Bucky was back in Germany.

He walked, dazed, through the snow, trying to find his unit. A grenade had taken out those nearest him. He'd been hit by the shock-wave, and his ears were still ringing, but he was alive, which is more than he could say for most of the men he'd arrived with. He came up short, finding the barrel of a gun in his face. Someone was shouting at him in German. Two more Nazi soldiers appeared behind him, rifles leveled at his head. He raised his hands reluctantly in surrender.

He swaggered and talked as the guards led him away, acting as if he were on his way to a party. Possibly because of his smart mouth and possibly just because he was unlucky, he'd been singled out from the other prisoners and led out through the yard, guns trained on his head. No one they'd taken had ever come back. He knew he was walking to his death. He wasn't going to give them the satisfaction of seeing him sweat, though.

He thought of Steve. Skinny, defenseless Steve. God he hoped that dumb kid was ok. He'd have to be, because it looked like they'd never see each other again. It was too much to hope the kid would take a desk job and stay out of trouble, but he fervently hoped it anyway.

"What is your commanding officer's name?" The short fat man with round glasses spoke English through a thick German accent. Bucky wasn't impressed.

"Uncle Sam"

He reeled as a heavy gloved hand slapped him across the face. The short man shook his head.

"Age?"

"Fuck off."

Another blow across his face. He spat out a bit of blood, but his defiant smirk didn't fade.

"You do not take orders well, do you? Typical of an American." The short man turned to the guards and spoke rapid German. Bucky was hauled up out of the hard wooden chair, his hands cuffed roughly behind his back. "Congratulations, you have just volunteered to aid the war effort."

"Aww, gee, I'd love to help, but I'm all booked up already. Maybe next war."

A rifle-butt connected sharply with the back of his skull and everything went dark.

When he came to, he was strapped to a table with a very unpleasant looking array of equipment pointed at him. A host of syringes and surgical equipment was laid out on a small cart to his left. The short man was pulling on a pair of rubber gloves.

"You just… don't take no…. for an answer, do ya?" He managed around the pounding in his head. Cheap shot, hitting me from behind, ya bastards.

"I don't have to." The short man informed him disinterestedly. A man in a black uniform and full face-mask stood beside him with a notebook, pen at the ready. The short man approached the table with a watery but disquieting smile. "For your benefit, Herr Barnes, I will dictate the procedure in English. I would hate for you to miss out on this important scientific journey."

"Procedure? What am I getting my tonsils out?"

"Perhaps in time."

Bucky glanced at the surgical equipment and his bravado wavered. Maybe being executed would have been better….

His voice was hoarse from screaming. He didn't know what they had done to him, but it hurt. It hurt like nothing he'd ever felt. Every fiber of his being was on fire. The fat man with the glasses had tried to ask him some questions, and he didn't trust himself to answer, so he started to recite his name, rank, and serial number, over and over. It kept his mind busy and drowned out the whimpering he'd rather be doing.

He didn't remember very much, but he remembered the injections that burned like acid in his veins. The electricity they shot through his body until he blacked out. He was losing himself and the worst part was, he didn't know if he could remember how to care that it was happening.

"Bucky? Oh my god …"

A new voice cut through the haze of name, rank, serial number. He hadn't even realized that the pain had stopped until now. His eyes slowly tracked to the blurry face above him. The restraints were gone, but no one had told him to move. It didn't occur to him to try.

"Who…Who's'ere?" he mumbled.

"It's me… It's Steve."

"Steve…?" It took a moment to remember who that was. "Steve." He smiled dimly as strong arms helped him up. … What was Steve doing here?

There was no mistaking the earnest, worried face in front of him, though he'd remembered it being a whole lot lower the last time he'd seen it.

Steve gently touched his filthy hair as if making sure Bucky was really there.

"I thought you were dead."

"... I thought you were smaller."

"C'mon."

Steve's surprisingly sturdy arm bracing him, they'd staggered out the door together. His own legs were doing little to support him.

"What happened to you?"

"I joined the army!"

They stumbled into the hallway and he managed to find his feet. Steve was restless ahead of him… and huge.

"...What really happened?"

Steve told him.

"... Did it hurt?"

"A little."

"Is it permanent?"

"So far…"

The train. He always ended up here. Blown out the side of a train car by an explosion that would have killed him instantly, had he not been protected by Captain America's shield. Steve climbed out after him, but there was nothing he could do. They reached for each other desperately as the bar he clung to gave way and he plummeted into the valley below.

He saw Steve break as he fell. He could hear it in the way the other man screamed after him.

He tried to grab onto a rock outcropping as he passed -anything to slow the fall - but he was moving too fast. The force snapped his arm like a twig and he bounced off of the rock, screaming in pain as his flesh shredded against the stone. It was several long minutes before he finally struck hard, icy rock at the bottom with a sickening crack and mercifully blacked out.

Alive… He was alive. It wasn't possible. He couldn't move and he was fairly sure his left forearm was entirely gone. A glance at the trail of fresh blood in the snow confirmed that. Someone had a hold of the back of his jacket, dragging him through the snow. For a moment he thought it was Captain America, come to the rescue one more time. But then a harsh stream of Russian floated down to him and he knew he was in even deeper shit than ever.

As he was flung into the back of a truck, only one thing penetrated the haze in his mind.

Fuck, I hope Steve can find me this time.

Kid's probably coming unhinged...