𝑼𝒔, 𝑹𝒆𝒎𝒆𝒎𝒃𝒆𝒓 - 𝑩. 𝑩𝒂𝒓𝒏𝒆𝒔

11b

"I'm gonna go in alone."

"Why?"

"Cause you're an Avenger. You know how he feels about that."

"Well, it's not like you two were known for frolicking in the sun together."

"He was obsessed with Hydra. He knew everything about Marcella and I." Bucky walked backwards and away from him. "Trust me, I got it."

Sam let Bucky go, and waited outside in the hall of the prison, anxiously. He didn't like that Bucky had a plan and didn't tell him. He was a little worried by Bucky's emotional outburst earlier. Would he be able to keep it together?

These kids, the Flagsmasher, were chartering dangerous territory and their movement was only growing stronger. He learned Karli Morganthau, the leader, was only nineteen. Nineteen year olds were supposed to go to school and go out with friends, not lead an organization like the Flagsmashers. She was too young. How could a young woman's life go down such a path like this one?

It was easy for him to ask that question, he realized. Sam took his phone out of his pocket as he thought of Marcella again. Another random young woman put on a path of life that she never deserved. Sam scanned through the contacts on his phone and found her. He looked in Bucky's direction, then touched the "call" button.

It rang twice. Then it picked up.

Marcella took a step onto the ballet studio floor. The black boards creaked under her and she paused looking at the ballet shoes on her feet. She couldn't afford to buy the expensive pointe shoes on her government Prisoner of War "salary" but she could get the fabric ones thanks to her roommates.

After her pardoning and her granting of dual-citizenship, Marcella settled into an apartment in New York with a few roommates; it was the only way she could afford it. To her surprise, the girls were welcoming and knew who she was immediately. At first she tried to hide it, but they decided that wouldn't do.

Zoey, René, and Simrit helped her. They brought her to meet other people. They reminded her how to have fun. They taught her all the things she needed to know for living in the twenty-first century. And even when she had nightmares they weren't scared away. They sometimes came into her room and sat on the floor with her to talk them out (Marcella of course skipping over horrific memories). They were amazing people and they made Marcella feel a little bit more normal.

They also convinced her to book a local dance studio for an hour and try to feel it again.

Marcella walked, her hand grazing along the wooden ballet barre. Her heart thumped in her chest like she'd just ran a mile. The music she played in her headphones couldn't even distract her thoughts. Marcella stopped at the barre and pulled her legs together, heels touching. She turned her feet out and lifted her arm into first position, creating a semi circle. She listened to the counts in the music, waiting to begin her exercise. She waited and waited, until she missed her cue. Then she missed the next one too.

Her face melted into a frown, her teeth bit her lip to stop it from shaking. It was too hard to move; her feet were rooted into the floor like a tree.

Marcella looked up at the ceiling. The lights were too bright. Her athletic top was too tight. Her music was too loud in her ears. Marcella looked at herself in the mirror, and sighed. She could see herself, back in '65 doing her preparations for the school's next ballet production. She was so excited, so ambitious.

She wished she never loved the thing that killed her.

Marcella dropped her hand from the barre and turned off her music. She walked to her bag and ripped the ballet shoes off her feet, throwing them in the bottom. She walked home to her apartment in the late afternoon.