Disclaimer: All characters (except Amarah and some others) and locations are property of Stan Lee and Marvel.

Author´s Note: Thanks for checking out this story I have been working on it for some time. Thanks for the favorites, follows and thanks to Angi Mari for being my first review! I would like to know what you think and if you have some ideas for this story. Enjoy!

Chapter 1

Amarah woke up with a strong headache, her body felt numb and her senses seemed to have detached from her body. She tried to open her eyes but her eyelids hurt and they felt heavy, she tried to bring one of her hands to her head to try to calm the pain so strong that she felt but could not. With a little more effort and pain, she managed to open her eyes and discovered why she had not been able to move her hand. Once again, she was tied. It should not surprise her to realize that but still; she could not help the tears of frustration that began to roll down her cheeks.

As her senses began to return to her body, she began to be aware of where she was and what had happened to her hours ago to find herself in this situation. She was in the same room where they used to send people who did not fulfill the purpose of the experiment or who behaved badly during the test.

Vaguely she recalled being called by one of the men in charge of the control of the hostages to go to the central laboratory, where they used to experiment with the thoughts and memories of the individuals. Amarah had begged the man in front of her to give her a little time before taking her with them; she needed to prepare herself for what was to come.

The experiments of this type, used to be the most painful and derogatory. Not only during the process but also later. The experiment consisted of altering the memories that the individuals had of their past lives and turning them into agreements designed by them to make them believe that all their life they had been preparing for when the moment to become a soldier of Hydra arrived.

The first time Amarah had gone through the experiment the consequences had been fatal. It was something she could never forget. She remembered exactly how they had taken her by force to the laboratory, tied hand and foot as a precaution to not try to escape. Upon entering the laboratory, the first thing she could see was the chair that was in the middle of the room. There were ropes on the sides where the arms were placed and more ropes on the bottom, where the feet were placed. The room was full of machines that Amarah didn´t know what they were for, there were wires all over the floor and there were no windows. With form approaching, Amarah could see the injections and medical devices that were on the side of the chair.

Once the same men who had taken her placed her in the chair and put the ropes on her feet and hands, two scientists who had already been in the room when she arrived began to place cables and small patches on her head, neck , arms, stomach and legs. The cables were all placed on her head and there was only one on her neck, the patches were distributed on the other parts of her body. Once that was done, one of the scientists took one of the needles and injected it into her neck, a little above where the cable was. The needle was large so it caused Amarah some trouble.

However, what came later showed Amarah that the needle's discomfort was nothing compared to the pain they were producing her. She felt that her head was going to explode, her vision blurred, she began to feel a pressure in her chest that made it difficult to breathe, her arms and legs felt numb and her ears buzzed.

She remembers that she began to scream and try to move but the cords on her feet and hands were tightly tied, so she only managed to move her body partially. Unable to endure it any longer, Amarah let herself be carried away by unconsciousness. When she woke up, she was in a dark room and felt much disoriented. Shortly afterwards a couple of guards brought her some water and explained why she was there.

After that and until this moment, Amarah never managed to complete the experiment satisfactorily. The pain and confusion was so big, that she started screaming and waving her arms in the middle of the experiment, the consequences were disastrous for her. Not only did she have to deal with the ravages of the experiment on her body and mind, leaving her weak, with severe headaches and with the feeling of not knowing what was true and what was a lie in her memories; she also had to deal with the punishment that was imposed on her for not to come with the test.

The punishment was almost always the same; they sent her to a dark room and kept her there for three days, without food and with very little water. After having been in this room several times, Amarah had tried to work harder and harder to complete the experiment, but never succeeded. Then, she began to accept the idea that she would have to learn to survive in that room, without complaining and trying to save as much water as they gave her for when they "forgot" to give her.

Today was the first day of her punishment and she was confident that the weakness and pain she felt would keep her asleep most of the day and avoiding the urge to drink water. It also represented a rest for her head. When she used to stay awake after the experiment, Amarah lost herself in her memories and was frustrated at not being able to identify which ones were hers and which ones had been placed by Hydra. So she preferred to sleep until her body and mind regained strength to continue fighting for survival.

She did not think of herself as someone who avoided pain or difficult situations, but she had so much to worry about and fight, that she tried to save her strength and energy for situations that would help her get out of this prison. There was nothing she could do to change what Hydra had done with her mind and what they would probably continue to do if she did not get out or die before, so she had decided not to wear herself out and take an easy way out.

With the thought that she was strong enough to keep fighting, she let himself be carried away by darkness.

When Amarah woke again, her body was less sore, her head no longer hurt and she was aware of everything around her. On the floor, next to the door, there was a glass of water. That meant it was the second day of punishment. Amarah had managed to decipher those little details that gave her information with the passage of time and her constant visits to the punishment room.

The guards did not bring her water on the first day, usually because she was unconscious or perhaps it was also part of the punishment. The second day was when they began to bring her water, twice a day and a piece of bread with a slice of cheese. The food was only received on the second day and on a single occasion. By the third day they bring her two glasses of water again.

Amarah did not have much to do inside that room. If she stayed awake for a long time, memories of everything that had happened in her life began to haunt her. Memories of her past life and her current life waged a battle inside her head that left her mentally drained.

Amarah used to have several happy memories of her life before Hydra, memories that with the passing of the experiments were erased and distorted. The only one who had managed to stay intact was the memory of the day Hydra kidnapped her. She remembered the nice blue dress she wore that day and her white shoes, remembered the fresh air in the park and the dancing of the leaves of the trees. She reminded the children that like her had gone to the park to play for a while and have fun; she remembered the ice cream stand where her mother had bought her one of her favorite flavor: vanilla. And she remembered her mother, beautiful and tall, taking her by the hand and taking her to each of the games she asked for.

Then, the memory transformed into screams, people running and the sound of a bomb exploding. Amarah remembered how her mother had tried to get her out of there as soon as possible; they started running towards the exit when they were intercepted by three men dressed in black, balaclavas and weapons. One of them took Amarah with him while she cried, shouted and kicked; asking they not to take her away from her mother. Another of the men began to hit her mother while the third entered the black truck behind them and began to light it.

They placed Amarah in the back, tied her hands and feet and put duct tape in her mouth before injecting her into her shoulder. Seconds later, everything went black for her.

Amarah tried to fight against those memories, at first she wished she could erase that day from her mind. Then she began to cling to that memory, it produced a force inside her that she did not know she had to keep fighting to survive and maybe someday, to avenge what they did to her mother and the childhood that was taken from her.

Clinging once more to that memory, Amarah plunged back into sleep.

The third day was always the longest and heaviest for Amarah. Her body had recovered fully, so she was not tired enough to sleep for several hours. It was on the third day, where she took advantage of the solitude she had to train for the next tests she had.

She tried to strengthen her mind by reviving as much as she could from all the times she had been taken to the lab to experiment. She forced her mind to understand the idea that the pain was not real. If she was convinced that the pain was false, maybe she could succeed in the future trial. Although she doubted it. The pain was so intense that there was no way to convince herself that it was not real and that frustrated her.

Amarah used hours trying to get strong that in the end, she managed to tire her body and mind enough to go back to sleep for several hours. Sometimes, she would fall asleep satisfied with the advances she made and other times, she would get angry at herself for not being stronger. The weakness did not help her in this situation. If she wanted to survive, she would have to start coping with the fact that her life was probably going to be full of pain, but that could not make her collapse and surrender without first fighting.

It had been seven years since she had first arrived at the base. Seven years in which nobody had been able to rescue her. Seven years full of pain and darkness. Still, Amarah did not lose hope of ever being free again. To be able to escape from this hell and try to leave Hydra in the past. She needed to be strong and endure everything that was to come, all the pain and all the experiments that had not yet arrived but that in due course she would live.

With the thought that at some point she would be presented with the opportunity to be free, Amarah allowed herself to be carried away by her dreams. Tomorrow would end her punishment and new things waited for her.