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It had been Peggy who taught him how to fight. Little, weak Steve would have never made it through boot camp trying to throw punches when he could barely lift thirty pounds. So, instead of relying on the brute strength that the other guys seemed dependent on, he learned how to fight, well, like a girl.
In their sparring sessions (always private, usually while the other guys were beating on punching bags or each other), she taught him ways to work around his lack of strength. Use elbows, palms, and knees instead of hands and feet (better leverage, more power, hurts you considerably less), always go for weak points (back of the knee, crook of the elbow, neck, face, avoid the chest), use the male’s high center of gravity against them (aim low, use it to get them off their feet).
She taught him every trick she had, and he internalized every single one of them. Maybe a week or so before getting chosen for the serum, he had sparred with one of the bigger guys in his division. He hadn’t won, but he got in a few good hits and managed to get the guy on the ground and pinned quite a few times. In the end, it was one hard punch to the jaw that did him in.
Peg had congratulated him anyways.
Maybe his favorite move that she showed him was the one that he had found the most ridiculous at the time. It entailed throwing yourself in your opponent’s arms, wrapping an arm around their neck, and “letting gravity do the rest”, as Peggy put it. He hadn’t believed her, because how absurd is that? But when she used the same move on four different guys, each one hitting the mat within seconds, he learned not to question Peggy (especially when he had been one of the four guys; damn had that one hurt). She told him that, even though your opponent will try to put their arms up to catch you, gravity will still give you enough of an assist to get them off balance and then pull them over the rest of the way with your hand planted firmly behind their neck.
He was proud when he finally got that one down; Peg didn’t bruise as easily as he did, though.
Flash-forward a few decades, and even in this backwards future where gods swing hammers and geniuses fly around in suits of armor, he still uses that move and it still works every time.
(He’ll never forget Thor’s face when he got him with it while they were sparring; the god had been at a loss for words, and Nat had gotten it on video, bless her heart.)
So naturally, when he and Bucky were sparring in the Tower’s state-of-the-art gym, he had to try the move out on the best friend-turned-assassin-turned-assassin best friend.
Except, there was one very big detail that he didn’t take into account…
~ ~ ~
“Steve?”
“Um.”
“Um?”
“This usually works.”
“This usually…”
Of course, Steve had completely forgotten about that arm. That arm, now wrapped around his back, is completely supporting his weight, the cold of the metal seeping through his t-shirt, metal fingers splayed against his side. And Bucky’s other hand, the skin-and-bone one, is under his knees, holding him in the air, and Bucky’s not on the mat. Nowhere near on the mat. He had barely flinched when Steve practically threw himself into the other man’s arms, not losing his balance the slightest bit.
How could he forget about the arm?
The room goes quiet, Clint and Nat pausing from their spar, Sam stopping the treadmill, Tony and Rhodey pausing from their therapy session (Rhodey’s hand still on the bar to keep himself upright). It’s dead silent, all eyes glued on them.
Bucky still hasn’t put him down.
“Um,” Bucky says, and Steve has never seen his eyes this wide. He’s so confused, probably has no idea what to do, probably doesn’t have any training to counter getting forced to hold someone bridal style.
Oh God. Bucky is holding him bridal style.
They both just stare at each other, neither having the slightest clue where to go from here.
Does he just put Steve down and continue like it never happened? Does he bullshit a counter move? Does he just drop the man and run for the hills?
Why is he still holding him?!
There’s a click, and both of them turn to stare at a Miss Natasha Romanoff who has taken out her phone and is currently pointing it at the two of them, her face still somewhere between amused and shocked even as she clicks multiple pictures in a row.
“Romanoff I swear to God—” Steve starts, but then Bucky drops him (he hits the mat pretty hard; he would probably bruise if it weren’t for the fact that it now takes a lot more than a drop to bruise him) and goes for Natasha, aiming more for the phone than her. She’s a bit too quick, moving out of the way and managing to keep the phone away from his grasping hands for the extra moment it takes to tap the screen a few times and then toss him the phone. Bucky suspiciously looks at the screen.
“You put these on Facebook?” he exclaims.
“And I sent back-up copies to all of the Avengers,” she grins. “Never gonna live this one down.”
“Я должен убить тебя прямо сейчас,” Bucky says.
“Попробуй меня,” Natasha responds, and Steve still hasn’t moved from where he landed rather ungracefully on the ground, still stuck on the fact that for the first time ever, the move failed (miserably, he might add), and Bucky had been holding him bridal style.
Nat saunters out of the room, waving at them as she goes.
“Catch you newlyweds later,” she says.
Bucky looks borderline-murderous, and everyone else has yet to move from where they froze. Stark reaches into his pocket a moment later, pulls out his phone, and snorts.
Steve barely manages to keep Bucky from strangling the genius moments later.
~ ~ ~
“’Secret Romance Revealed!? America’s Greatest Heroes Now America’s Greatest Power Couple!?’ What the hell kind of trash writing is this?”
“I’m just surprised there’s only one rainbow on the cover.”
“I’m gonna kill them.”
“Who?”
“All of them.”
“…”
“You know, they used the picture where one of your eyes is partially closed and your mouth is open.”
“Who are we taking out first?”