Chapter 32 :

Sleep should have come relatively easy for the pair of super-soldiers locked up in Hydra's filthy clutches, yet the lights hanging above Bucky and Luna's heads never seemed to dim, in fact they only seemed to get brighter. The temperature of the room had lifted, but only slightly, so Luna was still sat, attached to Bucky on the floor of their cell, Bucky being too weak to move, and Luna, with the pain in her back mounting, not wanting to. Bucky had passed out shortly after he'd been brought back into the room, his breathing slowing down immensely. Luna realised just how deeply into sleep he had fallen and silently hoped that Hydra would at least let him recover for a few hours before they took him away again.

At the thought of it Luna's stomach churned. She hated that she and Bucky were in Hydra's grasp, but she hated more the fact that they kept being separated. Soon enough, she would be healed to the point that Hydra would view her ready for testing. They were going to take her away. Away from Bucky.

Again.

The last time it happened, she thought he was dead.

Frustrated tears began to slip down Luna's cheeks, and in an attempt to not wake Bucky up with her quicker breathing, Luna carefully crawled her way up off of the floor and made her way to her 'bed', wincing the whole way, as the stitches in her back pulled. She quickly wiped the tars from her face, agitated that already she had let Hydra get to her, get the better of her. Bucky hadn't even shifted. For a second, Luna's mind started playing a trick on her. Bucky looked like death personified. He was pale, disheveled, and he was in such a deep sleep that his breaths were coming few and far between. She tried to remember the last time the two of them had eaten anything. They'd been with Hydra about 4 days now, and twice they'd been throw a hunk of bread that looked about a third of a loaf, which they'd then had to split between the two of them, something which had caused enough of an argument between the pair that they'd each sat on their respective 'beds' for about an hour until without any conversation needed the two acted like nothing had happened. That was a day ago at least. Hydra had just put Bucky through hell, and all they gave him to eat was a bit of bread. And now he was slumped in the corner of a room, probably drugged out of his mind from the water that they had been given, looking positively dead. Luna was getting Bucky out of here. She was getting him back to Steve, to his family.

Luna's blood boiled, and slowly, with a growing courage, as her partner slept, she turned her head in defiance up to the surveillance camera blinking its red 'transmitting' light in spite of Luna's glare. "I know you can hear me, you bastards. But your not going to break us. Not this time. Do what the fuck you want to. I don't give a shit. You hurt me and Bucky too much. You're not going to break us, you fools," swore Luna, letting out a humourless laugh, before deadpanning and staring straight down the lens of the camera, "We're already too far gone for that." Luna heard the sun of a click, and soon enough a pale gas was filling the room, pouring up and out of the slim vents that surrounded the bottom of the room. Lune let her head simply drop back to lean on the wall, as she took a deep breath in, feeling almost instantly sleepy and letting her eyes shut., She let out a low chuckle, knowing that the gas was Hydra's response to a small victory that Luna had just won.

'Get us out of here guys' was the last thing ruminating around Luna's mind as she drifted off into unconsciousness.

Natasha Romanoff was many things, super spy, assassin, murderer, expert in hand to hand combat and just as skilled with a knife - but one thing she most definitely was, was terrifying. Utterly terrifying. That was the collective thought running through both Steve Rogers and Tony Stark's minds as they watched the cool and calculated red-head though the one way window leading into the interrogation room. Clint was just thinking about what he wanted for dinner - after all, he and Nat were partners - he'd seen her at her very scariest (but Budapest wasn't something he wanted to think about right now), so he really just wanted to know what Sam was making for the team. Peter Parker, much to the teenagers chagrin had been send straight to his room on Tony's floor to sleep off, whatever it was that took hold of him in the Hydra facility. Of course, that wasn't actually what he was doing. No. Peter Parker has hacked into F.R.I.D.A.Y and was watching Nat's interrogation on the massive screen Stark had insisted Peter needed in his room.

Natasha sat, still fully suited up across the room, from a man whose face was covered in bruises, whose nose was taped up and whose eyes were black. Her feet were up on the table as she twirled a knife on the tabletop. "So, Dr Mayanka, can I get you anything?" Came her voice, cool and collected across the table. "Go to hell." The man spat back at her, with so much venom Natasha was sure it must have made his nose hurt. "I am," smiled Nat quite simply back at him, "but I intend to make sure that before I do, I get out of you what I need." The man visibly steeled himself in her presence. "Thats okay," she said smiling, "I can always go and ask Sophia if she knows where the Hydra base I'm looking for" Nat moved to stand up, pulling her feet off of the table, before the man in front of her paled, with a distinctive quiver in his voice, as he said "I don't know you you're talking about." Nat simply smiled, moving her weight onto her arms, which were resting on her knees. "Yeh you do doctor. Although I think you wife doesn't know what you do for a living does she ? Im sure her, Maxi and Elena would love to hear all about it, Elena just turned 8 didn't she? Let's get her started young !" The man in front of Natasha was now clearly shaking, breaths coming out shakily as he said "I don't know what you mean." Nat simply smiled again, standing up this time and making her way to the door of the interrogation room. "Wait." Said the doctor as her hand reached the door handle. "You know who I am, Dr Mayanka, so don't waste my time. Because if you know who I am, then you know what I'm going to do to you." Natasha's voice had dropped to a deadly quiet pitch. With people like Loki it was best to manipulate their underestimation of you. But with scum like this, people who knew her reputation, the tactic was all attack, simply scare them and they cave. "I-," the squirming man in front of her cleared his throat before continuing, "I don't know exactly where they are. They don't let us know exactly. For moments" he looked down, "for moments like this." Natasha looked dangerously unimpressed, yet said nothing, choosing to let his sweat for a bit. "But, I know their in Europe. Somewhere in mainland Europe. Near Germany. I'm sorry but thats the best I can do. I don't know any more." Said the scientist, seemingly done. "I think your lying to me," responded Natasha, moving around to be stood behind the man. "And I don't like it when people lie to me." With the flick of her wrist Natasha ripped the seam of the mans jacket and shirt across the right arm with scary precision. "See, I've always been good with a knife, but since I left our lovely mutual friends in Russia I think I'm a bit rusty." She moved across to his left arm, "You see, I'd hate to accidentally hurt you, especially considering the placement of the arterial vein on your neck, just next to your lovely jacket. It'd be a shame to have to get it dry cleaned. Of course, I'm not sure you'd need it anymore." Natasha poised the knife over the mans left seam and slowly began unpicking the stitches one by one, until she 'accidentally' applied too much pressure and just nicked the man's shoulder. "Okay! Okay. Jesus Christ." The man said, physically jerking so harshly away from Nat that he managed to topple the steel chair he was sat in, and fall onto the hard concrete floor. "West Germany. They're in West Germany. I don't know any more than that! Please, Jesus, please believe me." Natasha slowly moved across the room, and squatted, leaning her weight onto her feet as she crouched to the mans head height. "You're going to spend a long, long time in a cell. And I, just like everyone else, is going to forget about you and your sad little life whilst you rot."

And with that, the super spy got up and stalked out of the room, Tony, Clint and Steve following quickly on her heels and they moved towards Tony's lab, and unspoken decision whilst they narrowed down where Luna and Bucky were being held. They had purpose now. They had an entry point. An angle. They were going to find their family.

Luna's eyes opened slowly, as awareness came to her in waves. She blinked her eyes a few more times, panicking as they registered nothing. Luna's heart rate rocketed, as she called out for the only person she knew she could trust. "Bucky. Bucky what the fuck is going on. I cant see anything."

"Thats the point sweetheart." Luna froze for a second as she registered who was in the room with her and Bucky and what threat they posed. "Icarus." She ground out. "Hiya hun !" Came the woman's voice in response, disturbingly cheerful. Suddenly, the surface that Luna was lying on juddered into life, tilting Luna into an upright position. She was sure that if it wasn't for the restraints currently biting into her skin she would have almost immediately pitched over and fallen to the ground. She let out an internal sigh of relief, glad for the small mercy that was her not showing such obvious weakness in front of Icarus. Whatever drugs Hydra had coursing through her system had completely skewed her perception, of well, everything. And she still couldn't fucking see. "Take this bloody blindfold off then. I already know what you look like, or are you too much of a fucking coward?" Asked Luna, a false bravado presenting itself without much thought. Luna would not let this woman scare her. She was better than that. She was more. Plus, Bucky was in the room with her, and Luna didn't know what state he was in, she needed to be strong for him. "Oh honey, your eyes were free and clear! There's nothing on them. Well I say clear - they're kinda more of a black/grey at the minute." At Icarus's words Luna felt her heart turn to ice and her stomach utterly drop with desperation. "You're lying." Luna ground out. The sound of a metallic pulse suddenly echoed through the room and Luna felt her right hand becomes free of whatever surface it had been stuck onto. "See for yourself. - see what I did there, see?" Luna was quickly realising Icarus was a maniacal mentalist, but was too preoccupied to comment. Feeling the added weight now on her wrist, Luna drew her hand up to her eyes, and retched suddenly as she felt the lack of anything covering her eyes. Fortunately the restraints didn't hold her head back, so she didn't choke. "What the fuck have you done to me?" Luna panted out, heart hammering fiercely against her chest as she struggled to control her panic. "Well silly ! What fun would giving you the same tests as the soldier be ! We had you too recently for that pet! No, instead we really want to push you to be the best you can be! Your lucky really, they got fed up of waiting for you to heal, you were our first subject for our own regeneration cradle!" Luna could have thrown up again from hearing Icarus's words. She was a lunatic. What the hell did she even mean. Suddenly the rest of Luna's restraints demagnetised and she fell decidedly downwards. Yet Luna didn't land on the hard concrete floor of her and Bucky's cell. Instead, the ground below her was soft, padded. Within an instant Luna recognised where she was. "Germany then. How long was I here for? A year? Two ?" She said as she sat up, knelt on her knees, resting on her legs as she tried to get her balance. Be practical, she thought, you cant see but you can still hear. Figure out where she is. Figure out where you are. Find out what they want with you. "Nice try, little moon, but thats not going to work. Now stand up." Icarus's tone had swapped, suddenly, almost violently to professional, intimidating and sadly serious. If Luna had to guess that meant that the little white light that used to sit in the corner of the room had lit up. They were being watched. They had just swapped from a cat playing with its prey to a cat ready to kill. And Luna was the mouse.

She forced herself to her feet, grunting with effort, as the stitches in her back pulled and her balance tilted massively, nearly sending her straight back to her knees. Luna had no idea where in the training room she was, but she knew that she was at least on the mats, and thus somewhere near the middle. It took Luna more effort than she realised it would to stay on her feet without her eye sight as every few second her body threatened to throw her to the ground again. "это ваши инструкции. слушайте внимательно, я не буду повторять их дважды. Как вы знаете, вы не можете видеть. Я собираюсь бросить в тебя обсидиановые кинжалы со своих крыльев. ты собираешься увернуться или умрешь. ты понимаешь?" (these are your instructions. listen carefully as i will not repeat them twice. As you know, you cannot see. I am going to throw obsidian daggers at you from my wings. you are going to dodge, or you are going to die. do you understand?)

Luna barely had a second to breathe before her super-soldier senses warned her of something hurtling towards her left side. Luna practically threw herself to her right out of its way, immediately loosing her balance and tumbling to the ground hard. But she wasn't quick enough. As she dived one of what Luna could only assume were Icarus's obsidian dagger things tore open her side. From the second she had to evaluate her injury, Luna figured that it wasn't too deep. The problem was it felt like it was about 6 inches long. And it didn't take a mastermind to figure out that Hydra wasn't going to be too worried about helping her bandage up the injures they caused. Before Luna had time to give it a second longer of thought she heard the telltale sound of another dagger-thing being sent her way. This time Luna pitched forward, doing a forward role to 'hopefully' avoid getting cut again, managing to stay upright in a crouched position. It worked slightly better this time, but the dagger still skimmed her back as she rolled, leaving another long, but shallow cut. Fucking think, thought Luna as she more successfully dodged another attack. Figure out where Icarus is and get close, then attack. It definitely wasn't one of Luna's better plans, but it was something. But she was distracted. So distracted that she didn't notice the dagger headed straight for her head until it was about a second out. Luna tried to spin away, but not before the dagger made a nasty gash across the left side of her head, tearing across her ear. Luna let out a growl of pain, before a fierce determination set in. With a deep breath she steeled herself, closing her eyes, before charging towards where she could tell Icarus was stood. At this point Luna had figured out it was unlikely they wanted Icarus to cause as serious long term damage (despite the fact they seemed to think they had made a regeneration cradle) and that she was partially safe in this offensive attack. Luna's change however, stopped short as a sharp surge of burning electricity surged through her body, debilitating Luna, sending her hurtling towards the ground as she let out a piercing squark of agony. Momentarily, she realised, Luna must have passed out, as the next thing that registered in her mind was Icarus yelling at her to get up. Shakily, Luna tried to stand, but ultimately she collapsed to her knees again, too disoriented without her vision and in too much pain. She sat there for a second, before she heard Icarus land behind her, a dagger suddenly to her throat, as she heard the Icarus say, "How disappointing you are Black Moon, here I was thinking I had a challenge. Get the fuck up." Icarus demanded, punctuating the end of her sentence with a harsh shove to Luna's back, sending her hurtling back to the ground, winding her. She will not win. They will not win. I am stronger. Luna swore this to herself as she struggled back to her feet. Repeating it as a mantra as again and again, Icarus attacked her for hours on end, littering her body with cuts and bruises, trying to break her spirit.

She will not win. They will not win. I am stronger

Luna didn't know when, but it felt like hours later when finally a voice echoed across thee training space "достаточно" (Enough). She was physically and emotionally exhausted. She fell, unceremoniously in a heap to her knees as she dry retched, body exhausted and utterly worn down. At some point she heard a group of people enter the room, speaking in hushed tones and they walked past her; she didn't care to listen. Two guards grabbed her lifeless body off the floor and began, at some point dragging her down endless corridors and back to her cell. At some point one of them grabbed across one of her fresh cuts. Luna winced but didn't have the energy to even made a sound of pain. She didn't even realise she had reached her cell again until she heard the sound of the heavy metal doors depressurised and opened. She was thrown down, onto the ground utterly unceremoniously. All Luna noted was more pain pulsating through her body. She lay there for a while, unmoving, unspeaking barely breathing. Luna didn't understand. Where was her brother. Where was Bucky, to tell her everything was going to be okay. That she was going to be okay. At some point she fell unconscious, alone, and for the first time since her capture, properly, properly scared.

AN

my darling readers,

the fact that maybe even one of you might still be here warms my heart. i took some time off as a result of some extremely poor mental health and some bad descisions I made. coming back to this page to see the story still reaching new people, to see that there hasnt been a single day where this story has not had at least 10 new views is incredible to me. i hope you're all well. were back with a finished plot and a few chapters in my drafts to come!

reviews are perhaps more welcome than ever if thats even possible!

see you next time

ERS xx