Till the End of the Line

Nickolai

They touched down a couple of miles outside of Minsk. Since it was a larger city, Bucky had told her that they would blend in. 

"Act like you belong. Never act like you aren't supposed to be there." He'd told her.

He'd given her a quick rundown of how the mission was going to go. 

It was her first assassination and the thought of it made her want to throw up.

She was about to take the life of another person. Of a human being. She knew that kind of thing changed you.

She wondered briefly if that's why he was so cold. Maybe he was dissociating from this?

He'd done this at least a dozen times in the past, if not more. The way he worked was stoic, unmoving, emotionless. The face of a machine, not the man she'd talked to before.

Maybe that man never existed.

Her feet were starting to hurt from walking in the snow, and her entire body was screaming at her, telling her that it wasn't ready to be standing up, much less on a mission.

But she didn't dare complain. 

They kept walking in silence, holding their equipment bags and acting like they didn't know each other, and with every step they took, her heart felt like it was breaking.

Finally she couldn't take it anymore.

"I used to have a brother." 

She blurted out, desperate to break the silence.

Bucky didn't react, just stared straight ahead and kept walking.

"His name was Nickolai. He was nine when he died."

She thought she saw him wince. Maybe she was imagining things again. 

"He loved playing cowboys and Indians. He loved pirogies. He'd just lost a tooth, he was so excited to put it under his pillow so the little mouse would come and get it."

She kept going,  trying not to let the tears fall.

"He...he loved digging and snowball fights. He used to sit in my lap and I'd read him stories. I taught him how to braid and he'd braid my hair. In the spring we would make flower crowns in the field near our house, or pick cherries from our neighbors tree. He used to claim everything."

She sniffled, her attempts at keeping her voice steady not working. 

"He used to play king of the mountain. We'd fasten a cape out of an old bedsheet and everything. He used to whistle through the little gap between his teeth and laugh at the old cartoons even if he'd seen them a hundred times."

Her voice got quiet, almost more of a sob. 

"He was my best friend."

She looked at Bucky.

"And you wanna know what happened? What HYDRA did to my nine year old brother? They shot him. Shot him dead in the head and then my mother was left to mourn his dead body as I was dragged away against my will."

She swiped at her eyes, giving up all attempts at keeping her emotions at bay. Better now than when they were on the hunt. 

"I think about him every single day. You wanna know what the last thing I said to him was?"

She let out a soft whimper before continuing.

"I...said...I said you're nine now. Be a man. And he did. He jumped in front of a bullet that was aimed for me. He died, because of me and I—"

She stopped, doubling over as her heart was broken again and again and she couldn't stop crying.

"I miss him." She whispers.