Chapter Text
“You’re a damn fool Barnes…” Regretful words, muttered quietly under the breath of a man hunched on his motorcycle, a small journal clutched in his hands. Despite the regret in his tone, Bucky didn’t show any signs of turning the engine back on and leaving the ruins to their quiet, creepy existence. No, in fact, he intended to find a way over that fence and get beyond those double doors with no one catching him. The building he parked beside looms into the night sky like a clawed hand, desperate to put as much distance between itself and the ground as it can. Bucky grimaced slightly as he slid off his bike, knowing that feeling all too well. High metal gates tower between him and his destination, but he didn’t consider them an obstacle, not when there was something much more important, potentially buried inside.
In his time apart from the team and technically on the run, Bucky had been doing what he could to fill in blanks in his mind, ones that stood out more painfully than others. He could let go of the fact he doesn’t remember much from his childhood anymore. He could even let go of how little he remembers from his post-HYDRA wake up call, a blurred mess of pain and exhaustion rolling into a darkness he can’t tackle, not yet. But some? Some blank spaces came with nightmares and Bucky had been seeing this building in his hellish dreams for a little over a month.
Roosevelt Asylum.
It was unclear why exactly he remembered this place, or what it meant for the holes in his past, but digging around in what HYDRA files he had access to, he had found mention of the Asylum twice. And that was good enough for him.
The journal snaps closed in his hand and Bucky tucked it into the inside pocket of his leather jacket. Making sure his bike was secure but easily accessible in a rapid get away, he took a running jump at the metal fence and climbed over. Thudding down on the other side, he paused, crouched, to take in his surroundings of overgrown plants, cracked stone pathways and trash thrown over by careless passers-by. Nothing immediately jumped out at him, so Bucky made his way up the steps two at a time and slid leather clad fingers into his pocket for his lock pick. To his surprise, they weren’t needed, as his testing of the door handle hadn the door swinging wide open. Eerie.
While that raised his suspicions a little as he stepped inside, he had read about how often kids played pranks here. Testing their endurance and bravery inside the great haunted asylum in the hopes it would earn them a badge of honour. Bucky tried not to judge too harshly, but sometimes it made it difficult to distinguish between teenage prank and the threat of someone working out what he was up to and beating him here.
This wasn’t the first time retracing HYDRA’s steps had led him right into a trap in a derelict building.
Despite his attempt to be stealthy, the door slammed behind him with an echoing thud and Bucky winced, eyes slowly adjusting to the low light inside. The reception was a wreck; the desk rotting, cabinets smashed and overturned chairs spilled from here to the nearby hallways. Bucky took a few cautious steps forward, scanning the room before him, hoping something would jump out at him to trigger some kind of memory. Nothing did. Nothing familiar, at least. He noted dark stains on the walls and floor underneath the graffiti left by victors and recognised it immediately. Sprays of old blood from something awful a long time ago. The stains explained the scent Bucky was detecting as he chose left and headed down the corridor. The scent of blood and death.
The more Bucky explored the building, the more he began to think he had just dreamed the place up somehow. That his mind had simply woven a connection in his mind between two irrelevant things and it was just pure coincidence that he’d found the name of the Asylum in some old files. None of the rooms attracted him, none of the derelict corridors brought any sparks of recognition and the deeper he explored, the more he convinced himself that this was a lost cause. Not only was nothing familiar, he couldn’t find any hints of HYDRA ever being here, past or present.
It wasn’t exactly HYDRA’s typical gig either. In all his research, when it came to finding hidden cells to either destroy or burn, their leap into the medical field had been more into research and high-tech torture, not asylums and people just needed help and care.
Bucky’s exploration of the asylum eventually led him to a series of disconnected rooms on the upper floor, rooms that also showed the same rate of destruction as the rest of the building. One room made him stop in his tracks. It didn’t look familiar, but the scattered papers on the floor and the overturned filing cabinets suggested an office. If he was going to find any connections, this would be a good place to start.
Bucky carefully picked his way over some debris by the door and headed inside. While the room was in a similar state of disrepair as the rest of the building, he was interested to find that some of the filing cabinets still contained intact files and scattered paperwork showing signs of age. Bucky slid his gun back into his belt and began rummaging through the papers. He poured through each drawer, having to discard the majority due to damage and age, but finally a file caught his eye and he let out a low, sad whistle.
The file was tucked so far at the back that it had become trapped between the drawer hinge and the inside of the cabinet wall, resulting in mostly chewed up, useless paper. That wasn’t what caught his attention, however. As he pulled the file free with a muffled rip, the HYDRA logo became clear in the dull lighting. The logo was pressed lightly into the inside folder, the symbol on the paper like nothing more than a whisper. A reminder. It was confirmation, at least, that HYDRA had been here and god knows what they’d done while they were here.
Confirmation brought little comfort, however, as Bucky’s own involvement in the place was still worrying him. As he flipped through the unreadable file, a gnawing sensation began to form in his gut. His involvement in places, even back then, had never been for a cause of good. He was either sent somewhere to kill, threaten, scare or, on occasion, be rewritten. He exhaled tiredly as he flippe through it, realising there was nothing useful or readable left inside. Typical. He tossed the shreds back into the cabinet and shoved the drawer shut. Despite the symbol, he still had zilch in terms of info. Bucky sighed, running leather covered fingers through his hair and pressing down on his skull, a vain attempt to ease the heavy tension that had been building in his head since he stepped through the door.
Deciding to resume his search, Bucky turned around and immediately jumped. Standing in front of him, not two feet away stood a woman. A woman dressed in a dirtied, ripped nightdress with her hair hanging in ragged clumps around her face. As Bucky stared, shock dissipating quickly at being snuck up on, he realised that she appeared to be injured. No, not injured… mutilated? Her left eye was so brutally swollen it looked like her eyeball had popped right out of the socket, melting down the left side of her face. A few moments of complete silence pass as Bucky stared down the woman, unable to comprehend words to explain what someone like this was doing running around a place like this, but before coherent thought could catch up with his movements, the woman lunged at him with hands outstretched.
Instincts kicked in and Bucky ducked under her grasp, darting to the left and making his escape out into the corridor. What should have been a sprint to the end turned into a fast scramble to stop as the woman was there as well, out in the corridor, and she lunged towards him once more with noises that didn’t reach comprehension. Bucky grabbed for the weapon in his belt, reaction and survival overruling any sane thought, and he brought it up to aim at the woman.
“Hey!” Bucky barked out sharply, taking a step back to maintain distance while trying to get her to acknowledge him verbally. Who was she? Confirming HYDRA had their claws in this facility and getting attacked immediately after? He really should sit down and write a HYDRA scare tactic handbook.
“Hey!” he barked again as the woman paid him no heed and continued to loom before him, “back off. I don’t wanna shoot you.” The woman showed no sign she was even listening and, to Bucky’s surprise, her form appeared to flicker right before his eyes. A blink and she was gone, another blink and she was right back in front of him, close enough that his nose was filled with the scent of burned, rotten flesh. Without thinking, Bucky scrambled backwards, firing the gun once and letting out a yell of shock - his scramble backwards had taken him right over the edge of a collapsed floor and he tumbled down in the mess and darkness below.
***
Back at the entrance to the Asylum, the door swung open slowly, revealing two men standing in the doorway squinting at the dark and dour within. The tallest, Sam Winchester, pushed the door open wider for his brother, Dean, to step through first before following. Sam pulled a handheld video camera from his pocket and flipped open the screen, holding it up while Dean fished his own device out of his pocket; an EMF meter.
“Getting readings?” Sam asked as he scans their surroundings through the video camera. In answer to his question, a high-pitched squeaking rang out from the device in Dean’s hand.
“Yeah, big time.”
“This place is orbing like crazy,” Sam frowned slightly, watching as the camera picked up what their own eyes couldn’t; shifting shapes and lights only visible, currently, on his screen.
“Probably multiple spirits out and about,” said Dean, stepping over an upturned chair and leading the way down one corridor.
“And if these uncovered bodies are causing the haunting…” Sam began-
“We gotta find them and burn them,” finished Dean. “Just be careful, though. The only thing that makes me more nervous than a pissed off spirit… is the pissed of spirit of a psycho killer.”
Using their items as guides, Sam and Dean moved down the corridor, continuing their search for the source of the EMF readings and anything that looked like a body requiring burning. As they moved into a set of rooms, Sam lingered in the first with his camera while Dean followed a spike in EMF reading into an adjoining room.
“Hey, you think that bike outside belongs to a kid too spooked to come back for it?” Dean called through the entranceway. Sam rolled his eyes with a smirk, scanning around him with the camera.
“We’re not stealing that bike.”
“I’m just sayin’, it’s a pretty sweet ride to leave lyin’ around a dump like this,” Dean laughed, “be a shame to leave it for the ghosts.” Sam huffed out a laugh in agreement, glancing back through to check Dean was still within eye shot before looking back at his camera.
“Dean?” Sam called, brow raised as he catches sight of an old woman on the camera. Long strands of filthy hair frame her mutilated face, one eye blooded and hanging out of the socket. “Dean!!”
Dean came running through immediately, shotgun drawn and upon seeing the woman lunging for his brother, yelled “Sam, get down!” Sam threw himself out of her reach as Dean opened fire, emptying 2 salt filled buckshot rounds into her frail form. With an eerie screech, she disintegrated in front of them, leaving both brothers panting in her wake.
“That was… weird.” Sam frowned as he picked himself up from the grimy floor and dusted down his jeans.
“Yeah. You’re telling me,” Dean grimaced, glancing at Sam to give him a quick check over and make sure he was unhurt before he reloaded the shotgun and headed back out into the corridor.
“No, Dean, I mean it was weird she didn’t attack me,” Sam said as he followed.
“Looked pretty aggro from where I was standing,” replied Dean, leading the way down the hallway, this time with the shotgun raised up in his hands should the spirit, or any others, decide they wanted another crack at Sam. The entire building freaked him out, more so than he was willing to admit and seeing the spirits immediately target Sam when he was already vulnerable, it was worrying.
“She didn’t hurt me,” Sam insisted. “She didn’t even try! So if she didn’t wanna hurt me, then what did she want?”
Dean came to a stop, lips parting to raise a counterpoint that he didn’t give that damned spirit a chance to hurt Sam, when a clattering noise came from the room they had paused outside. Raising his shotgun, finger ready, Dean took a step forward. Sam pulled a torch out of his pocket and shone it into the room, scanning the light around before settling on an upturned metal bed covered with a ragged sheet. A silent look passed between the brothers as they approached and as Sam reached out to tip the bed over, Dean prepared to fire at anything remotely ghost-like on the other side.
However, as the bed clattered aside, they were both surprised to see a girl crouched behind the bed, facing the corner. At the removal of her protective barrier, the girl spun around with a shriek, clearly terrified.
“Hey, hey it’s alright, we’re not going to hurt you. It’s okay. What’s your name?” Dean dropped to his haunches in front of her, lowering his weapon so not to scare her further.
“Katherine. Kat,” she squeaked out after a moment of trying to find her voice.
“Okay. I’m Dean, this is Sam.”
“What are you doing here?!” Sam asked, a hint of exasperation slipping into his tone that earned a sharp look from Dean.
“Uhm… my boyfriend, Gavin.”
“Is he here?” Dean asked, “is that your bike outside?”
“What?” Kat shook her head, frowning, “uhm… no, no he’s around here, somewhere. He thought it would be fun to see some ghosts in here. You know the stories, right? I thougth it was just… y’know, pretend. Not… not real.” Her voice shook, and Dean reached out to help her up to her feet. “I’ve seen things. I heard Gavin scream and… and I heard gunshots and….” She trailed off quietly, chest heaving as she clutched her hands to her body as if it would protect her.
“Alright. Kat? Come on, Sam’s gonna get you out of here and then we’re gonna find your boyfriend, okay?”
“No! No I — I’m not going to leave without Gavin. I’m coming with you.” Kat took a cautious half step forward, as if the force of her words could somehow rustle up the courage she was attempting to channel. Dean glanced at Sam, who gave him a half-hearted shrug in answer.
“It’s no joke around here, okay? It’s dangerous.”
“That’s why I gotta find him. I can’t leave him here. And if this is part of his prank, I swear to god—”
“Oh, it’s not a prank,” Dean replied with a half laugh, cutting her off before he sighed and waved them out to the hall.
“Alright, I guess we’re gonna split up. Let’s go.”
Outside the room, Dean asked Sam to continue his search while he took Kat towards where she had last heard Gavin scream. It wasn’t ideal for the situation, but the sooner they found the missing kid, the sooner they could get back to actual business. Sam said his goodbye and headed back up the corridor while Dean and Kat headed through some double doors into a darker wing of the Asylum.
“Gavin?” Kat called, finding her voice a bit more now that she wasn’t alone. Dean hung back a few steps, intending to be protection should anything sinister decide young teenage girl was its delicacy, but as they continued their search room to room, there were no signs of life, living or spiritual.
“I got a question for you,” Dean began as they checked off the umpteenth empty room. “You’ve seen a lot of horror movies, yeah?”
“I guess so,” Kat replied, glancing over her shoulder at him and watching as he passed her to take the lead into a darker section of hallway.
“Do me a favour,” Coming to a pause at a fork in the corridor, Dean turned towards her. “Next time you see one? Pay attention. When someone says a place is haunted… don’t go in!”
Kat let out a sharp, irritated breath as Dean moved off down the corridor, but he ignored it. Baby-sitting teenagers who thought they knew better was not how he thought this trip was going to go. That, and he was starting to doubt that letting Sam go off on his own in a place like this when his inner ESPN was already sensitive, had not been the best idea.
***
Sam’s own search was going a little better. While he had located nothing ghostly, he had come across Gavin who had been sprawled, unconscious on the ground. He’d managed to wake the teen with some light shaking and after a bit of freaking out, Gavin had confirmed who he was and that he was okay.
“Take it easy,” Sam instructed quietly, helping Gavin to his feet. “My name is Sam. We found your girlfriend hiding a few corridors back.”
“Kat?” Gavin glanced around nervously, taking a subtle step closer to Sam, “is she alright?”
“Yeah. She’s worried about you. Are you sure you’re okay?” Sam asked, running his eyes over Gavin once more just to make sure there were no injuries hidden by adrenaline.
“Yeah, I was running… I think I fell…” Gavin lifted a hand to rub at his forehead, glancing behind himself again just to be sure.
“Running? From what?”
“There was this girl. She was… I thought she was Kat at first, but then she… wasn’t. And her face was all messed up, it was…” Gavin shuddered briefly, unwilling to dwell on the image too much in his mind.
“Okay but, listen. Did this girl… did she try to hurt you?” Sam asked, his brow furrowing as he compared their two encounters in his mind. Two women, possibly the same spirit? But despite the encounters, neither of them had been harmed. Yet.
“What? No, but she… uh…” Gavin’s cheeks flushed suddenly, a dusting of pink that had Sam’s brow raise in surprise, prompting the other to continue. “She... kissed me. I thought she was Kat, so I.. y’know.”
Sam’s brow stayed raised, swallowing his surprise.
“So… uhm, okay, but she didn’t hurt you physically, right?”
“Dude! She kissed me! I’m scarred for life!”
Sam rolled his eyes then, sighing before he motioned for Gavin to follow him. They had to find Dean before any other spirits decided to say hello.
“Trust me, it could have been a hell of a lot worse. Now, do you remember anything else? Did she try to talk to you or anything like that?” he asked.
“Well… yeah, actually. She tried to whisper something in my ear but I freaked man, and I ran. I ran like hell.”
***
“You son of a bitch.” Dean broke the silence between himself and Kat as the torch in his hand flickered and died. As darkness fell around them, he felt Kat brush up against his back. “It’s alright, I got a lighter.” His reassurance was met with a noise of agreement and he fished through his pockets for said lighter.
“Ow! You’re hurting my arm!” Kat exclaimed.
Dean lifted his attention away from his pockets, finally finding his lighter hiding in his jeans and flicking it on.
“What? I’m not touching you.” As the lighter flickered on, highlighting them both in dull orange, Dean realised Kat wasn’t close enough to have brushed against his back, and he definitely wasn’t close enough to grab her arm. Glancing down, Dean glimpsed a filthy, rotten hand wrapped around Kat’s arm before she was dragged into the nearest room and the large metal door slammed shut behind her.
“Kat!!” Dean immediately began to pound on the door, desperate for some kind of reaction on the other side. Struggling with the lock proved futile, and using all his available strength to kick the door didn’t budge it either.
“Let me out! Please!” Kat screamed from inside the room and Dean could hear her own pounding fits on the other side.
“Kat! Hang on!”
Glancing around, Dean’s eyes landed on a discarded metal pipe on the floor. He grabbed it, starting to smash at the door near the lock to dent the metal enough that the lock would shake loose. His efforts were futile, and, with a note of worried frustration, he discards=ed the pipe in favour of again grabbing the handle and trying to use his weight against the door as Kat screams inside.
“Dean?!” Sam yelled on approach as he sprinted down the corridor, Gavin tailing behind him, “What’s going on?!”
“Kat’s in there with one of them!”
“Help me!!” Kat screamed from inside the room, “get me out of here!”
“Kat!” Sam pressed against the door, trying to make himself heard over her screams of panic. “Kat, it will not hurt you. Listen to me, you’ve got to face it, you’ve got to calm down!”
“She’s gotta what?” Dean grabbed Sam’s elbow to stop him from endangering the teen, but Sam shook him off. “Listen to me! These spirits, they’re not trying to hurt us, they’re trying to communicate. You gotta face it. You gotta listen to it.”
“You come in here and face it!” Kat screeched from the other side of the door, and they heard a thud as her back hit the door in panic. “No!”
“Come on, Kat!” Sam yelled again, “Look at it, come on. You can do it. I promise it will not hurt you!”
Silence fell on the other side of the door and Sam pulled back, breathing deeply and sending a concerned glance to Gavin, who was pale, likely unable to grasp exactly what was going on.
“I hope you’re right about this,” Deam muttered, his heart pounding harder than he would have liked. Sam wasn’t giving him a lot to go on, and while he trusted Sam completely, it was still a risk. Silence fell, and they waited, cautious, for Kat to give a sign as to what was going on inside. Suddenly, the lock clicked into place and the door swung open. Kat appeared in the doorway and Dean grabbed her arm, pulling her out of the room as Sam ran inside. He re-appeared a few moments later, shaking his head at Dean; the room was empty.
“137,” Kat spoke shakily after she’d gathered herself enough, “it… it whispered in my ear…. 137.”
“Room number,” Sam and Dean said in synch. Gavin ran to Kat and gathered her up in his arms, cupping her cheek and asking if she was okay. As the couple reunited, Sam and Dean took a few steps away to make sure they couldn’t be overheard.
“Alright,” said Sam, “if these spirits aren’t trying to help anyone, what are they trying to do? I mean… other than snog Gavin.”
Dean’s brow shot up, glancing back at the recently rescued couple before he shook his head. “I don’t know. But Room 137 better give us some answers.” Sighing, Dean turned back to the teens. “Alright, you guys ready to leave this place now?”
“That’s an understatement,” Kat breathed out as Gavin dripped at her arm like was the sole thing keeping her from going missing again. Dean rolled his eyes a little, exasperated, before turning back to Sam. He reached for his shotgun again and tipped his head towards Kat and Gavin.
“You get them outta here. I’m gonna go find room 137.”