If this was a launch bunker, then she was a rocket. Rage coursed through her like fire- he had put her here, this man, this evil man, whoever he was, and now he would have to pay the price. Too long had people thrown rocks and used sticks and stones to break her down and keep her there.
"Have you not heard the tale of Baba Yaga?" she growled at the man, who didn't shrink back from her; he just held the gun at her. She turned her head to the side, as if she was analyzing him.
"Many times," he said coldly. "My grandmother told it to me first when I was a boy." he said, almost smiling. He had the stance of a soldier, Grace thought. The stance of a man who knew how to hold his ground and how to kill, but the cracks showed. His hand trembled slightly; he didn't stand as straight as he once did.
She didn't want to look in his head, open as she could see it was. Not of what his present thoughts were, but of his past. He was thinking of it now. Grace saw only a flash of it, of this man, once a soldier, holding the broken body of a little boy, and the sound of the man's screams. Something about the scene made her feel as though she should recognize it.
"Yes, it was Sokovia. These are the ghost stories that they won't tell you- the Avengers don't care. People like you don't care and don't belong anywhere, except a cage." he said.
Grace didn't move. It wasn't her fault, she reminded herself- it was all HYDRA. A cage was not where she belonged, not where James belonged, not where anyone belonged.
Instead of pulling the trigger, the man turned and ran. He ran through a nearby door, before Grace could catch him, and it bolted shut immeditatly. He then reappeared at a thick glass window in the wall, things that Grace hadn't noticed.
"You have become slow." he said, through what was apparently a microphone system.
"And because of that slowness, you will die here, just like the others."
"What others?" Grace demanded.
"Look behind you." he said.
"No." she said.
"Ah, well, then you shall just have to wait until your friends come in." he said.
As if on cue, Grace heard the sound of a door opening, and in came Tony in his suit, but without his helmet, followed by Captain America, and James.
Grace didn't run to them, didn't speak to them. She only glanced at them, then stared at the Sokovian man behind the glass.
"Grace!" James said, but didn't approach her. She glanced at him only to show that she recognized him. It was one of those odd times when her past life with him was utterly unreal, like some fantasy dream that never really happened. The fight was now, before her- she couldn't afford to let those other emotions get in the way, regardless.
"If it's any comfort, they died in their sleep." the man said, as yellow lights illuminated sections of the deep cavern, showing the plexiglass chambers that Grace had seen earlier. Inside were dead men and a woman, each with a shot to the head.
"I didn't want more of you, I only wanted them to bring you here." he said.
"So you killed innocent people just to trap us?" Steve asked. Grace ignored the murmur of words that came next, something about a promise, a loss. She was watching Tony's face as he was watching a video replay on a screen that was attached to a table. it was the video of his parent's murder- and the Winter Soldier was the assassin.
"You knew.." Tony said hoarsely to Steve. Tony was distracted, forgetting about the present danger, forgetting about the man who was the real threat in real time.
"I didn't know for sure if it was him." Steve tried to defend himself, but it fell flat.
"Bullshit!" Tony screamed.
Then it all went to hell. Nobody seemed to care about the shrinking sokovian man, or about anything except fighting each other. Didn't Tony know that it wasn't James's fault? That he couldn't control himself at all?
Tony apparently didn't blame her, and Steve didn't demand that she join the fight, so while the others brawled, Grace kept her eyes on the man behind the glass, following him as he climbed up and out of the bunker, out into the outside world, and into the snow and the broad daylight.
He didn't notice her and didn't care, but then, right as she was approaching him, he took a cell phone out of his pocket as if he was making a call, or listening to something. Then, as if from nowhere, T'Challa was beside her, taking his helmet off and putting it down, approaching the man.
"You know, I almost killed the wrong man," T'Challa said.
"hatred is consuming you, and it is consuming them. I am done letting it consume me."
T'Challa said, looking back at Grace. So, he realized James's innocence in the murder of King T'Chaka after all- he wasn't here to kill James- he was here to help her stop this madness. She nodded at him, then, without a word, turned and ran back to find Tony, James and Steve. T'Challa would look after this man, and then he'd come back to help her, if he could.
It was the "if" that scared her. What if they couldn't be stopped? What if Tony had them killed, or jailed, or worse? What if this was the end?
She found them slugging it out in the snow, in an open chamber on the side of the mountain, Tony trying to smash them both. Grace tried to asses the situation so she could see where she could best intervene, but they moved so fast.
"Stop!" she screamed, but no one listened. It was stupid, she thought, trying to grab at Tony. The whole thing was so stupid- it was as if she traded T'Challa's understanding for Tony's, and now there would be hell to pay for them all- against Steve, against them all.
"It's not his fault! He wasn't in control of himself, Tony- HYDRA is to blame!" she yelled, grabbing his arm as tightly as she could.
"You're no better." Tony growled, trying to throw her off. "You- you're a monster and I never should've trusted you. Nobody knows how many you've killed!"
He shook her off, despite her best efforts to hold on.
"You've forgotten who the enemy is!" James yelled, standing in front of Grace, as she got to her feet.
"Shut up, you murderer!" Tony roared, taking a swing at him.
The blow never hit- instead, it struck T'Challa square in the chest, as he stepped in front of James to protect them both.
"You are wrong, Stark." T'Challa said calmly. The blow hadn't even really hurt him because of his armor. "You are wrong about them both."
"What in hell do you care? I thought you wanted to kill him because he murdered your father?" Tony countered, standing back.
"He did not kill my father, surely you have realized that by now. If you wish to harm them, you must first go through me." T'Challa continued. Steve stood behind Tony, not moving, all eyes on T'Challa standing still as a statue.
"You don't know what has been taken from me." Tony said, now sounding almost pathetic.
"And you don't know what they have lost." T'Challa said. "They were happy, Stark, many years ago, until HYDRA separated them and destroyed them from the inside out. They have suffered more than you can ever imagine, Stark."
As if a shadow, Grace crept up from behind James and T'Challa. Tony had to know a fragment of what it was like- just one fragment, and maybe he would understand.
Then, like a magician, she waved her hand in front of Tony- so deep in his thoughts and at the sudden confrontation that he didn't notice her:
But then he saw it. She cast visions of her old life with James back in Brooklyn, of Steve when he was small, and what it felt like to be kicked around in a cage- the torture, and the nightmares. He shuddered, tears in his eyes, as he saw.
Then she made it all fade away, slipping back to her place behind James and T'Challa.
"Let go of your hatred, Stark." T'Challa said.
"Just walk away."
..............
Sometimes, Grace thought, as they left Tony behind, everyone going their separate ways, you just couldn't pick up all the fragments of a shattered life.
But you could try. Piece by piece, you could put it back together. It would never be made whole, she thought, as she sat beside James and Steve while T'Challa took them away in a quinjet. They would go to Wakanda there, T'Challa had told her. There, he would grant them asylum from the US government, and there, they might start putting it all back together.
James didn't speak, and neither did Grace or Steve. All were too exhausted to do anything except drift in and out of sleep, in and around fuzzy nightmares of an age long past, interwoven with old, happier memories. before they had been broken.
Nothing would ever be the same. Grace thought- she couldn't just start over with him. She was awake now, even though it was the middle of the night, and she didn't know where they were flying over. James was sleeping now, looking almost peaceful in his unconscious state. Tears streamed down her face. they should be dead by now, or soon dead, with many children and grandchildren and great grandchildren and a shared headstone in some quiet cemetery. Decades were gone, decades she didn't remember and he didn't remember. Steve had it better than both of them, she thought, glancing over at the sleeping super-soldier, who looked very relaxed as he slept slumped forward in his seat, his arms crossed. Steve hadn't been fed a lie and brainwashed to remember his own life differently- but he had left Peggy behind, and that was sad.
Slowly, Grace drifted off to an uneasy sleep as the quinjet flew further westward, further southward into the dark night.