The Seven ✦ {Avengers}

Chapter 5:

"Hart..." he called. She turned to him, wiping the tears off of her face before hand, to make it look like she hadn't shed a few tears.

"So that's it? Y-you think that you can just give some shitty, half-ass speech about seeing right through me and I'll tell you everything?" Lexi spun on her heel and shouted aimlessly at him. There was no point to it, it wasn't like he wasn't wrong. Bucky just sighed in response, almost in defeat.

"I can tell you've been crying," he pointed out. That was it, she couldn't hide it anymore. He knew enough to know that she was not doing well, but didn't know why. Lexi felt weak, not only in her body but in her mind. She dropped to her knees, and just began sobbing.

Bucky was stunned, he didn't think she'd break, especially not in front of him. He wasn't used to people crying in front of him, unless he was pointing a gun at their head. He had no clue what to do, he couldn't call anyone else for help, she wouldn't want that. From what it looked like, he was going to have to be the comforter, for the first time in seventy years. He crouched to her level, and tried pulling her into a hug.

"No! DON'T TOUCH ME!" She screamed fearfully, "I don't want to hurt you." He was very confused, how could she hurt him?

"Hart, you can't hurt me, I'll be okay." He reassured her kindly.

"If you touch me, you won't be." She said through sobs. His confusion grew.

"Why?" He asked curiously. She was only crying in response, "Hart, you can tell me." She glared at him suspiciously, but after a moment, took a few deep breaths.

"All I want to do for you, all of you, is make the pain go away. Make the sad, angry, fear-filled emotion in those terrible memories with HYDRA go away. No one should have to go through that, through torture, through being wiped, through killing people, through that kind of pain. The girls don't often feel anything towards HYDRA, no nightmares, no pain, nothing. And you've been getting full nights of sleep. I'm the only one who feels the pain from HYDRA. And I am ridiculed for being overdramatic. And I feel terrible when that happens, but I bear it. If only you knew what I do for you, for all of you." She explained painfully.

"You... you've been using your powers to take away our pain," Bucky realized, "for the past six months, you've been taking away our pain. But what happens to the emotion once you've taken it away?" He asked. She sighed again, knowing full well he wouldn't like her next answer.

"Since my powers are underdeveloped, the emotion just doesn't go away. When I take away pain or sadness or anger, I feel that emotion or pain until I pass it on to someone else. I can't store the emotions I've taken from others properly. If I could, I'd be able to store the emotions somewhere other than my amygdala. When HYDRA was experimenting on me, they wanted to give me time for my brain to be able to tell the difference between someone else's emotions and my own. Since Pierce wanted us out on the field so early, they didn't let my brain get used to which one was which. So when I was out in the field, my brain interprets any emotion I take as my own. I've never trained my brain to do that. The reason why I don't double over in pain or die, is because I'm able to deintensify the pain and emotions I take away, but I can't make them go away. No one should have to go through that kind of pain," she told him honestly.

Bucky sighed deeply, and stared at Lexi, completely stoicly. She was slowly killing herself to help everyone else, and she wasn't realizing it. Everyone was wondering why Alexis Hart was so cold all the time, so angry. All she wanted to do was help people, make sure no one else felt the pain that they did with HYDRA. So she bore it all herself. He had to do something. Bucky cringed at his idea, knowing she'd probably hate him for doing it, but it was the right thing to do. And he hated himself for it too. It was like he was turning into his selfless bastard of a best friend.