Chapter Text
It happens in flashes.
His father, begging for his mother to be spared. “Barnes, please, not my wife, not Maria-”
His mother, lips ruby with blood, fear in her normally saccharine eyes.
A metal arm.
Shock. Anger.
An overwhelming sense of loss.
He thought he’d moved on. He thought he’d come to terms with it. He lost his parents in a sudden accident, denied the chance to say goodbye. Only, it wasn’t an accident.
There is no logic to his actions. FRIDAY shouts in his ears, but he doesn’t listen. All he can think about is vengeance. Vengeance for his parents who were never all that good to him. But, they were his. And they were ripped away from him. He never got to say goodbye, never got to say, “I love you” one last time...never heard his father praise him until long after he was gone.
Time skips. He’s looking up at Captain America, the man his father never stopped searching for; never shut up about.
He looks up into those piercing blue eyes. He looks into him as the shield, his father’s shield, “You don’t deserve it! My father made it--it isn’t yours!” pierces his arc reactor.
He turns on his side and watches the Captain and his parent's murderer walk away, the echo of a shield left behind ringing in his ears.
He lays there as the blue (blue like that traitor’s eyes) of his arc reactor fades out. The floor beneath him is painted in red, and if he had enough strength left, he’d laugh.
He was only trying to help, trying to protect others, trying so hard to be good, and it’s all blown up in his face, again.
He’s tired. Tired of trying...failing. What’s the point? He’s no hero; there’s no redemption. There’s red in his ledger, and for every person he saves, another two die.
He knows he should stay awake with an injury so fatal, but he’s exhausted.
Maybe if he just rested his eyes for a minute...