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bakerstreet2016-06-01 12:13 pm
thelongcon) wrote in bakerstreet2016-06-01 12:13 pm
Tall trees bend and lean
the ON THE RUN meme
Sometimes, these things happen. Sometimes, you're in just the wrong place at just the right time, or you've made the wrong (or right, depending on your intentions) person mad. Sometimes it's better for everyone if you just go. Sometimes there isn't time for good-bye.
You've managed to lose yourself somewhere out there, for whatever reason it was. Maybe you took someone with you (willingly? not?), or you found someone else who needed to disappear as badly as you did. You're in your car, or a cheap hotel, or a house by the side of the road. What else can you do but watch, and wait?
It could have been as simple as being glimpsed at the 7-11. Your phoneline wasn't as secure as you thought. You locked eyes with the wrong person across the room. Now the house of cards is collapsing, and maybe not just your life, but the lives of everyone you love could be in jeopardy now. The walls are closing in, and your arms are giving out.
- post with your character's name and canon. if you have an on-the-run AU, or scenarios you might want to play out, mention them here.
- find others. tag them.
- and then, run.
SOURCE
hastily
no subject
"Wouldn't be much of an asset if I couldn't," Bucky says. He catches himself almost enjoying the back and forth despite knowing he shouldn't. Getting into the close quarters of a shower with an enemy operative goes against everything HYDRA drilled into him. Maybe that's why he does it anyway, keeps going, responding to Romanoff's push and pull.
Besides. It's almost nice to talk to someone he doesn't have decades of baggage with - read; Steve - and it feels at least with Romanoff he isn't trying to live up to some outdated picture. He turns to face her then. Face slicks down her face, her red hair plastered against her head and neck, his eyes traveling down as he assesses the old scar tissue, the wound on her leg weeping blood under the spout's spray. Eyes on the injury, he reaches back and squeezes body wash into his hand, managing to put it back without losing too much all over the tiles. It's with a hint of challenge that he slathers the body wash on her shoulder, feeling the press of muscle against her slicked skin.
"Pretty sure there's some kind of unofficial rule about our types fraternizing."
no subject
The hitch in her breath when his hand slides over her shoulder, however, is not. She recovers quickly enough and her hand gathers her hair so that she can hold it up at the back of her head, exposing more of her neck and shoulders to him. There's a dare there, it has to be. Or an invitation. It's hard to say with her, but wasn't it always? Natasha bites down on her lower lip as though she's considering whether or not she's actually going to open this can of worms or not. Her eyes meet his again and she lets her mouth draw into the familiar smirk. “Rules are boring,” she says.
Her wound is secondary right now, but she knows it's there because it's burning like a motherfucker in the water, but it also needed to be cleaned, so she was going to suffer regardless. At least he's a very pretty distraction from the pain—one she hadn't actually expected to end up this up close and personal with so quickly. He'd really thrown a wrench into it when he said he'd get in the shower with her. He was supposed to sulk on the bed. “Besides, no one is fraternizing...” there is a very obvious and unspoken yet at the end of that. To her credit, although she's pushing, she's letting him make the bigger decisions. Natasha Romanoff, after all, is comfortable with everything.
Would you be down for a ftb/timeskip in a bit? :3a
"Rules are there for a reason," he replies even as he doesn't exactly shoot her down, either.
He has to say this looks an awful lot like fraternizing. Of course it happened with HYDRA's rank and file. The smart ones didn't make the mistake of doing it front of him, thinking just because the Winter Soldier sat there mute and waiting for orders that he wouldn't turn in undesirable operatives while he was at it. This looks exactly like something he once reported: there's the hands on each other, the look on Romanoff's striking face, their bodies close enough together that no one can spin it as just two operatives being efficient and sharing the same shower.
Bucky continues to work the body wash across her throat and the dip of her collarbone, down Romanoff's arm, switching to her side and for a moment his thumb passes under her breast's curve.
"I think it's still a bad idea."
And maybe he finds himself wanting to enjoy pushing back at the conditioning precisely because of that. Common sense says he should just incapacitate Romanoff while she's injured (at the minimum) and get out of here.
no subject
A large fluffy towel is wrapped around herself and she surveys the bedroom. She assumes he already knows that he's going to end up there, but Natasha takes care to make sure she's dressed by the time he gets out so that he knows she's finished messing with him...kind of. She could have worn something less flattering (if such a thing existed) that didn't hug every damn curve on her. The wound is bandaged by then as well, hidden beneath the leggings she was wearing. There are clothes for him to wear as well if he chooses to not immediately put back on the other ones. It was going to be an interesting first night.
. . . approx 6 days later . . .
Things have gotten a little easier since that first night. Enough so that she lets him shower on his own and doesn't immediately expect that he'll be gone. On the third day she'd made pancakes and challenged him to a one-handed (it was only fair) flipping competition and had ended up calling bullshit when he was actually way better at it than she was expecting. On day five her leg was completely back to normal and she'd challenged him to a few sparring matches in the middle of the living room (after pushing all the furniture back). It may have resulted in a broken coffee table. He had a thing for throwing her into those, apparently. Outside of that, it hadn't been exceptionally exciting. She'd spar verbally with him just to get a rise out of him, but he always gave as good as he got. Part of healing was just to feel normal again, but this was probably getting to be a little too normal for either of them.
Fortunately, normal never lasts. Not for people like them. It's around two o'clock in the morning and Natasha wakes up from a dead sleep. She's gotten used to falling asleep and waking up next to him, even when he is gruff, but he's awake too and she can feel it more than she can see it in the dark. “Someone's outside,” she whispers and in the same breath her gun is clicking into place, prepared to defend. She moves silently out of the bed, even once she hits the floor, avoiding windows and nearly holding her breath trying to discern exactly where they are coming from. Regardless of who it is and what happens...there will be no more laying low in this safe house.
no subject
Bucky isn't the type to waste his time with hope. Mostly he keeps his head down. See how it goes. Assumes the worst and is pleasantly surprised when the worst doesn't roll his way.
It's almost a week of something he doesn't want to risk calling routine before it begins to fall apart. He can't tell exactly what gets him primed and alert - tired, but still ready to go - but he'll bet it's the same thing that has Romanoff's breathing pattern changing. She pulls a gun out from somewhere, like a magician trading in a rabbit for something with better stopping power. He rolls out, silently padding barefoot across worn wood floorboards as he cocks his head and holds his breath for a moment, ears straining. It's dark enough that he can just barely make out Romanoff's outline.
There's another crack of a foot against a twig, quiet enough that if he was your average, adjusted Joe Average, he probably would've shrugged and through it was some raccoon outside or something.
He keeps low and quiet as he moves to the kitchen. They talked about this over lunch the other day. He'd insisted. If Romanoff was offended at his lack of faith in her ability to cover their tracks, she didn't show it: she indulged his paranoia and they agreed on some escape routes. General flanking. Weapons. She wouldn't give him anything like a gun and even she hesitated when he pointed out the steak knife.
Bucky still goes for it anyway. Without his arm, he's weakened and if it's a HYDRA squad out there, like hell is he facing them without something better than his bare fists and giving an operative the chance to hit him with the trigger words. His hand curls around the plastic handle of the steak knife. The first thing he does is he makes sure that Romanoff can see him take it, doing everything he can to show that he isn't about turn into the Winter Soldier on her. She's still got the gun.
"Thought I heard maybe two, three out there," Bucky's voice is harsh, barely a whisper. He's running on auto-pilot and maybe between that and the darkness, she won't be able to see how scared shitless he is. "One of us out the back and the other through the bathroom."
Which will probably be Romanoff since she's smaller.
"Take them alive or no?" Because his default is either run and hope for the best or he faces them. If it's option two, he isn't sure how long he can keep things non-lethal. It isn't exactly his first gut reaction these days.
keeping it short so he can respond/decide
“The only good operative is a dead one,” she says and surrenders her gun to him. “I’ll draw attention to the front. The safe house is a wash. Go out the back, meet where we agreed.” Her hand rests on top of his when she presses the gun into his palm. “Keep yourself safe. Try not to engage.” She doesn’t know who it is that’s found them, doesn’t know if they know the words that could turn him back into a weapon to be used against her. She also doesn’t want him to hesitate to kill one of them before they can turn him.
This isn’t what they agreed to, they had both agreed to run, but she won’t. She doesn’t want whomever it is to find the both of them. She made a promise. If he doesn’t believe she’s with the people outside, then her decision to stand and protect him seems more noble, if he doesn’t, then it could easily look like she’s running him right into a trap, but then, would she have given him the gun? He doesn’t get much of a chance to argue though because there’s a sound of the front lock being picked with exact precision. Natasha doesn’t have a weapon, but she doesn’t really need one; she is one.
no subject
Either she's thinking of the worst case scenario, someone who can hit him with the trigger words, or she's very, very sure about the last few days.
Either way, suddenly he has a loaded gun.
He doesn't argue or ask why she trusts him with it. Instead Bucky nods, jaw set and his mouth thinned into a line, and he files it away, shoving it neatly to the side if they make it out of this alive and he's in a position to ask what was going through her head right that second. Fine. No prisoners. After all that time he spent on his own trying to keep his head down, squash his first kneejerk reaction to apply maximum stopping power, and it's almost like a weight lifts off him when he realizes he doesn't have to hold back. Safety off, finger resting along the trigger guard, Bucky nods and he slips out of the cabin, moving soundlessly. He spots the first operative around the corner, maintaining his cover until he hears the sound of a man's grunt, a thud, and he assumes that's Romanoff doing her thing.
The operative turns toward the sound. It's a human reaction but it's also a mistake, and while his first instinct is to sneak up and slit his throat with the steak knife, Bucky reins that it. Try not to engage, apply lethal force only if he has no choice. Swallowing thickly, Bucky remains in a crouch as he slips from cover to cover, from the woodpile to the old shed that he hasn't had a chance to see what's inside, maintaining a count of the human shadows of men and women.
He's almost to the tree line when the first operative turns and spots him. Bucky gets a good look at the patch on the man's shoulder - A.I.M - and he's too far for the steak knife and the quiet approach. The man raises something that looks like a gun that's on steroids, the lining glowing purple, and it's already too late because he sights and depresses the trigger and Romanoff's gun kicks in his hand. The gunshot echoes, a dark spot blossoming against the operative's chest as he tumbles back.
no subject
She hears discharge and she knows the sound of her guns—just by the sound. Also the guns that these operatives came with are strange glowing abominations that probably would have killed her if they hit her, but she's fast—and she knows this place inside and out. The last man standing is dispatched and he has one of the glowing guns that she takes with her. She doesn't know how to use it, but hey, it's not the first time she's picked up a weapon like that. At least this one was from this planet. She's trying to get out as fast as she can though because she doesn't know if they're after Bucky. It's quiet outside though and she can smell the blood gurgling out into the ground beneath the man. The shot in was never the problem, it was always that exit wound.
He isn't the only one bleeding (or dead), but she'll deal with that later. She kneels down next to the dead man to take a look at the patch as well and immediately swears loud enough that Bucky can hear it. She rips the patch off the uniform and grabs a few other weapons, including a couple of what she assumes are grenades. She stands up, looking around because she is worried Bucky has been taken or has run. She doesn't call for him, because if there is still anyone else out here, she doesn't want to alert them to the fact that she isn't alone.
Natasha finishes clearing the area, making sure no one else is around. She lowers the gun and the bright purple lines power down and she finally lets herself try and catch her breath. She keeps staring at the patch in her hand and getting more angry by the second. There's no way they're there after her. She waits, listening for the sound of him moving to see if he was still around, and if she's honest, she's kind of worried about his reaction and what it's going to be.
no subject
"I'm assuming that's all of them," he says and knows with Romanoff's track record that it is. "What's wrong?"
Because maybe he isn't Romanoff's buddy like Steve is, but he figures he can read her body language just fine when she's standing there with a rifle resting at her side, still humming as it powers down, and her shoulders are braced like she's still rearing to go for another fight. He does another glance of the area for motion, listening for any rustles or clicks that shouldn't be there, but mostly it's quiet aside from the soft gurgles of a man who's probably minutes away from dying. Might be long enough to interrogate him if they get there in time. Bucky hasn't had to do it in a few years now, thanks to being off the grid, but he knows - hates knowing - that muscle memory could fill in for his rustiness if he was desperate.
Right now he's trying to work out if he's desperate enough.
Bucky comes close enough that he can see the patch. Advanced Idea Mechanics. The names sounds familiar, vaguely, almost as if it was on HYDRA's watch list like so many others were. To Romanoff, it seems like it's a little more than that, if her posture is anything to go by. So he remains on edge, waiting for the ball to drop.
omg, I'm so sorry -- feel free to respond as the operative too.
She reappears from the house and the man who was on the verge of death was given a stim-shot right to the heart and the bullet hole was plugged with a syringe of expanding foam to keep him from bleeding out. His hands are bound behind him to his ankles so that he's sitting on his knees, but she's mostly doing the holding up for him with her hair gripped tightly in his hair while she waits for him to come to, keeping her body between Bucky's and the man on his knees. It doesn't take long once the adrenaline and epinephrine spread quickly through his body. The soldier gasps and his eyes snap open, landing on the barely-dressed woman with long red hair falling around her face. Maybe he would have thought it was a dream if it wasn't for the smile on her face, that promised anything but pleasure. “Black Widow...” he choked out.
“Were you expecting someone else?” she asks, pulling his head back a little further. She can feel him straining against the restraints, but she feels pretty confident that he won't be able to break them.
“We know you have the Winter Soldier.”
“And why would you assume such a thing?”
“He's missing from the facility he was being kept.”
“Did you break into my house in the middle of the night because your moles can't keep an eye on their asset?” she demanded. Her hand slipped over his face, a caress of his cheek that ended with her thumb pressed against the side of his eye, threatening to put it out. That sorted out who the leak had been, but it wasn't really surprising. HYDRA and organizations like A.I.M had been putting moles in just like the KGB had.
“Don't be foolish. You can't control him.”
“I don't have to. Why are you after him?” There wasn't a response and she pressed harder on the side of his eyeball until he cried out. “I need you to remember that nothing that they have done to you in AIM is as bad as what I can do to you in the middle of the woods where no one will hear you scream,” she said passively. She had very clearly gone into Black Widow mode, watching the switch flip was impressive. But how else was she supposed to compartmentalize everything she'd done—and was about to do if the man wasn't more forthcoming with his information.