A Glimpse of Fire

9

   "Aidan, I found you!" You called out giggling, running up to the boy.
   "You sure did." He replied, his long black hair touching his shoulders. "Are you staying here too?"
    "No, Mommy and I are just visiting."
    "Really?" His emerald eyes slowly looking to the floor. "I.. I was hoping you'd stay. There aren't any other kids for me to play with."
    "Well, maybe mommy and I can stay the night, let me go ask." You bounded back the office where you had last seen her.
    There sat the old man, scribbling away, your mom wasn't with him. You walked into the room slowly.
    "Where's Mommy?" You asked, your chest starting to constrict with panic.
"She went out." He replied, folding his arms on his desk.
You woke being jostled in the car, Bucky's jacket wrapped tight around you in the back seat. Slowly you sat up, every muscle protesting your movement. It was dark outside the car windows, both Tony and Bucky were silent in the front seats. Tony's eyes flickered up to the rearveiw mirror.
"Hey there fire starter, how ya feeling?" Tony asked, Bucky turned slightly to look back at you.
"Like hell." You replied, you could feel that you were almost naked under the coat. "What happened?"
"You turned into a human torch, full scale." Tony replied.
"What did you find out?" Bucky asked softly.
"My mother brought me there when I was five and ditched me while I was off playing with Aidan." Your voice came out cold and detached. "Evidently they hurt him a lot. And pitted him against me, saying I was good cause I took my meds without fighting."
"Seriously?" Tony asked. "What kind of person ditches their own child like that?"
"Don't know, nor do I care." You spat out. "But I need to go back, I need to find out more."
"Not today." Bucky told you, eyes never leaving you. He could see you were about protest and stopped you before you started. "We are getting a motel room and tomorrow, we'll see how you are and then talk about it."
"After we hit a store, sight seer, cause we didn't bring you any extra clothes." Tony piped up.
You couldn't argue with that as Tony pulled off into a run down look store. Bucky hopped out and ran in, he knew your sizes after all and you couldn't exactly walk in wearing nothing.
"I have to agree with the ice warden on this one." He spoke up. "Maybe take tomorrow as an off day and then go back."
"Tony, I can't just let this go." You stated rolling your eyes.
"I'm not saying let it go," he turned in his seat to face you. "All I'm saying is just rest for a day, give him a break. You didn't see the fear in his eyes when he lifted your limp body off the ground."
"I get.."
"No you don't." He cut you off before you could finish. "I've known him for a while and he and I don't get along all the time but he was scared to death. Hell I was scared, you didn't see yourself burst into flames and if it weren't for the fact your sitting in an expensive car and the fact he would try and go homicidal on me I would show you. Just rest tomorrow."
"Fine." You sighed as Bucky came running back out carrying a couple bags. "But after tomorrow we are going back."
"Alright," Bucky said as he climbed back into the car, placing the bags next to you in the back seat. You rummaged through till you found something to put on. "Let's find a place to crash for the night."
It didn't take long to find a motel, it wasn't anything fancy, or over the top. Tony argued for a few minutes before Bucky and you got out of the car effectively ending the debate. The inside of your room looked about as nondescript as the outside.
"I'm sorry." You said softly as you sat down on the edge of the bed.
"For?" He asked, not bothering to turn to look at you he riffled through one of the bags.
"Everything." You looked down at you hands, the palm on your right was blistered and crimson.
"Look, I get it." Bucky replied softly, kneeling in front of you taking your right hand gently in his. He opened the bottle of burn cream and poured some into your hand. "I know how you are, once you get something in your head you can't stop till you figure it out. It's one of the many thing I love about you."
He looked up meeting your eyes, slowly smoothing out cream over your palm. Your eyes scanned over his face. He pulled the gauze from his lap and placed it tenderly over the red surface.
"When we first met, those first couple of times of being around each other I almost killed you, you didn't back down. You wanted, needed to know me. You didn't back down when Steve wanted to send you away, you fought tooth and nail, making me remember who I really was. You've got the same look now that you had then." He stated, pulling the white bandaging out of the box to his left, slowly he began to wrap the gauze pad into place. "But, for the sake of our child and my sanity, all I want is for you to slow down. Just a bit, cause when you go at full speed you don't think about what could happen, you just go."
He taped the end of the wrap in place, pulling your hand up. He placed a kiss to the back of your knuckles, his sky blue eyes baring into you, pleadingly.
"Please, let's slow down a bit." He asked, he was right. A small smile graced your face as you nodded, sliding off the bed into his lap. You wrapped your arms around him, Bucky pulled you into his chest, kissing the top of your head.
"I'll try, it's hard to. I just have a feeling that he's, that's Aidan is coming for me. And I just need to know what's coming at us." You pulled back, looking deep into his eyes. "I can't let him hurt anyone I care about, especially you and our child. I could feel his anger, his rage it's all consuming. Whatever they did, he hates me for it."
"We'll find out, doll."
"James, it's harder then it looks. I can't see what they did, I can only hear it. I need to see what they did to him." You explained. "They hurt him and not me, and that's part of his blinding hatred."
    "We'll figure it out, I promise."