fossilised | I come from a land of ice and snow

I come from a land of ice and snow

Asgard sat atop the branches of Yggdrasil since time began, and little had changed in their society in the years since. Each Asgardian was long-lived into the millennia, their lands were fertile, their people brave and strong. They had their vassals, their allies, and their enemies. Yet even those who opposed them respected the might of the Golden Dias, and the royalty who sat upon it. Currently that was Odin Borson, though he grew weary more easily now and had begun to consider passing the throne to his eldest son.

He had been blessed with many children, but only two that he considered worthy of his lineage and status. His firstborn, Thor, strong and honourable and everything an Asgardian warrior should be. His second son, Loki, was not natural born, though none knew that but his wife. He was different, a creature of magic and mayhem, of sharp intelligence. Both were worthy, but together they would take Asgard to a new prosperity, he was certain of it.

Midgard, where the mortals dwelt, was a land raided every few centuries for stock. It was seen as a breeding ground, much like a corral for cattle. Mortals were lesser, short-lived and weak, they were fit only as slaves. The last raid had taken place when Loki had been but a baby, nearly a thousand years ago, but the mortals that had been taken had been bred and cared for so that a healthy slave population still thrived. Slaves were given a weakened mixture of Idunn's crop with their food, to extend their natural lives to at least a few centuries in order to make them worth the effort to train. They had no rights, but they were taught well that this was their natural position.

All slave children were raised in a central pen and taught the same when small, those that then displayed talent at cooking, riding, hunting, housework, artisan skills, or singing were then measured off to be specially trained for higher masters. Every five years those who could afford to buy a slave, or those of high enough status to simply demand them, came to the corral and chose. Those who were chosen were special, were envied, and those who were not ended up working the fields out in the far reaches of Asgard, the most menial of work.

Anthony and Steven had been friends since they were little and being raised in the large pens together. Both had excelled, Anthony at crafting and Steven at warrior's skills, but neither were chosen when they were five, nor ten, nor even fifteen. Now, at twenty, it was their final chance to be chosen before they would be assigned to one of the meanest farmers beyond the borders of the great capital. Steven woke Anthony as the dawn rose, mingled excitement and nerves on his face.

"Anthony! Wake up, I've got news! I heard the overseer talking to one of the passing guards, and Princes Thor and Loki are coming to the corral today."

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Bucky had no idea that Steve had just spoken to Tony and so he frowned slightly when he was asked if they were a tag team, or even if he were about to punch Tony's teeth out for annoying Steve. The engineer was just a big old ball of confusing issues at the moment, even for Bucky.

"I'm not about to punch you, why the hell would I? You helped save my life, I owe you a thanks for that."

That's not to say he wouldn't punch him later if he deserved it, but he wasn't about to forget that if it hadn't been for Tony then he would have been face down in an unmarked grave somewhere on an increasingly radioactive planet.

“Really?” Color Tony Stark confused. When people thanked him, it tended to be in that backhanded way. Or he knew it was coming because people were scared or had just been saved and were being polite. But this meant something from Bucky and Tony felt the corner of his lip turn up. “I’d do it again, no questions asked. But I really do not want to be involved in another surgery any time soon so take care of yourself.”

At least this encounter with Bucky wasn’t ending in a further dollop of anger on top of resentment on top of despair. So that was a good thing. He felt a wave of what he could only assume was some sort of good will connection (it was friendship, something he hadn’t forced onto the other person, just a mutual understanding and partial like shared between two people) He was about to excuse himself before he ruined the moment when FRIDAY chimed in.

“Hey boss? I can no longer detect the Earth we came from since moving through the breach,” she said, sounding only mildly concerned. “I can’t detect the breach at all. I’m ending diagnostics.”

Bucky leaned himself more completely onto one of the cabinets in order to keep himself upright, frown at his brow almost as soon as FRIDAY had finished speaking. He didn't fully understand what was going on, but he knew that it couldn't be a good thing.

"What does that mean? We just left it, how can we no longer detect it?"

There hadn't been a lot of people left on it, but he knew that Steve had at least intended to bring the skiff back once or twice more to make sure that they rounded up all possible survivors. And if there was no breach, then did that mean there was no way to get from their new moon back to the training moon to save the people there?

"Tony?"

He was the genius here, he had to understand this better.

The news was actually not all that unexpected. Tony had heard Loki and his own self mention how they wanted to destroy the poisonous realm that they had accidentally stumbled upon. Tony hadn’t thought it possible, but then again, he didn’t think cross-dimensional worm holes to be possible either and yet there the were, already having traveled through one to leave their own space behind and relocate in the crazy Asgardian universe where everyone was far too interested in slavery.

“I’m coming up to the Bridge. Get Banner.”

“Right away, boss.” FRIDAY left them to bother Bruce during the downtown he’d so severely needed after nearly a full day with Tony. They were still a day and a half from their moon, after all, so trouble could be bad.

Tony glanced over Bucky and sighed, offering him his shoulder. “Come on, Sarg. You can come too.”

When they arrived, the truth would be looking them in the face. They were stranded. The hole to their old universe had collapsed. The Earth in this universe had no knowledge of them and considering the periodic cullings from Asgard, it was likely that their technology kept them in the Dark Ages. Perhaps early Rennaisance. Tony was just speculating there. But this also meant that they had no where safe to run if Asgard found them. Their little moon was a full day from the training moon but that was not a lot of space in the grand scheme of things at all.

Bucky hadn't believed that their old Earth would ever be a fallback solution anyway, not with how irradiated it was. It would take lifetimes to become safe again, and maybe it never would, nuclear energy was extraordinarily long-lived. It was a sad thing that the wormhole had collapsed because it meant what they had on board was all the people they would be rescuing from there - but several thousand was better than none.

He had to sit heavily on the floor in the corner of the bridge, chest and stomach feeling on fire, but his eyes were still sharp as they took in all of the information brought up. Not that he got chance to give any of his opinions before Bruce came jogging in as requested. It didn't take him long at all to reach the same conclusions.

"We had a few months before we were going back to the training moon, it might be possible to find another, better fortified and further distance moon or planet to inhabit before then."

Oddly quiet, Tony just stood at the controls. He’d been ridiculous. His own issues help them all up and now they were stuck. They could have salvaged more, saved more people… There were priceless pieces of art, cultural objects, books-- Pepper had been fantastic curating a collection for him, and FRIDAY’s servers had a lot of information stored digitally for her to access, but it wasn’t the same and—

No. He was not falling down this rabbit hole again. It was just too easy to do it. It was too easy to let himself be swept away.

And that’s where all of the trouble started. Straightening up, Tony nodded at Bruce. “From what I gather, when these two busted out the first time, they’d looked for inhabitable moons within a day or two of the prison moon. That’s really not going to be good for us. We can salvage technology from it, and use it as a base or a pitstop if we have to, but we have to find somewhere else. Within reason. These skiffs don’t run on air. We still have a little over half power left and that’s with a few trips. Which is good. But we have to conserve.”

"I've been thinking about that, we're going to have to find a way to refuel on the little moon. Whether that's refitting, or creating something entirely new. I know it's a big ask, but this is life or death for us all."

Bruce knew that Tony would thrive under the pressure, just as he had done in that cave in Afghanistan. The suit had been an impossibility before that, the arc reactor just a pipe dream, and he had created both because his life hung in the balance. Now it did again, Bruce was confident that Tony would find a way to power the skiff so that they could take it as far afield as possible.

"We should also use the moon to lay false trails. They'll pick up on it after we're gone, obviously, and so we should make sure to leave information pointing in different directions to where we've gone."

Steve watched the commotion through the doorway as Bruce, Tony, and a few other scientifically minded people who had answered the questionnaires as to their education or work experience were left standing around the bridge, going through files, and arguing. Tony didn’t like to work with out people but Bruce seemed to have put his foot down about that and they were ‘discussing’ viable moons and planets in the skiff’s databases with possible layovers or trail blazers to throw anyone off of their scent. Steve was pretty sure that they didn’t need him poking his nose in on that one and was going to leave again when he spotted Bucky sitting on the floor, listening intently to the conversation.

Steve scoffed. “You’re so nosy. Let other people do something and stop getting out of bed. Every day just prolongs your whining,” he said, though there was worry in his eyes as he crouched down beside his friend and checked over his wounds. “Buck. If I have to promise that I’ll let you get my back, you have to promise to do everything in your power to let yourself get my back. I’ll bring you word searches or you can play FRIDAY at chess…whatever will keep you in bed.”

Bucky looked up at Steve with a slightly sheepish expression. There were small spots of blood on the bandages where he had tugged a couple of stitches, but nothing overly worrying especially with super soldier serum to fall back on. His wasn't as refined as Steve's, wasn't quite as powerful, but he was still better off than someone without any at all.

"I didn't exactly mean to be in here, pal, it just happened. Tony ran into me in the kitchen, I was gonna-- I remembered something, I wanted to test it out."

Even though the Asgardian honey had helped give him back huge chunks of who he was, the finer detail of exact memories were still fragmented and coming back in pieces.

"I wasn't about to go on a hike, cut me some slack, Steve."

"You don't get slack when you're bleeding," Steve said sternly, his hand splayed so that the red rosettes of blood spread neatly between them. He didn't want to apply too much pressure, though he was about to play field surgeon. Banner was busy and Steve could take care of some stitches thst the cauterize took hadn't fully singed closed.

He slipped his arms under Bucky and climbed to his feet, hauling the other man with him.

"You can tell me all about it in a minute. I don't have anywhere else to be except with you. And the sandwich I made for you," Steve grinned, holding Bucky close.

Was it odd that this had become his favored method of getting around the ship? He just liked carting Bucky everywhere.

"Woah, where do you get that from?" Tony was saying in the background, and was replied to that the woman who made the suggestion was a geologist.

"Let's hurry up out of here, pal," Steve chuckled.

Despite the fact that it wasn't the most manly way to get around, Bucky didn't really mind being hauled with Steve either. It meant that he could rest his head on Steve's chest and hear his heart beating, probably the most comforting sound out there, and just be reminded with every step that this was real.

Sure, the world had gone, humanity was endangered, but he was happy. Was that wrong?

"C'mon, Steve, I really want to try this out before all the ingredients I remember are gone forever. Take me to the kitchens?"

It was a recipe that he remembered Sarah Rogers teaching him before she died, in the months when she'd been sick. She passed on her apple pie to him so that her Steve would always have someone to make him the food he liked best when he was sick, and he just remembered it.

“I kind of feel like you’re trying to trick me,” Steve teased, taking Bucky to the kitchen. There were a bunch of people there, most of whom were poking around, looking at the PLEASE TAKE ONLY WHAT YOU NEED signs that graced every cabinet. They hadn’t really come up with a rationing rule yet but that didn’t mean that they should all just take whatever they felt like. A few were trying to cook large pots of pasta or make casseroles for their groups of the blocks of rooms beside their own. For now, everyone was working together.

Steve figured he would too.

After he sat Bucky down on a backed stool, he leaned against the counter, arms crossed over his wide chest. “Tell you what. You tell me what you need and I’ll play gopher for you. You have to stay seated or we’re out of here.” He wouldn’t actually realize what Bucky was doing until he was right in the middle of it. And then his eyes would widen and his heart would beat in his chest a little more rapidly.

How’d he live without this numbskull for as long as he did? Bucky was sweet. Even when riddled with bullet holes and half a fragmented memory.

Bucky kind of wished that he could do this himself so that he could have presented Steve with a fully made and ready apple pie, but this was good too. He saw the moment that Steve realised what he was making, but he didn't let on, just kept giving instructions from his seat.

A few of the other people on board looked askance at Captain Rogers using some of their limited supplies to bake an apple pie, but he was respected enough at the moment that nobody called him out on it. Yet.

"Smell familiar, Steve? Your Ma taught me to make this."

Apples were not exactly easy to come by, though Steve had helped to pack the cargo hold with plenty of canned fruits from areas that weren’t too badly affected by the nuclear fall out. They had all been deemed safe by Bruce and Tony and their equipment and there were a few palettes of the stuff in one of the rooms. They wouldn’t last forever, and after that…no more apple pies.

But Steve couldn’t fault Bucky for wanting to make this if he actually remembered the recipe. That was pretty amazing and he wanted to encourage it.

“You’re…you’re a gem, Buck,” Steve said, more a whisper than anything. He wasn’t sure if he should raise his voice, it seemed like too reverent. Too beautiful. “I really can’t believe you remember this.” After an egg wash, the pie went into the oven and only then did Steve realize that they were getting some looks. It didn’t matter that he’d worked hard rescuing everyone and stocking the skiff up. It didn’t matter that he was tortured for months. All these people saw were their own plights.

So this might be the last apple pie he’d ever had. He couldn’t fault anyone else for feeling as they did and he didn’t want to take any more advantage. That did not make him feel less grateful to Bucky, though.

Bucky didn't care that others were looking at them askance, he had spent seventy years being tortured and he damn well deserved every tiny slice of happiness he could get now. If he wanted to see the man he loved bite into an apple pie made with the recipe from his mother, then he'd do it, and they could all go to hell if they didn't like it.

He grinned as Steve complimented him, wanting to get up but obediently remaining in his seat so that he didn't get any further telling off from the other man who was determined, apparently, to repay Bucky for all the mother henning that he had done when he was younger.

"Excuse me?" One of the young women in the kitchen asked, frowning. "Do you really think it's a viable use of supplies to be baking an apple pie?"

Steve winced just a little before he turned towards the woman and leaned on his elbow on the flour covered counter. "What I'm going to say ma'am, well it's going to sound a little harsh. And I want to apologize up front. But when a man risks his life and is shot bringing back eggs and a can of apples, as Bucky did back in Kansas when we tried to rescue a group of people just like we rescued you, then yes. I would say he's entitled to use that can however he sees fit. Luckily for all of all, there were a few pallets of canned apples from that barn and while Mr. Stark and Doctor Banner were saving his life, I pulled the whole of it in. I'm not going to be greedy here and say that no one is allowed to use any of what I've brought in, but it's best to use the perishables up first. Eggs, milk... Once they go bad we can't use them anymore."

The woman looked shocked. Not everyone had been saved on this vessel by captain America and not everyone really knew him, what he looked like or any of that.

She was also a little mortified when he was done speaking and apologized under her breath.

"It's all right. We all have a lot to deal with right now."

Bucky was actually kind of proud of Steve for not apologising for doing something selfish, because this pie was selfish no matter who had been shot bringing the ingredients back on board. Sometimes they all needed something for themselves, that was the nature of being human, and he loved Steve all the more for it. He didn't want a perfect paragon, Captain America, he wanted Steve Rogers and all his flaws.

"You don't have to be sorry, ma'am, but I'm also not going to be sorry for baking this pie. You see, I've lived through a period of history where loving someone of your own sex was criminally insane, I've fought in a war, and I've been a Nazi prisoner for a hell of a long time just to get to here. If I want to bake a goddamn pie for a man I can finally outwardly say I love, then I'm gonna bake a pie."

She looked even more mortified and backed up, red in the face, as Bucky stared her down and then looked around the rest of the kitchen.

"I'm not gonna steal supplies, this is a one time deal. Anyone else got any problems?"

Normally, Steve would try to diffuse the situation. This time, though, he was more flattered than he was flabbergasted and so he didn't say a word, save for: "make sure you use the perishables first everyone."

It might become a problem later when the super soldiers and Banner came to be seen as needing more food than everyone else given their metabolisms to feel full, but that time was not right now. And so Steve and Bucky could have their pie while the scientists worked upstairs and a few people decided to make some baked goods of their own.

They waited together until the timer on the oven went off and then he carefully took out the pie with a towel and vacated the area with Bucky and their prize.

It was truly decadent to eat pie on the floor with two forks. Steve had never done such a thing and sharing field rations really didn't count.

Bucky hoped someone had managed to somehow get a picture, because Steve carrying both him and an apple pie back to their little room was worthy of being immortalised forever. He actually looked near on peaceful when he got put down and dug in with his fork, looking up at Steve out of deep blue eyes.

"Tastes like home, Steve."

Maybe they'd never get to taste it again, but he wouldn't forget it. A new memory that nobody could ever take away from him, like the taste of Steve's lips, or the sight of the stars as they flew through space.

Opening his mouth to say something cheesy, Strve found himself pressing his lips together again with a brilliant twinkle to his eyes. "Almost said that you tasted like home but I haven't resorted to cannibalism yet. And if I did, you'd be the last to go."

Thst really wasn't all that romantic either, though, and so he shoved more than he needed to into his mouth, cheeks bulging from flaky crust and sugary apple pieces in a light syrup. He waited for Bucky to say something, but held up his hand under his could swallow under the pretense of wanting to excuse himself from being a moron. Instead, he set a hand to Bucky's shoulder and kissed him inside.

There was a full day of just existing on this ship left and no one needed the man in the uniform with the shield just yet.

Why not let the twenty-eight year old have a few hours to make out over apple pie with his... Uh.

He pulled back with rosy lips and cheeks. "Are you my boyfriend?" It sounded so naughty.

Boyfriend didn't sound right, but that was only because the word seemed so casual. He wanted Steve forever, he didn't care if this was technically a new relationship, he had been in love since his preteen years and he was damned if he wasn't going to spend the rest of his life with Steve Rogers.

It was stupid, and it was probably going to scare Steve off, especially since they had technically been dating for all of a few days, but Bucky didn't censor himself.

"I'd prefer husband, but I'll take what I can get."

Just saying.

There was one thing to be talking about titles in the middle of a little pie-kissing, but Bucky’s sudden drop of that had Steve’s eyes widening halfway in the middle of ducking in to kiss him again. He paused, holding his breath, and drew back. Bucky wasn’t joking. He might be in a little bit of pain, but he was clear headed.

And that meant that he was being serious about wanting to marry him. Two weeks ago, the guy didn’t remember him. And now he was living every moment like it was his last. Steve should shut it down, but he’d learned not to take anything for granted. He wasn’t special. Anyone or anything could be taken from you at any moment.

He loved Bucky. Bucky loved him.

And while the church didn’t recognize it and there was no such thing as a government anymore, no legal proceedings to make it official, did they need them? No. “Husband does sound better. Are you proposing?” Leave it to Bucky to make the one thing that was meant to be romantic, totally not. Then again, everything else he’d been doing for days certainly made up for it.

Bucky didn't care how long ago he hadn't remembered Steve, he didn't care that it had been a week or less since they even kissed for the first time. He remembered now, and that came with a whole lifetime of memories, he knew there was nobody else he wanted to spend the rest of whatever life this might be with than Steve.

So he nodded.

"I sure am, Steve. I don't want to fill my dance card with any name but yours, so why the hell not?"

Maybe not the most romantic of proposals (definitely not), but heartfelt all the same. There was no way to make it official, but if they wore rings from one another and named each other husband, then who was there to tell them that it wasn't so? Isn't that how it used to be done anyway?

“Let ‘s do it.” Hadn’t they wasted enough time? The answer was yes, a hundred, thousand times yes. All that Steve wanted was to be with Bucky so why not? “I’m not really sure where we go for rings though,” he rubbed the back of his neck and then lightly tipped the pie out of their nest-bed so he could be closer to his…uh… His fiancé? It felt amazing to say that. It made him feel giddy and his cheeks actually turned pink as he laced his fingers with the other man’s and leaned their shoulders together.

He’d had no trouble getting used to the metal arm. It was part of Bucky now and just as wonderful.

“Maybe…uh… I kind of hate to ask Tony.” After everything that had gone down, he really ought to be their last choice for ring-bearer.

Bucky raised an eyebrow, already imagining what sort of issues Tony might take with being asked to provide some rings for them-- or maybe he'd take Bucky by surprise and that would be what flattered him enough to bury the hatchet for a while. It was hard to tell with the engineer sometimes.

"We don't need 'em right away, we know, we can wait."

He might broach it with Tony at some point if he caught the man in a good mood, but they had a whole lot of shit to deal with that had nothing to do with their engagement and everything to do with the survival of the human race. Not least because, even if they didn't know it yet, they had a small girl on board who had the hibernating gene of a new super-virus.

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