Fortunes of War

[WOLFGANG VON STRUCKER]

Several Hours After the Battle of HYDRA Island...

It was a mess. It was a complete mess. The Ultron threat was over but HYDRA lost quite a lot in the scuffle. Not only HYDRA Island as a headquarter, but all the tech, manpower, and research they had there. He would not say that they were crippled, though. The manpower was not a big deal, they could always recruit more people to their cause, but the technology research was another thing altogether. They spend so much time, effort, and resources and now they most probably have to start from scratch, all thanks to that fool Stark creating that abomination. Worst of all the Avengers and their silly 'Alliance' now knew the extend of HYDRA's hold and reach. It was one disaster after the other: the lost of their main base, the lost of the facilities and Helicarriers at Boca Caliente, Malick was dead and the woman responsible for it, Romanoff, once again escaped their grip. Would anyone rid him of that damn Fraulein?

Anyone else would have called this the biggest defeat ever... Anyone except Strucker...

The Baron was a strategist above all else and knew that a lost battle did not mean losing the war. Not all was lost. They gained a few advantages from this debacle. Now the lines have been drawn and they have a possible alliance of their own with Loki of Asgard and his Hellfire Club group. Although the Scepter was in his hands... he could become a potential ally of HYDRA, which worked perfectly. Finally the Scepter could be used. As for the Helicarriers... They could always build more and in fact the lost of those Helicarriers at the hand of mutants and superhumans added more fuel to the fire of the Superhuman Registration Act. Strucker knew politics and he knew that there were going to be never-ending hearings in the U.N. and the World Security Council about how unchecked mutants and superhumans were. More than ever the nations of the world would ask for some kind of regulation, because in their eyes these people were getting out of hand. Strucker could count on the peasants to forget that those mutants and superhumans actually saved their pathetic lives and instead would turn on them out of prejudice and fear. That was human nature. Good things were never remembered... bad thing were never forgotten.

It was indeed the age of miracles... and there was nothing more horrifying than a miracle...

The key to being a strategist was to take what seemed like a defeat and turn it into a victory... and he knew exactly how to do just that. The WSC shall pass the Superhuman Registration Act – they had to, after this – and then the Baron would use that as a cover for HYDRA to hunt down all their enemies. As for the 'Alliance', now HYDRA knew who they were. They had their suspicions but at that moment they had confirmation. It was a matter of targeting them one by one until they were all done for. Most importantly, it was time to dismantle SHIELD once and for all. It served its purpose and as 'Robert Armitage', Strucker will convince the World Security Council to tear down the agency into a thousand pieces and replace it with a new one... one completely controlled by HYDRA and with his beloved Kasandra – as 'Nita Strassburg' – at its head. It was time to take full control of A.I.M. and bring Leviathan to their knees as well. Sure, they have been set back a bit, but it gave Strucker time to perhaps change Insight priorities. The gloves were coming off. No longer HYDRA shall operate from the shadows. The secret war has now become an open conflict. This was not a death blow to their plans, just a small setback.

He was elated to learn that Wanda was alright – albeit mixing herself with a group like the Brotherhood – thanks to Loki who apparently had come across her. He wanted his Wanda back. Her brother Pietro... he could rot for all Strucker cared. But the bundle of insanity that was Wanda could still be a very important piece in HYDRA's plans and he had grown very fond of her, package of crazy that she was. Of course, he was not so sure about Kasandra liking that. It was no secret that his Baroness and Wanda... well... did not like each other much, which he could never understood. He could sort of understand why Wanda was not fond of Kasandra – his Baroness and lover was never nice to the mutant – but not why Kasandra was mean to Wanda in the first place. He sighed. That made him realize something: what was with Strucker and unstable women? It was like it was his fate to always be surrounded by unbalanced Frauen. As much as he loved and worshiped his goddess Kasandra, he could not deny that she was not the most stable of people. Then, when he thought that his beloved Baroness was dead, Ophelia came into the picture and that woman was not only mad but also sadistic and treasonous. Wanda. Contessa Valentina. Erika Holstein. Melina Vostokoff. Hell, the woman he hated the most in the whole world, Romanoff, was one step removed from lunatic.

None of that mattered at the moment though. Only one person did...

The doors of the expensive New York penthouse that 'Robert Armitage' shared with his 'assistant' and lover 'Nita Strassburgh' opened and he led Kasandra in. Standing in front of a mirror, he stared at his reflection. He looked like a mess! His always close cropped hair has grown and so has the stubble on his other wise clean shaved face. He looked like a damn peasant! Kasandra too was worst for wear after the battle. He wondered what was going through his beloved's mind. He knew that Kasandra did not have the same patience that he had, so he was certain that she was not taking what happened well. He had a good idea how frustrated and angry Kasandra must have been, but as always, his voice was soothing. “Worry not, mein liebeling.” He spoke into her thoughts. “Although as delicious as it would have been to get Romanoff on a torture rack for you to enjoy yourself, this is not as big of a loss as you might think.” He stood behind her, wrapping his arms around her beautiful waist. “We can always regroup and have a new base of operation... in fact, Castle Strucker could be a nice change of pace. Just like old times. And now we might be closer to our goals than before.” He continued and kissed her neck as he stood behind her. “At the very least, we are still here... and that is all HYDRA needs... you and I in command...”

TAG: KASANDRA WULF
WORDS: 1,161
NOTES:

[KASANDRA WULF]

A SHOT IN THE DARK Here they were again... They had been here in 1945, and again in 2014, with HYDRA, and its followers, standing in ruins. At least, that was how the world saw it, and even Kasandra herself the first time around. There was no one to tell her otherwise, no one who would have wanted to. With her baron out of commission, the she-wolf lost the only safety net she had after Project ROMULUS. The only people left in the aftermath, were the same people who'd wanted her put down for years. Not only was it imperative that she flee Europe like so many others as the Allied forces proceeded to invade, it was imperative that she flee what was left of HYDRA before they could finish what they started as well. The baroness would have had to have been told about their continued existence, that they had gone underground, disappeared in and among the ranks of the S.S.R, using the foundations of the group that eventually became S.H.I.E.L.D to grow another head. HYDRA had only been in its infancy when she'd been 'reborn', as it were, a mere project, an ad hoc group that had been created for a specific purpose. That they had been capable of going into remission, before striking again, like a disease, spreading through the ranks of the intelligence agency, Kass wouldn't have known. Not at the time, not when she had been left so utterly isolated after the war. For fifty years, she'd had absolutely no one but herself to rely upon. And she'd heard nothing, not until she had been inducted into S.H.I.E.L.D, and even then, a month passed before she learned the reality of the situation. HYDRA had been alive and well all that time, and not only that, but her baron had been looking for her, and she'd been recruited into the Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement and Logistics Division for a reason. Just as the former S.S.R had toppled them leading up to the aftermath of the war, HYDRA were to repay them in kind, seizing control of their greatest weapon in the process, with the intention of bringing stability to a world that had grown unstable in their absence. And so followed HYDRA's second ruining, but this time, Kasandra knew how they operated, the equivalent of a phoenix from the ashes. Let the world believe us to be dead, once again, at least that way, they won't be focussing on us. It had worked to their advantage the first time when they took control of S.H.I.E.L.D, and the second time when they secured that control over the intelligence agency. It would work again, Kass told herself, just as she had told herself earlier, when she had been forced to endure the company of Romanoff. HYDRA's first defeat had been a blow, the second had been a knock back, but the third? The she-wolf had become durable enough by now to withstand the third, and see the advantages they had been presented with, and HYDRA didn't even have to do anything! They'd lost, certainly, lost their base, manpower, weaponry, tech, research, but they'd also won. Once again, Stark's lot had proven they were no different from Loki and his army from three years previous, and the people would undoubtedly make their feelings known. This wasn't the doing of some alien army, or the HYDRA controlled Insight, this had been Earth's Mightiest Heroes, only not so heroic. They'd been responsible for Ultron, and if the protectors of the planet couldn't be trusted to defend it, the only way forward was the SHRA at last. They'd all but confirmed it, the Avengers, and the proverbial nail in the coffin. They'd survive, was what Kass had told herself on the island earlier. She'd believed it then, and she believed it now. As far as manpower went, they hadn't lost anyone valuable. Pierce had been valuable, and their most recent batch of recruits was nothing in comparison. In fact, they'd be doing Kasandra a favour if they died. She'd long since grown weary of the constant string of failure each and every one of them presented themselves as. Frankly, she was much better handling matters herself. It was certainly the way she preferred to do things. Fifty years by herself, not including the years she'd spent on the streets after being ostracized by her own family, had been the reason for such an outlook taking root in the first place, and it wasn't likely to change when the only alternative was disappointment. If you want things done right, do them yourself, and they couldn't afford for things to go wrong after Ultron, not now when the opportunity to enforce the registration act lay before them. They didn't have to do anymore pushing, not even nudging at this point. It was all there, prime for them to take advantage of. But that could wait until later... the world needed some time to recover before action could be taken. Kass didn't, but she had other things on her mind, tending to her baron was at the forefront, after they'd managed to escape what was left of HYDRA Island. Another boat ride was not something she was anticipating, but the baroness and her lover couldn't afford to be choosy, and this time, the captain appeared to know what he was doing. Not once, as they made for the New York shore, had the boat run out of fuel, forcing her to swim. This time, everything ran smoothly, and with Ultron no longer posing a threat, she could call in a chopper and arrange for alternative transportation from there. That, she proceeded to do, as the soon as the solid ground greeted the soles of her boots, and it wasn't long before the pair arrived at their penthouse. There, councilman Armitage resided with his assistant, Strassburg. However, Kass had never felt less like that bubbly PA than she had in that moment since the identity had been forged for her, covered in blood as she was. She'd had to cut her way into HYDRA Island at one point, and she could still smell the evidence of that on her face, and feel it as it started to dry and harden within her pores. The smell didn't bother her, but the sight did once she'd caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror. Kass had always been overtly conscious about how she looked, and she looked like an animal in that moment, a sight that briefly perturbed her until she glanced the chocolate brown strands of her hair that had been making themselves apparent as of late, peeking out amongst the raven tendrils. It was getting longer, too, for the first time, since her father died. The she-wolf's hair had been dark, and cropped for so long, there was something about the sight of her original colouring, and style that actually instilled something in her. Maybe it was confidence? She didn't know. She didn't have much experience with that particular trait. 'Worry not, mein liebeling' Kasandra snapped out of her reverie at her baron's voice. The mere sound of it was enough to attract her attention, "Vould it surprise you zu hear, mein liebling, zat I am not vorried?" the she-wolf questioned, as she turned around within his arms, turning to face him, she pressed herself against his chest, "Zis isn't ze first, nor ze second time. I've got vit ze program by now, and know enough zu know zis is just anozer beginning" she pointed out, her claws absentmindedly tracing the fabric of his shirt, fabric that had most certainly seen better days, along with what coated her voluptuous frame. But that was easily dealt with... "Ve can rebuild, like ve've alvays done, time und again. Ve have zat in spades: time" Kass's voice dwindled to a slight whisper, with a hint of a growl, as she slipped her trench coat away from her vinyl shoulders, and allowed it to fall to the ground. She didn't stop there, unclasping the corset bound around her torso so it too fell away, followed by the knee high boots that she stepped out of, the she-wolf's clawed fingers soon reached for her baron's, and brought them to the zipper at her throat, encouraging him to draw it down. words: 1384. tagged: WOLFGANG VON STRUCKER . outfit: here! notes: had to use the template there can be only one mikey! of caution 2.0

[WOLFGANG VON STRUCKER]

Baron Von Strucker was indeed surprised when he heard his beloved Baroness say that she was actually not taking the loss as hard as he thought she would. He smiled in amusement. That was interesting. His Baroness was the love of his life, but he was not as blinded by love as not to admit that she was not very high on patience or resignation. Their relationship was more than just love or carnality... they were truly partners and as partners, they were the Ying and Yang of each other. Strucker was always the calmed and collected mastermind, the one that thought three or four moves ahead in the game. Kasandra was the sword and shield, the tactical operator, the one that carried out their visions with action and decisiveness. That was why Strucker felt they were perfect for each other... each complemented the other. So when he saw her so calmed and collected after the debacle, he felt a surge of pride. She was becoming more than those idiots at Project Romulus thought she would.

Strucker, not even for a second after he met her all those decades ago, doubted his consort's intelligence and brilliance. As he has always said, women came and went but no one could compared to Kasandra Wulf. In his eyes, she was perfection reincarnate, even when the other commanders in HYDRA, before the purge, did not see it. Pierce did... and that was why he survived. Although the Baron did not believe in fate or anything like that, he did admit that finding her already inside SHIELD when they did was a struck of luck. A happy one for him, as he never stopped looking for her, even when common sense told him that she might have been dead. It was as if she was waiting to show herself right at the crucial moment in HYDRA's plan and assure victory for them. And she did. Everyone played their part. All three of them – Pierce, Kasandra and Strucker – moved the pieces perfectly. So that was why this set back was nothing in the eyes of the strategist...

And he was glad his Baroness felt the same way...

“I am proud of you, meine liebling. You are correct, it is not the end but just another beginning in the journey we both took all those decades ago. The only difference...” He played with the brown strands starting to show on her hair and smiled. “...is that this time, neither of us has to run. On the contrary, now more than ever we can be assured of victory.” He explained his thoughts about that: how this would push their plans forward and that the personnel and machinery they lost in HYDRA Island could easily be replaced. “It is a matter now to push things to the breaking point and fortunately... they did it for us. We can basically sit back and enjoy the show.” He finished as she turned around and shed the trench coat that covered her perfect shape. His hand rested on her waist, on that hourglass waist that was just one of the many things that drove him insane with desire for her.

He smiled as he watched her. To him, Kasandra was a lustful woman. At least when the two of them were together. He remembered fondly how Pierce use to complain about the two of them in their meetings. They seemed to not be able to keep their hands off each other. Knowing that she was encouraging him to do it, he unzipped her leather tactical suit slowly. But not all the way down, only just enough to show her pale and silky skin. Softly he ran his finger over it, keeping his bedside eyes on hers. “Quite. We have all the time in the world.” He added and kissed her neck softly, then the section where her neck and her chest met. “I need a bath...” He added, grunting a little. He did indeed. He walked into the penthouse, teasing her, not giving her what she wanted just yet. That was something that, for an outsider, would be very strange. Strucker and Kasandra had their own bedroom games, like teasing each other. It would be strange, considering who these two were. But in private, with each other, they were not the Mastermind and the Tactical Commander... no... they were soulmates and their love was deeper than the deepest sea.

But even in matters of intimacy the two of them were different. Strucker, again, played the chess game. He goaded her, teased her, tried to make her a bit angry with him. Back when he first met her, that was a dangerous proposition, as he was a normal man back then while she was heightened, so at any given time she could hurt him badly unwittingly. Not now though. Ever since the Deathspores, that never became a problem again. Another thing he was grateful for the accident. Even though the Deathpores did have some downsides, like the headaches, it also had upsides... teasing and making Kasandra lustfully hungry was one. He took his shirt off, revealing his deceptively good physique. Strucker was actually quite fit, not a brickhouse like a Thor or a Captain America, but he muscles were quite toned and he had very little body fat. That was because two things: the long lifespan and also because his own body generated the estrogen that helped with body building. It was not as if Strucker exercised... he did not need to. He possessed superhuman strength anyway.

“Möchte ich sie so schlecht” He said in their native tongue but then switched back to his British accented english. “But alas, I suppose it can wait. Look at me, I am a mess. Although, what you think? Should I allow my hair to grow longer?” He said with a lazy smile.

TAG: KASANDRA WULF
WORDS: 1,002
NOTES: Translation: "I want you so bad."

[KASANDRA WULF]

A SHOT IN THE DARK For a third time, HYDRA had been destroyed, but this time, Kass was confident it wouldn't remain that way for long. After three times, she had learned, learned to see opportunities in devastation, and her composure refused to be shaken by this latest turn of events. In fact, she was more disgruntled by her baron unzipping the vinyl suit, stopping at the point before he could strip the fabric away, refusing her in favour of a bath. A dissatisfied pout settled on her bottom lip, as a growl reverberated at the back of her throat, but two could play at that game and she had every intention of repaying him for that. The she-wolf was nothing, if not vengeful, and that extended to her lover as well in such instances. She was the 'hungrier' of the pair, as it were. It seemed that Project ROMULUS hadn't just bestowed her with animalistic features, but an appetite to match as well, both in terms of bloodlust, and carnality. The experiment had left her with a range of traits she had to adapt to. A keen nose, heightened hearing, sharpened eyes. All of them had required a certain level of adaptation. Just being around food, in the vicinity of music, stationed in a lightened room had been a struggle initially. The scents were intoxicating, the music deafening, and the light blinding. She also had to learn to handle things with care, holding them in such a way that she didn't end up cutting herself, or grasping someone in such a way that she didn't end up cutting them. At least she could heal. There was her strength as well, which wasn't much compared to the likes of Thor and Rogers, but when compared to the other HYDRA associates, it could prove harmful. Especially to her baron. Then there was the act of eating, and the amount of times she had bitten herself in those earlier days, be it her tongue or her lip. The cut wasn't the issue, it was the blood, and the scent that tickled her nostrils, which had a tendency to send her into a frenzy back then. Kasandra not only had to learn to adapt to her newfound abilities, she had to learn to curb the urges as well, and that had taken longer than any other facet of the experimentation, especially where swallowing the urge to bite into someone was concerned. The fact that many of HYDRA's past members were a bunch of 'arschgeigen' hadn't helped matters, and they would have been difficult for her to endure even if she was still human, but then there was the pleasures she derived from intimate contact, and those were a whole other matter entirely. To this day, the baroness hadn't succeeded in mastering the kind of control necessary to curb those particular animal urges. The word 'no' was as deafening in her ears as music had been. Her baron might not have said as much, but his actions did, and she didn't like it, not one bit. Indeed, she had every intention of paying him back, but until then, she would satiate her cravings by watching him undress. Not that that particular course of action satiated anything. All it did was whet her appetite even more, so much so she had to force herself to turn and look away, turning her focus in the direction of the bathroom, where she proceeded to fill the large and expansive whirlpool tub. "I don't like long hair" Kass commented, and she didn't, not on men anyway, it made them look like 'hippies'. The she-wolf didn't care for that sort. "Zat vould be more Jane Foster's preference, nein? Unless you vant me like Jane Foster?" she questioned, turning to her baron with a toothy grin. "Swooning over blonde macho men? Fawning over zer biceps?" she playfully asked, not realizing the extent of her own words. What Kasandra had described wasn't Jane Foster, it was Nita Strassburg... "I can do zat" the baroness grinned at him as she rose from the perch she'd assumed on the edge of the bathtub, stepping up to him, her fingers finding the buckle of the belt around his waist, and slowly unfastening it, "I can be like zat. Vat do you vant me zu start vit? Ze swooning? Or ze fawning?" she questioned with a growl, bringing her lips to his neck, and then his shoulder, before they trickled down over his chest, and along the line of his stomach, her fangs scraping the surface of his skin on the way down, as she passed his navel and moved beyond. Her clawed fingers pushed away at the fabric in her path so her hands could move, over his hips and along his thighs, her electric blue eyes staring up at him as she descended, until she was interrupted by the sound of something ringing. As reluctant a Kasandra was to pull away, even telling herself 'he pulled away from me first' didn't help, there was a special place in hell reserved for the sound phones elicited, and she had attend to it for the sake of her ears if nothing else. Even more disgruntled than before, she marched out of the bathroom, and just when she thought her eyes couldn't roll further into the back of her head, she was proven wrong by the sight of Erica Holstein's ID staring up at her. It was probably no more than an update about Boca Caliente, and that could wait. Her clawed fingers grasped the receiver, lifted it and placed it back down again, hanging up. Then, she took the thing off the hook completely, before returning to the bathroom, but she actually managed to restrain herself from approaching her baron right away, and remained in the doorway for a while. The vinyl was still clinging to her skin, and it had to go. Kass' fingers slid under the fabric, and peeled it away from one shoulder to begin with, revealing her breast under the skin-tight apparel, until her arm was free. Then, she turned to the other one, leaving the vinyl to bunch at her waist, before she pushed it down, exposing her legs inch by inch until the cat suit had been completely shed. After that, there was no restraining her, as the she-wolf made to embrace her baron, jumping up into his arms, her legs locking tightly around his waist, her fingers grasping the flesh of his back. Guiding him in the direction of the bath, she found the enamel edging, and her teeth seized his ear, "Oder, wir können überspringen, und nur ficken!" (Or, we can skip, and just fuck!) she growled viciously, only to be interrupted yet again, this time by the sound of a cellular phone, no doubt it was Holstein again... words: 1137. tagged: WOLFGANG VON STRUCKER . outfit: here! notes: nope! there can be only one mikey! of caution 2.0

[WOLFGANG VON STRUCKER]

If anyone knew full well how much of an appetite – carnally or otherwise – his Baroness had, it was him. He was also not unaware of her vindictiveness side either. He had known her for almost eighty years, shared his bed – and every surface in between – with her for decades, have been closer to her than with anyone and it would be a shock if he did not know everything about her... which he believed he did. It went without saying that she knew everything about him as well. In a strange way, her vindictiveness was on some occasions a point of concern to him – she was reckless when blinded by revenge and hatred – but it was also extremely arousing and delicious for him. That was why he pretended to reject the prospect of sex just now... to bring that vindictiveness off her. It made their relationship that much passionate.

He himself was no stranger of vengefulness, but he managed most of the time to curb it and even to let things sly, if conditions and circumstances allowed it. At this moment, the only two people in the Baron's list of painful retribution were Steve Rogers and Natasha Romanoff. One was for what he did seventy years ago, the other for what she has been doing for the last two years. He would have been able to ignore Romanoff, all things considered, if it not for what she did to Kasandra back at the R.A.G.E. Fundraiser and the several raids and attacks against HYDRA's assets. She has become a torn on his side, one he wanted removed swiftly. Rogers... well... his desire for vengeance against the good Captain was a matter of principle, if nothing else.

As for her 'appetite', Strucker would be the first to admit that his did not even compete with hers. Sure, the ROMULUS procedure was part of it, a big part, but Strucker have studied his Baroness, lover and best friend for a very long time and he had realized that she also had that in her even if she had not been experimented on. What ROMULUS did concerning her state of mind was to amplify to extreme levels things she already had before. Many a time, ever since that fateful night when he met her and stopped those idiots soldiers before they put her to death, Strucker had wonder how would it have been if they have met before all the insanity that their lives became. When she was a proper aristocratic lady and him a dashing, regal Prussian military officer. Without ROMULUS or the Deathspores. Many times they both have agreed that they would have married back then, their families after all were the crème de la crème in Prussia and they would have arranged it. But he had no doubt that they would still fall for each other regardless.

Another thing he knew that no one else did about his beloved was that she had a sense of humor about her. It was rare, because it was mostly reserved for him, but it was there. He was reminded of that when she commented about not caring for him letting his hair grow long. He himself did not care for it either. He had left his hair long, like back in the 60s and even in the 80's, as part of a persona. During the 60s, he infiltrated a group of 'counter-culture' activists and even managed to recruit some to HYDRA. In fact, it was in the late 60s-early 70s that he recruited a 'cool cat' named Alexander Pierce. So when she mentioned Jane Foster, Strucker could not help but laugh heartily. “Meine Gott... I have not heard that name in a while. I wonder what had happened to little miss Foster... she was dull as all hell.” Foster, for a while, was a target for Strucker because of her research about the Bifrost, but once he realized it was going nowhere – and realized that she was more boring than looking at paint dry – he stopped any funding he was channeling through SHIELD and the WSC and cut any contact with her. And good riddance, the woman was so plain it was pathetic.

He did remember when Kasandra, impersonating Nita, did just that... fawned and swooned over Thor back at the Fundraiser and he remembered feeling something he had never felt... a bit of jealousy. He was not sure why was that, as he knew that Kasandra was playing a part, just like he did as Robert Armitage with other women. Still, even feeling that, he was amused to see how it was getting to Foster seeing 'her man' getting so much attention from someone as stunning as Kasandra. There was no comparison. Be it as Nita or be it as herself, Kasandra was way more attractive, assertive and stronger than Foster would ever be. And that alone probably caused her to become irritated with his Baroness. It was, indeed, quite amusing... until Romanoff ruined the fun. “Oh I know you can. I have seen you... you seemed to enjoy it quite a lot, when you did it to the Asgardian.” He said with a hint of frustration in his voice... just a tiny hint. He was going to stand up and walk to her when she rose from the edge of the bathtub and stood in front of him before he could do so. So he remained seated and stared at her beautiful electric blue eyes, wondering what she was thinking.

"I can be like zat. Vat do you vant me zu start vit? Ze swooning? Or ze fawning?"

He gave her a winning smile, staring with those bedside eyes of his and tilted his head to the side. “You know me, meine üppigen Kasandra. I approve of everything about you. Surprise me.” He challenged her and he was not disappointed. Everything about his Baroness was a source of pleasure for him. Her caresses, her lips, her skin, her body and even her aggression. It would be hard for people who have not shared a whole life with the same person to understand how connected Kasandra and Strucker were. They have lived for so long and seeing so much, but they were basically the same people they were eighty years before, when they met each other for the first time. It was strange and interesting to see that they have not forgotten, regardless of so much time, where they came from and who they were. His lust for her was as strong as ever have been... and he knew that his Baroness felt the same way. He closed his eyes as he felt her lips and her fangs on his skin and was preparing himself for the onslaught that was coming when the phone of their penthouse rang. He decided that whoever it was could wait... and wait for a very long time if he had any say in the matter... and he did.

But Kasandra did pull away, although he did not feel any frustration or anger about it. After all, he did the same to her moments before and besides, it was just a matter of time and they literally had all the time in the world. So his eyes followed her as she went to the phone. “Perhaps disconnect it, meine liebe. That way it would not bother us.” He said after her and scoffed a little. “Who was it?” He asked as he was greeted by her beautiful form at the doorway. She shed her catsuit, which was almost her second skin... he could not remember when she started wearing that particular type of tactical suit. Not that it matter. It was very fit for her, as it did not hinder her movement or abilities. He wrapped his arms around her as she locked her legs around his waist and he got into to the tub with her. Having super strength indeed had its perks, it was like carrying a feather for the Baron.

He released a satisfied sigh as he felt the water. God knew he needed one after the long time of captivity by Ultron. “Meine Gott! That language, Kasandra!” He pretended to be appalled but was actually laughing at her words when the cellphone interrupted his answer to her question. This time it was a sigh of frustration and he knew, as Kasandra did, who was calling. It had to be Erika, to report what happened at Boca Caliente. He already had a pretty good idea what happened and besides, before they got to the penthouse, he called the WSC and they informed him about the Helicarriers. “Ignore it. In fact...” He stood up and turned the cellphone off. Whatever it was, she could leave a message. He returned back to the tub and kissed Kasandra's neck. “There, much better...”

TAG: KASANDRA WULF
WORDS: 1,490
NOTES: PMed you

[KASANDRA WULF]

A SHOT IN THE DARK There was a time when all Kasandra had thought about was what she lost after the First World War. She'd only been a toddler when it first started, and seven years old by the time it ended, only it didn't end, it never ended. Her family continued to descend, deeper and deeper into destitution. With the end of the war, came the abolition of the monarchical structures of the society she lived in. They stopped being members of the Prussian nobility, and started being simple members of the German upper class, effectively losing their recognition and status. The Marienburgs still commanded the respect their title was owed, but it wasn't quite the same. 'Die kleine Baronin', that was what people used to call her before. The she-wolf had been the only product of her parent's marriage, and the sole heir to her father's barony. The fact that she was a girl didn't pose an issue, and she was raised in accordance with the title she would one day inherit. Manners and etiquette made up the majority of her education, followed by music and dance. As far as physical education went, horse riding was the only activity she pursued. Languages were also key, taking into account the people she would be dealing with. Prussia was surrounded by several countries, Germany, Poland and Russia itself among them. The focus had been on English and German, but she also spoke Polish and Russian. It would surprise some to learn that Kass had been quite the social creature during her days as 'die kleine Baronin', considering how she eventually turned out. She had actually been charming, and actually been witty. They were the hallmark traits of a woman of her standing, and she had to compensate in some way for the fact she had two left feet. She never did quite learn how to dance, which was one of the reasons why she never quite learned the art of swordplay either. Whenever the baroness would dance, her father would let her stand on his feet, but the time eventually came when she grew too big for that, and such attempts usually entailed a flurry of apologies directed at the unfortunate individual, foolish enough to request that she join him on the dance floor. Kasandra had been as quick tempered back then as she was now, but the charming and witty woman she was bred to be was bled out of her during the years of the Great Depression, when Niklaus Von Marienberg died. With the head of the household, and the patriarch of the family dead, the family were left completely destitute. And she'd lost her best friend. The baroness had been extremely close to her father growing up. It was unusual for noble father's to play a part in their daughter's upbringing, but Niklaus had assumed the bulk of Kass'. He'd taught her to dance, and failed. He'd taught her to ride, and had been more successful in that particular venture. He'd taught her how to play the piano too. A huge admirer of Beethoven, he'd instructed her in a range of the composer's piano sonatas. A piano version of Beethoven's Fifth had even been utilized by her as a ringtone... That 'die kleine Baronin' had been Niklaus' sole heir might have played a part, but it was mostly down to Beatrix Von Marienburg, and she and her daughter had never seen eye to eye. There had always been a coldness about the woman, something father tried to reason with daughter was down to a period of mental stress her mother had endured shortly after birthing her. These days, they called it Postnatal Depression, back then, Beatrix would have been simply considered 'neurotic'. The shame played a majority part in her mother never receiving the necessary exposure to treatment options, and because of that they never did bond, so when the woman became the only thing Kass had left, it further isolated her. Just like that, the lavish lifestyle she had grown accustomed to - her home, her lessons, her dresses, her dolls, her horse - was all taken from her. And nothing stung more than the sight of her father's treasured Fortepiano being lifted from the drawing room... After that, she was no longer 'die kleine Baronin', she was simply 'die kleine Dame', and the resulting shock of seeing everything that made her who she was being stripped away broke Kasandra. To this day, the only way she knew to describe it was to compare the episode to an outer body experience. Something had broken inside her, and had the effect of pushing her out in the process. For years, the former baroness felt like she was watching someone else living what was left of her life, and it was someone else. It wasn't the young woman that would talk up a storm at the lavish parties her father would throw, who would try and fail to dance at them, outrun him when they rode through the nearby fields together, or outplay him at teatime. She didn't even look like her anymore... Then, Nikola happened, her name serving as the proof of the adoration the baroness had for her father. The feminine alternative of his name was bestowed upon her daughter, and with her birth, the little girl managed to drag Kasandra Von Marienburg back to the surface. Albeit, briefly. One minute, Nikola was there, and the next, she was gone. Not only had Kass spent years imagining what her life would have been like were it not for the outcome of the war, she wondered what her life would have been like had Nikola been a part of it. For so long, she'd lived in a blur of memories, memories she twisted into fantasies, where Niklaus was still alive, where Nikola was still hers. She'd never quite stopped imagining those scenarios. They simply took on different forms as time went on, and when she met her baron, he became a part of them, intertwined in them. In them, he'd been her husband, but there was nothing exceptionally 'fantastical' about these fantasies, of the life they very easily could have had together. It was what it would have been: normal. They'd attend the theatre, the opera, all the things Kass would have done anyway, had things not gone so horribly wrong. That was what it would have been: mundane. And the baroness would have traded in everything she had now in an instant for that, for that normal, mundane existence, where she was Baroness Von Marienburg and not a HYDRA experiment. For the second time today, her skin was greeted by the sensation of water, only this time, it was a far more pleasing experience. She wasn't swimming in the murky waters of the damned East River, for starters, but sinking into the depths of the bathtub, and with her beloved baron no less. The warmth enveloped her, and as it pooled around her, it scooped up the blood that covered her, and washed it all away. It was a relief, to be free of the blood, the dirt, and recent events at last. So much of Kass' energy was poured into the everyday operations of S.H.I.E.L.D, she couldn't recall the last time she had experienced relief, the tension just seeping out of every muscle, finally leaving her. But she experienced it in that moment, and without the weight it left her carrying, there was a slight spring in her vicious actions, one that took a hold of her in that moment at the mere touch of her baron's lips, grazing her neck. The she-wolf was up in an instant, the water splashing around her. Her clawed fingers grasped the top of the tub, using it to push herself up from the water, before lowering herself into it, sinking down on top of him this time.* words: 1453. tagged: WOLFGANG VON STRUCKER . outfit: here! notes: *check your PMs there can be only one mikey! of caution 2.0

[WOLFGANG VON STRUCKER]

As he turned off his cellphone, so he could not be bothered by Erika Holstein, and returned to his Baroness and to more pleasant endeavors, Strucker could not help but remember his own story. It was in a way similar and yet different from Kasandra's. Although both of them hailed from Prussian Aristocracy, his family was a bit more fortunate than hers. When World War I, or the Great War as it was often called, started he was a just a boy and by the time he could join the Reichsheeres, or the German Army, like so many in his family, the war was over. The Von Struckers were a military family through and through, who were good friends of the Kaiser. Their military lineage extended to the times of the Holy Roman Empire and a Von Strucker had served in every war Prussia had been involved for hundred of years. He was bred to be an officer and a gentleman, always proud of his family's name and its history. It was the natural way of things for them back then.

But unlike many noble families after the banishment of the Kaiser and the abolition of the monarchy, the Von Strucker's actually enjoyed a semi-normal existence, thanks to some savvy business transaction the patriarch of the family did. Sure, they were hit hard by the terms of the Versailles Treaty, as did every citizen of Deutshland. However, they managed to keep Castle Strucker and some inklings of their previous life. His father was a shrew industrialist and he could read the tea leaves. When the inflation of the 1920s hit Germany like a ton of hammers, he was ready for it, converting every single Deutshmark the family had into dollars and hence saving them from the horrors of hyperinflation, when a loaf of bread could cost up to 1 billion Marks in the morning and by evening the price went up to 5 billion. Almost everyone lost everything.

Often during the time he and Kasandra had been together, he had heard her stories about her father and how much she loved him and admired him. For Strucker, it was the opposite. It was his mother who was the guiding light in his life. His father was a severe and brutal man, running the household as if it was a military unit. Strucker was taught everything from swordplay to military tactics when growing up and he was expected to join the Heeres once he was of age. That proved difficult after the Great War, as the Treaty explicitly forbid Germany to have more than 100,000 soldiers and officers in their ranks. So his father had to pull a lot of strings to get his son be enlisted into a cavalry battalion. Unlike many Prussian noble families that abandoned the 'Von' in their names after the fall, those who always served in the military kept it. Famous names like Von Manstein, Von Rundstead, etc. were proud of their military families and their Prussian heritage and the Von Struckers were not an exception. With the Von Strucker penchant for military excellency, he strive, rising through the ranks. When his father died, he took over the family and was successful in running the family business, even when the great depression hit.

And if the lost of the Great War, hyperinflation, the depression and the Versailles Treaty were not disasters enough for the Fatherland... THEY rose to power. The loser little Corporal and his gang of thugs. Like many aristocrats, Strucker despised the Nationalsocialists, which he saw as nothing more than disgusting peasants and bullies, but he was also a pragmatic man. As part of the Heeres, he swore to serve his country but he was also ambitious, so if rising in the army meant pretending to follow those idiots, so be it. He was transferred to the Abwher, the German Military Intelligence agency and befriended its commander, Admiral Canaris. From him Strucker learned that not everyone was mesmerized by the pathetic little Corporal with illusion of grandeur. Still, Strucker continued to do his job and it was during this time that he came across the woman that would always be his bigger failure and the torn on his side, Natasha Romanoff. It was also during this time that he was once again transferred to a secret project, Plan Hydra, a sort of think tank and research section under yet another pathetic little man named Schmidt.

If there was one thing Strucker could thank Schmidt for, though, was that the man who was to become Red Skull wanted to take over the country and hence he plotted against the little Corporal. That was why Schmidt protected Von Strucker when the 'leader' wanted to execute the Baron, all because Strucker gave his word to a group of Allies soldiers and let them leave unharmed after they agreed on a small ceasefire. Strucker was not sadistic, he saw no reason to do harm to those soldiers and more importantly, he gave his word. It would have insulted his proud Prussian military heritage to not keep it. He also gained a lot of hatred from the powers that be when he spared the woman that was now sharing a bath with him. Schmidt in particular hated him for it. Project ROMULUS was to be completely terminated and by Strucker stopping the execution of the last surviving test subject of those experiments, he was defying not only the little Corporal, but Schmidt as well. Still, his work as supervisor of Plan Hydra was indispensable and that was why Schmidt tolerated him. So he spared her and took her under his wing.

It was the beginning of a love affair that had stood the sands of times...

As soon as he returned, he once again let out a sigh of relief. It was good to just relax and wash away the grime that he collected all those days as Ultron's captive. Some other man would have felt shame and anger about being taking captive, but not Strucker. In fact, he being captive by Ultron actually gave him a lot of information about many things, like that Emma Frost woman, Loki, the fact Wanda was alright, and even what was behind Ultron's insanity. The only regret... and it was always the same accursed thing... was that they had Romanoff dead to right and once again the infernal redhead slipped from their fingers. He could only hope she died when Ultron's mines exploded, but he knew he would not be that fortunate. Would anyone rid him of that woman? To hell with her... he focused his attention on his Baroness, who immediately went on the offensive, standing up and then lowering herself down, so her body was close to his. He smiled and his arms wrapped around her waist firmly yet gently. Even though both of them had regeneration and hence that eliminated the need to be too careful with each other, still he was not about to break her bones by hugging her too hard. He had super strength, almost on par with Captain America's, after all. “I suppose we are taking the night off from being the leaders of HYDRA, do we not? I surely can live with that.” He teased with a small smile on his lips and kissed her neck, his arms wrapped around her...

TAG: KASANDRA WULF
WORDS: 1,237
NOTES: PM to Kass

[KASANDRA WULF]

A SHOT IN THE DARK Her breathe immediately caught in her throat, and she shuddered in response to his caresses, trying with all her might to listen to her baron over the din her mind quickly became, but to little avail. Then, when he took her by the face, and brought her lips to his, those feelings of surrender dissipated. Still, Kass was no less reluctant, as she untangled herself from her baron, and pushed herself up and off him. The lack of stability her legs possessed didn’t help matters, and she wobbled slightly the moment her feet flattened beneath her. Shakily, she placed one of them in front of the other as she abandoned the bathroom and fled to the bedroom, perching herself on the end of the bed where she wrapped her arms around her naked body and brought her knees up to act as a chinrest, and just stared across the room, listening as her mind was reduced to a beehive of insecurities. Year after year after year, decade after decade after decade, those insecurities had never subsided, and now, she was one of the few people living that could claim to be over a hundred years old, and there was a reason there were so few. “Zis isn’t natürlich…” Kass mumbled, more to herself than to her baron, as she heard his approach, and glanced at the claws that grasped her knees. “Zese aren’t” she murmured in reference to those very claws, “None of zis is. I shouldn’t even be here, und zer’s a reason why, a reason why so many people aren’t, because it’s not natural. People don’t live zis long. Zey shouldn’t. Not like zis. Not… remembering. Zey forget. It’s human nature. Somezing happens, somezing bad, but zen time passes, und it stops… being bad. Our memories fail us, und zat’s a gut zing, because if ve remembered every little zing so clearly, ve’d go mad” she continued to ramble. “I… can’t forget because of vat zey did zu me. I remember… everyzing after zey found me. It’s not supposed zu be like zat. I should be able zu forget Ophelia… forget Vanda… forget zem all… zat is ze upside of time. Ve may fade… und zings fade vit us… but I can’t… I’m frozen… stuck… like a photograph…” words: 1343. tagged: WOLFGANG VON STRUCKER . outfit: here! notes: nope! there can be only one mikey! of caution 2.0

[WOLFGANG VON STRUCKER]

The Baron and Grand Imperator of HYDRA knew Kasandra almost better than she knew herself... in some aspects at least. He knew to read and recognize the signs whenever she was angry, or frustrated, or sad. That he failed to grasp the most overwhelming feeling of all, jealousy, was interesting. It could have been explained away with something as simple as Strucker's outlook in life. He has never felt jealousy about anything, because all his life he has been able to not only control his own destiny but had been met with nothing but success – except that incident with Romanoff back in the 30s and that explained his immense hatred towards her – so he has never felt inadequate or insecure about anything. He had complete confidence in himself. That made him, unwillingly, a very unfair man where his Baroness was concerned. He had put his beloved woman on a pedestal, considering her perfection without realizing how broken, damaged, and insecure her past experiences had made her. To him, ROMULUS was a blessing and he was quite unjust to think that she thought the same. To him she was perfect, but it was clear that she did not share the same feelings. This was a clear example of being blinded by the love he had to her, because even though he knew most of her story – how she found herself in the street and how she was deemed a failure after the experiments and almost got killed for it – he never stopped to consider how all that affected her on an emotional level.

So when she left the bathroom and sat on their bed, he knew that something was really troubling his beloved Baroness. He wrapped a towel around his waist and walked to her, but just before he started speaking, she began. That was another thing that was not usual from Kasandra: opening up. Oh she opened up to him all the time, but usually it took quite an amount of probing on his part to make her do it. This time, she simply did it on her own, which overjoyed him to no end but at the same time concerned him. If she was so readily to open up, there most be something really troubling her. She needed to unload herself and he was willing to listen to her, as he has always done so. Sitting beside her, he listened and studied not only her face, but her words. He was starting to understand now and he actually scolded himself for not been able to see it sooner. But surely Kasandra had to understand that Ophelia was just HYDRA's business. Sure, they were lovers for a while, but he thought Kasandra was dead. And besides, it was more like solidifying Ophelia as his second in command than anything else. If the other Commanders saw her as his lover, they would be more inclined to respect her. It was a pragmatic and conscious action on his part. Nothing more and nothing else.

Once he got the love of his life back, once Kasandra was back to him, then it was no longer necessary to keep appearances concerning Ophelia. The rightful Second in Command was back and now Ophelia would be a powerful entity in HYDRA, but no longer by his side. That she decided to betray him was neither here or there. Strucker did have fondness for Ophelia – hence why he spared her life after the failed coup – as he had fondness for Wanda Maximoff... but fondness was a far cry from love or desire. He had all he needed or ever wanted with Kasandra and she should have been aware of that. Strucker saw things in black and white: there was love, which he only had for Kasandra, and there was expedience, which was what Ophelia or Valentina or even Erika were. No one would ever replace Kasandra and he was shocked that she even considered the possibility. “No, it is not natural. But I do not care if it is or it is not. The Deathspores are not natural either, and yet, thanks to it we can still be together. We are timeless. Not many could say that.” Strucker actually was grateful that he survived the Deathspores Incident and became, for all intend and purpose, immortal. He had managed to carry out his plans for decades and more importantly... he could share that eternity with his best friend, his greatest love, his Baroness.

The revelation of her feelings of inadequacy because of ROMULUS came as a surprise. As said, he always assumed Kasandra considered the experiments a blessing rather than a curse. Why would she not? It made her perfect. Of course, she was perfect in his eyes, that did not mean everyone would see it the same way... she certainly did not. “Meine leibe... Ophelia is not and never was a source of concern for you. I admit that it was awkward, once you returned to me, but she was just a placeholder until the time for to take your rightful place came. I admit I did have fondness for her, like a good teacher had for a gifted student. As far as Wanda goes, is basically the same. She is important for our plans, she is a gifted yet unstable individual that needs a guiding hand in order for her to fulfill our vision and I do have fondness for her. Fondness. Not lust or love or desire. You do not need to feel as if you are competing with her. There is no competition... you already won the game.” He said and caressed her wet dark hair tenderly. This was all knew to him. Sure, he had soothed Kasandra plenty of times whenever she got one of her fits of rage, but never like this. “Kasandra... why would I ever replace you? It would be like cutting my right arm and throw it in the fire.” He leaned over and kissed her brow, wrapping his arm around her shoulder and embracing her.

TAG:KASANDRA WULF
WORDS: 1,023
NOTES:

[KASANDRA WULF]

A SHOT IN THE DARK ‘Zis isn’t natürlich…’ Kasandra had pointed out, speaking from the experience of one hundred and three years (having forgotten that she turned one hundred and four last year), remembering seventy-two of those with crystal clear clarity, and Nikola. Always, she remembered Nikola, and unfortunately, everything that happened surrounding her too. She remembered the shameful nine months she’d spent carrying her, and the agony of birthing her, but before any relief could be had afterwards, fear took its place. And she was alone. Her previous lifestyle had done nothing to help her during the years she’d wandered the streets of Marienburg, but her desire to escape had. The former baroness had relied on nothing but ‘favours’, and they kept her going until typhus and then HYDRA found her. Kass had often considered what would happen if that cure, the one her baron had been working on, the one she searched for in the years that followed, was administered to her. Would her claws and fangs simply fall off? Would her heightened senses dissipate? Would her cells stop regenerating? And if so, would she pick up where she left off? Would she start dying all over again? Or, would her body simply rush to catch up with time? Would she start aging again? She’d spent so many years alone by the time she’d launched her own search for a cure, the she-wolf honestly didn’t care either way, if she died as she should have done in the streets, or if she aged as she should have done by that point. She wasn’t as strong emotionally as she was physically, and she wasn’t keen to admit that without her baron, there was no reason for her to… be anymore. If she died, she died, so be it, she should have died years previous. But then he resurfaced, and life started for them again, as if they had never been apart, and all desire for a cure vanished. The vial had been there, before her eyes, within her reach, her baron stretching it out to her. And what had she done? Kasandra took it in her clawed hand, and she’d shattered it. However, that didn’t necessarily mean she’d grown comfortable with what ROMULUS had done to her. While she had grown accustomed to her enhancements, those claws and those fangs had never sat well with her. Never, in seventy odd years. A suppressant had been manufactured for her so that she could disguise them, with her reliance on the substance serving as the greatest indicator of how she felt about them. Now, her mind was being added to that list, and the memories that remained logged there decades later, exacerbating the insecurities she felt to this day. ‘Age’ afforded a certain level of acceptance, creating a bedrock of security over time, but ‘age’ had never visited itself upon Kass, and because of that she was stuck. She was trapped in a whirlpool of everything she felt, whirring around her, but the maelstrom never subsided, it only got worse. And it had reached a pinnacle of worse now, to the point that she ended up emotionally as opposed to physically unravelling before her baron’s eyes. For years, she’d kept it to herself, put her feelings for the likes of Ophelia, and then the likes of Wanda in a bottle, and shoved a cork in it. But as those years passed by, the glass began to crack under the pressure, and the cork started to work its way out, before it reached breaking point. And ‘breaking point’ was now, as she drew ever closer to revealing the truth of what had happened, and why it was HYDRA had found her on the streets of Marienburg, when she could (and should) have been anywhere else. “You did vit her vat you did vit me” Kasandra pointed out in response to his comments regarding Ophelia, and how she had never been a source of concern, when in fact, the woman was the baroness, several years later. “Und ve all know vat happened zer” not to mention, her baron had thought her dead, which meant he had even more reason to move on, and move on he had done. A placeholder? That wasn’t something she could see the woman as, no matter how much he stroked her hair, no matter how many kisses he planted on her brow, or how tightly he held her in his arms, not knowing the facts as they were. As far as Strucker was concerned, she was gone, and with her gone, there was a vacancy that needed to be filled, and that woman had filled it. And she could fill it again, a fact Kass was aware of, even if she wasn’t aware of everything she was doing that could bring it to fruition, as the grip she struggled to maintain on her mind slackened more and more. “You never asked me why…” the she-wolf of HYDRA mumbled, “In all ze years ve’ve known each ozer, you never asked why zey found me on ze street, knowing who I vas, where I came from… of all ze places… ‘destitution’, I suppose, vas your reasoning, und it suited me zu have you believe zat. I vas hardly alone in zat. None of us ver” she continued to mumble, and despite the embrace he held her in, she continued to stare across the room, and stare into the past. “Enough had already happened ven ve met, und enough happened after. I vish I could tell you it vas zem I couldn’t trust, but it vasn’t zem. I didn’t give a shit about zem. ‘Zem’ I could kill, and kill vithout batting an eye if it meant keeping zat information from falling inzu ze wrong hands. I… couldn’t do zat zu you. Neun months is a long time zu spend feeling… ashamed. It hangs like a cloud; und it never quite dissipates. It never did in my case, not really, und vat little did vas replaced, und replaced by fear. Zen time passed, und… ze more zat passed, und passed vit you, ze more I didn’t vant zu be vithout you. I couldn’t take ze risk. I couldn’t tell you… anyzing. I tried zu endure like meine Mutter alvays told me zu… but she vas never gut at zat” Kasandra had gone beyond mumbling, to rambling now. “She barely did ver mein Vater vas concerned, but vit him, she had a nice life, und zat life compensated for his mistakes. Zer vas no compensation for ze one, und only mistake I ever made, und just like zat, I vas alone… I couldn’t risk making a mistake, und being alone again, being vithout you. You understand, ja?” Kass questioned, finally turning her head to look up at him, her electric blue eyes doing something they’d never done before, pleading with him. words: 1144. tagged: WOLFGANG VON STRUCKER . outfit: here! notes: nope! there can be only one mikey! of caution 2.0

[WOLFGANG VON STRUCKER]

“You did vit her vat you did vit me. Und ve all know vat happened zer”

To deny that would have been completely dishonest of him and if there was one thing the Baron never was, it was being dishonest to Kasandra. He respected his Baroness way too much to try and lie or misguide her in anyway, shape, or form. He could be duplicitous with enemies and even allies in order to achieve goals, but all that stopped at Kasandra's door. Other, yes... not her. But he also never hid from her the fact that he was always looking for assets that could further aid their cause, the cause of HYDRA. Back in the day when he first met Kasandra, he saw potential in her, just as later he saw potential in Ophelia, in Wanda and others. But what happened after that was completely different. With Kasandra it was destiny, as he many times expressed. What began as him polishing a new asset turned into love and after that he was not looking back. Ophelia, though, was really him polishing an asset and not a replacement of Kasandra, even though he thought his Baroness was dead, he still had in the back of his mind the possibility that she might be found... and he did. So he was being honest when he said that Ophelia was a placeholder because against all odds he still believed that the true heart and soul of HYDRA – Kasandra – would come back to him.

Strucker was genuinely concerned from what he was seeing from Kasandra on this night. It was not unusual for him to sooth his Baroness after a defeat or a situation, but mainly it was to rein in her anger or temperament. Never has he seen her so emotionally vulnerable as he was seeing her now and it worried him, although he did not show that worry on his facial expression. The Baron was cool and collected, as always, listening to her because he realized that was what she needed... to be listened to. That his beloved woman has always had a chip on her shoulder he knew. She had to literally scratch and claw her way through the leadership of HYDRA, who never fully accepted her and with Strucker having to exert his power to force that leadership to take her seriously. That all change, of course, after the purge on their ranks and now Kasandra had the same authority as Strucker did, but it was not like that in the beginning, when she returned. He did wonder, though, why has Kasandra never expressed these feelings to him before? Why did she feel the need to bottle them up inside for so long – it seemed to him this was not a one-off, this has been building for years – and not feel comfortable in talking to him about it before?

He could understand her feelings concerning Ophelia, as erroneous as they might have been. She saw her as a rival and Ophelia was, in a real sense... but not for Strucker's affection. The only thing Ophelia rivaled Kasandra was in power inside the organization. Ophelia was the darling of the Council of Commanders – no doubt that the fact she slept with several of them to gain that influence was a major factor in it – and even if... even if... Strucker and Pierce would not have found Kasandra, the Baron was already planning to cut some of Ophelia's influence in the organization. Not because she slept with the commanders... Strucker could not care less about that... but rather because of exactly what happened later, once Kasandra returned. Ophelia would have rebelled whether Kasandra was back or not, but his Baroness returning was just the excuse Ophelia needed.

Most of the Commanders were behind Ophelia most probably because they were not ready to accept Kasandra... but if not, they would have been behind her because she charmed them against Strucker regardless. Once Kasandra returned, Strucker saw a chance to cut Ophelia off the knees without losing her as an asset, by placing Kasandra where she belonged as his second in command and keeping Ophelia on a short leash. His Baroness' return forced the Commanders' and Ophelia's hand, though. Ironically, it was Pierce's support of Ophelia the catalyst that emboldened her to make her move, only to see Pierce switch sides and it gave Strucker and Kasandra all the excuse they needed to purge HYDRA of the rebellious Commanders in one big swoop. And still, he would have pardoned Ophelia, not because some romantic entanglement with the Hungarian woman – he did not have such a thing... Kasandra was all he ever wanted – but rather because, again, he was not in the habit to waste good assets. The same could also be said about Wanda. She was an asset and although he was fond of her, it was nowhere near what Kasandra thought.

He returned from his reveries as she began to speak about something Strucker was not sure he understood fully. Kasandra was a woman of very few words, but oh she was talking up a storm on that night, which was both interesting and unnerving for the Grand Imperator. It was clear for the brilliant Prussian aristocrat that his Baroness had something she have been hiding from him for a long time, but as he listened to her, he could not quite put a finger on what this 'secret' was. It also seemed to him that whatever it was, it happened before they met on that faithful night in Bavaria. Was she talking about ROMULUS? He did not think so, he knew everything there was to know about what they did to her. Her past as a destitute aristocrat? He had some idea of what she went through, her story would not have been too different from the story of many families back in the days after the fall of the Kaiser and the time of the Weimar Republic. He even knew about her selling herself to survive and he never judged her for that. End justifies the means. Whatever she did prior of meeting him was not a problem with him. He was no saint either... not by a longshot.

Neun months is a long time zu spend feeling… ashamed.

He narrowed his eyes, but not out of anger... but rather curiosity and concern. Was she saying what he thought she was saying? If she was, he made some calculations. Whenever it happened, it would have been before Project ROMULUS took hold of her and experimented. After the experiments it was impossible for Kasandra to get pregnant, because her regeneration abilities would have probably affect the term. He was not sure, because he had never thought about it, but he was pretty certain it happened prior to the experiments. He found her right after the experiment was deemed a failure and she was not pregnant back then. Also, knowing that disgusting Schmidt, he would not have sanctioned the experiments if she was pregnant, because it would have conflict with results. One thing was clear, though. She believed that telling him would have caused him to turn her away, which was yet another error on her part. He would not have... he never would.

He again embraced her, trying to sooth her fears as he always has done, but as with always about him, he spoke in that reasonable, cool and calculated voice of his. “You made two mistakes then, Kasandra. First, ever thinking I would judge you or send you away. I told you all those decades ago that you and I... we were on this until the end of time. Nothing, not even you betraying me, would have changed that.” He said and then kissed her again before continuing. “Second mistake... not telling me. You have been carrying this burden for so long and the fact that you did not trust me to tell me what was on your mind is a bit hurtful. You are my everything, meine liebe, and you thinking I would be capable of being one of those who would have hurt you is disturbing.” He said but not in a scolding tone at all, but rather in a very calmed voice. “Whatever happened before you met me, happened before you met me. It does not change anything between us. Make it better now... tell me everything.”

TAG: KASANDRA WULF
WORDS: 1453
NOTES:

[KASANDRA WULF]

A SHOT IN THE DARK Kasandra had never earned anything in her life. Not really. She had no other choice but to acknowledge that during the years she’d spent on the streets, struggling to survive. Since the end of the war, her whole life had been a struggle, and when she was eventually found by Project HYDRA, the struggle continued. With them, the baroness found herself in the unique position of having to endear herself to people, something she’d never had to do as a child growing up, when people either respected her or they didn’t. There were few that didn’t. Her status commanded respect, and while the aftermath of the war had stripped her of that, their wealth saw to it that they maintained that respect, until that too was stripped from them. She never quite learned what it was, to have to get people to like her, and she’d never really tried after Project HYDRA had taken her in either, but in her defence, neither had they. They’d hated her on sight, viewing her as nothing short of a failed experiment, and one that could pose a risk at some point, and should be put down before that became a reality. That was probably about the only thing they did agree upon, Kass and the people that made up Project HYDRA, and that enmity was carried forward into the twentieth century, decades after she had first been recruited into their ranks. She’d entered being hated by them, she’d left being hated by them, in fact, she had to leave once the war had ended, in case they acted upon that hatred. Then, she returned, and surprise surprise, she was still hated by them. But Sarkissian hadn’t been, it might have been a mystery to the baroness if she didn’t have a fair idea what tricks that woman carried up her sleeve. She was just as much an unnatural product of an unnatural experiment as she was, and just as like to kill someone as they all feared the she-wolf would. Years spent worrying that she would tear them limb from limb, and the assault she’d carried out was no different from something any human would do. Her fangs weren’t required, nor her claws, not even her strength, though her senses did come in handy. Bullets was what did it in the end, shot from the very guns her baron had trained her to use, and that was when the enmity ended, and it required no more than two trigger happy fingers. ‘Fear’ was what ultimately did it, and in one effortless swoop, she’d finally earned something, as opposed to having it handed to her on a silver platter. The barony of Marienburg had been precisely that, waiting for her until she was old enough to seize it, and in the meantime, she could enjoy the wealth and luxury she had been born into until she came of age. Some might have said she was fortunate in that respect, to be a girl, and sole heir to her father’s title and lands and the wealth that accompanied it, and maybe she was. She’d never given it much consideration, predominantly because she’d never heard her father claim it to be the case. He seemed content with the notion of his barony falling into the hands of his daughter, and seemed to know that it would be secure in her possession, and she certainly had no intention of letting any husband seize control of it, and take it from her. It was hers, and hers alone. Until it wasn’t, first, the war proceeded to rob them of the barony of Marienburg, and then, the Depression came to take the rest. It started with their wealth, before making its way to Niklaus, and after carrying him away with the tide, his family were left stranded. The Marienburgs, or the Wulfs, the identity that they were forced to assume, had been left devastated by the economic crisis. One minute they had everything, but in the next they had nothing. Beatrix had hated her husband for what he had done, and she had made no bones about it either. If she was capable of scaling the building to reach the rooftop of their home, she would have shouted it from there, lambasting the man who had left them, and left them to pick up the pieces. But she couldn’t, and so, she scorned him for everyone else to hear, and to the remaining members of the family that took them in. Kass had listened to it, but she didn’t quite understand what any of it meant. She’d only been a child, and struggled to comprehend that her beloved ‘Vati’ had died of his own volition. Neither someone, nor something, had taken him from her, he’d simply left. Even when she was older, Kasandra couldn’t wrap her head around it, and as far as she was concerned, they were responsible. By ‘they’, the baroness meant the Allied Forces that had brought defeat to their country, after which, an economic downturn followed in the wake of that loss. They had taken everything from them. They had killed her father. No one else. Just as her mother blamed Niklaus, and hated him for the conditions he’d left them in, the she-wolf blamed the Americans and the English, and she hated them. To this day, she still did, and in her earlier months residing in the so-called ‘Land of the Free’, her resentment for them had distracted her from the fact she was alone. Numerous times, she’d considered returning to Europe, but out of fear that there remained sects of Project HYDRA, still intent on killing her, she never had done. By now, she’d gotten used to it, and as much as she hated to admit it, more of her life had been spent in the States than had been spent back home. Fortunately, she’d retained her accent, not that it was difficult, especially when she didn’t mingle with them. They were gone now, though, it seemed to suddenly occur to her, and she realized she could go back home. In that moment, it seemed like the perfect solution to everything, to her feelings concerning Ophelia, and Wanda. If she could just go back home with her baron, spend some time there with him, they could go back to a time and a place when neither of those women existed, and it would fix everything. For a moment, Kass allowed herself that ideal notion, but it wasn’t long before it was shattered, and shattered by her baron’s voice, in particular, when he commented on the fact she’d hurt him by not telling him the truth. The baroness simply had to tell him now. “I named her Nikola, after mein Vater. It vas all I could do. Meine Mutter had arranged for her zu be taken inzu a foundling hospital, I zink. She never told me, und I didn’t have ze chance zu ask. Zat vas why… why zey found me on ze streets. Nikola left a… stain on vat vas left of our family’s reputation, und so I couldn’t keep her, und neither could meine Mutter keep me, so…” the she-wolf took a deep breath before continuing. “Zat vas why… why zey found me. Mutter didn’t even give me a chance zu change my clothes after. She didn’t even allow me zat much… zu have zat little bit of dignity back after neun months… but she did grant me one, single reprieve. She kept Nikola’s name ven she handed her over, und zat allowed me zu find her, meine Tochter, after vat happened zu you. Zer had been so much destruction during ze var, I feared she hadn’t survived it, but… she did. Zey’d evacuated ze children zu Austria, so I thought ze best place zu look would be zer, and zer she was, but… zen I had to leave her zer. I don’t know… if she’s still zer… still in Austria… if she is even alive anymore… she’d be eighty-three now… as of February… she vas born on the twelfth… I remember… she could still be alive, couldn’t she? Eighty-three is not old, not by ze standards of zis time. She could still be alive, und have a life of her own now?” Kasandra had never really thought about Nikola as far as the present with. The image she had in her head of her daughter, that little blue eyed and blonde haired girl, had been frozen in time, much the same as herself. Only now did she consider the prospect of her having aged, of her being older, of her having led a life, maybe even having a family of her own… Kass hadn’t considered any of it, but she was considering it now, considering the possibility of her being alive, but would she be traceable? words: 1476. tagged: WOLFGANG VON STRUCKER . outfit: here! notes: nope! there can be only one mikey! of caution 2.0

[WOLFGANG VON STRUCKER]

He lifted his baroness up and placed her naked form on his lap, his arm wrapping gently around her waist and softly guiding her head to rest on his chest and shoulder as she began to tell him her secret. He listened attentively, absorbing every word she uttered. This part of her story, which he was hearing for the first time, was still familiar to him. It was the story of a society that lived by the code of their status. Aristocrats cared more about the perception of reality than about reality itself. A young aristocratic woman becoming pregnant out of wedlock was one of the biggest sins back then and it was a bit amusing to Strucker that, after almost a hundred years of human history, there were still traces of those antiquated views now. The more things changed the more they remained the same. So listening to his Baroness say that her own mother threw her to the wolves was not a shock... it was how things were done back then. Of course, not everyone was like that, but he could understand that the Von Marienburgs, already fallen from grace, would have been extremely careful to avoid yet another stain on what was a rapidly descending reputation.

Society back then, at the turn of the twentieth century, was full of double standards. A man that had lovers and cheated was forgiven and sometimes even justified. His own father himself encouraged him to go get 'conquests' under his belt. That was how it was. Strucker was sure that the man who had a relation with Kasandra suffered no stigma for sleeping around out of wedlock. So the blame, as always, fell on the woman. And in this case, the woman Strucker loved more than life itself. In those times, the woman was the vixen, she was the guilty party, she seduced the poor, defenseless man, etc. Both Kasandra and Strucker, who were products of that time and place in human history, knew how the game was played: A woman was not an individual, she was an asset for the family to marry off for political or financial gain. In the eyes of her mother – Strucker knew how much Kasandra loved her father – Kasandra ruined that delicate social arrangement by becoming what it is now called 'damage goods'. To her mother, his Baroness ruined the only chance for the Von Marienburgs to gain some prestige back, or so was how her mother saw it. It disgusted Strucker, but not for the reasons some might think. He knew that was the way of the world back then, but what angered him was that it was done to HIS Kasandra, to his Baroness and lover.

Back then, Strucker did not really give a thought about how society and the rules of Aristocracy worked, so focused and driven he was concerning his military career and his ambitions. Although, as pointed out, he dated 'well-bred' women, like actresses during his short career as an actor and even the rumors concerning him and Leni Riefenstahl, he was not looking for any entanglement. He was driven by one desire... to bring the Prussian elite back into power. One thing was certain, though. He was not too keen on being coupled with someone as a form of political or financial arrangement. He was sure that if his father were to be alive by the time he met Kasandra, he would not have approved of her, not that Strucker would have cared if he did or not. The Baron cared nothing that man thought of him. Besides, not many during those days and later when he found her again approved of her and look at what happened to them. Pierce was smart to not cross Strucker and Kasandra about their relationship, that was as clear as day. His mother, however, would have been more understanding, as she was not the atypical aristocrat. She knew how it was to suffer under a marriage that she did not wish to have. In fact, there were rumbles, before the fall of the Kaiser and the rise of the Weimar Republic, of a possible pairing of House Marienburg and House Strucker. Already an aunt of his was married to a Marienburg and the chances were the Marienburgs would have sought an opportunity to match Kasandra and Strucker. So the way he saw it, them being together for all this time was destiny.

So it seemed that when she thought he was dead, she tried to reunite with her daughter. In a way Strucker was sad that she did not have the resources she had now thanks to HYDRA back then, it would have been easy with their vast network to find this Nikola. It also saddened him that if she would have told him sooner, when they lived at Strucker Castle after he met her, he could have used the resources of Plan Hydra back then. They could have had a very good chance to find her. But she decided to keep the secret and have been carrying that burden ever since. Of course, Strucker was not going to scold her or recriminate her for it, she had her reasons and he loved her way too much to make her feel more guilty than she already felt. But it made him meditate on the impermeability of time. One wrong decision could have huge implications in the future. If they would have found Nikola back then... Kasandra probably would not have had to suffer so much alone when she thought he was dead. She would have had someone to ease the pain for her. Perhaps they would not have been separated at all. Perhaps HYDRA would have never came to be. So many paths would have been opened.

… she could still be alive, couldn’t she? Eighty-three is not old, not by ze standards of zis time. She could still be alive, und have a life of her own now?”

He read her mind just by listening to those words. One thing that also saddened him was the fact that they would never have offspring. Although he never thought about, now, listening to her, he realized that that was the only thing the two of them could not accomplished. He too was incapable because of the Deathspores and although before he really did not care about it, now in a way he felt sad that he could not give that to her, a woman he was willing to give everything she wished. But he decided then and there that he could give her something else... closure. “Only one way to find out. You possess now something you did not have back then... HYDRA. All our vast resources, money, contacts, and intelligence capabilities. I understand why did you not used them before, you did not want me to find out. And that was a mistake.” He grabbed her lower jaw softly and made her look at him. “Never assume again, not for one moment, that I would not be understanding of your plight. I love you more than life itself, Kasandra. You are my weakness and I would forgive you anything.” He said and kissed her lips. “We will travel to Europe and track her down. I could tell our operatives to do so, but I want this kept between us, so it would not undermine your authority. So we do it ourselves. We can go as Nita and Robert taking a bit of a personal vacation. That would make tongues waggle.” He smiled and kissed her again and then went down to her neck, raining passionate kisses on it. Suddenly, he turned her around and set her on the bed, laying on top of her and pinning her arms against the mattress. “Besides, I think we do need a vacation and what better way than to return to Strucker Castle.” he added and kissed her lips again.

TAG:KASANDRA WULF
WORDS: 1,342
NOTES:

[KASANDRA WULF]

A SHOT IN THE DARK A whole day, Kass had spent, making the arrangements to fly out from the States, and return to Europe. Of course, she and her baron were travelling as councilmember, Robert Armitage, and his assistant, Nita Strassburg. The purpose behind their visit was simple. As anticipated, the cries for the Superhuman Registration Act in the aftermath of the Ultron crisis had grown louder, so loud that they could no longer go ignored, and Robert and Nita required a break from it. After all, in the guise of the duo, the pair had positioned themselves as opponents of the act, and required the council of likeminded individuals to aid them in their opposition. One of the things that always confused the baroness about countries like England, and countries like America, was the way in which they treated their history, painting themselves as heroes to the world at large, when they had been responsible for a great many ills that had befallen it too. England certainly had a selective memory as far as it’s actions were concerned, the country that was predominantly known for its conquering and enslaving of other nations, actions that had birthed the America standing today, which they celebrated every year in the form of ‘Thanksgiving’. Germany most certainly did not celebrate an act of genocide, quite the contrary, it had erred on the side of caution ever since the Holocaust, and for them, the act was something to be cautious of given its history. As a result, a convention had been organized at the Estrel Congress Centre in Berlin, and it was the adjoining Estrel Hotel in the Executive Suite that councilman and assistant were staying at. They attended the convention, and a selection of talks, entitled ‘SHRA: What is the difference between the Superhuman Registration Act of today, and the Nuremberg Race Laws of 1935?’. Of course, neither Strucker nor Kass bought into a majority of what was being discussed, but Armitage and Nita did, and grimly nodded their heads at the claims of ‘what next?’ and the mentions of intern camps for enhanced individuals. However, as far as baron and baroness were concerned, the issue wasn’t race, it was individuals that believed they had a right to break the law on their own terms, and those just happened to be individuals that had the physical power to. It wasn’t just heroes, the likes of Captain America and Thor that would come under the registration act, but Strucker and the she-wolf of HYDRA herself who would be subject to them too. Not only them, but masked heroes as well, not unlike Stark, with his suits and his weapons. In fact, the billionaire had proven himself to be as great a threat, courtesy of the invention of Ultron, as invading alien forces like Loki. The SHRA was about protection and security, protecting and securing the average person, such as the human beings that suffered on a daily basis as a result of the actions of these enhanced individuals. There was no comparison between the act, and the racial laws that had been implemented as the Third Reich rose to power. It might have had some vague connection to minority groupings, but it was humans that fell into that category in this situation, and there was nothing to safeguard their interests, nothing but the registration act. Kass had to bite her tongue, in a manner of speaking, and prevent herself from asking every speaker they encountered ‘what is being done to protect the common people in all this?’, and ‘why is so much effort being spent lending superiority to already superior individuals?’, because Nita simply didn’t believe that. That the airhead believed anything at all took the baroness by surprise, but Kass needed to start establishing her other half as more than some bimbo that delighted in dangling off the arms of apparent Norse deities, especially considering what was to come. Instead, she spoke about the necessity for accountability, that it wasn’t about restricting enhanced and gifted individuals, but about failure to hold dangerous individuals – be they mutant, superhuman and human – responsible for their actions. “Ven a human being is responsible for a shootout, during vich a school child becomes ze inadvertent victim of zat shootout, do ve blame ze rest of humankind for ze actions of a single human? Nein! So why is it zat ve blame all enhanced individuals for ze actions of a few? For ze actions of Erik Lehnsherr, of Loki, of Stark?” the baroness, as Nita, pointed out. Of course, she knew damned well that was only true in certain circumstances, circumstances that were often dependant on cultural background, but it wasn’t as if anyone here would call her on that. Kass and her baron had flown out within a couple of days of her making the arrangements, and spent a further couple of days attending talks of that nature, before, finally, journeying to Strucker Castle, and taking a flight to Mödling from there. The flight was only an hour in duration, so nothing compared to the eight hour one from New York to Berlin. The Hyrtl’sches Waisenhaus, or ‘orphanage’ in the common tongue, didn’t appear as she remembered it. Standing outside of the building, she even wondered if it was the same structure. She didn’t know much about it’s history, it never concerned her, but the image she was capable of summoning forward in her mind with crystal clear clarity, left her with the impression that it had once been a church. An expanded church, considering it was capable of housing over two hundred children, and with its own hospital wing too, but a church nonetheless. Now, with the disappearance of the Romanesque face of the building, the Gothic architecture that had replaced it made it look like an English university, as if the Allied Forces hadn’t left enough of an everlasting impression on Europe. What had once been an orphanage, was now an English language school. This was getting better, and better, and as a result, Kass couldn’t shake the feeling this wasn’t going to go as smoothly as she anticipated. The structure that once stood in the aftermath of the war, that had survived its devastation, wasn’t the same structure that stood before her now, so what had happened? The least she could hope for was some kind of restoration project, as she entered the building, Strucker at her side, but it wasn’t long before she learned that wasn’t the case. “Nein, I vas… a freund of mine vas here, in ze aftermath of ze Battle of Vienna, in August. Ze offensive, it had… it had died down, come zu an end, almost” Kass, as Nita, tried to explain to the receptionist intent on hurrying her along, so she could deal with a prospective student for the year ahead. The receptionist was a French undergraduate student on work experience, studying German and English simultaneously. Her English was better, so that was the dialect the she-wolf of HYDRA opted for in dealing with her. Though her accent was fast beginning to grate on her. “Oui, in August, ma’am, everything seemed to die down, but when the second wave of Soviets were swept in… from September, to winter, and for years into nineteen forty-eight, the devastation was… severe. The school was caught in the crossfire, and so few survived” the receptionist explained. “Und of zat few, did someone called ‘Nikola Vulf’ survive?” Nita asked, in a fashion uncharacteristic of the bubbly assistant to Robert Armitage, and the receptionist sighed, before reaching for the phone and calling administration. “Mes excuses, Ms Strassburg, a member of our academic team will be with you shortly, if you could wait a moment, un moment?” the receptionist stressed, turning her attention back to her student, forcing baron and baroness to wait, something Kass intended to do outside. Sinking down to sit on the doorstep, she didn’t care how many people she posed a hindrance to as they entered and exited the building, she was in desperate need of fresh air to compose her nerves, since alcohol no longer had the desired effect. “Just ven I thought zat I could not hate ze Soviets more…” the she-wolf muttered under her breath, detecting Strucker’s approach from further away, courtesy of the ROMULUS suppressant coursing through her veins, heightening her senses in the process. “Austria vas meant zu be safe. Zey brought ze children zer because it vas safe. Now, zey are saying, it vasn’t? Ze Soviets ver here, zey ver here for months after ze var, und it took zese people until September zu realize ze dangers? Idioten…” Kass growled under her breath, “Mödling is Lower Austria, so how did ze Battle of Vienna even get here?” she questioned, growing more and more frustrated by the minute. words: 1467. tagged: WOLFGANG VON STRUCKER . outfit: here! notes: nope! there can be only one mikey! of caution 2.0

[WOLFGANG VON STRUCKER]

If there was something that Strucker loved – beside his Baroness – were debates, symposiums, and conventions. He enjoyed intelligent and thoughtful conversations, especially with people with opposing views, as long as those people used reasonable and intelligent arguments. For him, intelligence was the cornerstone of the future of humanity, a world ruled by pragmatism and common sense instead of the impulses and immaturity of the horde of peasants that felt entitled for no reason whatsoever. That was what HYDRA stood for... the creation of a united world that would take its place in the unshakable wave of the future. Sure, their methods could be considered wrong by the standards of a faltering society, but the ends justified the means. To create a world without conflict, without petty grievances, under a firmed, strong, unyielding but pragmatic hand required thinking outside the box. In fact, it were those impulsive, immature, and self-entitled horde of peasants that were clamoring for the very SHRA that others were complaining about. Humans were so amusing.

But even the Baron had its limits...

He could not understand why Kasandra decided to over-complicate their trip back to Europe by dragging them into one convention after the other about the SHRA and be surrounded by idiots that had no idea what they were talking about when they compared something as horrific as concentration camps with the SHRA. It took all of the Baron's vaunted patience not to stand up and Deathspore all of them! During the war, Strucker was one of the loudest and staunchest opponents of the Nuremberg Laws, the concentration camps and the horrors they brought later. If he would have had the Deathspores back then, he would have dealt with those fools at the Wannsee Conference and get rid the world of that rubbish! His opposition gained him plenty of enemies but the way he saw it, the whole persecution of a race of people was not only a waste of resources – those men and women who died at the hand of those Nationalsocialist fools could have served with distinction and honor for the Fatherland, just like they did in World War I – but also based on complete and uttered nonsense. Strucker was a Prussian Aristocrat and growing up many of his closest friends were Jews. He never saw any of them do the things that pathetic Little Corporal and his goons blamed them for. There was no 'stab in the back' during World War I as the would be dictator said, nor those people were a drag to society. In fact, it was the opposite. Many were men and women of good standing. For a man like Strucker, who believed in never waste good and competent people and assets, it was a travesty.

So his patience was strained to the breaking point when he heard those fools at the conference comparing one thing – the most horrible act of inhumanity ever committed – with the other, which was not even close. It was like comparing a brain hemorrhage with a sprain ankle! The SRHA, which he could not care less whether if it passed or not as long as it kept HYDRA's enemies busy, was just a measure of control, just like driver licenses were, but a bit more. It did require people with superpowers and mutations to be registered and possibly be hired to work for the governments of the world, but it was not even close to the disgrace the Nuremberg Laws brought to his country. Sure, HYDRA would not mind having that list of registered superhumans, just in case they needed to put them in their place – although it was never his intention of dealing with all superhumans, just those who proved meddlesome... there was a certain redhead schlampe and a fool with a shield that met that description – but the idiots in the convention knew nothing of what they were saying. So instead of interesting and engaging conversations, he was starting to lose his calm. He did, however, smiled a bit when he saw his Kasandra actually getting up there and speak about her thoughts – or Nita's – concerning the SHRA. She looked so disarmingly beautiful.

His Kasandra... she was something else. It would have been easier just to build their legend by reserving a room in the hotel and then just go to Strucker Castle, but for some reason – and he kind of knew why – his beloved woman seemed a bit unnerved and when she was like that, it was best to leave her do her thing. Not only she insisted that they should build up the reason for their trip by being seen attending those conventions – which was unnecessary, they could have just say they were on vacation – but also she refused to share the same room with him, arguing that they were pretending to be on an 'official trip' and they should keep appearances. He was tempted to remind her that everyone and their distant cousins and dogs knew Armitage and Strassburg were having an affair – for Gott sakes, it had been a constant thing in the Daily Bugle! – but he let it go, not wanting to argue with her and just allowing her to plan everything by herself. He knew how his Baroness was feeling about the real reason for this trip and if keeping her mind busy by over-complicating things helped her, then so be it. He did not want to add more pressure on her.

Much to his eternal happiness, they finally moved to Strucker Castle. The place was maintained by a housekeeping staff, all HYDRA, that did a superb job. Although not an over sentimental man, he had to admit it felt good to be back to the property that has been in his family's possession for centuries. It was in Strucker Castle that he and Kasandra started their decades long affair and he always had fond memories of those days when they courted each other. After a short stay, they then traveled to Mödling, which was their ultimate destination. During the short flight, Strucker did not speak much, allowing Kasandra time to prepare herself for what could be a very painful memory. When they arrived at their destination, Strucker took in the sights and allowed his Baroness to be the one taking the lead. After all, this was her quest and it would have been impolite and also condescending for him to take over. In a sense, he was there to give her support in what he knew was not going to be an easy thing for her and that was what he would do. He owed it to her. Of course, there was another reason as of why he was there... exactly because of what was happening. His Kasandra was, as it was always the case, losing her patience as she spoke to the receptionist. There were several thing wrong about this. First and foremost, the receptionist was French, that was on strike against her in Kasandra's eyes. Second, he German was atrocious, strike two. And then she mentioned the Soviets... game over.

As Kasandra almost stormed out, Strucker remained for a little while and the receptionist returned to him. He noticed that she gave him a very flirtatious smile and he decided to use that to Kasandra's advantage. He spoke to her in French, which delighted the simpleton. Besides, his French was better than the fool's German or English. “Mademoiselle, I would be eternally grateful if you could help you with this.” He said and gave her his most charming smile, the one he used back in the day during his short lived career as an actor and famous starlets' eye candy. Strucker was a handsome man, after all. And it worked, because the Receptionist was all smiles as they spoke. “I'll do my best, monsieur.” He nodded and grinned again. “I know you will. And please, is Robert, mademoiselle...?” He continued his charm offensive as the simpleton almost giggled and told him that her name was Jeanne. “Then Jeanne, a pleasure. I am in your debt. We shall await outside for the information.” He added and then walked away, using a technique he perfected during his days as resident dandy back in the 1930s. Being just unavailable enough. It was like ball of yarn to a cat. Supposedly that was how he attracted Leni Riefenstahl, even though they never actually slept together, but neither denied it either. Ah, the life of show business. Everything was public perception rather than actual facts.

He reached his beloved and listened to her speak. “Vienna was one of the most contested and brutal battles during the waning days of the war, meine liebe. I am not surprised the fire spread all over Austria, with the Allies coming from the West and the Soviets trying to reach Vienna before they did.” There was something else, but he decided not to tell her, at least not before they had favorable news about her daughter. After Strucker formed HYDRA in 1946, he sent feelers around, trying to build a file on the woman he hated the most... that damn redhead fotze. He was obsessed with her and Captain America, but the boy scout apparently fell over the North Atlantic, so he was out of the picture. Truth be told he was still obsessed with those two, even after seventy years. Anyhow, during that oppo search, his people found out that Romanoff was part of one of the Soviet Tank divisions that swept across Austria, before being transferred to the 5th Guard Tanks Army, which was the military formation that stormed Berlin in April of 1945 and basically ended the war. He knew that it would not help matters him telling Kasandra that, knowing how much she hated that damn redhead woman. “Of course, by then I was... well... dead. But I read about it later.” He said, in that calmed voice of his. He ran his hand over her beautiful dark mane, always soothing. “Be calmed, meine liebe. One way or another we shall find the information you seek.” He added.

At that moment, the receptionist popped her head outside the door. “Robert... I think we found something.” She said and again you did not have to be a telepath to notice the flirting in her voice and the twinkle in her eyes as she said his name. He smiled and thanked her, telling her they shall be there shortly. “See... it shall be alright. Come, let us see what this fool has for us.” He said to his Baroness and extended his hand to her. When she was up her feet, he placed a soft hand over her face and kissed her lips gently. “I am right beside you, so be calmed. I am sure we shall find what you are looking for.”

TAG: KASANDRA WULF
WORDS: 1,813
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