Leviathan

Chapter Four: The Country

Steve didn’t know if Stark could track him through the kit- probably, but it wasn’t like the guy couldn’t track him down in game either way, so using the kit that didn’t make him want to keel over and die thanks to the added wrench of his non-alcoholic hangover just seemed sensible.

They were logging in at Sam and Riley’s because at least the campus apartment had plenty of witnesses around, though there was at least a fifty percent chance they’d assume screaming was just an overenthusiastic party or a movie. The fact that Sam was with him didn’t particularly give Steve any confidence. Sam’s stats were the worst in their trio, and on top of that, he had never actually seen the soldier. Steve wasn’t even sure Sam saw him when Steve took off running.

This time the light came from under the third door. Steve was pretty sure the storylines were supposed to be played in order, without unlocking before a player had beaten the last. Then again, this guy could pause and port other players without permission. Steve was pretty sure he could unlock levels for them.

His suspicions were confirmed when he opened the door to reveal an open, grassy countryside. He stepped through and turned back to look at Sam as he followed. Sam immediately bent double, pointing and laughing at Steve. “You got a man bun!” he shouted, panting he was laughing so hard. “Ooh- ha- I’m never letting you live this down.”

Steve only raised an eyebrow. “One, I look totally badass. Look at this robe. I’m a goddamn samurai. Two, you have one of those stereotype long-hangy catfish moustaches, so I don’t know who you think you’re laughing at.”

“What? Man, that’s racist,” Sam declared.

Steve sighed. “Remember Riley, our friend, your roommate, the one who is missing?”

“Still not letting you live down your man bun,” Sam muttered.

They started walking again, and this time the soldier came to them. Again, he was outfitted all in black, but this time he looked like a ninja. Strapped to his back was a katana, but he still had the metal arm. Steve wondered again if that was against game protocol since no one this far in the past (or on an old-school whaling ship for chrissakes) would have had one or known what to do if they saw one.

Sam barely got a step forward before the soldier had wrapped Steve in another awkward hug and disappeared with him. He blinked and took in his surroundings. “The Dragon Claw pub?” Steve asked. “This is where Stark first hacked in, yeah?”

Then Steve looked at the door and his blood ran cold. He knew suddenly exactly what Riley had wanted him to see: there was a symbol carved over the binary, probably rendering it ineffective. A symbol Steve had only seen in history books or on conspiracy websites. It was a skull boasting several tentacles. HYDRA. “Stark is HYDRA?” he asked unsteadily. It made sense. Rich people always seemed to be the main members of secret cults.

The soldier sighed. He touched the door, then his own chest. “Y-you’re HYDRA?”

He gave Steve a helpless look. “But maybe you don’t want to be.” Finally, something lit up in those sad, blue eyes and the puzzle pieces began to fall into place for Steve. “Is there anything I can do to help?”

The soldier put his hand over Steve’s mouth again, silently pleading before pulling him into that awkward hug. Another command, and they were back in the room with all the screens. Steve immediately felt sick. It was almost Pavlovian the way that his gut reacted to this place, even though he couldn’t remember much of anything about it. The soldier took Steve by the hand and led him to a dark corner of the room where there was a door. He opened the door and gestured for Steve to go in. Steve wasn’t too sure about it, but he had a feeling the soldier was trustworthy. He’d saved Steve before, and he looked truly upset by whatever had been coming up behind Steve that caused him to black out.

Steve went in.

He tried very, very hard not to be alarmed by the fact that the door slammed shut and the soldier twisted the round wheel outside to lock him in. The soldier placed his right, non-metal palm on the glass and looked apologetic. Steve wasn’t sure if that was good or bad. Probably bad.

Fuck.

The soldier disappeared from the small window in the door and Steve was left with nothing but metal walls and what people who had phobias of the dentist probably saw when they pictured a dentist’s chair. The thing had straps for all four limbs and something that looked like it was supposed to grab onto your head and never let go.

He heard the soldier’s voice again, this time through the intercom. “Sit, please.”

Steve wished he could be angry, but that voice sounded so small and uncertain for such a strong looking guy. He contemplated not cooperating, but it wasn’t like he had anywhere to go or hide. So, because he was stupid and reckless and never knew when to back down, Steve sat.

The straps didn’t come to life, but a drill did come down from the ceiling and Steve was pretty sure he was going to die until he realized it was heading for the spot just above his left shoulder. It was after his player menu. Nonplussed, Steve let it happen.

He gasped as it all hit him at once and even let out a choked cry. He was suddenly aware of every player in the game, and he knew where they all were. He could hear their voices and whichever one he listened to caused one of the dots to burn a little brighter on the map that now lived in the upper right corner of his vision. He knew how to travel anywhere with a word just like the soldier, because it was written right there on the map, and he was fairly certain even without checking that his level and skills were all maxed out. He was now the most overpowered player the game could possibly have. His gear didn’t have stats anymore, and Steve was pretty sure it was because he didn’t need them. He was immortal within the world of Leviathan now.

The door opened and he kept his mouth shut. He knew now how they’d been found before. Someone could see when someone was in here, but only if they made noise. Was that why the soldier never spoke?

Steve pulled him into a hug, tucking his chin on the soldier’s shoulder before whispering the word that would take them back to Sam.

Sam who wasn’t there. “Falcon?” Steve called nervously.

“They’ve been taken,” the soldier murmured.

“No, that’s- that’s not possible,” Steve laughed nervously.

“They made you forget,” he reminded Steve. “They can make you do things, too. Whether you want to or not.”

“But it’s a game,” Steve insisted.

The soldier gave him a hard look. “Leviathan was never a game.”

Steve shook his head as the soldier began to draw in the air. He reached away from his beads and felt Sam sitting next to him in reality. He slipped his hand into his friend’s and squeezed. There was no answering squeeze. The hand was limp. “I- I- hang on-”

He logged out and sure enough, it was Sam and he wasn’t moving. The game was still running in his helmet. Steve grabbed his wrist, feeling for a pulse. He was alive. “Sam?” he asked as he shook the wrist to no avail. “Shit. Shit, okay. Uh… It’s gonna be fine, pal. It’s all gonna be fine.”

He really hoped he was telling the truth. Steve put his helmet back on and found the soldier just finishing his drawing of an oversized throwing star. With a few motions, it filled and became three dimensional. The soldier hopped just enough to land on it and Steve realized it was hovering. Had the soldier just created a mount out of nothing? And one that wasn’t even technically a mount because didn’t mounts have to be animals?

Steve wasn’t about to waste time. He drew a circle and then realized he wanted to do something at least a little meaningful. They were fighting Nazis, right? Steve grinned darkly as he drew a few smaller circles nested inside, all cradling a star. He colored it in red, white, and blue, and tried not to think about how similar this was to the program Steve had used to design Stark’s avatar.

“Good,” the soldier nodded in approval. “We have to cross some ground that can’t be walked on.”

“What’s wrong with my friend?” he asked quietly.

The soldier crouched down on his throwing-star mount and as he tilted it forward, it began to move in that direction. Steve, less gracefully, followed his example.

“If I say run, you log out immediately,” the soldier ordered. “Your missing friend, designation Wingman. He was asking too many questions, and discovered one answer too many. They don’t just have his avatar now. They can make you go anywhere, do anything, even after you log out.”

“So you’re saying they mind controlled him into kidnapping himself?”

“Essentially.”

Steve reached out with his beaded wrist and grabbed Sam’s wrist, wanting to know the moment anything went wrong. Steve kept his middle finger on his friend’s pulse. It was steady and strong, which was what Steve had to be now. “Why didn’t they do that to Falcon?”

“Bait.”

Steve shuddered a little at that thought. “Bait for who?”

The soldier looked at him. “Leviathan was engineered to find those compatible with HYDRA’s mission, and to eliminate those who are not.”

Steve let out a humorless laugh as they began to fly over a ravine. He’d pretty well painted himself as not in line with HYDRA, and so had the rest of his party. “So how do we stop them?”

“First, we do our best to save your friend. I gave you Mod power, so you’re essentially undefeatable. The problem is, so are they. The only way to stop one of us is to have greater numbers.”

“Okay, then what? How do we shut down Leviathan?”

The soldier was quiet.

“We… can shut it down, right?”

“I don’t know,” he replied honestly. “Maybe your friend Stork can figure it out.”

“I thought he was HYDRA?”

The soldier shook his head. “Leviathan is HYDRA. Your friend is poking them with a stick.”

Steve grinned. That did sound a lot more in line with what he knew of Tony Stark. “Okay, so… we take out as many Mods as we can… how do we give Falcon his brain back?”

“I… “ the soldier seemed like he was struggling to keep up now, like everything was too loud and he couldn’t think straight. “I was just going to force log him out. I don’t… know how they control you.”

“Okay, that’s… Yeah, I guess thing one is to get him away from them so they can’t do anything else to him.”

The soldier nodded, but he seemed all talked out. Steve let him ride in silence the rest of the way. They reached a Great Wall that was probably supposed to be in China, which led Steve to wonder if HYDRA knew samurai were Japanese. Probably not. They were fucking Nazis.

Their mounts flew up the wall and they came to a stop along the walkway at the top. Yeah, the devs had definitely gotten their countries mixed up. This was really, clearly, meant to be the Great Wall of China. He kept his thoughts to himself on the matter and followed the soldier’s lead as he hovered. There was someone coming for them. Steve dismounted and drew his weapon, feeling confident as the soldier drew his. He wondered if this was how Sam and Riley felt when they fought together. True, this wasn’t exactly real, but it had become a lot more real with the soldier’s revelations.

The lone warrior charged them, weapon at the ready and Steve stepped sideways and rolled two beads to slam the enemy sword to the ground, tripping its owner right into the soldier’s range. Steve was there in a heartbeat, and together they ran their weapons into the fallen warrior’s chest. He disappeared in what Steve assumed was the pixelated evanescence of a player heading back to the Badlands.

The next fight wasn’t so easy. She held her own, red hair flowing with each movement. “Stand down, soldier! This isn’t the way!”

He ignored her, and Steve didn’t waste time thinking about what she meant. Her fighting style was amazing, and Steve wondered if she was some kind of fighter in reality. “You can’t just Mod some random kid!” she insisted as she literally flipped up onto his shoulders and began to squeeze his neck with her legs. “You realize they’re going to his apartment right this second? He’ll be dead before you even get to the other one.”

The soldier bucked her off fiercely, eyes blazing. “No,” he said firmly and slashed her. The shock delayed her just enough that Steve could land a blow, getting the required two Mod hits in to send her to the Badlands. He turned to Steve, looking truly terrified. “You have to run. They know where you live.”

“Then it’s good I’m with Falcon,” Steve replied carefully.

“Log out now,” the soldier ordered. “I’m on my way.”

Steve’s heart was pounding as he logged and he shook Sam again just in case. “Fuck,” he muttered and tried to think about how they could possibly get somewhere safe without abandoning Sam or being slowed too much.

His hands were shaking as he pulled out his phone to call Stark.

“Yeah, what’s my favorite little truant been up to?” Stark greeted him. He sounded distracted.

“I need your help,” Steve rushed, and realized his voice was shaking as badly as his hands. “That game, Leviathan, it’s- Can you shut it down?”

“Babycakes, I thought you’d never ask.” He could practically hear the self-satisfied smile in the billionaire’s voice. “Just need to finish gathering some data on-”

“No, it needs to go down right fucking now,” Steve practically shouted.

“Okay, one, ow, no more shouting in my ear please,” Stark replied, still too calm to understand the stakes. “Two, what’s got your tightie whities in a bunch?”

“That game was designed by fucking HYDRA, Stark. They’re real.”

“Huh.”

“No, not ‘huh’ like it’s interesting. Shut it down. They’re gonna kill my friend.”

“Okay, but when I shut it down, that’s it. Everything’s gone. No info, no data, no proof… It never existed.”

Steve had to let go of Sam’s wrist before he broke it. He probably couldn’t actually break someone’s wrist with one hand, but he fucking felt like he could. “Stark, do it. I’m being serious, they could literally kill my friend any second.”

“Alright, alright.” Steve heard the clicking of some keys followed by a, “There. It’s gone. Poof. You’ve ruined the lives of millions of basement dwellers, are you happy?”

Steve pulled the helmet off Sam’s head as it powered down. Sam still wasn’t conscious or responding or whatever, but at least he was out of the game. Like the soldier had planned, they couldn’t make him do anything else if he wasn’t in the game. “Yeah. Thanks… thank you so much.”

“Anything else I can do for you?” Stark asked in a tone that clearly indicated it was rhetorical.

“We need a place to lie low.”

Steve knew he was probably supposed to wait for the soldier, but it wasn’t like he’d been given an ETA. For all he knew, the guy was in fucking Russia. The dorms had a wheelchair downstairs, which Steve stole without a second thought. He’d bring it back if he wasn’t killed by Nazis. He was shaking with fatigue, but the adrenaline helped him notice approximately none of it as he finagled Sam into the chair. The elevator was so slow, Steve was beginning to think he was going to die of old age instead of a shadow Nazi organization, but finally it arrived and Steve wheeled Sam inside and then into the lobby to wait for Happy.

Steve felt hugely guilty involving Happy. Sure, he was a professional bodyguard, but if an entire army or an elite squad or something showed up, they were all pretty much dead. Luckily, he showed up shortly after Steve managed to get Sam to the lobby (perks of a boss who could afford the fanciest cars, probably), so he didn’t have to wait anxiously in fear of being seen or tracked or whatever.

Happy’s help made moving Sam from the chair to the car much easier, though Steve was still so high on adrenaline he could probably have managed it himself. He sat probably a little too close to his catatonic friend on the drive, but his nerves needed that wrist in reach so he could be sure Sam’s heart was still beating.

He was so fucking still. Steve hated it. He hated every second of this whole thing, except the part where he and the soldier were fighting. Not only had it felt good to be side by side with someone in the middle of a fight, it kept him from thinking about kind, good Sam practically dead or Riley who was just as good and who hadn’t minded Steve falling asleep on him when he was drunk. Even hugged him a little like he knew how badly Steve needed to know he mattered to someone.

Fuck.

He wiped furiously at his eyes and tried so, so hard not to think.

That’s when the motorcycle appeared. It was gaining on them fast, and Happy grew tense as he accelerated to try to compensate. The motorcyclist sped up as well, coming up on the driver’s side. His face was hidden, but Steve could see the glint of a gun at the cyclist’s hip as his coat flapped in the wind. “He’s armed, Happy!”

The bodyguard floored it, but the guy on the bike wouldn’t be left behind.

That was when Steve saw another glint of metal. “Rogers, get down!” Happy yelled, but Steve kept rising, trying to get a better look.

It was his hand. It was a metal hand. His left hand was metal. Steve’s brain continued to process the same sentence in various compositions until he finally said, “Pull over.”

“Are you nuts?”

“I know this guy, he’s on our side.”

“I’m not pulling over just because-”

“This guy saved my life last night,” Steve insisted. He wasn’t talking about the ship. He was pretty sure something worse would have happened to him in that room with the screens if the soldier hadn’t been there. “Please, just pull over. He’s not going to stop tailing us, and he hasn’t drawn his gun. If he does, you have my full permission to floor it.”

Happy gave him a look, but did as he was told. Steve blamed Stark for that.

The soldier dismounted and Steve threw the door open (like an idiot, honestly how was he still alive with impulses like these) as he drew a gun. “Wait, stop! It’s me, it’s Murmur.”

The soldier paused, sending a confused look to the driver.

“He’s a friend. I didn’t know how far you were, and I knew-”

“Phone.”

“What?” Steve asked, but he was already fishing his out to hand over. The soldier accepted it wordlessly and then smashed it on the ground.

“If I can find you, so can they.”

Steve nodded shortly. “Uh.”

“You have a safe house?”

“Yeah, sorta,” Steve hedged. He was pretty sure Stark had the best security money could buy, so that counted, right? “It’s my friend Stork. He already shut the game down. He’s good.”

With a nod, the soldier returned to his bike. “Hurry.”

Steve slipped back into the car. “He’s coming with us,” he told Happy faintly as he tried very hard to remember he was in a life and death situation and not think about if it was hot that the guy both looked like his avatar and had showed up to protect Steve like it was his mission in life.

Not that it was a question.

He grabbed Sam’s wrist again, feeling for that pulse that kept him calm.

The drive took forever, and the soldier literally picked Sam up and carried him because apparently the extra two seconds to put him in the chair was too much. Steve brought the chair anyway. He was pretty sure Sam would appreciate not being manhandled any time they needed to move, whether he was aware of it or not.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, who’s tall, dark, and creepy?” Stark demanded as the four of them entered.

“Asset,” the soldier replied gruffly.

Stark raised an eyebrow. “Okay… and why are you here?”

“Protect Murmur.”

“Okay. Well. Short stuff, you have some interesting friends.”

Once the door was locked behind them, the soldier deposited Sam in the chair and proceeded to look unhappily at the room. “Too many windows.”

“That glass could stop a nuclear warhead,” Stark replied easily.

“But it cannot stop eyes.”

Stark opened his mouth to argue and frowned. “Well, yeah, I guess that’s true. We, uh… The lab doesn’t have much in the way of windows.”

The soldier nodded and Stark looked like he had something else to say but blessedly held it in and led them all down to the lab. “What is wrong with him?” asked a heavily accented female voice. Steve followed the sound to see a young woman, probably African judging by her accent.

“Some kind of mind control,” Steve told her. “Can’t wake him up.”

“Well, let’s see, bring him here,” she said, and Steve did as she said even though he probably should have questioned the fact that she looked like a teenager.

“Princess, meet my favorite pain in the ass,” Stark introduced them.

“I’m Steve,” he supplied. She seemed like a reasonable person who didn’t want to call someone by a different (possibly derogatory) nickname every time she addressed them.

“Shuri,” she replied shortly. “Stark, your scan matrices are failing again, please remind me why I could not bring my own equipment?”

“Because mine is state of the art,” the billionaire replied in a grumpy voice.

She laughed under her breath. “Maybe in America.”

Steve smiled a little, feeling like maybe things were going to be okay. He felt a hand on his arm and turned to regard the soldier. “Thanks,” he said, his voice tight. “You… I mean, you saved us.”

“Worth saving.”

Steve blushed a little. “Hate to break it to you, pal, but my avatar’s the hero. I’m just a crooked, ninety pound asthmatic.”

“Murmur-”

“Steve,” the blond insisted. “My name is Steve. What’s yours?”

The soldier froze for a long moment, seemingly lost for words. Finally, he repeated, “Steve.”

“Yeah, that’s me,” he agreed with a small smile. “What do I get to call you?”

“The Asset.”

Steve frowned. “You don’t have a name? Like… not a title or a designation, but a real name?”

The soldier (Asset) hesitated again. He almost looked confused as he stumbled over his words. “J- J- Bu-cky.”

“Bucky,” Steve repeated with that same, soft smile. “Nice to meet you.”

The guy nodded awkwardly, and Steve touched his hand. “Thank you. Really.”

“Worth saving,” he repeated and Steve’s face darkened.

“You don’t even know me, how can you decide if I’m worth saving?”

“The test,” he replied as if it was obvious.

“Okay… I don’t exactly follow…”

“You’re good,” Bucky insisted. “You don’t like killing.”

Steve laughed nervously. “Most people don’t.”

“Most people do when it’s fiction and there are no real consequences. You couldn’t even look at the woman in white.”

Steve didn’t ask. He knew Bucky was talking about the Greeter. He’d given Steve a nod, was standing in the background when it happened. Steve didn’t know for sure what his face was doing when he cut down that NPC, but he knew it was doing something.

The soldier definitely saw whatever Steve’s face was doing. “Right, but everyone does that. No one would have just leave a catastrophe alone. They’d help.”

The soldier scoffed again. “Too much ‘not my business’ going around these days,” he said instead. “You are good.”

“I swear, I’m really not anything special,” Steve insisted.

“You wanted to save the captain,” Bucky said. “No one has ever tried to save the captain. The mutineers sometimes. No one ever tried to save the captain. You did. You wanted everyone to survive.”

“And good job me, no one survived,” Steve replied, his voice heavy with sarcasm.

“You’re good,” Bucky insisted again, quietly. “I don’t remember the last person I knew who was truly good. They all.. Turn bad. They’re only good out of fear.”

Steve softened a little. “You’re good too, Bucky.”

Bucky looked away and shook his head. “Killed people. Not in a video game.”

Steve stopped to think, to make sure he said the right thing. Maybe Bucky had killed people, but Steve could tell he had a good heart. He looked at Bucky, his eyes fierce, waiting until the brunet made eye contact. “Did you want to? Did you like killing them?”

Bucky shook his head, and there were tears in his eyes, so Steve wrapped him in the best hug he could manage. “You’re good too, Buck. Nobody’s perfect, okay? We all do things we wish we hadn’t. We all have regrets.”

“What do you regret, Steve?”

Steve swallowed thickly. “I told my ma I missed art school,” he admitted. He tensed with the effort of holding back guilty tears. “She was sick, dying, and I told her I missed school, and the next day she died.”

“That is-”

“A coincidence, yeah, that’s what everyone would tell me if I told them about it. But it wasn’t. She thought I wanted to go to school more than I wanted her to be okay and she just… gave up.”

Bucky held Steve tight and nuzzled into his hair. Somehow, it wasn’t awkward. This was a non-awkward hug. “You are good, Steve. You’re the best good I know.”

Steve pulled away a little, eyes shiny. “You’re good too.” He’d leaned up to peck Bucky’s lips before he’d realized what he was doing and when reality hit, he paled. “Fuck, I’m sorry, I don’t know why I did that, I- I-”

Bucky rested his forehead against Steve’s. “Please do not apologize.”

“I- I kissed you,” Steve fretted.

“Yes,” Bucky agreed. “I… did not mind.”

Steve didn’t know what to do with that, and Bucky was holding him a little too close. “This is… Look, please don’t toy with me because I’m not hot and I have health issues, so it’s really hard for me to find someone who-”

“You are beautiful, Steve,” the soldier interrupted. “Please stop putting yourself down.”

Steve bit his lip and met Bucky’s gaze hard, feeling every ounce of reality they now had outside of the game. “Can’t help facts.”

Bucky only frowned further. “I do not think you understand the difference.”

Steve bit his lip. “Maybe not,” he shrugged. “But I can think of someone who might be able to help.”

“Good, where do we find them?”

“Did you not mind the kiss or did you enjoy it?” Steve asked, and that might have been every ounce of bravery he had that wasn’t reserved for losing barfights.

Thankfully, he didn’t have to be brave anymore, because Bucky was leaning forward, kissing him, hugging him completely non-awkwardly, and Steve really shouldn’t be on this level with a guy whose name he didn’t even know five minutes ago, right? He pulled away, looking at least a little ashamed. “We, um. My friends,” he mumbled and cleared his throat.

Thankfully, Stark and Shuri were having some kind of argument over a computer screen that Steve should have been able to understand more of after having been in Stark’s class, but he didn’t even try. It meant they had their backs to Steve and the soldier and saw exactly none of what had happened.

Steve looked at the bracelet she’d put on Sam and recognized it from his own kit, and from when Stark was leading them through the city. “What are these?” he asked. His voice was soft, but they stopped as abruptly as if he’d shouted.

“Kimoye beads,” she replied simply. “Much better than Stark Industries. If I had my lab, I could figure out what has been displaced in his mind, but I do not, so I am stuck with the primitive readings.”

“My tech is not primitive.”

Shuri was silent and stone faced just long enough for her disagreement to register without her having to say a word. “It is difficult to determine what precisely they have done to him as Stark’s brain maps are not as detailed as the ones in Wakanda.”

Before Stark could say whatever defensive thing he was going to say, Steve chimed in. “They did something like this to me too. Would it help to scan me?”

“Perhaps,” was all she would commit to. Steve felt the beads vibrate slightly and then she was absorbed in her screen again. After several minutes of poring over whatever she’d found in Steve’s brain, she shook her head. “I need more data. Whatever was done to you was minor, and the traces are all but gone.”

“Didn’t feel very minor,” Steve muttered under his breath.

The soldier- Bucky, he had a name now- stepped forward like a man on death row. “Scan me.”

She took the beads from Sam and put them on Bucky’s wrist and Bucky actually flinched a little like he expected it to hurt. That protective thing was rising in Steve’s chest again. If Bucky had volunteered for this knowing that what had been done to Steve wasn’t enough, it could only mean that worse had been done to Bucky. Shuri was quiet and contemplative while she studied the screen, which pretty much confirmed for Steve that Bucky had probably done some of the things he was ashamed of while completely out of control of his body. Steve knew what it was like to have a body that fought you every step of the way, but he couldn’t imagine how terrible it would be to have his body actively controlled and used for evil.

“I will need a moment to go over the scan, but this should do it.”

“Thank you,” Steve said to Bucky, but he did not acknowledge Steve in favor of putting the beads down and retreating to the far corner of the room, where he appeared to be keeping watch. Steve sighed and settled in to wait.