Red Romance
Russia, March 27th, 1992
Natalia was shaking in the folding chair they gave her. She was scared stiff, it was her first day with her new instructor, and by what she was told, he had a horrible reputation. He was credited for almost a dozen political kills, and much more not confirmed. And she was supposed to learn off this guy? Please, Natalia could never kill a human being, it wasn't right. She took a deep breath, she was ready for her new instructor.
A loud crash came from the hallway, Natalia leaned over in her chair, so she could see through the glass pane next to the door. It was like she was sitting in movie without sound. A man shrouded in shadow was fighting a bunch of guards, he was overpowering the guards easily. A clipboard smacks against the glass and Natalia jumps. Finally, more guards pin his arms behind him and shove him against the wall. Natalia sees a guard fumble with a pair of handcuffs before he gets loose, but the man was close. She sees the door open in a haste, and she hears a remark made about her new instructor.
"Better get him inside before he kills us!" says one of the guards. They push him inside and plop him down on the metal folding chair parallel to Natalia. One guard follows, who slowly takes the handcuffs off. Then he sprints to the hallway and shuts the door. The man stares down at Natalia's feet for a long time, and she gets uncomfortable. Finally, she shuffles her feet and clears her throat, when he lifts his head and looks straight into her eyes. His icy blue eyes pierce into Natalia's ocean blue, as if a glacier had somehow wandered into Natalia's sea, freezing itself in a part of her. She shakes her head out of the trance.
"May I speak?" She asks him.
"Why would you ask that?" he responds. Natalia thinks for a valid reason, the only one she can think of breaks the glacier out of her sea, and for a moment it is trapped in a different current.
"Punishment...?" She suggests. The man shakes his head.
"I wouldn't punish you," he tells her. "Call me Bucky" he says, extending out his left hand. His left hand emerges out of shadow and reveals itself as a prosthetic limb- bionic and beautiful- meant to kill. The metal panels click together with every move he makes, and Natalia is astounded by its beastly beauty. Natalia shakes his hand, slowly at first, then picking up speed as she gets a little more comfortable.
"I thought you were a Sergeant," Natalia says, Bucky nods.
"I was a Sergeant for the 107th, but that was a long time ago," he says.
"The I have to call you Sergeant... Bucky?" Natalia asks.
"Sergeant James Barnes, and only if you want to call me that, you can," He says, this time it's Natalia's turn to nod. The glacier freezes in Natalia's sea, this time it was permanently imbedded, no current would be strong enough to push the blue glacier out of Natalia's sea, it was stuck there.
That's where it all started, where Natalia felt something odd, unnamable, more beastly than Sergeant Barnes' arm but twice as more beautiful. Love. Yes. That's what it's called- love. But Natalia should not have love, she was a widow, a trainee for Russia's Black Widow program- she had no time to feel such a silly emotion as Love. Yet she found herself feeling, the exact opposite of what she was supposed to do while Sergeant Barnes coached her on killing.
It was like a movie, the girl was learning off the killer while secretly falling madly in love with him, little to Natalia's knowledge, Bucky was falling for HER. The beautiful girl who could kill you with her pinky finger if she truly wanted to. Yes, Bucky was falling for those tropical blue eyes, which washed in a new feeling the Winter Soldier wasn't supposed to feel. Love. Neither of them confessed, it wasn't right for an instructor feel such an emotion as Love for his pupil, and it was punishable by death if the pupil was caught loving their instructor. It was a dangerous game this Love was, but Natalia was committed to playing it.
"Sergeant Barnes, do you feel love?" Natalia asked one day. Bucky looked up from the papers he was filling out.
"L... Love?" Bucky asked.
"Yes, love, the electric feeling when you feel for someone," Natalia responds.
"Love... I do feel it of some sorts," Bucky responds. Natalia inches closer to Bucky, trying to be discreet.
"James..." she coos softly. Bucky's eyes go wide with realization. She had fully fallen for him, sadly he had fallen for her, so the pair found it almost irresistible to lean close and embrace. Bucky finally pushes her away.
"Natalia, we can't do this. It's a dangerous game to play," Bucky gasped.
"Love," Natalia responded, "Love is the dangerous part,"
They pull close again and embrace. Forever both were trapped in each other, forever washing away the glacier in James' Tundra and forever freezing Natalia's Sea. Was their Love strong enough to overcome the rules? It was an obvious answer, for the rules were nonexistent from that day onward. Each day was met with an embrace, then training was full of giggles and mistakes that should have been corrected, but never got pointed out. Natalia's skills slipped, and Bucky's harshness in his instructing became softer to Natalia. The Russian government soon took notice.
When Natalia walked into the training facility that day, she felt that something was off. James had still not arrived for training, which was a suspicious act since he was always early, so he could say good morning to Natalia. She sat down and waited for a while, feeling shaky like the first day she met James. Finally, the door clicks, and someone walks inside, Natalia stands for him.
"James, my god you had me scared to death!" she exclaimed. The figure stepped out of shadow to reveal itself as a guard, not James. Natalia turned pale white, she had made a mistake.
"Natalia Romanova, come with me," the guard said. Natalia gingerly follows him, scared out of her wits for James. The two walk down the hall to the freezing chambers, where the guard opens the door and shoves her inside. The guard closes the door again and the room is engulfed in black. Natalia feels her way around the room, running her fingers over something smooth and cold. She hears a whir and the smooth cold slides away, making Natalia jump back. A light overhead finally comes on to illuminate the area where the smooth cold thing was. Natalia's eyes finally adjust, and she what she sees froze the glacier in Natalia's Sea even more, so much more that it burned.
"Ack! What did they do to you?" She sobs. Inside the chamber was her instructor who she loved, frozen and lifeless, head hanging in an odd angle and eyes wide open staring at her. Fear trembled in his eyes, and a tear sits frozen on his cheek. Somewhere from the darkness, guards emerge and press a few buttons on the console beneath his feet, and slowly the tear slides down his cheek, fully thawed. James snaps back to reality when he sees Natalia.
"Natalia!" he exclaims. Guards grab hold of Natalia from behind as she struggles to break free.
"James!" she responds before a hand covers her mouth, making her words muffled. More guards grab James and pull him to a chair where large equipment rotates around his head. James is strapped into the evil machine and given no mouth piece. A scientist emerges with a red notebook and opens it to a certain page before he starts speaking.
"Longing," the scientist says. James starts to scream.
"Rusted," the scientist continues. "NATALIA!" he screams for Natalia to do something, anything, but she is watching helplessly from the sidelines, being handcuffed and thrown against the wall. She fights guard after guard, but the scientist still goes on.
"Furnace,"
"Daybreak,"
"Seventeen," the scientist is now motioning for the guards to release James from the chair. His screams get louder.
"No! No! Natalia get out of here!" he screams. The scientist continues.
"Begin," tears are streaming down James' face as a guard brings a gun case, a pistol.
"Nine,"
"Homecoming,"
"One," James screams, "Natalia!"
"Freight Car," James screams again, "STEVE!" The guards release James from the chair and he springs forward, only to rise from his resting place. The scientist gets close to his ear, the last word barely audible.
"Soldier?" He asks.
"Ready to comply," James responds. The scientist motions to Natalia, who was handcuffed to a railing on the wall.
"Kill her," the scientist says to James.
"No! James! You need to fight it! You can't kill me! James!" but it is no use, the Winter Soldier has taken over.
"You see little Natalia, the Winter Soldier does not feel love or emotion, he only knows to kill," the scientist says. If we could see inside the Winter Soldier at this moment, you would see James Barnes fighting harder than he ever has. He didn't want to kill Natalia, not the one who gave him a different water in James' Tundra. Not ever could he hurt Natalia, but he was taken over by a different person. A dark side of him that slept in his shadows and ran wild in his nightmares. The Winter Soldier was not James Barnes, but he was. So, there must be some way James could control his shadow. But the only way to control you shadow, is to block the sun. The Winter Soldier raises the pistol to Natalia's head, James felt sick. A tear ran down the Soldier's cheek, for one moment, James Barnes was in control, as he aimed the gun down, as the Winter Soldier pulled the trigger. Natalia crumbled to his feet, and James finally came through and turned the gun in the scientist. He pulled the trigger and the scientist fell, truly dead. Natalia raises her head from where she was to see the Winter Soldier on his knees, looking long and hard at the gun. He looks up to Natalia and makes eye contact, she shakes her head no.
"James! You don't have to do this!" she whispers.
"I love you Natalia," James says one last time. He pulls the gun up to his head and closes his eyes. The gun echoes around the room, but not before Natalia springs up and pushes the gun out of the way. James hit the ground hard, knocking him out.
The world goes black for Natalia Romanova, as guards rush in to get her and James to the medic ward.
James is the first to wake in the small hospital bed, positioned next to a window. He sits up slowly and looks out the window. There he sees another room, with a Natalia laying on the bed, bloody bandage around her stomach. James was sickened by the sight, he had done that to her- she could have died. It was his fault she had a scar from the bullet he embedded in her flesh. He looked to his left, down at his arm. It's what trademarked him as a killer, the Winter Soldier was only visible from his arm. The arm that James hated, had hurt the one he loved. James didn't realize he was crying until the tears fell on the white linen. He wiped his face with his right hand, the left won't do. James was mad with his shadow, and the gateway to his shadow started at his left arm. Surely a thing meant for killing could not partake in anything involving feeling or emotion or love. So where would that put James? Natalia was right, Love is the dangerous part, most are willing to play the game of death to be happy in the end. It would never work out with James and Natalia, it was a Red Romance- dangerous and beastly, never to work out because of who controlled them.
"James Buchanan Barnes?" James turned to look at the nurse who had entered the room.
"Your supervisor is here to see you," James lowered his head.
"You failed your mission, to kill her," said Karpov. James didn't respond.
"Zola's creation should have worked! You should have killed her!" he exclaims. "So why didn't you?" James lifts his head, Karpov never saw the sorrow portrayed by James, he would never understand how hard it is to have your memories wiped out of you and your body being taken over by someone else who lurked in your shadow.
"She made me feel human," James said after a long while. Karpov scoffed.
"Bah! You are not human! You are made to be a monster! Monsters don't feel emotion or humanity, they only feel death! You are such an idiot to feel emotion, when you are made to not feel anything," Karpov said. James springs out of bed and has Karpov down in a choke-slam before any guards could react.
"Because of you, a monster lives inside me! But just because it's in there, IT DOESN'T MEAN I'M A MONSTER!" James yelled. He releases Karpov from his hold and he coughs.
"Keep telling yourself that," he says hoarsely. This time guards are restraining James from killing Karpov.
"What do you want to do with him?" asks one of the guards.
"Pack him up, Hydra has some work to do," Karpov says.
Oh yes, Love is dangerous. Not as dangerous for you or me, but for a Red Romance, it's a game with death. Red Romance, a beastly thing- beautiful and dark with pitfalls deeper than a trench. For James and Natalia, Red Romance was death, both were aware of it. But were they willing to pay that price?