Falling for the Enemy || Captain America || Book 1

Chapter 11: Everybody Needs A Hobby

EDITED :)

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          I'm beginning to think that the author has a proclivity or kink for rendering me unconscious just to end the chapter on a cliff-hanger. And if that wasn't already humiliating enough – I'm a professional assassin dammit, I should know better – it turns out I wasn't KO'd by any gnarly, epic form of weaponry or super hero or Muhammad Ali (that I would've been okay with). Oh no –

          I was knocked out by a freaking frying pan.

          I didn't even know Flynn Rider and Rapunzel worked for HYDRA. I bet you the horse was in on it too, and the chameleon. Definitely the chameleon. Didn't trust that guy from the get go.

          Now let me tell you, waking up from abrupt unconsciousness is never fun. My body is iron, and the floor is a magnet. Even opening my eyes is a chore. Vertigo swarms and throbs around my head, the pressure akin to what I expect it would feel like to be lying on the floor, and have Thor balance his hammer on the temple of my head, helplessly stuck between two immovable objects, unable to do a damn thing. The tempest of pain that storms underneath what I am certain is a concussion, is an unsettling reminiscence of the hangover I had the morning after St Patrick's day a couple years back. Apparently, I'm more than capable of making bad decisions sober and drunk, because I believed it wise to challenge an Irish mob boss to a drinking game. On St Patrick's day.

          And there we have it kiddies; Lillian Veronica Nightshade's one functioning brain cell.

          The more aware I become of the world around me, the more I feel the aftereffects of adrenaline draining the remaining energy from my body, the all too prominent pain from the arrow wound in my thigh screaming for attention, whilst it grieves me to even move my jaw. The second strike, the one that sent me spiraling into oblivion, was a direct hit across my face. I expect pretty misshapen bruising to form over a good portion of it, the ache spreading from my cheek down along my jawline, going as far as the corner of my mouth, where a small, crusted split in my lip uncomfortably tugs with any movement made with it.

          Yet, at the forefront of mind, stirs the profound disbelief that Rogers shot me. Shot me. You know, I began to think we had a good thing going on, after all, a little rivalry, murder and hostility is good for the soul every once in a while, really helps get all that bottled up anger out of your system. But have I given him any injuries that will undoubtedly scar after one of our little skirmishes?

          No.

          Well, I mean, I did shoot him in the gut after the arrow incident, so maybe, but before that no!

          "The mighty assassin awakens."

          A displeased groan escapes my lips. Lasagne on a stick really? I just woke up, and I have to deal with this BS? Come on.

          "Mm, well, even assassins need their beauty sleep," I slur through the hazy fatigue, bleary eyes finally stretching open wide enough to survey my surroundings.

          Stained concrete walls and floors are what I find myself house in, the harsh surface unkind and unforgiving. A single wall of what looks to be thick glass with a few holes for breathing indicate my new humble abode is likely a cell, wonderful. Definitely a downgrade from the Helicarrier.

          The other figure, owner of the sarcastic, unfriendly remark sits as far away from me as possible in the far back of the cell, one Steven Grant Rogers definitely having seen better days. Pale, grimly so, especially with the flickering, unflattering small light precariously dangling from the room's ceiling. His knees are partially drawn up, but not enough so to hide the hands meekly pressed against his gut, stained crimson and bleeding out across a fair amount of his uniform. A gruesome gash runs from just below the corner of his left eye down to the corner of his lip, a compliment to the smear of bruising splattered along the right side of my face down to my own lip.