Dumpster #5: We didn't start the trashfire

[trashmod]

Welcome to the latest, greatest, scummiest iteration of hydratrashmeme. Come on in and please check your sense of shame at the door.

Rules in brief: Don't be a jerk except to fictional characters. Warn if you want, but read at your own risk, because this is emphatically not a safe space. Link your fills on the fill post. Unprompted fills: make a prompt or a header comment and reply to it with the full text. Continuations of fills from earlier rounds: just make sure you link in both places.

What's on-topic: Filthy and perverted twists on all the quality whump served up by Cap: Winter Soldier. Noncon, aftermath, uncomfortably sexualized violence, mind control, inappropriate uses of Bucky Barnes' metal arm, bad guys doing dirtybadwrong things to your faves.
What's off-topic: a/b/o, D/s-verse, soulbonds, mundane AUs, shippy/romanticized noncon, MCU heroes repurposed into OOC or edgydark delivery vehicles for your fave's suffering. If you've got a prompt for one of those burning a hole in your brain, head on over to mcu_trash.

[Rules in full] [Round 1] [Round 2] [Round 3] [Round 4] [Fill post] [Chatter post] [hydratrashmeme Pinboard archive] [Round 5 in flat view (comments in non-threaded chronological order, most recent last)]

Comments

Re: FILL - Contact - Part One

[(Anonymous)]

Bucky sits on the sofa opposite Steve, legs crossed, bent forward awkwardly over some sci-fi pulp borrowed from Sam’s stash. He’s actually reading now, eyes skimming right then down in an uneven, natural rhythm. Steve watches as he pauses momentarily on a word, backtracks a sentence, stutters forward again, then flips a page. It’s progress that he’s really reading, Steve thinks as he hides behind his own unread book. The months and months Bucky spent feigning it, his eyes tracking the page too methodically, pages turned in perfect timing to the last, that was exhausting. But he’s relaxed enough to read now, so that’s something at least.

The sofas are separated by a few feet and a shared coffee table, occupied currently by two coffee mugs. Steve reaches for his and braces inwardly for the predictable flinch across from him as Bucky’s eyes snap from the page to Steve and track his movement - pick up the mug, raise the mug to his lips, take a sip, put down the mug - Bucky settles again when Steve stills.

No unpredictable movements. No surprises. For the love of God, don’t touch him.

It had been Tony who’d told him that, and Steve had dismissed him immediately, foolishly. Tony wasn’t exactly tactful, so of course he’d upset him, of course he’d done something to set Bucky off into Winter Soldier mode, Steve had assured himself. Besides, when Bucky had turned up at the compound, confused and still half-brainwashed, he was looking for Steve, not Tony and his bravado. Steve had been so optimistic, so happy, when Tony had called, his voice on the other end of the phone tight with uncharacteristic anxiety that should have been a warning to Steve; Tony told him to get back to the compound ASAP, and Steve did.

He should have realized sooner how bad the situation was; he should have taken a look at Clint’s fractured femur, Sam’s broken jaw and clavicle, and the med techs with injuries ranging from minor breaks to a serious concussion, and realized that this wasn’t solely Hydra programming. Steve hadn’t been there when Clint had patted Bucky on the shoulder and told him it was good he made it here, hadn’t seen how Bucky, who’d apparently been standoffish and watchful but relatively calm up until then, had in response snapped Clint’s leg and thrown him against a wall, then attacked Sam when he intervened. Steve also hadn’t been there when a few stupid but well-intentioned med techs had tried to patch up the bullet holes he’d walked into the compound with. Steve should have realized then that this wasn’t some leftover Hydra programming; the Winter Soldier wouldn’t have left aggressors alive. This was Bucky, confused as hell, but still Bucky.

But no, when Tony walked Steve down to the holding cell Wanda had managed to usher Bucky into and said For the love of God, don’t touch him, Steve had brushed it off completely. Hydra, all of what Bucky had been through, what he’d been forced to do - they’d get through this together. Over a year of following outdated leads and raiding old Hydra bases for any hint, any intel on where he could be, and Bucky just turned up looking for Steve like it was nothing. He’d been so God damn happy walking into that cell, despite Tony’s warnings.

And, taking another slow and deliberate sip of his coffee with Bucky watching hawkishly behind his book, Steve supposes they have gotten through it in some respects. The cell had been upgraded from that initial holding cell to the Hulk containment area to this remote apartment on the compound that did an excellent impression of normalcy. Two bedrooms, two baths, nicely furnished throughout; Internet, Netflix, a small patio out back, no locks to keep Bucky inside. Sam and Nat even stop by occasionally, Sam with a new book and Nat with some coffee blend picked up on her last overseas trip. If you squint, Steve thinks, it looked okay.

Steve doesn’t put his book down and go rinse his mug in the kitchen. Instead, he says, “I’m going to put my book down and go rinse my mug in the kitchen. Need anything?”

Bucky’s eyes are back on him, sharp, a sniper’s, “No thanks.” Steve feels him staring as he sets the book down on the coffee table and picks up the mug as quietly as he can. Careful and obvious, he walks to the kitchen. No unpredictable movements. No surprises.

Steve stands at the sink for a few moments after washing his mug and listens to the quiet of the apartment. No fluttering of pages. Bucky is still alert, waiting for the next sound, the next telegraph of movement, of a potential threat.

*
*
*

The first cassette he’d watched, alone, three months ago in the compound’s underground storage bunker, was innocuous enough to make Steve momentarily doubt the alarming labels of the others. After something relatively innocent - well, as innocent as Hydra was capable of being - the other cassettes couldn’t be as terrible as their labels led him to imagine. Right?

It was labelled Asset - Physical Endurance Test - 1983.

The picture was grainy and the audio inconsistent, but Bucky was easily recognizable amid the herd of doctors and scientists. He sprinted, back and forth across a gymnasium as an unmoving camera recorded from the far side of the room. The scientists noted his times on clipboards, adjusted the sensors attached to him, and occasionally spoke to each other, the camera picking up little of the audio.

They measured the height and length of his jumps. They measured how much he could lift and push and throw. They weighed him down with barbells and retested the running and jumping portions. Bucky didn’t once speak that Steve could hear, never once interacted with any Hydra agents. Blank-eyed and vacant, he completed each task without hesitation.

It could have been Camp Lehigh if it wasn’t for the line of men in tactical gear standing on the sidelines, guns raised and tracking Bucky as he sprinted back and forth.

*
*
*

Dinner is routine. Everything is routine.

Steve sets the table. They have knives now, despite Tony’s (and Sam’s and Nat’s and Wanda’s and Clint’s and and and) reservations. But Steve is realistic enough to know that if Bucky decides to kill him, the absence of a butter knife won’t prevent him.

Bucky watches from his seat at the table as Steve putters in the kitchen, takes the chicken out of the oven and the potatoes off the stovetop. They’ve settled on a predictable menu consisting of things they ate back then, updated only slightly. When Steve had been more optimistic, he’d hoped that cooking like he used to would spark some of Bucky’s memories, and he supposes that it possibly has to some extent - every few days Bucky looks up at him and asks Remember when…? with a haunted look.

They eat in silence punctuated by brief attempts at conversation.

“Sam said you should come running with us tomorrow. Supposed to be a mild morning. What do you think, Buck?”

“The specs of your arm Tony found in the Hungarian base are pretty interesting, apparently. Tony has a few questions - maybe he can drop by?”

“I heard this new baseball documentary was good. Let me check, I think it’s on Netflix.”

What goes unsaid is the obvious, the responses Steve knows should be said, but aren’t in order to preserve the illusion of normalcy. Bucky won’t go running with Steve and Sam, just in case some cadet runs into him by accident and causes another incident. Tony almost certainly won’t drop by to chat, let alone look at Bucky’s arm like he wants to. And if Steve does put on the documentary after dinner, Bucky will only half watch from his sofa, most of his attention focused elsewhere.

*
*
*

The second cassette was labelled Asset - Sleep Deprivation Test - 1982.

It was silent security footage of poor quality. Bucky, alone in a small, padded room, rocked violently against a wall. As Steve squinted at the video, he realized it was less of a rocking motion than Bucky throwing himself into the wall behind him then jerking himself forward repeatedly. A fluorescent overhead light was discernible only because of its frequent flickering.

Bucky’s frantic rocking eventually slowed and he slumped down in one exhausted and desperate motion, his chest rising and falling heavily in the rhythm of someone long in need of rest. Only a moment later and without warning, Bucky flailed awake, his body upright again as the rocking resumed; an alarm must have sounded. There was no audio.

Sometime later he slumped a second time, only to shake awake again, now mouthing something that Steve couldn’t make out, over and over. Bucky squeezed his eyes shut, slamming the back of his head into the wall, still pleading. Despite the poor quality of the video, Steve thought he could make out tears.

The time stamp in the bottom right of the screen read 205 hours. Clenching his fists, Steve skipped through the video, fast-forwarding as Bucky continued to cycle through rocking, sleeping, waking, rocking, sleeping, waking, rocking, sleeping, waking - until after being woken once again, Bucky pitched forward, falling on all fours. Steve was certain Bucky was crying now. His shoulder shook and he collapsed, head in his hands. He reached out, grasping for something or someone not there, still mouthing the same thing over and over again.

Three uniformed men entered, all laughing as they hauled Bucky, semi-conscious but shaking violently and still reaching for something only he could see, out of the cell. The video turned to static.

*
*
*

At night Steve listens for patterns in Bucky’s breathing. Their bedrooms share a common wall and Steve can pinpoint the moment Bucky falls asleep; alert, wakeful breathing eases until it’s even and slow. If Bucky sleeps around eleven, the nightmares don’t start until two or three, giving Steve a few hours to sleep himself before Bucky’s breathing gets ragged and panicked, followed by the sounds of violent thrashing.

Bucky doesn’t want help. Steve tried to intervene, first when Bucky was still in the cell and then again soon after they moved to the apartment, but it only worsened the situation, left Bucky sobbing and vomiting and Steve bleeding. In daylight when Steve dared ask how he could help, Bucky just pled to be left alone. He metabolizes sleep aids and anti-anxiety drugs too quickly, Bucky told Steve, and he doesn’t want Steve in his room, can’t handle an intrusion like that, an unplanned knock on his door in the night. And no doctors, please Steve, no doctors.

So Steve lays awake and listens as Bucky’s breathing speeds up until he’s panting. Then the crying and the weak whispers of no and please and stop. Then tossing, the pulling of fabric, strikes on the already battered headboard and wall. Soon after the fit he fully wakes and Steve can almost hear the convulsions through the wall. Sometimes Bucky showers after, and sometimes washes his sheets. But not tonight; tonight Steve hears footsteps approaching his door, not the bathroom.

“Steve?” His voice is hoarse through the door.

“Yeah, Buck?” No point in pretending he was asleep. If he can decipher Bucky’s breathing, Bucky surely can his.

“Can I come in?”

Deep inhale; this is new. “Of course.”

Steve sits up in bed, watches as the door slowly swings open as Bucky, sweaty and red and wrecked, steps in. He’s bitten his bottom lip bloody and as he comes closer Steve notices he’s scratched his right arm raw. Steve doesn’t say anything, doesn’t dare draw attention to any of it, knowing Bucky will flee if pressed.

Please just let me touch you. Please just let me hold your hand.

“Can I sleep here?” His voice is so small. Steve sucks in a breath.

“Yeah, of course, Buck.” Steve slides over and makes room, checking his burgeoning expectations. They’ve had brief moments of progress before, but it never lasts. There are no miracles here, not with Hydra in Bucky’s wake.

But Bucky doesn’t lay on the bed; he lays down on the floor next to Steve’s night table.

Steve wants to say something, wants to insist Bucky take the bed. It’s big enough for them to share without touching, wide enough for Bucky to stretch out without bumping Steve. Or Steve can take the floor, let Bucky have the bed to himself. But he doesn’t risk it, knowing it will only spook him back to his bedroom alone. So Steve lays awake listening to Bucky lay awake on the floor beside him.

“Love you, Buck.”

“Love you too, Stevie.”