SURVIVE ➤ BUCKY BARNES

Chapter Twelve - Window

August stood as close to the wall as she possibly could, opposite side of the room from him. She slowly took a bite of the cooked pheasant that Steve had brought her, her gaze never leaving his face. Steve and Sam stood nearby, staring too.

He rubbed his hands together, visibly uncomfortable with all the eyes on him.

"It was 1989," His voice was low. "I was assigned to take out an engineer living in Minsk. He had some weapon designs that they wanted. I get there and..."

"I met him." August nodded. "SHIELD had me looking into Hydra assassins that were considered cold-cases as a training exercise. My partner, Fury, stayed in New York to monitor me. I was just there to see if the elements were really able to pick up extra clues that forensics might leave behind. Never thought that a piece of hair found in Cancun would really end up leading me to the guy."

Bucky did not look at her. He kept his eyes cast towards the fire.

"Ms. Haze was like a bat out of hell," He half-laughed. "Nearly ripped my good arm right out of its socket. I was coughing up bits of dirt for weeks afterwards too. They had to drain the water out of my lungs with a tube. That's when they gave me a new assignment. They decided that they wanted her, or at least to analyze her DNA and figure out how to replicate it. Sent me on a fake mission to Paris to try and lure her in."

August sunk onto the floor, sitting cross-legged. Steve passed her the hairbrush that he had found in the car, and she went to work detangling her curls, still staring at him.

"Mr. Stark- Howard, that is- and Mr. Pym had designed this suit for me. Vibranium spandex. It was supposed to amplify my abilities while protecting me from bullets, punches." She nodded. "Wore it for the first time when I went to Paris. It was incredible, like I was one with earth, water, air. It kept me from being utterly terrified over what I was about to face. It kept him from punching a hole all the way through my chest."

"I felt your ribs crack. Knew I punctured a lung, if not more-" Bucky's eyes quickly flickered up to her, but then back down, incapable of standing the intensity of her angry stare. "I was supposed to kill you."

"I escaped."

"I let you escape. That was the first time that I...snapped out of it, halfway through a mission. They spent months probing my brain after that, reprogramming me so it wouldn't happen again."

August swallowed thickly. She continued detangling her hair, her gaze slightly softening.

"After seeing the look in my moms eyes when I woke up from surgery, I told Mr. Stark I was done. He could find somebody else to chase the Winter Soldier. I'd go to my training sessions, I'd work on teams, I'd close cases with Fury. But this solo mission was over. He wasn't happy, but he let me off the case. I spent a few months with Fury in California after that. Celebrated the new decade with him and our friends, Carol and Maria, and her daughter." August finished with her hair, setting down the brush. She wrapped her arms around her knees. "My birthday comes and passes. I go home to visit with my family for a few days after Fury and I wrap up Carol's case. Life is moving forward, I'm forgetting about the man who nearly killed me. Then, one night, Enola and I are in the kitchen arguing about something stupid."

"You missed your dad's birthday. She was pissed that you forgot."

August blinked.

"You heard that?"

Bucky nodded.

"All of it. I had been tracking you for months before I finally figured out where your family lived. There was a bug in every room of that house," He rubbed his jaw, finally looking up to match her gaze. "You had just turned twenty-three. You and your dad are both Capricorns. You were so up your own ass about your own life, you forgot about his birthday. It didn't bother him, but your sister was mad. She yelled at you. Loudly. I decided to get close while you were distracted, figured it would be easy enough to get you from behind. But you looked in that damn window."