Агент.
Heal him now. We require him back out in the field.
――'he's bleeding too much.' SAVE HIM.
NOW!
Crimson spilt from the agent's lips and torso, stains spread on the grey nylon-cotton material. Adrenaline surged, the woman, having put her hair up in a low tie, slapped on a pair of dyed medical gloves. TERROR rippled through her torso, but perfectly still, coordinated, and proficient hands went to work. She KNEW he was going to die - The amount of blood flowing out, the forgotten look in eyes, lungs struggling to fill, it was all evidence.
But denying an order was not an option.
She had to do her job.
The woman retracted from the agent as chunks of flesh splattered on the ground in front of him, then regained her concentration, returning to blocking the exit wounds. Remove the bullets. Control the bleeding. CLOSE THEM.
"сосредоточить внимание на мой голос." Focus on my voice. She repeated this in a strained voice, over the grunts and muffled screams of the victim.
'Don't MOVE. You'll be OKAY.'
LIES ―――LIES to keep the victim from panic. ―But perhaps he already knew of his fate. He was letting go.
...
Medic-... ...Vicious trembling ceased into a heavy weight falling forward onto the woman's form. Slick with sweat and blood, she pressed her hands onto the man's chest, keeping him from pressing on her too far. Slowly, the body made its way to the side, a crunching limp echoing on the floor.
… She had failed.
H――
The commanders hovering over her met with DANGEROUS eyes. Before she could say anything else, one swung at—
Emily Grey felt a gentle shake on her right forearm, the opposite of what her body SCREAMED―― it had screamed an attack was coming, but instead, it was a concerning hold of her arm. Gentle, but firm. The touch tore down the walls blocking her from reality, tore down the episode she had walked into. She was here, in the present. Enough in the present, at least, to recognize the voice that made its way to her ear. Almost forcibly she blinked, blinked enough to erase the remnants of fiction remaining; she stared at her crossed arms, then her lap that remained seated in the hard wooden chair lined with old carpet like felt. The pounding sensation filling her throat refused to cease, but she had to push through it— she swallowed, and looked up at the source of the voice.
"... Hey, Dolly, you here or are you going to keep giving me the cold shoulder?" Emily hated her name, and everyone at her place of work, especially Clint Barton, knew of that matter. She was Dolly Grey to everyone.
Dolly stared at the blond archer, noticing the concerned features marking his eyebrows and lines surrounding his eyes. He looked so much older that way. This look shining from his face meant she was not in a stable state. She had lingered, but combated it with a soft smile curling at the ends of her lips.
"The concerning look doesn't quite suit your personality, Feathers."
Change the subject.
"Enough with the lame nicknames already, I deserve something cooler to equally represent my personality."
Success.
"I'm an engineer and a nurse, not a nickname professional!" To keep the previous topic at a distance, Dolly opted for the nickname subject, all while shifting out of the uncomfortable wooden chair to stretch her long torso and thighs— they had been sitting there for an hour, waiting for Nick Fury's "calling" as Clint put it. It had better be urgent; Dolly was pulled from her lab, separated from her monitoring system project, which only need a few tweaks before testing phase.
"What could he possibly want that he couldn't just phone in? It's been an ho-"
"What I could possibly want is to show you something you've wanted to see your entire time here at SHIELD, Agent Grey." In his baldness and usual level of leather and black, Nicholas Fury stepped from his office, giving Dolly a pointed look with his eye before nodding toward the room.
"Barton, you'll want to come in too. With how fidgety Agent Grey is on a daily basis, who knows what'll happen."
"With how fidgety I...? What's that supposed to mean?" Dolly followed into the director's office with Barton close behind her, preparing for the worst. Thoughts rolled through her mind, from the best news in the world, to the worst. Was she compromised? Was she found out-? Did someone die? Did――――
"――is this really necessar――"
She froze, a heavy weight forming in the bottom of her stomach. The pounding of her heart returned, beating against her frame, when it had left only moments before. Was this a joke? Was she still dreaming? Her eyes looked over the figure that stopped mid-sentence at the sight of her, their eyes locking. Her focus became blurred, perhaps because of the tears pricking the ends of her eyes.
"... Steve?"
"―― Dolly?"
Author's Note: This is my first Marvel fanfiction, and I'm just going right into it, since this is a fic primarily focused on Bucky Barnes, not Steve Rogers. The next chapter is more about introducing Dolly, her involvement with SHIELD, and her relationship with Steve. First impressions are appreciated!