Author's note: WOW okay um I usually don't take this long to update?¿ I've been really busy with my other work From the Flames, so updates on this story might take a little longer as I go back and forth between the two. And I hate to say this but... I think I might be bringing this work to an end, or it'll just take longer for me to post these one-shots. They'll probably be like monthly updates instead of sporadic weekly ones. BUT fear not, I'm kind of working on a little something else, kind of like a precursor to I'll Always Love You. I've got a few ideas I'm tossing around, but I'm trying to put my main focus on From the Flames for now. So just be patient with me here guys!

Anyways, this is a just a silly fic I came up with. I can't tell you guys how much I treasure the Bucky/Sam bro-ship.

Summary: Mario Kart is a very serious game. Please don't take it lightly.

There comes a point where you start to learn a lot of things about another person. You learn things like what makes them tick, how they strategize, how much is too much, how competitive they really are, etc.

In this case, it all comes about during a good old-fashioned game of Mario Kart. You know, that racing game? With the two plumber brothers who, if you took them out of context would look like really creepy old men? And like there's a lot of mushrooms in the game for some reason? Yeah, that game. Bucky only knows so much about it, so please don't look at him like he just killed fucking Mother Theresa or something.

For the record, this was so not Bucky's idea ("You can learn a lot about a person through Mario Kart," Sam nodded gravely like they were in a fucking zombie apocalypse or something. They had just watched The Walking Dead, don't ask). Bucky honestly, really doesn't know all that much about Mario Kart. He's tried it maybe once in college but that's about it. Apparently it's one of those really popular Wii games that just never gets old no matter how many times you play it, but Bucky's never really seen the appeal of racing games or a game filled with mushrooms for that matter ("Have you ever played the old gameboy Mario? Like have you ever lived?" Sam asked like Bucky'd stabbed him through the heart or something). After much insistence on Sam's part, Bucky caved and ordered the game online. It was due to arrive sometime within the week, which left Bucky ample time to gather up his courage and ask Steve over for a good old fashioned game of racing. Racing that involved plumbers and mushrooms and was that a turtle?

"DUDE." Sam looks over at him with the most horrified expression on his face. "THAT'S KOOPA TROOPA."

"Huh?" Bucky frowns at the yellow and green… turtle thing. "What the fuck is a koopa troopa?"

"That's his name moron," Sam rolls his eyes. "You know just for that, I'm gonna be Koopa Troopa."

"Fine, suit yourself. I'll be that buff guy with the spiky shell."

"That's Bowser. He breathes fire."

"Perfect."

"He's also a huge dick in the Mario games." When Bucky glares at him Sam puts his hands up in defense. "Seriously! You know how many times he steals Princess Peach from Mario?"

"Who?"

"Princess Peach! You know, the damsel in distress in like every single Mario game?"

Bucky just rolls his eyes and goes back to scrolling through the list of playable characters. Since Bucky's game had yet to arrive, Sam figured it would be a good idea to educate Bucky before his big thing (thing, date, whatever) with Steve. So instead of their usual 'shoot bad guys till the arrival of dawn with the addition of junk food and beer' night, now they're playing Mario kart and Bucky has no idea what any of these character names are supposed to mean to him. He knows the general stuff about the Mario character, but like he said before he's pretty clueless when it comes to this stuff. Being in the army and away from civilization for so long might play a part in that, and also the fact that his family wasn't exactly the wealthiest when he was growing up. Don't get him wrong, he had enough to make him happy and he wouldn't trade his childhood for the world, but the addition of Mario in his childhood might have been nice.

"You're seriously gonna be Bowser?" Sam asks skeptically.

"He breathes fire," Bucky shrugs like that's explanation enough. "And besides, I'm not the one that looks like a fucking turtle."

"Koopa Troopa. Not turtle, Koopa Troopa," Sam corrects.

"Whatever. Pick your racing car it's your turn," Bucky gestures to the screen. After 10 minutes of debating the advantages of motorcycles vs. an actual racing car, they finally start picking a race course. Bucky takes one look at Rainbow Road and it's a no for him.

"Oh come on, be a little daring!"

"I am daring. But that?" Bucky points to the course. "That is just fucking scary. No absolutely not we're doing simple here. Like.. that one!"

"Luigi's circuit?!"

"Hey, I'm a beginner here remember? You're supposed to show me the ropes not send me to my death."

"Luigi's Circuit is literally just a circle. That's it."

"Beginner Sam, remember?"

"Fine, fine," Sam relents. "We'll start with the easy ones and work our way up. Okay?"

"Sounds good to me."

"Wait Sam how do I use my power up?!" Bucky frantically asks as he tries to round the corner and not knock into the wall. He's already in 8th place and he can't afford to go any lower.

"I told you! Use the arrow pad!" Sam tilts his Wii remote all the way to the left and goes around the bend easily enough. Bucky knocks into at least two other players and runs into a banana. "Dude you suck at this."

"Shut up. Beginner, remember?"

"You said that for the last three courses already."

"Well this one's hard!"

"It's Coconut Mall!"

"Yeah well… still."

Sam's character suddenly races past Bucky's, meaning he's already on his third lap while Bucky is still lagging behind on his second lap.

Sam shakes his head. "You're falling behind man."

"BEGINNER SAM. BE-GINN-ER."

"Yeah, yeah. Just get up to 4th place at least and then we'll talk.

"Maple Treeway let's do this bro," Sam states as he points his Wii remote at the circuit.

As they're shown the preview of the course Bucky can feel his whole face cringing. "I'm gonna fall off the branches."

"No you won't. You improved significantly within the last four games we've played."

"I kept falling off those bouncy mushrooms in Mushroom Gorge. Pretty sure this is gonna be just as ugly."

"I'll go easy on you," Sam says, but there's a tiny bit of a smirk on his face.

Bucky narrows his eyes at him. If he didn't know any better, he'd say Sam was trying to rile him up, make him rise to the challenge or something. "Soldiers don't take pity from other soldiers," he simply states. It's a line their unit's commanding officer had beat into their skulls time and time again. It's a line Bucky's tried to live by, especially now with the missing limb and the thousands of pity stares he gets each day. And in this case, he's trying to use it on a fucking racing game with plumbers. What has this world come to now?

Sam's smirk turns into a full-out leer. "Alright then." He twists behind him and lifts up one of the empty beer bottles. "Loser has to go out and buy the beer."

"Oh hell no."

"Then you'd better beat me this time Barnes."

"Oh I totally am. No way am I going out at 11 pm to buy you fucking beer."

Bucky loses by one place.

He complains the whole the time as he's putting his shoes on and grabbing his sweatshirt. Sam takes pity on him and goes out to the buy the beer with him.

Bucky decides to be a little daring. Not like Rainbow Road daring but it's still daring. He chooses Moonview Highway.

Sam gives him a surprised look. "Little Barnes is growing up I see."

"Hell yeah he is," Bucky says before taking a swig of his beer. He's still feeling a little sore after losing on the Maple Treeway course. He'll get his revenge though.

"I have to warn you though," Sam says in a low voice, "But I beat my niece and nephew every time on this course."

"Then I guess I'll be the one to break that."

"Hah. We'll see about that Barnes."

Ten minutes later and Sam is in the lead with Bucky just a couple feet behind him. There is no way he's losing now, not after coming this far and only getting flattened by five cars. He's come a long way since they started.

"Gettin slow there Barnes," Sam comments.

"Shut up Wilson. We've still got more of this lap to complete," Bucky shoots back. He leans forward, as if that'll help him catch up to Sam and somehow cross the finish line. By some God given miracle, Bucky gets the power up with the mushroom that lets him speed up as long as he keeps clicking the button. He's right behind Sam now, with the finish line just in sight. He presses the button one more time and he goes zooming past Sam and over the finish line.

Bucky whoops loudly. Sam just kinda sits there in shock because he actually can't believe Bucky beat him. And on Moonview Highway of all courses, his speciality.

Bucky gets up and starts shaking his butt in Sam's face. "Suck on that Wilson!"

"I'd really rather not," Sam grimaces as Bucky's hips get dangerously close to his face.

"Oh come on. You know you want some of this action."

"No I really don't."

Bucky does that for another 15 minutes until Sam throws at least three pillows in his face. They're all totally worth it though.

Five sessions later and they've come to the final one of the night. That's right, they're doing the Rainbow Road course.

"You're sure about this?" Sam asks.

"What? Getting cold feet now Wilson?"

Sam scowls at the comment and stares straight ahead at the screen. "Let's do this shit."

Bucky smiles and turns back to the screen. He mentally preps himself up as the screen shows all the characters lined up across the start line, then the count down begins from 3, 2, 1…

"I hate this," Bucky says as he watches himself fall off Rainbow Road for the tenth time in a row. Sam's fallen off eight times, now going on nine.

"You're like not even trying anymore," Sam points out.

"Because it's fucking hard— oh shit." Bucky falls off again. Now it's eleven times. "Can we just do a different course?" He whines.

"No. Gotta rise to the challenge man, you chose it."

"Boo."

"Just get to the finish line and stop complaining. I'm gonna whoop your ass soon by the way."

"You're only ahead of me by two places!"

"Still winning at least."

"I'M IN 11TH PLACE."

Sam raises his eyebrow at him. "Your point?"

Bucky's about to reply but curses instead as he sees Sam complete his second lap already. Bucky hasn't even made it past his first lap and now he's in 12th place.

"Point proven."

"Oh shut up. Just let me win, okay?"

"Not a chance."

"Oh my god."

"Shut it."

"You just—"

"Don't say a word."

Bucky and Sam hold a stare off against each other. Sam breaks it by snorting out a, "Dude, you didn't even finish the race."

"I told you to shut it!"

Sam just snickers and points at Bucky's character still driving while that stupid depressing music plays. Sam managed to finish in 8th place.

"We're picking an easier course this time!" Bucky quickly clicks on the 'next course' button so he doesn't have to deal with this shit. He was doing just fine until he had to go and open his big fat mouth. Screw Rainbow Road, he's never doing this again.

Later that night Sam somehow convinces Bucky into doing Rainbow Road again. Don't ask how, but let's just say Bucky moved up to a grand 6th place while Sam finished in 10th. He's very glad he decided to do Rainbow Road again.

It's a little close to 1 am by the time they finish. Bucky would stay up later, but being the old man that he is, he's pretty exhausted from playing a couple rounds of Mario Kart for the majority of the night. Right before he's about to conk out on Sam's couch, he grasps Bucky's shoulder and says, "Well my young pupil, you have shown great skill tonight. I have no doubt you will impress your boyfriend."

"Gee, thanks man," Bucky replies dryly.

Sam barks out a laugh and squeezes Bucky's shoulder. "I have faith in you."

Bucky reaches out his arm so he can grab Sam's shoulder and reel him in. "Thank you for the pep talk," he says seriously. "Now can I sleep, or are we still gonna do this young grasshopper thing?"

Sam 'pffts' and pushes Bucky's shoulder. He doesn't push him that hard, but Bucky topples onto the couch anyway with an exaggerated noise.

"Yeah, yeah. Go sleep." Sam waves at him before gathering up the last of the beer bottles and making his way into the kitchen. He hears Sam putter around a bit, making noises here and there and then finally shuffling back into the living room. He flicks off a couple lights, tosses some extra blankets and pillows in Bucky's general direction (it's a good thing their army reflexes haven't totally disappeared), and then soon all the lights are off and they're both surrounded by darkness.

"Can you find your way to your room?" Bucky yawns out.

"Please, this is nothing compared to the night raids we went on," Sam snorts.

"Mhmm, I remember that. I kept having to save your ass," Bucky tries to retort back, but his words come out in a sort of drunken slur.

"You did not."

"Did too," he yawns again. The next few words also get slurred out, and before he knows it he's drifting off. If he wakes up to the Mario Kart theme song playing in his head, that's for his insane, sleep-deprived mind only.

*Five days later*

"I have to warn you though, I'm really good at this game," Bucky says with a mischievous smirk on his face.

"Oh are you now?" Steve asks as he reads the back of the game cover.

"Yes. Very."

"Huh. Should we test it out then?" Steve shakes the game a little and jerks his head towards the TV.

"Oh, I don't know," Bucky sighs. "It might be a little hard for you. You know, beginner and all."

"I think I'll manage." Steve opens up the game and takes the disc out carefully.

Bucky can't help laughing a little at how carefully he handles it. "You're such a dork."

"Am not." Steve inserts it into the Wii console and tosses a Wii remote back to Bucky. "Aww, no steering wheels?"

"Too expensive."

"I don't know if I wanna play this game anymore then." Steve gestures to the Wii remote sadly.

"Awww, giving up already Rogers?" Bucky sticks out his lower lip in a mock pout.

Steve raises his eyebrow at him. "Gee Barnes, if I didn't know any better I'd say you're trying to rile me up."

"Ya caught me."

Steve laughs and tugs the remote's strap over his wrist. Such a fucking dork. "We gonna do this or what?"

"Patience young grasshopper. In due time," Bucky says sagely. Just to get a kick out of it, he also tugs on his remote's safety strap. After all, it's going to be a very intense game.