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The train was packed. Bucky should have known that the flight would have been cancelled, with the dread portal open over New York again. Fucking necromancers – they didn’t give a shit about anyone else’s travel plans. Rebecca would kill him if he wasn’t there in time for Thanksgiving, so he’d had to take the option of the replacement rail service rather than stay at home like he wanted. He was only half way through the enchantment on his arm – the metal exoskeleton was still visible – and although it grated on his nerves it at least had the side effect of people staying out of his way.
No one wanted to piss of a Demonic. Few people even wanted to date them.
So when he sat down in his seat location – 34b – he didn’t pay much attention to the scrawny blond kid leaning against the window, just settled himself in the centre and tried not to think about the next 6 hours. Travel charms used to be fairly popular, speeding up journeys like the one he was about to take, but after a few crashes when super charmed trains smashed into one another – they were banned. The last one had only been a few months ago – no survivors, even with the Healers - even the Necro’s could find enough to resurrect. People had been scared into compliance. So a 6 hour long train journey it was.
There wasn’t a lot of legroom, which sucked, and his arm was too close to the kid in the seat by the window – raw edged and thrumming with power. He’d hoped that he’d have finished the outer covering, the illusion mask that would make it look like his other arm.
He was about to move into the aisle seat when a lumbering man appeared beside him. “34c?” He asked, voice thick, and a closer glance had Bucky noticing the grey mottled tone of his skin, bloated and almost jelly-like.
Jesus, the last thing Bucky wanted to be sitting beside was a fucking floater.
The train pulled out of the station with barely a judder, which was good, because Bucky was trying to stop any part of his body touching the man beside him. The smell was weird, spicy and slightly rotten, the tinge of death in the air. Luckily, the kid beside him wasn’t taking up a lot of room, and he slid closer to the window.
“I got to get home.” The floater said, his voice slow. Words were hard for the dead – Bucky knew that, but normally they wouldn’t travel on public transport. People didn’t like it – Bucky didn’t like it. He was a Demonic, he spent his time summoning Demons from the realm they lived, and he knew death well. That didn’t mean that he wanted to be sitting beside a drowned man for 6 hours. Rich enough to afford a temporary resurrection but not rich enough to get the private transport, the man beside Bucky was probably some middle manager – going home for his funeral. “I got to get home.” He repeated, and when he sighed, Bucky could hear the water in his lungs squeeze like a sponge.
It was going to be a very long journey.
About 20 minutes in, the kid who’d been staring out of the window shifted. Bucky was almost pressed right up against him, and he knew (he knew, okay?) that he was breaking all kinds of personal space rules. He was trying not to let his arm touch the kid though, because no one wanted that, and the result was that he was very nearly spooning the other guy – hip twisted into the window, arm tucked under his body.
The kid though – when he moved, Bucky could see that he wasn’t actually a kid. He had a hard jaw and a stubborn looking nose that had been broken at least once, re-set a bit squint but not… not bad. In fact, quiet nice. Very nice. The kind of nice Bucky might have offered to buy a drink or something if he’d seen him out. He was blinking quiet heavily, eyes unfocused, looking around like he had no idea where he was.
“You’re on a train.” Bucky said, keeping his voice neutral. He’d never met a Spirit Walker before – and he was pretty sure that the glazed look on this guy’s face was one of the signs. Either that or he was stoned. Surely the guy sitting beside him was way too small to be a Spirit Walker though? Those guys needed to be built like tanks – had to be – the strain on their souls was too much, it could be ripped right out of them. It looked like a good breeze could blow this guy apart.
“A train?” The guy asked, blinking some more.
“Yeah.” Bucky agreed, keeping all emotion out of his voice. He tried to remember what they’d said about Spirit Walkers coming out of a trance state. Stay calm, stay quiet, stay still.
“A train.” The guy said, and shifted in his seat so he was sitting normally, back pressed firmly against the seat, feet on the floor. “I am Steve Grant Rogers. I am 24 years old. I am on a train.” A pause, a breath, and then he sagged like a puppet whose strings had been cut, shoulders slumping down, head bowed. “Sorry.” He mumbled, and Bucky tried to shrug with one arm.
“No trouble.”
Steve had a bottle of water in his bag, and he wriggled a little to get it up from the space at his feet. Bucky tried to give him more room, but the floater had relaxed into the seat, sides spilling over – whenever Bucky moved, the clammy, cold skin of the dead man touched his, and he shuddered. Steve looked over his body and saw why Bucky was squashed into his seat. The look of distaste on his face probably equalled Bucky’s.
“I thought they had their own compartment.” He whispered, because seriously, pissing of a dead guy was a bad idea. “He’s dripping.”
“Thanks for reminding me.” Bucky grimaced. “I was trying not to notice.”
Steve smirked, and shifted nearer the window. “You can put up your arm rest and move over a little if you like.” He said, “I don’t take up much space right now.”
“Right now?” Bucky asked, as he did exactly that. He could really only move a couple of inches without the metal of his arm getting too close to Steve for his liking, but it meant that his right side wasn’t touching the cold dead skin of the man in the aisle seat.
Steve nodded. “Yeah, I um, I’m going to the Inventry.” He said, looking proud and a little worried.
The Inventry was – in its simplest form, a pavilion where the Inventors gathered and worked on their new Magiks. It was a pretty eclectic mix of people, most of them batshit crazy – and it was also where Bucky was headed. “My sister works there.” He said, pride colouring his voice. “Rebecca Barnes? She’s a Mage.” He paused, and then remembered that he’d not introduced himself. “I’m Bucky, by the way, I’m heading over there for Thanksgiving.”
“I’m Steve – but you know that.” Steve said, looking a little pink around the ears. “They’ve got this new thing – a potion, combined with some alchemy. Plan is, it should make me bigger.” He looked down at his hands, masculine and strong and far too large for his body. “The seer told my maw I’d be a big guy, you know? This big Spirit Walker, huge guy, strong.” His laugh was self-depreciating. “Didn’t really happen.” Bucky found himself frowning at the tone Steve had when he spoke about himself. He felt… he felt like he wanted to protect him. Like maybe… there could be a bond between them, shimmering in the air. He already felt like they were friends.
“They get it wrong.” Bucky said, trying to shrug off the feeling. Demonics weren’t the type of people Spirit Walkers became friends with. “Sometimes. Mine told my pop I’d shape a world after a fall.” He waved his flesh arm around the train. “As you can see, aint exactly changing shit.”
Steve smiled though, and gave Bucky a Look, seeing with more than just his eyes. They glittered like sapphires in the sunlight. “I dunno, Bucky.” He smiled, voice taking on the timbre associated with sight. “I think you could shape someone’s world easy enough.” He blinked, and his eyes were back to their regular blue. “Not sure about the fall though.”
Bucky laughed. “I know exactly where I’ll end up.” He said, nodding to his arm. “My demons got a taste of me already, and they don’t let go.”
Steve rolled his eyes, and Bucky found himself grinning. The smaller man was obviously powerful, Bucky could feel it in his core – but his small frame made Bucky uneasy, like any moment he might fly apart at the seams, that his thin bones couldn’t take the stress of the power contained inside. Between them, a silver thread, unseen, wrapped around them both.
He’d been talking to Steve for a while, pressed up against the smaller man, when he’d noticed that Steve was nodding off. “Get some sleep.” He said, grinning. “You’ve got along day ahead of you.”
Steve nodded, curling against the wall and closing his eyes. It didn’t take long for the monotonous rock of the train to send him to sleep, and he shifted – head resting on the metal shoulder of Bucky’s arm. Carefully, trying not to wake the smaller man, Bucky tucked his hand under his head, feeling the thin blond hairs run through his fingers, protecting his skin from the hard metal.
He must have drifted off – he must have, because the next thing he knew, the train was juddering, throwing him around in his seat. The floater, without the balance and speed of the living, was already in the aisle, death rattle working out of his bloated chest. Steve was gripping onto the side of his chair, the other onto Bucky’s arm – his metal arm. He could feel the raw power from Steve’s hand where it gripped him – felt it like he’d reached into his fucking soul, without the enchantments to protect his missing limb, he was vulnerable to power touches, and Steve must have been powerful to risk the Spirit Walk with his bird body. The train though, something was wrong. People were screaming, a woman was throwing up protective spells, trying to cushion the rocking of the train – a few others muttering under their breath, chanting the long lines of Necro prayers.
Bucky looked out of the window.
They were on a bridge, snow all around them, the bridge was long, but he knew this route – it should have taken them over a small lake, not a drop so steep that it hurt the eyes just looking down, down, down in to utter blackness - someone screamed: “A void hole!” Before the train ripped, metal screaming like it was in pain, as the compartment split almost central down the middle, dividing down the aisle. The floater fell. He wasn’t the only one. They whole side of their compartment was about to go. Bucky saw how it would go. He took a deep breath, grabbed Steve with his metal hand, and transferred.
Bucky Barnes remembered nothing. The void took everything. He became what they made him. The Demonic become the Demon. It is their fate.
“I am Steven Grant Walker. I am 25 years old. I am looking for you.”
He had a silver thread tied around his heart and no matter how much they pulled at it, it never snapped.
“I am Steven Grant Walker. I am 28 years old. I am looking for you.”
The silver thread was tight around him as he was forced to walk the earth at the bidding of his masters. Nothing more than a Demon puppet. A knife in the dark. Cold and hard and cruel. The silver thread the only source of warmth.
“I am Steven Grant Walker. I am 30 years old. I am looking for you.”
The walls were white. Too white – it hurt Bucky’s eyes to even look at them, so he kept his eyes shut. The whispering of the spirit world flowed around, just out of reach to understand words, but close enough to tease him – half words his brain tried to make sense of. Everything hurt.
“You saved my life.” A voice whispered, just on the edge of his understanding. “You saved me.”
“James Buchanan Barnes. You fell.” A voice said. “You saved my life.”
“You shaped a world, Bucky.” A voice said. “After a fall. They get it right in the end, don’t they?” A laugh, it has no joy in it. He doesn’t remember joy; he does not know how he would recognise the emotion. “I got big. I got strong.” The voice said, and drifted away again. “You saved me.”
“I am Steven Grant Walker. I am 32. I am going to save you.”
He woke up.
The room was white, and he snarled at the man who stood at the side of the bed. His demon teeth were sharp, his eyes red – he had been summoned once again into the land of the living, the memories of the last time still fresh on his teeth. Blood still on his hands. He had killed many. He would be made to kill more.
“I am Steven Grant Walker.” The man said, ignoring the snarls he threw out. He would not listen to this master, he had never listened to a master – he fought his summoning with every fibre of his being. “I am 32 years old. I am in the Inventry.” He wanted to spit, wanted to pull against the chains that bound him, but he could not. He was bound by will, and he could not break the bonds of his masters any more than he could deny them their power over him. “You are James Buchanan Barnes.” The man said. “You are Bucky.”
“Who the hell is Bucky?” He spat, and the thread that tied around his heart was anchored in the chest of the man standing in front of him.
The man smiled.
His binding spell was lessened when the man left, he could stalk around the room at will. He had will. He could not remember being given this freedom before.
He had notion of time passing, no way to measure other than the meals the man brought to him. Real food. He would not touch it, although he hungered. He was a Demon. He could not eat the food of masters.
The man, large, powerful, strong, would come to him. Sometimes many visits, sometimes few. He had no way to measure how long between visits.
“Your sister got married, Bucky.” The man said. “She’s got a little boy, he’s already showing signs of the Demonic – are you proud of that? He’s going to be just as powerful as you were.”
Another time he smiled. “Buck, you should have seen their faces when I told them. No one ever heard of a Spirit Walker who could be Demonic too. But it saved my life, Buck.”
“Hey Bucky, do you remember the train?” The man asked. Bucky was not restrained. He could not leave the room, but he could walk around freely when the man was there. He no longer wanted to kill the man. The man called Steve. “There was a crash, and you fell into the void.” He said. “I don’t know if you remember. Its… it’s not fair.” The man said, and he saw water fall from his eyes. “You gave me your gift. It’s kind of a big deal - to give someone your gift.” The man swiped a hand over his eyes, the water was gone for a moment before it fell again. “I know you don’t really understand. I’m sorry.” The silver thread around his heart was tight when they were close, tight and warm, and if he knew comfort, he would call it that.
He didn’t know why he wanted to stop the water falling from the man’s eyes. Carefully, so the man, Steve, would not think he was attacking, he knelt down. His hand was steady as he carefully touched the water on Steve’s skin. It was warm. He found himself… angry… at the water.
“Stop this.” He said, and his voice was rough, rough from disuse and screaming.
“Okay, Bucky.” Steve said.
“A train.” He said, testing out the word. He… had thoughts. He… could have his own thoughts.
“Yes.” Steve said, sitting on the bed beside him.
“A small man.” He looked at Steve, for a moment seeing more than the large, muscular man – seeing a smaller, thinner man. “Steve. The small man on the train.” He touched the silver thread and saw Steve smile.
“That was me.” Steve agreed.
He nodded, and lifted the food Steve had brought to his lips.
“I had an arm.” He managed, one day.
“I was scared.” Bucky said. Steve was sitting on the bed, cross legged and holding cards in his hands. The same hands as the small Steve he remembered on the train, but now matched to his big body. Between them, a small demon was holding onto Buckys fingers. Steve had summoned it – he was able to do this because Bucky had given him his gift – and now Bucky was a demon and Steve was… not his master. “Scared of falling.”
“I know.” Steve said, as he placed the card down on the bed. Bucky had been learning to read. “I remember.”
Steve remembered more than Bucky. The transfer of power from one person to another was never exact and required a very strong bond to work – but it had worked for Steve and Bucky. When he thought hard about why, the silver thread woven around his heart became warm. He realised that Steve could not see it.
“What card?” Steve said, holding it up.
“Four of Cups.” Bucky shrugged. Stupid game, he didn’t understand why Steve insisted they play.
Steve’s smile was bright, eyes sparkling.
Bucky remembered why he let Steve insist. The smile was worth it.
It took a long time, Bucky knew. He had a watch, he had a calendar – a bed and some items that Steve or his sister would bring him. He was allowed out into the pavilion. But it took a long time for him to remember everything. And longer for him to realise that… he wasn’t what he thought.
His eyes were not red. His teeth were not pointed.
“I was a Demon!” He shouted, looking at himself in a mirror for the first time. His skin was pale, eyes blue, his hair was touching his shoulders, a warm brown. “How, how is this possible?”
“You saved me.” Steve said, calmly. “When people fall into the void they either become Demon or walk the Spirit realm. I spent years looking for you. Do you think they gave me this big body so I wouldn’t use it?” Steve touched his shoulder, and Bucky didn’t flinch. “You can’t transfer power without a bond.” He said, softly. “I wouldn’t leave you to walk alone.”
“How did you do this?”
“Stark. Banner – Loki and Thor and even your sister. You split; one part became a Spirit, the other a Demon. Put them back together and you get one whole person.” He paused. “It almost didn’t work.” He said. “You spent a long time just… frozen.”
“Why would you do this?”
“Because. You saved my life.” Steve shrugged. “Because you gave me your gift. Because I thought you were worth it.”
Bucky was 38, and Steve was 36 when Bucky held his hand under the table at his sisters thanksgiving dinner. He finally made it back to her like he’d promised all those years ago. Her son summoned a small pixi demon who giggled and played with him as they ate.
Bucky was 39, and Steve was 37 when Bucky kissed Steve for the first time. He laughed and said he saw sparks – the fireworks around them lighting up the sky, the New Year welcomed in style – huge dragons sweeping through the air before exploding into colour and light, but none of them brighter than Steve’s smile.
Bucky was 40 and Steve was 38 when they stood together and promised in front of all of their friends and family that they would stand together for the rest of their lives.
They tied a silver ribbon around their hands and vowed never to let it go.
“I will be with you,” Bucky smiled, reciting the Paladins words.
“To the end of the line.” Steve finished.