It was far too early for anyone besides his erratic husband to be awake yet Steve found himself sitting on the floor of Bucky's small sitting room with Emmy, his husband fast asleep in the bedroom (having escaped from medical hours before). Emmy had zero interest in sleeping, it turned out, this newest disturbance to her already wrecked sleeping schedule making it impossible for her to settle down. It wasn't as if she was running around and making a mess, because she wasn't, she just wouldn't sleep and no amount of coaxing by Steve would get her to try.
"Emmy, I'm really tired baby," said Steve, his voice rough with sleep deprivation. "Please, will you at least try to sleep for me?"
Emmy shook her head and handed him a tablet before sitting on his lap and waiting to be read to like they always did at home.
"Baby, JARVIS isn't in this tablet," said Steve. "And Daddy's asleep so he can't access him, so both Daddy and Bucky and JARVIS are all asleep, just like we should be. Please."
Emmy shook her head and pulled Bucky's brush out of the pile of things she had collected over the time she had spent in the room. She climbed onto Steve's shoulder and began to brush his hair. Steve leaned back against the couch, resigned to being awake with his daughter. He knew it wasn't her fault but that didn't make him any less exhausted. The soothing strokes of the brush helped to lull his eyes closed and Emmy was so quiet that it didn't help his task to stay awake.
When Bucky wandered in a half hour later, he found Steve fast asleep, still propped up against the couch with several ribbons in his hair and Emmy on the couch trying to get the tablet to pull up a story, which was much more difficult than it should have been because she couldn't read.
"Did you keep Steve up past his bedtime, kid?" asked Bucky softly, sitting next to Emmy on the couch.
Emmy nodded but didn't look up, having clearly decided Bucky wasn't a threat and more interested in getting a book up so Papa could read it to her.
"If you're going to take apart my tablet I'm not sure you're doing it right," said Bucky.
Emmy looked up at Bucky, bags under her vibrant eyes, and made the sign for book, pointing at the tablet, visibly upset.
"That's a tablet, not a book, kid."
Emmy did the sign again, a single tear rolling down her left cheek.
"Um, you want to read a book?" said Bucky, panicking a bit at the sign of tears; he didn't know how to deal with crying.
Emmy nodded.
"Okay," said Bucky, snatching the tablet up. "Don't go crying. I'll get you a book. Just a second. How about War and Peace?"
Emmy wrinkled her nose.
"Picky little shrimp, aren't you? Okay, what about some Dr. Seuss? Kids like that shit, right?"
Bucky pulled up a Dr. Seuss book at random and handed the tablet back to Emmy. Emmy looked at it with a smile, then handed it back to Bucky and wormed her way under his real arm and stared expectantly up at him.
"Um," said Bucky, out of his depth. "I gave you the book. Now what do you want? No, I don't cuddle. So stop. Down kid. Heel."
Emmy cocked her head to the side in question, one soft red eyebrow going up. Bucky sighed.
"You learned that look from Steve, didn't you?" said Bucky. "Fine. But just this once. And if anyone ever asks, I'm telling them you ambushed me with tears before my first cup of coffee, got it?"
Emmy pointed back at the screen and leaned into Bucky's side, thumb absently going into her mouth.
"Don't do that," said Bucky, tugging the thumb out. "I was real happy and carefree and young, and I lived in a place called the Valley of Vung…."
The story didn't put Emmy to sleep. Neither did the one after that or the one after that one. Steve woke up during the fourth story to find Bucky doing all the voices and Emmy giggling from her perch on his shoulders where she was braiding his hair.
"You never did the voices when you read to me," said Steve with a yawn, smirking over his shoulder at his long time best friend.
"I never read to you, you dope," said Bucky.
"Nice hair."
"You too."
Steve blinked in surprise because getting up to go to the bathroom and check himself out in the mirror.
Bucky reached up and gently brought Emmy down over his shoulder and holding her in front of him under her arms so her legs dangled a bit.
"Now listen here, kid," said Bucky, his face serious but eyes sparkling with mirth. "Just because I read you stories and let you braid my hair doesn't mean we're going to cuddle again, got it? I'm a dangerous assassin, I've killed hundreds of people, and I do not cuddle. Understand?"
Emmy shook her head with a grin.
"Steve, I thought you said your kid was smart," whined Bucky.
"She is."
"Then why doesn't she get that I'm dangerous?"
"I think she'd take you a bit more seriously if you hadn't just let her braid your hair while reading her a story. That's not a very dangerous activity."
"Fine. I'm taking her to the gun range. She'll see how dangerous I am then."
"You can't take a four year old to the gun range," said Steve.
"Sure you can," said Clint, popping out of the vent to land lightly on the ground. "I wasn't much older when I started. Emmy, would you want to go with Uncle Bucky to the gun range?"
"I'm not her uncle," growled Bucky as Emmy nodded, still dangling from Bucky's arms. "I'm not your uncle, kid. Steve is not my brother and Tony is certainly not my brother. I killed his parents! Understand? I am not a cuddly, uncle type guy."
Emmy giggled and squirmed until Bucky set her on the couch next to him. Instantly, she climbed back onto Bucky's lap and put her hand on his face.
A blow shook the entire building, knocking everyone to the ground.
"You've got to be fucking kidding me!" yelled Clint as he coughed through the dust. "Who the hell are these guys?!"
"Pretty sure they're an extension of Hydra," said Steve, as he stumbled to his feet to check on his husband.
Bucky looked down at Emmy, who was cradled against his chest, protected from debris by his metal arm. She looked back up at him, utterly unafraid, as if that explosion had just been a fun game and she was waiting for the next fun thing Bucky would come up with.
"Steve, your kid's weird!" yelled Bucky.