Steve Rogers and the Rooms of Despair

by cptwinniethepooh

Summary:

Steve had given up the serum for the Soul Stone and is now skinny. How do he and Bucky deal with Sentry's rooms of despair?
Written for the May adoptable "End of the World (again)" prompt for Stucky Bingo.

The first time Bucky allowed himself to be deeply, bone-chillingly terrified was on the stairs leading up to the apartment. The Sentry had been contained in Bob, however that bullshit worked, and everybody seemed to return to life, himself included.

But.

There was always that nasty voice, that unchanging fear inside, ever since he'd almost lost Steve to pneumonia when they were ten. That horrendous 'what if...?' that only got worse over the years, first in the war, and especially now that Steve was skinny and non-serumed again.

His heart was in his throat when he unlocked the door and took his boots off.

Alpine greeted him by sniffing him up and then leaving copious amounts of white fur on his trousers; the downside of wearing dark colors and owning a white cat. But her chirps and purrs soothed Bucky even before he crouched down to pet her. If Sentry's powers affected animals, she was fine now.

"Bucky?"

Bucky closed his eyes and swallowed the lump in his throat.

"Stevie?" he called back, and he scrambled to his feet just as Steve came barreling into him. Bucky caught him and hugged him tight and soaked in the familiar scent of Steve's shampoo and meds. Seeing him still tripped Bucky up a little, still brought up the past, especially now. But Steve was no longer underweight, just skinny, thanks to modern medicine and nutrition and money. His elbows still dug into Bucky, though, and it still felt like he could've broken Bucky's ribs with that embrace.

They held onto each other for so long that Alpine got bored and went to lay down somewhere else. When they finally pulled back, one look at Steve's haunted eyes told Bucky all he needed to know.

"Are you okay?" he still asked.

"I should be asking that." Steve reached up to the cuts on Bucky's face. "What the fuck happened out there?"

"Let me clean up and I'll tell you," Bucky said.

Steve followed him into the bathroom and sat on the closed toilet lid while Bucky shed his dirty and smelly clothes, piled his weapons onto the counter, started a wash cycle, and got the first-aid kit. He didn't need it, strictly speaking, but it brought both of them comfort to go through the motions. And as Steve disinfected his wounds, Bucky told him about apprehending Yelena and the other... Thunderbolts, about Valentina's scheming, and about Bob turning into Sentry and creating the rooms of despair.

By that point Steve's forever cold hands had done what they could and hung helplessly in balled fists by his side.

"Tell me you didn't see..." he demanded, fury drawing his eyebrows close.

Bucky closed his eyes and leaned against the tile.

"I did. Everybody saw their worst moments. Yelena and Alexei were Red Room, too. That couldn't have been a field day either."

Bucky heard Steve gritting his teeth. He opened his eyes and let hot water into the bathtub.

"I'm okay, Stevie."

But it was the same old Steve with the same old anger.

"I want to strangle this Sentry," he said, his voice so cold Bucky shivered.

"Bob's a good guy," he told Steve, and got into the tub. Steve made a move to help him remove the prosthetic, but Bucky shook his head. "But yeah, Sentry can fuck himself."

"Did he take your arm?"

Fuck, Steve read him like an open book. Bucky poured enough soap into the water to mask the grime coming off him, leaned back and let the water drain the tension from his body. Steve settled on the bathmat next to him, anger still strong on his face.

"He did. Took me out for a minute, too. But the others grabbed me and my arm and dragged me out."

Steve let out a long breath.

"Walker, too?"

"Especially him. This whole almost-end-of-the-world somehow brought out the best in him. In all of us, maybe."

He sank below the water to wet his hair, and when he closed his eyes, he saw not only his own worst rooms, but Bob's, too.

"Yeah. I saw the news. 'The New Avengers'," Steve said when Bucky came up for air and began cleaning himself.

"Not just that," Bucky said. "It's..." Shit. He didn't have the words. Sam might have had. "You can think that I saw the worst things in there. But everyone saw their worst. There’s no point in comparing them. And we all saw Bob's, and, fuck, he didn't have it easy either."

"That's no excuse," Steve said. Bucky looked at him through water-logged eyelashes and thought that Steve would have more compassion for Bob if it weren't for Bucky's suffering.

"The serum enhances what's inside," he said quietly, so quietly amongst the water splashing and the washing machine whirring that he wasn't sure Steve's hearing aid would pick it up. But it did, and Steve nodded a little in acknowledgement. "You were already great before the serum. No, shut up. You were kind and brave and righteous. So of course you were more like that after, too. This Bob guy seemed to be jittery, and down, and his mind could go to dark places. No wonder whatever bullshit they did to him made that worse. But there's kindness in there, too, or he wouldn't have been able to come back. Walker, too, although he's still an asshole. And he took the knock-off serum willingly, while Bob didn't know what he signed up for."

Steve's shoulders drooped. He heard the unsaid parts: the torturous experimentation, the human lab rats, the manipulation. While Bucky washed the shampoo out of his hair, Steve was silent, and then a little petulant.

"I'm glad you guys helped him," he admitted.

Bucky squeezed his hand, splashing water onto him, not that it mattered much. The steam was sticking Steve's blond locks to his forehead, and he was still the most beautiful man Bucky'd ever seen. Bucky drained the water and decided to take a shower as well.

Instead of going out, Steve sat back onto the toilet lid and watched him. Not with lust, which Bucky was used to, but with the worry that Bucky could disappear again – and Bucky had to admit that he was used to this look, too, actually.

"What did you see?" Bucky asked, now that he couldn't see Steve from the water in his eyes, because he was a coward.

"Nothing as bad as you," Steve said.

Bucky scrubbed himself clean and rinsed the conditioner out before replying.

"You don't have to tell me," he said.

He wrapped himself in a towel as he got out, and Steve was staring holes into the tile.

"Stevie?"

"Ma's death," Steve said quietly, and Bucky's heart shattered. "You, falling down the train. Me going down with the plane. And then..." Steve waved, a little, with a weak smile. "You know. The future. HYDRA. The Accords. Thanos."

Bucky pulled Steve close and dripped water all over his hoodie, but Steve clung to him like a drowning man to a life raft.

"I'm so sorry, Stevie," Bucky mumbled into his neck, and at that moment, he, too, could've shot Bob for what he'd done. But it wouldn't have been fair.

"I just kept on losing you, over and over again," Steve mumbled. "I was so happy to see the news, that you were okay."

Once they could let go, and Steve chugged his damp clothes into the drier along the freshly done wash, and they put on clean boxers and climbed into bed, Alpine at their feet, Bucky held Steve close to his chest and breathed in the scent of home.

"Besides HYDRA, I also went back to you being gone," Bucky admitted. "It was worse than anything else. I almost want to go back to Wakanda."

Steve squeezed him tight. "Say the word and we'll go," he said fervently.

But Bucky thought of Congress and the New Avengers, and he thought of Steve, never being able to stop helping people. Of Sam, and Yelena, and the constant threats looming over their heads.

"You didn't, back then," he told Steve. "And I won't, now."

And Steve kissed him with pride.

Series this work belongs to:

• Part 4 of heavy is the hand that wields the shield
• Part 15 of Stucky Bingo fills