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Order can only be reached through pain. It started as a hard-learned lesson, a motto. Brock doesn't know when exactly it changed, became a prayer, something recited over and over in his mind, a feverish mantra. Order through pain. Without pain, there can be no order.
It starts when he's fifteen. He already knows that fighting makes him feel good, makes him feel calm. But it's not the hitting that does it for him: it's being hit. He doesn't think anything of it. His first girlfriend, pretty and popular, shows him the neat rows of scars she keeps hidden away on her thighs. It's frightening and he jerks his hand away until she tells him how it feels when the skin splits, like taking a deep breath after being underwater, like the first sharp taste of a snowfall. Like how he feels when a fist cracks his jaw. He takes the razor when she offers it.
The military won't take you if it looks like you self-harm. (Self-harm. He thinks it's strange that they call it that. It's not harming him it's helping him.) And so he stops until the scars fade and he can get accepted. It's not easy, but the military means structure, means purpose, and that's almost as good as pain. And for awhile it works.
1. Evans
Rumlow's a good soldier. He's hardheaded as fuck and a bit of a pain in the ass when they're not in the field, but as soon as they're out, as soon as he has orders, Rumlow becomes the best damn soldier Evans has ever seen. He makes their entire company look good, and of course, by proxy, Evans, as their CO.
The first time they lose someone, a fucking kid, barely 18, it's a fucking mess. The men have nightmares of blood and screaming for weeks or don't sleep at all. But not Rumlow. He gets to bed and goes still and stiff as a board, but he doesn't scream or thrash and he doesn't look as exhausted as some of the others in the morning.
Evans finds him beating his knuckles raw against a heavy bag late one night when they're on weekend leave. (Of course Rumlow decided to stay.) And he gets that, but it looks like the kid is about to knock the bag right off its chains. It's not the brightest idea, but he creeps up being Rumlow and gives him a hard shove, taking him by surprise enough that's he's knocked off balance.
Rumlow comes up spitting and hissing but Evans just shifts into a fighting stance and shrugs. "Feels better to hit something that can hit you back, kid." He doesn't miss the flash of relief that crosses Rumlow's face before he schools it into something hard. They're bloody and bruised when they finally collapse, gasping, back on the mats, and when Brock opens his mouth, gratitude on his lips, Evans waves him off before he can start.
It looks like preferential treatment or hatred or something, singling Rumlow out, so Evans avoids it for awhile. He catches a couple scratches on the kid's upper arm that shouldn't be there and tells himself it's nothing, brushes it away as clumsiness, an accident, although Rumlow is the least clumsy person on the whole goddamned base. And then a razor goes missing and there are drops of blood where there shouldn't me on the underside of Rumlow's uniform.
Evans takes Rumlow out to slam him into the mats again and the blood and scratches stop.
2. Jack Rollins
Jack Rollins likes Brock Rumlow instantly. He's loud and hilarious and has the kind of blind determination and loyalty they're all simultaneously in awe and terrified of. And Jack is strong and quiet and listens to orders without question, so Brock seems to like him back just as fast.
Brock likes to fight. He's not their CO, but they listen to him like he is, and when he says sparring will make them all stronger, no one disagrees. And Brock is good, takes down every other man in the company, but he's still a good half a foot shorter than Jack. It's a struggle but he takes Brock down, and the grin at each other around bloody teeth.
Jack is easily Brock's favourite, which is just fine because Brock is his too. And the fighting is fun sometimes, a good stress reliever and it gets the oxytocin flowing even better than sex. But some of the missions are hard, are draining, and Jack doesn't want to spar after like Brock does.
Brock pushes, tries to order him and his hands are shaking a little when he clenches his fists. But Brock's not his fucking CO and Jack doesn't have to listen to him and he can fuck off if he thinks any different. He doesn't expect Brock to look hurt before he storms off.
No one else will spar with him either and the CO finally snaps and tells him to go the fuck to bed and stop being an ass. Brock looks like he wants to snarl back at him, but he just spits and curls his shaking hands into tighter fists. Jack frowns.
Jack realizes the pattern starting to emerge. Whenever there's a bad mission or a tough call, everyone else wants to be alone, to curl up in a bottle of hard liquor or fuck someone senseless and then be alone and Brock... Brock just wants to fight. Jack doesn't get it. They just had to fight and isn't he fucking tired of violence by now?
And then Jack finds Brock leaning back against a tree out of the line of sight of the others, shirt pushed up and the waist of his pants tugged low on one hip, distracted enough that he doesn't hear Jack, who moves with the silence of a cat despite his size, coming up on him. He has his eyes closed, arching like he's doing something entirely different and Jack almost backtracks to give him some privacy.
Something glints in the moonlight, shivery in Brock's shaking fists, a razor. Brock drags it over his hip, low enough that it won't be easily spotted by the men. Jack is frozen, watching the look of... well... Peace, that washes over his friend's face, like that razor and that swell of blood rising from his skin is an anchor on rough seas. His hands stop shaking.
Jack should say something, to Brock or the CO or someone. But he doesn't. He backtracks and comes forward again, this time making more noise so Brock has time to right himself. And the next time they come back trembling from a mission and he's fucking exhausted, he comes up and claps Brock on the shoulder and asks him to spar.
The look on Brock's face is almost as good as the one when he cut. It's worth the fatigue later when he peeks at Brock's body in the showers and doesn't see any new scars.
3. The Soldier
The Soldier is told when he wakes up who his commander is. He looks...friendly. Obviously new, if he's smiling like that, almost genuine. He's taller than the Soldier, more thickly muscled, but not by much. That doesn't matter anyway. No one, or so he is told, has ever defeated him. Failure is not an option and so he does not consider it.
Rumlow is a good leader, the Soldier decides, although he doesn't have much to compare him to. The men like him, laughing and teasing, but falling in line when the time comes. He tries to make jokes with the Soldier too and doesn't seem unnerved when his attempts garner no response beyond a blank stare. The Soldier doesn't really understand jokes. Rumlow makes them anyway like he does.
Sometimes the commander looks at him with something the Soldier long ago learned to be lust, but he never tries anything like his past handlers have. It's not until he overhears Rumlow talking that he realizes his initial assumption was wrong. Rumlow doesn't want to fuck him, he wants to fight him. It's admirable. Admirable and stupid. The Soldier's reputation is well-known within HYDRA. Commander Rumlow wouldn't last five minutes against the Winter Soldier, and the agent he is speaking to, the Soldier hasn't been told his name but he is small and dark skinned and easily breakable, laughs as he tells him as much. The Soldier knows without a doubt the next look that passes the commander's face: rage and maybe a little bit of hurt. The soldier does not feel these things, but he can recognize the twist of a face and what it means.
Most of the missions go well. They have the Soldier, why wouldn't they? But accidents are sometimes unavoidable. The Soldier is disinterested in the way the other men cope, with sour smelling liquid and cigarettes and cheap girls; none of that appeals to him and anyway he does not need to cope.
Commander Rumlow is different. Sometimes he gets the tall soldier, Rollins, he thinks he's heard the name, to drag him off and the Soldier watches them come back bleeding and bruised. But not always. In the middle of missions, it is too dangerous to risk further injuring one another. It is on those nights that the Soldier notices a shake in the commander's fists, clenched tight enough to dig nails into palms, and when he watches close enough, the commander's breathing rattles, uneven and erratic in his chest.
Sometimes the commander slips away from the group. The Soldier follows and no one moves to stop him. The commander is pulling a small knife across his collarbone and the Soldier does not understand. It is... weak. It is unbefitting a leader. He doesn't care beyond a programmed disgust for all things as craven as this.
He lashes out before he realizes he's even moved, knocking the knife away and pinning the commander, metal forearm pressed hard enough to his throat that Rumlow struggles for breath but cannot break free. The Soldier, surprised at himself but unwilling, unable, to show it, rubs his arm against the shallow cut until blood shines on metal. He growls a few words (Enough. Jeopardize mission. Coward.) and throws the commander to the ground.
Later, he will forget it happened, and the next time he wakes up, is introduced to his commander, he feels a well of revulsion in his stomach, the word pathetic in his mind, although he cannot remember why.
4. Alexander Pierce
Brock Rumlow is blindly loyal in a way that makes Pierce sneer into his milk at night. It makes him more than efficient. The best HYDRA has ever had really, and he wish all their followers were like him. But... it's a little pathetic.
Pierce is wholly devoted to the cause, of course. He is the head of the HYDRA. But he made it better than the idealistic power-hungry fools like Johann Schmidt and Baron von Strucker. His HYDRA is more successful than it ever has been. His HYDRA is the one that will be remembered.
And Alexander Pierce isn't blind. Sometimes Brock Rumlow comes back with little scars that couldn't have been received on the missions. Sometimes he goes tense, whole body locking up, and his breathing changes, hands in fists and shaking, though they are as steady as a mill pond when he holding a gun. Sometimes he challenges his team to spar with him, two or three or four at a time, and he fights hard but he doesn't dodge their hits like he could.
It's only a matter of time before it gets out of control. Pierce cannot stand weakness, it turns his stomach and there are times he can't bear to look at the commander for how nauseated it makes him. But he's good in the field, a leader the men look up to, seal their fates with HYDRA in their loyalty and admiration of him, and the Asset, when they bring him out, falls into line with Rumlow more fluidly than he ever has in the past.
So for now, Brock Rumlow and his revolting habits of managing his issues, stays. Pierce wishes he could be like the other men and just develop a drinking problem or sleep around or something.
5. HYDRA/SHIELD Medical Teams
Brock Rumlow isn't exactly their favourite patient. He's mouthy unless you've got a pretty face and a nice ass, and he fights them on every goddamned bandage and antibiotic until they give up, sign his release, and shoo him off home.
He comes back with strange little scars on hard to reach places, across his hip, the curve of his shoulder, his collarbones, following the line of his ribcage, and he always has a pretty excuse ready. A tree branch (too straight) a knife fight (too shallow) a drunken accident (too even) but excuses are excuses and they have no reason to keep him.
And besides, no one wants to be the dumbass who sent Brock Rumlow to the Psych division.
+1 Steve Rogers
Steve likes Rumlow. He's passionate and kind and always smiling. He loves his team with all his heart and Steve is glad, honored even, to be a part of it.
But Rumlow wants to spar with him and for all the cracks he made to Stark about going a few rounds, Steve knows how easily he could injure a normal human. He sticks to his heavy bags and pretends he doesn't see Rumlow's face fall the way it does, like he's been rejected for marriage not just a playful fight between friends.
Rumlow brushes it off by the next time Steve sees him, is back to calling him Big Guy and punching his shoulder and inviting him out for pizza and beer with the guys and Steve really feels like he belongs on the team, for the first time since the Howling Commandos and he grins so hard it hurts a little.
Steve realizes that Rumlow spars a lot with his men. He takes on multiples and most of the time he still comes out on top. He does it most often, Steve has noticed, when they lose someone on the team, or things go wrong. It reminds him of the long row of punching bags he'd ripped, the sand coating the gym floor that he sheepishly cleaned up himself, stumbling over apologies to the manager, who only waved him off, out of awe of fear, Steve can never be sure.
So he gets it, what Rumlow needs. He takes him up his offer to spar. It's over in less than five minutes. Rumlow's a good soldier but he's no match for the serum; Steve slams him into the mats and he's too stupid to stay down, keeps coming until Steve forgets for just a split second who he is and who they are, hits too hard and feels something crack under his knuckles. Rumlow is black and blue, holding his ribs, two broken and one cracked, they'll learn later, and the idiot is grinning behind a wince.
Steve's done sparring after that, no matter how hard Rumlow begs. (And he does beg. He whines and prods and growls and resorts to insults, calls Steve a fucking coward when he gets no response. Steve just shakes his head and tells him he won't hurt him.)
He doesn't realize the irony in his words until later. Rumlow makes a bad call. Rollins winds up in Intensive Care, two others in the morgue. It's his fault, no skirting around it. He's dressed down by Fury in front of the rest of the men and although he tries to keep a straight face like a good soldier, Steve can see him shaking, practically vibrating where he stands, the misery rolling off of him in waves.
He ducks into the bathroom, in a mostly vacant part of the building as soon as he's dismissed and Steve, torn between giving him the privacy to pull himself together and offering some comfort, follows anyway, but hangs around outside the door.
Rumlow emerges after a few long minutes, eyes dry and hands still; he's wrapped a bit of cloth around his palm and it's bleeding through. When he steps out of the door and sees Steve, where he had obviously not expected anyone to be, he freezes, and both of their eyes go to the blood on his hand.
Steve reaches wordlessly and the sound of protest in Rumlow's throat. It's a clean cut, straight across the palm. Steve is sure if he ordered Rumlow to turn out his pockets, he'd find a nice newly wiped clean that would match the wound. Rumlow doesn't have any answers when Steve demands them, just flinches and looks like he wants to crawl into a hole.
Steve drags him by the wrist to an empty office down the hall and he doesn't fight and it's so unlike Rumlow that it makes Steve's chest hurt.
He doesn't understand. He's lost his friends, to war and age and illness, and they've today lost two more and Rollins might make three and Brock Rumlow is cutting himself in the bathroom. Steve gets the feeling this isn't a one-time thing, that the only reason he as caught it all is because he couldn't stand to wait until he got home. He's so angry he can't breathe. He wants to grab Rumlow by the shoulders and shake some goddamned sense into him.
He's bigger than Rumlow and stronger and he crosses his arms over his chest and won't let him leave until he explains himself, soldier. (Steve spits the word soldier like it's something Rumlow doesn't deserve and Christ, the sound he makes in response is the closest thing to whimper Steve's ever heard a grown man make.)
And he tries to explain, he does, Steve can tell, but it comes out jumbled, snippets of pain, helps, grounding, order and it doesn't really make sense but Rumlow is sucking in air like it can't get to his lungs, chest heaving and eyes a little wild, and Steve suddenly understands how helpless and useless Bucky must have felt when he had those asthma attacks.
Steve pushes Rumlow to sit in a chair and the soldier leans over, forehead against in his knees and hands in his hair and shakes while Steve awkwardly tries to calm him down. He catches fragments of my fault and fuck and relents, saying it is Rumlow's fault, but they all make mistakes. He says in a quiet voice for the first time since a night in bombed out bar, that he made a mistake that killed his best friend.
It's the wrong thing to say. Rumlow curls tighter in on himself like he wants to disappear and he presses his thumb into the cut on his palm until it bleeds freely again and Steve yelps and grabs for him. He doesn't apologize because, well, it's true and Steve's an awful liar anyway, but he stays there and places a hand on Rumlow's back.
He has to take him off duty. Rumlow isn't mentally fit to be in combat if he's cutting himself in bathrooms and begging people to beat the shit out of him. He should have been removed long before this unless everyone in the goddamned facility is blind and stupid. But when he tells Rumlow this, the soldier flies forward out of chair with enough force and surprise to knock Steve back.
His face is dry but he's shaking like an injured bird and he looks so desperate it hurts. He keeps saying he can stop but please please don't do this. He needs it he needs order and he looks like he's about to either shake apart or breakdown sobbing right there and Steve doesn't think he can handle either one right now.
Steve wraps his arms as tight around Rumlow as he can and the broken sound the man makes, the way he sags, defeated, into the touch breaks his heart. He can't think of anything to say so he doesn't speak, knows from experience how trite words can sound when everything is wrong.
Steve knows what it could do to Rumlow's career if he reports this. They forgive the Avengers for all of their faults, Bruce's rage and suicidal tendencies, Tony's arrogance and self-destruction, Clint's mind-control and subsequent shutdown, Natasha's bloody and frankly terrifying past, Steve's own struggles with PTSD and Thor's... well Thor's unfortunate familial ties. But Brock is just a human and as callous as it sound, he's more replaceable in the eyes of S.H.I.E.L.D. Chances are, if Steve marches into Fury's office and tells him Agent Rumlow is mentally unstable and resorting to self-harm or even going so far as to call it passive suicide the way he begged for Steve to fight him, that Fury would dismiss the agent immediately and black ball him as unstable for any other agency.
Steve knows from their time together that this, the military and S.H.I.E.L.D. is really all Rumlow has. He can't be the one to take that away, not when he put a plane in the ice after he lost his best friend. Rumlow is being reckless and stupid but Steve killed himself in the Arctic and isn't in a place to judge.
So he holds Rumlow until the tremors stop and tells him that he'll put him, put the whole team, on leave for a week to deal with the deaths of their friends, the grievous injury of their second in command, but that he has to stop. All of it, the fighting and the cutting and any other self-destructive bullshit he might be doing behind closed doors.
Rumlow nods weakly and promises even though he's not sure he can keep it, and Steve pulls them both up off the floor, gives him a moment to collect himself, scrub at his face and rewrap his hand, before clapping him on the shoulder and suggesting they go visit Jack, humming in response to the quiet thanks Cap he gets in return.