New Mexico
2015

Yelena knew there wasn't much she was going to want out of her room, but she still decided to go and at least get her clothes and the picture that she always had hiding under her pillow. She knew it was silly, having that picture of him in her room. She guessed it was because she was only a little girl when she had found out he was her father and had unrealistic expectations and desires. She had always been drawn to the Asset ever since she first saw him as a girl all those years ago in D.C., even before she knew of her connection to him.

The man who had no name and slept in a coffin of ice and had an arm made entirely of metal was always a topic of fascination for her. But then she saw what Pierce had done to him, and it scared her more than anything in the world. The events that happened in that room would haunt her dreams and would make her wake up in the middle of the night sweating and crying as the sound of his screams echoed through her head.

But she kept silent about it because she knew that what she had witnessed was not meant for her eyes. But the older she got the more she saw the importance of what was being done to him, and she no longer argued with it. In the words of Director Pierce, he was a weapon and could never be thought of as a man, and she agreed.

She used to look up to him, everything he had accomplished for Hydra and always had a longing to be like him. She knew in her mind that he was the best, and that was something she had always aspired to be. She wanted to be the best so she could have the satisfaction of being like him and so that she could gain Fleischer's approval. He had always expected the best from her and she didn't want to disappoint him like Anna and Isabel had.

But deep down, not even she could deny that she craved the attention and approval that only a parent could give to their child. She wasn't stupid, she knew that everyone had a father and a mother and while she knew who her father was, she did not have the luxury of his attention or approval. And of course, she could not gain that from her mother seeing as hers had died in an attempt to defect from Hydra.

So she had resigned herself to never getting any attention from either of her parents, and she was okay with that. A family would only distract her from her training and that was not an option. For years she had managed without her parents and so it had been quite a shock when her father had come for her and had told her that he cared about her. It was foreign to her and she didn't know how to handle somebody saying something like that.

Nobody had ever cared about her in that way before, except Fleischer, who had been her mentor and teacher for the past decade. Once upon a time, she might've even thought of him as a father figure, but she knew that was far from the truth. She may have never had a father, but she knew enough to know that fathers didn't touch their daughters like the Baron did to her. But despite his wandering hands, his lust-filled eyes and his volatile anger, her loyalty to him and his purpose was unwavering.

She was and would always be loyal to Hydra. She would succeed where the man following behind her now had failed.

He walked closely behind her as she walked to her old quarters so she could collect her things before she moved in with him and his friend in New York. This whole situation was weird, but she tried not to let that bother her as she walked. She could feel him keeping pace with her behind him, like a silent shadow stalking his prey. He said nothing and she was quite happy to keep it that way seeing as she didn't have the courage to actually hold another conversation with him at this point.

Her room was small and sterile seeing as she only had a few possessions and it was as well clean so everything would be easy to find and put away. She walked over to her closet and took the very few shirts she had and tossed them onto the bed and then grabbed her hairbrush and tossed it over with the rest of them. She wasn't going to take the mirror considering she could easily get a new one and it was too big and bulky to take with her, but she did reach down and grabbed her plain white tennis shoes as well as the pair of combat boots she owned.

"Can you grab my hair ties please?" asked Yelena as she shoved her belongings into the bag, "they're next to the mirror."

"Sure," mumbled Bucky as he went to reach for the bag of hair ties but paused when he saw the blue dress peeking out from behind the mirror. He had almost forgotten about the dress and he wondered if Yelena would want to take it with her to New York. It was the only nice article of clothing that she had and Bucky was immensely curious as to how she had come into possession of it as he gingerly picked it up and traced over the lace with his flesh thumb.

"Are you going to take this with you?" he asked but paused when he saw a flash of embarrassment and hurt pass over her delicate features. It was brief and fleeting, but Bucky had been trained in the art of body and facial language and he could tell that Yelena had been distressed at the sight of the dress.

Why would she-?

Oh.

Oh, he was such an idiot.

Why else would she be ashamed of a dress? A dress that happened to be the nicest thing that she owned. It was obvious that it had been given to her by someone for a special occasion and it didn't take a genius to figure out why he would give it to her.

Bucky's nostrils flared in anger as his hand involuntarily tightened around the blue silk and lace, wrinkling the expensive fabric under the crushing weight of his strength.

The lecherous bastard had dressed her up for his time with her.

He had forced her to wear the dress like she was some sort of doll that he could dress and play with.

He wanted to rip the dress to shreds and douse it in gasoline and light it up like the fourth of July. Anything to destroy the wretched dress so that Yelena wouldn't have to be reminded of that.

He grit his teeth as he slowly rose to his feet and tried his best to wipe the animalistic expression that was threatening to surface if he didn't control it. He didn't want Yelena to see him blow up in anger like Steve had earlier during the interrogation, so he sucked in his breath and turned to face the girl that was staring at him from across the room in stunned silence.

Although he had tried his best to hide his anger, she had still seen the way he had looked at the dress. He had decided earlier that he wasn't going to confront Yelena about her sexual abuse until she was ready to talk to about it, and that was if she was ever ready to talk about it.

He knew that talking about abuse was hard and although he had never been sexually assaulted, his mind had been raped by Hydra and he didn't know if he would ever be able to fully talk to anyone about what had happened. He had told Steve a lot, but he hadn't told him everything and now that his mind was healing he could remember what it was like to slowly lose the memories one by one until he didn't even know his own name.

He remembered how hard he tried to hold onto the memory of Steve as he laid there on that table with wires and machinery stuck to his head, but eventually, he couldn't remember why he was doing that and eventually even the memory his best friend had faded away.

But now Yelena knew that he knew and he prayed to God that this wouldn't cause her to feel ashamed or embarrassed.

Christ she shouldn't even have to feel embarrassed or ashamed about what happened to her. But did Yelena know that?

"No," said Yelena softly with a shake of her head, "I don't want to take it with me."

Bucky nodded stiffly as he stalked past her and deposited the dress on the bed before roughly shoving the rest of her possessions into the bag and zipped it up, his eyes drifting the dress that was lying next to him as he tried to decide if he should just leave it or destroy it.

Yelena quietly walked over to her pillow while he was busy staring at the dress and reached under it for the polaroid she had stashed under there only to find it gone. She got onto the floor and looked under the cot only to find nothing.

She was confused because she knew she had put it under her pillow, but she didn't show that to him. She didn't want him to know she had a picture of him because that was weird and embarrassing.
"Looking for something?" he finally asked as he tore his eyes away from the dress and looked down into her brown orbs.

"Thought I dropped something," she mumbled as she took the black bag out of his hands.
Bucky frowned, "if you want I could help you look for whatever it is you dropped?"
Yelena shook her head, "No, I'm good."
"You sure?" he asked, his right brow raised, "I mean it's got to be around here some-."
"I said it's fine," she said rather harshly as she glared at the man.

Bucky clamped his mouth shut and reverted to staring at her as she slung the black bag over her shoulder in agitation. Yelena felt a guilty twinge upon saying that to him while he had been nothing but kind to her, but she just kind of wished he would leave her alone and stop bugging her. She could tell that he pitied her and after seeing the way he had looked at the dress, it was painfully obvious that he knew about what the Baron had done to her and he was angry.

"Like any father would be," came a whisper from the back of her mind as she tried to brush the thought away.

It was no surprise that he felt like he needed to be fatherly towards her because she was his daughter and that was his responsibility. But while Yelena knew that he was her biological father, he couldn't really ever be a father to her because that's just not how this shit worked. Just because she shared twenty-three chromosomes with him didn't make him instantly responsible for her. Yelena was strong, she could take herself without his or anyone else's help. Besides, why would he ever want her for a daughter?

Yelena was a failure and she felt like she could never be anything more. Her entire existence was a failure, so what else in life could she be?

She knew that Bucky had said that he cared about her, but obviously be must be delusional or he just didn't know her well enough. If he really knew about her, he would be embarrassed to be her father.

So that's why Yelena decided that she wasn't going to let Bucky be her father because she knew that it would end badly for the both of them. She needed to protect herself from the contamination that came from Shield and their mindset. Hydra was the only right mentality and she would not allow herself to become contaminated from Bucky or Steve.

Yelena didn't even bother to look back at her room one last time before she and Barnes made their way out of the room. They were about to step into the elevator when Bucky stopped and looked back in the direction of the room with an undeceive gaze.

"Stay here," he said as he started walking back, "I left something in there."

Yelena huffed as she watched him disappear around the corner. She knew what he had not left anything in there and that that was just an excuse to go back in. She had a feeling he had gone back because of the dress that had been left on the bed and her suspicion was confirmed when she heard the distinctive sound of fabric being ripped to shreds.

"It seemed as though he couldn't help himself," thought Yelena numbly as she watched Bucky stalk out of the room.

Yelena said nothing as they both made their way to the hangar where Steve would be waiting for them. She couldn't help but notice the stares she got from the other Shield Agents and she tried her hardest not to let it bother her. She didn't care what they thought of her or what kind of treatment she would get from them, but she most certainly did not want their pity. She was above them and she would never let herself forget that.

She didn't know what awaited her in New York or how her life was going to be now that her "father" was in her life. They would without a doubt try to rehabilitate her and make her fit in with society, but Yelena was not born to be normal like everyone else. She was born to be superior to them and even though she would never accomplish that, she could still hold herself to a higher standard than them.

She would escape one day and continue the work that she had been born to do.

She would not let herself become less.

She would be more.

AN: The dress: I was reading through the comments on this story and I remembered a comment from artemis7448 about the blue dress that Fleischer gave to Yelena and how Bucky would be pissed when he figured out why she had it. I personally enjoyed him finally figuring it out and how angry he was and then having him rip it to shreds.

Sofia: A lot of you have expressed a desire to see Tony take Sofia under his wing and I agree that Tony would be the better option. Now we'll just have to see where her story goes :)

Hope you enjoyed! Comment and tell me what you thought!