Author's Notes: Marvel owns what it owns, and I own what I own, let's keep it that way shall we? Don't Sue me!
Recommended Listening: Bohemian Rhapsody by Queen, Yellow Ledbetter by Pearl Jam, and Under the Bridge by Red Hot Chili Peppers
Enjoy!
Ch 13: When Flying is Just Falling
She was flying, her body weightless and nimble as she soared through the clear blue sky. The wind washed around her warm and sweet. Higher and higher she soared, feeling the exhilaration of the height and speed and breathless delight. "Come down, Mags."
She paused, looking around. "Riley?"
"Come down, Mags."
"Riley? Riley? Where are you?" She looked down. Below, far below her, he was there. He was there at the ranch. At their ranch, by the barn looking up at her, his face bent in worry and care.
"Mags...Mags please we don't have much time." Riley called. He was wearing his fatigues, his bags were packed. He was leaving, he was leaving for his deployment. "Mags, we don't have much time."
"Riley." Her voice was swept away by the wind.
And now she could smell the smoke. The wind turned hot, smoke rising in the air, billowing in thick black coils around her, choking her lungs, making her eyes sting. She looked down the barn was on fire, the horses were screaming, trying to break out of their stalls. She looked to her wings, they were on fire. Pain. Pain seared through her hands up into her arms and spread all over her body.
And she was back in the kitchen.
Smoke, smoke was everywhere. Filling the kitchen, and her lungs, making her eyes sting and her chest ache as she tried to catch her breath. She couldn't move. She was tied down. She wriggled her right hand and wrist, trying to wrench free from the zip ties. Her left hand and wrist were swelling rapidly, the zip ties pinching and cutting into her skin.
Out of the corner of her eye, she could see him. Matt…James…The Winter Soldier. Just standing there, watching her as she struggled. 'Help me!' She tried to scream, but it came out in a muted, almost hoarse whisper. 'Help!'
He stood there, motionless, those piercing blue eyes boring holes into her as flames lapped at the support beams and studs of the kitchen. She could hear crashing around her, things sparking and snapping and collapsing as the fire consumed them, consumed her life.
'H elp me!' She tried again, her voice choked by the smoke, her head spinning, vision blurring.
'Mags! Mag's we're coming!' Sam rushed in, followed by Steve, but stopped before they could cut her from the chair. "Where is he?" Steve asked gravely.
"He's right there!" She tried to scream. "Please help me." Her voice was trapped, caught in her throat.
They glanced back where she had motioned, but he was gone. "Mags, where did he go?"
'Where did he go?'
Where did he go?'
'Where did he go?'
Their voices echoed a thousand times, as the smoke and flames overtook her, as she tried to free herself, her voice muffled even as she screamed, screamed for someone to hear her, screamed for someone to free her, to rescue her.
Then there was nothing but darkness as the voices continued. 'Where did he go? Where did he go?'
Maggie Ramirez jerked awake. Heart pounding, chest heaving, she gulped down air, tears streaming down her face as she tried to ground herself in space and time. She wasn't at the ranch, she wasn't suffocating, she wasn't tied to a chair, Hydra wasn't actively trying to kill her at the moment. She was safe on the 82nd floor of the Stark Tower.
Barely fighting back sobs, she wiped at her face with the right sleeve of her hoodie and yanked off her headphones, the Russian language podcast still playing seeping into the otherwise quiet office. She glanced around. It was all here still. The office with the grubby, stained, lumpy second-hand couch, suspiciously IKEA looking desk, bookshelves and work tables, the large world map she'd plastered on the wall. The stack of language software and the various files and Intel that Sam had collected. All of it still there.
Her whole body still shaking, Maggie sighed, sitting up, adjusting the sling around her neck, and cleared away the Russian textbook and Russian-English dictionary off her lap, and the photocopied documents she'd been working through.
It had been a month since Hydra had come, tortured her, burned her home to the ground, and she'd only narrowly escaped death thanks to Sam Wilson. It had been six weeks, nearly to the day since James Barnes had stumbled onto her property and into her life. One month since her world had ended and she'd agreed to help them track down the man partially responsible for the collapse of her life. One month and they were going nowhere slowly. Maggie turned, glancing over the back of the couch to the massive world map she'd plastered to the wall. Two red pins stuck into the east coast, the only known and confirmed sightings of James Barnes. There were orange pins, white pins, and green pins scattered around the world: points of interest, possible leads, known safe houses. There were also the dreaded black pins, which indicated dead ends. The black pins were starting to become more numerous than Maggie cared to think, while the red pins remained fixed: Washington D.C. and Last Chance Ranch.
Stark had offered her more technologically advanced methods, but she liked her pins in the wall map. She'd let Sam and Steve work with technology. She was going to work this problem the old fashioned way. Which was why she'd fallen asleep on the lumpy second-hand sofa she'd bought of craigslist, trying to brush up on her Russian so she could work through the files on the Winter Soldier. Why couldn't he have been held hostage by the Mexican cartels or ANY number of Spanish speaking countries it would make this whole thing so much easier.
There was a soft buzz, and Maggie pulled her phone from her hoodie pocket and read the message that had just appeared. Morning brief at your place in ten.
"Thanks, Sammie," She moaned, pulling herself up off the couch, and padded her way to the kitchen. A magnificent, multi-million dollar view of the Manhattan skyline greeted her from the floor to ceiling windows, the sun shining in. "Fuck off." She muttered as she started putting together coffee in the glass percolator.
She and Sam had been given the keys to the apartment and free access to the Avengers facilities. Free of charge, which was pretty generous of Tony Stark. Consider it a perk. At least that's what Sam had said. Personally, Maggie wondered what Steve had told Stark to convince him to let this random nobody move in without so much as paying a cent in a deposit. Then again, this was Captain America they were talking about. The man could read his grocery list by way of a motivational speech, and people would still follow him to the gate of hell and back. It probably hadn't taken much in the way of arm twisting.
However, oddly enough, since she'd arrived at the tower, he'd been very firmly Steve. He'd helped her move in her few remaining personal possessions from the fire, and even lugged the aforementioned lumpy sofa into the apartment for her. He'd invited her to dinner with the team, and helped her with her groceries, and had just been an all-around regular dude. Well, as regular as a dude from the 1940s could be when they were tracking down a man also from the 1940s who'd been trained by a Nazi organization to destabilize and destroy the world order as they knew it. Oh, and of course, this was the same man who'd also spent nearly two weeks hanging out on her ranch while hiding out from said Nazi organization. It was a lot to swallow.
Maggie wound her hair into a messy bun, managing to stick a pen to secure it using only one hand before pulling out three mugs. "Come in! It's unlocked!" She called over her shoulder as the intercom buzzed. "You take your coffee black right?"
"Ma'am." Maggie glanced up into the big earnest face of Steve Rogers, Sam trailing behind him.
"Steven." She cracked a small smile as she extended a steaming mug to him.
He took it carefully and nodded graciously.
"Same-same Sam?" She inquired, turning back to the stove.
"Yeah," Sam answered.
"How was your trip from Moscow?" She asked pleasantly, handing over his mug of coffee before pouring one for herself.
"Well, we have another place our guy isn't," Sam said with a heavy sigh.
"Another black pin, huh?" Maggie commented taking a sip of the coffee. It was black and slightly burnt, but it eased the pounding in her head slightly. "Let's adjourn to the office, and we can go over our next move." She said, motioning for the two men to follow.
Moscow was a little too on the nose. When they found Barnes, it wouldn't be somewhere like that. But that hadn't been her call to make. Steve had wanted to check, and so Sam had gone. "Did you find anything interesting? Hydra files?" Maggie inquired as she sunk down behind her desk and watched as Steve and Sam sat down on her lumpy, ugly sofa.
"Man. I can't believe Stark let you drag this thing into his multi-million dollar apartment." Sam scoffed, as he surveyed one of the stains on a fraying cushion.
"Stark didn't let me do anything. I wanted a couch, and I wasn't about to spend five GRAND on the one that you wanted from restoration hardware. Do not disrespect my couch Sam Wilson or next time you can sit your ass on the floor." Maggie rolled her eyes. "ANYWAY." She said, picking up a black pin from her desk and extended it to Steve. "If you'd do the honors Cap'?"
He rose and accepted the pin, pushing it forcefully into Moscow while She and Sam watched in silence. Steve made his way back over to the couch and sunk down before Sam spoke again. "How's the Russian coming along?"
"Slowly. The language programs Stark gave me access to have been excellent but, still taking me some time since I'm working several at once." She answered, picking up a bottle of pills and fiddling with the Cap.
"Romanoff could help you if you wanted. She's back stateside for the moment." Steve suggested.
Maggie paled. She'd seen the super-spy around, but they hadn't interacted, and Maggie wasn't sure she would ever be ready to do so. The woman had a presence. She was beautiful, and graceful, and terrifying in the way that most talented and deadly women were, and Maggie found that she was not prepared to interact with that in her current state of somewhere between a potato and walking grease stain. "I'm sure she has other more important Avenger-y things to be looking after than tutoring me." Maggie stammered out. "So." She continued clearing her throat. "What's our next move, Steve?"
They talked strategy and options, and Maggie took notes in the journal she'd started. Sam handed over and talked through the files he'd collected. Their meeting was cut short by Steve, who was called upstairs to talk Avengers business, and they adjourned their official business.
"So what you doing for lunch?" Sam asked as the front door closed behind Steve.
"Hadn't thought about it." Maggie said, booting up her computer.
"Have you been sleeping all right?"
"Not really."
"You should probably talk to someone about that."
"Can't mix pain meds and sleep meds, Sam, though frankly, I'd rather be able to drink again than have to deal with either." She replied.
"You know I wasn't talking about that." Sam said.
"I didn't think you cared."
"Of course, I care, Mags."
Maggie snorted, rolling her eyes. She really didn't want to have this conversation again. They'd gone round and round about that when she'd first arrived. Mostly about the ranch and about money when he'd been settling her affairs. He'd wanted to know why she hadn't asked him for help. Why she'd allowed the bills to stack up. Why she hadn't reached out to him. Fortunately, the ranch was in a trust now and being looked after. Not that it mattered, they weren't going to be able to find anyone to run the ranch. Sam had been able to convince Suzanne to re-home a majority of her horses, with the exceptions of Shadow and Ghost, who would stay with Suzanne. She should've been pleased, she wanted to be pleased, but instead, she was just angry: angry at Hydra, angry at Roberts, angry at Barnes, and even to some degree angry at Sam. This wasn't fair, none of this was fair. She was lucky to be alive, sure, but at what cost?
"What?" Sam asked.
"Nothing." She shook her head.
"You been having that dream again?"
"What dream?" Maggie asked blandly as she rose to her feet and walked back toward the kitchen.
"The flying dream you said you were having in the hospital." Sam replied, following behind her.
"Nope." Maggie shook her head, dumping out the stale coffee and returning the percolator to the stovetop.
"You wanna come have lunch with me?"
"Nope."
"Do you plan on having lunch?" Sam pushed.
"Grilled cheese." She answered. "And you're not my nanny Sam. You know that you're not responsible for me." Maggie bit out, with a little more venom than she'd intended. She could still see Sam's picture on the table, the one that Hydra had threatened her with. He didn't know, and she would take it to her grave, even if it rotted her from within. He was just as responsible as the Winter Soldier for Hydra coming and burning down her house, her barn, and her life. Only worse than the Winter Soldier, Sam had had a choice. He could've stayed on the ranch, he could've come and helped her at any time only he hadn't, and now they were here.
"When was the last time you left the apartment?" Sam asked.
"I dunno." Maggie shook her head as she placed a skillet on the stovetop and started assembling her grilled cheese.
"You really should let me take you to lunch." Sam said.
"I have work to do."
"Mags, you've been basically working non-stop since you got here. You can take a break, you know. This doesn't have to be your whole life. It shouldn't be your whole life."
Maggie didn't know what to say. Or rather she knew what she wanted to say but knew that wouldn't go over well. It would result in another fight, which was something her aching head didn't really want to deal with at the moment. The truth of it was this, she didn't have a life. This was her life for the foreseeable future, and until they found Barnes, she wasn't going to stop. She couldn't. She wanted to get her life back, she wanted to be back at that musty old farmhouse, with the leaky barn, and with bills up to her eyeballs rather than be stuck here. The ranch by the end had been a prison, a trap of her own making. At least it was home, as compared to this. So if running herself into the ground until they found Barnes was what it took, then so be it. Sam wouldn't understand. Sam had volunteered, Sam could walk away at any point, that option just wasn't available to her.
"I haven't washed my hair in a bit. It would take way too long to get ready." She said putting a slice of buttered bread on the skillet. "Seriously, Sam. You just got off the plane from Moscow a few hours ago. You're probably exhausted. You don't have to worry about me."
"Maybe I should be." Sam said, walking up beside her and starting assembling a sandwich. They worked in silence a moment, and Maggie could feel Sam trying to come up with something to say. She really had to hand it to Sam, he was way more thoughtful than she could ever be when it came to their interpersonal communication. "So, what do you think he's up to?"
"Who?" Maggie stopped and looked up at Sam, brows furrowed.
"You've spent the most time with our guy, and have spent the last month trying to get inside his head. What do you think he's doing when he's not, yanno, avoiding us?"
Maggie snorted, shaking her head. "I'm not trying to get inside his head. You know that's not what I'm doing."
"So what do you think he's up to? Based on your observations and the date you've collected." Sam commented, gently moving her aside, he took the spatula from her and flipped her grilled cheese in the pan.
"Oh. I dunno." She winced as she climbed up and sat down on the counter, watching Sam from an elevated perch. "To be honest, I hadn't thought about it like that."
"Well, perhaps you should," Sam said. "Might help," He shrugged.
"Might help what?"
"Help you find him. I mean, you were the one who let him sleep in the barn for two weeks before you knew who he was. Knowing that he's the Winter Soldier didn't change that much, did it?"
"I think it was the torture and 'dying' that might have changed my perspective about the man we're looking for a little bit." She answered dryly.
"You like your sandwich cut diagonally right, or has that preference changed?" Sam questioned.
"Yes. Triangles."
He cut the sandwich, plated it, and handed it to her, placing his sandwich in the pan. "It might help us find him if you can imagine him as a person, Mags."
"I know he's a person." She said with a mouthful of sandwich. Maggie chewed and swallowed. "He's just a person who tried to kill you twice to three times and is part of the reason that I'm sitting here."
"Okay. So what can you imagine that person is doing right now?" Sam pushed.
Maggie rolled his eyes. "I dunno." She took another bite of her sandwich. Sam wasn't wrong. He was never wrong. Maybe she was approaching this whole thing wrong. She'd stripped Barnes down to essentials, down to the behaviors he'd exhibited, rather than who he was as a person. But how could she possibly know that? Other than taking a wild guess. She exhaled slowly. "I really don't know, Sam."
"Maybe you should figure that out, it might help you with this thing." He paused, taking a bite of his sandwich he chewed slowly before swallowing. "In the meantime, we have to do something about your hair."
"You're a jerk."
"Nah, dude, it's just gross."
"Thanks, Sammie."
"Come on, Mags, let me help you with your hair. Please, if just for hygiene's sake, your hair is getting nasty."
She stuck out her tongue, taking another bite of the sandwich, she couldn't help but giggle. Sam smiled. It felt good. Just the two of them, together, laughing, almost like the old days.
Sam's phone beeped, and just like that, the moment was gone. "Have to run an errand for Steve. I'll be back in a little while." Sam said, biting his sandwich put the plate in the dishwasher. "I'll be back later, and we will deal with your hair then." He commented after he'd removed the sandwich from his mouth.
"If you try to take a pair of scissors to my hair, I won't be the only one down a hand." She said gravely, sliding gingerly off the countertop.
"Thought hadn't even occurred," he said, planting a soft kiss on her on the forehead. "You're salty."
"It's all the cheese you just consumed, Wilson."
"Well. Whatever the case. Have an answer to my question when I get back."
"Right. That." She rolled her eyes. "Where ever Barnes is, he isn't dealing with you and your bullshit."
"That's a feature, not a flaw, Magdalene," Sam said as they walked toward the door.
"Whatever."
"Whatever yourself!"
"Just go run your errand for Cap,' you ass."
"Love you too!" He shot as the door shut behind him.
Maggie chuckled, shaking her head. She turned to the office, to the stack of files, to the computer, and wall map, and language books, and the gross stained couch. "Okay, Barnes." She sighed, rubbing her face with her good hand. "If I where you, what would I be doing right now?" Maggie asked the silence of the flat. "Yeah." She groaned, sinking back down on the couch, resting her head on one of the cushions, she closed her eyes. "That's what I thought, too."
It had been over a month since the events on Last Chance, almost two months since he'd escaped Hydra, and about three days since his last "unpleasant" incident. Or had it been longer? He couldn't remember. He hadn't been sleeping well, or at all, it was hard to tell. His brain was too loud, two lifetimes of information and memories waring for dominance, for control What was real and what was an echo of a hydra implanted memory he couldn't quite make out, but it was in his head and making things difficult. He was writing everything down just like Ra…just like the woman had suggested, but that was only doing so much. Which is why he was out late, walking the damp empty streets. He'd been craving something sweet and salty, so he'd gone to the little shop on the corner to grab some chips and a chocolate bar. He'd gone to the park and eaten his snacks and was now walking back to the safe house. He'd be leaving in the morning, he had to keep moving, he couldn't linger long.
Then something clicked in his brain, almost like a sixth sense. He was being followed, and they were closing fast. His eyes darted around, looking for a strategic exit, witnesses, security cameras, anything, and everything that might prevent being compromised or captured. Then the man trailing him walked past, and it was then that he saw the man's actual mark.
Shit.
Somehow this was worse. He wasn't the garget, it was the woman walking ten yards or so ahead of them. She picked up her pace, and the man filling her matched paced to overtake her. James veered off right, his mind screaming even as he did. Stay out of this. Don't get involved. His brain screamed, followed by. If you do nothing- He scaled the building and looked down, keeping pace as he jumped with ease from rooftop to rooftop.
The man was calling after her, speaking in increasingly raised tones, trying to get the woman's attention. She'd quickened her pace, nearing a jog, her hands out of sight, likely curled around keys or a weapon of some kind.
She'll probably be fine. He reasoned, trying to find some way out of his present course of action. Just like Wilson should have been able to get to Ra- the woman before Hydra did?
He silently swore at himself, but he knew he didn't have a choice. If he did nothing and something happened, it would be his fault. He wished he could ignore it, and he hated that both parts of his mind were even having this debate.
Before he could talk himself out of whatever he was going to do, he jumped from the roof into the alley wan and then walked out into the street, just as the man grabbed the woman's arm.
She turned, a look of sheer terror on her face, which was only matched and surpassed by the look on the man's face when James grabbed his arm.
"Let. Her. Go." He bit out in a near growl. "Now." He ordered as he squeezed the man's arm, probably harder than necessary.
The man let go of the woman's arm, and James jerked him bodily away from her, putting himself between the stalker and his mark, before shoving the man away. The man stumbled back and fell, scrabbling to his feet, and darting away as fast he could manage.
James watched him go, only vaguely aware that the woman was still standing behind him frozen in place. He turned, slowly, and found that she wasn't a woman, she was a child, a girl, no more than sixteen. She looked up at him with big blue eyes, wide with fear, already welling with tears. He took two steps back, hands up in a way that he hoped was non-threatening, or less threatening rather. "You okay?" He managed after a moment
She nodded.
"There's a shop that's open two blocks that way." He motioned. "Call someone to come pick you up, you shouldn't be out this late on your own." He said shortly, turning he started walking back the opposite direction.
"Thank you." She called weakly.
He paused a moment before he continued down the road. His mind spun. You shouldn't have let her see you, you shouldn't have gotten involved. Yet there was something familiar about the action, about the girl, something that had happened not a month ago at Last Chance Ranch, but a long, long time ago, before the war, before the soldier. A name formed on his lips, but he didn't speak it into existence. He couldn't. Not here, not now. It would open up too many wounds, and he had too much to do.
James shook his head. Zero days since the last incident, and now he had to move.
A/N I hope you enjoyed! Thanks for reading! Love to hear from you, what you thought, what you think, favorite moments, and all that jazz. Remember to R&R And until next time, Happy Reading!
