"You're a most deadly weapon..."
"We've made you into a powerful human being, given you strength and abilities beyond anything anyone could imagine and this is how you repay us?"
"I thought you accepted your life... I thought you accepted this. Accepted me."
"Now that you have betrayed us, betrayed Russia, and betrayed me... you will know pain unlike any other."
"I know I can't hurt you physically anymore... but I still can hurt you in other ways."
"For your betrayal against me, I'll make you kill every last citizen of Urzikstan until control of the country is mine."
I had not opened my eyes as I awoke from my restless slumber, I felt like I didn't need to. I knew the energy of where I was, it was strange, dream-like... Because I knew that wherever I was, was safe. For the first time in a long time... I was safe.
And that feeling was completely unnerving.
I took in a deep breath and slowly opened my sore and straining eyes. My vision was blurry, as I tried to see through it, a sickly wave of nausea took over and belted my stomach and the sting of bile rose in my throat. I groaned and coughed out, finding my voice wheezy and scratchy with every haggard breath. My fit of coughing continued as I slowly leaned up from the bed I found myself in. I wiped the saliva from my lips and then prop myself up on my elbows, hissing in pain as my weak muscles complained against my every movement.
My eyes started to adjust a little as I held myself up, I saw I was in a light blue hospital gown and I was under cool, soft blankets that were... a pleasing white. A blinding white... a colour that seemed unreal. I loosely let my fingers touch the softness, letting them melt into it to test if this sense of comfort and safety was real.
I scan around to see the insides of a small hospital room, although this one was distinctively less morbid than what I had been used to... The room was plain and white brick-walled but was rather spacious and gave room for neat cupboards and locked storage along the walls. A small kitchenette tucked into the right corner.
The image of the barred window next to my bed gave the light of a clear sunny day outside, and the hint of a blue sky entered my peripheral vision. I saw that to my side was an IV drip with a cord predictably running stuck into my left arm and that's when I noticed the cool pads of an ECG over my body.
I wince at the sight and i follow the cords of the ECG to see a heart rate monitor next to the IV, seeing that line jump up and down just as I had seen many times before.
With a bout of strength rising through my weakened body, I pinched the needle in my arm and dragged out the IV, keeping the sharp needle tucked into my fist. I then take to the pads of the ECG and tear them off one by one, causing a buzzing alarm to come from the rolling monitor on my left side. I grunt, my head ringing from the sharp sound.
"Shut up," I spoke weakly, throwing a flimsy punch at the monitor, which stopped the beeping.
I take in a few deep breaths to steady myself as nausea runs rampant through me. I began to slowly sit myself up and take my legs over the left side of the bed, wincing as I did so and making sure to keep hold of that all-important needle. Once I got up, I caught my breath and held a hand to my chest.
I looked at the heart rate monitor across from me, seeing that my heart was beating 115 BPM before I took off the pads. A fast tempo for anyone else, but a rather slow speed for me. This showed that my body was still healing from... the cruelty.
My mind flashed back to that cell, the dirt, the rot, the filth, and that toxic smell of death. Chained to a wall of a BREAKER cell and forced to stay there every hour of every day, I had estimated I had been locked up like that for two weeks, starved, and forced to eat parts of my own skin to just relieve the dread of hunger. To make it all the worse I was visited repeatedly by that one person who threatened me with terror.
"For your betrayal against me, I'll make you kill every last citizen of Urzikstan until control of the country is mine."
Those words seemed so far away now, I knew something had happened and my transport from the BREAKER facility to Urzikstan and Al Qatala was halted. I knew I wasn't in the hands of Konni, Quds, or AQ. I knew wasn't in the hands of the monsters that held me for almost 15 years of my life.
Now was my time... time to destroy all that had destroyed me.
I took the needle from within my hand, pulled up the blue hospital gown and took it to my inner thigh. I knew I had to do this quickly before my body gave out again, I could already feel the ache of unconsciousness threaten to pull me down into its lurcherous depths again. I pant quickly, my fingers sweating profusely as I find the raised spot on my dark veined thigh and felt he length of the data device underneath my skin. I hold myself steady, taking deep breaths as my head starts to spin, and then I use the needle to cut mercilessly deep into my skin and tear it up from my flesh.
"Fuck!... FUCK!" I cry out as I draw the long deep line along myself. I kicked the bed with my other leg, feeling the cool metal dint under the force of my adrenaline-fueled impact.
I threw the dripping needle across the room and heaved in pain, but I didn't stop. I take my fingers, squeezing the sides of the wound as hard as I can until a small plastic tubing begins to crown. I pull the tubing out with a guttural groan, tears spilling from my eyes as the fire tore my body up. Blood pours from my fresh wound and the taste of bile stings my throat and I cough out again, writhing in my tortuous and depraved state.
I look at the small data device, grinning slightly through my self-inflicted pain. Knowing that it was this little thing that would set the biggest turning point in my life.
"I've masked it as a contraceptive, it has everything on there, All the records, All the data. All the Proof. Everything. Keep it on you until you know you can take it out. This will save your life. This will tell your story."
I was still on guard, I knew... I just knew this was the moment I'd been waiting for. Although I still didn't know exactly where it was I was...
I... was in a liminal space. Not knowing anything, Not knowing where I even was in the world, just this room and it's becoming sense of safety. If it was up to me I would stay here forever...
If I stayed here there would be no more Russia, no more Adrenagrowth, no more Killing, no more M-
I began to feel a shiver rise upon my skin as the bloodlessness of my wound came to much or my already teetering form. I look to my right and see that the wall is running with a long two-way mirror. There, I catch my reflection... my pitiful reflection, one I could never truly recognize and only the shine of my long long hair let me know it was me I was looking at. My only reminder of a sense of identity I had left.
I sucked in all the might I had left in my fading body and pull myself off the bed with my bare feet hitting the cool linoleum flooring. I held against the side of the bed for balance as I felt my body failing to cooperate with my wishes to stand. I slowly hobble forward across the room, slipping over the warm blood pooling beneath me. I reach the end of the bed and press forward on my own, eventually coming to the mirror.
My vision was spotty, but I pressed myself up to the mirrored stare deep into my shadowy eyes, coming face to face with that question that always comes when seeing my reflection.
Who am I? Am I really (Y/N)?
Just as I asked myself, a face came to mind, but it wasn't a normal face... some kind of form with deep eyes. It came to me in a flicker of memory, a scene where I was flooded in ghastly white and the song of a helicopter singing above me. And there, I reached for it, feeling it was some kind of salvation...
Who am I?
Before I knew it, I collapsed to the ground.
---
General Shepherd had fogged the glass windows of the CIA office and gave Kate Laswell a stern eye. He had his hands poised behind his back and walked to her slowly, letting her know that he meant business. Laswell had just got Captain Price and Gaz to scout for remaining missiles that might be with Major Hassan's contacts, and Laswell saw General Shepherd was stressing the importance of destroying every last American missile out there. But now, his attention was focused elsewhere.
"Laswell, who exactly have we got here?"
Laswell's eyes didn't part from behind her laptop, and she bit her lip. Her mind was running with every little bit of information she gathered about the captive in the container that was found with the missiles. The files... the data... but her mind just stuck more with the nature of the compilation of videos and photos she found of the young woman, it would be something that never left her.
"My team has been all over it for hours, we've found one hell of a story, we still don't know everything but you may want to sit down for this General."
The General does as he's asked, folding his hands over the table. "Make this quick Laswell, I need to know if she is of any importance to me."
Laswell got up a few screens on the display for the General. There were images of the young woman in combat gear, videos of her in various uniforms, red prisoner overalls, photos of her under the practice of doctors... and even images of her as a child with her head shaved, undergoing strange medical procedures. In all these photos, the girl never smiled. But it showed as she got older, the more prominently those dark veins grew on her skin.
"Her name is (Y/N) Belinay, an Urzikstanian POW in the Barkov Regime. She was ordered to a Barkov Labour camp as a child for her father was an Urzikstantian Army Officer, She was then sent to a facility called BREAKER, what we can gather is that it was a Konni and Qud's backed... operation." Laswell's eyes drifted to the young woman, her lips thinning. "As we scoured the information in the container and analysed the device she was storing in her body... we found something... huge. Take a look..."
Laswell clicks the screen showing a video of the young woman. She was shown in some kind of training facility, taking out and killing armed men with little more than her hands, her quick speed, and an incredible strength for her size and stature. The armed men were downed brutally in quick and precise but hectic movements, all victim to (Y/N)'s skilful and powerful attacks that saw grown men being thrown back sharp punches. General Shepherd leaned over the table, trying to gauge what he was seeing.
"Is this... real?" Shepherd muttered as he saw the young woman take down three assailants in quick succession. They failed to shoot her in time with their rifles before they were shot by her quick single shots from her pistol. From there she turns to jump and knife another oncoming soldier, all of it happening in the blink of an eye. Laswell folded her arms.
"(Y/N) is known by the call name 'Medusa'. We found that she has been at the forefront of a series of... experiments of young Urzikstanians that were taken into Barkov labor camps during his occupation." Laswell clicked into some documents, with a photograph of a large and guarded facility that looked to be like a kind of Russian prison.
"From the evidence we've gathered with my team, BREAKER specialized in brainwashing, biological and psychological experimenting. There was an operation co-led by Quds, Barkov, and Konni group that focused on the... training... of these Orphans to turn them into what they call... High Impact Killers."
General Shepherd rubbed his forehead, taking it all in silently, his mind still reeling from seeing how quick and strong the young woman was considering the images he initially saw of her... it was worlds away from the frail young woman found in the container found by Ghost and Soap.
"The main thing they were focused on during her experimentation and brainwashing was observing this new drug they frequently injected into the Orphans." Laswell put up two videos on the display for Shepherd.
"This was her before the Drug..."
A video played of (Y/N) as a young girl, her head shaved bald, she was crying, weak and skinny, bruises all over her. The people around her didn't hesitate to take a long needle into the young girl's neck. Shepherd took a moment to look away. Laswell did too by clicking to the next video. "And this is her after the drug."
The next video showed (Y/N) as the young adult she is today, this time with extraordinarily long hair, and a slim but strong build of muscles running with deep dark veins. She was lifting large weights 160 kg like it was nothing, running and jumping through an obstacle course with a crazy amount of speed and agility, she was firing all sorts of weapons at a shooting range, her shots never missing and only hitting the head or heart. She was filmed brutally murdering soldiers in battle who looked to be Iraqi Defence Force, sweeping and clearing their facilities dramatically and erratically, the girl's eyes were wide with her pupils taking up all of her (E/C) eyes. She was clearly under the influence of something, something that seemed to possess her.
General Shepherd's mouth dropped as he saw her strength and speed, it was hard to see this kind of performance from a man, no less a woman. He began looking to Laswell for an explanation. Laswell got some documents up, which showed dramatic graphs, as well as photos of young children and adults kitted under heavy medical equipment, all of the patients showing those deep purple vein scarring.
"We found these documents on the device..." She took in a long breath before speaking again. "It's roughly translated to be called Adrenagrowth, an experimental chemical that increases the production of adrenaline into the body by such an extreme extent that the experimented subjects can do amazing physical feats such as you have seen." Laswell pinched her chin. "We seem to gather it works by keeping the body in a sympathetic state for long periods and using the nature of Adrenaline to change the chemistry of her cells to be able to do things like this. With the Adrenagrowth, paired with intervals of vigorous special ops training, physical and psychological... torture... They've turned a 10-year-old Orphan into a highly trained killer."
"Are there any more like her?" General Shepherd spoke up, a new interest taking hold of him as his eyes scanned to photos of the young woman.
Laswell sighed, her fingers nervously tapping the table. "Through our research, they have experimented on and trained 301 Orphans, 200 died from the holding conditions, 50 from the torture and Adrenagrowth experimentation, and another 27 failed to adapt to the Adrenagrowth. 13 orphans were considered to be partial successes, but their bodies didn't adapt the adrenagrowth and they were killed off only recently. Only 1 was considered a true success of the experimentations."
"Her... The Medusa." General Shepherd answered for her.
Laswell nodded her head twice, then looked to the screen, seeing that young woman kill over and over again in her strange adrenaline-fueled frenzies, although her body movements were quick and erratic, it was paired with a visible high amount of special forces training alike that of the Marines and SAS.
"We do not know if there are others like her still out there, the drug was still in experimental phases, but that didn't stop them from using it. Considering she is the only successful experiment, she is one very valuable asset for anyone who wants to use her for killing."
General Shepherd's eyes went wide, something "So she's been biologically and... psychologically... manipulated to be a mercenary."
"Indeed. Although her physical manipulation was a success, it seems that in terms of psychologically breaking her... they still had a way to go" Laswell brings up a document, titled (Psychological Progress Report)
"Here it states that they tried to use known torturous brainwashing techniques for the outcome of her to do their bidding... the reports detailed that she was harder to break than most, but ultimately seemed to give in by submission and not necessarily the techniques they implemented. But..." She clicks to another report titled: (Incident Report).
"Three weeks ago, there was an incident. She was stationed at a Konni facility, this is where she was given various missions by Konni including a whole range of terrorist activity against civilians in Russian-occupied territories and covert missions in foreign countries. But she had escaped the facility, fleeing into the Russian wilderness for five days before she was taken in."
"So she's not totally under their spell," Shepherd asks and Laswell reaffirms with a nod. "But they still controlled her enough to get her to do their bidding for them."
General Shepherd leaned back in his seat, swinging in it from side to side a little as his mind ran wild with all the information that was thrust at him. "At this point, I don't know what is more dangerous, the missiles or this... woman."
Laswell folded her laptop up and the screens went black. "Agreed sir, the missiles are our more immediate threat... But the fact that there is this underground knowledge that can contribute to making soldiers of her calibre... is very threatening."
General Shepherd thought for a moment, then looked to Laswell with curiosity "Did she say anything to you?"
Laswell shook her head. "No... she' hasn't recovered and is still under medical supervision. Ghost was able to capture the person guarding her, Dr Trevor Ichvich... He's someone who took part in her experimentation and development. He's helped give up information after a brief interrogation... he's working with a medical team to get her back to a healthy status... since trying to escape the Konni facility she's been starved and put in solitary confinement as punishment."
"He's assisting?"
Laswell hummed. "He wants refuge in exchange for more information, something I'm seriously considering despite how much I despise his existence." The analyst spoke with grit in her voice. She took to Shepherd who had his head low with his eyes scanning around like he was deep in thought
"Do we know why she had tried to escape? Why now after so long?"
Laswell pursed her lips and shook her head. "We can only assume the obvious, we won't know for sure until we talk to her, one thing we can gather from her actions in the medical ward is that she wants us to know about this... she wants us to know what happened to her. She was clearly trying to smuggle information about herself and the facility out to us."
General Shepherd sat back in his seat, brows furrowing together, thinking over something, he then leaned forward over the table looked Laswell square in the eyes, and talked to her with a pointed finger.
"Laswell I need to know if she can tell us anything about these missiles, That's priority number one. She has to know something. And if she doesn't she may at least know where Hassan is." He spoke with absolute assertion in her voice. "I'll need to task a team with getting any information about this BREAKER facility, set our Russian allies to discover as much more as possible. We need to know more about the program and everything about what kind of soldier she is. And then..."
General Shepherd went deep in thought again, finding full confidence and assertion in what he was about to say.
"We need to know more about her, I need to know that even with what she's... been through. If she is going to want to try and return to being a citizen and be a part of a de-conditioning program or is willing to be some kind of cooperative asset or ally in taking down Hassan." He rubbed at his chin and looked down. "I sincerely hope it's the latter, she seems like a weapon like her could be a true asset."
Laswell bit her lip, biting back her true deep thoughts about it all. She was flaring with the idea that General Shepherd dared to say such a thing about the young woman. The young woman whom he had clearly seen had been brutally tortured and experimented on to be manipulated into a soldier at such a young age. The disturbing fact that he had called the girl a 'weapon' and an 'asset' after seeing the completely inhumane treatment of the girl sounded no different from the attitude of the Konni and Quds at the BREAKER facility.
It took a lot of inner strength for Laswell to not slap the General right there at that moment.
Laswell sucked in her anger and nodded deeply. "I understand and share your sentiments, sir." She spoke with her diplomatic tone of voice, the words tasting awful in her mouth. "I'll start interviewing her when she's in a state to talk. Right now she's still under medical observation and is being guarded by Ghost."
Shepherd's head perked up with the revelation. "Ghost?" He asked, he held a smile of disbelief, holding back a chuckle. "You're tasking a 141 with observation of all things?"
Laswell stood up and tucked in her seat, set her laptop into a bag, and slung it over her shoulder "Two reasons general... 1, only another 141 operatives could seem to match up to her if she decided to act out violently all of a sudden... and 2..." Laswell held herself steady, her mind tracing back to Ghost and what he had said to her just after the mission.
"Ghost... insisted he be the one to watch her."