Chapter 14: Rebirth and Reclamation
Steve hoped comfort food would cheer Bucky up. Tomorrow was surgery day, when Bucky would get an upgraded arm and lose the god-awful Hydra implants. Dr. Cho recommended no food after 8 p.m., so Steve decided to make it a good dinner. The man had been somber all day.
Steve wasn't sure what was wrong. Bucky had seemed to be eager to get rid of the clunky chrome arm that caused him constant pain, but as the surgery grew closer, Bucky grew quieter.
After getting permission to enter, Steve walked into the Veronica room carrying a large bag from Edith's deli. Bucky was on the floor in the center of the room doing one-arm push-ups. As the door closed, Bucky got to his feet and eyed the bag.
"What's that?"
"Dinner," Steve said. "You still have two hours until your food cut-off. How are you feeling?"
"Fine. Thanks for the food." Bucky grabbed two beers from the fridge and set them on the counter.
Steve pulled out large sandwiches and a couple of chocolate chunk cookies from the bag and set them next to the beers. Steve studied Bucky as the other man slid onto the stool. There was tension in his shoulders and tight lines around his eyes.
"I know you must be nervous about tomorrow," Steve said.
Bucky twisted off the cap to his beer and took a swig. "What makes you think that?"
"You seem tense."
Bucky took another swig of his beer and unwrapped his sandwich. It was pastrami, dripping with cheese and sauce. "Thanks for the dinner. At some point, I'm going to have to stop being a freeloader."
"You don't need to worry about that right now." Steve opened his beer and took a sip. "What's on your mind, Buck? Come on, man."
Bucky sighed and pushed the sandwich a few inches away. "I can't stand this arm." He held up his chrome monstrosity. "Every time I look in a mirror, I see the brand. The red star. I want it gone…." His voice trailed off.
"You get it off tomorrow," Steve said, taking another sip of his beer. "That's a good thing."
Bucky took a quick, deep breath. "I remember the other surgeries. I'm not sure I can make it through another one."
Steve set his beer on the counter. "Jesus, Bucky. Were you awake for all of them?"
Bucky nodded. "At various points. Anesthetic doesn't last long. They didn't care. I felt it. Heard it. The sounds were…" He shook his head. "I don't think I can take hearing those sounds again. And the pain after surgery lasted for…a while."
"Have you talked to Dr. Cho or Abodon about this?"
Bucky shook his head. "I kind of walked out on the last session."
"You don't have to do this if you don't want to."
"I want the arm off, so I have to do it."
"It won't be the same this time. I'll be there. The doctors care about you. They wouldn't do the surgery if they couldn't do it humanely."
Bucky took a shaky breath and another gulp of his beer. "It'll be ugly, Steve." He looked at his friend. "Gruesome. There's so little left of my shoulder. You sure you wanna watch that? I'd understand if you didn't."
Steve reached out and put a hand on Bucky's left shoulder, his thumb tracing where the metal met the flesh beneath the thin fabric of the T-shirt. "I'll be there the whole time, Buddy, unless you kick me out."
-0- -0- -0-
Bucky found himself on an operating table again, looking up into the goggled, masked faces above him. It was a little past 6:30 a.m. A thick needle was in a vein in his right hand and a tube snaked upward. Sensors were on his chest and head. Dr. Cho had placed discs along the back of his neck, vertically tracing his spine.
"Those neural dampeners on your neck are experimental and state of the art," Dr. Cho said. "They should significantly reduce your pain, even if the anesthesia wears off prematurely."
He wondered how many operations he'd need before he was completely renovated. Doctors Cho and Abodon were on his left, near the metal arm. An anesthesiologist was above Bucky's head, and a cardiac surgeon was positioned near Bucky's right shoulder. They hoped to remove all of Hydra's remaining implants, including the ones in his chest and leg, and insert upgraded ear devices to ward off the Winter Soldier activation words.
Steve stood near Bucky's right hip, his face covered with a mask and safety glasses. Even through the plastic glasses, Bucky could make out the concern in Steve's eyes.
"Hey." Bucky smiled. "If you faint or throw up, do it away from me."
Steve chuckled. "You know I haven't done either of those things since I let a German doctor experiment on me."
Bucky felt Steve's hand slip into his own and give a reassuring squeeze. He returned the pressure, using the warm contact as a reminder of where he was and why he was doing this.
"Okay, Bucky," Dr. Cho said. "Dr. Soral is going to start the anesthesia."
"I'm going to begin with a normal dose. I'll increase as needed," the masked anesthesiologist standing over Bucky's head said. "Count backward from one hundred, please."
Bucky started at 100 and made his way all the way down to 80 before he started to feel even the slightest effect.
"Hmmm." Dr. Soral leaned over Bucky, coming into view. "Are you feeling anything from the drug?"
"Just a little lightheaded," Bucky said. "You can up it. Hydra managed to knock me out without killing me. It never lasted very long, though."
"I'll do my best to keep you under," the man said.
"The neural dampeners will decrease pain if you wake up in the middle of the operation," Dr. Cho said, "but if that happens, you may still experience discomfort. We'll ventilate you after you're out, so if you do wake up and feel pain, tap your right hand, but otherwise try to remain still."
"Understood." Bucky took a deep breath. If that happened, he could handle it. He'd have to.
Steve's hand squeezed his again. Bucky managed a shaky lopsided smile and resumed his count, starting at eighty.
He made it to sixty before everything faded to oblivion.
He woke up in a daze. His vision was blurry. Figures were above him. There was an intense pressure on his left side. A tool buzzed near his left ear. Something beeped at the back of his neck.
"He's waking up." A man's voice. "Heart rate steady but rising. Increasing propofol another 50 milligrams."
"Bucky." Steve's voice. "It's Steve. I'm here. You're in the Avenger's complex having your arm replaced. You're okay. Don't move."
He felt tugging on his left side and tried to shift away from it. Pain shot into his chest. He tried to groan, but something was in his throat.
"Don't move, Bucky." A firm pressure came down on his right chest.
The restraint and the pain sent him into a near panic. The thing in his throat burned. His chest fought against an unseen pressure. He remembered the instructions and slipped his hand out of Steve's to tap on the table.
"Increasing 50 milligrams. Mr. Barnes, blink if you can hear me."
Bucky blinked. The world was a blurry mass of white and blue.
"I'm going to increase another 30 milligrams," the voice said. "I've never seen anyone need this much propofol. I'm worried—"
Everything went dark and silent.
-0- -0- -0-
Steve put a restraining hand on Bucky's right chest, keeping him still. He was waking up, fighting the surgery and the ventilator. The heart monitor beeped frantically. Damnit, Doc, get him under, he silently pleaded with the anesthesiologist. He knew the man was trying his best to keep Bucky unconscious without killing him.
But seeing Bucky wake up with half of the left side of his chest just gone was one of the most horrifying sights he'd ever witnesses—and that was saying a lot. He couldn't tear his eyes away from the gruesome image. Bucky had said it would be ugly. Steve thought he'd prepared himself.
But there was no way he ever could have fully prepared himself for seeing just how much of Bucky's flesh Hydra had carved out over the years to attach the various metal arms. If he'd encountered anyone else with so much damage done to their chest, he'd figure them for dead.
When Bucky finally drifted unconscious again, he heard Dr. Cho breathe a sigh of relief. She looked up at the woman on Steve's left—Dr. Aziz, a cardiac surgeon. Since they were opening Bucky up so close to his heart, Dr. Cho had coordinated with one of the leading cardiac surgeons to remove the kill switch on Bucky's heart.
"Switch, Dr. Aziz." Cho said, and like a dance, the doctors exchanged places.
Dr. Aziz worked quickly, her hands disappearing into Bucky's chest cavity. A holographic image of the heart hovered in the air over Bucky's chest. Steve watched, fascinated, as cardiac surgeon carefully maneuvered a small tool to inactivate the device. Then she removed her bloodied hands, dropped the tool on a tray, and opened her gloved palms.
Dr. Abodon set two tools in her hand. One looked like a long set of scissors with curved tweezers at the end. The other Steve recognized as a laser pen. Steve studied the slowly beating holographic image of Bucky's heart as Dr. Aziz resumed her work inside Bucky's chest cavity.
-0- -0- -0-
Bucky woke in darkness. He felt a burning vibration through the left side of his chest and tried to move but couldn't. Something firm pressed across this rib cage, holding him down. Panic gripped him, sending his heart thudding into overdrive.
"Bucky," a woman's voice sounded in the darkness, "this is Dr. Cho. You're in the regeneration chamber. We're integrating a new arm, bonding your nervous tissue with the vibranium."
It all came back to him suddenly. The surgery. His new arm. He inhaled a deep, slow breath.
"Can you hear us, Bucky?" Steve's voice.
"Yes," he whispered. His throat was dry. He gritted his teeth against the pain in his chest and shoulder.
"Good. This is going to take a little while." Dr. Cho again. "Try to relax."
Easy for you to say, Doc. You're not in here being remade. He closed his eyes and tried to take her advice.
Almost an hour passed. During that time, he felt strange sensations inside his chest and along the left side of his torso—pain, cold, tingling, numbness. They flipped back and forth, sometimes one or two sensations together, sometimes just numbness.
The humming and vibration finally ceased, bathing him in silence. A moment later, a shock ran through his entire body, stealing his breath, and he grunted, his entire body jerking.
"Bucky, are you okay?" Dr. Cho asked. "That was the final process in getting your arm online and integrated with your nervous system."
"I'm fine," he croaked again.
"We're all done." The lid to the regeneration coffin, as he'd come to think of it, opened. He remained still, catching his breath and letting his eyes adjust to the light.
Faces came into view overhead—Dr. Cho and Steve. Their masks were off. Dr. Cho looked relieved.
Steve was smiling. "You made it through with flying colors. Every piece of Hydra hardware is out of your body, including the kill switch on your heart, and you've got a new set of earwigs."
Dr. Cho tilted her head. "You should be able to move now. I've released the restraint. Sorry about that. It was important to keep you still during the process. Can you sit up?"
Bucky groaned as he sat up. The left side of his chest hurt. The clock on the wall read 8:06. Had the whole thing only taken an hour and a half? He blinked again at the clock and realized it was p.m. Almost 14 hours later.
His gaze swept over Steve and the doctors. "You must all be exhausted."
Steve gave him a tired smile. "It has been a long day."
Dr. Cho looked ecstatic. "But worth it."
Bucky took a breath and finally looked down to his left. A dark, sleek metal stump protruded from his shoulder.
"Here's your new arm." Dr. Cho held out the new appendage.
It was black, with a subtle shine, and the metallic plates would have been almost imperceptible if not for the soft nickel tips.
"I'm going to attach it to the shoulder piece," Dr. Cho continued. "It will feel a bit…weird, I imagine, as it connects with your nervous system."
She leaned over the side of the cradle and set the arm into place. He heard a tiny whir and then a click as metal connected with metal and parts slipped into place. His shoulder tingled with a sensation that grew into painful pins and needles. It snaked into his chest, back, and neck. An ache flared at the base of his skull.
Slowly he raised the appendage. His shoulder and chest flared with pain, but he didn't care. He'd felt the arm move.
He flexed his fingers experimentally…his fingers.
It was weird. Looking at the arm, he could feel it, but his brain had a hard time processing it as his own. His chrome arm had obeyed his commands, and there were basic sensations—pressure, a general idea of where the hand was and feedback related to movement and lifting, but it was clunky, and every new arm required a steep learning curve to simply hold something without crushing it.
This arm didn't quite feel like his flesh arm, but when he moved the fingers, he could feel them. When he made a fist, he could sense the fingertips in his palm.
"Can you open your palm for me?" Dr. Cho asked.
He complied, watching as the black hand twisted upward and the fingers unfolded. He felt the release of tingling pressure as his fingertips lost contact with his palm.
Dr. Cho gently brushed her fingers over his metal palm. "Do you feel that?"
Her touch was soft, warm. It tickled. His arm actually tickled. He nodded. His eyes watered as he looked up at her.
"There are 150 microsensors in your fingers and palm that send signals up to the new nervous tissue in your shoulder," she explained. "Another 100 on the back of the hand. This arm is removable, so it won't feel quite as sensitive as your flesh arm, and your forearm and bicep have fewer sensors."
She ran her fingers up his forearm. He felt it as vague tingle, but there was no sensation of warmth or cold.
She grabbed a clean scalpel and tapped it gently against his palm. "How does that feel?"
It felt like cool metal. He could tell the object was sharp, but it didn't hurt. When she pulled the scalpel away, she came back with an ice cube and set it in his palm. It felt almost hot.
"How about this?" Dr. Cho asked.
He pursed his lips. That wasn't right. "It's warm."
"Hmmm. Okay, we'll work on some adjustments and recalibrations tomorrow," Dr. Cho said, "but in the meantime, it seems to be functioning well."
Bucky nodded. He didn't care if things were a little wonky or it took some time to get the sensations right. His metal hand could feel in a way the one Hydra had given him never could. They didn't care about that sort of thing. They tried to strip him of everything that made him human.
But this arm felt connected to him.
"Are you okay, Buck?" Steve put a gentle arm on Bucky's right shoulder.
He realized he was trembling. Then, suddenly, he felt warm tears on his cheeks and dropped his head, squeezing the bridge of his nose with his right hand and willing himself to keep it together. His arm wasn't a clunky thing, anymore. It was elegant and beautiful, and if he held someone's hand with it, he would be able to feel the warmth of their touch within his own.
"Bucky, are you in pain?" Steve asked. "Are you okay?"
Dr. Abodon was there suddenly, a soft smile on his face. "I think he's more than okay."
Bucky nodded and wiped hard at his cheeks with both hands. He could feel the dampness against his new hand. He didn't even know how that was possible. How could sensors in a metal hand make his brain feel so many different things?
His chest still throbbed, almost as if it were on fire. He could deal with that for the time being.
He must have winced, because Dr. Cho leaned forward and asked, "How do your chest and shoulder feel? Are you in pain?"
He nodded and looked at her. "It's manageable."
Dr. Cho moved to a table and returned with several small discs in her hands. He recognized them as the neural dampeners she'd used during surgery. She placed three on the front of his shoulder, along the path where his chest met the metal, and another three on the back of his shoulder. Instantly, the pain dulled. It was still present, but it felt more like being sore after a workout.
"I'd give you pain killers, but I know they won't work well. These should help until the pain subsides in two or three days," Dr. Cho said. "It's your new nervous tissue and healing surgical wounds, but once you're healed and your brain adapts, the pain should resolve. Can you get up?"
He nodded, scrubbing his face again as he gripped the sides of the regeneration cradle and steadied himself, then swung his legs out. As he straightened, he found himself toppling to the right. Steve's hands grabbed him—one hand on his right arm and the other against his right shoulder blade—stopping him from careening to the floor.
"Easy, buddy," Steve said. "Forget the gymnastics."
"My balance is off," Bucky said, realizing just how much lighter the left side of his body felt.
"Thanks to the vibranium, your new arm is one fifth the weight of the previous one." Dr. Cho said. She placed a finger on the top of his metal 'bicep,' about two inches below the shoulder. "Your regenerated nerves go this far down the arm. The arm detaches at this point. The sensors in the arm feed up to these neurons."
"And that, Bucky boy," Tony sauntered in, his shoulders back proudly, a cocky look on his face, "means you can swap out arms with all kinds of cool features." "That one has the repulsors we talked about." He waved a hand in the air, talking impossibly fast. "We'll set up time in my lab to go over it all. Right now, they're disabled so you don't accidentally send anyone, or yourself, into a wall."
Bucky stared at Stark. He didn't know what to say except, "Thank you."
"You're welcome, and—" Tony's brow furrowed. "Hey, were you crying? You were crying, weren't you? There's no crying in the Avenger's complex. It's in the bylaws. I think. Well, if it isn't, it should be. Don't tell me there's something wrong with the arm? I can fix it, whatever it is. It's no big deal, Barnes."
Barnes cleared his throat and looked at Steve, who had a frustratingly understanding smile on his face. Bucky took a breath and scrubbed again at his face, then looked back at Tony. "The arm is...I can feel it. It was just a shock. It almost feels real. It's not some heavy thing hanging off me. It's almost like having my real arm back." He gave a quick snuffle. "Thank you."
The cocky pride vanished instantly from Tony's face, replaced by a soft, almost stunned expression that Bucky couldn't quite interpret.
"Oh, good." Stark cleared his throat and studied one of the monitors, fiddling with the control panel. "I'm glad you like it."
"I love it." Bucky straightened, bending the new arm at the elbow and gently rotating the shoulder. Pain flared but remained manageable.
He caught a glimpse of himself in a mirror across the room and walked closer to it. The black-and-silver arm looked sleeker and more elegant. He no longer carried the brand of his captors. Even his scars were gone. The area where the metal met flesh was a neat line.
Bucky looked back at Dr. Cho. "What happened to the scars?"
She smiled and tilted her head. "Tony might be able to make mechanical arms, but my regeneration cradle makes new tissue."
-0- -0- -0-
"You haven't eaten since last night." As Steve followed Bucky into the room, he couldn't tear his eyes away from the new arm and the smooth transition where metal met flesh. Soft blue lights blinked slowly from the neural dampeners on the back of the man's shoulder. "Are you hungry?"
Bucky shook his head and dropped onto the couch, putting his head back. He draped his new arm over the side, wincing at the motion, and hit the button to recline.
He smiled and rolled his head to look over at Steve. "I can feel the sofa controls a lot better. It's…nice. Weird, kind of."
Steve smiled. Seeing something good happen for Bucky lifted some of the weight that he'd felt ever since the day he'd watched his friend fall from the train. "How's the pain, and are you sure you don't want anything? A snack?"
"The pain is manageable, and yeah, I'm sure. My stomach's a bit queasy."
"Not surprising considering what you've been through and the amount of drugs they gave you. Dr. Soral was worried he'd accidentally kill you."
Bucky huffed. "The number of waivers they had me sign before the surgery was something else. I'm still officially dead. Dead men can't sue."
"At some point, when we finish working out the details, we'll get that changed."
Bucky tilted his head in acknowledgment. "You should get some sleep. You've been going for the past fifteen hours."
"You heard Dr. Cho back there. The condition of them not keeping you overnight for observation was someone stays with you."
"I know, but I'm fine," Bucky insisted.
"Yes, I'm sure you are, but they gave you enough drugs to take down an elephant, and you lost a lot of blood. They had to give you a transfusion. Your body's been through a lot."
Bucky sighed. "It's been through worse."
Steve winced at that.
Bucky sighed and gave him a smile. "Okay, but take a load off and close your eyes, at least."
"That, I'm doing." Steve kicked off his shoes and padded into the kitchen. "But I'm raiding your refrigerator first."
-0- -0- -0-
The next afternoon, Bucky was back in Dr. Abodon's office for a post-surgery check-in.
"How's the pain?" the Doctor asked.
"Manageable." Even healing from the surgery, the new arm was less painful than the old one.
"How did you sleep last night?"
"Okay."
"You're doing one-word answers again. Why?"
Bucky sighed. "It's just been a lot. I'm tired."
Dr. Abodon nodded. "Understandable. Any complications from the new arm or the surgery?"
Bucky shook his head. He hadn't really had a chance to test it out. "No, but you and Dr. Cho said to go easy on using it for two or three days, so I've been a good boy and followed your instructions. It's not like there's much for me to do around here, anyway. I read the Lord of the Rings books. I watch cooking shows.
"Let's see what progress you've made with your name. Are you up for that?"
Bucky took a breath and nodded, closing his eyes.
"Okay," Dr. Abodon began, "I want you to find the happy memory. Home. Your mother's voice. You're in sixth grade. She's reading your name off your report card. She's proud."
Bucky visualized the scene. The apartment. Walking in, bundled against the snow outside. The smell of cookies in the oven. He slipped out of his winter gear, pulled his gloves off, and reached in his back pocket to hand her his report card.
She smiled and looked down. Her eyebrows lifted. "My smart man, I definitely think you've earned a cookie. Who knows, you might be a lawyer or a doctor, someday. James Barnes, attorney at law. Or maybe, Doctor James Barnes."
He braced himself for the pain, but it never came. A chill went through him.
James Buchanan Barnes. James Barnes, he repeated in his head.
Still nothing.
My name is James Barnes. James Bucky Barnes. James Buchanan Barnes.
Tears swelled beneath his closed eyelids, and a disbelieving laugh escaped his throat.
"Bucky?" Dr. Abodon asked.
Bucky opened his eyes and the tears fell. He was grinning like a fool. "My name is James Barnes. I can say it. I can hear it. The pain doesn't come, anymore."
He had his name back.
Dr. Abodon smiled brightly. "That's fantastic progress. Welcome back, James Barnes."
Bucky could almost kiss the doctor. He shot out of his chair. "I'm calling the session for today." He needed to do something to celebrate. He was buzzing with energy.
"I'd say ending on a high note is always a good thing," the Doctor said.
Bucky hurried out of the office. Natasha and Steve were at the end of the hallway, walking in his direction toward the elevator. Bucky was still grinning, giddy.
Steve obviously noticed because his own face lifted with a curious smile. Bucky almost skipped toward them. He looked at Natasha and extended his hand.
"It's nice to officially meet you. My name is James Buchanan Barnes."
Natasha smiled, glanced briefly at Steve, then shook Bucky's hand. "It's nice to meet you, James Buchanan Barnes."
Bucky turned to Steve, and the grin on the other man's face mirrored his own.
"I have my name back," Bucky sputtered. "No more pain. It's all mine again."
Hydra may have stolen his identity, but he was taking it back.
