Wearing his helmet, Steve walked with Bucky and Madeleine up to the entrance set in rock. The door was still open.
"He can't have been here more than a few hours," Steve said.
"Long enough to wake them up," Madeleine warned.
Steve led them into the cast bunker. They traveled down into the depths inside a caged elevator. It stopped in the bowls of the bunker and doors slid open. Steve nodded to Bucky and Madeleine and heaved up the cage door.
Bucky and Madeleine readied their heavy duty machine guns and walked along a corridor, keeping close to a wall. Bucky and Madeleine looked into an alcove full of junk then the three of them and Steve moved on up some stairs. At the sound of a loud thud, they spun around, aiming down the corridor.
"You two ready?" Steve asked.
"Yeah," Bucky and Madeleine replied.
Double doors parted, forced open by Iron Man. Steve stared in surprise. Tony walked towards Steve, Madeleine and Bucky and retracted the suit's helmet.
"You seem a little defensive," Tony commented as Bucky and Madeleine kept their guns up while Steve walked to meet Tony with his shield covering his body.
"It's been a long day," Steve replied.
Tony glanced at Madeleine and Bucky. "At ease, Soldier. I'm not currently after you or her."
"Then why are you here?"
"Could be your story's not so crazy. Maybe. Ross has no idea I'm here. I'd like to keep it that way. Otherwise, I gotta arrest myself."
"Well, that sounds like a lot of paperwork." Steve lowered his shield. "It's good to see you, Tony."
"You too, Cap." He said to Bucky and Madeleine, "Hey, Manchurian Candidates, you're both killing me. There's a truce here. You two can drop..." Steve signed Bucky and Madeleine to lower their weapons and they did so.
The four of them cautiously walked along a corridor. T'Challa, in his Black Panther Suit, was hiding around a corner, watching them.
With his helmet and face plate reengaged, Iron Man led Steve, Madeleine and Bucky towards the enormous chamber with the capsules standing in it.
"I got heat signatures," Iron Man informed.
"How many?" Captain America asked.
"Uh, one."
As they entered the vast chamber, the lights came on. Hazy, yellow mist descended within the capsules. As well as Josef, each one contained an enhanced soldier from the 1991 experiment. Steve and the others looked around, bewildered.
Madeleine looked around the room and swallowed a wave of nausea. She stared at the chair in the middle of the room, flashing to all the times she'd been strapped in and brainwashed. How many times had they wiped her? How many times had she forgotten all she knew? Worst of all, how many times had she forgotten herself?
Bucky glanced at her and turned her to face him. After a moment, he hugged her and rested a hand on the back of her head.
Madeleine relaxed slightly in his embrace, still staring at the circle of instruments and furniture that had ruined her life and all that was good.
Zemo, on speaker, said, "If it's any comfort, they died in their sleep." All of the enhanced soldiers had been shot in the head. Madeleine stared at Josef's corpse and Bucky took her hand. "Did you really think I wanted more of you?"
"What the hell?" Bucky asked.
"I'm grateful to them, though. They brought you here." Zemo appeared in a control room. Steve hurled his shield, but it flew back. "Please, Captain. The Soviets built this chamber to withstand the launch blast of UR-100 rockets."
"I'm betting I could beat that," Iron Man shot back.
"Oh, I'm sure you could, Mr. Stark. Given time. But then you'd never know why you came."
"You killed innocent people in Vienna just to bring us here?" Steve questioned. Black Panther watched from the shadows. Steve looked at Zemo through a window.
"I thought about nothing else for over a year. I studied you. I followed you. But now that you're standing here, I just realized... there's a bit of green in the blue of your eyes. How nice to find a flaw." He offered a small smile to Madeleine and Bucky stepped in front of her whilst glaring at Zemo.
"You're Sokovian. Is that what this is about?"
"Sokovia was a failed state long before you blew it to hell. No. I'm here because I made a promise."
Steve and Bucky studied Zemo and said, "You lost someone?"
Zemo looked grave and clicked his tongue. "I lost everyone. And so will you." He played surveillance footage from December 16th, 1991. Steve stepped over to the screen. Bucky remained back with Madeleine, seeing a look that concerned him. He again took her hand and rubbed his thumb along the back of it in slow, gentle circles. "An empire toppled by its enemies can rise again. But one which crumples from within? That's dead... forever."
Tony looked at the freeze frame of a secluded road and the date, December 16, 1991. His eyes rose anxiously. "I know that road. What is this?" The video played. The car that the Winter Soldier forced off the road crashed into a tree. Tony watched intently as the Winter Soldier drove up and got off her motorbike. Steve and Bucky watched Tony's increasing unease. The driver laid on the ground beside the car.
It was Tony's father, Howard.
"Help my wife," Howard said. "Please. Help." The Winter Soldier walked over and hoisted him up by his hair. She stared at Howard's bloody face. Howard stared back pleadingly.
"Agent Barnes?" Howard realized.
"Howard!" Maria called. Tony glared at Madeleine and Bucky moved slightly to cover Madeleine's body with his. The Winter Soldier pounded Howard hard in the face with her metal fist.
"Howard!" In grief, Tony closed his eyes for a moment. His father slumped dead. The Winter Soldier put him in the driver's seat with his face against the steering wheel. Tony stared in horror. Maria was in the passenger seat with blood streaking down her face.
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YOU ARE READING
Remembering You
ActionMadeleine, with the help of her family, has pieced together parts of her past. Peace ends for the little family in Europe when one is blamed for something she is innocent of and, to put it mildly, all hell breaks loose. Then comes a space war with...