The Winter Witch (A Hawkeye/Avengers fanfic)

Chapter 5

Bucky woke the next morning and was confused as to where he was until he looked over and saw Winter sound asleep in her bed. Thankfully, she hadn't had any nightmares the rest of the night. His back was killing him from sleeping in the chair all night and decided to get up and see if Clint and Natasha had any aspirin. As he walked out of the room, he ran into both of them in hallway.

"You two are up early." They both looked surprised to see Bucky and he could see the panic in Clint's eyes. "What's going on?" Bucky asked.

Not wanting to shock Bucky with the rest of the team, Natasha made the decision to tell him then and there what she and Clint had discussed the night before. Bucky was silent after they told him. His heart broke for Winter, knowing what Hydra had done to her and the fact that they may have broken her more than they realized. He agreed with them that they needed to talk to the team now and before Winter woke up. He didn't want her to hear the conversation. Natasha had JARVIS wake up the team and have them meet in the common area. As the three of them made it off the elevator, the rest of the team were tiredly traipsing in.

"If someone isn't dying at the moment, I am going to be very upset with being awoken before the sun is up" Loki said while angerly plopping down on the couch.

"Please tell me you at least made coffee," Sam mumbled as he fell over into a chair.

Thor was rummaging around the kitchen, "Do we have any of those pastry things?"

"Bottom cabinet in the back," Natasha yelled back as she and Clint stood near the front of the room.

There was a ding as Bruce and Tony made their way off the elevator, both clearly had spent the night in the lab tinkering with who knows what.

"It's 5:30 in the morning Barnes, why are we here?" sighed Tony.

Steve came in, already dressed in his sweats and ready for his morning run as soon as the meeting was over.

"I know it's early, but this is urgent." Bucky said to everyone. "There was a situation last night with Winter and Clint and Natasha brought something up that I think we need to discuss before she wakes up."

The group all looked at Bucky, Natasha, and Clint in anticipation.

Natasha nudged Clint. Clint sighed, "Last night Winter had what I would assume to be a nightmare that turned into a very severe panic attack. However, that's not the part that we found concerning. Yesterday I noticed that in addition to the markings on her arm that was clearly from needles, which I assume are from the testing Hydra did on her, I also noticed markings that appeared to be self-inflicted."

Bruce nodded his head in agreement. "I noticed that too. Tony and I discussed last night that we think we need to put her under suicide watch. As someone who has gone through the same, I at least had the big guy to keep me from being able to do anything stupid. We don't know the full extent of her powers and if she could use them to hurt herself."

"Where is she now?" Steve asked.

"Asleep," Bucky replied. "I told JARVIS to let me know when she woke up."

Tony sighed, "I know we have her file and what Barnes told us yesterday, but I have a feeling there is more to her story than she is letting on."

"Or knows," Thor responded.

"What does that mean?" asked Clint.

Thor looked at Loki, "Brother? I saw the way you reacted as we watched her in action with the soldier, and furthermore when he mentioned her powers."

Everyone looked to Loki. "And what are you inferring?" he asked. Thor and Loki just looked at each other, as if they were having a conversation between them. Knowing Loki, they probably were.

"Are you going to share with the class or not?" asked Tony, clearly annoyed with being out of the loop.

Loki turned to Bucky, "Do you know anything about her lineage? Her parents?"

Bucky shook his head. "No, I didn't meet her till she was sixteen and it's not exactly something we talked about."

Loki then turned to Natasha. "Was there anything in her file about how she came to be in the facility?"

Natasha scrunched her face, trying to remember anything she read. "If I remember correctly, she was abandoned as a baby at the hospital. Went through the foster system until she somehow ended up with Hydra. The details aren't clear."

"Damn, this girl can't catch a break" Sam whispered.

They all turned to Loki, noticing the wheels in his head were spinning once again.

"Brother?" Thor said, breaking Loki's thoughts.

"I don't think she's fully human." Loki replied.

Before anyone could respond, JARVIS' voice came through, "Mr. Barnes, Ms. Winter is waking up."

"I'll be right back," he said as he turned and made his way to Winter's room.