Secretive - Bucky Barnes

52 || Birth

[Nova]
»You shouldn't go there on your own.« James hums, watching me getting on my suit, my Shuriken.

Their familiar touch somewhat eases me. Not because I look forward to use them, but because I know I can defend myself as I always have in times of emergency. When I think about having wanted to push this life aside and being dragged right into it thanks to the man in my front - unknowingly, for his part - I almost laugh together with my destiny. Almost.

If Jonas really is alive, God gave me a second chance. I will not let that pass. It means I still can save him, probably. Maybe they just hold him captive. Maybe they force him with anything to do what he does, now and in the past and in the future. I cannot know. But I have to try and safe him.

»It's nobody's but my business. Jonas is my brother.«

He leans on the door to my bedroom, observing me plainly. Whether he is all too pleased by that solo trip or not, there is no version in which I take the others with me, no matter what he has to say. Nothing in this world could convince me. »They could be fooling you. You don't know.«

»I know. But if there is the slightest chance he's not dead, I have to try.«

Turning, I slide my phone into my pocket, secured as the Shuriken's themselves. 

»Do you need a gun?« he asks after a short pause, voice as soft and gentle as it would be proposing a picnic on a summer's day.

And somehow, for us, it is. Just not in connection with my brother.

It is just what we do, if I want it or not. Ex-assassins pulled back into fighting for the good now, fighting with their own will and mind. Not really wanting to, feeling obliged to for what we are and what we can, and therefore, probably first pausing when the active evil is brought behind us.

This life has always been normal, and I have no vision of future in which it is not.

With a shake of my head and a »Not my style«, he responds nothing more, mere scrutinizing me and every of my actions of prepare. As soon as I am ready and walk towards the door, towards him to pass, I hear him sigh again, both hands grabbing my upper arms and positioning me right in his front. 

Eyes more bluish-grey than it should be legal direct themselves onto me, a sudden, all undertaking silence, and James's gaze calms me down from the hectical movements like it was magic. »You don't have to do this alone. Take me with you.«

I blink several times, way too lost into his eyes to take him seriously or even take anything of him, thinking he would already have accepted my choice but proven otherwise. »This is family business, you know that. There's-«

»Am I not family?« James asks, tilting his head sideways and exhaling with a temporary close of his eyes, before locking them voluntarily into the maze of mine again. »You know what I can do. What I am able to do. Please let me help. You can push anyone aside, I don't really mind, just please not me.«

His flesh hand rises, until he finally rests it on my cheek, his warmth spreading throughout my body in a mere second. Just like I would have slept years in ice and the prince's kiss awakes me. Sighing myself this time, I free myself from his soul by closing my eyes, unable not to enjoy the small gesture. »I will not be responsible for dragging you back into that business. Whatever Stark irresponsibly lets you do, I won't. You've been through enough.«

And he really is. With all the stories he told, with all the memories he made mine, it is hard to believe he is still standing on any battlefield. I will not let him fall on mine if I can prevent it.

»C'mon, let me have my choice in this, too.« His second hand rises, and with it, thanks to my hesitation, his inner hope, seeing me trembling over the edge. Placed on my cheek as well, shivers run along my spine; hot and cold both in my face, on my skin, my body is overwhelmed with where to put attention to first. Nearly collapsing, as always when he only is in the same room as I am. »Besides, I'd be happy to see how you lived a couple years ago.«