Stars ☆ PARKER

five : the awakening

To Bucky, waking up to the sounds of screams was nothing new. Whether it be from himself, the people in the nightmare screaming so loud he woke up, or Sam seeing a spider in the kitchen. So when he woke up to the sounds of screams he should not have been very surprised.

It took several moments for Bucky to escape the haze he was under from just waking up, but once he did, Bucky was less surprised and more confused. He hadn't had a nightmare, so he took up blaming and cursing out Sam until he remembered that Sam was not in the apartment because he was a mission with Steve.

It was then that Bucky took a moment to listen to the scream, it was a higher pitch than anyone in his building, and too near for it to have just been a mugging victim on the street, there was a type of pain that seemed to be scabbed over. It relatively abrupt and had stopped allowing the night air to be peaceful.

Bucky looked to his night side table where the alarm clacks green numbers glowed an annoying '2:16'. Since the screams had stopped, and Bucky rolled over and closed his eyes yet again.

Luck was not on his side, for just before he floated into a dazed and peaceful sleep another scream let out, this one was different from the first. There was even more pain and anguish in it. It lasted nearly 5 seconds before stopping.

Bucky was annoyed and confused yet again. What woman was screaming at 2:22 in the morning? He then remembered the previous day, and that his daughter was sleeping on the couch.

With the sudden remembrance, Bucky slid out of bed, threw a plain grey t-shirt over his head, and briskly stumbled down the hallway.

Anastasia was laying on the floor between the couch and the coffee table. It wasn't the part about her being on the floor that disturbed the father, it was her pale skin seeming slick with sweat, how fast her chest bobbed up and down and how desperate the breaths seemed to be. It was the way her eyebrows furrowed as if she were in pain, and it was the unnatural withering of her body which tangled the blanket he provided her hours ago to wrap and cling around her.

Her father tried to think of something to do, lost in his own thoughts he was trying to think of how Steve would wake him up from nightmares when he had first been cleared and moved into the apartment with him and Sam. Before Bucky could gently hold her shoulders down, remind her where she was, and help her snap out of it, another scream sliced through the silence.

Throwing caution to the wind Bucky vaulted the couch and knelt next to the screaming teenager. He shook her shoulders, it wasn't a particularly loving or gentle shake, but it wouldn't be enough to hurt her, at least, he hoped.

Anastasia was still seeing flashes of the guards and a slight pressure that remained from the hose as Bucky jolted her out of the dream.

It wasn't a very wise decision on his part, he recognized that as she woke and began hitting him.

"Hey, hey, calm down, you're okay!" Bucky was startled, mostly because he hadn't expected her to begin to attack her, and the rest because of how skilled she seemed to be, and the amount of blows she landed on his person. She was powerful, and although they were spastic and lacked technique, the hits were beginning to hurt.

"невыполнение является серьезным грехом, failure to comply is a grave sin," Anastasia mumbled under her breath as she threw her leg out and hit the ice of his knee, almost knocking him to the ground from surprise. Her eyes seemed glazed over as her body moved robotically, this was not the girl who had fallen asleep there.

Bucky was working to dodge blows and catch hands without hurting her when he heard the phrase she had muttered. 'Failure to comply is a sin', the pain she seemed to be dreaming about, remembering, it all seemed to fall into place within Bucky's mind.