Chapter Text
When he first receives the part, the Asset does not allot much time to examining it. He’s had many adaptations made to him, most reversed eventually when they do not function as they should. This is no different. In fact, this part is hidden, tucked away under clothes, and creates no obvious distraction during missions. The Asset sees no cause to look for trouble with it when there is none.
He doesn’t give his attention to it until it starts to bleed.
The morning begins in pain. Wrenching from inside the Asset’s own body; a squeezing, throbbing mass of tension erupting low in his stomach. It wakes him, as he opens his eyes a sliver and scans the room and his body. No external threats, no injuries. The pain doubles and the Asset searches out a remedy. He slips his single pillow between his legs and bunches up a threadbare blanket for something to grip onto when the tightness in his core spikes. It’s a decent solution for a while, but, when he adjusts the pillow placement after a few more bouts of cramping, it comes up stained red.
The Asset rises, banging on the door of his cell. This is a malfunction, some error in their application of the new part, which seems to be the source of the blood. The people who work at medical are sure to be angered at this setback, and a punishment for it might loom in the Asset’s future, but a punishment will come even more certainly if he doesn’t inform them something’s wrong. He bangs louder.
“I’m coming, fuckin’ Christ,” a guard says outside the door. His footsteps halt just in front of it. The Asset clenches his legs as more blood dribbles out of him.
“What’s up with it?” a voice calls from down the hall.
“I don’t know, but it’s all worked up. I’ll let you know.”
The guard sighs then, before he unlocks the door.
It should be obvious immediately what’s wrong. The Asset doesn’t need to look to be able to know that the blood has leaked through the light gray cotton of his non-mission pants. The guard takes notice of it as quickly as the Asset had expected.
“Oh,” the guard says as the corners of his lips tip up, “How long has this been going on?”
“From when I woke. Approximately an hour,” the Asset answers. He glances down at the dark spot on his pants and then up to the odd amusement on the guard’s face.
“Look at you. Your first cycle,” the guard hums, and a full grin has bloomed on his face. The Asset’s muscles tighten as he keeps his eyes locked on the him. Cautious, careful, ready for a strike back for this failure when he least expects it. But, the guard chuckles, and the hand that he raises up to the Asset’s cheek is, if anything, affectionate. The urge to rip it from the arm it is attached to brews in the back of the Asset’s mind, nonetheless, but that’s an urge he has become well accustomed to suppressing.
“I’m actively bleeding,” the Asset informs, “I require medical maintenance.”
The guard’s laugh bubbles out of him again.
“You’re being dramatic,” he says, cheeks wrinkling with his smile, “It’s just your time of the month. Chicks do this all the time, no trouble at all.”
The Asset’s brows crease into his forehead despite his best efforts at neutrality. When the guard shoves him towards the door, he goes.
The doctors say he’s menstruating. They say, in a week or two, it can start. The guard smiles more.
“I hope they let me use you first,” he tells the Asset upon depositing him in his cell, and, with that grin, made of teeth and wider than it should be, he shuts the door and locks it.
The Asset bleeds.
For the following four days, the Asset is given a set of thick pads to wear between his legs with instructions to change them out every three to four hours, depending on the amount of blood the part leaks, and is generally left alone. His abdomen and lower back constrict themselves into tight knots some more during the time. But, it’s a peaceful, solitudinous four days with little interaction to deal with; no punishments, no tests, no missions.
Immediately following the end of the bleeding, though, is enough action to make up for the four days he was left to himself.
It starts with doctors and scans, internal and external. Wands pass over his stomach or enter him through the part they made. Every part of it makes him flame with pain. The doctors murmur, sometimes in optimistic tones, sometimes huffy and aggravated, as they look at the black and white images of the Asset’s insides. They send the Asset away after a few hours and call him back the next morning for more of this.
Then the injections come; hCG after his morning training exercises and FSH before he is locked into his quarters for the evening. The Asset has not been directly told these names, but the nurses who have him bend over an exam table, drop his pants, and offer up his asscheek for the needle talk enough for him to garner them. FSH, used to increase follicle production, and hCG, used to bring on ovulation.
His temperature is taken by whatever guard is posted outside his door every morning when he wakes. He’s been going to sleep and waking up for more consecutive days than he’s used to. Something unfamiliar jitters through him with each added hour without a wipe.
Yet another morning of this routine, the Asset knocks on his door, it unlocks, a thermometer is pushed under his tongue, and, a few seconds later, the guard takes it back with a beaming grin.
“It’s ready!” he yells down the hall.
The Asset is still trying to work out what he’s ready for.
A week of cocks, it seems.
They are mostly in the new part, which aches and burns every time it’s entered, even worse then when they use his other hole. They–guards, lab techs, Rumlow and his STRIKE team, one or two who come in suits and must work for HYDRA in business setting–fuck the Asset one at a time at first, but that lasts hardly a few hours.
“Look at how it’s slobbering,” Rumlow says as he lingers fully seated in the new part. In the Asset’s mouth is the cock of STRIKE’s most junior member, “God, I know they told us what we’re here for, but I didn’t think it’d act like such a bitch in heat for real.”
The young agent laughs politely and rolls his hips until he knocks against the back of the Asset’s throat. Rumlow pounds him with all his force at that exact moment and the agent’s cock rams deeper. Salvia pools and drips out from the edges of Asset’s mouth. The young agent runs his fingers through it and spreads it back across the Asset’s stretched lips. The part seeps wetness, too, and it squelches each time Rumlow slams into it.
“Yeah,” the young agent says, more eager now, “It’s pretty desperate, huh?”
Rumlow thrusts before he answers, deeper, deeper, deeper, harder, harder, harder, and the Asset is unsure how to qualify the new sensation.
“It’s a fucking cumslut, is what it is,” Rumlow huffs in a way that means he must be nearing finish, “but that’s okay. That’s fine, you can be a sloppy breeding bitch. I’ll keep you filled up.”
His thrusting stops, hands tightening around the Asset’s hips.
“But, you gotta let me hear how much you want it first.”
The Asset conjures up some moans, whined and whimpery, around the cock in his mouth, and twitches the part around Rumlow. Rumlow empties himself with a groan. The Asset sucks and bobs around the junior agent’s cock until that empties, too.
“Yep,” Rumlow exhales. His sweaty palms land in the middle of the Asset’s back and dig in, “that was definitely a home run.”
The Asset, as he often does, has no idea what Rumlow means.
Commander Pierce delivers the news personally.
It’s after a second cycle of bleeding, injections, temperature tracking, and group fucking. The Asset has just left medical, having given them urine and blood samples, both which made the assembled doctors grin broadly upon testing them.
Now, the commander stands in front of him, in a suit the Asset can discern of being of high quality and loafers shined to glistening, and looks disjunct surrounded by cement flooring and unpainted walls. The Asset wonders if he will sit, and if so, where, considering the only places available are the Asset’s cot and the toilet.
The commander stays standing. He smiles at the Asset the same way the doctors had.
“I think a congratulations would be in order, yes?”
“Please clarify,” the Asset says as shivery tension climbs up his back, “what am I being congratulated for?”
A laugh simmers from the side of the commander’s mouth. He flips open a file.
“Let’s see here, hCG is at 700 mIU/ml, fetal length is 3mm.”
Sweat beads up on the Asset’s neck. He follows the feeling of one drop of it sloping down his back. His skin tingles, from his chest all the way down through his legs. Maybe he should tell Commander Pierce, it might be a malfunction. It’s very possible; he has gone a longer time than usual without a wipe or cryosleep, which can only lead to failure. The only time he has been left longer was a three month mission in Belarus, where he went missing for days after killing two of his own team and letting a target walk unharmed. The punishment for that felt endless, though he can’t remember exactly what was done. Commander Pierce reiterated the importance of obedience after.
The commander closes the folder and smiles yet again as the Asset stares at him.
“You’re five weeks pregnant. Both you and the fetus are in excellent health. We are so proud of this achievement, Soldier.”
The Asset’s stare drops from the commander’s face down to himself. The words make sense but also don’t. He knows them, knows what it means to be pregnant, but doesn’t know what it means for him. He has questions, a number of them, but he asks none; the commander will not want to have to bother answering them. He nods, lips held tightly together, and acknowledges it. He knows now; he is pregnant.
“We’ll be keeping you off-duty, at least for this first pregnancy. We don’t know how durable the fetus is, and there’s no point in risking it for missions STRIKE could surely handle on their own,” Commander Pierce continues. The Asset nods but doesn’t look up. He looks at his stomach. There is a fetus. Somewhere, 3mm, it is in there.
“And, also, no wipes, obviously. There’s no way to do that while keeping the fetus safe, certainly.”
The Asset glances up to the commander, who meets his eyes with a pleased squint.
“I hope you’ll be on your best behavior regardless,” he says.
“Yes, sir,” the Asset answers. His sweat chills. Commander Pierce nods and makes his way to the door.
“Exciting things are happening in the next few months, Soldier!” he calls behind him as he opens it.
Once he has locked the door, the Asset gives himself allowance to curl up on the cot for the time being and persistently think of nothing.
During the first few months of the gestation, the Asset is still being fucked. Mostly by his guards. Sometimes by varying members of STRIKE, when they are just finished with a mission and eager to release the lingering tension. The Asset’s mouth is used by a lab tech once after his nine week scan and examination. There’s ample time for it. He’s not going on missions, or being stored in cyro, and is very rarely in training. Something has to be done with him.
By the time he reaches twelve weeks–hCG at 28,107 mIU/mL, fetal length 6cm, fetal heart rate 125 bpm–however, his sexual use becomes restricted.
“No one gets to touch you like that anymore but me,” Rumlow tells him. The door is locked behind them and the Asset’s pants are at his ankles; Rumlow yanked a guard off him just moments ago, “Nod if you understand this. Only I can fuck you now. You let no one else do it.”
The Asset nods, though the purpose of Rumlow’s command escapes him. He usually prefers the other STRIKE members around when he fucks the Asset.
“Good,” Rumlow sighs. He settles down on the Asset’s cot, undoes his belt, and pulls his pants to his calves. The Asset takes in a breath and holds it for a moment before he walks himself over and kneels between Rumlow’s knees. Rumlow gets a hand on the back of his neck as soon as he does.
“Do you know why only I get you now? Do you know why I get to own all your holes?”
“No,” the Asset states flatly, “Please clarify.”
“Because,” Rumlow hums as his thumb wanders to the Asset’s mouth and yanks it open wider. His other hand trails down to climb up the Asset’s shirt and find the very slightest curve of his abdomen, “you are carrying my kid. You’re mine.”
Heat builds on the Asset’s neck, chest, and cheeks, same as it did upon Pierce’s visit weeks ago. He thinks of Rumlow’s cum filling him. He thinks of it sticking. He thinks of the fetus. He tries not to think of the fetus, when he can.
Rumlow shoves him away and grumbles some curses when the Asset vomits over his fingers and between his feet. It’s more restraint than the Asset had been expecting. He realizes it’s because of the fetus. He vomits again.
Rumlow becomes a regular presence in the Asset’s daily routine. He grows harder to deal with by the day.
Most of that is due to Rumlow's personality. But it’s more than that, too. It’s coming from the Asset himself. Dangerous willfulness is growing in him as quick as the fetus is. His mouth longs to scream. His fists long to hammer against each side of Rumlow’s head. His body longs to be left alone.
His mind … his mind has memories. Very few, fuzzed over and unreal. He doesn’t touch the memories.
He doesn’t do anything to Rumlow, either, because the punishment he’d get for it is sure to be worse than even Rumlow’s company, or even the endless fucking Rumlow subjects him to when he isn’t in medical examinations.
“Say you’re my bitch!” he demands of the Asset. The Asset doesn’t. His back aches from the continued ramming of Rumlow’s hips against his and the fetus alike; it’s large, even at only twenty weeks—fetal length 10 in, fetal weight 12.2 oz—and spends many hours of the day pedaling its stronger than average legs against the nerves along his spine. He lets his head lull onto the ground he rests on with a groan.
Rumlow makes sure to grab a handful of his hair and yank him up.
“Fucking say it!”
“M’your bitch!” the Asset complies, and adds on the lines he knows Rumlow would have asked for next, “I live to be filled with your come, to carry your babies!”
“Yeah,” Rumlow huffs. He pounds in, the part oozes around him, “is that all your good for? Being my baby vessel, that’s all you can do, huh?”
“Yes, yes, I need it,” the Asset hisses. Rumlow moans, his thrusting jittery and rapid.
The Asset ponders the truth of the statement. He has enough access to his own thoughts to say he fears it, becoming nothing more than a place to grow new soldiers. All those who have been involved in his gestation process have referred to it as his ‘first’ pregnancy. He is scared of how many more will follow.
“Fuck, fuck, I-ah, Jesus, I’m almost…” Rumlow pants. His hands shift across the Asset’s body, one landing around his throat, the other on the curve of his stomach. His hip movements stutter then speed up, “Fuck, you’re mine. I knocked you the fuck up. You’re mine, you’re mine, you’re mine, you’re…”
The chant cuts out with Rumlow’s orgasm. The Asset takes the chance to lay his head down again. He gets a full half minute before Rumlow slides out of him and gets a tight hand around his cock.
“Do you want me to play with your clit, cumslut?”
The Asset grits his teeth. Perhaps he does it because his headaches from going too long without a wipe are at their worst today, or that the way he’s positioned has the fetus pushing on his lungs so much that he can barely breathe, or that Rumlow has switched to an aftershave that makes him want to retch. But, against his better judgment, the Asset reaches under himself and rips Rumlow’s hand from his cock.
“Stop,” he growls.
Rumlow corrects his malfeasance by slamming the Asset’s face hard enough into the ground to break his nose.
“You should feel very grateful for your precious cargo, sweetheart,” Rumlow spits, standing up and tugging his pants back on, “because it’s the only thing stopping me from doing anything worse to you.”
The Asset grunts through blood in response.
“We’re done for today. Learn to act like a lady by the time I come back,” Rumlow says. Twisting his face out of view, the Asset sighs in relief.
Rumlow doesn’t come back for nearly a month following the nose breaking. The Asset was clear about who broke it when asked. He wonders if–and also hopes–Rumlow received some sort of punishment for it, considering how much caution there has been surrounding the gestation of the fetus.
Speaking of the fetus, it continues its growth, in both size and strength. Fetal length 14 in, fetal weight 1.8 lbs, and its kicking has broken one of the Asset’s ribs. It took only a week to heal, once set, so the doctors are not overly concerned about dealing with it when it inevitably happens again.
With Rumlow gone, the Asset has large sections of free time to stare at himself and how the fetus has remolded him. His chest has gained some fat, puffy mounds that weigh him down, with sensitive and wide nipples situated in their centers. His stomach has gotten very round, though the doctors say the fetus is only halfway done growing. It's nearly the only part of him that is large now, as much of his muscle mass has been drained by the fetus’s needs. It’s also constantly bruised; when a spot finishes healing, the fetus will simply make a new one. It moves often, especially during the night, so the Asset tries to get his sleep during the day.
He has some more memories during this time. Or, he’s not entirely sure they are memories. They just flashes, things he can hardly hold, that are too faint to be classified as real yet. Bloody knuckles, a woman’s short, curled hair in the same color as his own, an oddly shaped nose on a face it’s too big for, a train.
Maybe they’re not his memories at all, but somehow belong to the fetus.
Thinking of them, though, makes his eyes get wet and his muscles spasm with a restless want to do something, to do it to the people, HYDRA’s people, around him.
He tends to sleep instead.
“Hey babymaker, you miss me?”
The Asset, who had been making the best use of his time alone by drifting between rest and trying to bring his memory-pictures into focus, pushes himself up onto his elbows to get a look at Rumlow leaning against the door.
He doesn’t answer the question and won’t until he’s made to.
“Aw, c’mon, nothing to say to me, babe?” Rumlow frowns. He shakes his head and moves to stand beside the cot. His hand springs forward and the Asset doesn’t bother to fight when it takes hold of his face, blunt fingernails digging into his cheeks.
“Your nose looks fine,” Rumlow scoffs.
“It has healed, yes,” the Asset says. Rumlow and him stare at each other for a moment, a silent battle of wills, before Rumlow drops his hand.
“Okay, well, even if you didn't miss me, I’m sure your cunt must’ve,” he says as he lands a knee on the Asset’s cot, “Pants off.”
The Asset maneuvers around the weight of his stomach to slide his fingers into the waistband of his sweat pants and push them down to his ankles. Rumlow gets them off the rest of the way as he positions himself between the Asset’s legs.
“Did anyone try to fuck your holes while I was gone?” Rumlow asks, bending the Asset’s legs up, and the Asset shakes his head. Rumlow grins, “Okay, good to know that people here have some respect. No one for me to beat up, then.”
He turns his smile and his attention to the part and pushes two of his fingers into it up to the knuckle.
“Oh, look at that. Already a little wet for me,” he hums and starts working them, not too fast to start. The Asset shifts and tries, for what feels like the hundredth time, to classify the feeling of it, “now, don’t get me wrong, I love to fuck your ass. But, I mean, wow. This pussy they made for you really is a wonder.”
The Asset tries to glance down at it, but it’s no use; his stomach has been too big for that for weeks. Even before that, he didn’t often examine the part. Never pressed his fingers into it and jammed them up against that one spot that makes it twitch and drip, like Rumlow does now, speed picking up. On his own, the Asset keeps it hidden under clothes and doesn’t expend any further thought on it than he has to.
Rumlow’s fingers work the part until the Asset’s breath starts to catch and his hands tremble. Rumlow pulls away then and yanks the Asset’s overly stretched shirt up under his armpits
“Oof, the kid’s been doing a number on you,” Rumlow winces as he glides his palm over all the bruises and itchy, raw lines of red that pepper the Asset’s stomach. The Asset shivers with lingering shocks of sensation and grits his teeth. Rumlow rubs his thumb against a circle of yellowing purple right above the Asset’s navel with a pitying smile, “It’s a good sign, I guess. Means he’s gonna be a super-soldier.”
The Asset’s pulse skips a beat.
“He?”
He shouldn’t ask, shouldn’t allow Rumlow to hear all the curiosity and concern in his tone, shouldn’t allow himself to seek this out. The Asset, for reasons he can’t understand, knows he should aspire to know as little as possible about the fetus. But, the question had been out of him before he could stop it.
Rumlow’s eyes brighten.
“Oh! Yeah, I forgot to say. I pulled a few strings and got one of those lab techs to give me your file so I could find out the gender. You’re growing us a little boy, sweetheart.”
The Asset blankens his face and does an exercise he’d learned in training to slow his pulse. He focuses on his breath. Breathe in, hold, breathe out, all in measured seconds. Rumlow’s hand remains on his distended stomach, his legs remain open wide, the fetus–who is a boy–remains inside him.
Eventually, Rumlow’s light slap to his cheek brings the room back into focus.
“Hey. I went through some work to get you that information. You’re the kiddo’s mommy. Can’t you have some sort of reaction?” Rumlow huffs, his brow wrinkling. The Asset stares at him and keeps his jaw clenched so that no more inappropriate questions may escape. Rumlow groans.
“Whatever. I don’t know why I keep expecting you to act like a person. I’m happy we’re having a son, at least,” he grumbles. He leans back to undo his belt and release his cock from his pants, “But I guess a dumb fucktoy like you isn’t capable of caring about its own kid.”
He slicks himself with some of the part’s wetness before he pushes his cock into it with a grunt. The Asset’s head falls down to the cot. He counts the cracks in the ceiling, breathing in, breathing out. The fetus pedals its-his- its legs against various organs as Rumlow fucks into him.
“I’ll be honest. The stomach’s kinda grossing me out,” Rumlow puffs as he yanks the Assest’s shirt back down. The Asset’s count reaches five. Six, seven, you’re growing us a little boy , eight, nine, ten, you’re growing us a little boy . Rumlow grips onto the Asset’s swollen chest and shakes it, “but, goddamn, these adorable little titties, princess. Perfection.”
With his fingers pinching and grabbing at his chest, Rumlow seems content enough to fuck the Asset’s unresponsive body without demands for dirty talk or proof of enjoyment. The Asset is glad for it.
His memory flashes are still weak and unconnected. He can find little meaning in them. But, they have been able to show him one thing. He was, at some point prior to HYDRA, a person. And there is a small chance, if he can leave them, that he can figure out how to become a person again.
The Asset bides his time before making any moves. Rushing it will assure failure and his only deadline is the arrival of the fetus. He spends three more weeks on inaction, on having Rumlow fuck the part in new, painful ways and the doctors conduct exams on the success of the fetus’s gestation. It’s quite, quite large for how far along it is; they are pleased.
It’s on the very first day of the ‘third trimester’–fetal length 17in, fetal weight 4.25 lbs–that the Asset sets his plan into action.
He receives food five times a day; 0600, 1000, 1300, 1600, and 1900. The fetus requires a very high level of nutrients. Every one of these times, the guard bringing the food must open his door. The Asset has heard the footsteps and the voices enough to know that most of the workers on this level take their lunch hour at 1230. It’s simple enough, then, to ram the elbow of the Weapon into the guard’s temple when he comes by with a plate of tilapia and boiled spinach at 1300, grab the gun off the next worker he sees, tossing him into a wall after, and head down the hallway that leads to the elevator.
The truth is, if he is able to escape, the Asset has no idea what he will do next. He doesn’t know where this facility is in the world or where he could possibly go that would offer him help as opposed to violence. He most especially doesn’t know what he will do with the fetus that’s inside him. But, he does know that he will not have it be birthed directly into the hands of HYDRA. He can figure out what he might want to do with it instead later on, but it cannot be born in service of them.
And, if he’s killed during this escape, the fetus will come with him in that, too.
But, it turns out, neither freedom nor death will be allowed to him.
The first tranquilizer dart lands in the center of his back. It does little more than give him nausea and make him turn his gun on the person who shot it.
“No,” he bellows at her, and cocks the gun. She trembles at his voice. She is small and fresh-faced. Maybe he will not have to kill her. He threatens, regardless, “I will kill you. Let me leave.”
“I-I can’t. HYDRA will-”
Whatever HYDRA will do, she doesn’t get to. She shoots her tranquilizer gun again and the Asset dodges it without fuss. He steps closer to her, gun extended. She shakes even worse.
“I will kill you,” he repeats and looks at her, in her eyes, and sees that she is simply a person. Hopes, wishfully, that she will stare back at him and find the last remnants of his own personhood. If not that, that she’ll glance down to his stomach and consider that the fetus might become a person yet. He begs, “Let me leave.”
“I . . . I,” she stumbles and it’s the glimmer of contemplation on her face, in the end, that is the Asset’s downfall. That glimmer gives her enough time to fire a series of darts into his legs, for them to make the Asset’s vision spin, for the gun to fall from his grasp.
The woman cries as his knees give out.
“Oh, you really stepped in it now, sweetheart,” is the first thing the Asset hears upon waking. He blinks and Rumlow comes into focus. He tries to spit in his face, but his mouth is too dry to make enough saliva. Rumlow huffs at him, shaking his head.
“You big, dumb animal,” he tuts, “An escape attempt? While you’re housing my kid? Seriously? God, what the fuck would we have done if he’d been hurt, huh? That’s how I know you’re not a person. A person wouldn’t put their child in danger like that.”
The Asset’s breath goes heavy and hot. He’s going to choke Rumlow, regardless of whatever punishment he’ll get for doing it. He will tighten the Weapon around his throat and squeeze and squeeze and squeeze until that horrible face turns purple and every hint of smugness drips from it. When he tries to raise his arm to do it, though, he finds it bolted down to the exam table he lays on, the material strong enough that even the Weapon can’t break through it.
He growls and hisses and writhes as much as he can with all his limbs held down. He is certain he looks like a feral creature while he does it and hates that Rumlow might be getting any vindication from that.
“Yeah,” Rumlow smirks, “See, babe, when you assault guards and attempt a prison break, there has to be consequences. Now, keeping you locked to this table is not the most ideal way for Junior to grow, of course, so I doubt you’ll be here until you pop. But, you know, two or so weeks should help you understand the error of your ways, I’m sure.”
“No,” the Asset shakes, and his defiance is new and frightening to even him. The words screech from him, “No, no, no, no!”
“Yes,” Rumlow answers, before sighing as he sets his hands on either side of the Asset’s body, “I wish you hadn't tried shit. Really. I can’t fuck you while you’re strapped to a table. And you’ve nearly broken Commander Pierce’s heart with this whole mess.”
“The Commander?” the Asset croaks and feels miserably shameful about all his malfunctioning for a second or two before he tells himself he shouldn’t.
“You can only hope he learns to forgive you some day,” Rumlow chuckles. He leans down to nip the Asset’s earlobe with his teeth and laugh some more when the Asset tries to yank away, “Have a fun next few weeks, my stupid, stupid cumdump. I’ll see you after.”
The Asset is kept on the exam table for exactly twelve days, fourteen hours, and twenty-five minutes. He is permitted one hour each day off it for cleaning himself and using the restroom. The fetus’s required nutrients are supplied via an IV drip and a feeding tube that is threaded through his nose down to his stomach.
The Asset relies quite heavily on his memories during this time. They are strengthening; they have moved from flashes to films. The bloody knuckles are being carefully wrapped in bandaging. The woman with hair like him is smiling as she smokes a cigarette and ruffles someone’s hair. A hand is wiping gray smudges from the oddly shaped nose. The train races through frosted-over mountains.
When the fetus has been gestating for twenty-nine weeks and nine days–fetal length 18in, fetal weight 5.7 pounds–the Asset is escorted back to his cell. A slit has been added to the door. His food is delivered through that from now on.
The Asset goes into labor exactly one week before he is meant to. He’s not surprised; the fetus has grown so large, dominated so much of his body, that he can’t imagine it’s got much room left.
The pain, constricting and clenching, much like he had when he bled, starts up while he’s eating his 0600 meal. He doesn’t inform any staff until his 1000 meal is delivered. It seems, from his point of view, that kneeling beside his cot and digging his face into the pillow every eight or so minutes when the tightness seizes up in his stomach and wraps around to his back, is preferable to calling any staff in, who are sure to poke and prod and offer him not a second of peace. But, at 1000, a platter of food comes through the slit in the door while the Asset is in the middle of one of these pains and the guard becomes irritated with the amount of time it takes the Asset to fetch it.
“What could you possibly be doing in there?” she grumbles. The Asset sighs and places a hand low on his stomach, where the pains are centered. They’re getting worse and coming quicker now.
“I . . . I am in pain,” he admits.
“Pain?” the guard questions, “What type of pain?”
“It’s . . .” the Asset considers how to explain it. He doesn’t have the right words. Maybe this pain has no words for it at all, and can only be felt. But something in the pit of him knows it’s connected to the fetus, “My stomach. The fetus. Something is happening with the fetus.”
“Oh,” the guard mumbles to herself, “it’s in labor.”
She bangs a fist to the door and the Asset sits up straight.
“Don’t eat the food. I have instructions not to have you eat once it starts.”
“Yes,” he responds and pushes the platter away. The guard’s footsteps trail off down the hallway. The Asset sits back on his haunches and runs through his memories as he waits. He can make out the wrinkles around the eyes of the woman with hair like him, smile lines, he thinks, though he doesn’t know how the phrase came to him. Someone is there on the train, big and broad shouldered and blond.
A doctor and a lab tech enter the cell minutes later. The lab tech moves first, shoving up the Asset’s shirt and hooking some sort of belt around the circumference of the his stomach.
“Kneel over the bed,” the doctor commands the Asset and he does so. The lab tech moves in again to tug down the Asset’s pants and the doctor inserts two gloved fingers far up into the part. The Asset sucks in his lips as not to wince. The starts of a pain come on as the doctor spreads his fingers just slightly.
“Hm,” he mutters as he retracts his hand. The Asset muffles a gasp into the cot as the tightness sparks all along his spine, “Only two or three centimeters, about halfway there with effacement. It should be a while still. I’ll come back to check it in two hours and we’ll keep an eye on the fetal monitor. But, I don’t think much will be happening for a bit.”
The Asset slumps down to his knees, his shoulders sagging as the pain concludes. The doctor stands and turns toward the guard.
“Please let me know if it seems seriously distressed. Something might be wrong with the child.”
The pains continue for hours and hours. How many hours, exactly, the Asset couldn’t say, but the staff and the guard monitoring him switch out a few times. Every few of those hours, a doctor comes to put their fingers in the part and state new, increasing amounts of centimeters and effacement. Sometimes, Rumlow is there. Those are the Asset’s least favorite times.
“You know,” he says, stretched across the cot as the Asset grips onto the rails of it and rocks his hips through a wave of powerful constriction that just won’t end, “My mom delivered me in a taxi. Can you believe that? She was waiting for my aunt to get off work to go with her to the hospital, and by the time she did, I was nearly out. My aunt says she didn’t even make a fuss out of it. Just hiked up her skirt and pushed me out right there in the back seat.”
The Asset groans, chin to his chest. Rumlow has been telling him many, many stories.
“Anyway, all that to say that my mom wasn’t even a super soldier, sweetheart. Just a cashier from the South Shore, Chicago who had a kid out of wedlock. So, I gotta say, you’re being a bit dramatic about this whole thing.”
The Asset has no space in his mind to think of a response to that, so he presses his forehead against the Weapon, which is managing to stay cool while the rest of him sweats, and grits his teeth through the conclusion of the pain.
Rumlow lingers around until, amid the Asset’s gasps, an almost violent expulsion of water splashes out of the part.
“Okay, that’s, ah-Jesus, fuck, that is really gross. I can’t-uh, I’ll be back once Brock Jr’s coming out. I gotta-” and, thankfully, Rumlow makes his exit. The Asset sinks down, knees in the puddle of water he has produced, and huffs and winces and cries just as much as he wants through the pain that follows.
Upon the declaration of the part reaching 9cm and full effacement, the doctor there decides it’s time for the Asset to go to medical. The Asset vomits all over his chest.
A nurse changes him into a gown and a lab tech mag-cuffs his hands to a rolling bed. Also, Rumlow is back. Unfortunately.
“They don’t want you to go swinging at anyone if you can’t take the pain,” he explains, tapping at the cuff around the Weapon, “and, also, you’re a bit of flight risk, it seems. So, mag-cuffs.”
The Asset huffs. It doesn’t matter; let them cuff him. Let them shackle every part of his body down flat and gag his mouth. They will take the fetus and use it for their gain no matter what. All he can do now is find his way to the end of these pains; it’s all that he wants.
His legs are not cuffed but strapped into stirrups and hoisted up above him as the doctor puts what feels like an entire hand in the part. That, combined with the pressure that is rolling down his body with the force of a battering ram, has the Asset weeping.
“You’re fine, you’re fine,” Rumlow scoffs.
“You need to push,” the doctor says, “Push into where you feel my fingers.”
The Asset pushes as he’s told, will do whatever they ask of him at this point, as long as this can be over. The pushing shifts something deeper down into his pelvis. The fetus, he realizes. He can feel its entire shape, every curve and dip of its overly large body. His son, his little boy , his mind provides for him, traitorously, and he rejects the notion with a growl. He bears down harder.
“Oh, fuckin’ hell!” Rumlow yells, laughing, “You do not wanna see what is going on between your legs!”
“Use less force,” the doctor huffs, “I don’t want to have to deal with stitching up tearing.”
The doctor continues his instruction for the Asset on when and how to push, always in rhythm with the pains. Time elongates and shortens in varying bursts. At some point, Rumlow’s hands come up to smooth the Asset’s hair away from his face and wipe sweat from his brow. The touches make the Asset want to seize away as much as any of Rumlow’s other touches do.
“C’mon, mama,” Rumlow hums, “The little guy’s almost here.”
The Asset is aware of this; he can feel the fetus pushing heavily on the part, his- its head about to breach it. The doctor’s fingers slip in on each side of the part and stretch it wider. The Asset yelps as if he’s been shocked.
“It’s about to crown,” the doctor says over the outburst, “Sustain this push for as long as possible.”
The Asset sits up and tosses his upper half forward as much as he can while cuffed to the bed. He tucks his chin to chest and puffs long streams of air out of his nose. The searing fire that engulfs the part is too immense to try to counter. There is no fighting it, only getting through it.
The Asset calls up his memories. He splits his attention between bearing down and grasping every detail he can of the woman with the cigarette and the hair like him. He needs her, above all the others.
The area around the part rips; he feels it happen. The woman ruffles someone’s hair again, takes a puff, and sits down in a scraped up chair. The doctor announces that the head is out. There is sound in the memory now, two laughs, one from the woman and one from a child. Rumlow tells him he’s almost there. The child’s voice calls the woman ‘ma’.
The Asset weeps with enough force to shake his entire body. The image of his mother flares bright then fades. The fetus is born.
The cries of it are loud and the Asset feels them in the pit of his chest as they mingle and join with his own. He’s trying to blink through tears, to clear his vision so that he might get a glimpse of the fetus. He won’t be able to hold it, not ever, this he knows; he doubts he’ll ever even touch it. But, maybe, if the doctor or a nurse stands at the right angle, he’ll see its face.
When the room unblurs, the doctor who holds the fetus has his back turned and the Asset gets no glimpse. But , he hopes, but, he still might. He keeps himself balanced on his elbows and arches his neck around as Rumlow leaves his bedside to join the doctor. When Rumlow’s smile drops and his face tightens the moment he sets eyes on the fetus, the Asset’s pulse jack hammers.
“What’s . . . what’s wrong?” he pushes out weakly, as if anyone in the room is listening to him. The doctor’s shoulders hunch and a nurse hovers warily.
“This is . . .” the doctor mumbles, “This didn’t show up in any genetic testing. I don’t . . .”
“What the fuck’s wrong with him?” Rumlow hisses, “Why is he like that?”
“I don’t know,” the doctor seethes back and elbows Rumlow back a few steps. He turns to the nurse and shoves the screaming, wailing fetus her way, “Take it to the nursery. Call Commander Pierce and make him aware of the situation. We’ll do whatever he decides.”
“No,” the Asset whimpers, though he hardly hears it himself. The nurse nods and rushes the fetus off, never once turning the Asset’s direction. Rumlow returns to the side of the bed.
“Rumlow . . .” the Asset stumbles out. Rumlow’s hand is clasped into the bed sheets and, if the Asset quirks his wrist as much as he can, he can run his fingers lightly over its knuckles. He pets gently over Rumlow’s balled up fist, “What happened to-”
“You fucking whore,” Rumlow spits, yanking his hand away, “That is not my kid.”
“Where did they take him,” the Asset weeps as Rumlow glares at him, “Please, just-”
“Fuck this,” Rumlow hisses. He storms off, slamming the double doors to medical open and letting them swing shut.
Only the doctor and the Asset remain in the room. The doctor, who leans heavily against a counter, sighing and shaking his head, eventually turns to the Asset with a crestfallen face, sitting himself down between the Asset’s legs and wordlessly beginning the work of sewing him up.
“What happened to him?” the Asset begs. The doctor doesn’t look up. The Asset sniffles out more tears, “What was wrong?”
The doctor makes more stitches and the Asset winces through them, his heart clambering with need, his breath stuttering with desperation.
“Please, let me see him,” he tries, “I’ll do anything that you ask of me. Please, please I need to-”
“Stop,” the doctor bites, “Stop asking about it.”
The Asset wants to stop. It will be better for him to stop and not give a single one of his thoughts to the fate of the fetus now that it’s left him. But, he had a mother. He basically is a mother, as far as Rumlow has said, and he can’t leave it be.
“Please, just one minute. Anything. I’d do anything. P-please, please, bring him here. Just a minute. Only a minute, please, I need him. I need-I need to-to have-”
The doctor rises with a fire raging on his face. He holds his walkie to his face.
“The Asset is malfunctioning and unstable. I need sedatives for it ASAP.”
The Asset keens. He sobs until he retches. He thrashes until he feels his stitches rip open. He begs and pleads, even if it falls on deaf ears. When he is finally sedated, it’s almost welcome.
Commander Pierce makes another personal visit to the Asset’s cell three days after the birth.
It’s been an odd, uncomfortable three days, to say the least. The Asset is still healing, which is foreign to him considering the speed with which his wounds normally repair themselves. His body aches, especially the part as it bleeds endlessly. The bruises on his stomach may be gone but it’s kept its rotund shape, hardly shrinking. His chest is swollen and leaks. It upsets the guards every time they have to fetch him a new shirt.
His mind is . . . it’s malfunctioning.
“Well,” the commander sighs as he shuts the door behind him, and the Asset can’t help that the tone makes him flush scarlet with shame, “things have not gone exactly as planned.”
“The . . . the fetus had something wrong with it,” the Asset mumbles. The commander nods and, shocking the Asset beyond reason, takes a seat beside him on the cot. The Asset reorganizes himself; spine straight, feet planted on the ground, hands clasped together in his lap.
“Yes,” the commander answers. He glances over at the Asset and the Asset doesn’t breathe as he does, “How are you feeling? After all that?”
The Asset blinks. This encounter is full of nonsensical things.
“I am still bleeding. I have to change my sanitary pad every two to three hours. My chest continues to leak. Lingering contractions in my abdomen have concluded,” he lists, hoping he covered everything. The commander gusts a laugh.
“Alright. But I’m sure you have questions, as well.”
The Asset casts his eyes down, embarrassed that the commander is completely right.
“I’ll permit you to ask them, just this once,” the commander follows up. The Asset flushes again and keeps his mouth closed. The commander’s lips fall into a sad smile.
“The thing that was wrong with the . . . the boy, it was not salvageable. He wouldn’t have been able to serve his purpose, no matter how hard anyone would have tried to help him to do so. We couldn’t have him go through life like that, unfortunately.”
The Asset nods. It is dead, then. He tightens up his face against tears. He cries so easily since the birth, even when there’s nothing to cry about.
“We’re still running tests to determine what caused his issues. But,” the commander stops, his eyes narrowing at the Asset, “I might hazard a guess to say that it will be due in large part to the tranquilizers you required when you tried to escape.”
The Asset gulps as his face burns red hot. He would rather die, right here and now, crumple on the floor of his cell, than be in this moment and have to feel the horrible guilt of knowing what his defiance has wrought. His willfulness has not been done away with, he admits. He thinks of his mother constantly. He still considers escape, though he has no plan for it. He never intended to hurt Commander Pierce, or the fetus, with any of it, though.
“Did your punishment for that malfunction help teach you a lesson?” the commander asks.
“Yes, sir,” the Asset answers, eyes set on his feet.
“Good,” the commander says, “because nothing like that will ever happen again. Yes, Soldier?”
“Yes, sir.”
The commander’s smile returns as he stands from the cot.
“We will let you finish healing from the birth before we prepare for your next mission. Two or three more weeks is the timeline the medical team gave me, I believe. Then we can-”
“I want a wipe,” the Asset interjects. Which is a malfunction. He does not want. But he does . It’s the person bits that are left in him, the ones that have stayed from when he had a mother and friends. His mother. His friends. He hopes, if those people are still alive, they think him dead.
“Excuse me?” the commander says. The Asset battles to make eye contact with him.
“I want to be taken to the Chair and wiped as soon as possible. I need to be wiped.”
He stares up at the commander, as resolute as he can be while doing something like this. Consideration and curiosity plays across the commander’s face.
“Well, Soldier,” he sighs, “I suppose I would agree with that assessment. You are long overdue for a wipe. I still want to wait a few days for you to recover at least somewhat. But, yes, we will wipe you very soon.”
“Thank you,” the Asset trembles out through gritted teeth. Commander Pierce offers him half of a smile before he turns to leave. He stops just at the door.
“I don’t know if I should tell you this, truthfully,” he mumbles, and the Asset’s skin goosebumps, “but I am aware that this pregnancy was a difficult one and you have earned knowing this, at least.”
The Asset heart leaps around all parts of his chest. His boy, his son. This is about him. He can feel it in his bones. He yearns for it, leans into it, will take any scrap of it the commander will give him.
“I was able to see the boy. He had blue eyes,” the commander looks off, almost smiling, “Of course, who knows if that would have stayed. Most babies are born with blue eyes and few keep the color. But, still, he had blue eyes.”
The Asset thinks he should thank the commander for this, but, if he opens his mouth for even one word, a sob will come with it, and he will not have the commander see that.
“I’ll be seeing you again soon, Soldier,” Commander Pierce says and slips away, locking the door before he goes.
The Asset opens his mouth. He sobs.