Chapter 42: Bucky
The world took several seconds to come into focus as Bucky regained consciousness. He stumbled to his feet and looked around, dazed, numb.
Cars were lying on their sides along the street and the intersection was a smoking crater. Seeing it, everything came rushing back to Bucky, and he stumbled forward, catching sight of a familiar form among the debris.
"Steve!" He ran forward and fell to his knees beside Steve, dread filling him as he looked down at his friend's motionless body.
Pieces of broken shield lay scattered around Steve, glinting dully. He appeared unmarked, but his chest was still, his throat void of a pulse when Bucky checked. A small trickle of blood ran from his nose.
"No." Bucky felt again for a pulse and found none. "No, no…" He pressed a hand to Steve's chest, his vision blurring with tears. "Steve!"
He couldn't be dead. Steve was all he had, his only friend in this era where neither of them belonged. You can't leave me here alone, Bucky wanted to say, to scream. But Steve already had.
He was gone.
"No…" A shadow fell over Bucky as Stark arrived. Blood ran down the side of his grief-stricken face. A weak groan escaped his lips. "No."
Bucky turned back to Steve's body, his gaze resting on the closed eyes. For a moment more he let the tears course down his cheeks. Then he spoke to the man standing beside him, his voice as broken as his spirit. "We can't leave him here. Or the others."
"The feds will show up soon," Stark replied numbly.
Bucky clenched his normal fist. "No," he said firmly. "Not like that." He knew it would mean swarms of uncaring government agents who'd take Steve's body away and probably want to run tests on the super-soldier. The thought sickened him.
Abruptly, he stood, turning to face Stark. "We're doing it ourselves."
After a beat, Stark nodded. "I'll get the others."
It was raining by the time the funeral pyre was ready, the storm Thor had conjured running it's course in the absence of the Asgardian's will to stop it. The water poured from the dark sky and soaked into the splintered pieces of wood collected from ruined shops.
Four bodies lay atop the pyre. And as Bucky watched silently, Groot laid Rocket's small form beside Nebula's.
The Maximoffs had been found in a side street, lying inches from each other and surrounded by the bodies of the Chitauri who had killed them.
Bucky had no idea what Stark had told the others regarding Steve. He didn't care. He wanted to wake up from the nightmare that had become his life.
And he couldn't.
Instead he turned to face the survivors gathered behind him. Marvel caught his eye and he gave her a nod. It was time to finish this.
Marvel stepped forward and laid her hand on the pyre. There was a second's silence. Then the wood caught alight and began to burn with an intense heat as Marvel stepped back and slid her hand into Fury's.
As the flames climbed towards the bodies, Loki stepped forward and held out his hand silently. Magic fell like a blanket over the six fallen, covering the blood and brokenness with an illusion of peaceful sleep.
A sob caught in Bucky's throat as he looked one last time at his best friend's face, at the shield lying on his chest, made to appear whole by the magic. No one said anything. It wasn't the time for speeches.
We reached the end of the line, Bucky realized. I'm sorry I wasn't with you.
Then he turned away from the blazing pyre with the others to face the approaching flash of emergency vehicle lights.