HYDRA-Mandated Wife || 50s housewife!reader x Winter Soldier headcanons 2
warnings!: canon-typical violence, stereotypical 50s housewife—sexist undertones, questionable autonomy, implied brainwashing (reader), author's poor attempts at mimicking 50s speech patterns
notes: no use of y/n. reader's programmed to have a transatlantic accent. LIGHTHEARTED, despite the warnings. could be read as a standalone. exact timeline not specified but it's PRE-CA:TWS.
summary: the living situation, accompanying the winter soldier on missions, and barreling through briefings.
1, 2
✩₊˚.⋆✪⋆⁺₊✧
The Asset has started becoming difficult to manage, and there is only one solution left. So HYDRA really and looked at their most terrifying living weapon and went,
"Зимний Солдат has become too difficult to manage... What if we gave him... a wife."
You weren't sure where you learned the transatlantic accent from, but it did give you this old-Hollywood housewife polish while saying absolutely deranged things.
"Honestly, sweetheart, if you simply planned your exits more carefully, you wouldn't have to throw anyone through windows."
You were certainly handling your living situation well considering your little "house with a white picket fence" is essentially a bunker.
It was a bit gloomy, but this is nothing some well-placed drapes couldn't fix! By some miracle, you had casually walked up to one of those silly boys with the helmets and talked their head off that eventually, someone dropped off a box. You couldn't be more delighted!
"My, James!" you gasp, whipping out floral sheets out of the box like a magician. "Aren't these pillowcases simply divine?"
The Soldier ran his flesh fingers over the soft linen as you presented them to him.
"Just look at those darling forget-me-nots," you beamed, smoothing the new pillowcases over your apron. "We're gonna match perfectly!"
You had immediately gone to work and eventually, the two beds finally felt cozy and welcoming. Just exactly what this empty gray space needs.
☆
If you didn't prove so effective in stabilizing the Soldier, it would have been a much different story with the linens. Although, seeing as this is the longest anyone has lasted, HYDRA wanted to see it through. Could it be that the companion experiment actually proved effective? What was it about you that made the Soldier tolerate you longer than the other soldiers tolerated their own?
You were a baffling puzzle piece. Even more so when you would just walk into a briefing room—apron and all—bringing coffee for these terrified operatives, and passing by your husband who has somehow become more attentive to the briefing soon as you came in. As if somehow in your perception, HYDRA agents were merely your darling James' office coworkers.
"My goodness, you boys just work entirely too hard."
No one even knows how to respond properly. How would they? You were acting like this was a suburban insurance company while the Winter Soldier is standing behind you like a loaded gun. And now somehow, you're the highest authority in the room emotionally.
So when a handler starts talking to the Soldier harshly, you, standing right beside him, would immediately cut in.
"Oh, honey, your supervisor is having another one of his 'episodes'," you whisper not so quietly to your husband. Then louder, "Honestly, mister, there is absolutely no need to use that tone of voice. We are trying to have a civilized afternoon!"
The room temperature suddenly drops ten degrees because the Soldier slowly turns his head. All he knew was his wife is displeased. Which in his brain, ranks alongside national security threats.
☆
Eventually, HYDRA issued the both of you a base for a mission. A pristine, single-story ranch house, painted a cheerful pastel seafoam green that felt entirely too bright against the stark, empty landscape.
But you had grown attached to it. So much so that it's where you and your husband lived for a long time up to now.
It was spotless too. No one knows why. You were just ecstatic about finally living away from the gloomy men that you happily laundered blood out of tactical uniforms. Arranged flowers. Labelled ammunition shelves. And most importantly, scolding assassins for tracking mud indoors.
The Winter Soldier, a large man who's a ghost story to every agency that matters, gets told to use a coaster and he does.
Just as being assigned a wife, the Soldier adapted to domestic routine with no complaints. He approaches husbandhood the exact way he approaches missions. He's efficient, consistent, and lethally serious.
When you tell him, "Husbands should come home for dinner."
He arrives at precisely 6PM unless physically prevented by warfare, in which case, he heeds your words that a good husband should call when he's away.
If at exactly 6PM and he's not home, you would receive terrifyingly concise messages from your burner phone.
"DELAYED". "SAFE". "RETURNING TOMORROW".
"He's such a family man," you sigh wistfully, hugging the phone closer to your chest. While you read them like love letters, the Soldier is on the other side of the world with his expression blank and his body language remaining predatory.
You'd even treat his pre-mission weapon prep like he's merely getting ready for the office.
"Do you have everything you need?" A nod from him. Then you ask, "Lunch?"
"Yes."
"Extra magazines?"
The Soldier checks once more and responds with another yes.
"Goodness, James, you'd forget your own head if I wasn't here."
Somewhere in the Soldier's fractured psyche, that routine becomes important. It becomes expected. Needed, even. Because no one treated him like a man with a home to return to before. Only a weapon to deploy.
So now this terrifying assassin unconsciously starts structuring his existence around returning to base, hearing your voice, and existing near you in shared silence. And he still looks as terrifying as the stories told.
☆
You even occasionally accompany him on business trips like it's a corporate retreat.
The two of you would be in the middle of a European extraction mission and you're standing beside the Soldier in the snow wearing an immaculate fur coat. Meanwhile, the Winter Soldier commits acts of horrifying precision violence around you
"Will your client be coming over for a square meal tonight?" you inquired as you watched your husband tighten his grip on a struggling man.
"He's an arms dealer," he grunted as the man tried to elbow him. A futile attempt at escape.
"Now look here, mister, I don't give a hoot if he deals with arms, legs, or heads!" you declared, placing your hands over your hips. "I need to know how many potatoes to peel, is the man coming over or isn't he?"
"No." The Soldier snaps the man's neck a little too messily, ending his misery.
You sigh softly. "Oh, darling, that was a little excessive."
"He resisted," he tried to reason.
"Yes, but now your hair's all mussed!"
☆
Gunshots echo through an alley, bodies drop one after another, and you're tilting your head curiously with your gloved hands clasped together.
"James, sweetheart, try not to ruin your sleeves this time."
The Winter Soldier who's feared for being brutal, and already scolded for being excessively violent, starts switching to cleaner kills with almost subconscious obedience. Suddenly, single shots fire in neater trajectories with minimal blood spray. Because somewhere in his brain, his wife dislikes mess.
From that point onward, he's operating like the world's deadliest employee trying to impress the office manager. And the Soldier already valued efficiency and control, so your domestic standards slot perfectly into his logic. Less blood means less cleanup. Wrinkled clothing was operationally inconvenient. And visible struggle was unprofessional. He genuinely incorporates your preferences into mission execution, so now he's murdering people with the energy of a man trying not to embarrass his wife at a company dinner.
Your approval simply became integrated to his operational rhythm. After missions, he instinctively looks toward you first in a silent pause.
"Well look at you. Much better tonight, darling," you'd praise as you check his coat like a suburban wife inspecting grass stains. "Not a single tear, and no mysterious smudges. You keep this up, mister, and I might actually let you sit on the good sofa!"
The sofa being something the Soldier stole from two towns over because you had complained that the house HYDRA issued the two of you needed some life, or else you might start talking to the refrigerator!
☆
"You've been working all evening, James, take a break."
A target is desperately trying to escape through a corridor only to hear a pleasant voice ring from somewhere nearby.
"James, dear, watch the wallpaper."
The words were followed by a grunt, and what the target could have sworn was a low voice apologizing. Those were the last words the target heard before—BANG.
He dropped to the floor. A perfect headshot with no blood on the wall. A pleased hum rumbled through the Soldier's chest as he reloads. "Better?"
You light up like he brought you roses. What a good man, he always listens!
HYDRA-Mandated Wife || 50s housewife!reader x Winter Soldier headcanons
warnings!: canon-typical violence, stereotypical 50s housewife—sexist undertones, questionable autonomy, implied brainwashing (reader), author's poor attempts at mimicking 50s speech patterns
notes: I had to get these headcanons outta my head soon as I can, so sorry if it seems rushed. LIGHTHEARTED, which I know is bizarre given the warnings but trust me. timeline not specified but it's pre-ca:tws.
1, 2
✩₊˚.⋆✪⋆⁺₊✧
The Asset has started becoming difficult to manage, and there is only one solution left. So HYDRA really and looked at their most terrifying living weapon and went,
"Зимний Солдат has become too difficult to manage... What if we gave him... a wife."
Someone got shot for even suggesting that, someone else saw how impossible The Asset was becoming, and somehow, the mind-wipe isn't working anymore. And with The Asset's continued attitude problems, too unbearable to leave unchecked, too important to kill, mere weeks later, they accidentally assign him the loudest, most theatrical woman alive.
What's a girl to do when her husband accidentally splashes blood all over her new gingham dress?
The Soldier remained courteous with you. Once his handlers had introduced you to him as his designated wife, he gave them a simple nod and took you in as if you were any other mission.
Protect the asset, retrieve the asset, do not lose the asset— ...the asset is complaining again
You didn't have much complaints yourself, HYDRA just legally assigned you to this soldier and you just immediately start acting like you've been married for thirty years.
The first week, you were already reorganizing his living space (his designated area when he's not in cryostasis), stealing his shirts (whatever comfortable part of his soldier uniform you can find), and asking him how was work (he killed approximately five men).
And the Soldier just allows it. Despite not understanding domesticity, nor is he emotionally adjusted, he automatically categorized you as authorized presence, which transformed into constant presence. Which transformed to quality time being your main source of bonding. In eerie silence, often parallel to each other, but bonding nonetheless. Oftentimes, this means painting your nails while he disassembles his rifle.
Unfortunately, as much as you liked the peaceful quiet, you weren't quite as reserved as he is. So now, HYDRA's most terrifying assassin is walking down the bunker with you often found trailing behind him. Sometimes, even the other way around when you're especially peeved.
"Oh, honestly, James! You never take me anywhere swank! Sometimes I think you've forgotten I own a Sunday dress. If I don't get out of this lab soon, I will simply wilt!"
☆
Terrified scientists nearby pretend not to hear because that's the Winter Soldier being nagged like a suburban husband, although what really gets their attention is the fact that the Soldier merely seemed mildly inconvenienced.
"I brought you with me to Luxembourg," he responded with the confused sincerity of a man who measures acts of love tactically. "You said the architecture was beautiful."
"You're a real card, aren't you?" You raised a perfectly plucked eyebrow at your towering, regular goose of a husband.
The Soldier seemed to visibly deflate. Minus the gunfire that rang those nights, he thought the night lights illuminating those cathedrals were stunning. "I could take you to Sokovia on my next mission?"
You visibly light up at the mention of Sokovia, clapping your hands together at the thought of visiting. "Oh, that would be magnificent!"
✩
His version of being a good husband is filtered through being an assassin first. Dates are had in diners in the middle of a mission, and anniversary gifts are knives and holsters that you ultimately didn't use but appreciated the sentiment behind.
He provides what he can with the resources that he has to make sure you were warm, safe, and satisfied. Meanwhile, you wanted ceremony, you wanted the yearning and the romance and the gifts!
But the Soldier's idea of thoughtful gift-giving is silently dropping a military-grade flare gun into your lap because you complained about feeling unsafe. And you swoon because that meant he listens to you. As a soldier, he listens to a lot of people, but as a husband, he absorbs your plights and acts accordingly.
But, well, of course, being attuned to him, it often left you visibly breathless, completely undone by the sheer scale of his devotion.
✩
HYDRA agents get used to this eventually after long long months of mistaking you as the Winter Soldier's hostage suffering from Stockholm Syndrome. Eventually, they stop hovering around when you'd watch the Soldier gear up for a mission.
"Don't forget your gloves, dear!" you would chirp, standing by the doorway. "You wouldn't want to look like a total roughneck at your business trip, would you?"
The Soldier grunts in acknowledgement and puts them on right before anything else. You give him a kiss goodbye before he heads out because in your mind, this is just marriage where you wave goodbye before he leaves for work. And his work just so happen to involve international assassinations.
The Soldier never thinks it, let alone verbalizes it, but he knows deep down somewhere in his subconscious, you were such a good wife. You would talk to him normally instead of like a weapon. Notice when he's dissociating. Redirect handlers before they aggravate him. Instinctively lower stimuli after missions. Heavens, you were perfect.
Which means HYDRA succeeded in giving the Soldier something stabilizing; a routine, and most importantly, a person who expects him to come back.
It works, a civilian domestic presence starts anchoring him to humanity again. They could almost let you off on cosntantly calling the Soldier "James" despite the liability you were posing. Who even authorized you, why do you have access to such classified files?
On the flipside, they didn't mean to rehabilitate him, your presence was initially just to make him manageable. But instead, the Soldier starts developing habits, preferences, protectiveness, attachment... all because of a woman who watches him return covered in soot and blood and only exclaim about the time.
"Heavens to Betsy, James!" you exclaimed as you walked over to give your dusty husband a kiss on the cheek in outraged greeting. "I was beginning to think you’d moved into the office. What did you do that kept you out so late, mister?"
"Traffic," the Soldier responds curtly as he takes off his boots. He knew you never liked when he tracked mud all over the floor. He'd already gotten an earful from that.
✩
They let it. As risky as it was, your grounding presence has made the Soldier kill more efficiently. There were less blood being spilled, and he finished missions in record time, if not earlier than expected, just so he could come "home".
So long as you were effective, they'll avoid intervening and merely keep a close watch.
