A Game Of Hide and Seek - A Bucky Barnes Short story

Chapter 10

Time passed, she did not care to count the days anymore, and Cassidy noticed something different. Instead of dragging her to the interrogation room, Yakken came to her cell and injected something in her neck.

"If this doesn't work the first few times, we go to phase 2," Yakken unhooked Cassidy from her chains.

He left as Cassidy slumped to the floor. The lack of food and injuries she sustained made her too weak to conjure up a drop of water much less escape, her breath wheezed out of her bruised chest that most likely contained some cracked ribs. So she lay on the floor on her back, staring up at the ceiling blankly. She oddly felt grateful that she could lay down now.

Her vision seemed to unfocus and shift and she felt nauseous even though almost nothing was in her stomach, the sound of her pained breathing more loud. She heard noises, yelling and gunshots echoing down the corridor. Then she heard her name and her head lolled to the side.

"Cassidy! Cassie where are you?"

It sounded like Steve. Was this the day of her salvation?

"Steve?" Cassidy croaked hoarsely, turning her body toward her cell door and staring through the rusted bars.

"Cass!?" What sounded like Natasha.

"What?" Cassidy mumbled to herself. Had her family come for her at last?

"Doll!? Please be here!" Bucky.

"Bucky?" Cassidy dragged herself over to grip the rusty bars of her cage and pull herself up slightly as she yelled as best she could, "Bucky! Bucky I'm here!"

She continued to yell hoarsely with her parched throat. It was so taxing she slid back down to the floor and tears, she thought she did not have any more, ran down her cheeks.

Boots trampled their way to her and the door swung open, Cassidy looked up at her savior.

"Bucky," Cassidy's voice broke as she cried.

Bucky grabbed her and held her tight, "I have you, I have you."

"I thought you would never come," Cassidy whispered as she clutched his uniform.

"Of course I came," Bucky stroked her hair.

Cassidy stopped crying and looked up at him while sniffling, but she noticed something. The door had swung open, but Bucky would have rather pulled the bars off than take the trouble to find the key.

"Wait," Cassidy let go of who appeared to be Bucky, "What?"

Reality snapped back at her so hard she got whiplash and fell back. Bucky disappeared, the noises disappeared, the opened door disappeared, and the realization that it was all a hallucination broke her. A hallucination, trick, lie, false, mirage, and all part of the game.

Cassidy curled up in a ball and sobbed for hours.

Another week went by and Cassidy was emptier than ever before as information of any kind tried to be pried out of her. Yakken beat her harder when she came out of hallucinations when she refused to fall for it, she found faults in every lie soon after being pulled in. They did it multiple times a day and Cassidy tried to stop believing the images she saw, but they seemed so concrete and real. They changed each time and it was not always Bucky coming for her. She saw Natasha, Steve, Tony, and every Avenger in her visions. The last one they had done, Steve had held her and said that Bucky thought she had been killed and had killed himself. That one had her crying all night and she received a big punishment for it.

"Okay," Yakken came in flanked by two guards, "Since you didn't want to play my second game, I guess you have to play game number three."

"Never," Cassidy whispered from her bloody spot on the floor.

"Nope, not working sweetheart, let's go."

The guards grabbed her and dragged her to a different room, her malnourished body making her lighter but she still had some muscle left due to the serum running through her. The serum was probably the only reason she was alive. She vaguely wondered if the team would even recognise her now. She doubted she could even recognise herself.

She was strapped into a chair and her vision blurred slightly.

"Now, Miss Sawyer," Yakken smirked, "I found this little treat in one of our bases and you should remember it."

Cassidy recognised the contraption around her, it was the chair they had used on her and Bucky to make their brains mush. Cassidy weakly tugged on the restraints, trying in vain to break free. Her sense of fight or flight overloading her brain. And right now it chose flight.

"No," she whimpered, "please."

"Oh hush," Yakken waved his hand, "I modified this pathetic machine to make it better. You won't forget anything, but I can still control you."

"How?" Cassidy continued to struggle, "the book was destroyed and Hydra is out of my head, there is no way."

"Yes, but it is not impossible for me to control you again. You are pretty useless for information since you refuse to give it, so we can use you for something else."

The metal plates came down around her face and Cassidy screamed as the electricity surged through her and she felt control slipping away. Her body jerking and shuttering.

Soon she became a puppet, an empty shell, a ghost.

"Stand up soldier," Yakken commanded, "Now, soldier, you will be sent after the former Winter Soldier. You will kill him with a knife to the chest, for he is a traitor. And when you hear the click you will come out of your control."

Cassidy nodded with dead eyes.