' ' Perfect Enough To Break ' '

Consequences

Sova

"I can't do that."

The words leave my mouth before I can stop them, quiet but cutting. My voice doesn't shake. My stare is sharp, leveled at him like a blade I've just unsheathed.

It's the first time I've said no.

Pierce's brow lifts, ever so slightly. That subtle look of surprise—disbelief, even. It doesn't last. He recovers in an instant, his expression hardening into something cold and vaguely amused.

"Can't?" he repeats, voice soft. "Or won't?"

I straighten my shoulders, ignoring the heat building in my chest.

"I won't."

His silence stretches for a moment, thick with calculation. I've obeyed a hundred orders before this. Missions. Assassinations. Clean-ups. I never questioned the task—maybe how I carried it out, sure. But never whether I would.

Because everyone knows what happens to people who disobey HYDRA.

And yet... my voice didn't falter. Maybe I was too stupid to realize the weight of it. Or too blinded by what once was. By who I was before.

Pierce leans forward, lacing his fingers under his chin. His eyes narrow, dissecting me.

"You forget your place, Ace," he says, calm and cool, like a parent correcting a wayward child. "You're a tool—one we crafted, sharpened, molded into something lethal. You don't get to refuse an order. Especially not from me."

"I'm not a tool," I say, the words quiet, but solid. "I'm not doing it."

His eyes flicker. Just once. Irritation, quickly masked by something far more dangerous: amusement. The kind that never reaches the eyes.

"I warned them you were getting sentimental."

He presses a hidden button under the desk. A soft mechanical click. I hear them before I see them—two guards entering, boots echoing on the tile.

Standard HYDRA enforcers. Heavily built, glassy-eyed. I clock their movements automatically—how one favors his left side, the slight delay in the other's draw speed.

It doesn't matter. They're stronger.

Pierce waves a hand without looking at them. "Reinforcement room. Break her in again."

I move before they reach me. Twist my weight, drive a knee into one's gut, elbow to the throat of the other. But I'm already tired. I always am, these days.

Their hands clamp down—iron wrapped in skin. One pins my arms. The other grabs my jaw, forcing my head back.

"Let go of me!" I snarl, struggling harder, feet dragging along the floor as they haul me out of the room.

I don't look back at Pierce. I can feel his eyes on me. Smug. Disappointed. Amused.

The walk to the reinforcement room is short, but it feels like it stretches forever. My boots scuff the floor, my wrists twist against their grip until my skin burns.

Then the door.

It hisses open like a mouth.

They throw me in.

I hit the ground hard—marble biting into my ribs. My shoulder knocks the wall. I curse, scrambling upright as the door slams shut with a mechanical clang.

And then it's just me.

Alone.

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The room is barren. No cot. No chair. Just pale walls and a single overhead bulb casting a dull circle of light. The floor is ice cold. The air smells sterile—like bleach and metal.

I sit in the far corner, arms wrapped around my knees.

And I wait.

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