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Bucky drops his backpack onto the shabby queen size bed with a mute thump as he takes his first evaluating look around the room. Another night. Another sleazy hotel.
This one is no different. Just like the others, it seems to deal primarily with a clientele consisting of hookers and drug dealers who use the hotel as a base to carry out their respective trades. The service is basically nonexistent, and Bucky will be genuinely surprised if any the bathrooms here have been cleaned anytime within the past month.
In other words, it suits his needs perfectly. Criminal activity means that people keep their nose out of other people's business, and should he be forced to defend himself, he can be sure that no one will call the cops on him.
He should break that pattern soon though. He has been hovering around this area of the city for too long already. It is time to find some place nicer to stay; somewhere a criminal fugitive on the run won’t be expected to hole up. For tonight, however, this room will do.
He makes a quick mental note on the number of windows in the room before moving up to the closest one, peeking past the sunbleached curtain. There’s a fire escape outside, leading down to the street four stories below. It looks rickety, but that doesn’t really matter. Should he have to, Bucky knows that he’s fully capable of making the drop all the way down to the ground on his own without sustaining too much injury.
He pulls the blinds down in all three windows and turns back to the room. There is a bathroom situated to the right of the entrance, and he’s pleased to find that if he leaves its door open, it becomes a natural barrier that prevents anyone from opening the front door from the outside. Of course, it won’t do much against the force of a standard battering ram, but it’s more than enough to provide him with a few more seconds in case of an ambush.
He has no idea exactly how many people that are out there looking for him right now. After the battle at the Triskelion, the entire city has been in an literal uproar. There are roadblocks everywhere, and the security have been increased all over the place. It makes moving around undetected a living hell, and even though Bucky has plenty of experience in staying out of sight, he still doesn’t know if the people hunting him possess the same kind of knowledge that he does.
The thought of being taken back to Hydra is something he prefers not to linger on. Even life as a fugitive beats the life of being a mindless object, after all, and Bucky’s just begun to get his mind back. It’s a slow progress, but with each day that passes, more and more things slowly begin to slot into place inside his head. His name, for instance, even though, admittedly, he had some help with that one…
Long story short; as long as his biggest problem remains staying hidden from security cameras and avoiding the police, Bucky’s more than satisfied with the way things are, thank you very much.
There’s a mini fridge sitting next to the bed, and Bucky opens it more out of absentminded boredom than actual curiosity. There’s alcohol, of course, and something that Bucky suspects was once considered a pretty appetizing sports bar. None of them interest him, and he closes the fridge again while sending the bed a sideward glance.
He is tired. It is a rather new feeling, and he’s still not quite sure how to deal with it. Normally, he would have been sent back into cryo by now, to heal and rest in suspended animation, but that’s not gonna happen again as long as he gets a say about it.
He has been on the run for almost two weeks straight already, just stopping to eat and catch a few broken hours of sleep when he can – the latter done mostly while sitting in a chair facing the door, gun in hand, ready to shoot anyone who happens to be foolish enough to enter the room.
So far, no one has disturbed him. As a matter of fact, things have been going remarkably smooth so far, to the point where Bucky has begun to feel close to skittish about it. Can it really be that no one is in fact chasing him? Or are they just trying to lull him into a false sense of security before making their move, to catch him off guard?
Not that it matters. He needs sleep — proper sleep — or he’s going to collapse, super soldier or not.
For a brief moment, he contemplates on spending yet another night sitting in a wobbly hotel chair, but eventually decides that doing so wouldn’t be very efficient. If he keeps the gun within reach, the makeshift blockade at the front door will be enough to give him the edge he’ll need, should something happen.
He hates only having one gun. He is used to having a near unlimited arsenal of firearms at his disposal, and to have that singled down to a basic Glock 19 Gen4 with a limited number of rounds in the clip makes him feel both exposed and terribly vulnerable.
He doesn’t bother taking his clothes off, because, needless to say, making a quick escape while trying to get dressed seldom works out well. Instead, he simply pulls the gun out from the inner pocket of his jacket and sets it upon the bedside table, before sitting down at the edge of the bed.
He lays down, jacket, boots and all, and tries not to think about how the sag of mattress makes it feel as if he’s about to fall right through it. The bedsprings creak slightly as he adjusts his weight in an attempt to move his body into a more comfortable position, and he closes his eyes with a deep sigh.
His limbs feel heavy, but he is still tense and on edge, and even though he knows that he has to in order to sleep, he can’t seem to relax his body no matter how hard he tries. Relaxation obviously wasn't something Hydra bothered to program into his brain, and trying to will the tension in his muscles down feels… strange. As if he’s trying to imitate a behaviour he’s only previously read about in books.
Bucky remembers sleep, naturally, but it’s been a very long time since he had some while lying down , unguarded and undrugged. It’s harder than he expects, and after a mere ten minutes, he’s already managed to twist and turn so many times that the sheets have become dislodged from underneath the mattress.
There are too many thoughts running through his head for him to sleep. Memories of things that might or might not have been, mixing together to create deafening noises inside his brain. He tries his best to shut them out, to smother them with his own mind, but they still pull him in. They send him spiraling down a bottomless chasm, lined with faceless voices and images from the past that he’s not yet ready to face. For his own sanity’s sake.
The worst about trying to relax, however, are the emotions. The very moment he drops his guard, they charge him without warning, overwhelming him and dragging him under. They tumble from anger to fear, and from there onto panic. Mostly, he feels guilty, and the emotion is wound so tight with the confusion inside his head that he can barely breathe properly. They’re new, and at the same time not. He remembers them, but he can’t recall having experienced them for himself before. He must have, though, he realizes that much, and the insight causes a close to claustrophobic sensation to grow and press against the insides of his ribcage.
It’s not until he feels the hot burn of tears behind his eyelids that he finally admits to himself that tonight’s going to be one of those nights where he's better off distracted rather than idle. His thoughts are too loud, echoing back and forth inside his skull as they spew his own shame all over him, and thirty minutes after having first laid down, he gives up.
Propping his back up against the headboard of the bed, he reaches for the remote control to the TV that's lying on the bedside table next to his gun. He needs something to occupy himself with; anything that doesn't involve lying there in the dark and listening to his own mind.
He has never really operated a television set before, even though he’s seen it used plenty of times. Luckily, he recognizes the concept of a remote controller well enough, and so, turning the TV on proves to be little to no problem at all.
The hotel doesn’t have many channels, and the ones they have mostly consists of different varieties of porn —another charming addition to the room, courtesy of the hotel’s choice of guests. Bucky flips through them without any real interest.
He realizes pretty much immediately that he’s expected to be intrigued by the naked, writhing bodies displayed on the screen, but he's also terribly relieved to find that he feels nothing. The girls are too loud, too fake, too much everything, and the men are too burly – all with the same stupid, mindless expressions on their faces. Frankly, he finds it boring, and he’s basically already moving to turn the TV off again when the next channel he switches to suddenly catches his attention.
It’s still porn, but this movie doesn’t appear to have any girls in it. Instead, there are two men displayed on screen, and even if they’re both incredibly fit and already half naked, they’re nothing like the dense looking actors on the other channels.
One of the men – a tall, slender guy with dark hair – has another man pushed up against the wall of what appears to be a living room. They’re kissing each other, and the man with his back against the wall moans and rolls his hips against the other's body in a way that leaves very little to misinterpretation.
The same man lets out a throaty chuckle when his partner abandons their kiss in favor of licking his way down the first guy’s jawline and neck, suckling at his pulse. A hand finds its way down a pair of shorts while another curls around the edge of a bicep, and both actions are shortly followed by a new set of moans that rumble out from the television’s crappy speakers.
Bucky stares at the scene, still with the remote pointed towards the TV and his thumb hovering the standby button. His throat feels dry, and somehow, his breath has picked up pace without him noticing.
Another moan from the screen sends a spark of something hot and sizzling through his stomach, and he swallows hard, still unable to tear his eyes away from the scene playing out before him. Right hand trembling, he lowers the remote down onto the mattress beside him. The metal fingers of his left hand have curled into the bedspread, and as he pushes himself higher up on the bed, he can feel that his jeans have grown considerably tighter in just the past thirty seconds.
Sexual arousal. Now that one has definitely been a long time…
The man who had been pushed up against the wall suddenly moves, steering the other backwards until they both topple down on the couch standing in the middle of the room. He then grins as he mischievously begins to kiss and nip his way down his partner’s chest and abs, making the other moan and tip his head back against the cushions with a breathless gasp.
Bucky licks his lips as he unconsciously cants his hips into the nonexistent touch displayed on the screen, and he feels another hot flash curl its way through his body, sending his skin prickling with goosebumps.
He remembers this. The heat. The swirling sensation in the pit of his stomach that slowly travels further down towards his groin.
It's an intriguing sensation; one that triggers an instinctual desire to touch . To feel , and he raises his left hand to experimentally palm himself through his jeans, groaning softly at the stimuli. It feels nice, and he does it again, harder. This time, he has to bite back the moan that wants to escape his mouth when his eyes flutter shut, and he abruptly pulls himself together when the unfamiliar sound of his own voice startles him back to the present.
This isn’t the time, he reasons sternly. He’s on the run, hunted by God knows who. He needs to stay alert, and he can’t do that with his hands shoved down the front of his pants. For all he knows, there could be people coming for him right now, at this very second. He can picture the entire scene inside his head; armed forces with automatic rifles creeping down the hallway outside to stop right by his door. Gloved hands signing in the air before reaching for the handle, pressing down slowly…
The thought makes the air inside his lungs feel like it's shrinking, and suddenly, he can't breathe. His chest feels too tight, his skin too cold, and he can feel the hyperawareness like a black, inky spider against his skin as it comes crawling up his spine.
He can hear footsteps moving on the street outside, and from above him the sounds of a man and a woman yelling at each other travels down through the ceiling in deafening bursts of muted commotion. The voices of the two men on screen grow louder, but their once so soft moans now roll towards him like the ominous boom of thunder as his pulse amps up beneath his skin, though now from entirely different reasons than before.
He can hear the electric buzz of the television set crackle inside his head – a sharp, shrill fizzle of magnetism that brings back memories of a metal chair, of clamps around his wrists and words shouted at his face until his very brain collapses beneath the pressure.
What is he even doing here? He shouldn’t be here, he should be on the move already. There’s no time to rest, he needs to get out of the city before the people chasing him manages to find out where he is. Hydra, S.H.I.E.L.D., the police – there's no saying who might be coming for him at this very moment.
The mental image from before re-appears, unbidden inside his head, but this time, it’s not a fully prepared SWAT team that’s standing outside his hotel room. Instead, it’s a single man. A man with blue eyes, blond hair, a chiseled jawline, and a soft, safe voice that calls out for Bucky to please let him in.
Just like that, the noise fades, and Bucky’s heart slows down to its usual steady beat once more as the air finds its way back into his lungs.
Captain America. The man on the bridge.
Steve.
He slumps back against the headboard, closing his eyes with a groan. Steve Rogers…
Bucky had been to the Smithsonian. He had seen the pictures of himself and Captain America, read about his own assumed death and the events that had followed. Some of them had felt familiar, others like pieces out of someone else’s life, and if he has to be completely honest with himself, he's still not sure how to feel about that fact.
He had read about Steve’s seventy years trapped in ice, and the way he had joined the group called the Avengers to help save the city of New York, and possibly the world, after he had been brought back. Noble actions, no doubt. One might even go as far as to call them the actions of a hero.
Back on that helicarrier, Rogers had told him that they were friends. That they had known each other their whole lives, and going by the things Bucky had found at the museum, he hadn’t been lying. Was it possible that Steve might actually want to help him? If Bucky sought him out, would Steve—?
He shakes the thought out of his head almost instantly. No, he can't take that risk. Even if Steve would be willing to help him, there are no guarantees that the people he works for will feel the same. Bucky had single handedly murdered several of S.H.I.E.L.D.’s operatives, and had attempted to murder their Director. The odds that the people remaining within the organisation would like to see him return were not all that big.
If Steve were to meet with Bucky alone, however…
Again, his eyes drifts towards the TV, and a new thought enters his mind before he can stop it. The thought of Steve, pushed up against the wall with Bucky’s mouth on his. Steve, moaning and reaching for Bucky’s hips, grinding into him, and Bucky feels his lower body stir to life once more.
The image is so vivid, so clear, that it makes the muscles in his abs twitch with expectancy. As if his body is reacting to the thought all on its own; as if it isn’t really an alien thought at all. It feels almost like a memory, and oh, that would make sense, wouldn’t it?
It would explain why Bucky can’t get the image of those blue eyes out of his head. Why the sound of Steve Roger’s voice still lingers in the back of his mind throughout every hour of every day, and why Bucky still can’t walk down the street without half expecting, half hoping to catch a glimpse of his face, just one more time.
Had they been lovers? Or something in between that and friends? No matter what it was, the thought of Steve Rogers, panting and moaning against Bucky’s throat sends a vicious shiver down his spine, and slowly, his hands begin to drift towards his hips once more.
He watches the TV and thinks about what it would be like, to have Steve touch him like the men on the screen are touching each other. What it would be like to have anyone touch him like that.
Touch. How long has it been since he felt a touch that wasn’t meant to hurt? Whose purpose wasn't to tear and pull and force until there was no resistance left to oppose it?
What would it be like to feel the touch of friendly fingers move against his skin? To feel the gentle slide of lips brush along the nape of his neck…
Damn, he can't even remember if anyone has ever touched him like that.
There are memories; he can feel them lurking beneath the surface of his conscious mind, just beyond his reach, but their shadows provide him with little information. They’re ghosts, and ghosts are not meant to be seen by the living.
He remembers kisses, though. Remembers fingers curling against his jawline. Hot breath against his neck…
Had Steve been the one to do that? Or maybe someone else?
Bucky looks at the two lovers on the TV screen and wonders what it would be like to have Steve – Captain America, his friend-and-maybe-lover – kiss his way down the front of his body. Imagines the weight of Steve’s frame push against his own while Steve eagerly smoothes his hands down Bucky’s torso and hips
Steve Rogers is strong, Bucky already knows this. He has felt the force behind those hands before, when they were throwing punches at his face back on that godforsaken bridge. He knows exactly in how many ways Steve would be able to fight him, knows exactly what the sound of his laboured breath sounds like and what he looks like up close. He knows the feel of those hands on his body, the weight of them against the surface of his uniform, and here, lying like this in the dark, he can’t help but wonder what they would feel like if he were to have them slotted up against his bare skin. If they would be tender? Soft? Possessive?
He brings his hand up and lets his own fingers drag down across the front of his chest, and the action sends a shaky little sigh rushing past his lips. He does it again, feeling his nipples grow hard beneath the rough fabric of his clothes.
Fuck, even though he’s wearing double layers, it’s still enough to make his toes curl when he braves a light pinch to his left nipple with his right hand. Driven by a combination of curiosity and excitement, he then brings his left hand in underneath the hem of his henley to drag it up his abs and chest.
The metal surface of the hand is cold, and he gasps when it makes contact with his skin, but it’s not a bad sensation. Experimentally, he rubs the sleek pad of his thumb against his right nipple, biting back a groan behind his teeth as he feels himself twitch inside his jeans, and yeah, he can’t do this, he has to— he needs—
Fumbling, he undoes his belt and unbuttons his fly, shoving both jeans and boxer briefs down to hang loose on his hips as he grips around himself, more out of instinct than actual thought. The second groan that leaves his mouth is partially drowned out by the two similar ones coming from the TV, and the combined sounds sends his imagination soaring.
Steve’s hand grips him harder, moving up and down with a deliciously evil twist on the upstroke, knowing exactly what to do in order to make Bucky’s breath hitch.
Steve's mouth is there too, kissing and licking at Bucky’s neck at the same time as his free hand comes up to join Bucky’s underneath his clothes to toy with his chest. Full lips quirk up into a teasing smirk when a rough pinch to a nipple has Bucky’s body slumping even further down the headboard, and Bucky peers his eyes open, abandoning the fantasy for another quick glimpse at the couple on the screen.
The taller of the two men have fallen to his knees on the floor, kneeling in between the other man’s parted legs and Bucky moans, because oh. Oh, yes, that’s good.
Steve’s fingers curl around the base of Bucky’s cock, and as Steve opens his mouth, the words that come out of it sound so clear that Bucky for a moment forgets that this is just a fantasy.
C’mon, Buck. Don’t you want my mouth on you?
“Yes…!” Bucky gasps, in spite of himself as he digs his heels into the mattress. “Oh, yes, please…”
Steve’s tongue is hot against his skin when he lowers his mouth down, and Bucky drops his head back and pushes the side of his face into the pillow with a whimper. It feels so good, so insanely good, and the make believe vibrations of Steve’s amused chuckle sends his heart racing inside his chest.
Then suddenly, he’s not in his hotel room anymore. He’s outside, leaning against a tree in a forest somewhere. It’s winter, and there's ankle deep snow all around. He’s wearing a uniform – his uniform – and Steve’s on his knees before him on the ground with his mouth wrapped around Bucky’s aching cock while Bucky’s fingers tangle in the hair at the top of his head.
It’s a memory that sends an icy chill of combined pleasure and shock rushing up his spine. Steve looks up at him, his eyes slightly teary from lack of oxygen, but he looks pleased, as if reducing Bucky to such a state of complete incoherence is something he feels proud about.
This happened , his brain informs him calmly, and Bucky knows that it’s true. It scares him, scares him more than the police, more than Hydra, but yet he can’t stop . He chases after the memory, sprinting through his own mind in order to catch up with it completely, and as he does, other images slowly begin to form around him.
Images of Steve, on his back on a wooden cot with Bucky looming over him, his head thrown back in ecstasy and the smooth lines of his throat bared for Bucky to do with what he pleases. Steve, on top of him, panting and gasping Bucky’s name towards a cracked plaster ceiling in a rundown apartment in Brooklyn while he rides Bucky’s cock like he’s starving for it. Steve, buried to the hilt inside Bucky’s body with both hands in a firm grip around Bucky’s hips, keeping him in place as he fucks into him slow and tender while Bucky bites his pillow in order not to be heard by the soldiers still awake in the camp outside their tent.
The memories send his brain spinning. They swallow him up, and they’re confusing and frightening in ways Bucky doesn’t understand, but they all feel so good and so right , and he can’t stop, because he wants , for the first time in ages, finally, for himself.
Steve’s hands — his lips, his tongue, Bucky can’t tell which anymore — moves over his cock, speeding up. Bucky’s hips jerk, chasing the friction, and Steve chuckles again.
You gonna come for me, Buck? You close?
Bucky twists his head around and lets out another breathless groan into his pillow. Yes , he wants to say, but he can’t make his mouth work long enough to get the words out. Yes, I’m close, so close…
It’s okay , Steve’s voice soothes him. It’s okay, I’ve got you.
A noise blubbers past Bucky’s lips then, half a moan and half a sob as his erection twitches hard against his palm. Using his left hand, he grasps for the pillow beneath his head, clutching it so hard the fabric nearly tears beneath the punishing force of his fingers, and fuck, fuck, fuck, he feels like he’s going to burn from the inside out.
Steve gets up and leans in, hovering just above the line of Bucky’s throat as he presses fluttering kisses all over his skin, mouthing at his ear while tightening the grip of his hand around Bucky’s cock.
Come for me, Buck.
The request sounds so real. So earnest and right there , and Bucky’s eyes snap open as his breath catches in his throat one final time when the pleasure slams into him.
His back arches off the mattress as he comes all over his hand and chest, the release dribbling down to stain the length of his fingers as he sighs Steve’s name to the ceiling in dazed awe. He says it, over and over, until it's nothing more than a single syllable whispering past his lips while he breathes.
When he finally opens his eyes, he realizes with a wince that he's managed to ruin the only two shirts he owns – and at the same time, no less. He props himself up on his left elbow to see a large, wet pattern of stains soak their way into the fabric, and he immediately flops back down again with a heavy sigh.
Fuck it, he decides. He's been thinking about getting himself a spare set of clothes anyway.
With an annoyed huff, he manages to locate the remote to the TV. The porn is still going, but the couple which had been so arousing mere minutes ago are now too loud and obscene, just like the others had been, and he quickly turns it off before tossing the controller back onto the bedside table.
As an afterthought, he then sits up and removes both his jacket and his two soiled shirts, making sure to keep the stained henley and denim shirt away from the unscathed fabric of his other clothes as he tosses them onto the floor next to the bed.
Somewhere in the back of his head, a voice informs him that he's not allowed to leave his clothes like that, but he quickly pushes it away. That's the Winter Soldier’s voice, and Bucky doesn't want anything to do with him, now or ever again.
A bit of light from the street below trickles in through the space in between the blinds and the windows, reflecting in the gleam of Bucky's left hand – the Winter Soldier’s hand – and he pauses.
He is not stupid. He knows that even though the nature of the monster Hydra made him into is receding with every passing day, it's never going to go away completely. He knows that he's done terrible things – some too horrible for him to even think about – and he knows that such actions aren't simply washed away by a simple swim in the river…
Sighing, he closes his eyes. The dark behind his eyelids feels familiar. Safe, in a way, and Bucky decisively shoves the thoughts of the Winter Soldier out of his mind.
He's not that thing. Not anymore. He refuses to be.
Your name is James Buchanan Barnes.
Steve's voice comes echoing back to him through his memories, and Bucky curls his mind around it, repeating it over and over.
“My name is Bucky,” he whispers to the shadows, and the shadows don't argue.
This time, his mind is silent, and slowly, his breathing evens out into a steady flow of ins and out as his body sinks even further into the mattress.
On the floor above, a door slams open as the fighting couple moves their argument out into the corridor for the entire hotel to hear, and somewhere outside, a car backfires. The mini fridge gives off a high pitched whirring sound as the thermostat kicks in, and for the first time in nearly eighty years, Bucky finally sleeps…