Bucky had had the shield in his hand only a few minutes before and he had been standing right there when Steve was shot. Of course he tried to save him, clinging to the train door as he tried to reach out to his best friend but Steve realized at the same moment that he did that that door wasn’t going to hold and that one of them was going to have to let go. Steve, naturally, let go of the door and Bucky yells for him, reaching out in a feeble attempt to catch him. He might have even jumped after him but someone pulls him back in and Steve was gone.
*
When he’s flying through the air, bomb on board this god forsaken plane, Peggy begs him to do anything but what he’s about to but he doesn’t listen. He keeps hearing Steve’s voice over and over in his head, seeing his face as he falls and he knows what he needs to do. “I can’t come home Peggy. I have to land this plane.” His voice is calm, his decision is made, and he has accepted his fate. It almost feels good to know that he’ll get to see his best friend again and he feels the tension leave his body as the plane starts to decent somewhere over the arctic.
“Barnes, you need to get out of that plane right now! You’ll die!” Peggy yells at him.
“And I’ll save New York from blowing up. This is the right thing to do, this is what Steve would have wanted,” he says. Of that he’s certain.
“Don’t you dare do this!” Peggy yells at him in an almost desperate voice, “Steve still owes me a dance and I’m holding it to you now. Please, don’t do this. It isn’t what Steve would have wanted.” She was getting more desperate now and Bucky just sits in the front seat of the plane watching the ice rush up to meet him.
“Steve would have wanted me to do the right thing,” is the last thing he says before he hits the ice and everything goes black for a long, long time. The last thing he expects is to live.
*
Bucky wakes up in a suspicious hospital with a ball game playing but something about it isn’t right. The nurse isn’t right either, her eyes are too shrewd and Bucky has never seen a shade of red lipstick exactly that color. He would have known if that shade existed, Peggy favored red. “Who are you?” he asks, assuming the worst. He gets a bullshit answer about being in the hospital but he knows it’s a lie.
He gets confirmation when he leaps forward only to have the woman meet him, only a half a second behind his own movements and he can see from the way she moves that she’s trained well. The fight might not last long with her but it didn’t with the other seven agents he finds in the hallway either and then he busts through the wall and lights, lights were everywhere and the pictures were moving. He stops because he had no idea what any of this stuff was and that’s when he learns what SHIELD is.
*
Bucky feels awkward and wrong in the Captain America costume but Fury wanted him to pick up the mantle and that Coulson bastard was up his ass with questions about Steve. Within the space of a week he meets two gods, finds out some guy turns into a giant rage monster, finds out another guys flies around in a mechanical suit of all things, and a hundred other things that were surprising.
When he meets the Avengers on the helicarrier he’s still in that old fashioned Cap costume that makes him feel like a child wearing the face of a national icon. The first one he meets is Bruce and he shakes the man’s hand, wondering at his mild mannered nature given his uh… condition. He doesn’t say anything though because that’s rude. He meets Natasha next and she’s quiet but he can also see how dangerous she was. Next up was Tony Stark but when he sees the man that isn’t who he thinks of. “Howard Stark? How the hell did you manage to cheat death and aging?” he asks, shaking his head at his old friend.
The last thing he expects is for the man to whirl around with a look of hatred making fire out of his brown eyes. “I am not Howard Stark!” the man snarls with such force that Bucky takes a step back.
“This is Tony Stark, Howard’s son,” Natasha explains.
“Oh,” is all Bucky manages back. He spends a long time trying to think of a way to try and make his mistake up to Tony or something but he doesn’t get to before something happens to the helicarrier and their off to save everyone on it from certain death. To his surprise Stark works with him fast and well when on a time crunch. He still had no idea what that box thing was that Stark wanted him to examine, all he could tell was that it ran on electricity of some kind, but he pulls that lever thing and Stark falls out the bottom of the blades that could have killed him and back into the carrier. He says nothing else unless they’re in the field.
Even after Loki is defeated and all is said and done Stark doesn’t have anything to do with him. It was hard to imagine one slip up could get him so firmly placed on the man’s bad side but Bucky leaves it be for a long time.
*
The Winter Soldier, Natasha called him, was apparently after Bucky and even worse he recently discovered that SHIELD was HYDRA the whole fucking time. Steve would have known right away, he thinks, and he can’t help but wonder about his place in this… what was it Stark called it once? Spangly suit, that’s it. It had almost been a joke in the field, Stark was always making jokes and people didn’t take him seriously for it, even Natasha. Bucky wondered about that because he was similar but after watching the reactions Tony got for using humor to cover his feelings he just stayed quiet most of the time. Thor joked that he was the brooding type but he really wasn’t. He just didn’t want to suffer Tony’s fate, not when he was Team Leader and Captain America. He couldn’t afford to have people not take him seriously.
He could, he guessed, thank his lucky stars that HYDRA took him seriously enough to try and kill him. He and Natasha scurry around trying to find information on the Winter Soldier but they continuously find nothing, than Zola, and then another fire fight from the Soldier.
They’re going back and forth with hand-to-hand combat and Bucky thought this guy was good even with one physical arm. The other is metal and there’s a res star on it and Bucky makes no note of it other than it hurts like a bitch when he gets hit with it. It wasn’t easy to hurt a super soldier but this guy was managing. They fight back and forth, slamming each other into things over and over again until by chance Bucky gets ahold of his mask and pulls it off.
When he sees who is underneath he freezes completely. “Stevie?” he asks, resorting to his old nickname out of shock maybe.
The Winter Soldier, Steve, frowns at him. “Who the hell is ‘Stevie’?”
*
Bucky had no fucking clue what to do here but he did have information someone else would want. Zola had been… enlightening and truthfully he could use the help with Steve. If Stark would offer it after he told him what had happened.
Tony looks surprised to find him and Natasha in his lab and Natasha looks nervous. She didn’t think this was a good idea but they needed help and Tony deserved to know. Besides, even if Tony didn’t help they had already enlisted Sam Wilson. They even stole his wings back and Bucky had to admit that they were pretty awesome. “Capsicle, what can I do for you?” Tony says in that brisk, distant tone of his. He didn’t use it with anything but Bucky. He did get a nickname though, which was probably a good sign. He hopes.
“Tony I need you to sit down,” he says. Tony is walking towards him and he looks worried, a strange emotion on his face when it came to Bucky.
“Barnes, I think you need to sit down. You look like shit. And what the hell happened with that guy that’s been trying to rip your ass out through your throat?” he asks, guiding Bucky to a spot out of the way in the lab.
He doesn’t want to tell Tony, he doesn’t. He almost listens to Natasha’s advice and doesn’t tell Tony but he takes a few deep breaths. “Stark, Tony. It’s Steve. The guy that’s been after me is Steve Rogers.” He takes a breath before he can deliver the rest.
Tony’s eyes go wide, “oh shit. Seriously?”
Bucky nods, “that isn’t all. I… I’m so sorry Tony, I am so sorry,” he says and he starts to cry. It isn’t exactly something he does a lot of and it must be concerning because Tony’s face is bone white and his dark eyes were wide with concern. Maybe Tony cared about him more than he let on.
“What is it?” he asks softly, almost as if he can sense what’s coming. Maybe he could, who knew?
“Your parents’ accident,” he whispers, “it wasn’t an accident. HYDRA had them killed and… and they used the Winter Soldier. They used Steve.”
Tony jerks back, making a noise like a wounded animal might. On instinct Bucky reaches out to him but Tony stands fast and walks away at a quick pace shaking his head like he was in denial. “I’m so sorry,” Bucky calls after Tony, “so sorry.”
“I told you to leave this alone,” Natasha tells him as she leans down beside him. “Or you should have left his parents out of it. He’s never going to help us now.”
But Bucky wasn’t so sure. Besides, he couldn’t just not tell Tony. These were his parents they were talking about, he had to tell him what happened. It was only right. He could practically hear Steve’s voice in the back of his head telling him to do the right thing, even if it was hard and so he did.
*
Tony finds Bucky on his couch looking a little worse for wear with his spangly suit somewhere that he didn’t care about. Actually the one he showed up in, a blue Kevlar version of his suit with a star on his chest, was designed by Tony and far better than his tacky old costume but that was just him. He didn’t think a symbol of the American people needed to be so… obvious. Also the material was far better for his combat missions and still flexible enough for him to fight in. Normally Kevlar was tough but Bucky is a super soldier, he didn’t need material to be as flimsy as normal people did.
“When did you find out?” he asks, cutting to the chase.
“Two days ago,” Bucky says. “But we were too busy not dying to tell you. I would have told you sooner but this isn’t the kind of thing you tell someone over the phone. I’m so sorry Tony,” he says again and Tony believes him.
His parents’ deaths were a murder and they were murdered by the original Captain America. Howard used to compare him to Cap all the time, always reminding Tony of how he never measured up and the man was murdered by his own hero. Fuck, that was almost poetic justice as far as Tony was concerned. But his mother… that was harder. He wants to hate Steve, to rip him to shreds and then some but the look on Bucky’s face when he told him- the tears that were falling from his eyes. Jesus that was hard to look at and even now he looked horribly guilty, like he had done something wrong in not stopping Steve or whatever it was he was thinking about. Maybe he was guilty that he didn’t realize Steve was alive sooner, who knew.
Either way it was hard to see Bucky like this because of Steve. It made Tony have a miniscule amount of pity for the man, only barely, and only because against all odds he liked Bucky. He had mistook him for Howard when they first met and it took a long time to forgive him for it but this? Telling him his best friend killed his parents? That took balls and even Tony wasn’t so much of an asshole to spit in his face. He might not ever want to see anything related to Steve Rogers ever again but he was grateful to Bucky for telling him about his mom.
“It’s fine, not telling me sooner. I appreciate being told in person.” It’s all he can manage at the moment.
They sit in silence for a long time before Bucky finally looks up and sighs. “When we met, I accidentally mistook you for Howard and you freaked out. Why? If you don’t mind me asking,” he adds hastily.
Normally Tony would tell him to fuck off, he didn’t talk about Howard, but because Bucky had told him the truth he thought he would repay the favor. “I don’t know who you knew during the war but the man that was my father was cold, distant, mean, and abusive. He used to beat my ass every chance he got and he did his damndest to turn me into him. I vowed I’d never be like him but one day I woke up and I realized that Howard, me, there was no difference and it was probably the worst day of my life. It’s when I got this,” he says, gesturing to his arc reactor. “So when you called me Howard you reminded me of the shitty person he was, and the shitty person I turned myself into in a stupid attempt to appease a man that would never love me.”
Its personal and uncomfortable, even Bucky can feel that. “I’m sorry,” he says softly, “I didn’t… Howard was a good man when we met. Funny, a little crazy, ambitious. Whoever Howard became you’re nothing like that person, not anymore. I doubt you ever were if what you said was true and honestly you have no reason to lie,” Bucky says, shrugging.
Tony leans back in his seat and wishes he had a drink. Times like this were hard when he didn’t have alcohol to mute his pain like he usually did. “When he died I was glad,” he admits after a few long moments and his voice breaks at the end. “I was glad my own father died and I couldn’t help it, it was like a weight had been lifted off my shoulders and I was free. Then I found out-” his voice cuts out for a moment unexpectedly. “Then I found out my mom died too,” he whispers. “There went the freedom I thought I had just gotten.”
He felt horrible about it for years, especially because he got drunk at Howard’s funeral and told everyone that he deserved more than what he got. He hadn’t been lying and knowing what he knew now he’d do it again, even with the new knowledge of his murder. Howard was a mean son of a bitch and Tony could bring himself to care that Howard had been killed by the man he used to compare Tony to all the fucking time. He still felt like a weight was sitting on his heart for his mom though, especially knowing that she had been killed. He had so many things he wanted to say to her; mostly he wanted to tell her how much he loved her and that Howard had never been much of a childhood hero like most people thought. Of course the son would worship the father, that’s how it went, right? Wrong. His mom was his everything and now… now it wasn’t even a freak accident that took her away, it was a man. An organization actually. Still, it made him burn with hatred nonetheless.
“Tony,” Bucky says softly and he snaps out of his thoughts. Bucky has that guilty look on his face again and he takes a deep breath. “I have no right to ask you to do this but you know how dangerous he is. I need your help, we have to bring him in,” he says.
He was right; he had no right to ask Tony to do something like that.
*
Bucky was surprised with how well Tony and Sam got along, bantering back and forth easily in the field. Tony offered his help mostly in tracking Steve’s movements throughout the years but came up near empty so he took to the air. Bucky was shocked he agreed to help but it was, according to Tony, mostly to get Steve off the streets so no one ever had to suffer like his mother had ever again. Bucky respected that and accepted his help well enough.
By the time they make it to the Triskillion Tony had gone underground with Fury, Natasha with him, and he and Sam were facing Steve off as helicarriers were taking off, DC was half destroyed, and Bucky just didn’t have any fight left in him.
In the end he gives up and stops fighting, dropping the shield that was never his to carry and giving up because there was no way he was going to win without killing Steve and he was weak. He couldn’t kill his best friend even if there wasn’t any of him left in there. Steve could do it, he thinks; kill Bucky to do the right thing. But he wasn’t as strong as Steve and he never would be so he accepts that for the second time Captain America was going to die.
*
For two years they track him and after the information dump Natasha instigated after leaving Fury to go kick HYDRA agent ass Tony finds everything he can on Steve and his parents. He thaws considerably when he realizes the extent to which Steve was tortured and just how powerless he was to kill Maria Stark. Bucky does his best to console him, telling him over and over again how grateful he was that Tony was helping. He could see that Tony was still in pain but he wasn’t consumed by it anymore, he was just angry. It would fade.
Sam also does his best to help, tracing Steve’s actions and following up on leads as often as Tony did. They worked together well, Bucky had to admit, and when things were slow in the villain department Bucky introduces Sam into the Avengers. He blends in well and Bucky has to admit that this was a good choice. Sam was snarky with Tony, he bonded over science with Bruce, food with Thor, knives with Natasha, and with Bucky they just connected emotionally. They both knew what it was like to lose best friends the way they did and sometimes when they needed the comfort they went to each other. It was nice to have someone else to lean on and with Sam’s help be comes out of his shell a little, learning to adapt better to the future he was now living in.
In the end they get lucky, very lucky, and they manage to find Steve. It was a close call and Bucky was one hundred percent certain that Tony put way too much of a punch into that tazer blast, but it knocks Steve out and Bucky accepts that it was a better option than Tony killing him.
*
Steve stares at Bucky with one arm trapped in… something. Howard stands off somewhere behind him and Steve had to wonder how that happened but it was Howard, anything was possible with him. “Let me go. I won’t… I won’t hurt anyone else, I don’t do that anymore,” he says, his voice cracking a little. This gets Howard’s attention and there’s a weird amount of hate there but he lets it go.
Bucky sighs, “we know Steve. But we need to take you in before someone else finds you and we have to sort out everything that happened. The world still needs Captain America, you know,” he says, grinning like they were still in a time before all of this happened.
“They have Captain America, they don’t need me,” Steve says. He’s seen Bucky in the uniform, it suited him. Bucky should have been Captain America anyways, he’s always been the better man. He wouldn’t have done the things Steve did if their positions were reversed.
“That,” Howard says, “we can agree on.” He sounds weird and Steve swears he wasn’t that short but his memories were a little hazy these days. There was something in the back of his mind about Howard that he felt like he should remember but it was just out of his reach so he just focuses on the man in front of him.
“Tony,” Bucky warns and Steve frowns. Tony? Who was that?
“I’m just saying the mantle never fell, you make a good Cap and the world needs you. And you,” Howard- Tony?- says to him, “you need some psychological help probably. You need a lot of things.” Something in his voice is cold and a little distant and Steve doesn’t understand why.
He squints at him for a long time and he swears that he was trying to figure something out by looking at Steve, or maybe he was waiting for Steve to figure something out. It isn’t until almost three days later that he remembers what happened again. When he sees Bucky next he tells him to apologize to Tony, or at least that’s what he thinks Howard’s son’s name was, because what he did was unforgivable.
*
Bucky never expected to get his best friend back but he had, sort of, and between Villains of The Week he sometimes got enough down time to get gelato with him and explore New York with someone who was as new to the city as they were. Tony even made them a cool interactive map that Steve had loved with all these cool places to go to.
It was also nice, Bucky thought, to know that he had adjusted better than he thought because Steve freaked out over the smallest of things- like street lights- and Bucky was used to those. It made him feel better to know that maybe he could learn to face this world and thanks to Steve, Sam, and Tony especially he wouldn’t have to do it alone.
And thanks to Thor he could get drunk- mead of the gods was a gift to humanity as far as Bucky was concerned.