God, my head hurts.
I slowly open my eyes.
I can't move my hand, but I don't feel any restraints on me. I can't shift my head either.
"Oh, you're awake," Zola says, leaning over me, his glasses catching the light with a cold gleam. "Then let's test this now."
He tilts his head with clinical curiosity. "Get up."
The words hit me like a needle to the brain.
My mind... for a moment, it didn't feel like mine. I didn't want to move.
But I did.
I sat up. Then stood. My eyes locked straight ahead on a man in a Hydra uniform. My posture perfect. My face emotionless.
"She will obey?" the man asked Zola.
Zola folded his hands behind his back, beaming with pride.
"Yes. The implant is fused directly into the prefrontal cortex," he explained. "It overrides executive decision-making while stimulating compliance pathways. With the proper command sequence, she becomes fully responsive, physically and mentally. A clean override."
His eyes flicked to me.
"She is a prisoner in her own mind."
What the hell?
What did he do to me?
I was screaming inside. Terrified. But I couldn't move.
I tried to clench my fist. Nothing. No response.
"The other subject?" the general asked.
"He's already in cryostasis," Zola replied. "Completely wiped. He will only need programming when revived."
Other subject? There was no one else.
Except...
"His arm was replaced with a bionic one before we put him under. Fully functional. Stronger than any organic limb."
Shit.
Bucky.
That was you in that tank.
"Alright. Get her trained and ready to deploy," the general said, handing a file to Zola before walking out.
Zola turned toward me, smile stretching ear to ear. "Of course," he said. Then to me, "From this day forward, you are a weapon of Hydra. Subject X-13."
He was right.
From then on, I had no control.
It was like watching a movie, only this one didn't end. And I felt every agonizing second of it.
From the revolting taste of nutrient paste to the ache of each blow they landed on me.
They trained me. Broke me. Molded me into a killer.
Marksmanship.
Hand-to-hand combat.
Stealth. Infiltration. Linguistics.
Everything I needed to be their asset.
I learned something else too: I was strong. Unnaturally strong.
The body I'd gone to sleep in was gaunt, barely clinging to life. This body… was built.
Toned. Hardened. Capable of throwing a man across a room.
They tested the limits of the control. Not just tactical orders, humiliation, degradation, even murder.
And when that wasn't enough…
Zola ordered me to stab myself. Over and over.
Then handed me a cyanide capsule.
"Swallow it," he said calmly, watching with fascination like I was a rat in a maze. "Let's test where your loyalty lies."
I took it. Swallowed.
Not by choice.
I thought that was it.
That I'd die before hurting anyone else.
That I'd finally find peace.
I was wrong.
I woke up the next day. Heart slowed, body sluggish, but alive.
Whatever he gave me wasn't cyanide just made me feel like death had come.
Zola stood beside me, practically buzzing.
"Incredible," he murmured. "The serum must have accelerated the detox."
He laughed.
I screamed in my mind.
Begged.
Beat at the walls of my skull.
But my body never twitched.
No tears.
No voice.
No escape.
Once my training was complete, they deemed me mission ready. I was deployed with a handler. Whoever held the command codes held the leash.
For five years, I was Hydra's specter.
Assassinations. Infiltrations. Bombings. Torture.
I did it all, without hesitation.
They called me V-13. Nothing more.
My hair grew out, long past my shoulders. They didn't care to cut it, I needed a more feminine look they said to better attract my targets when needed.
I overheard conversations during handoffs over the years, Zola had been captured by some group called S.H.I.E.L.D.
The war was ending.
Captain America had gone down with a plane into the ice.
So much had changed.
But not me.
In 1950, I was transported to a Hydra base in Siberia. Cold, silent halls.
Zola greeted my handler personally, guess that imprisonment didn't take.
"Any signs of deviation?" he asked.
"None," the handler said. "Still fully obedient. No resistance, no questioning."
Zola smiled again. "Excellent. She is everything I envisioned."
He conducted a physical. Clinical, detached, as though I wasn't even human. He hummed through the process, tapping monitors and making notes.
Afterward, he tossed a bundle of clothing at me. "Change into these."
It was a skin-tight black suit, sleeveless, cut off just above the knees.
After I dressed, "Good. Now follow."
My handler had vanished. Likely drunk. He practically always was.
Barked degrading orders at me when he was, just to hear his own voice.
We walked deeper into the facility. The air got colder with every step. My breath fogged. Goosebumps crawled across my skin.
A scream rang out from ahead.
"AAAAAHHH!"
The sound cut through me.
Was I next?
Zola opened a steel door. Beyond it was a wide chamber with seven cryo capsules arranged like tombs.
And Bucky.
Strapped into a chair.
A metal device clamped to his head. Sparks flying.
He was screaming, pure agony. Or gritting his teeth so hard I thought they'd break.
I knew that pain.
My back shuddered involuntarily.
Was that… me?
A reflex? A memory?
Zola positioned me in the corner. Forced me to watch.
I saw his arm, it was back. But wrong.
It really was him they spoke of before.
It was…
Metal. Cold. A red Soviet star adorned the shoulder.
Bucky… I'm sorry.
The torture continued until a general entered, barked out code words in Russian. The device unclamped. Bucky rose, mechanical, silent.
He replied in Russian.
No hesitation. No soul.
They handed him a file. He left with two guards.
Like me. Another tool.
I'm sorry, Bucky, I wish the infection had taken you.
Anything but this.
Zola turned to me.
"Alright, V-13. Climb in."
He gestured to an open pod.
No.
No. Please, don't make me.
But my body obeyed.
I laid back in the cryo-tank.
Strapped in. Monitored.
Zola smiled one last time, his face hovering in the small window of the lid as it closed.
"Goodnight, Subject V-13. We'll speak again soon."
The machine whirred. The cold rushed in like a wave. My limbs went numb. Frost climbed the glass.
I took one final breath.
My heart slowed.
My eyes closed.
I hope I can dream this time.
I haven't dreamt in five years.
But what would I dream about?
The child I killed because her father defied Hydra?
The couple I tortured for information?
The bombs I detonated to frame foreign nations and start wars?
I don't want those dreams.
If I could have one wish,
Let the frost take me.
Let it end here.
Let me die.
Please.