บท 4: Chapter 4
March 22nd, 1992
From: Wyvern Project Leader
To: Director
Wyvern Project: Progress Report
Cognitive recalibration of the Wyvern has gone very well. Relying on findings of previous projects, such as Zola's work on the Winter Soldier, Chief Scientist Sanders' team has had great success with mental reconditioning and the memory suppression machine. Identity destruction, repetition tactics and continuous cycles with the machine have ensured that obedience trigger words are buried deeply in the Wyvern's psyche.
Final stages of reconditioning included presenting the subject with two "innocent" targets, providing the subject with a weapon and telling it to kill one of the targets. Subject initially questioned the order. This resulted in elimination of both targets, and 95 milliamps of electrical current were run through the subject's body. The subject was then wiped. This stage of reconditioning was repeated, with new targets each time, until the subject consistently obeyed orders in conjunction with the trigger words, with no questioning or distress.
Sanders and her team have asked me to particularly highlight this stage, as it seems to have had the best results in cognitively recalibrating the subject, and may prove useful in later projects.
Cognitive recalibration of the Wyvern has been deemed complete, and we will be moving on to training and enhancements. As predicted, the resource enhanced the subject's strength, speed, endurance and healing exponentially, and continues to interact with the subject's natural biological growth. We have already begun initial combat and weapons training with the base's current operatives, but I formally request further specialists to be posted on a nonpermanent basis, to ensure a rounded instruction in combat, intelligence, behavioural and technology skills.
Hail HYDRA.
March 23rd, 1992
From: Director
To: Wyvern Project Leader
Re: Wyvern Project: Progress Report
I am pleased to hear about the ongoing success of the Project. I was right to put my faith in you and your confidence in the Project.
I do, however, remain sceptical about the ability of such a young subject to learn and retain advanced skills. I will grant your request for HYDRA operatives with certain specialisations to be posted to your base, but will start with only one or two. The posting of further operatives will depend on initial reports.
Hail HYDRA.
March, 1992 (5 Years Old)
HYDRA Facility, Québec
The Wyvern had been wiped enough by now to know what had just happened to her. Chest heaving, arms pulling futilely at the machine's restraints, she closed her eyes as the bald scientist recited the words:
"Verre, transmission, affamé, sept, vieux, sécurité, trois, tunnel, digne, quatre-vingts." ["Glass, transmission, starving, seven, old, safety, three, tunnel, worthy, eighty."]
At the last word, the Wyvern opened her eyes.
"Wyvern," greeted the bald scientist.
"Ready to comply." Her voice was still high and young, but her tone was impassive.
The scientist smiled: a hard, sharp thing. "Report to the training room."
Once she was released from the restraints, the Wyvern got to her feet and walked from the lab, her steps even and her eyes blank. The Wyvern felt confused, as she always did after being in the chair, but she had her orders.
She still drew stares from the soldiers in the base when she walked, alone, through its fluorescently-lit corridors. The Wyvern suspected it was because of her small stature, or her even gait and fixed gaze. Her initial training had taught her how to hold herself: she was a weapon, and weapons did not blink, or cower, or feel. Anything she felt was discarded. The only things that mattered were the words, and her mission.
The Wyvern typed in the passcode to the training room – she did not know when she had learned it, only that she did know it – and walked in. The Project Leader stood on the thin mat in the centre of the room, speaking with two large, muscled men and a wiry-looking woman.
"Ah, here she is," said the Project Leader. His black suit was neatly pressed, and his hands were folded in front of him. "Approach, Wyvern."
She obeyed and saw the strangers' eyes widen. She knew what they saw: a blank-faced young girl who stood a third of their size, wearing simple grey training clothes.
"You want us to train… her?" said one of the men, who wore a green military uniform and a slouch hat. His accent was British.
"You've been briefed on the project," the Project Leader said, eyes sharp. "This is the project. Teach her everything you know."
The Wyvern kept her hands by her sides and watched them silently.
The second man looked equally sceptical. He was wearing sweatpants and a skin-tight underarmour shirt in place of a uniform. "I don't know about you two, but I prepared a training regime that requires certain physical attributes…" His accent was similar to the Project Leader's; distinctly Slavic.
As if he had been waiting for that, the Project Leader smiled. "Wyvern, subdue Agent Kuznetsov."
The Wyvern had been trained to use her intelligence, so she deduced that the man with the Slavic accent was Agent Kuznetsov. Soundlessly, she sprang from the floor and drove her whole mass into the centre of his chest. He slammed to the ground on his back, letting out a grunt of surprise, and the Wyvern slithered off him to seize his arm and try to force it under his back. She'd been taught that move… sometime. By someone. But the agent was clearly a well-trained man. He got over his shock and leaned into the move, flipping to his knees and positioning himself behind her. He grabbed both her wrists and tried to pull them behind her back, but the Wyvern strained against him, using her strength to resist the hold. She heard the man in the uniform and the woman gasp. The Wyvern turned on her opponent and landed a punch to the centre of his chest, knocking him back onto the mat. She didn't use all her strength, as she knew – somehow – that such a punch would break his ribs.
"That's enough," the Project Leader said. Instantly, the Wyvern got to her feet and stood at parade rest, eyes blank.
The agent got to his feet, a hand pressed to his sternum. Pain and shock flickered across his face.
"As you can see," the Project Leader said, levelling each of his guests with a long look, "she has strength and speed, but requires the training to back it up. Understood?"
He got three silent nods.
"Wonderful. Agent Kuznetsov, perhaps you'd like to begin?"
Kuznetsov was a former KGB agent. Once he got over the age and size of his trainee, he put the Wyvern through a brutal physical fitness regime that taught her the limits of her strength and how to use it. He and the woman, a Mossad operative in deep cover for HYDRA, trained her in intelligence and espionage.
They showed her how to analyse data and crack codes, and found that she took to it remarkably well – it seemed they only had to suggest the principle of something before she had mastered it. They had her follow certain soldiers or scientists around the base without being noticed. The woman convinced the Project Leader to take the Wyvern outside of the base for the first time, to test her covert surveillance skills in the forest. They taught her to lie. They built up her hand-to-hand combat skills, finding that the Wyvern fought like a small, speedy fighter and like a heavy-hitter. They didn't have to build up her physical strength, so they were teaching her how to use it.
Her enhanced body took to the training well, and whatever her body couldn't handle, her mind surely could. The third stranger was a Sergeant Major in the SAS, who surveilled a great deal of the British Armed Forces for HYDRA. He was a weapons specialist, and introduced the Wyvern to entire catalogues of guns, knives and explosives. He found that she was already familiar with the names and mechanics of many weapons, though she did not know how to use them. He set about remedying that, as well as teaching her about chemical and biological warfare methods that he hadn't learned from the SAS.
These teachers stayed with her for months. They soon realised that though her dark eyes were blank, she heard – and processed – every word they told her. She was by no means a photographic learner, as she had to repeat moves and techniques a few times before she got it, but she was still much faster than any of them had expected. She used her strength to devastating effect, and her mind even more so.
Not even Sanders and her team were sure if it was the serum or the subject's mind that allowed her to progress so quickly.
Of course, sometimes the Wyvern's teachers witnessed cracks in her façade. Once or twice, after long training sessions or a seemingly random comment, her blankness fell away and she started crying and cringed away from her teacher. They knew to alert one of the scientists when this happened, and the Wyvern would be taken away for reconditioning.
Sometimes the Wyvern was unavailable for training. The Project Leader would give no explanations, but when she returned she had wounds along her back and shoulders. Her teachers did not make their training any gentler, and were impressed that though the Wyvern appeared to feel her bruises and cuts, she did not cry out. The Mossad agent incorporated this skill into her training on resisting torture.
The time came for the three HYDRA operatives to leave. They had covers to hold up, though they all wanted to witness the ongoing improvement of the Wyvern. They had seen the Project Leader's vision, and knew that if the project was successful, it would be one of HYDRA's most formidable weapons.
The Project Leader saw them off with a single nod of the head, not taking his eyes off them until their helicopter vanished into the horizon.
"Well, Wyvern," he said, once he'd returned to the shooting range to find her hurling knives into a foam target. Her aim was one of her weak areas: it couldn't be fixed through sheer force or through intellect. That being said, every one of these knives had hit the target. The Project Leader folded his hands in front of him as he watched the small Wyvern wait for him to speak. "We'll soon see if you've earned yourself the right to more teachers."
"Yes, sir."
July 2nd, 1992
From: Director
To: Wyvern Project Leader
You'll have the resources you need.
Hail Hydra.
For the next three years the Wyvern was trained by an ongoing cycle of HYDRA's greatest minds and soldiers. The Québec base's proximity to the US made it a strategic position for other HYDRA projects and missions, so the Wyvern was often not the only reason an operative would be posted there.
The Wyvern received combat, intelligence, espionage and weapons training from operatives the world over. She benefited from the knowledge of the KGB, Mossad, CIA, MI6, the SAS, the Israeli Sayerat Matkal, the National Gendarmerie Intervention Group, Pakistan's SSG, and many more. HYDRA had operatives in most major organisations around the world, so the Project Leader had his pick of the bunch.
The Wyvern was especially good at programming, hacking, engineering, and other technological training. It was this proclivity that gave Chief Scientist Sanders the idea that the Wyvern's mind might hold the clue to achieving a long-unrealised dream of the Wyvern Project.
July, 1992 (6 Years Old)
HYDRA Facility, Québec
"Marino, I am starting to question your ongoing usefulness."
"Sir, you brought me here for my kn-knowledge of the Adamantium formula, and I have consistently delivered."
"If you call accidentally deforming and terminating the previous subjects 'delivering,'" the Project Leader said in an icy voice.
Marino, a weedy scientist with enormous glasses, cringed. "What you're asking for… it may be possible, but I'm not sure I have the resources to-"
"Resources?" the Project Leader didn't raise his voice, but Marino shrank all the same. "This project is one of the most favoured heads of HYDRA. What resources have I not given you?"
Marino shifted in his chair. The other scientists were studiously ignoring his plight.
"I require assistance – someone to help me run simulations, someone who can help me to program the molecular arrangement."
The Project Leader folded his hands together, a sure sign that he was restraining his temper. "Marino. The Wyvern Project is not going to be a cheap imitation of the Winter Soldier Project. We need this subject to be better, not just in mind and training, but in her enhancements-"
Sanders, who had until now been reviewing her notes on the subject's cognitive recalibration, looked up. "Use the Wyvern," she interrupted, not flinching when the Project Leader turned his gaze on her. He respected that about her.
"I beg your pardon?"
"The Wyvern, sir. She's shown an aptitude for science. She could help Marino."
The Project Leader stepped back from Marino, who sank into his chair in relief. "Are you certain, Sanders? She is still very young."
"Her advanced intelligence was clear in the surveillance, and in her ongoing testing. Baghavi taught her to make sarin gas in a matter of days. She improved on his formula."
"Would having a hand in the design cause her to resist?"
Sanders' cheek twitched, a tell that the Project Leader knew to mean she was irritated with him. "No, sir. The trigger words are now fully integrated, so we can ensure obedience at all times. And we can wipe her before the procedure, just in case."
The Project Leader leaned against the wall, running a hand over his jaw. Marino tried to make himself small behind his computer.
Eventually, the Project Leader pursed his lips and nodded to Sanders. "You're right. The Wyvern's mind is a source of great potential. Such a mind should surely have a role in creating the greatest weapon of our time."
September, 1992 (6 Years Old)
HYDRA Facility, Québec
The Wyvern knew the feel of the sedative. It immobilised her limbs, clouded her mind; a familiar weight. Of course, she couldn't recall ever having been sedated before, but it was familiar all the same. As were the metal restraints around her limbs.
Her orders were to lie still and don't make a sound. Easy enough to follow, especially with the sedative and the restraints. She was lying on her front, her face poked through a hole in the metal table. Before she'd got on the table, she'd seen beakers and tubes filled with a molten, silvery-grey metal on the laboratory desk. The metal had set off a tingle of recognition, but she had her orders to follow.
Lying on the table, she could hear the scientific equipment bubbling and beeping and whirring. Outside the room, her enhanced hearing picked up a conversation between the Project Leader, Sanders, and a scientist whose voice sounded familiar, but she couldn't place.
"-truly remarkable," the voice was saying. "I'd been close to achieving this particular molecular rearrangement, but to integrate it with the existing serum in the blood-"
"Yes, Marino, we've heard," said Sanders. "Now hurry up, we'll already be burning through our stock of sedatives to keep the subject still as it is. Are you ready for the procedure?"
"Yes, ma'am."
They entered the room and went through preparations. The Wyvern's bare back was sprayed with cold antiseptic, and she heard the snap of latex gloves. She remembered this – not specifically, but she knew this had happened before. There was no bubbling metal before, though. She felt a warm, latex covered hand press against the back of her head.
"Commencing procedure." Marino's voice was shaky, and his thumb swiped back and forth across her scalp.
A scalpel pressed against the Wyvern's neck, and she disobeyed orders. She screamed.
By the end of the procedure, the Wyvern had more than a passing sense of familiarity. She remembered how she and the scientist – Marino – had rearranged the molecular structure of the metal on the computer simulation, and watched it fuse to the bone. She remembered holding a sample of bone – her bone – in a pair of tweezers and painting it with the metal. She remembered the look of wonder on Marino's face when she told him her theory about the serum.
She'd even realised that the procedure they were hypothesising about was for her. She'd still done it. She'd still given them the answers.
The Wyvern knew what had been done to her, but feeling it was another matter entirely. The metal she had helped to formulate felt like shards of ice piercing her bones in one moment, and in the next felt like the scorching lick of flames. She shuddered on the cold metal tabletop as Marino and Sanders glued her skin back together. The sedative was wearing off, bringing a sharper bite to the pain, and she realised that she could move again.
But she had her orders. The Wyvern clenched her teeth and screwed her eyes shut. She breathed through her nose, because she'd screamed her throat raw.
Finally there were no more hands on her. She let out a shuddering breath, and couldn't help the whimper that escaped her mouth as her ribs heaved with the movement. The restraints hissed open.
"Stand."
The Wyvern's eyes shot open at the Project Leader's command. Her body wanted to resist, but she knew, deep in her psyche, that she had to obey. You are a weapon. Weapons do not feel.
With a groan keening between her teeth, the Wyvern managed to slide her legs off the table, and onto the floor. She followed them with her hips, then her chest, and then, with a monumental effort, settled her weight on her feet. Her body was ablaze with pain, and she was sure it was showing on her face, but she was standing. Throbbing bolts of ice and fire shot from her heels to the base of her neck.
The Project Leader watched her with his ever-calculating eyes.
"Marino," he said, eyes still on the Wyvern. "Report."
"It… It appears to be working, sir. The subject is mobile, with no signs of deformity. I will have to continue conducting tests to make sure the Adamantium grows with the bones, as the simulations predicted, but… the fusion appears to be successful."
"Scan her," Sanders said, unimpressed.
The Wyvern remained on her feet as the scientists scanned her. She knew that her healing was enhanced, but a procedure such as this would take time. She tried to reconcile herself to spending days, weeks, with this stabbing pain radiating through half of her body.
The scans that finally came back were just like the images the Wyvern had seen in dozens of simulations. The silvery-grey Adamantium coated the bones of her spine, her shoulders, the back of her ribcage, her hips, and trailed down the backs of her legs. Like scaffolding. The Wyvern knew what the result would be: she would be even stronger, able to support greater weights, withstand harder blows to her back. And she knew that what had been done today wouldn't be the end.
"Congratulations, Marino," said the Project Leader. He was looking at the scans with something like wonder. "This is the future of the Wyvern Project. This is what I promised HYDRA when I joined its ranks. This… this is the first strike at a sword that will be forged a hundred times over, to get the strongest mettle. You've done well."
"Thank you, sir," Marino's voice was hushed. The scientist's eyes were on the Wyvern, wide and bright.
"Wyvern." The Project Leader looked across the lab at his weapon, which was still shaking. "Do you feel stronger?"
The Wyvern rolled her shoulders. Beneath the pain, which was making her vision spotty, she could feel it – a spine stronger than iron, stronger than steel. A spine that could support enormous weight. That was what was keeping her upright. The metal in her body was sturdy enough to keep her standing tall when she felt torn to shreds.
"Yes, sir."
January, 1994 (7 Years Old)
The Red Room, Russia
"My gordimsya tem, chto prinimayem vas, General'naya Petrov." ["We are honored to host you, General Petrov."]
The Wyvern had been instructed to shadow the Project Leader and observe. Her observation of Madame B. was that the woman shared the Project Leader's calm calculation when it came to assets. She also sensed that the woman's polite words and sharp, insincere smile were intended to insult her guest.
"Madame," the Project Leader said, smiling. "We thank you for having us, and it's a pleasure to see you again. I have brought several prominent operatives and scientists who I am sure will benefit your pupils. I'm sure we will be of great use to each other."
Madame B.'s wrinkled face hardened. "We have never trained a girl who was not one of our own pupils." She curled her lip, glancing over her shoulder at the Wyvern. The Wyvern did not look away. "And she is too young to be of any use yet."
"Well, the Wyvern has weaknesses that require… correction outside of our facility."
The Wyvern knew this. She had been growing ever more proficient in combat, languages, and technologies, but she had little to no experience when it came to infiltration and espionage. She could shadow a target through a base or a forest without being spotted, but when it came to engaging with a target, ingratiating herself, she had no leg to stand on. She was a blunt weapon with a brilliant mind. Her teachers had only got her so far, and the Project Leader had decided she needed… fellow students.
"We will teach her," Madame B. said. "But if she fails, it is not necessary for her to live."
The Project Leader merely smiled again. "Madame, where would you like to begin?"
"Nachat'." ["Begin."]
The other girl rushed at the Wyvern, eager to prove herself against the newcomer.
The Wyvern had learned the fallacies of ego. She absorbed a few clumsy, powerful blows, then seized the other girl's wrist, yanked her to the ground and dislocated her shoulder. The girl, blonde-haired and blue-eyed, howled.
The Wyvern placed her foot on the girl's back and looked over her shoulder at Madame B. and the Project Leader. The Project Leader was suppressing a smile, but Madame B.'s face was stone. The girls standing in a ring around the fighters were too well-trained to speak, but the Wyvern could see them glancing at each-other, eyes wide.
"Zoya," Madame B. called. As the blonde girl was pulled to her feet and dragged from the courtyard, an older girl stepped up. She looked to be about seventeen, almost twice the age of the Wyvern, with black hair pulled behind her head in a severe braid. Her eyes were shrewder than the last girl's.
When Madame B. gave the order to begin, neither of them moved. They eyeballed each other; measuring, calculating.
"Nachat'," Madame B. repeated, a bite of anger in her voice. The girl and the Wyvern stepped together simultaneously.
This girl was good. The Wyvern recognised elements of martial arts in her style, but the girl changed from form to form so smoothly that the Wyvern couldn't pick out a particular kind. Her punches were driven, well-aimed, and she was quick enough to duck and weave in time with the Wyvern. The girl hissed when she kicked the Wyvern's lower back and felt the hard bite of metal. She recovered, though, spinning away from the Wyvern's grasp.
But the Wyvern was better. After a few minutes of interchanged blows and circling one another, the Wyvern sidestepped the girl's axe kick, ducked under a right cross, and slammed her fist into the girl's throat at full power.
Kill one of them, the Project Leader had murmured to the Wyvern when they stepped into the courtyard.
Watching the black-haired girl clutch at her crushed throat, eyes bulging, the Wyvern felt the completion of her order settle in her gut. She didn't look away until the girl had stopped convulsing.
The girls in the courtyard had taken a step back, leaving the Wyvern alone in empty space. She turned to face Madame B. and the Project Leader again. There was a ringing silence in the yard.
"This is not one of her weaknesses, Madame," said the Project Leader, his eyes fixed on his project.
Madame B.'s face was white. "Vernites' na svoi koyki," ["Return to your bunks,"] she managed to spit out, and the girls were gone in an instant, shooting each other sideways looks.
The Wyvern faced Madame B.'s stare with a steady gaze. The black-haired girl's corpse was crumpled at her feet.
After a long moment, the woman's lips parted. "Ona chudovishche," ["She is a monster,"] she breathed.
"Yes," replied the Project Leader, dusting off his black suit. "Help me to make her better."
The Wyvern and the senior members of the Wyvern Program remained at the Red Room for almost two years. She never killed another pupil – clearly the first demonstration had been enough. Instead, when she was trained in combat, the girls went up against her in twos and threes, which challenged her mind and body. She mastered more languages – as well as English, Russian and French she became fluent in Chinese, Arabic and Spanish.
The girls hated her. They hated each other, of course, but their hate for her was a unifying thing. Though they sometimes subdued her in combat in groups, she would always beat them at the logic puzzles, codes and hacking.
Four times the girls tried to kill the Wyvern, and only got close the last time: they converged on her bed while she slept and tried to slip a knife into her heart. That night the Wyvern learned a valuable lesson about vigilance, even in her sleep. The girls learned how long it took for their bones to knit themselves back together.
The Wyvern was given assignments with the rest of the girls. They were sent into towns and cities, with no supplies, and told to retrieve a certain file from a certain office, or drug a bureaucrat, or lure a wealthy man into an alleyway and rob him.
The Red Room's greatest success with the Wyvern was teaching her infiltration and assimilation. She learned by watching the other girls, listening to the things they said, noticing the way they wore their hair, how they pretended to be someone else. She learned social interaction like a science, observing the data and imitating the results.
In her final assignment, in order to put a drug in a Murmansk politician's brandy, she made herself appear to be a wealthy man's daughter and charmed her way into the politician's manor. From there it was a simple task to slip through the ornate corridors into the man's office, place the drug, hide under a divan to ensure the drug was consumed, and then climb three stories down to the bicycle she'd stolen. She was never told what the drug was, but on her way there had worked out that it was ricin. The politician would be dead in a day.
On her way to the extraction point, the Wyvern was questioned by a police officer concerned that she was out by herself. She smiled prettily and assured him that her papa said it was alright for her to ride home from her babushka's house. He patted her on the head and sent her on her way.
Madame B. said that her programming made her too blank to be truly convincing, but that she would reasonably pass against an untrained mark.
Sometimes, when the Wyvern pretended to laugh and smile and gossip, she felt uneasy. The false actions called to something inside her, something she was sure should be buried. But then she would be thrown into a fight against three girls who hated her, and the familiarity would vanish.
The Red Room taught the Wyvern about womanhood. She sat with ten other girls her age as one of Madame B.'s teachers told them what to expect, and what men would want. The teacher, a slender woman with silver hair, told them how they could exploit it.
When the girls went to their ballet lessons, the Wyvern would continue with an engineering tutor. A weapon does not dance, said the Project Leader. Madame B. had scoffed at him, but didn't push it.
In the dead of winter, one of the girls graduated. She was a poised, fine-boned girl of sixteen, but she took her opponents apart when she fought. All, of course, except for the Wyvern.
The black-haired girl the Wyvern had killed was supposed to graduate as well.
When the graceful girl came back from her graduation, pale and fierce, she shot the Wyvern a look of pure loathing. The Wyvern wondered if the black-haired girl had been her friend, or if she hated the Wyvern simply because she was better. The graceful girl left the Red Room with nothing, and never came back.
"You ought to consider a similar graduation for your project," the Wyvern overheard Madame B. say to the Project Leader, as the Wyvern withstood the blows from two older girls. She would be bruised, but her bones would never break.
"I am reluctant to resort to such a final measure. The Wyvern may prove useful beyond her skills."
Madame B. gave an unimpressed hmph. The Wyvern broke a girl's arm.
October, 1995 (9 Years Old)
The Red Room, Russia
The Wyvern woke, and climbed off her thin mattress. The tile was cold under her feet. She dressed in the Red Room uniform – loose black trousers and a grey and blue t-shirt – pulled on her shoes, and left her small room. Madame B. had first put her in the dorms with the other girls, but they'd kept trying to kill her and she'd kept breaking the handcuffs they used to chain her to the bed. She must have been doing it in her sleep. She didn't know why – she never remembered dreaming.
The Wyvern paced through the academy, drawing glares from the girls who passed her. She observed them, noted the degree of their hatred, their stance, their potential strengths and weaknesses in a fight, but maintained her blank, forward-facing stare.
She met the Project Leader at the foot of the ornate stairs. She normally took breakfast in the dining hall, checking her food for poisons and sitting alone in the corner, but the Project Leader had asked to meet her this morning.
"Wyvern," he said as she approached.
"Sir." He had taken to greeting her during her time at the Red Room. It could have been a reaction to her social integration training, but she suspected that he enjoyed showing up Madame B. with his superior asset, and saw offering the asset greetings as a form of reward.
"We are leaving the Academy, Wyvern." The Project Leader had a gleam in his eyes. He was as impeccably dressed as ever, in his dark suit and with his white blonde hair slicked back. "They are introducing a new batch of pupils, which will take up their time, and I believe you have learned what you can here."
"Yes, sir," said the Wyvern.
The other members of the project approached: Sanders, one of her scientists, two of the chair's mechanics, and three soldiers. One of the soldiers had a curved scar under his left eye, and shot the Wyvern a sneer.
Marino had remained in the Québec base, as the Project Leader didn't want his knowledge getting out.
Each of the project members had a bag. The Wyvern had nothing.
"The Wyvern has proven herself to be a worthy successor to the Winter Soldier," the Project Leader announced to the others. They nodded, pride in their features, not even glancing at the Wyvern. "I think it's time to test her."
They were farewelled at the door of the Academy by Madame B. and her teachers. She and the Project Leader exchanged veiled insults and threats for a few moments. The Wyvern scanned the room – an ingrained habit – and saw a door cracked open to her left. As she looked, a face appeared in the crack: an ivory face with piercing green eyes, framed by a shock of curly red hair. The girl was about the Wyvern's age, and obviously new. The other girls knew how to spy without being caught. The Wyvern stared back at the girl, blank, until she looked away.
"Well, Madame, let us both hope to never have the pleasure again." The Project Leader flashed a smile at Madame B., and then walked out of the Academy. The Wyvern was quick to follow, but the Madame was not done with her yet.
A hand shot out, catching the Wyvern by the shoulder. She looked up into Madame B.'s face, into her bottomless eyes.
"Do svidaniya, chudobishche." ["Goodbye, monster."]
The Wyvern waited until the woman released her arm, then looked away and walked into the open air, following her master.
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