CHAPTER 10

Bang! Bang! Bang!

With three consecutive shots, the crashing sounds of wood against the ground resounded in the now quiet training ground as smoke and the faint scent of gun powder wafted through the air.

Only the soft heaving sound of a man could be heard for those with acute auditory senses.

The man walked back to the door of the training ground he was in with a gun hanging down his hands, with another at his back and one strapped to his sides.

He was dressed in an all-black military combat gear, matched with black boots, sporting heavy muscle mass depicting intense training and a clean-cut beard with a low-cut. He had a stern image that made it hard for people to feel comfortable around him which alighted to his cold eyes and rigid demeanor.

He walked out of the room without looking at any of the guards or saying anything. He only stopped to give his weapons and walked away not even sparing the spooked guard another glance.

 With the way he was sweating, it could be seen that this training took a lot out of him, making the guards giving him a wild berth… Or maybe it was the blood covering his entire get-up.

Unlike other types of training, this one was way different because of two reasons.

The time and the nature of the training.

Three hours.

Three hours of constant gun-fire and acute focus under return fire.

With real guns, recalibrated motion sensors and moving targets.

Three hours.

32 bullet wounds.

150 moving targets.

1.5x motion sensors with 2.5x reflex time.

This was the hardest training he's ever done. He was glad they weren't programmed for headshots, although he didn't show it.

30 targets with AP rounds. Now those were a bitch to dodge. They were the cause of most of his wounds since he just couldn't hide from them and had to always be on motion and take them out first before he could focus on the others.

This wasn't a normal training because of it nature. It was also a form of graduation to showcase his skills to whoever was watching.

A test of might in order for allow him into the world.

He was their perfect weapon, surpassing even the Winter Soldier in everything else except strength and speed.

What he lacked in those areas, he made up for precision and deadliness… Or undeadliness.

With him they would once again enter into the stage of world power with the perfect army, taking it by surprise.

What mutants? How many could boast of true nuclear abilities. They were fearsome yes, but that percentage was in the 0.001 percentile of their more lesser population.

Ever since their momentary defeat at the hands of that 'Man', a shameful point of their past, they retreated back into the dredges of the Earth as they were hunted down relentlessly by the Allied Nations.

While they recovered from their wounds, growing more stronger like from the myth, the ignorant world celebrated a false victory.

Foolish enough they were to even believe that they were killed off, that travesty alone was proof that they alone were fit to rule.

They alone could never be killed, cut off a head and two more shall grow in its place. More ferocious. More cunning.

They learned from their setback.

Instead of attacking from the front, exposing themselves to the world, they did the opposite. Slowly, they infiltrated into the heart of their once enemies over time, bidding it and waiting for the call to strike. But not now.

This time they won't leave anything to chance, a thorough takeover; the military, the government, the civils, everything would be theirs soon.

And now, they have got the perfect soldier – The Draugr. A nigh-undying warrior. Even if he could still be killed, his potential was matchless, and he was still growing.

His strength and speed was lower than that of their Ultimate Soldier, The Winter Soldier, even his fighting skills was below that of the Winter Soldier but what made him more dangerous was his precision, accuracy and his ability to heal from even the most lethal of wounds bar sure-kill ones like to the brain and the heart.

Even critical wounds to the heart could be healed, as long he had breathe and it didn't outright completely destroy his heart.

All in due time.

Patience was a virtue of the victor, and they had a lot of it for they had long been patient.

…

[ELSEWHERE]

In a dark room, faces alighted on screens could be seen. Each with a file in front of them as the perused the data in it.

"You think he's ready?" One of the faces asked, referring to no one in particular.

"Yes. The tests were all passed spectacularly. All in record time I might add." Another replied. A familiar face.

"So it would seem. What of his faculties? Any relapses like the other?" Asked a female voice this time.

"No one so far. I think we have his ability to thank for that. Ever since he committed the act, I think his mental defenses fell, possibly due to trauma. It isn't that rare with new subjects who are subjected to their first kill." Answered a man this time. He was dressed in a doctor's coat with wrinkly features, seemingly the oldest out of them.

"So he was subjected to conditioning during that moment?" Came an inquiry from another man with an Eastern accent.

"Yes. He first fought against it, but due to regular procession, his brain adapted to it. Quite an irony it was." The doctor reply with a low chuckle.

"What of his response time? Any sign of self control?" Another question followed immediately after. This one however elicited a moment of silence.

"His response is… Mechanical, for lack of a more apt word." Replied the doctor with a smidge of uncertainty in his voice, but it was pick on by the others in the conference.

"You don't sound too sure. Need I remind you that this operation was approved on the grounds of assurance. So do tell us the problem." Questioned a man with a clear American accent this time, sounding not too pleased, something that was shared by the other members.

With that query, the other faces lined a focus on the doctor's screen.

Despite being under scrutiny, the doctor remained unfazed as he answered them. "I said mechanical because his behavior follows an almost systematic pattern." He said.

Seeing as they still didn't understand, he clarified.

"We had the mutant who found him-"

"The girl who can read frequencies?"

Taking a short pause at the interruption, he leveled an annoyed glare at his interjector and continued.

"Yes the girl who can read frequencies. We had her read his frequency when he was inactive and she found out that his frequency was almost 'mechanical' in nature, meaning that all his actions were systematical, aligned. Almost pre-ordained." He explained.

"So… What does that mean exactly?" Came the all too prompt question.

This time with a more laid back stare and a more unimpressed look, he answered with a deep sigh.

"It means-", he looked at them one more and strung out the words, "-that he's acting basely on instincts. But different from instinct, he responds intelligently to stimuli. She said his brain waves were constantly active, every time, but that they were somehow dulled, and it was with this dull state that he responds to stimuli." He finished and looked at the others with the same look he had since the starting of the meeting.

"So he's not braindead like the Winter Soldier. Won't this be a problem? What happens when something jolts these dull brainwaves then?" Asked the female member this time.

"Thanks for the trauma he suffered, we were able to weld our authority with his active brainwaves when they were in disarray, so while he can respond with low brainwaves, our 'orders' are what triggers his active brainwaves. Of which we have two members who can order him directly among us." He finished with a tone of finality.

"So we have nothing to worry about then." One of them asked, but making it sound like a statement.

The doctor, to this didn't even deign a reply as he continued staring with an impassive gaze that spoke 'try me'.

Seeing as no answer was forthcoming, the questioner relaxed back in his seat as the virtual room fell into silence.

"Do we put him in a strike unit, or make him go solo? Personally I suggest we give him a team to see how he works with others, if he will defer to a referred authority or otherwise."

With that suggestion, everyone present gained a serious and pensive expression, displaying the gravity of the suggestion.

This was a soldier with immense value, one with vast potential since the advent of the War Hero. This required heavy thinking on it, comparing the risk to the turnout, weighing the gain to the loss.

"I suggest we put him in a unit of some of our best tactical soldiers to review his ability to defer to others and also his ability to lead. If he could perform automatically on his own and if he can make decisions that align with his goal." The man with the Eastern accent presented his opinions as the conference once again became silence in thoughts.

"With the world still in a state of panic and vigilance due to the attack last year, this is our best chance to eliminate some our high ranking targets as it'll give us the perfect cover. Sending him in with a strike team will be more sufficient." The lady reasoned.

"I support this idea. Making him go solo will depend on the result of his tasks." Another supported.

They waited a while for any  opposition, or any other suggestion. Seeing no other reviews, the man with the clear American accent spoke.

"Since there are no other given opinions, the Draugr will be sorted into a temporary team of some of our best strikers where his work autonomy will be tested. This meeting is adjourned." Came the voice of finality.

"Hail Hydra!"

"Hail Hydra!"

"Hail Hydra!"

Like that, the room of screens once again went dark as all the users went offline, no doubt to peruse their given files to see what kind of benefits they could glean from it.

A coalition of some of the worlds reputable figures, gathered together with a grand plan while the world continues with its ignorance.

If the world were to know of such a gathering, another war will wreck the planet like that never before witnessed.

Ignorance truly was bliss.

…

[Draul St. Cross POV]

These past few months were quite eventful. Not in events but in experience.

I don't even remember how long I've I been here. I stopped counting after the 10th month.

…

…

13 months, six days.

*Sigh* If there was a downside to having  a super memory, it was doing a double-take at whatever you say.

Your brain picks up on any discrepancies as long as there is an intent, and forwards an acute suggestion.

I've been trying for a while now to get my subconscious be my… subconscious and I've had a little progress.

It wasn't always like this. I used to be able to control my main consciousness and had a certain degree over my subconscious, able to switch between them at will and able to suppress either to any levels but things started getting out of hand when Hydra started their brainwashing.

Normally, from what I'd gathered due to my little experiments with my brain, I should have being able to cancel their influence on my brain with either an already given order or a full overwrite targeted at their command.

It worked for a while, with me deleting every instruction implanted inside my brain, but then it started getting harder to delete or overwrite their commands and that got me brainstorming whatever 'Mind over matter' exercise and meditation guide I could recall.

Meditation was said to help make a more stable connection with the subconscious and that's what I did.

As someone who already had a direct link to his subconscious, meditation really proved helpful. With it I was able to do something similar to what Hydra did, but on a lower scale

Due to constant brainwashing, I found out that my brain was adapting the brainwashing signals… not adapting to.

While it still provided me resistance to the brainwashing, the constant act of it was wearing said resistance down making it register easier with my brainwaves.

With regular meditation, I was able to feel clearly the implanted orders and that was when I came up with an idea that I immediately implemented.

There was no program that couldn't be infected with a virus, rather the program was more sophisticated that the virus couldn't infect it.

Applying the same logic to my brain, I figured that my mental defense was lacking in sophistication, making their tampering stick no matter how many times I overwrote it.

Hydra's method of implanting suggestions was a series of direct attack after numerous probing. Simple.

So since erasing their suggestions was no longer feasible in the long run, I did the most dangerous thing I've ever done to myself – a full mental shutdown.

Like the age-old custom of rebooting your computer once it starts misbehaving or lagging, I attempted the same with the human body's most delicate organ – the brain… My brain.

With the mental shutdown, my body immediately fell asleep as my brain activity ran on intense Theta waves.

I didn't know what I was expecting in my inner mind, or whatever it was, to look like, accepting of everything I would find there. But this wasn't even in any realm of possible expectations.

Nothing.

It wasn't darkness.

It wasn't light.

It was just nothing

For some reason I couldn't even get an image of where I was. It was like that state of transition between dreaming and waking up – the part where we can't recall how the dream started or what was in between. The blank memory.

For some reason I couldn't remember what I was seeing at moment time, or if I was even seeing something.

It was like that saying that 3-dimensional beings couldn't comprehend or experience 4-dimensional aspects, but they can be felt.

So with whatever visual I had rendered void, I started with the reckless plan I came up with, based on nothingness but my conjectures.

It was all or out.