I’ve seen the file, Murphy. [ jack answers, slow and careful, after a long moment of silence. They’ve had this talk, and Jack’s not sure if anything else he can say will make Murphy see what the reality about Bucky is. But, he’d asked, so, Jack’s answering. ]

I’ve seen POWs, I’ve been one, and I’ve seen torture and interrogation, but what they did to him? Most countries wouldn’t even let you do it to lab rats. [ it comes in a sad, quiet voice, and while emotion doesn’t often show on jack’s features in a genuine way, he’s already wrapped up in it from missing murphy. It’s too hard to keep this choked down as well, splotches of red pulling up on pale skin around his eyes, cheeks, nose and lips. ] There’s a machine. They’d have to put a mouthguard between his teeth, because the first time they tried it, he shattered a few of them from the pain of it. Two metal plates came down around either side of his head, locking down around his skull, and… they put him through electric shocks so intense it burned every memory of who he was, where he came from and the life he’d had out of his head.

[ Jack breathes out slow, sniffles, and runs his nose against his sleeve. He hates thinking about that file. He hates thinking of the man he’s known, who held him while he sobbed, who’s talked him through panic attacks and listed off what things he finds beautiful about him, and been everything that the words safem comfort, contentment and belonging mean to him, being put into that machine… and made to experience so much pain that it could alter his mind. It breaks his fucking heart. ]

To turn him back to him, Will had to— [ jack sucks his lips against his teeth, remembering watching this, and he doesn’t have the luxury of being able to get lost inside his head right now, already too raw and out in the open with murphy. He swallows back against emotion and keeps going. ] He had to act like one of the Soldier’s handlers, and God— The man who punched through my door, who nearly broke your neck? He was terrified of answering a single question wrong. He couldn’t even understand the concept of being an autonomous creature with a choice in any of it, he was just scared, like an abused dog that can’t understand why it’s being beaten. Just of a question. I watched him shake, and I listened to him scream and sob like his soul was being ripped out of him, before we got Bucky back. Or, someone who could actually recognize the people around him that he’s known for months, for decades.

[ it was a haunting thing, and jack’s still having nightmares about it. Especially seeing as, at this point in time, jack still hasn’t seen his bucky really come back. Only a catatonic husk. No longer the winter soldier, but not the man he knew either. God, but he’s so fucking terrified they won’t ever get him back. ]

I’m sorry, but I— I can’t look at him and see a monster. [ That’s not what something evil looks like, and leaving him with the blame is doing exactly what the torture was designed for - giving someone truly twisted a scapegoat formed from a victim. jack has to take a second to scrub the heel of his palm against his eye, pushing tears out of them. he hasn't really taken a second to really feel about this yet, and here, with murphy so hurt, and bucky maybe never coming back, and jack helpless to do anything that feels right, it's all he can do not to just sob. ] If I knew who read him the words, believe me, Murph, I would rip out their spine and gift it to you on a silver platter with a goddamn bow. But this wasn't Bucky.