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Sam shifts from leg to leg, riding out an involuntary shiver. She wishes she grabbed at least at jacket, but she had underestimated the how cold the mid November air would feel after spending the last month in the desert. She's only here to grab peanut M&M's and a Milky Way, besides. She can hold out a little bit longer as she waits for the candy bar to fall.
The motel she and Steve are staying at is a classic two level (one star for each floor). Sam is currently in the ambitious, centrally located picnic area. She wonders to herself if anyone actually comes out her besides for a candy bar or a- she looks at the item tucked back in the corner- condom. Oh. It's that kinda motel. To be honest, all motels are that kind of motel, but being reminded of it so plainly makes her want to sleep in the car. She keys in the code for her M&M's and wipes her fingers on pants. She suddenly doesn't want to touch anything here anymore.
Sam's discomfort with the machine in front of her makes her throw her attention anywhere else. It's quiet, at least to her normal human ears. Too quiet, she notices with a frown. When she and Steve pulled up not too long after sunset, the forest that sits maybe a hundred yards behind the motel was alive with the hooting of owls and even the eerie call of a loon. Now all she can hear is the sound of an overly loud TV blaring a rerun of Glee.
Sam is a soldier, not a spy, not even a little outdoorsy, but she's seen movies and this feels like a warning to her. In the past six months, she had been training with Steve and Natasha. With each training session, the made sure to drill in the fact that she should trust her instincts. The silent forest is making her nervous. It could be nothing, but it could be something, so Sam resigns herself to a night of driving. It doesn't really matter much, anyway. She probably wasn't going to sleep, at least not in that bed.
Sam grabs the candy and turns to make her way back to their shared room when she hears a hoot of an owl. She takes in a deep breath through her nose. Maybe she was being crazy. It was probably just a fox. Animals go quiet, when any kind of predator is near, not just humans. Sam has half convinced herself that nothing is the matter, when she see a shadow move in the sheltered picnic area.
She stills, weighing her options. She could yell for Steve, but he is in the shower and any volume she would have to use to get through the rushing water would attract her neighbors and possibly put them in harm's way. Sam takes stock of herself and her assets. She has her key card, M&M's, a Milky Way and $3.65 jingling in her pockets. If Sam were Natasha, she could probably defend herself with that. She is not Natasha, though, so Sam settles for the next best thing: making a tactical retreat. She can see her handgun sitting uselessly on one of the end tables and vows to strap it to her thigh permanently, should she make it back to her room.
She doesn't make out of the enclosure, as it turns out. Before she can step on the concrete sidewalk, a hand pulls her back under the awning. Sam elbows her attacker in the stomach, but they only grunt. She tries to turn, but she can't break the grip on her upper arm. Sam notices with dismay that Milky Way is smashed in her hand that peanut M&M's are clattering to the floor.
Sam opens her mouth to yell for Steve (civilians or no, there only seems to be one pursuer and Captain America can handle that easily) but a hand claps over her mouth and pulls her flush against him. Sam finally drops the useless wrappers and smears chocolate all over the man's hand, in an attempt to free herself.
"Stop struggling," he bites out. "You're making this harder than it needs to be."
She wants to scoff but what comes out more like a cross between a whimper and a groan. She does stop struggling, though, once it is apparent that he won't kill her.
"Don't scream," he instructs. He seems to be waiting for sam to acknowledge his command, but she doesn't move, doesn't even blink. He sighs, then let's her mouth go. His other arm slackens enough for her to turn, but she cannot quite pull away.
"Bucky?" Sam asks, because it is him. He looks more like the Bucky from the Smithsonian than the the Winter Soldier with his hair pulled back and the lack of kohl around his eyes, but Sam is wary. She has regular nightmares and ones where the Winter Soldier rips off her wings and throws her off of a Helicarrier has entered the set.
"Wilson," he says as he looks for something to do with his chocolate covered hand. He settles for rubbing it against his dark black pants.
"You doin' alright?" She asks, because even with her jimmies rustled, Samantha Tamsin Wilson is first and foremost a giver.
"Fine," he answers voice clipped, and slightly uncomfortable. He still has not released her from his left handed grip.
"You look it, too. You look better, that is." Sam says with a smile. She hopes it doesn't look as forced as it feels, despite the fact that she is relieved to see him. "Steve will be glad to see you."
He ignores her complement and focuses on the last part. "No. I don't want to see him."
She tenses. This is what she has been fearing: a Bucky so changed, he no longer wants Steve's friendship. "Bucky, I... you-"
He doesn't let Sam finish her thought, not that she really knew how to, anyway. "Not yet. Not... I'm not ready."
She sags a little in his grip. She is relieved that Steve doesn't have to live with the knowledge that his best friend is rejecting him and, maybe a little selfishly, she is relieved that she doesn't have to tell him. "I get it."
The relief that floods him is so palpable that it startles Sam. His grip goes slack around her arm and Sam wrenches it free, taking a tentative step back. It hurts more than it should because metal fingers have no give, but that barely registers. She rubs her sore bicep absently as she stares up at Bucky.
"I get it, I really do," she says again, because she does, as much she can at least, "But, Bucky, we can't." Bucky closes off in an instant but does not say anything so Sam continues. "We just wanna help you."
"I don't want your help," he replies, and inexplicably, his voice is slightly accented with Russian. His posture is stiff and Sam sees the Winter Soldier, or the lack of Bucky Barnes, in his eyes.
Sam doesn't know if she should comfort him or give him more space so she just stands still, annoyed at herself. She does this for a living, she should be better at this. "I don't know how much you remember, but you're not safe by yourself." Sam sighs and collects her thoughts. "You've escaped before. There was a 18 month stint in the 80's when Hydra couldn't find you. We can't..." Bucky looks distant and Sam risks touching him to bring him back in the moment. He catches her wrist with his flesh hand before she even gets close, but it's worked; Bucky looks clear and attentive.
"We want to give you your space but we can't risk you getting caught again." Sam does not go into the consequences of that happening. He knows all too well.
For a moment that is probably much shorter than it feels, Bucky just stares down at the short woman, her slender wrist still in his hand. "I... understand," Bucky says slowly.
Sam's relief is stunted by the way Bucky stares at her wrist. She tries to pull away, but his grip tightens. She is no match for even his flesh hand with the knock off super soldier serum running through his veins. "So you'll come with us?" Sam asks, though the sinking feeling in her gut tells her that this meeting isn't going to go her way.
"Eventually," he answers, then faster than she can see, he has something in his metal fingers. He flicks his wrist deceptively lightly and Sam feels a sting like a bee's on her neck.
"Shit," she hisses and slaps the spot, pulling away a tiny dart. "I know you didn't just poison me?"
"It's just a tranquilizer," he answers somewhat indignantly. She wants to be annoyed that he's offended when she's the one who just got shot, but her legs are starting to feel like cement and she is struggling to stand. Bucky still has his grip on her, so when her knees buckle, it becomes more support than restraint. "Sorry," he says.
Sam's mind is starting to feel as sluggish as her body, so she really isn't sure if it's wise or not to slur out these next words. "For what? Ripping off my steering wheel? Ripping off my wings and throwing me off a Helicarrier? Or shooting me with a poison dart?"
Bucky flinches like she slapped him. She kind of wishes that her arms were working just so she could, but that may be the drugs talking. "All of that," he answers. "And it was a tranq dart."
Sam drops to her knees so Bucky picks her up bridal style. "P'me down," she says as she tries to struggle. All she ends up doing is flopping like a dying fish.
He holds her tighter to stop her squirming. "Can't. Only got a few minutes before the- Rogers gets out of the shower."
"Ass," Sam calls him, a long with a few other expletives that leaves him chuckling, much to her annoyance. "And," she adds just as her tongue gets too heavy to move, "y'made me drop m'candy."
That's the last thing Sam remembers before she wakes up with a serious case of cotton mouth at 3:43 am.
Her boots are in a pile at the foot of her bed and she's on top of the covers like she usually sleeps when they stay in seedy motels. Honestly, she might've thought it was all a dream if it weren't for the bruise on her arm and the soreness in her neck from the dart.
She looks over to Steve. He probably had no idea, just thought she was more tired than she told him. It happens enough to be plausible.
Sam pulls on her boots and grabs her gun on the off chance that Bucky hasn't used these hours to put as much distance between himself and Steve as possible.
She explores the whole complex short of knocking on people's doors and even asks the teenage boy at the front desk if any guys with man buns have checked in since yesterday. Her search is fruitless, and even the little woodland is full of life.
Like she expected, Bucky is long gone, but not before he dumped the entire contents of the vending machine (including the condoms) into the back of her and Steve's car. There's a note on top of the pile that says, "Sorry about your candy."
Sam sighs. "Ass."