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

greenkirtle)] [Round 4 in flat view (comments in non-threaded chronological order, most recent last)]

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.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Tony hated. He hated almost as much as he felt hurt, and he hurt on so many levels. The binders and notebooks, some of them spiral bound and some old scientific journals, all the cheap kinds you could grab by the handful at any grocery store. Yet that fucking mother killing son of a bitch had gone back for these bits of paper multiple times. His bug out bag didn't have money or guns or tools. It had a few high protein bars, a dozen pencils and these notebooks. There were more notebooks recovered from the flat, but these ones, the ones in the bag... They looked more cared for.

Reverent.

Anything that could hold that much draw- Tony wanted to see. Wanted to see what made the wind-up murder doll more than him. Wanted to see what scraps of a man Steve found worth- this. All of this.

What made Steve show his dark side. After all this time.

"FRIDAY? I want blackout protocols. Oh, and spin up, let's go with Johnny Cash, seems fitting for the old murder doll's mindmap." There was a slight pause, and then the choice of first song showed that while FRIDAY was still a new AI, she was still learning how to be sassy.

"I hurt myself today" Johnny began to croon out of the speakers as Tony flipped open the most ragged, and visually oldest, of the notebooks.

How appropriate that song would be, for what was to follow, would haunt Tony, as the tone set by the song combined with the first entries to suck Tony into the disjointed words and the mind they reflected.

It is you. In the film reels.
. . . But that ~~laughing jacka~~ ~~cheerful~~ person is not me.
I could only hurt you. The you that you were and the you that you are both could never take the me that was under that mask, even then. ~~How it feels to know I can never wear the him you knew again.~~
I remember, madness. Anger. Rage. Grief.

Those emotions. I could feel them when I watched the reel.

I remember looking at you as you saved my body and being so angry that the only reason worth living, was now going to die ugly and monstrous just like the rest of us sad sacks. Piece by piece they will kill you that could be and are and I can't lie to you in any way that will do anything but hasten it. I can't- you let me beat you. You let me take your breath. You let me collapse your lung. You let me beat you did it all in that stupid outdated armor.

If I ever told you about the pit, if I ever told you about the fire, if I ever told you about the laughter or the tears or the way I came to enjoy being useful even if it was in making someone else cry- the you you were would die in that pit. The you you were would crawl over glass to pull the fire from your veins, the you you are would look at that little girl and never stop seeing her blood as red as her hair and her tears that followed it.

I can't take your laughter.

You think it's dead, but you still have it.

I can't tell you any of these things.

Because none of the things I remember can be real for you. None of the things I did, I lived, can touch you.

I can't let them. God in heaven, I remember God now. I remember God and I remember Love and I remember Grief and I remember being a person and I can't be a person if I let any of this be real.

Steve. I remembered so many things, visiting that museum today. Want to know what the worst memory was?

It was how to eat for sustenance, today. And I felt disgusted by how inefficient it is.

I can remember cooking for you. I can remember sharing meals at an automat. But the idea of it makes me angry and disgusted. Because injections and the feeding port are more easily maintained. The slurry is always the correct mixture.

I can remember all these things I lost. And it is regaining the ability to eat that leaves me the most frustrated.

"What the fucky, Bucky? Jesus, seriously? You're right. This shit would kill Cap. That takes a special kind of fucked up." Tony stared at the words, spaced almost like slam poetry across the page, weird spaces and indents, ideas trailing and bunched by turns. "It's like the Joker wrote poetry. This is going to wind up making my head hurt. And you know what, Fuckaroo, I think I will enjoy the hell out of some cold Pizza while I read the next passage. Just in honor of your disgust. Inefficiency is more important than making some girl bleed and cry. Bet it was Natasha." Tony snarked, angry at her as well.

She chose. And fuck her too. The spy that screwed him over twice. He might even enjoy learning how the person that made her bleed and cry was somehow worth all of this.

Sure, there were other super soldiers, but they all chose Wakanda over coming home. Chose this murder-bot avoiding any sort of repercussion over, possibly fixing it. Over neutralizing the danger it presents? Crazy ideas like that. Tony dug into the fridge, the box of pizza and a large glass of orange juice to add tequila and some other spirits to. He ate a few spiteful bites and drank a few sips of his tequila sunrise and then skimmed the next entry.

OP:Oh wow, oh wow. I love everything about this already!

Hope the next part isn't too much for you. The part after will have some watersports and sensory deprivation, though Bucky calls it water.

Tony is going to find drinking hard for a while after that one.

OP: It's all good -I can't think of any absolute nos that I have for this prompt. I'm going to get some sleep, so I probably won't be reading/replying for some hours--don't take that as me squicking out or losing interest!

AN: This is the trashmeme- yey, but if you look too long at this passage- you may see things in the shadows. Those things include horrible awful messy deadly things happening to a little girl. Be safe please.

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

The words are cramped, the page wrinkled, clusters of words spaced across the page like daisies on a child's first flower crown. Dripping from one to the next with little trails of connecting words.

I keep throwing up.
I keep feeling like there is a heavy weight
I keep, just- getting sick and clutching the trashcan.
I remember you getting sick when you got the bad liver juice, I remember holding your head while your mother tasted it.
I remember her storming off to yell at he butcher, and me holding you as you moaned for us to let you die.

would it be kinder to die?

I remember my hand wasn't much bigger than yours, as you clung to it. You couldn't be more than eight. Maybe nine.

The Widows were that age. They had to be ready. I had to train them. I was encouraged to make the worst ones- examples. Make them last while doing it. Train them all, but break the ones that failed. Break them piece at a time.

I can remember the way her fingers felt. I can remember her sobbing as she threw up.

I can remember how much blood there was. It was kinder she hemorrhage. She didn't feel the example as much. By the time we got to the final class- all the other girls had no real danger of being last.

Her blond hair. Her blue eyes. The kindness she tried to show me, when I got confused.

I saved her.

I saved her from worse.

I took her away from them. Even as she scratched at my eyes, beat at me with broken wrists- I knew I had to protect her from them.

She could have been your daughter. All the Widows were so small. So frail looking. So strong and fast- enhanced. But she was- she was more than that. She had emotions still.

I don't want these memories. I don't want to be human.

Steve, I can't stop feeling her screaming on me- feeling her as the Matron laughed and told the other silent and still girls circling us, watching every blood splattered moment, listening to every thunk and gurgle, that uncertainty is a weakness, and emotions lead to death.

I wish I had died in the pit. I wish I had died before any of this.

Steve- I can't... I can't ever undo what I did.

She could have been your daughter. And to the few scraps of me that remained then, that meant that I had to kill her to free her. Have her blood on my hands, my face, my hips.

How can I ever be human again?
How can I ever be anything but the tool that calmly wiped her tears away while the handlers laughed? That thought that was the best way to help?

Why didn't someone go to far for me?

Why couldn't they have gone too far with me, why couldn't they have knocked out my teeth and torn me inside, more than the serum could heal. Why did they have to pull back too soon? Why couldn't I manage to die before they made me this?

Steve- why did you pull me off that table? Why didn't you just kill the monster I was already becoming?

Tony reread the page again. And then his own rising nausea won the battle against smugness, against the numb disbelief that had risen over him.

The way the words twisted in his mind. The images, the horrible truths shaded by hints and sideways mentions.

Horrible things done to a little girl that looked enough like Steve Rogers that the good man parts of James Buchanan Barnes chose her to- The pizza box joined the partially digested pizza in the trash can.

Tony found himself shaking and unwilling, unable to just burn the books and call it a night. To just shut it and walk away.

There wasn't a court in the world that wouldn't praise him for putting a hole in that lined forehead after reading this. Tony could assure Fucky the child murderer that he had nothing to worry about. He definitely wasn't human.

Tony turned the page, a drawing, of a child. It was blocky, but the features were easy enough to see resembled Steve's.

Tony bent over the trash can and wretched again. The sunrise didn't really kill the taste. Nor did the next five pages. Each with a drawing of another girl. Each ringed with hashmarks that on closer look spelled out "I'm sorry" and "I wish someone had done the same for me" and worse still "They stopped."

Tony felt almost relieved to flip to another page of text and horrors. New horrors to try to remove himself from the old. From the little girls with dead eyes that he could only imagine how they died and shudder.

OP: I'm not usually into the Red Room stuff, but this has all of what I like -what's left of Bucky in the WS trying to "save" someone (in the worst way possible, in this case), then living with the guilt as he starts to come back to himself, and of course the worst part of the story being what's implied rather than what's shown to us. I'm all about how you made sickly pre-war Steve the through-line for this part, and how the reader (or this reader, anyway) feels somewhat like Tony does at this point--almost relieved that one particular horror is over and morbidly curious about what comes next.

Steve- why didn't you kill me? You broke my shoulder. You had me in the helicarrier. Why would you let me hit you? Why would you do this to me? Why would you force me to remember how your skin feels as it parts under the metal fist?

WHY DIDN'T YOU KILL ME????

Why? Why did you let go? You started to fall. I know you tried, but you didn't even watch me go. You looked away. My last memory is of you looking away as I fell.

I remember flashes- waking up as they dragged me.

They wrapped the arm.

The pit. I kept fighting them.

I kept demanding to get out.

They told me you were dead. They showed me the paper.

I started trying to die instead. When they would beat my face, I started opening my mouth and offering my tongue instead of making them shove a metal ring in or pin me down with my face grinding on the stone and wrist held between my arms as a useful handle for the thrusts.

I managed to sneak three shoe laces out of twelve guards. It wasn't enough to strangle myself.

It was enough to earn the party pit. They called it that. I went from a dark box, in a cold stone room that would sometimes become light, to having my eyelids sewn shut and my eardrums pierced. I remember I couldn't feel the ground, I couldn't feel- anything. Not the air. Nothing but my own heartbeat. Then, the water. The smell of it. The sharp nearly citrusy mineral tang of it.

The thirst. I was so thirsty. I would always move my head away as much as possible, gagging and spluttering as the warm water would hit me. Drown me by moments as I cursed them and tried to spit it all out.

I came to crave those moments. Any sensation. Any proof that there was something besides my heart pumping lead through my veins for eternity.

It was the warmth, as much as the water quenching my parched throat, as much as having something, anything in my belly. My ears would heal, and I would react to them coming. To them talking. They would ask me to say three words. It wasn't even Hail Hydra. And my answers started out a myriad of ways of saying "Fuck you." They took it as an offer, and I got the novelty of sensations below my waist while my ears dripped silence.

A few dozen healings in, they performed a surgery. I could feel their hands. I could feel them disconnecting parts of me. Removing parts of me. I know what my gut smells like. After the agony, after the burning and the pain, they had added feeding me by the port, to the sensations I could feel. The way they would swap bags on the abdominal port.

I got a gag for those times. A ring of metal. Food has to be paid for. Water comes for free. All you have to do is not drown and swallow not spit. But food has a price.

I tasted musk and tang and the heavy salty aftertaste with every breath I took after being fed. Steve, I felt so grateful sometimes, just to have something to keep one sense engaged.

Then the horrible cold water would come, afterwards.

The healing took longer, I think, towards the end.

Towards the end of me.

I was leaning into every touch. Just the smell of fresh warm water would make my parched lips part eagerly. I would try to speak, to beg for more. To beg for touch. Any touch. Anywhere.

I apologized for trying to die, for fighting them.

When the sound of something besides my own heartbeat came back, Steve, I could have sworn it was you. The first voice I had heard in an eternity, asking me what I was, was like salvation. I was ready to stop being me, stop being human and become what they wanted. At least long enough to get out of the Party Pit.

There were only three words I needed to say, to feel the ground again. TO end the party and my punishment for trying to die. Steve I said them, and I feel them, every time I smell that warm water. I feel them choking in my throat right this minute.

"Ready to comply."

Tony put down the notebook and sat back in his seat, rubbing his chest as he swallowed again and again on his own feelings. He had read the files on how long it took them to break their prisoner into the early prototype Asset. It had only taken a little over a year. There had been a few little rebellions, after that- but he only really held out for a single year to break enough to be considered useful. To go on missions for them.

Tony had scoffed at that. He made it through three months in a cave just fine. Now however, Tony felt the cold water. He felt how helpless the tilt of the world in the chair was- the way he could no longer breathe, how the water rushed in and didn't leave his lungs completely no matter how he struggled.

Tony knew that the smell of stagnant water, the feel of cold water, could make him cough and choke, panic flooding his veins. What would that be like with something impossible to avoid like taking a wizz? He hated the sick son of a bitch that killed all those girls, that killed his mother, but right now he also pities the bastard. Killing him would quite actually be a mercy. Anything to stop that man remembering, would be a mercy. Steve died only a week after Barnes fell from the train. A few more days of the government hiding the fact he was dead. The paper would have been around two weeks in. Maybe a month after that they show Barnes the paper. Maybe sooner. And he decides to try to die. Because he knows only Steve would bother trying to track him down, or maybe just to end the rest of it.

No one raped Tony in that cave. He wasn't alone, either. He had Yensin. He had touch. He had both his hands and he had hope.

The shortest time he figures James "Urinal" Barnes hung around in some sort of suspension fuck chamber, was at least half a year. Hell a month of that would be enough to drive most people insane. Deprivation chamber tests were high octane nightmare fuel. This? This was just plain sick.

A small part of Tony wished someone had been kind enough to rape or beat Barnes to death then too. It would be kinder to all involved. Tony hated how he wanted to give the guy a dozen therapists. But it was that or a bullet. Because nothing could really undo that. Tony stood and took his drink to pour it out, unable to really look at it now.

Apple juice must be hell for Sucky. Tony thought absently, picking up the notebook and flipping to the next horror. The next entry.

The next entry was in a new pen, and the lettering was half carved into the page. The next three pages were all stuck together, the pen having dug through the pages hard enough to tear and seal the following pages to it.

Tony felt a sinking weight in his gut, to match the nausea of earlier. He also found it ominous that now Johnny Cash was singing "I keep a close watch on this heart of mine". Walk the Line, nothing could go wrong with that playing while he read whatever had upset this particular madman enough to carve the words into the page.

Nothing at all.

Steve- why didn't you kill me? You broke my shoulder. You had me in the helicarrier. Why would you let me hit you? Why would you do this to me? Why would you force me to remember how your skin feels as it parts under the metal fist?

WHY DIDN'T YOU KILL ME????

Why? Why did you let go? ~~You started to fall. I know you tried, but you didn't even watch me go. You looked away. My last clear and un blurred memory is of you looking away as I fell.~~

I remember flashes- waking up as they dragged me.

They wrapped the arm.

The pit. I kept fighting them.

I kept demanding to get out. Clawing and thrashing and making them pay for every pleasure they tried to take.

Then they told me you were dead. They showed me the paper.

I started trying to die instead of just fighting. When they would beat my face, I started opening my mouth and offering my tongue instead of making them shove a metal ring in or pin me down with my face grinding on the stone and wrist held between my arms as a useful handle for the thrusts.

I managed to sneak three shoe laces out of twelve guards. It wasn't enough to strangle myself.

It was enough to earn the party pit. They called it that. I went from a dark box, in a cold stone room that would sometimes become light, to having my eyelids sewn shut and my eardrums pierced. I remember I couldn't feel the ground, I couldn't feel- anything. Not the air. Nothing but my own heartbeat. Then, the water. The smell of it. The sharp nearly citrusy mineral tang of it.

The thirst. I was so thirsty. I would always move my head away as much as possible, gagging and spluttering as the warm water would hit me. Drown me by moments as I cursed them and tried to spit it all out.

I came to crave those moments. Any sensation. Any proof that there was something besides my heart pumping lead through my veins for eternity.

It was the warmth, as much as the water quenching my parched throat, as much as having something, anything in my belly. My ears would heal, and I would react to them coming. To them talking. They would ask me to say three words. It wasn't even Hail Hydra. And my answers started out a myriad of ways of saying "Fuck you." They took it as an offer, and I got the novelty of sensations below my waist while my ears dripped silence.

A few dozen healings in, they performed a surgery. I could feel their hands. I could feel them disconnecting parts of me. Removing parts of me. I know what my gut smells like. After the agony, after the burning and the pain, they had added feeding me by the port, to the sensations I could feel. The way they would swap bags on the abdominal port.

I got a gag for those times. A ring of metal. Food has to be paid for. Water comes for free. All you have to do is not drown and swallow not spit. But food has a price.

I tasted musk and tang and the heavy salty aftertaste with every breath I took after being fed. Steve, I felt so grateful sometimes, just to have something to keep one sense engaged.

Then the horrible cold water would come, afterwards.

The healing took longer, I think, towards the end.

Towards the end of me.

I was leaning into every touch. Just the smell of fresh warm water would make my parched lips part eagerly. I would try to speak, to beg for more. To beg for touch. Any touch. Anywhere.

I apologized for trying to die, for fighting them.

When the sound of something besides my own heartbeat came back, Steve, I could have sworn it was you. The first voice I had heard in an eternity, asking me what I was, was like salvation. I was ready to stop being me, stop being human and become what they wanted. At least long enough to get out of the Party Pit.

There were only three words I needed to say, to feel the ground again. TO end the party and my punishment for trying to die. Steve I said them, and I feel them, every time I smell that warm water. I feel them choking in my throat right this minute.

"Ready to comply."

Tony put down the notebook and sat back in his seat, rubbing his chest as he swallowed again and again on his own feelings. He had read the files on how long it took them to break their prisoner into the early prototype Asset. It had only taken a little over a year. There had been a few little rebellions, after that- but he only really held out for a single year to break enough to be considered useful. To go on missions for them.

Tony had scoffed at that. He made it through three months in a cave just fine. Now however, Tony felt the cold water. He felt how helpless the tilt of the world in the chair was- the way he could no longer breathe, how the water rushed in and didn't leave his lungs completely no matter how he struggled.

Tony knew that the smell of stagnant water, the feel of cold water, could make him cough and choke, panic flooding his veins. What would that be like with something impossible to avoid like taking a wizz? He hated the sick son of a bitch that killed all those girls, that killed his mother, but right now he also pities the bastard. Killing him would quite actually be a mercy. Anything to stop that man remembering, would be a mercy. Steve died only a week after Barnes fell from the train. A few more days of the government hiding the fact he was dead. The paper would have been around two weeks in. Maybe a month after that they show Barnes the paper. Maybe sooner. And he decides to try to die. Because he knows only Steve would bother trying to track him down, or maybe just to end the rest of it.

No one raped Tony in that cave. He wasn't alone, either. He had Yensin. He had touch. He had both his hands and he had hope.

The shortest time he figures James "Urinal" Barnes hung around in some sort of suspension fuck chamber, was at least half a year. Hell a month of that would be enough to drive most people insane. Deprivation chamber tests were high octane nightmare fuel. This? This was just plain sick.

A small part of Tony wished someone had been kind enough to rape or beat Barnes to death then too. It would be kinder to all involved. Tony hated how he wanted to give the guy a dozen therapists. But it was that or a bullet. Because nothing could really undo that. Tony stood and took his drink to pour it out, unable to really look at it now.

Apple juice must be hell for Sucky. Tony thought absently, picking up the notebook and flipping to the next horror. The next entry.

The next entry was in a new pen, and the lettering was half carved into the page. The next three pages were all stuck together, the pen having dug through the pages hard enough to tear and seal the following pages to it.

Tony felt a sinking weight in his gut, to match the nausea of earlier. He also found it ominous that now Johnny Cash was singing "I keep a close watch on this heart of mine". Walk the Line, nothing could go wrong with that playing while he read whatever had upset this particular madman enough to carve the words into the page.

Nothing at all.

OP: No matter how many fics I read where Bucky begs to be put down, it still hits me so hard in the feels every time.

"Hell a month of that would be enough to drive most people insane." Make that a few hours, Tony :( The human mind ... doesn't do very well under those conditions.

Bucky still calls it water! Ow, my heart.

Maybe it's been done before (but I haven't read a great deal of Tony content so I haven't seen it anywhere else) but I love the idea of Tony comparing Bucky's torture to his own and resenting him for not "holding out" like he did ... until he thinks a little harder about things. A lot of people like to just skip to the camaraderie that two people who survived similar horrors could have, but it's just as realistic for there to be bitterness and judgement when people try to weigh their experiences and reactions against each other's--and of course it's x1000 for these two.

That cliffhanger ... Oh my goodness. *rustles trash in nervous excitement*

This chapter almost felt like a respite after the last one, so I'm sure what comes next is going to be even more painful (in a good way).

This is amazing!! Can't wait for more

FUCKY YOU STEVE

FUCK YOUR FOLLOWING ME FUCK YOU

FUCK YOU

FUCK YOU LOOKING SO LOST

FUCK YOUR INNOCENCE
how dare you cry

YOU DID THIS TO ME!

YOU did this. YOU asked me what I was, and then you unwound me.

You did this. YOU! My eyes opened and the first thing they saw was you.

First thing I knew was YOU.

Your name was Sasha- and you pet my hair and told me I was ~~SAFE~~ and lies like that. That I was ~~good~~. YOU were there- you were there you were guiding me to Surgery, you were there when they removed the skin, when they undid the healing and cut into the stump and teased apart my nerves as I screamed and screamed till they cut my vocal chords, your hand in my hair telling me to be calm.

YOU telling me this was for me to be BETTER

FUCK YOU

I killed you.

I KILLED YOU!

I snapped your neck and killed the doctors! You didn't come back and then you did. You came back. Again and again and again

Your face and your fucking voice and your God damned eyes so blue. So pained when I popped them.

You spewed lies and you calmed me and you haunted me.

You refused to stay dead until the chair.
~~Even then you came back as Pierce.~~

I remember you. I remember you as Sasha, As Yasha as Sir, As Master, As Handler, As ~~#########~~, AND YOU DARE TO CRY????

YOU DARE TO LOOK INTO THE DISTANCE AND SAY IN THAT VOICE THAT YOU WANT ME TO COME HOME???

FUCK YOU!

Fuck you! Fuck your face! Fuck your tears and your pity and the way your voice pops!

Fuck you- I killed you before and you never once fought to kill then.

Fuck you- you may be the original but you're the exact same-

All I want is to stop fighting and hurting and killing-

But what I want doesn't matter- all that matters is you have what YOU WANT

Fuck. YOU

I WILL NEVER BE THAT AGAIN.

KILL ME- OR LEAVE ME ALONE
~~I can't look at you without remembering them.~~

Tony stared at the page. He didn't know what to do with this. Frame it? Instagram it?

Take samples of all the water marks he was suspecting were tear marks?

What do you get the patriotic asshole that knows better than everyone else?

Tony runs his fingers over the edges of the gouges the pen dug into the pages that followed. He traced the word so heavily crossed out the ink that showed was only on the third page down, the paper on the other two pages quite literally obliterated and he swore he could feel the pain in the ragged edges of paper. It made sense. Steve's soft spot and dark side is Barnes. Seems reasonable that if you are brainwashing a super soldier, using a familiar face and voice would make it stick just a little bit easier.

As a bonus it evidently makes the original returning just as problematic as urinals for said brainwashee. Walk the line indeed. Fuck.

Tony scrubbed a hand over his head and asked "You sure you didn't get a scan of these ahead of time?" more rhetorical than actually curious.

FRIDAY, being so young, answered. "There was no way for me to have scanned these, as you swapped the bag for a copy soon after arriving in the German location. At the time you called it operation DarkThunder with the goal of keeping General Ross from getting dangerous or incriminating information on Sgt. Barnes. They have been sealed in your personal effects since then."

Tony sighed "You are scanning the papers, or maybe there is a god of ironic songs. Whatever. Switch it up. Give me Simon and Garfunkle- And if you start with The Sound of Silence I am donating you to MIT."

Tony groaned but had to shake his head at the choice of starting song. The Boxer, yeah- keep the hits coming. Not like it's going to get any harder to read. Or easier. Tony thumbed the pages, stuck together and water logged as they were. Not his pain. It should mean nothing but triumph that the two people that hurt him would and could only hurt each other.

Somehow, all it did was make him tired. He flipped the page with the ironic "Though my story's seldom told" winding through the air. It's seldom told, but here Tony is reading it anyways.

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

AN if you play the songs mentioned, yes I am writing these with the songs as a prompt and pull for the next page.
Feel free to experience it with music if that is your jam.
Specifically leaving if Stucky was actually a thing or not to the reader- how much worse would being raped by a man that looks and sounds like Steve to his recovering mind be- if they were actually lovers before?

OP again and wow, this is great. I came for emotional devastation, and this delivered. It's like every chapter is a new circle of hell (and nice taste in music btw!)

My thoughts on Bucky's journal entries are just one long screech of sadness that can't be rendered phonetically- but rest assured that they are exactly the kind of angst I was hoping for with this prompt. I'm clinging to the fact that this takes place pre-CW to reassure myself that Bucky and Steve's relationship will improve from here, but if you want to deviate from canon and break my heart into even smaller pieces, that's alright too!

As inhumanly evil as the HYDRA goons are, Tony's the most disgusting person in this story to me, in his own way. His particular brand of spitefulness is so completely self-centered and gleefully voyeuristic--the deaths of his parents don't seem like as big a deal to him as his own wounded narcissism. I really like this grimdark take on his character (mostly because I don't like canon Tony all that much as a person). It'll be interesting to see if he becomes more sympathetic in future installments, if you decide to continue with him gaining more of an understanding of what Bucky (and Steve now! Poor Steve looking for a Bucky who can't bear to see him!) have been going through.

I am all for the ambiguous Stucky! It's a dynamic that I love both platonically and otherwise, and yes, the way the exact nature of their relationship is left open to interpretation makes for additional horror here. (I'll do you one worse-what if there were unacted-on romantic/sexual feelings on Bucky's end before everything went to hell, so if those feelings still exist on his part, he'll have to reconcile them with the fact that he has no positive non-platonic memories of the real Steve going forward?).

I AM IN PAIN THANK YOU BLESS

(also yesssss vocal cords unf)

OP: Oh man, yes, the vocal cords thing! Bucky being unable to speak or scream is a favorite flavor of awful for me too. I'm absurdly grateful that the WS/post-WS Bucky being unable to speak (or having some kind of physical difficulty doing so) is a fanon genre in itself; since canon Bucky speaks normally (if infrequently) throughout, it feels kind of incredible that the trope exists to the degree that it does.

I am so sorry Steve.

I am- still here. I didn't manage it.

I tried. I wanted it to end but I couldn't do it.

You don't need me anymore. You said you do, you told Sam you do while staring right past me- you never realize how close I am to you when you are moping.

You never did before, either.

Did you ever see it was a mask? My smiles before the war?

Did you know I sold myself and became a whore?

Did you know what it took to put the coals on in winter and the ice in for summer and the rainbow of medicines to make it one more season?

Did you know what it took to hold three sisters and a mother on one side, and a man too stubborn and proud to accept a scrap if I ever said just come stay with the family?

~~give me one roof less to pay for, one coal less to buy, just another five minutes on my knees before God instead of in the grime~~

You would shine my shoes, would kvetch about the knees of my trousers. Talk about my muscles from the boxing ring. From the Docks.

Did you know I wasn't making full wage at the docks? No one wanted no half kike rubbin elbows with the rest of the folk. Did you know the ring was for showin off the muscles- getting attention as much as learning how to defend you?

You always led me into battles, fights I never wanted yet were now my own.

Always with the protests and the marches and the causes too big to be won.

Fists up, eyes bright, never let em keep ya down.

I couldn't do that to you.

Couldn't drag you down.

Clip your wings and make ya walk in the mud.

why Stevie- why did ya join me in the mud? Why didja come to war. World don't need no more fighters. got enough of em, whorin for another crust, hustlin for another day, killin to stave off dyin one more moment.

I never wanted to fight. I did it cause ya wouldn't stay down. I stood up because I never could see ya get pushed around. Pushed down.

I loved you since before I knew love had flavors. Since the first time ya spat blood and asked if that was all they had. I loved you and I knew then, if I held you down, stopped you, it would break you.

Would it have been kinder to have laid down and died then- to have broken your wings before you cut them off? Traded them in for a rank and blood dripping from your shield, from your lips one lie at a time, your smile as fake as your perfect straight teeth?

I missed you. Not the big lug, not the man I already mourned in the war. But the you that would climb under the sheets with me. The you that forgot you was two bits of twine tangled in the middle, and would hold me like you could make my nightmares stop.

I missed the you that shook with coughs, but would find a way to joke about it. Scowl if I joked about it- like it was some great sin. Then do the same damn thing.

I woulda carved my heart out for you.

I walked into the chair for you.

I'm still breathin, Stevie.

I wish I never met you.
I just want to rest. I want to not have to fight or kneel or scrape.
Just once, I want to look at a smile and not wonder who bled to make it possible.

Tony swallowed around a lump. "Okay, so this is some heavy shit, JBB. Seriously. The world was robbed of a poet. Then again your poetry would require a security level nearly as high as the constitution check to keep the last meal eaten while reading it. So. How are you even alive. Am I going to learn that? Learn the magic to not eating a bullet because; I thought Brucie got a shit rap. You still murdered my mother. You still did awful things for awful people. But you didn't catch a a damn break from day one, did you?"

Tony tapped his fingers on his chest. There was no Arc Reactor there, but the habit stuck around. "You talk, you walk, you obviously got better from having your vocal chords cut. Which is horrifying on it's own ground, as someone that processes best by saying things aloud. You are just two tons of high octane nightmare fuel wrapped up in a tragic sad puppy super soldier casing."

"Well, JBB, can't say I feel your pain- Dear old dad buried being Jewish with extreme prejudice. So I can't even relate to that part. Your generation had some fucked ideas when it came to, basically everything. Welcome to the future. It still sucks. But in new ways to mask the old ones." Tony was talking to the notebook as if it were it's own person, it's own part of the man that poured his pain into it's pages.

The tapping fingers on the sternum picked up speed. "FRIDAY, enough with this grampa shit- let's get something fast. Something kicky. I'm feeling Nine Inch Nails, and see about speeding up that BARF project. CANDIELAND, full speed."

Tony was not even really shocked when Head Like a Hole began playing. Something that an hour ago might have been a laugh died stillborn in his chest, choking on the tangled emotions there. He wasn't in this for revenge anymore. Wasn't in this for his pound of flesh. It was hard to take a pound of flesh from a man that had been dying and starving for lifetimes already.

Tony, was in it now because he couldn't walk away. He couldn't put this pain down and leave it alone. It was as masochistic as it was invasive. But this was a story that had to be told. And even if Mr. Not So Perfect was a complete dickbag, even Tony wasn't asshole enough to mail this to him.

He had to know. He had to know so he could do something. Give Bucky what he deserved. Whatever that wound up being.

((FUCK I HATE MY INTERNET goddamnit I lost all of this. Ugh I rewrote it but it sucks compared to the original. SO MAD. anyways- onwards. NIN is gonna flavor the next two, and sorry dear OP- Saw the comment about Tony staying a self centered dickbag himself, but no, he winds up trying his best and learning a little bit about being human from someone struggling with being human on a completely different scale. Not ALL the entries will be about ripping out his soul and heart. I promise. Just like- 90% of them. ))

Aw man-sorry about your internet cutting out and you losing the first draft of this :( It's still wonderful, don't doubt that!

Pre-war Bucky angst with Bucky selling himself and not seeing how good he is and believing that he never deserved Steve and pining after him and just all of this... ***flails*** I know I must sound so over the top with these replies, but I wasn't even sure this would be filled, and you've packed so many of my favorite tropes in here purely by chance and given me exactly what I was hoping for when I requested this--it's like my birthday two weeks early. Thank you so, so much.

Aw, Bucky's dialect's coming back!

NIN-are we secretly long-lost twins or something? Because you are just pressing all of my buttons with this fill, right down to your music choices! NIN is like, my optimal Bucky/WS musical accompaniment (Is that cliche of me? Eh, don't care, still love it.)

I'm cool with seeing Tony grow a heart, no worries! Sorry if I came across as overly critical of him--I wasn't saying he needs to stay a self-centered ass, more that I like that you have him starting out that way. Don't feel boxed in by anything I start rambling about.

AA- YAY!!! Super glad this worked despite being redone. Tony's words were so much better the first time through- *hand waves*

TBH just the right level of top- not over it at all. It feeds my positive attention addiction and balances out how shit I feel. (Depressed writer is a trope, ayyy.)

I am so very glad to hear I am doing your prompt justice. Happy early Bday- As Bucky comes to grapple more directly with what was done, more of him comes back. He doesn't find that to be comforting.

I have about four thousand songs I want to use for Bucky feels- because every day is Bucky feels day for me, and that means songs too. Someday I will do the awful fic that goes with NIN - Only.
On that day, I may have to stop though- so instead- Into the Void will wrap up the journal music fest.

You may scream at the ending I have planned. Tony grows a heart, but I don't think Steve really approves of the kind of support Tony gives as a result of that heart. Then again, maybe someone will take up the gauntlet of Steve finding the journal or another one, and he might understand after all.

As it is I have a headcanon ending for this, but I plan to leave it at the title.

As for Tony- if he doesn't wiggle a little, grow a little, he wouldn't be Tony. He's just as human as Steve, just as flawed. (Okay a lot more flawed. He's a human disaster and I shamelessly love Clint Barton in the comics. Human disasters attrac me.) He's coming from a very upset place. He was trying to do the right thing, and for a certain value, he could be seen as in the right- could see himself as in the right, and, without actively seeking windows into other perspectives, he holds only that he was betrayed.

He holds all that hurt and pain, and he doesn't have the emotional maturity to set that pain aside, right at that moment. Also a lot of his asshole is also his coping mechanism. He assholes like a skunk stinks.

The journal acts as a window, letting him see a part of the events from another perspective, and by doing that, lets him re-evaluate himself and his own actions. Not that he goes that far in this fic, because he is a stunted manchild who more toddles towards being a functional human bean one pratfall at a time. BUT the potential is unlocked for him.

Re: BARFing Out Hurt (4/?) antisemitism ahoy

(Anonymous) - 2018-05-14 12:17 (UTC) - Expand

I killed Rebecca, Stevie.
I killed- dozens, of you.

But that woman haunted me.

It was- first batch. Graduating class into being Widows. First Matron I served.

She looked like I imagine Becca would have, just a dozen more years after we left.

And I wasn't- They hadn't gotten the chair right yet.

I was still in there sometimes.

I was still. There.

It was my choice. Steve I chose to kill a woman that looked so much like my little sister as an adult that when I was dragged to the chair- I kept apologizing to Ma.

Your Daughter was the next time they brought me out for graduation.
A celebration of the chair as much as for the widows, I think.

I can remember every kill now.

Steve, I can remember every single kill.

My hands. My body. The early ones- before lightning and silence, but the ones where I wasn't evena passanger in the vehicle. Like some sort of clockwork automaton from a fantastic tales pulp. Like somethin outta Metropolis itself.

Stevie- Stevie- I think I killed- no. I did. I killed Howie. Steve, it wasn't just- it wasn't look like.

It was Howie. It was Howie, Steve. I killed him. He recognized me, and I killed him.

I killed him and god help me his wife looked like Ma.

His wife looked so much like ma I had to check I didn't also kill my baby sister or niece or somethin.

Steve I killed Ma and I killed Howie and it wasn't like killin you.

it wasn't like killin my baby sister-

Steve

I killed Howard.

And I didn't even have enough of me in there to scream.

Stevie.

Steve.

I won't let them take me. Steve. Don't make me come in.

Steve- don't order me to come in. Please- if it comes down to it- you kill me. You do what I can't.

I can't do that again Stevie.

Because the next Steve I kill- if you're ordering me into the chair, is gonna be you.

And I won't even be able to tell the difference between the you that is you, and all them other yous.

I killed Howie- and he was askin me to help his wife. The man who told me he would never settle for one- would never find a woman good enough to keep him. Who joked and pranked and would bounce his math off my damned head- the man who was our stay at home Howlie.

And I crushed the woman he thought was more important than his own life, like she was a bug on a winshield an I can't- Steve I can't let them-

Steve I can't.

There are words.

There are WORDS.

Steve- Steve- Steve- #########

There are words and I can't let myself ever hear them.

And I can't puncture my own ears to avoid them. I CAN'T stop myself.

God help me, Steve.

You have to kill me.

There are words.

And they take me away and give them control.

You have to let me go.

You have to let me die, Steve. Let me go down so far no one can find me.

THEY HAVE WORDS STEVE.

Tony scrubbed his hands over his face. He breathed in. He breathed out.

He threw his water glass against the wall. And he breathed some more.

"You remember all of them. Of course you do. Fuck." He spat at the notebook, anger and rage and horror scratching at his chest like shadow shrapnel tearing through his heart.

And the worst part was he couldn't even say it was Barnes he was mad at.

"Fuck. Fuck. You were trying to say this before." Tony pressed his fists to his eyes, as if he could press the words out. As if he could undo them by will.

"Because words have power. For you, more than most. Shit. Fuck." Tony kicked the table, another hard, sharp breath escaping him.

"Fuck them. Fuck their control. Fuck Steve. Fuck all of that." Tony hissed into his hands after a dozen more angry breaths. He stood up and pulled the coffee table back to the couch, breathing in and out.

"FRIDAY, what's CANDELAND BARF status? And go ahead and give me niteniteCap status, for giggles." He was calm. This was calm. This was adult.

The whir of the small robot cleaning up the glass shards belayed how adult he was. Howard Stark's school of being adult was a shitty school and Tony really wanted to be just a little bit better than his old man.

Even if he evidently did actually love his mother. Even if despite cheating on her, he did value her. More than his own life. Tony pinched the bridge of his nose, having missed whatever the status update had been. It wasn't important.

"Get it within the margins, and get me a prototype." Tony actually paid attention to the music, the last few choruses of The Hand That Feeds was a bit too fitting.

Tony barked a sound- but it wasn't something he looked too closely at, as Survivalism blasting the beat that he had played on loop while building Jericho. Yeah.

Flip a page, dive in. He had more than enough Survivalism. Now he wanted to see what Barnes lived.

OP: Man oh man, I'm going to need a fluffy chaser after this chapter. (I've got a bunch of short ones marked tbr on AO3, so it's all good.) This is just the kind of pain I signed up for. Well done.

"They hadn't gotten the chair right yet. I was still in there sometimes."--Occasionally, I think about a Bucky in the early days of his captivity who still has his identity but is losing his grip on sanity, being forced to kill/commit atrocities under duress or because he's in the worst mental state imaginable.

But only occasionally, because fuck it hurts.

I was wondering how you would get Tony to a place where he could start to feel empathy for Bucky, and your solution is such a neat one (both neat as in "awesome" and neat as in "fits perfectly")--the idea that Bucky was made to kill his own mother after a fashion, so there's the sheer horror of that on top of the fact that, if you think about it, Tony and Bucky both lost their parents to HYDRA. It's like a paradox--the unimaginable pain, the kind that no one who isn't Bucky could understand, is what ends up allowing Tony to find Bucky's trauma more comprehensible, more like his own.

Re: BARFing Out Hurt (5/7?)

(Anonymous) - 2018-05-14 15:39 (UTC) - Expand

Re: BARFing Out Hurt (5/7?)

(Anonymous) - 2018-05-14 17:55 (UTC) - Expand

Re: BARFing Out Hurt (5/7?)

(Anonymous) - 2018-05-14 17:55 (UTC) - Expand

Re: BARFing Out Hurt (5/7?)

(Anonymous) - 2018-05-14 23:06 (UTC) - Expand

Re: BARFing Out Hurt (5/7?)

(Anonymous) - 2018-05-14 23:14 (UTC) - Expand

I want to die

I want to die and I can't harm the Asset willingly

I want to die

I deserve to die

Steve- I died in that pit
- I died a little more every time my hands moved under their orders-

Steve, I died but my body kept moving and all I feel is grief

Steve all I feel is horror and shame and fear and terror and

What if they come back?

What if they own me again?

What if I don't hide long enough?

I can't forget- But God, I want to.

I want your God, any god, anyone, to take this all out of me- I don't care how.

Break me-

as long as nothing else can use me

I don't care the cost

Steve I don't care what it takes

I can't

Can't ever kneel again.

I can't do- feel- be-

Steve I can't.

I wish I done died in th alley behind tha club
when I was first hookin'

when I first cut off pieces of me

I didn't have enough pieces of me left by the time they had me

Uncle Sam took em

I traded em off

I buried them a corpse at a time

a friend at a time

a spray of blood and missing smile at a time

A blast of blue a whistle of fire an explosion and the feel of dirt and blood and teeth raining on my helmet-

Steve- when I was marched into Azzano- when I was first taken prisoner

all I wanted was to go home

Steve I don't have a home

I can't

Steve- I love you

I have always loved you

But I hate you

I hate that I followed you

I hate what I became before they ever gave me an order

I hate that I can look back an alla the
I gave in I gave in I chose to give up
it'sallmyfault

I can't live cause all of me died a dozen years before I ever was in Kraut hands

Just too damn dumb to fall till they hung me up and pulled the wounds open

Steve- I dreamed of the chair, of the lightning-
and I longed for it

I don't want to be
~~alone alive here~~ anything anymore.

Tony leaned back, rubbing his hands over his jaw and working on breathing. Everything felt heavy. "Fuck, James, you are one sad, fucked up kid and none of this was- you never stood a chance. But emotions don't follow logic's rules. Fuck." Tony scrubbed at his face, rubbing his eyes and his nose, breathing as he flipped through more pages of slam poetry, sparse and flowing repetitions on the theme.

A man who had seen too many horrors trying to grapple with guilt and pain and suffering that could all be taken away with a few Russian words. Where every day was survival not because he chose it, but because he had no choice but stop hiding and be taken to be used again, or keep going. Zemo blew that out of the water.

Tony's skin tingled, he breathed some more- focusing on how the hair moved into his lungs, swirling and back out. Grounding to keep breathing. He lost track of time, flipping the notebook closed as a choice. There wasn't a single page that didn't have writing. And there were quite literally a dozen notebooks. This was James heart and mind and soul laid bare, Tony didn't need to take that from him.

Tony held the notebook, cheap and flimsy. Tearing and crinkling where it had been gripped too hard. Some pages wrinkled from water, others partially crumpled. Ragged. Stained and yet cared for. The wire had been bent. Crushed a few times, but carefully fixed, bent back into shape.

For as awful as the words were inside the spiral bound notebook, the spike gave Tony hope. A man who can show that much care to something like this, inanimate and ultimately disposable, might be able to find another way. Find a way to cut the wire.

"Boss, CANDIELAND is ready, a BARF unit with it programmed is ready in the lab. NiteNiteCap is estimated at another 12 hours." Tony listened to Friday, holding the notebook as delicately as any unstable material in the lab, while he stood to bring it over to the backpack and it's brothers.

Tony's voice was a hair thick as he asked "So, flight time from here to Wakanda, and time there when we would arrive, departure now?" "If you take the Quinjet, your time of arrival would be 9am local time in Wakanda." Tony nodded and slid the notebook into the bag, zipping it up. "Well, get clearances and all that jazz. Cap will just have to put on his big boy pants without assistance." Tony picked the bag up and carried it going down to the lab to inspect the headset assembly, before packing it in it's own case, and setting the case and the backpack into one of the special padded retrieval cases he had designed for carrying samples or artifacts when flying as Iron Man.

Tony was probably doing a million things wrong, but He had nearly enough on Thunderpants to get him ousted, and the changes to the accords were well in motion. This- takes priority.

Tony flew, and on the plane, he rested. He even slept, and if he woke up with a start, crying, no one was there to see. No one was there. And Tony was going to make sure James- didn't have to do that. Wake up haunted. Alone, for all that people are crowded around him.

He didn't read the other note-books, but he can bet James feels the same way, the same way Tony did, does, always will. At least Tony can do this. Offer this. Then he will go finish cleaning up house and preparing the world for the real war he knows is coming. And James- can rest. One way or another. On his own agency. With his own hand on the wheel.

OP: It really says something about how overwhelming all of the chapters are that the easiest journal entry to read is the one that's basically Bucky saying that he wants to die over and over again. :'(

About the Bucky being programmed not to injure himself- I have this hc that HYDRA wanted their Asset to function something like the I, Robot robots but with the three laws in a different order: 1. Complete its objectives, 2. never harm its handler and protect them at all costs (unless that conflicts with 1.), and never harm itself (unless that conflicts with 1. or 2.). Just my random take on that which this fill happens to fit with.

I've always put Bucky's not having killed himself pre-CW mostly down to inner strength and also down to Steve's existence being tangible proof that he did have a life before and therefore might have one again, but oh, the idea that Bucky simply was not able to end his own life but wanted to ... mmm that's top-shelf angst that hits me so hard every time I see it in fic.

"Steve- I love you/I have always loved you/But I hate you/I hate that I followed you"--Argh, this just breaks my Stucky heart in the best way.

Holy shit, just one more chapter!

Re: BARFing Out Hurt (6/7)

(Anonymous) - 2018-05-15 00:24 (UTC) - Expand

Re: BARFing Out Hurt (6/7)

(Anonymous) - 2018-05-15 00:30 (UTC) - Expand

Re: BARFing Out Hurt (6/7)

(Anonymous) - 2018-05-15 01:09 (UTC) - Expand

Things get hectic when Tony calls Wakanda for clearance. The entire affair gets more complicated, and worse, until he finally convinces the Furry-King to ask James Barnes if he wants another HYDRA free option besides over-riding the command preventing him from killing himself. Oh, and Tony has his backpack to give back. Tony isn't sure which bit of information has them agreeing, but he is given clearance.

Surprisingly, and there is a LOT of sarcasm there, Stevie's Bucky hadn't told them that part of the current standing orders in his head had been a huge part in keeping him alive no matter his own personal desires. Tony was shocked. Utterly shocked. Also utterly annoyed that Captain Murderously Perfect spent the last half hour of Tony's approach trying to bark questions.

For a brilliant tactician, the man was a moron when it came to dealing with the modern political climate, the social media game- and most especially, Tony. Not so perfect after all. Hollow victory as the man was currently brow beating him about invading "Bucky's" privacy.

Which was rich because they all knew if Tony handed Steve the bags that (the poor bastard called) "Bucky" would be dealing with a Steve that had read all the shit cover to cover.

So when Tony gets off the plane, it is with his suit all whisked away in the quinjet, the backpack on his chest and his arms through the straps, and the case for the BARF unit in both of his hands.

There is even more back and forth about being searched, and having the bag searched. And even more Mr. Asshole Perfect Teeth- which yes the fact dear old 'Bucky' was also annoyed at his perfect teeth made Tony a little more able to stare the man down without following the desire to lash out. Betrayal was the least of the problems Tony had with Mr. Exhibit A in Tony's own private Daddy Issues collection. The fact that Tony had thought they had overcome some of that shit, only to have it thrown in his face, was just- extra icing on the fuck you pile.

Tony was without caffeine so without the little things- this nightmareish blur of back and forth bullshit would likely end in fight. Well a physical fight.

Tony wished he had waited for the NiteNiteCap tranqs.

And then, there was James Barnes. Tony expected a residual flare of rage. Or an active one like Captain Jackass still pulled from him by breathing let alone opening his somehow traitorous and still sanctimonious pie hole.

Tony might maybe be doing less awesome on that not heading towards a fight thing than he wanted, but he might maybe be slightly manic right now. To be fair.

"So I respect the slam poet you are way too much to call you a shit name like Bucky unless you insist on the webcam name, in which case I will just go with nicknames based on it. Because I can't actually say Bucky without thinking of a pornstar or some kid with beaver teeth."

James Barnes looked startled, followed quickly by a bemused smile then an expressive shrug. "Call me anything but Asset, and we're fine."

"James it is!" Tony said easily, and Steven the wonder puppy looked startled and confused, and in the background Tony saw a Redhead. He would bet money on Hawkass being on a balcony somewhere. Tony took far too much glee in teaching them all to, as an old timer would put it, suck eggs. "James, I am a huge fan of your way with words. Don't worry, I got like six poems in and decided I'd wait for you to choose which ones to publish. I even have a goodie bag crown in this box that can remove HYDRA from your mind. A little, like just the words. A lot like most of the stuff that inspired you to write those early poems. The ability to just orbital bombard anything that touches HYDRA and anything that ever made you feel less in your memories and make it all a done by a clone or something, retain your training but none of the rest. Or you could Nuke it from orbit. Just remove everything after the Train, or after you got drafted, or anything you want, really. I also brought everything from your bag. I swapped it in Germany before they had more than a chance to peek. SO I think I'm your only fan. Think we can go sit down- somewhere comfy maybe?"

James blinked, eyes widening but after a bit, a tentative hopeful look coming to them, softening them and making him look painfully young.

Tony hated pushing 50 when a 28-30 year old made him feel this old. Steve started to say something, starting with "Bucky I don't-" and Tony just couldn't deal with Steven I-Know-Better Rogers fucking over James's head.

"Rogers, let the grown man make his own decisions for once in over 70 years, why don't you? Seriously. He didn't sign up for you to be his caretaker or his drill sergeant." Of course that didn't go over well, and Captain Ego began to inflate for a battle.

Watching Steve deflate like a balloon when James interjected "Steve, I want to hear this, and I don't want none of your tryin to sway me. We talked about this." was worth forgiving James. Okay no, it wasn't if he had done the things- but he hadn't, HYDRA had so it was just tasty to witness. Though Tony was extremely curious what the hell James had talked with Steve about that made Steve do that not quite blanch, not quite fluster.

"You have got to teach me that. Actually no- if I have to deal with Captain Sassypants before I finish undoing the damage he managed to cause with going so far off the rails on the Accords, it means something has gone direly wrong. And by then you come as a package set I think so you can just do that for us all. No stirring speeches for why oversight, especially that was already in the works to be amended and modified to protect our individual rights including to privacy, is so intolerable. Just you verbally jabbing him." Tony babbled, and James hooked his single flesh arm over his waist, a scowl on his brows.

"I appreciate frustration with Stevie bein' pig headed, but that is still my best friend." is said without overt anger, but a hint of steel there. It bodes well. Tony can't make the decision for Bucky. But he can hope.

The rest of the morning goes about like that, CANDIELAND programming and interface being discussed in depth with the aid of a girl that makes Tony feel like his father must have when Tony would do things he would swear were two technology leaps away.

Like he was standing in the past and watching the future unfold.

He could see why it frustrated Howard. For Tony, it just made him want to shower her with money and SI contracts and steal her away to his labs to have sweet sweet science with. It was a shame she was a princess and had a lab Tony would drool over if he had more time.

By shame, he means he wants to keep in contact with her and get her to publish some more papers. The world needs more minds like hers. Surprisingly, or not, James holds his own when it comes to looking over the formulas for some of the readouts and blueprints. It is incredible how his mind makes leaps in mathematics. The on the fly caclulations he does for his sniping are one thing- this is a thing of beauty to see. "Okay, so you have at least 4 things you can do besides fighting now- Slam Poetry, Modeling, Math pretty much anything, and full time ex-Avengers wrangler."

There is an odd look but more bemusement, which overall is better than stone faces or anger or upset or hurt. So Tony is counting it as a win. Is it a win? Whatever. Yay James bonding time. Now to get rid of his fretting Blonde Shadow.

Tony winds up being there besides Shuri as James puts on the unit. They won't know what he's going to do with his own mind until he pulls it off. All they can do, is be there if something goes wrong.

Tony doesn't let himself fully think about being there if James chooses the nuke all feature. It's a more peaceful way to die than a bullet, but Tony doesn't want to make weapons anymore. But if anyone deserves all the options... it's this man.

It powers up, and Tony hopes he is right.

He hopes James is more like him than Steve. If given an option to cut the wire, he cuts it, instead of laying across it. He hopes he is right, and Bucky isn't actually craving death- he's craving autonomy and freedom. In the end- that's all Tony can do now. Hope.

It never feels like enough.

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

Author is choosing to leave it at the BARF being used- but what Bucky uses it for is up to the reader.
HOWEVER I am also writing a follow up piece to be posted here and on AO3 for this, where Bucky takes off the BARF and shows Tony a more recent page in his notebooks where Bucky has already come to realize a lot of things, including that he doesn't want to die, and that while he did horrible things, dying won't fix any of them, the same as fighting won't. But living might be a way to honor those that died. And a really excellent way to spit in Pierce and Lukin and Zola's eyes.

OP: Yay! It's finished! (I'll keep my eyes open for the coda, but no pressure--this more than stands on its own).

Bucky being annoyed about Steve's perfect teeth amuses me way more than it should because Seb Stan has a distractingly white set of teeth as well so ... you have no room to talk, Bucky XD

"Like he was standing in the past and watching the future unfold." --Love this bit.

I like where you have Tony here--the earth-shattering revelations that he's had haven't humbled him, but they've given him the perspective needed to keep from lashing out again. A lesser writer would have given him a personality overhaul at this point, but this feels like an organic progression from where he's been in previous chapters and true to his canon personality (my read of it, anyway).

"'I appreciate frustration with Stevie bein' pig headed, but that is still my best friend.' is said without overt anger, but a hint of steel there."--Thanks for this concession to my sappy little heart :) I get that a lot people who are into Winteriron don't have the most positive view of Bucky and Steve's relationship or of Steve's character (and I respectfully disagree with their interpretation but that's a whole other discussion), so I hope you didn't feel pressured by my yammering to add something to this fill that you weren't keen on.

It's been a ride reading this chapter by chapter as it was written--and it's amazing that you were able to crank this out in just a few days (I'd have finished, like, three sentences by this point). Again, thank you so much for this (and for putting up with me) <3 <3 <3

Re: BARFing Out Hurt (7/7)

(Anonymous) - 2018-05-16 13:24 (UTC) - Expand

NA: I just wanna say I really enjoyed this whole thing, watersports notwithstanding. It's uncommon to get to find Tony written so equitably in post-CW, pro-Bucky fic and I especially liked the fact that he didn't have a personality shift after changing his mind, as you mentioned...because changing your mind about something, even something major, doesn't have to mean changing who you are and how you operate.

I think you nailed his narcissism (I noticed everything he says gets written out as dialogue, while others' words are more often described instead), mania, mannerisms, and irreverent humor while keeping him reasonably sympathetic. That's a fine line to walk and I think you navigated it very well in this fic.

And Bucky...poor Bucky. What you have in his journals closely mirrors my own headcanons of their contents. Snippets of memory, both vague and precise. Images of people he killed. A whole lot of "I want to die," and a lot of Steve angst too.

Bravo! I'm looking forward to the epilogue!

Re: BARFing Out Hurt (7/7)

(Anonymous) - 2018-05-18 08:36 (UTC) - Expand

First of all, I'm incredibly grateful to the prompter and the author, because reading Bucky's notebooks has been a fic dream of mine since CW came out. At that time, I prompted about it, but nobody ever picked it up, so I'm glad someone did now.

Second, you did an amazing job with it. It was painful to read, and it made me feel sick and cry at some points, which is exactly what I'd want of something like this. I love everything about Bucky's writings, and I also love your Tony. I think he is consistent and realistic with the character. One thing I particularly like is that he compares his own torture with Bucky's, this is one of my favorite tropes regarding those two. I also

Awesome job, and please post the link here if you put it on AO3 so I can save it! :D

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

Barfing Out Hurt (Prologue/?)

Re: Barfing Out Hurt (Prologue/?)

Re: Barfing Out Hurt (Prologue/?)

Re: Barfing Out Hurt (Prologue/?)

Barfing Out Hurt (1/?) (Child torture and the Grimdark)

Re: Barfing Out Hurt (1/?) (Child torture and the Grimdark)

Barfing Out Hurt (2/?)

FIXED: Barfing Out Hurt (2/?) DAMN FORMATTING

Re: FIXED: Barfing Out Hurt (2/?) DAMN FORMATTING

Re: FIXED: Barfing Out Hurt (2/?) DAMN FORMATTING

Barfing Out Hurt (3/?)

Re: Barfing Out Hurt (3/?)

Re: Barfing Out Hurt (3/?)

Re: Barfing Out Hurt (3/?)

BARFing Out Hurt (4/?) antisemitism ahoy

Re: BARFing Out Hurt (4/?) antisemitism ahoy

Re: BARFing Out Hurt (4/?) antisemitism ahoy

Re: BARFing Out Hurt (4/?) antisemitism ahoy

BARFing Out Hurt (5/7?)

Re: BARFing Out Hurt (5/7?)

Re: BARFing Out Hurt (5/7?)

Re: BARFing Out Hurt (5/7?)

Re: BARFing Out Hurt (5/7?)

Re: BARFing Out Hurt (5/7?)

Re: BARFing Out Hurt (5/7?)

BARFing Out Hurt (6/7)

Re: BARFing Out Hurt (6/7)

Re: BARFing Out Hurt (6/7)

Re: BARFing Out Hurt (6/7)

Re: BARFing Out Hurt (6/7)

BARFing Out Hurt (7/7)

Re: BARFing Out Hurt (7/7)

Re: BARFing Out Hurt (7/7)

Re: BARFing Out Hurt (7/7)

Re: BARFing Out Hurt (7/7)

Re: BARFing Out Hurt (7/7)

Re: BARFing Out Hurt (7/7)

Re: BARFing Out Hurt (7/7)

Re: BARFing Out Hurt (7/7)