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It started because Steve wanted to show Bucky movies. When they were younger, they had watched Disney movies whenever they came out - Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Pinocchio, Fantasia, Dumbo, Bambi. It was a habit of theirs, even when they were young adults. Sometimes, Bucky brought young ladies with them, but it was usually just an event for the two of them.
When Steve came back, about a week after he was off-ice, he discovered that they had not only kept making Disney movies - they had made at least three hundred more movies. He could hardly believe it. But, when he started watching all of them - courtesy of Stark, and beginning with Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs… He couldn’t do it. He remembered the jokes Bucky would whisper in his ear, how Bucky would clap his hands when he laughed, how Bucky had teared up during both Dumbo and Bambi and smacked Steve for mentioning it. So, he stopped. He didn’t watch any more Disney movies.
Now, though. Now that Bucky’s back, Steve finds he can enjoy the Disney movies, if he watches them with Bucky. They have been steadily making their way through Steve’s new collection of Disney movies for weeks now, and Natasha and Sam happened to be crashing at their place for dinner when they watched The Lion King.
And that was where it began.
“How can you not be upset about that?” Bucky demanded, pointing aggressively at the screen, where Simba was snuggled against his dead father. “His father died. Are you made of stone, Natasha?”
“No, but I don’t cry when a cartoon lion dies,” Natasha said, grinning widely. Sam raised his eyebrows as he looked back and forth between them. Steve stretched his arm across the back of the sofa, surreptitiously placing it around Bucky’s shoulders to comfort him. Bucky wiped under his eyes harshly with his flesh hand.
“I’m not crying,” he argued roughly. He cleared his throat and turned back to the movie. Natasha snickered, and Bucky whipped a glare at her, which only served to launch Natasha into hysterics. Sam threw his hands into the air.
“I’m not staying for this,” Sam said. He stood from his armchair and pointed at Steve. “You’re the responsible one here. Keep the kids in line.” He pointed at Natasha and Bucky. “You two. Don’t destroy the city, please.”
“Yes, Mom,” Natasha answered mockingly, snapping her gum and returning her attention to the movie. Sam gathered up his coat and shoes while Bucky calmed down.
“To be fair, it’s a very emotional movie,” Steve said, quietly.
“Maybe if you’re six.”
“Заткнись'!”
“Enough, both of you!” Steve shouted over them.
“Listen to your father!” Sam called over his shoulder. The front door slammed shut behind him. Natasha snorted, and Bucky smacked her with his bionic arm. Steve stood up and fell down in between them, separating them on the sofa.
“Well?” Bucky asked, his voice hushed. Steve rubbed anxiously at the back of his neck. “What do you think?”
“Well… I think it’s a terrible idea,” Steve answered honestly. Bucky scowled at him, stretching up to adjust the bucket of water on top of the door. “Seriously, Buck. Nat’s gonna kill you.”
“It’s gonna be fine! It’s just a fun prank,” Bucky assured him. “I saw it in a movie. It’s fun, Stevie.”
“Bucky, no,” Steve said, a warning clear in his tone. Bucky just looked at him and grinned.
“Bucky, yes,” Bucky countered, reaching back up to check the bucket again.
Steve watched as Bucky steadied the bucket and stepped back to admire his handiwork. “I’m not going to be here for this,” Steve said, and he turned and left, rubbing at the bridge of his nose as he did. Bucky grinned.
“Natasha! Идите сюда!” Bucky called. “Скорее!”
Bucky listened as he heard Natasha’s light footsteps hurrying closer. “Bucky, what-”
She pushed the door to the kitchen open, dropping the bucket of freezing cold water all over herself. With her violently red hair dripping down her abdomen and onto the floor, she slowly raised her head to look at Bucky with the deadliest look Bucky has ever seen on a person. And he was an assassin for about seventy years. She let loose a truly impressive amount of colorful Russian curses and dove at Bucky, tackling him to the floor. Bucky shrieked and hit the ground.
“Steve, please,” Natasha pleaded. “I just want to stop this stupid prank war thing, alright? Really. Sincerely.”
Steve looked at her suspiciously over his focus mitts as she punched them, dead on, every single time. “Nat, I don’t know…”
“Really, Steve,” Natasha said, stopping briefly to look at him imploringly. “I just want to stop this before it gets too crazy. I'll get him his favorite drink, we'll pour a couple, we'll be best friends. It'll be great.”
Steve sighed. “Yeah, alright.” Nat grinned widely and resumed her exercise.
“Natasha, what the hell,” Steve groaned, rubbing his hands over his face as he looked down at Bucky. He crouched down, lifting Bucky’s head, pulling back his eyelids to check his pupils. When he released him, Bucky’s head smacked back down onto the kitchen table. His bionic hand fell down to hang limply by his side. “What did you put in his drink?”
“A healthy amount of ZzzQuil and a little S.H.I.E.L.D. secret,” Natasha answered gleefully. She put the cap back on the whiskey bottle, and Steve groaned again.
“That’s why you asked,” Steve exclaimed, taking the bottle from her. He thumbed the fading label that read Old Crow Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey in old, classic type print. “It’s from 1925, too. Damn it, Nat.”
“This is going to be so worth it, Steve, you’ll see,” Natasha promised. She set the three bottles of hair dye and the container of hair bleach on the table next to Bucky’s tumbler. Steve shook his head, even as Natasha dug a hairbrush and a couple of bright pink elastics out of her bag. “He’s going to be very pretty. And I even themed it for you, look.” Natasha leaned over and popped the caps of the three dye bottles, revealing one red, one white, and one blue. Steve sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose.
“Just make sure he’s in bed when you’re done,” Steve instructed, and Natasha nodded gleefully. “And nothing to incriminate me!” he added, pointing at Natasha, who held her hands up peaceably before she put latex gloves on them. Steve left Natasha and Bucky there and went to bed.
When Bucky woke up, he yawned and stretched his legs out under the covers. He sniffed, smelling the faint scent of ammonia, and frowned, but he shrugged it off. He shifted, realized he was wrapped around Steve, just like they used to do when they were young. Even though Steve was, without a doubt, bigger than him now, he still seemed to want to be the little spoon, and Bucky let him, sometimes. Bucky shut his eyes for a moment, pressing his face into Steve’s hair and sighing before he pulled away. He dragged himself out of bed and nearly toppled over immediately. He clutched his head in his bionic hand, relaxing slightly with the relief the cold metal brought to his headache.
“What the hell,” Bucky murmured. He realized, fleetingly, that he had little to no memory of anything that happened after he drank Natasha’s apology whiskey, but he shrugged, assuming that it was just genuinely good whiskey. He yawned again, padding across the room in his bare feet and boxers to the bathroom. He flicked the light on and shut the door, so the light would not wake Steve, and looked blearily into the mirror as he passed. He stopped, frowning, and turned back to the mirror. His eyes snapped open as he took in the braided pigtails his hair had been twisted into, his dark brown hair replaced with bright red, white, and blue stripes.
“Natasha!” he roared, throwing the door open, a rapid stream of colorful Russian swears following. Steve jerked up in bed, staring at Bucky as he stormed by, muttering some unkind words in Russian under his breath. Steve pushed his blonde bedhead hair out of his eyes and squinted.
“Buck, what the hell?” Steve asked tiredly, but Bucky just continued out of the room, his bionic arm whirring. Natasha was sitting up on the couch when Bucky got in there, Steve skidding in right behind him, wrapping a sheet around his waist frantically.
“What did you do?” Bucky demanded loudly. Natasha jumped to her feet, her sweatpants loose around her legs, even where her tank top was tight. She was also smiling too widely for her own good.
“I did a favor for Uncle Sam,” Natasha answered cheekily. “God bless America, right, Barnes?”
Bucky let out a hysterical growl and ran at Natasha, tackling her to the ground, much as she had done to him when he dunked the water on her. They wrestled on the ground for a solid thirty seconds before Steve stepped in and ripped them apart.
“Chair,” he instructed Natasha loudly, holding her up on her toes by the scruff of her neck. He tossed her in that direction, but Natasha landed on her feet and took two steps before she threw herself into the armchair. Steve hauled Bucky over to the sofa and threw him down. Steve stood back, the sheet still wrapped around his waist like a towel and trailing behind him like a wedding train, and put his hands on his hips. Bucky shrank into the sofa a bit under his scrutiny, but Natasha held strong, slouching into the armchair and yawning.
“I’ve had it with your stupid prank war,” Steve said.
“The Great Prank War of 2K14,” Natasha began to say, sitting up, but Steve held up a finger, silencing her. She sat back again.
“Your stupid prank war,” Steve continued, pointedly not using the ridiculous name, “is cutting into my sleep time.” He shrugged, throwing his hands up and letting them fall back down, smacking his palms against his sheet-covered thighs. “I need my eight hours, guys, c’mon. This prank war is over, as of right now, you hear me?” Steve paused. Natasha and Bucky both looked sheepishly down at their hands. “I asked if you heard me.”
“Yes,” they both grumbled. Steve relaxed a bit, playing with the edge of his sheet, even as he kept making eye contact with Natasha, then Bucky, then back again, back and forth. Steve grinned.
“Good,” he said. He ran a hand through his hair, rumpling it further. “Buck, apologize to Natasha.”
“But she-”
“Apologize.”
“Sorry,” Bucky muttered. Natasha grinned at him, but the grin fell away when Steve said,
“Now, Nat, apologize to Bucky.”
“Sorry,” Natasha murmured under her breath. Steve clapped his hands together.
“Now, you two are gonna make breakfast, together, and then we’ll watch the news, and then we’ll go for a jog. Sound good?”
“Yes,” they both muttered again. Steve pointed to the kitchen, and they both stood, Bucky in his boxers and Natasha in her sweatpants, and dragged themselves into the kitchen, Steve following behind them. When Natasha flicked the back of Bucky’s colorful head, and Bucky shoved her over, Steve made them make pancakes and bacon and sausage and eggs, side-by-side the entire time, while he laughed and filmed it on his phone.
He only helped Bucky wash the red, white, and blue stripes out of his braided, pigtailed hair after their jog, just for good measure.