Lies of Silver, Heart of Gold ~§~ Bucky Barnes

-038-

Rumlow enters Carina's side of the holding cell nearly an hour after leaving and pushes the button to slide the partition into the wall. He stomps over to Bucky's chair and puts the back of his hand to Bucky's chest.

"Good enough," Rumlow mutters. "Okay lovebirds, here's how this is gonna go. I'm gonna take Carina to the room first, then come back to get Barnes. You'll have two hours unsupervised as promised."

Rumlow deactivates Carina's restraints and takes her arm in a firm grip. He takes her down a hallway—the first time he's let her see anything beyond her own cell or bathroom—and swipes a keycard in a door lock at the end of the hall. The door slides open to reveal a thick mattress on the floor covered in at least half a dozen pillows.

"Welcome to your personal HYDRA paradise," Rumlow jokes, gesturing to the small room. "This is the nicest mattress in the entire damn joint, so appreciate it and try not to get it too disgusting."

Carina steps into the room and Rumlow loosens his grip on her arm, though he blocks the doorway out of an abundance of caution.

"No cameras?" she asks, hesitant. "No audio equipment either?"

Rumlow shakes his head. "Nope."

No ringing. At least there's that.

"Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go get pretty boy. As soon as the door closes behind him in here, your timer starts."

Carina lets herself fall onto the makeshift bed. She sits cross-legged on the mattress and scans the room, noting there is no window built into the door and the only vent cover is welded into the metal wall.

It takes a few minutes for Rumlow to return to the split holding cell, but when he does, it startles Bucky slightly.

"Your turn, pretty boy," Rumlow grumbles.

Bucky's chair restraints open and he stands up slowly. Rumlow takes an electric disc and slaps it to Bucky's metal arm, then grasps his right arm tightly and guides him to the room where he had just left Carina. He yanks his keycard through the lock and the door slides open once again. Rumlow removes the disc from Bucky's arm and shuts the door.

"I almost forgot what you looked like without the partition in the way," Bucky jokes.

Carina giggles and swipes a faded orange lock behind her ear.

"It's good to see you smile again, doll." Bucky gently picks up Carina's wrist and starts tracing her scar with one of his metal fingers. "Well, we have two hours to ourselves. Let's catch up for a few minutes, then if we're feeling it, we can really catch up."

"I know you have a whole list of questions in your head without even reading it, love," Carina teases. "Go ahead, ask away."

Bucky clears his throat and his gaze shifts between Carina's face and hand. "As far as you know, does anyone with HYDRA know about your lightning-related abilities yet?"

Carina shakes her head and sighs. "No, not from what I can read in their thoughts. Maybe we can use it as some kind of secret weapon to escape at some point."

"I like the way you think, doll."

~§~

-TWO WEEKS LATER-

Bzzt. Bzzt. Bzzt.

"Dammit," Tony blurts. He lightly punches the edge of the table out of frustration. "J.A.R.V.I.S., how many potentials have we tried now?"

"Twenty-thousand, two hundred, sir."

Tony pinches the bridge of his nose. "How many more have we come up with today?"

"Six hundred thousand, sir."

"You're still only testing one a minute, right, Stark?" Maria asks over her shoulder.

"Yeah," Tony sighs. "S.H.I.E.L.D.'s encryption software alone wipes any passcode attempts after five minutes, according to Fury. He said more than five fails before it wipes and it destroys all the files exclusively accessed by the user."

Maria sets her laptop aside on the couch and stands up to stretch. "Our running theory is that the HYDRA files Rumlow might be hiding are encrypted within his private files. Almost like a ghost file."

"My question is, how does a multi-billion dollar government agency not keep a record of employees' passwords?"

"Because," Maria sighs, "with all the screening we have to do on recruits to begin with, we know we should be able to trust our people. Plus, if we do keep a record, that's for the highest-level eye only."

Ding. Fury steps out of the elevator holding a tired-looking orange cat. The moment the elevator shuts behind him, he sets the cat down and ruffles the fur on its head.

"Good girl, Goosey. Go take a nap," he croons. The cat sways and plops itself on the couch next to Maria's computer.

Tony blinks slowly, trying and failing to keep confusion off his face. "What is a cat doing in my penthouse?"

Fury straightens his posture and clears his throat. "Believe it or not, Stark, Goose here is my personal bodyguard, more dangerous than any human S.H.I.E.L.D. agent. Also," he pauses, "she ate my keys, so I'm waiting for her to spit those up."

"Director," Maria starts, "we still haven't made much progress with the passcode. Have you found any leads recently?"

"As a matter of fact, Hill, I have."