Winter's Midnight

4

"So, what are we going to do?" Tony asked his girlfriend while Lorin held Bucky close to her while they sat on the couch. It was morning, neither of the soldiers had slept, and had instead been sitting on the couch with each other whispering in Russian.

"I don't know, but Bucky is actually calm." Jessica whispered. She glanced over again to see Bucky curled against Lorin's stomach, his head resting on her chest and her legs wrapped around his waist. Lorin was singing a soft lullaby in Russian that Jessica couldn't quite hear.

"What's she doing?" Tony asked. Jessica leaned against his side, watching her friend sing before brushing against her mind and hearing the song as though it were being broadcasted through a speaker and the memory attached to the song.

**flashback**

Things in italics are in russian

"Soldiers will return to their cell and remain silent for the remainder of the night until morning, when they will give a mission report and be placed back in cryo freeze. Understood?" Midnight and Winter nodded before they were led back to their shared cell, the blood still covering Winter's face and clothes. While they stood in the cell with the door shut Winter started shaking.

"Winter? Are you alright?" Midnight asked. Winter rubbed his hands over his face, looking at the dried blood that rubbed off. He let out a broken cry and backing towards the wall and looking at the blood on his hands. 

"Winter, Winter calm down." Midnight said in a calm voice, Winter growled when she placed one hand on either side of his face and rested her forehead against his, looking deep into his eyes and begging him to be calm.  Winter stopped growling and Midnight slowly removed one hand, swiping her tongue over her thumb and rubbing it across Winters cheek, taking some of the blood with it.

"I've done it before, but never a child. I've never killed a child."  Winter muttered, a hollow look in his frightened eyes. Midnight moved her hands down to his straight jacket style vest and began undoing the buttons, removing the blood stained leather and throwing it across the cell before pulling Winter close to her.

"Hush now Mishka we'll get it off." Midnight said before pulling off his blood soaked one sleeved turtleneck and tore off a strip of clean fabric before throwing it away. She walked over to the cup of water the guards had slid through the door and dipped the fabric into the cloudy liquid before wiping the rough fabric over Winter's cheek, erasing any evidence of the child's blood.

"Never killed a child, never killed a child, never, ever, killed a child." Winter kept repeating while Midnight cleaned the blood. Eventually she threw the dirty fabric into the corner with the rest of Winters outfit and pulled him close to her, stroking a hand over his hair.

"Mishka you need rest." She said after about an hour of his mumbling. Winter shook his head frantically before gripping tightly to her leather jacket and pressing his face into her shoulder. She buried a hand in his hair, thinking back to when she was stalking the family, waiting outside the window to find a way for Winter to get in. The mother had been singing, a lullaby.

"You can't tell anyone." Midnight whispered into Winter's ear. He lifted his head a little so instead of his nose being pressed to her chest it was resting between her neck and shoulder. Midnight started humming the lullaby she was singing now.

"That's the story of how a single girl had the deadly Winter Soldier asleep with his head on her chest in seconds." Jessica heard a voice in her head say. The voice matched Lorin's but sounded deeper and more strained. Jessica looked behind her and saw a figure, a figure that matched the color of Lorin's conscious, sitting cross legged on a clump of memories in the midst of a raging torrent of screams and pleads for mercy.