— third mission, first death

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HIMat the young age of nine. Alexander Pierce, the blonde man that Madame B had brought into the Academy, took Arabella to Siberia to train with him. Pierce told her she was going to help him shape the century. He told her the soldier was going to train her to be better.

Turns out she did know him. Arabella remembered him, his face not really, but his arm was engraved on her mind. The metal arm that punched her unconscious, the metal arm that brought her to Hydra, the metal arm that killed the Arabella she was before all of this happened. She didn't remember very well because her memories had been taken away as soon as she stepped inside the Red Room. Although she got glimpses of a dark-haired man with tinted glasses and weird facial hair. She didn't know who he was or why did she keep on seeing him though. The world was just a blurry image to her.

The first week of training was hell. The poor little nine-year-old girl ached all over. The soldier broke her ankle, nose, and dislocated her shoulder. Bruises covered her small body that there were barely any spots that remained their natural pale color. She learned though, and the next week she did better. And so the weeks turned to months and the months turned to years, and Arabella grew into a sharp and skilled asset. Sure, the Red Room trained her well enough to be a formidable spy, but since Pierce took her before her graduation ceremony, she still had a lot to learn. So she learned it in Siberia.

boot-cladded feet. Her tied up hair was soaking wet and her eyes blinked desperately to get the droplets off her lashes. The wet bushes were brushing against kneeled legs as she waited for their target alongside the soldier.

Alexander Pierce had sent them to NEXUS Internet Hub in Oslo, Norway for a sanction and extract mission. No witnesses. Pierce said a man would be there with a little something he wanted, a light Hydra needed to shape the century, of course. The Superior told them this mission wasn't going to go on as smoothly as the previous two missions they had done together because the man was armed. They would have to fight. That's what they were best at anyway.

A car was heard and that was the cue for the soldier to get off the gun's safety and for Arabella to get down the road. A bright red car speed by but was abruptly stopped when a bullet dug itself in a tire. Arabella looked back up at the soldier as the car turned and crashed and nodded at him.

She wasted no time to run up to the car's driver side and shoot at it. However, before she could pull the trigger a light beam came out of the window, shattering it in the process. Arabella managed to dodge it by throwing herself to the side. She leaned against the vehicle and pull out a knife. The target came out of the car with two metal gloves and the one thing Arabella needed from him, an arc reactor. She slashed the knife in the man's left calf, making him bent down a little and stood up as quickly as she could. The target raised an armored hand and the repulsor ignited, ready to fire at the girl. The shoot missed though, because the girl had already climbed up on his back using his wounded calf and wrecked car as impulse. Her legs were wrapped tightly around his shoulders and underarms. Her hand was about to reach out the gun on her thigh but the man threw himself backwards and the girl collided against the car as a result. Her grip on the target loosened and he saw that as an opportunity to grab the girl's arm and pulled her off his back.

Arabella landed not so gracefully on the road. Her lip split as it bumped against the half-mask she was wearing.

"Who are you?" The man asked keeping his repulsors up and on.

She rolled over to the side to avoid being shot and raised her gun, aimed at his shoulder and shot. The man shrieked in pain and his eyes widened as his hand covered his bleeding shoulder.

The soldier stood still, just watching the girl fight fiercely against their target. Pierce had given him the order to just intercede when necessary, when her life was at stake. Not before. So he did just that. He watched as the girl kicked the target and moved back and forth to avoid the light beams.

"Who are you?" The target demanded still applying pressure on his arm. And it wasn't until then that Arabella actually looked at his face and the world seemed to stop. She dropped the gun she had been aiming at him. She narrowed her eyes and took a step forward.

Tinted glasses, black hair and weird facial hair. He was the man she kept on seeing.

The dark-haired man furrowed his brows in confusion as to why the girl who seconds ago was aiming a gun at his head was now approaching him calmly and weaponless. And then he caught a glimpse of her eyes.

Ocean eyes.

He knew that shade. He knew those eyes.

His eyes widened and his mouth opened slightly in shock. It couldn't be. Or could it? Could it be that his presumingly dead daughter was standing in front of him? Was that even possible?

"Belles?"

There was so much emotion and so many feelings in that simple word it was unbelievable. He said it with such tenderness, so longingly, and perplexed. And yet the girl in front of him did nothing but frown.

Belles. It sounded familiar to her just like this man felt familiar. The beach felt familiar too, yet she hadn't been at the beach. Not that she fully remembered anyways.

The man moved merely an inch closer to her, not finding the words to speak to her. The soldier took that as a sign of threat and aimed at the man and without hesitation he shot twice. Somehow the man saw it coming and deflected the bullets with his armored hand and the bullets decided to stop inside the chest of the girl.

Arabella was ten when her heart stopped beating. When the broken pieces of sternum dug in her heart. She fell silently on the floor. All that escaped her pink lips was a gasp. As she collided with the floor the black mask that covered the lower side of her face broke and fell, allowing the girl to take a breath of fresh air.

Tony Stark's world stopped. It just stopped the moment the mask fell of her face. It truly was her. Arabella, his daughter. She was there laying on the floor with a bleeding wound on her chest. His daughter was alive, she had been alive all this goddamned time and he didn't know. Oh, how much she had grown. How much he had missed. His heart ached and his chest felt very tight, glimpses of.tears could be seen in his eyes.

Arabella's hands flew immediately to her now bleeding chest. She heard a loud ring but she could still figured the man, who was already by her side, telling her to stay awake. But how could she? When her head felt dizzy and all she wanted was to sleep.

His hands delicately tried to pull her up to carry her. He didn't got to do so though, the soldier knocked him out.

Once again, time didn't want father and daughter to reunite just yet.

And so Arabella laid on the road with a shattered sternum and a literally broken heart.

So, I hope you liked this one and stick around for more!

Love, Lili