12:43, 17th June, 2006. Grecian beach bordering the Aegean Sea.
Anatoly Kozlovsky checked his watch discreetly as he lifted his glass of cognac. Five minutes until the deadline. It had been a long road for the boy who had grown up in Stalinist Russia – from eking out a meagre living on the Siberian steppes to becoming one of the world's greatest power brokers. A leader of HYDRA – an organisation that like him had evolved over the decades. History had shown that outright displays of power, no matter how frightening, would only invite resistance. No, the only way to save the world from itself was to direct it from the shadows – to see that the chaos and upheaval without an overarching authority would see humanity tear itself apart. And only the leaders of HYDRA had the will and the foresight to guide humanity to its golden age.
Even as a young intelligence officer of a mere two and a half decades in the 1980s Kozlovsky had seen this. And so his fellow sympathisers had arranged for him to disappear off the books into the shadows where the world's destiny was being shaped. He had long since proven himself to be an excellent agent whilst working for the KGB. It had been a simple matter to be quietly transferred into HYDRA'S black ops program – one of the three cells operating today. The Red Room. He was in his late forties now but looked like a man ten years his junior, with only a few grey streaks in his hair and a few wrinkles around his forehead – one of the blessings his association with HYDRA had bestowed him with. As he raised his glass again a slight cough sounded in front of him.
Ah, perfect. His fellow HYDRA leader was here.
'I do hope I'm not interrupting' Aldrich Killian said stiffly. Kozlovsky stifled a snort as he took in the Eurasian: he was tall and powerfully built, certainly, but his bearing just screamed out 'outsider'. Honestly, who on earth wore a suit to the beach?
'Please, sit down' he said cordially – as cordial one could be whilst contemplating how to kill the idiot in front of them anyway. He could already see the hushed looks, the curious wonderings of the locals. He raised the bottle. 'Would you like some?'
'Of course' Killian said faux-amicably. Ah. There was the leader of HYDRA's technological division AIM. And so, in the sunny locale of Grecian coastal paradise, they discussed how they would make HYDRA great once more. One way or another, Kozlovsky knew that they would finish what the Red Skull had started.
09:00, 29th June , 2008. Red Room Headquarters, Siberia.
Instinct, ingrained from years of experience in the KGB and then in the Red Room was the only warning Kozlovsky had that his current aide was in the room.
'You have a conference scheduled now, sir' she said.
'Ah yes, thank you Ms. Moneypenny' he said drolly, idly spinning around in his office chair like a child high on a sugar rush. He came to a sudden stop, and all levity left him as he speared her with a cool gaze. He waited until she had left the room and all security measures were engaged before he opened his laptop. A few clicks and keystrokes later and he was logged into what was possibly the most secure online messaging forum in the Northern Hemisphere, courtesy of sister organisation Advanced Idea Mechanics. And – unknowingly of course – SHIELD's own technological research. Captain America and his Howling Commandos must be rolling in their graves, he thought wryly. Just a few seconds later, a small phone icon popped up on the screen. Accept or decline?
He clicked accept. Instantly, the screen split into two. One each for his fellow leaders.
'Gentlemen' he greeted.
They inclined their heads in acknowledgement. Greetings were a waste of words, so no time was spent on further pleasantries. After all, they were not friends. They were merely people who shared the same vision for the world. The three people in the e-conference were collectively the executive board of the HYDRA of the new era.
For all the Red Skull's ambition and cunning, he had an ego to match. When he had disappeared with Captain America, HYDRA had been shattered very nearly beyond repair. But his few remaining lieutenants – Wolfgang von Strucker, Baron Zemo, Arnim Zola – had been prepared. Even so, perhaps the Skull's vision of a new world order might have ended with World War Two, but for an incredible gamble relying completely on the weakness of human nature. In the wake of Allied victory, drunk on success Churchill and Truman had made a critical error. One that would see the stagnant society that they had fought so hard to preserve be wiped from the annals of history with true utopia.
Operation Paperclip.
Drunk in his nation's crowning moment of glory, President Truman had quietly authorised the relocation of some one and a half thousand Nazi scientists to maintain its growing power. Among them were the scientists that had studied the mysterious power source Captain America had reported powering the Red Skull's army. The Tesseract.
Chief among them had been Arnim Zola, who had beheld the Tesseract in person. Slowly, whilst the nascent agency of SHIELD squandered its resources searching for the lost Captain and the Tesseract, Zola and his compatriots had overseen the rebirth of HYDRA. By the time Zola had died in the early 1970s, he and his colleagues had turned perhaps a hundred SHIELD members. Including a young SHIELD agent by the name of Alexander Pierce. The same Pierce who was now the Secretary of the World Security Council. Former US Secretary of Defence.
At the same time, the Skull's lieutenants had activated every single agent they had planted inside Soviet forces – a simple matter considering the vacuum left behind by Stalin's great purge. They had arranged for the safety of many of the remaining HYDRA loyalists. When the arms race had started in earnest in the 1950s, the Red Room's genesis had been all but assured. And as for Advanced Idea Mechanics? It had been surprisingly easy to convince the think tank that HYDRA was the only way forward.
'I need hardly remind you all that after neutralising the traitor Litvinenko in the nick of time that this Project Clean Sweep is crucial to putting us back on the map,' Alexander Pierce said. 'Our goal is as it ever was since our reconstitution; let slip the dogs of war and unleash chaos that can only be healed by HYDRA's order.'
The younger men waited patiently whilst the Secretary took a sip of water. After a long moment, he spoke again: 'You will have read in the papers that the heads of state of almost every sovereign nation will be meeting on neutral soil, in Wakanda some months from now. They claim that it is to rebuild the world economy. As is their wont, they will vacillate back and forth, make obfuscating promises…and do absolutely nothing. It is during this conference that we shall strike. The world is lost because it follows blind leaders. But we are the future, and we are here now. The time for such bumbling incompetence is at an end.'
'You plan to announce HYDRA to the world by killing them all?' Killian said drily, leaning back into his leather-backed swivel chair with all the arrogance of a wolf of Wall Street.
'Not at all, Mr Killian. What I have in mind is far more simple. HYDRA was founded on the belief that humanity could not be trusted with its own freedom. But as World War Two showed, if we try to take that freedom by force, they resist. And thus, humanity must surrender its freedom willingly for any lasting peace. To do that, we must first show them – show the world – how incompetent their leaders are. How, as millions die, they wine and dine without care for their citizens. Major Kozlovsky? Have you given the matter your attention?'
'Absolutely,' he rasped. It held just the slightest trace of danger, like a snake slithering unseen through the grass. 'Mr Killian and I have spent the past month preparing for this operation. And while on the face of it this appears to be quite a complex operation, I am pleased to report that the nearly all the resources we need are already at our disposal. Agents. Extremis. And a few items my agents are appropriating for our cause at this moment.'
'Major? Mr Killian?'
There was nothing more for him to say. 'Kozlovsky has sent his best agent to acquire the material for AIM for, ah, modification' the scientist said after a long pause. 'As to this conference with its high ideals, I can assure you that we need not worry. I am very happy to assure you all that by the end of the year the world will be purer and thank us for it. And the age of HYDRA will have begun.'
'And who is this agent?'
'My best student,' Kozlovsky said with what might have been the faintest trace of pride. 'The fastest to ever graduate from the Black Widow program.'
He licked his lips and tasted her name on his tongue.
Natalia Romanova.
11:13, 25th December, 2001. Red Room Headquarters, Siberia.
Three years. Three years since she had been taken from her home for him to shape her into the assassin he and his superiors needed. She had been stubborn at first, of course. Resistant. But she was far too important to risk killing, and so he had been uncharacteristically patient. And he had been rewarded for his restraint. She possessed an intelligence that was far beyond that of her peers, soaking in knowledge like a sponge. After a mere two years of instruction, she had already gained fluency in English and Mandarin Chinese, and had been well on the way to it in another four. She had learned quickly after the first few beatings and missed meals that failure was not tolerated.
One day, Kozlovsky remembered fondly, he had even been able to leave her outside for a few hours to think over her incompetence. He wasn't afraid of her somehow escaping – she was still only a child after all, and in any case where would she go? The nearest human settlement was days away and that was without taking into account the fact that she was naked and had no idea where she was anyway. No, as far he was concerned, she would either die, in which case she had been nothing more than a waste of time, or she would live and continue to provide him with the challenge of breaking her.
In the three years that she had been under his wing, Kozlovsky had never quite been able to manage to break her completely. Sure, he had been able to make her cry – one of his fondest memories had been beating and whipping her bloody and throwing her into a cell to freeze – but, he had never quite managed to make that faint light of defiance in those emerald green eyes disappear. But she hadn't yet begun to bathe in blood. That changed today.
He stepped up to the podium, peering down at the two young girls facing each other. Romanova and some other girl...Rasskazova, if he recalled correctly. At a nod from him, they began circling, studying each other for weaknesses. It was Rasskazova who finally gave in, lunging in with a strike at Romanova's head – only for Romanova to sway before lashing out with her leg. It was almost like a tennis match, Kozlovsky thought. Parry. Strike. Dodge.
It continued like this for several minutes, the two girls moving almost faster than the human eye could see, a combination of both their training and the serums coursing through their bloodstreams. In the end, and as expected, it was Natalia who stood victorious; after the first few preliminary minutes of feeling out her opponent, Romanova had gone completely on the offensive, slowly driving them back, yet at the same time, pulling her blows just enough so that it seemed they were nearly equal. Until Rasskazova's head struck the wall, as she jumped back from a final, sweeping leg. Stunned, she found herself on the floor, Romanova's knee digging into her back, hands daintily placed on either side of her neck.
Kozlovsky descended upon them silently. After a long, terse silence, he inclined his head to Romanova and offered her a slow clap. 'Finish her' he commanded, gaze intently trained on her face. This was the moment, he knew.
She hesitated, the ruthlessness ingrained in her over the past three years and the innate, disgusting compassion that was at her core warring – and the ruthlessness won, for a second later, she sharply twisted her arms, and the other girl fell limp to the ground.
'Next time, you will not hesitate' Kozlovsky said simply.
'No. I will not.' Romanova said slowly, eyes fixed on the young girl she had just killed with her bare hands. The director was pleased to see that the tremor that had pervaded her body mere seconds before was already fading.
'Look at me when you are speaking. You will not what, Natalia?' Kozlovsky demanded.
He hid a grin as her voice hardened and her head tilted to look him in the eye.
'Next time, I will not hesitate, master.'
For in her eyes, the bright vibrancy that had been there only minutes before was gone, replaced with a dull blankness of shock. Yes, he thought to himself. Now, we can truly begin.
Out loud, he merely nodded in acknowledgement and said, 'Merry Christmas.'
Silently, he added to himself: Heil HYDRA.
17:54, June 29th 2008. Location: just outside Murmansk
The young woman had been moving through the snow for nearly five hours, insulated from the cold by a snow ghillie suit that had her blending seamlessly against the snow and grey branches of vegetation long since dead from the chill. In front of her was nothing but a single storey high compound. It looked like a derelict old warehouse with its half collapsed roof and doors half-torn off their hinges, hanging awkwardly askew. The building was in fact a former facility of the Biopreparat and while it had fallen into disrepair for nearly decade, for a year now it had been hosting a small delegation of scientists and Spetsnaz agents sent by the Russian Ministry of Defence. To be precise, two scientists and six Spetsnaz agents. If the intelligence could be trusted.
Only a handful of people knew it was still in use; almost all of them were in the building. After today they would be dead.
Natalia stopped crawling. She was about three hundred metres away, she guessed. Slowly, she slid a single slim finger outside, testing the air. No wind. Perfect. Her fingers moved quickly; within a minute her sniper rifle was assembled, barrel just barely poking out of her camouflage. She took a mental inventory. Handguns. Both fully loaded and two extra clips on her belt. Check. Smoke grenades. Check. Knives, check: one holstered to each thigh, one on her belt and a couple more hidden on her body.
She scanned the inside of the warehouse through the scope: there were two guards pacing around…and no-one else. She felt a trickle of doubt. Had they seen her? No, she assured herself as she lowered the rifle by a few millimetres. There it was. A gleaming sliver of metal just barely poking out of the shadowy interior. A trapdoor, then. She let herself relax. All she had to do was wait.
Another half hour came and went before the guards began to change shifts. She watched as they rapped hard on the steel trapdoor and shouted in their walkie-talkies. She returned to the rifle, rolling her shoulders in preparation. The hatch began to swing open as the two guards above ground heaved. Two more clambered out; like their compatriots, they were clad heavily in clothes for the cold, but no armour that she could see. Even so…she adjusted her aim, and fired.
Even with her earmuffs deadening the sound she could make out a low booming crackle; her hands wove hard and fast. They all fell with a single shot, their mouths parted in a soundless shout of surprise and warning.
Now was the time to strike; she shook herself out of the ghillie and sprinted straight towards the warehouse. There was no way that the remaining guards wouldn't have heard their companions being gunned down, but would they lock down their facility or not? She didn't plan on waiting to find out; Kozlovsky had made it clear what he'd do to her if she failed him.
Twenty metres away; a hand was reaching out for the rim of the trapdoor. Without breaking stride, her hand flickered and that unfortunate Spetsnaz agent now found that their hand was pinned to the hatch by a knife. A few strides later and a bullet had gone right through his eye-socket. She dived down into the rabbit hole. Except this wasn't Wonderland and she certainly wasn't Alice, she thought grimly as she slammed down onto a burly agent. Momentum or not, he was barely fazed and slammed her against the wall; already she could see another Spetsnaz aiming for her head with their assault rifle.
She kneed her captor and in a single smooth motion twirled, looking for all the world like she'd been born to be in the Bolshoi. Perhaps, in another life, she would have been. The moment passed: her captor's arm snapped, bone jutting out at the elbow and he doubled over a moment later as his companion fired. Whatever poor excuse for body armour didn't save his life, but the bullets couldn't punch through front and back, so at least it saved hers. She held the dead man up as a shield. Two seconds later, a click sounded.
She didn't hesitate; Natalia tossed his dead companion at him, sending him stumbling back, off balance for just a second. An instant later he found himself swallowing a bullet. It didn't agree with him. Romanova flung the doors to the laboratory open and fired two shots. An hour later, by the time the alarm had been raised in Moscow, she had disappeared. Her wig, contact lenses and facial padding had been discarded. The computer hard drives had been removed. The laboratory notes were burned.
And her lethal cargo had already begun its journey west.
Hi, thanks for reading. Please follow, favourite, review, all that jazz. I assure you that this has only begun; its going to be massively AU by the time it finishes, and cross over into a couple of different fandoms. Until next time,
Phoenix
