Author's Note: This chapter is dedicated to NewMoonFlicker, who has been waiting far too long for this mountain of angst. And the dedication is particularly apt, my dear, because I would certainly not be writing any of this if not for you. And what an empty space that would leave in my life!
This whole thing originally stemmed from a dream I had back in March, which amounted to the basic gist of how this chapter ends. There was no context to my dream to tell me how they found themselves in that position, just a few snatches of dialogue and the overall feeling of the scene. But I was intrigued, so when I found a couple of pictures that strongly reminded me of my dream, I decided to take the plunge and figure it out. And now here we are with this whopper.
I should probably give a couple warnings about the subject matter of this chapter. For one thing, we're delving back into the self-harm thread I've been weaving into this fic, so be advised if that's sensitive material for you. Also, I'll just tell you up front that a large chunk of this chapter involves Steve and Bucky taking a shower together. This is not meant to be sexual or romantic in nature at all, but if you can't see how that's possible, this may not be the fic for you.
It took me a while to figure out exactly when to set this chapter, but eventually I decided it's shortly after "Broken Arrows," with a while still to go before "In His Eyes." I ended up using quite a few pictures for this chapter, though some of them kind of fit more thematically than literally what happens in this chapter. The pictures for the first scene can be found at keizu dot tumblr dot com / post / 145914949812 /dont-get-too-close-its-dark-inside-imagine / amp and kaciart dot tumblr dot com / image / 81834335160. For the second scene, I couldn't for the life of me find a source for one of them, but the other can be found at artgroves dot tumblr dot com / post / 647851195775565824 / for-those-are-pearls-that-were-his-eyes-by.
Mood music for this chapter (can you sense a theme?):
"Hurricane" by I Prevail
"Jet Black Heart" by Arrows to Athens
"Hurricane" by Truslow
"Hurricane" by Lifehouse
"Rescue Me" by Kerrie Roberts
"Anchor" by Skillet
Longing
The target appears in your sights, a head locked in the crosshairs, ready and waiting for your bullet.
Rusted
You breathe out slowly, then squeeze the trigger.
Furnace
A splash of blood, then the body jerks and falls to the ground, where it lies still.
Daybreak
Because that's all it is now.
Seventeen
Just a body.
Benign
You've turned a living, breathing person into a thing.
Nine
The head turns to you, blank eyes staring in your direction.
Homecoming
You can see every detail through the scope of your rifle.
One
You know every inch of that face.
Freight car
It's you.
Bucky jerked awake with a desperate wheeze as fingers closed around his throat. Those fingers were cold. Unyielding. Like they were...made of metal.
Terrified, he looked up into the face of the man who held him down on his bed. Blue eyes, as cold as ice. Long, dark hair dangling in the air between them, dripping blood onto Bucky's face. Teeth bared in the feral grin of a predator going in for the kill.
Bucky knew that face all too well. Because it was his own face. The face of the Winter Soldier.
He clawed at the hand around his neck, straining to loosen its grip enough to gulp down a breath of fresh air. But all he could breathe in was the smell of blood and decay.
"Stop struggling," the Winter Soldier snarled. A growl undercut his voice, like a wild wolf was hiding somewhere deep within. "You can't win. It's pointless to even try."
But Bucky kept fighting. His heart thudded crazily against his ribcage, begging him to get to his feet and run as far away from this monster as he could. But no matter how he strained against the fingers around his throat, no matter how he tossed and turned and tried to throw his assailant off, the Winter Soldier clung to him like a leech.
As Bucky fought, he realized that he wasn't just fighting a man pinning him to the bed. Black, slimy tentacles emerged from the shadows around the Soldier, like the appendages of some horrific creature scraped from the bottom of the ocean floor. They twisted around Bucky's limbs, binding him with inexorable strength.
"No," Bucky gasped feebly. "Get off...leave me alone..."
The Soldier leaned forward, pressing his knee to Bucky's chest and leaning all his weight against him, till Bucky could barely breathe. The Soldier's face filled Bucky's vision, eyes steely cold and mouth set in a grim line. There was no hatred in his eyes, no anger in his face. There was nothing but deliberate inevitability in every movement he made. He leaned in, his face mere inches away from Bucky's. "But you can't get rid of me. Because I...am...you."
The tentacles twined around his arms, and he couldn't tell where one began and the other ended. He was the Winter Soldier, and the Winter Soldier was him, and there was no escape, no cleansing the blood staining him head to toe, no way to rip himself away from the blackness in his own soul...
With a monumental effort, Bucky strained against the tentacle clinging to his right arm and reached for the bedside table. His hand groped about, searching and straining until finally, he felt the handle of his knife. With one final, desperate snatch, his fingers closed around it.
Bucky tried to pick up the knife and stab it into the Winter Soldier's chest, but he found that he couldn't move his arm up. The tentacles holding him down were too strong, the ties binding him to his darkness too tight. He strained against them, but there was nothing he could do.
"You can't kill me," the Winter Soldier whispered, his breath ghosting over Bucky's face. He smelled of death and decay.
Gritting his teeth, Bucky glared defiantly into his own face. "Yes, I can."
Before the Soldier could react, Bucky jabbed the knife towards his own neck.
"No!" the Soldier howled, and it seemed that another voice joined in. Tentacles wrapped around Bucky's wrist, holding it a mere inch away from his neck. "Don't do it!"
The Soldier grappled for the knife, but Bucky fought back with all that he had. The Soldier wasn't going to win. Not this time. That tentacle holding his arm down was strong, but Bucky had the strength of desperation fueling him. He was fighting for his life—by fighting for his death.
The grip on his right wrist was too strong. It squeezed tighter and tighter, forcing his fingers open until he dropped the knife. In desperation, Bucky lashed out with his left hand instead. His assailant, focused so completely on the hand holding the knife, didn't seem to see it coming, and Bucky's fist collided with his face.
As his enemy recoiled, Bucky pressed his advantage. The grip on his right wrist slackened, so he swung both fists, one after another. Some were blocked, but many of them found their mark. He could feel the impact, could feel the sound of fists against flesh...
"Bucky! Buck, stop! It's me!"
Only when Bucky opened his eyes did he realize they'd been closed. Had he been...asleep? Had that all just been another dream? Because here he was, still lying in his bed, with someone leaning over him. Not the Winter Soldier, though. Not a tentacled monstrosity.
"Steve?"
"Yeah. It's just me."
The lamp on the bedside table clicked on, and Steve's face came into view, hovering over him with a look of concern. And blood. Blood dripped from his nose and smeared from the corner of his mouth. A few drops showed up starkly against the pure white of his T-shirt.
Bucky blinked, his mind trying to process what he was seeing while his heart still screamed that an enemy was about to attack him. "What...happened? Why are you...?"
"You were dreaming," Steve said gently. "That's all. Just a bad dream. But everything's okay now."
Slowly, Bucky's gaze dropped from Steve's bloody face to his own hands. Sure enough, something red glistened on his knuckles.
He had hit Steve. He'd hurt him. Enough to make him bleed.
Just like before, in the helicarrier. Once he'd finally realized who he was fighting and what it all meant, he'd looked down and seen the bloody mess of Steve's face, realizing with a wave of horror that he was the one who'd made it that way. He was supposed to protect Steve, but every time he turned around, he just ended up hurting him again.
He couldn't look up. All he could do was stare at Steve's blood staining his hands.
Slowly, Steve sank onto the edge of the bed beside him. His hand went up, dabbing at the blood steadily oozing from his nose.
The reminder made Bucky's stomach churn. That was his fault. "Sorry," he whispered, his blood-stained hands clenching into fists. "I'm...I'm sorry."
Steve shook his head. "It's okay. It was an accident."
It's your fault, his mind whispered to him, growling like the caged beast it was. "I...I hurt you," he mumbled aloud, tears springing to his eyes. Just saying those words felt like stabbing himself in the chest.
"I was just trying to keep you from hurting yourself," Steve said, looking down at the floor.
Bucky followed his gaze and saw his knife lying on the carpet. It was clean, but...he'd been trying to cut his own neck to stop the Winter Soldier. Had he done that for real, not just in the dream? Had Steve tried to stop him, and that was why he'd come within reach of Bucky's fists?
"It's my fault," he whispered, his whole chest aching with the weight of that knowledge. It felt like the Soldier was still leaning against him, holding him down, pushing him back from the man sitting at his side.
"It's okay, Buck," Steve said again, reaching out a hand to lay on Bucky's shoulder.
But his touch was like fire, and Bucky jerked back against the headboard. Because Steve's hands were bloody, and so were his, and it was all his fault all his fault allhisfaultallhis—
His mouth watered, his stomach clenched, and before he realized what was happening, Bucky threw up all over himself. He sat for a moment with a warm puddle of his own sick in his lap, breathing in his own stench and tasting the sour bile on his tongue. Then the tears building up inside him began to spill out, dripping down to add to the disgusting mess of blood and vomit all over him.
This was what he was. This was what Steve had to look at. Disgusting. Ugly. Pathetic. Worthless.
Then he saw through his tears that some of it had gotten onto Steve's pants. It wasn't enough that he made a mess of himself. His filth spread even to his best friend in the world, dragging him down into the muck.
Bucky hated himself.
"Easy, easy..." Steve said. "Just take a deep breath. Can you breathe with me?"
Bucky struggled to match Steve's steady voice as he slowly counted out breaths. But it was...so hard...with the enormous sobs...ripping his chest apart...and the puddle growing cold in his lap...
Gradually, Bucky became aware that his breathing grew deeper, resembling Steve's more and more. Then, before he felt remotely ready, Steve stood up and gingerly pulled Bucky to his feet by the shoulders. The disgusting puddle in his lap slopped down his legs.
"I'm sorry," Bucky sniffled, tears pouring unchecked down his cheeks. Steve's hands still felt like red-hot brands, even through his shirt, but Bucky didn't have the energy to pull away this time. "I'm sorry...I'm sorry..."
"Shhh..." Steve barely even acknowledged his words. "Let's get you cleaned up, okay?"
Bucky let Steve help him strip down to his underwear. Steve wadded up his filthy pajamas, then used a clean corner of the shirt to wipe Bucky's face. Steve pushed him in the direction of the shower, reassuring him that he'd take care of the cleanup. Shame burned a hole in Bucky's chest, just letting Steve clean up his mess like every other time, but he barely even had enough willpower to follow Steve's orders and shuffle into the bathroom. He couldn't protest.
He stepped into the shower, halfheartedly slid the door closed behind him, and reached for the shower handle. He had just enough time to realize he'd forgotten to take off his underwear before a sheet of freezing water hit him in the face.
Bucky staggered against the wall of the shower, his chest seizing as his lungs struggled to expand. He blinked, and suddenly the shower was filled with those black tentacles again, shoving their way into the small space. They curled around his chest, squeezing tighter and tighter, crushing his ribs. The cold water pounded against his face, plastering his hair into his eyes and blotting out the light.
Coughing feebly, trying to force his lungs to expand, Bucky brushed the hair out of his face and looked down...and he saw nothing but red. Thick, viscous red liquid rose all around him, clinging to him and dripping from the walls and pouring out of the shower head. He could smell it, heavy and metallic. He could taste it on his tongue. He choked on it.
He was drowning in a sea of blood. The blood of all his victims, all the people who had fallen at his hands.
Including Steve...
His eyes burned, and he wanted to cry...but what right did he have to complain about his own pain? Steve was the one he'd hurt. His best friend, the one he loved more than anyone else in the world...look how he'd treated him.
You really are a monster, the voice said, echoing off the walls all around him. You're drowning in your own filth, and you poison everything you touch. You deserve death, because that's all you have to offer. That's all you are. A dead man walking.
He blinked, and the blood turned into shadows, and the shadows hid eyes, and the eyes were staring at him. Judging him. Waiting to see what he would do, so they could mock him before dragging him into the darkness with them. It was only a matter of time.
Bucky turned his back on it all, ducking his head under the torrent of icy water and squeezing his eyes shut. He shuddered violently from the cold and maybe something else, his chest heaving desperately. He wasn't sure if he was crying or just gasping, with his hair plastered to his face and the cold water beating down on his head. He braced himself against the wall with trembling hands, unable to do anything but struggle to breathe.
The roar of water in his ears still wasn't louder than his mind whispering to him. Filthy. Tainted. Ruined. Disappointment. Burden. He could feel the tug of the riptide with every word, trying to pull him down. It was where he belonged—swirling down a drain, destined to become nothing but sewage. Because that's all he was.
That's a lie.
Bucky's eyes popped open in surprise. That voice was different.
There, standing right in front of him with his back against the wall and water streaming over his head, was Steve. Not the Steve he was used to seeing, tall and strong and capable. This was the Steve from days long past. Short, skinny, his bony shoulders easily visible underneath his wet shirt. Steve was fully clothed, but he stood there in the shower, letting the water drench him to the skin as he looked up at Bucky.
Bucky knew Steve wasn't really there. Just as he knew he hadn't really been fighting the Winter Soldier, and the tentacles writhing in the corners of the room were really just shadows. But he still flinched when Steve raised his hands to cup Bucky's face. They felt so real, so bony and cold—but gentle. His fingers brushed Bucky's hair out of his eyes and settled against his cheeks, holding him in place.
Blue eyes looked intently into his, and then Steve rested his forehead against Bucky's. Remember, he whispered, his voice making no sound. Remember who you really are.
"I...can't," Bucky wheezed, struggling to draw breath. "I don't...I don't know..."
Yes, you do, Steve said patiently. Who are you?
Bucky took a breath in and choked on a mouthful of water. Breathlessly, he coughed out, "James...Buchanan...Barnes." He didn't know what else to say.
And who is that? Steve prodded.
Bucky shook his head helplessly. He glanced to the side, watching the dark shadows curling closer and closer. He could feel them snaking across his back, curling around his legs, twisting about his arms...
The Winter Soldier, whispered the darkness, answering Steve's question with truths no one could deny. The Asset. Assassin. Murderer. Guilty. Empty. Worthless. Waste of space. Better off dead.
No, Steve said, gently turning Bucky's head to face him again. He blocked Bucky's peripheral vision with his hands, so he was the only thing Bucky could see. Who are you? Who are you to him?
In an instant, the shadows fled and the room blazed with light. The tentacles were gone, and there was only water running down the drain, not blood. Bucky blinked, and Steve was gone too.
He was definitely crying now. Crying and shivering all over, unable to move. He didn't know what any of it meant, didn't know why Steve had left. He felt no closer to the answer than before. Who was he? He didn't want that cruel voice to be right about him. But...who else could he be? What was he, if not the monster lurking in the shadows of his heart?
He was drowning, caught in a hurricane of confusion and unanswerable questions. He couldn't find his way out of the maelstrom, couldn't even see the shoreline. There was no way out, no way out, no way—
"Buck?"
Steve heard the bathroom door click shut as he dropped Bucky's soiled clothes into the washing machine. Next, he pulled the sheets off Bucky's bed, moving carefully so as not to get anything else dirty. Once he'd stuffed the sheets into the washing machine, he looked down at himself and saw that his clothes were dirty too. He stripped off his pants and added them to the load, but he'd have to soak his shirt first. There were several large blotches of blood all over it.
After switching to a new pair of pajama pants and starting the washing machine, Steve headed to the kitchen, pulling off his blood-stained shirt. As he filled a basin with cold water, his mind drifted to Bucky.
The nightmares were getting worse. At least, they seemed to be. Bucky rarely talked about them, but Steve could glean a little from the things Bucky cried out in his sleep, or mumbled through his tears upon waking. Steve could only imagine what he'd seen this time, to lash out so desperately when Steve had woken him.
Steve found himself staring at the faint curls of blood spreading through the water from the stained cloth. Bucky grabbing for the knife on his bedside table... Steve had felt the adrenaline surging through him, expecting that blade to come darting towards him...but then Bucky had pointed it at himself. And that had been even more terrifying.
He dabbed gingerly at his nose, but the bleeding seemed to have stopped. Looking down at the blood smeared on his hand, Steve remembered the first time he'd walked into a room and found Bucky with his knife in his hand. Blood all over his wrist, all over his hand, all over the floor...
With a bone-deep sigh, Steve closed his eyes for a moment and let the sheer exhaustion of the past few weeks crash over him. Never in a million years could he have anticipated this struggle. It wasn't just that Bucky woke up screaming from nightmares almost every night. It wasn't just that he was carrying around the weight of a thousand memories Steve would probably never really know about. It wasn't even just that Bucky, of all people, was apparently in so much mental anguish that sometimes the only outlet he could seem to find was by shedding his own blood.
No, what blindsided Steve the most was that Bucky wasn't asking for help.
They'd always been there for each other. Ever since the day they'd met, they'd always known they could turn to each other for advice and comfort. Even if they didn't know what to do or say, they could at least sit at the other's side and offer silent support. Sometimes, that was the most important thing anyway.
There had been so many times they'd turned to each other when there was no one else. Steve particularly remembered the days right after his mother had died, and how Bucky had come alongside him when he felt like all the seams holding him together were frayed and torn. And there had been plenty of times that Steve had been able to return the favor, especially after rescuing him from Hydra.
But now, when Bucky was more broken than he'd ever been before, he wasn't asking for help, no matter how clearly he needed it. No matter how much Steve ached to offer it. It wasn't that Steve had all the answers. He didn't really know how to eradicate Bucky's nightmares, or how to help him keep from hurting himself.
Still...he could do something. At the very least, he could hold Bucky and remind him that he was loved.
If Bucky wanted him to.
With a tired sigh, Steve washed his hands and gingerly dabbed at his nose and lip with a wet paper towel, getting rid of the last traces of blood. Then he trudged back in the direction of his bedroom to find another shirt.
The water was running steadily in the bathroom. It sounded like Bucky was taking a nice, long shower, which was probably exactly what he needed. Hopefully the hot water would soothe him back to sleep...
Steve paused in the hallway outside the bathroom door. Something was...off. What was it?
Oh. There was no light showing under the door. Why was Bucky taking a shower in the dark?
Knocking softly, Steve cracked the door open, just enough to slip his hand in and flip the light on. "Buck?" he called.
The only response he got was a choked sob, a broken sound he was growing all too familiar with.
Pushing the door open a little farther, Steve peeked inside. "You okay?"
Through the frosted glass of the shower, he could see Bucky standing under the stream of water, bracing himself against the wall. He wasn't cleaning himself off, he wasn't relaxing, he was just...standing there. Crying with shuddering gasps that echoed off the tiles.
Something else clicked in Steve's mind as he stood there: No steam hung in the air. If hot water had been running all this time, he should have seen swirls of it curling around the lights. The mirror should be completely fogged up, but there wasn't even a trace of condensation on it.
Closing the door softly behind himself, Steve crossed the room. "Buck...can I help?"
He hesitated with his hand on the shower door, which hadn't been closed all the way.
"I don't...I...I..."
Steve couldn't just stand there listening to that shaky whisper any longer. He stepped into the shower, sliding the door shut behind him. The water pooling around his feet and misting against him from the steady spray was ice-cold, and now he could see that Bucky was shivering violently. It was like he was in so much pain he couldn't even reach over and adjust the temperature.
"Please, Buck..." he whispered. "Let me help you. All you have to do is ask. I'll do everything I can. Just...ask me for help. I'm right here."
If someone had asked him in that moment why it was so important for Bucky to ask him first, Steve wouldn't have been able to explain. But every nerve in his body told him that Bucky's response was of vital importance. And so he waited, hardly daring to breathe, watching streams of cold water pouring over that bare back.
Bucky drew in a deep, shuddering breath that became lost in a huge, coughing sob. He collapsed against the wall of the shower, as if all the strength had been sapped from him. And then, the tiniest whimper echoed off the tiled walls: "Help me..."
Steve needed no further invitation. He stepped closer, reaching around Bucky to grasp the shower handle. The cold water hitting his bare chest took his breath away; he couldn't imagine how Bucky had been able to stand under it for so long.
Once he'd adjusted the temperature to something much more comfortable, Steve reached up and twisted the shower head to the setting that made the water pour out in more of a light mist, rather than the intense pounding it had been.
"Buck?" Tentatively, he touched Bucky's metal shoulder, remembering how he'd recoiled earlier. He didn't want to make things worse...
Sniffling and still shivering, Bucky turned his head and peeked through the strands of hair plastered to his face. "Steve...I...I'm..."
Moving slowly just in case, Steve brushed the hair out of Bucky's face, smoothing it back out of the way. "Come here," he whispered, taking him by the shoulders and gently pulling him closer.
Bucky didn't resist. He leaned against Steve, sinking into his embrace and wearily resting his head on Steve's shoulder. For a minute or two, he kept shivering, but slowly the shivers grew fewer and farther between.
Steve held him closer, turning slightly to make sure that the water was only hitting Bucky's back, rather than spraying into his eyes or his ears. He slowly rubbed his hand back and forth across Bucky's bare back, hoping that the pressure and the warm water would soothe some of the tight muscles he could feel. Gradually, as the minutes ticked by, he could feel Bucky relaxing more and more.
They were silent for a long time, and Steve was content to just hold his best friend and hope that it was helping a little. Finally, Bucky broke the silence with a soft murmur. "It's warm..."
Steve smiled and opened his mouth to say something in response, but then he felt Bucky's chest heave with another enormous sob. The next thing he knew, Bucky was crying even harder than before, his arms clutching tighter and tighter around Steve's waist like a drowning man clinging to a piece of driftwood in the middle of a hurricane.
"Buck..." He didn't know what to say, didn't know what to do. Tears of his own burned against his eyelids as he squeezed his eyes shut, resting his cheek against the top of Bucky's head.
"You're...s-so good," Bucky sobbed against Steve's neck. "And I'm...I can only... I hurt you, but you... Why? Why are you so good t-to me? I'm nothing. I...who am I? Who...why...I don't..."
Steve planted a firm kiss on his cheek. "Who are you?" he whispered, his lips a mere centimeter from Bucky's skin.. "You're my friend. You're my best friend. That's why."
Bucky's chest heaved in another huge sob. "Sorry...I-I'm sorry..."
"Mm-mm." Steve shook his head, knocking it gently against Bucky's. "Don't you dare apologize for being my best friend."
"No...but I..."
"It's okay, Buck. It's all okay."
Finding every attempt at an apology immediately blocked, Bucky seemed to give up. Once more, he let his head rest against Steve's shoulder and sniffled himself to silence. Steve continued to rub his hand up and down Bucky's back, occasionally turning his head to press another kiss to Bucky's cheek, or his shoulder, or the top of his head.
"Don't wanna hurt you 'gain," Bucky mumbled. Steve could feel his rough chin rubbing against his skin as he spoke.
"Better me than you." The words were out of his mouth before he could decide whether he should voice that thought or not.
Bucky shrank back, holding his right arm tight against his chest, as if Steve hadn't already seen the cuts there a dozen times.
They'd had this conversation before, hadn't they? Steve had told him that every cut hurt him as well. And yet, that hadn't seemed to stop Bucky. It only made him look more and more ashamed every time Steve found another scar on his wrist.
"I don't...deserve...your help..." His voice was a thin whisper, nearly drowned by the rush of water.
Steve looked at him, dripping and disheveled, shoulders slumped and head bowed with shame, almost every inch of him exposed...and he loved every inch of him. He loved him from the scars he could see to the tears indistinguishable from the water spraying on their heads to his heart, beating invisibly in his chest.
"Okay," he said.
Bucky hesitated, then his head came up a little, his brows knotting in confusion. "Huh?"
"Okay," Steve repeated calmly. "You don't deserve my help? That's okay. You can have it anyway." He put his hands on Bucky's shoulders again, holding him at arm's length. "Would you like my help?"
Bucky stared at him for several seconds. It was the longest they'd maintained eye contact all night. And as second after second ticked past, Bucky's chin began to tremble more and more. Finally, he nodded. As Steve pulled him close again, Bucky hugged him tightly. "Don't let go," he whispered.
"Never."
When Bucky's shoulders gave another convulsive heave, Steve thought he was crying again. But then Bucky said, with a hiccuping chuckle, "Th-That's gonna make some things really awkward..."
A surprised laugh escaped his throat, even as his eyes burned with new tears. As he and Bucky chuckled somewhat giddily in each other's arms, he knew everything was going to be all right. Maybe not right away. Maybe not for a long time. But as long as they had each other, they could keep their heads above water and ride out the waves.