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It is early evening. Oranges and reds pool into puddles on the floor, on the side of Bucky’s face and on his metal hand, seeping into the little ridges as the sun sets. Light rain taps its fingers against the windows, and the sound is soft, soothing, almost lulling in the way Bucky wants to lose himself to it, wants to let himself fall away from the present, simply turning himself to single-minded concentration, almost hypnotic like. But he doesn’t, instead clasping his hands together as he sits with his back pressed against one of Zemo’s irritatingly comfortable couches. Zemo has procured a laptop from somewhere and is speaking into his phone in quiet Sokovian on the other couch, and Sam is sitting by the kitchen counter, engrossed in files of some kind. It wouldn’t do to let himself fall away now, not with them being so close, so he simply stares into the wall opposite him. Restlessness nudges its head against his legs, against his arms and chest, but he stays still. Silent.
There is nothing for him to do, not really, and the idleness is strange, not quite comfortable, not quite not; it is somewhat nostalgic in the way it echoes of another time in Riga, another lifetime, sitting still on a couch much cheaper than this one and listening to the quiet breathing of his sleeping handler. He hadn’t been allowed to sleep on that mission, this much he remembers; his handler, Polyakov, had brushed pale, long, musician fingers over the crook of his elbow that night, before slipping a needle under his skin. Cool liquid had slithered into his blood, seeping, marching to the beat of his heart up towards his mind. He hadn’t known what was in the injection and he still didn’t know, but it had kept him awake and alert the entire night and the night after too, his heart beating a little too fast, his breath a little too rapid.
Somebody breathes over his shoulder, and Bucky tenses, all of a sudden.
“Good evening, Soldier,” Polyakov’s voice wraps around his neck like a noose, and Bucky is up and pointing his SIG-Sauer at the man’s head over the back of the couch before he even really knows what he is doing, barely noticing Zemo pulling out his own gun and Sam’s surprised yell.
“Bucky,” Sam starts, cautious. Bucky doesn’t take his eyes off Polyakov, aiming the gun at him as the young handler walks around the couch and over to stand by Sam, eyes hollow and empty, grin unwavering. “ Woah , Buck,” Sam raises his hands, palms facing out, slow, telegraphing every movement clearly.
“What are you doing here,” Bucky growls, his heart screaming behind his chest, blood frothing at its mouth as it beats out a rapid, terrified rhythm.
“It’s me, Sam,” Sam says lowly, and Zemo moves to stand just in Bucky’s peripheral, gun aimed at the ex-assassin.
“I know who you are Sam,” Bucky bites out. “I’m talking about you .”
Sam blinks in confusion and looks around him. “Buck, who are you talking about?”
“On your knees, Misha,” Bucky hisses and takes a step closer to Polyakov, and, by extension, Sam.
“There is nobody there, James,” Zemo says suddenly, and in one swift movement, he is standing straight in front of Bucky, who scowls and aims his gun higher, over Zemo’s shoulder. Sam doesn’t move an inch, demeanor calm, hands still in the air. “Unless you want to shoot Samuel,” Zemo continues. “Please don’t. Unfortunately, we still need him.”
“Zemo...” Sam says warningly.
Polyakov conjures a gun from somewhere, laughs and shoots himself through the chin.
How roses bloom gently under the warming embrace of spring, and the world screeches to a halt as blood and brain matter blossom against Sam’s face and side, like red petals unfurling their arms all over the green plains of his t-shirt. Bucky lowers his gun, horror trickling down the back of his throat and into his lungs as Polyakov crumples to the floor like he is a rock thrown from a height. Somebody screams behind his ears, and the rain smashes its face into the windows to watch with glee, its laughter winding up and around Bucky’s shoulders, draping over him like a strange cape.
Zemo reaches out and pries the gun from Bucky’s hands. He lets him do so, flicking wide eyes to Sam, who’s lowered his hands and is now moving around the kitchen counter towards Bucky.
“Sam,” Bucky says hoarsely, and Zemo disappears behind him with both his and Bucky’s guns; something scrapes and somehow Bucky knows the Baron is putting them far from reach. “You’re covered in blood.”
“I’m not, Bucky,” Sam says, tone forcefully light. “Look.” He spreads his arms out to either side. “I promise you, there’s no blood on me.”
Sure enough, Bucky blinks and the blood is gone. He furrows his brows in bewilderment, and glances around Sam to look at Polyakov. Nobody is there. A sick feeling washes through him and he turns wide eyes to Sam.
“What the fuck?”
“That’s what I’m wondering, too, Bucky,” Sam says gently, and presses his hands to Bucky’s shoulders, guiding him back towards the couch and pushing him down so that he is sitting. “Are you alright?”
Bucky shakes his head, once. Then twice, like he is trying to shake sense free from its hidden confines. “I don’t-” and he bows his head. Says nothing else. What the hell. What- He must have been seeing things, but he hadn’t- He hadn’t lost it like this since World-War-goddamn-two.
“I am assuming you haven’t had something like this happen for a while,” Zemo’s voice pipes up, those brown eyes of his sharp, piercing through Bucky’s skull, and Bucky presses his metal hand to the bottom of his face, ignoring him. His head doesn’t ache, not really, but it swirls with confusion and adrenaline is still breathing a buzz into his body.
“This isn’t something new?” Sam asks surprised.
Zemo huffs out a breath, and sudden dread rolls through Bucky. He raises his face and stares at Zemo, who stares back at him, his head tilted in that irritating way of his. “Is it?”
“ Molchi ,” Bucky hisses, vehemently, the sound slicing through the air like a sword, and a muscle in Zemo’s cheek twitches, as if he is trying not to smile.
“I was surprised by how well the army records hid the-” and Bucky leaps up, throwing himself at Zemo, metal hand whirring as he presses it around Zemo’s throat.
Sam doesn’t say anything but he steps forward, a calming hand on Bucky’s shoulder.
“I will kill you,” Bucky murmurs harshly, and presses harder on Zemo’s throat. The Baron’s face is bright red and he laughs gaspingly.
“I- don’t- doubt that- you- will, Ja-mes,” and he raises a hand instinctively towards the hand on his throat to scrabble at it weakly with his fingers, his eyelids drooping slightly.
“Bucky, he’s going to pass out,” Sam says urgently, pressing the hand on Bucky’s shoulder tighter. Bucky continues to squeeze at Zemo’s neck, and the Baron’s lips part desperately, his head lolling somewhat. “ Bucky !”
Bucky lets go like Zemo is on fire, and the Baron’s legs give out. He crumples to the floor, muscles seizing minutely, as oxygen floods back into his head. Sam crouches by him, tapping his cheek, before giving Bucky a tired look once the Baron blinks up at him, coming back to full consciousness gradually.
“Buck…”
A horrified expression is splayed over Bucky’s face, and a creeping sense of deja vu winds reaching fingers around his lungs so that it is somewhat hard to breathe.
“I- I wasn’t actually going to kill him.” Sam doesn’t pick up on the ' yet' that is left unsaid, or maybe he chooses to ignore it. Bucky doesn’t know, and the older man sighs.
“I know. Just. Cool it a little, alright?”
“Samuel, asking the man to cool it after an episode like this is very un-counselor of you, isn’t it?” Zemo croaks, and Bucky grits his jaw turning around.
“Shut up, Zemo,” Sam hisses. “One. I am not his counselor. And two , just what the hell is going on here?”
“Nothing,” Bucky says quietly, and his right hand twitches slightly. His entire body is buzzing with a strange concoction of shame and lingering adrenaline and all he wants is to leave and never come back again, so he marches over to the hallway leading to the front door.
“Nothing is subjective,” Zemo mutters.
“Shut up , Zemo,” Sam barks. “Bucky, don't you dare leave right now. I will follow you until you tell me something.”
Bucky stops in his tracks and turns to face Sam, leaning heavily against the start of the hallway. “Nothing, Sam. I just- I haven’t slept is all.”
“So you pull out a gun on a hallucination?”
“...I haven’t slept in a long while.”
“Sleep deprivation is a common trigger for psycho-”
“Zemo, if you don’t shut your mouth I will choke you out myself,” Sam growls, and Zemo mutters an apology, sitting up slowly, and rubbing his neck experimentally. “Bucky, has this happened before?”
“Not forever.”
“Forever being…”
“ Goddamn it, Sam! Not since the forties,” Bucky grits out. “You happy now?”
Sam gives him a long look, before, “This likely to happen again?”
“I don’t know! Can I leave now?” Bucky sneers, the action almost childish, but he squashes down the embarrassment with purpose. “Thank you,” he says without waiting for an answer before he turns heel and leaves, just like that.
The rain still pitter-patters on down outside, lightly, as if the skies are holding back, and Bucky turns his face heaven-ward, almost in a prayer-like motion, before he sighs and disappears into Riga’s shadows.
Zemo is reading Bulgakov in the living room when he comes back, and Bucky toes off his muddy boots before fully entering the living room. It is dim, only illuminated by lamp-light and the meager light from the city outside. A clock ticks in the corner of the room, and electricity hums behind the walls. It feels almost dream–like, like the whole thing is out of a picture book. Except it isn’t.
He pours himself a glass of vodka, neat, from Zemo’s kitchen cabinets before walking over to stand in front of the Baron, who’d put his book face down beside him.
“I’m not sorry for choking you,” he says, and sits down on the other couch, furthest away from Zemo.
Zemo tilts his head. “I know,” he says, and his voice is still a little hoarse. “And I’m not sorry for what I said.”
“I know.”
“Glad we’ve got that settled then,” Zemo says, and Bucky rolls his eyes, taking a swig of his vodka. It burns his throat, but he doesn’t make a face.
They sit in silence for a little while, Zemo picking up his book again, and Bucky nursing his glass between his hands. The metal of his left clinks against the glass as he turns it in circles, somewhat compulsively. It is Zemo who finally speaks up.
“When did it start?”
Bucky doesn’t say anything at first, setting the near-empty vodka glass over onto the coffee table. “After I turned twenty-three, just a little before I fell,” he mutters, finally, rubbing his fingers over each other again and again, the metal catching the soft lamplight in its breast, casting it back up at Bucky’s face gently. “I didn’t- I didn’t know what was going on at first.”
Zemo hums. “It was the 40s, James. I don’t think schizophrenia was widely known.”
Bucky laughs. “You’re wrong. It was often diagnosed. I suppose perhaps wrongly sometimes. I know, ‘cause my mother was a psychiatric nurse.”
“I see,” Zemo murmurs, slightly ruffled.
“It stopped when I was the Soldier,” Bucky continues bitterly. “It- it all just stopped. I didn’t even- I didn’t know it had stopped but I know now that it had.”
“They had you on a cocktail of drugs, antipsychotics being one of them.”
It is Bucky’s turn to hum. Then, “I hate you, Zemo.”
Zemo dips his head in a half-nod, but he doesn’t say anything as Bucky scoffs, continuing:
“I don’t even know why I’m talking to you about this.”
Silence settles between them, heavy, not awkward, but not comfortable.
“Did Steve Rogers know?”
“I’m not talking to you about this,” Bucky says, nettled at the mention of Steve’s name.
Zemo smiles passively.
“Where’s my gun, Zemo?”
The Baron stands up then, heading towards a low cabinet, crouching down and pulling the SIG-Sauer out from behind a beautiful porcelain teacup before he walks over to stand in front of Bucky, holding the gun out.
“Interesting modifications,” he says.
Bucky grunts, and takes the gun, slipping it into his waist holster that he’d hidden under his jacket. He doesn’t grace the Baron with a response. The modifications were- they were. They were private, for private reasons, and a flash of bright eyes and spiked hair flits across his mind’s eye. He staunchly ignores it; he is too tired to dwell on it now.
“You should sleep,” Zemo continues. ”Unless you want a repeat of-” and he waves a hand in the general direction of the kitchen area. “I mean, of course, you should also considering getting a prescriptio-”
“Watch it, Zemo.”
Zemo shrugs, and the movement is so un-Zemo-like, that Bucky blinks at him, then rubs at his forehead, and stands up.
“If you escape I will find you,” he says.
“I have no doubts.”
Bucky nods then, and doesn’t glance at Zemo as he moves away from him and over to the arching doorway that led to the stairs and up to the bedrooms. “‘Night, Zemo.”
“Goodnight, James,” Zemo says thoughtfully.
Bucky doesn’t look back as he leaves the room, but he can feel the Baron’s gaze bore into his back all the way until he is out of sight. Exhaustion tugs at him. He needs to sleep, and he is actually going to try, no matter the dreams he knows he is going to see. Passing by Sam’s door, he hesitates for a moment. Maybe he should- no. No, he will deal with it tomorrow. Or never, and he grits his jaw momentarily. He will have to deal with the whole thing that happened today sometime, this he knows. But not now, and not today. Tomorrow, he tells himself. It is always tomorrow, and outside the skies finally split apart, turning the ever-drizzling drip into heaving, heavenly sobs.