Chapter 4: And so it Begins...

The world still swayed in and out of focus. But the heated voices cutting through the fog in your mind were becoming clearer. Sharper. Enough to make you wince.
 
"The tag was recovered from the bag–"
 
"Times Square isn't your jurisdiction–"
 
"An unidentified individual in a high-security zone–"
 
Your head throbbed with each word, their emotions bleeding into yours. The blanket Bucky had given you was still wrapped around your shoulders, but it did little to stop the trembling. Whether from shock or the evening chill, you weren't sure anymore.
 
"Enough." The word cut through the chaos like a knife. Tony stepped into view, his expression unreadable behind tinted glasses. "The bag had our tag. That makes this our business."
 
"Stark, you can't just–"
 
"Actually, I can." He held up the weathered tag, its edges crumpled. "Unless someone wants to explain why they dropped a person in Times Square with Avengers credentials? No? Didn't think so."
 
Steve stood at his shoulder, hands on his hips as he scanned the area. His presence alone was enough to silence any further protests. But something in his demeanour betrayed uncertainty. This wasn't a routine situation, even for them.
 
Cool metal encircled your wrists with a soft click. The agent securing the cuffs avoided eye contact, but his touch was gentle. Professional.
 
"Standard procedure," Steve explained. "Until we figure this out."
 
The world tilted again as strong hands helped you to your feet. Through the haze, you registered the thrum of helicopter blades growing louder. Bucky's steady presence remained at your side, a silent guardian as you were led toward the waiting aircraft.
 
"You’re safe with us," he murmured, helping you duck under the spinning rotors. "We'll sort this out."
 
But inside, all you could focus on were your restraints. You felt anything but safe. Perhaps these people were the lesser of two evils? The guy with the metal arm certainly felt trustworthy enough.
 
The engines roared louder, and beyond the window, Times Square grew smaller, the gathered agencies reduced to dots on the ground, their competing claims drowned out by the beating blades.
 
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
 
The helicopter's blades hadn't fully stilled when Bruce appeared through the compound’s glass doors, flanked by a medical team in pristine white coats. For some reason, the contrast between their immaculate professionalism and your bare feet padding across the landing pad made your stomach twist. If the earth could open up and swallow you whole, you’d die happy.
 
Dr Helen Cho stepped forward, a hospital gown draped over her arm. Her movements were cautious, like approaching a frightened animal. "Let's get you somewhere more comfortable."
 
The infirmary was all chrome and soft blue lighting. Dr Cho's gentle hands guided you behind a privacy screen, helping you trade Bucky's blanket for the cotton gown. The fabric felt whisper-thin against your skin, but at least it was something.
 
"Can you tell me your name?" she asked softly, her tablet poised.
 
You opened your mouth, then closed it. Such a simple question. Everyone had a name. But when you reached for the answer, there was only darkness, an empty space where memories should be. "I..." Your voice cracked from disuse. "I don't know."
 
Dr Cho's fingers hovered over her tablet for a moment before typing. You glimpsed the screen: 'Jane Doe'. The placeholder felt like a brand—nothing, nameless, devoid of identity.
 
Through the lab's glass walls, you could see them gathered. The Avengers. Earth's mightiest heroes, you heard one agent say. Now your... what? Captors? Guardians?
 
The red-head stood slightly apart from the others, her arms crossed. You couldn't read her expression, but her eyes never left you, studying, assessing. There was something in her eyes that spoke of recognition, perhaps a memory. As if you reminded her of something she'd much rather forget.
 
"Quite the mystery we've got here." Tony paced the hallway, gesturing at the screens displaying your preliminary readings. "No ID, no records, nothing. She just appeared out of nowhere in the middle of Times Square."
 
Steve stood with his back straight, every inch the soldier. "We'll figure it out… First priority is determining if she's a threat."
 
"And if she is?" Tony stopped pacing, turning to face the window. Your eyes met through the glass, and you quickly looked away, focusing instead on Dr Banner as he prepared what looked like enough equipment for a small army of patients.
 
"Then we'll handle it together," Steve replied, his voice carrying that note of command that reassured his team. “It’s as you said last night… It’s what families do. Even dysfunctional superhero families.”
 
Dr Cho's hand on your arm drew your attention back. "We're going to run some basic tests, alright? Nothing invasive for now. Just try to relax."
 
Relax. Right. Because that was so easy when you could feel the weight of their scrutiny, their uncertainty, their silent debate over your fate. You nodded anyway, watching as she prepared the first of what promised to be many needles.
 
"Basic blood panel first." Dr Banner's voice echoed from across the lab. "We'll start there, cross-reference with every database we can access."
 
Your arm tensed instinctively at the icy touch of alcohol, but the needle slip was almost gentle. Dark red filled the vial. At least that looked normal. One small mercy. Imagine if it had been green.
 
"Just the fingerprints now," Cho murmured, reaching for your hand. Her thumb brushed over your fingertips and she froze. The slight change in her breathing made you look up. She was staring at your fingers, brows knitted together as she gently pressed them against the scanner.
 
"Dr Banner? Could you look at this?"
 
Bruce appeared at her side, glasses perched on the end of his nose. He took your hand in his, turning it under the light. The gentleness of his touch couldn't mask his growing concern.
 
"That's..." He ran his own finger across your fingertips. "They're completely smooth. Tony?"
 
Tony’s sneakers squeaked against the floor as he crossed the lab, hands tucked in his pockets in a failed attempt at casual interest. "What are we looking at?"
 
"Her fingerprints." Cho guided your hand under a different scanner. The screen flickered to life, showing smooth, unmarked skin where friction ridges should have been. "They're gone. Completely burned away."
 
Tony leaned in closer, his reflection in the scanner's screen showing the exact moment his nonchalance cracked. "Well, that's... concerning." He straightened, running a hand over his face. "Great. That's one less answer and about a hundred more questions."
 
The tension in the room drew tighter. You could feel them all looking at your hands now, seeing not just missing fingerprints but erased identity, deliberate anonymity. The kind of thing that spoke of preparation, of purpose.
 
But Dr Banner's voice cut through the silence, almost optimistic. "That's okay." He moved back to his workstation, focusing on the vials of your blood. "So we'll focus on the blood samples. There's more than one way to skin a cat.”
 
The centrifuge hummed, separating your blood into its components while machines parsed data across multiple screens. Dr Cho's fingers moved efficiently across the keyboard, starting another analysis cycle… The third one, mind you.
 
You watched her face, the way her professional mask slipped just slightly as the screen flashed its response:
 
ANALYSIS INCONCLUSIVE
 
She hit another key.
 
ANALYSIS INCONCLUSIVE
 
Again.
 
ANALYSIS INCONCLUSIVE
 
"That's... impossible." The words escaped her in a breath, barely audible over the laboratory equipment. Her fingers stilled on the keyboard, hovering uncertainly—a gesture you'd yet to see from the confident doctor.
 
Dr Banner looked up from his own workstation, catching something in her tone. "Helen?"
 
"Come look at this." She didn't take her eyes off the screen, as if afraid the inexplicable results might disappear if she looked away. "Something's wrong with these readings."
 
The blue light from the monitor reflected off his glasses as he leaned in.
 
"Could be equipment malfunction," he suggested, but his tone lacked conviction. "Run a diagnostic?"
 
"Already did." Cho pulled up another window, numbers scrolling past. "The equipment is working perfectly. It's the blood itself." Her finger traced a line of data. "Look… no DNA matches, which isn't unusual by itself, but there are no markers we can trace. No genetic indicators, no blood type identifiers that make any sense."
 
Bruce removed his glasses, polishing them with the edge of his lab coat. He seemed like a confident man. Confident in his work, that is. And you’re throwing him off his game. "That's not possible. Every living thing has markers, identifiers..."
 
"I know." Cho started another scan, her movements now sharp with frustration. "But it's like there's nothing to find. The blood is there, it's real, it's not contaminated, but..." She gestured at the screen as it flashed another 'INCONCLUSIVE'. "It's like trying to read a blank page."
 
You stared down at the cotton ball taped to your arm where they'd drawn the blood. Such a small thing to cause so much confusion. But as you watched Cho and Banner huddle over the results, their whispered theories growing more complex and concerned, you couldn't shake the feeling that this was just the beginning of the impossibilities your presence would reveal.
 
 
It had been hours of tests, questions, and zero answers. Natasha pushed off from the wall and stormed out, the lab door hissing open. Her footsteps echoed down the corridor, sharp and angry, each click of her boots like a punctuation mark of frustration.
 
"Natasha!" Steve called, catching up to her in only a couple of strides.
 
She spun to face him, red hair whipping around her shoulders. "Don't."
 
"Talk to me." Steve's tone was gentle, but he kept his distance. The way one might approach a cornered wolf. "This isn't like you."
 
"Isn't it? ‘Cause I'm pretty sure being suspicious of an unknown variable dropping into our laps is exactly like me." She gestured sharply toward the lab. "No fingerprints, Banner can't even analyse her blood… and we're just keeping her here? In our home?"
 
The word 'home' cracked slightly, betraying something deeper than professional concern. Steve caught it too, his expression softening.
 
"We need to understand what we're dealing with."
 
"What we're dealing with? We could be dealing with a Trojan horse, Steve. The perfect infiltration. Someone so mysterious we have to keep them close. And we're playing right into it."
 
Resting his hands on his hips, Steve heaved an exasperated sigh. "So what's your solution? We just hand her over to the feds? Watch some other agency bungle this and potentially miss something crucial?"
 
"Yes!" Natasha threw up her hands. "Let someone else handle this bomb. Because that's what she is… A bomb waiting to go off. And you're all too curious to consider the blast radius."
 
The silence that followed was heavy, charged with a history of far too many if-onlys and should-have-known-betters. You don’t live to be one of the most talented spies and assassins in the entire world, or Earth’s first known superhero, without getting burnt a couple of times. Oftentimes, just when you open yourself up to vulnerability.
 
Steve nodded, careful to keep his response unbiased. "If we don't find answers, we'll revisit our options. And if I have to, I’ll hand her over myself.”
 

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

 
"Look at this protein structure." Bruce leaned closer to the microscope, adjusting the focus. "I've never seen anything like it."
 
Tony paced behind him, an empty coffee cup dangling from his fingers. "What are we looking at, exactly?"
 
"That's just it." Bruce straightened, rubbing his tired eyes beneath his glasses. "These proteins... they're acting almost like a smoke screen. Every time we try to analyse the blood's composition, these structures seem to..." He gestured vaguely with his hands, searching for the right words.
 
"Scramble the signal?" Tony supplied, setting his cup down to peer at the screen displaying molecular structures.
 
Dr Cho joined them, her tablet displaying yet another failed analysis attempt. "More like they obscure it. Like trying to read through frosted glass. We can see there's something there, but can't make out the details."
 
Bruce nodded, warming to the theory. "Or it could be artificial manipulation. Someone might have deliberately scrambled her genetic markers." He pulled up another screen, pointing to a series of unusual patterns. "See these sequences? They don't follow any natural pattern we've ever documented."
 
"As if someone designed her blood to be untraceable," Tony finished, his voice dropping. He glanced through the glass where you sat on the examination table, legs dangling, looking far too ordinary for the impossible readings you were producing.
 
"There's another possibility... I've seen something similar in certain viruses. The way they can hide from the immune system by altering their molecular structure."
 
Tony's eyebrows shot up. "You think someone altered her at a molecular level?"
 
"It would explain why we can't get any readable markers. No standard DNA sequences, no identifiable cellular structures our machines recognise…”
 
Tony turned to face the window, studying your reflection in the darkened glass. "So what you're saying is..."
 
"She's a ghost."
 
The machines continued their quiet hum, screens flickering with endless streams of inconclusive data. Through the glass, they watched as you shifted slightly, uncomfortable in the now darkened lab. A ghost with solid form, a person without markers, a mystery wrapped in impossible biology.
 
"Well," Tony finally broke the silence, reaching for his empty coffee cup. "I guess there’s one last test to run. Black light scan, and then we call it a night."
 
In the distance, Cho's tablet pinged with another failed analysis attempt. None of them bothered to check the results.
 
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
 
"Just one more test," Dr Cho said softly, helping you slip off the hospital gown. "The scanner will do all the work. You just need to stand still."
 
The examination stand felt cold beneath your feet. You positioned yourself as directed: arms slightly away from your sides, legs apart. Like The Vitruvian Man, but nameless, and far more vulnerable.
 
"The lights will go out for a moment," Cho explained, moving toward the control panel. "Try not to move when the scan begins."
 
Darkness fell. Your heart picked up speed, counting seconds in the black until—click—a soft turquoise glow filled the room. The platform beneath your feet hummed to life, beginning its slow rotation.
 
Behind the glass partition, Cho's tablet lit up her face as her fingers flew across the screen. Whatever she saw made her pause, index finger hovering over the display. She glanced up at you—still rotating slowly in the ethereal light—then back at her tablet.
 
The message she sent was brief: “Lab. Now.”
 
You couldn't see what was happening behind the scenes in the control room, but within minutes, the lab door whispered open, admitting Tony and Bruce. Then Steve. And lastly, Natasha.
 
Dr Cho angled the screenshot away from the scanning area, preserving your modesty while sharing whatever had prompted the urgent summons.
 
"Look at this."
 
There, illuminated on the screen, was an image of your back. And written across it in softly glowing letters, like bioluminescent ink rising to the surface of your skin:

ROGERS
ROMANOFF
STARK
 
The names seemed to pulse with their own light, as impossible as everything else about you.
 
"Well,” Steve almost breathed, “this certainly changes things, doesn't it?"
 
The platform continued its slow rotation, the scanner's gentle hum masking the sudden tension in the room. Behind the partition, you couldn't see their faces, couldn't know that their names were literally etched on your skin. But you felt the shift in the air. The moment a mystery became something far more personal.
 
The turquoise light continued its methodical sweep, searching for more secrets written in your flesh, while behind the glass, the named ones watched with new intensity. Whatever you were—threat, victim, or something else entirely—you were no longer simply a medical anomaly.
 
You were a message. And they were the intended recipients.
 

Thank you so much for reading! 🙏 Your support means the world to me, so if you enjoyed this chapter, please show some love by liking the video and leaving a comment with your thoughts… 🎥💖

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