Survivor's Guilt, Mourning a loved one, Grief
Steve walks around in a daze for the rest of the mission. He doesn't even remember getting off the train, or helping to secure the rest of the train. He doesn’t remember giving orders, or taking Zola into custody. He's just blank for those two days.
When he finally does blink back into his body, he’s standing in his doorway, looking at the things Bucky had left in his room. He takes a staggering step into the room, falling to his knees.
Bucky is gone. Steve let him fall. He should have been faster. Should have been stronger. Should never have let Bucky on the mission. Steve should have paid more attention to their surroundings. Should have known that the man in the monster metal suit hasn’t been incapacitated.
He’s failed Bucky, and now he has to live with his failure.
Steve falls onto his bed and sobs.
---
After delivering his report, he makes his way to an abandoned bar. It’s the same one that Steve had asked Bucky to follow him to his death.
He should have sent him home when they had the chance. Bucky would still be alive. Maybe he would hate him, but at least he would be alive.
Anything would be better than the truth.
Bucky will never smile at him again, never tease him about his stupid Captain America routine again. Steve is never going to get to draw him again, while Bucky shifts and complains about sitting still, There’s going to be no more reading aloud to each other. There’s going to be no future together.
Peggy comes in, eventually and talks. Despair turns to anger, and he’s going to burn Hydra to the ground. It’s the last thing that he’ll do.
---
They successfully attack the last Hydra base. The Red Skull is gone, and Steve has a good reason to never go back. He can finally join Bucky again.
He pulls out the compass that Bucky gave him (a picture of Agent Carter inside as a joke between the three of them,) and promises her a dance.
The Valkyrie crashes, and he drowns; Bucky his last thought.
---
But Steve doesn’t die.
He wakes, and once he realizes that he survived, he despairs.
Steve could have jumped after Bucky, and they could have survived. He could have saved him. If he had jumped and wrapped himself around Bucky so that he took the brunt of the impact, maybe they both could be alive today.
Here in the future, there were so many things Bucky would have loved. The foods, the stories, the new opportunities on every corner. The machines, the robots. Airplane and quinn jets. They had joked that Bucky should have been in the Air Force instead, but the Army was better. He would have loved to see everything.
It makes it harder to enjoy every new opportunity, when he’s constantly reminded that it was his fault that Bucky was gone in the first place.
He takes comfort in being able to hide behind Captain America, certain that he would fall apart at any moment otherwise.
---
Then Bucky comes back.