Hello everyone. Don't ask how I did it but I managed to get this chapter done. It's barely the first day and I'm already tired. SO here's the next chapter. Please Read and review. Not sure when the next one will be out but I'll try to work on it when I can. Thank you. Enjoy.
"So what's it like?" Gramps asks me.
"What's what like?" I say confused.
"Time traveling." He gives me a 'duh' look.
"Lonely, Confusing, Blinding, Cold." I say flashing back to the first time it happened.
"Cold?" he says as if he was expecting a different answer.
"Yeah, The first time it happened I was to busy being confused to notice it. The second time when I went to that place, the gold room, I felt chills running down my spine. The last time it happened it was the same thing but the feeling went away faster." I say.
"The first time you time traveled you were in Geneva at an physics presentation right?"
"Yeah." I was confused as to why he was restating the obvious.
"The second time it got triggered by the exploding power source of Hydra's weapons. The last time was here in the lab. How did you feel before then?" Gramps asked.
"We were talking about my love life and how I couldn't tell Bucky and Steve I loved them. I thought about everyone I've ever cared about and how in the end I ended up loosing them."
"You started panicking even hyperventilating a bit." Gramps pointed out.
"Yeah I was." I said remembering everything.
"I'm starting to see a connection." Gramps says.
"You are?" I said confused.
"You jumped through time anytime you were in danger. It's the basic fight or flight response except in your case you're flight response is time travel." Gramps pointed out.
"That's a good theory but there's one thing that disproves it. I was held prisoner by Hydra and I didn't time travel then." I said.
"No but we're not exactly sure what lets you time travel right now all we have is a causality."
"It's a theory that has holes." I retorted.
"It's something more than we had yesterday kid." Gramps says giving me a smirk
"Mr. Stark." Jarvis said walking into the lab.
"Jarvis," Gramps greeted.
"You told me to come and get you at seven sir, for your date." Jarvis reminded him
"Oh right, I have a date with Rose…" Gramps said thinking really hard remembering any other important details.
"Actually sir, I believe her name is Lily." Jarvis told him.
"Oh right, she's the one from…"
"The show girl from the theatre troupe." Jarvis reminded him yet again.
"Right," Gramps said, "We'll we should get going come on kid we'll drop you off."
"All right."
One short car ride where Gramps spent the entire time trying to remember everything about his date later, I was back at the apartment.
I walked in and the apartment smelled amazing.
"Doll, you're back." Said Bucky coming up to me and spinning me around making me shout out in surprise.
"Good to see you too Bucky." I said giggling. "The place smells amazing."
"That would be the pasta sauce." Steve calls out from the kitchen.
"Hey you," I said walking over to give him a hug. "You made everything from scratch?" I said looking around.
"Of course, It tastes better that way." He gets a spoon and gets a bit of sauce on it. He blows on it and pass it to me so I can try it. I grab the spoon and taste the sauce.
"Mmh that is good." I said practically moaning. Then a buzzing sound rang out from behind us.
"Garlic bread's done." Said Bucky putting on oven mitts and opening the oven.
"I'll go wash up," I told the guys heading to my room.
I took off my coat and went to the bathroom. I washed my hands and splashed some water on my face. I dried off and went back to the kitchen. Bucky was setting the table while Steve was putting the food on the plates.
"So I got news." Steve said.
"Oh yeah, what is it?" I asked.
"Agent Carter stopped by today, There's enough Intel for us to go take out the first base. We leave in a few days before Christmas."
"That's good." I say.
Bucky and Steve share a look.
"What?" I ask.
"You seem to be taking this really well." Steve says.
"Uh yeah, we were going to have to leave eventually. Besides the sooner we head out, the faster we can take out Hydra and the war ends that much faster." I explain grabbing a bit of pasta.
"So you're not scared?" Bucky asks.
"Nervous, Anxious, definitely not looking forward to camping and probably getting shot at, scared, not at the moment." I say nonchalantly.
"Well that's … good." Steve says giving Bucky a look. They're doing that thing where they have a conversation with their eyes again.
"I'm glad." Bucky says half-heartedly.
The rest of the meal we just make small talk, sharing stories about our pasts, etc. We stay up for a bit and then go to sleep in the guys' room as is becoming the new norm. I fell asleep hugging Steve from behind with my head resting between his shoulder blades. Bucky was behind me with his arm draped over my waist.
I closed my eyes and fell asleep. I was back in the ranch except it was different. All the furniture was different, the way it was before I remodeled the place. I was in the hallway outside of the study. The door was open which was strange since it normally shut on it's own since there was something wrong with the hinges. I walked into the study and looked around. Everything was still the same as I remembered it. The dark wooden bookshelves lining the walls, the pale blue walls with white accents.
"You have good taste." Said someone sitting at the chair. I recognized her immediately.
"Nana?" I asked surprised to see her.
"Sorry but no. This is just a form I took that I thought you'd react better to." I took a better look at her. Everything about her was identical to Nana except for the eyes. They were bright green and for a second I could've sworn they were glowing.
"Who are you?" I asked.
"I'm not a who, I'm more of a what and that's a question for another time."
"This isn't real." I said.
"Yes and no. I am very real. This place though is just a dream. I looked through your subconscious and recreated the first comforting place I recognized. I would've picked your lab but I wasn't sure how'd you react and didn't want you throwing things. I normally don't do this sort of thing but I felt as if I owed you for some reason."
"Owed me?" I asked confused.
"You've been through a rather rough ordeal the past few weeks and you've held yourself together better than I expected you would've."
"You've been watching me?"
"Not important, I don't normally socialize with…" She gestured towards me "But this is a one time exception."
"I'm confused, what are you doing in my dream?"
"You are in quite the predicament Nora Stark."
"Thank you Captain Obvious." I say. I say rolling my eyes.
"I'm not a captain, that's your soul mate's title. I'm here to warn you. For every Action there is an equal and opposite."
"I have a PhD in Physics I know Newton's third law."
"Do you really?" She says raising an eyebrow.
I respond by pointing to my framed Doctoral certificate hanging on the wall behind me.
"Why do I bother?" She mutters. "Just remember that any wrong move on your part could result in catastrophic alterations to the timeline."
"I know that already." I say seriously.
"I doubt that you really understand that. Time wants to happen Nora. There's a bigger picture you just can't see it yet."
"Who are you?"
"Not important. I did my job, good luck." She said and snapped her fingers and I woke up with a gasp.
I was still in bed next to Steve. I turned to my side and noticed that Bucky wasn't in bed. There was a light coming in from under the door to the living room. I slowly got out of bed and put on my robe. Being as quiet as I could, I tiptoed out of the room and closed the door. The living room was dimly lit. I saw Bucky sitting down reading a book I had left there earlier.
"You're up late." I said walking over to sit next to him.
"So are you Doll, everything all right?" he said moving over to sit closer to me.
"Had a weird dream and couldn't get back to sleep." I said.
"You want to talk about it?" he asked genuinely concerned.
I debated telling him about the strange warning from my dream but figured he was better off not knowing. "No, forget about it, I probably won't remember it later. What about you?"
"I just have a lot on my mind," he said giving me a forced smile.
"Nightmares again?"
"No its just, going back out there again brings it all back up. The fighting, gunshots, people dying, that lab." He says. I get the chills when he says that. "How are you so calm about all this?"
"I'm not. I'm freaking out. I'm terrified. I'm scared that we end up captured again and Zola finally gets to dissect me like he was planning to before Steve got there."
"Then why did you say you weren't earlier?"
"What good would that do? You and Steve have enough to worry about without adding my fears to it." I explain.
"Doll we worry about you anyway. You are so calm about everything it's hard to figure out what's going on in that head of yours" I'm still figuring that out myself I thought.
"That's how I feel when you and Steve have those conversations by just giving each other looks." I retort.
"What do you mean?"
"You two do it all the time, like at dinner when Steve brought up the news about leaving in a few weeks and then you asked how I felt about that. You shared a look, like you were saying something with your eyes."
"Oh." That's really all he says to that.
"I feel really out of the loop when you two do that. I feel like you're silently criticizing me."
"Doll, we don't criticize you. Before you got back we started talking about what happened when we were prisoner and Steve asked me if I was scared and I said I didn't want to talk about it. Then he asked if you had talked about it which of course you haven't. He's a lot more perceptive than you think he can tell it's bugging us."
"Why haven't you told him about the nightmares?" I ask.
"He knows about the nightmares. The first night at the camp after he rescued us I had one and I woke him up with my screams. He just doesn't know what exactly the dreams are about."
"He read the file Hydra had on me, He knows what happened or at least he has an idea of what happened. I haven't told him because there's nothing I can tell him he doesn't already know."
"Why didn't you tell me Zola was planning on dissecting you while you were awake?" Bucky asks.
"We were both tied down to a lab table and he was shocking us with electricity for fun. If I told you, there was still nothing you could've done. You would've panicked and just made things worse for yourself, I couldn't let that happen." I couldn't let him die before he was supposed to be rescued. If I die in the past the effects on the future would be minimal. If he died before the fall from the train I could alter the course of the war. He has to make it to the train the rest is up to me.
"Nora you could've died, If Steve hadn't gotten there when he did…"
"But he did and that's all that matters." I move over to sit on his lap and make him look straight at me. I put one hand on his cheek and the other on his shoulder. "I can't live in fear of what could've happened or what could happen and you can't either. It's okay to be scared Bucky, but don't let that hold you back."
"I'm not scared of anything happening to me, I accepted the chances of that happening when I got drafted. I'm scared of losing you or Steve. That's what the nightmares are about, Zola torturing you until you can't take it anymore or the red skull snapping Steve's neck." I can see his eyes starting to get watery.
I pull him closer so I can hug him. His face is buried in the crook of my neck. "Sweetie that's not going to happen. Steve has proven he can hold his own against the Red Skull. And as for me I'm not tied up anymore when we find the dwarf I won't be defenseless. I'll knock him out before he could lift a finger. Besides we're not alone, we have a team, it's going to be okay." I say for both of our sakes.
"How do you do it?" He asks resting his head on my shoulder.
"Do what?"
"Know exactly the right thing to say."
"That doesn't always happen, I've just been really lucky lately."
"Lucky? You were captured by Insane Nazi scientists." Bucky points out.
"I was but thanks to that I met you and Steve so like I said lucky." I start to feel sleepy and I'm not the only one. Bucky lets out a yawn. "I think its time to go back to bed." I tell Bucky. I move his arms off of me and stand up. He stands up and I grab his arm. I lead him back to the room. Instead of me being in the middle I told Bucky to lie down first. He did and then I curled up beside him. Then Steve in his sleep rolled over and curled into Bucky's other side. That's how we slept the rest of the night.