She has. Been through a lot. [He'd been tortured and experimented on for what, a week? Two? A month? He's never really been sure, but regardless, that had left him feeling like a shell of a human being for a while, and he still grapples with it, sometimes. Some scars don't ever go away, and the best you can do is just kind of ignore them in hopes they'll go away on their own.

He has no idea what it was like for her, to be beaten and ridiculed and brainwashed by literally everyone she's ever known. The nuns, Tomas, Maggie Chen, all of them. And he hates that she's not the only person who's had this happen to them, who've been trained as killers and weapons instead of treated like people.]

I think she can do it. I just don't want people trying to make her out to be some kinda monster if she slips up again. [And he knows it's less an if and more a when, because Helena knows how to kill and how to hurt and how to maim, and those are unfortunately her go to responses to stuff like this.

Bucky's brow furrows in thought, and his expression goes a little distant, like he's trying to remember something he can't quite wrap his mind around which, well. He is.]

I think people tried doing that to Ben, once. When he freaked out at some guy.

[The details are still hazy, and as much as he tries, he can't force them to get any clearer. But Ben had definitely jumped some guy, and people had been pissed about it. Maybe more than once.

Bucky hasn't talked a lot about his previous time on the Barge with Steve, mostly because the patchiness of the memories don't help it make a lot of sense, so it's easy enough to just shake his head a little - like he's brushing off a nightmare - and just keeps moving forward.]

She said she was a biologist? I didn't actually see what she said, before- you know. [Helena murdered her.]