We Were Soldiers
36. Doctor's Orders
"And you say there were two of them?" Phillips asked the next morning. The first thing Bucky had done upon waking was demand to speak to the colonel. One of the nurses had gone to request Phillips' presence, and he'd shown up with Carter in tow. Bucky didn't like that, because there weren't many dames in the camp, and one of them had to be a German spy. Agent Carter was his prime suspect by simple virtue of the fact that she spoke German.
"Yessir," he said, acutely aware that his cheek was still puffed up on one side, and that he resembled a small rodent, only bigger. "A man and a woman. Speaking German, somewhere close by."
"What were they saying?"
"I don't know, sir. I don't speak German."
"You don't remember any of the words?" Agent Carter pressed.
"No." He issued her a scowl. "Though, 'sie' might have been one of them."
"Congratulations, Sergeant, you've just identified one of the most common words in the German language."
"Colonel," said Dr. Peacock, who was loitering nearby whilst his patient was questioned, "Sergeant Barnes may not exactly have been compos mentis, last night. On top of the painkillers and antibiotics, we also gave him a sedative in his stew, to help him sleep. He was heavily medicated."
"I didn't imagine it!" Bucky half-yelled. "Sure, maybe I was heavily medicated, but if I was gonna imagine anything, it would be something much more pleasant than German spies. Rita Hayworth would probably feature heavily."
"The mind has a way of playing tricks, Sergeant," Dr. Peacock replied. His voice was soft, pitched to soothe in a very doctorly way. Mostly, Bucky found it patronising. "We're all under a lot of stress. We're far from home, up against a dangerous enemy… it's only natural for those fears to manifest themselves in dreams, and nightmares—"
"I wasn't asleep. I was awake, listening to people speak German." He turned his gaze to the colonel; pleaded with the man to believe him. "Please, sir, you know I wouldn't make something outta nothing. If I thought for even a moment that I could'a dreamt this, or hallucinated it, or whatever, then I wouldn't have brought you out here. But I swear on my life, I was awake. I heard what I heard."
The colonel stared at him for a moment, then took a long, deep breath. His usually scowl-ridden face looked even more troubled at the prospect of German spies.
"Very well, Sergeant. Agent Carter, please check with the troops who were on sentry duty last night. See if any of them spotted anyone moving around in camp… or if any of them left their foxholes for any reason."
Agent Carter pursed her lips, and Bucky could tell from the stubborn look on her face that she thought she was being sent on a fool's errand. But in the end, she gave a quick salute and a 'Sir!' so sharp that it might have taken any other man's head off. As she left, Phillips turned to the doctor.
"Doc, will you speak to your staff? The medical barracks are closest to the hospital tent; maybe somebody else heard something."
"Of course, Colonel. I'll let you know if I discover anything." He stopped to lay a hand on Bucky's shoulder, and bestowed on him a conciliatory smile. "Try to rest, Sergeant Barnes. That infection is subsiding nicely. If the antibiotics continue to work as they have, we should be able to take your tooth out tomorrow morning."
Oh joy, he thought, as he watched the man depart. As soon as the doctor was gone, he glanced back to the colonel.
"Sir, Agent Carter speaks German."
The man snorted loud enough to wake the dead. "Son, Agent Carter may be a lot of things, including a pain in my ass at times, but a German spy she is not."
Then it had to be one of the nurses. Which made perfect sense, given how quick the Doc was to shoot down his discovery.
"Then, Doctor Peacock could be the man I heard."
"I'm pretty damn sure Doctor Peacock isn't a German spy, either."
"Why, sir?"
"Because he's Jewish."
"Oh."
He put Doctor Peacock aside and began running through names. Stark? Maybe. Perhaps his fortune was amassed from selling weapons to both sides in the conflict. But then… wouldn't the military have checked into his dealings, before signing a contract with him? Dugan. The sergeant from the 69th was always being a jerk to Bucky, even when he—mostly—hadn't done anything to deserve it. Maybe he was secretly spying on the 107th, using his position to… figure out their poker styles? No, that was stupid. The chaplain! Yes, of course! Nobody ever looked twice at a man of the cloth. He could be hiding all sorts of spy gadgets in his personal tent.
"Sergeant, I'd like to reinforce the doctor's instructions," Phillips said following a moment of quiet observation. "Get some rest. You look like you need it."
Yes. Rest. He needed rest. And better food. Didn't Wells say they were all being starved? Maybe this exhaustion was part of the same conspiracy.
"Yessir," he agreed.
Phillips didn't believe him. He could tell by the way the man didn't seem overly bothered about finding the German spies. Hell, maybe he was one of them! A few hours later, when Gusty and Wells came to visit him, Bucky told them about his late-night discovery, and put his theories to them.
"What do you think?" he asked, after he'd outlined his reasoning for Carter, the chaplain and Phillips being potential spies. He still hadn't ruled out the Doctor entirely. Just because he was Jewish, didn't mean he couldn't be a collaborator. In fact, he would have to be Jewish to be a collaborator. It made perfect sense.
Wells reached out to lay a hand on his forehead; his touch was like ice. "I think you're running a fever, and probably dehydrated. Don't these nurses give you coffee?"
He swatted Wells' hand away and shook his head. "Only water. They say coffee's not good for people on the medication they've pumped into me, and I've gotta be nil by mouth a few hours before they take my tooth."
"At least you're in good hands," Gusty said. He smiled at Nurse Klein at the other side of the tent, and gave her a coy little wave, which she returned.
Wells rolled his eyes, and Bucky silently echoed that sentiment.
"But whilst I'm stuck in here, German spies could be up to all sorts of nefarious activities!" he insisted.
"Didn't the doctor say you were out of your head on meds?" Wells asked.
"No," he glared at his friend. "He said I was non compos mentis."
"And you've gotta know enough Latin to realise they basically mean the same thing."
"You don't believe me!" he accused.
Wells sighed, the same sorta sigh Phillips had given him. "It's not that I don't believe you. It's just that the idea itself, of there being wolves among the sheep, so to speak, is fairly unbelievable. Speaking of Latin, they taught you lex parsimoniae in science class, right?" Bucky sullenly refused to answer that question. "Which is more likely: That somehow, a couple of German spies infiltrated our camp and have managed to go all this time undetected, or that your overactive, medicated mind imagined some real, tangible threat that you could try to fight?" He sank down on the edge of Bucky's bed and offered another explanation. "Nobody likes being sick, feeling weak, and ill. Enemy soldiers are something we can fight; sickness is something we can't. Maybe your mind just needed an external threat as a way of counterbalancing the infection that's inside you. Turning something you can't fight into something you can."
"I do not think my mind is that complex. I should'a known you wouldn't believe me. If Steve were here, he'd believe me."
"Then it's too bad Steve's not here. The two of you could be paranoid together."
"Yeah, too bad I haven't got a friend who knows the meaning of 'trust,'" he shot back. "Figured I've earned a little of that by now."
"I'm just gonna… go… say hello to Audrey," said Gusty, sidling nervously away.
Guilt gnawed at Bucky's gut; guilt that his bickering had driven Gusty away. But it wasn't his fault. Wells was being entirely unreasonable. But then, Wells had barely batted an eye when Tipper told them of the Germans aboard the King George. Was that because he'd already known about them? Maybe Wells was the spy. He already spoke French; how different could German be?
"Look," Wells said, when Gusty was as far away as he could possibly get, "I don't appreciate the emotional blackmail bullshit. Of course you've earned my trust. A thousand times over, probably. You've saved my life at least twice, and put up with a lot of crap from me. More than anybody reasonably should do. If it helps to ease your mind, I'll look into the chaplain for you."
"Yeah," Bucky said. Inside, his suspicions grew. "That would be great." Wells hated the chaplain, so why was he offering to investigate the guy? Was it to throw Bucky off the trail? "Let me know if you find anything." What, if anything, he found, might be indicative of Wells' allegiance.
Bucky wasn't much in the mood for conversation after that, so Wells and Gusty left him to his introspective silence. The one good thing about this terrifying new mystery was that it took his mind off the pain. At midday, the nurses came along with more pills, and more syringes, and more stew, and gave him a bit of everything. That was nice, because it dulled the pain and made him sleepy, and for a while he drifted in and out of sleep and briefly managed to forget entirely about German spies.
Before dinner time, Carrot and Hawkins came visiting. Bucky wanted to believe they'd come out of concern for him… but what if they were Germans? What if they'd gotten wind of his late-night eavesdropping, and wanted to know exactly how much he might have heard? He tried to tell himself that it was stupid, that he was going beyond normal paranoia and into plain ol' crazy town, but part of him knew that until the spies were found, anybody, even the nicest of nice guys, could be a risk.
After dinner, Nurse Klein came along, to deliver some good news.
"Doctor Peacock will be performing your tooth extraction tomorrow, and he's decided to administer a general anaesthetic. That means you won't be conscious when the tooth is removed."
"Is that a good thing?"
"Some people find tooth extraction a little traumatic, especially when it's a molar being removed, like yours. And in your case, the abscess may cause additional pain that a normal local anaesthetic can't mask. The doctor is afraid that you might become overly agitated during the surgery if you have to stay awake through it."
"And after that, I can go back to the barracks?"
She gave him a cheery smile that dimpled her cheeks. When she smiled like that, he could see why Gusty liked her so much.
"Once you're recovered enough to resume light duties, yes. And don't worry about tomorrow; I'll be assisting Doctor Peacock during the procedure. I'll make sure it's smooth sailing. It will be over before you know it. Now, try to get plenty of sleep tonight. We want you well-rested for tomorrow."
Sleep. Like they weren't just going to sedate him anyway. How could he sleep at a time like this? The last time he'd closed his eyes for the night in this hospital, he'd woken up to find Nazis whispering in the shadows. He wouldn't be sleeping tonight. No sir. Not James Buchanan Barnes.
: - - - — — — - - - : - - - — — — - - - : - - - — — — - - - :
Bucky's eyes opened to the inside of a khaki tent and were immediately hit with a sledgehammer of light. It went right through his peepers and bounced off his brain, sending a lightning bolt of pain down his spine, bringing up a dizzying wave of nausea on its return trip.
"What happened?" he said, or tried to. His mouth felt like it was full of cotton wool. He spat something out, and saw it was cotton wool. It landed on the blanket covering him, the wad of wool red and white like a candy cane on a Christmas tree.
"Good morning, Sergeant Barnes," Nurse Klein smiled down at him in his reclined position. "How are you feeling?"
"Like I went out last night and had too much to drink," he said. Groggy. That was how he felt. Like he needed another eight or ten hours of sleep. "What happened to me?"
"We took your tooth out, of course! What's the last thing you remember?"
Bucky ran his mind back over the past few hours whilst he ran his tongue over the gaping hole in his lower jaw. It felt all soft and squishy and raw, and it hurt like hell when he gently probed it.
"I dunno. I was in bed, thinking that I wouldn't get any sleeping done. Then I woke up here. Why don't I remember anything from before the surgery?"
"That happens, sometimes," she said. "It can be temporary, but it's nothing to be worried about. Retrograde amnesia can't affect anything from that point onward. You didn't miss anything exciting, anyway. Oh, I have something for you!" She turned to a small table and picked up something up from the top. It was a glass beaker, and in the bottom was a large, creamy-white tooth, with what looked like a tree attached to the bottom of it. On the tree was a small oval mass not even a centimetre wide. "Just in case you want it for the tooth fairy."
"That little thing caused me so much pain?" he said, peering in at the abscess.
"Yes. It's actually quite large, as far as abscesses go. No wonder you were in agony! Would you like to keep the tooth?"
"Um, no, it's fine. Thanks." He sank back onto his pillow and probed his gummy gap again. "Can I go back to the barracks now?"
"Not quite yet. We've given you another shot of antibiotics, just in case the infection ran along your jaw, and we want to monitor the gum for a while; it bled heavily when we took the tooth out. We need to make sure it's starting to heal, and doesn't begin bleeding again, before we let you go back. Maybe by tonight, if things go well." She smiled when she saw the disappointment etched on his face. "Take the opportunity to rest and relax, Sergeant. It's not every day you get to lie around in bed doing nothing. Why don't I fetch you something to eat and drink?"
Food. Yes. His stomach was growling at the very idea.
"Can I have coffee and a cookie?" he asked hopefully.
"I'm sorry, but we can't let you have anything too hot whilst the gum's recovering. Tepid or cold water only, I'm afraid. As for a cookie… it's too hard. You'll have to stick to soft foods for a couple of days. We don't want something sharp jabbing in that gum and making it bleed again. I think there's some tinned fruit in syrup in the stores. I'll go and get you some." She reached out to give his shoulder a reassuring squeeze. "Let me know if you'd like a book brought to you."
He nodded, and she left to source him some soft, squishy food. Like I'm a damn baby.
He ran his tongue over his gum again. They were horrible things, gums. If it hurt that much to take a tooth out, did it hurt as much for one to grow through? No wonder babies screamed when they were teething. But at least when they teethed, they were too young to ever remember it.
Memory. Why couldn't he remember anything from the night before? Sure, Nurse Klein said it wasn't uncommon, but he had only her word for that.
He sat up in bed as a new thought hit him, and he kicked himself for not seeing the connection earlier. Nurse Klein was the female Nazi spy! It made perfect sense! She must have met up with someone near the hospital tent, hoping that Bucky's sedatives would keep him asleep. But that hadn't worked, so last night, or this morning, she'd done something to erase his memory. That was why she was working on his tooth extraction; to make sure he woke up with no memory of anything that had happened the night before.
But what had happened the night before? What had been worth erasing his memory over? The thought that something had happened to him, something he couldn't remember, brought a chill to his flesh and set his heart racing, his mouth dry as a summer desert. He'd been so won over by Nurse Klein's smiles and pleasant bedside manner that he hadn't considered she might be an insidious viper. Poor Gusty! He was gonna be heart-broken when he found out.
Well, Bucky would just have to pick up the pieces of Gusty's heart later. Unless… was Gusty the second spy? No, that was stupid. Or… was it? Either way, Bucky could find out. Now that he knew about Nurse Klein, he could force her to tell him the truth. He could wring the identity of her co-conspirator out of her. Then the colonel, and the doctor, and Wells, and everybody else, would finally believe him. They'd know that he'd been telling truth all along, and not imagining some conspiracy. He wasn't crazy. He was sane. The only sane guy in the camp, sometimes.
His eyes darted around the hospital as his heart thudded in his chest.
Thud thud.
A surgical kit lay on a nearby table, its instruments cold, gleaming their stainless steel winks at him.
Thud thud.
He pushed himself up off the bed and made his way over to the kit as his palms turned sweaty.
Do it, his heartbeat seemed to say. Thud thud. Do it. Thud thud. Do it.
Reaching out, he picked up the scalpel and turned it back on itself in his hand, so that it was concealed by his forearm. Then, he returned to the bed.
Thud thud.
He waited. Felt his heartbeat increase. His thoughts raced along. She'd poisoned him, somehow. In fact, she was responsible for his abscess. She'd put it on his tooth, made him sick, just so she could operate on him. Wanted to make him look mad in front of the brass. In front of his friends. That was her ploy. Get the entire troop medically discharged, one soldier at a time. Loss by attrition. The Allies couldn't win the war if they were all holed up with tooth aches and memory loss. And he'd almost believed it was Carter.
Nurse Klein returned and beamed another smile at him, but he wasn't fooled this time. Wasn't taken in by her dimples and her laughing eyes. Those eyes were only laughing at him. At the patsy she'd made him. At the time and memory she'd stolen from him. He wanted them back. He needed to know what he'd seen last night; why she'd taken it all away from him.
"Here we are," she said, placing a tray of soft fruit on the table beside his bed. "I hope you don't mind tinned pears."
"Klein," he mused. "That's a German name, isn't it?" In his hand, the scalpel felt cold as a shard of ice. Thud thud. Do it.
"Oh, I don't know, is it?" She gave a quiet laugh. Almost… nervous. "My Mama always said our family was Dutch, but I guess I could have some German ancestors, somewhere along the line. Now, eat up your pears!"
Thud thud. Do it. Poisoned.
Yes. She'd poisoned his food. Not content with stealing his memories, she was now trying to take his life. Well, she was gonna fail, because he'd got her number. Figured out her plot. And now, it was time to expose her for what she was: a traitor.
He moved fast, buoyed by a surge of adrenaline and fear. Grabbed her wrist. Turned her around and brought his right arm across her shoulders, scalpel to her throat. She screamed, loud and high, but that was fine; let them come. Her confession would be all the sweeter in front of an audience.
"Why did you steal my memories?!" he demanded.
Beneath his arm, she shook with terror. Feigned terror. She was a good actress. Good as Rita Hayworth. Better, because any man would have noticed Rita right away, but nobody looked twice at Nurse Klein.
"I—I didn't—" she whimpered, and he squeezed more tightly with his arm.
"Don't lie! I know who you are!" He spat the words in a snarl. She'd hurt him. Made him suffer. Stolen his memories. And he needed to know why. "Tell me what you're planning, you and your Nazi buddy."
"I don't know what—"
"Liar!" he growled. "No more lies! If you speak anything but the truth, I'll cut out your tongue. You're a Nazi spy, admit it!"
"Sergeant Barnes!"
Colonel Phillips voice was an unwelcome invader in his private interrogation. He looked up at the entrance of the tent, where Phillips was standing with Agent Carter and two armed MPs. He tried to pull the snarl from his lips, but it wasn't easy; he hated lies. Her body pinned against his, Nurse Klein was trembling. Sobbing. Pleading quietly, a prayer to God. A fine act.
"Colonel, I've found one of the spies," he said, gasping for breath. Felt like he'd run a marathon. Why was he out of breath? All he'd done was tackle a spy, and she hadn't even resisted. In his mouth, he tasted blood. Checked his gum with his tongue. Bleeding. Blood pressure too high, probably. Too much exertion. But he could fix that later. Right now, he had a spy to interrogate.
"Sergeant, let the nurse go," Phillips instructed.
"I will. But first, I want her to tell you herself exactly what she is." He tightened his arm against her chest, drawing another sob from her lips. "Go on, tell him."
"I'm just a nurse," she cried. "Just a nurse. Please, Sergeant Barnes, I just want to help you."
He felt his lips curl back up into a snarl. She was going to lie and lie until everybody believed her over him. He should'a cut out her tongue to begin with. Got a written confession from her.
"Sergeant," said Agent Carter. He looked up into her face and found her brown eyes focused on him. As focused as the pistol she had pointing at his head. "Let Audrey go, or I will shoot you."
He realised, then, that he'd got it all wrong. It really had been Carter all along. And she'd somehow managed to frame Nurse Klein for everything she'd done. But it wasn't too late. He could let Nurse Klein go, and then the colonel would listen to him when Bucky told him all about Carter, and how she'd set up a nurse to take the fall.
He slackened his grip, and Nurse Klein almost sank to the floor in relief. Thud thud. He transferred his gaze to Agent Carter as Nurse Klein scurried towards Colonel Phillips. Thud thud.
"Colonel, you have to listen to me," he said. "I know what's happening here."
"Son, put the knife down and we'll talk about it," said Phillips. One of his arms was wrapped protectively around the sobbing Nurse Klein. Guilt stabbed at Bucky's stomach. He'd done that. He'd got it wrong, and nearly hurt an innocent woman. But at least now, he knew who the guilty party was. Now, he didn't need the knife.
He tossed it onto the ground in front of the colonel, who gave a quick nod. The two MPs rushed forward, shouldering their guns as they wrestled him to the floor. Thud thud. Instinct kicked in. Bucky flailed and fought and lashed out and growled incomprehensible words at the men trying to put his wrists in restraints. Thud thud. Another group of MPs arrived. Thud thud. Overwhelmed, weakened from his infection and his tooth extraction, he was finally overcome. As he looked up, he saw the colonel lead Nurse Klein away, and at that moment, he knew: Colonel Phillips wasn't going to listen to him anymore.
: - - - — — — - - - : - - - — — — - - - : - - - — — — - - - :
Agent Carter had been having a bad day even before she'd heard the terrified scream from the hospital tent. She'd thought that nothing could be worse than three lost hair pins, a broken shoe heel and a lipstick stain on her best white shirt. But she had been wrong. Those things were simple annoyances, compared to what had just happened in the hospital.
"Here you go, Audrey," she said, crouching down beside the seated woman to give her a cup of tea. It was milky, just like the tea Grandmother used to be given, to calm her down during one of her episodes. Colonel Phillips had very wisely brought Nurse Klein into the command tent, away from the hospital. Away from Sergeant Barnes.
A shiver stole over Agent Carter as she recalled the feral look in the sergeant's eyes. The way he'd stared at her… it was as if he was seeing something for the first time. No man had ever looked at her like that before. No woman, either. She hadn't imagined such hatred was possible in the world. Clearly, she had been wrong again.
"I—I don't know what happened," Audrey said between hiccoughs. "One minute he was fine, asking to go back to his barracks…" a smile tugged briefly at her lips, "…asking for a cup of coffee and a cookie. The next minute, he had the scalpel and just lunged for me. It was like he was a completely different person. The Sergeant Barnes I know would never do anything like that."
But you don't really know him, Audrey, Peggy thought to her. None of us do.
She looked up as two pairs of footsteps approached and two shadows fell across the open flap of the command tent. Sergeant Wells and Corporal Ferguson looked a little confused about being summoned to the tent, and when Corporal Ferguson saw Nurse Klein's puffy, tear-stained face, his eyes widened and his hands twitched by his side, as if he wanted to reach out for the woman right there and then. Instead, he saluted along with Sergeant Wells, and stood to attention.
"Sergeant, Corporal," said Colonel Phillips, stepping forward to address them. "At ease." They relaxed by a small measure, and Corporal Ferguson's eyes darted immediately back down to Nurse Klein. "There has been an incident. Sergeant Barnes attacked Nurse Klein with a medical scalpel in the hospital tent."
"What?!" Corporal Ferguson demanded. "I mean, err, sir."
"What happened?" Sergeant Wells reiterated.
"That's what we're trying to work out," Phillips sighed. Just then, Doctor Peacock arrived, and stood silently nearby while the colonel questioned the men. "Have you noticed Sergeant Barnes displaying any odd behaviour, of late?"
"Only since his toothache started. Though technically, only after he claimed to have overheard people speaking German during his first night in the hospital."
"When you first brought him to me," Doctor Peacock spoke up, "you mentioned he said something about going to see a wizard..?"
Sergeant Wells gave the doctor a long, humourless stare. "That was actually a joke."
"Can you think of anything Sergeant Barnes may have done?" Colonel Phillips continued. "Anything he might have been involved in? Anything that might have exposed him to any mind-altering substances?"
"It may be something he imbibed, ingested, inhaled, or otherwise consumed in some form," the doctor added helpfully.
"Nothing, sir," said Sergeant Wells. "He ate what we ate, drank what we drank, and didn't consume anything that didn't come from a mess serving counter or his ration kit."
"What about your last mission?" Phillips pushed. Peggy could see the desperation etched onto his face, though it was doubtful anybody else could have read it there. This new situation was grim, and straining him badly. The colonel couldn't afford for his troops to start losing their minds. Not out here. "Could he have come into contact with something in the communications bunker?"
"Nothing I'm aware of. We went in, shot Nazis and secured the facility. The only time we split up was when I was dragging bodies, and he went to disarm the MG. Apart from that, we weren't out of sight of each other for more than a few seconds."
"What about that gas?" Corporal Ferguson suggested. "You know, the gas Mr. Stark made, to stop you talking?"
"I was exposed to that gas too, Gusty, and I'm not crazy." Sergeant Wells glared at the corporal. "I'm not." He looked up to Colonel Phillips again, his blue eyes full of concern. "Whatever's caused him to behave like this, I don't think it was something from the mission, sir. He was fine until he was admitted to the hospital."
Doctor Peacock took off his spectacles and gave them a quick wipe with his coat sleeve as he cleared his throat.
"Sergeant, if you're suggesting that my staff had anything to do with—"
"All I'm suggesting, Doctor," Sergeant Wells interrupted sharply, "is that Barnes was himself right up until he started treatment for his sore tooth. Something put him on edge and made him paranoid. Usually he's the voice of reason. God knows, he's tried to shoot down my paranoid theories often enough. And now, if he's attacked Nurse Klein, then he's definitely not acting like himself."
"Thank you, Sergeant," said Colonel Phillips. "If you think of anything else that might be pertinent, don't keep it to yourself."
"Yessir. Doc, can I see him?"
"I suppose it can't do any harm to have him see a friendly face," Doctor Peacock agreed. "We've restrained Sergeant Barnes in the hospital tent, but if he continues to be aggressive, we may eventually have to move him to more secure facility."
"You mean jail." The look in Sergeant Wells' eyes turned momentarily murderous. "You wanna put a sick man in jail?"
"Nobody's suggesting that, Sergeant," Phillips said quickly. "I hope that Doctor Peacock and his staff can help Sergeant Barnes before his condition becomes any worse. Now, you're dismissed. You too, Corporal Ferguson."
Sergeant Wells saluted and about-faced, but Peggy could tell Corporal Ferguson didn't want to leave. His salute was so sloppy that it never would have passed basic training, and his gaze lingered over the hiccoughing nurse.
"Colonel," Peggy spoke up, "perhaps if Corporal Ferguson isn't busy, he could escort Nurse Klein back to the women's tent. I'm sure she'd feel more at ease with a man to escort her."
From Colonel Phillips she received a quick nod; from Corporal Ferguson, a grateful smile. He helped Audrey up, and wrapped an arm around her shoulders as he led her out of the tent, the cup of milky tea still clutched in her hands.
"Doctor," Phillips snapped, and the man very nearly jumped out of his skin. "I want to know what's happened to Sergeant Barnes, and I want to know it an hour ago. I particularly want to know how likely this thing is to spread. The last thing we need out here is a full-blown epidemic on our hands."
"Of course, Colonel," the doctor said. "But finding what's wrong with the sergeant will take time, and curing him, if there even is a cure—"
"I don't want to hear 'if' or 'but', Doctor. Find out what's wrong with him, and find a cure. Ask Stark to help. Maybe he can speed up the process."
"Err, yes, Colonel. I'll go speak to him right away."
The doctor left, and Peggy was left alone with the colonel. He grumbled like a bear with a toothache, and finally relaxed enough to sink down into one of the flimsy collapsible camp chairs. His eyes, though, were anything but relaxed, and they jumped up immediately to Peggy's face.
"Did you find anything from your questioning of the men on sentry duty the other night?"
"Nobody heard or saw anything, sir," she said. A big fat waste of time was what that particular exercise had been. "Do you believe Sergeant Barnes? About hearing people speaking German, I mean?"
"I'll be damned if I know what I believe anymore," her SO sighed. "But something happened to that man, and I can't decide whether hallucination is the best case scenario, or the worst."
"I'll keep looking," she said. Another big fat waste of time. But it was better than doing nothing. Better than waiting for Sergeant Barnes to get worse.
"Very good. Dismissed, Agent."
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His heart had changed. An hour ago, he'd known it. The encouraging thud thud. Thud thud.
Now, it was different. Faster. Irregular. Thud. Thud. Thud thud thud. Thud. Thud thud. Like it couldn't make up its mind. Did a heart have a mind? If so, his heart was currently crazy. A good job, then, that his real mind was sane.
He could hear more clearly in the silence. The whispers. Voices speaking German, just on the edge of his hearing. From his bed, he could see the shadows of the two MPs stationed outside the hospital door flap. Couldn't see their mouths moving, but that didn't mean they weren't whispering. Just that they were doing it so he couldn't see.
Another shadow joined them, mumbled words he was too slow to catch because he was too busy trying to listen to the beating of his heart. Trying to figure out what it was telling him now.
The shadow grew larger as the person stepped through the door. A familiar face greeted him, though it lacked any semblance of a smile.
"Wells," Bucky croaked through his sandpaper throat and desert-dry mouth. "'Bout time you showed up. Help me out of these." He glanced to his wrists, which had been lashed down to the bed on which he lay. His ankles were similarly bound. "I think I've ruled out Nurse Klein."
"They say you nearly hurt her," Wells said, as he brought a chair to the side of the bed and sat down just a foot or two away. Bucky didn't like the look in his eyes. Silently accusing. That's what they were.
"Nearly," he agreed. "But not quite." Thud thud thud. Thud. Thud thud. Thud. What the hell was his heartbeat telling him? "How did your investigation of the chaplain go?"
"Terrible."
"He wouldn't tell you anything?"
"No. He told me everything. I can now recite his family history for at least six generations. None of it seems conducive to German spies. Sorry, pal."
He shrugged, or tried to. Hard to shrug with your arms tied down. "Two down… How many people are in this camp, anyway?"
Wells ignored the question. Leant forward, to fix Bucky with his gaze.
"How are you doing? Really?"
"I'm fine. Really. My jaw isn't even hurting anymore." Thud. Thud thud. "I just gotta get out of here. Apologise to Nurse Klein, and find those damn spies. Will you please untie me?"
"Sorry, Barnes, but I don't think letting you out is such a good idea. Not while you're sick."
"I'm not sick!" he insisted as the sweat on his forehead coalesced into a bead and began trickling down his temple. It was too damn hot. They were trying to kill him. This was torture. Like being staked out beneath the burning sun, only slower. More agonising. He was burning alive from the inside out. And nobody cared. They just pretended to. "If you don't let me out of here, I'll die," he insisted. Wells said nothing, just watched him sadly. "They're trying to poison me. Just like they're trying to starve you. Right?" Nada. He barely even blinked. "C'mon, Wells, let me out."
"I can't. Sorry, pal. You're better off here, where we can keep an eye on you."
He narrowed his eyes at the man he thought had been his friend. "It's you, isn't it? You're the other spy. You and Carter. That's why you're always pretending to fight. Why she pretends she doesn't like you. It's to throw everyone off your scent. Well, I'm onto you. And when I get out of here, you're going to regret everything you've done to me, and all those people you helped to kill. Tipper, and Danzig, and Nestor—"
"Dammit, Barnes!" Wells hissed, blue eyes flashing with anger. "Listen to yourself! Tipper stepped on a mine. Danzig was shot by an unmanned machine-gun. Nestor was driving the damn jeep that very nearly killed me and Carrot. You know all of this. It's not some massive conspiracy, it's just war, and people die. It's sad, and tragic, but that's life. If you weren't so sick, you'd understand that."
"That's just what a Nazi spy would say."
Wells sighed and stood up. "I'm going now. I don't know what I can do to help you, but sitting in here isn't helping at all. Maybe I can help Stark figure out what's affecting you like this."
"You can't trust Stark!" he yelled at the departing back of Wells. "I think he's selling weapons to the Japs!"
But Wells was gone. Probably to report back to his Führer how the poisoning of Bucky Barnes was going. But that didn't matter. He was restrained for now, but he wouldn't be restrained forever. The flimsy lengths of cloth had nothing on the Biggs leather belt restraints. Already he could feel the one around his right wrist loosening with the flex and torsion of his hand. A smile graced his lips as he thought of freedom. He'd finally figured out what his heartbeat was saying.
Thud. Thud thud. Thud thud thud.
Escape. Find help. Kill the spies.
He knew just who to turn to for help doing that.