dappered | (no subject)

[ It's Tuesday in Avengers Tower.

A lot of the particulars of this arrangement had gone over his head, given that he'd been all but catatonic from shock and exhaustion through half of it (turns out using the Cube for a major temporal displacement actually took a lot of energy from the bearer, in this case him) but it seemed to include a lot of shouting and posturing while he'd suffered a fatal disconnect over which Steve he was supposed to back up, the tiny angry one or the big angry one. But the gist of it, explained by Howard Stark's son, is this: the Tesseract fucks with time, and sometimes deigns to answers wishes. Even those not spoken out loud. One flash of blue light later it had dumped all four of them here in the future in some kind of 'temporal bubble,' whatever the fuck that was, and it's keeping them here indefinitely.

Stark promises he's working on fixing it, but the future has things like inhalers and endless amounts of hot water, so there's that. Bucky's not in any big freaking hurry to head back to the war front in any case, even if being stuck here means staring at the frankly terrifying person who is supposedly future-him, or one possible version of future-him.

They're all under what's effectively house arrest in Stark's future robot building, given leave to go wherever they want in the Tower. They've all got their own bedrooms, their own kitchens, even their own floors if they want them, but Bucky had shown up at younger Steve's door at first opportunity and hadn't left him since.

(Part of him thought that maybe, maybe he should be throwing in with the other one, the older one with shadows under his eyes and a look on his face like someone had just kicked him in the stomach, the one Bucky remembered from Europe, but stress had brought on one of Stevie's attacks and Bucky couldn't leave him alone for that.)

He'd been kicked out eventually, though, told to go do his worrying and hovering somewhere else and take his stupid glowing alien box with him, which meant that Steve wanted some space to be upset in peace and that was fine, that was all fine, Brooklyn Steve didn't really know him since he'd been taken off to the camp and. Yeah. He's different. He's killed a lot of people since then, has watched his best friend waffle between science experiment, propaganda darling and one man army with maybe 10% of the training he needs to do the jobs they've got him doing. He's got a glowing alien box that always comes back to him, no matter how he tries to get rid of it. It bothers Steve that he's different. Not a one of them really know each other right now.

He drifts into the kitchen out of lack of anything better to do, still dressed in yesterday's clothes because he hadn't gotten a wink of sleep while Steve rasped in the bed next to him, mechanically opening cabinets and going through drawers, staring in something like hopeless frustration at the array of supposed edibles. The packages are all brightly colored and there are three kinds of everything, all declared to be low-fat or pure organic or a good source of vitamin whatever, like it wasn't possible for a guy to just get milk anymore without having to make some kind of choice about it. The labels are in every kind of language possible, of which he can only read three with his fragmentary French, Italian, and German. There's butter, more than he knows what to do with, and real meat, impossibly fresh, and the house robot has told him that if there's anything he wants that isn't there, he just has to ask for it and it'll be delivered.

All he wants is a goddamn loaf of bread and some cheese to make a sandwich, jesus. ]

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[ what a sad pair of fools they make. or - maybe that's the joke, that james barnes is broken in every iteration of the man. it's obvious that bucky is laying in wait for steve, for whatever reason, and his tone reminds him that between the two of them, he's the threat.

shit. he looks away, relaxes his clenched fists. frowns. ]

I don't know.

[ it's an honest answer. he's not exactly comfortable with just helping himself to food when he's still trying to learn how to take care of himself, and walking around like a specter doesn't really serve any purpose beyond taking stock of where people are. the tower is safe. he doesn't need to keep casing the area. ]

Walking, I guess. [ humph. what a useless answer. ] Go back to sleep.

Edited (FUCKING FUCK) 2014-12-14 10:50 (UTC)

[ patrolling, morelike, and Bucky can't even really blame him when he does the same thing. But it's so different from the way he'd have answered the question -- christ, everything about him is so different, there's almost no resemblance between them at all. It's like some horrible echo of the serum for Steve, but at least that had left the personality intact. He doesn't know how Steve stands it, looking at something with Bucky's face that is so painfully not him. ]

I'm awake now.

[ at least they can agree on that much. he isn't the same, isn't 'james "bucky" barnes, 1916 - 1945', because their faces are different and that man was burned out of him long ago. they dug in deep and carved out every memory of brooklyn, england, austria, even all the way through to the fall. they took it away and never gave him a thing to hold onto afterwards that didn't come with a safety and a trigger. the only thing that remains of 'james "bucky" barnes, 1916 - 1945' is sitting right in front of him with disgust and hatred in his eyes.

he doesn't blame him. his own eyes are a little green, envy for the fact that bucky has so much life left in him. he'll never be able to be that man again, and he doesn't want to try. he just wants to learn how to live again, the same way bucky does, when they could still be called a good man.

but not tonight. he's woken himself up with the face of something awful, as if they both don't have nightmares enough to deal with. no one makes him feel like he should leave this place more than himself. he hates bucky because he's not wrong. ]

I can go.

[ should, will, but he states it instead and - and maybe he's waiting for the order. he resists the urge to cover the star on his arm with his right hand; he already looks enough the part of a chastised child to be adding defensive gestures to it. ]

Jesus Christ.

[ it's out of him before he can stop it, rolling to his feet and raking both hands through messy hair, a stress reaction. That-- submission, that wounded bird look, it's like being back in the work camp all over again. There'd been guys there that had been imprisoned longer, that had looked the way his future self does. Hollowed out and empty, quiet little shadows that made no impression on the world. They were the kind of people that, when rescue finally came, sat blankly and ignored the open doors to their cells, had to be prodded or pulled into motion. They'd have sat still while the rest of the base burned.

He stares, looking angry and betrayed. ]

What the hell happened to you.

[ it's not even a real question. he knows. brainwashing, and torture, and-- whatever, being frozen, science fiction bullshit, but he'd been tortured before. He'd been under Zola's knife before, woken up with the fire of some alien substance creeping through his veins, and it hadn't made him into this. ]

[ that is the question, though, ain't it? if he had an answer for himself, he might be more inclined to share it, but it doesn't make a lick of sense to him or anyone else. he inhales deeply, gaze flitting to steve's door and down the hall, and shrugs. ]

Seventy years is a long time. Memory's not what it used to be.

[ get it, because he's old and senile and everything he used to be was burned out of him time and time again. it's funny, insofar as he spends most nights ( and some days too ) screaming at voices and faces that aren't there anymore, and someone somewhere called this a success. bucky hasn't seen it, hasn't lived it yet, and part of him prays to a god he doesn't believe in anymore that bucky never will. he hopes they never leave this tower, if it means they're protected from the gaping maw of what's waiting outside.

even if it means living with the disappointment in his own eyes staring at him. he carries guilt with him everywhere he goes, but bucky makes him feel ashamed, like he's let him down somehow. and maybe he did, when he gave in to zola's torture and mind-breaking. if he had fought harder, if he hadn't been so weak, a lot of lives would've been spared.

if only they'd just let him die. it wouldn't be the first time he's thought it, or even asked - no matter how many times, in however many languages, no one ever heard him.

maybe bucky might listen. ]

Ask me whatever you want, I'll tell you what I can.

[ he owes him that much, at least. but - he looks up to steve's door again, then down the hall to where the older steve, could come from at any moment. ]

But not here.

[ he walks away without waiting for bucky to respond; whether he follows or not doesn't make a difference to him. maybe his room is safe, or the roof. the roof is better. he makes his way to the elevator. ]

[ he follows. of course he follows, he'd glanced at steve's door at the same time, and his fists clench in irritation at the thought of any shared behavior. Steve is his, boiled down to the guts of it, and he's put up with Carter and he's put up with Howard Stark and he is not about to give one more inch to anybody else that wanted a piece of Steve Rogers, especially the smaller version.

He's scowling for the duration of the elevator ride, grimly tapping out a cigarette from a battered pack he'd hoarded in his jacket pocket and then lighting it once they get out into the open air. Can't smoke around either Steve, no matter how much his nerves need it, Brooklyn Steve's asthma won't tolerate it and the older one kept giving him disapproving looks and making pointed comments about how he's ruining his lungs. ]

[ he pays him no mind in the elevator, not ignoring him but wholly concentrates on his task. people think just because he isn't speaking or moving ( or even blinking sometimes ) that there's nothing but a vast emptiness in his head, the perfect hollowed out doll for use. but it's rather the opposite. his mind is buzzing, always, always running a thousand processes at once that sometimes it's just too much to keep up with. the only way through it is to stay focused on the facts, the details necessary to his mission.

this man is james buchanan barnes. he is from 1945, when he should have died but was instead brought to the future. he is the bucky barnes that steve cries out for when he can't run from his nightmares anymore. he is him but younger, and bucky resents him for the years that span the space between them. that's why they're here, to bridge the gap.

he can do this. he can.

as soon as the doors are open, he walks straight ahead into open space. it might be nice to have a cigarette himself, though he doesn't really know where the inclination comes from ( bucky himself, he supposes ), but he won't ask for one, not from him. not right now. he looks at the sky instead, the blanket of stars that is a testament to just how isolated the tower keeps them from the rest of the world. this is one of the few places he truly feels at ease; it will either make this easier to get through or ruin one of his only safe spaces in the tower.

take your bets, ladies and gentlemen. he turns to face bucky with a certain clarity in his eyes, and waits. he made the offer, he'll wait for bucky to initiate. ]

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omg phone typos i am so sorry

no it's okay bb

lays on the ground

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