It would be so easy to slip back into trusting the Winter Soldier, the Captain thinks. So easy to pretend this is just a normal mission. Then he catches himself, wonders that he'd even had that thought at all. HYDRA's assets aren't prone to wishful thinking.
But they are so much more than HYDRA's assets, he's starting to believe. And that's why they're here at all. To learn what else they are, or were. Or could become.
It's clear the agents here left in a hurry. And that bodes well for finding more, he thinks, scanning the dim rooms slowly as his eyes acclimate, following the beam of the flashlight once the Winter Soldier flicks it on. There's a faint smile that wants to tug at the corners of his lips, at that gesture; he knows whatever truce they have is tenuous, and even calling it a truce might be too generous. The Winter Soldier is observing him, just as closely as they're scouring this base. They're no longer an unshakable team. Now, the Captain is nothing more than an unknown quantity. He knows it must chafe at the Soldier; the widening divide that feels like it's opened between them chafes at the Captain, too. He misses trusting his partner. He misses the rock-solid foundation they'd once had. He believes they can have that again. And maybe it doesn't have to be through HYDRA.
But he needs to know more.
"Together," he says, and his voice is wry as he says it. Of course it would make more sense to move separately. But neither can trust the other. And without orders, they have all the time they need. There's no rush. They're as safe and secure in this abandoned base as they are anywhere. "I want to find the infirmary. Where they kept us." It seems like a good place to start, a place where there might be records on them that are easy to access.
They come across the first body down a long hallway; it's a handler, one of their handlers, dressed in black tac gear and sprawled face-down in a long-congealed pool of her own blood. There's something about seeing a handler, dead, harmless, that feels strangely good. Like a relief. The Captain glances to the Soldier, wondering if he feels the same way. If he'll even be able to read anything off his face. "What a stupid way to die," the Captain mutters, because the whole mission by that point was a mess. He's not sure if he regrets the loss so much as feels disdain for the poor planning. Maybe both. "Do you want to check her for a radio?"
The question is almost a dare; he'd bet anything the answer is yes, but he wonders if the Soldier will actually say it.
all cool! I'm game if Bucky keeps side-eyeing Steve.
The chill seeping into the place means the body hasn't had a head-start on decomposition.
He recognizes the handler. She - it - was one of his, he realizes. A new one with the same last name as previous handler that he was authorized to see the file, to remind him that this man had watched him train against other HYDRA assets years, decades ago: like father like daughter, except this handler died in the field while her dad wasted away in some luxury retirement home. He pauses to stare down at the woman's body with his head cocked to the side, just like an animal seeing something new out in the field that wasn't there yesterday. What happens is the Soldier comes to the conclusion he feels nothing. This changes nothing. A corpse can't issue orders and she definitely can't order him back to the damned chair. She isn't a threat. She isn't anything now, no matter how much the directives pull and tug.
If he's glad to see she's dead, it doesn't register on his face.
After a second the Winter Soldier's chin lifts and his flat blue eyes slide over to his partner.
"Yeah."
It was a stupid way to die (fact) and of course he does want to check for the radio even if he knows he's being watched (fact). He does say it. Because they both know a radio is invaluable and not saying it will only arouse the Captain's suspicion through any silence. His jaw sets, a muscle in his cheek tightening as teeth clamp down and grit against each other.
Bending down, the Winter Soldier searches the dead handler, his hands probing with about as much care as if he was checking any old hostile on the field. A dead handler is just a liability loaded with possible ammunition, other resources. He comes up with whatever he thinks is worth taking. The radio, slightly tacky with blood. A forged ID to go along with the money that the SRR hasn't taken. If he was the SRR, he would've fully stripped all bodies for anything like this, but:
"They might've cleared out in a hurry," the Winter Soldier rasps, still on his knees next to the dead woman. "If she's dead, the others probably are too...but we should confirm."
His good hand grips the radio almost possessively - he'll wonder if the Captain wants to wrestle it from him - but other than that, he looks almost harmless, his tangled hair half in his face, and his blue eyes seem to lose focus, to stare vacantly past the corpse until he remembers where he is, and then his gaze snaps back for a moment, sharp, there.
The Captain stands watch while the Soldier checks the body. The corridors are quiet, cold, there's been no movement and no sign of life since they entered, but they both of them know better than to let down their guard. He knows this can't make up the distance between them, but he stands watch anyway, eyes moving around the hallway, checking back the way they came, the direction they have yet to go.
Then they land back on the Soldier when he speaks again. "Looks like they did," he confirms, because everything they've found so far seems to indicate that. Including the handler, with all her gear apparently still intact. He offers the other a short nod. "We will." He has no doubt there will be more bodies, especially the deeper into the complex they go. He wonders if all their handlers are dead. He wonders what he'll feel if they are. If they aren't.
He watches the Soldier clutch the radio like something precious, and the truth is, he has no real desire to take it away. Not… just to take it. But there is a curl of something in his stomach, at the idea that the Soldier might use it to call for backup. At what will happen, if they reach someone on the other end, if handlers and recovery teams are sent it.
There will be pain and torture and punishment for them both. And there is something in the Captain that balks at ever going back to that again. At ever sending his Soldier back into that again.
Their eyes meet, and the Captain lets out the smallest, barest hints of a sigh. "I won't take it," he says, because he wants to, but he won't. This is… trust. An olive branch. It might be slapped away and stepped on, ground beneath a heel, but it's there. Instead, he reaches out a hand that's tilted not upward, but sideways — a clear sign that he intends to simply help the Soldier to his feet. If he'll take it.
"We should keep going," he says, gaze finally resting in the direction they'd been headed. "The infirmary was in the central regions of the building, based on the schematics." Schematics they both saw. "I think we'll find what we want there." Whether it's information, or more handlers, more agents, he doesn't know. They'll just have to find out.
He waits for the Soldier to take up his position again, point the flashlight, and they keep going, deeper into the building. He can feel the other's eyes on him, skittering there and away, like he doesn't know what to expect. Maybe he doesn't, not anymore. They pass two more bodies in the next hall — SSR agents this time, plainclothes with simple handguns. Not guards or security; they must have been caught unawares. The Captain sinks down to examine the bodies this time, to take the weapons and search them for ammunition. He comes up with an extra clip for one, but the nothing for the second. He checks them, and holds out the one with more ammunition left to the Soldier, planning to keep the second and the clip for himself. A slight advantage in one sense, a disadvantage in another. It will even them out. A bit. If that matters.
The Captain should have taken the radio - wrestled it away by force if needed, broken a finger or two if needed, and then reset it later with the knowledge that the accelerated healing will deal with the worst of the damage.
But he doesn't...even though he makes it damn clear that he knows what the Winter Soldier is thinking.
A lapse in the Captain's judgment, maybe. But he'll take it and the radio will be tucked safely away where it'll be harder to get to: fastened inside a small leather pocket, with a clasp that would slow down the Captain for a critical split second if he changed his mind about this olive branch. After a moment's hesitation that he would've never made before this...incident, the Winter Soldier finally accepts the Captain's hand even if his own grip is tight enough to hurt, as if he's instinctively preparing to face off against another super soldier that he knows, vaguely, that he can't physically match if push came to shove. The other man's deteriorating mental state and his gun shot may tip the scales, though, and he'll come to his feet, assuming his usual position, but he'll be glancing at the Captain more closely than he used to.
Keep going. Investigate the infirmary where they were kept.
That part is acceptable, because whatever was there, he knows he needs to file it away and report it back to HYDRA. To his handlers. A more solid goal than how to deal with the Captain's discrepancies.
"Fine," the Winter Soldier grunts, almost under his breath.
They're going in the same direction and for whatever reason, he has a tool on him that he didn't have before. The radio works. He can use it once he's in a secure location. Given his partner's abilities, that could be awhile to find one, but he only needs a few minutes out of sight.
Now they travel deeper. A few more bodies sprawled in rigor-mortis, glassy eyes starring at nothing. Old, drying blood so dark it's almost blackened by now. Naturally he pauses at this speedbump, watching as the Captain assesses and he'll be surprised to find that he's given more ammunition. Valuable, of course. Not useful if he can't get far enough from the Captain to actually shoot him in his non-vitals, but still. The Winter Soldier takes any possible advantage and he'll feel up the corpse and he'll come up with the ammunition his partner left and a pockmarked, rusted pocket knife that looks so old that it's probably not standard-issue: probably a sentimental item, and he'll wonders if it's dulled. The blade won't even release, and he assumes the Captain must've already found it.
Eventually they find themselves in the infirmary. The lights are flickering on some dying, sputtering generator, casting jittering shadows of overturned trays and needles, on the two gurneys with their straps hanging free. Dark splatters of blood where the SSR agents had been killed by the Captain. The bodies, however, are missing here: removed because this was ground zero, in a way.
The Winter Solder glances around with his eyes narrowed, waiting for his vision to adjust to the dim light, and he can see that more changed here: the partition between the gurneys has been shoved to the side, and each shelf is gaping open, as if someone did a quick grab of anything that wasn't bolted to the floor. The fact the corpses were each removed here is also striking.
"They didn't leave the blood samples," he confirms after a few minutes, locating the case and the slots where HYDRA's asset samples should've been. A silver finger plays across the foam surface as he depresses it slightly, then glances up at the dark glint of a camera lens in the corner. "And they likely took any footage with them too."
The infirmary's flickering lights remind the Captain suddenly, viscerally, of the chair, of the way it makes his mind stutter until he can't connect one thought, one memory, to another. But here, now, he remembers — remembers taking out the agents, spilling their blood, even if the bodies aren't here. Remembers the gurney, remembers freeing the Soldier, remembers how things were and how he wants them to be again. He wants the Soldier's trust and loyalty back, feels that want twist in his stomach in a way that's not familiar. They're not supposed to want, of course. But he does, now, breaking down as he is. He wants so badly he can taste it.
He stands watch in the doorway as the Soldier moves through the room, nods at the unsurprising discovery that the blood is gone.He doesn't care about the blood. He doesn't care about the footage.
His eyes land on a row of filing cabinets, standing against the far wall. They appear, at least, undisturbed, and maybe they contain what he cares about: information. Information about them, about Rogers and Barnes, maybe. About who they used to be. Who they're supposed to be. He makes his way toward the drawers, pulling open the first one while angling his body so as not to put his back to the room (or the Soldier). He wants to trust, but by now he knows better than that.
He starts rifling through the contents, slow and methodical, even as his mouth opens and he finds himself asking, "Why?"
Of course, the question isn't overly clear. He clarifies as he continues to search, eyes skimming the labels: "Why do you want to go back to them so badly? Why do you want to take me back?"
If the Winter Soldier has that same gut reaction to the lights, he doesn't show it - his face is blank, almost too blank for it to be subconscious.
He busies himself with investigating the room, glancing up when he senses movement from his partner and confirms that he's interested in something else: the cabinets he had noted the other day, more as just part of the scenary than anything else. What they contained hadn't been a priority, necessarily. They were supposed to secure the compound of all hostiles. Anything after that was secondary, best left to the handlers and their teams backing them up. That data concerns them, just as threat eradication is supposed to concern the two assets. Frankly, it's never once occurred to the Winter Soldier to glance at something like a cabinet and actually think about opening it without a direct order. The confirmation that the thought's crossed the Captain's mind has him turning, stilling for a second.
"Why" should never, never be a question in their vocabulary. It shouldn't be said. It shouldn't even be thought.
But here it is.
"Protocol," the Winter Soldier says quietly, stiffly. What kind of question is this? "We were supposed to carry out the mission and report back. Even if we didn't hit the time table, we still need to carry it out. You're a high value asset - you need to be back on base."
The specifics are a little more complicated. The main one is because they were ordered to, because the Winter Soldier can hear an order and it seeps into his core, feels urgent, right. You do what you are ordered to, no ifs ands or buts. It makes perfect sense. The Captain is a valuable asset, arguably more valuable than him. Therefore it makes sense to ensure he's returned - willingly or unwillingly - so that HYDRA can continue to utilize his irreplaceable skillset.
The Winter Soldier remembers to turn his face away, although he's watching his partner from his peripheral.
"You know this. So why ask?"
Even with the...discrepancies, the Captain has to know this baseline. Doesn't matter the corruption running through those misfiring neurons. HYDRA"s bottom line: an asset must serve the cause and not all assets are equal. It makes sense that the Captain needs - must - return. The Winter Soldier stills, and he'll take a step closer, aware that his left prosthesis needs maintenance. Not yet within striking distance, but the question the Captain posed is important - a zero sum question, the kind he was asked in the embrace of the chair, listening to the suppression arc humming and read to sear rational thought away.
The Captain knows the protocol, yes. Knows what he's supposed to do, what they're supposed to do, and knows this isn't it. Knows exactly how much it irks the Soldier — and more, how much it grates, how much it, dare he think it, frightens the Soldier — to be questioned, to see his fellow asset go so far off mission, off task, off orders. But the orders are also breaking down, crumbling before his eyes, and there's no foundation beneath them. They're like a hollow wall of stone, that seems impregnable but turns out to have no support at all, once you can chip away at the surface, make the smallest of holes to see that nothing lies inside.
But why is he asking?
"Because —" The Captain pauses, wondering for a second why he is asking. What he wants to know. Why he so desperately wants names for the uncomfortable, tugging feelings inside him, why he wants to keep feeling them when they hurt in this strange, burrowing way, digging deeper like they're carving out the calm, empty spaces of him and lodging themselves there instead.
"If there was no protocol," he says, slowly, gaze apparently on his fingers flicking through the folders, but the Soldier's figure is always at the corner of his eye, never unobserved. Never quite out of his sphere of awareness. "Or if that wasn't the protocol, if you had no orders regarding me. What would you do then?"
He lets out a quiet breath, the closest an asset can come to a sigh, and shuts the drawer again. There's nothing useful here. No records or information that tells him more about who they were. Maybe he was foolish to hope for it, to think anyone would have left anything of use behind; but maybe he's still foolish, because he pulls open the next drawer, lower down, which sticks and squeaks and groans as he forces the hinges to move through age and rust and dust. This drawer hasn't been opened recently. Maybe it will hold something for him.
It shouldn't matter if there is no protocol. If there isn't, then he awaits them and if they don't come, then he assumes there must be protocols he isn't classified to know and act on. As the Captain speaks, his own face becomes increasingly flat, closing off even more, if that's possible. Yes, he can tell he's still being watched and no, that isn't the problem. The questions. All these questions, apparently rattling around in his partner's head when they shouldn't be.
The Winter Soldier's chapped lips purse into that thin, almost disapproving line - an expression that he doesn't seem to be aware he's making sometimes, when he's especially distracted. That small muscle in the corner of his jaw? It's tightened, almost ticking.
"...I don't think about these what-ifs," the Soldier grits between his teeth. There would always be orders if the other asset is involved. "No point getting hung up on it. Wouldn't go rogue if that's what you're asking."
It's the most conversational he's been in a long time, each unwilling word dragged out with a rasp as if he'd prefer to be silent.
He couldn't remember the last time he talked as much as he has the last couple of days.
The Winter Soldier turns away, although not enough that he can't always keep the unstable Captain in his peripheral. What kind of question was that? It doesn't make sense, at the core of it. The Captain has to know the answer: it should have been drilled into him that he is too valuable to allow outside of HYDRA and that he's also too valuable to be simply executed. That it has never mattered why they should return, only that they do and they never, ever give reason for the handlers to second-guess their commitment.
He moves away to check an overturned cart which gives him a better view of the rusted cabinet that's got the Captain's attention. From here he can see some old, yellowed files, their edges curling with age. Some of the handwriting is faded, illegible from here.
The Captain's mouth thins into a like. It's not what he's asking, no. Not necessarily. He wants the Soldier to think for himself, more than the parameters of the given mission allow. He knows it must be a delicate balance for HYDRA — maintaining assets that can adapt quickly, use their unique skillsets, make decisions in the field, but without breaking free of their protocol and orders. Without getting too independent. It's why there are always handlers, he thinks — well. One of many reasons, probably. But, given his regular injections and treatments… it's got to be a major reason.
But there are no handlers now, and the injections didn't work. He's stepped far outside their protocols, and he doesn't know how to pull the Soldier with him, and it's this growing, unhappy ball of distress down in the pit of his stomach, as he thumbs through old, yellowed folders, hard copies of — He pulls one out. They're medical records. Old. This one is dated 1944.
There's something about those numbers, lined up as they are, that gets his attention. That hooks into his brain like a fishing line and tugs. He pulls it out, pages through the folder, so old that the manila is fragile and crackling, the pencil marks on the papers smudged and faded. His eyes skim over the report, but… it's not what he wants. He shoves it back into the drawer and pulls out another, a few files back.
This one is dated a year earlier. He opens it, eyes skimming over the list of names, injuries, treatments, recommendations —
And catch on Barnes, Sergeant J.B. with all the force of running headfirst into a brick wall.
He doesn't answer the Soldier's question, which should probably be answer enough. He's even stopped watching the other asset out of the corner of his eye. His entire focus, just for a moment, is on this sheet of paper, with that name shining like a beacon, stinging like a slap to the face. His eyes skim the columns, note the injury was apparently a bullet graze to the side, barely in and out, with first aid in the field administered by —
By Rogers, Captain S.G.
… his hands were shaking, he remembers. His hands were shaking as they packed the wound with gauze, and there was a voice, low and smooth and calm, for all that it was tight with pain, saying, "It's fine, pal, it's nothing. We both know I've walked away from worse. And besides, you got the bastards, so it's all settled. They ain't walking away from this like we are…"
His hands are shaking now, he realizes; he doesn't know where the Soldier is, doesn't know how long he's been lost in his thoughts (only seconds), and his head snaps up, eyes wide, looking to clock the other asset.
So he found something. Something that actually has dragged his full attention away, something that the Captain has been very, very careful never to do around him - he knows that doing so is a tactical error, that the Winter Soldier has been conditioned to take an inch if it's presented to him. All that matters is finding the right opening, the right weapons and tools to incapacitate his partner and drag him, mostly in one piece, back to HYDRA where they both belong. Now was tempting...but he needed to see what it was that had distracted the Captain like this, taken his focus in a way that all the conditioning and rounds in the chair hadn't.
He doesn't - can't - remember everything. Not if the suppression chair and its techs do their job. Somehow there's this vague feeling he can't shake, this idea that he hasn't seen the other man freeze up like this. Hasn't seen him so open, not even when he was quivering in the chair restraints.
Need to see what he found.
This close he can see the way the other man's hands tremble. When his eyes dart up, he'll find the Winter Soldier has gotten closer and closer, almost within striking range even though his hands are at his side and there don't appear to be anything sharp in them. No, he can't risk stabbing the Captain and getting blood on the delicate folders, the old sheaf of paper. This isn't the window he's looking for. Not yet.
This isn't curiosity, he thinks, but a need to see what was in the file and commit it to memory, so that he can report back to HYDRA what had shocked even the Captain into forgetting his surroundings.
"You found something," the Winter Soldier says flatly. He doesn't demand the folder; he doesn't need to. "If it's classed as critical, then I need eyes on it."
Because you can't be trusted to compile an accurate report hovers between the lines.
He holds out his cybernetic hand, the prosthesis's metal palm glinting dully in what little light they have in the room. They're close enough that if he had wanted to, he could have taken that opportunity to make another pass at the other asset...but he didn't. His eyes, pale and blue and always either focused or glazed over with exhaustion and fear, lock onto the Captain and he barely seems to blink. The air, cold, stale, hangs heavier now as if the room itself is holding its breath.
Once the Captain has torn his gaze away from the file, his blue eyes finally pick up on and follow the Winter Soldier as he approaches. They flick down to the outstretched hand, glinting dully in the sad excuse for lighting down here, then back up to his face. The Captain's hands might still be shaking, minutely, but his expression is calm. Almost slack.
There's a frozen moment where he doesn't move, doesn't speak. Then he closes the file neatly and hands it over without a word. His hands fall to his sides, deceptively calm again, and his body is still and solid, no sign that he's distressed or that he'll make any kind of a move at all. He's waiting, now. He wants to see what happens when the Soldier flips open the file and reads the report for himself. Wants to see whether the same trigger words — they must have been trigger words, the names, maybe something else, something he didn't even comprehend reading — knock something loose inside the Soldier, too.
His own mind feels like this big, empty space with only that one burst of sudden images and sounds and feelings to fill it. He wonders, suddenly, if it's a real memory, or an implanted one. If this is a test. This… can't be a test, can it? It's too big. Too complex, too involved. The Soldier is too on edge, he thinks. Too unhappy. If this were a test, something both of them are familiar with to their bones, then it wouldn't feel so much like diving into uncharted territory.
If this were a test, the Soldier would be passing. The Captain would be failing. He knows that without a doubt, by now. But even if this were a test… he doesn't think he wants to pass any more of HYDRA's tests, anymore.
He can't start second-guessing everything now. He's committed to a path. He won't turn back. Which means, he thinks, that it might be a real memory. From a real life. Of being a real man. Before HYDRA.
They both were real men, before HYDRA. The question is, he supposes, whether they ever could be again.
He takes a silent, sharp breath of cold, dusty air through his nose and turns all his attention to the Winter Soldier. All that matters now is how the other asset reacts to the file. At that thought, there's a tiny sliver of something, shining in the back of his mind. The Captain doesn't — can't — recognize it yet as hope, but that's what it is, nonetheless.
The Winter Soldier's cybernetic fingers curl over it as he takes it, pivots away so it's harder to snatch away if his partner changes his mind, and then he stalks several paces away: enough to be able to read it in the meager lighting, far enough that he can react if he spots any sign of tactically-questionable movement from the Captain. Unfortunately HYDRA hasn't mastered implementing night-vision modifications. Even the Winter Soldier can't see in full darkness, and so there's a limit to how far he can scoot to read the file and also keep his peripheral vision on his former(?) partner.
He reads. Quickly. Eyes flick side to side, down, side to side. Repeat.
Names.
Old photos that he squints at and the Winter Soldier comes to the conclusion that they likely aren't forgeries. The two Assets were men with another life, another rank. Another name. Maybe not proof, but a question, at least, to where they both came from, who they where before HYDRA. He gazes down at the weathered folders contents and goes still, aware that he's being watched by the Captain - by this man who was once called "Rogers". The Winter Soldier's hair hangs in a dark, matted curtain and he's once again faintly glad it hides the bulk of his facial expressions. When his head lifts, he's done his best to mask his face into a neutral expression.
"This doesn't change things. Who we were doesn't matter," the Soldier says quietly. "HYDRA made us productive."
He adds that as if it explains everything. HYDRA gave them purpose whether they wanted it or not. This appears to be obvious. However, for the first time in a long, long while, it occurs to the Winter Soldier that suppression techniques have varying effectiveness between assets: what will turn his own mind and desires into a flatline clearly haven't had the same effect on another man. It should, in theory. It hasn't, in reality.
The Soldier is still holding onto the file with his head tilted toward his partner as he studies him through his tangled hair.
"We had names before," the Winter Soldier says - admits, grudgingly - and he goes on, as if trying to ignore that detail that's inconvenient to HYDRA. "Every asset around us has. You know this."
Maybe not every asset had those names dragged away by the Chair, but still.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
let me know if finding a body doesn't work for you and I can change that!
But they are so much more than HYDRA's assets, he's starting to believe. And that's why they're here at all. To learn what else they are, or were. Or could become.
It's clear the agents here left in a hurry. And that bodes well for finding more, he thinks, scanning the dim rooms slowly as his eyes acclimate, following the beam of the flashlight once the Winter Soldier flicks it on. There's a faint smile that wants to tug at the corners of his lips, at that gesture; he knows whatever truce they have is tenuous, and even calling it a truce might be too generous. The Winter Soldier is observing him, just as closely as they're scouring this base. They're no longer an unshakable team. Now, the Captain is nothing more than an unknown quantity. He knows it must chafe at the Soldier; the widening divide that feels like it's opened between them chafes at the Captain, too. He misses trusting his partner. He misses the rock-solid foundation they'd once had. He believes they can have that again. And maybe it doesn't have to be through HYDRA.
But he needs to know more.
"Together," he says, and his voice is wry as he says it. Of course it would make more sense to move separately. But neither can trust the other. And without orders, they have all the time they need. There's no rush. They're as safe and secure in this abandoned base as they are anywhere. "I want to find the infirmary. Where they kept us." It seems like a good place to start, a place where there might be records on them that are easy to access.
They come across the first body down a long hallway; it's a handler, one of their handlers, dressed in black tac gear and sprawled face-down in a long-congealed pool of her own blood. There's something about seeing a handler, dead, harmless, that feels strangely good. Like a relief. The Captain glances to the Soldier, wondering if he feels the same way. If he'll even be able to read anything off his face. "What a stupid way to die," the Captain mutters, because the whole mission by that point was a mess. He's not sure if he regrets the loss so much as feels disdain for the poor planning. Maybe both. "Do you want to check her for a radio?"
The question is almost a dare; he'd bet anything the answer is yes, but he wonders if the Soldier will actually say it.
all cool! I'm game if Bucky keeps side-eyeing Steve.
He recognizes the handler. She - it - was one of his, he realizes. A new one with the same last name as previous handler that he was authorized to see the file, to remind him that this man had watched him train against other HYDRA assets years, decades ago: like father like daughter, except this handler died in the field while her dad wasted away in some luxury retirement home. He pauses to stare down at the woman's body with his head cocked to the side, just like an animal seeing something new out in the field that wasn't there yesterday. What happens is the Soldier comes to the conclusion he feels nothing. This changes nothing. A corpse can't issue orders and she definitely can't order him back to the damned chair. She isn't a threat. She isn't anything now, no matter how much the directives pull and tug.
If he's glad to see she's dead, it doesn't register on his face.
After a second the Winter Soldier's chin lifts and his flat blue eyes slide over to his partner.
"Yeah."
It was a stupid way to die (fact) and of course he does want to check for the radio even if he knows he's being watched (fact). He does say it. Because they both know a radio is invaluable and not saying it will only arouse the Captain's suspicion through any silence. His jaw sets, a muscle in his cheek tightening as teeth clamp down and grit against each other.
Bending down, the Winter Soldier searches the dead handler, his hands probing with about as much care as if he was checking any old hostile on the field. A dead handler is just a liability loaded with possible ammunition, other resources. He comes up with whatever he thinks is worth taking. The radio, slightly tacky with blood. A forged ID to go along with the money that the SRR hasn't taken. If he was the SRR, he would've fully stripped all bodies for anything like this, but:
"They might've cleared out in a hurry," the Winter Soldier rasps, still on his knees next to the dead woman. "If she's dead, the others probably are too...but we should confirm."
His good hand grips the radio almost possessively - he'll wonder if the Captain wants to wrestle it from him - but other than that, he looks almost harmless, his tangled hair half in his face, and his blue eyes seem to lose focus, to stare vacantly past the corpse until he remembers where he is, and then his gaze snaps back for a moment, sharp, there.
o7 I figure they can get to the infirmary shortly
Then they land back on the Soldier when he speaks again. "Looks like they did," he confirms, because everything they've found so far seems to indicate that. Including the handler, with all her gear apparently still intact. He offers the other a short nod. "We will." He has no doubt there will be more bodies, especially the deeper into the complex they go. He wonders if all their handlers are dead. He wonders what he'll feel if they are. If they aren't.
He watches the Soldier clutch the radio like something precious, and the truth is, he has no real desire to take it away. Not… just to take it. But there is a curl of something in his stomach, at the idea that the Soldier might use it to call for backup. At what will happen, if they reach someone on the other end, if handlers and recovery teams are sent it.
There will be pain and torture and punishment for them both. And there is something in the Captain that balks at ever going back to that again. At ever sending his Soldier back into that again.
Their eyes meet, and the Captain lets out the smallest, barest hints of a sigh. "I won't take it," he says, because he wants to, but he won't. This is… trust. An olive branch. It might be slapped away and stepped on, ground beneath a heel, but it's there. Instead, he reaches out a hand that's tilted not upward, but sideways — a clear sign that he intends to simply help the Soldier to his feet. If he'll take it.
"We should keep going," he says, gaze finally resting in the direction they'd been headed. "The infirmary was in the central regions of the building, based on the schematics." Schematics they both saw. "I think we'll find what we want there." Whether it's information, or more handlers, more agents, he doesn't know. They'll just have to find out.
He waits for the Soldier to take up his position again, point the flashlight, and they keep going, deeper into the building. He can feel the other's eyes on him, skittering there and away, like he doesn't know what to expect. Maybe he doesn't, not anymore. They pass two more bodies in the next hall — SSR agents this time, plainclothes with simple handguns. Not guards or security; they must have been caught unawares. The Captain sinks down to examine the bodies this time, to take the weapons and search them for ammunition. He comes up with an extra clip for one, but the nothing for the second. He checks them, and holds out the one with more ammunition left to the Soldier, planning to keep the second and the clip for himself. A slight advantage in one sense, a disadvantage in another. It will even them out. A bit. If that matters.
no subject
But he doesn't...even though he makes it damn clear that he knows what the Winter Soldier is thinking.
A lapse in the Captain's judgment, maybe. But he'll take it and the radio will be tucked safely away where it'll be harder to get to: fastened inside a small leather pocket, with a clasp that would slow down the Captain for a critical split second if he changed his mind about this olive branch. After a moment's hesitation that he would've never made before this...incident, the Winter Soldier finally accepts the Captain's hand even if his own grip is tight enough to hurt, as if he's instinctively preparing to face off against another super soldier that he knows, vaguely, that he can't physically match if push came to shove. The other man's deteriorating mental state and his gun shot may tip the scales, though, and he'll come to his feet, assuming his usual position, but he'll be glancing at the Captain more closely than he used to.
Keep going. Investigate the infirmary where they were kept.
That part is acceptable, because whatever was there, he knows he needs to file it away and report it back to HYDRA. To his handlers. A more solid goal than how to deal with the Captain's discrepancies.
"Fine," the Winter Soldier grunts, almost under his breath.
They're going in the same direction and for whatever reason, he has a tool on him that he didn't have before. The radio works. He can use it once he's in a secure location. Given his partner's abilities, that could be awhile to find one, but he only needs a few minutes out of sight.
Now they travel deeper. A few more bodies sprawled in rigor-mortis, glassy eyes starring at nothing. Old, drying blood so dark it's almost blackened by now. Naturally he pauses at this speedbump, watching as the Captain assesses and he'll be surprised to find that he's given more ammunition. Valuable, of course. Not useful if he can't get far enough from the Captain to actually shoot him in his non-vitals, but still. The Winter Soldier takes any possible advantage and he'll feel up the corpse and he'll come up with the ammunition his partner left and a pockmarked, rusted pocket knife that looks so old that it's probably not standard-issue: probably a sentimental item, and he'll wonders if it's dulled. The blade won't even release, and he assumes the Captain must've already found it.
Eventually they find themselves in the infirmary. The lights are flickering on some dying, sputtering generator, casting jittering shadows of overturned trays and needles, on the two gurneys with their straps hanging free. Dark splatters of blood where the SSR agents had been killed by the Captain. The bodies, however, are missing here: removed because this was ground zero, in a way.
The Winter Solder glances around with his eyes narrowed, waiting for his vision to adjust to the dim light, and he can see that more changed here: the partition between the gurneys has been shoved to the side, and each shelf is gaping open, as if someone did a quick grab of anything that wasn't bolted to the floor. The fact the corpses were each removed here is also striking.
"They didn't leave the blood samples," he confirms after a few minutes, locating the case and the slots where HYDRA's asset samples should've been. A silver finger plays across the foam surface as he depresses it slightly, then glances up at the dark glint of a camera lens in the corner. "And they likely took any footage with them too."
no subject
He stands watch in the doorway as the Soldier moves through the room, nods at the unsurprising discovery that the blood is gone.He doesn't care about the blood. He doesn't care about the footage.
His eyes land on a row of filing cabinets, standing against the far wall. They appear, at least, undisturbed, and maybe they contain what he cares about: information. Information about them, about Rogers and Barnes, maybe. About who they used to be. Who they're supposed to be. He makes his way toward the drawers, pulling open the first one while angling his body so as not to put his back to the room (or the Soldier). He wants to trust, but by now he knows better than that.
He starts rifling through the contents, slow and methodical, even as his mouth opens and he finds himself asking, "Why?"
Of course, the question isn't overly clear. He clarifies as he continues to search, eyes skimming the labels: "Why do you want to go back to them so badly? Why do you want to take me back?"
no subject
He busies himself with investigating the room, glancing up when he senses movement from his partner and confirms that he's interested in something else: the cabinets he had noted the other day, more as just part of the scenary than anything else. What they contained hadn't been a priority, necessarily. They were supposed to secure the compound of all hostiles. Anything after that was secondary, best left to the handlers and their teams backing them up. That data concerns them, just as threat eradication is supposed to concern the two assets. Frankly, it's never once occurred to the Winter Soldier to glance at something like a cabinet and actually think about opening it without a direct order. The confirmation that the thought's crossed the Captain's mind has him turning, stilling for a second.
"Why" should never, never be a question in their vocabulary. It shouldn't be said. It shouldn't even be thought.
But here it is.
"Protocol," the Winter Soldier says quietly, stiffly. What kind of question is this? "We were supposed to carry out the mission and report back. Even if we didn't hit the time table, we still need to carry it out. You're a high value asset - you need to be back on base."
The specifics are a little more complicated. The main one is because they were ordered to, because the Winter Soldier can hear an order and it seeps into his core, feels urgent, right. You do what you are ordered to, no ifs ands or buts. It makes perfect sense. The Captain is a valuable asset, arguably more valuable than him. Therefore it makes sense to ensure he's returned - willingly or unwillingly - so that HYDRA can continue to utilize his irreplaceable skillset.
The Winter Soldier remembers to turn his face away, although he's watching his partner from his peripheral.
"You know this. So why ask?"
Even with the...discrepancies, the Captain has to know this baseline. Doesn't matter the corruption running through those misfiring neurons. HYDRA"s bottom line: an asset must serve the cause and not all assets are equal. It makes sense that the Captain needs - must - return. The Winter Soldier stills, and he'll take a step closer, aware that his left prosthesis needs maintenance. Not yet within striking distance, but the question the Captain posed is important - a zero sum question, the kind he was asked in the embrace of the chair, listening to the suppression arc humming and read to sear rational thought away.
no subject
But why is he asking?
"Because —" The Captain pauses, wondering for a second why he is asking. What he wants to know. Why he so desperately wants names for the uncomfortable, tugging feelings inside him, why he wants to keep feeling them when they hurt in this strange, burrowing way, digging deeper like they're carving out the calm, empty spaces of him and lodging themselves there instead.
"If there was no protocol," he says, slowly, gaze apparently on his fingers flicking through the folders, but the Soldier's figure is always at the corner of his eye, never unobserved. Never quite out of his sphere of awareness. "Or if that wasn't the protocol, if you had no orders regarding me. What would you do then?"
He lets out a quiet breath, the closest an asset can come to a sigh, and shuts the drawer again. There's nothing useful here. No records or information that tells him more about who they were. Maybe he was foolish to hope for it, to think anyone would have left anything of use behind; but maybe he's still foolish, because he pulls open the next drawer, lower down, which sticks and squeaks and groans as he forces the hinges to move through age and rust and dust. This drawer hasn't been opened recently. Maybe it will hold something for him.
no subject
It shouldn't matter if there is no protocol. If there isn't, then he awaits them and if they don't come, then he assumes there must be protocols he isn't classified to know and act on. As the Captain speaks, his own face becomes increasingly flat, closing off even more, if that's possible. Yes, he can tell he's still being watched and no, that isn't the problem. The questions. All these questions, apparently rattling around in his partner's head when they shouldn't be.
The Winter Soldier's chapped lips purse into that thin, almost disapproving line - an expression that he doesn't seem to be aware he's making sometimes, when he's especially distracted. That small muscle in the corner of his jaw? It's tightened, almost ticking.
"...I don't think about these what-ifs," the Soldier grits between his teeth. There would always be orders if the other asset is involved. "No point getting hung up on it. Wouldn't go rogue if that's what you're asking."
It's the most conversational he's been in a long time, each unwilling word dragged out with a rasp as if he'd prefer to be silent.
He couldn't remember the last time he talked as much as he has the last couple of days.
The Winter Soldier turns away, although not enough that he can't always keep the unstable Captain in his peripheral. What kind of question was that? It doesn't make sense, at the core of it. The Captain has to know the answer: it should have been drilled into him that he is too valuable to allow outside of HYDRA and that he's also too valuable to be simply executed. That it has never mattered why they should return, only that they do and they never, ever give reason for the handlers to second-guess their commitment.
He moves away to check an overturned cart which gives him a better view of the rusted cabinet that's got the Captain's attention. From here he can see some old, yellowed files, their edges curling with age. Some of the handwriting is faded, illegible from here.
"Anything?"
Lemme know if any of this isn't okay!
But there are no handlers now, and the injections didn't work. He's stepped far outside their protocols, and he doesn't know how to pull the Soldier with him, and it's this growing, unhappy ball of distress down in the pit of his stomach, as he thumbs through old, yellowed folders, hard copies of — He pulls one out. They're medical records. Old. This one is dated 1944.
There's something about those numbers, lined up as they are, that gets his attention. That hooks into his brain like a fishing line and tugs. He pulls it out, pages through the folder, so old that the manila is fragile and crackling, the pencil marks on the papers smudged and faded. His eyes skim over the report, but… it's not what he wants. He shoves it back into the drawer and pulls out another, a few files back.
This one is dated a year earlier. He opens it, eyes skimming over the list of names, injuries, treatments, recommendations —
And catch on Barnes, Sergeant J.B. with all the force of running headfirst into a brick wall.
He doesn't answer the Soldier's question, which should probably be answer enough. He's even stopped watching the other asset out of the corner of his eye. His entire focus, just for a moment, is on this sheet of paper, with that name shining like a beacon, stinging like a slap to the face. His eyes skim the columns, note the injury was apparently a bullet graze to the side, barely in and out, with first aid in the field administered by —
By Rogers, Captain S.G.
… his hands were shaking, he remembers. His hands were shaking as they packed the wound with gauze, and there was a voice, low and smooth and calm, for all that it was tight with pain, saying, "It's fine, pal, it's nothing. We both know I've walked away from worse. And besides, you got the bastards, so it's all settled. They ain't walking away from this like we are…"
His hands are shaking now, he realizes; he doesn't know where the Soldier is, doesn't know how long he's been lost in his thoughts (only seconds), and his head snaps up, eyes wide, looking to clock the other asset.
no subject
He doesn't - can't - remember everything. Not if the suppression chair and its techs do their job. Somehow there's this vague feeling he can't shake, this idea that he hasn't seen the other man freeze up like this. Hasn't seen him so open, not even when he was quivering in the chair restraints.
Need to see what he found.
This close he can see the way the other man's hands tremble. When his eyes dart up, he'll find the Winter Soldier has gotten closer and closer, almost within striking range even though his hands are at his side and there don't appear to be anything sharp in them. No, he can't risk stabbing the Captain and getting blood on the delicate folders, the old sheaf of paper. This isn't the window he's looking for. Not yet.
This isn't curiosity, he thinks, but a need to see what was in the file and commit it to memory, so that he can report back to HYDRA what had shocked even the Captain into forgetting his surroundings.
"You found something," the Winter Soldier says flatly. He doesn't demand the folder; he doesn't need to. "If it's classed as critical, then I need eyes on it."
Because you can't be trusted to compile an accurate report hovers between the lines.
He holds out his cybernetic hand, the prosthesis's metal palm glinting dully in what little light they have in the room. They're close enough that if he had wanted to, he could have taken that opportunity to make another pass at the other asset...but he didn't. His eyes, pale and blue and always either focused or glazed over with exhaustion and fear, lock onto the Captain and he barely seems to blink. The air, cold, stale, hangs heavier now as if the room itself is holding its breath.
no subject
There's a frozen moment where he doesn't move, doesn't speak. Then he closes the file neatly and hands it over without a word. His hands fall to his sides, deceptively calm again, and his body is still and solid, no sign that he's distressed or that he'll make any kind of a move at all. He's waiting, now. He wants to see what happens when the Soldier flips open the file and reads the report for himself. Wants to see whether the same trigger words — they must have been trigger words, the names, maybe something else, something he didn't even comprehend reading — knock something loose inside the Soldier, too.
His own mind feels like this big, empty space with only that one burst of sudden images and sounds and feelings to fill it. He wonders, suddenly, if it's a real memory, or an implanted one. If this is a test. This… can't be a test, can it? It's too big. Too complex, too involved. The Soldier is too on edge, he thinks. Too unhappy. If this were a test, something both of them are familiar with to their bones, then it wouldn't feel so much like diving into uncharted territory.
If this were a test, the Soldier would be passing. The Captain would be failing. He knows that without a doubt, by now. But even if this were a test… he doesn't think he wants to pass any more of HYDRA's tests, anymore.
He can't start second-guessing everything now. He's committed to a path. He won't turn back. Which means, he thinks, that it might be a real memory. From a real life. Of being a real man. Before HYDRA.
They both were real men, before HYDRA. The question is, he supposes, whether they ever could be again.
He takes a silent, sharp breath of cold, dusty air through his nose and turns all his attention to the Winter Soldier. All that matters now is how the other asset reacts to the file. At that thought, there's a tiny sliver of something, shining in the back of his mind. The Captain doesn't — can't — recognize it yet as hope, but that's what it is, nonetheless.
no subject
Good.
The Winter Soldier's cybernetic fingers curl over it as he takes it, pivots away so it's harder to snatch away if his partner changes his mind, and then he stalks several paces away: enough to be able to read it in the meager lighting, far enough that he can react if he spots any sign of tactically-questionable movement from the Captain. Unfortunately HYDRA hasn't mastered implementing night-vision modifications. Even the Winter Soldier can't see in full darkness, and so there's a limit to how far he can scoot to read the file and also keep his peripheral vision on his former(?) partner.
He reads. Quickly. Eyes flick side to side, down, side to side. Repeat.
Names.
Old photos that he squints at and the Winter Soldier comes to the conclusion that they likely aren't forgeries. The two Assets were men with another life, another rank. Another name. Maybe not proof, but a question, at least, to where they both came from, who they where before HYDRA. He gazes down at the weathered folders contents and goes still, aware that he's being watched by the Captain - by this man who was once called "Rogers". The Winter Soldier's hair hangs in a dark, matted curtain and he's once again faintly glad it hides the bulk of his facial expressions. When his head lifts, he's done his best to mask his face into a neutral expression.
"This doesn't change things. Who we were doesn't matter," the Soldier says quietly. "HYDRA made us productive."
He adds that as if it explains everything. HYDRA gave them purpose whether they wanted it or not. This appears to be obvious. However, for the first time in a long, long while, it occurs to the Winter Soldier that suppression techniques have varying effectiveness between assets: what will turn his own mind and desires into a flatline clearly haven't had the same effect on another man. It should, in theory. It hasn't, in reality.
The Soldier is still holding onto the file with his head tilted toward his partner as he studies him through his tangled hair.
"We had names before," the Winter Soldier says - admits, grudgingly - and he goes on, as if trying to ignore that detail that's inconvenient to HYDRA. "Every asset around us has. You know this."
Maybe not every asset had those names dragged away by the Chair, but still.