Bucky x Loki Oneshots

1943 (Part 4)

A/N: This is, historically speaking, WHACK.

WARNINGS: WAR, Violence

...

Somewhere in a trench; Austria 1944: (a few months after the drafting)

Bucky sat in the mud, pressing his rifle tight against his chest. His back was leaning against one of the wooden trench walls; it was just like him covered in blood stains, dirt and ragged. The bombs that were occasionally fired at their trench destroyed more than a half of what they had dug before the battle started. It had taken sweat and tears, working day and night in the hope to be done with it before the Germans had a solid shelter to hide in, but all in vain. Once they thought they had the upper hand, thought that they'd made it, the enemies already attacked.

They weren't a lot more than they were, in fact, they almost had the same number of soldiers on each side. 'Had'. The enemy was fearless, brutal. They took them down without great effort. Bucky saw men dying; young and old. Brave and frightened ones. Ones who had signed up because they wanted to protect their country and ones who signed up for the drill to fight.

The day he was being drafted seemed so far away to the soldier. The day he had seen Loki the last time. He'd thought about writing a letter to the other man, telling him that he was fine. That he'd be home soon. But the longer they stayed at the front, the more Bucky realized that he might never make it back. Each day they spent longer waiting in the muddy trench, ground soaked with the blood of the fallen soldiers, the fallen friends, the more they all lost hope. Their general would tell them it's a strategy, "let the enemy have the upper hand. Think you're weak. And then attack." He would say. They all knew every word coming from him was a lie. Nonsense spoken by a man who sends his soldiers onto the field to die. 'Died a heroic death' he would write in the letters that were being sent to the families of the fallen ones.

"Bullshit." Bucky thought as he straightened his helmet that was constantly sliding over his eyes. His hand trembled and his body jerked when a bomb went off only meters away from him. The dirt was thrown into the air and came crashing down on the men firing back. Bucky could hear voices; they were yelling. But his mind was too far off to understand what they were saying. A man crouched in front of him, gripping his left shoulder firmly.

"Sergeant." The man said breathlessly. "They're attacking faster than we can counter."

Bucky was pulled out of his thoughts and stood up, getting him into a kneeling position and dragging the other soldier a little to the right, so he'd be less likely to be hit by a bullet.

"How many are there?" he asked, looking around to see if the men who defended the trench were in need of help.

"Hard to tell. Bit more than 300? More than us for sure. They'll have us dead by the end of the night." Fear was glistening in the soldier's eyes. Much like Barnes', his face was bloody and dirty. There was a smear on his left cheek, right under his eye. 'He's been crying', Bucky thought. They'd all been there since they left home. Some days it's all your body can take, and you break down. Every day you're losing a friend hit by a bullet or by a bomb. And sometimes all that's left are bent dog tags in the mud. Bucky had gathered many of them, some men he didn't even know, and sent them back to their families if their death was confirmed or a month had passed since their disappearance. He'd hoped that maybe then their families find some peace.

"Shit." Barnes hissed in desperation.

"You can say that, Sergeant. There's only two options: We surrender, or we die." Bucky didn't say anything instead he took another look at the soldiers of his unit. They were on their limit, barely standing on their feet anymore. He turned back to the other man. Only now he noticed the hole in his helmet. He must have taken it from a fallen soldier. Maybe they were close?