clint doesn’t mean to befriend the world’s most deadly assassin, but then again, he doesn’t mean to do a lot of things – piss off the fucking mob, for one. dangerous people tend to be drawn to him, whether because they want to beat the shit out of him or – well, actually, that’s usually the only reason they’re drawn to him. but so far he’s done pretty well with not dying/convincing the dangerous people to switch sides and not try to kill him anymore
he’s not really sure how it happens, but after he brings bucky in (something he’s still not entirely sure wasn’t dream) bucky is spending more and more time at his shithole apartment and eating all of his shitty takeout food and sleeping on his shitty second-hand couch. they talk sometimes, about their favorite weapons or nat’s horrible dorky jokes or how terrifying it is to put yourself back together after being unmade, but most of the time they prefer silence
and yeah, occasionally clint gets fed up with bucky eating all of his food and spoiling pizza dog rotten and always always always hanging out in his apartment even when he wants to be alone, but then bucky will smile at him, hesitant and still a little broken, and clint can only sigh and pull out the frozen pizza he’d been hiding for a special occasion
well. he’s always had a habit of picking up strays
Once Steve gets over the shock of seeing Bucky again, once he’s thinking about what Zola did, all he can hear echoing through his mind is
I should have known.
He should have known because when he pulled Bucky out of Zola’s lab, he could barely walk, but he marched back to base at Steve’s side, under his own power.
He should have known because none of the injuries Bucky suffered in the field took the way they ought to have.
He should have known because while the Howling Commandos fought their way through Europe, Bucky was always at his side, always keeping pace with him.
He should have known because Bucky shouldn’t have been able to keep up with him, and he always, always did.
He should have known, but he didn’t – because his whole life, he’d been trying to keep up with Bucky.
And it never once occurred to him that Bucky shouldn’t be able to keep up with a super soldier. Because Steve was the super soldier, and of course Bucky could keep up with Steve. Because Bucky had always been ahead of Steve, and Steve’s new body just meant he could catch up.
It just meant Steve and Bucky were finally side by side, just like they were always supposed to have been.
I am convinced that this is the face
he was making underneath this mask
and no one can tell me different.
