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“Don’t do anything stupid until I get back.”
The seventy years old words echo in Bucky’s mind and he knows. Deep down he knows what Steve is going to do. He wants to say something, desperately wants to ask Steve to stay. But he can’t and he won’t. Steve deserves to have a shot at a normal life, with Pegs. He’s given enough.
So he scoffs and follows the script. “How can I ? You’re taking all the stupid with you.” They hug, like they did a lifetime ago. He doesn’t want to let go. Doesn’t want to let Steve go. But they part anyway, and Bucky looks down, because he doesn’t trust himself not to break if he looks in his friend’s eyes.
But then it occurs to him it might be the last time he sees Steve, so he looks up to his friend. “I’m gonna miss you buddy.” The words slip before he can try to hold them.
“It’s gonna be okay Buck.” Will it really be okay though ? Although, he supposes, okay can be a lot of things.
Bucky goes for a smile, but only the right corner of his mouth lifts and promptly falls back when Steve turns around.
Then Steve hops onto the platform and holds his gaze, they activate the machine... and Steve doesn’t reappear. Bucky waits for a couple of seconds, then turns around. So he did it. Good for him, he thinks. Then he sees someone sitting on a bench. He takes a few steps forward, uncertain, but who else could that be ? He calls Sam, because the guy still doesn’t have a clue about what happened.
Bucky watches Steve and Sam talk for a bit, then the first presents something circular to the latter.
He really smiles, then, because Sam is a good man, worthy of the title. He nods when the pararescue looks at him, then retreats. The moment is between the two of them, so he gives them their privacy. He will have time to talk to Steve later.
Farther away, next to the portal, stands a very confused Banner. Hulk. Professor Hulk ? Whatever. The man looks at him with a frown.
“It’s done.”
“He put the stones back ?”
“Yes.” Well, no confirmation yet, but Steve was there in one piece. And the guy was stubborn.
“Then why did he not come back on time ?”
“He lived a life.”
Bucky leaves after that. He’s not exactly sure why, but he cannot stay there. Instead, he goes back to the lake, where people are still talking.
Unfortunately, they hear or see him coming, so he’s got almost twenty faces looking at him expectantly in less than a second. “The stones are back to their rightful places”, he says, uncomfortable with the scrutiny.
People nod at him, satisfied, then go back to their previous activities.
All activity comes to a stop some time later when Sam and Steve return. Yeah, that must be a shock. -Hell, it is a shock to him, he didn't properly see Steve earlier- After all, Bucky didn't say anything more than that the stones were back where they belonged. Steve briefly explains what happened to the others, answers a couple of questions and sits on the porch.
Shuri turns to Bucky moments later. She looks at him with worried eyes and places a small hand on his arm. Are you okay, she asks. He offers her a small smile; I'm fine.
Bucky’s not fine.
The realisation hits him days later as he wakes up from a pleasant dream. A dream where Steve reappeared after the five seconds. They had hugged, Steve had clapped Sam and Banner on the shoulders and the four of them had gone to the cabin. The evening had come, Sam, Steve and himself leaving for Wakanda for a little while. Together.
Reality crashes down and roots him to the bed.
The bed is wrong. It’s too soft. The bed in his hut is not as soft. This mattress feels like it’s going to eat him alive. He’s never had something that soft. Not in the trenches, not on the run from HYDRA, god, he didn’t even had a bed during mission, not in Brooklyn…
It’s all wrong. He’s not where he should be. No, cross that, he shouldn’t be here at all. He should be dead. He should have died from that fall. Hell, he did in a sense. The real Bucky Barnes died on that day in the Alps. The real Bucky Barnes died in February '45.
He's a man out of time, just like Steve. Except Steve isn't anymore. Steve went back to live with Peggy. He doesn't pause to think about himself during those days, what if Steve did something and fucked up the timeline. What if he didn't do anything to protect the timeline but lived a happy life knowing Bucky was being used and treated like a machine.
Instead he thinks about how Steve deserved that life he finally got. He's happy for his friend. Truly. But a small part of him resents him nonetheless. He's happy for him, but feels betrayed at the same time.
Bucky lost the only person who really knew him, but at the same time he's not really Bucky Barnes anymore. Now he has a chance to start over, wipe the state clean.
He's happy for Steve, but he's sad for Sam. For that poor girl Wanda who lost her twin brother, her adopted brother and killed her lover for nothing. For Barton, Banner and the other Avengers who lost the friend they knew.
Then he remembers Steve lost Natalia and Stark. That Natalia had been his best friend as well. That it probably was what really pushed him, Stark’s advice just confirming his decision.
Bucky is happy for Steve, but why does it have to hurt so damn much ? His chest feels like it has been crushed, like it used to after the chair.
Bucky is happy for Steve because he loves him, but he hates him a bit as well because his best friend abandoned him.
'Til the end of the line.' That's what they had promised each other. Right. More like 'Til the end of the lie' apparently.
Steve dies.
Peacefully, he’s told. Bucky is glad, he deserved that much.
That fact doesn't stop him from breaking down after the funeral. It doesn't stop him from crumbling into Sam's arms, who is hurting as well and doesn't need to add Bucky to his own problems. It doesn't stop him from getting stuck in his bed and in his head the next morning when he realises that now he is well and truly alone.
They say, 'Home doesn't have to be a place. It can be people.'
His home just died. Stranded in an alien time, body and mind torn, Bucky is homeless.