The meeting beneath the Empire State Building was over.
The red holograms of Hydra's high council faded one by one, leaving only static echoes in the dark chamber.
Dr. Arnim Zola's digital face flickered on the monitor, his synthetic eyes narrowing in frustration.
"So close…" he muttered, staring at the empty chamber. "If only I could unlock the secret behind Vanderbuilt's Modia Units... then Hydra would truly rise again."
For now, he had to wait—and Hydra, as always, was patient.
---
The End of the Meeting
As the holograms vanished, Alexander Pierce straightened his suit and turned toward the remaining shadow on the wall.
"Baron Strucker," he said calmly, "what's the situation with S.H.I.E.L.D.?"
Strucker gave a thin smile. "Fury has been quiet lately. Though he seems obsessed with finding Captain America's body. Foolish sentimentality."
The entire room chuckled darkly. To them, Steve Rogers was a ghost from a bygone age—a relic buried with the Red Skull's failure.
"Let him dig up myths if he wants," Strucker said dismissively. "By the time he finds bones, Hydra will already have new gods."
He raised a gloved hand.
"Hail Hydra."
The others echoed in unison: "Hail Hydra!"
Their projections blinked out, leaving Dr. Zola alone with the glowing serpent sigil that burned like a brand in the shadows.
---
Baron Zemo's Departure
Across the Atlantic, Baron Helmut Zemo leaned back inside his virtual link chamber, the holographic feed fading from his visor. The pod hissed open, flooding the room with cool air.
His castle laboratory, hidden deep in the Bavarian Alps, pulsed with old machinery and new secrets.
"Prepare the aircraft," he ordered his men. "We're going to the Siberian bunker."
The Hydra soldiers around him saluted immediately. Within minutes, a stealth fighter lifted off from Zemo Castle, disappearing into the storm clouds above.
Hours later, the jet descended toward an icy wasteland—a forgotten relic of Nazi engineering buried beneath layers of snow and time.
---
The Siberian Bunker
The massive bunker loomed like a tomb for monsters. Concrete walls, scarred with age, were reinforced by new steel plates bearing the Hydra insignia.
When Zemo entered, the cold hit him like a knife. The Hydra officer stationed there hurried to his side.
"Lord Zemo, welcome. We've kept everything intact as ordered."
"Good," Zemo replied curtly. "Take me to the eighteenth sublevel."
The officer hesitated. "Sir… the eighteenth floor? You're certain?"
Zemo's expression didn't change. "You heard me."
The man saluted, and they descended through the bunker in a transparent elevator, passing floor after floor of grotesque experiments preserved in glass.
Twisted creatures, hybrid beasts, cloned human prototypes—failed attempts to merge man and machine. Their lifeless eyes followed the elevator's light like ghosts demanding recognition.
Zemo stared straight ahead. "Science without purpose breeds abominations," he murmured. "But science with control… breeds destiny."
---
The Eighteenth Level
The elevator stopped with a heavy clunk. Before them stood a gigantic steel door, thick enough to withstand a nuclear blast. The crimson Hydra emblem glared from its center, etched into the metal decades ago.
Zemo stepped forward, entering an encrypted code on the console.
Hydraulic locks hissed. Steam flooded the corridor.
The door opened slowly, releasing a wave of air so cold it burned to breathe.
Inside, frost-covered stasis pods lined the walls—five in total—each containing a motionless human figure.
Zemo's eyes gleamed beneath his mask. "At last," he said softly. "The Winter Program."
---
Legacy of the Winter Program
In the days of the Third Reich, the United States had created Captain America, the perfect soldier born from science and idealism.
But Hydra, driven by envy and ideology, had sought to craft their own weapon—a super soldier without conscience, without doubt.
The Nazis failed. But Hydra endured.
After the fall of the Reich, fragments of Hydra's program were smuggled to the Soviet Union, where they merged with an organization known as the Red House.
There, in the frozen laboratories of Siberia, science became horror.
Human subjects were injected with unstable variants of the super-soldier serum, twisted through chemical conditioning and psychological torture.
The result: a handful of superhuman assassins—the Winter Soldiers.
Each one capable of annihilating an entire strike team, but so unstable that mass production was impossible.
To contain the failures, Hydra froze them.
They would be awakened only when the world required a nightmare.
---
The Resurrection
Zemo and his escort entered the frozen chamber. The light flickered across the stasis pods, illuminating faces long thought dead.
Inside each pod lay a legend of destruction.
"Unseal all five."
The Hydra officer entered a code into the console.
Klaxons blared, red lights flashing. Steam hissed violently as the pods began to thaw.
Hisssss…
The glass panels slid open one by one. Mist poured into the air, revealing five figures standing motionless inside. Their chests rose slowly, breath returning after decades of cold sleep.
Four of them were built like soldiers—strong, scarred, and silent. But the fifth—the one in the center—was unmistakable.
James Buchanan Barnes.
His left arm gleamed silver under the light, engraved with the Hydra insignia. His face was calm, but his eyes… they were empty.
The perfect weapon, preserved in ice.
---
The Red Book
Zemo stepped closer, pulling a small red book from his coat. The cover was worn and cracked, but the Russian words printed across it carried a power stronger than any gun.
He began to read.
"Longing. Rusted. Seventeen. Dawn. Stove. Nine. Kindhearted. Homecoming. One. Freight Car."
The final word echoed through the chamber.
The air changed. Bucky's eyes snapped open—icy blue, filled with killing intent.
He stepped out of the pod slowly, the metal of his arm creaking with each movement. The four other soldiers stirred behind him, their breath forming clouds in the freezing air.
Zemo smiled beneath his mask. "Excellent," he said softly. "Hydra's sword awakens again."
---
The Transformation Chamber
The Hydra technicians rushed to attach cables to the soldiers, connecting them to the control consoles. On nearby screens, brainwave patterns flickered erratically.
One by one, the soldiers convulsed as Zola's neural-conditioning software began to sync their memories.
Images of war, betrayal, and blood flashed across their minds. Their identities erased, replaced by programming and obedience.
Zemo watched calmly as the process completed. "How long will the conditioning last?" he asked.
"Several weeks, sir—perhaps longer with proper reinforcement."
"Then begin reinforcement immediately. I want them at full operational strength within forty-eight hours."
He looked at Bucky, the once-loyal friend of Captain America, now standing lifeless and obedient.
"Soon," Zemo whispered, "the world will remember why Hydra was feared."
---
Hydra's True Purpose
Elsewhere, the communications hub of the bunker flickered to life.
A transmission appeared on Zemo's monitor—Dr. Zola's face, glowing green with static.
"Baron Zemo," the doctor said, "I trust the resurrection was successful."
Zemo nodded. "All five are awake. The Winter Program lives."
"Excellent," Zola replied. "Then proceed with the integration. The new directive files have been uploaded to your system."
"Directive?" Zemo asked.
Zola's grin widened. "Overhaul Protocol—the next phase of our evolution. No longer human. No longer machine. Something… perfect."
The line crackled and died.
Zemo turned to his men. "Prepare the brainwashing suite. We're going to rebuild them—not just soldiers, but living symbols of fear."
"Yes, sir!"
---
Bucky's Silence
As the lights dimmed, Bucky stared forward, his mind a blur of fractured memories—snow, screams, a shield painted red, white, and blue.
A single tear rolled down his cheek before freezing halfway.
Then his expression hardened again, emotion gone.
He raised his head and spoke the only words he remembered:
"Ready to comply."
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