For a second he pauses, taken aback, and the next moment it occurs to him that his hesitation is unacceptable. The Winter Soldier's mouth presses into a line before he tilts his head, reaching up to tuck his hair behind his ear. The stare he gives his partner is this side of judging, as if he's wondering why he's asking.
Still. Racking his standing orders, what he read, what was implanted through the chair and through screaming his lungs hoarse, he can't come up with a reason why he can't. Apparently no one thought this would happen - he knows he was one of those.
"SOP," the Asset says after a pregnant, uncomfortable silence where for a split second, his eyes flicker away from his partner's. "If you run out of suppressants and you're...unmanageable, you're to be removed from rotation."
It's a clinical way of saying he'll be killed the second the Winter Soldier has an opening.
Hearing it aloud, though, is different. The words feel wrong in his mouth even though it's the right thing to do, the correct thing. Rolling it over in his mind, the Soldier realizes he doesn't want to talk about SOP anymore than he wants to talk about the SHIELD agents they ran into only a few hours ago. Things had been easier when it was the mission, when his sole goal was to sight down his scope and depress the trigger and confirm the red blossom of his target's skull evaporating. Oddly enough...he misses that. It's another sign that he's starting to become unstable himself, the very thought sending a shudder up his back.
As if to hide it, the asset reluctantly returns to the first order of business: the SHIELD encounter.
"I'm concerned about what they said," he starts. He leans against the counter, arms crossed over his chest, a chrome finger unconsciously tapping. "Those names. We don't know if they're old covers or something else." (He doesn't want to know what that "something else" could be). "If they have these kinds of details, they might have other classified information they're sitting on."
The Winter Soldier dances around the real meat of the problem, instead choosing to focus on HYDRA first, the men who they used to be never. He searches his partner for signs that he's just as worried. There's a part of him dimly aware the Captain is...attractive. It makes sense he would be, considering his undercover work, how close he needs to get to people. He's good looking but there aren't any specific identifying markers like scars, nothing to really pick him out of a line-up. Ideally people will find him attractive and trustworthy and they couldn't put their finger on why. Sometimes, where he's been away from the suppression chair for long periods of time, the Soldier wonders if that's one of the reasons why he's always felt close to the other asset. Maybe he isn't immune to that either.
He hopes it won't impact his ability to carry out his orders.
"Too bad we couldn't get one of them alive. I would've liked to carry out an interrogation."
The Soldier balks, just for a second - it’s maybe the most human behavior the Captain’s ever observed in him, but he’s not really in a place to acknowledge it at the moment. If this were a normal mission, if the Captain were feeling like himself, the cold, focused precision weapon that he is, he would have noted the expression, the way the Soldier hides his hesitation with a small, seemingly innocuous motion. But the assets waste no motion, and they don’t hesitate when they’re asked questions.
Not unless they’ve been compromised - like the Captain is now, so he doesn’t file that information away, instead simply waiting for the answer.
When it comes, he’s not surprised - of course he’s not, of course that’s exactly what would happen. It’s what should happen. The functional asset should be the one to return to HYDRA, they have no use for a broken tool. He knows his own return is to be prioritized, it’s clear in every mission operating procedure, when the Soldier takes point, clears buildings, provides cover. But if it’s just the two of them, and there is information that HYDRA needs… the more reliable source should survive.
He nods, nothing deceptive in his gaze or his voice when he says, “I understand. Good.” It is good. He can’t say why, but… it is good. There’s no guarantee the Soldier will find an opening, and the Captain can’t guarantee that he’ll give him one. But it’s a plan to follow, and it’s enough. That, he does file away, tries to shrug it on like he shrugs on all his other missions, but it’s not like the fluid ease of stepping out of the chair and knowing what needs to be done. It’s less efficient, it’s less sure, but it’s still a plan, and he can try to follow it.
That plan having been established, the Soldier moves on to the Captain’s suggestion, though in a roundabout way. Still, “I’m concerned, too,” the Captain admits, though there’s little concern in his voice; it’s more detached interest. “If SHIELD has knowledge of past missions, they could decipher a pattern.” And he’s not stupid enough to think that all the files would have been destroyed with the base. There would have been backups, on paper or computer, elsewhere. “But that won’t be a mission for us,” he adds, because while they excel in stealth, they are weapons, first and foremost. Even when they need to infiltrate, blend in, deceive, it’s always with a death as the end goal. This will be a mission for another department - and while thinking that soothes him, in a way, as he feels the utter perfection of HYDRA’s smooth workings, the way the departments and pieces fit together to create a stronger whole, there’s still part of him that does, in fact, feel distressed at the thought of leaving that information in the hands of someone else, while he is taken to a chair and those names, Rogers and Barnes, are wiped from his mind forever.
The Soldier goes on, and the Captain’s lips twitch; one corner lifts, in a small, dry expression that some might call the barest hint of a sardonic smile, as he shifts where he’s standing, trying to ease the ache in his shoulder, which has become a constant white-hot spike in the back of his mind. “It would have given us something to do. Idle hands - “
He stops, frowning. Idle hands… idle hands, what? He doesn’t know why those words came from his mouth, and he doesn’t know what comes after them. But something comes after them. It’s… it’s a phrase, he thinks. (He doesn’t have the context to consider it an idiom.) Did he hear a handler utter the phrase? It must have been on this mission, he doesn’t recall past missions clearly enough, only with a vague sense that actions have been completed, that HYDRA has been satisfied.
He shakes his head slightly, as if to clear the words away. “We’ll just have to report fully on what we saw and heard.” And hope it will be enough that they won’t be punished for it; he’s been punished for incomplete reports, for steps missed, for sketchy intel before. He knows that, deep in his bones, just like he knows he doesn’t want it to happen again. “If our handlers hadn’t - ”
He stops himself again; questioning their handlers is not allowed. It’s not their place. Handlers have been punished before, but never on the words of an asset. The tool has no right to judge the actions of the hand that holds it; even so, the Captain glances at the Soldier, wondering if he feels the same way. If he knows just how… how lame-brained the actions their handlers took were.
The Captain blinks. He’s starting to feel fatigued. He’s starting to feel like he’s fighting an uphill battle, just to think straight. He’s starting to feel, in the pit of his stomach, worried.
The Winter Soldier normally would enjoy that little change in expression, how it just barely tugs at the corner of his mouth, so subtle a handler would miss it. Not another fellow asset. Not him. Somehow it used to feel like he was the only one meant to see it.
This time, though, he doesn't feel any closer to his partner. Now it's starting to feel like a sign of the weakness poisoning him.
"They used poor judgment," he finishes for the Captain. "If they aren't dead, they will be once we report their failures."
It's merely culling out the undesirable, the weakest holding the others back. And, and this is something he isn't sure the Captain feels too but he suspects he does, the Winter Soldier might even derive a small amount of pleasure at his old handlers being liquidated. It won't stop the suppression or the chair or the cryofreeze. He might not even remember what happened to them after this, if he's even alive himself. But for now, in this very moment, he dares to indulge himself for all of two seconds. They failed HYDRA, they failed their assets, and
The hesitation from the Captain doesn't go unnoticed. The whole time he stares at his partner, mentally stripping him for other signs of imperfections like he's a faulty rifle, blue eyes flicking across his face, his body.
It's a few hours later after further observation that the Winter Soldier decides to accelerate his plans. The degradation is happening even faster despite the injection and if he wants even a chance to deliver his partner to HYDRA alive, he needs to move fast. Incapacitate him and then, if it continues, he can process him out of rotation and still have a fresh body to deliver. The idea still sits wrong, festers and curdles, and the Soldier is disturbed to admit he almost debates backing out when he glances at his partner, asleep on the couch facing the boarded up windows. It doesn't stop him from slipping out just before dawn to search the ski lodge again, this time it isn't for weapons or for food, water.
He needs something that can sedate an asset.
There isn't much. He can probably poison the Asset long enough to get him restrained but after that, it's touch and go. The man has a higher metabolism than he does, a stronger immune system. If he doesn't hit him hard and fast, there's a strong chance that this won't be as one-sided as he wants it to be, even with the Captain's injuries.
It's the hesitation that costs the Winter Soldier. He collects some bleach to force-feed his partner, some rope to tie him down, but he...stops. Stands there looking down at the man who he's carried out countless missions with. When he's asleep, he looks a little younger, a little relaxed, and it's almost like looking at someone else, someone better. Someone he, for less than a second, feels almost regret for. That moment passes as the Winter Soldier takes in a slow, measured breath, and throws himself at his partner. He sees the other asset's eyes fly open at the last second, too late to pull back.
He commits.
The Winter Soldier plants himself so he can sit on the Captain, straddling his torso even as he snaps a punch at his face and then goes for trying to grip him by the throat, the other hand coming around with the bottle of bleach.
o7 please feel free to fill in anything or let me know if something needs to be changed!
The Captain manages to fight off the fatigue for several hours more but eventually, he’s got to admit that he needs to rest. Even for just a little while, because the pain in his arm is wearing, and the waves crashing against the barriers HYDRA has erected in his mind is wearing, and, although he wouldn’t have been able to put it into words, had he been asked, the way the Winter Soldier is watching him, like an evaluator searching for the chinks in the armor, the cracks in the facade, is most wearing of all.
He can feel, under his skin, that the world is waiting for him to crack. He refuses - HYDRA built him stronger than that - but it doesn’t mean he doesn’t notice.
He announces he’s going to sleep for a few hours; couches it in terms of the Soldier taking the next sleeping shift, and the Captain standing guard after that. He doesn’t have long to think about whether it’s safe to sleep or not, because it doesn’t take long after he slumps onto the dusty couch that he’s out like a light.
And he stays out, until the Soldier makes his move.
His eyes fly open only seconds before the other asset is on him; the Captain has the ability to snap from sleep to wakefulness in an instant, but the Soldier is fast and in that instant, he's had enough time to land his body on the Captain's, to slam his head back with a punch, to put a hand to his throat and bring up a bottle of -
The smell hits him full in the face. It's bleach, and the Captain's mind works lightning-fast, still at a disadvantage but it doesn't take long to catch up. Bleach won't kill him, but it will incapacitate him, subdue him long enough for the Soldier to neutralize him. Part of the Captain's impressed, maybe even a little proud, in a way that's welling up, so telling of the way the suppression is crumbling inside of him that he feels it at all, at the ingenuity of his partner. It's not a bad idea, pal, but you know I'm not gonna go down easy.
But it's that hesitation on his own part that means he gets a faceful of the stuff. His teeth are clenched, so the amount he ingests is minimal, but the rest of it splashes across his face and into his eyes, burning white-hot before the world starts to fuzz out at the edges, even as the Captain brings up his injured arm in a swinging block that shoots pain through him like a lance, but sends the bottle flying out of the Soldier's grip, somewhere behind the couch. He hears it clatter to the ground, its contents gurgling out over the floor, but it's the least of his worries now. He's still face to face with the other asset, and no matter how fast he blinks, the pain in his eyes only gets worse, and the gauze-like curtain that’s descending on his vision grows thicker.
It'll likely clear up on its own, as the serum in his veins sloughs off the damaged corneal cells, regrows new ones. But it will probably get worse before it gets better, and healing will take time - likely hours - and he doesn't have time right now. He has an asset that will put him down if he doesn't turn the tables first.
His programming says he should go for the kill. His instincts, if that's what they are, balk, and what happens isn't what he's been trained for. If he acted on programming, on training, the Soldier's neck would have been snapped in seconds, the limp, lifeless body pushed to the ground and let cool. There would be a full report made, once he's re-established contact with HYDRA, an explanation, a mission briefing, and complete and utter submission to the chair for reconditioning -
Reconditioning, he must need reconditioning, he must be breaking down, but he's not broken; there's something else coming up through the cracks, and that something else fights like a cornered animal, but an animal that only strikes as much and as far as is needed, and no further. An animal capable of feeling... sympathy ? Remorse? Mercy?
The way it should have gone down, one asset truly against the other, should have left the lodge with only one asset still breathing.
The way it does go down, at the end of it, has the Soldier face-down on the ground, cheek pressed hard into the thin carpet with the Captain pinning him down with his sheer bulk and no small amount of will, panting hard, battered on two fronts now by pain that's starting to scream louder than he has the capacity to tune it out. His injured shoulder feels like it's made of liquid fire, the arm hanging loosely, uselessly at his side almost like it's a prosthetic, like the Winter Soldier might look after a nasty EMP blast took out the metal that replaced flesh on one side. His eyes feel like spikes driving into his skull, his vision largely gone (and a decent swath of his face reddened and burning, making him look like a burn victim) as he twists the Soldier's left arm behind him at an angle that's almost certainly unnatural, in a grip as hard as steel locked around the metal wrist with his one good hand, and his elbow dug dangerously into the Soldier's back at the place where his spine curves up from shoulder to neck, a vulnerable spot that the right amount of pressure, applied in the right way with the force of a super soldier behind it could snap the vertebrae, and paralyze, if not kill.
it's cool! We might need a slight timeksip if you want to knock out Bucky though
The mistake is less than a second but it costs him in the end.
The Captain's cornered and that's when he's most dangerous - the fact he's able to operate like this even when he has a faceful of bleach, his eyes a reddened, ruined mess, says all it needs to about the thoroughness of his training. How their similarities end and he's the inferior model, the expendable one who can't compete against the original. That same training ends up with the Winter Soldier pinned in the worst position possible, his partner's full weight sitting on him as he squirms and struggles and grunts almost angrily under the other man, boots scrapping against the carpet as he tries to find purchase and can't. Not when the other asset's sitting at the perfect location to keep him from bucking him off.
The sound that drags out of the Winter Soldier isn't a whine - it's angrier, desperate; he can't carry out his objective and he knows exactly what that elbow means. He's been on the opposite end before. He might as well be dead. Even if he can somehow shove it off, the Captain's in the perfect position to hook his arm around his throat and roll over, crocodile style, controlling his body with his legs, and apply the right pressure against the carotid arteries. It wouldn't take him long to incapacitate or kill, even hurt as he is. He's superior to any other man but he still needs to breathe, still needs blood to deliver oxygen through his brain. The fact that his partner hasn't committed to either route somehow feels...wrong.
It takes a Soldier a tortured moment to realize this is what frustration must feel like.
His teeth grit against the floor. Carpet fibers dig into his cheek. "Do it or don't!"
For once his voice actually has a shred of emotion as it spikes past the usual monotone they both share. Used to share.
His metal hand twitches against the Captain's grip, the tiny internal pistons inside the chassis groaning in protest as he tries to force himself free. It wasn't built for the force. It shows as tiny sparks flare blue within the seams and his finger spasm as he starts losing control of them, joints dancing before he go limp. The Winter Soldier's face sets in a snarl as he continues to struggle even though self-preservation should've told him to stop, to cool it, to save this fight for another day.
They might not have another day. Not if his partner's already this far gone, despite the injection.
The thought of the Captain running around, free of HYDRA, turns his blood cold. It's wrong. Impossible. The concept of sinful doesn't exist in his world but he still has a deep, curdling sensation of disgust and unbridled fear forming in his gut, knotting, uncurling like a snake about to strike. It takes hold of him, hammers at the cold logical walls of his own conditioning and instead of lying obediently still so he can get another chance, another day, the Winter Soldier instead increases his struggling. At the rate he's going, he might get lucky, might get in the right position so that elbow slips and he can turn the tables.
So much for going down easy.
welp have a knocked-out bucky and a ridiculously long tag
Do it or don’t, the Winter Soldier snarls, and there’s something about the barely-there frustration in his voice that hits the Captain like a punch to the gut. His body flinches - doesn’t let go, doesn’t waver, but still flinches, even as the Soldier’s metal fingers twist in his grip and he grits his own teeth, squeezing the wrist harder, hearing and feeling the give in the metal and mechanics, feeling the instant the mechanism gives out.
He won’t do it. He knows that - he’s known it from the second he got the Soldier in this position, down on the floor under him. He isn’t going to kill the other asset, not even in self-defense, not even when he knows, deep down in this sour knot in his gut, that the Soldier is following orders, the same way he should be. He’s slipping; he can feel it, terrified, shaking, knowing that when HYDRA comes, when they find him, the recalibration will only hurt worse. The pain and the punishment will only last longer for an asset that’s losing its ability to carry out its only function.
And yet, deeper down, past that shaking, desperate thing that wants to know why the injections aren’t working, why his programming is breaking down… there’s something else. There’s something still trying to fight its way to the surface, and that thing… That thing has…
“Mission,” he whispers, almost more to himself, almost for a second as though he’s forgetting the Soldier is there, pinned down and struggling beneath him. “I have a mission,” he says, he promises himself and the Soldier, and he might have said more, might not, but it doesn’t matter, because just then, the body under his jerks and starts struggling, harder than before.
The Captain grits his teeth, and he doesn’t have a choice - lightning-fast, he drops the metal arm and grabs the Soldier by the back of the neck, hand almost a blur. He raises the body under his, and slams it back down onto the floor. He does it again, and then a third time, just to make sure that when the body of the Winter Soldier goes limp, it’s not because he’s faking it.
Even so, he stays where he is for a long, long minute, his own heart pounding and breath coming ragged. There’s the pain, flaring up in his arm, his eyes, his head, and there’s the body under his, now just dead weight, but it won’t stay there for long. And there’s… there’s the mission, this thing he can feel bubbling up from his gut, the parameters foggy, hidden, but they’re there. They’re coming. Like his ruined vision, they’re not something he can grasp right now. But they’ll get there. They’ll slide into focus.
He thinks he saw rope, in the Winter Soldier’s hands, just before he jumped. He has to crawl around like a blind man on the floor, holding his injured arm close and balancing his weight between thighs and abs, but he finds it. He grits his teeth through the pain as he turns the Winter Soldier over by feel, binds his hands and feet, and props him up against the base of the couch.
Then the Captain scoots around and sits, shoulder to shoulder, with the Soldier’s unconscious body. The weight of the Soldier, slumped against his own uninjured shoulder, feels… good. It feels calming, it lets him focus on something other than the burning, white-hot pain from the bullet that won’t let the bones of his shoulder heal around it and the bleach still burning its way through his eyes. Eventually, he can start to see light, shadows, blurred edges. He thinks he can feel his eyes healing, cell by cell, slow going, but doggedly moving forward, rebuilding.
He wonders if that’s what’s happening to his mind, too. He wonders if it’s been damaged, if it’s trying to rebuild. It feels like… like a long-buried, rusty and damaged protocol is surfacing, as the suppression of the drugs and the too-long-ago session in the chair start losing their grip on him. Without the suppression of the drugs keeping it where it belongs -
For a moment, he's terrified - he thinks that he must be broken, that HYDRA had suppressed him for good reason, had kept him on this strict regimen of drugs for a reason, and that this baseline protocol must somehow be so terrible and so strong that it couldn't be wiped, only held at bay, and now it's rearing its ugly head -
Rearing its ugly head, like a hydra. Like a monster that needs to be put down. Like -
"Fuck," he says, his head drooping, back bowing until his forehead's nearly touching the his knees as he draws his legs up, feet flat on the floor. They tried to burn something out of his mind, but they couldn’t. So they tried to bury it, and now it’s awake. “There’s something I have to… do.” He’s not sure what, but he knows, now, that there’s some task left unfinished, some aspect of his original protocols that wasn’t fulfilled. Did he fail, is that why HYDRA wipes him again and again, to eliminate his failure, erase it from existence? Or is it something else? “I’m compromised,” he says - admits, really, to the quiet air around them, to the sleeping - unconscious - Winder Soldier. “But I still have a mission.”
He doesn’t know how long they sit like that, with those words, I still have a mission, echoing over and over again through his head.
you say it like it's a surprise :P also with the right account
The first blow doesn't knock him out. It dazes the Soldier, renders his head ringing and his vision sparking. His teeth split his lip where he cuts against them, but he's still awake long enough to strain his neck for a moment as if that would be enough to stop the Captain from finishing the job.
The second one does him in.
After that the Winter Soldier's unconscious. It's a state that he fears in the lizard part of his brain that that he's never mentioned to anyone, a nothingness that howls with silence just like cryo. It isn't like the moments where he catches some sleep here and there, where sometimes he dreams; categorizes; reports to his handlers. It's pure nothing, unaccountable, and he can't tell exactly when he was restrained or when he started slumping toward his partner, head sagging, close enough that the handlers would've wondered if they remembered how to fraternize and maybe that would've made it into both their files.
He starts to revive after an hour or so, his head thundering and nausea rising, the Soldier automatically forcing down the bile by swallowing. Isn't the first time he's been unconscious. Isn't even the first time he's been knocked out by the Captain, either, because he remembers bits and pieces of their training sessions together, how sometimes he'd end up on the floor and there's be a gap before he wakes up getting dragged down a hall and the first thing he sees is his boots, wobbling, limp, and then he registers the taste of blood hanging metallic in his mouth. The Winter Soldier hadn't been pissed. Mostly he pretended to play dead and he'd enjoyed the sensation, the idea, that the Captain left a piece of him behind. It's that weakness that probably got him where he is now.
The Winter Soldier revives with a shudder and a grunt.
Normally when he wakes it's slow, quiet enough to pretend to be still out so he can access the situation and come up with some escape routes, some ambush points. This time it's uncoordinated like a normal man, losing whatever element of surprise he might've had. His eyes drift open reluctantly. Head hurts. Everything hurts, his arm isn't working - stupid of him to keep trying, in retrospect - and he can't spread his legs. Ankles tied. Arms too. Unacceptable.
His head lifts, the Winter Soldier's dark hair hanging in a tangled curtain in his face. The blood trailing from his nose and mouth has had time to dry into a dark crust he can feel as he scrunches face and wrinkles his nose and asks:
"...Mission?"
It comes out hoarse, a shade of suspicious. What mission? He gets that his partner has turned into the worst kind of liability seeing as the injections aren't holding, but the word "mission" rings a bell inside him. Hits him in the core of his own conditioning. He doubts the Captain's been assigned higher clearance for a mission he isn't part of - not with success record - but it isn't impossible. His ankles shift and bump against his partner as he tests the rope. Good knots. HYDRA good. Not surprising.
"You're compromised. Turn yourself in and HYDRA can help you," the Winter Soldier says quietly, his voice hoarse, his head ringing even as conditioning demands he trot out HYDRA's bottom line like it's from a pamphlet. "Do the right thing, Captain."
Even with his vision swimming he can see his partner isn't at his peak.
It's disturbing. Body language betrays him. The Winter Soldier isn't much for conversation unless he's been conditioned for it, but he can read the physical tells just fine. Everything about his partner sends up red flags: he's biting his lip, staring forward at nothing instead of a target, a point of interest like supplies or a weapon. His posture is in a weakened position, head bowed to rest against his knees instead of held up high.
The body next to him shudders, and the Captain feels both on edge and more relaxed, all at once. He lets the asset next to him claw his way back up into consciousness, taking as long as he likes, even though right now it feels like their time is limited, running thin. The storm outside is still raging, and likely will for hours to come. It could even be days before the snow and the wind abate; he remembers the briefing, the regional weather reports it had included, the instructions on what they and their handlers would do if weather compromised the mission timetable.
But those handlers are dead, and now it’s just him and the Winter Soldier - and his new (old?) mission, still slowly forming, nebulous and murky but growing sharper, clearly, piece by piece inside his head.
The mission that he isn’t sure how to explain, even as the Soldier lifts his head beside him. The Captain’s eyes are still healing, his vision murky but he can see just enough to imagine the rest of the picture, the blood crusting the Soldier’s nostrils, the way it’s scabbed along the top of his mouth, as he asks that simple question. Of course he’s asking - it’s the thing that has turned the Captain against him, in his mind, only what the Soldier doesn’t understand is that the Captain doesn’t want to stand against him. He never has, he knows that now. Every training session, every time he’d knocked the other asset to the ground, beat him into unconsciousness, was like a thorn twisting in his brain, a voice clamoring out of synch with the rest of the chorus telling him to comply. Telling him to follow HYDRA’s path.
HYDRA’s path… there’s something wrong with it. There’s some reason he’s supposed to sidestep off of it. And it has something to do with the Soldier. After an hour alone with his churning, half-buried thoughts, the Captain knows that much for sure, if not a whole lot else. It’s what makes him grit his teeth and shake his head when the Winter Soldier gives him the party line, the words at once hollow and whole, something the Soldier believes in just as much as the Captain no longer can.
HYDRA can’t help him, he thinks, and it’s like a revelation. It’s like that first spark that sets fire to the tinder, ignites what will soon enough become a blaze. It’s what makes him sit up, shoulder sliding against the other asset’s, looking him in the face, even if his gaze is just a little off, like a blind man trying to look you in the eye, only it’s a couple of inches off. He can see the other asset’s face, but it’s like a pale, shining oval set against the darker hair, the can vaguely see the outlines of features, the blue eyes, the blood-encrusted nose and mouth, in the dim light. The blinds are still closed, the sky still dark with the storm outside.
“I am doing the right thing,” he says, slow but sure, quiet but profound. His voice is plain, flat, clear, but there’s a quality underneath it that wasn’t there before. It’s subtle, but it’s steady. “I don’t know why, but I know that I am.”
He knows that won’t be enough to convince the Soldier. Of course it won’t - it’s vague, it’s unclear, it doesn’t comply. He is no longer compliant, and compliance is the foundation from which the assets were built. It’s why this deviation is the source of so much strife.
So he does something that he has learned never, ever to do in front of a handler. He does something that only the Winter Soldier could ever (has ever, maybe, has this happened before? He doesn’t know, can’t remember, and that frightens him, suddenly) bring him to do. He speaks his mind, he lets out a little of the secret he can feel, buried deep inside: “There’s a different protocol. I don’t think it’s HYDRA’s. I don’t think they can help me understand.”
There’s a pause; when he speaks, that thing coloring his voice has gotten stronger. “I want to understand what it is.”
He wants to know what this thing is they’ve buried, and to do that, they both know what needs to happen. He needs time. He needs to not go back in the chair. He can’t comply, or it will be covered up again, hidden from the light, and maybe he’ll never find it again. Or maybe he’s already found it a hundred times before. Maybe he's forgotten it a hundred times more.
The Winter Soldier listens and absorbs. What he picks up from his partner's tone of voice, the brief, still too long pauses? It isn't exactly instilling him with confidence.
"How do you know there's another protocol?" The Soldier's voice softens at the edges even as he stares at his partner like he's trying to bore right into his skull. "Maybe I can help you, if you let me.
Next order of business: if you can't immediately incapacitate a target, try to work your way into his/her good graces until you can. Whatever has contaminated the Captain's programming thankfully hasn't hit his: he's clear-headed, getting more so by the second as the ringing stops and his vision resolves. Parameters snap back into focus. Whatever pain he feels is shoved aside as a distraction, an indulgence that HYDRA won't allow and, therefore, he won't allow. The Winter Soldier's chin lifts as he swallows, jaw working, eyes closing for a second with what looks like a normal man's moment of weakness. The barest hint of blue peeks out as he stares at his partner. His face is ruined, inflamed and swelling and red...but even now he can see the signs that his advanced healing factor is kicking in, doing an even better job than his own. Bleach to the face would've taken him a day to recover from, at the minimum. At his estimate, it's probably been a few hours at most and the Captain's already got his eyes open.
For the first time in his memory, the Soldier experiences regret. If anyone should've gone off the reservation and gone rogue, it should've been him - he would've been easier to remove from rotation, would've been the easier loss for HYDRA to take. They could always make another like him. His partner, though. He's one of a kind, and right now he wishes he wasn't so...unique.
"We could do this together, just me and you," the Soldier adds. To the casual outsider, his voice is flat-lined, a borderline monotone as if he hadn't tried to kill a man who turned things around and introduced his face to the floor, the up-close and personal way. "You don't have to go at this alone."
For now he means it, because his mission requires it and because the naked truth is, he doesn't want to kill the other asset if there's another way. For one thing, the Captain's far more valuable than he is. And - and this is the private part, the one that he would immediately get strapped into the suppression chair for - he wants to keep working with him. Wants to clear rooms, wants to train with him back on base. The word "friend" doesn't exist in their world. If it did, it would've just been a liability. But examining where he failed today, the Winter Soldier comes to the slow, startling conclusion that this is a liability he would've wanted to risk.
He shifts from where he's propped up against his partner, drawing his legs up with a pained hiss, the thick heels of his boots dragging against the floor. He's strong, sure, but the Captain knows his limitations just like he does and naturally he made sure to tie his arms and his ankles together so he can't just snap free. Might be able to saw through if he can rub the rope against the chassis of his arm, but that would still take time. Best he can do is keep his partner talking as he tries to figure out another approach.
The Captain should know better. The Captain would know better than to believe the offer for help, would know it’s only a ploy, it’s practically SOP, to make someone dangerous that you don’t trust, trust you instead. But there’s something - someone? - inside him that hears those words, in that voice, and immediately gives in, takes a breath, relaxes. There’s something inside him that instantly feels better, more at ease, a knot in his gut that loosens, a spark that runs over and through him. His burning eyes flutter closed for a moment in what’s clearly a show of trust, of comfort around the other asset, of vulnerability he should never have been willing to express in the first place. It’s another clear sign of how far his programming has crumbled, even as the broken vestiges of the codes and failsafes and structure HYDRA put inside of him are still trying to hold, keeping whatever it is that he really wants to know at bay.
But while he can’t access the memories, the knowledge he wants, there are other things slipping through - sense-memories, instincts, things that run deeper than conscious thought, and are far harder to wipe away. They’re the first to return: the soft sound of the Soldier’s voice, the feel of his warm body next to his, the comfort he takes in knowing they’re together.
His vision is still too blurry to really assess the Soldier; he hears the asset shift beside him, more than sees it, but what little information he can get from his eyes, coupled with what he’s getting from his other senses, gives him a pretty clear picture. He knows he’s bound the Soldier tightly enough that he won’t be able to escape easily, can’t just snap the bonds. He knows he doesn’t want to leave his partner tied up, that something about that sits uneasily inside of him, and he’s already reaching clumsily for the other’s hands before he catches himself, pauses, fingertips just brushing the metal of the Soldier’s hand, inches from the knots at most.
“I want to do this together,” he says - again, words he would be backhanded, shot, sliced, burned, electrocuted for. Words that he would never have dared to say, should have known better than to say, known better than to even think while HYDRA still held his mind whole and molded in their hands. Now, his ruined eyes flick up, trying to find and hold the Soldier’s, though the gaze is still off, a little too far to the left and not as piercing as it should be, without that clear focus. But there’s still something genuine in it - genuine, and lost. “I think we’re stronger together. I think we belong together. I think my mission,” whatever it is, “needs you.”
His fingers inch closer to the knots binding the Soldier’s wrists, but even as they touch the rope, he doesn’t untie them. He’s still looking the Soldier in the face as best he can, still struggling with his own sense of duty, of reason, of protocol, all three of them screaming, clashing and disharmonious, inside his head loud enough to nearly drown out the sound of the howling wind outside. “I trust you,” he says quietly, eyes narrowing almost as if in confusion, as if he didn’t mean or didn’t expect to have said the words that just slipped from his lips.
Except he does mean them. “We’re partners,” he says… because they are. They’re partners, and… and something else, but he can’t find the word, can’t grasp it long enough to form it. “And partners trust each other.”
It’s a statement, almost as much as it might be a warning, as his fingers finally touch the knots, but then they still. Something in him says he shouldn’t unknot them; something in him balks at the idea that he tied them at all.
Trust. What the Captain says isn't his definition of the word trust. They're only together because HYDRA ordered it. It isn't up to them and that's fine, that's how it's supposed to be. This shouldn't be his partner's call to make all of a sudden.
The Winter Soldier doesn't say the first thing that crosses his mind.
Not if it gets in the way of lowering the other asset's defenses.
"So then we'll do this as partners."
The words feel both right and somehow like decay in his mouth, all at once, the familiar tainted by this bitter feeling that he's somehow being...compromised by going along with the other asset, even for the sake of his own mission. Unlike the Captain, he remembers it, remembers every contingency and remembers, clearly, what it means to carry out a mission to its logical end - HYDRA's will carried out and (preferably) both Assets turning themselves in for debriefing. That's how it's supposed to be. They're supposed to return, injured or not. Turn over their kit. On a good day, he can hear the sounds of the Captain screaming as they wipe him so he can be put back into cryo. Now he wonders if he'll ever hear that again, the certainty of it, that brief thrill where where he can read between the lines as the Captain's voice gives out and his gasps slip away even past the thin walls. It'd felt private, almost for his ears only. Now it sinks in that he might never hear those sounds again. If maybe this was their last mission. Maybe he'd done the unforgivable: maybe he's taken this partnership for granted.
"So what now?"
The Winter Soldier accesses some leftover muscle memory, some deep-cover persona he must have had when he was backing up the Captain. Maybe it wasn't completely scrubbed away. Maybe - and this is the better option, the one he approves of - maybe HYDRA knew this could happen. Maybe they had a contingency plan in his programming for a scenario like this. Where he couldn't just work his way out with his hands and whatever weapons were nearby. Where he had only his voice to work with. His voice and his body language and what he's picking up from his partner's instability, the man seems like he wants someone to...fraternize with. Be physically close to. Whatever it takes to build up that trust until he can get another shot at subduing the Captain.
He shifts pointedly against the other asset, bumping shoulders, his knees drawing up as he tries to dredge up those faint memories of what it was like being another man. He'd been a "James" once on an op. Had smiled, maybe even flirted - carrying out the parameters of some HYDRA tech who knew how to read his fellow man - and he could pass as something other than super-soldier, so long as he kept his arm covered. Now the Winter Soldier is trying to drag those memories back, trying to figure out what he can use to get his partner where he wants him. Physical contact was the first one. Knowing when to stare, when to look away (despite that being a risk), is another. The Soldier tilts his head down, almost as if he's pretending not to see the rope circled tight around his ankles, his tangled, matted hair falling into his face.
One more chance. The Winter Soldier knows he shouldn't even give his partner that much. That they're far past the point of trying to take him in alive and salvageable. But he finds himself hoping that the Captain will give him that opening, give him the chance to drag him back into the fold where they can fix him, where he can continue to run ops with him instead of facing that howling void again without knowing that the other Asset will be on the other side waiting for him.
So what now? It’s a valid question - a good question, a question anyone would ask. And normally, the Captain would have an immediate, effortless answer for him - missions always have parameters, after all, always a clear path to follow, even when there are contingencies branching out like the roots of a tree, racing away in a hundred different directions. Even then, the path is clear - follow the main objective, and if a problem arises, follow the next option to the next, and keep going until the mission is complete.
This mission is murkier - unclear. It’s a gut feeling - if the Captain knew what gut feelings were, could call them by name. He’s had them before - they’re actually part of what makes him valuable as a breathing, reasoning weapon, why they pull him out of cryo again and again - but the understanding of gut feelings and how they work and what they are has been burned from him, and it hasn’t yet returned. All he has is a certainty that this mission trumps all others, that this protocol is vital, and that he needs to drop everything else to pursue it.
So - that’s what now. That’s what they’ll do. The problem is, “We need information,” he says, fingers still poised above the knots holding the Soldier’s hands uncomfortably in place. It seems like the next logical step - you don’t act without intel, that’s just insane, but the problem is - he has the intel, and it’s locked away. The barriers are crumbling, but -
That’s it. “We need time,” he says next, burning eyes flicking to the shuttered windows, to the howling just beyond them. “I need time, to remember. We need to stay here, and you need to stop giving me injections.” It’s the reasonable move, after all - they’re not really working, but they're still slowing things down, barring the way, even though the barriers eventually give way. Stopping them would likely speed the process, let his synapses rebuild ruined pathways, let the burned-out bridges in his mind reroute. His lips twitch into something that’s barely an expression, barely a motion at all, but that the other asset might recognize as the Captain’s equivalent of a wry smile. “The weather seems to be accommodating for right now, at least.”
There’s still no telling how long the storm itself will last, but the longer it does, the more snow their lodge is buried under, and the longer they have before HYDRA comes looking for them. If they sit tight, and if they forego all contact protocols, if they sit and wait and let his mind keep recovering… the Captain is sure that what he needs will bob to the surface, will slough off the mud it’s under, and become clear.
His fingers flex a little, as the Solder’s shoulder bumps his own. Partners. That’s what they are, what they always have been, for the entire existence that he knows (can remember). They work well together, like two moving parts of a whole, like the trigger and the hammer of a gun, one complementing the other. The missions where they’re sent out together always feel the most complete, the most satisfying, and he wants to save that, to preserve it. He hopes, somewhere deep inside himself, that this new, desperate protocol won’t change that. If it does… if it does, he’ll deal with it then. He’ll have a choice to make.
But not right now. His fingers start to loosen the knots by touch, slowly but efficiently. He doesn’t simply remove the rope all at once, but he first gives the Soldier some slack, and then some more, ruined, still hard-to-focus eyes on the other asset’s face, watching for tells, watching for twitches, even as his fingertips feel for tremors in the other’s arms, signs that he’s going to fight back, to fight this. It’s only if he gets none of it that he’ll finally loosen the bonds, because if they’re in this for the long haul, together, then he can’t (he can, he doesn’t want to, he shouldn’t -) leave the Soldier tied and bound.
“We’re good - as partners,” he says, half a statement, half a question, seeking confirmation, agreement. “We always have been.” He can’t remember much, between the screaming and the hot-white-slicing pain of the chair, the beat-downs, the small army of guards it takes to subdue him and drag him into cryo, every time. He can’t remember past missions in detail, but he has enough - enough of those gut feelings, those sense memories - to be sure of what he’s saying. “We’re the best HYDRA has, together. I want to find out what else we can be.” And the answer, he’s so sure, is buried inside him, just beneath the surface, trying to claw its way free.
There's one thing they can agree on: the injections must stop. Clearly they aren't working. Not only that but now his partner knows they're coming, that they'll slow him down even as they do the job they're created for, and he'll be prepared to fight off any future attempts at mandatory medication.
It's times like this that the Winter Soldier catches himself almost...grateful that his own conditioning is simpler. Apparently less moving parts that can break in the field, away from the safety of a controlled environment. He doesn't need injections the way his partner does and his stint with the chair was only a few days ago, so he knows for a fact that it will hold for weeks, if not more, without needing to be revisited. Watching the way the Captain is struggling, how his eyes water behind a swollen, ruined face that his enhanced serum is trying to repair cell by cell, and he knows that what little stability the injections bring won't be worth the risk.
There's a difference between exercising patience on an op, waiting for a target. Doing it with a man he's trusted with his life over and over, and it's harder than he wants to admit.
The Winter Soldier's lips press together in a thin line that brings out the stress lines of his face, hollows his cheeks. His expression turns harsh as he tilts his head, trying to gauge how much of his partner's sight has returned.
"So long as it's together," he grunts, forcing himself to say the words, to act as if there is a life beyond HYDRA. It's harder than he thought it would be, considering his experience with deep cover, and he can feel his back teeth start to ache as he clenches and grinds them. "I don't want to be by myself again."
And that part, that part's true, it's the closest thing he has to deeply personal that he can manage with the conditioning, but it's necessary to feed out that vulnerability to his partner as if it's some olive branch for trying to incapacitate him. As he feels the rope around his wrist - his flesh wrist, not the metal one that's limp, the sensors fritzing on and off - loosen, he resists the immediate urge to break free and close his hand around the Captain's throat, squeeze the fight out of him and then call for backup from the nearest HYDRA cell. His eyes flicker down to the rope, loosening bit by bit, his wrist chaffed red because the Captain, despite his ruined eyes, the gunshot, has done the right thing and tied him up tight, before he glances back up at his face. He has to be looking for any of his usual tells that he's about to turn the tables. Knowing how high the stakes are, how important the Captain is to HYDRA (refusing to admit it's personal, too), the Winter Soldier does his damn best to make sure those tells don't show. For now he's docile, the second as always to his first.
It's only when the rope finally pools in his lap that he flexes his hand, trying to work some feeling in it. The metal one lies limp, the gleaming fingers twitching every now and then as the malfunctioning servos sputter.
"What do you think will happen after this?" the Winter Soldier plays ball and keeps things peaceful as he rotates his hand, curls each finger, his eyes burning judging holes in his partner's face. Once he heard someone describe the Captain as "handsome" - he wouldn't know, but he does know is he had short hair he approved of (less to grab), piercing blue eyes, and symmetrical features that consistently made targets want to like him. Now, with his face washed free of color from the pain, the cold, and the skin around his eyes a mask of angry red from the bleach, he doubts anyone would trust him the way they usually did.
Part of the Captain is… frightened isn’t the right word, but unsure, at the very least - he hasn’t been without his medication that he knows of, can’t remember a mission where it ran out, can’t remember a time before the daily injections he required between trips to the chair. He’s sure, in his gut, that stopping them will let what needs to break through come free, but even given that surety, there are hairline cracks, the last vestiges of his active and dormant programming, telling him that he shouldn’t stop, even when he thinks he should.
He ignores it - he’s made a decision, and he’s not going back on it now. To falter would show weakness, and HYDRA does not tolerate weakness. They built him to be strong, to be unstoppable, and even as he’s crumbling and unsure, he can’t give up the strength he still has, the conviction that this old, deep programming needs to come to light. It makes everything worth it - the excruciating pain in his shoulder, his ruined face, the way he’s tied up the Soldier, even if only temporarily. What little he can see of the expression on the other asset’s face makes him uncomfortable, in this deep, dark place, and he doesn’t like that feeling at all.
But the pit of unhappiness shrinks, when the asset finally speaks. When he confirms that they’ll do this together, that he doesn’t want to be alone. The lines of the Captain’s broad frame relax, as much as they can with the pain, and he nods, leg splaying out just a little, bumping the Soldier’s thigh with his own in this subtle, small gesture that none of their handlers have ever caught. “You won’t,” he says, and his conviction swells as he says it, beats back the unease just a little further. “I won’t let that happen.”
It’s not like the Captain to make empty threats; it’s unclear how he might carry this one out, when he is but a tool, a thing for HYDRA to point and punish and choose to use or lock away, but he means it, nonetheless. He won’t let them be separated, if he has to lie through his teeth when their handlers find them. He’ll deal with that when it happens, when he has the intel slowly shaking loose inside of him, when he can make an informed plan of action.
For now, they’ll wait.
“I don’t know,” he says, aware of the other asset’s gaze on his face, but steadfastly refusing to let anything but surety show on it. “If there’s a mission, we’ll complete it.” If it’s a mission, it will have parameters and an objective and an endpoint and a followup plan, just like all the others. Once he can grasp that information, he’ll feel infinitely better. “If it’s not, we’ll complete this mission, and I’ll handle the consequences.”
It’s clear he means by whatever means necessary, whether it’s lying or telling the truth. It’s clear that he means to handle those consequences himself, to ensure that no harm comes to his partner, nothing worse than the usual end-of-mission protocol. “We’ll stay together,” he promises. “We’re too valuable for them to split apart. I know how to make sure of that.”
For now, though, “Being knocked unconscious isn’t rest,” he points out. “And you had watch last night. Get some rest. You probably have a concussion. I can keep watch.” Even with eyes that aren't yet clear and sharp, his other senses are good enough to do as he proposes. And in a few hours, at most, his face and eyes will have healed enough that, while he still won't look as "handsome" as usual, he'll be fully operational - at least, in that respect. His arm still aches sharply, deep in the ruined joint, and he will endure it forever if he has to, but he doesn't like the idea of the injured arm slowing them down, if what he digs up from inside of himself doesn't include returning to HYDRA.
He'll deal with it then, though. Just like everything else.
That's what the Winter Soldier will tell himself, more than once. He's regained enough shreds of trust that he's fairly sure his partner won't walk off, grab one of the perfectly good steak knives on the kitchen counter, and slice open an artery while he's still bound. SOP says that's the best approach. But it doesn't happen, the Captain insists on a conversation, on indulging on these sentiments as if they aren't massive defects. Right now he's not sure what he means by "stay together". His immediate conditioned response is to assume that he's indeed a prisoner, no matter how the Captain dresses it up. If he were to take the other asset on in a fair fight? Truth is, he isn't sure he could win. The other man is the original, the one with the stronger serum burning in his system. Considering that, and what he can remember of those combat sessions they had against each other back on base, and he isn't sure he could win if it was just their naked fists.
"Fine," he says. At this point he'll probably be awake if he relaxes, if he dozes off. Concussions to them are inconveniences at most - his head pounds with a pressure from all sides and there's a few moments where he wonders if he'll throw up what little rations must still be in his gut.
At some point he supposes he doses off. When he opens his eyes, he'll see the Captain leaning over him a few times, eyes still red-rimmed but aimed his way with more focus, as if checking to make sure his healing factor is chugging along and that the concussion isn't suddenly a "complication".
When he wakes up again, he'll realize that the ropes around his wrists, ankles and legs are loosened enough that he can easily shake himself loose.
The knives on the counter are gone.
Getting up, the Winter Soldier winces, sore, but functional, and tries to make the best of this as he levers himself up. The ropes pool to the ground. His directive is the same. The Captain must either be incapacitated or killed when the opportunity presents itself. Doesn't matter what he said, or what he even told his partner. It has to happen and if he believed in a higher power than HYDRA, he'd be crossing his fingers and hoping he can aim for incapacitate instead of liquidate. First thing he does is assume that if he looks for weapons, opening and closing shelves and drawers, that the Captain will hear. It limits him to just a visual inspection and he can see that the Captain has used his own recovering eye sight to sanitize the room. Anything remotely lethal is missing. Whatever is bolted in place would require that he's already got the Captain tired and barely struggling.
The Winter Soldier huffs out a barely audible sigh. Long haul it is.
He finds his partner by the back entrance, already standing up straight with hardly any pained hunch to his frame and it looks like he swapped out the bandage around his torso's bullet wound. Damn. So much for hoping that any blood poisoning from the infection might've slowed him down. The Winter Soldier makes a mask of his face as he leans against the door frame, his malfunctioning arm hanging down by his side as it whirs uselessly, fingers twitching and spasming minutely every now and then.
"Storm still strong?" The Soldier doesn't circle things back to last night, to the whole part where he tried to cripple the closest thing he has to a friend. Instead he focuses on the now, on what he can control and assess, and hope, desperately, that his partner will give him an opening. With how the other Asset's shoulders square, and his red rimmed eyes rove, he isn't sure about his chances just yet. "The SHIELD agents might have risked it for all we know."
If he can't get to the Captain physically, he can at least try to seed in doubt psychologically. Try to plant something, make him second-guess (although he can't say for sure if SHIELD maybe did want them bad enough). The Winter Soldier remains propped against the door frame with his eyes burning holes in his partner. Maybe they're working together for now. But he can't shut off that instinct to look for hints of weakness, of aberration, in the other asset, and so he doesn't bother looking away as if he'll be embarrassed if caught.
The Winter Soldier sleeps, and the Captain feels something akin to relief. Not because the other is unconscious, but because he’s… being taken care of, getting what he needs to rest and recuperate. Neither of them is at peak operating capacity, the Captain least of all, and they both know it. He’s going to have to lean on the other asset for some things, given his own injury, and that’s exactly how it should be. They’re trained to work as a pair, complementary, giving over tasks to one or other other when one of them isn’t suited to it. This is how it should be… and yet the Captain finds himself rejecting that idea, the concept that he has to ask the other asset for help, that he can’t manage on his own. He’s a super soldier, HYDRA’s very best, and even down an arm, with his shoulder throbbing and stinging and still sluggishly bleeding, when he changes the dressing and has to grit his teeth and almost bites through his own tongue from the pain, he can manage on his own. It’s a foreign concept, worming its way in through the years of programming, but it’s strong and it’s persistent and it’s why he’s cleaned up and set the bleach-stained couch to rights and checked and double-checked their supplies. He goes out into the storm for a few buckets of snow, brings them inside where at least the temperature is above freezing and they’ll melt for fresh water. He cleans his shield and his uniform as best he can, and he cleans the Winter Soldier’s rifles and knives for the moment when he can give them back. There’s no point in letting good equipment go bad because of blood or rust or dirt.
But he doesn’t leave the weapons - or anything else that can be used as a weapon - in the same room as the other asset. He’s not stupid, and he knows the Winter Soldier’s orders, now, if he thinks the Captain is unsalvageable.
He’s not - he’s fine, he’s salvageable, he’s good - but he doesn’t want to leave room for uncertainty. Not in that respect, when he’s still not sure of what’s trying to grow and bloom inside his own head.
He hears the other asset wake and move, even over the sound of the storm; by now, his vision has returned almost to normal, even if his face is still a little blotchy, and some of his hair is a little discolored, damaged where the liquid splashed into it. He’s standing tall, not giving away any sign of pain, but his face looks worn and drawn, even under the new, pink skin around his eyes. He glances over, as the Soldier approaches, as he speaks, and the Captain’s smile is a grim, barely-there twitch of his lips, just like always. “It’s the same,” he says, indicating the storm - the snow is piling up against the side of the building, and the wind has barely let up, if at all. The sky is still an unbroken ceiling of darkness, and if there’s an end, he hasn’t been able to spot it approaching.
He considers what the Soldier suggests - that SHIELD is still looking for them, and… it seems reasonable enough. They are valuable assets, of course. He watches the Soldier watching him, and he tilts his head - a question between them. “Do you think we should move?”
His dry, steady tone of voice communicates clearly that he thinks any answer other than no would be a mistake. The storm is too strong, the terrain is too unfamiliar, and their would-be captors are an unknown that gnaws at his gut. This entire thing has been a mess, and clearly their intel was incorrect. That means SHIELD is now largely an unknown factor, and he doesn’t like that - just like the programming inside his head, an unknown factor all its own.
They have the advantage here, what little of it they have. They can fortify, they can learn this place quickly and determine all its strengths and weaknesses, they can mount a defense that SHIELD won’t expect. He’d rather go down in a hail of bullets than freeze to death in a snowdrift on a mountaintop. And he doesn’t want that end for the Soldier, either. It’s weak, it’s not what they were built for.
And something about that idea, that notion specifically, curls so cold and frightening in his gut that even his animal fear of the chair and his handlers and every punishment HYDRA has ever inflicted on him pales in comparison. He will never die in the ice and snow, and he will never let the Winter Soldier die that way, either.
“What’s the status of your arm?” he asks, instead, as though he isn’t the one who’d disabled it during their fight. As though he isn’t the one who feels like every thought he has is like stepping on thin ice, never sure where his foot is going to break through and take him, screaming, beneath the surface. He can feel the very last vestiges of his last injection wearing away, and it’s making him antsy, uncomfortable. He’s still fighting for control of his mind, his mission, and grasping at his training and his partner as those last familiar failsafes. He knows he wanted to stop the injections. He just knows that doesn’t make the idea of it any more appealing.
Moving would be a poor idea in this weather. Maybe it would've been worth the risk if the Captain was more injured, enough to keep him pliable and easier to control what he does until HYDRA backup arrives. But he's already healed the worst of the bleach damage; what remains is just cosmetic, and so it isn't worth the risk going out there. The Winter Soldier shakes his head, his lips pressed into a thin line as he files away the option of going back into the unforgiving cold and the snow under "unlikely". At least until he can try again with the other asset and establish a line of communication with the nearest HYDRA cell.
"Poor," the Winter Soldier opts for being truthful. After failing to incapacitate his partner, he'll need to work on buying enough of that trust back so he can get another opening. If it means being upfront about his weaknesses, then so be it. "It'll lower my effectiveness once we leave if it's left non-functional."
He can operate without it if needed. There had been plenty of exercises with it detached, both against the Captain and against select trainees fast-tracked to rise in the ranks. Some of them had found that no matter their skill level, their background - they couldn't last even a minute when he was one-handed and they thought he wouldn't kill because of their background, their contacts, the fact they were too prideful to surrender. The Captain, though. He'd always lasted. Always knew to go for his weak spot, use the missing limb to his advantage in any exercises, and he knew how to disable him using pain, location, and bone breaks on the flesh side. There had always been an immediacy about his approach. The Winter Soldier remembers respecting that, even if most of the actual details were only faint impressions of pain and smell and sound. Glancing at his partner, the Soldier studies him and he has to assume that part hasn't change. The injections may not have worked...but his sense of tactics, of taking advantage of a perceived weakness? Those are still fresh and he can't assume those will degrade too.
The Winter Soldier touches his damaged arm. It's non-functional from the elbow joint down to the wrist, where most of the damage was done. His face feels tender, as if he'd run headfirst into a tinder block, and there's no doubt some swelling from the Captain smashing his face into the floor as hard as he did. There's a vague memory that he hadn't settled for hitting him just the once. He'd done in multiple times, to be thorough. To be exact. Good to know that some instincts haven't degraded like his mental conditioning has.
It's a small comfort.
"You need to decide what to do about my arm," the Winter Soldier plunks that into his partner's lap. While he has his SOP to carry out, for now the Captain still has higher rank...and he must know that if he really wants the two of them to walk out of here, he can't have his partner crippled. It's weighing the odds, the pros and cons. How far he's willing to go to drag someone with him in this. "Either it needs to be repaired or you can leave me here."
The snow will die down, eventually. Probably can make his way out, contact the nearest cell. Take his chances dodging the SSR. Not ideal scenarios. But there's a choice, and now it's laid out in front of Rogers to choose how much he wants to risk for this unspoken, impossible mission of his. Things won't be the same between them. They can't be; not when the Winter Soldier has that new order brimming to the surface, feeling like it's somehow pulling at his nerve endings and his very bones and skin. Not when the Captain is acting like he'll go AWOL. Not when he speaks as if this invisible mission of his supersedes HYDRA itself.
The Captain looks at the Soldier for a long moment, at the way he touches the arm, at the damage he himself inflicted. He can remember, vividly, the feel of the metal giving under his grip, the sound it made, the way he felt dealing out the damage. It didn’t feel good. It felt like a mission he didn’t want to complete, a mission that made him sick to his stomach, despite the fact that he knew it had to be done. And when the Winter Soldier points out, bluntly, that he’s going to have to make a decision - he’s right.
So the Captain makes the call, because that’s what he does. He has been honed and trained to evaluate every single situation, take in all the information, and make the right call. “I’ll repair it,” he says, just as bluntly, just as confidently and with no room for argument. He isn’t a tech, of course, doesn’t possess the specialized skills for significant repairs. But he’s well versed in the arm’s workings and on the most basic ways to repair it, the best workarounds and solutions for the field, because he’s got to be. HYDRA had planned for every contingency (or, at least, so they thought): for the Captain’s time in the chair to wear off, and for the Soldier’s arm to become damaged. Of course, HYDRA always planned to ensure their super soldiers were accompanied by handlers, and that’s no longer true, but that never meant they didn’t give their most valuable assets the tools and skills they needed to keep each other going.
It’s… good, knowing he can do something about the arm. Of course, he’s the one who damaged it in the first place, but he can still undo it. He can make the Solider functional again, give him what he needs to survive, and even though the Captain knows it’s a gamble against his own survival, he doesn’t hesitate to make that call.
“I’ll repair your arm,” he repeats, not because he doesn’t think it was understood, but because now he’s using it as a jumping-off point, now it’s the basis of their new plan. “And then we’re going to lay out all the intel we have on the SSR, and what we heard there. I want to know more about Rogers and Barnes.” And this time, he won’t let the Soldier shy away from the names, from what he might know. They’re going to go digging, and it might not be pleasant, but it’s going to yield results. He’s sure of it.
In fact… he considers for only a moment before he decides that they can do both at once, really. He can repair the arm and they can talk at the same time. He glances out the windows, at the grey skies and the blowing snow, and makes a third call: “We can afford a fire,” he decides, because the lodge has a nice big fireplace and plenty that will burn and any smoke will be blown away quickly, lost in the gale still raging outside. He’s cold and stiff, his shoulder aching fiercely, and the Soldier can’t be feeling much better, with a damaged arm. They could both do to warm up, and there’s no reason to stay in these less-than-optimal conditions, with the storm blowing enough to dissipate any sign of their presence. “Help me gather kindling.” They sure make a pair, each with a damaged arm, but between the two of them, they can start a fire easily enough, and sit down by it so the Captain can pull out the repair kit he keeps in his belt and get to work on the Soldier’s arm. And then they can talk about Rogers and Barnes.
Good. The Winter Soldier would prefer it if the Captain just turned himself over and came quietly, but fixing his damaged arm is something he'll take without complaint. Another possible weapon against his partner, a higher chance that he might be able to take in the other asset without incapacitating him permanently. He nods, as satisfied as he can feel with this small victory.
It's something.
The Winter Soldier falls into place as the Captain makes for the door. The arm repair will come next, when he's back inside, when he can't ambush the other asset out in the snow. He doesn't try to jump the Captain as they venture outside, the biting cold against lancing across their exposed skin and he takes point again, part of out muscle memory, part because he's aware that even his partner, with that new, alien mission buzzing around in his mind like a corruption, wants him where he can see him. He's lost the white mask that usually muzzles his lower face, his lips numbing as he ducks his head and presses out into the snow. Visibility is low, a swirling mass of white smearing against shapes of buildings, of a garage and bowing bushes and trees. It's not as bad as the first night. He presses on, spreading out with the Captain to search near the forest's edge. Some of the kindling is too wet and will need to be tried. Others have recently fallen, the Winter Soldier holding as much as he can with one working arm until the Captain calls it for the day.
They return back inside, snow drifting across the foyer's floor before the door's tugged shut and locked. It's enough for a fire for a few hours, at least, and the Winter Soldier finds himself tasked with getting it started as his partner spreads out the repair kit: small, compact, but with everything needed to get his arm in working order.
The Winter Soldier sits down by the fire, close enough to get some of the heat warming his body. Far enough, though, that he can't possibly kick the sparking logs at the Captain. The time for that was yesterday. If he wants another crack at his partner, it'll be later, when he's good and ready and sure that this time he won't hesitate. Until then, he cooperates.
He's dragged over one of the end tables closer to the sofa, pulling it closer so he can grip his left arm by its chrome wrist and set it down on top with a dull clang. The arm's heavy when he isn't controlling it: a normal man would've had trouble lifting it. His fingers remain curled in mechanical rigor mortis as he glances over at the Captain. His face by now looks almost as good as new, unfortunately. The other asset's skin is reddened from snow exposure but his eyes are more alert and focused and whatever advantage he might've had from the corneal damage is gone.
"You said you wanted to talk," the Winter Soldier does everything he can to show that he's cooperating. Behaving. Displaying the obedience that he normally wouldn't have to fake. His gut wants to keep following his Captain even though his mind knows better. Knows that HYDRA must come first even before the man. His chin lifts as he glances at the fire, his face cast half in amber as he looks into the sparks and tries to steel himself for what will be...unpleasant. Very unpleasant.
For all that they have an (uneasy) truce, they’re both on edge. The Captain’s body language is tense, but every move is still controlled, deliberate, powerful. His mind is in turmoil, but he refuses to let his guard down, even as the Winter Soldier passes by every chance he gets to possibly take control of the situation. In the Captain’s mind, he wants it to be a measure of trust - but in his gut, he knows it’s not. They both know the Soldier’s chances of winning a fight against him, with the two of them in the states they’re in. Neither is at his best, but the Captain has always had the advantage, and he’s regained most of it; the Winter Soldier has lost the majority of his, with the arm nonfunctional. So it’s an uneasy truce, and it feels uncomfortable and foreign and like a wound the Captain keeps worrying open instead of letting it close. It’s a metaphorical thorn in his side much worse than the real bullet in his shoulder.
Once the fire is crackling, and the Winter Soldier has his arm laid out on the table, the Captain lowers himself gracefully, soundlessly to the sofa despite his bone-weariness - fatigue is not tolerated, and neither is showing it - and puts his bare hands to the chilled metal, assessing with his fingers as well as his eyes before he even picks up the first tool.
“Yes,” he confirms, his eyes on his work without lifting at the sound of the Soldier’s voice. He picks up the first instrument and begins working, testing the seams of each meal plate to find where they’re most badly bent, and where access to the arm’s inner workings will be easiest to gain. “I want to talk about what you know. What you remember. About Rogers and Barnes.”
He pauses, just for a few breaths. He knows - they both know - that the chair is more effective on the Soldier. It always has been; it’s why the Captain needs the injections, needs his partner, needs his handlers when missions go on too long. It’s why there are so many failsafes in place, except all of them have failed spectacularly, to this point. Well - almost all of them. The Soldier might have ostensibly failed, but he’s down, not out. They both know it.
“Start with the base,” he suggests. “With what you heard. How they reacted to you.” Even if the Solider won’t gain recall of a past mission, at least he’ll be able to fulfill that order. The Captain even offers up his own tidbit, as if laying out an olive branch. “When they called me Rogers… they really believed I was him. Whoever he was. They weren’t trying to make me believe it. They believed it.” He knows, based on all of his observations - pupil size, breathing rates, vocal tones and eye movements - that what he’s saying is true. “I’m not sure even their intelligence is bad enough to try to convince me I’m one of my past covers.” The SSR is weak, but not stupid. Which means, they don’t think Rogers was his cover. They think it was his. His everything. His life.
They're close, again, the two of them in a way that should feel comfortable, better now that it's just them in the field without the handlers watching their every move. Before he thought it was just battle assessment. Now he knows that they were looking for weaknesses in the mental suppression, any moment HYDRA isn't the first thought in their minds. Now he looks back on what he remembers - what he can even remember, because most are fragments - and he'll realize that the eyes had usually been on the Captain. Him, he'd been more or less safe. Reliable. Now he knows why.
He studies his partner. The Captain takes his time looking at the damage to the cybernetics, almost as thorough as his own team of techs, inspecting each plate.
"The base," the Winter Soldier says, that small hint of distaste again in his voice, flat to everyone else but the man who knows him most. "They started with asking the usual. Name; age; rank. They had a list of names they were asking: people we sanctioned over the years, I think."
A few struck a primal cord. Recognition, even if he couldn't point out a face from a lineup. Maybe the kill had stood out, been more difficult and engaging. Maybe it had been something more deep cover and maybe he'd had to fraternize to get closer to the target. Others were just blanks, the memory suppression keeping it away from him in case he was tortured. His lips purse as he thinks back, tries to ignore how almost pleasant the sedative felt - no howling nothing like cryo, no fear or nausea or wondering if he'll see the Captain again or if this is it. He just was. It's an unacceptable weakness he'll report back to his new handlers once this is over...assuming he makes it back to at all. There's still time for the Captain to change his mind and finish what he really should've started.
The Winter Soldier goes on, his monotone more pronounced than usual, almost as if he's retreating behind it and raising a shield. "They were handling me with kid gloves. Incorrect dosage. Thought I heard them call me Barnes, but I'd have to verify back with command if that's my name or an old alias."
Does it matter? They botched the mission, maybe not as badly as their handlers did, but they're making it worse by discussing this. By thinking of themselves outside of HYDRA.
"I don't remember Rogers or Barnes," and maybe the Winter Soldier betrays himself with a little shrug, his eyes darting to the fire sparks popping off the wood as they crack and resettle. The golden glow cast in the room pulls at him, seems to tug at some old memory he can't identify the when. Something about this position seems familiar, right down to the gentle hands on his arm, although it had been cleaning a wound of dirt, wrapping gauze on skin that wasn't there... "They said I served with you. That we used to fight for America." His mouth twitches. "Easy for them to say without proof. I'd want confirmation before I believe the SSR. They got lucky, but they're desperate. They don't have soldiers like us in the field and I suspect they'd want us instead of making their own."
“Maybe they had us,” the Captain suggests, because while he can sort of
maybe reconcile the idea that maybe he had a name and a life once, he’s
still unable to really, truly, get a grasp on free will just yet. So he
takes what he knows - what he’s heard and what he can feel, deep in his gut
- and fits it into his strange, cobbled-together picture of the world,
based on chairs and drugs and handlers and nothing but endless missions,
and comes up with that. And, on the heels of it, “Maybe they lost us to
HYDRA,” he muses, brain ticking over the possibilities as a picture starts
to maybe slot into place, all the while keeping his eyes on the Soldier’s
arm, his hands moving as the tools test and repair each interlocking
section before moving on to the next. He knows he’s hard to control - even
without whatever’s going on in his head, trying to break free, he knows.
His handlers have told him, time and again, it’s been coded into his very
being, how hard he is to control, and how hard HYDRA has worked to bring
him to this point. Maybe the SSR never could. Maybe, in letting him have a
name, more freedom, something, he became too hard to control, and they lost
him. HYDRA had picked up the pieces, and perfected them, and -
He feels the tiniest pang of longing for the order HYDRA has always brought
to his life. The last little bit of his programming is holding on tooth and
nail, making him miss the simplicity of the chair, the drugs. They’re
frightening and abhorrent, yes. But they also bring peace and order and
they keep him working with the Soldier.
He must have been working with the Soldier for even longer than he’s known,
if they used to fight for America together. He knows, beyond anything else,
that he doesn’t want to lose that.
He moves on down the Soldier’s arm, bypassing the crumpled outer plates for
now - he’ll have to fix those later, but the intricate inner workings must
come first, and piece by piece, the Soldier's motility returns. Regardless
of what might have happened with the SSR in the past, “Of course they want
us,” he agrees. Why make something when you can steal it and bend it to
your will? The Captain has no doubt now that’s what HYDRA must have done,
and they did it well. He also has no doubt that if the SSR figures
it out, they could potentially do the same.
He isn’t sure, all of a sudden, how he feels about the fact that he might
have changed hands, switched sides, countless times before - all depending
on who held the switch. Who held the better drugs, the best chair.
“We’re just pawns,” he finally says, almost coming to a realization. He
knew this already - of course they’re pawns, they’re tools that can be
moved around the board to serve whatever purpose is needed. He’d never
questioned that, and it’s true now, but the question of allegiance had
never come to the fore. Now it’s here, staring him in the face. “We could
have switched sides before.”
Finally, he glances up at the Soldier. He wants to know what his partner
feels about that.
The theory seems to bring the Winter Soldier up short.
The thing is, he never considered life before HYDRA. Why would he? All he needed to continue operations was a team of handlers, the reassurance that HYDRA was 1) still on target for its goal and 2) the Captain was still on the field. Everything else was...irrelevant. The expression on his face turns into more of a frown than that neutral, mask-like state it usually takes when he's on board with how things are panning out. His good hand tightens into a fist before he forces it to relax.
"It's...possible," and from the sound of it, not one the Winter Soldier wants to agree with. His own mental conditioning demands full loyalty to HYDRA: he'd been easier to break than the Captain and that means that those loyalties are burned in deeper, a cancer inside his body and mind keeping him operating instead of breaking down with the reality of what's been done to the both of them. "But they weren't strong enough to keep us. That should say enough."
A pause, then, as his eyes, blue and cold, travel down to inspect the other asset's work.
"I don't think it should make a difference," the Winter Soldier says, thin-lipped, not realizing he's displaying those small, tell-tale signs he's on edge. Only the Captain could pick them out, used to the slightest deviations from his status quo. "HYDRA wants to correct the world, steer it on the best course. The SSR doesn't seem like they want to play ball."
Which is enough for the Soldier, with his simplified mental conditioning. It should be that simple.
Glancing back up at his partner's face shows it isn't that simple.
He stares back at the Captain's face, studies how the firelight flickers and paints fresh lines in it. He can't pinpoint the other man's exact age. There's a timeless quality there helped along with a good dose of cryo. Before this, he couldn't have even said if they started the super soldier program at the same time. It wouldn't have mattered, really. It shouldn't have mattered. Suddenly it seems to. Now he wonders if they'd served together. If they were from the same batch. All thoughts that will swirl around, confused, banging up against walls that hadn't anticipated those questions. His lips purse.
The Winter Soldier's the first to break eye contact, giving himself a moment of glancing at the table, then at the windows covered by thick, dusty curtains, to wait for his trusted programming to kick in and correct whatever doubts he might have. Whatever "instabilities" might be trying to worm in, invasive, unwanted. He tells himself it's unwanted, almost convinces himself those thoughts are his.
The ghost of a frown, the slight downturn of lips on the Soldier's face… it strikes at something deep in the Captain. It's… familiar. It's comforting. He can't say why, but it is, even when the expression isn't necessarily a pleasant one.
He can't argue with the Soldier's assessment of the situation. Even if the SSR had them, they don't anymore, and that implies weakness. They should shy away from weakness, stand beside the strongest - and HYDRA is the strongest. But there's something in the Captain that catches at that, that keeps getting hung up on the SSR and their thankless plight. They are desperate and scattered and humane - not nearly as ruthless as HYDRA - and that is why they will lose.
Or, something inside him whispers, at the edges of his mind, is that why they will win?
When their eye contact breaks, the Captain sits back and lets the Soldier assess his repairs so far; whereas someone else might have made a gesture, a little go ahead, he just pulls back his hands and knows the other will understand what he means. The Soldier is most definitely on edge, uncomfortable, and something in the Captain hates making him this way… and yet he can't stop pushing for it, too. Can't stop pushing for that discomfort, for him to think, rather than accept.
"The SSR wants something different," he concedes, after a moment. That much is true. "They steer, but - they don't correct." Even as he says it, something flickers behind his eyes. Something about the words, those words exactly. He and the Soldier have both been through countless corrections. Most, he can't remember, except for the way they make him react, like Pavlov's dog, snapping to the appropriate response, be it fear - never show fear - or force, at the right prompting. HYDRA corrects. Their world requires many corrections, because there is no room for imperfection. Imperfection is weak. Cogs that think too much for themselves are weak.
But imperfections don't have to be flaws. Differences can make something stronger. That thought worms its way up through the Captain's gut unwarranted, and he leans in close again, to catch the Soldier's eye. "What if there were no more corrections," he says, and even now, as HYDRA's control is slipping, his voice is quiet, almost a whisper, as though the room is bugged and they'll hear him. Punish him. Correct him. "What if we were…"
He doesn't know the word he wants to use. Equals? Trusted? People?
He picks up the next tool, unconsciously biting at one corner of his lip, a tic that should never appear on an asset's face. It feels like pushing a bruise, thinking about it too much. It hurts, but he can't stop. He has to see how far he can go. "What if HYDRA's way isn't the only way. Why are we beholden to them?"
The Winter Soldier's looking tense again despite the fact that he isn't bleeding, he doesn't have broken bones and he isn't convulsing in the Chair. Even so, his face looks drawn, his jaw tightening, and he leans forward now, almost as if he'd like nothing more than to take whatever subversive thought has infected his partner and beat its skull in. If only it was that easy. But something in him wants to pause, to listen. To drag his feet instead of reaching out and forcing the Captain's head into the fire, like he would've with any other compromised asset.
"Because HYDRA will correct the world," he replies, and his voice is small, tight, even as his eyes burn blue at the Captain. How could he question this? It's the order of things. HYDRA has the will to do what no one else has the stomach or drive for - isn't that much obvious? "Those corrections allow us to help others."
He stares back at the Captain, unwilling to show how unnerved he is (is that the word?) at this new, alien conviction of his. The Captain almost doesn't look human to him. The skin around his eyes is sill seared red from the bleach and he blinks too much. But something about him looks too symmetrical, the blue in his eyes suddenly overly saturated. Piercing. It almost feels like he can see right to his core and the primary objective of deal with a rogue Asset that's spread through the Winter Soldier like the plague.
"Doing anything less would be selfish. We're helping people in the long run," he says. He'll insist on it. For all the brainwashing, all the torture through traditional pain, chemicals, and the Chair, and that's the most effective line that HYDRA has used. That they're looking at the great picture. Sacrificing themselves for future generations. They might not enjoy the fruits of a peaceful, orderly world, but billions will. Small price to pay. They can rest once that's carried out. Put like that, the Winter Soldier can only struggle to follow his partner's thought process. Is he saying that they should....that they should come first?
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no subject
Still. Racking his standing orders, what he read, what was implanted through the chair and through screaming his lungs hoarse, he can't come up with a reason why he can't. Apparently no one thought this would happen - he knows he was one of those.
"SOP," the Asset says after a pregnant, uncomfortable silence where for a split second, his eyes flicker away from his partner's. "If you run out of suppressants and you're...unmanageable, you're to be removed from rotation."
It's a clinical way of saying he'll be killed the second the Winter Soldier has an opening.
Hearing it aloud, though, is different. The words feel wrong in his mouth even though it's the right thing to do, the correct thing. Rolling it over in his mind, the Soldier realizes he doesn't want to talk about SOP anymore than he wants to talk about the SHIELD agents they ran into only a few hours ago. Things had been easier when it was the mission, when his sole goal was to sight down his scope and depress the trigger and confirm the red blossom of his target's skull evaporating. Oddly enough...he misses that. It's another sign that he's starting to become unstable himself, the very thought sending a shudder up his back.
As if to hide it, the asset reluctantly returns to the first order of business: the SHIELD encounter.
"I'm concerned about what they said," he starts. He leans against the counter, arms crossed over his chest, a chrome finger unconsciously tapping. "Those names. We don't know if they're old covers or something else." (He doesn't want to know what that "something else" could be). "If they have these kinds of details, they might have other classified information they're sitting on."
The Winter Soldier dances around the real meat of the problem, instead choosing to focus on HYDRA first, the men who they used to be never. He searches his partner for signs that he's just as worried. There's a part of him dimly aware the Captain is...attractive. It makes sense he would be, considering his undercover work, how close he needs to get to people. He's good looking but there aren't any specific identifying markers like scars, nothing to really pick him out of a line-up. Ideally people will find him attractive and trustworthy and they couldn't put their finger on why. Sometimes, where he's been away from the suppression chair for long periods of time, the Soldier wonders if that's one of the reasons why he's always felt close to the other asset. Maybe he isn't immune to that either.
He hopes it won't impact his ability to carry out his orders.
"Too bad we couldn't get one of them alive. I would've liked to carry out an interrogation."
no subject
Not unless they’ve been compromised - like the Captain is now, so he doesn’t file that information away, instead simply waiting for the answer.
When it comes, he’s not surprised - of course he’s not, of course that’s exactly what would happen. It’s what should happen. The functional asset should be the one to return to HYDRA, they have no use for a broken tool. He knows his own return is to be prioritized, it’s clear in every mission operating procedure, when the Soldier takes point, clears buildings, provides cover. But if it’s just the two of them, and there is information that HYDRA needs… the more reliable source should survive.
He nods, nothing deceptive in his gaze or his voice when he says, “I understand. Good.” It is good. He can’t say why, but… it is good. There’s no guarantee the Soldier will find an opening, and the Captain can’t guarantee that he’ll give him one. But it’s a plan to follow, and it’s enough. That, he does file away, tries to shrug it on like he shrugs on all his other missions, but it’s not like the fluid ease of stepping out of the chair and knowing what needs to be done. It’s less efficient, it’s less sure, but it’s still a plan, and he can try to follow it.
That plan having been established, the Soldier moves on to the Captain’s suggestion, though in a roundabout way. Still, “I’m concerned, too,” the Captain admits, though there’s little concern in his voice; it’s more detached interest. “If SHIELD has knowledge of past missions, they could decipher a pattern.” And he’s not stupid enough to think that all the files would have been destroyed with the base. There would have been backups, on paper or computer, elsewhere. “But that won’t be a mission for us,” he adds, because while they excel in stealth, they are weapons, first and foremost. Even when they need to infiltrate, blend in, deceive, it’s always with a death as the end goal. This will be a mission for another department - and while thinking that soothes him, in a way, as he feels the utter perfection of HYDRA’s smooth workings, the way the departments and pieces fit together to create a stronger whole, there’s still part of him that does, in fact, feel distressed at the thought of leaving that information in the hands of someone else, while he is taken to a chair and those names, Rogers and Barnes, are wiped from his mind forever.
The Soldier goes on, and the Captain’s lips twitch; one corner lifts, in a small, dry expression that some might call the barest hint of a sardonic smile, as he shifts where he’s standing, trying to ease the ache in his shoulder, which has become a constant white-hot spike in the back of his mind. “It would have given us something to do. Idle hands - “
He stops, frowning. Idle hands… idle hands, what? He doesn’t know why those words came from his mouth, and he doesn’t know what comes after them. But something comes after them. It’s… it’s a phrase, he thinks. (He doesn’t have the context to consider it an idiom.) Did he hear a handler utter the phrase? It must have been on this mission, he doesn’t recall past missions clearly enough, only with a vague sense that actions have been completed, that HYDRA has been satisfied.
He shakes his head slightly, as if to clear the words away. “We’ll just have to report fully on what we saw and heard.” And hope it will be enough that they won’t be punished for it; he’s been punished for incomplete reports, for steps missed, for sketchy intel before. He knows that, deep in his bones, just like he knows he doesn’t want it to happen again. “If our handlers hadn’t - ”
He stops himself again; questioning their handlers is not allowed. It’s not their place. Handlers have been punished before, but never on the words of an asset. The tool has no right to judge the actions of the hand that holds it; even so, the Captain glances at the Soldier, wondering if he feels the same way. If he knows just how… how lame-brained the actions their handlers took were.
The Captain blinks. He’s starting to feel fatigued. He’s starting to feel like he’s fighting an uphill battle, just to think straight. He’s starting to feel, in the pit of his stomach, worried.
go ahead and godmode him failing at his attempt!
This time, though, he doesn't feel any closer to his partner. Now it's starting to feel like a sign of the weakness poisoning him.
"They used poor judgment," he finishes for the Captain. "If they aren't dead, they will be once we report their failures."
It's merely culling out the undesirable, the weakest holding the others back. And, and this is something he isn't sure the Captain feels too but he suspects he does, the Winter Soldier might even derive a small amount of pleasure at his old handlers being liquidated. It won't stop the suppression or the chair or the cryofreeze. He might not even remember what happened to them after this, if he's even alive himself. But for now, in this very moment, he dares to indulge himself for all of two seconds. They failed HYDRA, they failed their assets, and
The hesitation from the Captain doesn't go unnoticed. The whole time he stares at his partner, mentally stripping him for other signs of imperfections like he's a faulty rifle, blue eyes flicking across his face, his body.
It's a few hours later after further observation that the Winter Soldier decides to accelerate his plans. The degradation is happening even faster despite the injection and if he wants even a chance to deliver his partner to HYDRA alive, he needs to move fast. Incapacitate him and then, if it continues, he can process him out of rotation and still have a fresh body to deliver. The idea still sits wrong, festers and curdles, and the Soldier is disturbed to admit he almost debates backing out when he glances at his partner, asleep on the couch facing the boarded up windows. It doesn't stop him from slipping out just before dawn to search the ski lodge again, this time it isn't for weapons or for food, water.
He needs something that can sedate an asset.
There isn't much. He can probably poison the Asset long enough to get him restrained but after that, it's touch and go. The man has a higher metabolism than he does, a stronger immune system. If he doesn't hit him hard and fast, there's a strong chance that this won't be as one-sided as he wants it to be, even with the Captain's injuries.
It's the hesitation that costs the Winter Soldier. He collects some bleach to force-feed his partner, some rope to tie him down, but he...stops. Stands there looking down at the man who he's carried out countless missions with. When he's asleep, he looks a little younger, a little relaxed, and it's almost like looking at someone else, someone better. Someone he, for less than a second, feels almost regret for. That moment passes as the Winter Soldier takes in a slow, measured breath, and throws himself at his partner. He sees the other asset's eyes fly open at the last second, too late to pull back.
He commits.
The Winter Soldier plants himself so he can sit on the Captain, straddling his torso even as he snaps a punch at his face and then goes for trying to grip him by the throat, the other hand coming around with the bottle of bleach.
o7 please feel free to fill in anything or let me know if something needs to be changed!
He can feel, under his skin, that the world is waiting for him to crack. He refuses - HYDRA built him stronger than that - but it doesn’t mean he doesn’t notice.
He announces he’s going to sleep for a few hours; couches it in terms of the Soldier taking the next sleeping shift, and the Captain standing guard after that. He doesn’t have long to think about whether it’s safe to sleep or not, because it doesn’t take long after he slumps onto the dusty couch that he’s out like a light.
And he stays out, until the Soldier makes his move.
His eyes fly open only seconds before the other asset is on him; the Captain has the ability to snap from sleep to wakefulness in an instant, but the Soldier is fast and in that instant, he's had enough time to land his body on the Captain's, to slam his head back with a punch, to put a hand to his throat and bring up a bottle of -
The smell hits him full in the face. It's bleach, and the Captain's mind works lightning-fast, still at a disadvantage but it doesn't take long to catch up. Bleach won't kill him, but it will incapacitate him, subdue him long enough for the Soldier to neutralize him. Part of the Captain's impressed, maybe even a little proud, in a way that's welling up, so telling of the way the suppression is crumbling inside of him that he feels it at all, at the ingenuity of his partner. It's not a bad idea, pal, but you know I'm not gonna go down easy.
But it's that hesitation on his own part that means he gets a faceful of the stuff. His teeth are clenched, so the amount he ingests is minimal, but the rest of it splashes across his face and into his eyes, burning white-hot before the world starts to fuzz out at the edges, even as the Captain brings up his injured arm in a swinging block that shoots pain through him like a lance, but sends the bottle flying out of the Soldier's grip, somewhere behind the couch. He hears it clatter to the ground, its contents gurgling out over the floor, but it's the least of his worries now. He's still face to face with the other asset, and no matter how fast he blinks, the pain in his eyes only gets worse, and the gauze-like curtain that’s descending on his vision grows thicker.
It'll likely clear up on its own, as the serum in his veins sloughs off the damaged corneal cells, regrows new ones. But it will probably get worse before it gets better, and healing will take time - likely hours - and he doesn't have time right now. He has an asset that will put him down if he doesn't turn the tables first.
His programming says he should go for the kill. His instincts, if that's what they are, balk, and what happens isn't what he's been trained for. If he acted on programming, on training, the Soldier's neck would have been snapped in seconds, the limp, lifeless body pushed to the ground and let cool. There would be a full report made, once he's re-established contact with HYDRA, an explanation, a mission briefing, and complete and utter submission to the chair for reconditioning -
Reconditioning, he must need reconditioning, he must be breaking down, but he's not broken; there's something else coming up through the cracks, and that something else fights like a cornered animal, but an animal that only strikes as much and as far as is needed, and no further. An animal capable of feeling... sympathy ? Remorse? Mercy?
The way it should have gone down, one asset truly against the other, should have left the lodge with only one asset still breathing.
The way it does go down, at the end of it, has the Soldier face-down on the ground, cheek pressed hard into the thin carpet with the Captain pinning him down with his sheer bulk and no small amount of will, panting hard, battered on two fronts now by pain that's starting to scream louder than he has the capacity to tune it out. His injured shoulder feels like it's made of liquid fire, the arm hanging loosely, uselessly at his side almost like it's a prosthetic, like the Winter Soldier might look after a nasty EMP blast took out the metal that replaced flesh on one side. His eyes feel like spikes driving into his skull, his vision largely gone (and a decent swath of his face reddened and burning, making him look like a burn victim) as he twists the Soldier's left arm behind him at an angle that's almost certainly unnatural, in a grip as hard as steel locked around the metal wrist with his one good hand, and his elbow dug dangerously into the Soldier's back at the place where his spine curves up from shoulder to neck, a vulnerable spot that the right amount of pressure, applied in the right way with the force of a super soldier behind it could snap the vertebrae, and paralyze, if not kill.
it's cool! We might need a slight timeksip if you want to knock out Bucky though
The Captain's cornered and that's when he's most dangerous - the fact he's able to operate like this even when he has a faceful of bleach, his eyes a reddened, ruined mess, says all it needs to about the thoroughness of his training. How their similarities end and he's the inferior model, the expendable one who can't compete against the original. That same training ends up with the Winter Soldier pinned in the worst position possible, his partner's full weight sitting on him as he squirms and struggles and grunts almost angrily under the other man, boots scrapping against the carpet as he tries to find purchase and can't. Not when the other asset's sitting at the perfect location to keep him from bucking him off.
The sound that drags out of the Winter Soldier isn't a whine - it's angrier, desperate; he can't carry out his objective and he knows exactly what that elbow means. He's been on the opposite end before. He might as well be dead. Even if he can somehow shove it off, the Captain's in the perfect position to hook his arm around his throat and roll over, crocodile style, controlling his body with his legs, and apply the right pressure against the carotid arteries. It wouldn't take him long to incapacitate or kill, even hurt as he is. He's superior to any other man but he still needs to breathe, still needs blood to deliver oxygen through his brain. The fact that his partner hasn't committed to either route somehow feels...wrong.
It takes a Soldier a tortured moment to realize this is what frustration must feel like.
His teeth grit against the floor. Carpet fibers dig into his cheek. "Do it or don't!"
For once his voice actually has a shred of emotion as it spikes past the usual monotone they both share. Used to share.
His metal hand twitches against the Captain's grip, the tiny internal pistons inside the chassis groaning in protest as he tries to force himself free. It wasn't built for the force. It shows as tiny sparks flare blue within the seams and his finger spasm as he starts losing control of them, joints dancing before he go limp. The Winter Soldier's face sets in a snarl as he continues to struggle even though self-preservation should've told him to stop, to cool it, to save this fight for another day.
They might not have another day. Not if his partner's already this far gone, despite the injection.
The thought of the Captain running around, free of HYDRA, turns his blood cold. It's wrong. Impossible. The concept of sinful doesn't exist in his world but he still has a deep, curdling sensation of disgust and unbridled fear forming in his gut, knotting, uncurling like a snake about to strike. It takes hold of him, hammers at the cold logical walls of his own conditioning and instead of lying obediently still so he can get another chance, another day, the Winter Soldier instead increases his struggling. At the rate he's going, he might get lucky, might get in the right position so that elbow slips and he can turn the tables.
So much for going down easy.
welp have a knocked-out bucky and a ridiculously long tag
He won’t do it. He knows that - he’s known it from the second he got the Soldier in this position, down on the floor under him. He isn’t going to kill the other asset, not even in self-defense, not even when he knows, deep down in this sour knot in his gut, that the Soldier is following orders, the same way he should be. He’s slipping; he can feel it, terrified, shaking, knowing that when HYDRA comes, when they find him, the recalibration will only hurt worse. The pain and the punishment will only last longer for an asset that’s losing its ability to carry out its only function.
And yet, deeper down, past that shaking, desperate thing that wants to know why the injections aren’t working, why his programming is breaking down… there’s something else. There’s something still trying to fight its way to the surface, and that thing… That thing has…
“Mission,” he whispers, almost more to himself, almost for a second as though he’s forgetting the Soldier is there, pinned down and struggling beneath him. “I have a mission,” he says, he promises himself and the Soldier, and he might have said more, might not, but it doesn’t matter, because just then, the body under his jerks and starts struggling, harder than before.
The Captain grits his teeth, and he doesn’t have a choice - lightning-fast, he drops the metal arm and grabs the Soldier by the back of the neck, hand almost a blur. He raises the body under his, and slams it back down onto the floor. He does it again, and then a third time, just to make sure that when the body of the Winter Soldier goes limp, it’s not because he’s faking it.
Even so, he stays where he is for a long, long minute, his own heart pounding and breath coming ragged. There’s the pain, flaring up in his arm, his eyes, his head, and there’s the body under his, now just dead weight, but it won’t stay there for long. And there’s… there’s the mission, this thing he can feel bubbling up from his gut, the parameters foggy, hidden, but they’re there. They’re coming. Like his ruined vision, they’re not something he can grasp right now. But they’ll get there. They’ll slide into focus.
He thinks he saw rope, in the Winter Soldier’s hands, just before he jumped. He has to crawl around like a blind man on the floor, holding his injured arm close and balancing his weight between thighs and abs, but he finds it. He grits his teeth through the pain as he turns the Winter Soldier over by feel, binds his hands and feet, and props him up against the base of the couch.
Then the Captain scoots around and sits, shoulder to shoulder, with the Soldier’s unconscious body. The weight of the Soldier, slumped against his own uninjured shoulder, feels… good. It feels calming, it lets him focus on something other than the burning, white-hot pain from the bullet that won’t let the bones of his shoulder heal around it and the bleach still burning its way through his eyes. Eventually, he can start to see light, shadows, blurred edges. He thinks he can feel his eyes healing, cell by cell, slow going, but doggedly moving forward, rebuilding.
He wonders if that’s what’s happening to his mind, too. He wonders if it’s been damaged, if it’s trying to rebuild. It feels like… like a long-buried, rusty and damaged protocol is surfacing, as the suppression of the drugs and the too-long-ago session in the chair start losing their grip on him. Without the suppression of the drugs keeping it where it belongs -
For a moment, he's terrified - he thinks that he must be broken, that HYDRA had suppressed him for good reason, had kept him on this strict regimen of drugs for a reason, and that this baseline protocol must somehow be so terrible and so strong that it couldn't be wiped, only held at bay, and now it's rearing its ugly head -
Rearing its ugly head, like a hydra. Like a monster that needs to be put down. Like -
"Fuck," he says, his head drooping, back bowing until his forehead's nearly touching the his knees as he draws his legs up, feet flat on the floor. They tried to burn something out of his mind, but they couldn’t. So they tried to bury it, and now it’s awake. “There’s something I have to… do.” He’s not sure what, but he knows, now, that there’s some task left unfinished, some aspect of his original protocols that wasn’t fulfilled. Did he fail, is that why HYDRA wipes him again and again, to eliminate his failure, erase it from existence? Or is it something else? “I’m compromised,” he says - admits, really, to the quiet air around them, to the sleeping - unconscious - Winder Soldier. “But I still have a mission.”
He doesn’t know how long they sit like that, with those words, I still have a mission, echoing over and over again through his head.
you say it like it's a surprise :P also with the right account
The second one does him in.
After that the Winter Soldier's unconscious. It's a state that he fears in the lizard part of his brain that that he's never mentioned to anyone, a nothingness that howls with silence just like cryo. It isn't like the moments where he catches some sleep here and there, where sometimes he dreams; categorizes; reports to his handlers. It's pure nothing, unaccountable, and he can't tell exactly when he was restrained or when he started slumping toward his partner, head sagging, close enough that the handlers would've wondered if they remembered how to fraternize and maybe that would've made it into both their files.
He starts to revive after an hour or so, his head thundering and nausea rising, the Soldier automatically forcing down the bile by swallowing. Isn't the first time he's been unconscious. Isn't even the first time he's been knocked out by the Captain, either, because he remembers bits and pieces of their training sessions together, how sometimes he'd end up on the floor and there's be a gap before he wakes up getting dragged down a hall and the first thing he sees is his boots, wobbling, limp, and then he registers the taste of blood hanging metallic in his mouth. The Winter Soldier hadn't been pissed. Mostly he pretended to play dead and he'd enjoyed the sensation, the idea, that the Captain left a piece of him behind. It's that weakness that probably got him where he is now.
The Winter Soldier revives with a shudder and a grunt.
Normally when he wakes it's slow, quiet enough to pretend to be still out so he can access the situation and come up with some escape routes, some ambush points. This time it's uncoordinated like a normal man, losing whatever element of surprise he might've had. His eyes drift open reluctantly. Head hurts. Everything hurts, his arm isn't working - stupid of him to keep trying, in retrospect - and he can't spread his legs. Ankles tied. Arms too. Unacceptable.
His head lifts, the Winter Soldier's dark hair hanging in a tangled curtain in his face. The blood trailing from his nose and mouth has had time to dry into a dark crust he can feel as he scrunches face and wrinkles his nose and asks:
"...Mission?"
It comes out hoarse, a shade of suspicious. What mission? He gets that his partner has turned into the worst kind of liability seeing as the injections aren't holding, but the word "mission" rings a bell inside him. Hits him in the core of his own conditioning. He doubts the Captain's been assigned higher clearance for a mission he isn't part of - not with success record - but it isn't impossible. His ankles shift and bump against his partner as he tests the rope. Good knots. HYDRA good. Not surprising.
"You're compromised. Turn yourself in and HYDRA can help you," the Winter Soldier says quietly, his voice hoarse, his head ringing even as conditioning demands he trot out HYDRA's bottom line like it's from a pamphlet. "Do the right thing, Captain."
Even with his vision swimming he can see his partner isn't at his peak.
It's disturbing. Body language betrays him. The Winter Soldier isn't much for conversation unless he's been conditioned for it, but he can read the physical tells just fine. Everything about his partner sends up red flags: he's biting his lip, staring forward at nothing instead of a target, a point of interest like supplies or a weapon. His posture is in a weakened position, head bowed to rest against his knees instead of held up high.
no subject
But those handlers are dead, and now it’s just him and the Winter Soldier - and his new (old?) mission, still slowly forming, nebulous and murky but growing sharper, clearly, piece by piece inside his head.
The mission that he isn’t sure how to explain, even as the Soldier lifts his head beside him. The Captain’s eyes are still healing, his vision murky but he can see just enough to imagine the rest of the picture, the blood crusting the Soldier’s nostrils, the way it’s scabbed along the top of his mouth, as he asks that simple question. Of course he’s asking - it’s the thing that has turned the Captain against him, in his mind, only what the Soldier doesn’t understand is that the Captain doesn’t want to stand against him. He never has, he knows that now. Every training session, every time he’d knocked the other asset to the ground, beat him into unconsciousness, was like a thorn twisting in his brain, a voice clamoring out of synch with the rest of the chorus telling him to comply. Telling him to follow HYDRA’s path.
HYDRA’s path… there’s something wrong with it. There’s some reason he’s supposed to sidestep off of it. And it has something to do with the Soldier. After an hour alone with his churning, half-buried thoughts, the Captain knows that much for sure, if not a whole lot else. It’s what makes him grit his teeth and shake his head when the Winter Soldier gives him the party line, the words at once hollow and whole, something the Soldier believes in just as much as the Captain no longer can.
HYDRA can’t help him, he thinks, and it’s like a revelation. It’s like that first spark that sets fire to the tinder, ignites what will soon enough become a blaze. It’s what makes him sit up, shoulder sliding against the other asset’s, looking him in the face, even if his gaze is just a little off, like a blind man trying to look you in the eye, only it’s a couple of inches off. He can see the other asset’s face, but it’s like a pale, shining oval set against the darker hair, the can vaguely see the outlines of features, the blue eyes, the blood-encrusted nose and mouth, in the dim light. The blinds are still closed, the sky still dark with the storm outside.
“I am doing the right thing,” he says, slow but sure, quiet but profound. His voice is plain, flat, clear, but there’s a quality underneath it that wasn’t there before. It’s subtle, but it’s steady. “I don’t know why, but I know that I am.”
He knows that won’t be enough to convince the Soldier. Of course it won’t - it’s vague, it’s unclear, it doesn’t comply. He is no longer compliant, and compliance is the foundation from which the assets were built. It’s why this deviation is the source of so much strife.
So he does something that he has learned never, ever to do in front of a handler. He does something that only the Winter Soldier could ever (has ever, maybe, has this happened before? He doesn’t know, can’t remember, and that frightens him, suddenly) bring him to do. He speaks his mind, he lets out a little of the secret he can feel, buried deep inside: “There’s a different protocol. I don’t think it’s HYDRA’s. I don’t think they can help me understand.”
There’s a pause; when he speaks, that thing coloring his voice has gotten stronger. “I want to understand what it is.”
He wants to know what this thing is they’ve buried, and to do that, they both know what needs to happen. He needs time. He needs to not go back in the chair. He can’t comply, or it will be covered up again, hidden from the light, and maybe he’ll never find it again. Or maybe he’s already found it a hundred times before. Maybe he's forgotten it a hundred times more.
no subject
"How do you know there's another protocol?" The Soldier's voice softens at the edges even as he stares at his partner like he's trying to bore right into his skull. "Maybe I can help you, if you let me.
Next order of business: if you can't immediately incapacitate a target, try to work your way into his/her good graces until you can. Whatever has contaminated the Captain's programming thankfully hasn't hit his: he's clear-headed, getting more so by the second as the ringing stops and his vision resolves. Parameters snap back into focus. Whatever pain he feels is shoved aside as a distraction, an indulgence that HYDRA won't allow and, therefore, he won't allow. The Winter Soldier's chin lifts as he swallows, jaw working, eyes closing for a second with what looks like a normal man's moment of weakness. The barest hint of blue peeks out as he stares at his partner. His face is ruined, inflamed and swelling and red...but even now he can see the signs that his advanced healing factor is kicking in, doing an even better job than his own. Bleach to the face would've taken him a day to recover from, at the minimum. At his estimate, it's probably been a few hours at most and the Captain's already got his eyes open.
For the first time in his memory, the Soldier experiences regret. If anyone should've gone off the reservation and gone rogue, it should've been him - he would've been easier to remove from rotation, would've been the easier loss for HYDRA to take. They could always make another like him. His partner, though. He's one of a kind, and right now he wishes he wasn't so...unique.
"We could do this together, just me and you," the Soldier adds. To the casual outsider, his voice is flat-lined, a borderline monotone as if he hadn't tried to kill a man who turned things around and introduced his face to the floor, the up-close and personal way. "You don't have to go at this alone."
For now he means it, because his mission requires it and because the naked truth is, he doesn't want to kill the other asset if there's another way. For one thing, the Captain's far more valuable than he is. And - and this is the private part, the one that he would immediately get strapped into the suppression chair for - he wants to keep working with him. Wants to clear rooms, wants to train with him back on base. The word "friend" doesn't exist in their world. If it did, it would've just been a liability. But examining where he failed today, the Winter Soldier comes to the slow, startling conclusion that this is a liability he would've wanted to risk.
He shifts from where he's propped up against his partner, drawing his legs up with a pained hiss, the thick heels of his boots dragging against the floor. He's strong, sure, but the Captain knows his limitations just like he does and naturally he made sure to tie his arms and his ankles together so he can't just snap free. Might be able to saw through if he can rub the rope against the chassis of his arm, but that would still take time. Best he can do is keep his partner talking as he tries to figure out another approach.
no subject
But while he can’t access the memories, the knowledge he wants, there are other things slipping through - sense-memories, instincts, things that run deeper than conscious thought, and are far harder to wipe away. They’re the first to return: the soft sound of the Soldier’s voice, the feel of his warm body next to his, the comfort he takes in knowing they’re together.
His vision is still too blurry to really assess the Soldier; he hears the asset shift beside him, more than sees it, but what little information he can get from his eyes, coupled with what he’s getting from his other senses, gives him a pretty clear picture. He knows he’s bound the Soldier tightly enough that he won’t be able to escape easily, can’t just snap the bonds. He knows he doesn’t want to leave his partner tied up, that something about that sits uneasily inside of him, and he’s already reaching clumsily for the other’s hands before he catches himself, pauses, fingertips just brushing the metal of the Soldier’s hand, inches from the knots at most.
“I want to do this together,” he says - again, words he would be backhanded, shot, sliced, burned, electrocuted for. Words that he would never have dared to say, should have known better than to say, known better than to even think while HYDRA still held his mind whole and molded in their hands. Now, his ruined eyes flick up, trying to find and hold the Soldier’s, though the gaze is still off, a little too far to the left and not as piercing as it should be, without that clear focus. But there’s still something genuine in it - genuine, and lost. “I think we’re stronger together. I think we belong together. I think my mission,” whatever it is, “needs you.”
His fingers inch closer to the knots binding the Soldier’s wrists, but even as they touch the rope, he doesn’t untie them. He’s still looking the Soldier in the face as best he can, still struggling with his own sense of duty, of reason, of protocol, all three of them screaming, clashing and disharmonious, inside his head loud enough to nearly drown out the sound of the howling wind outside. “I trust you,” he says quietly, eyes narrowing almost as if in confusion, as if he didn’t mean or didn’t expect to have said the words that just slipped from his lips.
Except he does mean them. “We’re partners,” he says… because they are. They’re partners, and… and something else, but he can’t find the word, can’t grasp it long enough to form it. “And partners trust each other.”
It’s a statement, almost as much as it might be a warning, as his fingers finally touch the knots, but then they still. Something in him says he shouldn’t unknot them; something in him balks at the idea that he tied them at all.
no subject
The Winter Soldier doesn't say the first thing that crosses his mind.
Not if it gets in the way of lowering the other asset's defenses.
"So then we'll do this as partners."
The words feel both right and somehow like decay in his mouth, all at once, the familiar tainted by this bitter feeling that he's somehow being...compromised by going along with the other asset, even for the sake of his own mission. Unlike the Captain, he remembers it, remembers every contingency and remembers, clearly, what it means to carry out a mission to its logical end - HYDRA's will carried out and (preferably) both Assets turning themselves in for debriefing. That's how it's supposed to be. They're supposed to return, injured or not. Turn over their kit. On a good day, he can hear the sounds of the Captain screaming as they wipe him so he can be put back into cryo. Now he wonders if he'll ever hear that again, the certainty of it, that brief thrill where where he can read between the lines as the Captain's voice gives out and his gasps slip away even past the thin walls. It'd felt private, almost for his ears only. Now it sinks in that he might never hear those sounds again. If maybe this was their last mission. Maybe he'd done the unforgivable: maybe he's taken this partnership for granted.
"So what now?"
The Winter Soldier accesses some leftover muscle memory, some deep-cover persona he must have had when he was backing up the Captain. Maybe it wasn't completely scrubbed away. Maybe - and this is the better option, the one he approves of - maybe HYDRA knew this could happen. Maybe they had a contingency plan in his programming for a scenario like this. Where he couldn't just work his way out with his hands and whatever weapons were nearby. Where he had only his voice to work with. His voice and his body language and what he's picking up from his partner's instability, the man seems like he wants someone to...fraternize with. Be physically close to. Whatever it takes to build up that trust until he can get another shot at subduing the Captain.
He shifts pointedly against the other asset, bumping shoulders, his knees drawing up as he tries to dredge up those faint memories of what it was like being another man. He'd been a "James" once on an op. Had smiled, maybe even flirted - carrying out the parameters of some HYDRA tech who knew how to read his fellow man - and he could pass as something other than super-soldier, so long as he kept his arm covered. Now the Winter Soldier is trying to drag those memories back, trying to figure out what he can use to get his partner where he wants him. Physical contact was the first one. Knowing when to stare, when to look away (despite that being a risk), is another. The Soldier tilts his head down, almost as if he's pretending not to see the rope circled tight around his ankles, his tangled, matted hair falling into his face.
One more chance. The Winter Soldier knows he shouldn't even give his partner that much. That they're far past the point of trying to take him in alive and salvageable. But he finds himself hoping that the Captain will give him that opening, give him the chance to drag him back into the fold where they can fix him, where he can continue to run ops with him instead of facing that howling void again without knowing that the other Asset will be on the other side waiting for him.
no subject
This mission is murkier - unclear. It’s a gut feeling - if the Captain knew what gut feelings were, could call them by name. He’s had them before - they’re actually part of what makes him valuable as a breathing, reasoning weapon, why they pull him out of cryo again and again - but the understanding of gut feelings and how they work and what they are has been burned from him, and it hasn’t yet returned. All he has is a certainty that this mission trumps all others, that this protocol is vital, and that he needs to drop everything else to pursue it.
So - that’s what now. That’s what they’ll do. The problem is, “We need information,” he says, fingers still poised above the knots holding the Soldier’s hands uncomfortably in place. It seems like the next logical step - you don’t act without intel, that’s just insane, but the problem is - he has the intel, and it’s locked away. The barriers are crumbling, but -
That’s it. “We need time,” he says next, burning eyes flicking to the shuttered windows, to the howling just beyond them. “I need time, to remember. We need to stay here, and you need to stop giving me injections.” It’s the reasonable move, after all - they’re not really working, but they're still slowing things down, barring the way, even though the barriers eventually give way. Stopping them would likely speed the process, let his synapses rebuild ruined pathways, let the burned-out bridges in his mind reroute. His lips twitch into something that’s barely an expression, barely a motion at all, but that the other asset might recognize as the Captain’s equivalent of a wry smile. “The weather seems to be accommodating for right now, at least.”
There’s still no telling how long the storm itself will last, but the longer it does, the more snow their lodge is buried under, and the longer they have before HYDRA comes looking for them. If they sit tight, and if they forego all contact protocols, if they sit and wait and let his mind keep recovering… the Captain is sure that what he needs will bob to the surface, will slough off the mud it’s under, and become clear.
His fingers flex a little, as the Solder’s shoulder bumps his own. Partners. That’s what they are, what they always have been, for the entire existence that he knows (can remember). They work well together, like two moving parts of a whole, like the trigger and the hammer of a gun, one complementing the other. The missions where they’re sent out together always feel the most complete, the most satisfying, and he wants to save that, to preserve it. He hopes, somewhere deep inside himself, that this new, desperate protocol won’t change that. If it does… if it does, he’ll deal with it then. He’ll have a choice to make.
But not right now. His fingers start to loosen the knots by touch, slowly but efficiently. He doesn’t simply remove the rope all at once, but he first gives the Soldier some slack, and then some more, ruined, still hard-to-focus eyes on the other asset’s face, watching for tells, watching for twitches, even as his fingertips feel for tremors in the other’s arms, signs that he’s going to fight back, to fight this. It’s only if he gets none of it that he’ll finally loosen the bonds, because if they’re in this for the long haul, together, then he can’t (he can, he doesn’t want to, he shouldn’t -) leave the Soldier tied and bound.
“We’re good - as partners,” he says, half a statement, half a question, seeking confirmation, agreement. “We always have been.” He can’t remember much, between the screaming and the hot-white-slicing pain of the chair, the beat-downs, the small army of guards it takes to subdue him and drag him into cryo, every time. He can’t remember past missions in detail, but he has enough - enough of those gut feelings, those sense memories - to be sure of what he’s saying. “We’re the best HYDRA has, together. I want to find out what else we can be.” And the answer, he’s so sure, is buried inside him, just beneath the surface, trying to claw its way free.
no subject
It's times like this that the Winter Soldier catches himself almost...grateful that his own conditioning is simpler. Apparently less moving parts that can break in the field, away from the safety of a controlled environment. He doesn't need injections the way his partner does and his stint with the chair was only a few days ago, so he knows for a fact that it will hold for weeks, if not more, without needing to be revisited. Watching the way the Captain is struggling, how his eyes water behind a swollen, ruined face that his enhanced serum is trying to repair cell by cell, and he knows that what little stability the injections bring won't be worth the risk.
There's a difference between exercising patience on an op, waiting for a target. Doing it with a man he's trusted with his life over and over, and it's harder than he wants to admit.
The Winter Soldier's lips press together in a thin line that brings out the stress lines of his face, hollows his cheeks. His expression turns harsh as he tilts his head, trying to gauge how much of his partner's sight has returned.
"So long as it's together," he grunts, forcing himself to say the words, to act as if there is a life beyond HYDRA. It's harder than he thought it would be, considering his experience with deep cover, and he can feel his back teeth start to ache as he clenches and grinds them. "I don't want to be by myself again."
And that part, that part's true, it's the closest thing he has to deeply personal that he can manage with the conditioning, but it's necessary to feed out that vulnerability to his partner as if it's some olive branch for trying to incapacitate him. As he feels the rope around his wrist - his flesh wrist, not the metal one that's limp, the sensors fritzing on and off - loosen, he resists the immediate urge to break free and close his hand around the Captain's throat, squeeze the fight out of him and then call for backup from the nearest HYDRA cell. His eyes flicker down to the rope, loosening bit by bit, his wrist chaffed red because the Captain, despite his ruined eyes, the gunshot, has done the right thing and tied him up tight, before he glances back up at his face. He has to be looking for any of his usual tells that he's about to turn the tables. Knowing how high the stakes are, how important the Captain is to HYDRA (refusing to admit it's personal, too), the Winter Soldier does his damn best to make sure those tells don't show. For now he's docile, the second as always to his first.
It's only when the rope finally pools in his lap that he flexes his hand, trying to work some feeling in it. The metal one lies limp, the gleaming fingers twitching every now and then as the malfunctioning servos sputter.
"What do you think will happen after this?" the Winter Soldier plays ball and keeps things peaceful as he rotates his hand, curls each finger, his eyes burning judging holes in his partner's face. Once he heard someone describe the Captain as "handsome" - he wouldn't know, but he does know is he had short hair he approved of (less to grab), piercing blue eyes, and symmetrical features that consistently made targets want to like him. Now, with his face washed free of color from the pain, the cold, and the skin around his eyes a mask of angry red from the bleach, he doubts anyone would trust him the way they usually did.
maybe timeskip a little to the next day or so?
He ignores it - he’s made a decision, and he’s not going back on it now. To falter would show weakness, and HYDRA does not tolerate weakness. They built him to be strong, to be unstoppable, and even as he’s crumbling and unsure, he can’t give up the strength he still has, the conviction that this old, deep programming needs to come to light. It makes everything worth it - the excruciating pain in his shoulder, his ruined face, the way he’s tied up the Soldier, even if only temporarily. What little he can see of the expression on the other asset’s face makes him uncomfortable, in this deep, dark place, and he doesn’t like that feeling at all.
But the pit of unhappiness shrinks, when the asset finally speaks. When he confirms that they’ll do this together, that he doesn’t want to be alone. The lines of the Captain’s broad frame relax, as much as they can with the pain, and he nods, leg splaying out just a little, bumping the Soldier’s thigh with his own in this subtle, small gesture that none of their handlers have ever caught. “You won’t,” he says, and his conviction swells as he says it, beats back the unease just a little further. “I won’t let that happen.”
It’s not like the Captain to make empty threats; it’s unclear how he might carry this one out, when he is but a tool, a thing for HYDRA to point and punish and choose to use or lock away, but he means it, nonetheless. He won’t let them be separated, if he has to lie through his teeth when their handlers find them. He’ll deal with that when it happens, when he has the intel slowly shaking loose inside of him, when he can make an informed plan of action.
For now, they’ll wait.
“I don’t know,” he says, aware of the other asset’s gaze on his face, but steadfastly refusing to let anything but surety show on it. “If there’s a mission, we’ll complete it.” If it’s a mission, it will have parameters and an objective and an endpoint and a followup plan, just like all the others. Once he can grasp that information, he’ll feel infinitely better. “If it’s not, we’ll complete this mission, and I’ll handle the consequences.”
It’s clear he means by whatever means necessary, whether it’s lying or telling the truth. It’s clear that he means to handle those consequences himself, to ensure that no harm comes to his partner, nothing worse than the usual end-of-mission protocol. “We’ll stay together,” he promises. “We’re too valuable for them to split apart. I know how to make sure of that.”
For now, though, “Being knocked unconscious isn’t rest,” he points out. “And you had watch last night. Get some rest. You probably have a concussion. I can keep watch.” Even with eyes that aren't yet clear and sharp, his other senses are good enough to do as he proposes. And in a few hours, at most, his face and eyes will have healed enough that, while he still won't look as "handsome" as usual, he'll be fully operational - at least, in that respect. His arm still aches sharply, deep in the ruined joint, and he will endure it forever if he has to, but he doesn't like the idea of the injured arm slowing them down, if what he digs up from inside of himself doesn't include returning to HYDRA.
He'll deal with it then, though. Just like everything else.
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That's what the Winter Soldier will tell himself, more than once. He's regained enough shreds of trust that he's fairly sure his partner won't walk off, grab one of the perfectly good steak knives on the kitchen counter, and slice open an artery while he's still bound. SOP says that's the best approach. But it doesn't happen, the Captain insists on a conversation, on indulging on these sentiments as if they aren't massive defects. Right now he's not sure what he means by "stay together". His immediate conditioned response is to assume that he's indeed a prisoner, no matter how the Captain dresses it up. If he were to take the other asset on in a fair fight? Truth is, he isn't sure he could win. The other man is the original, the one with the stronger serum burning in his system. Considering that, and what he can remember of those combat sessions they had against each other back on base, and he isn't sure he could win if it was just their naked fists.
"Fine," he says. At this point he'll probably be awake if he relaxes, if he dozes off. Concussions to them are inconveniences at most - his head pounds with a pressure from all sides and there's a few moments where he wonders if he'll throw up what little rations must still be in his gut.
At some point he supposes he doses off. When he opens his eyes, he'll see the Captain leaning over him a few times, eyes still red-rimmed but aimed his way with more focus, as if checking to make sure his healing factor is chugging along and that the concussion isn't suddenly a "complication".
When he wakes up again, he'll realize that the ropes around his wrists, ankles and legs are loosened enough that he can easily shake himself loose.
The knives on the counter are gone.
Getting up, the Winter Soldier winces, sore, but functional, and tries to make the best of this as he levers himself up. The ropes pool to the ground. His directive is the same. The Captain must either be incapacitated or killed when the opportunity presents itself. Doesn't matter what he said, or what he even told his partner. It has to happen and if he believed in a higher power than HYDRA, he'd be crossing his fingers and hoping he can aim for incapacitate instead of liquidate. First thing he does is assume that if he looks for weapons, opening and closing shelves and drawers, that the Captain will hear. It limits him to just a visual inspection and he can see that the Captain has used his own recovering eye sight to sanitize the room. Anything remotely lethal is missing. Whatever is bolted in place would require that he's already got the Captain tired and barely struggling.
The Winter Soldier huffs out a barely audible sigh. Long haul it is.
He finds his partner by the back entrance, already standing up straight with hardly any pained hunch to his frame and it looks like he swapped out the bandage around his torso's bullet wound. Damn. So much for hoping that any blood poisoning from the infection might've slowed him down. The Winter Soldier makes a mask of his face as he leans against the door frame, his malfunctioning arm hanging down by his side as it whirs uselessly, fingers twitching and spasming minutely every now and then.
"Storm still strong?" The Soldier doesn't circle things back to last night, to the whole part where he tried to cripple the closest thing he has to a friend. Instead he focuses on the now, on what he can control and assess, and hope, desperately, that his partner will give him an opening. With how the other Asset's shoulders square, and his red rimmed eyes rove, he isn't sure about his chances just yet. "The SHIELD agents might have risked it for all we know."
If he can't get to the Captain physically, he can at least try to seed in doubt psychologically. Try to plant something, make him second-guess (although he can't say for sure if SHIELD maybe did want them bad enough). The Winter Soldier remains propped against the door frame with his eyes burning holes in his partner. Maybe they're working together for now. But he can't shut off that instinct to look for hints of weakness, of aberration, in the other asset, and so he doesn't bother looking away as if he'll be embarrassed if caught.
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But he doesn’t leave the weapons - or anything else that can be used as a weapon - in the same room as the other asset. He’s not stupid, and he knows the Winter Soldier’s orders, now, if he thinks the Captain is unsalvageable.
He’s not - he’s fine, he’s salvageable, he’s good - but he doesn’t want to leave room for uncertainty. Not in that respect, when he’s still not sure of what’s trying to grow and bloom inside his own head.
He hears the other asset wake and move, even over the sound of the storm; by now, his vision has returned almost to normal, even if his face is still a little blotchy, and some of his hair is a little discolored, damaged where the liquid splashed into it. He’s standing tall, not giving away any sign of pain, but his face looks worn and drawn, even under the new, pink skin around his eyes. He glances over, as the Soldier approaches, as he speaks, and the Captain’s smile is a grim, barely-there twitch of his lips, just like always. “It’s the same,” he says, indicating the storm - the snow is piling up against the side of the building, and the wind has barely let up, if at all. The sky is still an unbroken ceiling of darkness, and if there’s an end, he hasn’t been able to spot it approaching.
He considers what the Soldier suggests - that SHIELD is still looking for them, and… it seems reasonable enough. They are valuable assets, of course. He watches the Soldier watching him, and he tilts his head - a question between them. “Do you think we should move?”
His dry, steady tone of voice communicates clearly that he thinks any answer other than no would be a mistake. The storm is too strong, the terrain is too unfamiliar, and their would-be captors are an unknown that gnaws at his gut. This entire thing has been a mess, and clearly their intel was incorrect. That means SHIELD is now largely an unknown factor, and he doesn’t like that - just like the programming inside his head, an unknown factor all its own.
They have the advantage here, what little of it they have. They can fortify, they can learn this place quickly and determine all its strengths and weaknesses, they can mount a defense that SHIELD won’t expect. He’d rather go down in a hail of bullets than freeze to death in a snowdrift on a mountaintop. And he doesn’t want that end for the Soldier, either. It’s weak, it’s not what they were built for.
And something about that idea, that notion specifically, curls so cold and frightening in his gut that even his animal fear of the chair and his handlers and every punishment HYDRA has ever inflicted on him pales in comparison. He will never die in the ice and snow, and he will never let the Winter Soldier die that way, either.
“What’s the status of your arm?” he asks, instead, as though he isn’t the one who’d disabled it during their fight. As though he isn’t the one who feels like every thought he has is like stepping on thin ice, never sure where his foot is going to break through and take him, screaming, beneath the surface. He can feel the very last vestiges of his last injection wearing away, and it’s making him antsy, uncomfortable. He’s still fighting for control of his mind, his mission, and grasping at his training and his partner as those last familiar failsafes. He knows he wanted to stop the injections. He just knows that doesn’t make the idea of it any more appealing.
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"Poor," the Winter Soldier opts for being truthful. After failing to incapacitate his partner, he'll need to work on buying enough of that trust back so he can get another opening. If it means being upfront about his weaknesses, then so be it. "It'll lower my effectiveness once we leave if it's left non-functional."
He can operate without it if needed. There had been plenty of exercises with it detached, both against the Captain and against select trainees fast-tracked to rise in the ranks. Some of them had found that no matter their skill level, their background - they couldn't last even a minute when he was one-handed and they thought he wouldn't kill because of their background, their contacts, the fact they were too prideful to surrender. The Captain, though. He'd always lasted. Always knew to go for his weak spot, use the missing limb to his advantage in any exercises, and he knew how to disable him using pain, location, and bone breaks on the flesh side. There had always been an immediacy about his approach. The Winter Soldier remembers respecting that, even if most of the actual details were only faint impressions of pain and smell and sound. Glancing at his partner, the Soldier studies him and he has to assume that part hasn't change. The injections may not have worked...but his sense of tactics, of taking advantage of a perceived weakness? Those are still fresh and he can't assume those will degrade too.
The Winter Soldier touches his damaged arm. It's non-functional from the elbow joint down to the wrist, where most of the damage was done. His face feels tender, as if he'd run headfirst into a tinder block, and there's no doubt some swelling from the Captain smashing his face into the floor as hard as he did. There's a vague memory that he hadn't settled for hitting him just the once. He'd done in multiple times, to be thorough. To be exact. Good to know that some instincts haven't degraded like his mental conditioning has.
It's a small comfort.
"You need to decide what to do about my arm," the Winter Soldier plunks that into his partner's lap. While he has his SOP to carry out, for now the Captain still has higher rank...and he must know that if he really wants the two of them to walk out of here, he can't have his partner crippled. It's weighing the odds, the pros and cons. How far he's willing to go to drag someone with him in this. "Either it needs to be repaired or you can leave me here."
The snow will die down, eventually. Probably can make his way out, contact the nearest cell. Take his chances dodging the SSR. Not ideal scenarios. But there's a choice, and now it's laid out in front of Rogers to choose how much he wants to risk for this unspoken, impossible mission of his. Things won't be the same between them. They can't be; not when the Winter Soldier has that new order brimming to the surface, feeling like it's somehow pulling at his nerve endings and his very bones and skin. Not when the Captain is acting like he'll go AWOL. Not when he speaks as if this invisible mission of his supersedes HYDRA itself.
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So the Captain makes the call, because that’s what he does. He has been honed and trained to evaluate every single situation, take in all the information, and make the right call. “I’ll repair it,” he says, just as bluntly, just as confidently and with no room for argument. He isn’t a tech, of course, doesn’t possess the specialized skills for significant repairs. But he’s well versed in the arm’s workings and on the most basic ways to repair it, the best workarounds and solutions for the field, because he’s got to be. HYDRA had planned for every contingency (or, at least, so they thought): for the Captain’s time in the chair to wear off, and for the Soldier’s arm to become damaged. Of course, HYDRA always planned to ensure their super soldiers were accompanied by handlers, and that’s no longer true, but that never meant they didn’t give their most valuable assets the tools and skills they needed to keep each other going.
It’s… good, knowing he can do something about the arm. Of course, he’s the one who damaged it in the first place, but he can still undo it. He can make the Solider functional again, give him what he needs to survive, and even though the Captain knows it’s a gamble against his own survival, he doesn’t hesitate to make that call.
“I’ll repair your arm,” he repeats, not because he doesn’t think it was understood, but because now he’s using it as a jumping-off point, now it’s the basis of their new plan. “And then we’re going to lay out all the intel we have on the SSR, and what we heard there. I want to know more about Rogers and Barnes.” And this time, he won’t let the Soldier shy away from the names, from what he might know. They’re going to go digging, and it might not be pleasant, but it’s going to yield results. He’s sure of it.
In fact… he considers for only a moment before he decides that they can do both at once, really. He can repair the arm and they can talk at the same time. He glances out the windows, at the grey skies and the blowing snow, and makes a third call: “We can afford a fire,” he decides, because the lodge has a nice big fireplace and plenty that will burn and any smoke will be blown away quickly, lost in the gale still raging outside. He’s cold and stiff, his shoulder aching fiercely, and the Soldier can’t be feeling much better, with a damaged arm. They could both do to warm up, and there’s no reason to stay in these less-than-optimal conditions, with the storm blowing enough to dissipate any sign of their presence. “Help me gather kindling.” They sure make a pair, each with a damaged arm, but between the two of them, they can start a fire easily enough, and sit down by it so the Captain can pull out the repair kit he keeps in his belt and get to work on the Soldier’s arm. And then they can talk about Rogers and Barnes.
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It's something.
The Winter Soldier falls into place as the Captain makes for the door. The arm repair will come next, when he's back inside, when he can't ambush the other asset out in the snow. He doesn't try to jump the Captain as they venture outside, the biting cold against lancing across their exposed skin and he takes point again, part of out muscle memory, part because he's aware that even his partner, with that new, alien mission buzzing around in his mind like a corruption, wants him where he can see him. He's lost the white mask that usually muzzles his lower face, his lips numbing as he ducks his head and presses out into the snow. Visibility is low, a swirling mass of white smearing against shapes of buildings, of a garage and bowing bushes and trees. It's not as bad as the first night. He presses on, spreading out with the Captain to search near the forest's edge. Some of the kindling is too wet and will need to be tried. Others have recently fallen, the Winter Soldier holding as much as he can with one working arm until the Captain calls it for the day.
They return back inside, snow drifting across the foyer's floor before the door's tugged shut and locked. It's enough for a fire for a few hours, at least, and the Winter Soldier finds himself tasked with getting it started as his partner spreads out the repair kit: small, compact, but with everything needed to get his arm in working order.
The Winter Soldier sits down by the fire, close enough to get some of the heat warming his body. Far enough, though, that he can't possibly kick the sparking logs at the Captain. The time for that was yesterday. If he wants another crack at his partner, it'll be later, when he's good and ready and sure that this time he won't hesitate. Until then, he cooperates.
He's dragged over one of the end tables closer to the sofa, pulling it closer so he can grip his left arm by its chrome wrist and set it down on top with a dull clang. The arm's heavy when he isn't controlling it: a normal man would've had trouble lifting it. His fingers remain curled in mechanical rigor mortis as he glances over at the Captain. His face by now looks almost as good as new, unfortunately. The other asset's skin is reddened from snow exposure but his eyes are more alert and focused and whatever advantage he might've had from the corneal damage is gone.
"You said you wanted to talk," the Winter Soldier does everything he can to show that he's cooperating. Behaving. Displaying the obedience that he normally wouldn't have to fake. His gut wants to keep following his Captain even though his mind knows better. Knows that HYDRA must come first even before the man. His chin lifts as he glances at the fire, his face cast half in amber as he looks into the sparks and tries to steel himself for what will be...unpleasant. Very unpleasant.
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Once the fire is crackling, and the Winter Soldier has his arm laid out on the table, the Captain lowers himself gracefully, soundlessly to the sofa despite his bone-weariness - fatigue is not tolerated, and neither is showing it - and puts his bare hands to the chilled metal, assessing with his fingers as well as his eyes before he even picks up the first tool.
“Yes,” he confirms, his eyes on his work without lifting at the sound of the Soldier’s voice. He picks up the first instrument and begins working, testing the seams of each meal plate to find where they’re most badly bent, and where access to the arm’s inner workings will be easiest to gain. “I want to talk about what you know. What you remember. About Rogers and Barnes.”
He pauses, just for a few breaths. He knows - they both know - that the chair is more effective on the Soldier. It always has been; it’s why the Captain needs the injections, needs his partner, needs his handlers when missions go on too long. It’s why there are so many failsafes in place, except all of them have failed spectacularly, to this point. Well - almost all of them. The Soldier might have ostensibly failed, but he’s down, not out. They both know it.
“Start with the base,” he suggests. “With what you heard. How they reacted to you.” Even if the Solider won’t gain recall of a past mission, at least he’ll be able to fulfill that order. The Captain even offers up his own tidbit, as if laying out an olive branch. “When they called me Rogers… they really believed I was him. Whoever he was. They weren’t trying to make me believe it. They believed it.” He knows, based on all of his observations - pupil size, breathing rates, vocal tones and eye movements - that what he’s saying is true. “I’m not sure even their intelligence is bad enough to try to convince me I’m one of my past covers.” The SSR is weak, but not stupid. Which means, they don’t think Rogers was his cover. They think it was his. His everything. His life.
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He studies his partner. The Captain takes his time looking at the damage to the cybernetics, almost as thorough as his own team of techs, inspecting each plate.
"The base," the Winter Soldier says, that small hint of distaste again in his voice, flat to everyone else but the man who knows him most. "They started with asking the usual. Name; age; rank. They had a list of names they were asking: people we sanctioned over the years, I think."
A few struck a primal cord. Recognition, even if he couldn't point out a face from a lineup. Maybe the kill had stood out, been more difficult and engaging. Maybe it had been something more deep cover and maybe he'd had to fraternize to get closer to the target. Others were just blanks, the memory suppression keeping it away from him in case he was tortured. His lips purse as he thinks back, tries to ignore how almost pleasant the sedative felt - no howling nothing like cryo, no fear or nausea or wondering if he'll see the Captain again or if this is it. He just was. It's an unacceptable weakness he'll report back to his new handlers once this is over...assuming he makes it back to at all. There's still time for the Captain to change his mind and finish what he really should've started.
The Winter Soldier goes on, his monotone more pronounced than usual, almost as if he's retreating behind it and raising a shield. "They were handling me with kid gloves. Incorrect dosage. Thought I heard them call me Barnes, but I'd have to verify back with command if that's my name or an old alias."
Does it matter? They botched the mission, maybe not as badly as their handlers did, but they're making it worse by discussing this. By thinking of themselves outside of HYDRA.
"I don't remember Rogers or Barnes," and maybe the Winter Soldier betrays himself with a little shrug, his eyes darting to the fire sparks popping off the wood as they crack and resettle. The golden glow cast in the room pulls at him, seems to tug at some old memory he can't identify the when. Something about this position seems familiar, right down to the gentle hands on his arm, although it had been cleaning a wound of dirt, wrapping gauze on skin that wasn't there... "They said I served with you. That we used to fight for America." His mouth twitches. "Easy for them to say without proof. I'd want confirmation before I believe the SSR. They got lucky, but they're desperate. They don't have soldiers like us in the field and I suspect they'd want us instead of making their own."
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“Maybe they had us,” the Captain suggests, because while he can sort of maybe reconcile the idea that maybe he had a name and a life once, he’s still unable to really, truly, get a grasp on free will just yet. So he takes what he knows - what he’s heard and what he can feel, deep in his gut - and fits it into his strange, cobbled-together picture of the world, based on chairs and drugs and handlers and nothing but endless missions, and comes up with that. And, on the heels of it, “Maybe they lost us to HYDRA,” he muses, brain ticking over the possibilities as a picture starts to maybe slot into place, all the while keeping his eyes on the Soldier’s arm, his hands moving as the tools test and repair each interlocking section before moving on to the next. He knows he’s hard to control - even without whatever’s going on in his head, trying to break free, he knows. His handlers have told him, time and again, it’s been coded into his very being, how hard he is to control, and how hard HYDRA has worked to bring him to this point. Maybe the SSR never could. Maybe, in letting him have a name, more freedom, something, he became too hard to control, and they lost him. HYDRA had picked up the pieces, and perfected them, and -
He feels the tiniest pang of longing for the order HYDRA has always brought to his life. The last little bit of his programming is holding on tooth and nail, making him miss the simplicity of the chair, the drugs. They’re frightening and abhorrent, yes. But they also bring peace and order and they keep him working with the Soldier.
He must have been working with the Soldier for even longer than he’s known, if they used to fight for America together. He knows, beyond anything else, that he doesn’t want to lose that.
He moves on down the Soldier’s arm, bypassing the crumpled outer plates for now - he’ll have to fix those later, but the intricate inner workings must come first, and piece by piece, the Soldier's motility returns. Regardless of what might have happened with the SSR in the past, “Of course they want us,” he agrees. Why make something when you can steal it and bend it to your will? The Captain has no doubt now that’s what HYDRA must have done, and they did it well. He also has no doubt that if the SSR figures it out, they could potentially do the same.
He isn’t sure, all of a sudden, how he feels about the fact that he might have changed hands, switched sides, countless times before - all depending on who held the switch. Who held the better drugs, the best chair.
“We’re just pawns,” he finally says, almost coming to a realization. He knew this already - of course they’re pawns, they’re tools that can be moved around the board to serve whatever purpose is needed. He’d never questioned that, and it’s true now, but the question of allegiance had never come to the fore. Now it’s here, staring him in the face. “We could have switched sides before.”
Finally, he glances up at the Soldier. He wants to know what his partner feels about that.
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The thing is, he never considered life before HYDRA. Why would he? All he needed to continue operations was a team of handlers, the reassurance that HYDRA was 1) still on target for its goal and 2) the Captain was still on the field. Everything else was...irrelevant. The expression on his face turns into more of a frown than that neutral, mask-like state it usually takes when he's on board with how things are panning out. His good hand tightens into a fist before he forces it to relax.
"It's...possible," and from the sound of it, not one the Winter Soldier wants to agree with. His own mental conditioning demands full loyalty to HYDRA: he'd been easier to break than the Captain and that means that those loyalties are burned in deeper, a cancer inside his body and mind keeping him operating instead of breaking down with the reality of what's been done to the both of them. "But they weren't strong enough to keep us. That should say enough."
A pause, then, as his eyes, blue and cold, travel down to inspect the other asset's work.
"I don't think it should make a difference," the Winter Soldier says, thin-lipped, not realizing he's displaying those small, tell-tale signs he's on edge. Only the Captain could pick them out, used to the slightest deviations from his status quo. "HYDRA wants to correct the world, steer it on the best course. The SSR doesn't seem like they want to play ball."
Which is enough for the Soldier, with his simplified mental conditioning. It should be that simple.
Glancing back up at his partner's face shows it isn't that simple.
He stares back at the Captain's face, studies how the firelight flickers and paints fresh lines in it. He can't pinpoint the other man's exact age. There's a timeless quality there helped along with a good dose of cryo. Before this, he couldn't have even said if they started the super soldier program at the same time. It wouldn't have mattered, really. It shouldn't have mattered. Suddenly it seems to. Now he wonders if they'd served together. If they were from the same batch. All thoughts that will swirl around, confused, banging up against walls that hadn't anticipated those questions. His lips purse.
The Winter Soldier's the first to break eye contact, giving himself a moment of glancing at the table, then at the windows covered by thick, dusty curtains, to wait for his trusted programming to kick in and correct whatever doubts he might have. Whatever "instabilities" might be trying to worm in, invasive, unwanted. He tells himself it's unwanted, almost convinces himself those thoughts are his.
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He can't argue with the Soldier's assessment of the situation. Even if the SSR had them, they don't anymore, and that implies weakness. They should shy away from weakness, stand beside the strongest - and HYDRA is the strongest. But there's something in the Captain that catches at that, that keeps getting hung up on the SSR and their thankless plight. They are desperate and scattered and humane - not nearly as ruthless as HYDRA - and that is why they will lose.
Or, something inside him whispers, at the edges of his mind, is that why they will win?
When their eye contact breaks, the Captain sits back and lets the Soldier assess his repairs so far; whereas someone else might have made a gesture, a little go ahead, he just pulls back his hands and knows the other will understand what he means. The Soldier is most definitely on edge, uncomfortable, and something in the Captain hates making him this way… and yet he can't stop pushing for it, too. Can't stop pushing for that discomfort, for him to think, rather than accept.
"The SSR wants something different," he concedes, after a moment. That much is true. "They steer, but - they don't correct." Even as he says it, something flickers behind his eyes. Something about the words, those words exactly. He and the Soldier have both been through countless corrections. Most, he can't remember, except for the way they make him react, like Pavlov's dog, snapping to the appropriate response, be it fear - never show fear - or force, at the right prompting. HYDRA corrects. Their world requires many corrections, because there is no room for imperfection. Imperfection is weak. Cogs that think too much for themselves are weak.
But imperfections don't have to be flaws. Differences can make something stronger. That thought worms its way up through the Captain's gut unwarranted, and he leans in close again, to catch the Soldier's eye. "What if there were no more corrections," he says, and even now, as HYDRA's control is slipping, his voice is quiet, almost a whisper, as though the room is bugged and they'll hear him. Punish him. Correct him. "What if we were…"
He doesn't know the word he wants to use. Equals? Trusted? People?
He picks up the next tool, unconsciously biting at one corner of his lip, a tic that should never appear on an asset's face. It feels like pushing a bruise, thinking about it too much. It hurts, but he can't stop. He has to see how far he can go. "What if HYDRA's way isn't the only way. Why are we beholden to them?"
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A fundamental weakness.
The Winter Soldier's looking tense again despite the fact that he isn't bleeding, he doesn't have broken bones and he isn't convulsing in the Chair. Even so, his face looks drawn, his jaw tightening, and he leans forward now, almost as if he'd like nothing more than to take whatever subversive thought has infected his partner and beat its skull in. If only it was that easy. But something in him wants to pause, to listen. To drag his feet instead of reaching out and forcing the Captain's head into the fire, like he would've with any other compromised asset.
"Because HYDRA will correct the world," he replies, and his voice is small, tight, even as his eyes burn blue at the Captain. How could he question this? It's the order of things. HYDRA has the will to do what no one else has the stomach or drive for - isn't that much obvious? "Those corrections allow us to help others."
He stares back at the Captain, unwilling to show how unnerved he is (is that the word?) at this new, alien conviction of his. The Captain almost doesn't look human to him. The skin around his eyes is sill seared red from the bleach and he blinks too much. But something about him looks too symmetrical, the blue in his eyes suddenly overly saturated. Piercing. It almost feels like he can see right to his core and the primary objective of deal with a rogue Asset that's spread through the Winter Soldier like the plague.
"Doing anything less would be selfish. We're helping people in the long run," he says. He'll insist on it. For all the brainwashing, all the torture through traditional pain, chemicals, and the Chair, and that's the most effective line that HYDRA has used. That they're looking at the great picture. Sacrificing themselves for future generations. They might not enjoy the fruits of a peaceful, orderly world, but billions will. Small price to pay. They can rest once that's carried out. Put like that, the Winter Soldier can only struggle to follow his partner's thought process. Is he saying that they should....that they should come first?
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had some slight godmoding, lemme know if I should change anything
THE LATEST TAG holy crap /o\
maybe I matched you in late tags - had trouble with Bucky's writing voice
No worries at alllll
apologies, shorter post
Not at all!
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I figure we can skip ahead over the next tag or two if needed?
light timeskip
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let me know if finding a body doesn't work for you and I can change that!
all cool! I'm game if Bucky keeps side-eyeing Steve.
o7 I figure they can get to the infirmary shortly
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Lemme know if any of this isn't okay!
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