Chapter Text
“The day misspent,
the love misplaced,
has inside it
the seed of redemption.
Nothing is exempt
From resurrection.” – Kay Ryan
______________
Excerpt from the journals of James Barnes, 2017:
The first thing I remembered was you. Don’t think I’ve ever told you that. It took nearly a year for the names of my parents and sisters to come back, but I remembered you. From the moment I met you to the fall from the train. Start to finish. Beginning to end. You were there in brilliant colour—like oil on canvas, perfectly preserved.
And I loved you. I knew that, too. I didn’t remember anything about Bucky Barnes except that he loved Steve Rogers with every damn beat of his bloodstained heart. You were air. Remembering you was like learning how to breathe again—oxygen finally cycling properly through my lungs after a lifetime of vacuum.
This was the mistake Hydra made: they thought they could erase you. But you are carved into my bones and saturated in my blood. To erase you, they would have had to cut me up into pieces so tiny they would have never fit back together whole again.
They damn well tried, but it wasn’t enough.
Because I knew you the second I saw you. I didn’t know who you were yet, but I knew you. And for an instant, before they sunk me back under, I loved you.
They thought they could use me to kill you. Fucking idiots. I’d endure their torture, the fall, the wars, all that fucking blood, a million lives and a million deaths, before I ever ended yours.
They sent me to kill you and doomed themselves.
And I hate them for what they did, but. You’re asleep in the bed next to me, mouth open, drooling all over the pillow. There’s a gun under that pillow but your face is relaxed, open and trusting and young and you’re so fucking beautiful. All these years, all this time, and I still feel my chest go tight and my lungs dry up every time I look at you. And I get to. I have you in ways I never dreamed I could.
I’m so glad I lived. Everything Hydra did, everything they took—it doesn’t matter. They didn’t take you.
But please, please may I never lose you again. I wouldn’t survive it.
_______________
BUCKY
Istanbul, 2017
Bucky Barnes is running for his life. It’s become a painfully common occurrence in the last two years, but few days have been as bad as this. He has no idea where Steve is, which makes a tight, furious ball of worry coil heavy in his chest, and the bullet lodged in his leg is making sprinting increasingly difficult. The black ops strike team had gotten the drop on them, shooting him before he even had a chance to react. He put three of them down but they just kept coming, and now he’s running.
He turns a sharp left, darting into the maze of the Grand Bazaar. Shouts rise up close behind him, too close, ordering him to stop, but he tunes them out, skidding as his feet hit the tile. He doesn’t fall, but it’s a near thing. His leg burns and he tunes that out, too. They aren’t going to open fire in here, too many civilians, and he’s fairly certain he can lose them.
He turns another corner, sneakers slick with the blood streaming down his jeans, and narrowly avoids crashing into a startled family of tourists. They gawp at him, no doubt taking in the metal arm, the smears of red across his pants and shirt, and his wild eyes. The woman opens her mouth to scream and Bucky shoulders past her. He can still hear them—five, heavily armed, fanning out in an effort to trap him.
He briefly debates going for the rooftops, but no, too exposed. His entire right leg is wet. They must have nicked an artery. Fuck, fuck, he needs to think—why can’t he think? And where the fuck is Steve?
He rounds another corner, gasping when his leg nearly gives out, and ducks through a stall of carpets, ignoring the angry shouts of the merchant. If he can just find a place to hide, then maybe—
Crack.
He cries out, shocked, as a bullet tears into his stomach. Fuck, so much for not shooting around civilians. And he didn’t see it, how could he have not seen it? He shoves the pain down as deep as he can and keeps going, turning down a smaller path. People scramble out of his way, yelling in half a dozen different languages. The bottom half of his shirt is soaked and he’s starting to feel lightheaded.
Focus. Focus.
He can’t see any of his pursuers and he takes the opportunity to slow to a brisk walk, scanning the various stalls. There, an older woman is manning a stall overflowing with various foods and spices. There’s plenty of room behind the counter to hide—the large displays will shield him from view—and he staggers forward, forcing his brain to switch to Turkish and his eyes to go wide and pathetic as he stops in front of her.
“Please,” he forces out, wrapping a protective arm around his middle. He lost his coat in the initial ambush and her eyes immediately dart to his metal arm, but they rest on his face and soften slightly. “Please, I need to hide. Just for a moment, please?”
The woman nods slowly, pointing behind her, and he stammers out his thanks as he sinks onto the cool tile behind the display. The burner phone is buzzing in the pocket of his jeans and he pulls it out, flipping it open with trembling fingers.
“Steve.”
“Where are you?” Steve sounds breathless and panicked. Bucky closes his eyes. The shouting is getting closer and blood is pooling onto the tile beneath him.
“You need to get out.”
“I’m not leaving you.”
Bucky shakes his head, blinking back a stupid, sudden onslaught of tears. He’s always known that someday their luck would end, that they’d run out of world to hide in and their enemies would find them. As long as it’s him and not Steve. They’ll put a bullet in his head, probably, but at least that’s quick and Steve will still be out there, saving the world like he’s meant to.
It’s an easy sacrifice.
“I’m cornered,” he says into the phone, keeping his voice steady. “Don’t come after me. You’ll just get caught, too. Get out. Meet up with the others.”
“Bucky…”
“Do it. Go, Steve. I’m not asking.”
“I’ll come back for you. I promise.”
Bucky closes his eyes. He can hear them walking down the corridor, checking the stalls. Any minute now…
He doesn’t ask Steve not to come, not to risk himself, because he knows Steve always will, for better or for worse. “I love you,” he says instead, voice thick.
"I love you, too.”
He clicks the phone shut and shoves it into a nearby bag of dried rice, just as three black ops members come bursting into the stall, guns raised. He puts his hands in the air and he doesn’t think they’ll execute him right here, in front of so many gaping civilians, but they seem to be a terrible combination of angry and desperate so he mentally prepares himself for anything.
The leader raises his rifle and slams the butt down hard into Bucky’s face. Once. Twice.
Everything goes black.
_______________
TONY
He can barely hear the ringing of the phone over the music blaring from the speakers of his workshop. When Ross’ name flashes up on the screen, he reaches out and puts him on hold on instinct. Ross hasn’t called him in months—not since officially decommissioning the Avengers after the epic snafu that was Germany and then Siberia and then Captain fucking America breaking four “dangerous criminals” out of the supposedly most secure prison on the planet and happily skipping off into the ether to start life at the top of the UN’s hitlist.
And sure, Tony’s still technically on active duty, but he knows that he’s probably the absolute last person Ross is going to call—only when world-ending scenarios are involved, and even then it would be debatable. Ross might actually prefer to watch the world burn to ash before asking for his help.
The screen flashes, insistent.
Tony tries to remember if aliens have invaded again. Someone would have told him about that, right? Rhodey, at least. Rhodey still calls to yell at him occasionally. Rhodey would definitely tell him about another invasion.
This must be about Rogers, then. Ross hates Rogers more than he does Tony and Rogers has slipped away from him four times in the last year. Each time, Ross calls Tony up to bitch about it. It would be hilarious if not for the ugly, tight mass of anger still thrumming against his ribs when he thinks of Rogers, or Barton, or any of them. Even Vision, who rattled off some bullshit about “unlocking the secrets of the infinity gem” and went on a (heavily monitored) visit to some monks in Nepal or Mongolia or something.
They’re all gone and Tony can’t remember the last time he spoke to another human being. Maybe last week? Did Rhodey call then? Or was it the week before that?
It doesn’t really matter. He prefers his machines, always has. Machines aren’t backstabbing traitors (not counting the one massive exception to that rule, nope) and they don’t have perfect teeth or try to preach to him about Doing the Right Thing or lie to him about his parents being fucking murdered, so yeah. He’s fine without people. Totally fine.
The screen beeps again, insistent. Tony sighs and debates just hanging up. He’s close to a breakthrough with this new gauntlet design and he’s not in the mood to hear about Captain America Grand Escape Number Five, but. Well. He hasn’t talked to another human being in one, maybe two weeks and the voice in the back of his head that sounds annoyingly like Pepper is insisting that’s unhealthy.
He braces himself and accepts the call.
“Stark,” Ross barks, annoyed, and Tony cuts him off at the pass.
“So how did you lose Rogers this time? Did he ride away on a unicorn? Ascend into the sky like Jesus? Oh wait, I bet he—”
“We have the Winter Soldier in custody,” Ross interjects and all the words die in Tony’s throat.
“How?” He blurts, because last time they managed that it did not go over well. And now, if intelligent reports are to be believe Rogers and Barnes are pretty much glued to each other so one without the other is ... unexpected.
“We got a lead on their next destination and ambushed them in Istanbul. Rogers escaped but Barnes was injured in the initial assault. We’re holding him in New York until the Accords Committee reaches a decision on his fate.”
A creak of metal startles Tony. He glances down and realizes that he’s curled his gauntleted hand into a fist, fingers scraping against the palm. He takes a deep breath, forces himself to relax, even if he can see where this is going.
Ross considers losing Barnes again a world-ending scenario.
Sure enough, “We’re concerned about containment. You have some experience from dealing with Banner that could prove invaluable. We’d like you in New York as a consultant until the committee’s decision.”
Bingo. Nailed it.
Ross waits, expectantly—no doubt for him to jump to attention like a good little soldier. Ha.
“Please hold,” he says and freezes the screen again, cutting off Ross’ protests mid-splutter.
He hasn’t left the mansion in a month. At least a month, probably longer. He still wants to shoot Barnes in the face repeatedly until death and he’s not sure he’s going to be able to resist the temptation if he has to be in Barnes' immediate vicinity for more than five minutes. Maybe even one minute. He wants to hang up on Ross and hole away in his mansion until the next inevitable alien invasion. He wants revenge for his parents’ deaths. He wants to forget Rogers, forget what a mistake trusting him was. He wants to watch Barnes suffer.
He wants to know why.
Fuck, why is he even standing here debating this? He’s known what his inevitable answer will be from the moment Ross mentioned “Barnes” and “custody” in the same sentence without “escaped” between them. With a sharp sigh, he reengages the call.
“I’m on my way.”
He’s going to regret this. He can can already tell.
_______________
BUCKY
God. Everything is so fucking white. He would think himself dead but everything also hurts and he’s going to hell, not heaven. Memories rush back like a flood—Istanbul, ambush, wounds, bazaar, Steve. Steve got away. Steve is safe.
He sags back against what he thinks is a floor and sucks in a sobbing breath. Steve made it out. That’s all that matters. He’ll take anything they want to throw at him if it means Steve stays out of danger. At least until he comes charging in with the cavalry, which will probably happen sooner rather than later.
Seven decades and Steve is nothing if not predictable—at least when it comes to dangerous, stupid rescue missions to save his sorry ass from whatever prison he’s managed to get himself thrown into. God, it’s irritating. He hates Steve’s Knight in Shining Armour tendencies just as much as he hates the fact that he always seems to end up the damsel. He supposes Steve is making up for the first ten years of their lives when Bucky was the one saving him, but still. Annoying.
The thought of Steve pulls his flesh hand up to the chain around his neck on instinct. They let him keep it, thank fucking God, and he clutches the ring on the end of it tight enough to dig indents into his palm. It’s a nondescript silver band with some African symbols engraved on the sides, but it’s the only possession Bucky genuinely cherishes. Steve bought it in a market in Cape Town and presented it to him with a sheepish smile after a truly epic round of sex and he will wear it until the end of his days.
The ring is here, but his whole left side feels stranger, lighter. Bucky opens his eyes again, squinting against the harsh florescent light, and lifts his head.
His arm is gone. Those fuckers took his arm.
He’s not really that surprised—was when they didn’t remove it in Germany—but helpless anger still burns through his blood. That arm, even though he loathes it, is a part of him and they just took it. He feels, absurdly, like they’ve maimed him.
He’s too tired to pitch a fit at the moment, though, and he can still feel the lingering ache and pull of his wounds. He files it away for later and uses his right hand to push himself up into a sitting position. His stomach twinges in protest, but he stubbornly ignores it. It will heal. Those kind of wounds always do.
Instead he looks around, cataloguing his surroundings. White ceiling. Slate grey walls on three sides that look like reinforced steel and concrete. The fourth a glass wall and what he assumes is the front of his cell. No furniture. A metal cuff around his ankle attached to a chain bolted into the floor. A harsh tug proves it’s anchored well and is not going to come up easy. The chain looks long enough to allow him movement around the room, but he’s almost certain it will retract automatically if he tries anything.
His head hurts—they probably pumped him full of sedatives to get him here; he can still taste them in his cotton dry mouth— and he can feel the tender pulse of still-healing bruises from where the black ops squad had bashed his face in with a semi-automatic.
There’s someone outside his cell. He hears the sharp, in and out rhythm of their breath—feels their eyes boring into the side of his face.
“Welcome back, Sleeping Beauty,” a familiar voice announces before he can force words out of his parched, raw throat.
Howard Stark’s son steps up to the glass. He has his hands stuffed in his pockets and his shoulders loose, casual, but his eyes burn like a furnace.
Bucky stifles a groan and the urge to immediately curl up into a protective ball.
Shit.