Misfortune (Bucky Barnes)

46• How I See It

Note: This chapter will be in Louise's POV.

' I'm right here, darling
Don't you worry bout' a thing,
Don't you worry bout' a thing
It's us against the world. '
-Oh Wonder, "Don't You Worry"
~

I'm sitting in a lab, staring my sister's lifeless body through a glass window. I know this is what she wanted, so I cover my fear up with hopefulness. Shuri is great at what she does and I trust her with my sisters life.

Steve puts a hand on my lower back leaning down to speak to me.

"She will be alright, Theo is the toughest girl I know." I nod in agreement hoping his accusations are correct.

Bucky on the other hand is unconvinced. He's been hovering in the lab with that stern look of thought written across his face. Steve tried to get him out of there an hour ago but he refused to move. He said something along the lines of 'I promised her'.

I admired his resilience when I came to my sister, she needed that. Theo needs someone to keep her grounded when I'm not around.

Steve and I take a seat on the couches located right outside the lab. He folds his hands in his lap giving me a worried look.

"What are you going to do when this is all over Louise?"

I shrug at his question, holding my tired head up with the palm of my hand.

"Tony needs a watch dog for any potential threats. I'm pretty good at spying, so maybe I'll take him up on that offer."

Our blue eyes meet for a moment, I can tell we are thinking exactly the same thing.

"They will be better- safer here you know. This is the perfect place to heal without any disruptions. I think you and I are a reminder of their pasts, something they can't accept just yet. I know Theodora won't ever clear her head when I'm around reminding her of the tragic childhood she faced."

Steve nods hesitantly as if knowing my words hold true.

"Plus this isn't such a bad place for a get-away," my smile meets my eyes this time, "I know they will find peace...if not here, than within each other."

I peer my head back over to the window facing the lab and watch Bucky again. Steve follows my eyes and let's out a small laugh.

"I'll have to drag him out of there soon enough."

I was weary of the soldier at first. How could I trust him when it was his hands that hurt her? But I see now, I see the way he looks at her... like he sees Theo how I see her. We would search the world for her, but she would destroy it for us.

"I don't think you'll ever get the chance," I respond meeting his eyes again.

Just as I say it a blinking alarm goes out in the medical room. I rush over to the glass just in time to see Steve grab Bucky by the arm in an attempt to get him out of the way. Shuri is hunched over my sisters body, picking at the small slice made in her head. I hold back the bile feeling in my throat and turn my attention to the men instead.

Barnes is giving him a hard time, and I'd rather not see the two break out in a fight over my sisters unconscious body.

I step in going up to Bucky at the door, "Come on James, my sister would feel better knowing you weren't breathing down her operators neck."

I can never tell if his stern face is one of anger or thought, whichever the case he obliges and follows the two of us out. I watch him sit down stiffly in the couch immediately staring down at his hands.

"How long will this go on? It's been hours," he grunts from beside Steve.

"Tony said the chip in her brain altered her DNA, it will take a while to remove that chip without causing any further damage to the existing cells," I respond gently.

"This is good though right?" Bucky says for once looking at me with a vulnerable look, "this is what she wanted?"

Steve gives him a reassuring pat on the shoulder, while I think. I remember when she was 13 and we were in a foster home with a messy past. The parents had lost their children in a fire years before and they adopted us in hopes to replace the emptiness they were feeling. Theo came to me one night crying hysterically, I asked her what was wrong and she told me she felt them. She explained she felt their grief every time they hugged us goodnight. She saw the burning home, watched the mother fall to knees weeping for her children.

Theo continued to feel their pain each and every day until it ate her away. At 13 years old... she snapped. She screamed, threw things, cried, and cried, and cried until finally we were relocated. The cycle continued every few years until the two of us finally ended up on our own.

I forgot that Bucky waited for my answer, so I gave it to him plainly.

"Theodora has seen many things that little girls should never see. She has felt every type of pain and anger before she could even understand what it meant. I have always wished for her to live without that constant fear nagging at her. She deserves this. She deserves to be free from it all."

The man gives me a curt nod, while Steve stares at me with his comforting eyes. Ever since Theo went in to get Bucky back in Bucharest, Steve has been extra concerned for my sisters well-being. I suppose before he saw her as most do, a temperamental girl. But now he understands.

Now everyone knows who Theodora June is. She is not as cold as she may seem. Deep down below all the brokenness of her mind, lies something much sweeter.

I look back up at the two men before me; Bucky with his head in his hands, Steve giving him words of encouragement. They paint a picture I've seen before.

How I see it, there is two types of people in this world. The ones like Steve and I that believe in doing the right thing, always. Then there are people like Theo and Bucky. The ones that will break every rule, run through anything in their path, bleed for, tear apart the world... for someone they truly love.

But I've come to realize, It's the broken ones that deserve all the love.