Chapter 26

Since dumping her roughly in an unnervingly white room Annie had not seen any sign of HYDRA. The room succeeded in somehow being clean while still being unpleasant. The room held nothing inside except her and a not subtly hidden camera. She made it her mission to glare as hatefully as she could manage at it, hopefully at least making a member of this evil group uncomfortable. Other than that Annie felt completely helpless.

She had no idea where she was, the bump where she was hit on her head still throbbing madly. The pain added to with the bleeding slice in her arm. She knew their plan. Obviously when they went searching for their escaped weapon and found her instead decided she would suffice as bait. Annie groaned as her head sunk into her hands. Why was she always such a liability? Now Bucky would walk right back to HYDRA and lose all that he has been working so hard to recover. If he came for her. As much as it hurt to just think that he didn't care enough about her to leave her with HYDRA, she still wished that he would stay away.

Because even if it meant that she would have to spent the rest of her life trapped in this room, it was worth Bucky finally being free from them.

She closed her eyes attempting to imagine herself anywhere but here. An effort that was useless as the evasive lights penetrated her eye lids even as they squeezed shut. Her body continued to shiver in the consistently cold temperature of the sterile room.

A loud clang echoed through the squared space and Annie's head sprang to the opening steel door. The tension that had been building within her at what was to come was released as a familiar face entered the room.

"Rumlow?" Annie questioned, surprised to see him here. She stood instantly and moved closer as she questioned, "What are you doing here? ...wait" Annie murmured as she noticed the odd smile on his face and the HYDRA symbol on his clothing.

"So little Annie Rogers is still alive. Does your brother know?" Rumlow questioned sadistically, enjoying the painful situation she was in.

Annie ignored his question as her eyes narrowed with disgust, "You worked for SHEILD. You were Steve's teammate!"

"I was but I have always been with HYDRA. And soon the asset with be as well." As Rumlow talked Annie could fell her anger starting to boil. She had trusted this man to look out for Steve on missions and now he was proving just how bad her judge of character was.

Rumlow who seemed to enjoy his time in the spotlight decided to enrage her further, "Did you know that there are very extensive and detailed documents about the process it took to 'fix' the asset. Documents that were old and never transferred to computers. I enjoyed reading the one on the process wiping his memories, descriptions of how he screamed, how many he had to go through."

Her head throbbed as the world grew dizzy and the loud blood pumping through her skull drowned out everything except Rumlow's verbal torture. She couldn't look at him but started at the floor as her eyes stung.

But he was not finished. His smile darked, "You know you were quite a problem, the asset had to be wiped over and over when he kept screaming for Annie and attempting to escape. He was punished for the guards he killed and eventually he stopped remembering you. I guess he'll have to go through that again once he gets here."

Every word Rumlow uttered was used to stab at her, an all too real pain in her chest. His words so effective because she knew he was right. Annie had caused Bucky more pain and it was going to happen again.

All logical thought was drowned in her chaotic emotions as she lunged for Rumlow, desperately wanting him to stop. HYDRA agents that she hadn't even noticed enter the room latched onto her arms and forced her to her knees.

Looking up at him through her wild hair, the frightening smile had not left his dark features. In a swift motion Rumlow's hand connected with her face. The slap furiously stinging her cheek. She couldn't submit to him and glared as he pulled a small object from his pocket.

Annie tried to hide her reaction as the now clear, sown initials BB alerted her to what it was; the handkerchief she had given to Bucky. Annie struggled against the confining grips of the HYDRA agents with no avail. "This was found with the asset when he was recovered." Brock Rumlow bending down to Annie's lowered eye level as he added, "You obviously know what it is. When the asset stole it once when he relapsed from the wiping we realised it was important. We started using it to test how effective the wiping was. Didn't want to take any chances."

The was a deep, resonant knock on the dense door. Rumlow abruptly stood and agitatedly turned to the guard that now stepped through the entrance; not pleased that his fun had been interrupted.

"The asset is here," the darkly dressed man informed stiffly. Annie felt her stomach contract as her head fell. All hope that Bucky would stay away gone. The smile instantly returned to Rumlow's face at the news as he anticipating listened. With the new silence screaming could be heard as it grew closer.

Eventually it became audible and recognisable as Bucky demanding, "Where is she?!" the aggression consuming the sound. Waiting a large group of guards came into the view through the doorway. All ridiculously armed and clad in heavy black armour. A few filtered into the room allowing the tall, dark haired and enraged individual enter the room.

As soon as Bucky's face cleared through the sea of HYDRA his eyes landed on her. Annie stared at him hoping the fear wasn't visible in her eyes. Fury flew back into him as he moved towards her and was stopped by an agent. His armour did not protect his as Bucky's fist launched into the agent's chest causing the man to crash into the wall. Bucky was already swinging his elbow at another agent and storming to Rumlow, wrapping his bionic hand dangerously tight around his neck. Bucky used his grip to lift Rumlow up, the man's feet helplessly dangling and his hands clawing at Bucky's. Bucky watched the man struggle for breath as he threatened, "Don't you dare touch her!"

Annie struggled against the man that still painfully grasped her arms as one of the HYDRA agents pressed the barrel of his gun at the back of Bucky's head but Rumlow ordered, "Don't shot him!" Rumlow had started to turn a sickly colour as the man shouted, "Put him down!"

The other agents followed his lead. Bucky refused to release Rumlow until one threatened to shoot Annie. Bucky let him drop to the ground resentfully.

As Bucky turned back to Annie, the anger seeping from his face until he just looked pained and tired. His face hardened as he ordered, "Let her go, I'll do what you want if you don't hurt her."

Annie franticly fought against the arms that held her as she shout, "No! Bucky you can't go back to them. Please just leave Bucky. Just leave me."

Rumlow finally regaining his composure seemed relieved at how well his plan had unfolded as he nodded his head answering, "Of course."

Annie continued to thrash attempting to reach Bucky and stop him. He refused to look at her as he defeatedly followed the squad of HYDRA agents out of the room. Annie just continued to scream out as her insides twisted painfully, "Bucky! They're HYDRA, you can't trust them! Bucky!"

And then Bucky was gone and all that was left was Rumlow and his smirk. "You're right Rogers. I don't have to keep a promise that he doesn't remember," he stated, proud of his loophole.

Annie panicked as he certified her fear that they would try to erase everything he was again. He carelessly threw the handkerchief that he had somehow kept a hold of through the turmoil. He turned dismissing her as he exited her prison but stopped as she shouted urgently, "Rumlow please, I-I'll do anything. Just don't make him go back. Please."

"Right now the asset with his memory wiped is worth more than your corporation," Rumlow answered factually before finally leaving. The guards releasing her and following out the door. The scrape of the metal signalling that there was no hope of escape. But it didn't matter as Annie did not get up from the chilling floor or even raise her head.

She didn't know how many hours she lay there, hoping to God that Bucky had released it wasn't worth it and ran away. As much as she wanted to hate HYDRA, hate Rumlow, hate herself all she could was feel the consuming sense of sadness. She wanted Bucky to be happy, to finally be free from HYDRA and war that he had been immersed in. But he wouldn't be.

She finally lifted her head and pale blue stood out from the eternity of white. She reached out for the slightly coarse material. Fabric she sewed on a lifetime ago. She backed up to the wall as she watched the handkerchief as if it spoke to her. She didn't force back the tears like she had before. Instead she let them race down her cheeks and scatter on her collar bone. Every salt drop released some of her sorrow, acting as an escape from her crowed heart.

Annie no longer felt crowded and distraught. Just empty and miserable. She tilted her head back and closed her eyes awaiting her fate and praying that Bucky would get a kinder one.

Annie had lost track of time in the cell. Food had come regularly so HYDRA did not want to starve her. The food was slid in, Annie having no human contact since Rumlow had left.

The silence and boredom was not what gnawed at her, what they left her to think about did. She mind tortured itself as it wondered to Bucky, a furry of questions and anxieties.

Her already high strung nerves jolted through her as the clang of the door's lock ricocheted through the silence. The sterile walls rejecting the deep sound. The door groaned as its weight crawled on elderly hinges, Annie's head lifting minutely to view her guest.

"Bucky," escaped from her mouth in a breath as her eyes widened. She staggered up and moved towards the looming man in the doorway. She stopped halfway through the motion when she saw no recognition in his eyes as he stared at her blankly. His form stiff and expression dark as he took a menacing step towards her, once again wearing his HYDRA issued suit. The light did not warmly angle and dance along the dents of his metallic arm, the deadly perfection of it showing HYDRA's effective reboot of their human weapon.

Annie ignored her instinct to step back and called, "Bucky?" The desperation and fear visible in the crack of her tone.

This caused him to frown, spitting, "Who the hell is Bucky?"

Her heart somehow sunk deeper into the forming pit that occupied her stomach while the irregular beating dominated her senses. Her body shock as she desperately searched the living weapon that was the Winter Soldier for Bucky. His icy, neutral gaze revealing no remnants of the protective but cautious man who had saved her. This time she stumbled back as he approached, her legs growing foreign in feeling as they refused her commands.

"Bucky, it's me. Annie! Please Bucky remember me!" Annie yelled at him as he continued to near her with that frighteningly dead expression. The brokenness of her voice growing as the assassin approached.

Her vibrating hands landed on the cold, slick tile of the wall kinetically signalling her trapped state. She pressed herself against the surface that that sent an icy chill through her arctic bones. She clutched her eyes closed, the echo of his heavy boot alerting her to her looming death. She hoped that he would never remember this in case that memory destroyed him. The one person he saved he ultimately destroyed. She wondered if she was the first person Bucky had broken through the mindless asset to save – did they always end badly?

Her fight or flight instinct forced her to duck without consultation with her consciousness as the Winter Soldier crushed his fist into the wall instead of her head, his bionic arm severely fragmenting the tiles that suffered the force of his synthetic arm. Annie tried not to contemplate what it would have looked like of the tile had been her skull and she darted away from the Winter Soldier. Rubble of the damaged wall cluttered down as his hand released its deadly pressure and he twisted to face his target.

A wave of panic washed over her as she noticed the dainty blue handkerchief that lay behind the deadly man that marched towards her. The sentimental value of the cloth seemed to outweigh her safety as she risked slipping under the trained assassin to repossess it. She had almost collected the slightly coarse material in her hands when the Winter Soldier caught her jacket and ripped her away. The force colliding the smaller woman into the (until now) pristine wall. The air that had resided in her lungs was sucked out leaving her chest with an empty aching that seeping into her ribs.

The Winter Soldier knowing that the blonde woman would be recovering for a few moments and was not viewed as the real threat to begin with turned to register the object she had so callously run for. It was not a hidden knife or shard of tile but pale blue cloth. His thick brows furrowed as his frowned deepened at the woman's confusing actions. He knew he should finish the job as HYDRA had commanded but his eyes treacherous refused to leave the mundane fabric. It did not hold any worth being of poor quality material with the only notable feature sewn letters that had been distorted with the extreme age of the cloth.

Questions began to bubble, filling his consciousness without his consent. Why did she run for it? What was it to her? Why was he even exterminating her? HYDRA had informed him that the blonde woman was dangerous and not to listen to any of her pleads. But she seemed harmless enough to not require his expertise to kill her. She was already in a cel- no HYDRA has their reasons. They are making a better world through him.

"Bucky," the breathy voice of the woman rang through the space. Her voice was weak but still retained a firmness. "You know what that is and you know that I am not your enemy or target or whatever lies HYDRA has made up about me. You saved me. You broke free from their brain washing and you can do it again." Bucky remained silent as his chaotic head warned him not to listen to her in a voice that was more HYDRA than his own but his heart begged him to believe it all.

Her voice and physicality had lost all signs of weakness as she stood and stated, "I'm not going to fight you. You are James Buchanan Barnes not the Winter Soldier!" the inner conflict he suffered only led to anger fuelled by frustration directing him to run at the oddly formidable woman before throwing his fist at her. His attack lacking the precision it always held as he faltered, hitting her shoulder instead of his target. The contact still erected a grunt as the woman once again struck the wall. She refused to hit to ground but pushed herself off to stand on her feet.

She rosy woman dodged his next disordered acts hinting that she was not as helpless as he had first suspected but she continued to decline retaliation. This only frustrated him more as he roughly grasped her shoulders and crashed her into the fractured wall. His radical breathing contrasting her calm but minutely strained exhales. Her pain seeped to her exterior as her face tightened and her body stiffened but her eyes remained filled with a maddening sadness. He instinctually removed his bionic arm from her shoulder winding it back. At the last second changing the target of the punch from the woman to the shattered wall.

"Get out of my head!" he screamed desperately unsure of who he was referring to. His chest expanding and contracting unsteadily. The varying puffs catching his wild hair that disrupted his sight. His wretched his eyes closed to make some sense of the world. He felt her hand lightly rest on his tensed arm directing his attention to her.

His eyes now glistened as salty tears threatened to emerge from them. Her smile tangled his mind further as she spoke softly, "Its ok."

A new chaos filled his thoughts as he suddenly found soft lips pressing against his own. They were not forceful but not light either. His body tensed, the crumbling of the wall heard as the tile turned to rubble into his fisted robotic hand. His emotions mixed with thought spinning at irregistrable speeds making all logical thought out of reach. He forgot his mission, his location and he was sure his name as well if he had one. The emptiness of his mind unleashed a flood of restricted memories that began to fill again as his eyes closed, the aged images filtering through his mind. The rapid speed not lessening their coherence as they assembled into a semi-finished jigsaw puzzle. Pieces were missing but the full picture identifiable.

Annie.

She was kissing him. And they had done this before. The sensations originating from the blonde's lips against his own sparked the memory of when it occurred previously. As if experiencing both kisses in their separate times and he pressed into the kiss. Annie stiffened for a moment under him but quickly melted into the evolved kiss as Bucky heard her heart drastically increase as his did. His organic hand slid from her shoulder to pull her closer to him but he dared not move his other hand as he felt another layer of the wall crack beneath it.

Annie pulled away for what Bucky would call too soon but he knew her reason. She desperately clutched his shoulders as she studied him, her cyan eyes flicking from one feature to another for a sign that he was Bucky and not the weapon that had attempted to end her. He watched her disbelievingly as he sorted through his new memories without the distraction of Annie's lips.

One refused to move along like the rest, stationary in his thoughts as it demanded it's importance. He sat numbly in a cylindrical cell with faded men crowding the small space. Their faces blurred as if he had not once looked at them. What had retained clarity was the cloth his grasped in his dirtied hands. The faded blue was somehow the most pleasant colour he could concoct and the fabric felt softer than it could have been. The 'BB' carefully sewn seemed to emit warmth but also act as the source of his pain. The fresh memory generating a realisation, "I loved you…" Bucky breathed as he finally looked at Annie.

There was barely enough time to see the enormous smile that eclipsed her face before she had tightly wound her arms around him and buried her head into his chest. Hesitancy absent as he his arms quickly warped around her, holding her tightly.

Relief dominated her emotions as her breathing finally steadied with the calming thud of his heart beat that her ear was pressed to. "Thank goodness," she breathed as her embrace tightened to make sure he was tangible. She had not known what had sparked her decision to kiss him, whether it was a vein hope that it would remind him of his past or whether she just wanted to before she was killed, but she was glad she had.

Bucky's arms retreated from her as his head darted examining the room, landing on the closed, reflective door. Annie understood he was working through a plan of escape. She was just hoping it was for both of them. No, she would ensure that they would both escape.

With a hardened expression Bucky ordered, "Lay on the ground and play dead." Annie nodded and efficiently positioned herself so her face was out of view of the guards she knew were outside the door.

She relied on her ears to record the events as the echo of Bucky's heavy boots and the metal on metal as his banged the door. The hinges whined again as it swung open. A muffled question was posed through the mask of the HYDRA personnel guarding the door that was abruptly followed by a harsh cracking sound and a clang that Annie assumed was the second guard colliding with the door.

Without sound Bucky appeared beside her, gently alerting her to their need to move with a light hand on her shoulder. He pulled her up as if she were a porcelain doll, his eyes darting about her frame for injuries that he had neglected to check for earlier. His stern features turning to a grimace as he noticed her hesitancy to rest her weight on one leg and the stiffness of her shoulder. She ignored his silent worry as she took the other of his stolen guns directing great concentration in appearing uninjured. The consistent furrow in his brow as sign he did not believe her charade.

Their escape from the HYDRA facility had blurred into dominant sensations as her exhausted mind refused to take anything else in. Only able to focus on the constant security of his hand desperately grasping hers as if he were afraid that if he loosened it too much she would disappear. The pain in her back, shoulder and knee grew to a throbbing that echoed in her eardrums and rippled through her limbs and chest. The voices of HYDRA pursuing them were muffled and ended as the sound of Bucky's firing rung in her ears. Her mind had cleared at points to enable to shot at a few guards but at some point Bucky had decided they were not moving fast enough and pulled her over his shoulder, tensing when she grunted in pain.

She could vaguely recall a mutely coloured car, the low rumble of the engine as Bucky guided her slacking form into the seat but most predominantly the warmth of his hand as he continued to hold her with his. A lazy smile breaking out on her bruised face as she noticed his worried glances constantly being shot at her while he drove.

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