Would I were steadfast as thou art
It was bound to happen eventually, he will reflect later, with the way he’s been holding everything in, forcing down every little urge and tick and reflex. Ironic, really. He’s kept himself under tighter control than HYDRA ever did, all in the attempt not to inflict any more harm on anyone. There is a deep dark void inside him, but even that has to overflow in the end, apparently. The lid blows off after he dozed off on the couch, paying only half-hearted attention to what you were watching on the TV. The trigger is a random noise from the TV program, jarring him awake and going straight to the center of his programming. The cat all but flies away with a hiss, sensing the sudden change in her human pillow. Her bushy tail fluffs out as if she’d been struck by electricity, making her larger than she is as she stares down the yet significantly larger predator across the coffee table. The Winter Soldier stands ready to pounce, every muscle tensed and ready. He stares at the TV, where a reporter’s voice over rattles off Alexander Pierce’s impressive biography, only Pierce isn’t in the TV. He’s standing right next to the set on its low shelf and looks at his soldier with an air of mild disappointment.
“You failed your mission.” Pierce says, with an edge to his voice that is made of sharpened steel and promising of indescribable punishments. The Soldier backs up, knocking against the couch in the process. The piece of furniture scrapes backwards across the carpet rather than him losing his balance; he is that strong. He doesn’t want to sit, either, his legs straight and unyielding as if electric currents flow through them. If he sits, he knows, he’ll be strapped back to the chair and then it’s only a matter of time before they break out the machine and pull him out through his screams until there’s nothing left that’s human. There is fear, cold and clawing. It flows through his every vein like ice. Pierce shakes his head with an expression that borders on boredom, like he’s tired of going through the same rigmarole time and again to keep his prized weapon primed. “You know what happens when you fail. You know the consequences.”
It’s not a dream, he knows he’s not asleep or caught in a flashback. He’s perfectly aware that he’s still standing in your living room, the cat locked in a stare down and the TV still running. He can even still smell the steaks and veggie stir-fry you had for dinner and hints of your perfume on the couch. The problem is, Pierce is as real to him as any of it. It’s made even more surreal by the slightly younger Pierce in the TV declining his Nobel Peace Prize.
You had only gotten up for a minute for a quick toilet break and to get some more water to drink. He’d been nodding off to sleep, eyes drooping and head sagging until it almost rested on your shoulder, despite the decent distance he still kept from you while sitting. You heard Becky’s hiss just as you refilled the water pitcher in the kitchen. You quickly rounded the corner, finding your guest standing in the middle of the room, drawn up to his full height. You could see the tension in his back even from where you stood. He was staring at a spot right next to the TV set. A very much empty spot. You mentally add ‘hallucinations?’ to your amateur diagnosis and advance, figuring, for some reason, that it might be a good idea to turn off the TV. Sensory overload or something along those lines. The screen dies just as the reporter explained the depth to which the former World Security Council Secretary Alexander Pierce had been embroiled in the recent HYDRA scandal. Becky sprints away like a furry red cannonball, but stays poised at the other side of the room, far away enough to be out of imminent danger, but close enough to leap into action should the need arise. His stance is that of a hunter, cool, calm, collected and ready to strike. It’s only his eyes that belie the impression. Wild with unbridled fear, they flicker over you for a fraction of a second before returning to the empty spot beside you. It occurs to you, once again, that you have absolutely no idea how to handle a situation like this, and it’s your own cluelessness that causes you to be afraid.
You’re standing right next to Pierce, looking distinctly worried. No small part of him prays that you’ll keep your distance; with the Soldier at the helm there is no way he can control what he’ll do. It’s like his brain is short-circuiting into autopilot and all he can do is watch, strapped into the passenger seat of a crashing car.
“I could order you to kill her right now.” The apparition of Pierce sneers smugly, “There’d be nothing you could do about it. You’re so weak; following orders is all you’re good
for.”
No. Nononononononono he would never hurt you, he wasn’t that person anymore (person? A venomous voice sneers in his head, not Pierce, someone much older from longer ago, person?! You are a dog at best, HYDRA’s own faithful little attack dog, nothing more). Pierce’s own sneer deepens, as if on cue, and his head inclines only a fraction towards your troubled face.
“Finish her.” He orders simply, as if he’d asked his PA for a coffee. The Soldier springs into action immediately, leaping over the coffee table, his arm swinging in a wide arc, enough force behind it to take off a head. You react by cowering on the floor, dodging the blow that went narrowly past you and retracting all your limbs until you’re no more than a little ball. It happens too fast for a sense of fear to really register, and you peer up through your arms to see him standing there, heaving deep, distressed breaths, the fist that sliced through the air next to you still clenched tight and dimly reflecting the light of the reading lamp.
All in an instant, he can feel his hands again and the apparition of Pierce is gone as if he punched it clean out of existence. You are cowering on the floor, glancing up at him with wide eyes.
The first thing he did once he had control of his body again was to bound out the open window, up the fire escape and onto the roof. You stay put a moment longer, dropping your arms and sucking in a few gulps of air. You hope his mad dash ends on the roof of the apartment block and that he won’t take off Assassin’s Creed style across the adjoining buildings. You need answers. Even more, you sense that he absolutely shouldn’t be alone right now. Willing your heart rate to slow down you shakily pick yourself up off the ground and begin your ascent of the fire escape.
He pulled himself up on the roof with shaking hands and promptly collapsed on his knees, retching and heaving against the last warm rays of the setting sun. His skull feels like it’s splitting open down the middle, the pain making his vision blur. But he still feels Pierce’s eyes boring into him, still feels the dread of being powerless and trapped in the confines of his brain, his body no longer his own. He has no idea how he managed to change the direction of the blow, it was close enough. Had you not ducked you would have been seriously injured, which frightens him most of all. It’s this dread that propels him forward, making him crawl across the roof pitifully until he comes up against the protruding air vent exhausts or whatever that thing is.
In retrospect, placing yourself right in front of him without any means of defense with only a low coffee table between you probably hadn’t been the brightest idea. While you may have been able to fight him off before, he was fully healed by now and could likely rip off your arms if he set his mind to it. Then why, exactly, were you doing the same thing again right now? Your fight or flight reflexes were kinda rubbish, it has to be said, especially when it comes to the flight part. Any sensible person would made for the proverbial hills, yet here you are, squatting down on the still heated surface of the roof in front of him as he holds his head between his hands and rocks himself back and forth slightly.
“Hey, you wanna tell me what the hell just happened?” your voice is gentle as always, but insistent. He’s not getting out of this; then again he’s not supposed to. On the other hand he can’t tell you really, because he doesn’t actually know, doesn’t understand. He has never been so divorced from the Soldier before, hasn’t recognized the asset (or himself?) as a separate entity in living memory. Granted, his living memory doesn’t exactly reach that far back, but one gets the point. It’s confusing, more than everything else in his life, which is already pretty damn confusing. Confusing like the fact that you come to him again and again, time after time after damn time. You shouldn’t, he’s dangerous, he knows this, at least. One of the few memories he has and has been allowed to keep is that of rooms full of heavily armored people training their weapons on him. He is erratic. Unstable. He is dangerous and deadly and must be contained.
“Why are you here?” he rasps after you’ve knelt there long enough to lose the feeling in your legs. He makes a good point, you have to admit. Still, you feel your hackles rising at the unspoken insinuation that you wouldn’t be, that you’d abandon him like you had been abandoned.
“I don’t give up on people. That’s not the kind of person I am.” You say firmly and reach for his hands, but he pulls them away. You stifle a sigh, reminding yourself to be patient and that his reaction has nothing to do with you personally. For a moment you consider pressing him about the incident that just occurred in your living room like you had originally planned to, but decide against it for the time being. Instead you stand and stretch your numb legs, wincing as the blood rushes back into them. With another wince, you plop down next to him, leaning back against the vent and stretching your legs out in front of you. He flinches away even though there’s almost a foot of space between you.
“You shouldn’t be here. You shouldn’t be anywhere near me.” He ground out thickly. His head was in his hands again, palms pressing against his temples forcefully, until he suddenly dropped his metal hand like it was on fire. He let it fall on the concrete and looked down at it disdainfully, lips pressed into a harsh thin line. You could see the metal fingers trembling as the last few rays of daylight reflected off of them.
“You feel guilty. And not only for what just happened, which was, by the way, not that bad. You had some sort of episode, but you snapped out of it.” You observed pointedly. He hung his head low again, refusing to meet your eyes.
“I’m a monster. I should burn in hell.” The speed at which he spits out the words is the only indication towards his inner turmoil as his voice is once again flat and blank, as if stating an obvious and indisputable fact. You made a vague, frustrated noise.
“You disagree.” He states, looking up again at last. You meet his gaze steadily.
“Personally, yes.” You reply simply, in that same matter-of-factness, “I don’t think you should be held responsible for any of it, but this isn’t about me. If you feel you have to atone for what HYDRA made you do then so be it. If that’s what it takes for you to work through this then that’s what you should do. As for the hell part, I think you’ve been there for quite a while - still are, actually. Maybe it’s time to leave.”
He stared ahead at the by now completely dark horizon, expression masked by the shadows of the night. You hugged your arms around yourself tighter and shuffled infinitesimally closer to him, trying to stay warm. He seemed to take note of it but at least he didn’t flinch away. Still, it was getting rather chilly up there on the roof.
“Speaking of leaving, perhaps we could take this back inside? It’s getting kinda cold.”
“Inside…” he echoed hollowly, knitting his brows together and squinting as if to pierce through a bright light, even though it was dark, the streetlights far down below barely reaching up for more than a dim glow.
“You want me to go back inside.” His frown deepened and he chewed on his bottom lip in contemplation.
“Yes.”
“You don’t want me to leave.”
“Not particularly, no.”
“You’re not throwing me out?” he finally lifts his gaze to yours, searching your eyes while the crease on his brow looks like it’s about ready to take up permanent residence there.
“No.” you replied, holding his gaze steadily. Eventually it was him that broke off the little stare down by running a hand over his face with a deep groan. He shakily pushed himself up and stood with hunched shoulders for a moment, regaining his balance. Then he stuck out his hand to you to help you up. You gawked at it for a moment, astonished, but took it and pulled yourself to your feet with a small triumphant smile.
“Just so we’re clear, I knew what I was getting myself into. I knew it those few weeks ago, and I know it now. Also I deeply resent being doubted, just so you know. And now let’s go back inside, I’m really getting cold.”
He almost smiles for a moment, drawn features softening ever so slightly, but then his brain fires another thought at him and it’s gone.
“You said ‘what HYDRA made you do’”, he starts, turning abruptly, “How would you know they made me do anything. I could have all been me, all of it.” His eyes turn to searching you, half distrust, half fear. You meet his gaze squarely, communicating that you have nothing to hide.
“If that were the case, would you be so troubled by it now?”
He frowns, pressing his palm to his temple again. You suspect he’s experiencing pain whenever he does that, but he refused the aspirins you offered him on a few previous occasions. Slowly, and like it’s taking him a lot of effort to string the words together, he speaks again.
“It was me, but …they told me I had to, that it was the right thing. Everything they told me – it made sense somehow, and it was all I ever had to go on. I wasn’t programmed to question, and when I refused to comply they… they…” his last words hung in the air heavily, his voice breaking until he couldn’t go on. You fought down a wave of nausea imagining how that sentence might have ended.
“I’m no expert but that sounds an awful lot like brainwashing to me.”
It was too much, that lost, broken, utterly miserable look he had. You took a tentative step towards him and gently wound your arms around his waist, rubbing his back soothingly. He stiffened immediately.
“Wha- what are you doing???” he asked, sounding slightly panicked.
“A hug. I’m giving you a hug.” You answered, your voice muffled against his chest. His body didn’t become even a fraction less rigid. “You can tell me to stop if it makes you uncomfortable.” You went on, making to pull away (reluctantly, he was comfortably warm and it had gotten even chillier in the meantime). Your movement was obstructed hesitantly when his right arm came up to loosely wrap around your shoulders.
“No, it’s… it’s nice,” he admitted, finally allowing himself to relax, though he still kept his left arm hanging limply by his side. “I’m just not…used to this.”