Chapter 3
The day after it looks a bit better. Stevie just wakes up once or twice the night and Bucky managed to sleep through all of it. Lady has stood guard in their room. Y/N gets Sam and surprisingly Tony and Pepper to play with Bucky. Tony even managed to coax Peter out of school and come to the play date. “Tony. I can’t believe you got Peter out of school earlier. He can’t ditch school like that. Not for playing.”
“Y/N. Come on. He loves the kids and they love him.”
“No, Tony. Actually, I agree with Y/N. What will you do with our kid if it ditches school like that?” Pepper looks at him with raised eyebrows and smirks as Tony rolls his eyes.
“Actually, I don’t mind.”
“I’m sure you don’t mind, Peter.” Y/N smiles at him as he carries Bucky on his back and runs around the room to get away from Sam who is chasing them. “Oh, come on, Y/N. It’s a onetime thing. Let it slip.” Tony almost looks like he’s pleading, so Y/N settles on glaring at him before she sighs and looks at Pepper. “Do you want to help me change Steve’s diaper and then we make a Lady’s day with him in the living room? We can ask Nat and Wanda if they want to join in.”
“With wine?”
“Obviously.”
“Okay. I’ll get the girls and the stuff and you get the monster ready.” Pepper nods and vanishes in the direction of the living room. Y/N smiles at her back. Pepper has started calling Steve a monster after he tugged on her hair a bit violently and almost pulled a few strands out. She makes quick work of getting a new diaper on him. She talks to him and tells him what she’s doing while he chews on another diaper he has pulled out of the bag as Y/N had put it beside him. “Now big boy. Let’s watch how your brother is doing, yes?”
“Bawy!” Steve’s eyes almost shine with happiness. Y/N laughs and pulls him upright on his hands. “Yes, Bucky.” She takes him up in her arms but fights with him about the diaper. Eventually, she manages to get it out of his grip and instead plants a pacifier in his mouth which he happily accepts. As she walks with him to the playroom, she hears Pepper talk to the other girls. She opens the door to the playroom and watches at the scene. Sam lies on his back while Bucky sits on his chest with a triumphant smile, claiming he and his brave horse have defeated the wild dragon. Lady is licking Sam’s face and he tries helplessly to get her away from him while Peter just laughs at him with tears in his eyes. Tony sits on Steve’s tiny chair and claps as he claims that the princess needs her kiss now. Y/N snorts at that and Tony throws a quick glare at her before he gives Bucky a smooch on his cheek. “Bawy!” Steve reach out for Bucky and the brunette turns around to look at him. He runs over and pulls Y/N down to give her a kiss before he kisses Steve a few times on his face. The little one giggles and tries to mimics him with the pacifier in his mouth. Y/N laughs and kisses Bucky’s cheek. “You having fun?”
“yes! I killed the bad monster and rescued princess Tony, mommy.”
“Really. I knew you’re a hero.” She kisses him again. “Mommy is in the living room with your aunts. Can we call you if we need a hero to rescue us?”
“Yes! Me and my pony can save you, mommy.”
“Ah, I’m glad. Then have fun with the princess and your horse. And don’t hurt the monster to bad, okay?”
“Okay mommy. Bye, Steve.”
“Bawy.” Steve waves a bit as Bucky does and Y/N giggles as he runs back to Tony and climbs on his lap. She shakes her head and joins the other girls in the living room.
* * *
At this night Bucky drops and lays next to Y/N. They just look at each other for some minutes before Bucky starts to apologize. Y/N shushes him and after he doesn’t stop, she starts kissing him to keep him from talking. It turns to a full making out session and gets heated soon after. They fell asleep in each other’s arms, naked skin on naked skin.
But now she’s awake. And she’s worried.
“Bucky, hey. Wake up.” Bucky’s slowly opens his eyes; his breath is far to laborate but Y/N sees in his eyes that he slowly comes back to her. His grip on her hand loosens but she doesn’t extract the hurting limb from him. Instead she holds on tight on his hand this time. “You’re here with me. In our apartment, in my room. You’re good. You’re safe.” The man takes some stuttering breathes and looks at her as if she could vanish anytime soon and he has to remember her face and cherish it. “You’re good.” She whispers and places her other hand on his bearded cheek. She leans in a bit and closes her eyes as she presses a soothing kiss on his forehead. “I promise.” For a second, he looks at her and she fears that he’s not back at all but then he sighs and pulls her on his chest and holding her like he’s afraid she runs away. “God, doll…”
“Shh… You’re good.” She lies on top of him for a while hearing his hammering heartbeat slowly calm down. At some point she probs herself up a bit, chokes back a hiss as she puts weight on her lightly bluish hand, though she knows Bucky detected it nonetheless, and looks him in the eyes. “Do you want to talk about it.”
“N-not really.”
“Okay. That’s fine.” She gives him a kiss against his lips and lingers there for a second, letting Bucky charge on the contact until his hands slowly grip on her tightly but gently and loving at the same time. She leans back and looks at him again. She lets her fingers glide through his hair that clings to his face and extracts it from it. “Bucky… I’m sorry, but I need to know what happened. Why are you two so upset?” Bucky closes his eyes and sighs defeated. He knows that she needs to know and that he should tell her but he’s tired and he really doesn’t want to talk about it. “Okay…” His voice is silent and defeated so Y/N lays back on her side of the bed and motions for the brunette man to follow her. He lays down half on top of her, his head on her chest so that he can listen to her steady heartbeat now while she plays with his hair. He takes a few minutes until he starts telling her from the mission. “We made our way to the buildings. We were silent and we thought no one had seen us. Steve had sent Nat, Clint and Bruce to the one side. Me, Tony and Sam were following him while Wanda and Vision should watch and come to who needs them. We managed to slip in but suddenly there was this noise. The coms died. Somehow, we were surrounded. Hydra knew we would come. We fought our way through and as Steve and I turned we were… alone. We didn’t know what to do but lives were in danger so we made our way further through the building. We came into a hall and there were so many children, Y/N. Small children, not older than nine years. The youngest looked like three. They were crying and pleading and suddenly there were so many Hydra guys. They pulled some children out of the room and others… t-they… they killed them… they just... killed them.” Y/N feels the man tremble. She tightens her grip on him and hums to him, so he can calm down. Bucky takes a few more minutes to calm and a few more until he starts speaking again. “Stevie got furious and started punching his way through. The way they pulled the children.” He gulps down and takes a shaky breath. “They threw them from the building when we came. The kids… They were just innocent kids…” He stops speaking and closes his eyes. “Some of these goons got on our backs and drugged Steve. He was out of it, couldn’t even walk a straight line. They pushed him through some halls and threaten to kill him if I pull something. This room was bigger. They got us on a rondel to look down. And.. and they threw Stevie over the railing as he came to himself again. He looked so scared. I grabbed his hands but they had some shocker and disabled my arm and he… he fell. The water was ice cold. I could… I could hear him gasping and panicking and… I don’t want to hear that ever again, Y/N. I don’t want that.” He sobs and Y/N feels some tears of her own. “I know, I know. It’s okay. You’re both safe now. We protect him, okay?” Reassuring, she strokes his cheek and waits until he has collected himself again. “I blacked out. I know I fought with some of these goons and I know I destroyed this glass pool and got Stevie back. God, Y/N. He was so afraid. He couldn’t even get a proper breath in and he started dropping then and there. I was panicking as well. What if someone was awake? Or hiding somewhere? And then I… I dropped, too. I.. I couldn’t…”
“Shh. You did good, Bucky. You kept Stevie and yourself safe. You came back to me. That’s what matters.” With a bit force she pulls the man up so that his head lands on her shoulder. She kisses his forehead a few times and wipes away his tears. “You did good. Screw these Hydra people. Screw it if they know about you. We deal. But now you’re safe with me. You’re safe and you got Stevie home.” She kisses him a few times more and just holds him. They lie in silence and Y/N tries to process what Bucky told her while comforting him. “Y/N?”
“Hm?”
“Do- Do you think we should stop?”
“Stop? Avenging?”
“…Yes.”
“Hm.” She hums again and thinks for a while before she shakes her head. “You do so much good in this world. I don’t think you should stop. Not unless you want to. This is what you like, what makes the bad days go to good ones. If you would stop, would you feel like it will be the right thing? Do you want to stop?”
“I-I don’t know…”
“Then”, she lifts up his chin and gives him a kiss. “You should sleep it over, talk to Stevie when he’s back and maybe tell the team why you think about it. They’ll understand.” Bucky nods and closes his eyes against her shoulder. “Can… Can we stay like this? Am I to heavy?”
“You’re prefect. We’ll stay. Try to sleep handsome.” She kisses his forehead a last time but returns to play with his hair. She waits for him to fall asleep before she slips under herself.
* * *
Y/N awakes with a start. The crying through the baby phone is loud and desperate as if he’s crying for some time now. She sighs and rubs her tired eyes before throwing back the covers and slipping into Steve’s big pair of sweatpants that still lie on a chair next to her big mirror. She shuffles to the kid’s room where Tony has set up the crib but stops in front of the door. The crying stopped. She frowns and slowly pushes the door open. The sight that greets her is marvelous. “Bucky…” She whispers it in a soft whiff. The man doesn’t hear her so she watches him with a fond an endearing smile while he holds the baby in his arms, rocking him and giving him one of his metal fingers to suck on. Lady sits at his feet and watches him with guarded eyes. “Yeah. And then I’ll take you to those football games Sam talks about and we make fun of him when his team loses and we’ll hide Nat’s brunch and run away so she doesn’t get us. We’ll have so much fun. And mommy will scold us but makes us cocoa nonetheless and we’ll get all the cuddles from her.” He leans down and kisses the child’s forehead. Y/N slowly walks up to them and places a soft hand on Bucky’s shoulder. “And then daddy makes the washing for at least a month, right?” The man looks at her with a smile and cooes at Steve. “It will be worth it. Go back to bed, doll. I got it.”
“Nah. I watch you for a bit. You’re a beautiful dad.” Bucky smiles and looks back down at Steve but his eyes show a sad expression, so Y/N places a hand on his cheeks. “What is it, Buck?” She strokes some hair strands behind his ear and studies him. He shakes his head and looks further down at Stevie who chews on the finger. “I’m happy.”
“You don’t look so happy.” He takes in a deep breath and lets it out again. “I just… I love being a daddy. And I really want kids sometime but… But none with my blood.” She takes in a breath and stares at him in disbelieve. “Why not?”
“Y/N. Do you really want to have a child run around that’s messed up like me and gets bullied for it? A child that doesn’t know what it’s capable of and someday explodes and doesn’t know what even happens? And who has to be ashamed of his dad and for what he did? I don’t want that. I can’t burden an innocent life with that.”
“Bucky. That will not happen. You were brainwashed. It wasn’t in our DNA. You will never give that part to a child. And you’re making up for the danger you did. You’re fighting on the good side now. You’re saving lives.” She kisses his cheeks while her hand glides through his hair in a calming motion. “And just let me say that Steve probably thinks the same about his serum. But one day. One day I’ll have two little kids run around in here. And these kids will be your children and they will be healthy and happy and have the best fathers a child can have. And I won’t take a no as an answer.” Bucky smiles sadly at her and rocks Steve a bit as he makes some noises. “Why do you want that? You never know-”
“And neither do you, Bucky. I rather have a child running around and have to explain a lot and be there for it any minute to guide it than have nothing. It’s always worth it. You’re always worth it. And so is Steve. I’ll take every risk to get you happy, even if it means all the bad things that can happen to these children are gonna happen. If the child will get powers, it doesn’t know of, so be it. We’ll help. And if the child is as sick as Steve was… I don’t care. We can cope with it and give it a wonderful life. I know we make up with it with lots of good thing and everything our family can come up with. I’m not afraid.”
“Sometimes I don’t know if your mommy isn’t a bit crazy, Stevie. She scares me.” Bucky leans down and kisses the boy again before he gives a kiss to Y/N. “And your right with being scared of me, young man. Come to bed, now.”
“Just let me put him in the crib.”
“No, take him with you into my room.”
“Y/N, no. I will crush him.”
“No, you won’t. Come on.” She drags the man with the baby into her room. They get settled, Steve in the middle and they both look down at him while Lady gets comfortable at the foot end of the bed. “Everything is alright, Bucky. I promise.” She kisses him and places a hand on Steve’s little tummy. “I know it.” And Bucky decides to believe it.
Everything will be alright.