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In his extended lifetime, Steve had seen many battlefields.
He’d watched men run across them in the countless newsreels, long before he has the serum mixed in with his blood. He’d longed for it, wanted to be there, and he had ran across them himself, his feet pounding while trying not to look at the pale, still faces of his former comrades lying on the ground. Steve had looked evil in the eye, then, and after he had awoken from the ice, he found a little relief in the fact he would never be in that exact position ever again.
Namely, because everyone he had known was now dead.
But that was different.
So he had slowly adjusted to life in this ultra-modern world, so unlike the one he had previously known. After the incident in New York, what with it being his first battle since the war, he didn’t think he could stand the ‘Big Apple’ after that, although Steve knew he would always be a Brooklyn boy. With that, he politely refused Stark’s offer of a room in Stark Tower, (a lot had changed, but Steve’s reluctance to accept charity hadn’t.) He packed his belongings, however few, and headed off to Washington D.C. He liked it right away; there was something comforting about being in the nation’s capital full-time. He had found a quiet apartment complex on a not so busy part of town, and, he’d been content. Not happy, per se, but content. He had everything he needed, and that was much more than he deserved.
The only thing he didn’t have was Bucky.
Steve was haunted every night by the image of Bucky falling, and every night, Steve was only able to watch helplessly as his best friend plummeted to his death. He’d wake up terrified, and covered in sweat, and afterwards, sleeping again felt like a war in itself. But, he would always hide that fact about himself, because he needed to be useful in order to function; his job was to protect and defend his country, and he would be damned if he ever stopped.
It had been an ordinary day when his cell phone (S.H.I.E.L.D had provided it, much to Steve’s detest) buzzed, with a message from an unfamilar number, saying he was needed on a mission; hostages were involved.
He decided to go for a run beforehand, to calm down. There, he got picked up by the one and only Natasha Romanoff. He knew her, but not too well. Getting in the car, waving goodbye to Sam, he figured that’s why she was sent to pick him up. It was a fact Steve was a better tactical thinker whe he was surrounded by people he didn’t know much better.
He pushed back the thought of maybe that if he had stayed away, Bucky would have lived.
He wouldn’t think of that.
No, he wouldn’t.
The thought of Bucky lingered in the back of his mind for hours afterward.
Losing Fury was a shock, a tidal wave of emotion he did not see coming. He’d always thought of the man as unstoppable, an unmovable force, strong and steady, seeing the world with one eye, and seeing each and every person not as themselves, but as individual ‘motherfuckers’. When he died, it was like a hole no one knew how to repair. He had run after him, busting through the window. He threw his shield at him. He watched it hurtle towards his enemy, right on mark, until the man turned and caught it, and threw it back, all the while glaring st him. There were huge smears where black war paint had been, circled around his eyes. Steve paused then. The eyes of this person, this bionic being, were so familar; it felt like he knew him -
No.
It couldn’t be.
No.
Not him.
Not Bucky.
Later at the hospital, by the window, Natasha had told him about this assassin. “Most of the intelligence community doesn’t believe he exists,” she had whispered. “And the ones that do, call him the Winter Soldier. ” She had paused. “He’s a ghost,” she whispered, running a hand through her hair. “We’ll never find him.”
She stopped speaking for a moment, for asking, “What was he like?”
Steve swallows, harshly swallowing the lump that had just suddenly formed in his throat.
He was like my best friend.
"He’s fast…strong."
Upon further thought, he added, “He has a metal arm.”
He wondered exactly what they did to Bucky.
The fight with him, surprisingly, was not as shocking as Steve thought it would be.
It was painful - oh god, it was painful - but nothing compared to the feeling of waking up, and realizing Bucky was gone. All those years he though without him, only to know he was being tortured, and who knows what else.
Sam says he isn’t the kind of person that they save; he’s the kind that they stop. But Sam doesn’t know. He’ll never know.
He said ‘til the end of the line, and if Steve Rogers was anything, it was a man of his word.
He finds Bucky, a year later, in their old Boy Scout meeting house - it was a run down shed by then. (Steve was surprised it wasn’t completely gone.)
Bucky doesn’t question how Steve found him; it’s obvious. This is where they pretty much exchanged their first words, all those years ago.
Steve carefully slids down the fragile wall to sit beside Bucky.
"I know you. Where from?"
The sudden, husky voice startles Steve.
"Um.."
He isn’t sure how to begin.
"I do know you, right? It’s not another another trick they did?" Bucky asks anxiously, and Steve sees that his eyes are full of unadulterated fear, and that pierces him to the core.
"No, you do! You do! I’m….I’m your best friend. My name is Steve."
"Steve.." Bucky says, slowly, as if tasting the name on his tongue. "What’s mine?"
"Your name? Your name is Bucky. Well, that’s what I call you. Your real name is James.”
"Is your last name Rogers?" Bucky says abruptly.
Steve’s taken aback.
"Yeah..how’d you know?"
"I remember seeing it…and hearing them say it a couple of times…they always said it in a red way."
"Red way? What’d you mean, Bucky?"
"Red way. Like, you know, angry. They always muttered and glared. They did the same when they talked about me. Said I was never ‘nough."
Bucky’s dialogue is broken up by sharp, piercing sobs.
Steve slides an arm around his shoulders.
"Hey, shhh. Don’t listen to them. What they made you out to be? That’s not who you really are. Believe me, Bucks. I know you don’t know, but I know you better than anyone in the entire world, and you’re the same for me. Do you really want to know who you are? Your full name is James Buchanan Barnes. You were born in 1925 to George and Winifred Barnes, and you had a younger sister, Rebecca, who adored you more than anything. Your mom died when you were really little, and your dad died in a parachuting excerise at Camp Lehigh right before Christmas in 1937. That’s why, even now, I bet, you’re afraid of heights. You dated Susie Dayton in the eighth grade, nad you always went on about how obsessed she was with you, although you ended up taking her to prom. You were always good at science and arithmetic in school; I always was better at history. You used to defend me from all the guys that used to pick on me because of my size, and that’s exactly how we became friends, right here in this room. Georgie Harris picked on me, you threw a punch at him, and I was amazed that someone stood up for me, because, that only happened in the books, y’know?"
"I remember,” Bucky gasped. “I remember that: Georgie, Susie, all of it! She used to follow me around all the time!
"I know!" Steve laughed for the first time in ages, and Bucky sat up with a new light in his eyes.
"I remember you, too! Your name is Steven Alexander Rogers, and you were born in 1920, in Brooklyn. And….your parents, Sarah…and Joseph Rogers. You had a whole lot of siblings; your house was always loud when I came to walk you to school. You hated Susie Dayton as much as I did, and you were the only one who paid any attention when history class rolled around. And you were my best friend."
Bucky turned to Steve.
"And you are now."
Steve Rogers had fought on many battlefields in his lifetime.
But none more rewarding than the one belonging to Bucky Barnes.