[ Bucky Barnes stares into the abyss, and the abyss stares back.
He’s aware, distantly, that the rest of the team — the West Chesapeake Valley Thunderbolts, guess that’s the group he’s working with now — are currently navigating their own individual darknesses. But Daisy’s here too, and there’s no rest for him as long as that remains true.
They’re only a couple months into this delicate new relationship, and officially calling each other boyfriend and girlfriend. And he’s been blessed with a girlfriend who can hold her own in a fight, who could bring down a building or disintegrate threats— but this creeping darkness across the city is something worse. Not a problem you can simply punch your way out of. Insidious, consuming, forcing you to face your worst memory and your worst self.
It’d be fucking paralysing if he hadn’t already spent the better part of a century looking right at his own. He’s had plenty of time to get accustomed to it; his shame’s an old friend.
He deals with it.
And afterward, before even searching for Yelena and company, Bucky goes looking for Daisy instead. He decides that he’s allowed to be selfish, this once. He needs to be sure she’s okay before he gets back to the job at hand. So it’s doors and hallways and doors, prying open a window and smashing a metal elbow through glass and jimmying through a nearby street cart vendor’s nightmare, then moving on, navigating this labyrinthine landscape folding in on itself. He can’t describe what draws him onward, besides that he knows her now: when he stands at a crossroads and tilts his head and listens, he’s got a pretty good idea that Daisy’s over in this direction, or that one.
So he follows that thread, a red piece of string running through a maze, searching for her. ]
[ This isn't the strangest threat Daisy Johnson has ever faced. Not quite, but with every passing minute, it does seem pretty close. It isn't the mindfuck that the Framework was, or the personal demons of the Fear Dimension bleeding into their universe, but instead, it's almost a combination of the two. She'd been blindsided by coming to in the Zephyr's cargo bay, the long abandoned Playground base beyond the open bay door. That would have been odd enough on its own, but then Hive had come around the corner, muttering to himself and sending a spike of fear and rage running through her.
Time stilled as the pod rose into the room and she watched her younger self exit. Daisy witnessed the pain and desperation as her other self pleaded with the monster who'd nearly ruined their lives. He placed his hand on the side her head and she closed her eyes, ready to give up the entire world just to feel that connection again. And then—
He entered the room, muttering. The pod rose. Younger Daisy approached. ]
No. Stop it. [ Whatever this is, she can't watch it again. Shame burns in her chest as she hurries forward, grabbing hold of herself and tugging the other Daisy back before she can get on her knees. She hardly realizes what's happening as she's quaked off her feet, flying backward and crashing into the wall of the pod. The next moment, the loop repeats, though it takes a moment for it to register through the ringing in her ears.
What the hell is going on? She'd gotten word from Bucky that something might be about to happen, so she'd rushed across town to help with any potential crowd control issues, fully trusting her boyfriend to have things in hand or call for backup when needed. Neither of them had expected that blackness to start swallowing everyone up. Is that what this is? Is that why she's seeing this? ]
Stop. You can't do this. [ Which of them is she talking to? It doesnt really matter as she approaches Hive this time, making to quake him back when he dodges and rushes forward in that almost preternatural speed. His hand is around her throat a second later, squeezing with all his might.
And then it repeats. Again. And again. And again. She loses count of how many times she fails to stop herself from begging to restore the twisted chemical connection with Hydra's original mascot. It's around the twelfth loop that she starts to unravel, focusing instead on trying to force her way out through the bay doors and having to listen to that pathetic begging in the background.
Every time she tries to get past him to the base beyond, Hive stops her. He throws her into a wall, forces her to the ground, grips her in a choke hold. And the entire time, her other self just watches, that disgusting pleading look on her face.
Another dozen loops pass and Daisy sits crumpled on the floor, hands pressed over her ears and yet still able to hear every syllable. Trying to drown out the words she knows by heart now, she repeats a whispered plea. ] Let me go. Please let me go.
Edited (spotted a rogue typo) 2025-09-05 05:33 (UTC)
[ There’s so much variety in these rooms as he passes through them. Some are loud and calamitous and violent; others are quieter, bleaker, conversational. Some people’s worlds collapsed with sound and fury, while other hearts broke in almost silence.
He doesn’t linger too long or try to get involved in any of them as he passes through; he’s just trying to find hers.
And when Bucky does finally step into the hangar, the scene he finds is almost disconcertingly understated. Someone standing there wearing Grant Ward’s face (except it can’t be a man, because that particular man was dead, he knew that much). Bucky’s gaze is drawn to the young woman on her knees in front of not-Ward, listening to the soft whispered Please take me back as he reaches for her face,
(pretty like the Skye, a flower, Daisy)
and Bucky walks right past that looping scene and their murmured conversation, to the other woman in the room. She’s older, her hair different from the version of herself talking to Hive. She’s more worn from years of experience and pain and happiness: there’s more laughter-lines and stress-lines alike etched into her face. His Daisy. The one he knows, now crumpled in on herself, hands over her ears, and his heart is cracking open at the sight.
He’d learned from personal experience that if you don’t try to disrupt the loop, it just keeps going, and so he ignores the rest of the scene. So after a moment, there’s a figure beside her and a warm hand at her cheek; not Hive’s, this time. Bucky’s voice, muffled through her clenched hands and her own murmuring anguish: ]
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
— soon i’ll be alone out in the dark.
He’s aware, distantly, that the rest of the team — the West Chesapeake Valley Thunderbolts, guess that’s the group he’s working with now — are currently navigating their own individual darknesses. But Daisy’s here too, and there’s no rest for him as long as that remains true.
They’re only a couple months into this delicate new relationship, and officially calling each other boyfriend and girlfriend. And he’s been blessed with a girlfriend who can hold her own in a fight, who could bring down a building or disintegrate threats— but this creeping darkness across the city is something worse. Not a problem you can simply punch your way out of. Insidious, consuming, forcing you to face your worst memory and your worst self.
It’d be fucking paralysing if he hadn’t already spent the better part of a century looking right at his own. He’s had plenty of time to get accustomed to it; his shame’s an old friend.
He deals with it.
And afterward, before even searching for Yelena and company, Bucky goes looking for Daisy instead. He decides that he’s allowed to be selfish, this once. He needs to be sure she’s okay before he gets back to the job at hand. So it’s doors and hallways and doors, prying open a window and smashing a metal elbow through glass and jimmying through a nearby street cart vendor’s nightmare, then moving on, navigating this labyrinthine landscape folding in on itself. He can’t describe what draws him onward, besides that he knows her now: when he stands at a crossroads and tilts his head and listens, he’s got a pretty good idea that Daisy’s over in this direction, or that one.
So he follows that thread, a red piece of string running through a maze, searching for her. ]
no subject
Time stilled as the pod rose into the room and she watched her younger self exit. Daisy witnessed the pain and desperation as her other self pleaded with the monster who'd nearly ruined their lives. He placed his hand on the side her head and she closed her eyes, ready to give up the entire world just to feel that connection again. And then—
He entered the room, muttering. The pod rose. Younger Daisy approached. ]
No. Stop it. [ Whatever this is, she can't watch it again. Shame burns in her chest as she hurries forward, grabbing hold of herself and tugging the other Daisy back before she can get on her knees. She hardly realizes what's happening as she's quaked off her feet, flying backward and crashing into the wall of the pod. The next moment, the loop repeats, though it takes a moment for it to register through the ringing in her ears.
What the hell is going on? She'd gotten word from Bucky that something might be about to happen, so she'd rushed across town to help with any potential crowd control issues, fully trusting her boyfriend to have things in hand or call for backup when needed. Neither of them had expected that blackness to start swallowing everyone up. Is that what this is? Is that why she's seeing this? ]
Stop. You can't do this. [ Which of them is she talking to? It doesnt really matter as she approaches Hive this time, making to quake him back when he dodges and rushes forward in that almost preternatural speed. His hand is around her throat a second later, squeezing with all his might.
And then it repeats. Again. And again. And again. She loses count of how many times she fails to stop herself from begging to restore the twisted chemical connection with Hydra's original mascot. It's around the twelfth loop that she starts to unravel, focusing instead on trying to force her way out through the bay doors and having to listen to that pathetic begging in the background.
Every time she tries to get past him to the base beyond, Hive stops her. He throws her into a wall, forces her to the ground, grips her in a choke hold. And the entire time, her other self just watches, that disgusting pleading look on her face.
Another dozen loops pass and Daisy sits crumpled on the floor, hands pressed over her ears and yet still able to hear every syllable. Trying to drown out the words she knows by heart now, she repeats a whispered plea. ] Let me go. Please let me go.
no subject
He doesn’t linger too long or try to get involved in any of them as he passes through; he’s just trying to find hers.
And when Bucky does finally step into the hangar, the scene he finds is almost disconcertingly understated. Someone standing there wearing Grant Ward’s face (except it can’t be a man, because that particular man was dead, he knew that much). Bucky’s gaze is drawn to the young woman on her knees in front of not-Ward, listening to the soft whispered Please take me back as he reaches for her face,
(pretty like the Skye, a flower, Daisy)
and Bucky walks right past that looping scene and their murmured conversation, to the other woman in the room. She’s older, her hair different from the version of herself talking to Hive. She’s more worn from years of experience and pain and happiness: there’s more laughter-lines and stress-lines alike etched into her face. His Daisy. The one he knows, now crumpled in on herself, hands over her ears, and his heart is cracking open at the sight.
He’d learned from personal experience that if you don’t try to disrupt the loop, it just keeps going, and so he ignores the rest of the scene. So after a moment, there’s a figure beside her and a warm hand at her cheek; not Hive’s, this time. Bucky’s voice, muffled through her clenched hands and her own murmuring anguish: ]
Daisy. Hey. It’s me. I’m here.