worthallthis (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
worthallthis) wrote2020-02-14 11:01 pm
worthallthis) wrote2020-02-14 11:01 pm
Entry tags:
In the Night: The Night We Met [Memories]
Memories for The Night We Met event
1. Pa (Soldat)
“Pa? Pa, tell us a story.”
Pa was always better at stories than Ma. Jamie sits up in bed, putting on his most pleading expression. “Please, Pa?”
“Will you go to sleep if I do?” Pa asks, sounding weary, but Jamie knows better. Pa loves telling stories.
“I promise,” Jamie says.
“Promith,” Becca lisps from her own bed on the other side of the room, even though she already sounds half-asleep. Baby Susie is bedded down with Ma in the other room, and Toby is already asleep next to Jamie, breathing wheezily, so it’s just the two of them to promise.
“What do you want a story about?” Pa asks, coming to sit on the edge of Becca’s bed.
“About the war?” Becca asks, which is one of her favorite things to ask. Pa hates talking about it, which is probably why she asks, because she’s a brat. Or else she’s just bloody-minded. Jamie hates hearing about the war. It makes Pa sad and Ma careful and it sounds scary. He thinks Becca likes to be scared, maybe.
“No, tell us one about the knights,” he counters.
“That’s better for a bedtime story,” Pa says, while Becca pouts. He strokes her hair. “Knights and princesses are less likely to give my babies nightmares.”
“Don’t have nightmareth,” Becca grumbles, but subsides readily enough when their Pa starts her own favorite, about the fairy queen and King Arthur. She and Jamie are both asleep before he finished, and Jamie dreams of wings and shining armor.
2. Stupid Songs (Sora)
He sits on the floor, holding out his hands to little Susie, who’s just old enough to be a nightmare on two chubby feet and babble mostly-nonsense. Baby Jeanie is tied up in a sling on his Ma’s hip while she kneads dough, while Becca has Toby in her lap at the kitchen table, keeping everyone distracted from his coughing (even himself) by telling him a story with some of her paper dolls. There’s flour everywhere.
Susie puts her hands against Jamie’s, and he pulls his back gently to make the little clap. “Like that, Susie.” She mimics him, giggling, and meets her hands again.
This is the last summer day he gets to spend with his brother and sisters. Tomorrow he starts school (yuck). He wants it to last forever. He doesn’t want to go to school, when he has to wear uncomfortable clothes and answer to teachers and learn to read, how’s any of that important? How's any of that better than spending time with his sisters and brother? But Ma says he has to, and what Ma says goes.
Even if he might have had a single unwise tantrum about it a couple weeks ago. He still remembers the swats he got for that.
Becca looks down from her dolls. “You have to sing the song,” she says. Her front tooth came in last spring, and she no longer lisps. (Jamie kinda misses it.) Becca doesn’t have to start school until next year.
“I do not have to sing the song,” he counters. He was patient with Susie, but he doesn’t have to be patient with Becca, because she’s almost as old as he is. And a brat.
That doesn’t mean Becca doesn’t keep insisting. “You do!”
“It’s a dumb song,” Jamie says. “You hardly even sing it!”
“Song song!” Susie cries, and he sighs heavily.
“Okay, fine.” If Susie wants him to. And holds out his hands again, letting Susie pat them. “Patty cake, patty cake...”
3. Friendship (Fjord)
“I ain’t scared of you!”
What a thing to hear coming out of an alleyway. Bucky stops to peer in, as much out of curiosity as out of a desire to see if he needs to help anybody.
He sees one skinny kid, maybe nine years old, a year or two younger than he is, holding up his fists like he’s ready to fight. Bucky doesn’t recognize him, but he’s got to admire that spirit, especially since it looks like he’d already been hit once or twice, judging from the split lip. He’s standing up to three much heavier boys. Bucky actually does recognize one of them as one of the local bullies, always hitting up the smaller kids for their lunch money, or because they looked at him funny, or because he could. Bucky has already beat him up a couple times for calling his Ma a dirty Jew, and his sister a brat (he’s the only one allowed to call her that), and little Toby (may the poor kid rest in peace) a waste of space that deserved to be in the ground.
Well, now he’s gotta intervene just on principle. He hates that guy.
“Hey! Why doncha pick on someone your own size!” he shouts, and without any more warning than that, dives right in, laying about him with fists and feet and one memorable time, a headbutt. The surprise works for him, and the fact that he’s been beating up people for picking on his family almost since he started school. When your Ma don’t go to church, it just kind of happens that way.
The skinny kid even gets a lick in.
The bullies flee finally, leaving Bucky nursing his own split lip and what’s going to be a fantastic bruise on his arm, and the skinny kid still bleeding from the mouth and now also the nose.
“You didn’t have to do that,” skinny kid says, glaring at him like maybe he’s gonna start hitting Bucky, next. It’s kinda cute, actually. Bold as brass, this kid.
Bucky dabs at his mouth, not glaring back. He gives his best lazy smile, or his second-best lazy smile since his first only works when he’s not bleeding. “Yeah, but I wanted to.” It’s apparently the right answer, because the kid deflates a little, looking like he’d expected a certain response, and that wasn’t it. Bucky takes pity on him and says, “I’m James. Kids at school call me Bucky.”
“How d’you get Bucky from James?” the kid asks, bewildered.
“James Buchanan Barnes,” Bucky elaborates, and grins more. “First year I started school there were six other kids named James, an’ my front teeth kinda stuck out.” He grew into them, but the nickname stuck. Could be worse.
The skinny kid blinks at him blankly, then finally starts to smile, just a little. Makes him look less like a starving rat. It’s a better look than the starving rat. “I’m Steve.”
4. Leaving his best guy (Javert)
He can see the change in Steve’s face when he finally looks up and sees the uniform, sees the badge showing his rank, sees where Bucky is going and Steve can’t go. Just about breaks his damn heart, that look, but it’s not like Steve has any business anywhere near the war.
“You get your orders?”
For a moment he can’t even say it. This whole thing terrifies him, finally shipping him out to the actual front instead of more specialized training. It’s finally here, and he’d-- hell, he’d rather hide under his bed like a little kid. He looks down, steels himself, only pulls up the cocky head-tilt Steve’s expecting after a beat and a breath. “The 107th, Sergeant James Barnes. Shipping out for England first thing tomorrow.”
There’s a pause while Steve looks down and away. “I should be going.”
There’s literally nothing he can say to that. Steve doesn’t understand. Steve starts fights at the drop of a hat. Steve never did really understand why Bucky never wanted to enlist, why the draft letter made him cry, why the uniform he’s wearing now makes him want to puke. So it’s not like he can talk to him about it. Instead he dredges up a smile, slings his arm around his friend’s shoulder, and pulls him out of the filthy alley he’d found him in (getting beat up, like usual; Jesus, he’s never gonna lose the habit of checking every alley he passes in case Steve is getting beat up in it). He says, “C’mon, man. It’s my last night.”
Then he withdraws his arm, realizing Steve landed in garbage on that shoulder. “Gotta get you cleaned up.”
“Why, where we goin’.”
Only the place Bucky had been anticipating for months, hoping to hell he managed to stay undeployed long enough to see it. Christ, Steve’s so caught up in this damn war and how he can’t go die in it, he’s forgetting the good stuff. Bucky doesn’t want to ever forget the good stuff, even if he is going off to die. He shoves the newspaper at him with the Stark Expo headlining. “The future.”
If he’s gotta leave his best guy behind, at least they can spend his last night together, looking forward to the future.
And then dancing. Because otherwise he’ll shake himself to fucking pieces before he even gets on the boat.
4.5 Sniper's Assistant (Hugh Maes)
"Sarge, look out, looks like you've got a friend," Dugan says, and he can hear the grin in his voice. He can't turn to look, because he's got his sights on where one of the Nazi officers is supposed to come out of the bunker any minute, but that doesn't stop him from twitching when he feels four cold, wet little feet land on his back, even through two layers of uniform shirt and jacket.
At least he's pretty sure they're feet. He hopes to God they're feet. They're moving around, in a little circle, in the small of his back. They're... pushing at his shirt, rhythmically. "What the fuck?" he asks of anyone who might happen to want to fill him in.
"It's a kitten," says Gabe, sounding like he's grinning, too. Gabe ain't even supposed to be with their unit, but his own got blown up by HYDRA a few weeks back, only two survivors, and the 107th needed a radio man, so here they are, the first semi-integrated unit in the US Army. Gabe's a great guy, anyway, so fuck the brass anyway.
"How the fuck did a kitten get all the way out here?" Bucky asks, trying not to laugh and either dislodge the kitten or his rifle.
"There's a farm off that way somewhere," Dugan explains, gesturing, either forgetting that Bucky can't actually see him from this angle or just not caring. "Everything but the barn got shelled. There must've been some cats left--"
"Shh!" Bucky interrupts, going still, trying to ignore the vibrating little thing on his back. The door to the bunker just inched open. He lays his cheek against the rifle, watching. Everyone else falls silent until he makes the shot, the Nazi fucker dies, and Bucky takes a moment to swallow and make sure he's not going to be sick. The kitten hasn't even twitched, just keeps purring.
It helps a little. Something small and innocent that doesn't seem to mind that they've turned him into a murderer.
"Okay, somebody get that little thing off me so I can get up," he complains, and everyone laughs. Once he's standing, he collects the little kitten-- soot gray and dirty, but purring wildly once snuggled up against his chest-- and tucks her into his jacket. "Guess we got a new mascot, boys. Gonna name you Brooklyn, kiddo."
5. Smaller (Rosinante)
It’s dark. He can vaguely hear rattling and shuffling of papers, footsteps, from the office beyond the circle of dim green light. It’s all too loud, sharp and painful, each sound making his head throb. It’s the fucking doctor. He knows those fussy little footsteps anywhere.
He mutters his name and serial number, the thing they’re trained to say, to keep from giving away secrets. Not that he knows any real fucking military secrets. A sergeant at his age and level of experience is impressive, but it’s still just a sergeant, not even a command rank. Not that the fucking doctor even asks about secrets. It’s just become a mantra now, something to focus on besides the pain. If he says his name, remembers his serial number, he’s not dead yet.
Feels like it probably won’t be much longer, though.
The footsteps recede. That doesn’t usually happen. They still echo, like they’re right next to him, like they’re... heavier. Longer strides. Kind of light and stealthy. One of the guards, probably. Come to put him out of his misery finally, or maybe carry him off to some new torture machine. He can’t turn his head, vision hazy, most of him strapped down anyway. He’s not going to make it easy on the mook, even if he’s got hardly any energy. Dead weight ain’t fun to haul around.
“Bucky!” he hears. But that’s wrong. Nobody here calls him Bucky. It’s all James and Barnes and Sarge (he likes Sarge, surprisingly). The fucking doctor calls him Sergeant Barnes, as if that title will endear him to his torturer somehow. “Oh my god,” he hears.
For a moment he doesn’t move, just feels the straps holding him down fall away with tearing, rattling noises. It’s not one of the guards, it’s not the fucking doctor, it’s-- “Is-- is it--”
“It’s me. It’s Steve.”
“Steve.” There’s that pointy nose, that stubborn chin, that scruffy hair. Aw, he’s gotta be hallucinating again now, but he smiles anyway. Because it’s Steve, and he looks okay. If Steve were really here, he would not look okay.
He smiles right up until whoever this golem is that replaced his best friend hauls him to his feet, saying, “C’mon.” Steve would have fallen over. Steve would be... looking up at him... not looking down. What. What? He can’t imagine ever hallucinating Steve being taller than he is.
He’s staring, even as Steve-- stubborn chin, pointy nose, scruffy hair, those same blue-green eyes, the same concerned wrinkle between his brows-- looking down at him, holding him up because he’s too unsteady to stand on his own, when Steve can barely hold him upright when he’s just drunk and not half-dead-- even as Steve checks him over briefly for injuries and claps the back of his neck. “I thought you were dead.”
The only thing that comes out as his eyes look up and down the strange giant with Steve’s face is, “I thought you were smaller.”
6. Changes (Alisaie)
The medics have released him. He’s in good shape. Better shape than he should be, honestly, after the factory and the pneumonia and the torture, not to mention the escape and the four-day trek back to base camp. It’s a little baffling to everyone, even Bucky. Especially Bucky. His insides don’t even hurt anymore, like they did when Steve first got him out.
God. Steve. He’s got no clue what to do about that. Steve, who’s off in debrief. Who’s going to come for him next, whether to try and talk or to drag him to debrief, too, now that he’s out of medical. Bucky’s not sure which is going to be worse.
He shuffles off to the mess, because he might be healthy, but he’s also starving. The whole way there, all he’s seeing is the way that dame stared up at Steve.
He’s had four days to get used to new Big Steve, even if it was in enemy territory and he was leading the scouts-- plenty of time to think, loping around the column of the wounded and the weird, giant, Frankenstein version of his friend... it wasn’t enough time. Not enough time to work through what the fuck he’s supposed to do with a Steve who can do things like jump thirty feet and carry his half-dead ass out of a burning factory and actually find his way across actual nature for four actual days without getting lost. When Steve is the one rescuing him, not the other way around. It’s like his whole world is upside down, and it leaves him feeling strangely bereft.
It’s like his whole fucking purpose just went up in smoke. How do you protect a guy who’s big as a brick shithouse and probably tougher than one? What does a guy like that need with a guy like him? It’s not a problem he came up with an answer for in those four days.
It didn’t even occur to him that he’d need to prepare for Steve finding a new face to look for in a crowd. No wonder he kept holding onto that fucked up transponder.
That does make his insides hurt, a little.
Food helps, though not enough. So does finding a bunk and collapsing on it, pausing only long enough to take in his reflection in a dirty mirror hanging on the tent wall. He looks terrible, missing most of his uniform, hair wild and sticking up in places, beard starting to come in for the first time since he started shaving, dark circles under his eyes. There’s even still blood in one ear, shit. He scrubs at it briefly with one dirty sleeve, then gives up and slouches to the empty cot furthest from the door.
But for all he’s exhausted, and his eyes feel gritty and raw, he doesn’t sleep for a long time. He just curls on his side and listens, because he can hear fucking everything. And smell it, he's sure emergency barrack tents never smelled like this before. And if he doesn’t close his eyes-- he does, he absolutely does-- it’s like everything is lit up bright even though the camp lantern in the tent is low and he shouldn’t be able to see much at all.
Jesus. Maybe he should be worrying less about what they did to Steve and more about what they did to him. At least Steve asked for it, apparently.
Even so, it’s Steve he’s still thinking about when he finally manages to block out all the noise and pass out. Steve who should be safe at home, but who somehow found a way to fight after all. Steve who might not need him anymore.
It’s not a happy thought.
7. I Got Rhythm (Misty)
He is not particularly fond of his job, but he is at least good at it. He’s lying in wait, in a trench half-hidden by bomb-ravaged trees trunks, overlooking the enemy line and peering through the Stark-enhanced scope on his rifle, trained on the HYDRA canon, waiting for their gunner to come back. None of the others could make that shot. No one else, at all, as far as Bucky’s been told. It’s tricky, sure, between lines of wire, with only a small space visible between helmet, shielding, and the gun itself once the gunner is in position.
But he can do it. He just needs the bastard to show up. Intel says they only got one guy who can manage to fire the damn thing, so taking him out means taking it out.
Steve sits behind him, watching and waiting, ready to surge up and lead the charge once Bucky’s done his part. And also so the moron doesn’t give away his position again by fucking waving at him or something.
The problem with his job-- besides the whole “shooting people in the fucking head” thing-- is the waiting. It gets really damn boring. The Nazis know perfectly well the Howlies are with the lines, now, and they’re being careful. So the wait has been long.
He starts humming under his breath, one of the songs he remembers from well before the war. One of his favorites.
“Buck. Are you kidding me,” Steve groans.
“Shut up, Steve. Maybe you can sit and stare at that mess for hours, but I actually got half a brain.”
Steve, thankfully, does not kick him, though Bucky can hear him shift as if he’s considering it. “Guess I ain’t surprised,” he says instead. “Ain’t like you’ve changed a bit from Brooklyn.”
They both know that’s a lie. But apparently music hasn’t abandoned him yet, at least.
Finally, finally, he spots movement. He settles a little further down against his rifle, sights, glances aside at the wind gauge. He doesn’t need to do the calculations on paper anymore. He’s pretty sure Steve doesn’t know Bucky used to have to-- he’s good at math, but not that good at math-- or he’d be wondering a lot more than he is what the hell is wrong with him.
“I got rhythm,” he sings softly to himself as a helmet bobs along the trench, low and slinky, like a warning rather than a proper bop. “I got music.” The big HYDRA-modified canon rattles a little as the gunner swings himself up into it, behind the metal shield. “I got my guy.” Bucky sights, finds the narrow stretch of throat, compensates for wind.
Breaths out.
Fires.
Feels the kickback from the rifle.
There’s a cry from the far trenches. Bucky grins what he knows is a terrible grin and finishes the chorus, as Steve stares at him like he’s a stranger. Maybe he is. He’s certainly not who he used to be, and he doesn’t know if either of them like this new Bucky.
“Who could ask for anything more?”
8. Breaking (Riku)
The stump of his arm aches. The doctors keep fucking taking the skin off, and it hurts like a bitch for a while until it starts healing. They’ve tested his pain tolerance on every damn part of him by now, but somehow nothing hurts like fucking with what’s left of his arm.
Right now, everything hurts, actually. He lies on the floor of his cell, exhausted and aching, not bleeding anymore but that’s only because he heals way faster than he even thought he did, when they were still actually fighting a war. He doesn't know how long it’s been. They bring him food twice a day, he thinks, but it’s hard to tell when there’s no fucking windows. He hasn’t seen actual sunlight since he first woke up on an operating table however long ago it’s been.
The lights never change: low and occasionally flickering. The sounds never change, the guards outside his door and the distant sounds of machinery. The view sure as hell never fucking changes, except when they pump drugs into the room and he wakes up with the doctors, the scientists, or the torturers. They haven’t run out of things to test yet.
They showed him his liver on a set of hooks, once, before they put it back in and wrote down how long it took to heal back into place.
But he’s still holding on. Steve will come. The asshole found him in the middle of enemy territory before. That asshole has enhanced senses the same way he does, maybe even better than his. Surely he saw him catch up against the side of the ravine, surely he heard his scream. Even if it’s a slim chance, even if there was no chance, Steve would never give up on him. Maybe it’ll take him a while-- it’s already taken him a while-- but Steve will come. It’s the only thing he has left, at this point: the only hope.
That hope is stretching a little thin, worn down by the mix of monotony and pain, constant hunger and the inexorable march of time. He thinks it might have been a year and a half, maybe two at most. Can’t be more than that, not unless whatever fucking Zola did to him changed how fast his hair grows. The doctors shaved it once a couple months in, to try and do something to his brain (that didn’t stick for more than a few days, thank god, because it left him feeling groggy, nauseous, and unable to speak, and finally resulted in collapse until the damage healed itself) and haven’t cut it since.
It's gotten pretty long.
He rolls onto his back on the floor, shivering but not as cold as he could be, trying to get his muscles to loosen up by stretching them out. Curling in on himself isn’t helping anything, anyway. The cold does help the arm stump.
The cell door rattles, but it doesn’t open. Just the slot they usually shove food through. Probably about time for a meal; he lost track of time during the latest session, their attempt to break him or catalog him or replicate him, or whatever the fuck they’re trying to do since they stopped asking questions ages ago, but he’s hungry. He’s always fucking hungry.
He can hear the heartbeat of the person on the other side of the door. Not a guard. Not a doctor. He knows most of them, by now. Knows the way they breathe, how they smell, how afraid of him they are. This is the one in charge, the one who stops by rarely but who always watches the sessions with him, when he does. He's not afraid at all. Some high brass in the Russian military. He hasn’t visited the cell, though. That’s new.
He finally rolls his head over to see what tasteless shit they brought him today. He’ll eat it, because he has to, because he has to stay alive long enough for Steve to get here. Because he doesn’t want to die, even now.
It’s not food. It’s a set of newspapers.
“Read them,” says the big wig. In Russian, which he’s picked up by now, after all this time. A lot easier than he picked up French from Dernier, in the cages. Something else to blame Zola for, maybe. “I think you might find it enlightening.”
He shuts his eyes and rolls his head back, facing the ceiling, spread-eagled on the cold tile floor, pointedly ignoring the papers.
The big wig chuckles and leaves.
It’s not even curiosity that finally makes him look at the papers, it’s boredom. He doubts it’ll have any real affect on anything, they wouldn’t give him actual intel, any kind of hope. Probably wouldn’t even tell him whether they won the damn war or not.
They’re in English. They’re from New York. They can’t be new, because they’re from just a couple months after he fell. The paper feels right, for a New York paper. It even almost smells right, not entirely as musty and wet as this Russian base. It takes a minute longer to focus on the headlines, maybe some kind of self-defense where his brain knows what it’s about to see and wants to protect him for another couple seconds.
But it can’t protect him forever, especially when it’s been working overtime on denial for probably almost two years, now. “Captain America lost,” they say. “A hero’s death,” they say. “Gave his life for his country. For the world,” they say.
There’s another in French, saying almost the same thing. One in German, crowing about it. A British headline praising his support and bravery, with a quote from Margaret Carter. It’s Carter that makes it finally seem real, and that’s what makes everything break into pieces.
The papers fall from nerveless fingers, and he hardly notices when he starts to cry, silent and shivering on the floor. Steve’s gone. Nothing else matters.
The next time he wakes up from the drugs strapped to a table, he can’t even bring himself to care. Steve is dead. He’s alone. No one is coming for him.
They finally found the way to break him.
9. Creation (Mewtwo)
Furnace.
There’s a word. It plays over and over in the room, in his head, confusing him-- distracting him.
Furnace.
But it can’t distract him. He can't let it. The handler tests his reflexes, his speed, his knowledge of defense with quick jabs to the face and shoulders. His reflexes are good, he is faster than the handler’s attacks, and his defense is perfect: block, dodge, swing away, block again. (Just like we taught him. Be faster, be smarter.)
Furnace.
“Now attack,” the handler says.
He goes on the offensive, fast and strong, perfect in his attacks, but he knows: he knows he must not actually hurt the handler. There will be punishment if he does. They keep hurting him for mistakes like that. He doesn’t know, anymore, why they keep hurting him. Maybe he never knew. (I knew. I used to know. Why don’t I know.)
Furnace.
“Now defend,” the handler says, stepping back, and three more rush at him. He fends them off, and it’s not hard, it’s like they move in slow motion compared to how fast he can move, but he’s so tired. He’s so afraid of what will happen if he fails, or if he hurts one of them too badly. His head hearts, pounding in time with the word. (These fuckers. What are they doing.)
Furnace.
Now they come at him six at once, and they have souped up cattle prods, electrified. Those really hurt, so he tries to avoid them, tries to throw them away from him before they can hit him.
Furnace.
“Who are you?” the handler demands from the sidelines, as he kicks one assailant away.
He doesn’t answer. Can’t answer. He knows what happens when he answers.
Furnace.
“Answer, soldier,” the handler says darkly.
He throws a second assailant across the room to slam into the wall. Too hard, he heard something crack. Not dead. Close, maybe.
Furnace.
“Answer, soldier!”
One of the cattle prods connects hard to the base of his spine, and he screams.
Furnace.
“Answer!”
He wants to know? I’ll fucking tell him. I fucking will.
On fire, trembling, he says the only answer in his head, each word bitten off, angry and pained. “James. Buchanan. Barnes. Sergeant-- number-- 32-- 55--”
Three cattle prods hit him at once, and then there’s nothing but pain, and he can’t even black out.
Furnace. Furnace. Furnace.
That’s all there is.
9.5 Almost Made (Joanna/Kal-El)
One.
There’s a word. It plays over and over in the room, in his head, confusing him-- distracting him.
One.
But it can't distract him. He can't let it. There are guards with weapons, knives and clubs, and he has to fend them off. It's a test. Everything is a test. They need to know if he's ready.
One.
He throws the last assailant out of range and stands waiting, not out of winded, not out of breath, not like the rest of them, but breathing harder than he should be, anyway. The test isn't over. It's never over. He hangs his head, lets his hair hide his face.
One.
"This is your one purpose, Soldier," the handler says from the doorway. "Protect your country."
One.
"Protect your superiors."
One.
"HYDRA needs you."
One.
"Who are you?" he hears.
One.
(I don't know. I don't know how to answer.)
"Who are you, Soldier?"
One.
He can't answer, and in his silence, one of the guards hits him with the now-familiar (why?) cattle prod, and he screams while the word echoes.
One. One. One.
10. Baby Widows (Naminé)
The trainees are very cute. Six year olds generally are. The Soldier probably isn’t the best teacher, not being great at giving orders, but the trainees follow them anyway. Even the unspoken ones, because he doesn’t talk much, either. They seem to like him okay, ever since the first day when they realized he wasn’t like the guards or the handlers.
Possibly because he absolutely adores them.
There’s three of them this time. (This time?) All girls, of course. (Why of course?) He’s already taught them the basics of pistol firing: aiming, compensation for the kick, trigger discipline. Today is breaking holds and turning an attack against the attacker. He has to show them the softest places to hit, so their small size will be a benefit and not a drawback.
But first is their warm-up.
He watches them go through their ballet routine and then run three laps around the training room, listens to them sing in unison, and almost remembers how to smile. There should always be music. Ever since the first trainees (when were there others?), they’ve always sung when they danced, when they did throws, when he taught them how to braid their hair flat so it can’t be grabbed. It’s like they know he likes it, even though liking things isn’t allowed. He doesn’t even have to ask, because asking isn’t allowed, either.
It makes everything so much less frightening when there’s music. Music makes a place better.
Even if he’s teaching little girls how to kill people.
“All right, kids,” he says when they stop and line up in front of him. In Russian, because the guards are always there, but casual Russian, because he fucking adores them. “Let’s get started.”
They’ll be gone soon. He doesn’t know how he knows this, but he knows it. But at least, he thinks, he’ll have helped them stay alive when they get bigger. He can give them that, even if he can't give them anything else.
11. Testing Widows (Ellever)
Rather than going to the prep room, the handler leads him to the training room. That has happened before, he knows, though he can’t remember when. It doesn’t happen often. He can’t remember how he knows that, either.
There are three young women there, standing and waiting, eyes on his face as soon as he comes in-- not the handler; not their handler, a severe-looking older woman in a suit... but him. There’s something about them, like maybe he’s met them before, like maybe he felt something about them. But that can’t be right. He doesn’t remember anything. He certainly doesn’t remember them.
Must be a glitch.
“Test them,” the handler orders. “Don’t damage them, we need them intact. But we need to rank their abilities.”
He can do that. See how well they fare against him, how long they last. He is well trained, but he’ll be careful. He knows how to keep from killing when he must. Besides, he’d really rather not hurt these young women. (Rather not hurt anyone, at all. But that's not allowed.)
They're girls, not young women. As the first squares off against him, it’s clear she can’t actually be older than sixteen. Jesus, they’re putting kids into the field. (Could be younger. Has been younger.) As she launches at him and starts seeking an opening, he’s starting to wonder again if he does know them. She knows things and moves in a way like he would have taught her, if he taught people how to fight.
Maybe he did. He doesn't remember. But he doesn't remember anything from before the mission prep, two hours ago.
She's good, but she still doesn’t last more than two minutes before he has her slammed against the ground with the metal hand around her throat.
The other two girls last less time. But they are still very good. They all stand at attention while the handlers discuss their strengths and weaknesses, as if they’re not there, but the girls watch him, not the handlers.
Sensing the way they watch him is almost uncomfortable. Makes him want to hide, want to duck his head away from their attention. Like he’s done something wrong and he doesn’t know what it is-- but not like they know, either. They don’t judge, there's no anger or blame there. They... admire him.
What the fuck is there to admire, here.
It’s a relief when the handler sends him back to the prep room for the actual mission.
It’s less of a relief when they tell him the girls are his field command.
Fuck, he doesn’t want to have them watching him like that while he kills people.
But it’s not like he has a choice.
12. Mission (Gregor)
The Soldier circles back around after the car crashes, parks the bike, and pops the trunk on the car. He collects the target materiel and straps it to the back of the motorcycle. But he has to make sure there are no witnesses before he takes the target materiel and returns to base. It’s part of the missions parameters, part of his orders. Leave no witnesses.
That both the people in the car are still alive is. Unfortunate. He’s always hated using car crashes to kill people. It never fucking works. (The Soldier doesn’t know how he knows this, but he knows it. He’s gotten used to just knowing things.) “My wife... help my wife,” the man is muttering. The voice sounds like something he ought to know. It makes his steps slower than they should be. He wants the mission to be over, so he can go back into cold storage, but his steps drag.
He grabs the witness by the hair, hauls him up. Stares briefly, brows coming together. The face looks like a face he should know. There hadn’t been pictures in the briefing. So how could he know the face?
“Sergeant Barnes,” the witness says, while his wife calls for him from the car.
Something seizes up inside him. Fear. It’s fear. It’s the terror he feels all the fucking time, except it’s slipping out of the hold he usually keeps on it. He has to complete the mission, can’t fail or there will be punishment, and he can’t know that name. That name means pain. He slams the metal hand into the witness’s face twice, smashing his bones into his skull, and sets him back in the car, as if he were dead on impact.
He takes care of the other witness. He has to use the flesh hand, so it won’t leave grooves from the metal, as if she were throttled by the seat belt, not an assassin. The Soldier wishes he could just fucking shoot her so it wouldn’t take so long for either of them, but it can’t be seen as an attack, just an accident.
Only on his way back to the bike does he spot the camera.
Fuck. He shoots the camera out, scales the fence to remove the tape to bring back to base-- mission parameters, leave no trace of his presence. They will probably punish him for not taking care of it first, but.
That voice. That face. That name. It distracted him. He should know that voice, that face, that name.
The Soldier doesn’t know why he’s crying as he drives back to base. He doesn’t.
13. Powder Kegs (Quentin/Midge)
The trainee kicks him against the cage wall, stands panting and glaring. All the trainees stare and breathe hard, like they're the ones fighting, or like they want to be.
The Soldier picks himself up, tossing sweaty hair out of his face, while the handler praises the trainee. Not the Soldier. He can’t remember a time anyone managed to kick him, as heavy as he is with the arm, into the air, let alone against a wall. (He can’t remember anything, but that’s beside the point. He knows it hasn’t happened.) He’s pretty sure he doesn’t like the feeling, but opinions are not allowed.
He doesn’t say anything.
He wishes the praise was for him.
The trainee doesn’t seem to care for the praise: he slams a technician into the floor. One of the guards-- in riot gear, more than they ever bothered around the Soldier alone-- hits him in punishment... all the trainees surge to their feet. The Soldier can see where this is going.
So can the handler. “Soldat-- get me out of here!” he hisses, gun out over his shoulder, aimed at the trainees.
All hell breaks loose. The trainees all throw themselves at the guards, at the technicians, at anyone in their path, attacking with brutality and fury and no finesse whatsoever. They are volatile. They are not obedient at all.
The Soldier is unaffected. The trainees might be able to kick him or throw him, but the order had never been to overpower or to kill them, just to train them. To test them. Now, the order is to protect the handler, and he does, holding the flesh arm protectively around him, using the metal one to push, punch, and pull away anything in his path, anything that could be a threat to the handler. There are a lot of potential threats to the handler, but there are a lot of guards, and the metal arm is strong.
The cage door slams shut behind it. The handler is safe, and the trainees continue to destroy the men left behind with them. The Soldier could have told them this was a bad idea. Their emptiness is not like the Soldier’s emptiness; they are still people. And they are angry people.
You can’t make a shield out of a keg of gunpowder. These trainees can’t be controlled. They’re going to need to be put down.
He wishes the handler would let him do it. He has to keep him safe, and that’s the only way to do it. To keep all of them safe from that.
The handler flees, but at least he takes the Soldier with him.
14. The Wipe (Rosinante)
It’s sitting in the Chair, only one clamp on its flesh arm, while the techs work on the metal one. The man on the bridge. From the mission. He jammed his metal shield into it, damaged it. Needs repaired.
The man from the mission. The failed mission. It knows that it almost never fails missions, that this is. New. Terrible.
The man from the mission.
“Sergeant Barnes,” it hears, and it twitches, sitting up. Doesn’t hear the techs complain. Hardly sees them. There’s an image in its head, a series of images: a bespectacled face (no, no, no not him) smiling down at him, a train in the snowy mountains, hands clinging to a breaking railing.
“Bucky, no!” a man cries, reaching, failing, falling away as it falls. It knows that man. The man from the mission.
“The procedure is already started,” it hears, and the buzz of the bone saw, the sight of blood on the snow from the stump of an arm. A flash of a medical table, doctors, cutting into him-- it can hear its breath coming faster, harder. “You are to be the new fist of HYDRA,” it hears, as it sees its now mismatched hands, feels terror choke it, feels the shiny new left hand choke one of the doctors. (No doctors, oh god no more doctors--)
“Put him on ice.” And the tank, the glass, the freezing-- seeing its face as the frost takes over and steals its breath-- no more, no please no more, it’s so scared--
The metal arm lashes out, and a technician-- a technician?-- goes flying. Guns point at it from all around. It pants, shivering, only half-aware. The images keep coming, the fear keeps it locked in place, even when the lead handler comes in. Even when it hears, “Mission report. Mission report, now.”
The backhand breaks the loop, focuses it intensely on... the man. The man from the mission, and from the images. “The man on the bridge,” it says, though it knows it shouldn’t. Knows the backhand was only the beginning if it talks back, if it questions. But there is nothing else in its head. “Who was he.”
“You met him earlier this week on another assignment,” Handler Pierce says.
It shouldn’t say it. There will be punishment. But there is nothing else in its head. “I knew him,” it says, not making eye contact, compliant in this at least.
Handler Pierce sits in front of it, meets its eyes for the brief moment that is allowed, before its own slide away. Obedient. Non-threatening. Even if there is nothing in its head but that man. “Your work,” the handler says, “has been a gift to mankind. You’ve shaped the century.” Behind the trigger of a rifle. The hilt of a knife. A hand taking life from someone else. “And I need you to do it one more time.”
One more time. It wants to be done. It wants the mission to end so it can go back into cold storage and feel nothing. The longing makes it suddenly swallow and look further away, carefully not at anyone, into the middle distance, at nothing. Field command is staring hungrily at it, like they want to hurt it, or maybe caress it, or maybe be it. The techs are hanging on the handler’s words. “Society’s at a tipping point between order and chaos, and tomorrow we’re gonna give it a push. But if you don’t do your part, I can’t do mine, and HYDRA can’t give the world the freedom it deserves.”
It wants to be done. It wants to not do it again. It doesn’t want to do its part. “But I knew him,” it repeats, as if it’s broken. Malfunctioning.
The handler sits back, sighs, then pushes to his feet. “Prep him,” he says. The mission will occur whether it wants or not.
“He’s been out of cryofreeze too long--”
“Then wipe him, and start over.”
It knows those words. It doesn’t remember those words, but it knows them. Knows what comes next. Its face crumples, but it remains compliant, lets the technician insert the bite guard, while field command continues to stare with that awful expression, while the handler walks away. The Chair leans back, clamps it in place with heavy metal bars, because it can’t control itself now. Shivers and shudders and pants around clenched teeth, ever muscle tense as the machine closes over its face.
Then there is just pain, and distant screaming.
15. Death (Cao Pi)
“You know me,” the target says.
It does. It knows that stupid fucking face-- would know it anywhere-- and that is terrifying. How does it know. They have never met. (It can only remember the past twenty-four hours. That is familiar. Horrible, but familiar.)
“No, I don’t,” it growls, swinging the metal arm-- the flesh one throbs, uncoordinated, dislocated; its ribs ache from the crossbar that had it trapped a moment before-- and knocking the target aside. It’s messy, just pummeling a target. Should be a knife. Should be a gun. But the target has been stabbed and slashed and shot, and he’s still standing.
Well, sort of standing.
The Asset is only sort of standing, too, breathing hard, rasping on the smoke from the slowly sinking helicarrier. “Bucky.” It looks up, something pinching deep inside at that word. The target hadn’t said it yet-- not that one. Buck, he’d said. Not Bucky. For a moment, it stares, breathless, aching strangely in a way not related to bruised ribs. “You’ve known me your whole life.”
What whole life? It has no life. It is a weapon. The metal arm swings again, knocks the target back again.
“Your name is James Buchanan Barnes,” the target continues anyway.
That doesn’t pinch. That burns. That stabs. That name. It can’t know that name. That name comes with pain. The fear surges up, swallowing the hurt in its head and shoulder. “Shut up!” it roars, swinging again, throwing them both off-balance on the already-unsteady surface.
The target yanks his helmet off while it regains its footing, drops his shield, lets it fall through the broken glass to the river below, stares at him with earnest blue eyes and a deeply concerned brow. “I’m not gonna fight you. You’re my friend.”
It doesn’t know why that fills it with sorrow. A wild, clawing sorrow that it can only express through rage, charging across the distance between them and hurling the target back, throwing him to the metal supports, holding him down. “You’re my mission,” it insists, furious and terrified, and hits. And hits. And hits again. And hits again.
True to his word, the target doesn’t fight back. He takes it. Makes it hesitate, holding the metal fist aloft and staring. Why isn’t he fighting back. “Then finish it,” the target slurs through swollen and bloodied lips. “Cuz I’m with ya to... the end of the line.”
The words cut, but not like the other ones. There’s no fear with those words. There’s-- there’s warmth. Acceptance. With ya till the end of the line, pal, it hears, in a voice something like its own. The metal fist starts to come down, the rage starts to die, replaced by confusion. The mission is gone. There is no mission, just a man struggling to breathe under its curled and unsteady flesh arm. A man who claims to be its friend. That it can’t bring itself to actually kill. The mission is gone.
Then there’s a horrible creaking sound, metal screaming, and everything goes white. That’s death. It doesn’t remember, but it knows, it knows death, both dealing and receiving. It has time for a split second to panic about the no-longer-a-target-- it can’t leave, it can’t let him die-- then nothing.
1. Pa (Soldat)
“Pa? Pa, tell us a story.”
Pa was always better at stories than Ma. Jamie sits up in bed, putting on his most pleading expression. “Please, Pa?”
“Will you go to sleep if I do?” Pa asks, sounding weary, but Jamie knows better. Pa loves telling stories.
“I promise,” Jamie says.
“Promith,” Becca lisps from her own bed on the other side of the room, even though she already sounds half-asleep. Baby Susie is bedded down with Ma in the other room, and Toby is already asleep next to Jamie, breathing wheezily, so it’s just the two of them to promise.
“What do you want a story about?” Pa asks, coming to sit on the edge of Becca’s bed.
“About the war?” Becca asks, which is one of her favorite things to ask. Pa hates talking about it, which is probably why she asks, because she’s a brat. Or else she’s just bloody-minded. Jamie hates hearing about the war. It makes Pa sad and Ma careful and it sounds scary. He thinks Becca likes to be scared, maybe.
“No, tell us one about the knights,” he counters.
“That’s better for a bedtime story,” Pa says, while Becca pouts. He strokes her hair. “Knights and princesses are less likely to give my babies nightmares.”
“Don’t have nightmareth,” Becca grumbles, but subsides readily enough when their Pa starts her own favorite, about the fairy queen and King Arthur. She and Jamie are both asleep before he finished, and Jamie dreams of wings and shining armor.
2. Stupid Songs (Sora)
He sits on the floor, holding out his hands to little Susie, who’s just old enough to be a nightmare on two chubby feet and babble mostly-nonsense. Baby Jeanie is tied up in a sling on his Ma’s hip while she kneads dough, while Becca has Toby in her lap at the kitchen table, keeping everyone distracted from his coughing (even himself) by telling him a story with some of her paper dolls. There’s flour everywhere.
Susie puts her hands against Jamie’s, and he pulls his back gently to make the little clap. “Like that, Susie.” She mimics him, giggling, and meets her hands again.
This is the last summer day he gets to spend with his brother and sisters. Tomorrow he starts school (yuck). He wants it to last forever. He doesn’t want to go to school, when he has to wear uncomfortable clothes and answer to teachers and learn to read, how’s any of that important? How's any of that better than spending time with his sisters and brother? But Ma says he has to, and what Ma says goes.
Even if he might have had a single unwise tantrum about it a couple weeks ago. He still remembers the swats he got for that.
Becca looks down from her dolls. “You have to sing the song,” she says. Her front tooth came in last spring, and she no longer lisps. (Jamie kinda misses it.) Becca doesn’t have to start school until next year.
“I do not have to sing the song,” he counters. He was patient with Susie, but he doesn’t have to be patient with Becca, because she’s almost as old as he is. And a brat.
That doesn’t mean Becca doesn’t keep insisting. “You do!”
“It’s a dumb song,” Jamie says. “You hardly even sing it!”
“Song song!” Susie cries, and he sighs heavily.
“Okay, fine.” If Susie wants him to. And holds out his hands again, letting Susie pat them. “Patty cake, patty cake...”
3. Friendship (Fjord)
“I ain’t scared of you!”
What a thing to hear coming out of an alleyway. Bucky stops to peer in, as much out of curiosity as out of a desire to see if he needs to help anybody.
He sees one skinny kid, maybe nine years old, a year or two younger than he is, holding up his fists like he’s ready to fight. Bucky doesn’t recognize him, but he’s got to admire that spirit, especially since it looks like he’d already been hit once or twice, judging from the split lip. He’s standing up to three much heavier boys. Bucky actually does recognize one of them as one of the local bullies, always hitting up the smaller kids for their lunch money, or because they looked at him funny, or because he could. Bucky has already beat him up a couple times for calling his Ma a dirty Jew, and his sister a brat (he’s the only one allowed to call her that), and little Toby (may the poor kid rest in peace) a waste of space that deserved to be in the ground.
Well, now he’s gotta intervene just on principle. He hates that guy.
“Hey! Why doncha pick on someone your own size!” he shouts, and without any more warning than that, dives right in, laying about him with fists and feet and one memorable time, a headbutt. The surprise works for him, and the fact that he’s been beating up people for picking on his family almost since he started school. When your Ma don’t go to church, it just kind of happens that way.
The skinny kid even gets a lick in.
The bullies flee finally, leaving Bucky nursing his own split lip and what’s going to be a fantastic bruise on his arm, and the skinny kid still bleeding from the mouth and now also the nose.
“You didn’t have to do that,” skinny kid says, glaring at him like maybe he’s gonna start hitting Bucky, next. It’s kinda cute, actually. Bold as brass, this kid.
Bucky dabs at his mouth, not glaring back. He gives his best lazy smile, or his second-best lazy smile since his first only works when he’s not bleeding. “Yeah, but I wanted to.” It’s apparently the right answer, because the kid deflates a little, looking like he’d expected a certain response, and that wasn’t it. Bucky takes pity on him and says, “I’m James. Kids at school call me Bucky.”
“How d’you get Bucky from James?” the kid asks, bewildered.
“James Buchanan Barnes,” Bucky elaborates, and grins more. “First year I started school there were six other kids named James, an’ my front teeth kinda stuck out.” He grew into them, but the nickname stuck. Could be worse.
The skinny kid blinks at him blankly, then finally starts to smile, just a little. Makes him look less like a starving rat. It’s a better look than the starving rat. “I’m Steve.”
4. Leaving his best guy (Javert)
He can see the change in Steve’s face when he finally looks up and sees the uniform, sees the badge showing his rank, sees where Bucky is going and Steve can’t go. Just about breaks his damn heart, that look, but it’s not like Steve has any business anywhere near the war.
“You get your orders?”
For a moment he can’t even say it. This whole thing terrifies him, finally shipping him out to the actual front instead of more specialized training. It’s finally here, and he’d-- hell, he’d rather hide under his bed like a little kid. He looks down, steels himself, only pulls up the cocky head-tilt Steve’s expecting after a beat and a breath. “The 107th, Sergeant James Barnes. Shipping out for England first thing tomorrow.”
There’s a pause while Steve looks down and away. “I should be going.”
There’s literally nothing he can say to that. Steve doesn’t understand. Steve starts fights at the drop of a hat. Steve never did really understand why Bucky never wanted to enlist, why the draft letter made him cry, why the uniform he’s wearing now makes him want to puke. So it’s not like he can talk to him about it. Instead he dredges up a smile, slings his arm around his friend’s shoulder, and pulls him out of the filthy alley he’d found him in (getting beat up, like usual; Jesus, he’s never gonna lose the habit of checking every alley he passes in case Steve is getting beat up in it). He says, “C’mon, man. It’s my last night.”
Then he withdraws his arm, realizing Steve landed in garbage on that shoulder. “Gotta get you cleaned up.”
“Why, where we goin’.”
Only the place Bucky had been anticipating for months, hoping to hell he managed to stay undeployed long enough to see it. Christ, Steve’s so caught up in this damn war and how he can’t go die in it, he’s forgetting the good stuff. Bucky doesn’t want to ever forget the good stuff, even if he is going off to die. He shoves the newspaper at him with the Stark Expo headlining. “The future.”
If he’s gotta leave his best guy behind, at least they can spend his last night together, looking forward to the future.
And then dancing. Because otherwise he’ll shake himself to fucking pieces before he even gets on the boat.
4.5 Sniper's Assistant (Hugh Maes)
"Sarge, look out, looks like you've got a friend," Dugan says, and he can hear the grin in his voice. He can't turn to look, because he's got his sights on where one of the Nazi officers is supposed to come out of the bunker any minute, but that doesn't stop him from twitching when he feels four cold, wet little feet land on his back, even through two layers of uniform shirt and jacket.
At least he's pretty sure they're feet. He hopes to God they're feet. They're moving around, in a little circle, in the small of his back. They're... pushing at his shirt, rhythmically. "What the fuck?" he asks of anyone who might happen to want to fill him in.
"It's a kitten," says Gabe, sounding like he's grinning, too. Gabe ain't even supposed to be with their unit, but his own got blown up by HYDRA a few weeks back, only two survivors, and the 107th needed a radio man, so here they are, the first semi-integrated unit in the US Army. Gabe's a great guy, anyway, so fuck the brass anyway.
"How the fuck did a kitten get all the way out here?" Bucky asks, trying not to laugh and either dislodge the kitten or his rifle.
"There's a farm off that way somewhere," Dugan explains, gesturing, either forgetting that Bucky can't actually see him from this angle or just not caring. "Everything but the barn got shelled. There must've been some cats left--"
"Shh!" Bucky interrupts, going still, trying to ignore the vibrating little thing on his back. The door to the bunker just inched open. He lays his cheek against the rifle, watching. Everyone else falls silent until he makes the shot, the Nazi fucker dies, and Bucky takes a moment to swallow and make sure he's not going to be sick. The kitten hasn't even twitched, just keeps purring.
It helps a little. Something small and innocent that doesn't seem to mind that they've turned him into a murderer.
"Okay, somebody get that little thing off me so I can get up," he complains, and everyone laughs. Once he's standing, he collects the little kitten-- soot gray and dirty, but purring wildly once snuggled up against his chest-- and tucks her into his jacket. "Guess we got a new mascot, boys. Gonna name you Brooklyn, kiddo."
5. Smaller (Rosinante)
It’s dark. He can vaguely hear rattling and shuffling of papers, footsteps, from the office beyond the circle of dim green light. It’s all too loud, sharp and painful, each sound making his head throb. It’s the fucking doctor. He knows those fussy little footsteps anywhere.
He mutters his name and serial number, the thing they’re trained to say, to keep from giving away secrets. Not that he knows any real fucking military secrets. A sergeant at his age and level of experience is impressive, but it’s still just a sergeant, not even a command rank. Not that the fucking doctor even asks about secrets. It’s just become a mantra now, something to focus on besides the pain. If he says his name, remembers his serial number, he’s not dead yet.
Feels like it probably won’t be much longer, though.
The footsteps recede. That doesn’t usually happen. They still echo, like they’re right next to him, like they’re... heavier. Longer strides. Kind of light and stealthy. One of the guards, probably. Come to put him out of his misery finally, or maybe carry him off to some new torture machine. He can’t turn his head, vision hazy, most of him strapped down anyway. He’s not going to make it easy on the mook, even if he’s got hardly any energy. Dead weight ain’t fun to haul around.
“Bucky!” he hears. But that’s wrong. Nobody here calls him Bucky. It’s all James and Barnes and Sarge (he likes Sarge, surprisingly). The fucking doctor calls him Sergeant Barnes, as if that title will endear him to his torturer somehow. “Oh my god,” he hears.
For a moment he doesn’t move, just feels the straps holding him down fall away with tearing, rattling noises. It’s not one of the guards, it’s not the fucking doctor, it’s-- “Is-- is it--”
“It’s me. It’s Steve.”
“Steve.” There’s that pointy nose, that stubborn chin, that scruffy hair. Aw, he’s gotta be hallucinating again now, but he smiles anyway. Because it’s Steve, and he looks okay. If Steve were really here, he would not look okay.
He smiles right up until whoever this golem is that replaced his best friend hauls him to his feet, saying, “C’mon.” Steve would have fallen over. Steve would be... looking up at him... not looking down. What. What? He can’t imagine ever hallucinating Steve being taller than he is.
He’s staring, even as Steve-- stubborn chin, pointy nose, scruffy hair, those same blue-green eyes, the same concerned wrinkle between his brows-- looking down at him, holding him up because he’s too unsteady to stand on his own, when Steve can barely hold him upright when he’s just drunk and not half-dead-- even as Steve checks him over briefly for injuries and claps the back of his neck. “I thought you were dead.”
The only thing that comes out as his eyes look up and down the strange giant with Steve’s face is, “I thought you were smaller.”
6. Changes (Alisaie)
The medics have released him. He’s in good shape. Better shape than he should be, honestly, after the factory and the pneumonia and the torture, not to mention the escape and the four-day trek back to base camp. It’s a little baffling to everyone, even Bucky. Especially Bucky. His insides don’t even hurt anymore, like they did when Steve first got him out.
God. Steve. He’s got no clue what to do about that. Steve, who’s off in debrief. Who’s going to come for him next, whether to try and talk or to drag him to debrief, too, now that he’s out of medical. Bucky’s not sure which is going to be worse.
He shuffles off to the mess, because he might be healthy, but he’s also starving. The whole way there, all he’s seeing is the way that dame stared up at Steve.
He’s had four days to get used to new Big Steve, even if it was in enemy territory and he was leading the scouts-- plenty of time to think, loping around the column of the wounded and the weird, giant, Frankenstein version of his friend... it wasn’t enough time. Not enough time to work through what the fuck he’s supposed to do with a Steve who can do things like jump thirty feet and carry his half-dead ass out of a burning factory and actually find his way across actual nature for four actual days without getting lost. When Steve is the one rescuing him, not the other way around. It’s like his whole world is upside down, and it leaves him feeling strangely bereft.
It’s like his whole fucking purpose just went up in smoke. How do you protect a guy who’s big as a brick shithouse and probably tougher than one? What does a guy like that need with a guy like him? It’s not a problem he came up with an answer for in those four days.
It didn’t even occur to him that he’d need to prepare for Steve finding a new face to look for in a crowd. No wonder he kept holding onto that fucked up transponder.
That does make his insides hurt, a little.
Food helps, though not enough. So does finding a bunk and collapsing on it, pausing only long enough to take in his reflection in a dirty mirror hanging on the tent wall. He looks terrible, missing most of his uniform, hair wild and sticking up in places, beard starting to come in for the first time since he started shaving, dark circles under his eyes. There’s even still blood in one ear, shit. He scrubs at it briefly with one dirty sleeve, then gives up and slouches to the empty cot furthest from the door.
But for all he’s exhausted, and his eyes feel gritty and raw, he doesn’t sleep for a long time. He just curls on his side and listens, because he can hear fucking everything. And smell it, he's sure emergency barrack tents never smelled like this before. And if he doesn’t close his eyes-- he does, he absolutely does-- it’s like everything is lit up bright even though the camp lantern in the tent is low and he shouldn’t be able to see much at all.
Jesus. Maybe he should be worrying less about what they did to Steve and more about what they did to him. At least Steve asked for it, apparently.
Even so, it’s Steve he’s still thinking about when he finally manages to block out all the noise and pass out. Steve who should be safe at home, but who somehow found a way to fight after all. Steve who might not need him anymore.
It’s not a happy thought.
7. I Got Rhythm (Misty)
He is not particularly fond of his job, but he is at least good at it. He’s lying in wait, in a trench half-hidden by bomb-ravaged trees trunks, overlooking the enemy line and peering through the Stark-enhanced scope on his rifle, trained on the HYDRA canon, waiting for their gunner to come back. None of the others could make that shot. No one else, at all, as far as Bucky’s been told. It’s tricky, sure, between lines of wire, with only a small space visible between helmet, shielding, and the gun itself once the gunner is in position.
But he can do it. He just needs the bastard to show up. Intel says they only got one guy who can manage to fire the damn thing, so taking him out means taking it out.
Steve sits behind him, watching and waiting, ready to surge up and lead the charge once Bucky’s done his part. And also so the moron doesn’t give away his position again by fucking waving at him or something.
The problem with his job-- besides the whole “shooting people in the fucking head” thing-- is the waiting. It gets really damn boring. The Nazis know perfectly well the Howlies are with the lines, now, and they’re being careful. So the wait has been long.
He starts humming under his breath, one of the songs he remembers from well before the war. One of his favorites.
“Buck. Are you kidding me,” Steve groans.
“Shut up, Steve. Maybe you can sit and stare at that mess for hours, but I actually got half a brain.”
Steve, thankfully, does not kick him, though Bucky can hear him shift as if he’s considering it. “Guess I ain’t surprised,” he says instead. “Ain’t like you’ve changed a bit from Brooklyn.”
They both know that’s a lie. But apparently music hasn’t abandoned him yet, at least.
Finally, finally, he spots movement. He settles a little further down against his rifle, sights, glances aside at the wind gauge. He doesn’t need to do the calculations on paper anymore. He’s pretty sure Steve doesn’t know Bucky used to have to-- he’s good at math, but not that good at math-- or he’d be wondering a lot more than he is what the hell is wrong with him.
“I got rhythm,” he sings softly to himself as a helmet bobs along the trench, low and slinky, like a warning rather than a proper bop. “I got music.” The big HYDRA-modified canon rattles a little as the gunner swings himself up into it, behind the metal shield. “I got my guy.” Bucky sights, finds the narrow stretch of throat, compensates for wind.
Breaths out.
Fires.
Feels the kickback from the rifle.
There’s a cry from the far trenches. Bucky grins what he knows is a terrible grin and finishes the chorus, as Steve stares at him like he’s a stranger. Maybe he is. He’s certainly not who he used to be, and he doesn’t know if either of them like this new Bucky.
“Who could ask for anything more?”
8. Breaking (Riku)
The stump of his arm aches. The doctors keep fucking taking the skin off, and it hurts like a bitch for a while until it starts healing. They’ve tested his pain tolerance on every damn part of him by now, but somehow nothing hurts like fucking with what’s left of his arm.
Right now, everything hurts, actually. He lies on the floor of his cell, exhausted and aching, not bleeding anymore but that’s only because he heals way faster than he even thought he did, when they were still actually fighting a war. He doesn't know how long it’s been. They bring him food twice a day, he thinks, but it’s hard to tell when there’s no fucking windows. He hasn’t seen actual sunlight since he first woke up on an operating table however long ago it’s been.
The lights never change: low and occasionally flickering. The sounds never change, the guards outside his door and the distant sounds of machinery. The view sure as hell never fucking changes, except when they pump drugs into the room and he wakes up with the doctors, the scientists, or the torturers. They haven’t run out of things to test yet.
They showed him his liver on a set of hooks, once, before they put it back in and wrote down how long it took to heal back into place.
But he’s still holding on. Steve will come. The asshole found him in the middle of enemy territory before. That asshole has enhanced senses the same way he does, maybe even better than his. Surely he saw him catch up against the side of the ravine, surely he heard his scream. Even if it’s a slim chance, even if there was no chance, Steve would never give up on him. Maybe it’ll take him a while-- it’s already taken him a while-- but Steve will come. It’s the only thing he has left, at this point: the only hope.
That hope is stretching a little thin, worn down by the mix of monotony and pain, constant hunger and the inexorable march of time. He thinks it might have been a year and a half, maybe two at most. Can’t be more than that, not unless whatever fucking Zola did to him changed how fast his hair grows. The doctors shaved it once a couple months in, to try and do something to his brain (that didn’t stick for more than a few days, thank god, because it left him feeling groggy, nauseous, and unable to speak, and finally resulted in collapse until the damage healed itself) and haven’t cut it since.
It's gotten pretty long.
He rolls onto his back on the floor, shivering but not as cold as he could be, trying to get his muscles to loosen up by stretching them out. Curling in on himself isn’t helping anything, anyway. The cold does help the arm stump.
The cell door rattles, but it doesn’t open. Just the slot they usually shove food through. Probably about time for a meal; he lost track of time during the latest session, their attempt to break him or catalog him or replicate him, or whatever the fuck they’re trying to do since they stopped asking questions ages ago, but he’s hungry. He’s always fucking hungry.
He can hear the heartbeat of the person on the other side of the door. Not a guard. Not a doctor. He knows most of them, by now. Knows the way they breathe, how they smell, how afraid of him they are. This is the one in charge, the one who stops by rarely but who always watches the sessions with him, when he does. He's not afraid at all. Some high brass in the Russian military. He hasn’t visited the cell, though. That’s new.
He finally rolls his head over to see what tasteless shit they brought him today. He’ll eat it, because he has to, because he has to stay alive long enough for Steve to get here. Because he doesn’t want to die, even now.
It’s not food. It’s a set of newspapers.
“Read them,” says the big wig. In Russian, which he’s picked up by now, after all this time. A lot easier than he picked up French from Dernier, in the cages. Something else to blame Zola for, maybe. “I think you might find it enlightening.”
He shuts his eyes and rolls his head back, facing the ceiling, spread-eagled on the cold tile floor, pointedly ignoring the papers.
The big wig chuckles and leaves.
It’s not even curiosity that finally makes him look at the papers, it’s boredom. He doubts it’ll have any real affect on anything, they wouldn’t give him actual intel, any kind of hope. Probably wouldn’t even tell him whether they won the damn war or not.
They’re in English. They’re from New York. They can’t be new, because they’re from just a couple months after he fell. The paper feels right, for a New York paper. It even almost smells right, not entirely as musty and wet as this Russian base. It takes a minute longer to focus on the headlines, maybe some kind of self-defense where his brain knows what it’s about to see and wants to protect him for another couple seconds.
But it can’t protect him forever, especially when it’s been working overtime on denial for probably almost two years, now. “Captain America lost,” they say. “A hero’s death,” they say. “Gave his life for his country. For the world,” they say.
There’s another in French, saying almost the same thing. One in German, crowing about it. A British headline praising his support and bravery, with a quote from Margaret Carter. It’s Carter that makes it finally seem real, and that’s what makes everything break into pieces.
The papers fall from nerveless fingers, and he hardly notices when he starts to cry, silent and shivering on the floor. Steve’s gone. Nothing else matters.
The next time he wakes up from the drugs strapped to a table, he can’t even bring himself to care. Steve is dead. He’s alone. No one is coming for him.
They finally found the way to break him.
9. Creation (Mewtwo)
Furnace.
There’s a word. It plays over and over in the room, in his head, confusing him-- distracting him.
Furnace.
But it can’t distract him. He can't let it. The handler tests his reflexes, his speed, his knowledge of defense with quick jabs to the face and shoulders. His reflexes are good, he is faster than the handler’s attacks, and his defense is perfect: block, dodge, swing away, block again. (Just like we taught him. Be faster, be smarter.)
Furnace.
“Now attack,” the handler says.
He goes on the offensive, fast and strong, perfect in his attacks, but he knows: he knows he must not actually hurt the handler. There will be punishment if he does. They keep hurting him for mistakes like that. He doesn’t know, anymore, why they keep hurting him. Maybe he never knew. (I knew. I used to know. Why don’t I know.)
Furnace.
“Now defend,” the handler says, stepping back, and three more rush at him. He fends them off, and it’s not hard, it’s like they move in slow motion compared to how fast he can move, but he’s so tired. He’s so afraid of what will happen if he fails, or if he hurts one of them too badly. His head hearts, pounding in time with the word. (These fuckers. What are they doing.)
Furnace.
Now they come at him six at once, and they have souped up cattle prods, electrified. Those really hurt, so he tries to avoid them, tries to throw them away from him before they can hit him.
Furnace.
“Who are you?” the handler demands from the sidelines, as he kicks one assailant away.
He doesn’t answer. Can’t answer. He knows what happens when he answers.
Furnace.
“Answer, soldier,” the handler says darkly.
He throws a second assailant across the room to slam into the wall. Too hard, he heard something crack. Not dead. Close, maybe.
Furnace.
“Answer, soldier!”
One of the cattle prods connects hard to the base of his spine, and he screams.
Furnace.
“Answer!”
He wants to know? I’ll fucking tell him. I fucking will.
On fire, trembling, he says the only answer in his head, each word bitten off, angry and pained. “James. Buchanan. Barnes. Sergeant-- number-- 32-- 55--”
Three cattle prods hit him at once, and then there’s nothing but pain, and he can’t even black out.
Furnace. Furnace. Furnace.
That’s all there is.
9.5 Almost Made (Joanna/Kal-El)
One.
There’s a word. It plays over and over in the room, in his head, confusing him-- distracting him.
One.
But it can't distract him. He can't let it. There are guards with weapons, knives and clubs, and he has to fend them off. It's a test. Everything is a test. They need to know if he's ready.
One.
He throws the last assailant out of range and stands waiting, not out of winded, not out of breath, not like the rest of them, but breathing harder than he should be, anyway. The test isn't over. It's never over. He hangs his head, lets his hair hide his face.
One.
"This is your one purpose, Soldier," the handler says from the doorway. "Protect your country."
One.
"Protect your superiors."
One.
"HYDRA needs you."
One.
"Who are you?" he hears.
One.
(I don't know. I don't know how to answer.)
"Who are you, Soldier?"
One.
He can't answer, and in his silence, one of the guards hits him with the now-familiar (why?) cattle prod, and he screams while the word echoes.
One. One. One.
10. Baby Widows (Naminé)
The trainees are very cute. Six year olds generally are. The Soldier probably isn’t the best teacher, not being great at giving orders, but the trainees follow them anyway. Even the unspoken ones, because he doesn’t talk much, either. They seem to like him okay, ever since the first day when they realized he wasn’t like the guards or the handlers.
Possibly because he absolutely adores them.
There’s three of them this time. (This time?) All girls, of course. (Why of course?) He’s already taught them the basics of pistol firing: aiming, compensation for the kick, trigger discipline. Today is breaking holds and turning an attack against the attacker. He has to show them the softest places to hit, so their small size will be a benefit and not a drawback.
But first is their warm-up.
He watches them go through their ballet routine and then run three laps around the training room, listens to them sing in unison, and almost remembers how to smile. There should always be music. Ever since the first trainees (when were there others?), they’ve always sung when they danced, when they did throws, when he taught them how to braid their hair flat so it can’t be grabbed. It’s like they know he likes it, even though liking things isn’t allowed. He doesn’t even have to ask, because asking isn’t allowed, either.
It makes everything so much less frightening when there’s music. Music makes a place better.
Even if he’s teaching little girls how to kill people.
“All right, kids,” he says when they stop and line up in front of him. In Russian, because the guards are always there, but casual Russian, because he fucking adores them. “Let’s get started.”
They’ll be gone soon. He doesn’t know how he knows this, but he knows it. But at least, he thinks, he’ll have helped them stay alive when they get bigger. He can give them that, even if he can't give them anything else.
11. Testing Widows (Ellever)
Rather than going to the prep room, the handler leads him to the training room. That has happened before, he knows, though he can’t remember when. It doesn’t happen often. He can’t remember how he knows that, either.
There are three young women there, standing and waiting, eyes on his face as soon as he comes in-- not the handler; not their handler, a severe-looking older woman in a suit... but him. There’s something about them, like maybe he’s met them before, like maybe he felt something about them. But that can’t be right. He doesn’t remember anything. He certainly doesn’t remember them.
Must be a glitch.
“Test them,” the handler orders. “Don’t damage them, we need them intact. But we need to rank their abilities.”
He can do that. See how well they fare against him, how long they last. He is well trained, but he’ll be careful. He knows how to keep from killing when he must. Besides, he’d really rather not hurt these young women. (Rather not hurt anyone, at all. But that's not allowed.)
They're girls, not young women. As the first squares off against him, it’s clear she can’t actually be older than sixteen. Jesus, they’re putting kids into the field. (Could be younger. Has been younger.) As she launches at him and starts seeking an opening, he’s starting to wonder again if he does know them. She knows things and moves in a way like he would have taught her, if he taught people how to fight.
Maybe he did. He doesn't remember. But he doesn't remember anything from before the mission prep, two hours ago.
She's good, but she still doesn’t last more than two minutes before he has her slammed against the ground with the metal hand around her throat.
The other two girls last less time. But they are still very good. They all stand at attention while the handlers discuss their strengths and weaknesses, as if they’re not there, but the girls watch him, not the handlers.
Sensing the way they watch him is almost uncomfortable. Makes him want to hide, want to duck his head away from their attention. Like he’s done something wrong and he doesn’t know what it is-- but not like they know, either. They don’t judge, there's no anger or blame there. They... admire him.
What the fuck is there to admire, here.
It’s a relief when the handler sends him back to the prep room for the actual mission.
It’s less of a relief when they tell him the girls are his field command.
Fuck, he doesn’t want to have them watching him like that while he kills people.
But it’s not like he has a choice.
12. Mission (Gregor)
The Soldier circles back around after the car crashes, parks the bike, and pops the trunk on the car. He collects the target materiel and straps it to the back of the motorcycle. But he has to make sure there are no witnesses before he takes the target materiel and returns to base. It’s part of the missions parameters, part of his orders. Leave no witnesses.
That both the people in the car are still alive is. Unfortunate. He’s always hated using car crashes to kill people. It never fucking works. (The Soldier doesn’t know how he knows this, but he knows it. He’s gotten used to just knowing things.) “My wife... help my wife,” the man is muttering. The voice sounds like something he ought to know. It makes his steps slower than they should be. He wants the mission to be over, so he can go back into cold storage, but his steps drag.
He grabs the witness by the hair, hauls him up. Stares briefly, brows coming together. The face looks like a face he should know. There hadn’t been pictures in the briefing. So how could he know the face?
“Sergeant Barnes,” the witness says, while his wife calls for him from the car.
Something seizes up inside him. Fear. It’s fear. It’s the terror he feels all the fucking time, except it’s slipping out of the hold he usually keeps on it. He has to complete the mission, can’t fail or there will be punishment, and he can’t know that name. That name means pain. He slams the metal hand into the witness’s face twice, smashing his bones into his skull, and sets him back in the car, as if he were dead on impact.
He takes care of the other witness. He has to use the flesh hand, so it won’t leave grooves from the metal, as if she were throttled by the seat belt, not an assassin. The Soldier wishes he could just fucking shoot her so it wouldn’t take so long for either of them, but it can’t be seen as an attack, just an accident.
Only on his way back to the bike does he spot the camera.
Fuck. He shoots the camera out, scales the fence to remove the tape to bring back to base-- mission parameters, leave no trace of his presence. They will probably punish him for not taking care of it first, but.
That voice. That face. That name. It distracted him. He should know that voice, that face, that name.
The Soldier doesn’t know why he’s crying as he drives back to base. He doesn’t.
13. Powder Kegs (Quentin/Midge)
The trainee kicks him against the cage wall, stands panting and glaring. All the trainees stare and breathe hard, like they're the ones fighting, or like they want to be.
The Soldier picks himself up, tossing sweaty hair out of his face, while the handler praises the trainee. Not the Soldier. He can’t remember a time anyone managed to kick him, as heavy as he is with the arm, into the air, let alone against a wall. (He can’t remember anything, but that’s beside the point. He knows it hasn’t happened.) He’s pretty sure he doesn’t like the feeling, but opinions are not allowed.
He doesn’t say anything.
He wishes the praise was for him.
The trainee doesn’t seem to care for the praise: he slams a technician into the floor. One of the guards-- in riot gear, more than they ever bothered around the Soldier alone-- hits him in punishment... all the trainees surge to their feet. The Soldier can see where this is going.
So can the handler. “Soldat-- get me out of here!” he hisses, gun out over his shoulder, aimed at the trainees.
All hell breaks loose. The trainees all throw themselves at the guards, at the technicians, at anyone in their path, attacking with brutality and fury and no finesse whatsoever. They are volatile. They are not obedient at all.
The Soldier is unaffected. The trainees might be able to kick him or throw him, but the order had never been to overpower or to kill them, just to train them. To test them. Now, the order is to protect the handler, and he does, holding the flesh arm protectively around him, using the metal one to push, punch, and pull away anything in his path, anything that could be a threat to the handler. There are a lot of potential threats to the handler, but there are a lot of guards, and the metal arm is strong.
The cage door slams shut behind it. The handler is safe, and the trainees continue to destroy the men left behind with them. The Soldier could have told them this was a bad idea. Their emptiness is not like the Soldier’s emptiness; they are still people. And they are angry people.
You can’t make a shield out of a keg of gunpowder. These trainees can’t be controlled. They’re going to need to be put down.
He wishes the handler would let him do it. He has to keep him safe, and that’s the only way to do it. To keep all of them safe from that.
The handler flees, but at least he takes the Soldier with him.
14. The Wipe (Rosinante)
It’s sitting in the Chair, only one clamp on its flesh arm, while the techs work on the metal one. The man on the bridge. From the mission. He jammed his metal shield into it, damaged it. Needs repaired.
The man from the mission. The failed mission. It knows that it almost never fails missions, that this is. New. Terrible.
The man from the mission.
“Sergeant Barnes,” it hears, and it twitches, sitting up. Doesn’t hear the techs complain. Hardly sees them. There’s an image in its head, a series of images: a bespectacled face (no, no, no not him) smiling down at him, a train in the snowy mountains, hands clinging to a breaking railing.
“Bucky, no!” a man cries, reaching, failing, falling away as it falls. It knows that man. The man from the mission.
“The procedure is already started,” it hears, and the buzz of the bone saw, the sight of blood on the snow from the stump of an arm. A flash of a medical table, doctors, cutting into him-- it can hear its breath coming faster, harder. “You are to be the new fist of HYDRA,” it hears, as it sees its now mismatched hands, feels terror choke it, feels the shiny new left hand choke one of the doctors. (No doctors, oh god no more doctors--)
“Put him on ice.” And the tank, the glass, the freezing-- seeing its face as the frost takes over and steals its breath-- no more, no please no more, it’s so scared--
The metal arm lashes out, and a technician-- a technician?-- goes flying. Guns point at it from all around. It pants, shivering, only half-aware. The images keep coming, the fear keeps it locked in place, even when the lead handler comes in. Even when it hears, “Mission report. Mission report, now.”
The backhand breaks the loop, focuses it intensely on... the man. The man from the mission, and from the images. “The man on the bridge,” it says, though it knows it shouldn’t. Knows the backhand was only the beginning if it talks back, if it questions. But there is nothing else in its head. “Who was he.”
“You met him earlier this week on another assignment,” Handler Pierce says.
It shouldn’t say it. There will be punishment. But there is nothing else in its head. “I knew him,” it says, not making eye contact, compliant in this at least.
Handler Pierce sits in front of it, meets its eyes for the brief moment that is allowed, before its own slide away. Obedient. Non-threatening. Even if there is nothing in its head but that man. “Your work,” the handler says, “has been a gift to mankind. You’ve shaped the century.” Behind the trigger of a rifle. The hilt of a knife. A hand taking life from someone else. “And I need you to do it one more time.”
One more time. It wants to be done. It wants the mission to end so it can go back into cold storage and feel nothing. The longing makes it suddenly swallow and look further away, carefully not at anyone, into the middle distance, at nothing. Field command is staring hungrily at it, like they want to hurt it, or maybe caress it, or maybe be it. The techs are hanging on the handler’s words. “Society’s at a tipping point between order and chaos, and tomorrow we’re gonna give it a push. But if you don’t do your part, I can’t do mine, and HYDRA can’t give the world the freedom it deserves.”
It wants to be done. It wants to not do it again. It doesn’t want to do its part. “But I knew him,” it repeats, as if it’s broken. Malfunctioning.
The handler sits back, sighs, then pushes to his feet. “Prep him,” he says. The mission will occur whether it wants or not.
“He’s been out of cryofreeze too long--”
“Then wipe him, and start over.”
It knows those words. It doesn’t remember those words, but it knows them. Knows what comes next. Its face crumples, but it remains compliant, lets the technician insert the bite guard, while field command continues to stare with that awful expression, while the handler walks away. The Chair leans back, clamps it in place with heavy metal bars, because it can’t control itself now. Shivers and shudders and pants around clenched teeth, ever muscle tense as the machine closes over its face.
Then there is just pain, and distant screaming.
15. Death (Cao Pi)
“You know me,” the target says.
It does. It knows that stupid fucking face-- would know it anywhere-- and that is terrifying. How does it know. They have never met. (It can only remember the past twenty-four hours. That is familiar. Horrible, but familiar.)
“No, I don’t,” it growls, swinging the metal arm-- the flesh one throbs, uncoordinated, dislocated; its ribs ache from the crossbar that had it trapped a moment before-- and knocking the target aside. It’s messy, just pummeling a target. Should be a knife. Should be a gun. But the target has been stabbed and slashed and shot, and he’s still standing.
Well, sort of standing.
The Asset is only sort of standing, too, breathing hard, rasping on the smoke from the slowly sinking helicarrier. “Bucky.” It looks up, something pinching deep inside at that word. The target hadn’t said it yet-- not that one. Buck, he’d said. Not Bucky. For a moment, it stares, breathless, aching strangely in a way not related to bruised ribs. “You’ve known me your whole life.”
What whole life? It has no life. It is a weapon. The metal arm swings again, knocks the target back again.
“Your name is James Buchanan Barnes,” the target continues anyway.
That doesn’t pinch. That burns. That stabs. That name. It can’t know that name. That name comes with pain. The fear surges up, swallowing the hurt in its head and shoulder. “Shut up!” it roars, swinging again, throwing them both off-balance on the already-unsteady surface.
The target yanks his helmet off while it regains its footing, drops his shield, lets it fall through the broken glass to the river below, stares at him with earnest blue eyes and a deeply concerned brow. “I’m not gonna fight you. You’re my friend.”
It doesn’t know why that fills it with sorrow. A wild, clawing sorrow that it can only express through rage, charging across the distance between them and hurling the target back, throwing him to the metal supports, holding him down. “You’re my mission,” it insists, furious and terrified, and hits. And hits. And hits again. And hits again.
True to his word, the target doesn’t fight back. He takes it. Makes it hesitate, holding the metal fist aloft and staring. Why isn’t he fighting back. “Then finish it,” the target slurs through swollen and bloodied lips. “Cuz I’m with ya to... the end of the line.”
The words cut, but not like the other ones. There’s no fear with those words. There’s-- there’s warmth. Acceptance. With ya till the end of the line, pal, it hears, in a voice something like its own. The metal fist starts to come down, the rage starts to die, replaced by confusion. The mission is gone. There is no mission, just a man struggling to breathe under its curled and unsteady flesh arm. A man who claims to be its friend. That it can’t bring itself to actually kill. The mission is gone.
Then there’s a horrible creaking sound, metal screaming, and everything goes white. That’s death. It doesn’t remember, but it knows, it knows death, both dealing and receiving. It has time for a split second to panic about the no-longer-a-target-- it can’t leave, it can’t let him die-- then nothing.