Finite Consistency - Bucky Barnes

Chapter 4: Steve

Steve had known many things that Bucky was. He'd known him to be sharp. Brave. Loving. Flirtatious. Strong. Kind. Smart. He'd known him to be a bit of a geek. A lover man. He'd seen Bucky smile and laugh, seen him loud and courageous. Steve may also have even seen him frown but never cry. He may have seen him lost but never hopeless and never for long. But one thing the blond had never seen from Bucky was scared.

That's how he knew this Bucky wasn't his. Maybe never would be again because how could someone treat the man in front of him so poorly for Steve to find him scared? Terrified? There's a longing in his friend's eyes that Steve couldn't think to have ever seen before. His clothes may be screaming 'threatening' and his metal arm spitting 'cold and strong' but the soldier's face shines past that. It speaks louder than the mess of unkempt hair and heavy boots. His eyes are begging. They're blue, vibrant and eye-drawing against the dark and grittiness of his hair and clothes. It isn't the soldier begging with Steve though. The soldier's heartless and stone cold but Bucky shines through purely his eyes and no more. And they are begging like the super-soldier has never seen because Bucky does not beg.

But that flicker of fear and confusion is far too well masked by his strong stance and killer stare. And for a moment, Steve wonders if the man had ever recognised him on that helicarrier at all, but then he remembers how that fear had risen up past his control and Steve had seen the shell crack. The image was burned into his brain as not The Winter Soldier, but not Bucky either, had leaned over Cap with his fist raised. And Steve could remember it so clearly now. The moment some man, broken and lost, had come through the thick shell of the assassin. How for just a moment, he had let his fist relax a little and his whole body hesitated to bring the fist down again. How his face had contorted with confusion and terror and hurt and recognision. Bucky had recognised him.

And though it's hard to see now with the way the soldier holds himself, Steve can still see a glimmer of that fear in his eyes though he's been taught so well to hide it. And somehow the supersoldier had broken through to him just a few days ago. It was difficult to find his friend in those eyes a second time but he was there. Otherwise, what reasons would the soldier have for such a daring disobeyment of direct orders? Why would he save a man who he'd been trained and directed to kill like so many before? The answer was simple. Bucky's past relationship with his mission was just strong enough to overthrow his trained mind. Just strong enough to push at his walls and earn a glimmer of realisation. Perhaps even find a memory from the past. It leads Steve to wonder if there is anything the soldier remembers about them. But if there is, he was sure Bucky didn't remember it at that moment. Because if he did, Steve wants to believe that it would be enough to have the soldier asking questions. But he doesn't. He appears the same way he did that day on the bridge when Steve had first recognised him. When Bucky had been nothing but a faceless machine on a mission. Now the blond tries so hard to see past that after the assassin had broken the first time but that version of Bucky is gone. Replaced by that cold face. Steve thinks he can see the suffering in his eyes but maybe that's just him wishing for something other than the killer in front of him.

But that's all broken away again when the killer doesn't answer Steve's questions so he takes a step forward and he sees it, and he knows it's not his imagination anymore. The soldier stiffens. It's slight and short lived but Steve sees it. But more than relief he feels like he's taken a hit to the gut because the man has flinched at Steve. His friend and his equal since way back when they first met in that school yard in 1921.

It had never mattered to Bucky that Steve was smaller or weaker than him and all the other boys. And though Bucky had taken care of him his whole life, tending to his wounds and watching over him when he was sick, finishing fights for him, Bucky had never looked down on him. Not once. If anything, he'd looked up to him despite Steve obviously being the smaller of the two. And when the tables turned and Steve was the one who had to crane his neck for Bucky, nothing changed. Bucky never worried that Steve wouldn't need him anymore and Steve never looked down on his friend. Never saw him as the one Steve needed to look out for because he was smaller than the Super Soldier was but because he was his mate. They both continued to look up to each other and fend for each other, never once worrying for the other because they were smaller or weaker. They only worried as a friend would a friend.