As Sara begins to regain full consciousness, the horror of her experience cuts away at her confidence and sense of worth even while Clint desperately tries to re-assure her.

Dr Palmer does her job with the usual brisk efficiency while Natasha makes the first steps towards healing the breach with her oldest friend.

Bucky and Beth share each other's fears and Bucky has a painful confession to make.

Plans are laid to recover the Winter Soldier book and Sara confronts how the aftermath of the assault has changed her relationship with Clint.

Marvel Characters are based on the Marvel Cinematic Universe and are copyright to Marvel and Disney. Their use here is for purely non-commercial entertainment purposes.

TRIGGER WARNINGS: Referenced violence, Referenced rape. Aftermath of rape. Implied under-age sexual activity

Reviews and comments welcome

It hurt, deeper and sharper than any pain Sara had ever imagined. Worse than the clawing agony she felt the day Beth called to say mom and dad were dead. She'd thought it was a bad nightmare when consciousness first returned, a car crash or something like that, and her disoriented mind merely invented those terrible images that haunted the space between sleep and waking.

She wished it had been. She wished she could have dismissed them as the disordered products of drug induced sleep instead of remembering every moment with increasing clarity. The worst of it was feeling and seeing within his mind, what he was thinking, what he was going to do; knowing how much her fighting him would excite him to greater extremes but unable to stop clawing, biting and kicking as long as she could.

Eventually she hadn't been able to fight any more...

That man, Brock, had destroyed her and enjoyed every moment; the control, and the pleasure of having power to hurt and humiliate, driving him far more than any simple sexual desire. She'd been nothing more than a toy for him to misuse and break until he was bored.

It felt like she was wrapped in a cocoon of fog, whether that was the painkillers or her own mind trying to protect her from the reality she couldn't tell. Nurses said things and she nodded yes or no accordingly; familiar faces came and went offering words of sympathy and comfort. She recognised Beth, and was sure she knew the tall blond man who seemed to be full of anger and sadness, but there was someone missing; a presence she desired and feared.

She could sense him in the doorway, his pain sharp and stinging, like vinegar on a cut.

"Hey, babe..." Clint said softly, sitting beside the bed. He put his hand on the covers close to, but not touching, hers; making it her choice if they were to touch "I came down earlier, but you were still asleep. I stayed for a while but... but they had to change your dressings"

Sara could hear the tears in his voice, feel the guilt he was piling onto his shoulders. Why was he feeling guilty? He wasn't the one who stopped fighting, who let Brock do what he did in the hope it would be over sooner. She tried to focus on the weeping man beside her bed, to touch his hand and reassure him. The most she could manage was brushing his thumb with her little finger

"Clint…?" her voice was still barely audible, little more than the softest whisper, he laid his hand gently on hers "I'm sorry, Clint…. I tried… I couldn't… I'm so ashamed…"

"Awww, baby, no" he murmured back, quiet and intense "This ain't your fault, none of it is. Please… please don't feel this way"

"I don't deserve you…" she whispered with the faintest ghost of a smile, tears sparkling in her eyes.

"No… Sara this is all my fault" he lifted her hand carefully to his cheek "I love you, I'm never gonna stop loving you… I'm gonna be here for you… look after you… I promise"

In this heavily-medicated state it was difficult to tell how much she was really aware of, or could take in, but Clint continued with quiet, soft words of comfort and assurance counterpointing her tearful self-blame until the nurses ushered him out. Visits had to be short, Sara tired easily and it was important for her not to become too distressed. He still didn't know if she was conscious of the full extent of what Rumlow had done to her.

Dr Palmer ambushed him in the hallway outside

"And when was your last checkup?" she asked, without preamble "Not since the last time you saw me two years ago, I imagine?"

She took his arm and steered him towards her office

"Come on, you know the drill; bloods, eyesight, hearing etc…"

Clint pulled his arm away

"Ain't with S.H.I.E.L.D. anymore" he retorted, gruffly.

Jessica glared at him the way she glared at Stark when he was being a brat, which was most of the time.

"True, but you still want to be functional, don't you? And a man on the wrong side of forty needs to take extra care."

He scowled at her

"Your bedside manner still sucks, know that?"

She took a firm grip on his arm again and led him down the corridor

"You try being Tony Stark's doctor for six years; then tell me how far compassionate healthcare gets you!"

"Steve asked you to do this, didn't he? To check if I'm fit for active duty?"

He glanced sidelong at Jessica, gauging her reaction. She shrugged

"He may have hinted at it; but you're overdue for a check-up, and still technically my patient so I have a responsibility. You can hang your jacket up here."

She waited while he took off his jacket and boots, sorting out the supplies she'd need as he hopped up onto the gurney.

"The way things are going, they may need your help; if you're willing to give it. Now, open wide!"

###

His room was much as he remembered it. Sara's stuff was gone. That must have been moved to her new apartment, but all his things such as they were, sat in their familiar places. Tony's bots had kept everything clean and dust free. Hauling his kitbag out from the wardrobe he unzipped it and pulled out the suit, shaking the creases from it. Stripping down to his boxers he put it on for the first time in two years. It felt tighter across the shoulders and bigger round the waist than he remembered. He'd definitely lost a lot of weight while away.

"You'll probably need to get that altered if you ever plan on wearing it again" He turned to see Natasha standing in the doorway "and you still keep forgetting to close your door"

"You want something, Natasha?" he asked "Cause I ain't in the mood for small talk"

She stepped into the room and closed the door behind her

"This isn't small talk, Clint. I came to tell you I'm sorry for not telling you the truth"

"Let me guess" he growled "'Fury ordered'"

"He did, but that had nothing to do with it. You met Sara, started making a life with her, with all of us." Natasha sighed "You were happy, Clint, and I wasn't sure the truth would do any good. Would you have thanked me for telling you?"

Clint shook his head unable to find the right words just yet. She was right but...

"Maybe I hoped I'd got one person in my life who'd never lie to me" he said at last, staring down at the floor.

"You do, you've got Sara; and when I saw how much you cared for each other I didn't want to ruin that. I thought there was a chance for the two of you"

"What about Laura, what about Coop and Lila? Just forget about them?" he snapped, blinking hard to stop the tears he didn't want right now "Throw them out with the garbage like Fury did?"

"I could have killed Fury when I heard about that." Said Natasha, remembering her anger and pain on hearing that Clint's family hadn't even been accorded the dignity of a proper funeral. "Every day I felt their loss, had to act like everything was normal and I wasn't screaming inside. I only pretend that I'm made of ice…"

"Did a good job of it…" he regretted those words the moment they left his mouth. Natasha and Laura had been like sisters. She'd loved all of them. The only time he saw her truly happy was at the farm "I don't mean that, Natasha, I know how much you cared for them; it's just..."

She shook her head

"You don't need to explain Clint, we denied you the right to mourn, to find closure and I can see what it's doing to you and Sara..."

"You looked after her Tasha, all of you. When I chickened out, you kept her safe and helped her. That means a lot to me. It really does, but I don't know if we can ever really be friends again; least not the way we were"

They'd been virtually inseparable once, the notorious Strike Team Delta, so closely aligned that the S.H.I.E.L.D. rumour mill had them as lovers.

"I know, and I don't have the right to expect anything from you; but we've both lost the people we loved, and I'm here for you if you need me." Natasha paused and looked him square in the eye "You don't have to mourn for them alone"

Clint got up and walked towards the window, looking out at the sky dimming towards evening. He shouldn't be mourning them at all. He should be reading Lila a bedtime story while Laura went over Coop's schoolwork. She should be snuggling up to him on the couch with a glass of wine while Lucky snored and farted in front of the fire. He'd not 'lost' them, they'd been stolen from him by a sadistic whim. There wasn't even a grave he could visit, not so much as a plaque in their memory

"I'm not ready for this Tasha, not anywhere near"

"I understand, Clint." She said, placing a thick brown envelope on the table. "Perhaps this will help"

"What's that?" he asked, turning to look.

"Everything I could salvage" she told him, quietly "Mostly photographs, a few letters. I was holding on to them for you; just in case."

Clint came over and picked it up in both hands, afraid to open it, unsure whether to laugh or scream. 12 years of marriage and two children reduced to a single envelope.

"Thanks…. Thanks for this" he managed to say at last. Sure, it wasn't much, but it was something.

"I'm not ready for this either" Natasha admitted "But we need to do this or it's going to keep poisoning both of us. There's a good chance we'll end up in action together soon and we need to know we've got each other's backs."

"I'll always have your back, Tasha" Clint looked hurt that she could have doubted that "I'd never let you down in a fight, you know that"

"I know" said Natasha sadly "But I don't think you're entirely sure about me at the moment."

"I'm not, Tasha, not yet anyway" he said with a note of quiet regret, then his eyes darkened "There's only one thing I'm sure of. Whatever it takes, I'm gonna make Rumlow pay for everything he did to her and more."

###

"How's Sara?" Bucky asked as Beth closed the door behind her. The room was shadowed, lit only by a single lamp, the curtains tightly drawn. Despite Stark's assurances about the security tinting of the windows in the penthouse, Bucky preferred to apply the old-fashioned approach. Beth walked over to the sideboard and poured herself a large drink.

"Dr Palmer broke the news to her. She didn't take it well" Beth paused a moment to feel the heat of the scotch hitting her throat and stomach, remembering Sara's helpless scream, the way her sister's grief, anger and shame felt like solid objects in her mind. If this was what Sara experienced on a regular basis then Beth was glad her own abilities were so minimal "She doesn't want to see anyone at the moment, a nurse is sitting with her."

"It's a terrible thing" Bucky sighed deeply "What about you, how're you feeling?"

Beth took another drink and stared at her reflection in the mirror as the alcohol worked its way down. She'd let her hair grown and wore it down these days, heavy black waves resting on her shoulders. How did she feel?

"I wish I could turn the clock back" she said "Take Sara somewhere far away and safe; where none of this could ever find her. But then I think it would have found us anyway, and maybe ten times worse."

Bucky came up behind her, slipping his arms around her waist. She'd become used to his metal arm so quickly it no longer looked, or felt, strange.

"Sometimes it feels like I'm stuck in some mad dream; full of gods, monsters and assassins from another time." Beth leaned back against Bucky as he held her close "Any minute I'm going to wake up and it's going to be a normal day; me late for work and Sara still deciding what to wear."

Bucky smiled slightly and kissed her neck

"And you'll spend the whole day wishing you were back with the gods and the assassins. For me, it's waking up in Brooklyn and Stevie's been in another fight…"

"If wishes were wings…" she murmured, turning to face him and running her hand down his cheek "I can't eat myself up with 'what if's?'; Sara needs me, and so do you, what Natasha told us…"

Bucky sighed heavily again, the news that the Winter Soldier Book still existed and might be in HYDRA's hands stirred a deep unease and alarm in him and seeing Natasha again was unsettling. There had been a flash of recognition, but she'd made no obvious sign of acknowledgment as yet.

"If HYDRA has that book, they can use what's in it to reactivate the Winter Soldier conditioning. I'd be theirs again"

He kept his voice steady, but Beth could feel the fear rising up in him. She kissed him gently, looking into his deep blue eyes

"Don't worry, James" she assured him "They'll find it and destroy it"

Bucky shook his head

"It's not the book that scares me. The conditioning is locked deep in my mind. Anyone who knows the trigger words could unlock it and there's nothing I could do."

He stepped away from her, visibly unsettled and afraid

"They could order me to kill you and I'd do it without hesitation"

"Isn't there any way that could be undone?" She was afraid too, and sounded it, more for Bucky than herself; scared he would do something reckless in the hope of protecting her from himself

"The roots go deep, I don't know how easy it would be to dig them up."

"Sara was able to break the locks in Clint's mind" Beth reminded him "Perhaps when she recovers?"

"No!" Bucky looked alarmed at the idea "Even if she was well it would be too dangerous, there's horrors in there..."

He sat down on the couch and looked up at her

"I don't want her to encounter him, not after everything that's happened"

The thought of Sara encountering the Winter Soldier, even in the depths of his mind, terrified him. He would destroy her without a second thought.

Beth sat down beside him on the couch and took his hand

"We'll find a way through this..."

"There's something else you have to know, and I want you to hear it from me" he said, after a long silence "Natasha and I were lovers."

He couldn't look at her, and Beth sensed he was waiting for her response before continuing

"When was this?" She asked

"I'm not sure what year..."

They'd not just used the Winter Soldier for killing. There were times he was called upon to train other assassins, specifically the novice Widows of the Red Room. The training hadn't just been physical and martial, techniques of seduction and arousal were a significant part of a Widow's arsenal and those needed refined and mastered also. A deep flush of shame and disgust coloured Bucky's cheeks as the memories became clearer, some of his 'students' had been very young. He couldn't tell if this assignment had been some sick reward or another way of binding the Soldier even further into his conditioning. There had been one girl though, a fiery redhead called Natalia, with more personality than the others; an intensity and drive that made her stand out. Maybe he'd been out of cryostasis for too long, but the walls began to crack and feelings developed.

"…as soon as they noticed, they wiped me clean again, put me back into stasis. A Winter Soldier can't be allowed to feel. Emotions are Death they said. I never knew what happened to Natalia untiI now."

It wasn't James, that was the thought Beth clutched hold of to keep her mind afloat in the maelstrom of horror and revulsion; it wasn't James with those girls any more than it had been James carrying out those killings. It was the Winter Soldier, the thing he'd been turned into. His keepers had used him as much as they used those poor, she shuddered at the word, children.

Bucky looked down at her hand, still tightly clutching his.

"I wouldn't blame you if you wanted to go, after what I've done..."

"What he did..." she said fiercely. He shook his head

"His memories are still part of me, part of who I am. I try to block them but they won't go away. He didn't even enjoy it. It was just another set of orders until..."

"Until Natasha"

Bucky nodded

"They called her Natalia, I don't know if that's her real name. When I first saw Sara, I thought it was her."

"Have you spoken to her?" she asked

"I don't know if either of us are prepared to revisit those memories yet" he sighed heavily "It wasn't a good time for me, I doubt if she remembers it fondly either"

"Are any of us prepared for this? It seems like this nightmare just keeps getting worse and I don't see any end to it" Beth didn't want to ask, but she couldn't avoid, the question "Do you still feel anything for her?"

Bucky took a deep breath

"I'm not even sure what I felt for her then, even the hint of a human response was enough for them to put me in the chair..."

He shuddered at the memory of the electrical shocks repeatedly running through him, scrambling his neural patterns over and over. It was still hard to put everything into context, random images and feelings surfacing and trying to latch on to something; pieces of James Barnes and the Winter Soldier jumbled together like two jigsaws in the same box.

"You have to talk to her" Beth said emphatically "She's the only other person who remembers..."

"Like Clint" Bucky's laugh was dry and sharp "She's become the keeper of our pasts"

"Excuse me, Sgt Barnes, Miss Wolfe" Jarvis's smooth voice cut in "I apologise for disturbing you, but Mr Stark and Captain Rogers would like to speak with you in the lounge"

###

"Why not just a full out assault?" asked Beth "Take the whole place down in one go?"

Maria Hill shook her head

"Logistics, pure and simple. We still don't have the resource or set up to take on HYDRA directly at the moment. Even with Tony's backing an operation like that would need to involve the military and the intelligence services and just now we don't know who we can trust or who's willing to work with us."

"And we also have the issue that we're sheltering two wanted fugitives" added Tony "I'm trying to get the warrants on Clint rescinded again, but I daren't even mention the subject of Bucky just yet; not until we have something approaching firm evidence."

"Which is why we need the Winter Soldier Book" said Steve "It's the only piece of proof we've run across and it might give us some clues about undoing Bucky's conditioning."

"And that's why you need us, Strike Team Delta" Clint glanced over at Natasha "Looks like I am gonna need that suit altered."

"I can't order you to do this, Clint; after everything that's happened I'm afraid to even ask…" Clint held up a hand to stop Steve in mid-flow

"You don't have to ask, Steve, I owe you big time; and I owe it to Bucky too." He looked round at them and shrugged "Guess it's time to start paying back some of what I owe."

"Right then!" said Tony resolutely, before things started getting emotional and he needed a drink "Let's look at the building schematics."

###

Sara could sit up in bed now, still needing the painkillers but off the drips. They were talking about moving her from the recovery unit into one of the private rooms where she'd be more comfortable. Everyone was being very kind.

Clint was with her now; telling her about the mission he had to go one, interweaving it with constant assurances of his love and need for her. The tender words cut into her like jagged nails. He would never say it, and was trying his hardest not to think or feel it, but Sara could catch just the faintest thread of it deep down inside.

Clint wanted to have children with her; they'd never talked about it, but she'd known almost from the first time they admitted their love for each other. It was the one thing that might have helped heal the bleeding wound in his soul and she couldn't do that for him anymore.

He grieved for Cooper and Lila perhaps more than he did for Laura. She was the woman he'd loved but they were his legacy; his gift to life, proof to the world and to himself that he was more than just a killer. Having them taken from him was the hardest blow, the cruellest thing Loki had done.

He needed her to mend that hurt, to take away a little of that pain and she'd failed him, been damaged and diminished, and Clint's kind heart would never allow him to admit that. She didn't deserve his devotion, not after all that he'd already had stolen from him.

"I'll only be gone a couple of days, three at the most" he promised her "Then it's just gonna be you and me and I'm not leaving your side for a long long time."

Clint leaned over and kissed her softly, smiling at her despite the lines of grief etched deep into his face.

"I'm missing you already, babe, take care of yourself…"

She stroked his face, letting her hand linger on his cheek and gazing into those soft eyes the colour of summer rain.

"I'll be okay, I promise" she murmured gently "Goodbye, Hawk. I love you"

He kissed her again

"I love you too, Sara, see you very soon"

Clint stood up, then paused and kissed her on the forehead before leaving the medical facility with a heavy heart. He hated leaving her while she was in this state, but she was well looked after and they had to act while they had the advantage. Sara watched him leave, seeing his shoulder sagging with the weight they bore.

"Goodbye, Hawk" she whispered at his retreating back. "I'm sorry…"