Southern Surrender

The first thing Bucky registered was the absence of pain.

Not its total disappearance—no, there was still a faint ache in the joints of his fingers, a hollow pressure behind his eyes, and a strange, disjointed weight in his chest—but the searing, white-hot agony that had raged through his body like wildfire had finally receded. The fevered tremors, the flashes of light, the ghosts with accusing eyes—gone.

What replaced them was a quiet, sterile stillness. Cold air hummed faintly against his overheated skin, and the rhythmic drip of fluid from an IV bag tapped out a steady pulse somewhere near his right arm.

He blinked slowly, blearily.

The ceiling above him was low, concrete, utilitarian. The shadows in the corners held no menace, just storage crates, metal racks, heavy-duty plastic bins. It took him a full minute to place the subtle details—the matte black wall-mounted firearm cases, the faint scent of gun oil and antiseptic, the blue glow of a biometric lock panel beside the emergency exit.

Yelena’s bunker.

Her basement. The one beneath her Southern Pines cottage—part armory, part panic room, part private ICU. He remembered her showing it off when they’d first arrived, half-joking as she tapped on a locked vault and called it her “retirement closet.” She’d been proud. Cocky. Warm, in her very Yelena way. And now…

Now the quiet buzz of power cords and the cooling blanket layered over his chest made it feel more like a sickroom.

He turned his head with effort. His muscles, though no longer burning, felt drained—as if someone had wrung out every drop of strength and left the husk behind to bake in the sun. A cooling pad was affixed to his forehead, and another was strapped loosely around his torso beneath the blanket. A cannula looped over his ears and into his nose. Saline dripped from the IV at his side, and somewhere across the room, a portable cooler hummed softly.

It was the most alive he’d felt in days. And somehow, it still felt wrong.

He moved to sit up, but his body didn’t quite obey—not fully. The motion made his vision swim and the back of his neck pulse with the echo of a distant migraine. Still, he pushed upward, planting a trembling hand against the mattress—

“Don’t.”

The voice cut through the haze like a wire. Bucky stilled.

Yelena appeared at the foot of the bed, looking as if she’d stepped out of a war zone. Her braid was loose, several strands of blonde curling around her face like static. There was a rawness to her, one that made his heart jolt.

A dark bruise bloomed under her left eye, angry and purpling, with the faint green edges of an older contusion just beginning to show. Her lower lip was split cleanly in one corner. There was a stiffness to her gait, a slight hitch in her step as she approached, like she was favoring one leg.

Bucky’s brow furrowed. “What the hell—are you okay?”

She ignored the question completely, instead holding out a bottle of grape Pedialyte, unscrewed and cold.

He stared at it.

“Seriously,” he muttered hoarsely. “You look like you got hit by a truck.”

“I did,” she deadpanned. “A 230-pound, fevered, hydra-trained truck who apparently believes I’m a haunted towel rack.”

His stomach sank.

The bottle pressed into his hand.

Bucky took it slowly, the cool plastic almost jarring against his fingers. As he drank, he kept his eyes on her face, that mottled bruise, the near-imperceptible favoring of her right leg.

Fragments came back in slivers. A crash. A scream. Something breaking. A flash of red eyes. The slippery heat of his own skin on fire. His right hand—the old scar, glowing like a brand. His own body wracked with hallucinations and the ice water that sizzled like oil as they submerged him.

“I hit you.” His voice was gravel.

“You don’t remember?” she asked carefully, her tone not quite neutral.

“Some of it,” he murmured. “Not all. I… I remember grabbing you. Throwing you? Christ—Yelena, I’m sorry.”

“Nope,” she cut in, sharp. “We’re not doing that.”

He frowned, blinking blearily at her.

“You don’t get to apologize for almost dying,” she said, firmly but not unkindly. “I’ve had worse, Barnes. Honestly, I expected more of a fight from you.”

The joke didn’t land. Bucky flinched instead.

“What happened?” he asked quietly, watching her carefully.

She didn’t answer immediately. Instead, she moved to the chair beside the bed and sat, exhaustion in every line of her body. As if summoned by the shift in energy, Fanny—ambled out from behind a storage crate and padded softly to Bucky’s side. She laid her chin on the mattress beside his right hand, directly over the scar.

He stroked her head absently.

“What DO you remember?” Yelena asked, her voice quieter now.

He frowned, staring at the floor. “The market. The noise. I felt off. Tired. Then worse. I went to bed early. After that…” He trailed off. “It’s foggy. Pain. A lot of it. And heat. Hallucinations. Then nothing.”

Yelena was quiet.

“I feel like I dreamed of drowning in fire,” he added distantly. “It hurt.”

She inhaled slowly. “Your fever hit 108.3 before the medic got it stabilized.”

His head jerked slightly. “What?”

“We tried ice. The tub. Sam got in with you to hold you down. You were burning. You nearly passed out twice before you finally did.”

“Jesus,” he whispered.

“Torres called in a combat medic from Bragg that he’s chummy with. She brought active cooling units. It probably saved your life.”

“That doesn’t make sense.” He shook his head, confused. “I don’t get sick. The serum—”

“I know,” she said.

“Then what the hell happened?”

She didn’t answer.

He looked at her sharply. “Yelena.”

She met his gaze, steady and serious. “Sam thinks you were poisoned.”

Bucky stared at her, then barked out a dry laugh—humorless and cold.

“Not possible.”

“Why?”

“Because they tried.” His voice darkened, sharpening like a blade. “Hydra. SHIELD. Others. They wanted to test the serum. Arsenic. Ricin. Snake venom. Shit I couldn’t even pronounce. Nothing ever stuck.”

Yelena blinked. “Damn. Your life sucks.”

“Tell me about it.” His tone was bitter.

Silence fell for a beat. He looked toward the empty stairwell leading up.

“Where’s Sam?”

Yelena hesitated.

Bucky sat up straighter, that sinking feeling growing in his chest.

“Where is he?” he repeated, tension rising.

Yelena raised a hand to calm him. “He and Torres went with the medic back to Bragg. They took samples of your blood to see if they could find anything—chemical agents, toxins, pathogens, anything.”

“They won’t find shit,” Bucky muttered, falling back against the pillows. “Not if the serum did what it always does.”

“You were hallucinating,” she said. “And you almost died. Something is different this time.”

The words didn’t hit Bucky like an accusation. They weren’t sharp or scathing. No, they landed in his chest with a quiet, unbearable weight—like a brick dropped into water. Slow and certain. He blinked against the overhead light, faint and filtered through the basement's single dust-laced bulb, and looked at Yelena where she sat at the edge of his makeshift hospital bed, arms crossed, her bruised face a tight knot of worry wrapped in practiced calculation.

“You always know how to cheer a guy up,” Bucky muttered, voice hoarse, aiming for a smirk he didn’t feel and hoping the sarcasm might throw her off balance, might keep her from peeling back whatever layers of fear she’d seen in him last night.

But Yelena didn’t flinch.

She didn’t laugh, didn’t snort. She just leaned forward, her eyes narrowing slightly—concern sharpening into something like strategy.

“What did you see?”

Bucky looked away, exhaling slowly through his nose. The basement was still. No creaking floorboards, no humming appliances. Just the occasional drip of condensation from the old copper pipes overhead and the quiet rustling of Fanny settling down somewhere near his feet. He focused on the shelves across the room, the dim outlines of weapons and gear—knives sheathed in neat rows, tactical vests, unassuming black cases filled with God knew what. He remembered Yelena showing him those first few days, her voice light with pride, her eyes watchful. He remembered teasing her about hoarding for the apocalypse.

Now it didn’t feel so funny.

A dull ache throbbed behind his eyes, just enough to make thinking uncomfortable. But the question lingered, and Yelena waited.

“I saw… Becca,” he said finally, his voice quieter now, rough with the dust of memory. “My sister. She looked like she did when I left for the war.”

He heard the shift of Yelena’s weight beside the bed, but she said nothing.

“She just...stared at me.” Bucky continued, the words coming slow, like wading through deep snow. “But then she was gone. And there was a woman—someone I killed. I remember her. That mission was… it was clean. Fast. And then there were others. Faces I knew. All of them dead. All of them looking right at me like they’d been waiting.”

He stopped, the weight of it crawling under his ribs like a parasite. But he didn’t mention the name they mouthed in silence. He didn’t mention the thing with red eyes. He wasn’t ready. He didn’t even know how to explain it—what it was, what it meant.

Yelena moved closer, her voice almost a whisper. “That’s not all. What else, Bucky?”

“There isn’t anything else,” he said, sharper than he meant to be, sitting up too fast. The motion made his head pound, the flicker of those glowing red eyes slicing across the back of his mind like a blade. He winced, fingers pressing against his temples.

“You did that before,” Yelena said, eyes narrowing. “The night before you started getting sick. When I asked you about what you couldn’t remember.”

“It’s not the same thing,” he mumbled, though even to his ears the protest rang hollow. His hand fell into his lap, trembling slightly, the right one—scarred and familiar, the site of that phantom pain.

“Then tell me what it is,” she said, grasping his arm. Firm. Unyielding. “I can’t help you if you won’t tell me. You trust me, right?”

“This isn’t about trust,” Bucky said, teeth clenched. “I don’t know what it is. I swear to you—I don’t know.”

Her hand didn’t move. Her eyes didn’t soften.

“I’ve seen you broken. I’ve seen you bloodied. I’ve seen you at your worst.” Her voice dropped. “But I have never seen you afraid like that. Not like that, Bucky.”

That stopped him cold. She wasn’t accusing—there was no venom in her tone. Just a heavy kind of sadness, the kind that came from seeing something you hadn’t expected.

Bucky swallowed, throat thick. “I don’t know what it means.”

“Try,” she said, quieter now.

And he did.

“There was something… they were all mouthing a name,” he said slowly, eyes unfocused. “I couldn’t understand it. I couldn’t hear it. But they kept saying it. Over and over. Looking right at me. And then… I think there were red eyes. Just for a second. But I don’t know.”

Yelena sat back, her lips pressing into a thin line, her mind clearly racing behind her stare.

“You mentioned a ‘he,’” she said after a beat. “More than once. You were terrified. Said he was in the hallway. That he was watching you.”

Bucky gave a dry, humorless laugh. “That doesn’t narrow it down. I’ve killed a lot of men.”

Yelena didn’t laugh. She rolled her eyes, but it was automatic, lacking any real humor. When she looked back at him, she was all soldier again.

“I think it’s all connected,” she said. “The memory you buried. Whatever’s happening at Bragg. Your fever. Someone got to you, Bucky. And you don’t remember because your brain buried it. Deep.”

Bucky frowned, shoulders tense. “Why would I bury something specific? With everything I’ve seen, everything I’ve done?”

Yelena didn’t answer right away. She was staring at her hands, picking absently at the thin silver band she wore on her thumb. A nervous tick he’d only ever seen once—right before a mission that had gone sideways in Kazakhstan.

The air between them grew heavy.

“What are you thinking?” he asked, voice low, a quiet churn of unease starting in his gut.

She didn’t answer for a long moment. Then finally: “I have a hunch.”

“Yelena.”

“We’ll figure it out,” she said firmly, lifting her gaze to his. “No matter what it is.”

Bucky opened his mouth to press her again, but the pressure in his chest spiked suddenly, a cold spear of fear plunging between his ribs. His mind flashed to Sam—warm and steady, with eyes that always knew when something was wrong. The absence of him now felt like a blade in its sheath, drawn and waiting.

Fanny rested her head on the bed beside him, her tongue lolling as she gently licked his right hand, right over the scar.

Bucky looked down at her, heart pounding harder than it should’ve been.

Fanny's nose was damp, her eyes soulful as she licked slow, deliberate passes over the puckered scar in the center of his palm. The sensation was light, almost ticklish, but it wasn’t the dog’s touch that made his chest tighten. It was the quiet insistence of it. As if she knew something he didn’t. As if she was trying to soothe something deeper.

His throat felt like sandpaper. His body, though no longer burning with fever, felt strangely hollow, like he’d been scraped out and left to dry under the weight of something invisible. His skin itched with a phantom sensation, nerves raw, and beneath it all, there was a pit of dread that settled low in his stomach, heavy and leaden.

“I think something’s really wrong,” he said, voice just above a whisper, the admission tasting like iron in his mouth.

Yelena moved with quiet grace. She crossed to the other side of the bed without hesitation, crouching beside her dog and meeting Bucky’s dazed eyes with something fierce and unflinching.

“Then we’ll figure it out,” she said softly but firmly, as if the force of her will alone could bend fate back into alignment.

But Bucky slowly shook his head, barely perceptible. His hand didn’t move. His muscles remained slack. Only his voice betrayed him—small and fraying at the edges.

“I think I’ve done something unforgivable.”

The words hung in the air, heavier than the storm clouds still swaying beyond the basement windows. There was no drama in his tone, no performance. Just a haunted kind of honesty that made the corners of Yelena’s mouth twitch before she snapped a sharp breath through her nose and smacked him lightly across the cheek.

“Cut that shit out,” she said, straightening a little. “No spiraling before I finish my coffee.”

Bucky blinked, stunned more by her sudden forcefulness than the actual slap. She leaned in again, this time with a glare. “We’ve all done unforgivable things. You’re not special, Barnes.”

Her words, biting and cool, were familiar armor—meant to keep him grounded. And for a moment, they almost worked.

Until she looked at Fanny.

Her brow furrowed, eyes narrowing like a sniper lining up a shot, before her whole body suddenly went rigid. She jolted upright, her black eye momentarily forgotten as her face lit up in stunned realization.

“Oh my fucking God,” she blurted, loud enough to make Bucky jerk in surprise and recoil instinctively.

He yelped, his head slamming into the wooden frame behind the hospital cot with a loud crack.

“Shit! What—what the fuck, Yelena?” he barked, one hand going to the back of his skull. “What is it?”

But she wasn’t looking at him. She was pacing, nearly vibrating with the frantic energy of a revelation tearing itself free from the fog.

“I know how he did it,” she said, turning back toward him with eyes wide and wild. “I know how you got poisoned.”

Bucky frowned, rubbing his scalp. “First off, who? Second off, I wasn’t poisoned.”

“You were,” she insisted, gesturing sharply. “At the bar. That night. When you cut your hand.”

He paused, blood icing in his veins—not with fear, but clarity. A hazy image slithered back into focus. The sharp, unexpected sting as the bottle shattered. The way Torres had leapt to mop up the blood, but someone else had been closer. A man. HIM. Austin.

“That guy—” Bucky said slowly, the words thick with realization. “Austin.”

Yelena nodded like she was afraid to speak over him.

“He gave Sam a napkin,” Bucky continued, voice flat now, eyes narrowing. “And Sam used it to stop the bleeding.”

“You didn’t want to touch it,” Yelena said, snapping her fingers. “You looked like you didn’t trust it, even then.”

Bucky nodded, still staring ahead as though trying to read the memory projected in the air. “I didn’t. I didn’t trust him.”

“Well, congratulations, your paranoia finally paid off,” she said, already reaching into the pocket of her sweatpants for her phone. Her hands were trembling, though barely.

“Who are you calling?” Bucky asked, already knowing the answer.

“Sam,” she said without looking up. “We’ve got a lead. If Austin’s the vector, this whole thing changes.”

Bucky didn’t respond right away. He just watched her pace with the phone to her ear, one hand clenched around the blanket that still covered his legs. The clarity of the moment—the way everything suddenly made sense—should’ve given him relief.

But it didn’t.

If anything, the knowledge turned his unease into full-blown nausea. Like a puzzle was finally snapping into place, but what it revealed was something jagged and monstrous. Something he didn’t want to see.

Yelena’s voice, low and urgent, filtered through the static in his ears as she got Sam on the line, rattling off everything they’d just figured out. She moved quickly, efficiently, already a few steps ahead in her mind.

But Bucky’s thoughts had drifted somewhere else entirely. His eyes, vacant now, turned toward the scar on his hand. Fanny was still beside him, muzzle resting gently on his wrist, warm breath comforting.

And yet, all he could feel was cold.

Yelena ended the call, turning back to him with that same determined set to her jaw. “They’re checking him out now. If we’re lucky, they’ll be able to trace the compound. Maybe even get a match.”

Bucky nodded, but didn’t meet her gaze.

“Hey,” she said more gently, stepping closer again. “We’re not out of the woods, but this? This is progress.”

He tried to nod again, but it was slow. Uncertain. The weight in his chest hadn’t lifted. If anything, it felt heavier than before.

Because deep down, something still didn't add up.

And whatever was buried in the corners of his mind—whatever lived in the gap between that red-eyed figure and the silent name they all mouthed—hadn’t shown itself yet.

But it would.

He could feel it.

It was just a matter of time.

------------------

Bucky paced the length of Yelena’s living room like a caged animal, the creaky wood floors groaning beneath his bare feet, each step adding to the restless rhythm that had haunted him all day. His body had recovered faster than he expected—at least on the outside. The worst of the fever had broken, and the chill that had seeped into his bones during those first lucid hours was now only a dull echo. But inside, something still ached. Something wasn’t right. The scar on his palm felt like it buzzed with static, as if still echoing the memory of that bloodied napkin, the one Austin had handed him with such casual familiarity.

He stopped pacing just long enough to glance at the clock on the wall and ask for what must’ve been the hundredth time, “When are they getting back?”

Yelena, completely unbothered, lay sprawled on her couch with her legs draped over the armrest, munching from a half-empty bag of Funyuns like the world wasn’t teetering off its axis. “You ask me that again, you’re gonna age like milk. Relax or you’ll wrinkle that pretty face,” she said between crunches, her tone dry and unserious, but her eyes—those sharp, Widow-trained eyes—never quite left him.

“I’m not agitated because they’re late,” Bucky snapped, though his tone was more exasperated than harsh. “I’m agitated because none of this makes any goddamn sense.”

Yelena tilted her head lazily. “You sure you didn’t know him?” she asked again, as if maybe repetition would finally shake something loose. “Austin. Tall. Creepy. Ex-military. The one who handed you a poisoned napkin and smiled like he already knew your blood type.”

“No,” Bucky said flatly, stopping in his tracks to face her. “For the last time—no. I’ve never seen him before in my life.” The words left his mouth a little too fast, a little too certain, like he needed them to be true more than he knew they were.

Yelena sucked on a Funyun, chewing thoughtfully. “Well, he’s connected to that memory,” she said casually. “The one that makes your head feel like it’s splitting in half. The one with the red eyes and the ghosts.”

Bucky rolled his eyes and dropped into a chair with a frustrated grunt. “Or maybe he’s just another asshole with a grudge. I’ve made a lot of enemies, Lena. Pick a name.”

Yelena shrugged, licking the salt off her fingers. “Maybe. But usually assholes with grudges try to shoot you. Not slowly poison you with napkins.”

Her words settled into the room like dust—soft, weightless, but impossible to ignore.

“I’m tired,” Bucky muttered after a long pause, his voice ragged. “Of all of this. I’ve been fighting for over a hundred years, and I’m still waking up every morning wondering who’s gonna try and kill me next.”

Yelena said nothing. She sat up slowly, folding the crinkled Funyun bag in half as her eyes studied him—not with pity, but with that quiet, focused concern she only ever showed when the world felt close to shattering.

He turned away from her, eyes drifting to the window. Outside, the late afternoon light filtered soft and golden through the trees, casting shadows across the pasture where a few of Yelena’s horses grazed. It was peaceful in a way Bucky had never known peace—open sky, low fences, quiet companionship. He stared until the image blurred and something in his chest ached.

“I was going to ask him to marry me,” he said, so quietly it barely escaped his lips.

“I was gonna do it here,” he continued, still watching the pasture. “Not during this trip, but... soon.”

The words hung in the air, suspended like dust motes in a shaft of golden afternoon light. Yelena, bag of Funyuns still in hand, froze mid-crunch. For once, she didn’t have a quip loaded and ready on her tongue. She just blinked at him, stunned into silence—something so rare it drew Bucky’s eyes briefly away from the window.

He turned back to the pasture before she could catch his gaze, his voice quieter this time. “I was going to go look for a ring soon. But now...” He exhaled, the sound closer to a sigh than a breath. “Now there doesn’t seem to be much point.”

That broke her paralysis.

“What the FUCK is wrong with you?!” Yelena shot to her feet, the crinkled bag of Funyuns falling to the floor with a hollow thump. She crossed the room in three angry steps and grabbed his shoulder, shaking it hard enough to force him to face her. “Of course we’re gonna look for a ring, you idiot! And you better take me with you because you’d pick some ugly, sad thing otherwise, and Sam deserves better than a titanium washer on a chain!”

Her tone tried to play it off, tried to tug him back into lighter territory with familiar sarcasm, but it didn’t land—not this time.

Bucky didn’t crack a smile. He didn’t even smirk. Instead, he turned his head fully toward her, letting her see the raw emotion he so rarely let rise to the surface. It hit her like a punch to the chest—the despair etched into the lines of his face, the exhaustion in his eyes, the hollow set of his shoulders. He looked older. He looked tired. And most of all, he looked like he was already mourning something that hadn’t yet happened.

The silence between them stretched, taut and unyielding.

“I can feel it,” he murmured finally. “Wherever this path leads... it ends with me losing him. I just know it, Yelena. I know it in my bones.”

She opened her mouth to argue, but he beat her to it, the words tumbling from his lips before she could speak.

“Maybe not right away. Maybe not tomorrow. But it’s coming. I don’t know how I know. I just do.”

“Bullshit,” she snapped, her voice hoarse with emotion. “There is nothing—nothing—in this world that would make Sam leave you. Not in a million years. Do you get that? He would rather burn the whole world down than walk away from you.”

She stepped closer, grabbing both his shoulders this time. “You’re going to find that ring. And you’re going to plan that disgustingly romantic wedding. And we’re going to hold it right here on my goddamn farm. And Torres is going to get tied to a horse for shits and giggles and scream like the melodramatic little bastard he is, and it’s going to be the best day of your goddamn life.”

A ghost of a smile passed across Bucky’s face. It was small. Fleeting. He looked down then, at his right hand, absently turning his palm upward. Fanny, ever-attuned, padded over and rested her warm chin on his knee.

He stared at the scar in the center of his palm. The one left over from that night at the bar. The one that had sparked everything.

A flicker of red behind his eyes.

He blinked. There again—the cliff, the desert wind. A dark shape silhouetted against the stars. A gleam of something ruined and burning. Glowing red eyes that didn’t blink.

He swallowed hard.

“I just wasn’t meant for happy endings,” he whispered.

Yelena looked ready to argue again, but before she could speak, the sound of tires crunching gravel echoed from the driveway.

They both turned toward the sound, tension momentarily breaking.

Through the living room window, they saw Yelena’s battered truck pull up. Torres jumped out of the passenger side, arms already full with two huge plastic bins overflowing with folders and manila envelopes. Sam stepped out next, his eyes scanning the front of the house with a soldier’s precision before softening when they landed on the window.

He gave a small wave, lips tugging into a tired smile.

Bucky’s breath caught.

He could hear the back of the truck creak as Torres yanked out another bin and nearly tripped over the wheel well. Yelena made a sound like a strangled laugh, shaking her head as she headed for the door.

But Bucky didn’t move.

He sat on the edge of the couch, one hand still curled palm-up in his lap, the faint pressure of Fanny’s head anchoring him. Her soft fur brushed against the scar in the center of his palm like a whisper, like a ghost. The rest of the world might’ve kept moving forward—light streaming through the windows, the quiet hum of Yelena’s old refrigerator from the kitchen—but Bucky couldn’t seem to pull himself from the stillness that had lodged itself deep inside his chest. That creeping, gnawing dread was back, curling cold fingers around his ribs. Something was coming. Something was wrong.

And then the front door slammed open.

Yelena shrieked a curse in Russian, one Bucky didn’t bother translating, as Sam stormed in like a man possessed. There was no pause. No transition. One second the air was full of static, of silence, of weight—and the next, Sam was there, slamming into him, arms locking tight around his torso and dragging them both backwards onto the couch in one massive, bone-crushing tackle.

Bucky grunted as the breath was knocked clean out of him, back colliding with the cushions, and Fanny bolting with a startled yelp. His arms instinctively came up around Sam’s waist as they landed, his hand splayed across Sam’s broad back, the warmth and solidity of him shocking Bucky’s system like a jolt of adrenaline.

And then Sam pulled back just enough to kiss him.

It wasn’t soft. It wasn’t gentle. It was desperate, teeth catching, breath unsteady, the kind of kiss that said a thousand words Bucky wasn’t sure he deserved. When Sam pulled back again, his hands came up, framing Bucky’s face, thumbs sweeping along his cheekbones with reverence that made Bucky’s chest ache.

Bucky blinked up at him, stunned, still lying flat against the couch like he’d been struck by lightning. Sam was above him, eyes wild and full of something raw, something scared. Something loving.

“…Hey,” Bucky breathed, voice rasped and unsteady.

Sam gave a breathless, crooked grin. “Hey yourself, Sleeping Beauty. Thought I was gonna have to go all true love’s kiss on your ass.”

That got a huff of a laugh from Bucky, and Sam slowly helped him sit back upright. As he did, his hands never left him—one at the small of his back, the other gently checking his pulse, brushing damp strands of hair from his forehead, searching his face with worried eyes.

“How are you feeling?” Sam asked, and it wasn’t just a casual question. It was heavy, serious, laced with undertones Bucky didn’t quite know how to name.

“I’m okay,” Bucky said softly, though it didn’t feel entirely true. He leaned slightly into Sam’s touch anyway, exhausted but comforted. “Better. Still a little slow. Foggy. But better.”

Sam gave a quiet hum, like he was measuring every word, every twitch in Bucky’s posture. “Good. That’s good.”

The moment shattered slightly as the front door opened again, this time with more control. Yelena came in first, carrying two plastic bins stuffed full of files. She kicked the door closed behind her with practiced ease, balancing the load like it was nothing. Torres followed, nose taped and bruised, carrying another pair of crates with far less grace.

Bucky’s eyes found Torres immediately, gaze snagging on the discoloration across his face. The broken nose. The bruising. The guilt punched into Bucky’s stomach like a second illness. His shoulders slumped.

Sam noticed. Of course he did. He gave Bucky’s arm a small squeeze, voice low but firm. “Stop. You were sick.”

“That doesn’t change the fact that I did that to him,” Bucky murmured, unable to look away.

Torres, oblivious, dropped the crates beside the coffee table and groaned. “Jesus. Why are these always so heavy? Every file ever printed since Vietnam is in here.”

Sam leaned over and opened the nearest bin, flipping through folders until he found the top tab marked “DELTACHROME OPS, FY 2005–2011.” He exhaled sharply through his nose, his whole demeanor dimming.

“Once Yelena called with the lead on Austin,” he said, tone clipped, “we rerouted. Pulled some favors at Pope. I have a few old friends still on base. They let us take what we could from the Delta Force mission logs. These are every recorded op Austin’s team was ever attached to.”

Bucky’s brow furrowed. He watched as Sam’s fingers stilled on the edge of a manila folder. “You think he’s tied to this?”

“I don’t want to,” Sam admitted, voice quiet. “But I can’t ignore the possibility. Not anymore.”

Bucky opened his mouth, but Torres cut in from the corner, flopping into one of Yelena’s mismatched chairs with a grunt. “Weird how small the world is, though, huh? You and Austin worked a lot of the same missions, Sam. Some of those old Falcon ops, even before I met you—dude was in your shadow practically the whole time.”

Bucky stilled.

The dread returned in full force, coiling around his chest like a vice.

Yelena glanced at him sharply, the muscles in her jaw going tense. Her eyes slid to Bucky’s face, and there was something in her gaze—something more than awareness. Something like realization. Like she was seeing a picture that wasn’t quite whole yet, but the shape of it was starting to make sense.

Bucky’s stomach turned.

Sam didn’t notice. He was still flipping pages. “Some of these look redacted, but we can pull what we can. There might be something in here that explains—”

But Bucky couldn’t hear him anymore. His pulse thudded loud in his ears, louder even than the rustling paper. That familiar dread had rooted in his spine, thrumming under his skin like static. The idea that something had been buried inside him—something dark, something dangerous—and now it was waking up. Now it was pulling at the edges of his mind like teeth on flesh.

He stared down at his palm again, at the pale scar in its center.

And again, in the back of his mind, a flash of red eyes.

The vision struck him like a whip—blinding, sharp, and gone before he could hold it still. Bucky blinked, his knuckles tight around the worn edge of a manila folder, his breath catching somewhere between his ribs. In that flash: the sky lit up over the jagged edge of a desert cliff, something small and screaming falling like a comet, black smoke curling against the Afghan sky. And the sound—God, the sound—like metal tearing, like someone yelling.

“Buck?” Sam’s voice pulled him from the edge. A hand rested on his shoulder, grounding him.

He blinked again, dragging himself back into the cottage living room, where the chaos of open files and flickering table lamps made the shadows feel closer than they should. Sam sat beside him on the floor, pressed close enough to share warmth, his hand lingering against Bucky’s spine.

Yelena stood nearby, eyes narrowed—not with suspicion, but calculation. She tilted her head and reached for a stack of folders, flipping through them with barely restrained impatience. Her gaze kept flickering between Bucky, Sam, and the documents, like she was waiting for something to click.

“So,” she said finally, tone brisk. “Where should we start?”

She tapped a worn folder with a red ‘CLASSIFIED’ stamp bleeding across the top. Her fingers hovered like she already had a guess, like she already knew it was hiding something but couldn’t quite pin what.

Sam shrugged beside Bucky. “Anywhere’s good.”

The hours bled together after that. Torres set up a makeshift sorting system along the floor, files spread like a paper minefield across the cottage. Yelena moved with cold precision, tossing folders into piles with little verbal input. Torres, less precise, read every third word out loud, offering unnecessary commentary.

“Okay, this guy’s name is fucking Chad?” he said at one point, flipping a page over. “Of course he’s in Delta Force. You don’t name a SEAL Chad unless he’s born with a knife in his teeth.”

“Focus, gremlin,” Yelena muttered, not even looking up from her stack.

Sam snorted, nudging Bucky gently with his shoulder. “Remind me why we brought them again?”

Bucky offered the ghost of a smile, but it didn’t reach his eyes. His thoughts kept circling like sharks. The red eyes. The cliff. That SCREAM.

They didn’t find much. Report after report, mission after mission, but nothing that set off alarms until a page fell loose from an older binder Torres was flipping through.

“Hey—Riley,” he said quietly, and the room stilled.

Sam glanced over, his hand pausing on Bucky’s knee. Bucky felt him go still, like something had drawn too close to the surface. He turned his head to look, saw the name typed clean and sharp under a list of operatives: RILEY K. HARRISON – AERIAL RECON 2ND CLASS, ATTACHED TO FALCON PROGRAM.

Yelena was already moving, crossing the room in quick strides. She didn’t say anything as she plucked the file from Torres’s hands, but Bucky watched the shift in her posture. Less hunter, more shield. Her gaze flicked to Sam—softening slightly.

“I’ll go through these,” she offered, tone light but not casual. “You don’t need to read this tonight.”

Sam blinked, startled. “No, I mean—I’m fine.”

“Sure you are,” Yelena muttered, already pulling a chair close and flipping the folder open. “And I’m a nun.”

Torres bit back a snort, and Sam gave a tired smile that didn’t last. Bucky watched the exchange closely. The way Yelena avoided Sam’s eyes. The way she kept one finger planted on Riley’s name, like she was anchoring herself.

Something was circling them, he could feel it. Like a storm too far away to see but close enough to make the air taste like copper.

They read deep into the night, the table growing cluttered with empty mugs, wrappers, and sticky notes scrawled in Yelena’s cramped, aggressive handwriting. At some point, Torres curled up on the floor, head resting against the couch, snoring like a congested bear.

Yelena muttered something about dismemberment. Bucky didn’t hear the rest of the threat.

Sam stayed close the entire time, touching Bucky often—his thigh, his shoulder, the nape of his neck. Warm, steadying touches that made Bucky feel like he wasn’t entirely drifting.

But that dread—it didn’t leave. It never left.

“You okay?” Sam asked quietly, sometime past one a.m., the lamp beside them humming faintly.

Bucky nodded, then shook his head. “I don’t know.”

He looked down at the folder in his lap, eyes unfocused. Sam’s fingers slid down to intertwine with his, and Bucky clung to the contact like it could hold him together.

Yelena glanced up from her corner of the room, her eyes finding his again. She didn’t smile, didn’t speak—but something in her gaze said she was watching.

The moment passed in a beat. As soon as their eyes met, Yelena looked away, back down to the folder she’d been combing through for the better part of the last hour. Her fingers moved like clockwork, flipping pages, scribbling notations, tucking loose reports into labeled sleeves. But Bucky could see the shift in her posture, the minute tightening of her shoulders, the faint twitch of her jaw—tells that most people would miss. She was thinking something through. Calculating. And it wasn’t just about the files.

He rubbed absently at the scar on his palm, feeling the phantom echo of the red eyes from earlier, the lingering static of a memory just out of reach. He hadn’t said anything, not even when Sam had pressed a glass of water into his hand earlier and looked at him like he was about to break apart again. Bucky hadn’t been able to meet his gaze. Not when the guilt still stuck like barbed wire under his skin.

Sam finally stretched from where he’d been sitting on the floor, his knees popping audibly as he stood. “Alright,” he said with a groan, scrubbing a hand through his hair, “I’m calling it. We’ve been at this for hours and found exactly jack shit except some old paperwork and a headache.”

Torres, who was halfway through eating Yelena’s Funyuns, perked up immediately. “Oh thank god, I thought I was gonna die here with these dusty ass files.”

Yelena didn’t even look up. “You’ll die because you’re a whiny lightweight who can’t handle spicy food and bad lighting.”

Torres made a sound of deep betrayal. “I bled for this team.”

“You got a nosebleed because you walked into a barn beam.”

Bucky was too tired to laugh, but a faint smile tugged at the corner of his mouth as Sam came around behind him, offering a steadying hand.

“Come on,” Sam murmured softly, voice brushing just under his ear. “Let’s get you to bed.”

Bucky nodded, and slowly, carefully, let Sam help him rise. His limbs were still sluggish, his body too warm but not feverish anymore, like someone had drained the strength from him with a siphon. Sam’s arm stayed firmly around his waist as they left the others behind—Yelena still focused, still not sleeping, still watching in those quiet, cutting ways of hers.

They climbed the stairs together, slow and quiet. Outside, the wind had picked up again, brushing soft against the windows, the storm from earlier lingering in the bones of the house.

Upstairs, in the bedroom lit only by the faint bedside lamp, Bucky sat down on the edge of the bed, head low, body aching. Sam moved around him with gentle efficiency, tugging his shirt off over his head, helping him out of his jeans. The touches weren’t rushed or clinical—they were reverent, tender, laced with care. Bucky couldn’t meet his eyes.

“Arms up,” Sam whispered.

Bucky obeyed, letting the soft cotton sleep shirt be eased over him, the neckline brushing against his collarbone. Sam knelt in front of him, fingers brushing over his thighs, his calves, steadying him as he helped him lie back.

“You okay?” Sam asked again, one hand splayed across Bucky’s stomach.

Bucky let out a low breath. “Yeah. Just... heavy. Like I’ve been wrung out.”

Sam nodded, slipping in beside him. He tucked Bucky in like he might disappear, smoothing the blanket, brushing the hair off his brow, and then sliding in behind him, long arms wrapping him up.

“I thought I was gonna lose you,” Sam said quietly, voice tight with a vulnerability that caught Bucky off guard.

Bucky blinked slowly, heart clenching. “You didn’t.”

“But I could have. And that thought—” Sam exhaled sharply against the back of his neck. “Bucky, you scared the shit out of me. I’ve never seen you like that.”

“I’ve never been like that,” Bucky admitted. “I didn’t know it was possible.”

Sam’s hand found his, fingers intertwining. “I don’t care how or why. I just—fuck, Buck, I love you. I love you so much it makes me stupid. You don’t get to leave me without a fight.”

Bucky slowly turned, facing him, eyes searching. “Sam...”

Sam didn’t move for a second—his eyes scanned Bucky’s face with that steady, almost reverent kind of intensity that always made Bucky feel like he was being seen far more clearly than he ever saw himself. It wasn’t like the stares he used to brace for, the ones laced with curiosity, judgment, or fear. This was something else. Something unshakable. Sam’s hand found its way to Bucky’s jaw, thumb brushing along the edge of his cheekbone with that familiar, grounding pressure, as if reminding Bucky that yes, he was here, and yes, this was real.

“I love you,” Sam said, soft but firm, his voice unshaking despite the raw emotion that painted every syllable. “I love you, Buck. I’ve never meant anything more in my life.”

Bucky’s breath hitched, his lashes fluttering as he blinked up at Sam, caught in the sheer gravity of the words. There was something in Sam’s tone—something fierce, like a vow —that pinned Bucky in place. He couldn’t look away. Couldn’t breathe for a moment.

Sam kept going, relentless in the gentlest way imaginable. “I don’t care what comes. I don’t care how messy it gets, or how hard it is. I’m not going anywhere. You—you are it for me. You always were.”

Bucky swallowed hard, throat clicking dryly, his heart thudding too fast in his chest, too loud in his ears. “Sam,” he whispered again, like maybe it was the only word he could trust to hold steady on his tongue. “I don’t... I’m not... I’m not someone who gets to keep things like this.”

“Yes, you are,” Sam cut in, firm now, both hands on Bucky’s face. “God, Bucky, do you even understand how incredible you are? Do you know what it’s like to wake up every morning knowing I get to love you? That you’re mine?”

“I’m not—” Bucky tried, voice cracking, weak in both conviction and breath, but Sam silenced him the way only Sam could—with a kiss that said more than any argument could.

It was gentle at first, soft and slow and reverent, but then Sam leaned in, deepened it—his mouth growing firmer, more insistent, his body pressing close until there was no space between them. One hand cradled Bucky’s cheek, thumb still stroking, and the other slid down, fingers curling around the edge of his jaw before tracing the line of his throat, resting lightly but deliberately over his pulse. Not in a way that restricted or threatened—no, it was a claiming, a reassurance, a tether.

Bucky gasped softly into the kiss, a quiet, broken sound that spilled from him like surrender. When Sam finally pulled back, breath warm against his lips, Bucky was left blinking up at him, dazed and disarmed, chest rising and falling in shallow rhythm.

Sam nudged their noses together, the gesture so achingly tender Bucky felt it like a punch to the heart. “I love you,” Sam said again, quieter this time but no less intense. “And I’m not letting anything tear us apart. Not this memory, not whatever’s waiting. It’s you and me. Like always.”

Bucky stared at him, unable to speak, overwhelmed by the truth of it, by the depth of what Sam was offering so freely. He didn’t deserve it—not really—but God, did he want it. And even though the weight of that unnamed dread still curled heavy and cold beneath his ribs, even though the shadow of that thing he couldn’t quite remember still loomed just out of reach, Bucky nodded slowly, the motion barely there.

Sam pulled him close then, easing them both down into the mattress again, curling around Bucky like he was something precious, something worth protecting. His arms wrapped around him, anchoring him to the present, to the warmth of skin and the quiet lull of Sam’s breathing, steady and sure.

Bucky let himself be tucked against Sam’s chest, felt the firm beat of his heart beneath his ear, and listened as Sam whispered soft, senseless things into his hair—gentle affirmations, confessions of love, half-laughed jokes about their ridiculous friends, promises that none of this was too big for them to face.

And for a moment—for the length of a few quiet heartbeats—Bucky let himself believe it. That this could be his. That he could hold onto it.

But even as sleep slowly crept in, wrapping him in haze and hush, he felt it—still—that sliver of cold pressing in around the edges of his happiness, whispering, ‘not yet, not yet, not yet.’

Sam’s arms were strong around him, and Bucky let himself drift, but even as his eyes slid shut, one thought remained:

He would give anything to keep this. To keep Sam. To make this love the thing he fought for—no matter what came for them next.

He just prayed it would be enough.