There was blood in the snow, a vibrant smear of crimson that painted upon argent canvas as the precious drops of life exuded from the grotesquely sheared limb. He was so cold; his broken gasping a liquid shudder that wracked him painfully.
Footsteps sounded in the frozen air, and a high voice that twisted with a heavy accent. Somehow, he could not distinguish the words, the pain and the struggling breaths that were wrested from his lungs were harsh in his own ears.
His jacket was grabbed from behind, and hauled from the ground, he was dragged limply, staring upwards into the snow flecked sky, the feather soft flakes lightly dusting his blood splattered face. The train tracks far above him were still, and he blinked away tears as consciousness slipped from his grasp the faint wisp of life.
Steve was up there...
James Buchanan Barnes slouched in his creaking chair, the metal of his bionic hand clicking against the glass it held, the dark amber liquid sloshing against its smooth sides.
He stared moodily out the dirty window to the street below, clenching his remaining hand into a fist, a futile attempt to stop its trembling. The shrill keen of a siren startled him, and with a shatter, his glass hit the grimy floor, followed by his chair.
Cursing, he rubbed his eyes tiredly. Kiev was not, perhaps, the best locale in which to lay low for a while, but it was what he remembered, one of the only things he could remember. He would be lying if he said they were good memories, but it had been, at most, his home for the past 70 or so years: it was the first place he thought to flee after the events in Washington.
He paced around the tiny room, a muddle of disjointed memories swirling within his skull, and he sank to his knees, utterly overwhelmed with faces and situations that he didn't understand. And always, the chiseled face of the sandy haired Avenger was before him, both a whip thin, schoolboy, and the brawny hero he had fought, and he still could not remember why he was so important. And always, the clear, fresh memories of the agile snuffing of human life, the fresh blood soaking his hands and clothes, which he could never fully clean. Bucky could not be sure about anything these days.