Chapter Text
“SNIPER!”
“Everyone get down!”
The Howling Commandos are sent into a strafing scramble like ants trying to escape a boot.
You scuffle along the debris ridden pavement, trying to get a quick start when Bucky’s hand snags your upper arm and he shoves you to the cover of a crumbling stone wall. It’s enough cover for one – you slam into the rubble, breath leaving you as you scramble to grasp at your helmet.
A bullet whizzes by you, striking the road by your foot and you tug yourself in desperately, eyes wild as you begin to realize that in that split second, you’d become separated from the bulk of the group, left pinned under the scope of a Mauser.
“Shit!”
A bullet twings off the Nazi insignia on crumbling German Volkswagen to your left, sparking a bright silver as you scramble to press yourself deeper into the pavement below you.
“She’s pinned!”
“I can fucking see that, Steve!”
You tug at your arms, nails digging into the red and white medic arm-band secured over your uniform. Another bullet whizzes by, striking a few feet off from your head and you scream.
The reaction stirs a new-found fear in your commandos. They’re all wide-eyed, frozen in step until you suck in enough air to bellow out:
“Fucking hell, can someone help me!?”
Back in motion.
Steve, from his perch behind a shop door, is quick to book it across the main road and skid into the safety of the bombed bakery that Dum Dum and Bucky had fallen into for cover.
Dum Dum is crouched behind an open door, eyes trained on you as Jim shares a worried look from across the road. “Can anyone see the fucker?!”
Another shot rings out, this one bounding off a rock over your shoulder and you scramble to make yourself smaller. At this point, the medic symbol emblazoned on your helmet is just as good as a target. Your boots scrape against the road, knees tucked to your chest.
And then you see it. The dislodged side-mirror of the Volkswagen – it’s five feet ahead, glimmering in the sun; and as another bullet flies by you and towards where Falsworth had poked his head out, you catch the glint of a muzzle flash.
“Straight down the strip! Church! Third floor! One of the left windows!” you bellow out, voice hoarse as you spot Bucky moving to scramble, “I caught it in the mirror!”
“That’s my girl!” it’s an affectionate cheer from Bucky as he slides into position beside Jim farther up the road sniper slung over his shoulder as he pops up onto his knees, “You’re going to be fine, doll! Just keep your head down!”
His voice is hoarse with worry and you nod, helmet shaking as you press yourself into the wall.
Bucky’s gaze is wild, jumping from his squad back to you. “Anyone wanna play chicken? I need a distraction!”
“Not really,” you holler, “I’m a little busy at the moment!”
“Do not move!” Bucky’s voice cuts through the air, heavy with an emotion you’ve never heard him speak with and it sparks something scary in your gut, “You stay right there, doll!”
Another shot flies by your foot and the wall crumbles a bit on impact, dusting you with dirt and debris.
“That’s six! He’s reloading!”
Bucky curses, ducking reflexively at the thwang of the impact – but your curled up figure has him stomaching the heavy dread of sticking his head out from cover; and sure enough, down the scope, Bucky spots the single Kraut holed in the church steeple. He’s grappling with ammo, and Bucky’s fingers shake.
He’s always had feelings for you – ever since you’d been assigned to the commandos on recommendation from Peggy months ago; you were a nurse turned medic, sick of seeing bodies come into the field hospitals.
(You’d disobeyed Phillips direct orders and gone and combed through the Kraut infested woods by Marigny – and you and three other nurses hauled seven men back to camp, dodging sniper fire and kraut artillery.
It had earned you some shiny medal and a letter from the President.
You thought it was a whole lot of bullshit and had told Steve you wished they had sent morphine instead of a fucking medal.
What am I supposed to do with it? I’ve dug shrapnel outta guys that are prettier than this hunk of metal.)
You and him had quickly become a working pair – and while Bucky knew he should think nothing of it, he did and it left him in a panic in moments like these.
“I see him!”
“Come on, Buck,” it’s Dum Dum, “We need our medic alive.”
“I would like her to stay alive, yeah!” Bucky breathes, lips tugged into a worried chew as he stiffens his shoulders.
There’s a beat of a moment, and exhale, a blink, and then he pulls the trigger.
The window of the church shatters, but the figure of the sniper moves and Bucky knows he missed.
“Did you –”
“Shit!”
A bullet peels by Bucky’s head and he curses at the volley. He felt the air on that one, and Jim’s face is pulled into a terrified grimace. The man presses his fingers along his brow and shoulders, reciting a quick prayer as Bucky’s annoyance grows.
You’re balled up tight, still, eyes wide in fear.
“Come on, Buck,” you shout, “You got ‘im!”
“Fuck this guy to fucking hell.”
Bucky’s fast, propping himself back up to volley right back – and this time, the hit is hard and fast and deep and the slump of the man’s shoulders and spray along the shattered window tells him he made the shot.
Silence falls along the street as Bucky watches – counting the beats of a breath. Still no movement. He’s down. And so, he tosses his sniper over his shoulder and stands, stretching his legs.
“We’re good.”
“Nice shooting, Buck.”
You melt into the pavement, hand clutching your heart and your helmet as you kick your legs up and roll onto your back. Relief is instantaneous; and though this certainly wasn’t your firstmoment of near-death in this war, you have to admit it was enough.
Bucky toddles over to you, boot nudging your own. His hands are on his hips, smile sly and eyes soft.
“You alright, kid?”
“Yeah,” you swallow, “I’m good. Just… leave me here for a bit. I gotta find my soul. I think it left my body on the second shot.”
Bucky offers a hand. “I ain’t leavin’ you anywhere. Now, get up, we got places to be, people to rendezvous with.”
You wish maybe you could be like him – heart-of-gold and never stopping.
He squeezes your hand and it reminds you of the balance you’d achieved with the sergeant. You’d throw yourself into the middle of it for a downed man and he’s cover you.
A fair, working relationship.
You stand on shaky knees and move to gather the medical pack you’d lost in the fray – it settles over your shoulders and you feel a bit safer again beside Bucky as the Howling Commandos fall in step again and comb through the abandoned French town.
“Thanks for that,” you say after a few miles of walking and a comfortable silence.
Bucky is picking through the back of a fast track for ammo when you say it, and his fingers still along the wooden crate – he blinks over his shoulder at you, emotions guarded.
“S’all in a days work, doll,” he chirps, tossing a box or two into his rucksack, “Without you, we got no medic.”
He comes up with a handful of bandages and tosses them to you. You catch them with a reserved amount of grace, muscles taught with an odd feeling of rejection.
Without you, we got no medic.
You stammer, tripping over your words as you follow him through the ruins of the town. “Yeah, but, y’risked your neck for me, Buck.”
“Like I said,” he chirps, “S’nothin’, doll.”
“Right.”
The silence that follows isn’t comfortable, and it sticks around as you fiddle with the pack of bandages and toddle behind the group. Bucky is in the midst of kicking himself – but maybe this was for the best; distancing the co-dependence knotting itself around his heart was only smart.
You were a medic.
Expendable.
But, no. Bucky can’t keep his fucking mouth shut.
“Ya alright?” he says, careful and tentative, “After all that, I mean. It can be kinda fucking rough on y’brain.”
You blink, eyes jumping up to him as he starts beside you. His step falls in line with yours.
“Oh. Yeah. M’fine.”
“Good.”
Bucky exhales. He pulls his brows together, rubbing his face. You watch him struggle to streamline the words into a sentence and tilt your head.
“Are you alright?”
“Yeah – I mean. I was kinda an asshole early. Just… you ain’t just our medic. I… You’re part of the Commandos and we all care about you. So…”
Your lips part. The confessions settles happily in your chest.
“So don’t go gettin’ yourself killed, alright? I can’t loose my medic.”
Bucky smiles, all crooked and slow and you nod and promise.
“Never.”