Some habits were hard to break for Gabe. There were old ones like making sure all the electric lights were shut off and that the candles weren't burning overnight. Gabe didn't think he'd ever stop doing those. The crack of his father's belt was a good enough reminder, even now that he'd been out of his father's home for several years. There were other habits that no one had to tell him to do; he'd learned from observing his community who not to make eye contact with when he was in town. It was hard to undo that one when he'd joined the Army and his unit all but merged with the 107th.

Gabe always made sure that the fuel was purged from the engine after shutdown of any automobile that he drove even though he knew it wasn't strictly necessary. Wasn't like the unpredictable old farm equipment he'd worked on as a kid (when his hands were small and could get into the dark, cramped spaces the adults couldn't reach).

Anyway, one of Gabe's newest habits was making sure someone stayed awake to take watch. This hadn't always been easy or comfortable when all of them were doing hard labour for sixteen hours each day. Kind of sucked to be the guy to stay up after all of that. But he and the guys in his cage at Krausberg had worked out a nice short rotation. The group of them had evidently stuck to it long enough to become a habit for Gabe. He couldn't sleep unless someone was keeping watch.

They didn't discuss it that first night after the rescue, but Gabe just stayed up anyway. The rest dropped off to sleep in short order. He just couldn't once he realised that there'd be no one to keep watch. Never mind that they had guys walking the whole perimeter, and one of those guys was a real-life super human.

Gabe was still awake and staring up at the patches of stars visible between the branches of the thin trees when said super human picked his way back among their group. There was a little look of surprise on his face when he saw that Gabe was still awake. He nodded his head in silent greeting.

Gabe returned the gesture.

Rogers stepped lightly for a guy his size. Pretty coordinated for a guy who'd moved into a brand-new body not that long ago. He navigated the tangle of limbs Gabe's companions made on the ground until he could lower himself down beside Barnes. Rogers put a hand to Barnes's cheek and then forehead. A little frown creased his face. He let two fingers linger on his neck. Pursed his lips.

"Alright, Captain?" Gabe said in a low voice, conscious of their sleeping companions.

He nodded in a distracted sort of way. "Yeah. Just feels like the fever's going up again. Heart rate seems to be going pretty quick."

"Should we be worried?"

There was a wry look on Rogers's face when he said, "I don't know. Didn't really inherit my mother's hand with nursing." He nodded his head to Barnes. "She passed it on to him instead."

Based on all of the stories that Barnes had told about Steve From Back Home, Gabe could believe it. He could see Barnes learning how to have a good bedside manner at the side of his sickly best friend's mother.

"To be honest," Rogers said, "I don't think anything my mother could have taught me would prepare me for this."

"Can't argue with that," Gabe said. "Consequences of non-consensual medical experimentation probably wasn't on anyone's lesson plans."

Rogers snorted with little humour. "Can't really get my head around this." He put a hand on the back of Barnes's neck. "I've never really been around Bucky when he's been…unwell. I've seen him beat to hell after boxing matches and in the throes of the usual childhood illnesses. Those situations were hardly anything like this."

Gabe wasn't sure he was following exactly what the captain meant.

Rogers kept his eyes on Barnes and said, "When we were kids, I thought I was getting to be best friends with a guy who was going to grow up to be a super hero. I thought he was invincible." He paused and lifted his hand when Barnes shifted in his sleep. Continued in a softer voice, "So when the rare times came when he wasn't invincible…I don't know. I didn't know what to think. And Bucky usually didn't want me around to see him when he was like that anyway."

"Sounds like he had a bad case of big brother syndrome," Gabe said.

"Right."

"Shit only goes one way with that. The older one can't go to the littler sibling and complain."

Rogers was nodding and said around a smile, "He said it wasn't fair to put more problems on me when I was already doing everything I could just to keep myself afloat."

Gabe said, "Sounds annoying."

"It was. But he said he could handle everything on his own, and I was so pissed off when he said shit like that that I usually just let him struggle through it. Reasoned that he'd ask for help when he realised he was in way over his head, and then I'd I-told-you-so him up and down the block."

"I probably woulda done the same thing, Cap. It's the only thing that gets through to stubborn people."

"Maybe. He never did ask for help."

Dum Dum shifted in his sleep and kicked a leg out. It hit Barnes square in the low back. He moaned in discomfort but didn't wake up. Rogers winced in sympathy and hesitated with a hand hovering over Barnes's back. He eventually brought it back to his own lap and fiddled with a strap on his trousers.

"Ya know," Rogers said, "I used to not worry about it at all. He was really close with my mother. I could go to him for anything, and I knew that he could go to her if he needed anything."

"What about his own folks?"

A sideways smile slid across Rogers's face. "Not always the best option. More often than not, they were the reason he needed help."

"Ah." Gabe knew the type.

"I guess I'm hoping he sees things differently now that…" he trailed off.

"You're a super man?" Gabe supplied.

"Yeah," he laughed humourlessly. "Something like that. I want him to realise that I'm still me, just more…I don't know, durable? Dependable? He can let me help him sometimes now. I can handle myself and be there for him at the same time."

"I wouldn't worry about it too much," Gabe said.

"No?"

Gabe shook his head. "Nah. He's going through some shit right now. A lot probably looks and feels different to him. He's been at war, he was captured, he's been sick and tortured, and his oldest friend is massively changed and also at war – where he's not supposed to be. Hell, the rest of us are reeling at the sight of you right now, and we didn't even know you before you changed. And we weren't tortured either. He'll come around, Cap, just give him a moment to catch his breath."

Didn't look much like Cap was comforted by that. "When you put it like that…I'm glad he's letting someone help him."

"Pffft," Gabe laughed. "He and Dum Dum are joined at the hip. If Barnes is trying to keep a secret, all you gotta go is get Dum Dum a little liquored up and chatty. He'll tell you anything you wanna know. He knows all Sarge's secrets."

"Oh yeah? Like what?"

"All sorts. I'm sure you know all of them, too. Gotta kick outta embarrassing Sarge when we were surrounded – before HYDRA captured us. Stupid stuff from their boot camp days. Pranks that got them both on latrine duty. A story about Sarge proposing marriage to some redhead that worked at a bar they always went to on their weekend passes."

He looked surprised to hear it. "Bucky proposed to someone?"

Gabe shrugged. "So the story went."

"What'd she say?"

"Dum Dum said she said that she'd think about it if he lived through the war."

Rogers breathed a huff through his nose. "Ouch."

"What's ouch?" Dernier said sleepily. He pushed himself up into a sitting position.

"Nothin'," Gabe said. "We wake you?"

Dernier hummed. "No. It's my turn for watch, right?"

"You sure?" said Gabe.

He nodded.

"No one here needs to do watch," said Rogers. "I have the perimeter covered. There's plenty of guys here who can do it tonight. Please, rest, all of you."

Gabe caught Dernier's eye and they shared a look.

"We'll keep watch," Gabe decided.

Dernier gave one definitive nod.

"OK then," said Rogers.

"I will take it from here," Dernier said.

"Alright. Guess that's my cue." Gabe settled down against the moist earth. He stared at the stars. Marvelled at them; he hadn't been able to see them since the day they'd been marched through those gates. He stared until he fell asleep.

It didn't feel like he was sleeping long before he was woken by the distinct sound of someone being sick. Gabe opened his eyes and sat up. He made eye contact with Monty and gave him a bewildered look. Dernier was sitting up sleepily; enough time must have passed for his watch to have ended. There was the retching sound again, and Gabe looked away.

Sarge was kneeling and puking his guts out, arms strung up between Dum Dum and Rogers. Gabe watched his whole body contract with another retch.

"Jesus," Dum Dum said.

"What's going on?" Gabe asked. "Besides the obvious."

Monty said, "Not sure. He just started doing this without ever waking up properly."

Gabe looked away when the next one came. The groups of nearby soldiers were starting to look anxiously and curiously toward them.

"That's blood," Jim said evenly.

Gabe looked to where he was pointing and wished he hadn't.

"OK, Bucky," Rogers was saying in an unsure voice. "OK. You're OK."

But he just kept retching, the pile of sick growing more and more red.

"Somebody get a medic," Rogers said when Barnes went slack in his and Dum Dum's grip.

"Don't think that's such a good idea," Gabe said.

"He needs something."

None of them moved to fetch a medic, so Rogers had to make eye contact with one of the ogling soldiers gathering around them and tell them to do it.

"Eyes open, Jimmy," Dum Dum was saying, crouching in front of him. "Hey, wake up, buddy. C'mon."

Barnes panted at him in response. Clenched his jaw against another rush of nausea. Maybe he tried to moan, but his throat wouldn't open.

"It's alright. Help's on the way. A medic's coming," Rogers muttered at him.

"Nugh," Barnes moaned. "No, no medic."

"It'll be just a second."

"No, please, no medic."

Gabe felt a growing sense of dread in the pit of his stomach. It only got worse when he saw the soldier jogging toward them with a man clearly displaying the red medic's cross. Rogers waved them over impatiently.

"This is going to be bad," Gabe heard Jim mutter under his breath.

"It's fine, Buck, the medic's here and he's gonna help," Rogers was saying. He tapped Dum Dum on the shoulder to make him clear the way for the medic.

By the look on Dum Dum's face, letting the medic any closer was the last thing he wanted to do. Barnes's body convulsed and he spat blood. Rogers made another impatient gesture.

The medic looked torn, but kneeled down as best he could with Dum Dum still there. He said, "Sergeant Barnes, this is Private Wade—"

"No," Barnes cut him off. "No, not you. Please, I can't do this again."

The medic's distress grew more apparent. He looked from Barnes to Rogers, a completely lost expression on his face. He said to Rogers, "Sir, uh, Captain, I don't think—"

Barnes fell forward with the force of the next retch. Dum Dum got an arm across his chest before he could collapse into his new pile of pink-tinged bile and saliva.

"What's going on?" Rogers said tensely.

The medic opened and closed his mouth a few times. Eventually said, "I don't know. It happened to the o-others. They-they'd get sick like this a-and—"

"And what?"

"And they'd maybe get better. But they usually didn't."

"What do you mean, they didn't?"

"I mean they died, sir."

"What do you mean? He was fine an hour ago!"

Monty went over and tapped the medic on the shoulder. "You're dismissed. Go on."

He left with several unsure looks over his shoulder.

To Rogers, Monty said, "Captain, I think it's time we got the column moving again. Daybreak is less than an hour away. Come, we'll get the word out. Dugan and Jones will get Sergeant Barnes onto a truck for the wounded. Come on. These men are starting to stare. Better they prepare for departure than stare at Barnes, hmm? Let's get him some privacy while he feels unwell."

It took some more convincing to get Rogers to step away. He adamantly refused at first. Wouldn't even hear a word about it until Sarge stopped retching and, apparently, passed out. Gabe hated the look on his face when Monty finally got him to start walking. It was desperate to help. Scared. And maybe there was a little bit of relief, the further he got away, at not being immediately responsible for bearing a problem so far out of his depth.