Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The wind howled through the Carpathian woods, sharp and cold as a blade, threading through the trees like a dirge. Katarina Petrova ran beneath its mournful cry, her breath catching in her throat, her skirts torn and heavy with mud. Each step through the damp underbrush felt like dragging the weight of a dying world behind her.

She did not look back.

The shadows that chased her were not beasts of flesh, but the fury of an immortal—a wrath that could stretch across continents and centuries. Klaus would not stop. He never had.

Only Rose had dared to offer her a chance to run. The vampire’s mercy had been bitter and brief, but it had cracked a door open in a burning house, and Katarina had thrown herself through it without hesitation. Her heart had burned ever since.

By the time she reached the edge of her family’s land, the moon was high and cruel above her. The estate, once full of music and life, now slumped in ruin. The scent hit her first—ash, iron, and decay. Then came the silence. Not the hush of sleeping woods, but the absolute stillness of death.

She stumbled forward, hope dying with every step.

Bodies were strewn across the frost-touched grass, contorted in frozen agony. Her father’s eyes stared blankly at the stars. Her sister’s hand stretched out toward the front door, as if she’d almost made it inside. And her mother—

Katarina collapsed beside her mother’s broken form, a strangled sound clawing its way from her throat. She touched her mother’s cold cheek, then pulled her into her lap as though that might undo it, as though love could raise the dead.

The world blurred through her tears. She rocked silently, back and forth, like a child again, like a mother stripped of everything. Her sobs did not echo—grief had swallowed the air whole.

Klaus had left his message, painted in blood and silence: No one escapes me.

But through the despair, something pulsed—faint, but alive. A memory. A cry from the past.

Her daughter.

Ripped from her arms at birth, stolen to be hidden far from the grasp of monsters. She had not dared to hope before—but now, with everything lost, the thought of her child breathed warmth into the hollow of her chest.

Inside the remains of the manor, blackened beams sagging under centuries of love now scorched away, she found it: a scrap of fabric clutched in her nursemaid’s hand. Faded embroidery marked it with the crest of a distant village—a place her mother had whispered about, should the worst come to pass.

Katarina’s hands trembled as she took the cloth. Her knees ached as she rose from the ashes of her past.

She did not say goodbye. There were no words left to speak to the dead.

Only a promise.

She would find her child.

The road ahead would not offer mercy. But even through the smoke and the blood, Katarina Petrova began to walk—toward the only thing left untouched by Klaus’s cruelty.

Hope.

⸻

The village was quiet, wrapped in the kind of mist that clung to memory more than stone. Katarina rode in alone, cloak drawn tight around her, eyes scanning every cottage as if one might call out to her — whisper the name she hadn’t spoken aloud in years.

She didn’t breathe until she reached the far edge of the village, where the fields dipped into shadow and a small stone house stood crooked against the hill. Smoke rose from the chimney in a steady thread. A single lantern flickered in the window.

She dismounted without grace, her legs shaking beneath her as she approached the door. She knocked once.

An older woman answered, her weathered face sharp with caution. Katarina didn’t speak at first — only studied her, searching for something. A kindness. A familiarity. When she finally spoke the child’s name, her voice cracked. The woman blinked, then opened the door without another word.

Inside, warmth. Firelight. And on the rug near the hearth, a child.

She couldn’t have been older than one. Small, with soft brown curls and a steady, babbling hum as she clutched a scrap of cloth between her fingers. Her cheeks were pink from the fire’s heat, and her tiny feet pressed against the woven mat as she rocked in place.

Katarina didn’t move.

The child turned, sensing her. Looked up.

It was the eyes that undid her — dark, searching, too knowing for their age. Katarina felt her knees give way, sinking down before she could stop herself.

The girl stared, unblinking.

And then, she smiled.

There was no recognition in the way adults might look. It was something else — deeper. Innate. The kind of knowing that lived in the bones, that stretched back to the womb, to something older than memory.

The child toddled forward, arms out for balance, and Katarina barely managed to catch her. Small hands gripped her cloak with impossible trust, and a soft weight folded into her chest like she belonged there.

She did.

Katarina’s hand trembled as she stroked the girl’s hair. “You knew me,” she whispered, voice raw. “Didn’t you, my love?”

The girl looked up, her eyes full of that same silent understanding. She nestled closer, letting out a tiny sigh, and Katarina — after so many years running, hiding, grieving — let herself fall apart quietly, one breath at a time.

For the first time in years, she wasn’t alone.

⸻

Katarina didn’t know how long she sat there, holding her daughter in the firelight. Time folded in on itself. The world narrowed to the child’s soft breaths against her collarbone, the tiny fingers that clutched her tunic as though she’d never let go.

Eventually, the old woman — silent until now — moved to sit beside the hearth. Her hands were worn and veined, the skin thin as parchment. She watched mother and daughter with a gaze that was too steady to be merely curious.

“She always quiets when strangers come,” the woman said, voice like dry leaves. “Not with you.”

Katarina looked up slowly, still cradling her daughter. “She isn’t afraid of me.”

“No. She isn’t.” The woman’s eyes, sharp as flint, softened just a touch. “She never cries, that one. Watches everything. Like she’s waiting for something.”

Katarina nodded, throat tight. “She was waiting for me.”

There was a beat of silence. The fire popped.

“I need your help,” Katarina said finally, her voice low. “She’s in danger. We both are.”

The woman gave no sign of surprise. “You come with secrets. Blood like yours always does.”

Katarina hesitated. “You know who I am?”

“I know enough. There are whispers even here — of a girl who fled the hands of men that call themselves gods. Of the name Petrova, cursed and hunted.”

Katarina flinched, even at her own name. “It’s not the name. It’s the blood. There is something in us — a thread passed down from mother to daughter. A tether the Originals can’t break. They will never stop hunting her.”

The woman’s gaze darkened. “A child should never pay for the sins of the blood she was born to.”

“I didn’t choose this,” Katarina said, holding her daughter closer. “I would burn the world to keep her safe. I already have.”

She expected judgment. Pity, even. But the old woman only sighed and leaned forward, resting her elbows on her knees.

“Your daughter,” she said, her voice gentler now, “is not ordinary. That thread in your line — it sings in her. Stronger than I’ve seen before.”

Katarina’s breath caught. “You can sense it?”

“She is gifted,” the woman confirmed. “Different. There’s a spark in her that calls across realms. It will make her a beacon to those who know how to look.”

Terror clutched at Katarina’s chest, cold and suffocating. “Then we need to disappear. Not just hide. Vanish. There must be a way.”

The woman studied her for a long moment. “There is. But it will come at a price. You will not belong to this world anymore.”

“I haven’t belonged to any world in a long time,” Katarina whispered. “If it means she lives… I’ll pay anything.”

The fire cracked again, throwing shadows across the stone walls.

The woman stood. “Then come back before moonrise. Bring her with you. I will prepare the spell.”

Katarina rose to her feet, clutching her daughter, who had fallen asleep in her arms. She looked once more around the cottage, then met the woman’s eyes.

“Thank you,” she said. And for the first time in what felt like a lifetime, she meant it.

The sky had darkened to that soft indigo hue that comes just before true night, when the world holds its breath between day and shadow. In the small, borrowed cottage on the edge of the woods, Katarina sat beside the single window, the child asleep in her arms.

Nadia.

She hadn’t dared say the name aloud until now. Hadn’t dared believe it could be her — this warm, living weight cradled against her chest. Her baby.

A year gone. Stolen by fear and running and blood. A year spent dreaming of this moment and never quite believing it would come.

Now here she was. Whole and impossibly small, with thick dark lashes and a tiny crease between her brows, like she was already worried about things too large for her world.

Katarina brushed a lock of hair away from Nadia’s forehead. Her own hands were trembling.

“I missed everything,” she whispered. “Your first breath. Your first cry. Your first laugh.”

Nadia stirred but did not wake. Her little fingers curled in the fabric of Katarina’s blouse, clinging in her sleep. That unconscious trust — it undid her.

“I should’ve died before I let them take that from me.”

But there had been no choice. Not then. She had barely escaped with her life, and Nadia had been hidden, safe — or so she told herself, over and over. Until she believed it enough to keep going.

Katarina shifted slightly, careful not to wake the child, and began to hum. The melody rose from memory like smoke from embers. A lullaby — old, older than her mother, older than the walls of her family’s estate. She had not heard it sung in years, but it came back with terrifying clarity.

“Spí, dieťatko, spí, mesiačik svieti…”

Her voice cracked.

“Nad tebou bdie tvoja malá mati…”

She remembered her mother’s voice, rougher than hers but always warm. Singing the same words as she tucked her into bed, back when Katarina believed the world was safe and castles meant something.

A soft sound escaped her — not quite a sob, but close. She rested her cheek against Nadia’s dark hair.

“You won’t remember this,” she whispered. “But I will. I’ll remember every second.”

Outside, the wind moved through the trees in long sighs. The old woman’s ritual would be ready soon. Another world. Another life. Katarina didn’t know what they’d find on the other side — only that they wouldn’t be followed.

She had no legacy left. No name worth keeping. But in her arms, wrapped in soft blankets and starlight, was something new. Something not touched by Klaus or Elijah or betrayal.

She kissed Nadia’s brow, closing her eyes as her tears fell silently.

“Whatever world we land in,” she murmured, “you’ll be free. I swear it.”

The lullaby faded, but she held her daughter long after the last note had gone.

The woods stood still that night — as though even the trees were holding their breath. A thin silver mist wound between the trunks, curling around roots and ankles like fingers unwilling to let go. The moon, swollen and low, bathed the clearing in an eerie glow.

Katarina stepped into the circle with Nadia pressed against her chest, the child bundled tightly in a woolen wrap, her warm breath fluttering soft against her skin. The air shimmered, tense with magic, drawn taut by incantation.

The old woman stood at the edge of the sigil carved deep into the earth, herbs burning in a clay bowl at her feet. Smoke curled upward in slow spirals, carrying the weight of words too ancient to be spoken lightly.

Katarina adjusted her grip on her daughter and hesitated, eyes fixed on the flickering runes painted in ash and blood. She had never feared magic. But this — this was beyond escape. It was exile.

“Before we go,” she said softly, turning toward the old woman, “may I ask your name?”

The woman did not look up immediately. Her hands moved with quiet purpose, drawing final symbols in the dirt with a sharpened bone.

After a moment, her voice rasped through the stillness. “I haven’t spoken it aloud in many years.”

Katarina stepped closer, her voice low with something like reverence. “I want to remember it. I want Nadia to know it. You… you saved us. You deserve more than silence.”

The woman looked up then. Her eyes, pale and clouded, were deeper than any sea Katarina had ever crossed. Not empty — no, filled with memory, with sorrow and things long carried.

“Mara,” she said. “My name is Mara.”

Katarina smiled through the ache in her chest. “Thank you, Mara. For everything.”

But the older woman only shook her head slowly, the corner of her mouth twitching in something like grief.

“Don’t thank me yet, child,” she murmured. “Magic like this… it does not cut clean. You will be hidden, yes — across the veil, beyond even the Originals’ reach. But your blood is not so easily severed. It follows.”

She turned back to the fire, casting another handful of herbs into the flame. Sparks hissed, rising into the sky like a thousand tiny stars fleeing the earth.

“You may run across time,” Mara said, almost absently, “across worlds even… but what you are is written into your bones. One day, she’ll have to know.”

Katarina looked down at Nadia — her small, perfect face — and her heart clenched.

“She will,” she said quietly. “But not tonight.”

The ritual began then — a pulse in the air, a low thrumming like a distant storm. The trees bent toward the clearing as if listening. The wind howled low and fierce. Light poured from the runes as if the ground itself had opened a wound to let them pass.

Mara’s voice rose above it all — ancient, powerful, full of a sadness so old it had no name. The world around them trembled. The sky seemed to blur at the edges.

Katarina held her daughter tighter, took one last look at the world that had buried everyone she loved — and stepped into the light.

Katarina Petrova stood in the middle of the street, Nadia clutched tight in her arms, surrounded by the stunned silence of too many voices all speaking at once.

The world had not prepared for five years of absence. The people who had disappeared had not prepared to return.

They had arrived in this strange new place amidst chaos. At first, Katarina had believed it was another curse, a trap by the witches who helped her. But the truth revealed itself slowly: this was not her world at all.

She’d expected to step into a quiet village, perhaps a meadow, or even purgatory—but instead she was standing in the heart of a futuristic city of glass and metal. Cars honked. Sirens wailed. People screamed in languages she didn’t recognize, holding loved ones, weeping openly in the streets. Some stared at her as if she didn’t belong. Others didn’t see her at all.

She barely remembered the ritual, only the smell of sage, the soft chanting of the witch, the way Nadia’s tiny fingers had curled around hers as the light enveloped them. Then—nothing. Until now.

Katarina turned in a slow circle. Nadia whimpered against her chest, and she immediately tightened her hold. She crouched beside a streetlamp, shielding the child with her body, her instincts flaring. Everything was foreign. Everything was too loud.

But she wasn’t the only one.

All around her were others like her. Dazed, displaced. Blipped, they called them. A word that meant nothing to Katarina but carried grief on every face she saw.

She watched a woman collapse onto her knees in the middle of the street. A man weeping into his hands. A child screaming for a parent. It was like death had passed over them all—and then spit them back out.

Katarina moved when someone shouted orders nearby. She didn’t understand most of the words, but she understood the gesture: this way. Help was being offered. Shelter. Aid.

She followed the crowd, a ghost among the returned.

The shelter was little more than a gymnasium filled with cots and buzzing with fluorescent lights. Volunteers moved like clockwork, handing out food, blankets, clean water. No one asked her where she came from. No one seemed to question her accent, her clothes, or the confusion in her eyes. She was just another lost soul in a sea of them.

She found a cot in the corner and sat down slowly, setting Nadia in her lap. Her daughter blinked at her, confused but quiet. She was gifted, the old woman had said. Different. Katarina saw it in her eyes now—how calm she was despite the strangeness around her.

“Soon,” Katarina whispered to her. “I will find us a way. I promise.”

That night, lying on a thin cot in a room filled with hundreds of strangers, Katarina didn’t sleep. She listened to the breathing, the weeping, the echoes of grief and hope stitched into the silence.

She had escaped Klaus. She had outrun the curse of her name. She had found her daughter.

And now—she was somewhere entirely new.

The war was behind her. A different one waited ahead. But for the first time in centuries, Katarina wasn’t running. Not yet.

And somewhere in this strange, broken world, she would find a way forward

Chapter Text

The name came easily—like slipping into an old cloak. One she’d worn in another life, one that felt powerful, untouchable.

Katherine Pierce.

It rolled off her tongue with more confidence than she felt, and when the volunteer at the intake desk smiled kindly and wrote it down on the form, Katherine felt something click into place.

She wasn’t Katarina Petrova anymore. That woman was dead, buried under centuries of blood and sorrow. Here, in this bewildering, blinding world of steel and sky, Katherine Pierce could be someone else. Someone who wasn’t hunted. Someone who could protect her child.

The shelter connected her with a relief clinic—overwhelmed, understaffed, but running. There were no questions when she said they’d been displaced. Everyone was displaced. The Blip had become the great equalizer of trauma.

She held Nadia’s hand tightly as they sat in the plastic chairs of the community center, surrounded by other parents and children. Nadia was quiet, her eyes darting around, absorbing everything. She wasn’t afraid—just curious, just cautious. Like her mother.

They called her name. “Katherine Pierce?”

She stood, adjusting the secondhand coat draped around her shoulders and lifting Nadia into her arms. The nurse greeted her with the tired warmth of someone who had seen too much loss and was grateful to see life.

“How old is she?”

Katherine hesitated, calculating quickly. “A little over a year. She hasn’t had… any vaccines. We were in a rural part of Europe before everything happened.”

The nurse nodded sympathetically. “We’ll get her caught up. She’s lucky she’s still so little.”

She’s lucky to be alive at all, Katherine thought.

The nurse administered the first round of shots while Nadia whimpered softly, burying her face into her mother’s chest. Katherine held her tightly, whispering reassurances in a language she hadn’t spoken in years. She tried not to cry.

Afterward, the nurse gave her a small vaccination card. Katherine stared at the neat rows of boxes, the promise of dates and normalcy. Of things like pediatric appointments and growth charts. A life.

“You’re doing great,” the nurse said gently, misreading the look in her eyes as fear.

Katherine nodded, her voice thick. “Thank you.”

That evening, back in the shelter, she rocked Nadia slowly on their cot, humming the lullaby her mother had once sung to her—the last thing she remembered before her childhood ended in blood.

Nadia blinked up at her sleepily, her tiny hand tangled in her mother’s shirt.

“Rest,” Katherine whispered. “This world… it doesn’t know us yet. But we’ll carve a place into it.”

Outside, the city hummed with unnatural light, and somewhere beyond it, the world struggled to rebuild after unimaginable loss.

And somewhere in that vastness, Katherine would find their path.

One step at a time.

The city hummed like something alive, restless and alien. Lights that never dimmed. Noise without silence. And people—so many people, their faces pale with exhaustion, their voices raised in tongues she barely understood.

Katherine held Nadia close, wrapped in a secondhand blanket from the shelter. The girl slept soundly against her chest, blissfully unaware of the cold or the ache in her mother’s bones.

They had made it this far.

Three nights at St. Margaret’s, and now the deadline loomed. The staff had been kind enough, but the halls were full of strangers with blank eyes and bitter grief. There was no room for anyone to linger.

“Next,” called the woman behind the counter at the housing office.

Katherine stepped forward. She had taken to calling herself Katherine Pierce—a name plucked from somewhere inside her, more familiar to this world than Katerina Petrova. The paperwork, the identification, the interviews—it had all come with whispers of miracles from the witch who had brought them here, cloaking them with false records, planting a story. Refugees from a distant place. Displaced by the Blip.

The woman behind the desk flipped through papers. “Okay… Pierce. You’re on the approved list. We’ve got a space in a converted unit on the Lower East Side. Not much, but it’s yours for now. Here.”

A key. A slip of paper with an address. A thin envelope of instructions.

Katherine blinked. “Just like that?”

The woman smiled, weary but kind. “You’ve got a child. You qualify. No one’s keeping score right now.”

She left the building with Nadia bundled tight and the city stretching wide before her. A part of her longed for stone walls and candlelight, for the smell of hay and spring in the fields of Bulgaria. But that world was dead, scattered in ash. She had seen the corpses of her kin. She had buried her past.

Now, only the child mattered.

The apartment was small and bare, but warm. A cracked radiator hissed in the corner, and the walls echoed their footsteps. Nadia toddled over to a patch of sunlight, her soft hands brushing against the windowpane, marveling at the traffic below.

Katherine crouched beside her, running a hand through her daughter’s curls.

“It’s not home,” she whispered. “But maybe… maybe we can make it one.”

The next morning, a neighbor let her borrow an old radio. As she made oatmeal from a shelter ration packet, a voice filtered through the static.

“Community Outreach & Trauma Support open daily. Food, guidance, medical care, peer support for returning citizens and displaced persons. Veterans, survivors of the Blip—everyone is welcome.”

Katherine stilled, spoon in hand.

Support. Guidance. Medical care.

She looked to Nadia, who sat on the floor stacking cups, humming quietly to herself.

They had fled monsters. Escaped death. Crossed time and space to be free. But freedom meant nothing if she couldn’t protect her child.

She turned the volume up.

“Maybe we’ll go,” she said aloud, more to herself than Nadia. “See what this new world offers.”

……

The fluorescent lights buzzed overhead like hornets. The room was full—too full—of murmurs, shifting bodies, the scrape of chairs, and the soft hum of machinery. Katherine had tried to keep Nadia calm with a toy she’d bartered for, a small cloth doll with yarn hair. But her daughter was tired, hungry, and overwhelmed by the noise.

Nadia squirmed on her lap and began to cry—sharp, insistent.

Katherine bounced her gently, whispering a lullaby under her breath. “Lele mama, lele zlato…” It was an old Bulgarian melody, soft and mournful, something her own mother used to sing. But it didn’t work this time. Nadia cried louder, twisting in her arms, small fists pounding her chest.

Heads turned.

Someone coughed impatiently. Then a man—middle-aged, in a windbreaker and worn jeans—snapped, “Can’t you shut that kid up? Jesus. Some of us are already on edge.”

Katherine stiffened. Her fingers curled around Nadia protectively. She opened her mouth—and closed it again.

Breathe. Think.

In the 1490s, a woman speaking out could be struck or shamed or worse. That instinct still lived in her, even here. She had survived by bowing her head. By staying quiet. And so now, she did the same.

“I’m sorry,” she murmured, voice tight. “She’s just tired.”

“I don’t care if she’s tired,” the man muttered. “If you can’t keep her quiet, maybe you shouldn’t bring her into a place like this.”

Katherine rose. Her heart was thudding, Nadia’s cries muffled now against her shoulder. She clutched her daughter tighter and turned to leave, humiliated and burning with resentment she didn’t know how to express. She didn’t belong here—any more than she’d belonged back there.

But then—

“Hey,” a voice said, low and calm. “She’s a baby. You don’t like noise, maybe don’t come to a public outreach center.”

The room quieted just slightly. The man in the windbreaker turned.

Bucky Barnes stood by the doorway, sleeves rolled up, a clipboard under one arm. He wasn’t glowering or confrontational—just still, grounded in that way that made people listen. His eyes, sharp and oddly kind, found Katherine’s.

“You alright?” he asked her directly.

Katherine blinked, uncertain. She hesitated, then gave a small nod.

“Then sit,” Bucky said gently. “It’s okay.”

The man muttered something and slunk away, taking a seat on the far side of the room. No one else said anything. The moment passed.

Katherine sat down again, shifting Nadia so she could settle in her lap. Her daughter hiccupped a few times, then quieted at last, snuggling against her mother’s neck.

Bucky didn’t linger. He moved to another part of the room to check in on an elderly woman, but not before offering her a small, knowing nod.

And for the first time in days, Katherine felt something strange ripple through her.

Relief. Gratitude. Maybe even the faintest thread of safety.

The room had thinned out by the time Nadia finally dozed off in Katherine’s arms, her soft breath warm against her mother’s collarbone. A volunteer handed her a form to fill out—shelter rotation schedules, vaccination appointments, food voucher times. Katherine signed it quickly, barely reading. Her mind was elsewhere.

She scanned the room again, not for exits this time, but for him.

He was near the entrance, crouched beside an old man’s wheelchair, speaking low and patient. When he stood, the old man smiled.

Katherine waited until he was alone again, setting the clipboard down on a folding table. She moved carefully, Nadia asleep against her chest, her steps quiet and steady.

“Excuse me,” she said softly.

He looked up. His eyes were the same—clear, steady, not searching for recognition or praise. Just… seeing her.

“I wanted to thank you,” Katherine said, careful to keep her voice even. “For earlier. I didn’t mean to cause a scene.”

“You didn’t,” Bucky said simply. “He was just an asshole.”

A faint breath of laughter escaped her. It felt strange and rusty.

“I’ve been in places where men like that speak, and everyone agrees with them,” she said, and immediately wished she hadn’t. Too much truth, too fast.

But Bucky didn’t press. He just nodded.

“I’ve been in those places too,” he said. “You learn to pick your moments.”

Katherine looked down at her sleeping daughter. “I’ve learned to leave.”

“That works too,” he said, then glanced down at Nadia. “She okay?”

“She’ll be fine.” Katherine brushed a strand of hair from Nadia’s damp forehead. “She’s… everything. I’m just trying to keep her safe.”

There was a pause. A quiet kind of understanding stretched between them.

“Well,” Bucky said, rubbing the back of his neck. “You’re doing a good job.”

Katherine looked up at him sharply, as if the words startled her.

“No one’s said that to me before,” she admitted.

“You deserve to hear it.”

The words settled into her like something warm and unfamiliar. For a moment, she forgot about curses, bloodlines, centuries of running. She was just a mother, holding her child, and this man—a stranger—had seen her.

Katherine nodded once, then turned to go.

But halfway across the room, she paused.

“Barnes, right?” she asked over her shoulder.

He looked back. “Yeah.”

“I’m Katherine,” she said. “And… thank you.”

He gave her the faintest smile. “See you around, Katherine.”

She didn’t smile back, but her eyes softened. And for the first time in a long while, she left a room not as a fugitive, or a burden, but simply as someone seen.

Chapter Text

The night pressed heavily against the flimsy shelter windows, city lights bleeding in through the curtain gaps. The air inside was stuffy and stale, thick with heat that no fan could chase away. Nadia whimpered again, her small body curled tight against Katherine’s chest, her forehead burning with fever.

Katherine rocked her gently, seated on the edge of the narrow cot. One hand stroked her daughter’s hair, the other fumbled with a lukewarm cloth to dab her cheeks and brow. Nadia’s skin was hot to the touch—frighteningly so—and her breaths came in shallow hitches.

Katherine whispered soft, nonsensical things in Bulgarian—half lullabies, half prayers—her voice low and cracking.

She hadn’t slept. Not since the fever started. Not since the outreach clinic told her it was likely a common virus and that she’d just have to let it pass. No medicine, no relief. Just wait it out.

She was alone. Truly, utterly alone. No nursemaid, no midwife, no mother.

Her throat tightened.

She hadn’t thought about her mother months. Not really. The woman’s face came back to her now, suddenly vivid—sun-browned hands threading herbs, eyes like storm clouds, always working, always worrying. When Katherine was sick, her mother had sung to her, boiled chamomile and crushed garlic, muttering old country spells under her breath.

And now Katherine sat here, with nothing but faded knowledge. She didn’t even have the herbs.

“I don’t know what I’m doing,” she whispered aloud, brushing sweat from Nadia’s temple. “Mama, I don’t know what to do.”

The moment cracked open.

A sob caught in her chest and burst free before she could stop it. She pressed her forehead to Nadia’s and wept—quiet, shuddering tears that soaked her daughter’s curls. She wept for her mother, for her broken home, for a bloodline of women bound to tragedy. She wept for being born into a curse she could never escape, for a child too innocent to carry that burden.

“I just want her to be okay,” she murmured. “Please. That’s all.”

Nadia stirred but didn’t wake.

Katherine stayed there, holding her close, riding the storm of grief until it dulled into something manageable. Until her breath evened. Until she remembered she had to be strong.

Because there was no one else.

When the fever finally broke hours later, just before dawn, Katherine didn’t sleep. She only held Nadia closer, her body aching, her heart hollowed—but still beating.

She had survived again. And that would have to be enough.

The morning light filtered through the outreach center’s window, pale and golden, casting long lines across the worn floor. Katherine sat with her back to the wall, Nadia nestled in her lap, small fingers grasping at her blouse in half-sleep. She watched the way the sun lit her daughter’s face—soft cheeks, dark lashes, that tiny mouth curved in the faintest smile.

There were moments like this, quiet and suspended in time, where love overwhelmed fear. Where holding Nadia felt like holding the whole reason her heart still beat. The child breathed purpose into her life—anchored her to this new, incomprehensible world. A world of flickering screens and towering cities. A world where women weren’t property but people. Where they ran businesses, drove cars, voted, had power.

And yet—

Katherine’s throat tightened as she looked around at the other mothers. Most of them had strollers and snacks in tidy little bags, wearing jeans and shirts that weren’t secondhand. Their children clutched toys and tablets. Their eyes weren’t shadowed with the same fear.

How will I ever give her that? The thought pressed down like a stone on her chest.

She had no husband. No dowry. No real education that applied in this place. She could read and write in several languages, but that didn’t feed a child. No trade. No resume. No savings.

She looked down at Nadia. “What if I can’t give you anything?” she whispered.

The baby blinked up at her, still drowsy, and let out a sigh that made her eyes sting.

Katherine had lived her life running—from men, from her name, from the curse in her blood. But she couldn’t run now. Nadia needed food. Safety. Shelter. A future.

This world gives women more than mine ever did. But only if I can reach for it.

That was the terrifying part—not the world itself, but what it demanded of her.

Because for once, there was no one chasing her. No vampire breathing down her neck. Just survival. Honest survival. And she had no idea how to do that without lying, stealing, or bleeding for it.

But when Nadia curled against her again, warm and trusting, Katherine closed her eyes.

She didn’t have all the answers.

But she had time. Maybe for the first time in her life, she had a chance. A real one.

And for her daughter, she would find a way.

Katherine stood in front of the mirror in the shared shelter bathroom, Nadia strapped snug to her chest in a sling. Her reflection stared back—tired eyes, a fraying sweater she’d mended twice, and that same unmistakable determination that had once helped her outwit centuries-old monsters.

She smoothed her hair back and adjusted the sling. “Let’s go get Mama a future,” she whispered.

Out on the street, the city moved fast—horns blaring, people brushing past without glancing up. But Katherine moved slower, calculated. She studied storefronts and signs with practiced eyes, cataloguing every detail. Her instincts, sharpened by years of evasion and survival, shifted into something new: strategy.

She stopped at a small café tucked between a laundromat and a bookstore. It was family-owned—she could tell by the hand-painted sign and the faded awning. The kind of place where people knew your name. Less corporate, less paperwork, she thought. More desperation when someone calls out sick.

Inside, the scent of coffee and warm bread curled around her. She waited until the lunchtime rush thinned, then approached the counter.

A middle-aged woman with weary kindness in her face gave her a curious glance. “Can I help you?”

Katherine smiled—soft, practiced, the kind that had once charmed noblemen and deceived killers. “Actually… I was wondering if you might be hiring. I’m new in town. I’m a quick learner, and I’ve worked in kitchens before.”

She hadn’t. Not modern ones, anyway. But she’d butchered game at fourteen and baked bread over open hearths. She could carry trays and stay quiet. She knew how to make herself small, helpful, unthreatening—useful.

The woman hesitated. “We usually hire through a temp agency, but we’ve been short lately…”

Katherine glanced down at Nadia, who had started to stir. “I’m willing to work any shift. I just need a chance. I can prove myself.”

Something flickered in the woman’s eyes—sympathy, maybe. Or just the weariness of someone who remembered what it was like to be down to your last option.

“Come in tomorrow,” she said finally. “Five a.m. You can start with dishes.”

Katherine smiled, not out of charm but gratitude. “Thank you. Truly.”

Outside, with the slip of paper bearing the café’s address in her hand, she felt a flicker of something she hadn’t in weeks.

Not just hope—but purpose.

She looked down at Nadia, whose small hand curled over her collarbone like an anchor.

“See? We’re not lost anymore.”

The early morning air bit cold against Katherine’s cheeks as she stood outside the café, Nadia bundled against her chest in a thick blanket. The sling held her tight, tiny fingers curled into her mother’s collar. She’d woken when Katherine had, sometime around four, bleary-eyed and quiet—perhaps sensing the tension in her mother’s silence.

Katherine took a breath. The street was still asleep, save for delivery trucks and the occasional stumbling straggler from the night before. She checked Nadia’s sling again, then stepped inside.

The café was dimly lit, its warmth already humming with ovens and brewing coffee. The woman from yesterday—Joanne—was unlocking cupboards and setting out pans. She looked up at Katherine, her brow lifting slightly at the sight of the baby.

“I hope this isn’t a problem,” Katherine said quickly, shifting her weight, ready to fight or flee if she had to. “She’ll stay quiet. I won’t leave her alone.”

Joanne hesitated, then shrugged. “We’ve had worse company back here than a baby.”

Gratitude surged through Katherine, but she kept her expression neutral. “Thank you.”

The back kitchen was tight, lined with prep tables, stacked dishes, an ancient dishwasher humming in the corner. Katherine was shown the sink, the racks, and the gloves that didn’t quite fit her hands. Nadia stirred softly, sensing the change in energy, and Katherine murmured against her forehead, “I’m still here. I’m not letting you go.”

And she meant it. After losing her once—after clawing her way back through blood and fear and flame—Katherine couldn’t bring herself to let Nadia out of sight. Not now. Not ever.

The first few hours were a blur of steam and clattering ceramic. The gloves were stiff and the water scalded her wrists, but Katherine endured it all with the same grit that had kept her alive in the woods of Bulgaria. Her movements were quick, efficient, and careful—always mindful of the warm weight resting against her chest.

There were curious glances from the other staff. A young boy named Milo offered to hold Nadia during a break, and Katherine’s smile turned cool as she declined. Trust was a currency she could no longer afford.

Nadia didn’t fuss—not much. She dozed in and out, roused only by the sounds of cups hitting trays, or the blare of a bell from the front. Once, when she started to whimper, Katherine paused the wash to hum lowly into her ear. It was a lullaby her own mother had sung, rough and ancient. She hadn’t heard it in over a decade, and yet the melody rose from her chest like it had never left.

By the time noon crept in and the rush began, Katherine was soaked to the elbows, her arms aching, her back stiff—but she hadn’t let go once. Joanne came by with a paper cup of coffee and set it on the counter.

“You did good,” she said, nodding at Nadia. “She’s a quiet one.”

Katherine glanced down at her daughter, now fully asleep. Her lashes cast shadows on her cheeks, a smudge of flour on her temple from earlier. A sense of fragile contentment bloomed in Katherine’s chest.

“She’s been through too much,” she murmured. “She just wants to be near me.”

Joanne looked at her for a long moment, then simply said, “We’ll work something out. If you need to bring her, you bring her.”

Katherine’s throat tightened. It wasn’t a handout. It wasn’t pity. It was grace—a kind she hadn’t been offered in a long time.

She nodded. “Thank you.”

That night, after they returned to the shelter and curled up in their shared cot, Nadia’s breath evened against her shoulder. Katherine stayed awake a while longer, staring at the ceiling.

The world was vast, strange, and new. But for the first time in months, she had done something with her own hands. Something honest. Something that didn’t come with blood or lies or regret.

She kissed Nadia’s forehead.

“I’m going to give you more than survival,” she whispered. “I swear it.”

Chapter Text

Chapter 4

The radio in the corner crackled to life as Katherine fumbled with the knobs, twisting one gently, then sharply, until something resembling music filled the room. Nadia was babbling to herself in the corner, stacking her blocks in proud, lopsided towers. It was one of their quieter afternoons—no outreach centers, no long queues, no forms to fill or sympathetic social workers to smile at her with careful concern.

Katherine had begun to test the waters of this strange new culture. She watched television in small doses, though most of it still gave her a headache. She’d found the food far too salty, the pace of life far too fast—but the music… she’d hoped the music might be familiar.

But as the first lyrics of the song came through the speakers, her brow furrowed.

“If you don’t wanna see me dancin’ with somebody—if you wanna believe that anything could stop me…”

At first, it was catchy. Rhythmic. She even swayed a little in her chair, patting Nadia’s back in time with the beat. Then the next song came on.

“I want your stupid love, love…”

Katherine froze.

“What?” she muttered aloud, reaching for the dial again. Another station. Surely something less—bold.

“I just took a DNA test, turns out I’m 100% that—”

Her mouth dropped open.

“Good God,” she gasped, twisting the knob until the voice disappeared in a squawk of static. Nadia squealed in delight at the noise, clapping her hands, oblivious to her mother’s rising mortification.

Katherine sat down heavily, staring at the now-silent radio like it had personally insulted her. She thought of the music she remembered—soft strings and serenades. A waltz in candlelight. Voices that crooned about longing and devotion, not—

She cleared her throat, shaking the thought from her head.

Later that night, when Nadia had drifted off to sleep, Katherine tried again. This time she found an oldies station. A mellow, crooning voice sang about catching a falling star and putting it in your pocket. The lyrics were sweet, wistful. The tempo gentle.

She exhaled softly, letting the music wrap around her like a shawl from her childhood.

“This,” she whispered to herself, “this is music.”

She rose and went to the tiny kitchenette, quietly humming along. She didn’t know how long she would stay in this world, or if she could ever fully belong to it—but perhaps she could carve a corner of it to suit her.

One with fewer expletives.

And maybe—just maybe—a little more romance

The city sidewalk was cracked and uneven, the kind that made every parent’s heart skip when their toddler insisted on walking on her own. Katherine hovered just behind Nadia, arms half-outstretched as the little girl toddled forward on unsteady feet, a determined wrinkle on her brow and her dark curls bouncing with every wobbly step.

It had taken months, but she was walking now. Not just clinging to Katherine’s fingers — she wanted independence, demanded it in soft babble and outstretched hands. And Katherine, as much as it terrified her, let her.

They were walking home from the outreach center, Katherine balancing a small bag of donated essentials on one hip while her eyes never left her daughter. Nadia clutched a scrap of cloth in one chubby fist—her “blankie,” though it was really just an old T-shirt Katherine had hemmed into something vaguely comforting.

“Stay close, sweetheart,” Katherine said gently.

Nadia turned and beamed. “Mama!”

Katherine smiled despite the tiredness dragging at her limbs.

They rounded the corner near the playground when a shadow passed them. A tall man, head bowed, long coat drawn tight around him, a paper bag in one gloved hand. Katherine barely noticed him—until Nadia let out a delighted, high-pitched squeal.

“Shiny!”

Katherine blinked. “Nadia—?”

Before she could react, Nadia was toddling forward straight toward the stranger, pointing excitedly at the man’s arm. His left one. The covered one.

Katherine’s heart jumped to her throat. “Nadia!”

The man turned, startled, pausing mid-step. His eyes flicked from the child to the woman chasing after her, concern creasing his brow.

Katherine swooped in and caught Nadia before she could latch onto the man’s coat. “I’m so sorry—she’s very curious lately, and I—” Her words stalled as her eyes met his.

It was him. The man from the outreach center.

His expression softened slightly as he looked down at Nadia, whose fascination hadn’t dimmed in the slightest.

“She likes your coat,” Katherine said, trying for casual, even though her voice came out breathless. “Or maybe you. I’m not sure.”

Bucky’s gaze shifted to the toddler. “She’s got good instincts.”

Nadia, in turn, just gurgled and leaned toward him again.

He crouched — slowly, carefully — offering her a gloved hand but keeping his distance. “Hi there.”

Katherine tensed, but didn’t pull Nadia back. Something in his stillness reassured her.

Nadia pressed her fingers to the leather covering his hand, then giggled and clutched it briefly before stumbling back on her own feet. Katherine caught her again.

“She’s walking,” she said, as if that explained everything. “It’s new. Terrifying.”

Bucky straightened, a faint smile tugging at his mouth. “She’s fearless.”

“She’s a handful,” Katherine replied, brushing a leaf from Nadia’s hair.

He nodded, then hesitated. “I remember you. From the center.”

“You stopped that man from yelling at me,” she said softly.

Katherine glanced at his gloved hand. She’d noticed his discomfort the last time, how he never used that arm unless he had to. Nadia, of course, had sensed none of that. Children rarely flinched from truth when it came without violence.

“She saw something,” she murmured. “Something shiny under all that leather.”

Bucky’s eyes flickered with something she couldn’t quite read. But he didn’t correct her.

Katherine shifted Nadia to her hip, brushing curls from her daughter’s eyes. “Thank you, again. For back then. And now, I guess.”

He looked at her a beat longer, then offered a nod. “I’m around here a lot. If you ever need—”

He stopped. She waited.

“I’ll see you around,” he finished.

With that, he turned and walked on, shoulders hunched slightly against the wind.

Katherine watched him go, her arms full of the one thing that mattered most in the world. Nadia wriggled and reached toward the retreating figure.

“Mama, shiny man.”

Katherine laughed, but her voice caught at the edges.

“Yes, baby. The shiny man.”

The small apartment was dim and quiet, the thin curtains drawn against the city lights outside. A single lamp glowed in the corner, casting a golden halo over the couch where Katherine sat with Nadia nestled against her chest. The warmth of her daughter’s tiny body, the rise and fall of her breathing, filled the silence more deeply than any words could.

Nadia had finally fallen asleep—after a long day of walking too far and laughing too much, her legs had simply given out. She’d collapsed into Katherine’s arms with the melodramatic sigh only a toddler could master, murmuring about shiny coats and park swings, her voice soft and sticky with sleep.

Now she was heavy in that sweet, trusting way small children had, her limbs flung wide across Katherine’s lap, her cheek pressed to her mother’s collarbone.

Katherine ran her fingers gently through her daughter’s curls. So dark, like her own. So wild, like everything about her life had become.

“She’s getting so big,” she whispered into the hush, not quite sure who she was speaking to. Maybe herself. Maybe the woman she used to be.

Nadia’s hands had grown, she noticed. Not chubby baby fists anymore. Her fingers stretched longer now, curled reflexively in sleep against Katherine’s shirt. Her legs no longer fit comfortably across her lap. When had that happened?

When had any of this happened?

Katherine leaned back, careful not to wake her, and looked around the tiny apartment. The chipped table. The thrifted toys. The folded laundry waiting in a corner. None of it was much—but it was theirs.

A year ago, she hadn’t even believed she’d hold her child again. A year ago, she had been bleeding and begging, a woman lost between worlds, clutching hope like a knife in the dark. And now—now she had little feet thumping across the floor, a warm voice saying Mama, and a heart that beat not just for survival but for someone else.

Tears slipped down her cheeks, quiet and unbidden. Not of sorrow this time, but something deeper. Something sacred.

“You’re growing too fast, my love,” she whispered, pressing her lips to Nadia’s hair. “Slow down, just a little. Let me have more time.”

Nadia stirred slightly, mumbling in her sleep, her arms tightening around her mother.

Katherine held her tighter in return.

For a woman born in a century where daughters were burdens and women were silence, she had never imagined a life like this. But here it was. In dim lamplight and lullabies, in feverish kisses and mispronounced words, in the weight of a child’s dreams resting against her heart.

She didn’t know what tomorrow held. But tonight, she had this.

And for the first time in a long while, it was enough.

Katherine watched the woman at the crosswalk with a kind of awe.

She wore a blazer two sizes too big, biker boots, and a T-shirt that said Don’t Call Me Sweetheart. Her lipstick was red enough to start a war. She looked confident—bordering on reckless—as she shoved her way into the crowded street, earbuds in, sunglasses on, and not a single glance backward.

Katherine tightened the scarf around her neck and pulled her coat closer. It was soft and tailored, a thrift store find she’d altered by hand. Her blouse had lace at the collar. She liked buttons. She liked structure. She liked looking like someone who belonged somewhere.

But in this world, she felt like she had landed in the middle of a stampede.

People didn’t walk, they sprinted. They didn’t talk, they shouted. They didn’t court, they “matched” on little glass boxes, fingers swiping left or right with the flick of a wrist.

She’d overheard a girl in the outreach center say she’d dumped a guy because he used a semicolon in a text.

“A semicolon,” Katherine had repeated to herself, baffled, while feeding Nadia pieces of banana. “What is wrong with a semicolon?”

Back in her apartment—a small, cramped space with peeling wallpaper but blessedly quiet—she unfolded one of her long skirts and ran her hands over the fabric. She missed the way people used to dress for dinner. The way a man stood when a woman entered the room. The slowness of things. The weight of intention behind simple gestures.

Now, everything was instant. Express. Disposable.

And yet…

When she held Nadia at night, singing lullabies in a language this world had long forgotten, something in her stirred. Maybe this world didn’t wait—but maybe she didn’t need it to.

Maybe she could build something that didn’t need to run at the speed of light.

In the kitchen, the electric kettle whistled—too loud, too fast—and she jumped. But she poured her tea with steady hands, and tucked her feet beneath her on the couch. She put on the radio, finding the oldies station again. Nat King Cole crooned in the background as she cradled her tea, and Nadia dozed in her lap.

The world spun on, impatient and burning. But here, for a moment, she carved out stillness.

Not everything had to be modern.

Not everything had to change.

And what did?

She would decide what stayed.

Chapter Text

Chapter 5

The café was small and brightly lit, smelling of burnt espresso and cinnamon. Katherine wasn’t quite sure why she’d come in—just that Nadia had fallen asleep in the stroller and her feet had grown tired from walking. The café had warm air, a window seat, and the illusion of stillness.

She ordered tea. The woman behind the counter raised an eyebrow when she asked for it “properly steeped.”

“You want… what, exactly?”

“Boiled water. Loose leaves if you have them. Not from a paper packet,” Katherine said primly, resting her hands on the counter.

The girl—pink hair, nose ring, tattoos like scripture down her arms—smirked. “Right. Victorian realness. Got it.”

Katherine bit back the instinct to correct her. She wasn’t Victorian. She was from an era older than that. Much older.

She found a seat in the corner by the window, nestled Nadia’s stroller beside her, and tried to pretend she belonged.

Five minutes later, the girl from the counter dropped the tea off and slid into the seat across from her without asking. “Hope you don’t mind,” she said. “My feet hurt. And you look like you could use someone to talk to.”

“I didn’t ask for company,” Katherine replied, voice calm but clipped.

“Cool,” the girl said, popping a piece of gum into her mouth. “I didn’t either. Funny how life works out.”

Silence stretched, broken only by the hum of a dishwasher and the gentle clink of ceramic mugs.

“I’m Junie,” the girl offered. “You got a name or just ‘Mysterious Lady in Pearls’?”

Katherine stared at her for a moment. “Katherine.”

Junie nodded. “You’re not from around here.”

“Not from this century,” Katherine muttered before she could stop herself.

Junie laughed. “No kidding.”

They sat there for a beat. Then, Junie pointed toward the stroller. “Your kid?”

Katherine nodded, glancing toward Nadia, who stirred but didn’t wake.

“She’s beautiful. You look… proud.”

“I am.”

“But also kind of like you think the world is about to collapse on her.”

Katherine flinched. “It’s not the world I fear. It’s what it can do to a girl.”

Junie leaned back, sipping her iced coffee. “You mean like freedom, voting rights, education, having a bank account in her own name?”

Katherine’s jaw tightened. “I mean vulnerability. Being alone in a world that sees women as objects. That hasn’t changed.”

Junie’s smile faded, and for a moment, her eyes sharpened. “You’re right. It hasn’t. But the difference now is—we can fight back. I don’t need a man or a title or a marriage proposal to matter. And neither does your daughter.”

That struck something in Katherine. Deep and painful. She stared at her tea, suddenly unsure what she wanted from it anymore.

“I grew up believing a woman’s only power was in what she could hide behind,” Katherine said, her voice softer now. “Beauty. Wit. Quiet manipulation.”

Junie leaned in. “And look where that got us. Wars. Dead queens. Disney villains.”

Katherine almost smiled.

“You’re doing good,” Junie added after a pause. “I can see it. You’re here, you’re surviving. And she’s lucky—because you know what it’s like to have to earn your space.”

Katherine looked at her daughter, her heart full and aching. “She deserves better than I ever had.”

“Then give it to her,” Junie said, finishing her coffee and standing. “And if you ever want help, or just someone who won’t blink when you talk like an Austen heroine—I’m here every Thursday.”

She was gone before Katherine could reply.

Katherine stared out the window a while longer, hands wrapped around a cup that had grown cold. The music playing overhead shifted to something loud and rhythmic. Not her style. Not yet.

But maybe… one day.

The outreach center hummed with the muted sounds of conversation and clinking coffee cups. It was quieter than usual—Nadia had finally fallen asleep on Katherine’s shoulder, a rare moment of peace. Katherine sat at a corner table folding tiny sleeves back into Nadia’s secondhand coat when Junie slid into the seat across from her.

Junie, with her ever-changing braids and knowing eyes, nursed a lukewarm tea and studied Katherine for a moment before speaking.

“You always dress like you stepped out of a vintage film. People would pay for that.”

Katherine looked up, confused. “Pay for what?”

Junie gestured vaguely. “The way you put things together—your clothes, the way you pin your hair, even your boots. You’ve got an eye. I’ve seen girls spend stupid money for less on Instagram.”

Katherine blinked. “Instagram?”

Junie grinned. “You know, where people post pictures of their lunch and their shoes and somehow get rich doing it.”

Katherine arched a brow, unimpressed but curious. “And you think I should… post pictures?”

Junie leaned in. “Not exactly. But have you thought about reselling vintage? Thrift, estate sales, flea markets—find pieces with style, clean them up, put them online. Depop, Etsy, Poshmark. You have the look and the story. People eat that up.”

“I don’t have a story,” Katherine replied, careful.

Junie shrugged. “You’re a single mom who dresses like a French spy. That’s a story.”

Katherine almost smiled, just a tilt at the corner of her mouth. “Even if I did this… I don’t know how to start. I’ve never… sold anything before. Not like that.”

“That’s why I’m offering to help,” Junie said, softer now. “I can show you how to set up an account, take photos, write up listings. You’ve got taste, Kat. People don’t. That’s a business.”

Katherine looked down at her hands, Nadia’s little coat still resting in her lap. “I don’t want to be dependent on anyone,” she said quietly. “I need something that’s mine. Something that keeps her fed.”

Junie nodded. “Then this is your first step. You’re already doing the hard part—surviving. The rest is just… uploading.”

The idea settled in her chest like something warm. Unfamiliar, but hopeful.

“I’ll try,” Katherine said at last. “But only if you promise not to make me do hashtags.”

Junie laughed, full and unapologetic. “Deal. You be the mystery, I’ll be the marketing.”

The lamp on the kitchen table flickered once before settling into a dim glow. Nadia slept curled in a makeshift crib, her soft breaths the only sound in the tiny room. Katherine stood at the table, a scarf wrapped around her hair, sleeves rolled up, staring down at the pale blue vintage blouse she’d carefully steamed and laid out like an offering.

She wasn’t used to working like this—quiet, methodical, exposed. Every hunt she’d ever done had been in shadows, running from monsters no one else could see. This was something entirely different. This required vulnerability.

A chipped phone rested nearby, its cracked screen glowing with the app Junie had installed—Depop. Katherine eyed it like it might bite.

Junie’s text blinked on screen:
“Just take the photo like I showed you. Natural light. Clean backdrop. People want to feel the piece. Not see your sink.”

Katherine snorted softly. “As if that weren’t obvious.”

She turned to the old bedsheet she’d tacked to the wall—her makeshift studio. The blouse hung from a wooden hanger, a soft ivory button-down with scalloped edges and delicate embroidery near the collar. It had belonged to a woman who had spoken kindly at the church, who’d offered it to Katherine with the simple words, “You have a better eye than I ever did.”

She lifted the phone and snapped a photo. Then another. Then cursed and took three more.

Next came the listing.

Title: Vintage 1950s Pearl Button Blouse – Delicate Embroidery
Size: Small
Condition: Gently worn, minor thread aging at collar. Cleaned and steamed.
Price: $32
Description:
“Soft ivory blouse with fine detailing. Romantic silhouette, ideal for spring. Feels like something you’d wear to write letters you never send.”

Katherine hovered over the last line, fingers lingering. It felt too much. Too close to who she’d been before. The girl who wrote letters to a mother already buried. To a child she’d never held.

But then—maybe that’s what made it honest.

She pressed Post.

The listing blinked to life on her screen, surreal and sudden. A small victory in a world still too big, too fast. Katherine leaned back in the chair, watching the glow of her posted item, waiting for the inevitable silence to follow.

Except it didn’t.

Within minutes, a heart popped up on the screen. Someone had liked it.

Then a message:
“Is this still available? Will you ship to Seattle?”

Katherine blinked, mouth parting slightly. She turned toward her sleeping daughter and whispered, “Maybe we can do this, Nadia.”

It wasn’t a battle, or a flight for her life. But it was a beginning.

Cardboard boxes lined the walls now—some half-filled with carefully folded dresses, others sealed and stacked with handwritten labels. The living room had transformed into a tiny warehouse. Nadia sat nearby on a blanket, chewing thoughtfully on a wooden toy as Katherine crouched over a stack of manila envelopes, hands moving fast but careful.

Her phone buzzed again.

Depop Order: 1950s Polka Dot Dress — Sold.
Shipping address: Brooklyn, NY.

Katherine exhaled, not quite a smile but close. That was the fourth sale this week. She reached for the dress on the rack she’d assembled beside the window, ran her hands over the fabric to smooth it once more, and began wrapping it in brown paper and twine. She’d learned presentation mattered—even online.

Junie’s advice had been gold:
“Sell the feeling, not just the piece. Make them believe they’re buying a memory.”

So she added a thank-you note in each one. Just a sentence or two, handwritten in her careful script:
“Wore something like this once to a dance where the music felt like air. Hope this makes you feel beautiful.” – K.”

At first it felt silly. But buyers messaged back.

One wrote, “I cried when I opened this. It reminded me of my grandmother.”

Another, “I wore the blouse to my wedding rehearsal. Thank you for making me feel soft and strong.”

Each note felt like a thread binding her to something beyond survival. She wasn’t just selling vintage clothes. She was carving a place in this world, one stitched hem at a time.

A knock startled her. For a moment, her instincts kicked in—back pressed to the door, heart racing. Then she remembered: it was just the postal worker. Routine.

She opened it and handed him the newest batch. “You’re moving fast,” he said, raising a brow. “You opening a boutique or something?”

Katherine blinked. “Something like that.”

He nodded and tipped his cap. “Keep it up. Brooklyn loves a good comeback story.”

As she closed the door again, Nadia let out a tiny laugh—babbling something incomprehensible but bright. Katherine looked over, and for the first time in days, she allowed herself to smile fully.

She scooped Nadia up and whispered, “We’re not just surviving anymore, are we?”

The child reached for her necklace—an old locket Katherine had kept hidden even in her worst days—and held it tightly.

Katherine kissed her forehead. “Not just surviving. We’re building.”

Chapter Text

Chapter 6

Sunlight spilled across the polished wooden floor of Velvet & Thorn, filtering through lace curtains hung with practiced elegance. Katherine smoothed the front display for the third time—silk gloves beside a velvet clutch, both nestled beneath the sway of a 1940s gown on a wire mannequin. Junie, all wide smiles and bright lipstick, perched on a stool behind the counter, counting a small stack of promo postcards.

“You’re gonna knock their socks off,” Junie said, eyes gleaming. “Seriously. This place feels like walking into an old movie.”

Katherine gave a tight smile, trying to hide the flutter in her chest. It was excitement—but also fear. She adjusted her blouse, eyes darting toward the little corner playpen where Nadia had been settled with her toys.

Empty.

Katherine blinked. Her heart missed a beat. “Junie,” she said, voice sharp. “Where’s Nadia?”

Junie turned, frowning. “She was right there—maybe she crawled under the table?”

They both moved, scanning, checking behind chairs and racks of vintage hats, calling softly. But the child was gone. The front door hung open just a sliver. The bell above hadn’t rung.

Katherine’s body went cold.

The room spun. The polished mannequins warped into pale corpses in her mind’s eye—flashes of her family strewn in blood-soaked earth, Klaus’s wrath. Her baby. Her baby—

She bolted out the boutique, shoes barely catching on the pavement as she scanned the street. Her breath came fast, shallow, hands trembling. “Nadia!” she shouted, voice breaking.

Too loud. Too raw.

Her vision blurred.

Then—
The bell rang. Behind her.

She turned and froze.

Bucky Barnes stood in the doorway, his jacket flung open, metal arm wrapped securely around the small bundle of a squirming toddler. Nadia was clinging to his collar, content and curious, babbling nonsense against his chest.

“She just… walked right into me,” Bucky said, eyes narrowing as he took in Katherine’s expression. “Didn’t want to be picked up at first, but I think she’s figured out I’m not a monster.”

Katherine gasped and rushed to them. She took Nadia in her arms so fast the child barely had time to protest. Clutching her close, Katherine sank to the floor of the boutique, breath ragged, tears slipping freely down her cheeks.

In Bulgarian, her words poured out, trembling and sharp:

“Ne te izgubih… ne i teb. Ne i teb, moeto slantse… molya te nikoga ne izchezvai pak.”
(“I didn’t lose you… not you too. Not you, my sunshine… please never disappear again.”)

She kissed Nadia’s hair, cradling her, rocking slightly on her knees.

Junie watched from behind the counter, stunned silent. Bucky stood awkwardly, shoulders tense, as though he’d intruded on something sacred. He didn’t understand the words—but he heard the grief in them.

“Are you alright?” he asked softly, once the quiet had settled.

Katherine glanced up at him, eyes rimmed red. She hesitated, then gave a tiny nod, smoothing Nadia’s curls. “Thank you,” she whispered. “You… you brought her back to me.”

Bucky’s expression shifted—careful, perceptive. “She’s a curious one,” he said. “Must’ve gotten it from her mom.”

There was no teasing in it. Just something kind. Curious. A question not yet asked.

Katherine gathered herself, rising slowly with Nadia in her arms. “It’s our opening day,” she said, voice fragile. “But I almost lost everything before it even began.”

Bucky looked around the boutique, then back at her. “Looks like you’ve been rebuilding.”

Katherine shifted Nadia on her hip. The child, soothed now, curled her fingers into the lace on her mother’s blouse and sucked quietly on her thumb.

“It’s been a lot of work,” Katherine murmured. Her voice carried the weight of more than sleepless nights and paint-stained hands. It was the exhaustion of running, of hiding, of trying to create something that might finally hold steady.

She didn’t say more. She didn’t have to.

Bucky glanced at the boxes still stacked by the counter, the half-finished backroom with clothing racks leaning against the wall, a stepladder tipped sideways in the corner.

“You need a hand?” he asked.

Katherine blinked, surprised. “You don’t have to—”

“I know,” he said. “But I want to. I’ve moved a lot of furniture in my time. And I’m decent with a drill.”

Katherine hesitated. Her instinct was to decline—pride, habit, fear of owing anything. But then she looked at Nadia, at the curls stuck to her daughter’s damp forehead, and the nearly missed tragedy of the afternoon. The truth was, she needed help. She just rarely trusted anyone enough to accept it.

She gave a quiet nod. “Alright,” she said softly. “But only if you let me pay you with tea and some leftover pastries from Junie’s stash.”

He gave a small grin. “Good. Because you look like you could use a break.”

Katherine let out a breath, almost a laugh. “I could use a hundred of them.” She paused. “But I’ll settle for one. Thank you.”

Bucky moved toward the nearest stack of boxes, and Nadia turned to look at him with wide, curious eyes. She reached out a chubby hand toward his jacket sleeve, as if remembering the earlier moment.

He glanced at the toddler, then back at Katherine. “She’s a brave one.”

“She’s all I have,” Katherine said softly. “So I try to be brave, too.”

The afternoon sun filtered in through the boutique’s front windows, casting a warm haze over the dust motes floating in the air. It smelled faintly of old wood, fresh fabric, and something softer—maybe lavender, maybe something floral that clung to the edges of the space like memory.

Katherine moved between clothing racks and folded linens, her dark hair pulled back loosely as she gave calm, clear instructions. She wasn’t commanding exactly—more deliberate, like someone used to taking charge without drawing attention to it.

“Boxes with the older tags can go in the back. Junie wants them sorted by decade,” she said, nodding toward the rear storage area. Her tone was firm but not cold.

Bucky carried a stack of vintage coat hangers past her, nodding once. “Yes, ma’am.”

The title made Katherine blink, almost startled, like she hadn’t been called ma’am before—or not in a way that sounded like respect. She didn’t correct him though.

Junie, bouncing between helping with the register setup and fussing over the curtain lengths, looked pleased to have the extra hands. “You’ve got a good touch with organization, Mr. Barnes.”

Bucky gave her a quiet smile. “Just following orders.”

He kept his movements careful, aware of the space, the fragility of old materials and newer emotions. Every time he passed by where Nadia sat, occupied with a soft cloth doll, he slowed slightly—just to make sure she was safe. Katherine noticed, but said nothing. She only glanced up from time to time, her eyes flicking from the child to the soldier and back again.

It wasn’t exactly comfortable, but it wasn’t tense either. They moved around each other like two people used to solitude but trying to meet the world halfway.

At one point, Bucky set down a heavy box with a soft grunt and rolled his shoulders. “You’ve got enough inventory back there to open a museum.”

Katherine raised a brow, amused. “Is that your polite way of saying I hoard?”

“No, ma’am,” he replied with a half-smile. “You’re just…thorough.”

That earned a quiet laugh. The sound surprised even her.

Junie caught it and grinned from behind the counter. “Careful, Katherine. He’s got charm under all that brooding.”

Katherine didn’t respond, but her gaze lingered on Bucky for a second longer than necessary, then dropped back to her task.

They worked like that for hours—quiet, steady. The kind of silence that wasn’t awkward, just full. Bucky didn’t ask questions. Katherine didn’t offer explanations. But there was something steady building between them. A rhythm.

And when Nadia grew restless and tugged on her mother’s skirt, Katherine scooped her up and whispered something in Bulgarian. Bucky didn’t say anything, but his eyes flicked over, and he recognized the word for little star.

He didn’t say he understood.

But he stayed a little longer than he had planned.

The boutique had settled into a lull, the kind that followed a long stretch of work. Dust had been swept away, racks straightened, boxes stacked neatly in corners that still held the scent of old mothballs and fresh beginnings.

Bucky sat on a worn stool near the front window, a paper cup of chamomile tea cradled in one hand and a half-eaten pastry in the other, courtesy of Junie’s never-ending snack stash. Across from him, Junie herself lounged with a smug air, sipping her own tea and watching the room with the eyes of someone who’d orchestrated the whole scene.

Katherine, meanwhile, had retreated to the counter with a needle and thread, quietly bent over a vintage dress that had lost a row of buttons and needed its hem corrected. Her brow was furrowed in concentration, the needle flashing quickly between her fingers, movements precise and economical. Nadia had fallen asleep curled on a patchwork quilt in the corner, one hand still clutching her soft doll.

Junie glanced at Bucky with a twinkle in her eye, then leaned toward a small Bluetooth speaker sitting on the shelf.

“Alright,” she muttered mischievously, “time for my favorite game.”

Bucky raised a brow. “Game?”

“You’ll see.” Junie tapped her phone.

A sultry beat filled the air, followed by lyrics that were, without question, not meant for 1490s sensibilities.

Katherine’s hand froze mid-stitch. Her back straightened, her eyes lifting in alarm as she processed the words now echoing through her carefully curated vintage haven.

“Junie…” she said with tightly restrained patience.

Junie choked on a laugh. “That’s the face! Bucky, you seeing this?”

Bucky tried—and failed—to suppress a grin. “Yeah. That’s a look.”

Katherine narrowed her eyes at both of them, though the flush on her cheeks betrayed her embarrassment more than any rebuke could. “Why must every song in this century sound like it belongs in a brothel?”

Junie waved a hand. “That’s half the fun. It’s art, sweetheart. Besides, you should see your face every time I play something with a little oomph. You go full governess.”

“She’s kind of a prude,” Junie added toward Bucky, loud enough for Katherine to hear.

“I am not a prude,” Katherine said stiffly, turning back to her sewing, though her hands fumbled slightly on the fabric. “I just believe music should have…poetry.”

Bucky took another sip of his tea, trying not to laugh. “What kind of music do you like, then?”

Katherine didn’t look up. “Frank Sinatra. Nat King Cole. Doris Day.”

Junie clapped her hands once. “Oh, she’s so vintage she out-vintages the vintage!”

Katherine’s lips twitched—barely. “I am vintage.”

The three of them fell into an easy, amused silence. The music softened. The tea grew cooler. Outside, the sky turned slowly gold.

And for a fleeting moment, Katherine allowed herself to enjoy this odd new rhythm of hers—needle in hand, laughter in the air, and something fragile yet warm settling in her chest.

Chapter Text

Chapter 7

Katherine watched from behind the counter as Bucky gently lifted Nadia into his arms. The toddler giggled, clinging to his neck with the ease of a child who hadn’t learned yet how dangerous it could be to trust so quickly. Katherine’s fingers curled tightly around the edge of the display table.

It wasn’t him—at least, not anything he’d done. Bucky was quiet. Respectful. Always offering help without expectation. He didn’t press her with questions or make eyes at her like so many men did when they saw a young mother on her own. But still… her stomach coiled.

Because trust wasn’t something she gave anymore. Not easily. Not to men.

Her father’s hand had left bruises on her mother’s arms and screams behind closed doors. Her first love had run the moment he found out she was with child, choosing freedom over fatherhood. And then there was Elijah—with his soft words and quiet strength—who’d sworn to protect her, only to hand her over to Klaus like a gift wrapped in betrayal.

And Klaus himself… he’d chased her like prey across continents simply because she’d refused to die for him.

Even now, in this strange new world where women could own stores and speak their minds, the echo of her past clung like smoke to her ribs.

She didn’t want to need anyone. Especially not him.

But here he was—arms around her daughter like it was natural. Steady. Protective. And her daughter, her Nadia, had taken to him like a bird to an open palm.

Katherine looked away quickly, pretending to sort a rack of scarves. Her throat burned.

She didn’t want to rely on anyone. And she didn’t want Nadia to think they needed a man to be safe. They had each other. That had to be enough.

Still, when Bucky met her eyes across the shop and gave her a small, uncertain smile, she found herself nodding back, just barely.

Not an invitation.

But not a wall either.

Just… a moment.

And for now, that was all she could give.

The lights in the apartment were low, the soft hum of the city drifting in through the cracked window. Katherine sat cross-legged on the bed, Nadia tucked warm against her side beneath the patchwork quilt Junie had helped them stitch together. The storybook lay open on her lap, the final page turned, the little mouse in the tale fast asleep in its tiny matchbox bed.

“Again?” Nadia asked, her dark eyes bright with hope.

“Not tonight, малко сърце,” Katherine murmured, brushing a curl back from her daughter’s forehead. “Your eyes are already too heavy.”

Nadia pouted, but her small arms wrapped around Katherine’s waist, leaning in with the ease of love that needed no convincing.

She began to hum, instinctively, the lullaby her mother had once sung to her in another lifetime, under a roof that no longer stood, in a country that had burned behind her. Nadia’s eyes fluttered, lashes dusting her cheeks—but then she stirred, lifting one hand, her fingers dancing in a clumsy rhythm.

“Mummy finger, mummy finger, where are you?” she sang softly, the tune Junie had taught her. Her tiny voice filled the room like sunlight through a shutter. “Here I am, here I am. How do you do?”

Katherine smiled, a pang blooming in her chest. But then Nadia’s small brows furrowed in thought.

“Where’s daddy finger?” she asked innocently. “Mummy… where’s daddy?”

The question dropped into the room like a stone into still water.

Katherine’s breath caught. Her hand stilled on Nadia’s back.

She didn’t know what to say. Not really.

How could she explain a man who had run?

More than that… how could she explain the ache that had followed her, the knowing that Nadia might always carry the weight of what she didn’t have?

“Mummy?” Nadia whispered, her voice already growing sleepy.

Katherine bent and kissed her forehead. “You have everything you need, малко сърце,” she said gently, voice steady though her heart trembled. “You have love.”

And you deserve the world, she thought.

Nadia’s fingers curled into hers as she drifted off, peaceful in a way only the very young could be.

Katherine stayed beside her long after her daughter’s breaths deepened, watching her sleep with a fierceness in her gaze.

She might not have answers. She might not have much.

The boutique was dimly lit, the sign in the window flipped to CLOSED. Junie moved with practiced ease through the small space, straightening hangers and folding a stack of silk scarves with her usual care. Katherine stood at the back table, a cup of lukewarm tea in her hands, watching the soft rise and fall of the curtain that separated the shop from the small apartment behind it—where Nadia now slept.

“She asked about her father tonight,” Katherine said suddenly, voice quiet but steady.

Junie didn’t look up. She placed the last scarf down, smoothing it with her palm before walking over and picking up her own cup.

“What did you tell her?” she asked gently.

Katherine leaned against the edge of the table, her profile half-lit by the low lamp nearby. “That she has love. That it’s enough.”

Junie gave a little nod, sipping her tea.

“But it isn’t,” Katherine said, softer now, as if the words themselves might break her if she spoke them too loud. “Not always.”

Junie didn’t argue. She let the silence breathe between them for a long moment.

“You know,” she said at last, “you’ve done more for Nadia than most people do with twice the money and none of the pain. That little girl lights up around you.”

Katherine gave a tired smile, one that didn’t quite reach her eyes. “She deserves more than an exhausted mother and a borrowed shop.”

Junie tilted her head. “She has more. She has a mother who’s learning to live in a world that never made space for her. That takes courage.”

Katherine looked down into her cup. “I keep thinking about my own mother. How afraid she was… how silent. I promised I’d be different.”

Junie reached over, resting a hand briefly on Katherine’s. “And you are. But you don’t have to do it all alone.”

Katherine didn’t reply at first. Her fingers curled tighter around the cup. Then, barely above a whisper, she said, “I don’t know how to let anyone help.”

Junie smiled faintly. “You’re doing it right now.”

They stood there in the hush of the boutique, two women bound by survival, resilience, and something like sisterhood. Outside, the city murmured on, but in the small sanctuary they had built, there was quiet. And for the first time in a long time, Katherine let herself breathe.

“I’ve always had to run,” Katherine said quietly, her fingers tracing the rim of the chipped teacup. “There was always someone—or something—chasing me. And when it wasn’t danger, it was expectation. What I should be. Who I should love. What I should endure.”

Junie tilted her head. “You don’t talk much about before. Where you came from.”

“I don’t,” Katherine said. Her voice was light, but her posture stiffened slightly, just enough for Junie to notice. “It’s not a place I can go back to. Not in any way that matters.”

Junie nodded slowly. “Fair enough.”

Katherine glanced at her, surprised by the lack of pressure, and maybe a little grateful for it.

“I made choices back then. Some of them were desperate. Some were… necessary.” Her voice caught on the word. “And some still haunt me.”

Junie didn’t look away. “Sometimes the only choices we get are between survival and silence.”

Katherine smiled faintly, but it didn’t quite settle. “I wasn’t always this person, you know. The mother. The shop girl. I don’t think I ever thought I’d live long enough to be… normal.”

“You’re not normal,” Junie said, smirking. “And thank God for that.”

That earned a quiet laugh from Katherine, who leaned back in her chair, folding her arms as she looked toward the back room, where the soft creak of Nadia turning in her sleep was the only sound.

“I don’t know how to do this,” Katherine admitted. “Raise her without fear. Love her without… shadows. Be a woman who isn’t always looking over her shoulder.”

Junie looked at her, serious now. “Then don’t do it alone.”

Katherine met her eyes. “I don’t know how to not be alone.”

Junie reached across the table and gently touched her hand again. “Then we’ll figure it out. One day, one dress, one tantrum at a time.”

Katherine let out a breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding. She didn’t say thank you. She wasn’t quite ready for that kind of softness. But she didn’t pull away, either.

And in the quiet that followed, with the weight of unspoken pasts and unpromised futures between them, Katherine began to believe—for the first time in a long time—that maybe she wasn’t doomed to always run.

Maybe she was learning to stay.

Chapter Text

Chapter 8

It was late when Katherine sat at the tiny table in the back of the boutique, her laptop open beside a pile of half-folded dresses. Nadia was asleep in the next room, a lullaby hummed into her curls still lingering in Katherine’s throat. She wasn’t sure what had led her to type his name into the search bar—curiosity, maybe. Or that strange, watchful kindness in his eyes that made her feel seen and unsettled all at once.

James Buchanan Barnes.

The screen lit up with results. The Winter Soldier. A name wrapped in shadow and contradiction. A war hero turned assassin turned something else—something redemptive. Katherine’s fingers trembled slightly as she clicked through articles, government briefings, video clips that blurred his face into a flicker of violence and stillness.

He was one of them.

One of those people. The ones who had fought back gods and monsters and aliens, who had brought half the world back from dust and memory.

He had carried her child like she weighed nothing. Had lifted shelves and old dressers without blinking. She’d thought him strange, quiet, perhaps broken in ways that mirrored her own. She hadn’t known he was something out of legend. And he had never said a word.

She closed the tab slowly, heart pounding, and leaned back against the chair. The boutique felt smaller somehow, like the walls couldn’t quite hold the weight of this knowledge.

“You’re making that face again,” Junie said from the doorway, holding two mugs. “The one that looks like you just found out you kissed a prince disguised as a frog.”

Katherine blinked. “He’s—Bucky is—he helped save the world.”

Junie handed her a mug, smirking. “Yeah, I figured you’d Google him eventually.”

“You knew?” Katherine stared at her.

Junie grinned. “Girl, everyone knows. I just assumed you were being coy. You’ve got that whole mysterious European vibe down to an art.”

“I didn’t know,” Katherine murmured, more to herself. “I didn’t think to look. He… doesn’t talk about it.”

Junie shrugged. “He’s not the bragging type. That man could wrestle a bear and still apologize for stepping on your foot. And you didn’t notice how careful he is around people? Like he’s scared of being real.”

Katherine was quiet. Then, almost without thinking, she clicked on another tab—an old black-and-white photo from the 1940s. There he was, young and soft-eyed in a soldier’s uniform. Another photo—post-blip—silent and hollowed out, but still there. Still trying.

“Displaced,” she whispered. “He’s… out of time. Like me.”

Junie caught the softness in her voice but didn’t comment. Instead, she nudged Katherine’s shoulder gently.

“Maybe that’s why Nadia likes him,” Junie said. “She can feel it. That he doesn’t quite belong. Just like you.”

Katherine didn’t respond right away. But she closed the laptop softly, her thoughts turning not to the things he’d done, but to the man who held her daughter with careful hands. Who called her ma’am even when her hair was a mess and her dress hem fraying.

Maybe they were both just trying to rewrite the past in a world that kept hurtling forward without them.

……..

Bucky didn’t have an excuse that day.

There was no shelf to fix, no dress rack to move. The boutique didn’t need him. But still, he found himself there—hands in the pockets of his worn jacket, standing just inside the door, pretending to look at a hat on display.

Katherine glanced up from where she knelt near the window, pinning the hem of a floral curtain she’d been meaning to shorten. She didn’t comment on his presence, didn’t ask why he’d come.

She never did.

Nadia was playing nearby, her small hands wrapped around a wooden toy dog Junie had found at a market. She toddled unsteadily between the mannequins, babbling to herself in a mix of words and sounds only Katherine seemed to fully understand.

When she noticed Bucky, Nadia lit up like a lantern.

“Hi, Bucky!” she chirped, wobbling toward him on chubby legs, arms lifted in expectation.

He blinked, a little caught off guard. “Hey, kiddo.”

Without thinking, he bent and scooped her up. She giggled, nestling in as if it was the most natural thing in the world. Her small fingers curled around a lock of his hair, and she tugged it gently, delighted.

Katherine watched. Her hands stilled on the curtain. She didn’t smile, not exactly—but something softer touched her expression. Something complicated.

“She likes you,” she said quietly.

“I didn’t mean to interrupt,” he replied, voice low, awkward as ever. “I just… was in the area.”

“She doesn’t take to many people,” Katherine added, her eyes on her daughter now. “Even Junie had to work for it.”

Bucky looked down at the girl in his arms. Nadia had begun humming softly, her head against his chest.

“She’s a good kid,” he said.

“I never thought I’d… have this,” she admitted. “And sometimes I worry I won’t be enough. Not here. Not in this world.”

Bucky’s eyes met hers. For a moment, neither of them spoke.

“You’re doing fine,” he said, gently. “Better than most.”

Nadia shifted in his arms, reaching out one small hand toward her mother. Katherine stepped forward instinctively, brushing her daughter’s hair back from her forehead, her fingers brushing Bucky’s hand in the process—light, brief, but enough to make them both pause.

It wasn’t a dramatic moment. Just a quiet one.

But something in the stillness had changed?

⸻

Bucky sat on the familiar leather couch, arms crossed tight over his chest. The clock ticked louder than usual, or maybe he was just more aware of it today.

Dr. Raynor didn’t speak right away. She watched him like she always did—too perceptive, too patient. It put him on edge.

“You’re quieter than usual,” she said finally.

He shrugged. “Not much to say.”

“Uh-huh.” She flipped a page in her notepad. “And the boutique?”

His brow furrowed slightly. “Still standing.”

“You’re still helping that woman? Katherine?”

He hesitated. “Not really helping anymore. Just… stopping by.”

Raynor arched a brow. “Stopping by?”

“She’s got a kid,” he said quickly, as if that explained everything. “Little girl. Name’s Nadia.”

Dr. Raynor didn’t interrupt. She just waited.

He shifted in his seat. “She—Nadia—ran into me the other day. Literally. And Katherine—she panicked. Called out in Bulgarian.”

Raynor blinked. “You understood her?”

He gave a noncommittal grunt. “Enough to know she thought she lost her kid. Again.”

Silence settled between them.

“She’s not from around here,” he added, after a beat. “I mean… not just the accent. There’s something about her. Like she doesn’t quite fit.”

Dr. Raynor nodded slowly. “Sounds familiar.”

He shot her a look. “Don’t start.”

“I didn’t say anything.”

Bucky exhaled sharply. “The kid likes me. I don’t know why.”

“Kids tend to know when someone’s safe.”

He didn’t reply to that.

Raynor leaned forward a little. “Is she married?”

“No,” he said quickly. Too quickly.

“Ah.”

“There’s nothing like that,” he muttered.

“I didn’t say there was.”

He rubbed a hand over his face. “She’s… rebuilding. That’s the word she used. Like she lost everything and now she’s patching it back together. Bit by bit.”

“Sounds like someone else I know.”

This time, he didn’t argue.

Raynor softened her tone. “Bucky… sometimes we find pieces of peace in the most unexpected places. Doesn’t mean it’s wrong.”

He didn’t respond, just stared at the floor like it might give him answers.

Raynor smiled faintly. “Next time, tell me more about her. And the boutique. And maybe… about what you want.”

He nodded, barely. But it was something.

The train rumbled beneath him, a low, steady hum that usually helped quiet his thoughts. Not today.

Bucky leaned back against the window, cap pulled low, coat collar turned up against the cold. It wasn’t the weather that bothered him. It was the image of a little girl with dark curls toddling toward him, arms outstretched, giggling like he was someone worth running to.

Nadia.

She had clutched his finger once—tiny, warm hand wrapping around his gloved one like it was the most natural thing in the world. He hadn’t known what to do. He’d looked up, startled, to find Katherine watching him from across the room.

She hadn’t smiled. But she hadn’t pulled her daughter away either.

And that terrified him.

They were rebuilding, she had said. He believed her. She moved like someone who’d lived through ruin and was now gathering what remained—threading her days with routine and tenderness, just enough hope to keep going. He recognized it because it was what he was trying to do too. Only, she made it look… softer. Real.

And that was the problem.

They were better off without him.

He had no business hanging around that boutique with its warm lights and quiet music. No business lingering to lift boxes he wasn’t asked to, or accepting tea with a woman who didn’t know the blood on his hands. She didn’t know the Winter Soldier. Not really. If she did—if she saw what he had done, what he had been made into—she would snatch that child up and run in the opposite direction.

She should.

Bucky closed his eyes and leaned his head against the window. The glass was cold. It helped.

He wanted to say it didn’t matter. That he was just being polite. That he only stopped by because it was on his way. But the truth pressed against him like a loaded silence: he liked being there. The sound of Nadia’s voice, the way Katherine adjusted the sleeves on old dresses with practiced fingers, the way Junie hummed as she worked the till—all of it made the world feel a little less sharp.

And he didn’t know what to do with that.

Because people like him didn’t get that kind of peace. Didn’t deserve it.

He opened his eyes, jaw tight.

Whatever Katherine was rebuilding, he wouldn’t be the one to wreck it. No matter how much he wanted to stay.

Chapter Text

Chapter 9

The bell above the door didn’t ring.

It had been four days.

Nadia was fussing over the ribbons in the display basket, plucking each one out and murmuring to herself in a language only toddlers understood. Every few minutes, she glanced at the door. Expectantly. Hopefully. As if someone was just late.

As if he might still show.

Katherine tried not to look herself, but she noticed it too. The lack.

She told herself it didn’t matter. That it shouldn’t matter. That he’d done enough—helped with shelves, moved boxes, tolerated Junie’s terrible tea and worse jokes. That he owed her nothing.

But the quiet scraped at her.

He had become a fixture, without ever saying much. Polite, gentle in a way that surprised her—someone who watched without judging, helped without expecting. He didn’t flirt. He didn’t pry. He simply… showed up. Until he didn’t.

She sewed faster to distract herself, needle threading through vintage lace like a metronome. Junie was out today, off on a sourcing run, which made the shop feel emptier. Or maybe it was just her.

Nadia paused, one hand still in the basket. She turned to the door again.

“Bucky?” she chirped, like a question.

Katherine’s hands stilled.

“No, moya lyubov,” she said softly, voice barely above a whisper. “Not today.”

Nadia sighed in that dramatic way only toddlers could, then plopped herself down with a thud. Katherine smiled despite herself, rising to gather her in her arms. The little girl curled into her instinctively, warm and real and utterly hers.

And yet… something—someone—was missing.

She hated that it bothered her. Hated that a man she barely knew had left a hollow space in the quiet rhythm of her days. She’d learned too many times that relying on men—trusting them—led only to loss. Her father. The man who left when she was pregnant. Elijah. Klaus.

But this was different. This wasn’t love. It wasn’t even friendship.

Katherine pressed her cheek to Nadia’s soft curls and rocked her gently.

Maybe it was for the best. Maybe he had sensed something about her—about the way she clung too tightly to what she loved. Maybe he’d done the smart thing and walked away.

She couldn’t blame him.

Still, her eyes drifted to the door.

And waited.

The boutique had closed early. Nadia had fallen asleep on Katherine’s shoulder during the walk home, her small fingers knotted tightly in the collar of her mother’s coat. It was always a soft kind of joy to hold her like that—to feel her weight and warmth. A simple kind of love, unshaken by betrayal or want.

But later, after Nadia had been tucked into bed with her stuffed fox and the lights had dimmed to a golden hush, Katherine found herself at the window of their small flat above the shop. The city pulsed below—cars moving like veins of light, laughter drifting up from somewhere near the corner café.

Two people stood there—young, tangled in each other’s arms, swaying slightly to music only they could hear. Their faces were lit up with that sweet, careless affection that made her chest ache. The kind of look that once made her believe in forever.

She turned away.

It wasn’t that she was unhappy. She had carved something out of nothing, built a life where there had once only been running and ruin. She had a daughter who clung to her and loved her with the kind of devotion Katherine had never dared to expect. She had a roof, food, warmth, purpose.

But she was still a woman.

And once, long ago—long before vampires and bloodlines and fear—she had been a girl who fancied love. She had dreamed of candlelight, of waltzes, of a hand outstretched toward hers in the quiet hush of moonlight. She had imagined intimacy like a promise, not a risk.

That was before.

Before the men who looked at her and saw leverage. Before Elijah, who called it love but chose his brother. Before Klaus, who never saw her as anything but a tool. Before her first love, who fled the moment she needed him most. Before she learned that love could be a weapon—and that she was always the one bleeding from it.

She traced her finger along the windowsill, heart heavy but her face composed.

She couldn’t afford to be soft now. Not when everything depended on her. Not when one wrong man could leave Nadia crying in the dark, the way she had once cried for her own mother. She was all Nadia had. There could be no flirting, no late-night talks that turned into touches, no letting herself hope for anything more.

Still, she longed.

She longed to be held. To dress up and feel beautiful for someone. To be seen—not as a mother, not as someone’s fantasy—but as a woman again.

She would never admit it. Not aloud. Not even to Junie, who already saw too much.

A breeze stirred the curtain beside her, brushing her cheek like a ghost of something almost forgotten.

Katherine closed her eyes.

She missed dancing.

The fire crackled somewhere close—too close. The scent of burning flesh and pine twisted in the air, thick and choking. Shadows danced across the walls of her family’s estate, flickering like specters.

She was running again.

Her feet pounded over scorched earth, her lungs screamed, but the dread was louder—deep and ancient and unshakable.

Klaus was behind her. She didn’t have to see him to know. She could feel him—like a curse stitched to her bones, inevitable and cruel.

Ahead, the boutique flickered into being—her present, her sanctuary. But the fire followed her there too. Dresses half-burnt, mannequins with melting faces, threads turning to ash between her fingers.

And in the middle of it all, Nadia stood barefoot on the boutique floor, her little arms outstretched.

“Mama?”

Katherine moved to her, but her legs wouldn’t carry her fast enough. The lights dimmed. Shadows crawled.

And then Klaus was there.

Smiling.

The way he had smiled centuries ago, when he told her that no one escapes him. That everything she loved would be turned to dust.

“No!” she screamed, voice raw and breaking.

She lunged forward, but Klaus was faster—always faster. He lifted Nadia effortlessly, and with a twist—
Crack.
The sound was small.

So small.

Katherine’s scream tore through her, her knees hit the floor, her arms empty, her child limp and lost.

⸻

She woke with a violent gasp.

Sweat clung to her skin, her breath ragged, chest tight with pain that had no name in this century. Her hands trembled as she threw back the blanket and stumbled to Nadia’s bed, heart thudding so loud it drowned out everything else.

“Nadia,” she choked, falling to her knees beside the crib.

Her daughter stirred with a quiet sound, one little fist curled near her cheek. Alive. Warm. Breathing.

Katherine reached out, hands hovering before she dared to touch her. Then she did—soft, frantic strokes through Nadia’s hair, over her arms, her chest, anything to remind herself she was real.

“I’ve got you,” she whispered in Bulgarian, over and over. “Mama’s here. I’ve got you.”

Her tears dripped soundlessly onto the sheets as she gathered her daughter into her arms, cradling her like she had the first day they were reunited after the blip. Nadia stirred but didn’t wake, her tiny body settling instinctively against her mother’s warmth.

Katherine rocked her slowly, the pain still sharp in her chest, the phantom of Klaus’s voice still echoing somewhere deep in her mind.

She pressed her cheek to Nadia’s head, whispering promises into the dark.

“You’re safe. I won’t let him near you. I won’t let anyone take you again.”

She stayed like that for a long time, swaying gently, holding her daughter as if love alone could ward off nightmares. The past was always waiting. But for now—for tonight—she had her baby in her arms.

And she wasn’t letting go.

The city always felt too loud when she was this tired.

Katherine squinted against the glare of the morning sun, gripping the handle of Nadia’s stroller a little too tightly. Her body moved, but her mind still echoed with the remnants of the nightmare: Klaus’s cold eyes, the sound of bones snapping, Nadia’s small, lifeless form.

She had barely slept. She couldn’t afford to crumble.

Nadia had been fussy all morning, clinging to her, crying without reason. As if she had sensed it too—the crack in Katherine’s composure, the memory haunting the edge of her every breath.

They were halfway down the block when Katherine blinked a second too long. Adjusted the strap of the bag digging into her shoulder. Just a moment.

And then—

The stroller was empty.

Her breath caught, ice crawling up her spine. “Nadia?” Her voice cracked. “Nadia!”

She spun around, heart thundering, vision blurred with panic. Words spilled out in Bulgarian, frantic and low: “Миличка, отговори ми, моля те…”

She didn’t realize she’d stepped into the street until someone gripped her arm gently, steadying her.

Bucky.

Of course.

He looked like he hadn’t meant to come close. He had always hovered—present at a distance, polite in his withdrawal.

“She wandered?” he asked, his voice already taut.

Katherine could only nod, her mouth dry.

Bucky’s expression shifted. Something flickered beneath the surface—regret, maybe. Or the resigned pull of old habits. He didn’t say anything more before taking off in long strides, scanning the sidewalks.

She should have stopped him. Should’ve told him she didn’t need help.

But she stood there, trembling, frozen in fear.

Minutes stretched like hours. She pressed a hand to her mouth, her other arm hugging her ribs. Her heart roared in her ears.

Then—there he was.

Carrying Nadia.

Katherine nearly fell to her knees in relief.

“She followed a dog,” he said, voice calm but clipped. He passed the girl over carefully, his touch reverent.

Katherine clutched Nadia close, tears pricking the corners of her eyes. “I don’t know what—if you hadn’t—”

“You’d have found her,” Bucky said, eyes skimming her face.

There was a pause. Nadia was murmuring softly, her tiny fingers curled into Katherine’s coat.

“She keeps doing this,” Katherine whispered, pressing her face into her daughter’s hair. “It’s not her fault. I was tired. I didn’t—”

“She’s a toddler,” he said gently. “It happens.”

Another beat.

He looked like he wanted to step away. His feet shifted like he might turn and leave again, the way he had been for weeks.

But he didn’t.

Instead, he reached into his coat pocket and pulled out something small and paper—an origami bird. He held it out like it meant nothing, though his fingers lingered as she took it.

“For her.”

Katherine looked at the delicate folds in surprise. “You made this?”

He gave a small shrug. “Helps with… things.”

Their hands had brushed. Brief. Still enough to feel the tension spark.

Nadia peeked at him through her mother’s arms, then reached out. “Bucky.”

And he smiled.

Just a flicker. A real one. The kind he didn’t wear often.

Katherine looked at him then—really looked. He hadn’t just come by out of chance. He never really did. And she had noticed. Even when she’d told herself she shouldn’t.

“You keep showing up,” she said, voice soft. A truth spoken before she could stop it.

He looked startled. Then guilty. “I shouldn’t.”

And yet, he didn’t walk away.
..

That night, the apartment was quiet.

The kind of quiet that didn’t bring peace, but instead made the shadows stretch longer, the memories louder.

Katherine sat at the edge of her bed, her legs bare, one hand resting lightly on Nadia’s back where she slept curled against her mother’s pillow. The little girl had insisted on sharing the bed after the scare that morning—climbing into Katherine’s lap with her blanket in one hand and the origami bird in the other. She’d fallen asleep to the rhythm of Katherine’s voice reading fairy tales in Bulgarian, her tiny fist clinging to her shirt.

But Katherine couldn’t sleep.

Her eyes were dry and aching from crying earlier, though she couldn’t remember when the tears had started. The nightmare still clung to her skin like a cold mist. The smell of burning wood. The crunch of snow under boots. The weight of her family’s blood on her hands, again. And Klaus’s voice—always Klaus, like a knife in her thoughts—echoing in her head.

“You can run, Katerina. But I will take everything from you.”

And he had.

Until now. Until Nadia.

Katherine looked down at her daughter, so peaceful, her breath soft and even, her cheeks flushed with sleep. A fierce, aching love rose in her chest. But beneath it, terror.

What if she wasn’t enough? What if history found a way to repeat itself?

Her hands trembled as she smoothed back a lock of hair from Nadia’s forehead. “I won’t let anything happen to you,” she whispered. “I swear it.”

But promises were just words, and Katherine had learned that words couldn’t stop monsters. Not Klaus. Not time. Not the world.

And sometimes not even herself.

She curled around her daughter, pulling the blanket up higher, burying her face in Nadia’s hair. She inhaled the familiar scent of baby shampoo and warm skin. It grounded her. Barely.

Her mind drifted, against her will, to Bucky. The way he’d looked at her today. The way he hadn’t left.

She hated needing anyone. Hated that her heart had reacted when he’d returned with Nadia in his arms.

But she couldn’t afford to trust a man—not with her heart, and definitely not with her daughter.

Still, as she closed her eyes, the last image in her mind wasn’t the nightmare or Klaus’s face. It was Bucky’s quiet, careful expression. The origami bird.

And the way Nadia had smiled, saying his name like it was a song.

Katherine didn’t sleep well. But when she did, her dreams were quiet.

Chapter Text

Chapter 10

The bell above the boutique door jingled softly, and Katherine looked up from the dress she was adjusting on the mannequin. She didn’t say anything—just paused, eyes flickering toward the entrance as Bucky stepped inside.

He looked like he always did—quiet, composed, jacket a little too heavy for the weather, hands in his pockets. His eyes found hers briefly, a wordless exchange passing between them. No mention of the days he hadn’t come by. No reference to the way he’d found Nadia on the street. No apology. No questions.

And Katherine didn’t ask. She didn’t know how to—didn’t trust herself to.

Instead, she nodded toward the small play area where Nadia was starting to fuss with her building blocks, her little mouth puckered in frustration.

Bucky took the hint. He crouched down beside her without a word, easing himself onto the floor like it was the most natural thing in the world. Nadia lit up at the sight of him, toddled straight into his lap, and immediately began babbling something about towers and monsters. Katherine turned back to her work, hiding the way her shoulders eased.

“Hey, kiddo,” Bucky said, his voice low. “Building a fortress?”

Nadia nodded with utmost seriousness. “Monster coming. Need Captain ‘Merica.”

“Oh yeah?” he replied, helping her stack two more blocks. “You like Captain America?”

“He’s brave!” Nadia announced, raising her arms like a little warrior.

Bucky let out a soft chuckle. “Yeah. He is.”

He didn’t mention that he’d fought beside him, or that he’d once been his enemy. He just let her keep building, let her imagination run wild. At one point, he picked up a cloth doll with a red scarf and made it the monster. Nadia squealed and threw a block at him. The doll fell over dramatically, and she declared victory with a clap.

From the other end of the room, Katherine watched them—carefully. She threaded her needle slower than necessary, just to buy herself time to look without drawing attention. The two of them together…it did something strange to her chest. Something dangerous.

She couldn’t afford softness. But God help her, she was already halfway there.

Bucky didn’t ask anything of her. He just stayed. He made Nadia laugh. He kept the shadows away for a little while longer.

And for that, Katherine didn’t send him away.

Not tonight.

The boutique was quiet after dark. The last of the soft evening light filtered through the gauzy curtains, painting long shadows on the floor. The air held that familiar stillness—like the city had paused to breathe.

Katherine moved slowly, folding a linen blouse and placing it into a drawer behind the counter. Her movements were graceful but heavy with fatigue, the toll of a long day pulling at her limbs. Nadia had finally fallen asleep in the back room, curled up in her little nest of pillows and her well-loved blanket, still clutching her “Captain ‘Merica” sticker sheet.

Bucky was by the front, hands in his pockets as he watched the streetlights flicker on through the glass. Neither had spoken much since Nadia drifted off.

“You don’t have to stay,” Katherine said after a moment, softly, without looking at him. “It’s late.”

“I know,” he said. He didn’t move.

She glanced at him from the corner of her eye. “You’re not good at taking hints, are you?”

Bucky offered the faintest shrug. “Maybe I just don’t want to leave her alone tonight.”

Katherine froze, the drawer half-closed. Then she exhaled and leaned her hands against the counter. “She’s not the one who’s alone.”

That silenced them both for a beat.

The truth of it lingered between them like something fragile.

Bucky finally crossed the room and sat in the armchair near the sewing station, elbows on his knees. “I saw the way you looked at her after she fell asleep. Like you weren’t sure she was real.”

“I’m not always sure she is,” Katherine admitted, voice low and dry. “Some nights I… I hear her breathing and I still think someone will come take her from me. Like it’s a dream I was never meant to have.”

Bucky looked down at his hands. “I get it.”

She tilted her head. “Do you?”

He nodded. “Sometimes I still wake up waiting for orders that never come. Expecting to see blood on my hands before I even get out of bed.” He looked at her then. “But she’s good. Nadia. She’s… light.”

Katherine gave a small smile at that, faint but real. “She is.”

“And you’re doing good, too,” Bucky added after a pause, his voice quiet. “Better than you think.”

She didn’t respond right away. Her arms crossed over her chest, protective. “You don’t know everything I’ve done.”

He met her eyes. “Neither do you.”

That stopped her cold.

He wasn’t trying to unearth her secrets. He wasn’t offering absolution either. It was just something real, and unexpectedly kind.

Katherine sat down opposite him, brushing a strand of hair behind her ear. The boutique hummed with silence again, but it was a different kind of silence now.

“Do you think people like us can really build something new?” she asked.

Bucky glanced toward the back, where Nadia lay sleeping.

“I think sometimes we don’t get to build it ourselves. Sometimes… it just shows up in pigtails and demands apple juice.”

That made her laugh. A quiet, genuine sound she hadn’t let out in days. Maybe longer.

She looked at him differently then—not like a man who might leave, or disappoint her. But like someone who understood the ache she carried, without needing it explained.

“Thank you,” she said softly.

Bucky gave her a half-smile. “I didn’t do much.”

Katherine shook her head. “That’s not true.”

And for a while, neither of them moved. The city shifted around them, loud and fast and full of things they didn’t yet understand. But here in the quiet, with the scent of old books and threadbare velvet, they sat still—two people out of time, slowly daring to feel like they belonged.

The night air was brisk, smelling faintly of rain that hadn’t yet fallen. The street was dim but alive with distant noise—traffic sighing over asphalt, a siren cutting through the dark, the hum of city life that never quite quieted. And yet, for them, it felt oddly hushed.

Katherine walked slowly, her arms wrapped protectively around a drowsy Nadia, whose head rested against her shoulder, curls damp with sleep. Bucky walked beside her, easily balancing the heavier tote and supply bags she usually carried on her own. He didn’t seem to mind.

They were a strange trio under the city’s gaze. A single mother cloaked in European elegance, her sleepy little girl in soft lavender pajamas, and a quiet man with shadows behind his eyes and a metal arm hidden beneath a jacket sleeve.

Katherine tilted her head toward him, her voice low and intimate despite the world crashing around them. “Do you… watch any films?”

Bucky glanced at her sideways. “Some. Not many.”

“Mm.” She adjusted Nadia gently. “I watched Titanic the other night. Junie thought it was criminal I hadn’t seen it.”

That made him smile, just a little. “And? Did it live up to the hype?”

“I mean, Jack should’ve survived,” she whispered. “There was room on that door.”

Bucky huffed a quiet laugh. “A tale as old as time.”

Katherine chuckled softly, then sighed. “It was… romantic. A bit ridiculous, but it reminded me of how much I used to dream about things like that.”

He looked at her, but she kept her gaze ahead.

“I guess I’m trying to catch up on things people my age are supposed to have seen.”

Bucky’s brow lifted slightly. “People your age?”

She smirked. “I’m out of time, remember?”

He smiled again, a little crooked. “Yeah. You and me both.”

Katherine slowed at a crosswalk, rocking Nadia slightly as a truck passed by. Her tone turned teasing. “So what do you do when you’re not haunting my boutique like a helpful ghost?”

He blinked at that, caught off guard, but his grin tugged at the corners of his mouth. “You think I’m haunting you?”

“Not haunting,” she said. “More like loitering.”

“I thought I was helping.”

“You are,” she admitted quickly. “It’s just… you don’t have to.”

Bucky looked down at the sidewalk for a beat. “Yeah. I know.”

There was something honest in that, something almost too close to a confession.

They walked in silence for another block, the weight of the bags and the sleeping child between them, a kind of tether. Katherine’s eyes found his again beneath the glow of a passing streetlight.

“Do you think about going back?” she asked.

He looked confused.

“To a different kind of life,” she clarified. “Something softer. Normal, maybe.”

Bucky gave a breath of a laugh. “Normal’s a stretch.”

“But softer?” she pressed.

He thought for a moment, then nodded. “Yeah. Sometimes. More lately.”

They reached the front of her building. Katherine shifted Nadia carefully as she dug out her keys. Bucky took the moment to set the bags down at her doorstep.

As she unlocked the door, she turned over her shoulder.

“Thank you,” she said again. “For tonight. For… showing up.”

He looked at her like he wanted to say something more, something significant. But then Nadia stirred slightly in her sleep, mumbling nonsense against her mother’s shoulder, and whatever he was about to say vanished with the moment.

“Goodnight, Katherine,” he said instead.

“Goodnight, James.”

And for a second, it was almost like the end of a movie she’d once dreamed of—only quieter, steadier, more real.

Katherine tried not to notice.

She tried not to notice how Bucky always managed to show up when Junie wasn’t around—on the days when Nadia was particularly restless or when the orders were piled high and she hadn’t slept a full night in a week. She tried not to notice how Junie always asked afterward, lips twitching with something just short of mischief, “So… did he come by?” like she already knew the answer.

She did know, Katherine was sure of it now.

But she said nothing, only brushed off the question with vague indifference. Junie would grin and change the subject, but there was always that glint in her eyes like she was watching something unfold and secretly rooting for it.

And Bucky—well, he made it increasingly difficult to ignore.

He’d come in like it was no big deal, sometimes with a sandwich or something warm in hand, claiming he was just passing by. But then he’d quietly take Nadia into his arms, her tiny legs wrapping instinctively around him like she’d been waiting all day. He never made a fuss. Never pushed or imposed. He’d simply be there, like a second shadow to Katherine’s somber life, grounding her in ways she wasn’t ready to admit she needed.

She didn’t know what to do with it.

Because she was watching him now. She caught the way his mouth tilted when Nadia babbled at him, the softness in his eyes when he brushed her hair out of her face. And the boyish charm—subtle, unexpected—when he laughed at something silly Nadia said or when he offered Katherine an awkward compliment.

It disarmed her. Not just because of how it made her feel, but because of how safe it looked.

And safety was not something she ever associated with men.

Her past was written in the language of betrayal—by fathers, by lovers, by monsters who wore charm like a weapon. She’d vowed to be smarter, stronger. To raise Nadia in a world where she didn’t need anyone else to survive. And yet… she found herself glancing at the door when it creaked open, wondering if it would be him. Her chest felt lighter when it was.

That scared her most of all.

Because even if she didn’t want to fall… she already might be.

Chapter Text

Chapter 11

Katherine had once been fire and velvet, a siren in silk gloves and sharp glances. Flirtation had been her armor—her dagger—sharp enough to draw blood or lure danger close enough to survive it. Before Nadia, and even for a little while after, it had been her currency. She’d crossed oceans and borders on the backs of false promises, whispered lies into the ears of smugglers, vampires, guards. She’d charmed them with the illusion of intimacy, vanished before dawn.

She never looked back.

And if Klaus found those men later—and he would have—she doubted they died quickly. Or painlessly. Or alone.

For a long time, she hadn’t let herself feel anything about that. Her family had been slaughtered while she was in hiding. What was the death of a few strangers to the graveyard she carried inside her?

But here, now—Katherine watched Bucky from behind the boutique counter, the late afternoon sun casting honey over his broad shoulders as he crouched beside Nadia, showing her how to tie the ribbons on a child-sized shoe. The little girl giggled, trying and failing to mimic him.

He looked… calm. Gentle. Not like a man she could use or escape from. Not like a man who would fall for half-lies and breathy promises. Not like one who would die for her mistakes.

That’s what made her curious.

What would happen if she poked the bear? Just a little. If she let herself slip into something old and familiar—her. Not the mother or the merchant or the woman carrying too many ghosts. Just Katarina.

So when he straightened up and brushed his palms on his jeans, glancing at her, she tilted her head. Met his eyes.

“You know,” she said, her voice smooth with that silken edge of mischief she used to wear like perfume, “you’re good with your hands.”

Bucky blinked. Stilled. Then gave a low, startled laugh. “That so?”

“Mm.” She leaned on the counter, propping her chin on her hand, eyes glinting. “With the shoes, obviously.”

He raised an eyebrow. “Right. The shoes.”

She smiled, slow and deliberate. It wasn’t sharp, not quite. But it had teeth. Just "a little.

He didn’t flinch. Didn’t smile back, either. Just looked at her—really looked at her—for a breath too long.

And something in her chest curled hot.

She told herself it was just curiosity. Just a test.

Because if he was the kind of man she thought he might be, he wouldn’t be so easily rattled.

She didn’t expect how steady that made her feel.

It came back to him later—hours after the shop had closed, after Nadia was tucked in with her doll and her blanket, after Katherine had disappeared into the back to take a call or maybe just catch her breath.

The boutique had gone quiet. The city outside still rumbled, but inside it was stillness and fabric and soft lamplight. Bucky stood near one of the mannequins, absently adjusting the hem of a vintage skirt, his metal fingers slow and careful on the delicate fabric.

He could still hear it. “You’re good with your hands.”

It hadn’t sounded cruel. Hadn’t sounded like it was meant to draw blood.

But it had lit something in him—something sharp and warm and dangerous. And for a man like him, danger always came with weight.

He wasn’t used to that kind of attention anymore. Not from women like her.

Katherine was all old-world charm and watchful calculation, someone who looked like she could read a man down to his regrets and then walk away before they surfaced. She was composed and capable and maternal—and yet, when she said that to him, when her lips curled around the flirtation like it was second nature, it had pulled something from him that he hadn’t expected to still be there.

And he hadn’t known what to do with it.

Now, with the quiet wrapping around them like a threadbare quilt, he heard her footsteps behind him. Soft. He turned slightly—enough to catch her in the corner of his eye.

Katherine stopped beside him, brushing her knuckles across the fabric of the same skirt he’d been fixing.

“She’s out cold,” she murmured. “Didn’t even flinch when I moved her.”

Bucky nodded. “Long day.”

They stood in that easy hush for a moment, both of them looking at the skirt like it mattered more than it did.

Then he said, quietly, “You were teasing me earlier.”

Her eyes flicked to him—quick, assessing. “Was I?”

“You know you were.”

Katherine’s smile was slow again, but softer this time. No teeth. “Old habits.”

He met her gaze fully now, something unreadable stirring in the blue of his eyes. “You don’t have to test me.”

“I wasn’t testing you,” she said, almost too quickly.

He tilted his head. Waited.

She sighed, brushing a lock of hair behind her ear. “Alright. Maybe I was. A little.”

He didn’t respond right away. Just let the moment hang there between them, heavy with unspoken things. Finally, he said, “I’m not like them.”

She looked away. “I never said you were.”

“No. But you’re used to men being either cruel or stupid.”

Her jaw tightened, but she didn’t deny it.

“I’m not either,” he said, softer now. “But I’ve been something worse.”

Katherine’s gaze slid back to him. “You think I scare easy, soldier?”

Bucky gave a low, almost imperceptible smile. “No. I think you carry too much.”

There was a pause. Not awkward. Just honest.

Then she said, barely above a whisper, “So do you.”

The walk home felt different this time.

Not colder, not even quieter—just fuller, like the air around them was carrying more than it had the night before. The tension between them was new, not born of conflict, but of recognition. A pulling back of veils.

Katherine held Nadia close to her chest. The little girl was half-asleep, her thumb tucked near her mouth, her cheek resting against her mother’s collarbone. The weight of her daughter had never bothered Katherine—she was used to carrying lives heavier than this—but tonight, she noticed the warmth of her small body, the steady rise and fall of her breaths.

Bucky walked a step behind her for most of the way. She didn’t ask why. She just felt it—the hesitance, the recalibration. They were both thinking too much, too fast. She could hear it in his silence.

“You’re quiet tonight,” she said without looking over her shoulder.

“So are you,” Bucky replied.

That was fair.

They turned a corner, the city thinning a little as the hour grew later. Katherine’s arms adjusted Nadia with practiced ease, her eyes flicking up toward a flickering streetlight before returning forward. Her voice came softer now. “You didn’t have to walk me back.”

“I know.”

She glanced at him, and this time he was watching her. Not with the same softness as before. Something sharper now. Something closer to curious.

“You think I carry too much,” she said after a beat, echoing his words from earlier.

Bucky’s jaw worked for a second. “You do.”

Katherine let out a soft breath, almost a laugh, but it wasn’t amused. “And you—what do you carry, James?”

He looked at her then, really looked. The question was simple. But what she asked of him was not.

“I’m still figuring that out.”

She nodded, as if she understood.

“I thought I had you figured out,” Bucky added, and the honesty of it startled even him. “But I don’t.”

Katherine turned her head slightly, the streetlamp catching the curve of her cheekbone. “That’s probably wise.”

He smiled—small, real. “You surprise me.”

“Do I?” she murmured, keeping her gaze ahead this time. “Most people stop being surprised by me once they know enough.”

“Maybe I don’t know anything at all.”

She didn’t answer that.

The rest of the walk passed in that strange stillness, each step carrying their thoughts a little closer, even if their feet didn’t. When they reached her door, she shifted Nadia to unlock it, and Bucky waited, watching the delicate way her fingers worked the key. She paused before turning the handle.

“Thank you,” she said. Quiet. Not just for the walk.

He gave a single nod.

“Goodnight, James.”

“Goodnight, Katherine.”

And then he stood outside as she stepped into the apartment, the door clicking gently behind her.

He didn’t move for a long time.

Katherine closed the door behind her and leaned against it for a moment, the soft click of the lock sliding into place sounding louder in the stillness of her apartment than it should have.

Nadia stirred in her arms, whining faintly at the shift in posture, her little hand curling tighter into the collar of Katherine’s coat.

“Shh,” Katherine whispered, brushing her lips to her daughter’s forehead. “We’re home, my darling. Just sleep.”

She moved through the dimly lit space like a phantom, her boots quiet on the worn floorboards. The apartment smelled like chamomile and lavender—Junie’s doing, most likely. The faintest light seeped in through the curtains, casting long, soft shadows along the walls.

Katherine laid Nadia down gently in her small bed, careful not to wake her. She tugged off the girl’s shoes, loosened the coat, tucked the blanket up to her chin. There was something so peaceful about watching her sleep, like the world outside couldn’t touch her in this moment. And for that moment, Katherine could almost believe it was true.

But the ache still sat deep in her ribs. That nightmare hadn’t left her. Not really. It clung to her like smoke. She looked at her daughter’s tiny frame and for a breathless second, saw the lifeless version Klaus had offered her in her dream.

Her fingers twitched. She reached out and touched Nadia’s hair, soft and mussed from sleep. She needed the contact. Needed to remind herself that she was here.

Alive.

Katherine lingered there for a while—longer than usual—kneeling beside the bed, resting her head on the edge of the mattress. Her heart beat slow, heavy. Her mind, though, refused to settle. Thoughts of Bucky crept in uninvited.

The way he’d looked at her when she teased him. The tension in his voice when he said she surprised him. The steady hands that had lifted her bags, soothed her panicked nerves, carried her daughter without question.

She didn’t want to feel this. Not again. Not with someone like him. He wasn’t like Klaus or Elijah, no. He was… good. Or at least trying to be. And good men had never worked out for her either—not when they realized what she’d done to survive. Who she’d been before the softness of motherhood clawed its way into her.

She got up quietly, walking into the small kitchen and switching on the kettle without thinking. Steam began to rise almost immediately. Routine. Something she could control.

She leaned against the counter and exhaled, rubbing the bridge of her nose.

Bucky Barnes was dangerous. Not like the men who’d pursued her for power or blood or survival. But because he wasn’t pursuing her. Because he showed up without asking for anything. Because he carried weight in his silences. Because he looked at Nadia like she was more than a burden.

And Katherine? Katherine didn’t know if she could survive a man like that.

She stared at the kettle, not really seeing it, her thoughts adrift.

Then, under her breath, almost scornful of herself, she whispered in Bulgarian: “What are you doing, Katarina? He’ll break you, and you’ll thank him for it.”

The kettle whistled. She didn’t move to stop it right away.

………

Bucky sat on the edge of his bed, the city’s low hum leaking through the cracked window. He hadn’t turned the light on. The room sat in the dusky half-shadow of a lamp across the street, blinking like a warning.

He hadn’t meant to walk her home again. Not really. He told himself it was just to be helpful. That Junie wasn’t around. That it made sense.

But he knew that was a lie.

His fingers drummed against his knee, restless. His jacket was still on. Her voice still lingered in his ears, soft and teasing in that way that felt… practiced. But not empty.

She was a flirt. He wasn’t stupid. He could tell she used it like a tool once—sharp and careful. The way she tilted her head. The flicker of her gaze. But then it shifted, just slightly. It had started as a poke. Then it turned into something else. Something neither of them wanted to name.

And now he was here, stewing.

His therapist would have a field day with this. Raynor would dig in like she always did. Ask questions he didn’t want to answer. But he could already hear her voice:

You keep going back, James. Why?

He sighed and tugged the tie from his neck, tossing it on the chair. Nadia’s laugh still echoed in his mind, high and light, the way she’d pointed at a picture of Captain America like she already knew. That kid had eyes like a hawk. She saw things. Him, maybe.

He ran a hand through his hair, then leaned forward, elbows on knees.

They’re better off without you.

That old, loyal voice again. Always there to remind him who he’d been.

But then there was Katherine, standing in the boutique with a thread and needle, her daughter climbing into his lap without hesitation. Katherine looking at him tonight like she didn’t quite know if she wanted to pull him in or push him out.

She was haunted, same as him. And it scared the hell out of him.

He sat there for a long time before finally standing up, shrugging off his coat and folding it. Quietly. Thoughtfully. Like he had something to protect just by keeping his movements careful.

And as he switched off the lamp and crawled into bed, Bucky admitted to himself—not aloud, never aloud—that he wasn’t sure if he wanted to stay away from them anymore.

Chapter Text

Chapter 12

It was a sunny afternoon, one of those rare days where New York didn’t feel like a city constantly pressing in on itself. Katherine had planned on just walking with Nadia, stretching their legs and maybe grabbing a snack in the park, when her daughter stopped abruptly in front of the museum.

The large banners rippled above the entrance, bold lettering announcing the “Legacy of the Shield” exhibit. And there, towering above the crowd in holo-glow and clean graphics, was Captain America in full heroic pose. Nadia, wide-eyed and flushed with excitement, tugged at Katherine’s hand.

“Mummy! Look!” she pointed eagerly. “Is that him? Cap merica?”

Katherine glanced at the display and then back at her daughter’s face. Her heart tugged a little—Nadia had been obsessed with superheroes lately, especially Captain America. No doubt thanks to the stories Bucky told her when he dropped by.

“You want to go inside?” Katherine asked gently, brushing a windblown curl out of her daughter’s eyes.

Nadia nodded rapidly, her little feet already inching toward the steps.

Katherine hesitated. Museums were… unfamiliar terrain. Crowded, expensive. But then again, there was nothing more precious than seeing her daughter’s eyes light up like this. She took Nadia’s hand and led her in.

The inside of the exhibit was breathtaking—sleek technology, holograms that shimmered mid-air, re-creations of battlefields that moved and responded as you walked past. Katherine had never seen anything like it. Even the air smelled different in there—sterile and sharp with glass and electricity.

Nadia was enthralled, racing from one display to the next, her tiny voice asking questions Katherine only half-understood. But then—then she saw it.

A black-and-white photo. Smaller than the larger-than-life Captain America centerpiece, off to the side near a row of dog tags encased in glass.

James Buchanan Barnes.

Young, in uniform, smirking at the camera with a boyish ease she hadn’t yet seen in the man who helped carry boxes and played peek-a-boo with her daughter.

She leaned closer. Read the small placard.

Sergeant James Barnes, known as “Bucky,” was Captain America’s closest friend and brother-in-arms. MIA, presumed dead in 1945…

Katherine’s breath hitched. Her fingers brushed the edges of the glass.

A second hologram flickered nearby, displaying a video montage—grainy footage of a much younger Bucky laughing beside Steve Rogers, firing from the side of a train, and eventually… falling.

The room seemed to grow quieter.

So this was him, she thought. The past he never spoke of.

She turned slightly, just in time to see Nadia standing in front of the projection of Captain America again, arms raised like she was trying to fly. She was too young to understand the weight of war or loss. But she recognized a hero.

Katherine looked back at Bucky’s photograph. His smile. His eyes—same eyes that sometimes looked at her with something he tried to hide.

Maybe that was why he looked at Nadia the way he did. Not just affection. But grief. Ghosts.

“Come on, little one,” Katherine said softly, reaching for her daughter’s hand. “Let’s learn what made heroes before they wore capes.”

As they moved deeper into the exhibit, surrounded by memories of a war from a century ago, Katherine couldn’t shake the feeling that she had just seen Bucky for the first time—not the man, but the boy he once was. The one who had fought, fallen, and somehow still walked the earth.

————

Katherine stood behind the counter, watching Nadia as she bounced around the boutique, playing with the toys scattered on the floor. Her mind wasn’t entirely focused on the little girl, though; it kept drifting back to Bucky. She’d tried to ignore it before, the pull she felt when he was around, but today, the thought of him was louder than ever. He had been helping out more lately, lingering around when he didn’t have to, but Katherine still wasn’t sure if that was a good thing.

She glanced at him, leaning against the counter with that unreadable expression of his. He was always so careful, so cautious around her. And she couldn’t blame him. After everything he’d been through, it made sense. But there was something about his distance that made Katherine ache in a way she wasn’t prepared for.

Nadia’s voice pulled her from her thoughts. “Mummy, look!” She was holding up her little lion plush, her eyes wide with excitement. “The lions!”

Katherine smiled at her daughter, but the smile didn’t quite reach her eyes. A trip to the zoo. It was such a simple thing, but in that moment, it felt like a lifeline. Nadia had never been to the zoo, and Katherine was starting to realize just how much she wanted to see her daughter experience the world outside of their small space.

But she hesitated. It was just a zoo trip. A family outing, right? Except it didn’t feel like just that when she thought about Bucky joining them. What did that mean? What was she asking of him, really? Did she even want him to come along? She didn’t know.

Nadia was tugging on her sleeve now, practically vibrating with excitement. “Mummy, can we go? Please?”

Katherine’s breath caught in her throat. She had never been one to ask anyone for anything, let alone suggest something like this. She could feel the tension building, the uncertainty in her chest tightening. But looking at Nadia—looking at the hopeful expression on her little face—Katherine couldn’t say no.

“James,” Katherine said, her voice tentative. She barely caught herself before her words fell too heavy. She felt his gaze immediately, his attention sharp and wary, like he could sense the shift in her. “I was thinking… maybe we could take Nadia to the zoo? I mean, she’s been talking about it all week and—” She paused, unsure of what she was even saying, her words trailing off. The request was awkward, too casual, but she couldn’t seem to stop herself from adding, “I know it’s last minute, but… would you want to come?”

She could see his internal struggle, the way he hesitated. There was something about his reluctance that made her second-guess herself. Maybe she shouldn’t have asked. Maybe she’d misread the situation.

“I don’t know,” Bucky muttered, looking down at Nadia for a moment, his brow furrowing. “I mean… I don’t know if it’s a good idea. I—”

Before he could finish, Nadia had latched onto his arm, her small fingers tugging at his sleeve. “Please, Bucky! Please come with us! You can tell me superhero stories. Like Cap merica!” She looked up at him with wide, expectant eyes, and Katherine noticed the way Bucky’s shoulders seemed to soften at the sight of her.

Katherine’s chest tightened, but she held back, not wanting to pressure him too much. She watched Bucky carefully, his gaze flicking to her before he sighed, obviously conflicted.

“I—I don’t know what you expect me to do,” Bucky said, his voice quieter now, almost hesitant. He looked down at Nadia, who was still holding onto his arm. “But I guess… I guess it wouldn’t hurt.” His words were reluctant, but there was something in his tone that made Katherine think he hadn’t completely shut himself off.

He was trying, and that was enough.

“Really?” Nadia asked, her eyes lighting up.

Bucky gave her a small, almost reluctant nod. “Yeah, alright. I’ll go.” He looked up at Katherine then, his expression unreadable, but there was a hint of something—something soft, something almost like a promise. “It’s for Nadia, right?” he added, though his voice had softened, the tension easing slightly.

Katherine felt a strange mix of relief and nervousness wash over her. It wasn’t much, but it was something. Nadia cheered, jumping up and down as she clung to Bucky’s arm, and Katherine felt a quiet smile tug at her lips. She hadn’t expected him to agree, not like that, and for a moment, she was left speechless, unsure of where this was leading.

As they started to prepare to leave, Katherine glanced at Bucky again. His reluctance was still there, but so was the vulnerability in his eyes—the same vulnerability she saw in herself sometimes. Maybe it was better not to think too much about it, to just let the day unfold as it came.

She reached out, brushing her fingers against Nadia’s hair as the little girl bounced ahead of them. “Thank you,” Katherine murmured to Bucky, her voice softer now.

Bucky gave her a small nod, but there was something in his eyes—something that made Katherine wonder just how much more there was to this quiet, careful man standing beside her. And maybe, just maybe, they were both taking a chance in a world that had taught them not to trust easily.

But for now, it was just a trip to the zoo. And for the first time in a long while, that felt like enough.

Chapter Text

Chapter 13

[Author note- thank you all those wonderful reviews, it gives me the inspiration and drive to continue onwards, I hope you this newest chapter]

The morning sun filtered through the trees that flanked the zoo’s entrance, the street buzzing with weekend energy—families arriving in bursts of laughter, strollers squeaking, kids clutching maps and snacks, already tugging their parents toward the animal enclosures.

Katherine stood just outside the gates, Nadia bouncing with excitement beside her, holding tightly to her mother’s hand while peering through the bars to catch a glimpse of whatever adventure waited inside. Katherine was dressed simply but carefully—an airy cotton blouse tucked into a modest skirt, her hair pinned back from her face. She’d even worn a hint of lipstick, something she rarely did these days. Just in case.

Nadia tugged on her arm suddenly. “Mummy, he’s here!”

Katherine turned in the direction of her daughter’s excited squeal, expecting the usual—tired eyes, the familiar stubble, the long, overgrown hair brushing past his ears. Instead, her eyes landed on a tall man in a crisp black t-shirt and a lighter jacket, haircut neatly trimmed and face clean-shaven.

She blinked, not recognizing him for a second.

And then he smiled—just slightly—and the familiar weight in her chest shifted.

“James?” she asked cautiously, her brows lifting, a note of surprise softening her voice.

“Yeah,” he said, rubbing the back of his neck like he wasn’t quite sure of the reaction he was supposed to get. “Figured I was overdue for a change.”

Katherine looked at him a second longer, then let her lips part in a slow, surprised smile. “You look… different.”

“Good different?” he asked, eyes flicking from her to Nadia and back again.

Her gaze lingered on him—on how the sun caught the line of his jaw now unobstructed, how he stood a little straighter, maybe uncertain, maybe just a bit self-conscious. She tilted her head.

“You look like someone who knows what day it is,” she said dryly, but the smile was still there in her voice. “Nadia’s going to think you’re trying to impress someone.”

“I’m not,” he said quickly, then—too quickly-added “Not exactly.”

Nadia, oblivious to the adult tension, was already pulling at both their hands. “Come onnn, the animals are waiting!”

Bucky fell in beside Katherine as they walked through the gate, and for a brief moment, Katherine felt something shift—not a dramatic change, but something subtle. As if the line between whatever they were and whatever they could be had blurred a little more.

She glanced at him sideways, watching as he took in the sounds and sights around them, as Nadia chattered and pointed at every giraffe poster and plush toy in sight.

He caught her looking. “What?”

“Nothing,” she said lightly, but it wasn’t really nothing.
————-

Bucky watched the crowd with a subtle kind of detachment, the kind he’d learned to master over the years—present, but not in it. The zoo was noisy, alive with the shrieks and laughter of children and the low hum of parents corralling them. Families clustered in little groups, all casual affection and easy familiarity.

And then there was Nadia, tugging at his sleeve.

“Bucky,” she said, eyes wide, “can you carry me like that?” She pointed at a man with his son perched high on his shoulders, the boy’s arms out like airplane wings, laughing as his father ducked under a tree branch.

Bucky stilled.

For a second, it was like he couldn’t move—his breath caught somewhere between surprise and something deeper, something older. Bucky’s own hands flexed at his sides, the phantom weight of a rifle long since put down echoing in his fingers.

“I—uh…”

He looked to Katherine.

She wasn’t smiling. She wasn’t urging him on. She just watched him, her expression unreadable but open—guarded, maybe, but not resisting. Like she wasn’t going to make the choice for him.

Bucky’s heart thudded harder than he liked. This wasn’t combat, wasn’t a mission, but somehow this moment—this tiny request—felt like something far more dangerous.

He looked back at Nadia. She was already lifting her arms, trusting him without hesitation, eyes bright and expectant.

He was always weak when it came to that look.

And so, with a quiet breath and something heavy but yielding in his chest, he bent down and lifted her carefully. She giggled as he settled her on his shoulders, small hands gripping his hair with gleeful abandon.

“Higher!” she squealed.

“You’re already taller than all the giraffes,” he said, voice rough with something he tried to pass off as amusement.

But inside, it hit different. Her laughter in his ears. Her small weight grounding him. The warmth of Katherine’s eyes, still watching him not with fear—but with something closer to trust.

Bucky didn’t know what he was to them. Or what he could be. But for the first time in a long time, he let himself imagine what it might be like to be just a man. Not a weapon. Not a ghost.

Just… Bucky. Carrying a little girl on his shoulders on a warm day at the zoo.

They sat under the filtered shade of a tree near the zoo café, the soft rustle of leaves and distant chatter of families blending with the clinking of lunch wrappers and juice box straws. Katherine had packed a modest but charming picnic: sandwiches, fruit, a few animal-shaped cookies Nadia had insisted on, and juice boxes.

Nadia was happily munching her tomato sandwich—more tomato than bread, judging by the mess—and now had a bright red smear along her chin and cheek.

“Nadia,” Katherine warned gently, reaching for a baby wipe. “Come here so I can clean your face.”

Nadia shook her head with stubborn glee. “Nooo! I’m not messy!”

“You are messy,” Katherine said with a sigh, sitting up straighter. “You have tomato everywhere, darling.”

Nadia giggled and ducked under the table before her mother could grab her, disappearing from sight.

Katherine blinked, then leaned forward just in time to see Nadia crawling between the legs of the bench and popping up between Bucky’s knees on the other side. She beamed up at him, her face sticky with tomato sauce and her curls wild from the summer air.

Katherine gave Bucky a look, arching a brow, and silently passed him a baby wipe.

He looked down at the little girl, then up at Katherine with a slow, almost reluctant smile. “You’re kidding.”

“I’m not,” she said, lips twitching. “You’ve been recruited.”

He sighed like a man defeated by forces far greater than himself, but bent forward anyway. “Alright, kiddo. Let’s see the tomato face.”

“Nooo!” Nadia laughed, backing her head into his chest.

“You’re cornered,” Bucky muttered, scooping her up gently. “No escape.”

She squirmed in his lap but didn’t really resist, letting him wipe the sauce from her face even though she squinted and turned her head like it stung. When he finished, she pouted, looking back at Katherine with a furrowed brow.

“Mama, he helped you,” she said, slightly betrayed.

Katherine chuckled, one hand resting on her cheek. “He’s on my team, sweetheart.”

Bucky looked over at her, holding the now-clean toddler in his lap. “Apparently.”

Their eyes caught—hers bright with laughter, his softened but something unguarded. For a moment, it was just the two of them, the space between filled with shared amusement and something else—quieter, growing.

Katherine let her gaze linger. Just a moment longer than she usually allowed.
—————————

The sunlight had softened by the time they made it back home, casting long amber streaks along the sidewalk. The walk had been quieter than the zoo itself—Nadia drowsy on Bucky’s shoulder, the picnic basket swinging gently from his hand, and Katherine trailing just beside, her sunhat shielding her from more than just the sun.

It had been a good day.

A dangerous day, Katherine thought, as she unlocked the door and stepped inside. Too sweet. Too easy. Too much like something that could hurt.

Nadia was already slipping into that strange half-sleep toddlers mastered—eyes fluttering, limbs slack but senses still faintly alert. Katherine bent down to take her, but Bucky hesitated, holding the child just a bit longer.

“She’s still light,” he murmured, almost surprised. “Not as light as she used to be.”

Katherine watched his face—how carefully he looked at Nadia, the quiet grief he always seemed to carry peeking through. She didn’t know what he was seeing. A memory? A shadow?

“She’s growing fast,” Katherine replied, brushing a strand of hair from Nadia’s forehead. “Too fast.”

They moved slowly—like people who didn’t want the day to end. Bucky helped settle Nadia onto the cot. Katherine draped a thin blanket over her and lingered a moment longer than necessary, pressing a soft kiss to her daughter’s hairline.

When she stepped out into the hallway again, Bucky was standing near the window, the last streaks of gold sliding across his jacket. He didn’t turn right away when she came up beside him.

“She likes you,” she said softly.

“I like her.”

A beat. A quiet one.

“And her mother?” Katherine added, teasing, but the words stuck a little in her throat. A mask she wore easily—but it didn’t quite hold when she looked at him.

Bucky glanced at her then, eyes tired but clear. “Her mother scares me.”

She raised an eyebrow. “Scares you?”

“Yeah.” He didn’t smile. “She’s got a way of seeing through people. Makes you wonder what she’s thinking. If she’s going to disappear before you get the chance to figure it out.”

Katherine’s smile faded. That hit too close.

She looked away. “I used to disappear. A lot. It was how I survived.”

“I get it,” he said quietly.

Silence fell again, gentle but heavy between them. The sun had dipped below the buildings now, shadows lengthening.

“I don’t know if this is smart,” she whispered.

“Probably isn’t,” Bucky replied.

She looked at him again, and for a moment she saw him as she’d feared to: not just the man who carried her daughter and teased her gently, but the soldier with ghosts in his chest. The man who might vanish on her one day too. The one who had every reason to believe he didn’t deserve this.

But right now, he hadn’t left.

So she stepped a little closer.

“Stay for dinner,” she said, unsure if it was brave or foolish.

He looked down at her, then nodded once.

“Okay.”

The dinner wasn’t planned—there was no elaborate spread, no candles or wine, just leftovers and quick improvisations from what Katherine had in the tiny kitchenette. She moved through the motions with quiet confidence, barefoot now, her dress brushing her calves as she reheated pasta and sliced bread. She didn’t ask if he was hungry. He didn’t ask what he could do. It just happened—like they’d done it before.

Bucky sat at the small table, elbows on the worn wood, watching her move. Not with hunger, but with a certain stillness, like he was letting the quiet settle into him.

Nadia stirred only once but didn’t wake.

Katherine plated the food and set it down across from him. “It’s not a feast,” she said. “But it’s edible.”

“It’s perfect,” he said, and meant it.

They ate slowly. The only sound was the occasional clink of a fork, the distant hum of the city outside.

“You cook a lot?” Bucky asked eventually, his voice low, careful not to disturb the peace.

“When I have to.” She took a sip of water. “I wasn’t always good at it. I used to get by on charm.”

He huffed. “That sounds… honest.”

Katherine tilted her head with a smirk. “You’re surprised?”

“No,” he said, a little too softly.

That pause again. The same kind of space that asked for nothing but held everything.

“I used to flirt to survive,” she added, eyes on her plate. “A smile here, a lie there. Just enough to get what I needed.. when I ran.”

Bucky looked at her, but didn’t push.

She glanced up. “It’s strange… this life. Slow. Predictable. Domestic.” A small smile tugged at the edge of her lips. “Sometimes I miss the danger.”

His voice was quiet. “And now?”

She leaned back in her chair, exhaling. “Now I just want peace. But I don’t know if people like us ever get that.”

“Maybe we don’t,” he said, and there was no self-pity in it—just knowing. “But we can try.”

Their eyes held.

A car horn blared outside, distant but sharp. It broke the moment just enough that Katherine stood to clear the plates. Bucky rose with her, gently taking one from her hand. Their fingers brushed.

She didn’t pull away.

They stood at the small sink, side by side, washing dishes. Something about it felt absurdly normal—and that scared her more than anything.

“I don’t know what this is,” she murmured.

“I don’t either.”

“But Nadia—”

“I’d never hurt her,” he said before she could finish.

Katherine met his eyes. She didn’t speak, but she believed him.

And maybe that was more terrifying than everything else.

————-
It was after dinner. Bucky had left with a quiet goodbye and a hand lingering a moment too long near Katherine’s. She didn’t reach for it. He didn’t press.

Katherine sat on the floor beside Nadia, brushing her hair gently as her daughter played with a stuffed rabbit, whispering nonsense to it like she always did. The toy’s head bobbed as Nadia made it “hop,” the rabbit landing in her lap with a dramatic flop.

“Bunny’s sleepy,” Nadia announced, eyes already drooping herself.

Katherine smiled. “Then it’s time for bed.”

Nadia didn’t argue tonight. Just crawled into bed and let Katherine tuck her in, thumb brushing at her cheek. She looked up at her mother, eyes glassy with the weight of sleep.

“Mommy?”

“Yes, sweetheart?”

Nadia turned on her side, her voice soft, almost sing-song.

“I saw the lady again. The one with funny eyes.”

Katherine’s breath caught. “In your dream?”

Nadia nodded, yawning. “She said… ‘soon.’ And she said your name. But she said it… old.”

“Old?”

“Like… ‘Katerina.’ Like when you get mad at me, but older.”

Katherine’s spine prickled. That wasn’t a name Nadia should know.

“What else did she say?”

“She said someone’s lookin’. And she drew circles in the trees.”

Katherine swallowed. Hard. The air in the room had gone still.

Nadia’s voice was fading. “She had red stuff on her hands. Like berries.”

Katherine smoothed the blanket over her little girl and tried to calm the sudden thrum in her veins.

“She’s just a dream,” she whispered. To Nadia. To herself.

The room was quiet save for the creak of old pipes and the occasional passing car below. Katherine hadn’t moved from Nadia’s bedside in over an hour. Her daughter’s breathing was slow, peaceful—nothing like the twist Katherine felt in her gut.

Mara.

She hadn’t thought of her. Hadn’t dared. The witch who tore a hole in the world for her to flee through. The woman who asked for nothing—only left her with words.

“You may run across time,” Mara had said, dusting ash from her fingers like it was just another day, “across worlds even… but what you are is written into your bones. One day, she’ll have to know.”

Katherine had laughed then. Or maybe she’d wept. What did it matter? She was desperate, feral with grief. She hadn’t cared what it cost. She just needed her child safe.

She had told herself Nadia was free of it. That she had escaped the curse of her bloodline. A normal childhood. A fresh start. No vampires. No doppelgängers. No Klaus.

But now?

Now her daughter dreamed of women who didn’t exist in this world. Drew sigils she shouldn’t know. Spoke names no one had taught her.

Katherine brushed a lock of hair from Nadia’s forehead. “You don’t have to be anything,” she whispered. “Not for them. Not even for me.”

But Mara’s words hung there in the dark like a prophecy she could no longer outrun.

One day, she’ll have to know.

Katherine stared into the night beyond the window. She could still feel James’s hand—warm and steady—when he’d helped her lift the picnic basket earlier. The way he looked at her when he thought she wasn’t watching.

Chapter Text

Chapter 14

Katherine had never asked about it.

Not because she didn’t notice it—how could she not? The gleam of metal when sunlight slipped through the window, the quiet whirr it made when he moved too quickly. But because she could feel, instinctively, that it wasn’t just an arm.

It was a scar. A burden.

She saw how careful he was with it. Always using his right hand with Nadia, never letting the metal one get too close unless absolutely necessary. Like he was afraid of it. Like it might betray him.

At first, she avoided looking. Not out of fear—but respect. She knew what it was like to carry something you didn’t ask for. Something people only saw when they were trying to figure out whether you were a danger or a tragedy.

But one evening, as he reached for something—Nadia’s stuffed rabbit under a display table—his sleeve slipped. The gold and black plating caught the light.

Katherine couldn’t help herself.

“It’s beautiful,” she said, quietly.

Bucky froze.

He didn’t meet her eyes. Just cleared his throat, adjusted the sleeve, as if her words were something dangerous—something he wasn’t sure he could believe.

“You don’t have to say that.”

“I didn’t say it for you.”

She stepped a little closer.

“That arm… I don’t think it makes you a monster. I think you carry it like someone who’s spent a long time trying not to become one.”

There was a beat of silence.

He didn’t speak. But something in him softened. And when she reached out, gently brushing her fingers along the edge of the prosthetic where it met skin, he didn’t flinch.

And that silence—comforting, not strained—was the closest thing to trust she’d felt in a long time.
——————-

It started with the cat.

Nadia had named it Buttons—a fat, grey thing with lazy green eyes who never paid attention to anyone but her. He wasn’t theirs. He belonged to a neighbor down the hall, but ever since the zoo trip, he’d begun waiting by their door each morning.

Tonight, though, Katherine found him sitting at the windowsill inside the apartment.

She stared at him. “How did you get in here?”

Buttons didn’t move. Just kept his gaze pinned on Nadia sleeping soundly on the couch, wrapped in her favorite blanket.

Katherine checked the windows. Locked. The fire escape undisturbed. She checked the door—still bolted. Her skin began to prickle.

When she turned back, Buttons was staring at her now. Unblinking.

Then—he hissed.

Not at her. Behind her.

Katherine spun around, heart jumping.

No one. Nothing. Just a breeze that hadn’t come from the window.

She stood frozen for a beat, listening. Watching. The air felt wrong. Still—but charged, like the seconds before .

Buttons meowed low and sharp, as if in warning, then jumped down and disappeared into the shadows of the kitchen.

Nadia stirred.

“Mama?” she whispered sleepily.

“I’m here,” Katherine said quickly, pulling her close, cradling her like she was still a baby. “I’m right here.”

But her eyes never left that door.

——————-

The boutique was closed. Nadia had fallen asleep in the backroom curled up on a little pile of blankets she insisted was her “castle bed.” The city hummed outside. Katherine sat on a low stool, rubbing the back of her neck, her shoulders heavy from the day.

Bucky was still there.

He hadn’t said much, just helped her clean up, folded stock, wiped down the glass counter without being asked. And now he crouched beside her, his jacket folded over a chair, the sleeves of his shirt rolled up to his forearms.

“You’re going to get lines,” he said quietly, brushing his thumb just between her brows.

She blinked. Her heart stuttered.

“You scowl when you’re thinking too hard.”

“I’m always thinking too hard,” she replied, voice low.

His thumb lingered for a second too long. Then he pulled away.

But the heat remained.

“I never saw myself here,” she said suddenly, unsure why she was even speaking.

“You love her,” Bucky said simply.

“I do.”

“Then it’s exactly where you should be.”

She looked at him then. Really looked. The cut of his jaw, the scar along his temple, the faint smudge of something tired behind his eyes. But the way he looked at her—it softened everything. Like she wasn’t some damaged girl running from ghosts. Like she wasn’t just a mother barely keeping it together.

With him, she felt… seen. And for a moment, she forgot the hiding, the lying, the weight of old names that still haunted her blood.

They sat like that a while. Quiet.

At one point, she leaned her head against his shoulder—not quite intentional. Not quite an accident either. He didn’t move. Just let her stay there.

“You’re warm,” she murmured.

“Didn’t think I would be,” he said, almost like he wasn’t talking to her. “Didn’t think there was anything left in me that could be.”

She didn’t say anything. Didn’t want to talk about her anxieties or acknowledge the growing darkness seeming to surround her and Nadia lately. She just didn’t want to think about it.

—————————

Junie was never subtle, not when it came to things she cared about—and today, that was Katherine.

She stood with her hands on her hips, eyes narrowed at the boutique counter where Katherine stood pretending to reorganize a tray of necklaces that didn’t need organizing. Bucky was nearby, crouched by a low shelf, helping Nadia stack a row of mismatched shoes like tiny sentinels.

“I’m serious,” Junie said, voice clipped. “You two need to go out. Without the tiny boss.”

Katherine blinked. “Junie—”

“Don’t ‘Junie’ me. I’ve got two eyes and a very sharp sense for people trying to tiptoe around their feelings. That includes super soldiers with mumbly voices and pretty brunettes who think they can hide behind racks of vintage scarves.”

Bucky looked up, startled. “What?”

Junie turned on him. “You heard me, James. Adult date. No toddler in tow. Two hours. I’ll keep Nadia.”

Katherine’s mouth parted. “She’s been… off lately. I don’t know if it’s the dreams or—”

“She’s a toddler,” Junie said gently, kneeling to scoop Nadia up. “They get moods like the sky changes clouds. And she’s safe with me. You trust me, don’t you?”

Katherine hesitated, eyes flicking to Bucky. He looked as thrown as she felt—back stiff, expression guarded. It wasn’t that she didn’t want to go. She did. But she was scared too. Scared of what she might feel if she stopped running for five seconds.

Nadia clung to Junie easily, babbling about shoes and frogs and something Katherine couldn’t make out.

“Two hours,” Junie repeated, softer now. “Go get coffee. Walk slow. Let yourself be someone who isn’t just a mother or a man carrying a war in his chest. Just be… two people trying to learn each other.”

Katherine still hesitated.

Then Nadia leaned out of Junie’s arms, pressing a sticky kiss to her mother’s cheek. “Go,” she said, mimicking Junie’s tone, one hand waving dramatically. “Shoo, Mama.”

Katherine blinked, laughter catching in her throat. Bucky looked halfway between stunned and amused.

And maybe—just maybe—it was okay to breathe for a couple hours.

She met Bucky’s eyes.

“Alright,” she said, brushing a lock of hair behind her ear. “But if she levitates something, call me.” She was uncertain if that could really happen.

Junie just grinned. “I’ll keep the floating objects to a minimum. Now go.”

“She ambushed us,” Katherine said, folding her arms as they walked. “Junie, I mean. She said it like a suggestion, but it was absolutely a command.”

Bucky gave a quiet chuckle. “I didn’t know what was happening until I was already putting on my boots.”

“I don’t even think she blinked,” Katherine said with a half-smile. “She just waved me off like I was a nervous intern and told me I needed ‘adult time’ or I’d turn into ‘weird mom goo.’”

“She’s not wrong,” he said carefully.

Katherine laughed. “You’re braver than I thought.”

They reached the edge of a quiet street, lit softly by the fading sun. For a moment, the world felt suspended between day and night—gentle, slow, unpressured.

“She’s been helpful,” Katherine added more quietly. “Junie, I mean. Nadia took to her. Its rare for her. She’s… selective.”

“She seems like a good kid,” Bucky said.

“She is,” Katherine agreed, her tone shifting slightly, thoughtful. “Too smart sometimes. I watched Peter Pan with her the other day, which—honestly, terrible parenting decision. Now she thinks she can fly. She’s been standing out on the balcony in the mornings, arms out, talking to herself.”

Bucky frowned a little. “Think she’d actually try?”

“I don’t know,” Katherine admitted. “She’s two. Almost three. She still eats things off the ground and swears up and down her toy duck talks to her. I had to sit her down and tell her she could only fly if she had actual pixie dust, which—thankfully—we are all out of.”

Bucky smiled, amused but clearly taking it in. “Sounds like she’s got your imagination.”

Katherine arched a brow at him. “Or something else entirely.”

They walked a little longer in silence, the kind that wasn’t uncomfortable. When he glanced down at her, Katherine looked up at the same time. Something passed between them—a flicker of emotion just under the surface.

“You ever wish you could believe in things that easily?” she asked.

He thought about it, then nodded. “Sometimes. But then I look at her, and I think maybe I still do. A little.”

Her breath caught, just slightly. She didn’t say anything. She didn’t need to.

Because for the first time in what felt like years, Katherine let herself just feel the quiet, and it didn’t hurt. Not with him beside her.

They started walking again, slowly, as if neither really wanted to return yet. The evening had slipped into that still, golden-blue hour when the city seemed to hush around them, as though even New York was offering them a moment of peace.

Katherine walked just a little closer to him than before.

She wasn’t looking at him directly, not really—but she was aware of him in that way women are when they’re trying not to look. She saw the lines of his jaw in her periphery, how his freshly trimmed hair framed his face, the way the curve of his shoulders shifted beneath that too-warm jacket. He didn’t walk like other men. He moved like he’d once been forged from wire and fire—careful, controlled. But there was something almost boyish about him, too, when he laughed. She remembered that sound. It had cracked something open in her.

Her hand brushed the side of her dress. Not quite close enough to his.

She wondered, vaguely, if he’d take her hand. Wondered what his would feel like. Warm? Calloused? Would it ground her—or undo her?

She didn’t know. So she said nothing.

Bucky, on the other hand, seemed lost in thought. His brow furrowed slightly, eyes ahead, like he was following ghosts only he could see. She didn’t disturb them—whatever shadows lived in his mind. She had her own.

But there was something in his silence now, something different. He wasn’t shutting her out. He was… grappling with something.

Maybe it was her. Maybe it was himself.

The tension between them was like the string of a violin pulled too tight. Nothing had happened. Nothing had been said. And yet it hung there between them—thick, waiting.

Katherine glanced at his right hand—the flesh one—and then away again. She wasn’t brave enough to reach. Not yet. Not when everything in her life had taught her that closeness cost.

And yet, here she was. Wanting it anyway.

Bucky, still looking ahead, caught the smallest flicker of movement from her. A breath, maybe. A pause. And he knew what she was thinking. Knew it like he could feel the hum of it against his skin.

He wanted to reach back. He wanted to take her hand.

But his were the hands of the Winter Soldier. No matter how human he tried to be now, no matter how soft his voice could sound when talking to Nadia or how patient he was with the child’s curiosity, some part of him still believed his touch could only hurt.

So he didn’t reach.

But he looked at her.

And when her eyes met his—just for a second—it was like the truth of it passed between them anyway: I want to.

They walked in silence for a while longer, their steps slow, unhurried. The city buzzed at a distance, like a radio turned down low. Katherine was still lost in her own thoughts when she felt the subtle shift—his pace slowed, just half a beat.

And then—warmth.

His fingers brushed hers first, light as breath, tentative. And then he took her hand.

Not the metal one. Not the gloved one.

His right hand. The one scarred by time and war, calloused from memory, lined with stories he never told. Hers—smaller, smoother, fingers curling instinctively into his.

She didn’t speak. Didn’t look at him right away. Just felt the contrast of him—rough against soft, worn against untouched—and the way, somehow, it fit. Like his hand had been shaped to hold hers, and only now found where it belonged.

Bucky didn’t say anything either. He just held on.

He didn’t even realize how tightly he’d been gripping everything inside until that moment, until her hand quieted something in him—something frayed, something lonely.

Katherine finally looked down at their joined hands. Her brows lifted slightly, but she didn’t pull away. Her thumb, small and unsure, brushed lightly against the top of his hand, across a faint, puckered scar that had likely been there for years.

It was such a simple thing. A hand in a hand.

But after everything they’d lived through… it felt like the beginning of something impossible.

When she looked up at him, her expression was unreadable—but her eyes were soft, searching his face like he might vanish.

“You didn’t have to,” she whispered.

He glanced sideways at her, lips quirking with a gentleness she rarely saw on him.

“I wanted to.”

Chapter Text

Chapter 15

Katherine told herself it was nothing.

A draft when the windows were shut. A flicker in the lights when Nadia cried too hard. The way her daughter’s mood seemed to cling to the walls like fog—heavy, shifting, inexplicable.

It had to be coincidence. Imagination. Maybe the stress was catching up with her, maybe she was reading too much into the strange little patterns: how the cat wouldn’t come near Nadia when she was upset, how toys occasionally ended up in places Katherine knew she hadn’t left them. Maybe it was just… toddler chaos. That’s what she told herself.

She didn’t believe it.

Not really.

Something inside her—something old, something buried—stirred with that familiar prickle of dread. Magic. Power. The kind that could never be controlled, not fully. The kind that always cost something.

Still, she said nothing. Not even to Bucky.

But he noticed. He always noticed.

When Nadia giggled, the air seemed lighter. Softer. When she wailed from a bad dream or a sudden tantrum, the shadows in the corners of the room felt longer somehow. It wasn’t just Katherine’s nerves—Bucky could feel it too. Like a storm circling.

He didn’t say anything at first either. Just watched. Stayed longer in the shop after helping with the accounts. Stayed later at dinner. Offered to carry Nadia when she grew restless or fussy. He was always nearby—not hovering, not intrusive—but present.

Protective.

And when Katherine caught him glancing toward Nadia during one of those strange, silent shifts in the room—when the temperature dipped ever so slightly, or the radio crackled without reason—he didn’t ask questions.

He’d always been good at holding things close. At watching from the edges. He could read people better than most—sometimes too well. And Katherine? She had one hell of a poker face.

But she wasn’t fooling him.

Not when the air in the boutique turned too still, too fast, the moment Nadia got upset. Not when he’d catch her, just for a second, staring at her daughter with something more than affection in her eyes—something that looked like fear. It passed quickly, buried beneath her usual poise, her calm smile. But he saw it.

And when he mentioned it—offhand, just once—something like, “She’s a strong little thing, huh?”—Katherine had only nodded and changed the subject. Smooth. Too smooth.

So now he watched them closer.

And the signs were harder to ignore.
—————-
Nadia’s tantrum the other day had rattled the windows. Literally. The glass shivered in its frame and the lights dimmed, briefly, like a power surge. Katherine barely blinked, only scooped her daughter into her arms, rocked her gently, and whispered something Bucky didn’t catch.

She was calm. Too calm.

Either she had no idea—or she knew exactly what was happening and was pretending it wasn’t.

He’d bet everything on the latter.

And it made his chest tighten. Not from fear. But from something heavier. He’d been trained to detect threats. This didn’t feel like a threat… yet. But it was something. Something powerful and old. Something watching.

He stood at the door to the shop that evening, watching as Nadia built a tower from buttons and scraps of thread. Katherine was at the counter, writing invoices with precise, fluid strokes.

Her posture was perfect. Controlled. But her jaw was clenched just a little too tight.

She knew.

And she wasn’t saying a damn thing.

It was early afternoon, the light golden through the windows of the boutique’s back room. The radio murmured softly in the background—something mellow and distant—and Katherine sat cross-legged on the floor with Nadia in her lap, a children’s book open between them. A lull between clients meant she could steal this time, and she used it well.

“One… две… три,” Katherine said softly, tapping her finger against Nadia’s hand with each word. “Say it with me, moya lyubov.”

“Eдно… две… три,” Nadia echoed, stumbling on the first syllable but grinning at the praise that followed.

Katherine kissed her temple, warmth blooming in her chest. These were the moments that made her feel anchored in this world—real and whole.

They moved on to colors, then animals. Simple words. The kind Katherine had grown up with and never thought she’d pass on. She found herself humming a tune halfway through—a lullaby her mother had sung to her once, or maybe her grandmother. She didn’t remember all of it, just the way it curled around the vowels of the language like a comfort.

And then Nadia began to sing.

Clear. Deliberate.

A melody in Bulgarian, soft and haunting. But it wasn’t the song they’d just stumbled through—it was something else entirely. Older. The phrasing too precise for a toddler still learning to pronounce “chetvŭrt.”

Katherine froze.

Nadia kept singing, eyes unfocused but content, like the words were simply there, waiting in her mouth.

It sent a chill down Katherine’s spine.

“Nadia…” Her voice was steady, though her heart began to pound.

The child blinked, her lips still forming the final notes. Then she looked up at her mother, almost shy. “Do you like it, Mama?”

Katherine swallowed. “Where did you learn that?”

Nadia just shrugged, curling her fingers around Katherine’s scarf and burying her face in her shoulder.

The room felt colder suddenly. Quieter.

From the shop front, Bucky glanced toward the back. He hadn’t heard the song—just sensed the stillness, the slight shift in air pressure, like a storm was gathering but hadn’t yet arrived.

Katherine said nothing when she rejoined him. Just resumed her place behind the register, hands a little too steady, smile a little too perfect.

But Bucky’s eyes lingered on her longer than usual.

Something had changed.

And this time, even Katherine couldn’t quite hide it.

Far across the city, in a house that never stayed in one place for long, a circle of women stood beneath flickering candlelight.

The walls were lined with bones and branches strung with feathers and dried herbs. Maps of old worlds and faded sigils lay scattered across a stone altar, smudged with wax and red ink. The scent of smoke clung to the rafters.

“She’s begun to sing,” one murmured, her voice raspy with age. “The tongue of the First Line, without being taught.”

A younger witch, her eyes ink-dark and gleaming with reverence, stepped forward. “Then it’s true? The Vessel lives?”

“She’s almost three,” another said cautiously. “Barely awakened.”

“All the more reason to act.”

They turned to the oldest among them—her eyes milk-white, blind to this world but not the next. She reached out, placing a hand on the tattered photograph of a child. It was blurry, taken in motion from a distance. But Nadia’s face was unmistakable.

“She carries the spark,” the crone whispered. “Through bloodline and chance. The Old Blood stirs in her.”

“But the mother—”

“—was skipped,” the old one nodded. “The flame passed her by. But she carries the vessel. The girl was never meant for this world.”

They bowed their heads. The prophecy—half-forgotten, half-feared—had begun to unfold.

“We must prepare the way,” the younger witch said. “Before she is taught to fear herself. Before they shield her too tightly.”

“And what of the soldier?” another asked.

A pause. Then, the crone smiled, slow and cold. “He will fight. They always do. But even steel bends to magic, eventually.”

Chapter Text

Chapter 16

⸻

The shop had fallen into a gentle hush. Outside, the light was golden—late afternoon, soft and lazy.

Katherine was behind the counter, rubbing her temple as she counted receipts, her thoughts fogged with exhaustion. She barely registered Nadia’s humming—off-key and sweet as always—as she played with her wooden blocks near the display window.

It had been a long day. She hadn’t slept well. Hadn’t slept much in weeks, really.

“Nadia,” she said without looking up, “five more minutes, then we close up, okay?”

No answer.

Katherine paused, pen still in hand.

“Nadia?”

Still nothing.

A chill slid down her spine. She rose from her stool, stepping quickly around the counter.

The floor where Nadia had been playing was empty. Her blocks were scattered as if she’d leapt up mid-play—but there was no sign of her daughter. No giggle. No little feet scurrying behind a dress rack.

The silence was sudden. Hollow. Wrong.

“Nadia?” she called again, louder now, her voice cracking halfway through. “Sweetheart, where did you go?”

She spun through the boutique, yanking curtains aside, looking behind every piece of furniture. She rushed to the front door—locked. Still locked.

She turned back—and that’s when she saw it.

Burned into the floorboards where her daughter had just been, like a brand left by something cruel and ancient, was a dark, spiraling sigil. Sharp lines twisted into unfamiliar geometry, and at its center was a smear of soot… or ash.

Katherine’s legs gave out. She fell to her knees beside it, hands trembling as they hovered above the symbol, breath caught like a scream stuck in her throat.

Her mouth formed her daughter’s name again, but no sound came.

This couldn’t be real.

It couldn’t be happening.

She had run. She had survived. She had given everything to build a life here—to keep Nadia safe. She had been careful. She promised.

Tears welled in her eyes as the weight of it sank in.

Her daughter was gone.

Taken.

And the worst part—the part that shattered her heart into a hundred splinters—was that Nadia had probably called out for her. Had probably reached for her.

And she hadn’t been there.

Katherine folded in on herself, one hand pressed to the scorched floor, the other clenched in the fabric of her skirt. She gasped for air that wouldn’t come, her entire body trembling.

“M-moyata malka…”

The sob broke free, raw and gutting.

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry…”

Today had been a Junie day.

She had left just an hour ago—smiling, waving, calling something about dinner plans and reminding Katherine to “try to breathe, just for once.”

Nadia had been right there. On the floor. Right where Katherine last saw her, stacking blocks and mumbling a half-song.

Now there was only the silence. The scorched mark. The unbearable emptiness.

Katherine stumbled to her feet, knocking over a chair. Her hands shook so violently that she nearly dropped her phone twice before unlocking it. The first number on speed dial wasn’t Junie, or the police.

It was James.

She didn’t even remember setting it like that.

Her fingers hovered—one trembling touch away from the call button—until the panic overrode everything. She pressed it.

It rang once. Twice.

“Come on, come on—please, please, please—”

“Barnes.”

His voice was rough, distant.

“James—” she gasped, choking on her own name for him. “She’s gone.”

“What?”

“Nadia’s gone, she was just here—I turned around, just for a second—there’s this mark on the floor and I—I don’t—”

“Katherine. Slow down. Where are you?”

“I’m at the shop—* the shop—*I didn’t hear anything, I didn’t—” Her breath hitched, tears spilling freely now. “There’s a mark, it’s not—normal. It’s burned in, and she’s not hiding, she’s not playing—”

“I’m on my way.”

The line went dead.

She stared at the phone like it might bring Nadia back if she begged hard enough. Then she sank down again beside the sigil, clutching the last toy her daughter had touched—a worn wooden cat, edges smoothed from love.

Katherine drew in a shuddering breath.

The world was spinning.

And all she could do was wait for James.

Bucky didn’t knock.

The door was ajar, and that was wrong. It set off something deep in his gut. He stepped inside quickly, voice taut. “Katherine?”

No answer.

The place was too quiet. Not even the hum of Nadia’s toys or the usual soft rustle of domestic life. Just stillness. Heavy and unnatural.

Then he saw her.

She was on the floor near the hallway, knees tucked to her chest, arms limp. Not crying. Just… gone somewhere far inside herself. Her face was pale, her eyes locked on the blackened mark burned into the floor. A sigil. Bucky didn’t know magic, but he knew a threat when he saw one.

He crouched down slowly. “Katherine.”

No response. Just a long, empty stare.

“Hey,” he said more softly, reaching out to her. “It’s me. I’m here.”

Her lips moved after a moment, barely forming the words: “She was just here.”

Bucky’s chest tightened.

“Nadia?”

Katherine gave the smallest nod.

“I turned my back for a second,” she whispered. “Junie had left an hour ago. She was right there. And now she’s not.”

Bucky didn’t think.

He simply moved—arms wrapping around her as gently as he could, unsure if she would even let him. But Katherine didn’t resist.

She folded into him like she was breaking apart. A dam inside her cracked with a sharp breath, and suddenly she was trembling, clutching at his shirt with both hands. Her sobs came in ragged waves, deep and guttural, like she had no practice in crying but couldn’t hold it in anymore.

He’d never seen her like this. Katherine, always composed, always one step ahead—flirtatious and guarded and sharp-tongued when it suited her. But now?

She was all broken edges.

“She’s gone,” she choked out. “Just like them—just like—”

Her voice cracked, and her next words came out in Bulgarian. Bucky didn’t understand them, but the sound of them was pure grief. Her accent thickened, her voice younger somehow, and she didn’t even seem to know she was speaking a different language.

“I told myself I could keep her safe,” she whispered, reverting back to English. “I lied. I lied like I always do. And now—now I’ve brought it back. The blood. The past. The bodies—”

Bucky held her tighter, one hand cradling the back of her head as her tears soaked his shoulder.

“Slow down,” he murmured, voice rough with quiet urgency. “You’re not alone, okay? You don’t have to—whatever this is, you’re not alone in it now.”

She kept mumbling, half-coherent, as if she was confessing to ghosts.

“I saw them,” she whispered. “My mother. My sisters. Cold. Staring. Because of me. Because I ran.”

Bucky closed his eyes. He didn’t understand. Not yet. But he understood loss. The way it hollowed you. How it buried guilt so deep, you started believing you deserved every bad thing that followed.

“It wasn’t your fault,” he said, steadying her as she shook in his arms. “Whatever happened… you didn’t deserve this.”

“I don’t know what I deserve anymore,” Katherine whispered into his chest.

And then, quieter, so quiet it was almost missed: “I think it’s came for her instead.”

Bucky pressed his lips on the top of her head. Just to anchor her.

“We’ll get her back,” he said again. Firmer this time. “I swear to you, Katherine. We will.”

And still, she didn’t let go.

……..

Bucky’s fingers hovered over the phone longer than they should have. His jaw clenched as he paced the small hallway outside Katherine’s apartment. He could still hear her inside—silent now, but not resting. Just… absent. Like the grief had swallowed her whole.

He hated this kind of waiting.

Finally, he tapped Sam’s contact and brought the phone to his ear.

“Barnes?” Sam’s voice came in casual, but sharp with curiosity. “Haven’t heard from you in a minute.”

“I need Strange’s number.”

There was a pause. Not long, but enough for Bucky to picture Sam narrowing his eyes on the other end of the line.

“Okay. Straight to business. That kind of call.”

“Yeah.”

“You in trouble?”

“No,” Bucky said, too fast. “It’s not—” He stopped, reined it in. “It’s not me.”

Sam exhaled, heavy through the speaker. “You gonna tell me what kind of mess we’re talking?”

“I don’t have time to explain.”

Another pause. Longer this time. Then Sam’s tone shifted—quiet concern slipping under the edge of his words.

“If this is something big, something bad… you call me. Not later. Now. You hear me?”

“I hear you.”

“Is it magical related?”

Bucky didn’t answer.

That was answer enough.

Sam sighed, but didn’t push. Instead, he rattled off a number. “That’s Strange’s burner. He changes them every couple weeks. Tell him I sent you.”

“Thanks.”

“James…” Sam’s voice gentled. “Seriously. You need backup—real backup—you don’t wait until it’s too late.”

Click.

Bucky didn’t hesitate this time. He punched the new number in with quick fingers, each motion sharper than the last.

As it rang, he glanced back at the closed door behind him. The light from inside spilled under the frame, warm and steady. But the silence beyond it felt colder than anything he’d known.

He would tear through worlds if he had to.

He just hoped Strange picked up.

The ringing stopped after the third tone.

“This better be important,” came the clipped voice of Doctor Stephen Strange—irritated, precise, and entirely unimpressed.

“It is,” Bucky said.

There was a pause. Strange’s voice shifted just slightly—less annoyance, more curiosity.

“Barnes? Didn’t expect to hear from you.”

“I was given your number. By Wilson.”

Another pause. “Then I assume this is serious.”

“It’s about a kid,” Bucky said tightly. “A little girl. She’s… gone. Vanished.”

“Children go missing all the time, Barnes. Why call me?”

“Because she didn’t walk away. There was a mark left behind. Like it was burned into the floor. Like magic.”

That got Strange’s attention.

“What kind of mark?”

“I don’t know what it means. But the girl—Nadia—she’s been acting strange for weeks. Dreams she shouldn’t remember. Speaking languages she shouldn’t know. Things moving around her. I didn’t want to believe it.”

“And the mother?” Strange asked, his voice already calculating, shifting into that unfazed, academic cadence.

“She’s human,” Bucky said. “Normal. At least… she says she is. But something’s not right. Not now. She’s in shock.”

“And you?”

“I’m holding it together.”

“You’re not trained for this kind of magic,” Strange said, but not dismissively. More… warning. “You know that, right?”

“I’m not asking for your approval,” Bucky said, sharper than he meant. “I’m asking if you’ll help.”

Strange was silent a moment. Then: “Send me a photo of the sigil. Now. I’ll let you know if it matches anything in the archives.”

The line went dead before Bucky could answer.

He lowered the phone slowly, shoulders tight, pulse still racing.

This was real. It wasn’t just Katherine’s grief. Or his own need to make it better. Something dark had taken that little girl—and now magic was on the board.

And Bucky Barnes was about to follow it.

The door creaked softly as Bucky pushed it open.

The apartment was dim—the curtains half-drawn though it was still daylight outside. The quiet inside was thick, heavy, like the aftermath of a storm that hadn’t finished passing. No lights. No movement. Just the ghost of laughter that used to live here. Nadia’s toys lay scattered where she’d last touched them—half a stuffed rabbit near the bookshelf, a crayon under the edge of the rug.

Katherine hadn’t moved.

She sat where he’d left her. On the floor near the wall, knees drawn up, arms wrapped around herself so tightly her shoulders trembled from the strain. She stared at a point across the room—empty space—as if willing it to give her back her daughter.

Her lips moved, but no sound came out. Maybe a name. Maybe a prayer. Maybe nothing at all.

Bucky stepped in quietly, boots making a soft sound on the wood. He didn’t speak yet. He didn’t know what words could reach her in this. But he crouched low in front of her, the way someone might approach a wounded animal—gentle, cautious, heart aching.

“Katherine,” he said quietly.

She blinked slowly, eyes glassy, unfocused.

“I called someone,” he said. “Someone who deals in the… strange. He’s going to help us. But I need you to stay with me. Just a little longer.”

The phone rang late—later than most people would call unless it was serious. Bucky snatched it up on the first vibration, legs stiff from pacing.

“Barnes,” came the voice on the other end—cool, clipped, with a trace of exhaustion behind its edge.

Bucky stood straighter, tension pulling tight across his shoulders. “Yeah. Thanks for calling back.”

“You said a child was taken under… magical circumstances.”

“Yeah,” Bucky replied. “Nadia. She’s two—almost three. And her mother, Katherine, she—”

“I’ll need to see her,” Strange cut in.

“She’s not—she can’t—” Bucky’s voice faltered. He looked over his shoulder at the room. Katherine hadn’t moved for over an hour. She stared at nothing, lips pressed tight, like her silence was the only thing keeping her from unraveling. “She’s… shut down.”

“I understand trauma,” Strange said, softer now. “But I need the mother present. The child’s magic is likely bound to her. If she’s the key to finding Nadia, I can’t proceed without her.”

There was a long silence on Bucky’s end. His jaw flexed. “She can’t even hold a glass of water. She’s barely speaking. How the hell am I supposed to move her?”

Strange’s voice dropped low. “Then you help her the only way you know how—remind her that there’s still something she can do. Give her something to hold on to.”

Bucky exhaled through his nose, rubbing his temple.

“I’m sending you the address to the Sanctum Sanctorum. You have three hours. After that, I begin without you.” A pause. “But Barnes—if you can’t bring her… we may never find the child in time.”

The line clicked dead.

Bucky stared at the screen a moment before shoving the phone in his pocket. He looked toward the couch.

Katherine hadn’t moved.

The weight of her stillness felt heavier than anything he’d ever carried.

Bucky stood in the threshold of the room, watching Katherine. She sat curled, arms wrapped tight around her waist like they were the only thing keeping her falling apart. Her eyes were open, but unfocused, her lips moving slightly—murmurs only she could hear. Her hair was a mess, her sweater pulled inside out, and there was a dried patch of tears down her cheek she hadn’t noticed or bothered to wipe.

Bucky crouched in front of her slowly, carefully. He didn’t reach out. Not yet.

“Katherine,” he said gently.

Nothing.

“Katherine,” he tried again, voice a little lower this time. “You need to hear me.”

She blinked, a tremor passing through her. Her gaze barely shifted to him. “She’s gone. They took her. I—I was here and they still took her. I should’ve known. I should’ve—” Her voice cracked.

“I know,” Bucky said, softly, steady. “I know. But sitting here? Breaking apart? It’s not going to bring her back.”

Katherine shut her eyes tight. “I can’t—I don’t know how to fix this. I left that life behind. I ran. It’s so much harder now.”

“Then stop running,” Bucky said. Not harsh—just honest. “You don’t have to do it alone anymore.”

She looked at him then. Really looked at him.

“I talked to someone,” he continued. “A man who deals in the kind of things you’re scared to say out loud. He can help. But we need to go. Together. He said he needs you.”

Katherine shook her head once, weak. “I can’t—I’m not strong enough.”

“You’re Nadia’s mother,” Bucky said quietly. “You’re more than strong enough.”

Silence.

Then he reached out slowly, offered his hand—not grabbing, not urging, just waiting.

Katherine stared at it. Her lip trembled.

Her fingers twitched.

And then, like a wave of willpower rising up from the hollow of her chest, she lifted her hand and placed it in his.

Her palm was cold, but she gripped his like it was the only solid thing in her world.

Bucky helped her to her feet. She swayed once, unsteady, but didn’t let go.

“Get your coat,” he said gently. “I’ll drive.”

Katherine nodded faintly, eyes clearing for the first time since Nadia disappeared. A storm still brewed behind them, but it no longer drowned her.

Because she was moving.

For her daughter.

Chapter Text

Chapter 17

The city lights blur through the window as Bucky drives in silence. Katherine sits beside him, small in the passenger seat, her hands in her lap. She’s pulled together just enough to leave the apartment, but her face is still pale, her eyes unfocused.

Bucky glances at her—wants to ask, but doesn’t.

After a long beat, Katherine speaks, voice quiet but raw.
“He’s going to think I’m mad. Whoever this man is.”

Bucky doesn’t look away from the road.
“He’s seen things that make madness look boring… and you know who I am right?”

Katherine almost smiles at that. Almost.
“I don’t even know what I’d say… how to explain it. It’s just I’m use to doing things on my own.”

“You don’t have to explain anything right now,” Bucky says. “You just have to get her back.”

Katherine nods faintly. She turns her gaze to the window again, the city flying past like ghosts.
“I tried so hard to give her a normal life. To pretend I could be normal too.”

Bucky grips the wheel tighter.
“You don’t have to be normal. You just have to be her mother.”

That hits her harder than she expected. Her throat tightens.

She doesn’t tell him that she’s from a different world. That her daughter’s father was had deserted her. That she ran from a monster. That monster killed her family and she was responsible for the death of the many men who tried to help her- many men she tricked into their demise.

That a witch gave her a chance to run and told her it wouldn’t be enough.

Instead, she presses her forehead to the cool window and whispers:

“I don’t know if I deserve to be.”

Bucky doesn’t push. He just says quietly, like a promise:
“You’re not alone anymore.”

The Sanctum was silent, like it had paused to listen.

Katherine sat in a tall-backed chair near the hearth, the flickering light of an enchanted candle casting uneasy shadows across her face. Doctor Stephen Strange stood nearby, arms crossed, expression unreadable but attentive. Bucky leaned against a support beam across the room, watching her with furrowed brows and hands clenched just enough to show tension. He hadn’t left her side since they stepped through the doors.

Strange broke the silence first, voice calm but edged with something deeper. “If we’re going to help your daughter, Miss Pierce… we need the truth. All of it.”

Katherine flinched at the name—Miss Pierce—a name she’d borrowed like an ill-fitting coat. But she nodded once.

“You think this started here,” she said, voice low. “But it didn’t. It started in 1490.”

Bucky straightened slightly.

Strange’s gaze sharpened. “Time travel?”

“No,” she said. “Not then. Just a small village in Bulgaria. I was eighteen when I gave birth to Nadia. She was taken from me the moment she cried. My father said I disgraced the family. They exiled me before I could even hold her.”

She swallowed, hard, as the words dredged up ghosts older than the city itself.

“I went to England to find someone powerful enough to help me get her back. That’s how I met Trevor. And through him… Klaus Mikaelson.”

Bucky shifted at the name.

“He’s not a man,” Katherine said bitterly. “He’s the first of his kind. A vampire—ancient, cruel, and powerful. But it was his brother Elijah who I trusted. Who I thought loved me. I was stupid.”

Strange’s posture hadn’t changed, but the air tightened subtly.

“I didn’t know I was a doppelgänger. A vessel. My blood, Nadia’s blood, was meant to undo the curse binding Klaus’s true nature. They never cared about me. Only what they could use me for.”

Bucky’s jaw flexed, his voice low. “So you ran.”

She nodded, slowly. “Crossed countries, borders… and eventually, time. I didn’t even know how at first. I don’t even know what realm or world we landed in, only that it was away. That I was away from him.”

Strange narrowed his eyes. “You traveled between dimensions without a relic or spell?”

“I didn’t choose it,” she said, bitterly. “I begged a witch to help me escape. She did more than that. She rewrote my path. Her name was Mara. She warned me what I carried in my blood couldn’t be outrun. That one day, Nadia would show signs.”

“And you didn’t believe her?” Strange asked.

“I believed her,” Katherine said. “I just didn’t care. I only wanted my child.”

She finally looked at Bucky.

“I’ve spent more than a year pretending this life was real. That magic couldn’t find us. That if I loved her fiercely enough, nothing else would matter.”

Bucky’s eyes met hers, steady and quiet.

“I know what it’s like to run,” he said. “I know what it’s like to pretend if you just don’t look back, the past can’t catch you.”

Katherine blinked fast. “But it did catch me. She’s gone. And I don’t know how to fight something I can’t see.”

Strange stepped forward now, gaze a little softer.

“The sigil left behind wasn’t just a calling card. It’s a claim. Someone—or something—is using a forgotten branch of blood magic. Very old, very deliberate. Nadia wasn’t taken randomly. She was summoned.”

Katherine’s breath caught.

“And you think they’re trying to awaken something in her,” Bucky said quietly.

“I think,” Strange said, “you were right to run—but that the time for running is over.”

The words settled heavy in the space between them.

Katherine straightened, the firelight catching in her eyes.

“Then tell me where to start.”

⸻

The table in the Sanctum’s library was nothing like any table Katherine had seen before—ancient, circular, carved with celestial symbols and shifting runes that pulsed faintly with arcane energy. At its center, a map unfolded itself as Doctor Strange unrolled a scroll made from something older than parchment.

“Your blood,” he said quietly, not unkindly, “is the thread we’ll follow.”

Katherine stood tense, arms crossed tightly over her chest. Her fingers twitched with the urge to snatch the scroll away—to do something, anything—but all she could do was watch as Strange pricked her finger with a thin needle and let a single drop fall onto the map.

The map came alive.

Lines etched themselves in glowing red, like veins forming across the parchment. Symbols rearranged, and a faint, pulsing point began to flicker near the outskirts of the city—deep in the woods, isolated and hidden.

“There,” Strange murmured.

Katherine took a step forward, chest tight. “That’s where she is?”

Strange nodded. “A holding site, masked by old magic. Someone built this place for containment. Not harm—at least not yet—but restraint. It’s deliberate.”

Her breath shook. “You’re sure?”

“As sure as I can be. The blood doesn’t lie.”

She hesitated, then looked up at him, voice low and sharp. “I don’t trust magic. I don’t trust the people who use it.”

Strange met her gaze. “Nor should you. Magic that preys on bloodlines… it’s a perversion. I find it abhorrent. Choice should never be stripped from someone by lineage. No child should be bound before they can speak.”

The fury in his voice wasn’t performative—it was genuine. That gave her pause.

Katherine looked away. “She’s only three.”

“I know.”

Behind them, Bucky had been silent, but now he stepped forward, shoulders set with purpose.

“I’m going with you.”

Strange turned, brows rising. “James—”

“I don’t care if I’m outmatched,” Bucky said. “I’m not going to sit here and wait. I have a bond with Nadia. She trusts me. If there’s anything I can do—fight, distract, carry—I’m doing it.”

The room stilled.

Katherine looked at him then—really looked. His jaw was clenched, his eyes tired but burning with determination. She thought of the metal arm he always tried to hide behind gloves, and the way he’d carried her through her own breakdown without flinching. He had every reason to walk away.

He didn’t.

Strange gave a long, assessing look, then gave a slow nod. “All right. But stay close, and don’t interfere unless I say.”

“I can handle myself,” Bucky said.

“I believe you,” Strange replied. “But this is blood magic. And if they’ve marked her…” He glanced back to Katherine words unspoken but rich with warning.

Chapter Text

Chapter 18

The Sanctum’s portal opened into shadow.

Twisting trees stretched like claws across the forest, branches bare despite the season, leaves scattered in unnatural spirals across the moss-covered earth. The air reeked faintly of sulfur and something sweeter—blood and roses, thick and sickly.

Bucky stepped through behind Strange, his boots crunching lightly against frost. The air hit different here. Dead quiet. Still.

The kind of quiet he remembered from kill zones.

But this time he wasn’t the weapon.

He flexed his metal hand, checking the knife holstered at his side. He didn’t need it. He could feel it rising in him already—that cold clarity. The one HYDRA forged into his spine. A predator’s calm. Except now there was heat pulsing through it.

Katherine.

The way she’d collapsed in his arms.

Nadia.

The way her absence felt like a tear through the world.

He swallowed. Hard.

He’d been on hundreds of missions. Thousands. But this one—this one mattered in ways he hadn’t let himself feel in a long time.

“She’s close,” Strange said beside him, voice low. His fingers traced a spell in the air, lines of blue light forming a compass of shifting glyphs. “Her blood is calling. The sigil they used—it’s part of a blood-binding rite.”

Bucky grunted, eyes narrowed. “What does that mean?”

“It means they’re not just using her magic—they’re trying to awaken something through her lineage.” Strange looked over at him, eyes serious beneath his cloak’s collar. “Something ancient. Something they shouldn’t touch.”

A beat of silence passed as the wind rustled dry leaves.

Then Strange added, glancing sideways, “You’re not exactly the usual babysitter. How did you end up in the middle of this?”

Bucky didn’t blink. “Nadia was the one that came to me.”

Strange nodded once, not asking more. “Then we stop it.”

He turned back to the spellwork, voice shifting back into precision. “We go quiet. As long as we can. You’re fast?”

Bucky’s mouth ticked in the ghost of a smile. “Try me.”

………..

The Sanctum was quiet.

Not the kind of silence that comforted. This silence pressed in around Katherine like a closing fist—heavy, vast, ancient. She stood near one of the tall windows, staring out over the New York skyline though she barely saw it. The streetlights below blurred into lines through the swell of unshed tears.

She didn’t cry.

Not fully.

But her breathing trembled, and she gripped the edge of the windowsill hard enough to whiten her knuckles.

Somewhere beyond the walls, beyond her reach, her daughter was missing. Alone. Taken. And it was all happening again.

“Katherine?”

She turned, startled—Wong stood in the doorway, a teacup in his hand.

“I brought something warm. For your hands. You look cold.”

She hesitated—then, quietly, gently, took it. The warmth seeped into her fingers like a balm, and for a moment she just held the cup, unmoving.

“I didn’t think it would happen here,” she whispered. “I thought… if I kept her isolated, if I made her world safe enough, the past wouldn’t find us.”

Wong stepped closer, not intruding—present.

“The past is persistent,” he said, voice like calm waters. “But so is love. So is healing.”

Katherine let out a quiet breath. “I didn’t grow up with people who came back for you. Not when it mattered. I—” her voice caught. “I keep waiting for that to be true again.”

Wong gave a small nod. “It is a terrible thing to learn to trust the world. But you are not alone this time. Strange is not careless with children. And the soldier… he carries her name like it’s written into him.”

She blinked at him, startled by the phrasing.

Wong gave a faint smile. “It is difficult to miss. He would tear open time itself if it meant returning her.”

Katherine pressed the cup closer to her chest. Her lips trembled—but she nodded.

“What if she’s scared?” she asked, her voice small. “She’s just a baby.”

“Then she will be found by someone who loves her. And she will come back to the one who made her brave.”

For the first time since she collapsed into Bucky’s arms, Katherine’s breath didn’t shake as much. She closed her eyes, tea warming her hands, and whispered something in Bulgarian—a prayer, or a hope, or a promise.

Wong stepped back, giving her the quiet space to believe in something again.

……..

They moved like breath through the underbrush—Strange ahead, glyphs floating at his fingertips, Bucky following with a soldier’s precision. Every step was deliberate. Every sound judged. The forest thinned ahead, opening into a glade that pulsed faintly with magic. A ruin lay at its heart—stone blackened by time, cracked columns laced with vines that coiled too tightly, unnaturally alive.

Bucky’s head lifted slightly.

A sound.
Small.
Fractured.
A hiccuping cry.

He froze. One hand shot out, catching Strange’s arm. The sorcerer stopped mid-incantation, glancing back. Bucky’s eyes were wide, sharp.

Then—
“Mama…”

A voice. So soft it could’ve been wind, but it wasn’t. He knew that voice. Knew it like he knew his own name.

“Mama… ‘m scared… want Bucky… want Junie…”

The breath left his chest like a punch. It came again—wetter this time, muffled.

“I be good… I be good now…”

His jaw clenched. His fingers curled into fists. He could see Strange tense, feel the magic stir like it had been challenged.

Bucky’s voice was low, steel beneath water. “They have her awake.”

Strange didn’t ask how he knew. He simply nodded. “The sigil on the ruins is active. It’s channeling her essence. They’re draining her—emotionally, psychically. That kind of spell feeds on innocence. Fear.”

Bucky moved before the words had fully settled.

“Wait,” Strange hissed, but Bucky had already slid into position behind a moss-covered stone. The ruins lay just ahead now, a faint light flickering in the crumbling interior—green and sickly, pulsing in rhythm with a ritual. Voices chanted low. Hooded figures. A ring of candles. And in the center—

Nadia.
Small. Shivering. Clutching a blanket that wasn’t hers. Her cheeks were wet, eyes huge. A charm pulsed faintly at her throat—restraining her. Suppressing her.

Her mouth moved again. “Mama…”

Bucky didn’t breathe.
Didn’t blink.

He’d seen horrors. Done worse.

But this—
This made something snap.

His eyes locked on Strange. “Tell me when.”

The sorcerer’s lips moved silently. Runes flared to life around his hands. His eyes flicked up—determined.

“Now.”

And Bucky surged forward, silent as death.

Bucky moved like shadow, a wraith in black, slipping between the ancient stones. The witches didn’t see him—so intent they were on their ritual, hands lifted, voices rising in a dissonant chant that clawed at the air.

But Nadia saw him.

Her eyes widened. A hiccup caught in her throat, the blanket slipping from her fingers. She opened her mouth—
“Bu—”

He raised a finger to his lips from across the ruin. Stay quiet, sweetheart. I’m coming.

Behind him, Strange’s incantation reached a crescendo. The air shivered, like reality itself had caught its breath.

The circle faltered. One of the witches flinched. Another turned, just slightly, frowning.

Too late.

Strange struck.

Blue fire lashed outward, slicing through the air with precision. Glyphs burst into radiant form, disrupting the sigils carved into the stone floor. Candles guttered and died. The magic broke—not fully, but enough.

Enough for Bucky to move.

He was on them—metal arm catching the first witch across the jaw, sending her flying into a pillar. The second raised her hands, panic in her eyes, but he ducked the curse and slammed her into the altar’s edge. Bone cracked.

Another witch screamed, conjuring a blast of raw fire—

Strange deflected it mid-air, flicking his wrist. The spell shattered harmlessly into golden sparks.

Nadia cried out again—louder this time. “BUCKY!”

And that—

That was it.

He surged forward. Past the altar. Past the reeling witches.

He dropped to his knees in front of her, tearing the charm from her neck in one motion. Nadia threw herself at him, clutching his neck like she might never let go again. He wrapped his arms around her, metal hand cradling the back of her head.

“I got you,” he whispered, barely audible above the chaos. “You’re okay now. I promise.”

Behind them, Strange cast a containment ward over the remaining witches—what few hadn’t fled into the trees. They howled in frustration, their power sputtering like wet ash.

“You dare interfere—” one began, her voice shrill.

“She’s a child,” Strange snapped, eyes blazing. “Whatever you think you’re awakening—it’s done.”

Bucky stood slowly, Nadia in his arms, her face buried against his chest.

He looked at the witch still speaking.

And didn’t say a word.

He didn’t have to.

The look in his eyes said it all.

The portal closed behind them with a whisper.

The Sanctum’s interior felt like stepping into a different world—rich with warmth, golden candlelight flickering against high arched walls. But to Nadia, still sobbing quietly in Bucky’s arms, it was no sanctuary yet. Her fingers clung to the collar of his jacket, wet from her tears, her small body trembling with exhaustion and confusion.

“She’s still scared.”

“She will be for some time,” Strange said, already directing his magic. The two bound witches hovered just off the floor, suspended in a containment field that shimmered like spun glass. “Their rite was incomplete, but something in her blood called to them. They’ll talk. Or they’ll rot here trying.”

Nadia let out a hiccup, sniffling, still too young to understand what had happened. Her wide eyes darted to the swirling glow of the containment spell—then to the crimson blur drifting toward her.

The Cloak of Levitation.

It floated softly beside her, curling its hem like a curious cat, giving a gentle flap near her cheek as if to say hello. She blinked, startled, then reached out a tiny hand.

The Cloak nudged her hand in return.

Nadia stilled, her little lip still trembling, but the cloak wrapped gently around her shoulders. She let out a small sigh—her first unshaken breath since the ritual had begun—and leaned into Bucky’s chest.

“…It likes her,” Bucky said quietly, watching the cloak settle around the child like a protective shawl.

“Magic knows magic,” Strange replied, cold gaze now fixed on the witches. “Even if she doesn’t yet.”

One of the witches snarled. “The blood sings. She is the Vessel—we only opened the door.”

“Vessel for what?” Strange stepped forward, eyes narrowing.

“For the Old Blood. What your kind buried and called unnatural. We remember. We wait for the child who can hold it again.”

“And you think tearing her from her mother would awaken that willingly?” Strange’s voice cut like a blade. “You’re lucky I stopped at binding you.”

“She won’t stay hidden forever,” the other witch said, lips curled. “That child is the key. She will always be hunted, unless she is shaped.”

Bucky’s jaw clenched. He felt Nadia tense slightly, perhaps at the harshness of the voices, or simply sensing the tension burning through him.

Strange turned slightly toward him. “Take her upstairs. She shouldn’t hear more of this. I’ll extract what’s needed.”

Bucky hesitated. “Katherine…”

“She’s waiting. Go.”

The cloak gave a final flutter, as if reassuring Bucky itself, and stayed snug around Nadia as he carried her up the Sanctum stairs—each step drawing them closer to the the portal Strange opens up.

Chapter Text

Chapter 19

The portal cracked open with a hum of shifting magic and metal.

Katherine turned before the sound fully registered, her heart already racing, her hands half-raised—reaching instinctively.

Then she saw her.

Nadia.

Carried in Bucky’s arms, face blotchy and tired from crying, but alive. Safe. Whole.

A broken sob wrenched from Katherine’s chest as she stumbled forward. Bucky didn’t hesitate—he set Nadia down gently on the floor, and the toddler rushed forward in a blur of small limbs and choking whimpers.

“Mama!”

Katherine dropped to her knees.

The impact of Nadia’s little body against her chest knocked the breath from her lungs, and for a moment all Katherine could do was hold her. Arms wrapped tightly around the child, face buried in the crown of Nadia’s hair, inhaling her scent like she could anchor herself to it. Her fingers trembled as they cradled her daughter’s face, checking her cheeks, her arms, whispering prayers and names over and over.

“Az sŭm tuk. I’m here, I’m here, baby… I’ve got you. I’ve got you…”

Nadia was crying, but it was the sound of release—small hiccups against her mother’s chest, her tiny hands fisted in Katherine’s sweater.

“Bucky—Bucky came,” she whispered hoarsely. “And red cloak, and—”

Katherine rocked her, tears finally sliding free. “I know, my dove. I know… shhhh. You’re safe. You’re safe.”

Behind them, Bucky stood still for a beat, watching—exhausted, cut across the cheek, but steady. His eyes softened at the sight.

Wong approached quietly and waited a respectful moment before he spoke. “You’re welcome to stay here, both of you. As long as you need. The Sanctum will make room.”

Katherine looked up, cradling Nadia tighter as if afraid she’d vanish again. “Thank you.”

Wong nodded, then glanced to Bucky.

“She needs time,” Bucky said quietly, though he didn’t stop looking at them. “But we need answers.”

Wong motioned with a tilt of his head. “Strange is waiting below. The coven’s bindings are holding. We’ll see what truths they’re willing to bleed.”

Bucky glanced once more at Katherine, who nodded silently, still swaying with Nadia.

He followed Wong without a word, the sound of Nadia’s soft breathing slowly fading as they descended into the Sanctum’s lower levels—toward the dark root of the thing that had tried to steal a child, and the reckoning to follow.

The walls were etched in protective runes, ancient and glowing faintly—wards humming low like a heartbeat.

The air smelled of scorched incense and iron.

The witches—four of them, bound in a circle of sigils—sat cloaked in shadows, their eyes watching Strange like jackals held just at bay. Even restrained, there was an arrogance to them. An old confidence that came from centuries of inherited power.

Strange stood at the center, unblinking. His hands hovered, weaving slow spirals of light through the air—enough to remind them that truth would come, one way or another.

The door opened.

Wong entered first, solemn and silent.

Then Bucky.

And suddenly the energy in the room changed.

Bucky’s eyes locked on the coven. He said nothing—but the cold, measured steps of a man who’d seen war and survived it said everything. One of the witches—a younger one, the veil slipping over her defiance—visibly flinched.

Strange glanced at him briefly. “How’s the girl?”

“She’s with her mother,” Bucky said flatly. “Now I want to know why you took her.”

An older witch smiled slowly, baring teeth like a wolf. “Because she’s meant. Born of cursed blood, forged from running centuries. She’s the Vessel. A bridge between silence and awakening.”

Strange’s eyes darkened. “You violated sacred boundaries. Magic drawn by bloodlines is dangerous. Tearing it open in a child is unconscionable.”

“She is not just a child,” the witch snapped. “She is prophecy. She was always meant for the Old Blood. For the return.”

Wong stepped forward. “You exploited a child. There is no fate that justifies that.”

Another witch, voice brittle, hissed: “You don’t understand. The mother ran. Across centuries. Across dimensions. The magic followed her—it wants to be fulfilled. Nadia’s existence was never accidental.”

Bucky clenched his jaw.

“You talk about fate like it’s a cage,” he muttered. “Like she never had a chance.”

He stepped closer, voice dropping. “But here’s the thing—I’ve been fate’s weapon. I know what it looks like when people try to decide someone else’s future for them. It ends in blood.”

Strange’s hand twitched. “Why now?”

The eldest witch’s eyes gleamed. “Because she’s nearly three. The veil thins in the third year. That’s when vessels open. And if we hadn’t taken her, something worse would have come.”

Strange stepped forward, his magic pulsing hot and bright. “You don’t get to make that choice.”

Wong raised a hand, signaling restraint—but tension simmered just below the surface.

Bucky looked at them, eyes steel. “You’re going to undo whatever the hell you started. Or so help me—magic or not—I will find a way to make you pay.”

The eldest witch only smiled.

“Then you better pray the girl doesn’t remember.”

Silence fell like thunder.

Strange’s fingers twitched, binding glyphs tightening. The chamber pulsed.

The air was heavy with magic—thick like a storm pressing down on the skin.

Strange stood before the witches, sleeves rolled, focus razor-sharp. Glyphs circled in midair, ancient symbols rotating like clockwork above Nadia’s likeness, drawn in sand and salt.

Wong knelt beside the oldest witch, fingers pressed against her temple, eyes closed. “The spell is knotted deep. Layered, cruel. They bound her to a threshold that would pull as she grew—unseen, until it was too late.”

Strange didn’t answer. His hands moved precisely, unraveling the magic in silent phrases, one thread at a time. The room pulsed as the connection snapped—not violently, but with a quiet unmaking, like silk being cut by moonlight.

The witches writhed. Two of them screamed.

But Strange’s gaze never wavered.

“She’s free,” Wong confirmed, exhaling sharply.

But Strange was already turning away.

⸻

Later – Sanctum Sanctorum, Inner Study

The fire was low, casting long shadows on the ornate carpet. Strange stood near the hearth, arms crossed, a small velvet box resting on the table before him.

Katherine sat on the edge of the armchair, shoulders rigid. Bucky stood behind her, quiet but steady. His presence grounded her.

“She’s asleep now,” Wong had told them earlier. “Safe. Dreamless.”

Now, Strange’s eyes met Katherine’s.

“I found something,” he began, “while unraveling the binding sigils. A relic—an old one, meant for protection. It masks supernatural signatures. Makes her… invisible to those who would seek her out again.”

Katherine’s breath caught. “Why didn’t you use it before?”

Strange’s gaze softened, just a fraction. “Because I had to be sure. Her bloodline is… complex. It’s not just magic. It’s interwoven with something older. A fracture in reality itself.”

He opened the box.

Inside was a thin, gleaming pendant—silver edged in runes, almost ordinary in its simplicity.

“She should wear this at all times,” he said. “It will shield her from magical detection. A kind of cloaking tether. The spell will age with her.”

Katherine’s fingers hovered above it, hesitant. “What happens when she grows up? When it’s not enough?”

Strange nodded, as if expecting the question. “That’s why I want to offer lessons. Nothing invasive. Just… preparation. I’d like to begin when she’s seven. Old enough to choose. Old enough to understand.”

Katherine looked down, voice low. “And if I say no?”

“Then you say no,” Strange said gently. “But I’ve seen children like her—born with ancient ties, unaware of what stirs inside them. It’s better to face it on your terms than be blindsided later.”

She was quiet a long time.

Then Bucky spoke. “He’s right.”

Katherine looked at him sharply.

“You’ve spent your whole life running,” Bucky said. “You can’t stop the world from spinning. But you can help her stand steady when it does.”

Katherine’s throat worked. She picked up the pendant—light as a breath in her palm.

“I’ll think about it,” she whispered. “When she’s older.”

Strange nodded. “That’s all I ask.”

The door creaked softly as Katherine pushed it open.

The room was dimly lit by enchanted sconces, casting warm golden light across the soft rug and the little bed tucked against the far wall. Nadia lay curled beneath the covers, her small form rising and falling with each breath. One tiny hand was curled around the cloak that had comforted her—Strange’s relic, left with her at some point. It glowed faintly still.

Katherine lingered in the doorway.

She almost didn’t enter.

There was too much inside her—grief, guilt, gratitude—knotted together like vines wrapped too tight around her chest. But her feet moved before she gave them permission. Step by step until she sank to her knees at the bedside.

Nadia shifted, murmured something in her sleep, and Katherine reached out—gently brushing a strand of hair from her forehead. Warm. Whole. Here.

For a moment, that was everything.

And then it wasn’t enough.

Katherine bowed her head, pressing her lips to the back of Nadia’s hand. Her voice was barely a whisper.

“I’m sorry.”

She hadn’t said it before. Not when she left her as a baby. Not when she ran through realms and names and masks. She hadn’t stopped long enough to say it.

“I wanted to protect you by being strong on my own,” she said, tears threading her voice. “I told myself it was love. But love is also accepting help.”

Nadia shifted again but didn’t wake.

Katherine looked at her daughter’s face—peaceful now, though tear-streaked not long ago—and felt something shift inside her.

Resolve.

“I don’t want you to be like me,” she whispered. “Running. Always afraid someone’s going to find you and take everything. I want you to be stronger than me. Strong enough to look monsters in the eye and never flinch.”

She swallowed hard.

“I want you to face people like Klaus one day—not because you have to. But because you can. With your head held high.”

Silence answered her. But it wasn’t empty. It was full of possibility. Of the long road ahead.

Katherine pressed one more kiss to her daughter’s hand and stood. She left the door ajar behind her, just in case Nadia woke and needed her.

Because from now on—she won’t run.

The door clicked softly shut behind Katherine as she stepped out into the corridor. The light was dim, shadows brushing the walls in quiet, gilded movement as the Sanctum shifted around them—never quite still, never quite silent.

Bucky was waiting.

He leaned against the opposite wall, arms folded, eyes fixed on the floor. He hadn’t changed out of the gear he wore on the mission. A faint scrape of blood—someone else’s—still stained the edge of his sleeve.

Katherine hesitated.

He looked up at the sound of her breath catching. And for a moment, neither of them said anything.

She tucked her arms around herself. “She’s asleep.”

Bucky nodded. “Good.”

A pause. Weighted and dense.

Katherine glanced down the corridor. Her voice was quiet—unsteady. “So… now you know. Everything.”

Another pause.

Bucky didn’t speak right away. He pushed off the wall slowly, his steps steady as he moved closer. He looked at her—not through her, not past her, but at her. And she hated how it made something ache deep in her chest.

“I thought about a lot of things when Strange said we had to get her back,” he said finally. “What we were walking into. What kind of magic we were up against. Whether I’d be fast enough if it came to a fight.”

He met her eyes.

“I didn’t think about you keeping this from me.”

Katherine’s throat tightened. “I didn’t want to - I just… didn’t know how to tell you that I’ve been hunted. That my daughter was born from blood magic. That I’m the reason any of this ever touched your life.”

“And yet here we are.”

She closed her eyes briefly. “I know.”

When she opened them, he was still looking at her—but softer now. Less winter soldier, more man.

“I thought you’d leave,” she said quietly, her voice starting to crack. “That you’d turn around and decide it wasn’t worth it. That I wasn’t worth it. That whatever this was between us—” She swallowed. “—was over before it ever really began.”

Bucky was quiet for a beat.

Then he said, simply, “You don’t scare me.”

Katherine blinked.

“I’ve seen monsters,” he said. “Been one. Been used like one. But I’ve also seen people claw their way back from the edge. I’ve seen what guilt can do. And I’ve seen what love can save.”

He reached out—not rushing, not assuming—just offering.

His flesh hand, calloused and warm, brushed the edge of hers.

“I care about you,” he said. “Even with all of it. Maybe because of it.”

Katherine’s breath stuttered.

“This doesn’t scare me,” he repeated. “You don’t scare me.”

Her eyes burned suddenly, too full of unshed tears. She didn’t move—didn’t trust herself to.

The corridor was quiet, the weight of what had just happened still hanging in the air. She glanced down at their hands, then up at him—expecting distance.

Instead, Bucky just looked at her with that same unreadable softness that had been growing since the day they met.

“You’re not… freaked out?” she asked quietly. “After everything?”

Bucky tilted his head, a dry breath escaping his chest. “I’ve had worse first date stories.”

That startled a laugh from her, rough at the edges. “You say that now.”

“And I mean it.” He looked at her more seriously now. “You survived vampires, time, dimensions—all to protect your kid. You’re not dangerous, Katherine. You’re just… human. Messy, stubborn, loyal as hell.”

She blinked, throat tightening. “You really think that’s all I am?”

“I know it is.” His voice was firm. “You’re a mother.”

A beat passed. She looked like she might cry again, but she swallowed it down.

Then Bucky leaned in a little closer and added with a small, crooked grin, “And technically… you’re from the 1490s, right?”

Katherine’s brows lifted. “Right…”

“So this is officially the first time I’m dating someone older than me.”

She gaped at him—then laughed in spite of herself, the sound spilling out raw and full of relief. “James Buchanan Barnes.”

“Hey,” he said with mock gravity, “I’m just trying to respect my elders.”

She nudged him in the ribs, gently. “You’re ridiculous.”

His smile softened as he looked at her. “Yeah. But you’re still holding my hand.”

She paused, then curled her fingers tighter around his.

“I guess I am.”

Chapter Text

Chapter 20

It happened strangely, like slipping into a dream you didn’t realize you’d been chasing.

The apartment was dim and quiet. Katherine had insisted on making tea, though she forgot it steeping on the counter. Bucky didn’t remind her. He just watched her move—distracted, tired, too haunted to be alone.

Nadia was curled up on the couch, thumb in her mouth, half-asleep in Bucky’s hoodie. She’d refused to let him take it back.

“I can go,” Bucky said gently. “If you two need time, I get it.”

Katherine glanced up from where she stood near the sink. “You don’t have to,” she said too quickly, then caught herself and softened the words. “I mean… stay. Please.”

A beat. Bucky nodded. “Couch is fine.”

“There’s enough space,” she said, almost offhanded, but her voice was tight around the edges. “In the bed. I’m not asking for anything—I just… I’d sleep better if someone was there.”

Bucky didn’t move for a moment, uncertain if he was misreading something.

Katherine saw it. “It’s not about that. It’s about… feeling safe, that I’m not on my own with protecting her.”

He is hesitant.

“Alright,” he said quietly. “But I’m taking the edge.”

She almost smiled. “Of course.”

⸻

Later, in the quiet warmth of her room, the three of them lay tangled beneath a blanket. Nadia was the bridge—between silence and understanding, curled between them with the trust only a child can carry. Her little fingers were wrapped around Bucky’s vibranium thumb.

“She’s good at cuddling,” Katherine murmured into the dark, her voice like something gentle and half-forgotten.

Bucky looked down at the sleeping girl, chest rising steady. “Yeah,” he said, a little husky. “She’s kind of got a death grip on my arm.”

“She likes you.”

“She’s a smart kid.”

There was a silence, not heavy, just tender.

“You jealous?” he teased, voice low and teasing. “She picked me.”

Katherine’s response came quicker than he expected. “A little. She’s cuddling with you. I haven’t even gotten to that step yet.”

He blinked.

And then—he laughed, surprised and full-bodied. The sound rumbled in his chest.

“You just blindsided me, Kat.”

“Well,” she said, settling in closer, her voice soft and dry, “now we’re even.”

She didn’t mean to say more. But she didn’t need to.

Their hands didn’t quite touch under the covers.

But they didn’t pull away either.

The light was soft—early morning gray spilling through the sheer curtains like fog in the trees. Quiet wrapped the apartment in a kind of sanctuary, broken only by the occasional hum of the heater and the faint stir of a city still sleeping.

Bucky blinked awake slowly.

For the first time in what felt like years, he hadn’t dreamed. No flashes of war, no cold steel tables, no commands echoing in a language that stripped him of himself. Just peace.

And warmth.

Nadia was tucked beneath his arm, curled close like a kitten, her breath soft against his side. A tangle of curls covered half her face, and her little fingers still gripped the edge of his shirt.

Then his eyes shifted.

Katherine.

She lay facing him, the soft rise and fall of her breath mirrored in the gentle arch of her spine beneath the blanket. Her long hair fanned out across the pillow, and when her eyes opened—rich and dark and deep with something unreadable—he forgot, for a moment, to breathe.

She smiled.

It wasn’t a big smile. Nothing forced. Just something quiet, content, like she hadn’t expected to wake up with someone still there and was trying to commit it to memory.

Bucky stared.

“Hey,” she whispered, her voice still threaded with sleep.

His hand moved before he could think. Slowly, carefully, he reached across Nadia’s small form and touched her cheek with the backs of his fingers. A gentle stroke. Warm. Uncertain.

Katherine froze—not in fear, but in surprise. Her eyes widened slightly, then softened.

She didn’t pull away.

Bucky’s voice was rough when it finally came. “You look…” He trailed off, unable to finish the sentence. Beautiful felt too fragile a word. Sacred felt too much.

Her smile deepened, barely. “I know.”

He huffed a laugh through his nose, lowering his hand but not turning away.

For a minute, they just looked at each other. No masks. No defenses.

Just them.

And in the stillness, something old and wounded started to knit back together—something neither of them had words for yet, but both were finally willing to reach for.

The sun poured in soft through the kitchen window, catching dust motes in golden halos. The apartment still carried the hush of early morning—no cars honking yet, no rush of outside life.

Katherine moved quietly between the cabinets, pulling out bowls and bread, setting the stovetop to low. Her hair was braided over one shoulder, slightly messy, her sweatshirt sliding off one shoulder. She hadn’t meant to let Bucky stay. She hadn’t meant for it to feel… normal.

Behind her, soft footsteps padded across the floor.

“Up already?” she called gently over her shoulder.

“Just me,” came Bucky’s voice, low and still sleep-rough.

When she turned, she saw Nadia in his arms, half-asleep still, head tucked beneath his chin like it belonged there. Her tiny hand clung to the collar of his shirt, her curls a wild halo.

“I heard her call out,” he said. “Figured I’d get her before she started a full-scale operation.”

Katherine blinked. She hadn’t even heard her daughter stir.

“You didn’t have to—”
“I know.”

She smiled faintly. Not out of politeness. Out of something deeper. Something quieter.

He moved to the couch and sat down with Nadia in his lap, rubbing her back in slow, soothing circles. She blinked awake fully now, soft and warm against him.

“Hi, Mommy,” Nadia mumbled, rubbing her eyes.

“Hi, sweetheart,” Katherine called as she cracked eggs into a bowl. “We’re making toast and eggs. Want to help?”

Nadia sat up straighter on Bucky’s knee. “I help with stirring.”

“You stir, I supervise,” Bucky said.

“That’s not how it works,” Nadia informed him with a very serious expression.

Katherine chuckled under her breath.

While she moved around the kitchen, Bucky stayed with Nadia, letting her sit on his lap at the table, guiding her small hands as they mixed. He didn’t ask where things went or how to help. He just did—like he always had since they let each other close. Quiet gestures. No permission needed. No thanks expected.

Katherine glanced over at him while she flipped the eggs. The way his metal hand steadied the bowl while his other supported Nadia’s tiny grip on the spoon. The way he nodded along seriously to her babbling about stuffed animals and dreams.

Something loosened in her chest.

He wasn’t trying to replace anything. He wasn’t trying to fix her. He was just… here.

She set the plates on the table a few minutes later, one for each of them—cut toast, scrambled eggs, and a little bowl of blueberries just the way Nadia liked.

“Breakfast is served,” she said softly.

“Yay!” Nadia clapped, sliding off Bucky’s lap and climbing into her chair.

Bucky stood up to help her settle, then paused—Katherine’s eyes on him, just for a moment longer than necessary.

“Thank you,” she said quietly.

He didn’t say anything. Just nodded.

But there was something different in the air now. Something full of quiet belonging.

Something like a home.

Chapter Text

Chapter 21

It had been a month since they brought Nadia home.

Thirty quiet, chaotic, strange days.

No grand confessions. No first kiss. No declarations made in dark hallways.

But Bucky was there. Nearly every day.

Some mornings, he brought coffee. Others, he just brought himself—always early, always steady, always acting like he had nowhere more important to be. Katherine never asked, and he never offered. But he stayed.

They didn’t talk about it.

Their relationship hadn’t changed. At least, not on the surface.

Katherine was still Katherine—guarded but warm, mother first, woman second. And Bucky was still Bucky—unflinching in danger, speechless in intimacy. They passed like that. Close, orbiting, drawn in like tides to each other but never letting the waves crash.

They had other things to focus on anyway.

Like Nadia.

Who had discovered—much to Strange’s growing exasperation—that she could make things float when she was upset. Or make them explode. Or worse, make them laugh.

“Bucky, Bucky! Watch!” she said one afternoon, eyes wide with glee, as she sent her stuffed duck flying across the living room like a missile.

It smacked against the wall and dropped like a stone.

“Uh-huh,” Bucky said, sidestepping expertly as a second toy whooshed past his ear. “Great. That’s… that’s terrifying.”

Katherine caught the third one midair before it could hit her square in the back. “Nadia!”

“Sorry!”

Bucky leaned against the counter, raising a brow. “You do know she’s gonna start levitating the couch next, right?”

Katherine sighed, brushing a hand through her hair, eyes tired but smiling faintly. “It’s like having a toddler with a slingshot and no safety switch.”

Bucky’s phone buzzed.

He didn’t need to check it. Only one person ever called anymore: Strange. Who had, reluctantly, become their unofficial “witch-baby pediatrician.” Bucky had the man on speed dial. Once, he’d caught himself almost texting him a picture of Nadia with spaghetti on her head just to prove she was still mostly human.

Strange had advised patience, routine, grounding exercises, and—under his breath—possibly a lead-lined crib.

Not that Bucky minded. Not really.

Nadia was… well, she was a good kid. Empathetic. Oddly aware of other people’s feelings. Even when she accidentally launched a spoon across the room, she was the first to run and say sorry, her little hand patting his cheek, her big eyes apologetic.

“She gets that from you,” Bucky had said once.

Katherine had blinked at him, then looked away. “She gets her stubbornness from me. Her kindness… I think she brought that with her.”

It was late now. The toys had settled. Nadia curled up asleep on the couch, hand fisted around the ear of her duck. Katherine tucked a blanket over her, then sank into the armchair opposite Bucky.

The silence stretched, not uncomfortable. Just… full.

He watched her for a long moment.

“You know,” he said quietly, “we should probably talk about it.”

Katherine didn’t look at him. She traced the edge of the blanket between her fingers. “About what?”

He gave a small, dry smile. “Exactly.”

She looked up then, their eyes meeting across the room, both of them bracing for something neither had words for.

But nothing came.

So they sat like that, unsaid things thick in the air between them. Something forming. Slowly. Gently. Like gravity.

It started with a giggle.

Bucky had heard enough of Nadia’s mischief-laced laughter by now to recognize the pitch of danger behind it. He was halfway down the hall, a towel slung over his shoulder, when the laugh turned into a shriek of delight—and then the crash followed.

“Katherine!” he shouted, bursting into the bedroom.

She was already there, barefoot on the hardwood, arms outstretched in horror as the entire bed hovered mid-air—wobbling, tilted dangerously on one corner.

“Nadia, no!” Katherine cried.

Nadia, crouched on the floor beneath the bed, was giggling uncontrollably—little hands glowing faintly with violet light, brows furrowed in concentration as if the chaos was a game.

The glow flickered. The bed dropped a full foot with a slam.

Bucky launched forward, metal arm out. “Get back!”

He slid beneath the frame, grabbed Nadia, and rolled out just as the bed thudded to the floor with a thunderous quake.

Katherine collapsed beside them on the floor, clutching Nadia to her chest, heart hammering loud enough Bucky could hear it.

“I—I didn’t mean to,” Nadia mumbled, voice small against her mother’s shoulder.

“I know, baby,” Katherine whispered, arms wrapped tight. “I know.”

But her voice shook. Her hands did too.

⸻

Later, at the Sanctum.

Strange stood silently, arms crossed as Bucky recounted the incident. Wong stood beside him, expression unreadable but watchful.

“She levitated the whole damn bed,” Bucky said, pacing. “She’s still a kid. It wasn’t like the other stuff. This was controlled. Intentional.”

Strange raised a brow. “You say that like it’s a bad thing.”

“She almost crushed herself,” Katherine snapped from the side. Her voice was raw—equal parts guilt and fury. “It’s not cute anymore. It’s not manageable. She needs more than what I can give her.”

Strange met her gaze.

“And you’re ready to let her have that?”

The question stung, though it wasn’t cruel. Just honest.

Katherine looked over at Nadia, who sat on the stairs giggling at the Cloak of Levitation teasing at her hair.

She’d nearly died hours ago.

And she was still just a child.

Katherine inhaled slowly. “I don’t want her to feel like there’s something wrong with her.”

“There isn’t,” Wong said gently. “But there is something in her. And pretending it doesn’t exist won’t keep her safe.”

Strange stepped forward, tone less clinical now. “I won’t push her. But I will teach her how to survive what’s inside her. And how to stop others from exploiting it.”

Katherine hesitated, then knelt beside Nadia.

“Sweetheart,” she said, brushing hair from her daughter’s face, “do you want to go with the nice wizards today? Maybe just for a little bit?”

Nadia tilted her head. “Will you come too?”

Katherine’s throat bobbed. “Not today. But I’ll be right here when you come back.”

Nadia considered this.

“Okay,” she said solemnly. “But only if Mr. Cloak comes too.”

The Cloak of Levitation did a dramatic little bow, which made her giggle again.

Bucky put a hand gently on Katherine’s back. She didn’t lean into it—but she didn’t move away either.

“She’s going to be okay,” he murmured. “And so are you.”

Katherine didn’t answer, eyes on the door as Strange and Wong led Nadia down the hall—tiny footsteps echoing beside wizard robes and floating fabric.

She had never let anyone fight for her before.

Now, she was learning how to let someone fight for her daughter..
————

The Sanctum was quieter than usual—still layered with its usual hum of ancient spells and enchantments, but softened today by the gentle sound of giggles and Wong’s patient voice.

In one of the upper chambers, books floated just out of reach, orbiting slowly like stars. Nadia sat cross-legged on a velvet cushion, her small fingers pressed together in concentration, a tiny spark of golden light flickering between them. Her brow was furrowed, tongue poking slightly from the corner of her mouth.

“Good,” Wong said, kneeling beside her. “Now… not so much power. Remember what I said about tea?”

Nadia’s nose wrinkled. “Too hot and you burn your tongue.”

“Exactly. Magic is the same. You pour too fast, you break the cup.”

She nodded solemnly, adjusting her hands. The spark stabilized. Glowed.

Strange watched from the doorway, arms crossed, his brow lifted in the faintest trace of astonishment. “She’s three years old,” he murmured.

Wong didn’t look away from her. “She listens. She doesn’t try to control it out of ego. Just… wonder.”

“She’s apologised three times today,” Strange added, almost amused. “Once for startling a book. Once for bumping into a statue. Once for levitating your teacup without asking.”

“She meant each one,” Wong said with a small smile.

Strange hummed. “That may be the most terrifying thing about her.”

A knock echoed through the chamber as Katherine and Bucky stepped in. Katherine looked rested for once, but her eyes immediately found Nadia.

The little girl looked up, grinned, and scrambled to her feet.

“Mama!”

Katherine caught her, lifting her into her arms with a laugh as Nadia buried her face in her neck, arms tight around her. “Did you have fun?”

“She moved the bookshelf,” Wong said with a dry note. “Only a little.”

Nadia beamed proudly. “Wong said I was clever.”

“You are,” Bucky said, ruffling her hair, and she leaned toward him, arms stretching until Katherine transferred her over to him without hesitation. She curled easily against his shoulder, as if she’d been doing this her whole life.

Strange approached, hands clasped behind his back. “She’s gifted. I can’t ignore that. She doesn’t just have magic—she respects it.”

Katherine tensed slightly. “I haven’t decided about—”

But Nadia turned in Bucky’s arms to look at Strange seriously, her small face very sure. “See you tomorrow.”

Katherine blinked. “Nadia…”

“She decided,” Strange said with a flicker of surprise and something gentler—approval. “Not something I take lightly.”

Wong added softly, “She was never afraid of it. Only curious.”

Katherine swallowed, her hand brushing over Nadia’s back. She was so small. But steady in ways Katherine had never been at any age.

“Okay,” Katherine said quietly. “Tomorrow.”

Nadia smiled, content now, her head resting against Bucky’s shoulder as they made their way to the door.

Strange watched them go, and for the first time in a long while, he let himself feel something close to hope.

The sun dipped low behind the skyline, casting the street in hues of warm amber. Katherine walked beside Bucky, the sounds of the city quieting around them as evening settled in.

Nadia was curled against Bucky’s chest, her tiny arms looped sleepily around his neck, her breath warm and steady. The same couldn’t be said for Katherine’s.

“She didn’t even ask me,” she murmured, voice tight with a tangle of pride and nerves. “Just told Strange she’d be back tomorrow like it was normal.”

Bucky glanced down at her, smile tugging the corner of his mouth. “Maybe it is.”

Katherine let out a soft breath, part laugh, part disbelief. “That’s what scares me. How quickly all of this has become… real.”

He didn’t say anything at first. Just walked, the silence between them no longer heavy, just lived-in. Comfortable. Familiar.

“I was running,” she said eventually, eyes on the pavement. “Through time even, I thought that’s all I’d ever be—someone who survives, not someone who stays.”

“You stayed for her,” Bucky said quietly.

Katherine looked over at him. There was no judgment in his voice—just calm truth. “Yeah. And now I don’t know how to be anything else.”

“You learn. You stay. You fight when you need to. And when you can’t—someone’s got your back.”

He looked at her then, eyes catching in the golden spill of streetlight, and something settled between them. Not quite a promise. Not yet. But something solid.

“You really believe that?” she asked.

Bucky gave the faintest shrug. “Didn’t use to. I do now.”

They walked the last block in quiet. When they reached the steps to their apartment, Katherine reached out and touched his arm. It wasn’t dramatic. It was just grounding. Real.

“I didn’t think I’d ever have this,” she said. “Not just Nadia. But… this. Coming home with someone.”

Bucky’s voice was soft, just for her. “You deserve it.”

And maybe for the first time, she believed it.

Chapter Text

Chapter 22

⸻

They never talked about it outright—not in words. But it was there.

In the way Katherine would lean over the counter at the store when Bucky passed behind her, brushing her arm just enough to feel his warmth. The way his hand would linger half a second longer on the small of her back when they stepped through the Sanctum’s portal, back from collecting Nadia.

It wasn’t the kind of intimacy either of them had ever rushed into. For Katherine, touch had always been a currency, one she’d traded when she needed safety, power, or a way out. For Bucky, it had been something stolen, weaponized, distorted by years of being someone else.

But now…

Now it felt different.

Soft. Earned.

Katherine would catch him watching her sometimes, like he was memorizing. Not lustful, not even particularly intense. Just… present. Like he saw her. The way she tied her apron strings at the shop. The way she laughed with customers who didn’t know her history spanned with grief. The way she pulled her hair up at the end of a long day, like exhaling into herself.

And he was different, too. Looser in the shoulders. Freer with his smiles, even if they were small. He’d joke now—quiet, dry things that made her laugh when she wasn’t expecting it. And he let her tease him. About the way he always checked the locks twice. About how he couldn’t help organizing the spice rack by tactical usefulness.

It was slow. Unrushed.

The first real touch had been almost accidental. She’d brushed flour from his cheek one evening after baking with Nadia. Her fingers lingered, and he didn’t move. Didn’t speak. Just leaned into it like he didn’t want it to end.

The next day, he touched her wrist when she laughed too hard at one of his rare, deadpan jokes. A brush. A tether. She didn’t pull away.

Now it was part of the routine. The quiet looks. The growing tension.

It lived in the way their fingers brushed when they reached for the same spoon in the drawer. In the hush that followed certain glances. In the silent agreement that something was growing, and for the first time in a long time, neither of them was running from it.

It was late. The kind of late where even the Sanctum’s windows seemed to dim with the hush of the hour.

Nadia had been asleep for hours, tucked in safely after an enthusiastic retelling of her lesson with Wong that mostly involved dramatic sound effects and an accidental glowing hand.

The apartment was quiet. Warm.

Katherine was washing a few remaining dishes in the sink, her sleeves pushed up, hair slightly tousled, a faint smear of flour still at the curve of her jaw from earlier baking.

Bucky stood at the kitchen doorway, watching her.

She felt it—the weight of his eyes—and glanced over her shoulder. “What?”

He didn’t answer. Not at first. He crossed the space between them slowly, his steps sure but unhurried, like he was letting the silence stretch just a little longer.

When he was close enough, he reached out—his metal hand first, surprisingly gentle—wiping the flour from her jaw with the edge of his thumb.

“You always manage to look like a mess and a miracle at the same time,” he said softly.

Katherine blinked, caught off guard. Her heart stuttered. “That a compliment, Barnes?”

His lips quirked. “Yeah. Think so.”

The water kept running behind her, but neither moved to shut it off. Her hand lifted, hovering for a second, then rested against his chest,.

“This thing between us,” she murmured. “We’ve been dancing around it.”

“I’m tired of dancing,” Bucky said. Then, quieter: “If you are.”

Her breath caught, but she didn’t pull away.

“Just don’t disappear,” she whispered.

“Not unless you tell me to.”

He leaned in slowly, giving her every second to stop him. She didn’t. She tilted her chin, her hand tightening in his shirt as his lips brushed hers—soft at first, reverent. Testing.

Then again, deeper.

It wasn’t desperate. It was grounding—like they’d both been holding their breath for months and could finally exhale into each other.

When they pulled apart, Katherine stayed close, forehead against his.

“Well,” she said, trying for levity, though her voice trembled slightly, “I guess this means I’m not imagining it.”

“You’re not.” His voice was rougher now, threaded with feeling. “I’ve wanted to do that since the second day I met you.”

She smiled—small, real. “What took you so long?”

Bucky leaned in again, barely brushing her lips with his own. “Had to be sure you wouldn’t hex me.”

Katherine laughed, breathless. “I’m not a witch, remember?”

“Right,” he said, mouth curving against hers. “Just a miracle.”

The days settled into a rhythm—but something about the air between them had changed.

It wasn’t just about sharing space anymore, or picking up Nadia from the Sanctum, or making dinner side by side while trying to stop her from levitating utensils. It was the way Katherine laughed now—freer, lighter. The way she leaned into Bucky when they sat on the couch, not quite curled against him, but close enough to burn.

And when Nadia was asleep, tucked under her blankets in that determined toddler sprawl, the woman Katherine had once been—the one hidden beneath centuries of running and the fierce love of motherhood—began to show herself.

She was quick-witted. Sharp, in a way that made Bucky pay attention.

One evening, as she leaned against the counter sipping wine in an oversized sweatshirt, barefoot and entirely at ease, she raised a brow and said, “You realize, Barnes, that I’m not just someone’s mom, right?”

He blinked, caught mid-motion reaching for a pot. “Didn’t think you were.”

“No?” she asked, tilting her head. “Because ever since we kissed, you’ve been looking at me like I might break.”

Bucky put the pot down. He turned to face her, arms crossing loosely over his chest. “I’m not used to wanting things that feel this… normal.”

“Normal?” she repeated, amused. “This from the guy who’s technically a hundred and lived through multiple wars, assassinations, and a multiversal crisis.”

He snorted. “Okay, fair.”

Katherine moved closer, a flicker of challenge in her eyes. “You don’t have to protect me from your feelings, James.”

His breath hitched a little when she said his name like that—soft, sultry, like it tasted good in her mouth.

“And I’m not fragile. I’m not running anymore.”

He didn’t answer immediately. He looked at her—really looked. Not as Nadia’s mother. Not as the woman tangled in centuries of chaos. Just Katherine.

Witty. Beautiful. Brave.

And flirty, apparently—because she trailed a finger lightly up his arm and smirked. “That whole silent brooding thing? It’s cute. But I kind of want to see what you’re like when you let go a little.”

“Oh yeah?” he murmured, voice rough. “You think I’m cute?”

“I think you’re dangerous,” she said, voice like honey. “And sometimes, that’s even better.”

Bucky reached out, catching her wrist gently, drawing her hand up to rest against his chest. His eyes locked on hers.

“You’re full of surprises,” he said.

“You’ve only scratched the surface.”

Their lips met again—slow, deliberate, the kind of kiss that lingered like a promise.

He was starting to see her. Not as someone he needed to protect. Not just as the mother of a remarkable child. But as Katherine—clever, fierce, impossibly alive.

And damn if it didn’t make him fall just a little more.

The kiss deepened with a hunger neither had fully anticipated.

Bucky’s hand slid to Katherine’s waist, fingers curling against the soft cotton of her shirt as her back hit the edge of the kitchen counter. Her breath hitched, a soft, involuntary sound swallowed by his mouth, and her hands fisted in the front of his shirt—holding, anchoring, pulling him closer.

It wasn’t just want. It was time. It was longing pressed between them, the ache of years spent alone, the shared understanding of what it meant to run and fight and finally—finally—want something gentle.

She sighed against his lips, her nose brushing his. “You’re dangerous when you stop holding back.”

Bucky smiled against her mouth, low and hoarse. “So are you.”

Her legs shifted, body arching up to his. One of his hands slid up, fingers brushing her jaw as he kissed her again—slower now, but no less intense. Her skin was warm beneath his touch, her heartbeat thrumming fast where their chests met.

It was dizzying.

And it was just about to tip into something more when—

“Mama!”

The cry snapped through the apartment like a ripple of cold water. Small, distressed.

Katherine froze, her eyes wide, lips parted against Bucky’s.

Nadia.

Katherine pulled back, already moving. “She never cries out unless it’s a nightmare.”

Bucky stepped away, hands brushing his face as he pulled in a breath, trying to steady himself. He nodded silently, watching her disappear into the hall.

A moment later, he followed quietly, pausing at the door of Nadia’s room.

Inside, Katherine was already seated on the edge of the bed, arms curled gently around the small, trembling form. Nadia clung to her mother, whispering sleep-slurred words into her shoulder.

Bucky leaned against the doorway, his heartbeat slowing as he watched them—two lives that had become the center of his own in ways he hadn’t quite expected.

Katherine looked up, her eyes meeting his across the shadows. She didn’t say anything.

But her gaze lingered—soft, apologetic, and full of something else.

Something that said later.

And Bucky, his pulse still racing from the fire of their kiss, nodded once.

He could wait.

…………

The shop bell chimed as Katherine pushed open the door, a basket of herbs tucked under her arm, sunlight clinging to the ends of her curls. The scent of chamomile and rosemary followed her in, drifting with the lazy hum of the summer day.

The apartment above the shop was quiet.

Too quiet.

She climbed the stairs slowly, expecting to hear Nadia’s voice in the halls, the soft clatter of her toys, the way she always filled a room without even trying. But the silence reminded her she wasn’t home yet.

She found Bucky on the couch, elbows resting on his knees, eyes fixed on the flickering TV screen in front of him. His expression was unreadable.

“…and in an official statement earlier today, Sam Wilson announced he would not be taking up the mantle of Captain America. The shield has been returned to the government.”

The words hung in the air.

Katherine set the basket down quietly, the rustle of dried lavender the only sound for a long moment. “I thought Sam was supposed to take it,” she said softly.

Bucky didn’t look at her. “He was.”

She walked over, sat beside him. “So what happened?”

He shook his head, jaw working. “I don’t know. Maybe he didn’t feel ready. Maybe he didn’t want it. Maybe…” He exhaled sharply. “Maybe he thought he couldn’t live up to it.”

A pause.

Bucky leaned back, finally glancing at her.

“You ever have something given to you—something meant to matter—and all it does is remind you of who you used to be?”

Katherine looked down at her hands.

“Every day.”

His gaze softened. “Steve gave that shield to Sam because he believed in him. Not as a soldier. Not as a replacement. As him.”

Katherine tilted her head, studying him. “But you don’t think Sam believes in himself.”

“I think… I think he’s afraid of what it’ll mean. Of what people will expect it to mean.” He rubbed at his temple. “And I get that. I do. But part of me…”

He swallowed hard.

“…part of me’s angry. Not at him. At the world. That he even has to doubt it. That people will question him more than they ever questioned me. Or Steve.”

Katherine didn’t interrupt. Just let him speak.

He went on, quieter now. “The shield… it doesn’t just carry legacy. It carries guilt. It carries blood. And it never sat right in my hands. But with Sam? It could have. It should’ve. And now it’s in the hands of the same system that broke both of us.”

A silence stretched between them.

Then Katherine reached over, her fingers brushing his metal hand.

“I don’t know what it’s like,” she said gently. “To have the weight of a symbol. But I know what it is to carry ghosts. And I think… I think you needed Steve to give it to Sam so you could believe there was still something good in the world.”

She met his eyes.

“But the world doesn’t get to decide if that goodness survives. You do. Sam does. You fight for it every day just by staying.”

Bucky blinked.

And then—quietly, unexpectedly—he laughed once, almost bitterly. “You’re better at this than I am.”

She shrugged, a small smile tugging at her mouth. “I’m a mom now, it’s part of the job description.”

He leaned his head back against the couch, letting the silence sit now, less heavy. More shared.

And when she rested her head lightly on his shoulder, he didn’t flinch. Didn’t move.

He just let her stay.

Chapter Text

Chapter 23

The front door creaks open.

Bucky steps in, heavy boots soft against the floor. He doesn’t announce himself. Doesn’t need to. The apartment smells like lavender and something faintly sweet—Katherine’s tea, maybe. The lights are low, golden, warm.

She looks up from the couch, where she’s curled with a blanket and a book in her lap. She doesn’t ask if he’s okay.

She sees it in the way his shoulders slump. The way his jaw is tight from holding everything in.

Without a word, she sets the book aside and stands. Crosses the space slowly. He’s still in the doorway, eyes not quite meeting hers. Blood on his knuckles. Dried dirt on his sleeves.

She reaches for his jacket first, fingers brushing the lapel gently. He lets her take it off, lets her peel away the outer layers like she’s unwrapping something fragile.

His hands tremble just a little.

She guides him to the couch. He sits, and she disappears for a moment. When she returns, she kneels in front of him with a damp cloth. No antiseptic. No scolding.

Just the cloth.

She takes his left hand—the human one—first. Cleans it gently. Then the metal one. Her hands move with the same care, like even this piece of him deserves gentleness.

Still, not a word.

He watches her, chest rising and falling slowly. His eyes are tired but softer now. Less haunted.

When she finishes, she doesn’t move away. She sits beside him, shoulder to shoulder. Close enough to feel the warmth of her. They sit like that for a while. The city outside hums faintly through the window. It’s the only sound.

Then—finally—Bucky leans his head against her shoulder.

Not heavy. Not desperate.

Just there.

She turns her face slightly, resting her cheek against his hair. A soft breath escapes her. Relief. Or maybe recognition.

Because sometimes, healing doesn’t sound like words.

Sometimes, it’s just presence.

Dinner is done. The dishes clatter softly in the kitchen sink, water running. Bucky is drying a plate when he hears Nadia’s little voice from the living room.

“Daddy, can you help me with the puzzle?”

The word is so casual, so natural, it hits him like a gunshot.

He goes still.

Not Bucky. Not Bucky-man like she sometimes teased. Daddy.

Katherine hears it too—from across the apartment. She stops, the towel in her hand still dripping.

She turns slowly to see Bucky frozen, plate still in hand.

Nadia’s at the coffee table, head tilted, waiting for an answer. She doesn’t even realize what she’s done. It’s not performance. It’s not a joke. It’s just the word that made sense in her little world.

Katherine’s heart thuds.

Bucky finally puts the plate down. Wipes his hands on his jeans.

Then walks toward her.

“I didn’t…” he starts under his breath, “I never told her to call me that.”

“I know,” Katherine says softly, meeting him halfway.

He looks back toward the living room, at Nadia’s small form bent over the puzzle.

“I’m not her father.”

“You’re the one she runs to when she has a nightmare,” Katherine replies, voice low. “You’re the one who makes her laugh until she snorts. You fixed her favorite stuffed bunny when she cried over it. What you are to her… didn’t come from a name.”

He exhales, shaky.

“I don’t want to screw her up,” he says, almost to himself. “I don’t want to be something she counts on just to—”

“She’s already counting on you,” Katherine says gently. “And so am I.”

That quiet admission hangs between them.

Bucky turns back toward the living room.

Nadia, still at the puzzle, looks up again. “Daddy?”

His jaw tightens. Then he walks over and kneels beside her.

“Yeah, sweetheart?” he answers.

Katherine leans against the doorway, arms crossed over her chest—not closed off, but full. Full of fear, yes, but also something so close to hope it hurts.

She doesn’t correct Nadia.

She doesn’t stop her.

Because maybe, finally, it’s not wrong to let someone stay.

The television flickered with fanfare and applause, the news anchor’s voice filled with forced cheer.

“Today, the United States government officially unveils the new Captain America—John Walker.”

Katherine, curled up on the worn couch, a mug of cooling tea in her hands, stiffened beside Bucky. Her eyes flicked sideways to him.

Bucky didn’t say anything.

His jaw was tight, unreadable, but she knew that look—had started to learn the quiet signs of his unease. The way his shoulders set, the way he stared just past the screen rather than at it. Not blinking.

Nadia, cross-legged on the rug with a rainbow palette of play dough spread before her, looked up when the camera panned to the shield gleaming on Walker’s arm.

Her eyes lit up.

“He has blue eyes! Like the other Captain America!” she chirped, proud of her observation, clearly expecting praise.

She had no idea what she’d said—no idea that she’d twisted the knife without meaning to.

Katherine gently brushed a hand over Bucky’s arm. He didn’t flinch, but he was far away, somewhere inside a memory she couldn’t touch.

Nadia, already distracted again, squished the blue dough flat with a little squeal of delight.

Bucky’s voice came low after a moment. “That’s not his shield.”

Katherine looked at him fully now, soft but firm. “I know.”

He didn’t say more. Not then. But he sat there beside her, eyes on the screen and ghosts behind them. Katherine shifted just slightly, close enough for their shoulders to touch. No words—just the weight of presence, a quiet offering.

And Nadia, blissfully unaware, made a tiny star with her dough and placed it at Bucky’s feet.

“Here,” she grinned. “It’s for you.”

That broke something.

He blinked down at her, at the little messy fingers holding out her gift, and took the blue star like it was made of gold.

The night had settled in soft and quiet, the kind of silence that came when Nadia had finally been tucked in and the dishes were done. The television was off now, the remnants of dinner cleared away, and Katherine was folding a blanket on the edge of the couch when Bucky spoke from behind her.

“I’m gonna be gone a few days.”

She turned, pausing just slightly before nodding, reading the tension in his posture—the way he wasn’t quite looking at her. “Okay,” she said gently. “You don’t have to explain.”

His jaw shifted, like he wanted to argue with her acceptance, but he just exhaled instead. “Just need… a little space. Head’s been loud.”

She offered a faint smile, more understanding than she felt. “I get it. Sometimes it’s too much when you stay still for too long.”

He finally met her eyes then, something unspoken passing between them—gratitude, maybe. Or guilt.

Katherine walked toward him, stopping just close enough. “Just…” she reached out, resting her hand lightly on his arm, “keep in contact, alright? Even if it’s just a text.”

Bucky nodded. “I will.”

And then, with a look that lingered a moment too long, he left.

The door clicked shut behind him, and Katherine stood still for a few heartbeats in the quiet.

She didn’t chase. Didn’t call after him.

She just whispered, “Be safe,” to the room, knowing he’d never hear it—but hoping it reached him anyway.

Chapter Text

Chapter 24

Katherine sat curled on the couch, the news still murmuring low in the background though she hadn’t absorbed a word in the last ten minutes. She was scrolling through old photos on her phone—ones Bucky had taken of Nadia giggling with her face covered in flour, of the two of them in the park with Nadia on his shoulders, her little fingers tangled in his hair.

It was quiet upstairs. Nadia had been unusually subdued that day, even after her time at the Sanctum. And when Katherine had gone to check on her earlier, she found her curled up in bed, clutching the stuffed bunny Bucky had won at the fair, the one she’d proudly named “Captain Bun.”

Then came the moment that stopped her cold.

Nadia had looked up at her with those impossibly big brown eyes and asked, “When is Daddy coming back?”

Katherine had stilled.

She’d known it was coming—Nadia had already started calling him Bucky-dad when she was being especially silly—but this time it hadn’t been a joke, hadn’t been playful. Just soft, real, and said like it was the most natural thing in the world.

Katherine had knelt by her bed and brushed her hair back. “He’s just away for a little while, baby. He’ll come back.”

“Okay,” Nadia had whispered, then, after a pause, “He didn’t say bye to me.”

That was what cracked something in Katherine. Not anger. Not even hurt. Just a quiet grief for how deeply this man—who’d been so afraid to get close—had become family to a child who’d never had one.

Now, back on the couch, her fingers trembled slightly as she tapped open her messages. She stared at the blank screen under Bucky’s name.

And then she typed,
Nadia asked for you today.

A pause.

Then, slowly, she added:
She misses you. I do too.

She hesitated… and hit send.

The soft buzz of the city filtered through the closed windows, a muffled heartbeat against the stillness inside. The apartment was quiet—too quiet. A half-drunk cup of tea sat cooling on the windowsill, forgotten. The television was on but muted, casting flickering light across the room.

Katherine sat on the edge of the couch, phone in hand, thumb hovering over the screen. The last message she’d sent still sat there, unread. “Just checking in. Nadia keeps asking when you’re coming back.”

That was three days ago.

She didn’t write again. Not because she didn’t want to, but because she didn’t want to be that person. Clingy. Desperate. But her stomach had been in knots since that first night the silence started stretching too long. Bucky had disappeared before—vanishing into guilt, into silence—but it had been different then. Before Nadia called him “dad.” Before he’d held Katherine’s face in his hands and whispered promises like he almost believed them.

She stared at the message, thumb drifting to the “delete” button, then back.

Don’t be dramatic, she told herself. He’s probably just… busy.

But her mind spun through the possibilities anyway. Was he hurt? In trouble? Had something happened with Sam Wilson? Or worse—had she misread everything?

She stood abruptly and walked to the kitchen, needing to move, to do something other than wait. The kettle still sat on the stove, untouched since the first steep. She opened a cupboard just to close it again.

In the hallway, Nadia’s voice rose in a half-sleep whimper. Katherine stilled, listening. Then, silence.

She leaned her head against the cabinet door. Her heart thudded quietly in her chest, a rhythm of ache and doubt. He’d said he needed space—but space wasn’t supposed to feel like being erased.

With a quiet breath, she turned off the TV, tucked her phone under a pillow so she wouldn’t keep checking it, and turned off the lights.

But she didn’t sleep. Not really.

The afternoon light slanted through the Sanctum’s front windows, turning dust motes to glitter in the air. Katherine waited in the entryway, arms wrapped around herself, shifting her weight from foot to foot. The echo of distant footsteps, the low hum of some arcane energy—it all felt far too large, too quiet.

Then she heard it—Nadia’s laugh, bright and bursting, and the thump of her little feet running toward her.

“Mama!” Nadia came flying into Katherine’s arms, face flushed, curls bouncing. She clutched something crumpled in one small hand.

Katherine bent to catch her, exhaling a breath she hadn’t realized she was holding. “Hey, sweetheart. Did you have fun?”

“Dr. Strange is weird,” Nadia whispered conspiratorially, “but Wong is cool.”

Katherine smiled despite herself. “Yeah? What did Wong teach you today?”

Nadia uncurled her fingers and held up a small, clumsy paper airplane—creased, uneven, its nose bent just slightly. “This! He said it’s not magic, it’s science you can touch.”

“Well, that sounds pretty magical to me,” Katherine said softly, taking the plane in her hand, pretending to admire it like a rare treasure.

Nadia nodded, eyes wide and proud. “I can’t wait to show Dad when he gets back.”

The words landed like a stone dropped in Katherine’s chest. Her smile froze, just for a heartbeat. Then she forced it back into place.

“Yeah,” she said, but it came out too quiet.

Nadia was already moving on, babbling about a strange glowing sphere she wasn’t allowed to touch. Katherine tried to listen. Tried to follow. But her mind buzzed and blurred, her fingers gripping the paper plane just a little too tightly.

Dad.

That word again. So effortless from Nadia’s mouth. So heavy in Katherine’s ears.

She wanted to believe he’d come back. That Bucky was just working something out, that he’d walk through the door one day with that guilty half-smile, unsure how to begin apologizing. But each day that passed chipped away at the hope. She hated that Nadia still believed so easily, so completely. Hated how much she wanted to believe too.

Katherine held the plane like it was a fragile thing, her thumb tracing one of the folds.

“Let’s go home,” she murmured, her voice steady again—because someone’s had to be. “You can show me how it flies.”

Chapter Text

Chapter 25

The wind was sharp, tugging at Sam’s flight suit and biting through the fabric of Bucky’s jacket. They stood near the edge of the airstrip, watching as the last of the military cargo was loaded onto the plane.

The silence between them was thick with resentment.

“You shouldn’t have given up the shield,” Bucky said flatly.

Sam didn’t turn to look at him. “We’re not doing this.”

Bucky’s jaw clenched. “Steve trusted you with it. I trusted you.”

Sam exhaled slowly through his nose, trying to stay calm. “That’s not fair. You don’t know what kind of pressure that puts on someone.”

“I know exactly what kind of pressure it is. I lived under it for seventy years,” Bucky snapped.

Sam turned now, eyes narrowing. “Then maybe you should understand why I didn’t want it.”

Bucky looked away. His fingers itched like they used to when a trigger was nearby. His phone buzzed in his pocket.

He didn’t look at it right away.

Sam stepped closer. “You act like I betrayed him. But I made a choice. You don’t have to agree with it.”

“No,” Bucky said tightly. “But I have to live with it.”

The phone buzzed again. He finally pulled it out, just to stop the sound.

Katherine.
Hey. Just wanted to check in. Nadia keeps asking when you’re coming back. Hope you’re okay.

His thumb hovered over the screen. Then he locked the phone and shoved it back in his pocket.

Not now.

Sam had already turned away again, watching the Flag Smasher intel scroll across a nearby monitor.

“You wanna fight terrorists or argue about a shield?” Sam asked, voice neutral but tense.

Bucky followed his gaze. “Fine. But we’re doing it my way.”

Sam raised an eyebrow. “Which is?”

Bucky didn’t answer. He was already walking toward the plane, jaw clenched, shadows in his eyes.

Behind him, the weight of Katherine’s message sat unacknowledged in his pocket.

The abandoned warehouse on the outskirts of Munich was quiet—too quiet.

Sam crouched beside a cracked windowpane, watching the silhouettes moving through the gloom inside. Crates were being loaded into a truck. The boxes were marked with faded medical symbols—vaccines, if their intel was right.

Bucky stood behind him, arms crossed, gaze fixed. “You sure about this?”

“No,” Sam replied, adjusting his goggles. “But we’re here.”

They moved in quickly and quietly. Sam took to the upper level, wings tucked against his back as he crept along the rusted catwalk. Bucky moved ground level, silent and fast. For a moment, it felt like they had the drop.

Then the first blow landed.

A Flag Smasher rounded the truck and caught Bucky off-guard, slamming a fist into his chest and sending him flying into a stack of crates. Wood splintered. Dust billowed.

“What the—” Sam dove from the catwalk, wings flaring. “They’ve got strength.”

Super Soldier strength.

Bucky rolled to his feet, metal arm groaning as he blocked the next strike. The fight exploded from there—chaos wrapped in fists and fury. Sam circled above, dodging thrown crates and lashing out with his wings and Redwing, trying to pin down targets. Bucky was already grappling with two Flag Smashers, every punch he landed answered by something just as brutal.

They were outnumbered, outmatched—and no longer in control.

Then, from the side of the warehouse, a shout cut through the clash.

“Captain America!”

Sam turned sharply just in time to see the red, white, and blue shield slice through the air—clean, practiced—and slam into one of the super soldiers. John Walker stormed into the fray, clad in the familiar stars and stripes, followed closely by his partner, Lemar Hoskins.

For a brief second, it seemed like the tide would turn. But coordination was lacking, rhythm off. Bucky fought like a knife, clean and direct. Walker fought like a hammer—loud, showy, and heavy-handed. Sam was precision, but had to work around too many moving parts now.

“Who the hell are these guys?” Lemar muttered as he ducked a brutal kick.

“Flag Smashers,” Sam gritted. “And they’re juiced up.”

A Flag Smasher caught Walker’s shield midair and tossed it back like a toy. Walker stumbled, stunned.

Bucky yanked one of the enemies off Lemar, hurling them into a pillar with enough force to crack concrete. His breathing was rough, movements sharp. “This isn’t working!”

Another Flag Smasher jumped onto the truck bed. “Go!” she shouted to the driver.

The truck roared to life.

“Sam!” Bucky called out.

“I see it!”

Sam dove after the truck, wings streaking behind him. He managed to fire Redwing ahead, clipping the tire and slowing the vehicle—but not stopping it.

The remaining Flag Smashers covered the escape, slamming Walker to the ground and sending Lemar flying. Bucky barely caught Lemar before he collided with steel.

Then the truck was gone—tires screaming as it vanished into the forested road beyond the warehouse.

Silence fell in the aftermath.

Walker picked up the shield, jaw tight. “Thanks for the help.”

Bucky didn’t answer. He just stared at the shield in Walker’s hands with a look that could’ve cracked iron.

Sam landed beside him, panting. “They’re stronger than we thought.”

“Yeah,” Bucky muttered, eyes still on the shield. “And so is he.”

Walker gave them a half-hearted smile. “We should work together.”

But neither Sam nor Bucky said a word. They turned and walked away in silence, their shadows long behind them.

The air in the station’s holding room was thick with tension—sharp, unspoken, and stubborn. Fluorescent lights buzzed overhead, casting everything in a cold, sterile glow. Sam sat back in his chair, arms folded across his chest, jaw tight. Bucky didn’t sit at all—he stood with his back to the room, arms tense at his sides, eyes fixed on a point only he could see.

Neither man spoke. They didn’t have to. The silence was heavy with everything they weren’t saying.

Dr. Raynor watched them from across the room, her notepad untouched in her lap. She didn’t need to write anything down to see what was obvious: this wasn’t a team. Not yet. Just two men who had fought side by side but were now fighting everything else—including each other.

There was a sharp edge in the air, the kind of weight that settles between people when trust has been frayed and pride won’t let either of them be the first to speak.

Sam’s foot tapped once.

His mind was a storm he hadn’t outrun since Baltimore. Since Isaiah. The way the old man had looked at him—like he was just another piece in a system built to chew people up and forget them. A supersoldier, locked away and erased. It had shaken Sam. Rattled something deep in his bones. He’d spent years believing in the promise of the shield, of the man who carried it, and now he couldn’t even say what it meant anymore. Not without tasting blood in his mouth.

And Bucky—Bucky shifted his stance, but it wasn’t restlessness. It was restraint. He was keeping himself contained in that stillness, trying not to give in to the fury coiling just under his skin. Sam had given up the shield. Steve’s shield. And no matter how many times Bucky tried to convince himself it wasn’t personal—it was. Because if Steve had been wrong about Sam… maybe he’d been wrong about Bucky, too.

Maybe he’d been wrong to believe in him at all.

The silence deepened.

Not for lack of words.

But because what they had to say could break something.

And both of them were still deciding if it needed to be broken.

Dr. Raynor folded her hands over her notepad and looked between them with practiced calm. “Okay,” she said evenly. “Let’s not dance around it. You two have things you need to say.”

Bucky let out a bitter scoff. “Yeah, you think?”

Sam’s jaw flexed. “What do you want me to say, Barnes? That I’m sorry I didn’t become Steve? I’m not him. I didn’t take the shield because I didn’t think I could be him.”

Bucky leaned forward, the words like fire on his tongue. “That’s the problem. You gave up the shield like it didn’t mean anything. Like he didn’t mean anything.”

“That’s not fair—”

“You don’t understand what that shield meant. To me. To a lot of people. You handed it off to the government like it was just another piece of metal.”

Sam’s voice rose, his arms unfolding as his anger sparked. “I’m not the one clinging to the past like it’s all I’ve got left!”

“Because maybe it is!” Bucky shot to his feet, his voice sharp enough to cut steel. “You think I wanted any of this? I’m trying to do right. I’m trying to make amends. I need that legacy to mean something—because if it doesn’t, then what the hell was I even fighting for?”

The room fell still again. Only the hum of the overhead light broke the quiet.

Dr. Raynor waited a beat, then shifted in her seat. “When was the last time you spoke to Katherine and Nadia?”

The effect was immediate. Bucky’s mouth shut mid-breath. The tension in his body hardened into stone. He looked away.

Sam blinked, confused. “Wait—who?”

Dr. Raynor didn’t look at him. She kept her eyes on Bucky. “Katherine and her daughter,” she said gently. “They matter to you, don’t they?”

Sam turned to Bucky, his voice softer, but suspicious. “Who are they, Buck?”

Bucky stared at the floor, shoulders rising and falling like a man under water. “No one,” he muttered. “It’s not important.”

“It is important,” Dr. Raynor said firmly. “Because every time we start talking about what’s really going on, you bury it in Steve, in the shield, in some impossible idea of redemption. But this? This is real. Flesh and blood. A woman and her daughter who trusted you. Who maybe still do.”

The silence that followed Dr. Raynor’s words was thick, almost suffocating. Bucky didn’t sit. He paced once across the small therapy room, the soles of his boots brushing against the industrial carpet like ghost-steps. Then he stopped near the far wall, one hand running back through his hair, the other curled into a fist. The weight on him wasn’t visible, but it was there—in the tension of his shoulders, in the way his chest barely moved when he breathed.

“I don’t want to talk about them,” he said through gritted teeth.

Dr. Raynor didn’t flinch. Her tone stayed calm, measured. “That’s usually when people most need to.”

His head turned slowly, his gaze cutting back to her. “You bring up Steve. The shield. Then them. Why?”

“Because it’s all the same thing,” she answered. “You’re not fighting for Steve’s legacy—you’re hiding in it. Because it’s safer than admitting you’ve started building something for yourself.”

In the chair beside Bucky’s, Sam shifted. His arms had uncrossed. His posture wasn’t defensive anymore—just thoughtful.

“You really didn’t tell me you had people,” Sam said, voice low.

“It’s not like that,” Bucky muttered.

“Sounds like it is.”

Bucky looked away, jaw tight. He moved back to his chair, but didn’t sit. Instead, he gripped the back of it with both hands like it was the only thing tethering him to the moment.

“Katherine…” He paused, his mouth working around words that didn’t come easy. “She’s… smart. Kind. Strong. No powers. Just… her. And Nadia’s this little light—three years old and she already knows how to look straight at you, like she sees you. They trusted me.”

His voice cracked slightly. He swallowed and shook his head.

“I left. Said I needed space. Said I’d call. I didn’t. I watched the news. Let the silence grow like it would somehow protect them from me.”

Dr. Raynor leaned forward, not pushing—just present. “Why?”

“Because if I go back… and they look at me different—if I already ruined it and didn’t even know it—how the hell do I face that?”

Sam leaned on his knees, his voice gentler now. “Or maybe you didn’t ruin anything. Maybe they’re just waiting for you to stop running.”

Bucky closed his eyes. The light in the room seemed too bright all of a sudden, like it was exposing every shadow inside him.

“They’re better off not waiting.”

“You don’t get to decide that for them,” Dr. Raynor said quietly. “ Katherine trusted you with her daughter. That doesn’t happen because you wore a uniform. That’s you.”

He didn’t respond, but his hands tightened against the chair. His fingers were pale with pressure.

“Then why,” he asked finally, voice barely more than a breath, “do I feel like I’m gonna break it just by walking back in?”

“Because you still don’t believe you deserve any of it,” Dr. Raynor replied. “But here’s the thing, James—if you keep choosing guilt over connection, you’ll always be a soldier. Never a man.”

The room fell quiet again. Not the silence of avoidance this time—but of something heavier. The silence of a choice waiting to be made.

Bucky sat down slowly, his eyes fixed on the floor.

“I don’t want to talk about them anymore,” he said.

Dr. Raynor nodded. “Alright,” she said softly.
……….

Outside the police station, the tension didn’t lift—it just shifted. The sky was overcast, the city muffled under a thick gray quiet. Sam walked a step ahead, jaw locked, not speaking. Bucky trailed behind, arms crossed, eyes flicking to every movement, not because of a threat—just because watching was easier than talking.

The therapy session had cracked something open. Sam had sat through Bucky’s reluctant confession about Katherine and Nadia with quiet disbelief—like he didn’t know where to place it. A man who had said almost nothing personal now had a whole piece of himself Sam had never been shown. And the way Bucky had looked when he’d talked about them—like he didn’t think he deserved to say their names out loud.

Sam hadn’t said much afterward. Not because he didn’t care. But because he did. More than he expected to.

They didn’t get far before the black government SUV pulled up, tires grinding on pavement.

Walker stepped out with the same strained smile that hadn’t fooled either of them the first time. Hoskins followed, more relaxed but alert, playing good cop to Walker’s polished force.

“Gentlemen,” Walker called out like he was still on a parade ground. “That was quite a stunt in Germany. You should’ve let us handle it.”

Sam exhaled through his nose, low and controlled. “Didn’t realize we needed permission.”

Walker laughed—too loud, too performative. “Well, we’re all technically on the same side. You want to help, that’s great. But we have protocols.”

Bucky stepped forward, his silence finally breaking into a flat, cold stare. “We don’t work for you.”

Walker’s smile twitched. “Right. You don’t work for anybody. Must be nice.” He let that hang, then glanced at Hoskins, who offered a small shrug. “Look, we could use guys like you. You’ve got experience, skill. There’s a role for you in this if you want it.”

Sam tilted his head, eyes narrowing. “That an offer or a warning?”

Walker’s gaze sharpened just enough to be telling. “I’m trying to play ball here. But this is bigger than all of us. We have orders. If you get in the way…”

He let the words drop, unfinished. A threat delivered with a politician’s polish.

Bucky didn’t flinch. Sam didn’t smile.

“Stay out of our way,” Walker finished, then gave a mock salute and turned back to the SUV.

The doors slammed. The vehicle pulled off with a low growl.

Bucky stared after it for a long moment before muttering, “He’s gonna get someone killed.”

Sam nodded. “Yeah. Or worse—he’ll make people think he’s the answer.”

They stood in silence for a few more seconds, then Sam glanced at Bucky.

“We need to figure this out. Fast.”

Bucky didn’t nod, but he didn’t argue either.

“Zemo,” he said. “He knows Hydra. He knows the serum.”

Sam sighed. “You serious?”

Chapter Text

Chapter 26

The Raft was a fortress carved from steel and sea, a place built to hold the worst of the worst. Inside, the cells were cold, silent, and clinical—each one a box of isolation meant to strip a man of time and purpose. But Baron Helmut Zemo had never lost his purpose. He was simply patient.

It began with a book.

Bucky stood outside the cell block, eyes hard, voice low as he spoke to a guard—an old Hydra sympathizer buried in the system, one Bucky had flushed out weeks ago. A nod. A transaction. A shift in the rotation schedule.

Inside Zemo’s cell, the book was waiting on his bunk. Machiavelli. Not subtle, but fitting. Between the pages: a magnetic keycard, just small enough to pass unnoticed. Zemo’s fingers didn’t even tremble as he slid it into his coat lining. His eyes lifted once to the corner camera. He didn’t smile, but there was the suggestion of one.

An hour later, the fire alarm went off in the laundry room—smoke thick and billowing from a waste chute jammed with burning towels. Chaos spread fast. Guards scrambled. Doors locked. Systems overloaded. In the confusion, Zemo moved.

He was a shadow—deliberate, calm, unhurried. He walked with purpose, knowing exactly which corridors would be less patrolled, which doors would open under his touch. The uniforms did the rest—he’d taken one from a knocked-out guard in the smoke.

By the time the alert went system-wide, Zemo was already outside the main block, slipping through service corridors rarely used, his face shadowed beneath a security cap. His final obstacle—a coded exit door—opened with the second key Bucky had arranged.

He emerged into the rain, the sea churning below the platform. A black car idled at the edge of the restricted access road. The driver didn’t look at him. Zemo slipped inside and closed the door softly behind him.

Freedom always came at a cost.

The private hangar sat on the edge of the airfield like something forgotten—weathered metal walls, concrete floors slick with oil and history. A sleek jet waited inside, its engines silent but threatening, like a weapon sheathed.

Bucky stood near the far wall, arms folded, jaw clenched. His posture was still, military-straight, but his eyes betrayed something quieter, darker. Not regret. Not pride either. Just resolve—the kind born of old scars and worse decisions.

Sam paced.

He was all movement, all tension, his voice rising the moment Zemo stepped through the hangar doors in his pressed coat and polished shoes, every inch the nobleman he once was—and still pretended not to be.

“You broke him out?” Sam snapped, rounding on Bucky without preamble. “You didn’t even ask—”

“We need him,” Bucky said simply, his tone flat. Unapologetic.

“We need answers, not a psycho who blows up diplomats.”

Zemo tilted his head slightly, his eyes unreadable, almost amused. “Good to see you again, Wilson.”

“Don’t talk to me,” Sam shot back.

Zemo didn’t bristle. He never did. He merely stepped forward with the grace of someone who’d already won a silent argument in his head.

“I have information you won’t find anywhere else. Hydra. The serum. The new players. You want to stop the Flag Smashers?” He looked between them. “Then you need me.”

Sam turned away, exhaling hard, like the air around them had gotten too heavy to hold in. “This is a bad idea. Everything about this is a bad idea.”

Bucky said nothing. His face was a mask, carved from stillness. He didn’t look at Zemo. Didn’t look at Sam. Just stared at the jet like he was already seeing what came next—and trying not to flinch from it.

Zemo, ever the opportunist, climbed the stairs to the jet with practiced ease. “Shall we?”

The engines began to hum.

Sam shook his head, muttering under his breath. “We’re gonna regret this.”

Bucky didn’t argue.

Because deep down, he already did.

The tension in the room thickened the moment Zemo began to speak. His voice, smooth and cold, cut through the air like a blade, each word measured, each syllable calculated. The trio was standing in a rundown facility on the outskirts of Madripoor, and the dim light overhead flickered, casting long shadows across the concrete floor.

Zemo’s eyes fixed on Bucky as he stepped forward, a slight smile pulling at his lips, though there was no warmth in it. He knew what he was doing. He knew how to provoke Bucky.

“I know how to get under your skin,” Zemo said softly, almost like he was testing a theory. “Winter Soldier.”

Bucky’s jaw clenched, but he didn’t move. His eyes flickered briefly to Sam, who was watching with furrowed brows, confusion written all over his face. He didn’t understand what was happening—didn’t understand the weight of those words.

Zemo took a slow, deliberate step closer to Bucky, his gaze never leaving him. “You’ve killed so many people. And you don’t even remember.”

Bucky’s body went rigid, his hand curling into a fist at his side, but he didn’t speak. His eyes locked onto Zemo with a look of pure disdain, but it was clear—the words were having an effect.

Zemo smirked, knowing he had touched a nerve.

“Who did you kill, Bucky? Was it in the name of your country? Or did they just give you a name and a target? Did they feed you all the lies? Did you believe them?”

Bucky’s breath quickened, a muscle in his jaw jumping, but still, he didn’t respond. He didn’t give Zemo the satisfaction. But inside, the fight was already starting, clawing at the walls of his mind.

Sam, still trying to piece everything together, looked between the two men, sensing the power dynamic at play. He stepped forward, his voice cutting through the tension, trying to stop this before it went any further. “Zemo, knock it off.”

Zemo ignored him, his focus entirely on Bucky now. The play had begun, and he knew how to push Bucky’s buttons, how to tear down his defenses with just the right words.

“You think Steve changed you,” Zemo continued, his voice taking on an almost mocking tone. “You think you’re free now. But you’re not. You’re a weapon, Bucky. A tool of the state. And I can make you forget.”

He said it like a threat, like a promise. Zemo knew Bucky’s triggers all too well. He knew the words that had been drilled into Bucky’s mind over the years, the ones that still had the power to make him snap. He recited them, one by one, slowly, deliberately:

“Longing. Rusted. Seventeen. Daybreak. Furnace. Nine. Benign. Homecoming. One. Freight car.”

For a moment, nothing happened. Bucky’s body didn’t seize. His eyes didn’t cloud over with the vacant emptiness of the Winter Soldier. He stood there, trembling slightly, fighting the pull, pushing against the words, but it wasn’t enough. They were still there, buried deep inside him—etched into his very bones.

Sam saw it then—the way Bucky’s posture shifted, the slight hesitation in his movements, the way his eyes lost their clarity for just a second. The trigger was still inside him, buried deep, but it wasn’t as effective as it once was.

Zemo’s smirk deepened, as if enjoying the small victory. “It’s not gone, is it?”

Bucky’s lips parted slightly, and his hand tightened into a fist, nails digging into his palm. His breath came in shallow gasps, each inhale like a battle against his own mind. He was fighting it, but he could feel the cold, numbing presence of the Soldier clawing its way back. His fingers twitched, and for a moment, he looked like he was about to strike.

But then, something shifted inside him. The walls he’d built over the years pushed back, fighting against the rush of memories and commands threatening to overwhelm him. His gaze snapped back to Zemo—hard, determined—and he took a step back, away from the trigger words, away from the programming that had defined him for so long.

“Not anymore,” Bucky said, his voice low, strained, but resolute. “They don’t work anymore.”

Zemo watched him for a moment longer, as if measuring the weight of Bucky’s words, before his smile faded. The game was no longer fun.

Sam stepped forward, his face a mixture of concern and frustration. “Bucky… you good?”

Bucky’s eyes were wild, filled with the remnants of the fight he’d just waged in his mind. He nodded sharply, though it wasn’t convincing. His voice was tight, barely above a whisper. “I’m fine.”

But even as he said it, Bucky knew he wasn’t. The battle inside him was far from over. And Zemo, standing there with that infuriatingly calm smile, knew it too.

Sam could feel the weight of the silence between them, the unsettled air hanging heavy in the room. They were no longer just dealing with the fallout of a man’s past. They were dealing with something darker, deeper, that none of them could truly escape.

Zemo’s gaze shifted to Sam, who was still processing what had just happened. “You should be careful, Captain. It’s hard to keep a leash on a wolf.”

Sam bristled at the comment, but Bucky’s low growl silenced him. For a moment, Bucky looked like he might lunge at Zemo, but he stopped himself. He’d fought too long, too hard to stay in control. He wasn’t about to let Zemo drag him back into that darkness.

Zemo’s eyes glinted with a strange, knowing look as he turned to leave. “You may have won this round, Bucky. But I doubt this is the last time you’ll hear those words.”

Bucky stood there, fists clenched at his sides, the remnants of the Winter Soldier clawing at the edges of his mind. But for now, he was still himself—still in control.

Sam shot him a quick, concerned look before stepping toward the door.

“Let’s just get through this,” Sam said, his voice carrying the weight of the unspoken understanding between them. “We can deal with the rest later.”

Bucky didn’t answer. Instead, he turned away, his back to the room as he fought to push the memories, the words, the soldier back into the depths where they belonged.

It wasn’t over—not by a long shot.

But it would have to be enough for now.

……..

The city of Madripoor rose like a neon fever dream out of the dark, the skyline jagged with luxury and decay. Bright lights danced along wet streets slick with oil and danger, where the rich floated above in golden towers and the desperate prowled below in Low Town’s underbelly.

The trio stepped from the shadows of their arriving vehicle into a world that smelled of ozone, liquor, and tension. Every corner had eyes. Every alley whispered a threat.

Zemo moved with ease, slipping back into his baron persona like a second skin. He walked with confidence and entitlement, dressed to draw attention—because in Madripoor, the trick was not to blend in but to stand out just enough to be feared, not targeted.

Sam adjusted the gaudy, snakeskin blazer Zemo had forced on him. He grimaced as he caught his reflection in a pane of dark glass—gold buttons, sunglasses, and a false swagger. “Smiling Tiger,” Zemo had said with a smirk, as if the identity fit him too well. Sam hated every second of it.

Bucky walked a half-step behind them, his left arm glinting faintly under the streetlights. But it wasn’t the arm that caught attention—it was the way he carried himself. Head down, shoulders tense, eyes sharp and empty. The Winter Soldier. Or the ghost of him, resurrected for this performance.

Zemo had insisted.

Sam hadn’t agreed.

But Bucky had slipped into the role with disturbing ease.

Low Town swallowed them quickly. Music throbbed from clubs that didn’t close, and shadows shifted with the weight of concealed weapons. Their contact was waiting inside a bar known simply as the Brass Monkey.

Inside, the air was thicker. Perfume, sweat, blood, and money clung to the walls. Conversations stopped as they entered. A hundred eyes assessed them. Zemo greeted the bartender like an old friend. Sam kept silent, jaw clenched. Bucky stood behind them, expression cold and unreadable.

A patron stepped forward—drunk, bold, stupid. He sneered at Bucky. “Winter Soldier. Didn’t think they let you off your leash.”

Zemo didn’t even glance back. “Soldier—attack.”

Bucky moved like a blade loosed from its sheath—quick, brutal, precise. A single blow dropped the man. Two more sent a warning through the bar. No hesitation. No remorse.

The bar fell silent again.

Zemo smiled, pleased.

Sam watched Bucky, a flicker of unease tightening behind his sunglasses. For a moment, he wasn’t sure where the line ended between performance and memory.

Bucky stood still. Breathing hard. Not looking at either of them.

Sam clenched his fists at his sides.

It was just a performance. It had to be.

And yet, as Bucky stood there, chest rising, his eyes distant and cold—Sam thought of that therapy session. The one they’d been dragged into at the precinct. The one Bucky barely spoke through until Raynor had pressed too hard.

Katherine and her daughter. They matter to you, don’t they?

Sam hadn’t even known the girl’s name. Just that there was a woman out there who’d let Bucky into her life—and a three-year-old girl.

It had stuck with him. Still did.

He watched Bucky now, waiting to see the flicker of remorse, the sign that it was all an act. But Bucky just stood still, fists unclenching slowly, like he didn’t quite know how to return to himself.

Sam turned away. The mission had to go on. Madripoor didn’t care about ghosts. But he did.

Because Sam had seen enough men lose themselves to their past.

And he wasn’t about to let Bucky become another one.

The room oozed tension. Selby reclined in her private chamber like a queen on a crumbling throne, her guards stationed like statues with fingers twitching near triggers. Sam didn’t like how many guns were in the room—or how many eyes were watching them like prey.

Selby’s gaze slid over to him, amusement curling at the corners of her mouth.
“You’re quieter than I expected, Smiling Tiger.”

Sam didn’t answer. He could feel his pulse ticking in his jaw. Zemo leaned forward, voice smooth.

“We’re not here to exchange pleasantries. We want the source of the serum.”

Selby’s eyes glittered, lips pursing thoughtfully. “Not for sale.”

“We’re not buyers. We just want to talk.”

She tilted her head, weighing the offer, then finally said, “Dr. Wilfred Nagel. Hydra used him. So did the CIA. Now he’s gone freelance. Hightown.”

That was all they needed.

And then—ping.

The soft chime of a phone pierced the air like a needle through silk.

Every head turned.

Bucky’s face didn’t move, but Sam saw the flicker of dread behind his eyes. The kind of dread that had nothing to do with weapons.

Bucky reached inside his coat and pulled out his phone. The screen lit up:

KATHERINE – Incoming Call

Sam’s brow furrowed. He recognized the name—from one of their therapy sessions. Dr. Raynor had brought her up once. Katherine. The woman Bucky wouldn’t talk about. The one he was avoiding, even as Raynor pushed him to stop running from the connections he was terrified to hold onto.

Selby’s eyes narrowed. “Who the hell is Katherine?”

Too late. The moment hung brittle and sharp.

Bucky silenced the call without looking at Sam. His shoulders tensed, jaw locked. The guards raised their weapons.

“Damn it,” Sam muttered.

Then the room exploded into chaos.

Bucky was already moving, brutal and efficient. Two guards down before the others could react. Sam ducked as a shot splintered the wall beside his head. Zemo grabbed a pistol from one of the fallen men.

Selby screamed something—Sam didn’t catch it. Another gunshot. She dropped to the floor.

They didn’t wait.

The three of them burst through the back door into the neon-drenched alleys of Low Town. The moment they hit the streets, Sam’s phone buzzed. Notifications. Bounty alerts. Their faces, already spreading.

Everyone would be looking for them.

They ran.

Sam kept pace beside Bucky, breath tight. “That call,” he said. “That was her, wasn’t it?”

Bucky didn’t answer. Didn’t look at him.

Didn’t have to.

Sam already knew.

And that silence—just like the one in therapy—spoke louder than anything else ever could.

The chaos of the gunfire was still ringing in Sam’s ears as they ducked down an alley, hearts pounding, feet pounding harder. Their pursuers weren’t far behind, and the bounty on their heads had just made them public enemies in Madripoor. Every corner held the potential for another ambush, and every shadow seemed to hide a danger waiting to spring.

Bucky was the first to break left, keeping to the shadows with the precision of a man who’d spent years hiding in them. Zemo followed, sleek and calculated, like a predator with an air of cold confidence. Sam wasn’t far behind, his heart racing with every step as he glanced over his shoulder.

Then, just as they rounded another corner, they were hit with the sharp echo of boots hitting concrete. The faint thump of footsteps, followed by an all-too-familiar voice.

“Move!”

Sharon Carter. The voice was unmistakable.

Sam barely had time to register what was happening before Sharon appeared out of the shadows, a silenced pistol in hand. Without hesitation, she fired twice in rapid succession, taking out the two nearest bounty hunters in a flash.

“Get down!” she shouted, already pulling them into a narrow, barely visible alleyway that led to an old, forgotten service door.

Sam didn’t hesitate. The moment Sharon fired, he was already on the move, following her into the hidden entryway. Bucky and Zemo were close behind, though Bucky’s expression remained unreadable, like he was still figuring out how he felt about this sudden intervention.

“Nice entrance,” Sam said, trying to catch his breath as they slipped through the door, Sharon pulling it shut behind them with practiced ease.

Sharon smirked, though there was a hardness to her gaze that Sam hadn’t missed. “Had to make it dramatic. It’s been a while since I had an audience.”

“Didn’t expect you to be in Madripoor,” Sam muttered, eyeing the small room they’d ducked into. The walls were damp, the scent of stale air thick around them. Sharon looked like she belonged here—like she’d lived here for a long time.

“I didn’t expect to be, either,” she replied, her tone sharpening. “But after Civil War, you know how it is. No one really wants to take a fugitive back into the fold. So I’ve been getting by. Madripoor’s the perfect place to hide—no one cares who you are, as long as you can pay your way.”

Zemo raised an eyebrow, his voice smooth but laced with curiosity. “You’ve been in Madripoor all this time, and you haven’t tried to get back to the States? To your government?”

Sharon’s eyes flashed, and the edge in her voice was unmistakable. “The U.S. government turned their back on me long ago. You think I’m going back there after what happened? Not a chance.” Her voice dropped slightly. “Besides, I’m doing just fine on my own.”

Sam didn’t know what to say to that. He’d seen Sharon’s loyalty firsthand, but the weight of her betrayal had to be heavy.

“How long have you been living here?” Sam asked, trying to change the subject.

Sharon shrugged, her eyes scanning the small room for any possible escape routes. “Long enough. I’ve got my contacts. My business.”

“You’re working for the criminals?” Bucky’s voice was flat, no judgment in his tone, just a hard question. He seemed more interested than anything else.

Sharon shot him a sidelong look, her lips curling into a tight smile. “Maybe. Maybe not. Doesn’t really matter what you think.”

Sam shot Bucky a glance, but Bucky didn’t return it. His attention was already on the door, as if waiting for more trouble to come their way. It wasn’t over, not by a long shot.

“So,” Sam began, trying to steer the conversation back, “why help us? I’m sure you’ve got plenty of other things to do.”

Sharon was quiet for a moment, looking between Sam and Bucky, her expression unreadable. Finally, she spoke, her voice low. “Because, like you, I want to make sure this world doesn’t fall apart.” Her gaze flicked to Bucky, and something flickered behind her eyes—a recognition of something unsaid between them. “And you two, whether you like it or not, are going to need some help.”

Sam raised an eyebrow. “We?”

Sharon didn’t answer immediately. She glanced at the door, her fingers brushing the hilt of a knife she had hidden at her side, eyes cold and calculating. She didn’t need to say anything more.

She was already planning their next move, and Sam knew they were all in it together now, whether they liked it or not.

Sharon led them through a labyrinth of narrow alleyways and hidden passageways, a far cry from the glamorous hideouts Sam had imagined. The air was thick with humidity, the scent of saltwater and street food clinging to every corner. They passed unmarked doors and flickering neon signs that buzzed above them like a swarm of angry insects.

Sam couldn’t help but notice how natural Sharon seemed in this environment, how she moved with ease, every turn and step calculated. She didn’t belong in the world of high-flying heroes and government buildings anymore—Madripoor was her domain now. And she was in control.

The small, dimly lit building Sharon led them to looked abandoned at first glance. The door creaked as she pushed it open, revealing a modest, but secure hideout. The room was sparse: a few mismatched chairs, a small kitchenette with a single burner stove, and a makeshift desk cluttered with maps and communication devices.

“Home sweet home,” Sharon said with a half-hearted smile, as if she’d learned long ago not to get attached to the space. She shut the door behind them and locked it with a swift motion.

Sam and Bucky exchanged a glance as they stepped inside. The place was hardly anything to write home about, but it had one thing they needed: safety, at least for now.

“Alright,” Sharon said, brushing off the dust from one of the chairs before sitting down. “You two might want to get comfortable because this is where we figure out our next move.”

She turned to a series of maps pinned up on the wall, all marked with red circles and locations of interest. “I’ve got my sources,” she continued, “and they told me Nagel’s hiding out in a facility just outside of town. It’s a no-man’s land, but I’ve got the connections to get us there.”

Sam nodded, taking a seat on the edge of a chair. “You’re really going all in on this, huh?”

Sharon met his gaze and leaned back, eyes narrowing. “This isn’t about loyalty to you, Sam.” Her words were flat but firm. “It’s about making sure the serum doesn’t fall into the wrong hands.”

Bucky, who’d been silent since their arrival, finally spoke up, his tone as cold and guarded as ever. “And you think Nagel’s the key to all of this? The serum?”

“Why else would we be here?” Sharon replied, crossing her arms.

Sam looked at her, then at Bucky. He could feel the tension between them, the distrust simmering beneath the surface. They hadn’t really had a chance to talk about what had happened back at the docks—about how Bucky had let Zemo out of prison, how they were now working together with a man who had once been their enemy.

“Let me guess,” Sam started, his tone soft but pointed, “this is where you tell us you’re playing the long game, right? Keeping your enemies close, that sort of thing?”

Sharon raised an eyebrow but didn’t respond directly. Instead, she picked up a satellite phone from the table and dialed a number. As she waited for the call to connect, she glanced over at them.

“You both might want to get used to the idea that we’re all stuck in this together now,” Sharon said, her voice colder than before. “There’s a lot at stake here—more than you realize. If we want to stop whatever Nagel’s doing, we need to be in this 100%.”

The phone clicked, and Sharon spoke into it quickly, relaying the plan to whoever was on the other end. She was making sure every detail was covered, each possibility accounted for. There was a calmness in her voice now, one that came from years of navigating dangerous situations.

When she hung up, she turned back to them, her eyes sharp. “We move at dawn. We get Nagel, we find out what he’s been working on, and we stop him before this gets any worse.”

Sam and Bucky exchanged another look, both of them still processing the gravity of the situation. They had no choice but to go along with Sharon’s plan, but Sam couldn’t shake the feeling that there was more going on here than he was seeing.

Bucky, however, didn’t seem concerned with anything other than the task ahead. His eyes were hard, unreadable, as he turned toward Sharon.

“Then what?” he asked, his voice low and steady. “What happens after we take down Nagel?”

Sharon’s gaze met his, and for a moment, there was something in her eyes—a flicker of something unsaid, something older, deeper. But she quickly masked it with a professional mask.

“Then we go from there,” she said, her tone clipped. “One step at a time.”

Sam, still processing everything, leaned back in his chair and exhaled, frustration lingering in his chest. “We’ll be lucky if we survive this step, Sharon.”

She didn’t respond. Instead, she busied herself preparing for the mission, pulling maps and coordinates from her desk. Sam could feel the distance between them, the thin thread of trust barely holding them together.

But if they were going to stop the serum from falling into the wrong hands, they had no choice but to follow Sharon’s lead.

And deep down, Sam knew they’d have to put aside everything else—every personal grudge, every history—to make it out of Madripoor alive

Chapter Text

Chapter 27

The dim light of the hidden laboratory flickered as the group—Sam, Bucky, Zemo, and Sharon—entered, the stale air heavy with the scent of chemicals and lingering fear. Dr. Wilfred Nagel, the scientist responsible for recreating the Super Soldier Serum, sat calmly at his desk. His glasses glinted beneath the harsh overhead lights, his fingers steepled together as if he’d been waiting for them.

Zemo led the way, his sharp eyes taking in every detail, his presence exuding a calculated calm. Sam and Bucky stood at the threshold, a mixture of tension and resolve radiating from both of them. Sharon, standing slightly behind them, kept her eyes on Dr. Nagel, her hand hovering near her weapon, just in case.

Dr. Nagel didn’t seem threatened by their presence. Instead, he regarded them coolly, as if expecting this confrontation. His voice was steady, calm, as though he were discussing a routine subject in a scientific journal.

“You’re here about the serum,” Dr. Nagel said, his tone almost dismissive. “I assume you’ve already heard about the latest batch.”

Bucky’s jaw tightened. Sam shot him a sidelong glance, sensing the raw tension in Bucky. He was clearly on edge—his mind still reeling from the lingering effects of Zemo’s words. But Bucky’s eyes were locked on Dr. Nagel now, his voice low and controlled. “How did you recreate it?”

Dr. Nagel’s lips quirked into a small smile. He was proud of his work, even though it had led to so much destruction. “It wasn’t as difficult as it may seem. I had access to the blood of someone who had already been injected with the original serum. Isaiah Bradley’s blood. The U.S. government kept it hidden for years, thinking no one would ever find it.”

Sam’s heart skipped a beat. Isaiah Bradley. The name was like a punch to the gut. Sam knew of him, or at least of his story—the forgotten hero, the man who had been erased from history. A Super Soldier, just like Steve, but one who had been subjected to the darkest of betrayals.

He exchanged a glance with Bucky, whose expression had gone unreadable, but Sam could see the flicker of something behind his eyes. Isaiah Bradley. Bucky had been connected to this story—just like Steve. But unlike Steve, Isaiah had been cast aside, discarded.

“How many doses?” Sam asked, his voice steady but his anger simmering just below the surface.

“Twenty,” Dr. Nagel answered. “I produced twenty doses, each one based on the blood sample. But they were stolen. Stolen by Karli Morgenthau and her group, the Flag Smashers.”

Bucky stepped forward, his voice harsh. “Where are they now?”

Dr. Nagel didn’t flinch. “I don’t know where she is now. But Karli was the one who took the serum. She believes in her cause. She’s been using the serum to enhance her group’s abilities. She and the Flag Smashers are becoming more dangerous by the day.”

Zemo, who had been silent up until now, tilted his head slightly, his expression cold and calculating. “And what about the rest of your work, Nagel? What other secrets do you have?”

Dr. Nagel raised an eyebrow. “I was simply recreating the serum. Nothing more. But I’m sure you all have your own theories. You must understand—these things are far more complicated than you think.”

Zemo’s gaze narrowed as he crossed the room, stopping just a few feet from Dr. Nagel. “We understand more than you think.”

For a moment, the air was thick with unspoken tension. Sam could feel it—Zemo’s malice, Dr. Nagel’s indifference. He wanted to lash out, to get the information they needed, but it was clear that they were running on borrowed time.

Karli Morgenthau. The Flag Smashers. The serum. They were all pieces of a much larger puzzle, and Sam couldn’t help but wonder—how much of it was connected to the broken man standing beside him?

Bucky’s face remained unreadable, but his hands were tight at his sides, his body taut with the effort of staying in control. He had fought so long to break free from his past, and yet here they were, dealing with the very legacy he had been forced to carry.

Sam didn’t look at him. He didn’t want to. He couldn’t.

Instead, he turned back to Dr. Nagel, his mind racing. “You said Karli stole the serum. What is she planning to do with it?”

Dr. Nagel shrugged, a flicker of something almost like amusement crossing his face. “What she’s always planning to do—reshape the world in her own image. The serum is just a means to an end.”

Sharon stepped forward, her voice sharp. “And where can we find her?”

Dr. Nagel’s lips curled into a thin, almost apologetic smile. “You’ll have to ask her yourself.”

Before anyone could respond, the sound of footsteps echoed through the hall, signaling that their time in this place was quickly running out. The urgency in the air shifted, and Sam felt the weight of their mission press down harder. They couldn’t stay here much longer. They needed to find Karli, to stop her before the situation escalated further.

Zemo glanced at Sam, then at Bucky, his eyes calculating. “Well, it seems our options are clear, gentlemen.”

Bucky turned away, a quiet storm of emotion swirling behind his eyes, but he didn’t say anything. Sam’s jaw tightened. There was so much they still didn’t know, so many loose ends that had to be tied up.

“We need to move,” Sam said, his voice firm. “Now.”

The group moved quickly, knowing that time was running out. As they left Dr. Nagel’s lab behind, the weight of the knowledge they’d just gained hung heavily over them. The stolen serum, Karli Morgenthau, the Flag Smashers—all of it was part of a much bigger, more dangerous game.

The tension in the lab was palpable, but the moment was over. Dr. Nagel’s words still echoed in Sam’s mind as the group moved quickly through the dimly lit hallways, the urgency of their mission driving their every step. Zemo led the way, his movements fluid, precise—like a man who was always three steps ahead. Sharon was already a few paces behind them, her expression unreadable but sharp, the weight of her fugitive status hanging over her like a storm cloud.

Sam shot a glance at Bucky, but his friend’s face was as unreadable as ever. There was a weight in the air, an unspoken understanding that they were facing something much bigger than any of them had anticipated. And yet, even with the knowledge they’d gained, there was no time to waste.

“Stay close,” Sam muttered, his eyes scanning the hallway ahead.

Zemo didn’t respond, his focus entirely on the path in front of him, but Sam could feel the tension in his posture. They had what they came for—the information about Karli and the serum—but the stakes were rising with every passing second.

They reached the exit, and that’s when Sharon stopped, her footsteps faltering as she glanced over her shoulder. The cold night air outside hit them like a blast, but the oppressive heat of the situation wasn’t about to let up.

“This is where we part ways,” Sharon said, her voice steady but tinged with something darker. “I’ve already done more than enough. I’ll handle the rest from here.”

Sam hesitated, knowing this wasn’t just about their mission anymore. It wasn’t just about the serum or the Flag Smashers. It was about something far more personal for Sharon—a betrayal she’d been carrying for years, a life stolen from her the moment she became a fugitive. She had no choice but to stay in Madripoor, hidden from the world that once called her a hero.

“You don’t have to do this alone,” Sam said, his tone genuine but firm. “I’ll help you. I promise, I’ll clear your name. I know the right people. We can make this right.”

Sharon’s eyes flickered with a brief, almost imperceptible flicker of something—relief? Hope? She was too guarded to let it show fully, but Sam could see it there, just below the surface. She didn’t speak right away, taking a breath before she gave a slight nod.

“You’re the one who always believes in doing the right thing, huh?” Sharon’s words were tinged with a bitterness that Sam understood all too well. “Be careful, Sam. The world’s a lot more complicated than that.”

“I know it’s complicated,” Sam replied, his voice low but resolute. “But I’ve seen how you’ve fought. I’ve seen what you’ve done. And you don’t deserve to be forgotten. I won’t let you stay in the shadows.”

Sharon studied him for a moment, the weight of her decision in her eyes. For a brief second, it looked like she might say more—might let the mask slip and allow herself to believe in that promise. But instead, she simply gave a curt nod, her lips pressing into a thin line.

“Just be careful, Sam,” she said again, before turning to face the darkness of Madripoor. “And watch your back.”

Sam watched as she melted into the shadows of the alleyway, her form vanishing into the night. His heart tightened as he realized that, no matter what happened, he was leaving her behind to face a future she wasn’t sure she could change.

But there was nothing he could do now.

Bucky moved beside him, his silence heavy, but Sam could feel the weight of his presence. Bucky hadn’t said anything during the exchange, but Sam could tell he was thinking about the past, about his own battles with loyalty and betrayal.

“We need to focus on Karli,” Bucky said, his voice rough but steady. He didn’t look at Sam, didn’t need to. “She’s the one with the serum. She’s the one who’s going to make things worse.”

Sam nodded, feeling the weight of their next steps pressing on him. They had a lead. They had a mission. But the road ahead was as uncertain as it was dangerous.

Together, the trio moved out into the streets of Madripoor, the cool night air swirling around them. The city was alive with activity, but the shadows felt thicker now. There were enemies everywhere—some they knew, and many they didn’t.

But for now, they had a clear goal. Find Karli. Stop the serum. And protect the world from the chaos they were all unwittingly tumbling toward.

The Berlin safehouse was dim and quiet—the kind of quiet that never sat well with Bucky Barnes. He stood outside alone, the sharp evening air biting at the edges of his thoughts. Inside, Sam and Zemo were talking—strategizing, arguing, maybe. Bucky couldn’t focus. His phone buzzed again in his pocket. He didn’t need to check to know who it was.

Katherine.

He’d ignored the last few messages. The first had been simple: “Are you okay?” Then came a photo—Nadia with a paper crown and chocolate on her face, grinning. Then another: “She asked about you again.”

And now the missed calls. The quiet worry in her words echoed in his skull louder than Zemo’s conspiracies or Sam’s frustration ever could.

He pulled the phone out, stared at the screen. Three missed calls. A few new messages. His thumb hovered over the notification before the screen dimmed and turned black.

What would he even say?

That he’d broken a criminal out of prison? That he was walking into old patterns with the Winter Soldier curling under his skin again, tighter than he liked to admit?

That he was terrified of being anything more than what he was made to be?

The sound of soft footsteps drew him from the spiral.

He turned—already sensing her presence before she stepped into view.

Ayo.

She moved like a shadow, the Dora Milaje armor gleaming faintly in the Berlin night, her eyes fixed on him, calm but unyielding. Bucky stiffened at the sight of her.

“Hello, James,” she said, the name like a tether to a place he’d almost believed could hold him.

He swallowed. “I was wondering when you’d come.”

“You freed him,” she said simply. No accusation in her tone—just fact. “After everything he did. To Wakanda. To T’Chaka.”

His gaze dropped, guilt sliding in like a blade between his ribs.

“I didn’t have a choice,” he muttered.

“There is always a choice.”

Ayo’s words hit with more precision than any strike she’d ever thrown. And maybe he deserved it. Maybe the shield, Katherine, Nadia—they were all just things he didn’t believe he could hold onto without breaking them.

His phone buzzed again in his hand.

Ayo noticed, just for a moment. Her eyes flickered to it, then back to his.

“You have eight hours, White Wolf.”

Bucky didn’t move for a long time. He just stared down at the phone in his hand, where a new message now waited:

“Nadia’s drawing a picture for you. She says you’re a hero.”

Chapter Text

Chapter 28

Ayo stood across from him, silent and still, her dark eyes holding the storm he didn’t want to face. Behind her, two more Dora Milaje waited, the golden trim of their armor catching the waning light.

“You have eight hours,” she said coldly, the syllables clipped. “Then we take him.”

Her words were a blade—measured, precise, and no less sharp for their restraint.

Bucky gave a small nod, but his throat was tight. “Thank you.”

It wasn’t enough—not for what she’d done for him. Not for the months they’d spent in the quiet woods of Wakanda, peeling Hydra’s poison from his mind, word by word, memory by memory. Not for the night he’d wept in the dirt, half-feral, when the Russian triggers finally failed to take hold.

Ayo took a step forward. “We gave you peace. We let you heal. And you break him out?”

Bucky couldn’t meet her gaze.

“It wasn’t easy,” he said, voice low, hoarse. “But we need him.”

Ayo’s expression didn’t change, but her silence spoke volumes. She had trusted him. Wakanda had trusted him. And now—Zemo walked free. The man who killed their king. The man who nearly broke the Avengers from the inside.

Bucky swallowed hard. The weight of Zemo’s freedom, of Katherine’s unanswered messages still sitting on his phone, of the blood on his own hands—it all pressed down, heavy and relentless.

He wasn’t the Winter Soldier anymore. But he wasn’t sure who he was instead.

“You walk a dangerous line, White Wolf,” Ayo said softly, her voice devoid of accusation—only sorrow.

“I know.”

He watched her go, her cloak catching the wind as she vanished around the corner. The Dora Milaje followed without a sound.

Bucky stood alone, the sky dimming above him.

He remembered the quiet of Wakanda. The stillness. The first time he heard birdsong and didn’t flinch. He had been someone there—someone almost whole.

But now he was back in the world. And wholeness felt like a dream fading with every step.

He pulled out his phone. Three missed calls. Two messages.

Katherine: Just let me know you’re okay. Nadia misses you.

Katherine: She asked if your arm was still strong enough to throw her. I told her it was.

His thumb hovered over the screen, but he couldn’t bring himself to answer. Not yet. Not like this.

He tucked the phone away, jaw clenched. He had eight hours to clean up the mess he’d helped make. After that?

He wasn’t sure what would be left.

The tension between them simmered as they walked the narrow, war-worn streets of Riga. The sun was low, casting long shadows that mirrored the growing rift in their trio.

Sam’s jaw was tight, his mind racing as he studied the small memorial set up near a courtyard—candles, flowers, photos. A woman’s face stared back at him from the center: Donya Madani. Karli’s mentor. Her loss was a blow, and Sam knew it had pushed Karli further into desperation.

“She’s grieving,” Sam said quietly, more to himself than to the others. “This isn’t who she wanted to be.”

Zemo scoffed softly, folding his gloved hands behind his back. “Grief doesn’t excuse terrorism, Sam. You cannot negotiate with someone who sees themselves as a revolutionary. Karli has chosen violence.”

“I’m not excusing her,” Sam replied, his voice tight. “But I’m not ready to kill her either.”

Bucky said nothing at first. He stood nearby, eyes alert, watching the children playing across the square, the way one of them laughed—carefree, innocent. The sound made his chest ache.

“People like her don’t just stop,” Zemo continued. “She believes she’s right. That’s dangerous.”

Sam turned on him. “So we just take her out? That’s the answer?”

“If we don’t,” Zemo said, calm and cold, “she’ll create more like her. That serum corrupted the first Super Soldier. It will corrupt her too.”

Sam looked to Bucky, searching for some kind of middle ground.

Bucky met his eyes, expression unreadable. He wanted to believe Karli could be reached. But he also knew what the serum could do—what it had done to him. And he couldn’t ignore the part of him that understood Zemo’s fear.

“She’s not there yet,” Sam said firmly, trying to hold the line. “I can talk to her.”

Zemo said nothing, but the look he gave spoke volumes. He didn’t believe in redemption. Not for Karli. Maybe not even for them.

Bucky sighed and looked away, pulling out his phone again. A new message blinked at the top.

Katherine: I hope you’re safe. Nadia made you something. She keeps asking when you’ll come home.

He turned off the screen without reading the rest.

Too many people wanted too many things from him—Sam wanted his trust, Zemo wanted his support, Karli might need his mercy, and Katherine… father, lover, protector, too many things all at once.

But he couldn’t be all of those men at once.
……..

The television’s screen was filled with chaos—shouts, a shaking camera phone, the blur of people running and crying out in fear. Somewhere in the crowd, a man was already on the ground, arms flailing, defenseless. Then came the shield.

It struck once.

Twice.

And then it didn’t stop.

Katherine stood frozen in the doorway to the living room, Nadia’s half-eaten apple forgotten on the coffee table beside her. Her heart thudded loudly in her ears as she watched the Captain America—no, not him, not really—drive the shield into someone’s chest with brutal, clinical force.

The screams turned to silence. And then blood. So much of it.

It painted the bottom of the shield in long, awful arcs, still held in that soldier’s hand. The camera zoomed in. People were crying. The man in the uniform looked anything but sorry.

Katherine moved fast. She crossed the room and slammed her palm against the remote. The screen went black in an instant, but the image had already seared itself into the walls, into her eyes.

“Jesus Christ,” she muttered, her voice shaking. “They showed that? They showed that?!”

Nadia looked up from her spot on the carpet, bunny clutched tightly in her arms. Her little brow was furrowed, eyes wide with something between confusion and unease. “Mama?” she asked softly. “That… that man hurt him?”

Katherine exhaled slowly and dropped to her knees in front of her daughter. “Yeah, baby,” she said gently, brushing a piece of hair out of Nadia’s face. “He did something really bad.”

Nadia tilted her head. “But he had the shield,” she said, almost like a question, struggling to pronounce it the way the adults did on TV. “That mean he’s good, right?”

Katherine’s heart twisted. “No, sweetheart. Sometimes bad people… take good things. Doesn’t make them good.”

Nadia looked down, fidgeting with the soft, frayed ear of her bunny. “He’s not like Daddy,” she whispered.

Katherine’s breath caught. “No,” she said, her voice quieter now, thick with emotion. “He’s nothing like your daddy.”

The room felt too still. Too heavy. The silence pressed in around them, but her thoughts wouldn’t settle. She was furious—furious that this was allowed on the news in the middle of the day, unfiltered, unblurred. No warning. No thought that maybe a little girl could be watching. That anyone might need shielding from that.

She wanted to scream. Wanted to march down to whatever newsroom had made the call to air that footage without a single second’s delay and demand to know who thought it was okay.

But Nadia was watching her now. Watching carefully.

So instead, she pulled her daughter into her arms and held her close. “You don’t need to worry about that man,” she whispered, smoothing her hand over Nadia’s soft curls. “We’re safe. Okay?”

“Okay,” Nadia said into her shoulder. Then, quieter: “I wanna show Daddy my paper plane…”

Katherine closed her eyes. A familiar ache bloomed in her chest. “I know, love,” she said, rocking her gently. “Me too.”

Chapter Text

Chapter 29

The warehouse was quiet, save for the sound of bootsteps on concrete and the labored breathing of three men standing at the edge of something inevitable.

Walker’s back was to the wall, shield on his arm like it had been welded there, blood still staining the underside. His chest rose and fell in fast bursts, like an engine running too hot, too fast. He didn’t just look cornered—he looked like an animal stripped of everything but instinct.

Sam took a step forward, voice steady but low. “You have to give us the shield.”

Walker’s jaw clenched. “You don’t want to do this.”

“Yes,” Bucky said grimly, stepping beside Sam, his vibranium arm flexing. “We do.”

The tension snapped.

Walker moved first—desperate, unhinged—and the shield was a weapon again, not a symbol. He fought like a man trying to hold on to the last piece of his identity, throwing punches with the fury of someone who thought he’d earned this, who thought the world owed him something for his service, for his sacrifice.

Bucky’s strikes were brutal, calculated—soldier to soldier, trained to subdue. But there was something else under the surface: rage. Rage that Walker had defiled the shield. Rage that Steve’s name had been dragged through blood and concrete.

Sam didn’t fight to destroy. He fought to reclaim. The shield had never been his, but it had been entrusted to him—and he was done running from that weight. Every time it hit his arm, every time it was torn from Walker’s grip, it echoed with history. With Isaiah’s pain. With Steve’s hope. With his own fear.

“You don’t understand,” Walker spat, grappling with Bucky, sweat flying. “I AM Captain America!”

“No,” Sam said, voice steel. “You’re not.”

The battle turned savage. Walker fought like a man with nothing left to lose, and when he ripped Sam’s wings from his suit—crushed them like paper—it felt like more than damage. It was an attempt to erase him.

Bucky caught Walker from behind, and together, he and Sam pried the shield from his arm. Walker screamed, refused to let go. The sound that left his throat was not anger, but grief. And when Bucky finally wrenched the shield free, the soldier-turned-murderer hit the ground hard, broken but still breathing.

Sam stood over him, the shield in hand, not triumphant—just hollow.

Bucky didn’t say anything. He looked at the red still streaked across the metal and then looked away.

Walker didn’t rise. He stared up at the ceiling like he’d just lost a war only he had been fighting.

Sam knelt slowly, his chest heaving. His fingers closed around the shield’s edge.

It felt heavier than ever. Not from the vibranium.

From everything it carried now.

Bucky stood in front of the Sokovian memorial, the weight of it all pressing down on him. The stone pillars rose like silent witnesses to a tragedy that had once been his to bear, the ghosts of so many lives lost, the shadow of his own past clinging like a second skin. His fingers brushed over the cold surface of the monument as if it could somehow erase the years of guilt, of violence, of Hydra’s influence. But it wouldn’t. It never did.

Behind him, the soft hum of approaching footsteps signaled the presence of Zemo. The man who had orchestrated the fall of Sokovia, the man whose actions had led to so much pain, so much bloodshed. And yet, for all the hate he had for Zemo, there was something else stirring inside Bucky—something complicated. Something that felt more like weariness than anger.

Zemo’s voice broke the silence, calm, measured, as if they were simply two old acquaintances meeting at a quiet café.

“You won,” Zemo said, eyes never leaving Bucky’s back. “I did everything I could to provoke you. To remind you of what you were. But it seems I’ve failed.”

Bucky didn’t answer. He didn’t have to. He didn’t know what the words would be anyway. He had no clear answer for Zemo’s taunt, no easy line of defense. He had been a weapon—a killer—because Zemo had set him in motion. And while he hadn’t done the final deed, he couldn’t erase the damage, the destruction, the carnage.

But this wasn’t just about what had happened in Sokovia. This was about what Bucky had done, what he had been. And what he was trying—trying so hard—not to be.

A shadow moved behind him, and Bucky knew they were there—Wakanda’s Dora Milaje. Ayo, ever the leader, was at the front of the group, her eyes locking with his, unwavering. The tension between them was palpable, an unspoken acknowledgment of everything that had transpired between them and Bucky’s past with Zemo.

“You know what has to happen here,” Ayo said, her voice steady but not without a trace of sorrow.

Bucky turned slowly to face her. “I do.”

He didn’t want to kill Zemo. It wasn’t just a matter of revenge or justice—it was personal. And after everything he’d been through, after everything he’d done, the last thing Bucky wanted was to slip back into that cycle. He had been a killer, once. He refused to be that again.

He looked down at Zemo, and for a moment, the man met his gaze, almost as if he was waiting for something. Waiting for Bucky to finish what they had started long ago.

But Bucky didn’t give him that satisfaction.

Instead, he stepped aside, his movements deliberate. “He’s yours,” he said, voice low, heavy.

The Dora Milaje closed in, their steps precise and coordinated. Zemo didn’t resist. He didn’t fight. There was nothing left for him to say, no last words, no more manipulation. He simply let himself be escorted toward the waiting transport, his fate sealed in the hands of those who would make sure he faced justice.

Bucky watched them go. His chest tightened, but there was a strange sense of peace settling in him, too. He wasn’t the Winter Soldier anymore. He wasn’t the man who had been forced to follow orders, to do the unthinkable. He was something else now. And if nothing else, this was his choice.

As the group disappeared into the distance, Bucky let out a breath he hadn’t realized he was holding. The burden wasn’t gone.

The Dora Milaje had come and taken Zemo away, and now, with the dust settled, the weight of his decision was finally starting to sink in. For the first time in what felt like forever, he stood still, his gaze distant and unfocused.

But then his phone buzzed in his pocket, cutting through the heavy silence of the moment. He pulled it out, the screen lighting up with Katherine’s name.

His thumb hesitated over the message, a wave of uncertainty crashing over him. He read the words, his heart tightening as they processed.

“Bucky, I don’t know what to do. Nadia… she saw the news. She saw what happened with Walker. She’s asking me questions, Bucky. She’s too young to understand all of it. She doesn’t know why someone who’s supposed to be a hero would do something like that. Please, I don’t know how to explain it to her. She needs you. I need you.”

A lump formed in Bucky’s throat, the weight of the words suffocating him. Nadia. She was only three years old, too young to understand the horrors of the world, yet here she was, facing the violence and confusion that came with the legacy of Captain America. The shield. The man who was supposed to be a symbol of hope and protection—now a symbol of something far darker.

He ran a hand over his face, guilt creeping in. Nadia had always adored Captain America, her favorite superhero. He could see her tiny face light up whenever she saw images of Steve Rogers or heard tales of his bravery. Bucky had seen it in her eyes when she’d spoken about the hero she looked up to—someone who was invincible, someone who could protect her from all the bad things in the world.

And now, this. The violence. The image of John Walker standing over a man with the shield in his hands, blood staining the legacy of a hero Nadia had loved so deeply.

Bucky closed his eyes, the weight of it crashing down on him. He had promised to protect them, but how could he have ever prepared for something like this? How could he have known that it would all come to this point—Nadia now having to make sense of the very thing she loved most turning into something terrifying?

He couldn’t leave her like this. Not with the same uncertainty that had plagued him his entire life.

With a deep breath, Bucky shoved his phone back into his pocket, his jaw tight. He could feel the pressure mounting inside of him. He couldn’t leave things unfinished again, not when he had the chance to make things right.

He’d done what he had to do with Zemo. But now, he needed to face the people who mattered most. He needed to go back.

Bucky walked away from the memorial, the mission still far from over, but his focus had shifted. The fight wasn’t just out there—it was also here, with the people he cared about. He couldn’t stand by while Nadia tried to process what she had seen. He couldn’t let Katherine carry the weight of this on her own.

He had to make things right for them. He owed them that much, at the very least.

And so, with each step, the decision became clearer. He had to go back to them. For Nadia. For Katherine. For the future that they could still have, if he did what was necessary.

And this time, he wouldn’t leave them behind.

Chapter Text

Chapter 30

The moment Katherine opened the door, Bucky knew he was forgiven—at least in part. Not because she said anything right away, but because her shoulders dropped, her breath caught, and her eyes welled up without a word. She had been holding her worry like armor, and now that he stood there—bruised, tired, but alive—she could finally let it go.

He stepped forward, hesitant, unsure if he had the right. But Katherine didn’t stop him. She let him cross the threshold, and when he pulled her into an embrace, she leaned into it like someone who hadn’t been able to breathe in days.

And then—like a spark—there was a small, squealing blur between them.

“Daddy!”

Nadia.

She crashed into his legs with all the uncoordinated force of a three-year-old who had waited far too long. Her little hands wrapped around his knees as she looked up at him with bright, watery eyes and a grin that could have shattered him. Bucky dropped to his knees, arms open, and she flung herself into them without hesitation.

“Hey, hey, kiddo,” he whispered, holding her tight.

“You come back now! You come back now I show you—look! Look, look, look—my book have doggies and cat but not spider. But I make you spider! It red like ‘Merica!”

She barely paused for breath, words tumbling out faster than she could shape them, her toddler logic leaping from one thing to the next. Bucky couldn’t make sense of half of it, but it didn’t matter. None of it mattered.

She was safe. She was holding him like nothing had changed.

Like he was really her dad.

“I missed you,” she said into his neck, muffled but sincere. “Miss you lots and lots and big-big.”

Bucky felt the guilt hit like a weight in his chest. Heavy and sharp. He had left. Again. He’d walked away thinking he was protecting them from everything broken inside him—but here she was, patching him back together without even trying.

He looked up at Katherine over Nadia’s head. Her eyes were red, but she smiled—a tired, complicated thing that held both relief and pain. She didn’t say I told you so. She didn’t need to.

Nadia pulled back, cupping his cheeks in her tiny, sticky hands. “I make you picture. It’s ‘Merica and you and me and Mama and hot dog.”

He blinked. “Hot dog?”

“Yes,” she said very seriously. “Is family now.”

He laughed—choked on it, really. Because how could he possibly be good enough for this? For her? For either of them?

But in that moment, he wasn’t the Winter Soldier. He wasn’t a weapon. He was just Bucky. And in Nadia’s eyes, he was home.

The apartment was quiet now, the kind of quiet that came only after a child’s world had wound itself down for the night. Nadia was asleep, tucked into her blanket fortress, one hand still clinging to the edge of the drawing she had made for Bucky—a red blob she’d insisted was a spider and a flag all at once. Her breathing had slowed, soft and even, and for the first time in days, Katherine could exhale.

She stepped into the living room where Bucky sat on the couch, elbows on his knees, eyes distant. She watched him for a long moment before speaking, her voice low and even, but edged in the kind of hurt that had been waiting too long to be voiced.

“You promised.”

Bucky looked up at her, blinking. “Katherine—”

“No,” she said, folding her arms tightly across her chest. “Don’t start with that tone. You promised you would let us know you were okay. That you wouldn’t disappear again. That—if you were going into something—you’d give me something. A message. A check-in. Anything.”

He lowered his eyes.

“If you were anyone else,” she continued, voice trembling with restraint, “I would have slammed the door in your face tonight. But you’re not anyone else. You’re in my life, and whether you admit it or not—you’re in hers, too. Nadia doesn’t get that you’re trying to protect us or shut us out. She just knows you’re not here. She asks where you are, and I have to come up with something. And I hate lying to her.”

Bucky ran a hand down his face, silent.

“I didn’t know if you were dead, or in trouble, or just…done,” Katherine said, her voice cracking slightly at the end. “And I couldn’t ask anyone, Bucky. I couldn’t go through your contacts or chase down intelligence reports. I just had to wait.”

“I’m sorry,” he said quietly, finally meeting her eyes. “I thought… I thought I was doing the right thing. That if I stayed away, it would be safer. Easier. For you. For her.”

“Easier for us?” She gave a sharp, humorless laugh. “She draws you into everything, Bucky. You’re in every family picture she makes. You’re the dad she talks about to her stuffed animals. And I get it—you didn’t ask for this. You don’t have to be anything you’re not ready for. But if you’re in my life, she comes with it. All of her. You don’t get to just disappear when it gets heavy and ignore my texts like none of this matters.”

“I know,” he said, voice raw. “You’re right. I just… I didn’t think I deserved any of it.”

Katherine’s expression softened a fraction, but the fire didn’t leave her eyes.

“You don’t get to make that call, Bucky. Not alone. Not when a little girl is sitting by the window wondering why you didn’t call back.”

She didn’t cry. Not now. But he could see the echo of every night she’d worried, every bedtime story she’d had to tell in his absence. He reached out, unsure, and she let him take her hand—barely.

“You don’t have to be perfect,” she said. “You just have to show up. That’s it. Just show up.”

And for the first time in a long time, Bucky let himself believe he still could.

They sat on the couch in the soft hush of the apartment, wrapped in the kind of quiet that only comes after a storm—when words finally begin to fill the spaces left behind. A blanket was draped loosely over them, and cups of tea, long since gone lukewarm, rested on the table before them. Nadia’s quiet breathing filtered from the other room, a gentle reminder that the world hadn’t completely fallen apart.

Katherine’s fingers moved lightly across the bruises on Bucky’s forearm, trailing each one like a question she wasn’t yet ready to ask. She didn’t speak, not yet. Just listened as he finally did.

He started with Steve—how confronting the absence of him had felt like confronting a ghost. “He believed in people,” Bucky said, voice low. “In me. In Sam. And watching that shield in someone else’s hands… it felt wrong. Like watching someone wear a piece of him as armor but with none of the heart.”

Katherine didn’t interrupt. Her hand paused at a fresh scrape near his collarbone, then moved again slowly.

“I didn’t trust Zemo,” he admitted. “Still don’t. But he knew things about Hydra, about the serum. And there was this girl—Karli. She wasn’t just radicalized—she was desperate. She had power, but no guidance. Sam wanted to reason with her. I wanted to believe we could.”

Katherine tilted her head, eyes searching his as he continued.

“I saw Ayo in Latvia,” he murmured, “She… she reminded me of what I owe. To Wakanda. To people I’ve hurt. She gave me eight hours before they came for Zemo. I gave him up. It was the right thing.”

“And the fight with Walker?” Katherine asked softly, her thumb brushing one of the deeper bruises on his knuckles.

Bucky hesitated.

“It was brutal,” he said finally. “He wouldn’t give up the shield. He killed someone with it—on camera. I could see it breaking Sam. And I… I didn’t want to be that man again. But I had to stop him. We had to.”

Katherine leaned her head gently against his shoulder.

“I don’t think I’m built for peace,” he said after a long silence, voice a rasp. “But I’m trying.”

“You’re here,” she said quietly. “That’s something.”

His hand found hers under the blanket, their fingers lacing without thinking. The warmth between them, however tentative, was real.

And for a moment—despite the weight of history, of mistakes and fear and everything unsaid—they just sat. Two people learning how to breathe again, in the quiet aftermath of too much silence.

The next morning was quiet in the kind of way that felt earned. The sky hung over New York in soft gray tones, the air brisk but not cold. Bucky walked alongside Katherine, their hands brushing occasionally, and Nadia trotted a step ahead of them with her tiny backpack bouncing against her back. She gripped Bucky’s fingers tightly whenever she looked up, chattering in bursts that only made half-sense, but he listened like each word mattered.

When they reached the Sanctum, the tall doors creaked open with a familiar shimmer of magic. Wong was already waiting. He gave Nadia a small, amused smile and nodded deeply at Katherine. But when his eyes settled on Bucky, something unreadable passed between them. A quiet acknowledgment. Respect, maybe. Or understanding. Bucky wasn’t sure, but he gave a short nod back.

Once Nadia disappeared through the door with a wave and a kiss to both their cheeks, Bucky and Katherine headed downtown. He offered to help at the shop—she didn’t ask, but she didn’t refuse either. The space smelled like coffee, paper, and lavender oil. He restocked shelves. Fixed a squeaky hinge on the back room door. He was wiping down a countertop when Junie stopped by with her usual oversized sunglasses and a cup of something bright and suspicious-looking.

“So,” Junie said, leaning dramatically on the counter. “You’re back.”

Bucky didn’t look up. “Seems that way.”

Junie tilted her head, clearly waiting. “Big world-saving mission or just a really long silent treatment?”

He gave her a look. “Do you want that tea restocked or not?”

Katherine came to his rescue with a dry laugh, elbowing Junie away with a tray of samples and a well-aimed “don’t start.”

Later, they left the shop and ended up sharing lunch at a small café with a view of the park. The food was simple—soup, sandwiches, a shared slice of cake—but the conversation felt light in a way Bucky hadn’t known he missed. He caught himself smiling without realizing it. Laughing at something small Katherine said about a customer. Watching her speak with that bright, expressive face she had when she felt truly herself.

When they went to pick up Nadia, the little girl ran full speed toward them the second she saw him, throwing her arms around his legs like she’d waited all day. Katherine scooped her up mid-sprint, and the three of them walked the rest of the way home together.

Bucky didn’t say much on the walk back. He didn’t have to. The rhythm of it—the child’s sleepy weight against Katherine’s shoulder, the sound of traffic in the distance, the feeling of belonging—settled deep in his chest like something he’d forgotten how to want.

He hadn’t realized how much he’d missed this. Missed them.

And for the first time in a long time, he let himself hope he could have it again.

They sat on the couch after dinner, Nadia already tucked in for the night, her small, steady breaths faint from down the hall—just enough to remind them of the quiet life Bucky had almost forgotten he could want. The soft lamplight cast long shadows across the living room, and everything felt still. Like a held breath.

Bucky leaned forward, elbows on his knees, rubbing his palms together like he could wring the nerves out of his body. He didn’t look at her when he spoke.

“I need to go,” he said, voice tight with restraint. “To see Sam.”

Katherine watched him, sensing the knot of something heavy in him, even if he wouldn’t name it. She waited.

“I owe him an apology,” Bucky added. “For a lot of things. I—I have to make it right.”

She nodded slowly, her mug warm between her palms. “He was yours and Steve’schoice.”

Bucky flinched, just slightly. “Yeah. And I didn’t make it easy for him.”

“You wouldn’t be this wound up if it didn’t matter,” she said softly.

His jaw clenched, and for a beat he said nothing. Then, in a low voice, almost a confession: “I should’ve told you I was okay. I just didn’t know how. Every time I thought about calling, I felt like I was dragging the worst of me into this house.”

Katherine’s expression softened, but she didn’t look away. “You disappeared, James. And I understood why. I still do. But Nadia’s three. She kept asking if you were ever coming home again. And I—” Her voice caught briefly. “I didn’t have an answer. I didn’t know if I should start preparing her for you not being in her life anymore.”

Bucky looked like he’d been struck.

“I’m not asking you to stop fighting,” she said, her hand finding his. “I know who you are, and I know you’re not done carrying what you carry. But if you’re in this with us—me and Nadia—you can’t just go silent. I don’t need daily updates, just… something. A text. A call. Let me know you’re alive. Let her know.”

He nodded, his throat working against the lump rising in it. “You will. I swear, Katherine. No more disappearing.”

She studied him one more time, then leaned in and brushed her lips to his cheek—tender, grounding. “Good. Then go make it right. With him. We’ll be here.”

Bucky squeezed her hand gently, then stood, casting a long glance down the hallway where Nadia slept—where his family lived. Where something fragile had managed to root itself into the broken pieces of him.

And this time, as he opened the door, it wasn’t to run.

It was to prove he was worth coming back to.

Chapter Text

Chapter 31

After everything that had happened—after the battles, the pressure, the loss of what he had once thought would be the next chapter in his life—Sam returned home to Louisiana. It was the kind of place that felt like the world stopped moving for a while. The air was thick with the humidity of the Gulf, and the scent of salt and the rustle of wind through the trees seemed to soften everything.

He stood outside the old family home for a moment, taking it all in—the creaky porch, the paint peeling on the edges, the overgrown garden his sister Sarah had been trying to tame, and the boat that had always been a fixture of their lives.

“Guess we’ve got some work to do, huh?” Sarah’s voice cut through his thoughts as she walked up beside him, wiping her hands on a rag.

Sam turned, offering her a half-smile. “Looks like it.” He didn’t add that there were things about the boat that reminded him of his father, and how he had always promised to fix it.

They stood for a moment in silence, both of them aware that the work on the boat was more than just mechanical—it was a way to rebuild something that had broken, just like the rest of their lives.

“I’ve been thinking,” Sarah said, already a little distracted as she wiped her hands on her pants, “maybe we should take it down the bayou once it’s fixed. Just… get away for a bit. The two of us. You, me, the boat. You think you’re ready for that?”

Sam considered her words. He hadn’t realized how much he had missed this—the easy, unspoken understanding between them. He’d been so lost in the whirlwind of his superhero duties that he had forgotten what it meant to just be Sam again, without the weight of the world pressing down on his shoulders.

“I think I’m starting to be,” he replied quietly.

They worked together, pulling off the tarp that had been covering the boat, its hull battered and worn by years of neglect. Sam felt a knot in his chest loosen as the two of them fell into an easy rhythm, just like they used to when they were kids. The boat had always been a place for their father’s stories, a place of quiet afternoons, and now it felt like the remnants of those moments still held on.

“I thought you said you were gonna leave all this behind,” Sarah teased as they dug in, trying to fix the boat’s engine. “You were the big city hero. Thought the boat was a thing of the past.”

Sam let out a low chuckle, his hands busy on the machinery. “Yeah, well, sometimes the past has a way of finding you.”

She raised an eyebrow. “Uh-huh. So what’s going on? You back to fixing boats, or are you planning on picking up that Captain America shield again? Cause last time I checked, that was your big thing now.”

Sam didn’t answer right away. Instead, he looked at his sister, trying to find the right words. “I don’t know yet. I just… I think I’m figuring it out. What I’m supposed to be.”

Sarah was quiet for a moment, then handed him a wrench. “Well, whatever it is, I think you’re gonna be okay, Sam. You’ve always been more than the suit, or the shield. Don’t forget that.”

He smiled at her, her confidence like a balm for everything he’d been questioning. “I won’t.”

Together, they worked late into the afternoon, the sun hanging low in the sky, casting long shadows over the bayou. There was still a long road ahead, but for the first time in a while, Sam felt like he was finally home.

The sun was setting over the bayou, the golden light casting a warm glow over the boat as Sam and Sarah continued their work. The air was thick with the scent of oil and wood, and the rhythmic sound of wrenches clanking against metal filled the quiet space. It felt like a thousand years ago that Sam had worked on the boat with his father, but now, it was Sarah beside him, and for the first time, a part of him felt at peace.

He was about to hand Sarah a tool when he heard the crunch of gravel underfoot. He looked up, squinting in the fading light. Bucky was walking toward them, his hands shoved into the pockets of his jacket, a quiet presence that had become familiar over the last few weeks. He had been away from them for a while, but Sam had learned to expect him, even if they didn’t always know how to move past the tensions that lingered between them.

“You need a hand?” Bucky’s voice was low, but there was something in it—like he genuinely wanted to help. Sam nodded, wiping his hands on a rag.

“Yeah, actually. Could use some extra muscle.”

Without another word, Bucky moved closer, rolling up his sleeves, his eyes scanning the boat. Sam could tell he was taking it all in—assessing what needed to be fixed, what could be salvaged, and what had to be replaced. For someone with such a dark past, Bucky was surprisingly good at this—good with his hands, methodical in a way that Sam hadn’t expected.

They worked in comfortable silence for a while. There was something easy about it. No talking, just the soft clinking of metal and the occasional grunt of effort as they maneuvered the boat’s parts into place.

As the evening wore on, Sam caught Bucky glancing over at him, his expression slightly more open than usual. Sam wiped his brow and sighed, feeling the strain of the day. Finally, Bucky spoke.

“Y’know, I didn’t think I’d ever be here,” Bucky said, his voice softer than usual. “Didn’t think I’d be this… involved in anything like this again.”

Sam stopped for a moment, surprised by the vulnerability in Bucky’s tone. He hadn’t heard him talk like that before.

“You think it’s that bad?” Sam asked, genuinely curious.

Bucky shrugged, his eyes not meeting Sam’s as he spoke. “I don’t know. I’ve done a lot of things in my life. A lot of bad things. I tried to fix some of them… but I keep screwing up. I still don’t know how to make it right.”

Sam watched him carefully. This was the Bucky that not many people saw—the one that was still struggling with the weight of his past, the one who was still learning to be something more than the Winter Soldier.

“You don’t have to have it all figured out,” Sam said quietly. “None of us do. We’re all just trying to get by.”

Bucky met his gaze then, and for a moment, there was a flicker of something—something that almost looked like gratitude.

“Yeah,” Bucky said, a small smile pulling at the corners of his mouth. “I guess you’re right.”

They worked a bit longer, but Sam could sense something had shifted. Bucky wasn’t just some soldier anymore. He was just a man, like Sam, just trying to make sense of the mess he’d made of his life.

Finally, Bucky spoke again, his voice quieter this time.

“I’ve been thinking about Nadia… and Katherine,” he said, his tone almost hesitant. “I never thought I’d be in a situation like this. A… father. Or someone who gets to be there for a kid. I didn’t know what I was supposed to do when she started calling me ‘Dad.’”

Sam wiped his hands on his shirt, giving Bucky a look that was both understanding and slightly amused. “I can’t imagine that’s an easy thing to figure out.”

Bucky gave a rough laugh. “No, it’s not. I wasn’t… I wasn’t good at it. At first, I thought I had to be perfect for her. But the more I spent time with her, the more I realized… I just needed to be there. That’s all she needed. I just had to show up.”

Sam nodded slowly, watching Bucky’s expression soften as he spoke. It was rare for him to let down his walls, but there was something about talking about Nadia that seemed to crack through Bucky’s usually guarded nature.

“I don’t think I’ve ever really had anyone like that in my life,” Bucky continued, his voice quieter. “Someone who just wanted me to be… me. Without all the baggage. Without the super soldier stuff, or the Winter Soldier stuff. Just… Bucky.”

Sam placed a hand on his shoulder, offering him a genuine smile. “You’re a good man, Bucky. You don’t need to be perfect. Nadia knows that. Katherine knows that. And honestly… I think you’re starting to figure it out.”

Bucky met his eyes, a mix of gratitude and something deeper in his expression.

“I’m trying,” Bucky said simply, his voice thick with the unspoken truth of it.

They worked in silence for a while after that, but this time, it wasn’t awkward. It was different. For the first time in a long time, Sam felt like he was seeing Bucky as more than just a soldier or a friend from the past. He was a man who had been broken and was slowly trying to put himself back together. And maybe, just maybe, that was something worth fighting for.

When they finally finished up with the boat, Sarah came over to inspect their progress, giving Bucky a nod of approval. He looked over at Sam and Sarah, and for the first time in a while, there was a sense of belonging that made him feel a little less like an outsider.

As they walked back toward the house, Bucky hanging back a little, Sam turned to him with a smirk.

“You know,” Sam said, “I don’t think I’ve ever met a guy who could go from fighting world-ending battles to fixing a boat in a day. You might just be a regular guy after all.”

Bucky chuckled. “Maybe. But don’t expect me to keep fixing things for you. I’ve got my own life to work on.”

“Fair enough,” Sam said, grinning. “But you’re always welcome here, Bucky. Always.”

Bucky gave him a nod, and for the first time, Sam believed it. Maybe this was the beginning of something better for both of them—something beyond the shield, beyond the war, beyond the weight of the world.

It was a start. And sometimes, that was all you needed.

The evening air was warm, the sun now dipping below the horizon, casting soft streaks of pink and orange across the sky. The boat, now in much better shape, sat proudly on the dock as Sam, Bucky, and Sarah leaned against the railing. A quiet peace had settled over the bayou, and for the first time in a long time, Bucky felt a sense of calm.

They had finished working on the boat, but they weren’t ready to go inside just yet. Sarah had gone inside to prepare dinner, leaving Sam and Bucky standing side by side, their eyes drawn to the water that glimmered in the fading light.

Sam leaned back against the wooden post, his arms crossed, and took a deep breath. He wasn’t sure what it was, but the weight that had been on his shoulders for so long felt a little lighter now. Maybe it was the work they’d done together, or maybe it was the conversation they’d had earlier, but he could tell Bucky was more at ease than when he first arrived.

“You’ve been carrying a lot of weight, haven’t you?” Sam asked, his voice softer than usual.

Bucky hesitated, looking out over the water before answering. “I guess I always have. It’s just… I never knew how to let go of it. I thought if I just kept moving, kept fighting, it would eventually go away. But it doesn’t. The guilt… it doesn’t just disappear.”

Sam nodded, understanding all too well what that was like. He had seen it in Bucky before—in the way he carried the weight of his past with him, like it was a part of him he couldn’t shake off, no matter how hard he tried.

“Yeah,” Sam said, his voice low. “I know that feeling. I gave up the shield, and it’s like… people keep telling me what I should’ve done, what I could’ve done. But it wasn’t just about the shield. It was about who I am, who I want to be, and what kind of legacy I want to leave behind.”

Bucky turned toward him, a trace of curiosity in his expression. “And what’s that legacy for you, Sam?”

Sam looked at Bucky for a moment before answering, his eyes thoughtful. “It’s not just about the symbol. It’s about showing people that there’s more than one way to be a hero. That you don’t need to be perfect to make a difference. And that the most important thing is standing up for what’s right—no matter what.”

Bucky was quiet for a moment, clearly considering Sam’s words. When he spoke again, his voice was almost tentative. “You know… when I judged you for giving up the shield, I wasn’t just judging you. I was… I was looking at my own guilt.”

Sam raised an eyebrow, intrigued. “What do you mean?”

Bucky rubbed his hand over his face, a sigh escaping his lips. “I was angry. Angry at Steve for asking me to carry the shield. But I was also angry at myself. Angry that I couldn’t do what he asked me to do. And maybe I was just looking for someone else to take on that burden so I wouldn’t have to deal with mine.”

Sam took in what Bucky was saying, his gaze steady but compassionate. “Bucky, that’s a lot to carry. I get it. I get that you felt like you had to be what Steve wanted you to be. But, you know, Steve… he was always about choice. He believed you should be who you are, not who you think people expect you to be.”

Bucky nodded slowly, processing the words. “Yeah… he always did, didn’t he?”

Sam leaned back against the post, a faint smile tugging at the corners of his lips. “And he chose you for a reason, Bucky. He trusted you. Even when you didn’t trust yourself. You’re a part of his legacy, but that doesn’t mean you have to live in his shadow. You have your own path now. Your own chance to make a difference.”

Bucky was quiet for a long time, the weight of the conversation pressing down on him. Finally, he spoke, his voice softer now, less burdened.

“I’m sorry, Sam,” he said, the words coming with a sincerity that surprised both of them. “I was wrong. About you. About the shield. About everything.”

Sam turned to look at him, his expression genuine. “It’s okay, Bucky. We all have our demons. It’s about learning to face them, and move forward. You’re not the Winter Soldier anymore, and you don’t have to be Steve’s soldier, either. You can be… you.”

Bucky exhaled slowly, the weight in his chest easing, if only a little. “I don’t know if I’ll ever stop feeling like I’m carrying the past with me. But I’m trying. I’m… trying to figure it out.”

Sam nodded, understanding more than Bucky knew. “That’s all any of us can do. We’re all just trying to figure it out. And sometimes, the hardest part is learning to forgive yourself.”

Bucky gave him a small, tired smile. “Yeah. I’m starting to learn that.”

The two men stood there for a long moment, the sounds of the bayou filling the silence between them. It wasn’t the first time they’d had a conversation like this, and it wouldn’t be the last. But something had shifted. There was understanding now, and maybe—just maybe—there was the possibility of real healing.

“You know,” Sam said after a pause, his tone lightening, “I think Steve would’ve been proud of both of us.”

Bucky raised an eyebrow. “You think so?”

“Yeah,” Sam said with a grin. “He trusted us to carry the mantle. And we’re doing it our way.”

Bucky chuckled softly, the tension easing from his shoulders. “Well, I guess that’s one way to look at it.”

As the last of the daylight faded and the stars began to twinkle above them, Sam and Bucky stood side by side, ready to face whatever came next—not as soldiers, but as men who had found something worth fighting for. Something that wasn’t about legacy or responsibility, but about healing. And that, Sam thought, was enough.

As the last of the sunlight dipped below the horizon, casting a soft glow across the dock, Bucky wiped his hands on a rag, standing up from where he had been working on the boat. Sam had been focused, his own hands working efficiently, but now the boat was in better shape than it had been in years, and both of them felt a quiet sense of accomplishment.

Bucky stretched his shoulders and turned to Sam. “I should get going,” he said, his voice low but steady. “Katherine and Nadia are waiting.”

Sam wiped his hands on his jeans, turning to face Bucky. There was a smile on his face, genuine and easy. “You know, next time, bring them around,” he said. “Would love to meet them both. It’s good to see you like this, Bucky—relaxed, even.”

Bucky paused for a moment, surprised by the suggestion. He hadn’t really thought about it—about bringing Katherine and Nadia into this, into his world, or even into Sam’s world. But it felt right, somehow. He owed it to them, to himself, to start sharing more, to stop holding everything at arm’s length.

He nodded, a small smile tugging at his lips. “I’ll talk to Katherine about it,” he said. “Nadia would probably love the boat. She’s at that age where everything is an adventure.”

“Yeah, kids are like that,” Sam said, a soft chuckle in his voice. “They make everything feel a little brighter.”

Bucky didn’t say anything more, but he felt a quiet warmth at Sam’s words. He had always admired Sam’s ability to connect with people, to bridge the gaps others couldn’t. And for the first time, Bucky felt like maybe he wasn’t quite so alone in all this.

“Thanks, Sam,” Bucky said, his voice quieter now. “For this. For letting me help. It… means a lot.”

Sam nodded, his expression sincere. “We all need help, Bucky. Don’t forget that.” He clapped him on the shoulder. “Take care of yourself. And, seriously, bring them next time. It’d be good to have a whole crew together.”

Bucky’s eyes softened at that, a mixture of gratitude and something else—something he wasn’t ready to put into words just yet.

“I will,” he promised, his voice steady. “I will.”

With one last look at Sam, Bucky turned and started walking toward the truck, the weight of the world still there, but just a little easier to bear now. As he climbed into the driver’s seat and pulled out onto the road, his mind wandered back to Katherine and Nadia, to the quiet warmth of their home. Maybe things weren’t as broken as they once seemed. Maybe—just maybe—there was a way forward, a way to rebuild what he had lost, and find something new.

He glanced up at the sky, the stars beginning to flicker to life, and for the first time in a long while, he felt a glimmer of hope.

And he promised himself that he’d hold onto it.

Chapter Text

Chapter 32

The door creaked open just past sunset. Katherine looked up from folding laundry, her breath catching at the sight of him.

“Hey,” Bucky said, the corners of his mouth tilting up.

She set the shirt down and crossed to him, arms slipping around his waist as he dropped his bag and returned the embrace.

“You’re okay,” she whispered into his shoulder.

“I’m okay,” he murmured back, burying his face in her hair for a moment longer. “Missed you.”

She pulled back to study his face. “Did you talk to him?”

He nodded. “Yeah. We’re… good. We understand each other now.”

She smiled softly, brushing her fingers across the scruff on his jaw. “I’m glad.”

He hesitated, then glanced toward the hallway where Nadia was babbling to herself in her room. “I was thinking… if you’re not too tired tonight, maybe we could go out. Just us.”

Katherine blinked, surprised. “Out? Like… a date?”

“Yeah,” Bucky said, trying not to fidget. “You, me, a real table and maybe a slow dance if you’re not sick of my two left feet.”

A laugh bubbled out of her. “Who are you and what have you done with the brooding super soldier?”

“Junie already agreed to babysit,” he added quickly. “Figured I’d take the risk of assuming you’d say yes.”

She grinned. “Of course I’ll say yes.”

The restaurant wasn’t fancy, not in a showy way. Soft lighting glowed from old brass fixtures overhead, jazz hummed low from unseen speakers, and the scent of butter and thyme drifted lazily from the kitchen. It was the kind of place built for quiet conversation and the gentle clink of wine glasses, not surveillance or escape plans.

For Katherine, it was almost disorienting. Not the place itself—but what it meant.

She sat across from Bucky in a soft burgundy dress, her fingers wrapped loosely around the stem of her glass, smiling as he told her about Sam’s nephews and how they kept challenging him to arm wrestling contests.

“They’re vicious,” Bucky said with a grin, shaking his head. “One of them almost had me.”

“You let him win,” Katherine teased, raising an eyebrow.

He shrugged, feigning offense. “I have a reputation to uphold.”

“You have a soft spot for kids and an even softer one for pretending you don’t.”

That made him laugh—really laugh—and it was that laugh that tugged something loose inside her. A knot that had once been survival, always coiled, always braced. She looked at him—not the assassin, not the man carrying a century’s worth of grief—but the one in front of her now, his blue eyes warm and a little shy when they caught hers across the table.

This. This was something she’d dreamed about once. Before Klaus, before the nights she spent glancing at doorways and mirrors and planning her next escape. Before the idea of normal had felt like a fairytale someone else got to live.

And now she was here.

No running. No shadows.

Just… a date. With a man who held her hand and looked at her like she mattered.

“You’re staring,” Bucky said suddenly, grinning crookedly.

“You’re pretty,” she shot back easily.

His brows lifted, that boyish charm sneaking out like sunlight through clouds. “I’ve been called a lot of things. ‘Pretty’ wasn’t usually one of them.”

“I’m not most people,” she replied, then leaned forward slightly, her voice dropping. “Besides, you blush every time I call you that, so now I can’t stop.”

He coughed, looking down at his plate with a small smile, but he didn’t deny it.

And she was flirting. God, she was flirting—and not because she had to, or to get out of a situation, or to manipulate the room. It was real. It was her. And for the first time in too long, it felt safe.

They lingered over dessert—chocolate torte he insisted on sharing because she’d once told him she hated wasting good things.

Katherine leaned back, her heart a little lighter, her chest open in a way it hadn’t been in years. “Thank you,” she said quietly.

Bucky looked up, surprised. “For what?”

“For making this feel… easy. Like I can have this.”

His expression softened. “You can,” he said simply. “You deserve it.”

And he meant it.

She reached for his hand across the table, lacing their fingers together. He squeezed gently.

They didn’t go far after dinner. Just down the block, where the restaurant’s sister bar offered live music on weekends and enough space to move without drawing attention. The band was halfway through a jazz set when Bucky tugged Katherine’s hand, wordlessly guiding her onto the floor.

She hesitated for only a second. Old muscle memory stirred—ballrooms and chandeliers, the rustle of gowns and clinking champagne flutes. A waltz in London with Elijah, her hand in his, the air heavy with civility and secrets. That had been a dance for show. A fragile treaty in motion while Klaus watched from the edge of the room with a drink in hand and hunger in his eyes. Even then, she’d known the warmth beneath Elijah’s hand couldn’t protect her forever.

But this wasn’t that. This wasn’t power disguised as affection. This wasn’t a stage.

This was Bucky. And this was now.

He settled one hand lightly at her waist, the other clasping hers, and began to sway with the music—nothing rehearsed, nothing formal, just the quiet rhythm of two people finding each other in the middle of everything.

Katherine rested her head against his shoulder, the fabric of his shirt soft beneath her cheek. She let her eyes close for a moment.

“I haven’t danced in a long time,” she murmured.

“You’re still better than me,” Bucky replied, his voice low, close to her ear. “But I’m told I have good footwork.”

She laughed softly, leaning into him more. “You’re doing fine.”

He didn’t push for more. Didn’t ask about the weight behind her silence. But she could feel it in him too—that quiet ache. They were both carrying ghosts.

“I used to think dancing was a way to keep peace,” she said finally, her words a hush against the shell of his neck. “A kind of… silent war in silk gloves. Like maybe if we just kept spinning long enough, no one would notice the knives under the table.”

Bucky’s hand tightened gently at her back. “Not tonight,” he said. “No knives here. Just us.”

She looked up at him, at the man who had walked through fire and still managed to look at her like she was something worth staying for. Something whole.

“No knives,” she agreed, and then, with a smile that was almost shy, “though I do still have one in my purse.”

He grinned at that, and the tension between them softened into something warm and steady. The music played on. Their bodies moved together in quiet trust, the world narrowing down to the steady pulse of the moment.

No Klaus. No Elijah. No fear or performance.

Just Bucky Barnes and Katherine—dancing slowly, like healing didn’t need to be rushed.

Like maybe, just maybe, it was already happening.

They stepped through the front door quietly, the warmth of the night still clinging to their skin. The living room was dim, the only light coming from the lamp Junie had left on beside the couch. A blanket was draped over the back of it, and the faint hum of the dishwasher echoed from the kitchen.

Junie met them halfway, socked feet barely making a sound across the floor. “She’s out cold,” she whispered, gesturing down the hall. “Tried to wait up for you two but passed out mid-princess story. She’s clutching that little Captain America doll like it’s sacred.”

Katherine smiled, her heart already drifting toward her daughter’s room. “Thank you, Junie.”

Bucky reached into his pocket, pulling out a few bills, but Junie waved her hand.

“You’re really gonna try to pay your daughter’s aunt to babysit her niece?” she teased, smirking.

“It’s the principle,” Bucky deadpanned, but there was a flicker of boyish charm under the sarcasm.

Junie snatched the money anyway. “Principle accepted. Guilt absorbed. I’m buying a burrito tomorrow.”

She winked at Katherine, grabbed her bag, and headed for the door. “You guys are disgustingly adorable. Please try not to explode from emotional growth overnight.”

When the door clicked shut behind her, the silence settled in. Not tense—comfortable.

Katherine turned toward Bucky. “We should check on her.”

He followed her down the hall, pausing at Nadia’s door. It was open just enough to see the soft glow of her nightlight—a little enchanted moon that slowly changed colors. Nadia lay curled up in bed, her hair a tousled halo on the pillow, the small plush shield hugged tight to her chest.

Bucky stood in the doorway for a long beat, his gaze softening. “She’s so small,” he murmured.

“She’s my entire world,” Katherine said.

They stood there together, still dressed from their date, both a little breathless from everything that had changed in the span of a night.

He looked over at Katherine, the corners of his mouth lifting in a tired smile. “We’re really doing this, huh?”

She leaned her head against his shoulder. “We are. And we’re not half bad at it.”

He didn’t answer right away, but his hand found hers, fingers lacing together as if he’d finally stopped running.

The soft click of Nadia’s door closing behind them seemed to shift something in the air. They returned to the living room in near silence, feet padding over warm floorboards, the echo of their laughter from earlier still hanging between them like an aftertaste. The light from the lamp painted everything in a golden hush—intimate, close.

Bucky reached for her first, thumb brushing her cheekbone as he looked at her like she was something half-remembered from a dream, now real and warm and in front of him. Katherine leaned into the touch, her hands resting lightly against his chest.

“Tonight felt like something from another life,” she said softly. “Like a dream I stopped having a long time ago.”

He didn’t speak—just leaned in and kissed her. Gentle at first. A thank you. A promise. Then deeper, as if all the longing and loneliness they’d carried had finally found release.

The kiss turned hungry quickly, fingers threading through hair, hands finding the hem of clothing with quiet urgency. They sank onto the couch together, tangled in the kind of heat that only came after slow healing—laughter between them, soft gasps, the creak of the old cushions giving them away.

……….

Later, the sky just barely beginning to blush with the earliest signs of dawn, Katherine stirred against him, tucked beneath his arm with the blanket half-slipped from her bare shoulder.

“We need to get up,” she whispered, groggy but smiling. “You need to get dressed. Before she gets up and finds us like this.”

Bucky groaned softly and buried his face in her neck. “You sure I can’t just say I fell asleep on the couch and blame my bad shoulder?”

“You don’t have a bad shoulder,” she teased, pulling herself upright and reaching for her shirt.

He sat up, blinking sleep from his eyes as she stood, slipping her clothes on with the graceful efficiency. He followed suit, zipping up his jeans and running a hand through his sleep-ruffled hair.

Katherine glanced at the clock. “We’ve got maybe fifteen minutes before the tornado wakes up asking for pancakes and a heroic morning cuddle.”

Bucky leaned over and pressed a lingering kiss to her shoulder. “Best reason to get dressed I’ve ever had.”

She gave him a crooked smile over her shoulder. “Welcome to the rest of your life, James.”

This time, it was different.

The weight in his chest hadn’t vanished, but it had shifted—softened by the warmth of home, of belonging. Of having something, someone, to come back to.

The sun hadn’t fully risen yet, casting a golden blur across the hardwood floor as Bucky stood by the door, buckling the last of his gear. Katherine handed him his gloves wordlessly, eyes lingering on his face. She wasn’t stopping him—she didn’t need to. He already knew what was at stake, both out there and in here.

Little footsteps padded across the floor. Nadia, still warm from sleep and in her fuzzy pajamas, rubbed her eyes and held out her arms.

“Go fight?” she mumbled, clutching her stuffed dinosaur under one arm. “You come back?”

Bucky knelt, swallowing down the knot in his throat. “Yeah, Nadia. I’m coming back.”

Nadia wrapped her arms around his neck, planting a damp, wobbly kiss on his cheek. “Okay, Daddy,” she whispered into his shoulder, the word soft and trusting.

Katherine crouched beside them, gently brushing Nadia’s curls aside. She looked at Bucky—really looked—and whispered, “You promised. No more shutting us out.”

He nodded, eyes flicking between her and Nadia. “You’ll hear from me,” he said, voice hoarse. “I’ll be okay.”

Katherine leaned in, pressing her lips to his in a kiss that was familiar, grounded, real. A promise of return.

As he pulled away, Nadia waved both hands, her smile toothy and proud. “Bye-bye, Come back fast!”

He grinned, just barely, kissed the top of her head, and stood.

For the first time in a long time, he walked out not just as a soldier—but as a father, a partner, a man with something worth protecting.

Chapter Text

Chapter 33

The air inside the GRC building was thick with smoke and panic. Sirens wailed and fire alarms shrieked overhead. Bucky moved fast, weaving through the chaos with grim focus. But this wasn’t the Winter Soldier. This wasn’t a man driven by orders or instinct.

This was a man making a choice.

He reached one of the armored transport trucks—hostages were trapped inside, pounding on the glass. The vehicle was rigged, teetering on the edge of a platform with a timed detonation counting down fast.

Bucky didn’t hesitate. He slammed his vibranium arm into the lock, metal crunching beneath his strength. With a guttural cry of effort, he wrenched the door open and helped the first hostage out, then the next. His voice was calm, steady, grounding the frightened civilians.

“You’re okay,” he said, guiding a man down by the elbow. “You’re getting out of here.”

The last person, a young woman no older than Katherine had been when he first met her, sobbed as he pulled her free. He shielded her as the truck behind them jolted. But they were safe.

And Bucky was still standing.

Later, when Karli appeared through the smoke and sparks—eyes burning, fists clenched—Bucky stepped into her path. But he didn’t lift his fists. Not right away.

“You don’t have to keep doing this,” he said. “You think you’re fighting for the voiceless, but you’re not listening anymore.”

Karli’s voice cracked. “You think you know better than me? You’ve lived in a broken system for a hundred years.”

Bucky shook his head slowly. “No. I’ve been used by broken systems. And I’ve hurt a lot of people thinking I was doing the right thing.”

Karli lunged—he dodged. Quick, instinctive. But still not striking back.

“I’m not your enemy,” he said, breath steady, even as she came at him again. “You’re not mine.”

There was a beat. A flicker in her eyes. Doubt, maybe. Or recognition.

He didn’t stop her from running. He didn’t need to win that fight. He just needed to be the man who didn’t add to the fire.

⸻

As Sam stood in front of the GRC and the world, his voice steady but impassioned, Bucky lingered at the edge of the crowd—still in his tactical gear, bruises fresh, dirt caked into the creases of his skin. The adrenaline was fading, leaving behind a sharp, raw stillness in its place. Around him, the chaos was slowly turning into order again. Sirens dulled. Voices hushed. And in the middle of it all, Sam spoke—not with arrogance or command, but with clarity. With truth.

He didn’t sound like a soldier giving orders, or a politician smoothing things over. He sounded like a man who had lived it—every loss, every injustice, every ignored cry—and still stood there asking the world to do better.

Sam didn’t vilify Karli. He didn’t wash over the damage she had done, but he refused to erase the reasons behind her rage. He spoke of the people lost in the cracks—displaced, overlooked, forced into desperation by a world that offered them no place. He spoke of empathy as a responsibility. Of power as something meant to serve, not dominate. And when he lifted the shield, it didn’t gleam like a weapon—it glowed like hope.

Bucky didn’t catch every word. Some part of him was tuned instead to the crowd, watching the subtle shifts—how tension eased in the shoulders of government leaders, how a reporter’s hand stilled over their keyboard, how a woman nearby wiped tears silently from beneath her glasses. People were listening. Really listening. And for once, it wasn’t about fear. It was about understanding.

And then Bucky saw them—children, clutching at their parents’ legs, wide-eyed and silent. The way they looked at Sam the way Nadia looked at him, like he was invincible. Like the world was still capable of heroes.

And in that moment, all Bucky could think about was her.

Nadia, with peanut butter on her cheeks and toy soldiers lined up in formation on the living room rug. Nadia, wrapped in Katherine’s arms asking, “When is Daddy coming home?” Nadia, who adored Captain America because she believed he stood for fairness, for kindness—not flags or power.

What kind of world will she grow up in? Bucky thought.

What questions would she ask one day? About borders. About war. About why people were hurting. And would he know what to say? Could he explain to her why he once let the silence grow between them, why he sometimes still flinched at the sound of his own name?

Could he look her in the eyes and say he fought for something good?

He didn’t know. But as he watched Sam—wings spread behind him like a symbol of something new, something brave, something earned—Bucky felt something stir. A seed of belief he thought had withered long ago.

Sam wasn’t just lifting Steve’s shield. He was reshaping it. Honoring it by challenging it. And in doing so, he was carrying all of them forward—the broken, the discarded, the kids like Nadia who deserved a better world than the one their parents inherited.

The applause came slowly, but it grew—like sunlight breaking through clouds. And as it echoed, Bucky tipped his head back to the sky. The stars weren’t visible yet, but they were there, waiting.

Maybe, he thought. There’s still hope.

Not just for the world.

But for Nadia’s.

The door creaked open softly.

It was late. The kind of late where the world was asleep, where only the hum of the refrigerator and the occasional passing car reminded you that time still moved. Bucky stepped inside quietly, his footsteps careful on the worn wood floor. His jacket was slung over his shoulder, his hair still damp from a quick rinse at the safehouse. The city outside felt far away now, like another life.

The living room was dim, lit only by the warm orange glow of a nightlight left on near the hallway. He paused there, breathing it in—the stillness, the comfort. Home.

Katherine appeared from the kitchen, barefoot in one of his old shirts, a tired smile on her face.

“Hey,” she said gently.

He looked at her for a long moment, as if anchoring himself. Then he crossed the room in a few strides and wrapped his arms around her. She melted into him instantly, arms around his waist, hands splaying across his back like she needed to feel every inch of him to believe he was real.

“You’re safe,” she whispered, pressing her forehead to his chest.

“Yeah,” he said, voice thick. “I’m safe. It’s done.”

They stood like that for a while, wrapped in silence. Then she pulled back slightly to look up at him.

“How did it go?” she asked.

He exhaled slowly. “Sam was incredible. He—” Bucky swallowed, his voice catching. “He didn’t just stop a fight. He… he changed the conversation.”

Katherine searched his face. “You look… different.”

He gave a small smile, not quite boyish, not quite tired. Something in between. “I feel different.”

She brushed a piece of hair from his forehead. “That good or bad?”

“Good,” he said. “Hopeful. Scary, but… good.”

She nodded, sensing the layers beneath his words. “She waited up for you,” she said softly. “Fell asleep on the couch twice. Finally gave in an hour ago.”

He smiled, following her gaze toward the hallway. “I’ll check on her.”

He moved quietly, easing the door open to Nadia’s room. She was curled up in bed, one hand still loosely clutching her stuffed tiger, her tiny brow furrowed even in sleep. Bucky stepped closer, kneeling beside her bed. For a moment, he just watched her breathe.

“She deserves better,” he murmured under his breath. “And I want to be the kind of man who helps make that happen.”

He reached out and brushed a curl from her forehead. Nadia stirred but didn’t wake, sighing softly as her body relaxed deeper into sleep.

He pressed a kiss to her temple.

“I love you,” he whispered.

Back in the living room, Katherine waited with two mugs of tea now in her hands. He sat beside her on the couch, fingers still warm from touching his daughter’s hair, and let his body lean into hers.

“I want to tell her stories someday,” Bucky said quietly. “About people like Sam. About the day Captain America told the world it had to do better. And maybe… about her dad. How he tried.”

“She’ll know,” Katherine said, resting her head on his shoulder. “She already does.”

And as the night settled around them, quiet and whole, Bucky believed her.

For the first time in a long time—he believed.
…………..

———————

The door swung open, and Sam stood there, smiling wide as he took in the sight of Bucky with Katherine and Nadia. It was clear from the moment Sam laid eyes on them that Bucky wasn’t exaggerating about his family. They had a warmth about them, a groundedness that Sam immediately recognized, and it felt right. But he wasn’t about to make this an easy meeting.

“Well, well,” Sam began, raising an eyebrow. “Bucky Barnes, you clean up well. And I see you’ve got some lovely company.”

Katherine smiled warmly, stepping forward with a hand extended. “It’s nice to meet you, Sam. Bucky’s said a lot about you.”

Sam shook her hand with a firm grip, then glanced at Bucky with a smirk. “Oh, I bet he has. All good things, right?” He looked over at Nadia, still clutching Katherine’s jacket, and his face softened. “And this must be the famous Nadia. Bucky’s told me all about you too.”

Nadia’s eyes were still wide with wonder. She stepped forward hesitantly, peering up at Sam. “You’re Captain America,” she said in a small voice, the awe evident in her tone.

Sam crouched down to her level, leaning in with an exaggeratedly serious expression. “You caught me,” he said, his voice low and conspiratorial. “I’m Captain America, but shhh, don’t tell anyone. I’m trying to keep it a secret.”

Nadia’s eyes twinkled as she giggled. “I saw you on TV! You were saving people!”

“That’s right,” Sam said, giving her a wink. “And if you’re ever in trouble, you just call me, okay?”

Bucky leaned against the doorframe, arms crossed, his lips curling into a fond smile at the sight of Sam and Nadia interacting. It was clear that Sam had a way with kids, and it made Bucky feel something deep inside—something good. Maybe this was how it was supposed to be. Heroes weren’t just the ones who wore the shield. Heroes were the ones who took the time, who cared enough to listen, to make someone feel important.

Katherine caught Bucky’s eye and smiled softly, shaking her head. “I can see how you two might get along. I’ve never seen him so… animated.”

“Oh, it’s Sam’s superpower,” Bucky replied, nodding with a teasing grin. “He’s got this whole ‘I’m Captain America, but I’m still the cool guy who makes dad jokes’ thing down.”

Sam rolled his eyes, clearly used to Bucky’s jabs. “You’re one to talk, Buck. You and your ‘grumpy old man’ routine. You’re the one who can’t get the hang of anything that doesn’t involve punching.” He winked at Katherine, making sure Bucky didn’t hear. “But trust me, if you ever need advice on how to keep him from going full soldier mode, just let me know.”

Katherine let out a soft laugh, thoroughly enjoying the dynamic. “I’ll keep that in mind,” she said, her voice light. “Seems like I’m not the only one who’s had to figure out how to handle him.”

Bucky shot Sam a mock glare. “I’ve had to put up with you longer than you’ve had to put up with me, Wilson.”

“True, true,” Sam responded with a grin, glancing at Nadia who was still holding onto Katherine’s leg. “I guess I’ve earned my stripes. Though if I’m being honest, I’m really just here for the snacks.”

Katherine laughed again, her eyes twinkling. “I’ll make sure there’s something for you, then. But only if you promise to teach Nadia how to do that superhero pose you were showing her.”

Nadia looked at Sam with big eyes, bouncing on her heels. “Can you show me? I want to do it just like you!”

Sam stood up, striking a dramatic pose, one hand on his hip, the other raised in a victorious gesture. “Like this?” he asked, his voice filled with mock heroism.

Bucky couldn’t help but chuckle, his arms still crossed. “Look at that. He even strikes a pose for the three-year-old. You should’ve known you were in trouble the minute you let him wear the suit.”

Sam spun on his heel, shaking his head, but still smiling. “At least someone’s having fun around here,” he said to Katherine, offering her a wink.

Bucky shot Sam another playful glare. “I’ve had enough of your fun for a lifetime.”

Katherine raised an eyebrow, still grinning. “Is this how you two are all the time?”

“Oh, absolutely,” Sam said, straightening up. “Bucky’s been giving me grief for years. But trust me, it’s all out of love.”

Bucky’s eyes narrowed in mock suspicion. “Sure. Love. That’s what we’re calling it now.”

Katherine chuckled, glancing at Bucky. “I think it’s kind of sweet, in its own way.”

Before Bucky could respond, Nadia tugged on Sam’s sleeve, drawing his attention back to her. “Can you teach me how to fly too?”

Sam grinned, ruffling her hair. “Well, that one’s a little tricky. But we can work on it. Maybe we’ll start with jumping off the couch.”

Nadia’s face lit up. “Yes! Like flying!”

Bucky laughed and leaned in to say to Sam, “Next thing you know, she’ll be asking you to teach her to catch grenades.”

Sam snorted, clearly delighted by the idea. “Only if she’s ready for it.” Then he winked at Nadia. “But first, we need to work on the superhero pose. You got it?”

Nadia nodded eagerly, mimicking the pose with all the seriousness her tiny three-year-old body could muster. It was adorable.

Katherine stood back, watching the easy, playful exchange between the three of them, and felt her heart swell. It was hard not to smile. There was something about the way Bucky and Sam bantered, about how naturally Sam slipped into the role of someone who didn’t just save the world, but who made it a little brighter too. It made her think that maybe, just maybe, there was room for more heroes than she’d ever realized.

As the laughter and light-hearted teasing filled the space between them, Katherine couldn’t help but feel grateful. Grateful for this moment, for the connection between them all. Bucky had come so far, and Sam—well, Sam was proving to be more than just the new Captain America. He was a friend, a brother in arms, and someone who would help make the world just a little bit better, one small moment at a time.

“I think we’ll fit in just fine,” Katherine said softly, to herself more than anyone else, but Sam caught her words. He looked at her with a knowing smile.

“Glad to hear it,” Sam said. “And hey, next time, you can bring the cookies.”

“Deal,” Katherine replied with a wink.

Bucky, rolling his eyes but still grinning, added, “I’m just here for the snacks, too.”

……….

The Louisiana sun casting a golden glow over the small dock by Sarah’s family home. The air is thick with the scent of saltwater and the distant hum of insects. Laughter echoes in the air as children run and play by the water’s edge, their joy contagious. Sam, Bucky, Katherine, and Nadia stand a little further back, watching the kids—some of Sam’s nephews, some of Sarah’s neighbors’ children—all tumbling over each other in their carefree fun.

Katherine leans against a wooden post, her eyes following Nadia as she chatters with Sam’s nephews, who are trying to get her to show them some “cool tricks.” Nadia has always been an eager performer, the smallest of the group but always the center of attention with her bubbling energy. This afternoon, she’s found a patch of dirt and is showing them something that makes Sam, Bucky, and Katherine exchange curious glances.

Nadia holds her hands out, focusing intently as she whispers something under her breath. A few of the kids look at each other, unsure at first, but then their eyes widen as a small, swirling gust of wind begins to form between her palms. It spins faster and faster, lifting small twigs and leaves into the air, twisting them into intricate patterns.

Sam, who had been watching from the sidelines, blinks in disbelief. His eyes go from Nadia to Bucky, then back to Nadia as the wind dances around her like something straight out of a comic book. He steps forward, his brow furrowing, unable to hide his surprise.

“Hold up—did she just…?” Sam begins, his voice trailing off, unsure if he saw what he thought he saw.

Bucky looks over at him with an uncomfortable shift in his posture, realizing Sam’s shock. He scratches the back of his neck, trying to suppress his own unease. “Uh… yeah,” he says sheepishly. “I might’ve, uh, forgotten to mention that part.”

Sam turns to face him, his eyes wide with confusion and a little bit of disbelief. “Forgot to mention?” he repeats, his voice tinged with a mix of humor and genuine concern. “Bucky, you do realize this kid is—what?—three? And she’s doing that?” He gestures toward the wind swirling around Nadia, who is now laughing as the leaves form spirals above her head, the children around her clapping in awe.

Bucky shrugs and lets out a quiet sigh, his expression sheepish. “Well, yeah. But you remember when I asked for Strange’s contact a couple of months ago?”

Sam’s eyes narrow as he pieces things together. “Wait… You didn’t. Bucky, what the hell did you go and do?”

Bucky looks at him, the corners of his mouth curling into a reluctant grin. “I may or may not have reached out to him for a little… consultation about Nadia.”

Sam rubs his face with his hands, taking a moment to process what Bucky had just said. “So you’re telling me—this?” He gestures again at Nadia, who is now drawing shapes in the air as the wind follows her commands. “This isn’t some fluke?”

Bucky’s eyes flicker over to Nadia with a mixture of concern and affection. “She’s got something, Sam. Something… powerful. I don’t know what it is exactly, but I thought it’d be best to get a second opinion.”

Sam stares at Bucky for a long moment, disbelief still written all over his face. “And you didn’t think to mention it until now?”

Bucky shrugs again, a little sheepish. “Well, I didn’t want to freak you out, and I wasn’t sure if I was overreacting. You know, with everything that’s been going on.” His gaze softens as he looks back toward Nadia, watching her with the other children. “But after everything, after her… well, her gifts, I didn’t want to leave her in the dark about it. Strange said there’s nothing to worry about right now, that it’s just… unusual for a kid her age.”

Sam exhales slowly, shaking his head in disbelief. “Unusual? Bucky, that’s one word for it. ‘Terrifying’ might be another.”

Katherine, overhearing their exchange, steps up beside them with a small smile, arms crossed. “She’s fine, Sam. It’s just a bit of magic, nothing to worry about.”

Sam looks at her, his expression still bemused. “Magic? Really? I’m sorry, but did we just go from fighting super soldiers to dealing with magic? Like, real magic?”

Katherine shrugs, unphased by the shock in his voice. “I suppose it’s a good thing we’re used to the unexpected by now.” She tilts her head toward Nadia, who’s now showing off her ability to make the air shimmer around her fingers, creating small, glowing motes of light. “Besides, if she’s anything like her father, I’m sure she’ll be fine.”

Sam looks back at Bucky, who’s now staring at Nadia with a thoughtful expression. The bond between them is clear, as if Bucky’s protective instincts for Nadia are in full force. Sam shakes his head, his voice teasing but with a hint of sincerity. “I should’ve known. You two are a walking, talking circus. First, you’ve got the whole ‘vibranium arm’ situation, and now we’ve got magic on top of it.”

Bucky gives him a flat look. “Just don’t tell anyone. We’re still figuring it out.” He crosses his arms, watching Nadia with a protective gaze. “She’s just a kid, Sam. I don’t want her to feel like she’s different.”

Sam’s teasing grin falters a little, replaced by something more understanding. “Yeah. I get it.” He looks back at Nadia, who’s laughing and twirling as she summons tiny gusts of wind. “But you might want to have a more serious chat with Strange. I’m not sure I’m qualified to help her navigate that kind of power.”

Bucky nods, his face serious again. “Already on it.”

Katherine watches the exchange, a soft smile playing on her lips. It felt like they were finally finding a balance. Between magic, super-soldiers, and everything in between, they were all adapting to a new normal—one step at a time. Nadia, despite the unknowns swirling around her, was happy. That was what mattered most.

And if Sam could get used to the idea of magic in the family, they might just be able to figure everything else out too.

The wind continued to swirl around Nadia, and the sun set slowly behind the dock, the peaceful hum of the day settling in.

Chapter Text

Chapter 34

A gentle autumn light spilling through the windows of their Brooklyn brownstone. Leaves swirl outside in gold and amber flurries, and inside, the home is filled with quiet morning energy—coffee brewing, cartoons murmuring in the background, and the sound of Nadia humming as she colors at the kitchen table. She’s five now, still bright-eyed and full of wonder, but there’s a new depth to her questions, a sharper awareness of the world around her.

Bucky stands in the hallway adjusting the collar of a navy-blue blazer, tugging awkwardly at the sleeves like they don’t quite fit—physically or otherwise. He turns toward the mirror and exhales. He doesn’t look bad. In fact, he looks annoyingly good. But something about it still doesn’t feel like him.

Behind him, Katherine leans against the doorframe, sipping her coffee. She’s wearing one of his old shirts, bare legs. Her eyes scan him from head to toe with mild amusement.

“Is that the same guy who used to growl at the idea of a press conference?” she asks, smirking.

Bucky huffs a laugh. “Don’t remind me.” He turns to face her, his voice softening. “But things are different now.”

Katherine nods, setting her coffee down. She walks over, straightening his lapel. “I know. And I support it—I do. The world needs someone like you standing up for what’s right. Not just behind a shield or on a battlefield. But in rooms where decisions are made.”

He watches her as she smooths out the fabric, her fingertips lingering. “You don’t think it fits,” he says.

She raises a brow. “The suit or the role?”

“Both,” he admits.

She shrugs. “You’re not a suit kind of man, James. You’re leather jackets and blunt honesty. But maybe that’s exactly what makes this work.”

He grins, his voice teasing, “So you admit it. You just like me better in leather.”

Katherine gives him a dry look but doesn’t deny it. Instead, she reaches for his hand and brings it to her lips, kissing his knuckles lightly. “I like you better when you remember who you are. And I love you for trying to build something better for her.”

As if on cue, Nadia runs into the hallway holding up a drawing with an explosion of color—stick figures of the three of them, with little sparkles around her hands. “Look! I made us superheroes and politicians!”

Bucky kneels down and takes the drawing, grinning. “You gave me a cape.”

“You’ll need one for the meetings,” she says matter-of-factly. “They’re boring, and magic capes make everything better.” Somehow she sounds like she is quoting someone.

He lifts her up into his arms and kisses her cheek. “Maybe you should be the one running for office.”

Nadia giggles. “I’m gonna be a magician president.”

“Well,” Katherine says, folding her arms with a smile, “then your dad’s just the warm-up act.”

Bucky meets Katherine’s eyes over Nadia’s shoulder—silent, full of love and uncertainty and determination all at once. He knows this won’t be easy. But he also knows why he’s doing it. For the little girl in his arms. For the family they’ve built. For the future they all deserve.

And if he has to wear a suit once in a while to fight that fight?

So be it.

…..

The television casts flickering light across the small room, tuned to a live news broadcast covering the chaos unfolding downtown. The camera shakes as it captures brief, dramatic flashes—Captain America locked in brutal combat with Red Hulk. Smoke. Screams. Thunderous impacts.

Nadia, now five, sits cross-legged on the floor in her pajamas, wide-eyed and beaming.

“Mama! Look! That’s Uncle Sam!” she squeals, pointing at the screen. “He flew right into that big red guy’s face! That was so cool!”

Her fingers flick absently, sparks of gold-light magic forming harmless shapes that match her excitement.

Katherine, behind her on the couch, watches with a very different expression. Her arms are crossed tightly over her chest, one hand pressed over her lips as her eyes track every movement of the battle. Her posture is rigid, breath shallow.

She doesn’t speak for a long time. Just watches. Not as someone marveling at a hero—but as someone who knows what it means to lose people. To monsters. To chaos dressed in power.

“Is he gonna win, Mama?” Nadia asks, still bouncing slightly on her knees.

Katherine swallows hard, then slowly comes down to kneel beside her, arms wrapping around her daughter.

“I think,” she murmurs, gaze lingering on the screen, “that he’s going to do everything he can.”

Nadia doesn’t hear the undercurrent in her voice. She just smiles, leaning into her mother’s chest.

“I wanna fly like him someday.”

Katherine kisses the top of her head and closes her eyes, whispering a quiet prayer—not for victory, but for survival. For Sam. For the kind of world Nadia believes she’s growing up in. For the weight they all carry, one way or another.

———-

The air hums with tension. Sam Wilson—now Captain America—walks with practiced confidence down a long corridor, flanked by armed guards and advisors buzzing in his ear. Then, casually leaning against a wall just ahead, arms crossed and smirking like he owns the place—

Bucky Barnes.

“Thought this was going to be a quiet day,” Bucky says, nodding at the visible chaos unfolding behind Sam.

Sam rolls his eyes but cracks a grin. “You’re the one who texted me ‘Need to stretch my legs, got a suit I hate.’”

Bucky shrugs. “It’s still true.”

They fall into step together, old rhythm returning like muscle memory. There’s a weight behind their banter, something tempered and healed since the Flag Smasher days. They’ve seen each other at their worst—and still showed up.

Sam glances sideways, teasing. “You know, I still don’t get how someone who sulks in corners for a living managed to land two gorgeous girls.”

Bucky blinks, mock confusion. “Two?”

“Kat and Nadia. Obviously.” Sam pulls out his phone and taps it open without looking. “You really should’ve warned me the kid was already learning magic. I had to play it cool while your five-year-old pulled sparkles out of thin air in front of my nephews again.”

Bucky huffs a laugh, stealing a glance at the screen. There’s a candid photo of Nadia at the dock, arms raised triumphantly, little illusions dancing above her palms—Sam’s nephews watching with wide eyes and goofy grins. The image is chaotic and joy-filled.

“She’s my daughter,” Bucky says after a beat, voice low but proud. “Took me a while to admit that, even to myself.”

Sam tucks his phone away, letting the moment settle. “Yeah, well. You’re doing alright. She’s lucky.”

“No,” Bucky says, glancing ahead with something gentler in his eyes. “I’m the lucky one.”

The hallway opens up into a mission briefing room, but for a moment, it’s just the two of them—brothers in arms, shoulders lighter than before, future less bleak.

Sam nudges him with a grin. “So, Buck. You babysitting while Katherine’s off doing witchy librarian things again?”

Bucky smirks. “You wish. I traded babysitting for this mission. Which means you owe me the next round of juice boxes and bedtime stories.”

“You got a deal.”

And with that, they step into the room—two men who’ve lost nearly everything, but still showed up for each other. And the ones they love.

The front door creaks open, and Bucky steps inside—his suit jacket slung over his shoulder, tie half-loosened. There’s exhaustion in his face, the kind that doesn’t come from bruises but from the weight of restraint, of watching instead of fighting. His hands are still twitchy, like they missed something they were trained to do.

The door clicks shut behind him, and for a moment he just leans against it, eyes closed. The echoes of the battle—Sam’s grunts, the crash of concrete, the roar of Red Hulk—still ring in his ears. He had watched it all from a command center, forced to observe, wait, stay diplomatic.

Once, he would’ve been in the thick of it.

A rapid patter of feet breaks through the silence.

NADIA comes tearing around the corner in socks and a superhero cape (the wrong way around), eyes shining with pure excitement.

“DADDY!!”

She flings herself at him, and he scoops her up without hesitation. Her joy is a balm, warm and grounding.

“Did you see it? Did you see Uncle Sam punch that big red guy in the face? BOOM! And then he flew and I think he broke the ground with his shield and—our new president is a Hulk! That’s the coolest thing ever!”

Bucky lets out a low, hoarse chuckle despite himself, burying his face in her hair.

“Yeah, I saw it, sweetheart,” he murmurs. “Uncle Sam was incredible.”

Nadia pulls back, her little hands cupping his cheeks with alarming intensity. “Do you think I can be a Hulk when I grow up?”

“God, I hope not,” Bucky mutters, but she’s already laughing, unbothered.

From the hallway, Katherine leans on the doorframe, watching with a quiet smile. But she sees the look behind Bucky’s eyes—what Nadia doesn’t. The ache. The conflict.

He meets Katherine’s gaze over their daughter’s shoulder. His voice lowers just a bit, mostly for her:

“I used to know exactly what to do in a fight. Now I sit at tables and shake hands with men who nearly voted against helping. And all I wanted was to be down there with Sam.”

Katherine walks over, brushing a hand along his arm.

“You wanted to fight,” she says softly. “But you’re helping build a world where maybe she won’t have to.”

Bucky looks down at Nadia, who’s now trying to summon sparkles from her fingers again, blissfully unaware of everything beneath the surface.

He exhales slowly and presses a kiss to her temple.

“Still,” he murmurs, “remind me to tell Sam next time that I could have taken Red Hulk.”

Katherine smirks. “I’ll be sure to pass it on. Right after I remind him how much you hate wearing suits.”

The house is still. Nadia is finally asleep upstairs, the echo of her excited storytelling lingering faintly in the air. The only sound now is the soft hum of the fridge and the occasional creak of the old floorboards settling.

Katherine sits curled on the couch, barefoot, Bucky’s hoodie draped over her like a second skin. A cup of tea goes untouched in her hands—steam long faded. Her phone rests beside her, screen glowing faintly with a message she’s just sent.

“You stopping by before heading home? She’d love to see you. So would I.”

She lets the phone fall back against the cushion and leans forward, reaching for the small collection of framed photos on the shelf.

The first one is old now—her, Bucky, and a much younger Nadia, curled up on the porch steps, their faces sunlit and unguarded. Nadia’s hair is a wild tangle, and Bucky’s smile is rare but real.

She traces the frame with a finger, then picks up the next.

Nadia with Sam and his nephews, grinning on the dock in Louisiana. Her fingers are mid-sparkle, showing off, while AJ and Cass laugh like she’s the coolest kid in the universe. Sam’s got that wide, amused smirk—mid-joke or mid-pride, it’s always hard to tell.

A breath catches in her throat as she picks up another frame: Nadia’s first day of school. New shoes, messy pigtails, and a backpack nearly half her size. She’d been so nervous that morning. Katherine remembers kneeling to tie her shoes, whispering encouragement. Bucky had stood a few steps back, hands fidgeting, pretending he wasn’t misty-eyed.

And then—Junie and Nadia, both laughing over a bowl of cookie dough in the kitchen. Junie had flour on her nose and zero shame about it. Nadia had looked so safe in her arms, so loved.

Katherine sets the last frame down slowly and exhales. Not a sigh of sorrow—one of gratitude.

They had come so far.

From the shadows of war and loss, of bloodlines and broken beginnings. From running, hiding, fearing. From wondering if any of them would be okay.

They weren’t just surviving anymore.

They were building.

A family. A future. A legacy—not in power or politics, but in a five-year-old’s laughter and a home that finally felt like one.

The phone buzzes gently.

[SAM]: “On my way. Wouldn’t miss it.”

Katherine smiles—small, soft, but real.

Chapter Text

TB1

The cameras clicked before the microphones even lit up.

Congressman James Buchanan Barnes stood at the podium, shoulders tight beneath the sharp cut of his gray suit. His tie had been knotted with military precision, but nothing about his posture suggested ease. The marble press room of the Capitol buzzed with anticipation—part reverence, part suspicion. Bucky could feel it all pressing down on him like a weight: the eyes, the expectations, the ghosts of what he used to be.

A reporter from The Daily Chronicle stood up first, holding his phone out like a weapon.

“Congressman Barnes—given the growing controversy around Director de Fontaine’s covert operations, would you support her impeachment if an inquiry reveals abuse of power?”

Bucky exhaled through his nose. He hated this part—the dance of words, of implications. He shifted his weight, glanced once toward the wings of the stage.

Then—

“We believe in accountability,” said a confident voice, smooth as silk but anchored in steel.

Katherine Barnes stepped into view like she belonged there—which, of course, she did. Her navy-blue sheath dress, subtle gold necklace, and calm smile drew attention without demanding it. Reporters leaned forward.

“Director de Fontaine’s position demands the highest ethical standards. If the inquiry confirms she overstepped, the law applies to her the same as anyone else. My husband believes that. So do I.”

She glanced at Bucky—just enough for the cameras to catch the warmth in her eyes.

“The question isn’t who she used. It’s who she hurt.”

A wave of murmurs swept the room. A few nods. Someone scribbled the quote down.

Bucky managed a tight smile. “That,” he said into the mic, “is better than I would’ve said it.”

⸻

Later, in the quiet of his congressional office, Bucky tugged at his tie and dropped into the leather chair behind his desk. The windows were shut against the D.C. summer heat, but his mind still raced.

Katherine closed the door gently behind them and walked over, slipping her heels off like armor.

“You looked good up there,” she said, leaning against the desk.

“I looked like I wanted to disappear,” Bucky muttered. Then, looking at her with a smirk: “You’re wasted as a strategist. You should’ve run for office.”

“Please. I still enjoy having a soul,” she said dryly, reaching for the water pitcher. “Besides, I get enough politics managing you.”

He chuckled, but there was tension behind it. A silence stretched between them—heavier than before.

“They’re circling Val,” he said at last, voice low. “If she falls, they’ll want a replacement who already has blood on their hands.”

“And you’re worried they’ll look at you.”

He didn’t answer.

Katherine walked to his side, her fingers brushing his forearm. “You’re not the same man they trained, James. And you’re not the weapon they lost control of. You’re the one they couldn’t break.”

He looked at her, and for a moment, the edge in his eyes softened. “Yeah,” he said. “But if they come asking, I’m still the one who knows how to pull the trigger.”

Katherine held his gaze.

“Then maybe this time, you point it in the right direction.”

The gala shimmered with polished decadence.

Inside Valentina de Fontaine’s private exhibition wing—a marble-walled museum annex attached to her estate—waiters glided like ghosts between ancient relics encased in glass. Gold accents gleamed under soft lighting. A vibranium dagger hung beside an old HYDRA cipher tablet, both curated as if they weren’t soaked in centuries of blood.

Bucky hated this place already.

He stood beside Katherine, a glass of something expensive in his hand, untouched. His eyes scanned the room like radar: exits, guards, cameras. Guests murmured in designer gowns and tailored suits, sipping champagne beside artifacts looted, traded, or quietly “donated” to Fontaine’s private collection.

“Tell me you’re at least pretending to enjoy yourself,” Katherine said under her breath, her lips barely moving.

Bucky didn’t look at her. “One of those panels has a false bottom. I saw the same model used by SHIELD when they were still—”

She cut him off with a soft smile, aimed at no one in particular, and clinked her glass against his. “You’re not the Winter Soldier anymore, James.”

He exhaled, a flicker of guilt crossing his face. “Old habits.”

“No,” she said, the warmth gone from her tone now. “That’s the problem. They’re not just habits. You think crawling through Fontaine’s shadows is the only way you know how to serve. But this—” she gestured subtly to the room “—this is politics. And we follow protocol.”

Bucky’s jaw tightened. “Val’s hiding something. The UN’s investigation into her failsafe program went dark last week. Now she’s flaunting a Kree war mask like it’s a centerpiece? Come on, Katherine—this isn’t a museum, it’s a vault.”

Katherine tilted her head, maintaining her social smile as a passing donor waved at her. Then, quietly: “And if you go snooping around like a relic yourself, you’ll give her the excuse she needs to discredit both of us.”

He finally looked at her then—tired, cornered, but still Bucky.

She softened, just a little. “I want to find out what she’s doing too. But if we do this, we do it right. For Nadia. For all of us.”

He nodded, jaw still clenched. “Nadia would probably blow the glass open just to spite her.”

That made Katherine smirk. “That’s why Wong’s teaching her patience. Or trying to.”

A pause passed between them. Then Bucky murmured, “She asked if magic could undo history. I didn’t know what to say.”

Katherine’s gaze flicked to the Kree mask, then back to him. “You tell her no. But you show her how to live with it.”

At that moment, Valentina appeared at the far end of the hall, surrounded by admirers and security, her eyes briefly catching Bucky’s.

She smiled like she knew a secret.

Katherine set down her glass. “Time to dance.”

Valentina de Fontaine was already halfway through a practiced anecdote when Katherine slipped beside her, champagne in hand, smile composed.

“…And I told them, if the Sokovia Accords taught us anything, it’s that a leash only works if the dog still believes in the walker.”

The surrounding donors laughed—too loud, too eager. Valentina turned to Katherine, her smirk perfectly sculpted.

“Ah, Mrs. Barnes,” she said, voice rich and inviting. “Or should I say the real backbone of your household?”

“I let him think he’s the spine,” Katherine replied smoothly. “It keeps his posture better.”

Chuckles rippled again, but the amusement didn’t reach Valentina’s eyes.

“Your husband’s looking rather tense this evening,” she said, turning her back to the group slightly. “Is he adjusting well to the… spotlights of democracy?”

Katherine’s smile didn’t falter. “He’s still learning that the battlefield and the senate floor aren’t that different. People lie just as much—only with better lighting.”

Valentina’s lips twitched. “You must worry about him. All that history. It leaves such long shadows.”

Katherine tilted her head. “I worry about anyone who trades chains for contracts. One looks cleaner. But power’s still power.”

A charged silence lingered between them—two women in gowns, standing still in a room filled with masks. Valentina looked amused. Katherine looked sharp enough to cut glass.

Then Katherine leaned in, her voice low and warm. “Be careful with your collection, Val. Sometimes relics bite back.”

Valentina raised a brow, but didn’t answer.

Bucky caught up with her near a narrow display case housing a Cold War listening device encased in glass. Mel stood beside it with the same posture she always had—rigidly neutral, like she was pretending not to be part of the conversation happening in her own mind.

“Fancy toy,” Bucky said casually, nodding to the display.

Mel glanced sideways, barely a flicker of acknowledgment. “Retired tech. Doesn’t bite.”

Bucky smirked. “Yeah, well. Some things don’t need to bite to do damage.”

She didn’t respond. Just kept her eyes on the placard, hands steady around her datapad.

“You know, Fontaine’s got a pretty eclectic taste. Bit of Red Room here, a dash of Hydra there… feels more like a warning than a gallery.”

Mel didn’t look at him. “I think it’s called curation.”

“And I think most people don’t put trophies on display unless they’re trying to distract from something worse.”

Now she turned. Barely. “You always this subtle?”

“Only when I’m in polite company.”

She finally allowed herself the faintest smile. The kind that didn’t touch her eyes.

“You’re not gonna charm me into anything, Mr. Barnes.”

He tilted his head. “Don’t need to. Just curious what kind of person signs up to work for someone like Valentina.”

“Someone who likes being alive,” she said, voice low and firm. “Someone who understands how the world works.”

Bucky studied her. Not in the obvious way that made people squirm, but in that quiet, unsettling stillness he’d perfected. Like he was listening for something deeper.

“You think staying close to her keeps you safe?” he asked softly.

“I think people like her notice when you stop clapping,” she replied, with a dryness that almost masked the fear underneath.

Bucky gave a slow nod. “Yeah. And when people like her fall, they make sure they’ve got company on the way down.”

Mel’s fingers tightened slightly around the datapad. That was the only tell. But he saw it.

“You’re not going to get what you want from me,” she said, carefully.

“I don’t want anything from you,” Bucky said, turning back toward the display. “Not today.”

A pause stretched between them. Heavy. Unfinished.

“Nice talking, Mel.”

He walked away without looking back.

Mel stood in place a moment longer, her expression blank to anyone passing by—but her eyes didn’t return to the display.

She was thinking. And he knew it.

The apartment above the bookstore smelled like cinnamon and old paper. Katherine liked to keep a pot of tea simmering with cloves and dried orange peel. It clung to the walls like memory—sweet and lingering.

Nadia was on the floor, her dark curls bouncing as she floated her Captain America shield plushy three inches off the ground with a glowing, golden thread of light. Wong would say she lacked discipline. Katherine said she had imagination. Bucky just said, “Not near the windows.”

Right now, she was building a “defense perimeter” out of cushions and casting what she called a “containment hex.” Her brow furrowed in concentration, small hands moving with charming confidence.

“Gotta keep the bad guys out,” she declared. “And keep Cap safe.”

Katherine chuckled from the kitchen, stirring a spoon through a mug. “He’s a plush toy, sweetheart. I think he’ll survive.”

“Not if Hydra breaks through the fort,” Nadia replied, indignant. She looked over her shoulder. “Right, Dad?”

Bucky, half-listening from the couch where he sat with a book unopened in his lap, glanced up with a tired smile. “Yeah. Gotta be ready. Always.”

Katherine carried two mugs into the living room, one of them his—black coffee, because he hated herbal. She set it on the end table by his knee and gave him a glance that meant you haven’t touched a page in twenty minutes.

He gave her a small shrug, as if to say I know.

She sat beside him, tucking her legs underneath herself. “She’s been practicing more with Wong,” she said, nodding toward Nadia.

“Yeah. He told me.” Bucky sipped his coffee. “Said she teleported his teacup to Nepal by accident.”

Katherine laughed softly. “I’d call that progress.”

Across the room, Nadia stopped, her magic thread fading. She looked up, eyes narrowing just slightly as she studied her dad. She was only eight, but she had her mother’s intuition—and something else. Something deeper. She walked to the couch, climbing up between them, tucking herself under Bucky’s arm.

“Are you sad?” she asked him plainly.

The question landed heavier than any conversation he’d had all week.

Bucky blinked. “What?”

“You look sad when you think no one’s looking,” she said. “But I see you.”

Katherine stilled. Her hand gently touched Nadia’s back, but she didn’t interrupt.

Bucky let out a slow breath. “I’m just… tired. That’s all.”

“You’re not just tired.” Nadia leaned into him, small but sure. “Is it the bad people again?”

He looked over her head at Katherine, who met his eyes steadily. There was no judgment there. Just the patience of someone who’d waited through worse.

“No, kiddo. No bad people right now.” He touched her hair lightly. “Just grown-up stuff. Work.”

“I think you need a break,” she said, like she was offering the world’s most obvious solution.

“I get breaks,” he murmured. “This is one of them.”

She looked up at him, squinting. “Then you’re doing it wrong.”

Katherine covered her mouth to hide her laugh.

Bucky finally smiled—something real, faint but alive. “You might be right.”

“I’m definitely right,” Nadia said, smug now, and hopped down from the couch. “I’m gonna go make you a happy potion!”

She scampered off toward the kitchen, probably to combine cocoa powder with ketchup or something equally horrifying.

Katherine waited until she was out of earshot. “She sees you,” she said softly.

“Yeah.” He looked down into his coffee. “That’s what scares me.”

“She sees what’s good. And you know what?” Katherine leaned her head against his shoulder. “She’s usually right.”

He didn’t reply for a long moment. Then, quietly:

“I wish I could believe it as easily as she does.”

“You don’t have to believe it. Just keep showing up. She’ll believe enough for both of you.”

Outside, the city carried on—sirens, footsteps, wind. But inside, for a little while, there was peace. Even if Bucky didn’t feel it yet, Katherine did.

And Nadia, in the kitchen, was humming while she stirred a “potion” that might taste like regret but was made with love.

Chapter Text

Chapter 36

The city was quieter at this hour—restless, but hushed. The kind of quiet that pressed in around the corners of windows and underneath doorways, carrying secrets.

Bucky zipped up his jacket, worn leather brushing against the inside of his wrist. His gear was light—just enough for reconnaissance. Nothing flashy. Nothing official.

Katherine leaned in the doorway of their bedroom, her arms crossed loosely, silk robe tied at her waist. Her expression was calm, but not unfeeling.

“You trust her?” she asked.

“Not even a little,” Bucky replied. “But she’s scared. That’s real. And scared people talk when they think they’re next.”

Katherine nodded slowly. “So you’re going alone.”

“It’s cleaner that way.” He hesitated. “If it’s nothing, I’m home by midnight. If it’s something…”

“You’ll be careful.” She stepped closer, eyes searching his. “You will call. Or text. Just—something. Even a thumbs-up emoji.”

He gave her a dry look. “I don’t use emojis.”

“Tonight’s a great night to start.” Her smile was gentle, but her voice had an edge of urgency. “Just let me know you’re okay, James.”

She didn’t say it like a demand. She said it like a prayer.

Bucky nodded once. “I will.”

Katherine’s hand reached out and landed over his metal one. Cool on warm. Human on alloy. She held it with such natural ease, as if it were always a part of him.

“You know,” she said softly, “if you’re done with Congress… if that life doesn’t fit, you don’t have to stay in it. Not for me. Not for the headlines. Nadia won’t love you any less.”

Bucky looked at her, something unspoken shifting behind his eyes. “It’s not about that.”

“I know.” Her voice dropped. “But I also know you’ve been carrying it like a punishment. You don’t owe the world your peace, Bucky. You just need to find it.”

He stared at her for a beat. Then he stepped forward and kissed her—slow and certain. A kiss that lingered, not as farewell but as a promise.

When he pulled back, his hand stayed against her cheek. “We’ll talk. When I get back.”

Katherine nodded. “I’ll be here.”

Outside, the wind stirred.

Inside, she stood alone as he left, the door whispering shut behind him.

And beneath her breath, she hummed an old song her mother once taught her.
————-

The restraints clicked into place one by one. Yelena glared at him. Ghost phased just enough to test the bonds. John Walker sat in stony silence, and Red Guardian… well, he hadn’t stopped complaining.

“This is excessive,” Yelena said, her voice sharp with her Russian accent. “We are not criminals.”

“You were being black-bagged by your own team,” Bucky said, cinching the last tie-down. “You’re lucky I’m giving you a chance to talk at all.”

“We were trying to stop her,” Ghost said. “You don’t even know what she’s doing, do you?”

“I know enough,” Bucky replied coolly. “And now I’ve got four high-profile witnesses in one place. Someone’s going to listen.”

Walker scoffed. “And you think that someone won’t be Valentina?”

“She wants you dead. That makes you useful.”

“I don’t need your charity,” Walker snapped.

“Wasn’t offering it.”

Yelena leaned forward, her voice lower. “You don’t understand. There’s someone else—Bob. She’s using him. She experimented on him, twisted him. He flew, Barnes. Flew. Took bullets and didn’t stop.”

“Great,” Bucky muttered. “Another superpowered weapon.”

“He’s not a weapon,” Yelena snapped. “He’s wrong. Like… he doesn’t know what’s happening. I think there’s still someone in there. Someone scared.”

Bucky blinked at her, the only sign of hesitation. “You’re telling me Valentina has her own in-house Frankenstein?”

Yelena didn’t blink. “You’re not listening. He’s a person. He was one of us.”

Red Guardian tilted his head. “Who is Bob?”

“An experiment,” Yelena said grimly. “One who flies and bullet proof.”

“Why haven’t I met him?” Red Guardian asked.

Walker turned to Bucky, less confrontational now, more resigned. “Look, man… we didn’t come together because we liked each other. We came together because she picked us. Same way she picked him.”

Bucky didn’t answer. He just looked down at the restraints, then back to Yelena.

“You want me to believe there’s something worth saving in this ‘Bob,’” he said. “But right now, I don’t even know if I believe in you.”

Yelena’s mouth opened to respond—then Bucky’s phone buzzed again. Unknown number. Again.

He answered.

Mel’s voice. Fast. Panicked. “You were right. Fontaine’s pulling the plug on the whole unit. Bob’s the failsafe. If he finds you—he’s not just strong. He’s unstable. He doesn’t know he’s a weapon.”

Bucky’s face twitched. “And those orders?”

“Wipe the field. Clean house. Everyone. Including you.”

She hung up.

Silence.

Bucky stared at the screen, then slowly turned to the others.

“…Bob,” he said finally, like the word had just grown fangs.

Yelena nodded. “Told you.”

Red Guardian looked almost offended. “Still not ringing any bells.”

The lights in Times Square were impossibly bright, even with the smoke still rising from the wreckage left behind by The Void. The cracked pavement shimmered with the reflection of hovering drones and camera flashes. Crowds packed the barricades, some crying, some cheering, others just stunned into silence.

On the temporary stage, a line of exhausted figures stood before the press—Yelena with her arms crossed and scowl firmly in place, Red Guardian trying (and failing) to stand like Captain America, Ghost flickering ever so slightly, and John Walker grim-faced but oddly composed.

At the center stood Bucky Barnes. Jacket torn, face bruised, metal arm scratched to hell—but standing. Watching. Calculating.

Behind them, a sleek black hovercraft descended like a spider.

Valentina de Fontaine stepped onto the stage with theatrical grace, her perfectly tailored suit unsmudged, her expression already shaped for the cameras.

Katherine stood across the crowd behind the security line, clutching Nadia’s hand. Her coat was still damp from the protective wards at the Sanctum, and her other hand held a talisman Wong had given her “just in case.” She hadn’t needed it. Not yet.

But her eyes were fixed on Bucky.

Nadia stood beside her, eyes wide, clutching a battered Captain America plush. She had seen the sky open. She had felt something break when the Void descended—and something else mend when it was banished.

Now she only looked for her dad.

Bucky’s eyes scanned the crowd until they found them. Katherine smiled, calm for Nadia’s sake. His mouth moved in a small, invisible “I’m okay.”

Then Valentina stepped forward.

“New York,” she purred into the mic, “tonight you saw something… terrifying. And yet, these five individuals stood between chaos and our survival. Not sanctioned, not ordered. Chosen.”

Yelena shifted. Bucky’s jaw tensed.

Valentina turned to the crowd, voice rising theatrically. “I know there have been… questions about my actions. Accusations.” She chuckled with false humility. “But tonight should answer all of them. When the world called out, my team answered. I give you the New Avengers.”

The crowd erupted.

Bucky’s face remained unreadable. He leaned slightly toward Yelena and muttered under his breath, “This wasn’t the deal.”

Yelena gave him a sidelong glance. “Did you expect her to go quietly?”

“She was almost impeached,” he said.

“Almost doesn’t count, Barnes.”

Red Guardian beamed and gave a two-handed wave. “We are Avengers now! Like family reunion, but with more bruises!”

Nadia looked up at Katherine. “Mom… what does this mean?”

Katherine bent down to her level, brushing a strand of hair from her forehead. “It means people like Valentina still know how to spin a good story.”

Nadia tilted her head. “Is Daddy okay?”

Katherine smiled, bittersweet. “He’s standing. That’s a start.”

Nadia’s little fingers tightened around hers.

On stage, the applause swelled. Reporters yelled questions. Valentina soaked in the moment, knowing the narrative had shifted, knowing the public would forget what came before—just as Bob, now sitting quietly on a stretcher nearby with vacant eyes, had forgotten what he had been made to do.

Bucky watched her from behind his stoic mask, eyes dark but awake.

They had won the battle. But Katherine knew—he didn’t feel like a hero. Not yet.

Still, as his eyes found hers again in the crowd, she smiled. She would remind him. Tonight, or tomorrow, or however long it took.

And beside her, Nadia’s eyes glowed faintly—not with danger, but power untamed.

The war wasn’t over.

But this family—this strange, strong family—was still whole.

The cheers had barely faded when the Thunderbolts stepped off the temporary stage, cutting through a corridor of flashing cameras and agents with manufactured smiles. Valentina was already basking in her victory, her PR team swarming like gnats.

But she miscalculated.

They didn’t follow her. They didn’t linger in the wings like pawns waiting for their next orders.

They cornered her.

Yelena moved first, blocking Valentina’s path with a deceptively casual lean. “Nice speech,” she said, her accent sharp. “Very patriotic.”

Red Guardian loomed just over her shoulder, cracking his knuckles with unconscious weight. “Yes. You do good spin. Maybe run for office next.”

Ghost appeared beside them like a wraith. Walker stood with his arms folded and jaw tight. And Bucky—silent, unreadable—stood to the side, flanking Valentina with a coldness that made the air between them shift.

Valentina straightened, her eyes scanning their faces, assessing the change. They were no longer fractured. They were no longer hers.

“What’s this?” she asked smoothly. “Post-battle group therapy?”

“No,” Yelena said, “this is us being clear.”

Bucky spoke next, low but firm. “You unleashed a man you broke. You used us to clean it up. You nearly burned the city to the ground, and now you want applause.”

Valentina smiled tightly. “And yet, here you are—standing. Beloved. Powerful. Named.”

Yelena stepped forward, close enough that Valentina had to lean back a hair. “We saved Bob. We saved your career. We pulled each other out of that thing’s shadow. And now?” She tilted her head. “You don’t own us anymore.”

Valentina’s gaze flicked from one face to the next.

“You think you can go rogue?” she said, voice dropping just slightly. “You think that label protects you?”

“We’re not rogues,” Walker said. “You made us. That’s on you.”

Ghost added, voice soft but deadly: “We’ve all been broken by someone. But now—we get to choose what we rebuild.”

“Starting with Bob,” Bucky finished.

Valentina’s smirk didn’t crack, but her eyes did.

“You’re going to keep him?” she asked. “That unstable weapon?”

“He’s not a weapon,” Yelena said. “He’s one of us.”

Red Guardian grinned wide. “He is like tragic puppy. Strong puppy. We help him.”

Valentina exhaled slowly. “Fine. You want to play team? Fine. Play. But don’t think you can just walk away when things get messy again.”

“Oh, we’re not walking,” Yelena said. “We’re watching.”

Bucky stepped in close now, his voice only for her. “This isn’t leverage anymore, Val. It’s a warning. Next time you light a match—we won’t clean up your fire.”

The silence that followed was thick and final. Valentina nodded once, too proud to flinch. “Congratulations,” she said. “You’re heroes now. See how long that lasts.”

They let her walk away this time.

But they were no longer following her.

The cheers were still echoing in the distance when Bucky stepped off the stage and into the crowd, the echo of flashbulbs replaced by real sound—Nadia’s voice shouting his name.

“Daddy!”

She flung herself into his arms with such force he stumbled back a step, catching her easily. She was all tangled curls and enchanted pins from the Sanctum, and she was glowing. Not magically—just purely, joyfully, his.

“You did it!” she grinned, cupping his face like she could hold the moment in her hands. “You saved everybody! You’re back! You’re a superhero again!”

Bucky smiled, a rare one. “I was always a little bit super, kid.”

“I knew it.”

Katherine caught up moments later, more composed but with warmth all over her face. She reached out and straightened his lapel like she’d done a thousand times, eyes locking with his.

“You know,” she said, mock thoughtful, “as much as I appreciated the congressman look, I have to admit—leather suits you better than ill-fitting government ones.”

He huffed a soft laugh. “You just like the old me.”

“I like all of you,” she said. “But I missed this version most.”

Nadia was still in his arms when her eyes widened—just past Bucky, looming like a brick wall in a crimson jacket, was Red Guardian. Her gasp was audible.

“You’re so tall,” she whispered, wriggling down and walking straight up to him without fear.

Red Guardian looked down, stunned, then puffed up like a peacock.

“And strong,” she added. “You’re kind of like Captain America. But… bigger!”

“Bigger!” Red Guardian beamed, nearly vibrating. “You hear this? She sees it! She understands!”

“Papa,” Yelena groaned behind him, arriving just in time to hear the whole thing.

“I am telling you,” he said proudly, “I always had fan appeal!”

Yelena rolled her eyes so hard it looked painful. Katherine laughed softly, offering her hand.

“Katherine Barnes,” she said. “I’ve heard about you.”

Yelena shook her hand with a wry smile. “I’m only dangerous when hungry. Your daughter’s safe.”

“Good to know,” Katherine said. “Though if Red Guardian starts giving her tips on how to throw cars, we may have a problem.”

“I make no promises,” Alexei grinned.

Nearby, Ghost and Walker were already peeling off from the crowd, beginning their quiet exit. Yelena looked toward them, then back at Bucky and his family—at the warm center of it all. It wasn’t perfect. But it was something new.

Something better.

And for the first time in a long time, no one was giving orders. No one was being used. They were just… standing, together.

Chapter Text

Chapter 37

The new Avengers Tower looked like someone had told a billionaire to design a superhero clubhouse and spare no expense. Bucky didn’t trust it. Too clean. Too shiny. Too full of unpredictable personalities with poor impulse control.

And one tiny magical tornado.

“Wong said I could practice this one!” Nadia beamed as she bounded into the room.

With a flourish of her little hands, a cascade of purple sigils danced through the air. A glowing unicorn made of energy shimmered into existence, galloped three full circles around Red Guardian, and burst into glitter.

Alexei gasped like he was witnessing the second coming.

“She is perfection! You must let her join the team. We shall call her… the Scarlet Spark! The Tiny Witch! The Arcane Avenger!”

Bucky didn’t even look up from where he stood at the coffee counter. “She’s eight.”

“Exactly! The perfect age for the warrior’s path!”

Katherine breezed in, catching the tail end. “You know, that does have a ring to it. Scarlet Spark. Or what about Chaos Pixie?”

Bucky gave her a warning look. “He’s serious.”

Katherine blinked, then turned to Alexei. “Wait… you’re serious?”

“Of course! Her power must be honed in the crucible of battle!”

“I was joking,” Katherine said quickly, then added to Bucky, softly, “I thought we were just teasing you.”

“You were,” Bucky said. “They’re not.”

“I can start her on soft blades,” Yelena offered helpfully. “You know, foam daggers. For form.”

“No blades!” Bucky snapped. “No knives, no hammers, no mystical weapons—she’s a child. A very sparkly, terrifying child, but still a child!”

“Dad,” Nadia sighed, in the universal tone of exasperated eight-year-olds.

John Walker, who’d been quietly sipping coffee, slowly lowered his mug. “Okay, yeah, I’m gonna be that guy. Are we seriously talking about training the next Scarlet Witch here? Did we forget Westview? The mind control bubble thing?”

“Pfft,” Yelena waved a hand. “Nadia would use her powers for good. Like turning enemies into raccoons.”

“Or confetti!” Nadia added brightly.

“She’s got discipline,” Ghost said dryly from a nearby chair. “She’s only levitated Red Guardian’s snacks three times this week.”

Alexei, proudly flexing, added, “She is already stronger than Walker!”

“Hey,” John muttered. “I’m not getting into a strength contest with a third grader.”

“She’s eight,” Bucky said again, as if that could anchor the room back to sanity.

Yelena leaned against the table next to Katherine and whispered, “So protective. It’s adorable.”

“I think we broke him,” Katherine whispered back, smirking.

“She’s not joining the team,” Bucky insisted, rubbing his temples. “You’re not recruiting my daughter for a magical death squad.”

“She already agreed,” Alexei pointed out. “She declared herself Scarlet Spark and claimed the training room as her dojo.”

“I did!” Nadia chirped.

John stared between them all, baffled. “This isn’t real. This is a bit. You’re all doing a bit, right?”

Ghost tilted her head. “It’s only a bit until she actually learns teleportation.”

Bucky gave up. “I need a drink.”

“She’s not allowed alcohol until she’s thirty,” Katherine called after him, smiling fondly.

“And no knives!” Bucky shouted from down the hallway.

“Soft ones!” Yelena shouted back.

Nadia looked up at the adults around her and giggled. “So when do I get a code name?”

Alexei raised a finger, full of dramatic purpose. “Tonight, little spark, we forge your legend.”

John looked around. “I miss when the weirdest thing in my life was Captain America’s shield.”

The new Avengers Tower was asleep—or pretending to be. Somewhere down the hall, Red Guardian was probably snoring like a dying engine, and Nadia’s gentle hum of magic still pulsed softly from her room, the air thick with latent warmth and wonder.

Bucky sat on the edge of the bed, his suit half-unzipped, his metal arm glinting dully in the low light. Katherine entered quietly, holding two mugs of tea. She handed him one, then sat beside him.

He took it with a tired smile. “Thanks.”

They sat in silence for a minute. The tower felt too big, too polished. A long way from D.C. politics and playdates at the Sanctum.

“She levitated a vending machine today,” Katherine said casually, blowing over her tea. “Tried to ‘liberate’ a packet of gummy bears.”

Bucky sighed. “Did she succeed?”

“Completely.”

He chuckled under his breath. “She gets that from you.”

Katherine raised a brow. “Excuse me? I follow laws, thank you.”

“You charm laws into letting you break them. That’s worse.”

She leaned her head lightly against his shoulder. “So. Chaos Pixie might be real.”

Bucky stared at his tea. “She shouldn’t have to be.”

They sat with that truth a while. The noise of the day finally quieted in his chest.

“She’s strong,” he said. “Scary strong. Not just with magic. She sees people. Knows when I’m not okay. I didn’t even have to tell her.”

“She asked me last week if you still dream about the war,” Katherine said softly.

He closed his eyes.

“I told her you dream about protecting people. That it’s just sometimes hard to turn it off.”

“That was generous,” he muttered.

“It was true.”

Katherine reached over, took his free hand—flesh, not metal—and threaded her fingers through it.

“I know this isn’t what we pictured,” she said. “You in a suit. Then back in tactical gear. Me trying to smile at cameras while you nearly die fighting the Void. And now Nadia has power that people will come for. People will fear.”

He looked at her, really looked. “Do you want out?”

“No,” she said, immediate and steady. “I want you to be happy. I want her to be safe. If this life gives us both… even the chance at that? Then I’m in. Fully.”

He studied their hands. “I just worry… about what kind of world she’s growing up in. What kind of person I’ve been. If I’ve earned any of this.”

“You don’t earn your child’s love, Bucky. You show up for it. And you do. Every damn day.”

He rested his forehead against hers. “I don’t want her to become a weapon.”

“She’s not,” Katherine whispered. “She’s a girl who believes in unicorns. And gummy bears. She’s got the heart of someone who loves fiercely and forgives easily. Wonder where she gets that from.”

He gave a weary smile. “Not me.”

“Yes,” Katherine said, brushing her hand against his jaw. “Exactly you.”

He pulled her in then, holding her like he needed an anchor.

“We keep each other grounded,” she said.

“Even if she joins a team of lunatics?” he murmured.

Katherine grinned. “Especially then.”

They sat like that until the tower truly did fall quiet, and Bucky finally allowed himself the first real breath in days. Home wasn’t leather or legacy. It was her. It was their daughter, curled up behind a magical barrier of her own creation, dreaming of saving the world.

The soft creak of the bedroom door was enough.

Bucky’s eyes snapped open. Years of instinct wouldn’t let him sleep too deep, even here, even now. The house was quiet, insulated by the hum of wards Wong had placed months ago. There was no threat.

Just Nadia.

She stood in the doorway, bathed in the pale light of the hallway, clutching her old stuffed pony with one hand. Her other hand was clenched into a fist against her chest, knuckles white, her little body tense.

Bucky was already sitting up. “Sweetheart?”

She didn’t answer—just moved forward, quick and quiet, climbing onto the bed like a ghost slipping through shadows. Katherine stirred but didn’t wake, murmuring something soft and turning toward the warmth.

Nadia didn’t cry. She rarely did. But she pressed herself against Bucky’s side with a tightness that said everything. He wrapped his arms around her, metal and flesh forming a cocoon.

“Another nightmare?” he asked gently, running his fingers through her curls.

A nod.

“I was in a forest,” she whispered. “There were women in red. They had gold eyes. They were singing something. I think… they were calling me. I couldn’t move.”

Bucky’s body went still.

She shouldn’t remember. She’d only been two when it happened—when the witches tried to take her. When her power began to spark and ripple, raw and untethered, drawing attention no child should have to survive.

He and Katherine had never told her the truth. They’d agreed: let her grow, let her choose her story. The memory was supposed to be buried, forgotten.

“I didn’t know if it was real,” she continued, quieter now. “But when I woke up, I was… scared.”

“It was real,” Bucky said after a long pause. He kissed her hair. “But it’s over. They’re gone. We got you back.”

“Was I bad?” she asked, voice small. “Is that why they wanted me?”

Bucky exhaled slowly, tightening his arms around her. “No. You were special. You are special. That’s not the same thing.”

He felt her nod against his chest. She didn’t fully understand, but she trusted him.

Katherine stirred again, now more awake. Her eyes opened and immediately softened when she saw them.

“She remembered, didn’t she?” Katherine asked, her voice hoarse.

“Pieces of it,” Bucky said.

Katherine sat up and reached over to stroke Nadia’s back. “You don’t have to be afraid, baby. You’re safe now. We won’t let anything happen to you.”

“I know,” Nadia said, a little braver now. “Can I stay here?”

“Always,” Bucky said.

Katherine smiled, even as her eyes brimmed with old pain. “Scoot over, soldier.”

They shifted, and Nadia curled into the middle, her little hand finding Bucky’s metal fingers like she always did. He stared up at the ceiling, remembering the night they’d taken her back—how close they’d come to losing everything before they’d even fully become a family.

She was just eight now. Still small. Still full of dreams and fears and wonder. Powers or not, she was their daughter first.

And Bucky Barnes—former assassin, former congressman, reluctant Avenger—was still learning how to be a father.

But this? Holding her through the night, guarding her dreams?

This he could do.