Chapter Text
Bucky could handle being alone. At least, that's what he told The Avengers time and time again. But really, it was the truth. It wasn't like this was going to be his first time alone in Steve's and his apartment. Bucky was better now. He could be alone. He could handle himself perfectly well. He wasn't about to go crazy because Steven Grant Rogers wasn't by his side 24/7.
"If one of you asks one more time if I'm going to be okay by myself I swear I will lose my shit and still tell Steve to go," Bucky said warningly, staring at each of The Avengers, in sequence, for a whole five seconds before he looked at another. The Avengers were big enough assholes that they didn't even flinch. The fuckers, Bucky thought bitterly.
"I think he's being honest. He'll be fine. It's not like he's never been alone in the apartment. Right, Buck?" Steve said cheerfully, giving a light-hearted pat on Bucky's back and grinning at the other Avengers like he was made of pure sunshine.
Bucky appreciated Steve's brighter-than-the-sun smile, but he really needed the guy to take a stand. Smiling at The Avengers just wasn't going to cut it and Steve needed to be a little more convincing than that. Steve was already biased for being his boyfriend, if he only offered his all-American smile, no one was going to believe jack-shit of what he said.
Tony looked suspiciously between Bucky and Steve, but miraculously managed to keep his mouth shut. Bruce and Sam shared a knowing look, but kept a mostly neutral expression. Clint turned to Natasha and signed something to her and she gave a curt nod of agreement. Natasha then pursed her lips and gave another nod, but this time in the direction of Steve and Bucky. "He's not going to kill anyone. He can handle being Steve-less for one month. It's not like he can't function on his own."
"Are you one hundred percent sure of that? Sure enough to take the chance that if he fucks up I can put the blame on you and Steve?" Tony asked, raising a dark eyebrow at the red-head.
She shrugged and said, "I'm with Rogers. I think Barnes is more than capable of handling himself."
Bucky was about two seconds away from bursting if they kept discussing him as if he weren't there. He was tired of having this conversation over and over again and wanted them all to leave so he didn't feel like breaking something (or multiple things). "Is it settled? Can we all move on with our lives now?"
"Yeah, okay," the Avengers all chorused and, almost as if they were one person, left the apartment at the same time.
When they were all luckily out of Bucky's sight, he let out the strangled breath/growl he had been holding in and glared at the door as if it embodied all of The Avengers. "I really hate your friends sometimes."
"Come on, Buck. Natasha stood up for you and she's your friend too," Steve said lightly, trying to brighten up Bucky's foul mood.
Bucky gave Steve a serious and unamused look and the blonde rolled his eyes. "Just prove that you can be alone, that will make them get off your case."
"I thought I had already proven that," Bucky said, unable to keep out the bite in his tone. He wasn't angry at Steve, honestly, but he was just there and Bucky sort of couldn't help himself. What he needed was to vent out his anger and Steve was the only person around.
Steve stood up from where he sat on the couch and approached Bucky. He stood a single step away from Bucky and looked at him with that expression that wasn't disappointment or sadness or anger or happiness, but seemed to be a mix of them all. It was a look Bucky was all too familiar with and somehow always knew what it meant. Bucky sighed and nodded. "Okay. Okay. I'm sorry."
He took the single step that separated him from his boyfriend, who now not only had a larger than life personality but also a larger than life body, and wrapped his arms around the blonde in a tight hug. He could almost feel Steve's grin when the blonde hugged him back. The little shit.
[ • • • • • ]
Bucky was, at long last, alone. Bucky liked being and living and breathing every second with Steve, but he also liked proving himself to The Avengers. He wasn't the broken shadow of Bucky Barnes anymore. He was not exactly who he used to be, but he also wasn't the fucked up mess the Winter Soldier had left behind. He was better. He was okay. He could be alone.
On his first morning alone, Bucky woke up insanely, but unsurprisingly, early and got ready to go on a jog. He threw on the first pair of sweats his hands found and a black t-shirt he found on his dresser that didn't smell too bad. He then slipped on some running shoes and he was out the door in like five minutes, tops.
He always liked going on jogs (or runs, if he was in the mood for them, they were mostly Steve's thing). They helped him clear his mind and they helped him ground himself. All he had to do was focus on his breathing and in putting one foot in front of the other and he felt better. It also helped that most of the time not another living soul was around because of the crazy early hour. He did not mind the loneliness because goddamn it he could be alone.
He went along on his jog, trying not to think so hard on how much he couldn't believe The Avengers had argued over the fact of whether or not it was alright for Steve to leave him by himself. He allowed his mind to draw a blank so he could truly relax.
Bucky never really kept track of time during these jogs. He more or less estimated the time he had been outside by his surroundings. He was never really planning out his path in his jog, but he always made sure he knew exactly where he was and how to go back to his apartment. It was important for him to know where he was even if he wasn't really paying attention.
Subconsciously, his path began to lead to the park and he went on because, really, who cared? No one was going to be there anyway and no one could tell him he couldn't go. It was a matter of about ten minutes before he was in the park. He cast a searching look around, but there was no other living soul around. The sky was still dark above him, but the few lamp posts around illuminated more than well enough for him to see.
Bucky walked over to one of the few benches and plopped himself on it. He puffed out a breath and ran a hand through his messy hair before casting one more look around. He was about to dismiss everything, now sure that everything was fine, when his eyes fell on something that lay on the bench beside him. Bucky looked with confusion at the spot to his right and tentatively reached out for whatever was beside him.
He grew even more surprised when he felt a smooth and somewhat oval shape beneath his hand. He grasped whatever it was and placed it on his lap. He ran his hand across the smooth surface and found that it was sort of the shape of an over-sized egg. Gingerly, he brought the egg closer to his ear and pressed his ear against it. He was not sure what he was expecting, but there came no sound from the egg-sized thing.
He shrugged, kept his suspicions to himself, and got back to his feet. He made sure to handle the object carefully and with one last glance sideways, he began to make his way back to his apartment. He was not one hundred percent sure why he was taking the egg with him, but he figured it wouldn't hurt anyone. There was no indication that it was a bomb so if there was something inside of it, it couldn't be that dangerous (unless it was what he thought it was).
When he was finally in front of his apartment building, he made his way as quietly as possible up the stairs and slipped into the apartment almost as silently as a ghost. Delicately he closed the door behind him and placed the egg on the couch. He blindly looked for the light switch and when he flipped it on, he was able to see more clearly what he had dragged with him.
Bucky kneeled in front of the couch and once more reached out a hand to what now clearly looked like an egg. There were only two problems with this statement: 1. The egg was huge. 2. The egg was a rich forest green.
"What the fuck have I done?" Bucky whispered to himself, staring at the egg with a look of almost hopelessness.
"It'll be fine. If it is an egg, it probably won't hatch and if it does, I can handle it. I was a professional assassin, I can handle whatever comes out of this thing," he told himself (although he wasn't sure he even believed himself).
He decided to let the egg be and walked over to the small kitchen. He began to make himself coffee, every once in a while glancing at the couch. Meanwhile, he kept repeating to himself: Everything is fine. It's okay. It's probably not a dragon.
The moment his coffee was ready, he walked over to the couch and sat down beside the egg. He kept a considerable distance between himself and the egg before he turned to look at the TV on the wall. He grabbed the remote that was on a small table beside the couch and randomly began to flip through channels. When he found one that didn't seem too boring, he set the remote down and took a drink from his still steaming mug of coffee. He cast a sidelong glance at the egg, but it had not moved a single inch. "Guess it's just you and me, buddy. That is if there's even a buddy in there."
Bucky realized he was, once more, talking to himself and went back to staring at the TV. He remained that way quite some time, even after he had finished his coffee. The sun had already begun to come out, but he did not pay it any mind. He remained in that trance-like state until he remembered he should eat something. He still hadn't fully gotten into the habit of eating regularly, but he tried to so that Steve would not worry. Steve, with his now super metabolism, could happily spend all day eating and he began to worry when he saw that Bucky had not eaten a thing in two hours.
With these thoughts in mind, Bucky got up and began to make himself breakfast. He knew Steve wasn't around to pester him about eating, but he felt like he should anyway. How else would he get in the habit of eating if he only did it when Steve was around? Maybe he could accomplish that too before Steve got back. He could already imagine Steve's little smile, the one only reserved for Bucky, when he saw Bucky getting up to eat at the appropriate times. Bucky couldn't help it, he wanted to make Steve happy. After all the shit he had put Steve through, he thought he owed him that.
It was about half an hour later that Bucky nearly had a heart attack. He had been calmly dusting around the apartment when he heard a loud boom of something falling. He stood frozen still for a few seconds before his instincts kicked in and he ran to see what had happened. His eyes immediately found where the sound had come from.
In the living room, the egg had fallen from the couch to the floor and was now wobbling to and fro. Bucky approached the egg precariously and in silent contemplation watched the egg wobble. He was beginning to regret having brought the egg with him, but he decided it was too late to feel something like regret.
The egg began to shake frantically and Bucky both saw and heard as the egg began to crack. It was, at first, a soft and almost muffled sound, but then the sound became louder and louder building up a crescendo that Bucky was sure the whole apartment building could hear, but was actually not all that loud. It took the egg exactly five minutes to hatch and Bucky was pretty sure his heart had crawled up his throat and he was about to puke it out.
Bucky swore he could no longer breathe by the time the egg was completely hatched. He was even more surprised (even though he should not have been) when he saw what hatched. The little baby dragon, a beautiful light green with some scales shining a soft yellow, took a deep breath and let it out in a soft sort of whistle. It then turned its chocolate brown eyes towards Bucky and cocked its head to the side. Bucky stared back at it, transfixed, and allowed the dragon to analyze him. When the dragon seemed satisfied with its analysis, it let out another sort of whistle sound and stumbled its way towards a still stock still Bucky.
The dragon nudged Bucky with its snout and peered up at him with its sweet little brown eyes. Bucky looked down at it skeptically before he gingerly picked the dragon in his arms. Bucky swore the dragon smiled at him at this and then licked his cheek before making a biting motion. "Are you hungry, boy?"
The dragon let out a soft growl and Bucky looked at it with confusion. "Is that a yes, boy?" he asked while he made his way to the kitchen.
The dragon once more growled and stared at Bucky intently. Bucky stopped walking and observed the dragon closely. It did not do anything to him, but it kept staring at him with an intelligent and serious expression. It then, somewhat miraculously, clicked in Bucky's mind and he exclaimed with a laugh, "Are you a girl?"
The dragon made a sort of yip sound and Bucky swore she nodded. "Well, thanks for letting me know, sweet girl. Let's get you something to eat."
She purred in agreement and Bucky smiled down at her before making his way to the fridge. He opened it and took out a piece of meat he was going to prepare for himself that day. He was not sure how accurate books and movies were about dragons, but he was pretty sure they liked raw meat. Bucky was about to cut the meat into smaller pieces to give them to the dragon when she suddenly sprang from his arms and jumped onto the counter. Before he could so much as blink, she attacked the meat and ate it with three big bites.
"I'm impressed. Are you still hungry? I should probably buy some more meat if my assumptions about your eating habits are any good."
The dragon burped loudly and once more offered Bucky what could only be described as a smile. He gently took her in his arms and when she did not complain he walked back to the living room. He set her down on the couch and she quickly began to dig her head into one of the corners of the couch. Bucky peered at her curiously, but let her be.
"Can you handle being by yourself while I get some more food for you?" he asked. He was still uncertain that she really could understand him, but he thought it was worth a shot. The worst thing that could happen was that someone randomly came into his apartment and thought he was insane (it wouldn't be the first time. He swore the guy in the apartment across from his thought he was bat-shit crazy. The tarantula incident was to never be brought up for the rest of time).
The baby dragon stared up at Bucky with her sweet little chocolate eyes like she was silently saying she was a sweet little angel that would do no harm. Bucky seriously doubted that, but really, what choice did he have? He needed to buy more meat for the dragon before she began to eat her way around the apartment. Nope, he could not allow that. Steve would kill him. There was artwork on their walls and expensive pieces of furniture they did no plan to replace for at least twenty years.
"I'm gonna trust you. If you behave well, I'll treat you better than a princess," he said, looking at her encouragingly like he was offering her something extremely appealing. Yeah, he was definitely insane.
The dragon nodded and, to prove her compliance, dutifully sat down and looked at Bucky kindly. He gave her one last stern and curious look, before he walked over to the apartment door and stepped out before locking her in.
It was only when he was in the grocery store, pushing a cart, that he realized he was still in his workout clothes. All he could manage to think was: Fuck it.
[ • • • • • ]
When Bucky came back from the grocery store, he looked like he was about to single-handedly feed the U.S army. He stepped into the apartment holding approximately 20 bags filled with meat and chicken and almost had another heart attack when his baby dragon was nowhere in sight.
"Hello? Little dragon?" He set down his bags near the door and began to walk deeper into the apartment when he heard no sort of sound as a reply. He searched every room, stupidly leaving for last his and Steve's room which was the only one that actually had the door open. What he saw nearly made him fall to the floor laughing.
The green dragon stood in the middle of the bed, a glistening silver watch in her mouth. She stood directly above a small pile of an assortment of shiny things, some of value and some of not much worth. The dragon let the watch drop when she saw Bucky and almost sheepishly nudged the pile of stuff in his direction.
Bucky let out a loud laugh and reached for her. He picked her up in his arms and she gently settled her face against his neck. "Are you hungry, girl?"
She made no sort of respond to his question and he figured she was full. He walked over to the front door where he had left the bags and began to take as many as he could carry with his metal arm. He had to make three trips to the fridge so that he could store everything away. He briefly thought he had bought too much, but with one glance down at the dragon now resting calmly in his arms, he figured she would eat more and more the bigger she got.
"Shit. You can't grow too big. I don't have room for a huge dragon here. Look around," he said, and purposefully showed her the relative smallness of the apartment. She did not seem to care and gave his neck two soft nudges, curling closer to his body like she was searching for more body heat.
"You also need a name. You gonna help me out pick a name?" he asked, gently running his knuckles over her head and down her back. She pressed against his touch and purred softly.
He sighed and sat down on the couch. He stared at the screen for a couple of minutes in silence while he tried to think of every dragon movie, TV series and book he had ever heard of and seen. Tony and Natasha had made sure he was up to date with pretty much everything and he had to admit that he'd always had a thing for anything that involved dragons. He had watched (and read) pretty much everything he could get his hands on that had dragons (including How to Train your Dragon). Bucky was not ashamed of that, why should he be? It was all purely fictional. . . Well until now that he found himself with his very own dragon.
Bucky stared down at the dragon and ran a mental list of names that he could snatch from any dragon related movie or whatever. He started naming some out loud, but the baby dragon just stared at him with a bored expression.
Suddenly, he was struck by an idea and exclaimed, "What about Khaleesi? Do you like that? Khaleesi sounds like a good name for you."
She did that yip sound again and nodded excitedly in his direction. He laughed and said, "Yes! Fuck yes! Khaleesi it is."
She grinned at him, showing him tiny but very sharp teeth, and he once more ran his knuckles on her head and down her back. Her scales felt rough and uneven under his touch, but she seemed radiant and full of light. The sunlight pouring in through the windows made her scales twinkle and sparkle, seeming to make her look even more unreal.
Then Bucky sharply got up and ran over to the windows. He violently drew the curtains so that the view outside was completely blocked. Why did he do this? Because the last thing he needed was for someone to casually peer in the direction of his apartment and find a live dragon running around. "Khaleesi, what are we going to do? How am I supposed to keep you a secret?"
The dragon stood directly in front of the couch and was looking at him indignantly. She sat down grumpily and glared at him with her penetrating big brown eyes. She huffed out a breath and seemed to be waiting for something.
That was right around the moment he realized that by getting to his feet so suddenly, she had fallen smack on the floor without any sort of warning. He rushed to her side and prepared to hug her and apologize, but she let out another huff and with one of her talons pushed him away. "Oh, come on! Don't be that way! It was an accident! It's not every day you find out you have a pet dragon!"
Khaleesi, still indignant, clumsily walked away from him, her nails clacking loudly on the floor. Bucky watched her as she made her way to his and Steve's room and disappeared inside. He sighed and stared back at the TV. Not at all coincidentally, it was playing Game of Thrones.
[ • • • • • ]
Bucky woke to the loud sound of snoring. For a moment, he was disoriented and automatically with his right arm shoved in the direction that Steve was supposed to be sleeping in. What happened thanks to this was that his hand went through thin air and he ended up slightly poking something that lay on his bed.
He almost exclaimed as he was startled out of his dream haze and he turned on the light on the bedside table. He was both relieved and disappointed to find Khaleesi staring at him with sleepy eyes. He sighed and gave her head a gentle pat. She nestled into his touch and calmly went back to sleep. Bucky stared at the pillow that was directly above Khaleesi and frowned.
Yes, Bucky missed his blonde little shit. It was his Steve that was going to be gone for a month and fuck yes he was going to miss him. In a very stereotypical manner, Bucky grabbed Steve's pillow and brought it up to his face. He buried his face in the pillow and took a deep breath. He felt a little tug in his chest at being reminded of how Steve smelled and he sat like that, with the pillow covering his face, for a while.
When he felt like he was bordering on being ridiculous, Bucky stood up and walked over to the bathroom. Now that he was awake there was no way he would go back to sleep (much less when he was missing his star-spangled Steve). He went about his normal morning business and then made sure to prepare Khaleesi's breakfast. He knew he really didn't need to cut the meat up into pieces, but he did it anyway and then he neatly set them on a plastic plate.
Bucky then, out of boredom, began to clean around the apartment. He really didn't have much to do and it was still three in the morning and he was scared of what might happen if he just left Khaleesi alone without any sort of warning to the tiny dragon. So, he proceeded to vacuum and mop and clean the bathroom and then then clean the stove like there was no tomorrow. He was worked up into a frenzy by the time he heard a loud crash.
Bucky stood still for a moment before he rushed toward his room. At first glance, nothing seemed amiss apart from the fact that his baby dragon wasn't on the bed, lying on top of her little pile of stolen coins and watches. He stepped over to the bathroom and knew then exactly what had provoked the sound.
Khaleesi somehow found herself with the shower curtain and the metal rod that held the curtain lying on top of her. He could not really see her but he could see her shape shifting and squirming under the weight of the curtain and the rod.
Bucky sighed dramatically and lifted the metal rod and then the shower curtain from atop the dragon. That was when he saw that Khaleesi was ferociously biting one of the metal hooks that held the curtain in place. Bucky rolled his eyes and picked her up. She looked at him sweetly, like a kid that would never ever break a single plate, and refused to let go of the metal hook. "Khaleesi, what do you think you are doing? Are you purposefully trying to get yourself killed?"
She did not react in any way to his words. She only kept looking at him with the metal hook in her mouth. Bucky rolled his eyes once more and walked over to the bed where there was a small stash of Khaleesi's treasures. "Give me the hook. Let's add it to the collection."
She stared at him suspiciously and then at her pile of "goods" before looking back at him. Grudgingly, she opened her mouth and he took the hook before she regretted handing it over. He set it amongst the other items and then walked over to the kitchen.
Khaleesi launched herself from his arms and onto the kitchen counter when she saw the plate of meat. He shrugged and let her go before heading back to the room and grabbing his wallet and keys (before Khaleesi stole them and claimed them as her own).
He waited until she was done eating and had clumsily thrown herself from the kitchen counter to the floor before he stepped over to the front door. She followed after him and stared up at him curiously. She then yanked at the bottom of his jeans, as if demanding where it was he thought he was going. "Do you think you can handle being alone for a little while, Khaleesi? I need to get out of the apartment for a little while and get you some toys. Is that okay?"
She let out a whine and tugged at the leg of his jeans once more. Bucky picked her up and set her down on the couch. He flipped on the TV and put on How to Train your Dragon (which he had recorded on his DVR and had forced Steve to watch it like three million times). Khaleesi let out a cheerful yip and stared at the TV with bright eyes.
"Behave, Khaleesi. I don't want to come back and find this place a wreck," he said warningly. She nodded obediently, entranced while she watched the movie.
He decided to just take the chance and leave because, well, the dragon wasn't going to kill anyone while he was gone.
[ • • • • • ]
A week and a half had gone by and Khaleesi was still very much alive and still very much in Bucky's care. Steve hadn't called at all yet, but that wasn't much of a surprise. Bucky was trying hard to take this all in stride and calmly. He made sure he went out of the apartment for at least an hour and then he spent the rest of his day with Khaleesi. He pretended to have a semblance of calmness during the day so that The Avengers could not say he was secluded in the apartment all day while Steve was gone. Bucky was still very much not into socializing, but he went out (which was more than enough if you asked him).
He turned his light eyes towards Khaleesi and watched her as she saw How to Train your Dragon for about the tenth time. She was obsessed with the movie and pretty much begged him to play it. Bucky was not always sure if he was making up these "conversations" with Khaleesi, but he seriously hoped she understood some of what he said. If she did not understand a thing he said, then he was seriously living a sad life.
Khaleesi then began to chew on one of her new chew toys. She wrecked through them like they were made of water and Bucky was pretty sure he had never spent so much money in his life. He was always cautious with how much he spent (even though he did not have to be) but now all those thoughts were thrown out the window. Khaleesi was often restless and he let her blow off steam by destroying her toys. He knew he shouldn't be spending so much money and he also knew that Steve would totally freak out when he came home and found a dragon in their apartment, but he just hoped Steve would be blinded by Khaleesi's cuteness and accept her graciously into his life like she was part of the family.
"Steve has his freak friends, I can have you, right?" he asked her sweetly, petting her gently.
Khaleesi yipped and then purred loudly as she rubbed against his hand. She then stood up and waddled over to his lap and curled into a small ball on his lap. Bucky grinned and kept petting her, acutely aware of the roughness of her scales.
At some point, Bucky fell asleep and was woken by a strange sound. He jolted to alertness, startled to find himself on the couch, and then stared down at his lap. Looking vaguely guilty, Khaleesi lay on his lap, two of his metal fingers in her mouth as she was caught mid-bite. Bucky quickly pulled back his metal hand and shuddered when a line of saliva trailed from Khaleesi's mouth to his fingers.
"Gross, Khaleesi. I'm not a toy. My metal arm is not one of your shiny objects to hoard and play with." He looked down at her sternly and her expression turned sheepish as she tried to hide.
She jumped off his lap and began to walk clumsily in the direction of Steve's office (which mostly held his art) so that she could more effectively hide. Bucky rolled his eyes and watched her go. She was mostly well behaved and he was pretty sure there was nothing breakable and shiny in Steve's office.
He was wrong.
Not a minute later, there was a loud crash and a pained yip. Bucky sprang to his feet and ran to the office as quickly as possible. When he saw what had happened, he had to suppress his panic. Khaleesi stood just bellow Steve's desk and she had broken glass all around her as a stapler lay randomly a couple of feet away from her.
Khaleesi scrambled to straighten, but that just made her slip and fall on the small shards of broken glass. She let out a pained sound and Bucky rushed towards her. He picked her up gently in his arms and turned her so that her belly was exposed. There he saw that she had a few shards buried in her belly, the most sensitive part of her body. Khaleesi let out another pained sound and Bucky sighed.
What was he going to do? He refused to show Khaleesi to any of The Avengers. They might take her away before he could convince Steve to keep her. He could not allow that. He would have to figure out how to treat her all on his own. . . He was pretty sure he had handled worse wounds. . . At some point. . . As the Winter Soldier.
Bucky really hoped his unreliable memory would not betray him now. He could not lose his baby dragon. She was his friend and she helped with his loneliness. No, he would fix her.
He walked to the kitchen and set her delicately in the sink. He then searched for the first aid kit (which was pretty huge and he was pretty sure he had everything necessary to perform surgery on someone) and he began to work on trying to heal Khaleesi to the best of his capabilities.
All the while he severely scolded the dragon and kept an angry expression in her direction. She only whimpered every once in a while, but it seemed to Bucky that it was because of his expression and not because of pain. He did not stop scolding her until he was done bandaging her. She gingerly stood and stared down at the bottom of the sink, refusing to make eye contact with Bucky.
"You can't scare me like that, Khaleesi. I want to keep you from the evil clutches of The Avengers and that won't happen if you keep being obnoxious." He picked her up and set her down on the floor.
Bucky then picked up the vacuum and cleaned Steve's office and made sure to put the stapler back in its place. He then closed the door to the office and looked in the direction of the living room for his dragon. When he did not find her there, he frowned and walked over to his room. With a quick glance he did not see her and his worry grew even more.
"Where are you, girl? Don't hide from me. I'm not going to hurt you," he said, walking around the room and even stepping into the bathroom to see if she was there. She was not, the bathroom was utterly empty. He stepped out and gave another glance around his room. That time he spotted her immediately.
Khaleesi lay beneath the bed, only her head peaking out, and she was gently gnawing on a quarter. She slowed her gnawing and turned it into a lick when she saw Bucky. She seemed to shrink under his gaze and she glumly stared at the floor before giving the quarter another sad lick.
He stepped over to where she lay and sat down on the floor. He offered his hand to her and she glanced at it warily before looking back down at her quarter. He sighed tiredly and lay down on the floor, trying to find a comfortable position beside her. She watched him as he struggled to get comfortable and did not stop staring at him with her brown eyes until he had settled down. The moment he had stilled, she went back to gnawing on her quarter.
"Khaleesi, please stay safe. I need you to stay safe," he whispered, gray eyes staring at the baby dragon with concern.
She cautiously moved so that she was no longer under the bed and she gave his chin a gentle nudge. He figured that was her way of promising not to get hurt again and freak him out.
[ • • • • • ]
Bucky was three weeks into having his baby dragon (and being Steve-less) and he had gotten regrettably drunk. He had broken into one of Natasha's apartments (whoops) and had stolen all her good vodka. He vaguely remembered thinking she would kill him when she got back from the mission with Steve. He also slightly remembered thinking he could handle her wrath.
These unfortunate decisions led to him being almost blackout drunk, and led to him making an even more regrettable decision. He was now back in his apartment, the empty vodka bottles scattered lazily on the floor in front of the couch, and he was haphazardly holding his phone as he took pictures of Khaleesi. The baby dragon was sleeping peacefully and was looking too damn cute for Bucky not to take pictures of her.
He giggled rather obnoxiously as he recorded Khaleesi snoring softly. He then took some more pictures of her (which were mostly blurred smudges—but there were some good ones!) and then looked through his contacts. In his alcohol induced haze, he thought it would be an amazing idea to send the pictures of his adorable dragon to Steve. Wouldn't he just think her the cutest? He thought with another hysterical giggle.
Too bad for him, his sight was fucked and he wasn't sure what he was doing and he ended up sending the text to the wrong person. He sent it to the worst person possible: Wade Wilson aka Deadpool. Alas, he was too drunk to realize his mistake and he grinned victoriously when he saw that he had properly sent the images of his precious little dragon.
The reply to his texts came immediately and yet took him about ten minutes to properly understand the words.
Wade: Are those pictures real?!?!?
Bucky: Obviiiiii
Wade: You're totally pulling my leg. Fucking bastard. I'm going over there. Wait up for me, LIAR.
Bucky stared dumbly at the screen after this last text and then shrugged. He threw the phone randomly and heard it fall somewhere, but he didn't much care where it was. He turned his eyes in the direction of Khaleesi and outstretched his arms towards her. She was too far for him to possibly grab her and he found himself falling to the floor with a wild flail.
Khaleesi opened her eyes and stared at Bucky seriously. When he grinned at her and reached out for her once more, she let out a puff of breath and walked over to him. He lay awkwardly on the floor, but she ignored this and stepped over him and settled down neatly on his chest.
Bucky laughed contentedly and lazily began to pet her. She purred softly, ignoring the drunk state of the man she had accepted as her father. He kept a drunken smile on his lips for quite a while and was startled slightly out of his stupor by a loud knock on the door.
"Come in! The door's open!" he called out in a sing-song voice.
The door opened rather violently and in burst Deadpool in all his merc with a mouth glory. He had a gun out and was pointing it directly at Bucky before he seemed to understand that he was really looking at Bucky, the Bucky Barnes, former Winter Soldier.
"Oh this is just perfect," Deadpool nearly squealed excitedly. He put his gun away and shut the door behind him stealthily (or trying to be stealthy which mostly resulted in a loud bang. . . whoops).
Bucky looked at Deadpool with confusion for a couple of seconds before he grinned and presented Khaleesi to the merc with a smile only a proud drunk father could pull off. Deadpool let out another laugh and grabbed the baby dragon quickly.
"She is real!" he exclaimed, examining the dragon not too delicately. He then seemed to think of something and turned sharply to Bucky. "Wait, where's your Captain? Shouldn't he be here helping you mother your new child?"
Bucky frowned and stared at Deadpool intently before he figured out how to use words to speak. "He's on a mission. He doesn't know."
Bucky then made a show of shushing Deadpool, bringing a metal finger to his lips and loudly going, "Shhhhhhhhh. He don' need to know."
Deadpool looked like he was about to burst out laughing by the pure joy this moment was bringing him. He was in Bucky Barnes and Steve Rogers' apartment and he was witnessing a drunk Bucky who had a secret pet dragon. Wade never thought he would witness something as perfect as this.
"Thank you," Deadpool said to no one in particular as he stared up at the ceiling.
"Gimme," Bucky called out on the floor, arms outstretched to pick up Khaleesi.
Deadpool gazed at the small green dragon for a second longer before handing her over to Bucky. Bucky squealed when he had her in his hands and began to "fly" her around. Deadpool was pretty sure he had never felt a purest level of joy than in that moment. This was fucking gold.
Deadpool took out his own phone and began to take pictures of Bucky. The pictures varied from Bucky giggling like a school girl to him making funny faces at the dragon as if she were an actual human child.
"Should I tell Cap about this?" Deadpool asked when Bucky had calmed down enough that he lay on the couch upside down, staring at the TV (which he had forced Wade to turn on and put on How to Train your Dragon).
Bucky once more went, "Shhhhhhhh," and then said, "I'm watchin' the dragons."
"Yeah, alright, alright," Deadpool said and held his hands up in a sign of mock surrender.
"Siiiiiit," Bucky mumbled/hissed at the merc and the other man obediently obliged, sitting on the exact spot Bucky was pointing at.
Bucky awkwardly gave Deadpool's head a pat and the merc almost burst out laughing hysterically. He kept in his laughter though and wondered if he had somehow died and somehow had managed to go to heaven. Wade then thought he must be dreaming and this was all some sort of fabrication of his mind. There was no way he was witnessing Bucky (the only person related to The Avengers who treated him slightly well) flat out drunk.
"Good, Deadpool," Bucky said drunkenly before giving Deadpool another pat on the head and promptly falling asleep.
Yup, Deadpool thought, I have definitely died and gone to heaven.
[ • • • • • ]
Bucky woke positively feeling like shit. He let out a groan and when he moved to sit up, he ended up falling with a loud bang on the floor. He quickly covered his ears with his hands to try to keep from having his head burst at all the sound he had made.
"What the fuck?" he whispered softly, silently cursing himself for getting himself drunk. He groggily looked around and the first thing in his sight were the stolen bottles of Natasha's good vodka.
"Fuck. I'm so dead," he whispered, struggling to get to his feet. Once he was (more or less) standing on his own two feet, he gave his surroundings another searching glance. His eyes then found Deadpool.
Bucky jumped back, startled, when the merc suddenly let out a loud snore. "What the actual fuck?"
Bucky grew even more scandalized when he saw that Khaleesi was comfortably laying beside the mercenary, snoring softly, her tail protectively on Deadpool's arm. Bucky ran a hand through his disheveled hair and blinked rapidly to see if what he was seeing was part of his imagination, but Deadpool really was in his apartment and his dragon was sleeping soundly beside the merc.
"Someone kill me," he whispered, casting a look over to the dining room and then to the kitchen. He found what he was looking for, his phone, in the sink. He was scared to think about how it had gotten there.
Bucky shuddered and unlocked the phone. He searched through his recent messages and found the reason why Deadpool was in his apartment. He had drunkenly texted the mercenary pictures of Khaleesi and the merc had showed up. Bucky cursed once more under his breath and set his phone on the counter.
He walked over to where Deadpool lay sleeping on the floor and shook him awake. Deadpool snapped awake almost instantly and looked wildly around until he properly saw Bucky standing in front of him. "Hey, Bucky-boy. How are you this morning? Need me to make you breakfast?"
"Wade, tell me I didn't drunkenly text you and that's how you are now miraculously in my apartment. Did you break in?" Bucky then gave the doorknob of the front door a suspicious glance, but it looked perfectly okay to him.
"Bucky-boy, of course I didn't break in. You left the front door open. All I had to do was turn the knob." The merc then got to his feet and brushed off imaginary specks of dust from his suit before he made his way to the kitchen. He opened the door of the fridge like he lived there and pulled out a slab of meat that was obviously intended for Khaleesi.
The dragon burst to alertness and ran over to Wade's side. She stared up at him with begging chocolate eyes and the merc visibly smiled under his mask. Bucky, meanwhile, wanted to crawl into a hole die.
"Relax, Bucky-boy. I'll make sure she's fed and I'll even make you breakfast."
Bucky was pretty sure the smile under the merc's mask was a cheeky one. Someone needed to kill Bucky as soon as possible. He opened his mouth to protest, but Deadpool cut him off. "Don't worry, Bucky. This will be our little secret. The Cap will never know I was even here."
Bucky (not so grudgingly now) agreed to keep the merc around. . . But only until breakfast was done!
Bucky quickly regretted this decision when the merc began to sing Barbie Girl by Aqua at the top of his lungs while he made scrambled eggs and toast. He wondered to himself then how he had even gotten there. Was that seriously his life?
[ • • • • • ]
Khaleesi sat obediently on the couch. Bucky had been pacing back and forth across the living room as he thought about what was bout to happen in a few minutes. Steve was supposed to come home soon and Bucky was about ready to chew his nails off from the anxiety. He sent furtive glances at Khaleesi (who was now bigger but not huge) and the dragon met his gaze with an excited one. He wasn't sure why she was so damn cheerful. She had never even seen Steve and worst of all, he might be the one to say that Khaleesi had to go.
Bucky ran his hand through his messy long hair for about the hundredth time. He had given up on keeping his hair in a tidy ponytail. He was stressing the fuck out and he needed to do something to calm his nerves. He began to mumble and mutter under his breath and nearly died when he heard a set of keys.
He panicked, standing straight and motionless in front of Khaleesi, as he heard the keys unlock the door and then watched as the knob slowly turned. He made no sound and his expression did not change when he saw Steve, his wonderful, full of pure sunshine Steve, and he kept his expression that of one of panic.
Steve looked at him with worry and said, "Bucky what's going on?"
The blonde stepped deeper into the apartment and a familiar red-head followed behind him. Bucky was cornered. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. He thought over and over.
"I may or may not have gotten us a dragon?" he said quickly, stepping aside so that the dragon came into view.
Khaleesi made a sound of excitement and stared at Steve with bright and hopeful eyes. Steve stared back at the dragon incredulously while Natasha simply smirked. The red-head turned to look at Steve and rolled her eyes when she saw the dumb-struck expression of the Captain.
"Is there a limit to the crazy shit you two can pull off?" she asked, looking at both men before she motioned for the dragon to come to her side.
Khaleesi gladly threw herself off the couch and ran happily towards Natasha. The red-head picked her up and gave her a pat on the head. "What did you name it, Barnes?"
"It's a she," Bucky said defensibly, crossing his arms in front of his chest. He looked at Natasha coldly and she only gave a dry laugh.
"What did you name her?" she asked once more, her attention back on the dragon. Khaleesi was gladly purring and nestling comfortably into Natasha's arms.
"Her name is Khaleesi," Bucky responded, sounding like a petulant child who was defying their parent and daring them to call him silly.
Natasha burst out with a laugh and shook her head. "You named her Khaleesi? Aren't you the real mother of dragons, Barnes?"
Bucky gave her his coldest glare and snatched Khaleesi from the red-head's arms. He then walked over to where Steve was still staring at everything that was unfolding before his eyes with a stunned expression.
"We're keeping her. She keeps me company."
Steve looked at his boyfriend, who was giving him the cutest puppy dog eyes in existence, and he nodded. "Yeah. Okay, Buck."
Bucky grinned triumphantly and then threw his arms around Steve because he really had missed the little shit a hell of a lot.