Michelle's world dissolved before her eyes.

Her day had gone well. She'd woken up this morning, mourning Peter but her chest felt just that little bit lighter. Regret still consumed her mind, but she hadn't felt like crawling under a rock and dying today. Which, was a start.

School had been okay. Less people were bullying Ned, because of Peter, but more and more people were staring at them. Michelle didn't want their pity, but she got it anyway. Ned and her had sat in silence during lunch. She 'read her book', but she was really just staring at the same word on her page.

Raft.

She didn't know why, and frankly, she didn't want to.

It took her a while longer than usual to get home from school. The carparks were full of parents driving their kids home. Usually, about seventy-five percent of the school would catch the bus or the train home. But ever since that creepy-ass hitman guy started terrorizing New York, parents wanted to keep there kids in sight at all times.

But, she'd got home.

The door was locked.

Which wasn't normal.

But she'd used her spare keys, and hopped inside. First thing she'd noticed was the kitchen.

Three different pans were strewn across the benches, unnaturally, the blinds were bent at awkward angles. The glass from the furthest window to her was smashed clean out, shards lying across the bar-bench below it in the hundreds.

Her heart did painful flips in her chest when she saw the faint tinge of blood on three of the larger shards of shattered glass. The kettle was upturned, and the microwave was dinging as it waited for someone to collect the food that had been warming up inside of it. The water was still running in the kitchen sink and was now bubbling over the rim and pooling on the floor below.

But there was a red tinge mixing in with the puddle of water.

Michelle had done lots of science experiments with different velocities and heat of liquids. She'd watched as the hotter, thicker substance was squeezed into the water. It would swirl out, like vines growing up a wall, the edges blurring and the water becoming ever-so-slightly discoloured. Then, because of the heat, the substance would rise to the top and sit there, like a lid to the water.

That was exactly what was happening to that puddle.

It was blood that was spreading into the overflow. Thick and hot.

Fresh.

And then her breath had been knocked from her lungs.

Because there, on the floor, was her mom.

Dead.

Dead dead dead dead—

Not alive.

Not thinking, not feeling, not breathing.

And suddenly, Michelle couldn't breathe either.

She tried to pull in a breath, but her lungs rattled.

Her heart shuttered. Her brain froze.

Because her mom didn't just die.

That didn't just happen.

Surely.

Surely.

She was on her knees, but she couldn't remember doing it. She was reaching out to her mom, but she couldn't feel her arms. She was sobbing, but she couldn't hear her own cries.

The world was gone. Everyone was dead and gone, and she was the only one left. The only one left moving and living, because everyone else had surely stopped to scream for her mother.

Michelle watched, disassociated from her own body, as she held her hands to the puncture in her mother's belly.

There was no point, though.

She was already dead.

They both were.

There was no life in her mom's body, anymore.

There was no life in the body that gave Michelle life. She was gone.

The knees of her pants were being soaked through, as she knelt in the water and blood spreading like wildfire across her kitchen floor.

There was blood on her hands.

Her mom was dead, and her mom was bleeding.

Blood on her hands. Interpretation could go both ways.

Her mom's eyes were closed, face peaceful.

And Michelle would never see those eyes again.

Her mom, who looked so much like Michelle herself. Her mother, who raised Michelle single-handedly, after her dad had taken Katie and left.

The one person Michelle had come to love with her whole being, not afraid of the consequences.

Nothing was more important than her mom, to Michelle.

Not school, not friends, not even Peter.

Her mom had been with her every step of the way, and she'd often taken in for granted. And now?

Now?

Now what?

What do I do?

What does sh—

A noise.

A noise she actually heard. Michelle spun from her position on the floor, head flying to the direction of the noise.

Heart thumping. Alive again, but broken into a million pieces.

Her eyes locked onto her worst fear.

And everything she'd lost slammed back into her, as adrenaline crashed through her body and fear numbed all other thoughts but—

Run.

It was the terrorist.

Dressed in black, looking like death himself. Black powder underneath dark eyes, black mask covering his nose and mouth, black straps across his chest, connecting to a black holster with a black rifle. In his black-gloved hand was a black-hilted knife with a silver blade.

The only colour was the deep red blood on the machete, and brown, curly hair.

It felt wrong, strange, unfair that whoever was behind all of these ruthless and heartless murders had an identity. That this monster had brown, curly hair. Every part of this murderer should be black, including his hair and his eyes and his skin and his heart.

Whoever this was? They didn't deserve colour.

Her mom, Peter, probably Ned; they deserved colour.

Not this...this mutant.

Not this murderous, monstrous, maniacal, malevolent man.

But those thoughts ran through Michelle's mind in mere seconds, because she was leaping to her feet with a yelp of fear.

She scrabbled blindly at the kitchen bench, until her hand found the handle of one of the frying pans that had been forgotten.

Probably what her mom had used to try and protect herself against this mutant. And she would die.

She would die, but she would see her mom again.

And Peter. And her aunt and uncle and cousin and—

Oh, God.

Oh God, help me please.

She held the pan out in front of her, pointing the rim at the terrorist.

Who just stared at her.

Stared and stared and stared and stared.

Mocked.

"What?" Michelle yelled, a numbing fury rising higher than the wave of adrenaline she was riding.

Her face burnt. "You think this is funny? You think this is good?!"

He stared. Just stared. Face blank, eyes blank, posture stiff.

"You're a monster! A monster! You don't deserve to be alive," she continued to curse, gesturing to the (dead dead dead dead—) body of her mom with the pan.

She didn't care if she lived or died.

She just wanted this terrorist to feel terror. To feel pain. And emotionally, because that was how you destroyed people.

She was destroyed, so she would destroy the one who destroyed her.

"Say something." She demanded, taking a step closer to the terrorist.

He remained still. Dead still. Standing mere metres away from her.

"Say something!" Michelle screeched again, hurling the pan straight at the murderer.

He dodged in with ease, only sparing a glace as the metal object flew past his ear. It crashed into the coffee table in the lounge room, shattering the glass.

She reached for another pan. Got ready to throw it.

"Say something, you coward!"

Silence followed.

And she threw it, aim off by half a metre and face ugly from tears.

"Please," she croaked, voice suddenly very quiet. She was pleading with a terrorist. A mindless monster. Asking him for an explanation. Why he would do this. Why he would kill people – kill her mom. "Why?"

False innocence blinked back at her, in the shape of the dark brown eyes of the mutant that was anything but.

Unbefitting innocence, that was horribly, horribly familiar.

And there was a sound coming from the murderer now.

Quiet, barely audible, not even words. Just a soft hum.

Just a hushed, "Mmm...".

Then his whole body jolted, pupils dilating visibly. It was just one jolt, but the stiff posture went back to graceful and eyes turned back to murderous.

Michelle watched with intense confusion at the sight.

There was something else going on.

Something more to this.

But then he was advancing on her, and fear leapt into her throat. She held out the pan, eyes wide with terror.

His knife was held shoulder-height, and the monster was walking with a clear purpose in sight. An obvious aim to his actions.

He was centimetres away. Michelle readied herself.

Ready. Ready to fight and ready to die.

But he walked right past her, eyes locked on the smashed window. Before Michelle could even process which emotion was relief and which was longing, he was clambering with the grace of an eagle – or maybe a snake – through the window.

And Michelle got a clear view of his leather-cladded legs. His calf had glass protruding from it, blood pouring in torrents from the deep wound. She knew where the blood on the glass had come from, now.

She didn't feel pity. Because she also knew where the blood on the floor came from.

But that wasn't what sent her into a frenzy.

No, it was the symbol on the side of his left thigh.

A skull with eight tentacles: HYDRA.

But he was gone in moments, running back to his master. Going to kill someone else. Who knew?

And Michelle was scrambling for her phone with trembling fingers and tears dripping from her nose.

And the first person she called was the last person left that she could trust. Her last friend. Her last ally in this new war.

"Ned?" She whispered.

...

Weapon X had felt something inside of his chest. An unnatural, painful clenching, like his lungs were seizing up.

It didn't feel good.

He didn't feel good at all.

But when he'd seen that girl...he'd felt it.

M.

That one letter had come into his mind at the sight of the girl. He didn't know why. He didn't care why. But one thing he knew, of all the things he didn't; there was something going on.

Something more to this.

So, he didn't tell anyone about what he'd 'remembered'. He didn't tell his Commander, because he never wanted to have to face The Chair again.

When he got back to the Compound, he'd gone to his cell, where he know hung from the wall.

This was his life now—

No. No, this was always his life. Kill or be killed.

But eventually, the Commander came to him.

"Successful morning, mаленький паук?" He asked routinely.

Weapon X nodded.

"Rather." Commander said scrutinisingly, his grey eyes scanning Weapon X's body suspiciously. "You have training soon, boy, and I expect you not to be late. Or you shall be punished."

Weapon X nodded again, holding out his wounded leg for inspection.

"Oh, and what is this?" Commander asked, eyebrows raised. "Did you get hurt?"

There was something in the way he said that that made the boy's stomach niggle. Another emotion he hated. Another feeling that didn't feel good.

He looked pointedly at the puncture wound in his calf, holding out his leg further. Then he moved his eyes to look at his Commander pleadingly, hoping he'd gave Weapon X a bandage.

"You'll live." Commander said harshly, and Weapon X looked at the floor. "Get up. Get ready. We won't wait."

And again...that squeezing feeling his chest. He didn't like it, he didn't want it. He didn't want to feel emotion.

M M M M—

The chains around his wrists and ankles fell away, and he got up to his feet. He wasn't supposed to feel the pain in his calf, but he felt the pain in his calf.

He wasn't supposed to feel. Not that burning in his chest, not the pain in his leg, not the confusion whenever he sees his Commander. He shouldn't be feeling it, and it's overwhelming him. Consuming him.

It made everything seem real.

Too real.

He wanted it gone. But he searched for it when his mind was left to its own devices. Searching and searching and searching for something he wasn't even sure existed.

He was a soldier. A weapon. And he liked it that way.

He didn't feel.

He limped to the Arena. Killed three of his training opponents and sliced open the artery in the thigh of one of them. He knew he would be punished for his weakness.

He knew he would be punished with The Chair.

(Tortured—?)

But he suddenly found himself wishing to lose everything again.

Like a drug. Take away the pain and emotion of the real world. He wanted to be disassociated from what's real. The Chair did that. Like a drug.

(Tortured, by a beast—)

"Get it out." Weapon X croaked when his Commander came to meet him in the Arena.

"What is it, mаленький паук?"

(By a bird—)

"Out. Get it out!" He repeated, clawing at his chest.

His Commander turned to instruct the Agents around him and Weapon X felt strong hands gripping him by the armpits.

"Out out out out—" Weapon X said it again and again, like a mantra.

He didn't want it anymore.

(A Vulture—)

And they dragged him away. Back to The Chair.

Back to his nothing.

...

oof, that was angsty. it gets better (??) i think.

now, as you process his really depressing chapter, check out this insanely awesome fan art by 8lydia14m99. I absolutely love it; like, I can't even begin to describe how excited this has made me. go chuck her a follow, and definitely check out her other artworks, that are on her wattpad! just show her some love, because she deserves it. 

lastly, please let me know what you think of my GOTG fic. I don't know if I should continue, cos if y'all ain't digging it, then I don't really have that much enthusiasm.

anyways, bye for now :)

LuvForStydia xx

(still freaking out about that art kslkadjlaksa--)