Frozen

California Part VI

Note: 18+ Content

Bucky emerges from the shadows. I stay still, like a deer under headlights, afraid that if I make the wrong move he will either kill me or flee.

"Bucky..." I whisper.

I want to call Steve, I want to scream, I want to wake up from this absurd nightmare. The best I can do right now is get as much information as I can.

"Bucky, Steve is looking for you." I make the mistake of moving my hands, and Bucky makes a run for the window like a cat looking to escape. "Wait! James!" I shout his name.

It's his turn to stop in his tracks.

"James." He repeats.

"Yes, Sargent James Buchanan Barnes."  I open my camera and start recording video, at least I can capture the audio and send it to Steve later.

Bucky turns to look at me. He looks like his been through it, his hair is longer, and he has grown a beard. Those starling steel blue eyes seem to take everything too.

"Do you remember me, from last May?" I softly ask.

He seems confused, crocks his head to the side.

"Was I send to kill you twice?"

The words punch me in the stomach, knocking the air out. I don't really understand the question.

"The Winter Soldier was sent to kill my parents. Then, last spring, me." I answer despise the pain. I make sure that the distinction is clear between the assassin he was made to be to who he really is. "James, Bucky... you can comeback with us. Steve can help you."

He is not willing to answer.

"The woman... the woman in the bridge. Who is she?" He asks instead.

It takes me a good few seconds to search my brains to make sense of what he is saying. Then it clicks he is asking about Natasha.

I am still very unsure of his intentions, if I am talking to Bucky or The Winter Soldier, and giving Nat's name would be a big mistake if I am wrong.

"If you were to come with me you would see her. She is my friend, and I won't tell you anything else until I know you are not a threat."

For the first time, Bucky seems to consider it. I am about to say something else when my phone rings.

It happens in slow motion; we both look at the phone in my hand, Steve's name flashing on the screen, then at each other.

I realize that there is a chance I could be dead on the next few seconds, and I am not passing the chance to hear his voice again.

I answer at the same time that Bucky closes the distance between us in less than a heartbeat. I feel the flash of cold touch when he grabs my phone so I shot "Steve!"

My phone is reduced to ground metal and glass as it is crushed with ease while not breaking eye contact with me.

"Tell him not to come looking for me, it won't end well." He warns me as the last of what once's was a working piece of technology fall to our feet.

Fear floods me from my head to my toes, I would be a fool not to be afraid, but as I see my own reflection in his eyes, and contrary to the cold delivery of his words, I don't perceive violence from him.

Not like before. No when there was nothing in him but the teachings of HYDRA.

He turns around and makes his way back to the window. I snap out of my daze to shout "He won't stop James, no matter what!"