The King: T'Challa.

Chapter 3: The Beginning Pt.2

Emily woke to silence and steel. The ceiling above her was bare, the light an unblinking fluorescent that hummed with the monotony of captivity. The restraints on her wrists were familiar. She did not need to ask where she was. Hydra. Again.

Her absence had not gone unnoticed. They considered her betrayal an offense beyond correction, but rather than kill her outright, they chose the crueller option: to repurpose her once more. So they placed her in a cell and called it science.

The experiments followed a rhythm so precise it eroded her sense of time. She was led out by faceless soldiers, strapped to a table so cold her skin ached against it, then subjected to the indignities of their curiosity. Needles siphoned her blood. Electrodes hummed against her temples, searching for ways to splinter her will. Fields of energy flared and bent around her body as technicians observed, adjusting frequencies, noting every failure with clinical disinterest.

They wanted to cage her abilities, to blunt what Hydra had once sharpened. But her powers remained stubborn, if scarred. She could bend space into shields of pure force, conjured from her hands or her mind. She could climb those shields as steps, scaling into the air until the earth dropped away beneath her. She could heal wounds—anyone's but her own. That limitation was a cruelty she never understood. The gift-bearer, denied the gift.

She endured. Weeks bled into months, her existence reduced to two states: being tested, or being forgotten. She counted cracks in the wall, recited names she feared she would never speak aloud again. Sometimes she dreamed of Wakanda—the warmth of Shuri's laughter, T'Chaka's steady voice, Okoye's unyielding gaze—and woke with the taste of iron in her mouth, dragged back to a life of silence and shackles.

The end, when it came, was violent. Explosions rattled the base, alarms shrieked through the corridors, boots thundered overhead. Gunfire barked. Her cell door buckled under impact, then burst inward with a roar. Smoke and light filled the room. For a brief, fleeting instant she thought it was freedom.

It was not.

The Avengers had come, and their efficiency was Hydra's mirror image: swift, ruthless, absolute. Before she could escape into the chaos, before she could even inhale the air of open space, she was bound again. New captors. New cell. The cycle resumed.

Days passed before they sent someone to speak with her.

He arrived without ceremony, his presence enough to fill the narrow room. Tall, broad-shouldered, his uniform unmistakable—blue, striped in red and white, a star emblazoned across his chest. Captain America. Steve Rogers.

He sat opposite her, posture steady, voice measured.
"Who are you?"

Her mouth was dry. "Emily Cassidy. Former Hydra agent."

The word former clung to her tongue like ash.

Steve studied her in silence, his gaze unflinching. It was not suspicion so much as assessment, as though he were weighing the shape of her words against the truth he thought he saw in her.

"Where were you based?"

She hesitated, then answered. "Siberia."

The reaction was immediate, if restrained. A tension in his shoulders. A shadow crossing his expression. The name meant something to him.

He leaned forward. "Do you know James Buchanan Barnes?"

Her body went rigid. The sound of his name cracked something deep within her. Bucky. Always Bucky.

"Yes," she whispered. "He was my partner. On missions."

Steve's eyes narrowed, though not with accusation—with concern. "And what became of him?"

The question was a blade. She clenched her fists, fighting the flood of memory. "We had a mission. We failed. We were captured. He escaped. Left me behind." Her laugh was short, jagged. "Not even a goodbye. Just gone. Like I was disposable."

Steve was silent. His expression had shifted—there was sorrow there, tightly controlled. Perhaps guilt. At last he asked, quieter now:
"How old are you?"

"Nineteen," she replied, voice sharper than she intended. "Twenty in three weeks. Young enough to answer that question without offense, Captain."

A flicker of amusement broke through his solemnity. "Forgive me, Miss Cassidy. I didn't mean—"

"Just Emily," she interrupted. "No titles."

He inclined his head, acknowledging the correction. The room fell still again, silence drawn out like a thread. Then he rose, abrupt, and left. The echo of his departure hollowed her chest. It was too familiar—Bucky had walked away the same way. Without explanation. Without a backward glance.

Minutes stretched before the door opened once more. Steve stood there, his expression altered, as though some decision had been wrestled into place.

He met her eyes directly. "How would you feel about joining the Avengers?"

The words caught her breath. For the first time in years, something more than survival stirred in her. Possibility.