The hum of machinery filled the lab as Tony tinkered with a piece of new tech, his attention absorbed in the intricate details. Dr. Banner, occupied at another workstation, eyed the data scrolling on a hologram in front of him.
"Tony, come here for a sec," Bruce called, gesturing him over.
Tony strolled over, moderately annoyed at his focus being broken. "What's the scoop, Doc?"
Bruce pointed at the hologram displaying Charlotte's brain scan. "Take a look at this. It's Charlotte's brain activity."
"Yeah, and?"
Bruce traced a specific section. "See this? It's her neural regulation. Or the lack thereof."
Tony raised an eyebrow. "Meaning?"
"Most people have a sort of built-in governor in their brains. It regulates physical functions, prevents overexertion, and keeps everything in check. But Charlotte…it's like she's missing that feature. Or…it was removed. Her brain doesn't have a 'stop' function."
"Wait, are you saying she can push herself to the point of exhaustion without feeling it?" His eyes narrowed.
Bruce nodded. "Or worse. To the point of exhaustion, then way past it. To the point of injury, or even…" He trailed off. "It's not that she's just enhanced physically; she was altered mentally beyond just the brainwashing. We didn't see this with Bucky. It's like they removed the part of her brain that's supposed to limit her, keep her from hurting herself."
Tony whistled. "That's both incredible for their time and, I don't know, fucking terrifying. Do we want to speculate on motive?"
Bruce sighed, running a hand through his hair. "I mean…you could argue that they wanted a more efficient weapon. If they had issues with…prior experiments hitting their limits and stopping." He winced at his own words. "They removed any chance of her stopping before the job was done. Even if she tore herself apart in the process."
A moment of silence passed through the lab as his words hung in the air.
Tony pondered, tapping his fingers on the lab table. "So, do we tell her? She's been through a lot already. I don't wanna freak the kid out."
"That's what I'm wrestling with. On one hand, it's her body, and she deserves to know. On the other, we risk opening old wounds. She's been through enough experiments, and without doing more, we don't have any answers for her anyways."
Tony's gaze flickered to the screen. "You think you'd want to know?"
Bruce sighed. "Hard to say. I mean, I've been through some shit, but not like her…it could just get in her head. Hell, she might already know. We saw her records, she'd been hospitalized a dozen times for injuries consistent with not knowing when to quit."
Tony leaned against a nearby table. "Alright, Doc, so what's the plan? Do we keep this to ourselves, or do we ask her if she wants more testing?"
Bruce looked conflicted. "Let's give her the choice. I'll talk to her, explain what we found, and see how she wants to proceed. It's her body, her call."
Tony nodded. "Agreed. Just…let's make sure we're sure. Review her file, see if there's anything we missed. Let's at least give her everything we got when we hit her with this."
As Tony turned to head back to his workstation, the weight of the decision lingered in the air. The delicate balance between shielding Charlotte from more trauma and offering her autonomy over her own discovery rested in Bruce's hands. The uncertainty of the situation hovered over him, a reminder that even for the most brilliant minds, some answers brought more questions than solutions.
"FRIDAY," He called. "Give me everything we've got on Charlotte Rossi."
"How about CopyCat?"
"It's gonna be really embarrassing for you to have gotten your ass kicked by someone named CopyCat."
Peter flushed, laughing despite the teasing. Charlotte nudged him with her foot on the couch, making sure he knew she was kidding…kind of.
The team was sprawled across the living room, lazily passing the evening after a long week of training. Peter, Charlotte, Wanda, and Nat lounged on the oversized sectional, limbs a tangled mess. All of the girls were comforted by physical touch, none of them wanting to outwardly address it, they had an unspoken habit of gathering together on the couch. Peter somehow always ended up in the middle, looking slightly uncomfortable but terrified of moving. Sam sat on the floor, back leaned up against the couch. Steve and Bucky sat on the hearth to the massive fireplace, tonight being one of the first nights chilly enough to warrant it.
"Mimic?" Sam tossed out.
All three women groaned in response.
"Okay, okay," Steve held his hands up. "Hear me out. How about Mockingbird?" The room went silent at the mention of her HYDRA project name. When no one spoke, he continued. "I'm just saying…it's a part of your history. We can't change that. Why not reclaim it?"
Charlotte shifted her position on the couch to sit up straighter, considering.
"Just…take it back. You aren't HYDRA's Project Mockingbird anymore…you're Mockingbird. The survivor. Maybe one day, the Avenger. If you want."
"I got my name from the Red Room, a cold war initiative to train female assassins." Natasha's voice was soft. "They called us Widows. I just choose not to think of it as a shackle from them. I remember all the women I was honored to know through that program, the ones who survived and went on to live the lives they deserved. Being Black Widow…I think it allows me to move on. Remember that my past is dark, and complicated, and yet…it got me here. So I can't hate it as much as I want to."
Natasha met Charlotte's gaze, her eyes sympathetic. She was strong, relentless, powerful, deadly…but she loved this team, her family with everything in her. No one had to wonder if she'd endure it all again to end up with this team, on this couch. She'd allowed, invited Charlotte into their lives. She hoped one day she would love the team, love this life as much as Natasha did. She longed to have something that made her life feel like it wasn't a string of disastrous circumstances, like it was all for something. All the suffering, the fear, the loss. All the lonely nights. All the nightmares. Like it was leading her to something, someone. Charlotte looked around the room at the earnest faces watching her, helping her reshape her identity.
"Mockingbird it is."
The Avengers Compound buzzed with activity as the team prepared for their annual benchmark testing. The expansive training grounds echoed with laughter and camaraderie, a stark contrast to the intensity of their missions. Off-duty SHIELD agents gathered around the designated testing area, eager for a glimpse of the Avengers' in action. One would think working at the compound alongside them would take some of the novelty away, but it was rare for any of the team to even get close to using their full abilities. Which made benchmark testing everyone's favorite day.
The early morning sun cast a warm glow over the compound. The Avengers, clad in their training gear, assembled near a row of obstacles and equipment at the front of the crowd. It had become an annual tradition over the past four years, every year garnering more attention from the spectating agents. What had originally been a way for the team to find their limits in a safe, controlled environment had become, as most things did, a competition. After several close calls with complete exhaustion, injury, or the rare case of a "web-block" - this was determined to be a necessary trial. Even Earth's Mightiest Heroes had a limit.
The setup had been arranged in what was ordinarily a shooting range, a wide open field behind the main building. The largest open space on the grounds was now occupied by things Charlotte didn't fully comprehend the use for. A car, parked in the middle of the field? She figured someone would explain soon enough so she kept her questions to herself.
The challenges were broken down into categories, testing each person on their specialty or enhancement. The two Super Soldiers would compete in a more physical manner, with an endurance run, strength competition, and then hand to hand combat. Clint would face a series of archery-related challenges, with targets that ranged from fifty feet to 500 yards away, some that moved, and some with obstacles (SHIELD agents as "hostages") in the way. Peter and Wanda both faced similar strength related competitions, seeing how much weight their respective powers could hold. Everything from an iron bench to the cab of a semi-truck to a Quinjet was lined up for them to lift. Natasha, of course, would have yet another trial all of her own. An obstacle course of sorts, beginning with hacking her way into the small arena. Tony saw it as his personal challenge to make it increasingly more difficult every year, competing against himself as he was also the one to design each tool on her combat belt. Once she was in the arena, she'd face two waves of a dozen agents, using her training pistol to take them out and make it to the other side. Once she crossed the arena, there would be an additional challenge. In years' past, it had been unscrambling an encrypted message, de-escalating a hostage situation (usually the same volunteer as Clint's), or hotwiring various armored vehicles.
Charlotte rolled her shoulders, jogging in place to loosen up. Since no one really knew what her abilities were, they'd agreed to let her participate in whichever tasks she chose. Everyone had been more than encouraging, some even making friendly wagers with her to see who would win what. The only two who seemed less than thrilled about it were Tony and Bruce, who'd exchanged a concerned glance when she announced she'd do it.
Now, she stood in the bullpen alongside Natasha and Clint for the first event of the day. Their suits were similar, all black neoprene with some high-tech enhancement to make the surface nearly bulletproof. Apparently there had been an earlier prototype that was completely bulletproof, but Natasha claimed it was far too stiff for her to do what she needed to do. So they settled for nearly.
"You ready for this?" Nat nudged her gently, tightening her wrist braces.
"I don't think I'm ever really ready for the shit I get myself into," Charlotte rolled her eyes. "I just do it."
"Fair enough." She winked. "See you on the other side."
The three participants were escorted to the starting line, each of them having their own separate course to run, all parallel to one another. Charlotte stepped into the box, high plexiglass walls separating them from each other. She felt a little like a rat in a maze. Thanks to their vantage point on the hill, the agents had a view right down into the action. There were screens projecting the parts of the course impossible to see, but nothing compared to the real thing. Taking one last deep breath, Charlotte stole a glance through the clear barrier to Natasha on her right. A reassuring nod from her friend and she was bracing herself for action.
"On your marks," Maria Hill's voice sounded through a megaphone. "Get set…GO!"
The starting pistol shot into the air and the gate in front of Charlotte dropped. She took off running blindly down a hallway, sprinting towards the door in front of her. It was a completely smooth surface aside from a small computer panel on the front. Heavily encrypted, probably behind several different layers of protection. Her stomach twisted. Hacking was never her strong suit. She slid her fingers all around the edges of the door, feeling for a groove or weak spot. Nothing. Heart beginning to race, Charlotte looked over to check the status of the others. To the far right, Clint had shot an arrow with some kind of live electric current directly into the panel, rendering it useless. He was now muscling it open, his face straining. Natasha, directly next to her, was punching away on the keypad.
Immediately, Charlotte snapped into action. She dropped to her knees, assuming the same crouched stance as Natasha. Feeling the gears whir in her mind, she tracked each rapid movement of Nat's fingers and replicated them. A half second behind, Charlotte's eyes were locked on every movement she made. A muffled beep then click sounded from the other side of the glass as Nat cracked the code. She gripped the round handle and threw her weight into it, opening the iron door. Sure enough, the same beep and click sounded clearly in front of Charlotte as she punched in the last number she'd seen. Not wanting to waste a moment, she turned the handle and yanked the door open.
This one led into a dark room, covered from above. Pausing, Charlotte listened to her surroundings. Rather than the patter of Natasha's light footsteps, she heard an irregular beat of feet on the ground. It sounded like…she was tiptoeing around something. Reaching back, Charlotte ran her hands across the ground, gathering a small pile of loose dirt. With a deep breath, she blew it out of her palms into the air in front of her. Red beams illuminated the room in front of her, criss-crossing across her path. Piece of cake.
After a split second committing the web of lasers to memory, she sprung into action. Leap, tuck, roll. Belly-crawl. Stand slowly. Don't breathe. Back handspring, back handspring, drop and roll. Her movements were instinctive, her body completely taking over. A fact she was thankful for considering her momentum was too strong to slow down or think about what she was doing.
Pulling herself to her feet, she reached the end of the hallway to a door that was, thankfully, not encrypted. She tugged it open only to hear a bullet whiz past her left ear. As she ducked, Charlotte heard a distant gasp from the spectators. She rolled to the left, gunfire peppering the wall only seconds behind where she was. An old filing cabinet stood two feet from her, one quick leap landed her behind it. Think. She closed her eyes and recalled the image of the room from the split second she saw it before the fire had opened. It was a mock office building, looking like a shootout had already occurred. Charlotte wondered if it was modeled after a real scenario they'd been in. She scanned the image in her mind as bullets peppered the back of the filing cabinet. Surely they aren't real bullets…right? She didn't give herself enough time to worry about it. Her assessment showed a dozen gunmen stalking around the room, guarding the door. Slowly, Charlotte turned, unlatching the bottom drawer of the cabinet and tugging it free of it's hinges. When the integrity of the cabinet was just about to give in, she moved. Swinging the metal drawer directly at the head of the nearest gunman, it collided with the side of his face. When his neck snapped to the right, she kicked the opposite direction and knocked the assault rifle from his hands. Sliding after it, she ducked behind an old desk just as the others opened fire on her. One of her arms hadn't quite made it behind the desk, being struck with a bullet. Hissing, Charlotte cradled her arm, checking for damage. It stung, but there was no more than a raw welt in its place. Rubber bullets.
Steeling herself, she stood and aimed. Three shots each, one to each kneecap and one to the exposed hand on the trigger. As always, her aim was flawless. They dropped instantly. She debated dropping the gun and running, but realized she didn't know what the next room would hold, so she maintained her grip and sprinted ahead.
When she pulled the door open, her arm was yanked backwards by some invisible force, not allowing the guns through. Charlotte turned her head to investigate, brows furrowed, one foot already in the next room. What the - WHAM!
A fist collided with her newly healed nose, sending blood spilling into her mouth. Slowly, she turned to look at the agent, fists still raised. The bloodlust and anger in Charlotte's eyes made the poor guy wish he hadn't volunteered for this. Without looking back, she let go of the gun, letting it clatter to the floor in the previous room. In one smooth movement, Charlotte's fist curled and swung straight from the doorway to the agent's jaw. A gruesome crunch would have made her nauseous if she weren't already so pissed.
The agent dropped to the floor with a thud, giving Charlotte a split second to reset her nose as the rest of the mock assailants advanced on her. She cracked her neck to one side and then the other, finally feeling warmed up. This time, it was another dozen agents. No one seemed to have weapons, but judging by their stature, these were the best hand to hand fighters on the force.
Unfortunately for them, they couldn't change their mannerisms. One agent, standing near the front of the pack and advancing quickly, held his head at an odd tilt to the right side. A flash of an old training session tore through Charlotte's mind. Agent Ellis, he can't go left. She scanned the group, eyes raking over each agent in milliseconds. Agent Kolstad, always opens with a right hook. Agent Armstrong, hits hard but can't dodge worth shit. One by one she recognized their tells, identified them, and recalled their weaknesses.
She cleared the room in a new course record.
Unbeknownst to Charlotte, she had a 30 second lead on Clint and was neck and neck with Natasha. The watching agents gaped as she ran to the next room, finding herself faced with a single female, standing in the doorway, not appearing to be armed. The woman spoke instantly, not moving.
"One, seven, three, three, nine, twelve, eighteen, two, six, seventeen, twenty-one, nine, six, fourteen, sixty-three."
Cocking her head to the side, Charlotte opened her mouth to ask what the hell she meant with this string of numbers. Before the words fully formed on her lips, a sack was tugged down over her head and cinched at the neck. Panic threatened to take over and her heart raced.
Breathe. Breathe in, breathe out. Slowly. Panic gets you killed.
Chest heaving but breaths coming slower and slower, Charlotte stood in a defensive posture, unable to see or smell anything about the room. Feeling the cloth around her neck, she felt the familiar metal band of a nanotech lock, complete with fingerprint pad on the side. Something told her it wouldn't be her thumbprint programmed in. Squeezing her eyes tight within the darkness of the hood, she willed herself to focus. The woman had stood right in the doorway, obstructing almost all of her view of the rest of the room. Conjuring the image of the woman up, Charlotte examined all the details she missed the first time. Instead of the agent's severe slicked back bun, she looked behind her to a grid on the floor. A series of thin planks covered the floor in erratic patterns, ironically about the width of a balance beam. The floor everywhere else…was missing entirely. She'd have to cross the floor by memory, only she never actually got a chance to look at the floor.
She took a steadying breath and ran through the maze on the floor one more time mentally, finding a route in the grid she'd seen over the agent's right shoulder. Crouching, Charlotte, gingerly felt the floor to reconcile the first stretch of plank with the image she had in her head. Once she was certain it was the same one, she stood and began to cross the room. Instantly, instinctively, her mind calculated distances and adjusted her leaps accordingly. Her feet were featherlight, almost silent, as she danced across the room. Her eyes stayed shut beneath the hood, clinging to the memorized image.
When she'd successfully crossed to the doorway on the other side of the room, nearly fifty yards across, she paused. Her body remained crouched in a defensive posture, ready for the next unseen obstacle. Sensing someone in her presence, Charlotte raised her fists.
"Friendly." A familiar voice called - the woman from the other side of the room. Charlotte didn't lower her fists, but didn't fight the woman's hand from approaching her. She felt delicate pressure on her neck, then a click as the lock around her neck opened. The woman was quick but gentle as she removed the hood, her face stoic but eyes slightly warmer than the beginning of the task.
"Recite the number."
Charlotte blinked, eyes adjusting to the sudden brightness.
"The number from the beginning. Recite it."
Sighing, Charlotte rubbed the throbbing spot on her arm from where the bullet had streaked across her flesh. "One, seven, three, three, nine, twelve, eighteen, two, six, seventeen, twenty-one, nine, six, fourteen, sixty-three."
The woman smiled, stepping aside as the final door slid open. Thunderous applause spilled in as Charlotte stepped out of the soundproofed room and back into the open air. Natasha's beaming face was waiting for her, Clint not far behind. His ragged breath told Charlotte he had just completed his run, while Nat seemed to have been done for a while.
"That's my girl!" Natasha ran over and gripped her shoulders, pressing their foreheads together. "You did amazing. Kicked major ass." Turning to the crowd, she grabbed Charlotte's hand and raised it, the cheers only intensifying.
Her breathing slowing down, Charlotte scanned the crowd, recognizing a few agents she knew from training. Her gaze dropped to the bullpen area in front of the stands, floor level with them. All her friends - the rest of the team - stood and clapped for her. Steve's eyes were crinkled with an almost father-like pride. Peter and Sam were the most hyped she'd ever seen them. Off to the side, clapping slowly, stood Bucky. A lopsided grin on his face. Charlotte ignored the blush she felt on her cheeks, ignored the face that his admiration meant more than anyone else's. She held his gaze, shrugging. He did the same, still clapping for her.
It was only when Tony walked up and clapped a hand on her back that she tore her eyes away. "Well, kiddo, that course is the result of our ten best defensive tactical strategists and four best engineers, so needless to say - someone's getting fired. Good job."
"Thanks," Charlotte grinned. "Although the bullets could have been softer."
"Just don't get hit next time." Nat winked.
After the hours spun past, the sun was beginning to decline in the sky. The day had brought so much excitement that Charlotte's cheeks hurt from smiling and her voice was beginning to get hoarse from cheering. After the chaos from their trials had subsided, the others took their turn. Peter, Wanda, and Sam all had their own versions of airborne obstacle courses. They went separately, each getting the whole sky as their arena. Charlotte caught herself clapping, jaw agape, more than once while she watched. She knew she herself was enhanced, but seeing the pure power emanating from Wanda's fingertips, seeing Peter swing through the air like it was what he was born to do…it left her awestruck.
Following the airborne spectacle, Steve, Bucky, Clint, Nat and Charlotte had entered a wide sparring ring. Each of them competing to be the last one standing. With a little shit-talking, Natasha claimed Clint as her first partner, promptly landing him on his back. Simultaneously, Steve and Bucky fell into a mesmerizing hand-to-hand battle, the force of their blows thundering through the crowd. Clint had gracefully accepted defeat, grumbling about being too old as he rolled through the sides of the ring. Slinking around the pair of Super Soldiers battling in the middle, Charlotte eyed Natasha. They circled, prowling for a few seconds, before Black Widow had struck. She used Steve's shoulder as a base to leap over both men and flip towards her opponent.
As always, Charlotte's brain snapped into overdrive, cataloging each move, each tell from Natasha. The information filed into her brain next to every other miniscule observation she'd made from the second they met. Rolling out of the way, Charlotte heard Nat's soft landing on the ground, exactly where she'd been seconds before. They fought the same way, not just because Charlotte was adapting her fighting style as it unfolded. Both build for stealth over power, both not especially big or strong, but both of them knowing how to leverage their weaknesses into strengths. Where the Super Soldiers fought with pure strength and power, the women danced around, trying to catch the other one off guard, land a destabilizing blow when it was least expected.
Most of Charlotte's fights went the same way: she played defense for the first half, observing, defending, tracking, learning. As soon as she felt like she'd gathered enough information, whether it took her mere seconds or whole minutes, she would flip the script. Usually, the change from her defensive tactics to her more predatory fighting style would catch her opponent off guard enough to earn her the high ground. Then, her actual fighting would seal the deal. As was the case with Natasha. Their dance around the duo in the middle went on, and then Charlotte saw her moment. Bucky had used the momentum from Steve recoiling back to avoid a vibranium fist to the face, sweeping his legs out from under him and letting him thud to the mat. The noise and force of Cap hitting the mat caused Natasha to hesitate, ever so slightly, so briefly. She had been up on one foot, about to roundhouse kick, when the movement of the mat shook her balance. The tiniest hop to regain her footing, but it was her downfall. Charlotte shifted, in that moment, from defense to attack mode. She caught Nat's foot and twisted, throwing her body into the movement the same way she'd seen her opponent do dozens of times. Nat caught herself as she was thrown to the floor, rolling away from Charlotte. Unfortunately for her, she'd let Charlotte watch one too many sparring matches, because she anticipated that too. From the leg twist, she'd immediately sprung into a back handspring, feet landing on the ground mere inches from Nat's wrists. All it took was Charlotte to drop to her knees, pinning Nat's arms down with her shins. A buzzer sounded from outside the ring, signaling Natasha's end in the round.
Charlotte heard her grumble, "Wonder where you learned that," as she helped the redhead to her feet.
Bucky.
The only other one left standing. He stood, arms lazily raised in a defensive posture, watching her. Charlotte cracked her neck, striding up to him.
"You know, I really thought the next time you choked me would be in a different setting."
He scoffed, rolling his eyes. "Those games might make Steve blush, but they won't work on me."
"We'll see." Charlotte cartwheeled toward him, hooking her legs on his shoulders and bringing him down. He knew it was coming and rolled into it, trying to land on top as they tumbled across the mat.
Their fight was by far the most intriguing of the day, every agent and Avenger in the stands locked on their every move. Their fight was somehow playful and lethal all at once. Their skills were even more perfectly matched than the two Super Soldiers or the two trained assassins had been. Even Steve's brows knit together as he realized Bucky wasn't pulling his punches. Knuckle prints littered the mat from where his left hand had narrowly missed Charlotte.
After nearly ten minutes of combat, it looked like Bucky had her beat. He had a fistful of Charlotte's hair, holding her in front of him while she thrashed. Both of her wrists were gripped tightly in metal fingers, rendering her somewhat immobile. All he had to do was drop her to the ground and pin her and he'd win. Charlotte paused, momentarily relaxing her body. Her features melted from fierce determination to watery shame. She spoke softly as she looked him dead in the eyes.
"I guess they were right. I am a failed experiment after all."
Bucky's mouth fell open.
The second the pressure on her wrist slackened ever so slightly, Charlotte moved. Her brow furrowed, face twisted with focus. Her right shin pressed against Bucky's chest, throwing her weight into him as her left foot planted behind his, sending him tumbling down. The thud of his back on the mat was the only sound in the air. Charlotte crouched atop his body, knees on his chest. Bucky stared up at her, eyes a swirling mix of pity, confusion, and frustration. Through her panting breaths, Charlotte grinned.
"See? Games work on you too. You're just more of a bleeding heart than a horndog." She climbed off and held a hand out to him, which he ignored.
"Cheater."
"Brute."
Their exchange was almost drowned out by the cheering of the crowd, going absolutely berzerk. It turned out that the agents were a lot more fond of Charlotte when she wasn't competing against them. There was a lot less shame in losing to someone who'd also beat the Winter Soldier - twice.
Once they'd been cleaned up, various scrapes and bruises tended to, they all settled in to watch the Hulk in his strength competition. He lifted every object laid out for him, ranging from a Ford Explorer to an old model Quinjet. None of them seemed to cause him any strain at all. There was a little unexpected excitement as he threw the vehicle across the lake, sending Peter and Wanda soaring to retrieve it and safely deposit it back on the ground.
Now, finally, the last challenge of the day awaited them. The endurance run. Charlotte stood between the two Super Solders, rolling her shoulders. Steve stretched, Bucky simply stood there, stealing agitated looks at Charlotte out the corner of his eye.
"Don't you need to warm up or something?" She raised an eyebrow.
"No."
"Okay…noted. Sore loser."
Bucky scowled but didn't respond to her. They were interrupted from further bickering by Agent Hill calling out a countdown. They were to run 25k (15.5 miles) through a trail in the woods - for time. The average time for agents to run it in was 2 hours and 15 or so minutes. Steve's personal best? 53 minutes. Today he was trying to break 50. Bucky was always hot on his heels, though he had to labor a little more to accommodate for the weight of his left arm. Again, no one knew which events to put Charlotte in as no one knew the full extent of her abilities. She'd insisted on trying the run as well. She knew her endurance was above average, knew she could channel just about anyone just by watching them. Truth be told, she too was curious about how far her abilities stretched.
Again, Bruce and Tony had been the only two who balked at her taking on a third event of the day. She'd brushed them off, stating that the first two challenges barely made her break a sweat. Though the bruise forming on her face from the first challenge said otherwise, they'd reluctantly agreed. What no one heard was their quiet agreement to monitor her extra closely and call the task off at any sign of her in trouble.
The first few miles had been easy. Charlotte fell into step with the other two, staying within striking distance but letting them set the pace. Their strides were longer, but she focused on their exact path through the forest, each leap they took over errant roots, every perfectly placed step. She let them carve the route for her. Halfway through the race, sweat was dripping down her neck into the collar of her combat suit. She didn't dare look away from their feet as the trio ran, but she assumed they were feeling the fatigue too. Super Soldier serum had made them enhanced, not invincible. They still got winded, still wore out. Just a lot slower than Charlotte, and a lot slower than the average person. Blood pounded in her ears as she copied Steve's leap over a fallen tree. To her surprise, her knees buckled ever so slightly when she landed, causing her to stumble and lose ground. Bucky stole a glance over his shoulder.
"You okay?"
"Fine," Charlotte breathed out, still reeling. Her body almost never surprised her. Well, with the exception of trying to kill the man in front of her at first sight.
They tore through the woods, the confusion of her misstep pushing Charlotte even harder to regain ground and catch back up. She felt Bucky's eyes on her as she ran harder, ignoring a look that she couldn't tell was concern or irritation.
"Charlotte," He hissed, grabbing her arm and skidding to a stop.
"What?!" Charlotte's voice was incredulous, chest heaving. "Let go!"
"Your nose is bleeding." Bucky grit his teeth. "I think you should stop."
She wiped her nose with the back of her hand, rolling her eyes. "If you're afraid of getting beat twice, just say so." Smirking through the blood running down her face, Charlotte took off running after Steve.
Bucky scowled, following her into the woods.
They were closing in on mile thirteen, on pace for Steve's goal. Long strides caught Bucky up with Steve and Charlotte no problem. His focus, however, was no longer on the race. He let familiarity with the trails guide him, keeping half his attention on the woman running beside him. Blood had soaked the collar of her suit, the dark fabric gleaming with sweat and crimson. Her face showed only the barest traces of strain as she pushed on.
He heard his heartbeat, sounding like it was going double time. Wait, that's two heartbeats…
Bucky focused his sharp hearing, trying to separate the sounds. He heard his heartbeat, quicker than usual, but within a safe range. Then he heard the other, Charlotte…Her heart was racing, dangerously high. It sounded like it was going to beat out of her chest.
"Charlotte," He spoke tightly. "You need to stop, you're hurting yourself."
She threw a tense look his way, but didn't waste her breath on a jab. Something is wrong.
Steve grew further and further down the path from them as Charlotte began to fade, literally. Her steps slowed, knees became wobbly. Her skin had dulled, looking pale and almost gray. Her eyes met his between a few hazy blinks and he saw a flash of something like fear in them. Stopping on a dime, Bucky was by her side in two strides. Charlotte's eyes rolled back in her head and she began to crumple.
The crowd roared as Steve crossed the finish line, right as the clock showed 48:52. A five minute record. He was breathing heavily, but not like someone who'd just ran a half marathon in less than an hour should be. He nodded thanks and high fived a few teammates before his brow furrowed in confusion.
"Where's Buck? Charlotte?" He looked to Nat. "They weren't that far behind me. They should have crossed by now."
She frowned, turning to Tony and Bruce, both equally pale. "FRIDAY, send drones through the path. I want visual on the trail, final two miles." Two drones whipped past their heads, soaring down the path Steve had just exited. The formerly elated crowd had died down, picking up on the concern.
Tony was intently scanning the screen in front of him when Bruce gripped his forearm, guilt all over his expression. "Tony."
They looked up to see Bucky Barnes carrying Charlotte's limp body out of the woods.