Adult-FanFiction.org : Marvel 'Verse

A Bucky Barnes Winter Soldier Fic - The Constant	By : TheConstant1944 Category: Marvel Verse Comics > Captain America Views: 2391 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own any Marvel characters. They are solely owned by Marvel and MCU. No money is made from this story.

Chapter List
- 71
- 72
- 73
Chapter Seventy-Two
The Winter Soldier & The Man On The Bridge

After The Mission
“We got him out of there as soon as we could, sir. Yes...yes...I don't actually know. I didn't see it. But Daniel did, and it...it was...” A lowered voice. “It was Rogers, sir.”
Felix nods as though Pierce could see him, and then shakes his head when Daniel looks at him. He then turns to look at the Winter Soldier.
“No,” he continues into the phone, “totally unresponsive. We're taking him back to the vault now. Uh-huh. We lost Artur...yes, sir...no problem. Meet you there.” And he hangs up, pursing his lips and blowing out air.
They are parked on a side street, and they can still hear the sirens heading to the distant scene. In the back with them is the body of their fallen comrade Artur Kostin, the man Rogers had been with, Sam Wilson had taken him down. But there was no time to mourn for their lostcolleague, and they had not even stayed to see Rumlow round up Rogers, Wilson, and Romanoff. But Pierce had just confirmed by phone that they had them.
Felix looks at Daniel Atkins. “Rumlow has Rogers, Romanoff and Wilson. They'll be terminated. Jesus, what a day...tell me again, what was it that Rogers said?”
They have the Winter Soldier but there is something wrong with him. His arm has been damaged, and he is covered in scratches and bruises, but it is his eyes that has Felix worried. Something has affected his mind.
“It wasn't exactly what he said. He called him something...it sounded like Bucky.” And as Atkins says it the Winter Soldier lifts his head. Both Felix and Atkins react by reaching for their guns, but the Soldier just lowers his head again. They can see he is saying something under his breath, but it is too quiet for them to hear. He has not spoken to them since they put him in the van.
“What did Pierce say?” Atkins asks.
Felix sighs, dry washes his face. “Just that we are to take him back for mission report at the vault and he will meet us there later with Rumlow.”
*
Mission Report
“Mission Report!” Felix repeats himself for the third time, but the Soldier simply sits in the master chair and stares at only something he can see.
Normally they would ask Freya to come and see if she can get any response, but word from above is she is now persona non grata. No one is permitted to talk to her, and even she herself is unaware of why. The Winter Soldier's team have been updated on the fact she has been seen talking to Rogers. To SHIELD.
She is to be terminated. And the Winter Soldier will be given the task.
Rollins enters the room. “Pierce has arrived but I warn you, he's not at all happy,” he tells Felix, adding: “Rogers and his friends escaped.”
“Shit! How?...No, don't tell me. I'll find out later.” And with that, he turns and leaves the vault with Atkins in tow. Their next task is burying Artur's body.
After they have gone, one of the technicians pulls up a chair next to the Winter Soldier and pulls on his metallic arm, opening it up so that he can get to the circuitry within. The Soldier sits still, still lost, still watching the flashes pass through his mind. Every so often his lips will move silently, as though he is conversing with someone.
“Sergeant Barnes,” Zola addresses him, standing before him. His heart begins to hammer. Fear grips him. The pictures keep moving, and this one suddenly jumps to a train about to enter a tunnel. Then he is onboard the train with a man, the man, the one he saw today on the bridge – but no, no longer in the train. Outside of it. Hanging on for his life. The man is leaning out of the rent in the side of the train, screaming “Bucky!” There is pure panic in his voice. The Winter Soldier cannot hang on, the metal is coming away from its moorings and as he falls backwards he hears the man scream again: “No!”
Then he feels himself hurtling through the air, but before he hits the ground the picture jumps again. He is now being dragged along the hard ice-covered ground, his body broken, part of his left arm missing. There is such awful pain everywhere. His mind is clouded and he cannot think. Then Zola again, telling him: “The procedure has already started.” A surgeon is cutting into what is left of his arm. He can feel it being sliced away and he tries to scream.
His pulse is elevated, his body sweating. Every so often he jumps as if something has shocked him. The technician grumbles: it will take forever to repair the arm if the Soldier keeps moving. He jumps again, moves, turns his head to the side as if listening to a voice. His long hair covers his face, wet with heavy sweat.
“You are to be the new fist of Hydra,” Zola is telling him. The images flash by so fast, he does not have time to think. In the memory he tries to hold his hands up: one is flesh, the other metal. And with the metal one he reaches out and encircles the neck of one of the scientists and begins to squeeze. “Put him on ice,” a voice says. He thinks it is Zola again but he is not sure. As he hears that, the scene begins to fade and instead he is in a pod, a cryo pod, but one of the old ones and they are freezing him. He can hear the crackling of his skin...
He wants to cry out. Wants to escape. Wants them to stop.
Without any warning the Winter Soldier lashes out, sending the technician flying backwards. The STRIKE guards move forward, guns all aimed on the Solider. He doesn't move any further, just sits on the edge of the chair, pumped, his fists clenched. He is so very far away.
What's happening to me? he thinks, and as he does so the pain in his heard worsens as his programming tries to shut down his memories. But he fights it. He wants to know the answer. The man on the bridge, he called me Bucky, why do I know that name? Why do I know that man? He knows it is important. He must fight to remember.
Pierce enters the vault with Rumlow in tow, but the Soldier is not aware of anything happening outside the confines of his own mind.
“Sir, he's unstable, erratic...” One of the technicians tries to point out to Pierce. As Pierce walks up to the Soldier, he indicates to the STRIKE team to lower their weapons and step back. He studies his prize asset and can see he is million miles away.
More flashbacks. “Bucky come on!” The man from the bridge again. Always it comes back to him. A Soldier wearing a bowler hat is calling him over: “Hey, Sergeant Barnes!” He lifts his hand in greeting. “Over here!” They are in a pub and the man in the hat is handing him a drink. He frowns, looks at him, and the man grins. Someone claps him on the back.
Then they are back up high, on the snow covered mountains and a zip wire is being snapped into place. He is with the same men. He can see the train again and a gut-wrenching feeling hits him, because he knows when he is on that train he will fall once more. Nothing can stop that from happening. Nothing can stop him from falling.
Pierce stands in front of the Winter Soldier.
“Mission report,” he says. He is the Handler and the Soldier should respond immediately to him - but nothing happens. “Mission report now!” There is a hardness to Pierce's voice.
Pierce moves forward and bends to look at the Winter Soldier, studies his face again, sees the lost look in his eyes – suddenly, without warning, Pierce strikes him around the face, hard. That seems to break the spell the Soldier is held in and he appears to come around; intelligence flickers back into those eyes, and he finally turns to Pierce.
“The man on the bridge...” And as he speaks, the Soldier can see Steve Rogers in his mind. Steve. That is his name - but who is he? The memory is on the very tip of his mind. Steve calling him Bucky. “Who was he?” he asks his Handler. He can see this Steve in his mind but still doesn't fully understand who he is, why he makes his heart race. There is no context to his memories.
Pierce makes sure they have eye contact. “You met him earlier this week on another assignment,” he says, expecting the Soldier to believe him. But the Winter Soldier cannot bring himself to believe his Handler. He cannot escape the look on the face of the man who said that name – Bucky. Truth be told he doesn't want to escape, doesn't want to lose the memory.
The Soldier's eyes drop as he tries to think, trying to take in what he is being told. “I knew him,” he says, his eyes again beginning to focus inwards at his memories.
Pierce knows he needs to stop him from thinking. He pulls up a chair, sits directly in front of the Soldier. The Soldier is still looking inwards, desperately trying to remember. He knows it is important, the man called Steve is so important to him.
Pierce starts to talk, gets the Soldier to look at him. “Your work has been a gift to mankind. You shaped this century, and I need you to do it one more time. Society is at a tipping point between order and chaos. Tomorrow morning we're going to give it a push. But if you don't do your part, I can't do mine, and HYDRA can't give the world the freedom it deserves.”
As he speaks, he watches the Soldier closely. The Soldier goes from looking at his Handler to looking away and then back again. It is obvious he is taking in what Pierce is saying, but he is also questioning it in his own mind. Pierce finishes his speech and the Winter Soldier looks at him once more: the look is one of query, one that shows he is still not convinced.
And then he tries to smile at Pierce. The smile is a sad one. “But I knew him,” he says simply.
Pierce is not happy. He gazes at his asset once more and then gets up and turns his back on him.
“Prep him,” he says harshly to one of the technicians.
“He's been out of cryo-freeze too long,” the man replies, and Pierce turns and looks at the Soldier one more time. “Then wipe him and start over.” The words are harsh, uncaring, his look is one of contempt for the Soldier in the chair. There is no pity, no compassion. His toy is broken, he wants it repaired no matter what the cost.
As he hears what his Handler says his mind begins to cry out in protest. The technicians walk over to him and force him back into the chair. He knows he has to obey, he knows the pain that is coming. He begins to breathe faster. One of the techs places a gum shield in his mouth. He feels the clamps catch his arms and pin him to the chair. His whole body reacts to them as he is pushed even further back into the seat. His Handler stands there, watching.
His fists clamp on to the sides of the chair and his whole body trembles, not because he is scared but because he knows what is to come. He cannot escape it. His breathing increases even more as the machine whirls overhead and comes down to clamp his head. He can hear the hum of the electricity that any minute now will be shot into him, into his brain, his mind, fry whatever he has there that they don't want him to keep. He wants to cry out, but then the hum turns into a crackling as it shoots through him and his screams can be heard all the way through the vault.
The STRIKE team shuffle their feet. They cannot look away, yet a few of them have a moment of pity for the Soldier as once again they watch him being torn apart piece by piece.
Pierce turns and leaves with Rumlow in his wake. Rumlow takes one look back and his feelings are conflicted. He is still angry about losing Rogers and the others, but there is a small part of him that hates to admit he still admires Rogers...and now as he looks at Barnes, pity overwhelms him. But he doesn't want that. He wants to be able to hate these men. At the beginning he thought they would be able to bring Rogers into Hydra's fold, but that was not possible. He took against Project Insight, even put doubts into Nick Fury's mind to the point where Fury had called for the project to be delayed. Rogers is too restricted in his thinking and does not agree with Hydra's vision of the new world and that makes Rogers dangerous. Rumlow wants to feel contempt for the Captain, but a small part of him still believes in the heroes from old and he doesn't want that. It annoys the hell out of Rumlow and makes him just as dangerous.
*
The Woman On the Bridge
The Winter Soldier is angry.
He watches the woman running for cover on the road below. She shot at him, hit him, but luck and his goggles had saved the bullet from doing any damage. He tells the others to go after the man. The woman is mine, he had growled in Russian.
He tracks where she has gone and jumps from the bridge down to her level. There are cars scattered everywhere on the road, people running, but he walks slowly, efficiently, scanning to find her, loading his Remington. He ignores the people trying to get out of his way; one look at him is enough to make them flee. He wants the woman who shot at him. He is hunting her now. He looks for her red hair. There is a vague familiarity there but he doesn't know why but it is so insignificant he doesn't question it. She has to die, and he will kill her.
It is getting quieter now - not so many people screaming - and then he hears it. Her voice. He listens to the words; it sounds like she is on the phone, requesting help. He listens carefully to pinpoint her voice and then he stops. She is behind one of the cars. He bends down and taking a spherical grenade from his belt he rolls it under the car. Five seconds later, it explodes. He is ready for her, expecting the explosion to flush her out but there is nothing and he realises he has been fooled. His hands tighten on his weapon, the annoyance showing in his eyes.
Before he can recover, the woman launches herself from atop of the car behind him and onto his shoulders, forcing him to drop his gun. She clamps her legs around his neck in the hope of bringing him down. She is strong, well taught in the art of fighting but he is stronger, has his enhanced strength and his metal arm. He struggles to unseat her. She has in her hands a wire garotte and attempts to place it around his throat but he stops her. His anger is fuelling his strength and right now he is furious that he cannot free himself of her.
He changes tactics. He throws her bodily forward into a car which dislodges her and she falls onto the road. He picks up his gun and goes to fire at her but she manages to throw a small metal disk which hits him and attaches itself to the metal of his arm. There is a crackling noise and a blue light, and an electric current runs through him, incapacitating his metal arm. He has to stop to disengage the disk whilst she runs. The Soldier dislodges it, hears his arm power up once more and then he is back to hunting her again.
The woman is running. There are more people around and she shouts at them to get out of the way, to run. She doesn't want them to get hurt. The Winter Soldier brings up his Skorpion machine gun and sprays the car she is running behind with bullets. A bullet catches her in her left shoulder, wounding her. She goes down but is protected by the shell of the car. The shock begins to make her go cold, her blood sugar level drops and fear starts to gnaw at her, something she is not used to. Her bogeyman is back.
He smiles to himself, he has her, he knows where she is and he knows she is injured.
He jumps up onto the bonnet of a car and aims his gun.
*
The Man On The Bridge
Steve Rogers looks around at the panic and confusion. People are running for their lives, away from the fight, away from the strange Soldier with the covered face. Instinctively they know he will fire at anyone who gets in the way. Steve cannot let it happen again. The road is a battleground of cars parked haphazardly: some crashed, all abandoned, some with engines still running. A police car destroyed earlier by the Winter Soldier burns in amongst the chaos, luckily the two occupants had jumped to safety when they saw in disbelief what was about to happen to them.
This thing, this creature has already killed Nick Fury and Steve was unable to stop that from happening. Now he can see the Soldier has Natasha pinned down behind a car. She's injured; he can see blood seeping through the left sleeve of her jacket, a bullet wound in her shoulder. She is sat up against the side of the car and there is an uncharacteristic look of fear and shock on her face. Steve can see the Soldier has her trapped and is going in for the kill.
This is the one he knows Natasha fears. He is the only person she has ever told about the Winter Soldier and her history with him. Steve is not going to allow the assassin a third chance to kill her. Looking at the Soldier now he can see that he is an expert killing machine: there is no feeling in those eyes but coldness, and he is zeroed in on his target and he will not stop until his target is terminated. He can hear the noise from the arm, see the metal glinting; the links are making an engaging sound and the Soldier is getting ready to fire, his gun lined up.
As Steve rushes towards the Winter Soldier, he takes in his features. He is dressed in black combat gear. All except the silver arm with the red star emblazoned at the top. A black mask covers his lower face. The goggles that previously obscured his eyes have gone but Steve knows if he looked into the Soldier's eyes all he would see is death. His dark brown hair is parted in the middle, down as far as his collar. From the Soldier's stance Steve would say the Soldier is in his early thirties. How can that be, though? Natasha said the Winter Soldier has been murdering and creating chaos for over seventy years.
The Soldier is stood on top of a car, gun in hand. He steadies himself to shoot at Natasha. Steve comes up on the right hand side of the Soldier, shield in his own hand and running as fast as he can. The shield is the only weapon Steve carries. He sees the moment the Soldier notices him approaching and becoming more of a threat than Natasha, Steve prays it will give her time to get clear.
The Soldier turns fully to face the oncoming problem. He hits out at Steve who brings up his shield to take the hit; metal strikes metal. It stops Steve in his tracks and the Soldier kicks out, hurling Steve away from him and firing his gun but the only target is the shield which Steve holds up to protect himself.
The Soldier tries to use several different weapons against the shield but none penetrate the metal and it becomes a fight between the two of them, punches and kicks that send both men sprawling as strength goes up against strength. They are evenly matched something Steve finds shocking. The Soldier has to be enhanced, like him, that can be the only answer.
Somehow the Soldier wrestles the shield away from Steve, who backs away as the Soldier throws it with lethal strength. He means for it to hit Steve, but Steve ducks and the shield ends up embedded in a van. The speed and strength of the Winter Soldier is daunting, matching Steve's own. He is forced to take on more of a defensive stand with the Soldier's onslaught, there is such anger there all now focused on him.
As Steve once again goes up against the Winter Soldier, the Soldier uses a knife to try to slash and stab but with no luck, Steve can see the anger mounting in the assassin's eyes. It is a cold deep seated fury, this Soldier has a mission and he must fulfil it. Steve continues to watch the Winter Soldier's eyes as he fights to give some indication of what is coming next. The Soldier does not even stop for a moment. He is here to kill and that is what he intends to do. That is his entire focus. Death and destruction.
Steve knows he is running out of time: he can hear sirens, knows that very soon they will be joined by STRIKE teams who are hunting him. He needs to try and finish this but not before the Soldier manages to get his metal hand around Steve's throat. Squeezing, the Soldier pulls Steve towards him and then throws him backwards into a car. Any other man would have died. Steve uses the moment to rescue his shield from where it is wedged in the van and uses it in an all out attack on the Soldier.
He pressures the Soldier and manages to wedge his shield into one of the metal rings that make up the metallic left arm, causing damage. He can hear as well as see the damage he causes but it does nothing to incapacitate the Soldier. Steve hits the Soldier with the side of the shield, pulls at him and hurls him to the ground but he rolls and jumps up. Where Steve hit him hard his mask is dislodged and falls to the road.
Steve can now see the assassin's face.
And he feels like someone has punched him.
He looks at the Soldier in front of him, twenty feet away and he feels a jolt of pure shock in his chest, his mouth opens wordlessly. He can see the Soldier so clearly now. The blue eyes, the familiar features. The Soldier watches him for his next decision but Steve doesn't move.
“Bucky?” Steve's voice is incredulous and the look in his eyes mirrors the shock he is feeling. The Soldier can see the man is stunned. A million thoughts flash through Steve's mind. How? How can it by Bucky? It can't be, Steve thinks...but he would know James Barnes anywhere.
The Soldier frowns at what the man has just said to him. “Who the hell is Bucky?” he growls, watching his assailant. Then, and just for a brief moment something shows in the Winter Soldier's eyes, a flash of confusion. But it does not last long. He shakes himself and raises his gun.
Steve is not thinking straight. He has let his defences down and the Soldier takes advantage of that, aiming his gun. Steve still stands there, an easy target but before the Soldier can fire he is hit from behind by Sam, flying in on his special military-grade wings.
The Soldier is thrown forward. He recovers from the blow and raises to shoot again but he is too late, he is out of time. Whilst Steve is still stunned the Soldier can see Natasha has recovered and is now just behind and standing to the side of Steve, holding the Soldier's own grenade launcher. She fires at him. The missile hits the car next to him and by the time the smoke and fire clear he has gone, there is no sign of him at all.
Steve runs forward, searching, but he cannot see anyone. In those last few seconds he had seen the Soldier's eyes, and the look of anger and frustration had gone – instead there was something else – hurt and confusion. Something in the name Bucky had clicked with him Steve knows it had.
“Jesus, Buck,” he says quietly to himself. “What the hell happened?”
*
Sam Wilson
Sam Wilson watches Steve Rogers. He feels as though he has known him forever and he guesses in a way that he has; growing up with a legend like Captain America, everyone in the USA has heard of him. But to not only have met the man but become a friend, he realises now just how important both Steve and Natasha have become to him in the short time he has known them.
They had been captured by Rumlow, and he still finds it difficult to believe both Rumlow and Pierce are with Hydra. And if it had not been for Maria Hill, they would have been disposed of; their bodies rotting in lonely graves but she had rescued them, brought them here - where another shock had been in store for them.
Nick Fury – alive.
He can see that Steve's thoughts have taken him a million miles away, and he cannot say he blames him. Yesterday he thought their day was bad enough; today everything had once again been turned on its head. Yesterday they believed Nick Fury was dead and now they know he is alive, hiding out here at a converted HQ hidden in the dam.
He doesn't look well...but it's better than being dead.
Sam realises he has avoided getting to close to people since he lost his co-pilot, Riley. It hurts too much when you lose a friend. He had hidden himself away by helping people at the Department of Veteran Affairs and whilst helping them with their PTSD, he realises he was also helping himself. The guilt he feels over not being able to save Riley will never leave him, and now he has a chance of redemption. Yet in truth, no redemption is needed. Sam Wilson is an honourable man: there was nothing he could have done about his co-pilot dying - but he will never see it that way. It is just one of the symptoms of his PTSD, the guilt that he has survived whilst others had not.
Now he looks out at Steve and recognises the same look in his eyes. He had told them that Bucky Barnes had been his best friend. They had grown up together - even when I had nothing I had Bucky, he had said. They had heard the stories years ago, how Captain America and the Howling Commandos had defeated Hydra – or so it was thought - and how one of the Commandos, Bucky Barnes, had lost his life in that fight.
But both Sam and Natasha had known Bucky had been more than a friend to Steve, and they can both see the pain he is in. He had not saved his own partner, had not even been able to bring his body home. And now? Now Bucky Barnes was not only alive, but had been all along and was the fabled Winter Soldier. How? What had happened? It could send Steve mad if he let it, if they let him. He needed them now and didn't even know it but they did.
Steve gazes at the water out over the dam's walkway. A bell tolls somewhere in the distance as Steve remembers how Bucky came to find him after his mother's funeral; when Bucky had promised he was with Steve 'until the end of the line'. He can almost feel the warmth of Bucky's hand on his shoulder, see the blue eyes looking so deeply into his. Remembered how Bucky had made him feel like he wasn't alone. And, just for a split second he feels that somehow when he was frozen Bucky was there as well, still ensuring that he wasn't alone. Before he can grasp the concept fully, Sam interrupts his thoughts and it is gone like a dream you cannot remember when you finally wake up.
“He’s going to be there, you know?” Sam tells him and Steve continues to gaze out across the water.
“I know.”
“Look. Whoever he used to be, the guy he is now...I don’t think he’s the kind you save. He’s the kind you stop.”
“I don’t know if I could do that.”
Sam knows he has to be honest. “Well, he might not give you a choice. He doesn’t know you.”
Steve finally looks at Sam and there is a determined look in his eyes that carries through to his voice. “He will.”
Steve looks once more at Sam, and then goes to walk away. “Gear up, it’s time,” he says.
“You gonna wear that?” Sam asks as Steve turns. He smiles for the first time.
“No. If you’re gonna fight a war...you've got to wear a uniform.”
*
At the Smithsonian the old guard decides to take one more turn around the Captain America exhibition. It is gone midnight, quiet. Everyone is asleep.
He is thinking about yesterday. About the woman with the long plait and the man chasing after her. The man had actually gone back to talk to him, to ask questions about the woman and it took a few minutes for the guard to realise he was actually talking to the Steve Rogers. He tried to apologise but Rogers had smiled, told him he wasn't to blame, thanked him for doing his job.
“Can I have your autograph? You know, for my grandson?” he had asked at the end, and like a gentleman Steve had taken the time to autograph one of the leaflets from the Exhibition.
“Whats your grandson's name?” he had asked the guard.
“Stan,” the guard had said, flushing red, but Steve had already guessed the autograph was actually for the guard himself and he just smiled.
And then later, he heard that someone from the government had come and taken away the CCTV disks for that day. He doesn't know it but he is lucky that they had not realised at that time that he had talked to Rogers or the woman. That knowledge, fortunately, dropped through the gaps and doesn't come to light - otherwise he may not have lived to see his next birthday.
As he walks into the area where the costumes are he looks up at the display and blinks. He looks again and then walks forward.
“Oh, man. I am so fired!” he moans as he realises that Captain America's Second World War costume is missing.
All that is left is a naked dummy covering itself with a wooden shield and what looks like an embarrassed smile.
- 71
- 72
- 73
You need to be logged in to leave a review for this story.You need to be logged in to leave a review for this story.
Report Story

A Bucky Barnes Winter Soldier Fic - The Constant