Command • T'Challa

Chase, part 2

And right now, I missed her more than I could ever saw. No one understood me like she did no one connected with me like she did. She was my best friend, my only real ally.

I tried to focus my thoughts on her, not to remember.

"I'm sorry about your mother." Barnes said.
Shit, he'd seen it. Why did it always have to work this way?
"Was it HYDRA?" he asked. I shook my head.
"Her boyfriend shot her while I was at school, when I was only 14. Came home and found her that way."

Sometimes it was hard to remember that there was a world outside of the one contained within our superhuman lifestyle-a life and a world that operated outside of HYDRA and the Avengers and the governments. This was one of those times to see that-and then forget it.
You see, that is not our world. It isn't Barnes' world, not Tony's and it sure as hell isn't T'Challa's world.
But it used to be mine, though it is now dead and buried like my mother.

I hung my head, waiting until we arrived.
........

"The caged bird sings with a fearful trill,
of things unknown, but longed for still,
and his tune is heard on the distant hill,
for the caged bird sings of freedom."
- Maya Angelou, I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings

Sitting in that container was like being choked. I was sitting still, held down, unable to do more than mentally reach out. I couldn't use my telekinesis, only telepathy.My containment wasn't even as large as Barnes' was, likely because mine was a backup in case Barnes' was compromised.
The whole thing was killing me.

Barnes, on the other hand, seemed calm and serene, or at least resigned to his current state. I guess being held up for so long, or exhausted from his running, he just decided to give up. I didn't understand his stillness.
I was encased in bulletproof glass, my hands bound in metal casing, not unlike what Elsa from Frozen had been locked up with (we have Disney movie nights at the compound sometimes,okay?) and I wished I could just Let It Go.

The truck went over a speedbump and the. I felt us going downwards, probably into a tunnel or some structure. Not long after that, the truck came to a stop. They removed Barnes first, me second. No others were around, and we were being pushed in our containers to a poorly lot, empty concrete room about one storie tall.

Empty, except for the little desk and chair, and neat little pen and pad of paper that sat on it. What the hell was this? Why were we being placed side by side in front of this desk?

We were left alone, no explanations, nothing. We might as well have been containers with dead bodies, for all they seemed to care.
The dim lights flickered, and and a door I hadn't noticed in the wall opened, a brown-haired white guy came through. They apparently have sent us a harmless little accountant to interrogate us. Ha-ha.

But it was no laughing matter.

I was about to reach into his mind when the lights flickered again, and he spoke into the little microphone, staring at Barnes.
"Mission Report, December 16th, 1991."
Barnes blinked. "Go away." he whimpered,shutting his eyes. Why so helpless all of a sudden? The man repeated himself, and Barnes swore through gritted teeth. In desperation, I reached into the interrogator's mind.

I jerked-hate and malice emanated from him like a stench. It wasn't hate towards Barnes-or even towards me, but a hate towards the Avengers. Who was this guy?
I had the distinct feeling that, one, no one could hear us scream for help, and 2, he wasn't supposed to be here, like, at all.

He spoke again, this time reading from a thin red book, and Barnes froze. "Stop!!" Barnes screamed when he noticed the book in the man's hands.

"Longing, rusted, furnace, daybreak, seventeen, benign, nine, homecoming, one, freight car."

the man spoke evenly and clearly, like someone using voice control would, so as nothing was to be missed.
Oh shit, it was voice control.
"Soldier?" the man asked, a little harsher this time.

"Ready to comply." Barnes said, his voice distant and faraway. Shit, shit, shit, he wasn't Barnes right now, he was the Winter Soldier.

The man turned to me, and got closer to my container.

"Ghost." I said. That was the one name I remember-
"The Ghost in the Machine?" he asked.

"Yes, sir." I said. I actually wasn't sure, but I was going to play along.

Barnes was already busting out of his container. The man stared at me, and I stared back, my eyes never wavering. I knew full damn well that he was taking great pleasure in 'deciding' my 'fate', as he hated the Avengers so. He had no powers of his own, none but his determination and cunning.

"You think I'll let you out, don't you?" he mused, laughing humorlessly.
"Screw you." I spat.

"I was never going to let you out-I don't need you. You're useless as far as I'm concerned."

Oh, now that pissed me off. I just kept staring at him, like the way that a caged Tiger or lion, or hey, even a panther, stares from a zoo cage. Once that glass jo longer separates us, he's a dead man.

And he knows it. He'll never admit it, but it's true. He looks at Barnes, who has escaped his container, opening his mouth to say something, but it never comes. Barnes comes right for my container, punching a hole in the glass with his metal arm, grabbing me. Snapping the bar that holds me back, and my hand locks, and handcuffs, he pulls me out.

The moment our skin comes in contact, my hand on his right wrist, and it all froze for both of us.
......