barton (awcoffee) wrote in soulboundic, @ 2020-02-18 14:42:00 |
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Entry tags: | !log / thread, -player: mena, -player: squid, bucky barnes / the winter soldier (mcu), clint barton / hawkeye (616) |
WHO: Clint Barton & Bucky Barnes
WHERE: Crackers
WHEN: January
WHAT: A random run in between multiverses
WARNINGS/SPOILERS: some for Secret Empire.
STATUS: Complete
Of all the people to run into, Bucky was probably top of the ‘do not want’ list.
Okay, not true. Clint could probably think of worse people. Fury, Osborne, Venom, Daken, Jessica, Bobbi (maybe, depending on if he bugged her that week), Barney. So, okay. Barnes wasn’t the worst person to meet in this weird not-dead place but he still wasn’t Clint’s favourite person in the world -how could he be?- even if he was a lot less sad greasy assassin robot right now.
This whole alternate world thing was hurting his head. At least Wanda’s soul-son and the changeling kid (and yes, he did know their names, even if he apparently joined some team with Kate’s little friends and went all West Coast Avengers 2.0 with them, but that was not the point) knew what was what and who was who. Clint was still getting around the whole HYDRA in Shield he’d read about and half of the Avengers being dead (overstatement, perhaps, and sure Nat and Tony had both died before in his lifetime, but it seemed a bit more permanent for the other versions).
Now he was tossing in not-his-Natasha and not-her-Barnes and he was scowling more than he needed to and blaming it on his sandwich not having the right amount of cheese. God, 2020 sucked already.
“Has anything ever spontaneously combusted under your gaze just to stop being glared at?”
“Once or twice,” Bucky deadpanned in response before glancing up and arching his eyebrow. He hadn’t actually been meaning to glare at his sandwich. Fuck, he never used to have a resting angry face. He used to have a relatively neutral - if not approachable - resting face. Just one more thing to thank the Russians for, he supposed.
He wasn’t sure that he officially knew the guy approaching him but he had seen him on the network; he recognised him though. Clint Barton. Not the Clint Barton that had worked with them, obviously, but a version of the man from an alternative reality.
Ugh.
He wondered what Clint’s reality version of himself had done to warrant such a greeting. “Not recently though.”
He tipped his head. “You need a seat?” he asked, waving his hand. “That one’s going spare and I don’t mind the company.”
Don’t mind company. Bucky Barnes, not minding company. That was new.
Clint gave a shrug, taking the seat and glancing at Barnes’ sandwich. “So, did it offend you or something?” Clint was sort of used to Barnes and his silences, the glares and sighs. But then Clint got that from most of the people he knew from one point or another.
He had his own sandwich and his coffee, it was enough to hold his attention for five minutes at least.
“I wasn’t actually glaring at anything,” Bucky said, reaching out for his coffee and lifting it to his lips. “I was thinking, but I get that nowadays my ‘thinking’ face is pretty damn close to my ‘murder’ face.” His lips twisted in dry self deprecation and he placed the cup down again.
He watched Clint take a seat before he asked, because he felt that it was appropriate, “I’m guessing you know me from where you come from. How bad is it?” Did he want to know? Probably not. Would Steve be mad at him for asking the question? Probably. Was it too late? Definitely.
“It’s probably weird that your murder face and thinking face are the same, dude.” Then again, Clint had resting dumb face, but he worked on that personally in a bid to make people underestimate him. It was just that it worked a little too well on everyone sometimes.
One of Clint’s shoulders raised in a weird half shrug that he did, “Probably the usual. Captain America’s sidekick, got captured, saved, lost in the fray and presumed dead. I dunno if you were with the Red Room or just loaned out to them, but the whole Winter Soldier thing was pretty prolific.” If he were being honest, he zoned out a lot when Bucky or whoever was talking about his past, because it was deeply depressing and involved a lot of death and Clint couldn’t really figure out if he should feel sorry for the guy or not.
“You’re an Avenger now, in my world,” another shrug while Clint ate some of his food, “still got that arm too. Probably kinda similar I guess. Maybe.” Hard to tell, given everything. “At least I think so, hard to remember. I’m not at the moment at least.”
Because everyone needed a break and he was dealing with SHIELD again. God, why.
“Man,” Bucky started, “I can’t believe I’m going down in history in two realities as the sidekick.” He wasn’t too mad, not really, and that probably showed in the slight smile on his face. The main stinger for him had been that he wasn’t needed any more: Steve had gone and become a superhuman and there wasn’t a place for Bucky, or so it had felt. As always, Steve had proved him wrong.
Still. Those feelings were hard to shake and though the reckless idiot had put everything on the line for someone he didn’t even know anymore (and who barely knew him for the longest time), there were too many reminders that Steve had moved on without him.
“Nice to know there’s hope for some version of me out there,” he added with a little grin. “I have no idea where I was headed before I came here. We were all just recovering from taking down Thanos. Mourning the lost. Not really sure the Avengers are even a team anymore, with Stark dead and Steve being a literal octogenarian.”
If Clint hadn’t been aware that their timeline was fucked up, he’d probably have choked on his coffee, which really, rude Bucky. But instead, he just waved his hand a little. “You or Sam will probably head things like you did before. Man, first time Steve ‘retired’, and Clint put those in little air quotes, “you went full homage. Didn’t like being called ‘Bucky Cap’ either.” Which was dumb, because it was a good name.
“Second time, well, I think you were off doing weird covert stuff or whatever, so Sam was all Captain Falcon and shit.” They had a habit of just giving their shit to each other - or in his case Cap giving his shit to a teenage girl, which again, what the actual fuck Steve?
“But I’m guessing my world is a little more loosey goosey than yours. Sounds like we’re a little less morbid and down on shit too.” Especially if people constantly looked like they were plotting death.
“Yeah, Steve gave his shield to Wilson so now we’ll have Captain Falcon. Or Falcon America. Whatever he’s gonna be- wait-” Bucky lifted his hand, one finger raised as though something had just dawned on him. “Wait, the version of me in your world went full Cap homage?”
He laughed, “Tell me that he didn’t dress up like Steve and at least kept something original.” He paused, adding a second later, “And I am still older than Steve, right?” Even if technically it was anyone’s guess as to which of them was physically older now considering their time on and off the ice.
“Um,” there was a lot to go through there, honestly. “Actually I think Steve was technically a couple years older than you? And then the serum did weird ass shit to him. But I think since he was frozen for a long stretch and you were in and out of the freezer like ice cream at a single dudes place, you’ve lived more years?” God, it was hard to keep track of this shit. “You’ve both also been dead and fake dead for periods of time.”
Hard to fucking keep up.
“But yes, full homage. The little wings on the cowl and everything. You didn’t have as much patriotism I think, more black and less flag but…” The point was to pretend that Captain America had never gone. “I mean I guess you looked better in it, but I’m going by Natasha’s opinion so.” Clint just shrugged.
“Sounds about as complicated as mine and Steve’s time on the ice,” Bucky answered dryly, picking his sandwich apart into smaller pieces that he then ate. He couldn’t shake the feeling that he made the guy very uncomfortable but didn’t want to ask too much in case he heard something he really didn’t want to.
His eyebrow arched. “Why would the Natasha in your world have an opinion on-” He cut himself off, thinking about the comment Clint had made about the Red Room and relatively quickly drew a conclusion and he lifted his hand, “Never mind. Your world sounds like a riot.”
“I don’t think there’s a life either of you would live that wasn’t complicated.” Who wanted a quiet life after all? And if Steve was the same in all the universes well, that was going to be a handful all by itself. He’d heard a lot of stories.
Clint was noticing that Bucky frowned about as much as he glared, and cut himself off. “Well, y’know, most of my besties are females. And I’m around a lot for the discussions of tight suits and the like.” Which wasn’t entirely wrong. He’d gotten into a heated discussion with Jessica Jones regarding Wolverine and Spiderman’s butts and that had been super enlightening. Especially when Logan reminded them the next day about his hearing.
“I’m pretty sure Natasha keeps a tally on whose butt is objectified the most.” She might, he’s just saying. Natasha had a dark streak that was decidedly childish.
Bucky snorted. He didn’t know the Natasha in his world very well, but her dry sense of humour was almost legendary and Steve was very fond of her. He nodded, hardly surprised if that was the case from what little he knew. Her death had hit Steve hard, as had Tony’s.
“I’d be surprised if it wasn’t Steve.” He chuckled and finished his coffee, and then what was left of his sandwich. “Considering.”
He glanced at his watch and then leaned back in his chair. “Still, we’re all here now and it looks like people who are dead aren’t staying dead.” Which, in many ways, was a relief. He knew Steve was happy, at least.
"Usually was," Clint agreed. Sometimes there was nothing but good old American Ass right there. "I think sometimes Nat just got caught up in Thor's Ass-gardian rear. Every now and then we'd team up with the X-Men, and there's some asses there." And Clint wasn't meaning aesthetically pleasing ones. God, they were full of dipshits, no wonder Wolverine hung out with them more. "When we lived at Stark's place it was a constant gossip fest." Finishing off his sandwich thoughtfully, he kind of missed when shit was easy going for them, before the shit ended up dogging them all down.
Invasions and death and splits and battles between the teams. Psychotic breaks, world ending events, resurrections. Just... Chaos.
"I mean... That's semi-normal for me." Clint shrugged, he'd been killed twice, he wasn't sure if Emma's fiery inferno counted as a death if he were honest. "Probably says something being kinda used to it all." But Clint wasn't really looking to see what that meant.
Bucky opened his mouth to ask about the ‘X-Men’ but then thought better of it, in all honesty, because that seemed like a conversation for another day. He’d never lived at Avengers tower, for the brief time that Steve and the others had stayed there before everything fell apart, and he wasn’t sure that he would have wanted to anyway: he preferred his own space and privacy. Sharing a suite here with someone he didn’t know was difficult enough.
“Death isn’t permanent where you come from?” Bucky let out a humourless chuckle. “Wow, I’m not sure if that’s a good thing or not.” Especially if it meant people were so blase about death.
“Sort of but not really? It’s hard to explain really.” It seemed different for different people, but in a way… “Most of the time there’s a get-out-of-death clause, or there’s fake death or something or other. Personally speaking? Wanda altered reality and I died fighting Skrulls, then Wanda altered reality again and I was alive. Then Wanda killed me when we confronted her about altering reality. Then Wanda altered reality and I was alive.” To anyone else, they’d probably think he hated Wanda.
He should probably get a shrink some time to talk over why he didn’t.
“Steve faked his death, you faked your death, Vision died, but then he got a new body. Tony died and then just wasn’t dead. Loki died, but then magic and then he was good, and then magic and he was bad. Steve killed Nat, but then she got a new body and her consciousness downloaded and…” And Clint killed Bruce… but so far he was … well he was dead.
Clint trailed off with a sigh, finishing his coffee. “It’s just a complicated mess of mind fuckery and we never really take anyone for actually being dead anymore. Trust issues man, through the ass.”
Bucky tried to picture the Wanda he knew killing people, or altering reality for that matter, neither image stuck particularly well. He knew she was capable of it, of course, but not in the sort of cavalier way that Clint described. Whether it was actually cavalier or not was another matter entirely, but the laid back way Clint talked about death was discomforting.
He cleared his throat. “That’s messed up, even by my standards.”
“Oh, so messed up.”
Clint was aware he was a wreck. The only thing holding him together most days was the sheer determination to not being a useless piece of shit on the floor. He ran around with Gods and monsters, he couldn’t be the weak link.
“Luckily I’m in excellent company. We’re all a bunch of messed up idiots.”
Bucky snorted. “Sounds like it,” he said with a nod. “At least you’re in good company.” His shoulder lifted. “Pretty sure most of the people here are idiots too.”
He glanced at the time and sighed, “Speaking of, I’m pretty sure I’m meant to be running a training session in ten minutes.” He rubbed his hand across the back of his neck. “Better head off, doesn’t look good if the trainer’s late, right?”
Offering Clint a half smile, Bucky got to his feet. “See you later, Barton.”
Clint would’ve told Bucky that he was definitely part of that ‘idiot’ group, but given that this Bucky seemed a little different from his, he held off just now. Let the dark and mysterious Winter Soldier hold on to the pretence a little longer.
“I guess, I couldn’t say. I show up ten minutes late for everything.” Which wasn’t even an exaggeration in the slightest. Clint should be more concerned about that than he was, but still.
With a mock salute, a very sloppy one at that, Clint sat back a little, “Later Barnes.” At least he wasn’t insufferable.