Insanity

Chapter 34

Song: When The Darkness Comes by Colbie Caillat

☆☆☆

"Drawn into your mystery,
I was just beginning to
see your ghost."

☆☆☆

Steve sat on the couch of his apartment, nervously twiddling his thumbs. Natasha had called a few minutes prior, stating she had something very important for him and that she'd meet him at his apartment. Steve thought about what Fury had said, that there were ears everywhere, and hoped what she was bringing wasn't too terribly classified.

There was a soft knock at his door and he leapt off of the sofa, hurrying towards the door. Sure enough, Natasha was on the other side, a broad grin on her face. "Were you waiting by the door or something?" she asked, stepping into the apartment.

"Something like that," Steve said, shutting the door behind her.

"Your face looks better. How are you feeling?" she asked, taking off her jacket and draping it on a tall coat rack.

Steve lightly tapped the bruised areas on his face, noticing it was still tender though not quite as much as it had been. He'd never had a bruise that lasted this long since he'd gotten the serum, but then again he'd never stepped down from a fight before the helicarrier incident, either. "It still hurts. Wouldn't you know it, metal to the face really does hurt."

"I know, I had braces," Natasha joked, fishing through her extremely large handbag before handing Steve a small stack of papers poorly stapled together, as if it had been done in a hurry. "Sorry I didn't translate them in the first place, I forgot most people aren't versed in multiple languages."

Steve took the stack of papers, his hands shaking. A few days ago, Natasha had brought him a folder from Kiev with information regarding exactly what Hydra had done to his best friend; unfortunately, the entire thing was in Ukranian, a language Steve didn't know even a single word from. So Natasha had taken the file back, promising to translate everything in Bucky's file to English. Steve was impressed she had gotten it done so quickly, actually, though he wondered if there was some fancy Google or Goggle or whatever it was machine that had done it for her. "You did this yourself, no, uh, Google involved?" he asked.

"All on my own," she said, smirking. "It would have taken twice as long on Google translate and besides, that thing isn't accurate half the time anyway," she scoffed, flopping onto Steve's sofa. Steve sat gingerly beside her, afraid to uncover the first page, afraid of the truth of what kind of torture Bucky had endured over the years.

Steve cleared his throat. "I heard they thought he was at the Smithsonian the other day," he said, staring at the blank first page of the report, trying to will himself to flip to the first page. "That's what Fury said, anyway."

"Yeah, he said James was in your exhibit. Trying to learn about you, maybe," she suggested, shrugging. "It's just horrible what happened to him."

Steve sighed, still trying to stall reading the report. "You know I broke into that museum to steal back my original suit so I could fight him," he started, turning towards Natasha, who seemed confused.

"Because you didn't have a protective suit?" she questioned, raising an eyebrow and crossing a black booted foot across her knee.

Steve shook his head. "Nah, would have been easier to steal from S.H.I.E.L.D. at that rate."

Natasha paused, cocking her head to the side ever so slightly, just enough to where her bright red hair fell over her shoulder. "Did you think that if he saw that suit in particular he might remember?" she inquired, her voice low and hushed. Not harsh or angry, but concerned, intrigued. Steve said nothing, figuring that was all the answer she would need. "Well, it must have worked."