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(SOMEWHERE IN GERMANY)
"Fuck you," says Sam, while Steve is busy gassing up the car. "Ugh, just, fuck you, man."
He hates Barnes already. Not because he's deadly, or brainwashed, or even because Steve is obsessed with him. He has stupidly long legs and sharp knees he likes to methodically press into the back of Sam's seat, and Steve keeps looking at him through the rear view mirror instead of looking at the road, which is terrifying, but Sam can't convince Steve to let him drive. Steve gets weird about being driven around, and Sam's too tired to have that fight with him.
(Steve was raised in New York. He likes taking the subway. He's even been known to take a taxi -- but if he's in a car he flips his fucking lid if he's not driving. For fuck's sake, Sam can and has driven a tank. He's driven in Washington DC. Steve needs to get the fuck over his self.)
"I don't like you, and I don't trust you," says Sam, glaring at him some more.
Bucky smirks him, sideways and mean, and says, "Probably a good choice."
Which is when Sam realizes: "You're actually an asshole. You're actually just a real asshole, just like he is."
Bucky looks at him with huge gray eyes, full of limpid innocence. It's a great look, almost entirely believable, if you hadn't just realized he was just a mean son of a bitch. Sam feels betrayed by history and also Steve Rogers, because according to them Bucky Barnes shat angel feathers and it turns out he's just an ordinary dude who was a giant fucking jerkass. It's probably a worse disillusionment than Steve was, because at least Steve had things in the history books describing him as 'dedicated' and 'determined' or 'committed to his goals', which everybody knew was code for a real stubborn asshole. Like, you never heard Tony Stark being described as pigheaded, but it had taken about three seconds for Sam to realize that dude had all the ability to compromise of a crabby two year old.
"That might work on Steve," says Sam, opening the car door, because fuck this, if he's going to deal with two assholes in a literal clown car for the foreseeable future, he's doing it with Kinderegg chocolate. "But fuck me if it ever works on me."
"If you wanna," says Bucky.
PUNCHBUGGY RULES
- A car can be called for punchbuggy OR slugbug, not both, by one person
The same car may not be used again for punchbuggy or slugbug unless the initial caller has failed to say "no returns" or "no backfires", in which case the other party may call either punchbuggy or slugbug, whichever has not been called
- Punchbuggy must be called with color; an incorrect color is a foul (may be modified in case of previously established colorblindness)
- No hits must cause tears or bruising (visible on Sam or lasting more than five minutes on Bucky)
- No hits must draw attention of outside parties / adults / the driver / Steve
- VW buses are allowed but must be called as "doubleslug" BECAUSE THAT'S HOW THE WILSON FAMILY DOES IT, JERKFACE
- Calling yellow bugs is a infraction of Yellow Car, and is a foul (all parties must announce "yellow car", unless of course in case of a yellow taxi, where calling it results in a foul, look does Sam make the rules, unfortunately he does not)
- A car may only be called once a trip, or once every twenty four hours, whichever is greater.
- There is a lifetime limit on the amount of times one car may be called, which Sam is not fucking arguing about because he seriously doubts he'll ever be in one place long enough to have it matter
- Cars on sales lots do not count
- One-eyes are for kissing people. They do not count for punchbuggy or slugbug. If you call a one-eye as a punchbuggy/slugbug you must either kiss the other party or be penalized with a finger flick
- NO FINGER FLICKS OR PUNCHES ALLOWED WITH THE METAL ARM FFS ASSHOLE
PENALTIES
If a punchbuggy/slugbug has been called incorrectly, the fouling party will be given a penalty as judged by a non-player or as agreed previously. If a penalty is argued unsuccessfully for more than three minutes, the penalty is doubled. (Penalties may be postponed until Clint texts back a ruling.) Penalties as follows:
- Double hit
- Noogie (yeah you bet Sam's gonna give Barnes the father of all white boy gangsta dreads)
- Finger flick (rules about metal hand apply)
- Tattling (fuckin watch me, Wilson)
- Tax on food / drink (NOT chosen by fouling party, with the understanding that the other party will not demand a tax on a favorite food or drink)
- Giving up shotgun turn
(LATER, MUCH LATER, IN WAKANDA)
"Is this some sort of American pastime?" says T'Challa doubtfully. He's reading the rules, which have been crossed over and scribbled over by both Sam and Bucky, and are covered with hash marks counting hits and a brown stain that is probably coffee and another stain that is probably not coffee. The paper is folded over a lot because they secretly passed it back and forth while Steve was focused on the road.
They should make a new copy, but Sam is attached to this one, and he's pretty sure Bucky is gonna put it in his Notebook of Stuff if Sam lets go of it. If they weren't on the run and the cloud wasn't inherently insecure, Sam would just get him an Evernote and teach him how to use it. He'd taught Steve how to do it, and Barnes had at least half the brains and ten times the common sense.
Sam stares at him. "What do you mean, point? It's punchbuggy."
"It seems rather pointless," he says. And like. T'Challa is Sam's dream prince and all, but thinking that Punchbuggy is pointless may be a deal breaker.
Sam can't think of anything to say besides 'you must be an only child' and he can't say that without his mother hearing him on the astral plane and telepathically smacking him one, so he coughs a little and says, "It's just what you do on car trips, okay?"
"I see," says T'Challa politely, and the conversation switches over to things like not getting themselves violently murdered in the face by SWAT teams and extradition policies.
(GERMANY, BEFORE THINGS WENT FURTHER TO SHIT THAN THEY ALREADY WERE)
"Can you move your seat?" says Bucky.
"No," says Sam.
They glower at each other.