The Backup

2011

The Soldier had managed to get the boy new clothes and food, washed and entirely unafraid. The boy trusted him enough to sleep while the Soldier remained awake, staring at the metal door on the opposite side of the cot.

He still could not believe that his child was alive. He could, however, believe that Department X had lied. Nothing was more important than their precious Black Widow.

And being related to the Black Widow, the Soldier wasn't surprised when they were both immediately thrown into training. It was the same cage from only two days before. The three agents that had escorted them made sure all exits were locked, and then left the room. One remained, standing in the doorway as still as a statue. A watch dog, a signal for the others to come running if the animals acted up.

The Soldier turned back around to look at Peter, who has wiped his face clean of emotion. His eyes shone with worry and anxiousness. He couldn't blame him for feeling that way.

"Backup," he said, looking him in the eyes. Peter raised his chin and locked their gazes together. "From your evaluation the other day, you need to work on your defense. A fight is made up of a mix of offense and defense, from each attacker." He clenched his right hand into a fist, bending his arm so the fist was by his chest. "A dodge or a block," he jabbed at him, aiming beside his cheek. Peter caught his wrist as he flinched to the side, eyes going wide, "could save your life."

Peter's face set into an expression of determination, still holding on to the Asset's wrist. His eyes narrowed, his mouth pressed into a tense but eased line, and his eyes screamed I will prove myself.

The Soldier could relate to that feeling.

Peter bent his knees, pivoted on his feet to spin under the Asset's arm, and pushed his elbow into the pressure point underneath his bicep before spinning himself out of the way. He quickly recouped as the Soldier judged his next move. He wanted to go easy on him, but did not want it to be overly noticeable to the statue in the doorway.

He aimed a push kick at Peter's chest. Peter jerked to the side, avoiding the blow. He wrapped his arms around his leg, swung himself underneath and pushed himself up off the floor. He crossed his legs around the Soldier's neck, and swung himself around so he was braced on the assassin's back, using the momentum to pull him to the ground. Once on the ground, Peter bent his legs to pin the Soldier's arms and hooked his arm underneath his chin, craning his neck.

"Black Widow move?" he asked, grinning.

"Yeah."

"Could use a little more refining," he said, casually, before he dug his fingers into the soft tissue behind Peter's knees. He yelled, letting him go and pushing himself away.

The Soldier quickly flipped himself onto his him, pulling his bent leg up beside him so he could push himself onto his knees. He grabbed Peter's ankle and pulled him back as he pushed himself up. He placed his hand on Peter's collar, his palm flat against his thin chest.

Even though he was following orders, training the boy, he felt wrong. Not just because the kid was his son, but because of something deeper he no longer remembered. He was tiny and weak, against an opponent that was far more advanced. That inequality dug under his skin.

He removed his hand and stood up, holding it down to his son. Peter took it, helping out as the Soldier pulled him up. "Do you know who trained you?" he asked, releasing his hand.

"A few of the guards. A Black Widow named Yelena Belova."

The name struck a chord, and he took a step back. "Is she still here?"

He shook his head. "No. She did her time, she said. Said that she had to be placed in Siberia with the others."

He nodded in response, pressing his hands flat against his pants. "Did you trust her?"

"Not for years."

"Good." He regained his composure, inhaling and exhaling deeply. He opened his mouth to speak, to continue training, but wasn't given the chance.

"Soldier!"

The pair froze, but neither looked away from each other. The voice of Colonel Karpov echoed in the Asset's ears, chilling him to the bone.

"The Backup's previous trainers are none of your business." Metal clanked as the cage was opened. "You are meant to train him, not question him."

"The information is useful. Depending on who trained him, I would know what he's been taught and how to expand on it."

"Yelena Belova is none of your concern."

Blond hair hung limply in front of a girl's face, frizzy from the heat of the room. She growled at the girl she was opposing, and slashed at her eyes with her nails.

Worry jump-started his heart, and he darted forward as the opponent stepped back, avoiding the feral attacks. He put his back to the girl with red hair, putting an arm around Yelena's front and pushing her down onto her back. His warning came out as a hiss behind clenched teeth, expression tense with irritation. "You are a Black Widow. Not a cat. Act like it."

"What the hell are you looking at?" a voice rang, vibrating in his skull.

"It should have been me, not her."

Lia, his mind reminded him. You called her Lia.

His double-layered reality returned to one when a slap cracked across his face, pushing his head to the side. With that slap, the nickname ran away from him, and he suddenly felt empty. So close to some sort of answer, until it was torn away.

"What do we do with him?" one of the agents asked. The Asset shut down, letting his chin drop submissively and becoming the statue he was expected to be.

"Wait. We'll wipe him tomorrow morning. Give them another half hour in here, then take them back." The red-capped officer pushed through the agents to leave the cage, and the guards followed behind him. The cage was locked, an agent remained at the door, and, beyond the red mark on the Soldier's cheek and the Backup's horrified expression, it was like the Colonel had never stepped into the room.

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"Peter?" he asked, wanting the boy's attention.

The ten year old laid on the cot, curled up in a tight ball. He kept his back to the door, since he knew he would be kept safe by his father. After an aching moment of silence, he asked with a crack in his voice, "Papa?"

The Asset flicked his gaze away from the door, landing on Peter's vaguely outlined form. He could just barely see him through the darkness, only enough for the assurance that he had not disappeared, that the Soldier had not, in fact, made him up.

As if knowing what the Soldier wanted to discuss, he whispered, "What do they do to you?" His voice sounded wet and strained, like he was scared or on the verge of tears.

The Soldier sighed, pushing himself up from the chair. He took the few steps to the cot and sat down on the floor, putting his arm on the other side of the pillow, beside Peter's head. He leaned his head into his knuckles, his face close to his son's. He asked, "Why do you want to know that?"

"They are mean to me. Are they mean to you, too?"

"You saw what happened earlier. I think you know."

Peter shifted, moving closer to the soldier, his hair brushing his bicep and shoulder. "The Colonel hit you."

"They've hit you, too, I have no doubt," he whispered, sadly. Reluctantly, he said, "It's just the environment we're in. We can't help it. We can't let it faze us, bub."

"But you're the Winter Soldier!" he exclaimed, as if his father hadn't known that. In reality, he knew it all too well. "You're stronger than any of them! They always talk about you."

"And what would you hear?"

"Some of them are really scared of you. Others just see you as...a lot of unkind things. Do you know what they say about you?"

He nodded, glancing away from Peter so he couldn't see his face. If this went further, he'd be back in the chair for sure. "Yeah. I know what they say." A muscle in his cheek twitched and he firmly pressed his lips together. "Peter, there's a lot about me that you don't understand, and it's hard to grasp. What they do to me is beyond what they have ever done to you. You need to know, sooner rather than later. What is going to happen tomorrow morning will affect you, too."

"Is it why you don't remember anything?" he murmured, defeatedly.

He wet his lips before saying, "They take my memories. When I met your mother, they didn't know much about me, and I was able to pretend that I wasn't having issues. She started doing the same thing. We were both avoiding treatment so we could be together. When they figured out about us, they tore us apart and tortured us with it. Now, if I remember anything of her, it's just a woman with fiery red hair. No name, no face, just that she was there. And she was beautiful."

"How did you remember me?"

"When the Superior suggested you were my son, what little I could remember of her triggered the memory of you. That you existed. And remembering you triggered more of her."

He suddenly grinned. "Can you tell me more about her?"

He sighed. "Then we have to get back to the point. Alright?"

Peter nodded eagerly, happily agreeing.

The Soldier raised his left hand. Though part of him never wanted to touch his son with the piece of him that was the cause of so much death, he gently pushed his metal fingers through Peter's brown curls. When he began to speak, his words were softly spoken and not a bit rushed.

"I was an instructor for the Black Widow Ops Program. She was a Black Widow. The very best - still is, in my mind. I trained her, and she stood out from the other girls. I decided that I had to know her. Through that, we fell in love. We shouldn't have, but...I think when it's true and real, you can't help it. Webroke rules, risked our lives, and had you. That was when we decided that we had to leave." The Soldier was plagued by a smile unlike any other, hands on his chest that pushed him into another room, a kiss that lit him up from the inside. He was barely aware of the corner of his mouth curling up in a vague smile of his own. "I don't remember how, but we got caught just outside of the city. We were so close, but so far at the same time." He paused, a thought having popped into his head. "Have you ever seen the sun, kid?"

"The sun?" The confused look on Peter's face saddened him.

"It's in the sky. Outside."

"I've never been outside. What's the sun?"

"It is..." He wracked his brain to remember astronomy. He knew this, the information came and went every now and then. "It's a ball of gas in space, millions of miles away. It lights up the world. Our world. You've seen fire, right?"

He nodded, staying silent.

"It's a big ball of fire. Is that easier to imagine?"

He nodded his head again. "What else is there?"

"In space, there's tons of things. Moons, stars. Planets. Completely different galaxies."

"I wish I could see all that."

Carefully, he said, "One day. One day you'll get to see them, and I'll be right beside you, pointing out all the constellations for you."

Peter remembered the point of the conversation. "How do they take your memories, Papa?"

"They have a giant chair that they strap me to. It...it shocks my brain, and they do it for a long enough period that I forget everything that makes me your papa. That makes me...me. They've implanted certain technologies that let them manipulate me. There are words that are used to make me into their asset, instead of just being some guy who has no memory. Since your mother and I were caught, they do it more often. Every few months, at least, or as needed. Right now, they can tell it's needed." His voice broke at the end of his sentence, and he cursed himself as he pushed his face into his arm, Peter's hair ticking his jaw.

"After tomorrow morning, you won't remember me?" The lonely, lost tone in Peter's voice caused tears to suddenly build in his eyes. The Soldier had only ever had one person to rely on, but she had known how to work around the brainwashing. Peter was new to this, young, and he wasn't prepared for that severity.

"You can try to make me remember," he said with a tremble in his voice, a little hopefully. "It-It won't work for a little while, but it'll eventually start to help. You can't hold back in training, because I won't be able to. I could kill you if they told me to."

Peter rolled over, wrapping his arms around the Soldier's shoulders, pressing his teary-eyed face into his throat. At hearing a choked sob, the Soldier put his arms around Peter, set his chin on his brown curls, and closed his eyes; willing himself not to break down to dust.