Out of the freezer

[disassembling]

What: AU where The Winter Soldier is found by SHIELD before CA: TWS and settled in with an agent.
Warnings: Just tl;dr. It is my specialty.


Trains weren't generally a source of overland transport anymore, not with planes so conveniently available, but there were points where subtly was required more than quickness. There were less questions about trains, fewer looks with the amount of goods moved into a country so more was able to get through. It was easier to pay people off in shipping yards to look the other way while important items were shifted in and out.

If it had been known early in the process that his superiors had known that an agent had defected and tipped off that there were weapons being moved in from Russia, he would have been removed from the train. Too little, too late though, and the train was hit with SHIELD looking for both intelligence and weapons from the Soviets. It wasn't until a STRIKE team had made it towards the back of the train that some members suddenly realized that their mission had just gotten a lot more complicated.

Cryostasis was a process developed out of the 1940s, though perfected over the years by the Soviets first and then the Americans. Of course, it only worked on him, others never coming up from the surface again because their bodies were advanced enough to cope with the strain on the body and the healing powers required to make it back out of deep freeze. He was special because he was a weapon, made that way to survive the worst conditions. So he bubbled up as he was thawed from the inside out in a process that took hours generally but could be sped up.

Speeding up the process left him disoriented and intractable, irritated and violent. It was fine when enemies of the organization were kicking in the door and shooting the scientists in charge of thawing him. The damage was done though, the anti-freeze drug fast acting in his body as his muscles became suffused with warm blood and his lungs filling with a deep gasping breath as he arched, his blue eyes unfocused as men yelled orders, called in findings. It was all a blur to him.

Someone touched his cold flesh shoulder, but they were gone in the next minute as his metal arm swung around and slammed into the man's gut, blasting him away. He rolled from the chair, acting only on instinct as he grabbed the nearest object - metal table and threw it into a group of men raising their guns. He fought them; worse, he killed them until another team moved in and manhandled him to the ground. Someone did something; a familiar voice called a set of words that made him relax and stand down, so he did.

He was blind-folded, cuffed from wrist to elbow so his shoulders were forced to bow in awkwardly, but his legs were left free so that they could walk him into the SHIELD medical facility where many interested parties had gathered in the time it took to transport him. News had circulated and damage control had not been fast enough where the fact a man was found half-frozen on a train. If he had had his memories of his other life, he might have found it ironically he was found on a train.

The only words spoken above whispered tones was that there had been another similarly unfrozen a few years before. "Call them in. Maybe give us a clue on stabilizing this guy." He was pulled off, seated and chained to a bed in a padded room. With the blindfold off, he knew he could break down the door if he was ordered to. He was deemed too 'unstable' to be in a more populated area, so he was caged and observed.

Damage control indeed. Where were his orders and mission debriefings?

Comments

[disassembling]

He preferred that they were alone anyway, and he didn't even really put much, if any, attention to the fact that they were being watched behind the glass. He had come to accept such things that it was natural to just put it from his mind. He didn't even have any sense that he should be embarrassed for what they had done because why would they be embarrassed over something that had made them feel good?

"Should I feel embarrassed over that?" He wasn't entirely certain he knew how to feel that particular emotion either. He wasn't even certain if he had felt it in the past, though he would have to ponder that and see if any new memories flowed up to the surface. He glanced towards the door that was now closed and bowed his head slightly. "I went against orders. Sorry," he murmured softly.

[eleutheria]

Now she really couldn’t help the light laugh that escaped her and it was a good thing since it did made her feel better, getting her rather embarrassed feelings under control and she shook her head a bit. “No, that depends on the person, I mean not even in the past you got embarrassed about this kind of stuff.” The only time he had been was when she had been the one that caught him making out with a girl, way before the war even happened, and he had tried so hard to explain himself then, no, the job of getting embarrassed over this was hers and not his.

“No, you don’t need to apologize.” She rested one of her hands against his cheek and gently lifted his head, throwing damn caution to the wind, she leaned and quickly pressed her lips against his, it was a soft and gently one not like the one they had shared a few moments ago before she pulled back and pressed her forehead against his with a small smile. “I mean, I did the same after all, right?”

[disassembling]

Her laugh was almost startling to him who was subjected to so little of those kinds of emotions in his tenure with the organization that kept him. No one laughed around him or smiled or told jokes. It just didn't happen. "I didn't?" He frowned deeply, trying to draw on memories that hadn't yet emerged and shook his head a little when he couldn't draw on anything solid in the face of her words. "I don't remember..." he murmured, peering at her between his dark hair strands. He wanted to remember for her and for himself, but some things just didn't come when he wanted them to.

He didn't fight the hand that drew his head up again, blinking when she kissed him. He sighed despite how quick it had been, watching her as his eyebrows twitched in almost confusion. "I'm not... allowed to go against orders," he replied softly, shifting his shoulders. "Orders are there to keep me from hurting anyone that I'm not supposed to."

[eleutheria]

“No, you didn’t, you said there was nothing to be embarrassed about.” She did felt a bit bad when he frowned, she knew what he was doing so, he clearly didn’t remembered many things and this was one of those instances and if she was being sincere, she wasn’t expecting him to remember, it had just been a random comment she had thought about making and she hadn’t wanted to make him feel bad or anything for not being able to remember. “I know, you’re going to be able to remember, eventually and if not, then it’s alright as well.”

She really wasn’t going to push too much if he didn’t remembered certain things, if there came a moment in which he didn’t remembered certain things, she was going to let it pass and let it go for there was little else she could do. There was a small minute of silence. “And which orders did you just broke then?” She wanted to be sure if he was talking about throwing the tray to the agent or the fact they had kissed.

[disassembling]

Had he really said that? Perhaps she referred to the person that he had a bit of a grasp on but still seemed very foreign to him. He suspected that even now he wouldn't be embarrassed if he had been that person back then either, but he had no idea. He didn't remember enough to be certain, but she knew and sounded certain so he was content with that. "Maybe, I don't know if it will all come back." He wondered if she knew if that possibility was going to happen or not. Would she still like him if he couldn't remember everything or even miss some of the important aspects?

How could she not know which order he had broken when she had only really given him one to begin with? "You ordered me not to kill anyone, but I could have. I shouldn't have thrown that..." he trailed off and turned his head enough to peer at her with one eye. "Are you going to punish me or... just let me get away with it?"

[eleutheria]

“Yes, I am aware that you might not be able to remember everything.” After all, she still wasn’t sure how many years in total he had been going through all the conditioning and memory modification or whatever it was through all of these years, she was even sure yet how many times he had been, in a sense, woken up to fulfill his missions or the exact amount of time he had been awake in between, which could have entailed a lot of those procedures he had mention, hell for all he knew he was unconsciously finished offing most of his memories when he had fought nail and tooth against this particular fate. “And I have told you it’s alright if you don’t.” She had finally made peace with that possibility and accepted it now, it wouldn’t change that she wanted to help him to have a better life or be close to it.

And this was the kind of things that worried her about just how exactly he viewed her in this situation; she was just probably quite a blurry line for him between the fellow weapon, handler or the person that had been with him in the past categories. “Yes, you could have but you didn’t, you stopped before actually doing it.” He had only scared the poor man to death and that wasn’t exactly good either. “…do you want me to punish you? I am not exactly good at it you know.”

[disassembling]

He nodded, assured again that she would be alright if not everything came back to him. There were already so many details missing, and it was hard not to feel drawn to her because she was so much of what he was missing. He also was drawn to her as if she were a similar case to him but with memories and that would give him purpose if no one actually came for him, which didn't seem like much of a possibility, but he was aware enough of his surroundings and the people involve to feel the need to plan for that potential eventuality. "You'll just have to tell me some of what I missed out on then."

He had still defied the order; he had acted with knowing he was stepping on the line. Normally someone dealing with him would either praise his action or punish him. Some might even laugh at the poor bastard who had earned his ire. He hadn't figured out the way that she was going to react to him yet in those instances; she had never done more than scold him when he stepped out of line, which wasn't a measure that was normally taken with him. "It's your decision on if you think I deserve to be punished."

[eleutheria]

It was good that she had the chance to let him know, that regardless if he remembered everything or not, her stance about him wasn’t about to change. Again, she really wasn’t that naïve as to hope everything was going to magically work and that she was going to be able to restore everything, in all truth, it was more than probable that he wasn’t going to be the same man he had been before, but that didn’t mattered as long as he remained with her, in whatever role he felt more comfortable with since she didn’t wanted to push him into anything. “I will try to do that or at least till I am able to do.”

And the need to sigh returned, she was doing that a lot lately, probably what he had done will have ended earning him quite a punishment, but she wasn’t like that but there was also the fact that he could have hurt that agent and she couldn’t exactly oversee that, he might try to do it again and not stop it the next time around. “I am going to remind you that you’re not supposed to hurt any of the agents working for S.H.I.E.L.D or scare them like that,” Though if there was a mole or someone with double loyalties, then that one he could hurt, “As for your punishment, well the restriction of our interactions will be that.”