New Mexico
Hydra Base
2015
Tony Stark sighed as he set his mug of coffee and down and stared at the files in front of him, his mind working furiously to try and make sense of everything that was in them. He had volunteered to help sort through the hundreds of files that had been found in this very base just a few days ago and it was proving to be a very tedious task.
Of course, it was always hard to go through any of Hydra's files, but these documents contained some of the most horrifying and gut-wrenching information he had ever read through, and there wasn't much that could grab at his heart like this did.
Hydra had kidnapped little girls and had tortured and abused them so that they could mold them into their own sick image. It was similar to the Red Room, in fact, the Baron's own father had worked for the program before it was shut down.
That was most likely where had developed his obsession with the Academy in the first place, by his own father who had helped oversee the operation during the Cold War.
"Like father like son," mumbled Tony in disgust as he shoved Fleischer's file into the folder on the desk.
He took another sip as he pulled up the files on each of the girls that had ever been admitted to Fleischer's program, which only amounted to four separate files. Each one displayed the blank faces of the girls, their despondent expressions making them look much older than they really were.
He had already read through Anna's and Isabel's and had cross-referenced them with missing person's files from around the time they had been admitted, and was relieved to find two files from two different counties in the state of New Mexico.
He had found Isabel's parents and had alerted Shield so that they could inform the family that their daughter, who had been missing for over ten years at that point, was dead.
It was hard to do, but at least her family would finally get the closure they deserved after all these years. But while Isabel had had a family that had missed her, Anna had no one to contact. She had been living in a children's home when she had been abducted and had become nothing more than file locked away in a filing cabinet in some police station.
And now both of them were dead and it weighed heavily on Tony.
He shook his head as he exited out of Anna's and Isabel's files and pulled up Yelena's file, which had an abundance of more information than any of the other girls. Which was not surprising considering she was the product of Hydra's many experiments to replicate the serum.
Tony had read all of Zola's files on what he had done to Bucky, starting from when the Sergeant had been captured in 1943 and experimented on until Zola had physically died in 1972. He had read how Zola had managed to create his own version of the serum and how he had stabilized it using the Tesseract before giving it to Bucky just before the Captain had rescued him and the rest of the 107th.
The notes that Zola had written in that bunker in Azzano would be the direct cause for Yelena's birth, but would not be put into effect for decades. Zola had wanted to know if Barnes's gamete cells had been affected by his serum, but had never gotten around to actually experimenting with the concept. In fact, it was really nothing more than a footnote in the Swiss doctor's notes that expressed nothing more than curiosity.
It would be years before Pierce would put Zola's idea to use and impregnate a woman with the Sergeants offspring, but not without first trying to make a clone, which failed spectacularly seeing as the cloned embryo's never made it past the second trimester before spontaneously aborting. It was the first time a human clone had been attempted, and as scientifically advanced as Hydra was, even they couldn't create on healthy enough to live very long.
But Yelena didn't have the serum, proving that not every cell in the Sergeants body had been altered, much to everybody's surprise. Tony wondered if Erskine's formula had altered Steve's gamete cells, but something told him he wouldn't be finding that out anytime soon.
Tony read through the rest of Yelena's file before setting it aside, his attention going towards the last file waiting to be viewed.
Sofia was the youngest of the girls that had been admitted into the program, and she was one of the only ones left. At the tender of age of four, Sofia had been kidnapped by human traffickers and sold to Hydra.
She had no living relatives and nowhere to go, which meant Shield would have to figure something out for her like they had for Yelena.
Tony stared up at the picture of the dark haired girl, his mind reeling as he tried to figure out what they were going to do with her. It wasn't fair that Yelena was getting more attention than this girl, who had been just as much a victim as she had.
Sofia had been Hydra's puppet for years and she had been subjected to the same abusive training as Yelena, but at the same time, Sofia was different than the older girl. Sofia was not as advanced in her training as Yelena was and judging from the Baron's notes, he was less than pleased with her progress. It was probably a good thing Sheild had liberated them when they did, or else something worst might've happened to her.
"Hey," came Natasha's smooth voice from the door as placed her hands on her hips, "you looking through the girl's files?"
"Trying too," said Tony; not bothering to look at her or acknowledge her inquisitive gaze.
Natasha stalked into the room and came to stop in front of the computer, her eyes skimming over the file intently as she placed her arms over her chest and sighed.
"How's Barnes?" asked Tony with only mild concern. It was obvious that Romanoff wasn't going to leave him alone, so he might as well indulge her curiosity.
"How do you think he is?" asked the redhead with a raised eyebrow.
"I heard he and Wilson drank all of the Baron's personal stash of whiskey last night," said Tony with a shake of his head, "if he wasn't enhanced he would've given himself alcohol poisoning."
"Well then it's a good thing he's enhanced."
Tony scoffed as he crossed his arms over his chest and looked back to the computer before exiting out of Sofia's file and turned to look back up at a curious Natasha. He could sense that she wanted to ask him something from the look on her stoic face.
"What is it Romanoff?" he asked, "I can tell you didn't just come here to admire my good looks, or did you?" he asked with a grin.
"Why are you helping Barnes?" she asked as she ignored his egotistical remark, "what are you hoping to gain?"
"Nothing," he said truthfully, "I'm just trying to help him out."
"A few months ago you wanted him locked up," pointed out Natasha with raised eyebrows, "now you're letting him move in?"
Tony rolled his eyes and scoffed at the redhead, "did you just come here to interrogate me? I promised they could have a floor in the tower and I mean it."
"He killed your parents," said Natasha pointedly, "surely that warrants some resentment."
"So that's what this is about?" asked Tony sarcastically as he refilled his cup with more coffee, "you think because Hydra forced him to kill my parents that I have some ulterior motive for letting him and his daughter come live in the tower?"
"I'm just trying to understand," she said as she handed him the creamer, "Barnes is a good person and I don't want to see him get any more hurt than he already is."
"Is that why you wanted to hide Yelena from him?" said Tony truthfully with raised eyebrows as he waited for her to reply.
"When I found out about Yelena I did want to tell him," began Natasha, "but I also didn't feel that he was emotionally stable enough to handle it. Bucky isn't the same man he was seventy years ago and for a time there he was struggling to hold onto his sanity. I thought the news that he was a father could wait until his mental state was in a better place," said Natasha as she looked down at her shoes, "I did what I thought was best."
"Don't tell Capsicle or Bucky bear this, but I think you were right to want to temporarily keep it from him."
"No," said Natasha with a small shake of her head, "I was wrong to do so. And if anything, him knowing about Yelena has helped him."
"How so?"
"Haven't you seen him lately?" pressed Natasha, "ever since he found out about her he's been-."
"More lively?" interrupted Tony.
"Yes," said Natasha softly.
Tony said nothing as he poured the rest of his cold coffee down the sink and swept a hand through his messy hair. He hadn't slept since flying out and it was starting to show.
"So what do you think is going to happen to Sofia?" said Natasha, breaking the uneasy silence between them.
"I don't know," said Tony with a slight shrug, "I was hoping you could tell me."
"I've already talked to her," admitted Natasha with a sigh, "she's not as bad as Yelena, but she does need help."
"What kind of help?"
"Rehabilitation mostly," she said, "her combat training isn't as advanced as Yelena's and she doesn't even know how to use a gun very well."
"What about her mental state?" asked Tony as he tried to come up with a plan for helping the girl.
"Stockholm syndrome and mild PTSD," said Natasha, "with Therapy I'm sure she'll be fine eventually."
"So what? We let her stay in the tower?" asked Tony.
"I think she should stay with Yelena for the time being," said Nat after a few moments of careful consideration, "once she's started to heal and adjust, then we can go from there."
"I'm fine with that," said Tony, "just don't expect my tower to become an orphanage or anything like that," warned Tony.
"Tony's Home for Wayward Youth," said Natasha with a sly grin, "I kinda like it."
"That's a terrible idea," said Tony with a shudder, "I already give to charity enough as it is."
Natasha laughed, "You sure you don't do that just for the tax breaks?"
"Like I need tax breaks," scoffed Tony with a shake of his head, "I give to charity because I choose too, not because I want tax benefits."
"You're a good person Tony," said Natasha as she pushed herself away from the edge of the counter and made her way over to the door before stopping and turning around to face him, "I know this isn't easy for you, but thank you."
Tony pursed his lips and dipped his head down as Natasha made her way out of the room and into the adjacent hallway. He knew he was doing a good thing by letting Bucky and Yelena stay at the tower, but at the same time, he felt a looming sense of dread and regret bubble inside of him.
He was actually going to let his mother's killer come live at the tower, and he knew that this would force him to face the reality of his parent's demise at the hands of Hydra.
He would be nice to Bucky, that, of course, was a given, but it wasn't like he was going to sit in a circle with him and sing Kumbaya like they were best friends. He would be polite to the Sergeant, but that was all.
He would do nothing more, and he would do nothing less.
AN: I'm back! I had to take a little break from writing because which I have to do sometimes because writing for an audience can be stressful. But good news! The next chapter is almost done and It will be posted after I finish it and edit it, which shouldn't take that long.
Sofia: I am currently debating with myself on what should be done about Sofia. I originally didn't plan on her becoming a regular in the story but a few of you have expressed your curiosity for her character so I have decided to go a little bit more in depth with her. I want her to have a parent figure in her life and I can't decide if it should be Tony or Steve. Any opinions?
Comment and tell me what you think!