Surprise, HYDRA's inside and everywhere.
And in the midst of helping, The Berlin Curse and Winter Soldier are thrown out into the vulnerable world. Except, Berlin, aka Karin Annelie Annie Banica, has started remembering before the hellicarriers c...
In the middle of the afternoon, Annie had found herself working tirelessly at the wretched metal arm the mechanics have failed to repair. The clanks were heard from the very halls that the others of SHIELD are sleeping in.
They told her to sleep. But the dark was full of unknown entities. If Annie were to sleep, for sure she could get more information about her life. The cons were whether she wanted to risk the horrific things she'd done. The innocence bleeding out of her like a gash in her neck. Annie knew that the majority wasn't her, it was the Berlin Curse, but she did kill in her conscious to protect the man she loves. Or, at the time it seemed like she was just protecting the feeling of love itself.
The needle she held stops midway of poking a misplaced wire when she hears her door squeak. The sound triggered an unpleasing image of arteries being torn from her leg. Violently shaking her head, she places the needle down on the small coffee table and turns her head to see Steve.
He stands with a grey t-shirt and navy blue sweats crinkled from a probable unrest of planning. His posture is slumped, and he rubs his eyes.
"How long have you been sleeping?" he asks, stepping closer to Annie's bed.
"I plan to not sleep," Annie mumbles and shakes the short ragged dirty hair from her face. "But I 'm glad that you've come."
"Is that so?" He inquires with a slight raise of his brow.
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"Yes, I have much to talk about."
Settling on the bed next to her, he lays down and so does Annie.
"Do you remember everything? Back in the 40s..."
Annie looks away, ashamed of herself. She does, but even then Annie had done terrible things. She'd murdered someone, out of fear. Before the entire HYDRA brainwashing's, she was already guilty.
"Not entirely," she partly lies. Her fingers collect themselves in a know above her stomach, twitching now and then from the still loose wires. "I remember Bucky, though. I remember you and I know I should be overwhelmed with grief and pity and guilt, but I don't."
Steve blows out a breathe. "That's not bad."
"I'm not so sure."
A collective silence settles between them, until Annie breaks it. "I can remember the little things. The way your mother looked, and her bread sticks...I do recall the events...but I can't grasp the feelings, Steve. Do you know what I mean?"
Steve actually did, but he had never experienced it. He felt grief, pity, sadness, angry--you name it--when he got out of the ice. Loosing Bucky and Burdge had been his key...And Peggy too. Steve still understood. "You see, but you can't feel," he whispered. "A picture with no meaning."
"How so? He's probably been under the same thing as you."
A pained expression contorted, her mind flashing with Bucky screaming for Annie to help him...
"He's been under it too long," Annie says. "I've committed numerous crimes myself, Steve. Far worse than Bucky. But, he's sensible. He's been remembering too often, and when I tried to help him, something always triggers him to...get violent. HYDRA would always wipe him over."
Annie knew she was capable of an ability she'd long forgotten to use. She recalls that she never showed HYDRA her power, for they would've experimented on her...Which, at this time, sounded really horrific. Though, she never needed powers, she needed her knowledge. Hell, Annie just found out she was responsible for the Berlin massacre in 1999, hence the name.
"I'm working on that, Annie," Steve acknowledged. "He'll remember me."
"Not..."Annie choked on her own tongue. The thought of Steve dying at the hands of Bucky killed her. "Not if it's too late, Steve." She sucked in her breathe, collecting herself. She shouldn't cry.
Turning her head away from Steve, Annie walks up to the table and picks up the needle. "You'll let him kill you," she says and pokes her hand, surprisingly sparking purple. "You'll let him do whatever he can, and I can't lose a part of my life like you."
"If that's what it takes, Annie, I'll let him," he replies. His face could depict the sight of a lost golden retriever. Blue eyes cast down in a veil of concern and helplessness.
Annie knew exactly how he felt. "But you can't, Steve. If you die, he may not fully forgive himself. He may not remember..." Clenching her fists, Annie drops the needle. "He won't remember me! Not without the one thing that he loves like family. If he doesn't see us both, together, I don't think he'll be the same."
She intently looks at her childhood best friend. "Remember when I said that I had a gift? A gift unlike anything, so alien, even I didn't know what it was?"
Steve nods his head. He could recall feeling odd and absurd at the time.
"Well this is me using it right now. As Burdge Strath, I was smart enough to predict the future by the actions of those around me. That's how Insight was made. Through me, they used that intelligence like a program. I remember Zola and the recruiting of German scientists. I was one of the willing to let them in, and then sent on a covert mission. I went to find Bucky, because I knew he was alive. HYDRA was alive, and I was the only one who knew."
"That's when they took you?" Steve questions. "The file I read, a bit before what happened in New York...It said that you went missing right after the recruiting."
"Yes," Annie sighs. "I can pick up the events, like I said. I knew what was happening...I knew they were using me--"
Maria Hill knocks on the door, her stiff posture explains that she didn't mean to interrupt.
"Cap, we need to go."
Steve tiredly looks at Annie. "When we come back..."
Not letting him finish, Annie pulls her best friend into a hug. "Bring him home, Steve. And then we can all talk."
"With him," Steve whispers rather in a farce.
"Yes, with Bucky."
Savoring the possible last moment together, Annie lets Steve go. She watches the two walk away and disappear as they turn a corner.
Then, slipping into her lethal facade, she packs her suit and tidies a little but of her hands and legs.
