I couldn't write this story without incorporating the most iconic Steve and Bucky quote of the bunch, now could I?

Steve XIII: The End of the Line

The next day, he woke up with a cough. Steve always woke up with a cough, but this one took hold of his chest and refused to let go for almost twenty minutes. He couldn't even set up his morning nebs with his usual efficiency because he had to keep doubling over to hack up a lung. "Steve, you alright?" Dad asked, poking his head into the room.

"Think so," he managed. Dad nodded and stepped back out. If it had been Mom, Steve thought she probably would have pressed the investigation further, but it was a Sunday so she was still at church. Ten minutes into his treatment, Tony texted him asking if they could talk.

"Doing vest right now. Can you wait twenty minutes or so?" he wrote back.

"Yep."

"What's this about?"

"Something important."

Steve didn't think he could handle anything else without collapsing either entirely or collapsing a lung. Could stress actually do that? He didn't know. Hopefully Tony was just exaggerating. The vest didn't clear him out as well as it usually did in the mornings, which terrified him. Another hospitalization did not sound very enticing at the moment.

He called Tony and asked, "How important?"

"Dire," Tony said solemnly. Steve braced himself. "Listen, Steve, it's come to my attention that you and Bucky aren't on speaking terms."

"Who told you?" he asked angrily, nearly cutting himself off with another cough. He hadn't spoken of the conflict with any of his Gravesen friends, which meant Tony must've learned it from Bucky.

"Doesn't matter."

"Yes it does."

"Fine. Bruce told me."

"Bruce? How does he know?"

"He said you went on a date with his cousin and she told him."

"Wait—Jennifer is Bruce's cousin? How did I not know that?"

"I don't know. And I don't think it matters since the relationship is clearly over, given what Bruce told me. But this thing between you and Bucky is a much more important problem. What's going on?"

"It's a long story." Steve didn't want to talk about it. His emotions regarding the situation ranged from spitfire rage to deep sorrow and everywhere in between and it was way too early in the morning to rehash any of them. Besides, this was between him and Bucky.

"I've got time."

"Tony, I don't," he had to stop to cough again. "I don't want to talk about it."

"Too bad. I'm not letting you off the hook until you spill. Remember how the last big fight ended?" Of course Steve did. He still occasionally had nightmares of Tony dropping dead before him. "Yeah, we're doing this the right way this time. I'm not letting things between you two get that bad."

"I'm afraid you're probably too late for that."

"Nope. As long as both of you are alive and kicking, there's still time."

"Who knows how long that'll last," Steve huffed.

"Is that what this is about?" Tony asked, suddenly far more serious. "Steve, what did you do?"

"What I had to."

"Which was?"

"Give Bucky space."

"I find it hard to believe that's all you did. Maybe this'll get you talking: I already heard Bucky's side of the story from Parker."

"What?"

"You heard me."

"What did he tell you?"

"That's none of your business. What did you tell him?"

"I just told him that he should spend some more time with his other friends because he was blowing them off to hang out with me."

"God, Steve, you can be so ignorant sometimes," Tony sighed.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"It means, his other friends are still gonna be here in ten years!"

Steve blanched. "I know that, Tony. That's exactly the point."

"Steve, you've gotta explain your logic here. I'm a little lost."

His voice changed, though whether from congestion or tears he couldn't tell. "I…he…we're too close, Tony. I don't even know what I believe…about the after…at this point, but I do know that I don't want to see what happens to him after I'm gone. It'll kill me. I thought it would be better if he started moving on."

Tony fell silent. At least, Steve hoped he did because he started coughing again and probably wouldn't have been able to hear him anyways. "You really hurt him, Steve," Tony said when Steve finally stopped.

"It won't be the last time," Steve said despondently.

"But this one was your fault."

"Did he tell you he lied to me about relapsing?"

"He might've mentioned it. You both fucked up pretty badly here, but do you really want this to be the end of your friendship? Do you want to die mad at him?"

"No," he admitted. Nothing was farther from the truth. Steve wanted Bucky there until the end—of course he did—but he didn't want to force his best friend to suffer through that. Then again, was that really his choice to make?

"He doesn't want to be mad at you either. But both of you need to put in the effort to fix this. Do you want to fix this?"

"God yes. But what if he doesn't?"

"He will," Tony promised. "I trust you two."

"Thanks Tony."

Steve didn't know what he would've done if their friends hadn't intervened like this. Only now he faced the monumental task of reaching out to Bucky to make amends. Or he could wait for Bucky to reach out first. Ultimately, he didn't have to wait long. Bucky waltzed into their apartment alongside his mother coming back from church, taking Steve completely by surprise.

"Look who I found," Mom announced.

"I see," Steve said, eyeing Bucky cautiously. He felt none of the anger that had overwhelmed him the last time they met face-to-face. They both retreated into Steve's room.

"I'm sorry," Bucky blurted out immediately. He didn't sit at the foot of the bed like he usually did, instead remained standing stoically by the door.

"I'm sorry," Steve echoed. "I don't know what came over me. I guess I just wanted to do whatever I could to protect you from everything that's going to happen."

"I never should have told such a horrible lie. I was so desperate not to let you walk away like that."

"I'm just glad it's not true," he confessed. "When you told me that, and I started thinking about losing you, Buck, it was the sickest I've ever felt in my life. And that's saying something." As if to prove his point, his lungs chose that moment to act up again.

"Steve, that's how I feel all the time now. But I need to make one thing crystal clear: I'm not going anywhere. I'm with you 'til the end of the line."

Steve shuddered and probably would have fallen over if Bucky wasn't there to gather him up in a one-armed hug stronger than any two-armed could ever be. "I'm not so worried about the future when I can share the present with you," Bucky added. Who started crying first, neither of them could tell. But it didn't matter. The weight of the world lifted from Steve's shoulders, and he relaxed for the first time in weeks. How had he ever thought he could do this without his best friend?

The only thing that eventually tore their embrace apart was more coughing on Steve's part. Bucky, accustomed to it, didn't bat an eye, but Steve quickly noticed something very wrong. As often as he coughed, it never felt like this. Bucky quickly caught on to his distress. "Steve, are you okay? This isn't an asthma attack, is it?"

Steve shook his head, cursing his lungs for their impeccable timing. "Get Mom," he managed to choke out between gasps. He upped the rate on his oxygen concentrator to try and amend the shortness of breath, but it did nothing. His chest hurt like it never had before. Mom took one look at him and asked, "Ambulance or not?"

Steve shook his head. "I'm okay."

"Yeah, no," Mom said urgently. "Bucky, keep him awake."

Steve's vision started to darken around the edges, so he sat down. Bucky appeared behind him to prop him up. "You are not dying on me mere minutes after we make up, you hear?" he said, false sternness barely disguising the panic. Steve managed a thumbs-up. He completely lost track of time, but at some point paramedics arrived and took over. By the time they loaded him into an ambulance, his head was spinning and his only coherent thought was a repeated mantra of "Stay awake stay awake stay awake."

He stayed awake, the rapid chorus of urgent voices melting into each other. Everything went numb except the stabbing pain in his left chest. The only phrase he managed to catch and interpret was, "I think his lung collapsed." Well, shit. How did that happen? An X-ray, a chest tube and a throat culture later, they told him he had a raging fungal infection. They admitted him to the hospital and started him immediately on anti-fungals, which only made him feel worse.

His whole life, Steve had feared a fungal infection. Because fungi were more similar to human cells than bacteria or viruses, medications to kill them often had severe side effects. The one they put him on included the worst full-body aches he'd ever experienced. Steve shut down. He didn't want to talk or move, afraid of setting off another coughing fit that would dip his oxygen sats and aggravate joints already on fire.

The next day, his fever started climbing, and with it his terror. Steve knew that if he had to be put on a ventilator, he'd probably never get off of it with these lungs. He vaguely heard his mother praying beside his bed, but beyond that, he barely registered anything going on around him. When he drifted off, Steve did so not knowing if he'd ever wake up again—and not entirely wanting to.

Despite his vast history of fevers, Steve had never experienced fever dreams. Maybe his temperature never ratcheted quite high enough to trigger them, or maybe his brain just didn't respond that way to elevated temperatures. Regardless, the concept of a dreamscape this vivid and tactile felt completely alien to him. It wasn't so much a dream as a vision.

He stood in a jungle of all places, surrounded by thickets of trees and the hum of mosquitoes. His limbs ached with a familiar exhaustion, full of the heaviness that always lingered for weeks after he got over an exacerbation. Steve imagined this was what he'd feel like after a long and arduous workout, something he hadn't been physically capable of doing since before the asthma attack that put him on oxygen.

A sense of impending doom washed over him, and the very air tingled with anxious anticipation. Steve braced himself for a fight without really knowing why, forcing his exhausted muscles to cooperate.

The figure appeared through a portal, materialized in a flash of blue light and emerged from a copse of trees in front of Steve. He knew immediately that he faced Death. All artwork depicting the Grim Reaper or descriptions in myth of Hades failed to capture the menace and sheer disregard for life and innocence conveyed by that cruel visage. He sneered and strode forward, Steve's muscles seizing up in terror.

Who was he, one insignificant, sickly, weak individual, to stand against a force as formidable as Death? Wouldn't it be so much easier to surrender? What was the point of fighting if it ultimately led to nothing but an indefinite series of battles, each progressively more onerous than the last?

As the looming figure advanced, Steve turned his gaze to the sky. A red, blue, and gold blur shot across the great blue expanse like a human cannonball. Steve felt an overwhelming desire to follow it, a longing familiarity filling his chest, but he knew he wasn't welcome wherever the blur called home. Not yet.

The decision—and Death—was upon him. Steve stood before the hulking humanoid creature with two options. Throw himself into this fight with every ounce of strength he still possessed after nearly two decades of smaller-scale battles. Or kneel and admit defeat. Steve glanced upwards one last time, but the blur did not reappear to judge his decision. On second thought, its absence served as judgment in itself. Seeing it again would only encourage Steve to follow it.

With a roar, he charged.

Death didn't expect a full frontal assault, and he staggered backwards with the first few blows. Steve's body wailed in protest, but he ignored it. Now that the surprise at Steve's boldness had worn off, Death's superior power quickly turned the tables. Steve lost ground and his strength waned, but his morale refused to be beaten into submission.

Death threw a punch that Steve had neither the speed nor the time to dodge. Instead of taking the blow full on, he caught the massive fist in his own hands, digging his toes into the Earth and bracing against the force pushing him backwards. His every muscle quaked with the effort, but he knew that relinquishing his hold would mean the end of it—the end of everything. Death pressed onward, forcing Steve's elbows to bend gradually more, unable to withstand the pressure. The thought of giving up crossed his mind. Not just crossed, it entered and lingered. But as soon as that thought took up residence, thoughts of his family soon followed. Mom. Dad. Bucky. Tony, Natasha, Parker, Thor, Nick, Bruce. Clint. Carol.

Steve's biceps were melting, encased in flames burning away at his resolve. He tilted his head upwards and met Death's harrowing gaze. They reached an agreement in that shared moment, a very simple agreement.

Not yet.

Steve let loose a scream and surged forward with an explosion of energy from his feet though his core. From his hands shot a beam of golden light that blasted the figure backwards, sending it tumbling into the underbrush. A strength not entirely his own kept Steve on his feet and carried him through the jungle. He glanced back at Death collapsed among the vegetation and watched the golden light rise from it and congeal into the red and blue blur before shooting off into the sky.

"Not yet," he whispered after it.

The MCU-based dream sequences strike again. Although I did add the blue-and-red blur part. You can interpret that however you want. Next chapter will offer some much-needed outside perspective of what's happening right now.