Coming Down ➢ Steve Rogers

thirteen

Chapter Thirteen;

Delaney remembered the first time she had learnt about her power.

She much preferred to think of the time it was broken to her by Natasha and Clint; to think of her parents was almost unbearable.

It had been a few days after she'd been taken to S.H.I.E.L.D., when she'd mostly recovered from the shock of waking up to having all of her memories wiped. It had been Clint who told her what she could do.

It had terrified Delaney. To know she could control the actions and thoughts of a person merely by speaking a few words made her chest constrict and her world spin. It seemed almost immoral, to take over someone like that without giving them a choice. She'd hated it – and that hate, over the years, had never truly gone away. She'd learned how to tolerate her power, to accept it as part of her, but she still didn't like it.

Initially, she'd refused to learn how to use it. But Clint had argued against it. "You're going to have to learn to control it," he'd said. "Otherwise, you could use it without thought. And that could be disastrous."

Delaney had cringed at the thought of a few odd comments that, if her power applied to the words, could end up with horrific consequences.

So she'd agreed. Her practices were quiet, and shared only between Clint, Natasha, and two other agents: Evan Wilde and Cristina Wood. Both were tolerant and patient, and over the course of time Delaney found herself growing closer to both of them. Both were encouraging and grew to trust Delaney more over time, when she made them do nothing more than raise their hands or sing a line of a song.

She mastered control of one person quickly, but controlling multiple people at once – Delaney couldn't do it. She couldn't even get Evan and Cristina to do anything simultaneously. Instead only the person whom she'd focused on first would react to her instruction.

"Maybe," Natasha said, "You can't control more than one person at a time. We'll try this for another few days but if we still don't get a result, we'll conclude you can only affect the actions of one person."

The days passed, and Delaney found that she, as Natasha theorised, she could only control one person at a time. She tried to hide how much of a relief that was for her, but the others appeared to understand that at once.

From that point onward, Delaney had been sent on mission, S.H.I.E.L.D.'s weapon. Hypnosis, she'd been called in code.

She hadn't lost a battle.

+++

Now, after two years, Delaney found Hypnosis rising once again, ready to fling into action.

Her gaze at the Winter Soldier narrowed, and she realised he was holding a grenade launcher. Delaney gasped and grabbed Natasha's hand, yanking her friend to the ground. Steve raised his shield and was hit full on by the bullet. He wasn't injured, but the momentum sent him flying off the bridge.

"Steve!" Delaney screamed, but there was no chance to look back as the sound of rapid gunfire ripped through the air. Delaney gasped and scrambled after Natasha, bent double. Blood pounded in her ears as she sprinted for cover – she found herself heading in the same direction as Sam.

"Lane!" Sam reached out and pulled her behind the car he was using as cover.

Delaney flashed him a grin before her eyes narrowed. "Sam, cover me for a second!"

If Sam gave her an answer, Delaney didn't hear it. She closed her eyes, the sounds of the firefight still ringing in her ears as she got her head into the mind space necessary to use her power. She had discovered early on in her first mission with S.H.I.E.L.D. that if she was panicked, fearful, or just overwhelmed with emotion, she couldn't use her power. To control someone else's mind, she'd discovered, her own needed to be calm. She needed to be in control of herself first, so she could think clearly, and give direct instructions without the noise of an overwhelmed mind.