This is my story, and mine alone. I have my past, and although I'm not proud of some parts, it is part of me.

I will never let it go.

Part One - Hail Hydra

Hail Hydra.

Hail Hydra.

HAIL HYDRA!

Words. Always the words. The same two over and over and over, twisting her thoughts and wrecking her mind. But she was strong, and she would survive the endless days, the harsh, bare nights in a Hydra prison. Waiting. Always waiting. But for what? She knew the answer. It was life's great answer that no one and yet everyone knew.

Lea was waiting for death.

"Wake up you insolent arschloch". The German officer was relentless with his baton to wake her up, hitting the bars of her cell. Even though though Lea was supposed to be left alone. No one wanted her messing with them. Not with her skills. Lea yawned sleepily and stretched like a cat.

"I'm feeling a bit down today. Maybe you can make me feel better. If not, well, I might have to see about solitary confinement for a week." He spat in her face.

Bastard. She thought. But still focused her efforts into the particles that flowed down from her fingertips, flooding around his head and sensing the man's emotions. It turned grey to indicate a small amount of depression. Then Lea willed it to turn a vibrant yellow, the colour of happiness, and it sank through his temples. The officer would walk out of the cell block whistling. Using her energy to entertain the officers was annoying an degrading, but still better than the beating Lea's already weak body would receive if she didn't.

As you can see, it's probably pretty clear what my powers were. I could manipulate emotions, bend them to my will, but I could also read people like books. Their whole emotional history was in their brain, it was just mine for the taking.

Lea was a prisoner of Hydra, but she was a SHIELD agent. She would never stop fighting them, no matter how awful the torture got, no matter how long she was kept in solitary confinement. They were trying to convert her, to turn her into a slave. Although Lea was resisting the torture, she had never estimated that they would go to the extremes that they did before her escape.

"Up you dumb girl, get up!" The female guard snarled at her. Taking as long as was humanly possible, Lea rolled over, stretched and clambered to her feet. There wasn't much to do in her cell, so she spent most of her time sleeping, and keeping her strength up.

"Time to go, you know where today's location is." She smirked and opened Lea's cell.

"It's the same as everyday, of course I know." She replied sarcastically.

Director Fury always said that my sarcasm was genetic. I guess he was right, because even in my situation, I was always able summon a sarky comment, or a hidden jab at the guards. But anyway, you'll be wanting to know where they took me, won't you?

Lea was screaming. The pain she was experiencing right now, in that very second, was unimaginable.

"Stop."

The disembodied voice that haunted her mind, screaming 'HAIL HYDRA' was talking to her again.

"Are you ready to submit yet, Agent? Because if not, we can go again, and again, and again. So, if you wish for your pain to end, say it. You know what I mean." Of course she did. The two words that Lea would still not allow herself to utter. Not even in her mind. She had been forced to use her own powers against herself, sinking the stream of light straight into her heart. It was excruciating, and Lea had had enough.

"I will no longer be your play thing! I am not your slave!" She screamed to the two way mirror that help the man speaking to her. And with that, she smacked her own arm, activating the tracker that the electricity treatment they'd given her had rebooted. The skin on her left bicep glowed red for a few seconds, and Lea waited for a minute, then sent streams of her power flowing under the door to the guards. They slept immediately. Half an hour passed, then an hour. Lea was tiring quickly from the constant stream of power holding the guards back. Then, just as she was about to give up hope, the door was flung open by none other than Director Fury, accompanied by Natasha Romanoff. Lea dropped her arms, and staggered towards them.

"Director, I didn't tell them anything. I didn't tell them..." She whispered.

"She might have waited too long Director..."

Then the world went black.