Chapter 12 – Lost
Wanda bites down hard on her lip to stop from saying everything she wants to as Bucky's motionless form gets thrown into his cell, and he rolls onto his side. The cell door is slammed shut, and one of the guards smirks in her direction before they disappear up the corridor. She listens to their thoughts as they go, but most of it is a language she doesn't understand and the only things she can guess at are to do with what the one's wife has planned for dinner that evening.
Not helpful with trying to work out where they are. Unless the team can find an Eva who makes excellent stew and dumplings.
'Bucky?' she kneels down at the bars and reaches through the bars, just able to brush her finger tips against his hand. 'Bucky?'
A low groan comes from the super soldier. 'They are really not as friendly as they pretended to be.' He manages to push himself onto his back and Wanda tries to bite back on the whimper that escapes at the sight of his bloodied face.
'Bucky…'
'Hey, it looks worse than it is,' he tries to reassure her with a smile, but she can feel the pain he's in.
'No, it doesn't.'
He laughs then groans. 'Yeah, alright you got me there.' He manages to shuffle closer to her so he can take hold of her hand properly. 'Have they done anything to you?'
She shakes her head. 'Nothing. It's like they're ignoring me until…'
'Until they've broken me.'
'Not necessarily-'
'No, they'll break me first,' he squeezes her hand in reassurance, 'because by breaking me they'll be part of the way to breaking you.' He gives her a grim smile. 'I've seen them do it too many times not to know, Wanda.'
'Is there anything I can do?' she asks, wiping at the tears angrily with the back of her free hand.
'Tell me about growing up,' he says, closing his eyes. 'Loki helps me when I'm in there by letting me go through the link and be with him. But it doesn't stop them hurting my body and I need to find a way to relax so it can heal up as much as possible before they come back for me. So, tell me about you growing up. Tell me about your brother.'
'Ok,' she says, getting comfortable. 'Every week we'd take it in turns to pick what to watch from the suitcase of films that my father would try to sell on. It was how we learnt English.'
'Did you choose all the Disney films?'
She laughs. 'No, I wanted the Dick van Dyke show.'
And so it continues, as the light from the small windows at the top of their walls gradually fades, and the odd star is all they can see.
'You are looking tired, brother.'
Loki looks up at Thor as the blond sits next to him. 'They are taking Bucky for another session, I need to prepare to bring him through to protect his mind, Thor. Can we have this conversation another time?'
'Can I bring you anything? Something to drink perhaps? I shall ask T'Challa if we can postpone our trip to the UN.'
'No, you go. I'll stay here until they return him to his cell.'
'But brother-'
'Go, Thor. We need to continue this fight so this has not all been in vain. Go, I shall be fine.'
'Alright,' Thor sighs, but leaves him in peace. Loki notices him talking to Tony before he follows T'Challa and they leave.
'Need some company?' Natasha asks, coming to sit in Thor's vacant seat.
'I'm sure Bucky will appreciate it as much as I will,' he smiles in reply.
-Loki?-
-Natasha and I are here, Bucky. You are not alone.-
-Thank you. I…I'm so tired. I've never lasted this long before, even when they first took me.-
'Does he want to practise his Greek?' Natasha smirks.
-You can tell her if she tries speaking Greek to me I'll stab her when I get back.-
Loki laughs and relays the message.
'Alright, I'll be nice,' she reassures them both.
They continue to try and hold a conversation, though it's often interrupted with reassurances to Bucky as his torture continues. Loki's grip on the chair steadily increases, until a small hand takes hold of one of his and squeezes it in reassurance. He smiles at Natasha in thanks, trying not to let Bucky know how much these sessions affect him in turn.
-Loki…I…I feel…-
-Bucky? Bucky! Stay with me.-
-It…can't…Wanda…once they break me…Wanda next…get…get Wanda…I…-
-Bucky?- There's silence from the other end of the link.
'Loki?'
-Bucky! Speak to me Winter Warrior!-
'Loki? Loki!'
-BUCKY!- Loki doesn't realise he's shouted out loud as well as in his head until Natasha's panicked face appears in front of him. He looks down at her as she places her hands on either side of his face, finally registering the fact he's standing.
'Loki?' her voice is small and he can feel tears trailing down from his eyes to stop at her fingertips.
'Loki what happened?' Sam speaks up and Loki looks around the room, meeting the worried gazes of the team.
'He…I couldn't do enough,' Loki's voice cracks.
'What do you mean?' Steve's voice is barely loud enough to be heard.
'He…they've done it.'
'Done what?' Rhodes demands.
'They've put the conditioning in place.'
He tries not to wince as Natasha's fingers tighten involuntarily on his face. He can't meet Steve's eyes, with the weight of his failure on him.
And in his mind, there is only silence. For the first time in months, he feels alone.
Wanda keeps her gaze down as the footsteps stop in front of her cell.
'What do you want?' she growls after a few moments of silence, finally looking up at her visitor.
Bucky says nothing, face and gaze blank.
'No,' she whimpers, half falling and half walking across the cell. 'Bucky, please, speak to me.'
He stays silent and opens the door, not even attempting to catch her as she falls to her knees in front of him. Reaching down with his vibranium arm he takes hold of her wrist and pulls her to her feet.
'You're hurting me!' she cries, desperately trying to get her feet under her. 'Bucky, stop! What are you doing?'
But he doesn't answer, he just begins to drag her along the corridor and up the flight of stairs where he's always disappeared from her sight before. Wanda tries reaching into his mind, to see if she can think of a way to get through to him, but what she sees terrifies her. There's nothing in his mind except his orders. Bring her upstairs.
'Bucky come on. You can beat this, you can beat them. You fought it and won before remember? Remember us and Vis in Tony's lab? Working through your memories together. Remember Tony taking you upstairs? Telling you that you weren't to blame for everything you did? Bucky!'
'Who is Bucky?' are the first words he says to her since he arrived.
'You,' she whispers, tears falling down her face and she can't help the feeling of despair that fills her. 'You are,' she sobs. Then comes the rage; the anger that someone has taken her friend from her and she suddenly jumps onto his back, digging her fingers into the soft parts she can reach just like he'd taught her to do.
'You are Bucky!' she screeches in his ear as he tries to throw her off. 'You are! You taught me to do this! You're the one who stays up with me when I can't sleep and Peter's not at the facility. You're the one that refuses to wake me up anymore after I threw an alarm clock at you one morning. You're the one that makes us all laugh. You. Are. Bucky!'
He slams her backwards in a wall and she cries out in pain, losing her grip on him and falling to a heap at his feet. With the pain the despair returns and he looks up into his hard gaze, not trying to hold back her sobs. 'I'm the Winter Soldier,' he tells her.
'Loki calls you the Winter Warrior,' she reminds him softly as he grabs hold of her wrist and pulls her up again.
'Who the hell is Loki?' he demands.
She can't form a response before he opens a door and throws her into the room.
It's nothing like what she was expecting.
Compared to the rest of the rooms she's seen this one is positively comfortable, with a fire burning and two comfortable chairs sitting next to it; small tables litter the room, with books and trinkets piled on them. A large desk dominates one wall, again filled with books and trinkets, and bookshelves line the walls with ornaments dotting some of the shelves.
'Thank you, Soldier,' a woman says, standing from one of the chairs. 'You can go, I'll call you when it's time for Wanda to return to her room.'
Bucky says nothing, simply turns and walks out without a backwards glance.
'So, this is the infamous Wanda Maximoff,' the woman says, tone cheerful. She has long black, wavy hair with a round face and a friendly smile; dark eyes that send a shiver down Wanda's spine as they assess her. The woman is wearing a long dark dress with a high collar and walks in a circle around her. 'I hear you've worked out my runes make it impossible for you to cast your spells. You see, Wanda dear, in a given space only a witch who cast the runes can use her magic.' Wanda sees dark blue light dance across the woman's fingers. 'I was quite surprised you didn't know the fundamentals. Though I will admit to being impressed that you worked it out, toots. I thought you were going to give yourself a migraine keeping up with that magic for a while.'
'Who are you?' Wanda demands, finding her courage as her rage returns.
'Me? I'm the gal who's going to teach you all you need to know about magic, dearie. After all, they really didn't do a good enough job of it the first time around. Honestly! You just cannot get the staff these days. And once we've solved the problem of your lack of education, you can be an even greater asset to us than your friend there.'
'You still haven't told me who you are,' Wanda glares at her. 'And I'll never help HYDRA.'
The woman grins. 'But you will, Wanda. After all, HYDRA created you so it's the least you can do, don't you think?' Then she puts a hand to her mouth. 'Oh, and how rude of me, I completely forgot to introduce myself. Agatha Harkness. Wonderful to meet you, dearie.'
A/N: Hello everyone! I hope you're still enjoying the story and this chapter was a bit of a peek into where we're off to next.
I apologise profusely for what I did to Bucky. I'm not going to lie...it's going to get worse before it gets better. As always do let me know what you think and if there is anything you'd like to see in the future!
Love always,
L x
As always here's your sneak peek:
'Shit! Cap we got incoming!' Clint says. 'One vehicle heading this way at speed. We need to go now if we're going to get away without a fight.'
'Nat?'
'We need a couple more minutes.'
'Clint can you buy us some time?' he asks.
