Steve
It's 2013, and every truth Steve ever held is slowly falling away, piece by piece, like wet paper. America is free and the war is over (lies). SHIELD are the good guys (lies). HYDRA is gone (lies). Steve didn't die for nothing (lies lies lies). Back in 1944 Steve knew many things. He could, for instance, have filled an anthology with things he knew about James Buchanan Barnes. But seventy years and Arnim Zola have eroded that knowledge too, until even the truth of his death was a lie. Steve has lost Bucky all over again, and, like Sam had pointed out barely a week ago, he had never really had a chance to grieve the first time.
So Steve begins learning Bucky Barnes anew, but of all the things he finds out during the next 24 hours, not one of them is good. Some things could have been predicted, such as a violent aversion to being touched. But some things are unsettling, unexpected discoveries. The Soldier cannot bear to hear the name James Barnes, for instance. He does not sleep. He does not eat. They try him on every mild and nutritious food they can find in Mitch's pantry – white rice, stewed pork, beans, tinned fruit. Bucky cries silent tears while they force the food into him and then within minutes it gets hurled straight back up. He does at least drink water, if it's held up to his mouth. He doesn't speak much, and when he does it is a half mangled mix of Russian and English that they need the help of Sam's phone to interpret. Mostly, he is silent. Sometimes he is catatonic.
They learn, much to Steve's distress, that apart from when it comes to physical contact, Bucky doesn't seem to be aware of his own body at all. Sam calls it lack of recognition of 'bodily autonomy'. He doesn't seem to recognise being hungry or thirsty. He never answers when they ask him whether he's in pain. And after the second time Bucky pisses himself they realise he is just not going to tell them when he needs to be let up to use the bathroom. Sam has to uncuff him from the chair and order him into the washroom every few hours just to make sure he is relieving himself. They are soon down to the last pair of sweatpants in the house.
They learn the Soldier will obey anything worded like an order, without question. They learn that he doesn't make eye contact. They learn that porridge is a horrible mistake.
They make it to Friday morning before the next disaster. Bucky has been sitting quiet and still in the chair all night, looking pale and hurt and vulnerable, but he just won't sleep and they don't dare leave him alone. Sam has been watching him for hours now and he is starting to look almost as ragged as Bucky does, but they had already agreed that Steve at least needs to stay out of the Soldier's sight line. He's tried to kill Steve multiple times but hasn't attacked Sam yet except when it was self-defence or when he was in between the Soldier and his mission. From what they know of HYDRA it seems that Steve and Nat were the Soldier's last targets. If HYDRA even knew about Sam they probably didn't recognise him as a threat. But Steve… That's a different matter entirely and whatever they did to Bucky to break his free will, wipe his mind and compel him to kill without conscience…Sam and Steve have no idea how to undo it.
But Steve has no doubt it can be undone, that HYDRA's control over Bucky has to be cracking. Steve knows he saw a glimpse of something else on the helicarrier. For the briefest moment, the brainwashing had slipped and something else had looked out through Bucky's eyes; something frightened and in pain and something that knew Steve . There's no sign of it in the Soldier now, but who's to say it can't break free again? And there's something else Steve knows, something that he hasn't yet spoken out loud to anyone, not even Sam, and that was that he had known he wasn't going to make it off the helicarrier alive. Not after the crystal was locked and he realised the man who had once been his best friend hadn't made it off the ship either. He wasn't going to leave Bucky to fall alone again.
And so they had fought, and he had dropped the shield and then he'd dropped after it. He remembers the fall, the impact of the icy surface, darkness. He should have died there; a cold, fitting, airless end beneath bitter water. But he didn't die and they found him two hours later on the river bank, and no-one will admit that he was in no condition to have made it out of the water unaided. Only one person could have dragged him to shore. Bucky had saved him, and now it is killing Steve that he has to stay away, in another room or out of sight, while Bucky is the one that needs saving.
Whatever Natasha says, Steve has more than enough self-awareness to know how much he doesn't fit into this future. Since the moment he woke he has been out of place; a drifting, discordant note. So maybe it is selfish, this need to be near Bucky, to keep him in sight, to keep looking around the door to confirm that he's really here too. He validates Steve's own anachronism. He's an anchor that Steve can tether himself too. He means that Steve is no longer alone in this wild, unpredictable future. But there really isn't time to dwell on his introspection and self-doubt, and there's a far more practical reason for Steve's constant hovering, and that is that Sam can't do this by himself. The man is already exhausted. He's already gone nearly 50 hours with only a couple of hours' sleep, and he's no supersoldier. And Bucky won't talk or eat or sleep and until he eventually collapses there's no sign anything is going to change.
Steve does what he can to help, which mostly means trying to find some food that Bucky can tolerate, pacing up and down the hall carpet, and brewing endless pots of coffee for Sam. Once or twice he even finds himself praying, praying the way soldiers do where words that once brought comfort of home turn heavy and urgent with fervor and desperation, devotion more instinct than thought. He isn't sure what he's praying for, or to whom.
Another long night passes and around 7am Steve brings Sam's latest scalding mug of coffee and a box of plain crackers he's found into the front room where they are holding the Soldier. Steve looks automatically to Bucky first. The man is slumped forwards in the chair, hair hanging low into his face. There is just the faintest glint of his eyes to show he's still awake. Sam looks up from his seat on the couch as Steve enters, rubbing his eyes. He puts the tranq gun down on the coffee table and reaches gratefully for the mug.
"I think there might be more coffee in my arteries than blood right now," Sam says, but he takes the drink, wrapping his hands around the ceramic. "How many cups is this?"
"I've lost count." Steve says sympathetically and nods towards the Winter Soldier, keeping his voice low. "Any change?"
"Nothing," Sam replies low, and wearily accepts the crackers. "He hasn't moved for hours and he won't talk to me at all anymore. I have no idea what is going on in his head right now but I'm not sure it can be good."
"We need a new plan," Steve agrees, moving back from the couch and glancing towards the window, and the distant sunlight outside. "I just don't know what-"
Suddenly the Winter Soldier moves. He is surging up from the chair, both arms free, a blade flashing in his hand. Steve catches a glimpse of cold nothingness in his eyes before the Soldier kicks the tranq gun off the table into a corner and at the same moment the metal fist crashes into Steve's still healing jaw. Steve rolls his head back and the blow glances off without doing any real damage, but already a knife is coming up under Steve's arm; it skitters across his ribs, drawing blood. Steve strikes back as hard and fast as he can, knowing he is fighting for his life. The Soldier will kill him if he gets the opening. Sam is yelling and running forwards, even as Steve punches up towards the Soldier's head and the blade bites into his left forearm rather than his throat. He doesn't even have his shield.
The Winter Soldier drops the knife the moment Steve blocks it and spins, bringing the left hand up to catch it just like he did during the ambush at the overpass. But somehow it doesn't work; somehow the metal fingers don't respond quite fast enough and he fumbles the catch. In that brief moment, Sam tackles him from behind and all three of them go down to the floor. The knife is knocked away. There is a brief, inelegant struggle which results in Sam bleeding from the forehead and Steve almost getting his throat crushed before they manage to get the Soldier pinned face down onto the floor under their combined weights. He turns his face away and goes limp.
"I'll hold him," Steve says, kneeling on the metal arm to keep it trapped. "Grab the cuffs!"
Sam doesn't argue but goes straight over to the chair where the mag cuffs are lying on the floor. It's quickly apparent that while Bucky was looking hurt and beaten in the chair, he had also been slowly working a knife blade in between the magnetic connectors on the cuffs, shorting them out. It's a terrifying reminder that even though they thought they were being watchful and careful, they'd both been lulled by his obvious pain, soothed by his passivity into forgetting that the Winter Soldier is not just a traumatised rescued POW but a captured enemy agent with a deadly mission.
"They still work," Sam says, checking the mag cuffs. He brings them over and clamps them back around the Soldier's wrists. There's a reassuring clunk as the two halves snap together. Sam wipes the blood off his forehead, grimacing.
"Get the knife," Steve says, still not wanting to loosen his grip on the Soldier's limp arms when there's still a weapon lying around.
Sam grabs the discarded knife and holds it up. It's small and wickedly sharp; the blade is as long as his palm and matte black. An assassin's weapon. Not something Bucky could have picked up in the cabin, but they thought they'd already searched him back at the motel.
Sam crouches down next to the Soldier where he's still lying on the floor and holds up the knife.
"Where did you get this?"
The Soldier doesn't answer. Beneath his hands, Steve can feel the robotic arm vibrating like an idling engine. It's the first time he'd really touched the thing, other than during a fight. The metal is smooth and cold, brutally neat and unblemished, except for visible dent in the upper bicep.
"Hey," Sam says again, louder. "Winter Soldier. I'm talking to you."
There's still no reply, but now Steve's right up close to the arm he can hear it is emitting a sound; a sharp, metallic whine, just on the edge of his hearing. He remembers the way the Soldier's metal hand hadn't worked right when he'd tried to catch the knife and wonders if the thing is malfunctioning somehow.
"He's not going to talk, Sam," Steve says. Bucky's face is turned away from him but he thinks he knows by now what his expression would be. Blank nothingness. "He must have had that knife this whole time."
The whole time they've been in this room, and the whole time he was sat behind them in the car, silent and watchful, all the while with that deadly little knife in reach...
"We gotta search him again."
So they do, and the Soldier doesn't resist or fight back, just lets them manhandle him like a sack of rocks. After a few minutes Steve finds one more blade hidden in a sheath along the Soldier's spine and two four-inch long metal pins in the jacket's Kevlar plating, sharp enough to sever nerves. They dump Bucky back to the chair and he lets them recuff his hands behind the chair back without a struggle. At last they step back. The Soldier slowly raises his chin, looking at them through his curtain of lank hair with eyes that are dead dead dead inside, and in that moment Steve hates HYDRA more than he has ever hated anything before in his life.
Whatever Steve has been hoping and praying for, it's clear Pierce's orders and HYDRA's brainwashing aren't as broken as he thought, and as soon as the Soldier has been disarmed and restrained and they've licked their wounds, they fall straight back into the old status quo again. More hours pass. The Soldier sits silent and unmoving in the chair. Sam watches from the couch and Steve brings coffee and paces the hallway carpet. At breakfast time he makes some plain rice but this time the Soldier won't even open his mouth when Sam holds up a plastic spoon to his face. He just blinks, blankly, a faint tremor running through him. Steve doesn't think it's defiance this time, more a lack of comprehension. It's almost as if he has been saving up all of his endurance for that last attempt to kill Steve and now there's just nothing left in him. Steve watches from the doorway and thinks now he looks more like a ghost than ever. The Soldier seems hollow and strangely thin, as if he might disappear if Steve looked at him from the wrong angle or out of the corner of his eye. But there is that hideous arm, hanging like a dead weight from a shoulder too small to carry it, like an anchor dragging him down, trapping him to this squalid earth. Right now, Bucky's head is tilting; every now and again he drifts off, exhaustion dragging him into unconsciousness and then he jerks awake again. It's as if he is afraid to sleep. Something has to give.
Steve finally decides enough is enough. The bedroom behind the lounge is a twin. Sam and Bucky can sleep while Steve keeps watch over them both. Steve shakes Sam back into full consciousness and explains the plan. Then he stays well back. holding the tranq gun trained and ready while Sam detaches Bucky's cuffs from the chair. Bucky flinches and shakes when Sam hauls him up to his feet, but he doesn't make any move to attack or escape and Sam doesn't let him go until he is safely deposited on the right-hand bed, furthest from the door. Sam threads the cuffs through the solid iron bed frame and snaps them shut again.
Both Sam and Steve relax the moment the cuffs are secured, but Bucky doesn't; in fact he seems even more agitated. Despite there being plenty of room, Bucky won't lie down, and Sam's attempts to make him leave him twitching and flinching like a palsy sufferer. In the end they give up, leaving Bucky slumped against the headboard. He's half curled around his belly; it's probably aching like crazy from all the puking he's been doing.
Sam falls onto the other bed. He just has time to check Steve still has the tranq gun before he's kicking his boots off and muttering;
"Wake me when shit goes south."
Then he is instantly asleep, snoring gently into the pillow.
Bucky is still staring towards Steve, heavy eyed and pale. Steve has no idea what he's thinking behind that emotionless mask. Is he planning yet another attack? Picturing killing Steve? Analysing more ways to escape? Somehow, he doesn't think so. Somehow, he can't imagine Bucky feels very differently to the way Steve himself is feeling, afraid and hurting and nervous as hell. Steve very slowly and carefully backs away from the bed and sits down on the floor several feet away, murmuring a constant litany of " You're safe here, it's okay Bucky, no-one is going to hurt you, they'll never get to you again."
Bucky is still watching him. Steve smiles casually and, keeping the tranq gun close at his side, picks up a ratty book he had grabbed from the bookcase in the living room. It's some cheap romance novel, not his thing at all, but being occupied with another task will make him look more at ease and maybe put Bucky at ease too.
For a long time, it doesn't seem to be working. The Soldier stays silent and hypervigilant on the bed, eyes fixed firmly on the tranq gun, unblinking, almost unbreathing. It's like he's locked in some kind of strange, intense internal war, as if the very concept of lying down to sleep is so alien to him that he doesn't understand what to do. The stillness is an eerie echo of the Bucky Steve remembers after Azzano. By the time the Howling Commandos had come together, the war had already hammered out Bucky's lazy Brooklyn ease, moulding it into a stillness and stealthy calm that let him disappear between one breath and the next; perched in trees or clock towers or rooftops for hour upon hour watching down his rifle for that perfect shot, all without a single extraneous motion. And then, when the mission was over and the day was saved, when the Howlies were camped down somewhere that was the closest approximation to safe they could manage, then they saw the polar opposite. The Bucky that couldn't sit still, who paced and drank and didn't sleep for days, whose whole body rattled with excess energy and whose hands shook around endless cigarettes. It had been hard for Steve to witness, perhaps the most difficult thing, amidst all the strangeness and fear and uncertainty of those first few months in Europe, in his new body, at war. To find Bucky, his life's one constant, so inexorably changed. But Steve had found his feet then, by taking control, being the Captain America that Bucky and the Howlies had needed. And with that realisation, he knows what to do now.
"Bucky. Go to sleep. That's an order."
Bucky blinks once, and then melts back against the wall like an icicle under the sun. He is asleep within seconds.
Several hours of blissful silence pass. Steve slips out of the room about 1300 to retrieve his phone, and neither Bucky nor Sam wake up. He knows he owes Nat and Tony a message at least, but what the hell should he say? All either of them know is that Steve and Sam left DC. How does he explain the last two days, the Winter Soldier and Bucky and all of it? And even if he wanted to, would it be safe to put something like that in a text? But Sam had been right before. They're walking a very fine line here, and another wrong step like this morning and someone could die. Sam could die. After a long deliberation, he realises that as much as he doesn't want to, someone else needs to know that the Winter Soldier is here, just in case. And the choice of who that person should be isn't hard.
STEVE ROGERS: Hey Nat. We're at the cabin, it's great, really quiet. Met up with an old friend who's going to hang out with us for a while. The stuff you left with Sam turned out to be useful. Hope it's nice wherever you are.
To Tony, he just sends a bland greeting, a vague comment about the cabin and a promise to call. He's not trying to keep secrets, but this isn't just something he can send in a text. He can't put his faith in the fact that Tony will understand that it's best for Bucky if Steve handles this his way. He's prone to overreacting after all. Neither recipient replies.
Steve watches Bucky sleep. He's lying awkwardly, half sitting against the bedstead with his head pushed up against the rails. It looks horribly uncomfortable but Bucky clearly is too deeply asleep to notice. Steve had expected him to be restless, perhaps even suffer nightmares, but Bucky has been completely silent in his sleep, and unmoving. Steve doesn't know if that is more of a concern or not.
They know a little of what Hydra put Bucky through from the Kiev file, although it was hardly comprehensive, and there are decades of notes missing. But what was in there had made Steve break a lot of things and then go and sit outside the cabin on the steps in the dark for several hours. He doesn't know how to fix this, any of it, and Sam has already told him that this is so far out of his area of expertise that they aren't even on the same map. Sam's a counsellor for combat veterans suffering from Post-Traumatic Stress, not a brainwashing specialist. Steve knows he is going to be even less help, still trying to get a handle on how much psychiatry has changed from his own time when battle fatigue was considered at best a result of exhaustion, and at worse, a sign of poor moral fibre. Getting to know Sam back in DC before any of this madness had started and sitting in some of his sessions had opened Steve's eyes a little. Sam was a good counsellor, and while he had been talking to Steve as a friend and not as a patient, Steve had already been re-evaluating his own experiences during the war in a new light.
Be that as it may, Steve knows he's barely scratched the surface of understanding what's going on here, and even if he did, that wasn't going to be enough. What Bucky has been through...there has never been anything comparable. Helping him is going to be a monumental task. Steve suspects Sam already thinks it can't be done, even with professional help. Sam has all but told Steve that the Bucky Barnes he remembers probably no longer exists. But Steve is not going to stand for that. Bucky remembered him on the helicarrier. The Soldier had denied it, but Steve had seen it in his eyes. Then, he'd saved Steve's life on the river bank. And now, Bucky's body has come back. His mind and his memories will follow. Even if it takes the rest of their lives to figure it out. He will get Bucky back.
Steve is reading up online about brainwashing during the Cold War when he happens to glance up and realises with a start that Bucky is awake and watching him. Sam is still asleep, breathing slow and even, so this is the first time Steve and Bucky have been alone since Bucky attacked him in the motel. Steve smiles at Bucky cautiously, but the other man doesn't even meet his eyes. He is staring fixedly at Steve's torso, hooded eyes watching every move. Steve slowly gets to his feet and stretches, making sure to stay out of the range of Bucky's legs should the other man lash out at him. But Bucky makes no movement and just watches, impassively.
"Hey Bucky," Steve says, low. "Sleep well?"
The Soldier doesn't reply, of course. But he shifts his gaze around the room, taking in the closed door and window, the tranq gun still on the floor, and Sam's sleeping form. His eyes settle back on Steve. Not meeting his gaze, just resting centre mass.
"How are you feeling?" Steve asks, warily, reading for an attack.
Bucky, to Steve's surprise, looks like he is actually considering the question. Then, even more surprisingly, he answers.
"Report. Asset function compromised beyond acceptable limits. Mission suspended. Behavioural correction in process. Maintenance required. med tech required."
Steve gapes. Then he tries to process what he had just been told and not focus on the fact that it's the most words he has heard from his friend in 70 years.
"'Mission suspended'? What does that mean, Buck?"
"Asset function compromised," the Soldier repeats, staring past Steve's shoulder.
"The Asset...that's you, right? That must mean you're injured. And maintenance...for the arm. It's not working properly, is it? That's why you couldn't ki- why you dropped your knife the other day."
Bucky's face twists for a second; an ugly, pained grimace; and then returns to its blank state.
"Affirmative."
"All right," Steve says, filing that away. "Your mission, then. What can you tell me about that?" He knows the Winter Soldier had been sent to kill him, and Natasha too, but it won't hurt to confirm that there's nothing else they haven't anticipated. This isn't the time for surprises.
"Two targets, level six," Bucky recites. "Steven Rogers, alias Captain America. Natalia Alianovna Romanova, alias Black Widow. Allied. Affiliations: SHIELD, the Avengers, the KG-"
"Okay," Steve interrupts. "Okay, Bucky. That's enough." He thinks fast. Mission suspended. And then, You are my mission. The Winter Soldier has tried four times now to kill him, and has gotten close, too. And now he's, what, giving up? Steve is desperate to think it's because he is remembering. But the answer itself has already been given in Bucky's automaton words. The Soldier is outnumbered and outgunned, and too tired and injured for his mission to succeed. He's too hurt to successfully kill Steve.
"Okay," Steve says, needing to be very clear on what he is being told. "If I understand you, you are saying that you wouldn't succeed in your mission right now because you are injured and the arm is damaged. Is that right?"
"Yes."
"What about Sam? Do you have to kill him too?"
"Outside mission parameters."
"And what about when you are properly rested and healed up?"
"Mission will proceed as ordered once sufficient function is restored."
Jesus. Steve feels something buzzing inside his head, like screeching metal, far off. It's a sharp little shard of panic he hasn't felt since he woke up in Times Square, surrounded by the garish glare of LED screens in the place of poster paint billboards and twinkling yellow bulbs. There's no time for it now either. He has to focus only on Bucky.
Steve glances at his watch. The two have been asleep for about six hours, which is more rest than he thought they would get. He looks over at Sam. The man is still out cold, breathing deeply. Steve can't ask any more of him for the time being. He turns back to Bucky, takes a deep breath, and tucks the tranq gun into his pants.
"I figure you probably have to take a leak, so I'm going to take you to the bathroom," Steve says. "And I really hope that this 'Mission Suspended' stuff isn't a load of crap." Not that it seems likely Bucky is capable of bullshitting anyone right now.
Bucky flinches so violently when Steve approaches that he almost rethinks the entire endeavour. He wants to trust Bucky, but he can't help being a little tense after the number of times Bucky has tried to kill him in the last three weeks. But Bucky is quiet and compliant as Steve unfastens the cuffs and refastens then again behind his back again without a hint of resistance. Steve leads him into the bathroom, and removes the cuffs once more again. Bucky instantly starts fumbling with the waistband of his borrowed sweatpants; he hasn't yet shown any sensibilities of modesty but Steve steps back out into the hall to give him some privacy anyway. They have to treat Bucky like a person if they want him to start remembering that he is one. But even then Steve leaves the bathroom door open because it would be very, very foolish to let the Winter Soldier completely out of his sight, and Steve might be hopelessly naive and painfully optimistic, but he's not an idiot. After several minutes, he hears the faucet, and when it is still running over sixty seconds later, he glances inside. Bucky is standing at the sink, letting the water run over his hand. He looks almost as if he's checked out again mentally, but Steve can see his eyes moving as he watches the water spiral down the drain.
"All done?" Steve asks, wondering again what is going on in Bucky's head. Bucky doesn't reply, but he shifts his hand, letting the water run down his wrist. Then he sighs, and turns off the faucet. Turns to face Steve with his eyes down and hands at his sides. Waiting.
Steve takes another gamble. "You know, there's a shower here you can use later. Loads of hot water. You could even wash your hair. If you want."
Bucky tilts his head a little, but Steve can see him thinking. After a long time, Bucky nods, and Steve wants to cheer. Instead he just smiles, and says:
"Sure thing, buddy. But right now I'm so hungry I could eat a horse. Pretty sure we are going to have one similarly starving ex-pararescueman on our hands when Sam wakes up. So, food first?"
Bucky moves then, and Steve tenses until he realises Bucky is just holding out his wrists, ready for the shackles. Steve looks at them for a moment, and thinks what the hell. He puts the cuffs back into his pocket and really, really hopes he hasn't just signed his own death warrant.
"Come on," Steve says, and sets off towards the kitchen. "Let's go scare up some food."
Without a word, Bucky meekly follows.
Once they arrive, Steve pulls out a few pots and pans, and starts raiding the cupboards. It was clear from what Sam said that no-one had been up to the cabin in months. Before Bucky has crashed into their lives, Steve and Sam had intended on heading into the local town to stock up on some supplies as soon as they'd settled in, but then the need to maintain a 24-hour guard on a brainwashed assassin had thrown that plan out of the window. Despite the fact that it's nearly four in the afternoon, Steve could murder a decent all-American breakfast right now. Unfortunately, without fresh supplies, they're stuck with what Sam's friend Mitch had left in the pantry.
Steve pulls out a few canned vegetables, some spices and some sort of...wait, is that Spam? They still make that? He stacks it all on the table next to the dried beans Sam put out to soak last night and considers their options. Steve is a hopeless cook. He's confident he'd still be a hopeless cook even if he had had a recipe, all the correct ingredients, a fully equipped restaurant kitchen and an advice panel of expert chefs. But hopefully Sam won't care. Not like Bucky used to; God, the complaining...
Speaking of Bucky, Steve can see him out of the corner of his eye, hovering in the kitchen doorway.
"You can come in," Steve says to him. "Sit down if you like."
Bucky looks ready to fall down but if he is sitting at the table, Steve can at least make sure he is well away from the kitchen knives at all times. Bucky does indeed come in, but instead of taking one of the kitchen chairs, he sits on the floor behind the table with his back to the wall. He draws his knees up to his chest, rests his arm on top, and pushes his face into the metal so only his eyes are showing. Steve's not particularly happy – Bucky's chosen position means Steve has to turn his back on him to use the stove-top, but they've been attempting this new trust thing for ten minutes so far and he's not dead yet. Might as well carry on pushing his luck.
Steve turns back to his ingredients and to a small pile of cans and jars on the sideboard that have already been separated out from the rest. The Kiev file, with its description of nasal feeding tubes and liquid nutrient supplements, had prepared them a little for the problems Bucky was going to have with food. While Sam had been watching Bucky, Steve had already raided all the supplies in the house and separated out anything he thought might not be too harsh on Bucky's stomach, but the only things Bucky's managed to keep down so far has been stuff he can drink - watery soups little more than dissolved bouillon cubes, and cups of diluted juice. Every time they try to make him eat anything more substantial, Bucky will swallow a few spoonfuls and then cry silently until he pukes. Steve is desperately worried about it. Back during the War, he heard about POWs and civilians who had survived the Nazi work camps only to die when their well-meaning rescuers fed them candy and chocolate; too much stress on their starved bodies. Whatever method HYDRA was using to keep him fighting fit, Bucky clearly hasn't really eaten much of anything for weeks.
In the 'Bucky's food' pile, there's a few canned soups, more stock cubes, a bag of polenta, some applesauce, white rice... Steve's hand hovers, but in the end he picks out a can of sweet condensed milk. The packaging has changed, of course, but he remembers that from 1943 as well. Maybe Bucky will too.
As he haphazardly throws ingredients together in lieu of real cooking, Steve talks. He doesn't know if Bucky is listening; the man never makes a sound. When he throws a glance in his direction, Bucky is still huddled behind his knees, staring into the middle distance. But Steve talks anyway; about Peggy, about the War, about their old neighbourhood in Brooklyn and how so much has changed in the world, and yet how so much is still the same. He feels better, more grounded, but Bucky still says nothing.
After about thirty minutes, Sam appears in the doorway. He shuffles his feet and yawns ostentatiously just before he steps into sight; a courtesy so that no-one is startled by his arrival. He leans against the frame, looking well-rested and casual, but even though Steve has only known Sam for, God, not even two months, he can tell that Sam is as tense as a coiled spring. Sam's voice is as laid-back as his body language, but his eyes are fixed on Bucky.
"Man, I needed that. Haven't crashed that hard in years. What time even is it?"
"You don't want to know." Steve answers lightly, stirring the pot. "Here, you're just in time. Bucky and I made breakfast. Though as it's almost evening and this meal contains zero-percent breakfast foods, I can't really justify calling it that. Also I can't cook worth a damn, so grab a plate and take your chances."
"Haven't known you long, Rogers, but I could definitely have called that one. You really don't seem like the domestic type."
Sam walks into the room, even though Steve can tell he doesn't want to be a step closer to Bucky than he has to be. Beyond a flicker of his eyes, Bucky himself has paid no attention to Sam's arrival, and instead is staring at a crack in the floorboards.
"What's going on, man?" Sam asks in a soft undertone when he reaches Steve's side. "You do know he's not cuffed, right?" He takes down some plates to cover the sound of their conversation, though that's probably pointless. Steve quickly and quietly fills Sam in on his apparent truce with the Winter Soldier. Sam doesn't look convinced.
"How do you know this isn't a trap?"
"I just gotta have faith, Sam."
They can't convince Bucky to come and sit at the table while they eat, so Steve puts the mug of warm watered-down condensed milk near Bucky's feet until he's ready to take it. Steve and Sam both wolf down the spam, bean and tomato stew thing Steve has created.
"Wow," Sam says, after scraping the last of the distressingly crunchy beans into his mouth and chewing, thoughtfully. "That was actually not that bad, Steve. I guess necessity really is the mother of invention."
Steve nods, pleasantly surprised himself. "First time for everything. Never thought we'd see the day when I actually cooked something edible, right, Buck?"
"Stevie, you could burn water," is what he expects to hear. Longs to ear. Instead, there's just silence.
They make Buck drink the milk very slowly over a long time, followed by a whole bottle of water. He retches a few times but isn't actually sick, and there are only a few silent tears before it's over. It's so small a success that some might consider it barely a victory at all, but to Steve's mind, any little thing they can claw back from HYDRA is a triumph. Bucky has been uncuffed for two hours; Sam and Bucky have slept, everyone has eaten, and no-one is dead. Fuck you, Alexander Pierce.
After they've cleared the table and Sam's finished the dishes, Steve crouches down until he's at Bucky's eye level. "Bucky, you still up for that shower?"
For Sam's benefit, he clarifies. "Bucky was looking at the water in the bathroom earlier. I thought he might want to take a wash." He turns back to Bucky. "I think you'll feel better. But only if you want."
Bucky doesn't answer, but he does get to his feet. Steve takes that as a silent 'yes' and leads the way back to the bathroom. Sam follows them without a word, because that's who he is. God bless Sam Wilson.
Once they arrive, it is clear that a bath is a much more practical option than showering. Bucky needs to wash his hair and, with his metal arm possibly malfunctioning, it's going to be much easier if someone else helps, and that person is going to get much less wet this way.
Once the water starts sloshing into the tub, Bucky seems to figure out what's going on, and takes Steve's "You're going to need to take some of those clothes off, buddy" as an order. He strips off his boots and pants without any sense of modesty, but it's as he's sliding out of his jacket that he suddenly pauses. His left arm is raised to shoulder height but seems to be stuck. They can all hear the whirring of servos and buzzing gears somewhere inside and the scratch of the plates realigning, but the damn thing just won't move. Steve can see the problem – Bucky's undone all the stupid buckles on the front of the jacket but there's a clip at the back of his neck that holds the tac harness in place and Bucky can't reach it.
"Hey man, I can help you with that," Sam says, quietly. "Just say the word."
Bucky says nothing, and continues to struggle for almost a full minute, fighting the arm's stiffness.
"I want to help," Sam adds, when they can both see Bucky's frustration. "But I said I wouldn't touch you without your permission. If you want me to help, you're gonna have to say so."
Just when Steve is starting to think they might just have to help, permission or not, Bucky jerks his head in what might be a nod. Sam steps forward and releases the buckle. Bucky shakes the jacket off, and fumbles out of the grimy black t-shirt he's wearing under it. Then, without warning, he sort of shudders and then he's gone . Sam calls " Winter?" a few times, and taps on his flesh arm, but Bucky doesn't respond. He is fully catatonic again.
Steve hesitates, wondering if they ought to abandon washing. Both of them very much do not want to do things to Bucky's person while Bucky is not around to consent to it. Sam seems reluctant too, but he does point out that this washing process is going to involve a lot of touching, and the dissociation is a defence mechanism. For now it might just be best to let Bucky be safe in his own head while they clean him and fix him up. They'll have to address this at some point, but that time is definitely not now. It feels wrong, to both of them, but what doesn't these days?
Before they begin, they sit Bucky down on the edge of the tub to quickly check him over. Steve doesn't know where to start. Bucky is filthy and he stinks, and he's so thin . Steve could comfortably fit his thumb into the hollow between each rib. The skin itself is smooth though and bears no discolouration. In fact, apart from the line of thick scarring around the seam of the arm, Bucky has no scars. Plenty of bruises, but no scars at all. That should feel like a good thing, but it doesn't, not when they know some of what Bucky has suffered. There was a short section in the Kiev file describing the medical events affecting the Soldier during the 1970s alone – a bullet in the thigh, stab wounds, blunt force trauma, internal injuries, whippings - but there is not a mark on Bucky's skin to show for it, apart from that monstrosity of an arm. Whatever torments he suffered, the serum has wiped his flesh clean every time, just as the electroconvulsive shocks and cocktail of reality-altering drugs seem to have done to his mind. The true trauma lurks more than skin deep.
And that itself raises another concern. They know next to nothing about the knock-off serum that Zola dosed Bucky with, but given that he survived multiple events of cryogenic freezing and the traumatic loss of his arm, the healing factor of the HYDRA serum must be at least as strong as that of Erskine's – maybe stronger. It is therefore quite clear that, for some reason, Bucky is no longer healing as well as he should be. Bucky still has injuries from the Triskelion battle nine days ago; in that same time, Steve has almost completely recovered from three life-threatening bullet wounds, near drowning and a broken jaw. But Bucky still bears bruising and contusions across his body, particularly across his chest and legs where the beam fell. His right shoulder is still swollen. Then there's the glancing bullet wound that Sam gave him back at the motel. It's tacky and swollen, barely closed.
But more unsettling than all of these is a strange injury on Bucky's back on the left side, below the scarred seam where the metal arm meets flesh. The skin is discoloured deep purple and black in a swathe across Bucky's ribs, a patch as big as both of Steve's palms. The top of the area is marked with three little dark circles. Steve brushes his hand over the wound; it doesn't feel too distended, but it's hot to the touch and he can feel something hard raised up under the skin where the dark patches are. They feel like nail heads.
"Might just be a bad bruise," he says, uncertain.
"Might be internal bleeding," Sam replies. "Could be serious. He needs to be in a hospital, Steve."
Bucky gives a sudden all-over shudder at that, and Steve wonders if Bucky is more aware than he seems. He shoots Sam a quick glance and the other man doesn't say anything more, whatever he's thinking. Between them, they maneuver Bucky into the tub where Steve gives his friend a quick and efficient scrub, and then washes his hair. Sam sits out of the way on the toilet lid, fiddling with his phone. Steve is just grateful he's here. Bucky is soon much cleaner than the water, with the exception of the arm which has dirt and blood and God only knows what wedged between the plates. Steve does not touch the thing, though he does visually inspect the damaged portion in the upper arm he noticed before. Two of the large plates have buckled, forcing at least three smaller ones out of position. It was probably Steve's own shield that did that damage, back on the helicarrier. It's no real surprise that Bucky is having trouble moving it.
Sam helps Steve haul Bucky out of the filthy water before his skin starts to prune, and then dresses the worst of Bucky's cuts and abrasions. They tape an ice pack to his black ribs and another to his shoulder. Bucky has already used up all of Steve's spare clothing, so they dress him in a set of Sam's sweatpants and an old t-shirt that they have to split up the shoulder to get the arm in. As for the rest of him, Bucky's not a small guy any more, and there is really no way Sam's stuff should fit him. But he's just so thin.
Be that as it may, it's clear that they are going to need more supplies if they are going to make this work. Clothes for Bucky. Fresh groceries. First aid supplies. Beer (Steve's suggestion) or wine (Sam's). They prod Bucky back out into the lounge and lie him down on the couch while they wait for him to come back round from wherever his mind has gone to. Steve cleans up the bathroom, and gathers up the Winter Soldier's discarded gear. He resists the urge to hurl the jacket and boots into a fire, and instead, he places them at the foot of the couch where Bucky can see them when he comes to. Sam doesn't make any comment about it, but neither does he mention the cuffs again.
Now he's seen what Bucky looks like with the false bulk of the body armour stripped away, Steve can't get the sight of those prominent ribs out of his mind. There's so much wrong with the Winter Soldier that dealing with any of it seems almost insurmountable, but the fact that Bucky is barely able to eat anything has to be their immediate concern. The serum meant that Steve's metabolism is highly efficient and he can last a lot longer than a non-enhanced human without any nutrients at all; he learned that during the war. But based on the experiments that SHIELD had put him through after the ice, they worked out that if he's under strain - having to fight a lot or heal from an injury, for example - then he needs about 6000 calories a day to stay healthy. Bucky is managing maybe about 200 calories at the moment. If they can't fix this he is going to starve to death in front of their eyes, long before the drug withdrawal or psychological trauma become relevant factors.
"We can look in town," Sam says doubtfully, when Steve brings it up. "Walmart is Walmart, but I'm willing to bet even they don't sell specialist starvation therapy foods. Might be health protein shakes or something, but they're generally designed for losing calories, not packing them on."
Steve considers. "Think we could order something online...?"
Sam looks thoughtful for a second, then pulls out his phone, swiping across the screen as he talks. "I'm trying to remember, but I'm sure I saw something online back in the summer...these scientists won an award for this stuff they invented for use in famines. It was basically baby formula but with a full complement of vitamins and an adult-size load of calories. I wonder if it's available for sale to the public, or- Ah, here it is."
He holds the phone out for Steve to see. One the screen is a news article with the headline " Famine relief inventors win top humanitarian prize" and a photo of six young people posing in front of a large banner, shaking hands. And on the banner…
"Stark Industries," Steve points out.
"Oh, yeah. Wow. So how does that work, do you have contacts there, or…?"
Of course it was Stark Industries. Well, it was inevitable that Steve was going to have to stop avoiding Tony sooner or later. They haven't spoken properly since SHIELD imploded, since Howard Stark and Peggy's legacies were dragged through the mud, and now Steve is sheltering a former HYDRA agent. But maybe this was just the universe giving Steve a push, telling him the time has come to stop hiding. If they needed that formula for Bucky, then Steve was just going to have to do what was necessary to try and get it, no matter how difficult the conversation with Tony was going to be.
"It does sound exactly like what he needs," Steve agrees at last. "Yeah, I happen to know a guy...Leave it with me. "
As Steve's walking out of the room with the phone at his ear and waiting for JARVIS to connect the call, Steve hears Sam muttering under his breath:
"He has Tony Stark on freaking speed dial. Of course he does. What even is my life right now?"
