Captain America Bucky Barnes Winter Soldier Steve Rogers Fan Fic - The Constant

Chapter Twenty-One: The Nurse & The Patient - The Abusers & The Abused

(WARNING: Rape and sexual content. Mental abuse. Please be aware of these warnings as this may be a troubling chapter for some readers).  

The Nurse & The Patient - The Abusers & The Abused

They have finally completed the last few pieces in the puzzle, and the new arm and hand are working.

They watch as the test results confirm their prognosis. Ever since they went with the second arm that incorporates a hand instead of implements, the patient seems to have become adjusted to the metal arm. But he is still quiet. He has rarely shown any emotion since that terrible night.

It has felt like a longer time to you despite being only six weeks in all. Since that night you are sure at times that something about your patient is...off. Just...not right. It's only a feeling, and of course you know what Lehmann thinks about your feelings.

Maybe he is right this time.

Maybe it is just tiredness and anxiety.

Since that night, the patient has seemed different somehow. It almost feels as if you are just seeing a façade that he wants you to see. He is quiet but will still do anything you ask of him. If they cause him pain, then he takes it. You had heard Lehmann describe him as a whipped puppy, and although you hated to agree with him, you understood what he had meant. Before, there had been a total innocence there, but now? Now, you are not so sure. Some of the time his eyes seem different, hooded, and a chill runs down your spine when you catch him watching you.

You berate yourself. You are looking for things. You are being stupid. You wonder if maybe it is because seeing him every day is screwing with your mind. You find yourself looking for characteristics of James, and because you are looking, instead you think you see glimpses of something else. You still haven't mentioned anything to Lehmann, but you have talked to Doctor Jakobs. He is learning to trust your feelings, but he has to admit to you that he himself has seen nothing.

Lehmann has been spending a lot of time with the team that will be responsible for "programming" the Winter Soldier. You have no idea what is meant by "programming," and nobody will tell you. A new Austrian doctor has joined the team. You only know his nationality and name. Doctor Johann Fennhoff. You were there when he was introduced to Lehmann and when he conducted an initial examination of the patient. He did not say a lot in front of you, but he seemed pleased, almost smug, about something. You just don't know what. At first you thought he was a pleasant man, one that maybe still had humanity in his thoughts, but as he continued to examine your patient you began to change your mind.

There is something unpleasant about Fennhoff. Something that usually means Hydra has tainted more than his soul.

You hear Lehmann explain that James Barnes was an expert marksman, that he was able to fight, was a trained soldier. All that seems to have gone. "But there is no drive in him, no anger, no life. We successfully broke his mind...but have we broken more than that?"

Fennhoff smiles and shakes his head. "The potential will always be there," he assures the director.

"So is there any other way of bringing back the killer instinct that was part of James Barnes?"

"I don't think you have anything to worry about. Everything we need is still there," Fennhoff says.

What is it he has seen in the patient to make him think that? you wonder.

*

They have the patient in the Master Chair. You don't know all that it does, and you have been told it is nowhere near completion, but they sit him in it to acclimatise him to it all the same. It is how they will control him in the future. They have mentioned such things as mind wipes. How are those any different to programming? They have still not let you into all of their secrets. Lehmann still does not trust you, does not like you to be present all the time, and more often than not you are not invited along until later. Or, if you are there, you are pushed to the back of the room, out of the way. Defunct.