Heya! I'll be honest with you, I… haven't read or watched marvel… at all, I think… maybe a single spiderman film, though it was more that my siblings were watching it and I happened to see it. Oh, except Black Panther. I did see that one. However, I saw a pin on Pinterest and one thing led to another and oh dear I'm in way deeper than I should be – caLlING imMEdiate back up!
I'd watch the movies, but backup made me promise to watch it with them this fall, soooooooo. Yeah. Anyways, I love tragic backstories so. Bucky. ~(= v =)~
{-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-}
They pressed against the opposite wall of the unconscious figure, eyeing it.
The strongest Soldat from the Winter Soldier program.
"Think we can get out of this one, Buck?" Steve said, managing a grin despite his injuries.
"Only ever met it once; stronger than any of us, but erratic."
Bucky let out half a chuckle, resting his head against the wall and closing his eyes. "I should've known better than to think that you would do the smart thing."
"They tried to use it for training; I was the only one of the dozen there who survived."
"Never," Steve vowed.
"Dozen? I didn't know they made that many."
Bucky rolled his eyes. "You had to bring the stupid with you, huh?"
"They didn't. Soldiers, Doctors, Handlers, it didn't matter. She killed them all."
They both fell instantly silent as the figure stirred slightly, previously shallow breathing turning inconsistent, hacking.
"You said she never complied with missions. Why haven't they killed her?"
"Don't know. It's possible they couldn't."
An eye found them, vibrating as they were keeping themselves from doing. It searched them up and down, taking them in.
"Fuck…ing…"
They didn't react to her raspy mumble, merely watching in apprehension as she struggled to push herself up.
Bucky's eyes narrowed. It shouldn't be that hard to stand up, from the fact that they had always kept him in top 'working' condition, if painful. Perhaps she was in the middle of some punishment…?
Metal scraped along the cement floor, and they both looked down to see two hollow sockets of metal, rather than legs.
Steve swallowed, then said, "Hi."
Bucky could have fallen over.
Having finally pushed herself up against the wall, she looked at them again. "'ey, Cap," she managed in a rasp. "And…" She stared hard into Bucky's eyes for a moment; Bucky stared back. Her shoulders, though they hadn't noticed their tense position, relaxed. "Buck," she finished, chuckling hollowly.
"You know us?" questioned Steve.
She blinked at him in surprise, then stared at the floor, unseeing. "Guess not," she finally mumbled with a sigh.
Steve and Bucky exchanged looks.
"'m no soldat right now," she said, and they both looked back up in surprise. She was scowling slightly, her left eye puffy and half shut. "I'm not planning on eating ya."
"That hardly matters, what you're planning, though, does it?" Another voice from out of view had sneered, making Steve and Bucky jump.
She merely scowled further. "If you weren't going to die soon, I'd spend time trying to rattle you, brat," she snapped, readjusting. "Just 'cause you can't doesn't mean I can't."
There was a disgruntled, angry sound, but Steve, thinking, interrupted, "You mean to say they can't control you?"
She looked back at them. "Not well enough," she murmured, slumping back against the wall. "Damn…"
Steve and Bucky looked at each other again, but fell silent.
|^V^V^V^V^V^V^V^V^V^V^V^V^V^V^V^V^V^V^V^V^|
"No, please, please-!"
Thud.
Steve winced at the sound of flesh hitting flesh, though neither Bucky nor the person sitting across from them did the same. They merely stared at nothing, stoic, unresponsive.
Dry sobbing echoed through the halls, slowly receding, accompanied by many more thuds and cries of pain. A few seconds later, a door slammed, and the sound cut off completely.
"Told him…" the other muttered, giving another sigh. "He's not coming back…"
"How do you know?"
Bucky shook his head. "He isn't."
Steve frowned at them. "Ok, but why do you-"
"Stevie, 'fraid you couldn't tell," the other said, chuckling faintly.
Both Steve and Bucky had tensed at the name—it was undeniable evidence that she knew them, at least to some degree, though, if she was using that nickname, more probably to a significant one.
Before they could make any other reaction, much less form a question, the other stiffened, eyes widening before shutting, squeezing hard together. "Fuck," she breathed. "Not even gonna…"
"What-"
Steve broke off, and Bucky didn't need to ask why; the sound of footsteps, beyond where humans could hear but within reach of super soldiers, were echoing through the freezing air.
Soon, another bit of light brightened the cell, and Zola stood outside it, grinning.
(ÞϘV)
So much. So many. How she hadn't exploded with it all was a miracle.
HA!
Miracle? It was a damned curse.
|^V^V^V^V^V^V^V^V^V^V^V^V^V^V^V^V^V^V^V^V^|
She was hardly conscious as she was being returned to the cell, blinking blearily, struggling to rid herself of the images and sounds taken from the hapless man—the man now dead.
They had known that he would not survive, yet they had given him the treatment and her the trash anyway, no doubt simply enjoying their pain. Or, she might have considered had she been in a better state, they just wanted to see how much they could pile in before she really did explode.
Iron scraping, several thunks, and she was happily permitted to let go of awareness.
(ÞϘV)
As she stirred, Bucky and Steve again fell quiet.
The Soldat was volatile.
Volatile, powerful, dangerous, a super soldier, a victim of the Winter Soldier program, Hydra's prisoner.
The Soldat was all those things, but now the girl lay limbless, empty metal sockets replacing her knees and elbows, no more able to fight than stand.
Her eyes opened groggily, and she blinked over and over, seeming to be trying to clear her vision. Eventually, they grew less hazy, and she focused on them.
"You have any plan?"
They started; that is not what either had been expecting.
She raised her eyebrows.
"We-"
Bucky elbowed Steve in the ribs, causing a grunt and confused glare. He shook his head. "Might report," he said quietly.
"Glad you aren't idiots," she said, once again surprising them. "Well, Stevie's still an idiot, but he's got me- you there to stop him," she slipped, shaking her head slowly, experimentally. "Go away…" they could hear her breathing, eyes closed and jaw clenched as though resisting the urge to be sick.
"How do you know us?"
She didn't seem to hear them, still muttering to herself. "…away… I'm…"
When she had trailed off, Steve tried instead, "What's your name?"
The other flinched violently, eyes screwing shut as she groaned. She bit her lip, stifling the noise, but didn't look up.
Bucky watched her; this wasn't unfamiliar, but, at the same time, it wasn't quite right. It wasn't like the pauses and pain and anger of forgetting everything, it was, inexplicably, different. The best way he could describe it was that his screams had contained less, while her gasps held more.
She settled into pants, resting her bruised cheek against the floor as though it brought some kind of relief. "What'd you say?" she rasped after another few minutes.
They hesitated to repeat the question, deciding to tack.
"How do you know our names?" Bucky asked.
She opened her eyes and slowly looked up at him; they were overbright, yet undeniably tired. "Wish I didn't, but so do you," she mumbled as to herself. "Fucking researchers…" She trembled violently.
Steve tried another strategy. "Are you hungry?"
She didn't seem to understand at first, just staring at them, then snorted, triggering a coughing fit. Gasping in great gulps of air, she managed, "Obviously; aren't you?"
"We have food, if you want some."
She quietened slightly, her pants slowing. "Guess you're not that kid for nothing…" She shook her head slightly again, looking dazed. "N-no… 's fine…"
Now didn't that sound familiar to the both of them; Bucky heard that from himself all the time, not wanting to bother his Stevie, and Steve heard it from him, a blatant lie made ever more obvious the more times it was used.
Steve carefully tossed a piece of the old bread that had been dropped off by a guard so that it stopped in front of her face.
She jerked back slightly, but didn't get anywhere; concrete walls tend to do that. And extreme exhaustion. And the lack of limbs.
Blinking rapidly, she stared at it. "Idiot," she finally scoffed, moving the stumps of her arms. Despite not having hands, she managed to maneuver so that the part of her arm still flesh—still present—could flick the food back, which she promptly did, much to Steve and Bucky's bewilderment. "They aren't going to let me die, not that I can so easily," she said, scowling as she tried to sit up with two less limbs than before.
"Are… do you want some help?" Steve offered hesitantly.
She looked up; it was obvious she had not expected that. "Aren't you worried I'll strangle ya?" she asked, though one could have sworn that there was an amused glint in her eyes.
"Not very," said Steve.
She frowned at him, then shrugged best she could, slumping back to the ground.
Steve got up, carefully approaching and bending down. She flinched when he touched her shoulders, her breath quickening the longer he touched her. He stepped back, having leant her against the wall, hurriedly, and she relaxed slightly, though still watching them with much colder, calculating eyes than before.
"You know us," Bucky said eventually.
She deliberated, her not bruised eye opening further to observe them. "Sort of."
"You called him Stevie," continued Bucky, nodding at Steve.
She looked like she had forgotten an item at the store. "Ah, I do- did, didn't I?"
"Who are you?" he asked.
"Friendly neighborhood trashcan," she muttered, leaning her head back against the wall and letting her eyes shut—mostly; her bruised eye seemed too puffy to fully close.
"What do you mean?" Steve pressed.
She chuckled faintly.
Steve repeated, "What-"
Boom
She jerked so violently she fell over, cursing fluently. Bucky and Steve, too, had made to jump up, though with much better results. They stood attentively, ears straining for noise.
"What was that?" the other managed huskily, struggling to sit up again.
Alarms had begun to ring, red flashing in their dark little cell.
Bucky gave Steve a pointed look, and, albeit rather regretfully, he nodded back an 'obviously.'
The door banged, and a few guards came strolling into view, carrying various tools Steve didn't want to know the purpose of, especially when Bucky recoiled slightly.
Then, with a deafening clang, Bucky was dragged backwards by his own metal arm, firmly stuck to the magnet in the wall. Steve shouted, but they butted him in the head with a rifle, and he, already injured, fell backwards, the world spinning slightly around him. As he struggled to stand, the chains attached to his ankles and arms shortened, reeling him back to the wall beside Bucky.
"Grab it!"
"-now-"
"Yessir-YEOWCH!" a man yelped.
Thud.
Their fellow prisoner had managed to bite one of them, despite her inability to really move, and now shook her head to clear it from the blow that had followed.
"Just choke her!"
A noose was slipped around her neck, instantly tightening. She gagged, and they shoved a wad of cloth into her mouth.
"Now!"
They trooped out, the other struggling pointlessly in their hands. Steve's eyes widened as he met her terrified, desperate ones.
"What are you doing?!" he yelled, struggling to stand; the cuffs around his wrists had pulled him into tight against the wall, unable to do much but shout.
"But the Asset-"
Thunk.
"Take it now!"
"Y-yes sir!"
Marching footsteps raced down the hall, leaving Bucky and Steve behind, their door left hanging open.
Crash
"Captain and Barnes are on the seventh level!" Tony shouted, releasing them from their chains. "You get it?!" he added to them.
"What happened to waiting a few days?" Steve returned, accepting his shield from Tony.
"They were going to be moving you!"
Bucky swore.
"Uh, Mr. Stark?" the static of the intercom added to the discord. "I know you're busy and I really didn't-"
Crash
"-some back up would be really nice right about no-OW!"
"You okay, kid?!" Tony asked, flicking his hand in a 'come on' gesture and turning back through the hole in the wall.
"Yeah! I'm fine! Totally fine-!"
Bucky started, "We need to-"
"Yeah, I'll get her," Steve said, returning Bucky's look. "They need reinforcements; I'll get her," he repeated. "Go on ahead, I'll catch up!" Steve shouted, pelting down the hallway.
"Don't be an idiot!"
He grinned to himself, yanking the door open so hard it broke off its hinges.
(ÞϘV)
She was no longer able to move, oxygen deprivation numbing her muscles and brain as their drugs no longer could. Crashes and shouts echoed, bouncing around outside her, not that inside her head was any quieter.
"But I knew him."
She might have screamed as something was shoved into the metal cavities on her knees, might have used her reattached legs to fight as her arms were similarly reconnected, might not be in this damned situation if not for, well, so much.
"Buck!"
She hacked as the noose loosened slightly, but it was barely enough for her to be able to think. Or not, as the images and sounds continued pounding against her skull, drilling out her own thoughts.
"…the end of the…"
"…Stevie…"
She dimly registered that she was rolling, then being picked up again. The thing choking her snapped, and she allowed herself five seconds to heave. Then, she moved.
Unable to see right, hundreds of images from the fights of people she was not blurring her present, she fought blindly, following the instinct that came with so many lives.
"—ARE—MY—MISSION—"
She couldn't hear or feel or anything quite right, all of it a haze of sensations, she unable to pick out which were her own and which were the others', but that didn't mean she couldn't fight back. She had more experience than anyone alive, had the experience of dozens of people, lifetimes all stuffed into her head as discard from the real projects.
"…taking all the stupid with…"
Maybe it was because she had so recently interacted with the two that his-her-his-her- recollections were strongest in her mind; maybe some sort of trigger from their words or voices or mere presence, she didn't know. But, now, the one she-he called Stevie shouted, "–need to get out of here!"
'Ironic,' she thought, still following that blinding instinct to fight, the intuition to make up for her lack of grounding.
She gagged again as the breath left her lungs, unsure what had happened, but her instinct screaming that she was trapped.
She fought.
She shrieked as his-her-his-her- arms were disconnected, leaving her more helpless.
She fought.
Her legs, too, were being removed.
She fought.
She was unable to lift herself from what had hold of her, unable to move whatsoever, especially now that she didn't have her limbs.
She growled faintly, and welcomed unconsciousness.
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She could feel, stronger than the memories constantly pounding against her senses, needles in her upper arm. Experimentally, she tried to wiggle her toes. Positive. Fingers. Negative. So she had her legs—for good measure, she wiggled first her right, then her left, toes; both were present—but not her arms.
"Go~od morn-"
Whoever it was that had touched her was cut off as she twisted, kicking her legs up and swinging herself with them, wrapping around their neck and holding herself upright there. The movement took two seconds, and she was cutting off his circulation.
"Calm down!" the one called Stevie could be seen shouting, Bucky sitting behind him on a cot. "We're not-"
She twitched as something poked her in the side, looking down to see the one she had hold of with a needle.
"Tony!"
She raised an eyebrow.
Everyone was silent for a moment.
Turning blue, the one called Tony spluttered, "How- awake-"
She flipped away as a white projectile whistled past her, kicking a tray so that a scalpel flew into the air. This she caught with her teeth, turning around to see a rather large living room. She twitched; she didn't know that word, merely picked it up from the memories.
Her gaze hardened as Steve moved slowly forward, hands raised placatingly.
Glancing quickly around, she noted four people in the room; Stevie, Bucky, the one called Tony, and a boy. She flinched, a wave of dizziness overcoming her as another memory resurfaced; Tony Stark, eccentric upstart.
She blinked back to herself to see Steve had stopped several feet away. Her eyes narrowed. Muffled, slurred by the knife in her mouth, she managed, "What's all this, eh?"
He stared at her, then let his arms fall. "We're at the Avengers base; away from Hydra."
She nearly dropped her weapon, a dumb mistake she was saved from making by a memory of a similar scene from one of the Others. Instead, she lessened her fighting crouch, glancing down and plucking another knife from the floor with her toes.
"You're safe now," Steve continued, taking another step forward.
Her own memories, the memories of the Others, perhaps both, made her take a step back, swiftly ensuring that she could immobilize him with her knife. She'd prefer to keep the scalpel.
"Will you put down the knife?" he tried cautiously.
When the stare down continued, Bucky said, almost experimentally, "You think he has any ability to hurt somebody?"
She didn't stand down, but she relaxed slightly. "Where're my arms?" she asked, words once more contorted by the scalpel in her mouth.
Steve glanced at Tony, who said, incredulous, "You're kidding me, right?"
Steve glared, but it was Bucky who stood and took the arms from behind a table, bringing them forward. She retreated another half step, but didn't prepare to slash him as he drew closer. In silence, he reattached her right, which hurt significantly less than usual, only eliciting a grunt, allowing her to take the scalpel from her mouth and eye the rest warily. She bit her lip to stop the noise as Bucky replaced her left arm.
Then, he walked back to his own bed, and she straightened. "Great," she said, not really sure what to do with herself.
Steve motioned to a bed. "You should sit down; you're still injured."
She rolled her eyes, accidentally quipping, "Damn, Stevie, you're a genius."
She froze, tense, but they looked more resigned than anything else.
"Do you wanna sit down?" Steve reiterated, rubbing his temples and moving a few feet further away.
Deciding that, yes, her entire body was in a decent amount of pain, possibly with long-term damage, and that they weren't too likely to be a potential danger, she inched to the bed and sat down, hissing as her left leg properly linked.
"So," Steve said, but she ignored him, glaring at Tony. Steve sighed. "Tony, Peter, give us a minute?"
"What? Oh, sure, Mr. America- captain sir- yes."
After a dirty look at Steve, Tony followed.
The door swung shut, and they all stared at each other.
"You have my memories?" Bucky finally said bluntly.
She sighed wearily, far more at ease around the two who she remembered- he reme- she- he-
She shook her head hard, ignoring the ache of her neck.
"Do you?"
"I assume so," she said as bluntly. "I have all the memories that I know of."
"Is there any way to get them back?" Steve pressed, Bucky just watching her.
She chuckled. "If I knew how to get rid of them I'd do it," she said bitterly, pulling her legs up onto the bed with a groan of relief.
A tense silence. "Would you be willing to try?"
"You mean tests?" she unintentionally hissed. "No."
A heavy sigh.
"I remember things they would have erased," Bucky broke the silence.
She blinked at him. "Like what?"
"I knew him at the bridge."
Her eyes widened. "I have that one too…" Her gaze trailed away—she really was put far too at ease by the people she did – didn't – did – didn't know. "I guess they're still available if… if…" She frowned. "That memory is a little hazier then it-" She broke off, head throbbing threateningly.
"Did they give you the Super Soldier Serum too?" Steve asked.
She snorted. "I have no idea. I can remember them giving it to plenty of people; who knows if I was one of them?"
"So you can't distinguish between your memories and others?" he pressed.
She shrugged. "Sometimes I can, sometimes I can't. Not all memories are the same quality. I know it wasn't me if there's something I can prove in the present moment isn't the case. I don't have a flesh arm, so I'm pretty confident in which one's are m-Bucky's," she said deliberately, "and which aren't, though I can't tell if they're another of the Others… I can recognize sometimes if it's different enough, but there're too many similarities between most of the ones at H-" she cut off, trembling. Gripping her other arm, she resumed scratchily, "Of course, there's always the risk that I'm wrong about whether it was me."
"You're a lot more chatty then I expected."
She laughed hollowly. "The same tactics don't work quite so well when you're gaining more memory." A moment. "I think… they did…"
They tensed up, but she seemed absorbed in things that only existed in her mind.
"… vaguely remember…" She frowned in concentration. "Yeah, I- no… that was… was that blonde hair?" She pulled some of her tangled black hair in front of her, sighing and shaking her head as she let it fall back. "Never mind."
She lost track of them, thinking hard, trying to shuffle around the myriads of data that existed in her. "They did… I think- yeah, I have a lot of memory with similar characteristics of them trying to turn me into a soldier too… but, of course, most of the Others were subjected to that, so… And," she added, looking back at them with a laugh, "I wouldn't be quite so chatty if I didn't vividly remember you. Just 'cause I don't know who it is that is seeing doesn't mean that I can't remember what is seen," she added in explanation. "Even if I wanted to shut up, I can't help recalling a lot else, too. Repressing it hurts, so I talk." She stared at them. "And," she said after a minute, "whatever drugs that upsta- Tony stuck into my side haven't so much knocked me out as made me overly relaxed."
"Why didn't they kill you?" asked Steve.
She snorted. "Blunt fella, eh?" She paused, blinking rapidly. "They… the stuff where they were seeing if they could-" She stopped, pressing a palm to her forehead. "…fuck."
"It hurts to remember?"
"Obviously… and I'm not particularly eager to focus on- on that…" She shuddered, pulling down on her face. "Too much, always, too much," she almost laughed.
"How can you fight like that?"
She raised her eyebrows superciliously. "That? Never mind," she forestalled. "If you had all the memories of all the subjects of the Winter Soldier program, I think you would gain quite the fighting instinct, no? And, I mean-" She flexed her metal arm. "Metal appendages help."
"You should probably stick around here for a while," Steve said seriously, Bucky lying back on his own distinctly not-hospital-y bed.
She blinked. "I'll stay here the rest of my life, if that's chill."
Steve stared at her.
She shrugged. "I don't have anywhere to go back too, at least not my own, at least probably not. And I doubt H-" She faltered. "Hy-dra is- is completely gone… I'd prefer to stick around a person I can remember as someone who refused to back down from a fight he had no chance of winning than drift around until they catch me."
"Alleluia," Bucky cheered, making Steve slightly red.
"Does…" Steve started, something horrifying apparently dawning on him, "does that mean…"
She watched him, smirking.
He turned a brighter red, but forced himself to calmly continue, "You remember what… good, friends we- we were?"
She hooted. "Unless it was somebody else kissing ya!"
Steve flushed fully.
She continued slyly, "But you weren't the-" She dodged as Bucky threw a knife across the room at her, a warning look in his eyes. "Alright, alright, I won't spill."
"What?" Steve asked, looking between the two and the knife with wide eyes.
"I can't tell you, or your boyfriend's gonna silence me."
"Buck, what is she talking about?"
"Nothing important," Bucky said pointedly.
She sniggered. Then, swiftly and without warning, she said, "He had kissed girls before, though!"
An explosion might have gone off by how fast they were streaking around the room, she laughing maniacally as Bucky swore.
{-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-}
I struggled to find a reason that she would be so chatty; it's how it first came out, but I didn't want to write another thousand+ words to naturally reveal what she says. This was a single afternoon's work (except for the beta reading, which I did the next day) so I didn't want it to be all that long. Also, I have OTHER PROJECTS IM SUPP OS ED TO Be dO iNG RiGH T NoW! But I just got sucked into a Marvel hole, and there was no escape. (pls someone rescue me)