New Mexico
Hydra Base
2015
Bucky followed Sam into what he presumed was Baron Fleischer's office and watched as other man headed straight for the liquor cabinet that was neatly tucked at the back of the room away from the general public's view.
"Found it this when we cleared it out," said Sam as he pulled out a bottle of whiskey and two shot glasses, "I'm sure Shield won't mind."
"I won't tell if you won't," said Bucky accepting the glass and pouring himself some much needed alcohol. He knew it was pointless to try to get drunk with the serum that Zola gave him back in the war, but he'd be damned if he didn't at least try.
"I saw what happened in there," said Sam sinking down on the floor and making room so Bucky could join, "not pretty man."
Bucky huffed in agreement as he downed the burning liquid in a single gulp before pouring himself another.
"You know what they say about first impressions?" asked Bucky, "well I'm pretty sure we both blew it."
"She was spittin fireballs and you know it," said Sam taking a sip, "I honestly wanted to slap the shit outta her."
Bucky only tilted his head back in resignation, "she was right though."
"About what? You being a lap dog or deserving death?" said Sam pointedly.
"I was their lap dog," he took another sip, "for seventy years I was their lap dog. Obeying their every command without question and always coming back to them even when I had the chance to escape."
"They brainwashed and tortured you," said Sam in his defense, "you had no other option."
"I killed people," said Bucky, "and I can remember them, every single one."
Sam had nothing to say because there was nothing he could say. Bucky had killed people and he wouldn't be doing him a favor by trying to reassure him at this point. Sometimes it was just better to let people come to term with things on their own.
"For years they forced me to do things," began Banes again, "they tortured me into compliance and made me fulfill their every whim and need. And after finding Steve again I thought that maybe I could start to recover from it all, start to get those lost memories back and live a somewhat normal life," he said laughing, "but the thing about Hydra is that just when you think you're free of them, something always happens just to remind you that you're not."
I'm never gonna be free of them," he said after a long pause, "Not after everything they've done and taken from me."
"No," said Sam in agreement as he poured himself another glass, "not after they took your memories and your daughter."
Sam could only lean his head back against the wall as Bucky let his feelings out. He was beginning to not trust himself with words as he felt the whiskey start to impair his judgment and thought process, the slight buzzed feeling taking over his body.
"But at least my life wasn't always so bad," drawled Bucky, "I grew up with two parents and a little sister, so life was good in that aspect," said Bucky slightly smiling at the memory of his family.
"And I always had Steve, that little punk who was always too dumb to walk away from a fight," he said with a half-hearted smirk as he remembered the day in the alley.
"I didn't know you had a sister," said Sam with a loopy smile, his eyes starting to look glossy and his pupils starting to dilate. His speech and actions were starting slow down and he was starting to become looser with his words and actions.
"Rebecca?" asked Bucky, "she was my little sister, she uh died a few years ago," said Bucky with a longing look on his face as he remembered Becca.
She had been an old woman when she died surrounded by her children, grandchildren, and great-children just a few months before the Triskelion. When Bucky had started to regain his memories of her he had looked her up in vain hoping that she was still alive only to be greeted with her obituary. He went to visit her the next day with a bouquet of her favorite flowers and a heartfelt goodbye.
She was his little sister, she wasn't supposed to die before him an old woman. He also visited his parent's grave, Winifred and George Barnes at their family plot in Brooklyn. They all died thinking he was dead, his empty grave next to theirs was proof of that.
"What about you?" asked Bucky, "got any siblings?"
"Just me, my parents could never deal with another," said Sam, "but I did have my best friend Riley," he said with a longing expression.
"Riley?" asked Bucky curiously.
"Yeah, we were brothers in every way but blood. When we were old enough we both joined the Air Force and became Para-rescuers," said Sam taking another sip, "we served in the 58th rescue squadron."
"Where is he now?"
"He died during a mission in Afghanistan, got hit by an RPG," he said as he relived the memory, "all I could was watch."
Bucky sighed as he took another swig of his whiskey, the silence between the two was deafening as they both buried themselves deep in their thoughts.
"I imagine it was a lot like Cap watching you fall from that train," said Sam out of the blue. It was at that point obvious that Sam was drunk because no matter how much they disagreed and teased each other, he would've never said anything like that.
Bucky didn't say anything as his mind was taken back to that day in 1944. When he was first starting to remember that was the memory that always plagued him. The feeling of free falling away from Steve only to be greeted by the bitter cold and the welcoming sleep that came with it. He had been dazed when he woke up but he could still clearly remember the searing pain in his arm and the blood that stained the snow red. Things from there was a blur but he could always feel himself being dragged and the faces of the Russian soldiers who found him.
He could remember being strapped down to a table as the rest of his arm was sawed off and Zola's ugly face smiling at him. When his new arm had been put on he remembered being horrified by it. He tried to kill one of the scientists with it before they sedated him.
When he woke up he was trapped inside a metal container before the ice got to him.
He remained like this for years before they thawed him out in the fifties and wiped his mind continuously until he couldn't remember who he was.
And that's when the Winter Soldier was born, out of ice and forgotten memories.
"I'm sorry, I shouldn't have said that," said Sam as he observed Bucky's clenched fists and strained breathing.
"It's fine," Bucky said still breathing deeply before he opened his eyes.
"You wanna talk about it?" asked Sam, his inner counselor and war veteran starting to show through. It was a nice gesture but now was probably not the best time considering how drunk Sam was.
"No, not now. Maybe one day, but I just can't right now," said Bucky truthfully.
"Well when you're ready you know where to find me," slurred Sam with a moan as he lowered himself to the ground and started to make himself comfortable.
Bucky shook his head as he reached for the whiskey bottle only to find it completely empty, which had mostly been his fault seeing as he had drunk more than Sam had. He sighed as he set it down next to him and leaned his head back against the wall.
"I saw the tape," interrupted Steve as he burst through the door to find his two friends sitting on the ground with an almost empty whiskey bottle between them.
"Stevie! Come to join the party? We have an extra bottle if you'd care to join us," said Bucky as he pointed towards the liquor cabinet in the far wall.
"I'm serious Buck," said Steve placing his hands on his hips just like Bucky's ma used to do when she scolded him, "Are you okay?"
"What? Me? I'm fine, just peachy," said Bucky with a hint of sarcasm.
"No he's not," moaned Sam from his spot on the floor as he turned his head to look over to Steve.
"Traitor," mumbled Bucky as he kicked Sam in the ribs only to be met with a groan and a certain special finger.
"Alcohol isn't gonna do you any good, Buck," said Steve as he pinched the bridge of his nose, his shoulders tight and tense as he breathed heavily.
"No, but I think in this case I'm entitled to try," said Bucky raising his glass in Steve's direction.
"What's the point of alcohol if you can't get drunk?" said Sam from his spot on the floor, his sentence becoming garbled near the end.
"I'm not joking," said Steve ignoring his inebriated friend on the floor, "I saw the tape so don't just sit here and tell me that you're fine."
"Okay Rogers, you really want to know what I'm thinking?" asked Bucky with raised brows and pursed lips.
Steve only stared him down waiting for him to spill and Bucky sighed, setting his glass down before looking back at the other man.
"I was experimented on," began Bucky, "I was forcefully injected with something that I never wanted in the first place just so Hydra could have their own super soldier. Then they did things to me, made me forget everything and turned me into a weapon for their own sick purposes. And then decided that they were gonna try to replicate Zola's serum but then realized that they had no way to stabilize it because they no longer had the damned cube, so what did they do? They took my DNA without my knowledge or consent and created a kid with it because they thought she would be like me. But she wasn't Steve, she was just a normal little human baby but apparently that was good enough for Pierce," snarled Bucky, "and now I have a daughter who's as fucked up as I am and every time I look at her it's like a punch to the gut."
Steve remained silent during the entire speech, his face blank as he stared down at Bucky with sad eyes.
"And if I want to try to drown my sorrows out over a good glass of whiskey then I'm gonna fucking do it," snarled Bucky not even bothering to try and hide his anger as he poured himself another glass.
"Okay," said Steve raising his hands in surrender, "do what you need to, Buck. I ain't gonna stop you."
"You might want to get him out of here," said Bucky looking down at Sam who was already happily snoring happily on the floor, "he's gonna have a killer headache tomorrow," said Bucky reminiscing about the hangovers he used to have before Zola's serum.
"I'll leave some aspirin by his bedside," said Steve as he attempted to wake Sam up, but found that the younger man was out fast. He managed to eventually wake him partially before wrapping his arm around his shoulder and leading the groggy man out the door.
"You might want to get some sleep tonight, tomorrow they're gonna have a meeting to discuss what should be done about her," he said staring Bucky in the face, "you might want to be there."
"Will do," said Bucky nodding his head.
"See you in the morning," said Steve walking out the door, leaving Bucky to his thoughts and whiskey.
Bucky was about to get up and grab another bottle before he decided against it and pushed his empty glass away. Even though he wasn't affected by alcohol anymore because of how fast his cells regenerated, he still knew when he had had enough.
But even though he was done drinking, he wasn't done thinking about Yelena as he sat against the wall in Fleischer's office.
He needed to figure out a way to talk to her without her trying to rip his head off again. He knew it would take time to get through to her, but he had no intention of giving up.
She was his daughter and he'd be damned if he didn't fight for her just like Steve had fought for him. He had had faith in him when Bucky didn't even have faith in himself, had believed him when no one else did.
And that's what he wanted for Yelena.
AN: I know Sam and Bucky aren't exactly best buds, but I've always felt that in some ways they could connect on a deeper level. Both have served in the military and both have varying degrees of PTSD and they've both lost people. Sam is also a counselor and Bucky has obvious issues and I can imagine Sam wanting to help him in that retrospect. Sam is able to recognize now that Bucky is a victim of Hydra and that he's hurting about the situation with Yelena and he's willing to help in any way that he can.
Also in this chapter I brought out a lot of Bucky's feelings of anger and some of that is directed at Steve, but not intentionally. His emotions are kind of all over the road at this point, but It's understandable considering what happened in the last chapter.
Comment and tell me what you thought.