Bucky's Diary

May 4, 2007

Rise – Katy Perry
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Dear Diary,

After walking straight into the HYDRA facility last month, I've been kept in my room all alone while they ran tests on me. It hasn't been painful thankfully, but I have a bad feeling that's all coming to an end terribly soon.

I've been on free will the whole time simply acting like they're controlling me, my only fear is that I'm not being convincing enough. Seriously, these HYDRA agents are very good at detecting lying Soldiers such as myself.

Though, I've made it a month already so maybe it worked. Yet, I can't help but worry due to the simple fact that I've been practically quarantined from everyone else in the facility for the past month. It's like they're afraid I'll transmit my free will to everyone else here.

I suppose it could be worse.

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This morning, unlike the last few, I was awakened by an Agent. He instructed me to get into my uniform, which was something else that was... strange.

I did as I was told and got dressed, awaiting their next instruction. When the man came back, he was accompanied by three armed Agents. I was told to go with them, so I did so without attempting to break free. After all, I had walked in the front door of this place all on my own, so they couldn't possibly be afraid that I'd run.

We entered a room that seemed familiar, it felt like something I'd seen in a fever dream before, or perhaps it was actually something I'd experienced before.

They chained my hands together and threw me to the floor before an empty chair, making me realize that this was the very room in which I'd first met Alexander Pierce. I wondered immediately if it was him I was meeting with again today, especially after the Agents left me in there alone and bolted the door shut.

I looked around the poorly lit room to see if I recognized anything or if I could notice any changes in it since I'd last been there. My eyes first were drawn to a large encompassing darkness at the back of the room, something I'd failed to take note of before. I wondered what was back there- what they were hiding.

The door snapped open and the heavy metal dragged across the ground as a man walked in all on his own. Because there was only one light in the room, its dim orange glow hovering above me, this man stood in the dark from my perspective.

"Soldier," he addressed me, a thick New York accent breaking through immediately; he's clearly an American like I am. This wasn't the man I met before, he was someone new, certainly not Alexander Pierce.

I turned to face him, my eyes looking over his shadow as he stood in the dark.

He stepped forward and the light hit him, his dark brown hair cut short at the sides and longer on top, his stubbly facial hair, his muscular arms, the black clothes he donned– and his yellow-green eyes that bore a deep hole into mine as they scanned my face.

"Welcome home; James, is it?" he said, his voice raspier than it had been before. "Can I call you James?"

I thought about it. I'd prefer James to Soldier or to Bucky, because both of those words had a past I wasn't willing to face right now. I nodded and met his eyes again, a smirk creeping onto his face. I looked down.

"So, James," he started anew. "How was your time in Moscow?"

I quickly met his eyes, shocked that he'd even mention that. "Uh... I-"