Chapter Text
The first lie comes easily.
In the mirror, in the fog, showerhead thrum like a ship propeller underwater.
Bucky tries to separate skin from real and his entire body feels false. Scrubs his torso and wills some transformation to take place on his non-flesh arm, to mirror the woven wire patterns that pock the rest of his body. Signs of human all over his skin and that - that thing in the glass above the sink with his face.
He takes a boning knife and hacks away at his hair. Maybe then, he can look at the thing and not feel like a thief.
Borrowed. Stolen. The thing keeps staring back like it’s asking for something to be regifted.
Bucky hacks away in uneven clumps until there’s no more fistful of hair to grab.
Steve talks a lot about memory. The re in remembering. Bucky’s brain made it. Made it through the wringer and back. There’s a lot to thank but not really. It was just the serum. Healer of all things, even time. Years without having his head fumigated to remove worms from the past. But does he really have to be thankful for something so decent?
He knows how old he is from the museum display with the same face as the thing in the mirror. With his newly trimmed hair and his practiced smile coming more easily, he looks the same as the boy who left for war and didn’t make it back. Until 70 some years later anyway.
He thinks of the Japanese soldier who kept fighting in the war for 29 years after it ended. But had it really ended, or just ended with the Japanese soldier? And does this mean Bucky carried the war into the 21st century?
After all, he was never actually informed of the war's end. Just restored, shut down, restored again.
Most of all, being half-god is where he and Steve’s similarities seem to end. Steve keeps beating the rock, willing a spring to flow where a desert has risen beneath their tired feet. But Steve died a national hero, slept through the nights Bucky remembered and prayed silently in a chair for rescue that never came. And then Steve woke up, hair still shining, eyes brilliant, chest broad like America’s entire westward expansion was built on it. Smile there - sad, sure, lonely, okay, but his teeth are so bright and straight. Reminds Bucky of a bloodless chain of picket fence.
Steve woke up and didn’t know so many things. Others helped him learn all the history he missed. Nowhere in those lessons did they mention Bucky. Steve never asked. Steve saw Bucky die that day, saw the tinsel of red decorate the mountain shelf as Bucky hit packed snow on rocky ice.
***
As it goes, there isn’t much in Bucky’s apartment. Just bare-knuckle furnish. A television, some corners, a bucket to catch a leak in one. So he’s almost sick with a twinge of relief when a new captain america is announced. Gives him an excuse to sneak up on Sam. Invite himself along on a mission to do whatever, anything, so long as he stops checking his phone for a reply from Rumlow. Raynor says he needs to stop ignoring texts. From people who care about you, maybe she meant to add. But she didn’t. So Bucky feels free to keep silent vigil in hopes that someone who definitely doesn’t care will give him something to wrap around. Rope tied to a body, pulled taut around a tree.
On the flight to Germany, Bucky’s phone buzzes. An electric jolt to send his heart waltzing. It’s Rumlow. He just knows.
But he fixes his eyes on Sam. Sam, so resilient and selfless and deserving of the shield’s weight. Only Sam could push that boulder up the hill again and again. Bucky longs to get lost in Sam’s waves, break apart and melt into the sand.
Instead, Bucky stares. And stares. Sam stares back. Bucky wonders what kind of an ocean he himself would be - not Sam’s powerful waters, strong enough to shoulder lightning and kindly push ships to shore.
Perhaps he himself would be a dried-up sea, a once-was. Boneyard. Full of sun-bleached rib cages white like Steve’s teeth, passed down from animals of another time.
Sam jumps out first. Bucky checks what Rumlow had to say. Bucky had sent the first message the night before. After waking up. After watching that face in the mirror raise its - their - arms and kill, kill, kill.
He left Yori’s door and barely made it back to his apartment when he told Brock the only thing that made sense: it’s me.
In the dim screen before him, Bucky reads: look what’s off the leash
Bucky swallows and feels the muscles in his jaw clench around his tongue. He jumps with no intention of landing right. No intention of landing like that thing in his dreams.
***
His mind is elsewhere. The fighting comes easily, but he pulls his punches. Finds himself outspent by an untrained group of kids because he wants to be. Finds relief in Sam’s arms when they’re rolling around a field and he lets himself linger for a moment too long before spitting out, you should’ve taken the shield. A yanked breath here and Sam is pushing himself off of Bucky. Stay, Bucky thinks. He doesn’t dare say it out loud. He bites his tongue until he tastes the unmistakable copper tang of blood.
Buffalo clouds gather overhead. The field rolls on forever and Bucky feels the weight of Rumlow’s text in his pocket as Sam removes his goggles by Bucky’s side. Sweat on Sam’s brow glistening like a trail of moonlight. Bucky drinks up this moment. Hopes to commit it to memory forever. Sam’s hand so close Bucky could reach out and hold it, and hold it so gently he would. Feel Sam’s sturdy knuckles and be unafraid.
But Sam stands and Bucky follows suit. They’re back on the plane before Bucky has let go of the warm scent of grass and the hum of wind on their faces. Another buzz from his pocket. Another spiraling waltz and a surge of electricity in his brain as he tells Sam that they should just take it, take the shield. What’s so wrong with taking? Things were taken from him. Decade after decade. An arm. Autonomy. Memory of face and song and then, the will to question whether he even wants to be alive. He misses Rumlow. He does. No questions with Rumlow. Just pain. And the slightest hand of affection after.
Bucky tells Sam of Isaiah and he feels a pang of shame and justice as his head is lowered into the back of a cop car once they’ve left the old man’s house. Traitor, traitor says the look Bucky imagines in Sam’s eyes. Finally, something Bucky deserves. Anger. Hatred. Traitor, traitor continues the crowd of stomping feet in Bucky’s head and he hopes, against all odds, that Sam will strike him for it. Hurt me, Bucky thinks. It’ll make us both feel better. But the blow never comes.
What comes instead is an admission of sorts to Sam, about the importance of Steve’s shield, now Sam’s, but not really Sam’s, not until Sam accepts the burden only he is worthy of carrying. I want you to hate me, Bucky wants to say. Really hate me. He wants Sam to discard Bucky so he can feel right, validated in his certain knowledge that all he’s good for is Hydra. Or what’s left of it. Who’s left of it. Rumlow. Just one shitty person to remind him that he’s even shittier.
But then, Sam says that he’ll quash the issue right now. They can bury the hatchet and Bucky catches a whiff of that feeling from earlier that day, when he lingered for a moment too long tucked under Sam’s chin, chests pressed together and safe. This is selfishness, Bucky thinks. He’s such a selfish person, to contaminate Sam’s glacier-clear springs with his own murk.
Sam leaves first and Bucky leaves next. Raynor stays back. He checks his phone again. Or you someone else’s dog now?
Bucky debates texting back something snarky, maybe something defensive, anything but what he settles for: i need it.
Why jump the gun so quickly, let the truth come barreling out in that explosive shot? There’s that crowd again, traitor, traitor, gush of blood in his ears and his heart is louder than the sirens Walker blares from across the building lot. No way to take the words back. He’s sure Sam will leave him if he found out, if he read with his own two eyes Bucky’s selfishness. So much desperation in those three words. Steve isn’t even dead. He’s just on the moon. Rarely talking to Bucky. How could anybody have known that Bucky’s resolve would part like a shoal of fish at a moment's notice, making room for the growing need to feel so intensely hurt that he can feel like he’s allowed to take up space again? Surely, Rumlow knew. Rumlow alone.
***
When Zemo says those words, jumble of Russian pried from a book like an old wives’ tale, Bucky’s ears twitch. That’s all.
But Zemo watches him with a crow’s eyes, inquisitive and benign. Just reaching for a chance to scratch that itch. Bucky understands. They’re both looking for something they need. Zemo needs something outside of those prison walls, to keep his mind company. Bucky needs something he can’t quite comprehend.
In the seconds before Bucky leaves to break Zemo out, Zemo calls out to him. “We can help each other, James. You need something that confuses you. I can give it.” Bucky stops. Doesn’t turn around. Lets his ears burn on both ends and set the rest of his head on fire. Wild flame in his lungs as he leaves the cell and tells himself that Sam can never know. He’ll shut Zemo up by force if he has to. He feels his phone dig a hole in his pocket until he finally has a chance to fish it out between helping Zemo escape and getting to the garage where Sam waits.
Tell me what you need, baby boy reads the reply from Rumlow. Bucky’s skin prickles. Rises on every end in the form of a threatened cat. He can hear the sneer in Rumlow’s voice. That unkind lilt he grew such an attachment to as the soldier, when it was the only thing that would precede any mimicry of affection.
i’m lost. is all Bucky texts back. Almost immediately after he pockets his phone, he gets a reply. Bucky grits his teeth and ignores it. Goes to fetch Sam from the garage. Goes to make a point to Zemo about not knowing what the hell Zemo was talking about earlier.
***
Zemo is rich. Zemo has a jet. Zemo has sticky fingers and Bucky lets himself be relieved of Steve’s old notebook at the slightest brush of hand against pocket. Turns a blind eye to the thievery and even lets Zemo read the names until -
flare of paranoia and a hand finds flesh to throttle in Zemo’s neck. A flicker of that same crow’s curiosity in Zemo’s eyes as he apologizes, makes it clear with a close-mouthed survey of Bucky’s reaction that he isn't afraid. Bucky is unraveling, Zemo knows. Bucky knows that Zemo knows.
When Sam takes a moment to use the bathroom on the far end of the plane, Zemo takes his chance. Wanders into Bucky’s head and finds wounded land. A landscape both he and Bucky know well. So many bodies in the welted trees Bucky tries to dismember, to make room for sunlight to ease his cluttered mind. There needs to be order, Zemo sees. He speaks.
“Who is it?”
Bucky raises an eyebrow. Frowns and doesn’t answer. Shifts in his seat and lays his metal arm across his chest in conspicuous view. Zemo pushes. “The Hydra agent you’re talking to. Who is it?”
There’s a flush. Sam will be back any moment and Bucky is...afraid. No, obligated. Zemo knows and won’t drop the subject. Continues to stare into Bucky as if his eyes alone can hatch the secluded information out of Bucky. Zemo knows that Bucky’s been a traitor, and Bucky owes him the information he wants. Otherwise, Zemo gets leverage. Gets that sharp knife with which to slit Bucky’s throat, to tell Sam all about how Bucky reached out to Rumlow first, and never stopped texting back. If Bucky tells Zemo who it is, then a bargain will be had - a name in exchange for a secret kept.
Through the thick bramble of tongue and tooth, Bucky stumbles onto an answer. “Brock Rumlow.”
Satisfied, Zemo leans back into his seat. Sam returns. “What’d I miss?” he asks. The sunlight cuts into the plane and lays a gentle hand over Sam’s eyes, turning them into delicate pools of sandstone and clay. Sam glows. Bucky notices, and notices. He feels the heavy weight of his own hands against his sides, and wills Sam away. Maybe then, he won’t melt in Sam’s halo.
Finally, they land. While Sam is changing to fit the part of Conrad Mack, Bucky checks his phone.
Are you hurt? it reads.
No Bucky texts back.
And then, a few minutes later: do you deserve to be?
yes Bucky writes.
***
Stepping back into character as the winter soldier makes Bucky feel pristine. Gleaming. Like his body has been blissfully punctured and every breath that’s been gathering is freed. Old air let out and Bucky immediately knows what to do. Takes the hand off of Zemo’s shoulder and feels every bone in his body click into place. A freshly oiled machine. Turns back to look at Zemo for a nod of approval. Finds comfort in finally having a handler again, outlined agenda, all he has to do is maim. The fight comes easily. He puts Bucky in the backseat and the soldier glides through armed men as easily as a fin cuts through water. And then, just before he fully intends to suffocate a man to death at the bar -
well done, soldier.
A rush of sickly affection towards Zemo blooms in his chest. It feels as though his very own arteries are attaching to this bud of warmth thinking it a new sun. Settling deep, taking root, his heart is begging to be watered with further praise. With a sinking feeling, he feels Zemo turn away from him. Another fracture in his ability to tell the soldier and Bucky apart. The thing in the mirror smiles. Gotcha. The thing in the mirror has sharp teeth. The thing in the mirror reaches out a hand, metal just like his own, begins to pull Bucky through until -
you good?
Sam puts a hand on Bucky’s shoulder. The weight of gold. The weight of warmth. Bucky sees the thing bare its teeth one last time before releasing Bucky. It shrinks back into its side of the mirror and Bucky feels himself grow to fill the space again, outgrowing the soldier, outgrowing the thing, outgrowing everything but this space he shares with Sam. The world narrows. What if, he wonders, the world could just be the two of them? So large that nobody else fits, so large that only they fit in each other’s hands.
But all Bucky does is give Sam a nod in reply.
Maybe Sam will never know of Bucky’s gratitude. Just another leaf lost to the wind, another kindness Sam had given Bucky even though he hasn’t earned it.
In front of Selby, in Zemo’s hands, Bucky’s vision blurs again. He can’t figure out what he wants or needs. He’s never been allowed to want or need. Nothing prepared him for this. All of his time in Wakanda was spent on killing old triggers. Being declawed until the soldier had been deemed dead enough for Bucky to be rewarded with a new, proper arm. In Wakanda, Bucky never anticipated standing in front of anyone again, regarded as an item to be bartered. A favor. Pretty gift, your lips are so red beneath that mask, Pierce used to croon.
Yet here he is, familiar feeling, head up and chest squared although his heart trembles. Zemo runs a finger over his chin and almost, almost, Bucky leans into the touch. He doesn’t dare look at Sam, but he can see it, in his mind’s eye, Sam’s ill-concealed look of worry. For what, Bucky thinks. For fear? Can Sam see how easy it was for Bucky to don the soldier’s skin again, and can he see how difficult it is for Bucky to twice shed that fur? Heavy, dark, perfect for hiding. Maybe, Bucky thinks, Sam won’t object if Zemo really does sell Bucky off to Selby. If things go south, if this bargain is the only thing that can lead Sam to Nagel and Bucky can’t get away. There were the words for violence. They were taken care of, fine. fine. fine.
But then there were those words Bucky didn’t tell anybody of. When the Wakandans had asked him if those Russian words for violence were it, the last dredges of rot scalded from Bucky’s skin, he had said yes. That was it. No more soldier left, just Bucky Barnes. Eggshells. A heap of flesh beneath. No more hidden layers to be stripped away. How could Bucky have possibly known that he would hear these words again? Words omitted from the book, offered from mouth to mouth like an heirloom. Exalted string of sounds in an ancient language, impossible to understand. Shared only between a handful of people in Hydra, Pierce and Rumlow being the last ones to know.
So Zemo couldn’t possibly -
Zemo speaks.
Bucky feels lighter and lighter until he watches in horror as his knees bend on their own. Feeling his torso still in his control, he tries to scramble away from Zemo, to cover his ears and force his legs to move. He’s clawing at the floor with his metal arm when Zemo speaks again, and he feels his sides clam up as well. Unmoving, he lays face down, harshly aware of his own breathing, drawn out like a heavy plough dragged across his throat. Behind him, he hears the sound of Zemo’s shoes as the baron steps closer to Bucky’s body. He feels the press of Zemo’s heel between his shoulder blades. The small hairs of his neck tickle as Zemo draws in close, puts his lips so close to Bucky’s ears that only Bucky can hear him.
“I told you, James” Zemo says, hardly louder than a breath, “I can take care of you.”
A cold knot Bucky didn’t know had been forming in the space between stomach and lung turns heavier. Out loud, to the room, to Selby and Sam, Zemo finally releases Bucky. “At ease, soldier,” he says.
Bucky regains control of his body, but the heaviness is still there.
The imprint is complete, Bucky realizes. It’s been so long since he felt this way. Overwhelming want. Overwhelming need for validation from Zemo, any ounce of affection, some kindness, even a single word of praise would do. And for that, Bucky would do anything. Take whatever pain or humiliation Zemo wants to impart upon Bucky, for a moment of softness.
Bucky gets back onto his feet. He feels himself teeter. Lurch to the side. Ship with a ripped sail, severed mast, holes in the deck and he feels his body sway before Zemo catches him. Steadies him with a hand. Bucky feels grateful. He looks to Zemo and sees something shiny, a savior, armored knight ready to keep Bucky safe. Bucky resists an urge to scream.
“Who am I?” Zemo asks Bucky. Zemo cups Bucky’s chin between forefinger and thumb, tilting Bucky’s face up to meet his eyes. “Tell me.”
Bucky shakes his head. It isn’t worth it, it isn’t worth it, he thinks. They’ll just find Nagel some other way. A large part of him that has healed thinks of Steve, of Sam, of Thor’s valiance and Tony’s altruism, the undeserved heaps of empathy the Avengers gave him despite everything he’s done. Bucky tries his best to wriggle away from Zemo’s grip. Tries hard to avert his gaze.
But Zemo gives him a shake.
“Who am I?” Zemo repeats. Bucky is forced to look into Zemo’s eyes again, and the feeling comes back. That overwhelming need. Spreading in his chest like spores, Bucky gives in.
“Father,” Bucky rasps out. He hopes that’s enough. He wants to transform, then, into somebody else, into anything else. Into nothingness. He feels sick. Like his very bones are porous and diseased.
Zemo pouts with mock disappointment. Raises a hand to run the tips of his fingers through Bucky’s hair like Bucky is a child, needing to be consoled. Cajoled into revealing a truth.
“You can do better, James,” Zemo says. Squeezing his eyes shut, Bucky says the word he knows Zemo wants to hear. Not father. Something younger. Something from a time and place when he was more malleable, the thing he used to call Pierce when they were alone and Pierce wanted something specific and foreign-feeling.
“Daddy,” Bucky says. It’s barely above a whisper, but the noise booms in the silence of the room. He can feel Sam’s discomfort grow from feet away.
Zemo raises his arms as if displaying something grand.
Selby claps slowly. “Quite the show, Baron,” she says. For the first time in a very long time, Bucky chances a glance at Sam.
Sam is disturbed. Bucky can tell. He can tell from the way Sam’s brows are stitched together, in that righteous sort of way Bucky has only ever seen mirrored in Steve. But there’s an overlaid film of disgust in Sam’s eyes as well. What else could he be disgusted at, but Bucky? Bucky is so sure now that Sam would love nothing more than to leave Bucky behind. If not in Selby’s care, then Zemo’s. Once this is all over and done with, Sam will rid himself of Bucky. Shake him off like a pesky bug and move on, forget about Bucky, wish Bucky all the worst.
“Tell us what you know about Nagel, and I give you him.” Zemo says. So this is it.
This is it.
And then, Sam’s phone rings.
Like the earth has cracked open, chaos pours from every direction as Selby is suddenly shot and they’re on the run again.
Before Bucky’s had a chance to recover from the look on Sam’s face, seared into his head again and again, Sharon reveals herself as Selby’s shooter. Within the hour, they’re in hightown and Selby offers her place as refuge for the night. Gladly, the group accepts.
***
Sharon steps out of the living room to take a call. The silence between Sam, Zemo, and Bucky inflates until Sam finally decides to shear it.
Glaring at Zemo, Sam sets the tone of his voice dangerously low. “Whatever it is you did back there, undo it.”
Meeting Sam’s eyes with a tilt of his head, Zemo pats the side of his left thigh. Involuntarily, Bucky moves. His body reacts for him, his thoughts trailing behind. He wants this, his body says. He doesn’t want this, his head says. He does. He doesn’t. It’s only muscle memory.
Bucky gets up from the seat of his armchair to crawl over to Zemo. He stops only when he’s reached the spot on the floor next to the other man, and drops his head into Zemo’s lap. He lets his eyes cloud over and looks at an ornate corner of the ceiling, away from Sam. Zemo runs a gloved finger through Bucky’s hair. Bucky lets out a sigh.
“Why don’t you ask him what he wants?” Zemo says to Sam.
Sam grits his teeth. Clamps down so hard Bucky can hear it. “Undo it, Zemo.”
“Come now, Sam,” says Zemo. “You don’t think he’s happy? Being told exactly what to do?” More petting. More shivers. “He hated being in control. Didn’t you, James?” Zemo pats the side of Bucky’s head with feigned sympathy and tuts. Sam looks pained. He slides to the edge of his own chair, gripping the armrests as if to ground himself.
“Stop it, man. Undo whatever it is you did to him.”
“Or what?” With a sharp yank, Zemo grabs a clump of Bucky’s hair and pulls. Bucky’s head is forced back and he lets out a whimper. Within seconds, Sam has gotten up and is blazing an angry trail towards Zemo when, just before reaching the baron, Zemo lets Bucky go. He raises both hands in surrender and smiles that chimerical smile. “All for show, of course. No need to get violent.” In a flash of new words from Zemo, Bucky feels that heavy feeling from earlier dissipate. He feels the strings attached to his limbs snap loose.
Exhausted, Bucky peels his head off of Zemo’s lap and scoots away. Sam makes a motion to reach over and take Zemo by the collar when Sam’s eyes flicker over to Bucky and, for just a half-second, their eyes meet. Bucky pleads with Sam to let it go. Let this go. Please.
Sam’s shoulders slacken although the heaving of his chest suggests the anger is still there. Trapped bird, trying to pry loose with a dull beak.
Bucky lets himself up. Rolls his shoulders back and helps himself to Sharon’s whiskey. He can’t get drunk. He and Steve have tried. There was that night, wind dagger-sharp and the night storm-sea bleak, when they chugged five bottles of vodka each. Felt nothing. Chugged five more. Still felt nothing. Stared down the blinking streets of Tribeca from their perch on a rooftop, daring each other to jump. What’s the worst that could happen? Absolutely nothing. A twenty story fall and what? A bruise. Maybe. A cut. Probably not. The only things that could hurt them now were gods. Entire helicarriers crumbling into the Potomac, fire from explosions large enough to level a city. The millennium turned and there they were, back in New York, heads full of bad ideas like they never quite moved past being twenty something.
But they still were, weren’t they? Just twenty something. Jokes all around about being centenarians, but they stopped aging long ago.
Bucky takes the glass of whiskey and empties it anyway. And then, he pours himself another. Zemo takes the opportunity to remove himself from Sam and Bucky’s company. He quietly retreats to a spare room Sharon has set aside.
Sam doesn’t make any move to get closer to Bucky. For that, Bucky is grateful. A single inch closer and he might feel crowded enough to explode.
Sam does, however, speak. He meets Bucky’s eyes again. Unwavering this time. Planted flag, conquered land, you don’t have a choice but to work with me here. “Buck,” he says.
Bucky sucks in a breath through his teeth. “I told you not to call me that.”
Sam doesn’t roll his eyes. Just corrects himself. “Fine. Bucky. Wanna tell me what’s going on?”
Bucky leans against the bar.
“You know I can’t get drunk?” Bucky says.
Sam shakes his head. “I thought all the words were taken out of you,” Sam says, ignoring Bucky’s last comment.
“Steve and I have tried. Lots.”
“Did Steve know about this?”
“What, the drinking? Of course. He can’t get drunk either.”
“No. You know what I’m talking about.”
Bucky inhales. “No. Steve didn’t know. Still doesn’t.” He says the last bit with inflection, hoping Sam gets the hint. Steve can’t know. Steve can never know. If Steve knew, he would drop everything, come running back to Earth so he can take care of Bucky, babysit more like, waste his time away on Bucky because Bucky is so selfish, incapable, so pathetic and bad and -
he can’t help it. The panic swells in his chest like a wave and his vision grows bleary once again as he begins crying. He tries so hard to stop, but he can’t. Sam takes a cautious step towards him and a fresh spring of tears well up in Bucky’s eyes before they too, fall.
In the past, as the soldier, when he would be punished for minor infractions after particularly grueling missions, he would cry from exhaustion. It was rare, but they could never remove this part of him. After all, he was still human. Mostly. The soft whir of his metal arm never did anything to quell the way his heart pinched before the sobs broke away from his chest.
But then, then it was so much worse. Crying was the worst thing he could do. Crying meant he thought he had feelings, and that his feelings mattered. Crying was manipulative. Crying was trying to get his handlers to feel bad for him, and it was met with punishment so severe he was relieved to be taken back to the chair afterwards.
But now -
now what?
He couldn’t do it again. He desperately didn’t want to do it again. Cuts so deep from whips that it took even him weeks to heal, the press of bodies into his, held down and air cut off while he was fucked with so much force that he prayed he would pass out.
Would Sam do that? Sam wouldn’t, wouldn’t, but Bucky couldn’t risk it, had to at least try to make things right.
“Sam,” Bucky says, face wet with tears. “Sam, please. I’m sorry. Please don’t hurt me.” Bucky’s voice comes out hoarse, barely more than a croak. “I’m sorry,” he continues to beg. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorrypleasedon’thurtme.” He’s well aware that his words come out in a barely coherent jumble of noise.
Sam steps closer now, more rushed, like he needs to reach Bucky before Bucky vanishes. As Sam reaches Bucky, Bucky takes a step back. Sam takes a step forward. Bucky takes another step back. And another. And another, until Sam clasps Bucky’s shoulders with his hands. Bucky’s panic rises. He shouldn’t have stepped backwards. Stepping backwards was always seen as a sign of reluctance. Hesitation. Resistance and thoughts of escape. Bucky deserves to be punished for it, he knows. He knows, he knows, but he just can’t bring himself to get on his knees and offer himself to Sam. Not to Sam, not right after he witnessed Bucky being pet by Zemo. He doesn’t want Sam to know just how easily his body was passed around over the decades, from one rough set of hands to another as he filled every sick role that was demanded of him.
He doesn’t want Sam to touch him, because Sam doesn’t deserve to be dirtied by touching Bucky. Just like how Steve didn’t deserve it. Just like how he felt guilty each and every time Steve hugged him or laid a hand on his shoulder. Sam and Steve, selfless and immaculate. Too good and too bright to see the filth that clings to Bucky beyond their own circles of light.
“Bucky,” Sam says, loudly this time. Firm like the roots of an old tree. “Bucky!”
Sam’s face snaps into focus as Sam lets go of Bucky’s shoulders. Sam’s face, eyes wide and jaw slightly hanging open as if he’s not done speaking, but he doesn’t know what else to say.
“Please,” Bucky says, one last time.
“Nobody is going to hurt you. You’re safe, Bucky. Nobody is going to hurt you.” Sam says this over and over, as if to calm Bucky down. And it does, to an extent. At the very least, Bucky knows that Sam has no plans to discolor his own cleanliness by touching Bucky in all the hurtful ways others have in the past. But there’s also the issue of, of -
“Thank you,” Bucky manages to squeak out. Sam looks relieved.
“Hey, no need to thank me,” Sam replies. His voice sounds distant. “You good?”
“Yeah,” Bucky says. He takes another final, shaky breath, and manages to stop crying. His breathing evens out.
But there’s also the issue of Bucky finding what he deserves. Getting the discipline he needs, for crying, for making such a scene, bringing attention to himself and being so stupid enough to let Zemo say those hidden words. He should’ve fought harder, been better, not been such a fuck-up and done the terrible thing of begging Sam to not hurt him. He never should have stepped away from Sam to avoid contact, even if he did do it for Sam’s sake, so Sam could stay clean of Bucky’s contamination.
“Why did you think I was going to hurt you?” Sam asks. Bucky waters down the truth and serves it, hoping Sam finds nothing wrong with his answer.
“I just -” Bucky looks away, rubs the back of his neck to emphasize his discomfort. He wants to make himself look like he’s having a hard time revealing the truth. This way, it’ll be more convincing, he thinks. “Hydra used to hurt me, you know? For crying.”
Sam blinks expectantly. When Bucky doesn’t continue, Sam supplants the silence with what Bucky thinks is supposed to be words of comfort.
“None of that was your fault. What Hydra did to you - that was wrong. You didn’t deserve any of that. Nobody is going to hurt you, Bucky.”
Bucky resists the urge to laugh. What does Sam know? How could Sam know? Of anything? Bucky is bad. He is selfish, pathetic, deserving of correction. Just because Sam sees the best in everybody doesn’t make any of those things less true. And as for nobody hurting Bucky - what if Sam hadn’t been there? He would still be under Zemo’s boot, following the man around on all fours and curling up on the floor at the foot of his bed, desperate for any morsel of closeness. He recounts the loneliness he felt at Hydra, those long months spent out of the ice, regaining consciousness and memory and knowing that he couldn’t - shouldn’t - tell anyone. The loneliness that swam up from beneath, dark and unending as a whale’s mouth, indistinguishable from the rest of the black sea save for large pillars of teeth.
“I’m sorry. I think I need to be alone.” As Bucky turns to leave, Sam catches him by the hem of his shirt. Reels him back in.
“Bucky, listen. I don’t think you should be alone right now.” Ah. There it is. As if Sam knows that Bucky plans on seeking out punishment the moment he has time to himself.
He needs to think of a lie. Fast.
“I'm gonna crash,” Bucky says. Sam looks hesitant at first, but Bucky does his best to keep the lie believable. “Swear.”
It’s enough for Sam. Maybe just barely, but still enough. Sam’s posture eases up and Bucky gives him a half-smile in reassurance. Just before he turns to leave, he makes sure to add the thing that had been so pivotal: “Just don’t tell Steve. Please.”
Back in the safety of his own room, Bucky checks his phone. As expected, a text from Rumlow. Ice down his spine like a wash of relief from a humid day.
Madripoor. You know how to find me.
Bucky does. But what are the odds that Brock is also in Madripoor at the same time he is? Although it makes sense, Bucky thinks. After the fall of Hydra, being a wanted man with a specific skill set - Madripoor was the obvious choice for Rumlow. Bucky doesn’t know why he didn’t figure it out on his own, sooner.
Some time past two, when everybody else is sleeping and Sharon has left her place, Bucky sneaks out. He goes to seek out the familiar X signs that signify Rumlow has left a trail for him to follow.
Some time around half past two, Bucky ends up scaling the sides of a building not too far from Sharon's in high town. He knocks on the window, and sees Brock's familiar face appear on the other side.