verb.
To fall back under pressure. To shrink back physically or emotionally.
noun.
The kickback of a gun upon firing.
•
It takes a stubborn mind to cling to their humanity when the world seeks to strip it away.
It takes a desperate soul to reach f...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
"Beginning descent, time to gear up."
Kat glanced up at Steve's instruction from the cockpit, pausing in her quiet checks over the equipment they would need.
The last few hours in the Quinjet had been spent solidifying their plan, outlining all of the potential risks and eventualities they might face once they reached the Siberian base. The fear and doubt she and Bucky had combed through was filed away, in favour of focusing on the mission.
She knew the access codes for the external doors – provided they faced no resistance on the outside of the building, she could get them through those easily enough. From that point, they would branch off. Steve and Bucky would descend to Sub-level 9. The heart of the Winter Soldier programme. Katrina would head down to the transportation level she had attempted to escape from so many years ago, and move to the records store where she remembered filing away the details of the 1991 serum trials – if any command triggers existed for the five soldiers, they would be either there or in the Red Book.
If she couldn't find what they were searching for, she would regroup with them, and form a united front against whatever they might find when they moved down into the lower level of the missile silo.
Of course, at any stage in this plan, they could meet with trouble. The soldiers could already be loose, or the doctor could be waiting for them. He could attempt to trigger Bucky again, but they had taken measures to combat that. As Steve had handed out a fresh set of coms, he had shown how a swift twist of the earpiece would send feedback squealing through the system. If any of them heard even an utterance of 'Zhelaniye', they would be able to drown it out long enough to get Bucky somewhere secure.
And if that didn't work, they just had to hope Kat would be able to tame the Soldier before he turned on them.
The best-case scenario they could hope for, was that they had been fast enough. That they would get there before the doctor released the soldiers from stasis. In that scenario, Kat could shut the chambers down, and completely remove that threat from the equation.
The next preference was that they caught the five assassins recovering from their cryostasis, weakened, disorientated, vulnerable.
The most likely outcome was that they would be active, under the control of the doctor and ready to fight. At best, they would be unarmed, but Kat and Bucky both knew how lethal they were in hand-to-hand combat.
Honestly, none of those options were particularly appealing, but they had to be ready for anything.
"Remember, if the chambers are still intact when you get down there, don't touch anything until I'm with you." Kat reminded them as she once again checked on her earpiece, before zipping the neck of her leather jacket up to its highest point; "Any damage to the system could activate the safety protocols, and the last thing we need is one of those guys being released unnecessarily."
