There were so many kisses that meant the world to Bucky. So many he could look back on and find it impossible to determine which one was the most important. Only with Elsa, of course; none of the rest mattered when he found the one that made his heart skip a beat.
Was it their first kiss; mid-tirade and in a bid to shut her up when she was making too much sense?
Was it their wedding day; when they sealed their union and declared themselves as soulmates, a single entity, to their closest friends?
Was it the more modest, routine day to day? The lasting, parting pecks in the morning and the reuniting ones in the evening that meant everything there and then? That embodied them as a whole and how they ran their lives together as one?
Or… most recently… the last one. The last one. The one he still dejectedly tried to remember on his lips. The one a hand on his shoulder had gently steered him from, to act as an extension of the Avengers by lending his local knowledge in establishing ground defences. In all the quibbles and passive aggression Bucky had willingly participated in with Sam Wilson, he did not and would not resent him for being that hand on his shoulder. He went reluctantly and with near physical pain of being ripped from his other half but dutifully, he left to defend his home and all he held dear within it.
The repeated explosions from above, reverberating on the transparent dome, distracted Bucky for a moment; then, it reinforced the decision to protect the place that had protected him.
"A'right." Gruffly, Bucky fell into business mode by the call to arms from his earpiece; Sam was no different. This was personal. "Let's show these sons of bitches. My dog'll get pissy if his walk's late."
The hum of the open-top transport, while normally practically noiseless imposed itself as an insistent buzzing; it was screaming, deafening: only enhancing the fear and apprehension of its occupants.
Bucky looked across to Steve; the dignified and silent Steve. Far from an unusual feat to either of them, or even Sam; essentially riding into battle, no one spoke. The tension grated at the warrior turned farmer turned warrior again, so much so that even the sound of his own voice was preferable over the death knell the transport to the frontline emitted.
"D'you remember a Second Lieutenant Colm Collins?" Steve tweaked his head in curiosity at the apparently random question. That boy? From so long ago in Europe? "Wanted to join the Howlin' Commandos after we busted outta Austria, but got yanked back to his unit?"
"Skinny, Irish kid in a British uniform?" Rogers thought hard, until he eventually placed a name to the pale, freckled face; even out of thousands of soldiers to cross his path, he managed it. "Bowl cut? Couldn't understand a word he said? Couldn't'a been more than twenty?"
"Yeah." Bucky remembered him fondly, but for a different reason than just the Commandos. "That's him."
"I think I know him. Or… Knew him. Why?" Where was he going with this? His friend's internal smile, and the so-far unshared significance of the seemingly random soldier prompted another tilt of the Captain's fair head. "Buck? Wanna share?"
"He made it home." The White Wolf finally divulged, his grin growing until it reached his eyes. "Married that sweetheart he told us about. Had three kids. Two boys and a girl."
The smile was mutual; even if Steve's was intrigued, while Bucky's was knowing and involved.
"Riiiight. And you know this how?" Bucky's beam widened, his entire body automatically swaying with the gentle pull of the transport, the hum of it not quite bothering him as much anymore.
"Three weeks ago... I married his granddaughter." Steve, as expected, did not hide the flicker of awed surprise in those handsome features. Trust their exceptional paths to lead to something like that; even if it was the last thing he expected. "Beat that, huh? Of all people. Crazy how things come back around."
"I know he ain't on the side of good old Robert Kincaid, that sweet kid." The White Wolf's face rightfully contorted at the very idea of the kind, naive Colm Collins being in any way related to his loathsome father in law. Well… They had ultimately become connected when Colm's only daughter met and fell pregnant by the older, married and less than savoury Robert Kincaid but Bucky could gloss over that.
"Looks like this is it." Cold practicality shattered the air of geniality; reality elbowing its way back in. The fond reminiscing had been a humane distraction, but it would not last forever. Nothing good ever did, as they would soon find out. The transport whirred to a halt, dipping ever so slightly on its side to allow the passengers to exit without injury. Injury via the transport, with what they faced now, would be embarrassing irony.
Hundreds, maybe thousands, of warriors already lined an invisible front. The King's Guard, the remnants of the Border Tribe (who attended not only out of duty, but guilt and an eagerness to prove themselves to their rightful king), the Dora Milaje and M'Baku waited with his loyal Jabari; T'Challa was right, M'Baku liked a good fight.
Wanda, while often stony-faced and restrictive with her emotions, did not reign in her worry on that dreadful day. True, this place was safe and absolutely everything was being done by a group of outstanding individuals to diffuse this outlandish situation but still, fret plucked. She stayed at Vision's side, his hand enclosed in hers while mutual utterings of comfort and encouragement floated between the two. Like those outside, a different pitch of whirring set her teeth on edge.
"Do you think she's alright?" Vision's head lifted briefly from the examination table to spy the young woman standing rigid by the window; his scarlet headed companion twisted her neck to follow.
"I don't know..."
And really, how could one tell? When she faced the window, the vast expanse of African landscape and the growing front line, staring and silent?
Wanda, feeling similar anxiety to her own radiating from this other female, gave Vision's hand a final squeeze before relinquishing it in a bid to find out.
The approach was an awkward one. Wanda's eyes took in this tiny creature, smaller than herself but powerful in her stance; and the primed rifle had nothing to do with it.
"They're going to do everything they can." It took a moment for that fearful trance to fracture, splinter and eventually crumble; for the brunette to realize she was being addressed. When she turned her wary gaze to the one they called "Scarlet Witch", she found it already under concerned scrutiny.
Wanda, despite her own trepidation, felt a tug at her heartstrings. While Vision, her own partner, underwent a mind-bogglingly complex procedure, she could not help but pity this poor creature; ashen-faced and completely out of her depth. Unfortunately, but out of necessity, Wanda had acclimatized herself to danger. Taught herself how to run on adrenaline. Expanded her comfort zone to include all manners of weird, wonderful and absolutely terrifying.
Elsa… Elsa did not have such a luxury.
Bucky had often teased her (playfully, with no malice), accused her of being pampered and spoiled; that assumption was often associated with having money and an opulent lifestyle, and he was not the first to make it. While it might have been true for her father and brothers, it was not so much for Elsa who purposely distanced herself it; associating it with the family she did not particularly like.
Naturally, she was quick to remind him that if she was so pampered and spoiled, what was she doing wading through muck and animal waste on a daily basis? When she could have set up a cushy practice in the States or Canada? If she really wanted to put distance between her and her abominable family but in the maximum comfort? Someone so high maintenance would not have volunteered for a "minimally paid" post in some "backwater" African country.
"I know." Came the uncharacteristic squeak; her previous strength and swagger had evaporated swiftly, and dread had taken their place. "I know… I trust them… I just…"
"Trusting them is a start." Wanda's gentility had the desired effect: the noticeable (if subtle) relaxing of the little vet's (Steve mentioned she was a vet, hadn't he? Was that what Wanda had heard?) terror. "I have only met him briefly, your husband-"
"Bucky."
"Bucky…" Briefly was a stretch but even in the limited duration they had fought side by side on the airstrip, the Winter Soldier's (now ex-Winter Soldier) skills had not gone unnoticed; by Wanda or anyone else. If she could use that meagre observation to bring comfort to a petrified wife, she would do so wholeheartedly. "But I've seen how he handles himself. He trusts his instincts, his training and his skills; all that will serve him well out there. Besides…" Wanda's wry grimace preluded another observation that Elsa had already thought of in an attempt to settle her nerves. "That bunch of lunatics he's with? Won't let anything happen to him."
It was a bloodbath; the like of which Bucky had never seen in all his years of destruction and massacre.
More than once, the ex-Winter Soldier had found himself ground into the dirt; disarmed, injured and scrambling but ever the warrior, Bucky strived to get back up again. With mud ingrained in every pore, every muscle aching, the sun in his eyes and fresh gunpowder in his nostrils, there were clear parallels to be drawn from the battlefields of Europe that Bucky thought he had long forgotten. Even when he was down and struggling, the fray went on around him; everyone else almost too occupied with their own foe to have another's back. It made for a hopeless scene, watching the people he fought toe-to-toe with becoming swiftly overwhelmed; many falling before his very eyes. Even Steve, who (out of a Brooklyn habit) Bucky never let out of his sight, looked drained, dishevelled and willing for it to be over.
There was a… was that a racoon…? Firing wildly, recklessly, howling with near-suicidal fervour: "COME AND GET SOME, SPACE DOGS!" And all Bucky could think was: I've seen a lotta weird shit in my time but… whatever. If I let a talking racoon die, my wife is gonna kill me. After all, he could only blame her for that thought entering his head in the first place.
Before that marvel could be overrun and torn apart too, Bucky reacted; swooping in and catching the demented creature by the scruff and holding it aside to fire into the faces of the oncoming stampede its taunts had attracted. Why stop there? Two guns are better than one and with this small, furry thing wielding something that even Bucky couldn't identify, it only made sense to maximize the damage and combine their firepower.
Too focused and adrenalized to get dizzy, Bucky's trigger finger worked overtime (miraculously without cramping) as the two spun together in a frenzied, murderous merry-go-round; never introduced but assumed to be on the same side. All the while, his new brother in arms goading, mid-spin: "COME ON! GET SOME, GET SOME, GET SOME!"
And just like that, it was over. Probably one of the most outlandish, insane experiences Bucky Barnes would ever have in his extended life; within this larger, outlandish and insane experience, of course. He could recall sharing a strange moment with an animal before (Cody was all kinds of strange) but one never opened its mouth and asked, shouting over battlefield din:
"How much for the gun?!" And Bucky calmly and resolutely replying:
"Not for sale." Before self-defence in an uncertain skirmish and attempting to re-establish a victory could become his priority again (and he did try by taking a few opportunistic shots), Bucky was railroaded by another bizarre inquiry.
"Okay, how much for the arm?!" That, Bucky would not dignify with a response. Instead, he pursed his lips and lumbered off, more conscious of the weight of his new arm, in search of new prey; he would not need to look far or hard. Whether the uttered threat of: "Oh, I'll get that arm…" registered was anyone's guess.
Tension-laden conversation with regular, gaping silences, continued in the lab, like a blinkering against the atrocities happening in plain sight on the battlefield below. They (or rather, Elsa) acclimatized to the bloodshed but still, the little vet could think of nothing else but her farmer-turned-soldier and how he was faring.
That is, of course, until something on a whole different level of disturbing literally unearthed itself.
Elsa and Wanda watched in joint horror as the monstrous bulges in the ground tore through the layer of terrain under the dome. The call to fall back was lost to the two onlookers in the lab but they could not help but see dozens of allies mown down like ants under a lawnmower in the blink of an eye. Those giant, metallic claws that ripped through the surface and ground down everything in their path had been a special deployment to maximize damage, and not just on the battlefield.
"I have to go down there…" Wanda declared breathlessly, already turning on her heel to leave with scarlet bulbs of energy smouldering in her palms. But first: a detour to the side of the table where Vision did not try to sway her either way; the redhead did all the near-tearful talking, promising how she would be back soon and how everything would be fine. As if not to fuel or dissuade her, Vision said nothing, just nodded his worried acceptance and fearlessly pressed a chaste kiss to her glowing hand.
"You can't!" Elsa protested in near hysteria, having swung down the rifle when a change in the winds of victory had become thick in the air, and not in their favour. The frenzied blue gaze followed her new friend to the door and their previous instructions resurfaced. "You'll be killed! What about-?! Steve said-!"
"I know what he said." Those bulbs had started to pulse, fed by determination and resolution; despite what abandoning her post could mean. "And if I don't go down there… They'll all be killed."