Haunted By Him

Chapter One

The Winter Soldier escapes that night, when the guards’ backs are turned and all the lights are off. He’s timed it perfectly, waited weeks out of pure fear, but now he’s going to try.

He bursts out of the building and into the yard. No one’s seen him yet and no one knows. They think he’s still in his cell, but he’s taking a running leap at the gate now and he scales it, throwing himself over the barbed wire and he falls several feet to the ground. He muffles a cry, biting down on his gloved left hand and grunting and pain shoots up his ankle. He’s broken it or sprained it or something and he sees rips in his pants where the barbed wire tore. Blood is bubbling up, but all he feels are his broken ankle and the adrenaline. And, of course, the fear.

But everything has gone according to plan and no one has noticed him yet. So the Winter Soldier drags himself painfully to his feet and starts to force himself to run.

There’s a building nearby, an abandoned lot, and he heads there, hoping he can hide. It’s not part of the original plan, but he knows he won’t get very far on this ankle and he needs a place to look at it. He’s hoping they won’t notice his disappearance until morning, by which time he’ll be long gone.

So the Winter Soldier hobbles into the building and finds himself deep in the depths of it, up to his eyes in dust, and it’s everything he can do not to start coughing. When he thinks he’s safe, he drops to the ground and starts taking off his boot, chewing on his tongue to distract himself from the pain.

He’s never tried to escape before. He’s always been too afraid to try and he’s certainly afraid now, but it’s too late to go back. It’s do or die.

His ankle is twisted, and it hurts to move. He rolls up his pant leg and is considering tearing strips out of it to bind his ankle when a voice makes him freeze with fear.

“Hey!” A woman’s voice shouts and the Winter Soldier’s head snaps up. On the other side of the room is a tall, redheaded woman. She’s in rags and she’s covered in dirt and he doesn’t know who she is, but he still panics. He doesn’t think he can pull himself back up to his feet again and so he starts scooting himself away frantically. All he can think is, ‘I’ve been caught’.

“Who are you?” The woman cries and she approaches him faster than he can pull himself back. He can kill her. He’ll have to kill her. But at this second, panic is seizing control of every muscle in his body and he just wants to get away.

“Don’t hurt me,” he hears himself plead.

“I’m not going to do anything to you,” the woman says and now she’s standing over him and he thinks his heart has stopped. She brushes hair out of her face and kneels down to look at him. He’s trembling, his entire body, and he holds himself as far away from her as possible. “What are you doing here?” She asks him accusingly. His eyes flicker down to his ankle for a second and the woman follows his gaze. “You need help,” she reasons and the Winter Soldier nods.

“I have to go,” he tells her. “I have to hide. I have to run.”

“Alright, calm down,” the woman says and she reaches out and takes his ankle and the pain makes him gasp. Her hands on his skin are cold and tears are starting to sting the corners of his eyes. “I said calm down,” the woman repeated herself, looking at him with raised eyebrows, and then he watches her take a roll of gauze from her pocket and hold it up in front of them. “Are you going to let me fix this?” She asks. “It just looks sprained.”

He decides for that one second to trust her. He doesn’t have another choice.

He nods slowly and clenches his teeth while she wraps the gauze tightly around his ankle. When she’s almost finished, she looks up into his face and their eyes meet and she holds him there. Her mouth opens a little as she stares and he notices her eyes are clear blue and he doesn’t like the way she’s looking at him.

“What?” He says. The woman pulls back and reaches into her pocket again and pulls out a square of paper, a photo. She doesn’t offer to show him yet and instead examines it herself.

“Wow,” she says and holds the photo up to the Winter Soldier’s face. He pulls away uncomfortably, but she’s still scrutinizing him with those blue eyes. “Same nose, same mouth, same chin. That’s remarkable.” She laughs. “This can’t be happening.”

“What are you talking about?” The Winter Soldier asks. He’s still in defense mode, every muscle in his body taut, and he leans as far apart from her as he can, looking her up and down.

“Bucky Barnes,” the woman says and she turns the photo around so the Winter Soldier can see. “You two could be brothers.” The Winter Soldier squints at the picture. It’s of a clean cut man in an army uniform, grinning at the camera. He doesn’t know what to say. He supposes he agrees, but it’s really the least of his problems right now. He stays silent.

The woman turns the photo back around and examines them both again.

“Your eyes are different,” she says excitedly. “But you’re close enough to be convincing.”

“Convincing to whom??” The Winter Soldier exclaims. His ankle is wrapped up completely now and the pain is starting to subside and he begins to scoot himself away again to try to stand and the woman reaches forward and grabs his arm in an attempt to stop him. Everything in the Winter Soldier cries out, an alarm system of fear, and he yanks his arm away from her.

“Don’t touch me,” he says in a low growl and the woman puts her hands up in defense.

“Alright, fine,” she says. “Whatever you want, Bucky.”

“That’s not my name,” the Winter Soldier replies.

“Then what is your name?” She asks and sirens go off in the distance, interrupting her. The Soldier looks up, gasping.

“I need to get somewhere safe,” he breathes.

“How about America?” The woman asks and he looks over at her, confused. She’s holding up a pair of tickets now, leaning back on her butt with her arms resting on her knees. “One for me and one for the long, lost Sargeant.”

“I told you, I’m not your guy,” the Winter Soldier snaps and he scrambles now into a standing position. The woman’s blue eyes go cold. He leans against a wall for support and watches her stand slowly.

“I know that,” she says. “My guy is dead, after all. But I need someone to fake it for a while and you look like you could have fallen right off the Barnes family tree, so what do you say?”

The Winter Soldier swallows. He looks behind him, where the sirens are wailing and he can hear feet on pavement, people searching for him, and then back to this strange redheaded woman, still waving her tickets in his face.

“Free ride to America,” she taunts him. “Take it or leave it.”

He can hear their voices now, getting closer. There’s nowhere to run, nowhere to hide. Panic washes over him.

“Tick tock,” the woman says.

“I’ll take it,” he says hastily and with that, she grins slyly and slips the tickets back into her bag. An instant later, she’s grabbing his arm and pulling him into a hiding spot just a few feet away behind a curtain.

The sirens wail and the pursuers get closer. The Winter Soldier presses his back against the wall behind them and sinks to the floor, covering his mouth with both hands because his breathing is becoming loud and his entire body trembles.

What seems like hours later, the world falls silent again. The sirens move on and the people are gone and when the woman pushes back the curtain, the Winter Soldier bursts out, sucking in breaths and shaking. He collapses to the ground and pulls his hands through his hair and tries not to hyperventilate.

I’m safe, I’m safe, I’m safe, he repeats to himself in his head. Above him, the woman is looking down and staring.

“Who are you?” She asks him. It’s difficult for him to hear her emotions. Is she horrified? Is she disgusted? Is she curious? He doesn’t know. She’s staring at him, he can feel her eyes, and once he’s got a hold of himself again, he hauls himself to his feet and avoids looking at her face.

“Just get me to America,” he growls.