Hellfire & Brimstone

Trial and Error

The samples were sent over quickly, Okoye herself brought them. She wanted to stay, but there was an urgent call back to Wakanda. I thanked her for rushing them over, she shared in our concerns for my young warrior. Bruce got me setup in a lab, that wasn't too much different from Shuri's. The added bonus was F.R.I.D.A.Y. Having her run tests while I did other things made it a lot easier. 

It was late morning by the time Steve came to check on me. The lab I was in had a large window that allowed me to look in on Steven while I worked. 

"Never thought I'd see you in a lab." He smiled at me, walking over with a cup of coffee.

"Ya," I chuckled, "I think it's in my genes." I took a sip from my coffee. "My parents were scientists, and Shuri had ways of encouraging me to do more with what I had." I turned toward a screen and pushed a few buttons. 

"How's the tests?" Steve pointed to a random screen.

"Well," I smiled, "Those would be his vitals, which are good. His heart rate is still elevated, but everything else is good." I took another sip from my cup and then set it down. "This over here," I pointed to a lit up 3 dimensional rendition of a DNA strand, "is the testing. I have Bucky's DNA over here." I pointed toward a screen that showed a spiral of DNA. "I have mine over here, and I am currently separating mine from Steven's. This..." I looked to Steve to see if he was still interested, which he appeared to be. "Will allow me to check for artifacts or anomalies in Bucky's portion of his DNA and, by separating out mine, we can check for any anomalies there as well." I walked back over to my cup and lifted it to my lips.

Steve was looking over the screens and then looked back to me. "You know, I don't know if I followed that." He smiled to me, "I do know that Buck would be proud of you." 

I smiled to him and took another drink, nodding my head in thanks. 

"We're going to start testing down in the Hangar." Steve said as he walked toward the window to look in on Steven. "I don't know if you'll lose power or not."

"Friday?" I spoke out into the room. 

"Yes, Miss?" She replied overhead.

"Can you isolate the power to this lab and the adjoining medical room from the rest of the grid?" I took another drink from my cup, smirking at Steve.

"Done, miss." Friday replied quickly.

"I think we'll be ok." I lowered my cup. "Be careful."

"Always." Steve said as he left the room. 

I spent the next several hours staring at screen after screen. While they were downstairs playing with time, I was up here begging for more of it. The scans and images weren't finding any anomalies.

"Friday," I spoke out again, my eyes fixed on the DNA strand in front of me. "Pull the medical files from project Hellfire." My thumb nail came to my mouth and found myself holding the nail between my teeth as I waited for a response.

"All files available have been pulled miss."

"Search for genetic alterations to..." I took a deep breath, "the patients DNA makeup." 

"Searching..."

I ran my hand along my chin and down my neck, taking a deep breath while I gave a sigh. Maybe I was looking at this wrong. Maybe it's my DNA that's affecting him. 

"Genetic alterations to patient zero's DNA has been pulled."

"Check for traces of those alterations in our current patients DNA." I reached over for my cup, finding it empty.