Papa Ain't Raise No Coward
“Should we kill him?” James asked after what felt as if a 20 minute silence of both of them standing over the Governor who was still out.
“Do you think we should?” She looked at him to which he responded by pursing his lips and shrugging. “We can but we’re in New York, someone will see us with his body.”
“Nobody saw me when he was over my shoulder.” He had a point.
“Good enough. You doing the dirty work?”
He stayed silent, he would if he needed to. “If needed..yes.”
“Oh god just by the sound in your voice I know you don’t want to, but I don’t want to either! I don’t kill Americans. Why did you even mention if you don’t want to do it?” She whisper-yelled at him.
Before he could answer they were interrupted by the Governor starting to stir around below them and groan.
“Shit!” Ara said right before punching him unconscious again. “Don’t give me that look, I panicked! We don’t have a plan!” She said defensively to which he responded by unknowingly rolling his eyes.
“We either kill him and ditch his body or we return him home, but he will talk,” James then got that thousand mile stare before saying, “they always talk.”
“We’ll threaten his family, he’ll think we’re going to kill them if he comes out to the public.”
James looked at her, “Do you think that’ll work?” He asked, but she responded by chewing on her bottom lip.
“We will have to make it since we both don’t want to kill the man.” Ara chuckled and he had a tad trace of a smile upon his lips.
When they got back into her apartment from threatening the shit out of the Govenor to which he more than likely shit his pants, Ara went straight to her computer and James followed behind her which struck her as unusual. “Since you’re part of the deal was a no-go, you still owe me a Governor.”
“And you still need to help me get away from Hydra.” Ara growled at herself, she had completely forgot about that part of the deal.
“Fine.” She muttered and opened the laptop screen.”
“Did you have a backup plan if things failed with Armstrong?”
Ara felt like an idiot, “No… He was so corrupt I knew he would make a deal with me, so I scoped out everything I needed to know about him, interviewed all his past victims and such, I was going to make things work with him. I had no other options.”
James thought over what she said, “How did you even get him to agree?” He finished a yawn.
She snorted and chugged down some whisky, “I knew I could get that dirty piece of shit because he was a man who loved having people with different strengths to do his dirty work, he liked the fact that people owed him favors, and I was highly capable of doing whatever he wanted without it being traced back to him, or me for that matter.”
Ara placed a search on James to see if she could delete anything from the internet about him; news articles about his assassinations, or even sightings.
When she opened up the first article that popped up, her eyes bulged, he looked exactly the same right now as he did from the 1940’s and it still came as a shock to her, that this was real and he was in the room with her right now. The article talked about the Howling Commandos and all the good they did in WW2, but the picture of him and Steve Rogers made her stomach turn. She knew she was way over her head.
It had been a couple minutes of just reading the article and she had thought James was right behind her looking over her shoulder, but when she glanced he was standing there. With his eyes closed.
He literally fell asleep standing up. Legit eyes closed and everything. Ara watched for a minute, somewhat dumbfounded that it was possible for humans to fall asleep standing up, and slightly jealous that she couldn’t do it because it would have been handy when she was in the forces.
She stood up slowly and stood in front of him, watching his eyes roll back and forth under his eyelids. And whether it was because she was just so curious about him, or if she was just down right feeling playful, she snapped her fingers right in front of his face, and everything went blurry.
It took a good 20 seconds for Ara to figure out that she had her face pressed to her kitchen counter right next to her laptop. She thought something had happened like she had a stroke or just a temporary loss of consciousness, but when she tried to stand up it was now obvious that James was literally holding her down. He had grabbed the hand she snapped in front of his face and held her wrist, extended out straight behind her back as if he were going to snap her arm just by controlling her wrist. His human arm pressed hard right between her shoulder blades. She’s completely at his mercy and there was nothing she could do except miserably flail her legs back since she was on her tippy toes and leaned over the counter, her limbs were useless and other hand couldn’t slide it’s way out from under her own body.
“James!” was all she could groan out in pain. As soon as she said his name he quickly snapped out of it and let go, darting across the room.
Her feet hit the ground and she stayed their stunned that she had actually let her guard down for a moment and didn’t see it coming. When she turned around he was leaning against the wall as if it would happen again.
“Don’t ever touch me again.” Ara breathed, he caught her at a moment of weakness, again. This was the second time she couldn’t escape from him and she was terrified because that has never happened before. She was bred to believe that there was no such thing as a moments of weakness. Because weakness is for cowards, and she’s no coward.
“I didn’t mean to..” He looked as if he were aching, in actual physical pain from what he had done.
Ara sighed after a moment, she knew the truth, it was her fault and she would have reacted the same way. Actually, she has done the similar to people who got to close in the grocery store, “I know you didn’t it was my fault for being all up in your personal space, I would have do the same thing.” He’s dealing with demons from the past, and present. He was just confused as to what they were because he had no idea what he’s dealing with let alone how. Just like she is.
“I could have hurt you, I’m.. I’m sorry..” He could have, and was probably going to if she didn’t speak up when she did.
“Many people could have hurt me, but they didn’t…” Ara said but he didn’t say anything, and the silence became too awkward for her, “Look you’re tired, you literally fell asleep standing up and I had no clue that that was possible, I’m guessing you have nowhere to stay and breaking into a cheap motel that prostitutes conduct their business on doesn’t sound flattering. You can crash on my couch because I’m not letting you out of my sight until I get another Governor and I get you out of America. We had a deal and I’m a woman of my word.” James remained motionless, leaned up against the wall opposite of her.
Ara then walked off into her bedroom and grabbed her winter blanket in her closet and a pillow off her bed, when she walked back into the living room he hadn’t moved an inch.
She sat them down on the couch and turned around to leave back to her room, “Look, just go back to sleep. We’ll figure all this out in the morning.” She said.
When she exited the room James still stood against the wall for a couple seconds longer, he let out a breath he didn’t know he was holding and slowly walked towards the couch and sat down with his head in his hands. He had no idea who and what he’d gotten himself into.