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When Stark had stepped up to his face, eyes tremulous with a fury equal to his own, and spat, “you’re a laboratory experiment Rogers. Everything special about you came out of a bottle,” Steve had nearly laughed.
Buddy, he wanted to say, you’ve got no goddam clue how true that is.
Later, in the mess of Stark tower, limbs weary and muscles worn ten times over from the fight, and somehow more exhausted in the face of the press and flashing cameras, Stark— Tony— proves himself a better man than Steve is when he slumps to the ground beside him with a glass of something expensive in hand.
“So,” Tony drawls, slow and wry, “I guess I gotta apologize to every elementary school teacher from here down to the peninsula. Apparently, teamwork does make the dreamwork.”
It’s abrupt enough to startle a laugh out of him, which earns Steve a pleased little smirk. Not that he sees it for long before Tony covers it with his glass.
“Don’t overwhelm the fossil, Stark,” Romanoff snarks, though the bite of it is as soft as she means it to be. A woman— an agent— like that doesn’t say or do anything without knowing exactly how it’ll come across. “Not sure he’ll get that reference.”
It’s probably sentiment or wistfulness that makes him laugh again at that, and he tilts his head to watch the others— Barton, Banner, Thor— collapse into whatever piece of rubble resembling furniture looks like will hold them up. “Some things are universal, you know,” Steve goes.
Barton grins, just the twist of his lips but it’s more genuine than Steve expected. “Not sure universal’s the right word for it Cap.”
“Mm!” Tony snaps his fingers and points. “Sound the trumpets, he’s right, which means I probably have to employ some poor elementary school teacher so we can get this vocab lesson started.”
This time, when Tony slaps his hand on his shoulder, Steve doesn’t brush it off. It seems like it surprises the other man a little, because his hand starts to slip before stubbornness makes him cling onto the bright blue of his uniform. It also immediately makes Steve feel like an asshole.
The familiar, if wry, so what’re you gonna do about it punk? that bursts like the spray of bullets hitting the dirt in the back of his mind tightens his throat so severely he’s surprised he doesn’t choke. Steve has to close his eyes for a moment, feeling the air in his lungs as he breathes, and thinks about the asthma that’d made what to everyone else was a simple act, feel like the hardest thing in the world for him.
Steve opens his eyes once he feels a little less like that kid from Brooklyn, meeting Natasha’s half-questioning, half-knowing gaze over the sea of lighthearted bickering between the others. He honestly doesn’t know what to do in the face of that so he just shrugs at her, feeling thankful when she sends him another small grin his way before letting him be.
Tony’s hand is still on his shoulder, fingers drumming against the reinforced cloth as he chatters aimlessly against Clint’s and Thor’s commentary.
Because Steve is not an asshole, he doesn’t shrug his shoulders like he usually would, at risk of dislodging Tony’s hand, and instead nudges Tony’s sharp loafers with his own boot. When he turns to him with a raised brow and a wry, questioning grin, Steve’s tongue goes momentarily dry with the familiarity of it, which— he should be getting used to by now. This side-step dance of nostalgia paired with the feeling of almost recognition.
On Tony’s face, the questioning grin takes a sharper turn towards something complicated, though it doesn’t drop. “Oh no,” he says dryly. “I recognize that look. Alright, Cap, have at it. Tell me all about the good ol’ days with Stark Genius one-point-oh and I’ll do my best to pretend I’m listening. Although I reserve the right to call bullshit on at least half of it just on principle.”
That’s not who I recognize, Steve thinks to himself half hysterically. Not even close. Because that raised brow, that twist to the corner of his lips, the indulgent expression on his face? Some of it is Howard, but not all of it. Then he thinks, you two could've been friends. If he was here, you could’ve been friends. And finally, feeling drugged and floaty, why me?
Because Steve, before the serum, never even thought he’d make it to thirty. It’s a miracle he’s made it to his twenties at all. So now, in the future— the 21st century— with its lights and cars and screens that make his eyes go dizzy, it’s inane that Steve’s the one here to see it all. Of all people. This is more than being a fish out of water, this is being a fish thrown into the desert with the fossils and the reef skeletons, and being told with a smile, “a lot has changed.” No shit a lot has changed. So much of it has, and even then, not enough. Not enough has changed at all. It’s all the wrong things, or maybe all the right things, and Steve is ungrateful for everything. He’ll be the first to admit it, because he really is. It’s not like he hasn’t tried to be grateful. He has. There’s a hub of information at his fingertips, sights to see, trains to ride, cafes he can sit at to sketch the stretch of skyscrapers— and they really do scrape the sky— but then he goes back to his empty apartment, filled with government folders and no handwritten letters, and with his sketchbook filled with cityscapes that don’t exist anymore. And still, Steve aches for something more.
God, is he ungrateful. Ungrateful enough he’d nearly posted on his knees to pray. But it’s not like Steve believes in that anymore. How can he? Why should he? That faith died. He’d argue to say that it died twice.
He doesn’t say any of this though, because Steve’s not insane like that (yet). Instead, he swallows around the thickness of his throat and tries to smile. “Well, my first impression of your father was his expo back in ‘43, and he set his car on fire. I think your flying suit’s just a bit more impressive than that.”
The easy, ambient chatter fades into silence and Steve has to stop himself from cringing. Natasha, from what he can tell, is distinctly amused— even pleased, for some reason. The others have more complicated expressions on their faces.
He’s about to apologize when Tony, as if the static has just cleared, bursts into peels of laughter, bright and delighted. The hand on his shoulder tightens only to hold the other man up as he collapses around the middle, snorting through his nose. “Aw, damn. No one said you were funny!”
“Probably ‘cause I’m not,” Steve remarks honestly, allowing a wider grin when Tony continues to cackle. “I wasn’t exactly the life of the party back then.” Also, he hadn’t really had to worry about that. Someone else always had that handled.
“No need to be so hard on yourself Rogers,” Tony snorts again, “but by all means, tell me your honest opinion.”
Steve winces a little at that, thinking back to the lab on the helicarrier, and bobs his head. “Think I’ve been a little too honest lately.” And because he’s no coward, he looks Tony in the eye to say, “I’m sorry for what I said back then. You’re worth more than your suit, Stark, and worth more than a sacrifice.” He cringes in earnest, shame heating the tips of his ears. “It wasn’t right of me to say. You don’t demand a sacrifice from your soldiers.”
“We’re not soldiers,” Tony bites back, but it lacks much of the heat it did back in the air. Steve nods his assent again, because he’s right, none of them are soldiers. It’s just Steve now.
Tony sighs, suddenly looking older than he is, but he pats his shoulder twice before his hand falls away. “But thanks, Cap. And uh,” his face twists a little, awkwardness seeping into the corners of his eyes. “Sorry. Too. For saying all that shit about your, uh, the serum. I’m sorry. I’m sure not everything special about you came from a little bottle,” he jokes, eyes flickering up then around, like his own honesty’s too much for him to handle.
Hearing it feels a lot like pulling teeth.
It’s endearing enough for Steve to smile and knock their shoulders together. “Thanks. I can tell that was pretty hard for you to say,” he jokes back.
The eye roll that earns him makes him laugh.
“And I’m going back to being a sarcastic sonuva bitch. You see where being sincere takes me? I’m being mocked— ridiculed!"
“Aw, tighten up Stark,” Clint leans forward, distinctly amused. “Y’all were doing so well.”
“Indeed Starkson,” Thor beams, and Steve squints at him, imagining the guy’s long hair flowing in a nonexistent wind. “To speak from the heart, to right wrongs, is a lesson we learn again and again. Painful, at times,” the god admits, “but worth it all the while.”
“Cute sentiment,” Natasha smirks, but there’s a genuine— as far as Steve can tell— crease to her eyes as she talks. “Seems kinda wasted on this group though, don’t you think?”
“Is it?” Dr. Banner muses, and Steve’s eyes flit over in surprise— the man had been so quiet that it's an honest shock to hear him speak. “I mean, I haven’t known him long but I think that’s the first time I’ve heard Tony say sorry. Earnestly, at least.”
Steve leans back against what must’ve been the remains of a very expensive table with a soft snort. “Well, it’s not like he was wrong. Everything did sort of come from a bottle.”
Instead of the teasing agreement he’d expected, what he gets is a sort of amusing floundering from Tony’s end. “Oh, come on! Don’t— don’t use my words against me— uh, not that were they my words, anyway. Technically they were in influence ‘cause of tall, dark, and fascist’s little glow stick of doom so can we actually blame me for that—?”
“Breathe, Stark,” Natasha comments dryly and Steve stifles another snort.
“Well, obviously all the super part of the super-soldier stuff came from the serum,” Clint agrees with a squint of his eyes, “but not everything, right?”
“Sure,” Steve says. The air smells of night, and dusty sheets, and whatever drink Erskine had brought with him. “I mean, sure’s nice to breathe right and see right, hearing’s way better, and my heart beats all normal too,” he gestures vaguely towards his head then his chest, “and, obviously, the strength, speed, and healing— all part of the design.”
“But?” Tony hedges.
“But,” he grins, knocking his head back to stare at the ceiling. “Dr. Erskine, the one who chose me… see, the Army wanted a soldier. A good soldier, one who was already strong, and fast, and could breathe right without needing a steam shower at the end of the day. One who’d follow orders. But Dr. Erskine,” he stops for a moment, swallows past the surprising lump in his throat, “what he wanted— needed— was a good man.”
“And that was you?” Bruce asks, his tone kind.
Steve shrugs. “It was what he saw,” he says softly. “Good becomes great,” he repeats. “Bad becomes worse.”
“Well,” Tony snaps, and Steve can hear the appeased grin in his voice, “problem solved. Super soldier shit came from the serum, goody two shoes came from the Captain.”
He shakes his head mutedly and for the second time in the past half-hour, the room goes silent. “Everything special came from the serum.” He presses his lips together, feeling the familiar burn behind his eyes as he continues to swallow around the grief that he thought would be lost with him in the ice. He didn’t think he’d wake up with it. He’d hoped to not wake up at all. “And everything good about me came from—” his teeth clack together and he breathes out through his nose. Shudders through it, really. “All the good. It came from Ma. Or— or it came from Bucky. It came from them.”
The silence stretches for a long moment. Long enough for Steve to start breathing deep, feeling phantom hands— big and small, through all stages of life— press against his back.
“Breathe for me Stevie.” Bucky had said, face so worried for a ten-year old kid. “You gotta breathe.”
“Can’t.” Steve remembers gasping out. “Lungs don’t— an’ my heart—”
“Just follow me. I’ll do it.”
Bucky had pulled him close, Steve remembers, chest to chest, breathing slow and exaggeratingly into his good ear when he’d hooked his chin over his shoulder. Bucky, ten years old, had gone, “I’ll do it. If you’re heart an’ lungs can’t do it— I’ve got working ones. I’ll be that for you. Stevie, you gotta breathe when I breathe, okay? Remember—”
“You’re my lu— lungs.”
“Right! And your heart. I reckon I’ve got enough for the both of us, so you’re gonna be just fine.”
Steve blinks through the well of tears suddenly stinging his eyes, though they don’t fall.
Buck, he thinks distantly, through the rush of blood loud in his ears, Buck, I can’t breathe. You and Ma are gone now, and I can’t breathe.
“Woah. Woah, hey. Capscicle— Steve!”
The ceiling’s spinning.
He blinks, inhaling sharply through his nose and the air stings his lungs.
The ceiling’s spinning and his head feels light and dizzy. His fingers twitch and it’s like he’s back in the ice.
Not that he actually remembers it. He wasn’t awake to feel the thaw and he was knocked out too early to feel the freeze, but he can imagine it. Ma always did say he’d had an active imagination. And it’s like this. Vision fuzzing at the edges, fingers cold and numb, the chill travelling up his arms and into his chest where his lungs stutter through the ice that slips in, and the air burns like every part of him’s scraped raw.
People are hovering, he realizes distantly. All the good that does him, when he blinks again and curls so his forehead rests against his knees. Their noise floats by, murky, like all of a sudden the serum’s failed and his ears’ gone bad again.
Steve almost wishes the serum would.
Fail.
Someone’s hand rests on his back and Steve nearly flinches. Instead he shuts his eyes tight and works on trying to get the air into his lungs, but all he’s thinking about is how it’s not Bucky helping him through this.
And, god, it’s stupid, but it feels like a spit to the face. To be helped. Because it’s always been Bucky who did this for him. Him or his Ma. There was no one else, but now there’s almost too many people and he can’t— Steve can’t. He can’t. If all he has left of Buck are his memories, than he won’t have them replaced.
That hand tries to follow him when Steve near folds himself in half, but someone else gently moves it away. It’s such a relief, because now he can shake himself apart without the visceral feeling of having someone else overlap what he’s got left of Bucky.
Because there’s nothing fucking left. All Steve’s got of him are memories and a folder with a giant “KIA” stamped across it and that can’t be all that’s left of him. It can’t. Because James Bucky Barnes had to be more than Steve Rogers’ goddamned memories and a piece of paper. So much of what Steve was— so much of who he is was made with Bucky and if Steve’s here, if he’s here, then Bucky should be too. Because it’s to the end of the line, right? They’re not at the end yet, and if they’re not at the end, then where the hell is Bucky?
“—gers! Hey! Steve!”
That’s Tony’s voice. Why’s he—?
“You’re name is Steve Rogers and you’re in Stark tower. We’re here in New York and the date is March fourth, 2012. You’re with friends,” Natasha’s voice floats in, and the cadence and tone indicates that she’s been repeating this for a while. “You’re name is Steve Rogers and you’re in Stark tower…”
There’s no telling how long it takes for him to settle the galloping pace of his heart to Natasha’s low, steady murmur, words like a metronome that he sets his inhales to. It could’ve been mere moments or the long stretch of an hour, but the time that passes by is like the thickest humidity in a summer rain. It’d almost be easy to get lost in it, lungs thick and brain nothing more than overheated soup, but Steve dredges up the rest of his awareness and breathes away the sudden panic that’d gripped him.
Once the rise of his shoulders has steadied, Natasha hums and lets up on her repetition, shuffling to Steve’s other side and slumping against the overturned debris that he’s been curled against.
As if her silence was a signal, the rest of the team relaxes too, and in the hidden safety that his downturned head offers, Steve lets his cheeks go red in embarrassment. Christ, what the hell was all that about? What brought that on? Nothing’s even— he hadn’t even been doing anything. It can’t have been… Okay, sure. Those doctors mentioned things like this happening, and he’s gone spacy and panicky before, but this is. There’s no fight. The fight’s done. And Steve’s. He’s thought about Buck before, and his Ma, and Erskine. None of these are new thoughts. So why did he…?
But he’s never had to talk about them before.
The realization winds him like a punch to the gut. His pre-serum gut. But. No. No, that can’t be right, right? He’s had to have talked about them before.
Steve racks through his memory but not much springs up. And not anything longer than a couple words here and there, all said to those doctors when he first came out of the ice. More shame colors his face and mortifyingly enough, he can feel the burn of tears forming at the edge of his eyes. He shuts his eyelids tight, squeezing until little shapes appear in the darkness, to fend against the emotion choking his throat.
There’s an uptick in murmurs, words being exchanged that Steve doesn’t really care to pay attention to, and then the shuffle of shoes squeaking across tile. To his left, the opening and closing of doors echoes weirdly in the silence as he sits there, curled in around his stomach, and swallowing around the remembered realization that Steve’s got no one left.
It’s the 21st century, over 70 years into the future, and there’s no one on Earth who knows Steve Rogers over Captain America.
A heavy hand, warm and squeezing around the protective padding on his shoulder, forces a wet, shuddering gasp out of his mouth and just like that, the tears that Steve has damned since he woke from the ice come rolling forth. Another shoulder, smaller and lithe, presses against his and he chokes on another shuddering heave.
Over his head, Tony exhales through his nose and says the words no one’s thought to say since they told him they’d won.
“I’m sorry for your loss.”