A Bolt from the Blue

Chapter 1

"How?" he murmured. The emotion in his voice was hardly concealed as he watched the steady and peaceful motion of his friend's chest. Standing by the foot of the hospital bed, Steve played in his head the last moments the two of them shared in the quinjet before crashing.

As real as the crash was, so was the presence of Bucky. He looked just as young as before and his face didn't show any faint sign of aging just like him (his whole body had frozen at the sight of his unaltered reflection in the car window when the Colonel and his team were driving him out of Times Square).

"It seems Hydra's experiments on your friend were far more advanced than anyone would have suspected. His metabolism is strong and resilient as if he had been given a replica of the super-serum used on you," Colonel Fury answered. He then turned his head to him with a slightly raised eyebrow. "...Which is incidentally why you also survived."

It seemed the colonel wanted to make a point to refocus the conversation on him. It was true Steve had omitted to show any form of interest in understanding he was still alive.

"Then why isn't he awake like I am?" Steve asked dully.

Bucky seemed peaceful from what it looked and anyone would have believed he was merely sound asleep.

"Don't worry, captain. All the doctors are very optimistic. He will wake up soon. In this time or the other, you still do things faster than the rest of us. It's only a matter of time before he does the same...Days or weeks, at most."

Steve's face twitched. He would trade places with him in a second if he were given the choice. Part of him hated HYDRA for what they had made Bucky endure, but another part, more selfish, quietly breathed a sigh of relief for not having lost him too...for not having to go through all this on his own. They would have each other; they would face this reality together. Bucky would find the words to reassure him. He always had. Only he had to key to soothing his concerns and fears. He had done it all the times his army application was rejected and his determination wobbled; he had done it that one time he lost his mother and his world shattered. Now that his world was shattered again, Steve needed his best friend more than ever.

"The S.H.I.E.L.D. will provide an apartment for you. Nothing luxurious but still cozier than any room here," the Colonel said. "A place that would feel a bit like home."

Home. This word sounded like a shallow shell. He had lost his home the moment he had crashed into the ocean. He couldn't think of anything from his past that could have possibly made it to the new millennium. Except for Bucky. Bucky was his last and only bearing and it was still uncertain he would keep it. Not as long as he was in this coma.

"I have to stay with him," he said eventually with a strong nod. "He needs me."

Just as much as he needed him. It wasn't like he had any other place to be or a better thing to do. All he wanted - and needed – was to hold on tightly to the only constant he had in this strange, foreign world.

"Of course," the Colonel answered quite understandingly. "You can come and see him as many times as you wish until he wakes up."

Steve didn't look at him – like he hadn't since the moment he had stepped into the room, incapable of diverting eyes from his unconscious best friend.

Colonel Fury stepped back and made his way towards the exit to leave him some privacy.

"Once you are ready, you can go to agent Johnson who was there when you woke up. She'll give you civil clothes and some personal belongings we managed to retrieve from the ice."

Steve hardly reacted and even less showed any enthusiasm. His interlocutor gave him a last sympathetic nod and opened the door.

"And by the way," he said. "Welcome back."