James Buchanan Barnes spent five years in rehabilitative isolation before he allowed himself to go by that name. Another half-a-year before he left the hospital to start his adjustment back to civilian life. It took even longer, longer than he wanted to admit when asked, for him to accept what he had done. He — that other guy. The Winter Soldier.
And accept was the key word. He believed it and lived with it. But he would never forgive himself for it. The things the Winter Soldier had done, the things he had done, were all too disgustingly real. He saw their expressionless faces on his eyelids, felt the cold of their skin on his fingertips. He could smell death in the icy winter breezes, reminding him of long, patient hours in kale landscapes with but metal and snow to keep him company. Sensations and images — not clear enough to feel like memories, but real all the same. These were the things his mind tormented him with while awake.
But worse than that — the blasted feeling. Whenever he saw those three colors together, whenever a news report zapped by on the television or he saw his face in the papers. Even the damned national anthem could trigger it. Anything particularly american, to be honest, and that feeling was there. That wanting. That need.
A need to kill Captain America.
It wasn't Bucky's need, it was the Winter Soldier's. None the less it was all in Bucky's head. It didn't stop there, either. Night fell, sleep came and the nightmares took over. Hands wrapping around Steve's neck. A gun held steady, aimed at Steve's heart or his head. More often than not it was the head. It always turned out messier. Steve would drop to the ground and blood would paint the black void that was the dream world. His face would be covered in his own bodily fluids, or even blasted off entirely, making him unrecognizable and too horrible for even the old Bucky to mourn. Each and ever single night, this happened.
Worse still was the real times. A lazy, lonely day on the sofa, zapping through TV channels when a news anchor appeared. He reported on another of Steve's heroic deeds. It turned black before Bucky's eyes, and the next thing he remembered was being handcuffed with electromagnets and taken down to S.H.I.E.L.D Headquarters. Locked up for six days. Willingly.
He'd thrown the TV through the window onto the street below, hitting a passing car. A father and his two children were injured.
After that Bucky lived with Steve. He was deemed unable to live alone and Steve's was the only company he was sure he could stand. Plus, Steve had insisted. They moved the couch, put up some temporary walls and another bed in the living room. Locks were installed on every window and the door. Once a week Bucky was allowed to take a walk or eat out, and then only with Steve or another associate of S.H.I.E.L.D's.
Steve's apartment, turned into a prison, basically. It was a horribly boring life, but Bucky endured. He wanted to get better. He wanted to get his life back.
But it was so hard.
Steve knew the rules — he'd recited them himself — nothing associable with Captain America was allowed in the apartment. All his gear and suits were stored at Headquarters. His shield, the only thing he was allowed to keep at home for safety reasons, he kept in a separate room down the hallway. Bucky had been out one day with his bodyguard (the world's bodyguard), and Steve had taken the opportunity to take out the shield and clean it some. Only, Bucky had returned a little earlier than expected, and saw the shield.
It happened so fast that the S.H.I.E.L.D agent had a hard time giving a clear account for it. Bucky remembered, though. Afterwards. From that day and forever. He had run over and grabbed Steve by the neck with his metal prosthetic arm, slamming it into the countertop so hard it broke in two. Steve was unprepared and knocked out cold by the first blow. But Bucky– no, the Winter Soldier kept going. He saw white stars and icy windows. Faces he knew and faces he knew he should knew swept by his blurred vision and twisted his reality.
Four, five, six. Seven times Steve's head crashed into the countertop before the S.H.I.E.L.D agent landed a shot severe enough to disable Bucky. It took two shots to the legs and one in a shoulder to stop him. This monster.
He was lucky the agent had not aimed to kill him, or so he was told. Bucky wished she had.
Steve was hospitalized for near nine weeks, of which he spent seven weeks in a coma, diagnosed with head trauma that would have been fatal for any normal person. But Steve was not a normal person — now that was lucky.
Steve had no recollection of the event at all — he didn't remember coming home, or even pulling out the shield in the first place. When Steve was let out of the hospital, he wanted Bucky to come back with him. Said he was still welcome, that it wasn't his fault, that he didn't blame him. He said anything to get Bucky to feel better.
Bucky went with him. Laid his head on the pillow in Steve's living room. Let his eyes close, sleep come and the nightmares take over.
Tonight he was back in a ship falling apart, standing with metal fist ready over a beaten man. Captain America. Steve Rogers. Too fast to be hesitant, Bucky– the Winter Soldier! slammed his fist into Steve's face. Into his cheek, his chin, his neck. he kept hitting and hitting, for hours on end, until the only thing keeping the head attached to the body was his own hand in Steve's hair.
Bucky stood up, holding the head up by the hair. Blood dripped from the severed neck, long pieces of meat dangling and shattered bones sticking out everywhere. The eyelids hung half open and heavy over placed eyes, dead to the world. Teeth were busted and cheekbones had cut through the skin.
Too sincerely to be forced, Bucky smiled. Too swiftly to be regretful, he held the head above a hole in the crashing ship's hull and let it go. He watched it fall into the blue, cloudy abyss below. Then, too slow to be proud, he turned around and walked away.
Then he stopped. And held his hand up in front of him. It was clenched into a fist. Around hair. Hair attached to a head.
Steve's eyes burst open, blood-shot and swelled up. Still glazed over. "YOU KILLED ME."
That was the last night Bucky spent in Steve's apartment. And that morning was the last time he ever saw Steve at all.C