Guest: Hey, don't you worry; I'm cool with you giving me that tip. I was a bit worried about that too and was debating whether or not to write in an explanation chapter, but I decided it would disrupt the flow(?) of the story and was planning to save it until the end. To rid you of some of the confusion, though, I've thrown it in here, and while it's not a perfect reason at this point in the story, I'm hoping it'll ease your mind a little bit and the minds of others who questioned the same thing.

As for the Hydra/Thanos/Gauntlet thing, I realized that, but then I remembered that in the Avengers, S.H.I.E.L.D. was prepared for an alien attack as Nick Fury explained during the scene just before Bruce hulked out. They'd already known about the Tesseract, and after The Dark World, there's no way they'd not know about the Aether, and so they'd keep on digging until they found out about the Infinity Gauntlet. What S.H.I.E.L.D. knows, Hydra knows, which leads you into this chapter, which explains how Bucky knows. And how S.H.I.E.L.D. came to find out that the Infinity Gauntlet even existed is already planned and will be explained in a later chapter.

I also admit that this story is based more off the movies than the comics, so if something differs too much, that's probably because I was drawing more conclusions from the movies than the comics. I've read some of the comics, but the rest are hard to get my hands on so I try my best and make do with the ones already in my library.

Again, I know my explanations aren't perfect, but I hope they clarify enough until it's all explained later. Thanks for your advice!

Russian Hydra Base— Late March 2014

The newest Hydra member was a spindly Scottish boy who was rather ecstatic to be on Project Winter Soldier. Despite his young appearance and even younger career profile, he'd impressed Russian scientists enough to land him a spot in one of the most elite operations in the world. He'd even caught the eye of Baron von Strucker.

As clever as the new Scottish boy was, he wasn't as street smart as he could have been and was a bit too arrogant for his own good. Then there was the fact that if the Russian Hydra scientists had known how he acted whenever a pretty girl was thrown into the mixture, they wouldn't have spared him a second glance.

The scientists didn't know how he acted, though, so this was how he ended up proudly examining the tank which held one of the deadliest weapons in Hydra's possession.

"Looks a bit like a ghost, doesn't he?" an effeminate voice purred behind him.

The scientist whirled around to the vibrant red hair and fluttering lashes of a smiling woman. His thoughts immediately turned away from the dark blue face in the tank, and all thoughts of professionality were thrown out the window.

"Yes," he said, flattening his hair to his forehead. "He does."

"The Winter Soldier, correct?"

"Yes, ma'am," he said with a grin.

The woman raised an eyebrow and stared into the tank with a somewhat wistful look passing her face. "This is not the only asset Hydra possesses."

"No," the boy's grin was replaced with a frown. "I thought you'd know that. You are Hydra, right?"

The woman's face didn't betray any emotion. "Aren't we all?" she said wryly. With a relieved sigh, the boy's grin was back.

"No, it isn't our only weapon." He lightly emphasized 'our.'"The Infinity Gauntlet, too, and one of the twins."

"But I knew that."

"But you knew that," he replied smoothly.

"Tell me, just what is the Infinity Gauntlet? I'm afraid I was never filled in," she laughed somewhat sheepishly.

"A glove that can give its user infinite power when used with the Infinity Gems... I shouldn't even be telling you this. If the Baron—"

"I was never told because there was an incident in London which I had to investigate," she said crisply. "How many gems do we have?"

"One out of six."

"And the twins?"

"The Scarlet Witch." The boy was starting to curdle; this seemed more like an interrogation than harmless flirting.

"Her brother?"

"Peter Maximoff. We've located him in the Moscow area—"

He was cut off when the woman pulled a hypodermic needle from her lab coat belt and jammed it into his neck.

"Sorry about your job," she said with a scowl, "but if a couple of batting eyelashes are all it takes for all that information, I'm not entirely sure you deserved it."

With that, she plucked a phone from her pocket. Underneath the screen, the Stark Industries logo was emblazoned; the phone was a gift from a friend, the head of Stark Industries himself.

"Sir," she said. "They know more than we hoped. The twins, the Gauntlet... almost everything."

The redheaded woman walked away with the phone still held to her ear. Neither she nor the scientist, who had mysteriously been found dead in his home three days later, realized that the sleeping ghost with his heightened senses could hear every word they said.

Ivy was a rather grouchy riser, Bucky noted.

He'd shaken her awake the next morning, and she'd smacked his metal arm with her good wrist. That had startled her awake, and she'd stomped complaining into the shower. She'd been upset ever since.

They headed down to an abandoned car garage. Bucky cleared the space of any debris and gave Ivy back her knife to which she arched an eyebrow.

"Shouldn't you teach me how to aim and shoot?"

"That's harder."

"I wouldn't think so."

"Well, either way, you have a better build for knife-throwing and fighting. We should focus on that," he decided. "Now, you have a hurt wrist, so you'll be out for three days. We'll probably stay at this hotel for a little under a week to give you enough time to learn the basics."

"None of the fancy parkour stuff."

"No. You should manage just fine with two knives and your feet. Of course you can embellish your fighting style a little bit, but I'm only going to teach you martial arts and knife combat."

"I'm seriously not going to learn how to shoot a gun?"

"If we get there," he said, "then we'll touch on it. Do you know any hand-to-hand combat?"

"Oliver does, and he taught me a couple of moves," Ivy said weakly. "And when I was ten, my mom enrolled me in a tae kwon do class. I only got to blue stripe before another girl named Eloise Lekrillane started calling me tae kwon dork, so mom pulled me out."

"Show me."

And so that was how Ivy and Bucky spent the better part of their day, with Bucky as a somewhat impatient teacher and Ivy making the occasional snappish comment or pun. Ivy was mercifully a quick learner, and Bucky couldn't fathom why her classmates would have called her derogatory names; for a beginner, she wasn't doing badly. In fact, with her sprained wrist taken into consideration, she was doing very well.

"You'll have to compensate for your wrist," he mused at one point. "Try using it that arm more as a balance."

"But it'll heal in three days."

"We could be attacked at any moment, so you need to be prepared."

And so Ivy did as he said and swung her right wrist around in a windmill motion, allowing her left hand to follow through with the knife in a move not dissimilar to Michael Jackson in Thriller.

When Bucky's left arm flew up to block the knife, a resounding clang accompanied his lips quirking up in a small smile. "Good. Again."

They repeated the action, and each time, Ivy was greeted with an, "Again." Soon enough, Ivy's left forearm was starting to turn red from each time Bucky blocked her swings, and the pain was overshadowed by the pride she felt as his smile slowly and uncharacteristically grew.

But Ivy was starting to become annoyed. The tedious, repetitive movement was starting to make her arms ache as she swung over and over again. Finally, she snapped.

Rather than swiping at Bucky with her knife, her right arm swung and she used the momentum to swing her left foot around and into his shin. His momentary surprise let her push him with her good arm as he staggered backwards a bit, and despite the influidity of her unexpected attack, he looked up at her with pleasure.

Ivy knew she wouldn't be able to overpower him if she hadn't kicked him in the shin, but excitement still bubbled up inside her as she hopped up and down on the balls of her feet.

"Sorry if I hurt your leg, but was that one okay?"

"Yes," he said. The mask was back, but Ivy could still see the satisfaction in his gaze. "Do you think you're ready to spar?"

Ivy's green eyes widened. "No, I'm pretty sure I just got lucky."

"While that may be the case, it was a good move nonetheless. You'll need to practice it."

So they spent the rest of the day sparring. Ivy had the sneaking suspicion he was going very easy on her, but she was having enough trouble as it was and didn't complain. As the sun started to set, Bucky announced that it was time to head back. They took the car back to the hotel, and Ivy immediately headed to the fridge and collected some ice for her wrist.

"Who's got dibs on the bed tonight?"

"You have a hurt wrist. You do."

"Okie dokie."

"Go to sleep now," Bucky said. "We'll be practicing again tomorrow."

"Hm..." Ivy lifted a finger to her chin and pretended to think. "I don't think I'm all that tired. How about you get some food?"

"Food?" Bucky asked skeptically. "Don't you remember what happened last time?"

"Relax! It's a small town, just head out, wear a scarf around your mouth, and you'll be good to go."

It didn't seem like a foolproof plan to Bucky, but Ivy seemed confident, and that was reason enough for him to go. He wrapped a scarf around his face, and with a halfhearted glare thrown Ivy's way, he was out the door.

"Get enough for breakfast tomorrow!" Ivy called as he headed out.

He wasn't back fifteen minutes later, and Ivy bit her thumbnail as she stared down her cell phone sitting on the table. After a brief moment of hesitation, she picked it up and dialed Oliver's number for the first time since she left D.C.

There was no reply.

"We're doomed!" Laurie wailed. "Peter was right; we'll never get out of this alive! He's probably already dead! Katya's probably already dead!"

"Laurie, please! You'll wake Blaire!" Craig cried in an effort to calm his wife. Oliver had to admit that Laurie was being childish. Even Ivy wouldn't act this way, and Ivy could become very immature when she was upset.

"Mom, maybe they're just setting them free," Nathaniel said weakly.

"No!" Laurie shrieked again. "They're dead! They were so young!"

"With all due respect, Miss Brooker, you need to shut the hell up," Oliver said as politely as he could.

Laurie turned a furious shade of red, and, completely unfazed, Oliver arched an eyebrow at her. Finally, Laurie leaned against the wall and sighed as she rubbed her temples.

Oliver nodded once and turned his attention back to his thinking. As much as he missed the presence of Katya and even Peter, whose name he didn't even know up until a few hours ago, he knew that panicking would not help matters. He dealt with his worries in different ways, like trying to figure out a way to call Ivy before they ended up next.

He had no doubt in his mind that Katya and Peter were either dead or seriously injured. What he couldn't get out of his head, though, was the way Peter had turned to a blur as the guard grabbed his arm. There was no way he wasn't imagining that.

Then again, why was it not a possibility? Only last year, some guy with a green cape decided to try and take over the world with an alien invasion worthy of a superhero movie. Super speed wasn't exactly too far-fetched, especially with the Thor incident in London thrown into the picture.

If that was the case and Peter actually did have superpowers (Oliver still felt ridiculous thinking about it), then that changed Oliver's ideas as to what could have happened to Katya and Peter. Of course their captors would want to find extraordinary people. But then wouldn't that mean that Katya was special, too?

A headache was starting to make itself known, and Oliver pinched the bridge of his nose. A sharp, accented voice seemed to echo around the small cell, telling the hostages to hold out hope.

Well, princess, Oliver thought bitterly. Looks to me like it's time to give up.

Oliver must seem pretty rude. Oh, well. I'd be rude, too, if I was trapped in a Russian holding cell and just waiting out my slow, painful death.

Thanks for reading, and review!