Chapter Text
There are times Bucky wishes he'd never returned Sam's call that day.
He thinks about it as the FBI preps him for his political debut, fast-tracking his progress, but keeping it just slow enough to avoid suspicion. He thinks about it as he's sworn into office over a year later, taking yet another oath for his country. He thinks about it as he meets with Gary and several others about Valentina's shadowy agency dealings.
Bucky still thinks about it three years later as he watches John walk away from him, and realizes he lost any right to protest because he's the one who left first.
That doesn't make it easier. It doesn't make seeing the camaraderie and in jokes between the others sting less. It doesn’t make it easier to see the ring still on John’s finger and realize he’d probably never been a serious consideration for the other man- that John is still holding out hope for the family he’d once had. He pushes down the bitterness that tries to crawl up his throat at the realization.
Bucky is the last one that joined the team, and even before that, he had run them down like they were things- a mission- not people. It makes him wonder if that was Bucky, the Winter Soldier, or a little of both.
It makes him wonder at the kind of man he has become, and if Steve would still be proud of him, still consider him a good man, a man worth saving.
He hates seeing John laugh at Yelena and Ava’s jokes, even when they hit a little too close to home and he flinches first. He hates seeing him take Bob under his wing, attempting to be reassuring even when his own life is in shambles. “Never give up,” he says time and again, like it means something special to the others. He hates seeing John and Alexei compare notes on being a state-sponsored hero, and how they were both abandoned by their governments and their people.
Mostly though, he hates himself for losing John’s trust, and he doesn’t think he can ever get it back. He knows he doesn’t have the right to it.
It makes him snappish. Bucky knows he's doing it, but he can't seem to keep himself from making sarcastic comments at nearly everything. It doesn’t help that they’re all forced to live practically on top of each other, something Bucky hasn’t had to do in quite some time. He’s out of practice, living with others.
The remainder of the residences are slated to take a few weeks to complete. In the meantime, they're all doubled up in suites, too close together, and it becomes glaringly obvious rather quickly that none of them are used to it.
Alexei leaves half-empty bottles and dirty clothes everywhere. Yelena complains about the mess, but refuses to do the dishes. Ava only cleans the things she uses- nothing more, nothing less. Bob tries to help out, but he's haphazard at best, starting and leaving tasks half-finished.
John takes up cooking when it becomes evident that no one else knows how beyond boxed mac and cheese, a thick, spicy soup that Alexei swears by as a hangover cure, and pancakes. The first time John announces that he’s making them dinner, Bucky falls into place instinctively, taking out a cutting board and knife for the vegetables. John shoots him an odd look. “What are you doing?” he asks, and it then occurs to Bucky that this isn't that little house in Georgia, and Bucky lost his place next to the other man three years ago.
“Nothing,” he mutters, slamming the drawer closed and stalking out of the kitchen and past Yelena.
“Woah,” he hears her say to Walker. “What crawled up his butt?” Bucky doesn't linger to hear the response. He doesn’t think he could bear to listen to John say “nothing” like those three months they had spent together didn’t mean anything to him. Bucky avoids the kitchen when John is in it after that.
They attend a lot of interviews post-Shame Room incident.
A lot.
Everyone wants to talk to the New Avengers. The Washington Post, The Boston Globe, The New Yorker… There are quite a few ‘the’ titles Bucky is beginning to realize, as if each are the ultimate of its name. Vanity Fair asks to do a spread on Yelena and Ava- women in superheroism, they're thinking of calling it. Yelena seems excited about it, and even Bucky isn't enough of a bastard to rain on her happiness.
The only other person who seems excited about all the interviews is Alexei.
“One step closer to getting on Wheaties box, hunh?” He slaps Bucky across the back, who moves with the force of it rather than risk cracking his spine.
“Uh, I guess so.” Bucky isn't quite sure that Wheaties is as much a measure of success that Alexei seems to think it is, but what does he know? Most of his reference points are either stuck in the 1940s or are from the few small bits he remembers throughout his years as the Winter Soldier that aren't related to completing mission objectives.
Bucky hates the attention. So does Ava. So does John. He can tell they’re all in the same boat of ‘just give them an objective and let them loose to complete it.’ Instead, they’re given haircuts and a makeup artist. Bucky doesn’t think his hair has ever been as soft as it is now- even as a congressman he had just bought what was cheapest.
Ava looks twitchy before each interview, idly pulling a knife from somewhere and flicking it up into the air and catching it. Bucky would insist that she leave it behind, but in all honesty, he understands the urge, so he leaves her to it. If he hadn’t had to learn to put the knives away while he’d been congressman, he probably would have joined her, but he prides himself on having more self control these days.
John seems to have the hardest time with the interviews. He’s tense and barely verbal before each one, only responding in one or two word answers when asked a direct question. Then it’s like a switch is flipped when he steps out onto the stage, all wide grins and humble beginnings, and it brings Bucky up short the first few times he sees it.
Then he remembers the bright lights on a football field, the big on-camera smile, and the self-deprecating humor that had felt just for show while he’d watched on a TV screen hundreds of miles away. He remembers the fake confidence that had tried to hide a man scared of failing.
Bucky also remembers holding that same man months later as he broke down in his arms over having done so, and knowing that he bore at least some of the responsibility for it.
The John in the interviews is a different, yet familiar man. Whenever the interviewer ultimately asks the question- the one that comes in various forms, but always ends with a silent condemnation- John doesn’t shy away from it; just answers it calmly and directly, addressing the unspoken part out loud.
I made a mistake, he says, every time. A terrible one- one I can’t take back. All I can do is try to be a better man. Every day is a new day to try harder. It doesn’t sound like a line. On either side of John, Yelena and Ava nod, like they know it for the promise that it is.
Most publications are still cynical of them though. Yelena, even as a former Widow, probably gets the least amount of scrutiny and bad press. Natasha Romanov’s past hadn’t been a secret for many years, and while some people questioned it, many couldn’t argue the good she’d done for the world. It was easier for people to accept the little sister of one of Earth’s original Avengers.
Ava is an unknown to the general public, and while her powers make people wary, they see her as someone who had stepped up that day in NYC, even if they don’t know where she came from, or understand why she decided to stand up that day.
Bucky’s own reception is a mixed bag. His story is well known and tragic: fought in World War II, POW (twice), brainwashed, a hero once again, and then a congressman who had to step down because the choice was between changing things slow from the inside- which he was failing at anyway- or making a difference one catastrophe at a time with a ragtag group of anti-heroes that aimed to do better.
The choice had been an easy one for him in the end.
Between Alexei and John, it’s arguable who has it worse. Alexei’s involvement with the former Soviet Union makes him less-than-ideal, especially when old propaganda videos start circulating on the internet. Valentina, or Mel, or someone working for Valentina- Bucky really doesn’t know how it works- releases a series of statements with each one, highlighting that Alexei’s involvement ended years ago, and painting a picture of him as a political prisoner.
John, on the other hand, has the memory of his very public failure hanging over him. Each time an article is written about him, his brief stint as Captain America is brought up, never having a chance to be forgotten. His mistake is always front and center. It makes people wary of him, and Bucky sees the little wince every time someone pulls away from him.
The obvious hurt it brings John makes Bucky ache for him, just a little. It also makes him want to grab the man about the shoulders and yell at him to get over it. Public opinion is as transient as the wind and sea, and it would be better if he just forgot about them and focused on his team instead.
Bucky could probably stand to take his own advice.
Of course, all of these things would be made easier if they were given a chance to prove themselves. A mission to bring down a terrorist organization, a mad scientist turning people into naked molerats, something to give them credibility and show that they’re not just a one-off. Anything where they could turn theory into practice.
Sam had his contract work with the military before taking on the Captain America mantle and before that he’d been pararescue, which gave him the kind of background the public loved for a new Cap. However, everyone in this new group has either been a mercenary, a black-ops operative, a mind-controlled assassin, worked for an opposing nation, or had been discharged from the military in disgrace. Some of them could even check off more than one of those categories.
It’s no wonder the media and general public call their authenticity into question, especially as they point out that there already is a Captain America, with a team of his own. And that's what every Avengers team needs doesn’t it? A Captain America to lead them. Bucky is at times tempted to petition for the title if it wasn’t for the fact that A: he would probably have to fight Sam for it, and B: he doesn’t actually want it.
(He’s pretty sure John doesn’t want it either.)
Though, it might be nicer than continuing to be referred to as the Winter Soldier despite his repeated requests for them to call him something else- preferably his name- but Valentina says everyone else has a superhero name, so it makes sense he does too. When he sarcastically asks about Thor, she just stares blankly at him and says that when a god asks you to call him by his name, you listen. And besides, he technically did have an epithet: God of Thunder.
Buck had walked out of her office cursing.
Later he overhears John in the big common room of the Tower’s living space, TV turned low in the background.
“I just wanna do the work, you know?” he says to a chorus of agreement from Yelena, Ava, and Bob. “I joined the army because of my brother,” Bucky hears John add, and nearly stumbles over his own feet. “He was my hero.”
John had never told him about a brother. All that time together, and he’d only spoken a handful of times about Olivia and Lemar. He’d barely even mentioned having parents, even though he obviously had to have had them.
But just a few weeks with these new people and John is already telling them the things Bucky had tried so hard to learn three years ago. Something dark and ugly wriggles in the pit of his stomach. Bucky tries to reason it out to himself- they hadn’t beaten him and broken his arm over a symbol after all- but from Bucky’s understanding, they had all tried to kill each other.
Which is arguably worse, in Bucky’s opinion. Or maybe that’s just what Bucky tells himself to feel better about that final fight in the warehouse where he and Sam had tag-teamed a grieving man.
In the vault, as the ones who were there have told it, it had been both their jobs and a misunderstanding born of a plot conceived by Valentina to get rid of loose ends that had led to the three of them being there that day. And Bob had just been wheeled in by circumstance and his desire to be better. Bucky supposes he can see how that might unite some people in a tie deeper than a few months of reluctant cohabitation.
Bucky wonders what other things John has shared with the others, but not with him. He puts the conversation from his mind, and tries not to dwell on it.
The dark, ugly knot in the pit of his stomach doesn’t go away, but it doesn’t grow either.
A week later, the floor with the second set of suites is finished at last, and Bucky can finally have his own space again.
“Uh, I can move, if you want,” Bob offers, standing nervously in the middle of their shared living room.
“It’s fine, Bob,” Bucky says for what feels like the hundredth time. “I don’t even have that much stuff. It makes sense that I be the one that moves.” Bob hadn’t been an awful roommate- he’d actually been rather considerate, all things said- but Bucky had learned that John planned to move down to the new floor, and instinct had him following after. Ava would be taking the third suite, but Bucky has a feeling he won’t be seeing much of her.
He doesn’t know why he’s so set on following John to the other floor. Or rather, he does know why, but admitting it to himself means also entertaining the idea that he’d been wrong to leave all those years ago. And the thing is- he doesn’t think he was wrong. John was going down a dark path, one that he’d refused to reconsider, and Bucky had felt left with little choice.
Staying had meant he condoned what John was doing, in some small way. Maybe he could have tried to stay. Maybe he could have attempted a different approach, or just worn John down, but the truth was that Bucky hadn’t had the mental capacity for all of that at the time. He’d just barely pulled himself out of the darkest trenches of his own mind- had already been trying to support John through his grief and guilt- and Bucky hadn’t felt capable of taking on more.
Now, years later, Bucky has the realization that maybe they’d both been using each other to forget, but while it had been a healing type of forgetfulness for Bucky, one that also included remembering pieces of himself he’d long thought lost and forgotten, it hadn’t been the same for John. Memories of that time- ones Bucky had purposely pushed down- were resurfacing now.
He remembers the desperation with which John had clung to him that first time. Bucky remembers how John had never said no to him, how he’d only had to push just a little to get him to say yes, and how John had just gone along with everything Bucky had asked of him, like all he’d ever wanted was somebody to tell him what to do.
It’s a sick sort of realization.
While Bucky had been falling in love, John had just been clinging onto the first person who didn’t leave him to drown. John had done as Bucky had asked because he trusted Bucky when he didn’t trust himself to know what was the right thing to do. John had done his best not to disappoint Bucky, until he had.
So, as much as Bucky wants to be near John, to pick up where they had left off, he knows he doesn’t have the right to ask that of the other man. Bucky is realizing now that while he can hate the decisions John had made- the things he had done- he still doesn’t hate him. Could probably never hate him. Bucky still sees the man that chooses to do the right thing when it matters most, who picks himself back up again and again no matter how hard he is knocked down, who still protects first and fights back second.
But right now, it’s easy to see that John doesn’t want much of anything to do with him, and while Bucky can’t exactly blame him for that, it's also not in Bucky’s nature to leave something he wants alone, so he does the next best thing.
He makes himself a problem.
It’s far from his finest hour.
He gives John backhanded compliments, and watches the other man’s brow furrow in confusion. If Bucky happens upon him while he’s training, he gives unsolicited advice, nitpicking the other man’s form. When John makes a comment or a joke, Bucky stares until the silence becomes awkward. He’s little better with the others; snapping at them during drills- the ones he can get them to attend- about better teamwork, finding fault with whomever makes the tiniest mistake. Bucky tells himself it’s because he’s worried about them, but deep down he knows it’s not just that.
He’s jealous.
It gets bad enough that Yelena pulls him aside to talk to him.
“You need to get over it,” she tells him after a particularly grueling training session, arms crossed over her chest.
Bucky glares at her from under his hair. “Get over what?” he snaps, though he has a fairly good idea.
“Whatever has turned you into this gigantic asshole.” Well, he’ll say one thing for Yelena: she never pulls her punches.
“I’ve always been this way,” he says, suddenly weary, feeling the fight drain out of him just as quickly as it had entered.
She shakes her head. “No, I refuse to believe that.” Her expression softens just slightly. “Where is the man from that garage? The one who believed in us enough to convince us to try and stop a being more powerful than a god?”
Bucky huffs. “Don’t you get it?” He starts to turn away. “That man never existed.”
A small hand catches him by the elbow. “I do not think that is the case,” Yelena says, as soft as she ever says anything. “I think he is in there. Otherwise, you would not have been able to convince us as you did.”
“What makes you say that?” he rasps.
“We’d all been abandoned by the world when you found us.” Her words are coated in sadness. “Only someone who truly knows what that’s like would have been able to say the things that you did.” The hand slowly falls away. “You’re one of us, Barnes, whether you want to admit it or not. You can talk to us too. Anytime.” The words are said awkwardly, but he can tell they’re genuine.
He glances at her over his shoulder. “Thanks, but I’m fine.” Bucky tries to give her some semblance of a smile.
She snorts. “Between you and Walker, this must be the finest team in existence.”
That gets Bucky’s attention. “Is something going on with John?” He doesn’t hear the familiarity as it drops from his mouth.
Yelena opens her mouth to say something, then closes it again. She seems to consider for a moment before finally speaking. “You know how he is,” she says with a wave of her hand. “Always saying ‘I’m fine’ to this and that.”
Bucky’s heart clenches. Yeah, he remembers it really fucking well actually. He also remembers what it looks like when the other man finally breaks. “But he talks to you.” More than he ever did with Bucky. “You, Ava, Bob. Even Alexei.”
The corner of Yelena’s mouth turns down thoughtfully. “About some things, yeah. But it still feels like there’s something he’s holding back. Something that’s bothering him and he’s refusing to talk about it.”
Bucky has an idea of what it might be, but it’s not really something he can bring up to any of the people here. And, well, if John couldn’t talk about it with his friends, then he certainly isn’t going to talk about it with Bucky. Whatever they might have had is gone, and maybe it’s time for Bucky to accept that. The thought has him closing himself off once more. He steps back. “Well, if you find anything out that you think makes him a liability, let me know.”
“That isn’t wh-”
He disappears around the corner before Yelena can finish her sentence.
Soon after that conversation, they have their first mission.
There had been some talk among themselves after the incident in Midtown to go ahead with the trial and have the four of them testify at Valentina’s hearing- to finish what Bucky had started. They would have made a compelling case against her, Bucky knows; enough to get her impeached at the very least, hopefully forced to resign from her position as the head of the CIA. Unfortunately, public opinion is currently on her side. The time to have denied her claim that she’d formed them as a team to combat threats in the hole the original Avengers had left was past them.
Yelena is the one to bring up the fact that having someone like Valentina under their thumb could be useful. Bucky protests at first. One of the reasons he’d become a congressman- had let himself be pulled into the world of politics- was to bring Valentina down.
“I know,” Yelena says, looking directly at him. “But there could be more information out there about what Bob is- what they did to him. And we’ll never get it if we cut her out.”
At his name, Bob looks around the group. “Oh, guys, you don’t have to worry about me. I’ll be fine.” He nods his head like that had ended the conversation. Yelena rolls her eyes and huffs, mouthing ‘another one’ to Bucky. He lets the corner of his mouth tick up a notch in agreement.
“Of course we’re gonna worry about you, Bob.” Walker speaks up from his spot on the couch. “You’re one of us now.”
The comment garners a soft look from Bob, and Bucky feels the dark, ugly thing from weeks ago wiggle and grow. He pushes it back down.
“Thanks, guys.” Bob smiles at the group, looking relieved and grateful at the same time, like a lingering doubt had been assuaged for the time being. “I don’t wanna hurt anyone again.”
After that conversation, Yelena puts pressure on Valentina, who insists that there are no more facilities- the last of everything to be gotten rid of had been in that vault. There is only what the scientists who’d been at the Tower knew, which is nowhere near the complete picture.
It’s Mel that comes to him about the back-ups.
“There is one facility that was completely off the books,” she tells him, ever-present tablet clutched to her chest. “We kept the bare minimum there though. Just enough to hopefully restart the project if the opportunity ever came.” She looks up at him from under long eyelashes. “I don’t know where it is though. She didn’t trust me that much.”
Bucky smiles at her. “Thanks, Mel. Knowing it’s out there is enough for now.”
She nods. “I owed you one. For keeping your promise.”
“That wasn’t- I didn’t,” Bucky stumbles. “You don’t owe someone for keeping their promise. That’s not how it works,” he sighs.
Mel fixes him with a skeptical look. “Maybe not in the time you’re from.” Her voice holds a note of teasing derision. “But nowadays it's common to repay favors. I called, you came.” She smiles up at him then, and he feels his spine pull straight, unease settling over him.
“This isn’t a trap, is it?” he asked, because he’d lived too long to trust anything at face value anymore.
The smile immediately falls from Mel’s face. “What? No. Why would you say that?”
Bucky tries to soften his tone. “After everything, it’s just a little hard to believe that Valentina wouldn’t expect you to say something to us about it, so why not lie to me?”
Mel bites at her bottom lip. “I did something. Up in the Tower. I think it made her believe I’m still loyal to her.” She catches his gaze with her own, holding it firmly. “I haven’t exactly disabused her of that notion. But I’m not. I want you guys to succeed.” Mel lets the sentiment hang in the air between them for a moment. “And she’s crazy.”
He huffs, turning that over in his head for a moment, brows drawn close. “Are you offering to spy for us?”
“I wouldn’t quite call it that,” she replies. “More like… pass along information that might be helpful, from time to time.” Privately, Bucky wonders what the difference is, but knows better than to argue the semantics. “I like Bob,” she adds. “He didn’t deserve what happened to him.”
Well, that is something they could agree on. “None of us did.” He makes sure to look directly at her when he says it. She gives him a brief smile, and just like that, he has someone inside Val’s office.
And so Val stays on as the head liaison between the government and the New Avengers.
Which brings them back to their first mission, as assigned by Val.
They get the call at three forty-six am. Bucky knows this because ten minutes before that he'd been torn from his sleep by a nightmare. They suit up quickly and less than fifteen minutes later they're in the jet being briefed on the details.
“It’s an earthquake,” Val tells them over the comms. “Largest in Charleston since the late 1800s. The local emergency services are requesting assistance in search and rescue. Your combined skillsets make you uniquely qualified for this type of mission,” she says, tone self-satisfied from even miles away. “You'll be there under the supervision of the incident commander. Do exactly as they tell you.” There's a general murmur of agreement. They'd had briefings on how to handle natural disasters, but this would be the first time they got to put what they'd learned into practice. “Oh, and I'm making Walker lead on this since he actually has experience digging people out of rubble.”
Across from Bucky, Walker tenses, like he's bracing for a blow. Or maybe someone to argue. Bucky remains quiet.
“Makes sense,” Yelena says from the pilot's seat, and the tension eases out of John slightly.
They exit the jet into organized chaos. There’s screaming, crying, blaring sirens, and a general air of determination and purpose. For a moment, they survey the scene, and then from beside him, Bucky hears John murmur, almost as if to himself:
“Time to go to work.”