I was so delighted by all the people who reviewed in the first day, especially NicoleR85 who has reviewed every chapter of my story. Thanks for supporting me so loyally. So I got straight onto the next chapter and my dudes, stuff goes down.
Because my outline for the story is not hugely fixed there is room for suggestions of interesting scenarios Annie could get into.
Please enjoy!
Chapter 41
Wanda's magic pulsed through her head. Kneading and tugging at wisps of memories. Wanda grunted in frustration at her inability to latch onto anything in Elvira's head. once again.
The Maximoffs had verbally filled her in on everything they knew about her. Some things she had learnt during their training sessions as information popped into her head like muscle memory. Such as use the opponents weapon against them and locate weaknesses to exploit. The basic knowledge quickly growing more refined.
But they had moved onto Wanda attempting to draw latent memories out with her abilities. Elvira opened her eyes as Wanda removed her hands from Elvira's temples. Her eyebrows were drawn in and a frown tugged at her lips, "I can feel the memories there but I can't get to them. They're moving around too quickly." She groaned, trying to find the words to explain her experiences in the mind, "they're not tethered to any events or objects or other clusters of memories like they should be."
Elvira searched her mind to find her memories still fluttered out of her conscious reach but some combat related ones were closer. "I can recall being in a small, cluttered room looking for information. There is someone else there but their face isn't clear. I'm looking for maps and time tables?" she finished more as a question.
Wanda perked up minutely at the semi-progress.
"I also weakened what brainwashing I could find," Wanda's voice whispered in her head. With Elvira opening up to the Maximoffs, Wanda was able to communicate telepathically with Elvira like she did with Pietro.
"Thank you," Elvira responded, squeezing Wanda's hand.
With the strain of the day wafting fatigue into their systems Elvira began the night-time ritual she had developed to calm her mind enough to sleep. She curled into Pietro's body tonight, as the twins took turns sharing their slim beds with her. When Elvira had dosed right off in Pietro's arms after the wiping the theory was tested. They discovered that Elvira could only sleep with another body next to her. Why? They had no way of knowing.
Pietro lazily draped an arm over her torso, bringing the blanket over her with it. With her eyes shut she began to hum a tune she didn't know the words to. She only knew 2 lines of the tune but she just repeated it in a soft hum until she lost consciousness.
As the humming stopped and silence filled its place, Pietro whispered, "She can't stay here."
Wanda sighed, "I know."
"So what are we going to do?"
"I need more time to work on her memories. Without them she'll be running around blind in the real world." Wanda sighed at his scrunched-up forehead the peeked over the top of Elvira's sleeping head. "We can't go with her Piet. The only way to Stark is through HYDRA."
BBB
Pietro grinned and Elvira's eyes squeezed tighter to keep away consciousness. Her hair was spread out in all directions like a golden, curly mane. Which had been what waked him up. Her hair to landed on his nose, blocking his breathing.
To be honest he didn't mind. Pietro appreciated any way of waking up that didn't involve Elvira screaming. Like that one morning when he had jolted awake at the sound of her screaming about a man in black shotting her from beside Wanda. He sprung up to protect them from the man, but in his hurry his blanket had wrapped around his legs, and he tumbled onto the floor. I was not a good morning.
Elvira finally peeked an eye open to see his cheeky grin. She pushed his face away with a poorly supressed smirk.
"Would you both quit giggling like school girls," Wanda muttered grouchily from her own bed. But she was awake now and without much time before Elvira was whisked off to her mysterious training, they should get a move on. "I guess we should get onto fixing you brain," she smirked from her bed, playfully adding a sigh.
Pietro, as always was perched at Elvira's side anxiously watching as Elvira and Wanda sat cross-legged opposite one another. Wanda raised her hands to Elvira's head for better focus on her odd thought movements. As usual it was like grasping at air. Everything moved so fast and with no pattern. Then she found it. A solid memory. She tugged at it.
Elvira's breath hitched. "Its my nightmare," she explained in an abnormally weak voice.
"It feels like a memory, not a dream," Wanda muttered as just keeping hold of the memory was taking most of her attention.
She felt something connected. The tie was weak but it was there. She followed with hesitancy but also fear of losing it. This was the closest they had come to definite progress. As she gripped the new memory, she could faintly hear Pietro soothing Elvira.
With a shaky voice the blonde described the memory as it came to her, "I'm in an empty room but I'm holding something blue. It's important but I don't know why. It's small. There is someone standing in the doorway but I it's too dark to see them yet. They're tall and-", Wanda can feel her swallow a shriek and try to pull away.
She holds her firm, "Go on. It feels real but you're safe."
Elvira gulps in big, slow breaths and continues, "It's the man wearing a black leather suit that shot me. He is coming towards me. His eyes are cold. He's back to kill me," she takes another breath to steady to voice. "I'm not fighting back but he almost crushes my head," she jumps and a small sound of pain escapes her, "H-he throws me against the wall. No." Elvira pulls away from Wanda's hands furiously shaking her head. "I don't want to see anymore."
Wanda lets her go but asks curiously, "Why did this man try to kill you twice?" She left the second question to herself. 'Why didn't you fight back?'
Elvira sinks into Pietro's hold, "I don't know, but what if he's still out there?"
BBB
The padded floor moulded slightly to her weight as she stepped onto the matt. The elasticated floor thumped as the HYDRA agent brawled towards her. She didn't even need her powers to dodge the lunge and twist behind him. But the purpose of this battle wasn't honing her skills. It was to refine her blood-lust. No-one exits until they see blood.
It was always one of her guards, a particularly cruel one, that was suddenly called into the impromptu fighting ring. The surprise on their faces suggested that they were never informed before-hand. With some the surprise morphed into fear and others grew a wicked grin, excited to battle the weapon.
This one was eager to fight. He swung around, his fist following his eyes. She wanted to end this quickly. However, a simple cut or scratch won't be enough to exit this fight. Dr. List wants progress. A portal appeared between his fist and Elvira's head right before they collided. He stared in shock as his appendage sunk into the window in space. The blue light oddly illuminating the guards twisted brow.
With a silent but hesitant command, the blue twirling portal vanished and with it the guard's hand that had been thrust into it.
He froze, trying to process the clean end of his forearm. Elvira, no matter how unkind the guard was, didn't want to watch the blood drip from his now-stump of an arm. That doesn't change that she maimed this man. She did it because if she refused, Elvira would be thrown back into the tank. Left to painfully lose every gasp of breath. Her fists clenched to keep herself in line. To remind herself that her disobedience will be rewarded with pain. That did not mean they held her in their pocket.
Elvira looked to Dr. List for permission to leave. Let him believe she needs his permission. The balding man's grin she takes as a yes. She vaguely hears the scuffing of boots on the floor as the frozen guard is dragged away.
"Excellent progress Project Fusion," Dr. List grinned as he scribbled in his notebook. "Now we move onto phase 3."
Before Elvira could ponder what phase 3 meant for what phase 1 and 2 had been the door slid open. A tremoring man in hand-cuffs was pushed inside. His swollen eyes searched the room with rampant fear. He wasn't HYDRA.
Elvira's stomach dropped. This couldn't be-
Dr. List held out a gun. The motion resulted in the guards surrounding the room to train her movements with their own firearms.
"Kill him."
"What?" Elvira breathed, her voice cracking over the vowel.
"You recall how to use a firearm, yes? You're report says you were quite skilled." Dr. List searches for the logical conclusion of her horror.
"No. I will not shoot an innocent man," she seethed at him. Her eyes screamed at she would not object to using that gun on Dr. List.
He jotted a few notes in his book as he sighed, "Yes you will."
Her hand latched onto his as he wrote. His hand tensing under the bruising force. "I am not your weapon to point and shoot."
He struggled to keep his voice from shaking but Dr. List managed to state with some confidence, "You already are and you will accept it."
Her forehead creased before an opening door was followed by an accented outrage, "What are you doing?!"
No.
She dropped List's arm and turned hoping she was wrong. Pietro was being dragged towards her, an electric collar, similar to her own, strapped to his neck.
Dr. List pushed the gun towards her more assertively this time. "Shoot the civilian or the Maximoff takes his place," the punctuate the threat a guard held a gun up to Pietro's shocked face, "Either way, one will die." Dr. List grinned at his cleverness.
This is what he had wanted all along. That's why he had placed them all in the same cell. To control her. To make her care about something so he would have leverage. She wanted to kill Dr. List. To tear him apart. But she was the idiot who let herself care. To openly walk into weakness.
But it was too late now for regret.
Her face twisted into stony stillness. All emotion drained from her heart leaving an even beat exactly like it did when she held Pietro's throat in her hand. Her arm gripped the gun securely, not one tremble. HYDRA had won. She did care about the orphan twins from Sokovia. Their lives now weighed more than an innocent life. Than any number of innocents.
Dr List's countdown started, "10-".
His voice cut off at the bang before nine even touched his lips. The target dropped to the floor, fear frozen on his whitening face. Dark blood seeped from the bullet hole in his forehead.
Pietro's gaze darted inhumanly fast from the now dead man to Elvira. His bloodshot eyes disbelieving. Like he couldn't fathom what she had just given in exchange for his life. But how could she not?
She turned away from him still full of a sickening calm. Elvira set her impassive eyes on Dr List who now wore a victorious grin. She intended to rip it from his face.
"You wanted a killer? You got one. I'll do what you want but if you threaten Pietro or Wanda again, I will break this collar off with my bare hands, teleport your lacky's bullet into his own head and send a piece of you to every country."
Dr. List's face twisted into a mix of horror and fear. He now saw her for what she was. A caged animal that would tear them all apart if given the slightest chance.
With that she left, grabbing Pietro's wrist on her way out. Two guards following behind, more meeting them on the way out. Her grip bruised his wrist as she pulled him further away from the dead body she left in her wake.
He finally wrenched free, "Elvira! What the hell did you do?!"
She stopped and the guards grew nervous. "I saved your life Pietro!" she shouted back. "What? Did you think they were bluffing? We are nothing but objects to them. If we don't work as planned, they tear us apart and start building again. If we break they make a new one!"
"That wasn't your decision to make!" he rebuffed with intensity to match her own.
"You don't get it! If I didn't kill him they would have killed you instead. Then they would have brought in Wanda and broken every part of her body until I did what they wanted."
Every breath Elvira took seemed make breathing harder. Every inhale not enough so she tried to suck in more. "I-I can't lose both of you," wheezed as everything inside her burned. The weight of the stakes finally hitting her.
Pietro wrapped her up in his arms, cradling her head into his shoulder as she completely collapsed into him. "You're not going to lose us," He said into her hair.
Her body shook, "I… If I can can't protect myself, how can I protect you?"
He pressed a kiss to her forehead, "You don't have to protect us. We're a team. Besides, just because I can't sneak up on you in a fight doesn't mean I'm helpless."
She looked at him with a playful frown, "You looked pretty helpless to me yesterday when you were babying your bruises on the floor."
Despite Pietro's comforting words and touch. Something was unsettled within Elvira. She felt a door had opened and she couldn't close it back up. It left her feeling hollow.
BBB
Steve
James
Clint
Sam
Natasha
She gave a name to every person she killed. She can't remember where she learnt those names. It felt like the only way to stay tethered to her humanity was to acknowledge that the white-faced, shaking individuals that stood on the other end of the barrel of her gun were human. With names and lives and families. She had to carry their murders with her because the second she stopped feeling their death pounding through her veins, she would be a monster. A mindless weapon.
She wanted to crush the metal of the gun into distorted fragments as it hung in her grip. It would then poetically match her mind.
The door slid open. The scuffling of feet. The steady beat of her heart. Heavy sobs echoing from across the room. The deep hum of the collar around her neck. This was the routine. The painful music that was stuck on a loop.
Her stare at the whitening knuckles around the gun finally moved to the person whose life would abruptly end.
Her heart beat lurched into her throat. It was a child.
A small girl with wide, crying eyes cowered away from the gun or her. She wasn't sure. Peggy. The girl's name was Peggy in her mind. The chains around Peggy's hands rustled as she trembled. Gulping sobs breaking through her mouth.
No.
Elvira's face contoured with pain and conflict. The gun in her hand creaked under the pressure of her fingers. She wouldn't kill a child.
"Project Fusion begin," Dr. List commanded impatiently. As if this was a minor inconvenience.
"No," she growled. Her voice firm but with a dangerous edge. This was the first time she hadn't immediately taken the shot since he had threatened Pietro and Wanda.
He raised a challenging eyebrow. As Elvira stood firm he warned, "If you refuse to do what you are told than Miss Maximoff might have to be brought in here as an incentive."
As he waited for her response the room stood still. Elvira leisurely examined the gun in her hand before she smiled.
"You just broke your promise Dr. List. But unfortunately, I keep mine," Elvira spoke in a low voice.
Her gun snapped up faster than any normal human could. The young girl's scream and the echo of the gun morphed together and the guard that had once been beside Peggy dropped in front of her feet. The dropping of bodies joined the merged sounds before the stillness had lifted from the room.
The clicks of guns being cocked one after the other mimicked an echo as the remaining 4 guards trained their weapons on the small woman. Elvira dropped her gun, void of bullets, replacing the empty space in her hand with the collar of 's lab coat. Dipping gracefully behind his body to use it as a meat shield. The guards hesitated. Unsure if the lead scientist was worth sacrificing.
She used this moment to clamp her remaining hand on her collar. A roaring scream deafened 's ear as she crushed and tore at the metal around her neck. It retaliated with waves of electricity that jolted through her body and into 's, sharing the pain. Click, click, and a sharp whine of the metal and the collar shattered onto the ground in 2 pieces.
She was gone from behind the middle-aged man. Dr. List watched as a flash of blue light burst from the left side of the room overwhelmed his sight. Another flash, then another and another with no sound to accompany the visual spectacle aside from the muted drop of bodies and the clang of their guns.
The blue faded to the normal clinical glow of the overhead blubs. Elvira collected the automatic firearm from the last body, sliding the strap over her shoulder. She slipped a knife out of the boot before she appeared before Dr. List, knife already against this throat.
"Turn off the force field," She emphasised her demand but pushed the knife deep enough to draw blood.
List's head nodded frantically as his hand clumsily flailed over a keyboard and pushed a button. The distinct sound of energy powering down swirled in her ear. She beamed at the man that had caused her so much pain.
"Don't go anywhere. I'll be back to keep my promise," she ordered. For insurance, the knife left his throat to dive through his hand and into the workstation.
She teleported over the stunned little girl and broke the chain connecting the handcuffs with an adrenaline filled heave. Elvira tugged Peggy into her arms she was enveloped by the warm embrace of space as they both reappeared in the hallway, the furthest down she had ever been. She scrabbled to a door and wrenched it open to find a room full of robotic limbs. It would have to do.
Elvira set the girl down and spoke quickly but as softly as she could manage, "I'm not here to hurt you but if you want to be safe you need to stay here until I come and get you okay?"
Peggy slowly nodded. Struggling to keep up with the turn of events. Elvira deemed that reaction good enough as she closed the door and set of running, deeper and deeper into the labyrinth of ancient tunnels of the facility. If the generator that was powering the force field that surrounded the whole facility was anywhere it would be out of the way and hidden deep.
By the third tunnel she sprinted into the squeal of a siren pierced the air. She pushed faster, using the walls to slow down enough to turn corners. As 2 guards barrelled up some stairs towards her, she teleported to the bottom and fired 2 shots into their backs. Soon the siren turned into a low drum that reverberated through the stone walls.
There. 3 men standing in front of a lead lined door could only mean that room held the generator. She teleported behind the first guard, twisting his arm disarmingly behind him. He yelped as she ducked around his chest and shot the 2 startled guards remaining. The contact of the bullets at close range had enough momentum to hurl the bodies onto the damp cobbled ground. The last guards shoulder popped at her distracted pressure. That was not intended. Her hand slipped up to grip his head and she propelled it onto her raised knee.
Tip-toeing over the bodies, Elvira spied a small black box with a blue window jutting out of the wall beside the door. She had seen this used before. She lifted one of the limp hands of a guard to the fingerprint scanner. 2 high-pitched beeps signalled success. The door slide away from the opening to reveal a large droning device that pumped energy through pipes that nestled invasively into the aged rock ceiling.
She raised her gun and fired and aggressive spray of bullets until the surface had more holes that intact metal. Bullets dug into the interior of the machine starting sparks that burst into infernos.
Yes she could feel it. She was no longer in a cage. Their was no barrier between her and the rest of the universe. She felt it swallow her. Reinvigorate her.
BBB
the Maximoff twins jump as the door to their cell was opened so fast that it nearly swung off its bulky hinges. The sirens had alerted them to something going wrong but they had no idea how wrong until Elvira stood in the doorway with a small girl in her hands and blood spluttered all over her.
Pietro rushed to her side worried that the blood was a sign of injury.
She stared at him dead on stating, "It's not mine."
"What happened?" Wanda exclaimed.
Dr. List wanted me to kill this girl. He's no longer a problem. Now we need to go now. The force field's down. I take us all but I'll need to rest halfw-"
"We aren't going with you," Wanda said.
"What? B-but we're escaping?" Elvira drew back. It was impossible that they weren't coming with her.
"Didn't see that coming?" Pietro joked weakly, trying to weaken Elvira's pain. Pietro finally looked to her eyes. His expression hard. "We choose to be here for a reason. And that's why we need to stay."
Wanda grasped her shoulders firmly as Elvira stared at them in terrified disbelief, "You need to go! Now!"
"No! You're not leaving me!" Elvira gasped, like their imminent separation had drained her lungs. Her eyes darted between them, trying to memorise their faces. "But what will they do to you?"
Pietro gave his cheeky grin but it felt forced, "We'll be fine."
Elvira swallowed deeply to find her voice, "I'll find you after you've done what you need to do." She pulled Wanda's hands from her shoulders and with wisps of vibrant blue, Elvira and the girl in her arms disappeared. From HYDRA, from the twins.
BBB
She waved goodbye to Peggy who stood beside her mother. The older woman's eyes looked like she hadn't stood crying for 2 days.
Her eyes closed, surrounding herself with space and nothing else. No loss, no fear. She felt a vastness to it that baffled her in its complexity. When she called, it folded. With no destination in mind, she let it decide. To pull her tens of thousands of meters away. She gave into it as the blue light engulfed her.
Her eyes flashed open when her feet step onto smoothed ground. A sudden honk swallowed her senses. Elvira's hands instinctively flashed out to stop the car about to run her down. The vehicle roughly jolted forward and the abrupt stop. Her hands warped the metal of the front. A man with dark skin and a thin line of facial hair stared at her in shock. More horns flooded through the air. She needed to get out of here.
A vortex of azure filled the intersection before evaporating leaving empty space where the woman had just been.
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