A/N: Alright all, we are gonna go back and see a little of what lead up to this point. Hope you enjoy the flashback! Let me know what you think! -Cat

Chapter Ten

EIGHT YEARS AGO

"How could you do that to me? How could you do that to dad?!" She screamed across the living room.

Her mother looked frantic, "I didn't know what else to do Madeline, you have no idea what it was like back then, the decisions we made, it was like existing in a vacuum."

"No, you're the vacuum, you suck everyone in and get them to do what you want, on your terms!" Madeline yelled across the room at her mother.

"That isn't fair, you have no idea what he was like then-"

"Don't try and pin this on dad, if anyone is a victim here it's him. How could you keep me from him?! HE DIDN'T EVEN KNOW I EXISTED! Don't even think about playing the 'he wasn't ready to be a father' card cause you didn't even give him a chance!"

"Do you think I was ready to be a mother? I was a functional alcoholic, after years of being not so functioning, do you think I had some playbook to tell me what I should do? No one was helping me, and I didn't think Gotham with the batman for your dad was going to work."

"But L.A. With Uncle Iron Man would be a.o.k. ?!"

"Tony has nothing to do with this!"

"No?! How come he behaves like my dad half the time? He probably wanted to keep dad out of my life like no other."

"Don't you talk about your Uncle like that after all he's done for you."

"I just can't believe I am related to you people. You just make these unilateral decisions that effect people's lives, and you think you are doing it for the greater good, but you are just doing it for yourselves, to vindicate your conscience. Well, I won't ever forget this. Not ever." Madeline sank heavily down into an armchair, arms crossed refusing to look at her mother.

Adriana put her head in her hands. Madeline couldn't tell if her mother was crying or not, either way she didn't care. Who was she to cry? What had she lost or suffered? Boo hoo. Let her cry.

Eventually Adriana straightened up and went to leave the room but stopped behind Maddy's chair.

"Madeline," She said, "I hope you love someone who loves no one but you and you are never faced with a situation that you can't see a way out of." She turned to walk outside.

Madeline mumbled under her breath, "Yeah, well, why don't you just drop dead."

Madeline watched as the scans came up on the screens. She didn't even realize she had put her hand over her mouth until she went to enlarge a section over his chest. She had decided to do a full body scan just so she could have an overview of his medical health as well as his brain.

"Did it work?" She looked up through the glass partition at Bucky who had sat up on the table.

She nodded, unable to speak. She hit the print button on the keyboard and then looked back up, Bucky had got up and was walking out of the booth. She quickly took a deep breath to steady her nerves.

To say he had seen trauma was like calling World War Two a difference in opinion. His body was storybook that read like a tragic horror story, the countless breaks through his whole skeleton, all fused perfectly but still present, including a recently healed clean break in his right arm. He had scar tissue throughout different areas of his body reminiscent of electrocution. His liver looked like chunks had been taken and regrown, actually a few of his major organs looked like that. And his brain... The scar tissue was incredible, whatever experiments the nazis performed on him must have been light years before their time, based on what his brain looked like it was amazing he could stand, and walk and talk, let alone all at the same time.

Bucky stood a few feet away from her looking at her expectantly, "Did you get what you needed?"

She looked over at him. The printer seemed to be deafening in her ears. She swallowed. Madeline was not someone who got overly emotional. Probably the genius thing. But looking at those scans and seeing the pain in this man's eyes made her want to curl up in the fetal position and just cry for days... That or wrap her arms around him and not let him go, keep him safe from anything that threatened him. And she had no idea why.

"Dr. Wayne?" Bucky took a step towards her, making sure there was still a good distance between them.

"I,...uh," she stuttered, it was like being sucked into his eyes, they were blue...it was the first time she noticed, she blinked and looked away, shaking her head a bit and clearing her throat. "I think we got everything we need for now, I will probably want to do some more scans of your brain eventually, but we can worry about that later." She picked up the printed scans and carefully slipped them into a large manila folder. "Tricky thing is, we don't know how hard they are looking for you but we are gonna stay on the safe side and keep everything old school. Hard copy only, no computer files, no Cloud…hmm, gonna need more notebooks. Where are you staying?" Madeline asked her head snapping up.

Bucky, who had been looking around her lab looked back at her shrugging, "I don't know yet."

Madeline nodded, going back to ordering the files, "Kay, your staying with me, so when we get home-"

"Sorry, what?"

Madeline blinked, looking back at Bucky who had a confused look on his face. She couldn't tell if he was surprised or offended and she definitely couldn't tell if the fact he apologized for interrupting her was a good thing or patronizing. "Well, obviously, you should stay with me." She said straightening up.

He crossed his arms, "I don't see what's obvious about that." His voice went lower as he spoke.

She looked over at him, again trying to read his expression and coming up completely empty, "Is this, like, a generational gap thing? Is it because I am a single woman... and my honour and that?"

Bucky looked at her like she was insane, "No, it's a danger thing. Do you not understand what I told you about what happened to me?" He took a step towards her, intensity radiating off of him, "I have no idea when that switch might be flipped. I am dangerous. I can't stay alone with you, it's too dangerous."

Maddy shook her head, "Have you had any lapses in your mental condition since all you memories came back?"

"No, but it's only been a day or so..."

"Look," Maddy put her hands up seeing the pattern and realizing they could get sucked into an argument with no end, "You need somewhere to stay. Hotels aren't a good idea, there are too many people circulating around, too many people to bribe to keep their mouths shut. Honestly it's a waste of money right now, who knows when we may have to do that, so lets keep that until it is actually necessary. Secondly, I need you to be in a calm, controlled and consistent environment, which my apartment would provide. I also want you to be consistently monitored, who better to do that then me? Plus I have a panic room so if you totally lose it, I can just lock myself in." Bucky stood with his arms crossed over his chest glaring at her with a questioning look.

"A panic room won't stop me."

Maddy blinked at him, "Kay look, you can argue with me and do what you want. But if you want my help, you will suck it up and realise you need my help and you need to trust me. It's nearly three in the morning, I wanna go home and look at your scans, and eat and shower. You are more than welcome to join me, get a good nights sleep in a bed then have like a real breakfast. Or you can go huddle under a bridge somewhere and meet me back here at ten o'clock tomorrow night. It's up to you. But my place is pretty nice. SO, yeah..." She picked up the files and walked past him to her office to get her purse.

Bucky stood there for a moment with his arms crossed in complete indecision. Madeline certainly could talk. But she did make some good points. He ran a hand over his face completely unsure of what the best thing to do would be.

He certainly didn't want to put her in any unnecessary danger. And sure he hadn't had a relapse ...yet. But what if he did? What if he woke up out of control. Madeline seemed to be taking his abilities a little too cavalierly for his taste. He was tired though.

She came out of her office wearing a cream coloured leather jacket. She looked over at him. "Well, are you gonna scale down the side of the building and disappear into the night, or do you wanna come with me?"

She looked tired, and hopeful? Bucky took a deep breath, "Alright," He scooped his clothes up and fell into step behind her heading to the elevator door that were in the back of the lab. She pressed the button and glanced at Bucky's chest. He noticed she kept looking there...

Suddenly her eyes shot up to his and caught him watching her, Bucky cleared his throat and went back to looking at the elevator doors, "Won't you be cold?" She asked.

He glanced down at himself. He was still in only the scrub pants. "No,"

"Oh," The elevator doors opened and they both stepped into it. Madeline dug her keys out of her purse and put one in the panel above the buttons before pressing the button that read P2. She glanced back at Bucky once the doors closed. "Is that relating to what they did to you?"

Bucky shrugged, "I guess so, I never really thought about it. But no I don't really get cold anymore."

"Huh," Maddy reached into her big tote bag over one shoulder and pulled out the notebook she had been writing in earlier and started writing in it feverishly.

They stopped moving and Madeline walked out the doors as soon as they opened without looking up from her notebook. Bucky fell into step behind her. She navigated her way through the parkade without looking up from the book, until she almost walked into a cement pillar.

Bucky grabbed her right arm and yanked her out of the way. She blinked looking up and around herself a bit, like she didn't know where she was for a moment. She glanced at the pillar, then looked up at Bucky. "Thanks, I've walked into that too many times already. Come on, I am just parked over here." She veered off to the right, looking in her purse, over her other shoulder, for her keys.

Bucky watched her blinking. She was very odd. Not like any girl he ever remembered meeting before. In someways she was so composed and in control. When he was first in the lab, she was completely in control, ready to defend herself. When she spoke about her work she seemed so in her element it was like she instantly became wiser. Then she would say something strange, out of the blue, or almost walk into a pillar.

Bucky shook his head, there were worse people to put your trust in, he assumed. He continued to follow her. She stopped next to a Bentley Continental GTR-3. She clicked her keys and the lights flashed. Bucky looked at her.

"This is your car?"

She blinked, looking from the car, as if she was worried there was something wrong with it, back up to Bucky. "Yeah, why?"

Bucky shrugged, "Not what I was expecting."

"Oh," Madeline opened her door, "Get in my side, you can sit in the back. The windows are tinted." Bucky obliged, crawling awkwardly into the back.

Madeline put her seat back again and then got in herself starting the car by pushing a button. "Kind of a Wayne family tradition, Bentley's." She explained reversing out of the parking stall. "That and Lambourgini's. But I keep that in California."

"Your a very strange person," Bucky said.

Madeline looked from the back windshield to Bucky, "You aren't the first person to tell me that, but I have to say, nice to meet you pot, I'm kettle."

Bucky actually found himself chuckling. It surprised him so much, he ended up turning it into a cough and then clearing his throat. Madeline looked at Bucky in the rearview mirror, she smiled brightly at him. "Kay, let's go home," With that she settled in the driver's seat and took off towards the exit.