Chapter Text
Bucky watches the Battle of New York from a lumpy hospital bed in Walter Reed, his neck aching as he peers up at the television bolted to the wall. The last week has been a blur - Afghanistan to Landstuhl to Bethesda, sand and blood and pain to white sheets and bandages. He's not 100% sure that what he's seeing isn't some kind of drug-induced hallucination, because at that point he's still on the good stuff.
Even overseas they'd caught the news about the giant green monster rampaging through Harlem, and of course everyone knows Tony Stark, but it's the man in red, white and blue that catches his attention. At first, he assumes they've just shoved some new guy into the costume, but halfway through the action the man loses his mask. Bucky did a report on Captain America in eighth grade, requiring a lot of digging through old posters and film reels, and he'd know that face anywhere. Not to mention that he'd just been discovering sex, and all those spandex-clad muscles had done a lot to help him figure out that he was an equal opportunity kind of guy.
The point is, after asking two different nurses and the nutritionist who delivers his afternoon serving of slop, he's pretty sure that a) he's not hallucinating, and b) that really is Captain America out there. The reporters - and he still hasn't decided if these guys are brave or just dumbasses - are in the thick of it, filming from behind overturned cars or in circling helicopters, and it's almost like watching an action movie. It's probably kind of ridiculous that he's more hung up on Steve Rogers than the alien whatevers trying to destroy New York, but it's hard to reconcile his black-and-white memories with this version in living color. If Gary Cooper wandered into his hospital room and told him to stick 'em up, it wouldn't be any more surreal. "Quit pushin' me, Harv. I'm tired of being pushed."
"What was that, Sergeant Barnes?"
A nurse pokes her head through his open door, and he realizes he's spoken aloud. Maybe the drugs are still affecting him, after all. "Uh, just talking to the television there," he lies, gesturing with his good arm. (His only arm, but that's not a thought he's allowing himself just yet.) The nurse eyes him suspiciously but leaves, and he turns back to the news.
Iron Man and some giant dude with a hammer (Bucky peers at his IV bag, because what the hell?) are providing air support, and they clearly have a damn good sniper, though none of the reporters have managed to catch a shot of him. The green guy seems to be smashing things indiscriminately, leaving Cap and a slender red-headed woman in control on the ground. The cops have mostly given up on fighting in favor of crowd control, and Bucky has to wonder why they haven’t called in the goddamn National Guard or something, because six people against an alien invasion is … not going well.
Then the woman performs some improbable gymnastics and gets carried away on the back of one of the flying aliens, leaving Captain America on the ground all by himself, and Bucky bolts upright, dislodging his IV and setting various monitors to shrieking. “What are you doing, you idiot?” he shouts as Cap barrels through a group of aliens, his shield held in front like a battering ram. “Have none of you people ever heard of teamwork?” Iron Man swoops in just as Cap’s about to be overwhelmed, plucking him off the ground and zooming away. The camera darts around shakily, losing sight of him for a moment before catching a flash of blue atop what looks like a ten-story building. One of the big whale-looking things is heading straight for it, and the captain takes a running leap and dives off the building.
Bucky throws the remains of his lunch at the television just as the nurses arrive to sedate him.
So, Bucky misses the end of the battle, but in the weeks that follow, he keeps track of the progress in rebuilding New York. The group of heroes, who have been dubbed the Avengers, have apparently all stuck around to help with the cleanup, and when the news isn’t covering the rebuilding they’re talking about the reappearance of Captain America. Bucky distracts himself from two surgeries and the realization that yes, he now only has one arm, collecting every bit of information on Cap that he can. Every time he’s tempted to feel sorry for himself, he thinks of the poor bastard being on ice for 70 years, and suddenly his own hurts aren’t so bad.
One month after losing his arm, Bucky leaves Maryland and moves into a one-bedroom shithole not far from his old neighborhood in Brooklyn. He’d always felt a sense of pride, knowing that he and Captain America grew up less than a mile (if half a century) apart, and he’ll swear ‘til the day he dies that knowing Cap is back has nothing to do with him moving home. By all accounts, the Avengers have moved in with Stark (and seriously, Bucky would kill to see what that’s like), so it’s not like Cap’s going to turn up next door.
Bucky unpacks his single duffel bag full of clothes, pays a cabbie to lug his new television up the stairs, and resumes his superhero-watching, doing his best to ignore the nagging question of what the hell he’s going to do with his life.
On Bucky’s third day in his new home, the Avengers are called to reassemble.