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Bucky moved with a catlike grace. Near-silent, deadly, ferocious, disappearing into the darkness of the old warehouse like a jaguar slinking through the jungle. Probably as deadly. Not that Sam knew a whole lot about jungle cats. Sort of thing didn’t come up too often.
Sam pressed himself against a row of musty boxes, adjusted his grip on the shield, and tried not to breathe too loud in the thick silence. His heart hammered. He strained to hear the sound of movement, the rustle of clothing or the pad of boots against concrete. Nothing. Maybe Bucky had snuck out somehow since Sam had followed him in. Maybe Sam was all alone after all.
Sam moved carefully toward the exit. His sneakers crunched over the loose gravel on the cement floor. His breath was harsh in his ears. Water was dripping somewhere.
Thump.
Bucky landed right in front of him from high above. Sam scrambled back, bringing up the shield, but Bucky’s metal hand clamped around the edge. Sam pulled back instinctively, his arm still in the straps, but Bucky held tight. Through the shadows, he could see Bucky’s eyes glinting, hard and unblinking and distant. Like he didn’t recognize Sam at all. The moment stretched out.
“Bucky…” Sam breathed.
“That isn’t my name,” Bucky said, and wrenched the shield sideways, the hard edge driving into Sam’s arm. It was caught between them, and then Bucky jerked it away and something near Sam’s elbow snapped wetly and the shield came free.
Sam bit back a scream of pain and staggered backward, cradling his arm to his chest, as Bucky slid it dispassionately onto his own arm.
“This isn’t you,” Sam gasped.
Bucky stared at him with the empty, emotionless gaze of a predator. Then, casually, like it was nothing, he shoved Sam with his vibranium arm, the force of it sending him flying backwards into a stack of crates that splintered and toppled under his weight. Sam crumpled to the ground stunned.
When he finally managed to push himself up from the rubble, staggering and bleeding and holding his broken arm tight to his body, every inch of him aching, Bucky was gone.
“What do you mean, a hallucination wizard?” Bucky said, staring at the file Sam had spread out over the picnic table. “No way that’s a real thing. It doesn’t sound like a real thing.”
“You just don’t like that I called him a wizard,” Sam said. “But that’s the name he goes by. The Wizard.”
Bucky snorted derisively. “So what are we talking here? A sorcerer with a hat?”
Sam smirked and punched Bucky’s arm lightly where he was sitting beside him on the picnic table bench. He was tickled that Bucky remembered the joke. It was probably because Bucky had a cyborg brain with an assassin’s attention to detail, but it was tempting to think it meant more than that. Wishful thinking on Sam’s part, obviously.
Bucky grinned at him and the butterflies in his stomach did a little flutter.
They were at the dock, listening to the seagull calls and lapping waves while Sam filled him in on the latest intel from Torres. In the months since Sam had taken on the shield, Bucky had mostly been content to stay in Delacroix with Sarah and the boys, helping out with the business and the housework while Sam went off on missions. Still, he always insisted on hearing what was coming down the pipe. And sometimes he insisted on coming.
“So it’s either a sorcerer or someone who can do sorcerer-like stuff. He specializes in screwing around with people’s minds. All accounts indicate he’s set up shop in NOLA. Lotta tourists looking for a ‘magical’ experience, and they’ll pay.”
“Is he hurting anyone?” Bucky said.
“Reports of people forgetting who they are, leaving their families, selling everything they own, attacking neighbors...and they’re not coming back to themselves on their own. They start wandering around, all feverish and confused, thinking they’re someone else or somewhere else,” Sam said.
“That’s not good,” Bucky said.
“So since it’s one of the Big Three, I said I’d check it out,” Sam finished. “And hey, it’s not like it’s going to be a long trip.”
“I’m coming with you,” Bucky said.
Sam studied his face for a moment, surprised. “Are you sure?”
“No one should have their mind taken from them like that,” Bucky said, in a low voice that sent a chill down Sam’s spine despite the Louisiana summer heat.
Sam nodded, and put a hand on his arm. Bucky sucked in a sharp breath through his nose. His arm was tense under Sam’s hand.
“Okay,” Sam said. “I get that.”
They headed into the city in Sam’s truck the next day.
Sam dragged himself out of the pile of boxes Bucky had tossed him into, and back to his truck, still in the gravel parking lot outside the warehouse. Bucky was nowhere to be seen. His cell phone—which Sam had used to track him to the warehouse in the first place--was lying on the dusty gravel of the parking lot, the screen cracked.
Sam swore under his breath, climbed in the truck, and drove himself to the emergency room.
Sarah insisted on coming to meet him and wouldn’t take no for an answer. When Sam walked out into the waiting room with his arm strapped to his chest in a splint, several hours later, he found Sarah hunched anxiously in one of the plastic chairs biting her nails. She stood up and walked up to meet him but hovered, like she wanted to hug him but was afraid to upset his arm. He could see her eyes moving from the splint on his arm to a long scrape on his cheek from the boxes to the older circle of bruising that ringed his neck.
Sam wrapped his good arm around her and pulled her in sideways. “You didn’t have to come all the way out here.”
“Carlos is watching the boys,” Sarah said, stepping back and looking him up and down. “Bucky did this?”
“He wasn’t himself,” Sam said, then couldn’t help but scrub his good hand down his face, the reality of the situation sinking in another few degrees. Tracking down Bucky and trying to apprehend him had been hard enough when he’d been in good shape and Bucky had had his phone. Now, he didn’t even know where to start.
“Hey. You look terrible,” Sarah said, worry softening her tone. She caught his good elbow. “Let’s get you home.”
“I’m fine,” Sam said automatically. The drugs they’d given him before setting the bone were starting to wear off. His arm throbbed sharply. His head and body ached in a dull echo. He needed to sleep. He realized he was clenching his teeth and forced himself to relax his jaw, but it was too late.
“I’m driving you home,” Sarah said. “I’ll send Tommy to pick up the truck tomorrow.”
Sam let out a long breath, and then nodded. As much as he wanted to go after Bucky—as much as everything inside him screamed to go after Bucky, because Bucky needed him—he was dead on his feet, he had no leads, and it was well past midnight.
“Good,” Sarah said, and before Sam could change his mind she was herding him toward the parking lot.
It was raining lightly, and the droplets on the car windows blurred the dark world outside, creating prisms of all the hospital lights and street lights and headlights. Sam sat in the passenger seat, feeling every single bump on the road like a pickaxe through his elbow. Feeling more helpless than he had in a long time.
“You’re scared, aren’t you,” Sarah said as she pulled onto the highway.
“He doesn’t know who he is,” Sam said. “I have to bring him back. I have to bring him home.”
Sarah sighed, like she’d understood everything he’d said and everything he hadn’t said. “I know you do,” she said.
The wizard’s address put him on a side street close enough to Bourbon Street to get a steady stream of tourists.
Though the drive from Delacroix to NOLA was less than an hour, Sam hadn’t spent much time in the city growing up. Home had been Delacroix and his family and extended family and family friends who might as well have been family, and there had rarely been much occasion to leave the town. Pulling the truck into a parking spot along the side of the street in front of the wizard’s shop, Sam was struck by that old sense of excitement he’d always felt as a kid when they’d made the trip in. Silly, considering how far from home he’d been since. He fed quarters into the parking meter, smiling to himself.
The address Torres had given him led to what looked like a typical souvenir shop, if leaning just heavily enough on magical New Orleans imagery to cross over to the wrong side of distasteful. It was nestled between a restaurant and a tattoo parlor and the sign on the door said OPEN.
“This is it?” Bucky said.
“This is it,” Sam shrugged.
They were in civilian clothes, seeing no reason to cause a stir in downtown New Orleans during what was primarily an information gathering exercise, though Sam had the shield and the wings ready to go in the covered truck bed if they had to make a quick change.
Despite the heat already permeating the morning air, Bucky was wearing boots and a long sleeve T-shirt that covered his vibranium arm. Sam watched him for a moment, half admiring, half thinking how much more comfortable Bucky looked when he was back at Sarah’s, surrounded by people who didn’t care if he had a metal arm or not.
Bucky caught his eyes, and Sam looked away, but not before Bucky gave him a little smile. It made Sam’s heart beat harder than it had a right to.
A little bell over the door rang as they walked inside. Inside, the shop was small and cramped. Shelves lined every wall and cluttered the floor, and all of them were overstuffed with cheap souvenirs. Sam eyed a shelf full of shot glasses with colorful slogans and said, “Huh.”
“Not what you were expecting?” Bucky said, picking up a shirt that said Beignet There, Done That. “What do you think?”
“Suits you,” Sam said.
“Hello there!” a new voice said. Sam turned and saw the face he’d only seen in black and white in the file Torres had sent him. The Wizard was a tall man with a pale face and long wispy red hair, and he was wearing gaudy purple wizard’s robes and a pointed hat.
For all that The Wizard was by all accounts a dangerous man who was into some serious sorcery-related shit, Sam couldn’t help but elbow Bucky subtly in the ribs and mutter, “See? Wizard with a hat.”
Bucky snorted. Sam grinned.
“Now, what can I do for you gentlemen?” The Wizard said. He had a generic northern accent with a refined undertone, which somehow made his whole appearance more jarring. “First trip to New Orleans? Special occasion? Are we...traveling together?”
Sam frowned, trying to parse the innuendo he was relatively sure was in the words, but failed to find it exactly. It made him wonder distantly if he and Bucky looked like a couple to an observer and then he had to quell the flutter of excitement that came with it.
“Actually, we’re here because we’ve heard a lot about you,” Sam said. “Heard you might be able to, uh, help folks out in unconventional ways.”
The Wizard’s expression shifted, ever so subtly. He was still smiling, but there was a hardness to it. “What sort of help are you interested in?”
“I think you know,” Sam said.
The Wizard looked him up and down, and then looked Bucky up and down. This time, the scrutiny made Sam’s skin crawl, and made him move in a half a step closer to Bucky, even though he knew Bucky could take care of himself.
“This way,” The Wizard said, waving them toward a back room marked Private. “Let us see what there is to discuss.”
Sam had an awful, restless night. Since Bucky had taken the spare room at Sarah’s, Sam had mostly taken to sleeping on the couch when he wasn’t out town on Cap business. But Bucky was gone, and Sam’s arm was throbbing mercilessly and spiked agony at the slightest touch, which made the couch less appealing than usual. The thing that made the most sense was sleeping in Bucky’s bed where he wouldn’t spend the whole night squished against the couch cushions.
So he spent most of the night lying on his back, surrounded by blankets and sheets that smelled like Bucky—Sarah had offered to change them, but it was late and Sam told her not to bother—staring through the dim moonlight at all the little reminders of the life Bucky had made for himself in Delacroix. Half a dozen houseplants. A pile of books. A deck of cards he sometimes took down to the docks to play card games with Carlos and Tommy and talk about whatever old people talked about. A construction paper card one of the boys had made for him for some occasion Sam had missed. A framed photo of Bucky and Sam, grinning at each other, with a sticky note still stuck to it that said something in Sarah’s neat handwriting.
The air conditioning was on, but the room felt too small and too stuffy, like there wasn’t enough air. Sam’s arm was hot and tight and swollen where it was strapped against his chest, still throbbing, and his mind raced and raced and raced.
Bucky was gone. He didn’t know where. He didn’t have any way to track him down. Even if he could find him, he didn’t have any way to help him. The Wizard was dead. The spell was irreversible. Sam was compromised. Bucky could be anywhere.
He must have fallen asleep, because he opened his eyes to sunlight streaming in through the window and the vague recollection of a haze of uncomfortable dreams. He was on his back, Bucky’s blanket tangled around his legs. When he sat up, his arm hurt so bad he had to stop there on the edge of the bed and close his watering eyes and breathe through the pain for a good minute or two. Just what he damn well needed.
He showered and dressed clumsily, swearing under his breath through the whole ordeal, then dragged himself out into the kitchen for a pot of coffee—a pot—and breakfast. He realized he hadn’t eaten anything since before he and Bucky had left for the city the morning before. It was already eight o’clock.
In the kitchen, Sarah was on the phone, and Sam’s brow furrowed at the snippet of conversation he overheard.
“—uh huh, with a big shield—you know that Captain America shield, stars, stripes, and all—yeah, anything at all—thanks. Thanks a lot.”
Sam helped himself one handedly to a cup of coffee and a bowl of cereal, settled onto a stool at the kitchen counter, and said, “Who were you talking to?”
Sarah shook her head. “Good morning to you too. I’ve been calling around. Anybody who might’ve seen him making his way back down here.”
“What makes you think he’s coming back?” Sam said.
“Where else is he going to go?” Sarah said.
Sam shrugged and tried not to look as miserable as he felt. The truth was, Bucky could go anywhere. He could be anywhere. He could be halfway across the world by now and there was no way Sam would ever find him.
“How are you doing?”
Sam was tempted to admit he’d spent most of the night staring at the ceiling and going through every worst case scenario in mind again and again. That he was terrified of losing Bucky over such a trivial mission, one he’d gone into laughing. Or that he felt like something important had been ripped out of his chest and he didn’t know if he was ever going to get it back or close the gaping wound that had been left behind.
“Sore,” he said. “But it’s alright. I’ll manage. Tommy come back with the truck yet?”
“On his way,” Sarah said. “Where are you going?”
“Back to the warehouse,” Sam said. The plan had come to him somewhere in the neighborhood of four in the morning, and was the best he had. “I’ll take Redwing. See if I can turn up any evidence as to which way he went.”
“Alone?” Sarah said.
Sam sipped his coffee, then nodded, grimacing slightly. “If I involve anyone in this—Torres, even Rhodey—there are gonna be questions from the government about how much of Buck is left.” He thought about the blankness he’d seen in Bucky’s eyes right before Bucky had snapped his arm and thrown him aside like it was nothing, and swallowed. “I need to be the one who answers that.”
“Be careful,” Sarah said.
“Always am.”
“Don’t lie to me, Sam,” Sarah said.
At The Wizard’s direction, Sam and Bucky settled into soft plushy chairs in a back office cluttered with back orders of the crappy souvenirs that filled the shop out front. A large poster of a pair of Mardi Gras masks stared down at them from behind The Wizard’s desk. The fine hairs on the back of Sam’s neck prickled though he couldn’t say why.
“Now tell me,” The Wizard said. “Who referred you to me?”
“Oh, uh,” Sam said, trying and failing to sit up straighter in the plush chair, “Buddy of mine named Joaquín. Heard some great things about you. Told me I just had to come to NOLA and see for myself.”
“A man named Joaquín,” The Wizard said contemplatively. “Very well. What seems to be the problem? Romantic troubles?” He looked at Bucky, who stared back at him with the utterly blank expression that Sam understood meant he was extremely uncomfortable.
“Um,” Sam said, and was about to agree because it was as good a cover story as any, especially if The Wizard had already made assumptions to that effect. If the thought of pretending, even for something as absurd as this, made him ache with the possibility, well… that was something to bury deep down and never think about again.
“No,” Bucky said before Sam could finish. “It’s not that.”
Sam quieted his entirely inappropriate disappointment. “Right, uh, you tell him, Buck.”
“We have an enemy,” Bucky said seriously, and it was about there that everything went downhill.
“An enemy!” The Wizard said, and started laughing. “That’s the best you can do? Captain America and his pet Winter Soldier, showing up here to infiltrate my business, and you couldn't be bothered to come up with a better story?”
The Wizard waved his hand, and the office around them seemed to shift and melt in a way that defied perception, the gaudy decorations and souvenirs resolving into an intricate set of runes or symbols or—something—covering rough stone walls, that seemed to keep moving like shadows cast by water. The Wizard’s chair morphed into a massive throne around him. The Mardi Gras poster was a pair of ancient staring faces etched into the wall far above The Wizard’s head.
The Wizard’s purple robes and hat getup hadn’t changed, but Sam no longer felt even the slightest desire to laugh. Everything around him radiated a malicious energy that set Sam’s teeth on edge like a bass note so deep you felt it rather than heard it.
The climbing sense of danger Sam had felt before suddenly seemed paltry and pitiful. He should have been absolutely terrified.
He tried to push to his feet but his squishy chair—also unchanged—sucked him down with an invisible force. Bucky was doing the same beside him, grunting with the effort, but going nowhere. They were trapped.
“Now,” The Wizard said. “Let me explain a few things to you. You are not going to stop me. The only one who can reverse my magic is me, and I have no plan to do that. No, quite the contrary.”
“Why?” Sam gasped, still fighting the chair. “Why are you doing any of this?”
“Why?” The Wizard chuckled. “Money, of course. Why else? Very lucrative business, revenge, on top of the little charms I sell in my souvenir shop.”
“Let. Us. Go,” Bucky grunted.
“Oh, I will,” The Wizard said. “But first, I shall change you both into...agents of chaos. Yes. That has a nice ring to it. And let that teach you both a lesson about meddling in my affairs and keep all your friends distracted.”
The Wizard pointed at Bucky and said something in a language Sam didn’t understand. Sparkling purple energy, glowing and shifting like ink jetting through water, shot from The Wizard’s hand and caught Bucky in the chest. Bucky jerked back, his eyes flashing purple, his mouth moving wordlessly. Then he went still. Completely still, staring straight ahead, his face an emotionless, miserable mask.
“What did you do?” Sam snapped, his fists clenching against the pull of the cushy chair.
The Wizard shrugged. “Oh, I tweaked a few memories and made him believe he’s the Winter Soldier once more. Who does he think he answers to? What will he do next? Should be exciting to find out, should it not? Now, hmm, what to do with you… the great Captain America …”
“Bucky,” Sam said, trying to meet his eyes but getting nothing but Buckys’ harsh profile as Bucky stared at The Wizard. There was still a little bit of purple energy playing in the cracks in his vibranium arm. “Hey. Bucky. Are you listening to me?”
The Wizard smiled a horrible simpering smile, and then pointed at Sam. Sam braced himself for the inevitable blast of energy and whatever hallucination might follow.
Except, it never did.
Bucky pushed himself up in a shower of purple sparks, the magical energy still running through his vibranium arm, but there was no triumph on his expressionless face. The Wizard started, distracted for the moment, and turned toward Bucky.
”How did you—“
Bucky stalked toward him, every motion deliberate and deadly. His vibranium arm closed around The Wizard’s neck. The Wizard tried to pull away but Bucky was too fast. There was a sickening crack and The Wizard’s head jerked the wrong way and then he was crumpling to the floor in a flutter of gaudy purple robes.
The corpse that hit the floor was white-haired and ancient, and it dissolved into a shriveled mummy before Sam’s eyes, eye sockets empty, lipless mouth gaping in a silent scream.
“Shit!” Sam gasped, still stuck in his chair. Bucky turned toward him.
There wasn’t a shred of recognition on Bucky’s face, and--for an interminable moment--Sam was certain that this was how he was going to die, and the only thing he could seem to feel was a misplaced sense of regret.
Bucky stepped toward him and picked Sam up by the collar. Purple energy sparked around him as whatever strange magic was still being conducted by Bucky’s vibranium arm broke through the hold the chair had on him. Bucky spun around and slammed him into the rough stone wall hard enough to knock the wind out of him. His metal hand closed around Sam’s neck.
“Bucky,” Sam choked out, because he couldn’t believe that Bucky was gone, just like that. “Stop. You’re not the Winter Soldier anymore. You’re my--”
Dark stars were starting to explode at the edges of Sam’s vision, and he gasped, fighting the encroaching darkness. His hands came up to grasp at Bucky’s arm.
“--my--”
Bucky’s metal fingers tightened around his throat, and everything went dark.
When Sam came to, Bucky was gone. The stone room was an office again and the door leading back into the souvenir shop had been ripped open. All that was left of The Wizard was a scattering of dust and ash in purple robes. The shop itself looked like it had been abandoned for years, an empty space full of nothing but dust and debris.
Sam picked himself up, rubbing his bruised throat, and stumbled outside. He found himself blinking owlishly. The sun shone through the trees lining the street and the restaurant next door was seating people outside for lunch, the buzz of conversation spilling over into the street. No one paid any attention to his exit from the now-abandoned shop.
His truck was exactly where he’d left it. The only sign that he’d been inside for hours was a parking ticket that had been slipped under his windshield wiper.
Sam half-sat, half-collapsed into the driver’s seat, allowed himself exactly two minutes to panic silently, then pulled out his phone with shaky hands and pulled up Bucky’s location. Bucky hadn’t bothered to turn it off.
The dot on the map was blinking at a spot near the southern edge of the city, a warehouse district with access to the gulf. Not far at all.
Sam pulled into the street, following the map, and tried not to think of the emptiness he’d seen in Bucky’s eyes as Bucky choked him out.
Sam pulled into the wide, empty parking lot of the warehouse, gravel crunching under the truck’s wheels. His broken arm throbbed, the pain leaving him irritable. He hated that the short drive had left him in such bad shape. He couldn’t afford to be hurt that badly.
He’d considered putting the suit on while he checked out the warehouse, but his arm was so swollen he doubted he could get into it with the splint on. His maneuvering abilities would be severely compromised even if he did. It wasn’t like Bucky was likely to still be at the warehouse, in any case.
So he dropped out of the truck, feeling the impact of his sneakers against the gravel like a spike through his elbow. He grabbed Redwing off the passenger’s seat and tossed it into the air. The infrared display on his wristband already showed no sign of human life, but any clue as to where Bucky had gone would be valuable.
As Redwing scouted the area, feeding data to Sam’s wristband, Sam walked around. He didn’t really expect to find anything that Redwing couldn’t, but the need to be doing something while Redwing made the rounds was too powerful. Having a pair of human eyes on things never hurt.
His footsteps echoed inside the quiet warehouse. Adrenaline shot through him and he couldn’t help but remember how easily following Bucky inside had shifted to being hunted.
He wondered, with a tightness in his chest, why Bucky had spared him twice, in the souvenir shop and in the warehouse. It wasn’t exactly the Winter Soldier’s MO.
As Redwing buzzed overhead, Sam walked the perimeter of the warehouse, then between the rows of stacked boxes. The pile he’d crashed into was still there, a reminder of how close he’d been.
An hour later, he had nothing, except that being on his feet that long made the pain in his hot swollen arm reach an uncomfortable crescendo that finally forced him to admit to himself he needed a break. He gritted his teeth and headed back toward the truck to wait while Redwing finished collating the surveillance data.
He had just pulled down the tailgate of the truck with his good arm and settled down to sit with a too-warm bottle of water and a handful of Tylenol, when his phone buzzed.
He’d been expecting the alert from Redwing, so he frowned down at the display when he saw it was an incoming call from Sarah.
“Hey? Everything okay?”
“I’ve got a...a lead for you,” Sarah said, and over the phone he could hear her frowning at the language. “Erica—you know Erica, with the shoe store, in town?—said her uncle’s got a place with a big barn near the edge of town. Saw Bucky go in last night. Didn’t see him come out. Poor man thought he was losing his mind.”
“Alright,” Sam said, standing up as fresh adrenaline shot through him. Even the throbbing in his arm seemed more distant. “Send me the address. Tell Erica to tell her uncle to stay out of the way.”
“Should I meet you there?” Sarah said, and Sam felt an unexpected swell of affection, that Bucky had become such a part of their lives it was even a question.
“No,” Sam said. “This, I gotta do myself.”
About a week after the barbecue, after Bucky had shown up with an ice cream cake and a smile and they’d walked off into the sunset together, Sam took Bucky out on the boat. He had no agenda aside from sharing a couple of beers with Bucky and testing out how the boat handled out in the deeper waters after all the repairs.
He put down the anchor where it was just the two of them, and the ocean and the setting sun and the distant shore, and handed Bucky a beer.
They leaned against the railing together in companionable silence that was broken only by the lapping of the waves and the squawking of seagulls overhead. The gulf breeze smelled like salt and seaweed and home. It ruffled Bucky’s hair slightly, and pulled his T-shirt tighter, and he looked relaxed and at ease, and Sam realized he was paying more attention to Bucky than he was to the view.
“It’s beautiful,” Bucky said, leaning his forearms on the railing. He hadn’t taken pains to cover up the metal one since he’d come to Delacroix and that thought made a warm affectionate feeling swell up in Sam’s chest. He liked that Bucky fit in. That Bucky was comfortable in the one place in the world Sam had always felt like he could just be himself.
“Really is,” Sam said, a beat too late.
“Something on your mind?” Bucky said, then shifted to face him.
They were close, just the two of them on the gently swaying old boat, and Sam’s heartbeat picked up as Bucky turned toward him.
“No,” Sam lied, and gestured out over the water, where the red-orange-purple hues of the sunset were starting to reflect off the gentle waves. “Just taking in the view.”
Bucky nodded. “Actually, uh. I wanted to ask you something.”
Sam turned back to him. His heart beat in his throat again. Like he was some kind of lovestruck kid. Ridiculous. “Ask away. Anything.”
“How long do you want me to stay here?”
Bucky’s voice was a low monotone, like he didn’t want to give anything away. Sam’s chest clenched.
“As long as you want,” Sam said firmly, meeting Bucky’s gaze. “I mean it. This place is home, if you want it to be. For as long as you want it to be.”
Bucky nodded jerkily. He was smiling, except it was somewhere between a smile and a grimace, and his eyes glinted in the falling light. “Thank you.”
Sam reached out and squeezed Bucky’s hand, aware of what the gesture meant and what it didn’t mean and the million and a half ways Bucky could take it.
“I mean it,” he said.
They stood there for a long beat, Bucky’s hand clasped in his. Sam savored the moment and the feeling of peace that lingered, even after Bucky let go and they turned back to the setting sun.
“Sam?” Bucky said.
“Hmm?”
The following silence stretched out long enough that Sam turned again to study Bucky’s face. Bucky was already staring at him, something hungry in his eyes, and Sam couldn’t look away.
Then Bucky shook his head and laughed that self-deprecating laugh of his, and said, “Never mind.”
“Are you sure?” Sam said, shoving back disappointment he knew it wasn’t right to feel.
“Yeah. It’s getting late, right? Sarah’s expecting us,” Bucky said.
“Yeah,” Sam said. The feeling like he’d been kicked in the stomach wouldn’t last. He’d already known Bucky didn’t feel the same way about him. He’d just gotten caught up in the moment. “Yeah, of course. I’ll pull the anchor. We’ll be back in time for ice cream with the boys.”
The address Sarah sent him was toward the outskirts of what could reasonably be considered town, where houses were scattered amid sandy inlets and thick green growth. The winding road was bleached white by the sun and riddled with potholes that left Sam gritting his teeth, but he was thrumming with a nervous, focused energy.
He knew he had to find Bucky. What he was going to do when he found him was an entirely different matter. The Wizard was dead. It wasn’t like Sam could make him undo the spell. There was always Wakanda. They’d broken the real programming once, so maybe they could break a facsimile of it. Or Doctor Strange-- Sam didn’t exactly know the man, but as Captain America and a former Avenger, he could probably get an audience. Whatever he did, the first order of business was still finding Bucky and bringing him in.
He pulled off the road not far from the barn and opened the tailgate, then tugged the case holding the Cap suit and wings out of the truck bed. This time, it seemed inevitable he’d have to go hand-to-hand against Bucky, which made the suit his best option—useless arm or not. He unstrapped his sling and tossed it into the truck bed. The bulky splint had to come off too. He sucked in an apprehensive breath and worked it off slowly, grunting as he felt what was probably the raw ends of bone grinding together.
The feeling spun off into the visceral memory of Bucky snapping the bone without a spark of recognition or concern on his face. The hopelessness of what Sam was trying to do crashed over him and he closed his eyes, fighting it back, and the pain along with it.
Once the suit was on, and the jetpack was secured, he took off for the barn. It was a short flight, made shorter by the buzz of adrenaline running through him. He sent Redwing to scout ahead, and the infrared image that appeared on his wristband confirmed what Sarah’s friend Erica with the shoe store in town had reported. There was a single living form in the barn, Bucky’s height and weight. Body temperature elevated, consistent with reports of The Wizard’s victims appearing feverish. Heart rate and breathing suggested he was at rest, and beside him was a cool, dense circle that could only be the shield. The barn was otherwise empty, aside from a tangle of mechanical equipment and old netting.
Sam touched down outside, swallowed, and then gripped the handle of the barn door with his good hand and tugged it open.
On his display, Bucky jerked into motion and stood, grabbing the shield beside him. He was still hidden from view by a pile of rusting boat parts.
“It’s me,” Sam said loudly, stepping inside and retracting his wings. Redwing hovered overhead.
Then Bucky was in front of him, as silent and cat-like as before. He looked terrible. His face had a grayish pallor to it, except for splotches of red high on his cheeks, and his eyes were bright with fever. The shield was clasped tightly in one hand, his face was expressionless, his jaw set. His vibranium hand curled into a fist.
Out of nowhere, Sam thought about how Steve had confronted Bucky on the helicarrier and how Bucky had beaten the shit out of him before coming to himself.
“Bucky,” Sam said, in the calm and conciliatory tone he’d perfected in group therapy sessions at the VA years before. It was all he had to work with now. “I just want to help you. Even if you don’t remember...I can get you help if you just come with me.”
Bucky stepped closer. His expression hadn’t so much as flickered. “Don’t call me Bucky.”
“Okay,” Sam said. “I won’t. I promise. But you need help, right?”
“I have to…” Bucky started to say, then stopped, and blinked, a flicker of something crossing his haggard face. “Get out of my way.”
“What do you have to do?” Sam said. His mind was working. Bucky seemed...confused, but he hadn’t attacked yet, like he had the first two times. He could work with that. He could—
“Out of my way!” Bucky ground out, and then he was leaping at Sam with his teeth bared.
Sam brought the wings down as a shield and Bucky slammed into them. Vibranium fingers caught the edge of one wing and twisted, trying to throw Sam or open the wings. Sam fired the jet pack, compensating, fighting to stay upright, and pivoted to catch Bucky in the chest with an extending wing. The force shoved Bucky into the wall of the barn, where he stumbled, gasping and regaining his footing and his grip on the shield. His arm singing with pain, Sam rose into the air, but before he could counterattack the shield came hurtling toward his head and when he dove to the side Bucky met him in a flying leap that sent them both crashing to the ground amidst pieces of boat motor and metal scrap. The pain of the impact that exploded through Sam’s broken arm was blinding in its intensity, overwhelming every fighting instinct he had.
He fought to push himself up but his momentary paralysis had given Bucky the chance he needed to climb on top of Sam and press him into the ground, his wings pinned, Bucky’s knees straddling his chest. Bucky grabbed his arm and twisted it violently, and Sam screamed, the world disappearing again into a blur of agony that had no origin and no end.
Then Bucky’s fingers were around his throat again, like they’d been in The Wizard’s shop, and Sam choked. Several thoughts ran through his mind in a jumble. This was how he was going to die. He shouldn’t have come alone. Bucky had never felt the same way about him. He’d known he couldn’t take Bucky hand-to-hand with a day-old broken arm and yet he’d come alone and empty-handed because on some level he’d believed that he could get through to him. He’d been a fool.
“Bucky,” he gasped. Bucky’s face leaning over his seemed distant and unreal as his vision blurred and darkened at the edges. As reality faded, a strange, immaterial sadness rushed in to take its place. A loss of something he’d never had. He remembered Bucky on the boat in the soft light of the sunset. He wanted Bucky to come home. He thought he was pleading but he’d lost the thread of what was real and what was only in his head.
Then he was gasping, taking in great breaths of air, the physical relief and the return of oxygen mingling into mindless euphoria until the world resolved again, bringing with it pain and horror and— Bucky, pushing off of him, stumbling back and dropping his head into his hands.
Sam tried to pick himself up, but ended up only rolling over and coughing raggedly as his abused throat spasmed, pain rolling through his arm and chest and neck. The wings on his back felt like they weighed a thousand pounds.
There were hands, on his good arm and side, steadying him, until his breathing evened out to normal.
“I’m sorry,” Bucky was saying, repeating the words over and over. “I’m sorry. It's over. I’m sorry.”
When Sam could breathe, Bucky helped him up. His hands were gentle. He helped Sam to lean against the wall and then cupped his face.
“Sam,” Bucky said. “I need to get you help.”
Sam would have thought, after Bucky hurting him so badly, that Bucky being so close would have been uncomfortable. But he knew—with a certainty that was hard to place—that Bucky was himself again, and Bucky would never hurt him. He closed his eyes, and leaned his cheek into the fever-warm skin of Bucky’s palm.
“I’m okay,” Sam said hoarsely, and found he meant it. “Really.”
“No, you’re not,” Bucky said shakily. He sat back on his heels and scrubbed his hands down his face. “I hurt you. I almost killed you. I’m sorry. Sam, I—I—“
He broke off and buried his face in his hands again, and this time, Sam shook his head slightly. His arm was throbbing with an increasing urgency, but he needed to understand. “Why didn’t you kill me?”
Bucky stared at him wildly. As blank as his face had been for days, it was all unbridled emotion now.
“Hey. Forget it,” Sam said, shaking himself. It wasn’t the time. Wasn’t helping.
“I can’t forget it,” Bucky said sharply. “I would have finished if I didn’t—“
He broke off, and Sam was able to stand about five seconds of that silence before saying, “If you didn’t what?”
Bucky closed his eyes like he was bracing himself. He looked sick. He looked mortified.
“If I didn’t,” he paused again, and closed his eyes, like he was trying to physically push the words out, “If I didn’t love you…the way I do…I don’t think I would have stopped myself.”
Sam opened his mouth, and closed it.
“I know. I know you don’t think of me that way. I’m sorry to put that on you on top of everything else,” Bucky said. The expressionless mask was back, but this was the uncomfortable one, not the Winter Soldier. “I’ll take you to the hospital. Then I’ll leave you alone.”
Sam shook his head and huffed an incredulous, exhausted laugh. “Hold on. No. You’re wrong. You are so incredibly wrong.”
“What?” Bucky said. The mask slipped again. There was doubt. Fear. Hope.
Sam exhaled slowly, aware he was toeing a line he’d promised himself he wouldn’t cross. Except there was no reason to hold back now. “Bucky, I’ve been in love with you pretty much ever since you showed up and picked up that inboard motor like it was the easiest thing in the world.”
They stared at each other. The silence between them was thick with a tension Sam wasn’t sure either of them knew how to break.
Then Bucky was moving toward him, his hand coming up to cup the side of Sam’s face again as he leaned in. His lips met Sam’s and his stubble was rough and his mouth was hot and tasted like blood, but Sam returned the kiss like a dying man finding water in the desert.
They broke apart and Bucky sat back again, breathing hard.
“Sam, I should—“ he started to say, but Sam cut him off.
“Don’t,” Sam said. “Whatever you do. Don’t you dare take that back.”
Bucky laughed, and Sam felt something inside him—something that had been tight and scared and lonely for days, or maybe it had been longer than that—start to unfurl.
“I was going to say, I should take you to the hospital now.”
“Oh,” Sam said. “Okay. Yeah. That’s a good idea.”
Over Sam’s protests that he could walk just fine, Bucky looped an arm around Sam’s waist and walked him, ever so carefully, to the truck.
The water lapped gently against the dock. Seagulls called and the warm breeze smelled of seaweed and salt. Sam leaned his hip against the boat’s railing, and closed his eyes, enjoying how the boat rocked gently beneath him. It was good to be home.
“You’re sure about this?” Bucky said.
“Course I’m sure,” Sam said. “It’s my idea, isn’t it?”
It had been three days since Sam had found Bucky in the barn. Sam was, on the firm recommendation of the doctor who had reset his arm and encased it in a thick cast, staying away from any sort of strenuous activity or superhero-ing. Bucky had spent much of the last few days hovering, first in the hospital and then back home, alternately troubled and watchful. He was looking better, at least. It seemed that whatever hold The Wizard had held over him had faded once Bucky had broken free of the curse.
Still, they hadn’t talked, not really. Bucky had quietly begun slipping back into life in Delacroix, but he’d been withdrawn, slower to smile, hesitant to join in at meals or when friends stopped by, and laser focused on whatever odd jobs Sarah asked him to do. Sam figured he was working through, well, the horror of having had his autonomy stripped from him and being forced to hurt people while thinking he was the Winter Soldier again, and so Sam hadn’t pushed when Bucky had brushed off his first couple “you okays.” Bucky knew Sam was there if he needed him. In any case, Bucky had spent a whole lot of his post-Hydra life managing the emotional fallout of being the Winter Soldier, and Sam trusted him to deal with this the same way. If throwing himself into fixing up the boathouse was what did the trick, so be it. Sam understood the desire to be helpful.
But Bucky’s reticence left other things unsaid, and Sam’s own selfish doubts were creeping in. Maybe Bucky wasn’t talking because he regretted what he’d said, regretted the kiss. He’d still been sick. Not in his right mind. Maybe Sam had it all wrong.
After a few days sitting around at Sarah’s house, stewing, Sam had had enough. Bucky conceded to take the boat out for the evening even though Sam’s instructions to take it easy meant Bucky had to do all the work while Sam got to lean on the railing and appreciate the view and the salty gulf air.
“Okay,” Bucky said. “I think it’s ready to go. You know Sarah’s going to hit me if I break her boat, right?”
“So if you have to break something, break my half,” Sam said.
“I’ll do my best,” Bucky said.
As the boat moved out of the harbor, Sam ran through all the things he wanted to say, once there was no chance of getting interrupted by Cass or AJ or Sarah or anyone dropping by. That he didn’t blame Bucky for what had happened. That he’d meant what he said in that barn, but he understood if Bucky hadn’t. That Bucky was welcome in his life regardless.
Later, when they’d left the shore and Bucky had lowered the anchor, Bucky came to stand next to him by the railing. Every muscle in his body was tense.
Sam opened his mouth to begin his spiel, but Bucky beat him to it.
“Did you ever wonder,” Bucky said, “why I ended up in a barn in Delacroix?”
Sam shook his head.
“If I was apprehended by hostile forces as the Winter Soldier, my objective was to neutralize all threats and return to my handlers,” Bucky said. “I think I knew, at some level, that Hydra wasn’t in control of me anymore. That meant the closest thing to home base was...here.”
“That makes sense,” Sam said.
“I could have hurt your family,” Bucky said, the words rushing out like a confession, like he’d been waiting days to say them. “I know you trust me. It means a lot. But...how do I know this isn’t going to happen again?”
“You don’t,” Sam said.
Bucky closed his eyes, swallowing and nodding. “Right. I don’t. I’m dangerous and I don’t belong here, because it’s not safe for you or Sarah or the kids.”
“Bucky,” Sam said, pretending that the pit of his stomach hadn’t dropped out the second Bucky’s intentions, and the reason for his silence, became clear. This was worse than Bucky rejecting him. This was Bucky walking out of his life for good. “When I said this was home for as long as you want, I didn’t mean contingent on you not getting cursed by an evil wizard and forced to do a bunch of shit I know you didn’t want to do. It’s not a favor to you, me saying that. I want you here. I—I need you here.”
Bucky’s eyes flashed. “I hurt you.”
Sam stepped closer, and put his good hand on Bucky’s shoulder, squeezing gently, feeling his muscles tense beneath his thin T-shirt. “The Wizard could just as easily have gone for me first. You were a victim. This doesn’t have to--this shouldn’t--change anything.”
Bucky turned around to face him. There was a rawness in his expression, in the moment itself, that made Sam’s heart beat faster. He swallowed. Bucky was so close. Finally, Bucky nodded.
“Thank you,” Bucky said quietly.
“There’s nothing to thank me for,” Sam said, and the relief that surged through him made his knees weak.
“Of course there is.”
“I want you here, Buck. As long as you want to be here.”
Bucky smiled. When he spoke, his voice was thick. “Sam, I’m pretty sure I want to stay here forever.”
Their eyes met, and the longing Sam had been nurturing, so sure there was no chance that Bucky could feel the same, exploded to the surface. He shifted his hand from Bucky’s shoulder to cup the side of his neck, and saw a desire that mirrored his own. This time, it was Sam who leaned in, and Bucky met him halfway. His lips were warm and soft and his teeth pulled at Sam’s lip and he pulled Sam in closer, his vibranium hand pressing into the small of Sam’s back. It was everything Sam had wanted, and he let the kiss and the moment and the peace linger.
They broke apart and Sam put his arm around Bucky’s shoulder. They stared off together into the horizon, where the sun was just starting to set.
“It was when I picked up the boat motor, huh?” Bucky said, smiling.
“It was...dramatic,” Sam said, and felt a smile pull across his own face. “How long were you waiting around to make an entrance, anyway?”
“You don’t want to know,” Bucky said. “But hey, if it worked…”
Silence fell again, and Bucky curled in and pressed another soft kiss to Sam’s lips. It felt good. It felt right. It felt like everything he’d ever wanted.
“You okay?” Sam said.
“Yeah,” Bucky said. “It’s good to be home.”