Monster

Thirty-Three

When Bucky was gone, I turned back to Oscar to ensure he was okay. He appeared unconscious, and the other men were groaning throughout the living room. I really hoped none of them were dead. I stood to check a man sprawled out on the living room rug. He was breathing, but his spine was bent, and I wasn't sure he'd be able to recover from that. I knew I shouldn't feel bad for someone who wanted me dead, but I never wanted anyone to get hurt. I guessed that was part of the job risk when you gave your allegiance to Hydra.

Unfortunately, I took my eyes off Oscar for a moment too long. I was checking over the unfamiliar man bleeding on the floor when a boot met the back of my knee. I toppled over, and Oscar's hand came around my ankle, yanking me back toward him. I swung and tried to fight him off, but he had me pinned in seconds. He smothered my face with his grimy, bloody hands. His face was seething with rage.

I flailed my arms, searching for the knife I'd dropped in my fall. My hand wrapped around the sparkly pink handle. He didn't try to stop me. Instead, he smiled and moved to press his thumb to the hollow of my throat.

"You can't do it," he said. "You've never been able to do it. You're too much of a...."

I swung upward and jerked the knife into his chest. I couldn't pull a trigger and never wanted to kill anyone, but that didn't mean I lacked other skills. I was always good with knives. It was how I'd gotten my team to stop calling me "Tinkerbell." They thought "Knives" was more appropriate.

His eyes widened in shock. His expression went from amusement to disbelief in a second. He rolled away, gasping and whining about the stupid sparkly pink handle sticking out of his chest. I crawled away and nearly tumbled over the man with the broken spine.

"You bitch," Oscar said with astonishment. "You little bitch. I can't believe you actually stabbed me. I'm going to bash your fucking head in."

Since the knife was gone and I wasn't about to risk going back for it, I reached for a gun abandoned by the couch. I got to my feet and raced for the door. I knew Steve was on his way, and if he got there in time, I'd never have to use it. But I didn't have enough time to find my weapon of choice. I needed something to keep him away, even if I wasn't brave enough to pull the trigger.

I stumbled out of the front door and into the yard. He shouted and crashed through the house after me. So I spun around and lifted the gun. He'd found another one, probably one that belonged to one of his teammates. He waved it casually as he walked out onto the front steps with my knife still sticking out of his chest. The shock was gone now, replaced by rage.

"I've been thinking about this moment since that day you kicked me out," he said, holding the gun aloft in one hand.

The other was clutching his bleeding chest. The bedazzled pink handle protruded from between his fingers, right above the Kevlar vest and below his collarbone. It wasn't a deadly place to be stabbed. I'd done it on purpose. But now, I regretted that choice. There were other places I could have stabbed him that wouldn't kill him but would have got him down so he couldn't kill me.

"The first time you pulled this stupid pink knife on me, I said to myself, 'God, I can't wait to kill this bitch.' You know what they told me? They said, 'Not yet. We've got plans for that one.' But they're not here. And I'm really going to enjoy this."

He lifted the gun, and there was only a moment for me to make another choice. I could take his life, or I could let him take mine. I knew he wouldn't aim for my shoulder. He would go right for the face, and I'd never live to see another day. I'd never see Bucky again. And Oscar would never stop hunting him. He'd pull Bucky apart and remove every piece of me from his memories and his heart.

My mind went black. My heart was pounding. I lifted the gun and fired.

It shook in my hands, and the blast reverberated through my whole body. Hard enough to rattle my bones. The shot was so loud it echoed through the otherwise quiet neighborhood. The alarm in Tony's car began to wail in sync with others parked on the street. Someone screamed from a nearby house.

Oscar's eyes slid out of focus. Blood poured from the hole in his throat. He took one more step before dropping face-first into the grass. He didn't move again.

I stood still. My brain couldn't seem to register any thoughts. I moved my hands, and the gun slid from my sweating fingers and landed with a thud on the sidewalk. I limped forward and sat down on the grass at his side to roll him over. The knife was bent by his landing. A chunk of his neck was gone, and I pressed my hand against the hopeless wound. I didn't remember making a choice to fire. I couldn't have done it.

I used to fall asleep to the sound of his heart beating the way I had with Bucky the night before. Even though there was a darkness in Oscar, there was a point when I hadn't seen it. I liked him. And wanted to love him. Long before I knew what he was really capable of. I couldn't forgive myself if his heart stopped beating because I'd decided to end his life.

"Please, don't die? Please?" I repeated as I started compressions on his chest. I knew it was a lost cause. His airway was already blocked with blood, and there was no life left behind his eyes. It was shock, I realized. My hands felt like ice. They were trembling. I couldn't breathe.

There were footsteps on the grass, and someone appeared on the other side of Oscar. She pressed her fingers against the side of his neck, checking for a pulse even though it was obvious there wasn't one. It was the girl who worked for Talbot. Marion.

"Are you okay?" she asked, leaning over his body to put her hands on mine.

"I killed him," I said. "I didn't mean to." She wrapped her hands around my wrists and pushed me away from him.

"He's dead, Jo. He's gone."

"I didn't... I can't... I couldn't...."

"Hon, I think you're in shock. I already called Colonel Talbot. He's sending someone over. Are there any more of them?"

I slid my wrists from Marion's hands and clamored away from both of them. I staggered to my feet and headed back toward the sidewalk. I didn't have a destination in mind. I just had to move. My hands were shaking and covered with sticky blood. I couldn't feel my fingers.

He tried to kill me first, but I could have aimed for his shoulder or his arm. I didn't think. I just lifted my gun and shot. And now he was dead.

I thought about his mom. The woman I'd never met, who'd invited me over for Christmas dinner because she thought there was actually hope for our relationship. I could imagine the call. The conversation. "Who killed my son?" The girl she wanted him to marry.

Sam said I had a habit of putting the lives of others before my own. I hadn't shot Oscar to save myself. But to stop him from going after Bucky. There were others, of course. But at that moment, Oscar was the only threat. And I'd taken the shot without thinking. Because I wasn't worried about myself.

Bucky wouldn't come back. And I wasn't sure I wanted him to see me like that. The rumble of a motorcycle should have alerted me to Steve's presence. But I was pacing, still lost in my own thoughts. Until I felt a hand on my shoulder, guiding me with incomprehensible words to the grass. I pressed my head against my knees and counted.

"One, two. Three, four." And again and again. "One, two. Three, four."

"Are you okay?" Steve was asking. I lifted my head, only half aware that he was there. Blood was caked to the creases of my trembling palms and stuck in my fingernails.

"I didn't freeze this time," I told him.

"Where's Bucky?"

"He's gone. He didn't kill anyone. I did."

"Which way did he go?"

"Through the backyard. I don't know."

"I'm going after him. Wait here for Sam. He's on his way."

"It's too late, Steve." He moved away anyway, and I turned to watch him go.

"Don't talk to anyone until Sam's here," he told me. Then he jumped the fence like it was nothing and left me sitting there on the grass.