Bound By Legacy

Holding Out For A Hero

Torres was kind enough to brace my wrist and get me some pain killers for the trip home. A lovely black bruise is forming over my left eye as well. Every bit of me hurts as I lay back on the bench of chairs in the cargo hold. My neck and back pop as I try to find a comfortable position.

"I think, in all my years of doing this, that this is the worst I've ever felt after a fight."

I don't get a response from Sam or Bucky, both lost in their own little worlds of confusion, anger and deep thought. Sam lays back with his arms crossed. Bucky sits on some crates, his arms and hands rigidly holding him there. 

"Are you alright?" I ask. He nods his head, and he doesn't stop there, in fact he doesn't answer me at all.

"Let's steal the shield." It's enough to get Sam and I to sit up. "Let's take the shield and do this ourselves. 

"We can't just run up on the man, beat him up and take it."

"Do remember what happened the last time we stole it?" Bucky doesn't lose eye contact with the ground in front of him. "Because I know she does." Sam points at me and I recollect all the terrible memories of when the Avengers were apart and my friends were on the run. 

Bucky swallows. We were both in Wakanda for the majority of the time Steve and his crew were on the run. "I'll help you in case you forgot. Sharon was branded an enemy of the state and Steve, Natasha, Wanda and I were on the run for two years."

"We couldn't put you through that again Sam." I say speaking up. I never want my family that divided ever again.

"I mean, we just got our asses handed to us by Super Soldiers, and we got nothing."

"That's not entirely true." Buck finally looks up.

"There is someone that you should meet." He directs this statement at Sam. He then glances over at me. "You did time in Korea?"

"Yes." I say trying to figure out what he's talking about. "I was with the SSR, we did a joint operation with the Army." I say it slowly, the terrible memories of the Korean landscape coming back to me. I'd been there a while, the only woman in my division. 

Bucky gives me a sad smile. "There's a man named Isaiah Bradley..." I feel the color run from my face. I'd met the man only once, the day before he died. 

"Isaiah's dead." I shake my head. Sam is looking at me. "He was a soldier, I never found out what they did to him but Howard Stark told me he was a potential subject for the resurrection of the super soldier serum program." I look up with pleading eyes to Bucky. 

"1951-" 

"SSR was trying to track you down if I remember right." It was true, at the time we had no idea who he was or what he was, but they were sending man after man after him, not many lived to tell the tale. "I didn't get to see the war through before they brought me back, but they told me that he died in Korea, I saw the report with my own eyes."

"Who told you he was dead?" Bucky challenges. I try desperately to put a name to the face of the man who told me. I think it had been a soldier, of SSR or Army I can't discern.

"I don't remember." I say simply.

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"Everyone we ever sent after him," Isaiah says with a sigh. "Never came back." His eyes wander from Bucky to me. "The day after I met you they sent me after him." He looks back at Bucky. "I took half of that metal arm in the fight in Goyang. I see that you've managed to grow it back." He starts to turn away from us. "I just wanted to see if you got the arm back." He looks over his shoulder, "Or if the two of ya had come to kill me; I saw that you got married in the paper."