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Blood trails down the back of Bucky’s neck; thick and oozing from the rusted pipe now discarded to the corner of the room. His assailant lays face-down in the concrete, unconscious. Steve’s outline sways in double vision a few feet away as Bucky gently taps his fingertips to the source of the bleeding. He winces at the touch and vibranium onyx comes back coated in red.
“Where is she?” Bucky murmurs through the pulsing in his head. He doesn’t have to specify who he’s referring to as Steve calls for you to check in on the coms. It’s a silent agreement they shared— the knowledge that it will always be you he’s asking for. Bucky leans against the wall, half holding himself up as he waits for your voice to come through the coms. Instead, all he hears is crumbling static.
Suddenly, traces of faded purple burst into the hallway—remnants of an exposition of light and energy and power from several hundred feet away. A strangled scream follows and Bucky is sprinting towards the epicenter before Steve can warn him otherwise.
There’s no mistaking that sound. The break in the voice, the panic, the fear. Bucky runs until the room is coated in blinding light, until the purple energy touches over every surface and seeps through the cracks of the concrete. Until it’s consuming everything around him.
He knows that sound because he’s heard it in the dead of night. It’s familiar and agonizing and his stomach plunges deep below the surface, buried under the foundation and dirt and burning through the center of the earth. You cry out again and it echoes through the halls—chasing him, mocking him. He can’t get there fast enough.
Bucky doesn’t spare the time to check whether the witch still occupies the room as he races inside. Darkness tunnels around his vision, his heart pounding so violently in his chest he’s not sure if it’s the adrenaline or the concussion threatening to pull him under. None of it matters as he filters through the purple light in search of you.
When he finally spots you huddled in the corner of the room, desperately clenching your hands around a rusted wrench, Bucky can’t find it in himself to feel even an ounce of relief. Your back is pressed to the wall, protecting yourself. You’re trembling, panicked, and Bucky’s not sure his heart will ease for even a moment until you’re safe on the jet and that terrible ringing has left his ears.
“Y/n,” he says your name gently, but you flinch violently enough you nearly knock your head against the wall.
“Bucky? Is that you?” you call, nearly shouting into the purple haze. Bucky is only standing a few feet ahead of you and while you’re clouded by the remnants of magic, he can see your outline perfectly clear. Still, he notices that you’re looking beyond his shoulder as you call for him. Vacant stare, unfocused eyes.
“Yeah,” he replies gingerly, stepping closer. “I’m right here. Can you see me?”
You shake your head rapidly, your grip flexing against the wrench as if you might be afraid of what else laid within the purple mist. The remnants have faded since whatever the witch did to cause such an explosion of power and Bucky turns his head to find Steve standing at the back of the room. They share a concerned look.
“It’s too dark in here,” you tell him, trying to inch closer to him though each step is apprehensive, like you don’t see him at all. “She must have cut the power. Harkness was right there but then she… I don’t know… it’s too dark, Bucky. I can’t… I can’t see anything.”
Bucky’s heart stills. It freezes cold within his rib cage and blood stops flowing entirely. Daylight seeps in through the broken window to your left and the sunlight touches gently against your skin. Do you not see the stream of light? Can you not feel the warmth on your skin?
You move forward in search of him and you collide against his chest. Startled, you raise the wrench out of instinct and Bucky manages to wrestles it from your grip and toss it to the floor before you could land a swing. You start to panic again, screaming out for him because you don’t realize it’s his arms that wrap around you, his arms trying to ease your fear.
“Hey! Hey! It’s me!” Bucky warns as he blocks an uppercut you attempt to swing at his jawline.
You still, brows furrow in confusion. “Bucky?”
But Bucky doesn’t respond. He can’t. Now that he’s close enough and the magic has faded from the room entirely, he can see what’s become of your eyes and it renders him speechless. Stone molds through his body, tension coursing like mud in his veins, and still—his damn heart won’t stop beating so violently it might crack through his ribs and spill to the floor by your feet.
In place of the vibrant shades he’s grown to adore is a paralyzing storm of dark grey clouds. Swirling through the whites of your eyes, sinking into your irises. Deep and heavy as if lightening might strike within their storm. Thunder rolling just over the hills. They consume every inch.
Bucky reaches forward and grabs the sides of your face. It’s harsher than he ever intended, but he needs you to be still, needs to understand how this could have possibly happened, how the light and color could have been drained from you completely. The suddenness of the touch startles you, but he can’t focus on anything beside the darkness that has consumed your eyes. It terrifies him straight to his bones.
“Bucky? What’s wrong?” you ask him even though he knows you can’t see the hardwired clench in his jaw or the way his eyes screw shut to stop the tears from building. He doesn’t know how to respond or what to say to you. He doesn’t know how to not make you as scared as he is.
“What is it?” Steve calls from the edge of the room, his voice taunt.
You flinch at the sound of Steve’s voice, your gaze turning in his direction and though you’re looking straight at him you still ask, “Steve? Was that you?”
“It’s him,” Bucky replies defeatedly.
You shake your head and his hands fall from the side of your face. “How can you be sure? Harkness has pulled tricks on us before and with the power cut—”
“The power’s not out, Y/n.”
You freeze.
Bucky swallows back what he’s sure is a pool of blood from the inside of his cheek. It’s bitter on his tongue. “The lights are working fine. The sun is shining through the windows. I—I can see him. I can see you, sweetheart.”
“What? No. That’s not…” you step back a few paces, oblivious to the wrench Bucky had cast aside. He lunges for you before you trip over it and still, your heel catches on the edge and you lose your balance. There’s barely time to yelp before you’re back in his arms. He stabilizes you the best he can and then, you glide your shoe against the floor, touching the wrench with a startling realization.
The panic starts to distort your features. Your chest starts rising too quickly, your hands begin to shake. Suddenly, you’re uneasy in your stance, knees falling weak as you try to look at Bucky’s face, but all you can see is an unforgiving darkness. It swallows him whole. It swallows you, too.
“I can’t… I can’t see…” you start to murmur between shallowed breaths. “Why can’t I… Why can’t I see?”
“You’re going to be okay. I swear it on my life that I’ll fix this,” Bucky tells you because he can see the panic attack coming on. He knows the signs. He’s seen them before in the mirror and he gathers you within his arms. You’re shaking against him and all he can do is hold you tighter. “Just focus on me, okay? Just on me. I’ll fix this, sweetheart. I promise I will.”
It takes twenty minutes before he gets you to calm down enough to make it to the jet. He carries you through the ruins of the warehouse and across the vacant lot because your legs are too weak to walk. The hyperventilation has worn you thin and as you curl against his chest, he can feel the unease buzzing under your skin.
With every step, your hands clench around the straps on his suit like you’re afraid he might disappear if you let go.
***
The only reason you sleep at all is because of the sedative Banner gave you. You had clung so desperately to Bucky’s arm on the jet home, fused yourself like an extension of his own body when you landed back at the compound. You screamed until your voice gave out as the medical team attempted to separate you. You didn’t know they were SHIELD. You couldn’t see the familiar faces. All you knew was someone was trying to pull you away from Bucky and you fought against it with everything you had left.
Bucky tried to tell you who they were. He tried to get you to listen over the noise but you couldn’t see the way he reached for you, couldn’t see the desperation in his eyes or the desolation dragging him under. You were still screaming when Banner put the syringe in your arm; that same ringing returning to his ears, the awful sound of your screams he couldn’t erase from his memory.
The moment your body fell slack, heavy limbs sinking into the gurney as they carted you away, Bucky sank down to his knees. At the center of the landing bay, the Winter Soldier’s helplessness was on display for anyone to witness. He couldn’t find the strength to move until Steve came in search of him an hour later.
***
“Buck?” Steve stands at the frame of Bucky’s room, leaning into the open doorway. His arms fold over his chest as a short, tight smile pressed at his lips. “Did you even try to sleep?”
Bucky sighs and shakes his head. He knows better than to lie. He’s seen the dark marks under his own eyes.
“You’re listening for her,” Steve says. It’s not a question.
“You know how bad her nightmares use to be, Steve,” Bucky replies slowly. He glances over his shoulder to the wall behind him. You’re separated by a few feet worth of drywall and foundation and still, it’s as if he can hear every breath you take. He can hear the rustle of your sheets as you toss and turn. The squeak of the floorboards when you pace at night. It’s the only barrier between you.
Your screams used to carry through the entire floor. Steve and Sam would be hovering outside your room by the time Bucky got you to calm down enough to close your eyes again without fear of the demons you’d find. He never had the courage to stay and you never dared to ask, so he reluctantly pulled away each time your breathing fell back to an even pace. He’d slip his body out from under your hold and he’d pass Steve and Sam lingering in the hall, talking quietly amongst themselves as if they too hadn’t been awoken by the monsters lurking in your dreams.
Bucky pinches the bridge of his nose. “We don’t know when the spell will wear off. If it ever will. Wanda is doing everything she can to track down Harkness but—”
A scream rips through the walls and it pulls the breath straight from Bucky’s lungs. He knows that scream. He’s committed that awful, agonizing sound to memory and on instinct, Bucky sprints into the hall. He slams his shoulder on the doorframe on his way out and a sliver of wood breaks off.
“Get Banner!” Bucky shouts to Steve, pointing back to the med wing. Steve disappears down the end of the hallway without an ounce hesitancy.
Your nightmares have never sounded this real; as if the demons might actually be crawling from under your bed and through the shadows to devour you whole. Your voice breaks as if they’re consuming you alive. Like a small child afraid of the monsters in her closet, sheets pulled tight above her head— with only the slight shift of a t-shirt from the window’s draft, you scream as if you’ve seen bared teeth and scales.
Bucky breaks the hinges on your door as he shoves his way inside. He barely has a second to adjust to the darkness of the room before he registers you fumbling for the gun on your nightstand. There’s no hesitation as you unlatch the safety and aim in his direction. Bucky’s eyes widen.
“Y/n, wait!”
You fire.
Bucky blocks the bullet on his left forearm as he advances on you—the sharp click of metal to vibranium and sparks burst from the contact. He doesn’t let himself look at the tears streaming down your face, the sweat beaded into your hair, or the bullet now lodged into your dresser as he wraps his hand around the gun and yanks it viciously from your grasp before you can manage to pull the trigger again.
“No! Stop!” You scream as if he’s one of the villains in your dreams. Vile and evil and ruthless in his pursuit. There’s such fear in your voice that it nearly paralyzes Bucky on the spot.
It’s only then that he realizes that the lines have blurred between nightmare and reality. You can’t open your eyes and see the comfort of your bedroom, the safety of the compound. You can’t prove to yourself that the demons are only trapped within your head. Because you’re trapped there, too.
“Y/n! Y/n, listen to me!” Bucky shouts. He fights his way to crawl on top of you, pinning your body to the mattress just to keep you from hurting yourself. You whimper and he molds his palms to the sides of your face. Even as you scratch at him and break blood on his cheek, he’s unyielding. He barely feels the sting of it when you’re this afraid.
He tries to remind himself it’s not him. It’s not him you’re scared of, not him you think you’re fighting. But it’s hard not to when you’re begging him to stop, to let you live, to not hurt you.
“You’re awake!” Bucky tries again, growing desperate and he hears his voice crack. He holds his hands firm on the sides of your face; the solid metal of his left in contrast to the warmth of his right. “Feel me! I’m right here, okay? I’ve got you. Hear me, sweetheart. Feel me. It’s Bucky.”
You freeze, you gaze unfocused up at him though you’re not able to meet his eye. You look directly at him and still—you see straight through.
Suddenly, your features begin to contort and then, you’re sobbing and Bucky’s heart cleaves down the center. He quickly climbs off of you, curling in against your side and wrapping his arms around your trembling frame. You come to him easily, face pressed tight into the crook of his neck, your hands bunched into the thin fabric of his t-shirt.
“You’re alright,” he whispers, soothing a hand down your spine. “You’re okay. I’ve got you.”
“I don’t… I don’t know what’s real,” you murmur against his collar and he’s certain that if he didn’t have the serum in his veins, he wouldn’t have heard it at all.
“This is real,” Bucky affirms, holding you as tight as he can manage. “You and me. Right now. This is real, okay? No one is going to hurt you. I’ve got you, honey.”
It’s only then that Bruce slowly emerges from the doorway. He’s holding another syringe in his hand, a solemn look upon his features. He exchanges a short glance with Bucky as he begins to approach.
“Do you trust me?” Bucky asks slowly. He slides the long sleeve of your t-shirt up your arm to give Bruce better leverage. You don’t say anything, but you nod against his chest. Bucky sighed. “You’ll feel a little prick on your arm, okay? It’s going to help you sleep. No dreams this time.”
You don’t respond and Bruce looks to Bucky for guidance. Bucky swallows and give him a short nod. The needle is only inches away when you squeeze Bucky’s waist.
“Promise you’ll stay,” you whisper. “Please.”
Whatever remained of Bucky’s heart shatters completely. Its shards and glass and broken pieces left within his chest and still, he finds the strength to tell you, “I’m not going anywhere.”
You don’t even flinch when Bruce pricks the needle to your vein. Your body becomes so slack that Bucky has to remind himself you’re only sleeping. He still finds himself checking for your pulse, focusing on the gentle breaths against his skin. He doesn’t sleep at all.
***
Bucky spends every night in your room. Even if he starts in the chair by your windowsill, he feels better knowing he’s close enough to notice the nightmares before they start. The slightest variation in your breathing and Bucky crawls into the bed beside you. His arms snake around your waist and gently tug you to lay over his chest. A hand soothes down your spine until your breaths flow evenly again and he listens for the sound of your heartbeat until morning.
You haven’t woken up screaming since.
“Bucky?”
Bucky pulls himself from his trance. He’d barely slept in the week since your sight was taken and the exhaustion is evident in the dark circles under his eyes and the gaunt look on his face. He’s just thankful you’re not able to see it. Still, his lids are heavy as he pushes himself to his feet and follows your voice to the bedroom.
He’s learned to retrain his steps so that you can hear him as he approaches. Intentional placement of his steps over the squeaking floorboards and a heaviness in his heels. It feels almost unnatural given his decades training to be invisible, but it puts you at ease. He can see the tension fade from your shoulders when you recognize his gait.
Slowly, you reach for Bucky but you extend your arm too far to the right and you miss him entirely. Your hand hovers through the air until you find his shoulder and only then do you start to relax as you touch the cold surface of the vibranium.
“Nat usually helps me but she’s out on a run,” you say as your fingers gently tap against his shoulder, light pressure in tender rhythm as if playing the keys on a piano. “Would you mind?”
Bucky nods, but quickly adds, “of course. What do you need?”
“Just something that matches. I can put it on myself, I just… I already feel out of place so I don’t want to be walking around with two different socks on.”
“Lang does that all the time, you know,” Bucky chuckles, desperate to see you smile again. It seems to take most of your energy, but your lips curve just slightly in the edges. It lasts only a moment and it fades quicker than it arrived, but it’s something.
Bucky riffles through your drawers in search of something comfortable for you to wear. Eventually, he settles on a pair of leggings and a loose fitted t-shirt you wore often enough for the color to have faded a few shades lighter in the wash. The fabric is soft against his fingertips as he pulls it from the drawer and sets it on the bed. He doesn’t know much about twenty-first century fashion, but he hopes you won’t mind. Your fingers graze over the clothes and your smile returns.
Then, you reach out for his hand and Bucky hesitates for a moment before he places his right hand in yours. A frown pouts over your lip and you extend your free hand in search of his left. He’s not sure what to make of it, how you noticeably sigh at the touch of cold metal to your skin. It’s not the first time you’ve sought out his left arm since Harkness stole your sight and Bucky simply can’t wrap his head around it.
“Why do you do that?” A shiver passes through his spine as your fingers graze along the gold detailing in his palm.
“So I know it’s really you.”
You say it so casually, as if you might see his arm as something other than the embodiment of violence he’d committed under Hydra’s orders. You touch the lines of the plates and trace over what would be his lifeline marked by a river of golden embellishment; feather light grace at the tips of your fingers. It’s almost as if you’re committing the details to memory; preserving him. He realizes then that the arm he’s grown to despise has become a comfort to you – a reminder that when doubt creeps in and threatens to drag you deep into the shadows, that he’s still there with you.
“I’ll be out in a minute, okay?” you tell him, reluctantly letting go of his hand. Bucky lingers a moment longer as you feel around for the tag at the nape of the t-shirt to make sure it’s facing the right way. You smile in his direction and he tries not to let his stomach drop when you look too far to your right and miss him entirely.
“I’ll be outside the door.” Bucky’s voice is raw as it slips out—a byproduct of the shock. Then, he closes the door behind him, careful of the broken hinges he’s yet to replace.
When he looks up, he spots Wanda and Steve huddled around the kitchen table. Wanda’s vibrant red hair is tossed up in a bun, strands falling out of place, and she wears dark circles under her eyes that mirror the discoloration on Bucky’s face. She’s been tracking Harkness since she disappeared but she hasn’t had a single new lead in days. The frustration wears on Steve’s face, too, as he clenches his jaw at something she said.
“Have you heard anything?” Bucky can’t help but ask as he approaches. He feels like a child as he wrings his hands in his lap, looking between Wanda and Steve with what he knows is misguided hope. It’s been too long now for the spell to have faded on its own.
“Not yet,” Wanda says slowly. “I’m doing everything I can to track her down but…”
“We need to prepare her, Buck,” Steve cuts in. A frown is etched deep into his features and it looks as though it physically pains him. “Even if we find Harkness, there’s no guaranteeing she’ll reverse the spell. If she even can.”
Bucky falters in his stance, physically taking a step back. His breath suddenly feels tight inside his chest. “What are you saying? You’re just giving up?”
“No, of course not,” Wanda implores. She stands and reaches a hand for Bucky but he flinches before she can touch him. Her lips press to a thin line as she steps away to give him space. “I just… I don’t think we should give her false hope.”
“This doesn’t have to be debilitating, Buck,” Steve tries, but Bucky is barely able to hear him through the ringing in his ears. It echoes as badly as it did in the halls amongst the purple haze, as bad as it so often carried through the foundation into his bedroom as he sprinted to chase the demons from your dreams.
“People lose their sight all the time and they learn how to reacclimate,” Steve continues, cautious with every word. “It’s a difficult road, but Y/n–”
“–is an Avenger, Steve!” Bucky slams his hands on the table. The coffee mugs shatter onto the kitchen floor; shards of broken ceramic on the floor by Wanda’s feet, mocha sinking into the cracks in the tile.
“Buck–” Steve reaches out for Bucky’s arm to put him at ease, but Bucky yanks himself out of Steve’s grasp.
He feels like his entire body is on fire. He can’t stand still, can’t breathe. He’s been hanging on by a thread, desperate to portray the strength he doesn’t have so you could hold onto hope, so you didn’t have to feel this paralyzing fear the way that he does.
He tries to stop himself, to stop the fears from slipping out, but they’re like fire on his tongue and he can’t swallow them back.
“How the hell is she supposed to be an Avenger if she can’t fucking see!? She’ll never be in the field again. Do you get that!? The one goddamn thing she’s worked her whole life to do—to help people—and she’ll never go on another mission again!”
Wanda lowers her head, eyes averting to the floor. A blush of red coats her cheeks and Steve slowly sinks in his chair, an agonizing look on his face. Bucky is breathing so heavy it starts to feel numb in the back of his head, in his teeth, in his fingertips. His hands tighten to fists and he nearly lashes out again when he notices Wanda’s eyes flicker over his shoulder.
Bucky’s heart drops as he turns to find you standing in the frame of the door, gripping tight to the handle. Tears well through the cloudy grey skies in your eyes and Bucky is certain the floor must have given way from under him because he’s falling through hundreds of feet of abyss. His stomach is somewhere else, his chest caved in. A tear slips over your cheekbone and Bucky’s knees nearly give out.
“Y/n, I—”
“I know,” you say, your voice absent of emotion though it’s laced with such heaviness, it sounds as if it might pull you under the surface to meet him at the bottom of the void. “I know the chances of finding Harkness and reversing this. I know.”
Bucky crosses the room to you— slowly, because he wants you to know he’s coming, to give you the chance to retreat into your room and slam the door in his face. But you don’t. You stand firm and your gaze lays on the ground as he approaches.
“I’m sorry,” Bucky whispers heavily. “I shouldn’t have—”
“You’re were right, though.” You shrug and there’s a painful sort of emptiness in your expression that fractures a piece from Bucky’s heart. You brush a hand over your eyes and catch tears on your wrist; the reflective streak against florescent lights shine bright over your skin. “Without Harkness, there’s no reversing this. And we both know I’m useless in the field if I can’t see the guy with a gun standing a few feet ahead of me.”
Bucky swallows back bile. “You’re not useless—”
“Even if I learned how to adjust to civilian life, I could never be in the field again. I’d be a liability,” you argue, a lump burning in the back of your throat. “And you—you would end up getting hurt because you’d devote all of your attention to making sure I don’t get myself killed.”
“We can talk to that guy in Hell’s Kitchen,” Bucky offers desperately. “He’s blind, right? I’m sure he could help figure out a way for you to—”
“He’s got powers, Bucky. Superhuman senses and I don’t know—sonar or something,” you scoff. The grey storm clouds in your eyes seem to rumble; not in anger or rage, but something darker, something worse, something like acceptance. You exhale a breath so heavy it could have held the weight of an anvil over your chest. “We’re not going to fix this, okay?”
“You don’t know that.”
Bucky’s not sure why he says it. Wanda’s warning about false hope echoes in his ears but maybe he needs it, too. He needs something to cling onto because if he confronts the fact that he may never get to watch the way the afterglow flickers within the colors of your eyes again, or catch your gaze from across the room as a smile lifts at your cheeks made only for him, or see you sprinting towards him in the middle of a battlefield and leap into his arms, he might crumble completely.
He knows it’s selfish. He knows that this isn’t his burden to bear, that this isn’t his reality to accept. But if you’re not a part of the Avengers anymore, you’ll inevitably learn how to be okay without them. You’ll learn how to find normalcy again in your own way – he knows you will because you’re stronger than anyone he’s ever known.
But—
What if you no longer find purpose living in a tower with a team you’re no longer a part of? What if you decide you don’t need him anymore? What if you leave? What if you break his heart beyond what he can repair? He won’t survive it and that, he knows most of all.
Bucky doesn’t say a word of his own fears as he slowly reaches towards you, his hand gingerly laid upon the side of your cheek. You gasp at first, startled by the sensation, but you relax as the onyx of his vibranium thumb brushes along your cheekbone. He knows then that if you could see his face, you’d realize how painfully he loves you – so whole and heavy that his entire world rests simply in the palms of your hands.
“I’m not giving up,” Wanda says softly from the edge of the room. “I promise, Y/n. I won’t stop until I find her.”
“I know,” you tell her and to anyone else, they might have assumed the smile you forced was genuine. But Bucky can see how it aches, how desperately you wished for it to be sincere. It doesn’t reach your eyes, not with the oncoming storm in its wake, and it fades the moment Wanda’s footsteps disappear from the room.
***
Bucky wakes when he hears you scream. He jolts out of bed, the sunlight streaming in through the cracks between your curtains, and he’s disoriented for a moment as he finds he way to his feet. He slept in your room again last night as he had for the two weeks since Harkness disappeared, and he stares blankly at the empty bed. Sheets are thrown to the side, crumpled in use, and you’re nowhere to be found.
Then, he recognizes the bitter smell of coffee filtering into the bedroom. Bucky narrows his eyes, certain that the rest of the team was out in search of Harkness. No one else should be on this floor. His heart is still pounding as he makes his way into the kitchen, cautious of the broken hinges on your door.
He finds you running your hand under the sink, grumbling under your breath, and the coffeepot sitting half empty on the counter top. Beside it sits two mugs amongst a pool of spilled coffee over the marble surface. Bucky sighs.
Without word on Harkness, you’ve been trying to find your routine again. Determined to get back to a normalcy you weren’t convinced you’d ever find, but stubborn enough to try. The couch is slightly shifted out of place, the edge of the carpet turned up. He can practically envision your path to the kitchen and clumsy attempts to avoid the furniture in your way.
“Are you alright?” Bucky calls gently, soft enough to not startle you to his presence.
You glance up in his direction and quickly turn off the faucet, nursing your left hand. It’s only then that he sees the burn mark running over your skin; red and beginning to blister. You hold your wrist delicately against your ribs and you make no attempts to hide it from him. You know better than to try.
“I just wanted to do something nice for you,” you murmur, embarrassed. “Thought I could at least make you coffee after you spent these last two weeks taking care of me and I—I still fucked it up.”
Bucky gently takes your injured hand in his own and covers the burn with the cool palm of his left hand. You sigh at the touch, eyes fluttering closed, and for a moment Bucky can pretend like this is any other day. He could imagine that when you open your eyes again, it will be to the vibrant shades he sees in his dreams
“Looks like perfectly good coffee to me,” he says sweetly, eyeing the coffee as it drips over the edge of the counter into a puddle on the floor. “You just missed the cup is all.”
He’s surprised when he hears your muffled laugh against his t-shirt. Your lips curve to a smile and you lean your head against his shoulder, content in the security of his frame beside you. Slowly, as if to give you the chance to pull away, Bucky brings your hand to his lips and presses a feather light kiss to the burn. The feeling surprises you as you pull in a shaken inhale and you turn your head up to him.
Bucky’s gaze flickers to your lips.
“Y/n!” Natasha’s voice suddenly echoes through the hall. It startles you enough that you flinch against Bucky’s hold, pressing your face tight into the crook of his neck. Footsteps carry in from the elevator, Natasha panting as she sprints towards you. She pauses at the edge of the kitchen. “We found Harkness.”
You stiffen in Bucky’s arms, though you don’t say a word.
“You’re sure?” Bucky says instead.
Natasha nods. “She’s in interrogation now.”
“Can she reverse it?”
“Wanda’s working on it,” Nat admits, the hesitancy reading in her tone. She tries to get a better look at you, hoping to see relief on your features, but you’re too afraid for that. You’re too afraid to give yourself even an ounce of hope in the fear it might be ripped away from you again. So instead, you press your ear to Bucky’s chest and try to steady your breathing. His arm wraps tighter at your shoulders and the compression seems to alleviate some of the tension in your body.
“I’ll bring her down in a minute,” Bucky says and you squeeze your arms around his waist. Natasha gives him a short nod and he waits until the sound of the elevator dings and the doors have closed behind her to exhale.
“Bucky?”
He swallows. “Yeah, sweetheart?”
“Will you—” You pause, taking in a shaking breath. Your gaze fixated beyond where he could see, dark grey clouds fading near to black. “Will you promise me… if this doesn’t work… Promise you won’t leave me behind?”
Bucky’s heart lurches and suddenly, his throat is so dry it might start bleeding from the cracks.
“I’m scared this might not ever go away, Bucky, but I’m… I’m terrified that I’ll lose you because of it,” you cry, your voice muffled by the collar of his shirt and it fractures Bucky completely. Your fingers curl into the fabric as you gather fistfuls in your hands. “I know this hasn’t been easy for you, either, and I know it’s been such a burden to take care of me the way you have but—”
“No,” Bucky manages to choke out, his voice breaking in the effort. “Never, sweetheart. I’m right here. I’m here with you. Always. As long as you want, okay? Forever, if you ask.”
He’s not sure how else he can say it—that he loves you. The very idea of you being anything but the brightest light at the end of tunnel was unimaginable to him. To even consider you as a burden, as a weight upon his shoulders he could not carry, was inconceivable. Every moment he had with you before Harkness – while hidden amongst stolen moments and safe within the shadows – was all that kept him going for a long time. And now—now he has you in his arms and you cling to him as if he could ease each of the worry lines on your face with the touch of his fingers.
There is no doubt, no hesitancy, in his voice when he says, “you have me, sweetheart. No matter what happens. You have me.”
Bucky doesn’t dare allow himself to consider the weight of how easily you relax into his arms as he says it. You only give him a short nod, a tight smile, and he begins to guide you to the elevator. He doesn’t know what to expect, when he reaches the interrogation room, but there’s something lighter in his chest – as if a boulder had been lifted from his shoulders – because you’re holding his hand.
Natasha’s eyes flicker to your intertwined fingers as the two of you approach. She does well enough to hide the smirk that pushes at her cheeks, but Bucky can still see the vague twitch in the muscle. She folds her arms over her chest.
“Ah! And here’s the guest of honor herself!” Agatha Harkness’ voice rings through the room. She wears an unsettling smile that sits wide against her features but does little to reach her eyes. She fixates on you as you step inside the room, admiring the storm clouds blocking your line of sight. Bucky can’t register touch in his left hand the way he can in his right, but he can still feel the pressure as you squeeze it tighter, flexing your grip to remind yourself he’s there with you.
“Just do as you promised, Agatha,” Wanda warns.
“As long as our deal still stands,” Agatha taunts back. She tugs at the bindings securing her hands—and her powers—at bay and still, a flicker of purple light dances in the tips of her fingers. She winks in Bucky’s direction and he finds himself inching in front of you. It only seems to make her smile wider.
“Reverse the spell, Agatha,” Wanda orders flatly. Bucky doesn’t dare ask what she agreed to do in exchange for Harkness’ cooperation, but whatever it is, he’s grateful.
Agatha rolls her eyes. “Fine, fine. Bring her to me.”
Bucky doesn’t move. He can practically feel your pulse raging from your palm as you keep your hand latched against his. Natasha bends down and slowly releases the cuffs on Harkness’ wrists, though she’s cautious to remind the witch that there were several Avengers still present in the room should she try anything foolish.
“Can’t exactly perform a miracle if the metal man is standing in my way,” Agatha groans. She kicks her legs up onto the interrogation table, lounging back into the thin metal chair as if it could recline.
Bucky feels a growl burning in his chest as he stares down the witch and a dangerous thought crosses his mind of whether ending her pathetic life would simply reverse the spell on its own. She must read the contemplation upon his face because her smile falls and she sits up straighter in her position.
“It’s okay, Bucky,” your voice says gently from behind him. Your hand slips from his hold and suddenly, he feels cold. He’s not sure what to do with the emptiness there, so he curls his fingers to a fist as you feel for the back of the chair and slowly sit opposite Harkness.
“Wow,” she preens, “I really did a number on you.”
Your expression remains unchanged. Only Bucky notices when your jaw flexes, the muscle twitching as you struggle to maintain the steel to your features. He nearly reaches out for your hand again before he stops himself.
“Do it, Agatha. Now,” Wanda presses. Red magic filters at her fingertips, traveling between the spaces in-between as if she were rolling a coin. Effortless and beautiful and terrifying all the same. Agatha swallows as she watches the magic curl to a ball at the center of Wanda’s palm.
“Alright, alright. Geesh.” Agatha leans forward against the table, her hands coming up to her eye line as a purple light begins to emerge in the middle of the room. It begins as nothing, pulling pieces of magic from the air or from the florescence or from the very matter of space itself until it winds and winds like spooling a ball of yarn until it’s the size of a small ball.
Agatha licks her lips in concentration as she lowers the ball of magic to your eye line. Then, the very edge of her mouth curves up at the corner and Bucky doesn’t have even a moment to react before Agatha’s arms extend and the light warps into a purple so dark, it’s nearly black, and the entirety of it is drawn into your eyes.
“What did you do!?” Wanda yells, slamming Harkness against the wall with the invisible strength of her power. Natasha is on her in an instant, cuffing her wrists and dampening the witch's power.
But Bucky doesn’t notice any of it happening around him. Not as you start screaming. He skids onto his knees in front of you as your hands press into your eyes.
“Y/n!” Bucky shouts, his hands gripping at your thighs. “Y/n! Answer me!”
But you can’t. He doesn’t even know if you can hear him over the sounds of your own screams. It echoes so painfully within the room that Natasha winces as she dares a glance in your direction. You start shaking then, tremors so violent that Bucky doesn’t even have a moment to think before he’s scooped you into his arms and takes off running.
He doesn’t know where he’s going. The med wing, maybe. But he can barely think. Barely breathe. He nearly slams the two of you into the stairwell doors in an effort to race you between floors. He should have known better than to trust the word of that witch. She’d blinded you to make a quick escape. She had no reason to reverse the spell and every reason to destroy the lives of the people intent on tracking her down.
He never considered that it could get worse. He never stopped for even a second to wonder.
He should have. If anyone understood the cruelty of the fates, it was Bucky Barnes. He should have protected you from it. He should have kept you safe. He should have—
“Bucky?”
He stills on the third floor, his pulse pounding so violently in his chest he’s scared to look down into your lap, scared he’s going to find his blood coating your clothes, his heart raw and exposed in your hands. Your voice echoes through the stairwell as you call his name again and slowly, he lowers you to the steps.
Your eyes are squeezed shut, almost painfully so as Bucky kneels down on the steps ahead of you. You keep your hands clenched into his shirt, your fingertips grazing over the comfort of solid metal on his left arm.
"I should get you to Banner,” Bucky tries, throwing a cautious glance to the door a few steps above. He can see the agents in lab coats passing by the small window in the door and he wonders if maybe he can grab their attention and bring someone to you.
When he turns back to you, he finds you staring at him. Lips parted, hands shaking.
It takes a moment before he realizes.
But when he does—the air gasps from his lungs.
The wash of storm clouds in your eyes has faded, cast out beyond the horizon and exposing the rush of color in its wake. You don’t blink. You don’t look away from him for even a second and your eyes start to water as you stare at him, trying to find the strength to speak. But words aren’t enough. They can’t be. Not with the way you’re looking at him.
“Y/n?” Bucky gapes, unable to tear his gaze away from the crystal-clear sky in your eyes.
The smile that presses into your cheeks makes Bucky’s stomach weak. It brightens across your face, touches your eyes, and Bucky chokes back a sob before it can consume him whole. Your hands are on his face then, holding his cheeks, thumbs brushing sweetly over unshaven stubble. You look at him like he’s the most wonderful thing you’d ever seen and it renders him speechless.
“Hi,” you manage to say through the tears and the laugh and the smile so wide on your face it might even touch your ears.
Bucky laughs and it tastes so beautifully of relief. “Hi.”
“You’re so beautiful,” you whisper, your fingertips pressing delicately along his jawline as if you’re memorizing him all over again. There’s no teasing in your voice as you say it, no playful smile. It’s the sincerity of it that scares him the most, that tugs the lightness from his features and made his heart pound so loudly he’s sure you can hear it.
He doesn’t mistake it for a moment when your gaze flickers to his lips. It happens quickly and the anticipation that follows feels thick in the air between you. His chest rises quicker with every breath, his hands shaking in anticipation. He doesn’t realize how close he is to you until your breath touches his cheeks. And then – you pull him to your lips.
There’s a new vulnerability in closing his eyes but as your lips meet and he’s consumed entirely in the feel of your mouth against his, the fear slips away. Your arms wrap around his neck, tugging him closer and he crawls up the stairs to hover over you. He feels you smile against him, your tongue flicking over his upper lip, and he swears he’ll never know what it is to be afraid again.
When you finally pull away, it’s only when your breathless and Bucky’s cheeks are pink, his lips swollen.
You laugh, brushing your hand down the side of his face. Your eyes trace over his features, taking your time, before you meet his eye again. “You said if I asked for forever…”
There is no hesitancy when Bucky replies. He pressed another kiss to the corner of your mouth, then to your cheekbones, your nose, feather light over your eyes.
“I’m yours.”