The Siren (Bucky Barnes x OC)

Part 7 - A Song of Mourning

It was like night had fallen around Maya. It swayed and shifted and sang around her, its stars spinning out of control. Her hair ensnared by the hands of night, dragged this way and that in a desperate attempt to escape. Blue light cut through the midnight darkness, two guiding lights that Bucky used as his lighthouse to navigate the darkness.

Sam stood in the doorway, watching, as Bucky pushed his way through the chaos of shadow that wrapped itself around Maya. Night swallowed him whole with each trying step as he shoved his way deeper into the shadows, no longer visible to Sam. A set of feathered wings consumed darkness around them, a deeper black than than that which surrounded her. The molten blue light sparkling brightly in contrast. It was a beautiful tragedy.

Bucky came to a halt once he found the calm centre of the storm. Standing behind Maya he stood there in awe at the images that flashed around him in the shadows. It reminded him of how she had shown him the possible future in his mind, but now it was all around the both of them. Distant memories of her life painted within the darkness, splashes of colour on a black canvas.

In front of him was a younger Maya laughing, wrapped in the arms of a boy. To his left was a family eating dinner at a large wooden table, to his right Maya was sitting at a camp fire, roasting a marshmallow which she handed to her mother. The memories faded, swept away by the churning shadows, only to be replaced by more. She held a camera up, taking a photo of her family on a holiday. A laptop screen with a blurred out movie played whilst she and her boyfriend kissed. A microphone held in hand as she performed to her friends and family.

The memoires were painted over once again, and repainted with hues of grey. A tear hazed image of being shoved into a van. Needles piercing the skin, pushing a blue liquid into Maya's arm. An aged man smiling, stroking her hair as she tried to move away from him.

Bucky couldn't watch any longer, or see Maya having to relive these memories. He placed his hand on her shoulder lightly, and crouched down in front of her. Eyes of volcanic blue met his own, but there was no fire left in them.

Glancing down briefly in front of him, he saw the box of heads he dreaded HYDRA punished her with. With a a subtle movement of his metal arm, he pushed it aside, all the while maintaining eye contact with the broken girl.

"What have I done?" she asked, blinking tears away.

"Nothing. You had no control over any of this." Bucky tried to sound reassuring.

"I did have control over it. If I'd stayed, my family, my boyfriend, all of them would still be alive."

"But would you be?" He raised an eyebrow.

"Am I now?" Her wings flared slightly behind her, the perfect image of a fallen angel.

Bucky let out a small sigh before standing back up. He reached a hand out towards Maya, "Come on, let's head back inside."

Ignoring his hand, she stood, walked over to the box and folded the flaps closed over the top. Cradling it in her arms, she walked through her shadows,  letting them ebb away with each step.

Sam still watched from the doorway as she emerged, Bucky just behind her. The feathery mass of wings she carried folded in on itself, vanishing with a small shiver from Maya. A grim look was plastered on Sam's face as he nodded to Bucky on the way inside.

● ● ●

The warmed handle of the shovel rested gently in Maya's hand. Dirt caked her finger nails, clothes and hair. Wild flowers were all neatly arranged atop each of the three graves. White flowers for her mother, pink flowers for her father, and red flowers for her boyfriend. Maya knelt down in front of the fresh graves, in front of the three people she had used as her guiding light of hope.