Chapter 2: In the Shadows
The trust of the innocent is the liar's most useful tool
-Stephen King.
Darkness covered her like a blanket. The air was so thick it threatened to suffocate her. It smelled of sulfur and a heavy force was pushing down on her. It made a low and menacing hissing sound as it did so, its colossal jaws threatening to crush her within moments.
"Frost the Wolf of Evermore…"
Venom dripped from its fangs, each drop burned like flames and blinded her sight all the more than it already was.
She couldn't see. All she could see was blackness for miles.
"Black the beast of Shadow's Forlorn…"
The hissing grew louder, the venom burned her skin causing her to cry out in agony.
Her skin was turning hard and cold, like scales on a lizard.
Slowly, she felt the venom killing her.
A voice cried out in pain and longing. It didn't take her long to realize it was her own voice that had wailed. But why? Why was she crying and who was she crying for?
"Gold the Light of Iron's War…"
She couldn't see, she couldn't hear, she couldn't think.
All was dark,
There was nothing.
"Rose the Raven Nevermore…"
Three years.
The Wolf has been caged for three years. Snarling and biting for release, but in return is often beaten and cut like the animal it is seen as.
In the darkness, Lexi waits.
Waits for death, waits for blood. Waits for something other than the blackness that has become her light. Her room is dark, her hair is dark, her eyes once a luscious and rich brown now coal black like everything else in her life.
She sits silently on her bunk as silence stretches on from minutes into hours, yet she does nothing. Lexi just sits there, her knees pulled to her chest and her hand resting on a grotesque scar that is carved into her arm. She still remembers how she got it. Though it was three years ago, she sees it constantly as if it was a mere minute ago.
She nothing more than a wisp luring the unlucky dog into the shadows to be taken. She was supposed to cut herself to draw attention, but ended up actually harming herself on accident. The shock and the pain had driven the four-year-old to tears at the time, but in the end the Wolf was captured and it didn't matter.
At least not to them.
The wolf had had the opportunity to smell her lies, see her for the trickster she was and end her right there. But she didn't. The wolf bandaged her arm and gave her food. But was then taken anyway and turned into the pale girl she was now.
Three years.
It took three horrific years to finally break her. And Lexi had enough.
The wolf helped her, and the wolf was punished. The wolf needed help now. And so the wolf would be saved.
They would be here soon.
"Lexi." A gruff voice called as small wisps of light flooded her room and called her dark eyes to him. "They're here." Fang said, hatred in his voice and her assault rifle slung over his shoulder.
She should have said nothing, refused to fight and let them take her and the wolf away. That is what she wanted. That's what she asked for. But she knew he would cut her down before they even knew she was there if she gave up now.
In the darkness, Lexi nods.
In the darkness, Lexi moves.
White Fang runs ahead of her as she all but sprints in order to keep up with him. He suddenly stops as she follows his movements. Fang presses a code into the keypad, and the wall opens to reveal more darkness.
Lexi's heavily dilated eyes take in the picture before her; other than the pitch black she was used to, the ceiling above her was much taller, and a dark blue color, with little dots all around… more than she could count. As well as the large glowing orb that she had to shield her eyes from… the light was simply blinding.
"Lexi, we need to move." Fang orders as the seven-year-old notices their opponents for the first time. The soldiers were clearly mechanical, if their blank glass faces and hinged limbs were anything to go by. And the triangle within the six-teared circle indicated they were made by Stark himself. Made sense, the Wolf was important to him as well.
In the night, Lexi said nothing.
One of the robotic soldiers stepped forward, its optic lens focusing on the two of them and speaking in its monotone voice, "HYDRA Agents… identify yourselves."
Fang said nothing, he only reached behind his back, his large fingers closing around the hilt of his standard pistol, sure the gun was standard, but his skill with it was the farthest thing from.
The click of the trigger, the loud bang of gunfire, and within seconds the Stark droid was headless on the ground, the connection lost. The other droids saw this through their optics as hostile and moved to attack. But the partners were ready for them.
Lexi pulled a sharp dagger from her belt and chucked it at a random droid, the knife piercing its screen and 'killing' it instantly. Knife after knife she threw it perfectly, hitting and striking down every droid in her path, Fang by her side shooting and reloading with lightning speed too fast for the droids to track much less try and counter.
I know what you're thinking, "That little girl is seven, and how did she turn that robot into a pile of scrap in two seconds?" Lexi was trained to be perfect in combat since before she could learn to talk. As for Fang, he'd just always been there; he wasn't her mentor and he was the farthest thing from a family figure, but despite her always being afraid or even terrified of him, he was all she knew…
Him and the darkness.
With another bullet fired, and another blade thrown, the last of the droids fell. "That takes care of that," Fang sneered at the destroyed robots, kicking one's severed head as if it were garbage. Lexi said nothing as she began to follow him back into the base, back into the dark, when the air shifted.
With speed to rival Quicksilver, Lexi grabbed Fang's arms and pulled him to the ground as an arrow pierced the ground where he once stood. Fang shoved the girl away roughly, so she was on the ground now, and pulled his pistol again.
A SHIELD hovercraft was at least twenty feet in the air, with a rather buff man aiming a notched bow at Fang and Lexi, along with a red haired lady, and another beefy guy; but his hair was longer.
The beefy one spoke, no doubt his voice projected by a mic or something. "White Fang, hand over your prisoner, now!" he growled lowly, making Lexi's skin crawl.
Fang just laughed, "Let's do this," he said to his child partner as he reloaded his gun.
Lexi nervously looked at him, though it was doubtful he even noticed; they were just a kid with knives and a guy with one gun, the Avengers had broken out the heavy artillery for this fight. The Wolf must have been really important for them to bring the Hawk.
The frightening man glared at her, "Go secure the prisoner, they're mine." Lexi just nodded at his orders and sheathed the knife she was holding. She hesitated as the Beefy one pulled some sort of lever, opening the bottom of the hovercraft allowing the redhead to jump down and run into the facility. Lexi takes off after the redhead running into walls along the way. As blood runs into the young child's almost pitch black eyes, she squeaks in pain causing the redhead to turn around.
"What the hell?" the redhead says looking down in shock to see Lexi. In the light of the bright facility, Lexi is clearly seen to be malnourished and barely able to stand as she quickly loses blood from the cut on her head. Pieces of a skull swirls around her arms as another piece of the skull birthmark on her hand broke off darkening her eyes even more.
Silence stretched on for seven long harrowing seconds, until the child ripped a loose pipe from the wall and hit the red head in the shins before sprinting off down the halls. Black Widow cursed loudly holding her leg as she took her gun from her belt and aimed it at the little girl. She would have pulled the trigger had the child not vanished into the shadows.
Widow got to her feet despite the pain and ran after the girl. "Where are you?! Where's my daughter?!" she shouted into the darkness.
In the darkness, Lexi was listening.
Surrounded by the shadows was she, so much that the Widow didn't notice the child right beside her as she aimed her gun at nothing. Lexi reached out her small hand and interlocked fingers with the Widow, the red head jumping at the gentle contact and pointed her gun into the child's forehead.
"The cat has caught the bird, and he'll scratch your eyes out too, the wolf is this way." She whispered as Lexi tugged on her hand, leading her into the dark. The Widow snatched her hand away like she'd been burned.
"Where's my daughter? Tell me!" she demanded as she aimed her gun again. The child didn't as much as blink. All she did was tug her hand again and point down the corner. "You'll show me." She questioned, though her tone wasn't so much a question as it was a demand. Lexi nodded once and tugged her hand one more time, this time Black Widow complied and followed the child through the twisting endless corridors.
They came to a door marked with three claws slashed across the metal, the small child having to stand on her toes to reach the keypad, because of the blood running from her face the child slipped slightly on the sterile floor. If not for the life-threatening stakes, Widow would have found it slightly adorable.
The red light on the keypad turned green when Lexi put in the code 9653. The metal door swung open into more darkness, save for one florescent light over a moldy cot in the corner. A figure was hugging her knees, her skin paler than snow and her white hair a halo around her shoulders. Widow kneeled beside the girl, lightly touching her shoulder.
"Charlie, Charlie wake up detka," she said softly. The white-haired girl lifting her head slightly, just enough for Natasha to see a pair of cold silver eyes that did not belong to her daughter. Orbs of silver that saw and felt nothing because of the numbness she'd learned to control over the last three years.
That is until she met the unemotional yet warm and loving eyes of her own mother.
"M-Mom?" she said, her voice hoarse and cracking from not speaking for years, unless screaming in agony counts.
"We need to go detka." Her mother said before her daughter could add anything else. Natasha turned to the small child, who stood quietly, a pool of blood forming around her feet. Widow approached her and took her up in her muscular arms gently, the girl not struggling because she trusted Widow or because she'd lost too much blood to form strength to fight back.
Charlene pushed herself to her feet, she wobbled slightly but was better off than the girl in her mother's arms. They left the metal room and made their way back through the corridors until they reached the outside once more. Lexi winced from the moonlight and covered her eyes as Widow carried her.
Natasha laid her eyes on the sight of White Fang pinning Hawkeye with a gun to his throat, finger closing in around the trigger. Widow pulled her own gun and shot to weapon away from Fang. The muscly man growled in fury as he charged at Widow, but a familiar figure tackled him to the ground. The Winter Soldier punched Fang unconscious with his metal arm before slinging Hawkeye over his soldier and sprinting towards the SHIELD hover. He threw the Hawk inside before picking up his daughter and helping her up.
Natasha handed him the little girl, whose dark eyes were locked on White Fang, small pools of water leaking from her eyes and the smell of salt mixing with her blood-caked face.
Once Hawkeye's eyes were bandaged; Fang had landed a pretty bad strike across his eyes, the hover began to take off.
They were in the air about to be rid of that place, when White Fang woke up. He spotted the agents of SHIELD escaping and roared so loud Lexi could feel it vibrate in her teeth. The HYDRA agent locked eyes with Lexi and his anger fell away, there was nothing in his eyes but the burning pain of betrayal.
Lexi let her tears fall as another agent bandaged her head.
"Goodbye." She whispered, not loud enough for the agent to hear, but somehow, Fang heard it all.
The HYDRA base disappeared in the distance,
And in the darkness, Lexi cried.