checkin | [hypnos]

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[hypnos]

[Her room smells like death, a scent that you know intimately enough to recognize it. She spent all last night coughing and struggling to breathe, and sleep, death's closest relative, didn't come to either of you. It's almost time and the both of you know it, so you square your skinny shoulders like you can carry the weight of the world when you go to her.]

"Come here, Sunshine Boy. I want to tell you something." [And you go, your heart pounding like a hurricane in your chest, like it's trying to shatter your ribs and tear free. It would hurt less.] "Your life is always going to be a difficult one, but don’t let that harden your heart." [You promise her. It's a fight that you'll fight for the rest of your life. Soon, she gives up hers, and the humble apartment falls into silence.]

[Her name is Annie, a brunette with chestnut curls and the bluest eyes you've ever seen. She's always at the dances that your best pal drags you to, but you've never seen her dance. You think that somehow makes your chances better, so you spend the better part of an hour gathering the courage that comes to you so easily in an alleyway. You ask her to dance to something slow, something you know your imperfect lungs can keep up with. She laughs. Her friends laugh too.[]

Don't let that harden your heart.

[An arm is flung around your shoulders, a warm, familiar weight.] "C'mon Steve, you don't need her. Let's get out of here."

[There's a certain amount of horseplay to be expected in an Army barrack. Guys goofing off, throwing something from one soldier to the next. You try to get it back from them, try to fight them and tell them that that book was your father's, one of the few things of his that you have. But you're already so out of breath, turning from one to the next, reaching for the precious book when all they have to do is lift their arm to keep it from you. And you know that any second, one of those fragile pages will rip, or they could all pull loose from the spine.]

"Come on guys, we're all on the same side."

Your life is always going to be a difficult one.

[The serum floods your body, and for a few blinding moments all you know is pain. But your shoulders get broader. Your lungs get stronger. It's not so hard to breathe anymore. Things will be easier now.

You lift up the shield just before the tomato strikes it.]

Come on guys, we're all on the same side-

"That's all that's left of the 107th. The rest were killed or captured."

[Your heart stops, and doesn't beat again until you find him strapped to a table, until you can slide your warm arm around those trembling shoulders, lifting him up the way he always lifted you.] "C'mon Buck. Let's get out of here."

[When he falls, your promise to your Ma becomes a lot harder to keep. You realize that it's possible for a heart to be too strong, because it should've stopped beating with his.]

"I'm not gonna stop until all of Hydra is dead or captured."

[And then you have one by the throat, his helmet falling to the ground, the Hydra symbol still gleaming in your periphery.]

Sunshine Boy...

[You wonder if he can smell death too, tinged with enough sweetness to make a person sick at their stomach. He's struggling to breathe, but your lungs work just fine now. And your shoulders are strong enough to lift him right off his feet.]

Your life is always going to be a difficult one.

[Your grip tightens.]

But don't let it-

[Your heart is always pounding when you wake up. And it's always harder to breathe.]

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Don't let it harden your heart.

[ text is all bucky manages right now, and the violation of Steve's mind, his dreams, the sadness that curls around him very nearly chokes him on it makes it hard to face him directly.

Steve is suffering, enduring grief over and over again in dreams, and he plays snippets of it over and over in his mind. He feels like he's violated something sacred, something Steve holds close to his heart. The days are hardest for the ones who were left behind, the ones who don't know how much you love them. ] You're the better one of us both. You've always been.

Edited 2015-05-22 13:08 (UTC)

Where are you?

stop looking for me

No.

give it up, steve.

No.

[ JUST CUTS THE LINE AND KILLS THE CONNECTION.

but bucky lets himself be found by him within two days, sitting on the stairs. ]

[Son, did you really think that hanging up on him would make him stop? Because it doesn't. Steve approaches slowly, and takes a seat beside him.]

You're wrong, you know.

[ TBH BUCKY GOT TIRED OF EVADING HIM it's like trying to outdodge a pitbull hell-bent on... well, whatever pitbulls want. things don't escape pitbulls very often.

bucky's tired. he hasn't slept, and his communicator is cracked in places where he tried to break it. he looks back at him, and lets him sit with him. ]

About what?

[Bucky, do you not know about Steve Rogers or something.]

I'm not the best of us. [And he lets that sink in for just a second before he continues on, before Bucky can protest or interrupt.] I'm not perfect, and if you think I am, it means that you really don't see me. I might as well be wearing a star on my chest all the time.

[Because when people talk about a "better" man, they're usually talking about Captain America. They pass Steve Rogers right on by.]

The only reason I'm here at all is because of you. And I don't want you holding me above you or pushing me behind you. I just want my friend beside me. That's all I really need.

[ he knows about Steve Rogers. He knows so much more about him than anything. ]

I don't care about that star on your chest. [ Bucky never did -- he sees Steve the way no one else did; and it's not perfection. It's honesty. This little scrapper trying to punch bullies out who are so much bigger than him. ] And you're damn sure not perfect.

[ Because if that's what Steve took from what he said, then he needs to be corrected. But Steve... well, he's the better one of them both. He's the one who wanted to go to war when Bucky didn't care for it. All he wanted to do was get it over with and come back to Steve.

Bucky is... he's not sure what he is anymore, only that he's killed far too many, and he wonders if it's a moral failing that he's desensitized to it already. Does it matter? He listens to those words, lips pursing just for a few moments, as if thinking hard about what he ought to say next. When Bucky talks about a better man, he passes Captain America right on by. ]

I keep thinking about it. [ He tells him finally. ] The video that keeps playing in the Smithsonian. You don't smile like that any more.

[ Neither do I. ]

[Bucky mentions that old film, the black and white images of the two of them smiling even while the war raged on around them. Hardships were just easier to bear with him, always were. Bucky took as much of them as he could onto his own shoulders, sometimes Steve didn't even realie it.

He watched it over and over again that day, the effortless way that his mouth curved into a smile. It was like watching someone else. A ghost.]

Yeah, I guess that didn't make out of the ice with me.

A lot of what we were didn't make it out with us.

[ And isn't that a tragedy? Bucky's non-metal hand moves to rest over Steve's, and he exhales. He's so tired. The fury and anger at being violated once again had bled out in the first few days, and all that's left is ash, and Steve, and who they were to each other.

In his memories he wanted to get home to him after the war, and nothing had turned out the way either of them hoped it would. ] I remember being at my happiest when I was with you.

Same.

[And that does make him smile, looking down at the step below him.]

Times were hard, but we made the best of it. It didn't really matter what the world threw at us, because we had each other's backs.

We did, huh?

[ Like now. Like... well, like this, as much as possible. ] I could have killed you.

No.

[Steve shakes his head gently.]

If there was even just a shred of you left, I don't believe that would happen.

[ Bucky thinks about that for a moment. Something's bothering him, an unsettling question burning under his skin. ]

What if there really was nothing of me left? Would you have really --

Yeah.

[Steve thinks about it for a moment, thinks back to that moment, and he knows he would have. It's probably not the answer that Bucky wanted to hear, but it's an honest one.]

I couldn't lose you a second time. Not again.

[ There are a lot of things Bucky doesn't want to hear, but this is honest, and this means a lot. He squeezes Steve's hand, brings it up to press his lips to his knuckles in what could pass for a prayer, if he believes in that anymore (he doesn't).

It's brief, but heartfelt, for what it's worth, and he releases it awkwardly before a strained smile tugs at the side of his mouth, gone too quickly. ]

You could have at least taken me with you. [ It wouldn't be so bad if that happened, would it? ]

[Steve still believes. It's hard not to when he has the impossible answered one sitting right beside him. He watches Bucky bring his hand to his lips, quietly awed by it. Humbled.]

Yeah, I guess I could've.

[He looks down again. They were meant to be together through thick and thin. Soulmates. Their world isn't the same without the other.]

But dying's a bad habit, one that I think we should help each other break.

I think so, too.

[ It's strange, a semblance of a Steve-shaped sort of hope that flickers in his chest. They've come out of the past several decades changed in so many ways, but they've found each other again, and perhaps the days and months and years that come after won't be so unbearable.

Bucky thinks about that. Soulmates. ] I remembered you. [ He pauses. ] I think I did. They could never take that away.

Well, you know what they say.

[Steve smiles to himself, but his game face is on when he looks up again.]

You never forget your first love.

[Troll mode: engaged. But he still gives his hand a squeeze.]

I know you did. Taking one of us away from the other would take a hell of a lot more than what Hydra's got.

[ He knows that face. He knows what it means, and he knows exactly what kind of mischief Steve is capable of getting up to. Bucky eyes him dryly. ]

I was your first love first, you punk. Gave your skinny, reckless ass more than just the time of day.

[ Lobbing it right back at you, it's like a game of gay chicken. ] All the hearts you drew in your sketchbook.

[Bucky sounds so much like himself at that moment, enough that Steve catches his breath and looks at him like he thinks he might look physically different too. He doesn't, of course. But it's not a disappointment.

Steve grins at him, and damn if it doesn't come close to the one on black and white film.]

I never drew hearts, only your name. Someone had to try to teach you how to spell it properly.

[ Steve grins at him like everything important lives inside of him, and it's something he knows he will treasure forever.

No hearts, only his name. He muses. ]

That must mean I'm pretty important.

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