He leaves the body lying on the side of the river and goes away unseeing and feeling numb. He struggles with his vision, it feels doubled. He sees the crash and burn and people running in all directions, and he sees a different scene entirely at the same time. It's so easy to look through all the chaos and see the harmony of two guys laughing together in the park, playing like there is no care in the whole world. He doesn't know why he feels that way, he doesn't know why he feels at all, when all that should matter is his failed mission. The word is now bitter in his mind.
He recalls beating the face of a man marked to be destroyed and shouting the word. He remembers the wrongness that came with it, the malfunctioning of his brain stopping the metal halfway and making his brain burn. Not unlike the machines they put on his head every time he questions them or is out of order. His thoughts bring pain so he chooses not to think, he just flows somewhere between reality and screams and destruction, and the smile in the long, kind face, so similar to the one he beat to a pulp just minutes ago.
He doesn't know where he's going, he's empty like a shell, drained from all the anger and need to lash out, and it all feels dumbed down, like he's having one of those heavy dreams like murky icy water, where the flashes of light and sound make him ache much more than the cold. The constant cold that he's used to, that has chased away so many sleeps of his, dream-less and feeling like it's the last time every time they put him under. He wonders if this time it will be true. After he failed his actions and lost the target, ensured the safety and not destruction, he will possibly be put down to never be awake again, gotten rid of like a broken gun that's of no use to its masters anymore.
He goes and goes, farther than he ever remembers going on foot without being stopped. He waits for someone to appear and grab him, take him into a van and drive away to yet another hollow place with machines that bring pain and oblivion and men who make sure he is kept still. He can't seem to stop himself from wandering, so he continues to go while the view changes and his body aches. He notices only now that he's in pain. From the fight, from being almost crushed, from swimming in the river with one arm whirring alarmingly and other hanging at a painful and seemingly unnatural angle.
He reaches a dilapidated looking building and automatically makes it his cover for the day, feeling like his body will give away and seeing only shadows in his vision. He can't understand why he's suddenly so weak, he's never weak, and he doesn't have a right to be. But now that no one approaches him and no one seeks him out to be dragged back to his owners, he gives up searching for answers in his head and just slumps down by a dirty wall, until his heavy and still wet body makes it to the uneven ground inside the walls he's found for his hiding.
No, he's not hiding, he can't hide, he's been told before. They will find him whenever he goes and bring him back, he's a mark and he's always in his place and now that he's not, he's certain they will come and take him to where he needs to be. He hears more noises coming out from his arm, his metal one, and he looks to see if he can do anything for the damage by himself. The wire that's drawing his attention is red and it's cut off and sticking out from his elbow joint at the inner side of the arm. He feels that he knows that wire and tries to pull it off. After some minutes of scrambling with numb fingers he manages it, and he can see the tiny chip at the end of it, blinking away.
He suddenly understands. This is his way out, if he dares take it. This is the thing that has him tethered to the masters' machines, to the chair, to the cold and the pain of not knowing anything but his target and the weapon of choice. He finds it in him to climb on the top of the building through the old stairs that lead him straight to the roof. He uses his remaining force to destroy a heavy lock and gets through the door up. He sees the sky, which is gray but still so beautiful that he thinks he sees it for the first time, or it feels like it. He senses the rain tickling his face and he climbs through the garbage and stops at the ridge of the building, seeing the smoke still lifting from the direction of the crash he has just escaped.
He looks at the smoke and breathes the air in, blinking the rain out of his eyes. He swings his metal arm as far as he can and the red wire with the chip disappears in the distance like it's never been there in the first place, the wind howling in his ears. He feels even emptier now but maybe he can try and fill it out with something. He has no operation to carry out, no plan, and no data. So he will gather some.
He knows he needs to search for the man whose name made him feel almost the same agony as the machines did. He needs to understand why he didn't kill the man whose words made him stop and wait and jump and swim, and drag and run away to where he is now. Most importantly, he has to know who Bucky is.