chapter 199 part 2
On the screen, the expression on Doctor Zola's avatar paused for a moment before he relayed another piece of news he had only just learned to Helmut.
"Captain America is missing."
"What?!"
Hearing this report from Doctor Zola, Helmut's grim face changed. His eyes behind his glasses widened as he pressed for more information.
"When did this happen?"
"Just now. Due to the high security of the basement, Hydra did not permit fire department personnel to enter. We only began to take stock of the laboratory's losses after the fire department's rescue operations had concluded. It was during this inventory that we discovered Captain America was missing."
"Haven't you looked again carefully?"
Captain America was of great significance to Hydra's Super-Soldier Serum experiment. Helmut certainly couldn't just stand by and watch his body disappear.
"Is it possible he's buried under something?"
"The laboratory where Captain America was kept had special protective measures, and Bruce Banner didn't cause too much damage to it, so..."
"So, you're saying Captain America disappeared on his own?"
"A corpse that's been dead for over seventy years suddenly vanished from the laboratory by itself?"
The thought of having to report this news to Marshal Johann Schmidt in Berlin made Helmut's scalp tingle.
He could almost picture the look on Marshal Johann Schmidt's face upon hearing this news.
"From the current situation, that seems to be the only possibility."
Because of the destruction caused by Bruce Banner's transformation into the Hulk, the surveillance footage of the entire base laboratory was severely damaged. Even Doctor Zola couldn't determine the truth of Captain America's body's disappearance from the corrupted recordings.
"However, at least we didn't come away with nothing."
Looking at the incredibly grim expression on Helmut's face, Doctor Zola tried to console him.
As colleagues working together at Hydra, Doctor Zola and Helmut's fates were practically intertwined. If something were to happen to Helmut, his own situation wouldn't be much better.
As Doctor Zola's words fell, an image of a specially designed laboratory appeared on his screen before Helmut.
Inside a reinforced, special cage in the laboratory, a green mouse as tall as half a man was frantically ramming against the bars, creating a deafening series of impacts.
"This is a lab mouse that was also exposed to Gamma Ray radiation during the experiment, just like Bruce Banner. I believe Marshal Johann Schmidt will be interested in the power it possesses..."
***
"Cough, cough, cough..."
Amidst violent coughing, Banner slowly opened his eyes.
He vaguely remembered being exposed to Gamma Rays in the laboratory, after which everything seemed to become a blur. In fragmented pieces of memory, Banner could faintly see scenes of destruction.
"You're awake?"
However, just as Banner was struggling to piece his thoughts together, a raspy voice interrupted him.
Only then did Banner realize that he was no longer in Hydra's laboratory but in a completely unfamiliar room.
Everything in this room gave Banner a strange feeling. The odd statues everywhere and the exorcism tools he had only ever seen in films gave him the bizarre impression that he was at the scene of a cult gathering.
"What is this?"
As he climbed up from the floor, Banner's fingers inadvertently touched an ugly-looking statue on the ground.
"Careful..."
The voice spoke again: "That is a Pazuzu Statue. Legend says it is the demon of disease from Mesopotamia and Assyria, with the ability to spread pestilence."
The voice's warning made Banner's hand freeze. He looked down at the statue's form: four bird wings, talons like an eagle's, a face like a lion's, and a long horn on its forehead. This humanoid statue, a mishmash of various animals, indeed exuded a strange sense of terror. As his gaze met the statue's eyes, a bone-chilling feeling rose up from within him.
It was as if at any second, the statue would come to life and bite his neck off.
Swallowing hard, Banner forced his gaze away, avoiding eye contact with the statue called Pazuzu.
"But Pazuzu can't get out of Hell that easily, so you don't have to worry too much..."
Then, the man's voice sounded again. Hearing this, the stiff expression on Banner's face relaxed slightly. He cautiously moved his hand away from the Pazuzu Statue in front of him and scanned the jumbled assortment of various statues and strange objects in the room.
If it were in any other situation, Banner wouldn't have paid these things much mind.
As a man of science engaged in physics research, he didn't really believe in such ethereal beings as demons.
But the atmosphere of the room, along with the strange man before him, gave him an inexplicable feeling that made Banner subconsciously accept it all.
Of course, all of this could also be the influence of his memories.
Although he had no specific memories of being the Hulk, he vaguely recalled being in some kind of danger at the end, and then being saved by someone.
As Banner thought back, a blurry image surfaced in his mind.
Under the illumination of a red light, a hand reached out and pulled him out.
"So, what exactly happened? Why am I here instead of at Hydra?"
Shaking his head to suppress the blurry image in his mind, Banner scanned everything in the room, his gaze finally settling on the man before him, who was clad in a black cape with his face hidden in the shadows.
"Who are you?"
Under Banner's questioning gaze, the man pulled back the hood of his cape, revealing a gaunt face with a salt-and-pepper beard. "Stephen Strange. You can call me Doctor Strange."
(end of chapter)