Rani Barnes, the daughter of Bucky Barnes, was raised in the shadows of Hydra-trained to hunt, obey, and survive. Now 19 and rescued from that life, she's thrown into a quiet existence she doesn't understand, living with a father still grieving the...
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A breath. That's all she heard.
Not sharp with rage or desperation, not labored from exertion—but long, slow, and utterly out of place. It cut through the room like a knife through fabric, too gentle to belong in a place like this.
Rani heard it before she saw him. Her instincts sharpened, snapping her gun up again just as John Walker shoved Yelena to the floor and cocked his own weapon. The tension between them was taut, trembling like the last wire of restraint—but then—
Movement.
A figure stepped out from behind the overturned table, right into the line of fire. He wasn’t supposed to be there. None of them had registered him until that second. It was like he appeared, not through skill or stealth, but because the world suddenly remembered to render him into the scene.
He looked… ordinary.
No armor. No gun. Just grey pajamas clinging to his tall, lean frame as if he had risen from sleep moments ago. His longish brown hair brushed just past the tips of his ears, disheveled like he’d run a hand through it too many times.
And the expression on his face was not war-hardened or calculating—it was terrified.
His eyes—startled, pale, human—swept the room. They darted from Yelena crouched on the floor, to Walker bristling with bloodlust, to Ghost standing like death in a suit, and finally—
To the body.
To Taskmaster.
His breath caught, and then stammered out of him.
“Is she… is she really dead?” he asked. His voice was soft. Almost childlike. And it trembled, as if some deeper part of him already knew the answer.
No one answered.
The weight of his question sank into the space between them like a stone thrown into deep water.
Rani didn’t lower her gun. Neither did Walker. Ghost tilted her head slightly, considering him with distant curiosity. Yelena’s brows furrowed as she slowly pushed herself back to her feet.
