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Bucky Barnes heaved a sigh, turning his old motel key in the tarnished lock. He had been to Kiev and spent cool mornings jogging among the crowded white buildings. He had been to Belgrade and drank whiskey on the splavovi at dusk, dropping pennies like wishes into the Danube. He had been to Mumbai, where he’d spent days lost in the overwhelming gray, the deepening mists that engulfed the ever-evolving city threatening to suffocate him. And everywhere he went, Steve was never far behind. How Steve had found him in San Sebastian was baffling, but Bucky kept moving. He stole food where he could, bribed where he needed, and persuaded where he had to. Steve was persistent, though. He’d find Bucky here too.But it was easier in Seattle, where Bucky could at least speak the language, where the unrelenting patter of rain could drown out the ache of recovered memories. He had only been there for a couple of days, so he had a few more days to scope out a new hideout.Or so he thought.“Wet out there,” a voice remarked as Bucky flipped the light switch. The dim overhead light didn’t do anything to diminish the solid power that was apparent in the curve of Steve’s shoulders, or to conceal the look of surprise on Bucky’s face. “Please don’t,” Steve said as Bucky turned on his heel, bracing himself to push off the doorframe and over the rusty balcony railing. Bucky paused, the twinge in Steve’s voice sending his heart into overdrive. It was enough. Steve was already up and beside him, one hand on his good shoulder. “I’ll just find you again, Buck.”“I don’t want to be found, Steve. Why don’t you get that?” Bucky said, turning and shaking off Steve’s hand.“We can do this together,” Steve said, his voice earnest. Bucky wasn’t looking at his face. He couldn’t look at Steve’s face. One glance into those blue eyes and his resolve would crumble. All the things he remembered—the Before, and the After—the narrow Brooklyn streets, the whooshing sound of detonation, the icy, pitiless snow filling his mouth, the metal burrowing into his muscles, the bite of rubber between his teeth, the words. Longing, rusted, furnace, daybreak, seventeen, benign, nine, homecoming, one, freight car. The feeling of being unmade and undone and not having to think but thinking still and not being able to stop as he watched himself…No. He couldn’t face that. He couldn’t face Steve.But Steve’s mouth was so close that he could taste his breath, could see the vein in his neck pulsing rapidly, the muscles straining under his blue t-shirt, and Bucky couldn’t help it. He looked up. He saw Steve’s eyes. He saw the way scrawny, unremarkable Steve used to look up at him back before he was deployed. The way Steve had always looked at him, even when they were on that damn helicarrier and Bucky had him pinned between his legs and his massive, metal arm was hanging in the air about to deal another blow.He had let Steve get too close. He had let himself look into Steve’s eyes. What chance did he really stand now?***The quinjet ride had been mostly silent, punctuated occasionally by Natasha mumbling coordinates and flight plans and Sam pacing and cursing under his breath. Steve wanted to ask how much Bucky remembered, but he didn’t want to press. Bucky hadn’t looked at him since they’d left the motel room. Instead, he spent the flight looking down at his hands, the veins in his right hand jumping, the cool metal of his left hand clicking almost imperceptibly as he flexed his prosthetic fingers. Steve also noticed that Bucky was worrying his lip between his teeth. He wished he would stop doing that. It was really distracting, and Steve had important matters to consider.When they reached their safehouse, a sturdy underground structure in Portland, Steve couldn’t help but breathe a little easier. They were safe here. Bucky was safe here. Ever since he’d ripped the mask off the Winter Soldier in D.C. and seen Bucky’s face—Bucky, God, it was Bucky—Steve had felt on edge. How to save Bucky, how to fight Bucky without hurting him, how to make Bucky recognize him, and then Bucky had pulled Steve out of the Potomac and Steve had woken up in the hospital and Bucky was lost again. With Sam and Natasha’s help and Steve’s unrelenting determination to get to his friend, they’d found him again. It was only a matter of time, and now Bucky was with him and they were safe.“Well, it’s not vibranium,” Tony was saying, poking at a digital copy of the metal arm that was displayed in the air in front of him. Bucky sat on a table in the middle of the room, still looking down, still biting that lip. He was so twitchy. He kept rubbing his thighs and resting his hands on his knees and then sighing and tucking a dark strand of hair behind his ear. And still, his tongue would slip out to wet his bottom lip, and that lip would go right back between his teeth. Steve took a steadying breath and wrenched his eyes away from Bucky’s face, trying to concentrate on what Tony was saying.“What is it then?” Steve asked.“Dunno,” Tony said, though he sounded intrigued. He tapped at the screen, pushing and pulling little boxes of computerized information here and there, his movements almost robotic as he scanned the data. “It’s strong, but the algorithms show that vibranium is the stronger alloy. That arm wouldn’t stand a chance against your shield, not in the long run. Good news: I know where we could get him an upgrade,” he said, raising his eyebrows and peering around the hologram at Steve. Steve glanced at Bucky again, unsure.“Could we even get this one off of him?”“I think both ventures lead us to the same place, Cap.”“Where’s that?” Bucky asked, peering up at the holograms and frowning, scratching his fingers through the stubble on his cheek. Steve fought the urge to reach out to Bucky and do the same, clenching his traitorous fist until his knuckles were white. Bucky had flinched at every touch, but Steve’s even more so than the others’. The craving to touch any part of Bucky’s exposed flesh was overwhelming in a way it had never been before. Since his raids with the Howling Commandos and Bucky’s eventual fall—Steve’s fault, all Steve’s fault—he had not been this close to Bucky. Sure, they’d fought in D.C., and he’d chased Bucky all over the world, but now they were in a room together calmly discussing Wakanda and Bucky’s metal arm. It was unreal. And still, Bucky flinched, so Steve tried to keep his distance. Well, as much distance as he could, which turned out to be just a few feet most of the time. He didn’t want to let his friend out of his sight was all. When he let Bucky out of his sight, he lost him. Every time. It was infuriating.What was even more infuriating, enraging, and downright unfair was that Steve felt like he and Bucky were two opposite poles of a magnet. When Steve moved closer, Bucky moved away, mirroring his steps. Steve bowed his head toward Bucky, Bucky picked his head up. Steve kicked out a foot, Bucky pulled his back in. Steve reached for something, Bucky’s whole body moved in the opposite direction. Maddening. Absolutely exasperating. So incensing that Steve felt sick sometimes. And then, like his body was calling the shots now, his hand reached up to rest on Bucky’s shoulder and squeezed. Bucky pulled away as if he’d just been burned, stood so quickly that Steve hadn’t noticed he had even moved until he was almost right next to Tony. They were talking. What had they been talking about? Steve exhaled quickly and closed his eyes, shaking his head like he was trying to shake off a fly.“…they’d be able to take the arm off?” Bucky asked, ending a question of which Steve hadn’t heard the beginning.“That’s the idea,” Tony responded, fishing into his back pocket and pulling out his phone. “You say the word, Sarge, and I’ll make the call.”Bucky winced when Tony had called him “Sarge,” but Tony hadn’t noticed. Steve had. But then, Steve noticed everything about Bucky, like how he was chewing on the inside of his cheek and pacing, rubbing his left shoulder where flesh met metal. He stopped, glancing at the hologram and then at Tony, sparing a small sideways look at Steve as well. He sighed heavily. “Do it.”

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Another day, another quinjet flight, another itch Bucky couldn’t scratch.  He wanted to do so many things.  He wanted to rip his arm off, he wanted to punch something hard that wouldn’t give, he wanted to jump out of the jet without a parachute, he wanted to bite his lip until it bled, he wanted to… He looked at Steve, sitting across from him in his seat, staring out at the dark, starless night.  The hum of the engines was nearly silent, but Bucky could swear his whole body was vibrating with them every time he glanced at Steve and Steve was looking back.  But then Bucky would look away just as quickly.  Was it just him, or was there something buzzing, some tingling, electric spark that pulled Bucky closer to Steve when all he wanted to do was get away?Who am I kidding? he thought, standing and walking toward the back of the jet.  He didn’t want to get away, but he had to.  He was so careful not to let Steve within arm’s length because if he got that close, he’d never break away again, and Steve didn’t need to fight Bucky’s battles.  Bucky had seventy years of training with HYDRA, more assassinations that he could count, more faces than he could remember—but he did, he did remember them, a new one with each passing day, and he had to put up a wall between them and him or he was sure he would combust.  As it was, it was hard not to throw up, and he took steadying, heaving breaths, wishing he could just get out of this damn plane.So preoccupied was Bucky with trying to fight back his ghosts that he hadn’t heard Steve come up behind him, but he could feel it.  There it was again, that nagging buzzing, that metallic twang that had nothing to do with his arm.  He wanted to turn around and punch him.  He wanted to turn around and…but no, Steve had to stay away.  The force of Bucky’s memories, the sharp edges and stinging guilt and the raw pieces—those had to stay Bucky’s.  He could not, would not let Steve take on that burden, and he knew Steve well enough to know that he would try.“You okay?” Steve asked, and Bucky turned and took a step back just as Steve had taken a step forward.“I’m fine, Steve,” Bucky said, though even he could tell his voice had sounded too gruff, too unconvincing.“I haven’t wanted to push, but do you remember much?” Steve asked quietly, glancing at Natasha, Sam, and Tony, who were engaged in conversation.  From Sam’s laughter, it must have been something light.  Bucky didn’t remember what that felt like, but to answer Steve's question, the real question Steve was asking? That was easy.“I remember everything,” he mumbled, running a hand through his hair and leaning against the side of the jet as Steve took another step closer.“Is that what this is about? The running, the brooding, the silence?  Bucky, that wasn’t you that did those things,” Steve said, and Bucky made the mistake again of looking at Steve’s eyes.  He really believed what he was saying.  But he didn’t understand.“I may have been taking orders, but it was me.”“It wasn’t.  I know you, Bucky.  You’re the guy who finished every fight I started, not because you wanted to fight, but because you didn’t want to watch me get punched.  I was the little guy and you were always saving me,” Steve said, and he took another fucking step closer.  He was always stepping closer, and Bucky was backed into a corner, and the buzzing was louder, humming in his ears, or was that blood rushing to his brain, telling him to react, get out, get free, kill anyone to do it?Bucky could not stand it anymore, it was driving him crazy, the noise, Steve’s breath on his face again, his eyes all trust and calm and be better, Bucky, be better than you are, better than me, because that’s what I think of you, and he lost it.  Before he knew what he was doing, he stepped toward Steve, hands on his chest, pushing Steve into the opposite wall and pinning him there, and his left fist was going to connect with Steve’s face, Steve’s beautiful, surprised, determined face, and Bucky couldn’t breathe but he could still think and he didn’t want to hurt Steve and he---He was breathing, he was breathing too fast, and his fist was deep in the side of the quinjet’s structure, all wires and sparks and the crunching sound of metal on metal, and Steve was still looking at Bucky like he hadn’t just almost broken his nose.Not that his nose would have stayed broken for long, but that wasn’t the point.Bucky wrenched his fist back, bringing parts of the jet with it, and Sam was suddenly at Steve’s side, no, Steve’s front, and he was between Bucky and Steve, and the buzzing had stopped and all that remained was the infinitesimally quiet hum of the engines.“Trouble in paradise?” Tony said, deadpan, from the front of the jet.  He hadn’t even looked back. “Sam, it’s okay,” Steve said, pushing Sam aside, but Bucky had already turned away and gone back to his seat, his entire body quivering.  Steve was wrong.  He was so wrong.  What did Bucky have to do to prove it?  He had to make him stay away.  But then Steve took his seat next to Bucky again and looked over at him.  “Buck.”“Just stay the hell away from me, Steve,” Bucky growled.  “Can’t you see I’m dangerous?”“I’m not scared of you.”Of course he wasn’t.  Steve had never been scared of anything.  “Well you should be.”“You keep forgetting that I know you, Bucky.”“Not anymore.”  And Bucky could tell by the wounded look on Steve’s face that something Bucky had said had actually hurt him, and Bucky’s heart ached to take it back, to laugh things off like he used to, like the Bucky that Steve knew, but he wasn’t the Bucky that Steve knew, and Bucky had to prove that to him.  Had to make Steve stay away.  Hurting him physically wouldn’t work, not to mention that the thought of really hurting him like he had on that damn helicarrier made vomit rise in his throat.  So maybe hurting his delicate, wonderful, confusing feelings would work.  Anything to keep him alive.  But Steve was still Steve.  It would likely take a lot more than hurt feelings to deter him. “Buck, I wasn’t lying when I said that we could do this together,” Steve said, his silvery voice unwavering. “I’m not going anywhere.”“We’ll see,” Bucky said.  But he already knew Steve wouldn’t leave, not unless he knew Bucky was really safe, but Bucky was never really safe, so Steve would never leave.  Silence fell uncomfortably between them.“Okay, guys, but can we just try not to rip the jet apart while we’re still in it?” Tony said. “I don’t really want to carry either one of you super soldiers all the way to Wakanda.  I’m not an air taxi.”

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Looking out of the floor-to-ceiling windows of the Royal Palace of Wakanda was always a breathtaking experience.  The vast, green landscape of gardens and hills and mountains beyond the city could leave anyone dizzy.  Steve stood stoic, arms crossed, drinking in the way the sunlight rolled across the expanse of trees and purple-topped buildings, glinting off the glass and warming his skin.  Behind him, Tony and Shuri were animatedly discussing Bucky’s brain like they’d discovered a new species.  Maybe they had.“If they could program him with Nazi technology back in 1942, then—” Tony was saying.“—we could pinpoint where they planted the trigger words—” Shuri interrupted.“—and delete them, like an old file,” Tony finished, both of them tapping at the translucent screen in front of them.  Bucky was lying on a table, both arms loose at his sides, staring at the ceiling.“Will it hurt him?” Steve asked, approaching and raising an eyebrow at the digitized brain that turned slowly on the screen.  It had ten small red dots in various places on it, glowing like angry bugs.  Shuri was touching them one at a time, and the image would zoom in until it was one big red circle surrounded by hundreds of computerized branches, stemming off from the center and climbing to the edges of the screen like tiny tree limbs.“I thought we were focused on my arm,” said Bucky, and his left arm twitched audibly against the silver steel of the table.“Sarge, the arm’s an easy fix.  I mean, we could just rip it off,” Tony replied, not looking at Bucky, who growled in response. “Did I say ‘rip?’ That was the wrong word.  We can take it off, no problem.  It’s designed to release.  Those trigger words, though, are implanted pretty deep in your brain, and I don’t want to give you a replacement vibranium arm until we know you’re in complete control of it.”“I don’t want a replacement.”“If you’re going to be an Avenger—”“I’m never going to be an Avenger.”“It might hurt,” Shuri said, answering Steve’s question.  “Each word was inserted into different parts of Bucky’s brain.  Like this one, ‘rusted,’ it’s in the parietal lobe.”  She pointed at one of the blinking red spots.  Steve was already lost, and he must have looked it, because Shuri explained, “The parietal lobe is where we have our sense of touch and pain.  Then this one here, ‘longing,’ it’s in this deep structure called the hypothalamus.  That’s the part of our brain that controls the autonomic nervous system—sleep, hunger, thirst, sexual response…” At this, Bucky shut his eyes tightly, and Steve could swear that his cheeks had flushed a little pink, and the urge to touch Bucky was so strong that his stupid arm was raised again, but he quickly rubbed the palm of his hand through his growing beard instead.  “This one, ‘homecoming,’ is in the frontal lobe, which determines our personality, behavior, and emotions.  ‘Freight car’ is—”“Point being,” Tony interrupted just as Steve’s stomach did a flip and his heart jumped into his throat at the mention of a freight car, “each word is attached to a different structure, and all these little branches off of it are memories that are associated with each word.  Then these lines,” he continued, pointing at the glowing red lines that connected each blinking red dot, “connect them all in a certain pattern.  That’s why Zola had to say them in a specific order to activate Winter Soldier.  The problem here is that these memories are likely significant.”“And carving out these trigger words…” Shuri started.“Could hurt like a bitch,” supplied Bucky, biting down on his lip.  “Will I still have the memories connected to the words if we erase the triggers?”“Most of them,” Shuri said.  “We’ll save what we can, unless you don’t—”

“Yes, I want those memories, but will it erase the memories of the things I did?  For…HYDRA?”

“No,” Tony said, swiping one hand across the screen, clearing the data from their view.  “Those memories are stored in the hippocampus, in the long-term memory area that Zola conveniently left untouched and unassociated with his trigger words.”“Great,” Bucky said sarcastically, but he ran a hand through his hair and hitched himself up on one elbow, turning toward them.  “When can we start?”“Hang on.  Did you hear the part about it hurting?” Steve asked, striding over to the table Bucky was lying on.“Yeah, Steve, I managed to catch that bit.  Though it sounds like they’re not sure it will hurt at all.  It’s a chance I’m willing to take.  I can’t have those words just floating around in my brain waiting for someone to activate them, to make me…to control me again.”  Steve inhaled quickly, nodding at the three of them.“Normally I’d ask your permission, Cap, but it’s Sarge’s brain we’re scrambling,” Tony said, smiling.“Like you’d ever really ask my permission,” Steve replied, rolling his eyes, but he couldn’t help but smile a little.  There was no one on Earth or any other planet Steve would entrust with Bucky’s brain other than Stark and Shuri.  Well, maybe Banner too.  He knew they’d pull it off.  He just didn’t want to wound Bucky further in the process.  The thought made him uneasy.“You’re right,” Tony shrugged.  “We can start now if you want, Sarge.  I don’t have anything better to do.”  Shuri smiled too, nodding in agreement. Bucky bit down on his lower lip and shrugged, lying back against the cold metal of the operating table.  “Whenever you’re ready.”

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Bucky felt a little ridiculous with a rubber cap on his head, wires protruding all over, but it wasn’t as bad as the tight leather restraints around his ankles and right wrist or the vice holding his metal arm in place or the strap across his forehead.  “Just in case,” Tony had said as he strapped Bucky down.  Bucky tried not to shake, but his body was betraying him.  This was so reminiscent of Italy and Zola and then HYDRA that he wanted to wrench his arm out of the vice and scream.  He took some calming breaths and closed his eyes, trying to focus on happier memories.  Steve in his white tank top, hanging off of his skin like he’d bought it two sizes too big, his thin hands curled into fists in front of his face as Bucky taught him how to protect himself.  The smell of hot dogs and ketchup from the hot dog stand down the street with its yellow and white umbrella spindling back and forth in the wind.  Steve’s laugh when Bucky dropped a whole scoop of mint chocolate chip ice cream on his lap at Coney Island.  The way Steve smelled after a shower, like soap and aftershave he didn’t really need, and the way the damp, blonde strands stuck to his forehead and fell into his eyes, dripping water onto the faded linoleum floor of the bathroom.  Steve, Steve, Steve…“I expected a lot of reactions to all this, but smiling wasn’t one of them,” Tony said loudly, and Bucky opened his eyes in surprise, and Steve was there, standing over him and smiling too and Bucky could swear that he was grinning now but he didn’t know what a grin felt like anymore and he wanted to reach up and touch his own mouth to check but the restraints and the vice and oh, God, is that a mouthpiece? he thought as Tony’s hand appeared above him, wiggling a hunk of black rubber.  “Sorry, pal, but we wouldn’t want you messing up that award-winning smile, which I’m sure comes out all the time,” and Bucky was grimacing again and frowning and this felt right, at least.“Is that necessary?” Steve asked, though they all already knew the answer, and Tony didn’t even stop to explain when Bucky opened his mouth to let Tony slide the mouthpiece between his teeth.Suddenly, a soft hand was covering his own, and Shuri’s kind face appeared above him.  “It’s going to be okay, Mr. Barnes,” she said, her lilting voice only slighter louder than a whisper and so, so soothing.  She smiled encouragingly down at him, her dark head silhouetted against the sunlight streaming in, and Bucky wondered how many people she’d convinced with just that look in her eyes that they were more than a science experiment.  Then her hand was gone, and the only thing left in front of him was Steve, and he wanted to say something but the mouthpiece and the rubber cap on his head and the vice…“I’ll be here the whole time, Bucky,” Steve said, and for the first moment since Steve had found Bucky in Seattle, Bucky wished Steve would touch him.  The buzzing had started again, but it was just a low hum, the overpowering madness of it diminished by fear.  Bucky lifted his hand as much as he could against the restraints and reached for Steve, who didn’t miss a beat.  Christ, Steve’s skin felt so warm, is this what this always felt like, and his skin was touching Steve’s skin and when was the last time their touch hadn’t been obscured by clothing and why, why, hadn’t Bucky been touching Steve all along and God, Steve’s hand is hot, it’s so hot, it’s burning, but it feels so good, what does Steve feel, can Steve feel this too? “All right, let’s get this party started,” said Tony, and there was a blinding flash of white, and Bucky could see, hear, and feel…nothing.But then Bucky was back on the train again, picking up the sleek, impossibly light shield, its silver star ringed in blue and red.  Steve was down but stirring, and then a blue light hit the shield and fractured out around him and Bucky was blown through the side of the freight car, holding on to a flimsy metal railing as Steve climbed out, reaching for him, calling his name, and then there was ice, only ice, ice in his eyes, ice in his hair, ice in his bones…Bucky was strapped down to a table, lying there in the dark, half-awake, far-away sounds echoing around the small room.  No, he wasn’t strapped down, he was free, someone was standing over him, saying Bucky’s name, saying “Steve,” and then Bucky was saying “Steve,” and two strong arms were wrapped around him, pulling him up from the table, it was Steve?  No, no, it was Steve’s face, but all these muscles and fuck, he’s tall, but there’s that aftershave, it is Steve, where are we?...

There were at least a hundred of them now, traipsing through the woods, a tank behind them, and they were approaching the base, and there were people clapping, yelling, cheering, and there was Agent Carter and she was standing there staring up at Steve—wait, Steve? A twinge of jealousy as Steve stared back down at her, smiling, smug, proud, had he ever looked at him like that before?  Let’s hear it for Captain America…The sweet smell of his mother’s perfume, like amber and autumn.  He looked up at her, her dark, curly hair obscuring her face…One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, nine toy soldiers, their green paint chipped, aligned on the windowsill…Steve and Bucky were lying in the grass, it was summer, and Steve kept swatting gnats away and covering his eyes with his forearm and his face was right next to Bucky’s and he smelled like the juice of a watermelon, and did he move a little closer?  God, it’s hot out here….The sun was just coming up over the nearby buildings, dusting the view with golden light, and Steve and Bucky were sitting on the roof of the drycleaners, and they were kicking their bare feet over the ledge and their feet caught, ankles crossed, just for a second…It was Bucky’s seventeenth birthday, and Steve had brought him a red velvet cupcake, his favorite, and he was blowing out the candle and he’d never shared that particular wish with anyone…Bucky was digging into the breast pocket of William Holt, Private First Class, and he found the rusted pocket watch inside, clenching it in his fist, one tear falling down his ashen face onto his fallen companion…The white light that had blinded him was expanding, it was stretching into every inch of his visual field, and the buzzing that he always felt when Steve was near wasn’t just buzzing anymore, it was so loud that his ears were bleeding, his heart couldn’t possibly beat this fast, and he had a hand in his and he was squeezing it so hard that he felt the bones snap beneath his grip and he was definitely, definitely screaming now, the taste of rubber between his teeth, in his throat, his skin was ripping apart, his head was exploding, surely he was dying…And then there was nothing.

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Bucky’s whole body shuddered as he bit down on the mouthpiece.  He groaned, his palm sweat-slick in Steve’s hand.  Steve only held on tighter, looking down at his friend and running a hand through Bucky’s wet hair.It could have been minutes or hours later, Steve wasn’t sure which, but Bucky’s grip tightened, his body shaking more violently, and tears were rolling down his face...and then he started to scream.Steve couldn’t handle it.  “Make it stop, Tony!” he demanded over Bucky’s shouts as he thrashed to break free.“We’re almost there!” Tony yelled back, tapping the last glowing light on the screen, and then Bucky clamped down so hard on Steve’s hand that Steve heard the bones pop.  He barely registered the pain, though, because Bucky was convulsing now, his whole body straining and sliding against the black leather.  Bucky bit down harder on the mouthpiece, his wounded yells ripping Steve’s heart out of his chest, and the leather around his wrist snapped.Steve did the only thing he could think of doing and threw himself on top of Bucky, pinning his loose arm down against the steel table.  Bucky’s skin was cold from the sweat, his t-shirt soaked through, and Steve’s broken hand was throbbing.  “STOP THE DAMN PROCEDURE, TONY!”  But as he said it, Bucky’s muscles relaxed beneath him.  He had stopped shaking, the echoes of his wounded cries fading around them.  Steve could feel Bucky’s heart thumping wildly against his chest, but he was breathing, and his eyes fluttered open.  Tony had cleared the blinking screen, and he reached over and pulled the mouthpiece from Bucky’s teeth.“Bucky?” Steve asked, barely a whisper as Tony began unlatching the restraints, starting with the one on Bucky’s head but leaving the metal arm in the vice.“S…Steve?” Bucky said, licking his lips and looking around.  “Tony?  Shuri?”  They must have recognized the question in his tone, because Tony and Shuri grinned at each other and then beamed back at Bucky.“How do you feel?” asked Tony.“Well, um…” Bucky said, flexing the fingers in his right hand.  He cleared his throat, peering down his nose at Steve.“Oh,” Steve said, “right.”  He dismounted, his own shirt wet from Bucky’s sweat, his hand red and swollen.  He cradled it to his chest.“What happened?” asked Bucky, alarmed, looking at Steve’s hand.Steve couldn’t help but let out a soft laugh.  “These two just rewired your brain and you’re worried about my hand?  I’m fine, Buck.”“Did I do that?” Bucky asked, trying to sit up, but his arm was still in the vice and he fell with a soft thump back onto the table.  “Steve, I’m so—”“Stop,” Steve interrupted, rubbing his sore knuckles with the opposite palm.  “Super soldier, remember?  It’s already healing.  How do you feel?”Bucky rolled his right shoulder, stretched out his legs, and craned his head side to side.  “I feel…good,” he said, and a small smile tugged at the corner of his mouth.  His answer was tentative, but it was so much more than Steve had expected.“We got them all,” Tony said, pulling the data back onto the screen.“We’ll want to run a few more diagnostic tests later,” Shuri piped up, “but I feel confident enough to say, congratulations, Mr. Barnes.  You are no longer the Winter Soldier.” *** It was true, Bucky did feel good.  He felt lighter, somehow, clearer, less foreign.  The fog clogging his thoughts had lifted and everything felt so soft, or was it hard?  Sharper, but less like the blade of a knife and more…real.  He could focus on one thing at a time, like the sudden floating feeling in his arm when Tony loosened the vice, or the way his sweat looked drenching Steve’s shirt.  He let himself really look at Steve, the dark beard taking over his angular chin, the slight pulse in his neck, the crook right above his collarbone, the shape of his muscles underneath that stupid t-shirt he was wearing.  He was always wearing t-shirts that were way too tight.  Every muscle in his abdomen was visible through that material, and Bucky absolutely couldn’t help himself as he bit his lip and reached out and touched Steve’s stomach.Damn.Bucky was definitely grinning now as he sat up on the table, danging his legs off the side.  Steve raised one eyebrow at him.“You’re big,” Bucky said, still smiling.  Steve laughed.  Bucky felt a little dizzy, actually, like he’d just climbed to the top of a mountain, but his chest wasn’t tight anymore.  He’d been drowning for so long and now Tony and Shuri and Steve had reached in and pulled him to the surface and he’d taken a huge deep breath and every part of his body was getting oxygen again and he was breathing and he was smiling and he was…had Steve’s eyes always been that blue? Steve shook his head at Bucky, but there was an incredulous smile still on his face as he crossed his arms in front of his chest.  His hand wasn’t swollen or red anymore.  Super soldier, indeed.  Did jeans always look that good on him?  Had he always been this…dazzling?  It was like Bucky had been seeing things in grayscale and now everything that was beautiful and blue and bright was Steve standing in front of him in that stupid fucking tight t-shirt and those amazing jeans and that idiotic smile on his absurdly handsome face.And the buzzing—oh, it was still there.  But it was delicate.  It was hot, it was downright searing, but it felt…good.  There it was again.  That mediocre word for every staggering thing he was feeling.  Good.   He grinned as he reached out and hooked a finger through Steve’s belt loop, pulling him forward, pulling Steve right between his legs.  He couldn’t remember ever being this close to Steve’s chest before and he couldn’t breathe again, not really, but it didn’t hurt.  It felt good.  It felt damn good.It was Steve’s turn to back away, though.  He swatted at Bucky’s hand playfully, but he was backing away, and Bucky’s eyebrows knitted together in confusion.  “Where ya goin’, pal?” Bucky asked, trying to reach for him again, but now Steve wasn’t even in arm’s reach.“Bucky, I’m right here,” Steve laughed, but there was something in his eyes that Bucky recognized.  That look Steve got back in the ‘30s when Bucky would get too close, or grab Steve’s hand, or tuck a stray strand of hair behind Steve’s ear.  Bucky’s heart ached to have him where he wanted him.  God dammit, Steve.  Can’t you see I need you so much closer?  He sighed, turning to Tony and Shuri.  To their credit, they’d started to tiptoe out of the room.  Bucky shoved the nagging feeling of disappointment away.  All things considered, Bucky still felt good.  He jumped down from the table and called to the escaping scientists.  “Wait a minute, you two.”

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As Bucky shook hands with Shuri and Tony, thanking them for their help, Steve stared out the windows again at the vast green below, taking deep breaths.  His heart was beating so fast that he might’ve been running.  He had goosebumps on his arms, the feeling of Bucky’s hot breath on his neck still lingering, and he had to get this under control.  He and Bucky, they were just friends.  Best friends, of course, but nothing more.  Steve reached into his pocket and pulled out the pocket watch he still carried, opening it to see the sepia photograph of Peggy, its edges soft and worn.  Waiting for the right partner…He thought he’d found her, all those years ago.  He’d wanted to push her dark hair out of her face and kiss her the moment he first saw her, but he had never had a lot of luck with women.  He was awkward and short and thin, and women didn’t look at him the way they had always looked at Bucky.  Bucky didn’t need the serum to be attractive.  He had always had this air about him, a certain light dancing in his bright green eyes, and he was so tall and confident and Steve was sure that he knew what he was doing when he bit that lower lip of his.  Even the thought of it made Steve’s heart quicken. Then Steve had volunteered for the experiment, falling out of that tiny chamber suddenly Bucky-sized, and women had started to look at him differently.  Peggy looked at him differently.But Bucky had never looked at him differently.  Bucky had always looked at him and seen the real Steve, whoever that was. Steve felt a hand fall on his shoulder and he turned around, Bucky’s face close to his again.  He took a small step back.“Steve…” Bucky started, furrowing his brow.  A little crease appeared right between his eyebrows, above his nose, and it was so endearing and full of concern that Steve wanted to…No.“I can’t believe Stark and Shuri actually did it!” Steve said, sidestepping Bucky.“Yeah,” Bucky said.  “I guess they can give me a new arm now, too.”“I thought you didn’t want one?”“I didn’t want to…hurt anyone again,” Bucky said, frowning and swallowing hard.  He shoved his hands into his pockets.  “What I did…all those years.  It’s still in there.  I can still see their faces.  But it feels a little less like…me.  I still feel guilt…and anger.”  Bucky’s green eyes flared briefly, but he looked down at the floor, toeing at the marble designs.  “But I can finally feel other things too.”  He glanced back up, eyes locking with Steve’s, and he took a step toward Steve again.  Steve hesitated, but didn’t move.“Then we’ll get you a new arm,” Steve said, eyeing the metal prosthesis.  “They have vibranium here, in Wakanda.  It’s what my shield’s made out of.”“Yeah, Tony mentioned that. I want to let Shuri run those diagnostics first, though.  Make sure everything’s…fixed.  As much as it can be.” “You don't need to be fixed, Buck.”“You know what I mean,” Bucky replied.

“I guess that means Wakanda is home for the next few days, at least,” Steve said, crossing his arms and looking out the window again.  Bucky followed his gaze.“You don’t have to stay,” Bucky said, but there was anguish and uncertainty in his voice, and Steve itched to pull him into a hug.“Of course I’ll stay,” he responded quickly, and Bucky looked back at him and gave him one of his signature half-smiles, the kind that used to make Steve a little weak—and still did; even with the serum pulsing through his veins, he felt a little wobbly.  He hadn’t seen that look in so long, and his reckless body was trying to betray him again, trying to reach out to Bucky when he didn’t tell it to, and his arm was out, so he pat Bucky clumsily on the shoulder.  He had to get a little further away so he would stop doing that.  It’s like when Bucky was near enough, his body just drew Steve in, like gravity was pulling them together.That’s all he’d been trying to do for months now, wasn’t it?  Get closer to Bucky.  Get Bucky safe.  Get Bucky help.  Get closer, touch him, hug him, reassure him, protect him.  And now that Bucky was trying to get closer to Steve, Steve was backing away.  It was familiar, though.  Just like in the 30s, when Steve would get close, Bucky stepped back.  When Bucky got close, Steve stepped back.  They were never on the same page.  They’d spent all their lives trying to catch up to one another, back and forth, back and forth, like a seesaw.  Maybe they weren’t ever meant to.It was so exasperating that Steve struggled not to punch something.  Anything to let out this all-consuming frustration.  A raw, hungry energy had been building up inside him ever since he found Bucky in Seattle and he’d had no release.  It was devouring him.Why couldn’t he just let Bucky closer?Because of all the reasons he’d always used before, he thought.  People would talk, they’d turn on him, they’d humiliate him, they’d target him, they’d hurt him, they’d hurt Bucky, if Bucky even…and he couldn’t ask.  He could jump on top of what he thought was a live grenade, a ticking time bomb waiting to rip him to pieces, but he couldn’t ask Bucky how he felt about him.  Because what if it wasn’t what Steve wanted to hear?Or worse, what if it was?

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“Возвращение домой,” Tony said, struggling through the Russian word for ‘homecoming.’  Bucky was shaking now, not imperceptibly.  He had insisted on being strapped down for Shuri and Tony’s diagnostic tests, even though they’d removed the metal arm.  It hadn’t even been that hard once Shuri had done some sort of scan on the thing.  She’d made a four-dimensional model of it and detached it without a problem.  It hadn’t even hurt.  And now Bucky was free of it, didn’t want it, didn’t need it.  But he still needed to be secured.  The arm made him lethal, but without it, he could still cause a lot of damage, and he didn’t want to hurt anyone else.  He wouldn’t hurt anyone else. Bucky even insisted on Steve leaving the room.  Steve put up a fight at this, but Bucky actually begged and Tony put on some Iron Man-esque arm of his own and threatened to shoot Steve with it,  at which Bucky's mind went static with danger, danger, danger, and he'd jumped in front of Steve and growled before Steve laughed, hand on Bucky's shoulder, nudging him out of the way.  Still, Steve had finally acquiesced. And though Bucky was still nervous about hurting Tony or Shuri or somehow escaping and blowing up all of Wakanda, the shrieking sound of the traitorous, serum-enhanced blood throbbing through his head as the words were spoken hadn’t come.  The enraging blindness that had taken over, slowly suffocating him, strangling out what little humanity he had left in him—that hadn’t come either.  He was trembling against the leather straps, but he was still Bucky.  “грузовой вагон,” Tony finished, sounding out ‘freight car.’Bucky shook harder, sweating now, breathing so fast that he was dizzy.  But still, nothing.“That was dramatic,” Tony said coolly, exiting the computer screen and walking over.  He was smiling that familiar smug smile, one eyebrow raised.  “So, who am I talking to?  Brooding, depressed Bucky or killing machine Bucky?”  Bucky scowled in response.  “Ah, yes, the former, I see.  Well, in that case, you won’t mind if I undo these—”

“Do it again,” Bucky said.Tony stopped, hand mid-air, and pursed his lips.  “Why would I do that?”“You might have mispronounced something.”“Do I really seem like someone who makes mistakes?”Bucky could have pointed out all the things Steve had told him about Tony Stark, like the nuclear warheads, but he thought that would be a low blow, so he held his tongue.  “Just do it again.”Tony looked up at the ceiling and closed his eyes, sighing heavily, obviously biting back an exasperated remark.  But he walked back to the screen, and, rolling his eyes, started again.               After half a day of Bucky insisting that Tony said the words in the wrong order or didn’t say the “r” sound quite right, Bucky gave in to the idea that maybe he and Shuri had actually worked a miracle on him. “So, Mr. Barnes, do you want to see what I’ve made for you in my lab?” Shuri asked him when Bucky had finally let Tony unstrap him from the table.  Her dark eyes were shining and there was a small smile playing on her lips, a ghost of the arrogant looks Tony always gave, but a self-satisfied smile nonetheless.  Bucky quirked an eyebrow at her and let her lead him to her lab.It was a place like Bucky had never seen.  It was massive, all glass and metal and light shining off the enormous machines, sleek, almost invisible computer screens lining the walls, the floor black and white marble carved in jagged patterns.  Guns lay disassembled on white countertops, black suits hung, stretched out in front of some kind of scanner, little green and yellow bulbs all over lighting up occasionally, some making high-pitched but quiet ringing noises.  There were people tending to various screens, all dressed in white.Bucky was overwhelmed at all the brightness of it, and he paused in the doorway, eyes wide.  Shuri turned to him, smiling wider, and reached out a hand.  He felt his mouth hanging open slightly, but he couldn’t quite muster up the sense to hide his amazement, and he tucked her tiny hand in his and let her lead him inside.They finally stopped at one of the many glossy countertops, on top of which rested a black leather box, austere against the white of the room.  Shuri sat Bucky down on a stool beside her.  Bucky’s heart should have been racing, but he was too entranced at all the novelty of everything in her lab that he couldn’t focus.“Mr. Barnes,” she said, calling for his attention.“Just Bucky, please,” he responded, dragging his eyes to her. “Okay,” she smiled, turning to the box, her fingers hovering over the golden latch.  “You don’t have to accept this, but I wanted you to know that it is yours if you want it.”  With that, she flipped open the latch and lifted the top of the box to reveal a metal arm.  It was different than the one Bucky had worn, all uneven and rough, the red star like blood splashed on the deltoid.  This one was smooth, no sharp edges digging into each other, no blood-red star, and it was a different silver, too—matte and gunmetal, and intricate in its own way.  Impressive.  The old Bucky would have whistled at the sight.Bucky shifted on his stool, leaning over the box.  It really was beautiful, a piece of art, and Shuri had made it for him.  He could at least try it on.“Okay,” he said, “let’s give it a go.”  Shuri grinned, picking up the arm and, with deft fingers, attaching it to the metal socket that the old arm had left behind.  Bucky could feel it clicking into place, and found that it was thinner and lighter than the old one.  Shuri stepped back to admire her handiwork as Bucky shrugged his shoulders, testing it.  To his surprise, it felt…right.“Flex your fingers,” Shuri said, and Bucky obliged, and it felt like using his own hand again.  These fingers hadn’t shot a gun, hadn’t crushed anyone’s throats or snapped anyone’s necks.  This arm hadn’t betrayed his entire country, his home, his heart…this arm hadn’t hit Steve, hadn’t been intent on killing him, hadn’t bruised and cut the most important thing to him on this Earth or any other…and this arm was strong, stronger even than the one given to him by Hydra, and the way it let him bend his elbow and flick his wrist was so incredibly human.  He was looking from his new hand to Shuri and back, mouth open again in shock.  She was still smiling.  “What do you think?”“It’s…it’s…” and Bucky couldn’t find the words for exactly what it was. “Hang on,” she said, like she had another surprise, “close your eyes.”  Bucky didn’t generally take to closing his eyes in front of anyone because he didn’t fully trust anyone, except for Steve, but the sound of Shuri’s sure voice and the way her invention felt in his skin and the impossibly bright lab and that lingering feeling of good that he’d felt since Tony and Shuri dug out those implanted words made him a lot less leery, and he closed his eyes. He felt a tickle on his arm.  Not his right arm, with its skin and veins and nerves and muscle, but his left arm, the one taken from him after he fell, the one that only ever felt metallic and cold and wrong.   Bucky jerked back a little in surprise, opening his eyes again.  “What—”Shuri was holding a single white feather, running its edges against the crook of Bucky’s elbow, and he could feel it.  He could feel the little thing, so insignificant, so small, almost weightless, its soft, floating edges sending flickering sensation up his arm and deep into his chest, his stomach furling and unfurling in satisfaction.  He stood up in one fluid motion, putting both arms around Shuri and pulling her in, her laugh catching in his chest and he was laughing too and he was definitely still open-mouthed and nothing would ever compare to this gift Shuri had given him.But as soon as the thought crossed his mind, it came grinding to a halt.  He sank back down into his stool and looked at the arm again, eyebrows knitted in sorrow.  He couldn’t keep this.  He knew it was made of vibranium, the stuff Steve and Tony had told him about, the sturdy, unbreakable, dreadfully invincible metal that made up Steve’s shield, that symbol for everything Steve stood for and protected.  Bucky couldn’t have something like that.  Bucky didn’t stand for anything.  Bucky had done too much, too much carnage and murder and slaughter, all him, brutalities unspeakable and unending, and Bucky couldn’t possibly accept this arm with its unyielding strength, couldn’t have something that wouldn’t give under any kind of force.Bucky was dangerous.“Take it off,” he said, low and ferocious, like he’d just been backed into a corner.  Shuri looked down at him quizzically.“Bucky—”“Shuri, get this damn thing off of me,” Bucky growled, wanting so badly to keep it, wanting to feel with it, but not wanting to kill with it, like he knew he could, like he knew he would…And then, of course, of fucking course, Steve Rogers walked into the lab.  Did he have a god damn tracker on Bucky?  Could he feel when Bucky got this way?  And how did he know he was the only cure?Shuri hesitated too long, and Steve was by her side, and he was looking at Bucky with that same warm look that melted Bucky’s resolve like butter, and he was smiling, because of course he was smiling, and he was eyeing the new arm Bucky was sporting, and because Steve was so infuriating and because he was always close to Bucky when Bucky wanted him to back away (and always so annoyingly far way when Bucky wanted him close), he reached out and touched Bucky’s new hand, and Bucky felt Steve’s fingertips, certain and tickling and warm and there was that damn buzzing again and the buzzing wasn’t just in the air around them, it was in Bucky’s hand and up his arm and in his head, and Steve was running his fingers up Bucky’s palm, his nails just barely scraping the metal up Bucky’s forearm, and Bucky’s heart was in his throat and he was shivering and he didn’t stand a god damn chance now that Steve was touching his arm like that.“Looks good, Shuri,” Steve said, and just like that his fingers were off of Bucky’s arm, but Bucky still felt so good, still reeled from Steve’s delicate touch, that he didn’t move, didn’t speak, too conflicted now to talk.Because Bucky didn’t want the arm if he was going to hurt someone with it, but he wanted the arm if it meant he could feel Steve touching him like that again.  Was it worth the trade?No.  No, of course not. But, said a small voice in his head, Shuri and Tony erased the Winter Soldier.  You won’t hurt anyone anymore.  No one can make you hurt anyone.  And what you just felt?  You could feel that forever.  You could feel Steve forever.  You could feel your arm beneath his hands, if you could just get him to…Bucky huffed in exasperation at his inner monologue, and Steve raised an eyebrow at him, crossing those stupid, strong arms in front of his chest again.“Are you gonna keep it?”  Bucky could have rolled his eyes at the question because that was the question, wasn’t it, and Bucky just didn’t know the answer.“Can I think about it, Shuri?”“Of course,” she responded, but still, she hesitated.  “Do you want to think about it with it on or with it off?”Another impossible question.  With it on, he could hurt someone, he could hurt Steve, but he could also feel things, things that formed a lump in his throat, and something stirred deep inside his belly…“Um…”“C’mon, Buck, leave it on for a bit.  See how it feels,” Steve urged, and despite Bucky’s qualms, he knew he wasn’t taking it off now.

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Steve, Bucky, and even Sam had decided to stay in Wakanda for a while.  Natasha kept Steve and Sam informed on her and Fury’s movements in Eastern Europe as they tried to flush out Hydra’s remaining cells.  She promised to keep them in the loop if they needed them.  So far, if they’d found any Hydra bases, Natasha hadn’t shared that with Steve.It had been a few weeks since the procedure, the one that erased the Winter Soldier, but Steve could still see it in Bucky’s eyes sometimes.  Every morning, he and Bucky met up outside of Bucky’s little hut on the hill that Shuri had set him up in, and they’d run together.  Not an all-out dash like Steve was used to in battle, but a nice jog, fast-paced but steady.  They would do a few laps around the palace and stop at the edge of the lake, watching the lazy ripples that reverberated out when they dipped their feet in the water.  Sometimes, Bucky would run his metal hand through his sweat-damp hair, and it looked so natural in the morning light that Steve sometimes forgot that Bucky wasn’t born with it.  Then Bucky would look down at the hand, ball it into a fist, grimacing and knitting his eyebrows together.  Steve wondered if it was another memory, another piercing wound of Bucky’s that Steve wanted so badly to sew up.But some mornings, Bucky was all warmth, that blazing smile that Steve had known so well before the War lighting up even the dark places.  The small gestures that Bucky didn’t even know he was making, like biting his lip, or rubbing the heel of his hand on his chest, or scratching his long fingers through his beard, or tucking hair behind his ear, or his languid, gravelly laughter that Steve could sometimes produce from Bucky—all of it was like Bucky from Before, none of the stiffness or venom of the Winter Soldier behind his captivating green eyes.  It all made Steve’s heart flutter in his chest.Sometimes, Sam joined them on their runs.Bucky was having one of his mornings where Steve felt like he was out of reach, like doing anything, even jogging, was something he was doing on autopilot.  On those mornings, Steve remained quietly at Bucky’s side, just in case Bucky needed him—though Bucky never seemed to need him at all.“On your left!” Sam called when he lapped Steve and Bucky for the first time. Steve was so surprised, had been so focused on keeping step with Bucky, that he hadn’t heard Sam come up behind them.  As Sam passed by, he turned around and started running backwards in front of Steve and Bucky, laughing and shrugging his shoulders.“You little…” Steve began.“Language, Cap!” Sam said, grinning that gap-toothed grin, sweat pooling at the neckline of his t-shirt.“I swear to God,” Steve said, speeding up and passing Sam.  Sam turned and sped up as well, and the two were racing alongside each other.  Steve laughed, knowing he could pull ahead of Sam at any time, but holding back because it was so good to just live in a moment that didn’t have any darkness seeping in around it.  Sam was sprinting now, huffing and trying to keep the pace, pushing Steve with both hands to try to get him off-balance.  “Cheater!” Steve laughed, regaining his momentum and catching up.Then Bucky appeared alongside them with a small smile, the acceleration pushing the long hair off of his face.“Fuck you, man!” Sam said when Bucky passed both of them, but there was no hardness to it.  “You two have that super soldier power!  This is the definition of cheating!”“Sorry, dude,” Steve shrugged, laughing still and passing Sam to catch up with Bucky.Sam huffed in indignation behind them, running as fast as he could.  Bucky had picked up the pace and was just in front of Steve now.  “Race you to the lake!” Bucky called over his shoulder.“Oh, you’re on,” Steve replied.The adrenaline coursed through him as he trailed Bucky, just barely.  He could feel his heartrate quickening.  The way Bucky looked from behind, the curve of his lower back and the sweat dripping down the back of his neck, plastering some strands of dark hair to his perfect skin—it made the tips of Steve’s fingers tingle.  Every nerve ending in his body was on fire, and it wasn’t from the run.  The run he could handle.  It was the way Bucky looked, the way his sweat smelled lingering on his skin, the way his t-shirt rucked up a little at his waist, it was all dizzying.  Steve caught up to Bucky, and the two of them matched each other step-for-step, finally slowing down as they reached the edge of the lake.“I’m pretty sure I won,” Bucky said, panting and bending over, hands on his knees.“You wish!” Steve laughed, eyeing the way the tight muscles in Bucky’s back heaved as he breathed.  Steve wondered what he looked like without a t-shirt now.“I…want…a rematch…” Sam said a minute later when he reached them, throwing himself onto the grass and breathing hard.“Neither of you stand a chance,” Steve said, hands on his hips.“I could take you in my sleep,” Bucky laughed, shoving Steve’s shoulder. “Yeah, in your dreams,” Steve said, shoving Bucky back, not missing how Bucky's shoulders tensed a little at Steve's words.“Oh, you think so?” Bucky responded, smile still on his lips, and Steve was so mesmerized at the light dancing in Bucky’s eyes and the way the sun shone on his hair that he hadn’t even registered that Bucky was running at him now, shoulders down, and Bucky collided with Steve hard enough that Steve was falling backward into the lake.  He had just enough time to wrap both arms around Bucky and pull Bucky in with him.They both resurfaced, sputtering and laughing, Bucky splashing Steve in the face.  “Asshole!” Bucky chuckled, slicking his wet hair back with both hands.“You started it!” Steve replied, indignant, splashing Bucky back.“WATCH THE LANGUAGE!” Sam yelled from his spot in the grass, and Steve was rolling his eyes and laughing, and Bucky was shaking his head and laughing too, his smile so big and beautiful that Steve felt his knees give a little. “Come on, pal,” Bucky said, slinging his arm around Steve’s neck and leading him to the shoreline.  The way the cool metal felt on the back of Steve’s neck was tantalizing, and Steve’s whole body was humming with the proximity, his breath catching in his throat.  He hoped Bucky didn’t notice that his heart was hammering harder than it had when they’d been running as he let Bucky lead him ashore.  They collapsed together on the grass next to Sam.The three of them lay there for some time, staring up at the azure sky above, little fluffy clouds hung here and there, passing sluggishly by.“Man, y’all suck,” Sam said eventually, pushing himself off the grass and heading back to the palace.  Steve lifted his head to watch him go and smiled to himself.***It was too hot out there.  It was way too hot, the sun beaming down on Bucky’s drying skin, but that’s not what it was…it was the furnace fire of heat that Bucky felt when he was this close to Steve, lying in the grass and staring at the sky like they had back in in 30s.  The absolute inferno that Steve’s body radiated made Bucky giddy, dizzy in a way that wasn’t uncomfortable, and the buzzing that overwhelmed any birdsong was unrelenting but pleasant.The feeling was engulfing him.Bucky couldn’t even think to stop himself when he nudged Steve’s arm with his, and nothing, nothing could have prepared him for Steve reaching out and grabbing Bucky’s hand, his new one, the one that felt so real that warmth was spreading up his arm, unfurling itself like a cat in Bucky’s chest at Steve’s touch.  And now Steve was trailing his fingertips up Bucky’s arm like he had in the lab, and it felt like every cell in Bucky’s body was exploding, screaming from the pleasure of it, and it was so, so, so much better than that stupid fucking feather and Steve’s fingers were moving back down his arm and everything in their wake was gooey and delicious and warm.It could have been hours later, Bucky didn’t know, he couldn’t think, but eventually Steve’s fingers disappeared, and the sudden cold feeling was so jarring that Bucky hitched himself up on his elbows and looked at Steve, whose blue eyes were fluttering open. “Sorry,” Steve murmured, resting both hands on his chest.“Don’t—” Bucky started, just barely stopping himself from reaching for Steve’s hand again.  He fell back down into the grass. “Don’t apologize.”Bucky wanted to say it felt good, it felt right, it felt perfect, it felt insane, but he didn’t.  He licked his lips and sighed, closing his eyes and feeling a little like he’d just found something invaluable, only to lose it again.

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Time to come in.“So much for ‘hey, how ya doin?’” Steve said, flashing his phone screen to Sam.“Aw, how sweet,” Sam responded, pulling his own phone out of his back pocket and checking his texts.  “Looks like we’re off to…Luh…jub…what the hell, man?  Hydra gotta hide their asses in a city I can’t even pronounce?  This is bullshit.”Steve looked down at the follow-up text.  Ljubljana, Slovenia.  I’ll send the coordinates.“Not your idea of a vacation?”“Eh, it’ll be good to get back on a mission.  As long as I don’t have to save your sorry ass again this time.”“Why would you need saving?” Bucky asked as he walked through the doorway to the suite T’Challa had offered to Sam.  Steve would never get used to seeing Bucky wandering around the marble halls of the Wakandan palace.  He was used to Bucky in Brooklyn, paint-chipped walls and sickly yellow wallpaper, or crowding a tent flap, hands grimy and strong at his side.  This Bucky, with his hair pulled back into a half-bun behind his head, a maroon t-shirt bunching up at the hem of his black cargo pants—this Bucky was foreign to this place, to this time.  He didn’t belong there.  But then again, neither did Steve.“Cap can’t seem to stop sacrificing himself for the ‘greater good,’ and then I have to risk my damn life to save him,” Sam said, shoving unfolded clothes into an olive duffle bag on the bed.  Steve laughed.“When have I ever needed saving?”“Uh, let’s see, there was Bucharest, St. Petersburg, Prague, oh, and I seem to remember an incident in Warsaw involving a pipe bomb and handcuffs.”“I had them on the ropes!” Steve laughed, glancing at Bucky, whose gaze suddenly became softer.  Steve wasn’t even surprised when he felt his heart skip a beat.“I’m sure you did, Stevie,” Bucky said, almost a whisper, and he smiled at Steve, whose breath caught in his throat at Bucky’s old nickname for him.  He hadn’t heard it in so long that he’d almost forgotten it.  Sam cleared his throat, and Bucky bit down on his lip.  “So, uh, are you going somewhere?” Bucky asked.“Yeah, Lubjublala,” said Sam.“Never heard of it.”“That’s because it’s Ljubljana,” Steve corrected.  He handed his phone to Bucky.“Hydra?”“Cut off one head, or some shit,” Sam responded, zipping his bag.“I want to come.”Steve had been waiting for Bucky to say this.  He knew Bucky would want to help in any way he could, and Steve had to admit that he didn’t fancy leaving Bucky behind, but he knew Nat and Fury would never let him come.“Buck, I’m sorry, but you gotta sit this one out.”“Why?” Bucky asked.  “I can help!  And I’ve been training with T’Challa!  I know Hydra, Steve.”“And they know you,” Steve said, at which Bucky flinched.  “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it like that,” he amended quickly, taking a step toward Bucky and reaching out a hand.  Bucky glowered and stepped back.  Magnets, always magnets, always one step away, never too close.  Dammit, Steve thought, clenching his fist.“I don’t need you to remind me what I did,” Bucky said, tone flat and angry.“What Hydra made you do.”“Still me, Steve.”“Buck, we’ve been over this—”“Yeah, and I don’t really want to fucking go over it again,” Bucky snapped.“Language,” Sam said, and Steve knew he was just trying to interject some levity into the conversation, but he had stepped in between Bucky and Steve, one hand lightly on Bucky’s chest.  Steve thought Bucky might break Sam’s wrist from the look he was giving him, but he exhaled in a huff and turned away.“So you’re just gonna leave me here with a babysitter?” Bucky asked, motioning toward the hallway.“It’s not like that, Buck,” Steve argued, but he knew how Bucky must feel, and he also knew that leaving Bucky behind would be next to impossible.  He hadn’t been away from Bucky since they’d found him in Seattle, and he was so afraid that if he left him now, he’d never be able to find him again.  The thought of it made his stomach tangle in knots.  He felt a little sick.“Fine, go, whatever.  I guess I’ll hang back and, what was it you said? ‘Collect scrap metal in my little red wagon?’” Bucky said over his shoulder, and Steve wanted so badly to stop him, to wrap his arms around him, to run his hand through Bucky’s dark hair and whisper that he wouldn’t leave him, but Bucky was already out the door.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

A week had gone by.  A whole week since Bucky had felt Steve in the room with him, had felt that maddening buzzing, had felt whole.  Steve being gone felt like a hole in the chest—a gaping wound with raw, tattered edges that left Bucky feeling choked and incomplete.On top of that, Bucky hadn’t heard from Steve, Sam, or even Natasha or Fury in three days.  Neither had T’Challa.  No one could tell Bucky if Steve was okay.  T’Challa tried to reassure him, tried to focus Bucky’s worried energy into combat when they trained together, but Bucky couldn’t focus.  He could barely think.  When was the last time he’d eaten?And why, why, why the hell had he let Steve go without him?  That big dumb lug would put himself between danger and his friends without a second thought.  He needed someone to jump in front of him for a change.  Bucky would be that person.  Bucky was always that person.  God dammit, Steve, he thought, his metal fist clenched in his lap.  More than anything, Bucky wanted to find Steve, to hop on a quinjet to Slovenia and comb the countryside for his reckless, rash, insane, obtuse—Bucky’s cell phone vibrated in his pocket.
They’re back.
T’Challa couldn’t have predicted that his simple text would send Bucky’s heart thumping into his throat, but Bucky ignored the uncomfortable choking sensation and took off toward the landing pad.  They were back.  They were back.  Steve is back…Bucky barely had the patience to wait for the quinjet hatch to open, and he definitely didn’t have the patience to wait for them to disembark, so he strode up the walkway and saw Sam supporting Steve, Steve’s long arm slung over Sam’s shoulder, his head dropped to his chest as he tried not to put too much of his weight on Sam. “Shit,” Bucky swore under his breath, running toward them and ducking under Steve’s other arm, pulling his weight onto his shoulders.  “What the hell happened?”  He tried not to sound too scared as he eyed Steve’s face, a cut just above Steve’s left eye dripping blood down his cheek.“Ambush,” grunted Sam.  “We managed to destroy the base, but Cap here decided to hang back a little too long.”Bucky could feel his blood boiling, and it felt like there was a dragon awakening in his chest.  He clenched his teeth.  “Why the hell would you do that?” he asked in a low growl.“There…was…a kid…maybe eighteen years old,” Steve explained.  His eyes were closed, his breath coming in short gasps, and Bucky could feel him shift more of his weight onto Bucky as they walked.  Of course, of course Steve would sacrifice himself for some idiot kid that got himself wrapped up in Hydra way too young.  The dragon in Bucky’s chest was curling and angry, threatening to spit fire.“And you thought your life was worth risking for his?”“I’m not…worth any more…than he is.”“God dammit, Steve!  You’re worth ten of him!” Bucky yelled.  Steve flinched.  “Don’t you know what you mean to me?” he asked, voice softer now, so soft that only Steve could hear.  “What would I have done if you’d gotten yourself killed?” Bucky could hear the choked sob in his voice, and he cleared his throat.  Steve looked up at him, blue eyes all concerned and tender, and the way he looked at Bucky was making Bucky’s knees weak.  He tore his gaze away from Steve’s face and focused on supporting most of his weight.  Sam was still on Steve’s other side, panting a little under Steve’s bulk as they made their way to the infirmary, led by T’Challa and a few medics, who had smartly refrained from coming between Bucky and Steve.“Buck, I…I’m sorry,” Steve said, his warm breath on Bucky’s neck.  The buzzing was electric now, zapping Bucky’s rage into something gentle and mewling, and his chest was aching with the weight of it.“’S fine, Stevie,” he breathed, because he couldn’t bear to say anything else.  Not with Steve looking at him like that and his breath on Bucky’s neck and all the unspoken things between them.Sam looked relieved when they reached the infirmary, rubbing his neck when they’d finally dumped Steve onto a bed.  Medics and nurses were swarming Steve now, bandaging the cut on his face, sticking his forearm with a needle, starting IVs and putting electrodes on his chest that connected to a sleek, black computer screen, wrapping a blood pressure cuff around his bicep.  None of them asked Bucky to move.  They simply worked around him, communicating to each other in nods and raised eyebrows.“We’ve given him something to help him sleep,” one of them told Bucky as Steve’s eyelids closed heavily.  Bucky nodded.  He didn’t have to ask if Steve was going to be okay.  He knew the serum was already working its magic on Steve’s battered body, healing him faster than anything the nurses could do for him.“He looks peaceful,” said a voice from behind him, and he turned to see Natasha Romanov, clad in her usual black, thin but strong arms crossed in front of her chest.  Bucky narrowed his eyes at her.“No thanks to you.”  Natasha raised an eyebrow, a smile tugging at one corner of her lips.  Bucky had the feeling that not many people talked to her that way.“Look, I know you worry about him—”                “You don’t know anything about me, or him,” Bucky snapped, and he felt his shoulders tense up, both fists clenched at his sides.  His whole body was taut and heated. “Easy,” she responded slowly, but she didn’t back away like most people did when Bucky scowled at them like that.  “I didn’t want him to get hurt either.”“Could’ve fooled me,” Bucky said, turning away from her and taking Steve’s hand in his.  He had no interest in easing Natasha’s conscience.  “He’s not going anywhere without me again.  Not ever.”  It wasn’t a request.“Fair enough,” she said.  Bucky could feel her eyes on him.  It irritated him.  “Bucky,” and her voice was softer now, “I care about him too.”“I’m sure T’Challa will keep you updated then.”  Bucky’s request was obvious, if unspoken, and he didn’t have to turn around to know she’d heeded it.  He couldn’t feel her eyes on him anymore.  She was gone.Bucky squeezed Steve’s hand and ran his metal fingers through Steve’s hair with the other.  The way the silky strands felt between his metal fingers, the soft warmth of Steve’s hand in his, it was all a little much.  Even the buzzing was still there.  Bucky felt tired, tired of worrying, tired of wanting, tired of resisting urges and pushing down feelings and aching, always aching.  Steve’s heavy breathing was sleepy, his chest rising and falling easily, and Bucky couldn’t help it, couldn’t fight the compulsion, didn’t want to, and he leaned down and brushed his lips on Steve’s forehead.  The resulting tingle, the spark igniting in his chest, the soft mmm Steve uttered—it was all so, so worth it.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

“Ow,” Steve winced.“Wuss,” Bucky responded, but he eased up a little.  Steve was lying down on a gym mat, Bucky kneeling over him with his right hand cupping Steve’s left shoulder and his metal hand in the crook of Steve’s elbow, pulling Steve’s left arm over his body and stretching it.  Honestly, it didn’t hurt Steve at all.  His shoulder was a little sore from the bullet he’d taken, sure, but as soon as they’d dug the thing out and his skin healed over the wound—no scar—he hadn’t felt much pain in it.  This, though.  This was the opposite of pain.  Maybe it should hurt him, maybe a little, but Bucky crouched beside him, his broad frame hovering over him, the feel of his leg pressed against Steve’s right side and the prickling sensation that flooded out from all the places Bucky was touching him—none of that could be considered painful in the least.This was becoming A Problem.Steve hadn’t spent a lot of time analyzing things between him and Bucky, not since before that sweltering, sticky day in the sun when he’d dozed off and woken up to find himself trailing his fingers on Bucky’s arm.  It felt good to reach out and to find that there was something still there to touch.  Every time he’d reached out before, there’d been only air where Bucky had been, where Bucky had stepped back, away, always a step away, unless there was a good reason for them to touch. Physical therapy seemed a good enough reason.So Steve pretended to ache more than he really did, pretended to need Bucky’s help with stretches, pretended that some movements still hurt him.  Did Bucky know?  Did he suspect that the only reason he was still putting his hands on Steve was because Steve was lying to him?  Steve knew it was wrong, and he had always prided himself on doing “the right thing.”  But was this really so wrong?The fire in his gut said no.His head said yes.Stupid head. But the touch and the closeness of Bucky felt so good.  His whole body was betraying him. “All right, come on, sit up.”  Bucky tapped a palm to Steve’s side, his cue to tune back in.  Steve obliged, and Bucky shifted behind him.  His hand appeared on Steve’s neck, lightly, and Bucky’s palm was so warm and soft that it was like a giant match lighting Steve’s nerves on fire.  Steve closed his eyes, and there was nothing he could do to stop himself from leaning into it a little.  God, that feels good.  Bucky’s metal hand curled just below Steve’s bicep, and he raised Steve’s bent arm to shoulder level, stretching his deltoid and trapezius deliciously.A little moan escaped Steve’s lips.“Is this okay?” Bucky asked, letting Steve’s arm drop a little, concern in his voice.  Bucky had turned his attention from Steve’s arm to Steve’s face, the ends of his hair brushing against Steve’s shoulder like tiny firecrackers, sending a current of mouthwatering tingles up and down his arm.“It’s great,” Steve breathed.  Soaking up all the succulent, crackling, burning energy, his eyes still closed, Steve felt absolutely ablaze.  Bucky hummed in approval, lifting Steve’s arm up again, and the resulting stretch felt so good that Steve moaned again.Steve didn’t have to open his eyes to know Bucky was smiling.  He could feel it.Bucky ran his hand down Steve’s bent arm and tugged at his wrist to extend it.  His other hand slid down from Steve’s neck and rested on his shoulder.  With his fingers around Steve’s wrist, he started moving Steve’s arm up and around in a small circle.“What’s next, Cap?  Pilates?” Steve cracked one eye open to squint at Sam, who’d just walked in the training room and was standing nearby, a knowing smirk plastered on his face.“You can’t rush healing,” Steve responded, a little grateful for the interruption.  Before Sam had walked in, the heat that Bucky’s touch was eliciting in Steve had started to get real low in his gut.  Too low.Ignoring Sam completely, Bucky moved one hand to the middle of Steve’s back and pulled at Steve’s wrist, lifting Steve’s arm up and over his head.  He tugged back a little so Steve was stretching backward and up.  Turns out, when he wasn’t focused on the way Bucky’s hands felt on him, his shoulder did ache.  A little.Bucky must have noticed Steve’s flinch, however miniscule, and he let up immediately, spinning Steve around to face him.“Fuck, I’m sorry, Steve.”Steve grinned.  “It’s okay, Bucky.”  And just like that, Steve had a good enough reason to continue physical therapy.I mean, part of it’s research, he thought to himself.  Maybe…maybe I’m not the only one who feels like this when we’re touching…but he shut the thought down immediately.  It was too much to hope like that, and hope had never gotten him anywhere.********“While I’m sure the amenities have been up to par, you have to admit that nothing beats Stark Tower,” Tony smirked.  Bucky, Steve, Natasha, Sam, and T’Challa were gathered in one of the smaller conference rooms.  Bucky was fidgeting in his swivel chair as he watched Tony pace on the screen before them, hands shoved in the pockets of his slacks.“I don’t know if you heard, but Cap had a bullet in his arm just last week,” Sam pointed out.  “He’s not well enough right now.”Tony pursed his lips and raised an eyebrow at Sam through the screen. “He looks fine to me.  Gramps?”“Sam—” Steve started, sighing and turning toward his friend.“Don’t—”“—sprained his ankle.”Tony scoffed. “So Quailman’s down for the count.”“Look, Robocop, I’m fine.”“Well we’ll take however many of you we can get.  This sleeper here in New York is starting to wake up, and Fury is breathing down my neck to get it under control.”Bucky was trying to focus on the thoughts whirring in his mind.  Hydra had a sleeper cell in New York?  Weren’t they smarter than that?And then, menacingly, a voice in his head whispered, Yes, they’re brilliant, which means they didn’t think hiding out in New York was a bad idea.  Which means…“We’re on our way,” Steve said, moving to stand.  Bucky felt anger curling in his chest.  Steve hadn’t asked one question about any of it.  He had made his decision without ever thinking about the consequences.  He was going to risk his life, again.Bucky stood before Steve could and put a hand out toward Steve’s chest.  The air thrummed with the proximity.  Bucky ignored it.  “Wait, no.  We’re not going just like that.”“I don’t remember inviting the One-Armed Wonder,” Tony responded.“Steve isn’t going anywhere without me,” Bucky snarled, and the tone in his voice was far more threat than promise.Steve stood too, moving closer to Bucky and putting one large hand on Bucky’s shoulder.  “I’ve got to go, pal.”“Not without me,” Bucky repeated, eyes narrowing.  There was no way in hell he was letting Steve go on another mission without protection.  He already knew Sam couldn’t be trusted with keeping Steve safe, and he didn’t trust Natasha or Tony as far as he could throw them.But then again, they probably didn’t trust him either.Tony’s sigh was audible over the speaker.  “Look, to be honest, I don’t care what’s going on in your love life—” Bucky and Steve both flinched.  Tony barreled on without noticing. “—but I do care about Stark Tower getting blown up.  Not that they’d get past security, but, you know, better safe than sorry.”“How big is the sleeper?” Bucky asked, deciding to ignore Tony’s dig.“Intel says around a hundred, give or take.”“A hundred?  That’s not a cell, that’s a parade!” Bucky barked.“Oh, come on, we’ve faced worse!  Remember Ultron’s sentries, Cap?  Nat?”“You mean the ones that helped Ultron nearly drop an entire city on Earth’s surface and cause global distinction?  Yeah, that rings a bell,” Natasha responded coolly.“Okay, when you say it like that, it sounds bad, but we stopped them!  Remember the shawarma?” Apparently shawarma was a thing after their big battles.“I remember we had the help of a thousand-pound giant and a hammer-wielding god,” Steve quips.“These aren’t AI we’re fighting this time!  They’re just a bunch of Nazi assholes.  They’re human.”“He has a point,” Natasha said.  “It wouldn’t be a bad idea to get a jump on these guys before they come up with something resembling a plan.”“They have a plan,” Bucky interjected, “they always have a plan.”“Well this time, we’re going to head it off,” Steve said.  He took a step toward Bucky, lowering his voice.  “Look, buddy, you don’t have to—”“Don’t fucking tell me I don’t have to come, Steve.  You can’t stop yourself from jumping in front of bullets, so you need someone who’s going to jump in front of you.” That was way too honest, Barnes, he thought, huffing.  But it was too late.  The pained look was already spread across Steve’s face.“There’s no way I’m letting you jump in front of me,” Steve whispered, and Bucky saw his hand twitch at his side like he wanted to reach out. “You’d never be able to stop me.”“Boys, boys, I’m sure there’s an agent for everyone,” Tony interrupted, but the ache in Bucky’s chest was still pounding.“As you all know, you are always welcome in Wakanda,” T’Challa said, whether to ease the tension or change the subject, Bucky wasn’t sure. “But we can have you off to New York in an hour.  I have matters to attend to here.”“Of course, Your Highness, no need to don the catsuit,” said Tony, a wry smile playing on his lips.“We’ll be there soon,” Natasha said, standing and tapping the screen to exit the video call.  Even with Tony’s face gone from the screen, Bucky could feel the tension in his muscles, the way his body tightened at a threat.  Natasha, Sam, and T’Challa were filing out of the room, Sam limping a little, but trying hard to conceal it.Bucky made no move to follow.  To his credit, neither did Steve.  Bucky was trying hard to calm the dragon raging in his chest.  He took a few deep breaths, steadying himself.  “Okay, when I left you at the recruitment tent that night in Brooklyn and told you not to do anything stupid until I got back, you really didn’t listen.”“Buck, I—”Bucky held up a hand to quiet Steve.  His breathing was becoming sharper now, the anger roiling out of his mouth before he could stop it.  “You signed up to be a guinea pig for a mysterious science experiment, you waltzed right into a Hydra camp without any backup, you ziplined onto a moving train, you crashed a plane into the Arctic—”“Bucky—”“Oh, I’m just getting started, Steve, so you just better fucking settle in,” Bucky said, and his voice was more of a yell now.  “You joined the Avengers, you jumped around on a flying helicarrier to restart an engine, you battled space monsters that came hurtling out of the sky, you stopped fighting me when we were on that street in D.C.—actually, you were going to let me kill you on that damn helicarrier—and I think Stark already mentioned Ultron.  Then, after all that, you came looking for me!”“Of course I came looking for you, Bucky.”“You don’t know what I’m capable of.”“You wouldn’t hurt me.”“I think we’ve established that I nearly killed you!”“That was the Winter Soldier.  We’ve been over this.”Bucky threw his hands up in the air.  “Whatever!” he yelled.  He was pacing back and forth now, worrying his lip between his teeth.  God, he wanted to punch something.  “Now you want to go running back to New York to take on a Hydra sleeper cell without knowing anything about their plan!”“What choice do I have, Bucky?  I can’t let innocent people get killed.  I’m Cap—”“Don’t, Steve.  Don’t you dare fucking say you’re Captain America.”“I am!” Steve said, putting himself in Bucky’s way as he paced.  Bucky halted just in front of Steve’s chest, and the rise and fall of his muscles under that damn t-shirt was turning Bucky’s anger to…what was that feeling?  Arousal?  Bucky tore his eyes off of Steve and focused on the wall behind his head.“That’s not why you do these things, Steve.  What do you have to prove to anyone?” Steve ran a hand over his face, sighing. “I spent my whole life not being able to do anything, not being able to help people.  Barely being able to help myself!  A strong wind could have blown me over.  You remember when I got scarlet fever in ’39?  I barely lived through it.”Bucky remembered.  He remembered Steve’s white-coated tongue, remembered Steve pink-cheeked and pathetic, pushing the covers off of his thin legs and then shivering and pulling them back up, how Bucky worried about the room and kept putting his hand on Steve’s forehead to feel how hot he was, how he hated to keep waking Steve to force water down his throat, how Steve’s hands shook under the weight of the chipped porcelain coffee cup and he spilled hot chamomile tea on his lap, how Bucky had eventually given in to the sleep that had fogged his brain and woken up with Steve’s bony arm flung over his chest, Steve’s ragged breath hot and labored in his ear.“When they wouldn’t let me enlist and I had to watch you get shipped off…and they wouldn’t let me follow you, I…I couldn’t handle it, Buck,” Steve was saying, his blue eyes fixed on Bucky’s, pleading, desperate.  “You were being torn away from me and no one, no one would stamp that stupid card and let me go with you.  I couldn’t…I couldn’t just stay there, making macaroni on the stove of that tiny Brooklyn apartment and tuning that beat-up radio every night just to hear news about the dead.  I couldn’t wait there for someone to come to my door with your dog tags and tell me you…that you were…” and Steve’s voice broke, and all the rage Bucky had been feeling was melted away, gone, absolutely vanished, and all Bucky could think was that he needed to stop Steve from crying, stop Steve from hurting, stop hurting, Steve, and Bucky wrapped his arms around him reflexively, his hand resting at the nape of Steve’s neck, the warmth and the buzzing and the anguish choking down any restraint Bucky had ever had.  The dragon inside was a kitten, a small kitten, purring and stretching and rubbing against him and wasn’t he just so angry, just a second ago, but Steve was pressed against his chest and…Bucky couldn’t stop himself.  His hand was on the back of Steve’s head, in his hair, and he was pulling Steve closer, and the electric current that charged around them was so hot that Bucky was sure they’d catch fire, but he couldn’t stop, wouldn’t stop, not this time.And Steve’s hand was in Bucky’s hair and his breath was sweltering on his lips and Bucky surely wasn’t breathing anymore because Steve’s chest was pressed against his and his other hand was on Bucky’s back and they were so, so, so, so close…Steve’s lips met Bucky’s, soft at first, hesitant, pressed against his for just a second and then pulled away, but Bucky couldn’t stand it, needed Steve’s mouth against his, and he pulled Steve in again, hard, sure, and the air was popping around them like fireworks and Bucky was spinning and wobbly and nothing, nothing had ever felt this good, he couldn’t think, he couldn’t…Steve’s tongue flicked out into Bucky’s mouth and Bucky was so shocked by this, so surprised that his knees were weak, he needed support, he was crowding Steve’s body backward into the wall and he needed more and he pulled Steve’s hair and Steve moaned and Bucky was trailing sloppy, wet kisses down Steve’s jaw, biting his neck, and fuck, that noise Steve is making is so fucking hot, good God, oh my God, oh my God, Steve…And Steve’s teeth were on Bucky’s jaw now, then his earlobe, and Bucky could be dying right now and he wouldn’t care, everything was whirling and buzzing and electric and Steve’s heart was beating against Bucky’s chest and Bucky was smiling into Steve’s mouth and Steve was growing hard against Bucky’s waist and the old Bucky, the old Bucky would have turned red at the thought but this Bucky rolled his hips against Steve and the delicious sound Steve made was way, way too much…“Gentlemen,” and the interruption was so jarring that Bucky and Steve broke apart, Bucky shoving himself off of Steve, out of breath and aching and wanting and hard and… “If you’re planning on catching the flight to New York, you might want to wrap this up pretty soon.” Natasha was resting against the doorway, arms crossed, no hint of surprise on her face. “We’re…we’re, ah…” Steve said, his breath catching in his throat, still eyeing Bucky, and his pupils were dilated, eyes dark, hunger apparent in his face, and Bucky had never felt less like resisting an urge in his entire life, but Natasha was quickly making this way too complicated.“Coming,” Bucky finished.  He ignored the clipped, low sound of his voice and swallowed again, hard, trying to ignore the buzzing sound that was roaring in his ears, the blood rushing to all the wrong places, and the feeling of Steve’s lips imprinted forever in his brain.

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“I drove that car phenomenally!” Steve argued with Sam nudging him and reaching for the keys in his hand.  Steve elbowed Sam in the chest and laughed, dangling the keys over their heads, just out of his reach. Bucky trudged along beside them, duffel flung over his shoulder, bright eyes scanning the crowds.  Steve could feel the unease in Bucky’s shoulders, knew Bucky was uncomfortable around this many people, out here in the world where the Winter Soldier had wreaked havoc, but the lingering pleasure of the night before, the way Bucky had pressed Steve bodily up against the wall, sent goosebumps crawling up Steve’s arms.  The plane ride on the way over didn’t do anything to dispel the way Bucky’s hot lips felt trailing along Steve’s jaw.“Okay, Speed Racer, whatever you say,” Sam huffed.  “Tony can’t blame me when you ding the Range Rover.”“I am an incredible driver!  Bucky, back me up!”  Bucky startled at the sound of his name, his wide-eyed gaze settling on Steve.  Was it just him, or did Bucky’s pupils dilate a little?  Did Bucky’s eyes flick down to Steve’s lips for just a second?  God, was all of that just a dream?  They hadn’t touched since Natasha’s unceremonious interruption, hadn’t even accidentally bumped each other, but it wasn’t the back-and-forth Steve was so used to with Bucky, either.  The distance was constant, unchanging, the buzzing quieted but persistent, like a faint hum just beyond his reach.Bucky pressed his lips together, smiling slightly, and shrugged.“See?” Sam slapped Bucky on the chest with the back of his hand, doubling over in laughter as they walked.  Bucky balked at the sudden touch, but a bemused smile spread across his face.  Steve had never seen Bucky smile like that.  He had a mental list of all of Bucky’s smiles, and he added perplexed smile to it, hoping he’d see it again.“You’re not getting the keys!” Steve argued, pressing the unlock button on the car remote as they approached it where it sat, inextricably right outside the door they'd just exited.  Tony was always a step ahead.“Fine.  SHOTGUN!” Sam yelled, even though Bucky was already pulling open the passenger’s side door.  Bucky paused, eyes wide, slamming the door and crouching down beside the car.“Get down,” Bucky hissed, tugging at Sam’s wrist.  Sam looked around inquisitively, eyes darting back and forth, but Bucky was on the driver’s side now, and before Steve knew what was happening, he’d pinned Steve to the ground and hauled himself over him.  “Steve,” Bucky whispered, and Steve was momentarily distracted by the way Bucky’s warm breath felt on his ear, “where’s your shield?”“Hey, what the hell are you doing?”  Sam had already gotten into the passenger’s side and was leaning over, peering at them through the driver’s side window, voice muffled. “Buck, it’s okay,” Steve said, trying to suppress a laugh.  “It’s just a saying.”“’Shotgun’ is a saying? What does it mean?”“It’s what you say when you want to call the front seat,” Steve explained.  Sam was howling with laughter from inside the SUV.  Bucky pushed himself off of Steve and stood, scowling at Sam through the window.  He reached out a hand to help Steve up, which Steve accepted, and a surge of heat shot through him at the touch.  If Bucky felt it too, nothing in his face betrayed it. “I’m going to kill him,” Bucky said. “Get in, soldier,” Steve laughed, and Bucky rolled his eyes, but did as Steve said.  Steve’s heart was still beating a little fast at the close contact, and he took a steadying breath before getting in the driver’s side and starting the car.“Hello, Captain,” the smooth, reassuring voice of FRIDAY said over the speakers.  In his rearview mirror, Steve saw Bucky jump.“It’s one of Stark’s computer programs,” Steve explained. “Hi, FRIDAY.”“Mr. Stark has programmed me to take you to Stark Tower.  Please put the car in drive.”“Yes ma’am.”“Onward, Jeeves!” Sam ordered, hitting the dashboard with his palm.Steve followed FRIDAY’s directions without much thought.  Instead, his mind returned to replaying the events of the night before.  It was all he was able to think about.  If he was being honest with himself, he’d known he wanted to kiss Bucky since the first time he'd woken up next to him.  The way the sunlight spilled through the gaps between the broken slats of their Venetian blinds, casting its splendor on one of Bucky’s closed eyes, his long eyelashes thick and dark against his skin—it made Steve’s heart race.  It was all he could do not to plant a soft kiss on the crease at his brow that appeared whenever he had nightmares, or when he was fussing over Steve.  They’d shared a bed because Steve had the flu, chills racking his small body, and no matter how many blankets Bucky layered on him, he couldn’t get Steve to stop shivering.  So he’d climbed into bed next to Steve, wrapped those incredible arms around him, and pressed his chest to Steve’s back.  By morning, Bucky was lying on his back, one hand on his chest and the other arm draped off of the bed, head turned toward Steve, and Steve was content to just watch him sleep, watch the sunlight as it moved across his clean-shaven face. He had known, though, that those feelings were unnatural.  Improper.  Wrong.  Inappropriate.  And he had to shut those feelings down, now, before he did anything stupid.  Because Steve Rogers was known to do stupid things, things that put himself at risk, but he wouldn’t put Bucky at risk.  Bucky was a risk Steve was never willing to take.  Besides, Bucky gave no indication that he ever thought of Steve that way, and Steve was content with being Bucky’s best friend.  Not everyone had the good fortune to have Bucky in their lives, and he was the luckiest, because he got to be his best friend, his roommate, his confidant.  He got to have the most of Bucky.  He wanted that to be enough.He’d tried to move on over the years.  Bucky was always setting them up on double dates, but none of the girls were especially attracted to Steve.  It didn’t bother him much.  He wasn’t especially attracted to them either.  What did bother him was watching Bucky with them, the way he’d slip an arm around their waist, hand resting on their hip, or whisper in their ear with that cocky half-smile, or steal a kiss when the slow songs came on.  The ease with which Bucky dated, schmoozed, danced, focused his attention on anyone but Steve—it made Steve’s throat feel like it was closing, his heart plummeting to his stomach.  He had tried to move on, he really did.  But then Bucky would put himself between Steve and a bully, or bring him breakfast in bed when he was sick, or compliment Steve’s sketches in his tattered notebook, or hold Steve’s mug for him when he was too weak to hold it himself, and then there just wasn’t anything for it.  There was no moving on.The closest he’d ever come was Peggy, but then Bucky fell from that train and—no, Steve couldn’t think about that.  Every time he did, he felt like he’d been shot in the chest.  There was no world he wanted to live in that didn’t have Bucky in it. But then he’d found him again, almost sacrificed his own life because he was unwilling to hurt him, lost him, found him.  Then the buzzing started, and then, last night…He’d never let himself imagine that Bucky ever wanted him the way he wanted Bucky, that Bucky would ever feel…well.  He’d always been careful.  When Bucky had reached for him in the lab that day, after Tony and Shuri had erased his triggers, pulled him close by his belt loop—well, he’d had plenty of practice sweeping things under the rug before, making excuses.  Bucky had simply felt elated, freed, that was all.  He didn’t want to, you know, kiss Steve or anything.But after what had happened in the conference room, the indescribable way in which Bucky sighed into Steve’s mouth, lips upturned at the corners…Steve’s heart was pounding again, and he brushed his own fingers against his lips, as if trying to remember the exact feeling of Bucky’s against his…If only he’d been paying better attention to the dark van behind them or the black SUVs that flanked them on both sides, he might have seen it all coming.

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Bucky had been tracking the cars for three blocks.  After the incident with Sam yelling “shotgun” and Bucky being fully unprepared for a fight, he’d quietly strapped his knives and guns to his body.  He wouldn’t be caught unarmed again.  Not when Steve’s life could be in jeopardy.Anything for Steve; that had always been his mantra.  From the very first day they’d met, both alone on the school bus, when Steve had stood up and thrown a pencil at Greg Ramirez—three times Steve’s size—for calling Michael Chambers a loser (and Bucky had to deck Greg in the face before he had the chance to hit Steve), he’d known that he’d do anything for Steve.  Anything for Steve.The thing was, Steve never saw himself the way Bucky saw him.So Bucky knew, he just knew that Steve didn’t think of Bucky the way Bucky thought of Steve, because Steve was way too good for that, way too honorable and proper and good, and Bucky was none of those things…but he tried to be.  For Steve.  So he went on dates with girls and set Steve up too, but they also never saw Steve the way Bucky saw Steve, which meant they were obviously blind, he was way too good for them anyway, and Bucky distracted himself with pretending to like the way they laughed at his jokes or ran a hand down his arm or the way their lipstick felt on his cheek, but he didn’t really.  Nothing lit him up like Steve, being in Steve’s proximity, touching his shoulder surreptitiously or curling around him when he was quaking from the cold or just staring way too long at the way his clear, blue eyes traced an object when he scribbled it absentmindedly in his notebook.And when those feelings eventually started to overwhelm him like they always did, he went on another date.  Kissed another girl.  Stamped down on his feelings so hard that he fully expected to die from the force, the will to protect Steve from himself.  He’d even enlisted to get away from it.  Steve had probably thought it was for some insane, noble reason, because that’s the reason Steve did it, and Steve always thought better of Bucky than Bucky deserved.  But no, it was to get away from the feelings that had only grown since that first day on the school bus, had culminated in too many nights with him pulling Steve far too close, too much heartache and far too many cold showers. But then Steve had shown up, serum-enhanced and just as brave as ever, and pulled him from that table, that awful, cold, metal slab where he only vaguely remembered whispered Russian and the sting of needles in his arm, and then everything after, the hundreds of innocent lives, he’d absolutely painted the world red with their blood, and he was about to add Steve’s name to that long list of missions accomplished, but then he’d said ‘til the end of the line, and it was like some sort of system override, a glitch, he was malfunctioning, and he knew his face, and he couldn’t hurt him, he had to save him…and then he had to get the hell away from him. And, of course, of course Steve had come looking for him, had found him in every city, because the one person he never seemed to be able to actually run from was Steve.And then, then, then…Bucky’s entire world went topsy-turvy when Steve had let him kiss him last night.  Nothing, nothing could have prepared Bucky for that. And he wanted to think about the way Steve had let him suck on his tongue, wanted to replay every sound he—Bucky!—had caused at the back of Steve’s throat, but something…something was wrong.The two SUVs on each side were edging near, the van at their tail closer than Bucky liked, and for three blocks, he watched them.  Right up until they stopped at the red light.He could have said something to Steve and Sam, but he just watched, studying, calculating, eyes narrowed, not daring to focus any of his attention anywhere else, and when the first two guns emerged from the blacked-out windows on Bucky’s left, the hair on his arms stood on end.It was like watching the world in slow-motion.  Everything dimmed but the gleam of the sunlight on the barrels of the guns, and Sam was making some joke in the front seat, but Bucky couldn’t hear it, couldn’t hear anything as the Winter Soldier conditioning kicked in, finally, finally uncoiling like a snake out of its hardened, leathery eggshell, forked tongue lapping between deadly fangs.Mission?  Take out deadly Hydra assassins.  Protect Steve.Targets?  Acquired.Assessment: these windows were probably bulletproof.  So were theirs.  He’d have to shoot the guns out of their hands.  Then there was the problem of the car on the right and the car behind them.  He’d have to deal with that after.  One step at a time, soldier.“FRIDAY, back window down on the left.”  It was a command.  Not even a computer program could have mistaken it for anything else.  And he knew what would happen the minute his window rolled down, even an inch.  He was ready.The loaded guns in his hands were a familiar weight, he barely had to take aim, he was running on autopilot now, and the sharp pop-pops of his guns were barely audible to him.  There was no missing his target.  Not now that the Winter Soldier was on board.Vaguely he registered that Steve had thrown their vehicle in park, had reached for his shield that was on the floorboard of the backseat—thank God he didn’t leave that fucking thing in the trunk—and Sam had ducked down below the dashboard, sliding his finger over some gadget over his wrist and yelling into what Bucky assumed was a comm.The doors on the black SUV that he’d just shot at opened, and Bucky kicked his own door open, hair whipping in the wind as he trained his guns on the emerging men, all dressed in black.  Predictable.He could have easily taken them out.  It would have been so simple, just pull the trigger, and one after another, they’d fall.  They weren’t as lightning-fast as him, didn’t have that supersoldier serum pulsing through their veins, didn’t have even a tenth of the experience Bucky’d had in his 70 years as Hydra’s lethal assassin, didn’t have the rage that bubbled just beneath the surface, that rage that had started with the damn freight car and the ice and the needles and the vice and the rubber and the blood…But then Steve was emerging from the vehicle too, and he sure as hell didn’t have any guns, just a big, dumb shield and an intense desire to put himself in danger, and Bucky hesitated, watching him…More of them appeared now, and Sam vaulted, Falcon wings outspread, into the air above them all, firing at crowd gathering around them.  Two of them trained their guns on Steve and fired.Steve easily deflected the bullets with the shield, using it then as he stepped forward to hurdle one man back into the open SUV door behind him and out of the other side.Bucky had felt angry before, had felt maddening, all-consuming fury, but absolutely nothing in the world had ever filled him with wrath like watching someone shooting at Steve.  It was all he needed.  A calm descended over him, body cooling from his head downward, and he knew he’d never, ever stop shooting until every single person who aimed at Steve was dead.When his gun was knocked out of one hand, he pulled out a knife, spinning it in the air in front of him before catching it and slamming it into the shoulder of an oncoming attacker, who crumpled at his feet.  He felt someone running up behind him and extended his metal arm, catching the man by the throat and crushing his windpipe, dropping him hastily to the ground.  Instinct told him to block a bullet to his face, and he raised the arm, barely feeling the bullet as it bounced feebly off of the vibranium (he'd have to ask Shuri how that worked later).  He felt Steve bump into his right shoulder, saw him raise his shield to protect both of their heads as more bullets sprayed down upon them. Bucky could do this all day.It was serenity, the way the two of them moved together, not even having to communicate as they parried and shoved, shot and stabbed, backs to each other, Sam assisting from above.  Blood gushed beneath Bucky’s feet, but it wasn’t the first time, he was used to the sickening stink of copper and burnt gunpowder, and if the serum keeping him lithe in his and Steve’s deadly dance was like a song in his ears, well, then…play it again.

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At last, no more gunfire came.Mission complete.Steve was at Bucky’s back, barely winded, their shoulders touching.  A few yards away, Sam was holstering his guns and wiping an arm across his face to mop up the blood spatter.“Bucky, you okay?”  The first words out of Steve’s mouth were used to check on him.  Bucky should be pleased.  The kitten in his chest should be purring with satisfaction.  And—and—he and Steve were so close when Steve turned to inspect him that Bucky imagined Steve might reach up to cup his face, but—The buzzing was gone.Instead, Bucky felt…nothing.Assessment:  Stark and Shuri had removed the trigger words.  He didn’t feel like he belonged to someone.  He dimly recognized that he could make his own decisions, that no one was controlling him, that his mind was his own.  Still lighter.  But it wasn’t like before, when he could feel all that loud buzzing and tiny sparks trailing on his skin wherever Steve touched him.  Not like when Bucky was on the run, wanting to stay hidden because he was dangerous.  He was dangerous now.  He’d never not been dangerous. Finally, Steve did reach out to clap him on the shoulder, squeezing it in reassurance.  No spark.  No buzzing.
Answer the question, soldier.
“Yeah, yeah, ‘m fine.”  Steve hesitated but smiled, and Bucky noticed that it didn’t reach his eyes.  Not convincing.  Bucky didn’t really want to discuss the sudden stop to all the white noise.  He’d worry Steve.  It didn’t matter that he’d worry him, that wasn’t the issue, but it did matter that Steve would try to fix it.  And…Bucky could probably be more efficient this way.  Could protect him better.  Because that was the mission, after all.  Protect Steve.  What would he normally say here?  Oh.  “You?” he added, hoping the pause wasn’t too long to be perceptible.It’s not that Bucky didn’t care if Steve was okay.  That really wasn’t the point.  He had a mission.  A mission he’d given himself.  A mission he’d worked his whole life to achieve, a mission he’d die before failing.  Protect Steve.  And who better to protect Steve than the Winter Soldier?  Or at least…this version of him, the version that could be cutthroat without consequence, but could act of his own accord.  He wouldn’t kill innocent people.  But then again, people trying to hurt Steve weren’t innocent.Steve shrugged, hitching his shield onto his back.  “I guess we’re walking the rest of the way,” he remarked, eyeing the shattered glass and bullet holes in the Range Rover.“I told you I should have driven,” Sam said, cracking a smile and shoving Steve’s shoulder.Steve pulled his phone out of his back pocket and tapped it a couple of times.  “Tony!...Oh, you’ve already heard, good…yeah, we’re all fine…” Bucky could hear the annoyed but slightly panicked voice of Stark on the other end.  “We’re only a few blocks away…Tony, we’re armed, it’s fine…” Bucky didn’t point out that, technically, Steve wasn’t armed.  Bucky hadn’t holstered his gun, though, and was walking behind Steve, gun in one hand and knife in the other, while Sam took the lead.  “Don’t send a car…no…just tell SHIELD that they may want to come clean this one up…”Only a few minutes later, they reached Stark Tower, all glass and cement and sharp angles, looming over the nearby buildings.  Bucky followed Sam and Steve as they took the elevator to the penthouse floor.When the door dinged open, Bucky blinked.It wasn’t just Tony there.  Bucky wasn’t sure what he expected.  There was Tony, pacing, as usual, and Natasha, arms crossed in front of her and face neutral.  Then there were people who he recognized from Steve’s video calls, like Clint, perched on top of a table, arrows strapped to his back, and Fury, with his signature eyepatch and black duster jacket.  Then there were people who Bucky had only heard of—the guy in a strange purple and blue skin-tight suit with a yellow gem on his forehead had to be Vision, the girl with the big eyes and pretty brown hair down to her waist next to him had to be Wanda, the dark-skinned man leaning against the wall was surely Rhodey, and a young woman with her dark hair pulled in a ponytail wearing a SHIELD uniform must be Agent Hill.Assessment: danger.  Danger.  Danger.Steve moved to step off the elevator, but Bucky put out an arm in front of him.  “Take us back down, FRIDAY,” he demanded.“Uh, no, don’t do that,” Tony called.“I am sorry, Sergeant Barnes, but Mr. Stark is the only recognized authority.  His orders are set to override any others’ except Miss Potts.”Rhodey arched an eyebrow at Tony.  “I know who really rules the roost,” Tony said, tapping his temple.“Smart man,” Agent Hill commented.“Buck, what’s up?” Steve asked him under his breath.  Bucky kept his arm extended in front of Steve.“It’s not safe.”“It’s probably the safest place on Earth right now.  Maybe even the universe,” Steve laughed, pushing past Bucky's outstretched arm.  Bucky calculated just how likely it was that he’d be able to wrestle Steve to the ground and get the elevator doors shut, but without FRIDAY complying, he didn’t stand much of a chance.  He resigned to follow close to Steve instead.“Heard you ran into some hostiles on the way over,” Fury said.“Piece of cake,” Sam quipped, wiping his face with a towel.“Those are Pepper’s favorite dish towels.”“Then why the hell are they in the conference room?”“I got hungry and my plate was too hot!”“Hope she likes her dish towels stained with Nazi blood, then.”“If she doesn’t, I’ll take ‘em!” Clint interjected.  Sam threw the towel in his face.“Good to see you again, Captain Rogers,” the cool voice of Vision interrupted.  “And you, Mr. Wilson.  I have yet to make your acquaintance, but you must be Sergeant Barnes?” Vision had walked over, offering his hand for a handshake.  Bucky narrowed his eyes at him.“Bucky,” he corrected, not moving to shake his hand.Vision didn’t seem offended, but simply let his hand fall to his side and bowed his head slightly instead.  “It is a pleasure.  I have heard so much about you from Captain Rogers.”Bucky didn’t respond.  He moved to stand next to Steve, who had plopped down at the crescent-shaped table where most of the group were seated.  Steve waved at Rhodey across the room, shooting one of his million-watt smiles at Wanda, and squirmed a little to settle into his chair.Fury stood, positioning himself in front of a giant glass computer screen.  “Now that we’re all here, let’s get started.”

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It didn’t take long for them to go over the plan.  Fury’s intel placed the Hydra safehouse in Queens.  They’d call in a gas leak, get that part of the city evacuated, and then go in, guns a-blazing.  They may not have the full might of the Avengers on their side—Banner was still MIA and Thor was ostensibly taking care of business on Asgard—but with the help of Vision and Wanda, this thing probably wouldn’t go sideways.Steve wasn’t really worried about that.Steve was worried about Bucky.Something had shifted in him since the ambush on the street.  Bucky stood closer than he’d dared to lately, and every muscle in his body looked coiled to strike.  Instead of the pleasant tension that had grown into vexing static since their kiss, the air between them felt cold, bereft of its usual taut magnetism.  Steve kept glancing at Bucky, who wasn’t even looking at Steve, but who was eyeing the room and its inhabitants icily, warily, as if daring them to inch closer.“I, for one, can’t wait to see Terminator 2 in action,” Tony said.  Steve dragged his attention away from Bucky, fixing Tony with what he would call his best Captain-America-is-disappointed-in-you face.Fury didn’t even flinch.  “Absolutely not.”“Why not?” Tony asked innocently, both hands on one knee, leaning forward like a dare.“For one, he’s tried to kill at least four people in this room, me included!”Bucky blinked, looking around.  Steve suddenly felt very nervous.  He’d put himself between Bucky and anyone there if he had to, but he was really hoping he didn’t have to.“Aw, come on, Fury!” Clint pleaded, eyes widening as he hopped off the tabletop.  “You never let us play with your new toys!  Besides, look, he’s better now!  He’s on Team Cap!”“Not a good idea, Clint,” Natasha said.  She threw her most devastating look at Clint, and his smile faltered.  He sat back down, shoulders drooping.Vision turned toward Bucky.  “I’m sure Sergeant Barnes would like to make his own decisions.”  Vision said it in such a matter-of-fact, Jarvis-like, soothing way that Steve almost agreed.“I said no!” Fury barked.Bucky turned toward Vision, eyebrows furrowed.  “Are we discussing whether or not I’m going on this mission?”  Steve wanted to laugh.  Of course Bucky hadn’t caught Tony’s Terminator reference.  Bucky looked back at Steve, the same steely expression on his face, betraying nothing.“Yeah, pal, that’s what we’re discussing.”“Are you going?”Steve had expected the question.  Bucky hadn’t been paying much attention to Fury and Tony’s back-and-forth about the plan.  To be honest, neither had Steve, but he’d been too focused on Bucky.  Bucky had been too focused on the rest of the room. “Buck…”“If you’re going, I’m going.”“It’s out of the question,” Fury reiterated, his good eye narrowing. “You can’t stop me.”“The hell I can’t!”Bucky moved so quickly that Steve hadn’t been able to stop him.  In fact, he’d never seen anyone except Pietro move that quickly.  The sudden memory of Pietro’s mane of golden curls flopping in his face sent a twinge to Steve’s chest, but he pushed it aside.  Bucky was already to Fury, one knife that Steve hadn’t seen him unsheathe in his gloved hand, sharp edge pressed against Fury’s throat.  Fury hadn’t even blinked.  He didn’t look scared.“Try me,” Bucky growled, pressing the knife harder.Around them, everyone had moved at once.  Clint had nocked an arrow in his bow and was pointing it at Bucky.  Vision had stood, holding back Wanda with one hand, her hands at her sides reddening with raw energy.  Rhodey had pushed himself off the wall he was leaning against, but seemed unsure of what to do next, so he’d simply moved closer.  Tony was seated, twiddling a pencil in between his fingers, tapping its eraser on the tabletop, remarkably unbothered by the whole scene.  Natasha and Maria were both pointing guns at Bucky’s head. Sam and Steve had moved together, both beside Bucky, Sam stepping in between Bucky and the various weapons pointing at him, hands held in front of him, palms toward them in supplication.  Steve’s hand was resting on Bucky’s elbow.  He hadn’t decided whether or not to disarm Bucky.  He wanted Bucky to show everyone that he wasn’t dangerous, that he wouldn’t really hurt Fury, but after the way Bucky had been acting for the last hour, he wasn’t sure what Bucky would do.Fury exhaled deeply, seemingly annoyed at the whole situation.  “Put your weapons down,” he commanded, looking at everyone but Bucky.  Most of them complied, but Maria still held her gun, its barrel trained at the back of Bucky’s head.  Steve swallowed hard.  “Agent Hill, that is an order.”  Reluctantly, she lowered her weapon.“Bucky, Bucky, please,” Steve whispered in Bucky’s ear, putting some pressure on his arm, coaxing him to lower his knife.“You are not going anywhere without me,” Bucky hissed in response, but his knife wasn’t pressed against Fury’s neck now. “I won’t go,” Steve promised, and Bucky’s arm was back down at his side, but he was still glaring at Fury.“The hell you won’t,” Fury said, dusting one of his shoulders off and smoothing down the collar on his duster.  Bucky flinched like he meant to threaten Fury again, but Steve clamped down on Bucky’s wrist.  “You’re going, Cap, and you’re going to take Sergeant Barnes with you.”Bucky ground his teeth together, nodded once, and turned toward Steve.“I’m sorry, what the hell just happened?” Sam asked, turning toward Fury, eyes wide.“I changed my mind, Wilson.”“Just like that?”“Just like that.”“Director Fury,” Natasha started to protest, but Fury held up a hand.  Behind her, Clint grinned. Steve’s heart was hammering in his chest.  He felt a little dizzy at the turn of events.  He didn’t know if he wanted to protest or if he actually felt better by the idea that Bucky would be at his side.  He knew better than to question Fury, though.  He had a reason for everything, but he rarely revealed it.“Great!  It’s a party!” Tony said, moving to stand.  “Avengers, suit up!”*                           *                              *                           *                                 *Bucky scanned the empty street, tensing a little when a lone napkin on the sidewalk fluttered in the wind.  Steve was by his side, shield hooked on his right arm.  Bucky had tried to convince Steve to carry a gun, but he assured Bucky that he didn’t need one.  Luckily, Bucky had two, and two knives on him to boot, all of which would be used to protect Steve.  He still vaguely wished they’d been able to stay behind.  Steve couldn’t be trusted not to make stupid decisions in a fight.“Nat, what’s your status?” Steve said quietly into the comm.  They could hear some muffled noises on the other end.  Natasha didn’t respond.  “Nat, status.”“Hang on, Cap,” Clint responded.  “She’s working on it.”Bucky glanced at the roof of the nearby empty sandwich shop.  Clint was perched at the edge, arrow ready in his bow, keen eyes watching someone Bucky couldn’t see.“If we wait much longer, we’ll be eligible for the senior citizen discount,” Tony huffed.  “Hey, Cap, Sarge, do you qualify for that?  I bet shawarma is really cheap!  You could even spring for some baba ganouj!”“What’s baba ganouj?” Bucky asked, voice low as he stepped over the body of an unconscious guard.  Natasha’s doing, Bucky was certain.  He and Steve stopped on either side of a rusted metal door, its grey paint flaked and peeling—the backdoor to the abandoned warehouse that Fury’s intel had pinned as the Hydra hideout. “Oh, man!  They feed you guys anything besides gruel in the Ice Age?”“All clear,” Natasha declared.Steve nodded at Bucky.  “Move in,” Steve ordered.  Bucky kicked in the door and they stepped inside, looking around.  Nothing.  “All clear at the backdoor.”“There are so many jokes I could make right now,” Tony muttered, and Bucky could hear gunshots and blasts that must be coming from Tony’s suit in the background.“We’ll come there,” Steve forged on, ignoring Tony’s quips completely.Clint chuckled in Bucky’s ear.  “It’s…it’s so easy…”“Hawkeye!  Finally someone who speaks my language!”Steve rolled his eyes, motioning for Bucky to follow him.  They made their way through the large, empty room and to a stairwell.  The exit sign above it was dusty and half-lit, and the door had been removed from the hinges.  Bucky stepped in front of Steve, though Steve tried to pull him back.  Bucky shook his hand off, glaring at him.“Wanda, can you get this guy off my—” Rhodey said, chagrined, a little out of breath.“Ooh, ten points!” Sam called, whistling.“Only ten?  She took out eight guys with that blast!” Natasha remarked.Bucky and Steve finally made it to the second floor.  A man in a Kevlar vest with a rifle on his shoulder was shooting at Sam as he twisted through the air, wings outstretched and laughing.  Natasha had her legs wrapped around another guy’s neck, dragging him down with a thud as another attacked her from the side.  She reached around his neck too, pulling him over her shoulder and slamming him down, righting herself again in a blur of red and black.  Wanda was standing in the corner, hands moving together in a dance Bucky had never seen, red light sparking between her fingers.  The others must have been elsewhere, because they were still updating each other through the comm, but Bucky couldn’t see them.Sam landed, taking out his guns and shooting at a group of men who were running at him.  Bucky barely registered that Steve was running to his side. Assessment: DANGER.There were at least ten guys running at them, from all angles, and Steve stepped in front of Sam, shield raised as bullets flew in their direction.  Bucky growled and trained both guns on their attackers, easily taking down six in a matter of seconds.  Sam had shot another two, and Steve threw his shield at one, hitting him in the neck and crushing his windpipe as he fell to the ground.  The shield ricocheted off him and hit the last one in the flank, probably breaking most of his ribs, before returning dutifully to Steve’s arm.“Just like bowling!” Sam exclaimed, pumping a fist.  “Speaking of, I could probably kick your ass at bowling,” he added, elbowing Steve in the arm.“You wish,” Steve grinned back at him.“There’s a bowling alley on the 58th floor,” Tony interjected.“Of course there is,” Sam sighed.  “Man, I wanna be rich.”“What’s mine is yours, Big Bird.”“Does that extend to women?”“Far be it for me to tell Pepper what to do, but no, actually.  If you try, I’ll kill you.  Actually, she’d probably kill you.”Steve’s chuckle was warm in Bucky’s ear.  Bucky thought it sounded kind of nice, but shut the thought down as soon as it emerged.  His mission was to protect Steve Rogers.  That would be harder to do if he was focusing on stupid stuff like the rumble of Steve’s laughter.  Bucky studied the room, assessing quickly that Natasha, Sam, and Wanda were all unhurt.  Natasha was dusting off her legs.“You’ve got some blood on your face,” she said to Bucky, raising one eyebrow in a perfect arch, a small smile tugging on her lips.  He was surprised to see her looking so pleased.  She wanted Bucky in the fight least of all.  Bucky ran a gloved hand over his face, and Natasha actually smirked.  “Now you’ve made it worse.  Here.”  Before he could stop her, she licked her thumb and wiped it over his cheek, through the stubble that was a constant there now.Bucky blinked.  “Um…thanks.”“Sure thing.”“Tony, what’s your status?” Steve’s voice was a little panicked in his ear.“Oh, didn’t we say?  We’re back at the tower sipping mai tais.  Jeez, what’s taking you guys so long?  Thawing Capsicle and his boyfriend out of cryofreeze again?”“If you’re all actually back at the tower—” Sam began, but Rhodey cut him off.“We just ganked the last guy.  Meet you outside in five.”Bucky ignored the way Steve flinched when Tony had called him his ‘boyfriend.’  He didn’t have to think about that.  He wouldn’t think about that.  Where was his whole The-Winter-Soldier-has-descended resolve?  He huffed to himself.Threat level: minimal.  Non-existent?Was it ever non-existent around this group of…what?  Heroes?  Avengers?  People who had proven time and again that they’d give their lives to save the world?  To protect each other?  To protect…Steve?  Bucky scowled.
Fine, threat level zero.  For now.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

“Did that seem too easy to anyone else?” Steve asked once they’d regrouped back at Stark Tower.  They’d made their way to the penthouse lounge, and Tony had immediately busied himself behind the bar.“Hey, who invited Captain Pessimism to the afterparty?” Tony said, pouring whiskey from a crystal decanter into his glass.  He held it up to offer it to the group.“He’s right, Tony.  None of us even got scratched,” Rhodey pointed out.“Speak for yourself!” Clint brandished his shoulder, which sported a quickly blossoming bruise.“You did that running into the doorframe,” Natasha commented.  She made her way behind the bar too, pouring gin and vermouth into a shaker.“I didn’t say he was wrong,” Tony answered Rhodey, ignoring Clint and Natasha.  He piled whiskey glasses onto a tray and walked around the room, passing them out.  He pointedly skipped over Wanda, who rolled her eyes.  Vision declined with a tip of his head.Behind the bar, Natasha shook the shaker, ice cubes and alcohol swooshing back and forth.  “It was just Hydra Ops.”“What?” Steve had taken a sip of whiskey, watching Bucky stare at the glass in his hand, and he coughed a little.“Oh, the hundreds of computers and lack of fire power didn’t tip you off?” Tony sighed.  “Those guys were barely armed, but we’ve definitely scattered the remaining agents.  We just have to assume they’ve got the bigger guns.”Steve took another sip of his whiskey.  He wasn’t even sure he could get drunk anymore, but he felt a tingle in his fingertips.  He studied the glass.  “How are we supposed to track them?  You blew up everything before we left!”  Natasha arched an eyebrow.  Steve pinched the bridge of his nose.  “Oh, right.”“Oh, ye of little faith, Captain!” Tony put a hand over his chest as if wounded.  “In the meantime, I’ve set you and C3PO up with suites downstairs.  Don’t worry, they’re adjoining.”Bucky choked on his whiskey.  Steve figured Bucky didn’t need to understand the Star Wars reference to put together that Tony meant the two of them.  “Thanks, Tony,” Steve said before the silence got too awkward.“What’s in this?” Bucky asked, looking at his right hand and flipping it over slowly, touching his thumb to each of his fingertips.“Oh, I gave you and Cap the special whiskey.  I’ve been looking for something that might affect a supersoldier.  How do you feel?”Steve narrowed his eyes at Tony.  Bucky didn’t look up from his hand, turning it back over and clenching it into a fist.  He seemed to consider the question before finally replying, “Good.”  Tony smirked, leaning back into his seat and swirling his own drink, obviously pleased.---------------A few hours later, the crowd had dwindled, and finally Tony had called it a night himself, so Bucky and Steve were the only two left.  Steve was flung low on a comfortable lounge chair, and Bucky was next to him, lying on the couch with one leg hanging off, a hand behind his head, the metal hand clutching his near-empty glass on his chest.Assessment?  Mmm.Turns out the Winter Soldier didn’t have a whole lot of purchase when Bucky was somewhat intoxicated, and Bucky hadn’t been intoxicated since the war, and, and, and he was still armed but he was pretty sure there’s no way he could protect Steve if someone attacked now.  That wasn’t good.  He set his glass down, the clink of the crystal against the marble table too loud.“You need another?” Steve asked, leaning forward as if to get up.“Nnh,” Bucky responded, waving him off.Steve bit his lip to hold in his big, dumb, goofy grin.  “That’s not a word, Buck.”Bucky opened his mouth to say something smart, but closed it again when he couldn’t think of anything.  Hmm.  “Why…why’m I more drunk than you?”“Probably something to do with the serum.  I think mine might have been…” he trailed off, glancing at Bucky and looking away, like he didn’t want to say anything else.“Stronger?” Bucky supplied.“You’ve always been the stronger one, Buck,” Steve answered quietly.That’s the thing about Steve Rogers.  He didn’t know his own strength. Bucky huffed.  Steve Rogers also didn’t know his own limits.  Bucky needed to be there to enforce those limits.  No…no.  Bucky never did a very good job at enforcing those limits.  He needed the Asset.  He tried to sit up but found that his head was a little too heavy for that, and he collapsed back down on the couch. Steve chuckled.  “Where ya goin’?”“Just…just tryna…I gotta get up so I can…” Bucky tried sitting up again.  He found it was easier with one eye shut.  He pulled himself up with one hand gripping the back of the couch.“Time for bed?” Steve offered, standing and stretching.  Bucky eyed the way Steve’s shirt pulled up when he raised his hands above his head, a strip of bare skin visible between the elastic waistband of his boxers.  Suddenly, inexplicably, Bucky noticed that damn buzzing again.  It was muffled, quiet, like white noise that didn’t demand to be noticed, just hung around in the background edging out the silence.  Bucky’s eyes narrowed in annoyance, but he hummed in response.  Steve reached out a hand and Bucky blinked, unsure of what to do.It was like the metal arm just took control in times like these, like it had a mind of its own, like it needed, touch-starved in a way Bucky never admitted to himself.  He didn’t consent to it reaching out and grabbing Steve’s outstretched hand, didn’t give it permission to thrill in the warm way Steve’s palm felt against the cool metal, didn’t endorse the way sparks went licking up his arm and down his spine, fire roiling in his belly.  Steve smiled, seemingly oblivious to the traitorous way Bucky’s body was responding to the touch, and pulled Bucky to his feet.Bucky wobbled slightly.  He closed one eye again.  Easier to see that way.  Hmm, I’m gonna fall.“Whoa, Buck,” Steve said, pressing his whole body into Bucky’s armpit, snaking an arm around Bucky’s middle and propping Bucky up on his shoulder.  “I got you, buddy, I got you,” and another hand came up, resting on Bucky’s chest.  There was no way Steve couldn’t feel the duplicitous way his heart hammered at the touch.“’M supposed to…supposed to get you,” Bucky said, tugging his lower lip in between his teeth.  Steve had been eyeing his face, and Bucky didn’t miss the way Steve’s breath caught in his throat.  God, that’s good.  Bucky smirked, all teeth and mouth and saliva and bite.  Steve’s pupils dilated a bit, and Bucky swallowed hard.Hadn’t this…had this happened before?  Had they…back in Wakanda, hadn’t they…but the Winter Soldier had arrived and shaken that memory out of him, stomped on it until it bled, but now it was forcing its way back up Bucky’s throat and into his head and he remembered the way Steve had been so flushed and pliant under his hands…and that kitten that mewled in delight in his chest had returned, clawing at his lungs, his heart, his ribcage, grasping and aching and begging for more…“Come on, solider,” Steve laughed, half-dragging Bucky toward the elevator.The elevator felt very strange in its descent, sending Bucky’s stomach into his throat.  Steve’s arm was still wrapped around him, big hand steady on his chest, Bucky’s heart thrashing against it like it was trying to break free of his chest and be with Steve, where it belonged.Bucky remembered something about adjoining rooms, and Steve had finally deposited Bucky onto a too-soft bed.  It felt nice and out of place.  Bucky peered down his chest at Steve, who was kneeling at the end of the bed, untying Bucky’s shoelaces.And God, didn’t that look good?  Captain America on his knees. And the thought swirled around with so many other thoughts in Bucky’s head, like the way Steve’s hand felt against Bucky’s ankle, and then Bucky was imagining how those same hands would feel on his chest, beneath all these useless clothes, and how hot Steve’s breath would be in Bucky’s ear, on the skin over his collarbone, how it would feel to grind himself against Steve’s hips just to feel the friction, and then he remembered the gasps and moans and throaty whines he’d drawn from Steve in that conference room in Wakanda and Bucky was suddenly very aware of how hard he was against his jeans.And surely Steve noticed, but he didn’t say anything, just moved to the nightstand to flick off the lamp, and he was leaving, he was leaving…Bucky reached out and grabbed Steve’s wrist.  Even in the dark, Bucky knew Steve was smiling, and he wanted to feel that same smile beneath his own lips, pressed into it the way he always wanted to press into Steve.“You want me to stay?” Steve asked quietly, and what could Bucky possibly say to that?  He scooted over and patted the bed.  Steve, of course, of course, smiled bigger, and moved to unbutton his pants.  Bucky made a guttural sound, he couldn’t help it, and he didn’t even have the wherewithal to feel embarrassed when Steve chuckled quietly in response.  Steve kicked his jeans off and crawled into the bed, nudging Bucky so that he could pull the covers up over them both.  “You comfortable like that?” Steve asked, clearly indicating Bucky’s jeans, and Bucky could have died at the thoughts that question brought on, but he really, really wasn’t comfortable like that, for more reasons than one, so he grumbled something and unbuttoned his pants too, trying to ignore the vibration of the zipper, gasping only a little at the feeling of his jeans pulling against him as he wiggled out of them.  Steve was turned away from him, but he scooted backward, pressed his back to Bucky’s chest.“Steve,” Bucky warned, but Steve just scooted closer, ass suddenly against Bucky’s erection, and there was absolutely no ignoring it now, but Steve said nothing and reached for Bucky’s arm, pulling it around him.“Somebody’s gotta watch my six, huh?” Steve mumbled, smile still obvious in his voice.  Bucky couldn’t even respond, could barely think with Steve pressed to him like this, and it took everything in him not to roll his hips forward into Steve.  Everything.  As it was, he sunk his forehead into the nape of Steve’s neck, Steve’s skin on fire beneath him.  He sighed, aching and wanting but still good.  So, so good.-----------------Steve was flushed and tender and throbbing.  The cool weight of Bucky’s metal arm against him didn’t help, couldn’t possibly help the burn that was rolling through him.This was Bucky, though, wasn’t it?  Not the strange, distant person who’d emerged after their fight in New York?Steve felt how hard Bucky was against him, and the stinging desire to do something, anything, about it was threatening to choke him to death.  But Bucky was drunk, plain and simple, and this certainly wasn’t the first time he’d had to haul a drunk, handsy Bucky home.  Granted, it had been a while.He remembered a warm night in Brooklyn and the way Bucky had pushed him up against a brick wall in a wet alleyway, smiling down at Steve, all cocky and brave and eyes lit up like a neon sign.  “What’re you doin’, Buck?” Steve had managed around his aching throat, blood pooling in his groin at the way Bucky was propped in front of him, both of Bucky’s hands on either side of Steve’s head.“Testing a theory,” Bucky responded, his voice gravelly in the back of his throat as he pulled his bottom lip between his teeth.  Steve fought the urge to groan in response.  It was too much, Bucky looking down at him like that, perfect teeth edging his wet lip.“Is this what you do to the girls?” Steve tried, and he really was struggling to breathe at this point.“Mm,” Bucky hummed, smile tugging at one corner of his mouth.  “Is it working?” He raised one hand and smoothed Steve’s hair behind his ear, trailing one long finger down Steve’s jaw.Steve drew in a deep breath.  “’M not a girl, Buck.” Bucky flinched.  “I know that,” he snapped, and he was becoming all angles and edge again, pushing himself off of the brick wall and stumbling backward.  Steve wanted to reach out and pull him in again.  “Let’s go home, punk,” he’d said finally, almost tripping over his shoes.“You know I can’t carry you, jerk.  Why’d you have to get this drunk?”And Steve was back in the present, pressed up against Bucky now like he’d wanted to then, and Bucky was wrapped around him, closer than either of them had allowed when they were growing up.  It felt good, too good to be against Bucky like this, and Steve was hard too, had been since he’d brushed his fingers against the skin at Bucky’s ankle and Bucky had been looking down at him, muscled chest rising and falling fast, and Steve knew it was him that was doing this to Bucky.But Bucky was drunk just like that night in the alleyway, and Steve didn’t want Bucky to regret anything, didn’t want to do anything with Bucky intoxicated and confused like this, so Steve ignored the desire flooding his insides and closed his eyes instead, evening out his breathing and trying like hell to fall asleep.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

Bucky became vaguely aware of several things at once—his head felt fuzzy, distantly aching, he was really thirsty, and Steve was tucked under his arm, facing Bucky, shirt rucked up, hair messy on his pillow.Steve was—Steve—Bucky’s fingers clamped down on Steve’s waist, and suddenly Bucky was very awake.No, no, no, he thought, right as the kitten purring in his chest thought, yes, yes, yes.Steve stirred, opening both eyes slowly, barely waking.  “Morning, Buck,” he said, voice sleep-rough and beautiful.Bucky couldn’t move.  Bucky could only stare, could only gawk at that impossible blue, the affectionate smile taking over Steve’s face, and before Bucky could register anything else, Steve’s hand was too close, pushing a strand of Bucky’s hair behind his ear.  Bucky pulled his hand back from Steve’s waist as if he’d just realized it was there.And boy, did he not want to move it.  He didn’t want to do a damn thing he was doing right now, backpedaling and escaping and running like he always did, but he was moving away from Steve when his heart was screaming to do the opposite, his body singing with the craving to keep touching Steve, to put a hand on the back of Steve’s head and pull him in, to feel the way Steve’s perfect lips felt, warm and hopeful and hot on Bucky’s tongue, and there was blood and want and need pooling deep in his belly, and he was scooting away, he thought he moved faster than this, usually…A little crease appeared at Steve’s brow, a frown flicking over his gorgeous face, and Bucky was making Steve sad, and it was too much for him to handle, so he stopped moving—Steve reached for Bucky, finding a place on Bucky’s chest, fingers digging into Bucky’s shirt and pulling him forward, and really, what could Bucky do to stop it at this point, with all this buzzing and magnetism and Steve was the only true north on Bucky’s ever-spinning compass of a heart and there was no, no, no stopping it from hammering away at his resolve, cracking it in seconds flat.Bucky was pressed completely against Steve now, half on top of him, and Steve’s arms were circling him, crushed against his back, and holy hell, did Bucky want so much more than this as he buried his face in Steve’s neck, just under his jaw, and was that Steve’s pulse racing or was it just Bucky’s imagination?“Bucky,” Steve said, and his name in Steve’s mouth sounded like a prayer, but that wasn’t right because Steve was a god damn religion.  “Buck…I’m sorry, I know I shouldn’t—shouldn’t have stayed—you were really drunk and I couldn’t—”“Stop,” Bucky interrupted, pushing himself off of Steve with some newfound resolve.  He hovered over him, studying the agonized look on Steve's face, wishing he could make all that pain go away.  He could try.  “Don’t.  I was but—I wanted—I want—” Steve raised his eyebrows.  “Fuck, Steve,” Bucky managed, shaking his head and sitting up on the bed.Steve sat up a little, turned toward Bucky, legs still maddeningly under the covers.  Bucky was heaving with the need to get some more air, it was all thin in here, no, not thin, thick, thick and heavy and impossible.  “Sorry, I’m sorry,” Steve said, reaching out a hand to grab Bucky’s, and Bucky let him.  He had to let him.  He rarely had any choice in the matter.“Stop apologizing,” Bucky pleaded, letting his thumb trace the back of Steve’s hand.  Was he imagining it, or was Steve’s pulse quickening with every caress?“I don’t know how to—to do…this,” Steve tried to explain.  Bucky had no idea what he was talking about.  Or did he?He hazily wished he could recall how to bring that indefatigable determination of the Winter Soldier back down on him.  It was so, so much easier than this, this constant questioning and hoping and wanting.  But he couldn’t do it, not here, not with Steve’s hand in his, so close in the early morning light.“We didn’t really talk about what happened, you know, the other night,” Steve continued.  Bucky shouldn’t be surprised.  Steve didn’t back down from a fight. “Didn’t, ah, really get a chance,” Bucky responded.  He didn’t know what to say, didn’t know what he was allowed to say, all these years later, all these emotions suddenly and inexplicably permissible and…wanted?  He rubbed at his neck.“Do you want some water?” Steve asked suddenly, shoving the covers off and standing.  Bucky could have whistled at the sight of Steve there, next to the bed, black boxers sinfully low on his hips and grey t-shirt wrinkled, hair rumpled even as he ran a hand through it.  Bucky could only nod, could only watch as Steve retreated from the room.  He barely registered the sound of a cabinet opening and shutting and the tinkle of slow water, ostensibly from a refrigerator door.  Steve returned and handed the glass to Bucky.  Bucky raised the glass to his lips, grateful for the way the cool water felt in his dry mouth and down his aching throat.  “So,” Steve said after a second, studying Bucky’s face.  Bucky set the glass down on the nightstand.  Steve sat on the end of the bed, one knee jumping anxiously. “I don’t…I don’t know if I can—” Bucky started, and the look on Steve’s face could have absolutely killed him.“Right, God, I’m sorry, no, I just—I thought—but of course not, I’m—”“Jesus, Rogers, can you let me finish?” Bucky cut in.“Right, yes, sorry.” Steve bit his lip.  Bucky’s heart jumped.“I don’t know if I can trust myself…with you,” Bucky finished.  “I don’t know what any of this means.  I don’t know how to be the Bucky you knew and be the Bucky who was once the Asset who pulled the trigger when Hydra asked me to.”  It was all kind of spilling from his mouth, everything that he didn’t even know he’d been thinking.  “And I sure as hell don’t know how to protect you from me, let alone yourself.  I can’t take it, the thought of you hurting,” he admitted, voice suddenly hard and desperate, and he didn’t know how to calm that feeling, the feeling that had bubbled up in him when Steve had been shot and lost all that blood, or the feeling that finally struck him like a knife when those men were pointing their guns at Steve and Bucky was the only person that stood between Steve and certain death.But Steve Rogers knew how to calm that feeling.Steve was suddenly on his knees again, on the bed, wrapping his arms around Bucky, shoving his hot face into Bucky’s neck and saying Bucky’s name over and over, softly, and the feeling that elicited in Bucky, to have Steve say his name, whisper it like a invocation, it was taking over, tamping down the anger at anyone who’d ever even looked at Steve wrong.“I’m not scared of you,” Steve finally said, and he’d said it before, but Bucky wasn’t sure he’d believed it until now.“Steve, you—”“Don’t say I should be,” Steve interjected.  “Because you’d never hurt me.  I know you’d never hurt me.”And he was right.  Now, at least.  The Winter Soldier couldn’t even hurt Steve, not really, could never kill him, certainly.  Not even when Steve invited it, asked for it, told him to finish it.  Not even when all he wanted to do was shut him up, break him, have him split open in front of him and bleeding out every stupid, amazing, awful, indescribable feeling Steve Rogers had ever felt for James Buchanan Barnes.So Bucky did the only thing he could do at that point.He tugged Steve’s arms down from around him, cupped his face in both hands, and pulled Steve in, and the heady scent of him in the morning, sweat and sleep and sun, filled his head, and he pressed his lips to Steve’s.----------------Steve was coming apart, he was sure of it.  Or maybe he was being put back together.He was kissing Bucky.  He was kissing Bucky in a bed.  He was kissing Bucky in his boxers in a bed. And Before Steve, little Steve, pre-serum Steve was absolutely whooping at this turn of events. But post-serum Steve was pretty enthused, too.And the way Bucky felt against his lips was like nothing he’d ever felt before.  It wasn’t the same desperate urgency that he’d felt back in Wakanda, where the hope and the fear had frantically clashed.  It was soft and sure and…unreserved.So unreserved, in fact, that Bucky’s hands had traveled to Steve’s waist and were pulling Steve on top of Bucky as Bucky fell into his pillow.  Steve straddled Bucky with fervor, and he couldn’t stop himself from running one hand down Bucky’s neck, over his chest, down his side, and he pulled up his shirt to get beneath it.  Bucky’s skin was hot under his hands.Bucky pulled his lips away from Steve to press a kiss on his jaw, and then his neck, sucking a little bruise there.  Steve moaned in response, and Bucky actually snickered, biting at the skin, and it stung a little in a nice way.  He arched into it, into Bucky’s mouth, and Bucky answered by pulling Steve’s shirt up and over his head.They were both panting now, and Bucky’s eyes were wide and pupils blown as he studied Steve’s chest hungrily.  Steve grinned, and Bucky, with the cat-like grace and determination of an assassin, pushed Steve over and climbed on top of him, pulling his own shirt off, and damn.Steve had never seen anything so beautiful.He let his eyes roam over the muscles in Bucky’s chest, his abdomen, the way the skin over his jugular pulsed rapidly.  He noticed the angry places where skin met metal, reaching up to trace one of the scars.Bucky flinched, looking away from Steve’s face.“Buck,” Steve breathed, still tracing one finger over the thick, pink, puckered scars.  Bucky closed his eyes, not moving.  Steve let his fingers run over the metal then, tracing his fingernails over the bicep and down into the crook of his arm.  Bucky gasped with what looked like pleasure.  “Bucky,” Steve repeated, and Bucky opened his eyes, looking down at Steve.  “You’re so beautiful.”  He couldn’t help but say it, but he flushed anyway, knew the way his face was burning, but he didn’t care.  “You’re so fucking beautiful.”  It was a whisper.  He hoped Bucky believed him.“Language,” Bucky breathed, a smug smile blossoming on his face, and it was the same smile that Bucky had for him in that alleyway, so self-assured, so maddeningly confident that Steve felt small again beneath him.“Not you too,” Steve moaned in mock-anger, rolling his eyes.  Bucky chuckled, leaning down again, letting his warm breath in Steve’s ear send tendrils of fire burning down his spine.“Stevie,” Bucky whispered in his ear, and Steve was sure he was coming apart again.  He felt overstimulated and helpless, and he whimpered, both hands finding purchase on Bucky’s waist.  He pulled Bucky into him, surging his hips up to meet him, and finally felt the satisfaction of friction. “Nngh.  Jesus, Buck.  You’re killing me.” He rubbed himself against Bucky again, the heat threatening to engulf him.  Nothing could stop the moans that were tearing from the back of his throat.  Bucky smiled against his skin.“See, that’s why you need me,” Bucky said, biting Steve’s neck again.  Steve gasped.“Need you so bad,” Steve repeated, nodding and carding a hand through Bucky’s hair, tugging a little.  Bucky keened in response, rolling his hips forward to meet Steve this time, and Steve’s inhale was sharp.“Need me to keep you safe,” Bucky said, nuzzling Steve’s neck and planting wet kisses there.Steve flexed his hand in Bucky’s hair, tugging again as Bucky groaned, deep and satisfying.  “Need you to—to—”“What?  Say it.” The pleased way in which Bucky demanded it of him was so arousing that Steve couldn’t even register his own embarrassment, if there was any. “Touch me, please.  Touch me,” Steve begged, half-heartedly tugging at his own boxers.  Bucky nearly hit his head against the headboard.  Steve laughed a little, noting just how hard Bucky was against him too, and knowing Steve had done that to Bucky was unbelievable.Bucky complied, reaching down and pulling off Steve’s boxers and his own, pressing them together, and the slide of Bucky’s cock against his own sent shivers down Steve’s whole body, quaking underneath Bucky’s touch.  Bucky reached in between them, taking Steve in his hand, and squeezed.  Steve pressed into Bucky’s hand, desperate for more, the heat and touch making him drunker than any liquor ever could, and the sounds ripping from his throat were absolutely vulgar.  Bucky smiled, biting his lip in that damnably erotic way, and arched an eyebrow before running his thumb over the tip of Steve’s cock, smearing pre-cum between his fingers before jerking Steve once, slow and hard.  Steve careened into him again, unable to bite back a loud moan, suddenly and totally aflame.“Fffu—Bucky, oh my god…” and then it felt very important to let Bucky know, “Buck, I—I’ve never…” he trailed off before the words would form.Bucky stopped then, and Steve whined impatiently, but Bucky searched Steve’s face and planted a light kiss on his lips.  “I—me neither,” he breathed, and Steve’s heart felt like it was going to explode out of his chest.“You…you haven’t?” Steve managed as Bucky continued the pressure, planting kisses along his jawline.  He wanted to believe, but never really hoped…“No, Stevie,” Bucky admitted, locking eyes with Steve, his face just inches away.  “I always stopped it before it got there.  I would start kissing someone and then in my head it just…it always became you.”  Steve immediately wondered if he was dreaming, but he didn’t care, moving his head up to kiss Bucky on the lips, putting both hands in his hair and bringing him back down against his mouth.  He flicked his tongue in between Bucky’s teeth, and it was Bucky’s turn to groan happily. “Why didn’t you tell me?” Steve asked between kisses.“I wasn’t sure you felt the same.”“Idiot,” Steve mumbled, sucking on Bucky’s lower lip and pressing a bite there.  Bucky grinned into it.“Should we…do you want to…slow down, or…?” Bucky was panting, words muffled against Steve’s mouth.“Hell no,” and it may have come out more of a plea than he meant it to, but Bucky laughed, tugging at Steve’s earlobe with his teeth.“Okay, but let me know if you change your mind, okay?” he murmured in Steve’s ear.“There’s no way I’m changing my mind,” Steve huffed, canting his hips forward into Bucky again, “so get on with it, Barnes.”“So bossy, Rogers,” Bucky growled, stroking up and down the length of Steve’s cock again, and Steve was absolutely, definitely coming apart.  Bucky began planting kisses down Steve’s chest, onto his abdomen, slowly letting his tongue sink further down.  Steve was alight, sparking, blazing, shivering underneath him, eyes opening and closing, breathing harder than he ever had during a long run or even a tough battle, even when he was getting his ass kicked in an alley, even when his asthma had been acting up—nothing had deprived him of oxygen like Bucky’s tongue all over his body.If he thought that he couldn’t get any harder, if he thought nothing could feel better than that, he was wholly unprepared for the feeling of Bucky taking him into his mouth.  Slow, at first, just the tip, swirling his tongue around it, and then further down, his thumb paving the way down the underside and his warm mouth following.  His breathing might have stopped for all he knew.  His whole body was melting beneath this man, the feeling of his tongue and his wet mouth around his cock was unrivaled, unimaginable, incredible, and his body was taking over, hands in Bucky’s hair, pushing him further down, tugging him back, hips rolling forward in a pace that Bucky expertly matched.  When Bucky moaned, Steve felt the vibration through his whole body.“God, Bucky, I’m gonna come, oh my god, oh my god, Bucky, Bucky,” and he knew it was a string of nonsense, just pleading and saying Bucky’s name like a benediction over and over, and when Bucky pressed him harder with his mouth, Steve was done, unraveling and shouting and cursing as he came, Bucky stroking him through his orgasm, keeping his mouth and hand pressed firmly against him.  “Bu-ucky, Bucky, Bucky,” he was whispering now, stroking his hand through Bucky’s hair, and Bucky swallowed, coming back up to plant a salty kiss on Steve’s lips.  Steve was dazed, drunk, sloppy, boneless.  Ecstasy had ripped through him, and he was ragged and breathless and satisfied like he’d never been before.Bucky rolled off of Steve, propped himself up on one elbow, and ran his hands through Steve’s hair, looking down at him.  “How are you feeling, Stevie?” he whispered, fingernails running against Steve’s scalp.“Mmm,” was all Steve could manage.---------------------------Bucky had never let himself imagine quite what Steve would look like this way, blissed-out and undone by him.  The image would come to him and he’d force it away, think of something else, anything but the dark-eyed, hungry way Steve was looking at him now.Bucky had never been more turned on in his life.“God, you don’t know what you do to me,” Bucky said because he couldn’t hold it in any longer, and he pressed himself into Steve’s thigh because the buzzing was telling him to and he wasn’t sure there was anything that could have stopped him.“Mm, I hope it’s something anywhere near what you do to me,” Steve said, nudging at Bucky’s shoulder and climbing on top of him.  “How do you want this?” He was trailing burning kisses over Bucky’s chest, and he paused to take a nipple in between his teeth.  Bucky growled loudly, unable to contain it, and goosebumps spread all down his arms.  He grabbed Steve’s hand, too far gone now to be shy, and worked Steve’s fingers into his mouth.Steve shuddered at the sensation, growing hard again against Bucky’s stomach.  Bucky took each finger into his mouth, slicking them up with saliva, and then ran his tongue all over Steve’s hand quickly, and he was rushing now because he couldn’t take it, the way Steve tasted, clean and brackish and delicious, and he needed Steve’s hand on him, needed a release, needed—oh.Steve had reached down and slowly encircled the tip of Bucky’s cock, pressing all the way down his length and up again, and Bucky’s hips sprang forward at the contact, his breath catching in his throat and he was seeing stars, and Steve was doing it again, stroking him and licking at his nipple and sprinkling kisses up his neck and then his hot breath was in Bucky’s ear, and Bucky’s heart was a battering ram against his chest as Steve slipped his tongue into his ear, clearly smiling through it, and the sounds Bucky knew he was making were inhuman, beastly, but Steve seemed to like it and was speeding up—“Want you to come for me, Buck, want you to come all over my hand,” Steve muttered in his ear, and Bucky had never in the entirety of his life imagined anything hotter than Steve whispering dirty things with his hand around him, tugging at him and pressed against his chest.  Nothing, nothing was ever going to be better than this, his entire body all nerve endings, sparking and coiling and ready to strike.“Steve, oh fuck, Steve—”“That’s it, Buck, come on, come for me,” Steve whispered, more urgently now, and his pace had quickened and Bucky couldn’t hold on any longer, was coming all over Steve’s hand and both of their stomachs and Steve was grinning and whispering, “Yeah, yeah, that’s it,” and Bucky was tipped over the edge, freefalling and, for once, not terrified of the impact, because Steve was there, Steve was there, kissing him and gripping his shoulder and smiling into his mouth.Bucky was heaving, moaning, so much more satisfied than he’d ever imagined he could be, and Steve was hovering over him with that million-watt smile like he’d just won something and his trophy was Bucky, Bucky’s cum all over his chest and his dick still hard on his stomach.        And if that wasn’t something, he thought, the way he looked on Steve and the way Steve’s golden hair stuck up at odd angles, the sheen of sweat pooling just above his collarbone and Bucky did that to him, Bucky caused that look in Steve’s eyes and Bucky was going to get to do that again and again and again and again and…God bless America.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

Steve’s blood felt like honey, thick and slow, as he wound his fingers in Bucky’s hair.  They’d fallen back asleep for a while, but he was awake now, every inch of his skin singing with the closeness of Bucky’s body to his.  He had tucked Bucky’s head under his jaw, flung one leg over both of his, and pressed him as close as he could get, like his very existence depended on Bucky being as close as possible, his breath heating the skin that pulsed in his neck.He could have stayed like this all day.Well, if it weren’t for the interruption.“Yo, Steve!” Sam’s voice called from the kitchen.  Steve hadn’t even heard the front door open, so focused was he on counting every contented sigh he was pulling from Bucky’s mouth as he traced his fingers at the nape of his neck.  His hand stilled, pulse quickening.  Was there any way for him to move him and Bucky in the next five seconds into a more innocent pose?  He tried pushing on Bucky’s shoulder, but the arm Bucky had tossed over Steve had gripped harder, the metal unyielding even as Steve only half-heartedly struggled to get away.  Bucky shushed him, smile evident against his throat, and Steve huffed, rolling his eyes in response.  He turned his head toward the door to the bedroom, which was, of course, wide open.  “Tony sent me to come check on you and Barnes.  He said something about FRIDAY mentioning some rapid pulses earlier this morning, but I told him that you both just drink way too much cof—ho-ly shit.”  Sam had stopped dead in the doorway, mouth open in a comically wide “O.”“Uh, hey, Sam,” Steve said, flashing a sheepish smile, a strand of Bucky’s hair caught in the corner of his mouth.Sam was fumbling for words, blinking rapidly.  He cleared his throat.  “I—I will—it’s, um—breakfast—”Bucky reached his metal arm behind his head and pulled his pillow out, chucking it at the doorway and hitting Sam square in the face.  “Fuck off, Wilson!”“Right!  Right, I’m gonna, yeah, I’m gonna do that, I’ll just be—y’know, upstairs, there’s breakfast, and I won’t—say…” he was backing up quickly, and finally turned on his heel and ran out the front door without looking back or finishing his sentence.Steve shook his head, laughing.  “That was mean, Buck,” he said, planting a kiss on Bucky’s forehead.  “Probably scarred the kid for life.”“It’s payback for all the times I’ve had to watch him try to flirt,” Bucky said, grinning up at him and pressing his lips to Steve’s.  “I mean, it’s really painful to see.”Steve closed his eyes, bringing their lips together and deepening the kiss, moaning a little into Bucky’s mouth.  Bucky made an excited noise, pushing himself on top of Steve and shoving his tongue into Steve’s mouth.“Okay, okay, slow down, soldier,” Steve chuckled, squirming out from under Bucky, who frowned, pouting.  Steve couldn’t help but kiss him right where the little crease in his brow had appeared.  “I have to use the bathroom, and I don’t know about you, but I’m starving.”Bucky absentmindedly placed a hand over his stomach and rolled his eyes.  “Yeah, I guess I am too.”“Breakfast with the Avengers?”“Do we have to?”“No,” Steve said, standing and stretching, not missing the dark look that descended over Bucky’s face as he eyed Steve’s naked body.  “But they have the waffle maker.”“God damn delicious ass waffles,” Bucky muttered, bending forward to bite at the skin just beneath Steve’s bellybutton.  It sent a searing hot shiver down his whole body.“Mm, on second thought,” Steve said, making to get back into bed, but Bucky crawled over to the edge of the bed on his knees and leaned up toward Steve, wrapping both arms around his back and spreading feather-light kisses over his collarbone.  “Buck,” Steve warned, feeling himself growing hard against Bucky’s stomach.“C’mere, Rogers,” Bucky growled, pulling Steve down on top of him.  “The waffles can wait.”--------------When they finally made their way up to the penthouse, it was just before ten in the morning.  Luckily, whoever had made breakfast had taken into account all the human Avengers present plus the two supersoldiers, and the kitchen island was heavy with food.  Bacon, crispy and chewy, piled high on some paper towels, a huge helping of scrambled eggs, kept warm on a burner, mounds of pancakes and waffles with a huge bottle of syrup, dripping stickily onto the counter, a plateful of sausage patties, a mass of hashbrowns, and a huge, plastic bowl piled high with fresh-cut fruit.Clint was balanced on the armrest of the nearest couch, stabbing at some eggs.  Natasha was next to him, a piece of bacon between two delicate fingers, chewing a bite and eyeing Steve and Bucky as they made their way in, Bucky barely muffling a yawn.  Sam was seated at the counter, clearly avoiding Steve’s gaze, and Tony was flipping through channels on a screen bigger than was really needed for a television, arm slung over Pepper, who was the only one who looked like she’d showered that morning.Steve made a beeline to the coffee pot, pouring two cups and offering one to Bucky, who had padded up behind him.  Taking a sip, he said, “So, when do we get started on the mission?”“I vote that we at least take the weekend off,” Tony said, not bothering to look over his shoulder.  Then, as if he’d just remembered, he removed his arm from around Pepper and turned on the couch to face them.  “Oh, how was the superwhiskey?”“Is that what you’re calling it?  Not a really creative name,” Clint pointed out.“It’s still a prototype!”“Worked on me, but not Steve,” Bucky said, making himself a plate. Tony frowned.  “I will make it my mission in life to get Captain America drunk.”“And why is that your mission?” Steve asked.“I just can’t stand the completely clean-cut image.  You have to have a dark side in there somewhere.”“You should hear him talk dirty,” Bucky mused, piling sausage patties onto his plate.The room went silent.  Natasha was mid-chew, and Sam pushed his plate aside to put his forehead against the marble countertop, grumbling to himself under his breath.“Um, and why is that something you’ve witnessed?” Tony asked, though Pepper was squeezing his thigh and giving him a look.Bucky looked up from his plate and scanned the room.  Steve watched him, biting back a nervous laugh.  Bucky shoved some hashbrowns into his mouth, shrugged, and took a seat next to Sam, who audibly sighed.“Oh…my god,” Clint started, pointing at Bucky with his fork and then back at Steve and then back at Bucky again.  “You two?”“About time,” Natasha said, putting the last of her bacon in her mouth.“Does this make you bisexual?” Tony asked, clearly pleased.Bucky looked up at Steve like it was a question he’d also meant to ask.  Steve rolled his eyes, taking another sip of his coffee and contemplating the question.  The truth was…well, the truth was.  “I think I’m just…Buckysexual,” he admitted.  Bucky’s eyes widened and a grin spread over his face, the same grin that Steve had seen him level at people hundreds of times when he got his way.  He stood up, crossed the kitchen faster than Steve’s eyes could track, and tugged Steve in, both hands on his waist, kissing him without reserve in front of everyone.  Clint dropped his fork.“You’re making me blush, Rogers,” Bucky said low in Steve’s ear before grabbing his ass.“You’ve never blushed a day in your life,” Steve replied, pushing Bucky away, but blushing himself, his skin red down into his neckline.“Then I’m gonna have to make you blush some more,” Bucky threatened, wiggling his eyebrows and kissing Steve again.“Get a room!” Sam said, forehead still against the counter, eyes trained down.“Hmm, good idea,” Bucky replied, grabbing Steve’s ass again and pulling his lip between his teeth.  The look Bucky was giving him was dangerous in front of all these people, and Steve had to think of something, anything that would take his mind off of Bucky’s low growl and that lewd look in his eyes.“A room would be a lot more private if people didn’t just come barging in,” Steve said, ribbing Sam and moving to make his own plate.Sam picked his head up.  “How many times have I walked into your room and you’re just watching tv or sketching or lying on the floor listening to Trouble Man?  And the one time I walk in since The Winter Soldier’s decommission and it’s right after you two—you know—you—”“I think they call it ‘boning’ these days,” Tony supplied. Sam groaned, but Bucky laughed, crossing the kitchen to sit back down next to Sam.  “Aw, man, I don’t want to think about it again,” Sam said, avoiding looking at Bucky and burying his head in his hands.“Hmm, and I never want to stop thinking about it,” Bucky replied.“Buck,” Steve said, nudging him in the ribs and taking a seat next to him.“What?”“I think we’ve made them uncomfortable enough for one day.”  At that, Bucky peeled open a banana and raised his eyebrows at Steve, taking a bite from the end.  He didn’t need to put it that far in his mouth, and Steve hoped his answering sigh wasn’t shaky enough for anyone else to notice.And then Bucky spit the banana onto his plate.“What the fuck is this?” Bucky asked, looking at the banana in his hand as if it had bit him.“A…banana,” Sam said.“This is not a banana.” Bucky dropped the whole thing onto his plate.Steve suddenly remembered his first twenty-first century banana.  “Oh, I almost forgot!  They taste weird now!”“They taste awful!  What…what happened to them?”“Banana plague,” Tony said.“Banana what?”“The kind of banana that was around in the Paleolithic Era when you two were born are different than the kind we have now.  The kind you had was wiped out.  But banana-flavored candy is supposed to taste like your nasty, sugary bananas.”“I want banana-flavored candy.  I want it right now,” Bucky said, looking at Steve.“Can I eat breakfast first?”“No.”“Guess you’re going to the store by yourself,” Steve said, taking a bite of his scrambled eggs.Bucky huffed, folding his arms in mock-indignation.  “Fine, I’ll wait.  But it’s under duress.”“Noted.” Steve leaned over to kiss Bucky on the cheek, and the way he lit up was something that Steve was pretty sure he’d never get used to.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

There was blood everywhere.  It was congealing between his fingers, sticky and dark.  It was dripping from the ends of his hair, and he could taste the coppery twang of it on his tongue—was it his own?  No, no, there were bodies everywhere, strewn around him, broken like eggshells, limbs askew, and one of them was a little girl, blonde hair wet against her cheek, and she was struggling for air and he was reaching out to help her…wait—no, no, no—his metal hand was tightening around her tiny neck and the bones underneath his hand gave way, easy as crumpling paper…Bucky screamed.He lurched up in bed, fumbling off the edge, wasn’t fully awake as he reached between the mattress and pulled out a knife, slamming his back against the opposite wall, chest heaving.*                       *                       *                            *Steve moved when Bucky did, heard the plaster in the wall crack with Bucky’s weight as he threw the covers off of himself and scanned the room.  Nothing.  Bucky was edging along the wall, knife in one hand, pushing himself into a corner, wide-eyed and hyperventilating.“Bucky,” Steve said.  Bucky’s head snapped up.  His eyes locked with Steve’s, narrowed and menacing.  “Buck, it’s me,” Steve continued, but he’d seen this look in scared dogs before when they were backed into a corner.  Steve inched a little further away, doing a quick assessment.  His shield was propped up against the wall on the other side of the room, infuriatingly far away, and Steve was fast, faster than Bucky, but he also had no suit on, nothing between him and the knife in Bucky’s hand.  If he couldn’t talk Bucky down…his hand tightened around a pillow.  It was better than nothing.  “It’s me, it’s Steve,” he said, barely above a whisper, still moving ever further away, an inch at a time.Steve saw the moment Bucky decided to jump, saw the tightening of the muscles in his bare thighs as he pushed himself off the ground and sprung at Steve.  Steve had a second’s head start, leaping off the bed and throwing the pillow at Bucky to distract him.  Bucky easily knocked it out of the air, catching Steve around the waist with this metal arm as they both went tumbling down onto the floor, Bucky on top of Steve, the knife in his flesh fingers glinting in the moonlight.  Bucky straddled Steve, pressing his metal hand to Steve’s neck, but not pressing hard enough to stop him from breathing.  The knife hung in the air above them.“Bucky, pal, it’s just a nightmare, it’s not real,” Steve said, reaching a hand up to cup Bucky’s face.  Bucky flinched at the touch, growling low in his throat, clenching the hand around Steve’s throat just a little tighter.  “Buck…Bucky…” Steve was repeating his name over and over, putting his other hand over the metal one.  “I’m here, it’s me, it’s Steve, I’m here, I’m with you ‘til the end of the line, Buck,” and he was rambling, but as soon as he muttered the last phrase, Bucky’s eyes softened, hand releasing his throat, knife clattering to the floor. “S…Steve?” Bucky asked.  Steve could feel Bucky begin to shake all around him, and he threw himself backwards off of Steve, cowering against the bed, threading both hands in his sweat-damp hair.“It’s okay, Buck,” Steve whispered, sitting up and crawling over to him.  He shushed him quietly as Bucky started sobbing, pulling Bucky in toward him, letting Bucky’s head fall to Steve’s chest.  Bucky snuck both arms around Steve’s middle, moaning into his bare shoulder.  “I’m here, Buck, I got you, I got you,” Steve was saying, running both hands up and down Bucky’s back.“I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry, Steve,” Bucky sniffed, trying to pull back, but Steve held him tighter and kissed his crown, shaking his head against Bucky’s.“Shh, don’t, it’s okay—”“No it’s not, Steve!” Bucky snapped, managing to get his hands on Steve’s chest and push himself away.  “I just almost killed you in our sleep!”“I’m not even bruised, Buck.  I would hardly call that ‘almost killing’ me,” he deadpanned, and it took a lot of strength not to roll his eyes, really just to show Bucky that he wasn’t hurt.“But I could have, I had my knife and—”“You dropped it.  You didn’t even use it, Bucky.  You didn’t even try to,” Steve whispered, reaching out toward Bucky again, wanting to touch him, wanting to badly to show him, prove to him that he wasn’t hurt.  Bucky moved away from Steve’s outstretched fingers.“Steve, you have to get out of here,” Bucky said.  Steve tried to ignore the pleading sound in his voice.“I’m not leaving you.”“Steve, get the fuck out of here!” Bucky yelled.  He tried to stand, grasping the side of the bed and pulling himself up, but he was shaking too hard and he sank onto the edge of the bed.  Steve couldn’t help that his breath hitched in his throat when he saw the way the light streaming through the window played on Bucky’s bare chest, all shadows and angles.  Just like it always did, just like his body never asked permission before acting when Bucky was around, his fingers reached up, brushing the skin over Bucky’s chest with his fingertips.  He saw Bucky shudder, goosebumps raising on his beautiful skin.  He did that.  He could do that to Bucky, even now, even like this.  Bucky huffed, but he seemed a little less tense.“When have you ever seen me run from a fight, Buck?” Steve asked, scooting closer so that he was sitting between Bucky’s feet.“This isn’t like that, Steve.  I’m dangerous,” Bucky argued.  Steve sighed a little, turning his head to brush his lips over the sensitive skin on the side of Bucky’s knee.“I’ve already told you that I’m not afraid of you.” Steve rubbed his cheek against Bucky’s leg, one hand coming up the other and resting just above Bucky’s knee.  Bucky had stopped shaking as much, was breathing easier now, but the curtain of his hair hung between them.  Steve laid a feather-light kiss on Bucky’s leg, reaching up to tuck the hair behind his ear.  “Look at me, Buck,” Steve ordered, suddenly very aware of the thing he wanted to say, the thing he’d never said out loud to Bucky before.  The thing he’d never even admit to himself. Bucky sighed, running his tongue over his bottom lip and taking the corner of it between his teeth, finally letting his eyes trail up Steve’s face.  Their gazes locked, and Bucky’s eyes darted between Steve’s like he was looking at him for the first time.  “Steve, I can’t…I can’t do this…you’re the only person that means anything to me.  If you got hurt, if it was me that hurt you—”“You didn’t hurt me.  But listen, we’ll just maybe take the knives out of the mattress—hear me out!” Steve said as Bucky began to protest.  “We’ll talk to Tony about the security measures here, okay? We’ll make it so only me and you can get in here.”“I could kill you with my bare hands,” Bucky pointed out.“Even the Winter Soldier couldn’t do that, buddy,” Steve countered, and Bucky glared at him.“Always so cocky, even when you’re absurdly outmatched.”  Steve grinned in response, and Bucky rolled his eyes. Steve could tell Bucky was about to say something else, but it was just—he couldn’t hold it in any longer, not here, not when he was knelt between Bucky’s legs and Bucky was being self-deprecating as usual and he smelled like sleep and sweat and there was still a shadow of a smile on his face.  Not when Bucky was in front of him in just his boxers with his hair half in his face, eyes sad and lip stuck between his teeth.  Bucky started anyway.  “Steve—”And Steve blurted it out because his chest was hurting with the magnitude of it, the certainty and the need and the decades that he’d gone without saying it, even though he’d felt it for so long that it had become who he was.  He had to say it.  He didn’t really have a choice.“I love you, Bucky.”*                             *                           *                            *                             *Bucky was not sure he heard that correctly, or rather, he was probably hallucinating, or this was just part of the nightmare—hearing something he had never heard before, tumbling out of the set of perfect lips on the handsome face of Captain fucking America, and he was going to wake up and find that none of this happened and that Steve definitely, absolutely did not just say what Bucky’s mind was supplying.  No.  It was too surreal.  It couldn’t be happening.But the hand that had been curled behind the crook of Bucky’s knee disappeared, reaching toward Bucky’s face, cupping his jaw.  Steve, or dream-Steve, trailed his thumb over Bucky’s cheek, running through his beard as Steve sat up on his knees, pressing himself closer to Bucky.  Steve pressed a kiss to Bucky’s collarbone, pulled his head back and looked at Bucky expectantly, a little smile tugging at his lips, and a light blush spreading over his cheeks.  He raised his eyebrows at Bucky.“Uh, Buck…did you hear me?” he asked, one side of his mouth quirking up.“I’m still dreaming,” Bucky explained, shrugging his shoulders.  Steve laughed, pinching the skin on Bucky’s right bicep.  “Ow!” he groused, slapping at Steve’s hand.“See, you’re awake.”“It’s not possible, Steve,” Bucky said.  He closed his eyes and felt the way Steve’s hand crept up his side, trailing heat up and down his back with his fingertips.  He made a sound, halfway between a sigh and a moan, a little embarrassed by the way it came out of him without permission.  But this was a dream, so he didn’t have to be embarrassed.“Buck,” Steve whispered, trailing kisses along his jaw and stopping at his earlobe, biting down a little and huffing his name again into his ear.  Bucky swallowed.  “What do I have to do to prove to you that you’re awake?”“Fuck me,” Bucky suggested.  Steve laughed, dipping his head to sink his teeth into Bucky’s shoulder.  “Ow,” Bucky said again, only half-heartedly, because it stung but it also felt so fucking good, and he was hard now.Steve drew back, eyeing Bucky in the lightening room as the early morning sun started to seep in.  “I’m in love with you, Bucky,” he said, and Bucky could see the pulse in his neck quickening.  Could…could this be real?  He replayed the moments leading up to it, the nightmare and jolting awake and pouncing on Steve and dropping the knife and Steve, too stubborn to walk away, the pain when Steve pinched him and again when he bit his skin…“Wait…wait…Steve,” Bucky blinked, suddenly very sure that this wasn’t a dream, that Steven Grant Rogers was on his knees on the ground in front of him, hair mussed up from sleep, boxers tenting beneath him, and he was saying something.  He was saying something important.  “Steve,” Bucky repeated, swallowing against the dryness in his throat.  “Say it again.”“I’m in love with you,” Steve said.  “I’m so gone on you, Buck.  I have been since we were kids.  I’m sorry it took this long to tell you, and I just need you to know that I’m so fucking in love with you and I tried so hard to stop but now I don’t even know how.  I don’t want to know how.  I’m nothing without loving you, Bucky.  I love—” and Bucky’s heart was squeezing so hard in his chest that he thought he might die from it, but nothing he’d ever heard or ever imagined hearing compared to the way Steve was coming apart in front of him.  Bucky surged forward and caught Steve’s mouth with his, pressing both hands into Steve’s hair and kissing him desperately like he could pull those words right from Steve’s mouth and into his, swallow them down and keep them forever because they were his, Steve was his, hadn’t he just said so?  Steve pressed forward, stood, pushed Bucky back onto the bed and climbed on top of him, kissing him like he never needed to breathe again, and Bucky was pretty sure that Steve was the only oxygen he’d ever need.But they did finally break apart, panting, and Steve pressed his forehead to Bucky’s.  “I love you so much, Bucky.  I just had to tell you, but you don’t have to say it back.  It’s really—”“God, Steve, you’re such an idiot,” Bucky breathed.  “I love you too.  I don’t remember a time when I didn’t.  I’m so hopelessly in love with you, Stevie.”  Steve’s responding grin was so big it could split his face in half, and he met Bucky’s lips again with his.  Bucky could feel it now, the way their hearts crashed into each other, the desperate way Steve kissed him like he wasn’t sure he’d still be there when he opened his eyes.  Bucky trailed both hands down Steve’s back, arching up into him as much to get them closer as to rub his hard-on against him.  Steve noticed.“Hmm, you did mention you wanted me to—what was it?” Steve teased, tugging Bucky’s lip into his mouth.“Ngh,” was all Bucky could manage when Steve bit down on his lip and rolled his hips forward, grinding Bucky into the bed.“Use your words, Buck.”“Fuck you.”“I thought you wanted it the other way around,” Steve whispered into Bucky’s ear, and Bucky felt a surge of pleasure pooling in his groin, urging him to comply.*                             *                           *                            *                             *Steve and Bucky spent the better part of the next few weeks exploring each other.  Steve had never felt more on edge, or more alive.  His body and heart responded to Bucky in ways he didn’t think possible, and Bucky, inexplicably, seemed to feel the same.  Bucky still had nightmares that would wake him up yelling, but they fought them side-by-side, just like they’d always done.When Fury pinpointed new targets, more Hydra assassins, they geared up and took them on together too, and with the rest of the Avengers at their backs and in the sky, they wiped them all out one by one.They’d come home, filthy and battle-weary, and Bucky would kiss Steve’s bruises until they faded under his lips, and Steve would trace his fingertips up Bucky’s metal arm until he shivered, and they’d fall asleep cradling each other and whispering the words that they’d come to say over and over, like a newly discovered song on repeat.I love you.