"Okay
I'm feeling the way that I'm feeling myself
Fuck everyone else
Gotta remember that nobody is better than anyone else, here
(Do you need some time to think it over?)
Look what they do to you
Look what they do to me
Must be joking if you think that either one is free, here
Get up off your knees, girl
Stand face to face with your God
And find out what you want
(Hello, my name is human)
Hello, my name is human
And I came down from the stars
(Hello, my name is human)
I'm ready for love, and I'm ready for war
But I'm ready for more
I know that nobody's ever been this fucking ready before, hey
(Do you need some time to think it over?)
So figure it out, or don't figure it out
I figured it out
The bigger the river (the bigger the river)
The bigger the drought (the bigger the drought)" My Name Is Human by Highly Suspect
Chapter 20
Sitting in the back of a limo on the way back from wedding dress and bridesmaid dress shopping with a group of my girl friends is way more fun than I expected. We're all drinking champagne and singing some crappy pop music while Happy tries his best to ignore us in the drivers seat. Pepper, Natasha, and Wanda are the women in my wedding party. Bucky has Steve, Sam, and Bruce.
I found the perfect dress that luckily didn't need any huge alterations done, my bridesmaids will be wearing pale pink floor length dresses that they all love. Bucky is out with the men getting tuxes. It's all starting to feel real. Our date is set for one month out. I'm more excited than nervous.
"Are you writing your own vows Liya?" Wanda pours me another glass of champagne as she asks.
"Of course! I'm probably going to bawl like a baby when I hear Bucky's, he's such a sap in the best kind of way." She smiles warmly at me.
"He definitely is very sweet with you, his whole face lights up whenever you're around." Natasha smiles at Peppers comment.
"His eyes are always on you, that man has got it bad. Never thought I'd see Barnes like that." Natasha still doesn't talk about her history with Bucky a lot with anyone but a select few, her past in the red room is a painful thing to bring up. I'm just grateful that they have a deep seeded respect for each other.
"I've got it just as bad as he does. I love him so much." All my friends make aww sounds and we break into a carefree bout of laughter.
"Sorry to interrupt girl time but anyone know why traffic is worse than usual right now? Something going on downtown I didn't hear about?" We look out the windows when we realize that Happy has come to a stop in the heavy traffic.
"Something isn't right." Wanda is concentrating hard on something, she has a far away look on her face. "It's too quiet." Now that she mentions it it is too quiet, no honking horns, no loud voices, none of the usual sounds of the hustle and bustle of the city.
"Yea I think I'm gonna go ahead and give Tony a call." Before any of us can agree with Happy the limo is hit with enough force to send the car skidding across the road onto the sidewalk. The right side is caved in slightly, luckily none of us were sitting there.
"Nat?" She immediately pulls our stored away guns out from under our seats. .
"Open the sunroof Happy and then get Pepper the hell out of here." God I'm glad I wore pants today and not a dress.
"If I leave you here Barnes is going to not only murder me but torture me slowly first!" The sound of bullets ricocheting off the side of the car has me pushing Pepper down in her seat. Happy looks a little panicked now.
"Liya, you need to take off with Happy and Pepper. You are not risking your life before you get married!" I scoff at Natasha and pull myself up onto the roof of the limo. I'm not going to leave my friends to fend for themselves when I'm able to put up a fight.
The three of us stand at the ready beside each other in the middle of the rode. I vaguely hear the sound of the car leaving behind us.
The scene around us suddenly starts to dissolve, the previously packed streets are actually empty. It was all an illusion. The only people out here are us and a teenage girl and middle aged man. They stand directly across the street from us. The man has an assault rifle poised over his right shoulder. The girl is staring at Wanda with a look of shock on her face.
"She's trying to read my mind but can't, I can feel her. She's never encountered someone with similar powers to hers." I can tell Wanda wants to reach out to her.
"Why did you attack us?" Natasha's voice rings out loud and clear in the empty streets.
"You're the enemy, you'll kill me." The girls Bulgarian accent is thick.
"Why would we kill you?" The girls eyes turn to me.
"Because you hate Hydra, because you hate anyone who has powers and isn't you." Shes right on one of those fronts but not the other.
"I was like you and now I'm an Avenger. You don't have to be on the wrong side of things." The man takes a bold step in front of his young companion.
"You will not fill her head with your poison. We were sent here to take The Reaper and to find the Winter Soldier, so that's what we're going to do." What? Why? Natasha and I exchange a glance.
"Sorry to spoil your plans but no ones going anywhere with you." Natasha has a shot fired off before I'm even able to register that she's done so.
Wanda is deflecting the bullets that are now flying our way. "We should apprehend the girl!" I agree with Wanda.
I go to make a move forward but the scenery around us shifts. We're standing in a familiar bedroom. My stomach drops when I see the closet I used to hide in. The ghost of a voice screams out my name in anger, in perverted lust. He's dead though, I know he's dead.
This isn't real Liya" Natasha has a hand on my shoulder. She must've known from my expression that this was meant for me.
"I know but it's effecting me more than it should. We need to stop her." Both of our eyes shift to the closet and the whimpering coming from inside. It's me, a little girl terrified of what she knows is about to happen yet again.
"C'mon, we need to find a way to cut through the illusion."
The scene shifts yet again as we make our way behind us to Wanda. She looks like she may get sick. A family of four sits at a dinner table in front of us before the room explodes into chaos. The mother and father are dead, two children are trapped under a pile of rubble. I realize now that the female child is Wanda.
"I'm so sorry I ever messed with your mind Natasha. This is horrible." Her voice trembles slightly.
"Water under the bridge. Although seeing it like this on a grand scale may almost be worse than even what you did. At least this time I kind of know what to expect." Just as the words leave Nat's lips we are thrust into a new memory.
A younger Natasha is being held in a chokehold in a training room of some sort by none other than Bucky. She fights against him, throwing her elbow into his side sharply. Present day Natasha's face is a mask of indifference as usual. When her past self reaches around behind her and pulls the winter soldiers lips down to her own she looks to me apologetically. I'm well aware of the strange past between the two people I care about most in the world, doesn't make it any less awkward and slightly painful to watch though. I'm assuming this memory is supposed to damage us both.
"What the hell is this?" My fiancé is here in the flesh and not just a screwed up memory. He's appeared before us with Steve and Tony lands not ten seconds later clad in his newest Iron Man suit.
Bucky looks thoroughly confused and almost frantic as his eyes dart back and forth between the memory unfolding before our eyes and my face. I reach and out and intertwine our fingers.
"There's a girl here who has powers similar to my own. She's projecting traumatic memories from our pasts. She has a man with her, he's heavily armed." Wanda sounds far steadier than I feel.
The scene around us shifts and Bucky seems to visibly relax before his breathing hitches and his hand squeezes my own almost painfully.
We're surrounded by mountains and snow as far as the eye can see. The disarmingly loud sound of a train speeding towards us makes us all take an unnecessary step back.
"No!" Steve's voice sounds broken. I watch on in horror as I see a man get blasted out of the train, he's dangling from the side. The Captain America of the past tries to reach for the man.
"Wait…that's you? This is when you fall?" Bucky's jaw only clenches in response. The screams of both James Buchanan Barnes and Steven Grant Rogers roar out over the sound of the train as he falls to his supposed death. In a way that man that fell from the train did die that day. The Steve I know today hangs his head, tears in his eyes. Bucky is just blank, that emotionless mask he hardly ever wears around me.
"Fuck this, we have to stop her!" I try to move but Bucky's hand holds me firmly in place.
"Already on it Annie!" Tony takes off into the air again where I see Sam and Rhodey.
"I'm takin ya home." His voice is flat and I hate it.
"We can't just leave our friends here!" His eyes narrow in frustration, he's glaring at me.
"I don't want to leave them either Liya but they're after us! The best thing we can do for our friends is get outta here." I understand what he's trying to say but I can't do that.
"Hiding is not the best option Bucky! I refuse to live my life waiting for these people to capture us. I refuse to let someone else fight my battles!" I can see him grit his teeth in anger.
"I'm not gonna lose ya to these monsters." I can see it now, he's scared.
"Hydra isn't going to take you again, they aren't going to take me. It's ok baby, you aren't their soldier and you don't have to run again." His outward anger dissolves, he nods his head in acceptance.
"There's no time for this much conversation and romance in the middle of a battle boys and girls!" I roll me eyes at Tony's comment and give him the finger as he flies overhead.
"Not really a battle when there's no fighting going on Ton!" Apparently the words should have never left my mouth because bullets are suddenly flying our way.
Steve and Bucky jump into action and take off towards the source of the bullets. Before I can step forward the scenery has yet again changed. The Winter Soldier is strapped to some kind of horrible mechanical chair directly in front of me. A device is wrapped around his head, electricity courses out of it and shocks him repeatedly, he's being electrocuted in some way. This is what they did to wipe him. His screams now are worse than they were when he fell. He's in so much pain, he's so scared, he's losing himself. My sweet, strong, beautiful Bucky went through this over and over again. I'm frozen in place as I watch the man I love so much continue to scream. I don't realize I'm crying until Wanda grasps my wrist and starts tugging me away.
"This isn't happening right now, you need to keep in the present. We have to find the girl." Natasha is on the other side of us walking with determination.
Wanda comes to an abrupt stop. "Keeping the illusions up is draining her strength. She's nearby, she can't keep me out of her mind now."
The screams of The Winter Soldier still ring out around us. It's throwing off my concentration still. Natasha was right when she said I was rusty. I'm not sure I have the heart to be out in the field anymore, especially with stressors like this. Just as I'm thinking the worst of myself I see a glimmer of white blonde hair that vanishes into the memory playing out in front of me.
Before I can second guess myself I unholster my gun and fire a shot where the glimmer previously was. Everything around us fades back into the streets of New York. The teenage girl is now visible, she yells out in pain clutching her shoulder as she falls to the ground.
Natasha and Wanda rush forward and grab the girl the same time that an arm wraps tightly around my neck.
"Let the girl go!" The muzzle of a gun is pressed roughly to my temple.
"You said you needed The Reaper you're not going to shoot her." Natasha's voice is more tense than I've ever heard it before.
The Bulgarian man tightens the hold of his arm on my neck and pulls me even closer against him, it's getting hard to breathe. Tony, Steve, and Bucky run up behind Wanda and Natasha. All three men look angry and panicked.
"I need the Soldier, she's expendable. I will not be punished too harshly if I don't bring her back too." My vision is starting to blur from the lack of oxygen but I have enough of my wits to reach as stealthily as I can for one of my kamas. I use as much force as I can to sink a blade into the flesh of my captors side.
Luckily he screams and loosens his hold rather than shooting me immediately. It gives me enough time to rip away and unholster my own gun but he's quick to recover and has his raised and pointed square at my head before I'm ready for him.
When the shot rings out I figure I'm done for and squeeze my eyes shut. When I feel no pain and the slump of a body in front of me I reopen my eyes. The man is dead on the ground, a bullet between his eyes instead of between mine.
When I turn to face my friends I see Bucky lowering his gun, I'm grateful his sniping skills cane in handy. The teenage girl is crying out in grief for her comrade, what was he to her? Tony and Steve get the girl ready to transport back to the compound and I'm getting scooped into the arms of the man I love.
"Lets go home doll." His voice is raspy with emotion. I want to marry this man as soon as possible. Today has yet again made it glaringly obvious how fast our lives can be snuffed out.