The long lost Barnes

The Road to Recovery

Bucky Barnes had never gotten used to the cold. Not the kind of cold that pierced your skin, but the kind that crawled beneath your ribs and settled in your chest, filling every corner of your soul. That kind of cold had been with him for a long time. It was the cold of loss, of regret, of a life stolen from him, and it had only deepened as the years wore on.

Hydra. The name was like a disease that spread through the veins of history, poisoning everything it touched. Even now, after everything—after the Red Skull, after his own reawakening from decades of mind control—Hydra was still out there, still hiding in the shadows. The team had learned to track them with ruthless precision, but the feeling that something worse was always lurking behind the corner was constant. Hydra had no intention of staying dead.

And now, this.

Bucky adjusted his gear as he made his way through the snow-covered mountains, a cold wind biting at his face. It had been a typical mission at first—standard reconnaissance, a Hydra outpost to take down, no big surprises. But something was gnawing at him. His gut had been twisted up in knots since they had gotten the intel. It was wrong somehow. Too quiet. Too controlled.

Beside him, Steve moved like he always did—efficient, determined. But Bucky noticed the slight tension in his posture, the subtle narrowing of his eyes. Steve didn't say anything, but Bucky knew better than to ask. Steve was always good at hiding his feelings, even when it came to the darkest parts of their shared history.

"Watch your six," Steve muttered, breaking the silence. The faintest sound of gunfire in the distance sent a shiver down Bucky's spine.

"I'll always have your back," Bucky replied quietly, eyes scanning the terrain. The words were automatic, rehearsed. It had become instinct at this point. Not just a battle cry, but a promise.

The Hydra facility was a fortress hidden beneath layers of ice and rock. From the outside, it looked like nothing more than a remote research station, abandoned for decades, sitting at the edge of civilization. But the closer they got, the more Bucky felt something strange gnawing at him. The compound was too pristine. Too well-maintained.

Inside, it was worse.

They breached the perimeter without much resistance. Hydra's usual protocols were in place, but nothing that could stand against them. Black Widow, Falcon, and the others quickly spread out, neutralizing the guards with swift precision. Natasha's voice crackled over the comms, sharp and controlled.

"Two dozen guards down. No sign of civilian personnel. The place is a ghost town," she reported. "I'm heading for the medical wing. You guys clear the east wing."

"On it," Steve replied.

Bucky's breath caught in his chest when they arrived at the medical wing. Something was wrong. The stench of antiseptic and the cold hum of sterile equipment hung thick in the air. And the security was... unusual. Bucky's instincts kicked in, a wave of icy realization rushing through him. Hydra didn't usually leave their prized projects unprotected. This wasn't just any research facility.

As they entered the holding chambers, Bucky froze. He felt the air shift, a sudden sharp pull in his chest. The unmistakable sensation of his own past slamming into him with the force of a freight train.

There, in the center of the sterile room, was a woman.

She was unconscious, her body thin and pale from years of isolation. Tubes and wires ran across her limbs, machines humming steadily beside her, keeping her alive. But what took Bucky's breath away wasn't the medical equipment or the bleakness of the scene. It was her face.

For a moment, time stood still.

Bucky couldn't breathe. He couldn't think. His heart was pounding so loudly in his chest he feared it might explode. The woman on the table, whose features were so familiar it felt like a dream, had been lost to him for decades.

Leia.

His wife.

She hadn't just been a casualty of war. She hadn't been killed like he had told himself for so long. She had been taken by Hydra, altered, twisted. Changed. He had tried so hard to forget the woman who had been his world. The one who had smiled at him with love in her eyes, who had stood by him through the darkest parts of his life.

But she was here. She was alive.

"Leia," Bucky whispered, his voice cracking as the word escaped him, as if it had been a secret he'd buried for too long.

The voice that followed his whispered name wasn't the soft, familiar one he remembered. It was colder. Stranger. "Who... who are you?"

It took a moment for Bucky to gather his bearings, his mind swirling with disbelief. "It's me," he said, stepping closer, his voice hoarse. "It's Bucky."

The woman's eyes—Leia's eyes—fluttered open slowly. Her gaze was confused, unfocused, her brow furrowing with suspicion. "Bucky?" she echoed, her voice flat and emotionless. She looked at him as if he were a ghost, something foreign. "You're one of them. Hydra... Hydra made you lie."

His heart sank. She doesn't remember.

Before he could say anything more, Steve entered, his eyes scanning the room. When his gaze fell on the woman on the table, his jaw tightened.

"Bucky," Steve said softly, the edge of disbelief creeping into his voice. "Is it... her? Is it really her?"

Bucky didn't answer immediately. He couldn't. His mind was a whirlwind of emotions, but all he could focus on was the woman in front of him, a ghost from his past who didn't even recognize his face. The betrayal of Hydra wasn't just physical. It was mental. It was emotional. And they had erased the one person who had meant everything to him.

The woman—Leia—was shaking her head now, looking between Bucky and Steve with growing horror. "This isn't real. You're not real. None of you are real."

"Leia," Steve said gently, stepping forward. "It's me. It's Steve. I'm your brother. Hydra... they took you. They changed you."

At the sound of the word "brother," something flickered in her eyes. But it was gone as quickly as it came. She recoiled from Steve, from Bucky, as if they were both strangers. "No," she whispered, shaking her head violently. "No, they made me forget. They made me forget everything. I... I don't know who you are."

Bucky's heart shattered.