hydratrashmeme | Dumpster #4: I Don't See How That's a Party

Dumpster #4: I Don't See How That's a Party

Okay, kids, you know the drill. Don't be a jerk except to fictional characters. Warn if you want, but read at your own risk, because

hydratrashmeme is about as far from a safe space as you can get. Garbage we like: noncon, whump, aftermath, violence, mind control, inappropriate uses of Bucky Barnes' metal arm, bad guys doing dirtybadwrong things to your faves. Garbage you should find a different trashcan for: a/b/o, D/s-verse, soulbonds, mundane AUs, OOC evil!good guys doing dirtybadwrong things to your faves, rotting leftovers dressed up as a romantic gourmet meal. Nothing wrong with 'em, but this isn't the crowd you should be pitching to if you're trying to sell Brock Rumlow as anything but a human dumpster fire.

Link your fills on the fill post, post unprompted fills as replies to a header comment so the wall o' text is collapsible, and let me know if you're interested in helping out with the Pinboard archive.

[Rules in full] [Round 1] [Round 2] [Round 3] [Fill post] [Chatter post] [hydratrashmeme Pinboard archive (maintained by

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All prompts or fills that contain Infinity War spoilers must go on the Infinity War spoiler post until May 26th. Spoilers in the main dumpsters will be deleted.

Round 4 is closed; comments and fills in existing threads are still welcome, but all new prompts go to Round 5.

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He was getting too used to Rogers. Too comfortable with him. When he came for him unbound, with Rogers held still and mute, he found himself thinking about Rogers’ voice, what he would say, what he would sound like. He could hear it so clearly in his head as he worked.

He knew it when he appealed to an officer to bathe the prisoner. They laughed, turning him away, and he backed down, appearing appropriately shamed. But he tried again with a different officer another day, and another after that. He tried next to leave Rogers so filthy, so grotesquely coated in various fluids, that even the technicians who presumably went in to chain him in place and pull the hood over his face wouldn’t want to handle him. All attempts failed. Every day he’d return to find Rogers trying to scrape away the layers from the night before, using part of his limited and erratically supplied water to clean himself.

But Rogers had gotten under his skin when he’d asked, in a rare low moment, “Why do you never say anything about how, every time we meet, I’m covered in…”

He couldn’t finish, but he didn’t have to. He’d assumed that Call Me Jimmy was being similarly abused, but he didn’t walk around naked with dried come all over his thighs, forced to ignore it just to maintain some composure and make an attempt at dignity. It wasn’t the same.

But he was right: of course it was obvious what was happening. He couldn’t have missed it. So all he could offer for answer was a confused, “Did you want me to say anything?”

The answer was no, of course, but Rogers had clearly been bottling that one up for a while. He didn’t seem better, exactly, after acknowledging the elephant in the room, but it seemed important nonetheless.

But it had gotten to him. The stress Rogers had tried to hide, the shame finally peeking through the veneer.

Finally, he convinced a gullible lab tech that his programming demanded cleanliness and was provided with a hose under the slot in the door to just do it himself if it annoyed him so much.

He recognized the hose. It was far too powerful to be used on anything living; its normal use was in the transport bay for vehicles. He thought carefully before he turned it on, pointing it at the wall behind the drain and covering it with his metal hand. The pressure was strong enough that he jolted at first despite bracing himself for it. He experimented, trying to temper the force and the flow rate until he had something that wouldn’t injure Rogers. He washed him all over, ungentle but thorough, as the water beating against his palm vibrated up into his shoulder. He aimed it with almost full force a few times to make it clear that this was for the mission and not for Rogers’ comfort -- the upturned soles of his feet, under his arms, vulnerable places. He slowed the water to a trickle when he held it to Rogers’ backside.

Rogers’ couldn’t help reacting to this new stimulus, jerking every time the water found a new target, but here he stilled, his fear palpable in a way that it normally wasn’t.

He finished quickly, dropped the hose, and left Rogers dripping wet. He was shivering when the Soldier pressed into him.

He knew that he’d have to make up for this insolence, but when he saw Rogers the next day, deeply bruised but sitting a little straighter, he knew he’d do it again the moment he could.

This is so good!

hnnnnng so many lovely bits. The Soldier being resigned to being manipulated by his superiors! The Soldier trying to be nice to Steve!!

The gum omg the gum I am ded

(oh god the Soldier's gonna get punished isn't he?)

I just love the humanity of the Soldier that comes across, that even without his memories and even with all the long years of being the Soldier, he is still far kinder than his keepers. *feels*

Thank you! Please allow me, if you will, to spew some meta. I decided that for the premise to really work, Bucky had to be functional and reasonably engaged, so somewhere between his 616 and MCU versions. I couldn't have him sitting in the cell with Steve and just totally zoned out or completely lost at how to deal with people. It wouldn't really work, and they wouldn't have much in the way of meaningful interaction so it'd be boring and never move. He had to know a little bit, at least enough to get by and pretend, or else Steve would figure everything out too quickly. He had to be smart and considering variables constantly, and if he was going to be smart enough to work through all of this and read Steve and adjust his approach accordingly, then he had to believe he had more agency than he did. Like Pierce appealing to his sense of duty in TWS; he doesn't really have a choice, but Pierce wants to convince him that he does because loyalty is more powerful than fear. So he believes initially that these people he's punishing have earned this, and that his role is enforcing something important and hopefully accomplishing something good down the line, or else why would he be committing these atrocities? And that's one of the things he's slowly realizing and going to have to come to terms with. So there had to be enough humanity for that to work and Steve is the one sparking it, but in sort of a gray way where it's all wrong but sort of unavoidable so he just tries his best to mitigate it.

Which is to say, uh, there will definitely be consequences for the Soldier, but they may not be what you think.

:O

The gum! The hose! Uggh, everything hurts.

Thanks for reading. It's going to get worse before it gets better.

I love all of this so much. It's seriously my favorite thing I'm reading right now. The soldier's slowly growing empathy for Steve, and how it's changing the way he sees himself and his own situation, is so great. Poor Steve, too, being in such rough physical shape. The little moments when Steve suspects something bad-- like Call Me Jimmy telling him to reach into his pants-- are heartbreaking, so I can't imagine how bad it's going to be when Steve realizes who the soldier is.

Wow, thank you so much. I'm so glad this is working for other people because this prompt just really grabbed me, but it's so, so rough. I didn't really set out to take an already dark prompt and make it 100% more painful and horrifying, but that's where this one went.

If I may ramble obnoxiously for a moment: I wanted to convey, beyond the powerful effect that Steve has on Bucky regardless, that part of the reason the Winter Soldier is changing and coming around is just being treated with kindness and respect and being presented with someone who never does what he expects. Steve is a bit of an aberration; he's wearing down, he's not doing well, but he's different, and he's consistently good to and concerned for this guy he really has no reason to trust (and obviously that trust only goes so far, like when he balks at being asked to reach into his pants without a good reason, but it's still genuine). And whether that serves to distract him from his own nightmare or whether he just genuinely can't stop himself from investing in and looking out for people (and he's Steve, we know the answer is both), Steve acknowledges his personhood, and now that the Soldier is regaining that, he doesn't really want to see Steve lose it either. And their treatment of him is inhumane in the extreme, and the Soldier may not remember experiencing that (even though we know he did, for the most part), but he probably recognizes on some level that this is different, that their interest in this guy means something beyond the usual, and that nothing they say can justify doing this to someone no matter what lies they fed him. So he's desperately trying to find this balance, and the scales keep shifting under his feet, but he knows the center won't hold forever.

Oh, man, it's going to get so much worse, though, sorry. The Soldier is trying so hard, and Steve is hanging on, but the powers that be have noticed. I have that scene partially written and. Yeah. It is Not Good when Steve realizes the truth. It is so very Not Good that I already have part of the recovery sequel written just because I needed that shit.

Thank you again for reading and commenting!

Recovery sequel? I am so happy there will be a recovery sequel.

Arghhhhhh oh no so bad, so very very bad! I'd been mentally focused on how much this will suck for Steve, but now you've got me thinking about how much this will also hurt Bucky, especially as he's started to realize that he's capable of more humanity, and that the things he's doing to Steve (and the other prisoners) are genuinely horrible, and that he is, at least in some way, responsible for the distress he's inflicting on Steve. Ooooo this is going to be so bad. And I am relieved to hear there will be some recovery aspect, too. Because off, I think we're all gonna need it!

Oh, definitely, the recovery sequel is very necessary after what's in the cards for these guys. Both of them. It's definitely not without hurt of its own, but it's looking much heavier on the comfort. I've got 25k of pure misery packed into this thing so far, with several important scenes left to finish, so I strongly suspect it's gonna be roughly 35-40k by the end, honestly, and after all that emotional investment, I'm going to have to try to put them back together because holy fuck is this thing painful. I hope it's worth the ride.

DA, but bless you -- I'm clinging onto the thought of a recovery sequel as I read on.

I hope you'll post it on AO3 after you're done so that I may bookmark it and read it endlessly

I think I'll probably post it on AO3 when it's finished (probably after an attempt at editing, since this is a VERY rough draft but what can I say, I wanted to share the pain), and the sequel will probably go there exclusively because I'm not sure if it would be inconsiderate to clutter up the meme with something more trash-adjacent than actual trash, but it seems iffy. Also, there are some scenes I'd like to show that don't match the PoV or work in the context of the greater story, so I'm thinking of doing those as oneshots and stuffing everything into an AO3 series to keep it neat. Honestly, this thing is out of control. I'm so, so glad other people want to read this thing, so it means a lot every time someone expresses interest. Thanks so much.

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Dumpster #4: I Don't See How That's a Party

FILL: Daybreak part 8c Re: Identity Porn in captivity

Re: FILL: Daybreak part 8c Re: Identity Porn in captivity

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Re: FILL: Daybreak part 8c Re: Identity Porn in captivity

Re: FILL: Daybreak part 8c Re: Identity Porn in captivity

Re: FILL: Daybreak part 8c Re: Identity Porn in captivity

Re: FILL: Daybreak part 8c Re: Identity Porn in captivity

Re: FILL: Daybreak part 8c Re: Identity Porn in captivity

Re: FILL: Daybreak part 8c Re: Identity Porn in captivity

Re: FILL: Daybreak part 8c Re: Identity Porn in captivity

Re: FILL: Daybreak part 8c Re: Identity Porn in captivity