The Shadow (Book 1)

Chapter 3

Germany

''Listen to me,'' Shadow sprung up from her bed. Sweat covered her body, leaving her sticky and uncomfortable. The voice had woken her from a dream she couldn't quite remember.

''Get out of my head,'' she seethed, her hands gripping the sides of her head as a sheering pain flashed through her mind.

''It was never your head. It was mine first,'' the voice was shouting back at her in equal amounts of pain. Shadows head throbbed, the pain worse than it had ever been. She squeezed her eyes shut, willing the voice to go away, but it did not. It persisted, clinging to the inside of her mind as a parasite clings to its host.

''Let me finish this mission. This will be the last one, then I'll set you free. I'll let you have this body back,'' tears started to taint her cheeks. The pain, slowly leaving her, replaced with a sense of fear. What if the voice did what she had done to them? Trapped inside their mind to be driven crazy by her own thoughts?

⫸⫸⫸

"This is your captain speaking. We'll be landing in Germany shortly. Please prepare for our descent," Shadow glanced out the window and sighed. Rain splattered the small oval window in hard, heavy lashes. Thunder rolled across the sky as the plane slowly descended towards the runway.

Once the plane had finally come to a stop on the runway, did Shadow finally stand up from her seat. She had ditched her long ominous black coat, as it would draw too much attention to her, in favour of a leather jacket and dark blue jeans. Sunglasses perched on the end of her nose to hide her eyes because you never know who might be watching.

"Though I'd get it down for you," Reaching up to grab her luggage Shadow, found Oliver's arm blocking her own.

"I can get it down myself, thank you very much," she bit back, shoving his arm roughly out the way, yanking the suitcase off of the rack herself. There were no more words exchanged between the two as Shadow pushed past him, making her way off the plane.

Oliver scrambled to keep up with her demeaning pace as she made her way gracefully through the crowds of people; who milled around the airport. Shadow was not used to waiting around for anybody, and she sure wouldn't be waiting around for Oliver of all people. Oliver was only able to catch up with Shadow when she passed through the airport exit and out into the car park, where a man stood beside a taxi, a sign in his hands that read Oliver and Shad.

''Let me take your bags,'' the drivers' German accent was thick as he stumbled over his English pronunciations.

''Danke und wir können auf Wunsch auf Deutsch sprechen,''(Thank you and we can speak in german if you wish). Shadow, for an odd reason, felt for the man. Something inside her could never understand why he would choose a job where he'd be forced to speak languages he didn't fully understand. Never the less the man nodded, grateful for her giving him a choice for perhaps one of the only times. Picking up shadows bag and putting it carefully in the boot. Oliver's was placed next to hers. The two then settled in the back of the taxi.

The journey to the hotel was conducted in silence. A thick layer of tension had wrapped itself around Shadow and Oliver. Neither one of them so much as glance at each other the entire ride; if the human body didn't require Shadow to blink, she wouldn't have done that either. It didn't help that the Taxi driver was playing a Plethora music that spanned several decades, from classical to rap and early nineties pop. After a while Shadow tuned it all out, choosing to stare out the window, focusing on the German city that whizzed past.

''Danke,'' Oliver was the one to thank the driver and pay him, while Shadow wandered into the hotel.

It wasn't anything fancy. In fact, it appeared to look as if a moderate strength gust of wind would cause the structure to fall over. The outside of the building seemed to be veering to the left a little too much for Shadows liking. Most of the windows had wood nailed over them. A dead cat was laid on the second step; Shadow only found that it had died when she accidentally stood on its back leg and it didn't so much as flinch.

The front desk was; manned by a woman, who looked as if the next time she shut her eyes to take a nap, the likelihood of her waking up again was low. As Shadow approached, the woman's eyebrows raised, it seemed she hadn't been expecting any visitors. A string of German greetings, along with compliments, fell past the old woman. In hopes, the visitors in front of her; hadn't been too put off by the building's exterior.

However, the interior wasn't exactly a masterpiece either. Wallpaper hung loosely on the walls, drastically peeling away in serval places; a bloodstain had turned the cream carpet a dull brown colour.

''Wir haben Zimmer unter dem Namen gebucht Williams,'' (we booked rooms under the name Williams) the surname of the voice sounded foreign on her tongue. At that moment, Shadow realised she was going to have to get used to hearing it being said again and not just from her mouth.

⫸⫸⫸

''Sir. We've had an update on the whereabouts of Doctor Williams.'' Phil Coulson was the one to approach Nick Fury, who had been staring down at the Doctors file that lay open on his desk.

Each day he found himself drawn to the file his intrigue, constantly peaking the more he read about her. A Doctor with several Phd's, including be youngest to receive many of them. She was smart, had been the head of an organisation, an illegal one, but never the less she'd had authority. Then she'd supposedly died in a lab explosion in Calcutta. Then proceeded to appear a year later, with a metal arm, green eyes and a taste for murder. No matter how impossible it may have seemed, Fury just knew the person who called themselves The Shadow was Doctor Williams. All he had to do was prove it.

''I want a full Strike force, with you in charge. She's brought here to me. I have many questions that I'm hoping she'll know the answers to,'' Agent collusion nodded and retreated swiftly from the room.

For what felt like the hundredth time in the last few days, Fury shut the file in front of him, leaning back on his chair, a deep sigh emitting from his lips, ''not long now, Doctor,'' he muttered to himself.