, Natalia was having a bad reaction to the overlapping memory implants given to her by the Red Room. She lost track of her own age and would experience contradictory memories of her own history from one moment to another, culled from her false cover identities and past brainwashing. During this period, Natalia went through with the marriage to Alexi Shostakov, at the instruction of the General Secretary. Although Natalia and Alexi were ordered to wed, there was some genuine affection between them. Natalia spent several years with Alexi, living more as a housewife than as a spy. There were difficulties in their marriage, however, as the Red Room’s serum and alterations left Natalia unable to conceive a child. In her current mental state, she did not remember why, and Alexi did not have the clearance to jog her memory, leaving them both frustrated.
In 1963, the Soviet Union tapped Alexi to become an icon of the state, the Red Guardian patterned in opposition to the West’s Captain America. A crash during a test flight was faked, taking the famous Alexi Shostakov out of the public eye and allowing him to operate from the shadows full-time as Red Guardian. At the time, it was believed that Natalia was no longer stable enough to maintain the lie, and so the secret of Alexi’s survival was not shared with her. Alexi was privately relieved to separate from Natalia due to the difficulties in their marriage. It was hoped that Natalia would live out her life in retirement as a widow supported by the State. However, Natalia could not remain idle. She presented herself to officials hoping to give back to the country she and Alexi loved, now that he had passed away. With her damaged memory at the time, Natalia was essentially asking for training she already possessed. Premier Krushchev relented and allowed the Black Widow to be reactivated as an asset, reasoning she would be far too restless (and potentially a danger to herself or others) without being given a mission, or purpose. [Avengers (1st series) #44, Black Widow: Deadly Origin #2]
[Note: In the original story from Avengers (1st series) #44, Natasha was deliberately tricked into becoming a spy by the Soviet Union, who turned her grief over Alexi’s death into a weapon against the West. Later stories would add the memory implants and other details to re-contextualize the events.]
In one of her earliest assignments as a spy, Natasha traveled to America and met with a mercenary named Danny French. They had instructions to investigate the mysterious “Project Four” and were almost immediately targeted by Chinese agents with similar orders. Danny was cocky and misogynistic towards Natasha, making their partnership tense. At a secret installation in the Nevada desert, Natasha and Danny infiltrated Project Four and uncovered the energy globe at the center of the project. As Natasha retrieved the globe, Danny tossed a gas grenade at the scientists to deter pursuit. However, the grenade contained poison instead of knockout gas, accidentally killing those responsible for Project Four. Danny and Natasha had been lied to by their superiors, and so Danny went rogue and kept the energy globe rather than turning it over as intended. It would be years before Natasha saw Danny French again. [Daredevil (1st series) #90]
On another early assignment, Natasha was sent to Fidel Castro’s Cuba by the Red Room to reconnect with her old sister-in-training, Marina. The Comienzas, a married couple close to Castro, were feared to be traitors selling secrets to the Americans. Marina was already stationed 
in Cuba and would serve as her contact. Natasha got the Comienzas to expose their activities to her, then assassinated them publicly as a message to anyone who would defy the Communist regime. At the direction of her handlers, Natasha then ruthlessly murdered Marina under suspicions of growing too comfortable with her distance from the Red Room. She executed Marina’s boyfriend and even her cat for good measure. [Black Widow (5th series) #19-20]
[Note: Marina’s tale is a glitch in Natasha’s timeline, based on the irregularities previously discussed. According to Black Widow: Deadly Origin and other sources, Natasha attended Taras Romanov’s academy from ages 10-12. She was then independent until entering the Red Room at age 28. Black Widow (5th series) #16-20, on the other hand, presented Natasha and Marina as pre-teens who grew up in the Red Room, and graduated to active service together. It is possible Taras’s academy and the Black Widow program were part of the same larger Department X network, and the known memory implants could paint over Natasha’s long absence. Also, given the timeline of Castro’s rule of Cuba, it’s necessary to place this story after Natasha’s breakdown and return to action as a widow.]
In her "down time" between active missions, Madame Natasha was established among the elite of the international jet-set. She had a presence in European high society, socializing with numerous rich and connected men over the years. Natasha seduced many of these businessmen and tech industry figures, fleecing assets and information from them before moving on, often leaving her targets penniless or even dead. No criminal charges seemed to stick to her during this period, but her status as a spy was an open topic for gossip and intrigue. A mystique grew around Natasha as decades passed without her seemingly aging a day, a broken series of lovers in her wake. The glitterati gave her the nickname “the Black Widow” without knowing how ironic it was. [Black Widow: Deadly Origin #3]
It wasn’t all glamour and intrigue for Special Agent Natalia Shostakova, though. At times, the KGB would call her back from her long-term espionage work to serve on active field missions. When Logan first recovered from the Weapon X Program, he was amnesiac and began looking into his past. Several American and Canadian intelligence operations fought to prevent Logan from digging up too much. On behalf of the Soviet Union, the Widow intervened to keep these parties from claiming Logan as their own. (Ironically, Natalia’s own memory implants likely made her oblivious to her past relationship with the amnesiac Logan at this time.) [Wolverine (2nd series) #minus1] Natalia also led a flight of MIG fighters for the KGB to intercept a spy mission by Logan, Ben Grimm and Carol Danvers to uncover the secret of Project: Red Storm. The valor of the American and Canadian spies impressed her more than the bluster of her ally, Colonel Malenky. When ordered to call off her attack by the Inspector General, Natalia was eager to comply and allowed the enemy agents to proceed on their way. [Before the Fantastic Four: Ben Grimm & Logan #1-3]
Somewhere around this time, Natasha was assigned a Red Room mission to extract the famous scientist Professor Ho Yinsen. Posing as a young widow, she stalked Yinsen at a cemetery where he attended a private funeral. Natasha seized the proper moment to knock out Yinsen’s bodyguards and retrieve the professor on behalf of Wong Chu, who wanted him to make weapons for the Sin-Congese warlord. Natasha was deaf to Yinsen’s pleas about his wife and family as he was loaded onto Wong-Chu’s airplane. [Black Widow (6th series) #6]
[Note: Because of the nature of Marvel-Time, Natasha's original depiction as a Cold War era spy in the modern Age of Heroes is no longer viable. By the current time table, the Soviet Union collapsed decades before her first appearance. Black Widow: Deadly Origin #3 lightly retconned this, stating Natasha received freelance employment by rogue Anti-American parties in the modern age rather than the sitting governments of the Soviets and China. Below, we will be referring to her employers as they were identified in the original stories.]