Blood Brothers
Bucky's life is in danger. Question is, does he want to live?
Steve looked concernedly, but tried not to stare, at James as they sat across from each other in the quinjet troop carrier. This was his first trip back into the field since Steve and Sam had found him wandering about in a very rural Polish farm, half wild from his broken, tortured mind and the other depressed to the point of death.
"Bucky. It's Steve. Put the gun down. I'm here to help you." Rogers soothed. Falcon hung back at the edge of the trees surrounding the tiny plowed field to give Cap his space. A nervous energy ran along his spine as he watched though, hoping Cap was right about being able to talk James out of his psychosis.
Lightening doesn't always strike twice, Cap, Sam muttered to himself, while surveying the situation, his finger on the triggers of his pistols.
Crouching down, realizing there was no cover in the open field, Bucky turned to glare at his pursuer, the silver arm extended partially in submission and as a threat. His flesh hand grasped the butt of a pistol in the other, index finger trembling. The blue eyes that looked back were so haunted that even Steve wasn't sure he could exorcise all those ghosts. In the back of his mind, Steve wondered briefly about his own ghosts. "You. Why do you keep following me?!" James yelled back, his voice a mixture of anguish and rage. The tone reminded Steve of his declaration on the helicarier that Cap was his "mission". It made Steve feel like Bucky's soul was being torn from his body.
"I'm your friend, Bucky. That's all. I want to make you feel better." Steve held up his hands and advanced very slowly, footstep by footstep over the tilled black soil. His approach made soft sucking sounds in the wet ground and stirred up the scent of fertile earth between them. In the distance, a rooster crowed and hanging laundry flapped gently by the farmhouse.
Bucky was heaving breath as if he had run a marathon, but he was otherwise still as a stone. As Rogers approached, he could see the silver arm had damage to it, like intentional harm, and Bucky was too thin.
"Please. Let me help you." Steve said carefully extending a hand toward his best friend.
Bucky's eyes darted wildly from Steve's face, his hand, Sam at the tree line and back to Cap. There were tears at the corners of his eyes, and his nose was running as if he was a small child trying to hold them in because he would be beaten if he let them fall.
"Please."
Bucky lunged forward into Roger's arms and hugged him so fiercely that Cap thought his spine might break. Huge sobs tore themselves from James's body that sounded like a wounded animal was tearing him apart inside. Cap embraced his friend and they both sank to the ground and let their grieving begin, together.
The mission was approaching and Steve still wondered if Bucky was up to this. After brining him home, Fury had given Rogers some names of people who could help with the depth of Bucky's damage. Sam did what he could and Stark polished up the arm to full functionality. It took almost two years but James was declared fit for battle. Was he really ready?
"Bucky, we don't have to do this, you know." Steve said to James over dinner at their now shared
Brooklyn apartment.
"I know." was the simple reply as Bucky pushed his mashed potatoes around on the plate, sopping them up with gravy. Rogers noticed that even with therapy, James tended to say much less than he used to.
"I mean it, Bucky. We can quit. Hang up our hats. Enjoy life… for a change." Steve's tone became wistful.
James's eyes lifted from the plate of steak and starch and looked calmly at his best friend, "I know."
"Well then can you please tell me why the hell you are so eager then to go back into battle?" Cap's voice took a harder edge and he felt his body go ridged with tension. Rogers suddenly noticed he was clutching his steak knife like a dagger. Bucky's eyes drifted to the knife and then casually back to Steve's face. Steve immediately put it down.
Bucky, poignantly, remained composed and regarded his friend while he chewed his forkful, "Steve, I've been doing this my whole life. What else is there?"
Rogers felt there was another motive there, but let it go, "Because there is a life out there, Buck. A life we never got to live. With jobs and wives and families… and…" Peggy's face swam into his vision. He blinked her away.
"Do I need to call Sam for you?" was all James replied and then they both lapsed into stillness.
Fury was working his way across eastern Europe, doing what he had planned to do after the Washington D.C. debacle: flush out and destroy Shield/Hydra agents left behind. Two weeks ago, it became apparent to Nick that he was going to need some more specialized firepower. As Putin was making a power grab for the Ukraine, some tentacles of Hydra appeared. Nick needed help.
The message was brief: let the SEALs take out the "normal" hostiles and Bucky, Sam and Cap destroy the Hydra agents. There was a weapon mentioned; nothing like the tesseract-powered guns that Dr. Zola had made, but not quite normal ordinance. Dr. Banner was consulting from a distance, noting he'd like to get his hands on some data. There were hints that Stark wanted to see the technology. All Rogers wanted was his friend to survive and get out, skins intact.
All Steve could do, was tumble the idea around in his mind like laundry: was Bucky ready? Or better yet, was he?
