Chapter 18 - Connection
Bucky tosses and turns, unable to get comfortable. "Ugh!" he grouches, sitting up in bed. "I can't do this anymore," he steps to the floor and stretches, "I'm taking a walk," he says to himself.
He heads down the hall and enjoys the change of scenery. He doesn't see anyone until he reaches the desk and then, the nurse has his back to Bucky. He sneaks past and continues on towards Steve's room. He pauses outside the door and raises a hand to knock.
He changes his mind and gently pushes the door open instead. When he pokes his head inside, he sees Steve dozing off with his head at an odd angle. He smiles. Now that he has seen that Steve is alive with his own eyes, he feels much better. He walks to the bed and flips off the lamp.
As he reaches to close the door he hears Steve say, "Buck? What are yo... why aren't you in bed?"
"Good morning, sunshine. I couldn't sleep," he sits on the edge of Steve's bed, "I wondered if you'd like some company. I didn't mean to wake you up."
Steve shrugs, "It's fine. I had just dozed off. What time is it?"
"I don't know. 3?"
"It's that late?" Steve sits up straighter, "I slept longer than I thought."
"A.M. 3 A.M."
"Oh," Steve slouches back down, "never mind then. So are you allowed to go home?"
Bucky bobs his head up and down as well as side to side, "Well, I think I will be released tomorrow sometime. I've healed faster than they thought."
"Yeah. I can move from the waist up now. I had actually been sketching when I fell asleep," he holds up his sketch pad to display a sloppy, yet somehow still accurate, drawing of Thor.
"Speaking of that," Bucky says remembering the picture he'd seen earlier, "did you draw my sister?"
"No. It's this girl I saw delivering flowers to your room from the IT department at the tower. Her name was Jamie and she was almost identical to Beky. Strange, huh?"
"So that's where the flowers came from," Bucky says then places a hand on his head and closes his eyes, "Describe her."
"Uh, you saw the picture. She had an oval face with a sharp jaw line. Her cheeks, slightly freckled. Brown eyes, brown hair, I don't know much more. Maybe 5' 3"?"
"I remember. It's all coming back now. I remember falling. I'd come looking for you and I walked into the balcony off the gym. I was shot in the leg and then fought her. She wore a mask but as I fell, I pulled it off. I thought it was my sister, but it could have been her. And if she was in my room right before you were poisoned..."
"It could have been her. But, Bucky," Steve's face wrinkles in thought, "does that mean that you are related to her? After all, it would be rather odd for the two to look so much alike and not be relatives."
"We need to find a way to talk to her and see why she is trying to kill us."
"I bet that we could find her files at the tower with family information. Then it's a matter of finding her."
"With out scarring her off you mean. We can't let her know that she's been caught. She needs to admit it herself."
"If you get to go home, you can do that. Oh! I hate not being well!" Steve sets his sketchbook on the side table and looks at Bucky as a thought comes to his mind, "I wonder if Nat could talk to her. People tend to share things with her that they wouldn't otherwise."
"I'll go home tomorrow and look at her files with Nat, on one condition though," Bucky places a hand on Steve's leg.
"What's that?"
"You have to hurry up and get better."
Please, please, please tell me what you think!