Greetings, comrades. This is a little thing I've been working on with my friend Tyloric. Set before Winter Soldier.
Hope you enjoy :)
Disclaimer: Don't own Avengers. The quote belongs to Ed Sheeran.
"If this is to end in fire, then we should all burn together.
Watch the flames climb high into the night."
The explosion is sudden, a supernova of heat and fire and pain, sets the darkness ablaze before he can react. Steve can't remember moving, calling out, reaching blindly for the body beside him, but he remembers agony and suffocation and fear.
His ears ring long after the bomb has died away and taken the upper floors with it. Eyes open, forget-me-not blue, to meet a darkness thicker than before. It takes a moment to adjust, and when he has, the pain catches up and he can't breathe again. Gasping, choking on burning dust, and he rolls on his side to avoid suffocating on the black that is suddenly crushing him. There's a volcano sitting on his chest, filling his lungs with lava and his heart with ash. He has felt this once before, when he crashed a doomed German fighter plane into the Atlantic and drowned in fiery agony for the six hours it took him to freeze.
It takes too long for his mind to clear, and he knows he's not okay. He groans (a pathetic sound he will deny later), coughs to clear excess dust from his lungs, and distantly studies the broken ceiling above him. Rubble has piled around him, thick slabs of cement and plaster, and he's lucky to be alive. He's buried, but breathing because God's not done with him yet. He wishes he can lay here, forget the world, and a hundred years from now it will find his bones in a rusted shield. But he has never been known to quit, even as a child, and refuses to do so now. He sits up slowly, but a fresh wave of agony ripples through his torso and he curls in on his side, fighting the dark haze to his vision.
It's still there when Steve finally manages to sit up, but the stabbing pain in his side will keep him awake long enough to get out. His uniform is torn, covered in ash and blood, too much blood. When he wipes at his eyes, his hand comes away sticky and red. He's shaking, but adrenaline is rushing through his veins like poison and he won't allow the panic to show until he's alone in his room and he knows Clint is safe.
Clint.
Hawkeye was just beside him when the explosion hit, a bomb planted in wait for the two SHIELD operatives that would inevitably pass. He didn't see where the other man ended up, but Clint Barton is not a super soldier and has no doubt suffered more damage than Steve. His heart is pounding in his ears now, arms shaking with pain and exhaustion as he struggles to stand and gain his bearings. Rubble from upper floors has collapsed to form a pyramid around him, and the trick is moving it without getting crushed. He can, though. He has done harder things with worse injuries in Nazi Germany, and he won't let a comrade die because of his own weakness.
He searches the mess for a stable place to begin his escape and finds one across from him, where a gap between two larger slabs has been jammed with concrete and debris. It's a fair distance off the ground, and he will have to climb to reach it. The rubble isn't heavy as he moves it, but the strains pulls at open, bleeding wounds and he has to steady himself on a slab of concrete as unconsciousness threatens him again. Blood is fresh and warm as it slides down his face and torso, but he ignores it. He has to. Not enough time, too much to lose. He has to be as strong as they think he is.
You will fail them all, his mind whispers and he squeezes his eyes shut against an onslaught of pain that knows no wound. He can't grieve now, while time is a trickle of sand through an hourglass. He is not Steve Rogers, the kid from Brooklyn, the last of a generation. He can't be, because the world is frail; it's a ticking time bomb, and Captain America is the man that knows no weakness.
He takes a breath, steadies himself, and continues digging. The gap he makes is narrow and unsteady, but he hoists himself up and climbs through it without hesitation. Agony flares, white hot, as his wounds tear and bleed in torrents. His legs are not steady beneath him once he's through and he has to breathe deep through a wavy of dizziness. The burning air moves with a current here; they are not completely buried. It brushes his pale skin and leaves a black print to mark where it has been.
Concrete and glass litter the hallway. Walls are precarious and collapsing. Ash makes the air thick and hot, stinging his eyes like fire. At first glance, he does not see Clint through the chaos. His search is desperate, reckless as he throws heavy stone slabs aside like pillows. He opens his mouth to speak, to call out, to scream, but smoke and adrenaline have stolen his voice from him. The effort reduces him to a violent coughing fit and the iron taste of blood coats his tongue. Pain wreaks havoc through his body, leaving him light-headed and trembling. Something is wrong, so wrong, but he will find his comrade or die trying.
He doesn't noticed the muted silence that has befallen the wreckage, the blazing heat that is slowly rising, the thick ash that blinds him and fills his lungs like ice water in the middle of the Atlantic and he's drowning again not again, I can't.
But he sees the heavy, crumbling rubble that blocks his way. Hears his own heart pounding in his ears. Smells blood and smoke and not enough oxygen. He can't speak, but he doesn't need to. The next slab he lifts is large and gives him a clear view down the hall. He freezes for a split second, despite his panic, before sprinting off faster than his body should allow. His mouth is open; he can't scream.
Clint is lying face down in the dirt, not awake, not moving, is he even breathing?
Steve stumbles to his knees beside Hawkeye and his chest feels like it's on fire but he ignores it. Fear and panic are smothered ruthlessly beneath his soldier instincts. Two fingers search out the carotid pulse instantly, press harder than necessary just to ensure that it's there. Weak, but steady. He brushes his hand in front of the archer's mouth and senses a faint gust of air on his skin. Breathing. Alive.
The assurance is short lived. Glancing his comrade over for obvious injury, Steve freezes. His heart is pounding in his chest, his throat, his skull, burning and threatening to vacate his injured body. The wound is gaping, scarring, so much blood and God, that's not going away, not ever. Steve rolls his friend over to keep himself grounded, observes for other injuries, but his mind is flashing back to a different time, assaulted by memories of seventy years prior when he was leading men through Nazi Europe to fight and bleed and die for their country. Of battles and horrors and carrying injured men out of the line of fire; of wounds and blood and scarred bodies that won't ever heal, my fault, I lead them to this.
Hawkeye's purple uniform is singed and tattered, mask long since torn away and buried under ash. Like Steve, he is covered in blood and dirt and his chest is heaving like the air is too thick to breathe. The Captain tears away the uniform, and Clint can bitch at him later so long as he is alive to do so. Various cuts and puncture wounds present themselves, sluggishly bleeding and raw at the edges. They aren't serious, but the other injury is still bleeding and Clint is deteriorating fast.
They need to get out. Now.
Captain America tears at his own uniform until there are enough makeshift bandages to create a tourniquet, wrap the wound and staunch the bleeding as best he can. Steve isn't a medic, he's a soldier, and this is the best he can do to keep his comrade alive. He checks once more, ensures Clint is still breathing and he hasn't missed anything else.
Steve pauses, sighs, shoves his own agony aside so that he may shoulder another's. "I'm sorry," he whispers, but without a voice, the words are breathless and silent.
His feet are unsteady beneath him when he stands, legs shaky and weak, but his back is strong and the body draped over his shoulder is limp. He can't go the way they were heading, as no doubt HYDRA has more traps lying in wait for them, so he can only go the way they have come and pray that the entrance is not caved in.
Smoke and ash continue to fill the hallway, but the rubble remains largely at the site of detonation. The Captain runs, sprints through the destruction with strength he doesn't have, because everything is riding on him and he'll be damned if he lets anyone else die. His lungs burn, heaving breath that comes shorter the longer he runs. He's covered in blood, absolutely drenched, and some of it isn't his. Steve doesn't stop, won't slow down, thrusts his suffering away because there's no time. Clint is dying on his shoulder and he can worry about his own deteriorating health later, when he knows he hasn't failed again.
He runs into more debris, where a domino effect has triggered bombs further down the hallway, but he doesn't hesitate. He can't; there's so much at stake, everything to lose, and he won't stop until he's dead. He's gasping for breath, and it's scorching as it rushes in his throat. His legs are burning, bleeding, lack the strength to pass hurdles of rubble, but he continues on willpower alone. Stone and glass cut into his skin as he climbs and shoves it aside with his shoulder, but he hardly feels it. The pain is fleeting compared to his adrenaline and panic.
Belatedly, as he passes the damage and continues on through a passage black with smoke, he thinks of his radio. A brief check reveals that it's been damaged in the explosion, and Clint's is missing altogether. They are alone, isolated, without help, and he can only hope that Fury has an extraction plan. Steve can get them to the surface, but he doesn't think he will be able to fight his way out of here if HYDRA does make an appearance.
Time is hazy with darkness and suffocation. I quick glance over his shoulder shows that Clint still isn't moving. The archer is quiet on a good day, but this silence is unnerving in its blood and dust. Capitan America is not a coward, but he is living his greatest fear and it will haunt him like gunfire and grenades and faces he will never see again.
He doesn't remember reaching the exit and leaving the way he has come, only that there is suddenly sun in his eyes and air in his lungs. His legs nearly give way beneath him, but they're still on HYDRA turf with fire behind him and chaos before him and no SHIELD aircraft in sight. His fight isn't over yet. Clint is still dying. The Captain continues on.
The explosions were widespread and they have taken out the entire building. Any intel SHIELD could have obtained from the sleeper cell has no doubt been destroyed, the mission failed, their sacrifice for nothing. People flood out of the building, through doors and windows and jumping from upper stories to keep from burning to death. They pay no mind to Steve and his limp cargo, which works in his favor. Steve can't fight them, when time and strength and blood are dwindling like sand through his fingers. He sprints past fire and concrete, blazing vehicles and screaming people, paying no mind to suffering innocence and hating himself all the more. He has to make a choice, though. That's his job, why they allow him to lead a team of 21st century heroes. He can make the hard decisions and bare the nightmares afterward, because he's done it before. World War II was pain, hard choices, sacrifice, and hatred. Seventy years later, he finds that the world isn't all that different.
Steve is through the security gates and sprinting toward the abandoned road they had come from before the guards notice the infiltrator. Gunfire joins the cacophony of noise as bullets shoot past his head and into the trees. He can't turn around, doesn't have time to fight when his comrade is dying on his shoulder, so he continues to run and lets the enemy shoot at his back. He's unprotected, can feel the lead like hot daggers piercing his shoulder, his leg, too close to his spine to be safe.
Can't stop. He takes the road into the trees, out of range, out of sight. He's stumbling, can barely continue with strength that abandoned him long ago, and hears the HYDRA guards pursue not far behind. Injured or no, Captain America is the pinnacle of human performance and does not surrender beneath the heavy weight of suffering.
The ambiance of the wood is loud in his ears, roaring with footsteps and gunshots and heavy breathing. He still can't speak, vision hazy on the edges and fading fast. Sun is hot on his neck, blood warm on his skin. The sky is blooming with light from the east as darkness sets across his eyes and he can't keep going. His body will collapse soon and HYDRA will kill his comrade like they did seventy years prior, when he hung from a fast moving train and lost everything. He can't; he's so close to salvation and he can't drop now or everything he has ever believed in dies with Clint.
The wood ends abruptly at a sheer cliff side, where the earth meets the raging sea in a violent drop. The sound of crashing waves can be heard drifting up over the rock face, roaring though they are so far below. Steve can't stop, doesn't look back, has to make a split second decision if the two agents have any hope of survival. He strains to listen, desperate and fading fast, and thinks he hears the faint hum of an engine overhead. Before he can determine reality from memory, he's jumping off the cliff and hurtling into the abyss.
He holds the limp archer tight, arms strong even as his vision fails and they plunge headlong toward merciless waters. He doesn't see the ocean; he sees failure and ice and drowning and oh God no, not again, please…
A wave of darkness sweeps over him, tows him under like a relentless flood, and he doesn't notice the silent figures falling with them.
Steve knows fear.
Oblivion.
Thank you for taking the time to read :) Please review! I love to hear what you lovely people have to say, even if it's criticism.
(Side note: Yes, per Tyloric's wishes, Hawkeye wears his traditional purple suit)