Chapter Text
Bucky has no idea who's paying for his apartment in New York. It's possible there's a military back pay situation someone is trying very hard to hide and so they give him what he needs. A small apartment near enough to his old neighborhood that he could walk there if he wanted, not that he'd recognize any of it, probably. He hasn't tried.
Down in Louisiana, with Sam's stupidly warm hand in his and Sam's awful smile making something melt inside Bucky's chest somewhere, things seemed pretty clear. To figure out what kind of person he wants to be, he needs to get rid of the mortgage the Winter Soldier took out on his soul.
Make amends. Give recompense for the wrongs that have been done, somehow. Properly, this time. Not to make himself feel better, not to fix his nightmares, but to give the people who were hurt some closure. People he hurt.
The guilt sits heavy inside his chest - where his heart should be. It thrums with the sound of battle, the ricochet of a gun.
Bucky has no idea who is paying for his apartment, but he's going to have to find out, before all of this is over. He can't keep letting other people have control of his life like that.
+
For seventy years, the world has been shaped by Hydra hiding in the shadows, using him to chisel away at a better future, to turn it into a Nazi utopia. If Bucky had been a better, stronger man, he could have stopped them at any point. When it mattered, he didn't kill Steve, programming be damned - so it stands to reason that what stood between the world and true progress was his weakness.
How do you apologize for that? How do you make amends for single-handedly forcing history down a darker path?
+
He starts at the top.
Mr. Nakajima smiles when he sees him and that's not right, that's the worst thing he can do. It cuts all the way through Bucky's resolve and he's this close to turning around and running away again. He doesn't want to hurt this man any more than he already has.
"Want to get some lunch? I'm paying."
His credit card is government issue and he has an account that's mysteriously filled with enough to get by, even indulge himself every once in a while. Mr. Nakajima shakes his head happily. "You got it last time, today I will pay."
Bucky sighs and lets the old man lead the way. The sushi place is so crowded, they decide on hot dogs instead and find a bench to sit and talk. It's a nice day, sunny but not too hot, and the people walking past all seem to be a little happier than usual.
"I heard your date did not go so well after all," Mr. Nakajima says, his tone a playful tease. "You will have to grovel a lot to make up for it. But I'm sure she will forgive you."
Bucky closes his eyes and leans back, trying to feel the sun on his face. He's cold suddenly, like winter is still running through his veins. He can't talk about new sins right now, not when the old ones are going to choke him. He's scared. He likes Yori and he doesn't want to lose this tentative friendship, but Sam is right - his feelings aren't what matters here.
How do you apologize for killing someone's son?
Bucky takes a deep breath. "There's something I wanted to talk to you about." He can't look at Yori. "I know what happened to RJ."
Yori doesn't speak, but his breath sounds ragged in the silence between them. Bucky opens his eyes to look at him. The old man is hunched over, hands clasped in his lap. He looks fragile, like a single tap could shatter him. Bucky hates himself for being the hammer.
"Do you want me to tell you?" Bucky says. He can't be the one who makes that choice. "I don't know if it will hurt you more to know, or if it will finally give you peace."
Yori mutters something beneath his breath - it's Japanese, but Bucky can't make out the words. Then he takes a deep breath and looks at Bucky with so many unshed tears. "How did you get this information? I have tried everything. The police could not find the killer or why they would murder my son. Please tell me what you know."
This is it. This is where Bucky has to explain it all, explain himself and hope that it will be enough to serve as closure. He leans back and looks at the sky. It makes him think of Sam and his wings and his conviction. Be as good of a person as you can be by doing good things.
"I don't know how much you know about any of this, so I'm going to start at the beginning. They called me the Winter Soldier. I was born in 1917 and got drafted into the army during World War II." He gives a rundown of the events that led up to his fall from the mountain. "I didn't die. It would have been better for everyone if I had, but the serum they put in my blood served its purpose."
Bucky swallows hard. He probably shouldn't have eaten anything because he feels like vomiting. "Hydra found me. They put me in a machine and they fried my brain over and over again. Whatever they did, it made me susceptible to these code words they put in my head. Anyone who said those words could order me to do absolutely anything, and I did it. They put me on ice when they didn't need me, but for seventy years, I was their willing puppet."
Glancing over at Yori, Bucky finds the old man crying quietly, hands clutched so tight his knuckles go white. "Do you need me to stop?"
Yori shakes his head very, very softly, but doesn't say anything else.
Bucky closes his eyes, leaning forward, mirroring Yori's pose. "I killed a lot of people. I did other things, too, some that I'm glad I can't really remember. Hydra had their fingers in a lot of pots, did a lot of damage to the world. Your son, RJ, he really was in the wrong place at the wrong time. His hotel hosted this politician, a diplomat trying to build a peace agreement between his country and a powerful neighbor. My mission was to take that guy out, no witnesses. RJ... he was just trying to get into his room. He saw me, saw what I did, and I didn't even hesitate."
Bucky exhaled shakily. "I shot him. He didn't stand a chance."
There is utter silence. Even the sound of the other people in the park seems muffled somehow. Maybe it's the roar of blood in Bucky's ears. Yori moves to stand, shaky legs trembling. Bucky tries to help when Yori flinches back. "Don't touch me."
Bucky sits back down. The words hit him like a slap in the face. "I'm sorry, Yori. I-"
"Mr. Nakajima," the old man hisses.
Bucky can't breathe. He nods. "Mr. Nakajima.
Mr. Nakajima stands before him, an old man shaking with rage. "You are a monster. Coming here and doing what? Pretending to be my friend? Did you want to kill me too?"
"No, of course not! That's not me anymore, I-"
"Soldiers, they come back from war, they always say that. I was just following orders. I'm a different man. Doesn't change that people are dead."
Bucky shakes his head. He can feel his heart beating like war drums. "No, it doesn't. I just wanted to help. Please, tell me what I can do to help."
"Bring back my son."
Noise crashes back in on them, children playing, dogs barking, the sound of life all around them. Bucky can only shake his head. "I can't."
"Then we are finished here, Winter Soldier."
"Yori-"
"It's Mr. Nakajima," he says and walks away. "Mr. Nakajima."
+
Bucky sits on the bench for hours, his mind a blur of guilt and memories.
+
Dr. Raynor's office is too quiet. She looks at him and waits. She's very good at this kind of violence. They've done this before, when Bucky felt particularly defiant. His record is a whole ten minutes just staring back at her, until he breaks.
"Why did you give me the rules?" Maybe if he keeps asking questions, one of these days she will give him an answer.
Dr. Raynor sighs. "I was hoping you might talk about what has you spooked so much you needed a session at 9pm."
Bucky opens his mouth, but nothing comes out. He takes a breath. "When I told you I wanted to make amends, help put the world back together after what I'd done, you made this face like a I had disappointed you somehow. And then you gave me those rules. Why?"
Dr. Raynor closes her notepad and puts it away. She leans forward in her chair and gives him a tired smile. "Bucky," she says, carefully, as if to a scared animal. She has never called him Bucky before. "When we started these sessions, I told you what my purpose was. I assess combat readiness and potential danger to self or others. I'm not a trauma therapist."
He nods. "I know that."
Dr. Raynor sighs. "Do you? I can't teach you how to live your life, certainly not twce a month for thirty minutes at a time. The rules were there to protect you, because I can't stop you from making those choices. Just hope that you don't get yourself killed trying to right a wrong you're not responsible for."
Bucky's eyes widen. "Bullshit," he says through clenched teeth. It's 2024 and there is video of the Winter Soldier roughing up a bar in Madripoor. He still remembers pulling every trigger. It's his hands that are full of blood.
Dr. Raynor shakes her head. "What was done to you was unbelievably monstrous, so much so that I have a hard time wrapping my mind around the damage. You try to act like you're fine and you're very, very good at that. Making amends is something you think you need to do, because it's giving you control over the situation. Because if you admit that all of that was done, not by you, but to you, all of your carefully erected walls might crumble."
+
Don't do anything illegal. Just because you're pardoned for past crimes doesn't mean they can't put you away for the next one.
Don't hurt anyone. Yes, that includes yourself. Especially yourself.
Tell them that you're not the Winter Soldier anymore. You're James Buchanan Barnes. That's important.
+
"Bucky, tell me what happened."
+
He thinks about Sam. When it all falls apart and he's tearing through all his walls, that's what's left. The way Sam smiles at him, believes in him, challenges him. He's crying, he knows he is, and he can't stop it. He talks and talks, tells Raynor of the way Mr. Nakajima looked at him. What he said. How it knocks down the small piece of himself he's grown into a real person, or tried to.
"Bucky," Raynor says, as gentle as she can be. Which is still a tough old war horse, but Bucky appreciates the effort. She's not the worst person to be in the room when Bucky loses his shit.
"I don't know who I am," Bucky says, and as soon as he says the words he understands that he is afraid of finding out. For so long, everyone else has defined who he was, and now that it's his turn, he's scared to fuck it up.
"But I do know who I want to be."
Raynor smiles. "And who is that?"
Bucky is sure that what he brings out in this moment is the wettest, ugliest smile in his long history, but it's genuine.
+
He gets the text on the way out the door of Raynor's office. It's a sign.
They're in New York. Don't do anything stupid. Wait for me at the old Avengers Tower.
+
Bucky is going to do exactly what Sam asks of him, but then he runs into Walker in full Captain America gear with a shield on his back and follows him all the way to the GRC summit building. If Sam has intel on the flag smashers, Walker probably has it, too. There are a lot of people who'd rather have his version of Captain America than Sam's, and they're more than ready to break protocol to help the guy.
There are hundreds of protesters and Bucky's sure that some of them are active flag smashers, but most of them are probably just good people, trying to make the world a better place. Or at least stopping it from becoming actively worse. He remembers being sent to kill people like this, to disrupt their movements, to channel them into revolutions or disperse them, dilute their messages.
He feels old guilt tug at him, but he sets it aside.
There has never been someone else. The Winter Soldier is not a different person from you, he's not your evil twin. He's what you were when you didn't have any power or agency. He is the man who survived unimaginable torment. Lay him to gentle rest.
Bucky loses Walker in the crowd, but that's not his biggest problem. The GRC summit is on high alert, tight security and everyone armed to the teeth. But Bucky knows a thing or two about infiltration and some of these guards don't look right. They're nervous beyond what the situation would explain, sweating, shifty eyes. Fingers too close to triggers.
Fuck.
The flag smashers are not just a small terrorist group, they're a movement. They have supporters across the world. In every walk of life.
Bucky takes a deep breath. He needs to get into that building unseen. This is Winter Soldier work. His hand is shaking, just a small tremor, and then he cracks his neck, closes his eyes. Opens them and feels calm, icy certainty.
+
He moves silently, gracefully, through back alleys, across rooftops. Jumps higher, farther than he has in years. He feels nothing and wants nothing, there is just the mission. And the rules.
You're James Bucky Barnes. You are the Winter Soldier. You will not hurt anyone unless absolutely necessary. Sam Wilson believes in you.
+
There are hundreds of them, flag smashers all, and they look like children playing at war. There were twenty vials of the serum, Zemo destroyed about half a dozen, maybe as many as eight. Worst case scenario, Bucky has to deal with ten or eleven super soldiers. The odds aren't great that he'll make it out alive, but for the first time in a long time, he wants to make sure that he does. It feels like a warm knot in his chest. Where his heart is.
Sam is still several hours out, even if he got a ride on a military jet.
The light goes out.
It's starting.
+
The Winter Soldier works himself through from the bottom to the top. He doesn't kill anyone. He runs into Walker again about five floors away from the summit chambers. Walker has a gun, not the small service weapon he wore before, this one looks like a M4 rifle. The Winter Soldier prefers the AK, of course, because these American guns are shit in any kind of weather. You drop into a river with an AK on your back, it'll still kill your enemy on the other side. A desert looks at the M4 funny, it jams in your hands and gets you and your people killed.
Walker has blood on his hands. Not just metaphorically.
"Walker, you have to stop. This isn't the way," Bucky says.
Walker has a rifle. Bucky brought a knife to a gun fight. He smiles.
+
Bucky twists and flips and ducks out of the way of the spray of bullets until he gets an opening in Walker's rage. They fight hand to hand and Walker packs a real punch, but the new shield is made of nothing but metal. It dents under Bucky's assault, buckles under the strain.
"I'm going to kill you," Walker spits at him, "and then I'm going to kill the bitch that killed Lemar. For the entire world to see."
Bucky lets the Winter Soldier out to play.
+
Walker yells after him, spitting curses like fire, but he's tied to a weight-carrying pillar, bound as securely as Bucky can make it in such a short time. Bucky flips him off.
"Should have stayed out of my way, Captain."
+
The GRC summit chambers are a battle field, Bucky counts several hostages, screaming and crying, a few bodies fallen where they stood. Karli and her people are working on something technical, until the massive screen at the back of the room lights up with Karli's face. It's a prepared video statement, paused on an a neutral expression. No smiles for the end of the world as they know it.
Real Karli looks tiny in comparison. "Are we live?"
One of her men nods. "We're broadcasting everywhere. Anyone with a computer, phone or TV is going to hear us."
+
"Today is the day that everything changes. My name is Karli Morgenthau. Many of you know me, many more have heard my name said in the same breath as the word terrorist. And if terror is the only way things can change, then so be it.
The GRC is preparing to herd millions of people like cattle and stick them into camps. We all know our history, don't we? They'll send us away so you can live your normal lives in peace. And how long is that going to last? Who is next? They don't like the color of your skin, the way you love, the things you believe in, and suddenly you're right there with us. You can't appease the powerful, all they want is more power.
Today we say no. I will start to cut out the rot from the head, one GRC council member at a time, but I ask you to go out there tonight and take back your communities from the people who would charge you for every breath. Take back what's yours. Don't let them divide us!
One world, one people!"
+
Bucky drops from the ceiling like a very deadly spider. There's at least five super powered individuals in the room, more with guns, and all he has is the element of surprise. But there's a danger in giving untrained, terrified people big weapons they don't know how to use properly. The Winter Soldier has been a machine of war for nearly a century. He grins. He can take them.
+
I'm about to do something stupid. Get to the GRC summit ASAP. We're in the 113th floor.
+
He's not wrong about what the Winter Soldier can handle. He's cocky, sure, but he's not stupid.
He just doesn't expect the French guy with the military grade EMP rocket launcher pointed right at his chest from half a room away.
Bucky has just enough time to think, well, fuck, and pull up his arm for some kind of protection, before a small sun explodes in his face and all the world goes white.