Chapter 22

The chopper took us back to base. Partway there, Natalia began to stir. She had succumbed to unconsciousness as we left the warehouse, and Rogan's men had told me she was merely confused, not an enemy. Now she opened her eyes and looked up at me from where she lay bound on the floor of the chopper. "Bucky?" Her voice was almost drowned out by the noise of the chopper, but I could hear her anyway, due to my enhancements.

"That's not my name," I replied.

"Yes it is," she insisted, speaking quickly and forcefully. "Your memory's been stolen by Rogan. You need to wake up."

"No more talking!" one of the soldiers ordered.

Natalia fell silent, but she didn't break eye contact with me. In the end, I looked away. What had made her this confused?

A few minutes later the chopper touched down inside the snow-covered complex. I climbed out and walked to where Rogan stood waiting by one of the buildings.

"Mission report," he demanded emotionlessly.

"Target escaped," I replied. "We evaded police. Memory is compromised beyond that. Extraction was late last night."

Rogan nodded. "See that you do better next time, Soldier."

"Da, General."

We both turned as a scuffle broke out by the chopper, where Natalia was trying to break free from one of the soldiers. Another of Rogan's men hurried over and between them they got her under control.

As they half-dragged her towards one of the buildings, Natalia twisted to face me and yelled, "Steve would want you to fight this!" Then she was pushed inside and the door closed.

Rogan looked sideways at me. "What has she said to you, Soldier?"

"Nothing important," I replied, and I almost meant it.

He accepted that and we walked back to my cell, where he left me to get some rest. I lay down but couldn't get to sleep.

Natalia's words were stuck in my mind and I couldn't get them out. She had called me Bucky. I knew that name somehow. It was as familiar to me as my own reflection. Never mind if I could only ever remember being called Soldier. The name felt right.

It was my name.

But if I was Bucky, who was Steve?

I closed my eyes and tried desperately to remember a face, a voice, anything that could answer the question. Natalia seemed to think he meant something to me. I had to remember something about him.

What I remembered was a blinding flash of light and a deafening roar of sound as the Infinity Stones exploded.

And with that the dam burst open and the memories flooded back. Everything was there – just like it had been last night before that soldier said the blasted words.

"Thank you, Natasha," I breathed. The trigger words alone weren't strong enough to hold my mind for long, not with my memories so close to the surface.

Quickly, I got up and moved to the door. It was locked, so I applied pressure until something gave and it swung open. I glanced both ways along the dark hall, but no one was in sight.

Now I was free, I wasn't entirely sure what I planned on doing. I didn't have a clue where Natasha was being held, but hopefully she would be somewhere close by. This was the prison area of the complex, after all. I set off down the dark hall and tried the first cell door I came to, calling quietly for Natasha.

Ten doors later I was beginning to wonder if Natasha was in Room 37 instead of a cell. Rogan would need to wipe her mind again if she was going to be of any use to him. The thought made my stomach knot sickeningly.

There was a slight sound from the hallway behind me and I spun to see a soldier standing there, staring at me with wide eyes. He knew I wasn't supposed to be out of my cell.

"Don't move!" he ordered, reaching for his holstered gun.

I leapt forward before he could use it and slammed into him, pushing him across the hall and into the far wall. The impact knocked the breath out of him and he collapsed to the floor, gasping.

I snatched up his gun and glanced about. The game was well and truly up. My only chance was to get out as fast as possible. Natasha would have to hold her own until I had backup of some sort, much as I hated the idea of leaving her here.

With the basics of a plan in place, I took off back down the hall the way I'd come. From my cell, I knew the way to one of the doors that led outside.

As I reached the broken door of my cell an alarm went off, blaring loudly from a speaker overhead. It echoed through the halls as I ran past other cells, smashed through a locked door, and skidded around a corner to see the door to the outside world at the end of the hall.

Three armed guards ran into the hall ahead of me from a side corridor, shouting at me to drop my weapon.

Not likely.

I raised my gun and fired as I continued down the hall. Each shot was intended only to disable the guards, and each shot did just that. I didn't want any blood on my hands today.

I dashed past the guards as they lay groaning on the floor and slammed my metal shoulder into the door. It flew open and a breath of cold air brushed against my face.

Freedom lay just over the wire fence five hundred feet away through the predawn gloom.

But between me and it lay a gauntlet of exposed ground and guards alerted by the siren. Already those closest were turning in my direction. No way was I getting across there without taking a bullet.

I glanced around quickly. A watchtower stood at each corner of the compound fence, rising above both the barbed wire-topped barrier and the surrounding buildings.

That would be my way out.

A Jeep was parked by the wall a couple of feet from the door. I ran and leapt onto the hood. From there it was a simple jump to the building roof.

I ran along the middle of the flat roof, preventing the guards closest on the ground from having a good angle to shoot at. When I reached the edge of the roof I jumped to the next one and kept going.

The sentries in the western watchtower began to swivel their searchlight around towards me. I raised my gun, aimed, and squeezed the trigger. The searchlight went out in a shower of sparks and glass.

A hail of bullets from the tower slammed into the roof slightly to my right. They didn't have their light but they still had guns.

I pushed myself to run faster. Almost there.

I reached the edge of the last building between me and the tower, and leapt across the distance, landing on the watchtower railing. I shot the first sentry in the leg and stepped down into the tower as he sank to the floor, dropping his machine gun. I grabbed the second sentry by the front of his uniform and dumped him over the rail. His cry of fright was cut off abruptly by the snowdrift below.

As I turned away from the railing a burning pain snatched at my right shoulder, causing me to stumble. Obviously the northern watchtower had caught onto what was going down. It was time to leave.

Ignoring the throb of pain it caused, I pulled myself up onto the westernmost railing of the tower, balanced there for a second, then threw myself across the gap between tower and fence.

The silver wire flashed by below and then I crashed into the snowy ground, rolling to break my fall. I grunted as sharp rocks dug into my shoulder and side, then staggered to my feet and took off running towards the trees. I had to get deep enough into them that vehicles couldn't follow.

Bullets from the northern tower kicked up the snow around me as I ran, weaving from side to side to avoid giving them an easy target. Running flat out through ankle-deep snow that hid the uneven ground below was anything but fun. I managed to keep my balance through a mixture of practice and luck, and plunged into the tree line.