The Asset: The Beginning and End of the Winter Soldier

Chapter Two

An unknown amount of time passed before he was once again awake and aware. He was in a different facility with different people, none of whom spoke English. His awareness seemed to blur for a time, during which he came to realize he could understand what they were saying, could recognize many languages as Russian, Romanian, German, Spanish, Japanese, Chinese, and dozens of others. Other knowledge came to him, knowledge he knew he had not had before, geography, politics, technology, weapons training he had never physically experienced. It was only after he had pulled himself free of the Winter Soldier that he had realized they had used whatever implants were in his brain to give him accelerated learning, essentially downloading everything they felt he would need, to include Hydra's overall mission.

Once the knowledge download was complete, other things happened, slowly, insidiously, not giving him knowledge but chipping away at his identity. The doctors and technicians, all of whom spoke Russian, would discuss their progress over his helpless form, unconcerned that he may be able to hear them, to realize what they were doing. He was injected with an unknown drug that caused his reality to shift and blur, not quite to hallucinations, but enough so that he was confused, unsure of himself. The personnel around him would then question him on dozens of different topics, some that were personal to him and others that were more general, everyday knowledge. Finally, the questioning became simple and repetitive.

"What is your name?" Uttered in monotone as others took notes regarding his responses.

"Sergeant James Barnes," he would answer at first, in English. Then more drugs would be injected into him, blurring his perceptions, causing blank spots in his memories.

"What is your name?"

"James." When he was certain, they injected more into him.

"What is your name."

A pause as he tried to think, but it was so hard to think, to reason, to know anything. "I don't know."

The session would end, with no further injections, no further questions. He would be left in a small, windowless, bare room for the drugs to wear off. He would sit and try to remember, try to think through the haze of the drugs. He could hear the technicians or doctors talking outside of the room, voices echoing strangely.

"We must be careful that we do not damage his mind. Long term exposure to these substances will eventually cause irrevocable damage, they are poisons even in the smallest amounts. We need only to destroy his identity, everything else has to be intact or he is useless to us."

"He has extraordinary healing ability now; any physical damage will not be an issue. As for any mental damage, we are monitoring him closely," another doctor or technician answered. "These drugs are only to begin the process, to make him question his identity. He is too strong mentally and too stubborn for us to have any success in this project without shaking his faith in his mind."

He would slowly begin to emerge from the drug's effects, becoming sure of himself once again, though he would be uneasy as he began to believe that they would succeed in taking his sense of self away. He felt a growing sense of horror at just how helpless he was against whatever they were doing to him, whatever they intended to do. He was not allowed to even begin to defend himself against it. He would scream at his captors, his tormentors, in anger, using his strength that seemed so intense to batter the door of the room until he was subdued with gas that rendered him unconscious. The strength that was more than he had ever felt was useless against them. He would wake up, once again restrained, once again facing the doctors, or the technicians, as they injected him with poison to drug him, possibly trying to control him, he could not think clearly enough to understand their intentions.