epiphany || bucky barnes

𝐒𝐈𝐗

THE RAFT. 2016.

I was freezing.

It was the first time I was truly alone in two years. I thought I'd never have to go back to living a life where I was always terrified of. Yet, I'm here. Being one of the highest threats in the world. I was right back where I started.

"Hey! Wake up, Pandora!" A guard yelled, elbowing the thick plexiglass that separated us.

My body seized up at that. I wasn't Pandora, I was Lucy. I still have all my memories and my thoughts. I don't remember anyone triggering me.  

"That's not her name, jackass!" I heard another voice scream from the cell beside me. His voice was so faint, I could barely make out that it was Sam. 

Bucky... Where's Bucky?

Then again, where am I?

Why is Sam here?

"Sorry, apologies, Lucille." Another guard spoke, again making my brows furrow in fear and my body shrink down into the corner of the room. "You need to eat something. This is the first time you aren't crying when we come to see you."

Crying?

Then, I realized how badly my eyes hurt from the tears, my nose stuffy and making it hard to breathe. My face was red and puffy in the small mirror in the room. A shiver ran up my spine, making goosebumps appear all over my body. 

Why can't I remember anything about crying?

"We knocked you out with a tranquilizer because you were making the other prisoners on edge. That's probably why you won't remember anything."

On edge?! More like I was the one on edge!

"Where's Bucky?" Was the only phrase that could escape my lips. "Is he here?"

Sam looked over to the wall beside my cell, "Don't ask that, Lucy! They just want to hurt you!"

His voice was muffled because of the sound barriers between the cells. I could hear the guards laugh behind the glass. "We don't know, sweetheart. That's what we're trying to figure out so our pretty little soldier duo can live happily ever after."

My heart dropped at those words, my eyes filling with tears as I looked around. My ears started ringing, my hands nervously playing with the hem of my blue uniform. "What...?"

It really hit me now. Bucky telling me to stand back, that he would be okay. Then, Bucky and Steve running after the hangar as I tried to follow them. Vision stopping me with the Mind Stone. When the air-tower fell in front of the hangar, even with Wanda's effort to try and stop it. 

They hadn't even waited for me. All I could do was stare at the quinjet as it rose higher in the sky, resulting in Rhodey's near-death experience. At the time, I just hoped that they would get to safety and then come back for us. But that hope was quickly lost as metal cuffs locked around my ankles and wrists.

"But... I didn't even get to say goodbye." My voice was barely above a whisper, a few tears falling from my eyes as the guards backed away from my cell. "That isn't fair- you can't just leave!" 

The door to our room of cells shut before they could listen to me any longer. My hands balled into fists, stumbling out of the small bed and slamming them into the glass. "YOU CAN'T JUST LEAVE!"

I almost directed it at Bucky primarily. He'd been by my side for almost my entire life and he just left?

Makes me wonder if I was ever meant to be with him in the first place.