Caught in Storms

A Statement

-Bucky-
Emma and I spend the next few days just being with one another and spending virtual time with James. Pepper makes it so that we can FaceTime with him and she sends plenty of videos and pictures.
Having this time with him and together has sort of restored our resolve and reminds us that we need to take care of ourselves to get him home. As hard as it is to not have him here, we know it's going to be the safest place possible for him right now.
Hill finally let's us get back into missions and we are able to take out a few more bases. In the meantime, the hunt for Rafferty continues.
Sam and Torres have been working together to get some intel on local circles where crime has increased and think Rafferty might be building his influence. Emma has been hard at work retracing her steps and trying to see if she can remember him saying anything about where he might have gone. I spend my recon time wandering through Brooklyn, trying to see if I can pick up on anything going on in the streets that might lead to Rafferty.
I am going through a few documents when I pick up on an address that may be connected to Emma's birth mother. I peek over at her and she is curled up on the sofa in the living room, holding onto James' baby blanket as she sleeps like a rock. I take down the address and come over and kiss her cheek softly before I run up to our room. I grab my keys and a knife and gun then head out to the garage. Sam is in there testing his wings after a short circuit.
"Hey man where are you going?"
"I may have found a lead, I want to go check it out."
"Did you tell Emma?"
"No she's asleep and I don't plan on going into the location fully, just recon."
"Let me go with you, we can use RedWing too."
"Hop in," in I say and start the truck. Sam gets in and we drive out to the address in Brooklyn, but park a few blocks away.
Sam finds a good perch to loose RedWing from and I decide to wander around the building and see if I can find anything around it.
"See anything yet?"
*Not yet, but keep your guard up. I don't like this place. You said this was where Emma's mother lived?"*
"That's what the file said."
As I round a corner, I hear arguing from a very angry man and I try to get out of sight.
"I don't give a fuck. Hydra is paying good money for her and the Winter Soldier. I don't know why they want her, but they are gonna get her. Now I want to get ready to strike tonight."
"Sam you getting this," I whisper as I get my gun out.
*"Every word, but don't engage."*
Before I can get out of there, I come face to face with Rafferty, walking out of a loading dock of the apartment building, I instantly have my gun pointed at his head, getting ready to kill this asshole if I absolutely have to.
"Well, well, well. That was easy," Rafferty says with an evil chuckle.
"Nothing easy about it, asshole. You're going away, and whether it's to the Raft or blown away is up to you."
"Oh I don't think you're in the position to be making threats Sergeant, especially not with this," Rafferty says and holds up his phone to show video feed. It is a live feed from somewhere behind the compound, pointed into the back window to show Emma asleep on the sofa, right where I left her. She looks like she is tossing a little bit.
"She's all there by herself, and all I have to do is say the word and she's dead," he says angrily. "So you have a choice Sergeant Barnes: you can either turn yourself over to me and spare her the fate that Hydra has planned for her, or rush me and she's dead before that bullet touches my brain."
I watch Emma on the feed and she is still clutching James' blanket for dear life, looking like she might be having a nightmare and I wish now more than anything that I would have stayed at the compound.
*"Bucky, please don't do this, we don't know what's going to happen to Emma if you do that. We can figure this out,"* Sam says in my ear. I look up at Rafferty and glare as my chest starts to hurt.
"You better hold to your word. Because if I don't kill you, I know for damn sure she will. You underestimate her greatly. I have left all of my real gear in her possession. Believe me when I say that the shit I've done as the Winter Soldier will look like heaven compared to what she will do," I say, but I'm not speaking to Rafferty, I'm speaking to Sam.
Rafferty calls his men and they slap some vibranium cuffs on me and lead me away, tossing away my knife and gun in the process.
*"Don't speak, just listen. I heard you. Stay alive and we will come find you. Keep that earpiece as long as you can, it has a tracker in it."*
I am lead to a large blacked out SUV and a black hood is thrown on me and I am sucker punched hard in the face.
"Fucking COWARD," I yell angrily and then I'm kicked in the ribs.
"You would do well to shut the fuck up or we will make the brainwashing process harder for you, Sergeant Barnes," I hear Rafferty say and then I get another kick in the ribs. They toss me in the back of the car and I curl up and try to stay calm, thinking of Emma on the couch. Sam would be just about back at the compound with those wings by now, running in to tell Emma what happened.
I should have stayed home, I think as I let myself disassociate from what is going on. There is no way that I'm going to let myself sit through what is going to happen now that they have me.