8.

1987

The asset was unarmed. The STRIKE agents were not, and Pierce had specifically requested live ammo. Even so, the asset completed the obstacle course in the time it took Pierce to finish his coffee.

This was as close as he would ever get to seeing the asset in action, Pierce considered. Muted by bullet-proof glass, with the asset hobbled by the need not to maim or kill. Even so it sped Pierce's heart a little, fired up his nerves. Below the observation deck, the asset grabbed the Glock off an agent's hand and forced him down with a twist of his arm just before he half-spun around and sent another agent flying with a kick. It wasn't about being the strongest, or the fastest, or the most ruthless, even though the asset was all those things. It was about being a blade, a bullet. It was about being only hot lead or steel on its way to a target, uncontaminated by fear or weakness or pain.

No, not completely, he realised. The asset was still favouring his right side a little. Once or twice he used his metal arm purely as a shield rather than a weapon.

'Do it again,' Pierce told the asset when it was over. The asset's eyes were dull, his breathing even. There was only a light sheen of sweat on his skin. Pierce wondered how long would the asset run on his orders until he dropped from exhaustion, how many blows could the asset deliver until his bones began to crack and his sinews to tear.

The asset's gaze sharpened a fraction. His eyes turned toward Pierce's, then lowered. He nodded. His hair was a little tangled and there was a cut on the right side of his jaw, but the bleeding had long since stopped and the flesh, Pierce was sure, was already knitting itself back together. The asset healed cleanly. The asset always healed cleanly.

'You heard the boss, guys,' one of the agents said to the reserve team members. Rumlow something, not even six months in STRIKE and already cocky about it. Pierce couldn't blame him too much. He might be wet behind the ears, but he'd earned it by doing. 'Time to get off the bench.'

He had the asset do it again, and again, and again, until Pierce could finally tell him he was perfect.

:=:=:=:

She'd waited until Abby's school break was over to move out of the house and back to her mother's. That was what angered him the most, even more than the fact that he had not seen this coming.

Now they were sitting the closest they'd been for the past six and a half months, on opposite sides of the law firm's polished mahogany table. So close Pierce could see the age lines on the corners of Laura's eyes, the colourless down on the underside of her chin. Once in a while he let his thumb fiddle with his class ring. He'd already removed the wedding band.

It wasn't hot anger, which he seldom felt. He was calm, collected, at ease. 'No need to make this complicated,' he said with equanimity when asked about not retaining his own counsel. This was all very civilised. They were all friends here, weren't they? Well, at least Laura's attorney was, chuckling along with Pierce, explaining this or that passage in the papers. His assistant, a singularly plain woman with a face stretched up by an old-maid bun, sat instead in shuttered silence, once in a while saying something to Laura in a whisper.

Whisper, whisper. He pressed the soft pad of his thumb against the underside of his ring until it hurt. What were they saying to each other? Who'd put the notion of divorce in Laura's head?

'I want Abigail to live with me,' Laura said. Other than the greetings at the start and the occasional mumble of acquiescence, they were the first words she'd spoken during the entire meeting.

Not hot anger. He wasn't going to yell. He wasn't going to put a stop to this. He sure wasn't going to make a spectacle of himself. He was going to sign the divorce papers and when the guys from the moving company came to pick up the stuff Laura was getting, they'd find most of the things already neatly packed and an ice-cold six-pack waiting in the fridge. He was going to pay the agreed-on alimony on time, and without complaint. Probably throw in a little extra once in a while. Lend her a Secret Service driver if she ever needed one.

Hot anger was for hotheads. Cold anger was a pared-down blade of ice. You could tuck it away and bring it out when needed.

'She's seventeen,' he said, sounding good-humoured. 'I'm guessing that's old enough to pick where she wants to live.'

'Correct,' the attorney said. He must love that word, Pierce decided. He always did this little bird-like head thrust whenever he used it. 'With older teens, custody arrangements…'

Pierce tuned him out, even as he nodded once in a while and pretended to give the man his full attention. He could watch Laura, even if his eyes weren't focused on her. He could try to see if she would give it away, where she'd acquired this— He didn't know what to call it. He thought of fevers and diseases.

What had ever been demanded from her, really? Goddamn it, he wasn't one of those men who kept tabs on their wives, and wanted them to account for every last cent, and flew into rages if their dinners weren't ready when they wanted or if their wives so much as looked at another man. He hadn't even asked her to be smart, or accomplished, or one of those society wives who managed to show up in glossy magazines in between all the fundraisers and charity galas they put together.

All he'd really expected from her was a reasonably pleasant house, well brought up children, and for her not to embarrass him in public. He'd loved her, of course, but more importantly he'd always treated her as she deserved to be treated: birthdays and anniversaries celebrated in style, summers in the Hamptons and Martha's Vineyard, trips abroad or to the theatre or the ballet whenever the whim struck her, generous amounts of spending money, fine dining, polite conversation. For a while he had wondered if she was having an affair. That at least would explain this. That would be forgivable. He'd never strayed, but he was an honourable man, and they would be able to move past it. But the only man she'd been meeting with was her attorney, and she hadn't been calling anyone from her mother's house.

It would keep bothering him long after it stopped making him angry, like a pebble in his shoe.

He approached her when they stopped for a coffee break and the two of them were the only people in the room. She stood by the window, cradling a styrofoam cup in her hands, looking out, not drinking. She was wearing her usual perfume, but her hair—had it always been this mouse colour?—was down instead of in the usual up-do that bared that sweet spot on her neck, and her breasts, which were her best feature even at almost fifty, were hidden under a shapeless sweater. He'd brought a tailored suit and his best smile.

'Thank you for this, Laura.'

She seemed to shrink around her cup. Christ, you'd think she'd at least have the gumption to look him in the eye.

'Hope you enjoy my money,' he added.

Her face turned towards him. 'I don't—'

'No, no.' He made a dismissive gesture. 'I don't mind. You clearly need it a lot more than I do.' She lowered her eyes as that, as he knew she would. She was a flincher, always had been. 'I suppose you're going to stay at your mother's. How old is she now? Seventy-five? Guess it won't be long until she needs you to feed her and bathe her. Maybe she's quieter now. Maybe you won't have to complain as much as you used to when we got married, remember that? You couldn't wait to get away from her. She must be easier to handle now. I can't imagine an old lady calling a grown woman an ungrateful little cow.'

Laura said nothing. Her eyes were half-closed, which felt like a barb. He wanted to make her open them. He wanted to lift his fingers and, gently but firmly, slide the eyelids up.

'I'm sure you'll find something to get you out of the house, though.' He spoke with considerable bonhomie. 'Even you can come up with something to fill your head. Maybe you can pretend you're forty-five and find another husband, have a few years before he trades you in for a younger model. Or you can go find yourself, all that New Age stuff. Sounds like a waste of time, but it's none of my business.' He took a sip of his coffee.

'Alexander, please.'

Please. His eyes drifted down from her face to her wrists, where the skin was stretched over breakable, bird-like bones. Please. He hated her right then, just a little, just for a moment.

He couldn't help but think of her in a drugged sleep. The jaws of a machine closing around her head, like they did around the asset's head, then wiping off whatever trash was making her do this as easily as an error was erased from a blackboard. Then everything would go back to normal.

He drew a little closer to her. There was still a handspan between them, but it was enough for her to feel the weight of him, he was sure. 'I can tell you one thing, though: I don't know why you decided to pull this now or what kind of crap you put in Alice's head to make her only come home once in a blue moon, but you're not going to do the same with Abby, do you understand?' The pleasantness was gone from his voice. 'You think she doesn't call me? Tell me how much she hates it at grandma's? You think I would ever let my children be upset?'

She didn't answer, didn't even pull back, but two spots of colour appeared on her cheeks.

And wouldn't that be proper, he thought, if she walked out of here wild-eyed and flustered? He might not be in the public eye much, but D.C. was a small place, and the people in the know were going to talk about this. And they'd say: I heard she was the one who asked for a divorce. And: No, I don't think she's marrying someone else. And: Yeah, I know Pierce, stand-up guy. And: She must be crazy.

Crazy. Wasn't that the truth, however you wanted to slice it?

He drew back just before the attorney stepped back into the room, and drank another sip of coffee before he smiled in greeting. The assistant still had the same sour look on her face, but Pierce found himself disliking her a little less. His smile brightened. Not too much; he was getting divorced, after all. 'Shall we get back to it?'

:=:=:=:

He was hunting with Alice. They didn't have guns, but he understood that wasn't a problem. He walked behind her, watching her dark hair bounce on her shoulders, and they followed the deer trail down to a lake shore. She turned to him and nodded, and he looked down at the shape lying halfway out of the water. He couldn't tell if it was wrapped in plastic or some kind of sheer fabric, but he could see the dead flesh inside, blue and grey with exposure.

It felt very peaceful.

The phone scattered his dream, then his sleep. He sat up and turned the light on. A stray half-thought: this was going to wake Laura up. He picked up the handset.

'Hello?'

'Were you sleeping?'

Nick. Pierce sat up on his pillows and reached for his reading glasses. 'No. No, go ahead.'

'I know you were sleeping,' Nick said. His voice was as alert as ever, but Pierce didn't think he'd ever heard it sound sleepy or slurred, not even in the hospital after Nick had lost the eye. On some level he was sure Nick never slept. He just rolled his chair into a quiet corner at the Triskelion and powered down for the night. 'But I also know that if I ring you at 2 am, you want to hear what I have to say.'

'You know me too well, Nick.' Milky light seeped in through the curtains and Pierce could see a faint reflection of himself on the television screen in the bedroom. The TV set had been Laura's idea. He supposed he could get rid of it now. He supposed he could get rid of the house too, find a smaller place. He rattled inside this one like a dry pea in a shell. He just had to make sure Abby's bedroom could be moved to the new place. Something to think about.

'Sorry to hear about you and Laura splitting up.'

Pierce said nothing for a second, then launched into the usual litany. He could probably say it in his sleep by now. 'Thanks, Nick. Can't say it wasn't hard, but it was for the best. Sometimes things just don't work out. And the girls are fine, that's what really matters.'

There was a soft rustle on the line. 'You ever get tired of saying that?'

He couldn't swallow a half-hearted chuckle. 'Probably right after the first time I said it. You didn't ring to talk about my marital problems, Nick.'

'Operation Razorback.'

If there were any threads of sleep still clinging to him, that brushed them away. 'You heard.'

'I heard.' There was a pause. Pierce heard a siren in the distance, pulling away. 'The extraction went ahead, but by the time we got there our people were already dead.'

'I see.'

'Does it end, Al?' He still sounded like he always did, but this time there were thorns under the surface.

'Have you been drinking?'

'It doesn't count if everything is still clear.'

Neither of them spoke for a while. Pierce watched the digits change in his clock radio.

'I've been Director of S.H.I.E.L.D. for three years and sometimes it already feels like three centuries. Do you ever get tired of it? Of feeling like you're bailing out a sinking ship? I don't mind being hated for it. I just wish I could be hated for succeeding.'

'You're the one who taught me how to get results, Nick. And I—' He trailed off. He could pick out all the faint electronic noises in the room: the aural snow of the telephone line, the soft hum of the radio, even—he was sure—the crackle of electric wires deep in the walls. The house was too big and too empty; hollowed out. When he spoke again, he was sure he sounded as tired as Nick felt. 'You know, I have this thought sometimes: if it weren't for you…'

'… I wouldn't have anyone in the world who really understood me. I know.' A pause. 'Long time since Bogotá, Al.'

'Longer still since Phnom Penh.'

There was a pool of silence, then a soft clink of glass on the other end of the line. Nick taking another sip, maybe. When he spoke again his voice was stone-cold sober. 'I think someone in S.H.I.E.L.D. is dirty.'

'I thought you already knew the names of everyone dirty in S.H.I.E.L.D.'

'I do. Sometimes I even let them know I know.' That could have been a joke. It was hard to tell, with Nick. 'This is something else. Someone I can't see.'

'I take it you're calling me on a secure line.'

Nick let out a curt noise of disapproval, presumably at the idea that he could ever do otherwise.

'Who else knows?' Pierce asked.

'Just the two of us.'

'Well, I can vouch for everyone in the Council.'

Pierce could practically hear Nick's eyebrow arch. 'Can you?'

The clock's digits slipped from 2:03 to 2:04. 'No. No, I can't.'

'I've got to go.' There was a rustle on the other end of the line. 'You'll keep a tight lid on this.' It wasn't a question, just an observation.

'You've got something planned.' That wasn't a question either.

'Unless you've got something in your back pocket.'

'Sure. I've got the Winter Soldier stashed in a freezer,' Pierce said, deadpan. 'Just let me know who he needs to get rid of.'

Nick waited a few seconds before answering. 'You see, that's just the sort of thing that gives me trust issues. When I bought my freezer it only came with Jimmy Hoffa's body.'

:=:=:=:

It was a little past 3 am when Pierce made it to the vault, and there were only two scientists and one guard on duty. The thinnest of skeleton crews, only around in case the cryo-tube or the asset malfunctioned. They weren't expecting him, but it wasn't the first time he had done this.

He looked at the cryo-tube's frost-rimmed window. He did this, sometimes, just come to the vault without a mission for the asset. He would do what he did now, dismiss everyone so he'd be alone with the asset, pull up a folding chair and sit where he could see the asset's face. After a while he'd forget about the hardness of the metal seat, the uncomfortable cold in the room, the ozone smell coming from the machines. It was comforting. He spent his days surrounded by talk, and in his death-sleep the asset never made a sound.

Sometimes he was comforting awake, too, like sitting next to a large and warm animal. There was a solidity to the asset. He was incapable of listening for politeness' sake, of making non-committal noises to pretend he was caring or paying attention, of being too busy thinking about what he was going to say next. You could tell him a secret, and he would take it to his grave.

Pierce stood up and stepped to the cryo-tube, placed his hand on the glass and leaned in until he was close enough to see the hint of stubble on the asset's jaw, the lace of ice on his eyelashes. Once in a while some place deep in Pierce's mind startled at the fact that he was watching someone who wasn't dead and yet was also not breathing or moving, but he managed to push it aside.

What was it like, this ice sleep? What was it like, to wake up from it? Pierce knew it could be painful—once or twice it had been necessary to outright make it so—but he wondered if there were dreams. Just shapes, maybe, flashes in the dark.

It was the asset's fault, Pierce knew. The divorce, talking to Alice only once a week and seeing her only twice a year. He hadn't done it deliberately, of course, but he had done it nonetheless: all those times when Pierce was out of the house to see the asset. Laura must have got it into her head that he had a mistress. She must have told Alice too.

It didn't matter, he realised. It didn't matter that sometimes—too many times—the asset was sullen, or stubborn, or disobedient. He'd been shorn of pretence, guile, fear. Humankind perfected, freed from the burden of the future and the weight of the past, from all the rotting trappings of civilisation and its delusions of morality. Pierce couldn't think of anything more liberating. Just doing, without having to be.

He let his fingers slide down the bitingly cold glass.

He didn't want to lose the asset. The thought dropped like a tomb lid, sudden and final. The asset was a weapon, and one day, when the new order began, there would be no more need for weapons. A memory floated up: Alice, soon after being born, red and squalling. He hadn't really believed that such a tiny, fragile creature could possibly remain alive, and sometimes he had sneaked into the nursery room at night to watch her, as though only his presence and vigilance could keep her breathing.

He went out to the prep room, where the one remaining scientist sat in front of a bank of monitors and control panels. He nearly upended a bag of gummy bears getting to his feet as Pierce entered the room. The other scientist had decamped to parts uncertain.

'I want the asset woken up,' Pierce said. 'Get whoever you need to get if you can't do it on your own.'

'Yes, sir,' the man said. 'Do we need a mission brief?'

'No. There isn't one.'

The scientist opened his mouth to speak, then seemed to think better of it. 'I'll get right on it.'

While the scientist went to make his calls, Pierce took a small key from his pocket, slid it into a slot in the back of the bank of instruments, and twisted. On the first turn, a set of machines went on standby. On the second turn, they powered down entirely.

The power grid, the cryo-tube, all the machines monitoring the asset were still working perfectly. Their output was simply no longer being recorded. For the moment, all the devices watching the asset had been rendered blind.

He put the key back in his pocket.

When the time came, Pierce wanted to keep the asset. But if he couldn't, he wanted to be the one to do what would need to be done. He would be kind. He would be gentle. He would make sure the asset would feel no pain when Pierce drove the needle or the knife into his flesh. If there were whimpers, he would soothe them. If there were tears, he would wipe them away. He would make sure the last thing the asset saw was his face.

And afterwards, he would grieve. Afterwards, and always, he would think that the most beautiful thing he'd ever seen in his life was the asset sleeping under glass, his flesh going from brittle and cold to warm and alive when he was woken up, like the happy ending to a fairy tale.

He understood now.

'We'll be ready to wake him up in about twenty minutes,' the scientist told him.

He loved the asset.

TBC…

Author's note: The bit with the body in the plastic bag in Pierce's dream was inspired by Twin Peaks. The line "If it weren't for you, I wouldn't have anyone in the world who really understood me" is lifted from a bit in the comics in which Bucky tells Steve that if it weren't for him, Steve wouldn't have anyone in the world who really understands him. Because obviously my goal in life is to take everything that is positive in the movies and the comics and come up with some horrific and twisted mirror image. (So, keeping to the spirit of the MCU Winter Soldier plot line, then. /ba-dum-tish) Speaking of twisted, I really can't help but think of Pierce's plot with Fury in CA:TWS as the implosion of a (metaphoric) marriage, a la Amy and Nick Dunne from Gone Girl. (If Amy and Nick Dunne had met in a S.H.I.E.L.D. outpost during the Cambodian Civil War.) So I do think Pierce is being genuine in everything he says to Nick Fury, for a horrific narcissist's value of genuine. Which of course would make Bucky… I guess these three put the nuclear in nuclear family, amirite? (Yes, I am a terrible person.)