Wanda Maximoff/Scarlet Witch
When HYDRA kidnapped their targets, they knew there were risks. But there were two escape risks unaccounted for, who were speaking in their room.
“We leave tomorrow,” Wanda said to Pietro. “After everything they've done? Kidnapping those people? We need to escape.”
“Can we take them with us, do you think?” Pietro asked.
“I... Maybe,” Wanda said, frowning. “But they're under heavy guard. That woman, Rana, she's watching them. And if we get caught...”
Pietro shuddered, and Wanda felt herself doing the same. Since getting her powers, she hadn't found herself fearing much. But now?
Emil Blonsky was bad enough. Combined with Rana, the Centipede soldiers, Deathlok? Wanda felt fear. Together, she was sure she and her brother could defeat them, at least escape if nothing else. But with the prisoners?
But they needed to leave. Maybe go back to Sokovia? For some reason, the idea no longer appealed to her. She felt... she needed to do something. Make amends, somehow.
There was a knock at the door. Sharing a look, Pietro sped over to the door in a blur and opened it before rushing back to Wanda as though he had never moved at all.
Helen and Deathlok walked into the room. Helen brushed her hair behind her head, smiling at the pair. Deathlok simply stared at them.
“Hey,” Helen said, sounding friendly. “We have orders.”
“Orders?” Wanda asked confused. “What are we doing?”
“Leaving, dawlin,” Helen said kindly. “Well, the others are. SHIELD and the Avengers will be on their way soon. Some of us will stay as a skeleton crew, lead them somewhere else to fight.”
“I'm sorry?” Pietro asked, his accent becoming a touch stronger. “We're just going to be a distraction?”
“Not exactly,” Deathlok responded. “Strucker and Sterns have a plan. And Blonsky can't wait.”
Pietro and Wanda shared a look at that. Everyone knew what Blonsky wanted. It was, after all, what the Maximoffs wanted as well... or it was.
“Ok,” Helen said, looking over at Deathlok. “Sugah, you mind if I talk to the Twins alone for a sec?”
Deathlok nodded, turning and walking out. When the cyborg left, Helen waited for the door to close. Then she tapped her belt, and brief noise of static came from it, followed by her turning to glare at the pair.
“Seriously, if you're going to talk about leaving, make sure ya ain't bugged,” Helen said. “Or at least invest in a jammer.”
Pietro uncrossed his arms, gaping. “How did you-”
“Please, sugah, Sterns and Strucker have been bugging and unbugging this castle since we got here,” Helen shook her head. “Now listen closely. Because my girls and I have been talking about the crap HYDRA has been pulling, and I think we can help each other out.”
------
January 20th, 2014
Rana Williams/Aberration
Within the castle, in the early morning, Rana stood at Struckers right side, watching as soldiers and scientists lifted large boxes, put away equipment, and packed up chemicals and serums. Sterns was standing with them, the big-headed scientist scowling as everything was moved.
“This is not conducive to my research,” Sterns said, his eyes hard on Strucker. “If you approved my experiment earlier, we could have a force capable of fighting the Avengers off.”
“Not without control over them,” Strucker pointed out. “As it is, we are being forced to leave America entirely.”
Sterns scowled. “If you'd allowed me more time-”
“The AI has begun to track us,” Strucker said firmly. “And your intelligence has proven insufficient. We can no longer even divert them,” Sterns scowled at the insult to his genius. “SHIELD has taken down three bases in their rage... And the Hulk is helping. They are coming here.”
Rana and Sterns glanced at Strucker. Sterns, with interest and a small smile on his face.
Rana, on the other hand, thought about that. The Hulk. She had only been changed a couple of days ago. And she'd felt... magnificent. Her strength, her durability, speed, even her healing. She felt unstoppable. But there were two beings she wanted to challenge now. She'd never been competitive. But now, even in her human form, she felt Aberration lurking in the back of her mind. A monster, wishing to challenge other monsters.
And the Hulk, no matter what Abomination said, was the pinnacle of monsters. Though a new challenger to that throne had appeared. Dial...
Sterns sighed dramatically. “Very well.”
“Thank you,” Strucker turned and walked out of the room, Rana following diligently. Once they were far enough away, she spoke.
“Sir-”
“I remember my promise to you, Rana,” Strucker said softly. He was only ever soft with her, Rana appreciated that. Not in the way of a woman blushing towards a gentle demeanor. Strucker was soft, but only to let her understand how serious he was. “In the meantime, I need to speak with someone. Blonsky will be waiting for you.”
Rana nodded. They walked until reaching the Chitauri soldiers Strucker always had some distance from him, then she turned and walked away.
------
It was easy to find the monster who everyone knew as Abomination. He was given a barn to live in, but the monster was often restless. It had been a problem, in fact.
Emil Blonsky was not a monster given to relaxation. He needed a battle. He needed a challenge.
So did Rana. Which meant when he'd challenged her, she immediately accepted.
It's why she walking towards the barn Abomination called home. The barn stood in the middle of a field, with a forest a short distance away and a peaceful river running nearby. She took a breath of the fresh air, only to wince slightly. Since getting her powers, her senses had been heightened, and the scent of fresh air was tinged with that of feces, blood, and more. There was the scent of vegetation and water as well, but she still had to get used to it.
She strode up to the large wooden structure and wasn't surprised to see the giant monster standing there, his arms crossed and a wide grin on his face. What did surprise her was the sight of Deathlok standing there as well.
The cyborg was a mystery to her. According to Garrett, Deathlok was his most trusted soldier, at least since he'd sacrificed Grant Ward to escape SHIELD. But she never knew what to think of the man. His face was scarred on it's left side by a large burn, but she got a sense that the pain in his eyes didn't come from that. It wasn't helped by how formidable he was. While not the strongest in HYDRA's current group, he was a strong contender for the title.
Deathlok was looking up at Abomination, who was speaking to him with a condescending tone as Deathlok listened calmly. As Rana strode up them, she began to shapeshift. Her smooth skin became scaled. Her boots stretched around her now clawed feet. Her eyes began to glow. And she felt her power increase massively. The feel of it, of suddenly gaining so much strength, that freeing sense of rage begging to lash out without worry of the consequences, made her sigh a little in ecstasy.
“-all the power in the world,” Abomination mocked. “And you worry about things that don't even matter.”
Deathlok's fists tightened, and his eyes hardened. His forearms opened, and the rockets within sprouted. He looked up at the giant Abomination, standing firmly and eyeing him angrily.
Abomination smiled down at him in turn.
Rana came up then, and both monsters turned to look at her. She eyed them both calmly, eyeing them.
“Damn,” Abomination chuckled. “Why do you look so much better than me?”
“Shut up, Blonsky,” Rana said simply. “Deathlok. We have a problem?”
“None at all,” Deathlok turned around. “Just checking on things. Goodbye.”
Deathlok leaped into the air and shot upwards. Ports opened on his back, and Chitauri energy sent him flying through the air.
“Huh. Didn't know he'd learned how to fly,” the giant chuckled. “What a fun world I've woken up to.” Abomination looked at Rana. His eyes panned up and down her form. For all the height and muscle mass she had gained, he was still larger. “They told me you picked the name Aberration.”
“Yeah, I did,” Rana said, looking up at her male counterpart.
“I like it,” Abomination cracked his neck. “Well, we'regonna be fighting later today, and I want a good warmup. We're allowed to destroy this place, so we can really have some fun. How about it, bitch?”
He had to have said that on purpose. Just to anger her.
But that was the thing about those with gamma-irradiated blood. Anger came damn easy.
Rana stepped forward and kicked into Abomination's giant chest. He went flying back into the barn, destroying the doors with ease.
“I'm going to beat you to death!” Rana roared, leaping after him and landing on his chest.
Roaring with rage, she punched him in the face, her scaled knuckles smashing against his chin.
“Hahaha,” Abomination laughed quietly.
She chose to respond to punch him again, sending one of his teeth flying. He grabbed her by the neck, lifting her up, and Rana kicked him in the throat.
“Enough!” he threw her to the side, getting up and confronting her.
Rana flipped in the air, landing against the wall of the barn and immediately jumping off of it. As the wall shattered under the strength of her jump, she flipped around and kicked Abomination in the face. He stepped back, then punched her in the face in return. She took the blow as the barn around them began to shake and fall apart, punching Abomination in the stomach. He grabbed her arm and spun around once before throwing her upwards. She went flying through the ceiling of the barn, and snarled with rage as she flew straight up, orientating herself to face Abomination as he rocketed towards her. He rose over her and brought his fists down on her back with a Captain Kirk ax handle, launching her back towards the barn where she slammed into the dirt. She took a breath, then rolled over, dodging Abomination's landing. They eyed each other for a moment.
“...Is that the best you've got?” Rana said, trying to get him to attack.
Instead, Abomination blinked, surprised. Then he laughed, a deep growling laugh. The barn began to fall apart around them as he continued to laugh. “Okay, 'Aberration'. Let's go!”
The two scaled monsters leaped towards each other, ignoring the barn falling on their heads, and began to beat each other, forgoing tactics trained into both military soldiers for the sheer joy of brawling. They tore through chunks of the barn, turning it into sawdust against their invincible forms. Shockwaves were sent out with every punch and kick. Anyone nearby would have assumed an earthquake had begun.
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They fought for about ten minutes and turned the entire area around them into a crater before finally stopping. When it was over they'd turned the entire place into dust, shattered wood, and massive craters.
A good warm up, when the Avengers would be visiting soon.
------
Wanda Maximoff/Scarlet Witch
In another section of the castle grounds, Wanda and Pietro met with Helen. She walked them over to the river that ran through the land. Then along the shores for a while. Eventually, they reached a large oak tree standing majestically over the river. Two people sat underneath its shade, as different in appearance as night and day. When they walked up, Helen introduced them.
“This is Marian Pouncy, aka Poundcakes,” Helen said with a smile. “Don't let her size fool you, sugah, she's a sweetheart.”
Wanda was glad she'd said that, because Marian was the biggest woman she'd seen that wasn't Rana Williams in her Aberration form. She had neck length black hair that fell over the right side of her face, an upturned nose, and a shy smile. She also had muscles on top of muscles, all easy to see in the tight blue t-shirt she wore, while still being extremely buxom.
“And this is Mimi Gold, we call her Songbird,” Helen pointed at the pixie-like blonde woman sitting next to Marian, dwarfed by the massive figure beside her.
Wanda, in fact, felt massive compared to her, she was that small. Despite that, Mimi was also as physically fit as Helen and Marian were, something Wanda was curious about. She had blonde hair cut to the scalp, and grinned confidently up at Wanda and Pietro. The tiny blonde rose up along with Marian, and the two strode forward to greet her brother and her.
“How's it going!?” Mimi said. She had a beautiful voice, one that seemed to fill the air a while after she'd spoken.
“Hello,” Marian said softly. She brushed her hair out of her eyes and looked at Helen, who nodded gently, before tapping her belt. That soft buzzing came again.
“Okay sugah, we can't be heard. At least, according to BRIDGE,” Helen said.
“BRIDGE?” Wanda asked, still trying to understand what exactly was going on. All Helen had told them was that she had a way out of HYDRA.
“It's SHIELD's new name,” Helen said.
“How do you know that?” Pietro asked. “Haven't we had trouble getting news on them?”
“I've got my sources,” Helen smiled secretively.
“Why are we here, Helen?” Pietro said, losing his patience.
The three women in front of them slowly stopped smiling. Helen shared a glance with her friends, then turned to look back at Wanda and Pietro.
“...I told you that I stayed with HYDRA after Davida was captured to get her back. And that was the plan. To find her, help her escape. And you guys wanted to kill the Avengers, Tony Stark in particular. How about this? You tell us your story, we tell you ours.”
Wanda began to open her mouth. Then she stopped. An old pain filled her heart. She looked at Pietro. Her brother was staring at the ground. He licked his lips, a nervous action, and clenched his fists. The three women don't say anything, simply waiting. Wanda was about to speak when Pietro stepped forward and put a hand on her shoulder, nodding when she looked at him.
“...When we were ten years old, we were having dinner, the four of us. When the bombing began that day, our home was hit. The first shell landed two floors below us, makes a hole in our floor... Our parents go in. Our home falls down around us,” Pietro swipes at his nose, his breath harsh. “I grab her, roll under the bed, and another shell comes in, lands three feet from us... But it just sat there. It didn't blow up, it just stayed there. On the side was a word...”
“Stark,” Wanda said quietly.
“...we were under that bed for two days, as they tried to dig us out. Staring at his name,” Pietro shook his head.
“While they tried to dig us out, all I could think with every shift of brick,” Wanda said softly. “Was that 'this will set it off.' For two days we stared at Tony Starks weapon, waiting for it to kill us.”
“...But now we are working for people who are worse,” Pietro said, cursing out the words. “I spent years, hating him. Hating America, hating the Avengers when he made them. And now... I can't even find the energy anymore.”
Wanda looked at him, surprised by his admission. He looked away, ashamed.
“I'm sorry,” Mimi said, the petite young woman giving Wanda a pitying look. Wanda brushed it off.
“Well, that is why we joined HYDRA. Strucker told us he would give us the power to kill Tony Stark, and he did. But we cannot be a part of this anymore.”
Helen took a deep breath. “Well, our reason is a little different. We just wanted Davida back. She's been our friend since high school.”
“Our sister,” Marian said, the giant woman crossing her massive arms.
“We wrestled together,” Helen said. “Until the car crash. We ended up in a coma for years. When we woke up, our doctor gave us powers. So we used them to do some simple bruiser work, made some small cash that way. Then Strucker offered us enough cash to set us up for life, Davida gets arrested on her first job, and Strucker asks us to work with him for the chance to help her escape.”
“But then they started mutating people, kidnapping, and brainwashing,” Mimi scowled. “We want nothing to do with them, and the second we got a better offer-”
“A better offer?” Wanda asked, furrowing her brow. “From who?”
The three women didn't respond, Helen giving Mimi a glare for her misstep.
“What are we here for?” Pietro stepped forward, his eyes hard.
“So you can escape,” Helen said, moving to stare into his eyes. Speedster and wrestler eyed each other. “You have a chance to join in on our deal. But first, we need to tell you something, about Strucker. About HYDRA, and their role in Sokovia. Because after all this time being pissed at the blacksmith for making a sword, you've worked with the knight who wielded it.”
Wanda had a sinking feeling that everything she had ever known was going to fall apart.
------
Days before, January 15th, 2014
Mahmoud Schahed/Dial
I was standing in front of the massive skyscraper that Daniel Whitehall had been using as his base of operations, watching as BRIDGE agents took away HYDRA guys away through the glass doors in front. More were being carted away by members of the US Military.
“Still hard to get used to all this,” I said softly.
“Tell me about it,” Creel said, standing next to me as we watched everything going on.
I looked around. We hadn't brought in everyone, but enough Avengers, new and old, had come along to make it a bit crowded. Bruce was sitting in a van nearby, looking relieved that he hadn't had to change into his alter ego. Apparently, that was called a 'Code: Green' situation. Natasha was sitting with him, listening as he typed at his laptop and spoke with her at a rapid pace.
Tony hadn't come, but Rhodey was floating over us with his arms raised and pointing at the HYDRA soldiers and personnel that were being escorted out. He hadn't had to do much, just blow up the helicopters on the roof before they could be mobilized, and the War Machine was now on sentry duty.
Steve and Sam were speaking to the press. Officially, Steve and Sam were now the team leaders, so it was up to them to talk to the media. Sam seemed nervous, but he was doing his best.
As Creel and I stood side by side watching everything, two new members of the team walked up to us. Bobbi Morse and Isabelle Hartley, two of the four women on BRIDGE's list of female assassin badasses without powers, along with Natasha and Melinda May. Bobbi smiled as she stood next to me, carefully avoiding coming close to Creel.
“We did good work,” Bobbi said, the tall buxom blonde crossing her arms. “I don't think anyone ever really got hurt on our side.”
“Plenty of theirs though,” Hartley, still looking like an older and stronger Xena to me, if with more concealing clothes, looked on as body bags with HYDRA soldiers inside were wheeled out. Her resemblance to the Warrior Princess only increased with the savage smile on her face.
Me, I was just glad I hadn't had to kill. The Omnitrix had changed me back on the way through a lab, but a healthy amount of ICER's had kept the bad guys down. Thank god for Fitz-Simmons and the magic tranquilizing bullets they'd invented.
“How you feeling?” I asked Creel. “Taking down Daniel Whitehall.”
“...Damn good,” Creel crossed his massive arms, smiling. “I kinda wish I could kill him myself though, instead of capturing him.”
“Aw, so do I, big guy,” Hartley patted him on the shoulder. For some reason, the two of them being friendly seemed weird to me, but they'd hit it off quickly.
“Oh, Isabelle,” I said, remembering. “Your sister is coming by tomorrow. I'll have her fixed up by then.”
Isabelle stared at me for a moment, before smiling brilliantly. “Thanks.”
“Of course,” I looked up at the building. “Man, can you believe how nice the place was? Seriously, evil assholes have the best decorators.”
Bobbi scoffed. “Yeah, if you like torture chambers.”
“Eh, depends on the company,” Isabelle joked.
“I'm thinking about buying it,” I admitted. When the three looked at me, I smirked. “I stole HYDRA's money, remember? I mean, I donated half of it to charities and good causes, but I still have some cash to burn.”
“That rich, huh? I ever tell you how attractive you are?” Isabelle said, grinning. I laughed but kept looking up.
“Seriously, what do you guys think? We could use a big base like this, and I bet it'd sell cheap.”
“Might want to ask the director,” Bobbi nodded towards someone behind us, and we turned to see the Director of BRIDGE.
She was wearing the same outfit she usually preferred, a blue jumpsuit, though she had her hair down, and the new BRIDGE logo rested on the left breast of her outfit. Maria Hill had joined Steve and Sam, and the three were answering questions together, Sam still nervous, but Maria and Steve apparently calm.
“She's a good choice,” Bobbi noted.
“Well, she is better looking than Fury,” I quipped. “But yeah, I'll ask her if she thinks it's a good idea.”
“Kid!” Hawkeye called out, removing the last of the suit he'd worn over his costume to masquerade as that Bakshi guy. “Come on, we're flying back home!”
“Right,” the four of us walked towards him, and I tapped the Omnitrix. Instead of changing into an alien, my Quinjet flew down towards us.
Our first mission as BRIDGE against HYDRA was a win. Now the war was going to begin in earnest.