Random writing.

You don’t know what “Hydra” is. You don’t understand the hiss of electricity you sometimes taste at the back of your tongue, the static that makes your hair lift before the pain crashes down. You only learn to breathe through it. Count. In. Two. Three. Four. Out. Two. Three. Four. The first language you become fluent in is not English; it’s endurance.

By twelve, you’ve got a system. Ice packs in the freezer. Soft clothes. Sneakers unlaced but ready by the door in case you have to pace the hallway at three a.m. to convince your body it’s yours. You keep a notebook that looks like it should be full of heart doodles; it’s filled with dates and symptoms, a crude map of someone else’s suffering laid over your growing-up years. You get good at noticing the patterns. There’s no point asking why. The why hurts almost as much as the when.

There are months that feel like mercy. Weeks where your life is ordinary: school, hot chocolate, friends who tease you about the way you patch them up after PE like a one-girl med tent. It’s always been there, that impulse. If someone’s scraped a knee, you are half a step ahead with antiseptic and steady hands. Your teachers write “calm under pressure” on your report cards. You shrug. They don’t know that pressure lives in your marrow like weather.

You decide early: if your soulmate is going to live a life like this, you will build a life that can help him. You won’t drag him under with your pain. You’ll be careful—hyper-careful, the way other people are with words they only say once. You keep to sidewalks. You clip your nails. You never push a dull knife through a tomato. Your high school friends call you “grandma” because you keep band-aids in a silver tin and text to make sure everyone gets home safe. You smile and let them laugh because this is the only way you know to love a stranger: become a place that doesn’t hurt.

You work, study, volunteer at the free clinic even when the head nurse warns you the hours will wring you dry. You learn to read vitals like sentences and stitch skin like you’re coaxing something holy back together. When pain hits—sharp, crushing, electric—you excuse yourself, breathe behind a door, splash cold water, return. Patients call you sunshine. You don’t feel like light, not really. You feel like a glass lamp with a storm inside it, but you’ve gotten good at making the outside glow.

You hear his name before you meet him like a rumor in a language you almost understand. James Buchanan Barnes. Sergeant. Assassin. Avenger. Ghost. The way people say it, you could believe he’s a half-made myth wrapped in a man’s body. You watch grainy footage once, because you think maybe you should know what his shadow looks like if you’re going to spend your life holding its weight. He moves like he’s been taught to be both bullet and bruise. He doesn’t look at the camera. He never looks at the camera.

When you get the offer—the Tower’s medbay is hiring, the pay is good, the benefits are better, and the NDAs would make your law professor weep—you read it three times and put the phone down. The Tower. A job where your carefulness might matter; where your quiet hands might do something for the man who’s been hurting you by accident since you traced suns in crayon. You don’t know if he’s there, if he exists the way the headlines claim, if he’s healed or breaking or in between. You only know that your chest says yes so fiercely it feels like a door blowing off its hinges.

New York is less myth and more noise than you expect. The Tower is glass and steel and gravity; it’s also the medbay coffee machine that sputters like a sleepy dragon and a stash of mismatched mugs, three of them chipped. Dr. Cho is as brilliant as the stories promised and almost unnervingly kind. She looks at you the way she looks at the bioregenerative cradle: as if you’re a technology worth understanding. “We do medicine differently here,” she says on your first day, and she isn’t talking about equipment. “We don’t treat the body as separate from the person who lives in it.”

“Good,” you say softly. “I don’t either.”

The first time you hear his voice, you’re inventorying suture kits. It isn’t a dramatic entrance. No alarms. No sprinting down gleaming hallways, no blood blooming across floor tiles. It’s the slow murmur of a debrief drifting through the medbay door someone propped with a lab stool. He doesn’t sound like a ghost. He sounds… tired. Kidding, a little, around the edges, the way people bargain with exhaustion. Someone laughs—Sam Wilson, probably, that warm rasp—and then a lower rumble says, “I’m fine,” and your lungs forget their job. Pain doesn’t spike. That’s new. That’s alarming. That’s relief so sudden it feels like a bruise pressed and found not tender.

You don’t see him. You don’t need to. You sink onto a stool and wrap your hands around your own wrists until the urge to go to the doorway and look—just look—passes. You’ve spent years not chasing pain. You can give yourself one day not chasing a man.

It turns out to be three days, because life is busy and the team rotates through like weather systems: in, out, sometimes dropping with laughter, sometimes with the hard silence of missions that didn’t go the tidy way. You keep their secrets like stitches—neat, small, essential to healing. You make sure there’s always a clean blanket folded on the end of the cot that faces the window. You set aside the mugs that get used most. You learn Natasha’s tell for “don’t ask.” You become very good at saying, “I’ve got you,” and meaning it.

When you finally do see him, it’s not heroic. It’s a Tuesday. You’re rewrapping Clint’s wrist because the idiot archer has decided his tendons work better if wrapped in stubbornness. The door opens. The air changes. You don’t look up because you’re a professional. You tell Clint to stop using his injury as an excuse to avoid dish duty and tie a tidy knot with your teeth while you reach for tape.

“Barnes,” Clint says, because he’s a menace. “Make the sad eyes at her; maybe she’ll guilt-release me.”

“Not a chance,” you say, and glance up on the smile, and that is how you meet the man who has taught you your own pain.

He is larger than the headlines made him. Not in height—though he’s that too—but in presence, like a storm-tossed ship that has decided to be harbor instead. His hair is longer than you’d expected, his mouth softer, his shoulders—God, his shoulders. The synthmesh shirt he’s wearing gives you every detail you don’t deserve. He’s carrying a bruise on his cheekbone like he’s done this before and will do it again.

“Hey,” he says, slow, as if the word might shatter if he isn’t careful. His eyes find you, and something at your breastbone loosens without permission. The thing about learning someone in pain is that you can tell when they aren’t. Today, right now, he isn’t. You exhale a smile you didn’t know you’d been holding.

“Hi,” you return, equally gentle. You will not drop the room into reverence because a man with a tragic dossier walked through the door. You will not orbit him like he’s gravity. You will thread this moment into the cloth of the day, and see if it holds.

“I need a quick look,” he says to the room in general, and to you specifically he adds—almost apologetically—“I took a hit. Nothing big.”

Clint makes a noise that means “define big.” You pat his wrist and say, “I’ll trade you out with Dr. Cho and check Mr. Nothing Big. We’ll see which of you wins the ‘most dramatic patient’ medal this week.” Clint huffs and you stand, finally, on legs that feel steady because they remember what steady has been for years.

“Sit,” you tell the soldier you’ve never touched, and he obeys so instantly it’s almost a prayer. You take in the details that matter: blood at the shoulder seam, sluggish, just enough to tell on itself; a rip at the shirt that’s more resigned than angry; the set of his jaw like he’s holding a drawer closed with his knee while the contents lean hard against it.

“Arm?” you ask, reaching out, hovering your fingers over the metal. He nods. You lift. The weight is mercifully familiar because you’ve trained on the Tower’s simulators; the heat is real and particular. He watches your hands, not your face. You don’t mind. You’ve always known people from the outside in.

The wound is ugly and simple—shrapnel tore a crescent low along his deltoid. It should have felt like your body was being carved open while you slept or ate cereal or argued with insurance forms, but it didn’t. You felt a echo, maybe, last night: a tug, a silent alarm. Not the old lightning. Not the chair.

You’re cleaning it when you see the scar.

At first it’s just another pale seam among many on his shoulder, a crisscrossing atlas of old maps. Then your vision tips, tilts, and your hand goes still. There’s a crescent there, almost the same path as the wound you’re treating, and another line that forked off it years ago, long-healed—no, not years. You know it like you know your own heartbeat. You know it because sometimes you scratch at your upper arm in the shower not because it itches but because you’re remembering something that never touched your skin. You saw this scar once, with your fingers. It was the first time he survived long enough for the wound to become a story. You bled for it and then you didn’t.

He shifts, and the world comes back. You have to breathe, remember? In. Two. Three. Four. Out. Two. Three. Four. You finish cleaning, wrap, tape, and only then, only when the practical magic is done, do you say, “You’re okay.”

He huffs. “Define okay.”

“Alive. Not leaking. Clear for lunch if you promise to actually chew.”

It startles a laugh out of him, rusty and perfect. He lifts his eyes. You shouldn’t have been unprepared; you’ve been preparing for this your whole life. But there’s something about the color—lake-water in shadow, a bruise after the sting fades—that lands in your throat. You could drown there and not mind.

He sees your reaction. He sees everything. His expression changes in a way you’ll learn means he’s thinking about something dangerous like you’re a safe place to put it. “Have we met?” he asks softly, like he’s already sorry for taking a piece of you with the question.

“No,” you say, and it’s true. It’s also the closest thing to a lie you’ve ever told. You swallow, choose gentleness, choose truth that fits in your mouth. “I’m new. First week.”

“You’re good,” he says, as if he’s been doing this long enough to know. He flexes the arm experimentally and doesn’t wince. You watch relief move through him like light. You try very hard not to cry.

“Eat,” you say, because you’ve used up your bravery for the hour. “And come back tomorrow so I can admire my work.”

“Order, huh?”

“Suggestion,” you amend, and then because you’ve been living careful for so long you’ve forgotten what it feels like to let a door swing open, you add, “I make good coffee. As a bribe.”

His mouth does a thing you will think about later, when the city is quiet. “I’ll take it,” he says. “The coffee. And the bribe.”

He leaves. You stand in the middle of the medbay with your heart beating like it’s relearning tempo. Clint slings his legs off the cot and smirks. “So,” he says, “you gave the Winter Soldier a juice box and told him to chew. Bold strategy.”

You make a face and flick his chart. “Go. You’re cleared. But if you open that jar of pickles with your wrist again, I’m telling Natasha.”

You don’t intend to get hurt. You never do. Being careful is your religion. But life, with her crooked sense of humor, likes to test faith.

It happens on a Thursday two months later. The team is out. The medbay is quiet. You’re stocking gauze on the high shelf you shouldn’t be using because you’re five-six on tiptoe and this is a job for someone with a ladder. You tell yourself to be sensible. You tell yourself not to reach. You reach. The metal box shifts. You catch it. Victory, you think, and then the corner kisses the back of your hand with enough enthusiasm to leave a mouthful of glass.

It’s small. It’s nothing. It’s the sort of cut you could put a cartoon band-aid on and call it character-building. You stand there, watching bright blood well up like your body is surprised by its own richness, and you feel something you haven’t felt in a very long time: terror so swift it edges into shame.

You do not hurt him.

You move on instinct. Sink to the stool, grab gauze, clamp down, breathe, breathe. It’s fine. It’s barely anything. You are overreacting after a lifetime of training yourself not to. You sit there counting seconds until the hot panic cools to embarrassment, and then the door slams open so hard the stool skates under you and crashes into the cabinet.

“Where?” Bucky demands, and he’s across the room before you can assemble words for his face. He looks wild. Sweat slicks his temple. There’s road-dust in his hair and blood on his knuckles and a kind of grief in his eyes you have seen before—from the inside.

“Where,” he says again, softer, as his hands find your hands. He pulls your fingers away from the gauze with care that makes you dizzy. When he sees the cut, the relief he lets out is almost obscene, like he’s been holding his breath under a long wave. His thumbs tremble at your wrist. “You,” he says, and the word is as full as prayer. “You. It was you.”

You don’t realize you’re crying until he makes the soft noise people make when they find a fragile animal and want to prove they won’t hurt it. He looks up at you and doesn’t look away. He doesn’t look away.

“I felt it,” he says, simpler than the ownership brand you’ve both been living under. “On the bike, it hit me so hard I thought—” He stops, swallows. Tries again. “I’ve been feeling things for years I couldn’t name. And then months of quiet, like someone was trying not to breathe too loud. I thought I was going crazy or getting better or both. And then this, just now, like a firefly sting, and I knew.”

You laugh, wet and breathless. “Firefly.”

“Don’t make fun of me; I have a limited bug vocabulary.”

He is shaking. So are you. You reach up and touch his face—first time, first real time—and his eyes close like the light’s too bright. His skin is warm. He leans into your palm the way a man leans into a lighthouse in the middle of a ruin. “Hi,” you whisper, because you don’t know what else to do with a moment this large.

He opens his eyes. His hand comes up to cover yours at his jaw, large and steady. You can feel the edge of a scar under the pad of your thumb, the fine, faint seam you traced once with shaking hands while he slept on a cot three rooms over. He lifts your palm enough to kiss the heel of it and the world tilts.

“I’m sorry,” he says, and the apology is too big for the room. “For all of it. For… Christ, you’ve been—how long?”

“All of it,” you echo, but your voice is gentle. “Don’t be sorry you were alive.”

He makes a hurt noise and laughs at the same time. “You sound like Cho.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment.”

“It is.” He swallows. “I kept thinking I had a guardian angel. Or a ghost. Or—” He looks down at your hand again, at the careful little crescent of red sealing itself at the edges. He is not horrified by blood; anyone can see that. He is horrified by this: that his life might land anywhere near yours with sharp corners. “You were careful,” he says, and it’s not a question. “I can feel it. Now that I know, I can feel—there’s space where there shouldn’t be. You made a quiet place out of yourself.”

You laugh again, crooked. “I didn’t want to hurt you.”

He lifts his head. For a long time he just looks. “You can, you know,” he says quietly, because he’s Bucky Barnes and he’s braver than grief made him. “If you want to live. You can stub your toe and burn your tongue and climb a stupid ladder and—” He inhales, wincing like the truth costs him. “I don’t want you small. Not for me.”

The careful thing would be to nod. To say you’ll think about it. To promise a theoretical you freedom tomorrow while you keep yourself wrapped in bubble wrap today. But you are holding his face and his hands are holding your hands, and you have been breathing around this man for years without the words for him. The truth falls out: “I want to be brave in ways that don’t break you.”

He kisses you like an answer.

It isn’t a cinematic kiss; the medbay doesn’t swell with music. It’s clumsy—both of you shaking, both of you a little stunned. But his mouth is warm, and he is careful in a way you understand down to the cell. He is careful the way you have been. He cups the back of your head. It’s not a collision; it’s an opening.

When you pull back, he presses his forehead to yours and exhales. “I won’t always be good at this,” he warns, like you haven’t read the manual written on your own nerve endings. “I’m grumpy. I get it wrong. I—”

“Me too,” you say, so fast and fervent that his laugh chokes. “I’m soft, not stupid. And I’m not here to fix anything. I’m here to be with you while you fix it yourself.”

He is very still. You can feel him rerouting the way rivers reroute after a landslide—slow, hungry, unstoppable. He nods. His hand is still on yours, both of them, metal and flesh, and the balance of them might be your favorite thing you’ve learned so far. “Okay,” he says. “Then be with me while I do this right.”

He kneels.

It’s not a proposal. You’re not ready for that, and he knows it. It’s something older. He’s always had a soldier’s instincts for ritual, and this is one: he kneels, taking your hand in both of his like it’s a flag he’s been carrying too long and is finally returning to its rightful owner. He flips your hand gently so the back faces up. He studies the small, fresh cut the way he studied maps once. He leans in and kisses beside it, not on it, and when he looks up again there’s a wet shine in his eyes he isn’t ashamed of.

“Matching scars,” he murmurs, the words slow with reverence. “A story only we know.”

You breathe out a laugh that doesn’t hurt. “You’re getting poetic on me, Sergeant.”

“Don’t tell anyone,” he says, and stands, and kisses you again like he likes you. Like he will like you in the mornings and the messy middles. Like the bruise-color in his eyes is light coming back, not leaving.

You learn quickly what the Tower already knows: Bucky Barnes is grumpy like a cat is grumpy—performative, selective, deeply amusing when you know the tells. He is also gentle like gravity is gentle: constant, inescapable, the thing that pulls you home. He looms, sure, but it turns out that looming can be a love language. He has to get used to you swatting at his chest when he tries to open your doors for you, not because you don’t like chivalry but because you have hands and you’d like to use them. He has to get used to you laughing in his mouth when he glowers at Tony for teasing you, because the teasing is affectionate and you can handle affection. He has to learn that if he scowls at your coffee mug and says, “You should drink water,” you will hand him a matching mug and say, “You should drink water,” and then you’ll both drink water and pretend you won something.

He worries. You don’t mind. Worry is another word for “I know what it is to be powerless, and I refuse to be indifferent.” He touches your shoulders to feel that you’re solid. He watches you walk down stairs like the stairs have offended him. He loves you with his body like a fortress and with his mouth like a promise. He learns to say “I’m taking a walk” when pain flares, and you learn to say “I’ll come with you” or “I’ll be here when you get back” depending on which kind of alone he means.

The team, of course, knows before either of you is ready to make speeches about it. Natasha gives you a clean nod that means welcome to the club of women who will set the world on fire to keep our boys warm. Sam hugs you once and mutters, “Thank you,” hot and awkward into your hair. Tony pretends to be scandalized and then pesters Bucky with a PowerPoint called “Safe Practices for Pain-Linked Partners,” which includes, among other gems, a slide that reads DO NOT DO ANYTHING DUMB, BARNES, with an animated arrow pointing at your face labeled ALSO YOU.

You live anyway. That’s the point. You stub your toe on the medbay stool and you both yelp and end up on the floor laughing so hard you scare the interns. You burn your tongue on pizza and he licks his own on reflex and makes a betrayed noise so theatrical you cry with laughter. You trip on a curb and he catches you and then trips with you because momentum is a law and the two of you grinning on the sidewalk like a PSA about joy is a fact. Pain happens. It doesn’t own you. The point is, finally, that you’ve stopped letting fear steal the future from you in tiny, obedient bites.

There’s one night—the kind of night New York does best, fog rolling off the river like a secret coming home—when you’re both on the roof because the elevator decided to sulk and the stairs smell like Tony’s latest experiment. You sit with your back against the lip of the roof, knees up, sweatshirts zipped, mugs cradled. The city hums below like an animal settling its bones. Bucky slides down the wall until his shoulder is pressed to yours, metal warm through the cotton.

“You know the worst one?” he asks after a while, like you were already mid-conversation in some parallel life.

“The worst… scar?” you ask. You can feel him smile into his mug.

“Pain.” He tips his head against yours. “The one I hated the most.”

You go quiet the way you do when someone hands you a small, important box. He doesn’t make you guess. He never makes you guess when it matters.

“It was when I realized I was hurting someone else,” he says, soft like a confession into church dust. “Not just in the field. Not—” He swallows. You put your hand over his knee, grounding. He draws a shaky breath. “Sometimes it hit like an echo. Not mine. Quieter. I didn’t know what to call it, and I sure as hell couldn’t tell anyone. But it made me… careful, I guess. More careful than the job wanted me to be. If I could take the hit instead of giving it, I did. If I could remove a fight from a room with my body, I tried.” He huffs out a breath. “Sam says that’s why I’m still alive. Stubborn kindness.”

You blink hard against the sting in your eyes. “You did that for me,” you whisper, and it feels too big and too small at once.

“I didn’t know it was you,” he admits. “But yeah. For you. For whoever you were. I wanted—God, this is sappy—to build a world where you didn’t have to carry quite so much of me. Even if I didn’t get to see it.”

You want to say a lot of things. You choose one. “You do.”

He turns his head to look at you, and the roof becomes a quieter place. “I do,” he says, and then he laughs, soft and disbelieving. “I do.”

You don’t bring up the chair often. When you do, it’s not to pull pain up like a bucket from a well and splash yourselves with it. It’s to set the bucket down between you and say, “This is heavy. Let’s carry it together.” Sometimes he tells a story about something small—how the edges of the metal bit into his palm, how he learned the songs of the machine and where he could hide his mind between notes. Sometimes you tell a story about the day you learned to count breaths. You compare scars. You don’t rank them. You decide the only metric that matters is “we are still here.”

He touches your arm one evening and says, “There,” and you look down and see what he means: a faint pale crescent near your deltoid, one you didn’t get yourself, one you have touched absentmindedly for years. You’ve never loved your body more than in that moment, marked with your shared history like a secret tattoo.

“Matching,” you say, smiling. “I like the symmetry.”

He grins, and his grin is a revelation every time. “I like that I can kiss it,” he says, and does, and the spark you feel is not pain. It’s recognition wearing joy like sunlight.

People ask, later, if it’s hard to love someone whose pain is also yours. You tell them—when you answer at all—that love was never the problem. Love was the reason. You were careful for him, and then he was careful for you, and then you were brave together, and that was the bridge you walked across into a life that had room for both the hurt and the healing.

You don’t keep the notebook anymore. Or rather, you keep it, but you start a new one. The first page isn’t a date and a list of symptoms; it’s a grocery list that reads like a poem—tomatoes, basil, the good olive oil, bread, ice cream, patience—and beneath it, in the slanted hand you get when you’re shy, you write, “Tell Bucky the firefly story.” He snorts when you do, because he pretends to mind being teased. Then he kisses you until you can’t see the page.

There are still nights where pain rolls in without warning and you ride it out together, your breath syncing, his hands anchoring, your voice in his ear counting him through it the way you counted yourself through it for years. There are mornings when he comes back from a run with a split lip because New York sidewalks don’t care how many medals you buried. You clean it; he kisses your fingers; you bring him an ice pack for his pride. There are days so quiet you forget to be grateful and then remember and sit down on the floor just to feel it properly. There are thunderstorms. There is laughter so sudden it hurts. There is hurting that softens because you name it and hold it like a sparrow.

And there is this: a pair of matching scars with a story only you know. Not because you keep it secret out of shame, but because stories belong most to the people who lived them. If anyone asks, you can say what Clint says when he’s feeling dramatic and wants to pretend he’s not: “It’s complicated.” If anyone listens harder, you can say what Dr. Cho would: “It’s healing.” If anyone pushes, you can shrug and say, “It’s us.”

Sunshine and storm. Grumpy and gentle. Careful and brave. Two people who met in a room that smelled like antiseptic and coffee and chose, over and over, not to make each other smaller.

The world will write its own versions of you—mission reports, gossip columns, memes. Let them. Your version is the one that matters: you, in the medbay, saying “Eat,” and him, hours later, coming back with a sandwich he cut in half, placing one on a napkin in front of you like an offering. You, on the roof, mugs warming your hands, telling him about the day you decided to become a healer for a man whose name you didn’t know. Him, sprawled on his back beside you on a patch of warm concrete, pointing out constellations he remembers from a childhood spent on a different shore. You, stubbed toe and all, laughing. Him, kissing the crescent on your arm before a mission like it’s a compass.

If love is a language, you are fluent. If healing is a map, you’ve drawn a new one together, all the old scars turned into landmarks, the routes between them marked with the most unglamorous and holy word you own: “home.”

Author's note: I was dealing with some difficult feelings as happens sometimes. So I channeled it into this.

if you need help

You marked it on the calendar. The paper one you always bought every year out of habit. It wasn't a special day. Didn't fall on a birthday day or holiday, heaven forbid you ruin anyone's mood. You sent up automated emails and texts, letting your boss know you quit, your dickhead of a landlord should call someone. The ones to family should have been harder, right? It should have made you stop and rethink it, question why you were so bent on self destruction.

Truth was it made it easier. Scrolling through meaningless text with your parents. You're trying to share something meaningful only to be stonewalled; a cute pic of you at a cat cafe was met with 'your apartment doesn't allow pets'.  That didn’t touch your sibling; your brother hadn't bothered to text you in years. Your sister is  living the apple pie life. Two kids you hadn't met, as you lived on the wrong coast. The last phone call still stung. She hadn't listened to you when you mentioned the promotion. Just talked about her kids, a book club, mom and me get-togethers.

They didn't care.

That's what made it so easy. No one actually cared. No one checked in after months of no contact. No one asked you out for drinks with the team. No one looked for you at the bar.  No one cared. You were so unnoticeable that you might as well have not existed.

So, that's when you picked a date. It felt good. You cleaned your apartment, got rid of anything that was of value. Making sure all your affairs are sorted. That money you'd tucked away for a new apartment would cover the cost. You didn't want a plot or headstone. Hell, they could chuck your ashes in the trash. To be honest that's probably what would happen anyway.

Tonight you bought your favorite take out food. Two large expensive bottles of wine. A tub of your favorite ice cream and some candy. It wasn't lavish, but you didn't need it to be. As soon as you got home you'd get to celebrate your last night in this hellhole. Last night in this miserable body. It felt good. Felt like an accomplishment, better than any project you'd finished. It was an end to the suffering.

Walking down the alley to the side door you nearly fall over with a scream as a man grunts in pain beside a dumpster. Regaining your composure you stop to look at him. Expecting someone drunk or high, instead, you are met with the most pain-filled blue eyes. His lip is busted, nose caked in blood, one eye swollen shut. He clutches at his side where he is bleeding

"Oh my god, hold on, let me phone someone." You scramble to find your phone, placing the bags on the ground as you dig into your pockets.

"No." The half-dead man croaks, struggling to speak. "No hospital."

Your face pinches, phone in hand with 911 dialled and ready. "You're really in bad shape, someone needs to look at you."

He shakes his head again, pushing against the trash bin to stand up. You drop everything into the bag and help him up. Once beside him, you realize just how big and heavy he is, but you were not leaving him here. A grunt leaves him as he leans on you, blood staining your shirt. You half-hazardly grab the bag and fish out your keys with one hand. 

"Where can I take you?" You ask, slowly walking him towards your front door. "I can call anyone."

"No-no one," Is all he managed to get out, voice hoarse like he swallowed razors.

Biting at your lip you try to figure out what to do. You can't force this man into an ambulance no matter how much you try. Police were generally useless, you didn't own a car so that wasn't happening. Were you really going to let this stranger into your apartment? This was a bad idea. Why today of all days?

"I live on the third story of this apartment building. I got a first aid kit and youtube. Will you come with me?" You give him the option, despite his ragged breath and heavy body.

The man looks at you like you just offered him a gift. Those eyes peering at you like he could read your mind. He didn't say anything, just nodded.

"Alright, let's get you fixed up." You say more to yourself than anyone.

Getting him into the building and up the elevator made you question yourself a few hundred times. You weren't a nurse or paramedics. The most you'd done was get your first aid updated regularly for the pay bump. Now you were half dragging, half holding up, a giant, very stinky and bloody man. Hopefully it won't leave tracks. Last thing was a note from the landlord about cleaning floors.

The place is spartan now, but you get him over to your old couch. You get him seated there, his brows scrunched behind his black hair. His head tips back against the cushion like he hasn't had comfort in years. You do a quick assessment of him, the blood on his side isn't as gushy, his face is bruised, but nothing pressing. He looks exhausted, eyelids barely keeping open.

"I am going to get you water, and put the kettle on." You keep chattering to him, hoping it will ease him. "I am going to go get my first aid kit and some clean clothes for you. Take a look at your wounds."

The man just nods his head. Body limp against the sofa, it looked like he's given up the fighting against your comfort for noe.

.

A glass of water is placed on the coffee table, while the kettle whistles. The first aid kit isn't much, you'd added butterfly bandages, a stitch kit, and few other things to it. If there was anything worse, you would have to figure it out.

Clothes are the hard part. The man isn't exactly small. Throwing open your merge closet you dig around, an oversized shirt from an ex, some very stretchy and solid colored pj pants would have to work. Coming out you are nearly thrown to the floor when you walk back into your living room to see him sitting there topless.

One, he has a metal arm, silver with a red star and works just like a human one. Two, he had taken a beating. His torso was decorated in bruises from his collarbone down to below his belt. The gash on his side was at least six inches, but it had already started to clot. He turns to you and holds out his hand. You stare for another moment before your brain clicks.

"Stay still." You say firmly, watching his shoulder sag as he leans against the sofa. "You look like you got hit by a bus and won."

He stares at you and you wonder briefly if that pissed him off. Then he huffs, turning so his side is to you. You grab a throw and kneel on it, pulling out stuff from your kit.

"Can I know your name?" You ask as you ripe open some wipes, while telling him your name. "Or is it super secret?"

Blue eyes just staring unfocused at the wall. The metal arm whirling as his fingers move abstinently  against the cushions. 

"Alright, well I am going to talk. Just keeps my head on." You keep going, you go to touch him and he flinches. "Okay, are you sure you want me to do this?" He nods, it's almost scary how little reaction he has. Like a frightened dog who knew better than to bite. "I am going to take these wipes to clean the area first." Carefully, you do as you say. Walking him through each step. "This is pretty deep and long, it's not too wide, I think butterfly stitches will do. It's already started to clot which is good."

The wound now satisfactorily closed, you ask him to look at you. You carefully clean the cut on his brow, cheek, and lip. Once again talking him through it, making sure to not startle him.

"I found some clothes. They aren't great, but if you feel up to it you can shower and wear them. I can clean the stuff you wore." You pointed at the clothes and shower.

He looks at the clothes and then at you, face pinched. You pick up the clothes and get up.

"Come on, I will show you." You should probably be scared of him, terrified even, at being in such a small space. Yet, he never gave you reason, just looked like he'd never received a moment of care before.

In the bathroom you show him how the water works, wear the towels where, giving him a new bar of soap and telling him to use your shampoo and conditioner. You put the clothes and a towel on the counter.

"You okay to do that?" You keep your voice gentle but firm.

He blinks a few times and nods, hands going to his pants button and zipper. A squeak leaves your mouth and you back out of the room. Carefully closing the door behind you.

Outside your brain suddenly catches up when you see the circled calendar. It was supposed to be your last day, instead you were now helping a stranger who had his shit rocked by someone. You rub a hand over your face and card it through your hair. Glancing into the kitchen you saw the take out and wine was on the counter.  Maybe this was a sign.

Shaking your head you grab two bowls and divide up the food. You stuck the wine in a cupboard, you needed to be clear headed encase the man decided to try anything. Opening up the frigid you cringe. You had nothing. If he stayed for any length of time you'd need to get food of some kind.

Would he stay? You didn't want him to go out like he was. You needed to at least clean his clothes. The look on his face, the layers of bruises and scars on his body. He'd been tortured, and then dumped behind your building. Who would do that?

Pulling the food out of the microwave you make some tea. One of the few things you had. Placing everything on the coffee table. At the same time he came out of the bathroom. His hair was damp and dripping over his broad shoulders. The shirt and pants were ridiculous on him, but at least the clothes were clean.

"I got food ready and tea. If you want sugar or creamer, let me know." You say and sit down on the couch. "After I eat I will bring your clothes to the laundry room and clean them."

He still didn't say anything, just sat down and stared at the bowl. Looking over at you he watches you eat then looks at his own bowl.

"Promise it's good, my favorite place." You nudge his arm carefully with your elbow.

With careful fingers he grabs the fork and takes a bite. Chewing it carefully, his eyes widened at the taste of it. Then he grabbed another fork full, eating almost recklessly.

"Told you, it was good." You grin, happy he seemed to like the food. "Have some tea too. It's just mint."

He drinks it and makes a face, tongue clicking a few times. Pushing it away he grabs water and downs it.

You can't help the chuckle. "Okay, chamomile may have been a better choice."

The two of you eat quietly. When you're finished you are surprised when he gathers up the bowls and mugs bringing them to the sink. He fills up both glasses and brings them back, sitting down beside you.

"I am going to take your clothes to the laundry and clean them. " You knew he understood you, just didn't like talking. "Be only gone a minute."

He nods his head as you do just that. Staying perfectly still on the sofa, you almost wanted to tell him to come with you. Not stay in this unfamiliar place alone, but people would talk if they saw him. You'd be quick, there and back. Grateful that the laundry room was on your floor and not in the basement like normal.

Coming back he was exactly where you'd left him. Shoulders square, body drawn tight, noticeable even under the bag clothes.

"Do you want more water? Maybe some different tea?" You ask, chattering nervously. "Your clothes will take a couple of hours. But you're welcome to stay the night."

Again, he doesn’t speak, just carefully leaning back against the cushions. You took that as a good sign, walking into the bedroom you grab your pillow off the bed and find a couple of extra blankets. Bring them out, place them beside the sofa and sit down, again.

"I just got to fix up a few emails and texts." You tell him, tucking your legs up and under yourself. "I quit my job, finally." Pausing not sure what else to say. Yeah I was planning on offing myself tonight but then I found you. Like a dirty ragged cat who needed a home, and suddenly killing myself feels awkward. "Thinking of maybe moving, finding something less office."

Blue eyes watching you, he looked so tired and worn. What had happened to him? Who had done this? You remember him flinching at your touch, the way his shoulders rounded themselves like he was trying to make himself smaller. The man needed a rest.

Flicking open your phone you remove all the scheduled text and emails. Writing a new one to your boss that you'd quit and all work related stuff was at your desk. She'd be pissed and probably try to demand a million things. You would not be giving her any of that, references be damned. They had never appreciated your work when you were there, so why would you do them favors now?

"Well, your clothes are probably done, I don't think they are made for a dryer." You rub the back of your neck. "I'll bring them back here and hang them up."

He didn't move, hands placed on top of his thighs, still watching you. It should have been irritating, but it wasn't. You didn’t think you could be mad at him.

Clothes brought and hung up you yawned. The day had caught up to you and bed was calling. Tomorrow you'd have to face a new day, and figure out what you were going to do. Probably go get groceries if he was still here.

"I am going to call it a night. You're welcome to stay, or once your clothes are dry you can go. Just close the door behind you. It locks on its own." You tell him, hoping you come off as neutral as possible.

Not expecting an answer you get up and head to your bedroom.

"Thank you." He says, almost too quiet to hear.

Turning you nod back at him.

***

A decade later.

You never meant to look for him, not really. It was hard to miss when he was pastured all over the news. James Bauchan Barnes, Bucky to his friend, Steve Rogers. It had stopped you in your tracks, eyes glued to your phone. That was the man you’d helped, the one who looked like he’d seen the nasty end of a baseball bat. The man who’d saved your life without meaning too. 

Time passed, monsters, aliens, the end of the world, half the world vanishing in a blink. It was rough to say the least, but you kept going, kept moving forward, something driving you that you didn’t fully understand. You’d built a good career, a really good one. It had survived the blip, and then the post blip when everyone came back. If you’d known a decade into the future you’d be where you were now, you won’t have thought about ending it. That’s the thing about life, you don’t know what's going to happen. You don’t know how much you have to fight to survive. 

Then he ran right into you. Actually, right into you. You’d both been going in the opposite direction around a corner and smashed into the other. 

“Oh, umm, sorry,” He looks up at you, Bucky Barnes. His hair is different, shorter on the sides, body more defined, and filled out. Blue eyes are still as piercing as ever, not wide and fright like before, but calm focus. “It’s you,”

Your mouth opens and closes a few times, trying to gather yourself, it’s been a decade. “I, umm, was not expecting to see you here. Didn’t think you’d remember me.”

A chuckle escapes, “Hard not to,”

“That a good or bad thing?”

“Good, really good. I-umm-I wasn’t looking for you or anything. I just live in the area.” He stumbles over his words, cheeks staining pink as he talks. 

“I wasn’t worried, and I wasn’t looking for you either. Didn’t realize you had moved to New York.”

“Ah, yeah, home, and friends live around,” He gestures with his hands, “Just made sense.”

“Can I get you a coffee? Is that weird?” You ask, suddenly wanting nothing more than to talk to this man you had only met for a few hours.

Bucky glances around, rubbing the back of his head, “Well, let me get the coffee, and we’ll call it square.”

You let out a small laugh, “Alright fine, I guess.”

There is a spot just around the corner, you both slip in, you order then Bucky. Finding a spot out of the way to sit at. The place is graciously sparse with customers. You see him, take in the back door just behind the counter, spotting the cameras dotted around. Still a soldier, still a spy, even if he isn’t on the job.

“It’s nice to actually meet you,” You start off, teasing a little. “Wasn’t sure I’d ever see you again.”

Bucky’s eyebrows go up, “Yeah, I-I am not sure what I was thinking at the time, just knew I couldn’t stay there. Wasn’t safe for you, not with everyone looking for me.” 

“Oh, I get it. Like I was sort of hoping you would be there at the time. But I know why you left. I haven’t done a background search on you, but from the little I’ve gathered, it makes sense.” You reply easily, remembering the next morning. The tug in your stomach that he was gone had never really gone away until now. 

“You helped me, and you didn’t have to. Washed my clothes and made sure I ate.”

“Gave you terribly strong peppermint tea” 

He scoffs at that, his eyes crinkling. “To be fair, never was much of a tea drinker.”

You smile, “It might have been a bit reckless, letting some stranger into my house.” You pause, chewing on your lip. “Okay, it was really reckless. I don’t regret it, I couldn’t just leave you there bleeding.”

“I’d fallen from an aircraft, and before that my best friend beat the shit out of me. Justifiably.” 

“You helped me that night too. Not to get too deep, but it had been a really shitty week.”

“A half dead bleeding man was just what you needed?”

“In a weird way, yes. It was. Changed my plans.”

Both of you pause for a moment, his fingers tracing the rim of the cup. Metal hand covered by a black glove. Your own fingers, picking at the side of the cup, wondering just how much you should tell him.

“You weren’t just moving that night.” The way he holds your gaze tells you everything. He’d known. 

“No, I wasn’t. Not to get too detailed, but I was planning on leaving everything behind. I didn’t see a place for me in this world.”

“But you’re still here now, you decided to stay.”

“I did. It seems inane to say outloud, but every time things go rough. I thought of you.. That for a few hours I had helped someone, and they had helped me.” You swallow feeling emotion get the better of you. “So I kept going.”

Bucky’s eyes water, he looks down at a table, hands clenching together. You’re careful when you reach across to touch his hands, giving him time to move away. At the same time you both make eye contact, as you carefully cover his hands, squeezing them gently. 

If you need help

Part 1 - Caught in a Net 

The bullet misses your head by an inch.

Had you been running any slower… no, you’ll think about it when the mission is over.

The precise stakes of the mission itself are a mystery. At least now you know why Nick Fury and Maria Hill had been acting so cagey about it all morning.

Technically, everyone knew the facts. Hydra is expecting a shipment tonight, S.H.I.E.L.D. wants to be there to intercept it. According to their intel, said shipment is expected to arrive at 0300 hours in a shipping container labeled, XSD344. Everyone has been thoroughly reminded that this will not end without a fight.

Even on a good day, Fury is a no-nonsense, cut-to-the-chase kind of guy. Had you not been paying close attention, it would have been easy to miss the uneasy glances shared between Fury and Hill. If you weren’t so light on your feet, you wouldn’t have heard their hushed whisper from behind a closed door.

At first, you’d written it off. Old paranoia that plagued most of the S.H.I.E.L.D. agents you know. A ghost story.

The Winter Soldier.

Suddenly, you remember a night, years ago. You wouldn’t go so far as to consider you and Natasha Romanoff friends, but that was the only other time you’d heard that name. A drunken night after a mission gone south. The two of you had been nursing your injuries over a bottle of vodka, not your favorite, but Natasha insisted, when she revealed the only other time she thought she might die.

Clumsily, she’d lifted her shirt to reveal a raised scar just above her hip. “A few years ago, I was escorting a nuclear engineer out of Iran. Somebody shot out my tires near Odessa. We lost control—went straight over a cliff. I pulled us out, but he was there.” If Natasha were the kind of person to shudder, it would have been then. “I was covering the engineer, so he shot him.” Her face went ashen. “Straight through me. Soviet slug, no rifling.”

You’d gone quiet, solemn. It was the first time you’d seen Romanoff look remotely afraid, and there was a heavy way she’d said he, as if it were something more than a random assassin. Bottle gripped tightly in your hand, you’d asked, “Who’s he?”

“Most of the intelligence community doesn’t believe he exists.” Leaning forward, she’d taken a heavy swig from the bottle and didn’t give it back. “The ones that do call him The Winter Soldier. He’s credited with over two dozen assassinations in the last fifty years.”

Thanks to the near-death experience, the two of you had drunk a lot that night. Enough that you—Natasha was somehow spared, woke up with a pounding headache, and less than clear memories of what you’d talked about that night.

Even when you’d overheard Fury and Hill whispering the name, you only vaguely remembered Natasha mentioning that she crossed paths with him once.

And frankly, when you and your team are prepping to take on at least ten Hydra operatives in the name of interception, reality takes precedent over Soviet myths. Although it does leave a bad taste in your mouth that it’s a frigid night in January, and if the so-called Winter Soldier will be joining the party, his namesake gives him seasonal advantage.

An hour ago, you and the rest of the S.H.I.E.L.D. agents selected for the mission loaded into a transport van that took you down to the shipping docks in the name of recon. Everybody was dressed in the same sleek black tactical suit and armed to the teeth.

You’d been adjusting your combat boots when Sharon Carter shoved the agent seated beside you to steal their seat. She ducked low to whisper in your ear, checking once to ensure that the comms in her ear were off. “Is it just me, or were Fury and Hill acting…”

“Cagey?” You’d supplied, relieved that at least one other person shared your suspicions. The van bumped over a crack in the road, forcing the two of you closer as you whispered.

“Yup,” Sharon nodded in agreement, “I mean, what are we actually intercepting?”

Somehow, it had only dawned on you then just how vague the mission details were. “They just said we can’t let Hydra get their hands on it.”

Whatever Sharon had been about to say was interrupted by the quiet roll of the van doors opening. Nothing else had to be said. Conversation time was over. It was time to get into position.

You never considered yourself a particularly impatient person, but there is nothing worse than the minutes leading up to inevitable chaos.

As per instructions, you’re on your stomach, waiting and watching through the scope of your rifle.

The concrete beneath you is damp and gritty, leeching the cold straight through your uniform. Down below, the docks sprawl out: skeletal cranes hunched against the dark sky, cargo containers stacked in uneven towers, each one streaked with rust and faded lettering.

Below the large docks, water slaps against the pylons with a steady, indifferent rhythm.

A heavy fog drifts in from the bay, creeping up the edges of the pier and turning the floodlights into soft halos of yellow. It’s too quiet. Even the gulls are silent, perched on the warehouse roof like they know something’s coming.

You shift slightly, the metal of the rifle cold against your cheek as you steady the scope. You know Sharon is just across the way, scanning the same way you are. Through the crosshairs, the drop point is still empty—an expanse of concrete and shadow.

What you expect is to see the chaos unfold. Instead, it's the sound of quiet footsteps that alerts you that the fight has begun.

One set, getting closer by the second. All that sits behind you but a long stretch of metal walkway. Nowhere to hide for you or the attacker.

You spin at the last second, surging to your feet. He’s just as surprised as you are, not expecting you to move first. He lunges, blade glinting under the floodlights, but you’re faster. The first swing misses your throat by inches; the second catches the side of your sleeve, tearing through the fabric.

You slam the butt of your rifle into his ribs, once, twice, enough to make him stumble but not enough to drop him. He recovers fast, throwing a wild punch that sends you careening into the guardrail. Metal bites into your shoulder.

There’s no time to think. He’s already on you again, knife slashing. You duck low, swing a boot behind his knee, and he crashes forward with a grunt. He’s bigger, heavier, but momentum is your ally, and adrenaline’s already in your veins.

With a shout, you drive your boot into his chest and use your full weight to shove. For a heartbeat, his fingers scrabble uselessly at the railing, and then he’s gone, tipping over the edge.

You don’t watch him fall, you just need to hear it: the sharp splash of water below, swallowed by the roar of the bay.

Before you can even celebrate the win, the first burst of automatic fire tears past. Bullets spark off the metal grating, ricocheting too close to you. Someone’s shouting below.

“They’re on the catwalk!” And suddenly, the night explodes.

Muzzle flashes strobe through the fog. One container goes up in a spray of splinters and shrapnel. Another erupts into flames, painting the air orange. Voices blare in your comms. Hill barking orders, agents shouting over one another, but it’s all noise under the thunder of gunfire.

You duck low and sprint. A grenade detonates somewhere near the loading ramp, the shockwave rattling the catwalk beneath you. Smoke and salt choke the air as you vault over a set of pipes and slide into cover.

That’s when the shot rips past. So close you feel the heat graze your ear, and forcing you to question if it was a matter of skill or pure luck that it did not hit you.

Firing back, and watching in satisfaction as your bullet lands in the center of the Hydra insignia on the man's chest, you duck behind a cargo container to catch your breath.

Predictably, you don’t get more than five seconds. The warning comes through your earpiece a second before you hear a volley of bullets being fired from a few meters away. It’s Hill, sounding more frantic than you’d expected.

“Target incoming from the north.”

“Got it,” You exhale, angling your body in the direction, the gun in your hands aimed toward the sound.

You fire the second you see a combat boot rounding the corner. The team of agents is tight-knit. You know exactly what they wear, how they walk. Nothing about this guy is familiar, and if anything, there is an off-balance trait to his footfalls.

The bullet hits him the second his body moves from behind the storage container. A good shot, clean. Straight through his shoulder. He should have been down. He should have at least been screaming or grabbing at his arm in pain.

Nothing.

The man rolls his shoulder out and keeps stalking forward. Unaffected. Unconcerned.

The oddity of it all shocks you to the extent that you don’t realize someone is coming up behind you until it's too late.

A hand fists in the back of your tactical vest and yanks you off your feet. The world tilts, hard metal slamming into your side as you hit the deck. Instinct takes over. You twist, roll, and bring your knee up just in time to block the downward swing of a combat knife.

It’s close, his breath hot against your cheek as you grapple for control. Over the din of your own fight, you catch flashes of movement in your periphery. Two S.H.I.E.L.D. agents, rifles up, emptying full magazines into the man you shot.

He moves like he’s brushing off raindrops. One agent rushes him and is swatted aside like a rag doll, body hitting a cargo crate with a crack that turns your stomach. The second tries for a flank, the man barely glancing his way before twisting his arm and driving him to his knees.

The distraction costs you. Your opponent’s blade slices low, catching the meat of your thigh and sending white-hot pain racing up your leg. You bite back a yell, duck under his next swing, and slam your elbow into his jaw. He staggers, but it’s not enough.

You slam the butt of your sidearm into his temple. Again. And again, until he crumples to the deck with a groan.

Breathing ragged, you stumble backward, eyes dragged back to the figure still advancing like nothing human. Both agents are down. He’s already turning, already calculating his next target.

Your body slides slowly to the cold floor, palm flat against the wound on your leg. It burns like hell and will need medical attention. For now, it’s not debilitating if you can stop the blood flow.

Keeping one eye on the Hydra agent, you quickly tear a strip from the hem of your undershirt and knot it tightly above the wound, crude but effective, before pressing your palm over the worst of the bleeding.

You’re not even sure what you’re looking at.

At first, you think he might be a robot.

One of his arms is entirely mechanical. Harsh gunmetal reformed into a limb with a red star stamped into his shoulder. Most of his face is concealed by a black mask, his long dark hair falling over his eyes. From what you’d seen, he moves impossibly fast. And if you couldn’t actually see the spot of blood on his shoulder, you wouldn’t even be sure that you shot him.

After taking down two agents in the blink of an eye, he stops, pressing a hand to his ear and listening to whatever orders come through the comms. Right when you climb back to your feet, he pivots and starts moving toward a tower, likely to take a sniper position.

It’s the perfect in and you know it, so you wait a few seconds before following him.

Crouching low, you peek through the opening and see him climbing the stairs two at a time. As you’d suspected, he’s looking to get high up, which gives you enough time to sneak up on him. Keeping him in your line of sight, you step through the opening and glance up the stairs.

You’re smaller than he is, careful not to let the stairs creak as you climb to the first-floor landing and duck around the wall. Just because you don’t think he saw you, doesn’t mean he didn’t.

Holding your breath, you listen to the sound of him ascending when the comms in your ear crackle. It’s an order, the kind you know not to question.

“Agent. Do not engage. I repeat, do not engage.”

If it made any sense, you really wouldn’t question it. Inching further away from the stairwell, you duck your head. “Why? He’s right there, I got him.”

It’s quiet for a moment. The steady crackle of feedback that tells you the line is still open. A second passes, then two, each one tightening the unease in your chest.

And another order comes. “Run.”

This, you do not question.

You sprint back toward the stairs just in time for the man to land mere feet away from you.

His boots slam into the metal, shaking the floor as he lunges. Blue eyes shining with intensity as he comes at you.

You don’t waste a second. You fire.

But the bullet ricochets off the metal arm, not slowing him at all. You squeeze off two more rounds, backing up with every trigger pull, and watch them both ping harmlessly away. He’s too fast, the arm moving in tight, brutal arcs, turning your bullets into nothing.

And then he’s coming at you.

Close enough now that the gun is all but useless. In a practiced move, you drop low and sweep your leg out, hooking behind his knees before spinning up into a brutal kick that drives the heel of your boot into his chest.

The second your boot hits his chest, which may as well have been a wall of steel, the truth is frighteningly clear.

The Winter Soldier.

His hand snaps out, catching your ankle mid-recoil. The grip is vice-tight, impossibly strong, and a heartbeat later, you’re yanked off balance, dragged toward him until the heat of his body crowds the air around you.

You twist, wrench, fight to pull free, but he’s already moving. A gloved hand clamps around your wrist, twisting hard until your weapon clatters uselessly across the concrete. You swing with your free hand; he catches that too, bends your arm just far enough to make pain bloom sharp and hot through your shoulder.

Two dozen assassinations in the past fifty years.

You duck under his next blow and use the spin to your advantage, driving your elbow straight into the wound you put in his shoulder. It’s desperate, ugly, earning you a sharp, bitten-off grunt that finally seems human.

It’s over before you can capitalize on it. He spins, grabs a fistful of your vest, and slams you back into the nearest wall hard enough to knock the breath from your lungs. The world tilts.

He shot him—straight through me.

You lash out again. A hail-Mary knee to his ribs. It’s like hitting stone. He catches your leg mid-swing this time, and suddenly you’re weightless, boots dangling above the ground, body caged by the strength of his hold.

For one suspended second, neither of you move. Your pulse is a drumbeat against your throat. His breath brushes the edge of your jaw. Warm, steady, close enough to count. His eyes are glacial. Focused. A static hum in the inches of space between you.

The second you think maybe you’ve rattled him, his grip tightens.

One sharp pivot and the floor drops out from under you.

Your back hits the wall again, harder this time. Pain ricochets up your spine, teeth clacking as the metal reverberates through you. The blow leaves you limp, muscles refusing to answer as your vision swims and the edges of the room blur.

When it clears, he’s already walking away. Calm. Deliberate. Reloading his weapon with the same ease someone else might light a cigarette. As if you were nothing more than a distraction he’s finished dealing with.

Bracing your palm on the floor, you can shift slightly now, and you grit your teeth, forcing your body into an upright position.

This time, you’re close enough to hear the orders that come through his earpiece: “Soldat. Ustranit' vraga.”

You’re not exactly fluent in Russian, but you know enough to recognize a kill order when you hear it.

This makes you lurch forward. Throwing yourself toward the exit and already knowing it won’t be fast enough. At least it wouldn’t have been were it not for a volley of bullets shooting straight at The Winter Soldier and forcing him to duck for cover.

The second you burst back into the open air, orders crackle through your earpiece.

“Change of plans. Shipment’s been rerouted to Dock 12. Intercept before they load the truck.”

Your boots hammer the slick ground as you run, weaving between crates and muzzle flashes. Sharon falls into step beside you, rifle blazing as she drops two agents in quick succession. You swing around the next container, fire off a burst of rounds, and keep moving.

The fight spills into chaos; smoke, shouts, the echo of gunfire bouncing off steel. Every step forward is a fight, every inch a battle, but the shipment is ahead, and you’re not letting Hydra reach it.

You skid around the final stack of crates and freeze.

One of them is already there. Tall, broad, and armored heavier than the others, a Hydra enforcer is cutting through the last two S.H.I.E.L.D. agents like they’re nothing. One goes down hard; the other crawls for cover, blood streaking the ground. Behind him, a cargo truck rumbles to life, its engine growling like a countdown.

You don’t think. You act.

Your first shot punches into his shoulder. The second ricochets off his chest plate. He turns toward you slowly, with the kind of confidence that makes your stomach clench.

“Sharon—”

“I see him.”

You break left, she breaks right, flanking him as bullets rain from both sides. He roars, swinging a heavy rifle like a club, and you duck just in time for it to whistle over your head. A follow-up kick to his back barely slows him down, but it’s enough to give Sharon an opening. Her next round slams into his thigh, forcing him down on one knee.

He’s still fighting when he charges you again. You meet him head-on, ducking under a wild swing and driving your knee into his ribs. He catches your wrist, twisting until white-hot pain sparks up your arm. You snarl, slam your head forward, and feel the satisfying crack of impact as his nose breaks.

“Get the driver!” Sharon shouts over the sound.

Shoving free, you sprint toward the truck. The enforcer staggers after you, blood streaking down his face, and grabs the edge of your vest. Luckily, Sharon is there to cover you as you reach the reuck.

He’s still moving, still cursing in Russian, when Sharon’s final round takes him down for good.

The truck’s wheels screech against the concrete as the last Hydra agent tries to peel away. You leap onto the hood before it can gain speed. Fingers gripping the cold metal, you slam the butt of your rifle through the window and yank the driver out by his collar. He hits the ground hard, groaning.

It’s quiet again.

The truck’s engine idles, cargo intact. You and Sharon exchange confused look before she jerks her chin toward the container.

“On three.”

The metal groans as you both wrench the doors open, expecting crates of weapons or rows of high-tech hardware. Instead, there’s a single shape crouched in the dark.

A man.

He’s thin, reedy, even, with close-cropped hair and eyes that gleam too sharp for someone who’s supposed to be cargo. A small, unsettling smile curling at the edges of his mouth.

“What the hell…” Sharon mutters under her breath, weapon still trained on him.

He raises his hands slowly, deliberately, like he’s mocking the gesture.

“On your feet,” you snap, stepping forward and grabbing his arm. His skin is clammy, like he’s been sitting in there for hours, maybe days. Whatever this is, it’s not a standard weapons drop.

The two of you move fast, binding his wrists with zip-ties and marching him back toward the rendezvous point.

The man’s strange little smile is still etched into your brain when Sharon stiffens beside you.

“Contact—three o’clock.”

You turn just in time to see a blur of movement cutting through the fog, fast and relentless. The Winter Soldier. He’s not retreating. He’s charging.

The two of you fall into muscle memory, stepping in front of the prisoner and raising your weapons. The air itself feels charged, tense, and then—

A blast of compressed gas fires from somewhere behind you. A lattice of crackling blue wire blossoms midair, wrapping around the charging figure with brutal precision.

The tech is simple, brutal, and S.H.I.E.L.D.-standard: a containment net wired to stun on contact and not stop until the subject’s vitals drop into a safe, non-threatening range. The net blooms in the air like lightning. It hits him square in the chest and detonates into a web of blue-white current, wrapping tight around his torso and limbs. Tiny arcs of electricity crawl across the woven cables, pulsing harder each time he moves.

The impact is violent enough to drop most men flat.

But not him.

He takes one step. Then another. Muscles seize and spasm beneath the crackling wire as he keeps moving, staggering forward like the pain is just another obstacle to conquer. The net bites harder, electricity arcing across his body, the smell of charred fabric and flesh cutting through the cold night air.

And still, he moves.

The sound he makes is primal, ripped straight from somewhere deep in his chest: a bellow, a wordless roar of defiance as his legs threaten to give. His shoulders shake, his breath tears out of him in ragged bursts.

Until, finally, his knees hit the ground.

He drops hard, muscles quivering, every inch of him trembling with the sheer effort it takes to stay upright. His breath comes in harsh, uneven pulls. Sweat beads at his temple. The net crackles on, merciless, crawling up his spine in jagged bolts of blue fire.

Even then, he isn’t done.

With a broken growl, he claws forward. Inch by inch. One hand, then the other, dragging his weight across the concrete. His body convulses with each pull, electricity tearing through every nerve ending, and still he crawls. His knees scrape, legs buckling beneath him as he drags himself forward anyway.

“Jesus Christ,” Sharon breathes, voice barely audible. “He’s still going—”

“Hey!” you shout, voice cracking with the surge of adrenaline. “Hey! Stop moving, you’re just frying yourself!”

It’s pointless. Ridiculous. But you can’t not say it. Because no one does this. No one fights through this. The pain is supposed to make surrender inevitable. It’s supposed to break the body before the will.

He refuses, like he doesn’t know he’s allowed to stop.

His jaw clenched so tightly a vein stands out in his temple. His eyes, those impossible, ice-blue eyes, are wild with pain, glossy with it, and still focused. Still locked on that same man. His breath stutters. A hoarse, ragged sound tears from his throat as he drags himself another inch.

You step forward before you can think, drawn to him by a mix of horror and awe. The air around the net vibrates with power, hissing and snapping. Instinct takes over. Your hand reaches out, brushing the crackling wire. Agony bites into your palm. White-hot, searing. You yank back with a sharp gasp, the stink of your own burned skin joining the electric tang in the air.

“Damn it!” You hiss, shaking your hand. “I said stop! You’re only making this worse!”

It is as if someone far away is controlling him with a remote.

It takes another thirty seconds before the crawling stops. Before his arms finally buckle and the strength drains out of him. Even then, he collapses slow, fighting gravity until the last second, until his cheek hits the concrete and the world goes still.

Part 2 - Medical Restraints

The S.H.I.E.L.D. base is a mess of even more chaos than usual.

The west med bay overflowing with agents all in need of attention in the post-mission phase.

Neither you nor Sharon escaped the ordeal unscathed, but your injuries pale in comparison to what some of the others have suffered, so you linger in the hall outside the door until things calm down.

On a regular day, there are two emergency rooms prepped and ready for mission fallout. Today, no one dares step into the room across the hall. It’s occupied.

The whispers have risen steadily in the past hour. Ranging from disbelief, scorn, and fear.

Is The Winter Soldier real?

Did S.H.I.E.L.D. actually manage to catch him?

Fury and Hill have been annoyingly absent. The second you and Sharon arrived back at the base with the ‘cargo’, they dismissed you for medical treatment without an explanation. Both of your many questions about who the man is, if they knew the shipment would be a human, and what the hell they want to do with him now have gone unanswered.

The two of you came to a silent agreement to at least not tell everyone else about the mystery, but it eats at you now.

Your palm burns, the wound in your thigh throbbing as you glance once toward the door of the room holding The Winter Soldier.

When The Asset wakes up, he is restrained.

It is not unusual for him to be tied down. Horizontal.

Especially in rooms like this. Sterile with fluorescent lights. Medical equipment lining the walls.

A sharp flare in his shoulder makes him flinch. Jolting against the restraints anchoring him to the bed.

The doctor closest to him jumps back. Afraid. This is unusual.

They are supposed to be used to it. Ignore it when he screams or pulls away. Normally, they do not stop.

The doctor's voices scramble over each other in a panic.

His skin burns. A web of heat that wraps around his body. Electric barbed wire.

He remembers falling. The net.

What is this place?

“Get more sedative! I don’t know how the hell he’s still awake!”

Slowly, his senses come back to him. A sharp sound muffled by the muzzle when someone tries to touch his shoulder.

The door opens with a bang, one of the doctors sprinting out.

Through the hall, he can see you.

Alarmed and already reaching for your gun like the blonde woman beside you.

You. You were there when the net trapped him. Ordering him to hold still.

A hand is back at The Assets shoulder. This time, his entire body jerks away. Skin barking in protest. Like the nets electricity is still coursing through his veins.

The Asset tries to hold still. To stay calm. But he always hates when they restrain him like this.

From experience he knows. Rooms like this always make the pain even worse.

And he tries. He does. Fighting the confusion in his head.

For a moment, he inhales. Exhales. Takes in his surroundings because they will punish him if he fights too much. For a moment he is calm. And then everything changes.

He snaps.

Sharon tramples your foot as she staggers back from the open door.

Up until seconds ago, things had been relatively under control. Or as close to control as anything gets when it involves a living weapon. Now? The med bay is a warzone.

You don’t know much about science, but even you know it’s strange, unnatural, that no amount of sedatives can keep The Winter Soldier unconscious.

The muzzle is still locked tight over his mouth, but his eyes are wide open, wild, snapping from face to face with feral precision.

And then there’s the rest of him. The bare rest of him. His upper body is stripped down to skin, all scarred muscle and sweat-slicked tension—the burn marks from the net still angry and red across his chest and shoulders. It’s brutal, wrong to see someone like that and still feel the air hum with danger.

The inevitable comes fast. The metal arm rips free of the restraint bolting it to the bedframe with a crack. A surgical tray goes flying through the door, spinning end over end before smashing into the wall hard enough to dent it. You and Sharon both duck, the clang echoing down the corridor.

Your gun is in your hand before you even register pulling it, sights trained on the open doorway.

Risking a glance down the hall confirms your suspicion. Fury and Hill are here, and between them, the man from the container walks in shackles, head held high, the picture of arrogance.

Fury’s gaze cuts to the med bay, to the chaos spilling out of it. His jaw tightens, and then he’s shouting, voice carrying over the alarm klaxons and shouting agents.

“Enough! Treat him as hostile. Full containment protocols, now. Get him out of medical and into Vault 13! I don’t want him anywhere near civilians or staff.”

Vault 13. A place designed for things that don’t stay down.

More agents flood the hall in seconds: armed, armored, coordinated. It takes six of them to wrestle him to the ground, another two to secure the thrashing metal arm in heavy cuffs. Even muzzled and drugged, he’s fighting like something rabid, his muscles straining, chest heaving, the sharp snarl of his breath audible through the mask.

You watch, gun still raised, as they drag him past the door. His boots scraping against the tile. A smear of blood and burn against pale skin.

He’s being pulled down the corridor, deeper into the belly of S.H.I.E.L.D., where steel and electricity will be all that keeps the rest of the world safe from him.

Part 3 - Pinned to the Wall

You wait until the base quiets down. Intentionally postponing your medical treatment so you’re the last one in the med bay.

One shot of anesthetic later and the wound in your thigh is stitched, dressing wrapped around the burn on your palm.

With carefully deft fingers, you may have stolen some medical supplies that you're confident no one will miss. Keeping an eye out, you shove them into one of the many pockets in your suit and step back into the hall.

Almost everyone is gone. Either back to their homes or crashing in one of the bunks on the upper levels. Even Sharon called it a night, only leaving when you promised to be close behind her. You were lying, of course, but what Sharon doesn’t know won’t hurt her.

What you don’t know gnaws at you. That same uneasy feeling that seeded when you saw The Winter Soldier thrashing in that net.

It leads you down one floor to where Fury, Hill, and a select few have been stationed with the man from the docks for the past few hours. As if he could sense you coming, Fury meets you right outside the door.

A frown furrows his brow. Different from the stern look you’d grown accustomed to.

“Who is he?” The question is out before you can find a more tactful way to get information.

When Fury shakes his head, you can tell he’s lost rather than withholding. “Wish I knew. The guy won’t say a word. Not a fucking word in twelve hours.”

“Seriously?” Your eyes narrow. Everyone knows that S.H.I.E.L.D.’s methods of interrogation are often… unorthodox. You’d seen the agents Fury selected to help him deal with the man. They never leave a room without answers. Not to mention that the man himself hadn’t looked all that impressive, at least physically. “You’re telling me he’s holding up against—”

“We aren’t doing that.” Fury looks at her, almost startled. “We don’t know that he’s a threat. And frankly, we aren’t even sure the guy speaks English.”

Surprise makes you blink. Because, according to the intel you’ve been receiving for the past week, the shipment Hydra was expecting to receive had been considered a Level Five threat. “Russian?”

“Who knows. Where the hell is Romanoff when you need her?”

“Derek speaks Russian,” You point out.

“Derek's an idiot.”

“I speak a little.” The offer falls flat. Both of you know that the amount of Russian you know is not enough to get any helpful information out of this guy. Before you can incriminate yourself any further, you lie again. “I’m heading out then.”

“Yeah, see you tomorrow,” Fury just nods once, already heading back into the room.

Which is perfect. He doesn’t see you descending the stairs and finding Vault 13.

It was easy to convince the agent on duty to leave their post.

Nobody likes taking overnight watch. Especially not for Vault 13. Especially not when the rumored Winter Soldier is just behind the thick metal doors.

You, on the other hand, are too curious to be afraid.

Waiting until the agent is gone, you push through the door and step inside.

Vault 13 sits at the far end of a heavily reinforced corridor. The hallway narrows into a short antechamber; the lights dimmer. Ahead of you, behind a thick pane of reinforced glass, is the most dangerous man alive.

The Winter Soldier is no longer thrashing. No longer fighting. They’ve made sure of that.

He’s upright, pinned to a reinforced metal wall by a lattice of restraints.

Both arms are pulled wide, the metal one shackled into a magnetic lock that hums faintly when you draw close. His legs are forced apart, ankles bolted to the floor, and a heavy band cinches across his chest, tight enough that you can see the rise and fall of his breathing beneath it.

The muzzle is still on.

The first thing that hits you is how still he is. His eyes are open, fixed on some indeterminate point in the middle distance, unnervingly motionless. As if even the act of resisting has been beaten out of him.

His hair hangs in dark, damp strands around his face. There’s a split in his lip, a dried streak of blood at his temple. Across his torso: a map. Old, silvered scars crossing fresh burns; a puckered mark beneath the left clavicle; newer scorches striping the lines of his ribs.

Even without the armor, he looks weaponized.

For a long moment, you just stand there, separated by the glass.

You tell yourself you’re only here to look. To understand what they’re dealing with. To remind yourself why they had to do this. The longer you watch him, the harder it is to convince yourself that’s true.

He doesn’t move when you approach—hardly acknowledging you at all. And yet, as you draw closer to the glass, a flicker of something crosses his face. Barely perceptible, gone before you can name it.

Recognition, maybe. Or curiosity.

The keycard trembles slightly between your fingers because every instinct you have is screaming that this is a very, very bad idea.

For a second, you question if this is stupid. If you should turn around and ignore the strange feeling in your chest for better or for worse. Deciding for you, the lock clicks open.

The door seals hiss as they release, and a wave of cold air greets you the second you step inside. The temperature here is lower than the rest of the facility, hitting the raw skin of your knuckles with a sharp, needling sting.

Gooseflesh rises across his chest and shoulders; his skin is too warm for a room this cold, heat ghosting into the air between you.

The door closes behind you.

Up close, the restraints look even more brutal.

He’s watching you now. Still as ever.

It’s unnerving, the way his eyes track you, the way a hawk might track something moving across the ground. Precise. Unreadable.

Your boots break the silence as you take another cautious step forward. The plastic water bottle in your hand crinkles slightly under the pressure of your grip. You don’t even remember grabbing it, some impulse to offer something, anything. The carrot or the stick, and you really don’t think the stick will work on him, but now it feels absurd, almost insulting, against the scale of him.

The muzzle means you can’t see much of his expression. Even so, the eyes are enough. Icy, focused, threatening without trying.

You hover a few feet away, just outside of reach, not that he has any reach, and suddenly it’s too quiet. The soft hum of the restraints, the slow rhythm of his breath, the rush of your own pulse in your ears.

He’s not a ghost. He’s not a myth.

He’s a man, chained to a wall, watching you walk closer with eyes that haven’t decided yet whether you’re a threat or something else entirely.

You stop a few feet in front of him. Just far enough to feel safe, close enough that if he could move, you’d have time to back away. The bottle hangs loosely at your side, condensation slick against your fingers.

“Alright,” you murmur, more to fill the silence than anything else, before trying to run through the little Russian you do know. “YA sobirayus' zadat' tebe vopros.” I’m going to ask you a question.

You’re not even sure if he hears you.

You nod at the restraints pinning him to the wall. “Ty sobirayesh'sya popytat'sya napast' na menya?” Are you going to try and attack me?

It’s a stupid question. With the magnetic locks and cross-brace over his chest, he couldn’t reach you even if he wanted to. For some reason, you’re desperate to know how he’ll respond.

Slowly, shortly, he shakes his head.

“Good,” you say, and it sounds steadier than you expected. Possibly because that was exactly what you’d expected him to say. Dots you hadn’t even connected until now.

On the docks, he could have easily killed you. You were down, too dizzy to fight back or even move, and all he’d done was walk away. It wasn’t until direct orders came through his earpiece that he looked at you like anything more than an obstacle.

You take a step closer, letting your gaze flick briefly to his shoulder. The skin is stained a deep rust-brown around the hole you put in him. The edges are still raw, angry.

You tilt your head, professional and detached. Or trying to be. “Pulya proshla navylet?” The bullet went clean through?

He hesitates, just for a second, before nodding once.

You ask the next question quickly. “Did they at least cauterize it?” English, for two reasons. One, no one ever taught you the Russian word for cauterize. And two, you’re certain he did understand your English when he was trapped in the net earlier.

This time, he shakes his head. You’re not sure if the tiny coil in your chest is foolish, misplaced sympathy.

The silence stretches again. It’s heavier this time, crowded with all the things you want to ask and all the things you know you shouldn’t. Curiosity wins.

You shift your weight slightly, eyes never leaving his face, by now, you’ve abandoned your attempts at Russian. “Who is that man?”

For the first time, something changes. His expression, if you can call it that, shutters completely. His gaze slides away from you, fixing on a point somewhere over your shoulder. No nod. No shake of the head. Nothing.

The question hangs in the air between you, unanswered and humming like static.

Silence stretches until it almost starts to feel like a power play. You cross your arms, studying him the way you would a suspect in an interrogation room.

“Were you going to kill him?” You ask finally.

Nothing. Not a twitch, not a breath out of place. His gaze stays fixed somewhere past you, as though the question never happened.

“Why is he here?”

It’s subtle, a flicker. A hitch in his breath. The smallest, involuntary flinch.

And suddenly, it clicks.

The net. That relentless, desperate thrashing wasn’t just rage. He wasn’t looking at you or Sharon or the dozens of agents aiming rifles at his chest. He was staring past you, at him.

And in the med bay, when all hell broke loose, it hadn’t been the doctors or the restraints or the pain that pushed him over the edge like everyone assumed. It was the moment that man walked by the door.

You glance at The Winter Soldier again, really look at him this time. The tightness in his jaw, the way his pulse beats hard at his throat. There’s no way to know for sure. But if you didn’t know better, you’d almost say it looked like fear.

You should leave it. You should. And if your eyes would stop drifting to the black muzzle strapped across the lower half of his face, you might have been able to.

Up close, it’s worse than you expected. The edges dig harshly into his skin, leaving angry red welts along his cheekbones and jaw. The material cuts into the soft space beneath his eyes. Every breath he takes sounds shallow and forced, like he’s dragging air through too-small gaps.

Against your better judgment, your hand is already moving, hovering near the strap.

“Don’t bite me.” You murmur, part bad joke, part warning, just to alleviate the suffocating silence.

The clasp resists you at first; intense Hydra tech meant to keep it locked in place. You fumble for a while until it gives with a soft click. The muzzle comes free with a slow, reluctant hiss.

The reaction is instant.

Air rasps over his bare throat, the tendons standing out as he drags it in like it hurts to breathe, and he’ll do it anyway.

A sharp, uncontrolled gasp rips from his chest, his whole body jolting as the first real breath of air hits his lungs. His head tips back just slightly as he drags in another breath, and another. The relief is raw and physical, impossible to hide, and for the first time since you walked in, his eyes betray him.

It’s there, just for a heartbeat. Relief.

You just stand there, the weight of the muzzle heavy in your hand, and try to reconcile the myth you’ve heard about with the man gasping for air right in front of you.

Turning the muzzle over once in your hands before setting it aside, you try not to think about how light it feels compared to the damage it’s done. The water bottle is still clutched loosely in your grip.

A step forward.

His gaze follows the water instantly. It’s instinctive: a predator tracking movement. At a closer glance, it looks simpler, more human. His lips are cracked, Adam's apple bobbing as he swallows around the dryness. The need is obvious, written in the smallest clues of his body and the way his eyes linger on the bottle.

You lift the bottle, uncap it, and raise it toward his mouth.

The rim bumps his lower lip and a droplet slides off the plastic and tracks over the cut at the corner of his mouth, down the hollow at the base of his throat.

That’s when the shift happens.

The hunger is still there. Layered now. Tangled with something older. He tenses, head jerking back a fraction, a subtle recoil like he’s bracing for the worst. His eyes dart to yours.

They are full of suspicion. Like the instinct is carved deep. A lifetime of never trusting what’s offered.

Your chest tightens with understanding.

This isn’t at all what you’d expected. He’s acting less like a threat and more like a rescued hostage who still hasn’t learned to trust the world. Just a few months ago, you and Natasha brought down a Red Room warehouse and brought back half a dozen girls to be reunited with their families. None of them even ate the food offered to them until they saw you and Natasha biting into the sandwiches.

More surprised than anything, you bring the bottle to your own lips and take a sip. Intentionally unbothered. Then you lower it again, hold his gaze, and offer it back.

This time, he doesn’t look at the water. He looks at you.

Slowly, he leans forward. The cool rim brushes against his lower lip. It’s almost imperceptible the way his eyes flutter closed for a heartbeat, the faint tremor that runs through him as the water touches his tongue.

No, this isn’t similar to a recovered hostage. It’s exactly the same.

It’s greed and resistance all at once. He drinks in short, careful swallows, his body pulling him closer even as his shoulders stay tense, ready to flinch away at any second. You tilt the bottle a little more, and his throat works as he swallows again, each movement betraying how long it’s been since anyone offered him something without force.

When the last swallow is gone, you lower the bottle and step back,. His breathing is steadier. His shoulders still haven’t loosened, but the harsh edge of tension has dulled into something quieter. Watchful. Waiting.

You tilt your head slightly, breaking the quiet first. “So you guys do speak English.”

For a beat, there’s nothing. Just the hum of the magnetic locks and the faint rasp of his breath. Then, finally, like the words are being dragged from somewhere deep:

“I prefer Russian.”

It’s flat, mechanical. The cadence is too smooth, too even, as if he’s repeated that exact sentence a hundred times before. It sounds less like preference and more like a line he’s been taught to give.

You hum quietly under your breath, neither agreeing nor arguing. “Do you have a name?”

A slight shake of his head. At first, it looks like a refusal before you realize what is really is. Confusion. The question doesn’t compute.

“Do you?” He asks after a long moment, voice low and hoarse, eyes locked on yours.

You shake your head, shrugging slightly. “Not if you don’t.”

Clearing your throat, you let your weight shift back to one hip, eyeing the torn flesh and dark stain around his shoulder. “You realize you fought off a team of doctors trying to deal with that bullet wound, right?”

He blinks once. No denial, no defense. It is as if he genuinely doesn’t remember fighting anyone. Like his body acted on its own.

“You shot me.” He says, more fact than accusation.

Right, of course he’d remember that. “Didn’t seem to affect you much.”

Your gaze drifts back to his shoulder. Up close, the damage is worse than you’d thought. The net caused the fabric of his tac suit to fuse to the wound in places, even after the doctors cut it off. A jagged ring of dried blood circles where the bullet punched clean through.

That’s not the only thing making your stomach twist.

It’s the way the restraints hold him. Arms spread and pulled taut, chest bound back against the cold steel of the wall. His weight isn’t centered. Every muscle in his body strained. He can’t even take a breath without pushing his chest against the band crossing it, sawing the harness into him.

And every slight shift tugs at the healing wound, a mean little pull at the edge of torn tissue.

It’s a wonder he hasn’t said anything about the pain. The setup itself is pain.

Your eyes keep moving, unwilling but unable to stop. And that’s when you see the rest of it.

The burns.

They lace across his skin in an ugly, angry pattern. Deep, jagged streaks where the net’s current kissed exposed flesh. Some are faint, others are raw and blistered, darkened and split along his forearm, his neck, the side of his jaw. Considering the pain in your palm, you can’t imagine how it would feel to have that covering most of your body.

You swallow hard, remembering the way he thrashed inside the net, how the electric hum didn’t stop until his body finally did. The acrid smell of scorched fabric and scorched skin. Now, standing this close, you can almost feel the residual heat coming off those burns.

The worst part? He hasn’t made a sound. Hasn’t complained once or attempted to shift away from the pull of the restraints. He just stands there, silent and still, like this is all he’s ever known.

It does something strange to your chest.

“I can help,” You say finally, not even realizing your tone has already shifted from interrogatory to cautious. The same treatment you give to hostages. To people so clearly afraid and in pain. “I’m not a doctor, but…”

You’d watched for a reason, hadn’t you? When the medics upstairs cleaned and treated the burn on your hand. Normally, you don’t concern yourself with how doctors do the things they do. All you ever want to know is how quickly you can be back in action again.

When he finally nods, you start at the neck.

The skin there is mottled red and black, streaked with raised welts that trace the shape of the net’s wires.

Up close, you can see where the fabric of his suit melted and fused to him, where electricity bit straight through into flesh.

You soak the cloth in cool saline and press it to the worst of it. Liquid gathers at his collarbone, then slips down the notch of his sternum in a cold line.

His head snaps back; a ripped-off noise punches from his throat before he can catch it.

It builds there first. In the shallow hitch of his chest, the breath that stalls half-formed behind clenched teeth. You can see the fight in the line of his throat, the way his body braces like it might hold the sound in by sheer will.

Your hand drags lower, wiping away the soot with more pressure now. The movement coaxes a small, involuntary twitch from his abdomen. A ripple beneath the skin, like his body’s trying to flinch even though the restraints won’t let him.

At first, there’s just breath. Uneven, shaky. Then a hiss, teeth clenched so hard you can hear the grind of enamel. His shoulders pull tight against the wall, muscles locking in a losing fight against the current of pain crawling through him.

You know what those muscles are capable of. The same ones that ripped through a dozen armed agents on the docks. Now they’re shaking beneath a scrap of wet cloth, every ounce of lethal strength made useless by something as simple as pain.

Another swipe. Deeper pressure. The cloth snags over charred skin, and his chest stutters on a breath that dies halfway out. A low sound ghosts past his lips, too soft to name, half-swallowed before it ever reaches the air. Instinct, not intention.

He’s been taught, you realize, to stifle his reactions.

You keep going. The next pass earns more than a twitch. His jaw clamps harder, veins standing out along his neck as the restraint bites into his wrists. Every muscle in his chest jumps under your palm, ribs flaring with each harsh inhale. It’s like watching a dam fracture one crack at a time.

And then it happens.

The first real sound breaks free—a sharp, strangled whimper, raw and unguarded, clawing its way out of his chest. His head jerks against the wall with a hollow clang, metal clanking as his biceps flex hard against the cuffs. The sound lingers in the air, thin and wrecked. A confession he never meant to give.

It’s enough to make you freeze. Until logic catches up: the faster you go, the quicker this will be over. For both of you.

You press again, firmer this time, dragging the damp cloth along the burn to lift soot and char. His breath comes out in uneven bursts now, each one shuddering through his chest. The next sound is quieter, more desperate, vibrating low in his throat as his knees nearly buckle, body instinctively trying to curl away before the restraints drag him upright again. The lines of his obliques jump under your palm; his ribs flare and fall too fast.

“Sorry,” you mutter, barely audible. Then bite the inside of your cheek, furious you even said it.

When you reach for the next patch of damage, the breath stalls in your lungs.

You take in his bare abdomen. The tactical fabric must have ridden up and torn in the struggle, leaving broad planes of skin exposed and burned beneath the harsh light. The net hadn’t spared him there either. Blackened streaks and jagged, blistered trails slash right across the ridges of his abdomen, cutting cruel lines over muscle that tightens and shifts with every shallow breath. You brace yourself and press the soaked cloth against them.

The muscles clench under your hand so hard the V of his hips tightens; his breath breaks, head dropping and lifting again as another helpless sound slips free.

The sound he makes can only be described as a groan, low and guttural, strangled halfway between pain and instinct. His abs contract violently beneath your touch, every muscle jumping under the shock of contact. His head drops forward, chin nearly touching his chest, hair falling over his face as another broken grunt slips free.

And still, he doesn’t fight. Doesn’t curse. Doesn’t speak. He just endures.

You work faster now, because you have to. Cool liquid drips down his stomach in thin rivulets as you swipe the antiseptic over blistered skin. The sharp sting drags another hiss between clenched teeth, his breath ragged and shallow.

The cream is worse. When you smooth it over the worst of the burns, his body goes rigid. Every muscle pulled taut, trembling, a barely contained quake that shudders through him. He tries to brace against it, shoulders pressed hard to the wall as if sheer strength could keep the sound inside.

It doesn’t.

The first exhale frays apart, unraveling into something rawer—a moan, low and guttural. Dragged from somewhere deep and helpless. His eyes squeeze shut, lashes trembling, and the sheer humanity of it hits you square in the chest.

It’s too much. The smell of scorched skin. The way his abdomen clenches violently under your hands. The fact that the most dangerous man alive is hanging here, gasping and shuddering, when earlier a bullet through the shoulder hadn’t even slowed him down.

You steady him without thinking, fingers splayed under his lower ribs to keep him from twisting. His body betrays him anyway. In a sharp, involuntary jerk, his hips buck forward. A ragged grimace cutting across his face as it happens.

The reaction is raw, too revealing, and shame flickers across his features in its wake. His jaw locks, eyes darting away from yours, as if refusing to acknowledge how much of himself he just gave away.

The motion knocks your breath loose, a reminder that no amount of control can fully cage what’s breaking inside him.

You swallow hard and keep moving, because if you stop now, neither of you will make it through this.

The burns are bad. The burns are brutal. And the shoulder, the shoulder is worse.

Up close, you can see how the blast welded shreds of fabric into the entry wound. Blackened threads crust the rim, tiny charred flecks stuck in the torn flesh like grit. Some are hair-fine, almost invisible until the light hits; others are glossy, melted beads clinging to the edge. You know enough to understand that it can’t stay.

You flood the area with saline first, then bring the tip of your knife in to dig the pieces out. The point slips under a fused fragment and you lift slowly.

The sound he makes when the blade drags too close to the wound is nothing short of wrecked. A sharp argh slips from his throat, followed by a hiss that trembles at the edges. His head jerks back again, the muscles in his neck corded and tight.

It’s… different from anyone else you’ve seen. Most people scream, thrash, curse loudly. He doesn’t. He hardly reacts. Small, involuntary spasms that betray how deep the pain cuts. A quiver in the defined muscles of his abdomen, the twitch of a jaw trying to stay clenched, the heavy drop of his head when the agony gets too much.

And God, there’s something about that restraint, about the way he takes it, that’s worse than any scream. It’s so controlled, so deliberate, like he’s trained every inch of his body not to fight what’s happening.

When the last scrap of ruined fabric peels free, his breath shudders out of him like it’s been held for too long. He’s sweating now, a thin sheen across his temple and throat that makes you question how you ever found him robotic in the first place. When his eyes find yours, they’re glassy and pleading without a single word spoken.

You reach for the antiseptic next, tilting the vial just enough to let a slow stream run over the torn skin. It’s too much. His shoulder jerks violently against the restraint, fingers twitching as his jaw goes slack and a low, strangled sound escapes. This one is part hiss, part groan.

When his body jerks, the mag-lock on the metal wrist hums louder, blue light pulsing. “It’ll alert someone if you keep fighting,” You warn him. “I can… stop if it’s too much.”

“Keep going.” The words are barely a breath, so quiet you almost think you imagined them. But you can feel his breath ghosting your cheek. They’re real. They’re a command. A plea. Both.

You do. Because how could you not?

You work faster now, pressing the cloth against raw skin, every touch drawing a new sound out of him. His knees bend again, muscles trembling as if his body wants to fold in on itself, but the restraints don’t let him. They force him to stand there and take it, every motion etched across his features: the hard line of his jaw, the flutter of his lashes, the tiny muscle jumping beneath one eye.

When you finally pull your hand away to grab the burn cream, his breath catches. His head tips forward, eyes half-lidded and searching for you.

“Don’t stop.”

Like a reflex. Like some part of him needs this, needs it finished, needs it to end.

So you don’t.

The gel goes on cool, slick, a thin line of relief chasing the burn it leaves in its wake. His eyes flutter closed, breath coming in short, shaky bursts as the tension bleeds out of him inch by inch.

Is the title a ref to that Hozier song? Love it!

"Rooms like this always make the pain even worse." My poor Bucky :(

"Vault 13. A place designed for things that don’t stay down." Effective use of words (leaves enough to the imagination) but also the words are carefully chosen: "things" instead of "people"

SHIELD not being perfect (the implied torture ("Everyone knows that S.H.I.E.L.D.’s methods of interrogation are often… unorthodox") and leaving him restrained and his wounds untreated)

“Derek's an idiot.” hehe

"The clasp resists you at first; intense Hydra tech meant to keep it locked in place." PLUS that whole muzzle-removal scene. Showed the desperation super well.

"He’s acting less like a threat and more like a rescued hostage who still hasn’t learned to trust the world." YESSSS, then the realization later: "No, this isn’t similar to a recovered hostage. It’s exactly the same."

"He’s been taught, you realize, to stifle his reactions." aaah my buckyyyyyy :((((((

The sounds slowly being released? Oh goodness. Poor baby.

I think there's also a lot of meaning behind the "do you have a name"//"not if you don't" exchange. I'm trying to figure it out. Building a sense of unity/connection? I know there's a Doyalist explanation (didn't wanna say Y/n and risk breaking the immersion) but I also am trying to think of thematic or Holmsian explanations.

In conclusion: I loved this and will 100% be checking out the rest of your blog. Have a lovely day!