"My dreams are the worst I've ever had. Images of the Winter Soldier fold in on each other… I see things I forgot happened… Like a door unlocking in my mind… Torture… Slaughter… And training others in their use… So much horror… I wake up vomiting. And don't feel much better afterwards. My bad dreams linger… But I wouldn't expect anything else."
James Buchanan Barnes, Captain America, Issue #618, 1968.
Six Months Pre-Snap.
Very little disturbed the peace of another hard-earned night of blissful slumber; cuddled up together in the only way James Buchanan Barnes could sleep now, with his little vet tucked close. The novelty, the newness of it all would never wear off; he would never tire of it, he was sure.
True, the crickets chirped outside, the nightbirds called from the trees and Cody's hot, loud, billowing breath from the bottom of the bed could be construed as disruptive but Bucky and Elsa included those in the silence; well used to it by now.
Something else though… Something else that the Lioness had not yet learned to sleep through (and probably would never out of pure concern) ushered her back to the darkness of the hut.
"Howard…"
If the twitch and sudden jolt from below did not usher Elsa groggily back to the waking realm, the urgent hiss of a name in her ear certainly would. Not her name, no, but a name she had heard before and it could only mean one dreadful thing.
"Howard… Maria…"
Slowly and carefully, the smaller brunette began to wriggle her way free from the tightening grip of her adored partner of only a few weeks. If she waited any longer, she could guess that discomfort would ensue. After that: pain and bruising.
"Bucky… Sweetheart, wake up…" The soft plea fell uselessly on sleep-clogged ears though it was no fault of his. The clicking of the bedside lamp and the subsequent pool of light did nothing to rouse or ease him but instead, it bestowed Elsa with a grim view.
Drawing herself towards the end of the bed where Cody had started to blink awake, she took in the growing patch of sweat on the sheets, being added to before her very eyes by the relentless drips from the ex-Winter Soldier. Just then, however, the "ex" did not seem to matter. Shaking and convulsing, thrashing and whimpering, it made for an upsetting sight.
"Howard…! Maria…!"
The distressed, helpless cries rumbled from the heaving chest of someone who had no control; whose mind knew the vile deeds to be wrong but powerless over their body to right or fight them. The sweat continued to pour, mingled with tears tumbling from behind tightly sandwiched lids; his face, ashen from torment, contorted to the sob that followed.
"Bucky…" Calling him did not seem to be working and so, with options running out, Elsa decided to resort to a more hands-on approach - Literally. Knees on either side of his waist, her much tinier form leant forward and pressed a (hopefully) soothing palm to his cheek. "Darling, you need to wake up…"
What she had not expected, however, was the sudden, swift and excruciating snatch of her wrist; the offending arm toned by massacre and agriculture respectively. The yelping gasp at the savage, bone-threatening squeeze of the significantly smaller appendage was not the sound to stir him, but Cody's barked protests; the only time he had ever barked at his father outside of play.
Wading through the confusion of suddenly no longer being on a dark, isolated back road, Bucky Barnes blinked several times to help his eyes adjust. Vision and head swimming, his surroundings were slow unravelling themselves through the thick glaze over his eyes.
What's wrong with Cody…? Is he okay…? Is Els okay…? He doesn't bark like that… Is there someone outside…?
His ears started to tune to a softer sound closer to him; slow, measured breaths to stave off fear and trepidation, all the while struggling to cope with the very real agony suffocating her wrist still.
"Bucky, love… My wrist…" And in that horror-inducing instant, Bucky (even at his peak as the Winter Soldier) had never moved so fast. The release happened so quickly that it took her a second to realize her wrist had been relinquished at all but still, hovered aloft where her partner had held it. From there, in the low light of the bedside lamp, the angry scarlet mark of seizure could be clearly seen.
It did not stop there.
In record time, the White Wolf hauled his notably larger self out of the bed, away from Elsa and cleared the distance to the bathroom; he had neither the time nor the capacity to shut the door before his dinner met the inside of the porcelain.
"Cody, stay." The mutt may not have understood, but he did so anyway as his mother, too, hopped from the bed.
Panting, gasping, and attempting to process an entirely different helping of trauma, James Buchanan Barnes collapsed to the side; saved only by the wall beside the toilet. Hunched over, only hand knotted into his hair (right into his scalp, tightening in stress) and utterly distraught by the multifaceted ordeal, he felt no better by being awake or by puking. The press of a cold, wet cloth to his forehead from over his right shoulder provoked an afflicted moan but he dipped his forehead into it regardless; grateful for the soothing of the near icy compress, however severe.
"Sshhhh… You're alright… Breathe… I'm here…"
Despite the rush of feelings he hadn't felt in… well… ever, in that moment they became tainted and synonymous with guilt; had he turned to his left shoulder where her hand supportively rested, he would have seen the tangible cause.
"Go..." He managed, drained and hoarse through a shuddering breath; be it from the protective and romantic emotion or the physical stress that still resonated in and wracked his body. Maybe both. Either way, his recovery was slow and talking did not seem to factor into it. "Go home... While you can... Take Cody… if you want…"
"James…" Came the gentle, patient sigh from closer than before; turning his head, his nose tipped her cheek and the comfort of the extra contact jolted him into another sob. "What you're going to learn, sweetheart, is that I'm remarkably stubborn." Elsa, taking advantage of the closeness and to reiterate her dedication to the (admittedly young) relationship, pressed a light kiss to his cheek. "Maybe you should pop into the shower while I change the sheets?"
That one exchange, every other kindness she had shown him aside, cemented everything for Bucky Barnes. To repay her? Or even begin to?
Cooperation.
Through glassy, brimming eyes, the ex-Winter Soldier found The Prettiest Girl in Brooklyn and accepted the benevolent suggestion with a shaggy nod.
"Yeah… Yeah, okay…"
Bucky could have been forgiven for thinking he had been in the bathroom for several hours (despite it only being ten minutes) as upon his departure from it, it looked like Elsa was in the throes of making breakfast. His shamed embarrassment reminded him that, without his interruption, she would have had several more hours of much-needed sleep before she rose for work.
The bedsheets had, as she declared, been changed and while she had managed to keep Cody at bay until she finished, the moment she turned her back, he had reclaimed his usual spot.
Did he love any sound more than the frantically excited thump of a tail on the mattress? Maybe one or two, and they all came from Elsa.
"Hey, pal." Kneeling beside the bed and flattening his torso to it, the "Heinz" (as Elsa playfully called him), complete with whole arse wiggle, dragged himself to where his father lay to partake in the rough, tight embrace; a mutually loving thing. The affectionate nuzzle between a man and his dog never failed to help him feel better or to make his heart soar. "Thanks for the wakeup call. I don't know how far that would've gone if it weren't for you. Your mom might have a broken wrist."
Bucky, face buried in the mutt's mostly black bristles, inhaled deep; the scent of dog shampoo from the day previous barely lingered. He remembered looking at the dog, at a loss, and thinking: "Goddamn it, what do I tell Els?" A fair question when one's dog has just dived, head-first, into a pile of elephant shite. It had been the first time, it would not be the last.
"But I don't." Came the accented chime from the kitchen; instead of lifting his face from Cody's fur, he simply reorientated his gaze, his physicality never leaving the dog. Still in her (Bucky's) nightshirt, the little vet poured the contents of a saucepan into two cups waiting on the table, set it aside to be washed later, then stirred. "I don't have any cream or marshmallows and I'm not sure how the girls' cream would work for this, so we'll just have to make do…"
Hot chocolate. Jesus, when was the last time he'd had hot chocolate? Romania? Maybe, but money had been tight then and such a beverage would have been a luxury; an unnecessary luxury, one he could not have justified and so, unlikely to indulge in.
"Come on, let's try and get back to sleep, shall we?"
Bucky did not argue.
The White Wolf, despite the reclaimed dark and restfulness of the hut, could (understandably) not sleep. With his Lioness tucked close once more, the heat of her to his side and the rhythmic press of her chest against his side when she breathed usually lulled him, but with those vile images still freshly burned into his brain, he would not be tranquillized so easily.
"Are you alright?" Perhaps she was not so deep in slumber after all.
"I could've really hurt you tonight."
"But you didn't."
"That's not the point, Els. You should've left when I told you to."
"Cody wouldn't cope at the apartment and he can't sleep without you, you know that."
"At least he would've bit me. I was seconds away from breaking your wrist and the one to tell me so was him, not you."
"Oh, so, if I had given you an unmerciful clatter, you wouldn't have broken my wrist? Is that it? It wouldn't have made matters infinitely worse?"
The stumped silence that followed allowed Elsa a small stoke of satisfaction while Bucky mulled the prospect. The truth seemed: He did not know. But…
"These…. night terrors… They happen a lot. Not as much as they did, before Shuri got my bug out, but we're gonna have to put something in place for when they do. There was never anyone in the firing line before, no one I could've potentially hurt in the process… but now that there is, we need some sort of protocol. 'Cause I don't think I could forgive myself if anythin' happened to you."
Had she fallen back to sleep? The delay in a response certainly suggested so, so Bucky did not push the issue. Until, of course, the little groan from his side snatched his heed and confirmed otherwise; more to the point, when her tiny entirety took up her partner's lap.
"If it makes you feel better, and safer-" His sleepy brunette conceded, cupping both sides of his jaw within dainty but medically skilled hands; he didn't need to be able to see her to know she was beautiful. That her hair probably stuck up at all angles. That her eyes were barely open but just enough to look upon him. "Then I will do whatever will put your mind at ease. Be thinking about it while I'm at work and we can discuss it over dinner tomorrow. Is that fair?"
"That's fair." He knew that tiny puff of air meant her cheeks had become punctuated by dimples; one of his favourite things when she smiled, one of the things he had dreaded only a few weeks ago. He knew it meant a scrunching and wrinkling in her button nose. He also knew that, when he died, the last thing he wanted to feel, was her thumbs caressing his jaw the way they did just then in the pitch black. Don't say I Love You… Don't say I Love You… For God's sake, don't say I Love You…
The kiss that always followed upon the cradling of his jaw came as expected; much to Bucky's savouring, another novelty that would never diminish.
"I don't think I can sleep. I was gonna go out and get a head start on feeds and whatnot for tomorrow." The thinking might have been sound but to implement it would mean: A) Dragging himself from the warmth and comfort of the bed, and B) Shimmying his way out from under his precious anchor.
"And what do you think Queen Bonnie would make of you disrupting the flock at this hour?"
"I wasn't gonna go near their shed, I was only gonna go to the feed shed."
"And you think, as soon as you start shovelling, that they won't hear you? Your flock, obsessed with food? Who know exactly what the different mixes are by sound? And God forbid you should even brush against the oat bag. Really?" Had Bucky been looking for a way or reason to adore Elsa more, he may have found it in the realization that she knew the intricacies, habits, and quirks of his flock (be it goats or chickens) as well as he did.
"What if I took Cody for a run?"
Once more, sensibility and logic prevailed from someone who had made animals her life and her career.
"Night-time is hunting time, love. Too many predators out after dark, especially on foot. Either you'd be coming home without Cody or he'd be coming home without you. The farm is protected, your trails are not. If you could even get him out of the bed. But… I do have a suggestion."
"Okay…?" Bucky thought nothing of the second kiss; despite it being longer, deeper and more passionate in nature while the first had been simply comforting. Naturally, of course, he obeyed his instincts and returned it in the same appetitive vein.
"I mean… I completely understand if your night has been too taxing-" It became a fight for words as urgency and desire climbed and her suggestion became apparent. She scarcely managed to get them out in between the desperate, almost aggressive, meeting of their lips in the dark. "Or you'd simply… rather not…" Pulled tighter to the White Wolf's solid torso, her lips got a break. Bucky's did not, not when her neck became a source of fascination instead.
"Rather not…? Since when…?"
"All I'm saying, darling, is… Oh God… There are better ways to soil the sheets."
And that only meant one thing. That one thing that James Buchanan Barnes would even consider separating himself (no matter how briefly) from his partner for.
"Cody… Basket, buddy. And cover your ears."
