#and the fallen needles can stab clean through a sock into your skin | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

beckzorz · 5 years

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Blood Bank (one-shot)

Pairing: Winter Soldier x f!Reader Words: 8007 Warnings: Death, blood, needles, murder, swearing, mentions of past torture... And angst, in case all the other warnings didn’t give it away. Summary: Your captors ask you your blood type. Your answer changes everything. A/N: Written for @connorshero’s song challenge! My song was “Take Me To Church” by Hozier, I was particularly inspired by these lines: “I'll tell you my sins and you can sharpen your knife / Offer me that deathless death / Good God, let me give you my life.” Thank you so, so much to @prettyyoungtragedy and @jewelofwinter for beta reading at different points for me :3 So much appreciated! I hope you enjoy :3

There’s a rattle at the door. Low voices hissing, arguing. You know those voices. They’re the voices of the people hurting you.

You groan and force your eyes open. Who is it now? Another bout of torture? Another round of tests? More foreign substances pumped into you? The last pills they gave you made you hallucinate for three days straight. You’ve only been clean—as clean as one can get in a place like this—for a few hours.

Unless the whispers are hallucinations, too.

At least you know the cell is real. It’s small, dark, the same it’s been since you were first thrown in. It’s not too cold right now, or at least, you’re not shivering despite the fact that your only protection is a thin gray jumpsuit. You don’t even have socks, let alone shoes. But still, you’re not cold.

Is it daytime? It’s not like you can tell. The whispering has ceased, but you can hear the key sliding into the lock with its customary grind.

The guard who barges inside is breathing heavily, his eyes wide and face pale. You cower into your flimsy mattress, but the guard—Vasilyev? Vasilev?—doesn’t grab you just yet.

“Your blood type!” he barks. It’s not a question. You answer anyway. He sighs, his shoulders slumping in relief. “Thank fuck.”

He storms out, slamming the door behind him, but it doesn’t catch.

You sit up slowly.

The door is open?

Is this freedom?

You leap to your feet, head spinning, heart pounding. Before you can take even a single step towards freedom, Vasilyev bursts back in. You throw your hands over your head with a whimper, waiting for the inevitable blows, but all Vasilyev does is grab your wrists and drag you out into the hall. You stumble at his brisk pace, limbs aching in protest. His grip is too tight, and after three days in your tiny cell your legs are sore.

He yanks you along. The concrete is rough against your bare feet, more so when you stumble again, feet dragging on the ground.

“Keep up.” Vasilyev’s voice is rough, but there’s an edge of panic to it that leaves a long string of question marks in your hazy mind.

What’s going on?

You haven’t been imprisoned long. It all happened less than two weeks ago, the man in black and the blood and the blindfold…

In that time, they’ve taken you around their little complex, but it’s all been with a lazy interest that’s sent shivers down your spine every time. Nothing they’ve done to you is important, not really. Whatever they’re testing aren’t things they need. Experiments, not necessity. They’ve barely scratched the surface in the torture department, at least in your opinion. No pulling fingernails, no American handcuffs, no brands in your skin.

But the panic in Vasilyev’s voice is different. It’s new. You’ve never heard him so unnerved before, not like that. The only other time was when you got your hands on an empty syringe, and were about to jab it into your skin—

You’d gotten a beating for that, before they injected you with hallucinogens. Even now, there are bruises on your thighs. But they hadn’t hurt you enough to break anything. Or even break you. Not really.

The second turn clues you in to where Vasilyev is taking you. The infirmary is the only place at this end of the building, at least that you’ve been to. You assume the dark room across the hall is a morgue.

Maybe they’re bringing you there.

But no, Vasilyev thrusts you through the swinging infirmary doors shoulder first. The same nurse, doctor, whatever, from your syringe escapade jumps up from his seat and rushes towards you.

“Here she is. Where do you want her?” Vasilyev’s grip is bruising, but for all that you can still feel his trembling.

“What’s going on?” you blurt.

“Strap her down, over there,” the nurse says, ignoring your question entirely as he points towards two gurneys sitting side by side. “It should work.”

Vasilyev drags you to the closest gurney and pushes you down. You bounce on the thin mattress; the bruises on the back of your thighs are so tender you cry out.

“The other one, you idiot,” the nurse says. “What, you want me to stab his left arm?”

“Shut up, fuckface.” Vasilyev drags you around to the other gurney and slams you down so hard you see stars.

By the time your vision clears, your hands and one foot are strapped into cuffs hooked to the railings. You kick at Vasilyev with your one free leg, but he grabs it easily, strapping it down just like the others.

“Now keep still, or else.”

Vasilyev jabs his fist into your stomach. You wheeze, doubling up as far as your bindings will let you. Your eyes burn, and even after the initial pain fades to a dull throb, you can’t keep the tears at bay. The nurse is busy at his station at the other end of the room, the tinkle of instruments and the sloshing of liquids all sending fresh shudders up your spine as you collapse flat on your back.

Your mind reels. What is happening? What could possibly be so urgent? Why are they stabbing someone’s arm—is someone else being brought in? What are you doing here? It had all started with Vasilyev asking for your blood type.

Blood, needles, arms, liquid—rubbing alcohol?

The nurse hurries over, his steps light and quick and the little cart squeaking against the floor until he wheels it to a stop at your left side, between the gurneys. You lift your head, heart racing, but all you see is a syringe hooked to a tube.

Arms. Needles. Blood.

“Come here, Vasilyev, hold her down.”

Vasilyev grumbles, but he obeys. He leans across you, holding your left arm down in a bruising grip at the wrist and shoulder. You hiss, try to shift, but you’re weak and he’s too strong. He smirks down at you, but there’s still worry lurking in his eyes.

You swallow, almost ready to ask, but then the nurse swipes the inside of your elbow with rubbing alcohol. You tense.

Blood.

“Please,” you beg. “Please just tell me what’s going on!”

“Relax your arm,” the nurse says. He wiggles the syringe by your face. “Otherwise this will hurt.”

You try to relax. You really do. But the needle is thicker than you’re used to, and Vasilyev’s weight digging into your arm is already giving you pins and needles, and you’re more scared than when the walls started crumbling around you during your hallucinations, and—

A scream rips from your throat as the nurse slides the needle in. It burns; it’s like a whole knife shoved up your arm.

“Oh, please,” the nurse scoffs. “Calm down, won’t you? You’re giving me a headache.”

Vasilyev snorts.

Your scream dissolves into sobs; every one exacerbates the ache in your stomach, but you’re powerless to stop. The nurse tapes down the needle, pats your shoulder, and starts to hum off-key. Vasilyev lets go of you at last. They leave you.

You lie there, shudders racking your body as you slowly come back to yourself. Every movement of your arm shifts the needle, shooting fresh pains up and down your arm. You hold as still as you can.

Arms. Needles. Blood.

A commotion starts in the corridor, silencing the nurse’s humming. Echoing shouts, bangs… Vasilyev and the nurse jump to their feet; Vasilyev rushes out into the hall. The nurse inches towards you, pale. You twist your head to look at the door, brows pinched and neck twinging.

“What’s going on?” you ask.

“Time to do our part,” the nurse says with false cheer. “We mustn’t make our little outpost look bad now.”

The door bursts open; the nurse skids back. Two guards, led by a stony-faced Vasilyev, are supporting a third man dressed in black whose feet drag along the floor, leaving trails of blood in their wake.

“Oh my god,” you breathe.

The man in black’s head is lolling on his neck, his chin tucked against his chest. His clothes are shiny with blood. Behind his curtain of matted dark hair, a long scrape along his cheek is dotted with blood too.

The guards are breathing heavily. The man in black is barely breathing at all.

“Stand up,” Vasilyev barks, but there’s a hint of fear behind his order.

The two guards step gingerly away from their—prisoner? He has to be a prisoner, the way Vasilyev is barking and the way the blood is just leaking out of him. The man groans as he rights himself, barely able to lift his head.

Vasilyev slaps him.

You flinch. The man doesn’t react at all, except that his head falls to the side, giving you the first clear view of his face. He hasn’t spotted you yet, but he’s white as a sheet behind the blood.

“Get on the gurney,” Vasilyev orders. He shoves the man, who stumbles and barely catches himself.

At a look from Vasilyev, the two other guards help lift the man in black onto the gurney. He’s tall, broad; he takes up more room on the gurney than you were expecting from his pathetic entrance. He’s oddly quiet now; has he fallen unconscious? No—he shifts under their prodding hands, hair falling around his face to reveal a chiseled profile and barely parted lips. Vasilyev pushes one of the guards aside and starts to strap the man in. He works fast, too fast; his fingers slip on the second cuff and he swears.

The nurse, puttering around, sniffs with disdain.

“He’s lost too much blood to be a threat, Vasilyev,” he murmurs. “Just look at him.”

“You spend too much time at this godforsaken outpost. Trust me,” Vasilyev says, strapping the man’s chest down with a grunt, “he’s always a threat.”

Always a threat? You stare at the man beside you as Vasilyev adds yet another strap, this one across the man’s black-clad thighs. Who is he?

All he does is moan.

Now that the man is strapped down, the nurse steps between the gurneys. He’s holding another syringe, but he hesitates.

“Should we remove the sleeve, perhaps?”

“Don’t waste our time,” Vasilyev snaps. “Get to it!”

“I can’t get to it if I can’t find a vein.”

Vasilyev positively growls. He yanks a knife free from his belt and none too gently slices up the thick sleeve, baring the man’s arm to the elbow and nicking a fresh cut on his upper arm. A drop of blood wells up against ghostly pale skin. “Happy?”

“Mm, it’ll do.”

The nurse doesn’t bother to clean the other man’s elbow before he presses the needle in. That, at last, is enough to prompt you to speak.

“What about the alcohol?”

The nurse sighs. He rolls his head along his shoulders until he’s giving you the most bored look you’ve ever seen. “Do I tell you how to do your job?”

You tug against the cuff on your right hand, the one that won’t move the needle. Vasilyev takes a step towards you, a warning. You go still, but the nurse is still watching you expectantly. You glance at Vasilyev, but he rolls his eyes and gestures for you to answer.

“Yes,” you tell the nurse. “You told me to calm down.”

“Ha. So I did.” He slaps his knee. “Good advice, if I say so myself.”

“I don’t know,” you say shakily. You turn your head further to your left and flinch.

The man beside you is staring at you with blank blue eyes. His rapid, shallow breathing fans the few hairs caught on his lips. Tears sting your eyes. What have they done to him?

“Did they kill your family too?” you whisper.

Not softly enough.

Vasilyev and both other guards storm your gurney. You pull your limbs as far in as you can, but there’s no curling into a ball now.

“Lighten up, boys,” the nurse says loudly. The three guards come up short, Vasilyev’s hand inches from your throat and the others shoulder-to-shoulder at your feet. “She won’t last, he’ll be wiped, what’s it matter? Let them talk.”

The guards back away as the nurse turns back to you, fitting a clear plastic tube to the syringe lodged in your left elbow.

You won’t last?

The man beside you is frowning now. His mouth moves, but no sound comes out. A tear leaks out of your eyes. Poor soul; he looks half a corpse. Is he going to be fed whatever they’re about to put in you?

What do they mean, wiped?

Suction in your veins draws your eyes down to the needle in your arm.

“Whaa?!”

The nurse moves away, and suddenly you can see. They aren’t putting anything in you.

They’re draining you dry.

“No no no no no no no!”

Blood is being sucked out of you through the needle into the tube; you shake your head, terror clamping down your throat, as you follow the path of the snaking blood through the tube hanging in the empty air between the two gurneys.

The man beside you hisses as his right arm sucks up your blood. His eyes squeeze shut; the veins on his neck stand out in sharp definition over his collar even with the streaks of blood painting his skin. You look down, pulse racing, and rattle your left arm, but the syringe is taped down too tight, and every bend of your elbow sets it further in.

Scant feet away, the man’s rapid breathing eases. You whip your head back to look at him, shudders racking your whole body.

“Who are you?” you whimper.

He meets your eyes again, but his expression is as blank as before.

Enough. If he can’t answer with words, what’s the point in talking to him? You tug at three of your bindings, keeping your left arm still, but there’s not enough give to do anything more than sit halfway up. You glance back at the man, but he’s not looking at your face anymore. His gaze has landed on the plastic tube dangling between the gurneys. Just as you had moments before, he follows the trail from your arm to his.

He frowns. Looks back to you. You’re still shaking. Will you ever stop shaking?

You close your eyes and take deep breaths until they’re almost smooth. Then you look back at the man, bypassing his confused face to study the rest of him. There’s the ruined sleeve, baring a pale, muscular forearm. Blood dotting his uniform…

Uniform?

You suck in a breath, eyes wide as you finally grasp the whole picture. He’s armed. Armed to the teeth, or he would have been, if all the holsters criss-crossing his body had been full. Most are empty, but you know what’s missing. Pistols. Knives. Instruments of death…

As it is, the wide holster against his thigh is still sporting a knife. Your eyes snap back to his. His gaze wanders almost lazily down to his leg; he runs his fingers along the hilt of the knife at his side as he looks back to you.

Why have they left him armed?

“Who are you?” you rasp.

Confusion clouds his face. He licks his lips, blue eyes struggling to focus. When they finally do, his expression clears. “They took you.”

What?

You open your mouth, but the question lodges itself in your throat. The knife… The guns, the black uniform, the fact that he’s armed—that he knows they took you—

“Oh god!”

You try and scoot away, but the bindings on your arms and legs only let you go so far.

“You—you killed them! My family, they’re dead!”

He just stares. There’s no remorse in his eyes, no denial.

“Oh god…”

Your eyes burn, your stomach quakes. You jerk harder with your arms and legs, rattling the gurney and doubling up as much as you can against the wave of nausea. The gurney skids inches across the floor, the harsh squeal of locked wheels against cold tile echoing through the infirmary. The needle taped into your elbow shifts; you cry out, but you don’t stop. How can you stop? You’re literally being forced to give life to the man who killed your family.

“Hey!”

Vasilyev bears down on you, brandishing a scalpel.

At that, you freeze.

“Keep still or I’ll pin you down!” he growls. He jabs the scalpel next to your head, yanking hard until the fabric tears, the sound unnaturally loud so close to your ear.

“I’ll have to clean that now,” the nurse says drily. “Isn’t the whole point to not waste her blood?”

Vasilyev snorts. He pulls the scalpel free and pushes you even closer to the other gurney than before. The man—the murderer is within reach, even with the cuffs. You bite your tongue to contain your whimper, but the man beside you makes no move in your direction.

All he does is look.

You can’t hold his gaze. Your eyes fix on the tube connecting you. There’s a break in the bloodstream from your struggle. It oozes along, slow as molasses, until it’s sucked into him.

You close your eyes.

Are they dragging this out on purpose? Is this ever going to end? You crack open an eye, but the nurse is lounging on a wheeling stool, the picture of inaction. The guards are huddled in easy reach, but too far for you to make out their hushed conversation. The room is cold now, colder than before. Goosebumps break out along your arms.

Meanwhile, the man beside you is regaining color. His breathing is steady; yours is a mess. Your stomach is more curdled than sour milk. Bile rises in your throat as you stare at your family’s killer.

“Why did you do it?” You swallow hard. “What did they do?”

“They were in the way of freedom.”

“What?!” you gasp. “They were fighting for freedom!”

You know what your parents were up to. They’d always left you out of it, but you knew. You’d known all along. Your hands were always clean, but you’d never been ignorant. Of their methods, perhaps, but you knew what the pamphlets were for, even if you never had a chance to read them before they were whisked out of sight.

No, you were never involved. But here you are, strapped to a table, giving life back to the man who took everything from you.

“What about me, then?” you ask, voice and hands shaking. “What did I do?

“You?” His eyes dart around, but they don’t land on anything. After a heavy moment, he shakes his head. His brow darkens. “You know what you did.”

“Do I?” The laugh that comes out of you isn’t recognizable. It’s painted with horror. “The worst things I’ve done—they don’t merit this.” You shake your left arm at him. The plastic tube wavers in the air.

“What did you do?” he asks, voice low. His gaze flits to the doctors, but they’re ignoring you still. “Tell me.”

Your stomach churns. You’ve never told anyone… But this is it, isn’t it? This is your last chance.

“I stole from my parents. I burned a flag. I tried to kill someone, once.”

His face contorts with shock at that. “You?”

You can’t blame him for his incredulity. What a picture you paint now, with sweat beading on your brow and your hands shaking, rattling the cuffs against the metal railings. But you’d been alive once, really alive, with as much vigor and feeling as anyone.

“Who?” he asks.

You swallow. The guards and the nurse are watching impassively. One of the guards leans over and whispers something in the nurse’s ear; both of them snigger. Hot anger surges in your breast, and you fix the man beside you with a harsh stare even as you shiver.

“Someone who tried to hurt me.”

The man frowns. “Is that all?”

“Wha-what else do you want?” You laugh weakly, but it quickly turns into a cough. Every hack jolts your aching head and sets your stomach roiling.

The man’s blue eyes slide around the room. His fingers glide along the knife at his thigh. You whimper.

“Enough,” the man says, loud enough for the guards and nurse to hear.

“We’ll see about that,” the nurse says, hurrying over. He pushes the gurneys farther apart and stops the flow of blood, leaving the needles in. He turns to examine the man behind you. The nurse hums as he looks the man over, seeming satisfied with what he finds. “Alright, he’s stable.”

The nurse takes the needle from the man’s arm, taping down a gauze pad to stop the bleeding. He does the same for you. The second the hole in your elbow is taped up, you curl your sore arm as much as you can. You hiss. God, it hurts. And every bone feels like a hundred pounds. Your arm collapses back to your side, bouncing on the mattress.

“Well, soldier, what’s the damage?” the nurse asks.

Soldier? Is that what he is? He isn’t dressed like the others, who wear uniforms with red berets like normal soldiers. The man beside you is dressed like a shadow, or a ghost.

Like a murderer.

Vasilyev looms over you, his eyes sharp and mouth pressed in a thin line. You roll your head aside, away from him. Your skull is throbbing hard now. Vasilyev’s hands are hot on your skin as he undoes the cuff on your right arm. If you had the strength, you’d try to hit him. As it is, you’re as helpless as a rag doll, your gaze fixed on the man lying beside you. He’s watching you, something like sorrow in his blue eyes as the nurse prods at his ribs.

“No more,” you whimper. You don’t know whom you’re pleading to. “Please.”

Vasilyev ignores you as usual. The other cuffs are gone in seconds. He forces you to sit up, but the second he lets go of you, you topple back with a wheezy grunt. Your head pounds from the impact.

“For fuck’s sake,” Vasilyev groans.

The nurse tsks. He swivels on his stool to look you over. His acrid green gloves are stained with blood. “What did you think was going to happen, Vasilyev?”

“No more,” you repeat.

The nurse pats your cheek. “There, there.”

Blood clings to your face. You glance to your left again, eyes wide and wet. The soldier’s lips, pink now, part as he takes you in. Your blood is in him, and his blood is painting your skin.

“Make it stop,” you beg. “Please, soldier.”

His mouth sets in a line. His blue eyes harden.

“Just use the gurney,” the nurse tells Vasilyev, and then he turns back to the man at your left.

The soldier drives his knife into the nurse’s gut. The nurse freezes, gurgles. The soldier yanks the knife across the nurse’s belly; blood spurts out of the wound, splattering the soldier’s black uniform with a fresh coat of red.

You gape. Your weak pulse pounds in your ears.

The soldier sits up, the bindings across his arms and chest tearing as though they were butter. The nurse topples to the ground. Vasilyev is shouting, pulling out his gun; the other two guards rush over, but the soldier twists to his left, toppling his gurney. Vasilyev’s first bullet pings against the metal frame; the second tears through the mattress, but the soldier’s already rolled away. Four more bullets whizz through the air, inches from you, but none hit their mark.

Your heart skips a beat. Is this freedom? Bullets, blood, bile in your throat—is this freedom?

Vasilyev drops to his knees at your side as the soldier carves his way through the other two guards. The air moving past you sparks a fresh burst of goosebumps. Vasilyev props his gun on your knee, taking aim.

“Don’t move,” he warns.

You freeze. Your heart sinks. Not freedom, then.

Every shot sends shudders recoiling along your leg, and you clench the gurney’s handles in an attempt to keep still. There’s an empty ferocity on the soldier’s face, one that doesn’t dissipate when his eyes pass over you.

Fresh blood is spattered on his cheeks.

Are you next?

Vasilyev swears. He reloads his gun, but before he can take aim, a bullet whizzes through the air over your legs and hits him square in the forehead. Vasilyev topples backwards, gun soaring through the air.

Only then does the soldier turn back to you. He’s not even panting. The work of barely a minute—four men dead, himself freed from bondage—hasn’t winded him at all.

Vasilyev’s gun clatters against the floor.

“No more,” the soldier says.

Your words, in a quiet, thoughtful baritone. Your words, in his mouth?

Is that better or worse than your blood in his veins?

You don’t know. All you know is that lying helpless and freezing on a gurney, your family’s killer standing over you, half your life sapped away to fuel his—none of it feels like freedom.

The soldier tucks the stolen gun into one of his holsters. His blue eyes rove across your prone body, from your face to your bare arms to your bare feet. You curl your arms across your chest. Your left elbow is sore, but the scratchy gray jumpsuit is far too little protection. Under his intense gaze, you feel exposed.

His inspection complete, the soldier kneels over the bodies of the dead men littering the floor. You don’t have the energy to lift your head to look, but you can hear rustling, and the jingle of a keychain. Is he going through their clothes?

A thump at your feet makes you flinch. You finally prop yourself up on your right elbow and stare at the pair of military boots at your feet. Two footwraps come next.

Oh.

The soldier is stripping the bodies.

Why? You can’t imagine. Everything is foggy.

You can hear the dull sounds of the soldier moving the bodies around. Is that an arm hitting the floor? A leg? You close your eyes and lie back down. Closing your eyes does nothing to shut out the sounds of the dead.

Your body feels so heavy.

“Here.”

You open your eyes. The soldier is standing over you again, holding out one of the dead guard’s jackets. You can clearly see where the knife had gone in, come out. There’s a dark patch of blood around the tear in the fabric.

The soldier shakes the coat at you. You push yourself up, breathing heavily from the effort. He grips your shoulder in his left hand to help right you, and you stare in shock.

His left hand—is metal?

“Here,” he repeats impatiently.

You tear your eyes away from his hand, mind reeling as you look back at the coat. It’s for you? Are the shoes for you, too?

“Why?” you ask.

“It needed to stop.” His face is passive, save for a tic in his jaw. “Wasn’t—” He cuts himself off, but he’s said enough.

Tears well in your eyes. Somehow, even though he thinks your parents had deserved death, you don’t.

What would your parents think of their killer saving you?

You sniff, and nod. It doesn’t matter now, does it? Whatever comes next, you’re too helpless to go on alone. And you know perfectly well there are more people here than the four lying dead on the ground.

He drapes the coat over your shoulders; you stick one arm through, then the other. It takes an eternity, and by the time you’re done the soldier has torn the ripped sleeve off his uniform, baring his sculpted pale arm, and you’re exhausted again. The extra weight of the jacket is no comfort against the chill. Your chill is from inside, not out. You clench your knees tightly, locking your elbows to keep yourself upright.

“They drained me dry,” you whisper; it’s as loud as you can manage.

The soldier doesn’t answer. He grabs the footwraps and boots from the end of the gurney and kneels at your feet. You stare down at his blood-matted hair as he wraps your feet—in another life, you might have laughed at the sensation of someone else’s hands there. Right now, all you can do is watch. Your arms shake a little; the left one is still too sore to keep perfectly still.

The boots slide on easy—whichever guard they’d belonged to had bigger feet than yours, apparently. The soldier stands.

“You can’t walk?” he says. It’s barely a question, but you shake your head anyway. The brief movement makes your head spin. He steps back, looks you over. He does a button up on the jacket, near your collarbone.

Then he slides his left arm under your knees, the other around your back, and hoists you into his arms.

It’s a painful jostle. Your arm aches in protest, and your limited energy means you can’t even shift to find a more comfortable position against the myriad straps over his chest. And while your upper body is protected by the army jacket, the thin jumpsuit pants are no barrier at all against all the blood yet to dry on his uniform.

The soldier strides out of the infirmary, pushing the swinging doors open with a well-aimed kick and ducking through.

Voices ahead.

He pauses.

“You need to hold on,” he says, voice flat.

You wriggle your arms around his neck. Your skin is too clammy to get a good grip, and you end up gripping your covered elbows instead of your wrists. If you’re choking him, he makes no comment. All he does is pull the stolen gun out.

A gun in his hand, grim determination in his eyes, blood splattered across his face—is this how he’d looked when he’d killed your family? You hadn’t seen the face behind the mask, but now…

You shudder and bury your face in the crook of your shoulder. Whatever comes next, you don’t want to see. If you’re about to die—

Well. You’ll die without giving anyone else the satisfaction of seeing you frightened.

What comes next is a blur of movement and gunshots. Something pings off the soldier; is that his metal hand, deflecting bullets?

How much of his flesh has been replaced?

You just hang on around his neck and let him swing you around as he dodges and moves through the corridors, bending here and there to grab a fresh gun. Time moves slow as molasses, but in the back of your mind you have the strange sensation that things are moving all too fast. You adjust your grip, and for the first time your face brushes his skin.

It’s scorching. You suck in a harsh breath in shock; you’re still so cold. Are you so cold? Has he got a fever? Or did he just take all your warmth?

You don’t lift your head until you feel fresh air on your face. It’s dusk—or dawn? You’re not sure. But the light is gentle, and the air is cool, clean. Fresh. There’s a few cars parked near the door, but beyond that is a forest. Birds chirp, bugs chitter, leaves rustle—

Tears stream down your face. It’s beautiful.

Freedom never felt so sweet.

The soldier pulls out a keychain and heads for a black van. He opens the passenger side first and sets you down. It takes a moment to unwind your stiff arms from around his neck. Your left elbow aches, but at least you’re free to move it. If you can muster the energy.

The soldier pulls the buckle across your chest. He’s quick but careful, polite—not groping, or harsh, or leery.

“Thank you,” you murmur.

The soldier pauses as he finishes strapping you in. His haunting blue eyes fix on yours from inches away. Your breath catches.

Despite everything, despite the blood on his face, despite what he’s done to you, what he did to the four dead men in the infirmary just minutes ago and however many others in the corridors, you’ve never seen anyone so beautiful.

Maybe it’s just that you’re free now. Everything is beautiful in this half-light, even a murderer.

In this half-light, the murderer might almost be a man.

You grip the seatbelt and swallow. His eyes dart across your face. Your heart thumps in your chest.

In this half-light, the man might almost be your hero.

A harsh caw shatters the quiet. The soldier pulls back and slams the door. In the space of seconds, he’s in the driver’s seat beside you, keys in the ignition and engine rumbling to a start. He doesn’t look at you as he drives into the woods, but you can’t take your eyes from him. You’re on his right again, just like before. His dark hair hides the scrape on his cheek. Your eyes train along his bare arm. It’s so still you might mistake it for a sculpture, but then he turns the wheel and the illusion breaks.

He’s real. He’s very real.

“What’s your name?” you ask.

His hands tighten on the wheel. The plastic creaks in protest. He lets out a low breath.

“Dunno,” he says.

You open your mouth to ask, to protest, but then think better of it. What use is it, to ask a man about things he doesn’t know?

How much of him had they taken away? His hand, his identity, his freedom…

His freedom?

You bite your lip. Is he as trapped as you had been?

“Are you… free?” you ask.

He frowns. “Dunno.”

Your parents had kept you out of their politics. You don’t understand their caution now. Surely they’d realized you’d be at risk no matter what. Risk or no risk, your politics aside, you know what freedom is supposed to be.

“If you don’t know, then you aren’t.”

He doesn’t answer. All he does is set his jaw, his shoulders.

You look away from him at last, gut clenching. How can he have done so much yet know so little?

How much of him had they taken away?

You lean against the window, the glass cool against your clammy skin. The trees whizz by; the road is gravel and dirt. It’s jostling. You’d been too caught up to notice before.

Strange. Fifteen minutes ago, you’d been desperate to get away from him.

Not anymore.

You turn to gaze at him again. For the first time since he’d gotten in the car, he glances your way. There’s nothing of the monster left in him. He’s just a man now. Yes, he’s done terrible things, but all for reasons. Not his own, it would seem, but there’s a logic to it nonetheless.

If he really was a monster, you’d never have gotten through to him. He would have let them kill you. He might even have killed you himself. As it is, he’s taking you… where? Even if he’s saved your life, he’s still a stranger, still a ghost.

“Where are you going?”

“Hospital,” he says.

“What for?”

“You need a doctor.”

That’s certainly true. You twine your cold fingers together and sigh.

“What about you? What do you need?”

“I need to finish my mission.”

Your blood—what little is left—runs colder than ever.

A mission?

Is that what your family had been? A mission?

You shift closer to the door and squeeze your stinging eyes shut. “You don’t need to finish it.”

“I have a mission,” he snaps, brow drawn low and mouth set in a hard line. “That’s what I know. I’m going to see it through.”

“They’ll kill you!” Your eyes pop back open. You grab his shoulder; he stiffens, but otherwise doesn't react. “What you did—you killed all those people—”

“They weren’t doing a good job anyway,” he says drily. His expression softens. He doesn’t shrug your hand away. “They’ll understand.”

“Will they?” you challenge.

“Yes.” His tone brooks no argument.

Even so, you don’t believe him. What had Vasilyev said? Always a threat? Is a threat worth forgiving? Worth understanding?

He’s a threat to you, though, whatever his current quixotic impulse and whatever your strange, sudden fascination. How fast had he turned on the nurse, the guards? Your words had pushed him to save you then. Would the wrong words now push him to kill you instead?

You don’t know.

You let your hand fall from his shoulder. You don’t dare touch his bare skin, much though you long for the warmth. You’re still too cold. You press your trembling hand to your chest; the phantom feeling of him lingers.

How long has it been since you touched someone of your own volition? Fifteen, sixteen days? Two weeks, give or take. Is two weeks a lifetime? It might as well be.

Your head tips forward.

“Hey,” he says. He reaches out and adjusts your head until you’re leaning against the window. His hand is warm on your face. “You okay?”

“No, soldier,” you answer. You close your eyes and huddle into the jacket. The only warmth you have left is what lingers from his hand. “I’m not.”

—

Long before you open your eyes, the road evens out. The car is zooming now. A highway, maybe?

Even behind your eyelids, you can tell it’s getting darker. You sigh, and let true darkness claim you.

—

A hand shakes you awake.

You cry out, flailing at the unexpected touch, but someone gathers your hands in their own, gentler than you’d expected.

“Hey, hey, calm down.”

Your eyes focus at last—the soldier is still sitting beside you in the driver seat, the dried blood flaking on his face but his expression unthreatening. It’s safe. He’s safe.

You’re safe.

The car is stopped on the side of a main road god knows where, but there’s little traffic. You’re between streetlights, the car cast in shadow and the blue of his eyes barely visible. There’s no one else on the street, save for the shrinking headlights of a car already passed by. For all intents and purposes, it’s still just the two of you. You relax your hands into his hold. Your fingers tremble, but it’s outside your control. He seems to understand. He folds your hands together, then lets them go.

You clasp your hands to your chest. God help you, but you wish he hadn’t let go.

“Can you walk?” he asks.

You look around more closely. “Wh—where are we?”

“By a hospital.”

Your heart drops. None of the buildings look like hospitals…

“Where—”

“Around the corner.” He’s unbothered, looking at you almost blankly, left arm propped on the steering wheel so he can face you. “Can you walk?”

You test your limbs. Your left arm is still sore, but the fitful rest had conserved a little strength.

“Maybe.”

He frowns, glances at the street as another car zooms past. There’s no one else on the road, but he clenches his fist. He’s not calm anymore. Tension is building—in the set of his shoulders, his jaw.

“You have to walk.”

“What if I can’t?” you counter. Your heart is racing, pumping too-little blood through your veins. It sounds hollow in your ears.

“You don’t have a choice.”

The soldier reaches across you and opens your door.

“Get out.”

You gape at him. You clench the seatbelt still securing you in and shake your head.

“I—no!”

He yanks your hands away from the seatbelt and unbuckles it. “You don’t have a choice.”

“You can’t make me!” Your voice rises dangerously. Tears well in your eyes; panic swells in your chest. For the first time, you grab hold of his arm. His skin is hot, smooth. His muscles clench under your desperate touch.

“What the hell is wrong with you?” he snaps. He shakes his arm, but you don’t let go. His metal fingers tighten on the wheel. The plastic creaks; he swears under his breath and lets go, leaving an imprint of his hand behind. He glares at you, angry and confused. “You gotta go!”

“Not without you!”

The words burst out of you without thought, and the sudden admission leaves you staggered. The soldier’s eyes widen; he’s more shocked than you are. The anger melts from his face, less so his confusion. There’s something strange in his eyes now—an echo, maybe? You don’t know. You don’t know. All you can do is stare into those blue eyes, heart racing.

Why did you even say that? How could you? This man—he’s not your friend. He killed your family! He killed all those men at the base without a second thought. You haven’t seen an ounce of regret for any of the murders.

Not that you regret the deaths of the men who tortured you, and all the others there who took part in whatever wicked work they were pursuing. Knowing they can’t come after you—it’s a relief.

But the soldier, the man beside you, he’s part of that wicked work too. He killed your family! He killed them, not even knowing them, not even knowing himself…

You shut your eyes and press your forehead against his shoulder. Tears roll down your cheeks. The soldier stiffens, but he doesn’t pull away.

The work of a few hours has transformed him in your eyes. Monster and murderer to your only hope. To your savior. The murders haven’t gone away, but there’s more to him now—more, less, you don’t know; how much doesn’t he know? His own name, taken from him…

Like your family was taken from you.

By him.

It’s a sick circle. But he’s the only link back to them, and to the weeks you spent imprisoned for no good reason at all. He’s the one who believed you, who freed you—all that death, just for you.

To save you.

And now he wants you to walk away, so he can go back to murdering innocents. Even now, with your body half-drained, your mind is sharp enough to know the wrongness in letting him go.

How can you let your savior become a monster again? How can you let the man whose life you saved with your own blood go back to whatever hell he came from? Even if he doesn’t know the wrong in what he’s done…

You do.

You take a deep, shaky breath. The metallic scent of blood and his own smell flood your senses. The reminder of his realness is an instant comfort. You run your hand down his arm until you can bring his hand to your cheek.

Forget the morals. Forget the monster. Beneath it all, you’re terrified of being left alone.

You press a kiss to the back of his hand.

“Please don’t abandon me, soldier.”

You lift your head from his shoulder, still holding tight to his hand. As tight as you can, at least.

The soldier lets out a breath that hisses between his teeth. He studies you, eyes flitting over your face, from your shining eyes to your quivering chin.

“Alright.”

You stare at him, lips parted and heart pounding. There’s a resignation in his face, but he’s serious. He—he’s serious. You let out a little cry and litter kisses on his hand, on the back of it, over his fingers curled around yours.

“Thank you, thank you, thank you!”

The barest hint of a smile ghosts across his lips. He takes the keys out of the ignition, carefully untangles his fingers from yours, and gets out of the car. You’re practically bouncing in your seat.

He saved you, and now you can save him. Together, you can find freedom.

You take a deep breath to compose yourself before he comes around the front of the car. He offers a hand to help you out.

“Can you walk?” There’s a dry humor to his question, and you smile.

��If you help.”

The soldier tucks an arm under yours as you step down from the van to the sidewalk. With his support, you feel light as a feather.

He locks up the van and starts to walk.

“You can’t give them your name,” he says, voice low and fast. “Pick a fake one, or don’t give one at all. And don’t tell them where you’ve been. Just tell them you were lost in the woods.”

“That hardly explains all the lost blood,” you retort.

He pauses, looks down at you. His eyebrow goes up. “Right… well, then forget everything. Don’t hint at it.”

“Okay.” You laugh breathlessly. “Like you.”

He flinches.

“Maybe we can get new names together,” you continue, gentler.

The soldier doesn’t respond.

He leads you around the corner. There’s the hospital, the sign dim but bright light spilling out onto the walkway halfway up the block from the doors into the emergency room.

That light is freedom.

You grasp the soldier’s hand, your throat tight. A lifetime ago, you had always hated hospitals. But now, that stark light is heaven.

You quicken your steps, surprised at your sudden burst of energy but not questioning it for the world. The soldier keeps up without trouble, and soon enough you’re on the walkway to the hospital.

“Remember,” the soldier murmurs, breath warm on your ear, “forget everything.”

You nod, jaw set. “I remember.”

“Good.”

The automatic doors slide open. You pause and turn to say one last private thank you.

Your thanks die in your throat.

The soldier’s face is in stark relief in the bright light. He looks dead. He looks terrible. Like the wrath of god.

“Soldier…?”

He lets go of you—you stiffen in surprise—and shoves you through the open doors.

You cry out, sprawling to the floor inside the emergency room. Your teeth rattle in your skull with the impact. You catch a glimpse of a few people jumping to their feet from stiff chairs, a woman rushing around a desk, sterile walls.

But you ignore it all. You surge to your knees, twisting to stare outside.

“Sold—”

The path is empty.

He’s gone.

“No!”

You collapse back to the ground, sobs tearing from your hollow chest. The woman from the desk runs to your side, calling for a nurse. You barely hear it. You’re dizzy, head swimming. All the warmth that had settled from his arm around you vanishes.

“No,” you whisper.

He’s left you. You’re alone—abandoned.

Why?

You spread your hands flat on the floor. The cool tiles feel miles away. All you can feel is the emptiness of the soldier’s absence. He stole your blood, and now he’s stolen that unnameable piece of you that had settled with him.

Gentle hands cradle you, sitting you up.

“Miss? Miss?”

You blink through your tears. The room is spinning around you. Nothing is clear, except what you’ve lost.

Forget everything.

Your heart squeezes painfully. No, soldier, I can’t.

A nurse's face clears in your vision. She’s got a hand on your face, checking for a fever.

“Miss, what happened?”

The soldier’s face is branded in your memory, but his final direction rattles through you. However impossible forgetting will be, you know you can’t tell anyone here what’s happened to you.

“Please help me,” you gasp. “They did things to me—I’m just so cold, and scared, and I don’t know—I don’t know—”

“Shh, shh, it’s okay,” she reassures you. You hiccough, swipe away your tears with shaking hands.

“I don’t know,” you say again.

But you do.

Within the hour, you’re being fed back more blood to make up for what was taken from you. The nurse and doctor seems to believe your fragmented tale, even with so little detail. Trauma, they say, can make a person forget. And it’s not like people hadn’t disappeared and reappeared before, shaking and traumatized and mind—memories half-gone.

But you remember. You remember blue eyes, a thick needle in your arm, blood on your skin. Death, a metal hand, burning skin against your face. A monster, a man.

You remember.

You always will.

Thanks for reading! Let me know what you think :3

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