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Steve landed as lightly as he could on the fire escape so as not to rattle the wrought iron. If anyone on the street bothered to look up, they would see him, but that was the least of his worries. When he tugged up on the window it didn’t budge. He frowned, pulling until the latch broke with a sound of splintering wood. Steve stepped through, sliding it closed behind him.
Bucky’s apartment was fairly cluttered, with a mattress and blankets in the corner and dirty dishes in the sink. Steve could see all of it from where he stood. On a coffee table were piled books with spines so battered the letters were unreadable. Steve paused, taking a moment to glance over everything. For a second, he felt like he was standing in their old apartment in Brooklyn. It had the same scattered organization and warm light shining through the window.
Then he remembered where he was. Romania. With a German Swat team descending rapidly.
But with Bucky out somewhere, there was nothing he could do.
On top of the fridge were a few protein bars and a notebook with colored tabs marking pages. Steve felt the ghost of a smile tug at his lips. Good to know Bucky was still a nerd, even after all this time. He picked up the notebook and flipped through the pages to find newspaper clippings of the Howling Commandos and Captain America. And a few old pictures of himself—Steve recognized one as the family picture that Bucky had kept framed on his dresser when they were younger. The pictures had probably ended up in a museum somewhere or thrown in the trash when there was nobody to pay their rent, and these were printed off from the internet. Notes were scribbled in the margins.
Bucky’s handwriting still looked the same.
In his earpiece, Sam said, “ Heads up, Cap. German Special Forces approaching from the south. ”
Steve nodded, “Understood.” Bucky had been seen coming into the building, so where was he now? He went over to the window, scanning the low roof and streets below, not knowing what he was looking for.
Creeaak .
The floorboards groaned and Steve turned towards the door just as a hot pain split his face, sending him reeling back into the kitchen counter. Stronger than any one man had the right to be. Dishes clattered to the ground, shattering, as Steve struggled to regain himself. He could feel his nose bleeding, hot blood in his mouth and spilling onto his chin.
He spluttered for breath like he had been drowning. The reaction came more out of shock than anything else.
“What are you doing here?” Demanded a voice. Cold and hostile, but distinctly Bucky. Anger dissipated from Steve as he recognized his friend, as well as any desire to retaliate.
Steve took a deep breath and looked up to see Bucky standing over him, face half cast in shadow. Words stopped in his throat, his chest seizing up. He gasped, “You punched me!”
“‘Cause you’re in my apartment,” Bucky said, raising his fist like he was threatening to do it again.
Sam’s urgent voice cried in his ear, “ What was that, Steve? ”
“It was nothing,” Steve said quickly. “Just warn me about the police.” Swallowing hard, he refocused on his aim. He said to Bucky, as evenly as he could, “D-do you know who I am?”
He pulled his helmet. Maybe it would help Bucky recognize him.
“Yeah, you’re Captain America,” Bucky said lowly, stepping back so Steve could straighten. “And now you’ve broken into my apartment.” He still stood with an edge but the anger quickly dissipated as he spoke. It gave Steve a sliver of hope, even though his head felt like it was packed with cotton balls and his nose stung something terrible.
“ They’ve set the perimeter .”
Steve wiped the blood on his face, leaving a streak of dark, almost black, red on the navy blue uniform.
“Can you do any better than that?” He pressed one hand to the side of his head and the other behind him flatly on the counter. He felt like the world was spinning around him with Bucky as an axis.
“Because there’s a team of German Special Forces who plan to take you in for murder of a king.”
“ They’ve entered the building. ”
The expression on Bucky’s face was unreadable. “I am a murderer.”
“That wasn’t—” Steve gritted his teeth. He fought the urge to grab Bucky’s hand and drag him out of the building. “I know you, Bucky. And I know you don’t want to go to prison for a crime you didn’t commit.”
Bucky shook his head slowly, “Maybe not this one. But there’s enough blood on my hands to put me in an electric chair.”
Steve frantically tried changing his angle, “They don’t plan on taking you alive, Bucky. You don’t want to die.” You don’t punch someone for breaking into your home and then willing surrender yourself to handcuffs.
“Let them come.”
Steve could only blink in confusion. How did Bucky not understand the direness of the situation? He wiped more blood from his face and bit the pain.
“ They’re on the roof. I’m compromised. ”
Footsteps thudded across the ceiling, Bucky’s eyes darted upwards as he pulled off his glove, revealing a hand that looked like it had been dipped in silver. Steve’s breath caught in his throat.
“You dragged me from that river,” he said flatly. “And then you punch me. Why?”
“Because you’re in my apartment,” Bucky shot. “But you don’t seem to have gotten the hint. I don’t know you.”
“ Five seconds. ”
“I know you’re confused,” Steve pressed. There was no way of getting out of this if Bucky didn’t cooperate now. “But—”
“I’m not confused,” Bucky said shortly. “I know exactly who you are, and you have no relation to me.”
“ Three seconds. ”
Steve struggled to keep from yelling, wiping blood from his face again. “You know that’s not true.” Bucky had to be lying, he had to be.
Bucky tilted his head, “You’re out of time.”
“ Breach! ”
The farthest window shattered and something came through. A grenade the size of his fist. It landed at Bucky’s feet and he kicked it towards Steve. Steve could feel his body transition into fight mode as he used the shield to smother the blast. Blood rushed past his ears and his thoughts were smothered with a frantic calm. Steve barely had time to straighten before another attack came through the same window, Bucky seized the mattress and hoisted it over his shoulder, turning his back.
Steve took the moment to jam his helmet back on his head as Bucky moved to throw a metal, skeleton-like table in front of the door. Probably to prevent anyone from coming in with a battering ram.
Suddenly, in a fury of glass shards, several figures dressed in tactical gear and the letters POLIZEI stamped in white across their backs swung in on cables from the roof. Steve swore under his breath. He gathered a fistful of the rug in his hands and jerked harshly to sweep one of the officers off their feet.
He looked up to see Bucky throwing an officer against a wall. Steve realized suddenly that Bucky had no intention of going peacefully.
Bucky intended to fight his way out.
“This doesn’t have to end in blood,” Steve cried over the German shouting and sounds of fighting.
Bucky shoved Steve to the ground. For a split second, he thought Bucky was going to break his skull. The hand crashed through the floorboards next to his head.
“Clearly you’ve never been in a proper fight, Steve,” Bucky said. His face was trapped in a scowl but there was a gleam behind his eyes. A suppressed recognition. At least, that’s what Steve hoped it was.
Bucky pulled his hand back up and clutched in his fist was a black backpack. Without looking, Bucky threw it out the window and Steve knew it would land on the low roof outside. That’s Bucky’s escape route, Steve thought. Planned, probably, before Bucky even moved in.
Smart. Steve had done the same thing when he bought his last flat.
Steve threw up his shield to deflect a hailstorm of bullets. Bucky shoved Steve away and he stumbled back through the window and into an officer on the balcony. Steve quickly knocked him out—there would be no dead bodies today. He jumped back inside to see Bucky heading out to the hallway and stairs. Steve bounded after him.
Beside him, an officer was panting into a radio. “ Der Verdächtige ist ausgebrochen. Er ist am östlichen Treppenschacht. ” Steve seized it and crushed it into nothing more than useless wires.
Bucky had disappeared onto the lower level, Steve jumped across the stairwell to follow him. There was a swarm of officers in black pads and Bucky attacked them with a ferocity like he was out for blood. But they wore tactical gear and were well-trained, Steve knew—and Bucky probably also knew—that their injuries wouldn’t be debilitating.
As if in direct contradiction to Steve’s thoughts, Bucky threw a man over the side of the railing. Steve just managed to catch him by the straps of his vest. With little effort, Steve hauled him back over the railing.
“Work with me, Bucky,” Steve groaned wearily.
Bucky took a moment to pause. “You broke into my apartment, I’m not working with you.”
“Get over that, will you,” Steve sighed. He heard the rustle of someone preparing a gun and turned to knock the barrel out of another officer’s hands.
With Steve’s back turned, Bucky leaped down the center of the spiraling stairway. Steve heard him grunt and the sound of metal bending. A few moments later, the muffled breaking of glass.
Bucky would have jumped out the window and onto the low roof after his bag. Steve swore, tearing his attention from the officers and banging a fist against the railing. That had been Bucky’s plan, make it to a level where he could easily survive the fall. Still, more out of misplaced hope than anything else, Steve jumped after him.
The landing was empty but would be swarming with polizei soon enough. He rushed to the window just in time to watch Bucky land, rolling to ease the force. Another figure was creeping up quickly. Dressed in black, but…but cleaner than the officers. Smoother and less crude, not in tactical gear.
As the figure leaped up, arms extending and what could have been knives glinting in his fists, Steve leaned forward and yelled, “Watch out!”
Bucky didn’t hear him. The two collided and Steve tore himself away. Taking a few steps back, he asked Sam, “Did you see that?”
“ Where? ” Sam sounded out of breath.
“Southwest rooftop,” he said, skidding to a halt in front of another window.
“ Who’s the other guy? ” Sam cried.
“I don’t know,” Steve admitted, catching his breath. “But I’m about to find out.” He took a few bounding steps and leaped through the window, taking the force with his shoulder to avoid the glass shards.
He landed on a neighboring rooftop.
Taking a moment away from the fighting, he checked himself once over for any injuries. His nose had stopped bleeding—he didn’t know when it stopped—and his head felt a lot clearer. It’s good to see Bucky again, he thought with a smile before straightening to join the fray once more.