Archive of Our Own

Kidnapping had to be a new low. Breaking and entering, destruction of property, and occasionally making the right people disappear was more Yelena’s area of expertise. It was the middle of the night, moonlight casting shadows where it peeked through the trees onto worn, old bricks of the building. This certainly wasn’t the “public facing” job Yelena requested, but as she slipped through an unlocked window, one thing eased her mind: whoever she was capturing was an amateur, and clearly wasn’t expecting her. 

The information she had been given was rather sparse, but Yelena had enough information to work with. An address to a shoddy apartment building in Vermont rented to a woman named Koda Ellis, the usual backstory of a person too dangerous to be left roaming free, and half of a blurry photograph from a low-level security camera were in the files, but not much else. When she had accepted the task, Valentina had told her that she’d be certain of her target if she saw them, even with the uncertain photograph on file. Creeping through the room, nothing looked unusual or out of place, but Yelena knew better than to let that fool her. The lack of security measures could simply be a ruse, lulling her into a false sense of comfort. Anyone worth Valentina’s time certainly knew enough to protect themself.

Yelena had come in through the laundry room window and entered the hallway, silently sweeping through a cluttered den and a bathroom showing signs of someone having recently showered. Her target wasn't in either of the rooms, which wasn't surprising. It was late at night, late enough that most people would be asleep. She drew her gun and continued into the next room a little more warily. A bedroom, furnished with earthy tones and touches of nature. Posters and drawings hung on the walls, held up with scotch tape and thumbtacks. Fake plants and string lights adorned the tops of the walls, and a desk with chipped paint held dozens of books and CD cases. The blankets on the bed were rumpled yet unoccupied, cold to the touch. They had been placed into a ring, making a sort of nest on the bed complete with a floppy plush nestled beside the pillow. There was nothing underneath the bed, not even a hidden weapon, just a few scratches on the wooden floor. The closet held clothing, as many did, but no hidden quarry. Yelena shuffled through the hanging clothes just to be sure, rustling shirts and jackets far too big to fit the approximate measurements in the files she had been given. On the floor were a few cardboard boxes, a hat for a sports team, and… bones. That caught Yelena's attention. She dropped to one knee and tugged the bones out from the shadows. Jagged ridges ran along the length of a few of them, too uneven to be knife marks but not right to be for teeth either. The bones had been properly cleaned to a dull off-white. Yelena tugged out the various pieces until she came across something easily identifiable. The stub of an antler had been stashed away in the corner, and she let out a slightly relieved sigh. The bones weren't human. They were deer bones. Strange, but not as concerning as things could have been. She picked up one of the smaller bones and hid it away in her pocket, noting the marks on it before making her way back into the hallway.

The apartment itself seemed respectable, though a bit old. It was cleaner than Alexei’s place had been, at the very least. She came to the end of the hall and into the main living space. A flimsy tripwire was fashioned at the entrance of the hall, blending in against the carpet, but Yelena had been expecting something of the sort. Maybe it would have worked against a thief, but she'd been watching for any defensive measures, so she simply stepped over it and entered the living room. The TV flickered dimly in the background and surely covered over whatever noise she had made breaking in. Curled up on the couch was a person wrapped in a blanket, sound asleep with a half-empty mug of tea sitting on the floor in front of them. The darkness obscured much of their appearance, as did the blanket. By the light of a late-night news broadcast, Yelena crept closer and took a moment to study the sleeping individual.

She was pale with dark circles under her eyes that stuck out starkly. Medium-length brown hair framed her sleeping face, falling free from the hood of the sweatshirt pulled over her head. Aside from that, Yelena couldn't tell much. She was likely young, but it was hard to tell exactly how old, maybe mid-twenties or early thirties. For a brief moment, doubt crept up Yelena's spine. Whoever this was, she didn't look particularly dangerous. Valentina had said she'd be certain of her target upon seeing them, but there didn't seem to be anything remarkable about her. But there had been a trap set in the hallway, the strange bones in the closet, and the woman's appearance seemed to match the photograph in her file. She was in the right place. And really, her job wasn't to question Valentina. If she said her target was dangerous and needed to be brought in, she would carry out the task.

Rather than give her target time to fight back or prepare to attack, Yelena pounced while she was still sleeping. The blanket worked in her favor as a net, tangling up limbs and slowing movements. The woman awoke with a yelp and immediately began struggling, but her defenses were weak and sloppy. The mug was kicked over, spilling all over the floor as the pair struggled. The woman's hood fell back and revealed a pair of fuzzy, pointed canine ears atop her head. That must have been what Valentina meant when she said she'd know her if she saw her. After only a moment, Yelena had the target subdued and cornered, a gun held by her side. Another moment, and the woman was crumpled on the floor unconscious, a needle in her side. Yelena hoisted her over her shoulder and disappeared into the night.

Light blurred and bled into streaks of gold and orange. In the uncomfortable backseat of a car, Yelena's target began to stir. Save for being prompted to eat and drink, and the occasional stop at a rest area, she had remained in a drugged sleep throughout the journey. The land had gradually flattened and trees became more sparse, terrain shifting and changing with the miles put between her home and whatever strange place she was being taken, but she hadn't been aware enough to notice until then. She had hardly a moment to process before a voice was speaking to her, accented and unfamiliar entirely.

"You are awake now. I am not going to hurt you, okay? I just have to take you somewhere secure where you will not be a danger." The voice paused, then picked up again with a slightly more curious tone. "You are Koda Ellis. But that is all I know about you. We do not have to be enemies."

The woman, Koda, sat up and cautiously eyed the driver. She was not someone she had seen before, and her voice was not one she recognized. The car they were in also wasn't hers, and Koda wondered how long she'd been gone already. The surroundings whipping by looked almost alien compared to her home. She opened her mouth to speak yet it took a few tries before anything more than a hoarse whine could leave her mouth. Eventually, she managed a strangled, "Are you going to kill me?"

"No. We are going to a secure facility where the wrong people cannot get to you. I was only supposed to have to bring you to New York, but the plan has changed. We are in Utah now."

Secure facility? The wrong people? The phrases weren't as unfamiliar as Koda wished they were. "Oh," she said. "The doctors are back." A sick feeling of dread settled in the pit of Koda's stomach. The words alone were enough to make her pointed ears pin back in fear.

"Doctors? What doctors?" Yelena looked quizzically into the rearview mirror. "There are no doctors where we are going. We are meeting with my boss somewhere safe."

"Is she a scientist of some sort?"

"Uh… no. Not that I know of. Are you okay?"

"You kidnapped me! Of course I'm not okay!" Koda saw Yelena wince in the mirror.

"Yeah, that is fair."

The car was filled with silence thick enough to suffocate in. Koda contented herself with counting mile markers on the highway for the time being, choosing to ignore her captor's attempts at conversation. As far as kidnappings went, she supposed it wasn't too bad. She hadn't been hurt except for the initial struggle, and sometimes a box of snacks or a bottle of water would be tossed in her direction. Yelena quickly gave up in her attempts to be friendly, and they spent the last leg of the journey in relative silence.

The streaks of gold and orange Koda had woken up to had been the sunrise. By the time they arrived at their destination, the sky was turning orange and red again, this time for sunset. The instant the car was parked, Koda lunged out of the backseat and scrambled across the red dirt. She didn't bother looking behind her to see if she was being chased. She knew she was. This was her only chance for escape, and she wasn't about to waste it. Wobbly legs carried her a good distance before she stumbled and fell in a heap, tumbling into the dirt. Having sat for so long unmoving had thrown her off balance and unprepared to run, and her attempt to get to her feet was slower than she would have liked. A body crashed into her back and she fell again, earning herself a mouthful of sand.

"No running. Come on, this way." A firm hand grasped Koda's arm and lifted her to her feet. Once she was stable and upright, the hand didn't let go. In fact, it held on tighter. She brushed off as much dust as she could and the hand around her arm loosened for just an instant. "Have you always had that?" Yelena asked.

Koda straightened up and furrowed her brow, head cocking to the side like a curious puppy. "Had what?" She glanced behind her to where Yelena was pointing and she winced. A bushy tail had escaped the back of her pants when she'd tripped. The fur was thick and soft, matching with the ears atop her head, and Koda glanced away and hitched up her jeans. "Oh, um. Yeah. That's been there."

Yelena circled around her with a critical, curious eye, like she couldn't quite believe what she was seeing. They'd been in an enclosed space together for multiple days and she hadn't noticed. "Right. Okay."

The grip on her upper arm returned and guided her back to the car. Even when Yelena let go, her firm glare pinned her in place while she gathered things from the trunk. Koda took the opportunity to adjust her tail more comfortably. Now that it had been noticed, it seemed pointless to hide it down her pant leg again. She tugged it through a slit cut into the back of her pants and gave it an experimental wag. Much better. It was like having a piece of herself back. At home, the ears and tail were always hidden under pants and hats. In such a small town, the sudden appearance of a newcomer was strange enough, let alone one with features like hers. She'd hid them since her arrival there, as uncomfortable as it was.

Yelena's voice cut through her thoughts. "I just received a call. A rogue operative is at the facility intending to steal information. I need to take care of her before we meet with Valentina. You are coming with me and you will do exactly what I say."

"I don't want to fight anyone," Koda protested.

"Will you run if I leave you up here alone?"

"…Yeah."

"Then you are coming with me," Yelena said firmly. "You don't have to fight. Just stay out of the way until I am done."

The hike up was rather grueling, if Koda was being honest. A constant, steep uphill along a dirt road that she really wasn't sure why they couldn't have just driven up. At the top, at least, the view was beautiful. She barely had a moment to enjoy it before Yelena dragged her behind a rock, pointing to a lone figure standing by the vault's entrance. Koda peeked up over the rock to watch, holding her breath, and fell backwards when the figure just… disappeared.

"How did they do that?" she gasped. Yelena didn't answer. She motioned for Koda to follow as she crept forward, gun drawn and ready. She'd equipped a few weapons while at the car, and Koda looked over herself bitterly. She hadn't been given a weapon of any kind, and she was defenseless. Yelena at least looked as though she had some protective pieces on her outfit. Koda stood no chance in a fight, and she had no opportunity to attack Yelena and make her escape.

"Follow me," Yelena whispered. The vault door slid open, allowing Koda and Yelena to enter. The whole interior was made up of earthy tans and browns, with stone and rock features where the vault had been carved. A sleek metal elevator slipped open, and Yelena held her gun at the ready as she approached. Empty. Yelena entered and motioned for Koda to follow her, allowing Koda to stand behind her so she could keep her gun at the ready. Exiting the elevator, they both turned to watch as it closed behind them ominously, having deposited them on a floor that seemed to be a warehouse.

Koda padded along behind Yelena, staying no more than a few steps behind her as she swept the room. It seemed to be empty, and Koda let her guard drop slightly. Whoever they'd followed wasn't here. She took the first opportunity to leave Yelena's side, putting space between them but keeping her in her line of sight. Yelena continued searching for the mysterious, disappearing target she had been sent after, but Koda studied the contents of the room. Crates and boxes were filled to the brim with files and paperwork. Medical equipment and various carts and shelving units littered the space in a sight far more familiar and recognizable than Koda was comfortable with. Shuffling through papers revealed schedules, doctor's notes, medication dosages, photos of medical tests, and times of death. IV poles and blood pressure cuffs stood abandoned in various places. Tubes and braces and gauze lay scattered throughout the room as well, and Koda felt a sharp stab of betrayal. She turned to Yelena, prepared to snap, ears back and tail stiff, but she looked just as confused as Koda did.

"You said there weren't any doctors," Koda growled. She'd known better than to trust her, really, but she'd sounded so sincere about the lack of scientists and doctors.

"I didn't think there were any. This… I have never seen these things before. Come look at this."

She crept warily back to Yelena's side and peeked over her shoulder at what she was looking at. A stack of photos held together by a binder clip sat in an unlocked case. Beside them were charts and plans, edited and noted in red pen, and a design for an unfamiliar logo. She picked up the photos and flipped through one or two of them before tossing them back into the case. They showed people, humans, like test subjects. A hallway filled with body bags in a neat row. A shadowy imprint on a wall. Koda felt sick. With her tail between her legs, she turned away as Yelena stuffed some of the paperwork into her pocket.

And then there was a man in the room, gun drawn and pointed at Yelena. Koda dove behind a storage box as shot after shot rang out in the air. The sounds of a fight, of metal on metal, and the sharp crack of gunfire assaulted Koda's ears. She hadn't realized guns were so loud. She poked her head up just in time to see Yelena go flying across the room and land on the floor nearby. The man stalked closer, clearly not done with the fight, and Yelena rose up to meet him. With a scowl on his face and a shield on his arm, the man swung at Yelena as she produced a knife and slashed at him. He deflected her blows and the pair struggled over the knife for a moment.

"You're not even my target," Yelena hissed.

The man replied with confusion evident in his voice. "You're mine."

Koda ducked back down behind the box as he swept the knife away and Yelena lunged for it again. It was probably best to stay hidden until the whole thing was over. The man seemed nice enough, and Koda didn't particularly want to watch him die. He was holding his own fairly well, but Koda knew it was just a matter of time. Yelena had kidnapped her, after all. She surely had all sorts of nasty tricks up her sleeve that she was just waiting to use.

A crash sounded from the other side of the room, and a new voice spoke. Koda didn't hear what they said, but it wasn't Yelena and it wasn't the man either. As much as she wanted to stay hidden, she needed to know what she was hiding from. Fluffy ears poked up from behind the crate as the masked newcomer made a beeline for where the man now lay on the floor. The stranger had a shield on their arm too, and wasted no time in attacking. With everybody fairly occupied, she took the opportunity to crawl a little further away and find somewhere safe to hide and watch.

Settled a little more safely, Koda watched as the new stranger joined Yelena's spot tumbled on the floor. The man's shoulders twitched and he moved toward them again, but another person appeared with a distorted rumbling sound. Koda recognized them, at least. It was the same person Yelena had been following into the building. The man swung at her, but she disappeared straight through him and appeared on the other side, lunging at the masked stranger. With each move, the fighting drew a little closer to Koda. The center of the room had been cleared in the struggle and the makeshift arena continued to grow as the surroundings were used as shelters and cover. Koda had given up trying to watch the fight, instead curled up on the floor with her hands over her ears. It had been bad enough when there had been one gun in the room making such loud noises. Now, with four fighters and various weapons, she knew better than to stick her head out somewhere she could get shot.

A sudden crack of a gun stunned the room into silence, and all fighting stopped as a body thumped to the floor. Still, Koda didn't peek. The only thing that drew her attention was somebody retching and coughing a few feet from her. She carefully crawled over, tail and ears low, and pulled back sharply when she saw a man in pale blue scrubs throwing up. All eyes turned to him, including Koda's, as he tumbled into the open and struggled to his feet.

"Is she actually dead? Oh…" he said, rushing to the doorway. As if on cue, thick, metal doors slammed shut ocer each entrance. He stumbled back over to the three remaining fighters, and all weapons were instantly aimed at him. "Whoa, no, hey. Hi," he stammered. He raised his hands in a non-threatening gesture. "I- I'm Bob."

At least Koda had a name to one of the new faces. They hadn't shot him, at least, so Koda popped up from the corner with her hands raised as well. The weapons snapped to her and she took an instinctive step back. "Hi," she echoed, tail wagging weakly.

"Who are you?" Yelena's target asked, confused.

"I- I- I'm Bob! I told you, I'm- Yeah. Bob." He shrugged and wiped his nose with his sleeve.

"Jesus Christ, stop saying 'Bob'," the other man snapped.

"And you?" she asked next, gun pointed at Koda's chest.

"I'm Koda. She kidnapped me," she said, pointing at Yelena.

Yelena ignored her, keeping her gun pointed at Bob. "Who sent you, Bob?"

"Nobody! Why would I be sent?" Realization seemed to dawn on him, and he gestured weakly at the three fighters. "You- you were all sent?"

"Okay, I'm not sure what's happening here, but you're all exhausting and my job is done, so-" The other woman let her gun fall back to her side and moved to leave, but she was interrupted by Yelena.

"Ah, but you see, my job is to keep an eye on you. So no, you are not gonna go anywhere anymore."

"So you're keeping an eye on her, huh? That's a halfway decent cover for someone stealing assets from OXE," the man said, gun pointed at Yelena now.

"I'm not stealing. She's stealing!" Yelena then went silent and sighed, lowering her gun. "Okay, it's clear we have all worked for Valentina in some shadow ops capacity."

Koda crept over to stand beside Bob, cautiously watching the group negotiate. She nudged him in the side gently and asked, "Do you know who these people are?"

"Uh, I- No. I don't think so." He jumped a little when she nudged him, but he didn't move away. "Do you?"

"No. Um, except for her." Koda pointed at Yelena. "She brought me here."

Bob began creeping away from the bickering group and Koda followed. Bob seemed just as confused as she did, and he didn't seem to have any weapons either. Her ears perked up as the bickering continued, this time with names and histories and organizations she was only vaguely familiar. SHIELD, Ghost, Red Room, Budapest, Captain America. Koda stopped and looked, head tilting and eyes narrowing. He didn't look like Captain America. Not at all.

"I thought Captain America was black?" Koda piped up. Nobody answered her, save for a brief look of confusion and a glare thrown her way. But something that this "Ghost" had mentioned about publicly killing a man in the street jogged her memory, and Koda remembered a news segment she saw on the TV a few years back. He was Captain America. The one before the one with wings but after the one that fought Nazis. She couldn't remember his name, but at least she knew he wasn't going to kill her. He was one of the good guys.

He said something about his wife and son, the others being mercenaries, and bringing them in. The two other women laughed, and Koda's head tilted in the other direction. It made sense to her, so she wasn't really sure what was so funny, but it was better than them trying to shoot each other.

"It was getting so tense in here… for a second," Bob started, then trailed off. The grin on his face faded and turned more scolded when he was glared at. He cleared his throat and shuffled back behind his boxes.

"I'm not leaving here without completing my mission. Valentina gave me a clean slate guarantee, and I'm not screwing that up." He slowly approached Bob and Koda, irritation radiating off of him. "But these weirdos weren't part of the job, so I gotta know…" he paused right in front of them, "how'd you get in?"

"I- I don't remember," Bob said, laughing awkwardly.

"Yelena broke into my home and brought me here to see Valentina," Koda supplied. Yelena nodded solemnly when he looked back at her, confirming her story.

"Alright, terrific answer, Bobby." He turned back to the other two, not quite letting Bob and Koda out of his line of sight. Koda relaxed just slightly. She hadn't let Yelena out of her sight, but she felt better knowing someone more qualified was keeping an eye on the kidnapper. "Okay, um… tie yourselves up," he said, like the plan had been agreed upon.

"Wow. No, and goodbye," Ghost said, stalking off to one of the closed doors.

"Did you really think that was gonna work?" Koda asked him, and he glared at her. Any response he was going to give was cut off by an ear-shattering squeal vibrating through their bodies, halting Ghost from vanishing through the door. When she stumbled back away from it, the sound stopped.

"Whoa," Bob breathed, "you guys hear that?"

Koda lowered her hands from her ears and shook off like a dog out of water. "Yeah. You heard that?" Bob nodded, looking more than a little surprised that someone besides him had heard the sound.

"I guess that means we're stuck."

Koda sat on a crate, feet dangling over the edge, with Bob beside her. The other three were arguing again, but they didn't seem to be trying to capture each other anymore, so that was an improvement. Koda was leafing through some of the papers, reading reports and updates on whatever experiments the corporation had been working on. Bob peeked over her shoulder and read along, occasionally making a quiet sound of discomfort or distaste when they stumbled upon something particularly gruesome. After a few pages, Bob took the stack of papers from her hands and set them aside. He offered a slightly nervous smile, like he wasn't sure what he'd just done was okay.

"Let's, uh, think about something else. Yeah?" Bob prompted. "Your ears are kinda… uh… stressed out?" He gestured to Koda's ears, which were pulled back in a way reminiscent of a nervous puppy. He gave her a reassuring if not slightly awkward smile. "So, uh… what's with the ears and stuff?"

Koda's nose twitched, her face scrunching up for a second. "I was… part of an experiment kind of like this one. But it was when I was a kid."

"Oh. That's- that's not very fun."

"No, not really. It kind of sucked."

"So, uh, do you have powers now?" he asked.

"Uh, not really. Just the ears and stuff." She rolled up her sleeves to show off her forearms. A straight line of fur ran down the length of her arm. Bob hesitantly reached out and touched it, looking to her to make sure it was okay. "This is it. Uh, but both sets of ears work, so I hear a lot of noises people usually don't."

"Whoa. That- That's pretty sick," he said.

Koda nodded and was about to reply when the trio began squabbling again. Like a curious puppy, she hopped off the crate and wandered over, watching as two of them began taking weapons from the dead body on the floor, despite Yelena's indignation.

"What? She'd want me to have it. I need it."

Koda laughed, covering it behind an unconvincing cough when Yelena glowered at her. Any further squabbling was halted by the lights dimming to an ominous red and the sudden blaring of an alarm. Mechanical whirring from the space above them filled the air. Koda glanced around, wide-eyed and nervous in the dim lighting, and inched a little closer to the group. Even a former Captain America was better than nothing. He'd probably know what to do, at least more than the Ghost lady would. Definitely more than Bob would.

"What's goin' on?" she asked cautiously.

"It doesn't sound like a shredder," Ghost answered. "It's an incinerator."

"Two minutes. Then Valentina's slate is wiped clean," Yelena added. Koda's tail tucked between her legs. Being incinerated certainly wasn't very high on her list of ways to die. She didn't even particularly want to be cremated, really.

"You don't know that for sure; it could be for anything. Could be for when they come to pick me up!" Koda stopped to think about that. Maybe he was right? Someone would probably notice if the former Captain America went missing.

"Do you feel that? The temperature rising dramatically, as if heat was involved?" Ghost snapped back at him.

"Okay, it's an incinerator," he conceded.

"Oh boy, that is no way to go," Bob said, shaking his head a little.

"Well, how would you like to die today, Bob?"

Koda interrupted at the same moment, shaking her head. "It's better than drowning, at least. Or starving." Bob nodded a little.

"Okay, ghost lady," Yelena prompted, plan already forming in her mind.

"Ava."

"Sure, whatever, don't care. We need to get you through the walls so that you can open the door."

"But she tried already," Koda argued. She began pacing back and forth, ears flickering as the alarm continued to blare. She left the group to formulate a plan, halfway listening for anything that could be useful. They were all arguing and debating, yet the countdown timer continued to tick down second by torturous second. Koda knew that nothing would be able to stop the fire, not now. An escape route was unlikely. But as she rolled up her other sleeve, she realized that she really wasn't ready to die. Sure, she'd thought about it before. Who hadn't? But with the threat looming in her face, she saw a thousand futures she would never live, a million opportunities she would never be able to experience. Her childhood had been stolen by a lab full of medical equipment, and now her adulthood would be too. It was fitting in a sick, macabre sort of way at least. She wasn't sure what she was looking for, but she couldn't keep herself from darting around the room, methodically searching and avoiding places the others had already been.

"I think I found something," Yelena called. Everybody scrambled over as Ava popped open a box full of wires. Yelena glanced in it, muttering something about overriding it, and cold dread coiled in Koda's stomach against the rising temperature. Overriding it would take far too long, even she knew that. They had less than a minute left, surely. A shaky exhale escaped her, and her tail went limp.

"On your left!" Sparks flew from the box as a shield crashed into it once, twice. Ava disappeared through the door, disappearing like a mirage.

"Thank God," Koda huffed, shooting a displeased look at Yelena.

The four of them stood in front of the closed door, watching. Waiting. It didn't open. Thirty seconds left. Twenty.

"She left us," Koda breathed. Her head poked up behind the two men, using them as a shield from Yelena.

"I should've seen this coming." The air around the vents waved and distorted with heat, metal burning red-hot as the incinerator came up to heat. Death was imminent, waiting to claim all four of them like a tiger hidden in the trees, waiting to pounce on its prey. Ten seconds left.

Eight.

Five.

An alarm blared and the door rumbled open. In the same moment, all four leapt for the opening as the flames licked out from the shafts and gushed to the floor. The sudden blast of heat and fire propelled them forward, rocketing them out of the vault room and into the stone hallway, door slamming shut behind them not a moment too soon.

Koda lay crumpled on the floor, head pounding and ribs sore. The blast had thrown her against the stone wall, debris scattered around her. She tested each of her limbs and found them all relatively unharmed, thankfully. Sitting up proved to be a bit more painful, but that too was accomplished without too much of a struggle. She replayed the memory of what happened, piece by piece, searching for any gaps or blank spaces that would indicate she lost consciousness. Everything seemed to be in order. Probably no concussion, then. Not a major one, anyway. Minor things could wait.

She looked around and took note of the others. Bob and Yelena were side by side, hands tangled together. Koda grinned. It wasn't on purpose, surely, but it was kind of cute in a way. They began to move, and she breathed a sigh of relief. Ava was still by the door, face covered and impassive. Koda's ears twitched and she glared in her direction. She sure could've rushed things along a little more instead of almost letting them die, not to mention her attitude at every turn in a conversation. She mentally categorized each person in a little list of favorites, putting Ava firmly at the bottom.

She skittered over to Bob and Yelena. She hadn't exactly forgiven Yelena for kidnapping her, but she had been essential in escaping the incinerator. A little politeness couldn't hurt. "Are you guys okay?" she asked.

"Uh, yeah. I'm- yeah. Fine," Bob answered. Koda offered him her hand to help him up, then did the same for Yelena after only a moment of hesitation. On the other side of the hallway, Ava was offered the reverse of the situation, ignoring the hand reaching for her help and muttering something about power being cut to the elevators. Koda's nose twitched again with distaste.

With the team back on their feet, Bob began to pace by the door, mumbling to himself. Koda took hold of his arm and led him away from the scattered rubble. Sharp rocks and shards of stone covered the floor, and Bob wasn't wearing any shoes. He was going to get hurt if he kept pacing.

"You sure you're alright?" she asked. Bob nodded but didn't say anything. After a few beats, he began pacing again and muttering to himself.

"Hey, Bobby!" a voice snapped. "Less talking to yourself and more talking to us."

Koda glared in his direction, stationing herself between the two of them. "Hey, be nice. He didn't do anything."

"Exactly, he didn't do anything. I'm tired of whatever his… problem is!"

Yelena reached out a hand to pull him back. "Walker," she warned. Koda's ear flicked and she filed the name away. At least she finally had a name for everyone.

"I- I swear," Bob stumbled, "one minute I was getting my blood drawn, you know, for this medical study. And the next minute I'm here. Uh, in my pajamas. I don't know what's happening."

Koda understood that. Sometimes things happened like that, with weird memory gaps and complicated medical things muddling whatever happened. "You just kind of… appeared by where I was when they were all fighting," she added.

"Where everything is on fire?" Walker snapped. "That's real convenient."

"He didn't remember last time you asked either," Koda pointed out. "Asking him again isn't gonna magically change that."

Walker turned and walked away, bristling with annoyance, and Koda shrugged at Bob sympathetically.

"You don't remember anything?" Ava prompted. "A bag over your head, a needle in your neck…"

"No."

"I think he's just a civilian," Yelena said.

"If he's a civilian he knows too mucn, if he's an agent he sucks. Either way I say we throw him back into the fire."

Koda stared, then barked out a sharp laugh. "Dude, what's your problem with him?"

Encouraged by Koda's laughter, Bob snickered a little too. He clasped his hands in front of himself and looked down at the ground, but his smile was wider and a little more certain than before. "Sorry… Y- You said you were Captain America?"

"Why're you laughing?"

"Just 'cause… you're, y'know…" Bob's smile faded a little bit. "It's just a little funny, you know?"

Walker wasn't seeing the humor in the situation, clearly, and he grabbed Bob by the throat and shoved him against the wall. He held him there for a second but suddenly backed off like he'd been burned. Yelena took the opportunity to shove herself between them, forcing Walker to back off. "You. Go over there." She pointed to the opposite end of the room. "Bob, you come with me." She pulled him to the side with surprising gentleness, checking him over.

Koda followed Walker to the other end of the expansive room. It seemed to be some kind of landing, elevators lining the opposite wall. She stayed well out of his space but kept an eye on him, her gaze a mixture of amusement and confusion. "Did you just get put in the time-out corner?"

"What do you want?" he grumbled.

"Just wondering what your problem is. that's all."

"We just almost died, I had three people trying to kill me, and Patient Zero over there shows up and you're asking me what my problem is?"

Koda tipped her head to the side, and her ears perked up a little bit. Things made a little more sense now, even if he didn't really answer directly. Her tail gave a weak wag. "You're scared."

"I'm not scared. I'm concerned."

But Koda saw the way he stiffened, how his jaw clenched a little too tight for someone not afraid. Things definitely made more sense now. He'd been backed into a corner, metaphorically at least, and everything looked like a threat. Even Bob, with his too-big scrubs and wet kitten personality. A scared dog will bite, well-trained or not, and Bob was the weakest target for him to start with. "You're scared. Did you think he was going to hurt you?" she asked. She wasn't quite judging, just curious. "He looks like a lost kitten."

"Says the one with ears and a tail. What's your issue anyways?"

Koda's grin returned, tail wagging a little harder. The opportunity was too perfect, practically laid out on a silver platter. "We just almost died and you're asking me what my problem is?" she echoed. Walker opened his mouth like he was going to say something, then closed it when he recognized his own words. But Koda saw the slightest, faintest twitch of the corner of his mouth, pausing being angry long enough to find it at least a little funny.

"Fine."

Koda trotted after him as he made his way over to the elevators like a man on a mission. Bob and Yelena seemed to be in the middle of a deep conversation, and she didn't particularly want to be left alone. Ava stood to one side of the elevator shaft and Koda stood to the other while Walker examined it and looked over his surroundings. He wandered off for a little while to study other parts of the landing, and Koda stood awkwardly eyeing Ava without saying a word. Thankfully, he wasn't gone for very long, and he seemed to have a plan. After a few quick swings with his shield, Walker broke a hole in the side of the elevator wall, concrete crumbling and falling away. Once the hole was human-sized, he called out to Bob and Yelena.

"You guys done with therapy yet? I think I found a way out."

Ava went through the gap first, disappearing for a moment. A hole in the top of the elevator car opened with a swish, and Koda hopped up as Bob and Yelena finished up their conversation. Once on top of the elevator, the situation looked more grim. They stood at the bottom of the elevator shaft, down too far to be able to climb out. As each person's head popped through the hole, they all came to the same conclusion. Yelena broke the silence first.

"So… none of us fly? What, do we all just punch and shoot?"

"And bark," Ava added scornfully, eyeing Koda.

"Okay. Don't worry, I got this," Walker said, looking up from the bottom of the abyss. With about as much effort as Koda put into playing hopscotch as a kid, he launched himself up and out of sight.

"Whoa," Koda whispered. "I didn't know he could do that. Did you know he could do that?"

"He is a supersoldier, Koda," Yelena answered.

A second later, he came crashing back down and landed flat on his back, groaning with a pained grimace. Yelena looked delighted, grinning like a kid in a candy store. Ava peered down at him. "You should try that again," she suggested. Koda's nose twitched and she shot a glare at Ava.

"You okay?" she asked, tapping his side with her shoe.

"Never better," he answered, wincing as he got to his feet. "We're pretty far down here. You-" He pointed at Ava. "Why don't you walk up through the walls or whatever and throw us a rope down?"

"Okay well, first of all, someone other than you would have to ask me. And second of all, I'd have to know where I'm going 'cause I've never been able to hold it longer than a minute, so I'd just get lost in an ocean of dirt, and then I'd be crushed to death."

At the same time, John and Koda spoke.

"Just a minute?"

"You can only last a minute?"

Koda looked over at him, absolutely delighted somebody might be making the same joke as her. She wasn't sure if it was on purpose, but it was funny either way. Her tail wagged and she snickered, but she tried to stifle it a little when nobody else laughed.

"Oh, shut up," Ava hissed.

"Oh my god, you two suck," Yelena sighed, holding her head in her hands.

"Uh… I have an idea," Bob piped up.

"Left. Right. Left," someone called out. All of the voices were strange and echoey in the elevator shaft, and Koda couldn't quite tell who it was. Not that it mattered. She followed the instructions, stepping with each call.

Bob's idea had been better than nothing, though it still wasn't ideal. The five of them pressed their backs together, feet pressed into the walls of the shaft as they made their way up step by step.

"This is a lot harder with five people than with four, I would think," Koda commented. "Is this going to work?"

"Yeah, It'll be fine," a voice answered. Walker, she thought.

"Ew, which one of you is wet?" Yelena said, disgusted. To her side, Bob winced.

"Sorry, uh- that's me. I, uh, I run hot, sorry."

"And someone's got a weird, hard butt."

"It's not my butt, it's my suit," Ava retorted.

"Well, you need to get a new suit," Yelena said.

"Pardon me for the inconvenience," Ava started. "I mean I only spent my entire life in labs hooked up to machines so I could create this physical cage to keep my material body from disintegrating at all times, so yeah, I'm so sorry for that—"

"I spent my whole life in labs too, you're not special," Koda snapped.

"You do not want to start the whole sob story game. I win. Enslaved child assassin over here," added Yelena. Clearly Ava's little pity party was grating on everybody's nerves, not just Koda's.

"Well, you were just a kid, so…" Walker trailed off.

"Oh, so that's a good thing now?" Yelena bit out, turning her attention to him as they continued up the elevator shaft one step at a time.

"I just think it might be nice to know that you didn't really know any better."

"Thanks, I feel way better."

"Well, he's a little bit right," Koda piped up.

"I don't remember asking you for your input on my childhood experiences."

"Hey, quit it," Ava barked. For the first time, Koda agreed with her.

The team paused for a moment, breathing hard and assessing their progress. They'd managed to travel a good distance, but the end still wasn't in sight. A seemingly endless stretch of steel reached above them, darkness smudging out details and any indicators of distance. Each step felt pointless, like any progress was futile. Maybe things would have been easier if they'd just died in the incinerator. Sure, it would've been painful, but it was better than the endless straight vertical they were attempting. The steps continued, however, with only brief pauses now and then. Talking while making progress took too much extra effort, so the only noises were the scuffing of shoes and the occasional grunt or pant from somebody catching their breath.

It wasn't until the group was high above the ground that somebody spoke again.

"It's crazy, I can't even see the floor," Ava said.

"Can we not talk about how high up we are?" Bob tipped his head back, keeping his gaze pointed firmly upwards. "I'm not- I'm just not so great with heights."

"This was your idea," Koda huffed.

"Wait, I think I see the door!"

"Now what?" Yelena said.

"I guess… one of us should go?" Ava suggested.

"Then the other four immediately fall," she argued.

"I guess I didn't, uh, think this far ahead," Bob admitted.

"Genius plan, Bobby!"

"Well, we all agreed to it, so…" Behind Koda, Bob murmured something to himself. She couldn't make out the words, but it sounded weak and yet resigned.

"It's these bloody boots. I don't think I can hold it much longer."

"Okay, hand me your baton, I think I can reach it," Walker ordered. Yelena instantly balked, arguing.

"What? You're just going to leave us! Spin us around, and I can latch on."

Koda growled low in her throat. Out of all the times to start arguing again, this was one of the worst. "The only one who's tried to leave us is Ava. If Walker can do it, let him."

"We will all fall, and—"

"Cucumber, cucumber, cucumber!" Bob yelled, drowning out the rest of the conversation.

"What the hell is happening?" Yelena asked, baffled by his contribution.

"Growing up somebody told me that you can stop a sneeze if you confuse your brain," Bob rushed. "I always just yelled 'cucumber'."

"…okay?"

"I have to sneeze. But if I sneeze, I'll lose control, and we'll fall, and—"

"This is insane, okay? I can get us all out of here, I just have to go first."

Koda's foot was slipping. The argument suddenly seemed a lot more pointless. If nobody went first, they were all going to die anyways. She struggled to stay steady, grumbling a bit, just as Bob breathed out a quiet, "Oh no."

A chorus of overlapping shouts of "Cucumber!" anwered him, mixed with Walker's insistence that he had things under control.

And then Koda was falling. Wind whistled past her ears and the curved wall blurred before her eyes. In a wild panic, she grabbed at the wall, digging into it in an attempt to slow her fall.

It worked.

A searing pain ran through her hands up to her shoulders, and she cried out. Thick claws had carved a row of gashes into the side of the wall, deep enough for her fall to be halted. Bob fell behind her, but a cable shot out and wrapped around his leg, and he jerked to a stop dangling upside down. He sneezed, and Koda would have laughed if her hands didn't hurt worse than hellfire. He sounded like a kitten. Yelena and Ava were a short distance above Koda, and the cable around Bob's leg was attached to Yelena's wrist. Walker hung from the ledge of the doorway, Yelena's baton in hand. If they'd just worked with his plan, they could've been more organized instead of free-falling down the elevator shaft. Koda grumbled again, but she didn't have enough energy to complain besides that. It took all she had to just hold on and not slip the rest of the way down.

"You selfish prick," Ava hissed as she was hoisted out. Not only had Walker gotten to the doorway, he'd found a rope to lower down to the rest of the team. One by one, they all were dragged up from the elevator shaft to safety.

"Yet, you're all safe." He didn't sound particularly bothered with Ava's fire. "I made a tactical decision to secure my own safety and ensure all of yours. Pretty ungrateful if you ask me, but…"

Koda scrambled up the rope and grabbed the hand Walker held out to her, and she pretended not to notice the way he paused and held onto her hand a little longer than expected.

"You, uh… good?" he asked. She tugged her hand away with a curt nod and immediately skittered far from the exposed elevator shaft, putting as much distance between herself and the fatal fall as she could. It would be far too easy to just tumble over the edge and never be seen again. Smoothing her clothes into order, Koda pointedly ignored the ways Yelena and Ava were staring at her hands. A thin layer of short fur covered them, an uncomfortable halfway between hand and paw. Her nails, which she always kept short and blunt, had morphed into strong claws. Scarlet blood oozed from around her nail beds and dribbled onto the floor in little droplets. Her very bones ached, sending an occasional electric jolt of pain through her arms as the bones settled back into proper position and the fur faded out. The occasional gruesome snap and pop of shifting bone made Koda's ears twitch and a sick feeling spread in her stomach. It was always unpleasant, even if the pain was bearable, and tucked her tail between her legs, ears flat to her head.

Yelena's attention had thankfully shifted away from her. It was turned to Walker, who was standing at the edge of the shaft staring down into the void. "Walker," she called. Like he had been in some kind of trance, his head snapped up and he looked over at her. "Uh… what the hell are you doing?" For the first time in a while, she didn't sound angry at him. Confused, maybe. Concerned, probably.

He looked away and took half a step forward, stopping short just shy of the abyss. Koda saw him move almost like he'd forgotten the edge was there and he was rediscovering how close to it he was. He stared down it for another moment before turning to face Yelena, and Koda felt an itch in her hands as she fought the instinct to sink her claws into him and pull him back from the edge. "I'm fine," he dismissed, and Yelena furrowed her brow. Bob looked away from him guiltily and shuffled after Ava towards the other, thankfully working, door to the vault entrance. Or exit.

"Alright, let's get out of here," Ava muttered. Yelena and Walker followed, but Koda hung back a bit. They were peering around the corner, staring at the exit with lights flashing through the glass from outside. But she stayed just a bit behind, lagging halfway between the group and the open hole down. Her attention was focused keenly, mirroring every step Walker took to keep herself between him and the ledge. A distant memory popped into her head, one from long ago. She'd been at a county fair once as a child, and there had been an arena to show animals. She'd seen a Border Collie and a sheep, and the dog had herded the sheep around a course with the aid of calls from its owner. Koda's tail wagged faintly at the memory, and she turned the memory into a sort of game. It was always easier to focus when things were a game. Walker was a sheep, and so was Bob, and Koda was the mixture between man and dog, herding the sheep away from trouble. She saw the way Walker had hesitated, how he took a moment too long to step away from the edge. She'd seen that fleeting, scared-dog look on his face, like he was a moment away from becoming intimately familiar with the floor a mile down. She'd worn the same face a few times herself.

Yelena and John spoke at the same time and snapped Koda out of her reflection.

"Okay, we need to come up with a plan."

"Here's what we're gonna do."

Her attention didn't waver, however, tracking each step Walker took. It was something to focus on, something to keep her mind away from the shouts and flashing lights just outside the vault door. He would take care of the difficult parts with Yelena, and all Koda had to do was make sure her sheep didn't die.

"Oh, so you're in charge now? Cute," Ava scoffed.

"Well, yeah, it's our only chance of getting out of here, so…"

"I think I might just surrender, probably," Bob mumbled. He shuffled his feet nervously and looked at Ava for approval.

"Okay, fine. Every man for himself."

"Why should you be in charge? You almost killed all of us right there." Yelena gestured to the elevator shaft across the room.

"But he didn't," Koda added.

"Well, let's see. I've been in the trenches of every war-torn country on this planet, rescued God knows how many hostages, and shook the hands of two U.S. presidents. What else? Oh! High school state football champs back-to-back-to-back, go Bears."

"Oh, wow," Yelena said sarcastically. "When I was five, I was on a peewee soccer team called the West Chesapeake Valley Thunderbolts sponsored by Shane's Tire Shop. We won zero games and one time, this girl, Mindy, she did a poo at midfield. Anyone else have any other pointless childhood stories to tell?"

That didn't quite seem fair to Koda. Most of his reasoning was sound, even if the high school football wasn't very applicable. Everything else certainly gave him the experience to navigate the current situation. The others seemed a little too busy disliking him to notice that he was being helpful, even if he was a bit abrasive about it. She padded a little closer with soft, cautious steps.

"What position did you play?" she asked.

Yelena immediately voiced her disapproval. "Koda, stop encouraging him. We get it, you think he's God's gift to America."

Her nose twitched and her ears flicked backwards. "I didn't say that. He's just right, even if he's being annoying about it. And he is, a little bit."

"Right, okay. Here's the plan," Yelena said, completely brushing off Koda's argument. "We set off an explosion to bring them in."

"No, too many variables with an explosion," Walker interrupted. He took a few steps away from the others, and Koda followed, staying just outside the edge of his space.

Yelena, however, ignored him. "They turn on their night vision. You," she said, pointing to Walker, "handle the first wave, but you wait for me after I've blinded the remaining troops."

"I'm just gonna wait for you?"

"It will only work if you wait."

"Terrible plan."

"Ava, you find—" Her sentence was cut off by the sound of Ava phasing through the door, disappearing and leaving the rest of the crew behind. "An escape vehicle."

"Uh, and what about me?" Bob piped up quietly.

"And me," Koda added.

"You stay behind me, Bob. You can go with Walker if you think he is so right all the time."

"I'm supposed to handle the first wave, not dog-sit."

"Too bad. I am not taking both of them. Bob, with me." She pulled an explosive out and gestured for Bob to follow.

Koda fidgeted uncomfortably in the darkness. Yelena hadn't wasted any time shutting off the lights, and the darkness was creeping in, inky shadows swallowing everything in sight. It wasn't that she couldn't see; she could see just fine. A little better than fine, even. The cover of darkness was simply suffocating. Anything and anyone could be around the corner, waiting to pounce. And she still had no weapons. She did, however, have a super soldier standing beside her, already pissed off about something or nothing in particular, and he would do all of the hard work. She hated to put all her eggs in one basket, but her options were fairly slim to begin with, considering her other choices were her kidnapper, a socially anxious amnesiac, and a disappearing ghost of a person.

"You. Koda. Over here." A firm hand grabbed her shoulder and dragged her down a hallway. "Stay here. Don't touch anything, don't do anything. Stay. If someone finds you, just… bite them, I don't know. You'll be fine."

Simple enough instructions. She nodded silently and pressed her back against the wall. Biting wasn't her go-to and she hated the coppery taste of blood, but she didn't have much else to work with. Walker disappeared down the hall again, leaving Koda alone in the shadows with his command to stay echoing in her ears.

Yelena and Bob's voices came from just down the hall, not far away. In the opposite direction, gunfire and shouting echoed off the walls. It didn't last very long, and everything went quiet. Yelena's voice was a little closer now, Bob's layered beneath it. More gunshots, somebody yelling, and the very distinct sound of Bob yelping, "Sorry!" The voices were just around the corner now, and Koda peeked around it. Bodies were crumpled on the floor and some sort of smoke or mist swirled around them. Bob and Yelena were tied together back-to-back, but she whipped him around and aimed his gun at a moving shadow. The hallway erupted with bursts of light and sound, and bullets ricocheted off metal. Yelling was muffled under the crackling of gunfire, and Yelena paused shooting for just a moment. The yelling became clearer, angry noises organizing into words. Koda's ears rung and the sound of them was still a bit muffled, but she could make out what was being shouted now.

"Stop! It's me, it's John, stop!"

"Where were you?" Yelena's voice answered. Koda crept a little closer, standing behind Bob like an apparition.

"Where were you?!"

"The explosion fried the wires."

"I told you, too many variables, I knew it."

"And then you didn't wait," Yelena accused, jabbing a finger at him. Koda popped up beside her warily but didn't add anything to the conversation. It wasn't the time to be playing shepherd anyways. Her vision blurred and smudged for a moment before clearing, and Bob stared at her with a confused expression, but he didn't say anything either. He just looked down at the gun in his hands and shuffled behind Yelena.

"I did wait! And the—" He cut off, and Koda heard the faint crackle of a radio. Her ear twitched towards the sound but she couldn't make out any words with the ringing in her ears so loud still. It was fading, but her body was never meant to have two pairs of ears overloaded at once. "We've probably got about sixty seconds until they mobilize. If the ghost lady actually did what she was supposed to, maybe we'll all get out of here alive."

"How are we gonna get out?" Koda mumbled. "They have guns. And there's more of them."

Yelena dropped to one knee and began ripping the uniforms off the unconscious soldiers. One, two, three, four. She thrust a set of clothes at each of them with no instruction. Koda held hers, staring at the unfamiliar clothes. "Put it on," Yelena ordered.

"I'm- I'm already dressed, though," Koda protested.

"Don't care. Put it on."

It was too big. The sleeves hung past her fingertips, and the pants hung awkwardly over the pair of jeans she was wearing beneath. The boots, at least, weren't too bad if she laced them tight enough. Her sneakers were too conspicuous and would draw too much attention if she didn't match.

Koda stumbled as she finished tying the second boot, a nudge against her side setting her off-balance. "Hangin' in there, mutt?" Walker asked, and it didn't come out as harsh as Koda expected.

"Huh? Yeah, good. Fine."

"Koda, here," Yelena ordered. She tugged a mask over Koda's head and bent her ears to lay beneath the straps. It wasn't perfect, but hopefully nobody would be looking too closely. Not with all four of them dressed the same as every other solider. The plan was far from perfect. But so far, all of their plans had been half-baked at best. Bob was supported between Walker and Yelena, stumbling and limping like he was injured. Koda trailed after them, not too close but not too far, with a few of Yelena's weapons and Walker's shield. They couldn't hold onto them while in disguise without giving away their identities, but Koda would hopefully be able to slip out unnoticed, or at least unquestioned.

The trio hobbled out first, Bob slung between the two with only somewhat stifled complaints. Koda counted slowly in her head, taking stock of the soldiers she could see just outside. A new team filed through the vault door, guns sweeping the room methodically, but none of them stopped the disguised trio or questioned the lone soldier trotting out with various weapons. Koda forced her feet to slow to a normal pace that wouldn't draw suspicion. The truck was almost dead ahead, and the back was still open with Bob inside. Yelena was talking to him, casting a glance in Koda's direction, and she felt her steps quicken just a little bit. The stubborn little piece of her still playing shepherd was quite pleased that Walker made it safely.

Someone grabbed her by the back of her uniform and pulled. She whirled around, and a soldier yanked the mask from her head. Two fluffy, pointed ears fluttered free and condemned her of their own accord. This soldier was bigger and dressed differently, a commanding presence swirling around him like a visible fog.

"Who are you?" he demanded.

"Nobody, uh… sir? Just a solider." Koda struggled in his grasp but he didn't relent, keeping a fistful of the back of her uniform. The grip he had tightened, and Koda found herself being dragged away from her desired path and towards a woman who looked a bit too familiar. The woman opened her mouth to speak, and Koda recognized her in an instant. Valentina Allegra de Fontaine, Secretary of Defense, soon to be impeached—At least, that's what the news had said a few days ago. Pieces of the puzzle clicked together, sliding into place and filling those annoying, fuzzy gaps in her understanding. Valentina, the woman Yelena worked for, was the same as Valentina, the woman being accused of creating her own superheroes. The medical equipment and records in the vault made much more sense, and Koda mentally kicked herself for not figuring things out sooner.

"Well, look who we have here," Valentina said smugly. "If my information is correct, you're one of the Starlight Program children. Luperca Genus, is that what they called your group?"

"Wha- Huh? How did you know about that? Nobody knows about that," Koda stammered.

"I do. I need your help, Ms. Ellis. You could be the solution to a particularly stubborn problem I've been trying to solve." Valentina stepped closer and Koda shied away, but she approached again a little more slowly. The shield and weapons were taken from her more gently than expected, and the officer left with them with only a wave of Valentina's hand. "You could be very special. Wouldn't you like to be useful?"

Koda's nose twitched. She would like to be useful, but she knew better. She'd heard similar phrases as a child, said with the same sickeningly sweet enthusiasm. "I'm not special. You're planning something bad. You tried to have me killed right there."

"That was a mistake, Koda. Why do you think my men are here? I realized you were in the vault and I sent them out to rescue you. You can trust me, Koda."

That was, unfortunately, quite possible. Valentina had needed her specifically for something, that's why Yelena had been sent to bring her in. The vault and incinerator could have just been a misunderstanding. That thought confused her and muddied the waters of her reasoning. Nobody had hurt her yet, and she hadn't really been taken captive. There were no guns pointed at her. Maybe it would just be easier to agree.

Choppy gunfire and urgent yelling further muddled her thoughts. Even if Valentina was telling the truth, Koda's new friends were waiting for her. But she found herself being pushed into the arms of a young assistant, flanked by the same officer as before. She was rushed into a car as more gunshots cracked through the air, and this time, the yelling was a little more familiar.

Bob.

Bob was running, waving a gun in the air, drawing the attention to him. Every soldier's weapon was pointed at him, and Koda yelped and hid her face as the night air lit up with the flashes of dozens of guns. The cacophony halted suddenly, and she dared to peek, expecting to see a limp and bloody body. Bob stood unharmed, but he wasn't really standing. He was floating. His clothes had been ripped to shreds from the gunfire, but there didn't seem to be a single wound on his body. Koda almost fell backwards as she watched Bob shoot up into the air the instant the guns began to fire again, higher and higher until he was barely a tiny speck against the prickles of starlight. In the commotion, nobody noticed a single truck pulling away, not even Koda. He crashed spectacularly, landing with such an impact the shockwave knocked over each and every one of the soldiers. The assistant was back at Valentina's side, ruffled yet professional, and Koda was alone with a strange man with a gun.

The sun was coming up with brilliant orange and yellow hues, peering over the horizon the way it did every day. Koda, however, was not enjoying it the way she usually did. She sat in a hastily constructed tent in the middle of a strange and unfamiliar environment with Valentina and her assistant, Mel. She'd been given water and a snack, both fresh from packaging and free of any poison. That was as good as the day was going to get, she suspected. Her head ached, only intensified by the loud buzz of helicopters overhead. Yet despite the pounding headache, she found herself falling asleep upright despite her best efforts at staying awake. Layered shouts and orders in the background did nothing to keep her awake either, but falling asleep in the midst of the enemy seemed like a poor choice in her mind. Her best bet was to stand up and walk around until the drowsiness disappeared like the dust in the wind.

The camp wasn't much to look at, if it could be called that. Very little had been brought to the rise overlooking Bob's crater. She poked around a bit, but she didn't find much aside from a screen displaying the local news. Unsurprisingly, the explosion Yelena had caused last night had drawn some attention, but Koda had been there when it happened. She didn't need any details. Out of anything else to examine and unable to wander off, she headed towards the canopy she'd been sitting under earlier. Valentina and Mel were discussing something outside, and she padded a little closer.

"Get rid of them, Mel. They're the last piece of evidence."

Koda's ears flickered and her tail gave a hesitant though happy wag. The team must have escaped if Valentina was still looking for them. Trotting out of the tent, she decided to at least try asking what was going on. At best, she would know what to expect. At worst, she would at least not be wondering what would happen if she asked.

"Are you going to kill them?" she asked warily. "My friends."

"Hm? Your friends?" Valentina looked down her nose at Koda like she was seeing a particularly bedraggled, sad puppy. "Koda, they aren't your friends. You knew them for what, a few hours? They're not your friends, and they're not coming back for you, if that's what you're wondering."

"You… don't know that for sure," Koda said weakly.

"Actually, I do. Ava snuck off with the weapons you had been carrying last night. They got their gear back, but not you. I don't think friends would do that." Koda's ears drooped. She hadn't been hidden or guarded by anyone, and the team hadn't tried to get her back. That stung. "Yelena is a trained assassin. Ava stole an entire lab. You didn't want to be friends with them anyway. But I'll keep you safe from people like them."

"But Walker was nice. He used to be Captain America. He's one of the good guys."

"Koda," Valentina said gently, "there are no 'good guys'. There are only bad guys and worse guys. Maybe your time in the labs kept you a little naive, but I assure you, behind the all-American golden boy front, he isn't the kind of person he wants you to think he is." She scoffed. "Just ask his ex-wife. Or that man he killed in the street. Trust me, you should be happy he's gone."

With that, Valentina turned on her heel and left Koda more confused than when she started. She didn't have any time to chase down the issue or ask more questions before being ushered into a helicopter and sat between Valentina and another armed man. Mel pecked away at orders on a tablet, but the rest of the occupants were silent throughout the flight. The noise of the helicopter drowned out any chance for conversation, and Koda once again found herself trapped in a moving vehicle with someone who kidnapped her. She hoped it would be the last time. This time, she wasn't even drugged, so any rest would be fitful and unsatisfying.

The flight was long and, if Koda was being honest, miserable. There were several stops, but she was always supervised and never given information on what was happening, much to her frustration. They were treating her like a child, refusing to tell her anything, watching over her, and occasionally Valentina would pat her knee and praise her for being so brave. But at long last, the helicopter arrived at what had once been the Avengers Tower. Scientists in crisp white coats were waiting to lead Koda off somewhere the instant she set foot on the ground, and no amount of struggling or fighting would dissuade them. A few clumsy punches, her most intimidating growls, and bared teeth earned her nothing but a disapproving huff from Valentina, and Koda was whisked away to somewhere in the belly of the tower.

Rather than immediately being subjected to tests and procedures, she was led to a small doctor's office where they took her height and weight and measured her ears and tail. And then she was being dragged out again, this time to a different floor by a woman in a white coat. She led her to a door and opened it, revealing a small room.

"This is your room for now. Valentina would like to speak with you soon, but she asked that you wait here until she's done attending to some pressing matters." Koda suspected the 'pressing matters' were the impeachment meeting Mel had been talking about in hushed whispers when they arrived. She nodded politely and closed the door behind her, stepping into the room fully.

It was… nice. Small yet cozy, and well-furnished. A queen-sized bed sat in the middle of the room, blankets already arranged in a circle to make a little nest. Clean, fresh clothes were folded and placed on top of the dresser for her to change into. A tiny bathroom was tucked off to the side. But what caught Koda's eye the most were the decorations. She'd expected something akin to a hotel room, impersonal and crisp, utterly generic. She couldn't have been more wrong. Warm, orange lighting filled the space, casting shadows onto a green rug in a way that felt like sunshine. Plants hung from the ceiling in ribbons, lively and green. Shelves contained a few books, a number of empty notebooks, and an untouched sketchbook. A dog crate was tucked into one corner beside the bed with fairy lights strung through the wires of the cage. A fuzzy blanket patterned with fish and a large dog bed were tucked inside, and a basket on top of the crate held a few chewy dog toys. A map of North America hung on one wall of the room, and a calendar hung on the back of the door. It looked almost like a smaller version of Koda's own room back home in her apartment, and she couldn't decide whether to feel comforted or deeply disturbed. She decided to think about it while taking a much-needed shower.

Emerging from the bathroom didn't clear her mind much at all. Neither did fresh clothes. She curled up in the nest of blankets on the bed, ears low and tail thumping nervously against the mattress. Being clean did feel better, but everything felt too right. Details nobody should have known about were present. All of her socks were striped, the blankets were arranged properly to her liking, the copy of her favorite book was present on the shelf, even in the same edition, and the hole in the back of all her new pants for her tail was carefully stitched so as not to fray and rip. Nobody knew these things about her, she thought. She hadn't told anyone that would be here in the middle of New York City to prepare it all.

A soft knock on the door alerted her to someone's presence. After a moment, it opened to reveal Valentina. She approached Koda and sat on the edge of the bed a respectful distance away.

"Hi, Koda. Is everything to your liking?"

"Uh- Yeah. Yeah, how did you know?" she questioned.

"I just had my people set up what I felt would be right for someone as special as you. I hope it will be satisfactory. I want you to be as comfortable as possible while you're here."

"You aren't… gonna dissect me?" Koda squeaked.

"Heavens, no. You're too important for that." Valentina laughed a little at the absurdity of the question.

"Important?"

"Of course, Koda. I needed you to help me. I had one of my best agents find you specifically. Nobody else is like you."

"What- um, what happened to them?"

"They're all fine. But one of these days, they won't be. That's what happens to bad people like them, criminals and rejects. You have to let them go."

"But- but they were helpful. I-"

"Koda. They are not your friends. They wouldn't understand you, not the real you. I do. They wouldn't." Valentina put a hand on Koda's knee. "I know the truth about your powers, what the labs did to you as a child. Do you really think they would accept you if they saw what a horrifying monster you were? I will. It's exactly why I needed you. But they would never accept it."

"But…" Koda trailed off. Yelena and Ava had looked at her oddly, and Walker had called her a dog. And they hadn't even seen the full truth. Maybe Valentina was right.

"You have a dog crate and chew toys, Koda. Do you think they would ever see you as more than a pet? A mascot? If they did, they'd assume you were some kind of… degenerate freak. But I understand. You need these things, and it's okay. I understand. They make you feel safe."

"Yeah," she murmured sheepishly. Her ears were drooping now, tail tucked. It seemed to have become Koda's default posture as of late, and she wasn't a fan of it.

"I understand, and I need you. We can be a team. Bob is here too, I saved him. The three of us can be a new team together."

Koda shot up at that, tail wagging. "Bob's here? He isn't dead?"

"He is very much alive. You can see him soon, if you would like. But I have to ask one favor of you, can you do that?"

"Yeah. Uh, sure."

"I need you to show off those powers, let me see what I'm working with. I'd hate to push you too far, so I need to see what you're capable of." She held a hand out, hushing Koda like a fussy baby when she shrank away and shook her head. "Shh, shh, shh. I need you to do this for me, okay? I won't judge you, I promise. I just need to see the real you. You don't need to hide from me, Koda."

Koda had been a favorite subject at the labs as a child. She was eager to please, cooperative, always listening to what she was told. It was only heightened as the procedures tweaked her biology and behaviors. After all those years, nothing had changed. Somewhere beneath it all, Koda was still the same little girl eager to earn a gold star on the board. Valentina had chosen her. Specifically her, even knowing everything. She didn't want her to hide, or to keep secrets. A weak whine slipped from Koda's jaws and the aching itch beneath her skin began.

"That's it," Valentina praised, squeezing her hand.

The lines of fur down Koda's arms spread and thickened. She shook her head and whimpered like a kicked puppy. Aches and pains radiated through her whole body, starting at her limbs and working its way in. Her tail lashed like a whip behind her. Fingers grew claws and thickened, paw pads emerging to accompany them. A flurry of whines fell from her mouth as she thrashed, the bones in her legs snapped and rearranged before fusing together to form strange joints her body wasn't meant to have. Her arms followed and became thicker and stronger, covered in a warm layer of fur, tearing the new shirt she had just been given in the process. Skin stretched and ripped and shredded to fit over the new limbs before mending itself with only a trickle of blood betraying that it happened at all. She buried her head in the blankets and pillows and let out a choked howl as her teeth morphed inside her mouth, the taste of warm copper dancing over her sharp teeth. When she raised her head, her face had been replaced with a sleek muzzle, dark fur covering her head to paw. Her hair ruffled around her head almost like a mane, and her eyes had the same pitiful brown gaze as they did in human form. The transformation was complete, leaving Koda more beast than human, somewhere between bipedal and quadrupedal. Her arms were a little too long, her legs bending in ways a human's never should, snout fuzzy and unnatural but somehow so right on her face. There were many names for what she might be called: dog-man, werewolf, lycanthrope, shifter, hybrid. But the common denominator through them all was always unnatural monster.

A warm hand landed on the black and brown fur between Koda's ears, petting cautiously. Valentina hadn't run away or hurt her. She looked a bit shell-shocked and horrified, but she was still there. "Your powers are amazing," she breathed. "Bob and I are the only ones who will accept you this way."

Koda saw the shocked revulsion on her face and believed it. Valentina had sought her out specifically and still couldn't quite bear her. The others would never accept her, never understand. It wasn't what she had hoped for, but it was better than being completely alone. But stuck stubbornly in the back of her mind, she wished the others were with her. At least Walker hadn't seemed to mind her being a dog. He was a scared dog too. But there was a lot of difference between a dog and a monster. Koda lowered her head and reluctantly wagged her tail as Valentina scratched behind her fuzzy ears.

Valentina swiftly vanished from the room, leaving the beast alone. It was midday, but Koda was exhausted and sore and in an unfamiliar location. The room, however, provided a degree of security that she was in desperate need of. Somewhat reluctantly, she rolled off the bed and ambled towards the dog crate. Her steps were an odd mixture of two legs and four as she tried to get a feel for the new body she was in, and she took a few experimental laps around the room before settling into the crate. There was more than enough room for her, even as monstrous as she was and she curled up into a tiny ball. Closing the latch had proven difficult though manageable, and the extra degree of safety put her at ease regardless of how superficial the protection might have been. Tucked into the back corner of the crate was a floppy plush like the one she'd had at home, except this one was a puppy. Koda picked it up in her jaws and settled it beneath her muzzle.

The next few blissful hours were spent asleep. She hadn't had any proper rest since being in the car with Yelena, only dozing a bit on the flight to New York. So when a sharp rap on the door woke Koda, she was less than pleased. Valentina didn't even wait for an answer, letting herself into the room. The latches on the dog crate were flicked open, but Koda pressed her body into the back corner, ears back and teeth bared. Valentina shot a withering look of disapproval at her, and she crept out of the cage with her tail tucked between her legs. As a second thought, she stuck her head back inside and pulled the puppy plush out in her jaws.

"I have some things I need to know about you, Koda. See, I know a lot about your history, but I don't know much about your… condition. My team would like to get to know you, learn more about you."

The fur on the back of Koda's neck rose and she turned to dart back into the cage. Valentina shut it with a clang and latched the door, and Koda had nowhere to run. Even with the promise of Valentina's understanding and acceptance, the prospect of being examined and studied like some kind of specimen pushed all the wrong buttons for her. But then there was a hand firmly grasping the back of her neck, tugging like she was a wandering pup being brought back to the den, and Koda's paws stumbled into line beside Valentina. How she'd known to do that, Koda wasn't sure.

The room she was lead to was what she'd expected her initial welcome to be. Vials and beakers and strange tubes cluttered black countertops. An exam table was pushed against one wall at the other end of the vast space. Koda's room had been small, likely temporary construction, but this room, however, seemed to stretch over the whole floor of the tower. People in white lab coats whispered to each other in hushed tones and wrote notes on clipboards with a degree of curiosity and scrutiny Koda didn't really appreciate. More medical equipment was scattered around the room as well; some things she recognized and some she didn't. With the puppy plush still clutched in her jaws, she skittered across the floor, claws clicking, to the closest table and hid beneath it. Valentina's voice came out strong and commanding, causing her ears to twitch a little bit.

"This is our other guest of honor. Please see to it that you treat her kindly. All the same tests that you did on Sentry plus what I sent earlier, both her forms, and I had Mel write up a questionnaire for her to fill out when… you know, she can write again."

She swept out of the room, abandoning Koda to a pack of ravenously curious scientists. The shyer scientists leapt back from Koda's warning nips, but a pair of strong-willed arms dragged her from beneath the table, avoiding Koda's claws and teeth. From that moment on, it was a whirlwind of tests and studies and discomfort that Koda couldn't avoid. The scientists quickly learned that she didn't want to bite, so a few firm words and an unflinching hand were enough to earn her cooperation until they could slip a muzzle onto her face. Blood draws, x-rays, measurements, fur samples, pupil reactivity, tooth mold, everything imaginable and possible to be performed dressed seemed to have been ordered, and Koda sulked through the entire ordeal. A few growls and yelps escaped her, but the staff remained unbitten. Rather than have Koda double back, each test was performed first in one form, then the other. The initial shift with Valentina had been agonizing, the second one even moreso, but each following transformation became easier. Once her body grew accustomed to the change, she could almost seamlessly slip between bodies like she had as a child.

After some time, Koda was human again, left with the questionnaire Mel had apparently printed out for her. The questions were all targeted towards Koda specifically, and the thought of the assistant meticulously creating a werewolf questionnaire made her huff out a laugh. It wasn't dissimilar to the mental health sheets she'd had to fill out in the labs as a teen, and the format was familiar if not grating: a series of questions in a column, each with a row of boxes beside it labeled 'yes', 'no', 'I don't know', and 'sometimes'. She sped through basic ones without much of a thought, writing an 'x' in the applicable box. But after an initial few boring questions, they began to get a bit more interesting. 'Are your shifts in form triggered by the moon phases?' and 'Are you vulnerable to silver?' caught her eye immediately, and she sighed. She filled in the box labeled 'no' for both, as well as for the question, 'Is your condition transmittable?'

With the superstitions cleared out of the way, Koda dove into some of the more interesting questions, the things of real importance. The box for 'yes' was ticked for 'Do you have an increased appetite after shifting?', 'Are both sets of ears functional?', 'Can you understand human speech well while shifted?', and 'Are your senses heightened before or after a shift?' A few questions caused her to stop and think for a moment to analyze her behaviors or thought processes before she could answer. To Koda, she was just Koda. It just felt natural to chew on things, to mimic canine body postures, to just be. It was all she remembered, all she knew. The boxes for 'sometimes' were checked for 'Do you have territorial urges?' and 'Do you struggle to speak when shifted?', and the box for 'I don't know' was filled in for 'Are you prone to bursts of aggression?'

Two questions, however, Koda left decidedly blank. They'd brought a scowl to her face, and she read over them again with disdain dripping from her voice though nobody was around to hear her. "'Do you experience an estrous cycle (heat)?' and 'Are you medically sterilized?' That's my business," she grumbled. "Gross." The boxes for 'no' stared up at her temptingly, but Koda set her pen aside. It was the principle of the thing. They'd already poked and prodded all sorts of information out of her, and she didn't particularly want to share everything. Especially not with strangers. She left the clipboard and questionnaire laying on the exam table she'd been perched on, though she hadn't thought to remove the muzzle, and made a beeline for the elevator. The tower was, by Mel's statistics, only seventy percent renovated. That left a lot of space for Koda to wander and explore.

Much to her disappointment, most of the floors were empty or otherwise uninteresting. It seemed to be a reoccuring pattern that any opportunity for exploration turned up nothing of note. Construction blocked off some areas, and others were furnished but empty. Sitting alone in a giant room got boring very quickly, and everyone on other floors were too busy working to talk. With great reluctance, Koda hit one more button on the elevator in a final attempt before she would retire to her room. This one, however, proved to be more interesting. It opened out onto a floor with a beautiful skyline view and what might have been a bar along one wall. A spiraling modern staircase sat at its far end, and Koda crept up the stairs slowly. At the top she found another wide, expansive room. This one was far less furnished, clearly still in the process of being renovated. A room similar to Koda's lay within, temporary construction standing out like a sore thumb. Koda's at least had been made to seem a bit more inviting. A rolling clothes rack containing strange, golden suits waited outside the entrance, along with a few more people in white lab coats scratching away at their clipboards. At the heart of it was Valentina and Mel. Her ears twitched in their direction as she listened in for any interesting information. The room must belong to Bob, and Koda hadn't gotten to see him yet. Listening in could reveal something about his condition. Huddled beneath a lab table, she watched the two women discuss something. From the horrified look on Mel's face, it wasn't something good. Heightened hearing was both a blessing and a curse, and Koda found herself immensely grateful for it in that moment.

"They're coming," Mel whispered. "They seem to have… joined forces with Congressman Barnes? They'll be here within the hour."

"Good, I knew they would come. Can't resist playing hero, can they?"

The line of fur along the back of Koda's neck prickled. Valentina had told her that the team wasn't coming. She'd been certain. But it was… a lie.

"Should I set up defensive measures?" Mel peeped.

"No need. We have the Sentry now. And even if he fails, we know what worked in him, and the new data from the wolf. We can start again," Valentina said confidently. "I knew they were coming. Actually, leave the doors unlocked."

"But you said-"

"I told the mongrel that they weren't coming because we needed her to be on our side. If she believed they were going to rescue her, she wouldn't be as receptive."

"But they came back for their weapons and left her," Mel remembered.

"You think I didn't have a hand in that? I let that happen. We needed her isolated, Mel, and I broke the superhero image she had in her mind. It pays to be a few steps ahead."

Koda's stomach turned and a cold sweat broke out over her body. Not only had Valentina lied about the team not rescuing her and Bob, she'd lied about Koda being important at all. She hadn't meant it at all. She just needed the secrets of human experimentation for her little project, probably whatever this 'Sentry' was. Betrayal stung in her chest, but she had been waiting for it. The shoe had to drop eventually.

"Aren't you worried about her turning on you?"

Valentina scoffed. "Her? No. Mel, she's as dangerous as a wet puppy. Horrifying, though. God, it was. I hope, for your sake, you never have to see it. Disturbing. But no, I'm not worried about her."

The acceptance and understanding was a lie. That, she had mostly expected. Sure, Valentina had put on a good show, but she'd seen the disgust on her face after she'd shifted. The safety, though, she had trusted. In one word, Valentina's illusion of safety and comfort shattered, pieces scattering and digging into Koda's chest like shards of glass. Horrifying. Valentina, the woman who had sought her out and promised acceptance, thought she was horrifying. It was true, Koda knew, but it didn't sting any less. The search for understanding and care would continue endlessly. Koda would find someone to care, let them in, show them the truth, and be forced to watch them fade out of her life once they realized what they saw: a monster, a problem, something inhuman and unlovable.

The itch beneath her skin began again, spreading like fire. Her tongue licked over sharpened teeth, the taste of copper never quite having left. The body she'd abandoned for so many years was becoming second nature to her again, the aches and discomfort becoming familiar and welcoming rather than something to be feared. She could have controlled it if she really wanted to. She could beat that part of herself into submission until it cowered and never showed itself again, but for some reason, she didn't. She just let go. Everybody would see her as a monster eventually. They'd all see the difficult, hideous parts of herself at some point, even if she hid it, because she never could truly hide it. The ears and tail and lines of fur never left, a permanent reminder of the "quirks" that would eventually drive everyone away. Long sleeves and hats and her tail down the leg of her pants could only hide so much. It was inevitable—hiding was pointless if every path led to the same conclusion.

"Soon you'll realize that there's a bad guy and a worse guy." The voices continued, unaware of the changes Koda was going through, but every word went through one ear and out the other without sticking. The voices drew nearer and then walked past, disappearing down the stairs. Koda was breathing hard, fur bristled, frozen in place. Valentina had lied. About everything. Her claws itched more than usual, the way they had when Walker was standing by the elevator shaft, some long-buried instinct to dig her teeth and claws into something. But this time it felt sharper, more intense, more angry. She padded out from under the table on four paws and crouched at the top of the stairs, looking down. Valentina was standing at the bar counter downstairs with a glass in her hand, and the beep of the intercom made Koda jump, tail fluffing.

"Jesus, you guys, I literally just put that drywall in. I left the door unlocked for you. Come up."

They were here! Koda's tail wagged and she inched a little closer to the stairs, debating whether or not to find them. Valentina would be angry if she knew she'd overheard things she shouldn't have, but surely they would protect her. But maybe not, maybe they wouldn't with her in this form. Maybe they'd even think she was a threat and shoot her. She crept back from the stairs a bit and dropped her snout onto her front paws.

The elevator downstairs dinged, and Valentina's voice reached Koda's ears again. She listened halfway, but her attention was drawn to the team. A new voice was speaking, one faintly familiar that Valentina quickly labeled as belonging to Congressman Barnes. He was definitely a good guy. Walker's voice was next, and Koda's tail wagged a little harder. She had expected Ava and Yelena to have killed him by this point. Yelena interrupted her train of thought, snapping at Valentina, and her head cocked to the side with her ears raised.

"Where are Bob and Koda?" Yelena demanded.

Upstairs, a few yards from Koda's crouched form, the door to Bob's room opened. Her gaze snapped to find him, but he looked… different. He wore one of the golden suits from the rack and he was blond now with his hair all slicked back. He had a cape. She wasn't quite sure, but his eyes looked like a different color too. He walked over and stood at the top of the stairs, stopping a few feet from her side with a cautious wave. She nudged her muzzled nose against his leg but stayed low to the ground with her tail tucked. Something wasn't right. She couldn't decide whether to move closer or pull away.

"Look at you. You are all so adorable. Just think, I send you down there to kill each other, and instead, you make nice and you form a team." She paused for a second, and Koda couldn't help but wonder what was happening. Her sight was blocked to just a portion of the room, leaving much to the imagination. "Who's this old Santa?" Valentina asked.

"I'm Alexei Shostakov. The Red Guardian."

"What?"

A guardian? He was also new, but guardians were usually good. His accent seemed to be similar to Yelena's. When she focused back into the conversation, Val was speaking again.

"Mel is having a little loyalty issue. But I'm just so grateful that she stayed long enough to lure you all in." Bob started down the stairs, and Valentina called for him. "Robert?"

"Oh my god," Yelena gasped.

"That's… Bob," Congressman Barnes half-questioned.

"Yeah, he's changed… a little," Ava added.

"It is… my great honor to introduce to you… The Sentry."

"Hey, guys," Bob said. He sounded the same, at least.

"All-powerful, invincible, stronger than all of the Avengers rolled into one, and soon to be known as Earth's mightiest hero."

Koda crept down a couple of the stairs at a snail's pace. Something felt very, very wrong. Valentina had planned to use the Sentry to fight, but The Sentry was Bob. Bob didn't fight. The old Bob didn't fight, but the new Bob had powers.

Ava shattered the moment of awe. "Have you dyed your hair?"

"Yeah, well it was-"

"It was my idea," Valentina said proudly. "People love a classic hero."

"Okay, I'll bite. What's the plan?" Congressman Barnes said reluctantly.

"You haven't figured it out yet, Bucky? Geez. Well, at least you're kind of cute-" Koda's nose twitched and her steps faltered at Valentina's words. That… wasn't the right thing to say, surely. Why would she have said that? It was beyond inappropriate.

"You're not going to hurt people," Alexei interrupted. Everyone had gathered by the stairs to see Bob, so Koda could see him now, set back towards the wall near the windows. He did look a bit like Santa, dressed in red with a big beard. He didn't want to hurt people. Koda decided she liked him.

"Oh, no! No, no, I'm not going to hurt people. See, the press is on their way here now, and they're going to witness the awesome power of Sentry as he takes down this ruthless group of rogue agents, thus beginning a new era in which I decide how to keep the American people safe, answering to no one," Valentina said smugly. "I'll be… unimpeachable."

Koda had certainly not heard this aspect of her plan. Her fur bristled even more, standing upright along her spine. Bob knew everything, and Valentina had spent all day with him. She'd been left in the labs with scientists and was only told that she and Bob would be a team. Her room had been nicer than his, but everything else made it seem like she was a second choice. The lesser option. Her claws itched.

"That's never gonna happen," Bucky stated.

"Sentry?" Koda watched in horror as Bob looked to Valentina. "Your first mission is to take out these criminals."

Ava's mask closed around her face and the others readied themselves for an attack.

"I don't wanna hurt you guys… Why don't you just turn yourselves in?" Bob said with a nervous chuckle.

"No, you don't wanna do this, Bobby," Walker said, trying to ease him down.

"You can call me The Sentry."

"Please, don't do this. You do not need to listen to her. You can trust me, I know you!" Yelena pleaded.

"They don't think you're good enough, Robert," Valentina prodded.

"I don't think that you do," The Sentry said.

"Enough talking! Nobody messes with the West Chesapeake Valley Thunderbolts!" Alexei charged towards The Sentry and was sent flying back with a single punch. Everyone except Yelena launched into a stream of constant attacks, each member swapping in and out.

Bad. Very, very bad. Worse than bad. Koda's ears pinned back and she crept down the stairs, belly low to the ground and ready to flee. Valentina rushed behind the rocky edge of the bar and hid, and Koda took the opportunity to leap. She slammed into Walker and sent him stumbling backwards a few steps, and she rose up onto two legs. The team, much to her frustration, immediately altered their attack patterns to cover for her, the new assailant. Fists and elbows caut her ribs and stomach, but she doggedly stayed upright and fighting. Her claws dug at Bucky's jacket and swung him off-balance before lunging at Alexei and tearing a knife out of his hands. She could only be in one place at once, gunshots ringing out from where she'd left Bucky. The bullets halted in midair, and The Sentry sent them flying back at him with a wave of his hand. Walker jumped in front of him with his shield raised but the force of the impact sent both men into the wall. Koda scampered over to them, nudging them with her muzzle, and Bucky reacted instantly, gun raised and pointed at her, and she fell to the ground with her paws in the air and belly up. A little whine left her mouth, wide eyes staring up at him. Walker sat up and stared at her for a second.

"Koda?" he asked, unsure. An affirmative bark answered him and he groaned.

"Do you know that werewolf?" Bucky asked in exasperation.

"Uh, yeah, well, kind of. She's changed."

"They do that."

Alexei retrieved his knife and charged at The Sentry again. Yelena was calling for them to stop, to not attack, but nobody was listening. Alexei stabbed once, twice, three times, four. The knife shattered and The Sentry remained untouched. Another flick of his hand and Alexei crashed through the window, hovering dozens of stories above the streets of New York City. The Sentry waved his hand the other way, and the man crashed into the bar, bottles and glasses shattering around him. Ava phased in behind The Sentry, but he blinked out of space and reappeared behind her. Walker followed up with a swing of his shield but The Sentry grabbed it, bending it around Walker's arm. Koda jumped after him and growled, barking at The Sentry with her teeth bared behind the muzzle. Her claws flexed at her sides and she swung out at him. Before she could connect with his side, a sharp pain in her upper arm pierced through her. Valentina stood off to the side with a gun raised, and Koda began to wobble. A feather-tipped dart stuck out of her arm, and the last thing she saw before tumbling to the ground was Yelena leaping onto The Sentry's back.

Koda awoke to the familiar squabbling exchanges of the team. Her eyes were stubbornly refusing to open and her limbs were filled with lead. Someone was holding her, someone big. Maybe Alexei? Voices were a little fuzzy and unclear, but whoever was holding her seemed to have an accent, so it was probably him. Her ears twitched and sounds came through a little more clearly.

"I haven't heard from you or seen you in a year!" Yelena spat accusingly.

"Okay, go easy on him," Walker said.

"Oh, so you're nice now."

"What, is it my turn?"

"No, you know you're a piece of trash, Walker. So does your family." Koda managed a weak growl at that, and the arms holding her adjusted slightly. Her eyes still wouldn't open, but her mind was less scrambled. "We're all losers. And we lost," Yelena bit out.

A hand was on her muzzle, tugging at the straps, and what she intended to be a fierce growl escaped as a whimper. She tried again and produced a weak snarl.

"Yeah, I know, you're really mad about it. Settle," Walker grumbled. "You're fine."

A different voice was mumbling something nearby, and she felt herself being shifted into somebody else's arms. With the muzzle gone, she could at least tell she was human again—at least as human as she ever could be—and her chin was hooked over somebody's shoulder. She emerged victorious after a fierce fight against her eyelids and stared out at the streets of New York without quite processing what happened. Someone was folding up the bottoms of her pants, and whoever was holding her was holding her like a baby. A lot of things didn't quite make sense, but she was too tired to try and sort it out.

"Walker," Bucky snapped. The voice was close, the way Alexei's had been, so he must have been who was holding her. "Get out of my space."

"I'm not in your space."

"Get. Out."

"God, I was just trying to be nice!"

"You can be nice," Bucky sighed, "over there. Away from me."

"Stop fighting," Koda slurred. She was promptly set on the ground, swaying a little bit. Apparently Bucky had decided that if she was awake enough to talk, she was also awake enough to stand. Thankfully she managed to stay on her feet.

Bucky was eyeing Koda warily, pacing back and forth. Now and then, he'd cast a glance at the muzzle still in Walker's hand and his expression would twitch. She couldn't quite decipher what his look meant, but it didn't seem to be overwhelmingly positive, though she wasn't exactly surprised.

"Do you want this back?" Walker said suddenly, holding out the muzzle. Koda winced and shook her head hard enough her ears flopped. "Okay, yeah. Cool." He tossed it in the nearest trash can, and Bucky gave a nod of approval.

"So you're a… werewolf?" Bucky asked. He had a certain kind of resignation in his voice, like it wasn't the strangest thing he'd ever heard but he wished it was.

"Sort of? I'm not magic. Or, like, cursed, you know?" She fidgeted, tugging at the sleeves of her shirt. This was the moment where they both expressed their disgust and that the others had already left horrified. Her tail tucked between her legs.

"Right," he sighed. "Not magic."

"I don't bite," she offered nervously. "I'm not mean or anything."

"Yeah, Koda's a good dog," Walker joined in. Koda wasn't sure why, but something in that made her tail wag ferociously. He let out a slightly startled laugh, but she didn't think it sounded mean. He just looked amused.

Automatic gunfire cut the moment short and both men instantly settled back into business. A crowd had gathered on the corner, pointing up at a dark figure in the sky, helicopters rapidly approaching it with gunmen hanging out the sides. The figure lifted its hand and the helicopter began to crash, spiraling into a crane standing beside the Avengers Tower. The helicopter exploded into a ball of fire and the crane toppled over onto a nearby building and scraped through the windows of the Tower. Bricks and glass and debris rained down onto the street and people scattered like ants. Chunks of concrete tumbled and fell, blocking roadways and crushing cars. Bucky instantly leapt into action, pulling people from harm's way and from the paths of the falling debris. Walker grabbed Koda by the arm and shoved her beneath a sturdy overpass, barking out a firm "Sit!" before disappearing. Koda wasn't a dog, but she listened anyways.

A second helicopter crashed, skidding along the road in a burst of flames. More debris fell in larger chunks and screaming rang in the air. Koda covered her ears and stared into the ground but it did little to deafen the overwhelming sounds of terror and panic. A thunderous crash rattled through her bones and she looked up to see a billowing cloud of dust with all five team members standing at the heart of it. The panic slowed and then ceased as the rain of brick came to a stop, and the crowd around them began to clap and whistle. A flame of pride swelled in Koda's chest and she skittered over to them, stepping cautiously to avoid shattered glass with her bare feet. She sidled up beside them just as a child screamed, and she and Alexei both bolted at the same moment. Bucky's arm shot out and stopped her dead in her tracks, hauling her back from the errant slab of concrete as it hurtled to the ground. Alexei bent over the child and the slab shattered over his back, and yet he stood up unharmed, child safe. He gave the girl a reassuring smile, and she vanished into a dark shadow on the ground. Gasps and screams erupted anew, bystanders staring at the place a child had been only seconds before. Three people disappeared. Then four. Scrambling, innocent people ran, turning to shadows mid-step.

"You all know the truth," the shadowy figure said. "You can't outrun the emptiness." There was no mistaking it now. The shadowy figure was Bob. The same mournful voice, just coming from an inky void rather than a man.

"I think Bob's dark side got superpowers. Get everybody off the street," Walker ordered.

"Come on, let's go, let's go!" Alexei yelled, hauling Koda by the arm. She sprinted alongside him as the darkness on the ground spread like a disease, turning anyone it touched into a shadow. The team ushered people inside, calling out and giving directions to terrified onlookers. All except Yelena. She stood at the edge of the darkness, gazing up at the sky.

"Yelena, what are you doing?" Alexei called.

The shadowy version of Bob was closer to the ground now, though no more detailed. Just a void of darkness.

"We're all alone, all of us," the Void said.

"Wait! Yelena!" Alexei yelled again, rushing towards her.

Yelena stepped forwards into the shadows, disappearing into a dark imprint on the ground. Alexei screamed, crying out, but he was dragged back by Bucky. Walker grabbed his other arm and held him back, but the shadows continued to spread, devouring everyone in their path. They crept up the walls of buildings, crawling along the street, radiating out from The Void. Huddled in an alleyway, Alexei leaned against the wall, crying. Koda stood silent, eyes wider than if she had seen a ghost. Ava pulled a knife out and strode towards the creeping shadows.

"I'm going after her," she declared.

"And then what?" Bucky countered.

"If she did that, she did it for a reason."

"What if she's dead, huh? What if there's no coming back?"

"What if she isn't?" Ava asked, and it was the softest Koda had ever heard her voice.

"How do you know that?"

"No, no, no, wait, hold on. I think she might have a point," Walker interrupted. "When- When I was back in the vault, I- I saw something, I went somewhere. I can't explain it, but…"

"What did you see?" Alexei demanded. Koda came to stand at his side, ears twitching. She remembered the vault, how Walker had lingered by the elevator shaft like he was in a trance.

"It- it was this memory, a bad one. Something I'm not proud of, and- and it was like I was in it. Watching myself."

"But you got out," Alexei prompted.

"Yeah, yeah. I got out; I was fine."

That was all Alexei needed to hear. Before the others could stop him, he charged out from the alleyway and disappeared into a shadow. Koda didn't want to be last, to look like a coward. Everyone else had already helped with rescuing people, and all she'd done was sit under and overpass and wait for it to be over. She stepped out of the alleyway and cast a dark imprint on the sidewalk where the shadows had touched her.

Koda awoke and immediately wished she hadn't. She was standing upright, transported into a different place. A pristine white hallway stretched out in front of her, cinderblock walls reaching high above her. Chemicals scented the air in a way she knew she would never be able to forget, not even decades later. An observation window on her left looked into an operating room filled with scientists and doctors in crisp coats and blue surgical masks. Huddled on an exam table was a child, no more than seven, with fluffy canine ears and a stub of a tail poking out from the back of a surgical gown. Koda. She approached the glass and watched her younger self, staring in through the window in numb shock. She remembered this moment. The scratchiness of the gown, the bitter smell of chemicals, the faux-soothing voice of the doctors. Her younger counterpart began thrashing and squirming, and the head surgeon pulled out a long, sharp needle.

"This won't hurt a bit, Koda. Can you just stay still for me?" he asked gently.

Young Koda kicked, catching him in the stomach. The nurses grabbed her arms and she lashed out, jaws snapping at their hands and arms. Both nurses flinched back, cowering at the sight of fearsome fangs poking from such a small mouth. The head surgeon approached again, needle in hand, and grabbed her tiny arm. Koda looked away, but she didn't have to see to remember the sickening sound of fangs piercing skin, or the wave of curses that came from the man, or the stinging slap across her face. Her younger self curled into a ball, spitting and spluttering the taste from her mouth, and sobbed. Another man ran into the room and scooped her up, cradling her to his chest and whispering soothing words to the distressed child.

"You're raising a monster, Doctor Ellis," the surgeon snapped. Blood blossomed over the sleeve of his scrubs.

The memory faded out, and Koda lifted her head. Rather than being in a new memory, it had just reset. She watched it play out once more, then twice, standing numbly. On its fourth run, she found a closet and tucked herself inside it, knees drawn up to her chest. Even then it wasn't enough to muffle the sound of the curses and the slap. She wasn't sure how many times the memory had replayed. She stopped counting after five, instead focusing on dulling the burning itch under her skin. She couldn't shift now. She had to control it, be strong. Be good.

The wall of the closet crumbled and Walker fell through it, face smudged with blood and tear tracks. Koda peeked around him to the memory he'd escaped from and saw a man crumpled against a pillar, head hanging limp. Walker moved to block her view and she took the hint, standing up and looking away.

Wordlessly she exited the closet and led him to the observation window. He glanced back and forth between versions of herself for a moment before smashing the window and jumping through it. Koda stumbled back, eyes wide, and stared while he attacked the scientists. They hadn't seemed able to see Koda before, but the room itself fought back, twisting and stretching. Koda hesitantly crawled through the broken window and swung at the surgeon. He flew back into the wall and it crumbled.

"C'mon, through there," Walker ordered. She stepped through the gap and into the woods.

The second memory was even more instantly recognizable than the first. Stepping through the gap, Koda set foot in the woods. A smoldering compound in the distance blew dark smoke, and a slim, teenaged version of Koda scampered through the trees. A scientist was on her heels, but not chasing. The same one who'd soothed her in the previous memory, running with. They both paused beside a boulder while the whirring of helicopter blades drew nearer. The scientist took both her hands in his and pressed a scrap of paper into her palm.

"Go here. I have things set up for you. I'm sorry, I had to save my little girl."

"Papa, no!" cried teenaged Koda. Her plea fell on deaf ears and the man ran back the way he came, heading towards the ruins of the building. Teenaged Koda darted into the woods, following a game trail. In the distance, at the edge of the memory, a deer with a jagged, uneven antler followed the same path, running from the burning fire.

"Where are we?" Walker asked carefully. Koda's shoulders hitched and her breathing wavered, but she answered.

"That's where I grew up," she said, pointing at the smoking buildings in the distance. "The lab compound."

"It… caught on fire?"

"No. My Papa leaked information, and the compound blew up to hide what they'd done. He'd been warned about the explosion and made sure I would be safe, but he didn't have time to get to the other kids."

"Other kids?"

"There were dozens of us, all ages. We had different groups based on age and animal hybrid. And they blew it all up."

"Jesus."

Koda flinched as the memory reset again, and she took off running away from the ruins of the building. Faster, faster, til her lungs burned. She hit a wall where the memory ended, trees painted on but details blurry. A crack ran up the length of it, and she slammed her shoulder into it again, falling through into another memory. Walker followed, a little more carefully, and dropped onto the ground. The opening Koda had made was now above them.

Koda sat up and immediately whimpered, ears drooping and tail tucking.

"Don't look," she pleaded.

Walker looked around, confused. There didn't seem to be much to look at anyways. A slightly run-down neighborhood with an old, brick apartment building set back against the trees. Moonbeams filtered through the clouds and peepers sung their summertime tune.

A lanky wolf crept along the shadows of the building. Its limbs were slightly too long, gait a bit unnatural. It was panting heavily, and stood up on two legs.

"Please, don't look," Koda begged again. She ran towards the memory while the wolf shifted halfway back to human. Hands remained paws with brutal claws, fur vanished, fangs remained but the snout shortened slightly, legs settled back into place but her gait remained uneven. A horrifying mixture of beast and human, not quite either, yet somehow painfully adolescent. She was wearing the same clothes as she had been running through the woods.

At the edge of the woods, a deer with a stumpy antler grazed and nibbled at grass. The half-wolf approached, snarling, and a sob caught in Koda's throat.

"You were there," the wolf growled. "You were there and you didn't do anything!"

The deer raised its head, frozen beneath the teenager's stare. Its ear twitched a bit, but it didn't flee.

"You didn't do anything! It's your fault! You didn't save them! He's gone because of you!"

Teenaged, lanky Koda leapt at the deer, claws slashing and ripping. It fell before it could make a sound, and Koda could feel the warm blood seeping into her hands still. Slick and wet and warm and the deepest red she'd ever seen. Her stomach turned, and she looked away from the memory. Her younger self crouched down beside the deer, panting, crying, staring at her claws.

"No, no, I- I didn't mean it! I didn't mean it, please, it was an accident, I don't-" she sobbed, claws dripping blood and gore.

Walker took her arm and dragged her away from the sight before the memory could reset. She didn't fight it, just followed and tried to hide her tears. She stood sniffling while he hammered at the walls of the building. The bricks crumbled, and he pulled her through the gap without a word.

They were in her room. The one in the Tower, the one Valentina had set up for her. Walker looked around warily, bent shield raised and ready to fight.

"What's so bad about this one?" he asked.

Koda didn't speak, not trusting herself to. She just pointed to the corner, fighting the urge to hide. Inside a dog crate woven with string lights, a shifted Koda curled up on a dog bed and pressed her snout into a plush toy. A slobbery chew toy sat to the side, and the steady thump of a wagging tail echoed in the quiet.

"So? Is that… it?" he asked.

Koda's head snapped up, shame and disgust written all over her face. It was the worst of the worst, her true nature. Just hours ago, not excusable as youth or damaged emotions. She was acting like a dog, like a pet. She wasn't acting like a fully-grown adult the way she should be. She was damaged, wrong. Nobody should act like that, not as an adult. It was pathetic and pitiful and disgusting, and she only felt worse knowing she had needed it. She hadn't even hesitated when given the opportunity to be a dog. It had felt right. She had shifted, curled up in a crate, chewed on a dog toy, and went to sleep with her tail wagging.

"I… shouldn't have. It's weird. Gross. I'm not a dog, so I shouldn't act like one."

"But you are a dog," Walker commented, visibly confused. "It's okay to be a dog if you're a dog, right?"

"But I shouldn't be. I should be like everyone else," Koda muttered. Without realizing it, she flattened her ears to her head and tucked her tail behind her, out of view. Almost enough to pass as human.

Walker shrugged. "Whatever. Looks cozy to me." He moved around the space, poking around like he was completely unbothered.

Koda balked. "What?"

"It looks safe in there."

She stared at him in bafflement. He wasn't laughing. She was rather certain that he wasn't making fun of her. He'd just shrugged and moved on. "I- Well, yeah. It is," she admitted with a sniffle.

Walker disappeared into the tiny attached bathroom, calling out a minute later. "Found it."

Koda scampered over, wiping away the last of her tears. Sure enough, a crack ran through the length of the shower wall. A second blow and it shattered, revealing a memory that certainly wasn't Koda's. She leapt through after him and was immediately caught up in a whirlwind of papers and furniture, Bob and Yelena at the center.. The room was attacking them, the way her first room had. Her claws stretched out from her hand without her realizing, and she slashed at the wallpaper and swirling papers. Someone yelled and ripped apart a pillow, casting stuffing through the air. The room calmed, and she glanced around. Everyone else was in the room. Ava, Alexei, Bucky. After a breath, Yelena spoke, awe in her voice.

"You came for us. What happened? What did you see?"

Bucky piped up first. "Oh, I'm fine. I have a great past, so I'm totally fine." He gestured to the broken wall behind him, and Koda peeked at it. It looked worse than hers, definitely.

"Yeah, this place is messed up," Walker added.

"We're here together," Alexei said solemnly. "That's what matters."

"Thank you, guys, really," Bob murmured.

"Of course. Here we are, Shane's Elite Electronic Thunderbolts," Ava said.

"The peewee soccer team?" Koda asked, barking out a laugh. Her ears twitched, and she grinned. The team name wasn't bad, all things considered. Thunderbolts seemed way too intense for a peewee soccer team. It suited heroes way more.

"Okay, okay. Just how do we get out of here?" Walker asked, looking to Bob.

"I mean as- as far as I know, it's just… endless rooms."

"Wait, you said this is the nicest room you've found and the others are way worse, right?" Yelena said.

"Ye- yeah?"

"So show us the worst."

Koda winced sympathetically. Her rooms weren't something she had enjoyed going through accompanied, and she'd only had Walker. She couldn't imagine the shame of revealing everything to the whole team. They hadn't rejected her yet, but the ice was still thin beneath her feet. Just because Walker had seen the worst didn't mean he'd understand either, once everything was over.

Bob, however, led the team down the stairs and down the hall. His house seemed nice, cozy, save for his family. His father screamed at him and Bob shrank back, cowering on reflex. Walker stepped up and slammed his shield into the man's head and he crumpled to the floor.

"Well, he seems nice," Ava muttered.

The room, like Koda's, began falling apart, furniture flying and room twisting while Walker ushered them all through a coat closet. Koda fell flat on her stomach onto concrete, falling from the sky with the team around her. The room seemed small, details quickly blurring out into the walls, but she was caught upside the head by a spinning sign. Tumbling back, her eyes tracked a chicken costume as it rampaged, twirling the sign erratically and attacking everyone on sight. The sign caught Alexei in the face, and Bob yelped.

"I was on meth!"

Bucky stepped up this time, laying the rampaging chicken suit out with a single punch to the face. Koda was pushed through another opening and tumbled into another room, then another, and another. Walker's method of entering the room and hitting everything proved most effective, shattering walls and laying out aggressive memories until the group came to one room more ominous than the rest.

Bob sat straight ahead on an exam table, slouched with his back turned. Void Bob. Outside the exam room, rows of lab tables were covered with pill bottles and chemicals, things Koda didn't know what were but recognized from her childhood.

"I've been here before," Yelena said.

"This is where it started," Bob mumbled. "I was roaming around Southeast Asia. Thought I'd figure something out, or at least find more drugs."

The team rose to their feet and doors hissed shut behind them, trapping them in the dark room. Koda shuffled a little closer to Walker, halfway hiding behind him.

"Then there was this guy. Started talking to me about a medical study. A trial drug that could make me stronger. Felt like a miracle."

Koda's ears twitched and she whined quietly. From the scattered memories of her childhood before the labs, she remembered her parents having a similar conversation. A miracle, something for special children, to make the world a better place, for making a difference. The group approached the shadowy figure slowly, one careful step at a time. It hadn't moved yet.

"I'd finally get to show everyone that I was more, that I was… something," Bob continued.

"And look what you unleashed," the shadow said. He finally hopped down from the exam table, walking around it slowly like a lion stalking its prey. "The most shameful thing of all was thinking you could be anything more than… nothing."

Yelena stepped forwards, addressing the shadow directly. "We're leaving."

He simply stood there staring, head cocked slightly to the side, eyes dimly glowing. After a long stretch of silence, "No."

The exam table behind him hovered in the air then flew forwards and Yelena grunted as it slammed into her. Both she and Alexei were pinned by the table, metal twisting and melding to form restraints that they couldn't escape. Pieces of the room tore off, twisting as easily as putty to form bonds not even the super soldiers could escape. A light fixture tore from the ceiling and wrapped around Bucky, and a shard of metal pierced through Walker's shoulder. A chair twisted around Koda's legs and pinned her to the floor as a chunk of metal held Ava in place by the doors. The only one untouched was Bob.

"Stop. Just- just let them go," he pleaded.

"Wait, you think they care about you? You don't matter. To anyone," The Void said firmly. Koda's fur bristled and she stopped fighting the restraints. If Bob didn't matter, she wouldn't either. Bob had strong powers, ones that could be useful. He was going to be a hero. Koda was just an experiment gone wrong, a pet science project let loose on the world. Her powers weren't strong. She couldn't fight. She hadn't even helped save people when the debris was raining down in the street.

"That's not true!" Yelena shouted, breaking Koda's thoughts. "We care about you! You are never alone if you have us!"

"Robert, the hero," The Void mocked, disregarding Yelena's words. A twist of his head and the cabinets shattered, shards of glass blowing into them like driving rain.

"I'm stronger than you," Bob mumbled.

"Let's see."

Bob hesitated for just a moment before punching the shadow. He seemed to have a physical form, at least, because the shadow's head jerked back. Its next blows were strong, not holding back, and Bob was sent to the floor.

"You thought you were gonna be some great man? Some savior? You can't even save yourself!"

"Get up, Bobby," Walker hissed.

Bob stood up and threw another punch, but his shadow self easily caught him and drove three punches into his stomach. Bob tumbled to the floor, groaning.

"We. Will always. Be alone," The Void reminded him.

Every beaker, every cabinet, every tube shattered, glass flying and cracking as The Void dragged Bob across the floor back to him. He struggled to his feet and stared at the team, and Koda watched him with wide eyes as he turned and tackled the shadow. He pinned The Void to the ground and punched again and again, hitting with all his strength against the darkness. The room swung and shook, falling apart around them with every hit. Cracks spread across the ceiling and floor, and the bonds tightened. But the darkness of The Void was spreading up Bob's body, swallowing him whole with each strike to the shadowy figure.

"This isn't right," Bucky insisted.

"Bob, stop! This is what he wants!" Yelena yelled. She strained, pushing against the metal with Alexei's added strength, and dropped to the ground. Furniture lifted off the ground and flew at her, beams from the ceiling falling in her way, but she didn't stop sprinting. She leapt as a chasm opened in the floor, landing beside Bob and throwing her arms around him.

Walker followed, tearing the metal from his shoulder, then Bucky. Koda kicked her way free from her bonds and scampered over the wreckage to join the others, grabbing at Bob and pulling him back. Her arms wrapped around his torso from behind, chin on his shoulder pressed in between Walker and Yelena. Ava and Alexei stumbled in and grasped at him, offering their support without a word. The dark shadows melted from Bob's body and he stopped punching, curling into the arms around him as he wept.

"We are a team," Alexei declared.

"Nobody is ever alone," Bucky added, "not when you have us."

Koda knew the words were meant for Bob, but it eased the ache in her chest just a little. They'd all seen the darkest parts of Bob, literally, and were not only standing by his side but holding him and caring. He'd turned New York City into a shadowy void, and still they cared enough to save him. Surely they would do the same for her.

The team collapsed backwards with Bob in the middle. When Koda opened her eyes, the view was no longer the spidering cracks in the ceiling, but clouds and sky. She sat up and looked around, one hand still grasping Bob's sweater, and watched the shadows fade from the city. Light returned, chasing away the bad, bringing hope to the weary team. People began to dot back into existence, searching out companions and family and embracing. Standing at the heart of it again, the team watched the city return to life.

"You were great in there, Bob," Walker said sincerely.

Bob grinned. "Thanks, Walker. Wa- hey, wait, in where? Whoa… what happened here?"

Koda stared at him. No shadows, no changing eyes. He was Bob, just Bob, and he had no idea what happened. Maybe that was for the best for now.

"You alright, Bob?" she asked, patting his back.

"Yeah. I'm fine," he said with a tiny smile.

A voice Koda was tired of hearing rang out loud and firm, and her attention snapped to its source instantly. Her nose twitched as she tried not to bare her teeth.

"Yes! I need an extraction right now!" Valentina shouted. "What? No, I don't have backup! I need help!"

"I am going to kill that person," Alexei stated. Koda nodded and shuffled over to him.

"Wait, wait- What happens when he regains his memory?" Walker asked.

Yelena grabbed Bob's arm and dragged him along with her in Valentina's direction. "Okay, come on. We stick together from now on."

"Oh… that's nice," Bob murmured.

Alexei and Bucky stalked off towards Valentina as well, halfheartedly arguing about whether they could kill her or not. Koda wandered along, a little less enthusiastically, beside Walker, with Ava bringing up the rear.

"Maybe when he does regain his memory he can fix this stupid thing," Walker grumbled, trying to bend his shield back into shape. Koda didn't say anything, staring ahead at Valentina with a burning anger and icy fear mixing together in her mind. Walker gave her arm a little tap. "You good, pup?"

"Yeah, fine. You good?"

"Yeah."

The team whisked through a parted tarp, chasing after Valentina, only to pull up short as cameras flashed and reporters cheered. They looked at each other, then the crowd, then Valentina in confusion as she entered into a speech.

"For years, I have been working secretly to develop a new age of protection. Today, the citizens of the United States needed that protection, and thanks to my hard work, they got it."

Koda growled low in her throat and subtly moved to Walker's other side, putting him between her and Valentina. He glanced at her and gave a little nod, tightening his grip on the shield as Valentina took a deep breath.

"Ladies and gentlemen, meet… The New Avengers."