fossilised | For Steve

"But not him?" He didn't mean to be so rude pointing that out. He really didn't. And obviously, Bucky had already hurt Steve. It didn't matter what the younger version said. It was an accident, yes. A terrible one. But still one that Bucky had caused. "I can handle you. I can protect you from hurting other people."

He hated to be the one to mention this, but he already had a feeling that the other Steve said something similar. They were being realist about this in a way that Bucky did not seem too capable of homseld.

"I know you care for him. I know how he feels about you. And maybe it's a good idea that he does become be. The past will need him. But how long will that be, Buck? I can keep you safe now."

Bucky stiffened from head to foot and his expression darkened by several degrees, half in guilt and half in anger. Was this out of jealousy? Had Steve changed so much over the decades that he had morphed from the man who was willing to give him up if it was what was best for him, to one who would resent any other Steve having him?

"I didn't mean to hurt him, and he-- I didn't attack him over the Potomac."

He could still remember the blood, the way that Steve had almost died and it had all been his fault.

"You were my last target, you-- Captain America, not him. I'm scared that might be latent inside me still."

This was not jealousy-- well. Maybe a little. Steve could keep that in for the most part. Sort of. He'd been embarrassed by his questioning of Howard Stark's intentions against Peggy Carter and he didn't want to go there again. Not with himself. This wasn't a friendship competition. If it was, Steve thought that he would have left Bucky with the other Steve because he needed him. God knew that Steve had needed Bucky at that age too. Especially when he didn't have the serum to back him up.

"I know-- I know you didn't mean to-- That was low of me. He said you have real bad dreams. And you sometimes forget who you are. And he's working win you on that. I'm grateful to him. But it doesn't matter if I was your last target. You aren't the Winter Soldier. Not you. And I know you'd never try to hurt me. But I can at least keep you from hurting anyone else. Accidentally. But only if you'll let me."

He leaned back with his arms crossed.

"Please let me help. If you want me to do that by going away, I will. I promise. Tell me to go and you'll never see me again."

For all his panic about actually meeting up with Steve, now that he was in the same room as him the idea of him going away forever and never coming back sent a bolt of fear through him stronger than almost anything else. It was so stupid, like there were two halves of him at war, and it made him less reliable to deal with than he should be.

"I can't leave him. But if you let me bring him, I'll come."

The compound sounded like a prison, and he didn't know any of the other people there other than by reputation, but he would trust Steve enough that he could leave if he had to when and if he wanted to.

"I don't know if I'm worth all this effort, but I'll try."

And there was that horrible hope that pulled at Steve's fuller, more adult face. He was so very pleased that his whole face seemed to smile. "Good. I'll talk to Tony and make arrangements." He didn't try to hug Bucky, but he looked like he wanted to. Like this entire life had just been put back on track again and if he wasn't a man and stronger than that, he'd burst into happy tears.

Steve sat down at the table by the single window and pulled some money out of his pocket. It was all authentic and probably more valuable than the face value given Tony's jest about needing to spend three times the money he was handing Steve to go save the day. Again.

"You know... There's nothing I wouldn't do for you. That's not how we are, Buck. It's okay if you don't remember that. But it's you and me. To the end of the line. And I don't see an end anywhere in sight." He handed over a few hundred dollars. "Will you come back day after next? Bring him with you. We can figure it out together."

It was hard not to see that the other Steve had been right about this one. They both loved Bucky. His eyes glowed with that love, the same as his smaller self's did.

Bucky didn't really need the money, he had taken enough of his own, but he pocketed it anyway because he wanted enough to be able to buy medication and food and clothes and anything else that Steve wanted in the meantime. It felt like a pact when he took that money, a silent promise that he would come back.

"Yeah, I'll come back then." He hesitated, voice growing softer and more unsure. "I'm trusting you, Steve, don't lock me up."

And without waiting for a reply, he turned and practically bolted out of the hotel room and down to the streets below again. By the time he made it back to the apartment, he had been gone almost two hours, slipping back inside on silent feet like a shadow, carrying a big bag that smelled of hot food.

"Steve?"

Was he here? Had he gone? Was it safe?

The running water would be a clue as to where Steve was, but with the door open and Steve having smelled fresh when he found him on the doorstep, that he was bathing again seemed unlikely. A coughing "welcome home" thst sounded more like a gut punch then any actual words slipped through the water fall noise, followed by a little commotion of a guy trying to cover something up.

Steve didn't like to look weak. The stress coupled with the cold walk home and the sudden and irrational thought that Bucky was never going to come back had led Steve to seek out the steam of the bath. Bucky would find Steve sitting on the edge of the tub, one side damp from the splash of water, buttons of his shirt half undone, looking a little sheepish and a little sad and a little embarrassed. There was no such things as panic attacks to the gener population in the 40s and so he'd been sitting here trying to figure out what was making his chest hurt for almost forty minutes now.

The steam just didn't seem to be helping matters at all.

"Sorry-- Almost done," he whimpered. It was pathetic.

Bucky turned off the water when he came in the bathroom, there was enough steam in here to fill the room pretty consistently already, and instead crouched in front of Steve to reach out and press the tips of his flesh fingers to the bare skin of Steve's chest where it was showing through the open shirt.

"Deep breath in."

It was a firm instruction. Not angry or too concerned, just efficient. He needed to see how constricted Steve's lungs were and how badly off he was. If he needed a hospital, or if the attack might pass on its own, because he had no idea this was panic and not asthma affecting him.

"I'm here."

If society had allowed it, Steve might burst into tears. Those simple words and the promise that came with them caused Steve to nod before he lifted his hand to Bucky's jaw. He was breathing all right, the other man would notice. Just a few little hitches, emotion and not fluid or mucus. Steve was all right, just afraid that he would not see Bucky again. He wasn't sure if he hoped that Steve would have managed to convince him to go to the future where it was safe or if Bucky had been spooked again and ran. Either was enough to rip holes in his heart new and unusual ways.

"You're here," he partially repeated, and his voice sounded stronger too now. He leaned down and settled his forehead to Bucky's the way that the taller man had done to him the night before.

If Steve was braver, he'd kissing him. Steve found his eyes closing as he thought it again. If he was braver? But he was brave. He was strong and he never backed down. Why should he hide how he felt when Bucky had already accepted him? Stomach fluttering with butterflies, Steve lightly pressed his lips to Bucky's. The contact was soft and brief, hardly capable of overwhelming either of them. "I feel better now."

Bucky didn't shy away from the kiss, though it was over and Steve had pulled back before he could even think about whether to return it or not. He didn't mind, if anything it made the tension in his own muscles drain away just a little bit as if he had grasped hold of a life raft in the middle of a stormy sea.

"I would have come back sooner if I knew you were ill. I went to get food for you on the way."

He was definitely getting better with some small autonomy and with longer sentences now that he had spent some time with Steve. It was a work in progress, baby steps, but it was happening and proof that Steve was good for him in almost every way.

"He asked me to go back with him, he said I could bring you. I won't go if you don't want to come."

Quick kisses were the only things that Steve could manage. He was too new at this and too afraid to mess something up. Bucky was a pro, he had so much experience under his belt even if he didn't remember it. And the kiss from the night before? Well that skill had made Steve swoon. He wasn't comfortable enough yet to try to recreate that.

Setting his hand on Bucky's shoulder, and about to say that he was really famished and could use a good meal, his words fell short on his tongue as he blinked down at the man still crouched at his feet.

"With-- Buck, I'll go where you going Steve said quickly. He had no ties here save for Erskine but he didn't doubt that the man would find another person for his super soldier. Or maybe he needed to become Captain America so that the other Steve did? But no. Bucky was still here--

Steve sputtered just a little before he laughed and confided in Bucky that he was overthinking things.

"So we're still in this together then?"

"'Til the end of the line."

Bucky's words were soft and he let his hand linger on Steve's chest for a little while longer, not really cognisant of just how much his words, his touch, his everything affected the smaller man in front of him. All he knew was that he had assigned himself as this Steve's protector, it was the first mission that he had given himself in so many years, and he didn't plan on letting it go so easily.

"I told you that I won't leave you, no matter what. I'll go to this place, this-- he said it's safe, but not without you, and I'm not staying if they try to trap me."

He knew he was asking a lot. He was asking Steve to abandon his possible future, abandon the serum, abandon everything he knew and take a leap of faith seventy years down the line with an older version of himself and a broken man who used to be his best friend.

Who still was his best friend. "I guess I have to start doing s better job of knowing that when you say you'll come back, you'll really come back," he replied. Every lingering touch was more than worth it. Even if each successive touch was the last he'd ever feel, he would have the ones that preceded it in his mind forever. Bright blue eyes searched the dissipating steam for some sign of emotion in Bucky's eyes. Some relief or maybe some fear he could help quell. He lightly scratched up to his hairline instead when there was just blankness and exhaled more deeply than he had managed in a long while. "I told him it would feel like a prison, but he got-- He was kind of upset that I even thought that. He's trying to help. And there might be something in the future that can help you. If they can go all Jules Vern on us then, wow, Buck. It's going to be a wild ride don't you think?"

He was excited to experience it with Bucky.

Out of the bathroom and sitting down for that meal Bucky brought home, Steve a little damp but the warmth in the room not bothering him too badly, the smaller man frowned lightly as if coming up with a thought he didn't like and set his fork down.

"Are you sure you're okay with me being like this? And not like him, I mean?"

"Why would I need you to be like him?"

Bucky genuinely didn't get it, and the blankness in his eyes melted just slightly to confusion. It had never been about muscles for him, not even when he had been a Howling Commando and they had been talking about following him as a hero. What Bucky had loved about Steve ever since they met was him, who he was at the core of himself. His bravery, his kindness, his compassion. He was perfect whether his body was an ailing asthmatic or a Grecian god.

"I'll always come back to you, I promised."

Whether or not had voiced something as stringent as a promise out loud before was up for debate, but he meant it all the same.

"You'll always come back to me, won't you? You won't let me lose who I am again."

"I'm afraid you're stuck with me forever," Steve replied, his worry melting again. Steve hadn't been so self conscious about himself until he had seen what he could become. Everything he was happened to be everything thst the other Steve was. The only difference was that the other Steve didn't have to sit in a bathroom in the steam and could keep up running. He could fight with and for Bucky. And that was always going to leave this Steve at a disadvantage.

Luckily, he was still pretty secure in his ability to pull Bucky back from the brink of the cliffs he found himself on. That didn't take strength of body. That took will and determination and bravery. And he had that in spades.

"I'm never gonna let you fall down any rabbit holes, Buck. I'm always going to chase you until you're back home and safe with me. And that's a promise," he said, nodding to make sure that Bucky understood the finality of it. "You're a good man. The best I know. And I'm going to help you find him again."

"What if I don't?"

Don't find that man, don't ever come fully out from the darkness. It wasn't meant to be a fatalistic or pessimistic question, just a genuine one. So much had happened over the last few decades that had scarred Bucky and had changed him irrevocably. Even if he regained all of his memories, he would probably never be able to go back to the smiling man he had been before.

Just like many of the veterans of war came back altered in some way.

But he was afraid that if he never made it back then it would be a disappointment, like Steve was only staying with him - both Steves - because they hoped that one day their effort would pay off and they'd be rewarded with their Bucky again.

Steve smiled without judgement or fear or doubt. His hand settled around his glass of water and he took a sip before he answered. "Listen pal, I don't expect anything from you other than being true to yourself. Neither of us are the same person we use to be before the war and before you went away. Neither of us can ever be the same guy again. I'm not expecting you to go back to who you use to be. I just want to help you find some happiness and stability in who you are now. You're still a good guy though. I know you are."

He took a thoughtful bite for a moment and then looked up again. He didn't see Bucky Barnes, the easy going girl magnet. He didn't see what other people always saw. In fact, he never had. He saw a guy who cared about him and went out of his way to help him.

And that was all still there. Every ounce of who Bucky was still survived in who Bucky is now.

"I want you to see what I see when I look at you.... And here I go again with the poetry." He rubbed his neck, embarrassed. "Sorry about that."

Edited 2017-02-14 22:20 (UTC)

That was exactly what he needed to hear right then. Not some optimism about how he would get better, or some empty words about having hope, but an honest reassurance that he wasn't expected to become anything. He was just meant to do his best and keep trying and that would be enough.

That earned Steve another one of his rare smiles, this one actually lighting up his face into a proper grin. It looked strange there, as if he hadn't grinned in decades, but it also made him look younger and less damaged.

"Don't apologise," he said, smile fading already but into a peaceful neutral expression rather than a blank one. "Thank you, Steve."

For everything.

Two days passed too quickly. Steve had pressed his bed up to the wall that he shared with Bucky and stayed close to it, in case he heard Bucky start to have a nightmare. He wanted to be able to go running. But the other man slept peacefully and Steve had too. He insisted that they go on walks and they even went down to the parade to celebrate the end of the war. Bucky did all right in the crowds of people but Steve didn't press it and make him stay too long. Besides, he wore his voice out cheering for the men paraded in front of them on the backs of jeeps and in all sorts of cars.

There wasn't any problems at all until the morning they were meant to go back to the hotel where Steve was staying. The younger Steve had already been up and was making coffee, Bucky in the shower, when a knock came to the door. Steve paused, thinking it was odd that someone would bother them here, but he went to the door and looked out through the peephole to see a man and a woman, both dressed in military uniforms. The had a little satchel with them and Steve was sure that they were coming to collect donations for the veteren's fund.

"One moment!" He called through the door before heading back to the jar where they kept their money, pulling out a generous twenty dollars. Soldiers deserved more than that but Steve didn't want to draw suspicion even as he gave a great deal.

He had just made it to the door when something dawned on him. That woman's hair wasn't right. A woman in the army would have her hair up in a bun and pinned out of her face in curls. The one at the door had hers down and it was a strange, auburn color. Steve paused. And that pause caused the people at the door to get antsy and start shooting through the flimsy wood.

Those two days had felt like a welcome respite. Bucky had gone with Steve to the parades because he could tell it was important to him, and he had hidden how tense the crowds had made him. He was good at that, good at pushing it down when he had warning and when he had to. But it was relaxing in other ways, he managed to sleep mostly soundly thanks to knowing Steve was so nearby, and it was a comfort each time he looked over and saw the smaller man still there.

And then the sound of gunshots filled the air.

Bucky was across the room and tackling Steve in a second, shielding him with his body and not caring if his weight caused any bruises or discomfort for now. Steve would feel a hell of a lot worse than discomfort if he got shot.

"Stay low, get under the coffee table and don't move," he snapped, rolling up enough to push Steve in that direction, eyes already hard, clearly ready for the fight. His hand dipped into the waistband of his pants and pulled out a knife, always hidden there just in case. He rounded the doorway to keep free of the path of any bullets; then, with a sudden and swift movement, he kicked the wood free of the jamb aiming to hit the two with the door itself.

There was something different about these two, something that would take Bucky a few minutes to put together as they broke free of what might have been a devistating blow. These were two Soldiers. He had trained them himself in Siberia for years, working on their combat skills as other departments worked on a new method of dehumanization. They didn't need another Asset. They needed soldiers. And soldiers needed to keep some sense of self.

The woman countered a hit in her direction. The man disarmed Bucky with a combination blow his partner made possible by blocking Bucky's momentum with her hip. Two against one was unfair odds, but luckily, the Steve who was not under the table came crashing through the hallway window, shield first. He had no idea that Bucky lived here. He had been following two HYDRA agents since that morning and they led him here. The shield cut.a path between them and between Bucky, ricocheting from the wall and back to his hand.

"Bucky? You and Steve all right?"

As soon as he saw that these were two of the Soldiers that he had helped train, his entire form shifted. He shuttered Bucky behind his eyes and brought out the Soldier in himself because he would need that in order to win. They were good, but he was better, always had been. He couldn't risk them getting back to their masters, this was one case where kill had to be better than capture.

He moved in a way that the newly arrived Steve had seen before, that fluid and deadly grace with the speed of a striking snake, a whirr of blade and muscle, but that the Steve under the table had never seen. This was the Soldier who had fought with Steve in the roadway and nearly bested him.

The question went unanswered, but the blur of the shield gave him the opportunity to leap forwards into the distraction and slam his blade towards the windpipe of the man while attempting to scissor kick the woman back towards Captain America.

Through the table legs and the sliver of open doorway, Steve saw blood. He saw blood rise in an arc from the left side of the jamb to the right. It was momentarily halted by one of Bucky's arms, countering his thrust with the blade into a tearing motion that knocked both opponents off balance. A gun was fired again and, feeling useless, Steve covered his head with his uncasted hand. The drop ceiling fell in a burst down on him. The table protected him from being further injured.

"Buck, no!" Steve called out, grabbing the woman by the wrist to twist the gun from her hand and wrench her arm towards her shoulder. "We need to question them!" His attempt to unarm her didn't stop her from tossing him over her shoulder and into Bucky. He snapped his shield back at her as she made a run for it, while he was sprawled on the ground in a pile. He jumped to his feet to sweep her leg just as she was standing again and this time she sent him through the wall and into the rubble just in front of where his younger self was trying to dig himself out of.

That left the woman to face off with Bucky agsin and she cracked her neck with a smirk. She said something to him in Russian, calling him a traitor before she charged him again, speaking the first trigger word with a growl.

At least the man was dead, his blood on Bucky's hands making the handle of the blade slippery and more difficult to control. Not so difficult that he couldn't do it, he did have a lot of experience with blood slicked weapons, after all. The blur of the fight, the noise of the crashing masonry and gunshots, it was all so familiar to him and pulled him in like quicksand.

Right up until that first trigger word left her lips.

Bucky snarled, lips pulling back over his teeth and an honest to God growl escaping him loud enough for anyone to hear, as he launched himself at her in a new desperation and panic. His entire being was focused on her now, taut and fuzzed at the edges, as his consciousness began to splinter.

"Stop! Stop!"

This couldn't be happening.

And she did stop. No matter how tough the super soldier serum was, none of them were invulnerable the way that Thor was. None of them were unstoppable like the Hulk. A soldier,, who was not as highly trained as the Asset, who did not have as much to lose as Bucky, was not going to be able to stop another in a frenzy.

Captain America got his bearings just a little too late and made it to Bucky's side a little later than that. He'd never seen someone torn apart like that and he'd studied the Hulk's rages once the battle for New York has ended so he would always, always know what his teammate was capable of.

He didn't immediately touch Bucky. He knew better than that, but he did call his name. "Bucky, it's done, it's over!" He repeated the words in the same order for a long time until he felt something push between him and the busted door jamb. He wasn't sure if he was proud or afraid as he watched the other Steve take Bucky's blood stained hand in his own.

He said his name too. Just more softly. More sweetly. "Come back to me."

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