INFERNO || Bucky Barnes

3

"Please have a seat Ms. Redman, we need to talk." Nick Fury motioned to the seat where she sat before with SSA Carson.

"I won't bite," He said as he sat down. The first thing she noticed was that he didn't have any fire protective gear on. But Inferno stayed still, didn't dare to move a muscle. She could feel Force Croixa smiling wide within her. "It's nice to finally meet in person."

Inferno cautiously stood up and took the seat across Fury. She was confused: the Avengers were basically disbanded, why was he here?

"I've heard about you, heard about what the Avengers did to your brother. Heard about what you did to your parents." Inferno winced back at his last words. She tried not to think about that, pretend it didn't happen.

"Oh don't worry, I don't judge. I meet people just like you all the time: people who do bad things but really aren't that bad. At least, that's what I think you are. Am I right?" She just stared at him instead of answering. Fury laughed a little then shook his head.

"Okay, well, how about a movie? You like movies?" He asked as he waved his had at the door, telling someone to come in. The door swung wide and two fireproof suit clad guards wheeled in a flat screen TV. As they were doing that, Fury kept talking:

"I've known about you for a long time. S.H.E.I.L.D knew about you since your parents brought you home. Hell, I know it may sting to hear, but Captain America knew about you way before Sokovia. So, again, it's nice to finally meet you." She held her breath at his words. He needed to stop talking about that kind of thing, stop talking in general before Force Croixa made her do something she couldn't reverse.

"Shut up," she whispered, anger obvious in her voice.

"So she does speak. Fascinating," Fury quipped as the two guards walked out the door and the lights clicked off. Fury moved his chair to face the TV. "But the shows starting so no talking."

The TV lit up. It was a black screen with a time stamp on it: 8:00 PM. Then the screen showed the picture.

It was a video of a barn, the view from across the dirt road. Two people, a man and a woman, the Freemans, walked in. Then fifteen minutes of nothing. The only things that moved in the video were the trees, but suddenly on the right side of the screen, a figure walked into frame. Her. Inferno. Her hands were held out and colored a bright red, like the color of extremely hot coals. She watched as her past self stomped up to the barn and held her hands out. An inhuman scream leaped out of her as bolts of multicolor fire shot from her hands. But that wasn't odd. What was odd was that fire also escaped her eyes. And her nose. And her ears and mouth. Then the fire consumed her almost as quickly as it consumed the barn. The Freeman's screams could be heard from the barn but they were gone in a moment. But Inferno? She stayed on fire for another fifteen minutes. Present Inferno and Fury watched in silence as she screamed the entire time, as she was consumed with fire. What had Force Croixa done?

The footage ended when she stopped screaming, and dropped to the ground. The rest she remembers. Force Croixa stirred within her but she put a picture of her brother in her mind and it stayed still.

The lights flicked back on and Fury turned again to face her. He looked at her hard with his one eye.

"I've kept tabs on you since you were five years old. That's almost twenty years. And nothing like that has ever happened. Explain."

She sat silent for a long time. He would never believe her, no one ever did. She was tired of this. So tired. Her only option was to be honest with him.

"I don't want trouble. Just let me stay here. Just leave me alone. I told Agent Carson the truth, ask him. I don't know what that was. Just let me be alone and I won't hurt a single soul any longer." Fury sat back at her words and shook his head.