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Sam stumbles into the room, half dragging, half carrying Steve's big dumb buff self. The reedy little man at the desk had somehow bought the poorly cobbled-together story Sam had slung at him. Steve was obviously not just drunk, and Barnes was obviously not just high. The three of them obviously did not just come from a party.
Sam resists the urge to turn and get eyes on Barnes. His hold on Steve is slipping, arm numb, and he isn’t gonna be able to pick Steve back up if he drops him again. Sam assumes (hopes) Barnes has the sense to follow. The metallic chink chink of the plates in Barnes's arm are audible as they shift. It sounds close.
Sam is trying to heave Steve on the nearest bed when he hears the door shut. He looks up and sees Bucky in the little pseudo hallway, fumbling with the door card, locking the door.
It’s…probably not great for Barnes to be the keeper of the keys.
Sam pauses, but—
Whatever. The front desk gave them two.
Not for the first time, Sam wonders just how much functional autonomy Barnes still has. Their interactions so far hadn’t indicated much (not that that had been at the forefront of Sam's mind at the time, anyway).
But the files Hydra had—they referred to Barnes in terms of an inanimate object, or, at best, a spectacularly dense dog. Frankly, Sam couldn't tell if most of what Barnes did was from some kind of instinct-driven dissociative muscle memory, or if he was actually operating on conscious decision.
Maybe it was neither. Maybe it was a secret third thing that Sam hadn’t wasted his time thinking of yet.
With what had been done to Bucky, Sam counted it miraculous he wasn't simply a vegetable.
Sam struggles to get Steve onto the bed, arms trembling. Too many limbs, too heavy. Sweat beads at his forehead, pricking at the skinned flesh. Sam has no way of telling what kind of substance Steve was hit with, other than the fact that it seemed like a gas. A gas Hydra formulated for a super soldier, perhaps, but to what end? He seriously doubted Hydra had any altruistic intentions. That, coupled with Steve’s concussion is bound to be a formula for disaster.
Steve's unconscious blond head pitches forward, hitting Sam in the chest. His hearing punches out like a mute button. His lungs seize, vision whiting out.
Blink.
He's on his knees on the damp carpet. He's on his knees on the damp, squishy, questionable carpet, and he has dropped Steve, too.
Steve, dropped, in lieu of the bed, has joined him in the floor. He is face down on the grody-ass carpet.
Good Lord.
All at once Steve shoots up, knocking his head on the bed frame as he goes. Steve’s arm swings out, flinging up with none of his usual grace or coordination, but with all the fervor with which Steve does anything. The blow swings wide, half-hits Sam’s skinned face. Unfortunately, a glancing half-hearted hit from Steve is like a normal punch. Sam huffs a groan, the road rash burning like live coals. His mouth tastes of ash, and he swallows thickly around a lump in his throat. Ow. Right in the concussion. Steve kicking out, missing Sam but hitting the frame of the bed beside them. The metal shatters.
“Steve! Steve, hey, hey!” Sam babbles, uncharacteristically spooked. “Stop, Steve! Stop—!”
Steve is weak, but Sam is weak-er. His wrenched shoulder spreads fire down his arm as they grapple pitifully in the dingy orange light of the room.
Barnes’s mild stare is burning into Sam’s back, pinning him as they move. Sam glances over, to where he stands propped up between the wall and a lampshadeless lamp.
Steve twists half heartedly, now just slapping Sam’s hands away. He slumps down after a moment, eyes rolling in a brief faint. Steve’s eyes are wide, solid black, pupils blown, his lips moving soundlessly. He is seeing something that is not there.
There are no other sounds except for Steve’s terrified wheezing and Sam's own terrified exerted breath. A shadow stretches long, draping across the ceiling as Barnes straightens and steps towards them. A jagged spike of fear burns up into Sam’s throat. He turns, panicking, snaps, “Sit!”
Barnes sits immediately, on the floor.
It's not fair and it's not nice and also, not what he meant exactly, but Sam cannot manage or protect them both at the same time right now. If Barnes inserts himself into the situation, inevitably gets confused, and starts swinging too, well… Sam honestly can’t tell whether he fully grasps the situation they're in, even, and none of them can afford a misunderstanding right now.
Sam sits down heavily, near Steve, back against the tacky wall. He watches Steve's colorless face for a moment, watches him mumble and roll his head back. After a few minutes, Steve draws his knees up, drops his face down, and is silent, shuddering.
The shadow that stretches across the ceiling and spills down the wall splits as Barnes’ arm jerks away from his body, grinding. Sam’s eyes jump towards it. Barnes sits still and rigid, knees on the disgusting carpet. He tilts his head slightly, eyes like two glittering cabochons in his impassive face. His brow is smooth, and he doesn’t blink. His arm was damaged in the fight somehow, and it’s a distinct bone-pop as Bucky grabs his own wrist and forces it back against his body.
Sam looks away. As the adrenaline fades, the searing tear of whatever he messed up in his shoulder sends fireworks into his arm and water to his eyes. Sam’s head pulses in tandem with his heartbeat. The bullet graze across his chest has to be stitched.
He knows if he does it now, it’s gonna be one of the worst stitch jobs he's ever done. Maybe the actual worst- there is no adequate light, his vision is so blurry, his hands so shaky. He is so tired.
Well. It doesn't have to be perfect, it just needs to be done. Perfection is the enemy of ‘good enough’. Failure is not an option: that was the Air Force, Sam thinks. The Air Force taught him that. Sam has never been a perfectionist, anyway.
He heaves himself up, knees cracking. His head feels…sloshed, bubbly, like a snow globe that was shaken too hard.
He gives Steve a wide berth in the short little hallway. Steve remains oblivious to the outside world, face turned to the side. He’s laid his head on his arms, and he is holding very, very still. A lone tear glitters in one blown-black blue eye, spills, and trickles its way down his skinned cheek.
Sam steps past and nudges the rickety door to the bathroom open, flips on the light. It flickers and pops, coming on with a low buzz. He goes to shut the door, but it has no handle or lock.
Sam turns to the mirror. Swollen, bloodshot eyes stare back, glassy, looking out of his ashen, scraped face. His pulse presses into his throat, squeezes the inside of his head. The buzzing of the bathroom light is low and inconsistent. Every few beats, Steve’s soft exhales carry out from the hall where he sobs silently.
Sam drags his hands from the counter, rifling clumsily through the drawers and the cabinets under the sink.
Hopefully, there’s a first aid kit around here, somewhere.
Ideally.
But because life isn’t ideal, or easy, or perfect, or whatever the fuck—no. There’s nothing. No first aid kit for Samuel T. Ha.
He does find cobwebs and some stale mouse droppings, after he fucking ran his hand over them.
Sam curses, swallowing down the little shocks of disgust. He’s going to think of them as figments of his imagination, and raisins, respectively, for the sake of his mental well-being.
They may not be in a 5-star, but holy crap.
He lets his head drop, bracing his hands on the peeling counter. His eyes burn. There’s a whisper creak of leather and the familiar squeak thump of several cabinets opening and closing. His heart beats hard, double-thuds, and then Barnes is at the door.
Sam whips his head around, his brain feeling prickly in his skull. He stares, hesitant to make any more sudden moves.
Barnes is tall, like Steve is- maybe a hair’s breadth shorter. He's built like Steve. This isn’t new-Sam knows this. It’s just. Before, whatever he had on Sam wasn’t overly relevant. Not through a willful lack of oversight, necessarily, or an overestimation of his abilities, but for one simple reason: The Falcon was never meant to cross paths, boots on the ground, with the Winter Soldier. Ever. The suit wasn’t made for that—Sam wasn’t made for that.
Sam’s no slouch, but he can be honest with himself. He has never closely strategized or ran through a scenario with Steve where Falcon would directly take on the Soldier at close range at any point, because Avoid, Stay Out of Reach and Range, and Distract, Dodge and Run WAS the plan for him.
Also, after witnessing that action on the bridge that totaled his car two years back…well!!
Sam rather likes his life. He can admit when he is outclassed. He is merely the mission assist.
The cramped bathroom seems to shrink, the buzzing light bouncing off the walls and between his ears, piercing pinhole-pieces of panic pricking his eyes.
He is painfully present, in this tiny space where Steve is folded up, crying in the hall. In the short doorway, where Barnes’s face looms, empty.
The memory of Sarah’s voice is so quick, so loud in his head that Sam startles. Her voice, just that morning, had been tinny but loud through the burner. He’d just been letting her know where he was, what they were doing.
“Man, what the hell? Sam, I think—“ an inhale.
“These are super soldiers you’re dealing with.” ———
“No, no! Don’t you start with me! Can you be quiet for two seconds?” ———
“I know you’re not dumb, I didn’t even say that, Samuel! Boy, you outta your league. I’m telling you. These people ain’t right…”
Sam, his wave a good humor swallowed by a burgeoning contrarian mood, had brushed her off, stubborn, saying, “Who’re you calling boy?” in the sort of insolent sassy tone that Sarah hates, and that guarantees the topic will immediately dissolve into a more titillating piece of conversation (bickering).
Now, seventeen hours later, Sam sucks in a breath, eyes blinking open. When did they close—?
Steve is here but isn’t, and Barnes is finally here but isn’t, and the sinking realization shoots through Sam: he is the sole delegate of his, and Steve’s, and Bucky’s continuing survival for the time being.
Shit.
So: Barnes, unknown status, in every way possible. Non functional.
Steve, status: concussed and gassed. Out of Order.
Sam, status: nuked shoulder, maybe-concussion, bullet graze. Pressing on.
So, it’s just Sam, and the gaping gauge in his chest, still leaking.
Just Sam, and the exhaustion that has him past the point of yawning, the fatigue softening his bones like acid, making him melt, slowly, to the floor.
Sam, and these shaking hands: that little tremor that found him first in that godforsaken desert all those years ago, and never quite left. It’s not usually this bad…but he is tired. He is just tired.
Breathe in,
Breathe out.
Sam can’t suppress a flinch, though, as Barnes shifts, extending the metal arm towards him. Sam swallows, eyes fixed on Bucky’s waxy face. It takes him a moment to register, blinking hard. The metal hand sets a dusty, rusted first aid kit down, gently, on the counter. It retreats, and Barnes stands sort of lopsided, awkward in the doorway, arms pressed to himself.
Sam stares at him, openly.
So Sam is here. Sam is here, and he is no super soldier. He is out of his league, in over his head. He knew that, when he told Steve he’d follow him. Sam knows he can't engage in hand to hand with a super-soldier, even on a good day. And this is not a good day.
If Barnes felt like now would be a good time to resume his last mission, and take Steve and Sam out right now, he could.
But Sam has to believe that he won't.
He sees this:
If Barnes’s first instinct, the bare bones of him, even after being stripped down and gutted, dismantled and remade…if after seventy years of torture and torment, his base reaction is still to help—
Bucky won’t.
His mission is over.
Sam opens the first aid kit.