InsaneJournal

[Bucky Barnes; R] Uncivil War: Chapter 24
Character/Series: Bucky Barnes; Marvel Cinematic Universe
Rating: R
Notes: Steamy R-rated sex at the end. Well deserved sex, if you ask me.
Title: Uncivil War- Chapter 24: Banging On The Door Of An Angel
Author: yuuo
Word Count: 4465
Summary: Bucky stared at his tablet, face propped up on his working hand.

there's nothing we can do about
the things we have to do without
the only way to feel again
is let love in
-Goo Goo Dolls

Bucky stared at his tablet, face propped up on his working hand. On the desk in front of him was the offending electronic, and he wasn't liking the information it was giving him. He tapped the screen a few times, hoping to elicit a more favorable response.

"That bad?" Maria said, looking over his shoulder. She'd surrendered the chair to him some time ago.

Bucky sighed, dropping his arm to rest on the table so he could bury his face in it. "That bad," he said. Without lifting his head, he pulled his arm free and slid his fingers inward on his screen from the corners, pulling out the 3D display. He sat up. The display showed a small pink ball made of computer interfaces and mechanical pieces. "See that? That's Junior."

"Junior's a pink glowing ball?" Steve asked, looking at the display from off to Bucky's right, though thankfully not crowding over his shoulder.

"That's what her interface looks like, given a physical appearance. And she's named after Tony's cat, did you expect something not pink? Junior's collar is pink."

"We've never had a chance to see Junior like this," Sharon said, one hand on the back of the chair Bucky sat in, her bottle of Mountain Dew still unopened in her other. "How do you know that's her?"

"Because she's almost identical to JARVIS," Bucky said. "JARVIS is bigger, and yellow. But we're missing pieces of Junior; either the transfer from the phone to my tablet didn't work, or the transfer from the quinjet to the phone didn't work. The plug might've been pulled too soon, or the phone wasn't big enough for her whole data packet, or something else all together." He sat up, leaning back slightly- taking care to not move the chair's support out from under Sharon's hand -and looked at Maria. "When did you download her? When you moved the quinjet, right?"

"That's right," Maria said. "She didn't seem damaged by the other guy's attempt to rip the quinjet apart. I followed her instructions. The jet's computers shut down after a few minutes, so I took that to mean that she was transferred. I probably should've tested her first, but I-" She cut herself off, rubbing her forehead. "I had no idea how to check for her, and I figured if she wasn't in the jet's computers anymore, then she was fully transfered."

Bucky nodded, acknowledging the statement, then sat forward again, twisting Junior's UI projection in his hand. "She might've gotten damaged in the quinjet. This might be all that's left of her." He heaved a sigh. "Well, I-" Like Maria had, he cut himself off. "Is it just me, or are those holes filling in?"

This time, he didn't mind as everyone crowded down around him.

"I think you're right," Sharon said. "Where are those pieces coming from?"

Bucky tapped at his tablet. "I didn't connect my tablet to the wifi, I know I didn't. But it says I'm connected." He looked at the projected UI, puzzled, until an answer finally presented itself in his brain. "I think she's downloading herself."

"But from where?" Maria asked, stepping aside just enough to get a different look at the projected image.

"From me, Miss Hill," JARVIS's voice cut in. His yellow projected image took dominance over the display, Junior's image shrinking to the side as the holes continued filling in. "When you contacted me that there was trouble at the school, I put Mister Stark on standby. He instructed me to download a copy of Junior into my databanks in case something happened to the quinjet. Your phone, as it turns out, is not big enough for her. I am replacing the pieces you were unable to transfer. She will be back online shortly."

Maria and Bucky exchanged a look before Maria looked back at JARVIS. "I assume this line is secure."

"Your assumption would be correct," JARVIS said. "Junior was under instructions to access the internet if she was able as soon as she could so we could track your location. This connection has been secure from the second the tablet accessed the internet."

"Mind if I ask a question?" Steve said.

"Not at all, Captain."

"If you had to download Junior's UI, does that mean the quinjet was the main copy of her? Tony didn't have a back up of her anywhere? I don't remember everything, but my memory's not so bad that I don't know that doesn't sound anything like him."

"There are back ups," JARVIS answered. "But I do not have access to them without specific commands from Mister Stark. Mister Stark has many redundant back ups of both Junior and I. But we do not have access to each others' core systems. If one of us is compromised, the other is not. It's a safety measure."

"A good one," Tony's voice interrupted, though his image didn't appear. "Thanks, J. Junior, when you finish putting yourself back together, go back to idle. I got this."

"I'm done!" the UI all but chirped. Tony, really? Weird UI. Good UI, but weird. "Going to idle now."

Both JARVIS's image, and the smaller one of Junior disappeared, replaced by Tony. They could only see from his shoulders up, but he was in his suit, Bucky noticed, which made him worry that Tony was expecting trouble out there.

"Okay, talk to me," Tony said. "JARVIS said there was some sort of fight going on at the school. Did orcs attack you?"

"Nothing so easy," Maria said. "That ghost we mentioned? She lived in the wires, and apparently was not merely a child with poor socialization skills. Maybe she had been in life, but she most certainly was not once she was dead."

Tony raised an eyebrow. "So what, she turned out to be like Alessa?"

"I'm so glad someone else gets that reference," Sharon said. "But yeah. She gave me video of a death threat against Bucky, then attacked us all with the cats. Bruce Hulked out, took out the arc reactor, cut off Kitty from her power source."

Tony turned his head, cupping his hand behind his ear. "I'm sorry, did you call the ghost 'Kitty'?"

"Catherine Sloupe," Maria said. "Kitty was her nickname. She had the ability to walk through walls, and we suspect the electrical fire that damaged the school and resulted in it shutting down was caused by her running straight into the electrical system and shorting everything."

"And I didn't discover this how?"

"Because she fixed up the damage she caused," Steve said. "When she wanted to, anyway."

Tony heaved a dramatic sigh. "And let me guess, she set the place on fire again when you took her on."

"Basically," Bucky said. "The place is trashed and without the arc reactor, there's no power. That's why we left for a hotel."

"And Bruce?"

"Hopefully has found the school and packed his own bag," Maria said. "I had to shoot him out into the woods somewhere. It wasn't a controlled Code Green, we couldn't get him to calm down."

Tony groaned, rubbing his face, then parted his hands to his ears, pulling back skin before he turned and looked up at Sharon. "And why are you wearing bandages around your throat?"

"Kitty tried to hang me with a live wire."

Tony's hands dropped and his arms lifted up into view in time for his head to rest on them. "Okay. Any other injuries? There has to be a nearby urgent care."

"Bucky's arm is toast," Steve said.

Tony looked up and squinted at Bucky. "What'd you do to it? That was a fine piece of machinery."

Bucky lifted his arm out of its sling and flopped his hand a couple times for demonstration. "Kitty decided she didn't like it and shorted it out. There's no damage to the surface, but the computers overloaded, I think."

Tony looked incredibly tired and twice his age as he stared at the dead hand, like that was possibly the last thing he needed. It probably was. "Okay." He took in a deep breath, then released it, going from 'why me?' to 'okay let's do this' as the air blew out. "Okay, so that's gonna require me getting there. I won't have the tools on hand to fix that if you stay at the hotel, but it's gonna take me a bit to get back to the Tower. Can you stay there a couple nights?"

"We have two nights paid for," Maria said.

"Good. As soon as you check out the day after tomorrow, head to the Tower. I'll be waiting. I'm going to take you guys out to New Mexico. I have better stuff to work with out there, and if I'm going to be digging into Bucky's arm, I'm going to need the good stuff."

"What about after that?" Steve asked. He sounded as desperate to stop hiding as Bucky felt. The girls probably were tired of it too, and Bruce, if he found civilization, was probably ready to just go back to the nice and predictable Tower for awhile.

"I don't know, Cap," Tony said. "Honestly, I don't. I have to find Bruce and I'm not even sure if I can fully restore Bucky's arm to its former functional levels. I'll have to take a look at it. If it involves getting in under the biomechtium, I could be in trouble." Then he pointed his finger at them. "And none of you heard me admit to that. I am a flawless engineer and mechanic, that arm will be my play toy by the time I'm done working on it, got it?"

"Please don't play with my arm," Bucky grumbled at him. "It's not a toy."

"I'll have it dancing like Pinocchio without strings," Tony said. "But enough of that. I assume you had to use cash to pay for the rooms since Junior was offline. She's back now, you should have access to that dummy account. Don't use cash unless you have to. I have JARVIS keeping track of where you go with that account. Not to sound like a creepy stalker, but right now, I want to know where you go and why. It was my decision to put you into hiding, I'm not going to abandon you to sink or swim in the wilds."

"You know," Steve said. "Normally I'd be protesting that much surveillance, but right now, I'm kinda glad for it. But Tony?"

"Yeah, Spangles?"

"After we all figure out where to go from here, you take the spy bugs off our shoulders, you got it?"

"Doable," Tony said. "I'm just being paranoid right now, humor me."

"I am," Steve said. "But just for the moment."

"Fair." Tony looked over the four of them. "You all look like you could stand showers and some quality time off your feet. Go on, I'll make sure everything's ready for you at the Tower. And I'll send in a crew to pack up whatever you had to leave at the school, if you want."

Bucky glanced at the others. "We got the important stuff, but yeah, we got more stuff back there that we'd like back. Like my tools, Steve's art stuff, our books. But the important stuff's out."

"Good." Tony waved his hands at them, shooing them off. "Go clean up and rest. Sharon, get to an urgent care clinic, get that burn looked at. Don't fret about insurance, just pay out of pocket. Use the account. Make up whatever you have to for an identity. You're a former spy, you should be good at that. I have to get back to Jerusalem, talk to Pepper."

"Is that why it's going to take you awhile to get back to New York?" Steve asked.

Tony looked reluctant to answer that. "It's going to change a few things in our current plans, yeah. I'll talk to Pepper, then see you guys back at the Tower. I mean it, leave at check out. Ithaca's not that far from NYC, I should see you before dinner."

"We'll be there," Maria assured him.

With a tired goodbye from all five parties present, the line disconnected. The wifi icon on the tablet showed no more internet. A quick attempt to reconnect failed. Damn. Tony might've had it blocked by Junior or JARVIS. Well fine, he'll just wait until they get to New York to check the news.

Really getting tired of the isolation. At least they had the TVs in the rooms, he could turn on a news channel and see what he missed. He'd even take Fox News by this point. Even with their bias, they had to be saying something about Israel.

Israel.

He glanced up at Steve. They should've been out there, not fighting pointlessly with each other at a haunted school that they ended up setting on fire. Bucky desperately wanted to be able to say to Tony when they met up that it was safe to take them out to the field.

Back to the tablet. Bucky sat forward, turning it off. "Okay, we have orders. Someone take Sharon to the nearest urgent care clinic, get her burn treated by a proper doctor."

"What about you?" Steve asked.

Bucky took a second to even figure out what Steve as talking about, then looked at his dead shoulder. "I'm probably already fine," he said, pulling the not-so-cold ice pack out from under his shirt. He set it down, then examined the area. "I think the only reason it's still red is the ice. It doesn't hurt." Then he peered up at Steve. "And what makes you think it'd be smart for me to go get a minor burn treated at the port of an artificial arm when we're trying to hide?"

Steve rubbed the back of his neck, frowning. "Yeah, you're right. I wasn't thinking, I guess."

Bucky bit down on the urge to snap at him; Steve hadn't really done anything wrong, not really. There may have been a negative reason in his head somewhere for whatever had him 'not thinking', but Steve had already made a big step that day, it was time to settle the reactive animosity down. There was still work to do, but 'anger' should no longer be the default.

"Why don't you take Sharon to get her burn looked at? I'm fine, you don't need to worry," he said instead.

"I could do it," Maria said.

"I know," Bucky said, not uncertain that she was trying to push for some time for he and Steve to talk like they needed. "But if we split up the genders, that means you and I can get our showers in while they're out, then they can shower when they get back, and there won't be conflict over the bathrooms."

Steve's eyebrows raised for a moment in a conceding facial shrug. "Not a bad idea," he said. He looked past Bucky at Sharon. "What do you think? Think you can handle my fussing?"

Poor Sharon.

"I've been putting up with your fussing for months now," she said, and a glance over Bucky's shoulder confirmed the smile he heard in her tone. She took a swallow of her drink before capping it and setting it down on the desk. "Just don't overdo it and I won't be forced to hit you."

Steve held up his hands. "Don't worry, I know better than to incur your wrath." He picked up the stack of card keys for the rooms. "Bucky, which one do we want?"

Once again, Bucky was forced to kick whatever was in his brain that bristled at Steve asking the decision of him. The Soldier had had far too much rein in the last couple weeks. It was time for him to shut his mouth, at least for the moment. This wasn't a life or death plan being worked out, fer fuck's sake.

"I'd say this one," he said. "Puts us between the girls and the rest of the hotel." He looked at Maria. "I know you two are perfectly capable," he said before she could even get started. "Which is why I want to trust our backs to you."

"Now you're just being paranoid," Maria said. "More than truly necessary."

"We said that about the school," Bucky argued. "And besides, how long have we been Avengers? Shit comes through windows all the time."

Maria looked like she was trying to find an argument for that logic that didn't involve 'you're being paranoid' when Sharon spoke up. "I would prefer the window side anyway," she said. "I'm a spy by design, I like having access to the outside window. I know this is all probably silly. Ithaca isn't known for much besides hippies and a big university, but we're still Avengers, and even in hiding, we attract trouble. If we didn't, we'd still be at the school. I think after everything with Kitty, we'd all be happier to be on guard until we get back to the Tower. We can relax there."

Bucky looked up at Steve. "Your girlfriend is a wise woman," he said.

"As true as that is, you're only saying that right now because she agreed with you," Steve said. Then he pulled out two keys from the stack he was holding, and set them down on the table. "There, one for our room, one for the girl's room for Maria. We'll take the other two and see you two later." He looked at Sharon. "Come on, let's get your throat looked at."

Sharon touched the bandages lightly. "I just hope they have a way of covering whatever they put on me so I can shower. I don't want a third application of this stuff."

"We'll ask," Steve said. "There might be something at a pharmacy we can get." He grabbed the keys to the BMW and held his arm out for hers.

She took his arm, smiling, and it was such a wonderful, normal scene, that it relaxed Bucky's tense shoulder muscles. At least something was still good, still the way it should be.

"Someone put our drinks in the fridge? And don't use all the hot water before I can get back, Maria," Sharon said on her way out the door.

Maria shook her head. "It's a hotel," she said to the closed door. "I don't know how she thinks one person can drain an entire hotel's hot water supply."

"She's trying to keep things normal," Bucky said, desperately wishing he could get response from his left arm, if only to tap his finger. The absence of response was unnerving, moving into outright disturbing territory. He was used to not having physical surface sensations, but trying to tell a muscle to do something and nothing happening tied his stomach into knots.

Maria traded her bottle of juice for Sharon's soda on the desk next to Bucky, then grabbed Steve's untouched Coke bottle. "She is. Trying a bit too hard, but she was hung by an electrical wire, I suppose I can't fault her." She held up the bottles of soda. "I can't fault her for leaving me to put away her soda, but Steve has no excuse."

Bucky grinned, an almost laugh making a faint sound, but not quite to even qualify as a proper chuckle. "I think he has good reason," he said, getting up. "We all do." He motioned to the piles of bags. "Want me to get Sharon's bag and take it over for you? I'll even take the soda."

Maria looked at him, then set Steve's Coke back down. "I can handle her soda, I have two hands and right now, you don't. I'll get my bags. And Sharon's bag with her uniform and weapons." She looked at the pile of luggage. "It's amazing how much stuff four people can accumulate and still keep down to two bags each."

"And just remember," he said, stepping over next to her. "There's more back at the school."

She made a noise of disgusted fatigue. "I'm not packing it. Tony can get professionals. I don't have anything of worth over there anymore. All my books can be replaced, same with the movies."

"My tools and my Dresden books, but only because the books were from Peter, and those tools were a custom set," Bucky said. "I think Sharon and Steve would like their Wii U stuff so they don't lose their save file. And Steve's paints and such. But really, even those are replaceable. They can start a new file."

Maria pursed her lips like she was trying to hide how much she wanted to smile. "She could find new ways to make him die in those earlier levels."

"She would, you know she would," Bucky said.

"And love every second of it," Maria agreed, shaking her head and smiling in affectionate exasperation. "We have a weird family, Bucky."

Bucky looked back at the bags. "Yeah, but they're our family. But come on, let's get this stuff taken care of so we can shower." He turned his head slightly, mostly looking at her out of the corner of his eye. "If we have time-"

"Do we have time?"

He scowled. "For once, I wasn't about to get flirty. I was about to ask if you wanted to finish going through those files."

That actually made her turn her head to look at him, her expression changing from sultry to somber, and wait, had that actually been an offer? "The Winter Soldier files?" When he nodded, she looked away, back towards the bed, quiet in thought, then back to him. "Are you sure about that?"

Deciding to answer before testing that offer again, he shrugged. "I can't guarantee things are suddenly okay with Steve, that we may not need your help that requires you knowing what's in there." He blew some hair out of his face. "Besides, like I said, there's some stuff that might help you understand me and my quirks." The hair fell back in his face and he reached up to pull it back in annoyance. "And it might help you work with me better on the field, if you see how I got to where I am. And goddamnit, after Steve is done with his shower, he is cutting my fucking hair."

Smiling, she reached up and tucked the offending bit of hair behind his ear. "Decided to trust him to do that? I could do that instead of looking at those files."

Bucky considered that offer. On one hand, it kept him from having to pull out those files. On the other, it would feel awkward with anyone but Steve with scissors around his neck like that. Steve had his back at the school, surely he could not be a prick with the scissors. He never would've been, to be honest; that mistrust had been unwarranted and came from a place of anger, not any sense of reality.

It was time to try to reestablish that trust.

So he shook his head and answered with a quiet "no." Then he gave her teasing grin. "Know why? Because you wouldn't do it right."

She elbowed him. "I can do a lot of things right." He wasn't going to deny that. Then that expression came back "Come on, there's showering to do."

"Yeah. Shower." He wanted one badly, and he was really ready to take her up on that offer. Fun aside, his busted arm would slow him down and take away valuable time with Maria. Even if that offer really was only for help in the shower, there was no way he was turning that down.

As if reading his thoughts, she put her hand on his dead one. "We have enough time," she said, voice made of silk. "I could help you shower. Make up for your arm not working. Unless you'd rather look through those files that are going to be there after we're done anyway."

He looked at her, returning that flirting with a false protest. "I thought something was said about privacy issues earlier."

She smiled, kissing his flesh arm that she captured in her arms. "We have enough time for a shower," she said. "We could even play good and not let it last long. You're going to take a longer time than I will otherwise."

His thoughts exactly. "Not going to shave your legs?" He still was going to make her work for it. That was half the fun.

"Don't need to," she said. "I showered this morning before going down to breakfast."

"Then you don't need a shower now."

"No, but you do." She ran her hand across his chest, under the sling. "Are you turning it down?"

"No," he answered before his brain tried to remind him of the whole 'Steve and Sharon will be back' thing. They wouldn't be back that fast. There was time to ravish Maria in the shower and get a good back scrub for his trouble. "I'm just surprised it was offered."

"Bucky, we were both in a life and death situation not that long ago. If you don't let me get us off in the shower while we have a chance, I'm going to hit you."

"Right, unpacking later, sex in the shower now. I see no problem with this plan."

Maria left contact with him long enough to grab his and her regular bags, leaving the uniform bags behind, then grabbed his shirt collar and pulled him to her, capturing his lips hard enough that he thought she might bite.

He wouldn't protest.

Clothing was stripped and tossed around the bathroom once the door was shut. She pushed him back against it, pressing tightly against him, leaving frantic nips and bites along his jaw, before they stumbled back towards the shower. They managed to get into the tub without killing each other.

She made a point of pausing and using her tongue to tease him while she crouched down to turn on the water, left on too hot to normally be comfortable, but after her tongue and the way she raked her nails over his hips, he didn't notice the water temperature.

He hauled her up to her feet and pressed her back against the shower wall, kissing her to steal her breath, matching heartbeat for heartbeat. Shower sex could be one of the best kinds, and the fact that Steve and Sharon might get back sooner than they thought and there'd be no secret that Maria had been in there with him heightened the arousal. It just meant he didn't have time to play, that the urgency between them demanded satisfaction then and now.

Around them, the room steamed over.