Chapter 7: During; After
Steve is as good as his word and doesn't let Bucky touch another Hydra weapon. They've stormed and infiltrated bases and interrupted supply lines, and even though Steve is the one calling the shots, he still manages to look out for Bucky and keep him from losing his cool again.
For his part, Bucky's not sure how he feels about this role reversal. It's kind of funny, the way Steve's looking out for him now. No one says anything, but Bucky feels eyes crawling over him and fire in his veins every so often. He has to blame Zola; whatever he injected into him, or the combination of those things, is fucking with his system. He just wants the war to be over. For Zola and Schmidt to be dead, for Hitler to be dead, for the Axis to surrender. He wants to go back to Brooklyn and retire quietly.
He settles for Schmidt's private brandy reserves out of a flask in his hip pocket. It's good, but the worst part is he has trouble getting drunk now, too. Nothing takes the edge off. He's got too much energy buzzing inside of him. Some nights in camp he and Steve spar and the guys bet on them. Bucky still can't take Steve down, but he can at least dodge Steve's hits and sometimes feels like he can see them coming.
"You didn't learn those moves in that Brooklyn gym," Steve says after their most recent fight. The guys are divvying up their bets, and Steve is actually breathing hard even though he once again knocked Bucky down for the count. The last time Bucky saw Steve winded after a fight was when they encountered the Red Skull during their escape from the Austria facility. Bucky shrugs. "Maybe when this is over we can get Stark to do some tests," he ventures. "Maybe he can figure it out."
"When this is over." Bucky pushes his sweat-soaked hair off his forehead. He leans back and looks at the night sky. His breath makes plumes of steam in the chilly night air. The stars are bright against the blackness. He never knew there could be so many stars, not until he was out to sea sailing for England and there was nothing at night but the flatness of the water and the velvet of the sky. It makes him feel tiny, a speck of dust in the grand scheme of things. For so long it's been nothing but war. "You really think this will end."
"I have to believe it will," Steve says. He reaches into his pants pocket and pulls out his compass. He flips it open. A photo of Peggy Carter has been cut out and stuck inside. "Not going to give me a hard time about her?" Steve asks with a slight grin. "The war's made you pretty serious."
"We all need some reason to keep fighting," Bucky tells him. "And if Peggy's your reason, who am I to give you shit for it?"
"What's your reason?" Steve asks, still staring at the picture of Peggy.
Bucky bites down on his lip, deep in thought. Why does he keep going? He doesn't have someone like Steve has Peggy. He didn't make Connie any promises when he left because he knew he wouldn't be able to keep them. To some degree he knows he was fighting because Steve wanted it so badly, and couldn't be part of it; he was fighting for the both of them. But now that Steve's fighting his own fight, what keeps Bucky going?
"I didn't think I would survive this," he finally tells Steve. "So I guess proving myself wrong, that's what keeps me going. Whatever universal beings are betting against me, I'm going to beat the odds."
Steve drops a heavy hand on Bucky's shoulder and squeezes. "End of the line?"
"End of the line."
They're in France, making their way back to England. Their intel suggests that there's at least one more Hydra base other than this one, but it wasn't marked on any maps that Steve saw, and none of the Commandos knows where their labor was shipping out to. None of the Hydra operatives they've interrogated knows anything of value. They're outwitting Schmidt at every step, but the Red Skull still has that one trump card up his sleeve.
It's broad daylight out; their other strikes have been at night, so Hydra's getting wise to them and they have to change their tactics. Jacques and Gabe man the wireless; Jacques presses the headphones to his ears and whispers to Gabe, who translates to Steve. "Four guards on the wall, two at the door. Shift change is in fifteen minutes," Gabe mutters.
"Positions," Steve says simply. Falsworth, Jim, and Dum Dum check their knives and side arms. Gabe and Jacques pull out the the Hydra guns they've been wielding since the rescue from Austria. Bucky looks away. "You alright being my eyes up high?" Steve asks him, one hand on his forearm as they all move toward their positions.
Bucky grips the strap of his sniper rifle and nods. "I think I'd rather take this one slow and steady," he tells Steve, only after the others have left them. "And no, I don't want to talk about it after. I don't know what Zola was trying to do to me, and the only thing that matters is I survived." He forces a smile. "I've got your back, punk. Stop worrying about me."
Steve nods and heads down the hill toward his position.
Bucky scales a steep rock, his fingers easily finding purchase. He spots handholds with little effort, and it's easy to pull himself up onto the mossy ledge. He's still breathing easily when he settles on his stomach and assembles his rifle stand.
It doesn't take long for the familiar ache to settle between his shoulder blades and for his left eye to water from being squeezed shut. He keeps his breathing even and wills his body to remain motionless but for the slight movements of his head and arms and the rifle barrel. He hears a bird whistle in the silence. It's a quail, and Bucky only knows this because Jim told them that, and that this type of quail isn't found in Europe.
He smiles slightly. It's his signal.
Five long, pointed, shining rounds are lined up to his right, ready for reload.
He scans with the scope and the first guard at the door goes down. One on the wall takes a knife to the throat. Steve bursts into the fray, all red, white and blue righteous fury. Bucky can't help but grin more widely. Steve always has to prove himself. Even now, when he doesn't have to, Steve seems to need to prove himself more than ever. Maybe it's for Peggy's sake, maybe it's for himself.
Motion on the upper decks of the facility catches Bucky's eye. More Hydra soldiers have come out of an upper exit that they weren't aware of. He doesn't think, just aims and squeezes the trigger. First one Hydra soldier falls dead. Two more come out. He reaches for his bullets, loads, aims, squeezes, takes them out without pity or prejudice. He's not firing a sniper rifle anymore: the rifle is part of him, an extension of his body. Even when he has to reach for more bullets his hand knows right where to go and what to do. He hardly has to think.
Time slips away and when he runs out of bullets he slings the sniper rifle over his shoulder and readies his pistol. He grabs the nearest tree branch and swings down without thinking. Heights never bothered him, but he knew to at least be cautious. This… he's not himself. He's moving through the twigs and leaves and branches, seeing everything as a blur of green and brown and gray. He hears the rat tat tat of gunfire and the high-pitched whine of blue-light-energy Hydra weapons and the clang of Steve's vibranium shield as it ricochets off the walls.
He slips into the facility and scours the offices, picking up files and folders and blueprints and stuffing them into his satchel while the others work to secure the building. He hears everything, is aware of every shifting shadow as he works. The Hydra soldier who attempts to sneak up on him doesn't have a chance as Bucky spins around and drives his palm up and into the guy's nose. He makes a strangled gasp and crumples on the floor, dead, his nose driven up into his brain. Bucky's hands shake after that, but he gathers what intel he can before ghosting out of the complex. He whistles a bird call when he's out past the treeline, and moments later thunderous explosions rock the forest.
All Bucky can do is wait at the rendezvous point, breathing heavily and clenching his still-shaking hands into fists. Why did I do that? He wonders.
How did I do that?
Bucky finds Steve sitting on a rocky ledge overlooking the still-burning Hydra complex later, when the shaking has stopped and he feels more like himself again. Something about the heat of battle flips a switch in his body and his brain. He hates it, he's terrified of losing himself to it, but he doesn't know what to do about it. He still remembers what he asked Steve as they ran from Zola's lab: "Is it permanent?" And Steve had said, "So far." That was nearly a year ago, and Steve hasn't changed. Well, maybe gotten harder and grimmer, but war does that. Bucky is beginning to fear that this is his new normal, that this will be permanent for him as well.
The flames turn the night sky a hellish orange, but the air is cool and smells like pine. "Falsworth found Schmidt's private stash before he torched the place," Bucky says, sitting next to Steve and handing him a bottle of brandy. He uncorks his own bottle and inhales the rich aroma before taking a sip. It doesn't burn going down; more like a pleasant stream of warmth, calming after the day they've had. "Whatcha thinking?"
Steve's helmet and mask sit off to his side and his face is smudged with ash and streaked with sweat. His sandy blond hair sticks up at random angles, like a baby bird's feathers. His eyes are weary as they reflect the firelight. "You ever think about after, Buck?" He glances over. Bucky shrugs and takes another sip. "After all this is over. After the war, if we live that long."
"Is this a test?" Bucky asks with a grin that Steve doesn't return. He sighs. Steve's the only one he can be truly honest with. With the other guys he grins and jokes and fights as hard and fast as they do. They're brothers in arms. But he and Steve… they're brothers. "Yeah. Yeah, I do. Every day." Especially now that I'm so messed up. "I'm guessing you do to?" Steve's nod confirms it. "So what does Captain America want to do after this is all over?" he asks.
It's Steve's turn to shrug, and he finally takes a long pull from his brandy bottle. "All I ever wanted to do was serve my country, and now I am. I don't know what I'd do otherwise."
"General America sounds pretty good," Bucky suggests and Steve sort of smiles. There's more on his mind. There always is when he's this melancholy. "But… you want something else?"
This was the last of the Hydra factories on the map. The allies are pushing back and holding the lines. After could very much become a reality. "I don't know," Steve says. Maybe I shouldn't think so far in the future. Maybe I'll just start with asking Peggy for a dance." He does smile, really smile, when he says this.
"Think she's got a friend for me?" Bucky asks with a grin. "A cute redhead? Someone to settle down with. Have a couple cute kids and tell them Pop and Uncle Steve's old war stories, maybe." He rubs the back of his neck. It's nice to be talking about something other than Hydra, and he has thought about after. They all have. After isn't a certainty, not with the jobs they're doing, but thinking about it gets him up in the morning. Thinking about a future where he's not making sure his guns are in working order before stepping out the door, where he's not sniping enemies or following orders. Where he's just Bucky Barnes again.
"Stark seems to think he might have work for me when this is done," Bucky ventures after a moment of silence stretches on too long. "I could work for him, get myself set up pretty nice. Wouldn't that be something? Working for Howard Stark?" The prospect of spending his days working at a desk or in a lab changing the world alongside Stark is actually pretty enticing. He takes a deep drink and kind of wishes he'd just get drunk already. Thinking about a hopeful future shouldn't be this depressing.
"I think you'd work great with Stark," Steve says. He stares at the bottle. It's good brandy, but there's not much point in drinking it if neither of them can get drunk. "Maybe he could help you figure out…"
Bucky sighs. He knew it would come to this. Every time Steve looks at him with that concerned shadow across his face Bucky winces internally. Steve shouldn't have to worry about him; Bucky can take care of himself. Even if he is twitchier than a rabbit these days. "Don't, Steve. I've thought about it over and over, and I figure if the worst side effect is that I can't get drunk anymore, I really don't give a shit what Zola did to me." It's a lie. He does care, he hates moving faster than he means to, seeing more than he wants to, hearing more than he plans to. "And I really don't want to remember all the details," he says a bit more quietly. Sometimes in his nightmares he sees the flash of light on a long needle, feels the pinch of said needle in his neck and wakes up sweating and gasping. Sometimes he dreams of Zola's grin and the glint of his glasses. "You're pretty much my brother, Steve, but this just isn't something that I want to revisit. Even with you." Bucky drains the bottle in a few gulps and throws it out into the night. It lands somewhere, a faint tinkle of glass in the evening quiet.
"Sorry, Buck. I won't bring it up again," Steve says, and he means it, even if it's going to drive Steve crazy never asking about it, especially when he can see how much it's bothering Bucky. Captain America can't lie if his life depends on it. "Here, you need this more than I do." He hands Bucky his half finished bottle. Bucky downs the rest of that one and heaves it out into the forest, too. "I think it'd be great if Stark had a job for you. And if you got that redhead."
"Yeah, well, we gotta get out of this first," Bucky says, staring out into the flaming night. "Then maybe we can think about after."
"We will, Buck. Til the end of the line, remember?" Steve asks, getting up. He offers Bucky his hand, and after a moment Bucky takes it and gets up as well.
Steve can't lie, and he's the most stubborn bastard Bucky will ever know. When he says they'll make it, Bucky believes him, and it makes it easier to keep thinking about an after.
They head back to their camp where the rest of the guys are standing around, talking excitedly. They've been celebrating; bottles of Schmidt's brandy litter the clearing. "Good news, Cap," Dum Dum says with a grin. He takes a swig of brandy. "Word came in from Phillips and Carter."
At the mention of Peggy Carter's name Steve blushes in the firelight. Bucky sincerely hopes that the 'after' Steve hopes for becomes a reality. God knows the guy could use a lucky break after a lifetime of otherwise shitty luck. And while becoming Captain America has been a good break, it's come with a lot of crazy risks.
"They intercepted some intel back at headquarters," Gabe tells them. "There's a Hydra train departing and heading through the Alps. Probably headed here," he says and everyone laughs. "We can intercept them."
"What's on the train?" Steve asks. Always the strategist, always weighing the odds.
"Not what. Who."
Dum Dum looks right at Bucky. "We have it on good authority that Zola's on that train."
A chill flows through Bucky and that sense of seeing too much, feeling too much all at once overwhelms him. Is this what Steve feels like, all amped up on super soldier serum? Maybe he'll ask him after. But right now all he can think as they prepare for extraction is that just maybe, once they have Zola in custody, they can give him a taste of his own medicine.