Chapter Text
Steve’s watch beeps, and Peggy sighs against his chest, where she's swaying with him to soft music.
“You have to go now.” It’s not a question.
Steve tightens his hold on her, one last time. “I know,” he says.
But Peggy has always been the practical one, between the two of them. She stops their swaying by putting some space between them. Steve tries to memorize as much of her as he can. There’s so much he wants to tell her and, ironically, so little time.
“Peggy–”
“I know,” she says, smiling even as she wipes away silent tears. She has a ring on her finger; a diamond almost as beautiful as she is. Steve is so, so happy for her. “Thank you for that dance, Steve.”
Steve chuckles, a bit wet. “I made a promise,” he says.
She smiles, and it’s a beauty that transcends time. “I never doubted you.” His watch beeps once more, a shrill, insistent sound. “Now, go, Steve, and don’t look back.”
So Steve takes a step back, clicks the button on his watch that allows Tony’s –god, Tony. The grief and guilt is still so all-encompassing– red and white suit to take place over his clothes. The mask goes over his face, and with a last look at a smiling glossy-eyed Peggy, he picks his shield up and says goodbye to his past.
He’s undone and rebuilt perpetually with the press of a button. He’s both lived centuries and never existed. He’s lost forever and it hasn’t even been a second. And once his cells start feeling something closer to themselves, he knows he’s close, knows he’s almost home, that he’ll open his new eyes and he’ll see Bucky– but then something YANKS–
***
Steve crash-lands on grass.
He tucks and rolls, is on his feet a moment after, trying to make sense of his surroundings. Grass, bushes, trees.
Okay, what went wrong? He’s supposed to be back by Tony’s lakehouse–
His eyes catch water in the short distance. That’s the– that’s the lake.
Okay, so he is where he’s supposed to be.
The landing pad is gone, though. So is Bruce’s workshop table. So are Bruce, and Sam, and–
“Bucky?” he calls. No one answers.
Wait. The shield, where is his shield? He had it in his hands just a second ago. How is he supposed to give Sam his name without the shield? He spent so long trying to find it–
“Sam? Bruce?” he calls out again. “Bucky?!”
If he’s in the right place, then, when is he?
Bob is elbow deep in soapy sink-water when there’s a knock on the door.
He turns towards Bucky in pleading alarm, which is fair. The door in question is actually a thick metal sliding wall, one which everyone living in the Tower has the means to unlock. Unless it’s Alexei, and the man somehow got past the first set of security, took the elevator, and then forgot the password to the second one; wouldn't be the first time. Or maybe he ordered uber eats again.
Bucky sighs and stands up, closing his laptop and the damning headlines inside it. “I’ve got it,” he says tiredly.
He walks unhurriedly to the panel beside the door and types in the password, then crosses his arms as he waits for the doors to slide open. It better be Alexei himself; if Bucky needs to have another talk about sharing sensitive security information with strangers–
Bucky’s entire body freezes on the spot.
“Bucky,” someone wearing Steve Roger’s face gasps in open relief.
“Bob?” Bucky calls. Fake Steve’s relieved expression –so fucking realistic– falls into confusion. Bucky turns on his heel and yells back into the room. “Bob?!”
Still with soap suds on his arms, Bob slides hurriedly into view.
“Yeah? Bucky, what–”
“Can you see him?” Bucky asks, pointing a thumb over his shoulder. He doesn’t dare turn back right now, in case the man-ghost-hallucination is still there. In case it’s gone.
Bob’s eyes go as big as plates, confirmation enough. “Is that–?”
“Did you do this?” Bucky interrupts. “Is this you, somehow?”
It’d be just like Bucky if his mountain of issues has somehow managed to unlock an entire new facet of Bob’s void-visions– his own personal ghost to follow him around and haunt him.
“No I–” Bob pats himself down, as if he’s gonna find what’s responsible for this as a physical manifestation on his body. All he does is get more soap on his sweater. “I don’t think my powers work that way. That I know, at least.”
“Okay,” Bucky says. Then, because he’s trying to be more polite nowadays. “Thank you, Bob.”
“No problem.” Bob’s eyesight flutters over Bucky’s shoulder. “Hi, uhm, big fan–”
“Don’t talk to him.”
“–okay, yeah.” Bob nods to himself and leaves back towards the kitchen. Once he’s almost out of view he turns his head for a last second glance; his eyebrows frown in bewilderment and he raises one hand in what becomes an aborted wave when he catches Bucky's glare. Which means that the man-clone-robot-not hallucination behind him probably waved at him first. What the hell.
Bucky breathes once, deeply, fists and unfists his hands twice, and doesn’t feel remotely ready to turn around, but he does.
In the same fluid movement, he pulls a gun and points it at Fake Steve’s head.
“Who are you?” he asks.
Fake Steve raises his arms slowly. “Buck, It’s me, I swear.” he says, and his voice is too goddamn real. Bucky is going to kill whoever is responsible for this. Fake Steve takes a slight step forward, and Bucky clicks off the safety in warning. “Okay, alright,” Fake Steve’s eyes –the exact shade of blue he remembers– roam over his face for a moment, visibly thinking. “Buck–”
“Who. The Fuck. Are you?” Bucky snarls.
“Your Ma used to bake those coffee cakes for you and your sisters,” Fake Steve starts, and Bucky’s breath gets stuck in his lungs. “You’d always sneak me a slice, and she’d pretend she didn’t see anything. On nice days –when the sun was out and my cough wasn’t knockin’ me flat– you’d pull me down to the docks, remember? We’d share a cone 'cause we couldn’t afford two. Strawberry, ‘cause it was my favorite, even though you were always sweet on vanilla. You were always doing stuff like that for me, even though you didn’t have to. You– Bucky, please .”
Bucky’s hands shake –his grip has never wavered with a gun in hand for almost ninety years and his hands are shaking. He clicks the safety back on and points the gun downwards.
His mouth is dry when he says. “Steve?”
“It’s me, Buck.” Steve’s voice is light with relief again, his hands are lowering and reaching towards Bucky; stops right before touching him. “Bucky–”
Bucky extends a hand –his right one– up toward Steve’s and almost expects his hand to pass right through but– his touch lands, and Steve’s hand is warm in his.
“Fuck, you’re real,” he says, and wastes no time in hauling the man into a crushing hug. Steve hugs just as tights back. “How are you real?” he asks, face already buried in Steve’s shoulder. “It’s been four years, Steve. I thought you–”
“I came back,” Steve says, one hand on the back of Bucky’s neck, one grasping at his waist. Bucky’s own hands are hanging onto Steve’s shoulders like a lifeline. “I was always going to come back, I swear.”
“You–” Against every instinct instilled in him, Bucky untangles enough to glare into the other man’s face. “You goddamn punk, where the fuck did you go?”
Steve is already shaking his head. “Nowhere. I followed the plan– I don’t know what the hell went wrong–”
“I thought you stayed. I thought you fucking left me behind–”
The hand on the back of Bucky’s neck grips tighter.
“No– Bucky, I’d never–”
Then he cuts himself off, because Steve’s lips are on his, and Bucky doesn’t care; nothing in that moment matters more. One of them makes a desperate sort of sound, but the moment is cut short when Bucky becomes aware of Bob’s voice hurriedly stepping back into the room.
“Wait, wait wait wait–”
Bucky turns his head in time to see Yelena and John rush into the room, weapons at the ready –with Bob hurrying behind them– and catches the moment they freeze. John pales about three shades in an instant.
“Uhm,” Yelena says, eyebrows up to her hairline. “Are we interrupting?”
Bucky becomes suddenly aware of the position he finds himself in. He looks back at Steve. Slowly, almost reluctantly, both men let go of eachother and turn ninety degrees towards their audience. Bucky can still feel the heat of Steve’s arm brushing against his.
No one says anything for an extremely long, very awkward moment.
“Steve,” Bucky starts. “This is… part of my team.”
“Right,” Steve says. “The new Avengers. You’re on a billboard.”
“And cereal,” Bob adds automatically in an almost choked tone, then seems to immediately regret it. Everyone tactfully ignores him.
There’s a few more beats of silence. Bucky wonders if he’s supposed to make introductions here.
Yelena talks first. “You are supposed to be dead.”
Steve lets out a single chuckle –Bucky is pretty sure he’s the only one that catches the hysterical undercut to it. “Yeah, heard that one before.”
“Were you actually on the moon?” Unfortunately, it seems like John has found his voice. And that he’s spent too much time with Alexei lately.
Steve frowns in confusion. “No, just sort of lost in time– I’m sorry, what’s your name? I’m Steve.”
“Yeah, I know. I was you for a while. I mean– not you. But I had your shie–” John’s eyes pop in consternation. “Your– I mean. I’m John, John Walker.”
Steve nods, if a bit bewildered, and then looks at Yelena, whose face is now carefully neutral, and only provides, “Yelena.”
“I’m Bob,” says Bob.
That actually brings a tiny smile onto Steve’s face –and, holy shit, that's Steve, his Steve. Smiling. That’s a sight he thought he’d lost forever.
“Hi Bob,” the miracle that is Steve Rogers says. “John, Yelena. It’s nice to meet you all.”
Then the elevator dings.