hydratrashmeme | 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.

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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.

In a way, I riffed the whole "Brothers, not in blood, but in bond" idea.

Tony is starting to see mirrors in Barnes as well as all these windows. Things he can connect with and interact with. A certain level of identifiable connection to frame how different the other parts are. Tony is hyper intelligent when it comes to machines and the mechanical sciences, space, chemistry, he understands. With people and emotions however, as you said, he is a child grabbing at growth.

For me, I relate to the isolation and the complete lack of age appropriate childhood interactions. It's a mirror for me. And I love making Tony grow the fuck up in moments like this. Where he runs face first into a learning moment and can either adapt or stall out.

The worst part is now that he sees Barnes as a complete person, sees him as James, Tony is devastated by everything done to and taken from Bucky. He thinks suicide is a complete waste.

But he also can't keep taking options away. So. Cerebral Actualizing Neuro- blahblahblah a tool for Bucky to be in the driver's seat of his brain. In a way some could argue no one should be.

I have, so many feels on all the things Bucky could do with CANDIELAND BARF. But they conflict and I want them all to be true, so... this fic ends with Tony bringing Bucky the unit, and admitting he read his slam poetry.

And that he wants Bucky to have all the control and options he never had before.

Because I secretly wish for an AU where WS came in from the cold and didn't kill Maria, where Tony fits a lot of Bucky's needs for protecting the squishy, and Bucky works to coax Tony out of his comfort zone bubble, bridging gaps etc. They do beautiful mechanical engineering together and make fantastically nerdy robot babies together and Steve is both incredibly unnerved and endlessly delighted by the two slick brunette goofballs.

Your take on Tony is a really refreshing one, it does do justice both to the fact that he's trying and to the fact that the process is an ugly one at times. (And relating to his early childhood on a personal level--I can't really say anything meaningful to that coming from the lucky life that I've had, but that has to be hard).

Heh- My feelings on Bucky utilizing BARF mirror what I imagine Steve's would be-"Oh God no Bucky that's the worst idea ever please don't do it but whatever you choose to do I'll respect your decision anyway but arrrghh whyyy." Because Steve does his best to do what's right even if it hurts him (and it always seems to hurt him), so he'd want Bucky have agency in this. And that would mean, as usual, that he and Tony actually want the same thing, I think, but they have very different ideas about what it would look like and how to get there.

Meanwhile Bucky is just all of the suffering. And now I'm thinking about what his reaction will be to Tony having read his slam poetry from Hell.

So looking forward to more!

I think the AU you are looking for is The Silver Age by Copperbadge.

Ohman thanks for reminding me about that fic. I blame it for most of my winteriron feels. Ugh- Copperbadge is a gift and a curse for that. <3

Also I was so tempted to call the litte robot a roomba. UGH fandom problems.

*goes off to reread that as a spacer before the last chapter because my heart is hurting rn*

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

Re: BARFing Out Hurt (5/7?)

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