Chapter 2: Sam stumbles through the shattered doorway, snow-covered and out of breath, just as Andrea's hand lingers too long on Bucky's vibranium arm - their moment interrupted by the one man who knows them both too well.
The wind howled through the shattered window, carrying stinging sheets of snow that hissed against the smoldering embers in the hearth. Feathers from the shredded mattress clung to the frost-covered debris on the floor. Bucky stood rigid, his back still pressed against Andrea’s, the phantom heat of her grip on his jacket lingering like a brand. The body near the doorway was already half-buried under a drift. The silence after the gunfire wasn’t peaceful; it was the taut, vibrating quiet of a tripwire.
Andrea shifted minutely, breaking contact. He felt the loss of her warmth immediately, the biting cold rushing into the space. She didn’t look at him. Her green eyes scanned the swirling white chaos beyond the blown-out wall, pistol held low but ready. Snowflakes caught in her fiery hair, melting instantly against her scalp.
"Two scouts," she stated, her voice flat, devoid of the earlier heat. Professional. Detached. "Too sloppy for a main assault. They wanted confirmation. Or a body count." She nudged the corpse at the door with her boot. It didn’t move. "They got one."
Bucky flexed his metal fingers. The servos whirred softly, the sound loud in the ruined room. He scanned the gaping hole where the window had been. The second attacker was just a dark lump rapidly vanishing under the snow. "Blizzard’s our cover now," he muttered. "Won’t last." He didn’t voice the other thought: Cover for them too.
A new sound cut through the wind’s relentless shriek. Not footsteps. Deeper, heavier. A rhythmic thump-thump-thump growing louder, vibrating the floorboards under the snow. Chopper blades.
Andrea’s head snapped up, eyes narrowed against the driving snow. Bucky braced, the vibranium plates in his shoulder tensing as he raised his pistol towards the ceiling. They exchanged a single glance. No escape. Nowhere to run in this white hell. Trapped.
The thumping intensified, shaking loose plaster from the ceiling. Snow swirled violently in the downdraft, turning the air white. A dark shape blotted out the grey sky visible through the shattered roof beams. Bucky squinted, finger tightening on the trigger. Andrea crouched low, finding partial cover behind the overturned cot frame, her pistol tracking the movement.
The shape hovered, then descended rapidly, landing with a heavy crunch in the deep snow just beyond the ruined wall. The downdraft blasted snow into the room like a sandstorm, momentarily blinding them. The engine whine died, replaced by the settling groan of metal.
Silence. Then, a hatch slid open with a metallic screech.
"Barnes?!" A voice bellowed, cutting through the wind. Familiar. Strained. "You better not be dead in there! This bird ain't cheap to operate!"
Sam Wilson. Bucky didn’t lower his gun. Relief warred with sharp irritation. Timing was Sam’s specialty – usually terrible.
A figure, bulky in a heavy winter flight suit and helmet, jumped down from the hovering quinjet, sinking knee-deep into the snow. He pushed up his visor, revealing Sam’s concerned face, eyes scanning the wreckage. He took in the shattered door, the blown-out wall, the overturned cot, the body half-buried in snow… and Bucky and Andrea, weapons drawn, frozen in defensive postures mere feet apart in the wreckage, snow dusting their shoulders and hair.
Sam whistled low. "Damn, Buck. You redecorate? Minimalist chic? Or just a really bad Tuesday?" His gaze flicked between Bucky and Andrea, sharp and assessing, missing nothing of the charged atmosphere, the proximity that screamed something happened here. He gestured at the corpse. "Friend of yours?"
"He brought friends," Andrea snapped, finally lowering her pistol, though her posture remained coiled. She wiped snow from her face, her glare fixed on Sam, wary. "Who are you?"
"Wilson. Sam Wilson." Sam gave a casual, two-fingered salute that didn't quite reach his eyes. He stomped snow off his boots as he stepped cautiously over the shattered timber into the ruined room. "Bucky’s… parole officer." He shot Bucky a look that said We’ll talk. "And you must be the package. Andrea Kuznetsov. Heard you were trouble." He glanced back at the quinjet, its engines idling. "Looks like the intel wasn't wrong. You two okay? Besides the obvious structural damage?"
"Peachy," Andrea bit out, finally holstering her weapon with a sharp motion. She turned away, ostensibly checking the body near the door, but the stiffness in her shoulders was evident. The sudden intrusion shattered whatever fragile, dangerous truce the firefight had forged. Bucky saw the defensive walls slam back up behind her eyes.
Bucky lowered his own gun, the tension in his shoulders easing a fraction, replaced by a different kind of strain. Sam’s arrival was a lifeline, but it also meant witnesses. Witnesses to the wreckage, to the bodies… to whatever had crackled between him and Andrea in the aftermath. He holstered his weapon, the click echoing in the sudden quiet. "What are you doing here, Sam? Thought you were in D.C."
"Tracking a ghost," Sam said, his easy-going tone belying the seriousness in his eyes. He nudged a piece of splintered wood with his boot. "Got a ping on some chatter. Mentioned this location. Mentioned you. Mentioned a Red Room firecracker causing waves." He looked pointedly at Andrea. "Didn't expect to find you two playing house in a snow globe gone wrong." His gaze lingered on the narrow cot, now overturned, the thin mattress shredded and feathered. "Or maybe playing something else."
Andrea whipped around, her green eyes flashing. "We were surviving," she hissed, the heat back in her voice, directed squarely at Sam now. "Unlike your parolee, I don't need a babysitter."
"Hey, I just saved your frostbitten asses," Sam retorted, holding up his hands. "Show a little gratitude." He looked back at Bucky. "Seriously, man. You look like hell warmed over. And cold. Mostly cold."
Bucky ignored the comment, focusing on the threat. "The chatter. What kind?" He moved towards the hearth, kicking at the embers. They needed heat. Fast. The cold was biting deeper now that the adrenaline was fading.
"Trouble kind," Sam said, his voice dropping, losing the forced lightness. He crouched by the hearth, pulling a small igniter from his suit and coaxing the embers back to life with some broken wood fragments. The small, flickering light threw his worried expression into sharp relief. "Word is someone’s cleaning house. Old debts. Loose ends. And you," he nodded at Andrea, "just became a very big loose end." He looked directly at Bucky. "And you’ve got a price on your head that just doubled. Courtesy of someone who really doesn’t like loose ends either. Name ring a bell? Baron Zemo."
The name landed like a physical blow. Zemo. Hydra’s ghost. The architect of so much pain. Bucky’s metal hand clenched, the plates grinding softly. He stared into the struggling fire, the cold inside him deepening beyond the winter chill.
Andrea had gone very still. She stared at Sam, then at Bucky, her earlier anger replaced by a calculating intensity. "Zemo," she repeated, the name sounding foreign on her tongue. "He is connected?"
"Yeah," Sam said grimly, feeding another splintered board into the fire. It caught, casting longer, dancing shadows on the ruined walls. "Seems he’s got a thing for unfinished business. And you two," he looked between them, his gaze lingering on the charged space still separating them, the shared history of violence etched into the broken room, "just became his newest project."
The wind moaned through the gaps in the wall. The fire popped, sending sparks skittering across the snow-dusted floor towards the dead man’s boot. The blizzard still raged outside the fragile shell of the safehouse, but a different storm was brewing inside. Sam’s presence was a buffer and a mirror, forcing them to see the wreckage – of the room, of their defenses, of the unspoken thing that had flared hot and dangerous in the freezing dark.
Bucky met Andrea’s gaze across the flickering light. Her green eyes held no warmth now, only a hardened resolve, a predator assessing new variables. Zemo’s name hung between them, another ghost joining the two already haunting the frozen ditch. The shared heat of survival had vanished, replaced by the isolating chill of a shared target painted on their backs. Sam’s arrival hadn’t ended the tension; it had just changed the battlefield.
The fire popped, sending embers skittering toward the dead man’s snow-dusted boot. Zemo’s name hung in the frigid air, thicker than the storm outside. Bucky stared into the struggling flames, the cold inside him crystallizing – not just from the winter, but from the ghost of a man who’d orchestrated his deepest shames. Andrea’s posture hadn’t relaxed; it had sharpened, her green eyes fixed on Sam with unnerving focus, the earlier flash of heat replaced by the predatory stillness of a trapped animal calculating angles of escape.
"Connected?" Andrea echoed, the word a low scrape in her throat. "How precisely?" She took a half-step towards Sam, ignoring the crunch of plaster underfoot. The flickering light caught the tension corded in her neck.
Sam sighed, rubbing gloved hands together near the meager flames. "Intel’s messy. Intercepts, chatter fragments. He’s got feelers out, old Hydra networks repurposed. Looking for assets. Or liabilities." He glanced meaningfully at Bucky, then Andrea. "You vanishing act definitely pinged his radar, Kuznetsov. Bucky popping up to retrieve you? Doubled the interest."
"Retrieve?" Andrea scoffed, the sound brittle. "Is that the polite term?" Her gaze flicked to Bucky, a challenge. "Thought I was just a loose end needing tied off."
Bucky met her look, the accusation stinging more than it should. "Mission parameters changed," he ground out, the vibranium plates in his shoulder shifting with a faint hum. "When the bullets started flying." He remembered the press of her back against his, the shared rhythm of survival. The sudden, jarring intimacy.
Sam watched them, his expression unreadable. "Yeah, well, parameters just changed again. Zemo’s playing a long game. He doesn’t just want you eliminated. He wants leverage. Pawns." He gestured around the ruined room. "This? Sloppy muscle. Probes. Next wave won’t ask questions." He stood abruptly. "We need to move. Now. Before this tin can gets flattened or the snow buries us alive."
Andrea didn’t budge. "Move where? Your flying tin can?" She jerked her chin towards the quinjet, its silhouette barely visible through the driving snow outside the shattered wall. "How many trackers did you bring with you, Wilson? How clean is your exit?"
"Cleaner than staying here waiting for the snowplow of doom," Sam retorted, pulling his helmet back on. "My bird’s got countermeasures. Better than huddling around a corpse and hoping the walls hold." He moved towards the blown-out section of wall, snow swirling around his boots. "Grab anything vital. We’ve got maybe five minutes before the window closes and we risk icing the engines."
Bucky scanned the meager wreckage. Vital? His own meager pack near the overturned cot was shredded. Andrea had nothing but the clothes on her back and the weapons she carried. The only thing vital was getting out of this frozen deathtrap. He bent, retrieving his pistol from where it had fallen during the scramble, the metal cold against his palm.
Andrea stalked towards Sam, stopping inches from him at the jagged edge of the broken wall. The wind whipped her red hair across her face. "And after? Where does Wilson’s taxi service drop off unwanted baggage?" Her voice was low, dangerous, meant only for Sam and Bucky. "Another cell? Another assignment?"
Sam’s helmet turned slightly, his voice muffled but firm. "Somewhere with fewer corpses and central heating. We figure out Zemo. Together." He stepped out into the knee-deep snow, the drift collapsing inward. "Move it or freeze, Red."
Andrea hesitated, a tremor of pure frustration – or maybe fear – running through her. She turned, her gaze locking onto Bucky who was straightening up, pistol secured. The firelight etched harsh lines on her face, but beneath the fury and suspicion, Bucky saw it again: the exhaustion, the raw edge of someone who’d spent a lifetime running. He saw the faint tremor in the hand resting near her holster.
The quinjet’s engines whined higher, a demanding shriek cutting through the storm. Bucky moved towards her, instinct overriding caution. "Andrea," he started, his voice rough. "Sam’s right. Staying is suicide."
She whirled to face him fully, the movement sharp. "And going with him?" Her voice cracked, the controlled mask finally slipping, revealing the desperation beneath. "Just trading one handler for another? Is that your solution, Soldat? Always following orders?" The old title hit him like a physical blow, conjuring ice water in his veins.
"No," Bucky said, the word ripped out of him. He took another step, closing the distance. Snow swirled between them, catching in her lashes. "Not orders. Choice." He saw the conflict warring in her eyes – the ingrained distrust, the fierce independence, warring with the bone-deep weariness and the terrifying unknown of Zemo’s reach. "My choice," he added, the intensity in his own voice surprising him. "To get you out."
Her breath hitched. For a suspended moment, the howl of the wind, the scream of the jet engines, the groaning wreckage of the safehouse – all of it receded. There was only her wide, green eyes searching his face, the frantic pulse visible at the base of her throat, the scent of snow and gunpowder and something uniquely her. The memory of her thigh pressing his, her back solid against him in the fight, the shocking heat of her grip pulling him from death's path – it all crashed over him. Not handlers. Survivors.
He didn't think. Didn't calculate. He reached up, the cold metal of his vibranium fingers brushing a snowflake from her cheekbone, startlingly gentle. Her eyes widened further, but she didn't flinch. Didn't pull away. The tension between them snapped taut, a live wire humming with everything unsaid, every shared near-death, every guarded glance.
THEY KISS AGAIN.
It wasn't gentle. It was collision. A desperate press of lips against lips, cold at first, then igniting. Andrea surged into it, her hands fisting in the front of his jacket, pulling him harder against her, a low sound escaping her throat that was part surrender, part battle cry. Bucky responded, his flesh hand tangling in her fiery hair, the kiss fierce, hungry, tasting of winter air, blood, and the raw edge of fear transforming into something else entirely. It was fire in the frozen ruin, a silent scream against the oblivion outside.
The world slammed back with the force of a sonic boom. A blinding white light flooded the blown-out wall – the quinjet’s powerful landing lamps cutting through the storm. Sam stood silhouetted in the glare, helmet off now, mouth slightly open, holding a thermal blanket he’d clearly come back to fetch.
"Okay," Sam drawled, his voice cutting through the sudden, electric silence. "Seriously? Now? In the murder cabin? With a dead guy watching?" He waved the blanket vaguely at the corpse half-buried in snow. "You two have the worst timing. And the worst taste in vacation spots." He shook his head, the picture of exasperated disbelief. "Get your apocalyptic make-out session on the damn jet. We have a psychotic baron to dodge!"
Bucky and Andrea sprang apart like scalded cats, breath ragged. Andrea wiped her mouth with the back of her hand, eyes wide, cheeks flushed a furious crimson that had nothing to do with the cold. Bucky stared at Sam, his metal hand flexing uselessly at his side, the phantom pressure of Andrea’s lips burning against his own. The blizzard roared, the quinjet engines screamed, and Sam Wilson stood there holding a blanket, looking utterly done.
Andrea recovered first, her familiar scowl slamming down like a portcullis. She shoved past Bucky towards the blinding light and the waiting jet. "Move, metal arm," she snapped, her voice tight, refusing to look back. Bucky exchanged a single, stunned look with Sam, who just raised his eyebrows and gestured impatiently towards the exit with the blanket. The battlefield had changed once more, strewn now with emotional landmines neither assassin knew how to navigate. But the dead man was still there, and Zemo was still coming. Survival, messy and complicated, demanded they move. Bucky followed Andrea into the storm, the taste of gunpowder and something dangerously like hope lingering on his tongue.