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The Asset pushes desperately against the heavy beam on its abdomen in vain, knowing that its right shoulder is out of its socket and that it will do no good anyway.
It must get up. It must complete the mission, and the target is going to get away.
The Asset cannot complete the mission if it dies.
Around the explosions, it hears the sound of two feet thunk! on the thick glass floor, and all of its attention snaps to the face and half mask of the Man in Blue, the target, who is quickly approaching.
He is suddenly afraid for the first time he can remember.
He has never feared before. Why would that moron come down here while the craft falls apart? He must be the Blue Man's target. What is he even afraid of? It must be failure. He cannot fail the mission.
They lock eyes, and The Asset can tell his face has betrayed his newfound fear. He struggles harder to escape before the Blue Man reaches him, but the Blue Man stops a few feet short of him and begins to lift the beam off of him. The asset scrambles to get out, suspicious of this and clutching his right arm close to his abdomen.
If he is the Blue Man's mission, he must want to torture him. Why would he help him? Just so he can hurt him worse later, there is no other explanation. This is a trap.
He quickly gets back on his feet, swaying slightly. He turns to the Blue Man, considering a preemptive attack.
"You know me," The Blue Man says intently, his sincere, bright blue eyes boring into him.
Something about them unsettles him deeply.
"No, I don't!" The Asset screams as he throws a punch to remove those eyes from his face. The man does not defend himself and takes a hit to the cheek with a crunch as the force causes both of them to fall down again.
As they breathlessly pull themselves back on their feet, the Blue Man calls out to him, "Bucky."
His eyes snap up at the Blue Man instinctively.
"You've known me your whole life."
Who the hell is this man? The Blue Man is going to make him fail the mission. Failure will result in consequences. Painful ones.
He throws a vicious backhand of vibranium arm into the Blue Man's face, and they both fall again. He turns toward the target, full of rage as he rises again.
Why won't he stay down?
"Your name is James Buchanan Barnes." The Blue Man tells him between gasps.
He knows what the Blue Man is doing. He is trying to confuse him, distract him from the mission.
"Shut up!" He throws another punch at the Blue Man, who barely shields himself at all. All he knows is rage at this man for still being alive, for being evenly matched with him, for turning his eyes on him...
The Blue Man struggles to his feet *again.*
Does he not know when to give up? The answer comes to him automatically from an internal voice he does not recognize. No. He never did know when to give up.
Who is that man? Do I know him?
"I'm not gonna fight you." The Blue Man drops his shield, and it tumbles down into the river below with the rest of the raining debris. "You're my friend."
That's not possible. The Asset has no one. He is a tool only. It's an attempt at a distraction.
Then why did he drop his shield? he hears the voice contradict.
He shakes the thought away. He cannot place exactly how, but he feels that this man is responsible for his most recent punishment. Anger floods him like fire.
Yes, that's better. It will help him.
He rushes the man and tackles him, pinning him down. "You're my mission."
He begins beating the man to death with his vibranium arm in a blind rage. He can feel the man's face crunching with each swing.
"You're!" *Crunch!*
"My!" *Crunch!*
"Mission!" *Crunch!*
He grabs the strap of the man's suit and pulls him up slightly for the final blow. Something about the boy's bloody face and swollen eye makes him hesitate with his arm behind his head. He can't bring himself to deliver the final blow.
"Then finish it."
What?
"Cuz I'm with you till the end of the line."
All of the sudden, Bucky is staring down at the small boy's busted face and hears himself say disapprovingly, "Sometimes I think you like getting punched." Then, he is above the boy who's face is no longer busted up. His hand rests on Steve's shoulder, and he reassures him with love and sincerity, "I'm with you to the end of the line, pal."
Fear and confusion cloud his brain as he stares down at the man, and his fist begins to drop.
It must complete the mission.
He is failing his mission. This thought brings an onslaught of pain that begins to make his face hot-
The floor suddenly drops out from beneath them, and he catches himself on a beam with his good arm. As he watches the man fall towards the river below, his head is a swirl of uncertainty and contradiction. All he can feel is waves of intense fear and regret he cannot quite place.
Bucky would realize later that this was the first decision he made for himself in 70 years, but as he lets go and dives after the man, it doesn't feel like a choice at all. It's instinctual. It's in his very being. It has been his mission for 100 years.
Fear consumes him at the prospect of failure as he reaches the man's unconscious form and begins to kick back up. He pulls the man up against his chest and swims them both toward shore until he can walk. The unexplainable fear that grips him begins to ebb away. He looks ahead as he drags the Blue Man ashore by his shoulder strap and drops him. Looking down intently at his mission, he sees breath coming from him, and the last bit of fear vanishes like it was never there.
Glancing around, he sees no one in sight. He has failed the mission. He cannot complete it, though he is unsure why. He cannot return to base, both because he will be punished for this and... something else. The harder he tries to think, the more his head feels like it's splitting open, like he is going to die.
He turns his back to the Blue Man and begins to limp towards the trees with questions running through his pounding mind.
Why did he do that? Who is James? Bucky? Who gave him his mission that he completed? Who gave him the one he failed?
He settles on a reason he pulled the man out: I will need information from him later. He must know something. It doesn't feel right, but it's the best he can come up with. It's the only tactical reason for what he has done.
There's a surprisingly forceful certainty in his mind, though: He has to find out who that man is.