The Winter Soldiers are a problem, one Stark has to bring up to the rest of the Avengers.

"Winter Soldiers, as in, plural?" Barton asks, after Stark had gathered them all in the meeting room and begun to explain what he'd seen.

Stark nods and taps his fingers on the table in front of him. "Steve and I knew that Hydra had tried to make more Winter Soldiers," he says before flicking his eyes up to the Asset and glancing away. "We didn't know what happened to them after though. They're barely mentioned in the file Hydra gave us, so we'd kind of hoped they'd died with the USSR or something."

Wilson shifts in his seat and folds his arms. "Do we know for sure what happened to them though?" He asks. "You said you saw them fight and get subdued. What happened after that? And why doesn't Hydra have a whole army of them?"

The table falls silent for a moment before the Asset realises that they are all more or less looking at him.

"Bucky," his handler turns to him, looking slightly awkward. "I know you might not remember but… do you know anything about what happened to the other Winter Soldiers?"

The Asset swallows and furls his brow, focusing down on his clasped hands on the table as he tries to pull up the memory his handler wants. He hadn't been able to remember much about the other Winter Soldiers until the BARF tech had triggered it for him, but now he thinks he might be able to come up with something if he just thinks hard enough.

The hazy image of the recalibration chamber comes to mind, the chair sitting ominously in the middle of the room with… with pods… circling the edges. He blinks. Cryochambers. That's what they are. Six of them, one for each…

He looks up and breathes in, trying to prepare himself. "Resistance is unacceptable," he explains, referencing the brief rebellion of the other Winter Soldiers. "Handler-Karpov deemed the Winter Soldiers too volatile to be calibrated and operated. The Winter Soldiers were placed into cryofreeze until a more effective method of control could be found." He pauses and frowns slightly. "The Asset was transferred to America. No further information is known."

His handler swallows and nods before looking over at the other Avengers. "It's possible that our guess about the fall of the USSR might not be too far off," he says. "If the other Winter Soldiers were put in cryofreeze to be dealt with later, but then the program was shut down…"

"Then they could still be there," Stark finishes. "Waiting until someone at Hydra who knows about them is desperate enough to break them out again."

Romanoff leans back in her seat and gives them all a look. "I don't know about you…" she says slowly. "But I imagine we've been making Hydra rather desperate lately." A heavy silence falls over the table as the implications of her statement sinks in.


It's decided that the Siberian base is the next major target for the Avengers, and the atmosphere in the Tower takes on a more somber tone as they begin to plan their attack. The Siberian base is a bigger, and more dangerous target than any other base they've raided, besides the Sokovian one, and the Asset finds his brain being picked over for every scrap of information he can offer on it.

"Do you think you can draw us a floorplan?" His handler asks as they sit in the meeting room, angling a piece of paper and a pen towards him. "Anything you can remember would be helpful."

The Asset swallows and nods, reaching for the offered pen with his left hand and pulling the paper closer to himself with his right. A part of him feels a little strange sharing his knowledge with the Avengers because it's akin to admitting that he remembers things beyond his programming… but that really doesn't seem to be a problem with them.

Not only do they not seem to care if he remembers, but they are actually actively helping him remember stuff with the BARF technology so… so he's beginning to think that his memory/malfunctions aren't so bad, at least, not with the Avengers. Either way, he still doesn't remember much about his time in the Siberian base. Giving him a tour of the base hadn't exactly been Hydra's top priority. But he does his best to outline the areas he knows for the team.

He draws a large square to represent the base, and marks all the entrances and exits that he knows, before beginning to separate off sections into hallways and rooms, leaving a large space in the middle open. He taps the open space and looks up at the team sitting around the table.

"This is the maintenance and recalibration room," he explains before drawing a square to represent his chair and six circles to represent the cryochamber pods. He draws a star next to one of the cryochambers. "This cryochamber is mine," he says, before pointing at the other chambers. "These contain the other Winter Soldiers."

He labels the recalibration chair before tapping the reinforced door leading outside. "Steel and concrete," he says shortly. "Opened only with a code in a separate room." He sketches out the small guardroom adjacent to the recalibration room before furling his eyebrows and scanning the rooms and hallways leading to the recalibration room.

"These…" He stars several rooms. "These are zapreshcheno," he explains, frustratedly wracking his brain for a room he knows the purpose of, the grey halls of the base blurring together in his mind.

"They're what?"

He looks up in surprise at Barton and his eyebrows draw together in confusion.

"Forbidden," Romanoff cuts in, before flicking her eyes up to him. "You were speaking in Russian."

He blinks, a little stunned, not having realised that he'd slipped into the other language. He castes a quick glance around the room, but no one seems overly upset by his mistake, so he goes back to the map in front of him.

He swallows and begins to tap on some of the smaller rooms. "These are holding cells," he explains, his fingers tightening slightly on the pen in his hand. He pauses before adding a few larger rooms to the empty space at the end of the hallway. "These are training rooms," he says, his brow furling as he tries to remember how many to draw. He hesitates for a moment before adding another smaller room beside the training rooms.

"This is an armory," he says, the image of racks of guns and ammunition coming to mind. "Zapresh— Forbidden without a handler." He flicks his eyes over the map for a moment, a blank space on the other side of the recalibration room seeming to stare at him.

He moves his hand over and portions out a hallway before hesitating over the individual rooms. "These…" He rests his pen on the paper and his eyes glaze over as he thinks, trying to remember what they are. Are they forbidden like the rooms by the holding cells or…?

He shivers and catches onto the image of dark rooms and hard floors and shackles and—

"These are correction cells," he says tightly, drawing his right hand into his lap and keeping his eyes on the table. He swallows and tries to breathe in evenly, reminding himself that the discipline with Hydra had been a necessary part of training and that he won't even be going with the Avengers to Siberia, so it shouldn't really matter to him what kinds of things had used to happen in those rooms—

they shove him in and darkens falls as they slam the door shut. He stumbles forward blindly, feeling his way a few feet to the far wall. His hand touches the rough surface and he sinks to the floor shivering, his hair wet and plastered to his forehead, drops of water dripping down his neck and into his collar.

One of his guards today had decided that a cold shower might make him more open to their training and he crouches carefully, trying not to touch more of the cold stone of his cell than necessary, wincing as his clothes stick to him, and his fancy metal arm protests at the lowered temperatures.

He hunches in on himself and closes his eyes, trying to ignore the pulsing, persistent pain throughout his body. They are very careful not to injure him enough to be useless, but the blasted serum makes it so that plenty of minor injuries can be dealt out without too much worry.

Lucky him.

He breathes in carefully, balancing his left arm on his knees to keep it from pulling on his shoulder, and reaching up with his right hand to scrub at his face, avoiding the growing bruise on his jaw. It hurts, but not enough to hinder him once food comes. He's been here long enough now that he knows the routine. Food (if you can call it that) will be here in a few hours, and then he can try to rest and heal and prepare for another day. Today had been practising basic orders – things like stand here, or run in place, which seems simple enough until after about the third hour – which means tomorrow will be target practice.

His stomach rolls and he ducks his head. That is one of his least favourite "training methods". He can hit the targets. He's good at that, and he'd given in a while ago, finally aiming and shooting at their targets, because he'd decided it wasn't a good enough hill to die on.

And then they had brought in a live target.

He closes his eyes and tries not to think of the figure he knows will be there tomorrow, bag over their head and arms tied behind their back, completely silent. He doesn't know who it is, he doesn't even know if it's the same person every time. But he knows they will be there. Every time, waiting to be the last shot he takes.

Twelve target boards and one live one. Every time now.

One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven, twelve—

And then he doesn't shoot.

And then he gets in trouble.

He shivers and hunches further in on himself. He hates target-days, but he knows he can never take the final shot. That is very very important. He knows that if he gives in and takes the final shot, then he can never come back from that.

He will shoot at the targets, but he will not shoot at—

He blinks.

He blinks again and stares blankly ahead of himself, his mouth hanging half open as a lightbulb suddenly dawns. He can't believe he hadn't realised it— He can't believe he'd never even thought—

He shoves away the uncomfortable thought of how far Hydra has managed to push and break him down because— because they give him a gun now. They give him a gun with thirteen bullets in it and he'd been focusing so hard on aiming at the targets and not missing so that they would just leave him alone that he hadn't even noticed that they'd given him a gun with thirteen bullets.

He sucks in a breath and shivers, water dripping from his hair into his eye as he chews over his most recent revelation. Thirteen bullets…

It's a long shot but… but if it hadn't occurred to him to use his gun against Hydra before, then hopefully… hopefully his guards will be similarly at ease with the routine he's fallen into.

.

His clothes are still slightly damp by the time they pull him out the next day and begin leading him down to the training room. His shoes squeak on the floor as he keeps his head bowed and follows along passively, internally trying to calm his nerves.

If I fail at least I tried, he thinks to himself as he steps into the training room and accepts the handgun one of the guards offers him. He goes through the motions of loading and arming it before stepping up to the targeting line, his eyes skittering over the hunched figure kneeling at the end of the row, their grey prison uniform hanging loosely off their body and matching his own.

He swallows and mentally takes a tally of all the men in the room as he raises his gun and aims at the first target board. There are four guards with him in the room and more agents behind the viewing glass, but if he acts fast enough, he might be able to catch them off guard.

He breathes in deeply and widens his stance, letting his eyes unfocus from the first target and become aware of the men behind him.

Here goes nothing.

He pivots and takes out the first two men before anyone even has time to blink. The man by the door lets out a shout of surprise, but he too is dead before he can even reach for his thigh holster. The fourth man rushes at him, forcing him to duck the arc of his shock baton, but his stance is rock solid as he takes aim and fires his next shot, squarely into the man's neck.

The man goes down with a ragged sputter, and he pauses just long enough to sweep up his door-key and sidearm, before leaping forward to let himself out of the training room. There are more agents in the hallway, all armed with shock batons, and it takes another five bullets before he's free to sprint down the hall, relying on his shaky mental map of the facility to get him out.

An alarm starts ringing, and he almost runs right into another guard as he skids around the corner, heading for the main chamber. The man is furious, but he has the advantage. They aren't shooting to kill, and he has no such reservations. The guard falls and he steps around him, his heart pounding a deafening rhythm in his ears and his breath coming in short gasps as he breaks into a sprint, the shouting of guards and agents echoing behind him. He can't really understand them, because everything is in bloody Russian here, but he gets the gist.

He stumbles and slips as he catches sight of the entrance to the main chamber, and a tranquilizer dart bounces off the wall where he'd just been. He ducks and rolls into the large room, firing at the guards that tries to intercept him. His first gun is empty, and he discards it, pulling out his other one as, in front of him, the doors leading out of the room – giant cement things controlled by a separate console – begin to swing closed.

He lets out an animal cry of desperation as he sprints towards the door, the shouts of the guards and blaring alarms blending together in his ears as he moves. If he can just make it through the doors— if he can just make it through, then he can— then he can—

He doesn't make it.

The doors slam shut with a final thud that echoes throughout the room, forcing him to skid to a halt, inches away from freedom. He slams his metal fist into the concrete with a cry of frustration, and pain lances up his arm and into his shoulder, sparking a headache behind his eyes. The next second, the headache is the least of his problems as pain explodes in his right shoulder, the joint jerking forward as an agent finally manages to catch him with a tranquilizer dart.

He grunts and turns, firing desperately at them, his heart in his throat as he takes in the enclosing guards. He fires off a few more rounds and stumbles before catching himself and breaking off towards a separate hallway, burying a bullet into the stomach of the guard who tries to intercept him. The hall doesn't lead outside. Of that he's pretty sure, but he's not about to go down without a fight.

His vision blurs and he grits his teeth, reaching up to yank out the tranquilizer dart and ducking away from a few more. Hydra has yet to come up with something that can drop him completely, and it still takes a few minutes to take effect, but he knows he's done for now. Already he can feel himself beginning to lose focus as he stumbles down the hall, his ears ringing as he sucks in a frantic lungful of air.

He ducks another dart and manages to drag himself into one of the side rooms, his vision spinning. The light flicks on automatically and he squints as he scans the small storage room, shelves of files leading away from him. The sound of pounding feet outside prompts him to lurch towards the back of the room, and he slides down beside a filing cabinet, his back pressed against the wall as he balances his stolen gun on his knees, aiming at the doorway.

He checks his remaining ammunition with shaking hands and blinks away a wave of dizziness.

Two bullets left.

He swallows, breathing heavily as he readjusts his grip and squints at the doorway. He's proud to say that he nails the first guard in the head before four more rush into the room, their riot shields preventing him from aiming at anything vital.

Someone chuckles at him, and he darts his head up to see a blond man in a green uniform enter the room, his posture a picture of confidence as he places his hands in his pockets and makes his way through the wall of guards.

His hands tighten on the gun and he glares at the man, hate rolling through his gut as he fights against his dimming vision. At the moment, he can't pull up the man's name, but he knows he's the one in charge of this whole operation, and that he'd approved more than one of his 'punishments'.

"Are you finished with this little rebellion then?" The man mocks in accented English.

He flexes his jaw and doesn't say anything, readjusting his aim a little as the man steps closer.

"What was your plan exactly, hmm?" He asks, leaning forward, his hands still in his pockets. "What did you think you would do if you got out?" He raises an eyebrow. "This base is surrounded by miles of frozen tundra, Sergeant. There is nowhere for you to go."

He rests his head back against the wall behind him and fights to keep his eyes open, tightening his grip on his gun. "Better that than here," he pants and fires—directly at the man's head.—

"Bucky?"

He flinches, jerking away as he comes back to reality and sucks in a breath, his heart pounding and his eyes squeezing shut as his head spins nauseatingly.

"Hey there."

He blinks and shakes his head as he looks up and becomes aware of Wilson crouching a few feet in front of his chair, the other Avengers a blurry mass further back in the room. There's a ringing in his ears. Wilson smiles gently at him.

"Hey," he says soothingly. "It's okay. You're safe now." The Asset sucks in another breath and tries to blink his eyes into better focus. For some reason it's hard to concentrate on Wilson. "Bucky." He can't seem to concentrate on much, actually, even his own limbs feeling far away as he tries to keep his gaze on Wilson. "I think you might be having something called a flashback," he tells him. The Asset swallows. His throat is dry.

"You're safe now," Wilson tells him again in the same even tone. "You're in Avengers Tower. No one is going to hurt you." The Asset licks his lips. Wilson flicks his eyes over him. "Can you try some breaths for me?" He asks, breathing in slowly, his chest puffing out steadily. The Asset tries to copy, his eyes focused on the up and down motions of Wilson's shoulders. "Good job," Wilson tells him. "Can you do some more?"

They breathe in again, and the Asset slowly becomes aware of a shaking in his muscles and a tightness in his chest. As he breathes his vision gradually begins to cooperate with him and focus more squarely on the man crouched in front of him. Wilson offers him a warm smile. "You're doing great," he tells him, his praise mixing with the even breaths to help calm him down. "You think you can name something in this room for me?"

The Asset darts his eyes around the room and eventually manages to focus down in front of him, his eyes feeling tired and strained. "Table," he rasps out, breathing in deeply again.

Wilson nods, his hands resting non-threateningly on his knees. "Good," he says. "Can you tell me something that's on that table?"

He scans the table, his eyes catching on the map he'd drawn. It's flipped over now, for some reason, the back side blank and empty. "Paper," he manages, turning back to Wilson.

Wilson nods again and breathes in and out with him. "What else do you see?"

He looks back over and becomes aware of his metal hand resting on the table, the pen it had been holding now crushed and leaking out onto the surface. He shifts and relaxes his hand, bits of plastic falling free and landing with a light clatter onto the table.

"Pen," he looks back at Wilson, his pulse beginning to even out a little, his heart no longer threatening to beat out of his chest as he breathes. "Sorry."

Wilson's mouth quirks up. "That's okay," he says gently. "We have lots of pens." He flicks his eyes over him again, and sits up slowly. "Now, how 'bout we take a break, yeah?"


They take a break, and his handler leads him back to their room, careful to keep a margin of distance between them. Ordinarily, the Asset might worry that he'd managed to upset his handler in order to be subject to this kind of treatment, but right now he finds himself more than a little grateful for the extra space.

"I'll get you some water," his handler tells him as they arrive in the room and the Asset can't help wondering how he'd managed to guess how dry his throat is currently. He follows slowly into the kitchen, sitting down at his usual chair as his handler gets a glass and fills it for him. He fills one for himself as well and takes a sip from it as he hands over the other glass.

The Asset's hands shake slightly as he accepts it and drinks eagerly, his eyes closing as the water washes easily down his throat and his stomach begins to settle. He breathes in and out again. The breathing is important.

"How are you doing?" His handler asks, his voice soft, almost apprehensive, and the Asset doesn't know how to respond. He'd just had a major memory/malfunction, and it had actually interfered with his work as the Asset, which generally isn't acceptable.

"I am functional," he tells him eventually, and his handler scans him for a moment, his finger tapping on his glass.

"Do you know what a flashback is?" He asks after a moment, the unexpected topic throwing the Asset off guard. He slowly shakes his head, his eyes on his handler.

Handler-Steve's lips press up in a small smile that doesn't quite reach his eyes. "That's okay," he says, his gaze focusing onto the Asset's shoulder. "A flashback is like reliving a vivid memory," he explains, his hand tight on his glass. "It can often feel like you're re-experiencing a traumatic event all over again." He blinks and looks off towards the living room. "There's nothing to be ashamed about having a flashback," he says after a moment, his finger tapping against his glass again as he looks back at him. "Apparently focusing on the present and your five senses can help to cope with flashbacks."

The Asset nods again, trying to digest what he's hearing. It sounds like… it sounds like the memory/malfunctions he has are… kind of like flashbacks. He flicks his eyes over his handler and finds it very significant that he hadn't said that having flashbacks is wrong. He'd suggested ways to deal with them, but he hadn't implied that the Asset is in trouble for having them.

He takes another sip from his glass, and his handler drains his own, setting it down and moving off towards the living room. "I'm going to put some music on," he says, and the Asset listens as his handler goes over to the record player and puts something in. A soft gentle tune begins to fill the air and the Asset finds himself beginning to relax, his body feeling drained as the events of the day catch up to him.

Eventually he leaves his glass and pushes himself up to make his way to the couch, finding his handler sitting down, his knees up and his sketchbook in his lap. The Asset sits down as well and he leans his head back, closing his eyes as he breathes in slowly, letting the music drift over him.

Today had definitely been the longest memory/malfunction – flashback that he had ever gotten. He doesn't exactly know what to do with it. He doesn't even know what it means exactly (although he had been fighting Hydra, that much is clear), but he's pretty sure it had been triggered by the Siberian mission.

A part of him is glad now, that his handler isn't allowing him to go on this mission, but the rest of him is anxious for his handler's safety. He is supposed to protect his handler, but he can't do that if he's stuck back in America, and he doesn't know what is going to happen on this mission.

Logically, if all goes well, Hydra won't have reactivated the Winter Soldiers yet and all the Avengers will need to do is neutralise them, which shouldn't be hard given how they are all frozen helpless in cryochambers—

He opens his eyes as a terrifying thought crosses his mind and he turns his head to look at his handler, his mind flashing back through all the kind gestures he had given him. His handler is good, kind enough to take his asset and give him good food and warm blankets and hand drawn pictures— kind-hearted enough to give him orders to live, like a person, rather than exist simply as a weapon, and smile at him when he tries new things and—

And probably good enough to decide that killing helpless soldiers in sleeping pods isn't right.

His breath catches and his handler darts his eyes up to him, his hand stilling on his sketchbook. "Bucky?" He asks cautiously, sitting up slowly on the couch and setting the book to the side. "You okay?"

The Asset sits up as well, breathing carefully and swallowing as he tries to gather his thoughts. He nods at his handler because he's busy looking concerned, and pulls his hands into his lap, shifting a little in discomfort.

"You will go to find the Winter Soldiers in Siberia," he says, and his handler nods slowly, his brows furling slightly in confusion. The Asset tightens his hands in his lap and he fights to keep from fidgeting. "It is dangerous," he says quickly. "You have to kill the Winter Soldiers. You cannot wake them up."

He places his hands on his knees and leans forward, his voice growing more urgent as he rushes to finish before his handler can say anything. "The Winter Soldiers will not— they are not the same as the Asset," he tries to explain. "The Winter Soldiers will not follow the Avengers. They will not stand down. They will not change or— or watch movies or play games or make food— they will not follow orders on missions, they—" He swallows. "They will not avoid secondary casualties, if— if they escape, they will destroy everything. They are trained better than the Asset."

His handler stares at him for a moment in silence, before looking back towards his sketchbook and swallowing. "I understand Bucky," he says softly, his hands twisting together in his lap.

The Asset scans his handler and can only hope that he really does.


AN: I was really excited to share this chapter and Bucky's flashback. It's a really important one I think because it shows how he fought Hydra, and also because it was invasive enough that the Avengers were aware of it and could react to it.

On another note, I always thought that in CA:CW, the Russo's took the easy way out of having Steve, Tony and Bucky either fight the Winter Soldiers or kill them in cold blood. Now, we don't have a Zemo to kill the soldiers, and Steve will have to make that choice. It's probably obvious that killing the Winter Soldiers is the wisest choice, but there's something a little off-putting about the idea of killing people outside of a fight.