Open Starter for Buckys who came back to kill their handler / HYDRA |
Written to this
. HYDRA doesn’t wait. It never does. With the Asset gone, it was time to wake up the others. And someone needed to rein them all. Lise looked up at his father, lips pressed into a tight line as he couldn’t refuse - the power and status that was placed before him, its responsibility and the changes they demand of him, just as much as he couldn’t refuse the tremors in his bone, the shaking breath rattling his ribs like an abandoned birdcage. The young technician glanced at the news on TV. At least one of them was free.
SHIELD doesn’t wait either. The Captain was hunting down their bases one by one and they still haven’t figured out how they were being found. Urgency surged through HYDRA’s ranks and they placed their hope and legacy onto their best project yet. Advanced wiping and imprinting technologies they researched and funded in their Dollhouse Project, the very same place Lise had been trained on how to handle assets in, now had his very own chair waiting. New, but not that much different from his, Lise thought.
Noisy. Vuhs closed his eyes. Director Brandt was presenting Scytheon’s remnants to him and the board to be part of his son’s new division. The way those blue eyes were gazing proudly at him like he was some kind of prized creation was annoying. Disgusting. Shifting his weight to the back of the leather chair, the new Director was relieved he changed his last name to his mother’s, much to the other man’s delightful distress. None of the other directors spoke a word against his ‘napping’. They all knew he was still dealing with the after effects. They all knew he represented all their founders. So noisy. Vuhs suppressed the other memories and reactions that threatened to rise like vomit.
Azra’il was coming along nicely. Assets rose from stasis one by one, retrained, remade. New ones too, were brought in. Vuhs studied each one lined up before him coldly. They were HYDRA’s. Now they will become his. And so will the ‘undying’ Beast that made him. After all, what better way to root it up than to destroy it from its head?
Impatient was the beast. As soon as his division began to form, it was not even operable when HYDRA threw the responsibility of bringing the Winter Soldier back into the fold onto them. Cold grey irises narrowed, tapered and perfectly manicured nails tapped irritably on the arm rest. His gaze fell upon his own hand and forced it to stop. Not his habit. Someone else’s. Vuhs fought to remind himself who he really was. Not HYDRA’s. Glancing at the document an asset- nay- marionette submitted, detailing how a few other directors were scheming on setting up a vote against his authority, his lips curved up in a sneer. His fingers tapped again.
The last thing he wanted was for James to come back to this.
“Dispatch Team 21 after the Lost One.” This new team would lose him easily.
Even the government wanted in on the action. Vuhs pinched the bridge of his nose, watching the news on the Winter Soldier fleeing the bomb site. At least Azra’il was now fully his. No one else would know how he arranged for his agents to get in the way of official forces, and just a little more to spite SHIELD. All in the name of bringing the Asset back into the fold of course.
HYDRA had its roots in power. With a sharp flourish, Vuhs smiled and signed on the Accords. Azra’il too will have a copy of names.
Things have quietened down. The Avengers scattered, SHIELD almost shut down, and HYDRA celebrated their new leadership. When he said it was time for the Beast to return to the shadows, like how it used to, no one doubted him. He was their Founders, HYDRA’s very best.
Smiles galore as he whittled and stripped away their power right from under their noses.
Being in power always meant making enemies. Questions were beginning to rise along with the fear of slow realisation. As the balance tipped, naturally Vuhs stood in the way of others. Small matters. He was strong enough now.
Another report came in: the shadow he had been chasing after was living quite well, from his sightings. Never mind the assassinations, it was a little like catching a cryptid on film every time he received a slip of news on him. Even the Director was not aware, of the slight smile and curve in his eyes whenever he read such reports.
I. II. III. Sunlight flooded the room when Vuhs flipped the switch that opened the curtains all around. Sitting up in his bed, he rubbed a hand over his face. Sounds of the easing and rising tides soothed away the pressing oppression in his chest, a tiresome thing he had grown used to every night when he slept. It’s not like souls rested easy when you drag them back from the grave. Wearing a simple T-shirt and boxers - a habit he forced himself to maintain - one he knew which was his before it became uncomfortable, Vuhs washed his face and made his way down to the kitchen to make breakfast.
