Eminent Silence

by Tristan Carey

  She stirred slightly, causing a lock of her hair to fall across her face, and she snuggled closer into his chest. He felt his cheeks heat slightly, as her body pressed closer into his own. He reached across with his left hand, carefully pushing her stray hairs from her face, making sure not to touch her skin with his titanium fingers.

  She looked so peaceful as she slept, there was no pain on her face, none of the serious expression she usually held throughout the day. Her skin looked smooth without so much as a scar, even though he knew she often took a serious beating in a fight.

  He found it odd, they had known each other for barely 6 months, 5 of those months they had barely shared a conversation but he found he was most comfortable with her. He could relate to her and, he guessed, she felt the same. He also felt incredibly protective of her, and he found that the oddest of all, especially considering how hostile she acted towards him in the beginning.

  The only other person in his life that he had ever felt protective of was Steve, and that was long before Steve had undergone enhancement.

  He smirked, thinking of Steve's jabs at him in the kitchen the previous day. As he became contemplative, remembering all the girls he wooed in his younger days, and without realising, he moved his arm to hold her closer to him.

  He felt her tense in his arm and jump slightly, looking around in bewilderment. She gaped when she realised where she was. 'Oh...'

  'Morning,' he murmured, smiling apologetically.

  Her cheeks began to redden and she looked away bashfully. 'Hi.' She sat up carefully, allowing him to move his arm, sitting sideways so she faced him. 'Sorry about that.'

  'It's fine,' he replied, watching as she pushed all her hair to rest on one shoulder. 'I'm just glad you got some sleep.'

  She bit her lip and looked embarrassed. 'Did you?'

  He smiled at her. 'Yeah, I did actually.' And it was surprisingly restful. He hadn't a night terror or dream at all, which was unusual, to say the least, for him.

  'That's good.' She sounded relieved and sighed, she looked out the window and frowned. 'How long were we asleep?'

  'A good 10 hours,' the doctor said as he and the nurses came in, one of the nurses carrying a tray of food. Bucky sat up and stood from the bed, moving to help Vielka sit back, although she protested. 'And today the physio will be visiting you, so it's a good thing you got some good rest.'

  'Heh, you'd think I got more than enough while I was unconscious,' she muttered and Bucky couldn't help but grin.

  'I better be going,' he said, as the doctor checked her stitches before he would let her eat.

  'Hey, could you possibly ask Nat to get me some real clothes from my room, please?' Vielka asked, her voice slightly muffled from the angle of her head.

  'Sure, just take it easy today,' he said, before smiling warmly at her and leaving.

  He found Natasha talking to T'Challa outside the living area.

  'Hey, where have you been?' Natasha asked seeing him enter the corridor they were standing in. She cocked her head to the side. 'You haven't been with Vielka this whole time, have you?'

  'She was wondering if you could bring her some normal clothes, she's seeing the physio today,' he said, ignoring her question, but noting the sly expression on her face.

  'Yeah, of course, T'Challa and I were just discussing her,' she replied, motioning to the Wakandan king.

  Bucky looked to T'Challa expectantly. 'More so the device than her, exactly. We believe we can reverse engineer the device to track the other soldiers,' he explained. Bucky frowned, unsure what he was getting at.

  'If we track the soldiers, we find Red and if we find Red...' Natasha explained more plainly.

  'We find Crossbones,' Bucky finished. He clenched his fists, just the name of the fiend angering him. 'How long will it take?'

  'It may take some time,' T'Challa admitted bitterly. 'However, the scientists believe the device may hold information about what it is Crossbones plans on doing too, we already know it involves a weaponized suit of some sort.'

  'So they want to extract the information before they start destroying it to reverse engineer it,' Natasha finished explaining for him.

  'Besides,' T'Challa said, a slight grin appearing on his face. 'I don't think Vielka would want to miss it.'

  Bucky grinned too, he was inclined to agree with the Wakandan. As he thought of Vielka and how certain he was that she would want to take vengeance on Crossbones and Red, he had an idea. 'Wait, I think I might know someone who could help.'

  Vielka let the physiotherapist wheel her to the gym, although she spent most of the ride with her face covered. It was bad enough not to be able to walk, but to be forced into a wheel chair and pushed through the facility just made her want to murder.

  She curbed that thought quickly and sighed in relief when she found the gym was empty.

  'Ok, Vielka, we are going to go over here and see if we can get you to start getting your body used to bearing your weight,' she said, lining the wheel chair up with a set of horizontal rails that were at waist height.

  She reached forward and worked to lift herself up, but struggled. Even her arms were needing to get used to taking her weight again.

  The physio, a small woman by the name of Elise, moved forward to help her, putting her arms beneath Vielka's arms and hoisted her upwards. Vielka grabbed the rails and locked her elbows, not giving her arms the opportunity to buckle under the weight of her body.

  It was hard work, holding her weight up, the whole measly 80 odd kilos of her, but she was hell bent on getting back to independence quickly.

  'Okay, put your feet flat to the floor, and straighten your legs, but make sure you hold on.'

  Vielka slowly did as she was instructed, concentrating hard on moving her feet into position, before beginning to try and straighten her legs.

  'Tuck that butt,' Elise said with a bit of a grin, as she watched on carefully, slipping between Vielka and the wheelchair.

  Vielka bit her lip, concentrating on trying to get her legs to straighten properly, until she finally felt her knees lock out.

  She sighed in relief as she held herself there, her arms beginning to shake from holding all her weight for the first time in a long two and a bit weeks and she was already to break out in a sweat from the effort, but she was happy that she could at least achieve this much.

  'Alright, let's get you down to rest, before we try again.' Elise moved her wheelchair behind her again and helped Vielka ease herself back down. 'How did that feel?'

  'So good,' Vielka answered breathlessly, taking the bottle of water Elise offered her.

  'That's great, I think you're going to make this really easy on both of us because you seem to have a really good mindset, but it's not going to be fast, it's going to be slow.'

  'We'll see,' Vielka murmured, before taking a mouthful of water. She wasn't sure Elise knew the full story on her.

  After three sessions with Elise over the last three days, Vielka was starting to get frustrated. She felt she was ready to progress, but Elise was insistent on taking it slow.

  As she sat in her room, listening to the mindless drone of the television she made up her mind to take herself to the gym. She needed to do something. She buzzed for a nurse, who hurried in.

  'What's up, Vielka?' she asked pleasantly.

  'Could I get a wheelchair? I'd like to get out for a roll,' she said, grinning at her own joke.

  The nurse laughed lightly. 'I don't see why not. Would be good for you,' she said and disappeared out the door, returning with the chair for her.

  Vielka slid from the bed with a little help from the nurse, although she took most of her own weight on her legs, which she felt pretty chuffed about.

  'All set?' the nurse asked, handing her a water bottle from her bed side. Vielka nodded once. 'Alright, off you go! Be back before dinner though, or I'll have his majesty send the Dora after you.'

  Vielka scoffed at the nurse's emp
ty threat. Most of the Dora Milaje were no fans of Vielka. Most of the wives-in-training and personal bodyguard unit of the Wakandan Royal, thought of her as a threat to their positions, each vying for the affections of T'Challa, although he had already disclosed to Vielka that he had no intention of marrying any of them.

  While they clearly had no understanding of the relationship between T'Challa and her, she recognised that at least one of them, Okoye, did not feel as strongly against her as the others, and Vielka had always suspected it was because she didn't join the Dora for the same reason as the others. For this reason, Vielka had far more respect for her than any of the others, and Okoye had proven on more than one occasion that she felt the same towards Vielka.

  She also knew that they knew, they would never stand a chance against her in a fight, this proven when she first arrived in Wakanda to take her place beside the Black Panther. There was a reason she was chosen to stand by his side when he went into battle as the Black Panther and not them.

  She wheeled herself towards the gym, her arms had definitely regained some of their strength and she appreciated the feeling of exercising them currently. So much so, she pushed herself to go faster, seeing how fast she could actually go.

  As she rolled into the gym, she was glad to see she was on her own. The good thing about being here in the middle of the day was that most of the personnel within the facility were busy working, so she could work out in privacy.

  She wheeled herself over to the rails and set the brakes on her wheel chair before hoisting herself up by her arms, carefully manoeuvring herself to the edge of her wheelchair before putting her feet to the ground and carefully starting to bear weight on them.

  She managed to stand for long enough to reach out and grab a rail with one hand, but when she moved to place her other hand, her arm gave way slightly and she fell, her legs unable to maintain the balance and weight. She caught herself by way of the rail under her right arm, hissing with pain as the metal bar bit into the tender skin under her arm.

  She shuffled herself back up to be holding the bars by her hands again, ignoring the pain. She placed her feet under her again, beginning to take the weight. She straightened her legs, being sure to tuck with her glutes to ensure her balance.

  As her knees straightened and locked out, she took a deep breath, preparing herself for what she wanted to try next. Elise had not been willing to let her try and stand unsupported yet, citing that she was not strong enough to catch all of Vielka's weight on her own and she wasn't confident Vielka would be able to hold all her own weight on her legs yet.

  Vielka's opinion was she wouldn't know unless she tried.

  She began to put all her weight to her legs, releasing the rails from her hands. Her legs protested somewhat, to suddenly bearing so much weight, but she grit her teeth and continued to stand, lifting her hands away from the rails completely.

  She felt her stomach leap, as her body stayed upright, unable to stop herself from smiling.

  She placed her hands back on the rail, easing her weight off her legs and stretching them out without the weight for a moment. She thought to perhaps put herself back to her chair to rest properly, but then, taking it easy was never in her nature.

  She placed her feet underneath her again, beginning to take the weight from her arms. Once she had removed her hands from the rails, her legs taking all the weight and maintaining her balance, she took a deep breath and mentally prepared herself for what she wanted to try next. She concentrated solely on her balance, ignoring anything and everything else, gritting her teeth as she tried to lift one foot, willing herself to place it in front of the other.

  She shifted her right foot slightly, the heel beginning to rise from the ground, but the extra weight on her left leg was too much.

  Her leg buckled and she began to fall to the ground, throwing her arms out in a bid to catch herself on a rail.

  Before she could hit the ground, or even catch herself on a rail as she had before, strong arms captured her from behind, a familiar, musky scent washing over her as she closed her eyes in relief.

  'Bucky,' she said without even looking back. He smiled slightly, carefully moving backwards to put her back into the wheel chair that was positioned next to the rails.

  'What are you doing?' he demanded, looking around to see if he could see her physio anywhere.

  'What did it look like? I'm trying to get walking again,' she replied, sounding slightly annoyed at his question.

  'Looked more like you were falling to me,' he said smugly, earning him a glare as he knelt down beside the chair. 'But what I meant was why are you doing that without your physio or doctor nearby?'

  She rolled her eyes. 'It's taking too long,' she murmured, looking away from him. He was slightly confused and his face must have shown that, because when she glanced back at him, she rolled her eyes. 'They're trying to take it too slow. I'm not just your average human anymore, you know. I can move faster than this.'

  He could tell by the way she spoke, she was growing frustrated. He could understand why too, to suddenly go from finding everything easy, to finding almost everything difficult.

  She scratched the side of her face and sighed. 'I suppose you're going to make me go back to the ward?'

  He was thoughtful for a moment. 'Well, I suppose I could interrupt my own work out to help you,' he said slowly. Her brow furrowed as she looked up at him before her face broke into a grin, her pretty Asian features accentuating. 'Come on.' He held out his hands to her, which she was quick to take, shuffling herself forward in the wheel chair slightly.

  When she was ready he hoisted her to her feet, she was wobbly but quickly took her balance with his help.

  'Alright, what now?' he asked, still holding her hands in front of her.

  'I'm going to try and take a step,' she said. He admired her confidence, but prepared himself to catch her again.

  He held her hands up in front of him, so that if her legs buckled, she would have further to fall and more time for him to catch her. He watched as she concentrated and strained to lift her right foot. Her heel lifted, and he felt her squeeze the fingers of his right hand, as she clenched her jaw and her whole foot raised from the ground. She moved it forward a couple of millimetres before trying to place it down, but her left leg gave out as it had the first time.

  She began to fall forward, but he was quick to catch her, his arms slipping around her mid section and holding her up. He heard her groan and glanced down to find her grimacing.

  He lowered her the rest of the way to the floor. 'You okay?' he asked, as she pulled herself away from his chest. He began looking her over quickly. He noticed a bruise was forming under her right arm, he hadn't noticed it before.

  'Yeah, I'm fine,' she muttered sullenly, frowning slightly. 'I was so close.'

  He gave her a sympathetic smile, before sitting on the floor in front of her. 'You'll get there.'

  'Oh, I know I will, I'm just impatient, I guess,' she replied with a sigh. 'I suppose I should go back to the hospital ward. I've got nothing else I can do.'

  He raised an eyebrow and was thoughtful as she glanced back hesitantly at the wheel chair. 'Well, that's not entirely true,' he replied, calling her attention back to him. Her golden-brown coloured eyes looked at him with mild confusion. 'I mean, you'd have to be careful, but I'm sure there's still a way you can work out the rest of your body.'

  She sat up a bit straighter, looking thoughtful. 'That is true.'

  'And, I'll be here to make sure you don't get carried away,' he said pointedly, making her purse her lips before she grinned.

  'Not even a little?'

  He rolled his eyes before standing up. 'Come on, up you get.'Vielka sat on the side of her bed as the doctors and physio consulted on the other side of the curtain. She was now able to walk, albeit she couldn't walk for long periods yet. Since that day in the gym with Bucky a week and a half ago, she had been to the gym every day, working with first ju
st Bucky, and then Steve and Sam joined them when they found out she was working hard at her recovery.

  Elise, the physio, hadn't been too pleased when she found out, but when she saw Bucky and also saw what they were doing in the gym, she had found it very hard to say no, bearing witness to the vast improvement to Vielka's strength and endurance.

  Now, she just waited for the okay to return to her own living quarters, and to start retraining with weapons. T'Challa had told her they were close to figuring out where Crossbones was hiding and what he was planning, she wasn't going to miss out on all the fun.

  The doctor and physio entered, followed by T'Challa, who she hadn't realised was a part of the conversation. He smiled at her when she looked at him in confusion.