I wake up, and I see a small, concrete room. I am dangling in the air; arms are tied with chains and attached to the ceiling, my arms extended all the way. One wrong move and my arms can be ripped out; I look around the room to see if there is any way for me to escape, there is none. Suddenly, the door creeks open and a man steps into my cell, I turn my head and stare at him. He grabs a chair and sets in front of me; he sits down and stares up at me. I raise an eyebrow and say,

"Take a picture; everyone knows you want to."

He smirks at me and then stands up. There is a knock at the door, and he walks over to open it. I wrap my hands, trying to get an advantage with the chains; two guards bring in a table. My blood turns cold, on the table is a bunch of torture devices and medical equipment. The guards leave, and the man turns to me, and his eyes are cold, I meet his stare and wait for him to do something.

"I want you to tell me something." The man says, "I want you to tell me what made you think you could escape HYDRA."

"I knew HYDRA would come for me, at one point or another, I just decided to do what I wanted to do." I lie, I thought I could escape them, I was foolish.

"They say that it would take an astonishing amount of injuries to kill you, let's test that theory." He picks up a whip and walks to my back. I hear the sound of his clothes rubbing against itself; he raises his hand, I lower my head and brace myself.

Pain. The whip cracks against my back, I feel the spikes at the end of it cut into the skin of my back, my shirt tears leaving my back bare. Blood is rising to the surface and slowly starting to drip down my back, the man raises his arm again and brings down the whip once more.

Twice.

Three times.

Ten times.

Twenty times.

By the time the man stops, my back is entirely bloody; a large pool is underneath me. The whip caught the skin on my stomach and chest, too; I dangle there trying to breathe through the pain. My body is screaming in agony; I refused to make a sound that entire time, they were NOT going to see me beg or show pain. The man stopped whipping me after the twentieth blow, he walks around me and stares at my bloody form, he sets the whip down and walks toward the door, right before he leaves to walk out he turns to look over his shoulder and says,

"Nikolina, don't you worry, I will break you. After all, I did it once before." He smirks at me and walks out the door, slamming it behind him, I instantly recognize him. Mikael Dimitrov, he used to train me in my powers when I first came to HYDRA. I would go through mental and physical challenges; I would be taught for hours on end without a single break. He pushed too far one day in one of his problems, and he broke me.

I snap out of my flashback and try to get my breathing under control, the room is cold, and the floor was wet, both with my blood and water. Nobody comes back for a few hours, and during that time, I was able to loosen the cuffs a little. Two guards come in and release the chains; I fall to the floor in a heap, my legs numb from being dangled for who knows how long. My arms are on fire; I feel the blood in my veins starting to travel to my hands. The guards use the guns in their hands and force me to stand.

"Where are you taking me?" I ask, my voice rough from not using it.

They ignore me and lead me down a hall, they shove me inside a room, and there in the middle of the room is a table with a light above it. I look around the room, trying to figure out a way to escape, suddenly the door bursts open again, and this time there are four soldiers, and they grab my arms and legs. I start to fight against them, I kicked one guard in the face and kneed another in the gut. The other two were able to strap my arms to the table, all four guards recovered and strapped my kicking legs to the table, they place straps on my stomach and head, so I won't be able to move, and then they walked out the door.

A doctor runs in with a tray of needles full of various liquids. I look at the dish and then at him. It's him — the doctor who experimented on me when I was a child. Dr. Vasiliev, a cruel man, he didn't care if I was scared, crying, in pain, or broken, he just kept on experimenting on me.

"Hello, Ms. Volkov, it has been a while, no? I see the powers I gave you are still wonderful."

"Stay the hell away from me." I snarl while flashing my eyes black, his eyes showed fear, but his face remained cold.

"Now, don't be like that, my dear." he raised a device that had one large needle with openings at the top. He unscrewed the needles from the vials and placed the jars one after the other in the machine. When he is done, he looks over at me and smiles. He raises the needle to my neck and shoves it in roughly. I bit my lip to keep from screaming out in pain; I felt blood begin to pool in my mouth. I realized that I bit my lip so hard that I pierced the skin.

The needle was still in my neck, and my blood is pumping hard in my veins; my body feels as if someone has set me on fire. I look up at the "doctor" and see him staring at me. The pain in my body is beginning to become too much.

I pass out from the pain, but before I do, I hear Vasiliev say something to me,

"I do hope you survive this."

Darkness.