Levi didn't know how long he'd been out when a nearly savage aroma of roasted meat dragged him awake.
The smell was utterly unreasonable—wild game's raw musk mixed with the sizzling richness of fat over high heat. It was like an invisible hand reaching into the abyss and yanking his consciousness back out by force.
He struggled to lift his eyelids. It took a full ten-plus seconds for his vision to crawl out of a blur of colors and finally focus.
Rough log beams overhead. A scratchy wool blanket over his body. Firelight from the hearth painted the room in warm amber tones. A mess pot bubbled over the flames, gurgle gurgle, filled with milky-white stew. The soul-stealing aroma came from there.
I'm still alive…
The thought finally let the knot in his chest loosen. What he'd done in the HYDRA base—the earth-shaking bursts of spatial control—had nearly drained him dry. The weakness that surged up from the depths of his soul hadn't been an act; it was real. Even though [Regenerative Factor] and [Life Reversion] had been quietly repairing him, that kind of mental exhaustion was like a brutal flu—no amount of sleep fixed it instantly.
He subtly scanned the room. Several Howling Commandos veterans sat around the fire, carving up a roasted rabbit with knives. Bloodstained, bearded, and filthy—but relaxed in the way only people who'd survived hell could be.
"Hey—he's awake!"
A sharp-eyed soldier spotted him. The room fell silent.
A dozen gazes snapped to him like searchlights. Those looks were complicated—curiosity, fear, and more than anything else, a reverent distance reserved for something no longer quite human.
Levi sighed inwardly. After showing power that bordered on the divine, a gulf had opened between him and his mortal comrades—an invisible one, but no less real.
"Awake?"
A steady voice came from the doorway. The wooden door creaked open as Steve Rogers stepped inside, bringing a gust of icy air with him. He carried two freshly skinned rabbits, looking absurdly energetic—nothing like someone who'd just fought nonstop, marched through snow, and cheated death.
The super-soldier serum's endurance really was monstrous. Levi gave silent props—while instantly switching his facial expression to full performance mode.
In less than a tenth of a second, the color drained from his face. His eyes dulled. He timed his breathing perfectly, radiating an aura of I'm-about-to-die weakness.
"How do you feel?" Steve strode over and crouched beside him, frowning as he checked Levi's forehead with the back of his hand.
Not hot.
"B-better… Captain," Levi forced a smile uglier than crying, his voice barely above a whisper.
"Just… no strength. Feels like my body's been completely hollowed out."
This persona had to hold. The last thing he wanted was Strategic Scientific Reserve lunatics in white coats dragging him off to be dissected.
Steve's clear blue eyes were full of genuine concern—no suspicion at all. He nodded, then stood and said firmly, "Eat something first. Then come outside—we need to talk."
Levi's heart skipped.
So it was coming after all. Captain America's talk. No dodging that.
Breakfast was bland rabbit stew and black bread hard enough to crack skulls. But starving as they were, it tasted like heaven.
Warm soup spread through his body. Levi felt [Regenerative Factor] speed up repairs to his mental fatigue, and the dormant Tesseract-derived energy stirred faintly.
Still, he kept up the act—hands "professionally" trembling even while holding a spoon.
After the meal, Steve came for him as expected.
Under the concerned looks of the others—easy on him, Captain—Levi was half-supported, half-dragged out of the cabin, swaying like he might topple at any moment.
Outside was a forest clearing, snow up to the ankles. In the center stood Logan, already waiting. He leaned against a pine tree, cigar in his mouth, smoke curling around half-lidded, wolfish eyes—clearly here to watch the show.
Steve released Levi and let him barely steady himself. He pointed to a bare rock nearby, his expression as serious as before a battle.
"Levi, you said yesterday that your power comes from a kind of 'resonance' you don't fully understand—and that the cost is enormous."
Levi nodded weakly, wearing a confused student listening to astrophysics expression.
"Dr. Erskine told me the serum amplifies everything about a person," Steve continued, voice intense.
"The good, the bad—especially willpower. Yours is strong. I can feel it. That means, in theory, you can control this power, instead of being controlled by it."
Levi screamed internally: No kidding! I've got decades of future knowledge rattling around in my head—of course my will's strong!
"But… Captain, how?" he asked helplessly. "That power… it doesn't listen to me."
"Start simple." Steve bent down, picked up a pebble the size of a fingernail, and placed it on the rock.
"Try to move it."
He pointed to the other side, about twenty centimeters away.
"Not destroy it. Move it. With your thoughts—like using your hand. Gently."
It sounded easy. For Levi, it was hell.
The spatial energy inside him was violent, chaotic, full of raw destructive instinct. Asking it to do delicate work was like telling Godzilla to embroider.
"I… I'll try."
Levi raised his right hand toward the pebble and carefully attempted to draw on that primordial force.
Humm—!
An invisible wave burst outward. The air visibly warped. Logan's eyes flew open; the cigar dropped from his mouth into the snow.
That smell again—the scent of something divine.
Sweat poured down Levi's forehead. He felt like he wasn't controlling power at all, but playing tug-of-war with an unseen cosmic beast.
The pebble reacted.
It didn't move.
It began to vibrate violently, emitting a high-pitched hum, like it was about to explode.
"Control it, Levi!" Steve urged. "Command it with your will!"
Crack.
A faint sound. A hairline fracture appeared on the pebble's surface.
Shit. Levi's heart sank. This was going to fail. Another second and the pebble would shatter into dust. Total embarrassment.
Just as he was about to give up—ready to roll his eyes back and fake a faint—Steve's earlier words struck his mind like lightning.
Willpower… the serum amplifies everything, including willpower…
That's it!
He'd been using his own will—a mortal rope—to yank on a cosmic monster. Of course it was impossible.
What he had now was willpower amplified geometrically by the super-soldier serum.
That was the bridle meant to tame a beast.
Levi's state of mind shifted instantly. He stopped suppressing the energy and instead tried—truly for the first time—to understand it, to guide it.
In his mind, he pictured that super-soldier willpower as countless flexible golden threads, gently—patiently—wrapping around the restless spatial energy.
His command changed from brute force—
Move, damn it!
—to calm guidance:
Easy… relax… see that little rock? Go say hello. Gently.
And then—
A miracle.
The energy raging inside him actually calmed under the soothing pressure of his amplified will. A single, incredibly thin thread of blue energy peeled away from the core like a well-behaved child.
Now!
Levi snapped his eyes open, starlight flashing in his pupils.
That tamed thread wrapped around the pebble.
No violent shaking. No screeching noise.
Before Steve and Logan's stunned eyes, the tiny black pebble wobbled—softly, gently—and floated up from the rock as if lifted by invisible strings.
One centimeter. Two.
It stopped in midair, perfectly still.
He did it.
Levi was ecstatic. He'd found the right way to handle godlike power.
Then—three seconds later—the backlash hit.
A tsunami of dizziness and weakness slammed into his mind. His vision went black. His legs gave out, and he pitched forward.
Plop.
The pebble fell.
"Levi!" Steve lunged forward and caught him.
"I'm… fine…" Levi gasped against Steve's solid chest, face paler than death. This time, the exhaustion was real—his mental reserves completely empty.
"You… you succeeded," Steve said, disbelief and joy barely contained.
Logan walked over silently, picked up the cracked pebble, studied it for a moment, then looked at Levi with an expression like he was staring at a prehistoric relic.
He bared his teeth in a grin that mixed feral instinct with approval.
"Kid," he said slowly, blowing out a smoke ring,
"you're a monster."
"But…"
"…an interesting one."
He stepped forward and stuffed the warm pebble into Levi's coat pocket.
"Keep it. Your first trophy."
They helped Levi back into the cabin. The others panicked when they saw how much worse he looked.
"He's just exhausted," Steve explained calmly, unmistakable pride in his voice.
"We're teaching him to control that power. If he doesn't, it's dangerous—to him, and to all of us."
"C-can he really control it?" Falsworth asked quietly.
Steve glanced at Levi—eyes closed, breathing shallow—then at the cracked pebble peeking from his pocket.
"Yes," he said without hesitation. "I believe he can."
Logan smoked silently beside him, beastly eyes glinting with something no one else could decipher.
Levi wasn't asleep. He just couldn't move. He touched the pebble in his pocket, calm and certain.
From taming a grain of stone…
Next would be mountains. Rivers. The world.
Then—
Rapid footsteps crashed through the forest. Someone nearly fell as they ran. It was Jones, the outer sentry.
He burst into the cabin, pale as death.
"Captain! Bad news—it's HYDRA!" he shouted, barely able to breathe.
"A massive force! The eastern valley spotted at least two battalions—Tiger tanks and energy weapons! They're sweeping the mountains! All exits are sealed!"
He screamed the last words, voice breaking:
"We're… surrounded!"
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