The Archangel (Avengers Fanfic)

Chapter Six

Later that evening, Bucky managed to corner me in the training room. "What's your problem with me?" He demanded.

"I don't have a problem with you." I tried to play it off and walk away but he saw right through me.

"That's bullshit and you know it."

I scoffed and tried to walk away a second time, "I don't have time for this."

"Make time," he insisted, pointing towards the mats I had seen Natasha and Clint going at each other on earlier.

"You really wanna do this?" I asked as I relented and stepped onto the mat.

He stepped onto the mat as well, "if you're not gonna be honest with me, the least you could do is put up a good fight." I smirked, I could definitely do that.

***

We had been going at each other like wild animals for the better part of the night, at one point even smashing chairs against each other. He was good, and with his metal arm, it would have been difficult for anyone else to match him but we traded blows as naturally as we breathed, learning each others patterns and anticipating them, it was what Hydra had drilled into us. But I knew that we both were holding something back, not using enough force to kill or seriously injure each other.

It was either really late at night or really early in the morning and neither one of us showed any signs of wanting to stop, it felt good to get my anger out against him, I could only imagine he felt the same way. But with each blow I gave him, my anger never dissipated, it became all consuming, I hated the man, hated him with everything I had, and sparring this way with him—keeping myself from harming him—wasn't helping. I could feel myself slowly sinking back into the training Hydra had drilled into me even without that device, like a child would a safety blanket, unfortunately, that just made me even deadlier to fight against.

I felt the itch of me turning to metal just before his fist crashed against my cheek. He held his flesh fist against his body as he growled, "what the hell? You could've broken my hand, didn't Hydra keep you on a tighter leash?" Leash? Yes, like a dog.

Something in me snapped when he said that, Hydra's training took over me and I started hardcore trying to kill the man. I drove him backward, out into the hallway and across towards Tony's workroom, there had to be something in there that could kill the bastard, if not I'd just use my bare hands. I wrenched the door off of one of Tony's cars and smashed it into Bucky's face, or attempted to, he used the other door as a shield.

"What the hell is wrong with you?" He had noticed that something wasn't right with me. I didn't like that word, leash, as if I were some sort of pet, no, not even a pet, he was the pet, I was nothing. I was struggling against the mentality I had in Hydra, that my anger was the only thing keeping me alive and I had to feed it by giving it someone to fixate on, someone to blame, but I could feel myself losing to it.

I slammed his face into the hood of the same car. The words felt alien to me but they echoed the sentiments I had for the past seventy years, "While you were stuck in cryofreeze, I was being tortured! You were always the good soldier, the favorite, they'd never risk your life, just mine. Because you were their precious Winter Soldier! But they didn't care about their slave as long as they had their pet." I grabbed one of Tony's sharper objects, I didn't care what it was, and slashed at him like I was using a knife, he managed to dodge out of the way before the sharp edge could pierce his flesh.

He disarmed me, flinging the knife into the car's leather seats. "You need to calm down, Archangel."

"That's not my name!" I turned away from him, some smaller part of me not wanting to kill him, so I slammed my fist into the hood of Tony's car instead of his face or chest, creating a huge dent. "It's just something else they took from me that they didn't take from you, James." I felt myself returning to flesh as the fight left me. This wasn't me, this was Hydra, Hydra was the one who wanted me to be a murderer, a nothing, not me, I wasn't this, was I? "I can't do this right now." He tried to get me to stop, but I shrugged him off and returned to my room, knowing that isolation was my only solace.

***

Both Bucky and I came down to breakfast late, or should I say lunch, I mean it was one o'clock already. "And where have you two been?" Tony asked as we came in at around the same time, he naturally assumed we came together—which we didn't.

"Sleeping." We replied simultaneously.

"Well that's odd, it's one o'clock and neither one of you are teenagers."

"We noticed." I replied, a little miffed, I could've slept at least an hour longer. "Didn't get much sleep last night." Tony didn't know what had happened between the two of us, or that the aftermath had kept me awake until well after sunrise.

I immediately knew that was a bad choice in words as Tony's eyebrows shot up. "And pray tell, what were you two doing that you didn't have time to sleep?"

I glanced at Bucky briefly from the far side of the counter—we had automatically avoided being near each other due to last night—before looking back at Tony, "working out our issues." Another bad choice in words.

"You mean, you resolved your issues, I'm still unsatisfied." Bucky interjected. I mentally facepalmed, this could not get any worse.

"Bucky? Shut up before I stab you."

"Like you did last night." I swear I could strangle him right now.

Tony held up his hands, "whoa, whoa, I'm all for details, but keep those ones to yourself. I mean, I hope you at least broke some furniture with the ruckus you were making."

"Now that you mention it, there might be a few chairs that need repair." This time I for-real facepalmed. "I mean, we were pretty rough with each other." I forcefully took in a breath and looked to the sky, hoping for some sort of god to grant me the strength not to kill him. "She left some pretty nasty marks on me, my one consolation is that she's sore too, very difficult to accomplish by the way."

"That's it!" I threw him against one of the pillars.

"Seriously! We had round six like two hours ago, you really wanna go for seven?" He wasn't lying, he had come across me pacing in the hallways like a maniac and I had punched him after he startled me and one thing led to another, that's how he ended up sporting that cut on his cheek that made him look slightly roguish.

"Jesus Christ!" I threw my hands up, "you may not be up to date with twenty-first century sexual innuendos, but I am! So shut up before your mouth gets us in more trouble than we already are."

Bucky started coughing, "sorry, what?"

I pointed at Tony, who looked like a deer in headlights, "he thinks we're doing the nasty because you can't keep your damn mouth shut. I mean, seriously! How did you think he would take it?"

"Like a normal person! You tried to stab me and we were very destructive when I defended myself from your psychotic side." Fair enough, I deserved that after my loss of control.

I took a deep breath to settle myself and turned calmly to Tony who looked as if he were watching world war three start. "Tony, we were sparring, not having sex. And if it ever does happen between the two of us—which is very unlikely, by the way—you will be the first to know and I will share all the dirty details, but we're not . . . just, no." I trailed off, not wanting to say it out loud.

"Oh thank god," Tony put a hand to his chest, "next time you decide to do this," he gestured vaguely in our direction, "do it at a reasonable time." He was halfway through the door when he turned back and said, "and break someone else's stuff!" He didn't know yet, but he would find out soon enough, and I didn't want to be around him when that happened.

Once we were certain he was out of earshot, Bucky asked, "you're not gonna tell him about—"

I put up a finger, and a moment later, I could hear Tony shout, "are you kidding me!?"

"I think he knows."

"What do you suggest we do?"

"Run, definitely run."