AN- hello I am here to ruin your day. Obligatory Bucky was with Steve when he crashed into the ice AU here we go.
Prompt:
Bucky and Steve both crash the plane and wake up in the 21st century
He knew the impact would be violent, but he hadn't expected it to be that violent. Steve had grabbed him and braced with the shield but it hadn't been enough. Everything had blurred together in a twisted mess of shrieking metal and shattering glass, the feeling of pressure and weight as if the sky itself was falling onto him, before everything went black.
Bucky wasn't sure how long he was out, woken by the cold burn of water dripping onto his leg. He tasted blood on his mouth and felt the warmth of it dripping down his face but he paid it no mind, forcing his eyes open to try and see in the nearly-black cockpit.
"Steve?" he croaked out, coughing up a mouthful of thick blood. That wasn't good. None of this was good. When he got no answer he tried to push himself up, momentarily forgetting his mangled left arm. He choked down a yelp and gritted his teeth, the acidic burn of the blue bolt Schmidt had hit him with now bright in the forefront of his awareness. The round had only grazed him but it'd been enough for it to tear through his sleeve and into his flesh, and now the sinister glow of it was advancing up his arm like a demented infection, eating away at him slowly. He knew that he only had a few hours, a day tops, before it got into his chest and he'd die.
"Steve?" he tried again but there was still no answer, his heart thudding loudly behind his ribs in fear. His eyes adjusted to the dim light and he saw a dark shape a few yards away, partially hidden beneath a scratched shield. He completely ignored the pain when he shoved himself to his feet, needing to know if Steve was alright.
"Hey— hey, Steve, Stevie, wake up—" the cold was starting to creep into his voice, teeth chattering and whole body starting to shiver violently. He wasn't going to make it more than a few hours in this cold but maybe Steve stood a better chance. He felt for a pulse and was horrified when he felt the warm tack of blood, but the heartbeat that thumped slow but steady under his fingers was assurance enough. He slid to his knees next to him, pushing the shield out of the way to wrap his arms around his friend's torso.
It was stupid, he knew it, and he could just hear Morita's blood pressure spiking at the mere thought of it but Bucky gathered Steve up in his arms anyway, getting as much of him up off of the cold metal floor as he could. Steve groaned in pain but he didn't open his eyes, face caked in half-dried blood and hair matted with it; Bucky was more terrified about that than the alien energy slowly consuming his arm.
He knew he was likely not much warmer than the surrounding air but any little bit could be enough to get Steve through the next few hours while they waited for rescue. He curled himself around as much of him as he could, some delirious part of him wishing Steve was small again, he was so much easier to fold himself around when he'd been small.
God, he was already so cold. Steve was cold too; everything was cold, colder than the coldest winter he and Steve had lived through. That was the year the radiator had gone out and they had to curl up together for warmth under every blanket they owned. He could only hold out hope that Peggy and the Commandos could find them before Steve froze to death.
Bucky tightened his grip on Steve and pulled him closer, keeping his left arm as far away as he could, not wanting the death creeping through it to cross to Steve. He was shivering so badly and couldn't feel much of anything, only aware of the faint warmth of blood and the meager body heat that leaked through Steve's uniform. He almost barked out a morbid laugh at the whole situation; he'd always feared Steve would die young, wouldn't make it through the winter, and now here they both were freezing to death in the belly of some wrecked plane. It seemed even the promise of the serum curing his ills wasn't enough to get Steve out of that fate.
His eyes started to slip closed and he shuddered out a heaving breath, the cold sunken clean through to his bones. The air was thick with the smell of sea salt, and he tried to focus on it and the soft rise and fall of Steve's chest against him, tried to imagine they weren't both dying in this God forsaken plane and were sleeping back in their apartment, that one cracked window letting in the spray-laden air from the ocean. The dark was closing in on his awareness and he knew he was going to die, he could only hope Steve held on long enough to be saved. That was the only important thing. He was dead anyway, with the blue energy lacing its way up his arm and towards his heart, there would be no saving him.
Without willing it his eyes slid shut and he couldn't open them back up, felt his heartbeat slow down and he knew it, knew this was it. He mumbled a choked sorry into Steve's hair, trying to focus on anything but how cold and lifeless Steve felt before the darkness overtook him.
The first thing he realized was that he was warm. He felt sunlight across his cheek and softness underneath him and he let out a wheezing exhale. His left arm still felt cold, pins and needles of ice up and down the length of it. He couldn't seem to move it and that was dimly alarming but that wasn't what was at the forefront of his awareness. Something was breathing against his right arm, a delicate puff of warmth every few seconds. It was enough to bring him to open his eyes.
Bucky groaned at the brightness, everything warm cream colors and flashing sunlight, but he turned his head despite the horrible stiffness of his muscles to try and get a better look. Bright, gold blond hair sticking up every which way told him immediately that it was Steve, a huge weight dissolving off of him in an instant. He was alive. The Commandos must have found them.
Steve was leaning onto his cot, one arm folded under his head in a makeshift pillow as he slept. Bucky found himself smiling just a bit as he lifted his right arm, smoothing down the more unruly tufts of Steve's hair and nearly laughing at the way he leaned into it like a cat. He hurt all over but Steve had made it, somehow they'd both made it, and that was good enough for him.
Those first few seconds of awakening were unclouded with the reality that his arm was missing, or that the radio was playing a game that had happened long ago in the past, or that the machine monitoring his heart beat was foreign and strange. Nothing else mattered at the moment, just that they had both lived through that hell, somehow.