Project 43: Healing

Used to running

"I wanted to ask for your advice," Bucky said after Elias told him to come in. The man had been standing outside the door for a while, once again trying to decide whether or not to walk in.

"Shoot," Elias said. He had started sitting upright three days after waking up and slowly his body was starting to recover. He was even able to take the couple of steps it took to get into the bathroom. Sadly he was too weak to get himself back onto the bed after making the long trip so he did need a wheelchair close by at all times.

Bucky looked around the room and finally decided to pull a chair from the corner to sit a bit closer to Elias. He looked at his hands for a bit before opening his mouth.

"They've offered to decode the stuff Hydra left in my head," Bucky explained shortly. 

"And what do you need my help for," Elias asked with a light chuckle, confused as to why Bucky had come to him. If he had a chance of getting rid of the trigger words, why not take it?

"They'd need me to go in ice again. And they're not sure if it'll work," Bucky clarified. Elias leaned his back against the wall, thinking through the whole thing.

Bucky knew it was unfair to ask Elias for advice on something so big, in the end, whatever he decided on, it needed to be his decision. Still, Bucky needed help with it all.

"So it's really a question of what's the lesser of two evils," Elias sighed, trying to figure out what he would do.

"Yeah," Bucky simply said, waiting for Elias to say anything that would help him out.

"Do it," Elias finally said as if it was the simplest thing in the world. Bucky looked up at the man with furrowed brows, silently asking Elias to explain.

"I don't know what being frozen is like for you but I can imagine what it would be like if someone told me I'd have to go through the experiments again," Elias explained quickly with a small shrug. 

"You'd do it?" Bucky asked to which Elias just nodded.

"I mean, you can still run and you'll learn to live life the best you can, but it would always be just running. I know that if I got the chance to live, I'd take it, no matter the cost," the younger soldier explained getting Bucky to lean forward in his chair. 

"What are you going to do?" Bucky asked, completely changing the subject because, at that moment, he had realized just how horrible Elias' life must have been for the past decade. 

Bucky had been so caught up in finally having someone who could understand what Hydra was like to realize that the man had been forced to figure everything out by himself. Bucky had been doing it for a couple of years and it had almost him. He finally understood the desperate sadness he sometimes caught behind Elias' eyes. Under everything else, the highly trained Hydra soldier sitting in front of him was just a kid, forced to continue running for almost a century.

Even tho Bucky had built his walls so high he couldn't even see where they ended, he felt a pang in his chest as he thought about what Elias must have gone through. If I got the chance to live, I'd take it, no matter the cost.

Elias just sighed and once more bucky saw a glimpse of the endless void in Elias' eyes. The man looked completely hopeless as he looked up at the ceiling before looking back at Bucky with a sad smile.

"I've gotten used to running by now," Elias said with a small shrug.

"This is making me feel like an old man," Elias huffed as he lifted himself from the bed onto the wheelchair. 

"You are an old man!" Shuri laughed loudly to which Elias just scowled at her. He was still weary of Shuri but was slowly starting to be able to be alone in the room when she did her tests. The more time he spent with the Wakandan Princess the more he grew to like her. At first, everything the woman did annoyed Elias, but slowly he grew accustomed to her loud personality. It reminded him of Charlie back in the forties.