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Or rather, Natasha & the Winter Soldier. Title is the Russian title of The Snow Queen, by Hans Christian Andersen. Given Bucky ... To warn, the story does reference the fairytale quite strongly.
Title: Snezhnaya Koroleva
Rating: PG-13
Fandom: Avengers movieverse
Characters/Pairings: Natasha, Bucky Barnes. Natasha & Bucky
Summary: Love is for children, and life is not a fairy tale. Natasha & the Winter Soldier
Wordcount: 304
Warnings/Notes: Set in the movieverse, but presuming Bucky ends up something similar to the comics Winter Soldier. Warnings for Natasha's backstory, and all it seems to have entailed. Also, this is set pre-Avengers and pre-SHIELD, so ... not so hopeful, maybe?
Disclaimer: Not mine
Title: Snezhnaya Koroleva
Rating: PG-13
Fandom: Avengers movieverse
Characters/Pairings: Natasha, Bucky Barnes. Natasha & Bucky
Summary: Love is for children, and life is not a fairy tale. Natasha & the Winter Soldier
Wordcount: 304
Warnings/Notes: Set in the movieverse, but presuming Bucky ends up something similar to the comics Winter Soldier. Warnings for Natasha's backstory, and all it seems to have entailed. Also, this is set pre-Avengers and pre-SHIELD, so ... not so hopeful, maybe?
Disclaimer: Not mine
Snezhnaya Koroleva
The man she had known as the Soldier always said goodbye as though it was for the last time. As though he would close his eyes, and when he opened them, all the world would be different, and all the people in it older. Colder.
When she'd been younger, the first time she had seen him wake, she had not understood.
In the stories, the fairytales from her childhood, those frozen on the lakes of ice were woken by tears from the heart, and the coldness of the world was washed away by the tears of waking. She had thought, once upon a time, that if he only had someone to cry for him, only someone he could cry for in turn, someone who's tears were worth more than hers, then he would never have to look through the prism of ice again.
The second time, older and colder, in her woman's body with blood on her hands ... she knew better. Life was not a fairy story, and love was just a childish dream. She had no tears left, for him or for anyone.
And he, she thought, forever the same, had never had any at all.
He had known. All along, as she dreamed her childish dreams, he had seen the future, seen it whisper, older and colder, every time he closed his eyes. Kai, who had watched Gerda freeze empty beside him on the Mirror of Reason. He had watched, as she sat down in her turn to build eternity in chips of ice, and he had known.
This time, when he closed his eyes ... it was she who said goodbye as though it was the last time, her eyes dry, and strangely burning.
And it was he, perhaps, despite a heart frozen in ice ... who dreamed childish dreams for her sake.
The man she had known as the Soldier always said goodbye as though it was for the last time. As though he would close his eyes, and when he opened them, all the world would be different, and all the people in it older. Colder.
When she'd been younger, the first time she had seen him wake, she had not understood.
In the stories, the fairytales from her childhood, those frozen on the lakes of ice were woken by tears from the heart, and the coldness of the world was washed away by the tears of waking. She had thought, once upon a time, that if he only had someone to cry for him, only someone he could cry for in turn, someone who's tears were worth more than hers, then he would never have to look through the prism of ice again.
The second time, older and colder, in her woman's body with blood on her hands ... she knew better. Life was not a fairy story, and love was just a childish dream. She had no tears left, for him or for anyone.
And he, she thought, forever the same, had never had any at all.
He had known. All along, as she dreamed her childish dreams, he had seen the future, seen it whisper, older and colder, every time he closed his eyes. Kai, who had watched Gerda freeze empty beside him on the Mirror of Reason. He had watched, as she sat down in her turn to build eternity in chips of ice, and he had known.
This time, when he closed his eyes ... it was she who said goodbye as though it was the last time, her eyes dry, and strangely burning.
And it was he, perhaps, despite a heart frozen in ice ... who dreamed childish dreams for her sake.
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