"There has been an unusual alteration in the brain wave activity."
"Detected when?"
"Yesterday, after noon."
"You think that's it?"
"I'm not sure. I just wanted to let you know in case it is."
"I see." After a sigh he added. "Thank you, Professor."
"No worries, Director."
- - - WS- - -
She was wearing light blue jeans and a very strange asymmetrical shirt that could be probably worn in many different ways. At least that what it seamed like. There were no heels in comparison to the their last (and first) meeting. She had flats on, that made her even smaller as she took a place on the couch in front of a chair he was occupying.
"You trying to make me feel more relaxed around you wearing simpler clothes?"
Jamie was glad to hear him giving her something more than one-word answers. And though the tone of his voice was bitter and irritated she would let him have it. This anger and betrayal that he has been feeling for some time (huge amount of time), it brought him to the place where they were at the moment. So for the time being she would let him remain like that if that's what he wanted...or the only way he knew how to be.
"It's Sunday." She sparred back watching his face, it gave away nothing. "Do you rather I was in a suit?"
"Don't care." He grumped.
His stance wasn't dangerously fixated but it wasn't relaxed either. Both his hands were securely laying on the chair's ones, back straight. His dark hair was falling on his face creating a menacing affect he probably wasn't going for.
"Good then, if we're done with my wardrobe. What do you want to talk about today?"Jamie watched James, her gaze calculated: she was seeking not scientifically researching.
If he was stunned by her question, he never showed it.
"I don't want to talk." He let out finally.
"I know you don't. But if you want this to work you're gonna have to do you best. And I'm gonna have to do my best.."
"There was an assistant at the HYDRA..."
"When I asked what you wanted to talk about," When the Doctor interrupted him James felt slightly confused which in turn made him even more angry. Wasn't this what she wanted from him. "I wasn't in any way implying that I wanted you to talk about HYDRA. Now if that's something you want to share then by all means but..."
He was silent.
"You know, I'm not sure if that's your thing but to watch sunrise from this tower is a moment to die for."
For him everything she said was full of controversials: to die for?! Did she have any idea what people died for? If no (and that probably was a no) in what world was she living in? And "his thing"? Seriously? He imagined his thing was stretched somewhere in the lines of killing people with the metal arm and no mercy.
"I can take it. You can say it out loud."
And he did. Because ironically what she said was probably the worst think she could have told him. James fisted his metal arm and his voice became dangerously low:
"What do you know about dying for something? What do you know about making choices with lives depending on it? A sunrise to die for? That's not why we enlisted in the army!..."
"Why did you enlist?" Her voice was the same as if she was expecting him to blow up like that. He was telling her off rather malevolently and her voice never wavered from the friendliness it was giving off.
"We wanted to help save this world. And the people. Yes, we gave ourselves a big credit, we were young and arrogant, but our intentions were good..." In his angry rambling the soldier didn't even realize that he was talking about the things he hasn't remembered before.
Jamie was looking at him intently, eating on every word he gave her, nodding with her head and with her eyes.
He suddenly stopped talking and seemed as though was tasting his own words. Then he looked back at the Doctor but this time it didn't seem like a prelude to strangling her but more of understanding and confusion at the same time.
"It's a very important memory, James." She said finally. "It's a motivation and the instinct to protect the ones that cannot protect themselves."
His arm un-fisted itself without any action on his part.
When it was evident that he didn't feel like discussing anything more, Jamie stood up from the couch and made her way in the direction of a kitchen counter.
"Let's give your mind some rest and get something to eat." She said loudly to his still unmoving form. "Have you eaten yet?"
"No." James confessed though didn't seem to be invested in the conversation, most likely still recollecting a piece of a memory that has just appeared.
"Pancakes sound ok?" Jamie asked searching through a stocked fridge.
"What?"
"Pancakes?" She repeated. "Do you want pancakes?"
James just furrowed his eyebrows at the Doctor.
"Well, I'm starving. I spent the night in the lab. I want to eat. If you want to eat too we could do it at the same time – which is now – same table. So if you're in, I'm turning my Martha Stewart mode on."
He couldn't understand the last part of the sentence but he knew without any shadow of a doubt that he didn't remember what pancakes tasted like. That prompted him to just nod his agreement as he placed himself at the kitchen island and watched a strange woman that was supposed to be his doctor making herself very comfortable in the kitchen.
"Do you sleep at all?" Jamie asked casually while pouring milk into a small saucepan.
He was watching unfamiliar movements while processing her question that was so simple that he almost forgot to answer it melting in her gentle stirring.
"Not much." James murmured still watching.
"You can't fall asleep or you have nightmares and you don't want to fall asleep?" Her eyes were trained on his and his on her hands.
"I'm not sure they are nightmares." He said after the pause.
"Do you want any medication for that?" She asked as casually as the previous question.
"No." There was no pause this time.
"I assure you it's nothing they've been putting into you while you were..." She grabbed sugar from the shelf that was on her eye-level.
"I said NO!"
"Calm down, tiger! Huh." James really couldn't understand Jamie, what was wrong with this woman? He couldn't remember anyone talking to him like that! Wasn't she afraid of the Winter Soldier. "I get it, you don't have to yell really."
"How do you know where the ingredients are?" He finally asked just because it was the random thought that was running circles in his mind. If she was here for the second time, how did she know?
"Oh, you've got the standard package!" She answered and laughed a bit mixing everything in a big bowl. His indicated that he didn't get her and Jamie continued. "There are a lot of people who live in the Tower from time to time. Right now Tony and Bruce Banner are here. But Tony insisted that every avenger had an apartment here. Similar to yours. And every time they stay here, the kitchen is stocked with the exact same wagon of food."
"Do you stay here?"
"Me? No!" Jamie started the fire for the pan. "I live Brooklyn. It's really one of the most affordable things on the market. Tony is mad about it, he orders me to move in here every other day."
She smiled imagining her boss.
"I lived in Brooklyn." James said and to someone who didn't know it would seem like a question.
Was it?
The young doctor took a big spoon and started placing the pancake mix on the hot pan.
"Right, you did." She said. "It changed a lot, you can only imagine."
He huffed in response.
"I'm sure when we get through the first stages of your treatment and evaluation, we'll talk about getting you to see Brooklyn." She flipped a pancake and it landed back on the pan with a little pouf.
Though James was enchanted by the movements in front of him, his mind registered what she said.
"You are a fool if you think they'll let you."
"Hey!" She pointed her spatula in his general direction.
Something had to be wrong with her...
"Help me here. I'm telling you, I'm gonna show you Brooklyn. Brooklyn that I know today. But before that you and I, we have a journey, not the easiest one, to take. You don't know me and with the history like your's I'd say the meaning of 'trust issues' might get a new meaning. But, I promise you that we're gonna go to Brooklyn, and we will. I'm a woman of my word."
She was dead serious, that he could tell. But the spatula in her hand...
"So..." Jamie put all the kitchen appliances down and placed a plate full of pancakes in front of the soldier. "Honey or Chocolate?"
With that she dragged two big bottles from one of the shelves.
- - -WS- - -
The lamp on the bedside table crushed as soon as the metal hand sent it flying.
James woke up in cold sweat. His thoughts...something dark in his head.
As soon as his eyes opened he couldn't recall what he saw, his mind blank. This state, the state of blankness, to him it felt worse than nightmares. He knew exactly it was the state when the Winter Soldier took over, when James was not in control of his own body.
His breathing slowed and he looked around in search of clocks. The digital ones on the monitor near the door signaled 4:49 am in red numbers. Dirty red. Was it the color of blood?
James stood up and slowly left the room for the main area, disregarding his T-shirt on the back of the chair and opting to stay in his slacks.
As he made it to the window his right hand reached his left shoulder and started tracing the joint, the line which separated the flash and the metal. The signals were sent to his brain that there was a touch but nothing else. He wondered if he could just scrape it away...
Bright reds, yellows and pinks started filling the room a second later, something James was not ready for. The rays were dancing right in front of his eyes as if they were some exotic dancers moving their ethereal bodies to their own music that no one else could hear.
James watched the show, his hands on the windowsill, his eyes trained in front of him. Everything else was silent at the moment, non-existent.
She was right after all. He be damned. It was a sunrise to kill for. He would.
Guys, I seriously need some feedback! At least just to know if I should go on with this! So push the button down there and leave me a couple words!
xx
Roadway Fox