Poetic Justice (Soft Robotics 2.0)

0.16(epinephrine)

First, the rodent is taped down to a metal board for two hours. Then, the rodent is removed from its restraints and immediately placed in water, forced to sink or swim. Finally, the rodent is forced to inhale diethyl ether until unconscious. This is the single prolonged stress model of research, used to induce trauma and its resulting neurobiological dysfunction. In other research models, a rodent may be held underwater or exposed to its natural predator.

For 61 days, I was kept in a prison cell when I wasn't in use. Each day, I was escorted to the bunker laboratory and forced to work. At night, I was tranquilized to prevent escape. Some days, a gun was pressed to my head. Some days, Rumlow was the one holding it.

The light of the lab around me flickers on and off. I jolt, causing my hand to slip, and IVY shocks me again with her loose wires. I suck the tip of my finger into my mouth and I blink up at Colin, who's standing by the door, next to the light switch. His bag is slung over his shoulder.

"I hate when you ignore me like that," he says.

I'm vaguely aware that he was speaking before he flickered the lights, but I was too lost in thought to register what he was saying. I'm on the cold tile of the lab, bits of IVY scattered around me. I've taken her apart again, even though I just put her together again last night. My knees ache, and my foot has fallen asleep, since I've been sitting on it. I stand up, stretching. My back pops.

"You do the same to me," I say, dusting off the back of my skirt.

"Well, I was trying to tell you I'm going home for the night," he says.

"Oh," I say. I glance at a monitor for the time. 1:37AM. "Yeah, me too. Wait up?"

Colin and I often walk home together, but we don't talk on the way. It's more like we're coincidentally walking in proximity to each other, only because we're both coming from Stark Hall and we live in the same building. Sometimes, during late nights like these, he'll drag his feet with exhaustion, while the darkness will propel me faster. I'll end up so far ahead that I lose sight of him behind me.

There's already distance between us by the time we cross the parking lot. I'm debating with myself on if I should minimize Rumlow's window of opportunity to kill me by taking the shorter way home through parks and secluded side streets, or if I should maximize the potential for witnesses around me by taking the long way through well-lit, busier main streets.

I run my tongue over the smooth crowns that cap six of my molars. I fractured some of them trying to chew open the lock on my chains like a rodent when I was first taken. Another had to be replaced entirely; it was too unstable. Rumlow slammed my face into a wall, knocking a front tooth loose, breaking my nose. Comply and I won't need to do this. I feel like I can taste blood.

I feel watched now. I feel it.

It's a stiffness in my spine, all the way through my shoulders, up to my ears, across my scalp. I slow down to take in my surroundings, but I don't know what I'm looking for. A guy with a gun, I guess. But there's only darkness, with just enough light from the stars and the streetlights to make shadows.

A bird takes flight out of a tree above me. I gasp.

Traumatized rodents experience hyperarousal of the locus coeruleus not only when exposed to stimuli related to their original trauma, but also when exposed to novel stressors. They are likely to exhibit general hyper-reactivity and sensitization, including an increased startle response.

I watch the bird soar off until it disappears into the night. My hand is clasped to my chest. My heart is pounding.

I slip my phone from my bag as I scurry toward the main road. I flip through security feeds, scoping out the rest of my walk home. I've hacked into a couple of residential doorbell cameras, some restaurant security cameras, some traffic cameras, some of my own millimeter wide cameras that I planted on park benches and street signs along my routes. There are no blind spots between my apartment and Stark Hall. I've made sure of it.