#Bucky also doesn't know how to deal with Tony and it shows

[mrsbarnesblog]

Push him

masterlist ko-fi ao3

Avenger! Bucky Barnes x PR manager! Reader

Summary: When you became Avenger’s PR manager, you basically got your dream job, but one particular man, who had been staring at you every single time you were around, made you wonder whether it was because he hated or liked you.

Word count: 6.8K

Warnings: smut, bucky is obsessed with your short skirts, bucky is recovering, grumpy x sunshine, good friend natasha romanoff, office sex, oral sex (f), unprotected sex, creampie, dirty talk, pet names

Author's note: ‼️so if you haven't seen my previous post, this is my new account. you may have seen this work on my old one (@inmyicyworld) but it was terminated and @support doesn't respond to me. please, follow and share this work. I'm going to reupload all of my old fanfics and hope to get your support ❤️

The work at the Avengers Tower wasn’t what you expected it to be. Tony Stark found you while you were working for another company a little bit more than a month ago. He was amazed by the way you were dealing with problems, by your charisma, and by your ability to find a common language with everyone. That’s how he knew that he had to have you as his partner and a part of the team.

The next day, you got a call directly from Tony, asking you to quit your job and accept his offer to work as Avenger’s PR manager. It would be an understatement to say that your jaw dropped to the floor when you heard your salary.

He said that you were totally worth it and that working with a group of such different people was not easy, but he was sure that you would be perfect at this. So on that exact day, you decided to take a risk and accept the challenge.

One thing that you hated about your previous job was the strict dress code. It was simply far from your style because you hated wearing the same basic and boring clothes every day. Tony said that it was the last thing that he cared about, and in that building, no one was obligated to wear certain clothes.

You knew that it was your lucky ticket.

He was actually really friendly and funny in person. You talked a lot during your first day while he was showing you all the necessary places in the tower: your office, his lab, common rooms and kitchens, avenger’s rooms, and even a beautiful garden on the roof. By the way, Tony allowed you to decorate your office however you wanted and gave you the number of the person who was responsible for this.

In short, it was perfect.

You were giddy with excitement on your first actual day of work. According to the plan, you had to meet with the Avengers and then arrange a few meetings for Tony.

It felt like you spent hours before your mirror deciding what to wear. Your whole room was a mess, and when you finally completed your look, which consisted of a short black skirt, beige long sleeve and a brown leather jacket on top, it was already time to go.

Everyone in the room heard you before they saw you because of the sound of your heels clicking on the wood floor.

“Don’t tell me that this is our PR manager, Stark.” Black Widow looked you up and down with a smirk on her face. “You look good, hun. Finally, someone with a taste in this boring group of losers, besides me and Wanda, of course.”

“Hi.” You nicely smiled, not ready to get a compliment as soon as you stepped into the room.

“Ohh, she’s also the sweet one.” Another red-headed woman, Wanda, said with a smile.

“You both, shut up.” Tony stood up from the armchair with a pack of chips in one hand and threw the other one over your shoulder. “Want some?” He asked you, showing the food, but you slightly shook your head. “Whatever… Now, you all listen here, this is Y/N; she’s our new PR manager. I stole her from someone because she’s incredibly smart and good at her job. Starting from this moment, she’s going to cover up your asses and organize all this stupid media stuff.” You blushed at his words but were still silent. “So, this is Natasha, Wanda, Steve, Bucky, and Th—wait, you already know them, right?”

“Yeah, of course I do.” You chuckled. “By the way, it’s nice to meet all of you. I hope we can work together, and I will have a chance to be helpful.” You took a look at all the Avengers in the room, and everyone looked at you with a smile except one person, whose eyes sent shivers down your spine.

When you looked at Bucky, you saw that his eyes were scanning your body with an unreadable expression, and you suddenly felt really weird in your short skirt. Your eyes met, and his famous death stare was really quite scary. He didn’t like you? You two were staring at each other for a few seconds, and you believe that the rest of the team noticed it because Steve loudly cleared his throat to get your attention.

He asked you a few questions about you, and Clint and Sam made a few jokes. Everything was fine as you all chatted for a little bit until Tony said that everyone should get ready for tomorrow’s mission, and you too have a lot to do.

You went back to your office only with the thought that, during this whole time, Bucky was staring at you like he wanted to burn a hole in your head.

Later that day, Bucky was sitting at the kitchen island with a cup of already-cold coffee while Steve was making himself dinner. It was quiet besides the sound of the cooking food, or at least Bucky didn’t listen to Steve’s words because he was too deep in his thoughts.

Well, he was mostly thinking about you and his mixed feelings about this interaction. As soon as you walked into the room, you had his whole attention. He couldn’t help but stare at your body, at your open legs, and at your smiley face. He knew that he sounded like a total creep and that it was inappropriate to look at other people this way, but he had never seen women dress this way. Was it normal right now? Was it new fashion trends or something? The only women that he had been interacting with for the past few years were women from Wakanda, and in the tower it was mostly Nat and Wanda, and he had never seen them dress like that. Or, at least, he just didn’t care enough to notice it.

When he saw you today, he felt something in him, and he didn’t like that feeling. It was something new, something that he had never experienced before, but his body became tense and his stomach tightened. It was weird.

“What, you're still trying to process her?” He was distracted from his thoughts by Sam, who came to the kitchen to grab a bottle of cold water from the fridge. Bucky looked at him and furrowed his brows when he saw a shitty smirk.

“What the fuck are you talking about? And why are you smiling like an idiot?” Bucky growled.

“Because you’re thinking about Y/N.” His words caught Steve’s attention, and he came closer.

“That’s why you two were staring at each other like that?” Steve said this while drying his hands with a towel. “Do you like her? I think she seems cute.”

“No, I don’t. She just looks... different.”

“Oh, the old man got excited by the beautiful woman and her short skirt.” Sam’s smile got even wider as he started teasing Bucky. “You know, I wanted to ask her out, but I can take a step back if you like her.” He leaned on the table so he could get under Bucky’s skin even more.

“I do not like her.”

“So you’re okay if I ask her out? Maybe I should go to her office right now.” Sam pretended like he was really thinking about this.

“Sam...” Steve said.

“You both are just getting on my fucking nerves.” Bucky’s chair almost fell to the floor when he angrily stood up. “Do whatever the fuck you want, I don’t care about you or her.” With these words, he stormed out of the room, and Sam started to laugh out loud.

“You didn’t have to do that, you know?” Steve shook his head like a disappointed mother whose kids always fight.

“That was fun, and maybe it’ll push him to ask her out. She’s hot, but not my type; I’m just trying to help this idiot.”

You have been working with the Avengers for over a month now. This work was literally a dream from any angle. You were making a lot of money, doing the job that you really liked, and found a lot of close friends.

Almost everyone on the team was very close to you. Natasha and Wanda were particularly your best friends. Sam was the funniest person you’ve ever met, and he always found time to tease you or to make a compliment. Bruce and Clint were like your uncles—a little bit old and annoying, but always with a piece of advice for you. A few times, you and Steve met at the gym when you came to work too early, so he was happy to train with you. Who would’ve thought that Captain America himself would teach you how to throw a punch?

The only pain in your ass was Bucky Barnes. Well, to be fair, he didn’t do anything. You’re not even sure that you heard his voice. He was always just staring. Any time that you came to the room and he was there, you either saw him from the corner of your eyes or felt his burning gaze on your back.

To this day, you had no problems with your job. You organized a few interviews for Tony and Steve, talked to the newspapers and magazines, and held some meetings, but right now, sitting on your white chair, you felt weirdly nervous.

Bucky had to come here any minute to talk about a recent accident. Apparently, he almost knocked out someone on the street. All the press and news sources were taking advantage of the situation and using loud headlines to cast a shadow on Bucky and get more views. “The Winter Soldier is back?”. “The Winter Soldier almost killed an innocent man on the street.”

It has been the biggest topic on the internet for the past few hours. Most of the people were furious and wrote too many inappropriate and rude things. So you asked FRIDAY to call Bucky so you could know the whole situation and give comments to the press as soon as possible.

You started thinking about what you should do, or, to be more honest, how to behave around Bucky, because a few days ago two red-headed women that you now considered your best friends assured you that he is in love with you and just doesn't know what to do with it.

You told them everything about his weird actions—that he always looked at you, checked your clothes, and stayed silent. Natasha and Wanda just looked at each other with smirks on their faces.

“Why are you looking at each other like that?” You arched an eyebrow and crossed your hands across your chest.

“Please, don't tell me that you don't understand his behavior.” Natasha looked at you and sipped her coffee.

Well, I wouldn’t have asked you if I knew the reason.”

“Honey, he lust likes you and thinks that you’re hot. You remember that he’s actually an old man, right? Women from his time didn’t dress like that, and you look really sexy.” Wanda’s words made Nat nod her head as you looked weirdly at both of them.

“That’s bullshit, Wanda. This can’t be true. I'm sure that he just doesn’t like me and thinks that I look too revealing. Or he just hadn’t had a girlfriend in a long time.”

“Some time ago, I came to the kitchen at like 2 a.m. just in my lingerie because I thought everyone was asleep. Barnes was sitting there with a book, and you know what? He just said “Hi” and didn’t even look at me again while I was making a sandwich. And when he sees you, he just can’t take his eyes away and stares like an idiot.”

You stayed silent, thinking about the girls' words, because everything seemed pretty reasonable.

“And what should I do?”

“I don’t know, seduce him or something.” Natasha just casually said it, and your eyebrows flew to your hairline.

“Wait, do you like him?” Wanda asked you, and Natasha huffed like it was obvious.

“I mean… he’s beautiful. I didn’t have a chance to talk to him, but Steve and Sam love him, and I trust their opinion.” You stopped trying to put together your thoughts. “To be honest, sometimes I think about the fact that he’s probably one of the hottest people I’ve ever seen. When we studied history at school, all the girls fell in love with America's Boy, and I with his best friend.”

“Then don’t wait. Just give him some hints, because I swear, for the ladies’ man, he’s too slow.” Natasha’s words made you smile. “Try to get closer to him; I don’t know, flash him with your boobs and look at the reaction. Push him a little bit. He’ll break.”

The loud knock on the door almost made you jump out of your chair.

“Come in.” You said this as you stood up and fixed your white dress and cardigan.

Bucky came probably to the lightest and most cozy room in the whole tower. A lot of white and pastel colors, comfy sofa and armchairs, and paintings on the wall. And in the middle of this was you—always perfectly looking, in heels, in a too-short dress, and with a smile on your face. He couldn't stop himself from looking at the smooth skin of your legs. It’s probably so soft...

“Em– Hi.” You awkwardly stood while his eyes were scanning your body. He didn’t answer; he just nodded. “So I think that we can sit there, it’s more comfortable.” You wave your hand at the sofa with a fluffy cover on it. “Do you want anything? Tea, coffee, water, soda?” Bucky just shook his head while he was trying to comfortably sit with a frown on his face.

You deeply inhaled while trying to be a professional. You didn’t know what was wrong with this man, but his behavior started to get on your nerves.

“Bucky, we can’t work together if you keep ignoring me. You can say if you don’t like something, because I don’t want to be on bad terms with anyone.” You sat across from him and crossed your legs.

“I don’t know what I should say.” His deep voice filled the room. Bucky took a pillow that was lying near him and started playing with the fringe. “I feel weird when I’m around you, and I don’t like it. I have thoughts that I shouldn’t have.” His eyes scanned your body once again, and you wondered if he was talking about what you thought.

“Can I do something to change it?”

“No.” He deeply inhaled. “It’s my own problem, and it’s not your job to try to fix it. Anyway, why am I here?”

“I think you know why. I need to ask you about the recent incident because I have a meeting with the press in less than an hour, and I have to give them a good reason why you did that. People didn’t take all that information too well.” You saw that Bucky sadly smiled and looked you directly in the eyes, making goosebumps appear on your skin. “So, tell me what’s happened.”

“You know that whatever you say won’t change people’s opinions about me, right? No one forgave me, and they’re still looking for a chance to call me a murderer.” He tried to hide behind a smile, but you saw everything written in his eyes. Bucky hurt himself with his own words.

“I understand how you feel about this whole situation, but we should address all those rumors because things might get worse.” You leaned on your knees with your hands, and Bucky’s eyes immediately fell on your boobs.

Push him a little bit. He’ll break.

You tried to hold back a smirk.

“Fuck.” He mumbled. “ I– um– I was walking from the coffee shop to the tower. It was another busy street with hundreds of people, but I still didn’t expect someone to touch me. That man jumped on my back or something, and my instincts just worked. I threw him over myself on the ground and put a hand on his throat. Turned out he wanted to take a picture. But I panicked because there are many people who want to take revenge and who might want to do it literally any second. I’m always ready for this.” He shrugged like it was nothing, but you could hear the pain in his voice.

You felt deeply sorry for the man before you. Even if he was cold and acted weird around you, you knew that it was his way to protect himself. After everything he came through, you couldn’t blame him.

“Do you still go to the therapist?” You gently asked.

“Yes, two times a week.” Bucky nervously ran his right hand through his hair while still holding your pillow in the metal one.

“Okay, that’s good; I can work with this information.” You nodded and reached for your journal on the coffee table. “Thank you for sharing this with me, Bucky. I really appreciate it. I’ll do my best to convince people that it was not your fault, okay?”

“Thank you, Y/N.” Bucky stood up, carefully putting your pillow in its place, and left your office without another word, while you were sitting there with a smile.

Maybe the girls were right.

After that day, everything between you and Bucky became even weirder. Yes, he wasn’t totally silent now, and you’ve got a few “Hi”, but his stares felt different.

It was like you two were playing some kind of game. Since you knew that he didn’t actually hate you, you tried to do as Natasha and Wanda said—get his attention and push more. And God, you loved that game.

Almost every day you found an opportunity or excuse to see him in common rooms or in the corridors of the Tower, and you made sure that Bucky noticed you. You wore tighter clothes, walked right past him, and looked at him with a smile. You knew that it was working because a few times Bucky just suddenly left the room while he was mumbling something.

It was almost 8 p.m., but you were still working on schedule for the next week. There was some kind of charity event, and Tony required you to convince everyone to go there because more Avengers can attract more sponsors and money. As always, Bucky was the one who refused to go there. He simply sees no reason for him to be there, and he doesn’t want to be there alone because he knows that Captain America will be the biggest star, and such a social butterfly as Sam will leave him in a second.

You decided that it would be better to talk to Bucky in person, but you didn’t want to lose a chance to get his attention, so you went by yourself instead of asking FRIDAY.

You looked in the small mirror to check your makeup and hair and went straight to where you knew Bucky was spending his evening. As you walked in a dark room filled with only light from the TV, you saw Sam and Steve sitting on the couch and Bucky on the armchair near them. You quietly walk to him and just casually sit on the armrest. His eyebrows flew to his hairline, and you heard that the chewing from the boys stopped. Bucky had no choice but to put his metal arm on your lower back.

“I need you in my office. You have to talk about the next charity event. Could you please give me some of your time?” You quietly asked and lowered yourself closer to him. Bucky was just staring at you for a few seconds, but then slightly nodded.

Bucky followed you to your office, not without getting smirks from the boys,and then stood near your table with his hands in his pockets.

“Don’t you want to sit?” You said and stepped closer to him.

“No.”

“Um– okay.” You took the papers from your table and stood in front of Bucky. “So, you know that there is going to be a charity event, and I’m responsible for getting all the Avengers there, and you are one of them.”

“I’m not going, I already told Tony.” He just shrugged.

“Why not?”

“Because I’m not needed there. I’m not an actual hero, people have no interest in me, especially when there will be Iron Man, Captain America, and Thor, you know? Plus, I have no interest in sitting alone the whole night.” You saw that Bucky tried to be casual about it, but he just put salt on his own wound.

“Don’t say that, Bucky. There are people who want to see you there, you have a lot of fans. You know, I’m going there too, so if you don't mind, we can–”

“What game are you playing with me?” He interrupted you. Bucky straightened his shoulders, which made him look even bigger, and started moving closer to you, putting you in a trap between him and your desk.

“W– what do you mean?” You couldn't control your body as you started to tremble a little bit from the power that this man had. As soon as you bumped into the table, his hands landed on both sides of you, and his face was right in front of yours.

“Don’t act clueless, Y/N. I see what you’re doing.” He stopped for a second, studying your face. “You know, I tried to convince myself that you do all of this by accident, but now I’m sure that you’re just playing your little game. Am I right, doll?” You two were staring at each other, and you felt almost nauseous from different emotions.

He was so fucking beautiful up close. Piercing blue eyes, pink lips, and light stubble You know why many women thought that James Barnes was charming. If he had more confidence, he would’ve been unstoppable.

Your eyes slowly shifted lower to his arms and chest as you remained silent. He was big, with well-trained muscles that were seen through the tight black t-shirt. Both arms were stretched near you, so you had a really good opportunity to look at the smooth tanned skin and beautiful dark vibranium. You felt how your lower stomach tightened just from the thought of getting those pretty hands on your body…

You were pulled out of your head by a sudden movement of Bucky’s hand, which gripped your face and pushed your lips together. He was obviously dominating in the kiss, as if he were desperate to taste you. The tip of his tongue brushed over your lips, asking for entrance, which you happily gave him. The moan came out of you when Bucky moved away and looked you in the eyes, still holding your face.

“This whole fucking time I thought that I was a creep for looking at you, but now I know that you did everything on purpose, doll.” His eyes moved between your eyes and mouth. “All these short skirts and dresses that almost showed me everything underneath it, all these innocent smiles and looks... You did it to tease me?”

“Not at first...” You mumbled. “But you were acting so weird, and girls said that you liked me and just didn’t know what to do. I wanted to find out whether it was true or not.”

“Fuck, if I knew earlier that this was your plan, I would’ve bent you over the nearest surface, baby.” Bucky moved a little closer, brushing his lips over yours. “Do you know how fucking hot and gorgeous you are? I haven’t felt that way in many, many years. Just wanna kiss you and make you mine.”

“And what’s stopping you from this, Sargent?” You asked with a smile and moved your hand to the back of his neck to gently play with the baby hairs.

“You’re gonna be my death, doll face.” He mumbled before leaning closer and kissing you again.

This time, you started to touch each other's bodies. Bucky’s warm and cold hands landed on your thighs, playing with the hem of the skirt and rubbing your soft skin after he lifted you up a little bit and helped you sit on the table, staying in between your legs. Your own hands were moving up and down his broad chest, discovering all of his muscles.

“Bucky…” You whined into the kiss when his finger brushed against the edge of your already wet panties.

“Tell me.” Bucky moved away from your swollen lips and left a path of kisses down your neck. “Tell me what you want, and I’ll give it to you.” He sucked a sensitive spot under your ear, which made you moan.

“I don’t know. Just do anything, please.” You both breathed heavily. You felt like you were too hot; your lower stomach ached, and your underwear was soaking wet. Bucky was looking at you with such lust in his eyes that you wanted him to destroy you.

“Lay back.” He ordered you as one of his hands went higher under your skirt and slid your black lace panties down your legs. You didn’t miss how Bucky shoved him into the back pocket of his jeans with a smirk on his face.

You quickly followed his instructions and just threw all the papers from our table on the floor. You’ll regret it later, but now you don't care. The sudden move of Bucky's metal arm grabbed and pulled your shirt, and all the buttons scattered on the floor, making you gasp in disbelief.

“Bucky! It was expensive.”

“Sorry, I’ll buy you whatever you want, I promise. But now I need to see you all.” He growled and fell to his knees before you. “Fuck, doll, such a pretty pussy. I’m gonna make a mess with her.”

Bucky’s hands grabbed both of your legs and threw them over his shoulders. He dragged your skirt higher, not wanting to take it off of you. His head fell on your right legs as he left a few kisses on your sensitive skin.

“Bucky please! Don’t tease me!” You desperately whined.

“I need a moment to appreciate both of you. I haven’t done it since the 40's, you know that?”

You wanted to say something, but his mouth on your most delicate part of your body left you speechless and made you grab his hair. Bucky’s tongue was gentle at first, just to get a taste of you and tease you a little bit. His tongue started to play with your clit, circling it and applying different pressures to find out what made your body twitch. It looked like he was enjoying it too; you felt deep grunts escaping his mouth as he was trying to catch every drop that came out of you.

Your loud moans filled the room as Bucky found the perfect place and made motions that made you see stars. A hand in his hair tightened even more when you felt one of his fingers at your entrance.

“M-hm, so wet and tight for me.” He pulled away a little bit, looking at how his two fingers came in and out of you, all shiny with your juices. His darkened eyes were firmly glued to your pussy, which was trying to get more, and his mouth opened a little bit at the sight. “Taking my fingers like a good girl.” Bucky attacked you with his mouth again. This time he was licking your folds, mixing his saliva with your juices. When the feeling of his nose touching your bundle of nerves came through your whole body, you gripped Bucky’s dark locks even harder, particularly trying to ride his face, and he had to put his metal hand on your hips so you wouldn’t move.

Your body tensed when he curled his fingers right on your g-spot, sucking your clit like a hungry man.

“Bucky—fuck, fuck, fuck! I’m gonna cum, please don’t stop!” You whined with tears running down your face.

A few more movements of his magical mouth, and you fell over the edge. Your legs tightened around his head, tingles went all over your body, and the loudest moan mixed with Bucky’s name came out of you as you were riding on the wave of your orgasm.

Bucky didn’t stop, though.

He made sure to lick every drop that came out of you, to the point that you had to beg him to stop because you were too sensitive.

“That was—“ You were trying to catch a breath. “That was the best orgasm I've ever had, oh my god. If you did it for the first time in like seventy years, I can’t imagine what you can do with practice.”

Bucky dragged you up by your neck, so you would be at the same level with him. His hand moved your hips closer to the edge of the table, and you felt how hard he was through those jeans.

“I can practice whenever you’ll allow me, doll.” He put his warm hand on your face to kiss you. The taste of your own release on his tongue made you moan.

“Need you inside of me, please.” Your hands automatically started to pull up his shirt, but he stopped you.

“We don’t have to take it off if you don’t want to.”

You were silent for a few seconds. “Why wouldn’t I want to take your shirt off?”

“You know, my arm and scars...”

“Do you really think that I care about it?” You left a few kisses on his cheek. “I think that your arm is hot, by the way, and I want to feel your skin on mine, Sarge.” It was enough for Bucky to pull off his shirt and stay before you half-naked.

Your hands moved to trace every muscle, every birthmark, and every scar on his chest, and you felt that this moment was so intimate, especially because of Bucky’s stare. He looked at you with such adoration and softness that you wanted to melt.

“You’re amazing, you know that?” He mumbled and kissed you with even more passion.

Bucky ripped off the rest of your shirt and quickly took off your matching black bra, gripping your breasts with both hands and taking your left nipple in his hot mouth.

You dug nails into Bucky’s back as he was sucking and licking your nipples, leaving them wet in the cold air. It felt good. So fucking good—his mouth was truly amazing. But the emptiness inside of you was almost painful, and you were clenching around nothing.

“Bucky! Sarge, please, I need you.” You almost cried and dragged his head by the hair back to your mouth.

“Baby, baby, wait– “ His hot breath was touching your lips, but he stopped your hands, which were unbuckling his belt. “Baby, I don’t have a condom. Fuck, do you have one?”

“We don’t have to use it... I’m on the pill. And I’m clean.” Your legs wrapped tighter around Bucky’s waist and put him closer to your naked core. He swore that he could feel your heat through his jeans and boxers.

“Fuck, I love twenty-first century... I’m clean too, can’t even catch a disease with this serum shit.”

His words were like a green light to you. You didn’t want to wait even a second more. So you just took off his pants with such speed and impatience that it made Bucky chuckle. With the last movement, all of his clothes were on the floor, and you sat on your table, frozen because of the sight before you.

Bucky’s thick and perfectly long dick was the best fucking thing that you’ve ever seen. Pink and a little bit curled to his abdomen. Your mouth watered just thinking about tasting it. Or how well he’ll stretch you out. You didn’t even notice how your mouth opened a little bit, and you unconsciously wrapped your hand around him.

“You’re gonna destroy me, Bucky.” You mumbled, to which you heard only a deep chuckle. Your eyes moved back to Bucky’s smiley face.

“I hope so.”

Two different hands landed on your thighs again, spreading and lifting them up. You both looked down at where his cock almost touched your bare folds, and the first contact made you moan loudly. Bucky took the base of his cock, giving himself a few pumps, and moved the tip up and down your pussy, moving easily because of the mixture of your juices.

You grabbed his forearm and whined at the action.

“Ready, doll?” He was trying to be tough and strong, but you saw how he nervously licked his lips, the tremble of his flesh hand, and the tension in his abdomen. But you still vigorously nodded.

It was different from everything you’ve ever experienced. He was big but tried to be as gentle as possible, not wanting to hurt you. He only pushed a few inches, but you already wanted to cry from all the feelings inside of you. Pain mixed with extreme pleasure.

Bucky was trying so hard to control his motions and go slow, but God, it wasn’t easy. From the first touch of his cock, it felt like he had gone to heaven. He knew that sex was good, he remembers it, but the feeling of you and your warm body that so gracefully greeted him inside made him feral. Bucky felt such a need to kiss you that it was almost painful, especially when your swollen lips were a few inches away from his.

He leaned in closer to your lips, but it made him slip deeper into you, which made you both loudly moan into each other's mouths.

“Fuck– doll, you’re so warm and tight, oh my god.” Bucky mumbled as the grip on your hips became harder. It’ll probably leave bruises, but you didn’t care.

The feeling of him inside of you was overwhelming. He was so deep and stretched you just the way that you wanted, and you almost cried from pleasure.

“Please, Bucky, please move!”

His hips slightly moved once, and it felt like his mood instantly changed. You were suddenly pushed back on your table, and your legs, still in heels, were thrown on Bucky’s shoulders. His metal hand stayed on your thigh, and the other one fell on your stomach to push your skirt higher on your waist.

“All dressed up for me, baby.” He started slowly moving, burying his cock deep inside, and then leaving only the tip to tease you. “You know how long I wanted to do that, huh? Bend you over and just fuck the shit out of you until you can’t say anything except for my name.”

“Bucky– Sarge, please go faster. Just fuck me, do whatever you want.” You were desperate, yes. But you couldn't help but beg, because you really needed him to keep his promise and fuck the shit out of you.

You reached for his hand on your stomach and interlaced your fingers together.

“If you keep calling me that, I won’t last too long, doll.” His thrusts became harder and faster as your body moved up and down on your table.

Bucky was looking at your drunk-looking face with a slightly open mouth because you couldn’t keep your moans quiet. Your hair was deshiveled, your skin glimmered with sweat, and it was the hottest thing he had ever seen.

“So beautiful, baby.” Bucky murmured, fucking you harder. The room was filled with loud noises from slapping skin and moans. “You love it when I talk to you like that, huh? Want me to tell you what a good girl you are?” His words definitely did something to you, and you unconsciously tightened around him. “Almost choking my cock, baby, fu-u-ck.”

“Mhm, Sargent, I’m so full of you.” You couldn’t see straight as the tip of his head pressed at the perfect spot with every thrust, it was too much and not enough at the same time.

The wet kisses on the inner side of your thigh sent shivers down your whole body when Bucky started to suck tender skin. His rough movement didn’t stop for a moment, and you knew that your orgasm was getting closer. The warm feeling in your belly slowly became bigger. It was hard for you to cum from sex, but Bucky did it so fast and without even touching your clit.

“C’mon, doll face. I feel ‘ya. Feel how your perfect little pussy is squeezing me. Cum with me, baby, cum on my cock.” His movements were still rough and confident, but you felt the slightest change in the way he was looking at you, how his body trembled a little bit, and the prettiest quiet noises escaped his mouth as Bucky was coming to his own end.

You were completely lost in your pleasure, with strong arms on your body and Bucky’s hard cock that was completely destroying you, so when fingers on your clit started to move in circles, your body slightly jolted up from your table.

“Bucky, Bucky, please—ohmygod, I’m coming!” You cried out loud and grabbed the hard wood under your arms.

“O-oh, fuck, doll, cum with me, please. Yes, squeeze my cock harder, make a mess. ‘M gonna cum.” With the last few pushes of his dick inside of you and movements of the fingers, you both fell from your heights, and the room filled with loud moans of pleasure. The feeling of his hot seed on your walls almost made you faint.

Bucky fell down on your body as your leg slipped from his shoulder. Two strong arms wrapped around you, and Bucky’s face nuzzled into your neck. You don’t know how long you two stayed silent, trying to catch a breath, while your hands gently rubbed Bucky’s back.

When he finally lifted himself up with a metal arm near your face on the table, the look in his eyes sent millions of butterflies to your stomach.

“I don’t even know what to say…” He chuckled and cupped your face with his right hand. “You look so fucking beautiful, Y/N.”

“Even when my makeup, my hair, and my clothes are completely destroyed?” You playfully arched an eyebrow and enjoyed the feeling of his fingers on your hot skin.

“Well, I did it, and I’m satisfied with it. You still look so hot, especially with my dick still inside of you.”

“Bucky!”

“Sorry, sorry. But I’m serious, though. Will you let me take you on a date? Maybe yesterday for lunch or for dinner after work?” His eyes had this little bit of doubt, and you couldn’t stop your wide smile because he was really thinking that you would say “no” after that.

“I will be glad to go out with you, Buck.” You dragged his face closer and gave him the sweetest kiss you could.

Bucky moved away, gently slipping out of you, and you hissed at the empty feeling. He helped you stand up on your shaking legs and handed you your clothes.

“Fuck, you completely destroyed my clothes.” You said as you were standing in front of the mirror. “How will I go home?”

“You can stay in my room.” Bucky came closer to you and helped you make your blouse look more presentable, even without buttons.

“Really?”

“Of course, doll. Just hold your shirt in case we bump into someone in the corridor, but I think everyone is already in their rooms.” Bucky finished dressing up, and you saw your underwear sticking out of his pocket.

“Don’t you want to give me my panties?”

“Na-ah, you’ll have to walk with me dripping out of you.” He gave you a cocky smile and turned all the lights off before wrapping his arm around you and leading you into the hall.

It was completely empty, but the second that you stepped out of the elevator, you saw Bucky’s best friends looking at you. All of you were looking at each other for a few seconds before Sam started hysterically laughing.

“You owe me fifty bucks, idiot!” He said to Steve, who was as red as a tomato. “Good job, Buckaroo, but I really thought that we were gonna ask her on a date first.”

“Fuck off, Willson.” Bucky growled, protectively stepping forward to protect you from their looks.

“Okay, okay, relax, no one’s touching your girl.” He said with a cocky smile on his face. “Let’s go, Steve. You’re too innocent to look at things like this.” Sam took his friend and led him in another direction.

“Asshole.” Bucky growled.

“Everything is okay, Buck, let’s go.” You stepped closer to his room, but he was still standing in his place. “I have to take a shower. Will you come with me, or will you stand here the whole night?” You smirked.

It was everything he needed to finally get closer to you, scoop you into his arms, and carry you into his room to the sound of laughter, which soon turned into moans.

[shieldslinger]

Tony slides into the room, fingers laced behind his back, projecting a faux innocence so hard it might as well be underlined in glittery gel pen. To be clear: He hasn't done anything wrong, per se; this is, he will insist, a strategic withholding of information until the best time to show his hand. And it's really not that big of a deal - at least, he doesn't think so - it's just a case of maybe knowing Steve too well and hedging his bets a little to ensure Steve doesn't mysteriously find something that he simply has to do, blah blah blah, stars, stripes, and Justice with a capital avoidance issue. Also? He thinks he maybe needs to pass on a warning before the main event. "Hey. I invited Clint and Hank for dinner Sunday. Kate, too." See? That's not so bad. He's broached it before, now he's just making good on it. Now on to the fun part: "Fair warning, though: If you see Clint acting weird - like how he acted with Jess Drew weird - just...Just let it go."

Routine maintenance for most people would be an oil change and airing up the tires. But for a bike meant to carry a super soldier around New York, Steve preferred to take the whole thing apart. As he checked each screw and gasket, he also searched for bugs and trackers, and made note of any pieces that needed to be replaced.

"Hey Vera, can you add this to the queue with Tony's fabricator?"

"Sure thing, doll." There was no clicking of heels, but he saw her holo-body move out the corner of his eye, leaning over to get closer look at the part, curled hair moving slightly. "You just want the one?"

"Make it two, just in case I mess up the replacement. Or so I have a spare on hand."

Vera gave a crisp salute before sauntering back over to her previous spot on the wheeled shop stool, holo-nail file returning to her hands. As Tony slunk into the room, Vera turned, giving him a flirty wink before continuing her slow spin back around. "Mister Rogers, you've got yourself a handsome gentleman caller."

Steve glanced up to her, then Tony, giving a small smile. "Thank you, Vera. That'll be all for the moment. Why don't you go check on those parts I need?"

Vera gave her best pout, which turned into an eye roll in the face of Steve's steady stare. She sighed dramatically and stood, walking past Tony and pausing. "You better tell me next, tiger."

She took another step and flickered out of existence.

Steve chuckled to himself, shaking his head. Despite it being Tony that had given Vera life, and it seemed his holo-assistant had taken on Steve's preference in men. One quick glance at his man let him know that Tony had something on his mind--some ambiguous piece of news he was trying to figure out how to break to Steve.

Steve picked up a toothbrush and began scrubbing.

Sunday dinner was one of the few meals they tried to have home cooked every single week, purposefully sitting in the dining room as a family. Inviting a few people--like Bucky or Carol--wasn't unusual. The guest list being Kate, Clint, and Hank wasn't weird. Frankly, what Tony was saying was less worrisome than how Tony was saying it. Like he was expecting Steve to... react badly?

Ah, and here was the proverbial other shoe. 'Acting weird like with Jess Drew.' Hm. They'd both been on a team with Clint and Jess. He didn't know Tony's experience, but Steve had lost count of the number of times he'd walked into the training simulator and had to "loudly forget" how "pin pads" worked to get the door open--hoping that by the time he walked in, everyone's clothes were back on.

Steve hummed and nodded, putting down the toothbrush and picking up a rag.

"So he and Hank are fucking?"

[mrsstruggle]

The Lost Child - Chapter 34 // Teen Wolf x Marvel AU

Summary: Y/N Stark was taken from her family when she was three years old. It's fifteen years later and her family believes she is dead. Then how is she living in Beacon Hills?

Warnings: Language, Mentions of Death/Injury/Grief/Torture, Possible Grammar Mistakes (please let me know if there is anything else)

Pairings: Derek Hale x Reader, Steve Rodgers x Bucky Barnes, Bruce Banner x Natasha Romanoff, Vision x Wanda Maximoff, & More To Come

Previous Pairings: Tony Stark x Pepper Potts, Scott McCall x Allison Argent

Words: 5.5k

Note: Sorry this is so late!

Additional Note: While this is a Teen Wolf x Marvel AU, not everything is true to the shows/movies/comics. I had to change things for the story.

One Last Note: Y/N was adopted by Tony Stark and Pepper Potts. I did this so more people can see themselves in this story.

***I do not own Teen Wolf or Marvel or any related characters. This is a work of fanfiction and is meant for entertainment purposes only.***

Masterlist

The Lost Child Masterlist

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Everyone was quiet as they made their way through the woods toward the hunter's safe house. The only sound that could be heard was the crunching of leaves and sticks beneath their feet. Y/N knows it's wrong, but she wishes she was Allison right now so she wouldn't have to deal with everything.

Stiles doesn't like the silence but it's taking everything in him to break it. He's worried that if he starts talking then he won't be able to stop. He's also not sure if he wants to accidentally piss off anyone who's in charge of protecting his life.

As much as he's annoyed at everything that has happened and that has come to light, he also can't help but have a little fanboy moment inside his head. He's about to head into battle with the Avengers. The last time they stormed a place he had been sidelined. Now, he's walking through the woods, about to go into a little war with the hunters, with the Avengers suited up next to him. It's like a dream he always had but also mixed with a nightmare he always had.

He watches Y/N from the back of the group as she and Chris lead them to the safe house. He doesn't like that he's been paired with Liam and Peter, but it could be worse. He could be paired up with Peter Hale. He wouldn’t make it out alive if that were the case.

"Are we almost there?" Peter Hale asks.

"Why? Do you have somewhere better to be?" Scott questions.

"Yes. I was thinking about asking your mother out again."

"Wait, what?" Sam looks between Scott and Peter, confused about what he just heard. How old is this guy and why does it seem like he only hangs out with teenagers? He knows Peter is Derek's uncle, but he also dated one of these kids' mothers?

"Ignore him." Derek rolls his eyes at his uncle. He just wants to get this over with. He's tired of having to deal with the Argents and the Avengers. He wants to go home, wrap Y/N up in a warm blanket, and not leave their bedroom until they have to. This past week has caused him too much stress and he's over it.

Y/N comes to a stop and waits for the others to stand around her, "We'll split up here. Remember, Sam, Bucky, and Malia, you'll take the right side. Kira, Natasha, and Wanda, you'll follow them but then split off to the north side. Scott and Steve, you're going to the left side. Stiles, Liam, and Peter, you'll follow them. You're in charge of killing the Anuk-Ite, so good luck with that."

Chris takes off his backpack before unzipping it and holding it out to everyone, "Everyone take a walkie-talkie. I'm sure these aren't as advanced as some of you are used to, but they'll do. I've already set them to the correct channel but it's channel 7 if you mess it up."

"Radio in if you feel the Anuk-Ite so Stiles and them know where to go. He has the mountain ash to kill it so don't try killing it yourself," Y/N says while everyone grabs a walkie-talkie. "Also, radio if you need help. While we have an idea of what we're up against, there could be more and some of you have never had to fight these types of creatures before. They are very different from your space aliens."

"Anything else?" Stiles asks.

"Yeah, don't die."

"How are you not a motivational speaker?"

"Okay, let's go before they do this for another twenty minutes," Scott says, walking away from the group to the left where Y/N told him to go. Steve presses a quick kiss to Bucky's lips and murmurs something under his breath to him before following Scott.

"Radio in when you're in place!" Y/N yells out to Scott.

The rest of the Avengers watch as Y/N and Stiles lock their pinky fingers and promise each other they won't die. Y/N doesn't know it, but she's done that since before Pepper gave her away. Anytime they'd go on a mission she'd make them promise they were going to come back. She believed that pinky promises were a binding promise and that there was no way you could break them. It's little things like that that let them know that the girl they knew is still there, just a bit different.

"One last thing," Y/N sticks out her hand toward Chris. Chris pulls out a bulletproof vest from his backpack and hands it to Y/N. She quickly pulls it over Stiles' head and straps it around him before he has a chance to protest. "Just in case."

"Why have I never been given one of these before?" Stiles scoffs.

"Just be grateful you're getting one now. Now go."

Chris, Derek, Peter Hale, Tony, and Y/N watch as the others run off to where they're supposed to be.

"What else do you have in that bag?" Derek asks, eyeing the backpack in Chris' hand.

"You don't want to know," Chris zips his backpack up and puts it back on his back.

"We're in place." Scott's voice rings out of their walkie-talkies.

Y/N sighs as she tries to mentally prepare herself for the fight ahead, "I think I could sleep for a week after this. I'm surprised I haven't gotten a call from my boss yet saying I'm fired for being gone for so long. I swear I didn't have this many vacation days."

Derek moves to stand in front of Y/N to meet her eyes, "I'm sure they've seen the news and will understand why you haven't been in for a while. Scott said Melissa was covering for you so I'm sure it's fine."

"I'll have to get her something nice for covering for me this long."

"And she'll tell you that you don't owe her anything." Derek pulls Y/N close and presses a kiss against her forehead. He knows how stressed she is about everything because he's also stressed about everything.

"We're in place." Bucky's voice rings out from the walkie-talkies.

"How do you want us to get into the house?" Y/N turns to Tony at his question. She almost forgot the others were there with her and Derek.

"We need to wait until everyone has lured out as many hunters as possible then we fly in," Y/N says.

"You can fly as well?" Tony's eyebrows shoot up in shock. Did he miss something in the files Hydra made about her? Can werewolves fly?

"No, you'll have to either carry me or I can get on your back."

Tony goes to respond but Kira's voice cuts him off as it rings out through the walkie-talkies, "We're in place."

"Okay," Y/N looks around at Chris, Derek, Peter, and Tony, "you ready?"

Chris tightens the knife holders on his thighs and double-checks the gun in his hand, "Ready."

"Ready," Tony says as his suit builds around him.

"Can we finally get this over with?" Peter asks, inspecting his claws.

"I'm going to climb up into a tree until I think it's time for us to hit the house. You should do the same." Y/N says, looking at Tony. "I'm their biggest target and if they know where I am then they'll forget about the others. We've got to hide a bit first."

"I'll follow you," Tony replies.

Y/N looks back at Derek, "Be safe and kick some hunter ass. I love you."

"I love you too," Derek says before pressing a hard kiss on her lips, as if he's scared he won't see her again.

Y/N pulls away and walks over to the nearest tree, "You know what to do babe!"

Derek, Chris, and Peter watch as Y/N starts to climb up the tree and Tony flies up into the one next to her. Derek waits until he can no longer see her figure before transforming into his beta form.

"Now we can get this over with," Derek says, letting out a loud roar to let everyone know it's time to go and to let the hunters know they're here.

---

Steve tightens the shield around his arm before looking up at the sound of a roar.

"What was that?" Peter asks, looking around making sure nothing is coming at them. He's dealt with a lot of weird things being in the Avengers, but he's never heard something like that before.

"That was Derek," Stiles states.

"You stay here and wait for someone to radio you," Scott tells Stiles, Liam, and Peter.

"Where are you going?" Liam asks.

"We're going straight towards them. Let's go." Scott nods at Steve to follow him.

Steve huffs a bit in frustration as he follows Scott. He doesn't enjoy being told what to do from a teenager. If it was Y/N here, he would follow without question. She might have been gone for 15 years, but he'd still trust her with his life.

Scott slows as he gets closer to the safe house. He can already hear a few hunters loading their guns and sharpening their knives. He listens to their panicked voices as they talk about the roar they heard and how they know they're being attacked. If he focuses hard enough, he can also hear Stiles, Liam, and Peter bickering behind them.

"Let's stop here. We don't want to get too close." Scott says. "We need to lure them out here." Scott tries to count the number of hunters standing outside of the house in front of them.

"I got it," Steve states, throwing his shield out toward the hunters. The shield hits three hunters, knocking them to the ground, before coming back to Steve.

"That's one way to do it," Scott mumbles, watching as the hunters look their way. He quickly ducts behind a tree as the hunters slowly make their way towards them.

Steve ducts behind another tree as they wait for the hunters to come closer. He can hear the ground crunch behind him letting him know where they are. He waits until he can see the end of a gun before jumping out and knocking the hunter back into two others.

That's when all hell breaks loose.

Scott jumps out from where he's hiding as all eyes are on Steve, throwing the hunter closest to him into a tree—knocking him out. Bullets start to fly as Steve and Scott attack. Scott is surprised he hasn't been hit by any bullets yet as he knocks out another hunter.

Steve throws his shield toward the hunter's legs, the vibranium metal breaking their knees and shins as it hits them. He quickly knocks them out as they hit the ground one by one. It's not long until they've taken out all the hunters that attacked them.

"Is that it?" Steve asks, knocking out the last hunter.

"I doubt it. The others must have the rest of the hunters distracted or the rest of them haven't left the safe house." Scott says, looking around for other hunters.

"We should move in," Steve says, moving towards the safehouse before Scott sticks out an arm to stop him.

"Not until we're told too."

"There's no one over here. We should move in."

"Not until Y/N tells us too."

Steve doesn't understand why they can't just move in. They easily took out the hunters. He doesn't understand why they were acting like they were going to be a challenge. The hunters are down on their side, and they have a clear shot toward the safe house.

Scott's head quickly turns as he starts to smell something in the air, "Do you smell that?"

"What?" Steve doesn't know what Scott's talking about.

"It smells like..." Scott's voice trails off as his eyes widen as he looks behind Steve.

Steve quickly turns around to see four large creatures standing behind him. They look like men wearing bones and an animal skull for a mask. "What am I looking at?"

"Berserkers."

---

Sam and Bucky are standing back-to-back as they fight off the hunters around them while Malia holds off more of them.

"How many of these guys are there?" Sam asks, slamming another hunter onto the ground.

"I don't know but they're pissing me off," Bucky says. His arm comes up to block the bullets being shot at him from a hunter on the ground. He rips the gun out of the hunter's hand and knocks him out with a quick kick to the face.

Bucky turns to find another hunter to attack to see the hunters fleeing from them.

"Why are they running?" Sam asks.

"Something's coming," Malia states, her eyes closed while trying to listen to her surroundings.

Bucky tries to listen and see if he can hear what she hears. He closes his eyes for a second. It sounds like something is running toward them. He opens his eyes and stares into the woods in front of him. Something is charging at them.

"Get down!" Bucky tackles Sam to the ground as a deer jumps out from the trees and almost tramples over them. It runs past them almost as quickly as it appeared. It looked rabid.

"What the hell?" Sam mutters, staring at where the deer ran off.

Bucky looks down to where Sam is in his arms from when he tackled him. Disgusted, he scrambles up off the ground and away from Sam.

"Did you smell that?" Malia asks.

"Robo boy's cheap cologne? Yeah, I smelled it." Sam says, wiping the dirt off his suit as he stands up from the ground.

"No, the deer. It smelled like fear."

"Fear?" Bucky asks. He thought that something was running at them but what if it was running away from something? He slowly pulls out his walkie-talkie while his eyes dart around. "We found the Anuk-Ite."

"On our way," Stiles' voice rings out from the walkie-talkies.

"Are you sure?" Sam questions Bucky.

"Yeah, I'm su–" a pained scream from the woods cuts him off. He pauses, his head whipping toward the sound.

"Bucky! Buck!" someone is screaming out for him. He moves to run into the woods, but Malia moves in front of him to stop him.

"What are you doing?" Malia asks.

"Do you not hear someone screaming?!" Bucky yells, angry that she's preventing him from finding whoever's yelling for him. He swears it almost sounded like Steve.

"The only person screaming right now is you," Sam says.

"What?" Bucky looks between Sam and Malia. Can they not hear what he's hearing?

Sam stares at Bucky for a second before realizing what's happening, "Close your eyes! Close your eyes now!"

"Why am I closing my eyes?!" Malia yells, her eyes now shut tight.

"It's the Anuk-Ite. Whatever happens, don't open your eyes."

Sam, Bucky, and Malia stand still as they wait for something to happen. They're hoping Stiles gets here soon to kill the thing.

"How could you?" Bucky quickly whips his head around, his eyes still shut tight, as Steve's voice whispers in his ear. "Why?"

"I don't understand..." Bucky whispers, confused about what's happening.

"I told you to finish him." Bucky's head whips around again. He knows that voice. It belongs to the man responsible for turning him into the Winter Soldier, Arnim Zola.

"Buck...no," Steve's voice whimpers. "This isn't you."

"You have your orders, soldier! Kill him!"

"No!"

"You can't stop him, Steve. He's no longer the boy you used to know. He never will be. He has always been the Winter Soldier, and he always will be."

Bucky's closed eyes tighten as he repeatedly mutters to himself, "This isn't real. It's not real."

"Buck..." Steve's voice is quiet. Bucky can feel a soft hand caress his cheek. It feels like Steve.

"I'll do it." That sounds like Y/N's voice but harsher. It sounds like when she was pretending to be under the hunter's and Hydra's control.

"Ah, my perfect soldier. Always ready to do what you're told." Zola's voice sounds closer than it was before.

"She's not your soldier," Bucky growls. Y/N will never be Hydra's soldier.

"I think you're forgetting who you are. Let me remind you. Longing. Rusted. Seventeen. Daybrea–"

"Shut up!"

"It's who you are! Now, finish your mission!"

"No!" Bucky is trying to remind himself that this isn't real but it's getting harder too.

"Let me." Y/N's voice is now coming from in front of him. "Just admit it. You couldn't save yourself, you couldn't save me, and you couldn't save Steve."

"Wh-what are you talking about?"

It goes quiet. Maybe it's over?

As Bucky brings a hand up to his face to wipe away the overwhelmed tears that were slowly falling from his eyes, he hears someone being stabbed in front of him. His body goes rigid as he hears someone start to choke—possibly on their own blood.

"Hail Hydra," Y/N's voice whispers in his ear.

Bucky quickly opens his eyes toward the ground in shock and confusion. His eyes move slightly in front of him to a knife sticking out of someone. Not just someone. He'd recognize that uniform anywhere. Steve.

Bucky's eyes shoot up to Steve's face only to be met with the glowing purple eyes of the Anuk-Ite. His body immediately turned to stone.

"Buck, you still good?!" Sam calls out, unaware of what just happened. He can't hear Bucky, but he can hear Malia. She sounds like she's apologizing to someone until she goes quiet. "Malia?"

"Malia?!" Sam can hear someone yelling for her.

"Uncle Sam?! Uncle B?!" Peter rushes into the area where Sam, Bucky, and Malia are. Liam and Stiles run in behind him.

"Oh my god..." Stiles stares at Malia's frozen figure. She looks like a statue from Medusa's lair in the Percy Jackson movie.

"Please tell me you're real?" Sam asks.

"The Anuk-Ite's gone," Liam says.

Sam opens his eyes to see Peter staring at a Bucky statue. Stiles and Liam are also crouched down next to a Malia statue.

"What happened?" Peter turns to look at Sam.

"I-I don't know. One second it was here and now it's not. I'm not even sure when this happened." Sam gestures to Bucky. Why didn't the Anuk-Ite go for him? He could hear Bucky talking to someone—most likely whoever the Anuk-Ite wanted him to talk to—and he could hear Malia, but nothing ever happened to him.

"Now what?" Liam asks.

"They still need people attacking on this side," Stiles says. They need people to weaken the hunters from every side.

"I can still do it but I don't know if I can do it alone," Sam states.

"I'll stay," Liam volunteers. "I can help on this side while you two get the Anuk-Ite."

Stiles looks hesitant but agrees, "Make sure nothing happens to them." Stiles looks between Malia and Bucky and wonders how much longer he has before their current state is permanent.

"Where do you think it went?" Peter asks.

"I don't know."

---

"What the hell are these people?!" Nat yells out, barely missing the edge of the blade that swipes at her.

"They're Oni!" Kira yells back. She's trying to hold off four Oni while Natasha and Wanda fight the other three.

"I thought we're supposed to be fighting hunters?!"

"I thought the same thing!" Wanda yells.

Natasha ducks as one of the Oni swings their sword at her. She's able to remove the sword from the Oni's hand as the sword lodges itself in the tree next to her. Nat quickly pulls the sword away from the tree and watches as the Oni pulls another sword out of nowhere.

"We're going to die here." Nat mumbles, readying herself to continue fighting.

As Kira blocks the Oni's swings, she can see the glint of a weapon coming from within the trees behind them. "I think the hunters have finally decided to join them!" She hears something firing.

Wanda and Natasha turn to see several hunters running toward them. Most of them seem to be carrying guns while the others seem to be holding knives. Nat can count about thirty hunters.

"You guys take the hunters! I've got these guys!" Kira yells at them, her eyes starting to glow.

"You sure?!" Nat asks.

"Go!"

Wanda and Natasha break away from the Oni and charge toward the hunters. Nat throws the sword in her hand on the ground and pulls out her Glock 26s. As the hunters start to shoot at them, Wanda uses her powers to rip a tree out of the ground and throw it through the group of hunters — knocking several to the ground.

Nat ducks behind a tree as bullets fly past her. The bullets slowly come to halt as she reloads her guns. She can hear footsteps getting closer to her. It sounds like five different people are coming toward her. Nat puts one of her guns back in its holster as she takes a deep breath.

As the tip of a hunter's gun comes into view, she grabs the front of the assault rifle while throwing her elbow into the hunter's face. He lets go of the gun as she knocks him out with the butt of her Glock. Adjusting the assault rifle in her grip, she turns and shoots down the other four hunters.

"I thought we weren't supposed to kill any of them?!" Wanda yells out to Nat.

"I don't remember agreeing to that!" Natasha yells back.

Wanda throws another hunter back as she watches Nat take down more as well. Looking back at Kira, she notices a glowing figure around the young girl as she fights off the Oni.

Kira can feel her anger and frustration growing as she continues to fight. She can also feel her control starting to slip. The fox spirit around grows bigger and bigger the longer she fights.

As she feels a blade cut through her right thigh, her fox quickly grows before launching itself at the seven Oni. A blinding light shoots out as the Oni are killed, hindering the hunters. Kira can feel her fox getting more powerful with each Oni it takes out.

With her back facing the light, Natasha uses the distraction to shoot down the rest of the hunters. Looking over at Wanda, she can see her crouched behind a tree blocking the light with her hands. As the light disappears, she turns around to find Kira kneeling on the ground and no Oni around her.

"What happened?!" Nat yelled toward Kira.

"I killed them!" Kira yells back, pressing down on the wound on her leg as it starts to slowly heal.

"Why didn't you do that earlier?!"

"I don't really have control of it!"

"Did you have to kill all of them?" Wanda asks Natasha, looking at all the dead hunters behind them.

"Did you want me to wait until they killed one of us?"

Wanda rolls her eyes at Nat's response. She could've put them all to sleep but it's too late for that now. She walks over to where Kira is now sitting on the ground.

"Are you okay?"

"Yeah, I'm fine. My leg should be good in just a minute." Kira replies.

"I wonder if everybody else also has to deal with more than just hunters?" Nat mumbles, sitting down next to Kira.

---

Sitting up high in a tree, Y/N watches as Derek, Peter, and Chris battle the hunters down below. She can hear her radio go off and Scott's voice asking for help. It takes everything in her to not jump down and help after one hunter's knife gets a little too close to Derek's throat.

"Is this what you deal with here in Beacon Hills?" Tony questions, watching as more hunters seem to come out of nowhere.

"Yeah, but hunters have always been the least of our worries," Y/N replies, her grip tightening on the tree in anger as more hunters appear. She could easily use her powers from here and take them out but then Kate would know where she is.

Tony feels at a loss for words. Watching the hunters down below, he can't believe this is what his daughter has been with. He doesn't know why this didn't hit him before. He was so caught up in everything else, he hasn't taken a step back to notice how calm she and her friends seem to be about everything.

Since the Avengers have been in Beacon Hills, they've dealt with hunters, Hydra, and more. He knows to an extent what Y/N dealt with when she was with Hydra, but what else has she dealt with?

Friends of hers have apparently died and he has no idea why. Was it because of hunters? Was it because of something else they've faced? Or was it something that has nothing to do with this little world she lives in?

Tony stares at Y/N as he thinks of something to say. He has so many things that he wants to say and so many questions he wants to ask but now is not the time.

"I can practically hear you thinking from here," Y/N looks up and locks eyes with Tony. "I know you have a lot of questions and so do I. I don't really know how long you're going to be here in Beacon Hills, but I'd like to start over after all of this is done."

"We can stay as long as you want. You can come back with us too...i-if you want. I-I mean I know you're a lot older now, but we kept your rooms the same as you left them. Well, we have a cleaner that cleans them once every two weeks."

"Rooms?"

"Yeah, one at the compound and one in our old home. We haven't lived there since you...disappeared. I still kept it though just in case."

"Even after you thought I was dead?"

"You're not the only person we've known to be presumed dead to still very much be alive. I didn't want to give up hope. No matter how little it became."

Y/N doesn't know what to say to that. She looks back down to watch the others fight off the hunters. Most of the hunters are down so now is a good time to get to Kate.

"We should go now," Y/N looks back at Tony.

"How are we doing this?" Tony asks, not sure how to carry Y/N.

"Can I just get on your back?"

Tony flies off the tree and hovers in front of Y/N with his back turned toward her, "Let's go."

Y/N pulls herself away from the tree and climbs onto Tony's back. A small smile appears on her face as it reminds her of the piggyback rides her dad, the sheriff, used to give her all the time as a kid before they lost her mom. As Tony takes off toward the safe house, she wonders if Tony or the others ever used to carry her like this when she was younger.

Y/N holds on tighter to Tony as he crashes into the middle of the house. Once Tony has landed on the ground, she hops off his back and surveys her surroundings. They landed in what appeared to be the living room but there was no one around. There's no one shooting at them, charging at them, or even watching them. They are completely alone.

"Why is no one here?" Tony asks, his blasters ready just in case.

"I don't know..." Looking around Y/N can see weapons and ammo everywhere. On the wall, she can see pictures of herself and all her friends. There's even some of the Avengers. There's a large blood stain on the floor but there is nobody. Whose blood is it?

It's also quiet. Too quiet. If she listens in, she can hear the others fighting, but it's quiet in the house. Kate must be hiding somewhere. If there's one thing Y/N knows about the Argents, it's that they love a good basement moment. That's probably where Kate is hiding out. And if she's hiding then she knows she's outmatched. She knows they're losing.

As she turns to look at Tony, a body flies through the living room window. Y/N jumps back and is ready to attack until she notices who it is.

"Isaac?"

Isaac groans in pain but makes no move to get up off the floor, "Hey Y/N."

"H-how? What?"

"Scott told me everything so we came to help."

"We?"

As Isaac goes to answer, a girl with a crossbow steps through the broken window, "Isaac?!" She starts shooting toward something Y/N can't see.

"Braeden?"

"Who are these people?" Tony asks Y/N.

"He's a friend and she's..." Y/N pauses as she thinks of a way to describe who Braeden is, "she's a friend of Derek."

Isaac snorts, "Yeah, a friend."

Y/N kicks Isaac's arm at his comment, "What's happening out there? How'd you go through the window? Why haven't you got up?"

"I can't really move."

"What do you mean?" Y/N crouches down next to Isaac in concern.

"We aren't the only ones who know a kanima apparently."

Y/N rolls Isaac onto his side and looks at the scratch on his neck. She can see some of the venom still dripping from the wound.

"Who else has been affected by it?" Y/N asks, laying Isaac back down on his back.

"Scott was protecting a guy on the ground with a shield when I found them," Braeden replies, walking over to them.

Tony curses under his breath, "Should we help them?"

"Kira and two other girls are currently helping Scott."

Y/N turns her head to the broken window as she hears a loud roar. It sounded like Scott but she's not sure.

"Is it just the kanima they're fighting?" Y/N asks.

"No, there's Berserkers as well. Four of them."

Y/N stands up and looks at Tony, "Stay here and help them. I've got Kate."

"You're not going alone," Tony states. He's not going to abandon his daughter. He's here to protect her.

"They need your help more than I do. If the kanima takes more of them down, they will all be dead. Help them."

Tony hesitates for a moment before agreeing, "Fine, but then I'm coming back to help you."

"Fine. I'll probably be in the basement. At least that's where I'm assuming she is."

Tony looks like he's going to hug her for a moment before flying out through the broken window. Y/N can hear when he finds the others.

"So that's your dad huh?" Isaac says with a small smirk on his face.

Y/N rolls her eyes and huffs, "Shut up." Her radio sparks to life and she can hear Chris Argent calling for Stiles. The Anuk-Ite must be near them. Y/N turns to Braeden, "I've got Kate. Make sure he stays alive."

Y/N flicks her claws out as she checks all the doors to see if any lead into the basement. When she opens the fourth door, she sees stairs leading down into another room. She walks down slowly until she reaches the bottom.

Looking around, the stairs seemed to have led her to a hallway instead of a room. There are four different doors, and she doesn't know what's behind any of them. There's a long ugly rug that runs throughout the middle of the hallway. It looks out of place in the modern-looking hallway.

She's about to open the first door when she notices the end of the rug is flipped up as if someone tripped over it. That's when she notices something behind it. Moving the rug with her foot, she finds an escape hatch.

Y/N bends down and opens the hatch. Not seeing anything dangerous, she jumps down into what seems to be a tunnel. Looking down at the ground, she can see a single set of footprints leading away from her.

She follows the footsteps until she gets to the end of the tunnel. She notices a small ladder leading up to another hatch. Y/N climbs up the ladder and slowly opens the hatch. It takes her a second to realize where she is. She's next to an old lake her mom used to take her and Stiles to during the summer.

Climbing out of the tunnel, she looks around for Kate. She knows she's here, but she can't seem to see her.

"Kate! I know you're here!" Y/N yells out.

As she moves to look around, a bear trap snaps around her right ankle. Screaming out in pain, Y/N falls to the ground.

"I was wondering when you would show up, but I'm surprised you showed up alone." Y/N whips her head around to see Kate slowly walking up to her with twenty other hunters and two Berserkers behind her.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

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[queenofthursday6599-blog]

No team Cap isn't morally correct in Civil War

I think my main problem with team cap stans as someone on team tony is that I don't actually put myself in the shoes of either team.

I look at what's happening in Civil War from the perspective of a random no powered citizen who'd really like it if people with super weapons or super human powers wouldn't trample over my right not to get killed because those super heroes decided "The best hands are our own".

Even when that completely disregards stuff like international boarders, jurisdiction on what the Avengers team was actually supposed to do (fight threats no one else can, in Civil War the inciting incident is them deciding to fuck around in another country as an anti-terrorism task force when they aren't in anyway trained for that), and you know the reassurance that I won't get murdered when the heroes go chasing after their bestie and I'm unlucky enough to be in the way.

I honestly feel like if you think what Team Cap does in Civil War is "the moral choice" then you're empathizing way too hard with Team Cap and not looking at the situation objectively.

Civil War worked in the comics because it was an entirely internal affairs situation happening inside the USA. It was about people with powers being put on a list and being monitored and being somewhat stripped of their personhood. Cap's side is in the right in the comics. Because the Civil War comics conflict is based in fantastical racism, which in the comic's universe had been established and building for literal decades before the actual CW incident takes place.

This is not true in the movies. Where it's based on the actions of this singular super hero team, and how they frequently go over international boarders, disregarding things like jurisdiction and due process, and leave fucking disaster zones and piles of civilian casualties in their wake. Even when they have no business being there interfering.

And how everyone else in the world who isn't a superhero fan, is fucking terrified that they're going to die because this small group with godlike abilities decided they were going to do whatever the fuck they wanted based entirely on their own morals, and anyone they happen to murder while doing that is acceptable casualties.

So no, no one on Team Cap is "morally right" in this situation if you actually look at the bigger picture. Especially because Cap's own motivations for the whole movie isn't even actually that he disagrees with the Accords, he's just wants to protect Bucky, and he goes the whole movie doing that at the expense of literally everyone else.

Along with everyone else on that team besides Clint and Scott who were just Captain America fans who were dumb asses and went along with whatever he said.

Sam's full blown power tripping and doesn't want government over site, Wanda wants to be a hero without taking any of the responsibility that comes with that, Cap doesn't trust governments and wants to protect his bestie at all cost.

Bucky is the only Team Cap member who gets a pass because, I don't think he even knows what the hell is going on that whole movie. All he knows is a bunch of guys showed up trying to shoot him and Steve showed up shortly after. He's trying to deal with fucking scrambled egg brain and being a POW for 70 years, he's the only person I don't blame.

Though I think Tony fucks up in the movie too. He brought Spider-man in without verifying that he was one a grown up, and two knew the situation he was getting into.

Natasha fucks up because her entire life she's had her morality dictated by whoever is her then trusted superior. Which at this point in her life is Steve & Clint. I honestly think Natasha is doing her best in this movie, but she still objectively fucks up by not actually picking a side and sticking to it.

T'Challa is only on Team Tony because he's convinced that it's going to let him get revenge for his father's murder. So he's also in the wrong. Yeah he's grieving. Still not cool trying to use your diplomatic immunity to try and meet out vigilante justice.

Honestly I think the only people not in the wrong at all during the whole movie who's part of the actual conflict is Rhodey, Peter, Bucky and Vision. And that's it, everyone else is fucking up bringing their personal emotions into something they're supposed to be dealing with objectively.

Which yeah, I know that's a hard thing to do in a high stress high stakes situation like this. But if they can't do it then they're just not cut out for super heroing. Or like high stress high stakes jobs in general.

So I'm more Team Don't be an Asshole than I am Team Tony, and Tony's team just happens to have fewer assholes in this movie.

[oph3liatlou]

— THE SHADOW WARRIOR series

CHAPTER TWO; Quinnjet

pairing(s); recovering!buckybarnes x oc!victoriastark

warnings; light swearing

word count; 1,363

proofread?; yes.

note from author; link to wattpad, link to character's spotify playlist (comment songs also!), find the full masterlist here.

summary; In the depths of Africa, the mysterious nation of Wakanda has reached out to the outside world for help. A mission has been set in place for Victoria Stark, to save Bucky Barnes - the former brainwashed assassin - from his past self. Can she rescue him from HYDRA's grips as the world watches and waits or, will he forever be lost to the shadows?

Victoria had to get ready for her mission that she had been tasked with. She headed back downstairs to see her father, who had just finished fixing up his suit.

Tony turns around as you enter the workshop, wiping his hands on a rag. "Done pouting upstairs?" He's trying to keep it light. The tension between you has been growing for months. He needs to fix it, but he just doesn't know how.

She rolled her eyes. Their relationship was always sarcastic banter but sometimes, he didn't agree with her decisions. Especially when she avoided his monthly functions. "I wasn't pouting." She stated, leaning on one of the shelves. "I got a mission so, scratch my name off the guest list for tomorrow night."

Tony's smile fades. He looks at you for a long moment, his expression going tight. He's not happy about you skipping yet another event. But rather than start an argument, he asks instead, "Where are you headed?"

"Wakanda." Victoria answered, not elaborating.

Tony's eyes widened, a slight flicker of surprise crossing his face. Wakanda? He hadn't expected that. "Why?" He tries to keep the tension out of his voice, but there's no hiding the concern in his eyes.

She was happy that her father hadn't started giving her attitude about her not attending the party. "Steve's friend, Bucky." She started to explain. "He's in Wakanda, the Princess is treating his conditioning - trying to demolish the Winter Solider." Victoria shrugged. "You know me and advanced technology. He thought I could help...and he wants a friend there."

Tony's worry eases slightly. He knows about Bucky, of course. The Winter Soldier, the infamous assassin. Helping to undo what HYDRA did to him wasn't something he objected to. And he understands the need for support.

He gives you a small nod. "Alright. Keep me updated. And...Victoria?" His voice goes soft. "Be careful."

She nods, turning back to the door. "Oh, and I'm bringing FRIDAY with me."

Tony raises an eyebrow, a hint of amusement returning to his expression. "Bringing the bots, huh? Trying to show off your tech prowess, aren't you?" He smiles, glad to see you a little more lighthearted for the first time in a long while. "Alright. Just watch out for Wakanda's tech. They've got stuff that will knock even you on your ass."

Victoria chuckled at his comment. "You better up your own game, then." She rebutted.

Tony gives you a wry smile. "Don't worry, kid. You forget who you're dealing with here. I'll have some new goodies for when you return."

He crosses his arms. "Now, get out of here. Before I change my mind about letting you borrow Friday."

She grinned. "Yeah, yeah." And with that, she left the workshop - her feet echoed on the floating stairs that shifted under her feet as she made her way to her room to get her gear.

As Victoria ascended the floating stairs to her room, thoughts of the upcoming mission start to swirl through her mind. She begins packing her gear, making sure she has everything she might need in Wakanda. As she sorts through her supplies, a mix of anticipation and apprehension fills her. The unknown always holds a thrill, but it's also a constant reminder of the dangers that lie ahead. Despite the nerves, she can't help but feel a sense of excitement.  She's eager to see Wakanda's advanced tech and how it compares to Starks. As she packs, she notices two pictures. One is of her as a kid, asleep in her dad's embrace, and the other is her and Tony, taken not long after, on their first successful mission together. They're a team. She smiles softly before placing both pictures safely inside the bag.

With all the essentials packed, she heads towards the garage. The Quinjet is waiting for her, already fueled and prepped for takeoff. As she approaches, she can see the familiar shape of Friday's housing unit being loaded into the jet. 

"All ready to go, Tori?" She asks, her voice filled with anticipation. "I've already downloaded a comprehensive database on Wakandan technology. It's quite impressive."

Victoria nods gently, though Friday can't see her. She was secured in an earpiece in her ear. "What else should I know? About Barnes, about Wakanda...?"

"Barnes' condition is improving with the help of Wakanda's healers and tech. They've already managed to dismantle some of the indoctrination that HYDRA instilled in him," Friday informs. "As for Wakanda, they value their privacy and highly protect their technology. The Dora Milaje, the warrior women, are formidable and will likely keep a close eye on us both." She pauses. "Oh, and the food is fantastic."

Victoria chuckled. "Sadly, I'm not going there for the food." She paused when both her father and Steve stood at the entrance of the Quinjet.

Tony and Steve stood near the Quinjet, watching as Victoria approaches. Tony's expression is a mixture of concern and pride, a look she's seen time and time before. Steve, ever the serious one, nods in greeting. The two men can't help but worry about your well-being, especially for this mission.

"I'll be fine, yeah?" She said to the two of them, in reassurance. She turned to Steve. "I'll bring your best friend home."

Tony gave a small nod, his expression softening, but the worry remains in his eyes. Steve, however, gives a small, almost imperceptible smile of approval.

"We know you will," he reassures. "Be careful in Wakanda. And don't hesitate to call if you need anything."

Victoria nodded. "Sure thing." She went to go into the jet before turning back around and hugging her dad.

Tony is taken aback by her sudden show of affection. His eyes widen slightly before he quickly composes himself. He hugs her tightly, ruffling her hair affectionately. It's a rare moment of parental vulnerability from him, and he cherishes it.

"Stay safe," he whispers, holding her close for a moment more. "We still have plenty to argue over when you get back."

She chuckled. "Yeah, like who let you wear those shoes."

Tony playfully rolls his eyes.  "Kid, these shoes are a fashion statement. You wouldn't know style if it smacked you in the face." Tony pulls back, a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. He looks down at his worn-out sneakers, a comfortable staple in his wardrobe. "Besides, these are just... comfortable."

Steve, still standing nearby, can't help but chuckle at the exchange between the two. It's moments like this that remind everyone of the family bond they've formed over the years.

Victoria walked backwards onto the boarding ramp and snickered. "You do realize, I'm the one who did most of the draft designs for your suits?"

Tony gives her a mock-indignant look, his hand over his heart. "Are you saying my suits are outdated?" He feigns hurt, though the playful glint in his eyes reveals his true feelings.

"Maybe we should leave the redesigning to the professionals," he quips with a grin. "Besides, we can't all pull off the casual sneaker-and-suit look."

Steve piped up, waving goodbye to me with a chuckle. "You definitely can't, Tony."

Tony rolls his eyes but can't resist a smile. "Keep it up, Cap. I could always program Friday to play baby shark on infinite loop in your helmet next time we're in the field."

"Hey Friday, keep that as a note." Victoria chuckled loudly...getting onto the Quinjet.

Friday's holographic form appears, shimmering beside you. "Noted," she assures Victoria, her voice filled with digital amusement. "Any other requests for Captain Rogers, while you're at it?"

Victoria smiled. "I'll think of something."

With a final farewell wave, the Quinjet's door seals shut behind her. She's enclosed in the sleek interior, the hum of the engines signaling that the adventure is just beginning.

As the Quinjet soars into the sky, heading towards the unknown lands of Wakanda, Victoria is filled with mixed emotions: excitement, anticipation, and a touch of anxiety. But as long as she's got Friday and her wits, she knows that she's ready for whatever comes her way.

[sineala]

What do you think was the better* “later addition to canon”?

Steve being frozen post WW2

Or

Tony being an alcoholic

Because those aspects weren’t part of the original sell of the character but it’s such a big part of each

Or a third option!

*better can be “I think this adds the most interesting things to the canon from a writer’s perspective” or even “I like this most 🙂”

Interesting question! Thank you for asking! Honestly, I feel like both of those things are very different from each other, in terms of narrative function, and if you're actually looking for moments in canon that added something new and major to Steve and Tony's characters that wasn't there before, I wouldn't pick either of those moments for either of them.

I have some thoughts about this!

Steve getting iced was basically just a retcon to put Steve in the comics at the age that they wanted and not having to deal with him having reached the ancient and decrepit age of 40, an age that is clearly forbidden for superheroes. It's not really much different from how they keep adjusting things as the timescale keeps sliding -- Sharon is Peggy's niece and not her sister, Tony's origin story moves to wars that are later than Vietnam. It's just one of a number of changes Marvel makes regularly to keep character ages consistent; sure, it might even be the first of them. But I don't think the icing itself is a fundamental change in who Steve is as a character.

Now, you could argue that the Man Out of Time aspect -- which came in as a direct result of the icing -- is a fundamentally different part of Steve's character that wasn't present in earlier comics and changed who he was. But in response to that, I would argue that, in a lot of ways, Golden Age Captain America isn't really the same character at all as later Steve Rogers. I would say that the Steve we know and love is one who has pretty much only existed since Avengers #4 and in a sense has always had the ice in his backstory. Sure, a character with the same name, powers, and origin as Captain America existed in the Golden Age -- but that guy, he doesn't really seem like Steve, and modern canon sure doesn't treat him like Steve. The fact that there was also a discontinuity in publishing -- unlike how DC, IIRC, never really stopped, Timely kind of isn't actually Marvel, and everything from before Fantastic Four #1 kind of doesn't count. I think.

I don't know how much Golden Age Captain America you've read. I haven't read all of it. I've only read about a dozen issues, but I feel like that's enough for me to get a sense of the character. So the thing about Golden Age comics is that they all just feel… really weird, compared to anything from the 60s and later. You get a sense that everyone at the time was still working out what a superhero comic, and maybe just a comic at all, was going to be like. The plots are weird, the villains are… okay, the villains being usually Super Racist is sadly not unique to the Golden Age, but it's really prominent. The characters don't really behave in ways you would expect. Bucky is treated as an actual child would have been in the forties -- like, there are panels of Steve threatening to spank him as discipline -- and the characters just don't feel the same.

Other than the fact that the super-soldier serum turned Steve Rogers into Captain America, and the fact that Bucky is his sidekick, and what Steve's powers basically are, nothing in these comics really feels a lot like the same character. Canonically, most of it isn't the same character! Everything after Captain America Comics #48 has been retconned to be people who aren't Steve, which shows you how much he isn't like Steve. Even the stuff that supposedly happened to Steve and Bucky doesn't really get referred to all that much. When later comics talk about Steve's time in the war, it's almost never the events of the Golden Age comics themselves -- instead, Marvel created a whole lot of stuff via flashbacks and then they refer to that. You never see Steve and Bucky talking about, say, the time they had to be in a drag show as punishment, although I swear this was a real comic. Nick Fury and his Howling Commandos? Not in the Golden Age. The Invaders? Not in the Golden Age as a team! The All-Winners Squad was, but again, that features Captains America who were later retconned as not Steve (William Nasland, Jeff Mace). Most of Steve's villains other than Red Skull are not really there. It's just… not really the same character and there's not much of a meaningful sense of continuity between any of the events in the Golden Age and later comics. Later comics are working mostly from their own retellings and flashbacks. So I feel like Steve basically starts anew in Avengers #4 and thus has always been a Man Out Of Time.

Okay, so what about Tony's alcoholism? Tony before and after Demon in a Bottle is still Tony Stark, but the thing is, I feel like Tony's alcoholism isn't a drastic alteration to the character, and it fits very well with established canon, and it has been easily accepted as part of Tony's character, unlike something that just comes out of nowhere and is true now and everyone is all WTF at it (looking at you, adoption arc).

Tony's worst villain has always been himself. Specifically, it's been his own body. At the beginning, it was his heart damage and the chestplate, and the terrible curse inherent in Being Tony Stark was that someday soon his heart was going to give out. There are so many panels of him dramatically plugging himself into the wall and thinking about how close he is to death. Tony's origin story was essentially Here, Have A Disability. His body betrays him. His body doesn't do what he wants. He can't control it. There's something wrong with him and it's hurting him. Every so often they take away whatever's wrong with him, but they always revert to it -- his heart's been bad, and then fine, and then bad, and then fine, and here's the alcoholism, and oh no now he's paralyzed, and now it's his brain and he has amnesia, and so on.

In that sense, the alcoholism really feels like a natural escalation from the heart problems and that it fits well with all of this all of this. Here's something else about his body/mind that isn't right, that's causing him harm, that he initially tries to hide from almost everyone, and that he often has difficulty controlling. It's just that it's not his heart anymore.

So what would I pick for canonical moments in comics history that weren't part of Steve and Tony's original character conceptions and that really represented a new addition to his character?

For Steve I'd pick either the original Secret Empire arc (Nomad) or The Captain, because those basically both show the same thing. Sure, Captain America has always been a symbol of all the ideals of America as a country, and sometimes America lets him down, and sometimes he has to lecture people about how they should be better people -- but, as far as I know, Secret Empire was the first time Steve basically said, "Yeah, no, fuck the government." He loves his country. He doesn't always love his government. He doesn't think what happened in Secret Empire (which, yes, we all know, is secretly Watergate) is right, so he's going to… simply stop being Captain America. He's going to be Nomad. The government itself has now massively let him down, and they don't get to tell him what to do anymore. And now we're all like, "Oh, yeah, of course Steve is mad at the government and has decided to stop being Captain America right now! He's gonna go on a road trip to find himself! Here he is in Civil War telling the pro-Registration side they're wrong and becoming a fugitive from justice." But… he didn't start out like that.

This is a character who was created to be a soldier and to do what his country asked of him. Sure, there are early arcs where he gives up the shield for a little bit, but they're because he's going through one of his usual "who am I when I'm not Captain America?" crises and then he comes back pretty quick. It wasn't that he didn't believe in his government; it wasn't that kind of crisis of faith. But then Secret Empire happens and he's like, "yeah, no, I can't represent a country when the president was conspiring with aliens to take over the world" and he's just out of there. Same deal for The Captain. The government wants to tell him what to do because he's Captain America? Nope! Someone else can be Captain America now. Of course, then John Walker does a terrible job and Steve has to come back anyway. John Walker is like your awful roommate who half-asses the dishes so no one will ask him to do the dishes again even though he clearly knows how to wash dishes and chooses not to, except with murder instead.

But, anyway, the moral stance depicted in Secret Empire and The Captain is pretty much the same -- when the government does something he thinks is wrong, he just simply stops being Captain America. He's not afraid to go against the government in Civil War or (for a more modern example) Devil's Reign. And it's not really a stance he had before Secret Empire, as far as I know. If you told comics readers in, say, 1970, that you really liked the fact that Steve wasn't afraid to quit being Captain America to protest unjust laws, they would probably be very confused. Steve is Captain America! He works for SHIELD! He does what the government tells him! Why wouldn't he? Except, well… these days, he doesn't.

And I think you can tell that this is important to the modern conception of Steve's character because it made it into the MCU. Okay, true, any adaptation of Civil War was probably going to have to involve Steve going against some kind of law about superheroes because he thinks it's the right thing to do -- that personality trait is basically baked into the plot. But they put it in the MCU way before Civil War, presumably because they thought this was important enough to Steve's character that it needed to be included. CATWS is an adaptation of Brubaker's Winter Soldier arc that I would say is a lot more faithful to the comics than many of the MCU entries that share names with the comics. But you know what the 616 Winter Soldier arc doesn't have? A plot where Steve decides that he's unable to trust anyone at SHIELD because they're secretly Hydra and therefore we are right to be suspicious of the US government which may not be acting in our best interests anyway because apparently even the good guys in SHIELD were still interested in building helicarriers to shoot people down -- they just had a different target list than Hydra did. The 616 Winter Soldier arc does, in fact, have the Red Skull infiltrating SHIELD. He then proceeds to successfully murder Steve. There's not really a Trust No One plot going on because Steve doesn't get that far, and he dies before any of this is discovered and also misses out on Secret Invasion. Plus, hey, the scene that introduces us to Steve way back in CATFA shows him sitting there staring at a sign saying it's illegal to lie on his enlistment papers and then we find out he's been lying a lot. Because he thinks doing the right thing is more important than obeying the law. Yeah, they went there pretty early.

For Tony, my pick for a similarly significant character development that absolutely wasn't part of his original character is his decision to stop making weapons in Iron Man #78. He was created to be a defense contractor. He spent about ten RL years making weapons and, as far as we can tell from canon, not really experiencing any kind of crisis of conscience about, say, being a superhero and also making weapons at the same time. And then (because readers complained) he meets a pacifist, changes his mind about everything, stops taking SHIELD weapons contracts, and then stops making weapons entirely. This is a pretty significant career change for a character who started out happily making weapons. He just stopped. He doesn't do it anymore. He hasn't in years. And now it's absolutely part of who he is as a character, such that it ends up being a defining trait of his in multiple universes -- even in 1872, Tony stops making weapons. In Superior Iron Man, one of the first things he did when he went evil was make weapons again. If he is making weapons, we know that something has gone very wrong with him.

This also made it to the MCU -- "Tony becomes Iron Man and stops making weapons" is basically the plot of the first Iron Man movie, right? They decided that "Tony stops making weapons" was important enough that it is absolutely had to be right there in the first movie. Sure, alcoholism is one of Tony's defining traits in modern 616 comics and I'm not saying it's not, though I am saying it's not coming out of nowhere -- but that didn't even make it to the MCU. (I'm sure a lot of that was Disney's fault, yes.)

You also might not know this from looking at modern comics, but The Government Wants Tony To Keep Making Weapons is actually a pretty salient arc after Tony stops making them. Half of the reason Demon in a Bottle happens is because Tony is forced to kill the Carnelian ambassador because Justin Hammer sabotages his suit, but the other half is because Tony is incredibly stressed because Nick Fury keeps trying to find a way to make him make weapons for the government and Tony doesn't want to. (Maybe Tony would have fewer control issues if people stopped trying to control him.)

If I had to pick a second new character trait for Tony, it would also be his willingness to defy the government (and, really, anybody else) and do what he thinks is right. (He and Steve are more similar than I think a lot of fandom gives them credit for. But that would be a different meta post.) I mean, they do what they do with opposite reasoning but they both kind of have the same problems to solve a lot, because comics plots are very often Here's The Trolley Problem. Utlilitarianism versus… what's the other one? Deontology.

Anyway, yeah, I'm talking about Armor Wars. The arc when Tony decided that the ends justified the means and he was simply going to steal his technology back from everyone who had it, including the government, and that he was willing to hurt anyone who got in his way (hi, Steve) and alienate both Avengers teams in the process, because he decided that he knew what he had to do, what he had to do was right, and nothing was more important, no matter what the consequences were to himself. This is the thought process that gets you Armor Wars, Operation Galactic Storm, and eventually Civil War. And before Armor Wars, Tony just… didn't do things like this. After Armor Wars, he does, and everyone expects him to, and none of that was there before as part of his character. So I'd say that's a pretty big change.

Interestingly, of the four things I've named, two of them each basically happen at the same time -- Tony stops making weapons in the early 70s, around the time the Secret Empire and Nomad thing is happening for Steve, and of course in the mid-80s Steve is The Captain when he confronts Tony during Armor Wars. I guess those were two very transformative time periods for Steve and Tony.

But yeah, those are my picks for the biggest changes to Steve and Tony that weren't part of their original conceptions -- Steve's willingness to say Fuck the Government and go do what he thinks is right even if it means not being Captain America; and Tony's decision to stop making weapons, as well as Tony's willingness to say Fuck the Government (And/Or Possibly Also All His Friends) in order to do with he thinks is right. There's a sense in which they're really not all that different.

[whyihatetonystark]

I feel people don't realize how much hardship Steve went through. He was the son of Irish immigrants and Catholic, which nowadays isn't a big deal but at the time was a huge deal so he faced discrimination for that. Thanks to that, he grew up poor. He was disabled at the peak of eugenics movement. Because of these things, he was considered subhuman. He latched onto Bucky because Bucky saw Steve as a human being. That's also why calling him and Peggy equals bothers me. Peggy grew up wealthy and is English and therefore was treated better than the Scottish, Irish, or Welsh. She is not physically or mentally disabled. She is a very priveleged woman. Yes she was seen as inferior at times because she's a woman, but she's not had to face near the hurdles Steve had to face.

I think that's because the movies hardly showed him truly struggling. There were deleted scenes, but they didn't end up in the movie. Whereas Tony was shown struggling, especially during Iron Man 3 and people just took that at face value. Even Bucky gets more outright sympathy, but Steve's just treated as this stoic goodey-two-shoes who everyone rolls their eyes at. The average MCU fan has never picked up a comic and doesn't know most of the things you mentioned. For them, Steve's character has little more depth than that he used to be sickly. And the movies didn't shove the rest in their faces, so they didn't give it anymore thought

[16woodsequ]

This is probably a shot in the dark, but could we (read I) get a list of all the fics you have? I'm particularly interested in ones that are "on the backburner" as you say. I wanna know what we're *not* getteing to hear about in WIP Wendsdays.

Actually I'd love that! I made a list a few weeks ago (it was hidden in a long reblog) but I realised it wasn't complete and this time I will be a bit more detailed about it.

First a meme I made for it:

Active wips:

Selkie Steve: Steve is a secret selkie who loses his coat after the war but no one knows.

Dogs are the Best Judge of Character: Steve was turned into a dog on a mission and captured by Hydra. After he escapes he's found by war veteran Bucky.

Bingo Steve Time Travel: For Steve bingo: Steve visits his Ma after he returns the stones.

Backburner wips (aka hopefully will write them one day):

Hanahaki Steve Trauma: Hanahaki disease has been linked to trauma after the war, but no one thought to tell Steve that.

The Captain and The Soldier: Hydra captures Steve in the elevator and succeeds in their take over plan. Now Steve is an asset like Bucky and has no idea why the Avenger rebels are so shocked to see him.

Platonic Cinderella AU: Steve is Cinderella, Joseph Rogers the Wicked Father. Bucky is the Prince, they're both aroace.

Stark Men are Made of Iron and Rogers Don't Take Charity (Iron and Charity for short): Tony and Steve are both turned into children on a mission and captured by Hydra.

Dreaming (nightmares) of You: Tony gets hit with some broken magic that makes him start dreaming of Steve's childhood through Bucky's eyes. But the dreams will stop when Bucky dies. Right?

Alt Options: Steve and the Battle for Wakanda: Steve's pov in the Alternative Timeline series of the Battle in Wakanda.

Alt Options: The Alt-Alt Timeline: Alternative Timeline, Steve pov of the Battle in Wakanda, but this time the Avengers have the warning to 'go for the head' they got from some time travellers.

I know why the Caged Bird Sings: Prequel to The Singer where Sideswipe and Sunstreaker are Singer Starscream's guards and witness the corruption around him.

2nd Winter Soldier Steve idea: Steve is captured by Hydra and wiped. The Avengers + Bucky find him and have to deal with the aftermath of a man who remembers nothing but the walls of a compound.

Cursed Obedience: Bucky has the obedience curse from Ella Enchanted. Hydra finds this out.

Mirror Mirror: Tony slowly realising that Steve doesn't like alcohol, and that it has to do with Joseph Rogers.

Wing Fic: Wing universe, but Steve's wings were damaged in the ice and now are in chronic pain. Tony's wings were also damaged in Afghanistan and he helps.

The Sound of Silence: Steve goes mute after staying at The Retreat, and it's Natasha's job to figure out why.

Way BackBurner (aka right now not actively planning to write one day)

Never in a Million Years: Steve is presenting at Peter's school when he experiences an active shooter drill (just a drill) and learns more about school shootings

Jewish Bucky in army fic: Exploration of how Bucky kept Jewish practices while in the army (much research needed)

It's not your/my fault: Modern-day Steve with cerebral palsy dealing with ableism from Sarah about his incontinence.

Scott and Steve PTSD fic: Scott and Steve are captured and Scott has a PTSD episode because of the Raft. Steve and Scott talk about shared PTSD.

Blue Eyes: The 2012!Steve that got left unconscious by Endgame!Steve is brainwashed when Rumlow finds him with the returned scepter.

Rest: Steve catches a virus from Thor (gives much the same symptoms as Long Covid) and has to adapt to being sick even with the serum.

Steve first aid trauma fic: CPR was invented after Steve died. He learns it after the Loki attack and has to use it after Bucky almost drowns in the helicopter (during Civil War)

Infallible: Steve's pov and 3rd instalment of the "Captured" series. Steve thinks he can't show his triggers, but learns otherwise.

Quirks in the System: Part of winglock series, John's upbringing as a science experiment and war weapon.

Evolution of the Stars: Starscream backstory fic—how he cut off his trinemates to protect them as Megatron got more dangerous.

Discovery: Megatron suddenly realises the abusive dynamics between him and Starscream are hindering the Cause and has to try to change it.

Difficult Lessons: Sequel to "Learned Lessons". Thor pov learning more about Loki and what happened to him before the attack in 2012 (ie Thanos).

Alone: More Starscream backstory fic. Angst of him losing his trinemates

I think that's all of them! Feel free to ask me any questions about them. It will probably result in me feel like working on whatever one you're interested in 😆

[themculibrary]

Fics Written In 2023 Masterlist

A Kiss To Remember (ao3) - anxiouswebhead steve/bucky, clint/natasha G, 10k

Summary: When he knows he's dangerous, nothing more than a threat to anyone in his life, Bucky Barnes allows himself to be put under cryogenic stasis by Princess Shuri and her team. What he wasn't expecting is for Steve Rogers to jump aboard the ship with them, refusing the leave until he saw that he was okay. When he woke, they decided he needed to heal for awhile, but eventually ask for a ship to get Bucky to remember. They fly to Romania, staying in Bucharest where they do, in fact, get Bucky to remember his life, but the how is indeed, a million dollar question. They share a kiss that the former sergeant thinks will be tough to forget.

all eyes on me (in the center of the ring) (ao3) - archerskate carol/maria T, 9k

Summary: An assassination of Carol and her brother Steve's parents leads to Steve's coronation and Carol being assigned a knight to protect her: General Maria Rambeau. Carol senses something fishy going on, and Maria starts to feel it too. With corruption, conspiracy, and treason, who will Carol be able to trust?

----

or a carolmaria royalty au

a love so pure (ao3) - ArabellaAM steve/tony, bucky/natasha G, 21k

Summary: The last thing Steve expects when he has an asthma attack in Stark Industries' elevator is for Tony, a handsome alpha who also happens to be his boss' son, to not only save him but also show interest in him.

That's the kind of thing that only happens in the romance books he likes so much, right?

Or, Alpha!Tony helps Omega!Steve through a rough day and they start falling in love.

An Endless War (ao3) - Eustacia Vye (eustaciavye) loki/natasha T, 23k

Summary: The Watcher dropped Natasha Romanoff into a world where she had died. It is very similar to the world she lost, with very significant differences. She's not about to let this world go down the same path that hers did, and will do whatever it takes to save it. Including dealing with a war criminal.

Bated Breath (ao3) - karedeviltrash matt/karen M, 46k

Summary: A step forward is suddenly interrupted by an unfortunate event.

Buck to the Future (ao3) - Ultra bucky/natasha T, 23k

Summary: What if Bucky never fell from the train? What if Steve wasn’t alone when he crashed the plane? What if the two of them really did stick together to the end of the line, even if that turned out to be the twenty-first century... and what would a certain red-headed spy make of Cap’s best friend?

How to (Try to) Lose a Guy in 10 Days (ao3) - rohruh steve/bucky E, 39k

Summary: “I like it,” Carol snaps her fingers and points in Bucky’s direction. “Let’s give it a deadline. How long do you think you’ll need to get someone to break up with you, Barnes? 10 days?”

This actually sounds kind of fun. It’s been a while since Bucky has felt this kind of excitement towards any of his work assignments.

“How to lose a guy in 10 days,” he says with a bit of wonder.

“How to lose a guy in 10 days,” Carol agrees, sharing a wicked smile with him.

“I won’t need all 10, though,” he tells her with certainty. “I’m sure I can scare him off way sooner than that.”

i can run but i can't hide from my family line (ao3) - archerskate clint/laura T, 4k

Summary: Everything in Kate's life had gone belly-up. Her home, her family, her life - gone. She expected to be spending Christmas alone in a hotel in New York, but Clint didn't let that happen. Kate asks Clint for a favor, and Clint obliges - even if he doesn't want to.

OR

post-hawkeye kate confronting her mother about everything and clint and laura adopt kate

I Just Want You to Know Who I Am (ao3) - TooManyBattles (Skarabrae_stone) steve/bucky E, 19k

Summary: By the time Steve Rogers was selected for Project Rebirth, Erskine thought he had eliminated the side effect that turned Johann Schmidt into Red Skull. He was wrong. This story explores the question: What would change if the serum caused Steve to look like Red Skull?

Kate Bishop: Vampire Hunter (ao3) - mabbbbs kate/yelena M, 16k

Summary: Kate Bishop wants nothing more than to avenge her father’s untimely murder. The only way to do that? Well, become the world’s greatest vampire hunter, obviously. But what would happen if it turns out the potential love of your life may be one of your greatest sworn enemies?

Never Let You See (Baby, What You Mean To Me) (ao3) - Carsonian steve/tony M, 12k

Summary: Steve Rogers' life was the kind of romantic comedy that most people would find themselves cringing out of watching after the first twenty minutes.

(A.K.A. the summer camp fic where Steve is a pining mess, Tony is an unrepentant brat, and there's a game of prison break to be won.)

Nothing But You (ao3) - scottxlogan bucky/tony M, 18k

Summary: Bucky's best friend Steve is getting married to the girl of his dreams and Bucky is playing his part as best man for the pre-wedding festivities. As Bucky works towards putting together the events leading up to the big day, Steve makes a request from his best friend that brings Bucky's secret past back to haunt him. When Tony Stark rolls into town it opens the door to a yearning that Bucky promised himself he would never return to again. Faced with temptation in Tony's arrival, Bucky finds himself fighting his forbidden attraction to the one man that years earlier Bucky told himself that he could learn to live without.

omega instincts (ao3) - haveufoundwhaturlookingfor sam/bucky, steve/tony T, 2k

Summary: Sam Wilson is having a normal day when there's frantic knocking at his front door. What he really doesn't expect to find is his neighbors little boy seeming scared and panicked. Sam's omega instincts kick in immediately.

So, we can be friends now, yes? (ao3) - catastrophe86 yelena/kate T, 16k

Summary: Set immediately following the events of s01e06: So this is Christmas?

Kate and Yelena meet up again after months of thinking about each other. Things don't go well, but it's clear there's something between them. Eventually they'll have to come to terms with their feelings.

Speak of the devil (and he shall appear) (ao3) - Anonymous bucky/brock/zemo E, 5k

Summary: “Rumlow was a better handler than you. He gave me what I needed.” It sounded pathetic in his own ears, much less Zemo’s. His growl was closer to that of a despondent puppy than a wolf. “Rumlow gave me what I wanted.”

Bucky has no problem using Rumlow's name to call out Zemo for how bad he is at handling him. Zemo decides to give him what, or who, he wants so badly.

Stained in Red (ao3) - TheeWill peter/wade M, 22k

Summary: Matt Murdock is used to working alone. He doesn't work well with others and others don't work well him. At least it used to be that way until two men dig into his life with quips and cheap food.

I guess this is the start of team red.

Tension (ao3) - Heavenly_hyacinth peter/wade M, 12k

Summary: Peter gets dumped by MJ due to his “second job” AKA being Spider-Man. Peter realizes he needs to step back from being the famous web slinger and focus on his personal life. In the meantime, he starts to hang out with his—sort of—friend, Wade Wilson/Deadpool. They both start to realize that there’s much more than their odd friendship and they could potentially be more.

Unknowing Witness (ao3) - airas_story tony/stephen G, 4k

Summary: The two men in front of him wanted to get married. They had somehow made this Wong's problem.

Wong was blaming the Ancient One for all of this.

We're All Made of Stars (ao3) - MoreThanAFeeling (Daretodream66) steve/bucky T, 21k

Summary: Bucky is studying a nebula that keeps doing something unusual and what he finds is his childhood hero, Steve Rogers. How does Bucky not fall in love with the big dork? Spoiler alert: he falls.

Would've, Could've, Should've (ao3) - Shelios28 steve/bucky M, 31k

Summary: Or, when the Winter Soldier takes an injured Captain America with him after the events at the Triskelion.

[noshitbarnes]

Better Now?: Chapter 3

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x OFC

Summary: Sophia was 18 when Hydra kidnapped her, gave her abilities, and made her their new secret weapon. Now, flash-forward 9 years later and she’s living with the Avengers, trying to live with everything she did, and trust those she now calls teammates.

Warnings: language

Word Count: 1,960

Notes: I know this chapter is a little short, but let me know what you guys think, thanks!

Better Now? Masterlist

Sophia makes her way from the R&D lab to the combat training area back upstairs. Once there she decides to stick around and watch for a while, she was surprisingly impressed by everyone that was there. Not that she didn't expect to see talented people there, she just didn't expected to find so many talented people. One of the women that was there had bright red hair and was currently showing three men that they were in fact not one of those talented people, she recognized her as Natasha. Sophia was amazed at how she was able to take down three large men with such ease and make it look almost beautiful. She's lost in her own thoughts when she doesn't hear anyone come up next to her.

“Hey Sophia, impressed?”

Sophia is snapped from her thoughts to see Sam and Rhodey walking up, “Actually yeah, Natasha is incredible.”

Sam laughs, “I’ve never heard someone call her that.”

She bites her lip and looks at the men, “Oh my God, is that bad or something?”

Sam shakes his head, “No, no, you’re right, it’s just, most people don’t say it out loud,”

“Yeah,” Rhodey chuckles lightly, “Nat can be intimidating.”

Sophia could see that, Natasha did just take down those men all on her own. She also remembered her not being all that talkative when they first met, but then again the only one who talked a bunch was Sam and that was because he wanted to know about her powers. Maybe some day Natasha would talk to her or something, not that it was a big deal, but seeing another woman be powerful was really inspiring.

“Oh, well it’s true.” Sophia smiles and starts watching everyone again.

A few minutes go by before anyone says anything, then Sam speaks, “Nice shirt by the way.”

Sophia groans, “Don’t you start making fun of my shirt too,” she frowns and looks down at it, “Mr. Stark didn’t like it either," she looks back at Sam, "is it really that bad?”

Sam chuckles, “It’s cute, Wanda’s right?”

She nods and Rhodey crosses his arms, “I’m surprised Tony gave you shit. He’s had his share of cheesy shirts. You got better taste though,” he pauses and Sophia smiles, “Wanda and Barton still treatin’ you ok?”

She smiles big, “Yeah, they’ve been really nice, I like them a lot.”

Rhodey nods and smiles, “Hopefully you get to see that the rest of us are too.”

“Some more than others,” Sam chuckles, “well, we have to get back to training, it was nice to talk to you though, hun." Sophia waves goodbye to them as they walk over to the mats where Natasha was waiting.

It's quiet for a while, all that's heard is the thuds of people getting tackled on the mats or Sam occasionally yelling at Natasha to stop trying to hit him in the face. It was odd, but this was the most normal Sophia had felt in weeks, even comparing it to staying in her room those first two days, this for some reason was better. She didn't realize she missed being around people so much, well that she missed being herself around people. With Hydra she was around people all the time whether it be at the main base, training, or on a mission, but at all of those places she had to fake who she was in order to survive. Here, she still felt on edge, but it was a little better now, she could slowly feel her old self coming back, and she loved it.

“So how’s the adventure going?”

Sophia jumped a bit not realizing someone new had come up next to her. She looks over to see Bucky with his arms crossed watching Natasha and Sam spar, “Oh, um, hi Sergeant,” she smiles, “pretty good, it’s a big place though.”

“I warned you,” he chuckles, “took me a while to get use to the place.”

She looks back to Natasha and Sam, “How long have you been here?”

“About 2 years, it was an adjustment, but I like it now,” he smiles.

Sophia nods and takes a deep breath, “I’m hoping I eventually like it too, so far so good.”

There's a pause and then Bucky speaks, “Can I ask you something though?”

She bites her lip and crosses her arms, “Um, sure.”

He continues his questioning without looking at her, “I got this feeling that chess and you don’t mix well.”

She smirks, “Well that’s not really a question.”

He scoffs a bit and rolls his eyes, “Alright, fair point,” he turns to face her and continues, “you got somethin’ against chess?”

Sophia turns and faces him, arms still crossed, “You got that from me not wanting to play?”

He smirks and look down at the floor briefly then back to her, “I’m a spy, Sophia, I can read people pretty well,” then he shrugs, “it’s just the read I got off you. You can tell me if I’m wrong.”

She closes her eyes for a moment and starts to tap her fingers against her arm, “No, you’re right, just surprised that you noticed is all,” she takes a deep breath and slowly lets it out, “but if you don’t mind, it’s not something I want to talk about.”

“That’s fine, you don’t owe me an explanation about why, I just felt bad because you looked upset,” he looks down at the ground, clearly hurt.

Sophia looks at him, feeling guilty, “It’s nothing you did, if that helps.”

He looks back up and smiles slightly, but it didn’t meet his eyes, “Okay,” he hesitates for a moment and ran his vibranium hand through his hair, “I know Barton’s told you some things about me,” he bit his lip and continues, “so, um, if you wanna talk, you can always talk to me.”

She smirks and nods her head, “Ya know, he actually did tell me I should talk to you too,” she smile lightly and shrugs, “I guess he thought you could help,” she pauses and meets his gaze, “um, has talking about your past helped you?”

He shrugs lightly, “Yeah, sometimes, but I um, I don’t remember a lot of things about my past,” he sighs, “I talk to Steve every once in a while, Sam too, and it’s helped, but they haven’t exactly been through what I have,” he pauses, "I do however have a court appointed therapist cause'a the pardon, sometimes she's helpful."

Sophia nods and smiles, “I appreciate the offer, Sergeant, but I um, I’m just not ready to talk about anything yet.”

**********

After walking through the compound most of the day it was dinnertime, so Sophia decided it was a good idea to stick around. Everyone had been so nice to her throughout the day, it would've been rude to go back in to hiding.

“Do you like pizza, Sophia?” Steve asks, “Cause no one here feels like cooking, so I thought we’d order one.”

Sophia nods, “Yeah, it’s been a while since I’ve had pizza.”

“Aright,” he smiles, “what kind do you want?”

“I’ll just eat whatever you guys get, I’m not picky,” she smiles at him and goes to the fridge to grab a bottle of water, “anything with cheese makes me happy.”

“Get some of their three cheese pizza then,” Tony threw Steve his phone and turns to Sophia, “this place down the block has the best pizza, we always order from them,” Steve starts dialing and walks out of the room so he could hear.

She smiles, “Sounds great.”

**********

After the pizzas had arrived, everyone was sharing stories, so that Sophia could get to know the team better. Sophia appreciated it too, she loved being a spectator when it came to conversations anyway, she's a great listener, and no one was bombarding her with questions either, so it was really nice. Currently, they were discussing how often pranks happen around the compound and from what Sophia had gathered, Sam and Bucky prank each other a lot.

“I’m still pissed that you wrapped my wings in plastic wrap,” Sam glares at Bucky from across the table, who just laughs.

“What? It was for April Fool’s,” Bucky laughs holding his stomach, “I had to get you back for last year. You covered my arm in tinfoil when I fell asleep on the couch,” Sam smirks at him and chuckles.

For some reason that made Sophia laugh, that she did try to stifle, but unsuccessfully, making soda almost come out of her nose. Bucky looks to her and her eyes grow wide, while he playfully smirks, "You think that's funny?"

“Umm…” she bit her lip, “I’m not gonna lie, it sounds funny,” she looks down at her empty plate, nervous under his gaze.

“It was,” Sam laughs along with everyone else, “it was fucking hilarious because you didn’t even realize it until Barton pointed it out!”

Bucky blushes and shakes his head, “Yeah, it was funny, I guess. Not as funny as you trying to take off and landing on your ass when your wings didn’t expanded,” everyone laughs, but Sam just glares at him.

Sophia smiles at everyone laughing, “Do you all prank each other a lot?”

“These two do,” Steve answers while shaking his head, “every once in a while when it’s been a slow week, Sam gets bored and pranks a few of us.”

“Why do you always think it’s me?” Sam asks.

Natasha narrows her eyes, “When is it not you? Do you not remember when you put post-it notes all over Tony’s suits?”

Sophia puts her hand over her mouth in shock, “You put post-it notes on his suits?” she then laughs which earns a glare from Tony.

“Yeah, he did,” Tony turns his glare to Sam, “it had to've taken him forever because they were all decorated like a rainbow.”

“Who said I did it by myself?” Sam looks over at Bucky.

Bucky was in the middle of drinking his beer and swallows hard, “I hate you."

Tony just chuckles to himself, “I’m not a dick guys, I can take a joke. Just be prepared for payback.”

“Anyway! Last week,” Sam gestured with his hands, “someone,” he eyes Bucky, who was trying to avoid eye contact, “put mentos in the ice cubes. Why the hell would I do that? That’s just lame.”

Bucky casually picks up the last slice of pizza from the box, “It was hilarious when you used them for your drink,” he grins and takes a bite, “but it wasn’t me.”

Sam glares at him, “I’ll get you back.”

“I just said it wasn’t me,” Bucky rolls his eyes, “maybe ask your local archer about it.”

Sam looks across the table to Clint who’s eyes widened, “Why would I do that? I’m more creative than that.”

Bucky raises an eyebrow, “Are you though?”

Sophia laughs as they continue to bicker, then glances down at her watch, and realizes it’s almost midnight, “Hey, I think I’m going to call it a night, everyone.”

Sophia says her goodbyes to everyone and that she'll see them in the morning and heads to her room. As Sophia heads down the hallway, she thinks about the day she's had and smiles, today was a success. Everyone was so incredibly nice to her and it made her think that she could start trusting again. After all, she just spent the entire evening with them and not one of them forced her to share anything about her life if she didn't want to, and she appreciate that more than they could even understand. Sophia arrives at her bedroom and reaches for the doorknob, when suddenly everything goes black and she collapses to the floor.

[loveloki555]

Civil War is not continuation of Age of Ultron

Here are my words from that reblog:

The MCU was good until 2015… Age of Ultron may not be a great movie, but that's where I draw the line… Old MCU/New MCU

Why am I not including Civil War…it's a good movie, it's not like Thor Ragnarok or Captain Marvel which confuse the chronology and start to reduce the entire franchise to pointlessness.

Civil War was supposed to show that the Avengers were responsible for their carelessness. Okay, this is a good thread. The only problem is how he does it. The writers won't think that Tony Stark taking Spider-Man on the team…doesn't work. Because Tony should make him realize that by supporting Tony…he supports signing up and taking off the mask. Peter doesn't know what he supports. He knows that Captain America has done something and he has to help because it's Tony Stark… How does this put the character of Tony Stark and the things he's come to understand in his previous films?

Also a political fact… suddenly the Accords are ratified and the Avengers are faced with a fait accompli. There should be a press conference something like at the end of Winter Soldier. They should present their case to the public… They should remind that Hydra recently infiltrated everything… and such a paralysis of their decision-making… may be beneficial for such entities…

Also, why did Ross blame the Avengers for the damage to New York… they were trying to stop the battle… It's not their fault, Loki is too smart. Not that it matters, I support Loki ruling Midgard;) But it's strange that the Avengers didn't remind Ross that this battle wasn't their fault. Maybe it's diplomacy's fault more… because they tried to fight and antagonize a being 1000 years older than them. Maybe if they sat down with Thor and Loki as mediators on the helicarrier… maybe the problems would be solved… or not… Loki, as usual, would be wiser. But at least they would try. (Yes, I'm a Loki fan… because first I'm a fan of Loki, and then I'm a fan of the rest of the MCU… Loki always comes first;)

I'm not sure how to rewrite Civil War to be more in line with earlier canon. Well…maybe remove Lagos and the Accords and start with the consequences for Ultron. Maybe some Senators want to take Tony's armor again. Maybe they'll decide the shield shouldn't be in Steve's hands. And in the background, involve this thread with Zemo and Bucky… Zemo could be this baron, an important figure from Sokovia who is publicly concerned about the fate of the world… and secretly works against the Avengers.

Civil War is a good movie… if we consider it the beginning of the New MCU Canon… which I allude to in this:

Because Civil War is not a good continuation of the threads of Age of Ultron. And neither is further MCU in general.

Age of Ultron threads

Hawkeye - having a family and a normal life, Laura tells him that in this world of gods and superhumans… he can make a difference… there is no continuation of this.

Thor - has a vision of destruction… what's more… it is said that he is guilty of it… how? Seeing at Thor Ragnarok, how can Thor be guilty of his father having an illegitimate daughter? What is Thor's fault in this? The vision talks about doom because of him, that he is a destroyer… that it is his personal fault… abandoned Loki plot?

Vision - is a consequence of Ultron's actions… and we don't have any storylines with it… how does he deal with it.

Thanos - already has the gauntlet. He has it. And he takes it from Asgard. I'm more betting on Loki offering it than war. But with a trick… Loki probably gave him the gauntlet, but he definitely kept the trick in his pocket.

Steve - sees Peggy's vision and knows that he has come to terms with the loss of what was… and he wants to continue building his life… completely abandoned plot.

Bruce - I don't know if Bruce was originally supposed to end up this far in space… Fury shows at the end of Age of Ultron that Hulk could have landed in the ocean, near the Philippines…

Also at the end of Age of Ultron, Thor says: someone has been playing an intricately game and has made pawns of us.

Another clue to Loki's abandoned plot? Because Thanos wants to destroy the Avengers at the end of Age of Ultron. Personally. There is no moral objection at all. He cannot be player making pawns. But Loki can. Because he was the one who played the game first and learned everything about the Avengers Team.

[unseededtoast]

Rectify | Bucky Barnes

Part 13/37 | Part Twelve, Part Fourteen

Summary: I've lived every day for the past five years looking over my shoulder. I knew they'd come for me, it was inevitable. I was foolish to think I could outrun my past. It's followed me everywhere I go, lurking in the shadows, waiting for the perfect moment to strike. Never would I have anticipated that the shadows would lead me to the light.

Bucky Barnes x OC

Series Warnings: Discussion of human trafficking, alcohol consumption, graphic depictions of violence, sexual content, discussion of suicidal thoughts.

a/n: Hi everyone, thank you for checking this out, I appreciate any and all support! This series is also posted on Ao3 and Wattpad if you prefer those formats/platforms! This is a completed series, and it's going to take some time for me to transfer it to Tumblr, so please bear with me!

"I want to undo the programming. I can't jeopardize my position here by getting too involved, I won't risk losing you again."

Sunlight wakes me up and I squint my eyes as I sit on the edge of the bed, preparing myself for whatever the day may hold. Hopefully it's less messy than yesterday. My feet hit the cold floor and I go to look in the dresser across the room, under the tv. I find there are different sized shirts and pants in the drawers. I rummage around until I find some black joggers and a dark green long sleeved shirt. I grab the new outfit and take it with me to the en suite.

Thankfully the en suite is stocked with fresh toiletries. I can't say how old the supplies in the bunker were, though I'm willing to bet it was all over ten years old. There's a fresh toothbrush, shampoo and conditioner, along with several other things. I set the clothes down on the counter and take a hot shower, scrubbing away the grime I couldn't get rid of in the bunker. Once I'm out I dry my hair and braid it off to the side before I put my clothes on. I pair my new outfit with the Shield issued boots I got and leave my room to see what I can find for breakfast.

I step out of the elevator and see everyone gathered around the counter, eating from a stack of pancakes that's by the stove. I catch Bucky's eye quickly and avert my gaze. I'll probably have to deal with this today, just not right now. I take a plate with two pancakes and sit next to Natasha. Tony's in the middle of saying something,

"Bruce says he wants some time alone to relax, the whole thing got to him pretty bad." I catch the end of everything he was saying. I hope Bruce is okay, I miss him.

One by one everyone finishes breakfast and walks away until it's only Steve, Bucky, and myself. Feeling like the silence needs to be ended, I decide to ask Steve his version of what happened over the last few days.

"Well, some of them got away, but we got most of them. It's hard saying how long they were infiltrating Shield." Steve answers simply. His answer matches the one Natasha gave me yesterday.

"So this whole situation got me thinking a little bit and I was wondering if you could teach me how to fight? Hitting people with lamps is starting to become a pattern for me and I don't want to get too reliant on them." I ask Steve who looks surprised.

"Uh yeah, sure." I smile at his answer. Bucky frowns a little bit, but stays silent. Steve and I walk out into the yard and I wait for his instruction. I don't know the first thing about fighting, I hope Steve doesn't mind starting from scratch.

He shows me how to stand and how to shift my weight when I land a punch. For him this must be comparable to showing a child how to ride a bike with the training wheels on. I get the hang of throwing punches relatively quickly and Steve starts showing me how to properly kick.

"Now try it all together." Steve says as he backs away from me. Steve is going extremely easy on me, never throwing a real punch or kick, which I am entirely grateful for; I'd probably die if he punched me. I take a quick breath and try to hype myself up before I start going after Steve. I throw a punch to hit his jaw, which he blocks, then shift my weight to land a kick on his torso, which he also blocks.

"I look really stupid right now, don't I?" I ask Steve as I finish putting everything together that he's taught me so far. He shakes his head,

"You're starting out a lot better than I did." I smile a little at the fact Steve is being patient with me and turn to do it all again. I see Bucky watching us off to the side and catch his gaze for a few moments. His blue eyes hold a certain sadness in them, one I haven't seen before. I look away and start the drill over again. I feel guilty for avoiding him, but I don't know what to say just yet.

Steve and I work for the majority of the day until I feel my muscles begin to ache. I stand across from Steve who looks like he's not even a little bit tired, which he probably isn't. I think he might be able to do this all day. I put my hands on my hips and take a deep breath.

"Can we pick this up tomorrow? My non-super soldier body is getting a little tired." I say, slightly envious of Steve's endurance and ability to keep going.

"Of course. You did good today, don't sell yourself short. Every single one of us here started somewhere." He says as he walks back into Stark's building. Bucky is still sitting at the edge of the grass, and I know I've stalled as long as I possibly can. I sit next to Bucky, nervousness taking over me. A few days ago this would've been a nice evening to spend together. I don't know where to start, there are so many things I want to say.

"I missed you." I want to start the conversation by showing him I care about him a lot. It won't be easy explaining to him why yesterday morning can never repeat itself, no matter how much I want for it to.

"I missed you too." He says quietly.

"Did Steve ask you about yesterday?" I ask, wanting to know what he said to Steve and if our stories aligned with one another.

"I told him I offered to share the bed because the couch was hurting you." He answers, still staring off and not looking towards me.

"I told him the same thing." I say, feeling only a little bit guilty for not giving him the whole truth.

"If he wouldn't have walked in would you have kissed me?" He directly asks, this time looking at me. I know the time has come to set the boundary but I don't want to do it. I sigh,

"Bucky, I want to help you. I want to help you through the process of getting your memories back, and I want to undo the programming. I can't jeopardize my position here by getting too involved, I won't risk losing you again. Even if that means putting personal feelings on the backburner." I avoid his question and the words are hard to say. I wish I didn't have to say them. He stays silent for a few moments, processing everything I said.

"You won't lose me again, and I won't lose you." I want to reach over and comfort him, but doing so would only make things harder.

"I can't take that risk. You mean too much to me and I still have so much work to do." I explain. We're still going to be in each other's lives, that's part of the job description. We just can't get intimately involved and I hope he sees it the same way. Without another word, Bucky gets up and leaves me outside alone. Perfect.

I stay outside, taking in the cool evening air. I hope that in a few days this blows over and things go back to normal. Bucky and I can forget that yesterday morning ever happened and continue like we were before. I can't exactly put my finger on what I feel for Bucky. I know I deeply care for him and have since our Hydra days, I just can't explain why he made me blush in the bunker, why I was so nervous to share a bed with him, and why I would've let him kiss me.

The image of us dancing in the Shield compound comes to mind, and I remember how warm I felt sharing that moment together. I've only ever known the Winter Soldier, I'm just now meeting Bucky for the first time and I feel drawn to him. In the Shield compound we spent hours together as he explained what he remembered and I would tell him small bits and pieces about what happened to me after I escaped. He's the only one who truly understands my trauma from Hydra, we're able to empathize with each other in a way nobody else can.

Not only are we able to connect on an emotional level, I'd be lying if I said I didn't find him attractive. His blue eyes are captivating and full of life, life I have never seen in him before. He's gentle, I remember how carefully he held my hand when we danced, how delicate he was when he rubbed my back. I love his long brown hair, how it blows softly in the breeze and the stubble that adorns his jawline. His jaw is sharp, but has a softness to it that makes him all the more inviting.

I push the thoughts away and stand from my spot to make my way inside, walking past those who are having dinner and heading straight to my room. I feel a little bit empty on the inside, knowing I can't spend the evening with Bucky watching tv or talking about something random. Besides Steve, he's the only other person I've created a meaningful bond with, and I fear that the bond has been damaged.

My room is too quiet for my liking, but fits right in with the way I'm feeling. I go to take a quick shower to wash off the sweat from today's lessons and put on some light cotton shorts and a t-shirt. I make my way over to the mini bar and find a bottle of vodka, this should be enough to drown out the sadness for a little while. I tip the bottle back and feel the burning sensation travel down my throat.

I sit on the couch, bottle in hand, and look out the window. I tip the bottle back again, and again, and again. I feel my lips become numb, along with my fingertips. I don't know why I'm getting so worked up about the situation, Bucky is still in my life, he's still going to be around. However, I think that just having him around will never be enough, I'll never be fully satisfied but I'll have to make it be enough.

I finish half the bottle and decide that's probably a good stopping point. I know I need to eat something and most people are probably in bed right now, so it should be safe to sneak downstairs. I tiptoe down the hall, being overly-cautious of making sure my steps are straight and that I'm walking in a straight line. I get in the elevator and step off at the ground floor. Tony is sitting behind the wet bar and looks up when he hears the elevator ding.

I stand frozen in place, knowing I am far too inebriated to have any sort of conversation with him. I see him smirk and he walks over to me,

"Looks like we had the same idea." He sits me down at the counter where the stove is and places a plate in front of me. It's leftover Chinese takeout that the others had earlier. I dig into the noodles as Tony watches me.

"You're not a spy. Natasha showed me the video." He says and I scrunch my eyebrows together,

"What video?" I ask, words slightly running together.

"This one." Tony flips his phone around to show me the screen. I see security camera footage of Steve and I helping Bucky into the plane. I swallow the bite of noodles in my mouth and look back at Tony once the video ends.

"He's heavier than you think." I smirk to myself. Tony walks over to the bar and makes some sort of mixed drink. He pours it into two glasses and hands one to me. I clink the glass with his and down the fruity mix, not feeling the burning tequila.

Tony and I stay in a comfortable silence, each of us dealing with our own reason for getting drunk. I'm happy he finally sees me for who I am now, and not just a supposed Hydra spy. I get up from the uncomfortable counter stool and lay on the couch that's situated in the middle of the room. I use a throw pillow to support my head and curl up on the couch, closing my eyes and feeling the room spin slightly. I feel a blanket being tossed over me, and give into the sleep that's calling my name.

[missvelvetsstuff]

Fridays Place

Bucky Barnes x Reader

Mob AU

Notes: She's back! this is kinda short but I've been struggling with it for months and finally pushed thru the block. Hopefully I'll be able to keep the story flowing.

Warnings: swearing, angst

Chapter 18

The first few days that Bucky and Becca stayed at her place were awkward. Becca didn't notice but they did. One morning Bucky thought Friday was still outside so he tried to go from the bathroom to the guest room in just a towel. Unfortunately for him, she came back in the house as he was walking down the hall.

After watching him for a second she joked "Jeez Bucky, don't you have a bathrobe or anything? It's dangerous running around a single girls house in nothing but a towel."

Bucky blushed and turned around smirking "I don't mind but I could get rid of the towel if you prefer."

Before Friday could respond Becca had opened her bedroom door and looked at her father "Daddy! That's gross, keep the towel or you might scare Miss Friday away again"

Friday had to cover her mouth to keep from laughing out loud. Bucky grumbled about smart ass kids and went to his room to get dressed.

Friday went into the kitchen to make breakfast for Becca before Bucky needed to take her to school. The three of them at the table eating together was so sweet and domestic Bucky thought he might explode.

After Bucky dropped Becca off he called Tony, Steve, Sam and Clint to meet him at the stable and discuss Malick returning to town, obviously due to the dust up with Hydra and the upcoming trials for Sharon and Pierce.

When he pulled back into the stable he sat in his SUV for a few minutes trying to figure out how to deal with this new twist. All he knew for sure was that he would kill anyone who tried to hurt Friday, with his bare hands if necessary.

When other cars started pulling up he got out and went to the grassy picnic area behind the house and waited for everyone to show.

Tony and Vis, driven by Happy, were the last to arrive. Friday made coffee and went with Peter and MJ to take care of the horses while the rest of them talked or more like argued about how to handle Malicks return.

Tony shook his head "I know you're spun on this girl Barnes but you have to think with your big head. You're moved in here so should be able to keep a close eye on her. The problem is that the trial is creeping up on us which means Sharon and Pierce will be around."

Bucky nodded "I know. There are restraining orders on both of them so they shouldn't come here but that doesn't mean they won't. I'm more concerned about the actual trial and Friday testifying. That's coming up quickly and I want to make sure we can keep her safe. She hasn't left her property since she came home from the hospital so leaving will likely be rough on her."

Tony nodded "We need to get our best lawyer in here. Matt Murdock is the only man for this job. He's really good with people who have been through Hell. Sensitive and all that. He also knows everyone and can find out what angle Sharon will play."

Bucky snorted "Sharon is the best at being horrible and playing the victim all at once. Friday will probably have to go through their entire relationship to prove Sharon's lifetime of animosity and nasty pranks."

Tony's phone rang "What's up Rhodey? Shit, that's all we need." his face paled and he hung up. He looked at Bucky "Rhodeys contact at the airport called. Private jet came in last night. From Sokovia."

Bucky and Steve groaned as Bucky looked at Steve "Go find out where that prick is amd keep me updated."

Steve nodded and grabbed Sam "C'mon, man."

Matt Murdock was called and scheduled to meet with Friday in a couple of days so that he had time to suss out the defense's strategy before he met her. That way they could work on theirs. When they did meet she was surprised to see he was blind, no one had mentioned it to her. They sat in her living room with Bucky while Becca was in school and went over what Matt had found out about the defense's plans and work on theirs.

"Sounds like Sharon is planning to play penitent and newly saved to help reduce her sentence. And they are selling Pierce down the river." Matt told them.

Friday rolled her eyes "She's tried that before. After the accident she caused that killed Louie and broke my leg, she showed up at the hospital, crying and begging me to forgive her. She blamed her mom, insisted she was forced to do it. I didn't believe her but Peggy did and wanted me to accept. I did but only for Peggy, she had done so much for me I couldn't tell her no. It wasn't even a month before Sharon and her friends were at it again. I don't believe for one second that she's changed or that she ever will."

In the last week Friday's anxiety ramped up and her sleep was plagued by nightmares. She woke up screaming every night and Bucky rarely left her side except to sleep, not including the times she fell asleep curled up against him while watching tv. She could barely eat either and started to look gaunt and sickly again. Bucky did everything he could think of to help her feel better without much luck.

A few days before the trial started Bucky, Friday and Matt were finishing up their meeting on the porch when a car pulled up. Bucky quickly stood up and reached for his gun, waving Friday and Matt behind him.

A medium height man with light brown hair stepped out of the car.

Bucky growled "Helmet, when did you slither back into town"

The man shook his head "Now James I thought we had grown past all that silly name calling." He raised his hands up showing he wasn't armed "I've come to speak with the famous Miss Friday, on behalf of my fiance."

"Fiance? What happened to your wife?"

"You know that story already James. Could you introduce me to your lady friend?"

"I'd really rather not" Bucky sighed "Friday, this is Baron Helmut Zemo from Sokovia. One of Malicks associates. Zemo, this is Miss Friday.

Now, Zemo, who is your fiance and why would she send you here?"

"Of course you both know her, Sharon Carter and I will be married as soon as this court mess is settled"

Friday rolled her eyes "Are you stupid, a masochist or one of those people that's into convicts? I'm not interested in anything Sharon has to say so you can leave now."

Bucky grinned "You heard the lady, so head on out."

Zemo shook his head "Miss Friday, I know you and Sharon have had a contentious relationship for many years but-"

Friday scoffed "If by contentious you mean she has done everything in her power to terrorize and bully me since we were kids, sure."

"I understand Miss but the most recent incident has given Sharon much to think about. She wants to turn her life around. She feels horrible about how she's treated you."

"Most recent incident? You mean the one where she and her boyfriend raped me for 2 days, she flogged me, poured alcohol on the welts and then tried to kill me? I don't care if she had an epiphany or found Jesus. I hope she feels like shit and rots in prison." She turned and led Matt back into the house.

Bucky smirked at Zemo "I think shes done talking to you. See you at the trial." And watched Zemo leave before going back inside.

The night before the trial started Bucky got a late call from Tony. "Pierce is dead. Fury said they're calling it suicide but I think Zemo and Malick are cutting their losses. There was a note, confessing to coordinating Friday's abduction and apologizing. They'll probably try to push the blame for all of it to him and claim Sharon was manipulated by him and Brock."

Bucky scoffed "Too bad they didn't find Sharon with him. Zemo stopped by, claims he's engaged to her and she wants to apologize to Friday, feels terrible about what she did"

Tony chuckled "I'm guessing she didn't go for it?"

"Nah, something about hoping Sharon rots and questioning Zemos intelligence and morals for getting involved with her."

"I hope she can keep that strength up. I'll see you in the morning, pal. Get some rest."

Friday came out of her room, looking exhausted "Who was that? Is everything ok?"

Bucky pulled her into his arms "It was Tony. Pierce was found dead. The police are calling it a suicide but thats unlikely. Malick probably had him taken out." He told her about the note.

Friday gripped him tighter "Cleaning up their mess. How long till someone comes for me?" She asked lifelessly.

Bucky pulled back, gently grabbed her chin until she was looking him in the eyes. "It doesn't matter, I won't let anything happen to you. I promise."

She pulled away from him "So you'll spend the rest of your life babysitting me? I get to live the rest of my life looking over my shoulder? I don't know if I can do this Buck."

"It won't be forever doll. We'll get past this."

She rested her head on his shoulder "I know you mean it but I don't believe it."

"Lets get you back to bed. You need your rest before tomorrow."

In a voice so soft he almost didn't hear her she told him "I don't want to be alone"

"You aren't" and he lead her back into her room where he helped her into bed and curled up behind her and whispered "I'll always be here next to you." Before they both drifted off.

Chapter 19

[sofiadragon]

Sometimes people have a right to know, even when telling them can't be a "good" thing.

@ripfic made a post about how Steve Rogers was justified in not telling Tony Stark that his parents had been murdered. I don't want to hijack it with an essay, so I'm doing my own post. I want to start off by saying I agree that Steve felt he did the right thing and that he had the best intentions, but I found this to be parallel to the beginning of the film. This isn't a "you are wrong" it's "I frame that differently" and I hope you'll find this an interesting take rather than a hostile rebuttal from someone on the other side of the fence.

I understand Steve's choice, and he did it out of good intentions, but it turned out badly because that's the point. Bad news sucks, but you should tell your friends anyway. It's about the only clear message in the film, with how badly the rest of the themes are handled. Tony let Ross tell the team about the Accords, springing it on them as something they have to deal with right now - sign or don't sign. Laws take ages to pass, so Tony had time to tell the team and chose not to. We don't get any reasoning for that beyond an implied "not his job" or perhaps "something something Ultron-based PTSD."

Let's get a timeline down, to avoid arguments about who knew what and when. The Stark assassination was part of the information Zola showed Cap and Nat in CAatWS to scare/delay them. Zola says "When history did not cooperate, history was changed" while showing a picture of the Winter Soldier assassinating someone. Then, he shows a newspaper clipping saying Howard died in an accident. This isn't exactly subtle storytelling.

It is possible he finds out while searching Hydra bases offscreen sometime later, but if this key moment happened on-screen it is here or when Nat hands Steve a file about the Winter Soldier at the end of the film and warns that he won't like what is in it. So, "I didn't know it was him" is only a true statement if either:

Steve knew Hydra ordered a hit, but the Winter Soldier was not mentioned at all on whatever documentation he was shown by Natasha or found later. Steve might have suspected but Steve never knew with 100% certainty, and he chose to disregard circumstantial evidence like Zola's presentation.

After finding out about Wintercore Steve is no longer sure, but that only happened a few hours ago. Technically true, but certainly playing semantics with this one because it wasn't true yesterday.

In either case, he clearly looks guilty when he corrects himself and admits he knew.

Let's not skip over that folder Nat gives Steve. Natasha gives Steve upsetting information that he deserves to know. Things that are uncomfortable to say and a bummer to know about. Nothing in that file is good news. Neither Steve nor Natasha does the same for Tony, and everything I'm about to say about Steve also applies to her even if her internal logic might be a little more utilitarian and less about feelings and morals.

Steve wanted to spare Tony at first because there would be no closure with Bucky in the wind and no idea who exactly ordered the hit - it would only open new wounds. He clearly does not know, because Tony doesn't talk about feelings, that Tony blames himself for Howard drinking and crashing the car. It wouldn't occur to Steve that even without closure this would be good for Tony to know. He thinks it would only cause pain.

Even if new information from other Hydra bases starts piling up, it just isn't worth it to have such a 'weird' or awkward conversation. Maybe very little additional info outside the most circumstantial is found - other Winter Soldier hits that fit a vague pattern for how they use him at best, but no clear statement of who ordered the hit so no specific target for Tony's anger beyond Bucky, who can't be blamed. They are already fighting Hydra, so giving Tony another reason to want to take down Hydra isn't useful - especially since Tony is stepping back and has not really been a part of the team since Ultron. Steve has already decided that the first big chunk of news wasn't enough on its own so it is easy to decide these little shreds are not enough.

At this point, after all that rationalizing, only something as clear as Barnes confessing to what he remembers or the magic video that somehow exists [what was that, a lucky wildlife camera?] would be enough to move Cap. The inertia of the decision is too much, he has decided that Tony knowing would only hurt him despite this being information that is deeply personal to Tony. It's about Tony's family.

Steve can't have it both ways, either it will matter so much to Tony that not telling him isn't right morally or Tony will care so little that telling him won't be a big deal - but people hold that kind of cognitive dissonance all the time for interpersonal relationships. If Steve thinks it is specifically him telling Tony that would be weird, then he could tell someone else like James Rhodes. Instead, Steve and Natasha kept this completely under wraps.

I don't think he would expect Tony to lash out, for the same reason he wouldn't know Tony currently blames himself for his parent's death. It didn't occur to him that Tony wouldn't be rational and would lose all control due to his strong emotions, even in that moment when Tony is clearly beyond anger after seeing the video. Steve mourned his mom at about the same age and he's moved on from it. He has nothing unresolved related to becoming an orphan. He really does think that he's sparing Tony by not re-opening a long-healed wound, and he likely feels he is respecting Tony's "allergy" to emotional moments by not bringing this to him.

This isn't in the post I'm responding to, but I see it too much to leave it out: So many Steve-stans try to say that Tony should have robotically processed the information and accepted that the brainwashing left Bucky perfectly innocent - but Tony isn't a machine, he is a deeply emotional character who makes poor choices in high-emotion high-stress situations. That's the whole premise and plot of Iron Man 2. Stark doesn't hold Clint Barton to the things he did under Loki's control in the back half of Avengers 1, but he didn't watch Barton attack someone he loved the same day he met the guy in person for the first time. Tony wasn't right to try and kill Barnes because of his grief, but Wanda wasn't right to torture an entire town because of grief either. Let's hold people to the same standards when they are in emotional distress.

Tony deserves to know because it is about him and his family. Even if it will be painful, even if there is no good way to say it, he deserves to be told in a respectful way. He is instead blindsided by the facts in the most traumatic way possible and has an emotional response that is so overwhelming he wants to take a man's life. this is Steve's fault in part because Steve should have told him.

Stark is guilty of a very similar if less emotional, failure to have an uncomfortable conversation. "Hey, Cap, you know how you are breaking about 30 anti-terrorism laws every time you go beat up the bad guys? Well, there is a law that says it wants to fix that but it's got gremlins in it. Nasty ones. I know you'll hate this, but we need to hammer out a counterargument and put together a PR blitz to get the public on our side about this or we're going to lose out bigtime." This needed to be said months prior to the beginning of the film but was not.

Steve deserved to know about the Accords while they were being drafted, not after over a hundred countries agreed to them. Sure, he hates the dancing monkey act, but he has played politics before when needs must. This affects him and his team "family" directly. Tony shouldn't assume that Cap wouldn't want to help with lobbying for changes or making a public statement. Steve is blindsided by the Accords at the worst time possible. Peggy's death means he doesn't get the chance to do anything about them. There is only this one meeting left where they are going to be ratified and he has to miss it because he won't miss saying goodbye to her. Tony can't know this would happen, he thinks that having stepped back from the Avengers it isn't his place to make sure they are keeping up with the news coming out of the UN, or else he figures it would just cause unproductive arguments with Steve about PR being either irrelevant or Tony's job. Maybe Tony just wants backup for the conversation and people are always spread out and busy - he'll tell them later after the cleanup from the last mission is done... and then another mission happens... and then another mission...

There is an argument to be made that the team should have known this was coming if they watch the news and pay attention to world events, but they were quite busy cleaning up the Hydra infestation. Natasha is an assassin and a honeypot, that kind of thing was always handled for her. SHIELD did that - and Tony replaced SHIELD as their source of funding, supply, etc. I'd assume Tony does handle this the way he'd handle an employee. A new regulation is imminent, time to tell the staff so they can integrate it into their safety protocols. Let the bad news come from someone else if a regulator wants to make the presentation. Then, soften the blow if appropriate by telling them what SI legal is doing to fix whatever issue the employees might have and tell them to suck it up and deal with the new regs because in engineering most regulations are written in blood. "Wear your PPE no matter how silly it looks and mothball the stuff that you can't work on for now, the highly trained staff we have to deal with PR and Legal issues are on it" is realistic for corporate America.

It's a bit more selfish from the start on Tony's end, but in both cases, someone is withholding information because the conversation won't be all sunshine and roses. They are sparing themselves an hour or so of discomfort when the right thing to do is sit down and have an adult conversation.

[sweater-daddiesdumbdork]

Sweet sweet Amber, how are you? Hope you're having a good weekend😘 I'm the same anon who shared Steve AOU imagination with you and I'm here to share some more.

I imagined Steve would meet his right partner the moment he woke up after 70 years in times Square. She was right there standing behind Nick Fury. She would help him settle in the 21st century because she felt bad for him, it was an act of kindness on repeat on her part. She'd make him smile and laugh on her jokes and show him that he's not the lonely one. She'd lost her family too when she was a young girl. She'd become Steve’s best friend. But his heart would do a somersaults when She'd give him a piece of her mind after knowing that he jumped out of the jet without parachute (TWS). She'd show him how mad she is because she cares and he would have this sweet smile on his face. He would see that she has all the motherly care in her. He'd promised her not to do anything like that again. And he'd just looked at her dreamily throughout TWS and at Fury's fake grave he'd place a kiss on her cheek catching her off guard. They'd stare into each eyes inches apart and both feel the shift in their heart. She'd help him locate Bucky and during the time b/w TWS and AOU, he would fall hopelessly and helplessly in love with her. He'd convince her in of the Stark galas to give them a chance and she'd tell him that she's not easy, the couple of relationships she had in the past lasted couple a months only, b/c no one wants to deal with her and Steve would assure her that he'd not leave unless she wants him to. And that would be the start of their whirlwind romance.

Nat and Tony would tease them to be teen agers in love and it was true, their giggles, whispers, blushed and flushed cheeks would be seen and echoed through compound. Steve would show how deeply he's falling for her through his kisses and innocent touch. And the first time they would make love he'd chant his I love yous in her ear leaving her shocked because she had told him that she wouldn't say the L word to him b/c she's afraid that she'd lose the people she loves but he'd just tell her that she doesn't have to say it back b/c his love for her is enough for both of them. He'd not ask her to say it back but she'd just pour her love in everything she'd do for him. She'd make him his favourite food, arrange their date nights in the kitchen and would do everything just the way he likes. And the biggest thing she'd do for him without saying I love you would be that she’d let him save Bucky, let him prioritise Bucky. Just before accords while he was in Lagos for the mission and she stayed back because she's been waking up sick. She'd found out that her husband has indeed knocked her up and she'd be ready to tell him, surprise him but accords happened and she would announce her retirement not taking any of their side. Steve was hurt and mad but wouldn't tell her anything. She'd hide the news from him because he'd drop everything to be with her that included Bucky and she wouldn't do that to him. Bucky was the only family he has and she wouldn't do that to him so she stayed back retired but got Nat to let them take the jet after the fight and also got Sharon to help Steve. She’d wait for Bucky to be safe first......

Ohh no, I'm sorry Amber, this was long. But I just think about it all the time...

Babes! I feel like if you ever decided to do some story writing you would be incredible at it. This is so good! Full of heartfilled moments, companionship, playfulness, drama and angst. It would take my heart and I would live happily in this verse of yours.

I really love how you vision the reader making Bucky such an important part for Steve. She's not making him prioritize her over Bucky. After this is all said and done, I see her and Buck having this incredible relationship, like siblings. Poor Steve when they gang up on him. 😂😂😂

But babes this is beautiful, thank you for sharing your dreams about these two.

And I'm doing good! Working on making dinner for the family and reading Throne of Glass to end my day. 💜

[tonystarktogo]

(this could’ve been) a villain’s origin story 

part IV

For @shitistanstank who wanted to see Bucky’s reaction and @everything-is-applepie who asked for more [Warning: Bucky is an unrepenant killer and his mindset is dark(er) than Tony’s parts were]:

James hates mentals. Doesn’t matter if they can read your thoughts, break out illusions that have you question everything you believe, make you forget everything you are, everything you used to be or if their powers are even more insidious -- every single one of them is a manipulative fucker with a god-complex. 

Usually, James doesn’t generalise like that -- it leads to assumptions and assumptions lead to stupid mistakes that get you dead -- but in this case he’ll make an exception. It’s widely known that, as fussy as the Winter Soldier can be about his jobs, he always takes contracts involving mentals. Doesn’t matter how old they are, what gender, how powerful, what specific abilities.

Mentals are weapons in a way that physicals aren’t, can’t ever hope to be -- and it doesn’t matter what their intentions are, what fucking alignment they hold -- like alignment isn’t just a skewed personality test gone wrong -- or what laws they follow.

[Every supe uses their power. You can’t not. You can’t be less than you are, even if some like to pretend otherwise. Like to play at being human, idealising what they’ve lost and will never achieve again.

Even when you don’t want to, even when you train yourself mercilessly, grit your teeth against it-- a supe’s first instinct is to use their abilities to the fullest. To survive. To live. To make life more comfortable.

There’s better men than James out there who like to offer long lists of requirements, of all the people they refuse to kill. As though not killing children, women, supes, humans, whatever the fuck their line in the sand is, somehow absolves them from the fact that they kill others for money, power or pride. As though having rules -- morals, as they like to sneer pretentiously -- makes them better, when all they do is choose and find one life more worthy than another.

James doesn’t have a list. He takes a contract or he doesn’t, depending on whether he trusts the contractor to pay up and not stab him in the back while he’s at it.

Have you ever seen a five-year old in a temper-tantrum that can bend the minds of those around them to their will? Have you ever considered what a toddler with the ability to erase memories is, what they become? Do you really think it was morals that kept anyone under fourteen from being chosen?

Rules, after all, are rarely implemented before they’ve proven to be necessary.]

The problem with having a reputation for killing mentals is that mentals don’t take kindly to being killed. And it’s hard to be prepared for a threat you don’t know exists until it reveals itself and tries to twist your mind into hushquietobeybenothing.

Granted, that doesn’t stop most of the stupid ones who track him down from monologuing about their righteous revenge before they get on with it. So convinced that just because James didn’t see them coming means he won’t kill them anyway.

Arrogant fuckers, all of them.

He’ll make them regret that before he’s done.

At least the last set of attackers wasn’t stupid. Makes it more of a pain, but ultimately a more satisfying fight. And fuck, if he hadn’t been blind-sided by the witch, James would’ve gotten away clean. But Scarlet Witch [And what kind of bullshit name is that when everyone knows her powers are anything but magical?] has been a persistent pain in his ass for a while now.

She’s smart and powerful and embodies everything James despises in a mental. The only reason they haven’t gone to war so far is because Scarlet Witch couldn’t care less about mentals as a whole. The only thing she values is her brother -- and the guy is a physical. A physical James wouldn’t try to land a hit on unless he was 100 percent sure he could take out the witch as well.

And Quicksilvers is a hard man to hit.

They don’t have an understanding of any sort because James doesn’t do understandings with mentals. But The Captain does, which puts Scarlet Witch and James into an awkward position as far as battles go. That’s the only reason James assumes their last showdown was an accident -- and, also, presumably the only reason he wakes up at all.

James doesn’t wake up slowly. Hasn’t since they shoved the pills down his throat for the first time, back before they realized that injections were that much more effective.

[The doctors never did figure out why James activated at all from such a low dosis, why he survived at all when the pills turned out to be useless with the sole exception of him. Granted, James killed them roughly forty hours after the first test, which might have played a hand in that.]

He comes to from one moment to the next -- finally, finally free of the black nothingness the witch trapped him in [nothing like what she can do, or so the rumors go, but that doesn’t make him itch to see her brain splattered over a sidewalk any less] -- and is immediately aware of his body, his surroundings, himself.

He’s in an unfamiliar place. He’s half-naked. He’s in a negligible amount of pain. He’s unrestrained. He’s not alone.

James is up and moving before the observation fully sinks in. It doesn’t have to. He already has all the data. [Has pinpointed the steady breathing and puttering motions of one person, placed him to his left, four steps, notices his odd surroundings even as he moves. There’s a wrench in easy reach that James aimes before he even sees the person -- man, young, brown hair, a head smaller than him -- and throws before he’s finished taking stock of his surroundings.

It’s more reflex than cold-blooded murder, really, not there’s much of a difference between the two where it concerns James.

The man ducks, proving that he’s not quite as idiotic as James initially assumed for keeping him unrestrained in his direct vicinity. That or he has good instincts.

He’s not a mental though, James can tell. He can always tell. His killing intent goes down a solid 60 percent with that realisation, though that still leaves him with plenty to work with should his potential client [James has lived through weirder recruitment strategies, though not all those potential bosses have] and potential victim prove troublesome.

It’s not that James wants to kill every human he meets. It’s just that he prefers to plan for the eventuality of needing to kill them and how to accomplish it efficiently, rather than be caught off-guard when the inevitable happens.

[There’s something that never made it into any of the papers and articles about supes and it’s this: A supe’s life is insane. There’s no logic, no rationality, no clear reason why you can’t go to a public swimming pool without accidentally ending up in a lagoon filled with starving piranhas. The Captain once theorized that supes offend the natural order or balance and this is nature’s way of striking back, of wiping them out. That or their unnaturalness attracts similar insanity.

James thinks that’s bullshit, not that it matters. He still has to live with the painfully ridiculous situations he tends to get himself into, after all.]

As such it really is nothing personal that as soon as James finally gets a clear view on the man -- kid, really, can’t be a day over twenty -- who’s found him, he immediately plans the guy’s death. It’s not like he acts on it right then, James isn’t a total barbarian.

He even gives the kid time to regain his footing and stare at him in shocked surprise, mouth half-way open and holding a bag of marshmallows as though those will somehow soften the next blow.

James is not gonna lie, he totally expects the boy to pull a sonar death ray, explosives or something similar out of some hidden stash and start some tirade about James having killed his parents and how he’s been planning this moment for a long time, or something along those lines.

Not to offer him marshmallows.

James gives the innocuous bag the deeply suspicious look that offer deserves. 

[On an unrelated note, his respect for the boy rises a smidge. James doesn’t know many people with the foresight to keep something ans inconspicious as poisonous marshmallows within easy reach.]

“No.”

“Oh.” The boy looks disappointed.

A scientist eager to see his newest creation in action? James doesn’t frown, but it’s a near thing. He’s not fond of scientists. [They tend to end up dead in his vicinity, but most people do.]

“Can I offer you something to drink?”

James raises his eyebrows, but fairly obvious attempt to drug and or kill him aside, he’s never before wasted a chance to be a little shit and he’s not planning on starting to now. 

“You can.”

The kid blinks. Snorts. “Oh, I like you.”

James smirks. He can’t recall the last time anyone told him they felt that way, but he doesn’t recall very many things beyond how to hunt and make them bleed.

“You’re the exception of the rule then.”

The boy laughs and if James wasn’t what he was, he wouldn’t have heard the bitterness echoing it. If James looks closely, he can even see the fractures in that pretty, wide smile.

“Believe me, Goggle Eye, I’m the exception of every rule.”

[It’s a good hour later, after the kid -- call me Tony -- has recounted where he found James and needled him endlessly -- “Come on, there’s got to be something you need! If not food or clothes, what about information? The adresses of your attackers? Schemantics of the newest SI rifle? Clean papers? Give me something!” -- that it occurs to James. A stray thought that nonetheless leaves an impression: It’s a good thing he’s human.

Because there’s something broken underneath Tony’s easy words and open gestures, something sharp and jagged -- still bleeding -- that was crushed and never healed quite right. Because when it comes down to it, you can forget the pills and the injections and the endless treatments and experiments designed to push for moremoremore. Because all the miracles of modern technology can’t build a monster out of spite and thin air. The drugs only reveal the potential that’s always been there.

And there’s no doubt what Tony would have been, should he have found himself among the test subjects.

His mind is a weapon worth killing for already.]

James leaves Tony’s lair two hours later, armed Quicksilver’s current adress -- one can never have enough leverage --, detailed information on four potential targets and the knowledge that Tony is the kind of competent that is as useful as it is dangerous and has an agenda James doesn’t yet understand. 

He’s not yet sure what to do about the latter.