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He knew things about the world outside of HYDRA. There was still a lot to learn, things everyone else seemed to know but him. Like how's a macchiato different from a latte, why you shake hands when you greet some people but hug when you greet others, why dogs aren't supposed to eat at your dinner table even if you really like them, and why it's impolite to ask people if they were sweating from exertion or something different even if he thought that just sounded like this 'small talk' thing everyone wanted him to figure out so bad. Those were just some examples. There were other things he did know. And the thing he knew that was relevant right now was that you shouldn't eat rocks.
Some animals have rocks in their stomachs to help them digest plants. He saw this on The Animal Planet. But Cassie Lang, his good friend and eight year old daughter of ally Scott Lang, who can shrink and get big(Clint Barton once said he 'shrinks and gets big' all the time and no one says it's a superpower and Steve made that face that the innermost parts of Bucky's brain tells him should make him laugh), Bucky knew she wasn't supposed to eat rocks. And he thinks she knows that too. He hadn't gotten a chance to talk to her about it and find out for sure because he had to focus on driving. Driving fast and well enough to escape the team sent to swarm the facility where they'd been holding the rock and where some of them-like himself and Steve and Wanda and Vision-also lived. It was a nice place. Quiet, mostly. Except when things like this happened. Usually Cassie wasn't around and they'd just fight until things were safe again. He didn't want her to be around a fight because she was small and a child and children shouldn't have to be in fights.
Then she swallowed the rock the men were here for and Bucky had no choice but to take her away from the place because one of the men said something about cutting her open to take it and he was not going to let that happen. It was beyond not good to be cut open, and if he thought that as an enhanced person, it was probably beyond doubly not good for Cassie to be cut open. Scott had 'flipped his shit' when Cassie ate the rock-a phrase Bucky learned from Sam which he tried to implement in his lexicon because Steve liked Sam so if Bucky were to model his speech patterns after anyone, it should probably be him-and Bucky hadn't really asked permission before snatching Cassie up and throwing her(as gently as one can throw a person) into the back seat of the first car he made it to. He knew he had to get her away from the men so that's what he did. He was allowed to give himself assignments like that, if he really wanted them, and he obviously wanted Cassie to be safe. He'd also grabbed her dog, Pukey-so named because he pukes and then eats it-because Cassie loves him very much and he didn't want her to miss him if they had to go into hiding. One had to consider all possible variables when making an escape.
So that's why he focused so hard when he drove. Even if one time three minutes ago he'd taken his eyes off the highway in order to punch the side of a truck to get it out of his way and he'd had to lean out the window to do it, he was still mostly focused. For example, he never once looked at his phone even though it'd been ringing and buzzing a whole lot. That was especially impressive because HYDRA never let him have a phone so it made him want to look at it even more and he still didn't because he was driving. He did turn the radio off at one point six minutes ago but he thought that wasn't as much of a distraction.
"Cassie," he said finally because there was only one car tailing them now and he supposed that was something he could deal with while also speaking to her.
"Yep?"
"You know you shouldn't eat rocks."
"I know," she said with a sigh, both her hands settling on her stomach. "But I thought if I ate it they wouldn't want it anymore."
That was an unwise conclusion to reach based on the information available to them. The men wanted the rock badly enough to break into one of the most well-guarded facilities in the world, staffed by enhanced persons. If they could penetrate those defenses, it should be simple enough to get a rock out of a person, especially a child. But Bucky didn't want to hurt her feelings because he cared about Cassie so he said, "It was a good effort, but I don't think your dad would like it if I advocated lithophagia so I won't."
"What's li-litha-"
"Lithophagia is the act of consuming rocks."
"Oh." She kicked her feet a little against the bottom of her seat. "Have you ever eaten a rock Bucky?"
"No." It was true. If he ever did it was a complete accident and he didn't remember.
Her voice dropped to a whisper and she said, "Am I...Am I gonna poop it out sometime?"
"Presumably," he said. He tried not to think about it because questions about feces were supposed to be gross and not the sort of thing friends talked about to friends. They told him this when Scott tried to ask Bruce Banner if he'd ever had to go while he was the Hulk and if so what was it like. Feces were not a subject he'd ever really dwelled on so he was fine with this restriction. Perhaps the Lang household was a bit more lax on the poop moratorium.
Cassie made a low humming noise, expressing her discontent. "I shouldn't have eaten the stupid rock."
"You'll be okay," Bucky said because when people were upset he knew you were supposed to say things like that, even if you didn't know with any certainty how things would turn out. Lying was good sometimes but bad other times. Life was confusing, especially his.
"Why do those guys want that dumb rock anyway?"
He wondered briefly about the distinction between dumb and stupid before trying to answer her question. "Stark was still in the process of researching the stone's properties. But it must have some strategic value, otherwise it would not be worth mounting such an offensive and storming the compound for an extraction."
"You're talking too big for me Bucky," Cassie said, eyebrows going up as she shook her head.
He hummed low in his throat. Simplify the report. "We aren't sure what the stone does, but it's important or they wouldn't want it."
"It does stuff?" Cassie asked.
"Presumably."
"It's just a rock!"
"The gem in Vision's forehead does things," he offered, trying to help her understand how a rock could do things. Even if he didn't understand how a rock could do things. He didn't feel bad about not knowing that though because Tony Stark was having trouble with it and he knew everything.
She wrinkled her nose. This was an expression of distaste. "Oh."
She didn't explain the reason for the facial expression and he wondered if his response was inadequate, if he'd said something wrong. So he had to know because he was allowed to ask to know things better: "Why did you make that face?"
"Because one time Vision gave me some food to eat and it tasted really bad." Her hand dropped down to the small round head of her panting dog and his bug eyes darted everywhere. "So I gave it to Pukey and even he wouldn't eat it."
"Mm," Bucky said, brows drawing together because that was serious. Pukey ate his own vomit so this meant Vision's food was worse than dog vomit. He would need this information in the future. Possibly share it with Steve and Natalia, just in case.
He probably wasn't required to notify Sam, though.
"Where are we going?" Cassie asked, looking out the window.
"We are currently traveling south on Interstate 81." He stopped because that was the answer to the question of where they currently were, not where they were going. "I haven't decided where to go yet." They still had one tail and they could not exit the highway until they'd lost it.
"I know where we should go!" Cassie cried, throwing up her hands and then he had no choice but to slam on the breaks because suddenly the car was not on Interstate 81, it was headed right up a flight of stairs and he'd been fairly certain they didn't build those on highways so that was very disconcerting. Cassie cried out as she bounced in her seat and Pukey yipped and he could hear people shouting outside of the car and that's when he noticed there were hundreds, if not thousands of people around but he had to focus on forward right now. And forward was a large castle that was a bit unlike most castles he'd ever seen though to be fair he had not often been deployed to castles but the ones he knew of were usually worn and old and crumbling a little and not bright blue like this one.
He got control of the car in spite of the sudden change in environment and came to a stop just before the opening of a large corridor that ran through the center of the castle. He thought castles were supposed to be well defended but this one didn't seem very good for that. There was no mote, no wall around the building, people could walk right up the stairs to get to it, and the doors to get in were just right there in that corridor for anyone to kick in. But he wasn't royalty or anything so he guessed it wasn't his place to criticize their architectural decisions.
"Wow," Cassie whispered, eyes big and round as she stared out the window. Pukey's nose was pressed to the glass, panting breath clouding the area around his mouth and his bug eyes were everywhere at once, absorbing the crowds gathering, pointing, shouting. Some people were running away and Bucky thought this was a good instinct to have because a car had materialized out of nowhere on the stairs in front of a castle and that's one of the last places cars belonged, really.
Bucky searched for potential hostiles. There were some men who seemed like police or security, dressed in blue, but instead of the standard patches issued from a city police department on their shoulders, there was a badge that looked vaguely familiar but he couldn't quite place it. A lot of things in his life were like that so he was used to it. The patches on the men's shoulders were three round circles, two of them smaller and set on the top of the largest central circle. "Do you know this place?" Bucky asked. Then a man in a giant duck outfit jogged by in the rearview mirror and Bucky squinted because certainly this could be a sign that he'd endured some sort of head injury recently. The duck wore a shirt but no pants even though it was dressed as a sailor of some kind and he knew of no navy where it was regulation to not wear any pants at all.
"Yeah, it's Disney!" she cried, kicking her legs with excitement.
Disney, he knew, was the company that owned the world, even more than HYDRA. That's what Tony told him. Clint said Disney owned his soul because he was the father of two children. Navigating an exit would then require careful maneuvers, because he did not think anyone should own his or Cassie's or Pukey's souls, especially not an organization with more power than HYDRA. He would possibly need to explain to Clint that he couldn't retrieve his soul from Disney while he was here because that meant putting Cassie's and Pukey's at risk. He was sure Clint would understand. "Where is Disney headquarters located?" he asked. They must've been at the headquarters, given the castle.
"Huh?"
"Where are we, currently?"
"At Disney..." Cassie said, still a little giddy but obviously confused because she'd already answered the question.
"But where is Disney in relation to New York?"
"Ummm," she hummed, a finger going to her mouth in the process. "It's...far. It's in Florida, where Grandma and Grandpa live."
Bucky stared at the castle and ignored the demands of Disney's soldiers to exit the vehicle please. Florida was very far. It was highly improbable that he had blacked out during driving and navigated all this way to the castle steps of Disney, a place he'd never been. Perhaps a wormhole had opened on the Interstate. But this also seemed improbable because the universe was enormous. But then he supposed if a wormhole was going to open it had to open somewhere. But then he thought he was being an idiot and just needed to do something already.
Pukey barked when a man knocked on the window. Bucky had been aware of their approach and was trying to grade how lethal these soldiers might be. They carried no guns, all of them seemed to be in their fifties or older and most of them were not in shape. It didn't make sense. This was an organization more powerful than HYDRA. Why did their security seem so lacking in firepower and physical fitness?
Then it struck him. They could be enhanced persons, all of them. He gripped the wheel tighter as he considered their options for escape. Given the amount of pedestrian traffic, he wouldn't be able to navigate these roads with a car. That could result in too many deaths and he was supposed to avoid things like that. They needed some information. A map of the area. He could get that from his phone, so he double-checked that it was still in his pocket. It was, with dozens of notifications of missed calls and messages, and the battery was low. He ignored another knock on the window. There were no weapons in the car but he thought if these were enhanced persons, they might end up being useless anyway. If they were like Wanda, for example, they'd be able to stop projectiles easily and throw him up into the air without touching him.
Finally, he reached into the driver's seat where he'd stashed his backpack. His old one was in his closet, worn, zipper broken, and with holes in it but kept just in case of an emergency where he had no other options. His new backpack had been a gift from Cassie on Christmas. It was a light grey color, with two smaller striped pockets that closed with brown leather flaps and clasps, and a leather drawstring closure with another leather flap to cover the main opening on top. The fabric was canvas and it was printed with small dogs comprised of paisley patterns in various bright colors. He valued it greatly even if Sam said it was girly as though this were a problem. Dogs were good and most girls were good too so he didn't understand why that mattered.
The bag held a comic book, two notebooks, two pens, a pack of gum-he often gnawed on the insides of his cheeks which Sam said was a body-focused repetitive behavior and was somehow related to stress and emotional overload which made sense because he hadn't been programmed to feel emotions in a very long time so the idea was to chew on gum instead of himself-his sunglasses, and twelve dollars and twenty-six cents. He was going to put Pukey in the bag because it would make things easier. He reached back and took the dog, who was very good and didn't squirm, and put him into the opening of the backpack, back feet first. Bucky pulled the drawstring but not too tight, and Pukey's head was all that poked out of the bag. He slid it over his shoulders and said, "Cassie, we're going to run now."
"Are we going on any rides?"
"We have to leave the car."
"Oh. What about Dumbo?" she asked and he didn't know what that meant. He held her hand as she climbed over the center console to get to his lap.
"What's Dumbo?"
"He's an elephant and he works at the circus and he flies around and around." Elephants couldn't fly but this was called imagining and it was a healthy thing for children to do so he knew he shouldn't correct her about it. "I like the dinosaur ride too," she continued as he put the vehicle into park and pulled the keys out of the ignition.
"What's the dinosaur ride?"
"Well, you get in the car and it goes into the past and there are dinosaurs and it's a little loud and dark and it can be scary but the dinosaurs never get you."
"Cassie," Bucky said. "What is a ride?"
"We're at Disney, they have rides you go on. They're fun."
"Rides are fun," he said, making sure he understood. He thought he knew that, some time ago, and he said without thinking, "Like Coney Island. They have rides there."
"Yeah, see, you know what rides are," she said, patting him on the shoulder.
"I just forget sometimes."
"It's okay because everybody forgets stuff and then you remember it later."
He couldn't really talk with her about it further because of the people knocking on the windows asking them to please get out of the vehicle, that the Buena Vista Police were on their way. He didn't want to involve the police because one: they didn't like him and his metal arm. And two: Cassie had eaten that rock and if those guys wanted it, the police might want it too. "Hold on," he said to Cassie and he wrapped one arm around her. Her arms came up around his neck and her fingers dug into the hood of his jacket. He could hear Pukey panting behind his head.
Then he shoved the car door open, knocking one of the Disney guards in the gut. Some people cried out and he bolted, ignoring them. The crowd mostly parted, even if people were shouting at him to stop. Someone tried to grab Cassie and he kicked them in the chest and they fell. "Do you know where the exit is?" he asked.
"Can't we please go on a ride first?"
"I don't think they will allow it."
Cassie sighed dramatically and the noise wavered a bit because of how fast he was running. People were chasing him and he expected a bigger challenge from an organization more powerful than HYDRA but none of them could keep up with him. "Okay. But I don't remember where you go out."
He scanned the area. The castle was likely the center of the compound, he figured. Where else would you keep the more valuable things? There was another spire some kilometers away and he asked, "What's that?"
"That's Space Mountain. It's a roller coaster. It's a little scary."
He didn't want her to be scared so he ran the opposite direction. He caught a sign that said things like 'Tomorrowland' and 'Frontierland' and had no idea what all of that was but one of them said 'exit' so he followed it. A man in a mouse outfit waved his gloved hands wildly, jumping out in front of him as he barreled down the street. Cassie practically screeched at the sight of the mouse and Bucky made out the words, "It's Mickey!" but he couldn't quite tell if she was afraid or thrilled. At any rate, the mouse was attempting to hinder their escape, so Bucky had no choice but to engage. He swung his left arm, fist meeting the mouse in the face. Bucky grabbed a handful of the mouse's shirt, heaved him off his feet, and threw him into a cart selling cotton candy. "Oh my God Bucky don't beat up Mickey Mouse!" Cassie cried, pounding on his shoulder.
"Mickey Mouse presented himself as a combatant. I had no choice," he responded.
"Will he be okay?"
Bucky looked over his shoulder. The mouse was rolling onto his side, clutching his stomach. "It's possible." He turned his eyes forward. No other people in animal costumes approached. Some people took pictures of them or recorded videos. Some people shouted at him to stop, others cried out "somebody do something!" but no one did so he kept running. He could hear sirens far off but closing fast. He leaped over turnstiles sort of like they had at the subway only the people here looked happy to be going through them. Monorails went by overhead and there were a lot of flowers and buses but no cars he could grab. Some group of men in uniforms approached from the right, so he bolted towards the left, where the buses were.
Only the sirens were very close now and dozens of police cars blocked the way. The police filtered out of the car and aimed their guns and tazers and everything at him and he clutched Cassie tighter but turned his back to them. But then he realized Pukey was still on his back so he couldn't do that either and he turned again because maybe if they fired he could keep anything from hitting Cassie with his arm. Several people were shouting at him all at once, demanding he put Cassie down and step away from her, telling him to put his hands on his head and get on his knees and he really didn't like that because it sounded a lot like HYDRA.
"Bucky, I'm scared," Cassie said. "Are they gonna shoot you? I don't want them to shoot you!"
He searched for an opening but was very wary of engaging with Cassie in his arms. He tried to figure out a solution and said to her, "It'll be okay." Even if it seemed like it wouldn't.
"I don't want them to shoot you!" she cried again. "If Paxton were here he'd tell them no!"
And then everything was quiet.
Steve hears Clint shout, "Hashtag W-T-F-W-S!" and for a minute he has no idea what the hell he's talking about. It's like deciphering another language and it hits him all at once that A) this is an acronym and B) it's about Bucky, who a lot of the general public still refer to simply as Winter Soldier. This is confirmed when Clint says under his breath, in a disappointed voice, "Aw, Bucky, no..."
"Well Cap, your better half just made about a billion kids cry today," Tony follows up, also looking at his phone. He looks sort of amused, actually, so that must mean no one's dead. So there's that.
Scott's less amused though. "How the hell?! How the hell!" he cries over and over again staring at his phone.
"What? What is it? How are you all-" Steve says, a little frustrated by a combination of things. The attack, Bucky and Cassie's disappearance, the mysterious gem. Everyone else having their phones out and knowing exactly where to get information about Bucky's whereabouts but himself.
"Twitter," Nat says. "And Instagram. Oh look someone uploaded a Vine." Steve doesn't even bother with his own phone, opting instead to sidle up to Natasha and look at hers. There's a short, looping video with grainy, shaking footage and the sounds of a gasping, shocked crowed and a few distressed cries. There's Bucky, with Cassie and Pukey in tow, and he punches a guy in a Mickey Mouse outfit in the face before hauling him off his feet and tossing him into a vendor cart and running like nothing happened.
Steve closes his eyes and let a breath out through his nose. Bucky assaulted Mickey Mouse. On tape. Because the Winter Soldier needed another reason for society to hate him. "God damn it, Buck," he mutters and Sam cackles loudly in the other room like this is the best thing that's ever happened to him.
Everything was quiet except for some bird songs and the occasional car going by outside. Disney was gone and so were all the police with guns. Instead they were in a bedroom and Cassie kicked her legs for a moment before saying, "We're at my room!"
Bucky looked around warily before setting her down. He didn't notice anything that made the place seem unsafe. No one in hiding. It was silent in the house. So he let her down and she jumped onto her bed. He knew Cassie lived in California, which is very far from Florida or New York. They'd traveled instantly both times. He thought about what happened just preceding the changes. The first time they'd been driving and he was trying to figure out where to go when Cassie exclaimed she had an idea. And then they were in Disney. This time he'd been trying to figure out how to deal with the police when Cassie got frightened and wished Paxton, her step-father, were there. He slowly turned to look at Cassie who was greeting all of her stuffed animals, including the Cassie Bear he and Steve made for her by hand for Christmas to go with her Bucky Bear-a standard one she'd modified herself to give a grey left arm to match the real Bucky-and Captain Ameribear.
"...and I can show you my swing set, and my turtle sandbox," she was saying, thrilled at the prospect of having Bucky over for a visit. He'd never been to her home before, and he thought maybe under other circumstances it would be enjoyable. But right now...
"Cassie." She looked up, and seemed very happy. Maybe she hadn't realized what he'd realized. "The rock. It's letting you take us wherever you want it to."
She scrunched her face up because it really did sound ridiculous. "How can a rock do that? It's just a rock!"
He shook his head. "I don't know. But you must be very careful about where you think of. We could end up anywhere."
"Okay," she said. "I won't think of anywhere bad or scary." She patted the place next to her on her bed and he knew this meant she wanted him to sit with her. They probably should've gone back to Steve and the others, but maybe they could sit here. Just for a minute. So he did, and Pukey scrambled out of the backpack and ran around the room sniffing everything. "Okay, this is where I go to sleep and this is the bed time story we're reading right now-" she reached over to the nightstand and showed him a pink book with a little girl on the front and the title said Matilda. "It's about a girl with a mean nasty family who doesn't care about her so she always reads books that give her superpowers. And the mean principal, Miss Trunchbull, picked a girl up by her hair and threw her out of the school! And she puts Matilda in the chokey!"
Part of him wanted to ask her what the chokey was but another part of him was already conjuring up horrifying answers and he was supposed to try to not think of things like that. "That sounds terrible," he said instead.
"Well, it's okay, because she is making friends with the sweetest, most nicest person in the world, Miss Honey. She's the only nice grown-up Matilda knows and they're friends now."
He nodded because he didn't think he'd like this book very much if Matilda never had anything good going for her. Even he did and he was the longest held prisoner of war in human history.
"And besides, it's just a story, and nobody like Miss Trunchbull is real. Mommy told me so."
"Good," Bucky said. He wasn't so sure if that was true but he thought maybe Cassie didn't need to know about how he'd been pulled around by his hair plenty of times and been put in all kinds of pain by other people.
"Okay, come here," Cassie said, sliding off the bed and taking him by the hand. She led him to her closet and she pointed to a pink dress that was very fluffy with gauzy skirts. "That's my favorite dress in the world. My daddy got it for me. He always gets me the best dresses. He's the best!" She stretched her hand out to it but it was a little high up. So Bucky pulled the hanger off the rack for her and handed it to her. "If I was a superhero like daddy and Wanda I'd wear this dress to fight in. It's so pretty and I like being pretty."
Once Natalia and Pepper had brought him somewhere where they put some mud all over their faces and then washed it off after it dried and Natalia said it was nice to feel 'pretty' every once in awhile. It made his skin feel softer than he thought possible and she'd been right, feeling pretty was kind of nice sometimes. That being his only reference point for being pretty, he nodded to Cassie and said, "It looks nice."
"Thanks," she said, pulling the dress on over her clothes. "Can we play like we're superheroes?"
He looked at his phone for the time but it was dead now. Too many people had tried to call him, maybe. "We should probably try to get back to Steve. And your dad."
"Pleeease, just for a little bit? We can go on the swing set."
He didn't like telling Cassie no and thought maybe it wouldn't hurt for her to play just for a while. "Okay," he said finally and she cried out with joy and the noise made him feel full inside of his chest. She took his hand and lead him down the stairs and out into the yard, Pukey hot on their heels barking. No one was home and he supposed that made sense given that they had jobs and it was a weekday.
"Okay you sit here on this swing and I'll sit on this one." She pointed and he did as she asked. She sat and held her arms out in front of her like she was driving a car. "Mission command central this is the Sugar Plum Witch reporting stat!" He wanted to tell her that what she'd said would be like gibberish on the field but that would probably make her feel bad. She waited, kicking her legs. Then she stopped the driving motion and looked at Bucky. "You're mission command central," she whispered.
He nodded. "This is mission control, go ahead Sugar Plum Witch."
"Mission command central," she whispered again, but not unkindly, sort of like how Steve did whenever he made a mistake.
He repeated himself with the correct designation even if he'd never been on an assignment that used a title like that.
"I'm up in the air a thousand miles and going a hundred miles an hour! I have to chase the alien menace that got the Iron Man suit and he's stealing it to sell on the alien outerspace black market! I need back up stat!"
"Affirmative, back up deployed. ETA-" he hesitated, unsure of how anyone he could deploy could match her speed. But then he tried to tell himself this was just a game and it didn't have to be that accurate. "ETA ten minutes to contact."
"Ten minutes? Mission command central you have to send somebody faster than that! The alien's already took the Iron Man suit into the toposphere!"
There was no part of the atmosphere called that, but he didn't think it was necessary to correct her. "Affirmative...Mission command central was in error reporting previous figures, ETA is now ten seconds."
"Whew! Who did you send mission command central?" She started swinging her legs furiously, trying to gain momentum. "Bucky, you have to swing too. You're going to be helping me up here, okay?"
"I thought I was mission command central?"
"Well you were but we're done with her, we need another superhero to chase the alien."
"Oh. Who am I now?" He started to mimic her to get the swing going. He didn't think he'd ever been on a swing before but it wasn't that difficult to get it to work.
"You're the Winter Soldier of course! You don't have to pretend to be a superhero if you already are one!"
Some people said he was a superhero but other people said he was a 'monster' or a 'villain' or a 'shitty excuse for a human being'. He wasn't sure which one was the truth or how he could figure that out. But he figured if they were pretending right now it was okay to just let Cassie say he was a hero. "I can't fly," he reminded her. "Maybe I should be War Machine, Falcon, Thor, or Vision instead. Or maybe Iron Man in a back up suit."
"No! They aren't as good as the Winter Soldier and I need the best for this mission! The alien is crafty and we have to take him down! So I use my Sugar Plum Witch powers to make you fly!"
He wanted to list all the logistical reasons that the people he mentioned would be better candidates for the job, and beyond that, if she could make someone else fly, Captain America and Spider-Man were much stronger and faster than him. But again, he reminded himself that this was pretend and it didn't have to be accurate and she wanted the Winter Soldier. "Understood," he responded, trying to keep up with her on the swing. It was a little difficult, because his legs were longer.
"Alright! The alien menace is in my sights!" She put her arms out again like she was driving. "He's tricky but we can beat him! I use my Sugar Plum Witch powers to stop him! Chchchch!" She made a noise like an explosion and then changed her voice, "Ohhh no, the superheroes are right on my tail! I have to get this suit to the high alien king so he can see how great I am at stealing from stupid Earthlings!" She waved her hands all over before settling them back in front of her. "Dang it! My powers only gave him a little damage! Winter Soldier it's up to you now!"
"Hm," he said, considering how he would approach a problem like this. "I might need an RPG. It won't penetrate the suit's armor, but it could damage some of the repulsors and render him flightless."
"Okay! Do it!"
"Um," he said, looking at his hands. He pantomimed holding the weapon but wasn't entirely sure where to aim. She'd just always pointed forward even though she was apparently also pretending to be the alien. So he followed her example. "Firing now."
"You have to make noises. That's how I know you shot him."
He tried his best to imitate the sound of a grenade launcher, and the resulting explosion, but he wasn't so sure it was accurate enough. Cassie said in her alien voice, "Ughhahhh you shot me! My repulsives are failing and I'm flightless! I'm dead in the air! Ahhhh!" She jumped out of the swing, launching herself into the grass. She scrambled to her feet and put her hands on her hips, "Good work Winter Soldier! I'm going to arrest this alien robber and put him in jail where he belongs!"
He stepped off the swing to join her. "I couldn't have done it without you, Sugar Plum Witch."
"We're going to be a great team when I'm big enough to fight bad guys you know," Cassie said, waving her arms at her sides. Then she looked up at him. "Thanks for letting us play even if we should go back to my dad now. I always wanted you to come see my house and my room and my stuff."
"I'm happy I got to."
"Can I ever see your house? I mean before you went to that place in New York where superheros live?"
He froze as he considered the answer to that question. A mocking voice in his head telling him in Russian, 'welcome home soldier' only home wasn't really home. "I don't..." he started to say. But then Cassie made a pained noise and clutched her stomach. Pukey jumped up on her, trying to sniff her face. "Cassie. Are you hurt?"
"My stomach!" She groaned and whimpered and he picked her up in case they needed to run. Maybe to the hospital. They'd know how to get the rock out of her without hurting her too. "No no! I don't like this! I don't like these pictures in my head!" Then it wasn't warm anymore.
"They're already gone," Tony says, dropping his phone back into his pocket as he approaches from the front of the jet. Steve clenches his jaw because at the rate they're going, they're never going to find them.
"What did you get out of them?" Steve asks anyway.
"Some security footage. Pretty much none of it is new, though, given all the cell phone videos we've already seen," Tony says.
"This is insane," Scott mutters, pacing back and forth along the aisle, hands running through his hair over and over. "Insane. What was she thinking? What was he thinking, bolting off like that?"
"They were both just trying to help," Natasha answers, obviously trying to keep Scott calm.
"Kidnapping my daughter isn't helping!" Scott says back but Steve's hesitant to call it shouting because he's plainly more concerned than he is anywhere approaching angry. He shoots a guilty look towards Steve and says, "I mean, listen Cap, no offense. I trust Bucky to try to keep her safe but-"
"He just acted. I'm sorry, Scott," Steve says. "We'll find them, don't worry."
"I can't not be worried," Scott responds, dropping into a chair. "We're not the only ones looking for them, after all."
It wasn't warm anymore. It was near freezing. And dark. And he didn't want to be here because-
He bolted without thinking when he saw it, the chair in the middle of the room. The doors were all locked and he slammed his fist into the reinforced steel over and over, the sharp thuds reverberating throughout the room. There was another noise and he ignored it at first, clawing at the door, he wasn't going back in that chair, never, his mind was his, he'd worked so hard, this was his he deserved to keep it, he deserved it, Steve told him, no one would take his mind away again no one-
"Bucky!"
The other noise was Cassie, crying out his name, clutching her dog tightly in her arms, and he froze. Breaths coming in shallow pants from the exertion, he glanced at her over his shoulder. She was standing a few feet behind him, tears in her eyes, but she wasn't doubled over in pain anymore. How could he be so selfish? He had a job. He had to keep her safe. Because-Because what if they used the chair on her?
He was at her side in a few quick strides and he picked her up and clutched her as tight as he could without hurting her. "They won't-I won't let them, okay? They can have me before you, you won't ever-It'll be like a deal, they'll honor it, I'll make them, okay?" he said and some small part of him begged him to calm down, that he was going to scare her, that things would be okay if he took a minute and breathed and asked her to take them back to New York. But he was too overwhelmed by the sight of this place, by the thought of them hurting Cassie and making her like him.
"Bucky," she whined, hands digging into the cloth of his jacket. "Bucky you're making me scared!"
"I'm sorry," he said and shoved his back against the wall, eyes wide and searching. The room was dark, cryochambers humming or maybe it was the electricity in the chair. Warming up. Ready to tear his brain apart. He wanted to squeeze his eyes shut so he didn't have to look at it but he had to pay attention.
"It's okay! Where are we?"
"I can't tell you."
"Why?" Her voice was small and afraid. She had no idea.
"Because it's too frightening," he said and she made a whimpering noise and he held her tighter just as much for himself as for her. She buried her face in his neck and he could feel her eyelashes on his skin when she blinked.
"I saw it in my head!" she cried. "And when I opened my eyes we were here! I don't want to be here!"
"Me either Cassie. Please make us go back to New York," he begged because he wasn't beneath begging. Especially to get away from this place.
"New York?"
"To Steve. To your dad. Please. I can't be here. They'll-What they do here-"
"Bucky don't be scared!" she practically wailed and he couldn't stop his hand from shaking. They had to focus or they'd never get out. He was the adult here. He had to stop being afraid because it was just making her more afraid and if she was scared she couldn't take them away.
He tried to think. Tried to remember all the stuff Steve and Sam and Natasha and Clint and even Tony had told him to do when terror gripped you tight. Clear your head. Take deep breaths down into your stomach. Don't fight fear, let it happen. Focus your energy on getting through it instead of trying to keep yourself from feeling it. But these were all for when you woke up in a cold sweat from nightmares, or when memories played out behind your eyes when you were safe at home but didn't realize it. These were not for when your nightmares were real again and you were a few feet away from the worst possible thing that could happen to you.
He took a breath anyway. "Cassie," he said and his voice only shook a little now. "You have to picture New York in your head. Remember-"
The lights in the room came on and panic stabbed through him. The other five cryo tubes were empty and broken and he could recall every beating and broken bone delivered by the people who used to live in them. There was an echo through the room as a door thundered open in the silence and he pushed them back, back into a corner between some bank of computers and the wall. His heart felt ready to explode, to crawl out of his throat and leave him for dead. Cassie whimpered and he held her tighter and they'd have to kill him because he wasn't going to let them take her too.
A shadow moved into the open door. Then a few more. And then: "Sergeant Barnes?"
He didn't answer. Cassie started to whimper again and he pressed her head to him just a little tighter, trying to make her understand how absolutely silent they needed to be right now.
"Sergeant Barnes, my name is Phil Coulson. Do you remember me? With SHIELD?"
SHIELD was HYDRA. Or they weren't now. But they were. And maybe still could be and he couldn't trust them.
"Sergeant Barnes, we're contacting Captain Rogers right now, okay? Can you at least tell us who brought you here? How you got here? Do you know who you are?"
He didn't say anything. Because if they knew about Cassie and the rock they might want her too. "Steve. I want to talk to Steve," he said finally.
"We can arrange that, certainly. But can you tell us how you got here?"
"Steve."
"Captain Rogers brought you here...?" Coulson asked, obviously not following.
Bucky shook his head, agitated. "No, I want to talk to Steve. And Scott Lang."
Cassie sniffled at the mention of her dad.
"Okay, just come on out and-"
Cassie muffled a cry by burying her face in Bucky's chest. And the chance to talk to Steve was gone.
"What do you mean you lost them?" Scott cries at the screen where Agent Coulson winces.
"We didn't even know we had them," Coulson answers. "We heard something pounding on the doors so loud I almost thought the place was about to blow or something."
"What were you doing there anyway?" Steve asks because he can't help it. After the vault in DC had been destroyed, the base in Siberia was the last place in the world with that horrible god damn chair in it and he definitely didn't like the idea of SHIELD snooping around. He didn't voice his other concern-why had Bucky been there?
"That's classified," Coulson answers and Steve lets loose a sarcastic bark of laughter.
"Classified my ass! My daughter was just there so you tell me everything she might've been exposed to or-" Scott was stopped by a hand on his shoulder. Wanda shook her head at him and he took a breath.
"We never even saw your daughter, Mr. Lang," Coulson said. "Why are you so sure she was there? And how did they get there?"
Before anyone could answer, Natasha cut in. "What did Barnes say?"
"He just demanded to speak to Captain Rogers and Mr. Lang. I couldn't get him to tell me anything. How did they get here?"
Scott shrugs and grins the most vicious grin any of them have ever seen on his normally good-natured face. "That's classified, asswipe."
The chance to talk to Steve was gone. Long gone. Maybe entirely impossible. Because. Bucky was pretty sure they weren't even on Earth anymore. Raccoons on Earth couldn't talk and didn't wear clothes. But then what were the chances there were talking raccoons anywhere else in the universe but Earth?
"Who the hell are you?" the raccoon snapped, tumbling back away from them and grabbing something that Bucky was pretty sure was a gun of some kind even if it hummed and buzzed like no gun he'd ever handled before.
Cassie flinched at the sound of the rough voice and Bucky tensed at the sight of the weapon but figured if he really had to, he could take a raccoon. He wouldn't like it though. "I'm Bucky," he said just to give an answer because a lot of times in these situations everyone tried to be so secretive even though no one on either side knew what was going on. So if he said something it was probably better than being hostile and asking his own questions.
"I am Groot," said another voice and Bucky's eyes flicked to the potted plant on the table because he was pretty sure that's where it came from.
"Oh go on and tell 'im your whole life story, why don't you!" the raccoon snapped at the plant. Then he turned his sharp little eyes back to Bucky. "That arm, where'd you get that? Looks familiar."
"HYDRA," he said.
The raccoon curled a lip and then shrugged. "Never heard of 'im. He does good work though."
"I. Am Groot," the other voice said again and it was definitely the plant, because it moved on its own.
"You don't know what you're talking about!" the raccoon said in a world weary way that reminded Bucky of Sam. "I say android and I mean it, they make lifelike ones these days you know!"
"I am Groot."
"Light in the eyes-Ugh keep your spiritual crap to yourself! That's an android if I ever saw one, light in the eyes or not!" the raccoon said, jabbing the gun towards Bucky. He flinched and held Cassie tighter and she whimpered again but only slightly. She seemed a lot less frightened and more curious, even with the gun, and she looked over her shoulder at the raccoon.
"Bucky's not a robot," she mumbled and the raccoon's ears pricked up.
"That one talks too?" the raccoon cried and then dragged a hand over its face in a very human expression of frustration. "How the hell did you two get here anyway?"
"Groot..." the plant said.
"A dog?! No no no, you don't bring dogs on my ship!"
"We don't know where we are," Bucky said. The raccoon was never going to wait for him to give an answer so he had to take the initiative, something he was getting better at. "We're here by accident."
"Lucky accident! You just wander into a ship in space, with a mangy little mutt-"
"I am. Groot."
"How can you of all people say that?! Dogs are filthy! It'd piss all over you if it had the chance!" the raccoon said to the plant.
Cassie's bottom lip jutted out in a pout and she squirmed in Bucky's arm to shoot the raccoon a look. "Pukey would never pee on anybody, he's a good dog!"
The raccoon burst into some of the most obnoxious laughter Bucky had ever heard. It even held a hand to its head. "Pukey? Even its name is gross! Come on kid!"
"Where are we?" Bucky asked, a little more interested in getting away than discussing whether dogs were gross or not. He had this conversation with Tony a lot so he was bored of it already.
"What makes you think I should tell you? Since you're playing dumb and want to pretend you don't know how you got here."
"The rock made us go here," Cassie said before Bucky could tell her not to mention it. He could see why she thought the rules no longer applied, given they were speaking with a raccoon and a potted plant.
"Rock? What're you talking about, a rock? What kind of rock? Does it glow? Feel like its watching you? Spill your guts, kid," the raccoon said, taking a step forward like they were supposed to be intimidated.
"You aren't very polite," Cassie said.
"World's a cruel place."
"That doesn't mean we have to be." The new voice drew their attention. It belonged to-well, an alien, Bucky supposed. It was green, and had features consistent with women on Earth but he didn't want to presume anything about alien anatomy and society so he refrained from calling it a her. Some people said 'it' was not a good thing to call people but Bucky had been called an 'it' plenty of times and it never hurt his feelings. "Rocket. Who are these people?"
"I been trying to figure that out but everybody's so damn keen on interrupting me-"
"I am Groot."
"Like that!" the raccoon cried, waving a finger angrily at the plant.
"Cassie, take us home," he said quietly. The green alien was armed and carried herself the way he did. Like a trained killer.
"Hey, hey, don't let them leave!" the raccoon said, hairs standing on end. The green alien tensed and shot a hard look to them. Bucky returned it and held Cassie tighter. "They've got one of them rocks like your asshole dad's after!"
At that, the green alien's eyes flew wide and she strode towards them. Bucky took an equal number of steps back and held a hand out at her and she stopped. "Get away," he said evenly. Maybe he was unfamiliar with where they were and who these people were, but he knew how to defend himself and he would. "Stay back."
"Where did you get the stone?" the green alien demanded more than asked.
"Doesn't matter, you aren't taking it," Bucky said. He had no idea what they would do with it. How important it was. What they'd be willing to do to get it.
"You think you are capable of stopping me?" the green alien said in a low voice.
"Initial assessments indicate a fair chance of success," he said.
"I am Groot..."
"Oh, what would you know?"
"What did he say?" the alien asked without taking her eyes off of Bucky.
"Says they're from wherever Quill's from, he can just tell, of course!"
"Then there is only one way they came here. Where did you get the Space Stone?"
"I don't know what you're talking about," he said.
"Good god that was the worst attempt at a lie I've ever had to bear witness to," the raccoon said. "You sure you ain't an android?"
Bucky shot a contemptuous look at the raccoon because he really did not appreciate being called a robot. Even if Sam swore it was a funny and appropriate comparison and Tony agreed. "Bucky," Cassie mumbled. He glanced down at her and her skin seemed pale but he had to keep his eyes on the raccoon and the alien. "I don't feel so..."
"We do not have time for games," the green alien snapped. "Are you aware how close you've brought it to the worst possible owner it could have?"
"No," Bucky said because honestly, he didn't. How could he?
"I am Groot!"
"She's gonna what?"
Cassie suddenly threw up, mindful enough to try to avoid vomiting right on Bucky's shoulder. Most of it hit the floor of the ship and the raccoon cried out in frustration again. Bucky heard something hit the ground and bounce, something solid and hard but small. His hearing was sharp. But so was the green alien's, apparently, because she dove for the stone without a second thought. Bucky had no choice. He kicked her in the face and set Cassie on the ground all in one smooth motion. The green alien grabbed him by the ankle and twisted, forcing him to react. He hit the ground chest first, his nose inches from fresh puke. He caught sight of the stone and slammed his left palm down onto it. The green alien stomped on his hand but he couldn't feel much with it anyway.
Pukey took issue with this, though, and jumped out of Cassie's arms, barking and yapping at the alien. She shoved it away with her foot and Cassie screamed. Bucky clenched his fist around the stone and scrambled back, trying to get to her so she wouldn't be upset. The raccoon fired a gun though and Bucky smelled something-burning hair. His hair. The ends of some strands by his ear were singed. The green alien dove for him again and he parried a blade with his wrist. Having trained the Widows, he made no assumptions about how capable a person was based on how they looked, and given that he was dealing with an alien, he just feared for the worst.
She gritted her teeth and he pushed back against her, the knife sliding off of his arm uselessly. He shoved her back with a boot to her stomach and she flipped away gracefully. "He is much stronger than Quill," she said, confusion plain on her face.
"Yeah, like that takes a lot of effort," the raccoon said, firing off another round. If lasers could be called rounds. Bucky rolled away and grabbed Cassie, who was holding Pukey tight. He tried to picture home in his mind, uncertain exactly how this worked. But then other images, places he was sure he'd never been, they came to mind and before he knew it-
"Mm, well," Tony says suddenly in a way that pretty much all of them have learned to not like the tone of.
"What?" Scott says frantically, rushing up beside Tony in front of the screen. He's staring at the image like he can interpret it and maybe he can. He's good with electronic stuff.
"His phone. Signal's gone."
"Maybe the phone died?" Steve suggests. It wasn't outside the realm of possibility for Bucky to not pay attention to something like that while on the run.
"I should still get a signal, even if the battery's dead," Tony says in a distracted voice, swiping at the screen. "The tracker has an independent power source and requires so little there's no way it's dead."
"What's that mean? Is it-like, broken? Did he break it?" Scott asks and he's almost breathless with worry.
"Possible. They're pretty tough and I don't know why he'd do that but then, this is Barnes and I understand very little of why he does what he does," Tony says.
"The stone can take them anywhere on Earth," Vision says in his odd, detached way, as though this were all an event happening in a book he was reading. "What reason do we have to believe that Earth is the limit?"
The whole room is quiet before finally Scott mutters, "Don't fuck with me like that, man." And Steve wants to agree. But what if?
Before he knew it they were somewhere he'd never been. And the place instantly made him feel fear. Uncertainty. The idea that he would not leave here gripped him tightly and his eyes darted around the vast emptiness, the rocks drifting by both mesmerizing and terrifying because how were they hurtling through space alongside them?
"Bucky, I don't like this place."
Before Bucky could focus on a safer destination, something like laughter boomed through the air. Laughter like thunder. Laughter like pain was coming next. "What's brought itself to my feet?" came a voice deep and gravelly and he knew authority when he heard it. Had spent most of his life deferring to voices like this. His hand came up to hold the back of Cassie's head, pressing her cheek to his chest. Pukey whimpered and was trying to crawl over Bucky's shoulder and into the backpack. Bucky had never been good at concealing what he felt, once he was allowed to feel things, and his wide eyes followed the enormous figure in gold plate armor as it stood. It was bigger than Steve. Bigger even than Banner when he turned into the Hulk. It was the biggest thing he'd ever seen.
"What is that guy?" Cassie asked, voice rising in a way that told him she'd be crying soon.
"Your end," the thing answered, taking one step forward. The ground shuddered beneath them. Bucky ran, even if he knew given the length of the thing's legs it'd be able to catch up without difficulty.
"Bucky!" Cassie all but screamed and he kind of wanted to scream too. He had to focus, New York, New York, New-
"Give me the gem," the thing demanded in a voice that cut through all his concentration, and Bucky almost felt compelled to do it. The instinct to respond to authority was so deeply ingrained and he'd never heard a more powerful voice in his life. Instead he clutched it tighter in his metal hand. They needed to go to a safe place. The only places he knew were painful and dangerous and hell and-
"That arm will make a beautiful trophy." A massive fist took a swing and Bucky managed to evade it. Cassie screamed and Pukey barked as ferociously as he could, which made the giant chuckle. Another came for them and the only thing he could compare it to was like being hit by a truck. They flew a few feet, and he hit the ground hard on his back while Cassie screamed and clutched him tighter. He started to push himself back with his feet even if everything hurt when the giant's boot came down, pinning his leg. Cassie screamed again, begging his name. He tried to focus but then the giant's hand was on his forearm, tugging and he writhed. He could feel something under his skin, the places where metal was bolted to bone or where wires met nerves and his skin would split open soon if the giant kept pulling. It would rip out his shoulder, his collar bone, his entire rib cage, his lungs and heart going with it-
"Steve!" he found himself screaming.
And Steve shouted back, "Bucky!"
He gasped for air but it only came in shallow bursts, the pain too much to allow for more. He groaned as he turned onto his back, leg protesting a movement that didn't even involve it. His left arm was damaged, fingers twitching noisily and out of sync, plates crushed inward, a few wires having forced themselves out through gaps.
"Cassie!"
"Daddy!" She scrambled to her feet and threw herself at her dad. He picked her up and held her to him like he could prevent her from disappearing again if he just held tightly enough.
"Oh my God, what happened?" Steve demanded in that voice that sounded so angry but was actually worried. Natalia had tried explaining this to him once, how a thing could sound one way but it actually meant something else.
Cassie couldn't answer, her face was buried in Scott's chest and she sobbed hysterically. Bucky propped himself up on his elbow and winced. Steve put a hand on his shoulder, pressing slightly and Bucky complied, staring at the ceiling. Out a dirty, cracked window he could see a blue sky. Not the empty void of space where giants lived. "There was-" he said around breaths, shook his head. "A thing. A giant."
"I want to go home!" Cassie wailed.
Bucky let go of the rock immediately, afraid he'd automatically picture her home and drag them all there.
"What are you talking about?" Steve asked.
He shook his head. "I don't know. It wanted the rock. It-" He tried to lift his left arm, to show Steve he wasn't lying. "Did this."
"I seriously want to put that thing in a warehouse and forget about it, Raiders of the Lost Ark style," Scott all but spat, hand brushing over Cassie's hair.
"What-" Steve started but then shook his head, figuring that was the least of his concerns right now.
"Where are we?" Bucky asked. They were indoors. The place was a real shithole. A word Clint used sometimes and Bucky was pretty sure it applied now.
Steve looked a bit sad but then said, "Brooklyn."
Bucky tried to think of where he'd demanded the stone to take them. He'd seen it in his head, a small apartment, some sketchbooks on a desk, cigarettes by the window and old coffee, they slept on mattresses on the floor. This image had been foggy in his mind and he was almost surprised to see it was a real place. "I told it...to take me somewhere safe."
Steve's eyes darted to him and they softened and he said, "It was a long shot. But I thought you might come home." He put a hand on Bucky's shoulder and for a minute, Bucky could forget about giant aliens and talking raccoons and electric chairs.
Scott and Steve got them back to the compound the traditional, non-instantaneous way. Cassie refused to leave Scott's arms the whole way back, and Bucky was pretty sure Scott preferred it that way. Steve kept the stone in a bag, afraid even putting it in his pocket was too much contact, that he might inadvertently use it. He surrendered it to Tony and Vision, the latter of which treated it like some sacred thing and the former of which made a remark about using a child-proof container this time. Of course, everyone there wanted to hear what, exactly, had happened, so once they were sure Bucky, Cassie, and Pukey were not fatally injured in any way, Bucky gave a report with assistance from Cassie. There were questions now and then, like why on Earth had he agreed to play pretend when Scott was freaking out looking for his daughter, or how can you be certain a house plant probably liked you a little, or whether or not the green alien was hot. But the ending made everyone go quiet until Rhodey finally asked, "So, the last guy. He's after the rock, too?"
Bucky nodded, eyes drifting back down to his mangled arm. Nearly everyone else's eyes went there too, knowing that while Bucky's arm was not exactly indestructible, it was not something that could be damaged by anyone's bare hands. Not anyone on Earth, at least. "What the hell do you do with information like that hanging over your head?" Scott muttered, drawing a hand over his face.
"Keep watch and be prepared," Natalia answered evenly. It was probably the best response anyone could come up with, even if Bucky hoped he never had to see that giant again.
The silence that fell after made him think everyone else was thinking the same thing, until Sam said, "That's what you get for punching Mickey Mouse."
If that was the case, Bucky would definitely never do it again.