Warren Barnes is trained in a lot of things. He has been taught to lie since he could talk, taught to fight since he could walk, and taught to kill since he could understand what the word meant. There are, however, several things that Hydra doesn't necessarily train its experiments for. For example: charm.

Warren is not charming. Warren has a knack for thievery, troublemaking, and bullying. A knack that seems to drive foster families away. When a new family takes him in, they may believe that they are the special one. That they will be able to use their expert parenting skills to put Warren in his place and make an angel out of him. Those parents do not know Warren well enough yet.

There is not one family that has been able to handle the boy for more than a month. The fastest he has ever gotten sent back was two days. It was intentional in the beginning, but has become less so as time goes on.

See, Warren never intended to end up in the grimy hands of New York State's Office of Children and Family Services, passing him between volunteer parents every other week like a game of hot potato. In fact, his intention was to avoid all governments of all nations. But seven-year-olds don't easily go unnoticed when they are spotted wandering the streets of New York City alone—even trained assassin seven-year-olds. There will always be that lady with the little, expensive handbag and iPhone in her hands, calling up the police as she watches a little boy jump into a dumpster. And when the police find out that the boy has no parents, that boy will go directly into foster care.

If Warren really wanted to and had the energy to, he could slip away from the system with little difficulty. But what he has learned over time is that foster care means food, a bed, and clothes. He may not want to get close to any of the parents he is placed with, but he is very happy to use them for what they have. That's why it's better not to stay in the same house for too long. The parents won't get too attached and won't expect any emotional bonding if Warren makes it clear to them that he hates their guts.

Usually, the trip to a new family goes like this:

1. Warren packs up all of his belongings into a garbage bag and waits on the front steps of the home he's leaving for a social worker to show up.

2. Warren sits in the backseat of his social worker's car as he is driven to the front doorstep of some other home.

3. Warren meets his new family and scopes out the home, taking mental note of anything that may be useful to take as his own.

This trip, however, is very, very different considering the fact that, at his last home, Warren made a very, very big mistake.

The thing about Warren is that he was an experiment. And that means that things were tested on him that gave him an incredibly special ability. The experiments done on him gave him the ability to vanish into thin air. The ability to turn himself invisible.

Three hours ago, Warren was sneaking back into the house after an early morning trip to the grocery store to steal a pack of Mini Muffins. He didn't expect his new foster parents to be up and about at 5:27 AM, but they were. And when Warren made himself visible again in the living room, he didn't expect for his foster parents to be walking into the room. When Warren appeared out of thin air, the woman let out a loud scream and the man instantly pulled out his phone, calling up OCFS.

Now, Warren sits on the front steps of the home he has been living in for the past week or two, and he contemplates his options. He could run away. If he did, though, he would have to go back to stealing breakfast, lunch, and dinner along with clothes and other basic necessities. Like a street dog. He wouldn't be able to shower anymore and he would have to use gas station toilets. That sounds suboptimal.

On the other hand, though, if he doesn't run away, he has no idea what is going to happen to him. Maybe the social worker will just think this family is crazy for thinking they saw what they saw and Warren will be sent to a new family, just like normal. But maybe the social worker believes the parents. Maybe Warren is about to be locked in a cell, or maybe tested on even more. He hates tests. All kinds of them. Whether he has to answer questions or have a needle poked into his arm, he hates them.

The choice is hard. Because he knows what it's like to be on his own in the world. He did it for a little while before OCFS got a hold of him. He knows how awful it is. But he doesn't know at all what is going to happen when he is taken away from this house. It could be the worst of the worst, or it could be the best of the best.

Sometimes in life, you have to take chances. That is what Warren did when he escaped Hydra. He took that chance and he survived. Maybe he'll survive this chance, too. If the people who are coming to take him are bad people, then he will just take another chance and run away again. It is not very hard. At least he doesn't think it will be. It wasn't very hard to escape HYDRA. The hard part was figuring out that he needed to escape in the first place.

So, Warren waits. He stays sitting on those steps and he tries his hardest not to pay any attention to the feeling of his now ex-foster-parents staring at the back of his head from the window.

It takes about twenty-five minutes for his social worker to show up. And when she does, she is not alone. Two other cars are with her. One has some sort of agent inside—a woman with brown hair and a look of authority—and the other has what looks to be soldiers inside. Warren pretends he isn't at least slightly intimidated by that.

Luckily, the soldiers stay inside the car for now. Except for one, who gets out of the backseat and leans against the side of the SUV. The woman with the brown hair gets out of her car, too, and she approaches behind Warren's social worker, who is walking toward Warren on the front steps.

"Hello, Alexander," the social worker—Miss Alice—says in her normal, very soft voice.

"Hi, Miss Alice," Warren replies, looking at the woman's shoes.

"I heard something happened." Miss Alice gives a frown, but not the kind of frown that's supposed to make you feel bad about yourself. It's the type of frown that is supposed to mean that she feels bad for Warren and she is worried about him. "Do you want to tell me what happened?" she asks, although she already knows very well what happened.

Warren shrugs. "Don't know. Who's she?" he asks, pointing to the brown-haired woman behind Miss Alice.

"This is my friend Maria. She's come to help me find out what is best for you today," Miss Alice explains. Maria gives a small wave and a quick smile, although none of it erases the she means business look she has about her. "To figure out what's best for you, Alexander, we have to know what happened. Can you tell us that?" Miss Alice asks, now crouching down in front of Warren to match his eyeline.

"I don't know," Warren says again.

He knows very well what happened, but he has no problem whatsoever with lying. Hell, the woman still thinks his name is Alexander.

Warren can't decide what he wants to do. Whether he is about to bolt and hopefully never be seen again or if he's about to tell these women the truth about himself is a mystery to everyone. His eyes dart around between the people. From the soldier, to Maria, to Miss Alice again.

"I can promise you one thing, sweetheart." Miss Alice reaches out and takes Warren's hand in her own, giving it a comforting squeeze. "No one is gonna hurt you. No matter what, we're here to keep you safe. Alright?"

With that information, Warren can finally make his decision.

"Well, I turned myself invisible and they saw."

✮

Warren is not exactly sure where he is going. Miss Alice has been driving for a good long while now, and the brown-haired woman, Maria, is sitting in the passenger seat. Warren keeps catching her staring at him through the rearview mirror. Like he is being monitored just to make sure he doesn't do something rash.

He won't, of course, because he needs the resources they will provide him with, though the idea of doing something just to get a reaction out of Maria tempts him.

Anyway, the drives to new foster families do not typically take as long as this drive is taking. Warren feels like he has been in the car for years and his legs are in desperate need of a stretch break. He doesn't usually like to talk very much on these car rides, especially not with Maria intruding, but Warren is dying to know just how much longer this car ride is going to take.

Hesitantly, he sits up a little straighter and asks, "How much further?"

"We're about halfway there, sweetheart," Miss Alice answers. Her fingers are drumming along the steering wheel like she's a little bit nervous. Warren wonders if she is scared of him or for him. "We're going somewhere new this time," she says, like that puts a positive spin on the situation.

Letting out a little bit of a huff, Warren leans against the window and tries to pretend that he is somewhere else.

"Is it really necessary to drive all the way to DC? Couldn't they just come visit him out here?" Miss Alice asks Maria very quietly. Warren hears it, though, because he has very good hearing and is an expert at spying on people.

"They want him at the facility," Maria says. It makes Warren's stomach twist a little bit. Facility. He doesn't like the word. "Preferably, we would have taken a quicker vehicle, but I couldn't get a jet on such short notice. So, road trip it is."

Riding on a jet would be way cooler and take way less time. Warren wishes they were in the sky instead. The car ride does give him extra time to think, though. It gives him an opportunity to consider all of the things Maria says quietly to Miss Alice and decide whether or not he is going to tell the truth when he gets to this facility they're taking him to. He is leaning towards lying at the moment, but he guesses his final decision will be made when he is right there at the facility.

✮

In the dimming evening sunlight, Warren is finally let out of the backseat of that stupid car. It was starting to feel like another cell and Warren wasn't sure how much longer he could take it.

Miss Alice takes Warren's hand in hers, giving him a reassuring squeeze. "Are you ready?" she asks, giving a soft smile.

"For what?" Warren mutters.

Really, they haven't told him much of anything about what's going on. That's why he still has yet to make his decision, even standing here in front of the building. He doesn't know what is going to happen when he goes inside, so he doesn't know if it's going to be better than what will happen if he doesn't go inside. And he has no idea the repercussions of telling the truth versus lying. He has no idea whatsoever whether or not to get the hell out of here.

Either way, Warren isn't exactly experienced in making his own decisions. The first time he made one wasn't that long ago—the day he decided to escape. He's been making some decisions ever since then, but for the first seven years of his life, he never made a single one. Turns out, it's harder than it looks.

"We're gonna meet some new people and they're gonna ask you a few questions," Miss Alice tells the boy. He stares warily at the big front doors to the building. "Don't worry, sweetheart. I'll stay with you every step of the way."

And even though Warren isn't sure whether he particularly likes Miss Alice, he's comforted by that thought. The thought that, no matter what happens inside, she'll be there next to him. She's been there for him for months now, in and out of homes, and she hasn't been cruel to him even once. It's strange, really. Warren originally thought that she would be just the same as the other grownups he'd met in his life. Life is a lot different outside of a cage.

"This way," Maria says as she steps around the car. When she starts walking up to the big front doors, Miss Alice and Warren follow behind her.

Unsurprisingly, the inside of the facility is a lot scarier than the outside. Outside, it looks pretty much like any other large building. Big windows, modern architecture. On the inside, though, there is a massive amount of security. Like, so much security. Maria scans some sort of badge and nods at some of the guards, either saying hello or confirming that Miss Alice and Warren can be let inside.

After getting in through the first doors, Warren has to walk through a weapons detector, and luckily, he has nothing on him. In his bag, which is still in the car, he has an old pocket knife he found outside some bar a few weeks ago. Other than that, though, all his weapons are still with HYDRA. That's lucky. Warren isn't sure what they would do to him if he did happen to have a weapon on him. This is his first time being in a place like this without being dragged around like a disobedient puppy on a leash.

It's very strange in here. A lot different from HYDRA. In the lobby, there's even a big statue of an eagle-like symbol. Warren knows that symbol. HYDRA hated that symbol. Warren's not sure how he feels about it. He still doesn't know if HYDRA is right or wrong. He only knows that he hated being there.

Soon after getting through a whole bunch of security measures that Warren thinks are pretty unnecessary, Maria leads him and Miss Alice into an elevator and they go up to a higher floor. On that higher floor, they go through a hallway all the way until they enter a large room with a bunch of chairs and a fancy desk by the window. It's an office, obviously, but in Warren's opinion, the room is about seven times larger than necessary for being an office.

Anyway, sitting at that desk by the windows, there is a man. Warren has seen this man before. Only in pictures, though. He's in charge of SHIELD, Warren is pretty sure. He has an eyepatch over his left eye and wears only black. He's got a serious look to him. Warren makes sure to glare, just in case HYDRA is right about hating this guy.

"Fury," Maria says as she walks over to his desk.

"Agent Hill," Fury responds, giving a nod as a greeting. He then turns to look at Warren, who is standing just a little bit behind Miss Alice. "Is this our Invisible Boy?"

"Sure is," Maria says. She pulls out a chair for Warren and a chair for Miss Alice. "Wanna have a seat?"

Miss Alice smiles and ushers Warren over to the chairs, where they both sit down. "I'm Alice and I work for the Office of Children and Family Services in New York. This is Alexander," she introduces without letting her smile slip.

Fury seems amused by her words. "Alexander, huh?" he asks with a smug look on his face.

When Warren doesn't reply, Miss Alice whispers for him to say yes, sir, and so he does. "Yes, sir."

"Hmm. Well, alright, Alexander. You wanna tell me how you managed to turn yourself invisible in your living room this morning?" Fury asks, cocking his head slightly to the side.

Warren shrugs. "Just did."

"Were you able to do that since you were born?" Miss Alice asks, hoping that she'll be able to make the question more clear for Warren. Warren knows what Fury means, though. He just isn't sure if he wants to answer the question.

"I don't remember being born," Warren tells them all.

Fury lets out a scoff-like laugh. "I'd hope not," he jokes. Warren does not laugh at his joke because he is much too anxious to. "Where are you from, Alex?" Fury asks next, putting suspicious emphasis on the boy's name.

"New York."

"Where in New York?"

Warren shrugs again. "New York."

"And your parents?"

"Don't know."

Maria lets out a huff. "This isn't getting us anywhere. I say we test him and-"

Warren instantly tenses up, his eyes growing wide without his control. "I don't want any tests," he tells them urgently.

If there is one thing that Warren knows for sure, it is that tests involve needles and cages, and he hates both of those things. He was already in that backseat for hours. He doesn't need to sit alone in an empty room, too. He wants to go to a new family and sleep in a bed. He doesn't want to sit alone in a cage. He really, really doesn't want to. Maybe he should have just run when he had the chance.

Miss Alice's eyebrows pinch together with concern. "It'll be just like a doctor's trip, sweetheart. They'll just take a little blood just to make sure you're not sick or in danger." She isn't positive that that's what the blood samples are for, but she is positive he's going to have to let them take them whether he wants to or not. Maria warned her about this. They need to test his blood at the very least. "Don't you want to be healthy, Alexander?"

"No. I don't," Warren spits. His hands are starting to grip the arms on his chair, and the grip gets tighter when Furt speaks again.

"What's your last name, Alexander?" Fury asks. When Warren doesn't answer, Fury leans forward on the desk, resting his weight on his elbows. Miss Alice opens her mouth to answer, but Fury shushes her and turns back to Warren. "My name's Nicholas. Nick for short. Last name is Fury. What's yours?"

The truth is, Warren never really came up with a last name for himself. He must have told Miss Alice one back when he met her, but he has absolutely no recollection of what that name could have possibly been. He chose the name Alexander because of a book he found in the library. It was called Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day and when Warren got taken by OCFS, he was having a pretty terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day. So the name Alexander seemed quite fitting. This day is shaping up to be a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day, too.

Now, Warren's heart beats quickly in his chest. He dares to glance up from his shoes, meeting Nick Fury's intense stare. He opens his mouth to speak, but like his lungs have stopped working, he can't manage to say a thing. Nothing at all comes out of his mouth.

"Is Alexander the name HYDRA gave you, or did you choose that one yourself?" Fury tests.

When Warren visibly tenses at the word HYDRA, Fury knows his suspicions are correct.

"Huh. Alexander doesn't know his own name."