If I'd had a hand free, I would have clapped it to my mouth. No. It couldn't be. But I searched those cold blue eyes and found nothing at all. I looked away. It was my fault. I'd trusted Bucky, believed every word that came out of his mouth. I'd been the one to call Sam, tell him where Bucky was, so he could be reunited with Steve. And all along, it had been a mission, a ploy to get close to him, and take him out. A mission that was now completed. Captain America, Steve Rogers, was dead. Probably shot in the back. Had Bucky taken out Tony at the same time, eradicating the remaining Stark, the one he'd missed years ago?
I never should have trusted him, never should have let him into my home, into my head. In one wild second of déjà vu, I remembered the first time I'd seen him, those blue eyes darting around in a panic. I could have kept walking. I should have.
Rumlow's boots were loud in the silent room, but I didn't look up. I didn't want to see either of them again.
"Turn around," he ordered, and I heard Bucky comply. I wished I could turn my ears away as thoroughly as my eyes. But I couldn't. So I heard the whup-ffttt-crack in the air, and I looked up at the unexpected sound, my eyes finding the line of red across Bucky's back as Rumlow drew the whip back. It descended again, the crack as it met Bucky's skin the only sound on the air. He didn't make a sound, didn't even move. Just stood there and accepted the blows.
"What is your name?" Rumlow asked quietly, the sound almost lost in the third crack of the whip.
"An asset needs no name," Bucky replied, and his voice was perfectly level.
"What is your purpose?" Crack!
"To serve Hydra." I looked away, thinking of Steve, of Tony, of his parents, of Natasha, of everyone the Winter Soldier had hurt.
"What are you?"
"A soldier. A tool, to make the world a better place." Bucky repeated. "A puppet on your strings."