When It Snowed

Chapter 5 - The Eyes Never Lie

Clutching onto a window frame of the operating room, Steve watched intensely with Natasha as the doctors worked restlessly to save Fury's life. Three bullets ripped through him thanks to the marksmen that had gotten away from the two. Somehow though, the tough bastared managed to hold on from Steve and Bucky's apartment all the way to the hospital. He was bleeding internally, and the doctors didn't know if they could stop it but they were going to try with everything that they had.

The one shaken up the most over these events seemed to be the Black Widow. Natasha was close with the director, he was the one that agreed to give her a second chance when Clint recruited her from the Red Room. Now, thanks to that recruitment, she worked to help the greater good; all because of him.

Bucky remained in the background, shoulder pressed against the wall watching the operation as well. Subconciously, he continued to rub the dull spots on his fingertips ignoring the patterns that he felt from the scars.

Even staring at the operation, the only thing he could see was the shooter's eyes from the previous hours. They were sharp, cold, secluded, and strong. Those weren't the only features that caught his attention though. There was something familiar about them. The way they held the ability to freeze him in place, how they seemed to control him in that split second and ignite his chest all at once.

It made his hands sweat, his stomach tighten, and his jaw clench; and for a moment, just a moment, he thought he could feel his heart patter back to life. It hadn't moved since the day he lost her, so why did it hurt now thinking about the assassin.

Bucky didn't like the feeling he got from it, so shutting himself down once more- he turned back to the operation and more importantly, back to the Black Widow.

"Is he gonna make it?" Natasha's tired voice cracked through the silence and into the glass before her. It pulled both of the men's attention away from the operating table to to her.

Steve sighed and crossed his arms. "I don't know."

Revenge seeped into her mind immediately seeing he condition of one of her dearest friends. "Tell me about the shooter." She demanded with a cool and collected voice. Behind that collected demeanor however, Steve could sense the emotion that lay beneath.

He was going to answer, he really was. But Bucky stepped up to answer the question first. He was the one that got the best look of her after all. "5'8, 150 pounds, black hair, blue eyes, a metal arm."

Maria Hill had suddenly entered the conversation. She was Fury's right hand man when it came to everything. During the Chitari invasion, for the assembling of the Avengers, she helped with everything. So, to see Fury in this state, it was surprising at how well she was able to compose herself.

Turning to face her for more information, Natasha demanded the facts. "Ballistics?"

"Three slugs, no rifling. Completely untraceable." Mariah informed her.

The frustration dawned upon the Black Widow as if she had experienced the situation before. "Soviet-made?"

"Yeah." The other woman agreed.

All of a sudden, alarms started sounding from Fury's room. Nurses began rushing in and tampering with the equipment around them. "He's in V-tach." A doctor announced.

"Crash cart coming in."

"Nurse, help me with the drape."

Back and forth the doctors and nurses raced at full speed. Their conversation and actions went by so fast, Natasha had a hard time keeping up with everything.

"Don't do this to me, Nick." She sighed slightly as Steve took her side and she leaned into him.

Bucky watched it happen, how the Black Widow looked to Steve for comfort. It wasn't something he would ever have predicted her to do, and that just highlighted the importance of Nick Fury in this stone cold assassin's life.

"Stand back!" The doctor ordered before pulling out the defibrilator. "Three, two, one...." he counted before pressing the pads to his chest. The electricity made Fury lurch on the table but the steady line of his heartbeat remained the same. So, the doctors and nurses tried again. Then again. Then again. Then again. After so long though, the medical crew was forced to announce that Nick Fury didn't have a pulse. So, turning up the electricity, the doctors tried once more knowing that the Black Widow would have demanded them to. It came up with the same result though, the director of SHIELD had flatlined.

"Don't do this to me Nick." Romanoff pleaded again. "Don't do this to me."

The doctors had to call it. There was nothing else that they could do. The estimated time of death for Nick Fury was 1:03 in the morning.

The Winter Soldier's mission was complete.

Nick Fury was dead.

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Natasha stared at Fury's body. She hadn't moved since they wheeled him into the room covered in a sheet. He was here so the group could mourn. All Steve could do was look at her, the way her stare never left the white figure before her.

Both Bucky and Steve remained in the background letting her do what she needed to do to find comfort. When Hill came in though, the new Director of SHIELD's face was stern and locked down. Of course Mariah was hurting, but her training wouldn't allow her to crash in the wake of catastrophe. "I need to take him." she announced looking to the ground.

How they were going to get him away from Romanoff though, he didn't know. Steve offered to take the brunt of this one.

"Natasha." He softly placed a hand on her arm. Not many people were allowed to touch the Black Widow. The Captain was one of the very few she allowed to do so.

Ignoring his touch though, she placed her hand on Fury's head for one final goodbye and pulled the sheet away from his face. Then, bending over to place a soft kiss on his smooth and cold forehead, the Widow stormed out of the room in a quick manner. Bucky could see the anger in her eyes, the Widow was livid. She wanted revenge and she wanted it now.

"Natasha!" Steve called before chasing after her.

Bucky remained where he was, watching as Hill stood over Fury and looked down to him. Inside, he was mourning just as much as them. It was a terrible thing. Under Fury's orders Steve and Bucky were brought back to life, they owed him everything for granting them the opportunities that they had now.

Nick was a very important man, and neither one of them were enough to protect him.

Immediately the guilt hit him that he could have done more.

He should have known something was wrong right away. Finley's lessons taught him to recognize that. "Always be aware of your surroundings, if you have a gut feeling that something is wrong, you're probably right. It never hurts to check things out." Finally though, one piece of advice from her stuck to him the most. "Watch their eyes, the eyes never lie."

Fury's eyes were filled with fear when he was sitting in the chair of their living room; they were telling him that something was wrong- but Bucky just wasn't able to listen.

Thinking about it though, her eyes were the ones he couldn't get off his mind. The eyes never lied, they never did.

So why were the assassin's begging for help?