Avengers Imagines

Two Kinds of Torture- Bucky Barnes

(Female Reader)

Warnings: HYDRA torture type stuff

You couldn't take it anymore. The heartlessness, the abuse, the screaming...the god damn screaming. Every experiment- no, every person. You refused to let HYDRA's mindset poison your own. However, there was one person in particular that made it all so much harder. His name was Sargent James Barnes. He was brought in two months ago, and every second Dr. Zola tortured him was nothing but brutal. You'd heard that he was Captain America's right hand man, and he fought like it. There was just this...fire in his heart that was inspiring. Even after two months, he fought for his identity every second. You had only been at the Siberian HYDRA facility for six months, and your spirit had cracked long ago. To be fair, you weren't there by choice.

Another strangled scream made its way through the heavy iron door, and you flinched yet again. The grip on your rifle, and your chin, started to wobble. You desperately tried to steady yourself through James' torturous experimentation happening just one door away. You and another soldier were stationed outside the "lab," but you didn't dare look to him. You couldn't be caught with a tear dripping down your cheek. You just did your best to stare straight ahead down the dark, damp hallway.

The door clanked and creaked open as Dr. Zola and your Sargent finished whatever the hell they were doing to him. You stiffened even further and held your nervous gaze ahead.

"Y/N, clean up the blood and take him back to his cell," your Sargent said over his shoulder without giving you a second, or even first, glance. Your chest tightened as you said your programmed "Yes sir" response. You'd never been assigned that job before, and you never wanted it. For good reason.

The other soldier stayed put while you warily made your way into the lab, the door slamming shut behind you. The sight you were greeted with, wasn't a pleasant greeting at all. It was more like a gut wrenching punch that riddled you with guilt. James was slumped on a metal table, hair dripping with sweat, and blood soaking his grey jumpsuit. Blood that undoubtedly came from attaching a new metal arm on his left side. The few lights in the cement room made it all a ghostly sight.

You tiptoed to the mop and bucket in the corner of the room, your eyes glued to James who was still beyond out of it. As you mopped the blood towards the room's drain, you noticed he was whimpering something. He kept asking for "Steve" and...apologizing.

Another tear surprised you by dripping off your chin. He didn't deserve this. In no way did he deserve all this pain. You heard sniffling over the sloshing of your mop, and realized you weren't the only one crying in the room.

The compassion and humanity inside you, that you were always secretly clinging to, took over your limbs and put the mop back in the corner. That was when you gave into it completely , and approached James carefully. You doubted he could hear your footsteps as you got to his side. He would've been defensive if he had. "James," you tried to speak as gently as possible, "I'm not going to hurt you." Hopefully he heard that.

Your fingers delicately pushed his hair away from his eyes that were lazily shut. Sweat had mixed with splattered blood across his cheeks and forehead, and you didn't want him to wake up to his own blood dried on his face. You could at least help clean him up a bit.

Pulling your sleeve over the heel of your hand, you shakily dabbed it over the blood and sweat. Your eyes kept wandering over his face while you cleaned off the blood. It looked so kind, and strong. "I'm sorry they did this to you..." you whispered. You wiped the blood directly under his eye, and on his cheek bone, and something overwhelmed you. A feeling of hope. "I'm going to get you out of here, I promise." That was something that was a pipe dream for both of you, but it was enough to pull his eyelids away from his striking blue eyes. "I promise," you repeated.