Silence echoed all around him as he slowly came to, his eyes blinking furiously in an attempt to get used to the lighting. He frowned as he tried to move but was unable to, still squinting he glanced to his left to see his arm encased in a vice.
Before he could begin to panic, to fight, he spotted a familiar figure in front of him and he relaxed a little. The black spot in his memory hadn't ended with him in custody.
Not of the authorities anyway.
"Hey, Cap!" a voice to his right called and a person he didn't quite recognise stepped from out of his line of vision.
Across the room Steve was turning away from where he had been peering up through a gap in the wall, a concerned look on his face as he folded his arms over his chest.
Apart from the three of them it seemed as though the warehouse they were hiding him in was empty and, despite the stab of pain at not seeing her familiar features, Bucky was happy Harper hadn't been brought into this mess "Steve…" he began, about to ask what had happened to her to make sure she was safe.
"Which Bucky am I talking to?" Steve cut across him and Bucky couldn't blame him. As much as he tried he couldn't remember the moments, hours or even days between being sat in that glass box and being holed up in the warehouse.
"Your mom's name was Sarah," he began, slowly lifting his head so he was able to look his former best friend in the eye. Ever since Ange had warned Harper Captain America was after them his dreams had been plagued with memories from their friendship back in the forties "You used to wear newspapers in your shoes," he added, unable to stop the chuckle from leaving his lips. It was hard to think that the man standing in front of him ever had to pack his shoes with newspapers.
Steve shifted on the spot slightly, exchanging a glance with the man now standing beside him "Can't read that in a museum," he said, though his tone came across a lot lighter and a smile even dared to tug at the corners of his mouth.
Sam, Bucky's memory of the man chasing him through the underpass with Steve and Harper shouting after them was slowly coming back, scowled "Just like that, we're supposed to be cool?"
Before either Steve or Bucky could answer there was a loud and echoing creaking sound followed by footsteps. Glancing around in confusion Bucky felt his heart skip with slight anxiety; maybe Steve and Sam had brought him here to hand him over to the authorities and whoever was currently making their way through the warehouse was coming to ensure he was captured.
"The perimeter is clear," an all too familiar tone hit his ears and he straightened up. Harper entered the room wrapped in a jacket much too big for her, her blonde hair had been tugged up into a messy bun and though her skin was already pale with worry she managed to lose even more colour as she turned and their eyes locked "Hey. You're awake!"
Bucky's eyes narrowed "And you were supposed to run."
Harper's eyes rolled "Are you saying you really expected me to run off after spending two whole years with you?" she asked, that edge to her tone which told him he wasn't to argue "We can let him out of that now right?" she continued with another question, this time aiming it toward Steve and Sam.
"No?" Sam answered in a snap "After what he did out there?"
Bucky groaned "What did I do?"
"Nothing that was your fault," Harper said with a rebellious tilt to her chin at the same time Steve answered with "Enough."
"Oh, God, I knew this would happen," he said with a sigh, watching as Harper crossed the room to hand him a bottle of water "How long have I been out?"
"Only a few hours," she reassured him as she stood protectively beside him, watching as he took a long drink "That doctor…"
"Everything HYDRA put inside me is still there," Bucky said with a shake of his head "All he had to do was say the goddamn words. Their way of making sure I would always be at their beck and call I guess," he said, glancing up and exchanging a glance with the concerned looking Harper. There had been nothing about trigger words in her file but he could see the cogs whirring in her mind as she wondered whether or not she would be clicked over to a murderous soldier by the mention of certain words in a particular order.
"Who was he?" Steve asked, obviously not catching onto the worrying glance between Harper and Bucky.
Bucky was glad of that. Here he was with his arm clamped, not to be trusted, and he didn't want that for her.
"I don't know."
"People are dead. The bombing, the setup. The doctor did all that just to get 10 minutes with you. I need you to do better than 'I don't know.'," Steve said before turning his attention to Harper "You're the researcher? Have you come across him before?"
"No," she replied honestly and with a shake of her head. "If I'd seen him before, suspected he was something to do with HYDRA or worse, I would have said something."
"He wanted to know about Siberia, where I was kept," Bucky spoke up, his heart weighing heavy as he ran through the questions he had been asked "He wanted to know exactly where," he continued, he hadn't wanted to tell them and didn't want to know there was more like him out there. If they knew about them there was always the chance they would find out about Harper and he didn't want her treated the way he was.
"Why would he need to know that?" Steve pressed.
Bucky took in a deep breath, not wanting to say the words which were about to come out of his mouth "Because I'm not the only Winter Soldier."
Beside him he felt Harper stiffen as memories of the training rooms and workouts came rushing to the forefront of her mind. The fact she was kept in a facility with others training to become part of an elite squad of super soldiers was something they hadn't spoken about often during their time together. He wasn't even sure if she had remembered there had been others, she was kept apart from them for most of the time she was there due to her elite status as the daughter of someone so high up in the movement and the fact she was more likely to band them together in an escape plan rather than training side by side.
"Who were they?"
"Their most elite death squad, more kills than anyone in HYDRA history," Bucky explained "And that was before the serum."
Sam's eyes narrowed "They all turn out like you?"
Beside Bucky, Harper shifted uncomfortably from one foot to the other. She wasn't sure if she had ever been out with the death squad officially, though she knew she had definitely been out on missions before, but she was certain that was where she would have ended up if they had kept her.
"Most of them ended up worse," he said in a quiet tone.
"And this doctor? Could he control them?"
"Enough," Bucky answered Steve's question with a shrug of his shoulders.
Letting out a sigh Steve turned slightly so he was facing Sam "Said he wanted to see an empire fall."
"And he'd be able to," Harper said, catching his attention once more and continuing before he could ask her how she knew "With these guys he could do anything. They speak 30 languages, can hide in plain sight, infiltrate, assassinate, destabilize…" she allowed her sentence to trail off.
Beside her Bucky was nodding with confirmation "They can take a whole country down in one night. You'd never see them coming."
Stepping closer to Steve Sam lowered his tone slightly "This would have been a lot easier a week ago."
As the two spoke, Harper bent down and smoothed Bucky's hair from his face. "Well that was scary," she said with a pointed look "I watched you crash into a river while flying a helicopter!"
An apologetic look came to his face as he reached up with his free hand to gently cup the side of her face "I'm sorry," he said, running his thumb along her cheekbone "You should have gone though H," he continued, taking his turn to look to her sternly "I can't have you dragged into this mess. What if…?"
"What if nothing," she cut through his words "I wasn't about to abandon you now was I," she continued as his hand dropped back down to his side "Plus, if anyone knows about this elite HYDRA death squad it's gunna be me isn't it."
"H…"
"It's okay honestly," she said, though the emotion in her tone told him differently "I wanted to know more about my past, this could be it. The answers I need."
If his arm weren't locked in a vice he would have pulled her in for a hug but instead he had to watch as she took in a deep breath and pushed herself up to her feet "Do we have a plan then?" she asked, interrupting the whispers going on across the room.
Steve and Sam exchanged a glance "We're on our own," Steve admitted with a shrug of his shoulders before Sam raised his eyebrows.
"Maybe not," he said, "I know a guy."
As Sam disappeared, his phone attached to his ear, Harper turned to Steve "We can let him out now right?" she said, her words phrased as a question but spoken as more of a demand, as she gestured down to Bucky.
His eyebrows raised as he glanced between Steve and Harper. This was not how he had expected the meeting between the two of them to go, he would never have thought he'd see her snapping at her idol.
"Yes," Steve answered after a brief hesitation, checking Bucky through slightly narrowed eyes before releasing him from the tight grasp of the industrial vice "Listen, I'm sorry I just-"
"-didn't know if you could trust me," Bucky finished off for him as he stretched his arm out a few times, making sure he still had full range of movement after it was crushed slightly "Don't worry man, I understand."
"I don't," Harper grumbled beneath her breath as Steve excused himself to see how Sam was doing. "They'd barely let me check you over," she said, reaching up to brush his hair from his face.
"I'm fine," he insisted with a roll of his eyes and a smile.
"I lost you," she said, shaking her head "I lost you Bucky, right before my eyes," she continued, her fingers gripping onto his t-shirt and her eyes focusing on the red material "You looked at me like you'd never seen me before, like I was a target and I...I didn't like it," she said with a shrug, her breath catching in her throat "Then I watched you fall, in a helicopter, into a river."
"I'm sorry," Bucky said in a whisper, wrapping his arms around her and tugging her into his chest. As much as he had wanted her to run, to get to safety, he couldn't help but be glad to have her there in his arms.
"This is so crazy," she said with a shake of her head as she took a step back, running her fingers through her hair "I'm mad at Captain America. Steve Rogers!" she exclaimed, narrowing her eyes over to Bucky as he let out a laugh "I mean...what are we even about to do?"
It was at that moment Steve reentered the room "We need to get to Siberia, to this 'Death Squad' before the doctor," he said, gesturing for them to follow him "We're meeting back-up at the airport."
Before she could turn and follow Steve out of the room Bucky caught onto Harper's wrist, spinning her back around to face him. His eyebrows were furrowed as his eyes checked her over "Are you alright?"
"Yes," she answered, her tone and the shrug going with it not even convincing herself let alone him "I'll be okay," she said with a determined nod of her head "I'll have to be."
"Because I'm sure-"
"I'll be okay," she insisted, twisting her arm out of his grasp and lacing her fingers through his "As long as I'm with you I'll always be okay," she continued, a hint of mischief sparkling in her eyes.
"Uch," he answered, echoing what she would usually say when he was being mushy, with a roll of his eyes. He took in a deep breath and took a moment to look at her, a hint of a smile on her lips and a slight dip of confusion to her eyebrows "Just in case," he said with a wink before pulling her closer and touching her lips with his.
"Any excuse," she teased, as she normally would, with an eyeroll. Her usual playful tone tinged with nerves as she squeezed his hand once more and they both turned to follow where Steve had disappeared off to.
He was lowering his phone from his ear when they caught up to him, the usual concerned look on his face as he glanced around "We need to get going," he said pushing his phone into the pocket of his jeans "To the airport and to collect some things on the way but Sam isn't having the best time trying to get us something to travel in."
A smile came to Harper's lips "Let me handle it," she said, knowing this was something she was good at making her confidence soar, as she turned away from them and disappeared around the corner.
She had seen a couple of cars parked along the road, seemingly abandoned, when checking the perimeter earlier on. Steve and Sam had brought them to a pretty isolated place so she was sure whatever vehicle she came across wouldn't have an owner desperately trying to find it once she was driving away.
Away from the others she found herself wondering what was to come for them when they made it to the airport. What was to come for her.
Siberia. She had seen about the training facility in her file, knew that was where it was located, and didn't know if she was ready to go back there. She knew it would give her the answers she so desperately needed but she also knew it was where the majority of the nightmares which had plagued her sleep were located.
She was supposed to have been in the death squad.
Her head ached as memories tried to surface from the back of her mind. It hadn't come up in her conversations with Bucky but she knew they were a thing, they were the ones she remembered fighting in her dreams and the screams which woke her from her slumber. They were the figures in the background as she practised throwing knives and were the ones being patched up on the beds beside her when they came in from missions.
A car. She needed to find a car.
Would Steve Rogers even trust her if he knew who he was taking back to the training facility? She had been the youngest but the best, used as an example to the others and hated for it. Her ability came naturally to her while the others were pushed to their limits daily, she got her own room while they were forced to share and, despite her many escape attempts, she was treated much better.
Pausing for a second she closed her eyes and tried to catch her breath. She hadn't allowed herself to think about it properly after reading all about the initiative in her file but now it was all she could think about.
In a snap, after just hearing a few words in a certain order, Bucky had become The Winter Soldier before her very eyes and she couldn't help but worry whether that was a possibility for her. There had been no mention of trigger words in her file but there hadn't been in his either; was there a possibility she could turn into someone she didn't recognise because of a few words said in a sequence?
Spotting the only car which didn't have parts falling off of it in the distance she pushed herself to carry on.
The door opened with ease and a slight creak and she quickly got to work. With her backpack still at the centre they were taken to she had to compromise, using the knife still attached to her ankle strap instead of a screwdriver, but soon the engine was spluttering into life. It wasn't the best, a spring had pushed its way through the seat she was sitting on and had begun digging into her leg while the general smell around the inside was the definition of musty, but it was the best the area had to offer.
There were two doors, four wheels and it actually worked. That was all they needed for now.
Pushing her worries back to where they belonged, the very very back of her mind, she shifted the car into gear, wincing at the sound the gearbox made, and spun it round to head back to where she had come from.
All three guys, Sam on Steve's right and Bucky on his left, were waiting for her by the time she got back to the warehouse, slight looks of concern on their faces as the car groaned and grumbled.
"It's fine!" she said, rolling the window down and grinning over to them "It runs!"
"Barely," Sam frowned, crossing his arms over his chest and craning his neck to check the car over "And it's gunna hold all of us?"
"It'll be fine," Harper waved off "You didn't give me much choice dropping us in the middle of nowhere, it was either this one or a car where most of the doors were missing."
"Was that car any other colour than light blue?" Sam asked, Harper could see Bucky hiding a smirk.
"Just get in please."
"There are only two doors," Sam pointed out, arching an eyebrow before grumbling "Well I'm calling shotgun," as Steve demonstrated the passenger seat folding down for them to climb into the back.
Harper glared across to him from the corner of her eye once Steve and Bucky had managed to negotiate themselves into the backseat, Steve behind her to give her the directions he was reading from his phone and Bucky behind Sam so she was still able to see him, and he settled in beside her.
"Right," she said, once complaints of no seatbelts were raised and dismissed, "Where to Cap?"
Thank you sm for reading :)
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