Command • T'Challa

Chase

If I could have cried then, I would've, but I couldn't. I could barely breathe.
I was run after James Buchanan Barnes, not the Winter Soldier, something I couldn't seem to get T'Challa to understand. I just can't.
Look, I know what it's like to have grief and rage blind you to sense or even to the truth. I don't wanna think about it right now, because I'll start remembering, and almost nothing good ever comes from that. My heart is racing as I catch up to Barnes, running up on his right side, grabbing his arm
Damn, he was strong. He wrenched his arm away, but I'm not easily put aside. I jumped on his back, sending him crashing to the ground, my arms around his beck, my feet hooked around his legs. This was a Brazilian jiu-jitsu takedown it's an insane form of wrestling/martial arts. It's Natasha's favorite, and it's used for taking people down without hurting them.
I tighten my grip, my left hand grabbing my right bicep, pushing down on his head with my right hand, getting tangled in his longish hair. This was a choke, one that should knock him unconscious for a few minutes, long enough to make some (attempt?!) effort to restrain him.
I could feel him struggling, trying to get out of my grip, but it wasn't working. He was losing consciousness.
I felt someone watching me, even in the midst of all of this. T'Challa, of course. He was walking in front of us, as I could feel Barnes slipping away, and I let go. He was either out cold or was going to throw me into another timezone in a few seconds.

"What happened?" T'Challa asked, dumbfounded.
"What does it look like? I put him to sleep for a few minutes."
"How?"
I opened my mouth to speak, but in seconds, Barnes had leapt to his feet and had grabbed me, pulling me into him.
"Grace has skills." he said, his metal arm locked around me, while he stared at T'Challa.
"How did you know my name?" I squeaked.
he didn't answer. He was dissapointed; I could feel it in the way he was holding me. I wasn't sure if he was threatening me or trying to keep me from T'Challa, maybe both. I wanted out, or in, or better yet, away from all of it.
"Let her go." T'Challa growled. "Now."
Damn, was he ever pissed. I could see his anger even through his mask.
Barnes didn't even dignify his highness with a response. Big mistake. I pushed my way out of his arms, kicking through to join T'Challa,who caught me for a moment, then
releasing me.
"Barnes, please just come with me." I said, in my best quiet, animal trainer voice. I had yet to perfect the hypnotic part of it with practice.
Barnes blinked, and I tried to reach out. I found a locked door and the sounds of his cries for help, back when he was first held by HYDRA in the 1940's. Other than that, I saw something else-him on a motorcycle on a dark road in the woods somewhere.
Then he locked me out.
"You come with me." he said, an order, not a request.
"That's not how it works." I said. he shook his head.
"Sorry, doll, but it's how it works with me, Grace." he said. Mt name, again, how did he know me?
T'Challa put his hand on my shoulder.
"She stays." he growled.
Barnes turned and ran, looking back at me for a moment. .
We ran after him, but someone else was getting to him as we ran. We were in a courtyard and now Tony came out of nowhere, in his meek little suit and tie and red sunglasses, looking more like a goatee'd
Bono rather than a superhero. Barnes was trying to shoot him, and I didn't know what the hell was going on.
I was locked out of everything, nothing from Barnes, nothing from T'Challa, just fear and anger from Tony. Tony didn't even acknowledge my presence, but having Barnes trying to shoot him wasn't helping, that was for sure as hell.

Fear could grip me,anger, passion,hate, love, anything.
but nothing came over me like helplessness, that feeling of being a total victim, powerless to make a single damn difference or change my situation.
a cage, this was what I am afraid of.
a cage in my head, a cage that my childhood encased me in, a cage that HYDRA locked me in and I can't ever seem to come out of.

Until this moment, I couldn't see how powerless I'd been feeling, how locked up in still was inside. This was why every cell in my body was screaming for me to just run, to practice the art of Run-Fu, to forget all my skills and get the hell out of Bucharest, just leave it all.

But I wasn't going to. Screw this, I was going to fight and nobody would be able to hold me down.

I ripped the gun out of Barnes' hands, trying to separate him from Stark. They wanted fireworks did they? they were gonna get them in spades.
My eyes changed color, and it was so on. I didn't care who got in my way, I was going to knock sense into everyone.
Chairs in the open-air cafeteria crashed against the walls, and I was even picking up and flinging tables, anything to get their attention,to make them wake up already.

"Grace!" I hears someone yelling. T'Challa, calling me by my first name, of all things. He was grabbing me by my shoulders and shaking me.
"Stay in control." he said.

"You can't control me!" I snapped, trying to push him away. His grip stayed firm.

"Not me, you. You are in control of yourself, not HYDRA. You are yours."

I stopped. Maybe, maybe he was right. I dropped the chair, setting it down in its place. "Okay." I said.

T'Challa let go, slowly.

"Do you know Barnes?" he asked, quietly.

"I don't think so, but maybe I did." I said.

"How could you not know? Isn't remembering things part of your powers?" T'Challa asked naively.
I let the tears fall from my eyes.
"They have wiped parts of my memory. They ruined my life, and there's a whole year of my life where I don't remember a single damn thing. Do you have any idea what it's like to go through that kind of hell?" I asked, my voice low.

He shook his head, bowing it a little.

And dammit, he had to go and reach for my hand, even if it was only to go after Barnes and the others.

He'd managed to talk me down off the lodge, and the sneaky cat was now holding my hand and running, running after a senior citizen with a metal arm.

Maybe this Prince wasn't so bad after all.