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psl for Steve

[The war had been raging for a long time now, and James Buchanan Barnes had been drafted some months ago to ship out to Europe and fight with all the others in the trenches and on the front lines. Telegrams came back daily with the news of more brothers, sons, fathers, and husbands killed. More friends who will never return, and still there was no end in sight.

But then something even stranger began happening on both sides of the timeline.

It was the result of Thanos trying to pull the time gem to him from where it was hidden on Earth, though nobody else knew that. It was just that the occasional object tended to disappear and then end up where it wasn't supposed to be, though only usually for a few moments or so before it returned. SHIELD, what was left of it, and the sorcerers worked to seal the issues and they managed to do it within only a few days. No major issues, no big anomalies in the past to muck things up.

But there was one piece of the future lost in the past that hadn't made it back.

The Winter Soldier-- Bucky-- whoever he was now, confused fragmented memories all he had to go on, had been thrown through time unceremoniously into a street that looked altogether familiar and confusing. He immediately went into hiding for a few hours, meaning he got missed when people tried to clean up the problems that the Infinity Stone had caused, but when nobody came for him by dusk he began to move again. His manner of dress was out of place now with jeans and a hooded sweatshirt, nobody else seemed to be wearing that sort of thing, but very few people stared. He didn't change it, he didn't have anything to change into. He found his feet taking him somewhere only half remembered.

An apartment with a key hidden under an old brick. Why did he know it was there?

He didn't know. He just let himself in, quiet as a whisper, and made his way through to the bedroom where someone was asleep under the covers. Skinny, blond, somehow also familiar (the man on the bridge? The man in the Potomac? The man at the museum? No, that didn't make sense, that man had bulging muscles, but somehow he was sure they were the same). He didn't say anything, just stood there and watched impassively, waiting for the man to wake up.]

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The raging war spread throughout the world, ripping away everything at the seams, leaving behind only rubble and dust. The survivors barely having the means or at times the will to put everything back together again. True evil existed and they all saw it now, taking the form of a corrupted man, grasping for more power. But he would lose and a somewhat normal life would return for those left in the wake of such ruin. For Steve Rogers, he experienced the ruin like a brand upon his chest, the loss of Bucky nearly too much to handle as he obsessively kept all the tabs possible on the war. Allowing the names of the fallen to etch onto his skin. But so far he hasn't endured hearing Bucky's name. One small relief in the looming darkness.

Despite everything, he still wanted to join said war and kept trying every avenue he could to make it there. He meant what he said to Bucky and he didn't deserve to do any less when so many men were putting down their lives for the cause of freedom. How could he do less than them?

One way or another he would become the soldier he knew destiny wanted him to be. For the time being, though, he needed to keep the focus on being able to even breathe. All his ailments made it difficult most of the time and sleep could be rare. Case and point - the coughing fit waking him up and with a low groan he pushed himself into a seated position, sweat clinging to his skin from the low grade fever he had. His shaky hands tried to reach out for the glass of water on the nightstand but his eye caught the sight of something else.

No.

Someone else.

What?

"What!" he exclaimed, eyes slowly adjusting. Wait a moment. "Bucky?" The man looked like Bucky but a more looming and large version. Had the war done that to him? "How are you - am I still asleep? I do dream of you but usually you're smiling." The sheets shifted and fell down to pool at his waist as he moved around in the small bed. "What's goin' on?"

The voice was familiar.

It was almost exactly that of the man on the bridge and the similarities seemed overwhelming, even if the two men couldn't be more different in physicality. There was something to that, an important memory that connected everything together, but it was still lost in the briar of his mind.

His stance changed when the smaller man woke up, shifting almost imperceptibly to be ready for a fight if one came. He knew he'd win, it was easy to see that this guy really wasn't built for fighting, but that didn't mean he shouldn't be ready.

"You're not asleep."

Bucky. That name again. Was that really who he was?

As he started to wake up more, confusion settled in because nothing about the moment made sense. The guy before him appeared like Bucky but wider and with a harder look on his face. Even with his lesser vision he could take in the larger aspects of wrongness. The man before him could not be Bucky and yet what other explanation could there be? They had not fallen into a sci fi film suddenly where clones were possible.

"I'm not awake in the right sense either. I don't - what's goin' on?" he asked, running a hand through his slightly sweaty hair. "You look - are you hurt?"

The blanket pooled at his waist, thin tanktop clinging tightly to his skin.

Hurt? No. Not any more than he usually was, anyway, he was functional and he had no immediate wounds that needed to be taken care of. He had the feeling that this wasn't exactly what was being asked of him, though.

"I'm not sure."

His voice sounded too quiet and too raspy, a leftover of not being allowed to use it except for mission reports for so long.

"I don't think I'm supposed to be here."

At the nearly broken confession, Steve's heart clenched tightly in his chest and he wanted nothing more than to grab onto the other man and pull him in close. So incredibly close but he already picked up on the clashing vibes of the moment.

This person sounded and vaguely looked like Bucky but there were too many differences all at the same time. "You're supposed to be at training. You left a couple months ago. Mighta been drafted by now. Probably. You were always the overachiever type."

Fondness stretched across his face, easy and plain to see. "What's the last thing ya remember?"

That niggled at the back of his mind as something that he should remember, and at least he could put it together with what he had read about Bucky Barnes when he had visited the Smithsonian for answers. It was still like learning about someone else's life rather than his own past, but obviously to this Steve it was his present.

"I was in Bulgaria."

He probably shouldn't tell him anything, should just leave and try and find a way back. But he suddenly didn't want to; if nothing else, nobody from HYDRA had ever even heard of him in this time, so nobody would be hunting him.

"I'm not who you think I am."

Bulgaria?

Just as he expected, this Bucky while similar in appearance had a completely different path and outcome. A time warp, which happened frequently in the sci fi novels he devoured more than he would admit to. But why here and why now? In the novels, a reason always existed, everyone just needed to figure it out.

Leaning forward a little more, he wrapped his arms around his upturned legs, regarding this Bucky with a tilt of his head. "You're still Bucky. I sense it and how you're looking at me is very familiar. This kinda wistful thing."

A pause as he considered a few things. "You're safe here, you know. Got a look like ya think somebody's gonna come and take you away." Another pause. "You hungry? Thirsty? Forgot my manners bein' wokin' up so suddenly."

Hunger and thirst were still things that he struggled to identify within himself, he had been taught for so long how to ignore them and keep going that they were always in the background now. He ate when he remembered to, or when he noticed that he had started to lag in his reactions, but when asked if he actually wanted anything... he just kind of gave Steve a confused look.

"I want to know where he is, the other-- James Barnes."

He had a sudden realisation that maybe if he could get to him first, a sniper shot from the distance, the man would never become the Soldier. He didn't even think about the potential paradox of that.

"I have something I need to take care of with him."

At the words, Steve's blood ran cold, a chill rushing up and down his spine the hint of promise there. A dark one, of course. Eyes narrowed as he shifted onto his knees to stick out a finger in Bucky's direction. "You're not taking care of anything, whichever kind of Bucky you are, you're still a jerk and need to sit down right now."

He barely refrained on commenting on how bad Bucky looked because he figured it would bother him in a way it never managed with his punk. His. Even just the terminology sent shards of pain and he needed a minute. Coughing into his hand soon after, he slipped from the bed.

"You're not from this time. What time are you from?"

The cough itched at the back of his mind, like something teetering on the edge of a shelf about to dislodge and fall free, like he should know why the sound of this scrawny guy coughing made him feel worried down to the pit of his stomach.

He didn't sit.

"A long time from now, and that's why I know what needs to be done."

Killing him before he became the Soldier would surely save hundreds, perhaps even thousands of people. Nobody else was a viable candidate, not without the bastardised serum he had in him.

It really didn't take much to read between the lines and being naturally perspective only clicked things more into place. Frowning deeply, Steve gave another weak cough but still strong enough to curl his spine and shake his hands into a tremble. Weakness in a physical way colored his daily life but his steely nerves always tried to rival it.

"Never lose your stupid do ya?" Steve accused once he managed the coughing fit. "Pretty sure killing your past self isn't gonna change anythin' in the way you want it to. It'll only make things worse." He read plenty of sci fi novels, thank you very much.

"Ya know what it'd do to me if ya never existed?" Steve asked, softer, the frown morphing into something more painful.

"You don't understand what you're talking about."

Bucky knows, without the shadow of a doubt, that the world would be much better off without him in it. It wouldn't make anything worse, it would make so many things safer and save so many lives.

"I wouldn't have never existed, it'd just be like..." He paused for a moment, brow furrowed as he tried to find the right words. It was hard, this was the longest conversation he had had in decades. "...like I died in the war. Lots of people died in the war and never came home, you'd get by."

Hands on his hips, Steve regarded Bucky with narrowed eyes. What a jerk, no matter what. "You're such a jerk," Steve muttered under his breath, voicing his thoughts aloud. "Ya go round killin' all kinda versions of yourself to know that's true?" he asked, moving a little closer to the Other Bucky.

"Ya don't know what kinda things you did after all that. Takin' away yourself now as the war is goin' on -" He trailed off with a shake of his head. "I know Bucky Barnes made a difference over there. Wouldn't do nothin' right without him bein' there."

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