Chapter 3
Everything hurts is the first thing Steve thinks when he becomes aware, even his eyelids seem to ache and he didn't know that they could.
He wants to open his eyes, wants to see where he is and what that annoying beeping os but awareness is already slipping away again and Steve is too tired to fight it and so, for the first time in his life, he doesn't.
The next time awareness comes everything still hurts but Steve hears Bucky's voice talking to him, asking him to wake up, so Steve struggles through the tiredness dragging him down.
His eyes open slowly and Bucky's there, not looking at him, holding his hand in his, Steve's knuckles set against Bucky's lips, eyes closed and praying for Steve to just wake up.
Bucky looks different than Steve's fuzzy mind recalls, though his placement at his bedside is per the norm.
"Had the strangest dream, Buck." Steve mumbles, voice raspy and Bucky startles.
He presses something as he shifts closer to Steve, for him to see him better.
"What kind of dream, Stevie?" Bucky asks, voice soft, relieved as he always is when one of Steve's illnesses pass.
"Weird one. 'Were robots 'nd Aliens 'nd 'puters." Steve slurred, "'Nd Hydra made you forget me."
"Steve." Bucky started.
"Why 'm I so tired, Buck?" Steve asked even as he started to fall asleep again.
"Hey, go on, I'll be right here when you wake up." Bucky promised, the usual note of love hidden in his words.
Steve smiled a little, "Always are, Bucky."
"Yeah." Bucky whispered against his forehead, usually they saved those kisses for home and not hospitals, Steve must have been really sick this time.
Steve hummed as he fell asleep to the murmur of Bucky talking to the doctor, though how the doctor knew Steve was awake Steve didn't know, maybe a nurse had peaked in on them.
The next time Steve woke he's a little more aware of things, he feels a little embarrassed about his previous awakening though he knows he shouldn't but Bucky's there as promised though he's asleep on a cot near Steve's bed with Steve's unbroken left hand held in his.
Steve can't help smiling at him and the fact that Bucky's there to hold his hand, it worked, they got their people back.
"He hasn't left your side." Someone whispers or no, they are just on the wrong side.
Steve turns his head, both to look at the man and to hear him better.
"Tony." Steve says.
Tony offers him some ice chips and Steve wonders why not water but he's thirsty but doesn't want to wake Bucky so he doesn't argue.
Tony sets the cup back on the table and looks at Steve.
"How you feeling, Cap'?" Tony asks, folding his hands in his lap and Steve sees the scattering of burn scars that travel up the man's right hand.
Steve frowns a little at the nickname, "Serum's gone. I'm not Captain America anymore."
"Yeah, you are, I think you were Captain America long before the Serum." Tony admitted looking away from Steve.
Steve hummed as he stared at Tony.
"I feel floaty." Steve admitted when the man looked back at him.
"Floaty?" Tony laughed, eyes crinkling at the edges, it was nice to hear him laugh again.
"Dunno." Steve shrugged a little, "I'm not in pain, I don't think."
Tony laughed a little, "I should hope not, Shuri's got you on the good stuff."
"We win?" Steve had to ask, his memories were a little spotty after the Serum was taken, he thinks he might have hit his head. He remembers Tony getting the Stones but nit much after that except Bucky's face and his tears and the taste of copper in his mouth.
"Yeah, we won." Tony said softly, placing a hand on Steve's arm, Steve wished his hand wasn't in a cast so he could return the hold, "Thanos is gone and the Stones are back where they belong." Tony assured him.
"Nat'?" Steve asked because maybe, maybe if they had returned the Soul Stone they got her back, but Steve knew it was a foolish hope, but the world was rocking a little, like a hammock in the breeze and Steve k ew he was going to fall asleep again soon.
"She's with Clint." Tony said softly, Steve almost didn't hear him, "He dragged her off for some family bonding and she took Bruce with her and Thor tagged along, they'll be by later this week now that you're waking up." Tony explained, "It was my turn to bring Barnes his daily bread and make him get his nap."
Steve felt a smile cross his face at the joke, he was glad that Nat was back and that everyone seemed okay.
Steve's eyes drooped for a moment before he forced them open.
"Pep'? Pet'r?" Steve tried to ask but the world was drifting away.
"They're safe, well, not sure about Peter because he and Shuri are best friends now with Ned and MJ and Harley and those girls are terrifying and Pepper won't let me ground a princess and Shuri just laughs and steals my daughter and ...." Tony's words slid together into background noise as Steve fell back into sleep, but hearing Tony ramble again was nice.
The next time Steve woke people were yelling, for a moment Steve considered just pressing his good ear to his pillow and going back to sleep but he figured he'd been sleeping enough and so he should wake up for a bit.
Steve blinked his eyes and stared at the little girl sitting next to his hip drawing, for a moment he couldn't place her, was she a random child, but no, those were Tony's hands curled around her crayons.
"What'ch'a drawing?" Steve asked softly.
The little girl looked up and, yeah, this kid was Tony's, no mistaking those eyes set in Miss Pepper's face.
"You." She told him.
"Can I see?" He asked, eyes flickering to the group still yelling off to the side, they couldn't hear them over the noise they were making so Steve decided to ignore them, though he wanted to call Bucky over.
Steve looked back at girl who held her drawing book to her chest, looking shy about her art.
"It's okay if you don't want to." Steve assured her with a smile as he scooted himself to a more upright position, his back ached but it didn't hurt quite the way it used to before the Serum and there was some type of cast on his torso so Steve ended up more upright than laying down, leaning against the wall behind him.
The movement took his breath away and he had to count his breaths until it was back to even, this he remembered keenly, he had not missed it.
The little girl watched him and shifted, she moved to sit on his right side, in the vee of his arm and side. She settled her art book on her lap, face down before she reached over for the cup on the table, she held the cup for him while he picked out a few ice chips, before putting the cup back on the table.
"Thank you, little miss." Steve said.
She giggled, "My name is Morgan."
"Morgan, that's a very nice name." Steve told her.
Morgan stared up at him and goodness, that look was almost all Tony.
"It's not very good." She said as she fiddled with her book.
It took Steve a moment to remember what she was talking about.
"Bet it's pretty good." Steve told her, in his opinion as long as it was something you liked and were proud of all art was good, it was just a matter of perspective and taste.
She looked at him and then nodded, "Okay." She said and turned her book over.
It was a childish drawing of a person, not a stick figure but not quite a proportionate human either, the legs were a bit too long and the arms were at odd angles. The person had a circle drawn on one arm and a line was draw from the other, connecting to a rectangle shape, they were meant to be Steve's Shield and Thor's Hammer based on the color scheme or what Steve supposed the color scheme was.
Honestly Steve could see how the girl might see it as flawed but in Steve's eyes it was beautiful.
"Pretty good, like I told you." Steve smiled at Morgan, "Better than anything I can draw right now anyway."
"Mr. Bucky says you're an artist." Morgan frowned up at him.
Steve laughed softly, "If you let be borrow a page in your book I'll prove it."
The girl nodded, pigtails bouncing.
She turned to a blank page and shifted closer so Steve could reach the page and she could watch, and she handed him a crayon, a red one if Steve was reading the tiny word printed on the wrapper right.
With his left hand Steve began sketching an outline of Ironman, it was shaky, his hand not quite cooperating with directions.
He finished and signed it because he always signed his work because 'that's what artist do, punk.'
Morgan looked at it as Steve wrote out Ironman by Steve Rogers at the top of the page in careful script, the lines not quite straight like he meant them to be.
She laughed delightfully when he finished.
"It looks like Baymax." She grinned.
"I told you, yours was better." Steve grinned back, ignoring the sudden quiet from across the roo.
The girl looked at his drawing and then back at him.
"You were right." She giggled.
"What he failed to mention, Baby Stark, is that he's right handed." Bucky told her from the foot of the bed.
She looked from Bucky to him with the biggest frowny face that Steve had ever seen and that face was definitely Tony's.
Steve couldn't help winking at her and pressing his finger to his lips.
She stared at him and then the casted hand that rested near her hip.
"I'll practice and be better than you when you can use your other hand again." She promised.
Bucky laughed as he walked around the bed to sit next to Steve, "Stark will love that."
"Love what?" Tony asked as he and the others began to drift over.
Natasha, with her hair newly cut to her chin again, Clint with his hair growing out again, Thor with his beard neatly trimmed and tamed, Bruce with his odd half transformation, right arm in a sling, Sam with a wide grin, Peter bouncing on the balls of his feet as he and Shuri talked in the weird language young ones seemed to have and Pepper standing next to Tony smiling at him.
Steve smiled back, his family was whole and it might grow but he had the core of it back and that was worth everything he had lost.
"I'm going to be an artist like Uncle Steve." Morgan shouted as she stood on the bed, Steve reached to steady her but Bucky was there first and then she was launching herself at Tony who caught her and hugged her tight before settling her on his hip, Pepper pressing a kiss to her hair.
Steve smiled, it was nice that Tony had gotten his family, he deserved it.
"Is that so?" Tony asked with a grin as he tapped Morgan's nose.
"Yep, I'm going to be great." Morgan crowed.
"I'm sure you are." Tony squeezed her and then turned to Steve, "How we doing, Steve?"
Steve looked at him, feeling Bucky sit down on the bed next to him, hand going to the spot between his shoulders and rubbing gently.
"A little sore, I guess, my hand's a little unsteady," Steve held his hand flat and they all watched the hand shake, "But nothing feels too bad, no worse than I remember anyway." Steve admitted, normally he wouldn't but only Bucky had any type of reference for how he used to be and Steve wasn't sure if he remembered everything so he told the truth.
"Steve." Shuri began forcing his attention to her where she stood at the end of his bed, "I'm going to need you to wiggle your toes."
"My toes?" Steve asked, confused.
Shuri nodded, "You broke your back and we had to do a few major surgeries on you in a very short span of time in order to keep you alive, normally we wouldn't, not even with permission from next of kin." Shuri nodded at Bucky, "But we did, so I need you to wiggle your toes."
"Oh." Steve said softly and he couldn't help looking at Bucky.
"I..., Steve..." Bucky started.
"Yeah, me too." Steve said, because there wasn't a thing Steve wouldn't do to keep Bucky with him just that one second longer.
There was a moment of silence before Tony broke it.
"Hey, if you can't wiggle your toes then I get dibs on making your wheelchair, maybe I should make one anyway, you want it to fly, I can make it fly." Tony told him, nudging his shoulder as he sat down in a chair on the right side of the bed, shifting Morgan to his lap and Bucky look Steve's left hand in his own left hand.
Steve laughed, he couldn't help it, because the look on Shuri's face when Tony called dibs on making his wheelchair told him that there was going to be a major wheelchair making competition if he needed one.
Maybe he and Bucky could race them to test them out.
Steve calmed down, and Morgan held out his ice chips and Steve smiled at her as he took the cup, Bucky dipping his fingers into the ice water for the shards of frozen water.
"You two are adorable." Natasha grinned from her seat on Bruce's lap.
"Scott owe me twenty bucks." Clint said, "O told him you two were ridiculously married, like, Laura and I, awesome Marriage, I would do anything for her and the kids, but I think maybe I might draw the line at fighting the entire world, maybe." Clint frowned in thought.
"Barton, you went on a murder-spree after you wife got dusted, I'm pretty sure she's like ninety percent of your impulse control." Tony said, "I now have her on speed dial to get her to tell you no."
Clint frowned at Tony, "That's fair."
Steve snickered, he had missed this, the easy jokes and lightness that they used to have with each other before everything had started to sour, even though he hadn't meant it to, he'd just wanted his best guy back and it hadn't been fair to make Tony ignore what Bucky had been forced to do so Steve hadn't told him, it had been a mistake, Steve knew that now but he was allowed those wasn't he?
"Steve." Shuri said softly.
Steve looked at her and nodded.
He looked at his toes and he willed them to move. He frowned when they didn't, he needed to wiggle his toes, he had to, what if Bucky had a nightmare and Steve couldn't get to him?
"Hey." Bucky's voice broke his concentration.
Steve looked at Bucky who wrapped his arm around his shoulder's.
"Don't hurt yourself pushing it, alright, I'm not going anywhere if you can't walk anymore." Bucky told him gently, "Sickness and health, remember?"
Steve stared at Bucky and felt tears in his eyes, "Wasn't sure you did."
"I do. We got this." Bucky pressed his forehead to Steve's.
Steve nodded, "I wanna try again, my hand moved a little bit after I wanted it to, got a bit of a delay between thought and movement there, maybe I just got a movement delay, what's one more thing?"
"As long as you're alive, it's nothing, sweetheart." Bucky promised.
"We got this." Steve whispered.
Bucky nodded and pulled back so Steve could look at his toes again.
He focused on the and tried to move them again, everyone silent while Steve concentrated on moving his toes.
They wiggled, it hurt so Steve stopped and it took too long in Steve's opinion but they moved at least.
Steve let out the breath he'd been holding.
"It took a moment." Shuri said softly, Steve almost didn't hear her.
"Yeah." Steve agreed, "You might want to make that chair though, it hurt." Steve admitted.
Shuri looked surprised, "You should not be feeling any pain, I have you on a dosage that should cover everything."
"It doesn't, my back hurts a bit and my lungs feel..." Steve frowned, searching for the right word but settled instead, "they feel squished."
"Alright, I can work with that, we'll adjust your brace a bit, is it something we need to do now?" Shuri asked.
Steve shook his head, he didn't want to do it now, didn't want strangers around him, didn't want Shuri to make his family leave.
She seemed to understand and nodded, and then she smiled, "Good job on wiggling your toes."
Steve stared at her as the group let out their cheers, "What's so big about that? A two year old can do it."
"Steve." Shuri paused as the others quieted down, though Tony was vibrating in his seat, probably wanting to get a head start on designing Steve's wheelchair, "How long do you think it's been since the Battle?"
The others glanced at one another silently but Steve ignored them.
"A week, maybe two." Steve told them.
"Oh." Everyone said.
"Steve." Bucky touched his hand to get his attention, "It's been three months. Shuri put you in a medical coma for the first two so you could heal some, they had to re-break your hand a few times to reset it and there were so many surgeries I don't even remember all of them. Shuri weened you off the meds that were keeping you asleep and you should have woken you about a week once they were out of your system. But you didn't." Bucky took a breath, "We thought... I thought... Steve..."
Bucky's hands buried themselves in Steve's hair and he didn't finish, so Steve did.
"You thought I wasn't going to wake up." He said softly.
"Should have known better." Bucky said against his temple before pressing a kiss there as Steve clutched at Bucky's shirt when the man pulled him to his chest, tucking Steve's head beneath his chin.
It was a familiar position and it was one of the things Steve had missed the most after the Serum, he just hadn't fit right after, even before all of the future nonsense.
"I'm okay, Bucky, we're okay." Steve whispered, he couldn't hear the words but he knew Bucky could, "We got time now."
"Yeah, finally." Bucky muttered to his good ear.
"What about my Shield?" Steve asked suddenly, pulling away from Bucky slightly.
Tony laughed, "Yeah, we got that, Morgan helped me fix it, didn't you kiddo?"
Pepper looked up from what she was typing on her phone, probably Stark Industries nonsense.
"Our daughter did what, now?" Pepper asked calmly.
"Did I say helped, I meant watched, from a very safe distance behind a wall." Tony said quickly.
"Mhm, Morgan?" Pepper asked, looking at her daughter.
"Daddy let me hold the blow torch and Peter painted it." Morgan said honestly.
Steve giggled.
"Traitor." Tony muttered and he squeezed the little girl close while Peter ran to get the Shield from the other side of the room, coming back and dropping it on Steve's lap.
"Sorry, sorry, you said you hurt, oh gid,bi hurt Captain America." Peter said and buried his face in his hands.
Steve stared at him, slightly bemused before he looked at the Shield. Tony had left the fissures where Thanos had broken it and Steve traced over them gently.
They were his mark on the Shield and Steve watched his fingers slowly move over the shallow grooves.
He smiled, he could hear Tony speaking vaguely, a discussion about how he could still be Captain America. But Steve didn't want to. He was tired, he was done with the fighting, done with the loss, he wanted to spend time with Bucky, wanted to teach Morgan how to draw.
Steve let his fingers stop at the edge of the Shield, he'd left his mark with it, on it, it was time for someone else to make their own.
Steve looked up and he smiled at them all, he knew that they would be shocked but he also knew that they would support his choice.
"Sam." Steve looked at his friend, his brother who had followed him from one disaster to another and had stood by his side.
Sam looked at him and smiled and Steve knew he was making the right choice, Sam deserved this, maybe more than Steve had, Sam had earned the Shield.
"Catch." Steve said, and it was still as easy as breathing to toss the Shield, although maybe that wasn't the right phrase considering that Steve probably had asthma again.
Sam caught the Shield, fumbling it slightly, surprised at the fact that Steve had thrown it to him.
"What?" Sam asked as he shifted the Shield in his hands.
Steve smiled at the man.
"Looks good, what do you think, Buck?" Steve glanced at Bucky.
Bucky looked at Steve, mouth aga, shocked like Steve had expected, like the rest of them were, although Peter and Shuri looked absolutely excited.
Bucky turned to look at Sam and then to Steve, after a moment he seemed to understand what Steve was trying to tell him without speaking and he looked back to Sam, leaning back against the headboard, drawing Steve with him, tucking Steve into his side.
"He'll grow into it." Bucky said with a grin.
Sam looked down at the Shield with a slight frown and Steve wondered if he was going to refuse.
Sam looked up, "I'm not keeping the outfit." He informed them.
The group burst into laughter and Sam couldn't stop grinning.
It took a moment for everyone to calm down and Bucky rubbed his fingers up and down Steve's side to help him down from his own excitement.
Soon enough the group began to discuss what had been going on the last three months, the recovery efforts, the therapy sessions, the regrouping and helping everyone everyone find a new equilibrium.
Steve understood that they were doing this here in order to include him and it was nice of them.
But it was nicer when little miss Morgan climbed up next to him from Tony's lap to settle against his side to draw next to him beneath his arm, it was nicer when Shuri and Peter climbed onto the bed to sit at his feet, talking in words that Steve knew were english but did not understand what they meant in the way the two used it.
The rest of them scooted their chairs closer, Pepper taking Morgan's spot on Tony's lap and handing him a Stark Pad as she curled her arms around his shoulders.
Natasha started putting small braids in Thor's hair as Clint, Sam, and Bruce discussed something or another.
They shifted over as other's came to say hi now that Steve was awake, some, like Wanda and T'Challa joined them for a while, others came and left after they said their hellos and get wells, Steve didn't hear a lot of them because of his hearing but he smiled at everyone that came.
At one point Morgan put her art book on the side table and curled up against him and fell asleep, and Steve smiled and almost wished she was on his other side so he could pet her hair but he liked that Bucky was on that side, because the beat of his heart was echoing in his ear where Steve was resting against Bucky's chest, Bucky's arm around his shoulder, fingers threading through his hair.
Steve could feel his eyes growing heavy, the voices becoming murmur of sounds blending together indistinguishably, the vibration of Bucky speaking, to him or someone else Steve wasn't sure, but it made Steve sink further down into the softness that awaited him.
The last thing Steve felt before he drifted off was Morgan pressing her face harder into his side as she tried to get closer and Bucky's fingers carding through his hair.
He's glad that they didn't take this from him.
He's glad that saving the world didn't take his family.
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A/n: so, third chapter, i honestly did not intend for it to be this long, half of this was not in the first draft I wrote up but there you have it.
Family fluff.
And Natasha lives damnit.
I just love the idea of Sam being Captain America but I can't really see him in the same Uniform so... Also a throw back to Bucky asking about the outfit in the first Captain America but Sam has no idea about that.
And yeah Steve and Bucky have a long road but the have time now, and Shuri and Tony but mostly time.
And yeah I implied they are married and then forgot about it till now. They had a ceremony in Nazi Germany with Phillips as an officiate, Peggy as the best man and the Commandoes as flower girls, to much grumbling, technically they are the first gay couple to be married officially because Peggy absolutely filed their marriage certificate as soon as it became legal in each and every state as they legalized it.
After she was retired she passed the necessary paperwork to a then probationary Agent Coulson who made sure to follow her footsteps in filing the paperwork.
Hope you enjoyed.