Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Steve wakes up to Bucky swearing at a goat. This isn’t unusual, at all, so Steve only contemplates getting up for a second before he relaxes and burrows himself deeper into the blankets. He sleeps a lot these days. Things get overwhelming, sometimes, and Steve has to step back. Bucky thinks he just hasn’t had a good night’s sleep since 1942.  

Regardless, the end result is that Steve spends a good amount of time watching Bucky move around each morning. The slope of his shoulders, the sun as it shines through the window; Steve doesn’t think he has the temperment for art anymore, but he wishes he could draw it. Then again, it doesn’t even seem possible to capture the moment. The feeling Steve gets when he looks at him is formless but inextricable; it would be impossible to do it justice with pen and paper.

Bucky wrestles his hair back from the goat and kicks it away. He is dressed in loose fitting clothes that rustle slightly in the wind as he trudges back through the open door. With a huff, Bucky drops down next to Steve, or more accurately on top of Steve. He kisses Steve on the neck, then settles in, apparently not planning on moving for a while.

“Your hair is wet,” Steve says.

“Misha was chewing on it,” Bucky replies.

“Misha?”

“It’s short for Dimitri.”

“I wasn’t aware the goats had names.”

“Maybe one day you’ll learn them,” Bucky says, muffled by Steve’s shoulder. His stubble scrapes against Steve’s shoulder.

Steve highly doubts he’ll ever learn them.

They doze for another hour before Steve gets restless and a little claustrophobic and has to get up. Bucky grunts and rolls off him, still half asleep, and Steve moves around and gets dressed. His hands shake a little. It annoys him.

“Let’s go to the city today,” Bucky says, slanting his eyes to watch Steve.

“What do we need?” Steve asks, pulling on a shirt.

“Nothing, but it seems unhealthy for us to never see anyone but each other,” Bucky says thoughtfully. He smirks and leers at Steve. “I do like lookin’ at you, though.”

Steve ignores the flattery, even though it sends a little shiver of pleasure up his spine. “If you want,” he replies instead, methodically going about making coffee. Bucky stands up and stretches like a cat, then slides behind Steve, hooking his chin on Steve’s shoulder.

“Hey,” he whispers in Steve’s ear. “We don’t have to. Whatever you want.”

“We should go,” Steve sighs, leaning back. “You’re probably right.”

“I’ll put on the arm, it’ll be just like getting all dressed up to go dancing.”

“Instead of a suit it’s a limb, Buck, I don’t think it’s anything like that,” Steve laughs, turning his head to look at Bucky’s face.

“You never let me have my fun,” Bucky huffs. “I should leave you for Natasha.”

“You can’t handle Natasha. She’d crush you with her thighs.”

“Sounds fun,” Bucky says, and Steve reaches behind to cuff him on the back of the head while taking a sip of his coffee.

xxxx

“How the hell can you eat that?” Bucky asks. Steve is picking at some sort of chicken and rice dish that he bought on the side of a road. It’s apparently really spicy.

“It’s good,” Steve says absently. He’s letting Bucky drag him around.

“That shit would give me an ulcer,” Bucky says.

“I bet you long for the days when we used to boil everything with cabbage,” Steve says airily. Bucky blinks at him and shakes his head.

“Oh, fuck you,” Bucky says. “Even Shuri stays away from that.”

“I had this noodle dish in Vietnam that was spicier than this,” Steve says. Bucky huffs and stops at a vendor who is selling knives. Steve is sure he’s got at least three stashed somewhere. Steve has a switchblade in each boot.

“I like this one,” Bucky says, holding it up to Steve like he thinks Steve’s gonna say no. Steve rolls his eyes nods his head, then goes back to his food.

Bucky flips the new knife over his fingers while they walk around, a mindless habit that unnerves some of the locals. They get a lot of stares, as two large white men in Wakanda, but for Steve it’s kind of refreshing to be stared at for something other than the shield on his back. Most people, however, ignore them. The capital city is huge, and like in most huge cities, the people are used to weird shit.

“By the way,” Bucky says shiftily. Steve narrows his eyes. “I might have promised Shuri we would come up so she could run tests on the arm.”

Steve huffs a sharp breath through his nose. “You just want to gossip,” he says in a manner that is not at all whining. He doesn’t whine. Steve is ( was ) Captain America.

“What I want is to have a functioning arm. Are you going to deny me that, Steve?”

Steve wishes for a second that he was cruel enough shove the spicy chicken into Bucky’s mouth. He isn’t, unfortunately, so he settles for leveling the Disappointed Stare™️, full force. Bucky flinches.

“You haven’t worn that thing in a month,” he deadpans.

“You can shoot stuff! Shuri built a firing range just for me. Granted, it’s virtual—“

“Now where’s the fun in that.”

“—but still, it’s satisfying. The targets blow up. With fire.”

Bucky’s staring at him with the big eyes. He’s got a sort of innocent deer look to him, even though the effect is lessened by his semi-persistent ‘handsome murderer’ aesthetic. Unfortunately, Steve’s been doing stupid shit for those eyes since 1926.

“Shuri always tries to take my blood,” Steve mutters, petulant.

Bucky grins and wraps an arm around his waist. “Aw, she’s just a kid, Cap. They’re curious,” he says.

“It’s my blood,” Steve says, ignoring him. “I’ve kept it this long.”

“I’ll protect you from the big bad 18 year old girl,” Bucky promises, faux-serious. Steve finds it in himself to shove a piece of chicken in his laughing mouth. It turns out to be deeply satisfying; Steve has a smug smile on his face all the way up to the palace.

xxxx

“Mr. and Mr. Rogers,” Shuri greets without looking up from her work as they are led into the lab by a guard.

“Hey!”  Bucky protests at the same time Steve says “I think the practice of taking a spouse’s name is archaic.”

Shuri blinks at the two of them before shaking her head. “I am constantly surprised by the two of you. You did not turn out to be as expected.”

“We live to rebel,” Steve says drily. Shuri rolls her eyes.

“You know, Captain Rogers,” Shuri starts slyly. Steve moves to stand behind Bucky.

“Hey now, I promised him you wouldn’t come after him this time,” Bucky dutifully scolds.

“So he uses his boyfriend as a human shield?” Shuri asks, nose wrinkled. She only looks amused.

“I prefer to think of myself as a formerly-platonic life partner,” Bucky protests, arms crossed. Steve nods.

“You two are ridiculous! Why do I invite you anywhere near me?” Shuri directs the question at the ceiling.

“I was promised a firing range,” Steve tells the room in general.

Shuri points without looking at him.

xxxx

When Steve reappears a few hours later, still vibrating slightly from recoil, Shuri is throwing random objects at Bucky and he’s batting them out of the air. Steve watches, amused.

“Put some muscle in it!” Shuri shouts.

“I don’t have a muscle!” Bucky shouts back. He smacks a pencil directly back at Shuri, who ducks. He’s tense and frustrated; Steve can tell that Shuri can tell. The arm looks fine to Steve, but he’s never claimed to be an expert.

“Hey,” he says. Bucky glances at him and quirks a smile.

“Ugh,” Shuri sighs. “We are done for today.”

“Yeah,” Bucky says. He’s got a faraway look in his eyes as he approaches Steve.

“You okay?” Steve asks when Bucky leans against him, forehead on his shoulder. Bucky hums.

“It’s too easy to use, ain’t that dumb? It doesn’t hurt like the other one,” he murmurs, muffled against Steve. “I can’t work out how to move right.”

“You’ll get it,” Steve says. “You’ve done it before.”

“Yeah,” Bucky sighs. “Let’s go home.”

“Home,” Steve repeats, smiling into Bucky’s hair.

xxxx

Steve watches from the shore as Bucky swims around the lake. The sun has dipped below the trees, leaving the sky a deep purple that reflects against the water. It’s beautiful here.

“You should get in,” Bucky says for the hundredth time.

“I’m good here,” Steve replies.

Bucky pulls himself out of the water and shakes his head like a dog, spraying Steve, who can’t be bothered to care as he watches a droplet of water run down Bucky’s chest.

“Steve. Steve,” Bucky says, suddenly right in his face.

“Hi,” says Steve, staring at his lips. Bucky stares back.

“I was going to pull you in the lake,” Bucky whispers.

“You were?”

“I got distracted.”

Steve falls back on his elbows so Bucky will chase him, and because he’s predictable Bucky does just that.

“We should go inside,” Steve breathes, Bucky’s lips an inch from his own. “Try not to traumatize any children.”

“They can do to learn,” Bucky smiles. “It’s the miracle of life.”

“It’s really not,” Steve says, and cuts Bucky’s smartass reply off with his mouth.

They haven’t done this a lot. Once, during the War—an event that has still yet to be spoken of— and never again for eighty years.

It had taken time to relearn each other, to touch in a way that didn’t taste of the end of the world. There are still times when Bucky will twist a hand in Steve’s hair and pull , and other times when Steve’s fingerprints linger on his hips for hours. But there are other times, times like now, when Bucky is pressing featherlight kisses across Steve’s collarbone as he moves, where they are gentle. Where they are and are each other’s. Steve loves it. Steve loves him.

Chapter Text

Goat names.

Dimitri (Misha)

Steve Jr.

Samantha

Tin Can

Katja

Roger

Naisi

Dipshit

Pearl

Concrete

This has been

Goat names.

Chapter Text

Steve Jr. is a kiss-ass. This is according to several sources, namely Dipshit, who really can’t say much given he had the unfortunate luck of being named Dipshit.

Regardless, Steve Jr. is a kiss-ass. One-armed Human likes him best, which may stem from One-armed Human’s not at all secret love for the other, blonder human. The blonder human is named Steve, presumably after Steve Jr., and One-armed is named Bucky. Bucky is the source of all the names.

Pearl is the one who remembers when Bucky arrived best. She likes to talk about how Bucky was so sad, isn’t it tragic, Katja? Katja isn’t overly concerned; she has never paid overmuch attention to the human, or to the other goats, for that matter. Especially Pearl, who is quite stupid, and yet won't admit it to herself. Unlike Concrete, who is stupid, and if he had the faculties to think too hard about it, would readily admit it. Concrete and Naisi like to flounce around together, eating grass or something.

Pearl thinks they are adorable. Katja is smart, and knows that love is for children.

Katja’s closest friend is Tin Can, who wasn’t exactly stupid. Tin Can is named after a man who had shown up in a red flying suit on the day he was brought to the farm.

“Old McDonald!” Red Suit Man had greeted Bucky, who was affixing a sparkly collar around soon-to-be-named Tin Can’s neck. Katja’s collar is black, because Bucky understands her.

“Stark,” Bucky had returned. Then, Pearl had looked up at Suit Man, screeched, and promptly fainted. Samantha had sniffed her, pronounced her alive, and then went about her business. Samantha is caring like that.

“For that I’m going to name a goat after you,” Bucky had said to Suit Man. “This goat is now named Tin Can.”

“I have better nicknames,” Suit Man had griped, before strolling off to make stilted conversation with Steve.

Dimitri is Katja’s brother. They were the first goats who got names. Bucky, back then, had been more haunted and prone to swearing at himself in strange languages, which is why Dimitri and Katja have weird names.

It’s alright. At least Katja isn’t named after Bucky’s boyfriend who wasn’t even his boyfriend at the time, like Steve Jr. or Roger or arguably Dipshit. And she isn’t a kiss-ass, either. Let that be noted.

Steve Jr. is a kiss-ass. He gets food first, just because of his name and the fact that he doesn’t do fun things like chew on Bucky’s hair or eat socks. Katja will win, one day. She will prevail.