Ultron Aftermath

Chapter 7

AJ could hear her heart in her head. Her ears were ringing. She felt disconnected from reality. She looked down at her hands, they were shaking uncontrollably despite telling herself to stop them from shaking,they didn't.

Seeing James had sent her into a spiral of panic. He had once been the person she had trusted most in life but he broke that. She didn't understand why the universe hated her so much as to send this guy back into her life. She had just started to forget about him,as of today she told herself she was going to look forward and move on from Hydra and everything before - she had just got a new found hope for a new life here- but now the past was coming back to haunt her.

"Hey kiddo you good?"

Steve asked visibly confused on the situation. He had been the first to pick up on Aj's apparent instability, indicated by her sudden shortness of breath and uncontrollably shaky hands.

Aj inhaled quickly,grabbing her chest as she cried,

"I can't...I can't breathe!" as a result of feeling suddenly claustrophobic.

This was spurred by her position at the table, where she began to experience the unsettling sense of limited space, causing her to jump out of her seat abruptly, in attempt to relieve herself of the uncomfortable feeling.

The sudden outburst of the girl caused concern to those around her. Wanda's eyes softened as she witnessed AJ struggle to manage her distress. Wanda knew that this wasn't a foreign experience for her, she had dealt with AJ's panic attacks numerous times,what really caused concern to Wanda was the fact that Aj was spiraling so quickly and deeply, which she had not seen happen before.

Steve immediately ran over to the 9 year olds side trying to get her to calm down and take deep breathes.

Bucky cursed himself under his breathe. He caused this. It was his fault. He had convinced himself that Aj was dead and that once he was out of hydra there was no point even trying to find her. But she was never dead, she was probably waiting for him to come back but he never did, she trusted him and he let her down. He left her there and by the looks of things they broke her.

Aj sucked in another Breathe and another. As she listened to Steve's counting breathing out on the odd numbers like he had told her too. However it felt as though she was breathing but taking in no oxygen at all.

"Steve I can't"

"It's alright kiddo I've got you"

Steve gently picked up the girl and headed towards the door to the back yard, he told the others they'd be back in a minute as he did so. He figured fresh air would help.

Once they had disappeared to the yard all eyes were on Buck.

"You have a lot of talking to do Barnes" Natasha's furrowed her eyebrows at the man stood sheepishly in the corner of the room.

The man rubbed the back of his neck awkwardly. He didn't even know what to say. Luckily for him Wanda did.

"You! You was the one that left her in that fucking place" She spat with hatred.

She knew about Buck and she didn't like him, she thought he was selfish. To be a grown adult and leave a 7 year old all alone in that place was something only a Sybaritic person was capable off.

"I thought she was dead"

As the realization dawned on him, the knot in his stomach grew ever tighter and he came to grips with the fact that everything he had forced himself to believe was not true. He had failed to upheld many promises, he had hurt the little girl whom he considered family.