eighty-eight.
When Nat opened her eyes, her pulse quickened in fear. She was alone and tied to a chair. It wouldn't stop her, but the scary part was the fact that she'd never been kidnapped without her allowing her captors to catch her. This time... Rumlow was fast, and he hit so fucking hard there was no way to stop him.
Feeling like he might be nearby somewhere, she called out, "So, how did you get us out of the alleyway without being seen?"
From around the corner, a clean-shaven Rumlow appeared. "There was an apartment to the left of you. Just kinda dragged you through it."
She laughed. She couldn't believe she'd been that stupid. "Is that all you did?"
He tilted his head as if to ask her what else he possibly could have done, but then he laughed. "Don't worry, Romanoff. I didn't have time to kill your man candy. No, I'm not interested in them... I'm not even interested in you... But I figured you're the fastest way to get to Steve, and he's the one that'll talk first."
She threw her head back and laughed. "Steve would never tell you anything. He may be blonde, but he's smarter than you bother to give him credit for."
"Doesn't matter. Steve will talk because I have you. If it was between say, telling me where Peter is, or me killing you... I'd bet that he'd tell me where Peter was first... And then I'd kill you anyway."
"Steve wouldn't give up Peter to save me, he knows better. He wouldn't give you Peter because that's what you want... That's what Bruce wants... But I hear Bruce isn't really your boss, huh? He's just above you."
"You hear a lot, don't you Romanoff? Who'd you hear it from? If you tell me, I'll tell you who's above me."
"Why would you do that?"
He sat across from her, brandishing his weapon with a sigh as he scratched his head with it. "Contrary to popular belief, I don't enjoy this life. It did this, to me." He gestured to his disfigured face and she chuckled.
"To be fair, you deserved it. But I've got no proof that you'll keep your word. You're Hydra. You betrayed the Captain, you raped Peter, you got May Parker killed. We trusted you, before. With our lives, Brock, and this is where that got us. You have to give me something else."
He sighed and rubbed his thumb across the barrel of his gun. "You sure do have a big mouth... I'm getting kinda tired of listening to you talk, but you're the only company for the time being so... I'm gonna regret this."
Rumlow stood and walked around the room, once again scratching his head with his gun. "We were given orders. They passed down the vine and ended up in my lap. I was meant to do the dirty work, so I did. It's my job, Nat. The original job was just to torture the kid. Get him to go crazy so he'd switch sides. We were supposed to get him to betray you, but he wouldn't. He was a tough little cookie... But I was told to make him crumble, and they told me how, and I didn't particularly enjoy it but I did it. That's what this job is. Doing things you don't like because they tell you to. It's that, or you can bite their bullet without a second chance. It was my job."
Nat noticed that he seemed to be trying to rationalize what he did for himself, to make himself feel better about what he'd done to them, to Peter. He almost looked like he regretted it, but Nat knew it had to be a facade. She was ready to put a bullet in his head.
"To tell you the truth... This is my last mission. I got my orders. I'm supposed to put a bullet in you, your man candy, and then myself."
Steve was staring intently at a wall, listening to all of the shit going on around him as he tried to figure out where Rumlow had taken Nat in the first place. Bucky was standing off to the side talking to some other officers. Bucky was the man to do all of the talking lately. It used to be that Steve was the only one allowed to talk to the media, as per Pepper's permission, being the CEO of Stark Industries and all. Everything the Avengers said reflected on Tony, who was meant to be the leader, and that reflected on Stark Industries.
So when Steve came into the picture, he was the only one allowed to do the talking because he knew what to omit from the media and how to keep the situation under control. But lately, he was lacking. he was losing patience with the media and everything they stood for. He hated what was going on in their country, but there was nothing he could do about it.
For now, the only thing he could do was what he was doing right now, and that was stay the fuck out of it and do his goddamn job. Outside of that, there was nothing he could do for anyone really. He couldn't fix the world, he couldn't even fix himself right now. His family, his life, was in shambles. Part of him was wishing he was back to being fresh out of the ice. Before Bucky came back and before he had these people to care about and look after. Back when he spent all of his spare time in his apartment staring at walls and wondering which rooftop would kill him faster.
And then everything with Rumlow went to shit, and Bucky was suddenly back in his life, even though he didn't know it. And then there was Nat, who'd been part of Bucky's life for nearly as long as Steve had been. And then came along the rest, and then Peter... Poor kid.
Steve thinks, maybe, what happened to Peter was his fault. Maybe there's a world out there where none of this would have happened to Peter, and in that world maybe there was no Steve and that's why Peter, and everyone else, would be fine. Maybe in that world, he never came back out of the ice.
He didn't like being this guy anymore. He didn't wanna be Captain America, whoever the hell that even was anymore. Steve couldn't even recognize himself in the mirror anymore, because even he couldn't see himself past the suit. He was nothing more than a shiny costume that lied to the masses because they would listen to him. Because he saved the day way back when, so he had to be listened to now.
He remembered what happened the last time people listened to him like that. Half of the team nearly got killed and there was nothing he could do about it then, and now Nat is gone and there's not much he can do about that either, except...
Just across the alley from where he was standing, was a door that led into the next building. It looked... Off. Upon closer inspection, it seemed that the door had been kicked in. Pushing the door open, he saw the aftermath of what looked like something being dragged across the floor. And then he spotted, on the white carpet, one firey red strand of hair.
He followed the carnage through the house, and then out the other side. He heard cursing, and then Bucky's heavy boot steps behind him.
"Steve, what the hell are you doin'? We gotta~"
"Shh~ Look." He pointed to a small puddle of what looked like blood. Nat had been wounded, which meant that Rumlow stopped with her, here, long enough for the blood to pool like that. "Nat may have accidentally left us a trail."
Bucky nodded and kept inspecting the ground, right up to what looked like fresh tire-tracks not far from the blood. "Steve, here."
The tracks were practically useless to them right now. It told them which way the vehicle went, but without someone like Tony or Vision to look into what kind of tires these were, they'd never find the vehicle in time. They were practically at a dead end until someone could figure out exactly what these tires went to. It was pretty much all that they could do to retreat for the time being to let the professionals find the vehicle, and then find Nat.
"You already betrayed us, but I can't believe you'd kill me, Brock. I don't think you'd get the chance."
Rumlow scoffed as he rubbed his hands on his pants. "No. I don't suppose I would. That's why I brought you here. Nice warehouse, abandoned for the weekend... They store meat. I'm sure you know what that means."
Cold. She knew it was cold. The goosebumps on both of their arms proved that. If he wasn't going to shoot her then... Then he was going to make her suffer.
"You're not gonna make it fast for me, are you?"
He shook his head. "No, and you can fight all you want, but I'm still bigger than you."
He approached her, his gun held like a club in his fist. She kicked at him but he grabbed her ankle and twisted it roughly until a sickening snap sounded between them and she groaned out in pain. She got her opposite arm free finally and swung on him, but he just grabbed and yanked it too, until she felt a disgusting pop in her shoulder and another gross snap at the elbow, and this time she screamed.
Trying to see through the overwhelming pain, she looked up at him just in time to see the handle coming towards her, and then she was out like a light.
Rumlow sighed and brushed the dust from his shirt before dragging a once again unconscious Natasha towards one of the meat lockers. He pulled the heavy door open and the blast of freezing cold air made him shiver before he dragged her inside. Carefully, he propped her up in a corner and then turned on his heel to leave.
Just before he closed the door, he tossed his pistol in with her. So if she managed not to freeze to death, she could at least kill herself before the hypothermia took over.
With one final look over her, he stepped out of the freezer, and closed the door, locking it in place behind him.
He pulled up the chair. And sat.