One
“Bring her around. We aren’t here to cater to whenever she chooses to finally wake up,” drolled the accented and clearly annoyed voice from the doorway before a bucket of icy water was tipped over the mess of blonde hair that hung like curtains about the unconscious face of a seemingly delicate woman.
Anosov. Sasha Anosov was that man’s name, as the woman would later learn.
With a frightened gasp, followed by a hyperventilating panic, the woman struggled against the metal cuffs that encircled her wrists, ankles and neck, binding her to the rigid chair.
“Nice of you to finally join us Dr. Harvey… Or do you prefer Red?” The man from the door emerged out of the slight darkness so that the shivering blonde could see him properly as he held an open file in his hands that he seemed to skim through instead of focusing on her. “It’s so hard to tell, sometimes. Our intel hardly provides us with preferences like that, so we have to ask.”
For a moment, he looked up at her expectantly, as if awaiting her to answer, but she didn’t, and he couldn’t quite tell if she was simply in shock or being defiant. Maybe both, given her history. After all, it had been quite the traumatic experience extracting her from her apartment basement garage. She had tried to put up quite the fight, but ultimately it came to an end when The Asset finally managed to get his hand around her throat and held her with her feet dangling helplessly over the pavement until she fell unconscious. It was a sight that Sasha had to admit, had a sort of beauty to it. She had successfully eliminated three of the four he had sent to extract her, and he was struck at how horrified she had seemed at being forced to take a life. Had it been her first time pulling that trigger with it aimed on another human being, or did she just value life so dearly that she intrinsically reacted that way anytime she was forced to take a life? Though how, as a SHIELD PSYCH Specialist, she would have ever had the opportunity to kill another person, he didn’t know. Maybe she had secrets as dark of the rest of them… Questions and thoughts to keep him busy in the long, dull hours that were certain to follow while they waited for her to crack.
“No? Red it is then. Easier, less personal. Anyway, let’s just make this easy on everybody and you tell us what we need to know and it will save us all the hassle, yes?” Though he knew better than to expect her to just give him the answers he needed. However, he enjoyed the drama of it all, even though more silence followed. “We need the information of Steven Roger’s security detail, his weaknesses, and your SHIELD mainframe access codes.”
Only then did she make a sort of strangled noise, paired with a look of horror as a sort of realization dawned on her… And he smirked.
“Well, that’s just to start. You’re quite valuable to us, my dear. You know many things that we need.” And then he paused on purpose, to bridge the last of the distance between them until the toe of his boot inched over the drain between her bare feet. “And you will tell us… One way or another.”
His knuckles brushed a stray lock of hair back behind her ear before she flinched away from his touch, and then he turned around, walking back towards the door. “Send in The Asset. Inform him that she has a fear of drowning and hates freezing. But make sure he knows to not kill this one this time.”
And then he was gone.
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The Asset. That was what they called him. That wasn’t his name, but that was what they called him. Sometimes, they called him The Winter Soldier, but that sounded wrong in his head too. He had another name, one he couldn’t remember, one from a long time ago, when he was someone else. He called himself Winter instead, but only in his head. No one else could hear. He was supposed to only follow orders, answer direct questions.
It had been three days since he had caught the target: a flimsy woman who seemed about his height. She had tried to shoot him, as he had those assigned to the mission with him, and she had emptied the entire clip trying to shoot him anywhere, but his reflexes had been faster and his metal arm had blocked the bullets. It was an annoying thing really, but manageable. She had still ended up unconscious with his metal hand wrapped around her throat, squeezing until she stopped squirming and she went limp.
That made Sasha happy, and when Sasha was happy, Winter wasn’t punished.
He remembered sitting in the back of the windowless van with The Target, she was laid across the floor and he sat at the back doors so that he was between her and the only available exit to her, but she never stirred once. However, he took note of her even breathing, the rise and fall of her chest in the white button down she wore, and how her face sometimes scrunched up as though she were in pain, but then it would fall slack again, and he almost thought she looked as though she was peacefully sleeping. Did that mean when her face scrunched up that she was having nightmares like he did?
It had been three days since he was escorted down the dark halls to the room with the metal door that locked from the outside. He had killed many people inside that room, but he had been specifically that he was not to kill The Target this time, no matter what, which almost disappointed him. Watching that light fade from their eyes and see that look of peace settle on their relaxed faces after days of horror and pain was his favorite part. He always liked seeing it all end so that it could be quiet again.
It had been three days of having a towel over her face while her chair was knocked back on the floor while he held a hose of icy water over her head, listening to her choke and gasp, watching her struggle and shiver as she slowly drowned. But still, she said nothing. She never once answered his questions.
Three days of listening to her cry.
Three days of watching her freeze.
He hated the cold. He felt sorry for her.
Today was supposed to be different. He had new orders. They wanted him to try something new.
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A part of her had always worried this day would come. A part of her always knew that she would never truly be safe after following Steve to SHIELD. Still, he had reassured her so many times. He had said she would be safe if she worked for SHIELD, rather than in the private sector. They could protect her, she would make more money, and she would be doing a real difference rather than catering to spoiled teens with drug addictions and their parents’ bank accounts to burn.
And she had listened to him. He was her best friend, after all, and she was his.
It wasn’t quite an orthodox relationship, considering he had sought out her services and clinic at Clint Barton’s suggestion. Though, it had been flattering at first, and amusing to know that even with the world at his disposal, the great Captain America wanted a quiet, calm place to unburden his mind, rather than with the elite therapists that SHIELD was certain to have. What had started as a client and his therapist eventually turned to a trusted friendship, and mutually beneficial one at that.
And so she transferred to working for SHIELD, specializing in counseling high value assets at SHIELD.
Steve had promised she would be safe there, that nothing bad would or could ever happen to her there. No client would ever attack her, or at least get away with it without someone coming to her aid within seconds, and that was a luxury that she hadn’t had before, and had the marks to prove it.
It had been a late afternoon when after a rather troubled teen had lashed out that Steve had found her in her office with the door ajar, the office in disarray, and her unconscious on the floor with fresh bruises in various places and a pair of scissors embedded in her thigh.
Not long after she had been finally released from the hospital, that she accepted the job offer from SHIELD.
“No matter what, if nothing else, I will always protect you, okay Doc?”
That had been Steve’s promise, but where was he now? Wasn’t he supposed to save her from all of this? Wasn’t he supposed to break down the door, shield in hand, and save her? Wasn’t that what he had promised?
But it had already been three days.
Maybe she wasn’t that important after all.
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Winter stared at the open flame that stood between him and Red -that’s what the others called her, when they weren’t laughing and calling her ‘Doc’, though why that would be funny, he just couldn’t understand. For a moment, he was mesmerized by the way the flames danced and glowed and relished in the warmth that radiated off of it, but his jaw nearly fell slack when he looked up and took in the expression on her face.
There was a smile there. There was peace written across her face as she stared intently at the fire in front of her. She didn’t shiver. She didn’t cry. She simply smiled as though her neck and wrists were not horridly bruised, as though nothing had happened over the course of the last few days. She almost seemed like a different person to him, one he had never met before.
“Thanks…” Her voice was hoarse and quiet, but calm, and his jaw clenched in response at her misplaced gratitude, her blind trust and the forgiveness that was so plainly written in her eyes as they finally looked up at him. She thought he had done this for her, to help her…
“Nyet,” came his blunt, and short reply. Her warm, grateful gaze quickly turned cold with a fear that he was far more familiar with, and for a moment, he regretted causing that change in her, for losing that almost adoring look that she gave him. He couldn’t remember any time anyone had looked on him like that. But that simple word from his lips had been all it had taken for her to shrink back against her chair and try as best as she could to shrink from him as his metal hand lifted to rest in the heart of the open flames.
His gaze never left her as her instinctual fear turned to morbid curiosity that drew her out of her shell for only a moment until her thoughts began to run with the possibilities and arrived at a dire and horrifying conclusion. He felt a sinking feeling in his stomach as he watched her thought process turn until she was squirming, trying and hoping to find some weakness in her restraints that she had somehow missed before, but to no avail.
“Access Codes. Now.”
His voice sounded more like a plea to his own ears than the threatening bark it had been the days before. Didn’t she know that with that simple answer, this would all be over? They didn’t have to cross this bridge? She could make it all so easy on herself and escape this agony if she would only tell him what his masters needed to know. Obedience was so much better than fighting it. He had memories and scars that attested to that end and had learned his lesson. She was so smart, so they said. How could she not choose to simply obey?
Slowly, taking his time as though he were stalking his prey, he walked around the side of the elevated, metal basin that held the burning logs, leaving his left hand in the flames until he moved around to the side of her chair, letting his metal fingers that now seemed to glow hover menacingly over the exposed skin of her arm while she squirmed, trying to pull her hand away from the intense heat that singed the blonde hair from her arms.
“Steve Rogers protection detail.”
But the only sounds to answer him was the crackle of the flames in front of her, and her own, hyperventilating breath. Inwardly, he sighed as he stepped behind her chair and lifted his metal hand dangerously close to her jaw as if to carefully caress the delicate skin.
“His weaknesses…” He could see how she trembled from this place above her, see how her hands shook and how rigid she was postured, and that same plea that had fueled his first demand returned with a word of its own: “… Please.”
He didn’t want to hurt her. If he could not kill her, she would live in pain forever, suffering at his masters’ hands with no reprieve. If she didn’t answer him with anything helpful, he would be forced to hurt her. Still, he continued circling her until he came back to stand at the side of the raised fire pit once more, extending his hand into the flames to ensure that it was as heated as possible. He stayed there for a moment, unable to look at her, knowing just what he would see in her eyes… Until… Just maybe…
Carefully, he moved to kneel over the drain between her feet, so that he was nearly eye level with her. His metal hand hovered in warning over the exposed skin of her upper right arm and whispered that plea once more: “Please.” Couldn’t she see? Couldn’t she tell that he had no desire to hurt her?
But his lips pursed together at the acceptance in her eyes, the dead, hopeless look that filled the dark green in her eyes. She wouldn’t answer him. She would take pain to protect the secrets and trust that had been instilled in her. It was honorable, but a sort of knot settled in his stomach knowing that he could not leave this room without either answers or proof trying to get them written in her skin.
“Shhhh…” Silent tears began to trail down her cheeks and his lips quirked into a frown at the sight as she tried so desperately to hold back a sob. “Shhhh…” His flesh hand came up to brush the tears away as his metal hand wrapped around the pale skin of her arm, making a sort of a sizzling sound.
And she screamed.
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They had been making fun of her all through the evening while he sat quietly, mimicking her screams as if it were some sort of joke. He did not see the joke in it. He could clearly remember her screams, every single one, until her vocal chords gave out and left her nearly silent. It was not funny to him.
Nor was it funny to Sasha, who had seemed pleased, and just commented “Mmm… The Captain will not like that we’ve damaged his little gem. How interesting. How much he’ll hate himself for all of this…”
It was nothing that made sense to Winter, but it was not his job to understand, it was his job to complete the mission as ordered.
But he could not seem to move his mind back to its quiet place that he usually could even during a mission. He was troubled, and the sight of her having fallen unconscious from the agony after the ordeal didn’t sit well with him. Nor did the fact that none of the others here seemed bothered that she had been given neither food nor water the entire time she had been here. Even he was now treated better than that. If he was to ensure that she did not die, that needed to change.
Using his ghost-like stealth, he snuck away from the crowd of Hydra agents to gather the things he needed.
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He had hoped she would remain asleep through most of the care that he took to applying medicine and ointment to the welted, burnt marks he left on her, but as was half way through applying the healing oil to the last of her burns, she finally stirred… In a moment of panic, he covered her mouth with his flesh and cool metal hands to stifle her scream as she seized and tried to get away from him.
“Shhhh.” If they were discovered now, they would both suffer, he for helping her, and she by being given to another to try and extract the information from her. He needed her to calm, to quiet and still so that he could help her.
It took several, long moments of her quietly sobbing with his hands clamped tightly over her mouth before she calmed enough that he dared release her. Tears had spilled all across her face and his hands and silently, he reached down to the supplies he had gathered and retrieved the small, slightly dirty cloth that he had stolen from the unguarded laundry and took gentle care to wipe her cheeks first before drying his own hands.
Next, he wordlessly refocused on finishing up attending to her burn, applying the healing ointment with extra care now that she was awake. He didn’t look up to face her while he worked, unable to bring him to see again that look of fear in her eyes that had been for him as she awoke. He was here to help her, and he could not bear to for her to look on him as a monster, even in this moment.
Time found her with her restraints opened so that she could eat, stand, stretch, and sleep. A flat pillow and pathetic blanket had been provided for that end, leaving her unsure of what he was doing or even why. She remembered the plea to his voice from before he had ever touched her with his branding hand. Had he been asking her to not force him to do this?
But his voice broke the silence with a question.
“Dr. Harvey or… Red? Your name?”
He seemed perplexed and concerned from where he sat by the wall, watchful like a sort of guard. Whether he was keeping her in, or keeping her safe from the others, she wasn’t sure, but maybe it was both.
She yawned once, curled up on the dirty floor with the pillow folded in half beneath her head and the blanket covering as much of her as she could as she answered him simply with: “My name is Ruby.”