Intertwine

96 - A Calculated Risk

ALINA

"Stop moving." Bucky's voice was gruff and impatient.

"I'm trying but it really," I bit down on my lip and closed my eyes, "it really stings."

He was dealing with the burn Wheel had dealt me on the top of my arm, which had gone through my jacket and shirt. It was enflamed now, massive blisters running across the top of my shoulder, going near my neck. The skin was raw and angry. 

"It would be easier if you took this off." He pointed to my sports bra.

I leant away from him. "Not in your wildest dreams Barnes." 

"It's not because I want to see you naked, it's because the skin is going to stick to it, and it'll be a lot less painful if you took it off now rather than when your body's begun to merge-"

"Fine." I spat. I got up and walked to the kitchen, pulling a knife out of a drawer and making a careful cut at the top of my bra, peeling away the material from just the top of my shoulder so I could keep most of the bra on. "This is not ideal." I muttered, sitting back down.

"You're telling me?" He shook his head as he continued to carefully dab anti-septic onto my shoulder. "Only person I'd like to be stuck with less is that ass Wilson."

"Hey don't hate on my buddy." I tried not to wince. "He's a decent guy."

Bucky shook his head. "I'm going to have to take the skin off the blisters."

"I thought you weren't supposed to pop them?"

He sighed. "You're not, but we can't go to a hospital or they'll find us. You're lucky this is only bad second degree, if that blast was any hotter and you'd need skin grafts." 

"Great." I muttered. "You're not going to mutilate me right?"

"I wish." He grunted, beginning to sterilise a needle. "You've got some burns on your face too."

"Oh." I hadn't realised. "Must have been from the explosion."

"Anything on your legs?" He asked.

I had been so concentrated on my broken ankle and the massive cut on my leg, as well as everything that had happened to my top half, that I hadn't even thought about surface wounds on my legs. I'd never been wounded worse. This was agony. I was definitely going to be left with some war scars. 

"I haven't checked." I admitted. "Probably. My ankle's been smashed and I've got a massive cut on my leg."

"Jesus Alina, you really went hard today." He shook his head again. "You could have been killed."

"I know." I said quietly. "I was there."

He sat back and looked at me. "You've got to be more careful. I'm going to need to stitch up your arm wound from earlier too."

"And my leg." I sighed. "And my chest." The cut on my chest was just above where my sports bra ended, and the one Aditi had fixed was just below. "Wheel stabbed me with his staff twice. The second time it went all the way through me. I thought I was really done for then. Somehow Aditi was able to..."

"Able to?" He asked, beginning to remove the burnt skin from my shoulder. "Keep talking."

I grimaced. "This really fucking hurts." I whispered.

"Keep talking Stark." He ordered.

"She," I took a sharp intake of breath as he removed another blister, "she somehow was able to tap into my healing power. Neither of us understand it."