Clutching || Bucky Barnes (3)

5

They regathered, once Basil had healed Vision up properly with the technology in the lab, in the study slash lounge room down the hall. It was a concrete and wood space with a wall of glass windows that looked out into a courtyard. Basil had removed his gum and hung his sunglasses on his shirt, taking a seat at the desk with Henry leaning beside him. The ginger looking slightly uncomfortable at being in a room full of superheroes and talking about superhero stuff. Bruce's story of Thanos was a bit daunting.

Basil nudged him with his elbow. "Chill out". 

Henry rolled his eyes. "Yeah yeah, mr I deal with the end of the world all the time". 

"Yep. Just a normal weekend for me". Henry rolled his eyes as Basil spun in his chair. 

The rest of them stood around the room. "So we gotta assume they're coming back, right?" Rhody asked. 

"And that they can clearly find us", Wanda added. 

Bruce was pacing around the room, a big bundle of anxiety. Basil felt tired just looking at the man. (Anxiety was exhausting and it never got better, just his technique of ignoring it). "We need all hands on deck. Where's Clint?" 

Nat crossed her arms. "After the whole accords situation he and Scott took a deal. It was too tough on their families, they're under house arrest". 

"Who's Scott?" 

"Antman", Steve replied. 

Bruce stared at them. "There's an Antman and a Spiderman?"

"Hey. There's also a Squirrel girl", Basil called. 

Bruce just gaped at him. "Is there?" Basil just winked as Steve sighed. Burce shook his head as if to clear it. "Okay look. Thanos has the biggest army in the universe and he's not going to stop until he gets", he paused, glancing at where Vision was leaning against the window. "Vision's stone". 

"Well then we have to protect it", Nat stated. 

"No, we have to destroy it", Vision voiced. Suddenly it seemed like things went quiet. The red skinned man sighed deeply. "I've been giving a good deal of thought to the entity in my head, about it's nature. But also it's composition". He rose from the window and turned to approach Wanda. " I think if it were exposed to a very powerful energy source, something very similar to it's own signature, perhaps it's molecular integrity could fail". He reached out to gently clasp her arms as her face changed with understanding of what he was saying. 

"And you with it. We are not having this conversation". Her voice was soft and horrified at this prospect. 

"Eliminating the stone is the only way to be certain that Thanos can't get it". 

"That's too high a price". Wanda shook her head. 

Vision stared at her pleadingly, hands coming to cup her face. "Only you have the power to pay it". For a second the couple stared at each other before Wanda was pulling away and striding across the room. Vision hung his head. "Thanos threatens half the universe. One life cannot  stand in the way of defeating him", he stated to the room at large. 

"But it should", Steve stated. "We don't trade lives Vision". 

"Captain. Seventy years ago, you a corporal Parrish laid down your lives to save how many millions of people? Tell me, why is this any different?" 

There was a clatter as Basil stood up. His boots half silent on the floor as he crossed the room to stand in between Vision on the Steve. The two men having been stepping slowly closer to each other. "I did not do it to save lives, though it was a bonus", he spoke clearly, meeting Vision's gaze. "I did it because I wanted to die. I felt that the world was better off with me dying. I was wrong". A second of stunned silence. 

"You might have a choice", Bruce interrupted before anyone could dwell on the things Basil had just said. (He had never hid it, but he had never stated it so openly before). "Your mind is made up of complex overlays. Jarvis, ultron, Tony, me, the stone. All of them mixed together, all of them learning from one another". 

"You're saying that Vision isn't just the stone?" Wanda spoke from the corner. 

"I'm saying that if we take out the stone, there's still a whole lot of Vision left. Perhaps the best parts". 

"Can we do that?" Nat frowned. 

Bruce shook his head. "Not me, not here". 

"Well we'd better find someone and somewhere fast", Rhody commented. "Ross isn't going to let you guys have your old rooms back". 

Basil grinned at Steve as his hands crossed over his chest in a familiar salute. The two men exchanged glances. "So we are going to Wakanda after all?" 

-------------------

Rhody and Vision decided to fly outside the plane to give them more seat room on the way to Wakanda. Basil was somewhat grateful for that as he took the empty seat next to Wanda. Nat and Steve were up front in the pilot seats (Though Basil still didn't trust Steve to fly a plane by himself after the whole artic incident), with Bruce snoring in a corner and Henry, Sam and Rhodes talking about Henry's books in another corner. (It turns out that both Rhodes and Sam were big fans of the murder mystery series). Wanda glanced at him as he sat down and for a second there was silence between them. 

"Was this what you felt like when they said you might have to kill the Winter soldier?" She murmured, fingers twisting together in her lap. 

Basil sighed and leaned his head back in the seat. "No. Because it wasn't Bucky asking me to kill him. I have watched him die and disappear, be frozen and turn into something nothing much more than a weapon. But in that time, thought I have lost him in numerous ways, I have never had the man I love look me in the eyes and ask me to do something that would kill him. And we know that getting rid of the stone will kill Vision. There's still the chance that Shuri can remove it, but destroying the stone or forcibly removing it will kill him". 

Wanda sniffed and leaned back to rub the tears from her eyes. "How can I do that? How could he ask me to do that?" Basil had no answer for her. After a second, she leaned over and leant her head on his shoulder. "Why must it always be us?" 

They both knew what she was talking about. Why was it always them who lost people? When Basil has first met Wanda he had felt a similarity between them. Both experimented on, both loosing parents, culture, brothers. They both lost them in different ways but there was something about it that they both understood. It was why he had leant his house as a get away for her and Vision, why he gave them that space. He saw a little bit of himself in her. Young, with abilities that scared others (his intangibility did scare people. People didn't like things they couldn't eliminate or control), and in love with a fleeting thing that caused just as much pain as it caused joy. (Well, maybe comparing loving a man created from science and half made form technology to being gay in the 1940s was a bit of a leap, but loving someone that people frowned on and shunned your for loving was always going to be the same no matter the circumstance or the era). That was what Basil could relate to. 

"I don't know", he muttered after a minute. "I think it is the cost for our power. We loose everything for it". 

Wanda drew in a breath. "But we never asked for our powers". 

"That's the horrible tragedy of it", Basil sighed. He leant his head on top of hers as Queenie, which had been annoying Henry, leapt onto Wanda's lap and made herself comfortable. Wanda began stroking the cat comfortingly. "But there's always something for us. Even if its something small. There is always something left behind for us. I got Steve, I got Henry, I got Queenie". He reached out and scratched the cat behind the ears. "There will be something for you too". 

Wanda didn't reply and Basil dozed off. He dreamt of blue eyes and laughter. 

unedited