Chapter Text
Somehow Bucky didn’t think it was a good thing that the absence of gunfire should keep him more on edge than the constant rain of bullets that always accompanied battle, the whistle and sing of vibranium through the air almost a damn lullaby at this point. He’d never wanted to go to war. It struck him now, as it had a dozen times before, how much of a damn shame it was that he was so good at it. Was he grateful that he was able to protect Steve’s dumb ass instead of waiting at home and leaving his best friend’s life in other hands? Hell yes. Did he like doing it? Nah, no way. You didn't always have to enjoy something just because you were good at it. Bucky hoisted the rifle between his hands and shrugged away his thoughts with a quick shake of the head. Getting lost in the clouds right now wasn’t the best idea. He needed to be sharp.
Hanging around Steve meant he always needed to be sharp, although he would freely admit he’d much preferred the days of pulling that scrawny ass out of alley fights over these days of following him around trying to take down HYDRA. Nazis had already been bad enough before things got weird.
“Anyone else think it’s creepier when these places are quiet?” Dugan asked from somewhere behind him and Bucky felt his mouth twist up in an easy grin.
“You pick up mind-reading skills in that last base, Dum Dum?” he called. “I was just thinking the same thing.”
“I told you all to quit calling me that.”
Some of the other boys laughed and Bucky shook his head, padding steadily along at Steve’s six o’clock. He would have felt a lot better if this were a planned raid; he really hated going in to these things blind. Even with the smallest scrap of information Steve had a way of putting together some crazy plan that almost always worked but they had nothing this time. Nothing but an innocuous looking building sat out here in the middle of the forest, all gray brick with snow on the windowsills and a brazen HYDRA logo stamped across the front door. Probably the creepiest part about the place was how they had literally just stumbled across it.
“No traps,” Jones murmured. “Anyone else notice there’s no traps?”
“Yeah, no sentries either,” Steve agreed.
“I got a bad feeling,” Bucky said. Then rolled his eyes when Dugan’s fist came up to jab him lightly in the shoulder.
“That might have been lunch. This is why we don’t let Falsworth do the cooking.”
All of them fell silent immediately at Steve’s signal. Bucky watched carefully as his friend made a few silent hand motions and then he was moving to follow orders with the rest of them, spreading out to make a circle around the building. Nearly an hour went by with all manner of silent messages passed around the perimeter before finally they all agreed that lying out here in the snow wasn’t going to accomplish much. Nothing was happening. If they wanted to know what was inside that building they were going to have to get in to it themselves.
Thoughts of stealth and infiltration were all thrown out the window, however, after Morita wriggled his way up to peer in through one of the windows only to straighten up and wave for them in plain sight, calling out, “The place is goddamn empty!”
One kick to the front door from Steve’s boot and Bucky saw that his teammate was right. The place was goddamn empty. A few crates were jammed together close to one wall and another corner had a pile of something covered with drab army tarps but other than that the building seemed to be nothing more than an empty shell, two stories high at the least but no second floor to break it up. It seemed like a waste of space to him. Or maybe a warning of some kind. No one built this much open space unless they needed to store something in it and just the thought of a weapon this big made something churn in Bucky’s stomach. He really was looking forward to the day when he could go home to Brooklyn and his life could stop being so stinking weird.
“You guys, uh, think the air is supposed to do that?” Morita’s voice asked, a little shaken. The rest of them turned to see what he was talking about and Bucky felt his jaw fall open. No. The air was definitely not supposed to be doing that. Yellow sparks were spraying out of absolutely nothing, slowly growing until they formed a ball that hung in the air with nothing to support it.
“Get down!” Steve’s voice snapped out, already pulling Dernier along as he moved. “Take cover, we don’t know what that’s going to do!”
The entire team dove behind what little cover was available between crates and the mess of tarps. It took a couple of kicks to make room but they were all able to hide themselves away just in time for the sparking ball to expand in to a massive hole. Bucky had only just scraped his jaw off the ground and here it was falling open again because that- that was definitely not the other side of the room he was seeing through the hole. That was a whole other place. Like he was looking through a window only to see a different world outside. Considering that, he was almost unsurprised when a monster came rushing through.
Massive and gray and very clearly angry, the beast ran with jerky movements on six unnatural legs, stumbling through the strange golden window only to crash straight through the brick wall of the building like it was made of nothing but paper. And then it was gone, galloping off in to the world. Bucky heard Dugan swearing under his breath and really he couldn’t help but agree.
There wasn’t time to question whether or not this might all be a really strange dream before two thankfully human shaped figures came leaping through the opening as well, one of them rushing over to peer out through the hole in the wall while the other hung back to stare back through the window. Bucky almost swallowed his own tongue when the second man spoke. He knew that voice. He’d just never heard it outside of, well, his own mouth.
“You know, this was my day off.”
“I- I- I don’t know where I sent it!” another voice answered. A young girl in strange robes appeared in the golden window, one hand outstretched with thick rings on her two raised fingers. She looked faintly panicked. “This is- Master Strange said-”
“Leave it,” the man by the outer wall turned back as he spoke and Bucky got a good look at his face. Skin as dark as Jones’, probably a little taller, he waved a hand through the air like he could push the young girl’s stumbling apologies away from himself. “Figure out where we are, come back for us. Just give us time to clean this shit up first.”
“Y-yes!”
“And I mean that! You better come back for us!”
The man standing by the window snorted. “Or he’ll have Carlos cut you up and feed you to the fish.”
One quick, terrified nod and the girl made a circular motion in the air with the hand not outstretched. The window wavered and then collapsed in on itself as though it had never been there in the first place, leaving the two strange men to wander towards each other with thoughtful looks on their faces.
“I feel like I know this place,” one murmured. The other lifted both eyebrows.
“Well shit. That’s never good.”
“No, not really.”
Humming, the one with dark skin lifted his wrist to show a strange bracer covering the better portion of one arm. “Should I have a look around? That thing moves fast but things could get real dangerous rushing off after it if we don’t know where we are.”
“I told you I- ah shit.” Not-dark-skin-voice-too-familiar kicked at a loose piece of debris by his feet. “Don’t bother. I know exactly where we are. What we really need to worry about is when.”
“Hey. Heat signatures.” The second man lifted both eyebrows in a significant expression and tilted his head ever so slightly. Right, Bucky noted, in the direction where most of them were hiding.
Before he could panic or even so much as look to their leader for instruction the first man was putting both hands in his hips, weight dropping on to one leg, and scrunching his face in to a grimace. “Is there seven of them? Great. I was afraid of that. Yeah, no, we’re fine. It’s just the Howlies.”
“The-?”
“Getting real tired of jumping around the decades like this.” Raising his voice, he called, “Come on out, Steve. I know you’re all there.”
Several beats passed in silence before Steve Rogers very slowly stood up and stepped around the crates, every movement precise in the way that said he was trying to work through the same shock they all were. It seemed like Bucky wasn’t the only one who thought that voice was just a little too familiar.
“Who are you?” Steve demanded.
The man gave him an exasperated look. “Who do I fucking look like?”
“Doesn’t much matter who you look like, I asked who you are.”
“And I asked you to bring ‘em all out. Come on, Steve, I know you’ve got the whole unit here. Howling Commandos, report for duty. Come on. Front and center. Even you, Dernier, don’t be falling asleep on the job again.”
“Well holy shit,” the dark skinned man murmured as their whole team slowly broke cover. Delight gradually filled up his expression with each new face that came in to view. “Is it my birthday?”
Bucky wasn’t sure what that was supposed to mean but he didn’t have a whole lot of brain power to spare for wondering. Now that he was standing and walking a bit closer he could see that it wasn’t just the voice that was familiar. He nearly fumbled his steps when the other man turned to look at him and he saw his own blue eyes staring back, less confused and more resigned but definitely his. And here he’d been thinking lately that he’d gotten some sort of handle on exactly what kind of weird the world was full of.
He should really have known better than that. Obviously thinking he knew shit was just asking to be proved wrong.
The Howling Commandos stopped in a firm line, weapons raised but to a man too stunned to do anything with them. Bucky could feel several of them glancing rapidly back and forth between him and the carbon copy of himself standing a couple dozen feet away. Not that he could blame them. This was some next level shit. God, they just didn’t pay him enough for this. He was grateful for the solidity of Steve for perhaps the hundredth time when his friend lifted a stubborn chin at the pair of strange men.
“Alright then. Now how about-” he got no further than that. Suddenly the dark skinned man was howling with laughter.
“Oh for shit’s sake.” Bucky’s lookalike rolled his eyes.
“Is that who I think it is? This must be my birthday come early! Oh my god. Oh sweet lord above. It’s-”
“Don’t!”
“It’s a bitty Barnes! Ahh! Yes! Go on over there and lemme take your picture with him you sour faced old man! Ha!” Bending over, the man slapped his knee and then leaned on it as if to support the weight of his own laughter. “Bitty Barnes!” he crowed again as if that should mean something.
Clearly it did to his partner, who shot him a dirty look. “I’ll kill you.”
“You won’t! Oh this is too good!”
“Shut up, Sam!”
“He’s so cute! You were so cute! We didn’t fall through space, we fell through time , and that’s- ah ha ha! Look at you! All confused and shit! This is the best day of my life!”
Bucky’s lookalike seemed to struggle for a moment with the decision of whether or not to murder the man beside him. Eventually he seemed to decide against it, looking away to offer Steve a look that said ‘can you believe this shit?’. The motion of it was so natural that Bucky couldn’t help remembering all the times he’d given his friend that exact same look and he knew in his bones somehow that the expression was dead on. Steve obviously thought so too by the recoil of confusion on his features.
“One of you fellas want to explain just what the hell is going on here?” he asked.
“What he said. I, uh, I am Bucky. Same Bucky as that one, just...I’m in the wrong time.”
“And isn’t that just the most ironic sentence you’ve ever said in your life.” The other man shook his head with a little chuckle as he straightened back up.
Fingers tightening on his weapon, Bucky finally spoke up for himself. “Prove it.” He waited until those blue eyes met his again to repeat, “Prove you’re me. What’s something only I would know?”
There weren't a lot of things that he would know but Steve wouldn't so it was a difficult question. He expected the chagrin that met his request but not the flush of embarrassment, the way he watched his own head falling back as if in preparation for the fallout about to come. When the man’s head rolled up again he looked almost pained but the words came out in forcibly even tones.
“When you were twenty two Bonnie Foster asked you to wear her silk panties to the pictures for her. And you did.”
That set the man at his side off again but the peels of laughter filling the room were like distant echoes in Bucky’s ringing ears. Not even Bonnie herself knew that he’d actually done it, swiped her panties while she was off powdering her nose, more curious than excited. The next few hours had been the most uncomfortable of his entire life, so uncomfortable that he’d skipped out on the rather blatant invitation to come inside for more ‘coffee’ after he walked her home. He’d burned the panties. Then never ever spoken to anyone about what embarrassments his own curiosity could lead to.
Now Steve was blinking at him very slowly with that good old all American blush rising up and he could hear some of the Howlies letting off reluctant little sniggers. God above but he regretted asking no matter that the answer had been about as effective as he could hope for. That was definitely him standing in front of...him.
“Yeah,” he managed to choke out. “That’s me.”
“Glad we established that,” his counterpart growled.
“So…”
“I don’t- Sam would you shut up? We’ve got a bogey to find. It’s my day off, we’re chasing an alien, and I’m staring at my own stupid ugly mug. Less laughing, more tracking!”
The one who was apparently named Sam finally managed to stand up again only to wipe away actual tears of mirth from both of his eyes. A few more hiccuping breaths hitched his breathing and the grin stayed well in place even as he fiddled with the strange cuff on his arm. “Calm your tits, I’m tracking, I’m tracking. Oh my god. If this is all just a dream I am gonna be so disappointed.”
“So good to know you dream about me,” Older Bucky said in a flat deadpan.
Bucky himself was reeling just a little too hard to try and contribute anything more. His eyes roved up and down his apparent future self, wondering at all the differences, weighing them against all the things that were exactly the same. Hair a bit shorter, though only just; must have just recently gotten it cut. Instead of the army fatigues Bucky had spent the last couple years wearing, this version of himself was decked out in strangely tight fitting pants and a well made leather jacket, both in solid black. The jacket had all sorts of extra details that looked like they could either be aesthetic or reinforcing but it was hard to tell. Same day old stubble on the same jawline, same blue in his eyes, same bitchy expression as he grumbled something under his breath, gaze on the ceiling in an age old prayer for patience.
It was in the way he held himself that really made a difference. Bucky almost felt the need to straighten his own spine just looking at himself so rigid, like a coiled spring or a beast waiting for the moment to strike. How much training, he wondered, was it going to take before he got to that state of constant battle-readiness? There was something about the eyes too. Something bitter in the corners of his mouth, something hollow in his voice. He couldn’t be anything more than a couple of years older but the sum of all his different parts made him seem like an entirely different man. Colder, older, distant. Bucky wanted to shudder and couldn’t say why.
“Any chance you can slow down and explain this a little better?” Steve asked. He was using his Captain America voice. Probably an unconscious reaction to feeling so out of his depth, not that Bucky could blame his friend. The rest of the Commandos finished their snickering and perked up, ready to listen in, but this strange Future Bucky looked nothing short of tired by the question.
“Oh my god, Steve, you’re faster than this. Catch up! We’re from the future. We fell through time. We’re chasing a big ugly monster that probably wants to eat people. Isn’t that really all you need?” With a roll of his eyes he turned to his partner. “Got anything?”
Sam looked up from his arm with pursed lips, all traces of amusement gone. “You’re not gonna like this.”
“It’s gone isn’t it?”
“Hey I can still follow it!”
“But it’s gone. Follow means locate which means it’s gone . Shit. I really don’t want to hang around here any longer than I have to. Really brings it all in to too much focus, you know?”
“Yeah, I know.”
They shared a look that for some reason heated the back of Bucky’s neck. Not even Steve had ever looked at him like that, soft and steady like the two men could see right in to each other’s souls. He peeked to the left and right but no one else seemed to think there was anything more than simple understanding in that look so maybe he was just reading too much in to things.
Sue him, this Sam guy was really pretty, gap toothed smile and cheekbones that didn’t quit. Bucky knew how to keep his mouth shut about certain things but damn it he did still have eyes and he was not prepared for the rush of jealousy that his other self was the one who got to stand on the other end of that intense gaze.
Clearly the future had some very high points waiting for him.
Listening as Steve bull-headed his way in to the world’s strangest staring contest and demanded more answers, Bucky swallowed against the dryness in his throat and cursed the day he’d been honest to his drafting officers. Maybe if he’d pretended some kind of illness he wouldn’t be standing out here in the middle of Germany with a gun that his hands knew only too well and a reflection of himself across the room that he didn’t know at all. Watching Steve declare in no uncertain terms that wherever this future Bucky was going he and the Commandos were going too, he wondered if maybe he could have stopped his best friend from going to war. If the two of them could have stayed behind and lived their lives in blissful ignorance of HYDRA or super soldiers or any of that shit.
And watching something quietly break in the eyes of his future self, letting Steve lecture him like he was listening to an old favorite record, Bucky wondered if maybe he’d still have these same damn thoughts even years from now.