Chapter 43: Serious Conversations
Victor and I both froze and clutched our ears, turning to look. Bucky was standing there with his hand on his hip, his 1911 raised and pointing at the ceiling. He scowled at Victor.
"Hey buddy. I know she can take it, but you mind not beating up my fiancée?" he snapped, eyes flashing angrily. He leveled his gun at Victor's face. "You may be tough but I'm pretty sure a bullet in your brain will put you down at least for a while."
Victor turned to look at me incredulously. "You're getting married?" he demanded.
"Yes," I said, and snapped my nose back into place, wiping away the trickling tears. I looked down at the missing section of my sleeve that had come away when Victor tore off part of my arm. I glared at him darkly. "That hurt, Creed."
Victor had the good sense to look at least a little abashed, reaching back to rub a clawed hand against the back of his neck. "Sorry. Pent up energy, ya know?"
I kept glaring. "This is why Jimmy is my favorite," I huffed. Victor scowled.
"That's not nice, pussy cat."
"Neither is biting off part of my arm, kitty!" I snapped back Victor sighed.
"Alright, sorry I bit you."
I sucked in my cheeks and scowled, but the glare lessened a little. "Thank you," I said primly, straightening my shirt. "Sorry I hamstrung you."
"Yeah. And hey, congratulations on getting engaged," Victor added, slapping me on the shoulder and grinning. It was a bit more menacing than the average grin, given that his teeth were so long and pointed. Also, they were still stained with my blood. He looked to Bucky. "You're a lucky guy."
"I know," Bucky replied simply, like Victor had just told him the sky was blue or Steve was a walking flag. Like it was a statement of indisputable fact. He raised an eyebrow at Victor. "You gonna hit her anymore? Am I gonna have to shoot you?"
"Nah." Victor shook his head. "Just needed to tear into someone, you know? That scientist didn't last and pussy cat here can take it."
"I despise that nickname," I groaned as everyone stared at Victor. Clearly, they did not get it. I didn't expect them to. It was a feral thing.
"We've got… a truck out front," Steve said slowly. "You need a ride anywhere?"
Victor looked at me. "You seen Jimmy lately?"
"Last I heard he'd been called back to Canada," I said as we headed towards the door, all of us heading back to see what the others had found.
"He'll be back over here soon then," Victor shrugged carelessly. "Think you can take me over towards Lorraine?"
"What's in Lorraine?" Steve asked somewhat suspiciously. Unsurprisingly, he was still looking at Victor like he was a ticking time bomb. He sort of was. Victor's bloodthirsty grin didn't help.
"Fighting, what else?"
"Whoa!"
Falsworth's face spoke for most of the Howling Commandoes as we emerged. The others had already loaded up the truck and appeared to just be waiting on us to get out. They all gaped at Victor. I didn't blame them. He was even bigger that Steve, with a good four inches and almost forty pounds on the Star-Spangled Man With a Plan. Not to mention his generally rougher appearance – pointed, dirty nails, scruff, and longer hair.
"Everyone, this is Victor Creed," I said, gesturing to him. "Victor, this is Dum Dum Dugan, Steve Rogers, Morita, Falsworth, Dernier, Jones, and Bucky Barnes." At his name I stepped closer to Bucky and took his hand, looking up at him fondly.
"Oh sure, leave me out, it's been a pattern today."
Yori was scowling, sitting in the cab with the door open. She hoped out and only winced slightly when the landing jostled her wound, a long strip of bandages tied around her middle. She glared at Steve.
"You and me – we're sparring when we get home and I'm throwing you into at least two things. Be ready for that."
Steve was unrepentant. "It was for your own good."
Yori scowled. "I was manhandled, Rogers. I don't like to be manhandled." Her hand drifted to the hilt of her sword. "Wonder how much secretaries would like him if I cut his pretty head off…," she muttered quietly enough that only those of us with advanced hearing could hear, that being Steve, Victor, and me. Steve flushed and Victor snorted.
"So you're Yori Tsukuda, eh?" he asked, approaching her and looking her up and down. "Damn, pussy cat wasn't kidding. You are a demon, aren't you?"
Yori scowled and I winced. Well, Victor had just firmly planted himself on Yori's hit list. "Careful, or I'll drag you back to hell with me," she said darkly, turning on her heel and stalking toward the back of the truck.
"Already been there!" Victor called after her, laughing. He looked from Yori to me. "How old is she, did you say?"
I rolled my eyes. "A hundred and ten, Victor, but she doesn't feel the need to go fight in every war."
"Damn," Victor cursed.
"How old are you?" Jones asked, looking at him sideways.
"I look pretty good for a guy past middle age, huh?"
"And he will tell you all about the Great War and possibly the Civil one too if you ask him," I said as I passed to join Yori in the truck, Bucky on my arm. We climbed in the back and Bucky gently took the arm Victor had gotten a bite of. Yori watched us while pretending not to as Bucky turned my arm this way and that, looking for lasting damage.
"There's not even a mark," he murmured in awe, but it was tinged with something darker, sadder.
"There never is," I said, placing my hand over his, but I was frowning. Something was wrong. "Bucky, what's bothering you?" I asked in concern, but he just shook his head as the rest of the team began to load up, Victor already passionately retelling bloody, violent trench stories from fighting with Jimmy in the Great War.
Victor had worked his way back to the Somme by the time we stopped for the night in the woods. He told stories around the fire as the men ate, listening in rapt fascination. I didn't blame them. It was one thing to read about history in a textbook and another entirely to hear it from someone who was there. I'd learned that first with Yori and then again when I met Victor and Jimmy.
I had heard most of the stories before so I wasn't as intrigued. Mostly I was torn between watching Yori glare at Steve when he asked if she was feeling okay and worrying about Bucky. He'd been quiet since we'd freed Victor and while I knew he wasn't pleased with me getting knocked around I sensed that there was more to it than that.
As Victor was recounting his time in France and Belgium, I caught Bucky's eye across the fire and jerked my head towards the trees. Steve and Yori looked up as we moved off from the camp but didn't say anything. I guided Bucky deep into the trees until I could no longer hear Victor, which also meant that he could no longer hear me. I didn't want him to hear the private moments Bucky and I had.
I stepped up to Bucky, placing a hand on his cheek. Stubble tickled my palm as I kissed him tenderly. "What's wrong?" I asked, leaving my hand in place when I pulled back. "You've been quiet."
Bucky sighed and reached up to cup my hand. "It's… well, it's not nothing," he admitted with a humorless smile, "but there's nothing that can be done about it anyway, so I don't see how it matters."
I reached up to cup his other cheek with my free hand, pulling him down so that our foreheads touched. Eyes locked I breathed, "It bothers you. It matters."
Again Bucky sighed. He pulled out of my palms but kept a grip on my hand, tugging me to sit on a downed tree. We sat down next to each other and I breathed deeply the scent of night air and Bucky. It made my mouth water. If he wasn't looking so upset I might have crawled into his lap right then.
"What's wrong?" I asked again.
Bucky leaned forwards, elbows on his knees, palms clasped together. He stared sadly at the ground between his feet. Deeply concerned by his uncharacteristic melancholy, I placed a hand on his back and rubbed comfortingly, waiting for him to speak.
When he did, he surprised me. "I'm going to die."
I blinked. "I… I suppose so, yes," I agreed uncertainly. Bucky looked up at me, agony in his eyes.
"You don't get it. You, Yori, and apparently Victor and Jimmy. A hundred years from now, you all will still be around, probably still looking about like this too. By that time I'll be long dead. And before that, I'll get old. I'll get old and wrinkly and I'll die and you'll still be just like that and I don't like that idea, I really don't."
My mouth dropped open. I knew this was the case, of course I knew. It was a given – Bucky was human. His blue eyes made him a mutant but like he'd once said, pretty eyes weren't super powers like I had. He was completely correct – he'd get old and die in the time it would take me to get the start of a couple wrinkles. The body technically started to die at around age 25, but mine would keep going thanks to my regeneration. When I was seventy I'd probably look much the way I did now.
"I didn't think that mattered," I said quietly.
"Didn't think it mattered?" Bucky huffed. "Of course it matters! I can't marry you with this hanging over us!"
I recoiled, feeling like he'd just ripped my heart out of my chest. Tears swam in my eyes as I stared at him in horror.
"You don't… want to marry me?" I whimpered. Those few words hurt more than Victor throwing me into that wall had. This hurt worse than what the doctor at Auschwitz had done. This literally hurt worse than dying.
Bucky's eyes softened and he reached out to me, drawing me to his side and rocking me. "Oh Belle, of course I want to marry you. But it's not fair."
"Life rarely is," I sniffled into his shoulder. "What's not fair?"
"I don't want to do that to you – tie you to me, saddle you with me when I'm old and wrinkled and bald and drooling on myself."
I pulled back, frowning as I stared at him. "Other couples go through that, what makes us different?" I demanded. Bucky groaned.
"Because I don't want you to see me like that!" he burst out. "I don't want you to see me when I can't walk or when I'm bald and wrinkled and ugly and you're still as gorgeous as you are today. Forget how I'll look, how would we look to other people? They'd think you were some kind of… of I don't even know what, but they'd say some nasty things about you for it Belle and I don't want you do have to go through that."
"You think I'll care how you look?" I demanded, offended now. "Bucky, I'll admit I'm fond of the way you look but you could have warts and a leer and I'd still love you because I don't love your body, I love you! You, Bucky! I know no one likes looking old but-"
"It's not even that, really," Bucky admitted, cutting me off. I shut my mouth with a snap.
"Well, then what is it?" I demanded, crossing my arms.
"I'll be weak," Bucky admitted quietly. His cheeks were red. He didn't like talking about this, I knew he didn't, but I needed him to. I needed to know what was bothering him so badly about this. I'll admit, it bothered me too. I wished Bucky could stay with me as long as I lived, stay as young and good-looking as he was now, but that wasn't reality.
"You are so strong," Bucky continued. "I see it all the time; I saw it when you were fighting Creed today. You're so strong, you and people like you. I'm human. I'm going to get sick and old and I'm going to become a burden to you. I'm going to die and I don't think I'm being cocky when I say that's gonna hurt you. I don't… I don't want you to have to go through all that for my sake."
"You don't want to inconvenience me by getting old and dying?" I demanded incredulously, standing up and pacing furiously. "You don't… You idiot!" I ranted. "You think I haven't thought about all of this before? You know that I never expressed an interest in any man before you, and I tried very hard not to feel what I feel for you!"
Bucky looked hurt now. "You… did?"
"Of course!" I huffed. "Because I knew that unless I found a man with similar abilities to mine – which thus far limits me to Jimmy and Victor and I like them fine but I don't want to marry either of them – I was going to have to deal with my husband getting old before me and dying. But then I figured something out." I dropped to the ground on my knees in front of Bucky, holding his face between my palms and forcing him to look me in the eye because it was important he understand this.
"I love you," I said firmly. "I love you more than I ever thought anyone could love someone else and I'd rather take fifty, sixty, years with you even if those later years aren't the way they are now than try and cut you out of my life. I'd rather have a life with you than a life trying to carve you out of my heart because that would hurt more than anything, more than getting tossed into a wall and more than getting dissected alive."
Bucky winced. "Please don't," he said throatily. "Don't mention that, I can't think about that, especially not right now…"
I pulled off my engagement ring and held it up so that Bucky could see the inscription.
"Only forever… and an eternity after that," I recited. "I knew what that entailed when I said it, Bucky, and I meant every word."
Bucky closed his eyes but I could see him wavering, see him start to loosen up and accept that I really did want to be with him for the rest of his life, wrinkles and cane and all.
"People will say some cruel things about us in forty years, Belle," Bucky said tiredly. "They won't be nice."
I growled and grabbed his shoulders, swinging up so that I was straddling his lap and staring down at him, eyes blazing. "Fuck. Them." I growled. Bucky actually let out a startled laugh at that. "If they wanna say you're some old pervert who landed a hot skirt for less-than-loving reasons then they'll have to deal with me."
"If they say I'm some kind of cougar?" Bucky asked.
"I'll inform them that that's just fine, because I'm a tiger." I kissed him hard.
"If they say you're probably just some dumb girl after my insurance money?" Bucky's voice held laughter again, which I took as a good sign.
"I'll throw my doctorate and a wad of hundreds in their face and say money's not and issue and I'm far from dumb," I retorted, kissing him again, hard.
"If they say I'm just with you so I have someone pretty in my bed?" Bucky's voice was going hoarse as I ground down against him a little.
"Then I'll tell them," I growled in his ear, "that I don't need a bed, and watch them sputter."
And then I knocked him off the log, kissing and nipping and licking as hands and clothes flew.
Bucky and I were reasonably well put together when we trooped back into camp. But we couldn't hide some things. Yori raised an eyebrow at me and smirked as she took in a leaf in my hair. I hastily tugged it out. Victor flashed us a crude smile and pointedly inhaled.
"Pervert," I muttered as I passed him.
"I'm not the one screwing in the woods," he shot back just as quietly. Bucky choked on his tongue and staggered as he heard. I bit my lip as we both knelt down to lay out our sleeping rolls for the night.
"How did he know?" Bucky hissed to me. I blushed.
"He could smell it," I replied just as quietly. Bucky looked horrified and across the fire I saw Steve looking equally red. I winced as I realized that even if he didn't have Victor's heightened sense of smell his heightened hearing would let him hear the exchange. I saw Yori smirk and lean over to whisper something in Steve's ear that sent him scrambling towards his bed roll, roughly the color of a tomato, Yori laughing wildly.
