Winter's Blade // Bucky Barnes

Ghosts of Winter's Past

The hospital is flooded with people- doctors, nurses, visitors, and S.H.I.E.L.D agents- bustling up and down the hall. No one was looking at Steve as he makes his way down the hall, slipping between people unnoticed, destined for the machine containing a hidden piece of information.

Steve, hood up and shoulders slumped, approaches the vending machine, body tilted to avoid cameras and avoiding the stare of any stranger passing by. Searching the machine, what he came for was gone, the metal spring empty of gum or the flash drive. Clenching his jaw while struggling to remain calm, Steve stares dumbfoundead at his reflection. Who took it? What was he going to do now? It was his only lead to who killed Fury. To figuring out this whole mess. 

The sound of gum popping alerted Steve of her presence before Steve saw the bright red of her hair reflected in the glass. A face appears, smug and cool, to the left of mine, blowing a bubble and letting it pop. "Missing something, Rogers?" 

Spinning quickly, Steve grabs her and pulls her into the empty room across the hall, hoping to go unseen. 

"What's on it?" Steve questions, leaning over Natasha. 

"I don't know." Her voice betrays nothing but he knows better. Natasha must have an idea. 

"Do better." Steve growls.

"I only act like I know everything." The smirk appears, taunting and arrogant. It's her defense. Her way to cover up her grief for fury and anger. Her way to stall until the other person gives up information she can use. 

"Stop lying!" Steve's frustration reveals itself. He's tired of the lies and games people keep playing with him. He just wants someone to tell the truth at least one goddamn time. 

"I know who killed Fury." Steve had Natasha backed against the wall. Any other person would have been intimidated. Not Natasha. She was trained to be a living weapon. Had faced men and monsters. Steve doesn't scare her. If she wanted, she could remove him in seconds without blinking. But she let him to feel as he was in control.

"Most of the intelligence community doesn't believe they exist. The ones that do call them The Winter Soldier and Styx. Both as cold and deadly as winter itself.Hydra's perfect killing team. They're accredited with over 2 dozen assassinations in the last 50 years. And that's just the official report."

"So it's a ghost story." Steve didn't have time for foolish tall tales. 

"Five years ago I was escorting a nuclear engineer out of Iran when somebody shot out my tires near Odessa. We lost control. Went straight over a cliff. I pulled us out but the Winter Soldier was there. And so was Styx. I was covering my engineer so he shot him. Right through me." Pulling up the edge of her shirt, Natasha reveals the old scar, smooth and healed over, on her abdomen. Then, she peels back the collar of her shirt, revealing another scar, this one ragged and rough. "Next, she shot me, a centimeter to the left and I would've died. I was her one failure." She released her collar, the fabric sliding to cover the old wound. "Soviet slug. No rifling. Bye bye Bikinis."

"Yeah I bet you look terrible in them" Steve's tone expressed no amusement.
"Going after her, them, is a dead end. I know. I've tried. Like you said. A ghost story." Her smirk returned, albeit weak, as she held up the drive, offering it to Steve. Taking it from her hand and placing it in his jacket pocket, Steve back away from Natasha and crossed his arms.
"Well let's find out what the ghosts want."

Steve paused, studying Natasha. The way she spoke about these...assassins. Hydra's team. It was as if she knew them. As if she cared.

"You knew them, didn't you?" Steve kept his voice soft, not wanting to push.

"Lets just say the ghosts of my past have come back to haunt me." Natasha said with a smirk. A slight shuffle of her feet betrayed, only detectable by the extremely trained eye, the unease she hid behind her facade. Pushing off the way, Natasha headed for the door, stopping to look over her shoulder.

"Let's go soldier. Time to go face the past."

Trailing after Natasha, Steve followed her as they snuck out of the hospital to wherever the hell Natasha was planning on taking him.