Hello and welcome I am so sorry it has been so long. But, here I am? Sorry again. When I go see Infinity War maybe i'll be inspired to write another chapter! So at least there's hope, right?! Hope you guys don't hate me haha.
This chapter continues on from the flashbacks in the last chapter, as promised! Hope you enjoy this depressing chapter whoops you've been warned xoxo
~O~
Steve handed Bucky his comms earpiece as he walked onto the quinjet. "What's the mission?" Bucky's voice was harder than usual and Steve frowned.
"Everything ok?" He asked but Bucky didn't respond, shifting impatiently as he slipped the piece of tech into his ear. Steve took the hint. "You remember that crazy, military woman, Miller, who wanted to wipe out all powered people or whatever?"
"The one we caught a couple weeks back, yeah, why?"
"She escaped police custody. She's on the run. We've got a pretty strong lead in Cuba, we're heading there now. We gotta bring her in," Steve explained.
"How the hell did that happen?" Bucky demanded, muttering something in Russian that Steve only faintly picked up. Something about incompetent cops and other words that Steve didn't even want to translate. "Didn't she practically vow to destroy our lives or some shit?"
"Yeah, I'm pretty sure that was her general consensus for all powered-people, but probably us especially considering we caught her."
Bucky moved toward the flight controls. "Alright, let's get going. I wanna get back as soon as possible."
Steve didn't question him on that front.
~O~
The door creaked open, light bleeding into the dark room and Maddy groaned into her pillow.
"You're back already?" Maddy questioned blearily, rubbing her eyes as she sat up. It had only been a few hours since her boyfriend left and usually missions lasted at least a day. But when she lowered her hands she found herself faced with someone who was decidedly not Bucky. "Oh my god," she gasped, pushing herself back against the wall. "How is this happening again?" She muttered under her breath, having serious deja vu back to when she had first met Steve in Bucharest. There were, however, a few differences; for one, she wasn't naked this time which was a definite plus. What wasn't a plus was the fact that this woman was not Steve. Also she had a gun. Her heart jumped into her throat.
"Get up! Now!" She yelled, waving the gun around like it was a toy. "I said get up!"
"Ok, alright," she held up her hands in a non-threatening manner, slipping out from under the covers and onto her feet. "How about we just talk about this? Are you here for money-"
"Shut up! Shut the hell up!" she punctuated it with a few profanities that Maddy found completely unnecessary. "Those two monsters, those-those abominations, they'll pay for what they are. For what they've done."
Maddy's eyebrows pulled down. "Steve and Bucky? They aren't abominations, they're just enhanced-"
"I said shut up!" She practically screamed, surging forward and grabbing Maddy's hair, pulling it harshly and making her cry out, jamming the gun toward her. Maddy's eyes watered, fear making her hands shake. She'd managed to talk her way out of the situation with Wyndham, but she didn't think she'd be able to do the same this time.
~O~
"I don't think she's here," Bucky said after they finished talking to the airport security. "That report was clearly faked."
"You think she planted it to throw us off her scent?" Steve asked, even though they both already knew the answer. Bucky nodded anyway.
"Or she had someone else do it. She might have someone working with her," Bucky said.
"Every border crossing and airport customs has her photo. There's no way she could get past them without being caught. If she's not here, then…"
"Then she's gotta still be in America," Bucky concluded. They headed back toward where they'd put the quinjet down. Bucky wracked his brain as they walked, trying to figure out how they would find a lead, when a horrible thought hit him and he stopped Steve. "She said she wanted to ruin our lives right?"
Steve nodded.
"How would she best do that?"
Steve looked at him for a moment before his eyes widened.
"Maddy."
They broke out into a run.
~O~
She'd dragged Maddy down to the basement, where she could shout and not worry about being heard by her neighbours. Maddy hadn't dared to yell for help on the way down, knowing that it would end with either her being shot or one of the innocent people living around her. At one point, when she thought the woman was off guard, she tried to surge forward to grapple the gun away from her. But the woman was, despite the crazed look in her eye, clearly very highly trained and swiftly elbowed Maddy in the throat, twisting her arm behind her back before hitting her over the head with the butt of the gun. When Maddy stumbled back, the woman raised the gun and pointed it at Maddy's head, warning her off trying something like that again.
It felt like a long time before she heard the loud sound of the landing quinjet outside. They must have literally been landing it on the street. The woman panicked and then she just...pulled the trigger. Just like that.
The gunshot was loud, ringing in Maddy's ears and making her light headed. Or maybe it was the blood pouring out of her side that was making her light headed. She wasn't sure. At first, she thought maybe it had missed her, because she didn't feel anything, felt numb from head to toe, frozen in time, just like Steve had been for so many years in the ice. Then the woman ran, hard and fast, out of her line of sight.
She tried to raise her hands to check herself over but found she couldn't move them. She looked down.
Oh.
Her pyjama shirt, that had little cats all over it, was soaked through with blood. It stained the pink fabric, leaking down onto her pyjama shorts.
Her legs gave out from underneath her and she fell onto the cold concrete ground, lying on her side. The pain suddenly hit in a wave so strong she thought she was going to be sick. She coughed and blood came out. She could taste it in the back of her throat.
Fear so biting it made her cry, rushed through her. I think I'm going to die, she thought and she didn't realise it at the time but she was crying. She managed to pull herself a few paces forward, toward the door to the basement, her hair dragging through the large pool of blood surrounding her, although she didn't notice.
Her head spun and her side burned so hideously that she almost wanted it to end. But she would not give up. She dragged herself forward another foot or so before the door burst open and suddenly Bucky was there, above her. He pressed his hands to the wound to try and stop the bleeding and she cried out. He was shouting but she couldn't hear. And then his voice was softer and she still couldn't hear but the way his lips formed around the word 'Maddy' was so distinct that she just knew he was saying her name, over and over again.
"Bucky," she think she managed to breathe. Steve was suddenly there too and then she was being lifted into Bucky's arms. She wanted to fall unconscious - badly, just so the pain would go away. She thought that was what happened in the movies - they got shot and then they fell unconscious and woke up all better, with just a bandage on and a doctor saying they were going to be fine. But she didn't fall unconscious. She stayed painfully awake the whole way to the hospital, even though her eyes felt heavy and her head spun like crazy. When Bucky finally put her down on the gurney, doctors and nurses swarming around her, she at long last let her eyes close and everything around her faded.
~O~
Maddy stepped out of the shower, rubbing at her fogged up mirror. She looked at her own reflection, the short hair, the flushed cheeks from the heat of the shower. Her hand reached up and her fingers trailed over the small, jaggedly-round scar a few inches above her right hip. She wondered if she would ever stop thinking about that night. She wondered if she would ever be able to just close her eyes as she lay in bed and not imagine the door bursting open. She wondered when she'd be able to sleep in the pitch black again, instead of leaving the bathroom light on and the door cracked. She wondered when she'd be able to stop obsessively checking the alarm system and the locks and closing all the windows before she even got into bed. And then closing her eyes and then opening them and getting up to re-check them, just one last time.
She wondered when she'd feel safe again.
Maybe never, she thought. Maybe this is just it. She closed her eyes. She couldn't believe that - it was too sad and too upsetting for her to accept. Ellie gets here in a few days, she told herself. Things'll be better after that. It was a small spark of hope in an otherwise dim, grey-scale bathroom.
~O~
PLEASEEE leave a review and encourage me and keep me motivated! I need it lol! Thank you my loves xoxo Also I know you guys are probably thinking ugh when does this get back to being Maddy/Bucky and the answer is SOON! Like in the next 2-3 chapters I promise! Until next time xoxo
