PSL for Serene_Rage

[irememberedhim]

The Soldier still hadn't remembered his name. Most of the mutants in the base had taken to calling him Winter after he'd given his code name when Erik had captured him. He knew he was still being watched. That the telepaths closest to Erik were doing everything they could to make sure he was still stable and mostly sane.

Over the weeks since they're fight and being taken in by Erik he had started to see things the way the man saw them. It wasn't much different from HYDRA. Honestly, in a way he thought Erik's view was better. The special people of the world, the mutants, people like him even, who had powers of different kinds...Erik wanted a better world for them because they were the future.

Well, who was he to argue, right? He just leaned into his bed, closing his eyes and sighing before shifting a bit to lay down. His memories, some of them anyway, had been coming back. He remembered a scrawny guy, remembered being close to him. But that guy would be long gone by then, even if he could remember his name.

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[irememberedhim]

Bucky tilted his head and slowly moved closer to the board, looking over what information they had, his fingers tracing beneath before looking at Erik. "He went down in the Atlantic...but..." He frowned deeply, shaking his head. "These aren't the right coordinates, Erik. This isn't where he went down."

[serene_rage]

His brows both lifted at that, just a little, "No?" If everyone had been working from incorrect information, he supposed it made sense that no one had actually found him yet.

He smoothed out the map on the board, "This is the last known location of the Valkyrie he was piloting, last transmitted coordinates before communication was lost." That was the one thing everyone agreed on, though there was some variance from there, factoring in ocean flow and tides and even just the aircraft's actual velocity and projected velocity.

"Or is that incorrect as well?" He asked, studying James once more, curious now just how much the man knew but didn't realize.

[irememberedhim]

He kept looking over the information before shaking his head. "No." He said suddenly, metal fingers moving over the map. "No I...I managed to break free one day. I got into one of their labs and I do remember the paperwork. They didn't have the...tools to go looking, but they had the right information at the time."

He brushed his fingers through his hair. "Everyone thinks he was headed this way and he was. This was the course the Valkyrie was supposed to be taking, but Steve took it off course slightly." He grabbed a pen, changing the course by drawing a line. "I know Steve. This would have been the best way to take her down, especially since he had been fighting Red Skull before he crash landed."

[serene_rage]

He nodded at that, mulling it over, not that he could even begin to guess what had been in the Captain's head at the time, nor how Hydra would have had the correct information but still hadn't found the man -unless they were still under-equipped, which he supposed was possible- nor anyone from the now-defunct SSR wouldn't have known the correct coordinates for when communication was lost.

But he was willing to let that go, for the time being, James was resolute in what he knew, and that was enough for him to go on, "We'll adjust our search area and do our best not to alert anyone to that fact."

[irememberedhim]

"Thank you, Erik." He said as he looked at the map. He brushed his fingers through his hair before looking back at him. "I want to go with the next search group. If they find him...I want to be there. If there is any chance he could be alive somehow..."

[serene_rage]

He nodded once, "Of course. We wouldn't dream of trying to keep you away." He clasped James' shoulder for a moment, "He was your brother long before you were ours."

That was the kind of bond Erik wasn't about to get in the way of if it could at all be helped.

[irememberedhim]

He nodded, sighing before pushing his fingers through his hair. "I think I should rest. I guess...let me know if there is another training session? Or if you need me...if you send a team to look for him..."

[serene_rage]

"Rest is probably the best thing for you now." He agreed with a nod, "And I'll let you know as soon as it's viable for us to send a team."

They were going to have to do some scouting first, he knew, and Pearl wasn't yet up to traveling with more than one or two others and he wasn't going to press her into trying more, he knew enough to let her recover first.

[irememberedhim]

He nodded before heading out and going to his rooms. He was hopeful, having a purpose and a goal in his mind. He would help them find Steve. He would bring Steve back with him...the way it should be.

[serene_rage]

It was another two weeks -and a handful of training sessions that Bucky was involved in- before Erik summoned him to the office.

"We've found something." He said, "We aren't sure what, we can't even guess whether or not it's him, but we're putting together a team to investigate."

[irememberedhim]

Bucky looked hopeful and he nodded quickly. "I want to go with them, if thats alright with you." He said, crossing his arms over his chest.

[serene_rage]

He nodded once, "I suspected as much, which is why I asked you here, I want to make sure you're prepared in the chance that it isn't him." A pause, "Or ore importantly, if it's merely his remains."

Erik wasn't going to bar him from going in any case, he just needed to know so he could assemble a team that would be able to handle the fallout.

[irememberedhim]

That thought had his metal hand clenching in the back of the chair he'd been standing next to and he ended up snapping the wood without meaning to. Though he understood that it was a very real possibility. He closed his eyes, taking a breath before nodding. "Yes I know. Its not something...I am trying to hold out hope that its him...that he is alive, but I know he might not be."

[serene_rage]

The physical reaction as well as the verbal one told Erik all he needed to know and he nodded once more, "We'll leave this afternoon, sixteen hundred." That would get them to the location during the warmest part of the day, not that it would make much difference, considering that was just the difference of slightly above zero instead of slightly below.

[irememberedhim]

He nodded again before turning and leaving to go get ready. Once it was time he met up with the team that would be heading out to go see if they could find Steve, or at least what possibly remained of the man.

[serene_rage]

The team was, for the most part, the same team he usually ran drills with, Thorne, Pearl, Rocky, Kite, Tempest, who could control the weather at least enough to keep the snow off of them, Pulse, who was one of the team's healers, and Magneto himself.

Pearl was the one to transport them, her usual shimmering blue-green rift opening in the hangar, stepping through herself to verify the location and that the snow would hold them all, followed by everyone else. They all immediately went about their assigned tasks, Kite keeping a lookout from above, Tempest keeping the snow off and even warming the air around them a few degrees, and Erik leading the rest of the team to the area they were going to be searching.

[irememberedhim]

They started looking, though Bucky knew he wasn't exactly much help. He was just human, albeit enhanced by whatever serum they'd engineered and given him, just liked they'd given Steve. Well, and he had his arm. But he didn't have powers like the others here did. He had nothing that would help find Steve.

He just watched them all in the hopes that someone would locate the plane and he suddenly perked up when he heard that one of them had. His eyes widened and he went running.

[serene_rage]

Magneto had been scanning as deeply as he could in the ice for any metal, and something as large as a plane would be difficult for him to miss, but he nearly had all the same.

After that it was up to Thorne and Rocky working together to actually get through the layers of ice to get to the pane, or at least clear enough space for Pearl to open a portal without overworking herself, but between the two of them -along with a handful of gravel and another handful of bean sprouts, they managed to do just that, Rocky finding natural cracks in the ice and dropping rocks in before causing them to explode like firecrackers, and Thorne sending tendrils of bean-vine down after to shift the larger pieces of ice out of the way.

Between the two of them they soon had the hatch cleared, and an easy slope through the ice to get down to it.

[irememberedhim]

Bucky had taken to mostly just pacing, keeping an eye out just in case someone showed up, anyone really. Thankfully no one did. Once the hatch was cleared though he moved over to the slope and then he looked at Magneto, swallowing hard before ducking his head and slowly making his way down. He was scared, more nervous than he could admit about what they could possibly be about to find.

[serene_rage]

Even with the hatch cleared, and even once Magneto had managed to pry it open, the inside of the Valkyrie was filled with ice as well, which meant that either the hatch had broken, or had deliberately been breached, or, perhaps, that some other portion of the plane had allowed water into the interior.

Whatever the case was, it made retrieving the Captain somewhat more difficult than first suspected, though Thorne and Rocky were using the same tactic they had before, if somewhat more carefully now, diligent as ever. Pulse had already made her way down as well, only able to confirm that whatever was in the ice was human, she couldn't yet confirm whether he was still alive or not.

[irememberedhim]

He just stayed as close as he could, eyes on the team working to make their way through the ice. Every once in a while he would look at Magneto or Pulse, but mostly he just watched the progress of the two, waiting until he could get into the plane. All he could think about was getting to Steve and he silently prayed to whatever God or power out there was listening that he was still alive.

[serene_rage]

Pulse was waiting, not quite chewing her nails, but giving the impression that she should be, coiled, not-quite tense while Rocky and Thorne continued chipping away at the ice little by little, having to be careful not to cause any damage to the body beneath it.

Finally, however, she startled forward, "Heartbeat! We've got a heartbeat." She ducked under Thorne's outstretched arm, dropping into the knee-deep pit of slush around what was turning into an ice sarcophagus around the body, "It's thready, but it's there."

[irememberedhim]

By that point it was taking everything Bucky had not to pull the three away so he could start working on the ice himself with his metal arm. He made a sound though at the revelation, one of relief at knowing that there was something there. Steve was alive under there, but they still had to get to him.

His fists clenched when suddenly he tilted his head, seeing something familiar to one side. He moved in closer to the three himself and reached down. "Wait." He curled his metal fingers in around the edge of something just barely visible above a patch of slushy ice before he started pulling. He let out a growl before a part of the ice cracked and split to reveal Steve's old shield.

[serene_rage]

Erik hadn't even differentiated the shield from the rest of the metal of the Valkyrie, and he just nodded once, smiling faintly as Bucky pulled it free. It was only fair, really, that he keep it.

Finally Thorne and Rocky had managed to free the Captain's body -still entombed in a six-inch-thick shell of ice- from the surrounding ice-pack, and that thickness was needed to keep him still, at least until they got back to the base and could thaw him out properly.

It also proved no problem for Erik to still catch hold of the man's armor beneath the ice, using it to maneuver the whole works out of the pit they were all standing in, prepared to get him back home in as short a time as possible.

[irememberedhim]

He wasn't far behind Erik, wanting to stay close. He didn't see how there was any way that there was a heartbeat coming from his friend in that thick block of ice, but somehow there was and all he could do was count his blessings for that. He just had to be patient and wait for them to get him out of there.

Much as he wanted to just punch his way through the block, he knew it wouldn't work like that. It couldn't. Doing something so drastic could end up hurting Steve and that was the last thing he wanted to do.