Longing
Whenever they put him back into cryo-sleep, strange dreams would always chase him. Garbled words, names that seemed to strike some kind of chord deep within him, but whenever he tried to grasp those threads, they slipped away like sand. Whenever he lost those threads, some senseless feeling of frustration and anger would well up. But one thing that was consistent with the non-sensical dreams was one person. The haze of his muddled memory and confusion would always conceal their face. One thing that stood out was their eyes; a clear and defiant blue.
This blue-eyed ghost would call after him, yell his name. Those times in cryo-sleep tormented him, not able to figure out who this specter was, why they called to him, or what they meant to him.
That changed whenever they took him out of his chamber. Electricity sent agony through his body, until the pain seemed to blot out the remnants of his dreams. Then the words. The words brought clarity. Purpose.
He was no longer a person haunted by the blue-eyed ghost. But a thing. A weapon. The Winter Soldier.
…..
2014. Washington DC, USA
The Winter Soldier crouched low over the rooftop, peering through his scope. The target was present, talking to someone outside his view. It didn't matter. His mission was to take out the target, and nothing more. Although the idea of leaving a witness alive grated against his ingrained training.
As soon as SHIELD Director Nick Fury entered his crosshairs, he pulled the trigger. The target fell, back arching as the bullets penetrated his body. Whoever he was talking to raced forward, looking for the shooter, for him. Rising, he collapsed his sniper rifle and slung it across his back. With his enhanced hearing, he could already detect whoever had been speaking to the target pursuing him. And fast.
He ran, leaping across rooftops. His pursuer was still hot on his tail. The sound of glass shattering behind him made him tense, but he still ran. As long as he disappeared before this person could catch him, he would have completed his mission.
A strange metallic sound pursued him, the hairs on the back of his neck raising in awareness. The Winter Soldier whirled and caught the projectile thrown at him. The metal hummed as if it was alive, the sound of it resonating in his metal arm. There was a man standing across from him. Even with his enhanced senses, he could not make out what the man looked like, with the light from the office building behind him blotting out his features. Only an outline. With as much strength as he could, he threw it back. Before the pursuer could react, he made his exit, plunging down into the traffic below.
2014. Washington DC, US. The Smithsonian. After the fall of SHIELD.
The Winter Soldier's head ached. Voices continuously bounced off him, children chattering excitedly as they pointed at the pictures of Captain America. He kept his head low, hands tucked into his pockets as he wound his way through the exhibit, trying to find what he was looking for. The thick information flier he had grabbed was clenched in his flesh hand. The painted visages of the Howling Commandos, of Captain America, sent spikes of pain in his head. Each stab seemed to bleed flashes of memory. They didn't make sense to him, at least not yet.
He stopped in front of a glass placard. Engraved on its surface was a familiar face. His face.
James Buchanan Barnes. Bucky. That was what Captain America called him.
Barnes was the only Howling Commando to give his life in service of his country.
He had a new mission now. He needed his memories back. HYDRA was never going to control him again, he would make sure of it. And the only way to do that was to rid the world of them. Of all of them. He had shown mercy to the scientists, the ones that handled him at the Ideal Federal Savings Bank, overwhelmed with the screams of past kills. The screams had quieted when he left.
Going after the scientists was not the right call. He needed to hunt the people that ordered his missions. And he knew where they were. Some he would not be able to touch here in the US. They would be hunting him.
He felt the blue-eyed ghost watching in the corners of his mind. He had a feeling he knew who it was. But they were still concealed from him.
They seemed to nod at the Winter Soldier's resolve.
….
2014. Washington DC. Undisclosed safe house.
Steve watched the screens. Sharon had helped him set the temporary work station up and made it easy to use so he and the equally-tech-inept Sam Wilson could also work it. Bucky had to be somewhere in the city. With the fall of SHIELD, checkpoints at the borders of the city were installed, hoping to pick up any fleeing HYDRA agents or collaborators. So far only a few captures had been made as many decided to lay low until the dust settled.
He knew that this moment was crucial. If they didn't pick him up here in the States, finding him abroad would be that much harder. Probably impossible.
Sam returned, still donning his incognito baseball cap and sunglasses.
"We got a lead. Someone spotted him at the Smithsonian. The FBI and CIA also has the Ideal Federal Savings Bank closed down. Apparently, that's where they kept him."
"Alright, we'll split up, hit both. Let's go."
….
2014. Washington DC, USA.
The Winter Soldier walked past panicked civilians, reloading his gun. They screamed as gunfire echoed around them. Amongst the yelling and bullets flying, he could pick out a thread of sound. A voice. Female. It was one of the targets, the woman.
He stopped, letting himself trace her voice to her location. Kneeling, he withdrew an explosive and let it roll. The car from which her voice came from blew up into a fury of fire and smoke. But no body.
She came from behind, flying to wrap her legs around his neck. The zip of a garrote made him raise a hand to defend his neck, the woman heaving at it with her wire. Seizing her by the back of her jacket, the Winter Soldier threw her off, her body colliding heavily with an abandoned car. Now was the opportunity to finish her off. He raised his gun.
But he had underestimated her. The machinery in his arm groaned when the woman planted a Taser disc on it, making her getaway. He closed his hand into a fist, ripping the disc off. The useless metal appendage whirred as he forced it back into action.
He clenched his teeth. The drive to finish the mission pounded in his head, the phantom feeling of electricity ghosting through his veins. He prowled after the target, her red hair a beacon through the masses. He lifted his gun and pulled the trigger. Her body arched as she fell. But it was not a death shot. It had merely tagged her.
Growling, he cornered her, jumping onto a car. Her eyes landed on him as he raised his gun, his finger tight on the trigger. Finally. He had her.
Until someone stormed at him. Dropping his gun, he lashed out. His metal fist clanged as it collided with the man's shield, the impact of it reverberating throughout his entire body. The sound of the shield was familiar. The man from the roof. The one that was able to catch up to him.
Pushing aside the shield, he kicked out sending the man flying to the ground. Raising his gun, he fired at the target, but the bullets clanged uselessly against his shield. He kept firing bullet after bullet but none of them hit.
The two clashed, blow after blow matched with equal strength. The Winter Soldier had fought many adversaries. But these two targets were proving to be more difficult.
The man caught him by surprise when he flipped him over his shoulder. His mask clattered to the ground as he rolled away. He turned, his hand going to his belt. His target paused, staring at him.
"Bucky?"
The name sent a flood of images through his mind, reviving the blue-eyed ghost from its dark prison. He could feel the ghost's expectation hovering around him. Blue eyes. Just like the target.
"Who the hell is Bucky?" he spat. He raised his gun. He needed to know why one word made the blue-eyed ghost come back. And he would get the answers even if he had to bleed it out of the man across from him.
Something collided into him from behind, sending him flying. He straightened, feeling the gaze of both the man and the ghost in his mind on him. It conflicted with the increasing drive to complete his mission. No. He shut them both out. Mission. Complete mission. He raised his gun once more. Until an explosion sent him flying.
He fled. He was surrounded. And the ghost kept glaring at him, their eyes blazing with disbelief.
Bucky?
The question echoed in his ears.
….
2014. Washington DC, USA. Ideal Federal Savings Bank
Neither Steve nor Sam turned up anything substantial. If the Winter Soldier had been spotted, it was a long time ago. He was in the wind now.
"I don't know if you should see what's in there," Sam said, putting a hand on Cap's shoulder. "It's pretty bad."
Steve shook it off. He had to. This was his best friend. He had to do everything in his power to get him back, and that meant he had to know what he had been through. The two slipped through the wall of cops and agents, donning FBI jackets. A quick flick of their borrowed badges let them in.
Inside the vault was a strange contraption. Part of it was a chair, equipped with metal restraints. A control station sat beside it, with unlit dials reading out voltage. Attached to the chair was a clamp, molded to attach to a person's head. An electroshock chair. An analyst was parked in front of the control station, studying the programs built into it. All of it was in Russian.
This was what HYDRA was doing to keep Bucky under control. Electrocuting him into submission. No wonder he didn't recognize him. Anger burned hot in his chest. It slithered and twisted inside him, threatening to burst.
The two slipped out of the bank. Steve remained silent the entire way back to the safehouse, clenching his jaw.
…..
2014. St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada.
The Winter Soldier kept his head bowed as he boarded the plane, equipped with a fake passport and ticket. The people paid him no mind, too consumed with their own issues and electronic devices. He pulled out a journal. He had already started to write down the shreds of memory that had started to come back, the words messy in his hurry to get everything down. He tapped a picture of Captain America to one page and tagged it. He had a lot of time when he slipped onto a trade freighter hiding amongst the shipping crates. He had been tempted to rip into one with his strength. But that would just leave another breadcrumb for HYDRA or the government to find him.
He was not going to be taken. At least not until he found the answers he needed.
The ghost seemed more agitated than ever, frenzied with his pursuit into his own mind. He could make out more of what they looked like. Instead of just a formless shadow, it begun to take shape. A slight shape, though he still couldn't tell if they were male or female. He thought of the countless kills he made for HYDRA. Several of them could fit the description, including his first kill under HYDRA's command. He just needed to get his hands on the files. And luckily for him, all of that was on the Internet.
And it was still trending. Whatever that meant.
….
2014. St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada.
They had traced Bucky to Canada, specifically an airport in St. John's. But things got hazy. Camera footage was spotty, and as being the Winter Soldier, Bucky would know how to avoid being recorded. There were also at least five men who matched his description, which Steve knew was no accident. Of course he would know how to blend in. They ran the purchasing history of all the suspected men. It did not help either.
One to Deer Lake, another town in the same province. Others to Halifax, Nova Scotia. Mainly national flights. But there were a few international flights. Paris, Rome, London, Frankfurt.
He tried to think of Bucky's history. Before he was flown abroad during the war, the 107th was stationed in Azzano, Italy. It was where they were ambushed before being taken as prisoners of war to a HYDRA weapons facility in the Alps in Austria. If he was tracing his past in the war, then he'd most likely go to Rome or Frankfurt to see where he fought or where he was captured. Since his capture as a prisoner of war started Zola's experimentation on him, Steve estimated that Frankfurt was the best bet. It had to be.
…..
1925. Brooklyn, New York.
When James Buchanan Barnes emerged onto the schoolyard, something immediately drew his attention. Some of the boys in his year had surrounded someone, in an isolated corner of the school building. The person they surrounded was so slight that he could barely make them out around the other boys.
"Hey!" he yelled. The boys turned. One of them clutched some money in his fist. A smaller boy took his chance and went for the stolen money. A simple shove sent him into the dirt.
"You give that guy's lunch money back now."
"Oh, what're you gonna do about it, James?"
He curled his lip. He hated being called James. Usually his father only called him that, whenever he was upset with him for stirring up trouble. He rather liked being called by his full name instead, James Buchanan Barnes. He insisted on his classmates calling him by his full name. Although it tended to be a mouthful.
"I'll punch ya right between the eyes, that's what. And ya know I mean it."
The boy threw the money onto the ground, leaving the smaller one to grab it from the dirt. They left him alone, jeering.
"You didn't have to do that, ya know. I had it covered."
"I'm sure you did," he held out a hand. The smaller boy grasped it, pulling himself up.
He gave the younger kid his signature cocky smile, one that his mother said would get him in trouble with the ladies when he was older. He didn't really understand what that meant. Girls were gross.
"I'm James Buchanan Barnes."
"Steve Rogers," the smaller kid replied, straightening his clothes. With his small bony build, you could almost mistake Steve for a girl. But the spark burning in the younger boy's blue eyes immediately drew James Buchanan Barnes to him. He had found someone like him. Someone with a fighting spirit.
"You have a long name, James Buchanan Barnes. Do you have a nickname?"
"No. As long as you don't call me just James, it's all good."
Steve chewed on his lip in thought. "How about Bucky?"
"Bucky?" He thought about it for a moment. It had a certain ring to it, like the stage name of a boxer.
"Alright, you can call me that. Let's go play, huh? Race you!"
The two boys raced off.
And the rest, you can say, is history.
…..
2014. Paris, France.
The Winter Soldier tucked his hands into his pockets, tourists darting around him. Many posed to take selfies, aiming grins or strange pouts at the small cameras. The Eiffel Tower rose above him, its point piercing the slate gray sky. He rubbed at his temple. The dream he had on the plane still haunted him. He had scribbled it down in the journal before it faded.
The sight of the monument made him lower his eyes. It felt like he was meant to see this with someone. Like he told someone that they would see it together.
This strange longing made him straighten. He wasn't here to reminisce. He was here for a purpose. A mission. He opened his journal, finding the address scribbled on the inside of the cover. Snapping it closed, he left the Eiffel Tower behind.
Once he found the address, he watched the small house. During the day, there wasn't much movement. At least until the late afternoon. A sleek town car spit out a little girl, clutching the hand of her mother. They both entered the house.
It was only when night fell when he returned. One of the HYDRA higher ups. Specifically a researcher into mental conditioning. He had connections to Whitehall along with other heads of HYDRA. Despite the leak of SHIELD's secrets, hence HYDRA's, this man, Francois Beaumont, had not been caught. He had a feeling HYDRA still had people working to manage the leak.
When the city quieted, he broke into the home. He made no noise as he snuck upstairs and into the master bedroom. Not wanting to disturb Francois' wife, he lifted the HYDRA scientist out of the bed. The man found himself tied to a chair and gagged in the kitchen, with the Winter Soldier sitting across from him.
He raised one metal finger to his lips, raising a threatening eyebrow. The man immediately quieted.
"You will tell me what I need to know," he murmured in French. "You will not scream or cry out. Or else you will regret it."
He didn't need to elaborate on the threat. One from the Winter Soldier was enough.
"Tell me what I need to know about Project Clairvoyant."
Hello everyone! Since I'm feeling major MCU withdrawals, I've decided to write a fic about some of my favourite characters. I'm going to try to be good and update weekly for this one (it's not long so it's a bit easier lol).
Question for you all: if either Bucky or Sam take up the mantle of Captain America, who do you think it will be? (Though the likelihood is somewhat low due to the announcement of a limited series staring both of these characters on Disney's new streaming service but I digress).
As always, read and review! :)