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[dysmorphics]

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[dysmorphics]

Steph's heart had stopped for a second when ash once more littered the battlefield, reminding her of that dreadful fight in Wakanda over five years ago. It was always Bucky she saw whenever she made the mistake of looking back to it; how, like on that train, he had slipped from her grasp and to his death. Once was bad enough, but twice? She had to be cursed.

It was their enemies that were crumbling to ash, but fear seized her anyway. The Stones had brought all the Vanished back, and she'd caught glimpses of Bucky during the fighting, but she'd lost track of him along the way, having had to concentrate on battling Thanos. She didn't want to think that he'd returned only to die again, but what were the odds? Enough to have her blinking back tears as she limped through the smoke and the ruins of the Compound and the dead bodies, searching for him. She knew she had to check on the others, run through her list and make sure everyone on her team was accounted for, but she had to find Bucky first. She wouldn't forgive herself if she didn't.

"Bucky? Bucky!" She was shaking from exhaustion. Her left forearm was still strapped to her broken shield, if only because she'd used the belts as a torniquet to stop the bleeding. In her other grimy, gloved hand, she held Mjolnir, but it barely registered with her that she was still carrying it until she had to drop it to grab a passing Wakandan. "Hey, have you seen Bucky?"

But nobody seemed to know where he was. That, more than the beating she'd taken, made her knees give way. Sinking into the ground, she pulled off her helmet and tossed it aside, her hair a disheveled mess.

"I'm so sorry, Buck," she sobbed. There were others to mourn — Nat, Tony — but this grief she'd long carried in the depths of her heart was finally clawing its way out, and she thought, idly, that maybe she could just lie down and close her eyes and not wake up.

[hadagreatpast]

Thankfully, Bucky himself wasn't that injured. Some scrapes here and there, he may or may not have rolled an ankle, nothing unbearable. And nothing that wouldn't heal within just a couple days. None of that was important though. The important thing was finding Steph. He stopped to ask a few people along his search if they'd seen her as well, but they were mostly tending to their own and he couldn't fault them for that.

But then he felt a slight breeze hit his skin, clearing away some of the smoke on the battlefield. And on the other side of the smoke, off in the distance, he saw a flash of blonde hair. "Steph?" he said softly to himself as he started moving in her direction, slowly at first, like he was unsure of what he was seeing, then picking up speed as he became sure it was really her.

"Steph!" he shouted again as he got closer, definitely close enough for her to hear him, and by that time he was running full tilt towards her. In that moment, he gave rougly zero shits who saw him running after her like that. He could see she was down on her knees, but at least she was upright. "Steph!"

[dysmorphics]

At first she thought she was just hearing things, or that she was lost in her own head again, thinking of him and all that they could have been. But something akin to the prickling sense of incoming danger seized her, and she looked up to find him running toward her.

Relief gave her that one last needed push of adrenaline. She somehow managed to get back to her feet, and had barely taken a few shaky steps forward when he caught up with her. She didn't care how much it hurt or if the gesture wasn't welcome, but she grabbed him in a fierce, crushing hug. Words failing her, she just buried her face into the crook of his neck and cried.

He was back. He was alive. The war was over and now they could go home. This had been all she ever wanted when she signed up for the supersoldier program. She just wanted to bring him home.

"You're here," she finally managed after a moment, her voice breaking.

[hadagreatpast]

Nothing on Earth could have made Bucky deny Steph that hug, because he needed her in his arms just as badly from the feel of it. He wrapped his natural arm around her tightly, while bringing his metal hand up to rest on the back of her head--always a bit more gentle with his left hand than his right, just in case.

It was then that the stress and the worry and the rolled ankle and the everything got to him as well. Much like hers had done before he even saw her, Bucky's knees buckled and down he went, landing in a sitting position on his knees and pulling her down with him. He didn't want to let her go for any reason, and he didn't try to fight the tears that were leaking from his eyes. "I couldn't find you and- I- I thought you were-" his arm tightened around Steph a bit more. "Don't you ever fucking scare me like that again."

[dysmorphics]

Her first instinct was to brace against him and keep him upright, but she'd been so spent from the fight that all she could do was sink to her knees with him. Not that she minded, not even when her broken left forearm throbbed from the motion.

"You're one to talk," she quipped with a strangled laugh, lifting her good hand to his face to wipe away his tears. "You were gone five years." And decades before that, technically, but she'd felt every hour of those five years. He could see that in the new lines on her face, the frazzled tips of her hair, the haunted look in her eyes.

Because it had to be said: "I'm so, so sorry." She hadn't stood a chance against Thanos back then, but she could've tried harder. And she shouldn't have given up on bringing them back. But after Tony did, and Carol, and Thor — all more powerful and more ingenious than her — what else could she have done?

[hadagreatpast]

"Five years?" Bucky repeated back to her, shocked by that news. But then he looked at her more closely. He could see the extra stress in her face, the very few new fine lines around her eyes. He knew that face like the back of his hand, and those lines hadn't been there before. Shit, it just felt like it was earlier that afternoon, but the signs were right there in front of him.

Shaking his head, he tilted forward just enough to rest his forehead against hers. His metal hand still rested on the back of her head but when they went to the ground, his natural one had shifted to rest on her waist. "I remember falling apart and then... then it was like I was pulled back together. Then that weird guy--I don't remember his name, with the big cape-- was opening some kind of portals? It was just a couple of minutes. I'm sorry, Steph. I'm so sorry. I don't want to leave you again."

Five. Years. Bucky was going to need the universe to stop doing this to them, just let them be already. He'd already made up his mind back in the 40s and here he was, almost eighty years later, and he still hadn't had the chance. So why not go ahead and take it before they got ripped away from each other again?

What was it he'd been hearing people say? Fuck it.

Bucky pulled back again, just far enough to look at her beautiful blue eyes. "I love you. I just- I need you to know that, alright?" Even if she didn't feel the same, which he figured she probably didn't, he just needed her to know already.

[dysmorphics]

"Yeah." Five years of pretending she was fine and encouraging the rest of the world to move on while she quietly drowned in her own grief. She'd been out of it for a time that Nat had stepped up to run the Avengers, or what had been left of them anyway.

But Bucky was back now, and even though there were other losses to mourn, the old gaping wound in her heart could at least begin to heal. Whatever she felt for him beyond friendship didn't matter; she would gladly have him by her side only as a friend than lose him again. Maybe that was the sacrifice the universe was demanding from her. Maybe it was time she pay it.

So she fought back the urge to tell him everything, silently promising to let the past stay in the past from now on and to not yearn for more than what she already had. As he rested his forehead against hers she closed her eyes, gently trailing her fingertips down his cheek before letting her hand drop to her lap.

I love you, she thought, as though in farewell—

"What?" She blinked at him in confusion. Did he really just say— "You do?" As a friend, right?

[hadagreatpast]

Bucky couldn't help the small, mostly humorless laugh that came out of him at her reaction. "Course I do, Steph," he said, moving his metal hand to tuck a lock of hair that had come out of her ponytail behind her ear. "You've gotta know that by now. I was never any good at hiding it."

He'd tried. God knew he'd tried to hide it, but it was like most of the people around him just... knew. Back before the war his Ma was always not-so-subtly hinting about wanting him to just marry her already, which ended up just putting too much pressure on things. Plus, she was his best friend. He didn't want to risk that. But then the war happened and as he worried about her nonstop he told himself he was going to tell her after he got home, and that he would make it home just so he could tell her. That's what was going to get him through. But then his capture, then his rescue, then his second capture...

"I'm not trying to pressure you or anything. It's alright if you don't feel the same," he said, trying to play it like it wouldn't tear him apart if she didn't. It absolutely would, but he'd stay by her side as long as she'd let him anyway.

[dysmorphics]

Fuck it.

It's alright if you don't feel the same — like hell she didn't. If anything, that comment of his only pushed her to lean forward and kiss him. What if they never got this chance again? She could bear not having her feelings reciprocated, but she could not bear hurting him, especially after all that he'd been through.

Later, they could make fun of each other for taking too long and being stupid. But for now, as she pulled back from that quick kiss, she whispered, earnestly, "I love you. I always have. I always will. To the end of the line." Now that she'd said it, it really hadn't been at all that hard. What an idiot she had been.

[hadagreatpast]

Steph kissed him. She kissed him. Bucky had been waiting almost a century to feel those lips against him, and while it was quick and not exactly in the most romantic place, it was perfect.

And then she was telling him she loved him and Bucky felt like maybe everything he'd been put through in his whole shitty life had been worth it, just to her her say those words for him. That time when he laughed it was genuinely filled with joy before he leaned in to give her another quick, simple kiss. "It's always been you, Steph," he said, his voice softer and lighter than it had been in a very long time. "No one else ever stood a chance cause it's me and you, to the end of the line."

[dysmorphics]

His laugh was a balm to her broken heart. She found herself laughing then, too, even though more tears were falling out of her eyes at the same time. "I promised I'd bring you home," she said, cupping his cheek with her good hand. "I'm sorry it took so long."

Then and there, she realized this was letting go of the past, too. The missed opportunities, the lost time, her own silly insecurities, none of those mattered anymore, not when he was here, solid and real in her arms, her present and her future. This was the end of the war she'd been looking forward to, the end they'd fought so hard to get to — but not the end of the line, no, not in many years, if she could help it.

She leaned in to rest her forehead against his. Battle fatigue was beginning to catch up with her, her broken left arm throbbing more painfully and her vision blurring a little as she felt a wave of nausea. "Kiss me again?" This wasn't the time or the place for that, really, but at the same time, when and where else? She could no longer wait. Look at what waiting had brought them.

[hadagreatpast]

"I'll kiss you any time you want, sweetheart," Bucky said simply before leaning in to press another short kiss to her lips. But he didn't linger for long, cause he was noticing some of those old tell-tale signs of pushing herself too far and ending up hurting.

"You don't need to apologize," he started as he moved to get his feet under himself and moved more to Steph's side. That flesh and blood arm wrapped around her waist, while he worked his metal one under her knees--not as easy to do when she was sitting with them bent, by the way. Steph was a lot bigger than she was when they were young, taller and less scrawny, but that didn't stop him from scooping her up into his arms as he stood up. "I promised myself I'd tell you I loved you after the war," he pressed a gentle kiss to her forehead then, before starting to look around, trying to figure out which way to go. "Even marry you if you'd let me. Guess I shoulda specified which war, huh?"

[dysmorphics]

After that confession and those kisses and being called sweetheart? Yeah, Steph could walk all this off. In fact, she was so giddy she felt like she could take on Thanos again if she had to.

"I'm fine—" she started to say, waving Bucky off out of habit more than anything, but she didn't actually put up a fight once he'd scooped her up in his arms. He'd done this for her so many times before that she was comfortable enough to let her guard down in his presence. The fighting was over. They were safe now. He was safe, and as long as he was alright, she could let herself rest.

She'd closed her eyes, allowing herself that, but opened them again when he spoke of marriage. That had been one of the things she wanted most back then, but she only wanted it with him, and she thought he deserved better than her. She'd imagined him having to care for her until she inevitably died, sacrificing so much — and for what? He would have been so unhappy, maybe even grow to resent her. She couldn't bear that.

"I would have married you out of high school," she confessed in turn, averting her gaze to a spot on his arm. "But what kind of life would you have had with me? I had nothing. I was nothing." She closed her eyes again. "At least now I'm pretty hard to kill. And I'm really pretty. But also fucked up and claustrophobic and occasionally suicidal." She'd never admitted that last bit to anyone before, despite having grown particularly close with Nat and Sam, but Bucky was her best friend and there shouldn't be any more secrets between them. "And I fucking hate the cold."

[hadagreatpast]

Bucky spotted a direction that it seemed like most other people were heading in and started that way as well before doing a small U-turn. Determined not to put her down, he bent at the knees and hooked a metal finger through an eyehole in her mask, then stood back upright and began walking in that direction again.

Steph's comments made him scoff, though. "Don't be stupid," he said with an eyeroll, keeping her tucked snuggly against him. "If you ever said the word I woulda married you at any point. You've always been everything, Steph. Yeah, you got sick a lot, but you were too stubborn to die, even back then. And I've always thought you were gorgeous, now and then. Besides, I'm a furnace. Except the arm."

But then a couple of her words made his steps stumble slightly, only for a moment, before he was able to right himself and continue walking, his brow scrunched and his eyes turning down to look at her as he moved. "Hang on, go back to the suicidal part."

[dysmorphics]

"I wanted to be your wife, not your charity case." There was a trace of bitterness in her tone, remnants of some old wounds from their youth; she'd learned early that young women could be very unkind, though she wasn't as quick to defend herself as she defended others. As long as Bucky continued to want her around, she took those unpleasant comments in stride, though they chipped at her confidence little by little without her realizing it.

Now she wished she could go back in time and meet that Stephanie Rogers too. Give her a big hug and tell her, "Chin up, he loves you too." But maybe that girl wouldn't have been worthy. Of the serum, of the shield, of Mjolnir. Of him.

You've always been everything. She held on to him a little tighter at that, and hoped he knew that she wasn't letting him go now.

They had other things to talk about first, though. "The Helicarrier?" She hadn't wanted to remind him, but it was relevant. "I'd be dead if you didn't pull me outta the water." She'd meant it then, when she'd told him to kill her and finish his mission. What would've been the point of living, anyway, if he was lost to her?

She became even more adamant not to look at him as she added, "The plane in '45." She sighed. "I think the boys knew. They hovered around me after you... fell. Dernier even set the chaplain after me." She laughed, but it was hollow; for a moment she was back on that mountain, staring down at its icy slopes, waiting for a train. "Then Schmidt was gone and there were bombs in the plane and all I could think was, I could finally see you again."

She turned away, burying her face into his shoulder in shame. Yet at the same time there's an odd sort of relief at having told him, even if he might look at her differently now that he knew.

[hadagreatpast]

Bucky shook his head, eyes forward as he continued to walk. His ankle was killing him, he kept having to step over or around holes or fallen, but he was going to get her somewhere she could be taken care of. So what if he wasn't sure of where that was? "You've never been a charity case. Not to me."

As she explained the rest, though, he couldn't help frowning. The thought of her dying--especially if she took her own life over a broken man like him--was the worst thing he could imagine, so when she tucked her face into his shoulder like that he turned his head to press a kiss to her hair and considered his words.

"First off, don't you dare do anything stupid like that again or so help me," was what he settled on to begin with. Even though, lets be honest here, he was a hypocrite. Even all the way back to when she rescued him from that HYDRA facility, if she had fallen in that fire? He would have jumped after her. He would not have left that building without her, even if he died in the process.

"Secondly," Bucky sighed a bit. "On the helicarrier, and on the bridge and everything before that? You were the only thing that ever broke through. At all. After decades of them messing with my brain. Course I pulled you out of that river, I didn't even know who I was but I sure as shit knew you needed to be safe." In the distance, he could see what almost looked like an old Army med tent, but clearly with much more modern equipment than they ever had back then. "Course they knew. They'd heard for months about the amazing girl I needed to get home to propose to."

[dysmorphics]

"... Oh."

That Bucky had talked about her before she showed up at that HYDRA facility never occurred to her, let alone that he'd implied feeling anything other than friendship for her. She'd always thought the teasing she got was because Dum Dum found out she had a picture of Bucky in her compass and told the others. How could she not have seen it?

"Well, you better not die on me again, or so help me," she huffed. He'd be relieved to know she didn't try anything funny after he got snapped away — but only because she believed she deserved to suffer for her failures, that death would be a reward she didn't earn. Would she have sacrificed herself as Tony did, if she'd gotten to the gauntlet first? Of course she would've.

She winced suddenly and sharply sucked in a breath. Something else hurt, but she couldn't tell what exactly; for now her suit and her emotional state were keeping the rest of her body together. Probably some broken ribs. Probably some internal damage. She hadn't hurt this bad since she fought him on that Helicarrier.

Thankfully, they soon arrived at a med tent of sorts, though even with how awful she felt she insisted on getting him looked at first. "I'm fine, just a fracture," she said, trying to wave off the medic. "Just maybe some water, if you've got any."

[hadagreatpast]

"Oh, she says," Bucky half-mutters to himself as he gently places Steph on the closest open stretcher and rolls those eyes, then presses a kiss to her forehead before standing up. Very obviously limping, he walked over and grabbed a nearby chair before pulling it over beside the stretcher and sitting down. They weren't going to be separated again, dammit.

But then Steph was trying to say she was fine. "Nope. No," he said quickly. "I'm fine, just a couple scrapes and a rolled ankle. She is clearly a concussed idiot who should not be listened to. Tried to fistfight a giant grape." Bucky was just going to ignore the fact that now that he was seated and she had a doctor in front of her, he was starting to feel more and more pains. Those weren't important.

[dysmorphics]

She smiled to herself as he dragged the chair next to the stretcher and reached out to run her good hand through his hair once he was seated. Maybe it was to be sure that he was still there, that she wasn't making this all up in her head, that it was okay to touch him now that they'd established what they truly meant to each other.

Then her fingers caught something, and she frowned. Drawing her hand back, she confirmed it was what she thought it was: blood. The dumbass had a head wound and didn't even realize it. Was that because of his old programming, all that training to not feel pain, or was he just being an idiot?

She tuned back to his conversation with the doctor just in time to hear him call her a 'concussed idiot' who 'tried to fistfight a giant grape'. It was funny, actually, but her concern trumped it and she huffed. "Says the dumbass bleeding from the head," she retorted, holding up her fingers to show to the doctor. "Don't trust what he says. He's probably bleeding elsewhere." So was she, probably, only it wouldn't be obvious because of the color of her suit.

[hadagreatpast]

Bucky was about to argue with her about the head wound, too, until he turned and saw his fingers for himself. "Huh." Frowning, he reached up to touch where she had touched and yep, it was wet with blood, but running her fingers over his scalp didn't reveal any large gashes or anything.

"It's probably just a small cut. I'm fine, sweetheart," he started, pulling his hand out of his hair to... well, he wiped his hand on his pant leg. They weren't exactly in pristine condition anyway. "Any kind of cut on the head always bleeds more than people think it will. You know that."

Reaching up, Bucky snagged the hand that she'd slid through his hair, not caring that it had his blood on it, then pulled it down so he could press a kiss to the back of it, before turning back to the doctor. "She wasn't even standing when I found her. Check her first." He played with her fingers a bit as he spoke, just happy to be able to do something like that, then turned his head to look at Steph. "You get checked first, I'll get checked after you, alright?"

What Bucky didn't notice was the slight look of amusement on the doctor's face as she looked back and forth between the bickering pair, but at least he did hear when she said they sounded like an old married couple.

[dysmorphics]

If he was trying to stop her from arguing with him by distracting her, it was working. She was particularly caught off-guard by how easily he'd made the transition. The casual use of sweetheart instead of her name, the little kisses, playing with her fingers. She'd thought he might have issues with touching or being touched, after everything, or that he'd want to keep things quiet for whatever reason.

"Okay," she relented. At any other time, she could and would argue with him all day, but it didn't feel like a particularly good use of their time — and they'd wasted so much of it already. That, and she was feeling rather out of sorts, which she admitted to in a roundabout way by asking, "Help me with my suit, please?"

The doctor looked even more amused by that, before saying something about giving them some privacy and excusing herself. Steph wouldn't have minded, long having gotten used to being wrapped in hospital gowns and examined by doctors, but she appreciated the discretion. Not because she didn't want anyone seeing and reporting that Captain America wasn't doing so great, but because she was suddenly self-conscious about her body. Bucky had never really seen this one before, or at least not like that.

[hadagreatpast]

Bucky nodded at the doctor as she left, then stood and moved to stand in front of Steph, clearly favoring one leg over the other. He chewed his lip a bit as he gently started unbuckling her shield from where it was still strapped to her obviously injured arm, trying not to jostle her too much.

But once that was set aside, he paused for a minute. Throughout their lives, he'd seen her in all sorts of states of undress and even helped her himself when she was sick a few of those times, propriety be damned. But that was before she knew what she meant to him. "Do you- Do you want me to help you with your suit or do you want me to get you the doctor?" It definitely wasn't that he didn't want to see her or anything, but more that he didn't want her to feel uncomfortable or pressured or anything. "I'll do whatever you want, Steph." Ever the respectful man from the 40s.

[dysmorphics]

"I want you," she answered, a dark flush coloring her paler than usual face; she meant that more than just helping her with the suit, too. She was no prude — a few years in the Army, back when it was mostly men, would do that to you — but she'd never actually been with anyone. Tony and Nat used to tease her about it and her old-fashioned sensibilities, but it hadn't even been about that. She just hadn't been interested. Everyone else only saw the body the serum gave her, not who she truly was, so why even bother?

"You've seen me in much less. It's fine." He'd even slept on her bed those times she was sick, and during those too cold winter nights in her rundown apartment. They'd also shared a tent on several occasions back during the war, when the nightmares and the horrors got too much and they needed a reminder that they weren't alone. This really wasn't that much different. Besides, it wasn't like she wasn't wearing anything under the suit, or that they were going to do something indecent. She wanted to, but sure as hell not in a med tent.

[hadagreatpast]

Bucky nodded again before reaching out to begin unhooking things for her. "Alright. Just didn't want things to be weird for you or anything." He would never want anything to be awkward for her if he could help it. But one of the big plus sides of being friends with her for so long was that he usually knew what was alright and what wasn't. Just because she was physically stronger now than she used to be didn't mean he was going to stop trying to look out for her.

As he got further into trying to get the suit off of her, though, he couldn't help chuckling a little. "You might have to direct me some here. Why'd you get such a complicated suit? Mine's just a jacket and some pants." And a couple belts but still, it was nothing compared to this thing.

[dysmorphics]

"What's weird is I don't gotta hold back now," she admitted with a quiet laugh, catching and squeezing his flesh hand. She wasn't complaining though. After all, she'd only wanted this since they were teenagers. She could still remember the moment: when he took her Coney Island for her 15th birthday and convinced her to ride the Cyclone. He held her hair while she threw up in a trash can afterward, then she punched his arm because he was the worst, and as he hugged her in apology, she thought that she would do it again, if he asked. She would do anything he asked.

Except stay in Brooklyn while he went off to die in the war. She'd figured she was going to die eventually anyway — and her health had been in a state of decline after he'd left, not that she ever told him — so she might as well go out there and die with him. Thankfully, neither of them were really dead, but she gave his hand another squeeze just to be sure.

Then he commented on her suit, and she laughed. "Tony is as bad as Howard in making practical gear." Was, she mentally corrected a second later, but didn't say it out loud, just swallowed back the lump in her throat. She turned her gaze to the fabric around her left forearm, where Tony had seamlessly attached some electromagnets so she didn't need to strap on the shield all the time. "I think this was his backhanded attempt to get me to agree to some armor, or a petty payback for Siberia." Her voice broke at the end then, that particular loss hitting her now too. Fuck, Tony was dead.

It should've been me, she thought, before feeling a strange sort of guilt wash over her at her relief that it wasn't her.