"There is a trigger."
Bucky's voice – because he is Bucky now, not all of the time but almost and that is more than Steve ever wished for – is soft, is tentative, and Steve turns his head and tries to understand what the other is saying.
"…what?"
"A trigger. They created one…inside of me, for. You know. Nothing bad, it won't make me run amok, I won't kill anyone, don't worry, it's just, it makes me go…." Bucky pauses, hesitates, and Steve knows that sometimes, it's hard for him to remember words; sometimes they just escape him before he can speak them out loud. "Pliant. That's what they said. Pliant."
Natasha told him about the possibility before, about there being some kind of on/off switch hidden in Bucky's brain, but Steve didn't want to, couldn't bear to believe it, and yet it seems he was wrong. Again.
He feels like throwing up, like drinking himself to stupor although he knows that is not possible anymore, but for Bucky's sake, Steve pulls himself together, asks, "What…what do you want me to do?"
Bucky hesitates, like he never used to but often does now, tilts his head to the left and looks at Steve with an intensity in his eyes that is new and frightening and makes Steve's heart ache a little with each beat.
"I want you to use it", Bucky says.
Steve says no. Says, oh God no, says no please, you can't ask this of me; and for the first time in his life, before the serum, after the serum, before Bucky fell and afterwards, he means it. The mere thought of it, of Bucky being helpless and vulnerable and a body without a mind, a puppet, makes him sick to his stomach, makes his skin crawl and his hands curl to fists, needing to smash someone's skull, to make someone pay. But while he cannot bear it, he can see that Bucky cannot let it go.
Over the next weeks, every of his movements seems to write it out in big, bold letters, every time his eyes mist over with thought and it takes him a couple of moments to come back to him, Steve knows what he is thinking of, what it is that keeps him back. And what felt bad before starts feeling worse, because he still cannot bear the thought, but cannot bear the thought of not giving Bucky what he needs either. Not before, not now, not ever.
It's a silent, grey afternoon and Bucky is staring out of a window of the flat which used to be SHIELD's, used to be Steve's, and now is theirs; Steve doesn't disturb him, doesn't try to snap him out of it, just sits down on the sofa next to the other and waits. Waits until afternoon turns to evening and then some time longer, until there is no light left playing on Bucky's features anymore, just shadows, which move and dance when the other finally turns around.
"Why would you want me to do something like that to you?", Steve asks, doesn't wait just in case he has lost his courage a moment later. "I just need to understand, Buck, I can't…"
Hurt you, he wants to end the sentence with, but doesn't dare to; for all he knows, hurting might be exactly what Bucky wants him to do, and Steve hates the thought with more passion than anything else, because it's the one thing he knows he will never be able to bring himself to. No matter how Bucky might crave it.
Bucky looks at him, and his eyes are painfully soft, and Steve's heart aches again, in a completely new and unknown way; it's surprising because he was sure he had felt every kind of pain already.
"I see them. I don't even have to close my eyes, I just see them all the time. The faces of the…", Bucky stops, closes his eyes, and Steve is not sure what he is searching for, a word or a memory. "The thing is, I don't even know if I killed them. Maimed them. If I just met them, I have no idea, but they are there all of the time, in the corner of my eye, in the faces of people I just met, and it-"
Again, a pause, but this time, Steve is grateful for it, because Bucky looks shaken, on the verge of a panic attack. Sounds breathless and scared.
"It is driving me insane." Bucky ends the sentence like it should be enough, should be an explanation, but it isn't, not to Steve. Who waits, doesn't say anything, just waits until the other continues.
"I don't remember what it felt like when they used that trigger on me. But- but that's the point. I just cannot keep thinking all the time, Steve, it is killing me, I can't run around and see dead people all around me. You wouldn't have to do anything, just, just speak the words and leave me on the floor, I don't care, but just give me this. Please. Give me a few minutes of not having to be like…like this."
Bucky's voice is quiet, if desperate, and Steve's heart is clenching up, cramped and pained, and yet he cannot do anything but hold out his hand, hoping that Bucky - who used to be so affectionate, used to throw his arm over Steve's frail shoulders whenever possible, and now shies away from touch so often – will take it.
He doesn't, just looks at Steve with eyes that look more dead than living and his lips pale, thin. "Please, Steve. I can't- not like this, it's too much and I can't ask anyone else. You're the only one I-"
Trust, his pale lips form, but his lungs don't give away enough air to carry the word to Steve's ears; he hears it nonetheless. And answers before he can think.
"Alright", he says, and ignores that his whole body revolts against the answer; Bucky has gone through so much and he is not going to take away the one thing which he can offer to make the other feel better. "Whatever you want. Anything. Anything for you."
He means it.
Coulson gives him the words and Natasha teaches him how to pronounce them, and within a day, they are in Bucky's room, all curtains drawn close and Steve feeling sicker than he has for seventy years.
Are you sure? he wants to ask, but doesn't, because he can see the answer in the line of Bucky's jaw, in the way he clenches his fists. Instead, he touches a hand to the other's shoulder, to tell him, I love you; Bucky nods, and it's the same as saying, I know. Almost the same as saying, I love you too.
He doesn't ask if Bucky is ready either (he has been for weeks, Steve knows that), just speaks the words and hates how they taste on his tongue, hates their sound and hates the meaning Natasha would not tell him about. Hates every single member of HYDRA who ever tasted them before him.
And Bucky goes pliant.
There is a second where Steve can just see it in the corners of his mouth, in his eyes, which are focused every other moment of the day, but glazed over now, but then the other drops to his knees, head bowed and arms hanging to his side limply. He's waiting for an order, Steve knows it, and feels the bile rising in his throat, hardly makes it to the bathroom before he is retching out his guts, hands shaking and eyes burning with tears.
It takes Steve several minutes until he can bring himself to walk back into the room, and takes every ounce of strength and self-control he has not to just turn around and bail when he sees Bucky in the exact same position as before, not having moved a muscle.
"Jesus Christ", he breathes out, and drops to his knees. Next to Bucky, next where he should always have been.
There have been no instructions from the other, about what to do and what not to, so Steve just looks, every part of him aching, and wonders how long he has to endure this to make Bucky feel better.
Without thinking, he reaches out, places a hand on Bucky's shoulder, just to make sure that the other is just away and not gone again, and for the first time since he found Bucky, half-dead and confused in the middle of a strange city Steve cannot remember anymore, the other doesn't flinch.
If anything, it should add to the horror, but instead, it does the opposite, makes something inside Steve flare up and wrap around him, consume him, because he has wanted this forever, to just be able to hold Bucky, feel him close and alive and well. Before he can reconsider it, Steve moves closer, his movements slow and hesitant, closer and closer and closer still, until he can feel the warmth radiating from the other's skin, until he can feel Bucky's breath against his collarbone, their chests almost touching.
And his heart is flowing over with guilt, making it almost unable to breathe, but Steve still leans in, wraps his arms around the other's waist and holds him close. Bucky is thinner than he remembers, the metal part of his shoulder hard and unfamiliar when pressed against his body, but Steve doesn't care, only cares about the heart beating next to his, about Bucky in his arms, about Bucky, who he thought was lost, but came home. Is still coming home, slowly, but surely. To him.
It's been four months and three weeks, and for the first time, Steve allows himself to cry, tears streaming down his face and wetting Bucky's t-shirt; he doesn't know how he will explain it, but cannot worry about it now. Just cries, and clings to Bucky, like he did after his father died, his mother died, and tries to imagine that Bucky is whispering soothing words into his hair, is rubbing circles on his back. Tries to pretend that the other is here and not hidden away in his own head, tries to pretend that they will be fine again, that Bucky will be fine.
A century passes, a universe is created and dies again, and Steve pulls back reluctantly, all tears dried up because there are none left in his body, not because he does not feel like crying anymore. His eyes must be bloodshot, and Bucky's shirt is a mess, his eyes still empty, and Steve's heart aches, aches, and aches.
He says the words again, his voice hoarse and broken, and watches Bucky come to life in front of him again, blinking blue eyes and still thin, still pale lips.
"Hi", Steve says, in an attempt to sound normal; he can see that he is failing, because Bucky looks at him almost concerned. Starts to reach up to his shoulder before he stops himself, mouth moving in unspoken words, and Steve knows that he has figured out what happened before Bucky does himself.
He expects narrowed eyes and words spoken in a deadly voice, telling him to back off, but nothing happens. Bucky just looks at him, leans forward the slightest bit, and says, "Hi."
Steve lets out a breath he didn't know he was holding and slowly rises to his feet, tries to forget how right Bucky's body felt against him as he offers the other his hand to help him up, even though he knows Bucky doesn't need it. But for the first time, he takes it, and Steve's heart flutters and swells and bursts with joy.
"Did I… did I do it right?", he asks after a few moments, after Bucky is standing and still has not pulled his hand away. It's more than one question, at least three wrapped up in the words of a single one, and Steve is not sure if he wants the other to notice it, but rather certain that Bucky does.
"Yeah", he answers, and finally pulls his hand away, leaving Steve's fingers cold and empty. "Yeah, you did..." And he smiles, or at least tries to, and he's not fully gotten home yet, but he's trying, and at least for Steve, that is enough.