B is for Basilisk
Brock Rumlow had been to his fair share of strange and creepy locations whilst working for HYDRA but the Paris catacombs had to be one of the creepiest.
They had been sent to Paris to kill a diplomat. Who he was and what he did to earn HYDRA’s ire Brock did not know or care. It was his job to hunt down the man and point the Winter Soldier at him.
The Winter Soldier had been woken from it’s frozen sleep six days ago. It had been thawed out and wiped as usual and set on the target. They had been hunting this man for the last five days and Brock was beginning to get the Heebie Jeebies. He never liked it when the Soldier wasn’t wiped regularly. The Soldier always began to get a bit unnervingly human if more that two or three days went in between wipes and it had been much more than that. The Soldier was beginning to show things like emotions on it’s previously blank face and every so often something other than the Soldier would look out of those cold blue eyes as they hunted through the dark.
The Soldiers increasing personality was not the only thing to creep Brock out the Paris catacombs was not the most ideal place to spend a better part of a week.
For a start they were cold and they were dark and they were full of bones. Brock might be comfortable with death (some might even say psychopathically so) but piles on piles of bones and skulls of six million people grinning at him was not Brock's idea of a pleasant décor. Fortunately the ossuary was only a small part of the actual catacombs and there were many other tunnels that they could chase the forsaken diplomat.
The darkness did not bother him so much as he was wearing night vision goggles. The burry green vision never failed to give him a headache after extended periods of use but at least he could see. But even with the ability to see it was still pretty creepy being underground and alone except for the company of an increasingly unstable Winter Soldier did not help with his feeling of unease.
The diplomat was apparently very familiar with the catacombs since Brock and the Winter Soldier had only been close to him twice over the last few days. The diplomat seamed to know all of the secret entrances and exits and even the Nazi map that Brock was using to navigate was not the most accurate of maps and only really showed where the Nazi’s had built their secret bunkers during the 2nd World War.
Brock was tired cold and hungry when they finally rounded a corner to find the diplomat twitching and shivering in his death throes. The light from the man's torch is enough to blind him through his night vision goggles and Brock snaps them up so he can actually see. The floor is littered with the bones of small animals and the spiders that seem to fill these God-forsaken tunnels are nowhere in sight.
Brock has enough time to see the body, a small lamp a long deep green line with a snatch of red on the floor, before the Winter Soldier’s black gloved hand slams into his head to cover his eyes.
Brock swears at the attack and brings his gun up. He knew that 5 days was too long between wipes. But before he can shoot the Soldier says “keep your eyes shut” in a low rough voice. Brock has only heard the Soldier speak once or twice mostly to confirm a mission or to tell them that it was ready to comply. To Brock’s knowledge it had never spoke with out first been spoken too.
It shocks him enough that he obeys. He feels the soldier step away, the surprising warmth of his hand removing itself from Brock’s face. He hears some slow steps and then the Soldier pauses. For a moment he wonders what the soldier is doing. He risks a peek. The Soldier’s goggles are also removed and it’s closed eyes are surprisingly human looking without it’s usual goggles.
Brock wonders why the Soldier is moving with his eyes closed. He knows that the Soldier’s senses are almost superhuman but there is no need for him to be stalking a dead man using only it’s hearing. The target is dead.
The Soldier lunges and its metal fist closes around the long green line. With a squeak that Brock will deny he ever made he realises its a snake.
Brock is not overly fond of snakes never has been but he was not expecting to see one in the catacombs of Paris. And escaped pet maybe?
The Winter Soldier has its head clasped in its metal fist. Brock can just see a brilliant scarlet plume on its head. The rest of the snake is green, the same poisonous green of a witches potion (or so Brock imagines) its about four feet long and its withering around the soldier hand hissing and spitting.
“I have never seen a snake like that before” Brock manages to whisper.
“It's a Basilisk” the Soldier says almost to itself. It’s voice is surprisingly soft and brock thinks he picks up the barest hint of an accent under the monotone. There is a sizzling noise and Brock realises that the Soldiers metal hand is starting to smoke in the dim torch light.
“What is going on?” he snaps “What on earth is a Basilisk?”
The Soldier seams to jump and snaps into reporting mode “The King of snakes” its says and it’s voice is once again mercifully flat with a slavic accent. “One look into its eyes will kill you instantly.” The Soldiers fist is starting to sizzle in earnest.
Brock looks from the Soldiers fist to the man on the floor. His face is fixed in horror, the final expression he ever made and Brock decides that he really does not want to meet the creature that caused the diplomats death. The same creature that is apparently corroding the Winter Soldier’s nearly indestructible fist with just its eyes. “How do we kill it?”
That strange look is back in the Soldiers eyes. The look that almost makes it look like a person with emotions and a will of its own is back. “We can’t.” Then it almost looks frustrated “I… I can’t remember.”
Brock allows himself to face palm. The one time the Winter Soldier’s knowledge might be helpful and its stuck behind a mind wipe. Great.
“Spiders flee from it” The soldier says haltingly like the information is being dredged up from its mangled brain. “But the cry of a rooster is fatal to it!” Itss voice is triumphant. “Give me your phone.”
Brock hands him his phone fortunately it's HYDRA issue so it works 20 feet underground and the soldier taps a few buttons and then the phone squawks “Cocka doodle doo!!!”
The snake hisses and twists but the Soldiers fist stops smoking and the snake wrings itself into a knot before going limp like a curtain tie that hasn't been hung up properly. The soldier closes it’s fist and with an ugly squishing noise that Brock would pay money to never hear again turns the snake head to goop.
The Soldier drops the snake to the floor with a wet thump. There is something alive and human in its eyes. Brock almost doesn't see it bolt but he does. The Soldier is gone in a blink of an eye disappearing into the dark.
Brock swears and follows.
They find it two days later wandering through the streets of Paris looking bewildered. When asked where he went he tells them that he was looking for something but when pressed can not remember what.
The Soldier is wiped until it is a drooling wreck and shoved in storage. Brock is promoted to the STRIKE team. The other missions he spends with the winter soldier he sees no remnant of the personality or knowledge that he met underneath Paris. That is until six years later when the Soldier comes back from killing Director Fury and asks who the man on the bridge was.