Through the Night || An Edelweiss Short

A Promise Made, A Promise Broken || Prologue

October, 1943
Austria

"We open on a desolate wasteland, our heroes gunned down, hope all but lost!"

Jesus.

"Can it, Dum Dum!" I holler at him. This bullshit is bad enough as it is, I don't need it being narrated.

"C'mon, sarg, thats exactly how the book would start!" He shouts back between rifle fire. "I'm tellin' ya, the second I get away from you boneheads I'm becoming a best-selling author!"

Jones groans next to me.

"Shut up about your war novel and shoot some germans!" Monty howls.

I've got enough on my mind without Dum Dum planning his future in my ear. This isn't just another mission.

"I'll be back before you know I'm gone."

That's what I told her. Time to carry through.

"Awe, lighten up, Buck!" Dum Dum continues to ignore the battle raging around him. "Who's that dame you been talking to?"

I bite my tongue. Y/N's arrival hasn't gone unnoticed.

" 'S not like that." I grumble.

"Can't hear you, sarg!"

I tear my eyes from the battlefield and shout at him.

"That girl's like my baby sister, jackass! 'S not like that." I huff and turn back to the more immediate issue at hand. "Now how 'bout putting that lead where it belongs, huh?"

I just know he's grinning as he says, "In nazis?"

"Yeah." I say as I take dead aim at one of the fuckers daring to stick his head over the lip of the trench. It takes me a tenth of a second to squeeze my trigger. His brains scatter around him. "In nazis."

A hearty laugh surrounds our ragtag cluster. I sneak a glance. He is grinning.

"Aye aye, sarg."

And then it happens.

Blue light jets across the field towards us, striking down any of our men in its path.

Quiet hangs over the land that seconds ago was so loud it'd give a deaf man his hearing back.

"Ze fuck vas zat?" Dernier asks the air. His accent mixed with his confusion would be really funny if we weren't all thinking the same thing.

Something sounds in the distance.

"Boys..." I say as mechanical footsteps stomp slowly closer until finally a human-shaped tank stands above us. "...bigger problems."

A losing battle has turned into a lost battle.

And I've broken a promise.

...

My dear Y/N,

I know journals are usually Steve's thing. But hey, maybe that government hack had a decent idea for once. Wouldn't be the craziest thing that's ever happened. As per her request, I've compiled every single memory I have since first being captured. Admittedly, there are some gaps. But who gives a shit? It's not like I'm going to actually show her. I want you to have these because there's a lot I didn't say that I wanted to, and that I should have.

All my love, always.

Bucky