logsinthenight | Making the Rounds [Closed prompts + Wildcard OTA]

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Making the Rounds [Closed prompts + Wildcard OTA]

characters: Bucky and Various (Closed prompts + Wildcard OTA)
location: Around Beacon
date/time: October 19 - 29
content: Catch-all for Bucky stuff
warnings: Just the usual occasional disassociation, swearing, and bickering with himself

I. Closed to Matt

The Soldier stops by the general store once a week to check the level of supplies and, on rare occasions, actually pick something up that someone in the house needs. The remains of the costumes are still strewn about, some on display, some just a mess in the boxes. The Soldier eyes them thoughtfully, something prodding at the back of its brain about scraps and raw materials, but fuck if it can work out what to do with that.

So it's there, picking restlessly at costumes with all the metal-scent and quiet mechanical arm-noises that entails, when Matt comes in.

II. Closed to Daylight

The Soldier has more than once spied Daylight visiting with spirits, and, thinking about its own spirit-friend, approached (somewhat nervously) to offer to see if any of Daylight's friends know Morse Code, in order to perhaps translate more phrases in their musical language to something the residents of Beacon can be taught to understand.

So here it is, following Daylight to the woods, bearing a pot of coffee securely in its metal hand (which can't feel the heat of the pot as "pain") and a bunch of very small cups and dishes it scrounged up, to see if these spirits appreciate its favorite drink. Always best to bring a little peace offering when planning to ask anyone to work on something, right?

III. Closed to Aziraphale

It takes a while to work up the bravery to come to Aziraphale with the request. But the Sergeant swore up and down that Aziraphale had offered, and seemed earnest about it. Seemed like he wouldn't mess with anything they didn't want him to. Like he would be polite and helpful and above all careful.

So one day when Crowley is out of the house and Aziraphale is finishing puttering around the kitchen, the Soldier sidles up a little and says, carefully not actually looking at him, "The Sergeant said. You could see happy memories."

Sucks to have the actual Soldier back, in some ways, don't it, Aziraphale?

IV. Closed to Bruce

There are a lot of odd people around Beacon, for a given value of "odd". Some of them are odd because they aren't human, or have obvious trauma, or particular reasons that they're obvious about telegraphing. The sneaky young man who avoids contact most of the time and visits the general store and Invincible when he seems to think no one else will be around doesn't fit into any of those categories. He hides and avoids people, he moves like he's more well-trained than he should be, and the Soldier is having a hard time pinning down just how old he actually is. He reminds it a little of Eleven, which makes it worry.

So the Soldier keeps a distant eye on him for a few days, or tries to. Occasionally it loses track, but always manages to pick it up again eventually. At least it does work out where the young man is staying, so it waits outside one late morning (ish; for a given value of "morning" in a place with no sun) to intercept him on his way out for the "day" at the time he usually appears. It doesn't do casual well, so it's just sitting on a tree stump within view, obviously waiting and watching the door.

V. Wildcard!

Got something you wanna say to the Soldier? Want to come to one of its classes at the gym? Got some other idea based on his daily routine? Just hit me up here!

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The fingertips to its face make the Soldier twitch back automatically before Aziraphale can actually make contact, but it does accept the handkerchief with an air of mild embarrassment to dab at its eyes itself, instead. (We need one of these. Or a couple of these. Spare fabric. From the costumes. There's an idea.) Even the Sergeant sounds a little stuffy. Aww.

"I think. It was. The city. Or the fire escape. He was always... he drew what he saw. I think." That feels like part of the memory, somehow. The knowledge of what Steve usually drew, so there hadn't been any curiosity to look at what he was drawing now.

"The city," Aziraphale repeats. "Brooklyn, I imagine?" he asks. The furnishings in the room had looked quite a bit outdated, though Aziraphale has a hard time placing a date because, well, his own furnishings haven't been updated since the late Victorian age.

But he wonders if Soldier remembers more of the man now that he's come forward in memory. "Can you tell me more about Steve?"

"Yeah... think so. Had to be before the war." That hadn't been the memory of someone who'd killed people. That man hadn't even known how to hold a gun. For a brief and painful moment, the Soldier wishes with everything it has that it could be like that man. To be something that had never been a danger to others.

It shuts its eyes at the additional question, putting aside the pointless longing, trying to think. "He was. Sick. A lot. They were outside because being inside when it was too hot made his. Lungs? His lungs act up. Stop working right." There's something familiar about that face, but for the moment the Soldier can't place how. Probably the echo of other memories. If they were... friends... if they lived together, then surely there's more memories.

Well, it had to be before the war because he'd had two flesh arms, Aziraphale thinks. A prosthetic that happens to be a weapon isn't just something people generally pick up during peace time, but he doesn't say that. He doesn't want to remind him about the one thing that is unerringly hard and meant for violence. He wants to remind Soldier that it wasn't always that way, instead. He had a life once, and loved ones. For goodness' sake, he was in a room just like this one, watching his best friend draw, love barely contained in those tiny little town houses.

"Did he get better?" Aziraphale asks. "Don't quite think New York is good on anyone's lungs," he adds. It's not a judgment, a lot of people stay in their homes because they can't pick up and go elsewhere. Lord knows that Aziraphale has stayed in London through some questionable times even when he had a choice, but even in the sunlight and happy Steve had looked frail, and less than half the size of his friend.

Though he sees now how it was so easy to reprogram Soldier to be protective. Wasn't a far stretch.

Well, the Soldier does have two memories of during the war, where it had two real arms. The timeline is still kind of unclear in its head as to when exactly it got captured and lost the arm... definitely after at least some war had happened. But this is so very clearly before the war, given that mentality.

"I don't know." The Soldier shakes its head slowly. "These memories... they don't come with. Much extra information. Just whatever was immediate. Sometimes a sense of things around it, but... not much. The Sergeant's told me it was the war with the Nazis, with HYDRA, but not the year. The malfunction with Scarlett told me about Widows and the Red Room where they were trained, but not how they controlled me without the Chair." It shrugs helplessly. There's not a lot it can do about what information comes, and what doesn't.

And honestly, after the war itself, most of the programming wasn't a stretch. Take the best designated marksman in one of the best units in the army and point him at different targets... it was the loyalties and temperament that had needed changing, less than the skillset.

Well, it will be hard to go through and dig out just the memories of Steve Rogers, but he thinks he could. He thinks they might all have the same signature of love, glowing and buried deep in the recesses of his memories, beckoning to be shoved into the forefront and cover all the other nasty memories.

"If you want, I could try finding another one," he says. It seems that this blond man, the frail one, might be a key to unlocking all the nice things tucked away behind the veneer. Everything else-- time, the scientists, the handlers, everything about his own identity is negative or unsure or sad. Only Steve is solid.

There's a pause while the Soldier considers that. It wants to. It didn't hurt to do it. A technician fucked around in its head and found something good, rather than something bad. Why wouldn't it try again? If the technician is willing and offering, and there might be more memories locked up in there that could give it something to cling to on bad days?

Because each memory is a threat, too. Something that might reveal a name. A real life, as an actual person. A family. A bunch of people probably all dead, now, if the Soldier really is as old as they think.

But that feeling. It still wants to feel it again. So after wrestling for a long moment, it finally says, "Maybe one more. If it isn't hard for you."

"As long as you're willing, and wanting, it will be easy," Aziraphale replies. It's a bit of an exaggeration, but it does make things easier and he certainly doesn't want to discourage Soldier trying to get more in touch with his personhood.

No, Aziraphale would bring that all back for him in a second if he could. It seems cruel to steal someone's own humanity from them, taking away who they are fundamentally. "Do you need a break? Water, perhaps?"

Stop trying to distract it, Aziraphale. It's on a mission and wants to get shit done. The Soldier can be very single-minded when there's a goal in mind-- or, really, most of the time. "I'm fine." Gives its eyes one more rub, this time just with the back of the flesh hand, then settles back down at the angel's feet, waiting.

"Oh, alright," he says, as he tries again. He eases in, lets Bucky know everywhere he's going, winds and wends his way through some treacherous mind, looking for more memories with Steve. It's not hard to find, Steve being a bright beacon of memory in a lot of dark ones.

It was good to know, that he'd loved once, that he'd been loved once.

He finds another one, particularly bright, and clutches it gently underneath a proverbial arm, trying to pull it forward.

The dark is more restless, this time. More painful memories dog Aziraphale's presence, as if trying to catch his attention, but knowing what he's looking for helps, too.

This memory unfolds equally as quickly, once exposed to the rest of the Soldier's mind. Inside a different small apartment, sitting in a tiny bathroom with a younger and even skinnier Steve sitting on the toilet seat, lip bleeding and eye starting to purple already.

He has the first aid kit out on the sink's counter, dabbing at the split lip with alcohol on a rag, eyeing bloodied knuckles and considering cleaning them up, too. "So why'd you start it, this time?"

"Why d'you always think I started it?"

"Because I know you, Stevie," he says with half a smile. Steve always starts the fights. He always has to finish them, and then patch Steve up after. Not that he minds, well, except for the whole "Steve bleeding" thing.

Steve grumbles something about bullies, like he usually does. Steve's like one of those angry terriers with a bone, except less cute and more wheezy. (Who's he kidding, Steve's cuter than a fuckin' terrier.) He wets a washcloth at the sink, managing to get a little cold water out of it, offers it to Steve. "C'mon, punk. Hold that on your eye."

Steve finally looks up, spots the blood on his own face, and his eyes go big and startled and all protective. Steve gets that look all the time, just not usually at him. It's a little different when it's turned full on a person, than when he's just seeing it pointed at some kid that needs defending. "You're bleeding!" Steve exclaims.

He deflects a little, vaguely embarrassed, putting fingers to the crusted cut over his eyebrow. "Yeah, but I'm a tough sunnovabitch, I can take a hit. Unlike you."

"It was Billy, wuddn't it, I'm gonna break his jaw next time." As if he could. Steve hops up, holding the washcloth to his eye at least, but pushes him down onto the seat next. "Your turn."

He sighs, as if annoyed, but lets him. Ain't that often Steve gets the chance to look after him, back; might as well give it to him. This time.

The alcohol to his brow stings, and he winces a little, and--

And as if summoned by the memory of pain, another scene leaps out of the blackness ti displace this one. Too much digging around in his brain did stir things up, and most of what's in there isn't good.

There's a surge of panic, and Aziraphale's mental presence gets launched right out before he can get more than a glimpse of a concrete lab ceiling with a pair of doctors bending over the Soldier, the sensation of sharp pain in its head, and the echo of a scream. The Soldier finds itself in a ball on the floor, metal arm wrapped over its head as if that might protect it from technicians that are probably long dead, now.

Still a successful escapade: two good memories against one bad one.

Aziraphale needs a moment or two to recover from suddenly getting forced out of Bucky's mind, but he casts a wide net of a soft feeling like a fresh blanket of snow, sort of like the mental equivalent of a hand reaching out to him to check if he's alright.

He reaches out a physical hand to do so as well, concerned that he might have regressed from this. That would be the worst-case scenario, losing more of Soldier than he'd had previously.

It was one of the reasons he'd refused Crowley to do this before, and one of the reasons he couldn't just sit here and force Bucky to return. Or, the nameless being who happened to be the one talking to Steve in those memories.

"Soldier," he calls, softly.

The touch does as is probably expected, and makes the Soldier jackknife away and scramble back, though at least unlike the dream event from before, it manages not to lash out. It backs itself up against the nearest wall, panting and staring at nothing for a long minute, before hearing its designation finally breaks through and it seems to see Aziraphale again.

And flinches, remembering the last time this happened in the angel-slash-technician's presence. "Sorry. Sorry." Half-sure it must have hit someone again, not aware of what happened between the memories taking over and finding itself halfway across the room.

"Don't apologize, dear, though you did give me quite a shock. Are you alright?" he asks, concern all over his face. "I just need to know you're alright."

He doesn't want to be touched, so Aziraphale gets up to make him some tea.

Space. Space helps. Gives it a minute to reorient itself, focus on where it is, dig fingers carefully into the carpet and get its breathing back under control.

"Yeah. Yeah, I'm okay. I've had worse memory malfunctions." The first dream with the stomach thing was worse, in the "more horrific" sense of being able to see its own organs. Aziraphale has apparently won enough sense of safety, when compared to actual technicians, that it shares: "They were doing surgery. On my fucking brain." It brings the flesh hand up to rub at the points of pain, still aching with the echo of it, but everything's whole.

And realized with a pang of actual, audible offense: "They shaved off all my hair." It may not be quite the vain thing that the Sergeant is, but the Soldier does take care of its hair. It's nice hair.

Aziraphale, who has lived through the entire span of human history and remembers when the time when the person who had steady enough hands to be a surgeon was the same person entrusted to be a barber, or a time when lead went into face creams, or a time when drinking mercury was seen as the epitome of health. He also knew of all the terrible things people could do to each other for fun, the sorts of horrors they inflicted upon their fellow man.

So, watching Bucky get dissected on a table, which for all intents and purposes seemed clean, and which was attended by actual doctors, totally against his will, isn't the most shocking thing he's seen by a long shot.

And yet, the face he wears is sympathetic. Because of all these horrible things, Aziraphale has liked precisely zero of them. Even if they led to greater medical advances, even if humanity has done well for itself considering how many of them were treated as disposable.

"But your hair has returned," he says. "So let's focus on getting rid of your other scars, yes?"

The annoyance at the small indignity, while unimportant in the scheme of things, is still at least a sign that it can have feelings about the whole mess. Even petty ones. (Maybe having petty ones is as important as having big ones.)

Still, the reminder makes it drop its hand and roll its shoulders inwards a little, looking back down at the ground. Other scars-- the ones inside, since outside the only scars it has are the ones around the join to the metal arm. How many of those does it even have, that no one can see except in its actions? Crowley said he knew how to undo programming, but he also said he'd never seen the kinds of things the Soldier had done to it. Even good memories aren't going to change the conditioned behaviors, nice though they are. Having actual friends can't stop it from not wanting to be a person.

So it wraps its arms around its knees and drops its forehead to them wearily. "I don't know if that's ever going to happen."

"You won't if we don't work towards it," he answers. "But if we do, then you might have a better idea."

He always just has that bright hopefulness to him. He has to. He's an angel, he's contractually obliged. "But why don't we take a break and have some tea, hm? You've made good progress today, dear. We'll just have to keep the momentum going. What do you say?"

It's a very different kind of hope than what Crowley has, and tries (badly) to hide. Coming from Aziraphale, on the heels of an afternoon's "work" like this, it's harder to believe in.

Still, the praise is... nice. Even if it feels unearned. And while coffee would be better, the Soldier has done more asking-for-things today than it anticipated or is used to, and it's run out of ability to do so again. Tea's fine, anyway. Maybe Aziraphale will contribute cookies, too. Biscuits, whatever.

So the Soldier levers itself slowly to its feet, and says, "Thank you."

Aziraphale always serves his tea with biscuits, and he even has plenty of handmade biscuits in a tartan tin, which he procures from the back. Having made so many batches, they're quite a bit better-tasting than they were at the start.

He lays a few out on a plate even as he heats their water for tea.

Even if he'd used salt instead of sugar, you know what, the Soldier would probably still eat it. It's still rationing, and has been down to one meal a day, and calories are calories. It plucks one up to try, and is pleasantly surprised to find that it was indeed sugar that went into these.

"Sometime. I should learn how to make these," it says slowly. It knows how to make a few things now, but not cookies.

"They're not so hard. Butter, flour, sugar. Really all you need, could make them in my sleep, now."

They're very short and crisp and crumbly. He really had to try to get the recipe correct, but now he thinks he's nailed it.

Apparently the Soldier is going to ask one more thing today. Staring down at the half-eaten cookie, it asks, voice quiet: "Will you. Show me?"

"How to... make biscuits?" he asks, for clarification.

And then: "Of course!"

Sounds like better afternoon plans than more memory diving, at least for now. The Soldier gives a small smile, then finishes off its biscuit to hunt down where the flour and sugar are hiding.

((wrap on this one? baking lessons are good for bonding :D ))

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Making the Rounds [Closed prompts + Wildcard OTA]

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sorry that took so long, had to decide on another memory...

<3

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