Bucky blinked in surprise as Clara spoke, processing the words she had said and what they had meant. No wonder she had been so desperate to find Karli, why she had stuck with him and Sam since the warehouse, and why she had been so damn stubborn. 

It seemed like a pretty good reason to do what she was doing, but Bucky knew it wasn't right. So how did he stop her? He couldn't physically, which meant he had to talk her down. But that was Sam's job, not his; he had no clue where to begin with that sort of thing.

'You know what the autopsy said?' Clara asked Karli, a terrifying calm in her voice as she took a step closer. 'That she died due to suffocation.'

'Clara, think about what you're doing,' Bucky warned her as Karli began gasping for air, her mouth opening wider as she became desperate for the oxygen being kept from her. 

Clara pressed on, his words passing her as good as unheard. 'She had thirty-four broken bones,' she told Karli, the sound of more muffled cracks reaching her as the fingers of Clara's outstretched hand twitched with the smallest of motions. 'A whole building on top of her, but what killed her was suffocation.' 

Clara could feel convulsions begin to take over Karli's body, and so she continued, wanting her to feel every second of pain that her mum had. 'She was there for hours as they tried to clear the rubble. Hours,' she stressed. 'Imagine that; imagine just waiting, hoping that someone will save you. Lying in agony as you're crushed under the pressure of a three-story building.'

'Clara!' Bucky tried once again, this time his voice firmer, and he saw she registered his words as she flicked her glare towards him for just a second. 'Don't do this. I promise you, whatever peace you think killing Karli will give you - it won't. It might at first, but you'll keep reliving this moment over and over until it starts eating away at you. You'll keep reliving this moment until you start second guessing what you've done, and you realise that all you've gotten out of it is a heavy conscience and a whole load of regret. You're a good person, Clara, don't make this what you're remembered to be, or what you remember yourself being.'

In truth, up until this moment, Clara had never planned to kill Karli Morgenthau. Like Bucky said, Clara was good. She was a good person. She had to be. 

But now, with the path right there in front of her, the way down that road seemingly oh so easy, she wondered just how bad it would be. Karli deserved it, she deserved to die for what she did, but she also deserved to rot in a cell somewhere that no one could ever save her from. So, now Clara wasn't so sure... 

Yeah, she was a good person at one point or another. But, when bad things happen to good people, what's stopping that all from changing? 

Bucky could see that, miraculously, he was somehow saying the right things. Clara had began to ease back a little, and he could hear a whistling sound as Karli snatched what little oxygen she could. 'You think killing her is gonna make everything better? Make it go back to how it was before you lost your mom?' He continued. 

'I didn't lose her,' Clara snapped, and Bucky grimaced as the pressure against Karli returned. 'She was killed by her.' 

'Killing Karli isn't going to bring her back! Okay, just take a breath,' Bucky winced as Clara looked over her shoulder at him, her jaw tightening at the arguably poor choice of words. 'Sorry, just- Look, this won't fix what happened. This isn't going to make you feel any better. All this is gonna do is give more people more want for revenge, and it'll create this cycle of hate that'll only get more people killed.'

She was slipping, Bucky could see that. Clara was coming around. Just don't fuck it up, Bucky told himself. 'You're angry. You're hurt, I get that. But, Clara, nobody is gonna get a win out of doing this, and especially not you.'

'I'm not trying to get a win,' she said, almost weakly, the purple in her eyes fading from a luminous violet to a deep lilac. 'I'm just trying to get the justice nobody else was getting for my mum.' 

'There are other ways,' Bucky said, keeping his voice as soft as he could. 'There are better ways. Just trust me on this one, okay? Trust in me and Sam. Let her go.' 

Clara faced Karli once more, seeing the panic in her eyes, the awareness of her surroundings still there. She let her drop to the floor. But she kept the shield in between her and Bucky because there was still more she wanted to say, and she knew that as soon as she let Bucky free, he'd do what he thought was necessary to disarm Clara. 

'You know what was worse than finding out she had died?' She asked, crouching down to get to Karli's level as she panted for breath, the woman clutching her broken ribs, each lungful of air causing a searing agony. 'What was worse, was being the one who found her.'

'I didn't...' Karli attempted to speak, lifting her gaze to see Clara's pained, green eyes. Her words sounded almost slurred as she spoke. 'I didn't know. I'm-'

'No,' Clara stopped her. 'Don't you dare say you're sorry. You don't get to make yourself feel better about this.' 

Karli looked down at the floor between them, doing her best not to slump to the floor entirely. 

'The human heart, the brain, everything that works in your body - it all runs on electrical impulses. Energy rushing from one part of you to another,' Clara rose to her feet, swaying slightly as she rerouted what little energy she had left to keeping Bucky away. 'One misfire, and you'd forget every happy memory you've ever had. A short circuit and you'd fall into cardiac arrest. If I wanted to kill you, I would have already. But I'm not like you, Karli. I don't kill people to convince them that I'm the good guy.' 

With all of that said and done, she withdrew the shields, and Bucky rushed over to her, wasting no time to do what she had assumed he would do. 

Except, he didn't.

Instead of knocking her out, stopping her powers from having any affect on any one of them, he just pulled her into him, wrapping his arms about her. 

Clara heard a sobbing in the room. Raw and pained, and she guessed whatever adrenaline had stopped Karli reacting in such a way before then had finally relented. 

It took Clara a long moment to realise that she was the one making the noise. 

Bucky held her, taking some of her weight as her legs gave out from under her. He looked at Karli, who was struggling to her feet. She was still clutching her ribs, and Bucky could see she was avoiding putting any weight onto one leg. 

He doubted it, but maybe there was still a way for Sam to talk her away from the path she was headed down. He mouthed at her to go, and she did, hobbling from the room and leaving them in the surprisingly intact living room. Somehow, with all the damage she had caused Karli, the only thing broken in the room was the shattered window. 

'Buck, you got her?' Sam asked through the in-ear comm. 

'I got her,' Bucky replied, hearing the crying subside and the shaking of her body relax. 'But...' He trailed off, unsure of what to say. 

'What is it? Everything okay?' Sam questioned him, his voice full of concern. 

'Depends how you define okay.' Bucky shifted slightly, scooping a now sleeping Clara into his arms. 'I'll meet you back at the apartment. There's a few things you're gonna need to catch up on.' 

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