Chapter 21

Thea leant over the window sill and looked out into the small garden where she could see a small black bird nibbling at the seeds. It was a peaceful scene that she would have found pretty if the situation was different. As it was, it was no more beautiful to her than a barren moonscape. Nothing in Malta felt pleasant or nice. Even memories that had once been sweet were now too painful to touch most days.

The days they spent there at the time of their wedding were so sweet and precious that she couldn't completely keep herself from returning to them mentally every few days when her longing for Bucky overwhelmed her. They had spent only one week there then and she had now been alone with Jamie in the tiny house for nearly 14. No corner of the little building seemed to retain the specialness of that time any longer, since everywhere had now been filled with the ache of being parted from her husband. Yet, the days after their wedding were some of the most beautiful times she could remember, so she couldn't keep herself from steeping herself in bittersweet daydreams of that time. She had been so wildly attracted to Bucky already and she had been slowly, clearly falling for him, so Thea had known that she was going to eventually be almost as painfully in love with him as he was with her. It had taken another few months to get there, but it had happened just as she had expected.

In fact, their honeymoon was so special to her precisely because of his understanding and love at that time, despite her own slower pace—even if things got rougher in the months that had followed. She had told herself then that she wanted to come back to Marsaxlokk one day, but now she wished she could leave and never, ever return. She would rather flee to almost anywhere else and have the house be torn down rather than have to remain sleeping alone in the tiny house where they had stayed with hardly a moment in which their hands or arms were not entwined. If she did not still have a ridiculous, foolish hope that Bucky would come to find her one day, then she would leave and never come back. Any sweetness in those memories could be better appreciated from far away where she did not have constant visual reminders of what…who…should be there with her.

Jamie no longer asked for Papa to sway him to sleep at night. She was not certain that he even remembered how Bucky loved to play zoo animals, tell him wildly imaginative stories, or tickle him out of a tantrum. The baby would come in a little over a fortnight more. She had no way of knowing for sure if Bucky was even alive. Maybe she would never know. Her daughter would essentially be born an orphan and Jamie would never remember anything else. She had this mental conversation with herself every day, but it didn't change anything.

Jamie was still taking his nap, which meant she could rest. Yet, she didn't feel as if she wanted to sleep. She didn't want to read. She had said her daily rosary for Bucky that morning. She'd whispered half of another as she watched Jamie sleep, but she didn't have the energy to finish.

Thea pushed herself up slowly from the chair near the window and grabbed her crutches to swing over to Jamie's cot. As she lovingly stared down at her son, she heard a sound that made her stomach drop. She spun on her heel and held her crutch up in the air as Bucky had taught her, ready to beat to death the person who had entered her home if they took a step closer to her baby.

The blond man standing in front of her looked very distressed, as he explained apologetically, "Uh, hello, Mrs Barnes. Um, I'm so very sorry that we scared you. However, it was not safe for us to wait outside. The password is Teva."

Thea dropped her crutch and stared back and forth between the two men that were standing in her small house. She tried to remember the correct wording of the question Bucky had given her. "Кто любил Василису Прекрасную?"

The tall man with the beard smiled. "The tsar, Mrs. Barnes." When Thea stepped closer with her other crutch lifted threateningly, the man stammered in Russian with a terrible American accent, "Царь женился на Василисе Прекрасной."

"Ok." Thea lowered her crutch and looked at the other man, who seemed to be trying to blend into the background with a suspiciously neutral expression on his face. "Who are you both and why are you here?"

Looking both sheepish and nervous, the blond man replied softly, "My name is Steve Rogers, ma'am, and this is my colleague, Sam Wilson. Your husband, Bucky, sent us to bring you to him."

Her head racing with confusion, hope, and relief, Thea leant into her crutches and closed her eyes. After a moment in which she realised that she might be going to pass out, she whispered, "I think…I need to sit down."

Moving so rapidly that Thea realised that he must have already seen she was in distress, the other man—Wilson she thought—caught her as her knees started to buckle and helped her to her chair. He said very gently, "I'm sorry that we frightened you, Mrs Barnes. You and your child are safe, I promise. I assure you that Steve and I would not have entered the house without your invitation if we had not been concerned about being seen. Can I get you a glass of water or something?"

Thea shook her head and stared at him as she said faintly, "No, it is quite all right. I will be ok. I just…I did not think that I would ever hear that password. It has just been 14 weeks since Budapest and there hasn't been any news in the papers for almost that entire time. I wasn't certain that Bucky was even alive."

The man who had identified himself as Steve—Thea thought that he looked similar to the man she remembered in the news broadcasts but not quite the same perhaps because of his dark blond beard—smiled with understanding. She stared at him as he spoke, thinking of what Bucky had told her about his childhood friend, and wondered how similar he was to the person Bucky remembered. She only half heard him as he said, "Buck is fine. He is safe and we all feel that it should be safe for you and your son to go to him now. Are you going to be ok to travel, ma'am? We will have to fly to get where Bucky is staying."

A fire kindled in her eye and Thea answered, "Try to keep me away, Captain Rogers. I'll walk if I have to."

Steve seemed surprised by the vehemence of her response, but smiled kindly. "I was referring to your advanced pregnancy, ma'am."

"This baby is not being born away from my husband if there is any option otherwise. I'll be on that plane, Captain. When do we leave?"

The other man, who seemed both highly amused and interested in their conversation, replied gently, "Actually, Mrs Barnes, we need to go as quickly as possible. We probably attracted attention when we landed."

Blinking somewhat at being called Mrs Barnes, as she was only used to her cover name, Thea replied determinedly, "Good. Would you mind helping me get ready? I don't have much here, but I don't want to leave anything behind, since I never want to return."

Sam asked with a friendly smile, "Of course. Do you have a suitcase, ma'am?"

"Just a bag, not a suitcase. There is another bag on the table in the kitchen, too. Would you mind terribly if I asked you to put all of Jamie's snacks and things in that bag? He will want something to eat whilst we travel, I'm sure. I can pack my clothing, since there isn't much at all."

Sam hurried off to the kitchen, whereas Steve stayed. He looked down into the cot. "He is a very handsome boy. He reminds me of Bucky's youngest brother, Joe, in a way."

Thea smiled. "Bucky said Jamie looks like his grandfather."

Steve laughed. "Yeah, he does a bit. His hair has a wave like Mrs Barnes' hair did, too."

She tilted her head and looked at him oddly, as she replied, "Really? Bucky never described her appearance to me and he doesn't have any pictures."

"Mrs Barnes was very petite and had wavy hair that she used to wear up in a large, old-fashioned bun. She cooked wonderful dinners, but her baking was even better. Everyone that knew her liked her and Bucky worshipped her."

Tucking her son's second pair of spare shortalls into the bag, Thea replied with a small smile, "It was clear from how he spoke of her that she was an enormous influence of good in his life. Do you mind getting Jamie's little bin of toys? We can leave the bin and just chuck the contents into the bag. Where are we going?"

Steve smiled regretfully, as he dumped the toys into the bag unceremoniously. "I'm afraid that I cannot tell you that yet. It will be a long flight, however."

How very familiar that felt, Thea thought. "All right. I suppose that it doesn't really matter, does it? Bucky never told me where we were going until we got there most of the time. Security always came first. Do you mind collecting the shoes and handbag over there?"

His smile faltering slightly, Steve sighed and then bent to snatch up the things she had indicated. "Certainly, ma'am."

At that moment, the other man re-entered the room. "All packed up, Mrs Barnes. Is there anything else that I should get together for you?"

"Erm, no, I don't think so. I suppose we shall have to leave Jamie's wooden rocking horse. I can't take that on a plane and it is so ancient that it would fall apart anyway. I'm almost done."

Steve shrugged. "If you want the rocking horse, we can bring it. It is a private plane."

"No, it is silly to pack it. I only got it because Bucky used to let Jamie ride him about the flat in Bucharest whilst he pretended to be a horse. It was Jamie's favourite thing, so I hoped the rocking horse might be as close a replacement as I could find. Thank you, though, Captain." Thea leant over to pick up Jamie, who started fussing immediately at being awakened too early.

Steve motioned to Sam, who was smirking and made a very rude gesture as he mouthed, "What?" Finally taking pity on Steve's frustration, Sam decided to slide the smaller bag under the pram and started pushing it towards the door. Steve snatched up the larger bag and waited to see if there was something else that Thea would need.

She, however, was not looking at either of them, since all of her attention was focussed on her unhappy son. She kissed his forehead and soothingly crooned, "It's ok, my darling. We are going to see Papa. Do you want to see Papa?"

The little boy didn't look impressed, but kept fussing and wiggling. Not looking away from him, Thea asked in an exhausted voice, "Would you get the picture please, Captain? That might help. Sometimes he will settle if I show him the picture and tell him stories about Bucky playing with him."

"Certainly ma'am." Steve looked inside the cot and felt a horrible pang of pain when he saw what picture she had meant. There was a newspaper photograph of Bucky from the time of the incident in Berlin. Had she no other pictures of him? He was not going to be the one to tell Bucky that his wife had soothed their son to sleep with a picture of the Winter Soldier. He handed the picture to her silently.

"Here we are Jamie, darling. See Papa? We are going to Papa now."

"Papa."

Her voice nearly breaking as she tried to remain calm, Thea said encouragingly, "Yes, darling, Papa. Won't that be lovely? We are going in a plane with Papa's friends. Then you'll get to see Papa."

"Papa go."

"Yes, he did go, darling. Now he will be back."

The baby pointed energetically at the picture. "Papa go, go, go, go."

"Yes, Jamie. Let's go see him. Ok?"

The toddler seemed quite pleased to hold the little picture and repeat off and on, "Go."

Thea placed him carefully in the pram, letting him have a small faded grey bunny that was probably once white and then looked at the two men. "I'm afraid that I need my crutches today, so I can't push the pram through the grass. It is too uneven for me, otherwise I could just use the pram to stabilise me."

Sam stepped forwards and offered with a look at Steve, "I don't mind, ma'am. I can carry the other bag, Steve."

Steve shrugged as he picked up the remaining bag and the rocking horse and then headed for the door.

Nearly two hours later, Thea was asleep in the back of the plane with Jamie in her arms and a blanket tucked all round her. Up front in the cockpit, Sam commented, "So I was right, you know."

Steve seemed perplexed. "About what?"

"That she was going to be just like Marie-Claire. Bozo crazy about your boy and ready to fight to be with him."

"Yeah, ok, you were a little bit right. He doesn't seem her type, but holy s*** is she his. Almost like she was made to order for Bucky Barnes."

"Yeah? Well, I would like to know how the f*** the d***ed Winter Soldier can get a girl when on the run from HYDRA. Before we raced off to Romania I was all righteous and an American hero and could I get a date? No. All Barnes had to do is stalk around waving his f***ing metal arm of death and he gets a girl that looks like that. Between him and you, it is enough to make a guy feel very inferior."

Steve laughed. "I wasn't expecting her to be quite that beautiful, no. And he used to make fun of the fellows who dated English girls during the war, I remember. However, Bucky has always had a thing for the petite girls and for redheads."

"Yeah? I like redheads just as much as I like blonds or brunettes. I'm not picky."

"Somehow, I'm not too worried, Sam. I seem to remember you and a very beautiful, very lethal Wakandan woman getting to know each other much better recently."

"Yeah, don't I wish?"

Steve looked knowingly at his friend, but didn't say more. Almost an hour later, they received a call, which Steve immediately took even though they were supposed to be radio silent during flight. He was not surprised to see how very haggard and wild looking Bucky was.

"Was she there? Did you find her? Are they safe, Steve?"

"Yeah, she's fine, Buck. I would let you talk to her, but she is resting. The baby is back there with her. He looks exactly like Joe."

Bucky's eyes widened. "I am sure he looks so different. Three months change babies so much. Was she ok though, Steve? Did it look like she was taking care of herself?"

"Yeah, Buck. She is fine. Really."

Looking incredibly relieved, Bucky said uneasily, "After her brother died in Afghanistan, she even stopped eating, Steve. I've been worried. Thank G-d."

"I'm sure she wouldn't do that with a baby on the way, Buck. It will be ok. She was pretty determined to get to you, I'll tell you that."

Sam laughed. "Yeah. Threatened to walk to you if we didn't fly her here immediately, Barnes."

Bucky looked with surprise at Sam and then back at Steve. "How much longer?"

"Uh, looks like three hours, I think."

"Well, I'll be waiting. Thanks."

As soon as the call was ended, Steve sighed softly. "You can't tease him like that, Sam. Seriously, don't."

Sam snorted and said seriously, "Hey, I tolerate the guy for you, buddy. I don't like him and I don't see myself ever liking him. But he's your friend."

"You know how much I appreciate that, Sam. A guy couldn't ask for a better friend than you, ok?" Steve stood and put his hand on Sam's shoulder before turning to go back and check on Thea.

AN: SunnySides: It wasn't a double update, but you aren't the only person who said they didn't get an alert or see Ch 19. The story is actually only about 2/3 through, so there are at least 10 more chapters to go. This is the point in the story where I diverge for the first time from canon (because Infinity Wars is not happening here). Thank you for your continued reviews!

Streetlife137: I am so glad that you are enjoying the story! Thank you for your review. :-)

Santee: I am so glad that you are enjoying this story, as well as the companion Captain America one. :-) Thank you for the compliments!

ARE: As always, thank you. Your comments and suggestions always help.